The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1882-11-23
A STRANGE STORY.
CHAPTER I.

"Then to take whatever The gods may send,
Putting to scruples and doubts an end,
Is the sensible way to live, my friend"
So sang a clear voice, with more Of
nature than cultivation in it. Per-
haps there was more of conviction and
acquiescence in it than of music.
Whether there be such a thing as
"luck" or not, it is certain that care
less Guy Crawford had found life very
good and the world very pleasant while
taking "whatever the gods had sent"
him.
The scene was scarcely calculated to
stimulate one to musical efforts. Over
head were the wet and dropping
branches of the trees, under foot the
soaked soil, and all around the dreary
moan of the rain-laden wind.
The rain had fallen all day long in
an almost silent torrent. AS evening
came on it had lessened little, while
the wind had increased in power. The
world seemed now one dreary, vacant
realm of night and storm.
But Guy Crawford, wet and weary,
cold and in darkness, alone and lost,
tramped sturdily on; and as he pressed
forward he sang, over and over again:
"Then to take whatever the gods may send.
Putting to scruple5 and doubts an end,
Is the sensible way to live, my friend"
Guy Crawford had left the little
railroad station at noon. He expected
his friend there to meet him, but he
had been disappointed. Asking the
station-master for directions he set
out on foot for his destination.
1t involved walking twenty miles I;
but he said to himself that he liked
walking.
1t rained but rain was better than
heat and dust.
Guy Crawford readily met each OBJ
lection which came up in his mind.
His friend would send for his baggage,
he said to himself his friend could
lend him dry clothes when he arrived ;
his friend would have Il warm well
come for him.
Guy would have laughed at being
thought more than moderately SEN
sible young man. But the man who
let the brighter features of his past
and the dearer hopes of his future shut
down so near together in his mind as
to make the present almost unreal,
was a philosopher, whether he knew it
or not.
When night had fallen Crawford
realized that he was lost. lie believed
it might be midnight now he could
only dimly discern objects about him
he had not seen a human face or hui
man habitatiOn for hours.
But he sang, nevertheless, as we
have said, and in the song one side of
his character stood fully revealed. Guy
Crawford would take life cheerfully as
it came. He would not pause in a
course which opened before him be-
cause of doubts as to the end of it all.
But, despite the debonair way in
which he sang of putting scruples to
an end, there was strong undercur-
rent of principle and honor in the
course of this mans lie, for all the
manifold ebbs and flows on the sur,
face-ebbs and flows which ran to anG
fro with the varying impulses of cir
cumstances. or fate.
Guy Crawford would have thought
of no alternative. He would have
said "fate" at once.
He sang the three lines over again
then muttered to himself:
"That's all right /; but it is very
natural thing for one to ask himself
why in the world Clinton was not al
the station?"
Down the rainy gale ran his voic'
again:
"Then to take whatever the gods may send
Putting"
"Stop your noise p said a harsl
voice at his elbow, and a heavy hanC
was laid on his shoulder. "Stop you
noise"
Something else touched his forehead
he could not see what 1t was. His i'm
pulse to fight was conquered by it