Frostburg mining journal. [volume] (Frostburg, Md.) 1871-1913, 1893-05-06
"KITTY'S FORTY" "

1t doesn't do men any good to live
apart from women and children.
never knew a boys school in which
there was not tendency to rowdyism,
and lumbermen, sailors, fishermen, and
other men that live only with men, are
proverbially half-bear sort of people.
Erontiersmen soften down when women
and children come--but 1 forgot my.
self ; it is the story you want.
Burton and Jones lived in shanty
by themselves. Jones was a married
man, and, finding it hard to support
his wife in "down-ea east" village, he
had emigrated to Northern Minnesota,
leaving his wife under her fathers roof
until he should be able to make a
start" He and Burton had gone into
partnership, and had pre- -empted' a
town site of three hundred and twenty
acres.
There were perhaps twenty families
scattered sparsely over this town site at
the time my story begins and ends, for
begins.
The partners had disagreed, quar-.
relied, and divided their interests. The
land was all shared between them ex.
cept one valuable forty acre piece.
Each of them claimed that piece of
land, and the quarrel had grown SO
high between them that the neigh
bors expected they would shoot at
sight. In fact, it was understood
that Burton was on the forty acre
place deter mined to shoot Jones if he
came, and Jones had sworn to go out
there and shoot Burton, when the
fight was postponed by the unexpected
arrival of Jones's wife and child.
Jones shanty was not finished, and
he was forced to forego the luxury OF
fighting his old partner in his exer.
tions to make wife and baby comfort
able for the night. For the winter
sun was surrounded by "sun bugs.
Instead of one sun there were four, an
occurrence not uncommon in this lati.
tude, but one which always bodies
terrible storm.
In his endeayor to care for wife and
child, Jones was mollifed little, and
half regretted that he had been SC
violent about the piece of land. But
he was determined not to be backed
down, and would certainly have tc
shoot Burton or be shot himself
When he thought of the chance oil
being killed by his old partner, the
prospect was not pleasant. He looked
wistfully at Kitty, his two-year-old
child, and dreaded that she should
be left fatherless. Nevertheless, he
wouldn't be backed down. He would
shoot or be shot.
While the father was busy cutting
wood, and the mother was busy other.
wise, little Kitty managed to get the
shanty door open.
There was no latch as yet, and he,
prying little fingers easily swung it
back. A gust of cold air almost took
her breath away, but she caught sight
OF the brown grass without, and the
new world seemed so big that the little
feet would fain try and explore it.
She pushed out through the door,
caught her breath again, and started
away down path bordered by sere
grass and the dead stalks of the wild
flowers.
How often she had longed to escape
from restraint, and paddle out into the
world alone. So out into the world
she went, rejoicing in her liberty, in
the blue sky above, and the rusty prai-
RE beneath. She would find out where
the path went, and what was at the
end of the world. What did she care
If her nose was blue with cold, and her
chubby hands red as beets ? Now and
then she paused to turn her head away
from rude blast, forerunner of the
storm, but, having gasped a moment
she quickly y renewed her brave march
in search of the great unknown.
The mother missed her, but sup.
posed that Jones, who could not get
enough of the child's society, had
taken the little pet out with him.
Jones, poor fellow, sure that the
darling was safe within, chopped away
until that awful storm broke upon him,
and at last drove him, half smothered
by snow and half frozen with cold,
into the house. When there was
nothing left but retreat, he had seized
an armful of wood and carried it into
the house with him, to make sure of
having enough to keep his wife and
Kitty from freezing in the coming aw.
fulness of the night, which now settled
down upon the storm beaten and snow.
blinded world.
1t was the beginning of that horrible
storm in which so many people were
frozen to death, and Jones had fled
none to soon.
When once the wood was stacked by
the stove, Jones looked around for
Kitty. He had no more than inquired
for her when father and mother each
read in the others face the fact that
she was lost in this wild, dashing
snow
SO fast did the snow fall, and SO
dark was the night. that Jones could