Show I I r A ROMANCE OF DULLTOWN i I u 5 G VWVVv VVVVWVVD L i 1 BY J W TEJIPLE II Ccp1t 1S95 by S S McClure LUn I I tted j Oullkywn as any tyro I In geography can I fceH is a Village of u few hundred inhabitants II inhab-itants situated on the line of the X X Xi railroad in the county of Blank and ie state of Incognito I Ito describe it as a real estate agent fwouM do It is Ore centre of o fine agricultural agricul-tural region and a trading point of no mean orcha judged by the staples bftaned from its depot and the merchandise merchan-dise sold by 1ts several Stores to the country people located near It It has the regulation supply of Shops offices and warehouses its churches its tscnoote its fine residences and Humble ctfttoges Itt it-t numbers among its population its rich z nan Its welltodo tradesmen its day k laborers its loafers it has its preachers < frts doctors its teachers it has its local politicians its officeseekers its cranks r ats weather prophets its orators for t otrrChofJuly demand and other occa HV ions It has tts local oauabbles its pro Sessional jealousies its commercial rival nes It has its milliners its dressmakers its fashionable coteries and their humble fimilators It has its elections on which days society is Stirred to its profoundest depths by the Struggles of Smith Brown and Jones to oewme constable justice assessor or collector It also takes a live part in greater affairs and semIs its three or four delegates to county conventions nvith commendable punctuality If ali of these pointers having been gaven the intelligent reader cannot locate lo-cate the village or town In the writers mInd he must be dull indeed He can have nv > more data from me It is quite possible however that different persons aIM locate It differently as I go on with an analysis of some of the peculiarities of its prominent citizens hurst that we may show a proper respect re-spect for wealth let us commence with the rich man of the town This Important personage who has now retired from active commercial pursuits and 4s in the enjoyment of a dignified old age came to the county of Blank in its early settlement Having a little money i and much shrewdness Ihe decided that I breaking prairie and raising stock was a slow way to wealth so he established a country store where he coijld enjoy a monopoly of the trade and whatever percentage per-centage he choose to ask on his sales which simplified merchandising Tery much 3n those early days He also invesice some spire money in buying tax titles having the good luck thereby to become i the owner of several pieces of land for 1 feited by their former owners under pressure of the times to the inevitable 1 I I tax laws He also gave credit and even I I made small loans at big interest to several sev-eral farmers who owned exceptionally good farms in ts1 vicinity but were poor calculators and when the times of set I tlement came and the debtors failed to pay further obliging them by extending the time on their executing certain mortgages mort-gages to secure the same which mortgages mort-gages generallv swallowed farms and improvements im-provements when the times got bad as they usuall did in those days These farms thus falling into his hands he either sold again partly on time with Eoortsage to secure the balance or rented to tenants taking chattel mortgages to secure the rent on the crops and teams of Sris renters so that let crops succeed or I fail he was safe and in fact a failure of buyer or tenant was better ti him than their success So in a few years he quit merchandising and set up as a banker loaned money shaved notes bought and sold farms and is now re tired from active business unless collect ing rents and cutting coupons be called such and as reaping the rewards of a wellspent life 5n the deference and de E pendence of hosts of his old neighbors though some arc illnatured enough to J associate his name with that of one Shy T Jock a Shakespearean memory but there are envious men everywhere a also thfere are e who call a spade a spade It would give me great pleasure to pro J on describing other residents of Dull 1 ow if I did not fear to bore the reader I should lk to describe its one lawyer whose principal forte it was r stir up t litigation in the neighborhood I should shold like t sketch the two justices of the peace dignified a owls and a Ignorant of lw but w fairly good judgment to get at the equity of cases unless be ce unles be fogged by the lawyers I should like to I lke several describe the preachers who filling their v appointments ra appitent came every two eVe 110 years full of energy and purpose t do much good but who found themselves confronted at the start by quarrelsome cliques within their own churches and petty jealousies bickerings and scandals I i without wWch neutralized their best ef t ft at reform while social life hsd its