The star. (Reynoldsville, Pa.) 1892-1946, 1903-10-21
4 DREAM MELODY.


et?" hectoringly. There you was a.
lying dead $50 1t looked at flrst) ON
the floor, and when the doctor was
fetched, ne says food, fire, wine an
good nursing. Who's to pay?' says I,
and he says, You'd better look among
his things for his money. In the mean
time, use this giving me a sovereign.
One Of the other dodgers sat with you
while l run out for the medicine, an
afterward We went through your things
together.
Ten pounds there was in two FIVE
pound notes, an Is shillings in silver.
l jist got the gentleman to sign his
name to its being all right, which,
thank heaven, he's here an can prove,
an in course l took out the three
pounds owing for rent, an paid the
doctor back his sovereign, an used
the rest as it was wanted. What's left
is in that there box on the table, an
another weeks rent due tomorrow"
She was hard, but honest. There was
still a remnant of gold among the sill.
ver-enough to last, please heaven, un-
til he was strong enough to crawl
about again, with the hope Of earning
precarious living.
Where the money had come from
goodness alone knew! A purse of gold,
where not one copper piece had been!
AS Colin lay back on his lodging
house pillow (hard and rather grimy)
unshed tears burned his eyeballs as he
thought of that doctor, who, seeing at
glance that he was dying from sheer
starvation, had not hesitated to give
the two pence" of the Good Samari-
tan.
THE mere money | may repay some
day." he thought; but the action,
never Whether one pound or fifty at
the last day, 1t will speak-it will have
thousand voices. God will hear
them"
AS soon as he could crawl, he
dragged himself to the piano. If even
now he could only be in time-time to
win that grand prize offered by the
Conservatoire at Florence for the best
setting of song to words supplied by
them C $50 English money, with the
situation Of harmony master at largo
salary too, perhaps, the cleverest group
of students the world had ever seen.
There was an exquisite but madden
ingly elusive melody in his brain-an
angel song; but his head was weak
from illness, and 1t was evidently
doomed to remain one of those untold
dream witcheries which thrall most
soul musicians at times and draw away
their thoughts to cloudland. He could
not hum it, could not find its begin
ming or end, though he tried each note
In the gamut; but he felt it, he had
dreamed It; some day-too late, per-
haps, to make use of it in this world
1t would come to him in its full, glori-
Gus beauty.
Song after song. tune after tune, he
painfully evolved, only to throw them
aside with cry of despair when fin
ished.
Mechanical! wooden! Correct har-
mony? Yes, but oh, ye gods, how COM
monplace, how evenly ON the dead lev
ell! and only "a hours left before the
MS. must be posted. am like q
drowning man who sees the life belt
hanging just only out of his reach. The
prize, the position, the melody, and my
utter inability to grasp it. What is
that?" spring to his feet and almost
ceasing to breathe as certain notes,
halting, faulty, but still glorlously
beautiful, reached his ear. who is
that? What is that?"- A long pause.
then he said deliberately, resolutely,
though his face was white as now,
That is the music that shall win the
prize! 1t is mine, not his! dreamed
1t. / can write it into something that
will electrify the world; my harmonies
shall be transcendentally beautiful. his
are hopelessly faulty; the melody is
worthless to him, to me 1t is salvation
for soul and body
The notes were played through again
slowly, tenderly, with wrong chords,
with right chords, with one finger on
ly, rich deep voice hummed them, a
girls clear soprano corrected the man
to curious minor resolution that Co
Inns soul had already leapt to-they
these unknown two-had given him
the clew to his dream melody; theirs
was of the earth earthly; he would turn
1t into something that was worthy
even of heaven itself.