HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Exeter Times, 1887-9-22, Page 3tirsatiortisiettertismitalexaaretersoteateettivOmt, worameywarsa
How a Miser was Ouredo
Jonas Pray was born atingy ; he hid his
aweetmeats from his little brothers when he
was a child, and enjoyed his pleasures alone
when he was a young man.
By the time he was forty no was a rich
man; but he lived as plainly as ever, and
somewhere about this time the first tender
feeling he had ever known crept into his
heart. He tell in love with a buxom, good-
temperea young wourian named Sara Wool-
wich, and offered himself to her, He was
not an ill.looking man, aud when he chose
could make hitnself agreeable. Sara liked
him and accepted him.
Jonas meant 0 be liberal to her at firet,
but after a brief honeymoon of happinese,
his old habits resumed their sway; and at
last, the second winter of their married life
coining on, Sara found,That all her remarks
about her shabby summer hat had no effect
whatever, and that she inight wait a long
,ti without having such a thing as a com.
fe:i. table oloak suggested her. She had been
a or girl and had no trousseau to speak
of; and so she feund it necesaary to put
her pride in her pocket and ask for what
she needed.
It was hard enough for a wife to do that,
but to be refused was something she had not
oalculated upon. She knew that her hus-
band had a large bank -account, and that
there was no reason why she should not be
dressed as well as any lady. But 'hen she
said playfully, "Jonas, shall I buy myaelf
Houle winter things toaliiy ? I need a shawl
dreadfully ," he had answered, "I thought
you were too sensible a woman to run after
the fashions, Sara, I'm sure you have very
deoent things that you might wear a long
time yet."
"That shows how muoh men know," Sara
answered, determined to be pleasant and
not to show that she was hurt; "yon would
not like your wife to look shabby, Jonas ?"
"Well, no," sed Jonas; "But really,
Sarah, money is so scarce just now, Don't
you think you might make what you have
Ii0 a little longer?"
"Row much longer," she asked quietly.
"Oh, I don't know," replied Jonas. "1
had an aunt who left me something when
she died, who wore the same shawl and bon-
net sixteen years, and boasted of it too 1"
His wife looked at him and said nothing.
"Economy is a great tning, Sara,"
said Jonas, uneasily. "It would
be a dreadful thing to die in the
poor -house, you know, and you don't
care for other people's admiration, do you,
Sara, when you know your husband likes
you just as well in your well.saved olotlaes ?
We ,don't call theixi shabby, Sara, only well.
saved."
"Call them what you please, Jonas, they
merit both epithets."
She sat quietly for a. while with her hands
folded on the table before her. Her temper
was riainglast, but she had seen enough to
control it.
A miser is the victim of a vice that mast -
era him just as the drunkard's does him.
Jonas was ashamed of himself, even as he
spoke, and she knew it. As she looked at
him a little while, grief came instead of
anger. There was so much that was good
abouOjtmsa. It was terrible to see this
cankerLeping over it all, to see the pinch-
ed lines'about his mouth—the strange anxi-
ous look in hie eyes. Poor Sara remember-
ed stories she had read of misers : how
they had starved themselves while they
counted their gold; how some of them died
, k in the dark to save candles; and how,
through a long illness, one of the wealthiest
' of these men refused to have a pillow
brought for him, or even a little saucepan in
which to heat his porridge.
Would Jonas grow to be as bad as these?
How could she tell' Once or twice of late
he had found fault with the amount used,
and moalite4 %.ver his butcher's bill. Bot
..‘ 'men genMiLly did somethiug ofthis sort, she
had heard, and men knew nothing about
dress. She arose !softly and went out of the
room, and brought back her shawl and bon-
net and placed them lfore him on the
table. 1.
"Jonas, deaf," she sai , "I don't want
to be unreasonable; look at these, see how
shabby they are. They were nice when we
were married, Init they were cheap, and
cheap things fade so. I have made every-
' thingI had do for two years. I did not like
to ask for clothes. You know you 'gave me
two pairs of gloves in our hopey-moon ; I
have them still." , l
"What a pod, careful girl." said Jonas,
caressing her dark hair, as she came and
sat on a low stool beside him.
"Yes, I have been careful, it is my no,-
' tune, to be careful," answered Sara. "Few
rich men's wives would have done so much.
Now look at these things, my dear."
Jonas looked. There came a time, after-
ward, when it seemed to him that the
faded tint of ,that shawl, its dingy
palm -leaves of yellow-brown, and the
crushed flowers and shabby ribbon of
the bonnet, had (been seared into his
brain. He looked at them long and linger-
ingly. He knew that his wife was reason-
able, and that the things were, and, long
had been, unfit for her to wear. But his
.1 money tugged at his heart -strings.
"The shawl is very thin," she answered,
"and I shall catch cold again, as I did :est
winter." •
"Poor girl 1" he murmured softly, and
looked toward the desk where his check-
book lay. But the grip of the fiend that
rules a miser's soul nipped him sorely as he
iid go.
