269

THE FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH

A ROMANCE OF THE SUPERNATURAL
By Mrs. Elia W Peattie.

CHAPTER I
I am no dreamer. I am not sentimental. I have been educated to be severely accurate. My grandfather was a professor of higher mathematics in a well known eastern university. My father was also an instructor in the exact sciences. I was educated in the west, and, having been graduated with-out honors, calmly faced the fact that there was very little use in the world for a dull young man who had chosen to call himself an ethnographer - or at least a student of ethnography. My friends wanted me to write a book on this subject in which I thought I was interested. As I had no knowledge which was not second hand, and no theories which were not some other man's, this was completely absurd.

Living in St. Paul as I did, I found no lack of opportunity for pursuing my favorite [reflections?], for there are races of men in plenty at that place, but ethnography like many other subjects, is a study which is pleasantest confined to the leaves of a book in a quiet library. What cause had I to be practically interested in the origin of my laundryman, of my bookmaker, and of my waiter? None. Abstractly, the race question was interesting. Concretely it was stupid. In short, I was a fool. I was in earnest about nothing. My boasted common sense and accuracy, my power of concentrating my mind on one thing to the exclusion of others which had been thought so fine an attribute at college and my disdain of the pleasures of other young men, began to seem very [pool?] things indeed.

I got so last that I would have bartered that huge library left me by my scientific and lugubrious ancestors, and all the learnings which I was supposed to have accumulated, for the cheap ability to enjoy myself for one hour in the hearty way that other young fellows enjoyed themselves. In my desperation I even thought of throwing ancestral precedent to the winds, and engaging myself as a salesmen in a dry goods store and experimenting with the simple pleasures of half holidays and lunches in the corner restaurant.

It will be seen that I was rather a poor fellow. I prefer to make this plain at the outset that I may appear as I am - the historian of certain events, and not the hero of adventures.

It is necessary though disagreeable, for me to tell a few facts about myself. They are not amusing facts. Having passed my early boyhood in a great library which was guiltless of fiction, and my later years in school under the supervision of a number of very grave and thorough old gentlemen. I had no experiences which were not associated with the school or my quiet home. I was not acquainted with life, with amusement, with women of any sort or degree, or with speculation in any form, except intellectual speculation in line more scientific than sentimental. By sentimental I mean political, ethical, and religious. These things, being matters of opinion, prejudice, or passion, had no interest for me.

Unfortunately I had a little money - which effectively threw cold water over what slight ambition I might naturally stand possessed of. This is the mental portrait of myself - Hilbert I Shadwin, aged 25. My physical portrait I cannot give I have never been able to make out what sort of a man I was in appearance, and as my acquaintances have preserved a unanimous silence on the subject I must suppose that they also have found it difficult to note any individuality in me.

Most expectedly, and just when I had come to consider myself absolutely useless, a use was found for me. I was invited by the government of the United States, at the suggestion of some influential friends, to go south and count the Seminole Indians. Counting in this case, meant something about their present habits of [?] their dispositions, their outlook and their general condition. I took fresh heart at once and thought with disdain of the white goods counter and half-holidays and determined to justify my family name by doing something worthy of it.

I reflected that I might not find something original to write about. My faint desire to prepare a work on the cave-dwellers of North America vanished and I determined to employ that practical sense which I had often been told I possessed - perhaps because I could be accredited with nothing better - and put my foot on the first ladder of a reputable career.

That is how I found myself at St. Augustine at the Hotel Ponce de Leon, smoking from a lofty balcony upon a scene of such luxuriant beauty as my northern eyes had never seen even in dreams. Is it necessary for me to describe that remarkable place, with its courts, its Spanish architecture, its mountains, its wonderful grays of ground and wall and wharf, its peculiar cosmopolitan life or its atmosphere of exquisite indolence? In a way St. Augustine is like Saratoga. At least one meets with a most remarkable collection of celebrities there. Not that I knew any of them. I knew no one. I knew nothing but the wharves, by the green water, the palmettos, the indigo skies of the night, the heavy perfume of the Magnolia. They were all new to me. They were intoxicating. At first I fought against the languor and the enticement of it all. It did not seem in accordance with my new resolutions. But in time the beauty was too much for me. I let my dreams of ambition float splendidly through a brain that was becoming intoxicated with beauty - with novelty- with the sudden-found joy of real living.

I was obliged to wait where I was for several days, for I had been requested to go southward in the company of an engineer corps, which was to survey a part of the Everglades adjoining the Big Cypress.

At the old Spanish fort I fell in with a gentleman who was afterward to become a firm friend. Perhaps you have never been at the Spanish fort and do not know the feeling one has as he walks through the labyrinth of dark and moldy passages, nor the sensation of disgust and almost fear that one has when he is left alone for a moment in the dungeon. A place so solitary and so terrible in its gloom that it seems impossible that men living in it kept their reason. I became so interested in the place, and so fascinated with the rain of reflections summoned by the dark chambers and the wild shadows jumping up and down in the flicker of the torches that suddenly I found myself alone and the guide and party with whom I had come quite out of sight. At first I thought to stand still, and wait for the return of the party, then remembering that I had spoken with no one, and that probably my existence had not been noticed. I concluded that it would be best for me to go on in the hope of finding some passage that should bring mee to safety, to daylight. I wandered for several moments and was on the point of [bellowing?] for help when I stumbled upon a form in the darkness.

"Sir," cried a voice indignantly.

"I beg your pardon," I said taking off my hat though we were in profound darkness.

"I should say so," said the voice.

"Now that we have met," I said very politely - for I had not then enough experience with the word to realize the value of rudeness - "perhaps you can tell me the way out."

"I can do nothing of the sort, sir! Do you suppose I am walking around in this hell's own hole for pleasure?"