iie casts Sts sets and a ostracisms which 3o merit in the individual nor in 1 ret in the cause ctould combat I could describe also that decribe aso ubiquitous per onvge the fast young man who punctually put in an appearance every evening at tne corner restaurant or ogled young ladies 0 their way to church who I h in spite of the care of the authorities autrie sfonnd means to keep hi flask filled and emptied every day and became eloquent < and melodious frequently as well as er I e a e ratic in his locomotion on Saturday even Jnes also that class of hangerson oC the village who seemed to have no visible means of support those unsolved conun I drums of every community who toll not neither do they spin but yet 11 trive t keep fat and sleek I could describe another class most active Sn the village Jife of Dulltown I Chat class of lfconstituted censors of I rubite morals whose duty and pleasure it seems to be ito watch over the affairs of other people much gratified to fnd rfar a i i Screfw loose or a flaw somewhere in the I i I rum lnggeas of the social machine In i d s zealous do they become that I they grow prophetic predicMnjr evils they cant see and like the dentist in his work 5 they find no cavities try to I 1 j I make them They have capital noses for noes faults they assign discreditable causes for actions good or ba 1 frailty claimed a victim they sucPicloned t bOn Hiw i if misfortune overtook a neighbor they had looked for it from his foolish man foaUS mn agement To be first 1 unearth a slan jr and to variegate it with fanciful dec orations as a Scott says the very skfrnminsr of their lifes cream 1 But ail these pointers will help the reader little to locate Dulltown There are sever villages we know or pos see of like citizens and the reader will feel like calling the writer o time and bidding him quit an bing hi qut generalities and drive o with his wagon Well Dulltown had its romance Start ixit incredulous reader I is not alone the unexpected but the improbable that that happens wa it probable that a tan ner of Galena or n sheriff of Buffalo a railspMfcter of Illinois or a canalboat Or a cnalbo boy o Ohio would fill the worlds high est places Was pla any good expected 1 coare out of Nazareth S a romance ro-mance is Txrssible anywhere even Sn Dulltown For the Ingredients of romance arc everywhere if properly mixed What n they Youth love ambition hope ruccess Given a poor but gallant youth for a lover Q lovely romantic maiden with regulation blue or hazel or dark eyes a hard worldly father opportunity in the shape of village sociables or other leveling or democratic assemblages where the rich and the poor meet together to-gether and the Lord 3s the maker of them all a the Bible says t illustrate the levelling function of such meetings and you have material for a romance even in the Dulltowns of the world So We wU prepare to mix our ingredients i ingredi-ents Perhaps the incantation of Mac beths witches would be a good Introduc ton Double double toil and trouble But It needs no mystic rhyme Trouble will double fast enough of its fat own motion mo-tion in such cases a this But we will Let artfully chapter adjourn our story her to the II The widow Brown moved Into Dulltown I one cold day in November or I forget what year But no matter Time 4s note not-e essence of my contract It is more essential to say that the Widow Brown a a a neighbor sid poor as plsen < ThIs neighbor was of the class before mentioned who deemed it their special duty to know just how poor their new neighbor was But poor she was theres no aenying else she had not taken such Srwor house on S back street of Dull town and immediately given cut that she wanted work to keep her family consist ins of herself and tree children She 1 proved to be 2 good needlewoman and I scon obtained work enough t keep the wolf from the doorwhich i easier to don i do-n the west even where wolves arc plenty plen-ty than In big cites they say Then she sent her two biggest children to school John her oldest opeful was a sturdy rollicking ragged chunk of a boy of 13 ragged but clean and well groomed and somehow his rags didnt I sit heavy on his soul to the inculcating of undue humility for before the first I schoolday was over he had licked tie for malting some profane and facetious remarks as Nasby would fay on the cut marks a Ivasby would say on the cut I and quality of his Johnny Browns trousers trou-sers and jacket The fact that the merchants mer-chants boy was a year his senior and the bully of the school at once made young Johnny loved feared and respected respect-ed by his mates a condition some philosopher philos-opher pronounces the most desirable one possible i this vale of tears At all events Johnnys ragged jacket didnt oa tracise him in the school and on the playground play-ground a certain Indefinite quality of leadership l asserted