The Pulaski citizen. [volume] (Pulaski, Tenn.) 1866-current, 1886-04-08
TAKING THE VEIL.

| anu III RICdG COO1Co,
whirlpools and seething currents seem
to be undergoing some terrible convul
sion of pain at being confined between
the barriers of the levees. Immediatel,
above and below this sweeping bend
moved along with something like ma
jesty in its smooth, broad surface, ant
creates an impression of its Titani,
power perhaps far greater than where i
bubbles and boils, twists and turns il
discontinue at being forced to chang,
its straight, onward rush to the sea t.
conform to the idiosyncrasies of the ir
regular banks. Here and there tn,
branches of partially submerged willows
were swaying to and fro moved by tn,
impetuous current, and RATS of drift
wood, gathered by the eddy from the
great masses floating down, kept up theil
slow revolution some twenty yards from
the bank. Every little while portions OF
this confused aggregation of trees
branches, twigs, fence rails and othel
hotsam, always seen in high water on
the Mississippi, would be caught by the
main current and go sweeping down as
if glad to part company with the heter-
ogenous mass it had just left. Deadman's
Eddy was known in those days by all the
steamboatmen, and few of them cared to
put the noses of their boats into it on a
dark night, for it had reputation that
was anything but inviting. Numbers of
boats had their wheels disabled by the
accumulated drift. and one or two had
been snagged within the boundaries of
this ominously named portion of the
river.
Opposite Deadman's Eddy, embowered
in grove of stately live oaks, stood the
large plantation house of the Cavellier
family, roOmy, comfortable building
belonging to the Creole Rtyle of archi-
lecture that probably affords more shade
and ventilation to the square foot than
any other known to southern climates.
1t stood about 200 yards back from the
levee, and the intervening space was
! laid out in parterres of roses and palms,
camelias and sweet olive.
| Neither the quiet charm of the land
scape, the delicious atmosphere of per-
| fume, nor the ravishing pearl shower of
! bird notes produced anything like the
effect on a visitor to this place that
the queenly beauty of Marguerite Cavel-
lier did. A brunette of %, her eyes had
set more guitars drumming in bach
elor's quarters along the river than any
! other belle ever known thereabouts, and
her face had flooded the table of the ed
itor of L'Abeille, in New Orleans, with
hundreds of poems, some of them writ
ten, it must be admitted, in questionable
French, but all warm, passionate and de-
voted. She was tall, with the figure of
some of those delicately phiseled Grecian
~ and vonccaaOaA of a hot
was so perfectly natural and free from
constraint it left with everybody the inn
preston that they had been intimate
friends of hers for years. She did not
know what guile or dupGcity was, and
with the naivete of a child would reprove
or compliment the action regardless of
any thought of the actor. Every negro pic
aninny on the plantation worshiped her
with a blind idolatry as something en-
tirely supernatural and not of this earth.
Her voice was low and musical, and
when her great black eyes were fixed on
the listener the effect was almost mag
netic. The French word svelte applied
to her most appropriately. To see her on
horseback in the morning galloping along
the river road, followed by her gayly-
dressed negro boy was sight well worth
the trouble of early rising, at least so
thought Edouard de Montpre, the strug-
Cling young attorney of the parish. No
matter how late he may have been pour
ing over his books endeaEoring to fix in
his memory precedents and leading cases
he never missed his promenade on the
levee just at that hour when the young
equestrienne came cantering along. A
lifted hat and deferential bow was al
ways paid for by a bewitching smile and
wave of the hand, and the lawyer for the
rest of that day saw that face peering
into his own over the back of his Hen
mems digest, and out of the panels of his
not too well filed bookcase. On his
fathers death city merchants had sold
out the Grand Bosquet plantation under
many mortgages, and the only surviving
son was left with an athletic form, good
disposition and excellent education as the
only legacies from the Montpre estate.
Everybody along the coast, as the banks
of the Mississippi river was called by the
residents in those days, esteemed the
young man and applauded him in his ef-
forts to re-establish the paternal name.
He visited the Cavelliers once or twice
a month, but his sef-pride imagined
that his receptions there were not as
cordial on the part of the venerable host
as they might have been, and this he at
tributed to his own modest purse.
1t would be pleasant writing to tell
how the friendship between the lawyer
and Marguerite ripened into an init
macy that soon developed into pure
and deep love. The Cavellier family, al
though opposing De Montpre's frequent
visits, were all of them under the sweet
influence of Marguerite, and could re-
fuse her nothing.
"Edouard," she said, twas so different
from the othef callers, and she never
saw him without learning something
ne was so gifted and knew SO much,
And so it was within a year after her
return from the convent they were en-
gagged, Mons. Cavellier agreeing to give
the young man the Belle Colombo place,
on the other side of the river, for a start
after marriage.
In the midst of that beautiful season
of contemplated love and betrothal, the
old plantation house was startled by the
report brought from New Orleans that
the state of Louisiana had seeded, and
troops were being raised for war. The
news spread rapidly. People that hith-
erto had taken little or no part in polit-
ical affairs began 70 discuss the situation.
Col. Lafferranderie, an old army officer
had established his headquarters at the
Cutoff postoffice, not far distant from |
the Cavellier place, and young men were
enrolling In scores. The conversation |
around the dinner tables now was de |
voted to the new artillery company Of
Capt So-and-so, or the splendid chas-
seurs a-peid of young Molaison of the ad-
joining parish. Edouard MontpFe caught
the infection. Forty young men ten
iered him their captaincy, and in three
weeks he and his men were on a steam
boat hound for the Crescent City. /
The parting of Edouard and Marguerite
was most tender and affecting. The men
of the company, long afterward, around
the camp fires in the mountains of Vir-
yinia, frequently talked of it, and not
little of the love and soicitude for their
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