FEARFUL TRAGEDY AT THE STATE PRISON!
As the warden of the Massachusetts State Prison was this morning making his round of observation and inspection among the shops, being in the shoemaking department at about ten and a half o'clock, and passing the bench where one Hodges (a disorderly convict, who, after repeated and severe punishment, had, that morning, been remanded to his shop) was at work, Hodges suddenly sprang upon him from behind, stabbing him with a shoe-knife, and killing him instantly. The assassin was immediately secured, heavily ironed, and committed, for safe-keeping, to the "Lower Arch." The body of the unfortunate warden was removed to the hospital, a coroner summoned, and the inspectors convened. By this sad occurrence a young family is bereaved of paternal support, and the prison of a long-tried and faithful officer.
"Dear me, Harmy, what a sad affair!" cries the compassionate reader; "and Josiah Flint's moth—no; let me see! I have it now. Josiah Flint's grandmother was a—was a Parker, Harmy."
"Yes'm," replies the woman, who has the Parker genealogy at her tongue's end; "an' your pa's was second cousins; an' the warden, ef he'd a lived, would be your third cousin. Law sakes! I mind, as well as can be, young Josiah an' his pa comin' to Saganock. You was a girl then, an' old Josiah, he was minister in Salem, an' his father before him (an' hot and heavy he made it for witches, folks say). Well, he come to Saganock to preach for our minister, an' brung his boy along; an' bein' connections, they was asked to put up with us. Sakes alive! I remember it all well as ef it want but yisterday. That Sunday we had apple pie an' milk betwixt sermons, an' when afternoon meetin' was out, I gin 'em a pipin' hot supper. Well, the old man was a powerful preacher," rambles on the old retainer, while Miss Paulina, heedless of her chatter, sits pondering the situation. "An' I had remarkable exercises of mind that Sunday; but there! that boy, goodness gracious! didn't he make way with my clam fritters an' gooseberry pie? Well, well, this is a dyin' world; an' now his time's come; an' sich an awful providence, too!" And here, kindly oblivious of the ancient onslaught on her supper, old Harmy drops a pitying tear for the dead warden.
"Harmy," says Miss Paulina, decisively, "Josiah Flint's wife has been dead these nine years, and somebody must see to those poor orphan children. Tell Reuben to put Major into the carryall. I shall take the next train for Boston, and probably stay at the prison till the funeral is over."
In accordance with this humane resolve, Miss Parker packs her travelling bag, and, in her second best black silk gown, sets out at four p. m. for the State Prison. Very cold and gray, in the early autumn twilight, is the residence of the late Josiah Flint, when Miss Paulina Parker alights from the depot carriage at its frowning entrance. A jaded housemaid answers the bell, and ushers her into a slipshod parlor, and thus meets her inquiries for "the warden's family:"
"Famblee, is it, mem? sure, an' it's jist broken up, it is. There's himself (God rest him) as dead as a dooer-nail. The baby wint years ago, along wid the mother; an' the soon he died with the ammonia (pneumonia) lasht fall, whilst he was away to the schule; an' as fur the girl—she's that wantherin', sure, that I couldn't jist this minnit lay me finger on the crather."
Discouraged by this curt summary, Miss Parker half inclines to a French leave of the prison; but inspired by the hope of future usefulness to the small estray upon whom Bridget cannot "jist lay a finger," she resolves to remain, and somehow elbow her way into this dubious and fragmentary domestic circle.
"I am Miss Parker (she explains), the warden's cousin, from Saganock. I have come to stay over the funeral, if you can conveniently keep me.