The Douglas independent. [volume] (Roseburg, Or.) 187?-1885, 1882-09-23
THE GOVBRNOR'S STORY.


''We we're very poor" said the Gov
ernor. "my mother and I. We lived in
q little cabin on General Linton's farm,
and saw bard time. My father had
died when was sixteen years old, leav-
ing us nothing but an honest reputation,
and, although I was stout and healthy,
my wages were very low, and | had to
toll late and early to provide the neces-
saries of life. But suppose / would
have been contented and happy enough;
that is, as much as we unsatisfied mortals
usually are, if it hadn't been for wo-
man. | don't know why it was that
Helen Linton made such an impression
on me, for she had by no means those
great and noble qualities by which men
as general thing are attracted toward the
opposite sex. On the contrary, she was
proud, arrogant and overbearing, and I
was confident if she thought OF me at all,
it was with feelings of contempt and DIS
dain alone.
Not on account of my personal ap
pearance, it is true, for though I was
rough and uncultivated, and my hands
were hard with excessive toll, and my
face Drowned with exposure to the sun,
still I had wonderful strength and great
agility, aud my hair and eyes we're as
dark as midnight, and many said that l
was handsome. But / was poor and
she was wealthy. / was General Lin
tons hired hand and she was General
Linton's daughter, and it was the old,
old story. 1t must have been her be-
wildering beauty that drew me more and
more toward her, for she was a queenly-
looking girl, with flashing eyes and mag
nihcent dark brown hair and form tall
and majestic and stately. But whatever
it might have been. am certain of one
thing, and that is, that I learned to love
her with maddening, painful, consum-
ing passion that seemed to devour my
whole being. ! tried very hard to
smother it and to drive her image from
my heart 7 knew I might as well think
of plucking down the moon or the stars
as to have dared to aspire to her hand,
But it was al no avail; the more
struggled the more became entangled.
In the. morning, noon and night there
was but one face that I saw, and but one
voice that heard, and that was the face
and the voice of Helen Linton. What
was worst of all. to me, in some way she
discovered my secret. How, can hardly
tell. They say murder will out, and the
same can most assuredly be said about
love. I had never oxen about it to
any one, not even to my mother, and as
to Helen, had scarcely ever spoken to
her on any subject. It is true that some
times she weuld give me instructions in
regard to he flower garden, which Gen
eral Linton had selected me to manage,
having. as he said, more opinion of my
taste i'll such matters than any of the
best of his workm n, but she never con-
descended further. I worshiped her
like star from afar off, and knew the
distance bet Feen us to be as wide and as
impossible.
One day she came into the garden
when was at work there, and, impelled
by some unknown power, as it were, /
gathered and presented to her choice
bouquet of flowers, and whether it was
from my guilty looks that she then dis
covered all, and determined to check me
in the beginning, or whether she bad al
ready probed to the depths of my heart
and thonght I was presumptuous,
know not; but certain it is she never
spoke to me after that. She had been in
the habit of giving me nod of recog-
milton whenever she met me before this,
but after this she passed me without
even a glance; disdain within her
naughty eye, and contempt upon her
scornful lip. You may know that my
life was as wretched as it could well be.
I used to sit down by the fire in our
little cabin. after my hard days work
was done, and curS my wretched fate,
and call God unjust in what considered
the distinctions he made in the human
race, but I little knew then what the
sequel would be.
Crowds OF company. gay ladies and
gentlemen. came every summer from the
CITY to spend the season at Linton Hall,
and it so happened that one summer
came among the rest young gentleman
pamed Arthur st. John. He was re-
ported to be wealthy, and handsome he
he certainly was, and it was not very
long before he commenced paying de-
voted attention to General Linton's
daughter; and it was easy enough to see
that she was as infatuated as he was.
They used to ride by our little cottage
on the bright summer evenings. on the
Foster road. as it was called, on their
prancing horses, he bending fondly
above her, whispering words of love and
tenderness, and she listening to them
with flush on her cheek and a smile
upon nef up. J. remember one evening
I stood Watching them as they rode down
from the Wild Glen, bathed in the
golden halo that the gorgeous fires OF
sunset threw upon the scene, while the
summer zephyr, loaded with perfume of
wild flowers, blew back her massive
hair from her queenly brow. until the
scene seemed to me celestial, and she an
inhabitant of celestial regions. just
then she caught sight of me, as I looked
at her almost entranced, and spoke
something in low tone to her com.