Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1908-10-21
CHAPTER XVI.
Watt.

Inc air unQer lHe pines was DdlAiy.
The hot July sun brought out their
resinous fragrance. Cleans of fire
fell through the boughs and dapp1ed
the soil at intervals, and on these sun
fakes numerous fritillary butterflies
with silver under-wings were fiutter-
ing, and countless flies were humming.
The pines grew only at the bottom of
che crags, and here and there in pat
.shes on the slopes. The woods were
composed for the most part of oak,
aow in its richest, fullest foliage, the
golden hue of early spring changing
to the duller green of summer. Beech
also abounded with their clean stems,
and the soil beneath them bare of
weed, and here and there a feathery
birch with erect silver stem struggled
up in the overgrowth to the light.
The wood was full of foxgloves, spires
pink dappled bells, and of purple
columbine. Wild roses grew where
ever a rock allowed them to wreath
in the sunshine and burst into album
dant bloom over its face. Eve car
ried her straw hat on her arm, hung
by it's ribands. She needed it's shell
ter in the wood no more than in her
fathers hall.
She came to brook, dribbhng and
tinkling on its way through moss and
over stone. The path was fringed
with blazing marigplds. Eve had
already picked some, she now halted,
and brimmed the extemporised basket
with more of the golden flowers.
The gloom, the fragrant air, the
flicker of color made her think OF the
convent chapel at Lanherne, whittier
she had been sent for her education,
but whence, having pinned under the
restraint, she had been speedily re-
moved. AS she walked she swung her
hat like a censor. From it rose the
fresh odor OF flowers, and from it
dropped now and then a marigold like
a burning cinder. Scarce thinking
what she did, Eve assumed the slow
measured pace of religious process
sion, as she had seen one at Lanherne,
still swinging her hat, and letting the
flowers fall from it whilst she chanted
meaningless words to a sacred strain
Then she caught her straw hat to her,
and holding it before her in her left
arm, advanced at a quicker pace, still
singing. Now she dipped her right
hand in the crown and strewed the
blossoms to left and right, as did the
little girls in the Corpus Christi pro-
cession round the convent grounds at
Lanherne. Her song quickened and
frightened, and changed it's character
as her Eighty thoughts shifted to
other topics, and her changeful mood
assumed another complexion Her
tune became that of the duet Laci
darem la mano, in Don Giovanni,
which she had often sung with her
sister. Size sang louder and more joy
ously, and her feet moved in rythm
to this song, as they had to the &C.
clesiastical chant; her eyes sparkled
her cheeks flushed
1t seemed to her that a delicate
echo accompanied her-very soft and
spiritual, now III snatches, then low,
rolling, long-drawn-ou4 She stopped
and listened, then went on again.
What she heard was the echo from the
rocks and srae holes.
Eut presently the road became
sleeper, and she could no longer spare
breath for her song; now the sacred
chant was quite forgotten, but the
sweet air of Mozart chung to her mem
DRY, as the scent of pot-pourri to a
parlor, and there it would linger the
rest OF the day.
AS she walked on she was in
dream. What must it be to hear these
songs accompanied by instruments,
and with light and scenery, and acting
on the stage? oh, that she could for
once in her life have the supreme
felicity of seeing real play!
Suddenly a flash of vivid golden
light broke before her, the trees
parted, and she stood on the Raven
Rock, precipice that shoots high above
the lamar and commands wide
prospect over Cornwall-Hingston
Hill, where Athelstan fought and beat
the Cornish in the last stand the Br-
tons made, and Kit Hill, dome of
moorclad mountain. AS she stepped
forth on the rock to enjoy the light
and view and air, there rushed out
of the oak and dog-wood bushes a
weird boy, who capered and danced,
brandished a fiddle, clapped it under
his chin, and still dancing, played La
ci daren fast. faster, till his little arms
went faster than Eve could see.
The girl stood still, petrifed with
terror. Here was the Pkg of the
Raven Rock Jasper had spoken of
The malicious boy saw and revealed in
her fear, and gambolled round her,
grimacing and still fiddling till his