The Richest Miser in America.

Hastings Standard, Issue 201, 19 December 1896, Page 4

The Richest Miser in America.

HE LIVES LIKE A BEAST

In bitter legal contention with his own brother, hating all mankind, and more especially all womankind, old Asahel Bell, with the full weight of fourscore years upon his stooping shoulders, is still a familiar figure in and about Fiskill Landing. Generations hereabouts have come and gone, men and manners and the very physical aspect of the country itself have changed, but the old Asahel, in his blue overalls, his jumper, his felttopped rubber boots his old slouched hat, the battered valise that never leaves him and looks like a stage property game bag for Rip Van Winkle after the twenty years' sleep—all this is as it was decades and decades ago, when men hereabouts who have grown to middle age and have passed from the scene were boys and guyed the surly miser, as the boys even at this day guy him as he goes his desolate way down to the grave that now cannot he far ahead of him. Old Asahel is probably the richest absolute miser and semi-hermit in New York State, if not in the country. There is no knowing how much he is worth in stocks and bonds, mortgages and money, but his real estate alone, in beautiful farms, scattered hero and there in this and neighbouring counties, is estimated at far beyond 100,000dols. There is really nothing lacking to complete the picture of the miser and recluse which this unhappy old man presents. Unshaven and unshorn, dirty, feeding on stale meat refuse begged from butchers, sleeping now in a hole in the rock, dignified by the name of " cave," and now on the floor wichin the bare walls of what was once the palatial country house of a prosperous New Yorker, who, in a moment of necessity, let himself into Asahel's relentless money-lending grip, hating everybody and unloved by everybody—everything is there which goes to making up the typical miser of the stage and the story books. Not even a romance, the blighted love story, is wanted. For Asahel has a romance. His early manhood love was blighted. Maybe that is why he turned curmudgeon, and maybe it isn't. But the love story is used to explain him, and here it is. It dates back sixty years, when Asahel was a young man of twenty. " Asahel Bell," said a resident n ho knows his history well, " was born in Duchess County, and up to his twentieth year was all that could be expected of a farmer boy. He worked on his father's farm, saved the pennies, accumulated the dollars, and finally bought and furnished a small house, with one hundred acres of fine land attached. " Then it leaked out among the farmers that Asahel had been courting Miss Jennie Brown, of Cold Spring, a farmer's daughter, with black eyes and dimples, who had been through many love conquests and come out unscathed, until she finally succumbed to the substantial attractions of Asahel. The weddingday was set, the county paper announced it, and Asahel bought the best suit of clothes in Duchess County for his outfit, and the best and the most expensive ring he could find in all Fish kill for his bride. He even went so far as to invite the boys down to the tavern to celebrate the coming event, and for the first and last time in his life spent money freely. "A week before the day set for the wedding the old mail coach came lumbering over the Cold Spring turnpike and halted before the tavern and post office at Fishkill village, where Asahel Bell sat in silent joy anticipating a message from his betrothed. He got it. It was not a letter ; it was a small square package. He winked at the boys as he pocketed it, and then he went home to enjoy the opening of it all by himself. It was not cheerful what he found. It was the costly betrothal ring returned to him, and with it a short note saying that Jennie had got tired of farm life and had eloped to New York with a man who dressed much better than Asahel and beat him in jewellery. Besides, she explained, he promised her an easy

living iu tha metropolis, fine clothes, and nothing to do. Like many other good looking girls, she prospered for a while; then she was deserted —the old story, except that Jennie was lucky enough to find a grave in her native town instead of in Potter's Field. " From that moment Asahel seemed to loathe mankind. He tied men up in mortgages, and no fiend was more merciless than he when the law gave him a twist 011 his victims. Farmer after farmer passed through his relentless hands to ruin. Up on the side of Mount Beacon he found the hole in the rocks which, with all his houses and farms, he prefers as a home. His greed for money grows with his increasing weight of years, as apparently does his hatred of men and women, particularly young men and women. Nothing seems to exasperate him more than the sight of a young couple who suggest possible matrimony. This is a spectacle which never fails to make the old man's dim eyes fairly gleam with rage."