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ATI ANT A iiA., NOYIMBER 12. ISM.
Terms in Advance: {u”£i7.«&2£«£• NO. 326
Aliuoud lilOKStUIUM,
ET LAURA G. PENUEL.
Tho songs of youth arc sweet as violets,
Or roses blown in showery April days ;
But we, ray love, may sing the sun that sets,
And almond blossoms for our brows may prafse
For youth drew pictures colored as the bow.
We knew not then ’twas born of falling rain.
We work God’s will now, liking better so;
The vanished visions come not back again.
The dreams were blossoms merely, fruitless died,
And deeds are garnered in life’s granary,
Whose seed were sown by others, we abide.
From hope we glean not, but from memory.
Noon, midnight, sun and rain are blessings all,
And needed lor the ripe and perfect wheat:
And life, from pink white spring to sombre fall.
Must pant and shiver, droop to blast and heat.
God sends ua messages by all pure things.
But most at eve He walks among the trees,
We feel His faint, sweet overshadowings.
And hear the “still small voice’’ within the
breeze.
Then, though the shadow fall, when sets the sun,
And all the, landscape darken as at even,
We’ll wait and watch the stars out, one by one,
Till gloomy earth is lost in glittering heaven.
ARCHIE BERM:
—OR THE—
TREASURY CLERK
By Harriet E. S. dressy.
CHAPTER I.
With thee were the dreams of mv earliest love,
Every thought of my reason was thine;
In my last humble prayer to the spirit above
Thy name shall be mingled with mine.
—Moore.
“Our new Treasury Clerk I suppose—do
you think her beautiful ?’
“There is no disputing her beauty, Davis,
though her eyes have the glitter of a str-
Pent>”
o ....Ib-3 .v*
seeing something wrong in everybody. J
can see nothing the matter with her eve:,
only that the long lashes conceal a little too
much of her beauty. I am sure Weston is a.-
proud of her as a peacock is of its plumage.’’
“Well, he need not be; she will never mar
ry him.”
“They are engaged,” asserted D.svis.
“There’s many a slip betwixt the cup and
the lip. She has got here to the capital where
some old Senator or other < ffl.-ial will full in
love with her, or show her some attention,
and then Weston may step one side; for he
is only a clerk, rather ordinary look og and
lacking in style—although he is a good fellow.
Bat she thinks l.ss of real goodness than of
of style, rank and wealth; and, if I am anj
judge of charact-r, I guarantee she thi k-
herself good enough for a duke.”
“She belongs to a family who have recent-,
ly lost their fortune, is very high-bred, and
possibly might make a duchess.”
“You notice,” persisted Newly, “how at
tentive Weston is to her, yet she hardly
deigns to answer or look at him. She is oniy
using him as a stepladder to get up higher—
here at the capitol 1 mean.”
“Well, Newly, we will see how it will turn
out.”
Weston and his betrothed were sitting at a
long, narrow table with a number if others,
all of whom were engaged in playing whist,
while Newly and Davis, a little apart from
them, were engaged in the conversation above
related. The company was composed of
clerks and other employees at the National
Capitol, who had met at the house of a wid
ow lady of good repute, whose daughter
served in the capacity of clerk at the Dead
Letter fileAnd what were Archi B. _ ton's
thoughts as she sat holding the cards with
her long taper fingers, now aud then looking
up to the s range faces before her. * On, how
dreadful that papa should have lost his prop
erty, thus compelling me to earn my ow u
living and associate with these people to
whom W eston belongs. To be sure they are
intelligent, but they are not as my former
associates. But 1 must try to feel contented.
Weston has tried so hard to get me a situa
tion here; yes, I should fetl very grateful to
him, Lot as to loving him—pshaw! Still, be
is very divAid to me.”
For awhile Ar hie was so occupied with
these thoughts that she made absurd mis
takes in playing, and finally asked to be ex
cused, aud then went and sat by herselt at
the window. Weston, however, soon j lined
her, for it seemed he could not bear her a
moment out of his sight.
“You are feeling rather lonely in this
strange company C he said. “Well, just as
soon as there is a break in the game, I will
suggest some music, aud of course you wiil
play aud sing for us!’’
“It is immaterial to me what I do in a com
pauy like this,” she replied, aud gave her
aristocratic nose the slightest turn, and pout
ed a little with her lips, making her look
prettier than ever Weston thought; out he
said with a sorrowful cast on his face:
“I am sorry, Archie, you feel thus. I was
in hopes you would like the people here.”
“Oh, 1 must,” she said, brightening up a
little, “if only for your sake; but you know
it is a great change for me.”
