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Title: Samantha on Children’s Rights
Author: Marietta Holley
Release Date: January 15, 2022 [eBook #67174]
Language: English
Produced by: hekula03 and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SAMANTHA ON CHILDREN’S
RIGHTS ***
[Illustration: FOR FIVE DAYS HE WUZ SHET UP IN HIS ROOM AND KEP’ ON
BREAD AND WATER.
_Frontispiece._]
SAMANTHA
ON
CHILDREN’S RIGHTS
BY
JOSIAH ALLEN’S WIFE
(MARIETTA HOLLEY)
AUTHOR OF “SAMANTHA AT THE ST. LOUIS EXPOSITION,” “AROUND THE
WORLD WITH JOSIAH ALLEN’S WIFE,” “SAMANTHA AT SARATOGA,” ETC.
ILLUSTRATIONS BY
CHARLES GRUNWALD
[Illustration: (Publisher colophon.)]
G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY
PUBLISHERS NEW YORK
Copyright, 1909, by
G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY
Samantha on Children’s Rights
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I 7
II 20
III 40
IV 60
V 77
VI 91
VII 106
VIII 123
IX 137
X 149
XI 161
XII 171
XIII 182
XIV 195
XV 212
XVI 224
XVII 233
XVIII 238
XIX 256
XX 270
XXI 283
XXII 287
XXIII 295
XXIV 308
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
For five days he wuz shet up in his room and kep’
on bread and water _Frontispiece_
And then all three on ’em yelled out: “Rubber
neck! Rubber neck!” 49
The mair sot off back to Jonesville, my pardner
runnin’ after her as he still had holt of the
lines 110
She wuz whippin’ little Kate, her face all swelled
up with what she called religious principle 157
I went up into the room and helped him ondress, and
hearn him tell his prayers 220
I drawed him away at a good jog and walked him into
what I thought wuz a place of safety 254
SAMANTHA ON CHILDREN’S RIGHTS
Jack has got a middlin’ round face, with eyes of dark blue. A sort
of mornin’ glory blue, and at times they are big, that is when
he is wonderin’ over sunthin’, or has found out sunthin’. And at
times they will be sort o’ half shet up, like mornin’ glories when
the sun is too hot. Then is the time when he has been wilted by
Hamen and his wife. The fresh, vigorous desire for knowledge born
in him, onbeknown to himself, jest as the freshness of the mornin’
glories wuz born in them, withered and too hardly sot down on by
the searchin’ rays of misapprehension, ridicule, etc., etc.
When he wuz a little bit of a fellow he would always shet his eyes
when he wuz scolded, for half an hour at a time, and walk round
with ’em shet. It seemed as if he wuz some disgusted with the
world, and wanted to lose sight on’t for a spell. Now he about half
shets ’em when he is mortified.
His hair is curly at the ends, it is brown, some like the deep
shinin’ brown you have seen in trout brooks, and where the curls
kinder crinkle up a streak of gold runs through ’em. His forward
is broad and pretty middlin’ white, and high enough, plenty high
enough, and the hair hangs down in little short curls over it the
most of the time.
Tamer Ann, that’s his Ma, don’t like it, she wants it brushed back
tight to show his intellect, and nags at Jack because he don’t keep
it back. Sez she in a very cross tone:
“Folks will think you hain’t got any intellect at all if they see
your hair all over your forward.”
And I sez, “I wouldn’t worry, Tamer Ann, if the intellect is there
it will work out, hair or no hair, and if it hain’t there no amount
of plasterin’ the hair back will show it off--I’ve seen it tried.”
Sez I in a milder tone, seein’ she looked kinder mad:
“I’ve seen hair brushed back straight from the forward so’s to give
a free pass to the intellect, and left long on the neck to entice
it out, but it wouldn’t appear, for the reason it wuzn’t there.
Don’t you worry about Jack, Tamer Ann, you’ll find his intellect
will push its way through them curls--I hain’t a mite afraid on’t.
“And at the same time, Jack,” sez I, for Duty is my companion and
I foller her blindly, “you must try to mind your Ma and keep the
curls back.”
Jack laughed and run his hand through ’em and put ’em back. Jack
always minds me, or, that is, most always.
Now I don’t always mind the Higher Teacher, I don’t always set the
stitches right in the great sampler that is hung up before me from
day to day. It is a true remark that wuz once made at a conference
meetin’ that “We often leave ondone the things that ort to be done,
and do the things that we hadn’t ort.” Then why should I be hard on
Jack when occasionally, very occasionally, mind you, he don’t do
exactly as he ort, or duz as he ortn’t.
You see our Heavenly Father tells us what to do, He has told us
once for all in the divine book, and then He wrops himself in the
Everlastin’ Silence and leaves us to our own convictions, our own
sense of duty to Him. He makes us afraid to disobey Him. His love
constrains us, our sense of duty holds us (a good deal of the time)
and we try (some of the time) to do right for the Right’s sake, and
because of the completeness and constancy of the love and tender
pity broodin’ over us.
Now, I have often wondered what we would do if our Heavenly Father
nagged at us as some parents do at their children, if every time
we make a miss-step, or a mistake, owin’ to the blindness of our
ignorance, or our waywardness, if He kep’ naggin’ at us, and
bringin’ us up short, and threatenin’ us with punishment, and
twitched us about and pulled our ears, and sot us down in corners,
and shet us up in dark closets, and sent us to bed without our
supperses, and told us to, “Shet up instantly!” and etcetery. I
wondered how long we would keep our love and reverence for Him.
Now, a father and mother are to their children the controlling
power, the visible Deity of their lives. They stand in the High
Place in their souls. Let ’em tremble and quail if they don’t hold
that high place reverently, thoughtfully, prayerfully. The making
or the marring of a life, a endless, immortal life, is in their
hands, let ’em tremble at the thought.
Jack’s mouth is a good natered one more’n half the time, most all
the time, when he is down on the farm with Josiah and me (he loves
to be there). It is quite a big mouth, but none too big, not at
all, with red lips, the upper one kinder short, and the ends curl
up in a dretful sort of a laughin’, roguish way. But them curls can
droop right down and the lips quiver like a baby’s--I’ve seen ’em.
That is when he is nagged at. Tamer Ann nags at Jack more’n half
the time.
Jack loves his mother, and that is why the naggin’s reach right
through the little blue jacket and touches his heart. And the
tremblin’ onhappiness of the heart makes the blue eyes shet about
half up in a forlorn way, and the red lips quiver. I’ve seen ’em.
Why, good land! Jack hain’t much more than a baby anyway, only
about six and a half years old. He’s a stout little feller, and
most always wears a dark blue cloth suit with a little sailor hat
sot kinder back on his curls if he puts it on himself. And I don’t
want to see a better lookin’ boy than Jack is. His father is my
cousin on my own side.
Hamen Archibald Smith, old Elder Archibald Smith’s boy. Hamen is
well off, he owns a big farm and a shingle mill up in Zoar, about
seven miles from Jonesville on the old State Road. Hamen’s wife is
a female he got acquainted with while he wuz away to school (Hamen
is high learnt). His father sent him away for upwards of seven
months to a high school, and then he got acquainted with Tamer Ann
Bodley and married her. She wuz from a high family, she herself is
over six feet high and spindlin’ in figger. She wuz to school to
the same place. She had been there over nine weeks when Hamen got
acquainted with her.
Their love wuz sudden and voyalent, and they married at the
expiration of the term and left school and sot up housekeepin’,
both of ’em bein’ high learnt, and havin’ traveled. Why, they went
over forty milds on their weddin’ tower. And the high school where
they got acquainted wuz upwards of thirty milds from Zoar.
Havin’ had all these advantages and bein’ forehanded, they
naterally put on some airs, and wuz looked up to. They did make
a handsome, high headed couple, I’ll say that for ’em. Hamen wuz
about a inch or a inch and a half taller than she wuz.
Well, how time duz run along to be sure. It don’t seem like a year
hardly sence we got the invitation to the weddin’ party Uncle
Archibald gin to the bride and groom at the old Smith house out
to Piller Pint. And now Hamen’s oldest child, Anna, is goin’ on
nineteen years old. How time duz pass away! Why, I declare for’t,
if it wuzn’t for these great tall livin’ mildstuns springin’ up all
along life’s journey we could hardly believe our old family Bibles,
and would deny our ages.
But these livin’ mildstuns can’t be gone by, they stand up straight
and tall, and we have to stop and read ’em, and then we see for
ourselves how fur we have come on the journey and how fast we are
approachin’ the great Stoppin’ Place for the Night. Anna Smith is
a good lookin’ mildstun. She is plump and fresh and sweet lookin’.
I like Anna and Anna likes me. Her brother, next younger than
herself, is named Cicero. Her Ma named him after some big man, old
Captain Cicero, it seems to me it wuz, anyway he wuz a big talker
and died some time ago.
Cicero Smith is now about fifteen years old, he is dull complected,
kinder frosty and onwholesome lookin’, with great big round eyes,
kinder pale and wild lookin’, some like gooseberries. His hair is
thin and strings down the side of his face like little wisps of
pale yeller straw, only of course some finer. His hands always
felt kinder clammy, and he takes after his Ma in figger, tall and
scraggly and spindlin’.
I never took to him at all nor he to me, he always wuz a
indifferent actin’ chap even in his cradle. He’d turn over in his
cradle when he wuz a infant and look at the rungs in the back side
on’t when I would try to git his attention, and I hain’t never been
able to git it sence. Jest as quick as he wuz old enough to read
he jest took to dime novels. His mother encouraged it, she said it
nourished a love for readin’, and would make him literary. He and
his mother, I spoze, have read more’n twenty cords of ’em if they
wuz corded up and measured with a yard stick, and most every one on
’em yeller covered and harrowin’.
I have told Tamer Ann that they wuzn’t good for her or Cicero to
devour so much. But good land! I couldn’t move her a inch. She kep’
on readin’ ’em and givin’ ’em to him to read, and the more blood
curdliner they wuz the more they doted on ’em. Why, I should have
thought their blood would have turned to ice in their veins, and
their skin got thick as a elephant’s hide with goose pimples caused
by the horrow of ’em; why, their names wuz enough to skair anybody
to death, let alone readin’ ’em. Anna never took to ’em, she seemed
to take after the Smiths more, so I think, and Jack of course
hain’t old enough, and I don’t believe he’ll ever love ’em anyway.
Hamen’s brother lived at their house when Jack wuz born, and he’s
made it his home with ’em ever sence. His name is John Zebulen
Smith, named after old Grandpa Smith.
And as he wuz always called John, why, they called little John
Jack, when he wuz a baby, to keep him from gittin’ mixed up with
his uncle and bein’ took for him, so he has always gone by the name
of Jack. And Jack from the first on’t has been a favorite of mine,
a great favorite. And I always felt so safe with him; I knew he
wouldn’t die from bein’ too good, as so many little Sabbath school
heroes do.
And yet he wuz always a noble child, truthful as the day wuz long.
He would scorn to tell a lie, he wuz too proud to. If he had done
anything he would own up to it, most every time he would. And he
had naterally a religious mind, I believed, though sometimes Josiah
would laugh the idee to scorn when Jack would git into one of his
scrapes. He wuz kinder lazy some of the time, and opposition,
onreasonable opposition, made him mad, and he would contend to
the last minute when he got to goin’. And he had been fooled by
Hamenses folks so much that he had got into the habit of keepin’
still and studyin’ out things for himself. The fools! they would
tell him such stories, lies, a purpose to keep him wonderin’ and to
hear him talk, that he had got sort o’ embittered and tried to rely
on himself to find out strange things. It wuz pitiful as anything I
ever see, and sometimes I thought pitifuler.
Now, spozin’ he wanted to find out some particular thing so
dretfully it seemed as if he couldn’t live a minute without knowin’
about it, he would ask Hamen and Hamen would tell him the greatest
story you ever hearn, and Jack would listen to it at first, and
talk about it, curous, I’ll admit, but not curous at all if it wuz
true.
And then Hamen and his brother would laugh like two idiots to see
Jack’s wonderin’ looks, and shamed and mortified and everything.
And then he would go to Tamer Ann, but Tamer would most likely
have some new dime novel that she’d just commenced, and would be
so wropped up in the joys and sorrows of the heroine, and would be
cryin’ over her lots of times, so she couldn’t see Jack through
her tears, and she would have to wipe her eyes when Jack disturbed
her, and tell him all choked down by her emotions to run away, that
his Ma wuz too busy to answer him, or else she would have some new
distemper that day, and tell Jack to run away for his noise wuz
killin’ her.
Well, what wuz the poor little feller to do? Everything wuz new to
him, he had so many things that he wanted to find out, what could
he do? Wall, there wuz only one thing he could do, and that wuz to
try to find ’em out for himself. Tamer Ann bein’ a good woman at
the bottom of her heart (but the goodness bein’ all covered up with
nonsense, dime novels, fancy distempers, etc.), she sent Jack to
Sunday school.
And everything there wuz new to him. Tamer Ann had, I spoze, been
willin’, but had never had the time to teach Jack the Bible. Havin’
so many heroines, pirates, etc., to drive along in front of her
mind, she naterally hadn’t any room for the apostles and prophets.
The procession of lovely bein’s and hoary villains wuz big, and
the thoroughfare small (Tamer’s mind I mean). And when a woman is
huntin’ round for new fancy distempers, what time has she to tell a
child about the Babe of Bethlehem?
No, Jack didn’t know a thing about the Bible, and the female Sunday
school teacher he went to wuz a Born Baptist, she wuzn’t as you
may say a woman, a female citizen, or human bein’, she wuz jest
Baptist, plain Baptist.
And so the food poor little Jack had put before him at that Sabbath
school wuz hard, sound food. Good doctrine, but tough, fearful
tough. Well, Jack accepted it jest as he did every new thing, and
then, as his first move always wuz, he went to investigatin’ it
himself.
She told him, with no explanation, that if any one prayed in faith
their prayers would be answered. It wuz a new idee to Jack, and he
wuz agitated over it. He asked his father that night if it wuz so,
and told Hamen about the Lamb appearin’ to Abraham, and sez Jack:
“If I had faith would my prayers be answered?”
“Yes,” sez Hamen, “if you should pray to have it rain down candy,
down it would come.”
Sez Jack, “Would the lamb appear?” That seemed to be uppermost in
his mind.
“Yes,” sez Hamen, “the lamb would appear, and mebby a hull drove of
’em.”
And then Hamen looked at John and winked, and they both snickered,
the fools! Well, Jack see that they wuz makin’ fun of him, and he
kinder meached away with his mornin’ glory blue eyes most shot up.
Poor little creeter! little, lonesome, abused creeter!
And when he got over his mortification a little he resolved to
investigate for himself. So he went out in the kitchen and built up
a fire in the stove, took off all the griddles, and piled on the
wood as nigh as Abraham did as he could in a cook stove, accordin’
to a picter the Born Baptist had shown him. He got a good hot fire
goin’, and then he took a book, a costly book that Hamen had gin to
Jack, thinkin’ that though it wuz pretty old for him now, he would
grow up to it. It wuz full of costly engravin’s, and wuz the thing
that Jack loved best of all his possessions.
So he laid that book on the hot griddles, and then knelt down and
prayed for God not to burn it up. He lifted his voice loud in
prayer. Tamer Ann, who heard him, thought that he wuz preachin’, as
he often did.
So she didn’t interfere, and she wuz at that very minute
mistrustin’ she had got a new distemper. She had bumped her knee
gittin’ down to look under the bed after a dime novel, “The Wild
Princess of the Enchanted Forest,” and wuz some in hopes that she
had got the sinevetus. But pretty soon she smelt a smudge, and she
run out and there wuz the valuable book all burnt and shriveled up,
and poor little Jack kneelin’ there with the tears runnin’ down
his cheeks in copious astorents and he a moanin’ to himself, and
groanin’ out:
“Oh, the Lord might a done it if He had wanted to!” and “Oh, the
lamb didn’t come!” and “Oh, He didn’t save my book!” And so on and
so on.
Well, Tamer Ann didn’t take the poor little mourner and seeker
after truth to her heart and wipe away his tears and tell him all
about it, all she could tell, all any of us can tell, which is
little enough, Heaven knows. No, she jest whipped him severely.
And when he tried to tell her what he did it for, how the teacher
had told him that it wuz so, she told him to stop instantly and to
not say another word to her about it, but to go to bed without his
supper for his naughtiness. And poor little Jack had to meach off
to bed and lay there with his little mind workin’ on and workin’
on, his hungry stomach makin’ his brain all the more active.
Tamer Ann might whip his tongue still, but she couldn’t stop his
mind from workin’. No, the one that set that machinery to goin’ wuz
the only one who could stop it. As he had told his Ma once, “You
can make me keep my tongue still, but you can’t stop my thinker.”
No, Tamer Ann couldn’t whip that still.
Well, the poor little creeter lay and pondered over what could have
caused the failure of his plans. And he finally made up his mind
that his sacrifice wuzn’t costly enough.
He loved the book the best of anything he owned, but the B. B. had
told him that he must offer up what he loved best of anything in
the world. And he remembered, too, in the story of Abraham it wuz a
livin’ sacrifice. Why hadn’t he thought of it? Why, it must be his
mother, of course. For, by that mystery of love born in the deep
silence and perils of maternity, Jack loved his mother the best of
all, and Tamer loved him (in her way).
Well, from that time Tamer Ann wuz doomed in Jack’s eyes, set apart
as a costly oblation to be offered up on the altar of sacrifice,
and he begun to watch her so mysterious like, and kinder prowl
round her in such a strange way that they all noticed it. He went
to Sabbath school agin in the meantime, and wuz agin fed on the
sound, hard food that would almost have cracked the teeth of a
adult, but which poor little Jack wuz expected to chew on and
digest (poor little creeter!)
And agin the subject wuz Faith, and agin the story of Abraham wuz
brung up, and agin they wuz admonished and adjured to sacrifice
what they loved the best of all, if they would be rewarded, and see
the lamb of sacrifice, snow white and glorious, appear at their
right hand.
Jack’s eyes grew bigger and bigger, and his plans seemed nearer
fulfilment. He wanted to do right and he wanted the lamb. He
thought he could make a pen for it back of the woodshed. But, above
all, the fervor of a martyr had been waked up in his ardent young
soul. He felt lifted up and inspired. He would obey the Lord.
He would do his duty regardless of his own feelings. He would
sacrifice his best beloved.
That evenin’ Tamer wuz settin’ peaceful readin’ “Lost Eudora of the
Gulch; or, The Becalmed Elephant,” when she heard a movement behind
her and she looked round and there Jack wuz applyin’ a match to
a string that wuz tied round her belt and wuz trailin’ along the
carpet. He wuz jest as pale as death and wuz cryin’, but looked
resolved. He wuz settin’ fire to his mother, sacrificin’ his best
beloved, according to the commandment of the B. B.
Well, Jack looked so woe-be-gone and agitated, and the string
looped into the belt and layin’ down on the floor like a train laid
to a gunpowder plot looked so curous, that Jack wuz questioned, and
it all came out. Well, I spoze that there never wuz a child whipped
harder than that child wuz. He bore the marks for days and days.
Tamer has got a dretful temper, everybody knows that, I hain’t
tellin’ any news.
And for five days he wuz shet up in his room and kep’ on bread and
water, and not one word said to him in all that time of comfort and
sympathy or enlightenment. But they whipped the idee of sacrifice
entirely out of him, and faith. For the next time the subject of
faith come up in the Sunday school, and the B. B. wuz holdin’ forth
all the beauties of faith, and the sureness of its rewards, Jack’s
little voice piped out:
“There hain’t a word of truth in it; for my folks say so, and I
know that there hain’t, for I’ve tried it for myself.”
Oh, the poor little creeter! not knowin’ one word of the divine
faith of which the story he heard wuz the symbol. Of how when
the dearest and best is offered up on the altar of a divine
renunciation, God sends His peace and His rest into our lives like
snow white lambs, and all sacrifices seem easy for His sake who
gave us His best. Poor little Jack! not a word of this, not a word
of common sense even, nothin’ but whippin’s and tellin’s to “shet
up instantly!”
Poor little creeter!
CHAPTER II
My son, Thomas Jefferson, and his wife, Maggie, have got a little
daughter, it wuz very pleasin’ to Josiah and me, and weighed over
nine pounds. It is now most ten months old, and is, with the
exception of my other grandchildren, the most beautiful child that
wuz ever seen in Jonesville, some foolish folks would think I wuz
prejudiced in its favor, but it is the prevailin’ opinion all over
Jonesville, it has been talked to Thomas Jefferson and Maggie and
Josiah and me repeatedly, so we have got to believe it, for what we
know ourselves and the neighbors know to be a fact must be so.
Its name is Snow, after the little one that went home and left
them. You know Maggie’s name wuz Snow, she is Maggie Snow that wuz,
and I wuz in favor of the child bein’ named after her, in fact, as
it may be remembered, I named the child, it wuz left to me.
“Mother,” sez Thomas J., the first time I went there after the
first little Snow came and I see the baby layin’ on Maggie’s arm:
“Mother,” sez he, and, though there wuz a smile on his lips, there
wuz tears in his voice as he said it, “nobody else shall name my
little girl but you.”
“No,” spoke out my daughter, Maggie, smilin’ sweet from her pillow,
“you must name it, Mother.”
The children like me, nobody can dispute that, not even my worst
enemy, if I had one, but then nobody would believe him, anyway, for
he would be a perfect liar. But, as I wuz sayin’, I looked down on
’em, Maggie’s face looked white and sweet out of the muslins and
laces round her, the bed wuz white as snow, and so wuz she, and the
baby wuz white. And Maggie’s soul wuz white, I knew, white as snow,
and so wuz Thomas Jefferson’s, his morals are sound, extremely
sound and light colored, and the baby’s, God bless it! I knew wuz
like the newly driven snow fallin’ down onto the peaceful earth
that blessed day, and so, sez I kinder soft:
“We’ll call the baby Snow.”
And I bent down and kissed Maggie, and Thomas Jefferson kissed us
both, and the thing wuz done, their little girl wuz named Snow. And
I said, “Try to bring her up so’s the name will be appropriate to
her.”
And they both on ’em said they would, and they did. Oh, what a
beautiful child that wuz, but it melted away like its namesake
in a April day, drawn up to its native heaven by the warm sun of
God’s love, and when this baby come to fill its place I wanted
it called Snow, and they all did, and that’s its name, she is a
very beautiful child, and they are bringin’ her up beautiful. Her
behavior for a child ten months of age is the most exemplary I ever
see (with the exception of my other grandchildren), it is a perfect
pattern to other children to see that child behave.
I despise now, and always have despised, the idee of grandparents
bein’ so took up with their grandchildren that they can’t see their
faults, it is dretful to witness such folly. But, as I have said to
Josiah and to others, “What are you goin’ to do when there hain’t
any faults to see? How be you a-goin’ to see ’em?” Why, there
hain’t any reason in tryin’ to see things that hain’t there. If
Delight and Snow and my other grandchildren ever have any faults
I shall be the first one to see ’em, the very first one, and so I
have told Josiah and the neighbors.
This little Snow is very white complected, and her eyes are jest
the softened shade of the deep velvet blue of the pansy, and her
hair is kinder yellowish, and curls in loose rings and waves all
over her head, all round her white forward and satin smooth neck.
She has got the same sweet smile on her lips that her Ma has, and
little angel Snow had, but the look in her eyes, though they hain’t
the same color, is like my boy, Thomas Jefferson’s, they look
kinder cunning and cute some of the time jest like his, and then
deep and tender jest like hisen. Thomas Jefferson is deep, it has
been gin up that he is, it is known now all over Jonesville and out
as fur as Loontown and all the other adjacent villages, that Thomas
J. is deep.
I knew it when he wuz a child, I found it out first, but now
everybody knows it, why the bizness that boy gits is perfectly
oncommon, folks bring their lawsuits to him from as fur as way
beyend Toad Holler and the old State Road, and all round Zoar, and
Loontown, and Jonesville, why milds and milds they’ll fetch ’em
ruther than have anybody else, and the land is perfectly full of
lawyers, too, painfully full. He and Tom Willis, his confidential
clerk, have more than they can do all the time, they have to employ
one or two boys, they are makin’ money fast.
Well, I spozed that seein’ Thomas J. wuz doin’ so well, and Maggie’s
father havin’ left her a handsome property of her own (the Judge
died of quinsy, lamented some years ago), I spozed, seein’ she wuz
abundantly able and its bein’ so fashionable, that Maggie would
have a nurse for her little girl. But the day the child wuz a month
old I spent the day with ’em, and Maggie told me she wuzn’t goin’
to. She looked kinder delicate as she sot there holdin’ little
Snow, her cheeks wuz about as white as the dress she had on, and I
sez, “It is goin’ to be quite a care for you, daughter.”
“Care!” And as she looked up in my face I wuz most struck with
the look in her big eyes, it wuz a look of such tenderness, such
rapture, such anxiety, such wonder, and most everything else; I
declare for it I never see such a look in my life unless it wuz in
the face of the Madonna hangin’ right up over her head. Thomas J.
bought it and gin it to her a few months before, and it hung right
at the foot of her bed. The Virgin mother and her child.
It wuz a beautiful face, Thomas J. thought it favored Maggie, and
I don’t know but it did, it did jest that minute, anyway, she had
the same look in her eyes that Mary had. Well, if you’ll believe it
right while we wuz talkin’ about that baby, Miss Green Smythe come
in to see Thomas Jefferson, she is tryin’ to git some divorces, and
she wants Thomas J. to undertake the job, she is dretful good to
Maggie and flatters Thomas Jefferson up, but Thomas J. won’t take
the case, unless he sees he is on the right side.
Thomas Jefferson Allen has took his Ma’s advice; he has never,
never took holt of a case that he didn’t think honestly and firmly
he wuz on the right side on’t. He has got the name of bein’ a
honest lawyer, and they say folks come milds and milds jest to look
on him, they consider him such a curosity. That’s jest why he gits
so much custom, folks would ruther see him than a circus, he bein’
such a rariety, and then when they see him they like him, they
can’t help it, and so he gits their custom.
I told Thomas J. when he wuz young to do right for the right’s
sake, sez I, “Thomas J., I despise that old proverb, ‘Honesty is
the best policy.’ I don’t want you to do anything out of policy,”
sez I, “do right for the right’s sake, for the sake of God’s truth
and your own soul. You can’t like yourself, nor God can’t like you
if you do a mean, shabby, contemptible act. Do jest as near right
as you can, Thomas Jefferson Allen, and leave success or failure
with Him who sees into your soul and your future clear to the end,
if there is a end, which I don’t spoze there is. You had better be
a failure outside than inside.” Sez I, “Let the one who can see
inside of you look down into a clean soul, and even if you are
covered with rags outside your Ma will be satisfied.”
So I would say to Thomas J. from day to day and from year to year
in his school days. And when he went into the law, sez I, “Thomas
Jefferson, it may be my lot to see you torn by wild horses and
layin’ on a guillontine, but,” sez I, “though that would kill your
Ma, it would kill her quicker to see and hear that you had got up
in cold blood and wuz tryin’ to prove that a lie wuz the truth, and
that the truth wuz a lie, usin’ all the intellect and power the God
of truth give to prove a untruth, to go against Him, against your
conscience, against your soul.”
Sez I, “Cases can be plastered over with all the thick plaster you
can lay on ’em about duty to clients, expediency, etc., etc. But
if a man is guilty he ort to be punished, and if he is innocent
he hadn’t ort to be punished, and if you ever take the part of
the guilty against the innocent, if you git up under God’s pure
daylight and try to prove that the innocent is guilty, try and
prove a lie, your Ma will not live long to see it go on,” sez I,
“for mortification would set in powerful and so deep that it will
soon end her days.”
Thomas Jefferson hearn to me, he wuz a honest boy by nature, and my
teachin’s have struck in deep. He is a honest lawyer, and as I say
folks come milds and milds jest to look at him. As it has turned
out he is a success outside as well as inside.
And Miss Green Smythe wants him to take her case dretfully. Good
land! she’s been in the law for years, her children have turned
out real bad, and she’s turned out sort o’ curous herself. She is
a great society woman, and has enormous success in that direction;
why, she has been, so I have been told and believe, to nineteen
parties in one night, she gives immense receptions, and has got
diamonds as big as eggs almost (bird’s eggs, I cannot lie, I do not
mean hen’s eggs). Yes, she has had great success in that way, but
she has had dretful poor luck with her children.
She has got a husband somewhere, I spoze. I believe that I hearn
once of somebody who had seen Mr. Green Smythe one day settin’ on
the back doorstep of her city house. But she always has two or
three young men danglin’ round, and she never sez a word about her
husband. Somebody said to me one day that it seemed kinder queer
that nobody ever see Mr. Smythe, but I sez:
“Oh, she most probable knew where he wuz; she most probable knew
that he wuz settin’ out there at the back door.”
I will stand up for my sect when I can, but I don’t approve of her
acts not at all; if I had a husband I should want one, and if I
didn’t have a husband I shouldn’t want one, and I should want it
fixed so I should know jest how it wuz.
But as I say, her children have turned out dretful, and most
everybody thinks that it wuz the way they wuz brung up that made
’em turn out so. She left the hull care of ’em to hired nurses
and servants, and they wuz mean, some of ’em, and neglected ’em
sometimes, and sometimes learnt ’em by precept and example to be as
mean as they wuz.
Why, a woman told me, and a likely woman, too, though I won’t
mention any names, as I am afraid she wouldn’t like it if I did,
but I will say that I always could depend on every word that Alvira
Sampson said.
Well, she told me she called Miss Green Smythe’s attention to the
way her children wuz bein’ dealt with by her help, and she said all
the answer Miss Green Smythe made wuz to look kinder dreamily at
her and wonder whether she had better have yellow or pink candles
in her reception room at her next party; she wuz gittin’ up a
Charity Ball for motherless children. And I told Alviry that Miss
Green Smythe had better include her own children in the charity,
for they wuz jest about the same as motherless.
And this certain woman said she tried to draw her attention agin to
the needs of her own offspring, and agin Miss Green Smythe looked
dreamily up and sez, “I am so ondecided whether to wear pale rose
colored chiffon or cloth of gold on the night of the party.” And
then that certain woman said she gin up the idee of gittin’ her
mind onto her own children’s welfare, she didn’t say another word
to her about it, and I believe her, for Alvira won’t lie.
So Miss Green Smythe wuz left with a anxious contemplation of the
color of the light that wuz goin’ to softly gild the heads of her
guests as they talked of the cruel needs of the motherless, and,
bein’ took up with this, she hadn’t time to worry about the evil
glare of vile and corrupt words and ways, deceit and lies, and
worse, that wuz fallin’ on the heads of her own children.
But to resoom forwards agin. Maggie and I wuz settin’ there calm
and peaceful, and saw the colored nigger’s countenance lookin’
round dretful clever from his high seat.
Miss Green Smythe swep’ up the neat gravel walk to the door, and
in a few minutes entered the room. She is a kinder good natured
little woman, but dretful wore out and haggard lookin’ under the
embellishments she uses to cover up the ravages of time and care
and fashionable ambition and worry. She always dresses in the very
height of fashion, but she has too many feathers and flowers and
danglin’ ends of ribbon to suit me.
I never took any fancy to her, though I spoze I ort to feel
complimented on her comin’ clear from New York to git Thomas
Jefferson to try her lawsuit. Her present husband is a distant,
a very distant, relation of ourn. But I don’t spoze that makes
any difference about her employin’ Thomas J., I spoze it is his
smartness that draws her. She is spendin’ the summer at a summer
hotel not fur off, she and her family, and she is tryin’ to git
some divorces for herself and one of her children. She don’t want
a divorce from Smith, Mr. Green Smythe gives her rope enough.
I guess she feels pretty foot loose, ’tennyrate nobody ever
sees him, though they know there is a husband somewhere in the
background grubbin’ away to make money. They say he is a sad and
humble sperited man, who sets a good deal on their back doorstep
at Newport and New York, when he sets anywhere, a modest, bald
headed man, with iron gray mustache and sad eyes. They say he don’t
seem at home in the palatial front rooms and boodoors, and is
kinder trompled on by the high headed servants in livery. But he,
knowin’, I spoze, that he could turn ’em all out, neck and crop and
leathered legs, if he wanted to, bears it pretty well, and sets out
there and reads the daily papers. And sometimes I have hearn holds
an old degariotype in his hand, and will look at it a long time,
of a pretty young country girl that he loved when he wuz young
and poor, and prized ambition and wealth a good deal more than he
duz now. They say he looks at that a sight, and some letters writ
by “Alice” and some little sprigs of old fashioned runnin’ myrtle
that has opened its blue flowers for many summers over a grave on a
country hillside.
They commenced to bloom about a year after he married the rich
widder Green, whose money put with his made him rich as a Jew.
She had three husbands, Miss Green Smythe had, before she married
Smith; Smith then but Smythe now. Her first husband, Sam Warn, he
don’t count much in her thoughts, so I’ve hearn, bein’ young and
poor, and havin’ married him for love, so called, and he her. He
died in a few years, died from overwork, everybody said. He wuz
tryin’ to work over hours to pay for a melodeon for his wife and
a pair of bracelets; she wuz ambitious then in her young and poor
days, ambitious as a dog. He died leavin’ her nothin’ but the
twins, Eudora Francesca and Medora Francina.
Her next husband wuz old Green, he wuz goin’ on eighty when she
married him, and he died in less than a year, leavin’ her with over
two millions. Her next husband, Emery Tweedle, father of Algernon
and Angenora, wuz much younger than herself, and I didn’t wonder at
that so much as some did, thinkin’ that she wanted to sort o’ even
up the ages of her pardners, and he wuzn’t nigh as much younger
than her as Green wuz older, and I always believed (theoretically)
that sass for the goose and sass for the gander might as well be
about the same age.
Howsumever, they didn’t live happy, he throwin’ her downstairs the
third year of their union and throwin’ a cut glass pitcher on top
of her. The occasion bein’ that she found him tryin’ to help the
pretty parlor maid carry upstairs the pitcher of ice water she had
rung for.
She wuz a real pretty parlor maid, and Miss Tweedle by this time,
havin’ run so hard after fashion, had got kinder worn out lookin’
and winded in the race, as you may say, with lots of small wrinkles
showin’ round the eyes and nose, and real scrawny where her figger
wuzn’t veneered and upholstered for company, and the parlor maid
had a plump figger, and complexion like strawberries and cream, but
wuzn’t considered likely. But ’tennyrate that fall precipitated
affairs, and havin’ got up with little Eudora Francesca’s help,
Miss Tweedle’s first move wuz to sue for a divorce.
Her back wuz hurt considerable, and so wuz her pride, but her heart
not at all, so it wuz spozed, for she married him in the first
place, not for love, but because he could sing bass good, she had
a high terible voice, and their voices went well together. He wuz
poor, and she made the first advances, so they said, bein’ anxious
to secure his bass.
And didn’t it turn out queer as a dog that when she married for
bass she got such a sight of it, she got more than she bargained
for. She had never made any inquiries about him, and found out,
when it wuz too late, that his voice wuzn’t the only base thing
about him. He wuz real mean and tried to throw her out of the
second story winder before they had been married two weeks. That
wuz because she wouldn’t deed all her property to him. But she knew
enough to hang onto her property, and he, bein’ so poor, hung onto
her off and on for a little over two years. They got along somehow,
and when she and affairs wuz finally precipitated, they had two
children, which the law give to her, about a year and a half old.
And about two months after the seperation she had another child,
Angelia Genevieve, but she didn’t live only a year or so, havin’
crep’ up and fell into the bathtub, and wuz drowned, her Ma bein’
at a masked ball at the time.
Well, she got a Western divorce and married Mr. Ebenezer Smith, and
spozed that the Tweedle eppisode wuz over. But after lettin’ her
alone for years, Tweedle, bein’ base clear to his toes, and havin’
run through his property and had reverses, wuz botherin’ Miss Green
Smythe, and demandin’ money of her. He said there wuz some legal
error in the divorce papers, and he wuz threatenin’ her bad.
Well, she wuz in a hard place and I felt sorry for her. And then
her girls had had sights of trouble, too, the two girls, Eudora
Francesca and Medora Francina Warn, that wuz their right name, but
their Ma thought that Green Smythe sounded fur more genteel, so she
called ’em by that name, they have had dretful bad luck. Eudora’s
nurse wuz a good faithful creeter (that wuz after her Ma had
married old Green, good land! she nussed ’em herself till then).
But as I was sayin’, Eudora’s nurse wuz a valuable woman but had
one fault; she would drink once in a while, and it wuz when she had
one of her drunken fits that she dropped the little girl onto the
marble hearth and hurt her spine, she suffered dretful and went to
a private hospital the year her Ma wuz in Europe for the fifteenth
time, the nurse stayin’ with her and cryin’ over her lots of times,
they say, for she had a good heart.
Well, she stayed there for years till she got to be a young woman,
while Miss Green Smythe took Medora Francina round with her
considerable. She had a great-aunt on her Pa’s side, Karen Happuck
Warn, who wuz as rich as Creshus, her husband havin’ made his money
in a coal mine discovered on his rocky old farm up in Maine.
Well, this old lady bein’ left without chick or child of her own,
what should Miss Green Smythe do but take Medora Francina up there
visitin’! And I spoze she done it from pure ambition and wantin’
to advance her child’s interests, she told her aunt that Medora’s
name wuz Karen Happuck Warn, and she called her all the time she
wuz there Karen Happuck. Well, that tickled the old lady dretfully,
and she seemed to like Medora first rate, and her Ma left her there
most a year, while she went off, I believe it wuz to Algeria that
time, or Cairo or somewhere.
The Warns wuz dretful religious folks, and Medora wuz under better
influences that year than she ever wuz before or since, I spoze,
and she enjoyed herself first rate, and realized the beauty of
a good honest life, of duty and labor and simple pleasures and
domestic happiness. She fell in love up there with a handsome young
lumberman, Hatevil White, and would have liked to married him, he
wuz a distant, a very distant relation to old Miss Warn, though she
didn’t have much to do with him then.
Well, they fell in love with each other, and I guess it would made
a match, but Miss Green Smythe couldn’t bear to have Medora marry a
common Mr. and a lumberman at that, she hankered after a title in
her family, so she took her home to New York and there she met her
titled man. You know that in one of the big hotels there you can
always see a hull row of ’em settin’ in the hall, lookin’ out for
rich wives; they write their letters from that hotel and hang round
there, but sleep, it is spozed, in some hall bedroom downtown, and
eat where they can, but they are real lucky in findin’ pardners,
and there Medora found hern. He wuz quite good lookin’, and, owin’
to his title, a great pet amongst the four hundred. Why, they all
wanted to marry him, the hull four hundred, or all of ’em that
hadn’t got some husbands, mebby three hundred or so. But Medora
carried off the prize, her Ma wanted the title in the family, and
he wanted Medora’s money; she wuz spozed then, besides her own
money, to be the heiress of her aunt.
But he turned out, as so many titled men do that hang round that
400 in New York, to be a imposter. He wuzn’t a Baron, he wuz
formerly a valley, or that is what they call it, to a real titled
man, and from him he had got the ways of high life, good dressin’,
flowery, flattering language, drinkin’, billiard playin’, etc.,
etc. Well, he spent Medora’s money, and broke her heart, and I
believe a few of her bones; he wuz a low brute, and I don’t blame
her for wantin’ a divorce.
She left the sham Baron after her bones wuz sot and went up to
Maine agin, and some say she made overtoors to that Hatevil White,
but he wuz true to his name and wouldn’t marry the fickle creeter
who had deceived him once. And then by that time (men’s hearts are
so elastic) he had got in love with a pretty young school teacher,
and married her the next year after these overtoors, and her aunt,
having found out how she wuz deceived in regard to Medora’s name,
left her hull property when she died to this distant relation,
Hatevil White.
So poor Medora Francina felt that her Ma had ondone her for the
second time. She has got a high temper, and her tongue is the
worst scourge Miss Green Smythe has to stand, they fight perfectly
fearful, so they say. Well, to resoom backwards a spell. About the
time Medora wuz married Eudora’s disease seemed to take another
form, it kinder went to her head, but she appeared well enough, and
could walk round as well as anybody. So, as she wuz very beautiful,
the handsomest one in the family, her mother took her home and had
teachers and learnt her what she could and made of her. And it wuz
the next winter after she went home to live that she ran away with
the coachman.
Her mother had to go to Europe agin that winter, ’twas the
twenty-fourth time, I believe; but, ’tennyrate, she wuz there. But
she left Eudora in the care of a very accomplished and fashionable
French governess. Miss Green Smythe didn’t have time to learn much
about this governess, she wuz so busy gittin’ her trueso ready
for her journey, and in givin’ a big fancy ball before she sailed,
so she couldn’t take the time to find out much about this woman,
and she wuz dretful romantick and kinder mean, and Eudora wuz
completely under her influence.
The governess thought this coachman wuz a Marquiz in disguise, son
of a long line of Earls, he said he wuz, when questioned about it.
But he wuzn’t no such thing; his Pa wuz in the peanut line on the
Bowery. The governess would have gladly married him herself, but
she wuz older and kinder humbly, so he proposed to Eudora, and
they run away and wuz married. There wuz no need of their runnin’
away, there wuz no one to interfere with ’em, for Mr. Green Smythe
out on the back steps wouldn’t have noticed what wuz goin’ on. But
the governess thought it would be so much more romantick to depart
by midnight sarahuptishusly, so I spoze she helped rig up a rope
ladder by which Medora descended to her coachman.
Well, he didn’t use her well, it wuzn’t hereditary in his family
to use wimmen well, they generally struck at ’em with their
fists, instead of polite tongue abuse when they offended ’em, and
take it with her ill usage and the wild clamor her Ma made when
she discovered the marriage, the poor awakening wits of Eudora
Francesca fled utterly. The coachman wuz bought off with a small
sum of ready money, and Eudora wuz taken back to the asylum for
good and all.
Well, as I say, the two little Tweedle children, boy and girl, are
queer little creeters, they are about eight or nine years old now,
and are with their Ma to Jonesville for the summer, with a nurse
for each one. The baby, the only child of Mr. Smith, is not with
its Ma to Jonesville, he is at another private asylum, not fur from
the one that Eudora Francesca is in; it is an asylum for idiots and
a sort of school to try to teach ’em what they can be taught.
And that he is there isn’t the fault of any nurse. No, I should
say it riz higher in profession and wuz the fault of the medical
fraternity. All the year before he wuz born Miss Green Smythe
wuz very delicate, but bein’ so fashionable, she considered it
necessary to wear a tight, a very tight cosset till the very day
the baby wuz born, and her doctor never said a word agin it, so
fur as I know, but realizin’ how delicate she wuz and that her
strength must be kep’ up in some way, he ordered her to take
stimulants, and she drinked, and she drinked, and she drinked. Why,
I spoze from what I’ve hearn that she jest took barrels of wine
and champagne and brandy. She never went half way in anything, not
even Hottentots, of which more hereafter. And the stimulants bein’
ordered she drinked continually. And when the boy wuz born it wuz
a perfect idiot. Her fashionable doctor who ordered the stimulants
said it wuz a “melancholy dispensation of Providence.”
The doctor who attended Mr. Green Smythe, and an old friend of
hisen, said it wuz “a melancholy judgment on fools.” He wuz a quick
tempered man, but honest and high learnt, and he wuz mad at the
fashionable doctor and Miss Green Smythe, too. Well, it cured her
of drinkin’, anyway; she had always wanted a boy dretfully, and
when the only one she had ever had wuz born a idiot it mortified
her most to death, and she could never bear the sight of it, and
had never laid her eyes on it since it wuz took to the private
asylum.
