The Madison daily leader. [volume] (Madison, S.D.) 1890-current, 1895-01-24
CUPID AND PSYCHE.

His name upon the ships books was
Edward Braithwaite Colchester, but be-
tween Tilbury and Sydney harbor he
was better known as Cupid. His mother
was a widow, with four more olive
branches, absolutely dependent on her
own and Teddy's exertions.
At the best Of times kindergartens
for the children of respectable trades
people are not particularly remunera-
tive, and the semidetached villa in Sy-
denham was often soreIy tried for petty
cash.
But when Teddy was appointed fourth
officer of the x. Y. z. company's steam
ship Cambrian Prince endless possibili-
ties were opened up.
II you will remember that every
thing in this world is ordained to o
certain end. you will see that Teddy's
future entirely depended on his falling
in love-first love of course, and not the
matter of fact businesslike affair that
follows later.
After his second voyage he obtained
a fortnight's leave and fastened home.
oC1Ik lOuO VI 5EIAIS dlIu SUCH IKE
a~musements, he was naturally brought
into contact with many charming girls,
who, because he was a strange man and
a sailor, were effusively polite.
Then he fell hopelessly in love with
a horribly impossible girl, and in the
excitement of the latest waltz proposed
and was accepted On the strength of a
fourth officers pay, an incipient mus
tache and a dozen or SO brass buttons.
During the next voyage his behavior
toward unmarried women was marked
by that circumspection which should
always characterize an engaged man.
He never allowed himself to forget
this for an instant, and his cabin had
for its chief ornament a plush framed
likeness OF a young lady gazing with a
wistful expression over a palpably pho
Geographic sea.
Now, it was necessary for his ultimate
happiness that Teddy Colchester should
learn that, like his own brass buttons,
without constant furnishing o young
lady's affection is apt to lose much of
its pristine brightness, and that too
~ 5Os ~ 10 S0ON AOI LEAIHCI. uG
licked off the days of absence, and as
his calendar lessened his affection in
creased.
At Plymouth a letter met him, a
jerky, inky schoolgirl epistle, evidently
written by a writer very cold and mis-
cradle, and the first reading stunned
him. ....
Had he seen a little more of the real
world he would have been able to read
between the lines something to this eff
feet: You're Teddy, three months
away, and I'm madly in love with a
soldier.
Then he would have noted that the |
writer was staying in Salisbury, after |
which he would have hunted up his
home papers and discovered that the
Royal Wiltshire yeomanry cavalry were
encamped at Huntingdon Down.
But as he had only seen life through
a telescope he could not do this. Conse. |
quently his pain was a trife acute.
His mother wrote him four pages of
sympathy.
But though he wondered at anv girl |
Jllting her boy she could not help a
feeling OF satisfaction at its being still
In her power to transmute three-auar- |
tiers OF his pay into food and raiment
for her brood.
Next voyage the Cambrian Prince
had her full complement of passengers.
and b Kangaroo Girl, whom perhaps |
You may remember, was of the number.
AT Plymouth a little reserved girl
Joined, and as she is considerably mixed
up in this story You must know that
n rejoiced in the unpretentious name
of Kinks.
For the first week or SO Teddy held
very much aloof from the en-.
gaging himself entirely with recoIlec.
tions OF the girl for whose sake he was
going to live ''only in memory"
Being an honest, straightforward
young fellow, be of course followed the
prescribed programme of all blighted
love affairs He began by plying him.
self Tor the sorrow he was undergoing.
then Went on to picture the future that
might have been theirs had she married
him, but before they were clear of the
bay he had arrived at the inyariahle
conclusion and was plying himself for
plying the girl who was foolish enough |
60 Jilt such an entirely estimable Young |
man as Edward Rraithwaite Colchester.
One moonlight night, after leaving
Glib be was leaning over the rails of
taae promenade deck feeling sympathet-
iOally inclined to the world in general
when somebody stepped MP behind him.
u was Miss Kinks She p~refaced her
convsrsation with two or three questions