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FOLKS in town, I reckon, thinks
They git all the fun they air
Runnin' loose 'round! - but, 'y jinks!
We got fun, and fun to spare,
Right out here amongst the ash
And oak timber ever'where!
Some folks else kin cut a dash
'Sides town-people, don't fergit! -
'Specially in winter-time,

When they 's snow, and roads is fit.
In them circumstances I 'm
Resignated to my lot-
Which puts me in mind o' what
'S called "The Literary."

"I WAS 'P'INTED TO BE WHAT THEY CALL 'CRITIC."

Us folks in the country sees
Lots o' fun!-Take spellin'-school;
Er ole hoe-down jamborees;
Er revivals; er ef you'll
Tackle taffy-pullin's you

Kin git fun, and quite a few!-
Same with huskin's. But all these
Kind o' frolics they hain't new
By a hundred year' er two,
Cipher on it as you please!
But I'll tell you what I jest
Think walks over all the rest
Anyway it suits me best,-
That's "The Literary."

First they started it"'y gee!"
Thinks-says-I, "This settlement
'S gittin' too high-toned fer me!"
But when all begin to jine,
And I heerd Izory went,

I jest kind o' drapped in line

Like you've seen some sandy, thin,

Scrawny shoat put fer the crick

Down some pig-trail through the thick

Spice-bresh, where the whole drove's been

'Bout six weeks 'fore he gits in!

"Can't tell nothin'," I-says-ee,

"'Bout it tel you go and see

Their blame Literary!''

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Very first night I was there
I was 'p'inted to be what
They call "Critic" - so 's a fair
And square jedgment could be got
On the pieces 'at was read,
And on the debate,-" Which air

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" TOMPS, HE READ ONE ON 'DREENIN' SWAMPS.'"'

Then they sung some - tel I called
Order, and got back ag'in

In the critic's cheer, and hauled
All o' the p'formers in.
Mandy Brizendine read one

I fergit; and Doc's was "Thought";
And Sarepty's, hern was "None

Air denied 'at knocks "; and Daut-
Fayette Strawnses little niece
She got up and spoke a piece:
Then Izory she read hern-

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They was some contendin'-yit
We broke up in harmony.
Road outside as white as grit,
And as slick as slick could be! -
I'd fetched 'Zory in my sleigh,
And I had a heap to say,
Drivin' back - in fact, I driv
'Way around the old north way,
Where the Daubenspeckses live.
'Zory allus-'fore that night-
Never 'peared to feel jest right
In my company.- You see,
On'y thing on earth saved me
Was that " Literary!"

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James Whitcomb Riley.

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AU LARGE.*

BY GEORGE W. CABLE,

Author of "Old Creole Days," "The Grandissimes," "Grande Pointe," etc.

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FOR

XIV.

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WHO SHE WAS.

a moment somewhat more than her profile shone upon Claude's bewildered gaze. "I shall see her eye to eye at last!" shouted his heart within; but the next moment she turned away and with two companions who came across the same threshold moved up the street and at the nearest corner vanished. Her companions were the American lady and the artist. Claude wheeled and hurried to pass around the square in the opposite direction, and as he reached the middle of its third side saw the artist hand them into the street-car, lift his hat, and return towards the studio. The two men met at the foot of the stairs. The Spaniard's countenance betrayed a restrained elation.

"You goin' see a picture, now," he said, in a modestly triumphant tone. "Come in," he added, as Claude would have passed the studio door.

They went in together. The Spaniard talked; Claude scarcely spoke. I cannot repeat the conversation literally, but the facts are these: A few evenings before, the artist had been one of the guests at a musical party given by a lady whose name he did not mention. He happened -he modestly believed it accidental to be seated beside the hostess, when a young lady "jung Creole la-thy,' he called her- who was spending a few days with her played the violin. The Spaniard's delicate propriety left her, also, nameless, but he explained that, as he understood, she was from

Copyright, 1887, by George W. Cable. All rights reserved.

the Teche. She played charmingly-"for an amateur," he qualified; but what had struck him more than the music was her beauty, her figure, her picturesque grace. And when he confessed his delight in these, his hostess, seemingly on the inspiration of the moment, said:

"Paint her picture! Paint her just so! I'll give you the order! Not a mere portrait―a picture!" And he had agreed, and the "jung" lady had consented. The two had but just now left the studio. To-morrow a servant would bring violin, music-rack, etc.; the ladies would follow, and then

"You hear music, anyhow," said the artist. That was his gentle way of intimating that Claude was not invited to be a looker-on.

