The Cedarville Herald, Volume 12, Numbers 27-52

mm ■N The Cedarville Herald ir & blair , rawbiwr. CEDAItTItL*. l OWO, r r A HOLY PLACE. Aholy pl*oo tBltiQhomh-*tone. Where lovedonerare gathered ’roonO, Wheremother*. ilreS andeieteradeer, * Andbrothers end tricnd*are found; Aholy place la the hoarth-slcna Rome's Innermost shrine l* there; LadenwithbtM*od benieon, Andbellowed by loving prayer. Aholy place lsthohearth-etonei What eluateringloyaabide ' Where theersdieofour Infancy , Was rookedby a mother’s Bldei . Aholy pl(M}el*thebeirtb-«toa<e. , Where oblidbood'apatteHeg feet Go glancing in ehade andsunshine ■To themusicof pleasure’*!,beat A holy placeluthe hearth-stone, Where theyouthhavewooed andwoe; Andwediradgoneto the battle Of life, with full armoron; . A holyplane is the hearth-stone. Wheremanhoodhas settleddown ’ With blessings blossomingroundbin, Apd love for a priceless crown. Aholy place Isthe hearth-stone, ” Whence the old andyoung havegone Torest fromtheirweary labor,. .Whenthe battle of life wasdonet AndohI fromthe holyhearthatone, . Whenparted fromthosewe love, - ’ Maywo goto mefcvbythe hearth-stone Of Our Father’s houseabove. -N . Y. Ledger. ApovmHCE T W O B $ O T t f E f ? S . - ........ BYEDGAIt FAWCETT, A uthor of "Tim C onfessions or C laud ;” ■• an ambitious W oman ,” “T ub E vil THAT Mw Do,” “A New Y ork „ . . F amily ,” E tc . (.Copyright, 1880, By Edgar Fawcett,] CHAPTER IX.—CONTINU*D. “ For all time—i f I chose to consider it in that light. You said nothing about my returning yon the envelope. You dimply placed it in niy hands, and—” . / “ Tush!’’’ broke in Sylvan. “ I was half out o f my head when 1 took that course. I’m sane enough now to recon* aider i t " ‘‘Pardon mo," said Gerald, in, his throat. ’ ’You are not sano at all to think of destroying it, and I refuse to give it you back fdr such a purpose." Sylvan scowled and vclenched hia hands. ” . “ Bah! you mustl You must, and you shall!” “ 1 refuse.” > ' “ Then yon commit an outrage!” cried Sylvan. “ You rob mo shamefully!” He flung:-,himself bock into tho chair be had quitted, and for a moment bowed bis face toward both his trembling ” WB SUALI, UKXCEFORTU BE STRANGERS." hands. "Our mother was right!” he suddenly shouted, again springingerect. “ God was against all that bad business! I never felt it as I feel it now. But yon don’t fqel it—you!” ho vrenton, in scath­ ing wrath. “ Y ou V ib an atheist—you’ve been one for years! You call it agnos­ tic, free-thinker, rationalist and such facile, convenient names. But ‘atheist’ is behind them all. Ccnnc, how, Gerald, i f you refuse to give mo back those pa­ pers, that in turn 1may fling them back among the powers o f evil where they belong, I—I shall never willingly speak to you or notice you again," Gerald measured his brother's frame With kindled and contemptuous eyes. “ Then we separate from this hour," he said, “ 1 will not give the papers back. “ 1 despise in you the spirit that makes you seek to bum them, and I gladly agree that we shall henceforth be strangers," ' Furious, ho dashed himself out of 8ylvan’s house. Doubtless at any pre­ vious period o f his Ilfs he would have remembered with pity that illness bad perhaps Iain at the root o f Ids brother's arrogant claim. But now he quickly forgot even the fact of their quarrel. It was so easy for bis infatuated mind and heart to forget every thing except tho Pew devotion which nowmastered both. A month,*two months, passed for him like the lapse Of a Week. He received three or four kind letters from Thorn- dyke, telling o f the frightful fire and his Owtt extraordinary financial escape from disaster which had beggered not a few o f his fellow-citizen*. Two of the letters Inclosed drafts, Which Gerald cashed hi Hew York, scarcely hating a gratefal thought, as he did so, with re­ gard to the kindly motive thatprompted their eonveyanoe. At another time he Would have written hia proteotor psges o f thankful response. But now he wrote only brief If sordial notea, all senaa of duty being vailed for him in vapors o f heedless egoism. He inces­ santly saw the woman he loved, and in­ cessantly told himself that she grew dearer to him after each fresh inf^r- 'view. HeJutd become jealous o f the poaalbilityHh&t she would Over regain her memory. Ho preferred hei* just as she wus, and had no realization of the reckless outlook on hie own future— , which be betrayed WbsA dCclaring to 1 Clyde: “ Even if she liad really bean ; some other man's wife my marriage with her would now Beemto me wholly sacred. Death took her, and in dying all the worldly boinds that Bhe had formed were nullified. Death gave her back to me, new-born, a second and perhaps a finer self. If she had sinned some dark sin during her former life, ! should never dream of not pardoning it, I feel that she will soon -consent to marry me. Almost immediately, then, we shall be mode one. Her health is. frail, and 1 will take her into the West, where Dr. Thorndyke, ever kind to me, will welcome us." ”, ' Cly$le expostulated, hut vainly.' Here Was madness ,indeed, but of a sort with which his whole pharmacopoeia of drugB had no power to deal, lie hod seen the men who had brought “ Perdita'a" body to Gerald’s rooms and hod'tried to wring from them a confession of that sort of robbery in which the rope of a wedding­ ring might be included. But the.men ,were rough fellows and yet keen-witted ones. They seemed clearly to under­ stand that when hiring them as he had done, Clyde had laid himself open, in his character of a physician connected with Bellevue and consequently with jits adjacent morgue, to chances.of the gravest and most injurious charges. “ Good heavens," thought the young physician, one night, after a stealthy conference that had teemed for him with humiliating rebuff. “ I . feel like some compromised person in a Bowery melodrama. And this comes of not keeping the wheels of one’s existence well within the ruts of the ordinary!. Ah, imagination, what traps yon can set for the unwary scientist!" Dread­ ing the ridicule o f his co-workers, he refrained from breathing a syllable about the elixir. There were times when he doubted absolutely that it had revitalized her whom Gerald now so adored. Again he would keenly regret tho accident which had caused him to overturn that flask of the fluid, and vow to himself that he would soon bor­ row his young friend’s formula and turn alchemist with sturdy zeal. Mean­ while he greatly regretted the absence o f Thorndyke, and at last wrote him another letter, far more copious than the first, in which he described Gerald as bout upon a perilous and reckless union with a woman whose brain and body were both disordered and who might bring upon herself and her suitor calamity almost worse than death. “ Leave, if you can,” ho counselled, .“ the tangle of your present affairs, and come eastward with speed. You have already written Gerald that your real losses arc slight, .. A11 the hotter reason, my good friend, why you should seek at this hour the mad boy who hurries to a bourne thatamy prove his lasting grief and disgrace." Somewhat strangely, it must ho owned, on the very afternoon when Clyde sat In his study scaling and di­ recting this letter, Gerald, with Hushed face and brilliant eyes, pushed himself unannounced across tho threshold. "Wish me joy!" he said, throwing his strong, lithe frame into a chair. “ She has consented to marry me. She loves me, and has pgreed to link her fate with mine. It must happen in. a few dayB, Clyde—a very few days. We shall go straight to join dear old Dr. Thorndyke after our marriage. I feel I’ve neglected him horribly. But when he sees Pordlta he will pardon' me. I'm certain. And we sh&U live out there­ with him, if he’ll let us." “ Whore do yon mean?" asked Clyde, wiping his pen, and giving a Bad little sniff to the autumn tuberose in his coat- front. “ Chicago? It can’t be very comfortable there just now, considering that most of it is in ashes.’’ .