Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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lewis m. grist, proprietor. J |nirepmlient .familj Jtetospaper: |for % promotion flf % political, Social, ^gricnltnral anil Commercial Interests of tjte Sont|. {terms--$2.50 a year. in advance. VOI,Too: YORKVILLE, S. C., THURSDAY, JANUARY 18, 1883. NO. 3% She ftorw idler. EIGHTJEEllEilttAWO. A BEAUTIFUL STORY. The cloak-room was clearing fast, and the pile of shawls and wraps attested to the fact that the majority of the company had arrived. The shire llunt ball, twenty years ago, began early. Being the great event of the year to many of the sober country people, they made a point of arriving at the very beginning and staying to the end. The music had been sounding merrily for some time, when two ladies came in, evidently mother and daughter; the one middle aged, calm and sedate; the other, young, eager and excited. The latter flung off her cloak, gave a hasty glance at the glass, and stood quivering with impatience, while her mother leisurely divested herself of her wraps and arranged her cap. "Come along, mother darling," the girl said at last. "Your cap is all right, and you look ? *** ...;n lovely.- we are so late. x-uui VI 111 ut I quite tired of waiting." "Poor papa," said the mother, drily; "he must be in a dreadful fidget, and all the young ladies should be engaged, and there be no partners left for him." The girl blushed and laughed. "Never mind, Florrie ; if anybody wants to dance with you, they will manage it somehow." Florrie blushed again, while a smile of the most perfect content broke over her face. It was a fair young face, pretty, not with any wonderful beauty, but with freshness, innocence and sweet temper; a face that weary paterfamilias, yawning in doorways, would comment upon with approbation; that jealous mothers would not pick to pieces, and that daughters would admire without envy. They found "poor papa" warmly discussing some magisterial difficulty with a country neighbor, and bearing this enforced delay of his entrance to the ball room with perfect equanimity. How Florrie's eyes roved around as they entered; how absently she responded to the greetings of various friends! Even the gentlemen who solicited the favor of a dance received but half her attention. She was only seventeen and had not. yet learned the art or the necessity of concealing her feelings. Every emotion wrote itself in clear letters on the childish face. Up and down the room her gray eyes wandered as she stood by her father, eagerly scanning the groups of dancers, and then a sudden light broke into them, a rush of color into her cheeks, as a young man detached himself from a knot of red-coated sportsmen and approached her. With what a radiant smile slie greeted him ! Her mother noted it and sighed; a sour maid of forty seeing it, sighed too, and said to herself, "What a flirt that girl is I" but even while saying it she knew that she was unjust. The young man did not sigh. He smiled a smile almost as radiant as Florrie's own?almost, not quite. "Oh! Miss Darley," he began, "1 thought you were never coming." "T thouirht we never were," she replied naively ; "but we are here now," she added, | in a tone of extreme satisfaction. "Yes, you are here now," he said, "and you ! will stay here to the end, and Rive me a great i many dances. Wouldn't you Tike some tea ?" j Of course she would like some tea, and as 1 she was going to dance the. next waltz with him, it was hardly worth while to return to her mother for the few intervening moments. Florrie was no tiirt, but she was only just j out, had seen nothing of the world, and had i never stirred from under her mother's wing. What wonder that she was completely captivated by this handsome young soldier, who contrived in so many little ways to imply, though he had not yet said it, that he loved her. She was over head and ears in love with him ; never doubted that lie was ordained to be her husband, and had the most perfect faith in him. He was certainly very happy in her society, and would willingly have sat by her side and danced with her the whole night. But Florrie had been well drilled on this point. She looked wistfully at her programme when he handed it back to her half filled with his own name. "You must scratch them all out but two. I shoidd like it, but I musn't," she said sim-1 ply. A look came over his face that half charm- j - - 1 ed, half frightened her. "Ah !" he began eagerly,-and then checked ! himself "I should like it, but I musn't," he half added under his breath. She looked at him wonderingly. "Did you spea"k ?" she asked. "No, no ; there is the music. Come." To say that Florrie enjoyed the ball would be to express it feebly. She was simply steep-' ed in content. Whether she danced, or sat 1 unnoticed by her mother's side, she was pro- j foundly happy. Then she had that second ; dance to look forward to, and she resolutely refused to go to the tea room till then, that j she might honestly want some refreshment af-1 ter it. Then followed another ten minutes, of which each moment was a lifetime of bliss, ! never.to be forgotten. As they passed the ball room they passed a girl coming out who had already attracted Mr. Peyton's attention by her extreme beauty?her dazzling complexion, her masses of golden hair, and her big blue eyes. She was j leaning on the arm of a miserable looking lit-1 tie man, who had been heading the train of her admirers the whole evening, and who did j not appear, judging from his countenance, to ; have derived much comfort from the amuse- I ment. The young lady stopped Florrie, say- j ing : "Well, Florrie, are you enjoying yourself ? i I have tried vainly to catch your eye the whole evening, but you have been so occupied that j you would not look at me." There was an undercurrent of sarcasm in the tone which was quite lost on Florrie, who re-; plied enthusiastically : "I am enjoying myself immensely." The beauty smiled and passed on, giving Mr. Peyton a glance from under her long ; lashes that kept him silent till they got back J to Mrs. Darley. "Who is that young lady ?" he asked. "She is a Miss Talbot," Florrie said. "Is she not pretty ?" Over her, too, had come a vague, indefinable sensation of something, she could not tell! what, that jarred upon her. A few minutes after Mr. Peyton had moved i away Alice Talbot came up, and, dismissing j her disconsolate partner with a careless nod, sue saju : . "Dear Mrs. Darley, may I sit by you ? Papa is always in the middle of a group of gen-! tlemen, and I never can get near him." Mrs. 1 Dar'ey cordially assented, not without a little j wonder, for Miss Talbot was accustomed to go about alone with her father, and did not usual- j ly appear to feel the want of a lady chaperon. \ "Who was your last partner, Florrie," Alice ; inquired. "Mr. Peyton," said Florrie. "Mr. Peyton," Alice repeated. "Oh, of i course?I know. He is one of the officers of the ?th. You must introduce him to me. j He has called on us, and it seems foolish not1 to know him." A few minutes later the introduction