Greenfield Republican, Greenfield, Hancock County, 12 April 1889 — Page 6

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KING SOLOMON'S MINES.

BY H. RIDER HAGGARD.

CHAPTER XV—CONTINUED. THE MINES. After Ignosi's visit I went to see Good, and found him quite delirious. The fever from his wound seemed to have aken a firm hold of his system, and to be complicated by an internal injury. For four or five days his condition was most critical indeed, I firmly believe that had it not been for Foulata indefatigable nur3ing he must have died.

Women are women, all the world over, whatever their color. Yet, somehow, it seemed curious to watch this dusky beauty bending night and day over the fevered mans couch, and performing all the merciful errands of the sick-room as swiftly, »ently, and with as fine an instinct as a trained hospital nurse. For the firet night or two I tried to help her, and so diu. Sir Henry so soon as his stiffness allowed him to move, but she bore our interference with impatience, and finallv insisted upon our leaving him to her, saying that our movements made him restless, which I think was true. Day and night she watched and tended him, wiving him his only medicine, a native cooling drink made of milk, in which was infused the juice of the bulb of a species of tulip, and keeping the flies from settling on him. can see the whole picture now as it appeared night after night by the lizht of our primitive lamp, Good tossing to and fro, his features emaciated, his eyes shining large and luminous, and jabbering nonsense by the yard and seated on the ground by his side her back resting against the wall of the hut, the soft-eved, shapely Kukuana beauty, her whole face, weary as it was. animated by a look of infinite compassion—or was it something more than compassion?

For two days we thought that he must die, and went about with heavy hearts. Only Foulata would not believe it. "tie will live" she said.

For three hundred yards or more around Twala's chief hut, where the sufferer lay, there was silence for by the king's order all who lived in the habitation3 behind it had, except Sir Henry and myself, been removed, lest any noise should come to the sick man's ears. One night, it was the fifth night of his illness, as was my habit, I went across to see how he was getting on before turning in for a few hours.

I entered the hut carefully. The lamp placed upon the floor showed the figure of Good, tossing no more, but lying quite still.

So it had come at last! and in the bitterness of my heart I gave something like a sob. "Hush -h—h!" came from the patch of dark shadow behind Good's head.

Then, creeping closer, I saw that he was not dead, but sleeping soundly, with Foulata's taper fingers clasped tightly in his poor white hand. The crisis had passed, and he would live. He slept like that for eighteen hours and I scarcely like to say it, for fear I shonld not be believed, but during that entire period did that devoted girl sit by him, fearing that if she moved and drew away her hand it would waken him. What she must have suffered from cramps, stiffness and weariness, to say nothing of want of food, nobody will ever know but it is a factgthat, when at last he woke, she had to be carried away—her limbs were so sti ffchat she could not move them.

After the turn had once been taken Good's recovery was rapid and complete. It was not till he was nearly well that Sir Henry told him all he owed to Foulata and when he came to the story of how she sat by his side for eighteen hours, fearing lest by moving she should awake him, the honest sailor's eyes filled with tears. He turned and went straight to the hut where Foulata was preparing the midday meal (we were back in our old quarters now) taking me with him to interpret in case he could not make his meaning clear to her, thongh I am bound to say she understood him marvel viisly as a rule, considering how extremely limited was his foreign vocabularly. "Tell her," said Good, "that I owe her mv life, and that I will nevsr forget her kindness."

I interpreted, and under her dark skin she actually seemed to blush. swifurning to him with one of those fast and graceful motions that in her always reminded me of the flight of a wild bird, she answered softly, glancing at him with her large brown eyes "Nay, my lord my lord forgets! Did he not save my life, and am i. not my iord's handmaiden?"

It will be observed that the young lady appeared to have entirely forgotten the share which Sir Henry and myself had had in her preservation from Twala's clutches. But that is the way of women! I remember my own dear wife was list the same. I retired from that little interview sad at heart. I did not like Miss Foulata's soft glances, for I knew the fatal amorous propensities of sailors in general, and Good in particular.

There are two things in the world, as I have found it, which can not be prevented you can not keep a Zulu from fighting, or a sailor from falling in love upon the slightest provocation!

