The Monitor., 1891-09-25
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Up the hill went Silas Beaver, but
never again to the knowledge of man
did he retrace his steps.
Were there high words: No one
knew. Perhaps the great eagle whose
nest was perched far over the topmost
rocks on the opposite side of the gorgs
could have told, or the crows as they
winged their dusky fight past the lone
ly homestead. No man but those two
was near to hear what passed between
debtor and creditor that summers day
so long passed by.
Inquiries ensued as a matter of course.
Search parties were organized. Inspec.
tion of the doctors premises brought tc
light that his gig was stained with blooS,
his horse bearing the appearance of hav.
ing been hardly driven the night before,
but DR.. Hoff accounted for these sus-
picious facts with complete coolness. A
long drive, an amputation after severe
accident. Further inquiry elected that
there had been an accident at q distance,
that the doctor had been there, that he
had performed just the operation that he
claimed to have performed.
No evidence So Silas Beavers dis.
appearance remains to this day Il inys-
terry
1t may be that the iron tracks Of the
great railway rested on their sleepers
above the murdered mans hidden re.
mains, for what so easy as to hide the
likely victim of passion under tue great
banks of upraised soil? It may be that
amid some tangle Of wood and vine,
rock and fern, the missing man was laid
away, hidden forever from earthly eyes.
Time went on; suspicion slept, watch
fulness abated, but never again did the
feet of Silas Beaver cross the threshold
of his own door.
Then one night there was Il lurid glare
lighting the tree tops Of the gorge. A
farmhouse, barns and all their contents
were one great pitiful bonfire. Oh, fol
the toll of weeks, of months, the slow
gathering of harvest, the pinchinG and
saving to obtain stock. Only a black
ened ruin, a hopeless prospect!
The victim had been at enmity with
DR.. Hof. 1t was he who had been fore.
most IN the search for the missing man
Beaver. The doctor had been heard to
threaten him repeatedly. So Dr.. Hod
was arrested and lodged in Jail, but be
fore the day of trial came he escaped,
and the neighborhood knew him nc
more
Silent and deserted stood the house on
the edge of the gorge, until one night,
when the storm ragged and the lightning
flashed and ghstened in the leaden skies,
the flame shot up from its lonely timbers
and We'd with the flashes of its kinder,
the electric bolt. When morning came
the sun rose over a heapof charred ruins,
and forest birds piped requiem over the
scorched trees and flowers.
He who lived in the homestead on the
verge of the gorge had been stormy and
passionate; fit ending to his dwelling te
perish by the fury and the passion Of the
storm.
Over the gorge now. By the hand OF
the axman shorn of its pristine beauty,
on its tracks of steel, supported by their
mighty trestles, hour by hour pass the
trains with slackened speed and painting
breath of steam in curb.
Down below, deprived Of the grateful
shade of its verdant friends, the forest
trees, the little brook ripples and gurglea
brayely in the garish sunlight. Alas!
no wary trout sport in its once cool, dark
depths. No timid deer bend their grace
full heads to drink of its waters, but few
birds quench their thirst in its now luke
warm shallow ripples. The beautiful
gorge, the cool, deep brook are things of
the past. Like the homestead which
once overlooked them and its passionate
tempered dweller, like the great eagle
which built its nest on the crags near by,
like the deer and the myriad forest
birds, it remains but memory, a rem
iniscence of long ago, told in an hour of
retrospection by the "oldest inhabitant.
Does any one ask what befel the poor
young wife of Dr.. Hoff? This is what the
'oldest inhabitant' told to satisfy the
visitors curiosity on that point: 1t was
supposed by many people that it was
Mrs. Hoff who aided the doctor in his
escape from Jail; however that may be,
she disappeared at the same time he did.
The lonely little grave in the corner of
the clearing no longer had mourner;
never again did posies Of fen and flower
deck its tiny upraised mound Then there
came day when sorrow and indignation
mingled in the hearts of those who had
known and loved the gentle English lady
who had led such sad life in the home
stead by the gorge. A certain Dr.. Hoff,
who had lived for some years in Canada,
but who had lately returned to England,
was on trial for his life for the murder
of his wife, near London, so the papeJ5
recorded. Later on was sent the new j
far across the water that DR. Hoff had
expiated his abominable crime On the
scaffoll.-Fidele H. Holland in Toronto
Globe
a Cat That Can cpcn Door.