was made. But Mr. Peyton did not seem disposed to spend much time on Alice Talbot. He turned to Florrie eagerly and said: "Will you let me take you in to supper V" i Then the vague shadow vanished at once from the girl's mind. , "You must just let me have one more dance with Miss Darley," Mr. Peyton said when Mr. ! Darley expressed his decided conviction that it was time to go, and the father could not resist his child's happy, pleading eyes. Shortsighted old gentleman, he wondered what! there was in dancing that all girls were so ; fond of it. When the dance was over and the pair came back, they found Alice stoutly resisting an at tempt on the part of her father to take her away. "I must stay for the next dance, papa. I am engaged to your good-looking friend," she added in a whisper to Florrie. "I wouldn't miss it for the world." But Florrie hardly heard her. She was absolutely wild with excitement. Never before had Mr. Peyton been so devoted; never before had she been so sure that he loved her, nor had she realized what it was to be so loved. "I shall see you on Tuesday at the Grays," he said as they stood waiting for the carriage, looking down with more tenderness than he perhaps knew into the flushed, happy face. It brightened, if that were possible. "But I thought you said you were on duty that day." "I'll get off somehow. 1 would risk a courtmartial sooner than miss seeing you." "That would be wrong," she said gravely, with her earnest eyes fixed on his face. "I hope you would not neglect your duty on any consideration. I am sure you would not," she .added in a tone of deep conviction. "I never will after that," he said in a very low voice. "Do you know that this dance has begun ever so long ago ?" she said presently, "and I know that you are enged to Miss Talbot for it." "Oh, Miss Talbot is so inundated with partners that I am sure she won't have waited for me," he answered carelessly. Nevertheless, he found that she had waited for him, though there were several gentlemen eager to supply his place. . . When he ai>ologized she gave him a brilliant smile, and said she quite understood and forgave him. Meantime the Darleys drove home. The moon shone down on the father dozing in his corner; on the mother, silent, with anxious hopes and fears regarding her darling, and on that darling, sitting upright and wideawake, gazing into the clear fosty sky, and murmuring over again and again to herself, "I am so happy, I am so happy." It was six months later, one hot night in June, that Florence Darley followed her mother into another ball room. ' Only six months. But a great deal of experience can be acquired in that time, and Florrie had acquired rather more than her share. An indescribable change had come over her whole face and manner. Something of her sweet freshness and happy content were gone. A touch of restlessness, even fretfulness had taken their place. She was profoundly indifferent to most of her acquaintances as she had been on a former occasion, but she made an effort to conceal it, and when she looked round the room it was with hasty, furtive glances. Xo one rushed eagerly up to her now to express delight at her arrival and to claim half a dozen dances. Hut Florrie had not been in the room a minute before she knew that Mr. Peyton was there. lie was standing by Alice Talbot who looked more brilliant and beautiful even than usual, and was bestowing her brightest smiles and all her powers of fascination upon him. With miserable, bitter humility, Florrie owned that it was no wonder he had neither eyes nor ears for any one else. But the acknowledement did not make it less hard to bear. "She has so many admirers she might have left him alone," said the poor little thing to herself. But she held herself bravely to outward appearance. A hundred times she checked herself in the act of letting her eyes wander in search of him. She laughed and talked so gayly that one of her partners remarked after wards tlmt 'die never knew Miss Darley had so much fun in her." Once, when he and Alice passed close to her, she was apparently so deeply interested in her conversation that she did not seem to see them. She might have spared herself that small piece of hypocrisy, for by him it passed unnoticed, and only brought a smile of derision to Alice's face. Florrie herself spent the rest of the night in regretting. For, after all, a smile or a bow from him would have been better than nothing. Mrs. Darley looked anxiously in the girl's pale face and eyes that had so deep a look of pain in them, though the lips smiled so incessantly. "I think, my darling," she said at last, "that it is time to go." "It is quite early," Florrie said wistfully. She could not voluntarily give up the last chance. But the mother knew how vain it was to wait, and that the sooner they went the better it would be for Florrie's i?eace. a?... M 4.1.# "l am urea, uear,' sue saiu geuwy, <iuu it is later than you think." Then Floriie acquiesced at once. It was over, then, this evening that she had looked forward to with such feverish hope and fear; and what had it brought V only the establishment of the miserable conviction that she had fought against for weeks past. He was indeed lost to her. Yet, with the inconsistency of human nature, she began at once to consider when and where she might have another opportunity of seeing him. She thought that even an occasional glimpse of his face, a word or a smile, would satisfy her. And she had it. At the top of the stairs they met him and Alice. "Going already V" said the latter gaily. "Ilave you enjoyed yourself, Florrie V" "Very much," said Florrie, promptly, and was about to pass on, for her mother was already at the foot of the stairs, when Mr. Peyton checked her by saying, with a slight express:on of uneasiness on his handsome lace: "I was so sorry you were out when I called yesterday. 1 came to say good bye. I am off to Southampton to-morrow, thence to India " Even Alice, who never took her sparkling eyes off the girl's sensitive face, could not detect by the quiver of a muscle that this was the first intimation Florrie had had of the fact. She looked with cold composure at the young man as she said quietly : "I am very sorry we missed you." "And you will not stay and give me one dance ?" he said. "I am afraid I can't. My mother is tired." "Well, you must keep one for me at the first ball we meet at on my return from India." "Oh, certainly, if you are not eaten by a tiger in the meanwhile," she answered, laugllinrr "fJnrwi hvp I?lull) VnViUW." Alld Witll "'b' w . --V"n? a nod and a smile slie ran lightly down the staircase. He turned to Alice. "I won't let myself be eaten by a tiger as long as I know you, my darling, are waiting for me." "Hush!" she said glancing round uneasily. "You must make a fortune before you can have the right to call me that. My father will never consent otherwise." "Trust me. Only say you will be true to me." She raised her lovely eyes to his face for a moment, and he did not notice that she said nothing. lie walked home in the early morning srnoka cigar and building