Greenbrier independent. [volume] (Lewisburg, Va. [W. Va.]) 1859-1980, 1896-08-20
THE WANDERER.

There was u prosage of storm.
Masses of blue black cloud hung over
the sunset. Tho wind vailed and
died and died and walled. In the
roadway rusty leaves leapcd sudden.
ly TO tho air, oddied and swirlod,
strove to unite with tho tree that
had cast them, shivered in the dixie.
AT tho fringe of the cloud there was
a star.
A stilo had been fixed at the turn
ing of tho road. 1t had three bars
and also step to cross by. On |
either side the hedge grew thickly, |
and there also two trees, like guard |
ians, gaunt in the horrid light. So |
the stile was picturesque But it had
its uses. On the farther side there
stretched path across the meadow.
1t led to the old house that had stood
among the beech trees through gen.
erations. From the stile you could
sec the turrots above the tree tops.
The inheritor, of the name of Dal-
rymple, the squire, lived there. If
you followed the road, you would
also como to the hall and enter by
the great gate. But the pathway
was nearer by far.
On the side of the pathway, in the
anglo whore it joined the stile, there
lay a pond. In the district there
about it was looked on as a place of
ill omen, and back to time out of
&c no1.
had passed it at nightfall with speedy
steps and eyes aslant Yet not to folk
learned In lore, but to the weirdness
of the place itself, should you go for
the reason. The trees grew close to
the margin and met overhead, save
only in the center, where the banks
We're widest. If a stranger should
take stone and hurl it to that
point, no would get in return a tone
so deep and resonant as we'll might
make him wonder. Now the trunks
oreaked and whined, and the wind
whistled in the branches. And the
shadows were black on the pond.
A man was seated ON the stile
His back was to the road, and his
eyes were fixed upon the turret tops
above the trees. He had como upon
a journey. You could tell it from
his boots. He was hungry. You
could tell it from his eyes. Such a
man indeed as one would pass upon
the farther side of the road and be
glad to get rid of toward evening
What hangs to the feet one vaguely
calls boots. With him it was
scraps of leather. And how tnin he
was! Through the rents in his gar
ments there peeped out angles as
sharp that tho coolest, if he saw
them, could scarcely withhold his
pity. At the points they were LAGER
ated by thorns, but the blood had
CONCEALED and lay matted thickly
with the dust of travel. His hands
were like claws. Long, sinewy, toll
stained, they protruded shamefully
from his rags, and, clutohing the
rail upon either side, kept him fixed
on his narrow perch.
There is n penury that chills the
blood. 1t was in the face of that
man. Coarse, tangled, thickly olot-
ted with dust, his hair hung loose
and rank upon his shoulders. A
scanty growth of unkempt beard,
streaked and tinged with gray, bris-
tied from the lower portions of his
face, as weeds grow sparsely on an
arid soil. His checks were so hollow
that the bones stuck out like the
knuckleS on mans clinched fist.
The color of his skin had come,
through time and sameness of
treatment, to accord with the dull,
coarse brown of his hair and mis-
clothes. His eyes-lusterless deep
sunk in the sockets, stained at the
margins with blood, weary, wild
gazed at the turrets OF the han.
have seen such look upon the face
of starving dog.
The wind walled in the branches,
and the clouds massed in the west,
but the man sat still upon the stile.
But when those who were hurrying
from the storm came by he moved
to let them pass. Yet ever he
dropped upon the side that was
farthest from the hall. Suoh as
were women eyed him askance
and suoh as were men with Won
der. But not soul passed him
q salutation. So the man remained,
and the birds cried out for the storm.
Then two maids returning to the
hall came to the stile and tossed
their heads, resenting that he should
soil with his clothes the rail which
their skirts must touch.
Yet the stile was his own. Nor
the stile alone, but the grass at his
feet, and the great house at the end
of the pathway, and the broad acres
that pressed it round. There were
warmt tin and good cheer at the house.
Still the man moved not. Had the
Journey been long. and did he 1inger