The Iowa plain dealer. [volume] (New Oregon, Howard County, Iowa) 1867-1895, 1891-11-12

be visited, ana IN that ease II would be
too late. Starvation would do for me.
even If the injury | had received did
| not. In my anguish lshrieaci aloud.
but was duly conscious ali the time
that nobody could hear me. Visitors
and custodians alike must have de-
| parted hours before: and even II my
| cries were heard from the streets be.
low nobody would attribute them to
| their real source.
| To the feeling of acute anguish sue
ccedea one Of blank despair. / no
longer fpeculated on the possibility Of
| being discovered dead or alive. There
was dull lcaden feeling at my chest
and | found myself repeating mcchan-
icaily old rhymes and jingles and say
| Ing the alphabet backward. as | once
| learned to do in seeking relief from in
somnia. Yet at the same time ! was
| conscious shat my whole life was pass
ing in review before me as they say it
does when one is drowning or being
hanged. ] remembered that saying,
too. and without any cessation of the
review | wondered in my double con-
seriousness if | were undergoing the
sensations Of drowning man or Of
one being hanged, and / wished
could put them down on paper for the
benefit of the rest of mankind. What
struck me as singular was that the
clocks kept on striking twelve. The
second time they did this l thought
must have lost consciousness for an en-
tire day and that this was the second
midnight. But when the third stroke
of twelve came from half a dozen
clocks | knew it could not be two DAYS
since had fallen. / thought first that
/ had become demented: and then it
occurred to me that if / were / could
not reason about it in that fashion so
the clocks themselves must be crazy
This theory satisfied me until the
striking began again, when | went of
in another fantastic speculation My
friends had discovered that / was miss
ing and were having the 6ells rung to
keep my spirits up
Oh. the long, long. weary hours l
spent in waiting Cor Il glimpse of day
light. l had no hope that daylight
would bring me any relief, but the
prospect of staying where it was end
lessly midnight seemed uncomfortable
| groaned and wept and dug my nails
into the palms of my hands until il
seemed as if the blood would come:
but did not even feel any sense OF
pain.
1t must have been after the clocks
had struck midnight a dozen times or
more-l kept no exact account-that |
saw in the distance at what seemed to
| be the farther end of the cathedral
roof two faint glimmers of light. Pres
emily there were two more. and then
two more, until there was regular
procession of them. / tried to shout,
but had become so weak with cold and
suffering that l could not raise nv
| voice above whisper. The lights
nevertheless approached, growing
gradually stronger until ] could see
that they were borne by several black.
robed figures who were marching be-
| side a coffin. As the procession moved
| slowly towards me began to wonder
what it meant and whether funerals
took place at midnight on the roof OF
Milan cathedral Then ! specnlated a
moment on the propriety of disturbing
the obsequies even in my extreme
need. Suddenly it dawncd on me that
this was my own funeral, and | knew
| that was either dead or had gone mad.
In the supreme anguish of this discovery
all memory of past suffering wa,
blotted out and / entered on u new
period OF the most exquisite torture
Fortunately it was of brief duration
AS the foremost of the moving figures
reached me felt Il grasp on my arm
and voice called in my ear:
Wake up. father: its time to be go
ing down. | guess you must have had
your yoke turned
1t was my daughter, and beside her
were the rest OF the party. flushed with
their ramble on the roof. straight
encd out my crampad limbs. which
must have gone to sleep about the time
did. and pulled out my watch. ! had
been there just fifteen minutes
| / don't mean to he understood tina
my hair really did turn gray in tha,
night of horror on Milan cathedral.
In the first place there is not much of
it and what there is has been toerably
gray for some years. But | do mean
to say that | am no longer incredulous
as to the possibility of such capillary
change as the story books tell about. ]
am quite sure that if any man O,
woman really had just such an expe
rience as l thought | had his or hel
hair would turn gray provided, o
course, he or she had any hair that wa
not gray already. Detroit Free Press
i A Logical Deduction.