The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1897-08-13

>Syh Vs>@/A poSSS, L i1oll IVY
~ and bye, be forced
:4AHyi5A0J' to say so much
EEASt99 about my own
v" affairs that l may
well begin by spar
ing s few lines to those Of another man,
a man on whose grave the grass has
been growing for many a long year.
His nam was Julian Lorraine. His
home, from the day when first knew
him to the day Of his death, was Herstal
Abbey, a fine old house in that part of
wooded Somersetshire where railways
have not yet come.
Although Mr.. Lorraine was a maj of
wealth, and, moreover, by education,
and, I believe, family, fully entitled to
take a high social position, Herstal
Abbey was not his ancestral home. He
had acquired it by simple right of pur-
chase, having bought out an old, i'm
provident, but popular county family
bought it out so completely that if he
did not literally step into its Shoes. he
sat in it's very chairs and used it's very
tables.
Such a wholesale buying up Of one of
their W class by an unknown man
always annOys, perhaps frightens,
county people, and Julian Loraine's
neighbors for some time looked at him
askance. He took one of those steps
by which a newcomer may occasional
ly gain access to the magic county cir
Gle. He brought no introductions. He
gave no large subscription to the hunt
indeed, there was not much hunting
in that part. He did not, in a covert
way, let his willingness to give grand
entertainments be known. He simply
completed the purchase of Herstal
Abbey and it's contents; took up his
abode in the old house, and troubled
nothing about his %neighbor, which no
doubt annoyed them all the more.
Little Julian Lorraine cared for this.
The truth is he was one of the most
unsociable men alive, and his cynicism,
If distributed through the county,
would have made Somersetshire a re-
gion in which life would have been I'M
bearable. He was-I pen the words re-
luctantly-an utter disbeliever in hui
mainly. Perhaps the life which he had
hitherto led brought him to this state
of mind.
For ia e very short time his neighbors
found out hat he was by no means the
unknown man they thought him. Peo-
pie who knew London life had much to
say about this Julian Lorraine. 1t was
soon made clear to the countryside that
the new mans social claims to the right
hand of fellowship were indisputable;
but other things were also made clear.
Lorraine had led a terrible life-the
very fastest of the fast. The wonder
was that he was still wealthy. At II
time it was thought he had run through
everything, for he had disappeared, and
no one saw anything Of him for two
years. But it turned out he had only
been leading a rowing life in tar coun-
tries. Reporting, let us hope NO;
Julian Lorraine was not a nice man.
But, nice or not, no one had any
longer the wish to keep Mr.. Lorraine at
arm's-length. Had he cared for it, he
might have enjoyed mixing with the
pick Of the county society. But ne
treated civility almost as he treated
GOODNESS, with complete Indifference;
and it soon became understood that the
owner of Herstal Abbey was a man
who no longer cared to mix with his
kind.
It was, of course, incomprehensible
that any one should buy a fine property
and settle down to the life of a recluse;
the more so as the man was still in the
prime of life, handsome and wealthy.
But Julian Lorraine was an incompre-
hensible man. I, for one, have never
been able to determine his true charac-
ter. Perhaps I have Stunned investi-
eating it. Perhaps, had 1 tried, I
should have been unable to gather
trustworthy information as to his true
nature, from the fact that tales afloat
concerning his early life would reach
me last of ALL
When he bought Herstal Abbey he
was a widower with one son, a boy of
seven. This boy he petted and neg
lected alternately. There were days
when the child was with him from
morn to eve; there were weeks in which
he never saw him from Sunday morn
ing to Saturday night; there were
months during which Mr.. Lorraine went
wandering off, Heaven knows where,