News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1889-01-24

the sleeping wild flowers. It had gently
tiuttcred the flame of the candle, that.
hour by hour, had sunk shorter, and it
softly waved long handbiIl that hung
on nail above the foot of the bed and
was gay with pictures of strange acts
and animals.
Bolt upright in q spl!nt bottomed
chair by the bedside, q man had fallen
asleep again aud again, in spite of his
determination to remain awake Eut,
Notwithstanding his wearinCss, he had
slept lightly, and had often awakened
ut the sound of faint moan, or tho
touch of the night-wind rs it softly
stirred the erect and unruly whisps of
his mop of tangled hair, and often
seemed to him, half waking, like the
soft carressing touch of childish fingers.
Every time he awoke with an anxious
start he saw the fever bright eyes of the
sick child were fixed longingly on the
pictured hand bill upon the wall as it
futtercd in the gentle night-wind And,
each time, when the man had cooled the
Parched lips with water, or patted the
schnty pillow, the child had piped:
Tell me more bout tue ole ele-
phant, pappyI"
And the man has told again OF the old
elephant-how he was almost as big as
the ''shack, and WAS dirt colored, and /.
had long white tusks and great big flap /
py ears. and a trunk tEat he swung
from side to side as he walked.
E. "An' he likes little boys--don't he ?"
Likes 'em first rate!" the man
would answer. thinks heap of 'em!"
And the fever bright eyes of the child I
would be bent more eagerly upon the {
long bill that fiufteIed on the wall and
III spite OF ms loving anxiety, the man {
would nod, his head would slowly sink
forward on his breast, and he would be J
asleep from sheer weariness.
Presently, as the candle burned almost
out, the east grew gray, then lighter.
A turtle-dove, that had winged her way
through the misty Ealf-darkness to Il
resting-place upon the topmost strand
of tho settlers piece of barbedwire
fence, greeted the coming morning with
her soft, solemn "coowoo !"
With his dim, half -drowsy and half !
delirious thoughts fixed on the poster, |
the child paid no attention to the doves |
call or the coming day, and the man, |
sleeping, with his weary head bowed on
his breast, heard not the one and saw not
the other.
If they had looked from the window
of the "shack," and the gray of the
morning had turned ittlo more to
gold, tho settler and the sick child might
have seen q novel procession passing
along the sectiou-road, quarter of n
mile away. There were queer, canvas
wrapped vehicles and gueerer blanketed
animals that looked strange enough in
the coming light, but which, denuded of
their wrappings in the glare of the sun
light and on the main street of Range
City, would blossom out into the more
or less gorgeous chariots, cages and
curiositles of circus parade.
But neither the settler nor the sick
boy beheld them, and the one slept on
in the splint bottomed chair. and the
other gazed with weak wistfulness at the
futtering bill on the wall.
The last crawling end of the process
sion WAS dimly discerned by a little
squad of broad ad-hatted, jangle-spurred
hOrsemen, whose gallOpIng cayuse po-
mics had carried them swiftly across
the prairie in the direction in which the
circus was slowly taking its way.
"Ihar I" cried one of the cowboys, rs
they reached the forks where the little
worn by-road that passed the settlers
cabin left the section-road. "Thar they
air Come on r'
The squad seemed on the point of
dashing along the sectiOn-road in the
wake of the circus.
''Hold on thar, Scotty !" cried the
Oldest man of the group. "We'ye got
"But thar's elephant, Slade," inter
rupted the first speaker, with an almost
boyish enthusiasm. "Ketcheda a glimpse
NV him among the wagons, jist as"
''Never mind the elephant" broke in
old Slade. ''We've got other business
Nnk 10 yn+R O
glimpse NV n granger, stead OF an ele-
phant, an sorto--"
'fSorto start q granger procession !"
cried another of the broad-hatted ones.
''Yes," growled Scotty, eth be a
procession that'il start quick and go a
tearin'. H'ain't got no time to progic
now"
"You bet Specially when thars
elephant as big's house movin' down
the road away from us, ;" said another.
"'Twon't take but little bit, said old
Slade. eve kin"
"But s'posen he shows fight2 Reckon
he'll cut up rusty, Or"
"Let him cut all he pleasesl'' broke
in Seotty, savagely. ''Let him cut
We're able fer him, all the same. Gran
gers is grangers !"
Changers were grangers, and therefore
entitled to little but indignities at the
hands of the cowboys and "cattle
kings" Though, legally, grangers, as
the cattlemen scornfully denominated
the squatters and homesteaders, have a
right on the range, they are regarded as
interlOpers, and the little patches of
prairie that they are bravely and toll
somely trying to convert into fertile
farms are regarded as so much stolen
from the rightful feeding grounds of the
cattle.
''He kin cut all he wants to- said old
Slade. "We're able fer him."
Which statement was substantiated
by the huge revolver holstered at the
hip of each one of the riders.
Although the consultation at the juno
ton was not an extended one, by the
time the cowboys were galloping down
the by-roads towards the shack of the
hated granger the last of the circus
wagons was disappearing where the sec
tion-road wound into the strip of distant
timber that fringed Buzzard Creek, and
the yellow in the eastthat had suppressed
ed the earlier gray was fast changing to
orange.
Neither the sleeping ohildnor the sick
man detected the approach of the horse