catles in the air, of which Alice Talbot was always queen ; while Florae, still in her ball dress, knelt in her little room at the top of the house beside the open window, looking over the wide expanse of London chimney tops, and sobbing : "I am so miserable?I am so miserable." It was eighteen years since that memorable hunt ball, which Florence Darley had marked as a white-letter day in her life, when she once more found herself within these walls of the old court-house for a similar festivity. Florence Darley still, and likely to remain, so both in her own opinion and in that of her friends, though a few of her contemporaries were disposed to consider her contended acceptance of the title of "old maid" as a personal injury to. themselves. And truly she was was only thirty six, and might have passed for younger had she chosen to assume the manners and dress of youth, lint she had long since lost her parents, and had, moreover, two grown-up nieces, who motherless, looked up to her as a mother, so she had no wish to cling to young ladyhood. She had placed herself in the ranks of the chaperons, and it was in that character she came to night. "My dear Florrie, you really make yourself ridiculous with your assumption of old age," \ | said a tall, golden haired woman who entered ; the room just behind her. This was the celebrated beauty, Lady Nor leigh, once Miss Talbot. She was still lovely, j though there were hard lines now around the | ; the beautiful mouth, and a restless look of , ! weariness and discontent in the large blue I eyes?a curious contrast to Florrie's serene j content. "How do you do, Alice ?" said Miss Dar| ley, declining to argue the point. "I thought ' you were in London. What brings you into I these parts ?" "Oh, I came, "said Lady Norleigh flippantly,1 "because Norleigh wanted me not tocome." j Norleigh, standing by, laughed feebly, and i tried to look its if it were a joke, in which he failed. lie was that miserable looking little man who had hovered so humbly around Alice j in this very room years ago. Several unex-1 pected deaths having considerably altered his ' worldly position, had also altered Miss Tal- j bot's sentiments toward him. Nevertheless , he looked none the happier for his double good j fortune. Lady Norleigh passed on in her dia-1 monds, lace and satin?the cynosure of all j eyes?while Florrie, in her sober black gown, j placed herself on a bench, prepared to amuse ; herself by watching her girls amuse themselves, ! though her attention wandered a good deal to ! her former rival. "Auntie," said one of her nieces, suddenly j ! startling her from an intent, half sad half j amused observation of Lady Norleigh, "I want j to introduce?" the name was lost. "I think I have had the pleasure of meeting i j your aunt before. Miss Parley," said a voice I which in eighteen years had never raaeci irom Florrie's memory; which even now brought such ;i rush of mingled pain and pleasure, such suffocating heartbeats, that for a moment, the sedate old maid was unable to speak. She j shook hands with the speaker as if in a dream, j was dimly conscious of his sitting down bej side her and making trivial remarks about the weather, the decorations of the room and so I on. Gradually she collected herself enough to [ look at him, and to take in the changes time j had made in him. They were not many. He t was still handsome, but very much older, both in manners and appearance?more so than | even the lapse of years accounted for, but Florrie decided that she would have known him anywhere. He did not stay long beside her, and presently Florrie saw him talking to a very pretty woman, whose youthful appearance, combined with her exceedinglysmart attire, proclaimed her a bride. "Whose bride ? As Florrie noted the affectionate admiration with which Col. Peyton looked upon her, she thought she had no need to ask, and, indeed almost at the same moment her niece said to her : "Is she not pretty ? Mrs. Peyton, I mean." "She is very pretty," Florrie said, with a smothered sigh. With profound, half painful interest she watched the fair young wife. "She looks good," she thought, "as if she would make a man happy. Heaven bless him. | Heaven bless them both." Col. Peyton, however, did not spend the whole evening in attendance upon his bride. He presently went in search of Lady Xorleigh, with whom he had already renewed his acquaintance. She was extremely gracious to him, and smiled as brilliantly as ever, but it was a hard smile. There was a certain defiant hardness now in her whole bearing. "Well," she said, as they took their places in a quadrille exactly opposite Florrie, "how do you find England after so many years of absence ?" "I find it," he replied, "so changed that I am tempted to return to India and never to repeat this experiment." 11 UT nminnim v/ll, IIUUOCIIOU, OUC 0<11U?<WJJ. JL OU|/|/UOt you did not exi>ect to find everything just as youleftjt." "No," he answered smiling, "I was liardly so unreasonable as that, but I was not prepared for so many changes." "Come, now, what changes ?" she urged. "For my part I should almost fancy not an hour had passed since?" She paused, and then I said : "Do you remember a ball here aboutwell, I won't say how many years ago V" "I do remember," he said gloomily. "And here we all areagain," she cont inued, "most of us, at least. Here am I, here are you, and there?with a slight change in her voice and a glance at Florrie?is Florence Darley." His manner changed too. "Yes," he said. "She is not changed." "You flatter her," said Lady Norleigh, sharply. lie looked confused for a moment, but went on undaunted. "She looks as good, as sweet, as content as she did eighteen years ago. Hers is, indeed, a face to make one feel the better for looking at, to save one from believing that there is 110 truth or faith left hi the world." "The meaning of this tirade being," said Lady Norleigh, sarcastically, "that you are i conceited enough to believe that Miss Darley has been wearing the willow for you all these years. Dont look so innocent and indignant. You know as well as I do, that you nearly broke her heart once; only, luckily, hearts are ! not made of breakable stuff, and hers was [ mended long ago." Then, with a sudden i softening of tone, perhaps with some vague j wish to atone for the wrong she had once so I deliberately done Florence Darley, she added, | half to herself: "Hut the scar remains, I think. Yes, you are right. She is a brave, true wo ! UJilll, illlU JTIMI WcI C <1 IUUI? I "1 know it,*' he said, with a quiet emphasis, ! that Lady Norleigh quite understood. When the dance was over, and Col. Peyton : had left his partner, he went over to Florrie, ! and sat beside her. "I)o you remember," he said, "that you promised to dance with me the first time we I met on my return from India ? I am going to claim that promise." "And do you remember," she answered, smi| ling, "how many years ago the promise was I made ?" "Then, you do remember?" he asked, with an eagerness, that moved her strangely, it was | so like his old manner. "Yes, I remember," she said, "but