The advocate., 1894-04-25


lastingly, do you, when you have been
sold Out?"
. "Sold 0utF
eyes, sold out. l suppose you don't
remember sold your place at the court
house door two months agol is your
memory failing? The sale was con-
firmed and the deed made long ago,
but the court gave Cotterell here two
months time to get out, and the time is
about up, and you will have to get
ready and CO."
$50? Oh, Sam, have we lost the
placer"
But Sam Cotterell'S gray head was
buried in his hands, his elbows resting
upon the patches on his poor, old
trembling knees. The old man was
silent. Mrs. Cotterell burst into tears
and left the room.
"Wel, what have you got to say, old
man? l have got to go. Come-when
are you going to get outP You don't
want me to have to thTOo0 you Out-do
your"
Still the old man did not speak. Soon
there was a sudden, conVulsive move
ment of his whole body, and the weak,
cOnValescent old farmer fell to the floor
and lay as if dead. 1t was toward sun
down. DIR. Darlington, receiving no
response to his knock, opened the front
door and entered, just as Mrs. COtter-
ell rushed furiOusly in at the back door
with an uplifted axe in her frenzied
hands. The terrified sheriff flying from
Mrs. COtterelPS axe almost upset the
Doctor in mad haste to get out Of the
house. But at sight of her prostrate
husband, she dropped the axe and
sought to raise him; the Doctor hast
ened to her assistance, and together
they lifted to the bed the wreck of what
had been Sam Cotterell. Their efforts
revived him at last, but his eyes wore a
vacant look and for the time at least,
the old mans reason had abdicated its
throne. The sheriff returned to town
with the determination to eVict his old
soldier comrade as soon as the courts
order would permit such recreation.
Yes, veteran soldiers, his comrade.
The sheriff wore conSpicuouSly upon
his coat lapel the badge of the Grand
Army of the Republic. He had
served in the same corps with his VIC
tim. What say you, men? Would
y0u have done to comrade the inhu-
man deed that sheriff was content to
do ? or would you rather have resigned
your office? Look at your ruined com.
rade as he lies there a physical and
mental wreck; see his patched gar
30 hn hn ~
conspicuous upon him and all about
him; old now, and no longer able to
cope with adVersity even should he re-
cover; just snatched back from the
brink of the graVe-loOk, and answer
it-What, had you been sheriff, would
yoW have done? The government he
fought for has decreed that he and his
old, worn-Out wife shall take each other
by the hand and 60 out into homeless
leaving behind them forever
the prairie eden which they had made
by long, weary years of toll. An at
mosphere of tenderest associations sur
rounds the old homestead. There three
children had been born; there one had
died; there Mrs. COtthrell had waited
her young husbands return from the
war; there she had run to meet him at
last that glad day when she saw him
coming; out in the yard are the trees
and bushes Kate had planted while yet
at home; every holy association that
can bind the human heart to a spot of
earth clustered about that homestead
whence the government, to whose de-
fense Cotterell had given four years of
his young manhood, had decreed he in
his old age should be driven. And a
man wearing the badge of the Grand
Army was to execute that unholy de-
cree-was to wreck thus a comrades
home, and life, and hopesl Would yOu
have done it? Take heed how you an
D.