Hopkinsville Kentuckian. [volume] (Hopkinsville, Ky.) 1889-1918, 1906-02-06
SHATTERED DREAMS.

"Well. I've done Europe, remarked
ne girl who had come into morsy,
and Asia and Africa--and I've done
with them forever!"
''What?' cried the other girl II
thought your che desire was to keep
travelling for the rest Of your life.
You said so when you came into
20, don't remind me of what | said, I"
exclaimed the other one, bitterly, and
don't remind me of my dead dreams.
IN wide awake now, anyhow
Tell me all about it, urged the
other sympathetically
LOT course l will. | am dying to sob
it out on somebody's shoulder You
know how | used to dream and dream
Of seeing Rome-and the Coliseum?
You remember how / used to plan
what | should do when old Uncle Will
liam should leave me my fortune2 You
.recollect how | used to keep pictures
around my room of the Coliseum by
moonlight, and oil the Sphinx and st.
Peters, and all of that? Well, | got
to Rome, and the moment ! had un-
packed my grip at one of their unro-
mantically comfortable hotels l went
down to the clerk and inquired where
| could get carriage to the Coliseum
and what do you think he said?"
Il don't know" replied the other in
an awed tone.
You'd better take trolley, miss,
That's what he said! Fancy! A troll
ley car running to the Coliseum
When | had recovered from the shock
| comforted myself with the thought
that | might forget that trolley in the
joy of viewing that grand old ruin by
moonlight; so | did get on the clang-
ing thing and went in it,"
"And was it beautiful by moon
light?"
/ don't know. and I never shall
know There was a great big arc lign'
hanging right in the middle of the
thing-and if there was any moonlight
you couldn't see a sign of it"
"O!" breathed the other, sadly
"But that wasn't the worst, I"
moaned the girl who had been to
Europe. q got out of Rome as soon
as | could. was afraid to go to st.
Peters, my dear, for fear his holiness
should address the congregation
through megaphone; so I hurried to
Venice. had longed all my life to
ride in a gondola on those ghost
haunted, moonlit canals. My soul had
sighed for the sound of guitar tink-
ling in the distance and the soft
splash of the oars in blue Venetian
waters. ! wanted to float past Brown
ing's palace and the palaces OF all
those dear old dead dukes and poets
and painters. 1t was with nerves
tingIing with anticipation that ar
rived in venice-to be met by a
jaunty, putting, iendish little steam
launch that carried me all around the
canals and past the palaces before J
had even time to think. much less to
dream. while guide with a mega
phone told us all about 1t in a voice
that should have raised the royal dead
from their graves"
but the Sphinx" pleaded the other
girl, surely they haven't mutilated
the Sphinx"
4 don't know" replied the Travelled
girl, YEARLY by the time had ar
rived in Egypt had lost my appe-
lite for romance and l was perfectly
calm when they put me in a trolley
car bound for the Sphinx And
never even bothered to climb 1t. be-
cause the guide assured me that ]
could do that much more easily a
year or so hence, when they had fin
lshed building the electric elevator,
now being constructed in il"
"And Mecca, sighed the other, hope
fully. Surely you went to Mecca
as you had planned?"
mo" was the caustic rejoinder
''our party decided not to go to Mecca
this time. They are building steam
railway so that pilgrims to the tomb
may go quite comfortably in year
or so. Won't that be delightful?"
Il should have died!' groaned the
other.
$50 should fright then and there, "
declared the disillusioned one, "but
was afraid to. l was afraid somebody
would suggest that ought to wait
until they finished an airship line to
heaven!"-Detroit Free Press.