A pretty lookin’ child, too, they said it wuz, only not knowin’
anything. They said about this time Ebenezer Smith’s hair changed
from iron gray to pretty near white, for he loved the baby, his
only child and heir to all his millions. And he kep’ lookin’ and
watchin’ for some signs of sense in it for a long time. And the
only reason he gin his consent to have it go to the asylum wuz that
he didn’t know but they might help it to some spark of reason. He
read his old letters more than ever, they said, out on the back
steps, and looked more at Alice’s face in the old velvet covered
case, and then he would look away from that sweet, fresh face off
onto the sky or ocean as the case might be, either in New York
or Newport, he would look off for some time and wuz spozed to be
thinkin’ of a good many things.
Well, it wuz to get a divorce for Medora and see to her own Tweedle
bizness that Miss Green Smythe had come to Jonesville. She had
employed a big New York lawyer, but he hadn’t been very successful,
and she wanted Thomas J.’s help. Tweedle had once lived in this
vicinity for some time, and she wanted Thomas J. to try and collect
evidence for her and help her. But he will walk round the subject
on every side and look at it sharp before he tackles it.
I spoze it is a great compliment to have such rich folks as the
Green Smythes so anxious to secure his services. But that won’t
make any difference to our son, he won’t touch it unless he thinks
she is in the right on’t. He follers these two old rules that his
Ma laid down before him when he first set out to be a lawyer. Sez
I, “Always, Thomas Jefferson, foller them two rules, and you will
be sure to come out right in the end:
“First rule, ‘Be sure you are in the right on’t,’” then,
“Second rule, ‘Go ahead.’”
As I sez to him impressive, “You will be sure to come out right if
you foller them two rules. Mebby you won’t always win your case
before earthly judges, though I believe you will be more apt to.
But that hain’t the important thing, my son,” I would say, “the
important thing is to win your case before the Great Judge that is
above all. Why,” sez I, “wouldn’t you ruther win a case before the
Supreme Court in Washington, D. C., than before a Jonesville jury?”
And he would say, “Why, yes, of course.”
“Well,” sez I, “wouldn’t you ruther win the case before the Great
Judge that sets as high above them Supreme Judges as Heaven is
above the earth?”
I tell you them simelys sunk into Thomas J.’s heart; he follers
them rules day by day. As I said more formerly, he is inquirin’
round about Miss Green Smythe’s case, and if he makes up his mind
that she and Medora are in the right on’t he will help ’em (and
thereby ensure her success), and if she hain’t in the right on’t he
won’t touch the case with a pair of tongs or leather mittens.
Well, to stop retrospectin’ and resoom backwards a little. Miss
Green Smythe greeted me and Maggie with considerable warmth, about
as warm as hot dish water, while our greetin’s to her wuzn’t any
warmer than new milk. Maggie wuz holdin’ Snow in her arms when Miss
Green Smythe wuz ushered in, leadin’ a pug dog by a ribbon, and
one of her danglers wuz out in the carriage lookin’ at the house
through a eye glass. Miss Green Smythe made a great flutter and
excitement in comin’ in, and made a sight of Maggie and me, but we
didn’t seem fluttered or excited by her, nor we didn’t make any
more of her than we did of any of the neighbors, though we used her
well, and she sot down and took her pug into her lap, for Maggie’s
cat riz up her back that high at the sight of it that I thought it
would break into, and I got up and let her out.
I knew what the call wuz for, it wuz to molify Thomas J. and make
him willin’ to take her case in hand. Well, she wuz dretful good to
Maggie, over good, I thought; she called her lots of kinder foolish
names, “Petteet Ongey,” and “belle amey,” and lots of other trash.
Maggie’s name hain’t Amy, nor never wuz.
Maggie took it all in good part and sot there smilin’ and holdin’
little Snow close to her heart. Miss Green Smythe didn’t notice the
baby at all, no more than as if it wuz a rag babe. But she begun to
talk about a big entertainment she wuz goin’ to have and wanted us
to come to, and she called it a real curous name, it sounded some
like Fate Sham Peter.
I guess it wuzn’t exactly that, for it sounded so curous to me I
sez to her, sez I, “I spoze Peter is all for fashion and outside
gildin’ and sham, and that’s how he got his name?” And I sez, “Is
Peter any relation of yourn?” And then she explained it out to me
as well as she could.
But I sez, “I guess I’ll call it Sham Peter, for that is nigh
enough to distinguish it from other Peter’s and other shams, and
that is the main thing.”
She acted as if she didn’t like it, and answered my questions
kinder short and uppish. I never took to her, for I had hearn all
these things I have sot down about her babies and husbands and
danglers and everything, and I spozed like as not I should have to
give her a piece of my mind before she left; I spozed that I might
have to onbeknown to me.
Well, Maggie excused herself from goin’ on account of little Snow,
she said she didn’t go out much to evening parties for they took
her strength so, and she felt that she needed all her strength to
take care of her baby. “Take care of your baby!” Miss Green Smythe
fairly screamed out the words, she wuz that horrow struck. “You
take care of your baby? Why, my dear Mrs. Allen, I could not have
understood you aright, you take care of your baby yourself!”
“Yes,” sez Maggie quietly, “I take most of the care of my child
myself, and I intend to do so.”
Miss Green Smythe held up both of her hands in horrow and leaned
back in her chair, “Well, that is something I wouldn’t have
believed if I hadn’t heard it myself, that you are goin’ to take
care of your own child,” and the idee seemed to upset her so that
she hurried off earlier, I believe, than she would otherwise. But
before she went she did git me to promise to attend a reception she
wuz goin’ to give before long; Maggie said she believed it would do
me good to git out and have a little change.
CHAPTER III
If there ever wuz a girl in the world that I loved, no kin to me,
it wuz Marion Martin. She lived nigh enough so I knew her hull
history from A to Z, specially Z. It wuzn’t the beauty of her face
nor her sweet disposition, though they wuz attractive, but it wuz
her real self, the beauty and patience and duty of her hull life
that made up her charm to me.
Her Ma died when she wuz fourteen, leavin’ two twins jest of a age,
three singles, and a Pa with a weak tottlin’ backbone that had to
be propped up by somebody, and when Miss Martin laid down the job
Marion took it up. She wuz real sweet lookin’, her eyes wuz soft
as soft brown velvet, and her hair about the same color, only with
a sort of golden light when the sun shone on it, a clear white and
pink complexion, a good plump little figger, always dressed in a
neat quiet way, and pretty manners, so gentle and lovely that I
always felt when I see her like startin’ up that old him:
“Sister thou art mild and lovely,
Gentle as a summer breeze.”
But didn’t always, knowin’ it would make talk. But I had noticed
that she begun to look wan and peaked. I knowed that she had a
lover, a good actin’ and lookin’ chap, that I liked first rate
myself. He had been payin’ attention to her for over two years,
and I wondered if the skein of true love that had seemed to run so
smooth from the reel of life had got a snarl in it. I mistrusted it
had, but wouldn’t say anything to force her confidence, thinkin’
that if she wanted me to know about it she had the use of her
tongue, and had always confided in me from the time she used to
show me her doll’s broken legs and arms with tears.
Marion wuz well educated and always the most helpful little thing
about the house. She wuz one of the wimmen who would make a barn
look homelike, a good cook, a real little household fairy, and
Laurence Marsh had always seemed to appreciate these qualities in
her. Her Pa wuz well to do, so Marion had enough to do with, but
the care of the family all come on her, her Pa, the two twins, and
three singles makin’ quite a burden for her soft little shoulders
to bear. But she seemed to be strengthened for it some way, I guess
the Lord helped her. She had jined the church when she wuz fourteen
and wuz a Christian, everybody knew. She kep’ the house in perfect
order, with the help of one stout German girl, makin’ mistakes at
first but gittin’ the better of ’em as time went on, takin’ the
best of care of the baby girls, kept an eye on the three unruly
boys, kep’ ’em to home nights jest by lovin’ ’em and makin’ home
a pleasanter place than they could find anywhere else, injected
courage and hope into her Pa’s feeble will in jest the same way by
her love and cheerful, patient ways.
She studied music chiefly so the boys could have some one to play
for ’em--they had good voices and loved to sing--studied all the
health books and books of household science so she could take the
right care of her babies, and her home improved every year, so
that now, when she wuz nineteen, I told Josiah that Marion Martin
wuz jest as perfect as human bein’s can be. You know folks can’t be
quite perfect, or else they would flop their wings and fly upwards.
And oh, how Marion loved her baby girls, two plump, curly haired
little cherubs, and how they loved her, and how her Pa and the
boys leaned on her! And I could see, if nobody else could, how her
heart wuz sot on Dr. Laurence Marsh, and I didn’t blame her, for
he wuz as fine a young chap as there wuz in the country. He wuzn’t
dependent on his profession, he had plenty of money of his own,
that fell onto him from his Ma. And he’d paid her so much attention
that I spozed he would offer her his heart and hand, though I
thought mebby he wuz held back by the thought of how necessary she
wuz in her own home. But it had come to me, and come straight--Elam
Parson’s widder told it to Deacon Bissel’s aunt, and she told it
to Betsy Bobbett’s stepdaughter, and she told Tirzah Ann, and she
told me; it come straight--that Marion’s Pa had been seen over to
Loontown three different times to the Widder Lummises, and I said
to myself the Lord had planned to lead Marion out of the kinder
stuny path of Duty into the rosy, love-lit path of Happiness, and I
felt well over it.
But who can know anything for certain in this oncertain world? One
day, when I had just been congratulatin’ myself while I washed
my breakfast dishes about the apparently happy future waitin’ my
favorite (Miss Bobbett had been in to borry some tea and told me
she see the Widder Lummis in the store the day before buyin’ a
hull piece of Lonsdale cambric. And I can put two and two together
as well as the best. So I wuz washin’ away with a real warm glow
of happiness--my dish water wuz pretty hot, but that wuzn’t it
entirely), Josiah come in and said he wuz goin’ right by Marion’s
on bizness, and I could ride over and stay there whilst he wuz
gone. He wanted to go right away, but he wuz belated by the harness
breakin’ after we got started, so it wuz after the middle of the
forenoon before we got there.
Marion wuz dretful glad to see me and visey versey, yes, indeed! it
wuz versey on my part, but I thought she looked wan, wanner than I
had ever seen her look. The hired girl had gone home on a visit,
and her Pa had took the two little girls and the boys out ridin’,
so Marion wuz alone. And as I looked round and see the perfect
order and beauty of her home, and my nose took in the odor of the
good dinner, started early, so’s to be done good (it wuz a stuffed
fowl she wuz roastin’ and cookin’ some vegetables that needed slow
cookin’), and as I looked at her, a perfect picture with her satin
brown hair, her pretty blue print dress, with white collar and
cuffs and white apron with a rose stuck in her belt, I thought to
myself the man that gits you will git a prize. But I wuz rousted
from my admirin’ thought after I had been there a little while by
Marion sayin’ in a pensive way:
“Do you think I could write poetry, Aunt Samantha?”
“Poetry?” sez I. “I d’no whether you could or not.” But as I looked
round agin I sez mildly, “Mebby you couldn’t write it, Marion, but
you could live it, and you do now in my opinion.”
“Live poetry!” sez she wonderin’ly.
“Yes,” sez I, “livin’ poetry is full as beautiful and necessary as
to write it, and a good deal more of a rarity.”
I knew her hull life had run along better and smoother than any
blank verse I had ever seen, better than any Eppicac or Owed; it
had been a full, sweet, harmonious poem of love and order and duty.
But she sez agin sadly:
“I can’t live poetry; I can only do common things. I can’t read
Greek or write poems, or carve statutes, or paint beautiful
pictures.”
Her sweet eyes looked mournful. I wanted to chirk her up. So I sez,
as my nose agin took in a whiff of the delicious food, “Folks can
worry along for quite a spell without knowin’ Greek, when they can
understand and do justice to a well cooked meal of vittles.” And
sez I, as my eye roamed round the clean, sweet interior, “There is
such a thing as livin’ a beautiful picture, and moulding immortal
statutes” (I meant the dear, good actin’ little twins), “and in my
idee you’ve done it, and I know somebody else that thinks so, too.”
“Oh, no, he don’t! he don’t!” And suddenly she knelt down by my
side and almost buried her pretty head in my shoulder and busted
into tears. And so it all come out, for all the world tellin’ me
about it jest as she did when the sawdust flowed from her doll’s
legs.
It seemed that Laurence Marsh had been away to a relative’s
visitin’, and went to some charity doin’s and had there met a young
widder visitin’ in the place, a poetess and artist and sculptor;
she read a Greek poem dressed in Greek costoom, and some of her
pictures and statuettes wuz on sale. He got introduced to her.
She made the world and all of him, and I see how it wuz--men
are weak and easy flattered and don’t know when they’re well
off--the bright, pure star that had lit his life so long didn’t
seem so valuable and shinin’ as the dashin’ glitter of this newly
discovered meteor (metafor). The widder had writ to him and he had
writ to her, and his talk since then had been full of her, and I
see how it wuz, he wuz kinder waverin’ back and forth, though I
mistrusted, and as good as told Marion so, that his love for her
wuz as firm as ever, it wuz only his fancy that had been touched.
Well, if you’ll believe it, that very afternoon after I’d got
home, who should come in but Laurence Marsh, he brought some legal
papers he had been fixin’ for Josiah--and I treated him quite cool,
about as cool as spring water, I should judge, for I didn’t like
the idee of his usin’ Marion as he had, though of course he wuzn’t
engaged to her, and had a right to pick and choose. And, for all
the world, if he didn’t go to work and confide in me. It duz beat
all how folks do open their hearts to me; I spoze it is my oncommon
good looks that makes ’em, and my noble mean, mebby, and if you’ll
believe it, and though I hadn’t no idee I should, I did feel kinder
sorry for him before he got through. He appreciated Marion, I see,
to the very extent of appreciation, but his fancy had been touched,
the romance in his nater had responded to Miss Piddockses romance.
“Miss Piddock?” sez I, “she that wuz Evangeline Allen?”
“Her name is Evangeline; so suited to her,” sez he.
“A widder with three children?” sez I.
“Yes, three beautiful little cherubs; I love them already from
their mother’s description.”
“Why,” sez I, “Miss Piddock is related to Josiah on his own side,
and we’ve been layin’ out to go and see her, but sunthin’ has
hendered. She lived out West, and has only moved back a year or so
ago. We’ve writ back and forth; and Josiah and I got it all planned
to stop and see her,” sez I; “I, too, have been greatly took with
her writings.” His handsome face grew earnest, he has perfect
confidence in me, and sez he:
“I can trust you, after you have been there will you tell me what
you think of her? Will you?” And sez he, “I feel that you will love
her, adore her; for if she is so lovely away among strangers what
a jewel she will be in the precious setting of her own beautiful
home! She has described it to me, and I have loved Nestle Down jest
from her description.”
I sez coolly, “Josiah and I hain’t goin’ to be sent out like spies
to discover the land; why don’t you go yourself?”
“She don’t want me to visit her,” sez he; “she is so sensitive, so
delicate, she has some reason I do not understand, and my duties to
the hospital tie me here until my vacation, which seems an age. But
my life’s happiness depends upon my decision,” sez he.
Well, I didn’t give no promises nor refuse ’em. What made me more
lienitent to Laurence Marsh wuz that I, too, had such feelin’s
of deep respect for Evangeline Piddock. I, too, had read with a
beatin’ heart some of her poems on the beauty and sacredness of
home and domestic happiness, her glorification of Mother Love and
Duty, and at a relative’s I had seen some of her pictures and
statuettes in stun, beautiful as a dream--she wuz truly a disciple
of Art and Beauty and a Creator. And then--I heard his ardent
words, I see the light in his eyes. And oh, the joys and pains and
the dreams of youth, the raptures and the agonies! I could look
back and feel ’em agin in memory. The impatience with Destiny,
the hopes, the uncertainty, the roads that branch off in so many
different ways before the hasty impatient feet. Setting at rest at
eventide in the long cool shadows, don’t let us forget the blazing
skies, the heart beats, the ardent hopes, the ambitions, the
perplexing cares of the forenoon.
Well, if you’ll believe it, the very next Sunday after that
Marion’s Pa married the Widder Lummis, stood up after meetin’ and
married her in a good, sensible, middle-aged way, and brung her
home, and Josiah and I wuz invited there the next week a-visitin’.
We’re highly thought on in Jonesville.
I found Marion’s stepma quite a good lookin’ woman, full of animal
sperits and dressed handsome; she seemed good enough to Marion on
the outside, but I could see that home wuzn’t what it had been to
Marion in any way; her new Ma wanted to go ahead and be mistress,
and thought she had a right to, and she didn’t keep the house as
Marion did; things wuzn’t dirty, but if the house resembled any
poem at all it wuz a poem of Disorder and Tumult. She wanted the
two boys and the twins to like her, and she humored ’em, gin ’em
candy and indigestible stuff that Marion never approved of, but
they did highly, and they seemed kinder weaned from Marion and
took up with their good natered, indulgent new Ma. And of course
Marion’s Pa, as wuz nateral, wuz all engrossed in his new wife; she
wuz healthy, handsome, and a good cook. Poor Marion! in the new
anthem they wuz all jinin’ in there didn’t seem to be any part for
her voice. She looked like a mournin’ dove; my heart ached for her.
Towards night I see her leanin’ up against the west winder of the
parlor lookin’ out sadly, and, though the settin’ sun wuz on her
face, it couldn’t lighten the shadder on it. I went up to her and
laid my hand on her shoulder, and I see then that her eyes had
been fixed on the pretty cottage Dr. Marsh had jest bought, the
prettiest place in Jonesville, a sort of a stun gray house settin’
back in its green trees with a big lawn like velvet in front, all
dotted with flowering shrubs and handsome trees. But I never let on
that I knew what she wuz lookin’ at. But I sez, as I laid my hand
tenderly on her shoulder:
“Dear, I shan’t see you agin for some time, as we’re goin’ to make
a few visits, if I can get Josiah started.”
She lifted her big sad eyes to mine, they wuz full of tears, and
she didn’t need to say a word. Her tragedy wuz writ there, the
loss of everything she had loved and held dearest in her life; she
didn’t need to speak, I read it all, it wuz coarse print to me, I
didn’t need specs. And she read what she see in my eyes, the deep
love and sympathy I wouldn’t profane by puttin’ into words. No, I
jest bent down and kissed her and she me, and, havin’ passed the
compliments with the new Miss Martin, we went home, and the next
day we started on our tower.
Well, as we approached Pennell Hill, the abode of Evangeline Allen
Piddock, I looked anxiously at myself and pardner and picked off
some specks of lint from his coat collar and my mantilly and
anxiously smoothed the creases of my umbrell and tried to fold it
up closter and more genteel, but I could not, it would bag, but I
felt a or in approachin’ her home, for I had studied her poems a
sight and almost worshipped ’em, and through them the writer,
you know sunthin’ as it reads, “Up through Nater to Nater’s God.”
So I had looked up through her glorious poems of Love and Home and
Childhood and Beauty, her divine poems and statutes, up to the
author, and my soul had knelt to her, and thinkses I, I am now on
the eve of enterin’ a home more perfect and beautiful than my eyes
have ever beheld, presided over by a perfect angel. Of course I
didn’t spoze she had wings or a halo, knowin’ a woman couldn’t git
around sweepin’ and dustin’ worth a cent with white feather wings,
and knowin’ the halo would more’n as likely as not drop off when
she wuz smoothin’ rugs or pickin’ posies to ornament her mantelry
piece. But I expected to see a woman perfected as I had never seen
her before in every way. And I not only paid attention to the
outside of our two frames, but I tried to pick out the very finest
soul garment I had by me, to clothe my sperit in, knowin’ then that
it wuz hardly worthy of her.
[Illustration: AND THEN ALL THREE ON ’EM YELLED OUT: “RUBBER NECK!
RUBBER NECK!”
_Page 49._]
But my meditations wuz broke in on about a mild from Pennell Hill
by seein’ a strange lookin’ group of children ahead on us; they wuz
bareheaded and clad in ragged dirty garments, and their faces and
hands and feet wuz as near to Nater’s heart as dirt could make ’em.
Their manners, too, wuz sassy, and grotesque in the extreme, for
when we stopped and I asked ’em politely if they could tell us
where Miss Evangeline Piddock lived, the oldest one sung out:
“What do you want with her? You can’t see her anyway, she’s abed!”
“No,” sez another of ’em, “she won’t look at you, you’re too
homely.” And still another stuck a grimy forefinger on the side
of a smudgy nose and sez, “What are you givin’ us?” And then all
three on ’em yelled out, “Rubber neck! Rubber neck!” Some sort
of a slang word, I spoze--and then they kicked up their dirty
heels and run and jumped over a fence, and one boy turned two
or three summersets, while the other ones kicked at us. Worse
lookin’ children I never see, nor worse actin’ ones, not in my hull
durin’ life; I felt stirred up and mad clear to my bones as they
disappeared over a hill. And I sez to Josiah:
“I should think that the ennoblin’ influence of Evangeline Allen
Piddock would have elevated even neighborin’ children and kep’ ’em
from bein’ perfect savages like these.”
And Josiah sez, “I’d love to try the ennoblin’ influence of a
good birch gad on ’em,” and I didn’t blame him, not a mite. Anon
we approached a shamblin’, run-down lookin’ place, the house with
the paint all off in spots and the picket fence dilapidated, the
pickets and rails hangin’ loose, and weeds runnin’ loose over the
yard, and Josiah sez, “We might inquire here where Evangeline
lives.”
I sez, “She wouldn’t have anything to do with folks that live in
such a lookin’ place, but it wouldn’t do any hurt to inquire.”
So Josiah approached the rickety piazza, and carefully stepped
up on the broken doorstep and rapped, the door-bell hangin’ down
broke. He rapped agin and yet agin, and the third time the door wuz
opened and a female appeared clad in a long flowing robe of sage
green, and her kinder yellow hair hangin’ loose, only banded in a
Greek sort of a way with a dirty ribbin and the robe wuz dirty and
two or three holes in it.
Sez Josiah, “Mom, can you tell me where she that wuz Evangeline
Allen lives, Miss Piddock that now is?”
And then the female struck a sort of a graceful attitude and sez,
“I am Evangeline Allen Piddock.”
You could have knocked me down with a hair-pin, and my poor Josiah
wuz also struck almost sensible, and sez he, “Well, we’ve come!”
And the female looked down on him, still holdin’ that graceful
attitude. But I broke the deadlock that ensued by callin’ out from
the democrat, I wuz only a little ways off:
“Miss Piddock, let me introduce Josiah to you.”
She come forward eagerly and sez with effusion, “Is this Cousin
Josiah Allen?” And she shook his hands warmly. “And is this my dear
Cousin Samantha?” sez she, approachin’ the vehicle and holdin’
my hand in both of hers. “Descend from your equipage!” sez she.
“Welcome, dear cousins, to Nestle Down!”
“Thank you, Evangeline,” sez I, as I slowly backed out of the
democrat and alighted down. But my soul wildly questioned me,
“Where, where shall we nestle down?” For I couldn’t see any place.
And after we got our things off and wuz visitin’ my soul still kep’
up this questionin’, “When, when shall I nestle down? And where?”
For the outside of the house wuzn’t a circumstance to the inside;
everything that could be out of place wuz, and everything that
could be dirty lived up to its full privileges in that respect.
The hired girl, a shiftless critter, I could see, wuz sick with
nooraligy, but appeared with a mussy, faded out, calico wrapper and
a yeller flannel tied round her face, and inquired what she should
git for supper. Evangeline wuz at that minute describing to me a
statute she had in her mind to sculp, but she left off and gin the
girl some orders, and then kep’ on with her talk.
She sez, “My mind revels in the heroic, the romantic, it spreads
its wings and flies away from the Present and the Real into the
Beautiful, the Ideal.”
And I thought to myself I didn’t blame the soul for wantin’ to
git away somewhere, but knew that it ort to be right there up and
a-doin’ sunthin’ to make matters different.
Well, after a long interval we wuz called out to the supper table.
There wuz a crumpled, soiled tablecloth hangin’ onevenly on a
broken legged table, propped up by a book on one side. I looked at
the book, and I see that it wuz “The Search for the Beautiful,” and
I knowed that it could never find it there. Some showy decorated
dishes, nicked and cracked, held our repast--thick slices of heavy
indigestible bread; some cake fallen as flat as Babylon (you know
the him states “Babylon is fallen to rise no more”), some dyspeptic
lookin’, watery potatoes and cold livid slices of tough beef;
some canned berries that had worked, the only stiddy workers I
judged that had been round; some tea made with luke-warm water.
Such wuz our fare enlivened by the presence of three of the worst
actin’, worst lookin’ children I ever see in my life, clamberin’,
disputin’, sassy little demons, reachin’ acrost the table for
everything they wanted, sassin’ their Ma and makin’ up faces at
us sarahuptishously, but I ketched ’em at it. The girl with the
nooraligy waited on the table; her dress hadn’t been changed, but a
mussy lookin’ muslin cap wuz perched on top of the yeller flannel
and a equally crumpled, soiled, white muslin apron surmounted her
dress, but, style bein’ maintained by these two objects, Evangeline
seemed to be content.
She wuz the only serene, happy one at the table, and she led the
conversation upward into fields of Poesy with a fine disregard to
her surroundin’s that wuz wonderful in the extreme. Her talk wuz
beautiful and inspirin’, and in spite of myself I found myself anon
or oftener led up some distance into happier spears of fancy and
imagination. But a howl from some of the little demons would bring
me down agin, and a look at my dear pardner’s face of agony would
plunge me, too, into gloom. Eat he could not; I myself, such is
woman’s heroism and self-sacrifice, and feelin’ that I must make up
for his arrearages, eat more than wuz for my good, which I paid for
dearly afterwards, and knowed I must; dyspepsia claimed me for its
victim, and I suffered turribly, but of this more anon and bimeby.
After supper we returned into the parlor, the children with
variegated faces and hands, caused by berry juice and butter,
swarmin’ over us and everything in the room, so I see plain the
reason that every single thing wuz nasty and broken in the house
and outside. They wuz oncomfortable as could be, every one on ’em
had the stomach ache; and why shouldn’t they! The acid in their
veins made ’em demoniac in their ways. Not one mouthful had they
eat that wuz proper for children to eat, nor for any one else
unless their stomach wuz made of iron or gutty-perchy. And I didn’t
believe they ever took a bath unless they fell into the water,
which they often did. The girl had gin their face and hands a hasty
wipe with a wet towel, and their hair, which wuz shingled, wuz as
frowsy and onclean as shingles would admit of.
Evangeline wuz good natered, and she had the faculty, Heaven knows
how she could exercise it, of bein’ perfectly oblivious to her
surroundin’s, and soarin’ up to the pure Heavens, whilst her body
wuz down in a state worse than savages. Yes, so I calmly admitted
to myself, for savages roamed the free wild forest, and clean spots
could be found amongst the wild green woods, but here in vain would
you seek for one. Her poems and statutes wuz beautiful, and she
had piles on ’em, some done, some only jest begun; she wuz workin’
now on a statute of Sikey, beautiful as a poem in marble could be,
and as we wuz lookin’ at it she sez, liftin’ her large, fine eyes
heavenward:
“Oh, to create, to be a creator of beauty in poem or picture or
statute, it seems to make one a partner with the Deity.”
“Yes,” sez I, “there is a good deal of sense in that, and I fully
appreciate beauty wherever I see it.”
But, bein’ gored by Duty, sez I, “How would it work to make your
own children, of which you are the author, works of art and beauty,
care for them, work at them some as you do at your own stun
figgers, cuttin’ off the rough edges, prunin’ and cuttin’ so the
soul will show through the human, and they havin’ the advantage
over your statutes that the good work you expend on them is liable
to go on to the end of time, carryin’ out your lofty ideals in
other lives--how would it work, Evangeline, and makin’ your own
home as nigh as you can like the ideal one you dote on--wouldn’t it
be better for you?”
She said it wouldn’t work at all; the care of home and children
hampered her and held her down; she preferred pure, unadulterated
art, onmingled with duties.
But I sez, “Wouldn’t the time to decide that question been before
you volunteered to assume these cares; but after you have done so
how would it work to do the very best you could with them, finish
the work you have begun in as artistic and perfect a way as you
can?”
I was cautious, I didn’t come out as I wanted to, so I sez, “How
would it work?”
But she sez agin, “It wouldn’t work at all.” Sez she, “To describe
the beauty of home and love, and child life in marble and poem and
picture, she had to be severed entirely from all low and ignoble
cares.”
“Low and ignoble!” sez I, for that kinder madded me. “No work a
woman can do is more noble and elevatin’ than to make a beautiful
home where lovely children rise up to call her blessed. Such a work
is copyin’ below as nigh as mortals can the work divine; for isn’t
Heaven depictered as our everlastin’ home, and God the Father as
lovin’ and carin’ for His children with everlastin’ love, countin’
the hairs of their heads even, He takes such clost care of ’em?”
“He don’t order us to be shingled, either,” spoke up Josiah. “He
don’t begretch the work of countin’ our hair.”
I wunk at him to be calm, for oh! how cross his axent wuz, but
knowin’ that famine wuz the cause of it I didn’t contend, but
resoomed:
“See how our Father beautifies and ornaments our home, Evangeline,
with the glories of spring and summer, fills it with the perfume of
flowers, the song of birds, hangs above us His dark blue mantilly
studded with stars, and from the least little mosses in hid-away
nooks up to the everlastin’ march of the planets, every single
thing is perfect and in order. His tireless love and care never
ceases, but surrounds us every moment in the home He makes and
keeps up for us below,” sez I. “If a woman prefers to keep aloof
from the cares and responsibilities of wifehood and parenthood,
let her do so, but havin’ assumed ’em let her realize their duty
and dignity, for,” sez I, “to create a true home, Evangeline, is
worthy of all a woman’s efforts, and in such a cause even brooms
and dish-cloths take on a sacred meaning.”
But she said that mops and dish-cloths and such things wuz fetters
that she could not brook. And at that moment the three little imps
all fell into the room demandin’ with shrieks and kicks sunthin’
or ruther that their Ma couldn’t pay any attention to, as she wuz
absorbed in contemplating a slight thickness in a minute part of
the butterfly’s wing on Sikey’s shoulder, and her mind wuz all took
up in thinkin’ how could she prune it off without destroying the
wing, it wuz so fragile and yet so highly necessary to be done. So
havin’ howled round her for a spell and tugged at her Greek robe,
so I see plain how the dirt and rents come on it, they hailed the
passin’ figger of the hired girl in the hall and precipitated
themselves onto her, havin’ previously kicked at the panels of the
door so it almost parted asunder, so I could see plain how in a
year’s time everything wuz in ruins outside and inside Nestle Down,
and how impracticable it wuz that any ordinary person could by any
possibility ever nestle down there, but Josiah here broke in agin:
“Evangeline, how long did your husband live?”
Sez she, liftin’ a torn lace handkerchief to her eyes, and leanin’
up against one of her statutes a good deal as I’ve seen Grief in a
monument in a mournin’ piece, “He lingered along for years, but he
wuz sick all the time, he had acute dyspepsia.”
“I thought so,” said Josiah, “I almost knowed it!”
Agin I wunk at him to keep still, but his arms wuz folded over his
empty stomach with a expression of agony on him, and he answered
my sithe with a deep groan, and knowin’ that I had better remove
him to once, I proposed that we should retire. But Evangeline
wuz describing a most magnificent sunset which she proposed to
immortalize in a poem, and in spite of the gripin’ in my stomach,
which had begun fearful, I couldn’t help bein’ carried away some
distance by her eloquent language.
Well, at my second or third request we retired and went to bed. Our
room wuz a big empty lookin’ one, the girl havin’ lately started to
clean it, but prevented by nooraligy, the carpet nails hadn’t been
took out only on two sides, and the children had been playin’ under
it, I judged by the humps and hummocks under it. Josiah drawed out
from under it a sled, an old boot-jack, and a Noah’s Ark that he
had stubbed his foot aginst, and I tripped and most fell over a
basket-ball and a crokay mallet. The washstand had been used by
them, I thought, for headquarters for the enemy, for some stuns wuz
piled up on it, a broken old hammer, a leather covered ball, and
some marbles.
The lamp hadn’t been washed for weeks, I judged, by the mournin’
chimbly and gummed-up wick, and there wuz mebby a spunful of
kerseen in the dirty bottom of the lamp. The bed wuz awful; the
children had used it also as a receptacle for different things.
We drawed out of it a old sponge, a dead rat, crumbs of bread and
butter, and a pair of old shoes.
The girl who showed us up said the children had played there all
the day before, it bein’ rainy, but she guessed we would find
everything all right. Not a mite of water in the broken nosed
pitcher, not a particle of soap, but an old apple core reposed in
the dirty soap dish.
Well, I fixed things as well as I could, and we pulled the soiled,
torn lace coverlet over us and sought the repose of sleep, but
in vain, awful pains in my stomach attested to the voyalation of
nater’s laws. Josiah wore out, and, groanin’ to the last, fell
asleep, for which I wuz thankful, the oil burnt out to once,
leavin’ a souvenir of smoke to add to the vile collection of
smells, so I lay there in the dark amidst the musty odors and
suffered, suffered dretful in body and sperit.
Amidst the gripin’ of colic I compared this home to the home Marion
had composed like a rare poem of beauty, and I bethought how much
more desirable is real practical duty and beauty than the gauzy
fabric wrought of imagination, or ’tennyrate how necessary it wuz
not to choose two masters. If one loved Art well enough to wed it
and leave father and mother for its sake, well and good, but after
chosin’ love and home and children, how necessary and beautiful
it wuz to tend to them first of all, and then pay devotion to Art
afterwards.
Well, I couldn’t allegore much, I wuz in too much pain, dyspepsia
lay holt of me turribly. But amidst its twinges I remember wishin’
that Laurence Marsh could compare as I had the two homes and lives
composed by Marion and Evangeline.
And then a worse twinge of pain brung this thought, a doctor I
ought to have. A woman should be allowed to choose her own doctor.
I said to myself I will send for Doctor Laurence Marsh in the
mornin’, which I did. Josiah bein’ skairt telephoned to him to come
to once. He come on the cars, arrivin’ at about ten A. M.
I guess I had better hang up a curtain between the reader and
Laurence Marsh as he stood in that home confronted by Evangeline
Allen Piddock and her household. I hadn’t told her who I had sent
for, not havin’ seen her that mornin’, so he see ’em all in a state
of nater as it were.
Yes, I will hold up a thick, heavy curtain with Josiah’s help, for
I don’t want the reader to see Laurence Marshes face as he looked
about him in the parlor and up by my bedside--such a bedside! His
face, as he measured out the medicine, wuz, as Mr. Byron sez, “a
scroll on which unutterable thoughts wuz traced.” But, amidst all
his perturbations of mind and wrecks of airy castles and dreams,
nothin’ could prevent him from bein’ a good doctor, though owin’ to
a urgent hurry, a case of life and death, he said, he had to return
to Jonesville immegiately, which he did.
But I felt so much better after takin’ the tablets twice every half
hour that we started home a little after leven.
It seemed to me that home never seemed so good, so dear, and so
clean to me in my hull life before, and what added to my perfect
enjoyment, jest as we set down to a delicious supper, cooked by
my own hands, one of the singles brought over a note to me from
Marion. It wuz a invitation to her weddin’, which wuz to take place
the next week.
CHAPTER IV.
What Maggie said about her makin’ a change kinder staid with me.
Great is the power of suggestion. She suggested it to me, and I
passed on the influence to my pardner.
I sez, “We’ve worked hard, and why not rest off and take a little
comfort?”
“Comfort! Who ever took any comfort a-visitin’! Bound up in your
best clothes settin’ round and talkin’ polite.”
“Your clothes don’t bind you, Josiah, and you know I always seek
comfort first, hopin’ mebby good lookin’ things may be added unto
me. And as for politeness, you don’t strain yourself much that way,
and I’d love to see some of these friends we owe visits to.”
He sez, “Don’t you want to go to Nestle Down agin?” And I sez, “No,
I did all the nestlin’ I wanted to once.”
Well, it wuz a number of days before he gin his consent, but
finally he did, and we sot off, and our first visit wuz to Alcander
and Fidelia Pogram’s.
We had been owin’ ’em visits for some time. They’re movin’
planets, and revolve round considerable, and always have. We are
stars, Josiah and me, that are more fixed in our orbits. It wuz
on one of Alcanderses revolutions (with of course his satellite
Fidelia a-revolvin’ round him) that they lived neighbor to us
for over two years, and I got real attached to Fidelia. She is a
conscientious, painstaking woman, and her husband is well off, and
naterally good-natered and well-meanin’. But when they wuz first
married Fidelia made a Molok of him, and burnt incense before him
day and night, burnin’ up on that altar all her own preferences
and desires, all her chances of recreation and rest, all her own
ideals, her own loves.
Never tryin’ to lift herself up and look abroad into the sunlight,
and foller it outdoors into happiness--no; she jest sot crouched
before that altar till her eyes got dim with the smoke of her
sacrifice and she couldn’t straighten up. And the cloud of incense
she wuz offerin’ up to him from day to day wuz so heavy between
’em that he’d lost sight of her; and bein’ at his feet, instead of
by his side where she belonged, he couldn’t see her very well, and
she seemed to be quite a distance away from him. She had made over
by such doin’s his naterally generous disposition into a selfish,
overbearin’ one. He wuz about as innocent as a babe of the way it
wuz done, and she, too. But, take it all in all, she had made about
the worst botch of married life that I had ever seen made, and she
all the time jest as conscientious and religious as old Job or
Zekiel or any of ’em; and he, too, thought that he wuz jest as good
as Obadiah or Jonah or Enoch. And, what made it seem still worse to
me, she wuz bringin’ up her girl in the same way.
Elinor wuz goin’ on twenty-one, and had a bo, Louis Arnold by name.
Her Ma had told me about it the year before, and I had noticed that
Elinor looked real rosy and sweet. That wuz in the first days of
courtship, and I could see that the spell wuz upon her. The earth
wuz glorified; the heavens bent down clost to her; she and Louis
wuz a-walkin’ through Eden. But the next time I see Elinor she
looked considerable faded and anxious-eyed; for all the world her
eyes looked like her Ma’s--lovin’ and faithful as a dog’s, and as
anxious lookin’ as a dog’s when it has been doin’ sunthin’ and
expects a whippin’. I had hearn from a neighbor that Louis wuz of
late growin’ cool in his attentions to Elinor. And I felt bad, for
I mistrusted how it wuz done. She had sot him up on such a hite
that he looked down on her. Good land! with her poster, he had
to look down if he see her at all. The neighbor said that it wuz
spozed that Elinor wuz goin’ into a decline, and sez she: “That
Louis Arnold is a villian. He paid her attention for a year and
won her love, and wuz as good as engaged to her, and she doin’
everything under the sun to keep his love, and then he grew cool
and drawed off. He is a villian!” she repeated.
“Well, mebby there is blame on both sides.”
And agin she sez, “Elinor did everything to hold him, and duz yet,
for she still hopes to keep him.”
And I sez, “Mebby she did too much.”
And the neighbor glared at me, and sez coldly, “I don’t understand
you.”
And I sez, “No, I spoze not.” And I didn’t explain furder, nor she
didn’t.
And this neighbor, bein’ a sharp-eyed-and-nosed woman, who
evidently loved scandal, sez, “Have you hearn anything more about
Fidelia’s troubles?”
And I sez, “No.”
And she sez, “Poor creeter! she is passin’ through the waters.”
And I sez: “What waters? Has she fell into the creek, or has her
suller overflowed?”
And then she sez, right out, “Her hired girl gits more of her
husband’s attention than she duz. Folks talk a sight!” sez she.
And I sez, coolly, “They generally do; they mostly make out not to
lose the use of their tongues by tyin’ ’em to their teeth.”
And I wouldn’t ask a word more; but she went on: “Everybody sez
Minnie acts more like the mistress of the house than Fidelia
duz, dressed up and loiterin’ round; though they do say that she
is faithful and honest; but Fidelia duz the hardest of the work
herself, and folks say that Minnie eats with them, and if anything
is wanted Fidelia gits up and gits it, and Minnie sits like a lady.”
“Well,” sez I, “most probable that is Fidelia’s fault. She wouldn’t
do it unless she wuz a fool!” sez I.
“And some one told me,” sez the neighbor, “that hearn it from one
that wuz knowin’ to it, that Alcander had been known to pay Minnie
compliments on her good looks and pretty dresses and find fault
with Fidelia.”
“Well,” sez I, “that is nothin’ but human man-nater; they will
always find fault with their wives in preference to other wimmen;
they’re built in jest that way, and mebby they can’t help it. I
spoze mebby they think that they’re complimentin’ ’em, payin’
attention to ’em; men are so queer.”
And agin she looked real meanin’, and sez, “Well, folks talk a
sight.”
And I sez agin, “They most generally do.”
Well, Fidelia Pogram wuz dretful glad to see me, and so wuz Elinor.
Alcander, owin’ to the course of treatment he had had, acted some
hauty, bein’ I wuz a woman--Fidelia’s fault, every mite on’t.
Alcander wuz warm-hearted when he wuz married, and liked wimmen
jest as well as he did men--and better, too, his wife bein’ a
woman. Well, I see in a minute that Elinor looked bad, holler-eyed,
pale, wan, and some stoopin’ in the shoulders (but of that more
anon). Well, they hurried round and got a good supper. Fidelia is
a splendid cook and duz all the cookin’, for Alcander likes her
cookin’ better than he duz anybody else’s; and Fidelia, bein’ so
anxious to please him, duz it all, every mite; and he thinks that
Fidelia duz up his shirt bosoms better, and so she irons all the
fine clothes; and Alcander finds a sight of fault if the house
hain’t kep’ jest so; and, Minnie not bein’ a nateral housekeeper,
Fidelia jest slaves round all the time, cleanin’ and pickin’ up,
and looks fagged out and tired and worn all the time, and the hired
girl pert and rosy; and Alcander paid her a compliment on her good
looks, and wished right before me that Fidelia could look more like
Minnie, and Minnie bridled up and looked tickled, and Fidelia’s
head drooped like a droopin’ dove’s. And I don’t know when I have
been madder, both as a friend and as a woman.
And I spoke right up, and sez, “Mebby if Minnie had been in the
kitchen over a hot stove, and br’iled the steak and creamed the
potatoes and made the coffee, and if Fidelia had been out on the
piazza part of the time, mebby she would have looked more fresh.” I
had seen Minnie there half of the time she wuz a-settin’ the table,
a-leanin’ over the railin’, actin’ lazy and uppish.
“But,” sez Alcander coolly, “Fidelia prefers to do the cookin’.”
“Yes,” sez Fidelia faintly--for she wuz wore out--“yes, I prefer
to.”
“Well,” sez I, “if you do, it is the least we can do, who enjoys
your delicious supper, to be thankful to you, and sorry that you
have wore yourself out for our enjoyment.” Fidelia’s cheeks flushed
and her eyes brightened at the unusual thing of a word of praise
bein’ gin to her; and the hired girl looked mad and black; and
Alcander looked on with perfect wonder at the turn things had took,
and spoke quite soft to Fidelia, and she brightened up still more.
Sez he, “Nobody can cook a steak equal to Fidelia.”
