The Lights and Shadows of Real Life Part 96

For many nights previous to the day on which permission would be granted her to see him, sleep had parted from her eyelids; and when the time did come, she was in a high state of mental excitement.

Morning slowly dawned upon her anxious eyes, but seemed as if it would never give place to the broad daylight. At last the sun came slowly up from his bright chambers in the east. It was the day on which she should again see her husband; the long-looked-for, the long-hoped-for. Tremblingly she stole out, ere the day was an hour old, and ran, not walked, to the gloomy dwelling-place of her husband.

For several days previous she had not been able to keep away from the prison, and the keeper, who knew her errand, had become much interested in her case. He received her kindly, and made instant preparation for the desired interview.

For three years Warburton had not heard the music of a human voice.

Far away from the sight or sound of his fellow-prisoners, he had dwelt alone, visited only by the mute keeper who had brought his daily food, or otherwise ministered to his wants. To his earnest and oft-repeated inquiries if nothing was known of his wife and children, for whose welfare a yearning anxiety had sprung up in his breast, he was answered only by a gloomy silence. He did not know, even on the morning of his release from solitary confinement, that the all-enduring companion of his better days had come to cheer his anxious eyes with her presence. Soon after daylight of this morning the door of his cell turned heavily on its hinges, and he was brought out among his fellows, and heard again the sweetest music that had ever fallen upon his ear, the music of the human voice. A stronger thrill of pleasure had never pa.s.sed through his frame. He felt as though he could remain thus shut out from the rest of the world for ever, so that he could see and talk with his fellow-men.

He did not then think of the keen delight that awaited him, for in the first impulse of selfish gratification he had forgotten the being who loved him better than life.

An hour had not pa.s.sed when he was again called for. The door of a private apartment in the keeper's house was thrown open, and he entered alone. There was but one being present: a pale, haggard woman, poorly clad, who tottered towards him with extended arms. At that moment both hearts were too full, and their lips were sealed in silence. But oh! how eagerly did each bind the other in a long, long embrace! It seemed as if their arms would never be unlocked. For one hour were they left, thus alone. But how were years crowded into that hour; years of endurance--terrible endurance!

It seemed scarcely one-tenth of that short time, when Mrs. Warburton was summoned away, but with the kind permission to visit her husband at the same hour every day. Slowly she pa.s.sed beneath the ponderous gate, and still more slowly moved away, thinking how long it would be before another day had pa.s.sed, bringing another blessed interview.

The case of Warburton and his faithful wife soon came to the ears of the governor, and he having expressed considerable sympathy for them, the fact was soon made known to Mrs. Warburton, who was recommended to pet.i.tion him in person for a remission of the sentence. The hint was no sooner given than acted upon, and after a delay of several months of hope and fear, to the joy of her heart, she found her husband at liberty.

In some of his former business or gambling transactions he had become possessed of a clear t.i.tle to three hundred acres of land, upon which was a log-cabin, situated about thirty miles eastward from the capital of the state, and nearly upon the national road.

Searching among his papers, still preserved by his wife, he found the deed, and as nothing better offered, he started with his family and but ten dollars, to begin the world anew as a backwoods farmer.

The few articles of furniture which his wife had preserved, served to render the dilapidated cabin, in which was not a single pane of gla.s.s, sash, or shutter, barely comfortable. It was early in the spring when they re-moved, and though the right time for planting corn and the ordinary table vegetables, yet it would be months before they would be fit to use. In the mean time, a subsistence must be had. The quickest way to obtain food Warburton found in the use of his rifle, for wild turkeys and deer abounded in the forest.

He also managed to take a few dozen turkeys now and then to a neighbouring town, and dispose of them for corn-meal, flour, and groceries. In about a month he was enabled to sell one hundred acres of his land for three hundred dollars, one hundred in money, and the balance in necessary things for stocking a farm. He was now fairly started again, with a cow, a horse, and all requisite agricultural implements.

Mrs. Warburton did not feel satisfied in her own mind that this sudden relief from daily pressing want would be a real benefit to them. She had learned to suspect the reformation which was effected by the force of external circ.u.mstances, while no salutary change in the will was going on. For some time, however, she had every reason to be encouraged. Her husband was industrious, and careful to make the best he possibly could out of his farm, and was kind and attentive to her and his children. Their garden, as the summer wore away, presented a rich supply of vegetables, and their corn and potatoes in the fall yielded enough for their use during the winter, besides several bushels for sale.

The winter, however, did not pa.s.s away without several indications on the part of Warburton of a disposition to indulge in the pleasures of the bottle. There had been, in the course of the summer, a tavern erected, about a mile from his dwelling, on the national road; and here, during the dull winter months, he too frequently resorted, to pa.s.s away the hours, with such persons as are usually to be found at these haunts of idleness.