“ Oh, we'll find some other place out in the West,” said Gerald, with an ex­ cited toss of the head, “ There are lots of them. It will be a new life, and that's just what I want. You forget that I only need a little time to work again at the elixir and realize from it a monstrous fortune.” Clyde made a plaintive sort o f tattoo on the desk before him with the well- kept finger-nails of one hand. “ Ah, yes—yes, indeed,” he muttered, in joy-, less monotone. Hot long afterward he posted his copious letter to Thorn­ dyke, and then had a conscience- stricken feeling that he should have spent a small fortune in sending it aU by telegram, _____ , CHAPTER X “ You are ready, Pcrdita?” said Ger­ ald with great gentleness, on a certain morning just three days later. “ Yes,” she answered, standing W o re htm in a simple dark dress, with a bunch of flowers at her bosom. Then, as he raised her hand and held it to his lips* she went on: “ Who is waiting there, Gerald?" - "Down In therdrawing-room? No one except tho clergyman who is to marry us and our good friend, Dr. Clyde, not to speak of poor, dull, obliging Mrs. Brawne." He was going to add, in hu- morons afterthought, “ expensive Mrs. Brawne, f might also caUher,” but sud­ denly preferred hot to speak Che words. Instead o f them he gayly said: “ The ■on Is shining ax merry as if it were one o f my Old English M sj mornings. And tbs sun is shining In my heart, too, t I’erdita! I do so hope it’s the same with you!" i Her eyes swam in tears as they dwett on his face, “ Oh. Gosald," «b* *«ud, “ whatever that blotted-put past o f mine may have been, I'm ’ certain It never brought love to me, never*, never!" She bowed her headon his shoulder. “ Them is no forgetfulness that could cloud suchlove as I fedffoy yon. It isth is thought that makes me sure l ean not be doing wrong. And yet who knows? who knows? There are times when SYLVAN TOOK NO NOTICE OFTIIE OCT* STRETCHED HAND. ' • . those hidden years are like a.monstrous iron door, against which 1 seem to be slowly dashing myself to death.” . Her words ended in a shudder. With tender force Gerald.uplifted her head and kissed her fervidly once or twice on the Ups. “ These arms are here," hchgaid, “ ready to save you from any Such' forlorn fate. And remember," he went on, with a kind of boyish catch­ ing of tho breath in . hia hope-stirred tones, ' “ there is somewhere a new life, prepared for us in a land that is new. He who so long lias been my benefactor will not desert me now. By degrees, my dearest, you will begin to forget that you have forgotten. Even the recollection that I found you homeless and shivering in the street., at night will melt into the brighter con­ sciousness of how much mutual joy that meeting has borne us both. Come, now; let us go down; they are waiting. There, I’ll kiss away your tears. Above all things that the eon hates to shine oh, I’m sure it must he a tearful bride." They went down-stairs together into the little front drawing-room. The placid-faced clergyman (unconscious of her mental trouble) hod taken Per- dita’s hand and was saying something kindly o r perhaps jocose to her in a lowered voice. Just then a servant slipped np to Gerald’s side and handed him a card. ■ 1 | Gerald turned toward Clyde. “ My brother, Sylvan," he said. “ Can he have heard of my marriage?” . “ /d id not tcU him," Clyde returned, neutrally. “ Where did yon b I iqw Mr. Maynard?" said Gerald to tho servant. - “ Into the next room, sir," he was answered. ' A pair of heavy folding-doors (in what is now a somewhat old-fashioned style for New York) separated these two apartments. These doors were tightly closed. Gerald turned to the clergyman with a Bmile. *Just excuse me for a moment?, please," he said, “ I promise you I’ll return directly. I haven’t got frightened enough to run away.” lie quitted the room by t£ side door, passed through the ball, and speedily came into the presence o f his brother. lie was smiling, and instantly put forth his hand. It ceemed impossible that he should hold a shadow’of malice, that morning, toward any human being —and least of all, toward one so near of kin. ^ ' But Sylvan took no notice of the outstretched hand. He was extremely pale, and the lung-malady that threat­ en s