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THE BAPTIST BANNER «&» SSSXaM&MO'OS' jggw% 3P A. %? 3® j 8,., BY JAS. N. ELLS & CO. VOL. IV. ota gaptfct IBiuwr, DEVOTED TO RELIGION AND LITERATURE, Is published every Saturday, at Atlanta, Georgia, at the subscription price of three dollars per year. JAMES N. ELLS & CO., Proprietors. J <9. N. Ells. S. D. Niles. A. K. Seago. MISCELLANY. THY WILL BE DONE. Searcher of Hearts I—from mine erase All thoughts that should not be, And in the deep recesses trace My gratitude to Thee! Hearer of Prayer!—oh, guide aright Each word and deed of mine; Life’s battle teach me how to fight, And be the victory Thine. Giver of all!—for every good In the Redeemer came— For raiment, shelter, and for food, I thank Thee in His name. Father and Son and Holy Ghost! Thou glorious Three in One! Thou knowest best what I need most, And let Thy will be done. [From Household Wortfs.] LOST "ALICE. A. DOMESTIC STORY. CHAPTER I. WHY did I marry her? I often asked myself the question in the days that succeeded our honeymoon. By right, I should have married no one. Yes, I loved her, as I love her still. She was, perhaps, the strangest character of her age. In her girlhood I could not comprehend her; and I often think, when I raise my eyes to her grave, quiet face, as she sits opposite me at dinner, that I do not comprehend her yet. There are many thoughts working in her brain of which I know nothing, and flashes of feeling look out at her eyes now and then, and go back again, as captives might steal a glimpse of the outer world through their prison bars, and turn to their brick-walled solitude once more. She is my wife.’ I have her and hold her as no other can. She bears my name, and sits at the head of my table ; she rides beside me in my carriage, or takes my aim as we walk ; and yet I know and feel, all the time, that the darling of my past has fled from me forever, and that it is only the ghost of the gay Alice, whom I won in all the bloom of her bright youth, that lin gers near me now. 1 She was not a child when I married her. 1 though she was very young. I mean, that 1 life had taught her lessons which are gene- I rally given only to the grey haired, and had laid burdens upon her which belong of right » to the old. She had been an unloved child, ' and at the age of sixteen she was left to her- I self, and entirely dependent on her own ex ertions. Friends and family she had none, I so she was accustomed laughingly to say ; 1 but I have since found that her sisters were living, and in happy homes, even at the time when she accepted that awful trust of herself, and went out into the great world 1 to fulfil it. Os this part of her life she never speaks; but one who knew her then has told me much. It was a time of strug gle and pain, as well it might have been. — Fresh from the life of a large boarding school, she was little fitted for the bustle of a great selfish city ; and the tears come to my eyes as I think, with a kind of wonder, on the child who pushed her way through difficulties at which strong men have quail ed, and made herself a name, and a posi tion, and a home. She was a writer, —at first a drudge for the weekly press, poorly paid, and unappreciated. By-and by, bright er days dawned, and the wolf went away from the door. She was admired, read, sought after, and —above a*ll—paid. Even then she could not use the wisdom she had purchased at so dear a rate. She held her heart in her hand, and it was wrung and tortured every day. “I mav as well stop breathing as stop loving,” she would say, with a happy smile. “ Don't talk to me about my tolly. Let me go on with my toys; and, if they break in my hand, you can not help it, and 1 shall not come to you for sympathy." She was not beautiful; but something —. whether it was her bright, happy face, or the restless gaiety of her manner—bewitch ed people and made them like her. Men did the maddest things imaginable for her sake : and not only young men, in whom follv was pardonable, but those who should have been too wise to be caught by the sparkle of her smile or the gay ringing of her laugh. She did not trust them —her early life had taught her better ; but I think she liked them for awhile, till some newer fancy came, and then she danced past them and was gone. It was m the country that I met her first; and there she was more herself than in the dty. We were distant relatives, though w e had never seen each other, and the !