The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1881-05-11
A STRANGE STORY
How Truth Sometimes Ec-
lipses Fiction.
4 Beautiful Nubian Slave and Her
History.
Paris Correspondence New


Read this history of human lives ant
wonder at novelists' timidity. In 1874:
Henry Husson gave up in despair He hat
adopted teaching as profession, but d.
as he might, he could not earn more thar
bare livelihood. To live in Paris will
only enough money to keep the wolf from
the door is to lead Tantalus' life, which
Henry Husson refused to do. Looking
over all the globe to see where he might
escape the curse of poverty, he thought
Egypt offered the most promise. He shook
off the dust of Paris from his feet and tc
Egypt he went. 1t was the hour wher
Frenchmen were most in favor there. He
was at once made naturalist of the govern
lment, and he explored Upper Egypt and
the frontiers of Abyssinia During one OF
those excursions he saw a beautiful Nubi-
slave, became enamored of her and bought
her. Zagfrana Cher nancy bore him son,
which he acknowledged" before the
French consul at Cairo, who register
led his birth as French sub
Iject: Henry Husson, natural son
of Henry Husson and of Zagfrana y
The woman was passionately attached to
father and still more to son; father seemed
to love her as well, but ''all earthly things
break, and bring safety and pass away, "
none of them more rapidly than love. One
day Henry Husson fell in love with Mile
| Schneckenburger, French girl, a daughter
of wealthy Lorraine merchant of Cairo.
Daughter, mother, father listened favorably
to his suit
| He quietly sent his son to French
boarding school, in the neighborhood of
| Cairo, and sent Zagfrana to the slave mar
| ket, where she at once found buyer.
Having in this way deity blotted out his
| silly Nubian romance he married Mile.
Schneckenburger, His married life had
been most happy if the cradle had had a
| tenant, but the rosy checked cheIub never
came One day husband confessed to wife
| that he had a son, and told her his SILLY
| Nubian romance" She became deeply at
tached to Zagfrana's son and begged her
husband to quit Egypt and make France
their home, bringing their SON. with
them. They returned here and made
Mile. Schneckenburger' native place their
home. Their first care after house
was in order was to have their marriage
certificate by the French consul at Cairo
| registered in Nancy, and to have record
made of their acknowledgment" of Tag
franas son for their own child. Nobody
| in Nancy stared to see a mulatto issue
| from the marriage of two white folks
| Egypt's sun is hot and burns faces to
swarthy hue. Years came and wears went
Lagfrana's baby grew up to be man,
| tie was married to a rich, accomplished,
beautiful young lady, Mile. Estelle Clement
| of an excellent family Of Nancy. And
Zagfrana? Her spectre, all tears, all wild
wall when son and husband We're reft from
| her, cruel conjecture of the life she had
| thrown back into African hands after long
handled by gentle European hands, haunt
| ed her old lovers bed and board.
I
er still sharper remorse for clouded hours,
| all her own, gnawed him until at last some
vital part was severed and death released
him from the torture. Lorraine's climate
| is harsher than Egypt. Zagiranas son
| soon after marriage fell into
rapid decline, and before the first
anniversary of his wedding came, gallop-
ing consumption had laid him in the grave.
| Zagfrana had never ceased to weep and
wall her son. Her tears We're her meat
| day and night. New masters soon grew
| tired of her woman there is only mans
| toy, and she changed hands time and
again. At last age defaced sex, and a mas
ter satiated with her charms, conscious
that no eye would again see promised
pleasure in her face form, and touched
by the story of her first love, her only
child, her rapid passage from hand to hand,
gave her freedom. Her wild longing was
transformed to hope - hope to see her
child again and press him once more to
| that breast which had for so many months
| (happy monthsD been a fountain of life to
him She made her way to Cairo There
she found out all she wanted to know at
the French consulate; but she was penni-
less. She haunted European travellers re
sorts, begging a copper coin here and
copper coin there. At last she got togeth-
lar 1I,,
goods, which she haWked, making a little
money on each sale. every cent of
which she boarded, save the petty
sum necessary to buy Il little pulse
to allay hunger's sharpest pangs.
Meantime she appealed to all of those
who had known her in happier days to
give her written certificates that she had
lived as Henry Husson's wife, and that
she was indeed the mother of Henry Hus-
sons son, In time she had amassed mon
ely enough to visit France, where there's
a will there's way" She made her APP
pearance in Nancy What strange sight
that Nubian negress, tossed from slave
market to slave market, from harem to
harem, amassing money by begging and
then by peddling in the Cairo streets, com
ing from Egypt to France, and seeking out
her flesh and blood, even to a provincial
town. That she might once more fold her
arms about her son, and hear from his lips
Mother, and think herself generously re
paid for all those nights of tears, for all
those years Of anguish, for all that hoping
against hope for all those months of pri-
walton. Scalding must have been her tears
when she found only graves at her strug-
giles end. She buried her face in her hands,
and gave nature warrant to ease with
with tears the DER fraught sorrow. And
then (who had looked for such delicacy Of
sentiment under that barbarian bronzeD
she applied to Nancy courts to do her jus
tice. death hiss indeed bereavsd me of
my child; the solace, the support of my
wretched, beggared old age has been taken
from me; bnt l have still one thing left
me, that death has not wrested from me
my title, Mother" my right to call yonI
grave My sons resting place I claim
these, my only earthly possessions, at your
hands" Widow Husson (Aille. Schnecken-
burger that was) resisted this claim; but
poor Zagfrana laid the certificate of her
child's birth given by the consul, and all
the certificates she had gathered at Cairo,
and at last Widow Husson, vanquished by
IL. l..