SANK TO THE FLOOR. cncd him was plainer, now, ta his glassy eye and hollow cheek. “ I would not have come hens,” he said, “ if it had not been for a most extraordinary matter. In their searches for my wife the two detectives I em­ ployed appear to have been very keen. They insist upon it that they have traced to this house (with final private aid, 1believe, from one o f its servants) a certain female whom they believe may vety possibly be tmCta." Gerald thought o f bis delayed mar­ riage. Besides, his brother had just behaved with tatolence In refusing to take his bend. He hall turned aWsy, with a alight enri o f th* Up. “ I know very few of the other people in tills house, You should make in­ quiries of the landlady here. Mrs. Brawne is her name." ' . - “ I preferredto tpako inquiries pfyoq," said Sylvan. “ I preferred it because I have learned that the. lady whom the officers have suspected 'qjf bpiftg Ltgda is in a certain way under'y^m* protec­ tion andthatof Dr. Clyde.” * ■ Gerald started, frowned, flushed and then grew deadly pale, ' “ She has entirely lost her memory,” pursued Sylvan, "and—" ■ “Stop there!" broke in Gerald. He spoke as if a cord girt his throat, “ What deviltry la this?*’ hei Went on, gaspingly. “ Who dared to tell you such a lie?" He stood staring at Sylvan with a fix­ ity that was full o f both defiance and bewilderment ,“ I have mentioned my informants," replied his brother, coldly, “ Perhaps they are mistaken; they have hot claimed Infallibility; but I am sure they have not dealt in falsehood-" A sudden impulse as of desperation took hold o f Gerald: “ The lady to whom you have so distinctly referred," he said, “ is here. Look for yourself." And quietly, but with speed, be un- clrfsed the folding doors. ' In a moment the two rooms became as one, Gerald moved forward,, his brother following, * She whom they sought stood, just then, between the clergyman andClyde. Mrs. Brawne, with commonplace visage and a qpeer, festive flutter about her toilet, was slightly iu ' the back­ ground, , Having approached within a few steps of the. woman ho meant to marry that morning,Geralddrew back andindicated Sylvan by a quick wave of his hand. “ This," ho said, looking straight at Perdita, “ is my brother." . She grovv very white, and remained for a few seconds motionless, with her gaze on Sylvan’s face. Then she sprang to Gerald and clutched his arm, ’ “ Your—yonr brother ?" she questioned. “ Yes,” said Gerald. ■ She had not taken her eyes from Sylvan. Clyde, who watched her now, never forgot the surge of intelligence mixed with frightful agony that soon swept across- her features. In another instant her clasp on Gerald’s arm loosened. She staggered toward Sylvan. Her eyes had now tho look of being dragged from their sockets. Her frail, pure throat became seamed with lines as of straining thews. “ Oh! my God!!’ she cried, i “ It all comes bock! I—I remember/" ■ In that, one last word rang out such anguish as a perishing soul might utter if damned by a sense of either its own despair, misfortune or disgrace.. “ Lucia!" exclaimed'Sylvan. He ad­ vanced as though to meet her. But oven then she sank to tho floor—sank with coUapsc so quick and terrible that no arm of those near by hod enough mingled force and swiftness to break her fall. Gerald was the first to raise her, and os lie did so a wild cry of sorrow broke from his lips. He had told him­ self, in that single fleet glance at her bluishly altered face, that she had ceased to. live. <. . 