But our pendulum had
swung too wide. Like many folk who suffer from one discomfort, we had
gone to the utmost extreme and courted another. We were tired of
climbing hills, and so we pressed too far into the lowland; and the
first grave dug in our Cemetery showed three inches of water at the
bottom. It was in "Prince's new lot," and there his young daughter was
to lie. But her lover had stood by while the men were making the grave;
and, looking into the ooze below, he woke to the thought of her fair
young body there.
"God!" they heard him say, "she sha'n't lay so. Leave it as it is, an'
come up into the old buryin'-ground. There's room enough by me."
The men, all mates of his, stopped work without a glance and followed
him; and up there in the dearer shrine her place was made. The father
said but a word at her changed estate. Neighbors had hurried in to
bring him the news; he went first to the unfinished grave in the
Cemetery, and then strode up the hill, where the men had not yet done.
After watching them for a while in silence, he turned aside; but he
came back to drop a trembling hand upon the lover's arm.
"I guess," he said miserably, "she'd full as lieves lay here by you."
And she will be quite beside him, though, in the beaten ways of earth,
others have come between.
Pages:
308
309
310
311
312
313
314
315
316
317
318
319
320
321
322
323
324
325
326
327
328
329
330
331
332