The weekly herald. [volume] (Cleveland, Tenn.) 1876-1888, 1881-02-04

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Alone and without friends, the young
man soon found his courage oozing out
underan uninterrupted series of failures.
Ready and eager to work, he found the
granting of the bare privilege to labor a
favor which he Gould not procure.
Every opening seemed TO be blocked by
a hundred as eager as him self. The
hardships he had spoken of so bravely
were not long in presenting Themselves.
For a while he managed to procure the
means OF the meagerest existence by
unmitigated toll of brain and body. At
this time he often lay awake at night
from sheer fatigue, longing for the scent
Of the pines and new-mown hay upon
the old farm, and ready to sacrifice all
his hopes for the privilege of standing
once more beside Primrose, to feel the
pressure Of her soft hand.
But his pride was not yet broken. 1t
was too late to go back now. He would
not admit himself conquered. He had
not the courage to confess his mistake
and return to the peaceful lot he had so
foolishly exiled himself from.
And shortly his affairs approached a
crisis from which be was extricated for
the moment by finding letter contain
ing small sum of money waiting for
him at the postoflice. Thele was no
writing inclosed. nor any mark by
which to identify the sender. Neverthe-
less something told him that it must be
Primrose.
He had fallen very low, he thought,
when he was forced to receive aid from
her. Tut want stared him in the face,
md he accepted the Offering with q soul
ull II bitterness.
Urtil he had achieved something, he
resolved, he would write no more; he
would hide himself even from her, in
the deepest mazes of the city. Even a
letter from her dear hand must seem like
calling reproaCh after this.
Not many days later it became ap-
parent to him that ere long but two
alternatives would be left to him; either
to crawl home footsore, dispirited beg
gar, and acknowledge himself con-
quered, or to die of absolute starvation
In the streets.
Yet little while he held out, yielding
slowly, stubbornly, to the pressure of
blind necessity.
One night less than a year from his
hopeful parting from Primrose, found
him pacing the streets without roof to
cover his head. Homeless, penniless,
starving on that bleak winter night, it
seemed to his irenzied mind as if heaven
and man had conspired against him.
There was little enough pride left in
him now. Want and despair had
robbed him of even that fallacious
strength. In his dazed thoughts there
seemed no better ambition than TO lie
down in some sheltered corner and
yield up his broken spirit.
The bright firesides shining through
the windows seemed to mock his
misery. At one window he saw a
young wife anxiously awaiting her hus-
bands return. Something in her figure
him of Primrose. What
would she think if she saw him now,
tered, ghastly, freezingP
Presently he fell into a species of
delirium. He thought he was on his
way back to the farm-back to Prim-
rose. The frowning rows of houses on
either hand seemed to stretch away into
the smiling, sunlit fields about his
fathers house. Yonder was the tree
where he had often met Primrose when
the days toll was over.
The hard pavement looked like the
dusty road he knew so we'll
ay, and could he not smell the alder
blossoms in the morning airp
He laughed aloud as he strobe along.
He tried to sing an old air thaS he
knew, and wept, he thought, for joy.
Poor soul! He did not see how the
chance wayfarers shrurk back from
him, imagining him a dangerous
maniac.
So he walked on straight toward the
riverside, where the water ran black
md ugly beneath the docks and piers.
For moment its sound seemed to recall
his scattered senses. He paused and
ooked vaguely around him. He saw in
he distance woman's figure Fastening
oward him, but he took no notice Of it.
His fancy went wild again, and he made
oward the river.
"HarkW he shouted, "the mill-stream ,
shall soon be homer
In another,instant he. had plunged into I
he water.
He was conscious OF an icy thrill, the Z
OF the lights along the shore, z
! shrill cry in woman's voice, and a r
leavy plunge into the river beside him. /
Then, as slender arm was flung around '
lin and voice, strangely familiar, '
poke some smothered words Of endear- 4
nent into his dull ear, he became insen- t
ible. {
A long, dreamy interval seemed to c
lapse and he awoke TO consciousness in |
he broad light OF day. The room in b
which he lay was his own chamber al |,
he farm. Was this the realityp Had a
1.-THE past been merely hideous dreamp q
lie knew that he was very weak, and tI
hat he must have been very near to o
cath. n
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