■ ates sent me to spend my summer vacation with my mother’s aunt, in a country vil lage, w here she was already domesticated. Had 1 known this, I should have kept my distance; for it was only a fourteenth or fifteenth cousinship that lay between us, and I had a kind of horror ot her. I hardly knew why. 1 was a steady-going, quiet ATLANTA, GEORGIA, FEBRUARY 21, 1863. sort of a lawyer, and hated to have my short holiday of rest an I quiet broken in upon by a fine lady. I said as much to my aunt, s in return for her announcement of “ Alice Kent is here,” with which she greeted me. She looked over her spectacles in quiet wonder as I gave her a slight sketch of the lady’s city life, as I had it from the lips of “ Mrs. Grundy ” herself. “ Well —live and learn, they say.. But whoever would think it was our Alice you are talking of, Frank ? However, I’ll say no more about her ! You’ll have plenty of time to get acquainted w’ith her in the month you mean to pass here. And we are glad to see you, and your bed-room is ready—the one you used to like.” I took up my hat, and strolled away to have a look at the farm. By and-by, I got over the orchard wall, and crossed the brook and the high road, and went out into the grove behind the house, whose farthest trees were growing on the side of the hill which looked so blue and distant from my chamber window. It was an old favorite place of mine. A broad wagon track led through the woods out to a clearing on the other side, where was a little sheet of wa ter, called “The Fairy’s Looking-glass,” and a beautiful view ot a lovely country, with the steep green hills lying down in the distance, wrapped in a soft fleecy mantle of cloud and haze. I could think of nothing, when I stood there on a fine sunshiny day, but the long gaze of Bunyan’s Pilgrim through the shepherd’s glass, at the beauti ful city towards which he was journeying. And it seemed sometimes as if 1 could wander “ over the hills and far away,” and lose myself in one of the fair valleys at the foot of those hills, and be content never to come out and face the weary world any more. I walked slowly through the woods, with the sunshine falling through the green leaves of the young beeches in chequered radiance on my path, drawing in long breaths of the fresh air, and feSTing a tingling in my veins and a glow at my heart, as if the blood were flowing newly there, until I came to the little circular grove of pines and hem locks that led out upon the “ Fairy’s Look ing glass.” Something stirred as I pierced my way through the branches, and 1 heard a low growl. A girl was half-sitting, half lying, in the sunshine beside the little lake, throwing pebbles into the water, and watching the ripples that spread and widened to the oth er shore. A black Newfoundland dog was standing between me and her, showing a formidable row of strong white teeth, and looking me threateningly in the face. She started and looked sharply round, and saw me standing in the little grove, with the dog between us. She burst out laughing. I felt that I was cutting rather a ridicu lous figure, but I put a bold face upon the matter, and asked coolly, “ Are you Alice Kent?” “ People call me so.” “Then I suppose I may "all you cousin, for I am Frank Atherton?” “ Cousin Frank ! We have been expect ing you this week. When did you come ?" “Just now.” She made room for me beside her. We talked long, about our family, our mutual friends, and the old homestead of the Ath ertons, which she had seen, though I had not. She told me about the house, and our cousins who were then living there, and I sat listening, looking now and then at her, as she sat with the sunshine falling round her, and the great dog lying at her feet. I wondered, almost as my aunt had done, if this was indeed the Alice Kent of whom I had heard so much. She was dressed plainly, very plainly, in a kind of grey ma terial, that fell around her in light soft folds. A knot of plain blue ribbon fasten ed her linen collar, and a gypsy hat, lying beside her, was trimmed with the same col or. Her watch chain, like a thread of gold, and a diamond ring, were the only orna ments she wore. et I had never seen a dress I liked so well. She was tall (too tall, 1 should have said, had she been any one else; for, wffen we were standing, her head was almost on a level with mine) and slender, and quick and agile in all her movements. Her brown hair was soft and pretty, but she wore it carelessly pushed away from her forehead: not arranged with that nicety I should have expected in a city belle. Her features were irregular, full of life and spirit, but decidedly plain; her complexion fair, her mouth rather large, frank and smiling her eyebrows arched as ■ if they were asking questions; and he” eyes , large, and of a soft dark grey, very pleas ant to look into, very puzzling too, as 1 ) found afterwards to my cost. Those eves were the only beauty she possessed, and • she unconsciously made the most of them. J Had she been a Carmelite nun. she would j have talked with them: she could not have s helped it. When they laughed, it seemed j their normal state —the bright beaming J glance they gave ; but when they darkened suddenly and grew softer and deeper, and *| looked up into the face of any unfortunate r wight with an expression