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YEARS! YEARS!
Years! Years!
-fio Icag the dread companionship of pain,
®o long the slow compression of the brain,
Bo go Ion" the bitter famine and the drouth,
J on." I've iiche for kisses on the mouth,
fteo long ue straining of hot, tearless eyes,
Iu backward loo Icing upon Paradise.
So long tired feet dragged falteriugly and slow.
So long the solemn sanctity of woe—
Years! Years!
—Richard Realf.
TWO BROTHERS.
| To the burghers it had ceased to be a
I strike. They called it a riot. The work
l inen no longer sought an increase of
f wages and a decrease of working hours.
they now wanted was a complete
subversion of the established order of
liings.
The troops, called in haste from every
point, were not sufficiently strong in
I numbers to quell the disorders. The
officers were uneasy, lest their soldiers,
exasperated by such continued alarms,
should lire without orders. In the day
while on the march, at night at the
mess, nothing was heard but talk which
seemed to presage a terrible engagement
the first; time the two forces would come
together.
Over one of the roads which cut
through the “dark country,” thirty sol
diers were going at quickstep, under an
icy rain, beating full in tlieir faces, and
increasing twofold the weight of their
; equipments. With a sub-lieutenant in
/ command, they had left the village to
take charge of the Rebaux glassworks,
which a gang of plunderers had been
threatening since early mom. For three
long hours they had been splashing along
through tlnfC black, sticky mire of coal
dust. Night came on, seeming but little
darker than the gloomy day which had
preceded it. On all sides were to be
seen nothing but drenched fields, here
and there a house of sinister aspect or a
wretched hovel, which, though crura
Wing to ruin, might, nevertheless, be the
dwelling place of some human being.
At times the road would rise up an im
mense slope, and then even these sights
would appear so dimly to the soldiers
that they might have thought they were
marching over an aerial road through
the gray clouds.
All of a sudden a gleam of light had
appeared in the distance. * At first they
thought it a signal of some kind, but it
had increased and spread to so great an
extent that they soon saw it was a con
flagration. “Halt!
H ie sub-lieutenant cried out,
Then calling to one of his soldiers he
asked, “\Vher e r-i that f i>t.
The soldier looked around him for a
moment to discover where he was, and
then replied: “ Tis the glass works,
lieutenant.”
' “The Rebaux glass works?”
(, \es, lieutenant.
And then like a shiver this sentence
spited through the ranks:
‘‘The glass works are on firel
‘‘Forward! commanded the officer.
Tlie men began their march anew,
deeply moved by the new disaster. One
only remained motionless at the edge of
the' road. One of his comrades called
out to him:
‘ Say. John, aren’t you coming?”
“J am ’ answered John, catclimg up
‘
with tlie others.
• ; He was almost a chUd, with a hand
some young head on a body that was
spM slender. Although not quite 20, he
had already seen two years in the ser
C !; H .' 3 la «8 hm S f f« waa
‘ that , day; his countenance bore
^ ■ op open
Uces of uneasiness. He was worried by
thought that his brother, his only
relative, was a laborer somewhere
that neighborhood, he knew not ex
»' he T®- The brothers, as a
rule, very seldom corresponded.
nrany months would elapse
rMe ‘ rmg news fro “
her. They were very much l attached
At
one to the other, however, and frequent
ly, in the evening, John would reopen
anil road the scarce letters of his brother.
Now, dining the past year John had
received two that had not a little dis
turbed him. They treated of things he
did not understand. The workman, in a
string of declamatory phrases, which lie
had evidently heard in meetings or picked
out of Anarchist papers, conjured his
brother, in the event of a riot, not to fire
on the proletary, but to shoot at his own
leaders. John’s very simple nature did
not readily understand wdio was that pro
letary that was to be spared, but was
considerably shocked at the advice to fire
U p 0n his superiors. He had burned these
letters, deeming them too offensive and
dangerous. been disturbing
Since the strikes had
th e country during the past month, the
full meaning of his brother’s letters had
dawned upon his mind. It caused him
no little sorrow when lie reflected that
perhaps Peter was enrolled in that army
c f rebels. He bad written him kind
letters replete with affection and artless
advice, but had received no answers to
them, the workmen having probably re
moved to some other village.
Since the campaign had opened the lit
tie soldier, who would not have flinched
j u the presence of a foreign enemy, was
n prey to the horrid fear that some day
might unwittingly fire upon that
brother, the idol of his affections. It
W as this thought which made him so
a i ix i 0 us and kept him away from Ills
comrades during the hours of rest, which
put an end to liia usual childish gayety,
w liich had caused him to stand so
mo tioiiIes8 in contemplating that distant
conflagration, listening to the indefinite
noises ixirne along by the wind, and ask
i U g himself, with an anguish which
seemed ready to choke him, whether Ids
brother would be there.
