The Love Story of Abner Stone   By: Edwin Carlile Litsey (1874-1970)

Minor punctuation errors have been changed without notice. Printer errors have been changed and are listed at the end. All other inconsistencies are as in the original.

THE LOVE STORY OF ABNER STONE

THE LOVE STORY

OF

ABNER STONE

By EDWIN CARLILE LITSEY

NEW YORK A. S. BARNES AND COMPANY MCMII

Copyright, 1902 BY A. S. BARNES AND COMPANY Published June, 1902

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

REPRINTED JULY, 1902

UNIVERSITY PRESS · JOHN WILSON AND SON · CAMBRIDGE, U. S. A.

TO HER

Preface

It seems a little strange that I, Abner Stone, now verging upon my seventieth year, should bring pen, ink, and paper before me, with the avowed purpose of setting down the love story of my life, which I had thought locked fast in my heart forever. A thing very sacred to me; of the world, it is true, yet still apart from it, the blessed memory of it all has abode in my breast with the unfading distinctness of an old picture done in oils, and has brightened the years I have thus far lived on the shadowed slope of life. And now has come the firm belief that the world may be made better by the telling of this story as my life has been made better by having lived it and so I shall essay the brief and simple task before my fingers have grown too stiff to hold the pen, trusting that some printer of books will be good enough to put my story into a little volume for all who would care to read. And I, as I pursue the work which I have appointed unto myself, shall again stroll through the meadows and forests of dear Kentucky, shall tread her dusty highways under the spell of a bygone June, and shall sit within the portals of an old home whose floors are now pressed by an alien foot. Now, ere I have scarce begun, the recollections come upon me like a flood, and this page becomes blurred to my failing sight. O Memory! Memory! and the visions of thine!

THE LOVE STORY of ABNER STONE

I

It is a long path which stretches from forty five to seventy. A path easy enough to make, for each day's journey through life is a part of it, but very difficult to retrace. When we turn at that advanced mile stone and look back, things seem misty. For there is many a twist and angle in the highway of a life, and often the things which we would forget stand out the clearest. But I would not drive from my brain this quiet afternoon the visions which enfold it, the blessed recollections of over a score of years ago. For the sweet voice which speaks in my ear as I write I have never ceased to hear; the face which the mirror of my mind ever reflects before my eyes I have looked upon with never tiring eagerness, and the tender hand which I can imagine betimes creeping into my own, is the chiefest blessing of a life nearly spent.

There is no haunting memory of past misdeeds to shadow the quiet rest of my last days. As I bid my mind go back over the path which my feet have trod, no ghost uprises to confront it; no voice cries out for retribution or justice; not even does a dumb animal whine at a blow inflicted, nor a worm which my foot has wantonly pressed, appear. I would show forth no self praise in this, but rather a devout thankfulness unto the Creator who made me as I am, with a heart of mercy for all living things, and a reverent love for all His wonderful works. The beauty of tree, and flowering plant, and lowly creeper abides with me as an everlasting joy, and the song of the humblest singer the forest shelters finds a response in my heart. Without my window now, as I sit down to make a history of part of my life, a brown coated English sparrow is chattering in a strange jargon to his mate on the limb of an Early Harvest apple tree, and I pause a moment to listen to his shrill little voice, and to watch the black patch under his throat puff up and down.