'And soon after­ ward, when she had been borne to a sofa, Clyde bent over her and verified the ghastly conviction. “Her heart has been feeble for weeks," he said, when no gleam of doubt aBto her death longer dwelt with him. Ris­ ing from tho sofa, he gazed with great gentleness and compassion at Sylvan, saying: “’She was your wife, then?” “ Yes," answered Sylvan. • At this point Gerald tore something from an inner pocket. “ The manu­ script and the letter!” he cried, in a voice throbbing with misery. “ Take them—burn them! you are right; they are accursed.” Sylvan received the envelope in a dazed way, with shaking hand. The mprning. in spite of its sunshine, had been somewhat chill; a fire of big black coal-blocks flashed and crackled below the mantel. Sylvan examined the papers, for a brief Bpacc, os well as Ills keen agitation would permit. Then he al­ most reeled toward the grate and flung them in among the yellow, coiling flames. Newly a month had passed when one evening Clyde and his friend Ross Thorndyke sat together. “ It is charming," said Clyde, “ to think of Gerald’s devotion to his brother nowadays. Instead of that horror having divided them it has made them better.friends than ever before." "Poor Sylvan is doomed, I fear," "said Thorndyke. “ His father's old malady has him In its clutch.” “ Yes; There seems every sign of an incurable decay." The two friends were seated in Clyde’s charming study, full of books and of artistic touches in the way of picture, bust or tapestry. Clyde let his eyes wander for awhile among these various proofs o f his own taste and culture. Then he slowly said, with a half-smile playing between his lips: . “ If all record of the elixir had not been lost, its powers of healing might be tried on poor Sylvan now. I don’t refer to any greater powers it might have pos­ sessed, my dear Thorndyke, so don’t watch in mo that half-contemptnous fashion. I merely mean—" But here .Thorndyke gave his gray beard an impatient pnll and flung one leg irrltatedly across the other. “ Ob, Clyde, Clyde!” he protested. “I often wonder that imagination o f yours has ever allowedyou to beoome the brilliant practitioner yon at*. Upon say word. X Wttwre ym taaretiy think there v u something sane In Egbert Maynard’* queer decoction, after all.” •Tcan’t helpbut wonder, sometimes," reteteMdCMs, “ fit,th* resuscitation of that drowned woman.” “ Wonder at 4tF* echoed Thorndyke with Unsparing soprn. "Why, how many thousands of so-called drowned pe*(4e have been revived by a dose of stimulant!” . -. , “ Then yon admit—" .♦•That It tear a stimulant? What else could it hav* been? Bat no more so than brandy—and perhaps not.as much." Clyde got up from his chair, with both hands tiuwst into his trousers pockets and with head reflectively drooped. “ Nos I w on t admit that," he said; “ I simply tcon’t. There were novel meth­ ods o f dealing with electricity pointed out by Maynard in that formula which might have astounded,the greatest liv- ingchemista.” “ Pah!” scoffed Thorndyke: ■"I should have liked to see any great living chem- 1st give it five minutes of serious atten­ tion." » , ! There was now a Bilence, during which Clyde stared np at one of his rare engravings.., “ Well, well," he at length murmured, “ it’s useless to. talk now of what merit or humbug the strange com­ pound may have concealed. But one “ BURN . th em ! YOU ARE BIGHT; THEY ARE ACCURSED." thing is sure: it bias wrought grief and > ruin enough to have been the shirt of Noises or the ‘poppled shell’ of Medea. And Gerald! how it has drugged him! Do you think he wiU ever quite recover from its effects?” ’ . “ Yes,” exclaimed Thorndyke, with a hearty emphasisthat was somehow both ’ manful and sweet. “He’s .young-yet, and he’s got all the world before him. Besides, you know, he has my warm friendship while I live, and. he'll have • what’s no doubt a good deal more val­ uable from me after I'm dead.” Clyde turned, with glowing eyes, and went np to his friend’s chair, laying a hand on the elder man's shoulder. “ You dear-old chap!” he laughed. “ No wonder the Chicago fire spared your goods and chattels as it did!” ■ “ Nonsense,” muttered Thorndyke, in his beard. “ It ruined many a better man!” [ t h e e n d .] . BELOW THE SEA LEVEL.. An Ocean o f Guttering Salt In the Colo. - • redo Desert. Salton is one of the lowest points in the United States, being 203 feet below sea level. It is a dreary spot situated about the end o f a huge valley. From time immortal Saltonhas been a desert, and for all time to come it will remain t so. Except for a few scant sagebush ' nothing grows on it nor can be made to grow. Here lie the