The Abilene reflector. [volume] (Abilene, Kan.) 1883-1888, 1885-04-09
FABLE THE sECoND.-CoxT1SuED.

1Ic ii cOIn6 ana STAY Will US at Mill OT
for year, and take a holiday of hi,
own; and when the years out, and hc
is broken a Bit out of his own ways
he'll stay on another, and another, anC
another, for as long as he's spared
He'll always be Blackthorn, of Ley.
Croft, you see; the land will always bt
his, whether he lives there or no, only
the trouble will be off his hands. Dc
you see? He'll lose neither the land
nor you So the long and the short Of
it is, I'm off tomorrow 20 Manchester
to buy you plain gold ring. Wen be
narried here, and then start for Mill.
port, all three, as soon as PrestOns
send down their man to see to the farm
and I've put him in the way. Darling,
we will all be so happy there, as happy
as the days are long.
And so she knew, or thought, as well
as he. But she had grown so happy
already during hcr season of troth-
plight that she would willingly have
heightened it out without limit; and,
now that mdrriGge was brought face
TO face with her as a fact, the very idea
of any greater happiness than the pres
ent assumed sort of awe. One can
but be happy-how can any change
make is more?
stephen" she said, looking up into
his face, whatever You wish, [ wish
too. If trying will do it, YOU shall be
L., Ia,,,f,-+ in
Darling! You'll make me that with
out trying said he. Give me your
finger please. No; not that. the fourth.
of the left hand. Where's my measur-
ing tape? Oh, here"
The surveyor got to work, and meas
ured that vast estate which lies be-
tween the knuckles and the first joint
of the fourth finger of the left hand OF
girl.
The morning after this happy even
ing, Farmer Marrish, though it was but
eight o clock, had gone over well-nigh
every inch of every field, had seen
every man and woman at his and her
task, and had done a good deal of hard
head-work besides For he was one OF
those farmers, rare and often misunder-
stood folk in those simple times, who
put brains into the soil. He never did
a single thing without knowing the rea-
son why; and so Though this does not
by any means follow he prOspered
while others failed. So one can only
Judge that the brains he used were eX-
cellent brains. Returning to the house,
a square, squat, stone building, without
a green leaf about it to break its stare,
and standing between a straw-yard and
a garden without a blossom, he cooked
for himself, in saucepan, about pint
of exceedingly thin Cruel, and ate it,
from the same vessel, with an iron
spoon. The meal was cheap, if not sat
isfying: but then there was the gratiti-
cation of feeling, with every mouthful,
that it might have been beef or bacon,
so that, not being either, at every
mouthful something was saved, and
therefore something gained. There was
nobody to wait upon him, for Farmer
MarriSh kept no more hands about
house or land than were needful fOl
profitable work. and what profit could
there be ia keeping a cook OF
parlOr-maid when he had hands
of his own, and only his OWL
mouth to feed? He had breakfasted or
that thin Cruel, getting thinner anC
thinner, every day since he was one ant
twenty, and, Tough it made the body
lank. it made the pocket swell. HC
dincd mostly on bread and cheese, OF
cold bacon. that wanted no cooking a
all, except on Sunday. when he made
potatoes and the weeks odds and end,
into hot stew. to avoid waste; and he
Suppcd on cruel again, with a singl,
tumhler of rum. He did keep ale fol
his men. because in those days to work
on water was thing undreamed of
but even those ready and uncrit.ca
omnibibants. who he'd as a general rule
that beer was beer, were driven tC
grumble. at times. of the SmallnesS OF
Welstead brew. He would dine with i
neighbor when invited, and would then
spare no expense. since the expense was
not his own: but he kept no company
at all 1t need hardly be said, seeing
that half the parish at least. and not :
few of the tradeSmen of Manchester,
were in his debt. that nobody in all thai
country was more respected than he
nav. it was whispered that he had the
vicar himself under his thumb, and that
he could buy up the DigbyS themselves
who constituted the ar.stocratic element
of that part of the world. Nobody had
ever got the better of him in bargain,
and no eyes had ever seen the color OF
his money except his own.
And vet this man, sordid and grasp
ing as he was. and apparently with nc
thought beyond adding guinea to
guinea and field to field. vas made by
nature with passions of all kinds of in.
tensity such as is given to few to feel.
lone side of him had not been a miSer,
L. other would have gone through life
at gallop, or rather, at storm. His
magnificent self-command had come
from his setting out with the fixed re
solve of diving worth a certain sum; ol
rather, of making a certain sum in time
TO enioy it for a certain number o.
years before he died. For he was nc
fool; he did not treat the making and
boarding of money as an end. He
fully meant some day to have his fling
and he preferred to have it at the latter
end of life, when he should be able tc
afford it, rather than at the beginning,
when he started upon WelStead com.
paratively poor man, in whose eyes
Tom Blackthorn was a millionaire.
However. As the time went on. crcrit
amor nunlDli, passion gradually went
to sleep, and when the sum at which he
had aimed At the outset was made and
saved even before the time, he found
that he ought to have aimed at a few
Thousand more before he began tC
spend.
Yet, even in the best-planned life