The scene “inside a log cabin” as described here may have been similar to this photo. (Photo Provided)

Scene In a Log Cabin

It was nearly midnight of Saturday night when a neighbor knocked on the Col.’s door, requesting him to go to the cabin of a settler, some three miles down the river, and see his daughter, a girl of fourteen, who was thought to be dying. Col.–[name not given], awoke me and asked me to accompany him, and I consented, taking with me the small package of medicines which I always carried in the forest, but I learned soon there was no need of these, for her disease was past care.

“She is a strange child,” said the Colonel, “her father is as strange a man. They live together alone on the bank of the river. They came here three years ago, and no one knows whence or why. He has money and is a keen shot. The child has been wasting away for a year past. I have seen her often, and she seems gifted with a marvelous intellect. She speaks sometimes as if inspired, and she seems to be the only hope of her father.”

We reached the hut of the settler in less than half an hour, and entered it reverently.

The scene was one that cannot easily be forgotten. There were books, and evidences of luxury and taste, lying on the rude table in the center. A guitar lay on the table near the small window, and the bed furniture, on which the dying girl lay, was as soft as the covering of a dying queen.

She was a fair child with masses of long black hair lying over her pillow. Her eyes were dark and piercing, and as they met mine, she startled slightly, but smiled and looked upward. I spoke a few words to her father, and, turning to her, asked if she knew her condition.

“I know that my Redeemer liveth,” said she, in a voice whose melody was like the sweetest tones of an Eolian. You may imagine that the answer startled me, and with a few words of like import, I turned from her. A half hour passed, and she spoke in the same deep, richly melodious voice:

“Father, I am cold; lie down beside me,” — and the old man lay down beside his dying child, and she twined her emaciated arms around his neck, and murmured in a dreamy voice, “Dear father, dear father.”

“My child,” said the old man, “doth the flood seem deep to thee”?

“Nay, father, for my soul is strong.”

“Seest thou the thither shore?”

“I see it, father; and its banks are green with immortal verdure.”

“Hearest thou the voices of its inhabitants?”

“I hear them father, as the voices of angels, falling from afar in the still and solemn night-time; and they call me. Her voice too’ father,– oh. I heard it then!”

“Doth she speak to thee?”

“She speaketh in tones most heavenly!”

“Doth she smile?”

“An angel smile! But, a cold, calm smile. But I am cold–cold–cold!– Father, there’s a mist in the room. You’ll be lonely, lonely. Is this death, father?”

And so she passed away.

From The [Parkersburg] Southern Methodist Itinerant

March 15, 1856

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Bob Enoch is president of the Wood County Historical and Preservation Society. If you have comments or questions about Look Back items, please contact him at: roberteenoch@gmail.com, or by mail at WCHPS, PO Box 565, Parkersburg, WV 26102.