Wauwatosa news. [volume] (Wauwatosa, Wis.) 1900-1948, 1900-05-19

would think that 50 humble an ambition
could never be realized?
| remember always, when | think of
her. the senseless husband staring at us
with unmeaning eyes-the two children
on the earthen floor playing with the tin
trumpet
Perhaps it was an omen. that tin trum-
pet
have seen her many times since then
| have seen her driving down to the lit
tie station in the cool fresh morning.
with the milk bottles in shining rows
behind her; or trudging up the narrow
winding path. heset with dancing cicalas
and, shining black bees, and here and
t-Nn..f A--1Ssorious swallow-tailed butter
/ flies, like flames of brocaded gold. Some
times [ have seen her digging in the val
| ley below, where the melons lie yellow
in the sun. and thyme and southern
wood grow rs weeds beside the way.
But wherever and whenever have seen
her. she has always been mt work and
alone
she always wears the same dresser
/ one like it-tadtd to the color of the
| brown earth The straw of her wide,
| Tapping hat is burned to the same tint
/ She Is gFayer now than when | first saw
/ her. and her face is scorched and wrin-
/ Killed. into the appearance of extreme old
/ age and the vacant husband still sits in
/ the hovel on the hill. like IA grim speech
less vampire sucking the poor fruit of
/ her labor.
/ But the tin trumpet has hung ON the
wall fer many year.
They went out those little pickers of
/ zampignans and figs. INTO the world he
yond the sunny herh-scentod Esterel
/ The elder, released from his service.
/ dufted away into other pathS-going in
/ the end, Of course. To swell the rutfiap.
! ism of lowest Paris. The younger came
! back, broken down by fever. poisoned
/ by the deadly miaSma Of some pcstilen-
tial African marsh-back 10 the mother
whom he was 10 hep, and the little bare
hut on the hillside.
Neither of these two men had ever
struck blow at an enemy. Neither had
lifted Il finger in the defense of his coun-
Try. Yet both were to die for it--one.
years later, by tire hand of the oXccu.
TONER one, only today, in the grip of
J disease.
For the last act in this humble drama
ended today. As | came through the
lonely rough road leading through the
forest to ST. Raphael, only an hour ago,
| heard the cracking of Il whip in the
stiffness. and the rumble of wheels.
/ Presently one of the great stonecartS
Of the quarry came in sight rocking
St0rmily among the rrtS, and drawn by n
den surprise. for upon the high seat.
holding the reiuS i'm her motionleSS
hands, sat my old milkwoman of the
hill
Her face was still and gray. and inn
passive rs stone under the shadow of
the faded hat Her bent brown figure
hardly moved TO the jolting of the cart.
Her eyes, staring past me. had the look
OF some dumb beast OF burden which
has bene goaded beyond even despair
Three or four quarrymen ran beside the
cart with whips in their hands, urging
the mules on with an occasional cut. and
a resonant Italian curse: and in the cart
lay a coffin. over which someone had
flung the dingy French flag from the
door of the dirty little cafe-ht covering
for IA soldier Of France whose life had
been offered MP on the altar Of his coun-
try's folly.
Stod aside, and the strange process
son swept past me. There was some
thing infinitely savage, but infinitely sad
The big black mules, with their high
peaked collars, the shape Of which had
perhaps never changed since the days 0i
the SaraccpS-~the brass laurel wreath>
worked upon the leather jrappiugs. din
SurvivalS Of Roman ConquestS; the run
ring men. with their dark. unmoved faces
and their brutal EXPLANATIONS. and high
above alt the faded. motjonless figure
sitting alone with its dcSolation and de-
Spdir. and behind il. the rough coffin coy
cred with a flag. torn by the fingers Of
PLAYING children, and despatched, not
with blood hut with wine.
And yet France laughs at those who
speak 30 her of peace. and the trumpet
calls from the empty fields those whose
lator It should be to make fruitful this
fertile dc>crt-calls them to useless dc