It was a few days after this last occurrence that Ignosi held his great "indaba" (council.) and was formally recognized as king by the "induns" .v (head men) of Kukuanaland. The spectacle was a most imposing one. including, as it did, a great review of troopp. On this day the remaining fragment of the Grays were formally paraded, and in the face of the army thanked for their splendid conduct in the great battle. To each man the king made a large present of cattle, promoting them one and all to the rank of officers in the corps of Grays which was in process of formation. An order was also promulgated throughout the length and breadth of Kukuanaland that, whilst we honered the country with our presence, we three were to be greeted with the royal salute, to be treated with the ceremony and respect that was by custom accorded to the .king, and the power of life and death swswas publicly conferred upon us. Ignosi, too, in the presence of his people, reaffirmed the promises that he had made, to the effect that no man's blood «houid be shed without trial, and that witchhunting should cease in the land.

When the ceremony was over we waited upon Ignosi. and informed him that we were now anxious to investi-

fate

the mystery of the mines to which olomon's Road ran, asking him if he had discovered anything about them. "My friends," he answered, "this have I discovered.... It is there that th6

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three great figures sit, who here are called the 'Silent Ones,' and to whom Twala would have offered the girl Foulata, as a sacrifice. It is there, too. in a great cave deep in the mountain that the kings of the land are buried, there shall ye find Twala's body, sitting with those who went before him. There, too, is a great pit, which, at some time, long-dead, men dug out, mayhap for the stones ye speak of, such as I have heard men in Natal speak of at Kimberlev. There, too, in the Place of Death is a secret chamber, known to none but the king and Gagool. But Twala, who knew it, is dead, and I know it not, nor know I what is in it. But there is a legend in the land that once, many generations gone, a white man crossed the mountains, and was lead bv a woman to the secret chamber and shown the wealth, but before he could take it she betrayed him, and he was driven by the king of the day back to the mountains, and since then man has entered the chamber." "The story is surely true, Ignosi, for on the mountains we found the white man," I said. "Yes, we found him. And now I have promised ye that if ye can find that chamber, and the stones are there—" "The stone upon thy forhead proves that they are there," I "put in, pointing to the great diamond I had taken from Twala's dead brows. "Mayhap if they are there," he said "ye shall have as "many as ye can take hence—if, indeed, ye would leave me, my brothers." "First we must find the chamber," said I. "There is but one who can show it to thee—Gagool."

And if she will not?" "Then shall she die," said Igno&i, sternly. "I have saved her alive but for this. Stay, she shall choose," and calling to a messenger he ordered Gagool to be brought.

In a few minutes she came, hurried alon by two guards, whom she was cursing as she walKed. "Leave her," said the king to the guards.

As soon as their support was withdrawn the withered old bundle, for she looked more like a bundle than anything else, sunk into a heap on the floor, out of which her two bright wicked eyes gleamed like a snake's. "What will ye with me, Ignosi^" she piped. "Ye dare not touch me. If ye touch me I will blast yeas ye sit. Beware of my magic." "Thy magic could not save Twala, old she-wolf, and it cannot hurt me," was the answer. "Listen Twill this of thee, that thou reveal where is the chamber where are the shining stones." "Ha! ha!" she piped, "none know but I, and I will never tell thee. The white devils shall go hence empty-handed." "Thou wilt tell me. I will make thee tell me." "How, 0 king? Thou art great, but can thy power wiing the truth from a woman?' "It is difficult, yet will I do it." "How, 0 king?" "Nay, thus if thou tellest not thou shaft die." "Die!" she shrieked, in terror and fury "ye dare not touch me—man, ye know not who 1 am. How old think ye am I? I knew your fathers, and your fathers' fathers' fathers. When the country was young I was here, when the country grows eld I shall still be here. I can not die unless I be killed by chance, for none dare slay me." "Yet will I slay thee. See, Gagool, mother of evil, thou art so old thou canst no longer love life. What can life be to such a hag as thee, who hast no shape, nor form, nor hair nor teeth— hast naught, save wickedness and evil eyes. It will be mercy to slay thee, Gagool." "Thou fool," shrieked the old fiend, "thou accursed fool, thinkest thou that life is sweet only to the young? It is not so, and naught thou knowest of the heart of man to think of it. To the young, indeed, death is sometimes welcome, for fhe young can feel. They love and suffer, and it wrings them to see their beloved pass to the land of shadow. But the old feel not, they love not, and, ha! ha! they iaugh to see another go out into the dark ha, ha! they laugh to see the evil that is done under the sun. All they love is life, the warm, warm sun, and the sweet, sweet air. They are afraid of the cold, afraid of the cold and the dark, ha! ha! ha!" and the old hag writhed ghastly merriment on the ground. "Cease thine evil talk and answer me." said Ignosi, angrily. "Wilt thou show the place where the stones are, or wilt thou not? If thou wilt not thou diest, even now," and he seized a speur and held it over her. "I will not show it thou darest not kill me, darest not. He who slays me will be accursed forever.'*