"They wear sacks a good deal, Sara,
don't they ?" he asked.
"Oh, they are very fashionable," repli-
ed his wife. •
"Then couldn't you make one of that old
It billiard -cloth that is in the trunk -room ?
My poor mother bonght it at auction' and'
• she meant toe use it for a coverlet; but
• we* very pretty green—don't erou,think so,
Sara rind such nice material 1"
The45 is a limit to woman's patienee ;
this -, suggestion measured Sara's. She
started to her feet and, gathering up
• her bonnet and .shawl, walked out of the
teem. After the had gone, Jonas really
looked at his check -book, and, for at least
• two minute; contemplated drawing a cheek,
and telling hie wife he had only been teas-
ing her. But he could not bring himself to
do it.
After a while his wife looked into) the
room with her old bonnet on, and her old
shawl about her shoulders, and said: 1
"Jonas, I am going to spend the day :
with my sister-iinlaw, but I shall be home
before dinner time." f
"I hope you will enjoy yourself, my ;
dear," he answered.
He sa4 her eyes were heavy with weeping, 1
. and letofecl away, ashamed of himself. Then ,
he betook himself to his office where he
ground out his money, and during the day !
eomproinisecl with himself. He wohicl do ,
no extravagant, thing; but when he went '
home he would give his wife what was i
necessary. And, after all, as he said to
himself, it -would have boon better if he had f
done it at first. He hadigrieved her, and ;
she was the only thhig he loved on earth. 1
,egle went libriao darlitsi than tisnal that
"'"-7,77.77.77.77:77-77-eggeesee.--erge---egegeeeeeee----e--emee. eesearee
evening, to make what amends his soul
would eonsent o; and, as he waled brisk.
ly along, being light upon his teet for—
who ever heard of a miser growing fat ?—
he thought he would never again bring
tears to those good, kind eyes. Never,
never again, never again, and then—but
what was that crewd? People were coming
his way, looking backward as they came—
men, boys, women, and all the riff rail thet
accident, quarrel or arrest could collect in
the city of Toronto. And now he was in
the midst of the throng and close to four
policemen, who, with set faces, were bearing
between them e;stretcher on which lay a human
form. It was covered with a shawl. Jonas
look, d. Oh, heavens ; he knew the pattern
of that shawl ! Only a few hours before its
dingy palm -leaves of yellow. brown, its faded
fringe, its shabby brown center, had been
spread before him. It was his wife's shevvl.
"Stop—stop—stop !" he cried. Let
me fuse her—let me see be 1"
" Do you keow her ?" asked a policeman.
"Let me sloe her face," said 'Iona; grow-
ing so faint that a kindly man hard by sup-
ported him by the arm.
You would not know her face; a tele-
graph pole fell on her, and it's crushed all
out of shape," replied the police. "But
ishawle are alike. Keep up your courage. I
do not think this is any relation of yours;
she's too shabby. Look at her shoes; see
here, this is her bonnet; you don't know
thatV'
He held up the bonnet. It was cruehed
entirely out of shape, but ;limas knew it,
the streaked ribbon, and a flower among the
other flowers had lost its petal. He had
fingered it as it lay on the table beside him.
f4 Yes , I know it," he cried. It's Sara!
It's my wife 1"
Then he pulled away the shawl from the
crushed face and fainted outright. Just as
his senses left him he heard some one say:
"His wife! Why, I thought she was a beg-
gar 1"
And another answered: "Like enough—
they call him a miser. I know him, his
name is Jonas Pray."
They carried the poor woman home' to
Jonas' old house, helping him to follow as
he became hiraself. She was laid upon her
bed, and there was a coroner's inquest; and
then women prepared her body for burial,
talking among themselves of the shame it
was that she, a rioh man's wife, shculd be
so clad, and then theilt was a pause, that he
might be alone with her if he would.
Before the time came he had a cab called
and went out in it. He was driven to a
large dry -goods store, where he asked to see
the manager, and was shown to his office.
The manager found him there, a pale,
miserable object, trembling and faint, as
one in deep illness. "He has Come to beg,"
thought the manager; and his "what can
I do for you ?" was curt. But Jonas cared
nothing for any one's manner now. He
answered sadly:
"1 want to buy a shawl."
"A salesman will* attend to you, sir,"
said the manager.
"No," returned jonas, "1 am too ill, too
broken, to talk to a salesman. I can trust
you. I want the costliest shawl you have."
"A madman 1"6thought the manager.
"our costliest is $1,500," he said, repressing
a:smile.
"Have it put up for nee," said Jonas.
"Certainly mad," said the manager to
himself.