The income of this house, as a place of accommodation for travellers, was very small, for within four miles of it stood a tavern and stage-house, kept in a style that had made it known to the travelling public. It was simply a receptacle for the odd change of the neighbours, at times when they had an hour or two to spare from business. Gradually, its business increased, and as gradually the farms of one or two individuals in the neighbourhood, who were, more frequently than others, to be found at the tavern, evinced a corresponding decrease in their flouris.h.i.+ng condition. Fences that never wanted a panel were now broken in many places; and barns that never admitted a drop of rain, now leaked at a hundred pores. Once, there was an air of cheerfulness and plenty around their dwellings; now, wives and children looked, the former troubled and broken in spirits, the latter dirty and neglected. Where once reigned peace and quietness, existed wrangling and strife.

During the succeeding farming season, Warburton gave considerable attention--cultivating his ground, which in the fall yielded him an abundant return. Still, during the summer, he visited the "White Hall Tavern" too frequently, and was too often under the bewildering and exciting influence of liquor. The next winter tended greatly to complete the work of dissipation, which had been commenced a year before. Frequently he would come home so much intoxicated as to be lost to all reason. At such times he was not the stupid, good-natured, drunken fool that is often met with; he was then a cruel, unreasonable and exacting tyrant. His poor wife and children did not only suffer from his wordy ill temper, but had to endure in silence his blows, and often tremble even for their lives. When sober, an indistinct remembrance of his cruelties and other bad conduct, instead of softening his feelings towards his family, made him moodily silent, or cross and snappish if a word were said to him.

The constant and almost daily drain of small change for liquor, had nearly exhausted all the money in the house long before the winter was over. The accommodating landlord seemed to discover, as by instinct, this condition of things, and encouraged Warburton to run up a score. He well knew that at any time it was easy to get the payment out of a man who had a good farm, well stocked. Not so much for the money to be made at the business, as for the purpose of attracting more persons to his tavern, the landlord of the "White Hall" kept a small store. At this store, Warburton, long before the winter was over, had also made a pretty large bill. As if to atone for his unkindness to, and neglect of his family, he would rarely return from his voluntary visits at the tavern, without bringing home something. A few pounds of sugar to-day, some cheese or fish to-morrow, or some dried fruit on the day after. The excuse, that such and such a thing was wanted, was often made to get away to the public house, and thus scarcely a day pa.s.sed without a dollar or two being entered against him on the books of the smiling landlord.

When the spring opened, and his bill was made out, much to his surprise, he found his account to be one hundred and fifty dollars!

After some two or three weeks' pondering on the matter, during which time he was cross and sulky at home, two fine cows and one of his best horses were quietly transferred from his pasture to the more capacious one of the landlord of the "White Hall;" and thus his account was squared with Boniface.

The discouragement consequent upon such a reduction of his stock, tended to make him less industrious and less pleasant. He was constantly grumbling about his expensive family, and could not afford to send his two oldest children to a school just opened in the neighbourhood, although the master offered to take them both for five dollars a quarter. His wife, he said, could teach them at home.

And in this she was not neglectful, as far as her time allowed.

How rarely does the drunkard, when once fairly started, stop in his downward course! How similar is the history of each one! Neglect of business--neglect of family--confirmed idleness--abuse of family--waste of property--and finally, abject poverty.

In less than three years from the day on which he breathed the air again as a free man--free, through the untiring a.s.siduity of his neglected but faithful wife, he struck her to the ground, and unregardful of all the ties of nature, left her alone with her children, in the wilds of the west, after having made over house and farm to the land lord of the "White Hall," for fifty dollars and his bill at the bar.

Day after day did his poor wife wait and look for him to return, until even hope failed, and she at last, with a heavy heart, commenced the task of recalling her own energies in aid of the little ones around her.

But she soon found her condition to be far worse than she had imagined. But a few days pa.s.sed after her husband had left her before the hard-hearted tavern-keeper came, and removed everything but the house in which she lived from off the place, and then gave her notice that she must also remove, and in three weeks, as he had rented the farm to a man who wished to take immediate possession.

Hope, the kind and ever attendant angel of the distressed, for more than a week seemed ready to depart; but at the end of that time, a faint desire to return to her native city began to grow into a resolution, and by the time a second week had pa.s.sed away, she had fully resolved to set out upon the journey.

But she had only twenty dollars, after disposing of the few things their rapacious creditor had left them, and with this she had to go a journey of nearly five hundred miles, with three children, the oldest about twelve years of age. But when once her mind is made up, there are few things a resolute mother will not undertake for her children.

