The Carbon advocate. [volume] (Lehighton, Pa.) 1872-1924, 1884-03-15

ont in a long weary line toward the re-
motest West. She was with her people
her parents, brothers and sisters, and
some other relatives, if remember cor
rectly This young lady, girl of elgb-
teen, gifted, graceful. good TO her par
ents, full OF affection, was suffering
from an uncomfortable fear of the Nor
mons. Her people, she told my father
in terrified whispers, were from the same
settlement the Mormons originally start
ed from, ana she knew that her people
would be Judged" by the Danites when
they came to Salt Lake, on their journey
to California.
1t subsequently appeared, however.
that she had not told quite all the truth
There really had been serious trouble
between her father and the Mormons
nearly year before. And this was the
nature of it. The Mormons had grown
mp in the settlement where the girls
people lived, and were all mixed up
among the neighbors. 1t was not easy
to say who was Mormon aud who was
not. Converts were new and numero rs
A man might be "Gentile" to-day and
II Mormon to morrow.
| One Of the busy women one of the
meddlesome and mischievcus kind found
in all camps who knew this poor girl:
history better perhaps than she suspect
ed, told the secret of her marriage to one
of the new Mormon elders. 1t was g
forbidden marriage too marriage or
discovery of which her father bad be
cJme very furious, aud loud with threats
to all Mormons. 1t was true, this busy
and meddlesome woman said, as she
gadded about, as such busy women will
when idle in camp, that the Mormon
elder to whom she was sealed had
n -ver quite got possession of her; that
/ er father even did not know his daugh-
ter's pretended husband, had never seen
him in fact. But for all that, the girl
had been married or "sealed" to a Nor
mon elder; aud trouble was going to
come of it. That was why her father
was taking her out Of the country and
away to California, Missed this garrulous
aud medilesome woman; that was why
she looked so sad and seemed so fright.
ened all the time, continued the CAD
ding and gurrulous woman, mysteri-
ously.
Now oil in tue world that my father
did on hearing the story Of this beauti.
ful and terrified girl, was to 60 to her
people, who were camped close by our
tent, and advise, even protest, that they
should take some other route to the re-
mote West than this one that lay by
Salt Lake Surely this WAS not much.
Yet it was enough to put our little Sun
day train in perpetual terror of "judg-
ment" from the Danites as we pushed on
across the plains. We did not see this
/ Miss Lane, the Mormon elders wife" 4"
again for months Her father either did
not see at to be advised, or, which is
more likely, found it impossible then TO
turn aside and seek another route, and
so crossed the Missouri, as if il we're a
sort of Rubicon, and pushed on ahead.
As he had horses and We only oxen, and
then, too, as be travelled on Sundays, his
party had soon left our little Sunday
train long way behind,
Aud obi what motley mass Of weary
people went stretching away, helpless,
/ daZed, dying, across the sands toward
the setting sun! There were some men
with but single horse to carry their
| food and blankets. Some men we're on
foot and alone, There was man and
his wife with a single OK between the
shafts Of cart Many men had little
hand-earts which they pushed OF drew
along, sad aud silcut, as some one of
their number fell dead by the way.
Some men had wheelbarrows. Every
day We passed dead cattle, deserted
wagons, carriages, by the roadside
Every night by some little stream We
eamped amid new-made graves.
But there was one conveyance, and
one traveller, too, in all this mass OF
moving, struggling, dying humanity.