On the next day Claude, in his nook above, with the studio below shut from view by the curtain of his inner window, heard the ladies come. He knows they are these two; for one voice, the elder, blooms out at once in a gay abundance of words, and the other speaks in soft low tones that before they reach his ear run indistinguishably together.

Soon there comes the sound of tuning the violin, while the older voice is still heard praising one thing and another and asking careless questions.

66 I suppose that cotton cloth covers something that is to have a public unveiling some day, does n't it ? "

Claude cannot hear the answer; the painter drops his voice even below its usual quiet tone. But Claude knows what he must be saying; that the cloth covers merely a portrait he is finishing, of a young man who has sat for it to please a wifeless, and but for him childless, and fondly devoted father. And now he can tell by the masculine step, and the lady's one or two lively words, that the artist has drawn away the covering from his (Claude's) own portrait. But the lady's young companion goes on tuning her instrument" tink, tink, tink"; and now the bow is drawn.

"Why, how singular!" exclaims the elder lady. "Why, my dear, come here and see! Somebody has got your eyes! Why, he's got your whole state of mind, a reduplication of it! And I declare, he looks almost as good as you do! If—I.

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The voice stops short. There is a moment's silence in which the unseen hearer doubts not the artist is making signs that yonder window and curtain are all that hide the picture's original, and the voice says, again:

"I wish you'd paint my picture," and the violin sounds once more its experimental

notes.

not see that the elder lady is already wondering at and guardedly watching an agitation betrayed by the younger in a tremor of the hand that fumbles with her music-sheets and music-stand, in the foot that trembles on the floor, in the reddened cheek, and in the bitten lip. He may guess that the painter sits at his easel with kindling eye; but he can not guess that just as the elder lady is about to say:

66

My dear, if you don't feel". the tremor vanishes, the lips gently set, and only the color remains. But he hears the first soft moan of the tense string under the bow, and a second, and another; and then as he rests his elbows upon the table before him and covers his face in his trembling hands it seems to him as if his own lost heart had entered into that vibrant medium, and is pouring thence to heaven and her ear its prayer of love.

Paint, artist, paint! Let your brushes fly! None can promise you she shall ever look quite like this again. Catch the lines,― the waving masses and dark coils of that loosebound hair; the poise of head and neck; the eloquent sway of the form; the folds of garments that no longer hide, but are illumined by, the plenitude of an inner life and grace; the elastic feet; the ethereal energy and discipline of arms and shoulders; the supple wrists; the very fingers quivering on the strings; the rapt face, and the love-inspired eyes!

Claude, Claude! when every bird in forest and field knows the call of its mate, can you not guess the meaning of those strings? Must she open those sealed lips and call your very name she who would rather die than call it?

He does not understand! Yet, without understanding, he answers. He rises from his seat; he moves to the window; he will not tiptoe or peep; he will be bold and bad! Brazenly he lifts the curtain and looks down; and one, one only,—not the artist and not the patroness of art, but that one who would not lift her eyes to that window for all the world's wealth,-knows he is standing there, listening and looking down. He counts himself all unseen, yet presently shame drops the curtain. He turns away, yet stands hearkening. The music is about to end. The last note trembles on the air. There is silence. Then some one moves from a chair, and then the single cry of admiration and delight from the player's companion is the player's name

"Marguerite Beausoleil!"

Hours afterward there sat Claude in the seat where he had sunk down when he heard that name. The artist's visitors had made a But there are other things, which Claude long stay, but at length they were gone. And can neither hear nor see nor guess. He can now Claude, too, rose to go out. His steps

VOL. XXXV.— 75.

were heard below, and presently the painter's how he 'low to meet up wid yo' at yo' papa' voice called persuadingly up: house to-morrow daylight. Yes, seh; Mistoo Tah-baux; yes, seh."

"St. Pierre! St. Pierre! Come, see." They stood side by side before the new work. Claude gazed in silence. At length he said, still gazing:

"I'll buy it when 't is finish'."