I never dance now; I am a chaperon." | "You a chaperon !" he added. "How very : ridiculous ! It seems but yesterday that you | and I danced-together in this very room. Do | you remember something you said to ine that i night about hoping I would never neglect my | duty V" "Observations made in a ball room are sel! dom worth remembering," said Florrie grave| ly. It would be more satisfactory if, instead ! of recalling all the nonesense you or I, or any ! une cist*, may nave uiiKeu su uianv )c.tia agu, ' you were to give me an account of India." j "Oh, I will send you some books about it ; if you are interested in that sort of thing." he i said, his face falling a little. "Well, but tell me something about what | you have been doing all this time," she said : with an air of grave, kind, interest. ' "I can tell you that in three words," he answered bitterly: "Playing the fool, and yet I have been saved from many follies by that one speech of yours. Your look and tone have haunted"? "I should like to be introduced to your wife, Colonel Peyton," Florrie interrupted. "My wife," he said, astonished. "Oh you ; must mean my sister-in-law. I have 110 wife." "I beg your pardon, she faltered.?"Somebody pointed her out to me as your wife." I lie looked with momentary surprise at her crimson face, then the surprise changed to an , expression of gladness and tenderness. Hut he only said : "When I have one I will certainly introduce her to you." The girls chatted gaily on their way home, over the events of the ball, wondering a little at "Auntie's" unusual silence, while "Auntie" leaned back in the carriage with claspedhaiuls, whispering softly : I have seen him again and we will always be friends. Whateverhappens I am content." And somethingdid happen. It was only two I days after the ball when he called upon Mrs. Darley, and his visit was sweet but not short, and the contentment vouchsafed was beautiful and lifelong. As the loving devo| ted wife of Col. Peyton, she was the admired i and esteemed of the county society, not except I the iM'jeweled but unhappy, consort of Lord I Xorleigh. |tti5?Ilimc0U5 fteMiug. THE DEATH OF CLEBURNE. ('. K. Robert, in the Philadelphia Times. It was the 30th of November, 18(34. At 4 o'clock in the afternoon the line of battle was formed, Stewart on the right, Cheatham on the left, their right and left Hanks, interlocked like Parthian shields, composing the centre. Gen. Stephen I). Lee's Corps was held in reserve. Cleburne's position was in the centre, his division formed in three battle lines and he at its head. Thus arranged Hood's line was nearly two miles long, advancing, curved like a Mussulman's scimitar, with the blade to the foe. But let us follow ^leuunie. X>UglC3 WCIC UlUWUIj;, muuio uvcming and bands playing. A courier dashed up to Cleburne's presence and soon the word "Attention!" was given, then "Forward, march !" and the column passed over a hill and through a little skirt of woods. Soon they emerged into an open field and steadily they pressed on with "pro]>er cadence" toward the rampart of blood and death. The Federal batteries began to open. First came solid j shot bounding overt he 'earth and tearing and ! crashing through the ranks; then the shrieking shell flew through the air on the wings of destruction bursting under and above and around the men and at every explosion unbinding more evils than ever flew from Pandora's box. Twilight was coming on. "Forward, men !" was repeated all along the line. A living sheet of fire was poured into their ranks. But the men pressed forward until the terrific roar ran from centre to flank, from wing to wing. Night came and the two armies fought like two blind giants in despair. Cleburne's old war cry rang out above the din of arms : "Follow me, boys!" Once again, and again, and again, and, seven times, Cleburne's division, indeed, all of Hood's army, charged the breastworks. And once again, and again, and aerain. and seven times were they re pulsed. Every time they formed and re-formed under a most galling lire. Atone time, just before dusk, Cleburne captured a portion of the works and turned the guns of a Federal battery 011 their former owners; but it was only a for a few moments?a little silver rift in the battle clouds that enveloped him in the darkness. It was the hottest fire Cleburne had ever met. It was but one stream of blazing hell. Confederates were 011 one side of the breastworks and Federals on the other. Men fell flat on their faces and fired from behind the bodies of their dead comrades. Dead soldiers filled the entrenchments. Blood made the earth as slippery as an ice pond. Thus the firing was kept up until after midnight, and gradually died out. But both' armies held their own. The Confederates passed the night where they were, just outside the breiistworks. The Federals only a few feet off, held their cover until near daybreak, .when they quietly marched away and retreated back to Nashville. IIOW CLE11URXE HIED. But when the morrow's sun began to light up the sky the surviving soldiers looked out upon a sad battlefield. The dead were piled one 011 top of the other in awful heaps and the wounded seemed thicker than the uncounted stars. Ilorses, like men, had died game upon the- defences, Cleburne's body lay there on top of the breastworks, ghastly in the sleep of death, pierced with forty-nine bullets, through and through. II is mare had her forefeet on top of the works, dead In that position. Not far from where Cleburne lay was seen me ?eaa uouy or uen. imams. ma muse Imd his forefeet on one side of the works and his hindfeet on the other, dead. The General seems to havelieen caught so that lie was to the horse's back, sitting bolt upright in his saddle, as if living, riddled and torn with balls. Gen. Stahllay by the roadside and his horse by his side, both dead, and all his staff. Gen. Gist, from South Carolina, was lying with his sword, reaching across the breastwork, still grasped in his hand. He, too, was dead. Gen. Granberry, of Texas, and his horse were seen, horse and rider, right oil top of the breastworks, dead. All dead! Four thousand live hundred soldiers all lying side by side in death. Thirteen Confederate generals were killed and wounded. Six brothers, members of a Mississippi regiment, were all dead. "This was the bloodiest picture in the book of Time !" The route over which Cleburne's command had marched the day previous to the battle of Franklin lay through some of the richest and loveliest country in all the South. The roads from Mount Pleasant to Columbia run through a farming district, fertile as the famous Blue Grass region of Kentucky, and in the highest state of improvement. Six miles from Columbia is what is known as the "Polk and Pillow Settlement," or as it now called, Ashwood. Here the distiguished and wealthy families bearing those names lived in a style of elegance and ease hut few baronial estates of Europe could afford. Gen. Leonidas Polk, the Bishop, was born here; so, too, was exPresident James K. Polk, Gen. Lucius Polk, Col. William Polk, Col. George Polk, Col. Andrew