Slowly Ignosi brought the spear till it pricked the prostrate heap of rags.

With a wild yell she sprung to her fe^t, and then again fell and rolled upon the floor. "Nay, I will show it. Only let me live, let me sit in the sun and have a bit of meat to suck, and I will show thee." "It is well. I thought I should find a way to reason with thee. To-morrow shalt thou go with Infadoos and my white brothers to the place, and beware how thou failest, for if thou ahowest it not then shalt thou die. I have spoken." "I will not fail, Ignosi. 1 always keep my word ha! ha! ha! Once a woman showed the place to a white man before, and behold evil befell him," and here her wicked eyes glinted. "Her name was Gagool, too. Perchance I was that women." "Thou liest, that was ten generations gone." "Mayhap, mayhap, when one lives long one forgets. Perhaps it was my mother's mother told me, surely her name was Gagool ale®. But mark, ye will find in the place where the bright playthings are, a bag of hide full of F.tones. The man filled that bag, but he never took it away. Evil befell him, I say, evil befell him. Perhaps it was my mother's mother who told me. It will be a merry journey—we can see the bodies of those who died in the battle as we go. Their eyes will be gone by now, and their ribs'will be hollow. Ha! ha! ha!",,

CHAPTER XVI.

1

E A E O E A

It was already dark on the third day after the scene described in the previous chapter, when we camped in some huts at the foot ef the "Three Witches," as the triangle of mountains were called, to which Solomon's great road ran.

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Our party consisted of our three selves and Foulata, who waited on us— especially on Good—Infadoos, Gagool, who was borne along in a litter, inside which she could be heard muttering and cursing all day long, and a party of guards and Attendants. The mountains, or rather the three peaks of the mountains, for the whole mass evidently consisted of a solitary upheaval, were, as I have said, in the form of a triangle, of which the base was toward us, one peak being on our right, one on our left, and one straight in front of us. Never shall I forget the sight afforded by those three towering peaks in the early sunlight of the following morning. High, high above us, up into the blue air, soared their twisted smow wreaths. Beneath the snow the peaks were purple with heaths, and so were the wild moors that ran up the slopes toward them. Straight before us the white ribbon ol Solomon's threat road stretched away uphill to the foot of the center peak, about five miles from us and there stopped. It was its terminus.

I had better leave the feelings of intense excitement with which we set out on our march that morning to the imagination of those who read this history. At last we were drawing near to the wonderful mines that had been the cause of the miserable death of the old Portuguese Don, three centuries ago, of my poor friend, his ill starred descendant, and also, as we feared, of George Curtis, Sir Henry's brother. Were we destined, after all that we had gone through, to fare any better? Evil befell them, as that old fiend Gagool said, would it also befall us? Somehow, as we were marching up that last stretch of beautiful road, I could nor help feeling a little superstitious about the matter, and so I think did Good and Sir Henry,

For an hour and a half or more we tramped on up the heather-fringed road, going so fast in our excitement that the bearers with Gagool's hammock could scarcely keep pace with us, and its occupant piped out to us to stop. "Go more slowly, white men," she said, projecting her hideous shriveled countenance between the curtains, and fixing her gleaming eyes upon us, "why will ye run to meet the evil that shall befall ye, ye seekers after treasure?" and she laughed that horrible laugh which always sent a cold shiver down my back and which for awhile quite toot the enthusiasm out of us.

However, on w° went, till we saw before us, and between ourselves and the peak, a vast circular hole with sloping sides, three hundred feet or more in depth, and quite half a mile round. "Can't you guess what this is?" I said to Sir Henry and Good, who were staring in astonishment down into the awful pit before us.

