St. Landry democrat., 1892-01-23
STORY OF A POPULAR NOVEL,
How Recent Work of Fiction Came
To Be Written.


One of the most successful of recent
pieces of fction-loved for its quaint, old
time pictures and its tender pathos
an inner history, known to few, observes
the Chicago Times. The story has
brought the writer into sudden fame.
This is how it came to be written:-lts
author, clever young female newspaper
correspondent, secured board for her
summer vacation with quaint old
Quakeress in the country, not far from
Springfield. The young lady and her
hostess soon became fast friends. Even
ing after evening they would sit together
upon the porch steps, and the old lady
would pour into the attentive ears of her
sympathetic listener the story of her own
hard Iife-an orphaned and comfortless
childhood; girhood of ceascless work,
devoid Of coveted "schooling;;" an early
and incompatible marriage; woman
hood full of the privations, struggles and
small economies of those who raised
family" and got home in the early
days; whole life filled with unsatisfed
craving for knowledge, power, apprecia-
ton! She had hungered for the bread of
intellectual companionship and had been
given the stone of solitary drudgng and
plnching.
But the pride Of life had not been
wholly crushed out of her. She had
chung to one dream. She has written
book. Yes, the last word of the last
page had been finished the very day that
her guest had arrived. She should never
forget-so she told her young listener as
they sat together under the notified,
quivering shade of the thick-leaved
naples which the moonlight silhouetted
upon the doorsteps-the feelings" which
she chad as she traced the word
"F-i-n-i-s' and put q straight mark"
each side of it, so:-
-Finis-
How long had she worked over it?
Ten long years. And now it was done
How glorious it would look in print-her
own book.
Il hope you put much of the story of
your own life into it," suggested the
young woman.
''Oh, my, no. exclaimed the dear old
mot bit of it. Nobody would
care to read that. It's all about lost
heir and things like that
The next summer the young lady came
put to the old farmhouse again-but not
for more moonlight visits with her quaint
DID friend, whose white lips had been
bitten into silence by the frosts of death.
The dull, sad husband led the young
into the bedroom, and pointing to
4 large package of sheets tied together
with welting cord, and dozen loose let
ers which stood upon the bureau beside
he tumblers and medicine, said:
"Mary wanted you to put them into
he coffin along with her when she was
aid out-wouIdn' have no one else tech
EN-, nohow. | can't understand it. Nor
cant see why them there letters should
! made her just pine herself away into
he grave. But they did, though
The young woman read one of .tIsssa9-
ers, r. tlrresT circulars, for they woro
ave regret that your manuscript is
lot available for our use and herewith !
eturn it, with thanks
She had no neel to read more of them, |
nut placed them and the rejected manu-
cript beside the dead. Then she re-
urned home, wrote the story Of the hum
lie life which "nobody would care to
ead,' and made fame the hundredth
art of which would have given the dis
ppointed life, which had just gone out
n darkness, glorious sunset.