J. Polk, Gen. Gideon S. Pillow, Col. Jerome Pillow, and other prominent and farvn-\?ta lun'cano* *mp??v1v *a11 nf hipup crpntlpmpn owned large plantations in Arkansas, Mississippi or Louisiana, and had princely incomes from their cotton and sugar crops, but here, at Ash wood, they had their superb homsteads, mansions each with a manor, and their surroundings were in keeping with everything refined taste could suggest and almost unlimited purses could purchase. CLEBURNE'S ROMANTIC GRAVE. Being zealous church people these gentlehad built a beautiful little Protestant Episcopal chapel, and hard by was the family burying ground. It was a very romantic place and the neighborhood quite typical of the flush days of our Sunny Southland. The chapel was in the purest Gothic style, and its walls and sharppointed roof were quite concealed by clambering ivy, while the flowers and the shrubbery looked fresh and green even on this bleak November day. As Cleburne, with his staff, rode by the General reined up his horse and lingered for a moment to admire a spot of such singular beauty. To him, however, it was the heantv of sadness. The flowers that bloomed there seemed ready to fade and wither on the breast of death ; the evergreen was waiting to lay upon his cottin-lid, and frost glittered on the fairest rose like jewelled mockery. Cleburne had a presentiment of the nearness of death. Turning to one of his staff officers, he said with a sigh : "If I fall in the coming light, bury me here at Ashwood." Two days after his mangled form was placed beneath the sod at Ashwood. The service of the Episcopal Church was said by Bishop Quintard, and then the soldier slept in the grave he had chosen. A TRIBUTE TO IIIS MEMORY. Some years after the war?before Cleburne's remains were removed to Helena, Ark., and a monument placed over them by the Ladies' Confederate Memorial Association?the writer was riding one day along the Ashwood" road, and paused for a moment to pay respect to Cleburne's memory. A rude head-board of cedar, with Cleburne's name in black letters, nearly obliterated by the weather, stood over a little mound the rank grass and weeds had nearly covered. Tearing away the weeds I wrote from memory on the board one stanza of a little poem that first appeared in a Dublin paper "Dedicated to the memory of Patrick Cleburne." It was this : Ye brave, on masse, who fall and pass To the leaden halls of death, There are palms for the few, but, alas ! for you, Not a leaf from the victor's wreath. 1 le was the festive toast, the soldier's boast, The type of a martial age; The foe of wrong, the soul of song, And thclight of a future page. CLEBURNE'S PERSONAL APPEARANCE. in apj>earance uieourne am not war our ins reputation?was weak and rather wan, a man, with iron-gray hair cut close to his head, delicate moustache and imperial, small grey eyes and sallow complexion. lie dressed always neatly, but with plainness, and had little taste for general society. His friends were few ; his tastes were simple ; his manners shrinking in the extreme. lie had a plodding ambition, a high sense of the merits of others, an obstinate though undemonstrative temper, i and a shy but loving heart. To those whom he liked he was tenderly affectionate. To his | antipathies he was silent and austere. I lis ' fancies were mainly prosaic; his turn of j thought altogether literary. But, in his own ever unobtrusive way, he was tenacious of his principles and his purpose, incorrigible in the execution of his plans and fastidiously true to his duties, personal and oflicial. He had traveled extensively. In early life he had served as a cornet of British Light Dragoons in India, and later passed three or four years in Paris as a student of belle lettres. He might have been mistaken for a seaman, and looked like a Greek. Ilis bearing was cosmopolitan ; his sj>eech peculiar to himself, a cross between a stammer and an accent. He was reckless of his person, but not from vainglory. He seemed to be unconscious either of exposure or : display, governed by the impulse or desire of the moment. His men loved him dearly ; but few of his oflieers were familiar with him. Hardee was his nearest friend, though he dearly loved young Lucius Polk. HIS BOLD AND ORIGINAL OPINIONS. Cleburne was very bold and original in his opinions. His proposition, two years before the close of the war, to declare all the negroes free and conscript the males, evinces his force of intellect and sagacity. "I would meet the proclamation of Mr. Lincoln," said he, "with , a better one. I would give the negroes not only their freedom, but a bounty of land for meritorious service." On one occasion he was : heard to declare : "If England and France 1 permit the overthrow of the Confederacy, I shall be in favor of restoring, the Union and : cleaning out Canada and Mexico." Had he ' lived he would have returned to Arkansas, married the lady to whom he was betrothed, 1 resumed the practice of law and eschewed Fenianism. "I am sick of fighting," he was J heard to say months before his death, "but we must see it to the end." ( KIDD'S CAVE. ! During the dog days last summer, i amused myself by hunting up some of the localities linked by tradition withe name of the famous pirate, Captain Kidd. It is certain that, when hard pressed by Lord Belloment, who linally caused him to be hanged, the pirate concealed in some safe place a vast amount of treasure ! We have nothing now to do with the whimsical stories told about exciting adventures in digging for these coveted chests glittering with costly jewels, ancient coins and solid wedges of gold. The matter of fact is that, within the memory of persons now living, excavations for Kidd's treasures have actually been made in the bank of the stream that used to run near Silver street, in New Haven, Conn. ; and the probability is that Kidd on occasions used to sail into the bay for repairs at Greenough's ship yard. Pits are also visible on Money Island, one of the group known as the Thimble Islands, oil Branford, where treasure hunters have been at work within the past century. Nearly everything, indeed, about these picturesque islands is flavored with reminiscences of practical adventure. Kidd's Harbor lies between two of the highest rocky points, and Kidd's Punch Bowl is exhibited as a great curiosity. The latter is a natural hollow in the granite ledge on Pot Island, and is about three feet long and a foot in width, and the same in depth. There is no proof that it was ever used for convivial or even culinary purposes. Viz-ia 'c P!?i vu hmirovf>r doeurvpe mnvp n:i vt if ular description. It is one of several small ^ grottoes in the granite ledges near Short 1 Beach, about six miles from New Haven. Leaving the cluster of cottages by the shore, we made our way through thickets of laurel and bay to what was once the natural sea wall. Following this for three hundred yards, we came to a rift in the rocks, around which a mass of fragments lay scattered for twenty feet. Measuring the height of this wall I found it to be about thirty feet above the sea level, and twenty-four feet above the adjacent meadow. Some former explorer has taken the pains to paint the name of "Kidd's Cave" on the wall near the entrance, which is an opening eighteen inches wide and five feet high. The adit slopes for ten feet at an angle of fortylive degrees to a small chamber, the floor of which is encumbered with fragments. The main passage rflns from east to west for twelve feet, and then turns abruptly north for sixteen feet. This measurement does not include rifts I and seams that reach much farther in several directions. The height of the chamber varies from three to eight feet, and there is an open- 1 ing at one place up to the surface, through j which smoke might ascend as by a chimney. 