The Brookhaven leader., 1883-05-10
THE BAR LIGHTHOUSE.

Government had for several wears
been sadly neglecting job of mending
in the case of the Bar Lighthouse
bridge. Here and there boards had be-
gun to spring suspiciOusly beneath UNI
wary footsteps; then the wind had be-
gun to tear them off, and the rain to rot
and molder them down. What was
every mans business was nobody's, and
no individual was disposed to interfere
with the province of that abstract mil
lionaire, the United States Government.
To be sure, the keeper of the Bar Light,
jackson Reed, who was naturally more
solicitous concerning the holding out of
the structure than any one else, had
wildly and fruitlessly patched some of
the worst places. off and on, after a
hard "northeaster," when he awoke
more kcenly to the exigencies of the
case, and the hopeless dilatoriness of
his task-master. But it had amounted
to very little. Long neglect had made
something more than mere patching
necessary. Now the quarter-mile bridge
leading to the Bar Lighthouse, if not
in an absolutely unsafe condition, was
not calculated to inspire any degree of
confidence in the unaccustOmed crosser
at least. 1t was not quite so bad at low
tide, or on a mild, still day. There
was not so much to fear then beyond a
little fall and a ducking; that is, if one
cleared one of those ragged apertures
successfully. But on dark night,
with the winds bowling over it, and the
ocean laundering beneath it, it was the
sort of bridge that only dsembodied
spirit could be supposed to cross with
any degree of nOnchalance.
The lighthouse itself was only an or
binary Westinghouse, strongly built,
with tower for the light 1t stood on
a massive pile of rocks, with little tufts
of coarse vegetation in the clefts. Jack
son Reed, who had an unfortunate love
and longing for garden spot, had ac-
tually wheeled enough earth over from
the mainland for a little patch a few
yards square, and when he was not en-.
gagged in a fruitless struggle with the
broken bridge he was engaged in fruit
less struggle with his garden. Apotter-
ing old man was Jackson Reed, lacking
in nervous force and 9uickness of intel
lect; but he had never let the light gC
out, and the only thing that is absolutel,
required of lighthouse keeper is t.
keep the light burning for the sailor.
who steer by it.
The wonder was that his wife Sarai
should have been his wife. She was
person not of a different mold merely
but of different kind; not of differen
species, but different genus. Nervou.
and alert, what her husband accepted il
ell oh Il
remonstrance and questioning. Hel
husband patched the bridge, crawling
over its long reach on his old knees
she rallied, as she watched him, at the
neglect of Government. He uncom.
plainingly brushed the sand from hi.
little, puny, struggling plants, and she
set her thin face against the wind thai
cast it there.
In both, the religious element or cast
of mind was strongly predominant, but
jackson Reed simply looked out on
Nature and into his own soul, and took
in as plain incontrovertible facts the
broken bridge, the tossing sea, his little
wind-swept, sand-strewn garden-patch,
and God in Heaven. Neither proved
the other or nullified the other: thew
49, HtCfDs Dul heeQ.
looking out on the frail, unsafe bridge
which connected them with the main.
land, and the mighty, senseless sea
which had swallowed up her father end
brother whom she had idolized, and
the poor little tender green things trying
to live under her window, had seen in
them SO many dumb denials of either
Gods love and mercy or His existence.
She was rheumatic old woman now
almost helpless, in fact, unable to ster
without the help of her husband. Ane
she sat, day in and day out, at one o.
the sea-windows of her sitting-room
knitting, and holding her defiant OLD
heart persistently against the pricks.
The minister at Rye, jealous youn,
man, with an innocent confidence in hi
powers of holy argument, had visitet
her repeatedly, with the view of improv
ing her state of mind. She had joinet
the church over which he presided, il
her youth; Indeed. it was the churcl