Wood River times. [volume] (Hailey, Idaho) 1882-1915, 1893-12-06
a CENTURY ride.
BY GRACE IL. DENISON,

You never saw such dear little vel
low-haired, dainty featured maid as
Maude Mannering, the successful girl
graduate and medical student.
When she came forward at commence
ment, in delightful little Greenaway
gown OF white muslin, peppercd over
with tiny dots, with the very smile of
childhood in her wide blue eyes, and
Der curly hair clustering round her
brows-the learned doctors, imported to
adorn the commencement exercises.
biinked their eyes and looked twice,
and hesita,ed, even then, to accept her
As an established fact. When she knelt
% receive her degree, they each and all
Ns.sned to hear the childish PRAYER.
"Now l lay me -" issue from her
little rosebud mouth. A degree for that
child9 Impossiblel She had come to
say her prayers, and be kissed and put
to bed. That she could be the medical
student, that she could enter dissecting
room, carve up a subject, watch mortal
sickness, stand by dying bed-prepos-
ferrous! it might not be. And yet, it all,
and much more, had been. Maude
Mannering was an enthusiast on matters
surgical, and had cleverly sewn up the
jagged throat of a would be suicide
softly rating him, as she did so, for not
having made a neat cut-on the very
day when she knelt dcmurely before
the Chancellor's footstool to receive her
degree.
The learned doctors stared, with their
unbelieving eyes, and the Chancellor
smiled as they turned to one another.
agapc, and shook their heads, while
Maude tripped smilingly back to her
seat, and the students shrieked and sang
to her glory.
"Shall l go?" were the words which
would have issued from her pretty lips,
one day, week later chad She been in
the habit of talking to herself), as she
finished reading long and chatty letter
inviting her to ''come away North, and
spend the holidays" and concluding
with these words: ave are fifty
miles from everywhere, and our roads
are splendid, so you had better
bring your bicycle. or velocipcde, or
whatever it is you ride to the horror
and confusion of Auntie." Maude turned
the letter thoughtfully over, skimming
from page to page There was post
script, OF course. simply four words,
Carr is with u.s." But, whatever the
girl read, she saw only those four words,
and it was on their account that she
asked herself, "Shail go2" Carr was
her correspondents brother, her escort
at the wedding Of that lady, and subse-
quently, her own rejected sweetheart of
last year. Last year was a long time
ago, to be sure, and Carr had not moped
over things; Maude was not vain, she
concluded to CO.
The station, away up North, was
reached by Maude on sweet June even
ing, about sunset. Never did a daintier
little figure descend from a palace car,
and stand forlornly beside a couple of
trunks and bicycle, watching the less
ening train a. it melted into the distance
in the red sunset. Half dozen houses
dotted the prairie; store, a driving
shed, small inn and the combined post
office and station clustered close together
In the vast emptiness. Within half q
mile stood the last grove of trees, mark
ing the western limit Of the timber
country. 1t required some womanhood
% accept things, for the first view of