Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1899-02-23
An Impulse of Spring.

An Impulse or Spring.
How exalting it is, now, to choose a
goal,
And drive straight for it, like flint
and steel!
To break off all round one, on every
side,
The bonds that bind one to home and
friends!
-Peere Gynt.
1t had been quarter or an hour out
of hell, but now that it was over the
feeling uppermost in James Homer
sham's mind was that of relief. Ac-
cording to his wont he had announced
by telegram to his sister, Mrs. Earle,
his intention of honoring her with a
visit and had driven down to Bixton
in his private hanson in a more
amiable frame of mind than that in
which the prospect of such a visit
usually found him.
1t was late in August, and no one
was in town. Adelaide, his wife, had
gone to stay with her own distinguish
ed relatives in the north, the club was
a wilderness, and the solitude of the
house in Dover street got uScn his
nerves. During his drive he came to
a determination which set him aglow
by the beneficence of its character.
Poor thing! He suspected it was many
years since she had tasted pleasure OF
the kind. He would try again to
bring back their old-time relation,
when she was pretty and gay, and he
was proud of her, and disconnect, If
possible, the thought of her from the
unsatisfactory husband and un-
wieldly family, whose shabby exist
ence disturbed his growing sense of
fashionable Importance. Not that any
of them often intruded their shabbi-
ness on the elegance of his household.
Emily, his sister, understood him, and
saw to that But the nature of things
necessitated an occasional exchange OF
visits, during which it was doubtful
whether giver or receiver was the
more i'll at ease. Altogether, besides
a financial one, there were ways in
which the relation was distinctly OPP
pressive. But today he was con-
scious of a different attitude toward
the visit, which difference might be
traceable to the absence of Adelaide,
before whose cold eyes he hated the
exposure of way of living wholly
foreign to her own genteel experience.
On the threshold of his sisters
house his agreeable new sensations
received a check. She opened the
door to him herself with a face full of
trouble. The unsatisfactory husband
had not gore to work that morning,
and was in the parlor nursing cold.
So she showed him into an ugly lit
tie drawing-room, furnished with
taste that had been common to them
in youth, but which he, with his larger
artistic opportunities, had long out
grown: and there she unfolded her
tale of woe. Usually at their meet
ings she presented neat and credit
able appearance, but today, with no
fear of Adelaide in the background,
she had omitted to make any toilet
preparatory for her brothers Visit,
and she looked untidy as well as
shabby.
Before the drawing room door had
been shut on them he had decided to
withhold his proposal for the even
ing.
It was the old story, and more so.
The landlord refused TO wait any
longer for his rent; the doctor mad
said that a visit to the seaside was
imperative for the little girls; and
and she was afraid there was BABY
coming in the spring.
The last item completed the revul-
sion of feeling that had already set IN.
His irritation was not to be suppressed
and as he wrote her out check he
let loose on her some OF his ideas on
the subject of the responsibility of
narenthood. He had not calculated the
eject of his words. He had long
ceased to associate with his sister
those Wild outbreaks of temper which
hang about the memory Of her In the
dark ages OF their joint history. In
fact. her latter-day weakness mad
heen almost a source Of irritation. To-
ssv he learned that the volcano had
not been extinct, but sleeping. She
tore the check he handed her to shreds
before his eyes, and filed his as
touished ears with the garnered bit
terness of grievances borne long
wears IN silence. She contrasted
sheir oositions-her own increasing
roverty and his growing wealth-and
declared the difference alone account
able for the rarity of their intercourse.
She inveighed against his ill-concealed
for her husband, and mis-
wife's open sighting of herself the
omission of her husband and herself
from any but the most informal and
dinner parties. He,
who. in view of the periodical checks,
had looked upon himself as the ag-
grieyed party. listened open-mouthed
10 his sisters extraordinary estimate
Of the situation. Finally she rose N
her wrath and ordered him out Of her
house. pursuing him with reqroaches
70 the doorstep, where her two little
brown haired, brown-eyed girls stop
ned their skipping in Mortified wonder,