Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1891-01-09
CASIMIR HALL.

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In the old ancestral home of the CAST
Mrs, where history and tradition breathed
their many legends upon the snowy canvas,
there was amid the masterpieces picture
of an old, gray bearded man. 1t was a
masterpiece itself. Simply an old man
with piercing eyes, but yet the picture fas-
cinated. It seemed instinct with life, and
the eyes spoke. It was not like the por-
traits CT other men, nor indeed like any
other picture. In looking at it every one
felt a kind of fear, as if they thought the
old man was going to speak to them. And
yet there was nothing in his face to indi-
cate that he would do any one an injury,
unless it was the deep look of his eyes.
Besides his piercing gaze there was an
other impressive feature about the picture
The old man seemed to have been count
ing something on his hand and had stopped
ON the fifth finger. And there, with the
first finger of one hand on the fifth finger
of the other. he stood like Fate itself But
some who looked deeper into the eyes said
he looked more like picture of Ven
geance, and that had he been alive they
would almost rather die than encounter
the wrath of those eyes.
How this portrait ever came to be there,
and who he was that had once moved in
the world as its living prototype, none of
the Casimirs ever knew-unless it was the
founder Of their long and illustrious line.
For there was story, a myth, some said,
connected with the picture that had been
whispered down from generation to gen
Grafton among the Casimirs. No one ever
spoke of the portrait or its history, yet
something seemed to keep the story alive,
and the young Casimirs breathed in the
mystery as naturally as they drew in the
forests breath. And the old tradition
fashioned itself something like this:
The founder of the Casimirs, years back,
was man of war-a creature of blood and
iron When he came into the broad and
rich domain which his posterity still en-
joyed the rightful heir was brave and
generous, though in some respects a
wicked, old man. This heir, who alone
stood between James Casimir and fortune,
disappeared one night and was seen no
more and the young soldier took undis-
puted possession of the estates. In the
manor house that was then standing upon
the lands there were number of works of
art left by the former owner, who had re-
Gently died.
Casimir's steward, after having arranged
everything in the new home, called his
masters attention to a very peculiar fact.
There was picture of an old man, with
gray hair and beard, in the gallery, he
said, notwithstanding in the list of pic
lures no mention whatever was made of
it, neither was it included or mentioned in
the inventory made out after the owners
death; and the steward, as well as his mas
ter, knew that nothing of the kind had
ever been among the latters effects. How
the portrait came there was q mystery
which they never solved. But the steward,
so the story went, told a friend of his that
this picture that had so suddenly taken
it's place among the others was the perfect
image of the old man, the heir, who had so
mysteriously disappeared And it is said
that when the wariike Casimir looked upon
it he shuddered and turned deathly pale,
and ordered curtain to be placed over it,
which should never be lifted save at his
command. And while he lived it was
the old mans face.
And so the broad lands and princeIy
home had descended from sire to son until
Clinton Casimir, the fifth in direct descent
from the first of the name, came into pos
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father and the one survivor of the race.
At the time of his fathers death young
Casimir had just reached the years of man
hood, and in his own person he illustrated
right royalty the blood that flowed in his
veins. Of fine physical stature, handsome
and brave, he was model for the artist.
| But of all the wicked and licentious young
men of that land Clinton Casimir was the
| widest. Already, though SO young in
years, he had gone through nearly all the
| labyrinths of crime.
| He knew the story of the old man whose
picture hung in the handsome collection
| that adorned his home. He did not remem-
| Der that any one had told him of it; it
| seemed to him that he had read it for HIM
| self in the depths Of the old mans eyes.
| Not day passed that he did not think of it
| and wonder what the old man meant by
! counting off the number five with his long
| index finger. He pondered in his mind u;
| the still hours of the night and sometimes,
urged on by an irresistible impulse, he
| would rise, and with lighted candle in his
| hand steal noiselessly along to where the
portrait hung and gaze upon it, shHddering
and afraid. Atsuch times he felt that thers
was curse upon him, an ancient doom,
and that ghostiy hands from old graves
were round about him. Then he would
! plunge into wilder designations. But in the
very midst of his carousals he would be.
come quiet and thoughtful, for he could
see those fierce and heart scorching eyes
| look down into his.
| One night, worn out from long days and
nights of revelry and crime, Clinton CAST
mir fell into a long and deep sleep. He
dreamed-it might not have been a dream
| but he saw a young man strangely like
| himself engaged in wild and riotous living.
! He looked upon him closer, and he knew
| in his dream that he was gazing upon his
own image. He saw the young man going
on in his wickednens until he had spread a
| moral blight and desoiation in all the land
| where he lived. And then in his dream,
after lapse he knew rot how long, he saw
a change come upon the young man. He
was no longer young, for the snow of age
had fallen upon his locks. In his dream he
recognized him then as the old man whose
portrait hung in his own home, and before
whose fierce and silent look he had SO often
trembled. He saw the old man as he went
about to retrieve the errors and sins of his
youth, and trying to make peace for his
soul in good works. And then he saw him
die, an unrepentant sinner. beneath the
dagger of a warlike man in the dead hour
of the night.
After long time Clinton Casimir awoke
from his dream. But he was not the same
man who had fallen to sleep in mad whirl
of sensibiiities twelve hours before. He
was changed. He knew it; he felt it in every
fiber of his frame He realized the curse,
the vengeance of an ancient crime upon
him. He knew as he looked about him
chat he was different being. In that
sleep. that dream, Clinton Casimir had
PASSED away. He thought Of what he had
been as we recall half forgotten things that
we have seen in dreams. He thought of
his present self as if he had just come back
into the world after long sleep. He did