The weekly herald. [volume] (Cleveland, Tenn.) 1876-1888, 1881-05-20

""J uio ih'N'bi hitl ~ OlANiA ANai ~
his glorious eyes The sentence: You
great old coward At him again = as
tender and appreciative sympathy which
the gift of speech could not have made
more assuring. My nurses had pitched
me tent on the south side of low
hill, and left me to get well at my leis
ure. My bottom dollar had dwindleC
into the value Of dime, my legs into
the thickness of pair Of tDhgs (for al
appetite was gomez, and one evening
hope failed me. Believing / was going
to die, | resolved TO do the fair thing b,
Jennie, apprise her of the event, and
advise her to forget me. BY the flicker
ing light of hit of tallow candle,
commenced the lettor-the first l had
written for months. | thought aloud
as / wrote. Fritz lay beside me, hi,
nose wedged between his fore paws, but
knew by the twitching of his ears that
he understood every word was writing
81 had reached the climax of frenmcia.
ton and wretchedness- or rather my
expression ofit-when lie suddenly ros,
and went out. soon heard him paving
and scratching and tearing the earth
about six feet from me, as though he
was under contract to dig a tunnel to
China before daylight. Thinking he had
found the burrow of a wolf or fox, ]
called him off, but he was as deaf as q
rock to my voice. Selling The cand le
hurried to the spot, around which lay
a half,bushel If gravel, which he had
loosened, when my eye caught the CLEAN
of dull red streak that stained a piece
of quartz about the size of an egg, lying
among the fresh earth. Would you be-
lieve il? That streak was worth fifty
dollars, for it was virgin gold. Nor was
it the only one upon that hillside. Fritz
had found a lode thanks to a gopher,
and 1, thereby, had found a fortune,
As soon as possible / had the gold of
that first precious stone wrought into a
ring of my own designing; all of it, at
least, but the contents Of one blunt
corner, which, in its native roughness,
had mounted as a simple brooch,
Sending these to Jennie, /"
can act of great generosity, sir,
think" interrupted Ruth, with laugh
ing CLINT in her eye. Gone would have
thought you'd have preserved such a
piece of rare good fortune as a memo
rial stone"
"You anticipate me, madam. 1t was
as a memorial that sent my first bit of
treasure, but l expected to get it back
again within two years, and the girl
with it,"
"And did you ?"
"No; nor even received line of ac-
acknowledgement that my offer had been
accepted. Nothing finds gold quicker
than gold, when man has once got q
fair share of it, and in two years l
had, in various ways, secured $40, 1000.
Investing it, as I thought, safely, 1 re-
turned to Philadelphia in all the pride
of conquering hero. My story ought
to end here; to wind up with the chime
Of wedding bells and beautiful Ra-
chez as my reward for faithful serving,
but l had scarcely arrived when I heard
incidentally that Jennie had gone with
her father to Europe, nor left one sign
that she ever remembered me-"
"You certainly did not let that fact
dampen the ardor of your pursuit%
queried Ruth; "you followed her, of
courseW
"Of course 1 did no such thing,
madam. l returned to San Francisco
and plunged into the excitement of
gold-hunting with a recklessness that q
woman cannot understand. Six months
after and I lost every dollar, but, by
that time, / had learned that experience
is worth nothing as solid capital until it
has been dearly bought. Iwhistled my
rhyme:
Loss and gain, pleasure and pain,
Balance the see-saw of life,
In the sensitive ears of my faithful
Fritz, hugged his brown head close to
my shoulder-don't laugh, that dog
was my friend-rolled up my sleeves
and again went to work with a vigor
that l knew meant success if the vein
held out. 1t did, and five years after
ward had bank account which ran
largely into the thousands. invested
it in land. BY that time was bach.
elor of thirty, Hard knocks and my one
big disappointment had shaken all the
romance out of me, and when 1 again
went East it was on business connected
with the construction of this railroad"
"And you had quite out-lived YOU
boyish fancy, as your heart began to lose
its youth ?" said Ruth, with the least
bit of cynicism in her tone.
II think Fritz knew" said the con-
ductor, quietly, "I had become almost
misanthrope for his sake. If left him
to go into society-such as we had-for
a few hours he either whined like sick
child or kept up such an increasing
barking and baying that, to save him
from being shot as n nuisance, 1 went
to no place where it was impossible for
4 = A