1 Remnants of fire show that the spot had been , used at some time as a hiding place ; though it would not be easy to tell if the refugees were pirates, Indians, or modern tramps. At ; one point the floor was examined for relics, and search was rewarded by the discovery of a few arrowheads and two stone axes. The fauna of Kidd's Cave includes spiders, 1 flies, frogs, slugs, snails and mice. Three of the latter were caught, and were found to be 1 specimens of the common field mouse. The temperature in the shade near the 1 mouth of the cave, at 4 P. M., on the day of 1 our visit, was 74? Falir. But, within the j grotto, the mercury fell, after an interval of ten minutes, to 5o? Falir., which is only one degree above the mean temperature of Mam mom uave, as ueieriumeu oy me sitiue instrument. I regarded this fact as remarkable, 1 considering the limited dimensions of the ex- { cavation ; and it confirms the opinion to which ( other temperature observations have led me, ! that the mean temperature of the earth's crust 1 in this latitude is about 54? Fahr., both Win- 1 ter and Summer. The origin of Kidd's Cave was undoubtedly marine ; and the probability is that it was considerably higher than it now is, and that ' the upper portion of the cave is all that is now visible. I judge thus from the fact that large j masses of rock have evidently fallen from the ' roof into some lower cavity, where they have j disappeared.?II. C. llovey in Scientific Anierican. | Curious Things Auout Animals.?Nat- ( uralists say that a single swallow will de- ; vour 0,000 flies in a day. t The army worms in Lyons county, Ky., are being destroyed by myriads of small ants. ? A curious sea turtle was found a short time 1 ago, off the shore at Manasquan, X. J., in a ? sieve net by some fishermen ; the turtle has s flanges instead of feet; its weight is 1,000 i pounds. ji A Belgian sparrow has literally built her s nest in the lion's mouth, having made her t home in the jaws of the monumental lion sur- l mounting the Belgiac mound on the field of 1 Waterloo. I A short time ago, while getting out stone \ in his quarry, a mile south of Kokomo, Ind., ( George W. Defenbough split a massive slab r and found embedded in tlie solid rock a lizard of a light color, alive and active. c A very large coach whip snake measuring i eight feet in length, and as large as an ordina- l ry man's leg below the knee, visited the bur- 1 row of a rabbit, at Madison, Fla., and took 1 therefrom a young one nearly half grown. ? The old, rabbit jumped on the snake, seized 1 the young rabbit, and tried to rescue it. The t snake held its head above the reach of the s old rabbit, and escaped with its prey. t A native named Kahale, while fishing at i Maliko, caught a very small lisli in his hand. Ii lie tried to kill it by biting the back of its n head. The lisli gave a sudden spring, and, a escaping from his hand, darted into his throat, a entirely closing the aperture and lodging half t way down. At first all efforts to dislodge it n were nnnvnilintr. It, was feared the man i would choke to death. At last, by being a placed in a favorable position and making c a filial effort, assisted by a friend, the fish t was ejected. Two teamsters coming to Kailey from Vien- p na, Nevada, encamped near the timber above 1" Boulder. One went out for game, while the n other was to make bread. As he got out the o sack of salt a cinnamon bear approached, u The teamster held out a handful of salt. The a bear licked his hand clean and asked for more, ii The third handful was disappearing when the a other teamster returned, took the trace chains t and some rope, and bound the bear tightly, ii Ilis bearship stood the tying with good hu- d mor, and was placed in the wagon and brought a to Ilailey. tl PROSPERITY OP SOUTH CAROLINA. From the Augusta Chronicle. To those of our readers who have not kept up with the material progress of South Carolina, the figures of our Columbia correspondent may amount to a revelation. No State in this Union can present a more satisfactory record, notwithstanding misrule and corruption during a portion of the time?for the past ten years, and no State can claim with confidence a future more assuring. The first notification to the country that South Carolina had taken up with vigor her march in material things was the publication of the tenth census. Iler increase of population was found to be astounding, and her growth in agriculture and manufacturing was almost correspondingly large. During the past three years, however, the State has made giant strides. IIow better can such statements be emphasized than by reproducing the figures of our Columbia correspondent: In 1879 the number of bales of cotton raised in the State was 522,548; in 1882, 530,758. In 1879 11,704,349 bushels of corn were produced ; in 1882, 17,400,000 busheD. The amount of wheat harvested in 1879 was 902,330 bushels ; in 1882, 2,973,(500. Oats in 1879, 2,715,455 bushels;.in 1882, 8,094,000 bushels; [Barley in 1879,10,545 bushels ; in 18S2, 423,000 bushels. Rye in 1879, 20,987 bushels; in 1882, 130,500 bushels. Sorghum?gallons produced in 1879, 201,708 ; in 1882, 507,197 gallons. In 1879 the farmers sold 257,195 gallons of milk ; in 1882, 430,933 ;and in 1879 made 3,190,857 pounds of butter on the farm, and in 1882, 4,001,484 pounds. This too in face of the fact that 1881, a notoriously severe year upon the farming interest intervened in the period above cited. Hut as our correspondent goes on to say, "if the results obtained by the farmers of the State in tho past three years are supprising, the increased production in the past ten years is astounding." In 1870 the State produced 224,500 bales of cotton and 9,735,405 bushels of grain. There were 88 acres of improved land to the square mile, and 0 bales of cotton and 287 bushels of jrain were made to the square mile. In 1880 there was produced 522,548 bales of cotton uid 17,010,593 bushels of grain; there were 111 -iwoa nf fillorl lunrl tn t.lifl snnaro mile and 15 bales of cotton and 501 bushels of grain were made to the square mile. In 1870 147 pounds of lint cotton and 13 bnshels of grain, per capita of population were produced. In L880, 245 pounds of cotton and 17 bushels of grain. The value of the difference between the field of corn, wheat and oats in 1881 and 1882 is more than the value of the whole amount of farm supplies