The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1888-02-25
Select Storg.
CASS.
From tornhiH Magazine.
CHAPTER 1.

From CornhiH Magazine.
CHAPTER l..
There have been changes at the Hard
since 1860 The boatmen have easier
times and are less jovial, the steamers
bluster in with an air of proprietorship, lie
by and shrek shrilly, take up their cargoes
of excursionists and baskets, and bluster
ont again, with much hauling of ropes,
much shouting and corner-shouting, and
oaths tempered to the ears ofpolite pleasure
parties. In the year 1860 the boatmen
watched their rivals jealously and were
eloquent in the language of abuse. Their
rivals have multiplied; the boatman of to-
day is gloomy and has no longer the spirit
to rail. 1t is still place of mysterious
charm to the ragged, shoeless, cheerful
town urchins who congregate near the
waters edge. The shops do a brisk trade
still in boiled beef and ham, buns and
pastry, fannels and printed cottons, shell
fish, nautical instruments, and beer and
stout drank on the premises; and still, in
doors and out of doors, the wholesome
odors of rope and tar and seaweed pervade
everything. But the shops nearest the sea
have gone; after the fire in 1860 they pulled
down the two old houses and built, again
on their sites And Cass, who used to
stand there, with her brown arms bare to
the elbow, her hands on her hips, fearless
as the sailors, and as ready with her laugh
and jest and abuse-Cass is gone with the
old houses and the old times.
Cass was the beauty of the Hard, and
knew it, and enjoyed the knowledge. She
enjoyed it as prince enjoys his title and
an old poet his renown; she would have
scorned to let admiration fatter her. She
sat on the doorstep of the shop W! en- she
was child and looked up into the faces of
strange ladies and gentlemen who pointed her
out to one another suddenly as they passed,
and was unabashed when they stopped to
survey her closely. She looked steadily
up at them with fearless eyes and rare
bushes. The fine gentlemen smiled at
her, the fine ladies lifted their gowns a
little, and bent down to question her in
simple language.
aAnd what is your name, little girl p
1Cass Brady. What's your'n?" she
said, and looked at her friends the boatmen
to approve and applaud her coolness.
The gentlemen would laugh as they
strolled on; the ladies would murmur some
thing gently about manners. Cass had
sharp ears and clear young voice. Her
voice would follow the strangers on their
way.
aManners An where's yer own?
Manners good as yourn any day, reckon.
When l pays me penny week | won't
come your way. No fear y And the
boatmen applauded loudly.
"Give EN- as good as they brought" "
said Cass.
"Trust you" said the men admiringly.
Cass was pretty at eight years old and
prettier at eighteen. Her skin was as
warm brown as that of the young Italian
girls who sang in the streets in picturesque
attire; her eyes were as brown as theirs
and brighter and more fearless; her hair
grew low and swept back in big waves from
her brow; her teeth were white, her lips
rosy without being sensual; her head was
well poised, her figure strongly yet slender
ly knit. If she laughed and talked too
loudly for the public street, if her repartee
was sometimes more rough than decorous,
her audience was not critical on these points.
The old men grinned at her benignly; the
young men liked girl who could hold her
own, cap Jest with jest, turn the satire
against the satirist, laugh indiferently at
compliments, and whistle and hum unmoved
when the chapel preacher and the temper
ance missionary came down to the Hard to
proselytize.
The shop, the doorway of which Cass
loved, was shop that sold cooked meats,
hot and cold; potatoes Drowned at the top,
moist with gravy beneath; steaming tea and
coffee, homemade cake of a rich and
weighty kind, and many other delieaeies-
shop which described itself vulgarly as
an clearinghouse. A hard-featured, gray
eomplexioned woman sat behind the coun-
ter, served her customers deliberately with
no unbecoming eagerness, and served all
alike without favor, netting out the exact
proportion of butter to each slice Of bread,
the Just amount of fresh mustard to each
plate. Her lips were straight, and opened
and shut without lending much expression
to her faceI her eyes rested shrewdly but
without interest on her customers and ac-
quaintances, on Emily her gentle niece,
and on Cass her daughter. She was a
woman who had seen trouble, and her
trnnhles had made her stolid.
Mrs. Brady's was well-populated house;
every room had its lodger, some more than
one The dodgers were for the most part
old, lonely, weather-beaten men who turned
in at night and out in the morning and
made little work. They took their break
fasts, and sometimes teas and suppers, in
two dark little rooms behind the shop
where the tables had oileloth covers which
could be washed down and dried on the
spot at moments notice without expense
Emily, in patient, gentle way, brought
the meals; Cass came in and out and
brought laughter to season the meals, and
heard complimentary comments on hel
bright eyes, her pretty lips and complexion
and was in no way disconnected. And
when Jim Cross, the youngest lodger, with
whom Cass for the last four years had been
excepting company" looked up sternly and
disapprovingly, Cass stayed longer and
laughed more gayly to prove her freedom
Things were going wrong between jim
and Cass. Perhaps some one was making
mischief secretly; perhaps the "preachings'
Jim had attended lately and his new, severt
religious views made him clearer-sighted
about Cass and the ungodly bent Of hel