And my Josiah looked real tempersome, and as if he wuz a-goin’ in
to combat for my rights as a stak’ist. But I spoke right up and sez:
“That is so, Alcander. Fidelia is one of the most splendid cooks
in the county, and you must be proud of her, and do all you can to
make her rest and recreate between meals, jest out of gratitude to
the one that furnishes such delicious food.”
He looked kinder cheap; and Fidelia looked troubled, for she
mistrusted that there wuz a shadder of blame bein’ cast onto
Alcander; but I changed the subject, like a good mistress of
ticktacks.
“I spoze, Elinor, you have read the last great book of----?” and I
named a book very upliftin’, and beloved by young wimmen.
“No,” she said; she hadn’t much time for readin’, she wuz so busy
makin’ Christmas gifts.
Sez Fidelia, proudly, “Elinor has hem-stitched twenty-two fine
linen han’kerchiefs for the aunts and cousins on both sides, and
made home-made lace to trim them with out of one-hundred-and-twenty
thread.”
And I sez, “I don’t know that there wuz any thread so fine.”
“Yes,” sez Fidelia; “it looks like a cobweb; and out of that same
thread she has made twenty yards of that lace to trim underclothes
for her two sister-in-laws.”
“Isn’t it bad for her eyes, Fidelia?” sez I, lookin’ at the worn,
red eyelids of Elinor.
“Yes,” sez Fidelia, “it wuz very hard on her; but she wanted to do
it, for she thought they would prize ’em higher; and then,” sez
Fidelia, “she has made two dozen doilies for Louis’ mother out of
that same thread.”
“How long did it take you to do it?” sez I dryly.
“Oh,” sez she, “I had them for work all summer; I begun ’em the 1st
of June, so I could be sure to get them done for Christmas. I think
that I could have done them in two months if I had worked all the
time.”
And I sez to myself, all these long golden summer hours, sweet with
bird-song, fragrant with flowers and beauty, she had sot over her
one-hundred-and-twenty thread patiently weavin’ cobwebs, hopin’
mebby to ketch Happiness in it; but ’tennyrate doin’ this slow
work, stitch by stitch, and lettin’ all the beauty and glory of
summer and life go by. For I begun to see plainer than ever why
Louis Arnold wuz a defaulter in the bank of love.
“Afterwards in her room,” sez Fidelia, “I want you to see the
slippers she has embroidered for Louis--I never see the beat of it;
they are so fine you can’t tell where the stitches are put; each
one took her three weeks of stiddy work; they are a design of pink
roses on a sky-blue ground.”
Sez I, “She could have bought a pair for five dollars that would
have done jest as well, and I would have loved to have seen some
of the pink roses on her cheeks, and some of the bright sky-blue
in her eyes. They used to look like bits of the sky peeping out of
rosy clouds.” (Them wuz her cheeks in metafor.) “But they look
faded now, Fidelia,” sez I--“dretful faded and wore out.”
“Yes,” sez she, “she has injured her eyesight this summer--injured
it a sight. She has sot up till midnight, night after night,
workin’, for fear she wouldn’t git ’em done in time. And then,” sez
she, bustin’ out into a confidential tone, “she has cried a good
deal. Oh, Samantha,” sez she, “you don’t know how much that girl is
a-sufferin’. There she is, jest the same as engaged, and she jest
as faithful as the north star to the pole, and he growin’ cool all
the time and indifferent.”
“Well,” sez I, “the stiddy faithfulness of the star can’t be
changed, Fidelia, nor the coldness of the north pole, for it is the
nater of that pole to be frigid, and we can’t do anything to warm
it up. But,” sez I, “as for this matter of Elinor and Louis Arnold,
I believe my soul that I could make a change in their doin’s if I
had my way.”
“Oh, dear Samantha! Could you, could you?” sez Fidelia, a-wipin’ up
her tears and lookin’ some brighter.
“But,” sez I, sort of lookin’ off mentally some distance, “it
hain’t no ways likely that she would do what I would want her to.”
“Oh, she would!” sez Fidelia.
“I would, I would!” cried Elinor, advancin’ from behind the
porchair. “Forgive me; I wuz behind the curtain a-catchin’ the
last daylight on these slippers, and I overheard your talk. I will
do jest as you say, for my heart is breakin’, Aunt Samantha,” sez
she. They always auntied and uncled us, our children did, Fidelia’s
and mine. “I will do jest what you tell me to,” sez she, standin’
before me, tears streamin’ down her white cheeks, her work-box in
one hand, and the oncompleted slipper a-danglin’ in the other.
“Well,” sez I, “the first thing to do is to put them aside,” sez I,
motionin’ to the slippers, two-thirds of which wuz not done; “and
them, too,” sez I, p’intin’ to the delicate cobweb-work hangin’
over the sides of her work-basket.
“Lay them aside!” sez she, in wonderin’, horrer-struck axents;
“these Christmas gifts?”
And I leaned back in my chair and looked indifferent, and sez I, “I
knew you wouldn’t do what I wanted you to.”
“Oh, I will, I will!” sez she. “I will do it.” And she went to a
side table and laid the work-basket on it and throwed a scarf over
it. I see she meant bizness, and she come back and sot down on a
low stool at my feet and leaned her pretty head against my knee,
and I smoothed down the clusterin’ curls on her pale forward and
went on.
“Now,” sez I, “the first thing you do, you go to the book-store
and buy a handsome copy of ‘Is Marriage a Failure?’ for Louis
Arnold, and some other nice book or piece of useful silver-ware
for his mother. Wrop these oncompleted gifts up in silk paper and
put them in the draw; and as you shet that draw up, shet up in it
all your cares and anxieties for Christmas; keep in your mind only
the beauty and blessedness of the day, and its holy and hallowed
meanin’. Keep this cobweb-work you have done for yourself as a
motto that means ‘I will never do it agin,’ and buy of some poor
girl that wants the money some of this hem-stitchin’ and tattin’
and drawn-work you want for your relations, and do them up, ready
to send away, and put them in draws; and when you shet up them
draws, shet up all anxieties for them. Then,” sez I, “all this off
your mind, bathe your wore-out eyes and pale face in some good pure
water, go to bed at nine, and get up in the early mornin’ fresh and
vigorous, and go out into the sunlight and drink down the sweet air
like a healin’ cordial.”
The weather wuz wonderful for October; Injun summer had made the
country beautiful; the roads wuz hard and smooth as summer roads.
Sez I, “Forgit all your cares, put on the pretty short dress you
used to wear, and go out for a long ride.”
“Oh,” sez she, “I don’t ride the wheel any more.”
“Why?” sez I wonderin’ly.
“Oh, Louis don’t like to have me. He thinks it is old-fashioned and
unladylike and unwomanly.”
“Don’t he ride?” sez I.
“Oh, yes--he has to for his nerves. He has an auto, but he thinks
that ridin’ a wheel almost cured him. He used to be dretful nervous
and weak. He can’t bear bein’ shut up in the house all the time.”
“Well,” sez I, “didn’t you think that it helped you to ride? Your
Ma told me that you felt like a new creature after you had had your
wheel for a month.”
“Oh, yes, Aunt Samantha,” sez she, “it did help me more than I
can tell, and you don’t know how I have missed it; I have felt
that it would have been such a help to me while I was makin’ these
Christmas gifts.”
“Well, why under the sun and moon, to say nothin’ of the stars and
meteors, haven’t you kept on with what you knew helped you so?”
“Oh, Louis doesn’t approve of my ridin’, and he wuz bitterly
opposed to my wearin’ short skirts; he considered it immodest, and
I had jest about as soon not go at all as to go in my long skirts.
The last time I rode, to please Louis I wore my long dress, and
right in the middle of the village my dress wound round the wheel,
and it wound my dress right up offen me, and I fell over onto my
head.”
“I suppose he considered that more modest?” sez I, dry as a chip.
“He is dretful opposed to short skirts,” sez she; “he talked awful
to me about ’em.”
“Why don’t you insist on his wearin’ his bath-robe on his wheel?
Let him try it once, and then see. Why didn’t you say that you wuz
shocked at the sight of his long limbs, and favored the Eastern
garb for men? Your dress wuz modest and mejum, it come to the tops
of your shoes, and you wore a divided skirt of the same cloth;
you can tell him, from me, your dress wuz jest twice as modest as
his’n.”
“Oh,” sez she, “I wouldn’t think of criticisin’ his dress.”
“Why not, as long as he criticises yours? But as for your dress
and his’n, they’re both all right. And now do you, within the next
fifteen minutes, don that garb, and go out on that wheel and take a
good long ride.”
“Oh, I don’t feel as though I could go right against his wishes. I
have done everything I could to hold his love.”
“You have done too much,” sez I coolly. “And now, Elinor Pogram, do
you brace up and have a little gumption. Get right onto your wheel
and go out into the sweet air and sunlight; and if you meet Louis
Arnold, jest nod at him cool as a cowcumber, and go right on and
foller it up next day and next, or as long as good weather lasts.
“I believe you rusted and tired out your faculties bendin’
over your fine work from day to day, and he didn’t find your
companionship exhilaratin’ and inspirin’ at all. He is a bright
chap,” sez I, “you know, and he will seek bright, inspirin’
company.”
She looked up gratefully as I abused her and excused Louis, in a
real womanly way, and left the room to put on her short bicycle
rig. It wuz dark blue braided with white, and a coquettish little
white cap with some black feathers stuck up real cute on one side,
and she looked as pretty as a pink--a white pink--and real cunnin’
as she sot off. Well, she come back lookin’ perter considerable;
she hadn’t met Louis, but she had met the sunshine and soft autumn
air, and they had invigorated her.
The next mornin’ I went with her, at her request, to git the books
and presents I had named, and, at my request, they wuz locked up
at 12 M., and backaches and eye-smarts and fevered anxieties and
pricked finger-ends with ’em. And at 3 P. M. she sot off agin on
her wheel. This time she come back lookin’ considerable white
around her lips, but her eyes bright and cheeks rosy, after all;
she had met Louis and done what I told her, and left him in such a
state of complete stupefication she wuz alarmed about him. Sez she
anxiously, “His looks wuz so wonder-struck and alarmed that I fear
for his safety; I fear that he may be led to extreme lengths,” sez
she.
“Wuz he on his wheel?” sez I.
“Yes,” she replied, “he wuz on his wheel, and the picture of health
and strength.”
“And so will you be,” sez I, “now you have laid aside your
eye-harrowin’, nerve-destroyin’ needle-work; and when I say this,
understand distinctly that I might applaud, though I pitied, your
work if it earned you your livelihood. But in your case it is
needless, and so I have said lay it aside; there is no fear but
that you will perform all the domestic duties you ort to, for it
is in your nater, and you will resoom your music and books, for
you will want to get brightness from them; but be out, care-free,
under the blue heavens all you can. Respect yourself, and insist on
bein’ respected. Be thoughtful of Louis’ rights, and insist on his
bein’ thoughtful of yours; respect his opinions so fur as you can
consistently; but as for his selfishness and whims, git onto your
wheel and ride right through ’em. If you are to walk through life
together, stand up straight by his side; don’t crouch at his feet
doin’ drawn-work and tattin’ all your days; he will like you enough
sight better. If you find him worthy, and you are to be his wife,
make his home the most delightful place on earth--a clean, sweet
restin’-place from the toils of life and a shelter from its storms;
but don’t burn up your own individuality as incense before him;
keep it to make his home more charmin’ than any other. Make him
love you for your sweet love and care for him; make him admire you
for your thought and care for yourself; use a lot of common sense
in the receipt of married life, and mejumness, use that lavish, and
you’ll git along first rate.”
Well, they urged me to stay a week or so; and Josiah havin’ bizness
to ’tend to right there, we gin consent. Elinor kep’ on jest as I
had planned, and stimulated by the example of plain common sense
right before her eyes, Fidelia braced up and began to use some
common sense and some mejumness herself. She spoke out of her own
accord one afternoon, and sez she:
“I have three night-shirts done, embroidered for Alcander, and I am
not goin’ to make any more of them for Christmas; and you, Minnie,”
sez she, turnin’ to the pert-faced domestic, “you may wash them and
do them up the next time you wash.”
“Why,” sez Minnie, “I can’t do the washin’ and ironin’ as well as
you can, Mis’ Pogram. Mr. Pogram won’t like my ironin’, I am sure.”
“Well, he will have to stand it,” sez Fidelia, lookin’ some pale,
but real decided; “and when you broil the steak for supper, Minnie,
be sure you don’t burn it; have a hot platter ready for it, and put
on the butter and pepper and salt even, and bring it to the table
pipin’ hot.”
The girl’s hauty feathers seemed to droop, and she spoke more
respectful to Fidelia than I had hearn her speak, and sez she, “I
will do my best, mom.”
And sez Fidelia, “If Mr. Pogram comes here before we do, tell him
that Josiah Allen’s wife and I have gone out for a long drive.”
In my inmost heart I said, “Bravo, Fidelia! bravo!” But outside I
only said, “I shall be real glad to have a good long drive with
you, Fidelia; it will put me in mind of old times.”
So Fidelia ordered her pony and low phaeton brought to the door
and we sot off. It wuz a very comfortable carriage, cushioned with
blue. I see that Alcander did his part by Fidelia in furnishin’
comforts and luxuries for her, only, bein’ so much engaged in
incense-burnin’ and embroidery, she couldn’t take advantage of
’em. As I lay back on the soft cushions my mind roved off on
the strange turn things had took, and I wondered if it wuz the
atmosphere of my strong desire and goodwill to help her that had
stimulated Fidelia to use a little common-sense; for I had not
said a word to her about her affairs and Alcanderses. I knew
that high, clear mountain air would do wonders for sick folks
in a short time, and I knew that my will to help her towered up
perfectly mountainous and high, and I spoze mebby it braced her up.
We mortals are such strange creeters anyway that we can’t really
understand how things be thus and so. But, ’tennyrate, as we rolled
along the pleasant country roads, under trees orange and scarlet
and gold-colored, sweet with the birds’ late songs, out into
sunny stretches of open country roads, sun-glorified, and further
embellished on either side by cozy homesteads and loftier mansions,
and anon long green meadows stretchin’ away to green woods and
tree-covered hills, with a tender haze hangin’ about ’em--as our
phaeton rolled noiselessly on through the soft, sweet Injun-summer
air, Fidelia’s cheeks got to lookin’ considerable pink, and her
faded eyes brightened up considerable, and her faculties seemed to
sort o’ wake up, and she acted brighter than I had seen her act for
upwards of ten years.
Well, supper wuz all ready when we got home. Fidelia had only
jest time to go to her room and pin a pink bow onto the bosom of
her dress, but I don’t know when I have seen her look so well.
Alcander noticed it in a minute. He looked quite admirin’ at her;
and though the steak might not have been so delicious as Fidelia’s,
yet her directions had been carried out, and it wuz good enough.
’Tennyrate, Alcander seemed to enjoy his supper the best that ever
wuz, for he and Fidelia wuz talkin’ together in a way I hadn’t
hearn ’em for years. And take Fidelia when she wuzn’t so wore out
burnin’ incense, and br’ilin’ steaks and chops and chickens, and
drawin’ threads out of fine linen and workin’ ’em in agin, she wuz
a smart woman and very agreeable companion.
Minnie, I noticed, had retired more into the background, as it
were; she waited on the table with a different air, less as if she
wuz the mistress of ceremonies, and more as if she wuz the helper
instead of the giver of the feast.
Well, it wuz on the fifth day, as Alcander and Fidelia and I
wuz a-drivin’ along through the soft air in the luxurious easy
carriage, behind two prancin’ horses, real happy and contented, and
talkin’ good-naturedly, who should we meet but two young folks in
a runabout? The young man wuz bendin’ fondly over the young woman,
so engrossed in conversation that they didn’t notice our presence
till we got almost up to them. Then they looked up, and we see that
it wuz Elinor and Louis Arnold. But wuz it Elinor? Yes, it wuz. But
what a change from the pale, hollow-eyed drawn-work stitcher! Her
cheeks were pink, and happiness sparkled in her soft blue eyes like
two bright stars becalmed in the June heavens. They had made up,
and Louis Arnold looked handsome and happy and contented.
Well, I told Fidelia, the next day, that as Josiah had got his
business done, I guessed I wouldn’t stay any longer, and she bust
right out a-cryin’ onto my shoulder (it wuz a gray outin’-cloth,
and I knew that it would wash, so I didn’t care).
And sez she, “My preserver, how can I have you go?”
And Elinor, who wuz in the room, throwed herself onto my other
shoulder, and her tears drizzled down onto my shoulder-blade (but
agin the thought calmed me that the colors wuz fast).
Sez Elinor, “You have preserved my happiness; you have dragged me
back from the very brinks of ruin.”
“And me, too!” sez Fidelia.
And I sez gently, extricatin’ myself from the four encirclin’ arms:
“Oh, shaw! you have preserved yourselves, and drawed yourselves
back by the cords of common-sense and mejumness. And now,” sez I,
in confidence, “ere we part, let me adjure you to cling to them two
strings, and cling hard. Use common-sense day by day, be good and
true to them you love, and be good and true to yourselves; brace
up, have gumption, and may Heaven bless you!” sez I, and I turned
away and begun to pack my nightgown and barred-muslin night-cap
into my satchel-bag.
CHAPTER V
Josiah wuz in a hurry to git home, but I persuaded him to stop for
a day at Dr. Phillip Rhode’s, who married she that wuz Dora Peak,
daughter of my cousin on my own side.
I think everything of Dora and she of me, visey versey, for, if
I say it that shouldn’t, I helped her more’n considerable to her
present state of health, happiness, and common sense, and I spoze
mebby you’d like to know about it. It’s quite a long story, but I
can tell it if it’s best. It wuz about a year ago that Albina Peak,
Dora’s mother, come to Jonesville on a errent, a important one.
I wuz standin’ before the winder washin’ my dishes and lookin’ out
on the great waves of pink and green that wuz spread out in front
of me (the orchard wuz in full bloom and promisin’ a grand fruit
year), and I seemed to sort o’ float away on them waves into the
past, layin’ firm holt of the present, too, and my clean linen
dish-cloth, as folks can in their most romantick moods, if they’ve
got any gumption--when all of a sudden Albina Ann Peak arrived.
We hadn’t seen each other much of late years, for she lived in
the city, but she wuz a third cousin of mine, and we used to go
to school together up in the old Rizley schoolhouse, and she sort
o’ leaned on me for strength and help in long division. She wuz
dretful romantick and dreamy in them days, and devoured pickles
and poetry enormously. But she sot store by me, and in the time of
trouble I spoze she thought on me and kinder wanted to lean agin,
her husband, who wuz a man of common sense and some property,
havin’ passed away some years before.
Albina Ann said that the doctor said her daughter, Dora, couldn’t
possibly live only a few months unless she got help, and it wuz a
mysterious inward disorder she had, though the doctor had named
it a strange, strange name that seemed to scare Albina Ann most
to death, she couldn’t remember what it wuz, she said it sounded
some like Constantinople-Andronopolis, but wuzn’t that, but wuz
worse and more skairful, but I told her I shouldn’t let any
doctor’s names skair me, they didn’t make nothin’ of usin’ names
that wuz fearful. Then she told me that with all this sickness
wuz love-sickness added, and for a poor dissipated chap, but good
lookin’ and fascinating, and I said:
“This is worse than Constantinople-Andronopolis enough sight.”
And Albina sez, “That hain’t the name, but sounds like it.”
And I sez, “Well, it is worse than anything that sounds like
anything.”
And she sez, “Well, I want to have it broke up, it has got to be
broke up.” And she resoomed, “I’ve got to go and see my son Henry’s
wife, who is dyin’ with fever at Denver, with twins added to it,
and he sick abed, too.” And she sez, “It seems as if my troubles
all fall on me to once. Both my children liable to die off at any
time, and my daughter-in-law and the twins, too.”
And I looked sympathizin’ on her and sez jest for all the world as
I used to at school, “I wish I could help you out, Albina Ann.”
“That’s jest what I’ve come for,” sez she; “I’ve got to go to
Henry’s for a spell, anyway,” and would I for the sake of old
times, to say nothin’ of the ties of third cousin, would I let her
poor sick girl come down into the country and see if the country
air and my care would recuperate her up a little mite, or if she
couldn’t be helped, make the poor dear, dyin’ girl as comfortable
as I could? She said money wuz no object to her. And I said it
wuzn’t no object to me. And then she said she thought it wuz a
mysterious Providential affliction to have her beautiful only
daughter so delicate and liable to expire any minute, still she
felt that it wuz tough on her, and she bespoke my sympathy, jest
as she used to git help in her old Ruger and Olney’s gography. And
she asked me pintedly if I didn’t think it wuz a strange, strange
dispensation of Providence that when she wuz so abundantly able to
care for her only daughter, so many poor girls wuz spared healthy
and happy, and her only girl seemed about to be took, and sez she,
“She wuz a healthy baby, weighed ten pounds at first, but,” she
added, “she is so sweet and pure that probable the angels feel that
they can’t do without her society much longer.”
And I sot up on the fence, mentally, as it were pretty straight,
and didn’t say yea or nay, knowin’ that many things wuz laid on
Providence He wuzn’t to blame for.
Well, I told Albina Ann, after thinkin’ it over and consultin’
Josiah out in the hoss barn, that she might send her girl down for
a spell and I’d do the best I could for her. She seemed to be real
relieved when I told her, and then bime-bye we got to talkin’
about Le Flam agin, for that wuz the name of the dissipated young
chap she had mentioned, and I told her I approved of her stand, for
if a man couldn’t reform durin’ the enchanted days of courtship
what could you expect when married life and its disillusions should
take place, late dinners, cleanin’ house, etcetery, etcetery, and
inflamatory rumatiz, ulcerated teeth and colick?
But I sez to Albina Ann, “Why under the sun did you let him come to
your house in the first place, if you knew what he wuz?”
And she said she always knew that he wuz a poor, miserable
creature, but she felt that it would be breakin’ up the sweet,
heavenly atmosphere of confidence that had always existed between
her and her only daughter if she said anything against Le Flam to
her.
“You hain’t spoke to her about him?” sez I, in wondering axents.
“No, Cousin Samantha; her heart seems to be so wropped up in him,
and the cords that connect her soul to mine are so linked in with
her girlish dreams, that I could not bear to ruffle ’em, the
harmony between us has always been so heavenly.”
Sez I, “The harmony would be liable to be ruffled a little if
you should see her abused by a dissipated brute, and she and
her children snaked round by the hair of their heads and turned
outdoors, etc.”
“Oh! oh!” sez she, puttin’ up her hands, “don’t pierce my soul with
such agonizin’ thoughts!”
“Well,” sez I, coolin’ down a little, “the best way to escape such
agony is to use common sense in the first place. Why under the sun
didn’t you stop her going with him?”
“Oh, her sweet, tender heart seemed to be set upon him from the
first, and I couldn’t bear to break up those sweet dreams.”
I begun to see where the land lay; I looked at Albina Ann sadly.
There she sot, a full grown woman, with a waist like a pipe stail
and shues with heels half a finger high, and tellin’ she dassent
warn her girl from the evil to come.
But I didn’t say anything to add to her agitation, I simply
remarked, “Well, I never see the time that I wouldn’t pull Tirzah
Ann out of the fire, if I see her blindly blunderin’ into it, or
haul back Thomas J. from precipices. But we hain’t all made alike,
and our faces all on ’em are but the faces of clay.”
I never meant to give her a cut no more than nothin’ in the world,
I wuz talkin’ Bible and feelin’ riz up.
But I see her lift her lace handkerchief in her tight gloved hand,
and then I see, her veil bein’ up, that her color wuzn’t nateral
and the hull complexion made up. But, good land! I wuzn’t goin’ to
try to make over Albina Ann Peak, she’d been made too long--she
wuz about my age--but I told her she could send Dora down and I’d
do the best I could for her, and she kissed me good-by through her
veil (a white one with big, black dots). I thought no wonder Albina
Ann’s eyes has gin out, she wuz most as blind as a checkud adder.
Why, if you’ll believe it, she sot most all day with that veil over
her face. I spoze she thought it wuz becomin’ to her, but I should
jest as soon wore blinders.
In about ten days Dora come, Josiah went after her with the
democrat and brought her and three trunks and some satchels. When
I see them trunks I felt dubersome, and mebby looked so, for
thinkses I, “Is it a life job I’ve tackled?” but in a minute I
thought, “Why, it’s in her bringin’ up; Albina Ann wuz always
changin’ her dress, and ornamentin’ herself, and actin’.” So I met
her with cheerfulness and kissed her on both cheeks, while Josiah,
a-groanin’, as I could hear, tackled the trunks. I see she wuz
naterally a pretty girl, but looked wan and wapeish, and I didn’t
wonder a mite at it when I took close note of the way she wuz
dressed.
I had a warm supper ready, for I thought she would be tired and
hungry. But she couldn’t eat a mite, she said, not a mou’ful, but
I see she had a big empty candy box in her hand, and she owned up
that she’d eat it all on her journey. And bime-by she told me she
had had some pickled stuff that she had brung for an appetite, and
they wuz all eat up.
Well, after she’d took her things off I see she wuz a sight to
behold. If her waist wuzn’t a cur’os’ty then I never see one. Why,
if I do say it, and I’m a Methodist in good standin’, it wuzn’t
much bigger than a quill--a goose quill; of course it wuz some
bigger, but it is within bounds to use it for a metafor. The heels
of her little pinted shoes wuz more’n two and a half inches high
and sot right in the palm of her foot, right on them nerves that
cause headache and blindness, and fits and things, and I knew by
the looks of them pinted toes that no human toes could possibly git
into ’em without bein’ all twisted up just like a heathen Chinee’s.
Well, I declare I felt to weep almost when I looked at her. She
wuz so weak that I had to take her right up to her room and lay
her out on the bed. And I hefted her dress and skirts after I’d
helped her off with ’em, and of all the heft you ever see, why, it
wuz astonishin’. Her dress wuz tailor-made, and embroidered all
over with braid, and fitted her like a glove, but heavy as lead
almost, and jest a-draggin’ round her waist--not a shoulder strap,
nor a button or string or anything that she could divide the burden
with; no, them heavy skirts all a-hangin’ like millstuns round the
little, spindlin’ waist, and that so tight bound down by a hard
bone-and-steel cosset that it looked like a prisoner of the deepest
dye incarcerated in the closest confinement. I see when she lay
down, tired almost to death and a-gaspin’, that she didn’t remove
her cosset; no, there it wuz, a-holdin’ her in its deathly grip
right there on the bed, and I sez, “Don’t you take off your cosset
when you lay down?”
“No,” sez she, kinder pantin’ for breath, “Mamma thinks it hurts
any one’s form so to lounge round with cossets off that she never
allowed me to take them off when I lay down in the daytime, and
Aggie le Fleur wears hers all night, so Mamma said, and she said
that she meant to have me wear mine all night when I got a little
stronger. Mamma sez that it injures one’s form terribly to go
without ’em even for an hour. It ruins anybody to go without ’em,
so Mamma said and so Aggie le Fleur sez.”
“Is it possible,” sez I; “I never mistrusted before that I wuz
ruined, and I’ve gone without ’em since long enough before you
and that young Le Fleur woman you speak of wuz anywhere round or
thought on, and,” sez I, “if I wuz in your place I’d run the resk
of bein’ spilte, and take that thing offen me.”
She wuz a sweet-dispositioned girl, I could see, and she consented,
and she sot up and exerted the hull of her strength, and finally
onhinged or onjinted it somewhere and peeled it offen her. And such
a sithe of relief she gin, as she sank down on the bed. I felt
dretfully to find out by a question or two that the cosset left
deep marks. But still I knew cryin’ and sympathy wuzn’t what she
needed; no, it wuz cast-iron firmness and common sense. So I took
up that instrument of agony some as if it wuz a snake and carried
it into the closet under the stairs, and hung it up and locked the
door, and sez I in a winnin’ way, “Now, my dear, you let that hang
there for a spell and see what will come of it.”
She wuz horrified at the idee, I could see, but bein’ of such a
good disposition she crumpled down and bore it.
Well, after Josiah and I eat (that man wouldn’t wait a minute for
the President) I got her a good wholesome supper and carried it up
into her room on a tray. I had a piece of the breast of a chicken
broiled and nice, some delicate toast, and sweet graham bread and
butter, and ripe strawberries, and a fragrant cup of coffee not too
strong, and plenty of cream. It wuz a good supper. I see she looked
disappointed in not havin’ rich cake and sweetmeats, but I talked
real cheerful to her about the relations and one thing and another,
and, though she said she couldn’t eat a mou’ful, yet she did
make out quite a meal. Well, after supper she put on a tea-gown,
a pretty, white affair, and some slippers, and come downstairs,
and I see, though mebby she didn’t think I did, how different she
breathed and how different she looked when she had her iron armor
off. She wuz a pretty girl, I see plain--just as pretty as a pink
rosy.
Well, that first evenin’ about a quarter to nine she began to look
perter and sort of brightened up, and I told her so, and she sez,
“Yes, Aunt Samantha, this is the hour that mamma begins to help me
dress to go out.”
“To go out!” sez I; “do you mean to the barn?”
“Oh, no,” sez she; “to go to parties.”
“To begin at nine o’clock to dress you to go to parties! Why, for
the land sakes, what time do you git home?”
“Well, usually before mornin’,” sez she, “along about four.”
“Along about four!” I gasped, “and you don’t git any sleep nights
until morning--till it is time to git up! For the land sakes!” sez
I. “What time do you gen’rally git up?”
“Well, usually before noon,” sez she.
“Before noon! Why,” sez I, “at noon all my work is done for the day
and I’m ready to sit down and rest, and you lose all them golden
hours, full of beauty, in bed.”
“Well, Aunt Samantha,” sez she, wantin’ to please me I could see,
wantin’ to like a dog, “I’ve tried not going to bed at all, but
I’m not strong enough to go entirely without sleep.”
“No, indeed!” sez I. “I should think not. Why, a ox hain’t strong
enough, let alone a delicate young girl like you.”
“But,” sez she, liftin’ her sweet, innocent face to mine, “what can
I do, then, Aunt Samantha?”
“Go to bed at the proper time,” sez I. And unconsciously, I spoze,
I put so much common sense into my axents that they sounded ha’sh;
she looked kinder skairt, and sez she:
“But, Aunt Samantha, if I go into society I must do as the rest of
’em do.”
Mekanically I lifted my eyes toward Heaven and sez, “Hain’t there
any society, then, but the society of fools and lunys? But even a
fool orter know that mornin’ is the time to git up instead of goin’
to bed.”
But she looked real kinder flustrated and helpless, so I desisted
from further remarks at that time, and at ten minutes to nine
precisely I got up and lighted our chamber lamps and Josiah wound
up the clock, and I sez, “Well, dear, I will go with you to your
room.”
She looked at the clock and then at me with a look that a female
Hottentot might have if I wuz fastening on skates for her to dash
out on to a frozen lake. But she didn’t say anything. And I kinder
whispered to her on our way upstairs: “It would disturb your Uncle
Josiah for us to set up longer, and you try goin’ to bed early and
gettin’ up early for a spell and see what it will do for you,” sez
I encouragingly. “I believe it will be just the thing to put some
color into your white cheeks and some bright sparkles into your
eyes.”
Well, she didn’t demur outwardly, but immediately begun to take her
hair down to brush it, and I laid my hand fondly on to them long,
golden waves that swep’ down below her waist, and sez I, “I want
you to be happy here, and to be happy one has to be healthy,” and I
repeated partly to myself and partly to her that invaluable bit of
advice:
“Early to bed and early to rise
Makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.”
And then I see that the toilet things wuz all right, plenty of
water and towels, and I looked at the little covered glass pitcher
with fresh drinking water in it, and see that there wuz matches and
candles, etc., and then sez I, “Is there anything else you would
like, my dear?”
Well, she sort of hesitated and looked as if most afraid to ask,
and then sez, “Well, Aunt Samantha, if you’ve got a piece of mince
pie or fruit cake I would like to take a bite. I sometimes have a
sort of gnawin’ at my stomach, and Mamma always keeps something
rich baked up for me; she thinks it’s strengthening to me to eat
rich things, and she always brings up a plateful before I retire,
with some cheese, or pickles, or dried beef; I have got into the
habit of eating something of the kind, but I don’t like to make you
any trouble,” sez she.
“Oh, no trouble at all,” sez I; “some folks can sleep better after
takin’ a bite.” And I went down into the buttery feelin’ mad as a
hen at Albina Ann and sorry as a dog for Dora. And I took a little
pink china bowl full of good night’s milk with a little cream in
it, and a slice or two of my good, sweet graham bread, and put ’em
on a little Japan tray with a pretty fringed tidy on it, and a
bright silver spoon, and when it was all fixed I took it up to her.
Her face fell as she noticed the absence of pickles and pastry. But
she thanked me and eat a little of it, and it seemed to taste good,
and she finished the hull of it before she got through. And she put
on a pretty white nightgown and got into bed, and I bent down and
sort of tucked in the light white spread and patted the pillows,
and I sez, “You feel pretty good, don’t you?”
And she smiled and sez, “Yes, mom.” But she looked real weak, and I
bent down and whispered to her:
“You mustn’t forget, my dear, to ask the True Physician to help
you.” She lifted up her head and was just about to git out of
bed agin, and I sez, “You can ask Him right where you be, for He
don’t mind; what He minds is the true reverence of the soul--the
dependent call for help from them that need His care and who
believes He can help ’em.”
“Yes, mom,” sez she; “I always say my prayers every night.”
“Well,” sez I, “so do.” And I kissed her and couldn’t help it. I
wuz beginnin’ to like her the best that ever wuz. But jest as I wuz
leavin’ the room she looked up anxiously with her big blue eyes and
sez, “Oh, Aunt Samantha, won’t you close the window at the foot
of the bed and the one in the next room?” That wuz another little
bedroom that opened out of hers and I used it for a clothes-press.
“Why,” sez I, “Honey, the wind couldn’t touch you at all if there
wuz any; your bed is out of the range on’t; but,” sez I, goin’ into
the next room and bringin’ out a big screen (one I made myself out
of the old ironin’ bars and some pretty cretonne), “here,” sez I,
“I’ll put this between your bed and the winder, and you couldn’t
git cold in a cyclone, much less in this sweet June air that comes
up fresh from the heart of Nater and brings a touch of her own
healin’ and rest with it.”
But she looked frightened still, most as if she’d faint away, and
sez she, “Mamma told me special to have you cork the windows up
tight if there wuz any airholes round ’em.”
“Cork ’em up,” sez I mekanically, “I would fur ruther oncork ’em,”
sez I, and I went on, “What is the reason for her desire for
corkin’?”
“The night air is so deadly,” sez she; “Mamma is so much afraid of
it that she never has dared to let a breath of it come to me after
I wuz in bed.”
“Why,” sez I reasonably, “what air could you breathe in the night,
only night air; and do you spoze,” sez I, “that the Lord would fix
things so as to have us breathe deadly pizen half of our time? Why,
you don’t have to go into algebra to figger it out; in the night
time you’ve got to breathe the night air; you can’t git any other,
and it stands to reason that you’d better breathe it fresh from the
hand that made it--good oxygen, etc., than to take it pizened with
all sorts of pizen risin’ from the prespirin’ skin, weak lungs and
stomach, coal gas, etc.”
Well, agin her good disposition come in and fetched her through
this crisis. She settled down agin into the bed with a kind of a
patient sithe, though I could see that she wuz as afraid of that
air as if it wuz wild beasts ready to devour her, yet lookin’ some
relieved at the apple-blows and mornin’ glories that twined round
all over that screen as if they wuz some protection to her.
I bent down and kissed her agin and she kissed me back, and I went
to bed. But I’ll bet I got up most a dozen times and went to her
door and listened, and once in a while I could hear her give a
kind of a low mourn or sithe. But I didn’t dast to let her know
that I wuz there for fear of wakin’ her clear up, and I spozed
goin’ to bed at such a different hour and so many new idees bein’
promulgated to her would naterally upset her, but I kinder worried
about her all night.
Well, in the mornin’ she wuz bed-sick--too sick to git up--and
I can’t say but what I did have a few reflections, mebby two or
three, thinkin’ of the night air and the corks I’d refused and the
quantities of air I’d let in. But yet I wuz held up a good deal by
duty and the thought that her weak feelin’s wuz probable caused
by reasons I’ve named and her journey in waist screws and heel
tortures, and then her sentimental feelin’s for Le Flam I spozed
helped it on some; but anyway and ’tennyrate, she looked like death
when I carried up her coffee and toast to her--not strong coffee,
but jest right, fresh, and fragrant and plenty of cream, and the
toast was delicate, brown, and crispy, and I took up a fresh egg
and a little china dish of strawberries. But she couldn’t eat a
mou’ful. And I wuz most skairt, she looked so white and tired, and
I sez to Josiah when I went downstairs:
“You’ll have to go to Jonesville and git the doctor.” For I, not
knowin’ how much wuz sentiment and how much sickness, thought I’d
better be on the safe side and git a doctor, and owin’ to a feelin’
that I couldn’t quite explain myself, it come to me so sort of
queer and sudden, “Git young Dr. Phillip,” sez I. You see, Dr.
Phillip Rhodes, father and son, wuz doctors, and folks called ’em
old Dr. Phillip and young Dr. Phillip.
And Josiah sez, “You always have the old doctor, Samantha.”
And I sez, “That don’t make any difference, Josiah; you get young
Dr. Phillip.”
And I thought on’t after he went, I didn’t really know why I did
insist on havin’ him; I don’t really think that I’d planned out
anything in my own mind at that time, but I wuz kinder led to do
what I did.
CHAPTER VI
Young Dr. Phillip Rhodes wuz a prime favorite of mine, and had
always been. He had as much goodness and common sense and smartness
about him as any young man I ever set eyes on. He wuz good lookin’,
too, with keen, dark eyes, kinder laughin’ and kinder sad eyes,
too, as if he see naterally on both sides of life--the bright
side and pathetic side. Tall, broad shouldered, manly lookin’, he
wuz, as nigh as I could make out from what I’d hearn, as near the
opposite of Dora’s bo as you could find.
Well, young Dr. Phillip took her little slender white wrist in his
hand and counted her heart beats by his watch, and mebby he counted
’em by his own heart, too, for Dora did look sweet as a picter as
she lay there with her golden hair all kinder curly round her pale
face and her big violet-blue eyes, and the waves of white lace
about her neck comin’ up round her soft cheeks that wuz jest about
as white.
Well, he left her some powders and some tablets and said he would
come agin the next day. And she lifted her soft, sad blue eyes to
hisen and looked so confidin’ and innocent and sweet at him that I
didn’t wonder it took him such a long time to fold up the powders
and why he seemed to linger round as if he wuz loth to go.
But at last he did go downstairs, and I follered him, and he turned
round in the settin’ room and faced me, and in a honest way that
would be invaluable in a doctor if follered up, he sez:
“What is really the matter with her, Aunt Samantha?”
And I sez, “A lack of common sense in her mother, or that is what
started the trouble in the first place.” Sez I in a sort of a blind
way, “There is mebby other complications now that will have to be
tended to.”
And I walked off into the buttery. I wuzn’t goin’ to mention Le
Flam to him, no, indeed! and when I come out I brung a plate of
cream cookies; he likes my cookies to a extraordinary degree, and
these wuz jest out of the oven, and he eat three, and then went
away with one in his hand. He appreciates good cookin’, yes, indeed!
Well, the next mornin’ bright and early young Dr. Phillip wuz there
agin with a pink rose in his buttonhole (I never see that before),
and he made a long call, and so the next day, and the next, and the
next, and she a-gainin’ all the while and beginnin’ to talk real
bright and chipper to him, and the seventh young Dr. Phillip said
it would help her to ride out that very day, for the air wuz jest
exactly right.
And I sez, “Well, I don’t know what I can do, for Josiah is away
with both horses.”
And he sez dreamily, “Yes, I met him, but,” sez he, “as it happens
I took my low, easy phaeton this afternoon, and I can take her for
a short ride as well as not.”
And I sez, “Won’t to-morrow do?”
And he sez, “No, for to-day the air is jest exactly right.”
And I, not wantin’ to hurt her, fell in with the idee, and I see
she wanted to go.
Now, if I hadn’t trusted him jest as firm as I would any old
deacon or pastor I wouldn’t hearn to the idee, but I did trust him
implicitly, and so I agreed to it.
And when he brung her back, she with a pretty light in her eyes and
a soft color on the white cheeks, he sez:
“As it happens I have got to go up the mountain in the morning a
few miles, and I will take Miss Dora out again if you think best.”
And I sez, “Josiah can take her.”
And he sez, “No, Uncle Josiah is busy; don’t bother him.”
“Well,” sez I, kinder laughin’ in the inside of my sleeves,
“doctors are most always busy.”
And he sez again, “I have got to go up there, and mountain air is
jest what she needs.”
Well, in a few days he said she needed lake air. And when I begun
to plan how to git her to it he said it happened jest so that he
had got to go down on the lake shore a few milds off, and he could
take her jest as well as not, and she seemed glad to go--glad
enough; and every single day she seemed to feel better and look
better. Early hours to bed and to rise, fresh, pure air, wholesome,
nutritious food, and easy, loose clothin’ had all done their
healin’ work on her. Why, I had let out her pretty muslin dresses
most half a finger under the arms, and she dast as well die as to
girt herself in agin, my eye wuz that keen on her and yet lovin’.
And I went to Jonesville myself and picked her out a pair of common
sense shoes, but pretty ones, russet color; why, good land! she
didn’t wear but number three, anyway--they wuz plenty big enough,
and I admitted it. And I spoze her freedom from foot sufferin’
helped her a great sight, and her winder wuz always open nights.
She had got to likin’ me too well to not do as I said, and when she
see me calmly carryin’ the pickle jar down suller and put a stun on
it, she knew that ended pickles; and when she asked Josiah to git
her some candy and I calmly took it and eat it up myself, makin’
me dead sick, but doin’ it cheerful in a martyr way, she didn’t
ask him agin to git her anything sarahuptishously, and it wuzn’t
long before her well stomach didn’t crave such trash--rich cake and
pickles and pies and such. And she begun to git so plump that she
laughed and said I would have to let out her dresses agin.
And I did before she went home--more than a inch on both sides--and
her cheeks got pinker and her eyes got brighter and brighter, and I
didn’t wonder a mite that the kinds of air she had to ride out to
take wuz so various and lay in such different directions, and young
Dr. Phillip wuz so willin’ to take her to ’em.
Well, Dora had wanted to surprise her mother when she come to see
her so much better, so we hadn’t said nothin’ in our letters about
the great improvement and change in her, and the very day that
Dr. Phillip and she went out on a two milds walk, two out and two
in, I got a letter from Albina Ann sayin’ she had seen a new kind
of invalid chair and askin’ me to ask the doctor if he thought it
would be a benefit to Dora, and sez she:
“Your evasive remarks about my poor dear invalid makes me fear that
I shall never see her agin, and,” sez she, “I drempt last night of
attendin’ a funeral, and I lay for more than an hour planning the
funeral when she is took from me, I picked out the text ‘Strange
are the mysterious ways of Providence,’ and,” sez she, “I wet two
handkerchiefs wet as sop with my tears right there in the middle of
the night.”
Oh, Albina Ann thought enough of her, I could see that, and kep’
her in her mind day and night. And the day I let her dress out for
the second time, that wuz the time she went out with her Uncle
Josiah to help rake the meadow and come in laughin’ and rosy on top
of the load jest as Dr. Phillip drove into the yard, makin’ her
face look rosier than ever.
