The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1892-11-15

I, twenty-five miles down the pike. wher'
there was neither railroad nor tele
graph station. explained the situa
ton to the young lady, and she blush
ingly consented. Why shouldn't she
She had known me all her life. ant
there was $500, 200 and a reasonah!.
! pood-looking husband in it.
$50 far everything was easy. Their
wero yet eighteen hours before tho
limit of time should expire. and we
felt safe. / put the best rider among
our neighbor boys on our fastest saddle
horse, and started him off to get Par
son Baker. requesting him on no ac-
count to fail to be at our farm by eleven
o'clock the next day. The young man
started about six o'clock in the even
ing, in heavy rain, and made the
preachers about eleven o'clock that
night The preacher told him to re-
main until next morning to rest his
horse, while Baker saddled his own
and was away by one o'clock in the
morning. simply telling his aged wife
that he was called to his circuit on i'm
portant business
mot five miles from home the pluckv
preacher found his road barred by a
washed out bridge. and he was Obliged
to make long detour-eleven miles
to get back to his road beyond the gap.
From there on he was singularly I'M
fortunate. His horse picked up stone
and went lame, and halts at three or
four farms were made before he got
another. BY this time it was eight
o'clock and he was yet fourteen vcry
muddy miles from our house, and
rain falling in sheets. Many an old
man Of seventy years would have
given over his pursuit of an uncer-
tainty, for he didn't know what was
the matter. But l never stopped to
think what the business was he said
afterwards; 4 simply knew that I was
to get there - the Lord willin'-by
eleven o clock At 1880 the grand old
fellow was within mile of the house.
He had come to what he thought was
an overfowed bridge across q little
brook emptying into the Scioto river
at his left. but he had no idea that the
bridge itself was gone, for he had
crossed several such places on his
road. He urged his horse forward,
and plump into twelve feet of water
they went between the abutments.
The horse was game, as well as his
master, and SWAN to tho fenced side of
the road, where he got his footing, tho
water being there about three feet
deep. The parson threw the bride
over fence rail and left his painting
and exhausted steed. taking across tho
fields to the house, and saving q mile
thereby. The lawyer saw him coming,
and met him in the middle of that
meadow before us. He explained the
business in twenty words.
Have they got the hcenseT was his
only question.
1.-The license was all right
Get them out on the porch, said
Baker, and the lawyer left him swash-
ing over the fence and hurried into tho
house. 1t was now five minutes to
twelve o'clock
I'VE were all on the porch in a quar-
ter of minute.
'As Baker hove up and came to a
halt on the walk, his rough jeans-suit
muddy water, the lawyer
handed him the license over the railing.
He glanced at it front and back-he
knew all It's points by heart-and then
off came his white beaver hat.
"Join your right hands.
MARY, do you take this man for
your husband?
81 do
George, do you take this woman
for your wife?'
81 do
:" Then, by the authority vested in
me by the Methodist Episcopal church,
and the laws of Ohio, pronounce you