The Washington critic., 1888-02-04
A DEAD MANS CHRISTMAS.


No ceremony between old friends,
Jack. Besides, / can share the rock
ing-chair with you, since you insist"
Rise ? Every hair on my head rose
so quick that it was as though L was
lifted to my feet. For the voice was
the voice of the friend whose coffin
was watching beside, and the words
responded to thought scarcely
formed in my mind. / pinched my
self and tried to wonder how long l
had been doing. / turned up the
low night lamp and rubbed my
eyes and sat down in another chair.
j didn't sit in The rocking-chair for
fearT might fall asleep again. The
change of position brought me face to
face with the clock. The black hands
pointed on the cold white porcelain
TO three minutes past five. | could
bave sworn / had heard it strike five,
and the harsh, metallic tick of the
pendulum proved that it had not
stopped. could not have been
asleep. / was fearfully awake now,
and the voice went on in the tones /
knew:
"Wben we shook hands last night,
and agreed to eat our Christmas din
ner together, as two old bachelor
chums should, had no thought of
dying. When you had gone l drew
back the curtain from the window
and looked out at the stars and
listened to your footsteps echoing
a1fhy down the street. Then the mid
~tght chimes began to ring, and the
Aers trembled in the music like ice
cfyGtals melting into tears. / hardly
know what happened then. The sound
seemed to pour into my ears like a
torrent. 1t drowned your footsteps
and put out all the light of the stars,
and with the darkness and the
thought that this might be death COM
ing suddenly, as / had been warned
TO expect it, the music rang softer and
softer until it tainted on the air, and
] floated away into silence.
In an instant the light came again,
and / was looking down upon the
earth with the sense of being at
great height, yet with clear vision,
as though from the elevation of the
housetops. My second glance was in
the direction you had gone, with the
hope that / might see you before you
reached the door of your. lodgings.
1t is an error of our vain philosophy,
Jack, to imagine the soul struggling
thing that would mount to universal
heights and revel in infinite glories
but for the restraining letters Of the
flesh. With all the mystery of space
spread out before my spirit eyes they
turned back to the dingy old street to
look for the little fat figure of the
friend / loved.
"What had happened TO the town?
/ scarcely recognized it, though had
but that instant left it. Why, the
chimes had not done ringing yet; for,
though l could hear nothing, could
see the open square of the bell-tower
darken, then fill with stairs, then
darken again, as the big bass bell
wung backward and forward.
"But the town had shrunk as if
centuries had passed over it and
withered it with age. The new court
house had disappeared, and another,
old, had risen in its place, The rail
roads had been pulled up, and had
dragged off with them all the pretty
suburbs they had built. The top
stories seemed to have been cut off
the houses, as If a cyclone had swung
scythe over the town. looked in
vain for the City Hall, and for most
of the prominent buildings that ]
knew. ] could not find the steeples
of half the churches, and almost all
the bridges had been swept away.
There were patches Of forest, with
open farm land here and there, where
the handsomest residences used to be,
"Yet could trace familiar land
marks, as one can see the remembered
features of child in the face of @
man. There were the rivers and the
hills, and some of the streets / knew
But the city wasn't half its old size,
and certainly couldn't have more than
half its former population.
81 need not weary you. with the
telling of how much / marveled al
this. Whom tell you that my mind
had not grown any since its divorce
from my body, you can imagine what
a situation it must have been for 6
poor human intellect to grapple with
was not dreaming. l knew thai
what / saw was an actual, sub
stantial existence. / fell TO Won
dering whether ii was possible
that in the infinity Of ages which
must have passed since you and ]
shook hands at my door, flood, or 9
worldwide conhagration, had swept
over the earth, and after counties;
centuries of recuperation, and Yher
new soil and new vegetation and new
forests had covered the ruins of the
old, new race of men had been ere
ated to people it. But the chances
were so infinitely against their build
ing another city so nearly upon the
lines of the old that fled from it tC
another theory, which was perhaps
even less probable. In the limitlesE
stretches of space could there be an
other earth, with city upon it so like
the one where ! was born that | coulc
not tell them apartp
"The possibilities of mathematici
were not vast enough for the calcula
tion, and while was struggling will
it day dawned upon the city that lay
beneath my eyes, and / dropped thu
question and watched with eager Gu
Tiosity TO see what manner of people
were its inhabitants. / looked espe
cially al farmhouse lying just out
side the city; for, although could no
identify il, il seemed more familiar
TO me than any other house in sight
1.-THE man who came out of thu
doorway, and went about his morn
ing work at the barn, shortly aftel
the blue smoke above the chimney
told Of the wood-fire within, had thu
size and 1pura and cl0thinsg iof a conn