The free press. (Poplarville, Miss.) 1890-19??, 1897-01-28

|
day when the question OF marriage
was brought up by John, Edward OBJ
served:
' III we both marry, our wives may
quarrel and cause trouble between us !;
whereas, il only one takes to himself
wife there can be neither jealousy
nor dispute, and nothing can come
between us. You are my senior, marry
| if you wish to; shall remain q bach
elor.
John would not at frst entertain
such an argument, and asserted that
he would remain a bachelor. Shortly
after the above conversation he fell
madly in love with daughter of one
of his customers, and married her.
after vainly endeavoriug to persuade
his brother to follow his example.
'It would, however, be impossible
to imagine a more united family.
Johns wife was good, affectionate
and Edward loved her like n sister.
Suddenly their happiness. was
turned tosorrow by catastrophe from
which they have never recovered, and
probably never will. Eight months
after his wedding Johns right eye was
destroyed by steel splinter. This
accident in itself WAS rrible enough,
but it was nothing to the consequences
that followed. Notwithstanding the
care with which he was surrounded,
and everything that scienes could do
for him, after months of terrible suf-
fering, john became stone blind. The
operation necessitated by the abation
of the injured eye induced complete
and incurable paralysis of the optic
nerves.
John had been the very soul of
| the business. Edward knew abso-
| lntely nothing about the manufacture
ing part of it, and even had he pos
sessed sufficient initiative to assume di-
rection OF tho factory, his SER -in-law
was too crushed and broken by her
despair to repluce him in the shop.
Moreover, the money they had sue
ceeded in saving had largely melted in
the hands OF the .urgeons, physicians
and druggists. Edward, being unable
to attend properly to the business, the
latter went from bad to worse, and
though he male superhuman efforts to
avert it, the final crash came, and they
found themselves reduced to penury.
''Yet during all the trouble, amid
ediHce bult~up with 30 much LABOR
was crumbling about their heads,
lowed the blind man to know anything
| about it. Both were animated by the
same noble anxiety-to make the snf-
ferer believe that tho business contin-
| ued to prosper. While their credit
ors were knocking ut their door and
they knew that failure was inevitable,
and that poverty stared them in the
face, they choked back their sobs, and
with tenrs OF anguish in their eyes
talked cheerfully about the activity of
business aud the orders that were
| pouring in.
"And when all was over, when they
had been forced to giys up the hope
less struggle, and. the shop having
| heen sol |, they came to live in yon-
der house, after buying horse and
cart with which to peldis cutlery in
the suburbs, they kept up, an,l con-
time to keep mp, the illusions OF
| the blind man, whom grief and snHer-
| ing have confined to bed of pain,
| from which he will soon be released
| by death. In order to do his they
reserved the old factory bell, which
now hangs in the little garden III the
rear Of the housr.
cat noon aud six O'Clock in the
evening when the workmen used to
he rung ont, the wife nr brother sets
the bell a-ringing,an aud Johns Iale and
wrinkled face lights mp with feeble
smile as be exelaims:
"'Ahl there go the boys!"
''On New Years day, when the
workmen we're accustomed to call in
body and pay their respects to him
my husband and about dozen OF the
neighbors troop mp stairs to shake
hands with him and drink to the guv'-
ner's health. And no thanks them
and calls them his dear comrades. and
chinks glasses to the success OF the