CLARA F. GUERNSEY.




The Blood Seedling.



In a bit of green pasture that rose, gradually narrowing, to the tableland
that ended in prairie, and widened out descending to the wet and willowy
sands that border the Great River, a broad-shouldered young man was
planting an apple tree one sunny spring morning when Tyler was President.
The little valley was shut in on the south and east by rocky hills,
patched with the immortal green of cedars and gay with clambering
columbines. In front was the Mississippi, reposing from its plunge over
the rapids, and idling down among the golden sandbars and the low, moist
islands, which were looking their loveliest in their new spring dresses of
delicate green.

The young man was digging with a certain vicious energy, forcing the spade
into the black crumbling loam with a movement full of vigor and malice.
His straight black brows were knitted till they formed one dark line over
his deep-set eyes. His beard was not yet old enough to hide the massive
outline of his firm, square jaw. In the set teeth, in the clouded face, in
the half-articulate exclamations that shot from time to time from the
compressed lips, it was easy to see that the thoughts of the young
horticulturist were far from his work.

A bright young girl came down the path through the hazel thicket that