Year: 1871

BY BRET HARTE.


Let me recall a story which never
failed to accur to my mind in my
long cunning excursion upon Ded-
low Marsh.-Although the event was
briefly recorded in the county paper,
1 had the story, in all its eloquent
details, from the lips of the princi-
pal actor. l cannot hope to catch
the varying emphasis and peculiar
coloring of feminine delination, for
nv narrator was a woman; but I'll
try to give at least its substance.


She lived midway of the great
slough of Dedlow marsh and, a good
sized river, which debouched four
miles beyond, into an estuary formed
bv the Pacific Ocean, on the long,
sandy peninsula, which constituted
the northern boundary of a noble
bav. The house in which she lived
was a small framed cabin, raised from
the marsh few feet by stout piles,
and was three miles distant from the
settlement upon a river. Her hus-
band was logger-a profitable bust
ness in a country where the princi-
pal occupation was the manufacture
of wood.


It was the season Of early spring,
when her husband left on the ebb of
a high tide, with araft oflogs for the
usual transportation to the lower end
of the bay. AS she stood by the
door cft6e little cabin when the yoy-
ayers departed, she noticed a cold
look in the southern sky, and she re-
membered hearing her husband say
to his companions that they must
endeavor to complete their voyage
before the comingof the Southwestern
" gale which he say brewing. And
that night it began to storm and
blow harder than she had ever ex-
perienced, and some great trees fell
in the forest by the river, and the
house rocked like her baby's cradle.


But however the storm might roar
about the little cabin, she knew that
one she trusted had driven bolt and
bar with his own strongh hand and that
had he feared for her, he would not
have left her. This, and her domes-
tic duties, and the care Of her little
sickly baby, helped her to keep her
mind from dwelling on the weather,
except. of course, to hope the he was
safely harbored with his logs at ITO
pia, in the dreary distance. But she
noticed that day, when she went out
to feed the chickens and look after
the COW that the tide was up to the
little fence of her garden patch, and
the roar of the surf on the south
beach, though miles away, she could
hear distinctly. And she began TO
think she would like TO have some
one to talk with about matters, and
she believed that that if it had not
been so far and so stormy, and the
trail so impossible, she would have
taken the baby and have gone over
to Rackman's, her nearest neighbor.
But then, you see, he might have re-
turned in the storm, all wet, with no
one to see to him; and it was a long
exposure for a baby, which was
croupy and ailing.


But that night, she never could
tell why, she didn't feel like sleeping,
or even lying dowu. The storm had
somewhat abated, but she still ''sat
and sat- even tried to read. 1 don't
know whether it was the Bible or
some profane magazine that this poor
woman read, but most probably the
latter, for the words all ran together
and made such sad nonsense that she
was forced at last to put the book
down and turn to that dearer vol
ume which lay before her in the
cradle, its white initial leaf as yet un-
soiled, and try to look forward to its
mysterious future. And rocking the
cradle, she thought Of everything and
everybody, but still was wide awake
as ever.


1t was nearly twelve o'clock when
she at last lay down in her clothes
How long she slept she could not re-
member, but she awoke with a dread
full checking in her throat, and found
herself standing trembling all over,
in the middle Of the, room with her
baby clasped to her breast, and she
was saving something" The baby
cried and sobbed, and she walked up
and down trying to hush it, when
she heard a scratching at the door.
She onened it fearfully, and was glad
to see it was only old Pete, the dog,
who crawled, dripping with water,
into the room. She would like to
have looked out, not in the faint
hone of her husbands coming, but
to see how things looked; but the
wind shook the door so savagely
that she could hardly hold it.-Then
she sat down little while, and then
walked up and down q little while,
and then she lay down again Il little
while. Lying close by the wall OF
the little cabin, she thought she
heard once or twice something scrape
slowly against the clapboards, like
the scraping Of the branches. Then
there was a little gurgling sound
sIiI1e the baby made when it was
swallowing" then something went
"click-click," and "cluck-cluck." SC
that she sat up in bed. When she
did so she was attracted by some
thing else that seemed creeping from
the back door toward the center OF
the room, 1t wasn't much wider
than her little finger, and began to
spread all over the floor. 1t wa;
water.