Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1891-09-02
THE WOMAN'S ROSE.

l have an old brown carved box; the lid
is broken and tied with string. In it l
keep little squares of paper, with ha ir in
side, and little which hung over my brot b.
er's bed when we wore childaen, and 9th or
things as small, have in it rose. Other
women also have such boxes where they
keep such trifes, but no one has my rose.
When my eye is dim, and my heart
grows faint, and my faith in woman flick
ers, a nd;her presence is an agony to me,and
her future despair, the scent of that dead
rose, withered for twelve years, comes back
to me. know there will be spring, as
surely as the birds know it when they zee
above the snow two tiny, quivering green
leaves. Spring cannot fail us,
There were other flowers in the box once;
bunch of white acacia flowers, gathered
by the strong hand of man, as we passed
down village street on sultry afternoon,
when it had rained, aud the drops fell on us
from the leaves of the acacia trees. The
flowers were damp; they made mildew
marks on the paper folded them in. After
many years / threw them away. There is
nothing of them left in the box now but
faint smell of dried acacia, that recalls that
sultry summer afternoon; but the rose is in
the box still.
It is many years ago now; was girl of
country town. 1t was young in those days,
and two days Journey from the nearest vii
lage; the population consisted mainly of
men. A few we're married and had their
wives and children, but most were single.
There was only one young girl there when
I came. She was about seventeen, fair and
rather fully fleshed; she had large, dreamy
blue eyes and wavy light hair; full, rather
heavy lips, until she smiled, and then her
face broke into dimples and all her white
teeth shone.
The hotel keeper may have had daugh.
fer, and the farmer in the outskirts had
two, but we never saw them. She reigned
alone. All the men worshiped her. She
was the only woman they had to think of.
They talked of her on the ''stoop," at the
market, at the hotel; they watched for her
at street corners; they hated the man she
bowed to or walked with down the street.
They brought flowers to the front door; they
offered her their horses; they begged her to
marry them when they dared. Partly there
was something noble and heroic in this de-
votion of men to the best woman they
knew; partly there was something natural
in it, that these men, shut off from the
| world, should pour at the feet of one wo-
man the worship that otherwise would have
been given to twenty; and partly there was
something mean in their envy of one anoth
or. If she had raised her little finger, l
suppose, she might have married any one
out of twenty of them.
Tnen came. I do not think was pret-
tier. I do not think was SO pretty as she
was. was certainly not 80 handsome. But
l was vital, and was new, and she was old.
They all forsook her and followed me. They
worshiped me. 1t was to my door that the
"a r L. ,f
| fered me when I could only ride one; it was
| for me they waited at street corners; it was
| what l said and did that they talked of.
Partly 1 liked it. I had lived alone all my
! life; no one ever told me that was beauti-
full and woman. / believed them; did
not know it was simply fashion which one
man had set and the rest followed unrea-
soningly. liked them to ask me to marry
them, and to say no. despised them. The
mother heart had not sweled in me yet.
did not know all men were my children, as
the large woman knows when her heart is
grown. I was too small to be tender. I
| liked my power. l was like child with
new whip. which it goes about cracking
every where, not caring against what. l
could not wind it up and put it away. Men
we're curious creatures who liked me, could
never tell why.
Ooly one tnlng LOOK lTou my Piodsute,
could not bear that they had deserted her
for me. 1 liked her great, dreamy blue
eyes,I liked her slow walk and drawl. when
l saw her sitting among men she seemed to
me much too good to be among them. l
would have given all their compliments ii
she would once have smiled at me as she
smiled at them, with all her face breaking
into radiance, with her dimples and fash
ing teeth. But knew it never could be;
felt sure she bated me; that she wished
was dead; that she wished had never come
to the village. She did not know, when we
went out riding. and man who had always
ridden beside her came to ride beside me,
that l sent him away; that once when a
man thought to win my favor by ridiculing
her slow drawl before me l turned on him
40 fisrcely that he never dared to come be
fore me again. 1 knew she knew that at
the hotel men had made e bet as to which
was the prettier, she or /, and had asked
each man who came iu, and that the one
who had staked on me won. I hated them
for it, but would not let her see that
cared about what she felt toward me. :.
She and never spoke to each other. II
We met In the village street We bowed and