Bellows Falls times. [volume] (Bellows Falls, Vt.) 1856-1965, 1896-07-04

advice OF u friend began the Com
pound. After using it two months l
was different girl. and now at the end
of six am entirely cured. '-MRs. ANNIE
KIRKLAND, Patchogue, L. ].
utter the breaking OF the colonels arm
threats which were loud enough to
rause the elder Bynum to disappear for
time, rumor said in Texas
The fire of enmity, however, was
never suffered to die. There were fit
full bursts of flame from time to time,
and fresh fuel was added when the
sleepy village of Tregarthen awoke one
morning to find itself the Headquarters
of the Tregarthen Coal d Iron COM
pany. All of the coal and iron land on
the mountain belonged originally to
the Latimer estate, but the Bynums had
disputed with the colonel the owner
ship to one of the coal veins which
cropped out near the boundary of Nc
Nabb's cove. They were defeated in the
litigation that followed, and the old
feud lost none of it's rancor by the de-
cision of the courts. When it's right to
the MeNabb vein had been established
the company had endeavored to open it,
but the overhanging stratum of sand
stone proved to be singularly intracta-
able, and the further development of
the vein was postponed until such time
as the depth of the other workings
| would make it less costly to timber the
Nc Nabb tunnel. Opinions varied as
to the cause of the difficulty in the
McNabb. Expert mining engineers
had declared that the sandstone form
ing the roof OF the tunnel was AS
| tenacious as that everything the other
veins, and that there was no apparent
reason why it should require timber
ing; but the indubitable fact remained
| progress, the miners frequently found
| the labor of a week undone in a single
| night by a caving of the roof which
filed the tunnel with broken rock.
Ludlow had it's own theory about these
mysterious accidents, but he kept it to
himself. 1t was suggested by the smell
of black powder which he detected
one morning when he was examining
| the debris that had fallen during the
| previous night. 1t struck him as be-
ing curious, because he knew that the
miners were using dynamite; and it led
to series of casual inquiries among
| the jewellers in Harmony Valley near
est to the entrance to McNabb's Cove.
| The replies were not entirely convinc-
ing, because the nocturnal noises heard
by the valley folk might have been
nothing more than the conclusion of
the falling rock; but Ludlow heard
enough to make him believe that when
| it became necessary to take coal from
the McNabb vein a night-guard at the
tunnel would possibly avert disaster
more efficiently than the most elaborate
system of timbering.
1t was during the progress of the
| lawsuit that jeff Bynum returned to
the farm in McNabb's Cove; and the
rumor which had pointed to Texas as
the objective of his migration was con-
firmed by his own story of his wander
ings. Not contented, however, with
this tribute to it's veracity, gossip again
busted itself with his affairs, and there
were vague hints of a lawless sojourn
in the Lone Star state, coupled with a
still more indefinite intimation that his
career in the west had terminated in
open crime.
One other element of discord had
been added by the passing years to the
Latimer side of the feud, in the person
of the colonel's son Henry. The boys
mother, to whose gentle influence the
fireside gossips of Tregarthen ascribe
| ~. r E. L.,
short life at ''The Laurels," died while
Hester and Henry were children; and
the boy had early learned the lesson
of vindictiveness from the lips of over
loyal servants. Uniting with hasty
and imperious temper contempt of
restraint curious in q descendant of the
conservative old Virginian, his rashness
became constant menace to the pre-
carious truce existing between the two
families; and as Henry grew to man
hood, the colonel was often reluctant
ly compelled to take the side of peace
for the sake of setting an example be-
| fore his son.
In the case of the daughter, educa-
ton in boardingschool, where she
had spent the greater portion OF her
girlhood, and, later, association with
the Ludlows, had done much to modify
her childish ideas of feudal vengeance.
but she was still enough of a partisan
TO be very warm in her defense of the
Latimer rights, and, in common with
her brother, she could never believe
that anything but vindictive malice
actuated the doings of the family in
McNabb's Cove.
Don't you think you are little in,
clined to judge them harshly, my dear p
Mrs. Ludlow had once ventured to ask,
when Hester had been expressing heI
contempt for the Bynums and every.