Well, that day Albina Ann writ to me agin, and sez she, “I write
to you, for I know that Dora is too feeble to write to me, and I
want you to tell me, and tell me plain, if you think she is going
to live until fall, for I must, if she is in immediate danger, I
must leave Henry and his wife and the twins, sick as they be, for I
must, I must see my darling, my idol! once more.”
Well, I writ her a sort of a comfortin’ letter, that would settle
her mind some and stiddy it; all the while I wuz writin’ I wuz
hearin’ Dora’s ringin’ laugh out in the front yard, where Dr.
Phillip and she stood a-talkin’ and laughin’ with my companion.
Well, Dr. Phillip wuz here about every day, and it wuz plain enough
to see what wuz in his mind; he had never paid any attention to a
girl before in his life as I ever hearn on, and if I wuz any judge
of girls (and I fancy I am a splendid judge) Dora wuz jest as fond
of him as he wuz of her. Le Flam, that poor dissipated chap, I felt
had only stood in the vestibule of her fancy, but Dr. Phillip I
believed had opened the door to her heart and walked in there to
stay.
Well, I felt that all I had to do wuz to set down and trust
the Lord; that’s all we can do after we’ve done all we can do
ourselves. Let mothers take this great truth into consideration and
consider on it; surround your young girls with good society, and
when I say good I don’t mean necessarily rich, but good, honest,
and reliable, then you can set down in your chair and rest, knowin’
that whatever is the Lord’s will to happen won’t bring grief and
shame to your heart. If it is His will to have your girl a bachelor
maid, thank God and take courage, if it is His will to have her
unite her fate to a companion, why accept it as His will and make
the best on’t, but ’tennyrate and anyway, don’t, don’t let her
marry a shack, and to insure that don’t let a shack come hangin’
round.
Well, everything seemed to be goin’ as I wanted it to go.
Considerin’ the Le Flam eppisode, I couldn’t act exactly as I
would if I had took her fresh from the cradle. In them latter
circumstances I would impress agin and agin on a girl’s mind
how many avenoos there wuz to walk in besides the matrimonial
one--broad, glorious avenoos full of helpful and grand
possibilities. But the Le Flam eppisode had hampered me, and so,
as I say, everything seemed to be goin’ as I wanted it to. And yet
anon or oftener I had a feelin’ that if Dora couldn’t be broke for
good of her foolish ways--foolishness nurtured and fostered by
Albina Ann--I didn’t want Dr. Phillip’s life spilte. And then agin
a good deal of the time I noticed her sweet disposition and put a
long white mark on that; her readiness to fall into better ways,
when she found ’em out--another long white mark.
As for his likin’ for her, I felt that I needn’t mark that, for he
had done it himself. And if she didn’t know as much as Sappho or
Aspasia, that I’ve hearn Thomas J. read about, I knew men never
cared any too much about that, and as for Miss Sappho and Miss
Aspasia, I never thought any too much of either on ’em, from what
I’d hearn; Miss Sappho, with all her smartness, drownded herself;
and as for Miss Aspasia, there is sights of talk about her and
always wuz.
And then I felt a good deal of the time that Dr. Phillip had
smartness enough for ’em both, and Dora wuz nobody’s fool, and I
felt that the sun of his strength and love would bring out the
colors in her mind and soul jest as the sunlight changes a poor
suller kep’ house-plant in the spring of the year.
Well, anyway and ’tennyrate, I had to let it go on. I jest had
to, for the stream wuz gittin’ too deep for me to ford or dam
(metafor), I meant the stream of deep, pure love that wuz a-flowin’
round Dora and bearin’ her on its deep bosom into happiness, as I
trusted and felt, I felt it had got to bear her where it wanted to.
Well, one day Dora and Dr. Phillip had gone up the mountain road,
the air wuz balmy as if it blowed off a bed of balm, and I had
seen the happy pair set off under the mornin’ sun lookin’ fresh
and bright almost as that luminary itself, only of course not so
dazzlin’.
And my Josiah had gone into the wood lot after a load of stove
wood, and I’d put on a clean gingham dress and sot there in my
clean kitchen alone in all my glory, same as Solomon did, or the
Queen of Sheba, I’ve most forgot which one on ’em it wuz, when I
hearn a rap on the door and I went and opened it, and there stood a
chap that I knew by the first look on him wuz Le Flam. He had that
same look on him, sort o’ dissipated and yet kinder stylish and
handsome, that I felt certain could belong to no other.
I invited him in and sot him a chair, for I felt that he wuz
a-goin’ to have a bad enough time without standin’ up, and he sez
most the first thing:
“I want to see my affianced.”
And I sez, “Nobody by that name is here or been here.”
Sez he, “My betrothed.”
And then I sez, “I don’t somehow seem to recognize the name.”
And he yelled up a little, “The girl I’m engaged to, Miss Dora
Peak; or that is,” sez he, “I’ve considered it the same as an
engagement, though perhaps it hasn’t quite reached that point.”
“Oh,” sez I, “you mean Dora; well, she is not here jest now.”
“And,” he sez, his red face growin’ redder and his kinder bloodshot
eyes dartin’ angry gleams, “I have heard all about your treacherous
conduct, and I’ve come to settle with you.”
“You have, have you!” sez I, and I turned over the sock I wuz
a-mendin’ and attackted it in a new place.
“Yes,” sez he, “I’ve heard how you have encouraged the attentions
of another man to the girl I wuz as good as engaged to, the girl I
have paid attention to for years.”
Sez I calmly, a-lookin’ him over as if he wuz a banty rooster,
“Have you paid attention to her exclusively?”
“I have never paid attention to another lady!” he yelled in quite a
loud voice and shrill.
“Mebby not,” sez I, and I went on, “Dora can do as she pleases, but
if I wuz a young girl,” sez I, “I wouldn’t accept the attentions
of a man who divided his attentions between me and saloons,
gamblin’ halls and horse races,” sez I.
“What do you mean?” he yelled out.
“Jest what I say,” sez I, a-gittin’ up and puttin’ in another
stick of wood and a-seatin’ myself some nigher the wood-box, for I
didn’t know what he might be led to do, for I could see as plain as
anything that he wuzn’t quite himself, and you never can calculate
what such a man may take it into his head to do. But I felt
considerable easy when I had a good stout birch stick of wood right
at hand, not that I wuz really ’fraid on him: dissipation had told
on him so he looked considerable tottlin’ and shaky under all the
outside veneer of fashion he’d put on; but how can you tell what a
poor, miserable tike will take into his head? Why, dissipation jest
onhinges all the moral and spiritual graces, all the manliness and
self-respect and will-power, and jest lets ’em all tottle down into
ruin, and I don’t believe he had many graces to onjint in the first
place.
“What do you mean?” sez he, lookin’ meachin’, meachin’ as a dog.
“Why,” sez I, a-feelin’ it my bounden duty to stand between Dora
and trouble, “I mean that it is a shame and a disgrace for such a
man as you are to even talk of takin’ a sweet, innocent young girl
into a life like yours.”
“She fills my heart,” sez he, “and my life, and has for years.”
“Not full!” sez I, lookin’ at him keenly, “not full! If she did
her sweet image would have banished the other vile inmates that
have abounded there--wicked companions, evil ways of all kinds.
What room is there in that black crew for an innocent young life
like Dora’s? Have you got the heart,” sez I, “to try to entice that
young girl into such a life as you know the wife of a dissipated
man must lead--into woe and wretchedness, and an early grave, most
likely?”
“I would reform,” sez he; “I would become a different man for her
sake.”
“Why haven’t you, then?” sez I. “Why haven’t you reformed in all
these years when you wuz on probation, as you may say, a-tryin’ to
win her love? Do you think that you’d do better when you wuz sure
of her and she wuz in your power? Now,” sez I, “I don’t want to be
hash to you, and I don’t want to hender you from singin’ that
‘While the lamp holds out to burn
The vilest sinner may return,’
but I don’t want you to sing it here; I want you to go away and let
Dora alone.”
“I never will,” sez he.
“Well,” sez I, “I will see about that;” and I got up and went to
the back door and called out loud: “Josiah, I want you and Ury to
come right here!”
Well, my conscience has twitted me about that performance more’n a
hundred times sence, if it has once. But, then, I would kinder argy
back, when I would git all wore out with that conscience a-proddin’
me, I did want Josiah to come that very minute, and I would have
liked to see Ury step in, there hain’t a doubt on’t. And what of
it, what if Ury wuz to Three Mile Bay for a load of spruce; and
what if Josiah Allen wuz two milds and a half away in our wood-lot,
I wanted ’em, there hain’t a doubt of that, and I didn’t lie.
And I spoze I might jest as well tell it right here as anywhere,
Josiah has told it more than twenty times in one day by the clock:
he sez, and I believe it implicitly, he had jest driv into the
woods and had commenced to load the wood in when he sez he hearn
me say: “Josiah, I want you.” And he sez there wuz in my voice a
certain ring of urgent need and anxiety that made him turn the team
right round and come home on the gallop, and consequently he met
Le Flam down by the big butnut tree. For after I called to them
men, for all the world jest as if they wuz inside the barn door,
Le Flam turned on to his heel and went off without biddin’ me
“good-by,” or “good-day,” or anythin’. He yanked the lines offen
the post (he had hitched by the lines--didn’t know any more--and I
spoze he broke sunthin’, somehow, for he seemed to be foolin’ round
with the harness for quite a spell; I spoze his hands wuz clumsy
and helpless owin’ to his state), and so, as I say, Josiah come
a-gallopin’ ’long, and past him down by the butnut tree.
Well, to me that little eppisode always went to show how close the
ties be unitin’ two true hearts, and how queer and curious the
atmosphere is that surrounds ’em. My voice in need reached the ear
that Love had attuned to hear it. Strange, strange is the mysteries
of pardners. I’ve always said it and I always will: strange is the
pathway on which their sperits can go back and forth and meet each
other. It made me feel queer and riz up.
But Josiah looks at it different; he thinks that it wuz my nateral
voice that he hearn, and sez he: “Samantha, I always told you that
I could hear you two or three milds away, and now I’ve proved it:
your voice is shrill,” sez he, “and you don’t realize how loud you
holler.”
“Why didn’t Ury hear me?” sez I scornfully.
“Oh, there is a limit to the shrillest voice. You couldn’t expect
to talk back and forth with folks clear to the Klondyke.”
Well, there wuzn’t no use argyin’, and he has throwed that eppisode
in my face ever sence, and I spoze he always will.
But good land, I don’t care; I know that we got rid of Le Flam
for good and all, for he didn’t make much of any move after that
eppisode of advice and warnin’ to him. I guess he did write to Dora
once or twice, but she never noticed his letters, and it wuzn’t but
a few months before he married a rich widder.
Well, it wuz on a bright September day that Albina Ann come to
Jonesville, after Dora had had only three months, mind you, of
common-sense treatment and reasonable livin’, and I wish that you
could have seen her face as it rested on Dora’s for the first
time. You see, she come in dretful pimpin’ and pensive lookin’,
for Henry’s wife had had a siege and Albina Ann had nursed her
faithfully, and Henry, too, and the twins, and they wuz all
a-pullin’ through.
But bad and wore out as Albina Ann felt, she didn’t feel too bad to
have that white dotted veil over her made-up face, and her dress
tight as tight could be, and sot up on wobblin’ heels half a finger
from the ground a-pitchin’ her kinder forwards. I pitied her. And
her first words was, “She is alive, hain’t she? Do tell me so!
Is she in the spare bedroom? Oh,” sez she, “to come from one bed
of sickness to another!” and she sithed and kinder groaned, and
started for the chamber stairs.
Sez I, “She has gone out for a ride.”
“For a ride!” sez she in amaze, “then she can’t be in immediate
danger,” and then she sez, “Oh, how I have dreaded to come from
the almost dying bed of my dear ones in Denver to the sick bed of
another.”
“Well,” sez I, “Dora hain’t bed-sick,” and, sez I, “you’ll see her
in a minute, for I hearn ’em at the gate.”
Well, when that plump, rosy-cheeked girl, with sparkling, laughing
eyes, bounded into the room (her Uncle Josiah had told her that
her Ma had come) and threw her arms round her neck and kissed her,
you could have knocked Albina Ann over with a pin-feather. I felt
conscience-struck, and as if I’d ort to told her. Her face turned
ghastly pale under the false color, and she looked at Dora and then
at me in a stunted, dumfoundered, helpless way, pitiful in the
extreme, that most made me ’fraid that she had lost her faculty.
But pretty soon she gradually brightened up into a happy, blissful
look, and her nateral color returned, and how she did hug and
embrace Dora, and she sez to me in a solemn way, “It is a mericle,
Samantha!”
“No,” sez I, “no mericle, only a triumph of common sense and
common-sense remedies--pure air, early hours, wholesome food, etc.,
etc.”
And then she noticed her dress, I see--the absence of cosset, the
common-sense shoes. But she never lisped a word aginst it, and
hain’t to this day, so fur as I know. The shock had been too great:
she had seen the dead raised to life, as it were, and it had shook
a little common sense and gumption into her. I ketched her myself
the next mornin’ a-lettin’ out her travelin’ dress, and she let her
cosset out some. I have some hopes of her.
Well, to resoom backwards a spell. Dr. Phillip come in with my
pardner, and when Albina Ann see that splendid, noble lookin’ young
man, and comprehended how and what it wuz, and that Le Flam wuz
only a dark shadder in the past and wouldn’t shade Dora’s future
agin, agin she sez to me in them solemn axents out on the back
stoop, “Another mericle, Samantha?”
And I sez, “No such thing, Albina Ann; nothing only another
triumph of common sense. Do you remember what I said to you about
surroundin’ young girls with good society?” And I felt so well that
I went on and eppisoded a little right there.
Sez I, “When you let a cat into a cream-dairy what do you expect,
or a dog into a bone factory? Will the cat pay any attention to the
catechism, or the dog to the doxology? No; you can’t expect them
to change their naters all of a sudden. So with young folks: throw
young hearts together in the springtime with no warnin’; what is
the result? Why, the trees and flowers and everything bloom out
under the sun of spring, and young hearts stand ready to blossom
out under the sun of love, and you ort to be careful, careful as to
the material you surround ’em with.”
But I see she wuzn’t payin’ the attention she ort to, and agin I
see her look at Dr. Phillip proudly and happily, and she murmured
agin, “It is a mericle, a mericle!”
And I sez agin, bein’ brung down from the mount of eloquence on to
the plain of common sense, “It hain’t no such thing: it is nothin’
but siftin’ good wheat from bad and usin’ a little plain horse
sense.”
Well, Albina Ann wuz always contrary; she’s never gin in, nor I
nuther. She always to this day contends that it wuz a mericle, and
sez she gives Providence all the praise for the hull performance,
which of course I want her to do, and still----
Well, if I hadn’t acted out what I believed wuz the will of
Providence she would have come out pretty slim.
Dora and Dr. Phillip wuz married ’long the next winter, and I went
to the weddin’, proud as a peacock of the bright, healthy, happy
looks of the bride--sweet as a rose, too, she looked under her
white veil. And they have settled down in Loontown, in a pretty
cream-colored cottage nigh the old doctor’s. And everybody sez they
are the very happiest couple in Loontown.
She knows enough! And he jest worships her, and she him, and they
both set store by me, sights of store.
CHAPTER VII
For about two years there has been great doin’s in Hamen Smith’s
family, owin’ to Tamer Ann’s wantin’ to make Anna marry a young
old chap who come down from New York village to look at some
grave-stuns in the buryin’ ground by the old Dutch Reform Church up
in Zoar.
There wuz some dretful aged stuns there with old Dutch names on
’em, and the young old feller wuz in hopes he would find some
ancestors there. He had piles and piles of ’em before he begun to
hunt there, enough for comfort and more, too, but he wanted some
more, so sure it is that the more you have the more you want.
And so he come down a purpose. He didn’t find any ancestors, but he
found Anna. And he jest stayed along and stayed along. He had only
got board at the tarven for two days, but he stayed seven weeks
that time and come down agin frequent after that, and the next
summer spent the hull of his summer there.
Anna wuz engaged to Tom Willis, a good lookin’ and good actin’
young chap, and Tamer Ann had never lifted her finger or said a
word to stop their intimacy or engagement. But when this old young
feller come she jest commanded Anna to not think of Tom Willis any
more, and ordered her to be polite and sociable with this young old
man. Curious how some mothers can act, ain’t it now?
I liked Tom Willis. He wuz studyin’ law under Thomas Jefferson, he
had been under him for several years now, and Thomas J. thought
everything of him, and said he wuz bound to make his mark in the
world. Yes, I liked Tom and Tom liked me. But I had never seen the
old young man till the day we went there a-visitin’, bein’ invited
special by Tamer.
It wuz a pleasant drive over there, and I got up middlin’ early and
got a good breakfast, a very good one, knowin’ that my Josiah’s
demeanor for the day depended a good deal on it. And I wanted his
liniment to be smooth and placid, for nothin’ gauls a woman more
than to have her companion kinder snappish to her when she takes
him out in company. She knows the wimmen are all comparin’ his
liniment with their own husband’s liniments, and she wants him to
show off to good advantage. She has a pride in it.
So I cooked, in addition to my other vittles, a young tender
chicken, briled it, and had some nice warm biscuit, and some
coffee, rich, yellow, and fragrant, with lots of good cream in it.
And I had other good things accordin’. I did well, and Josiah’s
liniment paid me; all the way to Hamenses his mean wuz like a babes
for softness and reposeful sweetness. He twice murmured words
of affection into my right ear, he sez, “Dear Samantha,” twice,
such wuz the stimulatin’ and softenin’ effects of that coffee and
broiled fowl. Oh! if female wimmen would only heed these words of
warnin’ and caution from their sincere friend and well wisher. If
they would only spend the strength they take to try to convince
their pardners that it is onmanly to snap ’em up and be fraxious
and puggecky to ’em, especially before folks and other wimmen, if
they would only spend this time in preparin’ food, if they would
only accept the great fact that men’s naters are made jest as they
be, and the effect of food on their naters is jest what it is, if
they would only accept these two great philosofical facts, and not
argue and contend and try to understand why it is so, or how, or is
it reasonable that it should be so, or anything about it. Simply
accept it, dear married sisters, and guide them gently on by this
safe and assured way. It will not fail you, no, Samantha has tried
it in the balances and has never yet found it wantin, for twenty
years and more that has been my safe weepon and my refuge in times
of trouble.
I know that I have repeated these words of advice and warnin’ anon
or oftener, but it is only because I have such a tender feelin’ for
my sister wimmen who are placed in the tryin’ position of pardners.
And I want ’em, oh, how I want ’em! to do the best they can with
what they have to do with. But I am eppisodin’, and to resoom.
We sot out for Hamenses about half-past ten on that pleasant
mornin’. All over the dooryard and about the house hung the soft
silence of the early mornin’. The birds wuz singin’ in the lilock
bushes by the clean doorstep. The branches of the trees hung low
down in the orchard. The sunshine lay in the dooryard in golden
patches flecking the green grass between the shade trees and on the
clean painted doorway and the winders. And I knew and Josiah knew
that we shouldn’t see no such sunshine agin till we see this same
light shinin’ in our dooryard and the white curtained winders of
home.
Well, we had a pleasant drive, with no eventful events to disturb
it till we got near to Hamenses house at about a quarter to twelve.
As we wuz a-goin’ down the hill pretty clost to his house I
methought I hearn sunthin’ wrong, a rattlin’ sound amongst the
iron framework of our conveyance, and I mentioned the fact to
my pardner. He then intimated that I had frequently called his
attentions to similar things on similar occasions (he didn’t word
it in this way, no, it wuz a shorter way and fur terser).
But I knew I wuz in the right on’t, and begged him to git out and
see about it. But he vowed he wouldn’t git out, he even made a oath
to confirm it. “Dum” wuz the word he used to confirm the fact that
he would not git out. But the very next minute one of the wheels
come off, and he did git out. Yes, he got out, and I did, too. He
got out first, and I kinder got out after him. It wuz sudden!
Everything seemed sort o’ mixed up and sick to the stomach to me
for quite a spell. But when conscientiousness returned I found
myself layin’ there right in my tracts, and what made it more
curious and coincidin’ I had a bundle of tracts that her old
pasture, Elder Minkley, had sent to Tamer Ann. He worried over her
readin’ dime novels so much, and he had sent her these tracts, “The
Truthful Mother and Child; or, The Liar’s Doom,” and one wuz, “The
Novel Reader’s Fate; or, The Crazed Parent.”
Well, I lay there feelin’ curious, Josiah tryin’ to keep the horse
from tromplin’ on me, and he wuz, I could see, agitated in the
extreme about me, though I had said faintly from where I lay:
“I hain’t killed, Josiah,” and, as he seemed by his looks to doubt
my assurance and mourn for me as lost, I sez agin:
“I am not dead, Josiah,” and I added in faint axents, “Have I bent
my bunnet much?”
And he sez, “Dum the bunnet!” And I didn’t blame him a mite when
I come to think it over. How sure it is that sudden reverses of
fortune brings out the flower of love in full bloom! As I lay there
kinder stunted I felt that I loved my companion and wuz well aware
how he worshipped me.
I spoze my remark about the bunnet had took the edge off from his
anxiety, and he felt that I wuz alive and considerable comfortable.
And at that very minute the mair, bein’ hit on the heel by the
thill Josiah wuz liftin’ up, kicked up both of the hind ones
(heels) and sot off back to Jonesville, my pardner runnin’ after
her as he still had holt of the lines. As I said I laid there
feelin’ dretful curious, for I couldn’t for my life git up, I spoze
I wuz stunted by my fall.
But as I looked back the way we had come and beheld my pardner
disappearin’ round the bend of the road in the wake of the mair,
I see comin’ towards me from that direction a queer lookin’ tall
chap with long, small limbs and a high collor and cane, and, as he
approached me, he stopped and looked down on me through a eyeglass
that hung round his neck, in a queer way, though polite, and sez he:
“You got out sudden, you know.”
“Yes, I know it,” sez I faintly, “but if I had a little help I
could git up agin.”
But he didn’t offer to help me. He looked at me through that
eyeglass and sez he, holdin’ tight to his cane and kinder jabbin’
it into his mouth now and then:
“You fwightened me, you know; I pwespiah now from fwight.”
[Illustration: THE MAIR SOT OFF BACK TO JONESVILLE, MY PARDNER
RUNNIN’ AFTER HER, AS HE STILL HAD HOLT OF THE LINES.
_Page 110._]
“From what?” sez I.
“Fwom feah, you know; feah.”
“Oh,” sez I.
Agin he jabbed that cane of hisen into his mouth, and sez he, not
offerin’ to help me a mite, but standin’ off and eyin’ me like a
one-eyed owl: “Are you shuah you have not sustained any sewious
injuwy?”
“Yes,” sez I, “I hain’t hurt much, I could git up if I had a little
mite of help.”
“Youh fouh ahm now, can you waise it?”
I reached out my arm, feelin’ considerable like a horse, or
mebby it would be more proper if I should say I felt some like
the old mair, she had sunthin’ the matter with her fetlock. And
he continued as he stood there with all the willowy grace of a
telegraph pole, and as tall as one, so it seemed to me:
“Do you feel any pain like basilah menigitis, you know? Do you feel
any uneasiness in youah pewicardium?”
Follerin’ his train of idees almost onbeknown to myself, I sez
faintly, “I never knew till this minute that I had one, but I guess
it is pretty middlin’ comfortable; I am obleeged to you.”
“Oh, I feel welieved if you haven’t injured youah pewicardium, for
that would have been almost suah to bwing on basilah menigitis.”
I give up that I wouldn’t git no help from him, and I sez, “If you
would just go to that house ahead and tell Hamen Smith’s folks that
I have come I would be glad.”
I did it partly to git help and partly to git him out of my sight,
he did look so dog queer standin’ there gnawin’ at that cane of
hisen, with his stiff collar holdin’ up his ears, and his clothes
that tight that I spozed mebby that wuz one reason he didn’t offer
to help me up, the other reason bein’ that he didn’t know enough.
But, truly, it would have been a rash and hazardous proceedin’ on
his part to bend over much, and I didn’t promulgate any desire for
his help after I took a minute’s thought about it. But when I spoke
of Hamenses he sez, “I am going there.”
“Are you?” sez I. “Then mebby they will want to see you right off.
I’d go on if I wuz in your place and tell them that I have come.”
“Yes, I will go,” sez he. He seemed good natured enough what there
wuz of him (his mind, I mean). And he started off lookin’ like a
tall, slim fork walkin’ away. But he turned before he’d gone more’n
a step or two and come back, and sez he:
“Youah shuah now?”
“Sure of what?” sez I.
“Shuah you have not sustained any sewious injuwia?”
“Yes! yes!” sez I, gittin’ wore out. “And I’d like a little help to
git up; I wish you would hurry.”
And then he went on a few more steps and come back agin, and I sez,
“For the land’s sake! What do you want now?”
“Youah cahd, you know, you haven’t pwesented me with youah cahd.”
Sez I with dignity, or as much as I could have layin’ most flat in
the middle of the road, “This is a pretty place to talk of playin’
cards or any other game, I settin’ flat down here in the road and
can’t git up. You had better start on to once and git away from
me,” sez I, “and tell Hamenses folks I’ve come.”
“I haven’t the pleasuah of knowin’ youah name,” sez he, lookin’
sort of pale round the mouth, and his eyes lookin’ big and round. I
spoze I skairt him some by my lofty mean (lofty under difficulties).
“I couldn’t tell, youah know, who had come, youah know.”
“That is so,” sez I, “I forgot. Tell ’em that Josiah Allen’s wife
has come.”
“Oh, Josiah Allen’s wife, I have the gweatest pleasuah in meeting
you. I have heard of youah, youah know.” And he took off his hat
and bowed low to me. I sithed, for I believed then and believe now
he would have stood there for an hour holdin’ his hat in his hand
and bowin’ to me and actin’, and he looked more’n a mile high, too,
I a-settin’ there helpless. But I looked at him that witherin’ that
he turned agin and hurried off as fast as his long legs would carry
him.
He hadn’t got more’n a few steps away before a light buggy come
rollin’ on swift, and who should it be but Tom Willis goin’ on some
law bizness for Thomas J. up beyend Zoar. How curious things will
turn out, now this wuz jest as curious as it wuz for Crusoe to
discover Friday.
I guess I didn’t have to talk to Tom Willis about his helpin’ me.
No, he flung the lines to the boy who wuz with him, and he wuz out
of that buggy and by my side in less than a minute. And it wuzn’t
a minute more when he jest lifted me right up and held me for a
minute or so, for I wuz giddy and sort o’ stunted, and then he
helped me into his buggy and we drove on to Hamenses and got there
long enough before that long legged chap had arrived. He couldn’t
walk fast, so he told me afterwards, on account of his “pespiwin,”
and then he had “dwopped” his cane, “you know.” And I could see
for myself jest what a time he had had pickin’ it up. For the
land’s sake! I don’t see how he ever done it, and so I told Josiah.
But, anyway, Tom Willis took me out of the buggy jest as tender and
careful as if I had been his own Ma, and, leanin’ on his strong
arm, I arrived at Hamenses door and went in, Tom leavin’ me at the
doorsteps and not goin’ in, for reasons to be named hereafter. But
as I stood on the front stoop, and Tom turned to go away, I see a
red, red rose come a-circlin’ through the air from right over our
heads and fall at Tom’s feet, and he took it up and kissed it, for
I see him, and put it in his bosom. And then he turned and looked
up into a window overhead, and no light of the mornin’ sun breakin’
through a cloud wuz ever brighter or more luminous than the glance
and smile he gin to somebody overhead. But it wuz all done in a
minute, and Tom wuz gone, and in a minute more Anna Smith wuz in
my arms, with both her sweet young arms round my neck and her soft
pink cheeks pressed clost to mine. I think enough of Anna Smith,
and she thinks enough of me.
Well, Hamenses wife come runnin’ in dretful glad to see me, she wuz
in the back kitchen givin’ orders to her hired girl, Arabeller, and
Hamen come in, too, real cordial actin’, he wuz in the back yard
at work, and Jack come boundin’ in and most eat me up, he wuz so
glad to see me. And bimeby Cicero come in with his fingers between
the pages of a dime novel, and shook hands with me in a absent
mekanical way, but he didn’t seem to sense my bein’ there much
of any, and what he did sense didn’t seem to be an overagreeable
feelin’, real cool and indifferent he acted. I guess Tamer noticed
it, for she spoke up and said:
“Cicero wuz such a reader, he had such a great taste for books and
literatoor, he wuz so much like his Ma.” And then she patted him
on his head, but he didn’t seem to mind that any, he wuz fairly
bound up in his book, it wuz “The Brave Bold Young Bandit; or,
The Farmer Fool Outwitted.” It had a yeller cover and painted on
it wuz a innocent lookin’ young farmer boy, kneelin’ at the feet
of a bandit boy with bold flashin’ eyes, embroidered uniform and
tall feathers in his hat. I looked at it when he laid it down for
a minute that day, and I see that it would be real instructive in
learnin’ a boy to despise honest labor and heart merit, and honor
dashing wickedness and crime. He had a cigarette in his hand when
he met me, and he had one in his hand or his mouth every time I see
him almost while we wuz there.
Well, to resoom backwards a little. Josiah come in in about haif
an hour. The mair had started back straight for home. That mair
has a constant heart under her white hide, and she’d left children
there and grandchildren, I didn’t blame the mair, though I pitied
my poor Josiah, he wuz beat out. He said that if it hadn’t been for
Tom Willis he never should have ketched her at all. But that didn’t
surprise me any, for Tom Willis is one of the kind who always will
find a way to do anything he sets out to. So he had helped Josiah
ketch the mair.
They wuz dretful glad to have us there, it had been more than a
year since we had been there to stay any, and now we laid out to
stay two days and nights, and they wuz tickled. But as glad as
they’d been to see us, when that long, slim feller come walkin’
in, if you’ll believe it, Tamer Ann Allen actually seemed gladder
to see him and made more on him than she did of Josiah and me, it
wuz a sight to see it go on.
It seemed that when that old young chap come down into that
neighborhood he put up to the hotel to Zoar, and then would walk
over to Hamenses, and be there day in and day out, and stay jest as
long as he could. He liked Anna as well as he could like anything
outside of his old bones and ancestors and things, and I didn’t
wonder at it, for her fresh young beauty must have been attractive
to him, and a sort of a welcome change from his own looks and dry
bones and family trees and such.
But I see she didn’t care anything about him, and I didn’t blame
her; good land! I thought to myself I could easier git up a
sentimental attachment to a good new telegraph pole, for that would
be kinder fresh and hemlocky. But Tamer bowed down before him as
if he wuz pure gold. His name wuz Von Winklstein Von Crankerstone,
or I guess that’s it. I can’t be sure even to this late day that I
have got the name down right, all the Vons and Winkles and things
in their right places. But I have done the best I could, and no man
or woman can do more.
Tamer didn’t like it, because I couldn’t git his name right when
she introduced him, and I guess I did stumble round considerable
amongst them Dutch syllables. But Tamer didn’t like it, for in
apology for my shortcomin’s I mentioned Dutch. And she sez out in
the back kitchen, where I followed her, to apologize:
“You speak of his bein’ Dutch; why,” sez she, “Josiah Allen’s wife,
he is from one of the oldest families in the country, he is a
descendant of the Poltroons who settled on the Hudson in Colonial
days.”
“Is that so, Tamer?” sez I. “And is a Poltroon any better for bein’
a old one than a young one?”
And she sez, “I didn’t say Poltroon.” And she went on to explain,
but it wuz sunthin’ that sounded jest like it. Well, he stayed till
after dinner, and then he went off, much to Anna’s relief, I could
see plain. But Tamer acted real disappointed, and urged him warm to
come agin soon, which he promised to do ready enough. He wuz comin’
back the next week, I believe; he had found some new old graves
somewhere that he wanted to identify and claim, if possible. It
beats all how fond he wuz of cemeteries. But, then, he had a good
deal the look of a tall slim monument himself.
He bid us all good-by in a real polite way, but agin, when I tried
to speak his name in farewell, I struggled round and fell helpless
amongst the ruins of them syllables.
Why, it beats all the time I had with ’em, and to eppisode forward
a little. A few weeks afterwards, when the Poltroon wuz there on
another visit, they wuz to our house to tea. He wanted to look in
the Jonesville cemetery, so they stopped to our house on their way
back. And Thomas J. and his folks, and Tom Willis and Elder Minkley
all happened to be spendin’ the afternoon there, and I shall never
forgit the names I called that Poltroon trying to introduce him.
Why, I called him by more than forty different names, I’ll bet; I
strugglin’ and wrestlin’ as you may say among the Vons and Crinkles
and etcetery, tryin’ hard to do my very best by him and the other
visitors and myself.
And that decided me; I toilin’ and prespirin’ and sweatin’ in my
efforts to git the syllables all straight in a row and drive ’em
on in front of me, and he standin’ lookin’ like a martyr. He bore
up under it wonderful, I must say that for him, lookin’ bad but
speechless. It wuz jest after that last effort of mine to git the
name jest right (for I wuz introducin’ him to Elder Minkley, and I
always try to do my best by ministers, good creeters, they deserve
it), that I wunked Tamer Ann out, she lookin’ mad, and I red and
prespirin’ with my efforts, and, sez I, “This must end, Tamer Ann.”
And sez she, “I should think as much!”
“Well,” sez I, “Von Crank or Von Wink is what that young man will
be called by me for the rest of my days.”
She demurred, but I stood firm. Sez I, “I may have to speak his
name several times while I live, and life is too short for me to go
stumblin’ round amongst the syllables of his name and wrastlin’ and
bein’ throwed by ’em. Von Crank is my choice, but you may take your
pick in the two names.”
She see I wuz firm as adamantine rock, and so she yielded, and
Von Crank is what I’ve called him ever since. Tom Willis acted
tickled, and so did Thomas J. Thomas J. sets a sight by Tom Willis,
and so we all do. He is a likely young feller, light complected,
with blue-gray eyes that are keen and flashin’, and soft at the
same time, and no beard, only a mustache; a tall, broad-shouldered
young chap. And as I say he wuz tickled to see Von Crank stand up
straight and stiff and immovable genteel, and I callin’ him by so
many awful names and knowin’ by my firm stiddy mean I wuz doin’ my
very best by him and myself and the world at large.
It hain’t nateral under the circumstances that Tom should love Von
Crank or Von Crank love him. They hain’t attached to each other at
all, anybody could see that at the most casual glance. To see Von
Crank try to patronize Tom and couldn’t, and to see Tom say the
dryest, provokinest things to Von Crank in a polite way and Von
Crank writhin’ under ’em, but too genteel to say anything back. It
wuz a strange seen. And to see Anna by all her lovin’ looks dotin’
on Tom, and Tom’s silent, stiddy devotion to her, and Tamer Ann’s
efforts to git ’em apart and still keep genteel--why, it wuz as
good as any performance that wuz ever performed in a circus, and so
I told Josiah afterwards.
Tom tried hard to act manly and upright, and that always effects me
powerful. To see a young man blowed on by such blasts of passion,
such a overmasterin’ love and longin’, and still standin’ up
straight and not gittin’ blowed over by ’em, it always affects me,
I can’t help it, I wuz made in jest that way.
Now, after Von Crank got to goin’ after Anna, Tamer Ann, as I said
before, told Tom Willis to never step his foot in her house agin,
and have nothin’ to do at all with Anna.
Well, Tom bowed to her, they say, and took his hat right up and
left without a word back to her only “good mornin’,” it wuz in
the mornin’ time that she told him. But they say, and I believe
it, that his face wuz white as death, even to the lips, and they
wuz tremblin’, so they say. And mebby he couldn’t say anything
owin’ to the sinkin’ of his heart, and mebby it wuz because he
wouldn’t promise to give her up and didn’t want to mad Tamer Ann by
contendin’ with her. Anyway, they say he didn’t say nothin’ only
jest “good mornin’,” and went out.
He might have said enough. Good land! if I had been there I could
have told him lots of things to say.
He might have said, “It is pretty late in the day to ask me to give
her up when she is right inside my heart and soul, and I should
have to tear ’em both open to git her out. It is pretty late in
the day to interfere when you have seen Anna and I playmates from
childhood. When you’ve seen us grow up side by side, all through
our happy youth to manhood and womanhood. When you’ve encouraged
us to be together at all times and all places, trusted her to my
care hundreds and hundreds of times all these years. Have looked
on calmly and seen, for you must have seen, how our hearts wuz
growing together, how our lives wuz gittin’ completely bound up in
one another. After you have sot quietly and allowed all this, now
because a richer, more fashionable suitor asks for Anna you think
you will take her away from me, from the one that holds her by the
divine right of love, and give her to one she does not belong to.
It shows either a criminal carelessness on your part, a criminal
neglect, or worse.”
That’s about the way I should have talked if I had been Tom Willis.
But he didn’t, he jest walked out and shet the door, not slammin’
it, or nothin’, and--and kep’ right on livin’. Never made no
threats about killin’ himself, never boasted, as might be spozed
he would, it is so common under the same circumstances, that he
had got sick of her, and, in fact, wuz so popular among the wimmen
that he had to slight some on ’em now and then, no, Tom never said
anything of all this, but jest kep’ right on with his work in a
manly, stiddy way, growin’ kinder pale and still for a spell, but
at last sort o’ brightenin’ up and havin’ a new and steadfaster
light in his eyes, and a more resolved look on his fine forward.
He see Anna every Sunday in church, and, though he obeyed her
mother and didn’t give her any outward attention, yet there is
a stiddy attention of the soul that a woman can’t misunderstand
when it is wroppin’ her completely round and round. There is a
language of the eyes beyend Tamer Ann Smith to parse; it wuzn’t in
her grammar at all. And if she couldn’t parse it, it wuzn’t likely
that she could stop it. No, she might as well try to stop the vivid
language of the skies when the hidden forces of nature speaks out
in sheets of flame.
Tom’s eyes, as they met Anna’s in the old meetin’ house, held hull
love poems, glowin’ stories of deathless devotion and faith in her.
And Anna read ’em, she alone held the key to the divine unwritten
language; the love in her own heart could alone translate the love
in his.
Well, it had run along so for more than a year, and Anna wuz
twenty and Tom wuz twenty-three; Tom workin’ hard and beginnin’
to be spoke of as a young lawyer who would rise in the world. And
Anna stayin’ to home and tryin’ to be dutiful (duty made hard by
naggin’). Havin’ to use Von Crank well under her mother’s eyes and
freezin’ him in lonely moments, froze one minute by Anna and thawed
out the next by Tamer Ann, and kep’ kinder soft and sloshy all the
time by his love for Anna, Von Crank wuzn’t to be envied much more
than Tom.
But Tamer Ann (for he had acted up to his high station as a
Poltroon, and kinder relied on Tamer Ann to bring Anna round when
he knew in his heart that she detested him) kep’ tellin’ him
all the time that she would be all right in time, it wuz only a
girl’s shyness, etc., etc. So he kep’ on comin’, and Anna kep’ on
shunnin’ him all she could, and Tamer Ann kep’ on naggin’, and so
it went on. Hamen and John didn’t seem to pay so much attention
to this domestic side show, for all their leisure moments, when
they wuz in the house, would be took up foolin’ Jack, tellin’ him
strange stories, drawin’ him on to talk strange about ’em, and then
laughin’ at him. And Jack would meach off, feelin’ all used up and
humiliated, and they snickerin’, the fools! There wuz more sense in
Jack’s little finger than in their hull long bodies, and so I told
Josiah.
Oh, how it incensed me to see it, and the incense grew stronger
every time I went there. Tamer Ann had got holt of a hull chest of
old dime novels that had fell to her from a distant relative. He
wuz jest sent to prison, bein’ a forger and a arson, and, as it wuz
for life, why this chest fell onto his relations, and as the rest
didn’t want the novels, why Tamer Ann got ’em.
This relation who owned ’em had had a large family who doted on the
novels, but they had most on ’em been transported for life or hung,
or sunthin’ of that sort. His wife had long before run away with
another man, she had worshipped the novels while she lived in the
house with ’em, but she had run clear away out of sight, so Tamer
Ann got ’em, as I say, and oh! how she and Cicero gloated over ’em
and devoured ’em. Anna didn’t care for them, good land! she had
a romance in her own heart that took up all her time and tears,
poor thing! Jack wuzn’t old enough for ’em. As for Hamen and his
brother, they could tell their own lies, good land! they didn’t
need the novels, so Tamer had the hull run on ’em herself, she and
Cicero.
CHAPTER VIII
Well, to resoom backwards for a spell. Josiah and I wuzn’t goin’
to stay only two days and one night, but, good land! they wouldn’t
hear a word to our goin’ so soon, so we stayed three days right
along. But then, as Tamer said, think of the visits that they had
made to us that wuz onpaid. Well, I thunk on ’em and thought likely
as not it wuz our duty to stay. But I see lots of things there I
didn’t like to see. I hate to talk about relations; I don’t think
it the right thing to do. But I can’t help sayin’ that I did see
lots of things that I wanted changed. Not Anna, she wuzn’t one
of the things I wanted changed, no, indeed! she and Jack wuz the
flowers of the family in full blow. Anna is jest as different from
the rest of her family as light is from darkness, and a good deal
the same way, and I believe Jack would come up a good deal like her
if he got a chance.
One reason is why Anna is so different from her Ma, she wuz brung
up by a aunt of her father’s, brung up by hand by Aunt Judith
Smith, who, bein’ a old maid, couldn’t, it stands to reason, bring
her up in any other way. For years after Anna wuz born Tamer wuz
really sick, and this aunt lived with ’em and took care of Anna
and thought all the world of her till her death, which occurred
when Anna wuz fourteen. She wuz brought up dretful good, curious,
hain’t it, she bein’ a old maid, but old maids are sometimes real
religious, with good common horse sense, too, and Aunt Judith wuz.
And I have always spozed it wuz her bringin’ up and her precepts
and examples that made Anna so different.
You see, the ideals she held up in front of Anna wuzn’t fashion and
expediency and outside show and vanity, no, indeed! they wuz truth
and honesty and honor and simple living and high thinking. She
held ’em up in front of her, and held ’em high, too, and propped
’em up by her own simple, straightforward, noble, self-sacrificin’
life. For it wuzn’t any comfort to her to leave her little quiet,
comfortable home to take up her abode in the house of a Tamer or
even a Hamen. But she shouldered her crosses wherever she found ’em
and marched on with ’em silently and oncomplainin’ly and bravely,
and folks didn’t know from her groanin’s how heavy they bore down
on her shoulders.
She didn’t want to take the care of this worse than motherless
child into her own tired hands. And she had plenty of means and
no need to, if she hadn’t felt it to be her duty. But she see the
little bark jest settin’ out, swashin’ and dashin’ round on the
jagged rocks of life, and she felt it to be her duty to take holt
of the hellum. Hamen had always been her favorite nephew, and she
wuz dretful sorry for his poor little peaked lookin’ baby. So, as I
say, she gin up her comfort and ease and histed this cross onto her
tired-out back, and commenced trudgin’ along the road of life with
it.
And wuzn’t it queer how things will turn out? This job she had
tackled only from a sense of duty and in a real martyr sperit
become the greatest comfort and pleasure of her life. For pretty
soon Love, the great high priest, come in and sanctified her
offerings of comfort and ease, and made her way glorious. How
she did love Anna, and how Anna did love her. Of course clouds
sometimes dimmed the horizon, shadders from Tamer’s personality and
influence dimmed the clear sky that she wanted always to shine down
onto her darling, also some lighter shadders from Hamen’s onwisdom.
