Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1890-03-07
JACOBS FAULTS.

/ tween New ork and Albany Inc SatiS
| fying greenness of the landscape left one
no chance to regret the past glory OF the
| blossoms II seemed as il. should one
speak at all, 1t ought to be in blank verse
about the hills clapping their hands, abont
| green pastures, about all the secret things
/ that have ceased to mean 50 much them
selves as to express in the abstract belief
in love aud love and life and beauty and
peace.
Jacob Raus was an inattractive oh.
server of this charming phase of nature.
| He was preoceupied with his own troubled
! soul, and here was but a wintry prospect.
The world points ont to man the neces-
sity of doing something; there was no cor
responding need in his soul He had late
ly come into an excellent property, and
had invested good proportion of 1t IN a
ranch in the West. The West was No
place of his choice, but what else was he
| to do7 He was thirty two, and was with
| out even a commercial training He had
been bred to no profession, and he was not
| rich enough to live with rich men as a
pleasure seeker, even had such life at
tracted him. He had perfect health, was
n good shot, IA good reader, a good walker,
good companion. He wore blonde
beard upon his sunburnt face, with its
handsome, clean cut profile and hazel eyes.
This bold statement of his case present
ed itself over and over to his mind, quite
| as if he were weighing an abstract question
that bored him excessively. Then he grew
irritated that his father should have given
him such an old-fashioned, half humorous
na.ne, and exerted always an unspokcn and
only halfrecognized negative tyranny on
his whole life; that his father should have
had that responsibility in the paternal
relation that is scarcely to be found out
side the Anglo-Saxon race-as If the
Anglo Saxon was born armed at all points,
aud with an intuitive knowledge of fight
ing his way through the world. The more
Jacob accused himself of impiety in ac-
cusng the dead, the more obstinately the
conviction forced itself upon him that his
thought was, nevertheless, just; and the
implied weakness on his own part was IN
nowise consoling.
Now he was free at thirty two-a free
dom that meant bondage to his own limit
ations; and while he bitterly regretted that
he had no profession, he bitterly recognized
the fact that the desire for larger life in
no sense proved talent. His desire was,
as we have said, not one for action. 1t
was vague desire for II larger happinc IS,
such as women have oltener than men.
They should wake like children of
Christmas morning, and find it in their
stockings.
All these reasons for gloom were ever
present to Jacob; but he had lately walked
to q more definite purpose and more
definite grief His decision to so on a
ranch had made him recognize that he
could not leave Millicent Fuller, whom he
had known from her childhood, and who
had been for some years past, his chief
occupation lie offered himself to her
She refused him. She was the youngest
and the only unmarried one Of five sisters.
She was twenty-five, handsome, travelled
and accomplished.
Jacob, as he walked through shady
road, cut a fine bouquet df sweethriar
roses, and trimmed their thorny, s!rag-
Cling stems with an ill-humored energy.
He bad not pride enough to go away with
out asking to see her once more, just to say
good bye, and she had accorded him an
interview that evening at half-past seven.
He walked all around the Fuller's large
house, past the broad piazzas, and found
her alone in little side-porch that was
overgrown with honeysuekle vines, and
amid their pinkish-y yellow blossoms Mil
licent, in pink muslin, looked like rosy
June personified. Her father and mother
had just gone to drive, she explained
precisely, as she took Jacobs silently
proffered flowers with q fine blush for
thanks
81 am afraid" she said, nerv ously, as
she carefully picked a few thorns from the
stem of her bouquet before she grasped it,
"that didn't succeed the other night in-
that-is-I mean that / am afraid that |
didn't say what ! meant
Il should be glad, said Jacob, "to hear
that you didn't mean what you said"
ooh! oh! I didn't mean that"
"Well, it doesn't matter great deal
what you meant if you didn't mean that"
II do wish that you would be reasonable,
jacob"
II wish you wouldn't call me Jacob
when you have told me that you didn't
like the name"
"Oh did | say thatY do think that ]
like it, since you have no other. Indeed,
Jacob, if it were not for some faults that
you have, 1 think I should like you better
than any one"
The young man sat down on q step
lower than the one the girl occupied
Perhaps" he said, gloomily, "you will
dgcqsa these faults of mine; | may suggest
some to add to the list Ny name is one;
but that is hardly my fault, and ! believe
that ] could change it by an act of the
Legislature or something of the kind
'But I should always know that your
real name was jacob" said Millicent
laughing; 'I shouldn't mind your name,
but there are some things that would grow
worse and worse"
my age, | suppose"
yes, for one thing. Ten years is too
much difference"
But you will grow older"
''There will still be ten years between
u.s."
"The general opinion is that woman
grows older faster than u man You would
catch up to me-
"Ah! that is like most general opinions,
wrong l have made my own observations
on that subject. To the close observer,
middle aged women are younger even III
appearance than men Of their own age.
"Where did you learn so much about
men!'
"Haye | not been in all our large cities
and in most of those in Europef Can one
not receive impressions of strangers as they
pass, and accumulated impressions form
opinionsi Mems eyes grow dull, and the
lines OF the mouth hard, and their faces
heavy and meagre; while women's faces
are still full Of beneyolence though their
figures have lost their grace and their com
plexions their delicacy. STILL those wo-
men are young"
- /, "a