peculiarly to themselves, heaven help him ! Though I had known her only five min t| utes, I felt this, when I chanced to look up HIS BANNER OVER US IS LOVE. and meet a curious? glance she had fixed on me. She had ceased to talk, and was sit ting, with her lips half apart and a lovely color mantling on her cheek, studying my face intently, when our eyes met. There was an electric kind of shock in the gaze. I saw the color deepen and go up to her forehead, and a shiver ran over me from head to foot. It was dangerous for me to watch that blush, but I d'd ; and I longed to know its cause, and wondered what thought had caused it. “ Fred, bring me my hat,” she said to her dog, affecting to yawn. “It is time for us to go home to supper, I suppose. Are you hungry, cousin Frank?” “ Yes—no,” I answered, with my thoughts still running on that blush. She laughed good naturedly, and took the hat from the Newfoundland, who had brought it in his mouth. “ How fond you are of that great dog,” J said, as we rose from our seat beneath the tree. “ Fond of him?” She stooped down over him with a sudden impetuous move ment, took his head between her two hands, and kissed the beauty-spot on his forehead. “ Fond of him, cousin Frank? Why, the dog is my idol I He is the only thing on earth who is or has been true to me, and the only thing—” She stopped short, and colored. “That you have been true to,” I said, finishing the sentence for her. “So people say,” she answered, with a laugh. “ But look at him—look at those beautiful eyes, and tell me if any one could help loving him. My poor old Fred I so honest in this weary world.” She sighed and patted his head again, and he stood wagging his tail and looking up into her face with eyes that were as she had said, beautiful, and what was better far, brimful of love and honesty. “I doubt if you will keep pace with us,” she said, after we had walked a few steps ; “and Fred is longing for a race; I always give him one through the woods. Would you mind?” “ Oh dear, no ! ” The next moment she was off like the wind, and the dog tearing after her, bark ing till the woods rang again. I saw her that night no more. CHAPTER II As I have already said, I was a grave, steady-going lawyer, verging towards a re spectable middle age, w ith one or two gray hairs showing among my black locks. I had had my dreams and fancies, and my hot, eager, generous youth, like most other men ; and they had passed away. But one thing I had not known, one thing 1 had missed (save in my dreams), and that was a woman’s love. If I ever gave my visions a body and a name, they were totally unlike all the real ities 1 had ever seen. The wife of my fire side reveries was a slight, delicate, gentle creature, with a pure pale face, sweet lips, the bluest and clearest of eyes, the softest and finest of golden hair, and a voice low and sweet, like the murmurings of an /Eo lian harp. And she sat by my chair in si lence; loving me always, but loving me si lently, and her name was Mary. I dare say, if 1 had met the original of this placid picture in life, I should have wooed and won her, and have been utterly miserable. So, as a matter of course, 1 fell into dan ger now'. When Alice Kent went singing and dancing through the house, leaving ev ery door and window open as she went, I used often to lay down my pen and look after her, and feel as if the sun shone bright er for her being there. When she raced through the grove and orchard with the great dog at her heels, I smiled, and patted Fred on the head : when she rode past the j house at a hand gallop on her gray pony, j Fra Diavolo, and leaped him over the gar den gate, and shook her whip saucily in my face, I laid aside my book to admire her riding, and never thought her unwomanly or ungraceful. We grew to be great friends—like broth er and sister, I used to say to myself. How that liking glided gradually into loving, I i could not have told. 1 met her one day in the village street. 1 turned a corner ano came upon her suddenly. She was walk-1 ing slowly along, with her dog beside her, j and her eyes fixed upon the ground, look- j ( ing graver and more thoughtful than I had . ever seen her before. At sight of me her ; whole face brightened suddenly ; yet she passed me with a slight nod anc’ a smile, and took her way towards home. Seeing i ■ that flash of light play over her grave face,' and feeling the sudden bound with which i my heart sprang up to meet it, I knew i what we were to each other. It was late when I reached home, after a J musing walk. The farmer and his wife had gone to bed, the children were at a merry making at the next house, and a solitary light burned from the parlor window,; ' which was open. The full moon shone I fairly in a sky without a cloud. l.unfas-’ ' tened the gate and went in ; and there, in ■ the open door, sat Alice, with a light shawl . thrown over