But Jonas had taken a check from his
breast, and ;with trembling hand was filling
up the blanks. The manager looked it
over carefully. "Jonas Pray," he raid,
more respectfully. Then it flashed upon
him that he had read in the paper of a fatal
accident to this man's wife. It was a
strange proceeding altogether. Secretly he
called others to look at his customer. One
knew him financially he was all right
"And tne reat is none of our business,'
concluded the manager, as he saw the
bundle of splendor carried down. stairs after
Jonas 'Pray. " They spoke of him as a
miser in the paper. That's a pretty pur-
chase•for. a miser."
Meanwhile, Jonas drove home. From
the door floated long streamers of black
crape. No aweet face smiled a greeting.
Within all was hushed. Carrying the
shawl under his arm, he went upstairs to
the darkened room, *here, under the
straight folds of white drapery, seemed to
• liwthe SO/TOW:Of the house. A watcher sat
there. He sent her away. Then, alone
in the room, he knelt down upon the floor
beside the coffin.
"Sara," he said, "Sara, can you hear
me? I loved you, Sara, but I was such a
miser—such a miser! I've bought you a
shawl at last. Oh, Sara 1 Sara! I've paid
as much as I could for it, my dear; you
• shall be wrapped in it in your coffin—"
But at that instant a voice cried:
• "Oh, Jonas! Jonas, dear! 0, my poor
Jonas 1"
• And turning, he saw his wife, either in
the spirit or the flesh, standing before him.
His knees trembled under him. He cried
out to heaven to protect him. But the fig-
ure came closer. It was no ghost, but a
living woman. She took him in her arms.
"Oh, how ill you look 1" she said. "And
it was all my fault. 1 went to my sister-in-
law's, and there, in a pet—oh, I was so an.
gry, jonas—I gave away my dress, my
shawl, and my bonnet, to a beggar.woman,
and vowed to sit in one of zny sister's dress-
ing -gowns until you gave me decent clothes
to come home in. And the poor woman
was killed two hours afterwards; and I
never knew that she had been takon for me
until this morning. Oh 1 such is dirty
creature, my dear, the papers described her.
And for a little while I was glad you had a
fright : but I am sorry now that I was glad.",
For an answer he picked up the costly 1
shawl and wrapped it about her, and took '
her folded in it like a mummy, to hie heart
again. "The miser is dead." he said, "but
Jonas Pray will show his wife how he can
pherish her."
.He did; e,nd if, ever afterward, Sara de-
tected sympionas of a relapse, all she had to
do waa to wrap heraelf in the wonderftil
shawl. The sight of it inevitably recalled
the moment when, in agony hf soul, he re-
alized how little, after all, is the value of
money. He may indeed, love his money
yet.; but he knows that he loves his Sara
more.
An Albany grocer, who was accustomed
to place some of his wares outside of the
doer as an advertisement, and amona them
an apparent bag of coffee which was, indeed,
but a coffee bag filled with sand, The
other night it was left out of doors, and a
citizen with little moral sense saw it, and
straightway hiring a horse and wagon,
stole the bag and carried it home. He paid
$2 for the horse and wagon, and when he
found that his coffee Was sand was so mad
that he sent a threatening letter to the
groceryman tolling him of the fact and
stating that if he did not send $2 to him (he
game a fictitious Tome) through the Post
Office he would expose his dishonesty. The
plan did not work.
A 13ostou family went off on a vacation,
and the neighbors saw a cat in the wiedow
and heard it mew pitifully. ;Cho Humane
Soddy broke into the betide and reectied
the feline from starvation. It was a platter
of Paris cat.
tk.
•' LIFE 1$ THE FrliENEES,
AY DAVID KITILR,
On the eurornit of the steep grassy bluff
upon evhich 1 am standing rises a tall,
gloomy, halt ruined tower, the sole remnant
of that grim fuedal stronghold whose found.
ations break gauntly through the oriel) green
turf every here and there in long streaks of
geay, mouldering otones, and from whose bat
tlernente the pious and noble Seigneurs of
Viclalos used to heng their vassals or pitch
their wives and children headlong in the
merry old thrice long ago. A queer -looking
etructure it is, that solitary tower, with no
sign of a door in any of its four sides, and
only one window many yards above the
ground, suggesting that the original lord of
the manor inust either have had himself
hoiated up with a crone and pulley, or have
been sufficiently advanced of his age to in-
vent an elevator. In fact, the whole build-
ing looks like a practical realization of the
famous joke of Diogenes the Cynic, who,
when is certain Athenian scapegrace wrote
over his own door, "Let nothing evil enter
here," asked.. pointedly, "Which way, then,
is he to get in himselt ?"
