Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1900-10-25
HIS THIRTlETH BIRTHDAY.

BY Lloyd Osborne: His 3Oth birth.
day! His first youth was behind him.
with all its heart-burnings, its failures,
its manifold humiliations. What had
he done these years past but drift, for.
lorn, penniless and unattached, over
those shadows where Others had stuck
and prosperel?
In the colonies he had toiled unre.
mittingly iii half a hundred characters
groom, cook, boundary rider, steam.
err Observation-Disclosures sinking, always
failing. Had life nothing more for
him than an endless succession of not
empty days ON the farthest beach Of
Upolu, with scarcely more TO eat thar
the common street Kanaka, and nc
other outlet for. his energies than the
bartering of salt beef for coprah an6
an occasional nights fishing on the
reef?
The noise of an incoming boat drew
him to the door and he looked out t.
see the pastors old whaler heading
through the pass. A half-grown girl
leaped into the water and FASTENED
up to the store with something fast
ened to banana leaf. II was letter
which she shyly handed to the trader
Walter Kinross looked at 1t with
surprise, for it was the first he had re-
ceived in four years, and the sight Of
its English stamp and familiar hand
writing filled him with something like
awe.
my dear nephew. | know
you're pretty old to come back and
start life afresh here, but If you
haven't had the unmitigated folly to
get married out there and tied by the
leg forever, I'll help you to make a
new start if you have the grit to do
it. You shan't starve If 81 500 year
will keep you, and if you will try and
turn over a new leaf and luake a man
of yourself in good earnest, l am pre-
pared to mark you down substantially
in my will.
But mind-no promises-paymen
strictly by results. You're no longer
boy, and this is probably the last
chance you'll ever get of entering civil
lied life again and meeting respectable
folk. | inclose you draft on Sidney
N. S. W., for 81 $50, for you will doubt
less need clothes, ETC., as we'll as your
passage money, and if you decide not
to return, you can accept Il as pres
emf from your old uncle. Affectionate-
ly yours, ALFRED Bannock."
The house could not contain him
and his eager thoughts; he must needs
feel the sky overhead and the trades
against his cheek, and take all nature
into his puny confidence. Besides
Vaiala had now a new charm for him,
one he had never counted on to find.
Hard and lonely though his life
had been, this Samoan bay was en-
deared to him by a thousand pleasant
memories. and even by the recollec-
tions of his past unhappiIess. Here
he found peace and love, freedom from
taskmasters, scenes more beautiful
than any picture, and not least, suffi-
cheney to eat
A little money, and his life might
have been tolerated, even happy;
enough money for a good sized boat,
a cow or two, and those six acres of
to buy. How often had he talked OF
the Pascoe estate, he had often longed
it with Leata, who had been no less
eager than himself to harness their
quarter of an acre to the six, and
make them all his little paradise.
Poor Leatai whom he had taken so
lightly from her fathers house and
paid for in gun-powder and kegs of
beef; his smiling, soft-eyed Leata,
who would have died for him! What
was to become of her in this new ar
rangement of things.
By this time he had worked quite
around the bay, and almost without
knowing 1t he found himself in front
Of Paul Englebert's store. Englebert
was the other trader in VaiiIa, a
peppery, middle-aged Prussian, who
had been good friend of his before
those seven breadfruit trees had come
between them.
He called Englebert's rough jovial
kindness, rendered how Paul had
cared for himself through fever, and
helped him afterwards with money
and trade. How could he have been
so petty as to make quarrel of those
breadfruit trees. Poor old Paul! It
was shame they hadn't spoken these
two years.
On the veranda, barefoot and in
striped pajamas was Englebert, pre-
tending not TO see him. To Kinross.
as he walked up the path and mounted
the veranda stairs the man looked old
and sick and not a little changed.
How do you do, Englebcrt?" he
said.
The German looked az him with
smouldering eyes, Cant you see I'm
busy?" he said.
you might offer a man chair"