But take it as a hull, Aunt Judith’s influence and sweet wise
teachings carried the day, and Anna grew up a girl of a thousand,
and at Aunt Judith’s death (which almost broke her heart) she wuz
so headed in the right way that she couldn’t be turned very fur
from it either way, not by Pa or Ma or any other onwise influence.
The money she left Anna wuz the least of the riches she give her.
She died jest about the time that Tamer recovered her health, or as
much of it as she ever did recover, so Tamer had the care of Cicero
and poor little Jack. But then Jack had Anna, too, to kinder lean
on, for Tamer had another spell for some years after Jack wuz born.
But Cicero never would hear a word to Anna, he had got thoroughly
headed in his Ma’s ways, and then I spoze it wuz kinder hereditary
in him, too; he wuz born that way.
Anna is real good lookin’, her cheeks are as pink as fresh young
damask roses, her complexion is clear and white and as smooth as
satin, and her eyes are very dark, and soft, and bright, too, her
hair is dark and wavy and kinks up in cunnin’ little curls on her
forward and neck, she can’t do it up so but what them little curls
will escape from the comb and cluster round her white neck and
forward as if it loved ’em. Oh, she looks well enough, as I have
told her time and agin:
“Anna, if you will only be as good as you look, you will git along
first rate.” As I sez to her anon or oftener, “Handsome is that
handsome duz.”
And she sez, “That is jest what Aunt Judith always said, Aunt
Samantha.”
But I’d look at her all the time with that admirin’, appreciative
look on my eyebrow that she knew, the witch, jest how pretty I
thought she wuz (and I not helpin’ it to save my life). Yes, Anna
liked me dretful well, which wuzn’t so strange when one comes to
think how well I liked her. And she told me right out plain and
square that her feelin’s towards that young Von Crank wuz almost
murderous, and she owned up to me that sometimes when he wuz
standin’ up so straight and stiff she wuz tempted to tip him over,
and sez she, “I don’t believe he would bend at all, but fall right
over straight like a clothes pin or a telegraph pole.”
“Well,” sez I, “don’t try to do that in the parlor, Anna, for if
it is so, think of the damage he would do to the furniture on the
other side of the room.” And I guess I kinder got her mind offen
it. But she sez, “You can’t bear him yourself, Aunt Samantha, and I
know it.”
“Well, dear,” sez I, “everybody has their own station house in
life to fill, and I spoze he has his, or else why should he have a
station house?”
Sez she, “He needn’t come round me with his mouldy old compliments,
for I would rather live with Tom Willis on bread and water than
with him in a palace.”
Anna loves Tom, loves him as she duz her eyes, and as I say,
Hamenses wife had invited him there and let ’em grow up together
like a mornin’ glory vine round the pillow of a porch, never sayin’
a word aginst their bein’ together, never noticin’ that under the
divine spring of youth and love her heart’s tendrils wuz puttin’
out livin’ branches and twinin’ round the pillow of his steadfast
devotion, jest as firmly and jest as onbeknown to her as the vines
she had planted wuz twinin’ round their supports in the spring and
summer of the year.
She waited, Tamer did, till the heart’s tendrils wuz wropped so
completely round the heart of Tom Willis that nothin’ but death
could ontwine ’em (and I don’t believe that death can, nor Josiah
don’t). But, howsumever, at this time Tamer Ann stepped in and
begun to tear ’em off. Just because Tom wuz poor, or that is poor
in money, for he wuz rich in all the qualities that go to make a
young man wealthy in himself, and there wuzn’t any doubt that he
would be rich in money in a few years the way he wuz going on now.
But his family wuz poor but pious, and Von Crank wuz rich. And
Tamer begun to tell me the very next mornin’ after I got there what
a great family he had descended from.
And I sez, “How big!”
And she sez, “One of the greatest families in the State.”
“Well,” sez I, “that don’t raise him in my estimation any. There is
a man in Loontown that has had thirty-two children by his different
wives, but he is a shiftless creeter, and so are most of his
children.”
Sez she, “I don’t mean that; I mean an old family.”
“How old?” sez I calmly. And I went on, “There is a man in Spoon
Settlement that has got a grandchild over seventy. And that you
know, Tamer Ann, must make the old man pretty old, and, in fact,
a pretty old family, for they are all livin’, father, son, and
grandson. But, good land! nobody ever thought of lookin’ up to
old Father Minkler, why, he is on the town, and has been on it
for years, and they say now his son is on it and his grandson is
jest thinkin’ of gittin’ on it. Good land! I should never think of
lookin’ up to a family because they wuz old.”
“Well,” she sez, “they’ve descended from a long line of ancestors,
they have great reason to be proud of it, there is where they have
the advantage of us.”
“Oh, shaw!” sez I, “that is jest what we’ve all done, or it stands
to reason that we shouldn’t be here. We have had to have ancestors,
everybody has. I don’t see that he has any more than we have, so
fur as that is concerned. I don’t spoze he has had more’n one
father, or any of ’em have had more’n one father apiece, and that
is jest what we’ve all had. If he had had several fathers and
mothers it might be sunthin’ to boast over, and I don’t know as it
would after all, for the text sez ‘every man stands and falls on
himself,’ or words to that effect.”
And then Tamer Ann sez agin, real hautily, “He is from one of the
old Dutch families it makes folks so proud to be descended from. He
is a direct descendant of the Poltroons.”
“Well,” sez I calmly, “I shouldn’t wonder a mite if he wuz, but it
don’t raise him up any in my estimation, and it wouldn’t if he had
had Solomon and Moses for grandfathers. When I gather a white lily
I pick it for its beauty and sweetness, and not for the soil it
sprung from, good land! what do I care whether it grew on sandy
sile or gravelly, or swampy, or anything? I prize it for its own
beauty and sweetness that it has drawn by its own life out of the
earth. Good land! I should jest as soon take up a handful of this
sile and treasure it up and try to see how it come to nourish so
sweet a life as I would to grope back amongst the dust of them
old Poltroons. Though to be sure it is nateral that a posy should
strike some clingin’ roots down into the sile it grew on, it is
nater and can’t be helped. You take any posey that is healthy and
vigorous, and take any tree or bush whatsumever, and when you pull
it out of its home it takes a wrench, a hard wrench to start it,
the tendrils strike so deep. God made posies and hearts kinder
clingin’ in their nater and they hang onto their old homes. It is
nateral for folks to look back with pride upon the noble doin’s of
their forefathers if they’ve done ’em, but to boast over a Poltroon
jest from the fact of his bein’ a Poltroon--I should never boast
over it, never.”
“Patroon,” sez Tamer hautily, “I have corrected you before in this.”
“Well,” sez I mildly, “they sound considerable alike, and when
there are so many big words that mean about the same thing it is
nateral that folks should sometimes git ’em kinder mixed.”
“They wuz high families,” sez Tamer, “they descended from the Dutch
settlers on Manhattan Island, that the grandest families of to-day
claim with pride as being their ancestors.”
“Oh,” sez I, “you mean them old market gardeners, them old cabbage
raisers, fur hunters, and pumpkin farmers. Why, how you talk,”
sez I, “I think more of Von Crank than I did. I had no idee his
ancestors wuz good honest farmers, plantin’ and diggin’ their
own sile. I spozed from his looks and mean that he had never done
anything more useful than to gnaw canes and look through a glass
eye onto nothin’, I am glad you told me, Tamer, why his ancestors
must be real congenial to Josiah and me, though of course we own
more land and live better than them old Dutchmen did. But they wuz
likely, though poor, and put to it for things, and a sort of beer
guzzlin’, ignorant set, but not to blame for not knowin’ much.”
Tamer didn’t like it, but she turned the subject off onto her
resolve to not let Anna have anything to do with Tom Willis,
seemin’ly not carin’ a mite what wuz goin’ on in Anna’s heart, no
more than if she wuz one of the enchanted females she had read so
much about.
But all this time, in spite of Tamer Ann’s perfect indifference to
the life happiness of Anna, she didn’t let anything interfere with
her riggin’ her up in the latest fashion, she didn’t let any of the
“Enchanted Females of the Wild Forest; or, Petrified Dragons of the
Dark Prairies,” or the last of the new diseases hender her from
seein’ with her own eyes that Anna had the newest and curiousest
kind of tattin’ on her underclothin’ and her dresses made in the
latest fashion, and all the smaller things about her clothin’ wuz
in first rate order.
These Tamer Ann called the essentials of life, and she allowed
nothin’ to interfere with ’em, but if she had been one of the
Enchanted Princesses or petrified animals she couldn’t been more
dumb and deef to the real soul and heart needs of her child. It
is pitiful, mighty pitiful, when the door of a child’s heart is
blockaded day by day by the stupidity and ignorance of a mother,
till at last the doors and winders are all shet up and the mother
shot out doors, ornamentin’ the outside with shiffon and jewelry
and knowin’ nothin’ of what is goin’ on inside.
It is pitiful, and in ninety cases out of a hundred the mother
is the one to blame. Why, good land! she is inside in the first
on’t, and there is nothin’ to hender her from keepin’ inside but
ignorance, carelessness, neglect, lack of sympathy, or lack of
time. In Tamer’s case it wuz mostly lack of time as I have shown.
The elopin’ females and Dejected Denizens of the Dungeon Keep kep’
her too busy, them and her basiler menigitis and sinevetus and
sangeletus and perinitus and etc., etc., etc., and her domestic
duties, some on ’em which she wuz to blame for undertakin’, and
I told her so. She had a new hired girl whose real name wuz
Hannah, but who thought it would be more romantick to call herself
Arabeller, and she made a specialty of the “beller,” she wanted
it pronounced Arabeller, and Tamer Ann, thinkin’ that it would be
real romantick to have a hired girl by that name, she jined forces
with her, and by the time I got there the name Hannah wuz forgot,
seemin’ly, and Arabeller wuz the name.
Well, Arabeller wuz a girl I wouldn’t have inside my house. She
wuz big and fat, and I never see her face when it wuz what I
called clean, and her dirty lookin’ hair, kinder drab color, wuz
all covered with hair oil and scented with bergamont. What her
complexion would be if it wuz washed clean I didn’t know, and spoze
I never shall, but as it wuz it looked muddy and grimy, and wuz all
covered with black heads and pimples, and coarse powder. She wore,
in the afternoon, her cheap, gaudy dresses in a train draggin’
round the house, and cheap, high-heeled shues, settin’ table and
washin’ dishes with them dirty ruffles floppin’ after her, wipin’
up all the dirt and nastiness that she couldn’t seem to git enough
of in any other way.
She had girted her waist down into the smallest dimension she
could, but bein’ fat and her buttons not to be relied on, there
would be dretful gaps on the waist in different places, and between
the waist and draggly skirt, and as she wuz one of the girls so
common in the country, who won’t work out unless she is one of the
family, her clothin’ showed up to good advantage at the table, the
dirt on her face and dress bein’ emphasized by blotches of flour
and grease, stove blackin’, prespiration, and sweat.
She, too, wuz most always to be seen with a dime novel in her hand.
Sometimes she would stop and take up “The Queen of the Haunted
Palace” in her hands and foller her fortunes while her dish water
got cold. And once I see her myself readin’ the Police Gazette
while she wuz fryin’ sassige, and one end of the dirty sheet
drizzled down into the fat (I didn’t eat any of the sassige).
She had took music lessons. Her Ma went out washin’ and had to
mortgage her cow, the only thing she possessed in the world, to
pay for Arabeller’s lessons. And, though there wuz no prospects of
her ever havin’ anything to practice on more melogious that the
clothes wringer, no earthly prospect or heavenly, either, for I
didn’t believe she would ever be good enough to play on the golden
harp even if she knew the notes. But she would take lessons, and
now when she could escape for a minute from the kitchen we could
hear her singin’ and playin’ at the top of her rough, coarse voice,
“The Bowery Boy” and the “Beauteous Ballet Girl,” which she
pronounced “beauchieus ballet.”
If she had a spark of talent I should have approved of her
ambition, but she couldn’t sing no more than a horse can make
fried cakes. And I told Tamer that if her Ma had gin the cow music
lessons and mortgaged Arabeller to pay for them, she would have got
better returns for her money, though who would take the mortgage
wuz more than I knew, unless it was Cicero.
Well, as I told Tamer Ann, I couldn’t have such a girl in my house
overnight, bold, boastin’, insolent, lyin’, nasty inside and
outside, leerin’, brazen, and altogether worthless. But Tamer said
she got her real cheap, and she thought by havin’ her instead of a
better girl she could save money enough to git a new sealskin cloak
and a bracelet out of the household money, so she hired her for a
song almost.
“Not one of her songs, I hope,” sez I.
“No,” Tamer said, she said it in a parable way. Well, as nigh as I
could make out from what I see myself and from what I hearn, Cicero
thought it would be kinder manly and like one of his Bandit Heroes
to fall in love with her, and pay her attentions, not in the good
open hullsome way of comrades and playmates, in her few hours of
leisure, but in the dime novel, pirate way, brigand and burglar,
romantick, sentimental way.
There wuz a cave in the woods back of Hamenses, and he used to
retire there quite a good deal. And he tried time and agin to run
away with her. She wuzn’t likely, so Tamer said, and she knew
she would have to watch her when she hired her, but she said she
thought she could, with her family’s help. She seemed to specially
count on Cicero’s help from her talk to me, but ’tennyrate she
owned up that it made her sights of trouble.
And I sez to her in the cause of duty, “Tamer Ann, why did you hire
a girl that you thought wuzn’t likely? Why did you bring such a
girl into the house with your children? I wuz never much of a hand
to wave fire brands round in piles of tow and flax, or light parlor
matches in powder magazines. But, howsumever,” sez I, “everybody
hain’t alike, and I spoze mebby you thought you would git along.”
“Yes,” sez she, “for I knew we could watch her through the day, and
then we always nail her up at night.”
“Nail her up!” sez I, agast at the idee, “what do you mean?”
Sez she, “There hain’t no lock to her door, but we have got an old
door that we set aginst hern and nail it up every night.”
“Don’t you feel queer while you are doin’ it?” sez I, for truly it
made me feel queer as a dog jest hearin’ it.
“Yes,” sez she, “I do feel queer, and specially when we drag her in
by moonlight, for she has often tried to run away with Cicero, but
we would some on us hear her, and then we would have to go out and
drag her back and nail her up.”
“Wuzn’t it a sight of work?” sez I pityin’ly.
“Yes,” sez she, it wuz a sight of work, for she wuz so mean that
she would let her feet drag, and they would have to pull her back
by main force.
Sez I, “Tamer Ann, it seems to me that it would be easier to
wash the dishes and sweep than to do this, and that is about all
Arabeller duz anyway.”
Tamer said it wuz a good deal more work, but it wuz genteel to
employ a servant, it give a sort of a air to a house to have a
servant in it.
And I sez, “Yes, it duz give considerable air, if you have to be
rushin’ round at any time of night to drag her in and nail her up.”
“Yes,” sez Tamer, “of course my family help me, but that has made
me sights of worriment agin, for I most know that Cicero has kep’
up a clandestine correspondence with her, and would slip notes into
her hand while he wuz helpin’ me drag her back. I have ketched
him,” sez she, “leavin’ the nails loose so she could break out
while he wuz helpin’ me nail her up.”
“Tamer,” sez I, real earnest, “do hear to me; do git rid of
Arabeller, or you will sup sorrer from it in the end.” And I see
that all that wuz keepin’ her back from it wuz the idee of style
and gentility.
I didn’t dread her influence so much over Anna, for I felt that
her nater wuz so healthy and wholesome and well grounded in good
actions that it would reject the pizen atmosphere. And little Jack,
I hoped and prayed none of her acts would even be known to him by
name. But I worried more than considerable over the hull matter,
and so did the neighbors, I could see. Why, one night while I wuz
there a neighborin’ woman, Miss Presley, walked right into Tamer’s
kitchen without knockin’, with an old shawl over her head and a
lantern in both hands. Cicero had gone into her paster and took
both her horses and gone off somewhere with ’em, he and Arabeller.
She wuz a old maid and said she had always been imposed upon, but
she demanded help to hunt her horses.
So Tamer and Hamen had to git up and pacify Miss Presley and help
hunt, for sure enough when they went to Cicero’s room he wuzn’t
there, and when they went to Arabeller’s room there the nails wuz
pulled out and she wuz let loose, and we found out afterwards they
had both run away to git married. But Hamen started off horseback,
he and the hired man, and they catched them jest before they
reached the minister’s house down on Stuny Creek.
Well, that broke that up, but Arabeller went about the house real
surly, and Cicero, though he didn’t say much, had such mysterious
looks that I most knew he wuz meditatin’ rapine or burglarly or
sunthin’ or ruther. But, as it come out afterwards, he wuz plannin’
to carry Arabeller off into his cave and keep her there till he
could bring a clergyman stealthily to the trysting place to unite
them. That all happened after I wuz there. But I worried about him
considerable nights after I went to bed, and wondered sadly how it
would all come out.
But to resoom backwards. The next mornin’ after we went there Tamer
got a good breakfast. She wuz sufferin’ from sinevetus, she said,
and wuz dretful afraid of basler menigitus, but they didn’t hender
her from gittin’ a first rate meal--good steak, creamed potatoes,
hot rolls, coffee, etc., and she did it almost all herself, for
Anna had her work to do, and Arabeller couldn’t git a good meal to
save her life.
CHAPTER IX
Well, after breakfast Tamer and I wuz in the settin’ room both on
us sewin’, for I had took a fine shirt of Josiah’s to finish, and
she wuz embroiderin’ some lace ruffles to trim a skirt for Anna.
“Tamer, I should think such work would be hard on your basiler
disease, whatever it is. Hain’t it dretful hard to embroider that
fine lace?”
“Yes, Josiah Allen’s wife, it is hard, but you know I don’t mind
any labor or any care if I can advance my children’s happiness, you
know jest how I watch over their interests and am willing to spend
and be spent in their service.”
And she bent closter still over the fine complicated stitches of
that wearisome lookin’ embroidery, and I thought and couldn’t help
it, if you would spend half or a quarter of the time you spend in
ornamentin’ the bodies of your children, in lookin’ out for their
souls and hearts, and studyin’ their welfare, you would come out
better in the end.
And at this very minute little Jack come in lookin’ bright as the
mornin’, which wuz very fair. He wuz dressed up slick and clean in
a little blue suit, with a deep collar braided painfully by Tamer
Ann in fine black braid, and all up and down the side of his little
legs that fine embroidery run. And Tamer begun to charge him the
minute he got into the room to not run round out doors for fear he
would soil that beautiful new suit. “You know,” sez she, “your Ma
done that for you when she couldn’t hardly lift her head from the
pillow. It almost killed your Ma, that work did.”
I see at this Jack’s little face grew overcast with a couple of
shadders. One wuz cast from the martyr’s cloudy brow, no doubt the
thought of killin’ his Ma wuz more or less painful to him, and the
other and deeper shadder wuz that he couldn’t run round free as
the young colts that wuz prancin’ about the medder by the side of
the house. His poor little legs wuz jest achin’ to jump and bound
and curvit round, and there they wuz doomed to imprisonment in a
braided fortress. Oh, my! I wuz sorry for Jack, sorry as I could
be. Well, Tamer and I sot there and had quite an agreeable visit,
Tamer has her properties, though she is sot and overbearin’, I mean
when she is herself, more’n half the time I do believe she imagines
herself a Female Amazonian or a African Princess or sunthin’.
We talked about the different relations on both sides, and quite a
good deal about my grandchildren; she talked middlin’ agreeable,
but what I can’t understand in her is her total lack of good
judgment. Why, she said that there had been other little girls that
looked jest as well as Tirzah Ann’s youngest, little Anna Thyrza,
and she said she didn’t like the name, and if Tirzah had called her
after herself she ort to called her Tirzah Ann. Sez I, “We call her
Delight, she don’t hardly know she has got any other name, and,”
sez I, “our daughter can’t bear the name of Tirzah Ann, she thinks
it is so old fashioned and humbly, and so I don’t know that she
is so much to blame for naming her in this roundabout way after
herself. Whitfield would have the baby named after her Ma,” sez I.
Sez Tamer, “I shall always call the child Tirzah.” And agin I told
her this it wuzn’t the child’s name, and agin Tamer sez firmly,
“Tirzah is a good name, and I shall call her Tirzah.” And so she
did call her through the hull of our conversation in spite of all
my explanations.
Well, bein’ a visitor, I thought I wouldn’t contend with her, but I
wuz some mad on the inside about it. But jest while we wuz talkin’
Tamer looked out towards the road and said, “If there don’t come
Aunt Nabby Barnes! oh, dear me! the sight of her fairly makes me
sick, and she will stay all day most likely. Well, we have got to
make the best of it, I spoze, she has got lots of money and no
heirs, and she thinks a good deal of Jack. Now, Jack,” sez she, to
the little boy who wuz lookin’ on with open eyes and ears, “you
must be good to her and pay attention to her all day.” And then
agin she resoomed her complaints. “Why couldn’t she have stayed
away to-day and let us alone? I hope she won’t stay long.” By that
time Aunt Nabby had knocked at the door, and Tamer met her with
enthosiasm and several kisses, and sez:
“Oh, my dear Aunt Nabby! how glad we all are to see you! Why
haven’t you been here before? It seems an age since we have seen
you; you have come now to stay a good, long while with us, haven’t
you? Jack come right here and kiss dear Aunt Nabby.”
“I won’t,” sez Jack. “I don’t want her here.”
“Do you come this minute, Jack, and kiss dear Aunt Nabby. Jack
talks about you so much, Aunt Nabby; he thinks everything of you.”
“I don’t,” sez Jack; “I don’t think anything of her at all.”
“Jack, do you come here this minute and kiss Aunt Nabby, or I will
punish you severely.”
Jack dragged himself towards her as if a heavy weight hung to his
feet, and put his cheek up against hers. He didn’t kiss her, I
don’t believe, but his mother thought he did, and so she let him
off.
Well, that afternoon Jack told a fib, and his mother ketched him
at it. It wuz what they call a white lie, as for me I have always
made a practice of thinkin’ that lies are never white, that they
are never any color but black. But this one of Jack’s wuzn’t very
black, anyway, it wuz a sort of a small light colored one (if they
are ever light colored). But you ort to seen the fuss Tamer Ann
made over it, and it wuz jest what ort to be done, he ortn’t to be
allowed to fib. But who learnt him to lie? Who sot him the pattern?
Them wuz the two questions that wuz hantin’ me as I hearn Tamer Ann
whippin’ him and heard Jack cryin’ over it.
Tamer come downstairs completely exhausted, and sez she, “Oh, what
a time I have had! What a job it is to bring up children right! My
arms ache as if they would come off, but I will bring my children
up right if my arms do come off in the job. Lyin’ is sunthin’ I
won’t have in this house.”
And Tamer meant what she said, I hain’t no idee but what she did,
she thought she abominated lyin’ and never mistrusted she had been
lyin’ all the mornin’ herself, about three and a half hours of
clear, stiddy lie, black as a coal. She didn’t mistrust it, but
in the cause of duty I reminded her of it, for I loved Jack and
couldn’t bear to see him spilte, and I sez, “Children are quick to
foller patterns.”
And she sez, tostin’ her head, “Nobody ever ketched me in a lie, or
Hamen, either.”
Sez I, “Jack heard you groanin’ and dreadin’ Aunt Nabby, and hatin’
to see her, to her back, and then kissin’ and tellin’ her how glad
you wuz to see her to her face; what is that, Tamer Ann Allen, what
is that?”
She tosted her head agin and sez, “Oh, you have got to do such
little things to git along peaceable.” Sez I, “Well, I spoze Jack
thought he had got to tell his little lie in order to git along
smooth.”
Sez Tamer Ann, “This is entirely different; we older ones have the
duties of society restin’ on us----”
“The older ones,” sez I, interruptin’ her, “ort to behave
themselves and not set patterns of falsehood before the children.”
“Society, as it is now organized,” sez Tamer Ann, “cannot exist and
run smoothly without a little, not exactly falsehood or deceit, I
wouldn’t use exactly those words----”
“I would,” sez I firmly, “I would, that is jest what they be, jest
what you used this mornin’ and whipped Jack for this afternoon.”
“Society would break in pieces if it were not for the oil of these
qualities, which I cannot exactly name----”
“I can,” sez I firmly; “I can name ’em.”
“If it were not for this to soften the friction of the machinery,
society would break in pieces.”
“Then let it break into pieces,” sez I, “into a hundred pieces. But
surely,” I sez, “there is such a thing as truth and frankness and
simplicity and honor in the world, surely there are them that live
their lives in a simple, honest way, not hidin’ or coverin’ up,
nor pretendin’ to be what they are not, but jest go on from day to
day and from year to year doin’ their best, not pretendin’ their
best is any better than it is, and not pretendin’ that it is any
worse (which is jest as wrong, though we don’t look at it in that
light). Not awed by them above ’em in worldly wealth and station,
thinkin’ how little one really can own in this life, not lookin’
down on them beneath ’em in worldly knowledge or wealth, thinkin’
how different God looks on different gifts from what we do, and
thinkin’ mebby he counts wealth of heart more worthy than wealth
of intellect. For that very reason havin’ no contempt for common
people or common things, knowing’ well that what we call common
He might call oncommon. The beggar mebby with his heart full of
prophecy and hope beatin’ under his squalid rags, and the king like
as not carryin’ his poor starved heart to a banquet with his royal
robes trailin’ about him. We can’t see through these rags and robes
always, and see what poverty or wealth they cover. So it is best to
carry our heads and minds jest as straight and stiddy as we can,
and doin’ our own duty we will have less time to either look up or
down on our poor fellow mortals travelin’ along the road with us,
we won’t have the time to pretend to like them when we don’t, to be
overjoyed to see ’em when we hain’t, but will try to tell the truth
with fear and tremblin’.”
Sez Tamer Ann, “Would you tell everybody right out blunt what you
think of ’em?”
“No,” sez I firmly, “no, indeed! that would make the world too
curious a place, that would make circuses and shows and curosities
too common and frequent in our streets. Oh, no,” sez I, lookin’
pensively at Tamer Ann, who had begun to embroider agin fiercely,
“I should hate to tell folks what I thought of ’em for even half
an hour. And there is no need of it, everybody can mind their own
bizness a good deal of the time, it don’t require much of any nack
to keep your tongue between your teeth, and not tell what you
think, to keep back things when it hain’t necessary to tell ’em.”
Sez I reasonable, “It is hard to do oft times, but it is much
better than to say a lot of things you don’t mean.”
Sez Tamer Ann, “Folks will git into places in this world where
it is impossible to git out peaceable without wigglin’ round and
deceivin’ a little.”
“There is always a open place above ’em,” sez I, “let ’em look for
help there and they will git it, and,” sez I firmly, “I have always
found that truth wuz the best to depend on in the long run even
from a worldly point of view, to say nothin’ of right and wrong.
It hain’t half so hard to keep kinder still and not talk a lot of
trash you don’t mean, and at the same time it saves your breath to
talk considerable about what you do like. And that I wuz always
quite a case to do. I always seem to have to talk about folks and
things that I like. The world is so full of beauty and goodness
and glory, and power and grandeur and loveliness, you meet all the
time folks so full of good qualities, things to admire and like,
that it uses up my breath. I never seem to have any left to praise
up things and folks I don’t like and look admirin’ at ’em, I don’t
seem to have the time and breath even if I wanted to, which I
don’t, Heaven knows.”
“Oh, well,” sez Tamer Ann, sithin’ deep, “it is so hard to know
what to do, sometimes I think it is better to use a little deceit,
if by doin’ so you can make folks feel agreeable, and make yourself
and others happier.”
Sez I dryly, very dry, dry as chips, “I spoze that is how Jack
felt, I spoze he felt that it would make you happier if he told you
he had done what you sot him to do, and Jack had partly done it,
as you know very well. I spoze he felt that it would make you and
himself happier and the friction lighter on the wheels of society,
and his poor little back, if he told you it wuz all done. But you
didn’t seem to like it, and the friction wuz severe judgin’ from
the groanin’s and screamin’s I heard from upstairs. But as long as
you do the same thing yourself, Tamer Ann Allen, and teach Jack to
do it, in the most powerful way, the way of example, you hadn’t ort
to whip him. For that is one theme for which I have labored long
and feel deeply, to not blame children for what we do ourselves and
teach them to do.”
“Well,” sez Tamer, foldin’ up her embroidery, “it is time to put
the teakettle on.” And she went out and shot the door middlin’
hard, but I didn’t care if she did, I had leaned against Duty and
felt considerable calm in my frame.
She got a real good supper, and I a-settin’ out on the porch could
hear her walk to and fro settin’ the table in the dining room,
Arabeller bein’ out in the kitchen cookin’ sunthin’. And then it
wuz I see that my talk to Tamer hadn’t struck in as I wanted it to,
but I pacified myself by turnin’ my thoughts onto the needecessity
of watchin’ after the seed is sown, and not be discouraged because
it won’t spring up the same hour you put it into the soil. No, I
felt (some of the time) that Tamer’s nater wuz kinder sandy soil,
bein’ drained by her different diseases, and beat down on by the
lurid glare of the climate she dwelt in most of the time, namely
them foamin’, blood-curdlin’ novels of hern, and I ort to wait in
patience, and as the Sam sez be willin’ to sow in season and out of
season, hopin’ that some of it would spring up and bear good fruit.
Well, the reason of this simely wuz the eppisode I witnessed
through the open winder between Tamer and poor little Jack. She
wuz learnin’ him a lesson in Gography every day, and as he had run
looser on account of company bein’ there, his lesson wuz belated
and he wuz tired, but she had sent him after his little Gography
and set him at it while she wuz settin’ the table. She told him
to bound Bolivia. Jack wuz in one of his wild moods, he had ’em
sometimes, restless, obstropulous moods, jest as we all have. Jack
wuz standin’ up on two chairs in front of his Ma some like the
Colossial Roads, I have heard Thomas J. read about.
In some things Hamen’s wife is real lax, laxer than I would be.
I should have made Jack stand up in front of me, or set. But she
didn’t mind, so he stood up with his feet on two chairs real
defiant lookin’ and uppish. And he spoke out loud and firm, and sez
he:
“I don’t like the word, Bolivia, Boliver is a good word, I will
bound Boliver,” and he stood up firmer than ever and the chairs
further apart, seemin’ly.
Sez Tamer, “Do you bound Bolivia.”
“Boliver,” sez Jack, “is bounded on the north by----”
“Bolivia!” sez Hamen’s wife.
“Boliver!” sez Jack firmly; “I like the word, and Boliver it shall
be!” And Tamer of course couldn’t stand that, and so she had to
whip him again, but I hearn him, as she dragged him upstairs, say
kinder low, but jest so she could hear him, “Boliver.”
And she tusseled more than half an hour with him, and supper wuz
belated, and she come down hot and wore out with her efforts to
make him give up, and sez she, “He is such a hard child to manage,
I can’t make him give up and say things right. Now, that child knew
that Boliver wuzn’t the right word, but still he wuz bound to have
his own way and say it as he wanted to.”
Then Duty gin me a real hard jog, I up and sez to her: “Children
are great cases to foller example and do what they see done.”
“What under the sun do you mean?” sez she wonderin’ly.
“Why,” sez I, “this very mornin’ when you wuz bound and determined
to call little Delight Tirzah, I told you that wuzn’t her name,
but you said that it wuz a good name and you should call her so. I
noticed Jack eyin’ us clost as if it wuz a new and agreeable idee,
that folks could alter names if they wanted to, and,” sez I firmly,
“Delight’s name is no more Tirzah than Bolivia is Boliver!”
“Oh, well,” sez Tamer, “that is of no consequence at all. What I do
and what Jack can do is two.”
“Yes,” sez I solemnly, “and it may turn out to be more than two in
the end.”
Sez she coldly, “I don’t know what you mean.” And to tell the
truth, I don’t really know as I knew myself, but it made a kinder
good endin’ to our talk. But as anybody can see Jack wuzn’t a mite
to blame in the Boliver affair, he is naturally very conscientious,
if they only knew enough to appreciate it, he always wants to fix
things jest right even in his play. I remember one time when I wuz
stayin’ there over Sunday he gin a remarkable instance of it.
Tamer wuz strict, I must say, about not lettin’ Jack play games
on Sunday, and he wuz good about mindin’, but I spoze he hankered
after playin’ sunthin’ when the time hung too heavy on his hands,
and, like older folks, he wanted a change. He had one Bible game
that Tamer let him play, but I spoze he had got tired of it, and
then the names wuz dretful tegus to keep the run on--Nebuchadnezer,
Melchizedec, Mephilboseth--good land! they wuz hard for grown folks
to git right. Hamen and his brother, John, wuz great cases to play
cards evenin’s, and Jack had a game that he played with ’em some
like authors. I had played it myself with him sometimes week-day
evenin’s, and Jack come to me that Sunday evenin’ and sez: “Aunt
Samantha, why can’t we play a Bible game with cards?”
And I sez, “I don’t see how you could fix it so as to play a Bible
game with ’em.”
And he sez, “Well, you can call the two spot Jacob, and I can call
for it, and we can call the ten spot Paul, or the Jack, and you can
call for him.”
And I sez, “I would hate to call such a good man as Paul the Jack.”
“Well,” sez he, “we could call the king Paul, and the queen Mary.”
But I talked him offen the idee, it didn’t seem right to me
somehow. But he wuz honest and likely about it and didn’t mean
no harm, and at the best it wuz only tryin’ to reconcile science
and religion, or religion and fashion, as so many do, holdin’ the
world in one hand and religion in the other, and tryin’ to carry
’em both stiddy. But Hamen and John laughed like two big gump
heads about it, and the next evenin’ when they wuz playin’ they
would call the two spot “Jacob” every time, and look at Jack and
laugh till I felt that it wuz enough to make him swing right out
and play cards Sunday, and not try to reconcile it with goodness
and religion. But Tamer, when she found out about it, whipped him
severe, she said it wuz irreverent and she wouldn’t have it. And
that wuz jest the way it wuz the hull durin’ time.
Well, we didn’t stay but a day or two after the Boliver affair.
Josiah felt that he must be to home, so we went, Tamer promisin’
Jack, who cried hard when we started, that he might come down and
stay several days with us in a week or so, when she went to see
Aunt Mary John she would leave him there and then stop and git him
on her way home.
CHAPTER X
Little Delight burnt up the world a week ago last Wednesday,
somewhere along about the middle of the forenoon.
She stayed here three days and four nights, while her Pa and Ma
went to North Scriba to his folkses on a visit. Diphtheria wuz
ragin’ there among the little children, and we none of us wuz
willin’ to let Delight go. And they thought that they must go, for
Barzilly Minkley, who hadn’t been in this part of the country for
years and years, had come home to his folkses on a visit (Barzilly
is Whitfield’s own cousin on his father’s side), and all the
Minkleys wuz invited to the old Minkley homestead to visit with him.
Whitfield wanted to go, but didn’t want to unless Tirzah Ann went.
I approved of their goin’, and told Tirzah Ann I would help her all
I could. I helped her make a new cashmere dress and a blue wool
travelin’ dress, and told her she could wear my new waterproof in
welcome, hern wuz a old one. And I told her I would take care of
little Delight and take it as a privelige. So they started early on
a Tuesday mornin’, and we went after the child Monday night, so’s
not to belate ’em on their journey. And it wuz on the Wednesday
follerin’ about ten o’clock in the forenoon that she burnt up the
world.
She wuz dretful willin’ to come home with us, and we wuz dretful
willin’ she should come, which made it willin’ all round, and
agreeable. She thinks as much of Josiah and me as she duz of her Pa
and Ma. And I made her a bed on the lounge in our room, and it did
seem good to have her there. We took sights of comfort.
Her little appetite wuz excellent, and it wuz a great comfort to me
to cook things she called for. I can tell you it brought back old
times when her Ma and uncle, Thomas J., wuz little children, every
time I baked turnovers for her. And when I fried cakes it did seem
so good to fry men and wimmen and children and every livin’ animal
I could think on for her. And it seemed as if I couldn’t hardly
satisfy her on the animals. I do believe I fried every critter I
ever hearn on, unless it wuz a hyena, and it kinder seems as if I
fried one of them one day, but I won’t say for certain, maybe it
wuz a catamount, they look some alike, anyway.
But we did enjoy havin’ her there the best that ever wuz. When
she got up in the mornin’ and come to us with her great bright
eyes dancin’, and the mornin’ light shinin’ on her wavin’ hair, it
almost seemed as if it wuz our lost youth comin’ back towards us
with immortal hope and gladness in its glances. We loved her so,
she wuz so much a part of our own hearts and lives that it seemed
as if our love for her and our tender pride and happiness in her,
carried us back into the Long Ago. And we could almost fancy she
wuz one of our youthful dreams gin back to us and made real.
Oh, we took sights and sights of comfort with her, I don’t think we
love her any better than we did her Ma and Uncle, Thomas J., I know
we don’t, and I don’t think the neighbors are doin’ right when
they say we do. And I think it is very unkind and unreasonable of
’em to say that we humor her to death and make a perfect fool of
her. It is not so.
But we have more time to spend with her than we did with our
children when they wuz little. Then we had to work hard to git
along and pay for the place. And Josiah didn’t have no time to take
Tirzah Ann or Thomas J. onto the plough handle in front of him and
let ’em ride round the field with him, and etcetery. And I didn’t
have time to stop sweepin’ and washin’ dishes and let ’em play they
wuz washin’ dishes and sweepin’, and so forth and so on.
And we didn’t have time, Josiah and me, to let ’em take holt of
our hands, one of us on each side of ’em, like the Babes in the
Woods, and lead us all over jest where they wuz a mind to--into
the woodshed and all over the dooryard, and the barn. But now when
Delight is here we are jest the Babes, Josiah and me, to be led off
anywhere she wants to lead us.
For things are different now. The farm is paid for, the children
are brung up, and well brung up (everybody admits that). And if
little Delight wants to lead round her Grandpa and me she is goin’
to lead us, and there hain’t nobody goin’ to break it up. Good
land! we enjoy it as much as she duz. And if she should take it
into her little head to lead us off into the woods and cover us
up with leaves, it wouldn’t be any of the neighbor’s bizness,
if Josiah and me wuz willin’ to be led and covered, as we most
probable should be.
I think it is very unkind of the neighbors to say we let her have
her own way all of the time, and don’t correct her at all. It is
not anyways likely it is so, but spozen it wuz, if her way wuz the
right way why not let her have it?
It’s very seldom that she duz a thing that is the least mite out of
the way. I don’t know that I could exactly approve of her burnin’
up the world--that might not been exactly the fair thing to do, but
it is very, very seldom she duz a thing a minister would be ashamed
of doing. She is a oncommon child for goodness. I don’t say it
because she is my grandchild, not at all. But truth will out. She
has a remarkable sweet, even disposition, and as to morals--well! I
would like to see the child that would go ahead of her in morals.
Why, we couldn’t tempt her to touch a penny that didn’t belong to
her. And burglary, or arson, or rapine, why, nothin’ would tempt
her into it. She is a wonderful child.
And she is jest as truthful as the day is long, that is, what she
calls truth. Everything is new to her and strange. The thoughts in
her little brain jest wakin’ up, and to a imaginative child the
dreams and fancies that fill her little mind, the child’s world
within, must seem as strange as the new strange things of the world
about her.
It is all a untried mystery to her, and it stands to reason that
she can’t separate things all to once and put the right names to
’em all. The gay romances of the child’s fairy world within from
the colder reasonin’ of the world without. The child’s world is
purer than ourn, it is the only land of innocence and truth we
know in this dreary life. And it seems as if we would let our
souls listen to catch any whispers from that land, so sweet, so
evanescent.
For there is the only perfect faith, unbounded, uncalculating, so
soon to be displaced by doubt. The only perfect innocence, the
blessed ignorance of wrong, so soon, so surely to be stained by the
knowledge of sin. The divine faith in other’s goodness so soon to
be dimmed by distrust. The gay, onthinkin’ happiness, so soon to
be darkened by sorrow and anxiety--the rosy hopes so soon to fade
away to the gray ashes of disappointment. Fair land! sunny time!
so bright, so fleetin’--it seems as if we should treat its broken
language, its strange fancies tenderly and reverently, rememberin’
the lost time when we, too, were wandering in its enchanted
gardens. Rememberin’ that the gate of death must swing back before
we can again enter a world of such purity, such beauty.
But we do not, we meet its pure and sweet unwisdom with our grim,
rebukin’ knowledge which we gained as Eve did, its innocent,
guileless ways with the intolerance of our dry old customs, its
broken fancies, its sweet romancin’ with cold derision or the
cruelty of punishment. It makes me fairly out of patience to think
on’t.
It stands to reason, when everything under the sun is new and
strange to ’em, they can’t git all to once the meanin’ of every big
word in the Dictionary, and mebby they will git things a little
mixed sometimes. But how can they help it? Why, what if we should
be dropped right down into a strange country where we had never sot
our feet before and told to walk straight, and wuz punished every
time we meandered, when we didn’t know a step before us, or on each
side on us, how could we help meanderin’ a little, how could we
help sometimes talkin’ about the inhabitants of the world we wuz
accustomed to, usin’ its language?
What we would need would be to be sot in the right way agin, with
patience, and over and over agin, and time and time agin. Patience
and long sufferin’ and reason is what we should need, and not
punishment, and that is what children need.
Many a child is skairt and whipped into bein’ a hippocrite and
liar, when, if they had been encouraged to tell the truth--own up
their little faults and meanderin’s--and treated justly, patiently,
and kindly, they would have been as truthful and transparent
as rain water. Children have sharp eyes and are quick to see
injustice, and things sink deep into their little souls. They are
whipped if they don’t tell the truth, skaired dark nights with the
lurid passage--“Liars shall have their portion in the lake of fire
and brimstone.”
And then they see their mother smile into some disagreeable
visitor’s face and groan at her back. How can the baby wisdom
part the smile from the groan, and find truth under ’em? How
can we? They are taught under fear of severest punishment to be
honest--“Thou shalt not steal.” And then, with their earliest
knowledge, they hear their mother boast of some advantage she has
gained over the shopkeeper, and their father congratulating himself
on how he got the better of his neighbor in a horse trade. And if
she be the child of a business man, happy for her if she does not
wonder at that sight strange to men and gods, to see her father
lose all his wealth one day, to rise up rich the next, rise up from
a crowd of poor men and wimmen he has cheated and ruined.
She is taught that deceit is an abomination to the Lord. And then
she stands with her little eyes on a level with the washstand, and
sees her big sister paint and powder her face, darken her eyebrows,
and pad her lean form into roundness. She is taught the exceeding
sinfulness of envy, strife, and emulation. And then, in the same
breath, urged to commit to memory more Bible verses than little
Molly Smith has learned, and consulted about the number of ruffles
on her dress with the firm resolve to have one more than she has,
so as to be cleverer and look dressier than she duz.
She is taught that God loves good children, and to flee from evil
communications, and then counseled to never by any means associate
with the washerwoman’s little girl, who is very good, but to play
with the banker’s little boy, who is very bad.
She is taught by precept to be studious, industrious, and that
Heaven smiles on contented labor, and industry and independence are
honorable and to be desired, she hears her mother say solemnly,
“Wealth is a snare.” And then she sees that mother bow low at
the feet of the rich, stupid, idle wife of the millionaire, lose
all her dignity and self-respect in the wild effort to become
her friend, sees her refuse to recognize in public the honest,
intelligent sewing girl.
