Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 April 1875 — A Strange Reunion. [ARTICLE]

A Strange Reunion.

At a late hour a few nights ago a gentleman well known in the business and w social circles of this city, who occupies a* handsome residence on one of the fashionable thoroughfares, was awakened from a sound slumber by an unusual noise in his sleeping apartment, and,-after listening intently for a moment, became conscious of the fact that some person was stealthily moving about in the room. The gas was turned off and the inside blinds of the window were closed, so that all was total darkness, but the next instant the intruder stumbled over a chair near the bed, the movement revealing his precise location. Most men, rudely awakened by the unceremonious entrance of a burglar, would have uttered an exclamation of alarm, or a cry for assistance, but the master of the house w r as a man of unusual self-posses-sion and determination; without uttering a word he sprang from his couch and grappled with his unknown antagonist. The struggle which ensued in the dark was brief but decisive. The burglar fought on the defensive rather than the offensive, and made the most desperate attempts to loosen the hand which grasped his throat like an iron vise, but his antagonist, although on the shady side of fifty, was a man of great muscular power, and the fellow’s efforts to escape were fruitless. Kneeling on the prostrate form of the panting burglar, the victor in the struggle called to his wife to light the gas, a command which the lady, who was awakened by the scuffle and who was nearly beside herself with fear, was not slow to execute. The instant that the gas-jet flooded the room with light, the gentleman released his hold upon the throat of his adversary, a pale, haggard and ill-clad young man, and the latter started to his feet. For a moment the two men confronted each other, and then, with a wild cry in which horror, shame and remorse were all expressed, the younger sank at the feet ot the elder. “Father!” “Charlie!” The recognition was mutual; the exclamations rang out simultaneously. It was indeed the reunion of a sorrow ing father and a prodigal son. Eight years ago the former was a resident of Wilkesbarra, Pa., and the latter, his only child, was -a bright youth of twenty, who unfortunately fell in with fast associates, and became proficient in all manner of youthful dissipation. Finding parental restraint irksome, the boy ran away from home and shipped upon a vessel bound for Liverpool. After several months spent in Lond m where he lived by his wits, he shipped as a cook on a vessel bound for Africa, but was prostrated by a severe fever and sent back to England. Upon his recovery he! w: > sent to South America, where he secured a position in the employ of an extensive stock-raiser, remaining there for four years, and at the end of that time having^saved several hundred dollars in gold. Soon the old rovingdisposition came over him, and he drifted oft' to Cuba and Mexico, and finally arrived in New Orleans last fall, where he associated with fast characters and soon lost what money he had, through tlie agencies of the winebottle and gaming table. During the winter he worked his way North, and about two weeks ago he arrived in this city from Cincinnati, with only three dollars in his pocket.

During all the long years of his absence the prodigal had never written home and had never heard from his parents. He was ignorant of the fact that they had removed to Detroit, and he determined to earn money enough if possible to take him back to Wilkesbarre, where he intended to endeavor to live a respectable life. Owing to the hard times he could obtain no work, and was finally forced to seek lodgings at the Woodbridge Street Station. After sleeping there several nights he was warned that upon his next visit he would be sent to the House of Correction as a vagrant. That night he wandered about the city hungry, penniless and desperate, and it was while in this forlorn, desperate condition that he yielded to the sudden temptation to commit crime in order to relieve his necessities. By some strange and yet fortunate fatality he entered the house of his own father, and what followed has already been described. Such was the story which the unhappy young man related to his grief-stricken parents in the room which he had entered for the purpose of committing a robbery. He protested that, no matter what excesses and sins he might have committed he had never before descended lo the perpetration of a dishonest act, and his remorse and repentance were so unmistakably sincere that he readily received the forgiveness for which he v pleaded. Fortunately the circumstances sos his unexpected return were unknown to other parties, the two female domestics being absent at a ball, from which they were not to return until two or three o’clock, and to divert suspicion the young man was provided with money and instructed to go to a hotel for the balance of the night. The next morning he purchased suitable apparel and returned to the house, where a little justifiable deception was used, and he was welcomed as if he had not been a previous visitor. The young man is apparently sincere in his determination to reform, and is occupying a desk in his father’s establishment, where he already demonstrates the possession of admirable business qualifications, and bids fair to become a useful member of society. This story may savor somewhat, of the improbable, but. it was related to the writer by a gentleman of unimpeachable veracity, who enjoys intimate and confidential relations with the parties, and who vouches for the entire truthfulness, while at the same time he withholds the names and other facts which might afford a clue to the identity of the dramatis persona in the little drama which so narrowly escaped being a tragedy. —Detroit Post. —ln the last twenty years the product of butter and cheese in the United States has been more than doubled. Last year it amounted to 650,000,000 pounds of butter and 200,000,000 pounds of cheese, of which more than one-fourth of the butter and nearly one-half of the cheese were made by the State of New York. The cheese factories number about 2,000, employ about $5,000,000 capital, and use the milk of three-fourths of a million cows. The American Grocer states that the production this year is likely to greatly exceed that of last year, but "does not believe that the! production will even exceed the demand. A —Among the voters at Bristol, R. 1., the other uay was a man named John Bullock, aged 104' years. He voted for Washington at his second election, and at every succeeding Presidential election but one. V