The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-08-12

Gnln euecLS VIII WHICH the human car
can be greeted
This afternoon before Christmas was
wild one in the English channel. Great
banks Of fog pounded along the southern
Cornish downs. Driving rain and sleet
cut sharply the faces Of all who braved
the blast; ana the thunderings along the
coast were fearsOme TO hear.
Il was so dark. but an hour after mid
day in the single struggling street Of
Stithney, that the huge miners candles
fiared in the dingy windows Of the dingier
shops. and other lights flashed cheerily
out Of d few of the better habitatlOns and
from the latticed windows Of the rectOry.
Little for Christmas cheer was prepar-
ing in the scrimped homes of this old
Cornish hamlet, and the only object Of
animation or life in the storm heated vii
laEe street were Poll Treenodle with her
donkey and cart, and greedy rabble of
children following after, as Poll passed
from door 20 door, her usual load of
grOwder row exchanged for sprigs of
holly. wreaths of mistletOe and that
greatest treat to Cornish little folk, the
currant-flled, saHron-smOthered Christ
mas bun.
But old Poll was in surprising spirits
and even in more surprising attire. Over
her poor. bent frame was a strange white
gown. She had twined about this, scrag-
gy garlands of mistletOe, interlaced with
gaudy ribbons, and on her palsied head
hung an Outlal3ish Cornish gowk wide
bonnet whose flap covers the shoulders ;
and from this the mist and sleet trickled
upon her gown, sadly discOlOring it with
the tiimsy, fading ribbon shades.
Some came to doors aud windows and
looked pityingly upon her, with such say
ings as see the poor mazed pattic sim
pleton) - or 'Awd rat it! 'Tis pity on
tn roadling i tn skew (pelting storm :"
or "Ol Polls streeyed Cabored) 'erlong,
thars down souse CHATS plain :" and
the like but the lonely soul smiled and
gurgled to compassionate or railing face
alike and sold her Christmas wares be-
times, unheeding all the folk and storm.
She had come in front of the little par
ism church, with her stores nearly gone
She looked up TO the belfry with grand
and knowing air. Some who were near
heard her mutter:
When our beels best once wrang tn
hams II be caad DOT, an then Joe an
POll'l be just one"
Those who heard this, also saw her sud
denly grow pale and totter against the
cart. They saw, too, that her eyes were
almost starting from their sockets, and
were fixed in an agony of terror upon a
corner of the church tower battlement
Peering through the mist, they saw a
single raven perched upon the stone. The
bird of ill omen bobbed and ducked and
craned its cunning head, first toward the
belfry and then down toward old Poll and
her cart. Then it settled its head back
between its shoulders, opened its uncanny
throat and uttered a mournful:
"Caw-caw-caw
With an unearthly cry of Joe, Joe -
ye're a korph marc dead body corb'n
dumping on tn shore - she leaped into
her cart, shriekingly urged the donkey
into mad pace and disappeared in the
thickening fog in the direction of the sea.
They tell at Stithney TO this day how
the miner, 'fatchin' hoam. " from the pits {;
the fisher folk, trailing into the village
from their boats and their nets; the
laborers Fastening back to their cottages
In the early evening hours; and all the
lowly folk that gather there from lowly
work and toll watched in little
groups in shops and the smithy, or in open
cottage doors discussing the grewsome
sign, and peering with eager eyes far down
the highway toward the sea- for sight of
returning Poll and Joe
They tell, too, that it was the dreariest
Christmas Eve old Stithuey ever knew
that as the storm changed from fog to
sleet and from sleet to pelJing snow. it
drove the villagers indoors early; that
but few were bold or strong enough to
loiter and wait; and that finally, but two
old miners, nerved by brave tales and gin
and treacle, were the last ones left beside
the village smithy door; where the flick
ering light from the forge played fantas-
tic conjurings with the strange snow
shapes along the hedges and the roads.
But here the two old miners waited
until nearly midnight; and at last, stupid
from waiting and from grog, were just
about closing the smithy door to plunge
through the snow drifts to their cottage
homes. One more look they would take
down the swirling, snow-pelted road.
They stepped from the door together.
They fell upon and over some suddenly
appraised obstacle. One of the old men
plunged headlong over a SNOWY hitened
donkey into drift, and the other sprawled
strugglngly within a snow-hlled cart.
What his hands touched and his body
met, besides the show, sent him bound
ing and laundering into the highway.
Then old Stithney hamlet was awakened
by cries of terror which brought its men
and brawny housewives to the smithy
door. Crouching behind it the watching
miners were chattering and mumbling in
superstitious fear.
They pulled and pushed the mute don
key and its cart within the shadowy
place. White as a new-washed fleece
they could see the donkey then. White
as driven snow were the donkey cart and
wheels. White as snow, or death, the
sti1ened objects, to which the pelting
fakes had strangely nodded. White as
the drifts in blOssoming hawthorne lanes,
the faces that they found beneath.
For there lay the ringer of the tenor
bell of Stithney, with sand and tiny sea
shells and seaweed drift in his grizzled
hair and beard, just as old Poll had laid
his liteless body IN her cart: and there
beside it, too, her thin and shriveled
hands clutching the other ones against
her pulseless heart, lay Poll Treenoodle,
a smile ON her weakened factor had
not their bells been rung their bans
called out, and had not the two at last
become as one in the everlasting Sleep
"Stithney would not ever since have
rested under the shadow of some
thing like a superstitious curse" per.
pleXedly remarked Rector Duulea to his
daughter hose and their young literary
friend from London, William Hardy, as
they sat together in the pleasant library
of the rectOry, some three years later
had not an unaCcountable incident at
that moment occurred -
He had been recounting the tragedy of
three years before, and the awe and
solemnity which had overshadowed the
villagers from the ghostly return of the
dead, when donkey cart and mute bur.
dens had come with their appalling 81.
lence out of the bitter storm to the open
smithy door.
They had got the frozen bodies