The hilltop must be a delightful place for
a picnic in the warm bright days of the
Pyrenean Summer, and even now, amid the
gaunt deeolation of midwinter, it commends
a view whose sad and solemn beauty is well
worth many a gayer lancleoeme. Around
the foot of the bluff, on its more sheltered
aide, the quaint little old-fashioned cottages
of Vidalos village huddle together as if try-
ing to keep themselves warm against the
bitter blast that sweeps down from the great
snow fields overhead, making the leafless
poplars nod like gigantic: plumes. On the
other aide the Gave de Pau rolls its dimin-
ished stream with is fretful growl through a
wide waste of pebbles and gravel, like some
ruined spendthrift trying to keep up a show
of splendor upon the wreck of his wasted
fortune. Along either edge of the broad,
solid highroad that winds away between the
hills towards Lourdes and Tarbes, the long,
bare stalks of the Indian corn bristle up
out of the snow like scattered hairs On a
bald head. The deep, dreamy silence is
auddeialy broken by a dull crash far away
up among the hills, succeeded by a hol-
low booming sound, as a rook, loosened by
the unexpected thaw, bounds thundering
bdeolwown. the mountain side into the valley
And now, e.s I turn my face in the oppo-
site direction, the beautiful Angeles Valley
spread itself out below me into the broad.,
smooth oval which naarked its boundaries
ages ago, while it was still hidden beneath
the pulseless waters of a lonely mountain'
lake. On the terraced ledges of the dark
hill that shut it in three or four tiny white
hamlets cling like flakes of snow, and a few
thin wreaths of blue smoke from their an-
tique chimneys curl lazily upwards into the
breezeless air. Far away to the right, three
miles or more from the spot on which I
stand, the peaked roofs and gray church
towers of Angeles hang half way up the
slope of a huge rocky ridge crested with
spotless snow, while from its skirts trails
down into the valley the long straggling
liamlet of Vieuzao, through the deep, crook-
ed streets of which Bertrand Barere,
the fierceit of all the vampires that sucked
the blood of France during the Reign of
Terror, once laughed and frolicked with his
playmates, still unclouded by any foreshad-
owing of hideous crimes. And all around
and about me the great white mountains
tower up in stately vista, like giant palaces
of marble, till the grand procession closes
at last, Lan to the sou war , e ag-
ger -like point of the &Tim Pic de Viscos
rising dark and threatening against the cold
gray sky.
Suddenly a sirrill whistle awakens all the
echoes of the surrounding hills, and the
afternoon mail (one of the three daily trains
which are our sole reminders that the outer
world exists at all) comes janking
rat-
tling through the quiet l' tle valley, send-
ing its tiny feather of white steam floating
away over the tops of the skeleton trees as
it sweeps round the base of the hill on its
way to Prerrelitte, which lies several miles
further on at the higher end of the gorge.
There the railway ends and here, standing
at the furthest extremity of that vast iron
network which links the Pyrenees to the
Caucasus and the Adour to the Volga, we
can look forth into the wild,. uritrodden
region beyond, upon whose gym solitudes
no railroad has ever dared to intrude. Only,
a few leagues to the south of us beyond:
these towering peaks that loom white and .
spectral against the southern sky, lies the
sunny land ofla:pain with its vines and
olives, its stately cities and noble 'forests,
its stern and shadowy mountains, and all
the romantic associations of a thousand
eventful yeats. But between us and it
frowns a rampart more than 11,000 feet in
height, the loftiest part of the great moun-
tain wall built up by the Central Pyrenees.
Experts have been discussing for several
years the feasibility of carrying a line of
rail right through the middle of this great
barrier tojoin the railway system of North-
ern Spain, and the advantages of such a
project when once realized are now gener-
ally acknowledged. But even for a genera-
tion whioh has tunneled Mont Cenis and
cut through the Isthmus of Suez the task of
piercing a wall whose buttresses are the
Vignemale, Mont Perdu, and the Mala-
detta is no child's play. and as yet the
Chemin de Fer International des Pyrenees
Centrales exist only on paper, the two rail-
ways which actually connect France with
Spain having gone humbly round to the
lowest parts of the great dividing rang,
whero i slopes downward into the sea on
the extreme east and west.
Had Vidor Hugo ever been here he
might have supplemented his famous de-
scription of the chateau confronted by the
guillotine with the addition of a noble chap-
ter upon the stern historical contrast: of past fi
and present embodied in the passage of this h
ancient castle. To those who e so wholly •
' thep e
modern railway beneath the ruins live of thisyeGs
past is apt to appear a picturescate fable
rather than a recognized fact, and the ma- 0
jority read of the wild deeds and grim per. I
sonagee of the feudal period with almost as w
little realization of such thingts having actu- h
ally masted in tbe very lands, which they b
themselves inhabit as if they were perusing a
the adventures of Baron Munchausen. or of
Sindbad the Sailor.
