Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1897-12-10

cyl, LUZ ne saw that unless no COLL -
o,,4 ' sumo way of getting Miss Pavson
OuU Vi That steeple he wonld ~ 9V a.
marry her whether he wanted 70 ~ ~
ne thought the matter over fo,. o,l.l -
naIss rayson weeping her level hest and
'oS'iilg her head in a forgetful sort Of
way on his shoulder. Finally a bright
luea struck him. There was tbe boII
rope, which was stout one inch ,,,onii
Ia. Why shouldn't he lower Misc De-
sUn 10 the ground with it, and then
slide down it HIMSELF"
He explained his plan TO tbo lad,
out she didn't seem to like it. She said
she was sure the rope would break nv
mat he would drop it, or that she
would be killed in some sort of way. if
the experiment was tried No saws
she, 1 will remain here and trnst to
your honor as a gentleman to defend me
from the sneers of the heartless world.
really haven't the courage to allow
you to lower me down this awful
height with any rope
Halsey won ldn't hear to her obiec-
tons and argued with her a long time.
1t wasn't until he accidentally men.
toned that the steeple was chock full of
mice and rats and bats and such that
Miss Payson consented to try the rope.
Even then she was mighty dissatisfied
woman and came very near resolving
that she would take the risk of the wild
ANIMALS rather than lose such a first
class chance for capturing a desirable
husband. Halsey rugged up a sort of
seat Tor the woman, so that she could
sit i'll the blight of the rope, with lash
lngs around her here and there, and
couldn't fall out if she wanted to. Then
he got her to stand on the window ledge
and lowered away. Miss Payson
shrieked a good deal at first and begged
Halsey to let her come back and die
close to him, but he wasn't going to
have any woman dying around his neck
II he knew himself. So he lowered her
down gently and easily, encouraging
her all the time, till he found that his
rope had come to an end. 1t wasn't
quite as long as he had supposed that it
was, and the upshot was that there was
Miss Payson about 80 feet from the
ground, with no possible way of reach
ing it unless Halsey should let go his
end of the rope.
He thought of letting go of it, but
being humane, good tempered man, as
said, he couldn't bring himself to do
it, since the result would have been
that either Miss Payson would have
been killed or atleast most of her limbs
would have been broken. So he made
the end of the rope fast to beam and
called out to Miss Payson not to lose
courage, and he would soon think of
some way of getting her out of the diff
Guilty. She begged him to draw her up
again, and he actually tried to do it,
knowing all the while what the conse-
quences would be if he succeeded, but
he found that he didn't have the neces-
sary strength. Miss Payson was heavier
than she looked to be, though she was
mostly bones, but she was "a good 70
! feet below him, and it would have
| taken two men of his strength to have
hoisted her up into the steeple again.
He pulled at the rope till he was pretty
nearly exhausted, for he naturally felt
a little ashamed of acknowledging to a
woman that there was anything that he
wasn't strong enough to do. However,
he had to come 70 it at last and tell her
that if it was to save both their lives he
couldn't manage to pull her back into
| the steeple. So she settled down to cry,
and he settled down to smoke a pipe,
with view to clearing his ideas.
"All of a sudden he saw what he
ought to do and wondered that he had
been such an idiot as to not have seen
it before There was the bell just above
his head, and all he had to do was to
climb up and ring it by swinging the
clapper from side to side till the alarm
should bring back the sexton with the
KEYS. By this time it was getting rath-
er dark, and Halsey set to work at that
bell and kept on tolling it slow and
regular, for that was the only way he
could manage TO ring it.
"Its the custom with us to toll the
bell when any body dies and to give
Just as many strokes on the bell as the
deceasedIhad lived years. When HaIsey
began to toll the bell, the Athensville
people listened to find out how old the
deceased had been. When the strokes
had got up among the eighties, they al
lowed that the Oldest settler IN the
town must have died very sudden, fol
he had been seen drunk, as usual, anc
in perfect health that afternoon as late
as 3 O'Clock. But the bell kept on, anc
bimeby, after it had tolled some 2o'
times and showed no signs OF stopping
folks began to think that the sextoI
had lust happened to hear about th'
death of Methuselah and was NOTIFYING
other people of the fact.
"You may ask why didn't somebody
% TO the church and find out what tn
bell was ringing for, Well, for on
thing, it was just supper time, and no
body felt anxious to take walk OF
mile or two just at that hour. Then
too. it had been said that the Baptls
cbnrcbyard was haunted, and ther
wasn't any general desire to lntefler
with ghosts in case they should nav
taken a notion to toll the bell. Inc toii
ing kent on till Halsey had tolled Tn
hell over 400 times, and then Rev. MI
Humphreys arrived on the spot an
when he heard Miss Payson' 8 volo
somewhere in the air over his heao n
was considerably startled, though nc
!, being a believer in ghosts he WASH = u
least bit frightened.
"nHow on earth did you come
.,.o-o ,,,o,am asked the minister, AN