itself but in so pleasant pleas-ant and jolly a way that very few felt called upon to make head against i Then Johnny Brown had a peculiar and original way of mastering his schoolbooks that was rather remarkable in Dulltown Far it had been customary there as elsewhere where for pupils to depend on their teachers teach-ers to punch em up as the directors expressed it and they had got so used to the punchingup process and had considered consid-ered It so goodnatured on their part towards wards their teachers to learn at all even with all the encouragement those unfortunates unfortu-nates could give them that they looked on Johnnys voluntary learning of a lesson les-son as little less that flat burglary I and some of the boldest took occasion to remonstrate with him for truckling so much to old Whackem the master But Johnny had his own notions on this as I on most mater Beside he had a little mother at home whom he cared more t please than all the people of Dulltown 1 i I ccsnbined and this unreasonable little bcdy had desolte her poverty presumed to entertain hopes and ambitions for hpr curl headed boy that would have shocked i the placid brains of her neighbors almost into mental activity had they Known Ulen And at the base of her plans in j the boys behalf lay a thorough education She knew that this of all earthly attain i meats is the greatest leveller of human I distinctions the greatest help for poverty to rise to rank and affluence and she a i poor needlewoman and on occasion a washwoman had the audacity to hope within her own bosom for such 3 career for Johnny as would have surprised and def illpleased some of her patrons to uhom he brought home budgets of work done by his hardworking mother But we will skip five years in our nar rative only stopping to observe that our hero Johnny Brown had in that growing i period shot up from a sturdy cuilyheatl I ed urchin of 32 to a rather tall awkward I youngster of 17 as selfreliant but much I I more bashful than on the day he enterefl school at Dulltown It was his good luck I that the school was presided over during those years by a really capable teacher I who accepted Johns unusual capacity as capcit a relief from the pond of medCocntv a which he was condemned to paddle and I 1 had exitendded the range of his studies j I much be 011 the usual limits of a fits I I tnct school To compensate for this out i I i ofhours Instruction Johnny had hoed out I the professors garden chopped wood for him winters and generally paid back 1 Jin I such currency a he had in hand for the loan of books mostly mathematical I and of practical value to Ithemalcal young I who had i in view to make his brains I help his hands For John was what is I called a handy lad with tcols and what he lost in the opinion of the Dulltown folk Ion I I-on the score of being a crank about book I larnin he partly redeemed by his skill I in making a bobsled or repairing his I I repirng mothers fences and sheds And now cm I the last day of school 5f te will listen to 1 a little talk as ho Is packing up his books to leave the old schoolhouse forever we I may gather something of tic true in i wardness of the boy and future man I from his conversation with a schoolmate I nearly as old a himself but certainly a certainy a thousand times prettier She is the young i I est daughter of the aforesaid rich man of I the village and we will call her Mary Van i I Gould which is not a bit like her real name but hath a moneyed sound to it and will pass as well as arother Well John she is saying I suppose today ends your schooldays among us this with a halfsuppressed sigh and with a i rather suspicious downcasiing of a pail of telltale eyes which the owner is determined j I I deter-mined shall tell nothing shal tel I Yes HIiss Van Gould John replies I reples J guess Ill have to quit Studying and go taI ta-I work I should have done to a year ago j but mother anted me to finish up surveying I sur-veying and trigonometry and aI was weak enough besides to hate to 1 leave the I school for mora reasons than one he I sheepishly added I he had been a little a bolaereyed he might have seen a little I I flush and pleased smile c n Marys face as she suddenly turned to sudde tured away to pick up a book she didnt want n bit But just then he too was blushing and as anxious taI ta-I hide his confusion a the lady so no harm i came of IL It But as usual the lady recovered herself her-self first And whats your programme net John she asked with an attempt wil ed indifference in her tone that wasnt avery a-very brilliant success for n suspicious moisture in her eyes made her turn round raull again to hunt for another bcok Oh fie what would Mrs fe Ir Grundy of Dulltown or what would her stately father the gold gald fcpectaclcd dignified exbanker and spectce dignifed exbalkcr present pres-ent millionaire have thought to