The prison mirror. [volume] (Stillwater, Minn.) 1887-1894, 1890-12-25

her loving. faithful heart. She brushed the
tears from her eyes, threw about her all old
shawl. kissed her sleeping darlings. turned
low the lamp, and then passed quietly out
into the night.
Nine years had passed since John and
Alice were married. He was young ma
chinist. and was man of many excellent
qualities of character. She was an orphan
girl who had made her own living since a
mere child. but Notwithstanding the many
disadvantages she had always had to con-
tend against she had grown up with all the
attributes of noble womanhoOd.
John had made good wages, and what
with the snug sum he had already saved, it
was not long before they were comfortably
situated in cosy little home of their own.
But dark cloud hung over the young
family. John, by occasionally visiting
gambling places along with his fellow
wOrkmen, acquired mania for gambling;
and as is usually the case with young men
of his nature. he could not stay away from
the game while he had cent to play on.
He was not long in acquiring the loose
ideas of morality and honesty of the class
with whom he associated. He fell into
their ways. and it was not long before he
found himself out OF employment and in
straitened circumstances. He must have
money, and he had arrived at that stage of
decentralization where it makes little differ
ence to man how he gets it.
The wife had not been blind to her hus-
bands danger, and like wise, loyal wife,
used every persuasion to save her young
husband. He never neglected her and the
children, but she could see the change of
lis character in his face and in the loss of
his old independence of spirit. He began TAX
ing short journeys abroad on one pretext or
another-usually that he was looking for
new situation. But she wondered how it
was that while he was out of work he still
seemed to have more money than ever.
She trembled for her husbands honor.
Once he went away and she heard moth
ing of him for months; and then came the
letter cOnfessing all. Her husband had
been tried and convicted of burglary and
sentenced to state prison for term of seven
years. He wrote her as manly letter as
possible under the circumstances, acknowl-
edging the great wrong he had done her and
their children, and advised her to forget
him forever. The poor woman was not so
much surprised. but the realization of her
fears nearly killed her. She kept the Sc
cret. but others did not. She had no rel
atives in the city, and she was too proud to
appeal to friends. most of whom either
treated her cOldly or with that air OF con-
descensiOn so humiliating to self respect
ing person. She avoided her former &C
quaintances, and kept her little children at
home that they might not be wounded by
the slurs and taunts of neighbors' children.
Poor woman, only God and herself knew
her misery. But her cup was not yet full.
''Ha there! What in thunder's the mat.
ter with you up there!" hallooed the man
under cell No. 731. in violation of prison
rules. The man took no heed of the voice
from below. but continued tramping back
and forth ON the iron floor.
1t was the evening of the 22nd OF De-
cember, and the man in '731" wasspending
the last of his nearly nine hundred nights
in prison. There was trouble in "731,"
and it was not the first trouble of the kind
that had occurred in that narrow cell. There
were two strong men in ''731" contending
iercely for the mastery. One was John
Cooper the machinist. and the other was
John Cooper the burglar. John Cooper the