She is taught that if she duz not learn the catechism and follow
its teachings, she is lost indeed, and she learns from that that
the chief end of man (and presumably wimmen) is to fear God and
enjoy Him forever. And then taught by the louder teaching of
maternal anxiety and counsel that the chief end of wimmen is to be
married, to get an establishment and a rich husband to support her.
How is the child to learn good from evil? God help the dear little
souls! and if they keep one iota of the sweet, oncalculatin’ trust,
the divine innocence of childhood, it is by the direct grace of
God, and no thanks to the poor worldlings and sinners by whom they
are surrounded.
Amongst the marvelous wonders of God’s universe to me one of the
greatest mysteries is this, how a good God, a just, pitiful God,
should send into such hands as He duz such little white souls.
Some frivolous young girl, whose highest thought and ambition has
never soared above her hair ribbon, some brainless boy, whose
deepest desire and highest aim has been to wear as small a boot
as he could, and contract hopeless debts for hair oil and cheap
cigars and whiskey. In some unhappy season, when circuses were
not possible, and wishing for a kindred excitement, they rush
into matrimony. And into these hands, joined by lowest links,
these hands defiled by sin, and weak with the utter weakness of
unreasonin’ selfishness and folly, is sent a little pure soul out
of Paradise.
And this little child must grope in the dark shadows caused by the
denseness of their ignorance. Suffer forever physically, morally,
mentally from the evil, the total depravity of their hereditary
and teachings. Suffer herself and grow up in the black shadow to
transmit its hopeless darkness and guilt down to other generations.
Strange, strange, most marvelous of mysteries, why this should be
so. But I can’t bear to even look on this dretful picture even in
hours of eppisodin’, it is bad enough and strange enough to look in
Christian homes, amongst meetin’ house brothers and sisters, and
see how the little ones are maltreated.
It looks dretful disagreeable to me, to see a young child whipped
for what we do ourselves. Now, I wuz at one of our neighbors’ the
other day (one of them that complains the most of our treatment of
little Delight), and she has got a young child of her own, some
four, or half-past four years of age. And when I went in she
wuz whippin’ little Kate with a stick, her face all swelled up
with what she called religious principle (I called it anger), but,
howsumever, it hain’t no matter what the name on’t wuz, her face
wuz all red and inflamed. And she, weighin’ from two to three
hundred pounds, wuz standin’ over that little mite of humanity,
that she herself brought into the world, for better or worse, stood
over it, grippin’ with one hard, red hand the little tender arm,
leavin’ great red marks with her voyalence, and layin’ on the stick
with the other, for she said she had lied.
[Illustration: SHE WUZ WHIPPIN’ LITTLE KATE, HER FACE ALL SWELLED
UP WITH WHAT SHE CALLED RELIGIOUS PRINCIPLE.
_Page 157._]
“And lyin’,” sez she, with her face redder than ever with what she
called principle (and I called madness and revenge), “is sunthin’ I
won’t have goin’ on in this house!”
Sez I calmly, for I see it wuzn’t my place to interfere, “What has
she been lyin’ about?” And she said she had told her to not stay
but a hour to Miss Bobbettses playin’ with her little girl, and she
had stayed two, had lied about it. She had promised to come back in
a hour and didn’t. “She said she forgot all about the time, till
the two hours wuz up, and I know she didn’t forgit!”
Sez I, “How do you know she didn’t forgit?”
“Why,” sez she, “how could she forgit when there wuz a clock right
in the room? She didn’t come back because she wanted to stay, and
she must own it up to me!”
“But,” sez I calmly, “if the child did forgit you are whippin’ her
into lyin’ instead of out of it.” I didn’t say no more, for I never
interfere, and she took her out into the back room and finished up
there, and I heard Kate own up that she had stayed three hours and
meant to, and wuz sorry.
And then her mother had to whip her agin because she had owned up
too much; finally she got her to own jest enough, and then Miss
Gowdey come back into the room triumphant and happy and give the
child a big piece of cake and jell. She said she always give the
child sunthin’ nice when she owned up to tellin’ a story. And so
she felt real good natered to think she had come off conqueror. And
we had a good visit.
My bizness there wuz to ask her in a friendly way if she didn’t
want to run in with me to see Miss Patten. Miss Patten had got a
young child, and we hadn’t either on us seen it. And she said in
a agreeable way that she would, and she told her husband when we
went out she shouldn’t be gone only “jest an hour,” and told him to
hang on the teakettle at five, and she would be there to help set
the table. And she told little Kate to look at the clock, and when
the pinter stood at jest five her Ma would certain sure be there.
Well, Miss Patten wuz dretful agreeable, and so wuz Sam, that is
her husband, and so wuz old Miss Patten, who wuz there takin’ care
of Susan. And nothin’ to do but we had got to take our things off
and stay to supper. We hung back, for we had told our companions we
would be home to git supper in good season.
Sez I, “I don’t like to disappoint Josiah.”
“And I can’t disappoint my folks,” sez Miss Gowdey.
“Oh, well,” sez old Miss Patten, “if they go through the world
without meetin’ a worse disappointment than that, I guess they’ll
git along. They can eat their suppers a little later.”
“Oh,” sez I, “there is everything cooked in the house, all Josiah
would have to do would be to make a cup of tea.”
And sez Miss Gowdey, “I have got everything all ready for supper,
and Mr. Gowdey can make a better cup of tea any day than I can, he
puts it in by the handful, he never uses a teaspoon.”
“Then do stay!” sez Susan.
And sez old Miss Patten, comin’ in from the kitchen (Nabby wuz
sick in the settin’ room bedroom), “you needn’t say another word,
the table is all sot for you. We have got stewed oysters and warm
biscuits and honey, and you have got to stay.”
And she took our bunnets right off and galanted us into the dinin’
room, and we did have a splendid supper. And there it wuz--we two
wimmen, both on us weighin’ most two hundred, and with half a
century’s experience--there we wuz doin’ jest what Miss Gowdey had
whipped little Kate for. That delicate creeter with her little mite
of judgment and her easiness to be led astray, and not weighin’
over forty pounds. Well, the supper sort o’ took up our minds, and
we set at the table a good long while. And we didn’t want to start
off the minute we got through eatin’. But I did feel strange in
my mind thinkin’ it over, and, though they wuz dretful agreeable,
I sot round in my chair and looked at the clock, and Miss Gowdey
turned round and looked, and sez she:
“Good land! if it hain’t eight o’clock. What will our folks say?”
And sez I, “What will Josiah say?” And we started home a pretty
good jog. And Miss Gowdey sez, when we had got most to her house:
“For the land’s sake! if we hain’t stayed away three hours.”
And sez I in a cursory way, for I will not hint or meddle, “You
whipped little Kate for staying one hour beyend her time, and we
have stayed three.”
“Well,” sez she, “I told her to be home in an hour.”
“That is jest what she told you to do,” sez I.
“And,” sez she, “she promised.”
“So did you promise sacred.”
Sez she, “A child is under greater obligations to her parents than
the parents are to her.”
“I think they hain’t under half so much obligations, for it is
the parents doin’s gittin’ ’em here, the children didn’t git the
parents here, it is right the other way.”
“Oh, well, it is different, anyway. Kate is a child, and we are
grown folks.”
“So much more the reason for us that we should behave ourselves
and not go to lyin’ and bein’ led off into temptation as we have
to-night, Sister Gowdey. We are both Methodists.”
The words sunk deep, I see they did, though she only sez:
“I do hope Mr. Gowdey hain’t got supper, a man tears up things so
and wastes. I would as soon have a tornado sweep through my buttery
as to have a man sweep through it.”
CHAPTER XI.
Well, the next mornin’ Josiah come upstairs where I wuz makin’ up
the spare bed, I had had it open airin’ it, and sez he, comin’ into
the room excited and agitated:
“Samantha, Delight has burnt up the world!”
I had heard her cryin’ down below, but knew she wuz with him,
so didn’t worry about her, and the next thing I knew, ontirely
onexpected, he told me what had took place. The Babe had burnt up
the world. It wuz thrillin’ and agitatin’ news, very. But I didn’t
git excited and skairt as some wimmen would, I only sez coolly:
“When did she burn it up, Josiah?”
“Since you have been up here.”
Sez I calmly, wantin’ to come to the bottom of the matter. “Did you
see her, Josiah Allen? Did you see Delight burn up the world?”
“Yes, I see her. I ketched her at it. How should I know,” sez he,
in a surly tone, “that she had burnt it up, if I hadn’t seen her do
it?”
“Oh,” sez I, “I didn’t know but you missed the world, and
mistrusted she had burnt it up.”
“No, I see her at it, I see her burn it up.”
Sez I calmly, bein’ determined to find out the truth, “How come she
to burn up the world?”
“She did it to be mean and ort to be spanked for it.”
Sez I firmly, “I don’t believe she did it to be mean. I believe if
she did it she did by axident.”
“She didn’t do it by axident, she done it a purpose, and her
burnin’ up the world wuzn’t the worst of it, she wuz sassy about
it, and ort to be spanked for sass.” I gin him a stern look and
kind o’ shot up my lips clost together and tossted my head a very
little, but didn’t say a word. But he resented it for all the world
as if I had spoke, and there I hadn’t said a word.
“Well, I say she had! she ort to be spanked for burnin’ up the
world, and she ort to be spanked for sass. But you can uphold her
if you want to.”
“I hain’t said a word of upholdin’.”
“Well, you encourage her in it, and you know you do.”
“Encourage her! Josiah Allen!”
“Yes, you uphold her in burnin’ up the world, and you uphold her in
sass.”
“Have I said a word, Josiah Allen?”
“You tossted your head, you know you did.”
“Well,” sez I mildly, “things have got to a strange pass if
pardners can’t crook their necks a little when they are makin’ up
spare beds. And,” sez I in still more gentle axents, as I patted
the mattress and spread a light-colored comfortable over it, under
the sheets, “tell me all about it, Josiah.”
“Well, I stepped out into the back kitchen to look for a file, and
when I come back she wuz jest burnin’ up the world, jest puttin’ it
into the stove.”
“She see me start the fire with an old World yesterday mornin’, and
she thought she wuz follerin’ her Grandma’s doin’s and doin’ right.”
“Uphold her if you want to! and uphold her for sass!”
“What wuz the sass?” sez I mildly.
“Well, I snapped her little fingers for puttin’ the paper into
the fire, and she cried, and drawed ’em back sudden, and I wuz so
afraid she would burn her that I put my hand sudden between her and
the fire and jest jammed my hand through the isinglass in the stove
and broke it all to smash and she stopped cryin’ and sez, ‘I am
glad Gappa broke the issac glass.’”
I laughed a little, a very little, and couldn’t help it. She always
will call it “issac glass,” and if I try to make her say micas she
will call it “michols,” she is so cunning and cute. He didn’t like
my laughin’, I see he didn’t.
Sez he, “I’d laugh if I wuz in your place, sunthin’ ort to be done
with her. I couldn’t git her to say she wuz sorry, do the best I
could. She will have to be punished.”
“Punished for what?” sez I, as I shook up a piller and put a clean
piller bier on it.
“Why, to make her say she is sorry.”
Sez I, as I laid the shams on smooth and pinned ’em up agin the
head board, “Mebby she hain’t sorry.”
“Hain’t sorry!” sez he, savage-like, “well, she ort to be, there
I ain’t hardly looked at it, and there is lots of news in it I
know. As many as seven or eight murders, most probable, and some
suicides, and hangin’s and such like, she ort to be sorry, and she
has got to say she is.”
“Well,” sez I, a-smoothin’ the things out on the toilet table, “I
don’t think she ort to be made to say she is sorry if she hain’t
sorry. I believe lots of liars are made in jest that way; probable
she told you the truth when she said she wuzn’t sorry, and you
want to make her lie,” sez I dryly, “and whip her if she won’t.
She see me put a whole paper into the stove this mornin’, and how
could she tell the difference between this week’s paper and last?
If anybody is to blame we are, we ort to told her to not touch the
papers, and we must tell her to not touch the fire. And if I wuz
goin’ to punish her for anything it would be for meddlin’ with the
stove. I shouldn’t whip her for tellin’ the truth, that wouldn’t be
my way.”
“Well, she ort to be punished for sass.”
“I don’t believe she meant it for sass,” sez I, “I wouldn’t
interfere if you wuz correctin’ her. But I do not think she meant
it for sass.”
“What did she mean it for, then?”
“Why,” sez I, “I believe she said she wuz glad because she wuz
glad.”
“Well, she hadn’t no bizness to said it, anyway, it didn’t sound
very good.”
Sez I, “Josiah Allen, didn’t you ever speak out when you had hurt
you and wuz in pain, and say things that didn’t sound good, and
that you would like to take back if you could?”
“No,” sez he, “I never did.”
“Josiah Allen,” sez I, “can you say that with a clear conscience?”
“Yes, I can, clear as a crystal fountain. I hain’t one of the kind
that fly all to pieces if I happen to bruise my thumb, or cut me,
or pound my fingers, some men do,” he admitted, “but I don’t, I
never say a word I don’t mean, I never say a word I would wish to
take back, no matter how severe the pain is.”
Sez I firmly, “Josiah Allen you do, you prance round and act lots
of times.”
“Oh, well, encourage her in burnin’ up the world if you want to,
and encourage her in sass. I spoze I can let it go.” He wuz fairly
dyin’ to let it go, I knew, he jest worships her. But I continued,
for I wuz rousted up in my mind. Sez I:
“Little Delight is in our power, we are physically stronger than
she is. We can whip her all day if we want to. But duz it look
noble and honorable in us to punish that little mite of a thing for
what we do ourselves?”
“I don’t do it,” sez he.
Sez I, “She is only three years old, she has got everything to
learn, she can’t endure pain as she can when she is older. She
didn’t know she had done wrong, and you, instead of reasonin’ with
her, and settin’ her right, skairt her, and hurt her hands, and
she wuz actually glad I’ve no doubt to think that you broke the
stove. She thought you wuz unjust, and wuz indignant at that, and
surprised and frightened to think you wanted to hurt her, you who
had always been so good to her, and loved her so well, and she
spoke out quick and impatient, jest as you and I do sometimes,
Josiah Allen, and we have had a lifetime to learn patience and
endurance.”
I see he wuz some convinced, but wouldn’t own it, and he sez agin,
in a cross tone (about as cross as a cross gut saw, his tone had
been like a bayinet or spear), sez he, “She no need to burnt up the
world.”
Sez I over agin, “She hadn’t no idee what she wuz doing, she
thought she wuz follerin’ her Grandma’s doin’s and doin’ right. But
because it hurt your own comfort a little mite----”
“A little mite!” sez he, groanin’, “and there it wuz full of
tragedies, I dare presume to say, and salts and butteries, and
burglaries.”
“Because she did sunthin’ that interfered with your comfort when
she hadn’t the least idee of its bein’ wrong you pounced at her and
hurt her, and want her whipped. And the other day, Josiah Allen,
when she did do a little sunthin’ we had told her not to, because
she did it in such a cunnin’ way, you laughed, and wuz mad because
I spoke of punishin’ her for it.”
“Well, I spoze you want me to say that I think it is right for her
to burn up the world, but you won’t git me to.” But his axent wuz
gittin’ smoother, it wuz about as smooth as a gimlet hole now.
Sez I, “I believe in punishin’ children when they persist in
wrongdoin’. But I always believe in findin’ out whether they have
done wrong or not, and then in the next place try to punish ’em,
not for revenge and to satisfy our own feelin’s, but to do them
good, break ’em of wrongdoin’. And if you can talk them out of it
it seems so much more noble and dignified than it duz to pound ’em.
It duz somehow look so disagreeable to see a great strong man or
woman weighin’ two hundred or so standin’ over a little mite of a
thing that can’t help itself anyway, whippin’ it.”
“Solomon sez,” sez Josiah, “spare the rod and spile the child.”
“Well,” sez I, “if I wuz in Solomon’s place----” And then thinkses
I the least said the soonest mended, and I thought I wouldn’t say
anything agin Solomon and his havin’ so many wives, and actin’, and
shet my lips up tight.
“Solomon what?” sez Josiah.
“Nothin’,” sez I.
And again he sez, “What? Solomon what?”
And again I sez, “Nothin’, Solomon nothin’.” And havin’ got all
through upstairs, I went down and went to sweepin’ out the parlor,
and jest as quick as I got that done, I went to gittin’ dinner (at
Josiah’s request, who said he hadn’t eat much breakfast, though I
didn’t know it and told him so). But he built a fire in the kitchen
for that purpose, and I got an excellent dinner, nice tender steak,
and stewed tomatoes, and smashed potatoes, and apple dumplin’s
that would melt in your mouth, and lemon sauce to eat on ’em, and
delicious coffee.
Josiah wuz happy in his mind, though some in pain owin’ to the last
four dumplin’s. And that wuz the last I ever hearn of any anger
on his part about the world’s burnin’ up. Well, they come after
Delight that very night, and we both hated to have her go, it wuz
awful lonesome without her. Though it wuz a great comfort to know
that she wuz comin’ up a week from the next Saturday to stay over
Sunday with us. We looked forward to it.
The very next day after Delight went home I wuz in the settin’ room
mendin’ my Josiah’s best galluses, the buckles had come off, and
I wuz settin’ there as cool as the buckles (which wuz nickle) and
as collected together as the galluses after I had got ’em mended,
when all of a sudden the door bust open with a bang, and in come
my companion Josiah from the barn, with a splinter under his thumb
nail, jest as mad as a hornet, as a man always is when he gits
hurt, and he danced and jumped over the floor like a lunatick and
hollered out, “It is all your dumb doin’s, Samantha! if it hadn’t
been for you the board wouldn’t been there!”
Sez I calmly, for frequent seens like this had gin me knowledge, “I
didn’t put it there, Josiah.”
“No, but if you had any eyes in your head you would seen there wuz
splinters in it, and I couldn’t be liftin’ it round without gittin’
’em under my thumb!”
“I didn’t know you wuz goin’ to lift it, Josiah.”
“You ort to know it! I wuz liftin’ it after hens’ eggs, I thought I
would see if there wuz any under the barn before I piled the straw
on the floor, and if it wuzn’t for you I wouldn’t keep a dum hen on
the place! And if I ever git so I can use this hand agin,” sez he
a-wavin’ it out kinder ferocious-like, “I’ll brain every dum one
of ’em, there never shall a hen step her dum foot on my farm agin
after to-day!”
“Well, well, do keep still, Josiah Allen, how can I git this sliver
out and you prancin’ round so?”
“Oh, yes, keep right on, jaw me all you want to, keep right on
jawin’ and talkin’, and not let me have a minute’s rest. And let me
faint away on your hands. Oh, gracious heavens! can’t you stab a
little deeper!”
“Why, you wanted me to prick it out, Josiah.”
In other times I should have rebuked him sharply for swearin’,
but truly a woman learns after twenty years experience in married
life that there is a time for scoldin’ and a time to refrain from
scoldin’. I knew that until that sliver wuz out and the pain eased
off there would be no more use reasonin’ with Josiah Allen than
there would be with a wild hyena, for when pain enters into a man’s
system (a ordinary man) it drives reason out of it, and common
sense and decency.
After a while I got the sliver out and did it up in Pond’s extract,
he groanin’ and jumpin’ and blamin’ me for it every minute. Why, he
told me in one of the worst twinges that if it wuzn’t for me there
wouldn’t be a hemlock board on the premises, anyway. And there I
never had to my recollection said the word “hemlock” to him. But I
knew that jest the minute he got cooled off, his sense would return
and his affection for me (he had acted all the while jest as if I
wuz prickin’ him a-purpose, and talked to that effect, and seemed
mad at me as he could be). But I sot demute, and he didn’t like
that, his state wuz such. Sez he:
“Set there and not say a word, will you! I should think if a man
lay dead at your door you would speak up and say sunthin’, but no,
you don’t care enough about it to say a word. Oh, gracious Peter!
did any human bein’ ever suffer what I am sufferin’!”
And then he jumped up and stumbled over a stool and most fell and
yelled out at me settin’ there peaceful, “Put that stool in my way,
will you! I’ll clear this house of every stool to-morrow if I’m
alive! the one that made that man-ketcher is a fool!”
And so it went on for most an hour, but Josiah got over it jest as
soon as the pain stopped, he acted like a new man. And he asked
me of his own accord before night if I didn’t want to buy a new
kind of hens, if I thought best he would buy some Shanghais and
Ayrshires. Josiah is a clever critter pretty near half the time,
and before he slept he offered to buy me a new stool, or two of
’em, covered with rep. Good land! it all come out jest as I knew
it would, I had passed through too many cryses jest like it to be
skaired. Why, when I married Josiah Allen I took all these resks, I
knew how it would be, my father wuz a man, and so wuz my youngest
brother and Uncle John, and I had lived in the house with ’em all.
I don’t blame Josiah so very much, I don’t spoze he could help
actin’.
Now, wimmen can’t help actin’ in some respects, such as this, if
company comes through the front gate onexpected, she can’t help
smoothin’ back her front hair if every hair lay as smooth as satin,
it is nater for her to go through the motions. And she can’t help
jumpin’ if she sees a mouse as if she wuz afraid of her life,
though it hain’t reasonable to expect that her life is jeapordized
and she will be attackted by it. And it is nater for her to kiss a
pretty baby and scold a boy voyalently who is stunnin’ a kitten or
a bird. Why, some things come jest as nateral as Nater herself, and
can’t be helped no more than she can. Josiah hain’t alone in his
actin’ and behavin’.
CHAPTER XII.
Accordin’ to promise Tamer Ann brung Jack to stay a few days with
me while she went on to her Aunt Nancy John’s. Her Aunt Nancy don’t
like children, bein’ nervous and highstericky, but she is a rich
woman and Tamer has expectations from her, and goes there quite a
good deal and makes of her. She is Tamer’s great aunt, and is one
of two widders of the same name, so to tell ’em apart we call ’em
Aunt Nancy John and Aunt Nancy Joe.
Jack wuz awful tickled to git to our house, and I wuz glad enough
to see him. And he played round jest as good as a child could all
the afternoon, and eat a good supper, and that night before he went
to bed he come and leaned his curly head on my shoulder, and talked
real confidential to me.
Tamer is a Piscopal, or, that is, what religion she’s got is of
that persuasion. I know Piscopals that are perfectly devoted
Christians and samplers for any one to foller, but with Tamer I
guess it don’t strike in very deep, though she duz go through the
motions in meetin’ wonderful for one of her age, and with all the
diseases she’s got on her, gittin’ up and kneelin’ down with the
best on ’em. And she’s real strict about follerin’ some of the
rules and wants her family to; she had told me some time ago about
the trouble she had with Jack keepin’ Lent, sez she:
“You know we ort to give up our own wills and do what is pleasin’
to the Lord in Lent, and I have the greatest trouble to make the
children see the necessity of it as I do, and I am so particular to
keep it,” sez she.
Thinkses I, Tamer Ann Allen, if you should try to do the Lord’s
will through one day of Lent you wouldn’t try to make your only
girl live a lie the rest of her life, and let your oldest boy go to
ruin down the path of dime novels and cigarettes. Why, every one of
the troubles she had pinted out to me wuz nothin’ bad in Jack at
all, only the sins of ignorance which we read are winked at. But
not a wink would Tamer give, not a wink. She had complained awful
about his irreverence in prayer time and his utter refusal to give
up pie and leave butter offen his bread durin’ Lent. “Why,” sez
she, “when I asked him what he would give up he said apples, he
guessed, he didn’t love ’em, and he said he would give up bathin’,
too, and soap, and havin’ his hair combed, the idee!”
“Did you explain it, Tamer Ann, what Lent wuz for, and why he
should make his little sacrifices?”
“No, it is enough for me to tell Jack what to do; he has no right
to inquire into my reasons.”
“But,” sez I, “didn’t you inquire into what you called his
irreverence at prayer time?”
“I inquired into it with a good switch, that’s what I did, for I
will not have irreverence and irreligion goin’ on in my house.”
Well, as I said, Jack come to me that night and laid his head
against my shoulder, and I told him he must be a good boy, and I
asked him why it wuz that he didn’t want to say his prayers. He had
been in real good sperits, but the minute I begun to talk about
that he kinder whimpered out, “I don’t want to everykneeshallbow,
and I told Ma that I didn’t, I don’t know what it is and don’t want
to talk about it, and I told Ma so, and then she said I’d got to,
and then I got mad and I told her I won’t everykneeshallbow, and
then she whipped me. And what is it, anyway?”
“Say it slower, Jack,” sez I.
“Every-knee-shall-bow,” sez he.
And then it come to me, “Every knee shall bow.” And I went on
and told him about the great kind Ruler who made him and all the
pleasant things that he had ever enjoyed, and how it is writ down
that every knee shall bow to Him.
“Well, I’ll do that,” sez Jack. “I will kneel to Him now, I didn’t
know what it meant, and Ma wuz too busy to tell me, and I got mad
and wouldn’t ask anybody else. And there is sunthin’ else that I
wanted to know awfully, and I wish you would tell me.” That poor
little creeter trusted me it seemed more than he did any other
person, and I felt greatly complimented by it, as much as if a
President or King had paid compliments to me.
“What is the Miz that Ma makes me pray about in church?”
“The Miz?” sez I.
“Yes, the sea and all that in the Miz. I didn’t want to pray about
that, for I thought it wuz sunthin’ big and kinder fuzzy. What is
it, anyway?”
And then I told him about the same great Ruler, who ruled over the
land and sea, and all that in them is. And he went to bed quite
happy and promised to say his prayers good, and I believe he did.
Poor little creeter!
Well, he stayed two days and had an awful good time, and Josiah
and I enjoyed it jest as much as he did, and the next day,
accordin’ to promise, I took Jack over to Tirzah Ann’s and Tamer
wuz goin’ to stop and visit her and Thomas J. on her way back
from Aunt Nancy John’s. I made a good call at Tirzah’s and see a
new sass dish she had got and admired it, and a shirt waist, and
then I left Jack happy enough to play with Delight, and called at
Maggie’s, and Miss Greene Smythe wuz there, she had come to the
office to see Thomas Jefferson and wuz waitin’ for him to come
home, he wuz expected every minute from Loontown. I inquired in
a polite way after her children, and she said that Angenora wuz
feelin’ rather nervous to-day, she wuz out to a child’s party the
night before and didn’t git home till two o’clock.
“That child,” sez I, “out till two o’clock!”
“Yes,” she said, “Jimmy De Graffe, a boy from the city, gave the
party, he lives near us at home and wuz devoted to Angenora; he
sent her a valentine last year which wuz a perfect love letter,
and one thing that makes Angenora feel so bad to-day, there wuz a
little girl there from the city who had on a much prettier dress
that hers--Angenora’s wuz white silk with only five ruffles on it,
and the little girl’s wuz pink silk with seven ruffles, and Jimmy
paid her much more attention than he did Angenora. It almost broke
her heart, she is just about sick to-day.”
Sez I to myself, fashion, love-disappointments, jealousies,
heartburnings, despair, emotions that child hadn’t ort to know
the names on for years and years. Emotions big enough and sad
enough to swamp lives well seasoned by years and experience,
all being suffered by that baby, who ortn’t to have an anxiety
above peanuts and the multiplication table, blind man’s buff and
puss-in-the-corner, for years and years, the idee on’t! Why,
what heart will that child bring to her lessons, her Elementary
Arithmetic all mixed up with problems about flirtin’ and social
supremacy, her Gography full of countries that can’t be bounded,
realms of jealousy, hatred and strife, her plain readin’ and
spellin’ full of readin’ and spellin’ that grown folks can’t read
or spell straight to save their lives. What will remain to that
child when she gits to be a young woman? All the emotions of youth
outgrown and wasted, she will be old at fourteen, a worn-out old
young flirt when she enters her teens. The pleasant care-free land
of childhood trompled down and destroyed, the lovely playgrounds of
youth and happiness turned into campin’ ground for worldly discord
and strife, it makes me feel bad to think on’t.
But Miss Greene Smythe went on, “Jimmy De Graffe seemed to think so
much of Angenora, she thought it wuz real mean for him to pay all
his devoirs to another girl.”
“Devoirs!” sez I, “the idee of them children payin’ devoirs, but
it is well named, for these carry-ins on, fashionable midnight
parties, child flirtations, etc., do jest devour all that is sweet
and lovely in children, all their unconscious grace and artless
innocence, and dear little ignorant wise ways, why,” sez I,
“Angenora ort to look on boys only as comrades and playfellows for
years and years to come, not lookin’ on ’em different from girls
only that they are stronger and can run faster and climb trees
better.”
Well, I went away pretty soon, for my pardner come from the post
office and thought we had better be goin’, but I kep thinkin’ all
the way home on that triumphant child flirt, and Angenora sad and
melancholy, and the idee of bo’s and flirtin’ that wuz planted in
the minds and hearts of babies, destroyin’ the childish mirth
and good comradeship that should exist in happy freedom between
children of both sects. Pictures of pretty playful hours between
Jack and Delight come to my mind some as you see pictures in a
magic lantern, and one of the very prettiest ones come to me as I
washed and wiped my dishes that night, Josiah doin’ his barn chores
at the same time.
It took place the February before, February the fourteenth, the
day when Angenora wuz writin’ and receivin’ lover-like epistles
from young old men of nine or ten years of age, I thought with
satisfaction and happiness of this pretty seen that had took place
in our own home. Jack and Delight had been stayin’ a week with me,
and I had noticed for a day or two before that the children had had
a good deal of mysterious talkin’ between ’em, and there seemed to
be a secret they wuz tryin’ to keep from me; I see ’em countin’
their pennies, and once I hearn Jack say, “All together we’ve got
leven cents.”
And then Delight sez, “We can get a splendid one for that.” But the
minute they ketched sight of me they stopped talkin’ in a dretful
elaborate way, put their fingers to their lips, and shook their
heads, and nodded towards me and Josiah, and I see it wuz sunthin’
connected with us, and I made a point at once of not seein’ or
hearin’ ’em at all. And that is one of the greatest secrets of
life and success, the nack of not hearin’ things. It is almost as
necessary in order to git along smooth and pleasant to not hear
things as it is to hear ’em.
Lots of times if you hear and see things, sass, for instance, from
help, I mean, little bits of sass that will spill out of the big
dish of daily worry sometimes, why, if you see that sass you have
got to pay attention to it, and wipe it up with admonition and
reproof, or ruther make them that dropped it there clean it up
with apology and atonement, which will take time and strength and
nerves, but if you don’t see it, why it will evaporate, and the
dish will right itself up of itself, in eight cases out of ten it
will.
And children, bless their dear souls! how many times it is a
positive boon to not see their little acts or hear their little
words. If you see the small feet wanderin’ for a minute from the
highway in search of some butterfly, or, ruther, why you’ve got
to pull ’em back agin by main strengh. But if you don’t see ’em
why they will come back of their own little accords, most always,
and save their temper and yours. And so with their outbursts of
discontent and annoyance, if you hear it you have got to rebuke and
chasten, but if you don’t hear it, why, good land! it is all over
in a minute.
And the best way to teach, anyway, is object teachin’. Make
yourself the object, try to do right yourself with fear and
tremblin’, and make a sampler of yourself for the children to work
their poor little pieces of life’s canvas by. That is the best way
of teachin’ on earth and the surest (sometimes I do eppisode even
in my reveries and have to resoom forwards agin).
Well, this wuz the day but one before Valentine’s day, and the
children beset Josiah to take ’em to Jonesville, and Josiah
promised he would.
But it turned out to be a turrible stormy day, blowin’, snowin’ too
bad for anybody to be out, and Josiah didn’t go. The children wuz
fearful disappinted, their little faces wuz sad and overcasted, and
I got a extra good dinner, and when I fried cakes I fried every
animal I ever hearn on, unless it wuz a Bengal tiger, for ’em, and
it seems some as if I fried him, but I won’t be certain. But even
this immense menagerie didn’t seem to fill ’em with the joy it ort,
but towards night they begun to brighten up some. I see their two
curly heads clost together, the light and the dark, talkin’ over
some project big to them, and then they’d look at Josiah and me
dretful meanin’ and nod their heads to each other in a knowin’ way,
their little faces all lighted up agin.
And they seemed to be in full and frequent communication with our
hired man, and then the two little heads, the dark lustrous one
with threads of gold runnin’ through the dark curls, and the light
flaxen one with threads of mornin’ sunshine wove into the long
flaxen waves, these heads would nestle clost together agin as if in
deep thought and endeavor.
Well, the mornin’ of Saint Valentine’s day wuz bright and sunshiny,
the long rays of gold light crept into our room through the white
curtain edged with lace of my own knittin’, and through them same
curtains I could see the great masses of warm light in the east
like a pink and gold carpet spread out for the sun to walk up into
the day on as he come up to light the world.
I wuz jest layin’ and thinkin’ how beautiful and glorious it all
wuz, and also with one corner of my mind wonderin’ when Josiah
laid out to git up, and whether he had got enough kindlin’ wood
the night before, when I heard two little taps at the bedroom door
and Josiah waked up. And before we could even ask who wuz there,
in come Jack and little Delight in their long white nightdresses.
Jack slept upstairs in the room with the hired man, and Delight
slept in a little room offen ours. But there them two beautiful
little creeters stood right in the rays of mornin’ light, hand in
hand, with faces as grave and earnest as if the hull weight of
the President’s cares lay on their curly heads. And as we looked
up and see ’em, they advanced hand in hand and made two bows, the
most stupendious and wonderful bows I ever see or hearn on, why
their little noses most grazed the floor, they wuz that deep and
impressive, and then they repeated both on ’em in their sweet,
fresh little voices:
“The rose is red, the vilets blue,
The pink is pretty, and so are you.
My pen is poor, my ink is pale,
My love for you shall never fail.”
And then they made agin them solemn deep bows and walked out of the
room still holdin’ hands. And Josiah and I kinder smiled a little
after they went out, not before them, no, not for a silver dollar
would I laughed before them, and I sez, “This is our valentine,
Josiah.”
“Yes,” sez he, “and a prettier one never went through a post
office.”
“That’s so,” sez I, “unless it wuz the one you sent me with the
roses and forget-me-nots on it the year before we wuz married.” And
all the time Josiah wuz buildin’ the fire, and while I wuz gittin’
breakfast I thought of how the blossoms of life are scattered down
through all the seasons of the year and of life. The roses that
come with that valentine of Josiah’s had faded, the frosts of
thirty years had stole the pretty pink tinge offen ’em, and the
years had gone by, long years, long years, and youth wuz past.
But, good land! could anything be so sweet and beautiful as the
valentine that had come to us on this February morning, when the
gray hairs lay thick on my own head, and my poor Josiah’s head
wuz bare beneath the touch of Time’s hand, which had been strokin’
him down for so long a time. I told the children at the breakfast
table, as they sot in their little high chairs opposite to Josiah
and me, and my face wuz jest as earnest and good as I could make it:
“You couldn’t have pleased us so well with any other valentine in
the world, there couldn’t be one bought anywhere that we should
have liked half so well--could there, Josiah?”
“No,” sez he, “not one; there hain’t a valentine in the hull
country that could compare with the one we got this mornin’.”
And then the children bust right out laughin’, they wuz so tickled
to think we liked it, and they laughed partly, I think, because
I had gin each on ’em a little glass dish of honey as a treat on
account of the valentine. Bless their sweet hearts! could any other
valentine be tinged with the light of love that gilt ourn? Could
any picture match the lustrous tenderness of the soft gray eyes,
and soft mornin’ glory blue ones? Could any gold-edged paper equal
the glint of the golden hair, could any page equal the pink tinge
of the rosy cheeks, and the white forwards and necks, and little
pink toes stickin’ out under their nightgowns as our dear little
valentines come to us in the fresh morning light, warmin’ up the
coldness of a February morning?
Well, a few days after this Josiah told me he had seen Mrs. Greene
Smythe to Thomas Jefferson’s office, and she wanted to see me on a
little bizness, and wanted me to come in when I wuz up that way, as
she understood I wuz quite often, she wanted to consult me about a
Charity Bazar. Well, the word charity is always a-takin’ one with
me, for in that incomparable chapter I love so well it describes
all the graces at full length, and then sez, “The greatest of these
is Charity.”
CHAPTER XIII.
It wuzn’t long after this that Josiah had to go over to South
Scriba to sell some spruce lumber, he wanted to dicker for some
salted white fish, they ketch sights of white fish to the lake,
and by goin’ a little round we could go right by the summer hotel
where Miss Greene Smythe wuz stayin’. The hotel wuz a big buildin’
standin’ in large, beautiful grounds; it wuz the biggest hotel in
the place, and she had the hull floor of one wing, lived there
jest as independent as you please with her own servants, and her
daughter, Medora, and the young twins, Algernon and Angenora.
Josiah left me there, and, as I wuz waitin’ to be showed up to her
room, I hearn the twins fightin’ fiercely at the head of the stairs
and kickin’ each other and swearin’ like two young pirates at the
top of their voices, and while I wuz lookin’ on in astonishment a
girl come runnin’ downstairs and yanked ’em back, one in each hand,
and swore at ’em, for I hearn her with my own ears, and scolded
’em like a termagant. I spoze it wuz their French nurse, for her
swearin’ had a kinder queer axent. Well, I sot there quite a spell
while the man went to see whether Miss Greene Smythe wuz to home;
he wuz gone a awful while.
And while I sot there a good lookin’ woman, with a rather sharp
chin and nose, come along, and sot down in a chair near me, she
come in jest as the girl dragged ’em off, quarrelin’ and usin’
words I wouldn’t speak for a dollar bill. And this woman went on
and told me things I hated to hear--I didn’t ask her, she told of
her own accord.
Sez she, “Miss Greene Smythe makes a great show, and don’t want to
even speak to folks full as good as she is.” And here she tosted
her head quite a good deal. “But if she would spend some of the
time on her children she spends on fashion and them everlastin’
young men danglin’ round her, she would be less apt to have a
gallows rared up in her family.” She said she didn’t believe
there ever wuz such a actin’ child in the hull world as Algernon.
Angenora, she said, wuz better dispositioned to start with, but
wuz bein’ spilte by Algernon’s plaguin’ her so. She had got so she
would swear and kick almost as loud and hard as he would while he
wuz fightin’ her.
“Well,” sez I, “they’re little things, they don’t know any better.”
“I know it,” sez she, “their nurses are ugly dispositioned, both
on ’em, and they’re jest as mean as they can be to the children,
though they keep ’em clean enough. But,” she said they wuz ignorant
as might be expected, and used so many slang words and low phrases
the children had ketched their language and oaths, so their talk
wuz more like a pirate’s children or a buckaneer’s than the
children of Christian parents. “And fight!” sez she, she didn’t
believe there wuz a bigger fighter on earth than Algernon for his
age. And lie! why, Algernon’s nurse, she said, wuz such a liar that
she fairly seemed to prespire untruth through her pores, and them
children wuz with her all the time and breathed her atmosphere,
drinkin’ it down with their milk (they wuz both brung up on a
bottle, Miss Greene Smythe thinkin’ it more genteel). And Algernon
would lie now in such a picturesque, dashin’ way as to fairly stunt
anybody to hear it.
And Angenora follered on as fast as her temperament and nateral
nater would let her. She said the children wuz with the nurses most
all the time, for Miss Greene Smythe and Medora wuz out nights,
and when they wuz to home they didn’t seem to have time to pay any
attention to the children, and she said little Angenora herself
wuz out nights sometimes till one and two o’clock to children’s
parties, and eat rich stuff and drunk coffee and champagne at
midnight, and that wuz another thing that made her so bad lately.
Sez I, “Our grandchildren have parties, but they invite their
little comrades of both sects to come in the afternoon, and they
play games, blind man’s buff, and tag, and they have swings, and
they play with dolls and balls and marbles jest like the babies
they are, and at six o’clock they have a good hullsome supper,
sweet bread and butter, and a little briled chicken mebby, and
one kind of good plain cake baked and frosted in pretty shapes to
please the childish eye, and plenty of ripe fruit, oranges, etc.,
and a little candy, and good chocolate with cream in it to drink,
and they home by sundown, happy and tired, a good, healthy tire,
that makes ’em sleep like tops and wake up refreshed to meet the
mornin’ greetin’ of the rising sun, ready and willin’ to tackle
their lessons or their play agin.”
Well, she said, “That wuzn’t Miss Greene Smythe’s way, and,” sez
she, “it is killin’ Angenora, her little head is gittin’ weak, and
she is jest on the pint of nervous prostration and heart failure.”
“Heart failure and nervous prostration at nine years of age!” sez I
convelsively.
“Yes,” sez she, “and you’ll see I’m right, though her mother
wouldn’t pay any attention if I should speak to her about it.
She don’t see me half the time,” sez she, “right when I meet her
face to face.” She stood ready, I could see, to talk aginst Miss
Greene Smythe, but I wuzn’t goin’ to jine in it, but I felt dretful
worried about what she had told me, and sez:
“How duz Algernon stand it?”
“Oh, he won’t go,” sez the woman; “he jest swears and throws
himself and acts so his Ma has gin up tryin’ to make him go. He sez
he hain’t a-goin’ to dance with girls and stay out all night for
nobody; and he is so ugly dispositioned they dassent try to make
him do what he don’t want to.”
“Well,” sez I, “ugly or not, he shows good sense in that.” But at
that minute the man returned and told me Miss Greene Smythe wuz
to home, and I followed him upstairs. Medora wuz away for a week
or so at some other resort, and Miss Greene Smythe wuz alone, and
she seemed quite glad to see me. She give me a big easy chair, and
almost to once begun to consult me about the entertainment.
Sez she, “I shall have musicians and elocutionists from the city,
there will be a big special train to bring the guests down, but I
would like also to please the natives, if I could. I am bound to
have the biggest affair of the season, and everybody who comes of
course will feel bound to buy something.”
And I sez reasonable, “I don’t believe that there are any natives
round here, not more than one, anyway--I hearn there is one
old Injun basket maker tentin’ in the woods back of Sylvester
Bobbettses, but it hain’t no ways likely he will come.”
She sez, “I mean the folks that live round here.”
“Oh,” sez I, “I guess they will turn out first rate, it is a real
charitable place here.”
“I want your help,” sez she; “do help me by talkin’ it up to
people, won’t you?”
And I told her I would, “For,” sez I, “Charity never faileth, and,”
sez I, “if I wuz not interested in charity I should feel like
soundin’ brass and tinklin’ cymbal, not that I know what a cymbal
is, but suppose it is a brass horn.”
“Yes,” sez she, “charity for the heathen is the main work of
course, but socially I want it to be a great success.”
I had told her, when I first went in, that I couldn’t stay
long, and had refused to take off my bunnet, so pretty soon she
mentioned she wuz goin’ to a lawn party to a neighborin’ hotel
that afternoon, and asked me if I would feel hurt if she went on
dressin’ while she talked to me, and I told her no, and I sez,
“Josiah is liable to come any minute, he’ll come jest as soon as he
makes his dicker.”
So her maid proceeded to put on her shoes, she had got her
underclothes all on and wuz in her dressin’ jacket and slippers.
She had handsome silk stockin’s on, embroidered beautiful, but she
wuz cut out for a big, fat woman, and her feet wuz big, they wuz
at the least calculation number five feet, but the shoe that maid
tried to get on them feet wuzn’t more than number three. I see the
efforts for quite a spell and didn’t say a word, why her feet wuz
squooze to that extent that her toes any good excuse for makin’ a
lame martyr of herself.