purchased outside of the State. Verily do these statistics speak volumes for prosperity and for the prospects of South Carolina. With such improvement, secured too during a time when a most disastrous financial panic had crippled the best growth of the whole country, the improvement of South Carolina at that period was as marked and as wonderful as her recuperation from the blight of civil war. What more assuring argument sail Kansas, or Iowa or Wisconsin make for the settlement of the immigrants, for the employment of labor or the investment of capital than South Carolina has forcibly set forth in these figures ? Xor is it alone to the foreign labor that she appeals. There is a lesson to 3very Southern farmer in the fact that in last year's cultivation there were half a million more acres planted in grain than in cotton. The State, too, is taking a prominent position in spinning the staple which grows abundantly in her fields. The productiveness of some of the cotton mills of Carolina has grown to be a part of the history of Augusta, still, the following figures taken from our Columbia letter, will be interesting in this connection : In 1870 there were 745 looms and 34,083 spindles in the cotton mills in the State, and the capital invested was ?1,337,000. The mills paid in wages, that year, $257,680, and employed 1,123 hands. They consumed 4,750,823 pounds of cotton, and value of all the products of the mills was $1,529,937. In 1880 there were 1,770 looms, 92,788 spindles, capital invested, $2,708,500; wages paid, $.340,100; hands employed, 2,195; pounds of cotton consumed, 14,809,500, and the value of all the producs was, $3,750,770. With such a record no fears need be felt of the future of a great State or of the prosperity of a noble people. They have secured a government as honest and as conservative as any in the Union, and they have gone to work themselves to prove that theirs is a State to be sought by others coming into this country. South Carolina during the recent war suffered heavily, but in her recuperation from these wrongs she has has shown more heroism than the conqueror of a hundred battles. Iler best people are in the fields at work; her most skillful hands are at the loom and her readiest wits are at the wheels of government or are devising means for the more complete rlevelopment of her resources. Many objectionable features of the old regime have passed away and have been replaced by a newer, stronger and healthier civilization, upheld by the dignity of labor brightened by the hope of lier people. In the ante-bellum days it used to be the belief of many politicians that South Carolina lonered to be the head and centre of a new Republic of this, section. Time has . hanged all that, but it Vould be 110 lowering jf her destiny were her people to resolve to make her one of the leaders of the New South n the restored Union?to rank with Georgia is an Empire State. A GLIMPSE OF SALT LAKE CITY. Salt Lake City is prettily laid out with wide streets at right angles, many large stores, well milt, and doing a good business, while the esidence portion contains very many fine louses surrounded with lawns tastefully laid jut, and a great variety of fruit and shade ;rees ; and all this has been reclaimed from a sage-brush plain by perseverance and a plenit'ul supply of water, distributed by a system )f irrigation. We were there at the time of i Mormon conference, and so had the oppor,unity of going to the "conference house" -church it would be called anywhere else?and law f>00 or more of the brothers and sisters, irincipally the latter assembled there, and alio heard President Taylor, Brigham Youngion of old Brigham?and one or two others L,i. fl?A n/lit.iti/iAmnnf nf f Loir incf l'tuf inn J1<1) IUL LUU UUVaUtCIiiUit Ui blttlJ. luobiiuvivii md annihilation of their enemies and oppresors. And here let me state my impression of he average Mormon. They are a set of peo>le drawn mostly from the lower classes of oreigners, and utterly devoid of personal >eauty or even average good looks, and as a vhole, showing a great lack of mental powers. )( course the leaders are exception to this last emark. "We next examined the tabernacle, but only mtside, as no Gentile would be allowed tliereji if it could be prevented. The new Tem>le was the next object of interest. It is 011y half completed, although the foundation was aid twenty-live years ago. It is to be a p-and massive structure of native stone, neary white, but lacking many (dements of beau11 4.1 .1. 4-.. otiltO.tif y. >> t; tiiun uiiivc iu liic ?atui oui|'n?t& prings, about three miles from town, while he driver filled us with anecdotes about the nliabitants. The "Bee hive," where Brig1am used to keep his numerous wives, was lext visited, though, without the association ,nd the bee hive on top, one would never look t the second time. Jt is a barrack-like, wo and a half story yellow adobe building, ior is the one next to it, surmounted by a lion, 11 which old Brigham used to live, any more ttractive. Since his death streets have been ut through these grounds, where formerly he unregenerate were never allowed to pass. When we reached the "bench land," or lateau, toward which the city has grown roin its original location lower down the nountain, we had a beautiful bird's eye view f the whole valley, with the city directly mler us. Imagine such hills or mountains s those surrounding the Profile House stretchng out into, as far as the eye can reach, continuous barrier around this basin, even he Salt Lake itself being partially hidden by is own mountainous islands, which in the istance give to it the appearance of a river, nil themselves as part of the great chain of lie valley. The city, with its many stores ' and dwellings, orchards and fine shade trees, both on the. streets and in the inclosures, lies [ at our feet, while as far as the eye can reach [ are farms, with their fields of grain, etc., in i the many colors of nature's patchwork, inter| sected by the railroads converging at Salt i Lake City. When we were there the snows 1 of the two days previous had been rain in the j valley, brightening everything, while on the i mountain-tops it had remained white and j unmelted, furnishing a beautiful contrast to I the green of the plateau and the brilliant colors of the Autumn leaves on every innsiae. Although the impression was one of beauty and grandeur which will long continue in my memory. BIRTH ANI) DEATH OF WORLDS. It lias beeu shown that had past geological changes in the earth taken place at the same rate as those which are now in progress, 100,000,(XX) of years at the very least would have been required to produce those effects which 1 have actually been produced, we find, since the earth's surface was lit to be the abode of life. But recently it has been pointed out, correctly in all probability, that under the greater tide raising power of the moon in past ages, these changes would have taken place more rapidly. As, however, certainly 10,000,000 of years, and probably a much longer time, must have elapsed since the moon was at that favorable