Nor is this tb be wenclered at. To almost
a,ny eivilized person the true pertrait �f
such beings as the petty despots wire reared
and tenanted the tower beside which I stand
would seem as monstrous and impossible isa d
talking horses and fire -breathing drag= of a
mediteval romance. The feedal " Seigneur"li
ot the old school pricier' himself on being en- 1e
able to road or write, never opened his
mouth without a volley of foul and bias- b
pheinorie oaths, combed his matted and it
greasy beard &beet once a year, and had ' el
probably never been washed sit= his hem- h
'
tism except when he waded through is river e
withall his clothes on "hen heated in the le
chase." His days were passed hi is pleasing rn
alternation of unsparing bloodshed, whole- d
sale theft, and aWiniah debauchery. To
hunt down stags and wild boars, to bora
houses, to eut throats, to get helpleisely
drunk in the genial soeiety el half a dozen
other brutes like himself, were in hie opin-
ion and sole occupations worthy of e man of
spirit and good breeding. When anything
irritated him—which ueually happened
al least a score of times in the day—he
tough e nothing of knocking down his wife,
breaking is hunting spear over the head of
hs son or daughter, or cutting open the
face of is bervant with hie iron gauntlet,
"like a fine old Gascon gentleman, all of
the olden time."
Yet this brainless ruffian, coaree ae the
loweee boor in epeech and manners, ignorant
as the meanest of his serfs, gluttonous lid the
ewine of hie ancestral forfeits, cruel and
bloodthiretv as the wolves of his native
mountains, was really a gentleman of high
birth and long descent, the object of awe
and reverence to his less distinguished
neighbors. He had hie own rough code of
chivalry, and was as true to it as King Ar-
thur hirneelf. The "bluest -blooded" Span-
ish Hidalgo could not have been more
punctilious regarding the purity of his blood
and the high claims of his ancestry, and lie
was ready to peril his life at any moment in
support of what he considered a point of
honor.
As time rolled on and one dynasty suc-
ceeded another upon the throne of France,
the fierce old race that had claimed equality
with the King himself, and had so often de-
fied his utmost power, began to die out, like
the bears and wolves which they li‘inted.
The iron centralization of the later Bour-
bons transferred to the crown all the power
formerly wielded by the nobles, and the
sun, whioh was the chosen emblem of Louis
XIV., gathered around it a revolving circle
of those plumed and jeweled Marquises who
live forever in the courtly memoirs of the
Duke de St. Simon and the wonderful &me -
dies of Moliere.
But all these changes brought no relief to
tia trampled peasants of the provinces. On
the contrary, they found—in the jullest
sense of the stern old Hebrew proverb—
that the little finger of their modern lord
was thicker than the loins of his grim an-
cestors. The savage Renee and Gmitons of
the Middle Ages had, at least, mingled with
their -fierceness is certain amount of coarse
and bearish good nature. They allowed no
one but themselves to oppress their vassals,
and at the wont they were always on the
spot to be appealed to for help by any
"peasant churl" bold enough to risk being
hanged for presuming to ask it. Far other
wise was it with the "absentee landlords
of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
While M. le Marquis, in the splendi
Court circle of Versailles, was carrying th
revenue of a whole estate upon his gold
laced coat and diamond -buckled shoes, o
flinging away at cards in one evening a sum
of money sufficient to maintain half a dozen
peasants for is twelve-month, his wretched
tenantry at home were making soup of
nettics and eking out their scanty bread
with sawdust, in order to supply his ex-
travagance. Such a contrast could hardly
im
fail to press itself upon the mind of the
people. The began to think, and the result
of their meditations was not wholly without
importance, for it took the form of the
French Revolution.
This shattered tower above me, and the
countless similar ruins which stud the whole
length and breadth of France, bear testi-
mony to the wale-wastins fury of that great
political deluge. But with all its havoc
and devastation it has undeniably improved
the conditioi of the people. What the life of
the ordinary French peasant was previous to
1789 may be read in the diary of Arthur
Young by those whose nerves are strong
enough, and when read will not be easily
forgotten. What the life of the same cies
is now, any one who travels through France
with his eyes in his head instead of in his
guide book can see for himself. a
Here as well as everywhere else the great
change has made itself felt. Beyond all
doubt, the ordinary surroundings of these
sturdy mountaineers among whom we have
been spending our Christmas would have
seemed to their down -trodden forefathers
something too good to be possible. Poor
though many of them unquestionably are,
the French peasant's wonderful aptitude for
making the moat of every trifle enables them
to get along comfortably enough where an
English laborer would have hard work to
avoid starving outright. If not particularly
bright or well intormed, the Pyrenean
" JacquekBenhomme" is frugal, patient, in-
dustrious., anti on the 'Whole a decidedly
goortfelle4v.iieliis dwn peculiar way. Rains,
frosts,' ho,Wling winds have' been ,his play-
mates from childhood 'and he seems to en-
joy their fierce' frolic§ is h 'kind of rough
practical joke. When you go past him in
the teeth of a pelting storm he will doff his
broad flat cap of bine woolen, f very much
like an exaggerated "Tam o' Shanter,") and
willgreetyou with a hoarseshout of "Saint!"
and a cheerful grin :worthy of Mark Tapley
himself. Give him a cabbage or two to
make soup, a loaf of coarse bread, three or
four logs for his fire, and a few stray cents
for cheap wine and tobacco, and Jacques's
cup of contentment is full to the brim.
