The Wounded Captain.

THE WOUNDED CAPTAIN .

BY S . C . COFFINBTjllY . ( From the "Michigan Freemason . " ) " OH , Heavenly Father , temper the wind to the shorn lamb 1 I am a Avidow and my child is an orphan I" Thus

exclaimed Clara Arthur , pressing her little daughter Eda to her bosom . Alas ! hoiv often during the war of the rebellion had that piteous A'oice of anguish burst from the heart of the bereaA'ed , aud been borne by the spirits of the departed

to the land of peace , when it was echoed by the lips of augels up to the throne of God . How often , alas ! has it been the doom of the widow and fatherless to be abandoned by the world to their prayers , their anguish , ancl the tears of pitying

angels . While ambition was planning campaigns , battle-fields and conquests , and philanthropy Avas suing to humanity for pecuniary means to execute them , and to comfort the weary soldier , their instrument—how many bereft widows and orphans were left to wander hopelessly and cheerlessl y from door to door , or to tread the path to shame and infamy , there to

sink into a dying life—a living death I It is when war unchains her dark angel and sends her shrieking among men , with her scourge of spears in one hand , her torch of blood ancl rapine in the other , to spread desolation ancl death , that the

hearts of men are barred against the wail of suffering and the cry of despair . It is then , Avhen humanity is listening to the boom of the cannon ancl ivatching the fortunes of the battle-field , that the " noble and the good , Avho have been taught the

pure lessons of " brotherly love ancl truth " from the deep but unsure fountains of all good , are left to fill a wide gap iu the ranks of humanity , and to quietly and patiently work out ancl demonstrate the profound problems of tho divine mystery , " on earth

peace , goodwill among men . " They hear the orphans' cry and widows' wail . It is iu the village of S -, in the State of S , that Clara Arthur and her daughter Eda are introduced to the reader . The mother appears to be about thirty years old , the daughter eight . They AVCI-O both beautiful ; the one as a woman in the

fullness of maturity , the other as a child in the purity of innocence . The neat yet plain room in which they are seen , indicates a comfortable but unostentatious manner of living . While there is nothing wanting for comfort and convenience , there is an entire absence of those metricious

appliances of luxury that indicate that aristocratic assumption which , in the present day , is so apt to gain upon and usurp the more rational aspirations of the domestic household iu pretentious ostentation . There is something grand in the lofty aud affectionate anguish of a Avoman . As

we gaze upon her , under the ministerings of the angel of sorrow , her womanhood enhances , and her very weakness and tenderness swell into the strength of sri-andeur : she rises above us from our

grovelling plane , and we look upwards as to an angel to contemplate her sublimity ; we see her in an upper , a holier sphere than that from which we look . There she stands , a being of a purer mould—a link of gold between angels and menbetween earth

, ancl heaven—too lofty to elicit our pity , too poor to affect our tears , too sublime to accept our condolence ; one works of consolation fall an empty mockery at her feet . We can only gaze ancl wonder in a spirit akin to awe .

How deeply touching is the grief of childhood ! We long to clasp the innocent to our bosom , to kiss away the glistening drops that tremble upon the silken eyelashes , to look Avords of peace ancl love into the pure soul that flashes out from the blue depths that sparkle licpiidly

beneath the quivering lids . Sweet childhood in its inexperience of the philosophy of life , it submits not to the fiat of destiny without many ingenious defensive alternations—many feints to parry the fatal shaft , The dignity of womanhood meets her

destiny coldly and calmly , though it may be in the majesty of sorrow and the grandeur of tears ; but childhood puts aside the point of the poisoned arrow and pushes forward to pass it ; it ivill not submit without an effort to avoid its keenest wound . Thus was it with Eda as she

exclaimed amid her tears , " Mother , there is yet hope ; the letter does not say that he is dead . Now , listen , and I will read every word of the letter over again ; " and she road :