They shook their heads. "Then it is clear that you have never seen the diamond mines at Kimberlev. You may depend on it that this is Solomon's Diamond Mine look there," I said, pointing to the stiff blue clay which was yet to be seen among the grass and bushes which clothed the sides of the pit, "the formation is the same. I'll be bound that if we went down there we should find 'pipes' of soapy brecciated rock Look, too," and I pointed to a series of worn flat slabs of rock which were placed on a gentle siope below the level of a water eeurse which had in some past age been cut out of the solid rock "if those are not tables once used to wash the 'stuff,' I'm a Dutchman."

At the edge of this vast hole, which was the pit marked on the old Don's map, the great road branched into two and circumvented it. In many places this circumventing road was built entirely of vast blocks of stone, apparently with the object of supporting the edges of the pit and preventing falls of reef. Along this road we pressed, driven by curiosity to see what the three towering objects were which we could discern from the hither side of the great hole. As we got nearer we perceived that they were colossi of some sort or another, and rightly conjectured that these were the three "Silent Ones" that were held in such awe by the Kukuana people. But it was not until we got quite close that we recognized the full majesty of these "Silent Ones."

There, upon huge pedestals of dark rock, sculptured in unknown characters, twenty paces between each, and looking down the road which crossed some sixty miles of plain to Loo, were three colossal seated forms—two males and one female —each measuring about twenty feet from the crown ot the head to the pedestal.

The female form, which was nude, was of great though severe beauty, but unfortunately the features were injured by centuries of exposure to the weather. Rising from each side of her head were the points of a crescent. The two male colossi were, on the contrary, draped, and presented a terrifying cast of features, especially the one to our right, which had the face of a devil. That to our left wa& serene in countenance, but the calm upon it was dreadful. It was the calm of inhuman cruelty—the cruelty, Sir Henry remarked, that the ancients attributed to beings potent for good, who could yet watch the sufferings of humanity, if not with rejoicing, at least without suffering themselves. The three formed a most awe-inspiring trinity, as they sat there in their solitude and gazed out across the plain forever. Contemplating these "Silent Ones," as the Kukuanas called them, an intense curiosity again seized us to know whose were the hands that had shaped them, who was it .that had dug the pit and made the road. Whilst I was gazing and wondering it suddenly occurred to me (being familiar with the Old Testament) that Solomon went astray after strange gods, the name of whom I remembered —"Astoreth the goddess of the Zidonians, Chemosh the god of the Moabites, and Milcom the god of the children of Ammod"—and I suggested to my companion that the three figures before us might represent these false divinities. "Hum," said Sir Henry, who was a scholar, having taken a high degree in classics at college, "there may be something in that Ashtoreth of the Hebrews was the Astarte of the Phoenicians, who were the great traders of Solomon's time. Astarte, who afterward was the Aphrodite of the Greeks, was represented with horns like half-moon, and there on the brow of the female figure are distinct horns. Perhaps these colossi were designed by the Phoenician official Who managed tne mines. Who can say?"

Before we had finished examing these extraordinary relics of remote antiquity, Infadoos came up, and, having Minted the "Silent Ones by lifting his spear, asked us-if we intended entering U»e

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'"'Place of Death" at once, or if we would wait till after we had taken food at midday. If we were ready to go at once, Gagool had announced her willingness to guide us. As it was not more than eleven o'clock, we—driven to it by a burning curiosity—announced our intention of proceeding at o:ace, and I suggested that, in case we should be detained in the cave, we should take some food with us. Accordingly Gagool's litter was brought up, and that lady herself assisted out of it and meanwhile Foulata, at my request, stored some 'biltong," or dried game flesh, together with a couple of gourde of water, in a reed basket. Straight in front of us, at a distance of some fifty pajes from the backs of the colossi, rose a sheer wall of rock, eighty feet or more in height, that gradually sloped up till it formed the base of the lofty, snow-wreathed peak, which soared up into the air three thousand feet above us. As SOOH as she was clear of her hammock, Gagool cast one evil grin upon us, and then, leaning on a stick, hobbled off toward the sheer face of the rock. We followed her till we came to a narrow portal solidly arched, that looked like the opening of a gallery of a mine.