“Yes, I know,” he replied a little sorrow
fully.
When music was proposed, Archie, with
assumed cheerfulness, arose and went to the
piano, where she played and sang to the de
light of all. She had a very sweet voice and
had been given every advantage for a musi
cal education that money could procure. Of
course every one was charmed at her perfor
mance, and she went to her boarding-house
in a little better spirits than she was in the
early part of the evening. She had only
reached the Capital the day previous, but a
letter was already awaiting her from her
mother, which she opened and read before
removing her hat aud shawl.
"11 v Dear Archie,” it read “I was suffer
ing from the most indescribable loneliness
after parting from you Monday, when I was
surprised by the sudden appearance of Mr.
Templeton, wno says he will be ready to
come into our bouse by the middle of next
vitek. You know we thought the family
would not care to come before the first of
July, and here it is now only the first week
Sit:
V-'f?W i IilKl I.I.kMH SN ABITHJtllTH'.
Wil’ie nd Wint i — age’ three,
Th pre List * wins that you tv- r did see,
Stated fec i rppon grati Gather s knee
For a counting lesson—o i —'wo—fhi ee.
in June. Of course we are not ready to move,
but we must g > at the time he proposes, for
we need the money for the rent.
Indeed I was forced to humble myself so
much as to ask him to pay me a part in ad
vance. Wasn’t this dreadful, my dear child?
Aud isn’t it the most depressing thing in th j
world to think of our leaving this grand
home to go into the farm house to live? Oh.
I am so thankful, Archie, that you got away
before we quite arrived to this humiliating
thing. But there is no alternative, aud we
may be thankful that we can have so good a
shelter. Toe farm-house, you know is very
comfortable and if we must do without ser
vants it may be more convenient for us
than this great mansion. Nevertheless, we
will come back here and live the-grst of Nov
ember, for Mr. Templeton will take his fami
ly back to the city by that time. But next
spring the mortgage will be foreclosed, and
where we shall all go I have not the slightest
idea. Perhaps we may all come to Washing
ton to live > M lud and Louise think they
would like it, but Charley says it is a very
expensive place to live, and unless one is
very wealthy or holds some high < ffiee he is
not of much account. I hope, my darling,
you will like it there; at all events, you will
try to feel contented, as you will be* earning
a little something Teii Weston I thank him
heartily for the pains he took to get you the
situation. The next time I write you I sup
pose we shali be settled at the cosy farm
house your pnpi fi;ttd up so neatly for farm
er Barnes aud his fauii ; r, and then we shall
have to sit m the little sitting room and see
the Templetens drive by in their coaches, as
we use to when the Barnes were looking at
us, Maude .and L >uise declare they will not
open aud shut the ga'e for them as the young
Barnes did for us, and I am sore I don’t care
to, and Charley is going to board with L ■ -
yer White til! be gets through with his stu i-
ies; it is so far for uim to walk back and
forth to the city every morning and right.
Sometimes I think it a mercy your father
did not live to see us all bi ought to such
straitened eircum tances. I do not think be
could have borne it as well as the rest of us.
And then he would have beeu so heart-bruk-
-n at the thought of bringing such misery
upon his family, for he was the cause of it,
.nd now and then I am a little inclirn d to
blame him for trusting our all in such vague
speculations. For some reason, I find it eai -
ier to write about these things than I did to
talk of them when you were here; still I
know it is foolish in me to do it just at this
time when your mind is probably taken up
with your own present annoyances, so I will
not write another word but to wish you all
the success and happiness that it were possi-
sible for mortal to find. From your troubled
and loving mamma,
Julia Berton.
Long before Archie had finished reading
this letter her eyes were suffused with tears,
and she said halt aloud:
“Poor, dear mamma, for your sake and in
hope of earning a little to help you I
will cry to be contented here, and do the
very best I can, and I must not be so indif
ferent to Weston.”
So when she met him the following even
ing she made herself as agreeable as p ss:ble
and thanked him for her mamma as jhe had
beep requested. And he, taking courage by
this, urged her to name the day when they
would be married, but then she grew so cold
and constrained again with u* giving him
the least reply, be dismissed the subject. In
the course of a week Archie answered her
mother’s letter,having en'. her only acuuple
of telegrams since her arrival aud this is
j what she wrote:
"Deal Mamma;—I thought when I first
came here I was going to he discontented, but
j after getting your letter I determined to '
j make tue best of everything and try to as-
! -imitate with these people who, like myself .
