Show GENEROUS OFFER OF A CONVICT some years ago my father rented a house in wethersfield neld field from captain willard who was then t the e warden of abe he connecticut state prison he was vas afterwards stabbed to death as you may remember by one of the prisoners who was hanged fr for the murder 12 said a brooklyn lady my fathers family was very large but so was the old house and there was plenty of room for U us s all the grounds were spacious and required a good deal of care so that fideor five or six colored gardeners were often working on them these men were all convicts hired hy by ny my father from the prison which was about a quarter of a mile from our house captain willard said they were a dangerous lot and birned us to watch them closely and advised my father not to allow any of us girls to speak to them or to tio go near them alone I 1 cannot say however thai any of the gang g to us ever misbehaved li unless n less indeed it was waa the one about whom I 1 am going to speak this was a big good natured fellow very black a capital hand with the banjo and about 40 years old his wife and children went to see him in the jail every visiting day and ami they all seemed to be very hopeful of the future for the prisoner was serving a term terin of only five years he was suspected of having participated in a number of burglaries but was convicted of but buethe one the robbery of a jewelry store in hartford very little property was fou found nd with him when he was arrested and though the store had been completely emptied of its ables it was supposed thit he had played but a very small part in the raid upon it ioanu anu his sentence was light but one day this mau man to who it my father had been bean very kind told him that he had been entirely alone in his last robbery and a dozen others an and that the day before lie pad had been taken into custody knowing that his arrest was imminent lie he had bad buried all his booty amounting in value ya lue he thought to close on in an unfrequented place he offered to tell my father where the treasure jay and share it equally with him if he would unearth it I 1 turn it into cash and hold it until his term of imprisonment had elapsed of ourse my father refused to listen to such a proposition and tried to worm out of his informant where rethe the wealth ws was hidden but the prisoner was too cu cunning unit ig for him he detected his olfert ol jert aud and became very reticent about a month arter after the nian man had been released my father received hecei ved by express a package containing fully worth of jewelry in the shape of ladies rings and bract las te there was no letter with the bundle but there was no doubt about the accuracy of the address th the e things were shown to the jeweler who had been robbed but he said paid none of them had ever belonged to him so we kept them subject to an original owners claim late last winter I 1 was in new orleans with my husband and one afternoon an elderly colored man accosted me as I 1 was walking in tile the street he was dreaded in the most fashionable material cut in the latest style and lie he literally twinkled with diamonds but I 1 easily recognized our old field gardener he was evidently quite rich aal and I 1 asked him when and how he be had acquired his bis wealth 11 missy he said forgetting that I 1 was an elderly married woman it was bedol I 1 went to prison I 1 done tole yer pa all bout it but he give me de cole sho ldah |