The Portland daily press., 1883-02-26
TIE PRESS.
Luke-Colorado Park, 1878
BRET HARTE.

wot's that you're readin'?-a novel? A novel well,
darn my skinl
You a man grown and bearded, ana nis'lh sucn
Stuff about gals and their sweethearts! No wonder
Link Il mei~clar two hundred and never read
one In my life!
That's nv opinion o. novels. And ez to their lynn
They belonged to the Jedges daughtsr-the Jedge
who came up last year
On account of his lungs and the mountains and the
balsam o. ne and tr;
And his laughter well she read novels and that's
what's the matter with her.
Yet she was sweet on the Jedge, and stuck by him
Alone in the cabin up yer till she grew like a
ghost, all white;
She was on slip of a thing ez light and ez up and
away
Ez rifle-smoke blown through the woods, but she
wasn't my kind no way!
speakin' O gals-d'ye mind that house ez you rise
the hill,
A mile and half from Whites and jst above Mat
You do? Well now thar's gal! What you saw her?
y, come now, thar quitl
She was only bedevln you boys, for to me she don't
cotton one Bit
But what was talking of? o!the Jedge and his
Novels the whole day long, and 1 reckon she read
them abed,
on the porch where he sa
And twas how Lord Augustus said this and how
LADY Blanche" she said that.
But the sickest of all that herd, wos yarn that
they read bout a chap,
"Leathe stocking by NAME and hunter chock
full e. the greenest o. sap:
And they asked me to hear; but says: "Aiss Mabel
not any for me;
When likes kin sling my own lies, end tbet.chap
and shouldn't agree"
Yet somehow or other she always was sayin'
brought her to mind
OF folks about whom she had read, or suthin belize
Of tibet kind
And thar warnt no end o. the names that she gave
"Robin Hood "Leather-stociing.' t'Rob Roy',-o.
l tell you, the dritter was queer.
And yet eff she hadn't been spilled, she was harmless
enough in her way;
She could jabber in French to her dad, and they
said that she knew how to play,
And she worked me that shot-poueh up thar
which the man doesn't liv ez kin use,
And slippers-you see 'em down yer-ez would
cradle an lnjin's papoose.
Yet along them novels, you see she was was in
And then she got shy with her tongue, and at last
had bothing TO say;
And it waIn't unlil she left that she gave me ez
much ez a look.
And this the way it was: 1t was night when 1
KEN up here
To say to'em all good by, for reckoned to go for
AT sun up the day they left, 50 shook em all by
'Cept Mabel, and she was sick, ez they gave me to
understand
dawn, s me one;
Like little wayer O. mist, got up on the hill with
the sun:
Mis- Mabel 1t was, alone-all wrapped in a mantle
And she stood .here Straight in the road, with
touch o'the sun in her face.
And she looked at me right in the eye-rseen
suthin' like it before
When hunted a wounded doe to the edge o'the
Clear Lake shore,
And had my knee on its neck, and was,iest raisin
When it gave me look like that-well it got off
with its life.
eve are going to-day she said, "and I thought
would say od-by
To you in your own house, Luke-these woods and
the bright blue sky!
You've always been kind to us, Luke and papa has
found you still
As good as the air he breathes and wholesome as
Laurel Tree hill.
'.And wen always think of you, Luke, as the thing
we could not take away
The balsam that dwells in the woods, tie rainbow
tina, Lives in the spray.
And you'll sometimes think of me, Luke, as you
know you once used to say,
As rife smoke blown through the woods moment,
but never to stay
And then we shook hands. She turned, but sud-
dent she tottered and fell.
And caught her sharp by the waist, and held her
minit-well-
1t was only mint you know, that ez cold and ez
white she Jay
Ez a snow fake here on my breast, and then-well
she melted away
And was gone. And thar are her books but says
not any for me,
Good enough may be for some, but them and 1
mightn't agree.
They spilled decent gal ez might have made come
chap wife;
And look a Kel-elar two hundred-and never read
one in my lifei-