Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1886-04-09

STOOD IN the dull, musty entry, and shout
ed, "Agee Sang Long !" and / was about to
repeat II when queer sounds proceeding from
a room opening near by struck my ear.
knocked, and as no one heard me, l turned
the door-knob and entered poor little room,
with the light of day creeping feebly through
two small windows that were CROSS barred by
gnarled and stalky remains of ancient grape.
vines on tumbling trellises. Everything but
two great wash-tub bs was very dminutive and,
az hastily noticed scrupuousy clean. But
there was only thing distinctly saw. In the
middle Of the bare floor, on a wooden crick.
ct, stood a small rude pine box, aud IN il,
surrounded by winter green, and about his
neck new ribbon lay my patient of yester-
day. Beside the box orouohed Agee Sang
Long, her head against the box, and sobbing
bitterly, aud on a chair at it's foot stood
music box, which cheerfully and monoton.
ously ratified out THE Beautiful Blue Dan
ube" waltz
"Agee why, Agee Sang Long,"
At the touch of my hand she looked up
with frightened eyes and haggard face.
"Oh, docto he dice Him all frien
hab, " she sobbed. "Dey pizen him, and
hab no frien' mo-"
Then she rose, with something Of Oriental
composure and politeness aud put her own
grief momentarily aside to attend to me.
1T is only a cat, Agee," 1 suggested, awk-
wardy. There are plenty of cats in the
world you will find pets enough"
She looked at me with patient wonder, and
aspasm crossed her ugly face.
"Wha' dice, dice. l lub no cat mo-"
AL this time the air was rent with The
Blue Danube"
who poisoned your cat Z" I asked.
"De peopr in do house. Dsy ha' me cos
| Chinee. Dcy wan me turn ou' oh de
house"
She said this with unA nohing composure.
She hardly pitied herself it was all fatality.
"Do they i'll treat you 2" l asked indig-
nantly
DE man ob de house be drinkee, and when
he drinkee he ha' all Chinee Dey try to
pizen 1. Dey pizen he" She turned back
aud patted her dead friend.
looked at her aghast. All this persecu-
tion against harmless, lonely creature in this
nineteenth century. as il, by the grace OF
God, we were in the Dark Ages
Are you all alone in the world z"
Yes Not in pity at all simply as q
fact-a fatality.
Look here, Agee," said, az l left the
room, "If these wretches annoy you in any
way, come to me and will see that we put
stop to II all.
As tuin.d into Paris court was 80 indig-
nant that for moment / forgot my own
pressing cares. II was a very cold evening"
and the sharp wind swept up all small OBJ
jscts and Whired them round the corners.
was going at swinging pace, buried in
wrath, when something came putting up be
hind me aud pressed against my legs with
piteous Whines | looked down, and found
it WAS a dog. Such a dog Never in my
life had / seen so pitiful cur. Thin and
lank, spindle legged, and so emacated that
his ribs were all outside, aud covered with
pink-white hide, he was perfect albino Of a
dog. lu race he was terribly diluted bull
dog, and one pink eye ggzed trustfully at me
out Of a black surrounding, the only bit Of
color upon his ungainly person. He shiver-
ed and whined aud waved AI emaciated tail,
and when | went on he folio we'd me as close.
ly as il he were an ancient retainer. felt
that be ref -cted discredit upon me, and l
vainly endeavored, by suggesting rats, to
lure him into byways.
When reached Mrs. MacRruder's l sneak.
cd into the house, and left him whining and
shiverpg on the steps. l took of my over
coat in my Office, and stirring the fire, sat
down in its blaze. Unfortunately l heard
that wretched dog howl outside, till at last
could bear It no longer so | opened the door
and let him in. lie required no pressing in
vitatiou, but sat contentedly in the humblest
place by the fire, and gazed at me with blink
iuB eyes ulh Jaws open, anu ulb fungus hue-
ly displayed. II ever / saw dog smile,
that was the dog and he beat the floor with
his tail in a way 1 knew was meant to be CON-
plimentary and grateful.
dont know why | thought of Agee Sang
Long as gazed into his melancholy eyes,
but felt instinctvely that these two belong
ed together. So the next morning. after
breakfast such as he never dreamed of in all
his widest dog dreams l took him to my
Chinese friend. She looked at us without
surprise, and accepted him, when offered by
me, as another bit of fatality.
He'll be company for you, Agee, l urged,
land shouldn't be surprised If he we're a
good Watchdog" This | remarked doubt
fully. the ancient retainer having brought no
reference as to character. Nor was his pedi-
gree AS exhibited in his counteuanoe reassur-
ing; but somehow he looked Trustworthy.
and instantly proved to be dog of no preju-
dice by cuddliug up to Agee and holding out
a paw until the little woman took it in one Of
her hard worked hands.
GOO doggee," she said, and looked CRATE
fully into his pink eyes.
Whether it was instinct or a trick we never
knew, but he was only too happy when he
could cuddle up to some one with his paw in
their hand. At night, when Agee's work was
dOne-she scrubbed, washed aud ironed, and
did chores for living-she locked the door,
and then she and the dog would sit by the
fire, side by side, he with an afectionate paw
in her left hand, while her right held, upside
down, tine breviary she could not read.
Beside them on a chair, 30 close that none
Of its delicious strains could be lost, the mu-
sic box ground out The Beautiful Blue Dan
ube, ," Agee listening reverently. This music
box was her Joy. After years of toll she
saved twenty dollars, and not without deep
IA oh IA in a huriaI Nil fnr
she longed TO rest peacefully in death, she
who in life had been so tossed about the
rest she invested in this precious music-box.
1t is unnecessary to say that she was cheated,
for it is the privilege OF civilization to get
the better of heathens However, she listen
ed to The Beautiful Blue Danube" and
Comm through the Rye" with profound
joy, heathendom and Christendom battling
in her breast sometimes when she yearned TO
consider the music box as something divine
But Christendom conquered, for she was q
Christian.
Years aud years ago she was converted
and every Sunday morning she trotted to the
cathedral with her yearbook that she could
not read clasped to her Chinese breast, and
as surely as the martyrs of old she suffered
persecution on the way. The people fright
ened her, but particularly the children, and
she only felt safe and at peace kneeling on
the stone hoor with her head bowed on her
breast and her yellow hands folded humbly.
Then it seemed to her as if she was not so very
different from the people about. To be sure,
they would edge away, and sometimes in the
interval of prayer, hard Irish face gared
contemptuously at her, but she expected no
better. There was a peace here in the light
Of the cleaning candles on the high altar,
and the sunlight falling through the beauti-
full gold aud scarlet windows, out Of which
people with kind divine faces looked down
upon their poor sister, not clad in scarlet and
gold and azure, but ugly and forsaken, and
yet not so far removed from them, as God
ces men and their deeds and suffering.
Forty years before, a Salem sea-captain
brought her over from China as a nurse to
his little child and somehow she stranded on
civilization, and never returned to her uDeles.
tial Kingdom. She was utterly alone in the
world, not a woman of her race in any place
around, and society was banded against her
The ladies of Irish extraction who took in
washing and scrubbed perseouted her for
daring TO do the same. They did her all the
mischief they could, and succeeded in all but
killing her. Ill-smelling po wders we're thrown
into her room, gunpOwder was put in her
coal, and water on her hre-wood her cat
was poisoned, and a sick sparrow she saved
from wind and weather was freed from its
cage and few away. She did not complain,
abe did not think of revenge, and-oh, for
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