Rensselaer Republican, Volume 12, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 January 1880 — CHARLIE DUNCAN’S LESSON. [ARTICLE]

CHARLIE DUNCAN’S LESSON.

The room looked, cozy in the twilight, though the furniture was shabby, old and ’plain. An open wood-fire, burning brightly on brass andirons, {tolished till you could see your face in them-, was not the suggestion of fashion or high art, but a necessity, resulting from a stormy night in October, and further from the fact that wood was cheap in that locality. Brass andirons were an every-day affair, and had been for fifty years, never having been displaced by modern heating monstrosities, or consigned to the ! garret as a relic of barbarism, and brought from thence as -an evidence of culture. The old lounge, even though it was just the place to dream in, and the chintz-cushioned chair in the corner, with the whitehaired gr.tnddame in it, hinted in some mysterious ,way of a welcome for all wfco entered. Busy fingers had been at work, for spotless hearthstones are not the result of chance, nor do tea-tables, covered with snowy drapery, and glittering with glass and china, drop From the clouds. The supply was limited, it is true, but the old blue china, an inheritance from the forehanded ancestors, would have been a God-send to a connoisseur, with even a crack or two to advertise its antiquity. But our grandmothers, as a ride, washed their own tea things, and cracks and niches were not in vogue. The storm beat against the window pane, and the wind came whistling down the chimney in an aggressive fashion that caused the hickory logs to Elink with amazement, and the well-bred Tabby to elevate her back in dignified protest. At the kitchen door, with shawl drawn over the bright curls, and blue eyes peering into darkness, stood Maggie, the household fairy, eagerly listening. •‘Why don’t Charlie come?” she sighed, to herself, and turning, went into the fire-lighted room that answered so many purposes in that small house.hold. She knelt by the cheery blaze, shivering more from the chill within than the cold without. Grandma’s eyes unclosed, and. the placid face bent over the girl, almost a child in years, a woman in capacity for suffering. “ What is it, Maggie?” and the withered hands gently smoothed the curls that the wind had been takino’ such liberties with. **O! Grandma! Charlie hasn't come yet and it’s almost nine o’clock. He uromised so faithfully to be at home at five. and now—l'm afraid, I'm afraid—.” and the words died ap ay in a shivering moan. - . & “Afraid of what, Maggie?” She crouched still lower, till the little head lay in grandma's lap, and whispered, “ That he's not himself." VI hat does that sentence, coined out of love’s vocabulary, mean to many a heart?” Indefinite in expression, sharply defined as the lightning’s track in the misery that it brings, it is the watchword of despair to wrecked lives and blighted homes. Grandma knew now; there .was no need of words. But grandma also knew what Maggie had. not yet learned—that through the conflict cometh victory. “Poor child!” she softlv said, and bending, kissed her. for one of the charms that made her almost sacred in Maggie’s eyes was the knowing when to be silent. The .old-fashioned clock ticked on; the winds howled yet more fiercely and Charlie still delayed his coming. Mrs. Duncan drank the cup of tea that Maggie gently forced upon her, and ate a morsel of the dainty toast that the little , housewife was so skilled in making. The table, with the cloth upon it, was pushed aside, and Sve the room that “.waiting look” knew too well. Ten—eleven—and still they moved not, listening, as if beating hearts and bated breath would hasten the footsteps of the wanderer.

At last he came—Charlie—but not himself— as Maggie phrased it. Strange eyes looked into hers, and those dull. _ thick tones were surely not the ones that said “good-by’’ so gaily in the morning, and warned her not to grow old and gray with, fretting. No need to bring the table near the fire; he coaid not eat, but throwing himself upon the chintz-cushioned lounge, lav in dreamless slumber, while Maggie wept the night away. Her only brother, her handsome Charlie! When both father and mother died and left them, alone in the world, with only grandma to look to, the memory of that dying mother's words, “While you live, Maggie, care for Charlie,’’ night, and day in the years that had come and gone, had been the motive power for action in the young girl’s heart. To live for and with him embodied all of joy that earth could give. And Charlie, kind-hearted, handsome Charlie loved her in return, but not as sisters love. Not alone to Maggie was he the hero of the hour, for that strange fascination which often proves the bane of its possessor, winning the hearts of old and young alike, was his

by inheritance, and the mother’s death prayer was, that the curse that came with it to her husband, might not descend upon her boy. It was the old story of wasted talents, and squandered opportunities. At first, with that charm of manner that he believed all-potent, he turned the edge of reproof and blunted the weapons of his oppoeers. But later, the promise “to try again,” and really meant for the tune, was worn as threadbare as the patience of those to whom it was given, all but Maggie and his grandmother. They never failed him. Good positions were offered him, and he was capable of filling them. Life was made easy, for wPere many a boy must have fought his way single-handed and alone, vnth Charlie it was but to ask, and receive, and the gates of life opened before his dazzled vision, as the gates of Paradise. Thus was the fair beginning of the morning clouded before the sun had risen to the senith, darkened, ere the noontide rest had come. Even Charlie found the scale had turned, nor deemed that his weakened purpose was the broken hinge. Independent or control, and reckless of consequences, at first he laughed to scorn the thought that he could not always find some one to whom his services were invaluable. But invaluable service implies more than entertaining company, and pleasant manners are not often considered an equivalent for neglect of duty. So the day came when Charlie Duncan, shaking the dust from off his feet at bis employer's door, turned his steps homeward with a wearied feeling that life meant something after all, that roses need constant training to insure continuance, that thorns and briars alone thrive on uncared-for soil.