her shoulders, her head rest ’ ing on the shaggy coat of the Newfoundland I dog. II is beautiful brown eyes watched ime as I came up the path, but he did not > stir. I sat down near her, but on the lower step, so that I could look up in her face. “ Alice, you do not look well.” But I am. Quite well. I am going away to-morrow.” “ Going away ! Where ? ” “ Home. To London. Well ? What ails you, cousin L rank ? Did you never hear of any one who went to London be fore ? ” “ Yes: but why do you go ? ” “ Why ? ” She opened her eyes and looked at me. “ For many reasons. First ly, I only came for six weeks, and I have stayed nearly three months ; secondly, be cause I have business which can be put off no longer; and thirdly, because my friends are wondering what on earth keeps me here so long (they will say soon, it is you I’rank). They vow they can not do with out me any longer, and it is pleasant to be missed, you know.” “ And so you are going back to the old life, Alice ? And by-and-by. I suppose you will marry ? ” I would not advise any man, be he old or young, in case he does not think it wise or prudent to marry the woman he loves, to linger with her in the doorway of a si lent farm-house, and hold her hand, and look out upon a moonlight night. The touch of the small slight fingers was play ing the mischief with my good resolutions and my wisdom (if I had any). “Alice,” I said, softly; and I almost started, as she did, at the sound of my own voice, it was so changed. “ Alice, we have been very happy here,” “ Very.” I took both her hands and held them close in mine. But she would not look at me, though her face was turned that way. “ There is a great difference between us, f dear Alice. I am much older than you, ( and much graver. I have never loved any woman but you in my life, while you have ‘ charmed a thousand hearts, and had a thou sand fancies. If you were what the world • thinks you, and what you try to make yourself out to be, 1 should say no more than this—l love you. But I know you have a heart. I know you can love, if you will ; and can be true, if you will. And so J I beseech you to talk to me honestly, and tell me if you can love me, or if you do. — ( I am not used to asking such questions of ; ladies, Alice, and I may seem rough ?nd rude; but believe me when I say you have ( won my whole heart, and I can not be hap py without you.” “ Yes, I believe you,” she said. “ But do you trust me, and do you love me ? ” She might trifle with & trifler, but she was earnest with me. “ I trust you, and I love you,” she an swered, frankly. “Are you wondering why I can stand before you and speak so calmly? Because I do not think I shall | ever marry you. You do not love me as 1 | have always said my husband should love j me. 1 am wayward and exacting, and I ( should weary your life out by my constant craving for tenderness. 1 was made to be | petted, Frank ; and you, though a loving, are not an affectionate man. You would | wish me at the bottom of the Red Sea be fore we had been married a month; and, because you could not get me there, you would go to work and break my heart, by way of amusement. 1 know it as well as if I had seen it all—even now.” ‘ She looked at me, and all her woman’s 1 heart and nature were in her eyes. They spoke love and passion, and deep, deep ten derness —and all for me. Something leap ed into life in my heart at that moment ’ which I had never felt before—something ’ that made my affection of the last few hours i seem cold and dead beside its fervid glow, i I had her in my arms within the instant—i< I close—close to my heart. ; ! “Alice! if ever man loved woman with I heart and soul —madly and unreasonably ifi you will, but still truly and honestly—l I love you, my darling.” “But will it last? O, Frank, willitlast?” 1 I bent down, and our lips met in a long, i fond kiss. “ You will be my wife, Alice?” ■■ She leaned her pretty head against my i i arm, and her hand stole into mine again, h “ Do you mean that for your answer?—L Am 1 to keep the hand, dear Alice, and call I it mine ? ” “ If you will, Francis.” It was the first time she had ever given I me that name. But she never called me | J by any other again until she ceased to loVfel ‘ me; and it sounds sweetly in my memory i now, and it will sound sweetly to my dying I da y. CHAPTER 111. j We were married not long after, and for ■ six mouths we dwelt in a “ fool s Para dise.” When I think that but for me it might have lasted to our dying day, I can only sigh and take up the burden of my life with an aching heart. They had called Alice fickle—oh, how wrongly ! No human being could be truer . to another than she was to me. “ I only wanted to find my master, Fran cis," she used to say, when I laughed at her about it. “ I was looking for him through all those long years, and I began to think Ihe would never come. But, from the first TERMS— Three Dollars a-yrar. moment when I heard you speak and met your eyes, I felt that he was near me. And I am glad to wear my master’s chains,” she added, kissing my hand. And I am sure she was in earnest. I pleased her best when I treated her most like a child. She was no angel—a passion ate, high-spirited creature. She rebelled a thousand times a day, although she delight ed in my control. But it was pretty to see her, when she turned to leave the room, with fire in her eyes and a deep flush on her cheek—it was pretty to see her with her hand upon the lock even, drop her proud head submissively, and wait when I said— “ Stop; shut the door and listen to me.”