The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1880-05-12

And all is peace within.
-HIV. LonUello,o, in Youths Companion
The PHILOSOPHERS BABY.
I had been considering for about s
year whether I should marry Winifred
Hanway, when I heard that she was en-
gagged to the philosopher. Why did she
accept him? 1t is true that he is both
imaginative and critical, but faculties
exercised in the formation of psyche
logical hypothesis, and the laborious de-
struction of those of ones neighbor dc
not usually rouse the sympathy of a
bright and beautiful girl, who is more
fit to love than to think about life. He
is certainly handsome, but as certainly
his clothes are barbarous. His trousers
can't keep their shape for day, and his
hats are never new. If he notices the
rain, he opens an umbrella which might
have served Us an Intellectual protection
Mt the time of the deluge; if he finds out
that it is cold, he assumes a garment
which might have been the everyday
coat of Methuselak. His manners are as
strange as his appearance. He may often
be seen walking in the park at the fash
iorable hour with far-off look in his
eyes, and his hat thrust back as if to
lessen the external pressure on his &C.
tive brain; more rarely you may hear
him bursting into enthusiasm in Picca-
dilly, although Piccadilly is the last
place in which man should allow
himself to be enthusiastic. In short,
though be is true friend, he is an un-
comfortable acquaintance; and his VOL
canic utterances, after long periods OF
calm contemplation, cause such shocks
to ones nerves as would be conveyed to
the Sunday citizen by the eruption of
Primrose hill. But if it was odd that
the beautiful Winifred Hanway should
marry my friend, it was yet more odd
that he should marry anyone. There
were no topics more certain to excite an
explosion in the philosopher than the
excessive population of the country, and
the wholesome solitude of the thinker.
How" he would tiercely ask, "can a
man think cffectually on fundamental
subjects. who is compelled by the des-
picable circumstances of life to exhaust
his analytical faculty in considering how
to pay his butcher and when to buy his
Goals? [ tell you, sir, it's better to
starve with cold and hunger than to de.
base ones noblest part to q game Of
skill with a grasping grocer" Again
and again had heard him declaim in
this preposterous fashion; and after all,
hewas going to the altar ike any other
victim, and would doubtless take
house upon his back with the docility
OF ; snail.
l could not solve the problem; /
would not give it up. So, full of the
determination to drag Diogenes out OF
his tub, and the secret out of Diogenes,
stepped round the corner to offer my
congratulations My friend was in his
study apparently writing, really eating
a quill pen. He rose at me with rush,
wrung my hand till it ached, and
hlushed rather uncomfortably. Con-
gratulations are the curse of the Briton.
Whether he is Offering them or receiv-
ing them, he is generally obliged to take
refuge in intermittent handshaking, and
most of his sentences tail off into grunts
nd groans. But on this occasion it was
evident that the philosopher had some
thing ready to say, and was nervously
anxious to say it. Indeed. had hardly
said more than "My dear fellow, don't
know when -" ! really am SO
awfully glad. I it's in every
way so, such satisfactory. you know
l really do wish all possible,
and all that sort of thing, you know"
when he burst in with speech so flu
entity delivered, that I knew 1 was
not his earliest visitor that morning.
"Of course it's taken you by SURPRISE"
be said. las I knew it would;
but the truth is, that have
been thinking of it fo: - long time, and
] am sure am right" Here I tried to
get in an impression of wonder at his
new notion of duty, but he was bent on
being rid of the matter, and hurried on
to his reasons. In the first place."
said he, Il am sure that, instead of in
cIeasing my domestic worries, my mar
riage will transfer them in a body to
my wife; and. secondly, when con-
slider the vast number of fools who are
born in, the world, I am terrified by
the picture of what the next generation
will be, if the thinkers of this are to be
without successors" Having dis
charged his reasons in this wise. the
orator stood blinking at me as if he
feared dissent, but was too astounded
by his magnificent audacity to reply.
Slowly look of peace stole back into
his face, a pleasant light dawned in his
G., es, and the promises of smile played
at the corner of his mouth. His re-
markable huency was gone, and indeed
his voice sounded quite choky when he
said: johnny, you don't know what
IN angel she is.'' A light broke in upon
me. Philosopher" ! said l be-
lieve you are going to be married be-
cause you fell in loYe?" Perhaps you
are right" said the philosopher.
After the wedding, the philosopher
and his wife went abroad for an inde6n.
ite period. an6 their friends heard 5u,
little of them. He wrote to nobody. and
she did not write to me. Yet there were
occasional rumors. Now they were
breathing The keen air of the Engardine
now sinking to the chestnuts and vines
of Chiavenna; now he was lashing him
self to frenzy over the treasures OF Rome
now she was gazing with sweet northern
eyes across the glowing splendor of tht
bay of Naples. Then they were in Ger
many, and about to settle for life in {
university town; but anon had flee
from it in haste after Il long nights dis
pute, in the course of which my learned
friend had well-nigh come to blows with
the university's most celebrated pro
fessor.
At last I heard that they were agair
in London, and, full of enthusiasm
darted round the corier to welcome then
home. Nobody was with them bu
Mrs. Hanway, Winifred's mother.
would enter unannounced and surpris'
the philosopher. entered unannounced
and was surprised myself. Was this tn
eff, ct OF matrimony or of foreign travel
Each occupant OF the room was engaged
in IN exercise wholly unconnected, as i
seemed, with those of the rest. NJ.
friends wife, the lady whom I had al
most loved, queen Of all grace and come
liness, was appearing and disappearin,
1;l, Qa,b Labsol ho dor5o Tr,,,