Here Gagool was waiting for

U3,

still

with that evil grin upon her horrid face. 'Now, white men from the stars," she piped "great warriors, Incubu, Bougwan, and Macumazahn the wise, are ye reaov? Behold, I am here to do the bid iing of my lord the king, and to show ye the store of bright stones." "We are ready," I said. "Good! good! Make strong your hearts to bear what ye shall see. Comes thou too Infadoos, who betrayed thy master?"

Infadoos frowned as he answered— "Nay, I'come not it is not for me to enter there. But thou, Gagool, curb thy tongue, and beware how thou dealest with my lords. At thy hands will I require them, and if a hair of them be hurt, Gagool, be thou fifty times a witch, thou shalt die. Hearest thou?" "I hear, Infadoos I know thee, thou didst ever love big words when thou wast a babe I remember thou didst threaten thine own mother. That was but the other day. But fear not, fear not, I live but to do the bidding of the king. I have done the bidding of many king3, Infadoos, till in the end they did mine. Ha! ha! I go to look upon their faces once more, and Twala's too! Come on, come on, here is the lamp," and she drew a great gourd full of oil, and fitted with a rush wick, from under her fur

"Art thou coming, Foulata?" asked Good in his villainons kitchen Kukuana, in which he had been improving himself under that young lady's tuition. "I fear, my lord," the girl answered, timidly. "Then give me the basket." "Nay,my lord,whither thou goest,there will I go also." "The deuce you will!" thought I to myself "that will be rather awkward if we ever get out of this."

Without further ado Gagool plunged into the passage, which was wide enough to admit of two walking abreast, and quite dark, we following her voice as sne piped to us to come on, in some fear and trembling, which was not allayed by the sound of a sudden rush of wings. "Hullo! what's that?" halloed Good somebody hit me in the face." "Bats," said I on you go."

When we had, so far as we could judge, gone some fifty paces, we perceived that the passage was growing faintly light. Another minute, and we stood in the most wonderful place that the ey«3 of living man ever lit on.

Let the reader picture to himself the hall of the vastest cathedral he ever stood in, windowless indeed, but dimly lighted from above (presuma bly by shafts connected with the outer air and driven in the roof, which arched away a hundred feet above our head), and he will get some idea of the size of the enormous cave in which we stood, with the difference that this cathedral designed of nature was loftier and wider than any built by man. But its stupendous size was the least of the wonders of the place, for running in rows down its length were gigantic pillars of what looked like ice, but were, in reality, huge stalactites. It is impossible for me to convey any idea of the overpowering beauty and grandeur of these pillars of white spar, some of which were not less than twenty feet in diamenter at the base, and sprung up in lofty and yet delicate beauty sheer to the distant roof. Others again were in process of formation. On the rock floor there was in these cases what looked, Sir Henry said, exactly like a broken column in an old Grecian temple, whilst high above depending from the roof, the point of a huge icicle could be dimly seen. And even as we gazed we could hear the process going on, for presently with a tiny splash a droy of water would fall from the far-off icicle on the column below. On some columns the drops only fell once in two or three minutes, and in these cases it would form an interesting calculation to discover how long, at that rate of dripping, it would take to form a piller, say eight feet high by ten in diameter. That" the process was, in at least one instance, incalculably slow, the following instance will suffice to show. Cut on one of these pillars we discovered a rude likeness of a mummy, by the head of which sat what appeared to be one of the Egyptian gods, doubtless the handiwork of some oldworld laborer in the mine. This wcrk of art was executed at alpout the natural height at which an idle fellow, be he Phcenican workman or British cad, is in the habit of tryiug to immortalize himself at the expense of nature's masterpieces, namely, about five feet from the ground yet at the time we saw it, which must have been nearly three thousand years after the date of the execution of the drawing, the column was only eight feet high, and was still in process of formation, which gives a rate of growth of a foot to a thousand years, or an inch and a fraction to a century. This we knew because, as we were standing by it, we heard a drop of water fall. (Continued Next Week.)

A Question of Degree

Judge.

Physician: I think from your symptoms, madam, that your liver muBt be quite torpid.

Mrs. Ilaceide: Land sakes alive, doctor! I guees you mean frigid instead o' torrid, for I'm jist about froze the hull endurin' time. Temper seduces tho wisest of mortals to speak like the^foolish, Patience enables the fool often toVeem like tlie wise. —James 1. Neamith,

MISCELLANEOUS NOTES.

