The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1923-02-22
Continued From Page u

some education. who had brought with
him to the wilderness a bundle Of
books and a taste for reading.
From faded letters and dimly. re
membered talk of those who once
chung fondly to the legends and ira
ditions Of old Vincennes, it is drawn
that the Roussillon cherry tree stood
not very far away from the present
site Of the Catholic church, on a slight
swell of ground overlooking a wide
marshly fiat and the silver current Of
the Wabash. If the tree grew there,
then there too stood the ROuSsillon
house with its cosy log rooms, its
clay-daubed chimneys and its grape
vine-mantled veTandas. while some
distance away and nearer the river
the rude fort with its huddled officers
quarters seemed to fling out over the
wild landscape, through its squirting
and lopsided portfolios. a gaze Of stub
horn defiance.
Not far off was the little log church,
where one good Father Beret, or as
named by the Indians, who all loved
him, Father Blackrobe. performed the
services of his sacred calling; and scat
tered all around were the cabins of
traders, soldiers and woOdsmen form
ing a queer little town, the like of
which cannot now be seen anywhere
on the earth.
1t is not known just when Vincennes
was first founded; but most historians
make the probable date very early in
the eighteenth century, somewhere be-
tween 1710 and 1880. In 1910 the
Roussillon cherry tree was thought
by a distinguished botanical letter
writer to be at least fifty years old,
which would make the date Of its
planting about 1860. Certainly as
shown by the time-stained family rec
Ords upon which this story of ours is
based, it was a flourishing and wide
topped tree in early summer Of 177S,
its branches loaded to dropping with
red clusters hang at one point that
a tall young girl standing on the
ground easily reached the best ones
and made her lips purple with their
Juice while she ate them
That was long ago, measured by
what has come 10 pass on the gentle
swell of rich country from which Vim
eennes overlOoks the Wabash. The
new town f1ourishes notably and its
appearance marks the latest limit of
progress. Electric cars in its streets.
electric lights in its beautiful homes,
the roar of railway trains coming and
going in all directions, bicycles whIrl-
ing hither and thither. the most fash
ionable styles Of equipases, from
brougham to pOny-phaeton, make the
DAYS of flint-lock guns and bUckslIin
trousers seem ages down the past;
md yet we are looking back over but
a little more than a hundred and
twenty years To see Alice RoussillOn
standing under the cherry tree and
holding high a tempting cluster II
fruit, while a very short. hump-bacEcd
youth looks up with longing eyes and
vainIy reaches for it. The tableaI IS
not merely rustic, it is primitive.
Jump the girl is saying IN
French, Jump, Jean; jump hight
Yes. that was very long ago, in the
days when women lightly bravei
what the strongest men would shrink
from now.
Alice RoussillOn was tall, 1.-THE,
strongly knit. with an almost perfcc
figure, judging by what the master
sculptors carved for the form u
Venus. and her face was comely and
winning, if not absolutely beautiful:
bur the time and the place were Wig
Orously indicated by her dress. which
was of coarse stuff and simply &C.
signed. Plainly she was a child Of the
American wilderness. a daughter of
old Eincennes on the Wabash in the
time that tried mems souls.
Jump. JEAN she cried. her face
laughing with a show of cheek-dIm
pies, an arching Of finely sketched
brows and the twinkling Of large blue
gray ey es.
Jump high and get Them
While she waved her un-brownej
hand holding the cherries aloft. the
breeze blowing fresh from the south
west tossed her hair so that some
loose strands shone like rimplad
flames.
The sturdy little hunchback did leap
with surprising activity; but the