Lancaster daily intelligencer. [volume] (Lancaster, Pa.) 1864-1928, 1886-05-01

therefore hardly characteristic, aud struck |
her for the moment, in an artistic sense, Gu
wet, dull afternoon, that she should ieel al.
most moved by the everyday incident of
Henry aud the dory and the fog. He seemed
20 her suddenly like asynbol OF the piteous
Fairharbor life rs one puts an eagle, an ar
row, shield, or whatever, upon The seal ot
a commonwealth or upon coin, 80 fairhar-
bor might take Henry so she gave up her
vigorous young life that " went down to the
sea In ships and so ghosts before their
time, her doomed men trod her shores
." believe 1 must stop and see Ellen salt |
about some laces," said Miss Ritter, upcer-
tainly, to the lady boarder, with daisies and |
y mandarin paraso, now pulpy with the log, |
and Offering acute temptation to stick ones |
finger between the ribs--the lady who joined |
her on the beach. 1t did not matter about
the laces, but il msttered to have to talk To
that stack Of daisies just then. The lsdy's
leather belt was tight, and the flowers seemed
to gasp as il they had got into corsets.
This was the lady who always complained
of the break fasts and knew how often every
gentleman i'm the hotel came to his wife
She was an idle, pretty. silly thing ahnor-
mally, one might say inhumanly, luxurious.
She wore thirty thousand dollars worth of
diamonds, because it was understood she
was afraid to leave them in the hotel rooms.
she gave three dollars to the subscription tor
the Fairharbor widows OF two hundred men
drowned last year she had acquired a the
ory that one must not make paupers.
As Helen Ritter struck oil alone through
the fog, down the lane, behind the wildrose
thicket, under the willow trees, and against
the big bowlders, to Mrs. salts little, old,
unpsinted ottsge-picturesquely gray aud
proportionally damp-she was thinking
neither OF the daisy and diamond boarder
nor of two hundred drowned fishermen, nor
even of Ellen Jane and the week y wash.
So far AS her thoughts had organization
rather than pulp, and might have been nau-
tically termed more conscious than ieily-tsh,
she was thnkiug-still iii that same anus,
ing, outside, artistic sense--of herself: look
ing ON, rs she looked on at the summer peo-
pie and the fishermen, with an unimpas-
stoned, critical eye.
Too well We all know those mad or inspired
moments generally ours on dull afternoons
when we seem to catch up the whole of lite
at a handful, and iling it from us utterly in a
kind OF scorn that may be wholly noble or
trivial, according to the impulse of the mo
ton or the direction Of the aim.
Shet Helen Ritter, of Beacon street, Boston,
twenty-eight years old, an orphan, q Brah-
man orch, If one stopped to think of that,
and a beauty, member OF the Trinity church
and the Brain club, subscriber to the provi-
dent association, and stockhoder in the Atb-
enieum, fond OF her maid, her relatives, her
oric.a-brac and her way, walking to her wash
woman's through the fog, and suffering one
of these supreme moments, could have flung
her whole personality into Nirvaua or tue
ocean by one sweep of her white-clad arm
that day, and felt well rid OF it To bs sure,
nothing had happened.
That, perhaps, was the trouble?
"l am type said the young woman
| aloud. b" 1 am nothing but a type | have
| no use nor name nor tame under the skies,
| beyond standing for the representative, like
| people that make the groups in tourists pho
| tographs. l may thank heaven If don't do
it inartistically, ! suppose and meanwhile
| pay my laundresS. l wonder why | keep
| on coming TO Fairhar5or ~
| Why, indeed ? Helen Ritter to Helen Rit-
| ter, in the scorn of her heart and the depth
| oft, would give no answer to that question,
| but HIT it with her fine, cool look as she
would any other social intruder, aud pass Il
by upon the other side. She was young,
tor life to have come to what She called It-
end.
Yet the light of a whole lite dies,
when love IS done,'
sang the musical boarder in the hotel parlor
beyond the rose thicket The east wind bore
| the sound over the powders, through the
willow boughs, driving with the fog, rs i
| both had been ghosts from the hidden sea.
| Why cling to the old spot where the light
| of life had once been kindled and quenched
| Why dog, like a spirit unreieased, tn,
| haunts of that blessed and accursed vitality
| No. no. She could not curse it; no. Whom
| or what had she TO curse Fate, perhaps
| or accident, or u mans terrible duiiness oi
| intellect before the nature of the woman ht
| loves, or her own doom, or her own - way
| that unlucky way which a. often wrpugh
| her mischief from being misunderstood Al
| from being 10 blame. but which was none tn
| less likely 10 be u blame for that.
| The mind has IA thousand eyes"
| sang the summer hoarder with laboriousl,
| accelerated emphasis for the gentlemen hat
come in from tns beach, and were listening
| "The mind has a thousand eyes,
And The heart but one
| Yet the light of "A whole lite dies
| when love Is dOne.n
| " Well, there - said Ellen Jane Salt, a. Dc
| come in out OF this thick weather. EOg''
| good for your flannel dress bleach it out
| but my amt you sloppy? You got drab
| bled on the beach. just you step up sgen
my tubs and let me wash out that hem o.
your'n jest rs you be. I'll stand you up to
| the stove after, and dry you up "A mite, too,
and iron you of, and you'll be slick as ever.
Pity did you up only last Saturday, You
know There I'm drove to death but
can't stand seem good washin' spoiled lik 0
that-and you, too, punctual as You are with
season besides. No the laces wasn't extry.
thank you. I'd be ashamed II couldn't do
bit of valingcens for yoH But there |
was up till two o'clock this mornin' ironin'
Mrs. Hannibal T. larrowstone's auted
nigh h'gownds Obread lace, every scrap
She had six. I'm drove out of my wits, and
Rate had 10 have one OF his spells at three
poor little fellow just as ia got snooze ia
my close atop of the bed spread, for it was so
hot with the heavy ironin' fire, and us so
near the coog-stove. There !"
70 be continued