But the time to see these honest "hill
folks" at their best is undoubtedly Tuesday
morning, the time of the weekly market,
which is our local subsitute for club, ex-
change, skating rink, fashionable promen-
ade, and every other form of public reunion.
All the preceding day busy hands have been
at work putting up stalls and booths in the
queer little market place, which is not much
bigger than a good-sized flower bed, and al-
most before daylight on the appointed
morning a distant rumbling of wheels and
jingling of bells, floating down from the
hills through the cold gray dimness of early
dawn, announces that the noble army of
marketeers are already mustering from
eyery side. You fling open the window
and step out upon a balcony overhanging
the main street of the village where the
rst ray of sunlight that streams along the
uge black cliffs of the Gorge de Pierrefitte
bows you is procession as motley as any
renetial carnival, or the pageant of St.
eorge in the streets of Rio tie Janeiro.
Striding manfully through mud and snow
omes a tall, sinewy, handsome young fel-
ow from the uplands of the Val d'Azon
hose alive cheek and crisp black ourls
int at an admixture of Spanish blood from
eyond the border. His approach is her -
hied by a sucteesion of ear-splitting squeals
from two or three enormous pigs, whose jet.
black heads atta pinky bodies make them
look as though they had jest been drinking
Ont of an inkstand by mistake. Character-
istically eager to go every way but the right
one, these four -footed Socialists give their
river a vast amount of needless trouble,
nd his long stick ie in constant action till
e add his hopeful charges disappear at
ngth toured the corner of the marketplace.
Next in order ecnnee creaking and rum•
ling up the steep, narrow streets, driven by
frosty -faced old Mall in a well worn gray
oak, a small cart, half ,filled with damp
ay, out of which a faint bleat is shaken
very now and then by a jolt of extra vie -
nee. Then appears a sturdy peasant wo-
an trudging sienttly along through the
irtbeside her lade e donkey, with her hard,
brown fag° fused in is hriOt blue hand-
kerchief, Another donkey follows, on the
back of which SUB is long-leggea boy, ise
white with snow that he Woke iike a bolster
set up on end. Many a man would think
himself overloaded with one of these huge
baskets of cabbages which those two strap-
ping wenches carry 80 easily on their heads,
laughing. and chattering meanwhile as it
the beaaneg of arch a weight over several
miles of rough mountain road were a mere
joke. This shambling fellow with the sack
on his shoulder, however, who comes slow-
ly up behind them with his rugged fo.ce
half hidden by the pointed. hood of his long
brown mantle, seems to find it no easy mat-
ter to mount this slippery incline in his
enormous wooden shoes, which elide hither
and thither as if it was they that were
moving the man instead of vice versa.
And SO, through the long morning hours,
the endless procession keeps filing past—
men and women, lads and lasses, oxen,
sheep, melee, horses, donkeys, and pigs.
The little market square—in the darkest
corner of which a miniature Post Office seems
trying to hide itself away from the general
bustle—is soon filled to overflowing, and
the tinkling plaeh of the tiny foentain in
its (mare is quite unheard amid the cease-
less buzz and clack of tongues. Ruddy
farmers from opposite ends of the Argeles
Valley grasp each other's brawny hands
with a broad grin ef welcome,. and exchange
a few rough-hewn country jokes in their
quaint Gascon dialect, with a running ac-
companiment of boisterous laughter.
Gaunt, wrinkled old women in scarlet
oloaks, grouped like priestesses around an
altar of cabbages, wag their peaked chins
over some racy morsel of local gossip.
Dashing young village isucks, who have
trotted in upon their own horses from St.
Sevin or Pierrefitte, get up sly flirtations
with the petty girls in the booths while
their mothers are busy elsewhere, and
orowds of ravenous small boys swarm
around the pernicious beauty of the cakes
piled on the nearest stalls, and, like the
hungry traveler in the old story, "eat as if
there were no hereafter."
The church clock strikes 12 o'clock -1
o'clock -2 o'clock—and still the hum and
bustle of this open air Parliament goes on
unabated. But toward the middle of the
afternoon a very marked slackening begins
to make itself apparent in the general
stir and hubbub. The keenest bargainers
suddenly call to mind that they are several
miles from home, that the short days of
midwinter allow no time for lingering, and
. that any one who may have the ill -fortune
to be overtaken by darkness upon one of
, those perilous mountain paths—especially
d if he should happen to have a weighty load
e to carry or an unruly beast to drive—may.
. think himself extremely lucky to reach his
✓ own door in safety. So bundles are corded
and horses harnessed, the busy throng melts
away little by little, and just as the gray
mists of evening are beginning to blur the
noble outline of the overhanging mountains
• the last hoof tramp dies away in the dis-
tance, and our quiet little village relapses
into its wonted stillness once more.
In a Dust Storm.
