Sacramento daily record-union., 1882-05-06


tongue would smooth over no truth, how
ever disagreeable, had ofttimes called his
rock ahead"
Never were happier people than Ruth.
ven Dyott and his wife-for time.
Bot at last sore and bitter trouble came
to them, and in this wise
A year after their marriage child had
been born to them-a boy with Kuthven's
dark eyes, clear. cut features, and sunny
smile. When the lad could stagger three
steps across the floor and then fall into his
mothers outstretched arms, Alice Thought
her cup of JOY could brim no higher when
his baby lips began to try to lisp her name
; she thought there was yet another note
added to the exquisite music OF life.
And so the years passed on.
The child became the boy, the boy the
youth, and then to Ruthven Dyott and his
wife Alice it was given to learn by bitter
experience the truth OF poor old Lsar's ex-
ceeding bitter cry that " sharper than ser
pent's tooth it is to have q thankless
child"
Cu.hbert, this only son of theirs, was
thing as too much love, as we'll as too much
harshness, in the rearing and tending of a
child?
The mother of this young fellow would
never have allowed such to be the case. In
her eyes all the wrong her boy did, all the
shame and sorrow he brought upon his
father and herself was the fault of some-
body else-frst of this false friend, and
then OF that bad companion never of him.
self. He was "too easily led" she said,
"and wicked people took advantage Of his
gentle disposition.
Her husband said little or nothing, and,
for her dear sake, was generous and forgiv-
ing to the young sinner. But he grew to
look older than his years his upright
form began to stoop. He would walk
along silent and preoccupied, his eyes on
the ground, the brows above them puck
cred in thought. More than once, when
Cuthbert, flushed of face, disorderly in
dress, unsteady of gait, d-voiced, def.
ant, or desponding according to the stage
of drunkenness at which he had arrived,
found himself in his fathers presence, that
father did but turn upon his heel, lock
himself in his private room where none
not even Alice-dare follow, and there
"dree his weird" in solitary, brooding
misery.
He had been willful, impulsive, ofttimes
lacking in patience and self-control, but he
had kept bis life clean and clear; he had
never degraded the manhood within him I;
he had toiled hard at his profession name,
fame, wealth, success were his and now,
Of what value did they seem in his hag-
gard eyes, Wha. was to become of this
CHASTITY fetch" OF his, this lad SO like in
outward seeming to the boy who had gone
to London nearly thirty years ago to try
to push his fortunes, the boy to whom
Milicent Warner had been so good and
true friend, Yes; strangely enough in
these, the days of his bitter sorrow, Ruth.
ven Dyott bethought him Of the past, re.
membered the woman who had frightened
and sweetened his life and then passed out
of it like shadow that is gone-remem-
bered her with a new spring of gratitude
rising in his arid heart toward her memory
like a sparkling rill of water in desert.
He set himself to wondering what had
become of her.
Was she married long ago, or had her
chastened spirit fled from earth to heaven,
and left only her memory to shine in the
hearts of those who had known and loved
her?
How he should like to have one of the
old long chats with her, tell her all about
this unhappy boy of his, and of Alice, his
darling, his wife who had been so tender
and loving companion to him all these
years! Alice weighed upon his mind almost
as heavily as Cuthbert. For strange
change had come upon Mrs. Dyott. She,
so guileless, so confiding, had grown silent
and reserved. No one ever saw her weep,
but her eyes were always weary, misty,
and with weird far.off look in their blue
depths, as if they were forever looking for
something they had lost-always wistful,
pleading, pathetic. Were they seeking
for the boy she had lost-the little lad she
remembered staggering to her arms with
merry ringing laughter-the boy whose
new clothes for his first going to school she
could hardly see to mark legibly, for the
tears that rose so fast, and had to be dashed
away between every dip of the pen! Who
can read aught of the sublime mystery of
a mothers heart mourning over the back.
sliding of the child she brought into the
world? Ruthven grew almost to fear his
wife. Her dim eyes meeting his would
send a chill through every nerve in his
body.
He had never been a man of much relig-
ious profession; but now in these terrible
days he was driven to Gods feet by the
scourge of pain he learned to pray, more
with the heart than with the lips, perhaps
yet none the less fervently for that to
pray, not for himself, but for Alice, his
wife, that heaven would have pity on her
suffering soul, and lift the cloud that was
darkening her life.
About this time an old friend came to
visit Alice Dyott, one of those friends
whom it is given to some women to make,
oftentimes truer, fonder and more faithful
than those to whom the ties Of kindred
bind us ever so closely.
"Let your boy come home with me for
awhile, said this good friend to Ruthven,
when her stay under his roof drew to a
close your wife is breaking her heart
over him."
"I know it," said Ruthven, his head
sinking on his breast /; "who better, And
yet am helpless can do nothing"
"Oh, yes. you can y said his oom-
panion. "You can let Cuthbert come to
us. He is my godson, you know; so 1
have some claim to part and lot in
him"
"What will your husband say %
"What, James He'll say I'm the
most sensible little woman in the world !;
he always does, you know"
"Wlth cause, too, answered Ruthven
with smile.
So Mrs. James Coveney had her way,
and Cuthbert left home for time, an ar.
rangement in which. after long talk with
her friend Ian interview from which Mrs.
Coveney came forth with no eyes to speak
of, but in which Alice shed no single tear,
his mother quietly acquiesced.
The Dyotts at this period of their lives
were living in London. Mr.. and Mrs.
Coveney dwelt far north. in lovely nest
of place among the English lakes so
Cuthbert found little similarity between
the life he went into and the life he had
left, and, for time at all events, the ex-
citement of change must-so his father
thought-tend to keep bad habits in abey.
ance.
Mrs. Coveney wrote at intervals, but
beyond a general cheeriness of tone, moth
ing very definite could be gathered from