Perrysburg journal. (Perrysburg, Wood Co., O. [Ohio]) 186?-1965, 1915-08-12

receiving nothing but the occasional
condescension OF smile? Does great
beauty so pTeempt woman's soul to
drive out even the homely virtues?
These questions bore insistently In
to my brain until 1t ached with per-
plexity. Then came the memory of
her momentary wistfulness; her crav-
ing for something more than life had
given her, or something different.
What was that? At all events,
knew that to fall again within the
scope of her personality would mean
to be swept rudderless from my moor.
ings. Whatever her object, be 1t ex-
alted or petty, / should inevitably
bow to it, in surrender, If such were
her good or evil pleasure. Consequent
ly the one end of all my thinking was
the resolve that / should not again
see her.
The journey was progressing with
more surety than my reflections. 1t
whisked us through the richness OF
blue grass pasture lands and the opu-
lent ease of blue grass life into bar
| er country, where the color of the
soil grew mean and outcropping rocks
lay bare.
We roared through foot hills where
the vivid green of young cedars
dashed the gray tangle of naked TIM
ber and scrub. At last we climbed
| into tn G mountains themselves, lying
,in dreary ramparts of isolation under
| skies that had grown sodden and raw.
Here were the barriers Of the Cum
berland heaping up gigantic piles of
raggedness under bristling needle
| joints of timber.
We passed through anomalous viii
| lagos where the nations most primi-
| tive and quarantined life was rubbing
shoulders with the outriders of CAPT
tails invasion. Shaggy men, ridden
in from distant cabins on shaggier
horses, men who probably nursed
guilty knowledge of Illicit stills, gazed
at the passing train out of humorless
and illiterate eyes.
At last we left the train at sta
ton over which the November dusk
was closing, where the coke furnaces
glared in red spots along the shadow
ed ridges. A four mile drive brought
us to the tawdry hotel, and after at
tacking our eggs and ham we went TO
our rooms. I, on a feather bed, with
the reek of low-turned lamp in my
nostrils, lay for hours gazing at the
horror of patched and dirty wall pa
per, and at last fell to sleep to dream
of a wonderful lady who opened a
door in wall of rock, and led me
through it to things which could new
er be.
The next morring, as we waited for
the wagon which YVES to take us TWEEN.
| ty miles into the hills, Weighborne
| showed me the dirgy court house
whose weatherbeaten walls had in
| other days been penetrated by Cat
| ling guns of the militia. He pointed
ont boyishly looking figures whose
eyes were young and mild, yet who
| had more than once "notched their
guns" He showed me spots where
| this man or that had fallen, shot to
death from the court house windows
by assassins who had never been ap-
pretended or prosecuted.
| "That is all changing" he said.
"When capital comes, the feud must
60"
Stolid groups of men, clad in but
ternut and jeans, eyed us with mild
| curiosity. Here and there father
whose face was as stupid and unedu-
Gated as that of Russian peasant,
walked side by side with son dress
| ed in the seasons ready-made styles.
Between parent and child yawned the
| gulf of schooling, which the younger
generation had acquired in a college
down below" or in the new schools
| at home, presided over by "fotched
| on" teachers.
| We travelled at snail's pace over
| twisting roads where our wagon
| strained and creaked in tortuous ruts
almost hub-deep, and where the scras-
| gly horses lay against their collars
and tugged valiantly at the traces.
| Quail started up before US with their
whir of softly drumming wings and
| disappeared into the thick cover of
| timber. Squirrels barked and scam
pered to hiding at our coming. DC
casionally fox whisked out of sight
with contemptuous flirt of its brush.
Once only in twenty miles we en-
countered another traveller. An old
man, riding bareback on mule, drew
up in the road and awaited us. De,
spite the cold, gap of soclSless, dust
covered ankle showed between his
rough brogans and the wrinkled legs
of his butternut breeches. Across his
mules withers balanced rifle. His
face was bearded and sad.
"Mornin', Rat-Ankle," drawled our
driver, halting the team for converse.
"Mornin' Pate" came the nasal re-
ply.