The Portland daily press., 1881-05-13
BY what name is she calling vou2u

|
The girl went in to her mother, and the
stranger returned through the Frightening
! moonlight down the rugged mountain, re-
| tracing the steps he had made in the morn
| ing The inn lay under the hills, few
miles below the wild region where Macha
| had been born, in which she had grown to
womanhood, eating the potatoes She had
helped to produce, and watching the blessed
spirits trooping up and down the skies.
Something will get you," said Macha's
] mother for the hundredth time, as the girl
! appeared for her supper: and she was not
| wrong, for Fate had got hold of Macha that
| very night
| Strange and unaccountable are the whms
| of men. Here was one with wealth and
| rank, accustomed to all that is cultivated,
witty and beautiful among women, and yet,
having gone fancy-free till rather late peri
| cd OF bachelorhoOd, he had climbed savage
| mountain in an isolated corner of what he
considered an uncivilized country, to fall in
love with wild girl with wild name, who
| lived upon potatoes in a howell under rock!
| And he did not feel ashamed of himself
[ Contrasts and Inconsistencies had always
| possessed fascination for him. Did not
the spotless white flower of the bog flourish
there as purely as though it had not sprang
out OF the black Shiny substance that held
its root? And Macha, with her shining bare
feet and arms, and her face like a poets
| dream, was all the more enchanting to his
Imagination because she had sprung. with
her spontaneous loneliness, out of the
mountain, and had been nourished and per-
tected between the wind and the sun with
| out help from Civilization" or a lesson
{ from cart"
He Was going back to the inn that he
{ might have further opportunities of seeing
| this girl and yet he told himself that his ad-
miratlon for her was merely an abstract
| leda; that after he had seen her few times
and studied her exceptional beauty and
character, he would go on his way content
ed, rejoicing to have perceived that Nature
can be still so lovely and unspoiled in her
own secret Businesses, beyond the ken of
the world His rest was broken that night
by new excitement; and he Weakened in
the dawn to fancy he saw Macha walking
with her bare white feet, in the rosy light
round the margin of the lake. He wanted
to hear her voice again, and feel the touch
OF her hand. 1t struck him as remarkable
that she had shown no shyness of him,
speaking to him as naturally as if he had
been her brother; and he OWNED that this
was SO because she knew nothing of ranks
I and classes Only the supernatural had
power to awe her, and she had felt safe and
happy as soon as she had assured herself
that he was living man. Accustomed to
the attentions of women, he would have felt
less attraction toward Macha had she shown
any desire for his return. The absence of
all coquetry in her delighted him.
The girl thouht of him, lying on her straw
bed in the dead of the night. There
!: was hole in the roof above her
head, a hole that would be matched
ovew with heather for the winter,
but at present it was good to let in the air of
heaven. Through it Macha could see star
shining in the sky, like a little island of
splendor in an ocean of dark blue, and The
rugged twigs of the broken heather made a
rough frame for the bit of glory The beau
ty of Macha's face lay quenched in darkness
beneath, but her soul escaped through the
opening up to the kindred mystery of the
star, carrying with it the memory of the
event of the evening. Her mind rested with
placid wonder on the occurrence of her
meeting with the stranger. She had not
fallen in love with him, as he with her nor
did she dream of such thing. Round
about her lay her mother, her grandmother,
t her little sisters, sleeping soundly, with the
love OF Macha asleep In their hearts. She
loved them passionately, and had nc
i thought or hope for herself apart from them.
To work with them, hand and foot, that
, they might all have enough potatoes and
, turf to enable them to live together, without
) more pain than they could endure, this was
the one object of her existence. Vague
| splendors and delicious rest and JOY were,
t she knew, awaiting them all beyond the
l gates of the sun. The only thing to be de-
) sired was that they might not be parted
, meanwhile in their purgatory ON the lonely
mountain. AS the night crept on, and the
/, stars waxed brighter, Macha owned to her
a self that the Giving man. might have been
| "him who lives down in the lake" after all
| Pondering this doubt, she fell fast asleep.
The stranger reappeared next day, and
for many days afterward haunted the
+ mountain. Macha had leave from hel
E mother to accompany him in his search fol
3 the wild flowers which, he explained to
l them, he wanted for scientific purposes
D The little sisters frisked about them and
' took their share in the search, dancing like
: young kids GU the edge of precipices, will
t wild bright eyes and flying locks. Potatoes
? boiled in the cabin were eaten on the heath
r er, and the long summer days went past
| like beads on a golden rosary, told brightly
' through the fingers. The man was brother
ly and kind with the little girls and the ED
| er women, but he recognized a gulf be-
| tween them and Macha. Their speech
f translated literally from the Irish, though
f poetic and musical enough, was not delicate
ly correct, as his ear imagined hers to be
| their swift feet were not white, nor was
their clothing spotless Macha who bathed
in the lake every morning, and hung Out
3 her yellow hair TO dry in the first beams Of
the sun, and who wore her well-bleached
: draperies like princess, could not keeI
: young nor old from dyeing their skins AMI
Y garments in tn bog-holes. An instructive
personal delicacy had come to Macha with
: her exceptional beauty. At the end of q
fortnight the stranger told himself that this
4 mountain flower was worthy of being trans
' planted into the brightest pdrterre evel
? cherished by man. And what a month age
, would have appeared to him only madness
) seemed now the most sensible course he
could pursue.
Macha came into the cabin one evening in
: the cleaning, with face of dismay.
''Motherr' she said, grasping her mothers
, ann.
3 ''What is on you child?"
''The sassenach is asking me to go away
! with him.
"Away with bim?"
t HE wants to give me satin gown and a
ring, and to take me to his home"
"Well, avourneen," with long sigh, ''ii
= he makes you true wife and is good to you
you would be better with him than here.''
r Mother" cried the girl, passionately
''have | vexed you, have | angered you, that
, you would turn me from your door,"
Turn you away, ashore machree! Ma
cha, are you mad? Wouldn't it be only tc
, you happy and well? suppose the man has
good farm and can pay his rent. And you
would be well warmed and fed. my Macha
/ though your mothers hearth would be
blank"
; 81 don't want to be well warmed and fed
, TO BE CONTINUED