Jimtown's Bride [pp. 374-386]

JIMTOWN'S BRIDE.
then it faded out, my normal condition
returned, and again I was a confiding
idiot, ready for self-immolation. Possibly
this is better than skulking through the
world in a cold-blooded detective fashion,
unjustly suspicious of our fellow men.
The ministering angel ("kin to the
Murphys of County Wexford" ), who
smoothed the pathway of Uncle Roche
from this vale of tears to the shadowy
realm of the " Great Hereafter," never
fully comprehended the scope of this col
lapse in his worldly possessions. Not
many months after the true conditions
were revealed she changed her residence
to San -Francisco, where she passed
away serenely, leaving no sign of disappointment, except that in a recital of
her experiences, in a confidential way
to a favorite boarder who was gifted
with rare patience, she invariably closed
with this epigrammatic sentence: "This
is a cold world, Mr. Fitzhugh, a cold
world."
James H. Lawrence.
JIMTOWN'S BRIDE.
I.
URSTS of revelry pervaded
Jimtown; revelry so abnor mal, so abandoned, and
I l i withal, so untiring, that
even t h a t turmoil-inured
settlement s t o o d aghast.
McHale's was ablaze with
three additional kerosene
burners, with the further lumination of
recently polished chimneys, radiating
from sundry bashful wicks the light they
had considerately and assiduously concealed for no knowing how many months.
At the bar clinked goblets and decanters
of cut glass, imported from San Francisco
in honor of the occasion; and what was,
perhaps, the most notable departure, in
the midst of all this splendor congregated
men in boiled shirts and creased pantaloons. Next door, Brennan's, and across
the street, Jack Doolan's, flashed and
scintillated likewise in rival luminosity.
One alt important topic of conversation
engrossed the attention of the various
companies that crowded around the bars,
and pressed through the doorways, or
gathered, with less assiduity, upon the
street corners and at the entrances of the
occasional provision stores. It centered
in the house on the hill, a house so
strikingly distinct from the other structures that served as abodes for the citizens of Jimtown, that it appeared to have
risen from the earth, with the elevation
that supported it, more like a peculiar
freak of nature than an artificial production of man. Not alone was artistic
skill shown in the style of its architecture, but fresh paint, glittering in the dim
light of smoking torch and Chinese lantern, proclaimed it the product not merely of an ambitious intellect, but one accustomed to the refining touches of civilization.
Within this house stood Jimtown's
bride, the new wife of Jimtown's peculiarly elected mayor, and the woman
whom all Jimtown took credit for establishing in their midst. By her side was
the fortunate man who, in winning the
political precedence of ambitious Jimtown,
had won along with it the sweetest
woman in the State of New York,-according to Jimtown's notion. Confronting the happy pair was the rather numerous committee, headed by Jim MTcHale,
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