The weekly Thibodaux sentinel and journal of the 8th Senatorial District. [volume] (Thibodaux, Lna. [i.e. La.]) 1875-1898, 1896-12-26
GOOD THE COMING,

It was an October day, and the air was
charged with the aromatic sharpness
that follows tho change in nature caused
b. the first frost. The sounds of the
woods-ha,l changed from the summer
murrlur to the autumn rustic, and ma
ture, like an aging coquette, was dress
lEg herself in gaudy colors for her last
season. The NAPLES were clustered in
crimson lnagniticence on the knobs and
ridges, while the elns and ashes in the
hollows clothed themselves in softest
yellows shot with green. And in the
fields departing summer was sIsod with
the rrsset Of the stubble lands.
Through this scene of melancholy
beauty was wandering ftfully, now half
running, row sitting down, disquieted
and u~nterved, q man who seemed
strangely ont Of keeping with it all. He
was tall and gaunt, sharp eyed, and in
moments ct repose a man who bore all
the marks Of authority. His lips invol-
unfairly shaped themselves to a ssneer
Of cold command" and his high, pale
brow. with its bright, transparent skin,
spoke Of ceaseless thought.
But he was acting like one possessed.
He would walk along rapidly for a few
moments. scanning the trees like an In
dian pot hunter and holding his gun in
readiness for a quick shot. Then lie
would stop suddenly, arrested by a
thought. Sometimes the thought would
be one that would wiring an oath from
his lips, and sometimes it would bring
to his face a look of perplexity that
would end il the laugh that
tells Of an uncomfortable feeling at the
heart-the kind hat often brings a
moisture to the eyes and a choking feel
ing to the throat. Hiram Pratt was
stirred to the depths Of his nature-stir-
red as he Thought he never could be. At
Il moment he would regret the i'm
pulse that hal taken him back to his
old homo on tue farm, and at the next
he would thrill with boyish delight at
the thought Of baeging gray squirrels
and quail, just as he used in his youth.
His friends in New York would have
been deeply concerned" could they
have seen him.
He had just spent the night with his
mother in the old log house where he
was born and had learned anew some
thing that be had forgotten. In his
business career he had schooled himself
to consider money everything and SEN
4timent nothing, hut III that old house
sentiment was supreme and counted for
more than the riches Of a palace. When
he asked his mother why she did not
live in the fine brick house which he
had had built for her and which his
brother now lived in, she replied:
"Why, Hiram, your father brought
me here when we were married and
when there wasn't five acres cleared on
the farm. You were all horn here, and
all who are dead died here, and as [
potter about you are all with me as
you were when you We're young. It
wouldn't be the samein the new house."
Then she put up her old wrinkIed
face to be kissed as in the other days,
and the worldly man stopped and kiss
ed her. As he did the hardness of his
heart chilled him like a curse, and
snatching up a candle he fastened to
the room her loving hands had prepared
for him. All night he tossed OH his pill
low, striving to strike a balance between
the love and tenderness he had lost and
the millions he had gained, and it was
because the problem was still painfully
unsolved that he wandered about SO dis
tractedly through the October woods.
At last he came to the thicket where
there used to be a covey of cartridges
every fall, but now there was no whir-
ring Of wings at his approach. But the
fallen oak round which they used to
hide and beside which he used to Get