The Russellville Democrat., 1880-08-19
THE DREAS1 OF A LIFE.
Found Among the Papers of a student of
 Medicine. TIA.

Iound Am ong the Papers of a Student of
 Medicine. f..
 Soul watching soul within.-IBulwer
 They tell me I am dying; know it; I feel that life is fast fading away. They tell me I am dying of disappointed love; it is falsel l spurn the weakness. | would not crush the impulses of soul which my creator has breathed into me; l would not, at the bidding oi an idle passion, paralyze the energies of body which was given to me as minstrant so the immortal spirit. No, it is false Tley judge not but by their own base conceptions; they know not that in i'm parting light and life to an inert soul I have been compelled to borrow from my own the Prometbean fire. I am dy- ing; but no vain and selfish desire has worn my life away It is from exhaus- tion of the soul not from a vearning fever of the heart I will not be thus misunderstood; will record my strange and painful experience-not as warn ing to others. for my fate is too peculiar to be thus useful-but rather to redeem my memory from so degrading charge From my boyhood 1 have been theo- rist, and my soul wandered over the vague ocean of speculative philosophy, seeking rest, but finding none, until wearied with physiological researches. I determined to seek amid physiological demonstrations for the minute links which bind the material to the spiritual My fortune placed me above the neees- ,sity of adopting profession, and Il be- came from choice a student of medicine, and it was during the year which spent in Dublin, while in attendance upon public lectures, that the circumstance occurred which has thus robbed me of myself.
 1t was my habit to pass much of my time in the hospital, where the effect of different diseases upon the various phases of human character as we'll as upon the diverse physical constitutions, afforded me an interesting subject of speculation. l was one day passing through one of the sheltered walks in the garden, when 1 heard sweet and plaintive voice singing what appeared to me to be snatches of old ballads. The sound came from the shrubbery in the grounds appropriated to the lunatic pa tients, and separated from the rest of the garden by high wall. Prompted by feeling which I can now under stand, l climbed to the top of the wall, and finding that the thick foliage pre- vented me from discerning the singer, leaped over the inclosure and entered the shrubbery. l shall never forget the picture which then stamped itself upon my memory. Seated upon a rustic bench, with single ray of sunshine piercing the deep shade, and resting like d halo upon her dark hair, was a young girl, so fair. so pale, so etherial in the delicate proportions of her figure, that almost feared the image was an illusion of fancy. Her large blue eyes were wandering restlessly around while she sung, and ere 1 had time to retreat l met their full glance. Instead of being alarmed at my intrusion, a sweet voice parted her soft lips, and, raising her fin ger, she beckoned me to approach.
 You have waited long, beloved, but you have come at last," she murmured in low and broken tone, as she drew me to a seat beside her; then, clasping my hand in hers, she fixed her gaze on my face with a look so full of solemn and earnest tenderness that my very soul thrilled beneath it.
 soon found that the fair girls reason was entirely obscured. and her insanity seemed to me to have assumed the all most hopeless form of imbecility. But her pure and beautiful instincts were So fresh and powerful as if intellect were still their guide. She was tender gen. tie and full of that confding innocence which knows no evil and suspects nc guile. Childlike in her frankness womanlv in her sweet tenderness, and withal evincing in every look the intui tive modesty and delicacy which SC characterize the pure-minded, sht seemed the very personiiication of al that was lovely in her sex. The very wanderings of her imagination were
 Like sunshine on the rill--
 1hoDgh turned aside twas sunshine snll.
 The beauty, the tenderness, the help lessness of this young creature interested me exceedingly. My syppathies .wer, aroused to degree positively painful and yet as 1 listened to her incoheren but sweet words uttered by the rosies lips that ever love had kissed, felt tha had her soul been awakened while he heart was thus gushing forth earth coulC have held for me no higher bliss
 When we parted, which we did witl a mutual promise of again meeting, l re - tired 10 my lodging in a state of excite ment such as l bad rarely known, ant my first care was to learn something o her history. l found that she had beer from childhood dull and inert of intel lect; that it had been only with exceed ing labor she had been taught the ele ments of knowledge, and that her mint seemed to become more obtuse as sh grew older, until severe fit of sickness which hcfell her ere she attained he hiteentll year. completely obscured he reason
 Upon further inquiry l learned tha she had been an affectionatc and de pendent creature, always looking flo love to everyone and, as l could learr never finding it. Her family were colo ph!egmatic and commonplace. Tn slr'Gt discipline of reason was all the could exercise, and the child had grow stupid m proportion as these means Ina oeen eXrrted upon her. She had bee lor three years in this state of imbecil
 y'and they had now lost all hope ( her recovery
 The next day l again found her in tn shiubbcty, where she was allowed 1 pass mos, Of her time as the absence al' close constraint and vigilance Ina been found decidedly beneficial. H. !oy at seeing me was unbounoed, am throwing herself on the turf at nv fee sue teamed her arms upon my knee, an !eslng her head upon them in ar att 'ue oi ehldlike repose, remained ga M nl5 %lth speeches. tenderness up in
 ny iace' She said little, but could 8