huge salt beds ( .which are now being worked by a San ' Francisco company, so what looks ap* ( pnrcntly useless waste isreally yaluablo ' land. - The beds cover an enormous area, and the salt la scraped from off the sur­ face, and is not, as some people imag­ ine, mined in tho same way as gold and silver. The beds are about six to eight leet in length, and often larger, for they are artificially made, and in them oozes the salt. The only tools which are.em- ployed to gather the salt are a shovel and a hoe. Then the crude 6alt is load­ ed upon flat cars and run down by a locomotive into the mills, where it U pounded bp into salt for the table, for the dairy aad for such other purposes as needed. The amount of salt that can be produced is incalculable. Indeed, there is enough to supply the civilized world for all time to come, and if there were a failure of salt anywhere the Colorado desert would be able to sup­ ply the demand. In broad day, when the beds arc seen from the railroad ears, they look like an immense inland oeean, whose waters are o f glaring white, upon whose broad bosom rise innumerable mirages from■ great city blessed with churches sod . cathedrals, whose spires are as numer­ ous as the masts on the river Thames of great ocean steamshipsand huge sailing vessels. In early morning, "when the ann is rising, the scene is one of unsur­ passed splendor, for as the rays strike ( the saTy crystals they flash forth vari- - ous colored lights.—San Francisco Chronicle. The Pet sa l the Kettle. . “ You have such ridiculous names oul In Washington. Snohomish and Klick­ itat, for instance," * “ Aht Where are yon from?" “ From Sagadahoc County. Me., sir. What of that?”—Pack. Pitted Ills Meath Better, lie—Yeth, 1 suppose I was born with a silver spoon in a»y month) She—Are yon quits sure, Mr. Sappy, that It wasn’t * sitter-headed cane” - Manae / SWeekly- OF g e n e ! —Aocordiug 1 • man of 50 yea worked 8.600 amused himself] 000 days. lie bread, Hi.ooo pounds j f veget* drank 7,000 gailjl --Lots of incu| people i» the Uj folks and other the last annual | post office it app 000 received in ■ ment from fpreid from the United] —The pineapjj per part o f a st three feet high . cluster of leave ground. The up becomes covere] the. plant, tbc enlarged, its pnf the pineapple. —A m ijor, th prietor of aweil-l industry, obtain] a trade a few. ye and the other ms less. He had jj for dinner, and ticket for the for soon made a fortl —It is a remi cemeteries whici •a western slop! graves are consicf bodies are usua]| feet toward the all the graves ar] on the western ■ with the feet hig| ■—If we were ■ in the world wel mounted up int-)] sands. There ai islands under thd Georgian bay, tH Lake Huron, whl islands on the m f ■several thousand! of course, quite —A post oliic<| City, la , who hi some time to di pilfering the <‘as| • City post office, that the offended mouse ‘ had bee] money for sever one twenty doli| 'dollars was recot) nest —The oldest house in the Uni| that<of Killian .site Albany. It| of brick with fro&t wall contal of which tho eal the Indiana A<f tho rear, Bet ujj memorative ■ soc| erected in 1052. —There ib a ears of jack-rail ote scalp bonnlj created a new in ' recently/of seve] their ears has active bounty- jacks, clipping 1 ing them loose | from which ho till the end of 1 —Fright caufi to Miss Alta F«] ' Pa. She was at Reeders, n| from a distanc between two some of her Ul informed thatf seriously injure shock resulted] sclous for eig| was able to ca by writing, sh] could not hear lower limbs ■ —Capt. Fratj died in Bath,, of tbe o'd-timi Ho was born | town of Filipp sea at the ago! a captain at | as master unt four years a| wrecked, and master he ne| although he 1 a great drivi i fourteen day] pool in the sH able run, wh| ern would fir 1 • will “ I have jm my way t o : said a yotui spent nearlf scheming a| down and 1c “What’s asked, “ Oh, ii’s si fact, that yl this labor-sfl a ready and| Now, here: tie then | Dear attending vowed turn the i forth." ■ “ This fo cards andi and look Trill save, toy way to ( —Arkaos*]