But the artist explained again that it was being painted for Marguerite's friend.

"For what she want it?" demanded Claude. The Spaniard smiled and intimated that the lady probably thought he could paint. "But at any rate," he went on to say, "she seemed to have a hearty affection for the girl herself, whom," he said, "she had described as being as good as she looked." Claude turned and went slowly out.

When at sunset he stood under the honeylocust tree on the levee where he was wont to find his father waiting for him, he found himself alone. But within speaking distance he saw St. Pierre's skiff just being drawn ashore by a ragged negro, who presently turned and came to him, half-lifting the wretched hat that slouched about his dark brows, and smiling.

"Sim like yo' done fo'got me," he said. "Don't yo' 'member how I use' live at Belle Alliance? Yes, seh. I 's de one what show Bonaventure de road to Gran' Point'. Yes, seh. But I done lef' dah since Mistoo Wallis sole de place. Yes, sch. An' when I meet up wid yo' papa yo' nevva see a nigger so glad like I was. No, seh. An' likewise yo' papa. Yes, seh. An' he ass me is I want to wuck fo' him, an' I see he needin' he'p, an' so I tu'n in an' he'p him. Oh, yes, seh! dass mo' 'n a week, now, since I been wuckin' fo' yo' papa."

They got into the skiff and pushed off, the negro alone at the oars.

"Pow'ful strong current on udder side," he said, pulling quietly up-stream to offset the loss of way he must make presently in crossing the rapid flood. "Mistoo Claude, I see a gen'leman dis day noon what I ain't see' befo' since 'bout six year' an' mo'. I disremember his name, but

"Tarbox?" asked Claude with sudden in

terest.

"Yes, seh. Dass it! Tah-baux. Sim like any man ought to 'member that name. Him an' yo' papa done gone down de canal. Yes, seh; in a pirogue. He come in a big hurry an' say how dey got a big crevasse up de river on dat side, an' he want make yo' papa see one man what livin' on Lac Cataouaché. Yes, seh. An' yo' papa say yo' fine yo' supper in de pot. An' Mistoo Tah-baux he say he want yo' teck one hoss an' ride up till de crevasse an' yo' fine one frien' of yose yondah, one ingineer; an' he say-Mistoo Tah-baux

XV.

CAN THEY CLOSE THE BREAK? THE towering cypresses of the far southern swamps have a great width of base, from which they narrow so rapidly in the first seven or eight feet of their height, and thence upward taper so gradually, that it is almost or quite impossible for an ax-man standing at their roots to chop through the great flare that he finds abreast of him and bring the trees down. But when the swamps are deep in water the swamper may paddle up to these trees whose narrowed waists are now within the swing of his ax, and standing up in his canoe, by a marvel of balancing skill, cut and cut until at length his watchful up-glancing eye sees the forest giant bow his head. Then a shove, a few backward sweeps of the paddle, and the canoe glides aside, and the great trunk falls, smiting the smooth surface of the water with a roar that, miles away, reaches the ear like the thunder of artillery. The tree falls; but if the woodsman has not known how to judge and choose wisely when the inner wood is laid bare under the first big chip that flies, there are many chances that the fallen tree will instantly sink to the bottom of the water and can not be rafted out. One must know his craft even in Louisiana swamps. "Knowledge is power."

When Zoséphine and Mr. Tarbox finished. out that Sunday twilight walk, they talked, after leaving the stile behind, only on business. He told her of having lately been with a certain expert in the swamps of Barataria, where he had seen some noble cypress forests tantalizingly near to navigation and market, but practically a great way off, because the levees of the great sugar estates on the Mississippi River shut out all deep overflows. Hence these forests could be bought for, seemingly, a mere tithe of their value. Now, he proposed to buy such a stretch of them along the edge of the shaking prairie north of Lake Cataouaché as would show on his part, he said, "caution, but not temerity."

He invited her to participate. "And why?" For the simple reason that the expert, and engineer, had dropped the remark that in his opinion a certain levee could not possibly hold out against the high water of more than two or three more years, and that when it should break it would spread from three to nine feet of water over hundreds of square miles of swamp forests, prairies tremblantes, and rice and sugar fields, and many leagues of railway.

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