, 1886-07-17
A DRUMMER'S STORY.

been college chtlns. ana Tonight, wien
| was leviling the luck that had left me
showed in at a miserable East Tennessee
station with n pack full Of our best goods
and an engagement 200 miles ahead, |
had collided on the slippery platform
with another angry and belated passen-
ger. Excuse me-" in a growing duet, a
lifting of Indifferent eyes, and we grasped
hands for the first time since our part
ing amid the excitement of a college
commencement.
And now, with n handful of others
who had abandoned the blocked train for
the comfort of n rousing log fire, and a
hot bite and sup, we sat talking of the
many things that crowd upon long-parted
friends, bridging the past with the pres
ent. The present, in his case, representing
nothing more substantial than unsettled
old bachelorhood, while mine had n solid
showing of a wife and babies, whose
pictures / exhibited with ~pardonable
pride. The past, in those exterior inc
physical features which represent the
vicissitudes of fortune and circumstance
was hastily gone over and the discovery
made that by a singular coincidence each
had abandoned the career upon which
he had entered On leaving college and
wandered into the itinerancy of a COM
mercial travellers life. Then we went
back to the old college days.
Trimble's question evoked two images
one sun-crowned like a young god the
embodiment oil eager anticipation, the
other wrapped in darkness, the incar-
nation of remorse. / murmured, Poor
Clemens !"
Predicating an opinion on recollections
of certain boyish tendencies, and accept
ing my half unconscious exclamation as
q cue, Trimble answered himself Z: "Gone
to the 'demnition bow vows has he?
Had n stripe Of the saint and a streak of
the devil in him. l always said he
would be one or the other. Poor old
chap Well, Pm sorry"
NO" said l, mot in the sense you
mean. He is rigidly honest, much re-
spected, and as sober as a Quaker; fact
Is, people think he is n little of on that
subject, but he is a man who has lost all
interest IN life, m has buried himself
out OF sight OF he world, like a hermit.
His farm is only ten miles from Belview,
one of the prettiest towns in Georgia,
and he has not been in for thirteen years
not since the trial"
Trial" exclaimed Trimble, you don't
say il was anything as bad as that?'
aYes II vvos about no had az II could
be. and has wrecked him. II struck him
in the weakest marta mart which under
other circumstances MIGHT have de-
welcomed into his strongest and best-bis
morbid shrinking from hurting ANYTHING
the utter absence in him of crIeltvV
bordering almost ON efreminocv II does
seem strange that what 90 strongly rc.
sembled virtue should become the in.
strument of his most exm,isite torture
a\yell. said Trimble flIino in Tho
nause that followed this reflection
athouob do mot know wbar has hefalIen
him. lie was not the sort of fellow |
should hive thoroht would turn ont n
crank"
~Guy de Maupassant sovs.rI re ioined.
u into the solitude in which every soul
dwells no other soul NAV penetrate.'
Who. then. NAV assert that he knows
what imnulses dormant and active ra-
side in that unyisited temple? Yes. wa
thought we knew all there was of
Clemeus He seemed possessed of an
emiuently social nature seeking in all
things sympathv and comnanionsbin.
esa. study was irL.s.ne, -. know he.
cause II must needs be solitary. A
thorough good fellow, generous, high
spirited, full of fun, richly endowed with
talent: might have made himself any
thing he chose. he was, too, the most
magnetic man / ever knew. The very
professors, with whom he was perpetu-
ally in disgrace, loved him, and the girls
would have spoiled any other fellow with
their petting, but he took it as n matter
of course. Did it ever strike you, though,
that while he attracted he never led. He
seemed to lack some quality that makes
men leaders,.
Yes assented Trimble; ~go on. am
very much interested
"Well, he went home that summer,
you remember, intending to take a course
of law at one of our universities, but the
term did not-open until fall. The family
lived ON the farm and he went right
out there. He had lost his mother when
he was a little chap. There was a house
full of children, and they grew Up as
they are pretty apt t o do when nobody
in particular controls them. The Oldest
girl mothered the whole lot, and was the
oldest, most anxious and womanly girl
l ever knew. but she was, after ali. only
a sister, and there was as many different
/ dispositions among them as there were
children.
"The farm was n very fine one and
the old farmhouse MS hospitable and
pretty n place to rusticate and have n
quiet season of rest in as you would wish
to 500 lint that was inst whore il did NOT