By persevering in her applications, day after day, to the wagoners on the national road, she at length so far prevailed on one of them as to let her and her children ride as far as Zanesville, for the trifle of a dollar or two, in his wagon.

In the true spirit of success, she looked only at the present difficulty, reserving thought and attention for all succeeding difficulties, whenever they might come. In this spirit she cut herself loose from her place in the west, and started for--utterly unable to say how she should ever reach the desired spot.

For the first day or two, the wagoner held no conversation with her; he had been unable to resist the promptings of his kind feelings in favour of one who had asked him for aid, although he had much rather not have given her a place in his wagon. By degrees, however, his temper changed, and he occasionally asked a question, or made a pa.s.sing remark; and by the time he had reached Zanesville, he had become so interested in her case, that he refused to take the stipulated price, and kindly offered to carry her as far as Wheeling, and to--, if he found it to his interest to go there.

The way thus providentially opened for her, few obstacles remained, and in the course of a few weeks she found herself again in the home of her childhood, the dear spot that had lived in her memory, green and inviting, for years.

But how changed was the poor sufferer! But a very few dollars of her money was left. The fatigue of travel. ling so long and in so uncomfortable a manner, had gradually shaken the props of a feeble body; and by the time she looked again upon the old, familiar places, her form was drooping with sickness.

Slowly she descended from the wagon, received her children, one by one, from the hands of the wagoner, thanked him with a tearful look, and tottered away. But where could she go? She had neither home, nor money, nor friends--was sick and faint. Years before, she had tripped lightly along the very street through which she now dragged her weary limbs. She even pa.s.sed by the same house, and heard the light laughter of thoughtless voices, from the same window from which she had once looked forth in earlier years, a joyful and light-hearted creature. How familiar did that dear spot seem! but how agonizing the contrast that forced itself upon her! Little did the merry maiden who looked out upon the pale mother, with drooping form and soiled garments, who gazed up so earnestly towards her, imagine, that but a few years before, that poor creature looked forth from that same window, a glad-hearted girl.

Scarcely able to act or decide rationally, for her head ached intensely, and she was burning with fever, Mrs. Warburton wandered about the streets with her three children, one a boy about twelve years old, the other a little girl about nine, and the third, a little one tottering by her side, scarce two years old. All at once, as she turned her steps into--street, her eye caught sight of the tall poplars that indicated the home of the homeless. "I have no home but this," she murmured to herself, and turned her steps instinctively towards the dark ma.s.s of buildings that stood near the present intersection of--and--streets.

"Where is your permit?" said the keeper, as she falteringly asked for admission.

"I have none," was the faint reply.

"We cannot take you, unless you bring a permit from one of the commissioners."

"I don't know any commissioner."

"Where are you from?"

"I have just come to town from the west, and am too sick to do anything. I feel faint, and unable to go farther. Can you not admit me, and let application be made to the commissioners for me?"

The appearance of Mrs. Warburton too plainly indicated her sick condition, and the keeper thought it best to admit her for the present. A meeting of the commissioners was held on the same afternoon, and a formal admission given.

The first indication that Mrs. W. had, that she was no longer at liberty to choose or think for herself, was the entire separation of her children from her. True, she was soon too ill to attend to them, but that would have made no difference. After a dangerous illness of many weeks, during most of which time she was insensible to everything around her, she was again able to droop about a little.

Her first questions, after the healthy reaction of body and mind, were about her children; her first request, to see them. But this was denied. "They are doing well enough," was all the answer she could get.

"But cannot I see Emma, my little one? Do let me see her!"

"It is contrary to the rules of the inst.i.tution. You cannot see her now."

"When can I see her?"

"I don't know,"--and the nurse of the sick woman left her and went to attend somewhere else, utterly insensible to the keen agony of the mother's heart. Was she not a pauper? What right had she to human feelings? But a mother's love is not to be chained down to rules, or circ.u.mscribed by the narrow policy of chartered expediency. As Mrs. Warburton slowly gained strength, a quicker perception of her situation grew upon her, and she soon determined to know all about her children. In vain had she asked to see them; but each denial only increased the desire, and confirmed her resolutions to see them and know all about them.

One day, when she could walk about a little, a day on which she knew the board of commissioners were in session, she watched her opportunity, and when the nurse was attending in another part of the room, stole quietly out, and soon made her way to the commissioners'

room.

"Gentlemen, a mother asks your indulgence," was her appeal, as the keeper checked her entrance.

"Let her enter, Mr.--," said one of them.

"What is your wish, good woman?" continued the first speaker.

"I want to see my children."

Her voice was so low and mournful, and her pale face, which still retained many traces of former beauty, expressed so strongly her maternal anxiety, that the hearts of all were touched.