Rensselaer Union, Volume 10, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 July 1878 — Another Enoch Arden. [ARTICLE]

Another Enoch Arden.

Truth is always stranger than fiction, but we ean only be made to believe it by startling oasoo like this. Tennyson naa immortalized “Enoch Arden,” but this story of William G. Raines, while it has all the pathetio features of the poem, surpasses it in thrilling incidents and advontures. Ten years ago Mr. Raines was a resident of our neighboring Village of Hendrysburg, where he followed tho occupation of a carpenter. He was married and had one child; but, thinking that he could better his fortunes, ho loft his family and sought employment in the East, expecting to return in a few months. During nis absence he was engaged by his uncle to make a nine-months” cruise to Calcutta in a merchant vessel, via Good Hope. He wrote an affectionate letter to his wife, inclosing S2OO, informing her of his intended voyage and expressing \ho hope that upon his return they would be able to live happily together. The vessel sailed, and while in mid-ocean another letter was sent to ltjs wife., After that, silence and oblivion. No word came from the lost man, and it was boliqveil that the vessel had gone down with all on board. After waiting threeycars, and hoping against hope, Mrs. Raines at last concluded that her husband had found a watery grave, and, yielding to the solicitations of a new lover, she abandoned her widow’s weeds and once more became a wife, marrying a Mr. Kyle, who is now a contractor on the National Road near St. Clairsville. The third act opens with the unexpected return of Mr. Raines. The vessel was really wrecked on the west coast of Africa, north of Cape Town. Mr. Raines and his uncle, with four other men, succeeded in reaching shore in a boat, but were soon after captured by the natives. The prisoners were marched 600 miles into the interior. Each tribe took one of the men and kept him as a curiosity. Raines was divested of his clothing while on exhibition, and visitors came hundreds of miles to-see the wonderful white man. He was the special protege of the King, and was regarded with affection by tne whole tribe. But the prisoner pined for freedom, and hoped that far beyond the burning sands and the rolling billows, he might find again his wife and child. Inspired by these thoughts, about a year ago he made a desperate attempt for liberty, and escaping from the tribe, he managed, after many hardships, to’reach Cape Town, wifere he engaged as a sailor, and three weeks ago landed at San Francisco, and immediately started for Ohio. He arrived at Caldwell, and learnod for the first time that his wife had married three years after his supposed death. Unlike Enoch, he did not decide Never to tell her, never let her know, but, with the honor of a true man, which even a life of six years among cannibals could not destroy, he proposes to let her decide which of the men she will live with in the future. Legally Mrs. Kyle is the wife of Mr. Raines; but, of course, she was justified in her second marriage, and Mr. Raines sensibly concludes that no man has a right to rise from the dead, as it were, and disturb relationships that were contracted in good faith. He will lot the woman choose between them, and abide by her decision. —Bamesville (Ohio) Enterprise.