Waterbury evening Democrat., 1904-05-25

WHY, HOW YOU SCARED MEi'' had partially dispelled that. A few years had wrought great changes her old fondness for him had van ished, and he feared that he was al- most forgotten. It was not pleasant, nor what he had secretly hoped, and yet it seemed a fact.
 His early haunts that he now vis- ited for the first time since his re- turn also read him lesson of change and bitter-sweet memory There was the old house, so shocking in it's rack -and-ruin condition, the woodshed where he used to hide his fish poles and traps, and beside it the old pear tree. The woodshed seemed a mere coop now, and he smiled at sight of that grindstone he used so to abhor Old memories might be saddening, as they were, but at least he was not likely to be called upon to turn grin stun again until his back seemed broken.
 MI Then came the garden, with its low wall hid by grape-vines, where he, with vexed spirit, had been made to pull pusley, year after year, and al- ways, it seemed, when he wanted to go fishing. Here he had usually dug for angle-worms p1easanter oc- cnpation; and when midsummer came, how good those crisp green cucum- bers used to taste! Beyond was the apple orchard, and, as he entered it again, one tree, to which he had many times. been sent to cut sprouts to be used later on, on himself, caught his attention. It was old and almost dead now, but of just such slenuer whips, as mother had used around his bare legs with such cheering effect, still grew from it's trunk And what a delight it had been, in the mellow autumn, to shake those trees and pick Up apples, and when the cart was filled, to ride on it to the cider mill and shollers' to the patient oxen. And then the cider making! The old horse walking slowly around pulling the sweep, the many-colored apples dis appearing in the hopper. the men folks heaping pumice on the press, and when the cider began to run, how delicious it tasted through a straw!
 Angie used to come here with other girls, on their way from school, and how pretty she used to look in her calico sunbonnet, her hair in one long braid falling in her way as she stopped over to suck cider out of the little Till that ran around the press. Martin recalled how he used to keep 8 bunch of nice white straws hid away, waiting for her, and when she appeared, his heart used to- beat 8 little faster.
 It was all 8 delightful memory, that apple gathering and cider making, and he always regretted when its season was over.
 And now he wanderd up to the brook running through the old farm-the one he was planning to utilize for trout raising--and as he followed it's leaping, laughing course, he paused to look into every eddying pool and at each little cascade There was i one deep hole below the Aabutments of a wooden road bridge, shaded by d willow, and here he halted longest
 
 It was only 9 little one, yet never since, among the thousands of big ones he had landed from lake oI x stream, was one that thrilled to his very finger tips as that one had. | And what a change in the stream itself! Then this pool appeared deep 1 dark, and dangerous; now he could l wade across it with impunity, and | the brook seemed a mere rill Above this it ran through a pasture where laurel grew and where he used to sci box trap for rabbits This, also was good arbutus ground, and over il l and along bordering woods he and Angie had come many times, gather ing those fragrant flowers. The laurel was now in full bloom, and great clus- ters, some pink, some white, sur- rounded him; but he was alone, and the happy days when he and she to- l gether, and sometimes hand in hand l wandered about here, seemed so long ago. He wonderedsif she would come here now with him, and if she did would it seem to either as it did then 1 And now he recalled the recent first meetings again, and her cool recep- tion, so disappointing, and then the [ oldtime youthful idyl seemed longer ago than ever. Life had swept him and doubtless her, far beyond the old sweet romance, and like the with. cred autumn leaves he now found crumbling to dust beside rocks, SC were those old-time memories doomed.
 (To be Continued.y