An English traveller, Mr. A. R. Hope,
writing from South America of life on the
pampas, relates some experiences that were
new and strange. Here is his account of a
storm he witnessed one afternoon while he
was visiting some herdsmen on the plains.
"A dust storm 1" they called to him, and
almost before he had time to make any in-
quiries, it was on them. The air was
crowded with birds flying before it
I The next indication of its approach was
that we felt Particles of the duct blown in
our faces ; and*'soon the dust not only in
g creased in denseness, but was mingled with
pieces of plants and othersubstances carried
along by the.wind with such violence as to
make the skin meet where they struck it.
The whirling clouds grew larger and
thicksr, and every oneputting his hand over
his month began to mike for shelter. A
few drops of rain fell, and these in passing
through the dust acquired the consistency
of mu& Peels of thunder were heard not
far off, and before long the force of the
wind was so great that it was difficult to
keep one's footing.
At the first signs of the storm the ca.ttle
grow restless. The herdsmen tried to round ,
them up; the great herd swayed to and fro, I
and began to move before the wind: ,The 1
last thing we sew befon the dust got so
thick that we could see no more was the
whole mass going off at a long, swinging
trot. 'By this time most. of us were safe in
the house where soon it was 30 dark that
lights had to be brought into the room.
For half an hour or more the darkness
continued. To me there was something al -
moat awful in this strange phenomenon,
but the other men seemed to look upon it as
a matter of course, and, throwing off lightly,
whatever annoyance they might have felt at
this interruption to the day's business, be-
took themselves to making the best of it, and '
the crowded room was soon a Babel of talk
and laughter, while through the dm now
and again burst a short, sudden peal of
thunder above our heads.
But except a few drops, rain did not fall,
and the herdsmen, whose camp lay farther
on in the track of the storm, were jubilant
over the hope that the rain -cloud was being e
carried away to come down on their ground. ,
Rain is of course most valuable at this time
of the year, and when it does rain, it does
rain ou the pampas; the weather there
knows its own mind and no mistake about
it.
'
BIDW.E1L, TUE i'OltGER.
l:uibrks:it,
rioann'ad8101/its Crimes
it
"Yes, replied William Pinkerton, the
deteetive. "1 erreeted and landed Bidwell
the great forger and bank robber, behind the
bars. Readingof bis mein; discharge from
the English prison in the papers the other
day etartedmid•thne reinipiecences of four-
teen years ago. There is a geed deal, of ro.
mence conuected with Bidwell, and that
sieter of his who, it seems, effeeted his re-
lease, has been in my office in Chicago
hundreds and hundrede of times on her bro.
ther's account to have US Use OUT influence
with the British authoritiee. He was an
educated fellow, sharp and shrewd, and con-
eequently one of the most accomplished and
dangerous criminals at that time in kmerica.
His name is Austin Byron Bidwell, and he
has a brother named George. He was born
and raised in Adrian'Mich'
. and now is
about 40 years of age. In 1872 the Third
National Bank of Baltimore was robbed of
nearly a million dollars, and the case was
given to US to work up. I took the case, in
hand and began work by shadowing is
woman named Chapame, wife of the notor-
ious bank robber, Joe Chapman, who I sup-
posed at the time was implicated in the
robbery , and I thought perhaps she would
in some way communicate with her hus-
band, who I had 'every reason to believe
wartin England. I finally got over to London
and one day while walking about the city
tracing some bank notes, I casually stepped
into Russell's tailor shop, onthe strand, and
there, right before my eyes, pricing some
goods'stood Austin Bidwell and Joe Chap-
man. Inspector Share of the Scotland Yards
and I watched them for some time, and I
finally came to the conclusion that they were
but indirectly, if at all, connected with the
great Baltimore robbery. I was at that time
making my reports to Messrs. Frechfield, of
the bank of England, and I took especial
pains to explain to them the importance of
keeping an eye on thetwo men. They merely
poolepoohed the idea tnat these men could
do anything, saying that banking in Eng.
was done on a diffeeent system than in
America; so I let the matter rest
"Itt the meantime we had caught the
Baltimore bank robbers, and in March, 1873,,
I returned to America. A shot time after
my arrival I received a cablegram from Lon-
don saying that the Bank of England had
been defrauded of nearly $1,000,000 by
none other than Austin Bidwell and a tog
of his named MaoDonnell. Another cable-
gram stated that MaeDonnell was en route
for New. York in the steamer Thuringia,
that she would arrive in port in a few days.
-and that Bidwell was at Santa Andre, Spain,.
and wall about to sail for Mexico and would
stop at Havana, Cuba. Being well acquaint-
ed with Bidwell I started off myself to in-
tercept him, and made a beeline for Florida.