“Oh, they would make light, and say I wuzn’t fashionable.”
And I sez, “I believe I could bear that better than I could what
you’re sufferin’ now. But I don’t believe they would notice ’em,
I believe you could wear a shoe big enough for your feet, so you
could walk and enjoy life, and nobody would find it out, nobody
would ever think to look and tell on’t.”
“Oh, yes, they would,” sez she, “they would laugh.”
“Well, mebby you would be in a condition to laugh yourself, which
you are fur from bein’ now,” sez I pityin’ly. But I couldn’t
convince her, and she stood up on them pinted toes and high, slim
heels, and waddled off to the bed where her dress wuz.
And then follered another battle between mind and matter, between
too compressed matter, namely a big, fat waist, and a small but
firm minded cosset and waist. For a long time the victory seemed
to be on the side of the fat body, but it had to gin in, the last
button wuz drawed to, the last fortress of flesh, which resisted
to the death, wuz overcome and crowded in, and the steel walls of
the prison told no tales of the agony within. Heavy skirts wuz
adjusted and draped about the achin’ form, the long train lay out
on the carpet, and the number six hands crowded into the number
four gloves, and Miss Greene Smythe wuz ready to go and enjoy
fashionable life. She said she wouldn’t go until dear Mr. Allen
come, but we would go and sit down on the balcony, where it would
be pleasanter than here.
Well, as we sot there in that upper piazza we could hear plain the
voices of Algernon and his nurse, and occasionally the voice of
Angenora, enough to show she wuz there, and we heard swear words
and nasty words, lots of ’em, words that our grandchildren, in
their love-guarded home, had never dremp of and wouldn’t as long as
their Pa’s and Ma’s and grandparents had eyes to see and ears to
hear. Miss Greene Smythe looked up to me and sez, “I am ashamed of
the way that boy talks, but he got it from his nurse, she is good
as gold in some things, but has got a voylent temper, and when she
is angry she uses awful language, but she don’t have her mad fits
often.”
And I sez, “Hain’t you afraid it will ruin the twins to be under
such influence now in the most impressionable age?”
And she admitted she had worried some about it, and sez she,
“I should got rid of her long ago, but she is a be-a-uti-ful
hairdresser, that wuz her father’s bizness, and her mother wuz a
dressmaker, and she has natural taste about dress. And you know
if hair don’t have proper attention it will lose its gloss and
won’t friz as it ought to. And, as for loopin’ up drapery, I have
never seen that woman’s equal in my life, my maid is jest nowhere
beside her. And goin’ into society as much as I do, you can see how
necessary it is I should have some one right in the house that I
can depend on, that I can put confidence in as to the hanging of my
skirt, and my bangs.”
“Well,” sez I, in a ruther cold axent, “if you don’t see curiouser
loopin’s and bangs in the twin’s heads and hearts bime-by than any
you ever had in a dress or foretop, then I’ll miss my guess.” And
I went on and argued with her for quite a spell for the children’s
good.
I tried hard to make her think that the well-doin’ of her children,
and the immortal destiny of their souls, wuz of more consequence
than the puckerin’s of her dress, or the frizzle of her hair, but
I couldn’t seem to make her think as I did, and so I spoze it will
have to go on. That girl’s nasty mad swearin’ talk settin’ the
example, and the twins follerin’ on and workin’ it out as plain
as my grandmother ever worked a blue rose and pink horse from a
exampler at school and framed it for us to look at. I knew the
sampler the twins wuz workin’ under that woman’s teachin’ wuz goin’
to be framed in a stronger frame than I ever sot eyes on and hung
on a higher wall. I felt bad, I knew that the frame wuz as strong
as a deathless life, and the wall high as eternity.
Little Angenora’s nurse wuzn’t so fiery dispositioned as
Algernon’s. But she give her opiates to make her sleep when she
wanted to go out with her bo’s, and hurt her body in that way, and
others I don’t want to talk about, but mebby she didn’t hurt her
soul so much as she did Algernon’s, ’tennyrate it didn’t show quite
so plain now, she didn’t swear so loud as he did, nor throw herself
so heavy.
But the opiates made the little creeter look wan and pale and
sleepy more’n half the time, and I said to Miss Greene Smythe
in this conversation, it seemed a shame to have her little
constitution all ruined in that way onbeknown to her, before she
wuz old enough to defend it. But she said she guessed she didn’t
give Angenora very much, she wuz a pale child naturally.
But I see her attention wuz wanderin’ from what I wuz sayin’ to
sunthin she wuz beholdin’ on the inside of her mind, and anon she
asked me if I could tell her where she could find a perfectly
white Spitz dog with a black ring around its neck.
And I sez in a kind of impatient way, for I didn’t like to be broke
up in my high minded, conscientious talk, “I don’t know anything
about such a pup.”
Sez she, “I didn’t really suppose you would, but I am so anxious to
git one I improve every opportunity to inquire. They are the height
of fashion, and, while I am obliged to stay here in the country,
waiting the ending of this tedious lawsuit, such a pet would be so
much company for me.”
“Company!” sez I, in a deep, impressive voice, “if you want
company, where are your own girl and boy, where are the two little
immortal souls the Lord gin you to guide and fit for a place with
Him bime-by? Them two little white souls you are leavin’ with
ignorant, coarse servants to train?”
And I went on real eloquent for as much as four minutes and a half,
but she didn’t hear me, for, after I got through with my powerful
remarks and wuz kinder waitin’ for a reply, she sez, “I can’t
possibly make up my mind which to have.”
And I wuz real encouraged, for I thought I had convinced her and
she wuz turnin’ it over in her mind which it wuz best to have,
help about her puckers and frizzles or more assured hope about her
children’s future, and I sez, “I could tell quick.”
“Well, then, do tell,” sez she, “for I don’t believe I can ever
make up my mind alone, there are so many things dependent on it, it
is not itself alone that you should take into consideration.”
“That is jest what I have been tryin’ to make you understand,” sez
I, “All the mighty consequences hangin’ on it, and I am glad you
feel to realize it.”
“Well, then,” sez she, “what color would you have?”
“Color!” sez I.
“Yes,” sez she, “what color would you have for the awnings and
trimmings for the big tent where I am to receive? I myself should
prefer pink as more becoming to my complexion. Medora wants
pale-blue on account of her hair, which she has just dyed a golden
color. But Mrs. La Flamme, at her great charity ball, had blue
awnings and draperies, and I wouldn’t for the world have her think
I copied her or was lacking in originality--what do you think of a
delicate shell pink?”
I riz up with a real lot of dignity, and, as I glanced down, I see
one of her danglers sot there in a stylish carriage, waiting for
her, evidently.
So I sez, “Don’t let me hender you any longer; Josiah will be here
in a few minutes, and I have got some bizness of my own to tend to
before I go.” I did want to see the landlord about some jars of
butter I had sold him, he had made a mistake about sendin’ home the
jars. So she went downstairs on that side of the buildin’, and I
swep’ through the hall with a sight of dignity, and didn’t finish
sweepin’ till I swep over some playthings of Algernon’s, and he
swore at me till I got to the bottom of the stairs.
Well, the landlord promised to send home my jars, and I went out on
the lower piazza, which wuz most deserted at this hour, and pretty
soon Angenora come and found me there. She had got sick of playin’
with Algernon, she said, and, as we sot there, we could hear him
swearin’ at his nurse and tearin’ at the cat’s tail. And the cat’s
yells of distress and the nurse’s coarse rebukes all come mellowed
by the distance, and she leaned up aginst me and we had a good
little visit. She knew me quite well, for she had been to our house
a number of times, and I had seen her at Thomas J.’s when she’d
been there to play with the children.
She wuz a affectionate little thing, or she wouldn’t have worried
so over Jimmy De Graffe. Her eyes wuz big and black and solemn
lookin’, and her hair curled in little short black curls all over
her head, her complexion wuz white and clear, and she looked wan.
But I believe it wuz what she had had gin her that made her look
so, as well as her late hours and fashionable flirtations. But she
wuz very handsome, and I didn’t wonder so much what I had always
heard, that of all her children Miss Greene Smythe loved this
one best, and wuz proudest of her and bound to have her shine in
society even at the age of nine, poor little thing! I don’t doubt
but what her Ma loved her, but it wuz a love so covered up and hid
underneath fashion and frivolity and show that I thought to myself
it might jest about as well not been there at all for all the good
it did her.
Though they say Miss Greene Smythe did once in a while, when she
had a few minutes’ reprieve from her life work of show and sham,
pet little Angenora, and tell her how she loved her, and that she
wuz the only comfort of her Ma’s hard, toilsome life. Love begets
love, and that is why, I spoze, little Angenora wuz the only livin’
thing on earth that really loved Miss Greene Smythe, she did love
her fondly.
She wuz a tender-hearted child, anyway, and had to love somethin’,
and wanted to be mothered, wanted to dretfully, but, seein’ her
mother wuz engaged in her labor of fashionable display, she didn’t
git mothered at all, and that gin her the wistful, longin’ look
in her eyes, that and her late hours and the stuff her nurse gin
her. And she had a sort of pitiful, skairful look in her eyes,
and that come, I found out, from her nurse skairin’ her nights
ever sence she wuz a baby to make her lay still, tellin’ her that
somebody would jump at her, or that there wuz great green eyes
lookin’ out at her from different places, and there wuz wicked men
ready to appear to her, and ghosts and everything, and as the nurse
had always told her that she would eat her up alive, if she told
anything about it, why, it had gin her a dretful subdued look and
afraid to say her little soul wuz her own. But I spoze the deep,
silent, constant love of this little thing wuz a rock of support
for her Ma to think on in her fashionable career, I spoze so.
Well, I put my arm round her, and she laid her little cheek up
aginst me real confidin’ and sweet, and I told her stories and
mothered her jest as well as I could till my Josiah appeared
drivin’ up the long avenoo with the mair and colt. And I told her
to have her Ma let her come down and stay a week with us, and she
brightened up real bright and said she would.
Josiah had made the dicker, so he told me, as we drove home, and
had swapped five hundred feet of spruce lumber for white fish put
down in sweet pickle. And I sez, “For mercy sake! what do you want
of so many fish!”
And he sez, “I love ’em dearly, Samantha.”
“But,” sez I, “you may love anything and not want to be swamped by
it, run over and drownded in it.”
“Well,” he said, fish agreed with his stomach and wuz nourishin’ to
the brain.
And I, takin’ a second thought on his last proposition, sez, “Mebby
you hain’t got any too many, Josiah, I guess you had better eat all
you can.” I knew if he couldn’t git down four or five kags of ’em
we could give ’em to the children.
CHAPTER XIV.
I always did kinder like to have onexpected company, it seems
as though I always have a better visit with ’em, and I felt as
pleasant as the day, which wuz a beautiful one, when two loads of
company driv up entirely onexpected about an hour before noon,
Tamer Ann Allen and Jack and Tirzah Ann and little Delight, all
happenin’ to come at almost the same time, and we had a real good
visit. Tamer had concluded to stop a day longer so’s to visit me.
I had got my work all done and a good dinner started, and wuz
standin’ on the porch lookin’ onto the environin’ seen when they
all driv up most together, though comin’ from two different ways.
I wuz jest noticin’ how sweet the posies wuz that grew by the back
porch, and how full the hearts of the roses wuz with perfume, and
how the pink and pale-blue bells of the mornin’ glories seemed
fairly swingin’ to onseen music, to show their delight at openin’
their eyes onto such a fair world. The far-off hills towered up
clad in deathless green and leaned aginst the sky as if real
contented and glad to be there. The blue sky, flecked with little
snowy clouds, looked down sweet and smilin’ on Jonesville and the
world. The meadows and pastures smiled up at the bendin’ sky, the
trees, all washed off by the shower of the night before, glistened
and shook out their velvet and shinin’ foliage, and the grass wuz
flecked with sunshine embroidered with daisies.
And, best view of all to my fond heart, my companion stood in the
open barn door in his shirt sleeves feedin’ the hens, and his face
looked calm and reposeful as the seen. Tirzah and Delight got there
a little the first, and as I lifted the sweet little creeter out
it did seem, though I knew it couldn’t be, that she wuz prettier
than she wuz the last time I had seen her. But my cool reason told
me how could that be, when she wuz jest as pretty as she could be
on that occasion. She’s got big, kinder talkin’ eyes, a warm soft
hazel, I guess they be, but they are so full of light and soul and
expression that you don’t care so much what the color really is, a
fair, white complexion, wavy, flaxen hair, good features, and the
sweetest mouth you ever see with most always a smile curvin’ the
rosy lips, and a pretty plump little figger most always dressed in
white.
When she see me she held out her little soft white hands and arms,
and I lifted her out, kissin’ her warmly as I did so; I then
greeted Tirzah Ann warmly, a good deal more warm than Ma-in-laws
usually greet their stepchildren, but, good land! I have always
considered her my own, jest as much as she wuz Josiah’s, though not
so soul congenial to me as Thomas J., she has her properties.
Well, they hadn’t much more than alighted when Tamer Ann and Jack
come. I wuz real glad to see ’em all, and, after they had took
off their things, I got ’em into the settin’ room, and went out
and made a few more preparations for dinner, though I had a good
dinner started. I had a stuffed fowl and some green peas on, and
wuz intendin’ to have some tomatoes cooked, and some fresh, crisp
rolls and a good lemon puddin’, besides coffee and cream and jell
and things, but I put on a different tablecloth and got out my pink
banded china.
I could hear Tamer and Tirzah talkin’ real agreeable together
while I wuz gittin’ my dinner. They wuz comparin’ notes about
their sicknesses, Tirzah Ann enjoys real poor health, too, some of
the time. And then they seemed to be comparin’ notes about their
children, and the right way to bring ’em up, and I felt bad to see
that Tamer Ann and Tirzah felt so much alike in a good many things
about their children. But I wuz so busy I couldn’t interfere and
take part in their talk until after dinner. Truly, when a man is
splittin’ wood in the rear of the house, complainin’ of faintness
at the stummick and anxiously watchin’ the clock and mistrustin’ it
wuz slow, and wishin’ he had sot it with the gong, etc., etc., it
behooves a woman to have dinner on time, if she loves tranquillity
and domestic peace.
And after dinner wuz over and my dishes washed, I washin’ and
Tirzah Ann wipin’, and we three wimmen wuz settin’ with our sewin’
and knittin’, the children bein’ out in the yard to play, then when
the conversation gradually turned round onto bringin’ up children
and its perils and perplexities, I put in my oar, too, and took
a part in the meetin’ as you may say. Tirzah had had a hard time
the Sunday before, she had taken little Delight to church and had
a trial with her that made her feel dretfully, and she wuz jest
beginnin’ to tell about it when she wuz interrupted by the children
talkin’ right under the winder; they wuz talkin’ so earnest about
sunthin’ we all stopped to listen.
Jack wuz speakin’ excited and interested, sez he, “Don’t you see,
Delight, that long, low cloud that is layin’ right aginst that
tree top? I believe if we should climb up that tree we could step
right off into Heaven, and I wonder if the Lord would be glad to
see us if we should walk in.”
“Of course He would,” sez Delight. “He would come to the door and
take us right up in His arms and say, ‘I am glad to see you. Suffer
little children to come unto me,’ that is what Mama told me He said
about children, and I learnt it.”
But at this juncter Tirzah Ann rushed to the winder and hollered
to Delight and told her to stop instantly, and Tamer Ann follered
right on and told Jack to not let her hear any more such talk. And
the children crep off into another part of the dooryard, lookin’
crestfallen and wonderin’ what they had said now that wuz wrong.
And, after they wuz out of hearin’, I sez, “Why did you tell your
children you would punish ’em for sayin’ what they did?”
Sez Tamer, “I won’t have Jack show irreverence, and I’ll whip him
if he duz.” And Tirzah Ann sez, “I will not allow Delight to talk
in that way.”
Sez I, “Tirzah Ann, ever sence she wuz a baby you have made little
Delight pray to God, you have learnt her He wuz her best friend,
you made her learn that beautiful verse she repeated, and now what
irreverence wuz there in thinking that God would be glad to see ’em
if they went to Heaven, when you have learned her to love God and
go to Him with all her little troubles and temptations?”
“What is proper to say at prayer time hain’t proper to say at other
times,” sez Tirzah, and sez Tamer, “Yes, that is so.”
But I sez solemnly, “Tirzah Ann and Tamer, that is a great
mistake; you try for half an hour each day to make your children
the inmates of another world, surrounded by different beings and
circumstances. Now, that hain’t so, God is with Jack and Delight at
this minute out there in the playground, jest as nigh as He is when
they are kneelin’ at your four feet, and in my opinion they ought
to be learnt that is the case, and what is proper for them to think
of God at one time is proper at another.
“Now, in my opinion, God would be glad to see them innocent little
children step into Heaven off from that cloud, if they could, and
my way would have been to told them that God would be glad to see
’em at any time, and that He did see ’em, that He wuz with ’em at
prayer time and play time, in storm and shine, and wanted ’em to
be good little children, and wuz grieved when they wuz naughty,
and then I should have tried to explain to ’em why they couldn’t
step off from that cloud into Heaven. That would be my way,”
sez I, holdin’ up Josiah’s sock and tacklin’ it in a new place,
“howsumever,” sez I mildly, seein’ Tirzah Ann and Tamer looked
wrathy, “howsumever, I will say agin it is easier to tell folks how
to bring up children than do the bringin’ up, or be satisfied after
they’re brung.”
“This irreverence in talkin’ about divine things is what I can’t
and won’t stand.”
“Then, Tirzah Ann,” sez I, “you should bring Delight up in a
different way. How is she to know the Being you encourage her in
talkin’ to one minute is not to be mentioned at another? Everything
in the world is as new to her as it would be to us if we wuz sot
down on the planet Jupiter to-day. How do you know we should have
first class Jupiter ways? I don’t spoze we should, I spoze we
should act like fools and lunaticks more’n half the time judged by
Jupiter standards. Delight has everything to learn, you teach her
that God is her best friend, more than father and mother, is with
her all the time, and yet she musn’t speak of Him only for a few
minutes night and morning. Delight can’t understand that, Tirzah
Ann. And I can’t, nuther,” sez I, in a milder voice, for I see she
looked mad. “Why,” sez I, “when Thomas J. wuz little he used to
talk to the Lord by the hour, tell Him all his little troubles and
sorrows. I would hear him, but never interfered, thinkin’ He wuz a
better, safer friend than any other could be.”
Sez Tamer, “It is a bad habit for a child to git into, talkin’ so
familiar with the Deity, and it should be stopped, in my opinion.”
Sez I, “You let Cicero fill his mind with burglars and pirates all
day long. Isn’t the Divine One a better inmate for the soul than
them pirates and enchanted elephants, Tamer Ann?”
She quailed quite a good deal, and I sez, “Jack is inclined to
be devout, Tamer, if it isn’t whipped out of him, he has got a
religious mind.”
“Religious mind!” sez she, laughin’ in a onbelievin’ way. “Hear
that! that sounds religious, don’t it?” Jack wuz yellin’ pretty
middlin’ loud, I’ll confess, out under the maples. But I sez, “I
don’t see anything aginst it in that, Tamer. I presume David yelled
full as loud, or louder, when he wuz a child, and Job, too. I dare
presume to say old Miss Job had her hands full with him, and let
him go out and yell, and encouraged him in it to git him out of the
tent, so she could rest her head and ears. Yellin’ hain’t nothin’
criminal, Tamer, and hain’t been considered so from Jerusalem to
Jonesville.”
“Well,” sez Tirzah, “you ought to been to church last Sunday,
mother, and see then whether you would think Delight did right; I
declare I wuz so mortified I wanted to sink right down through the
floor.” And Tirzah Ann assayed agin to tell the tale.
But as before we hearn the voices of the children almost under the
winder, and what of all the world do you think they wuz talkin’
about? Why, about marryin’, them two little tots lookin’ like two
clothes-pins, talkin’ of matrimony.
Now, marryin’ is sunthin’ I hate dretfully to hear children talkin’
about. But then, come to reason on it, Jack had heard it talked
from one week’s end to another at home, though I don’t spoze he
knew what it meant no more than a Hottentot understands snow-shoes.
But he heard Tamer argue for hours and hours that Anna should not
marry Tom Willis and should marry Von Crank, rehearsin’ the reasons
why she should marry one and not marry the other. How wuz Jack to
know that marriage wuz not a congenial or suitable subject for old
or young? Why, she talked that very day more than an hour about it
right before the children. It wuz no wonder they had ketched the
talk, some like measles when they’re round, and I hearn Jack ask
Delight who she thought she would marry.
But when she heard the word “marry” Tamer craned her neck out of
the winder and told Jack to “Stop instantly!” And he looked up, his
blue eyes half shot up, and sez, “Stop what?”
And she sez, “Stop that talk about marryin’!”
“Why, mother, you have been talkin’ about it all the mornin’.”
But Tamer sez, “One more word out of your head, young man, like
that, and I will shet you up in a dark room.”
They wuz kinder still for a minute, and I knew that the mornin’
glory eyes wuz shot up under the burnin’ scorn of his Ma’s axent,
and then, for I wuz nighest the winder, I hearn Jack say, in a low
voice, “I think I shall marry your grandmother, Delight.”
I felt the compliment deeply, to think I wuz the first choice of
that innocent heart. But it seemed even at that age the feminine
mind wuz more educated in the suitability of marriage than the more
opposite sex. Delight sez, “Oh, you tan’t.”
“Why not?” sez Jack, impatient.
“Betause she is too old.”
“Well, then I shall marry father.”
“Oh, you tan’t,” sez Delight.
“Why?”
“Betause he is a man.”
“Well, then I will marry you.”
“Oh, you tan’t!”
“Why not?”
“Betause I am too young to marry.”
And then Jack sez, impatient and loud, “Well, if some are too young
and some too old, who can I marry?”
And Tamer heard that last word, and she sprung to the winder and
leaned half out of it, and sez, “If you don’t stop such talk
instantly, Jack, I will call that bad man round the corner to come
and take your head right off!” And then she sez, sinkin’ back in
her chair, “Oh, dear me! what a job it is to bring up children
right.”
And Tirzah sez, “Yes, indeed, it is, now last Sunday in church----”
But Tamer, bein’ so full and runnin’ over with complaints about
Jack, she went right on and told over a dozen of his little tricks
and ways, kinder cunnin’ I thought some on ’em, but she and Tirzah
thinkin’ ’em dretful, and at last, though I am very close mouthed
and seldom speak, I did say, “It seems to me you ort to be more
patient with your little children, for they are learnt by us bigger
ones to do most everything they do, and then the poor little
creeters get whipped for it.”
“Well,” sez Tamer, “I would like to know who learnt Jack to do some
of his tricks, what would you do,” sez she, “if a child throwed all
your clothes out of the winder--dresses, petticoats, stockin’s, and
everything when you wuz tryin’ to dress? And poured water down on
folks who wuz passin’ below. Why,” sez she, “such strange things
would be throwed out of our winders that folks would inquire what
kind of folks lived there. And one woman that he spilte a bunnet
for threatened to sue us; of course that wuz some time ago, when we
lived in town, but I well remember it. She had stopped with another
woman right under our winder for a few minutes’ quiet and peaceable
talk, and Jack trickled a hull cup of water down onto ’em. Their
bunnets wuz kinder soft and spongy, and took up the water for a
spell, but when their heads begun to git wet they investigated, and
there Jack wuz, happy as a king, callin’ for more water, his cup
had gin out--how would you like that? And while you wuz tryin’ to
dress have all your clothes throwed down into the street, and you
can’t say that he had ever seen us do that.”
“I shouldn’t like it,” sez I mildly; “but how old wuz Jack when he
did this?”
“It wuz the winter we lived in Jonesville: Jack wuz about three.”
“Well,” sez I, “you ort to make Jack stop such works. I am fur from
wantin’ folks throwed out or poured down on. But I don’t spoze Jack
knew the mischief he wuz doin’. How did he know the effect of water
on artifical flowers? Or the trouble it would be to go out and pick
up your clothes? I remember jest before that, when I wuz visitin’
you, Hamen would throw things down on the floor and out of the
winder a purpose for Jack to go out and pick up, and he kep’ it up
more than I should in his place. It tickled Jack, and Jack would
throw things down on the floor, and Hamen would pick ’em up, and
Jack would giggle. And many is the time I’ve seen Hamen sprinkle
water down onto Jack’s curly head to see him duck and wink to git
away from it. Jack wuz only follerin’ his father’s example, Tamer
Ann, though, as I said before, I don’t approve on’t in Jack, and
want no man or woman throwed out or poured down on.”
“Oh, you will always stand up for Jack.”
“I stand for reason,” sez I solemnly, “and justice and common
sense. In ninety cases out of a hundred folks whip their children
for what they or somebody else has learnt ’em to do.”
And then Tirzah Ann spoke up again, kinder firm and decided as if
she wuz determined now to finish her tale. “Last Sunday in church
I wuz so mortified with Delight’s doin’s I thought I should sink.
We took her to meetin’ and there wuz a boy there a few years older
than she, and he kep’ tormentin’ her, pullin’ her hair in a sly
way, and pinchin’ her, and at last he stuck a pin into her, and
then what should Delight do all of a sudden but kneel right down
in the aisle--she wuz next to the pew door--and right while the
minister wuz talkin’, prayed loud for the Lord to stop that boy
that wuz plaguin’ her, and, sez she, ‘if he won’t stop, dear Lord,
kill him.’ I thought I should die with shame, and you can’t say you
ever heard Whitfield or me pray to have anybody killed.”
“No, Tirzah Ann, nobody ever heard that from you or Whitfield;
but,” sez I, “do you remember what part of the Bible you are
reading now at mornin’ prayers?”
“It is the Old Testament,” sez she.
“Well, them old prophets used to git awful mad at their enemies and
pray for the Lord to smite ’em hip and thigh, and kill ’em, etc. Of
course Delight heard you read, she always listens to everything she
hears, and I spoze she thought if that wuz Bible talk it wuz good
enough for her.”
“Well, what can we do, mother?” sez Tirzah. “You know we are
reading it through by course, and we want to read every word of it
or it won’t be by course.”
“Of course not,” sez I.
“But is there any decree or law of Providence compellin’ you to
read the Bible by course at family prayers? The Bible is a precious
mine of riches where each can get the wealth he or she needs and
desires, but, as in the case of other mines where gold and jewels
are found, there is some earth, some alloy with it. You wouldn’t
mount a slate stun and wear it on your bosom because it wuz found
side by side with a diamond. In my opinion lots of the talk in the
Old Testament, the breathin’ of vengeance and slaughter and rapine,
etc., is not exactly the food to bring up young children on.”
“But we wuz readin’ it by course, mother, we had to read the whole
thing.”
“Well,” sez I, “that hain’t the way Nater duz when she sets out
to make a white lily: she takes from rich Mother Earth all the
qualities necessary to make a lily, she selects what will make the
dainty whiteness, the delicious fragrance of the flower; she don’t
take the blackness of the soil, the dinginess and dirt. No, out
of the rich storehouse she selects the best, what she needs. Now,
the Bible is so full, Tirzah Ann, of all wisdom, divine knowledge,
tenderest love, and divine pity, full of the glory of the Great
Father of us all, why can’t you select out of it what you and your
children need instead of settin’ up that puny reason of readin’ it
by course, and gettin’ by that process all the earth of the human
natures through which God’s inspiration is filtered down into our
comprehension? You don’t need all that talk about slaughter and
vengeance, nor genealogies, etc., though I have seen folks read ’em
right through at family prayer, Johab begat Ehod, and Ehod begat
Ichabod, and etc. They had to be begot, of course, ’twas necessary
to be; but I could never git any good or inspiration out of readin’
’em in the mornin’ as food for the spiritual needs of the day.
Howsumever, I wuz never one to set up my way as the only way, but I
will say that after Delight heard you read about it she might have
thought she would foller the example of them old patriarchs with
her enemies, for I do spoze the prickin’ and jerkin’ of the little
torment made her feel that he wuz her enemy. And, anyway, if them
old prophets are held innocent for talkin’ in this way, with the
experience of a lifetime and the inspiration of the Lord to lead
’em, what do you think of a little child like Delight? Not that
I approve on’t in her, nor in them either, and I don’t believe
the Lord had much to do with such sanguinary desires, nor I don’t
believe the Lord wants you to read about it to the children.”
“Well,” sez Tirzah Ann, “I wuz mortified most to death. And once
in the parlor, full of company, a hard thunderstorm came up, and
Delight wuz awfully frightened, and she knelt right down and
prayed for the Lord to stop that thunder, and got up and stamped
her little foot to think it didn’t stop to the very minute, and
hollered out, ‘Stop it, dear Lord! Stop it this minute!’ What do
you think of that?”
Sez I, “I think of that as I do of other human creeters who are
scared and overthrown with the sorrow and pain of life. They pray
to the Lord to stop their agony, and because He don’t stop it at
once they grow impatient and onbelievin’, and mebby, as Miss Job
did, feel to curse God and die. We can’t wait no more than Delight
did for the storm to clear the sky; we don’t realize no more than
she that mebby it wuz needed to cleanse the air from impurities and
make us appreciate the sunshine and calm better. No, Delight and
Jack and all the rest of us are blind creeters, and it don’t do for
one of us to condemn the other too much.”
And then Tamer went on to tell how Jack had mortified her when she
took him on a visit to some very stylish people.
That very forenoon, so Anna told me afterwards, Tamer had whipped
Jack because she mistrusted he had not told her the exact
truth--whipped him for not bein’ open and candid.
And Tamer had warned Jack to be very polite at the table, to eat
whatever was put before him, and make no remarks about it.
So Jack, I suppose, felt he had done his full duty, and deserved
and desired credit, when he leaned back in his chair and said he
had finished his supper, and added:
“I have done just what you told me to do, mother. I have eat my
rossberrys, worms and all, and said nothin’.”
“I thought,” said Tamer, “I should sink through the floor; and
another time I thought I should expire with shame. Jack had been to
Sunday-school and the teacher” (the Born Baptist) “made him sign
the pledge. Jack loved sweet cider, and I wuz afraid he would break
the pledge, he wuz so little, and I thought I would ruther have him
wait till he got older and could feel the importance of it, and I
told Jack I would have his teacher take his name off the pledge.
And that very day she called, and I told her I thought Jack had
better wait till he wuz older, and she turned her eyes in a solemn
way to Jack and said, ‘Jack, do you want to take your name off the
pledge?’
“‘Yes, I do,’ sez Jack, independent as anything.
“‘Do you want to drink cider?’
“‘Yes, I do, and beer and brandy and whisky and anything else I can
git to drink.’”
Sez Tamer, “I could cried, I felt so, and that woman looked on us
as if she thought we wuz heathens. Hamen whipped Jack hard for
that.”
Sez I, “I wouldn’t be afraid to bet a cent Hamen and John had
plagued Jack about signin’ the pledge and told him he couldn’t
drink any more beer or whisky, thinkin’ it wuz smart and
cunnin’--didn’t they, now?”
“Well, I don’t know,” sez Tamer. “I remember they laughed at him
about it.”
“Yes, and mebby laughed away more than they bargained for, Tamer
Ann Smith!” sez I. “It is a solemn thing to bring up a child, and a
solemner one to whip him for what we learn him to do.”
Sez Tamer, real dignified, “I’ll tell you one or two more scrapes
Jack got into, and if you want to lay ’em to Hamen and me you can,
but it will be very unjust, very. It wuz when Jack wuz three or
four years old, he wuz out playin’ with another little boy of the
same age, little Eddie Grey, and Eddie said, about four in the
afternoon, that he had got to go home, for his mother wanted to
give him a bath, and Jack wuz lonesome and wanted him to stay a
spell longer, but Eddie thought he couldn’t, for his mother would
be waitin’.
“And Jack said he could git all ready for the bath there, and then
his mother wouldn’t have to take up her time ondressin’ him. So, if
you’ll believe it, Jack took off all the clothes from that boy and
sent him home bare naked through the streets with his clothes in a
little bundle under his arm. It wuz the town’s talk.”
“I am fur from thinkin’,” sez I, “that it wuz a proper thing to do.
But I must say if the town wuz as innocent as Jack, it would be a
good thing for the town, and the town wouldn’t have talked as much
about it.”
It wuz a real hot day, and as we sot there talkin’ time had slipped
round and the sun with it, till it beat right into our settin’-room
winder, and we all presperation and sweat, and Tamer got up and
looked in the glass and sez, “Oh, my! how I do look!” And she
took out a little pearl-mounted box from her pocket with some
rice powder in it and a little mite of a puff brush and went to
applyin’ it to her heated and red visage as she went on with her
remarks.
“It wuz that very summer, they wuz paintin’ the roof of the
Presbyterian Church a bright red, and Jack and Eddie went over
there while the men had gone home to their dinner, and they painted
each other a bright red all over, their hair and faces and hands
and legs all a bright solid red, and on their clothes they put the
paint in stripes. No human objects outside of a menagerie ever
looked as they did as they marched home through the streets. I
would love to hear you say, Samantha, that you ever see Hamen or me
cuttin’ up such tricks.”
“Not exactly,” sez I, lookin’ pensively at her paint box, “but I
don’t spoze the little creeters knew how dretfully they would look
or how oncomfortable and sticky they would make themselves or their
parents.”
“Well, I know Jack got a good whippin’ for that scrape after we had
scoured him off with turpentine so we could whip him.”
“Well,” sez I, sithin’ deep, “there is lots of things that we have
to learn by experience, Tamer Ann, lots of experiments we try with
our hearts, our lives, our feller creeters’ happiness and our own.
We dip the brush in carelessly that is to leave its mark on us for
life, that no turpentine can wash out, recklessly, onheedingly,
blindly, we make the fatal marks, blot out the hull of happiness
mebby, with the wretched fatality of ignorance. And we git whipped
for it,” sez I, “whipped by the achin’ pain in our hearts, by the
more stingin’ pain of seein’ some one we love suffer, that we
have laid the fatal brush on with our own hands. We are all blind
creeters; we are all poor, ignorant children sot down in a new
world and another mysterious one in front of us, and it duz become
us, Tamer and Tirzah Ann, to try and be patient with these other
poor little blunderers, whose mistakes are not so big as ourn,
because the consequences are not so mighty. Poor little creeters!
It would seem that in pity for our own mistakes we would deal
charitable with ’em.”
Jest as I wuz sayin’ these words two children who wuz boardin’
to one of my neighbor’s and goin’ to school, come to git some
dime novels that Tamer had promised to bring to ’em. They lived
only a little ways from Tamer’s when they wuz to home, and she
had supplied ’em with their mental nutriment for some years. They
had an armful they had read and got another armful to carry back,
for Tamer wuz one to keep her promise, and she had told ’em she
would bring some every time she came here visitin’. And they took
’em with deep delight, and couldn’t hardly wait till they got out
of the house before they commenced to devour ’em. They wuz as
blood-curdlin’ and soul-harrowin’ as any I ever see, and I felt
as if I should sink to see youthful mind hunger fed on such pizen
stuff. They wuz about fourteen and fifteen years of age, and the
girl wuz as pretty as a pink, but beginnin’ to put on airs and act
like a heroine. The boy looked ruther rough, some like Cicero,
and I knew he wuz tryin’ to give himself that hauty, overbearin’,
reckless air that the heroes all had in these novels.
After they had gone with their books I argued with Tamer Ann about
lendin’ such trash to children, but she said it would do ’em
good--it would give ’em a taste for readin’.
But my last words to her before I left the room and went out to
hang on the tea kettle wuz:
“Time will tell.”
CHAPTER XV.
Tamer and Jack stayed all night, and the next day but one we wuz
all to meet at Thomas Jefferson’s, and then she wuz goin’ home and
leave Jack with me for a week or so. The prospect wuz very pleasin’
to Jack and me, and to Delight, for she wuz going to stay too. The
next day, bein’ we wuz alone together, except the children, it
seemed as if Tamer wuz just crazy to onburden her heart to me about
her trouble in makin’ Anne listen to what she called reason and
marry Von Crank, and the ingratitude of a child’s disobeyin’ her
parents, and the imprudence and recklessness of her love for a poor
young man. And of course, seein’ she wuz a visitor, I had to set
and hear the talk dribble on. Why, the idee of punishin’ Jack for
talkin’ about marriage when he didn’t hear anything else when he
wuz in the house.
I let it go on, thinkin’ I had said all I could on the subject. But
at last, for wimmen’s patience can’t hold out only jest so long,
she promulgated the idee that she thought that she should send Anne
to the Convent of the Holy Heart; sez she, “She can learn some
accomplishments there of the Sisters that she can’t anywhere else.
But,” sez she confidentially, “the real reason I am doing it is to
separate her from Tom Willis, for if I could once git her mind off
from him I believe I could make her marry the man I want her to.”
Sez I coolly, “I would choose a place with some other name.”
“What do you mean?” sez she.
Sez I, “I would never choose a place called the Holy Heart for such
a heartless affair as you are goin’ into.”
“Heartless?” sez she.
“Yes,” sez I calmly, turnin’ Josiah’s second best vest over and
attacktin’ it on the other side (I wuz patchin’ it), “under the
shadow of the Holy Heart with His name printed above you you want
to desecrate and ravage a heart, sell a heart. There wuz a time
when your child’s heart wuz a smooth, ontroubled place, a page with
nothin’ writ down on it but domestic names and attachments. Then
wuz the time for you to have guarded that white, still place. If
you hadn’t wanted Tom Willis to write his name there on the virgin
whiteness of that heart why did you let ’em be together day by day
and year in and year out? You kep’ still, readin’ your dime novels
and discoverin’ your new diseases, of which I dare say you have a
variety,” sez I (for I see she looked mad), “you kep’ still and
never said a word of warnin’ or command, or disapproval, left them
two young hearts jest prepared for their images to be photographed
on each other by the divine photography of the Sun of Love, and
now when their images are stamped so full and onfadingly that no
earthly hand can rub ’em out, now you complain of the imprudence of
young people, the recklessness with which they form attachments and
the wickedness of it.
“But, Tamer Ann Smith, I tell you now that what you call the
imprudence and recklessness is not in Anna, but in her gardeens.
Her gardeens that didn’t watch her young heart, her young,
careless, springlike, girlish life, that wuz bound to burst into
bloom when the sun shone on it. It wuz in your power mebby early in
the mornin’ to have picked out the light for her, selected the sun,
but after it is once riz and set the world to bloomin’ you can’t
do it, you can’t stop the divine freshness, the bird’s song, the
sadness, the glory, the pathos, and the power, the light that never
wuz on sea or shore, you can’t put up any umbrell to shet off that
light, and so I give you warnin’.”
Sez she, “I will do it. Anna shall never marry Tom Willis.”
“You’ve started late in the day to hender it.”
“I will hender it,” sez she.
“Well,” sez I calmly, “time will tell.” And to turn the subject
round and please her at the same time, I sez, “How duz your basler
mangetus seem to be to-day, and your sinevetus?”
But she wuzn’t to be turned round even by her favorite subject. Sez
she, “You like Tom Willis, and you know it.”
Sez I, “I hain’t disputed it.”
“I believe you encourage Anna in thinkin’ of him.”
“Not a word has Anna heard me speak either for or aginst. There
wuzn’t any need on’t,” sez I; “it would be too late for me to begin
if I wanted to. No, I am simply settin’ still and seein’ things and
circumstances pass before me, some as if I wuz settin’ on a bench
at a circus.”
“If you wuz Anna’s true friend and mine, if you acted as a blood
cousin ort to, you would talk to Anna and try to make her listen to
reason.”
“No, I thank you, Tamer Ann; there is sunthin’ now in her heart
that is beyend reason, as fur above and beyend it as the stars are
above the earth.”
“If you did your duty, Josiah Allen’s wife, you would tell her to
obey her mother and marry the man her mother approves of, that her
mother’s superior wisdom and experience teaches her is the best
fitted to insure her child’s happiness.”
“No, Tamer Ann Smith, I make no matches nor break none, and if I
wuz goin’ to advise Anna, which I hain’t, I shouldn’t be liable to
advise her to give up all the beauty and romance and happiness of
life for the sake of settin’ down under the shade of a family tree
and let it shade me alongside that walkin’ mummy, Von Crank.”
“One of the oldest and most aristocratick families in the State.
You ought to take it as a great honor that he felt willin’ to
connect himself with the Smith family at all.”
I see we couldn’t agree, and I sez, “Tamer Ann, you will agitate
yourself so your baslar mangetis will be worse--man-get-us,” sez I
thoughtfully; “if that wuz only a contagious disease I know lots of
single wimmen who would love to have it prevail.” But my friendly
joke didn’t turn her mind round as I meant it should; no, she went
on bitterly:
“To think Tom Willis should think of marryin’ Anna, and his father
only a common carpenter.”
“Well, Tamer Ann,” sez I, “we kneel every day of our life and
worship One who wuz called that.
“Tom Willis,” sez I, “has got the wealth and distinction in himself
instead of havin’ to put on a pair of magnifyin’ specks and try
to trace it back to some remote ancestor, who mebby had a spark
or two of it. You’ll find it right here in him, and I think it is
better to have the nobility where you can put your hand on it in
a handsome young form than to be chasin’ back for it up a family
tree, climbin’ up mouldy old branches, follerin’ rotten, decayin’
old limbs, and some sound ones,” sez I, reasonable; “but, anyway,
nobility a century or so old seems sort o’ shadowy and spectral,
and don’t impress me so much as it duz while it is right before me,
strugglin’ on through disappointments and pain, tryin’ to reach the
high prizes of success and Anna--or, I mean, happiness.”
She tossted her head real kinder disdainful, but I went on, for I
begun to feel eloquent: “It is so difficult to know a hero when
you see him right before your face and eyes. It is easy now,
after everything is passed, to open your encyclopedia and read
the names of Columbus, and Washington, and Newton, and Luther,
etc. But the time wuz when Columbus walked the streets unknown,
all the fire of genius, the passion of the discoverer must have
looked out of his sad eyes onto the onsympathetic faces of the
crowd; it wuz all hidden in his soul. His ears heard the swash
of new seas breakin’ on onknown shores, his eyes saw the tall
mountains of a grander continent risin’ through the mists, but
them around couldn’t see it, they wuz down there in the mists
and stayed there. The discoverer of a new world walked homeless
and friendless through the streets. He couldn’t carry them cold,
blind eyes into the glorious possibilities of the future. No, the
poor blind eyes looked scornful at him and laughed at his hopes.
The great philosophers and inventors who apprehended what they
couldn’t comprehend; who looked through the summer skies cleft
by the fall of an apple and saw great systems of philosophy; who
saw by the steam of a tea kettle a whole world bound together
by swift-rollin’ wheels of lightnin’ speed; who saw through the
child’s kite the continents talkin’ together--their rapt eyes saw
all these glorious possibilities and wuz derided for it and called
idiots by them who looked down on ’em and told ’em it wuz folly,
idiocy of the deepest degree to see anything in the fallin’ apple
beyond the possibility of a pie. This is the same kind of worldly
common sense that makes us onmindful every day of our life of
the presence of real heroes in our midst who, manly, honest, and
God-fearin’, are tryin’ to vanquish the ills of life and conquer
success.”
“I spoze you think Tom Willis is one of them heroes,” sez Tamer
coldly, cold as a ice-suckle.
“Yes, seein’ you’ve asked, I’ll tell you plain I do think so, and
I lay out to look on him now with the same pair of eyes I would
when he got his name writ down on the pillow of fame; he needs my
sympathy now--he wouldn’t then, if I wuz livin’ to give it to him.