"I see my mistake sir," I apologized, "I beg your pardon."

"I'm glad you can even see a mistake sir" [?] interrupted my companion, " for I'll swear I could not see the devil himself if he were to appear."

I began to get irritated.

"You seem to have a very intimate acquaintance with the lower legions," I said.
"It is likely to become more intimate," retorted the voice.

"I hope your remarks are not personal," said I, tartly.

"My dear sir," responded the voice in protest, "nothing is further from my thought. It's just my way, sir, nothing more I assure you. I am always getting myself in hell's own hole with my darned foolishness. Shake hands, sir" I had a good deal of difficulty in finding his hand, but after the two of us had plunged around in the gloom for a few moments I received the gentleman's hand in the region of my left lung. He apologized, our palms met, and we were friends.

"I would like to give you a card, sir," said my friend.

I should be very much pleased. Under the circumstances, you might give it to me verbally." He did. His name was Thomas Bridges. His occupation was a difficult one - he was engaged in killing time. Apparently he was not a dead shot at it.

"Speaking fo the devil," he cried, suddenly, " there he comes!" It looked as if he was right. A towering figure, which seemed to fill the passage, and to [lap?] over on the wall above, came down the long vista of blackness toward us surrounded by radiations of dim fire. It was a guide with a torch. he seemed surprised at finding that there were two of us.

"I remember you," he said to my companion, "but I [hain't?] no rekulection of t other." I was not hurt. It was what I had expected.

You have done me a service already" said I. My companion looked me over by the light of the torch.

"Huh" said he, concluding the survey. "I'd just as soon do you another. Shake hands again." This time we did it without embarrassment. And I thought I had never seen such a peculiar or such a friendly young man. We were not sorry to get out of the cave and to return to the luxurious surroundings of the hotel. We dined together and I told him what my mission was. He listened attentively.

"I'm going with you," he announced.

"But, my dear fellow," I [?] "you'll never be able to kill time down there. From all I hear you are more likely to kill yourself with breakbone fever."

"That will suit me better," he said sullenly. I saw it would be indelicate to make a reply. His remark had evidently aroused an unhappy train to thought for he did not speak to me the rest of the evening, but sat staring up at the stars, and listening to the metallic stirring of the foliage in the court til he shook hands and made his way to his room.

The next morning there arrived from New York the corps of engineers which I had been expecting. The chief had the advantage of me by not more than five years. I was disappointed at finding him so young. I was shy with young men. Bridges was the first fellow of my own age that I had ever felt comfortable with. But then it did not matter how old Bridges was. His individuality would have been the same whether he was 16 or 60. I am sure I should have been struck with him under any circumstances.

This young engineer was very elegant- much more elegant than there was any occasion for, I thought. He forced me into all sorts of elaborations of manner. But he had no effect on Bridges.

"I should get in hell's own hole," he confided in me, "if I tried all the sort of thing" - meaning Bryan's fine flourishes.

"I shouldn't wonder if he is a nincompoop," I said to Bridges.

"No, there you're wrong," he said, thoughtfully, "He may be a gentleman, but he is not a nincompoop."

"I hope," I said rather coldly, "that you don't think it requires any apology for one to be a gentleman?"

"Well," he returned," I don't know I'm one myself, in a way. At least my folks haven't done anything for three generations and I guess that makes a gentleman of me. And I have always been apologizing to every one I've ever met with, for encumbering the earth."

It is always impossible to tell whether Bridges is a guying man or not. I was saved a reply by the appearance of Paul Bryan, the engineer. He was as handsome a fellow as I ever laid eyes on. In height he lacked a quarter of an inch of six feet. His legs and arms were fine enough to be cut in marble. His face was severe, calm and rather massive. His eyes were gray, his voice was rich, his tone incisive, and his carriage commanding. It was easy to see that the twenty men under him recognized a leader in him.

He bowed to first one and then the other of us. At this Bridges sniffed the air.

"If it suits your convenience, Mr Shadwin," he said to me, "we will leave tomorrow morning, immediately after breakfast."

"I am at your disposal Mr. Bryan"

"You are on no account to inconvenience yourself." he protested.

"But I have no plans." I returned, somewhat impatiently.

"I hope I am going to be invited," broke in Bridges, "for I certainly intend going."

"An invitation is superfluous," gravely returned the engineer, "you will be perfectly welcome. And," he hesitated and flushed, "and -I hope that we are going to be very good friends." He lifted his hat again and hurried out. We looked at each other -Bridges and I- and smiled.

"Why, he's not a pig after all," cried I.

"I tried to dislike him," Bridges confessed,"but there was something in him that made me fell if a man were in hell's own hole and Bryan was by, he would help him out."

The next morning we started - twenty-two of us. We were all young fellows, and were anxious to get the most out of everything, so that we weren't well on our way before we became conscious of a decided and very gratifying esprit de corps.
Bridges was the gayest of the party, ostensibly, and yet he said to me as we ate together "If I get the breakbone fever I shan't care a-tarnation!". And he was silent for ten minutes after he had made this remark. Bridges didn't look like a man with a secret sorrow. But then, it is difficult to judge a man's soul by an outward sign, and it is possible that even a man with a big nose, such as Bridges carries around with him, may have the soul of a Romeo.

By say or night, a journey through Florida is wonderful. it is mysterious. Above all, it is melancholy. The pine lands of the north are gayety itself compared with the pine lands of the south. Bryan's merry fellows kept up noise enough, but when we dashed through one of those cypress groves where the trees loomed gray as ghosts and black shadows hung over the vistas like shrouds, I had to go away by myself and give up to the feeling of settles, but not distressful gloom. Once I caught Bryan's eyes fixed on me with a flush, and we did not speak. But