Mrs. and Mrs. Gladstone are preparing for the celebration of their golden wedding.

The women in England exceed the men by 3,000,000, and yet the Englishmen come to America for their wives.

The so-called antique oak is ordinary American oak sawed in a peculiar way and stained to look like the old English oak.

India rubber is being tried as a substitute for asphalt in pavements in Berlin and the result is said to be good, but expensive.

The usual thickness of veneers for furniture is from one-eight to one-for-tieth of an inch, but as a curiosity they are cut as thin as 160 to an inch.

Joseph Jefferson has written his autobiography. It will be published in the Century, beginning a few months hence Portraits of other distinguished actors will illustrate the publication.

In reply to the question, "Shall we Smoke?" Dr. Oliver Windell Holmes says in a recent magazine, "Certainly not. Smoking is liable to injure the sight, to render the nerves unsteady, to enfeeble the will, and enslave the nature to an imperious habit likely to stand in the way of a duty to be performed."

The Seattle Manufacturing Company is preparing at its mill near Seattle, Washington Territory, for the Paris Exposition, a pine board one inch thick, forty inches wide, and thirty-two feet long, and entirely free of sap, gnarl, or flaw of any kind. The Paine Lumber Company of Oshkosh, Wis., wiil send to Paris a similar board thirty-six inches wide.

Charles Sedelmayer, the picture dealer who sold John Wanamaker "Christ Before Pilate," cabled from Paris to him at Washington when he was appointed Postmaster-General, congratulating him upon his elevation. The message was returned from the Washington telegraph office endorsed, "The person to whom addressed unknown here try Philadelphia.

In Leslie, Fifeshire, the people have an annual masquerade in honor of tne birthday of Burns. This yeai twentyfour ploughmen, farmers, and merchants paraded the streets in the costumes representing as many characters from Burns' works. The Old Nick, Burns himself, Tam O'Shanter, Bopnie Jean and Souter Johnnie were among the characters represented.

Women in the West End of London go about armed with small squirt guns filled with dirty water, with which they slyly soil the coats or dresses of persons whom they pass. Then they meet the persons, and, with elaborate bows, beg pardon for calling attention to the fact that the coat or drees is splashed, and offer to wipe it off with a clean white apron. Nine times out of ten the trick brings a generous tip.

Tony Pilcher, of Melrose, Fla., became impressed with the belief that the only true baptism was immeision, and that everybody and everything should be baptized. He took all Ms chickens and pigs to a lake and baptized them, and almost every day he would baptize himself. When Sheriff Shelley went to arrest him Tony tried to baptize him, but the Sheriff was too much for him, and got the irons on him.

IN its determination to crush out train robberies, the Arizona Legislature has made it a capital offense to "make any assault upon a railroad train, car or locomotive," or to compel railroad employes to stop a train for an unlawful purpose. There has never been a big railroad strike'in Arizona, but if there should happen to be one, he will be a bold man who"attempts to'interfere with the running ot trains while the terribly severe enactment remains on the statute book.

The Army and Navy Journal prints a letter from a naval officer, who suggests that the ancients, who knew the value of oiling troubled waters, learned this method from observing the sea birds. All fish-eating birds, cape pigeons, petrels, and the like, eject oil from the mouth when captured. In the South Atlantic, and South Pacific the writer had witnessed sea birds floating in spaces of comparatively quiet water when the sea around was rough. The usual smoothness of the water was evidently due to considerable quantities of oil deposited by the birds. ,•

Josh Billings' Philosophy. New York Weekly, A wize man never enjoys himself so mutch, nor a phool so little, az when alone.

Avarice iz az hungry az the grave. Thare iz a grate deal ov virtew in this world thatiz like jewelry—more for ornament than use.

I am satisfied that courage in more often the effeckt on konstitushun than ov principle.

men iz

About the best thing that experience kan teach us iz tew bear niisfortins and sorrow with kompozure.

Man's necessitys are phew, but hiz wants are endless. Thare are menny people "who not only beleave that this world revolves on its axis, but they believe that they are the I axio.

I think thare iz az menny old phools in the world az thare iz yung onee and thare iz this difference between them the yung ones jtnav outgrow their pholly but the old on^s never do.

The ambishun of 9 men out of 10, if it should receiveJnt check, would end in their distruksqun. f-

SATED BY A DREAM.

