OCR Text |
Show 402 men Ann. nunms. get into a difficulty like this of mine, I nm still su01cicntly yonr friend to hope that yon may fmd as good a flont. You can say to the owner of this cotton - a man named. Baxter, who, I suppose, is one of yom party this morning-that he will flnd it some five miles below; I shall not want it much farther. Should he lose it, howc,·cr, it's as 1ittlc ns a good })tttriot-ns it is said he is-should be ready n.t any time to lose for his country. FareweU-tlwugh it be for a season only. We shnll meet some day in Arkansas, where I shall build a clwrch in the absence of better business, and perhaps make you a convert. Farewell." Colonel Grafton came up in time to hear the last of this dis-course; and to wonder and laugh at the complacent impm1cncc and ready thoughts of tl1c outlaw. ·Foster pu\le(l his hat, with a llolite gesture, when l1e had finished speaking, and t urued his eyes from us in the direction wl1ich his strange craft was ta~ king. "Shall I give him a shot, colonc11" dcmnndcd one of the foresters, who lmd come up with Grafton, lifting his rifle as he spoke. "No, no!'' was the reply-"let him go. ITo is a clever scoundrel and may one day become an honest man. ,y e have done enough of this sort of business this morning, to keep the whole neighborhood honest for some years. Let us now return, my friends, nnd bmy those miserable creatures out of sight.. Hurd is!" lie took me suddenly as ide from the rest, and said : u llurdis, there is a girl back here, who says th at you have killed your own brother. She nffirms it positively." "She speaks falsely, Colonel Grafton," was my 1·eply; "I am not guilty of a brother's blood; and yet I may say to you that she has spoken a portion of the truth. A brother of mi11c has been killed among tho outlaws. Guilty or not guilty of their offences, he pa.ys the penalty of bad company. If you please we will speak of him no more." I had been married to Uary Easterby about tlwee years, when one day who should pay us a visit but Colonel Grafton and the lovely Julia, the latter far more lovely than ever. ller CO~CLUSION. 403 so rrows had sublimed her 1 t to nll her thouo-hts and .)enu Y; ,am1 seemed to give elevation heart, and its orav <"' a~twns. 1 h~ worm was gnawing at her l I I aoes "ere cxtcnclmg to her frame. but her c lCt! <-, t lOugh pH~e, was exquisitely transparent and, her c e tho~lgh alwaj:s. sad •. was sometimes enlivenetl wi~h tile firesyof a_n llllense spmtuai.ty which seemed to indicate the a noxima~ tJon of !.lOr thougll_ts to tile spheres and ofliccs of a lomer homo than outs. She. h vcd but a year after this visit, and died in a sw~et sleep, .'~l~~~h \ a~ted for.sevcral hours, without being disturbed by p.un, .wU from wluch she only awakened in anotller world. :May we hope that the loves WCI'e happy there which had. been so unblessed on cm·tl1. THE END. |