The soldiers had started off, quickening
their step. For a moment the ranks were
thrown into disorder by that black mud,
which at times formed real pools in the
middle of the way, compelling them to
around it, in single file, along its
border, for 100 meters or so. Tlie road
would then be leading over the top of one
G f these high slopes planted with wasliing young
trees to keep the earth from
awav altogether. reformed John
When the line was was
missing. His name was called, but he did
no t answer. The men began whispering
to each ether: some knew tlie uneasiness
c f the young soldier, and immediately
supposed that he had taken to flight sons
no t to be compelled to fire upon tha
workmen.
The sub-lieutenant swore furiously on
account of bis desert ion; but it was no
time to think of pursuing the runaway,
In the darknes8 hiding wag „ easy that
it would losillg timBj besides, the
platoon was in a great hurry to reach the
glassworks calling
After him once agahi, the sol
diere resumed their march, and soon the
of their footsteps was the otily
noise breaking tbc Kt illness of the night.
The young gddier had not deserted,
While his companions were calling him
he waii l h u „ CO nscious at the foot of
the declivity, across the top of which the
hiirhwav ‘jol.nVas ran 'thunderstruck
when, on re
gaining ^ his sensei, lie found himself lying
lerc benumbed and covered with mud.
How faad bo sH IIo w lad he rolled
dovrn there?
He listened, but heard no sound. His
mU8t not have seen him fall.
He remembered tiiat lie had been a
, itt!e way ^bjn,! tbe otb(T3 , M d reflected
that in "the face of so blinding a rain it
waJ5 ite ^ bIe tbat his faU migbt
h „ n notieed
TTptrtol t.<> g vet nin^liim un hut an atrocious
^ ^ w^ to b£ to the ^?ai earth.
“ erlmo^n W likc cauJfhim a oHead ^'cry^ul
it
, ^
he got frightened on thinking
that he was wounded and all alone inthat
black country. Were they going to aban
don him there?
He had raised himself ^ upon one elbow,
but let himself fall back heavily. Hia
shako had caught on to something dur
ing his fall, leaving him bareheaded to
the cold rain, which drenched bis short,
curly, fair hair, of which he was so
proud. Poor John! Who would have
recognized in the unfortunate lieing
stretched at full length in the mud the
dainty little soldier* always so tastily
primped up, and who invariably caught
the eyes of an die womeh on the prome
nadc?
He suffered so atrociously that he did
not have courage enough to examine
himself and try to find out the extent of
his injury. Ilis whole left leg felt as if
it hail been ground up in a mill And,
still, it might not lie so serioiw. He re
xnembered that, once upon a time, heliad
felt that same feeling of general sore
ness, caused by a violent blow from a
stick. It might not amount to anything,
and yet he could not remain there, lying
in tlie mud anil water, shivering with
cold. Tie would eventually go to sleep,
and the next morning they would find
him there, dead! He did not wish to
die! What! lie found there, in the mud,
like a dead dog. * * * Cost what it
may he had to get back to the road and
wait till some one came along. In uliort,
it was not such a great undertaking, only
ten meters to go!
What a torture those ten meters were
to him, ns with the aid of trees, roots and
rooks, dragging his lifeless leg along, ho
tried to get up to tlie road at the top of
the slojie. Twenty times he came near
giving up; twenty times he was on the
point of lying where lie was and wait*
even for death! But his youth rebelled
against tlio idea; love of life seemed to
urge him on, and at length he
the road. His strength was failing fast,
and all he could hope for now was that
somebody might come along before it was
too late.
Time dragged on so heavily for the
wretched man that seconds seemed
him eternities.
Fever kept him awake, his foot were
frozen, his head as if on fire, all his body
shaking with a shiver which caused in
sufferable twitches to run through his
h-g. lie no longer had strength enough
to cry out. and he could only give vent
to his sufferings in low moans.
All of a sudden, while under the in
fluence of a kind of nightmare, he heard
voices singing. He listened. It was sal
vation, it was life, because they were
coming his way. Oh but how slow they
seemed to walk! At last, he could dis
tinguish in tlie darkness the forms of five
w alkm S ™ ln «“- wben wl ^* n
a few steps , of where Jo
P<h 1 singung. So muehtha better, they
quite wol ‘ W near, 1,rar lie . Uim cried ca ' L out. V f l,en he them
“Help! IIclpl »»
The men stopped.
The astonished 1*! one men le again. went up to him,
an '.' on « ; K f lc,n(f ‘*“
claimed: ‘ Hello! it is oneof t|ioee soldier
hounds that lias got Ins dose.
’
cr '^.‘ ,u ‘; '> ell, let s finish him.
With these words lie raised tlie tool.