The Experience of a Traveler in Eastern Tennessee.

A few years ago a man named Bronson, who was an agent for a big seed house, was traveling through Tennessee making collections for his houss. He had

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visit many towns off the railroads,

and in such cases he secured a horse and buggy or rode horseback. One night, after he had finished his business in Chattanooga he made ready for a horseback trip of fifteen or twenty miles the next ^ay. Upon returning to his room for the night he sat down to smoke a cigar. He was neither overtired nor sleepy, but after smoking a few minutes he had what he termed a vision. He was riding over the eountry on horseback, when at a junction of the roads he was joined by a stranger. He saw this man as plainly as one can see another iu broad daylight, noting the color of hair and eyes, and

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shoulder. The two rode along together for a mile or more,and then came to as pot wtf ere a tree had blown down and fallen Across the narrow highway. They turned into the woods to pass the spot, he in advance, when he saw the sti anger pull a pistol and fire at his back. He felt the bullet tear into him, reeled and fell from his horse, and was conscious wl»en the assassin robbed him and drew fcis body futher in the woods. He seemv to see all this, and yet at the same timi knew that he was dead. His corpse wa." rolled into a hollow and covered wit.li' brush, and then the murderer went away and left him alone. In making an effort to throw off the brush, the dead man came to life that is the agent threw off the spell and awoke himself. His cigar had gone out, and as near as he could calculate he had been unconscious, as you might call it, for about fifteen min. utes. He was deeplj agitated and it as sotne time before he could convince himself that he had not suffered any injury. By and by he went to bed and slept soundly, and the next morning the rememberance of what had happened in his vision had almost faded from his mind.

Luckily for Bronson, he made some inquiries at the livery-stable as he went for his horse, and tie was told that it was a lonely road, and that it wouldnot be pnident to go unarmed. But for this he would have left his revolver in his trunk at the hotel. He set out on his journey in good spirits, and found the road so romantic, and met horsemen going to town so often,that^he reached the junction of the roads without having given a serious thought to his vision. Then every circumstance was recalled in the most vivid manner. He was joined thereby a stranger on a gray horse, and man and beast tallied exactly with those in the vission. The man did not, however, have the look or bearing of an evil-mind-ed person. On the contrary, he seemed to be in a jolly mood, and he saluted Bronson as frankly as an honest stranger would have done. He had no weapons in sight, and he soon explained that he was going to the village to which Bronson was bound on business connected with the law.

The agent could not help but feel astonished and startled at the curious coincidence, but the stranger was so talkative and friendly that there was no possible exeuse to suspect him. Indeed, as if to prove to his companion that he meditated no evil, he kept a little in advance for the next half hour. Bronson's distrust had entirely vanished, when a turn in the road brought an obstruction to view. There was a fallen tree across the highway! This was proof that every point and circumstance in the vision was being unrolled before his eyes and gave the agent a great shock. He was behind the stranger, and he pulled his revolver and dropped his hand beside the horse to conceal it. "Weil,well!" said the man,as he pulled up his horse. "The tree must have toppled over this morning. We'll have to pass around it to the right."

Bronson was on the right. The woods were clear of underbrush, and naturally enough he should have been the first to leavo the road. But he waited. "Go ahead," said the stranger, and and as if these words had been addressed to the horse the animal which the agent bestrode started up.

Bronsen was scarcely out of the road before he turned in his saddle. The tranger had a pistol in his right-hand. What followed could not clearly related. Bronson slid from his saddle as a bullet whizzed past him.and a second latter returned the fire. Three or four shots were rapidiv exchanged, and then the would-be murderer uttering a yell to show that he had been hit, wheeled his horse to gallop off. He had not gone ten rods when the beast fell under him, and hekioked his feet from the stirrups and sprang into the woods, and was out of sight in a moment. The horse had received a bullet in the throat, and was dead in a few minutes.

As a matter of course Bronson put the case in the hands of the proper officials, but the horse could neither be indentilied nor the man overhauled. It was agreed that he was an entire stranger in that locality, and that, while he dit^ not know Bronson nor the business he waB engaged in, he was ready to commit a cold-blooded murder, and take hi* chances of finding a fat wallet to repay him. 1

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particular notice

of the fact, that the horse was gray in color, and had a "y" branded on its

left

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