distance for raising tides, we are by no means enabled, as some well meaning, but mistaken persons have imagined, to reduce the life bearing stage of the f.,>m o /lnrofinn nf TOO 000.000 of vears to a minute fraction of such a period. " The short life but extremely lively one, which they desired to see established by geological or astronomical reasoning, never can be demonstrated. At the very least, we must assign 10,000,000 years to the life-bearing stage j of the earth's existence. If we now multi- A ply tliis period by seven for Jupiter we get & period of 60,000,000 years longer. But take the stage preceding that of life on the earth. From the researches of Biscboff into the cooling of masses of heated rock, it seems to follow that a period of more than 300,000,000 years must have been required for the cooling of the earth from a temperature of 2000^ centigrade to one of 200?, a cooling which has certainly taken place. Suppose, however, that these experiments, or the calculations based on them, were vitiated by some error so considerable as to increase the real duration of the fiery stage of our earth's history more than ten fold, the real duration of that period being only 30,000,000 years. Multiply this in 1 turn by 7 and we get a period of 210,000,000 j years, or 180,000,000 years longer. We ought \ next to consider the vaporous stage; but the evidence on which to form an opinion as to the duration of this stage of a planet's history is too slight to be the basis of actual calculation. Here, as Tyndall has well remarked, "conjecture must entirely cease." But by considering only two stages?the fiery stage and the life bearing, or rather that portion of the life bearing stage through which the earth has hitherto passed?we find the two monstrous time differences?180,000,000 and 60,000,000 years in all. They mean that if our assumption as to the effect of Jupiter's superior mass is correct, then, supposing Jupiter and the earth to have started into existence as distinct or as at the same or nearly the same time, 240,000,000 years must elapse before Jupiter will reach the stage of planetary life through which our earth is now passing. Whether the assumption be correct or not, the time differences between the stages of Jupiter's life and the earth's are of this order. They must be measured by tens of millions if not by hundreds of millions of years. We must note, however, that the 240,000,000 of years correspond with only a seventh part of that time in the earth's history ; so that we may say that, if our assumptions are correct, Jupiter would now be in the state in which our earth was 34,000,000 years ago, or nearer the beginning than the end of the fiery stage.? Prof. Procter in Bcbjrucia. Sunk Lands of Arkansas.?The Sunk Lands, in southeastern Missouri and northeastern Arkansas, are a sort of terra incognita. The average newspaper reader knows more of either Central Africa or Central Asia. The country was formerly as beautiful and fertile a plot of land as any on the globe. Boiling prairies were shaded by heavy forests and traversed by two beautiful streams, the Little at St. Francois Rivera. The rivers still exist, but the general face of the country was marvellously changed by the great earthquake in 1811-12. " These streams, instead of raeadering through rolling prairies and primeval forests, now keep their tortuous courses by a chain of lakes and swamps of cypress and tupelo gum, draped artistically with elk vine and gray moss. It is a paradise of lowland scenery, from which millions of photographic views might be taken, leaving millions more of equal beauty untouched. rru - ? 1- T ova 10A rvnlna lnnflr JL Iie OUI1K JjiUJUS piuj'CL uir J.-V uinvw 4v?e and average GO miles wide. They are diversified with beautiful lakes, rolling prairies, and dense forests. The lakes contain much open water, and vary in depth from five to thirty feet. Some are covered with forests of cypress and tupelo gum, festooned with moss and vines. While canoeing your way over these weird timber-grown lakes long vistas 'neath overarching trees and vines open up to view, and in the dim distance, seemingly miles away, so marvellous is the prosixjctive, the waters of open lakes are tremulous with sunbeams. These timbered lakes are a favorite resort for trappers and hunters. They annually capture thousands of dollars' worth of furs. Otters, beavers, raccoons, opossums, and muskrats are trapped by the hundreds. Fine game fish are also caught here. You can take the black and Southern bass on a liy, the trout and silver fish, the sun perch, the silver side j perch, the last the prettiest and gamest fish I r l?../% Hwmi ii'airrliitinr twfl | ever JjUW. i. illivc tau^ui mcui mv..v and a half pouuds, and black bass and trout weighing from five to seven pounds. Catfish have been taken weighing ninety pounds, and gars eleven feet long have been killed in these lakes. The land is unusually fertile. Large farms under cultivation yield immense crops of corn, cotton, wheat, rye, oats, sorghum, potatoes, and other vegetables ; yet to a stranger the country seems like an unbroken forest. The timber includes the most valuable timber known to commerce, black walnut, ash, white oak of the finest ship building quality, post oak, cherry, maple, hichory, hackmatack, cypress, catalpa and sassafras. The Moon in January.?The January moon fulls on the 23d at thirty-one minutes past 2 o'clock in the morning. The moon is in conjunction with Venus on the Oth, passing 3? 5' south. Planet and crescent, if not very near, will be fair to see on the morning sky. On the 8th, the moon is near Mars, but both are invisible. The new moon on the Oth pays her respects to Mercury on the 10th, and draws near Neptune and Saturn on the 17th. She passes 2? north of Jupiter on the loth, and is at her nearest point to Uranus on the 27th. The moon is in perigree or nearest *? 1 A1.? tne eartn 011 uie jlzim, aim me uiuum iuuo high" on the 19th. Tlie Winter nights, says the Scientific American, will be superb about this time, for the moon, rising high in the heavens, near the full, and near the brilliant Jupiter, will, on cloudless nights, Hood the forest bound earth with silvery light. The Richest Mine in the Would.?To the westward of the Surry hills, in Tashania, in the county Russell, and at a distance of 1U0 miles from Launcestun, lies Mount Rischolf, and here a few adventurers found tin in IS72. A company was formed and workings were commenced. i\n eminent mineralogist reported that the mountain was almost a solid mass of tin, the ore yielding from 70 to 80 per cent, of pure metal. Large swelting works were erected at Launceston, and in the year 1870 1,000 tons of tin were raised. Twentylive shillings only have been paid upon each share, but the present market price is from 00 to . 09, the company during the last four years having paid a dividend every two months of 10 shillings per share. A fortunate gentleman in Ilobort, who expended 87.7 in the purchase of 700 shares in 1870 rejoices in the receipt of 82,100 a year as the income of his investment.? London Fit hi.