Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1886-08-26
FORTHCOMING OF EVIL.
Strange Presentfments of Death.

A lady whom would not care to annoy
by giving her name, the wife of mer-
chant doing considerable business in a
country town between Cleveland and
Toledo, says writer in the Cleveland
Leader, from being lively and vivaci-
Gus CO mpanlon among her lady friends
became all at once very much of a re
cluse, and whenever she CHANGED to meet
an acquaintance she wore so solemn
cOuntenance as to attract no incOnsidera-
bic attention, and at last her old friends
began to indulge in remarks about the
wonderful change that had come over
her. She one day visited friend who
had known her all her days, and this
friend insisted on knowing what great
calamity had wrought such a change in
department. After a slight pause the
lady answered by saying that she really
did not know. It was not dream, nor
was it a vision. It came to her partly in
the form of the one and partly in the
form Of the other, not when she was
sleeping nor yet when she was broad
awake, but whenever she was in a sort of
doze. 1t was as vivid as any dream, and
Impressed itself upon her brain as firmly
as if she had beheld it with her own eyes
when broad awake. It had come to her
not once or twice, but many times, and al
ways the same-the same in it's beginning
and the same in its ending. By it
she had become fully impressed with
the idea that her husband was
IN some way to be nearly but not quite
killed, and in this condition he was to re-
main on and on, neither fully living nor
yet entirely dead, his property constantly
wasting, his temper becoming mOrOse and
nDlV until at last
and she required repose his support and
her own would devolve entirely upon her
own feeble efforts. This, in short, was
her story, the cause of all her woe. Her
friend tried to persuade her that it was
all an Illusion, and urged her to Danish
the thought from her mind and cheer up.
But 1t was all in vain. Time passed on
only short time-when one day a clerk
rushed to the house with the fearful but
unexpected announcement that the mer-
chant was dying, and that some men were
bringing him home. He had been strick-
ed with paralysis, and from his lips to his
toes was not materially different from a
dead man. And thus he remained His
property, somewhat encountered, was not
long in being wasted, and step by step
the poor woman saw only the inevitable,
and prepared for it as best she could by
taking in work from her neighbOrs,
many of whom few years ago were but
too happy to perform similar service
for her.
Colonel Webster, on the morning of
his death on the battle field, rose much
earlier than usual, bathed, changed all
his clothing, putting on his best and
cleanest remarking the while that he
would to the extent of his ability honor
his father and his name by dying in as
respectable condition as possible, and he
did.
Though he made no definite announce
ment of a premonition of the time and
place of his death, his brother officers re-
garded his conduct as sufficiently signii-
can't of what was bearing upon his mind
and which actually occurred few hours
later.
1 remember reading, when boy,
newspaper account of the death of
bridge-tender upon the Merrimac river,
near Newberryport, Mass, which at the
time struck me quite forcibly, and which
more than fifty years has failed to efface
from my memory. The bridges then up
on navlgable water were arranged differ
emily from what they are at the present
time. Instead of swinging laterally away
from the channel, two sections of the
bridge were arranged to open perpendicu-
larly, leaving an ample way for vessels to
pass. One man could manage one of
these Old-style bridges. When building
bridges over navigable water the duty of
constructing draw was of the first i'm
portance, as in the early days when rail
ways were unknown schOOners and slOOps
and packets were the most efficient We
hicles In the carrying trade between sea-
board towns. Thus it was upon the Mer-
rimac. Several towns upon that river
situated above Newberryport bridge de-
rived their principal Importance from
this traffic, and the bridge-tender had lit
tie leisure on the incoming and outgoing
of the tide, which alone rendered naViga-
ton possible. One day as the bridge
tender sat chatting with a number of his
neighbOrs, he expressed the conviction
that his end was near at hand; that on the
hood-tide to-day he was to be called to
open the bridge for the Schooner Cordelia
to pass up; that she would remain up
stream over one tide, and that when she
passed the bridge on her way to sea he
would fall and die at his post of duty.
''The schooner Cordelia?" says one of
his hearers, ''there is no such schooner on
the river"
''Very true," says the bridge tender
''but see by the Boston papers that the
schooner Cordelia, Captain Trefethern, is
plying between Boston aid the Piscata-
qua, up as far as Dover. She may drift
this way, and if she does I shall take it
for granted that she will not make the
sea before l am gone to my long home"
few hours at most would tell what re-
lance to put in the bridge-tender's
conviction. The wind was blowing
fresh from the sea, and many
sails were already blowing land
ward inside of Plum Island Bar. Present
ly the white sail of a schooner standing
out in mid-channel as though bound up
the river came plainly into view. On and