The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1897-09-30

how she would despise and contemn who
had so loved and trusted, when she should
learn how had trified with her happiness
and dlssipated the inheritance of our child
/ believe now that If had given up and
confessed my weakness and shame, my wife
would have forgiven me- even though il LETT
us 10 begin life anew at the Zer0-pont OF
the social and financial scale Perhaps /
thought so then. but the b lief only added
TO, my desperation. How could | live to
sue to her for pardon? Had she not trusted
me from the first moment our eyes met,
when we wee yet hardly more than chill
dren? Gould | bear to blight that faith and
disappoint that buoyani love? We are told
that love casteth out fear" but niue multi
piled ii thousanafoid. / thought would
rather die than have her know my weak
ness. In faci, ] often contemplated snicide,
and that no doubt would have been the end
OF the struggle. but / remembered a life in
surance policy that stood in her blessed
name, which would have been inyalidated
by such an act. IL was ali that would be
left Tiff / could not hold on. So did not
raise my hand against my life, but only
prayed that | might die.
And still the took fell, and continued to
fall Fraction by fraction, point by point,
1t crept down the scale OF value. / hanted
the brokers' offices and read the white rib
bons that rolled off the "tickersn until I
was afraid to look ut them any more. And
still the calls for more margins came.
A friend loaned me something on the
books had gathered in The hope, which a
man Of literary tendencies is so apt to in
dulge, of forming a really valuable collection
"a collection that shall be at the same time
of use while he shall live and a sort of
monument Of scholarly aspiration when he
shall be no more. They were my pride, but
not worth half the sum he advanced on
them. j think now he did it out Of mere
pity for my despair. When man has been
dead awhile he finds the world improves
wonderfully as he looks back upon it,
i knew the end must come soon, and tried
TO brace myself TO bear the shock of humilia-
ton which IT must bring was fully aware
OF what 1t meant. There is no crime the
world Will not forgive sooner than failure :
there is no other disgrace it will not forget
except poverty. Pay that thou owest," is
in these days the hottest Of all command
ments. Whoever is unable to comply with
it is already damned. Society. the church.
the club, his party and his friends stand
ready 10 treat him as an ou,cast. His
family are dragged with him to an obscuritv
in comparison with which Erebus is but
twilight.
very well understood that If nv little
property, modest as it was, were swept away
and | went for!h among men with the brand
of the debtor on my brow, it would be a
thousand times worse than the mark of
Cain, whom all men condemned but whom
none would STAY lest they should end his
agony; inasmuch as Msmmon's condemna-
ton is infinitely more potent with good
society than Gods. ! knew that when the
end came it would mean death.
So l walked the Office floor hy day and
the streets 10y night, waiting for the end,
wondering when the blow would fall and
how it would seem to meet annihiIation
/ think / must have walked a thousand
miles in these last few days Of eliminating
horror. How my head ached, and my back !!
An old wound-a relic of the battle days-
broke out afresh. How l prayed that it
might bring the end.
Still, as walked, the pavements and the
walls were covered with fgures-the queer
indented figures OF the ticker" The
white endless coils stretched like writhing
serpents over everything my gaze rested
upon. / watched mems lips a. / walked,
and saw what could not hear from the