The Hickman courier. [volume] (Hickman, Ky.) 1859-current, 1882-02-03
The Maid of Moosic.

An esteemed contemporary at Scran-
ton narrates with something OF the
unseemly hiliarity of the hated Sassen-
ach, the story of a young man and a
family Of young maids, which, under the
genial touch of the author of "Adam
Bede" or Tennyson, would have been
turned into q Mill on the Floss"
or "Enoch Arden" Our esteemed
contemporary speaks of the four
fair maids of MOosic as bright
and buxom," destroying at once
the poehcal conception which the
mind instinctly seizes when love and
the sexes are In propinqmty. Though
all the world loves a lover, all the world
Is not gifted with the subtle expression
Of loves moods and lenses, as the mar
rative in question proves. The rarest
and fairest of the MoOsic maids, whom,
as it Is fitting, shall be called Juliet, was
in the fullness of time made, as Shelley
says of the sensitive plant, TO feel love $
sweet want by an assiduous and loEn
Capulet of the neighborhood, TO whom
she pledged her virgin VOWS.
The stern necessities of life, as Is often
the case even in Arcadia, wrenched
Romeo from the vicinage of his adored
one. He went westward to grow-rlch
and feather a nest for his bird. There
Is, it must be owned, nothing out of the
ordinary in this But the innate shows
that there really was, for instead OF
fortune the exultant Romeo fOnnd only
the ragged edge of expectation upon
which to nourish his dreams Of the dis
tant Juliet. The tides of years ebbed
and flowed, and two had passed the
golden chord between the two hearts re-
spending faithfully TO their dehrlous
VOWS. But as the sweetest lips must
learn to frown the fondest faith grows
dim by absence. Juliet, meditating In
Moosic. doubtless saw IN her minds eye
the idle of her soul spooning upon some
Hoosier heiress as he paced the parental
prairies cOrraling the coyotes or tether-
ing the herds.
1t was in this frame of mind that the
maids father set up the siren song that
lulled Ulysses and his companions into
tarrying with the lotus-eaters. When
the rolling years had dimmed the figure
of the distant Romeo, another sutton,
under parental stimulus, took up the
tender tale. The maid repulsed him ut
first but 1t is so much easier to love
than to wait so much more joyous to
dance with the partner at hand than
wait for the one on the list so much
more real, in short, to lean on the strong
arm and look into the amorous eyes of
the fellow at hand than feed the
heart on hope and the soul on the barren
localities of promise, that this incon-
slant maid took kindly TO the new coat
sleeve and murmured yes with the same
throbbing Joy and sank upon his bosom
with the same maiden emotions that
marked her betrothal to the absent
Romeo.
The guests were met, the feast set for
the ceremony which should make the
maid the wife of another, when Romeo,
to whom some little bird of the air had
twittered sacrifice that parental impa-
tieuce was about to exact appeared to
the tickle one. The local historian does
not seem to have witnessed this pictur-
esque encounter, and hence We have
none OF those dramatic pleadings which
in the crises of our fates sometimes bring
about the greatest results. Is it neces-
sary TO tell any lover who has ever loved
what the result was? 1t was the old
story over again. It's well to be of
with the old love before we are on with
tine new Julet's heart was true to the
heart that had first made her bosom to
hutter, and the end was that the two fled
TO n neighboring dominic and were made
one. The precipitancy left painful
denouement for the other fellow, but
and here remarks the beauty of the
Moosic mind-the second Romeo. more
melancholy than mad, made his plant to
papa, when that sagacious man, pointing
to the Moosic maidens, ranged like
peonies on a stem, invited the discom-
fitted lover TO take his choice, and-he
did.
Now, there are various reflections that
follow picturesque incidents Of this sort
as sap follows the chip, but the discrim-
mating reader viii see the obvious moral
of this true and touching redemption of
love at the very altar steps.-PfHadol-
phid Times