; at present, have to work for a living. Muny ,
| of them are entirely unlike the people with l
i whom I have been accustomed to assoc ate, !
w hile others are quite refined. Every even
ingsince I have been here l have been going
somewhere, fi-sf. to a reception at toe White
House,then at the House of one of the cabinet
i ffi-ers, then toa theatre and opera,“isi have
atten led a couple of Congressional disputes
But Weston is at the bottom of this; he ap-
pe irs to want to be in my coniprny, aud as
we care not to sit down in my boarding mis
tress’s little parlor with a lot of stupid folks,
we just sally forth to some place of enter
tainment. 1 am not at all proud of Weston,
although he is quite passable, but I keep
wishing he occupied a higher posicion, and
that he had more money. As it is, I don’t !
believe I will ever marry him, but how.- be I
would feel if he knew I were writing this, I
for he cares for no one but me, I’m sure But I
I must tell you, mamma,that one of the Sen- I
ators from the South has succeeded after a '
great effort to get an introduction to me,and j
that he has put himself out of the way once or
twice to meet me. Indeed I should say he |
appears to be smitten an I he is rie ; a diet
stvhsh, bes des a widower or ba helor, and
if he should take it into his head to perse- !
wre in hi-: acquaintance with me. pray w hat ;
would I io with Weston? How jealous and
broken hearted he would be! N >w, as you
a.e about leaving dear old Edge wood, where
we have known so many happy hours, my
„ i :i is employed in these frivolous :lr_ught=,
but perhaps it is well your mind is diverted
with my nonsense a few moments. Oh,
mamma, my heart aches for you, and to
think of poor Maud and Louise I No more
parties, nor sailing, for probably Mr. Tem
pleton will monopolize all of papa’s nice
boats, nor driving, nor anything but work
an ! scrimp. I begin to thirds poor people do
not have the least joy in the world; but do
not despair, dearest • mamma, perhaps—but
no, I d .re not intimate such a thing, for
p nr Wesron! But I will not write more
no v, for I think I bear the sound of his foot-
st;ps on the walk. Your ever adoring daugh
ter. Archie.
CHAPTER II.
“Oh, fear not in a world like this,
And thou shalt know ere long,
Know how sublime a thing it is“
To suffer and be strong ”
— Longfellow,
“Why, Weston, what has sent you home
now ? 1 am mighty glad to see you but did
n it expect to have that pleasure till Christ
mas. Have you been discharged?”
“Worse than that, mother. I have been
deceived.”
“Oh, I see; it is an affair of the heart.
Arch’e is false, eh?”
‘ Just so, mother, and I stall not go back
to Washington.”
A cb'ud swept over the features of Mrs.
Bart'e:t, but she made no reply, thinking
it would be of no use just then.
Weston was her only boy and her heart
was bound up in him, so of course she made
his troubles her own. Since he procured a
clerkship in one of the government ifficis a
year and a 'naif before, it had bien a great
com'ort to her to k low he was steadily and
lucratively employe I. Ste had not asked him
| o contribute towards her support, but as-she
was a widow with limited means, he, like-tile-
kind dutiful son that be was, had sent her
i considerable money. And now she feared it
j v, ouid be a long time liefore he would find
• another situation as good as the ODe he left;
but to urge him to re. urn in his present state
| <1 feeling, she felt would be like urging &
I burnt child to go back into the fire. Sue bad.
1 never felt that Archie, from the description
given of her, would make a suitable wife for
j her son, and under less detrimental circum-
| stances would have been glad to hear the
| match was broken off. The acquaintance
tv. een’Weston and Aic’nie began about a year
liefore w hile he was at E 'gewood on a visit to
j Charley Berton, the tw o having attended the
; same school a length of time, and become in -
j limate friends. But she would not have ac-
| cepted his attentions as a lover, only that ir.
: her time of need he had made himself so use-
j ful to her in his efforts to procure her a situs
ti. n in the Treasury c fli e. Now that it was
secured, and a more brilliant admirer appear
ed, she was ready to cast. Weston aside. Thus
w e see New iy read her character aright. No
doubt her conscience was troubled, and she
even pitied Weston for the disappointment
she had caused bim, but her ambitious desirs
to become once more a shining light in socie
ty precluded ail o.ht'r considerations a3 we
may judge by the following written to her
j sister Maud, on the very day that Weston
| threw up his clerkship and went home,
i Dear Sister: It lias come about rather
1 snoden, all owing to my peerless beauty and
i attractions, I suppose, but I am already en-
I gtged to be married; 1 don’t know when, to
j Senator Welbv of Texas. And be is rich and.
