St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1888-11-12
A Sad Melody That Ended
With a Heart-Touching
Lullaby.
A Woman Tells the Story of
Her Life in Mu-
sic.
The Respectable Old Gentle
man Of Boston Who Saw
a Ghost.
Ed Murphy and the Diving
Feat That Fools the
Crowd.

The Baltimore American tells the
following exquisitely sad story: One
line morning young woman was walk
ing past the little house with roll of
music in her hand, when she heard a
melody from the piano coming through
the open window. Something in the piece
and the way the piano was handled,
attracted the girls attention, and she
stopped and listened. She grew so
much interested that she became bold
enough to ask an old woman standing
in the door, who lived in the house, who
was playing. A conversation followed,
the result of which was the young lady
found herself in five minutes in the
parlor and talking with the player of
the piano.
''Please tell me-" she said, "what that
piece wasp
sob. it was nothing much. l often
improvise as play. My fingers follow
my fancy, as1 suppose is the case with
everybody
81 can't think that was improvised.
1t was too good"
''Well, you mustn't laugh when tell
you that piece is really my own compO-
Sition, though not note of it has ever
| been written down. l somehow find
myself playing it very 0ften-I hardly
know why. l call it the Divorce
March,"
1.-The divorce March?' Heavens,
what name for piece of music!'
''It'S a peculiar fancy, know. but
it's my own. Don't think badly of me
for it.'
81 couldn't do that. It's very beauti-
full. Play it again.
Her long, shapely fingers swept over
the keys in delicious prelude. which
led up to the composition proper, 1t
was hard for the young girl, in telling
about it afterwards, to describe what
she heard. The way she interpreted it
was this: Bars upon bars OF beautiful
descriptive passages seemed to speak OF
beautiful spring weather, nature in her
finest dress, the trees full of foliage.
flowers blooming, soft winds blowing, rip
ping streams, and all that sort of thing.
She fancied she could hear the song of
the birds in the b0ughS, and answers
coming back. This was youth in full
glow, and the tender, Joyous, and some
times eXuberant, dialogue that followed
was surely two happy people talking
and telling of things that lie mighty
deep in these human natures of ours,
and which can not be found out by SUI
perfcial examination. 1t was some
thing of love. The melody went On.
ripplingly beautiful, now deeper, now
lighter in its go, changing occasionally
in time and key, with noticeable in
PRODUCTION here and there OF harsh
bar OF two, the memory of which,
by the grand dialogues and duets that
followed, full of harmony and life.
Those people were happy. Further
OH, family at first, were fragments of
soft marches, bits of melody resem-
| bling the famous Mendelssohn and
"Lohengrin" wedding marches, fam
liar to everybody, but not exactly like
them Here was wedding day. The
characteristic quality of the piece had
beens developing Slowly. Now comes,
| in slow time. one Of the Softest, most
moving lullabys the girl had ever heard.
The pathos of the player, she said,
was wonderful from the first moment
she touched that lullaby. 1t thrilled
her, but She, could not de
scribe it. She faneied all
sorts of things, the rocking Of cradle,
the cooling of babe, love and tears and
anxiety of the mother smixed, signs, i'll
FAINT smiles and what not. The march
swept OH, its distinguishing parts COM
ing out clearer and clearer; crashes of
discord, little quarrels and makiilgs up,
pleadingS in the minor key, glorious
burts of sunshine and sudden dOWnpour
|. of storm, ending in steady, solemn
march of SeparatiOn-an impressive,
gloomy thing, that died away like the
sound of the footsteps of two people re-
treating sadly further and further from
each other, never to come together
again, 1t seemed all done, when softly
there arose out of the sadness that de-
licious lullaby, touching, pathetic, tear
full. 1t went on little and faded away
in sweetness.
When it was finished and the players
hands dropped from the keys, the two
women claSped each other like children
about the neck, and Sobbed as if their
hearts would break.
That's the story of my life in one
shape" said the older, land somehow
that's why 1 play it so often. | loved
my husband, God knows. l wanted a
cultivated man and | was disappointed.
[ could have borne everything for my
child'S sake, but the court gave her to
him, and am wretched. That lullaby
is my child's voice. The judge said /
couldn't take care of it. Pm so poor,
you see, and he is rich"
A weird and startling adventure the
other night befel very respectable old
gentleman residing OH Commonwealth
avenue, in this city, writes Boston
correspondent of the st. Louis Globe.
bed quite early, having come home tired
from his bank that day, while his wife
ventured out by herself to visit neigh
Dor and gossip less than block away.
About II p. M, as the clock on the bed
room mantelpiece informed him, he was
awakened from sound sleep by a ring
at the door bell, and. surmising that his
better-half had returned without her
latch-key, he fastened to jump into a
few essential garments and run down
stairs. A dim light was burning in the
yestbule. and, as he opened the front
door, few rays were thrown upon
most extraordinary apparition which
stood without on the top step, as if
waiting to be admitted. The thing
whatever it might be called-waS of the
feminine gender, evidently. 1t even
wore skirts. But if woman, she was
assuredly most peculiar and unpleas-
ant specimen. For she was not only
head1ess. but actually did not appear to
have any body above the waist. In fact,
it was the lower half of fashionably
dressed female, which had apparently
been ringing for an entrance.
Now, the old gentleman IS worship
er of the sex. He is notoriously la
dies man, in fact, despite histyears.
But, as he subsequently took occasion
| to remark. he wants whole women or
none. Taken in sections they are not
nearly so attractive. For this reason it
was that.without pausing to further ex-
aminne his strange visitor, he slammed
| the heavy portal to, excluding her.
Scarcely had the echoes died away
when the silence of the house was again
disturbed by a series Of unearthly rum
| blings from below, accompanied by
sundry quasi-human squeaks it ere
scendo. All was still after that for