Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1889-08-24
TAUGHT BY FATE.
The Lesson Was CHASTITY; It's
Results We're Priceless.

1t was four o'clock on a depressing
autumn afternoon.
The railway station at one of our
most popular watering places was not
20 crowded but that the noisy mirth
OF group OF yachting men, assembled
to take leave Of one of their number.
attracted considerable attention among
the passengers, portcrs and loitcrors
collected on the platform.
In n instance this notice was
wholly Of a condcmnatory kind.
Opposite the spot where the Young
men stood a gentleman sat alone in n
first class compartment, from the win
dow of which he cast frequent chances
OF contempt and disapproval at the
~loud-Yoiced men outside.
These last were typical Englishmen:
four tall, wcll-built young fellows,
with fair skins burned red or copper
colored, gathered round a fifth. still
taller than they, and evidently older
a yeIlow-haircd giant, with a fine flo
ure that was beginning to tend toward
st"utncSs, n go%od-looking, red face,
ana Il manner that was at once genial.
didactic and self-assertive.
Whether from instinct, or from the
fact that be was dramatically opposed
in type to this particular individual,
the solitary Traveller before referred
TO took an especial dislike to this pom
dcrous fair man.
Great bumptious brutc!' he said TO
himself. Fancy being married to
such a man,
With this second reflection, the
blood rushed to his sensitive, dark
face.
lie was rather under than over the
middle height, with a slight. boyish-
looking figure, Il face rather interest
ing than handsome, and delicate. rest
less hands, with which he necessarily
stroked his mustache. His nerves
were strained to their utmost tensions;
doubt, uncertainty, pity and passion
ale love we're blended in his mind
with a great desire for solitude; and,
in this phase Of nerve tension, the
noisy laughter OF those four bronzed
yachting men, and the sclf-complacent
platitudcs of the fifth. irritatcd our
traveller almost beyond endurance.
Suddenly the door of his compart-
mcnt was burst open. TIE yellow
haired man jumped in, directed a por-
Ter where TO place his portmanteau in
n deep bass voice, suitable to his large
frame, tossed the man sixpencc, with
an air of princely patronage, then rat
tied down the window, and leaned out
for a few valedictory words to his
friends.
81 shan't go northward until to.mor-
row." he observed.
At which there was a laughing cho.
rus OF:
Tomorrow, Teddy?"
well, they don't expect me yet"
he went on, smiling, with II radiant,
superior calm. "a say, boys, we really
have had a most excellent time TO-
gethcr!'
PITY you didn't keep up that diary.
Might have interested them at home,n
suggested n Of the four.
you might compile an amended
edition in your spare time in London,
Gilpin!' put in another.
81 can't make you boys believe It;
but shall only stay in town long
enough to c my lawyer"
"And then take the next express
back to the bosom of your family. We
Gilpin."
"And, afterwards" the big man
went on. impcrturbably, II shall per-
manently settle down in the North and
put together my experiences into book
The train was moving of by this
time. The four yachting men ran
alongside of IL, waving noisy good-byes
1t steamed more quickly out of the
and tho fair man, after re-
peatedly noddlng to his friends, sank
heavily into a seat and gazed around
him with an air of %patronizing benov-
olence.
He evidently wanted to talk, and,
what was more. he meant 10.
First, he asked concerning the win
aows. whether his travelling compan-
Ion minded having them down; next,
he grew discursive on the fact that It
was not a smoking compartment. but
that he meant 70 smoke. After which,
observing uitha genial smile and a
North Country infection,