have seen that tear But nobody saw it and as I said before no harm was one And John went on blunderingly to tell that he hoped to ob thin employment in 3 machine shoo in a neighboring city He had thought of going to college but lack of menus and a dt1 sire t help the folks at home a little tj determined him to seek paying work with such chance of promotion as he might dc I serve I have taxed my mothers slender purse too long he said though every I bcdy knew he had helped her every way t i he could and only continued in school so lcng at her I Ilcg urgent prayer and now I said he I feel like trying my fate and I seeing I whether there i anything in me I that pluck and push will work out I i out i Oh JOn Im sure there is the girl I answered eagerly and then blushing elrl 1 her own forward defence And she 1 cantoned you may be sure that that you have friends here who will pray who will heartily wish you all success and believe in you to the end Now if John had been a little more forward and pressed things skilfully he might in that girls impressible mood grls I have got something more explicit but I nothing was farther from his hopes and I wishes He was a poor boy with his place to the world to make He had ha I nothing t offer The pretty girl before him generous and kindly as she was was a far separated from him a w antipodes anti-podes He had helped her in her lessons schoolboy fashion he had on one ocia sion stood between her and i consider j able danger when a herd of Texas stotvs were charging through thj street where she was walking to school a thing he I thought little of a stick in hand he I I got between her nail a vicious steer that 1 i developed hostile ntentions toward her I I red shawl But when a sound Lvi tn the j horns with a good shillelah hid I I change the brutes mind and sent him after the rest of the herl Miry pale as j I death looked on the handsome looke badsome youngster young-ster as a real hero Well perhaps hew he-w as heroes go but heroes of romance ro-mance are not generally painted in shirtsleeves shirt-sleeves witho torn straw hat t > n their heads and Jn patched trousers No she must have been mistaken Yet the silly girl couldnt get it out of her mind and heart that he was a hero and schoolgirls school-girls take t heroes a ducks to waiter a 1 the world knows Well John and Mary parted there with n handshake and a goodby as hundreds I hun-dreds of Johns and Marys have I and will and Mary went Ito 1 I-to her fathers elegant mansion Ito I-to dream of heroes and stout boys I i with sticks in their hands standing between be-tween her and danger and then or tall I bashful youths with unmistakable sprouting mustachSos and hands am e eyes albeit they but furtively glanced film under a rather fluffy hat And John went Into the world out te big wrd with a brave heart to try atad prove himself 3 man III Time flies Gentle reader this Is not a original remark In fact t authorship author-ship is lost in the mIst of antiquity though there has not been a age in which the essential fact It records hn not been repeated In varied shape all i > i < < < J J i either reasserting or moralizing upon the fugacious character of Time So we l suppose the old lt fie to I have made the circuit of three years Dull town ha held the even tenor of its way while he seasons and the almanacs I have marked every citizen of that placid village three years older No not P1 There are certain persons whose age I does not always tally with the almanac or the family record that is the age tie give to a curious public These individuals in-dividuals unmarrlea ladies generally sometimes fail to note the earths revolution revo-lution round the sun < but the whirligig whirlgg of Time brings in his revenges and he has a subtle engraver = who fails not t mark his work on cheek and brow But to our heroine Mary Van Gold Time was nothing but kind Since she had been a schoolgirl he had much improved im-proved her form filled her cheeks and painted them the most approved color had given her eyes more beauty and expression ex-pression though of a more sad and thoughtful kind and her mind iha overcame I over-came the depressing influence of Dull I town society She was the companion and joy of her father who lacked com corer from the home or ms you tin t Well John stayed at home a few weeks vis ttag his friends and welcomed by all a a relief from the monotony cf j I Dulltown and from the really friendly feeling with which every community welcomes wel-comes back those who go out into the world dk play ea manly part r thet Amd there Was no more appreciative or closelyobservant acquaintance than the exbanker Mr Van Gould His judgment of men was shrewd and unerring He took pains to engage John in conversa It ionto question him on matters of business 1 busi-ness of observation of principle of opinion 1 opin-ion in fact in his quiet