°," '. ,e f h ’° 1,,a ‘ T '' c ’' |mown voice John
, ha i‘ cr,e ? ° ut 'v.MIy. •-a. The
T 'c pickax had f.dlei, however^
f? Uie , f 8 exclamaUiu liad aiused the
^ ow to ^ , ev,at; ‘ : nevertheless Uie l>omfc iff
the pickax stnxk the lwlplew soldier »
°P1““8 a B a pmg ^misJ m his svde
name-caltai T1, ° m “’ .^‘“*1 m.-t so snddenly by.«h«t mt m mo-l tueh us a
?**< dar ,‘i
tunate soMior "J‘° , f ""‘'
in £ to the earth. H» surprised eom
P* 1010118 ^ understand; but
tbeir instinct them that something
was going on. At last Peter
down, and
the soldier s liead with his trembling
ha '?, Ja ’ b*™® 1 ““ I aca so as to get a
^ , “It is John!
These words came hoarsely from out
his panting breast Had the ground
opened in front of him it would not have
stiqieJied him so much as did the sight of
that bleeding man lying there in the rood
before him.
Then ho seemed to come to himse! I
again; ho rapidly passed bis liand ov« »
his brow, and then, with the incwttouch
iug care. Ik; raised the body in his her*
culenn arms. As lie was ulxiut to arise
to his toot, his companions stepped up r *
if to assist him, when* with a look, he
stopped them, saying in a hoarse voice:
*1 forbid any one to touch him!”
And, paying no more attention bur- to
them, lie stalked off with life heavy
den.
The nearest village was alxiut a quar
ter of an hour’s walk from where they
were. Peter wont over this long di
tance without resting, going along slowly,
now and then atopjsug when the plain: *
of the wounded man became too paint u.
The rain had ceased, but the brow of tb *
striker was lx?ailud with perspiration, r.i 1
each time ho stopped the cold winter
wind would cause his wet clothes to slit
to his body. works
Jj, the distance the glass st i
burned, sending up great tongues of fin
^ the gk> ’ ftcros8 w liieh great B mres if
, c ; 1 . with tho betoof c i OU( ps.
tU
village and kick in- ° at tlie dooru called
for assistance. streets*
,j^ )C were deserted- many per¬
h4d that morning after a frn v
- n }d)0ut t wentv men had l«
oitIier or Avimtnled. V.^e win
nMliainiH | j md t,a rr i c;u ied their doors ur I
preteI1( i et i n< , t t o liear.
Th( , m iscrab!e man was bitterly wcq
big; ’ ho seemed to hear the death rattle i i
tll0 thnKlt of \ dn p ro thcr, who was sthl
|osin , r ft ffrcat denl of , Wi j llst
fpU hig strength giving wav, ’sized on
n conM , r> | 10 wlw a irooil
building, through the half opened door
of which a dim light was streaming. He
entered it.
: Ifc h-tw a large unfinished and unfur¬
nished schoolroom, with whitowashr 1
walls reeking wltli dampness. All tlie
killed and wounded in the morning fray
had been taken there pell-mell.
About twenty human bodies were
st. etched out on a pallet of straw, AH
the faces seemed bo ghastly under the
dim light of the distinguish twp coal oil lamiw that it
was hard to the dead from the
A physician and two sisters of charity
were going anil coming, dressing lb
wounds, and reviving the spirits of tlie
bounded with words of comfort.
Tliey hurried to (he wounded man
brought in by Peter, fixing a place for
him on this straw. As one of the sisters
luid brought u lamp, the childi h fnec of
jioor John seemed livid. His dull cy< .
were half closed, and Ills lips were cov
ared with blood flecked foam.
The doctor tipped Iiis coat and thirl,
a^poeing hia fair white ekin to view.
Tlie shajic <ff his txxly seemed bo youtli
so delicate, fliat it was painful to
see Idm thus uncovered, a gaping wound
in his side.
At first Peter had drawn near, holding
his breath, his even wandering from the
wounded man to the doctor, Mcanning the
IatWr’s face as if lie w» hed to re:id t.’iero.
hr advance, the dt«i*»ion aliout to be pro¬
nounced. But when, by means of tho
dhn lanqifl^ht, the miserable man i>ei
celted the hruwedfledi of Ids brotlK*r, ho
gave a moaning Cry and dropped to the
sobMhg in the ment heart rending
kivmnet. A*werd from the doctor nearly
crazed latnt
“The wound in fhe leg is nothing.”
aoki lie; “ ’tis simply a fracture; but the
wound in the side is t cry dangerous. ’ ’
Ho, perhaps, his brother was going killed to
die, and it would be he that had
him.
He sprang to his feet, exclaiming:
^ not it? It ^ not p^blo
^ J( ,
0b ^rhort. terrified. Not that ho
feared being urrcbted if ho betravi-d h»»^