— Yet it was dangerous. I, who had never been loved before, what could I do but be come a tyrant, when a creature so noble as this bent down before me ! She loved me. Every chord of her most sensitive heart thrilled and trembled to my touch, and gave forth sweetest music; yeti was not satisfied. I tried the minor key. Through her deep affection for me I wound ed her cruelly. I can see it now. Some wise idea found its way into my head, and whispered that I was making a child of my wife by my indulgent ways, and that her character would never develop its strength in so much sunshine. I acted upon that thought, forgetting how she had already been tried in the fiery furnace of affliction; and, quite unconscious, that while she was getting back all the innocent gaiety of her childish years, the deep lessons of her wo manhood were still lying beneath the spark ling surface of her playful ways. If for a time she had charmed me out of my graver self, I resolved to be charmed no more. I devoted myself again to my business, heart and soul, and sat poring for hours ever law papers without speaking to her. Yet she did not complain. So long as she was certain that I loved her, she was content, and took up her pen again, and went on with the work our marriage had interrupted. Her writing-desk was in my study, by a window just opposite mine; and sometimes I would cease to hear the rapid movement of her pen, and, looking up, I would find her eyes fixed upon my face, while a happy smile was playing around her lips. One day the glance found me in a most unreasonable mood, and I said curtly : “It is bad t#ste, Alice, to look at any one in that way.” She dropped her pen, only too glad of an excuse to talk to me, and came and leaned over my chair. “ And why ? when I love some one.” This was a bad beginning of the lesson I wanted to teach her, and I turned over my papers in silence. “ Do I annoy you, Francis?” “ Not much.” Her light hand was playing with my hair, and her breath was warm on my cheek. I felt my wisdom vanishing, and tried to make up for its loss by an increased cold ness of manner. “ One kiss,” she said. “Just one, and I’ll go away.” “ What nonsense, Alice. What time have I to think of kisses now ? ” She stood up and looked me in the face. “Do I tease you, Francis?” “Very much.” She gave a little sigh—so faint that I could scarcely hear it—and left the room. 1 had scared her gaiety away that morning. This was the first cloud in our sky. It seems strange, now, when I look back upon it after the lapse of years, how perse veringly I labored to destroy the founda tion of peace and happiness on which I might have built my life. The remaining six months of that year were months of mis ery to me, and, I doubt not, to Alice, for she grew thin and pale, and lost her gaiety. I had succeeded only too well in my plan, and she had learned to doubt iny affection for her. I felt this by the look in her eyes now and then, and by the way in which she seemed to cling to her dog, as if his fidelity and love were now her only hope. But I was top proud to own myself in the wrong, and the breach widened day by day. In the midst of all this estrangement, the dog sickened. There was a week of mis giving on Alice’s part, when she sat beside him with her books, or writing all the time —there was a day when both books and manuscript were put away, and she was bending over him, with tears falling fast, as ! she tried to hush his moans, and looked ' into his fast glazing eyes—and there was an hour of stillness when she lay on the low couch, with her arms around his neck, neith er speaking nor stirring. And when the poor creature’s last breath was drawn, she bent over with a passionate burst of grief, kissed the white spot upon his forehead, and closed the soft, dark eyes, that even in death were turned towards her with a lov ing look. She did not come to me for sympathy. She watched alone, while the gardener dug a grave and buried him beneath the study window. She nevgr mentioned him tq me, and never paid her daily visit to his grave till I was busy with my papers for the eve ning. So the year, which had begun in love and happiness, came to its close. [CONCLUDED ON FOURTH PAGE.] NO. 14.