"At Cedar Keys I secured a cattle ship
and we sailed for Havana, and as good luck
would have it, we sailed past the very ship
that had Bidwell on board while rounding
into port. 1 arrested him as soon as he
stepped off the vessel, and there being no
extradition treaty then between Cuba and
England, the police authorities would not
lock him rip, but merely kept him at their
station. Through bribery he escaped, and
I had my work to do over again. Securing
a Spanish interpreter 'started out and finally
I located him at a Spanish town called Mare -
now, about forty miles below Havana, and
took him back with me to that place. He
again endeavored to bribe the man I had. to
guard him by offering him a United. States
bond for $1,000, but the man luckily did
not recognize the value of it and lie failed.
I stayed in Havana until June awaiting the
arrival of the English detectives, when he
was taken to England. While in Cuba I
intercepted a letter directed. to Bidwell at
HaiValla which was written in cipher. I
made part of the cipher out and immediately
cabled to New York to have them senire is
trunk adressed to Capt. George Mathews
that was at some European express office.
• Austin & Baldwin s New 'York Express
office my bretber Robert found the trunk,
and opening it found 365 $1,000 United
States bonds wrapped up in an old suit of
clothes. A woman called for it, and my
brother alutdowed her and found she was the
1 wife of the notorious Phil Hasgrave. The
letter was written by George Bidwell, who
was at Edinburgh at the time; and who was
arrested there a short time afterward. All
the others implicated in the robbery were
arrested afterward. Mac Donnellwas arrest.
ed in New York and Edwin Noyes Hill in
London, so with the two Bidwell brothers
we had the whole lot caged.
PEARLS OF TRUTR.
One of the first requisites of a well -ordered
home is punctuality. If there is no regar4
for time, if the administration is" happy.
go-lticky," there will always be more or
less friction.
Man's sense of ignorance is one of the
greatest of his gifts, for it is the secret of
of his wish to know. The whole structure
and the whole furniture of hi t+ mind are
adapted to this condition. The highest law
of his being is to advance in wisdom and
knowledge, and his sense of the presence
and the pou er of things which he can only
partially understand is an abiding witness
of this law and an abiding incentive to its
fulfilment.
To be too independent with those we love
is a mistake to be carefully avoided, for
excessive independence is a barrier that
checks sympathy as effectually as a rugged
boulder stops the even flow of is limpid
stream. To yield a little, taking and giving
trifling service; not only affords mutual
pleasure, but serves to draw closer the silken
threads of love, the tension of which, even
with our most intimate ones, Mot sometimes
to slacken, needing careful watching lest
the threads snap entirely.
The Plainer the Better.
"That is certainly the ugliest pug dog
ever saw," Said a husband whose wife had
led home a recent purchase.
"Yes," said the lady, rapturoesly, "that
is the beauty of the dear little fellow."
Now it seems when they first went to
London they went under the name of Hut-
ton St Co., and were there ostensibly for the
purpose of establishing large shops to manu-
facture Pullman cars to operate on English
roads. They brought $40,000 with them and
established a credit at the western branch
of the Bank of England. To begin opera-
tions they event to Brussels and secured a
number of bills of exchange, which was
counterfeited and passed on the bank. The
next they wanted was a Rotbsetuld's bill he
exchange, which was a little difficult to get.
At last an opportunity offered itself. Bid-
well was travelling between Caltds and
Paris on the railroad which happened to be-
long to the Rothschilds, when an accident
occurred and be was bruised up consider-
ably. Patching up his face with plasters,
he hobbled into Rothschild's office and ask-
ed for the Baron. He stated that he had
been injured on their road, but instead of
complaining he merely wanted a bill of ex-
change for a large amount of money
that he had with him. This he secured,
and after seouring a " bill of exchange of
Bledensteint their plans were fully pekfeet-
ed and their operations begun. They in-
serted an advertisement in ore of the Lon-
don papers for a private secretary, and had
one of their own pals (the Edwin Noyes Hill,
that I stated was arrested in London) to an.
swer the advertisement in the presence of
some big bank official when they engaged
him. Their plan was this: After counter-
feiting a number of the various bills of ex-
change they would in the morning send
Hill to the bank to cash it. They would
then watch outside, and if Hill came out
alone everything was all right, but if he
came out with a stranger it was a signal
that everything was discovered. Things
went on smoothly, and they had already se-
cured needy $1,010,000 when the fraud was
discovered one day by their being no date
on one of Bledenstein's bills of exchange.
The sequel is as I have alreedy told you.
Hill was arrested in London Austin Bid-
well in Havana, George 13iclivell in Edin-
burg, and MacDonnell in New York. They
were all sentenced to life imprisonment, and
now I see that Austin Bidwell is at last par
cloned and released. Another episode in
BidwelPs life is tbe one that gives the re
mantic coloring to it. While in London he
became infatuated with and married an
English colonel's daughter, who, there is no
doubt, loved him dearly, and believed him
to be the man he represented himself to be
He settled a dowry of $25,090 on her when
they wore married, which, of course, was
stolen money, and the poor girl did not
have at opportintity to spend but ebont
$150 of it,