| aristocratic, like our dear papa was, till those
; vnkures swooped down upon our property,
i It was love at fiist sight, and I think he wor
ships me, and he declares 1 shall not drudge
! in that Treasury < flice any longer, but board
I at some very stylish place, and dress and go
| into society; and very few here will know I
| ever have been in that place. Oh, will not it
be nice, and then when I go down to Texas
to live on our great plantation you can all
j come down and live with us, for I am sure
i Mr. Welby is very generous and kind. Poor
IVeston is terribly cut up, I suppose, and has
gone off home. His jealousy of my new ad
mirer exceeded everything, and for a week
before be left he would not come near me.
but Mr. W. was very attentive all that time,
and then it w as that the promise was made
tLat will bind me for life. I never ought to
have promised Weston. I did not thmfc *t
me, I could not refuse him. I hope you.are
all getting along nicely, and that dear mam>-
ma will think I have done the very best thing*
I could by accepting the offer of his lordship
Mr. Welby, Archie.
This letter was scarcely posted when anoth
er from her me ther was brought her by the
post boy, and thus it read:
Dearest Archie: We are now settled in the
farm house for the summer, at least. As the
Templetons wanted the use of the furniture
as well as the house, we brought very little
with ns, and it is the greatest of mysteries
to find out how we are to get along with so
little, still, I sometimes think we never shali
learn to use the little we have got. We are
to do everything ourselves, for we cannot af
ford even one servant. The Templetons are
to have Tom, our old < oacbman, our garden
er, old Ellen, our laundry girl and Hempbis,
who elas, after roasting and stewing for us
so many years, finds herself catering for
others. Maud and Louise already begin tc
go around looking quite untidy, for they
have no one to do up their muslins, and as
for their doing anything of the kind, they
know no more abouc it than a couple of kit-
j tens. Ellen was in here the other night and
! out of pity to us offered to take some of our
j clothes home to wash, but I told her at once-
j she should do no such a thing, fori was sure
: Airs. Templeton would think we were stoop-
! iug greatly tc allow her to do it, besides,
i they furnish plenty of the sort for the pdor
\ girl to do, for there is no end to their dress-
I ing, They go a little ahead of what we ever
did. The same old set with whom we used
to go, are now Slandering around th< m, and
would you believe it my precious, not one of
ttenumber w ho were so toasted and feted by
us in past years, will deign to enter our
present bumble abode. They do stop and
chat a moment as they sit in their carriages
whenever they see us at the window or door,
esj ecially the Hiltons, but that is seldom, as
w e keep in the background as much as po-s!-
ble. The other day a man of the middling
class came here and erquired fora bridle
that belonged to your papa, saying tin t Tom
the coachman told him it was in the carriage
house. As the key to the door was in the
house, Louise took it and went out to get the
bridle for him, ard just as she was banding
it to the man the Templetor.B drove through,
the yard looking as haughty as ever.
It was towards evening, still Louise wore
an old, soiled wrapper. I told her then, if I
ever saw her in dishabille again so late in the
day I would shut her up in the meal room
just off the kitchen. And she said; ‘I do not
care so I can find plenty of meal there tc-
eat.’ ZZZ- r Jt
The truth of it is, we get barely enough to
eat to sustain life now-a-days. because in the
first place we have so little money to buy it,
and we either don’t know how, oi else are
too indolent to cook it after it is got. Maud
and Louise expend ail their surplus strength
in walking to and from the city; you know
it is a long two miles and often seems as if it
were up hill both ways, to be sure the Tem
pleton’s offer to carry us, but we never go
with them, either we are not dressed, or they
have others than themselves in their carriage,
so we generally ‘walk afoot’ as the Irishman
said. The other day, however, Maud took it
into her head she would beg a ride of some
passer by, so she hailed a burly looking fel
low as she anu Louise stood at the gate wait
ing for some one to come along. He was in
a one horse buggy, behind a dapple grey, ,
which, as I thought from a view through the
shutters, looked about as intelligent as its
driver, and this is what she said:
‘Could you give me a ride, please to tho
city?’
‘Yes,’ he drawled out, "seeing you arc
pretty good looking.’
‘Well, I’ll not ride with you, you are no
gentleman,’ Maud replied turning and run
ning to the house
‘Why don’t she come along? Gone to do up
her back hair first, I ’spose,’ he said to Louise
who was about to follow into the house.
‘She is hot going with you, sir,’ replied
Louise.
Get up then, grey,’ he said to his pony
‘I don’t see but we’ve got the. mitten.’
And on he went while Maud threw off her
hat and sat down and snivelled; then, in a
(Continued on eighth page.)