A GREAT GRIEF.
DEAR reader, here is an occurrence common all over this broad land, but which
the public knows nought of. Scene, a lighted room. Comfortably seated at
the table is a man with a careworn face, on which are strangely blended the
emotions of relief and apprehension. He settles far back in his chair. He
opens a newspaper; and, after a cursory glance over it as a whole, he turns
out the local page, and, commencing at the first column, reads carefully
down. There is a dead silence in the room. Nought but an occasional slight
movement of the paper is heard. The man still reads. He is all absorbed in
the performance. Suddenly the face, which has become inexpressive, winces.
Pretty soon there is another wince, accompanied by either a decrease or increase
of color. Nervously he begins the next column, and goes down it more hastily
than the preceding. He reaches the bottom with a sigh of relief, and attacks
the third with a trifle less nervousness and much less expression. Suddenly
he clutches the paper with a tighter grasp, as if to save himself from falling,
and utters
an agonizing exclamation. It is some five minutes before he can
resume the reading. Now he is in the last column, and is perusing the marriages.
He reaches the last one. It gives the right name of the groom and bride.
There is a closing sentence made into a separate paragraph. It is simply
this: "The remains will be brought to this town for interment." Then the
man in the chair drops the paper to the floor, catches both hands into his
hair as if to lift himself from the face of the earth, and utters a groan
that seems to come from the very depths of a crushed heart. There is not
a soul to witness this misery, not a tongue to speak one word of sympathy.
All alone with himself, the wretched man, with white face and flaming eyes,
fights his great grief. No one knows his thoughts, or ever will. It is doubtful
if he thinks at all. To every appearance he is in a stupor of misery,—a
stupor so great as to deprive him of reason, of every motion except the spasmodic
twisting at his hair. Heaven help the miserable wretch! for of all the despair
and desolation and agony on this globe of ours there is nothing to equal
this. The man is a country editor; and the paper is a copy of the edition
just issued.
