Connecticut western news., 1897-01-28
A REDEEMING ACT.

DaNo was a CoWdA anu hC hdu ways borne the reputation of arrant cowardice ever since he had crawled over the Ide of his dugout cradle to wallow along with the underfoot world on the white sand before his parents cabin door, Though country born and bred, a passing thunderstorm struck him with terror, and the sight of the black waters of the "crick" caused a agitation of his knees He was . coward pure and simple. The brissling of a coon routed him uncondi- and determined possum could rob the henroost before his very :ace Indeed, Dave was 8 coward, and his cousin, Sue Spivey, laughed uproarious iy when the poor fellow perpetrated his initial and only act of boasting. He had said to her one day very solemnly and no eoubt sincerely:
 Toe purtec yo' honah an happiness [ 'ud th'ow away my wuthless life"
 Ordinarily Dave's speech was unpol shed and provincial, but on this occa- Sion it rose to the dignity of what he elt the occasion demanded.
 Sue knew full we'll his timorous dis position and would have thought it safe o count on his poltroonery in any vent But a day was sadly near which proved to her the full worth of the poor elbows grandiloquent assertion
 Long before the late unpleasantness nd until this day Honeypath was only siding, where occasional trains took eater and passed each other. Two or aree log shanties, without special pre- ensions to any architectural dissimi- arity, marked the site of the town, dis inguishing it from the vast area of inn oenetrable swamp that backed it and he arid waste of sandy bottom through which the glistening. polished rails of he grand trunk line writhed and sinu- tied. Along that glowing metal high way troops of both armies passed and repassed, gazed at curiously by the few old women and senile males left in the village, but exciting no other emotion han a blank curiosity that died out ven before the white mist of the fine and stirred by the soldiers feet had 'ettled behind the retreating bands
 Dave was a native of Honeypath and lived with an aged father in one of the ,hanties Sue dwelt with her mother in mother near by. Dave's father was .
 ot blooded southerner. whose patriot
 m answered to the first call to arms, ut Dave was tlmid, fearful of the smell If powder and refrained from action, preferring to suffer the opprobrious epi- thets which were literally bestowed up on him and the contempt of the county generally to facing he knew not what lorror upon the battlefield. He was not | philosopher and could not plead in ex-
 enuation of his neutrality that the martial slaughter of his brother man vas Q crime and that the wholesale sac rifice of human life was immoral
 Dave was simply a coward and accept
 d meekly the obloquy which the con iition imposed. not even the taunts and cutting sarcasm of pretty Sue Spivey being able to rouse the instincts of bat tie in his craven soul
 Before the strife ended Sues mother was gathered to her final rest being put out of sight in the little sandy graveyard, with only the comment of the two remaining neighbors And then Dave and Sue toiled early and late in order to wiring from the starving acres an unvaried livelihood of yams, corn bread and bacon, more often the corn bread without the establishment of DO tatoes and bacon, particularly during the weeks after hungry foraging party had passed that way.
 One day Dave was working among the young potato vines in an open arid field behind the cabin, when Sue rar out to him in troubled haste.
 "Oh, Dave, I'm pow'ful skeeredP she panted-
 "Skeered O what?" he asked. with out intermission of the bent labor. "Some-some soldiers just went dowr the road, an they spoke to me-sassy like" She hesitated. and Dave looked up to see her pretty face scarlet and hel ! brows bent together in angry lines Well. what did they all say?' h, | demanded in his accustomed slow draw after waiting in vain for her to proceed .'They lowed they all was a-comir
 back. '' ..
 "Wbo was they ennyhow?" he asket uneasily, his face blanching in antici patton of the martial visit
 They was Mosby's men, lowed | m they was five of 'em
 | "Our fellers?" little surprised ant straightening his back. Come on bacl to the house, Sue" and, shoulderinl
 his hoe, he trudged stolidly on before
 Don't you be skeered, |" he continue,
 as they reached the yard "I reckon they won't do nothin-
 | Of the two 1t would have been mani | fest to the most casual observer that h was the worst "skeered," but he walk
 ed on till they reached the house, an
 Sue cried oLt:
 l Wonder they come now-all five :" Dave's face blanched to a salloy
 whiteness, but he pulled her quickly in
 side the 6oor.
 What you gwine to dor" Sue aske
 nervously, keeping near her cousin, bu
 he apparently did not hear. He ha taken down Q rife that had belonged t Sue's brother, who had also offered ul
 his life on the altar of the cause, leaV ing his weapon to his sister as mean of defense in just such emergencies a this.
 "what you gwine to do, Dave?'' tn
 girl persisted, coming closer and layin her hand on his arm. Dave shook sever al cartridges into the cylinder of tn winchester and waited in silence, aI , parently not aware that Sue had touch
 ed him Only few more moments
 wait and then the last act in the con
 monnlace little tragedy. A loud pound