“It’s no use trying, Maggie! The fates are against me. What can a fellow do with such confounded luck. I’ll see Norton in the Dead Sea before Til ask him for the place again. The miserly upstart! ” There was no such balm for the boy’s conscience as abusing other people. The burden of personal responsibility is a heavy load for undisciplined shoulders to carry, and often the impossibility of permanently shifting it is resented as a personal injury'. Maggie was not gifted in logic or versed in rhetoric. The underlying feeling that occasionally would assert itself that Charlie was not wholly blameless in thus suffering defeat was thrust aside as disloyal, and the lad was comforted in his heart, but not to his soul’s content. There was one friend who justified the sacredness of the word, a man, though young in years, blest with energy and uprightness, had already made his mark, a man to be relied upon in emergencies and trusted in direst need. Such a man had Mills Stanton proved himself to be. He seemed to have reached depths in Charlid's nature that no one had ever touched. Fortunately for the wayward boy he had it in his jpower to give him another chance. That was the trouble. It was literally another chance—a hap-hazard purpose of reform that is almost as bad as no purpose at all. For weeks, however, all had gone smoothly. The restraint of regular hours and steady habits began to be irksome, and the slow method of progress was not suited to the nature of the ex-citement-loving boy. Maggie observed with sorrow the restlessness that is so often the precursor of a downfall. She tried to hope, even when hope itself trembled—but in vain. Now the climax had come. What would the end be? There is but one on a downward grade, and she knew it. That dreary night—she planned, but for what, and thought, but without purpose trying in the whirlpool of conscious helplessness to find a foothold for returning faith, but, alas! she could not. When the morning dawned the poor child rose and began the dull routine of life, trammeled by the barrier of a hopeless future that lay across her pathway. The pleasant room was as neat as hands could make, for Charlie had the grace to vanish to his own before the breakfast hour. Duty must be performed if hearts break, and coffee boiled, and eggs fried, when the right time comes, ds if anguish were a thing unknown. A click at the gate —a knock at the doof, and as she opened it, to her surprise, and almost horror, Mills Stanton confronted her. “ Excuse my early coming. Miss Maggie. But I wwted to see Charlie. May Ido so?” Someway, she hardly knew how dr why, she led the way to the darkened room, and opening the door as if in a dream, said “Charlie!” and left them alone together. What passed between them, she never knew. Sounds of low voices reached her, and once she thought she heard a sob from Charlie, but wasn’t sure. She could only wait; still she went the round of daily cares, now and then kneeling by the chintz-cov-ered chair, and resting her head upon the dear old friend, whose arms were ever open to receive her, and who could understand, when misery found no words to tell its story. What Could it mean? She asked herself. Low tones still reached her, with many a pause between. With bowed head 'she listened, prayed and wondered, and thus it was Milts Stanton found her, as he stood by the half-open door. As she sprang to meet him, with parted lips, she tried to speak, but failed. But Mills answered the pleading questioning of that sweet sace 1 , with low words of sympathy. “ Miss Maggie, I believe vour prayers are answered, and Mrs. buncan it was the thought of you and Maggie that he says has saved him.” It was late that afternoon before Charlie came to them, and their eyes beheld a something they had never seen before; a deep humility that intensified his manhood, an unconscious dignity, that is born of soul-conflict, crowned with victory. • Not in himself, or by himself, was'the battle fought that day. A stronger than Mills Stanton had been near, and the hand Almighty stretched forth to save.

Mrs. Duncan, with face illumined, not by faith alone, but her twin sister, hope, drew the weeping Maggieto .her heart that night, and whispered: “ Not unto us, but to thy name be the glory.” One does not scale at once th*3 moun-tain-peaks of aspiration. Step by step is progress made. There is no roval pathway out of bondage. So Charlie found it. In all that year of trial, and sometimes discouragement. Mills Stanton proved himself the trusted friend. The little cottage needed him—that the inmates qould readily understand. But that the bright fireside, the saintly smile of Grandma, the cordial greeting of Charlia, and above all the half shy glances of Maggie’s blue eyes, should become a like necessity to him, was more difficult to believe. That it was so, one day Maggie realized, when he told her of the first love awakened into life that dark October morning, of its growth week by week, and month by month, and drawing her close to his side, asked her the old, old question—- “ whether sweet love, strong as life itself, should meet with no response.” What Maggie said we know not, only that Mills Was satisfied, Charlie triumphant, and Grandma content.— Calva Victor, in Chicago Standard. Boys sustain the same relation to men that the buds do to full-grown flowers. Good men cannot be grown without first having good boys. Sdve the boys from vice and crime, give them a good training, physically, morally ana mentally, ana the prosperity of the Nation is assured. —Lansing Republican.