way he had thoroughly sized up our hero before the latter mistrusted that it was he instead in-stead of his news Mr Van Gold was weighing And after John had gone back to his duties in Near < York to take up again his lifes work nobody 3n Dull town ever suspected that the shrewd old man had inventoried him and laid him i away labelled for future reference But of the hereafter John and Mary met of course during those precious few weeks And a it is not in our plan t give details c lovemaking which you can get from any wellcon I structed modern novel I will only say > that before they parted they ware sworn loivers and tMs decp te the fact that there Iv re a million or so dollars between them But they mutually agreed that i would i I be better not to let their en engagement be known They dreaded the oppostion of I her father they knew the ibarrier fate had plated between them and knew also that many years must elapse before young Brown could hope with the bet luck to win means enough to demand the millionaires daughter with any prospect pros-pect of success So it was a sad parting but courageous on both sides Yet hope deferred mak < th the heart sick I was not may months before the keen eyes of the father noted n careworn look on his daughter pretty face and the fact that this look became be-came more marked after the advent or the mails He took the precaution also to step to the postotfice himself for his fami ly mail which his daughter had generally brought and noticed that when letters bearing the New York postmark were received re-ceived by her they were succeeded by a nervous depression she took much pains tc hide So he proceeds to take his measures with a diabolical cunning worthy of a Malvolio He first makes a errand to the Widow Browns cottage He contracts con-tracts for the making of some articles of clothing and a he is about leaving asks Ah by the way do you hear anything from your son John lately madam He Is surprised to see the widow burst Into tears and to hear her tell that a fire in his employers factory had destroyed the plant and all his own investment as apart a-part owner of the stock therein leaving John broken up as well as thrown out or employment And the good lady was surprised sur-prised to see a hard smile pass over tho millionaires stern face a smile of gratified grati-fied malice she was sure and could be sworn she heard a laugh as lIe stumbled downstairs and a remark that it served them right trying to deceive her old gray haired father And here the Romance of Dulltown properly commences and we will warrant it to be the first and only romance of the kirid ever recorded so far as our researches re-searches in the much trodden fields of fiction fic-tion reveal For what does that inhuman parent do He seizes her next letter breaks the seal reads the direction and I shame to say it the contents which were as follows followsNew York July 1 18 Dearest Mary Since I wrote you last week my affairs 1t 1 t i r have taken a still more decided turn for I the worse I had hope at that date as I told you that my partners might save enough out of the wreck to enable us to rebuild and go on wren our work but since then by the defection of one and the indebtedness of another our enterprise enter-prise is dead beyond hope Dear Mary I write this In more pain than you can imagine It is not the loss itself that crushes me but the utter hopelessness hope-lessness of starting again with a reasonable reason-able chance of succeeding in a good many years I will not deceive you I am ruined ru-ined financially beyond hope of recovery until after long years of toil and perhaps disappointed In the end I cannot as an honorable man ask you to wait for met With the promise you gave me to cheer and uphold me no man ever worked harder hard-er or more hopefully Now I see no prospect pros-pect of succeeding and dear as you are to me bound up in every hope ambition or dream of happiness I have had on earth for years I cannot hold you to a promise to which your heart more than your best judgment prompted you Dear Mary I give that promise back It would be wronging you wronging your father I r tt I I i i11iiI il i i C fiIiI vJJJ dc1T7 ffilihJ r i It 4 I GUESS ILL hAVE TO QUIT STUDYING AND GO TO WORK panlonship sadly since his wife had sickened sick-ened and died a prey to the universal stagnation some said It is a sad sight wihen man and wife are not society for each other This pair had never been He had married her for her wealth but he got no companionship for though a good woman her mind was weak and uncultivated His library was nothing i to her nor his conversation when it was above her range God help the man and wife who have no common interests to bind them together yet are doomed to pass their lives thrown upon themselves for society But Mary took the place his wife was I i I unfitted for and Mary was