Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1921-08-04

The light of the cell was dim, but
! Dyck managed to read the letter with
out great difficulty, as the writing was
almost as precise as print. The sight
of it caught his heart like a warm
hand and pressed it. This was the
substance of the letter:
"My Dear Friend:
Il have wanted to visit you in pris-
on, but my mother has forbidden it,
and so, even if | could be let to enter,
l must not dsObey her. have not
| read the papers giving an account of
| your trial. l only know you are
charged with killing a bad man, nOtO-
riOus in Dublin life, and that many
think he got his just deserts in being
! killed.
II will not believe that your fate is
an evil one, that the law will grind
| you between the millstOnes Of guilt
and dishonOr; but if the law should
call you guilty, still will not believe.
Far away l will think of you, and
believe in you, dear, masterful, mad
man friend. Yes, you are a mailman,
for Michael Clones told me-faith, he
loves you we'll that you've been liv-
ing a gay life in Dublin since you
came here, and that the man you are
accused of killing was in great part
the cause of it.
II think | never saw my mother so
troubled in spirit as she Is at this
time. OF course, she could not feel as
l do about you. 1t isn't that which
makes her sad and haggard; it is that
we are leaving Ireland behind.
Eyes, she and l are saying good-by
to Ireland. That's why l think she
might have let me see you before we
went; but since it must not be, well,
then, it must not. But we shall meet
again. In my soul l know that on
1 the hills somewhere far off as on the
first day we met, we shall meet each
other once more. Where are we 60
ing? Oh, very far, We are going
to my Uncle Bryan-Bryan Llyn. in
Virginia. A letter has come from him
urging us to make our home with him.
You see, my friend"
Then followed the story which
Bryan Llyn had told her mother and
herself, and she wrote of her mothers
decision to go out to the new, great
home which her uncle had made
among the cotton fields of the South
When she had finished that part of the
tale, she went on as follows:
eve shall know your fate only
through the letters that will follow
us, but | will not believe in your bad
luck Listen to newly don't you
come to America also? Oh, think it
over! Don't believe the worst will
come. When they release you from
prison, innocent and acquitted, cross
the ocean and set up your tent under
the Stars and Stripes. Think of it I!
Nearly all those men in America who
fought under Washington and won
were born in these islands. They took
with them to that far land the mem
DRY and love of these old homes. You
and | would have fought for England
and with the British troops, because
we detest revolution. Here, in Ire
land, we have seen it's evils; and yet
if we had fought for the Union Jack
beyond the mountains of Maine and
in the lonely woods we should, l be-
ieve, in the end have said that the
freedom fought for by the American
states was well won.
$50 keep this matter in your mind
as my mother and l will soon be gone.
She would not let me come to you'll
think | have never seen her so dis
turbed as when | asked her-and she
forbade me to write to you; but I dis
obey her. Well, this is a sad bust
ness. 1 know my mother has suffered
| know her married life was unhappy,
and that her husband-my father
died many year ago, leaving dark
trail of regret behind him; but, you
see, l never knew my father. That
was all long ago, and 1t is a hundred
times best forgotten.
"Our ship sails for Virginia in three
days, and l must go. l will keep
looking back to the prison where lies,
charged with an evil crime, Of which
he is not guilty, a young man for
whom l shall always carry the spirit
of good friendship.
"Do not believe all will not go well.
The thing to do is to keep the courage
of our hearts and the faith of our
souls, and I hope 1 always shall.
believe in you, and, believing, l say
good-by. l say farewell in the great
hope that somehow, somewhere, we
shall help each other on the way Of
life. God be with you!
II am your friend,
"SHEILA LLYN."
up. ST. beg you to remember that
America is a good place for young
man to live in and succeed"