Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1897-11-12
JOHN MABSHALL'S SPHERE.
ny Robert Z. v. Meyers.

lCOpyAiBhb1 Ao9it ny lle AulnOTJ
John Marshall, according to certain
people, was not only fool and snob,
but most exclusive specimen of the
two classes.
John Marshall had his theory:
Il understand the fool to be he who
invents nothing in thought or deed. /
AM 80 frequently bored by the thoughts
and deeds of men as mediocre as myself
that l prefer to be fool rather than
think or do. / have read Thackeray's
sweeping words regarding snobs and
his bosom may touch me. Yet cannot
help being rich and having tastes. | do
not work because the wealth at my
command might if employed in traffic
swamp numerous small concerns that
are necessary to the comfort of many
struggler. l go where the fancy leads
me, and, existing in an unheroic age, 1
cannot take in a war against intidels
and give finical orders respecting my
chain armor, so l confine my energies
to the wrestling of the least displeasure
from society, to the hang of my trou-
sers and the setting of my coat. And
thus l am designated an exclusive fool
and snob. Hard luckI'
He had inherited a conditional for
tune from his father. Another was Of
fered him when he should have obeyed
the conditions of that will-proposed to
Jane Cristowell, whose father had been
the junior in the firm of Marshall &
Cristowell. Jane was in nowise averse.
John led german divinely, was called
an Apollo by girls and had exquisite
taste in china.
John proposed. Jane was happy, and
it would have been beneath her self re-
spect to fancy that John was not. She
had conferred upon him beauty, some
brains and future. With her for
wife, he would in time be 1.-THE husband
of that lovely Mrs Marshall, who goes
to England every season, my dear, and
dimes at Sandringham
That there might not be too much
prestige given his name over against her
own Jane determined to be presented
at court before her marriage and on the
way pick up her trousseau. So i'll early
March she carried her determination
into effect. John babe her goodby on
board the Adriatic and was so attentive
in the matter of flowers that her beauti-
full eyes brimmed over, and, watching
for him on the slip as the ship steamed
out, spun her biggest bouquet toward
him and hit another man with it, which
man politely bowed his thanks to her.
She laughed and John laughed, and so
in merriment she left her native shores.
Papa she said at Sandy Hook,
when the vessel began to roll, Il wish
/ were not going, or that John were
going with us-though that would
scarcely be the thing i wonder if he
will be lonely without me?"
Old Cristowell grinned at the idea of
Johns being lonely-for old Cristowel
articled John as an expedient only, so
Jane bit her lip and looked over to a
yiscount who was dying to be presented
to her.
Yet John did miss her. 1t is possible
that he could have loved Jane and Jane
loved him had their respective fathers
let them alone. There was no saying
how much they might love each other
once they were married
For a week after the sailing of the
Adriatic John haunted the clubs and
yawned and was more of fool than
ever in being bored so easily. Then he
disappeared, and people missed him and
wondered if he were not more than they
had made him out to be-
He had been suddenly seized with
active satiety-the passive had long
been his Let him get away from it all,
from the usualities and ordinaries-
without Jane they were garish to a
maddening degree. Let him go to ma
ture, if it could be found, although he
much doubted its existence.
All of March he wandered about from
quiet country nook to quiet country
nook. Villages grew to know him. AT
Katco rough handed sons of the sol!
would see him gazing at them as they
delyed in the fields Children were on
the alert for the shower of pennies he
sent about them. A serious young WON
an once attracted his attention as he
laughed with the little ones, and she
went on with averted head.
"No nature even here" he said
"That Young woman s seriousness spolls
It Am so far down in the scale that
have no sphere? The people are glad tc
zee me here 1 doubt if any one was
glad to see me in town, which argues
that there must be a place where III
in" The serious young woman nae
bored him.
He went to farther wilds for couple
of weeks. Then one early morning h'
struggled into water washed hamlet
whose rudeness told him that if thu
were not the place in which he woul'
fit to try farther would bore hlm U
death.
1t was May now and little flower
sprang up about his feet. a.,
There was lowly house, an OLD ma
sitting before its threshold weaVln
nets. A younger and preternaturall
white man as to complexion and gar
talked with the older. The younger wa
evidently miller.
cts now she will, and now sn
WON'T" grumbled the young man
"Put it t'other way, said the mel
maker; "it's now she won't and ho'
she will Polly always will at th
last; won't amt her onliest word. "
Just then Marshall came up.
The miller cast look at him an