Blackfoot news. (Blackfoot, Idaho) 1891-1902, 1893-12-09
LAST LETTER FROM OLD VIRGINIA.
Correspondent Coming HOme--Sadness
of Parting Scenes, Etc.

vs. Ah senc sSNcDS'5 N%NS"
DEAR NEws:-We are coming bone.
1t will not be this week, it may not be
next week, but we are coming soon.
The little details needful for our
long journey are being made; the last
good byes to friends, living here and
there, are being said the last round
of visits to dear ones is being paid
The saddest part of our entire visit
is to come; it is near at hand. My
mother will feel it more keenly than
l. The last good byes to her will be
something like the last good bye al
the grave OF loved one.
Yesterday we visited the old school
grounds where my father and mother
played together, and in early child
life unconciously formed ties which
ripened into love and union of hearts
which are to end only when life ends.
The old teacher was gone; he is TAX
ing his long, long, vacation. The old
school house has been torn down and
moved away. The grove of native
white oaks has been cut down by
stranger hands, and but little is left
to mark the spot where for years and
years there was so much of innocence,
so much of happiness and SO much
planning and airy castle building for
future life.
The old spring with its clear limpid
water is still there. They tell me the
moss covers its low stone curbing as
it did 40 years ago. and its sparkling
water bubbles up and and goes leap
ing and laughing downward through
its narrow channel as it did when the
pupils in boyish and girlish merri-
ment and glee spent happy moments
chasing one another and jumping from
bank to bank Where are the hundreds
and hundreds gone who have quench-
ed their thirst with the water of this
dear old spring? Where, oh, where?
Last night IN the waning twilight
my mother and | walked down through
the garden walk-way TO bid last
good bye to the silent sleepers in our
little family grave yard. ! stood as
a sorrowful watcher and when my
mother walked in between two green
mounds, nestled close together, cover
ing the remains of her father and
mother and kneeling placed her right
hand upon the one and her left hand
upon the other and bowling her head
low in silent prayer, SO intense and
solemn was the stiffness that the very
night seemed to hold its breath and
the stars of the early evening ceased
to twinkle looking down in sadness
through the overspreading branches
of the leafess trees upon the pictur'
Of the sobbing mourners st the grave,
for the last time of their beloved
dead. When we retained hand il
hand TO the dwelling our lips moveC
not but our footballs on the graveleC
walk seemed to say in mournful con
cert: ''Good bye loved ones, foreve
here, good bye"
| shall not write sou again from on
old home or from our OLD State. NJ,
remaining time will be given to fare
' well visits and preparations for on
mid-winter returning journey acros
! the continent There are thousand
of things / might write about who
would interest some of your reader
: but they cannot be touched upon i
: this letter 1t may be agreeable &c
me to write about them after my r
} turn TO my faraway Idaho home.
We have not agreed upon our +
turn journey, whether by Old PoiI
Comfort over the Chesapeake Bay
d Baltimore or over the Blue Ridge an
Allegheny mountains through We
Virginia and Ohio to Chicago, s
Paul and then through the Dakot,
l, and Montana to Idaho The latt
route seems preferable at this writir
because we have seen much of Il
former route before.