Nevada County picayune., 1886-11-10


 ling on the silvery film, the delic- ious fruits growing beneath-have you seen that, sir!"
 The pre- -Qaphaelite artist scratch ed his head with his brush and said:
 "Well, no, l ain't."
 "Will yon come and see it, sir!' l said. twill you make it immor. tai on your canvass?'
 The pre- Raphaelite artist re- piled.
 "Well, 1 wouldn't mind."
 I dld not care what he said so that he came. My object was not art; it was the white umbrella. l desired to have him seated where the eye of handsome Arnold's res tive Prince would fall upon him as he turned the corner of the garden walk, and to that very spot l be- guided my artist and there station ed him, and, when he had settled with Chinese precision to his spid er-web and blackberries. hid my self behind tree to enjoy the comic scenes I fully expected would follow.
 l heard handsome Arnold bid adieu to the ladies. l heard the batter of his horses feet upon the road, and in a moment more, 1 saw him come gayly on. a smile upon his handsome face, a rich color on his cheek-yOuth, health, strength, happiness expressed In every curve and outline of his statuesque form. The next instant Prince had seen the white artist and the white umbrella. And then-then, Heaven forgive me, not the anus ing spectacle of handsome Arnold's discontinue that 1 had hoped to see. He kept his seat, while Prince, rearing and plunging, dash ed wildly away with him toward a precipitous path along the cliff side and vanished like a mad thing with his rider still upon his back, going straight toward certain awful pre- cipice, which overhung the rocky river shore below.
 l cannot go on. They picked him mp just alive, no more, at the foot of that precipice, and they car ried him mere mass of broken bones and bleeding flesh back to the great hotel. Late at night l crept up stairs on my way to bed, and, passing Bell Burton's door, heard those low, heavy sobs that tell of a breaking heart issuing thence.
 "He cannot llve," the messenger had said, and was perhaps doubly a murderer. l thought seriously of adding to my crime by committing suicide that awful night.
 But poor Arnold did live. He had wonderful constitution, un' broken, as all the men who knew him knew. by dissipation of any kind, and it is hard to kill such a man. He lived, and strength re- turned to him at last; but no one could call him handsome Arnold any more. He had fallen on his face on the horrible, jagged rocks, and during his illness all his bonny brown hair had turned gray. No one would know him, they told me, and so powerfully had his beauty and his sweetness affected even men of coarse natures that they uttered these words for the most part with tears in their eyes. As for myself l had rather have seen ghost,
 Yet the sight was forced upon me. One day l received a note from him asking me to come to the hotel, and it was signed-Henry Arnold.
 I had no choice. I could not re fuse. I went to him.
 As saw him seated Tn a great arm chair in the room to which the waiter showed me--as he ad- vanced toward me, and l saw that he limped heavily-I wondered that he did not die. l felt the blood leaving my face, and l saw inc hot flush rise to his. as he no ticed the shock it gave me.
 He only said:
 "Sit down. II is kind ot you to come"
 l staggered to a chair, and saw