his pride his i j i joy his all as he grew older Need it be said he grew anxious about her marrying mar-rying and leaving him alone some day And yet he was comforted by noting that 1r 1 i J ill oth while she was pleasant and kind to all no bright particular star seemed to rise over her horizon no one more than another of the youth of Dulltown received re-ceived favor at her hands And the old millionaire wondered at this not a little She was young healthy air and his destined des-tined heiress And yet she was entering her 19tih year with a heart as indifferent as when a schoolgirl to those attractions wthteh mean so much to young girls generally gen-erally But one day his eyes were opened for he had sharp eyes where his interests were touched For one day Johnny Brown came home from New York to visit his mother and the scenes of his you < h He had gone away a stalwart lad he came back a handsome manly youth of past 20 with the marks of toll and success plainly to be read on his person and 5n his air Those hands had been intSmate with hammer and wrench bar and lever His eye had the mechanical mechani-cal cast soon acquired by the worker in metals his arms the muscles of the athlete He was a fine specimen of the intellectual American machinist and no I imcHher could have taken back to her arms a manlier or a more welcome wan I nay it would be wronging myself to hold you on for years hoping against hope till the best part of your life had been lost it you and the roses had faded from your cheeks and the joy from your life Mary God only knows the pain with which I give you up Your image has been before me ever since I left the school where we parted on the last day of the I term when I was to go forth a green I boy to fight my way in the world And when you so kindly gave me your Gort I speed I went out to my task as bravely as ever went belted knight to win hosier of his ladys favor I knew even then what you were to me but I trust I had honor enough not to try to commit you i you who were so much above me in station sta-tion to any olds which might seem to i bind you although even then 1 hoped you might not be indifferent to me But when I seemed to be in a sure way to rise in the world when I came back to Dulltown and found you so much lovelier than I had ever dreamed of and better still as true and as good as you were fair I felt that uch good fortune was beyond my def de-f that It Could not be that a poor widows son was the chosen lover of such a one as my Mary It was too good to hope or believe and I fear it was better i I than I deserved for the fates have but given me a view of the Promised Land to hide it again in clouds where no ray of light can penetrate 1 Dear Mary you are free Forget me and be happy Or remember me as one who while ho would = gladly die to secure your happiness cannot deceive you with i vain hopes into wasting your youth wait ing for me i our ruined and hopeless bankrupt JOHN BROWN This he reads with many a hem and has to wipe his glasses two or three times because either his indignation or some other feeling is getting away with him Then closing the letter and sealing it carefully that his much abused daughter r I daugh-ter may not suspect that it has been tam i pered with he sits down and in cold blood writes to the lover of that daughter a letter let-ter of which the following is i a copy Dulltown Blank County State of John Brown Esq Dear Sir Having found outno matte how but not from my unnatural daughter daugh-ter that you and she have conspired to rob me of the one treasure I value in this world but also that you a doconspirator as aforesaid have acted what the world might call an honorable part therein now this is to inform you that as long as you I t vo are So silly as to like each other and as I find you to be a bright and honorable young fellow you have my full nsent to marry whenever you choose with an cud mans blessing to boot But I main I it i one of the conditions precedent that if you will go into your dhity manufacturing business it shall be in this country where I can live near you and still attend to my business N Blily daughter shall receive a check for one hundred thousand dollars on the day of her marriage which I hopo will be soon for I want to see the roses bloom in those pretty cheeks again before Christmas P SYou thought you were very clev PI didnt you Why bless your Jlly hearts I knew all about it ages ago So rcme home Johnny and Ill have the fatted fat-ted calf hung up by the heels ready for the prodigals return Your future fatherinlaw I THOMAS VAN GOULD I And thus ended the Romance of Dull tmvnor rather there it began In reality reali-ty for a jollier and more perfectly happy family than the Van GouldBrown connection connec-tion would be hard to find in this world of bank failures mail robberies and gm n oral cussedness Long may they wave I |