It would be a good thing for these heroes and for our own souls
if we put a few of the flowers we put on the monuments of dead
heroes into the empty hands, the poor, tired, scarred hands of our
live heroes to-day. If a few of the smiles and hurrahs we keep for
onanswerin’ eyes and ears was spent on our live heroes who are
fightin’ life’s battles jest as General Grant fought his, straight
on the line, with no manoovers or false movements, straightforward
and simple and manly----”
“You are thinkin’ of Tom Willis agin,” sez Tamer Ann sarcastickally.
“Yes, I am,” sez I firmly. “Tom Willis has got genius,
perseverance, good common sense and a lovin’ heart, and that is
jest the stuff heroes are made of. Genius alone is flighty and
takes a man offen his feet, swingin’ him up above the housetops;
common sense alone is too heavy, weightin’ a chap down; but take
both together, with perseverin’ industry and a lovin’ heart, they
will take a boy right straight towards a monument, and that is jest
where Tom Willis is goin’. He is goin’ away from the jealous eyes
and persecutions and tribulations; whether we help or hender, he
is bound for a newer, grander country, a prosperous future where
he will cast anchor bimeby; his sails are sot for it, he will git
to it, and whether he carries into it a happy or a achin’ heart
depends on you, Tamer Ann Smith.”
“Oh, shaw!” sez she.
Sez I mildly, “Shawin’ never did any good in the past, Tamer Ann,
nor I have no reason to think it will in the future.”
Nor any hurt, I sez to myself reasonable, for I had faith to think
that it would all come out right in the end, dark as it looked now,
for Anna wouldn’t marry without her ma’s consent, and it looked
like obtaining sweet milk from a soapstun to git a consent from
Tamer Ann. But I kep’ my faith, and would say to myself time and
agin, Hain’t it as big as a mustard seed? Can’t I git up faith as
big as a pinhead? I ort to, and then I would try.
That very day, whilst Tamer and I wuz visitin’, word come that her
mother on her own side wuz took away with a fit and the funeral wuz
to be to the house next day but one.
Hamen’s wife felt quite bad, she shed a number of tears that I see,
and mebby some I didn’t see, I shouldn’t wonder, for a mother is a
mother as long as her skin and bones hold her heart. Of course for
years Ma Bodley had been failin’ and runnin’ down, but watched over
good by Tamer’s old maid sister, Alzina.
She wuzn’t quite so noble a Christian old maid as the one who took
care of Anna’s childhood, but she wuz a good, faithful creeter,
and the best judge of mustard plasters and milk porridge I ever
see--well, she’d handled ’em enough to be a judge of ’em. Hamenses
wife went right on to her old home with the man who come to tell
the news, and Josiah and I told her we would come to the funeral.
It wuz goin’ to be to the house, and as their house wuz liable to
be full of relations I told her to leave Jack and I would bring him
with me.
We wuz goin’ to stop and leave Delight to home on the way to the
funeral. Well, no sooner had they started off than Jack tackled me
about the funeral--what funerals wuz, and what they did to ’em.
And I went on and explained it all out to him as well as I could,
and when I come to tell him about the hearse, for I talked quite
diffuse, partly to get his mind off, he said he should ride in it.
I argued with him for a spell, but he stood firm to the last that
he should “ride in that hearse.” I told him it wuz for his poor
Grandma. And he said there wuz room enough for both; she had always
divided everything with him. And he cried a little--he loved his
Grandma. And he wanted to know if his Grandma couldn’t talk and
tell him about dyin’, what it wuz. He said Grandma would always
answer questions.
And I sez, “Grandma can’t answer this question, Jack.” And then I
tried to explain it to him as well as I could how part of Grandma,
the best part, her life and soul, had gone up into heaven, and he
would find it there some day. Tegus wuz the questions he put to me,
but I buckled on my boddist waist of duty and tried to answer ’em,
and he went to bed quite clever.
I went up into the room and helped him ondress and hearn him tell
his prayers, and tucked him up and left him with a warm good-night
kiss and went below to git Delight ready for bed. And, oh, how
sweet she did look as she knelt in her little white nightgown, her
dimpled hands clasped on my knee, and her great, big, innocent eyes
lookin’ up into my face and through it, searchin’ for the Eternal
Good she was addressin’! I wuz waitin’ to hear her commence, my
Josiah lookin’ on admirin’ly from the other side of the hearth.
When all of a sudden she broke out, all of a sudden like, and, sez
she:
“Oh, before I forgit it, Lord, I want to tell you.”
Josiah made a horrified exclamation as if he wuz shocked beyond all
account, and would have stopped her. But I gin him a warnin’ look
and let her go on. “Before I say my prayers, dear Lord, I want to
tell you that I wuz a selfish little girl yesterday morning, and I
want you to help me; I want you to help me special to be a generous
little girl, and I will help you, too, or mebby I won’t.”
[Illustration: I WENT UP INTO THE ROOM AND HELPED HIM ONDRESS, AND
HEARN HIM TELL HIS PRAYERS.
_Page 220._]
Here Josiah fairly throwed up his hands and sez, “Samantha Allen,
this is goin’ too fur; I won’t set still and see irreverence goin’
on in my house. She must not be allowed to say such things. I speak
as a deacon,” sez he, lookin’ some big. And it wuz to think on a
dretful speech to make, tellin’ the Lord that mebby she would help
Him and mebby she wouldn’t. It sounded strange and bad, and if
I had hushed her up and rebuked her chillin’ly we should always
thought she wuz irreverent and irreligious; but I felt that there
wuz sunthin’ to the bottom of it more than she could with her small
stock of language readily make known. And I gin my pardner a
deep look as much as to say, “Keep still, Josiah Allen,” and then I
bent over Delight and sez:
“What do you mean, Delight, by sayin’ mebby I won’t? That don’t
sound jest right, sweetheart; you know you are talkin’ to the One
Highest and Best, who made you and keeps you alive and who loves
you better even than grandma duz. You must be very true and lovin’
and humble when you talk to Him.”
“Well, that is what I mean. If I told a wrong story to you it
wouldn’t be so bad as if I told it to God, would it?”
“No, I don’t know that it would,” sez I candidly.
“Well, I wuz so ’fraid I would tell one to Him if I said right out
I would help Him.”
And I sez gently, “Tell me all about it, Delight.”
“Well, yesterday mornin’ I took the biggest pear on the table, and
papa said I wuz gettin’ to be a selfish little girl, and he felt
bad about it. I told him I would tell the Lord all about it, and
I guessed He would make me better. I said I would ask him special
to, and I would help Him. But I forgot to ask Him last night, and I
thought mebby I would forgit and do something jest as bad, and that
would be tellin’ a wrong story to the Lord, wouldn’t it? And so I
thought I would say p’rhaps I wouldn’t, so He wouldn’t be sprized
if I forgot and wuzn’t jest good, don’t you see?”
“Yes,” sez I, “Grandma sees jest how it wuz,” and I cast a
triumphant look onto my pardner, but he, too, wuz lookin’ perfectly
happy and contented, and so Delight told her little prayers, “Our
Father,” and “Now I lay me,” and ended up with:
“God bless Papa and Mama, and Grandma and Grandpa, and Uncle Tom
and Aunt Maggie, and little Snow, and don’t forgit, please,
please, please, dear Lord, to make me good, and don’t let me forgit
it, and don’t let me forgit I want to be good when I git to playin’
with Jack and he plagues me, and bless Jack, amen.”
And I took her in my arms and put her to bed after I had held her
down to kiss her Grandpa, bless her sweet face! I laid her in her
little crib and kissed her more’n a dozen times, and she me; and
when I went back into the settin’ room I sez to Josiah, “If there
wuz ever a deep religious prayer, that wuz.”
“Yes,” sez he; “it wuz a prayer any minister might be proud on.”
“To think,” sez I, “of her bein’ so conscientious, so ’fraid of
lyin’ to the Lord; and think of all the long, long vows we have
heard to meetin’ with no idee they would be kep’ and wuzn’t kep’.”
“Yes,” sez he, “it wuz a powerful effort. I never see the beat
on’t, and I’ve been deacon goin’ on twenty years.”
“And then,” sez I, “to think of her honesty and the depth of the
idee of wantin’ Him to help her not to forgit that she wanted to
be good when she got to playin’ with Jack and he plagued her. She
felt how different it wuz to want to be good in the quiet and rest
of prayer time to what it wuz when took up with the cares of the
day and the happiness and selfishness of playin’ with Jack. She wuz
afraid, that little creeter wuz, that she would forgit that she
wanted to be good when took up with her playthings or when he wuz
plaguin’ her, jest as we be time and agin, Josiah Allen, when we
git so burdened with the cares of this world or took up with its
playthings that we most forgit that we want to be good.”
“Yes,” sez Josiah, “I hain’t heard anything more edifyin’ since I
jined the meetin’ house.”
Josiah Allen is very sound, and what I admire in that man, what
makes him so different from most grandparents, is that he hain’t
blinded at all by his love for Delight; he sees clear just how fur
above other children she is, and deep, and I am jest so.
CHAPTER XVI.
The next mornin’ wuz fair and pleasant, and we got a good, early
start. We went with the democrat, and Jack wuz goin’ to set between
us after we left Delight; we put in her little willer chair in
front, and Jack sot in that till we left her.
I had put on my second best black alpaca dress and my black bunnet
that I had mourned for Mother Allen in; it wuz jest as good as it
ever wuz. Mournin’ for a mother-in-law hain’t so hard on clothes as
mournin’ for your own parents. It wuz real fashionable in shape,
for you know fashions come round agin in jest about so long a time,
and I had kep’ this in a bandbox for years and years, till, lo and
behold! time, that had rolled round and round, had rolled this
right into fashion agin. It wuz a kind of poke, but not too pokey.
I also wore my black shawl I had mourned in, jest as good as new,
the nap not took off a mite. I didn’t wear my crape veil, thinkin’
I didn’t want to look as if I wuz mournin’ too much, but I wanted
to be jest right for a connection of the Bodleys by marriage.
Josiah acted kinder sot about dressin’ for the funeral. He would
wear his pepper and salt suit. I told him it didn’t look half so
well as black at a funeral.
“Well,” sez he, “I hain’t a-goin’ to mourn much.”
Sez I, “You could jest as well mourn what you calculate to in a
black suit as a gray one.”
But, no, he would do jest as he wanted to, and contended that he
should wear it, for he didn’t lay out to mourn a great deal. He
said they wuzn’t any real relation to us, and they wuz on my side
what they wuz, and, sez he, “I lay out to wear a pale-blue necktie.”
But I broke that up. He couldn’t find it at the last minute, and
had to wear a black one. Jack had on his little blue suit, but I
tied a black ribbon round his neck under his collar; he looked
good, anyway. We left Delight to home and went on, with Jack
settin’ between us and askin’ questions most all the time.
We got to the house about half-past ten--the funeral wuz at eleven.
We could told the house anyway, there wuz so many teams standin’
round the door and in front of the barn, and horses hitched all
along the fence, and they had took down a length of fence by the
orchard and lots of teams wuz hitched in there. There wuz top
buggies, one or two autos, democrats, double wagons with chairs in
’em for seats, and one or two buckboards and some bicycles leanin’
aginst the piazza steps. There wuz lots of folks present; Grandma
Bodley wuz respected.
We went through the front door into the big, lonesome-lookin’ hall,
the light comin’ through fanlights by the side and over the door
with narrer green paper curtains in front of ’em. The parlor and
settin’ room wuz to each side of the hall, and to the end of it
wuz a big, old-fashioned kitchen, part of it carpeted, which they
used for a winter dining room; the summer kitchen wuz back on’t.
The chairs wuz all put in the parlor--where the body wuz--for the
family to set on, and in the settin’ room and kitchen long boards
wuz put, the ends layin’ on kags and sap buckets. And the neighbors
had filled these seats full, for in such lonesome neighborhoods a
funeral is about the only break in the monotony of life, and they
are attended with avidity.
Jest as we went in the hall Hamen and his wife come down the front
stairs. She wuz dressed in deep black from head to foot, and had a
long crape veil she had borrowed for the occasion over her face,
and a black-bordered handkerchief. She looked real smart, havin’
forgot herself and her various diseases in the sad excitement of
the occasion. Alzina follered her, dressed in a dark alpacky, her
usual dress which she wore whilst she wuz tuggin’ along takin’ care
of the deceased day and night; but her eyes wuz red and swelled up
with weepin’, and she wuz real pale. I wuz sorry for Alzina. Anna
and Cicero follered, and then the other married sister and her
children, and then Grandma Bodley’s brother’s family, and other
distant relations. I laid out to fall into the procession long to
the last of it, but at the last minute I missed Josiah, and found
him in the settin’ room settin’ on a board near the door, and I
whispered to him and told him to come on into the parlor.
And he whispered back, “I told you I wuzn’t goin’ to mourn much,
and I hain’t.” I couldn’t move him no more than I could the board
he wuz settin’ on. But for the sake of decency and on Jack’s
account I went into the parlor with him, but I sot down pretty nigh
the door so as to compromise between my partner and duty.
Well, the sermon wuz pretty long, but scriptural, no doubt; it was
a bashful young preacher, and his first funeral sermon, almost his
first sermon at all; and then I guess the singin’ onnerved him--it
wuz dretful. The hymn wuz Grandma Bodley’s favorite, and chose by
Alzina:
“There is a calm for those who weep,
A rest for weary pilgrims found.
They calmly lie and sweetly sleep,
Low in the ground, low in the ground.”
But all the while they wuz singin’ I kep’ on thinkin’ that Grandma
Bodley wuz too good a woman and too good a Christian to have such
singin’ over her. It sot all the mourners off to cryin’, and no
wonder. They had a squeaky old melodeon that Tamer learned to play
on when she wuz a child, and a neighborin’ girl that played by ear
played on it; and the singers bein’ picked up that day as they come
in from different townships, they flatted and sharped them poor
hims in a way that wuz perfectly dretful; but I thought to myself,
poor Grandma has got where she can’t hear it, and this word come
right into my mind, “Blessed are the dead.”
Well, there bein’ no regular undertaker, the bashful young
minister, after the last him wuz sung, give a notice that wuz
dretful mixed up, and sounded more as if he had invited the corpse
to walk round and view the congregation than visey versey. A way
wuz cleared round the coffin, and the folks from the kitchin all
filed in first and walked round the coffin and then went out
through the parlor bedroom door into the kitchen and outdoors,
and then the folks in the settin’ room did the same, and then the
mourners.
Jack, the first minute he got a chance, squeezed in in front of
all the rest and wouldn’t move on. Grandma Bodley looked calm and
peaceful; she had lived a Christian and died one, and the peace
of God wuz wrote down on her forward. Her lips and eyes that had
smiled so many times on less happy souls wuz closed peaceful. Her
hands, that had gin blessin’s and help to so many emptier hands,
wuz folded, and she looked glad to be at rest. But Jack kep’ eyin’
her so with such a strange, searchin’ look it made me feel queer.
Grandma looked so peaceful and Jack so watchful of her I felt
curious and couldn’t deny it. After all the rest had gone out he
kep’ up that same stiddy watchin’, and he not sayin’ anything, nor
she nuther.
Well, way along that evenin’ when we had got back from the funeral,
for I told Tamer the house wuz so full I would take Jack home with
me agin, and after we had had supper, and it wuz gittin’ along most
bedtime, Jack come up and laid his head aginst my shoulder and sez:
“Aunt Samantha, I didn’t miss anything.”
Sez I, “What do you mean, Jack?”
“I wuz on the lookout to-day, and I couldn’t see that anything wuz
gone. You know you said part of grandma had gone to Heaven, and
I kep’ a good watch all day, and I couldn’t see but what she wuz
all there; her head wuz there, and her hands, and I couldn’t see a
thing wuz missin’, unless it wuz her tongue. I didn’t see that, but
I spozed it wuz in her mouth, she most always kep’ it there, and I
can’t make out what you meant, for you always are shure nuff; you
don’t fool anybody as most everybody duz.”
And then I had to go all over the ground agin and tried to be
patient, and bein’ on a solemn and grand subject, onbeknown to
myself I soared a little and spoke of the happy angels who had come
down from their blest abode to take dear Grandma home. And Jack
interrupted me with big shinin’ eyes:
“Do you spoze if I had been there I could have seen ’em?”
“No, Jack, I am afraid not. I am afraid we hain’t good enough.”
“Don’t you believe if I wuz dretful, awful good I could see the tip
end of one of ’em?” And here he branched off. “I heard mother say
she wuz goin’ to carry some flowers to put on the grave. She wuz
cryin’ and said it wuz because Grandma loved ’em. And I want to
take over a little mite of Bologna sassige and put on the grave;
Grandma loved it; she said she loved it better than most anything,
and I do, too. Can’t I take a little mite over, Aunt Samantha?”
And I told him, “No, that dear Grandma had gone where she had
divine food, and would never be hungry agin; she had everything
that wuz most beautiful and blessed.”
“Well, what makes mother carry the flowers?”
And I sez, “It will make your mother feel better, Jack, that’s all.”
“Well, it would make me feel better to carry the b’lona. What’s the
difference?” And I sithed and wuz at my wits’ end to explain the
difference to him, and don’t spoze I did after all my outlay of
breath, and, as Jack said, what wuz the difference? And I repeated
it to myself as I wuz ondressin’ goin’ to bed--“What wuz the
difference?”
And Josiah thought I wuz talkin’ to him, and sez, “What? There
hain’t any.”
And I replied to myself, for the subject hanted me, “But it would
be a town’s talk.”
And Josiah said, “What of it? What if it wuz? The town don’t know
everything.” And he wuz half asleep and didn’t know what he wuz
talkin’ and disputin’ about, nor I nuther, and we settin’ ourselves
up and callin’ ourselves smart. Well, though it is like hitchin’
the democrat to the old mare’s foretop for a few minutes, I spoze
I might as well tell what Jack told me afterwards how it come out.
He couldn’t seem to give up the idee of carryin’ that sassige,
and next time he see his ma carryin’ some flowers to put on the
grave, posies, too, that his Grandma couldn’t bear the smell of
when she wuz alive, said they made her sick (she never cared much
for flowers of any kind, wuz dretful practical and had cabbages and
onions growin’ right up to the front door), but Tamer wuz bound to
carry some, thinkin’ it looked well, I spoze, and agin Jack tackled
her about the sassige. Sez he, “Grandma loved it better than she
did flowers enough sight,” and his mother told him to stop such
talking instantly.
And then sez Jack, “I got mad and told her I would take some, and
then mother said she would whip me if I mentioned the subject agin;
and then I sez, ‘B’lona,’ and then she did whip me hard. Grandma
wouldn’t have done it,” sez Jack, “and I loved her, and I’ve heard
her say lots of times that children ort to have their rights, and I
can’t see why I can’t carry over sunthin’ to lay on Grandma’s grave
jest as well as all the rest. I would love to carry some yarn, she
wuz always knittin’. She would cry if she got out of yarn, and Ma
knows it, and I wanted to carry over a little skein of blue and
white yarn, jest the color she loved best, but Ma said she would
whip me if I took a inch of yarn there, and there it is. I can’t do
nothin’ I want to.”
And Jack whimpered a little, and I sez to him soothin’ly, “Never
mind, Jack, Grandma knows you love her, and she loves you jest as
well as she ever did, and better.” And I spoze I talked to him
over an hour on the subject, and spozed he had forgot all about
ornamentin’ the grave, he had begun to look considerable bright,
when all of a sudden he broke out real confidential: “Don’t you
think it would be a good plan if I took over a little mite of
cheese? Grandma wuz dretful fond of sage cheese.”
Oh, dear me! I had to go all over the hull ground agin, it took
sights of patience and breath.
But to reckon backwards. That night after Grandma Bodley’s funeral
there come up a heavy thunder shower, and I hearn Jack call out; he
slept out of our room in Delight’s little crib that night, and I
got up and went to him to try to soothe him, and I sez:
“Jack, are you afraid?”
His head wuz way down under the bedclothes, I could only see
the ends of one or two curly locks, and I sez agin, still more
soothin’ly:
“Can’t you trust the hand, Jack, that leads you through fair days?
That same hand is leadin’ you through storms, Jack; can’t you trust
Him?”
And Jack answered from way down under the bedclothes, “I am
trusting Him jest as hard as I can, Aunt Samantha, and I am most
skairt to death.”
Thinks I to myself how much like old believers that is: we trust
the Lord jest as hard as we can, and yet oft-times we are most
skairt to death
“When any waves of trouble rise
Acrost our peaceful breasts.”
Well, Hamen and Tamer stopped for Jack a few days after that; they
had stayed a day or two with Alzina to help her settle things.
They offered her a home with them, so Tamer said, and she thought
it wuz very foolish and onreasonable in her to stay there in that
big house all alone when she stood ready to give her a home and do
everything for her. And I told her I presumed Alzina would ruther
be independent.
“Independent, Samantha? I don’t know what you mean. I guess my
sister would feel independent in my house; it would be her home
jest as much as it is mine. Of course, I should’nt have to keep a
girl if she lived with me, for I know she would want to take hold
and help me; she would feel better for it; but she would have a
good home and some one to take care of her.” But, thinkses I, take
it with all that housework, and sinevetus and basler mengetus, and
dime novels shadin’ the background, Alzina wuz wise to stay under
her own hop vine and apple tree, but I didn’t say any more, for I
felt it wuzn’t my place.
I hated to have Jack go, and he cried, but Tamer said he might
come down agin before long, and she asked me if I wouldn’t go with
her before long and visit with her cousin Celestine, Uncle Submit
Smith’s girl, a widder with one child, who wuz home on a visit. And
I told her I would if I possibly could.
CHAPTER XVII.
Josiah had to go to Jonesville that afternoon after necessaries,
and I sot all alone in my cheerful kitchen almost lost in a
train of pleasant thoughts, and some sort o’ pensive ones, and
at the same time windin’ a skein of blue-and-white clouded yarn
for Josiah’s socks, when I hearn a little rap at the side door
and opened it, and see to my surprise Miss Greene Smythe’s black
coachman, Pompey, who handed me a note from his mistress, sayin’
she wanted me to answer it, so I told him to come in and sot him
a chair. He stood by it, twiddlin’ his cap round in his hands and
hesitatin’, but on my tellin’ him agin to set, he sot. Sidled down
into the chair, settin’ on the extreme edge of it.
And I took out my readin’ specks and opened the note; it wuz big
and square, and had a curious-lookin’ seal on the back, with some
strange figgers and a word or two on’t, but it didn’t seem to be
spelt right; I couldn’t make out what it meant; it wuz sunthin’
like this, Astra Castra Numan luman.
But if she meant anything about castor oil or somebody by the
name of Newman, anybody could see that there wuzn’t any spellin’
to it. But then, I sez to myself as I read it, though I pity such
a speller, let me not be hauty because I have had advantages and
spelt down the school repeatedly.
So I opened the letter. It wuz a invitation for me to attend a
bazar for the benefit of the heathen at her boarding place. But,
good land! it wuz two or three weeks off, and I wondered if she
thought it would take all that time for me to do up my work and git
ready. I thought she little knew my faculty in turnin’ off work if
she did. But then I meditated mebby she thought I would have to fix
over my black alpacky dress, or bind my flannel petticoat; anyway,
I spozed it wuz all well enough.
I thought I would try to go if I could, and sot down to write her
a note, and thought I would write it as near like hers as I could,
spozin’ hers wuz in the height of fashion. But on runnin’ it over
in my mind whether I could go or not, I remembered jest in the nick
of time that wuz just about the time our old hen turkey would come
off; it ort to come off the day before, but might hang fire. She
wuz settin’ on nineteen eggs under the horse barn, and I wouldn’t
run the chance of her streakin’ off to the swamp with all them
young turkeys, party or no party, so, as I didn’t want her to git
up no false hopes, I wrote:
“Josiah Allen’s wife and Josiah presents their compliments
to Miss Greene Smythe, and they will be happy to visit her
on date mentioned if their old hen turkey hatches at the
time it ort to, and they spoze it will.
“Yours truly,
“JOSIAH ALLEN’S WIFE.”
And then, as I see she had put in a lot of letters on one side to
kinder ornament it off, “R. S. V. P.”
And I spoze she meant Remember Samantha--V--sunthin’ or ruther to
my Pardner. I couldn’t make out what that V did mean; mebby she
meant to hint that my pardner wuz voyalent sometimes. But, good
land! I thought that if I had been throwed round as she had by
companions, I wouldn’t go to hintin’ about somebody else’s pardner;
but, howsumever, I don’t know as that wuz what she did mean; but,
’tennyrate, the letters strung out so did look kinder noble, and
I thought I would put on more than she did, both for looks and
meanin’, so I put on mine, “W. C. I. T. C. O. B.”
And, bein’ one that means to be square and aboveboard even in
fashionable correspondence, I put on in a postscript the meanin’ of
the letters--“We’ll come if turkey comes off before.”
So, fashion and duty bein’ both tended to, I handed the note to
Pompey, done up in a good, large, yeller envelope, such as Josiah
uses in the cheese factory, for I see that fashion demanded a
larger one than I used in ordinary, and then I went into the pantry
and brought out a plate of fried cakes and cream cheese for him,
and he seemed real tickled; he knew the taste of my fried cakes,
for I had gin him some before when he had been down on errents for
Miss Greene Smythe, and after he had eat the cakes and cheese up to
the last crumb, he sot there still and twiddled his tall hat in his
hand and seemed to be wantin’ to ask me sunthin’ but wuz afraid to,
and finally, to relieve his misery, which wuz evident, I sez:
“Is there anything else you wanted, Pompey?”
And then it all come out. He wanted me to write a letter for him
to his sweetheart in old Virginia. He said they wuz engaged; he
wuz goin’ to marry her when he went back home, and he had lots of
things to tell her. He apoligized almost abjectly for askin’ me to
write, but he said he might as well ask the Mornin’ Star to write
for him as either of his ladies, they wuz so high and mighty,
never speaking’ to him only to order him round.
Well, I told him I would write the letter, and I walked up to the
mantery piece agin and took down my pen and ink, and got out a
sheet of paper. He told me while I wuz makin’ my preparations that
he couldn’t write yet, but he said proudly he could read, he had
read a little book all though, mighty good readin’ in it, too, he
said.
Well, I read it out as I commenced it, “Jonesville, July 17th,” but
he stopped me and sez: “I don’t want that on, anyway.”
Sez I, “Why not?”
“Oh, my folks won’t know nothin’ about Jonesville; begin it
Chicago; she’s got a brudder dere.”
“But I can’t, Pompey; I must begin it where you are; it isn’t
proper to begin it Chicago.”
“Well, den, c’mence dat lettah Bermudy Islands; she’s got a uncle
dar.”
“Why, I can’t. You don’t live anywhere nigh Bermuda Islands.”
“Dat makes no diffunce, Miss Allen; I want dat lettah from
somewheah they will know about. She’s done got folks in both dem
places, and she’ll know about ’em.”
Well, I couldn’t persuade him to have it Jonesville, so I
comprimised on New York, for, thinkses I, it is in New York, and
it won’t be lyin’, anyway; and I sez, “Now, Pompey, what shall I
write?”
“Begin it, ‘Strong drink is ragin’.’”
“Why,” sez I, “you don’t want that in a letter.”
“Yes, I do; I read it in my own little book. She’ll know jest how
high learnt I am when she sees dat.”
Well, thinkses I, it is good readin’ anyhow, so I put it down. And
he went on:
“At de las’ it stingeth like a laddah.”
But I jest contended on that, sez I, “Why, ladders can’t sting; it
hain’t their nater.”
Sez he, “Dey can, for my book sez so.”
“Why,” sez I, “how can anything sting that hain’t got any stingers?”
But he contended till I wuz wore out and thought I would put
down things jest as he told me, but I spelt it onbeknown to him
a-d-d-e-r, I would. That letter wuz the moralist letter that I ever
see, but the curiousest, every word of it wuz took from the school
book he had learnt by heart, and it ended up with “Go to the ant,
thou sluggard.” The curiousest love letter I ever see or expect to.
But it suited Pompey, and if a bo, black or white, is suited with
the letter he sends his girl, that is all that can be expected or
desired. He told me to direct it to
“Priscilla Dinah Bones,
“Ole Foginnia.”
And I hope it got there. I tried hard to have him tell me where in
Virginia Miss Bones lived.
But he said everybody would know her, ole Foginnia wuz the place
she lived in, and he wouldn’t direct it anywhere else.
So I directed it Virginia, but I left off the Old, I would.
CHAPTER XVIII.
Well, Tamer and I had it all planned to go to Uncle Submit’s whilst
Celestine wuz there with her little girl, but at the last minute a
letter come from Tamer askin’ me if I wouldn’t come there and visit
with Celestine, as she had concluded to invite her there instead of
our goin’ to see her. There wuz some views, Tamer said, about their
house that Celestine wanted to paint, and had jest as good as told
her it would be more agreeable for us all to visit there than at
Uncle Submit’s. “Pretty cool in Celestina,” sez Tamer.
She always put on the “teeny,” but, good land! I didn’t. I knew she
wuz named Celestine after old Aunt Celestine Butterick. I wuzn’t
goin’ to add or diminish from that good old creeter’s name, so I
always called her Celestine.
Well, Tamer went on to say that, though it wuz pretty cool in
Celestina, but jest like her for all the world, mebby it would
be better for us to meet there, as Uncle Submit and Aunt Eunice
wuz kinder childish and mebby so many visitors would upset ’em,
and Celestina is all took up with her painting, and hain’t any
housekeeper, and the hired girl is a real shiftless one. And sez
Tamer, “Be sure you come prepared to stay a week, the children are
jest cryin’ to have you come. Anna sez, ‘Tell Aunt Samantha she
must stay a week anyway,’ and Jack has wrote you a letter which
I enclose in this. Cicero would send a message, but he is dretful
carried away with a new book he has borrowed, a splendid book, ‘The
Serpent Enchantress; or, The Doomed Fly-Away,’ it is perfectly
fascinating. I set up last night until four o’clock finishin’ it.”
I gin a deep sithe as I read this sentence. The letter closed with
another urgent request for to come when she give me warnin’, she
would write the day Celestina come, she said, and it ended
“Yours with devoted love,
“TAMER SMITH.”
I laid down her epistle and took up Jack’s, it wuz printed in
big letters, and the page wuz as full of love and longin’ to see
me as it wuz with smears and ink blots, and that is goin’ to the
very extent of describin’ the love it contained. Bless his dear
little warm heart! Well, I spozed I should have to go but thought
I wouldn’t talk it over with Josiah till the day drawed near, not
wantin’ to precipitate trouble onto him till it wuz necessary, and
I knew well how wedded he wuz to my presence.
And the next day I begun quietly and prudently to prepare for the
great Charity Bazar of Miss Greene Smythe’s. I bound over my best
woosted petticoat that wuz some frayed out round the bottom, and
mended a few broken places in the tattin’ that trimmed my white
one. I took the lace out of the neck and sleeves of my gray woosted
dress, which I laid out to wear instead of my black alpacky,
thinkin’ it looked more gay and cheerful and more adapted to the
requirements of a fashionable party in high life, I washed the lace
carefully and did it up and put it back, crimpin’ it on the edge
as I did so. I pondered on the enigma some time whether I should
look too gay, and go beyend the other church members present, if I
pinned on in front a satin bow of kinder pink ribbon that Maggie
had gin me, I held it up to the dress and see in the lookin’-glass
it looked well, but mebby a little too flantin’ and frivolous, so I
laid it back agin in the draw and made up my mind I would wear my
good old cameo pin, knowin’ that wuz safe for a Methodist member to
wear anyway, and I didn’t want to cause comments or roust up the
envy and jealousy of the other females present.
Anon and pretty soon the night come for the great Bazar for that
Heathen, and Josiah and I started in good season, for we didn’t
want the mair and colt to be hurried, nor be hurried ourselves. We
started about half-past four P. M. I got a early breakfast that
mornin’ a-purpose to git a early dinner so’s to git a early supper.
We eat supper a quarter past four P. M. with our things all on, and
I packed up the dishes in the sink, which I seldom do, but felt
that this wuz a extra occasion, and I didn’t want to wash dishes
with my mantilly on, the tabs dribblin’ down into the water.
Well, to go by the crossroad leading to Zoar and turnin’ off by the
Cobble Stun schoolhouse, it is only five milds to Edgewater, where
Miss Greene Smythe boards for the summer. The big summer hotel
there has as much as twenty acres of land round it, all full of
trees and windin’ walks and summerhousen, and hammocks and swings
and posy beds, and croquet grounds and baseball grounds, where they
kick each other about and lame themselves and break bones, and be
jest as fashionable as they can be, and have everything else for
their comfort. And in front of all is the clear, blue waters of
the lake, with boathousen and little boats floatin’ on the surface
jest like a flock of white geese down to our pond.
As we driv onto the grounds on a broad gravel walk with brilliant
posy beds on each side on’t, I see closter to the house a hull lot
of men fixin’ a big tent with flags on’t and puttin’ out rows of
little lanterns on strings leadin’ from one tree to another and
standin’ out a hull lot of evergreen trees round the big tent and a
lot of smaller ones.
The mair sort o’ pricked up its ears at the sight of so many
strange things, but kep’ right along on the path like the well
principled mair she is. But the colt bein’ younger and not so
way-wised, and I don’t believe havin’ the good principle her Ma
has, or ever will have, though Josiah sez she is likelier fur than
her Ma wuz at her age. But, ’tennyrate she made a dash into the
thickest of the crowd, and it wuzn’t till three waiters had been
upsot, by bein’ taken in their back onexpected, that my pardner
succeeded in catchin’ it. By this time the colt bein’ tangled
in the line of lanterns and one foot ketched in the rope of
evergreens, she stood still whinnerin’. And the waiters cussin’ and
swearin’ fearful, and my pardner goin’ as fur that way as he dast
with his professions and religion. He did say “dum” repeatedly,
and “gracious Heavens!” and “gracious Peter!” and all these milder
terms a deacon can use and not call it swearin’. And I, holdin’ the
mair, some excited but keepin’ my conscientiousness pretty well,
when a man come runnin’ out from the hotel that seemed to be in
authority and he quickly loosed the bands of that colt, and sent
the cussin’ waiters about their bizness and advanced onto me, it
wuz the landlord, Mr. Grabhull, I knowed him and he knowed me, and
he wuz real polite, though he looked cross as a bear, I must say.
And he asked me if I wouldn’t alight, and if he couldn’t help me.
And, thinkin’ I might as well, seein’ I had got there, I did alight
and git down, but refused his help, backin’ out and gittin’ down
myself with some trouble, for the steps of the democrat are high,
and I always use a chair to home to step down on, but wouldn’t ask
him for one if I had fell out, thinkin’ we had made him enough
trouble already. But the height wuz precipitous and I felt giddy,
and, when at last my feet struck solid ground I sez, instinctively,
and onbeknown to myself:
“Thank Heaven, as the man said, that my feet are once more on visey
versey.” And then, to let him know at once why we wuz there, I took
my card of invitation out of my pocket, and sez:
“We have come to Miss Greene Smythe’s Bazar for that Heathen.”
“Oh, yes,” sez he, “and you would like to see her, wouldn’t you!”
And I sez, “Yes.” And he turned towards a more secluded corner nigh
to the lake, and I ketched sight of Miss Greene Smythe settin’ in a
hammock with three young men hoverin’ round her like small planets
round the sun. Them Danglers I had hearn on, I felt sure from
their looks, they looked sort o’ danglin’ somehow. Two of ’em wore
white flannel and the other dark-blue woolen, with light-yellowish
colored shues on all on ’em, kinder slips like, one on ’em had a
banjo in his hand and one on ’em seemed to be singin’.
She wuz dressed in white, with a great broad hat all covered with
white feathers and streamers and things, and her dress wuz white,
too, and she wuz layin’ back in the hammock on some gay-colored
cushions as easy as you please, and one of them Danglers had a big
fan and wuz fannin’ her. But even as I looked that colt broke away
from the landlord, and, bein’ skairt most to death, jest bounded
into that peaceful group and scattered it like chaff before a
whirlwind. She upset the feller with the banjo, steppin’ right into
the fiddle as she jumped clean over the hammock, one heel kickin’
off and goin’ through that great white hat, and stepped into the
stomach of the dangler who held the fan and broke off the feller’s
song right in the most effective place, for he wuz jest singin’ in
a deep beartone:
“Come where my love lies dreaming.”
And, as if in answer, the colt come, one foot come square down
into them dreams, if she wuz dreamin’, and tore off more than five
yards of lace and ribbons, whilst the other one took off the big
hat, as I said, amidst her loud screams. My first thought wuz she
would have a coniption fit, and even in that minute, so practical
is my mind, I wondered what I should do without catnip or burnt
feathers. But even as I thought this she turned towards me and
see who I wuz and what had caused the fracas, for Josiah and the
landlord wuz follerin’ on in hot pursuit, whilst the old mair stood
in the background whinnerin’ to her colt, either in encouragement
or remonstrance, I couldn’t tell which.
Miss Greene Smythe looked cross enough to eat a file at that first
look, but immegiately the young men sprung up, one gathered up her
laces and ribbons and placed ’em in her hands, another her fan and
book, and, though I am ready to testify that that first look she
gin me wuz mad as a-settin’ hen with a brindle dog round, before I
could hardly git the run of that look and set it down in my mind
memorandum, she put on a dretful warm smile, yet as queer lookin’
as any I ever see, and I have seen queer lookin’ smiles in my day
and gin ’em, too, yes, indeed! and she come forward, holdin’ out
her hand with the lace and ribbin danglin’ from it, and sez she,
“How good of you to come, you will spend the day with me, won’t
you?”
“Spend the day!” sez I, agast at the idee; “why, we have come to
your reception and Bazar for that Heathen, but if I had knowed
how that colt wuz goin’ to act we would tied it to the fills, we
couldn’t leave it to home, for it hain’t weaned. I feel mortified
and sorry to think it pitched into you so, and upset them
Danglers,” I wuz jest a-goin’ to say, but bethought myself and sez,
“them young chaps, I feel dretful sorry, and am willin’ to repair
damages jest so fur as I can. I’ll give you one of my hats; and
that fiddle,” sez I, “if it needs new strings I stand ready to git
’em, we have got more cats than we need round the barn, and I can
furnish a dozen strings as well as not, and I’ll tell the young man
so.” And I advanced towards ’em.
But she hurriedly drawed me off the other way, and sez she real
warm, “How good of you, how extremely good of you to stay to the
reception!” And then she sez, lookin’ round sort o’ helplessly and
mournfully towards the Danglers, and then at me agin:
“You--oh!--let me see--yes--you come right up into my room, and
dear Mr. Allen must come into the reading room. They have caught
the colt, I see; I will rejoin you in a minute.”
And she slipped back to say a few words to them deserted Danglers,
who looked as helpless and queer as planets might look when through
some upheaval the sun wuz suddenly removed, and they wuz left
hangin’ round in space with nothin’ to revolve round. I thought I
hearn her say sunthin’ about havin’ to git a little rest, anyway;
the idee I thought of anybody goin’ to bed at that time of day,
and sunthin’ about seein’ ’em all to-night, and then she said she
wouldn’t say good-by, but awe revoir, and they all said it to
her, shakin’ hands with her and hangin’ over her hand as if they
wuz goin’ to the fur Injys as missionaries liable to be eat up by
savages, never to see her agin.
I spoze they referred to the “awe” they felt in seein’ a young colt
like that so uncommon active, what the “revoir” meant I don’t
know, unless it wuz some man by that name who owned a colt not
nigh so smart as ourn. Yes, indeed, that colt well merits Josiah’s
enconiums so fur as smartness is concerned. He had led Mr. Grabhull
and Josiah a tegus chase, but at last, as I could see, glancin’
towards the lake, Josiah Allen had got a firm grip onto his mane
and wuz leadin’ him back, still wearin’ the hat on his foreleg
instead of his foretop. The hat wuz spilte.
The smartest creeters have their limitations. That colt could make
light of Danglers and fashionable wimmen, step through their hats,
tromple on ’em and leap over ’em, scatter ’em like leaves in a high
gale, but when he come bunt up aginst the lake and whinnered at
it, and it still lay calm and smooth before him and wuzn’t danted,
he gin up that the lake wuz too big a job for him to tackle and
subdue, so he stood quite meek and wuz ketched. Presently the
cavalcade drawed nigh to us, and Miss Greene Smythe repeated her
invitation that dear Mr. Allen must come right into the reading
room, where he would find all the last papers.
“Is the World there?” sez Josiah, prickin’ up his ears at the idee,
he wuz all tuckered out and wanted to set down and rest. “Oh, yes,”
sez she, “the Weekly, the Daily, and the Sunday World. I will have
a couple of waiters bring those papers to you,” sez she.
“Yes,” sez I, “they are hefty.”
Well, I see that Josiah wuz full of happiness in a quiet corner
of that big readin’ room overlookin’ the lake, for there wuzn’t
hardly a soul in it at that time, and his beloved papers stacked
up in front of him some like a small haystack, he wuz fairly
overrunnin’ with contentment. Mr. Grabhull had led the colt towards
the stables, havin’ persuaded it to lay off its hat, and one of the
waiters wuz leadin’ the old mair.
Then I turned and silently follered Miss Greene Smythe up to her
room. Lots of men wuz to work hangin’ draperies and puttin’ flowers
up on the walls, and strings of evergreens and ribbins and makin’
it dretful pretty. But Miss Greene Smythe led the way through
’em all into what she called her boodore, and there she gin me a
rockin’ chair and I sot down, she asked me to lay off my things,
but I told her I guessed I wouldn’t take off my bunnet, bein’ as I
would have to put it on so quick, but I loosened the strings and
took off my mantilly, carefully foldin’ the tabs as I did so and
holdin’ it in my lap. She called a fashionably dressed girl with a
cap on, who wuz to work on a pile of satin drapery when we went in,
to come and take my mantilly. But I told her I jest as lives hold
it in my lap, as I should want to put it on so soon.
She looked sort o’ wonderin’ and went back to her work. I see, on
lookin’ closter, that it wuz a dress of pale-blue satin with a deep
velvet train, and she wuz puttin’ on the waist strings of gems of
all colors, and that skirt! I am tellin’ you the livin’ truth, that
velvet train wuz as long as from our bedroom to the parlor door,
and I d’no but it wuz as long as from our bedroom acrost the hall
into the spare room, ’tennyrate it wuz the longest skirt I ever see
or expect to see, all lined with pale-pink satin.
Miss Greene Smythe sez, “I am to be Queen Elizabeth in full court
dress. Here is my collar,” sez she, “and my crown,” and she
showed a immense collar of white lace and a crown all covered
with precious stuns in flowers and figgers, it fairly glittered
and shone like the posy bed in the early mornin’ when the dew is
shinin’ on it.
“I have combined,” sez she, “a Bazar, a reception, and a fancy
dress ball, for there will be dancing after supper is served.”
“What time is supper?” sez I, for I scented trouble ahead.
“Oh, about one,” sez she.
Sez I aghast, “Do you mean one o-clock at night?”
“Yes,” sez she.
“What time do you begin the doin’s?” sez I.
“Oh, the Bazar will be opened at ten, the reception at twelve, the
dancing beginning after supper, about two o-clock.”
“For the land’s sake!” sez I; “for the land’s sake!” and I leaned
back in my chair perfectly overcome by the programmy. And sez I,
“What time do you end up?”
“Oh, we may be through about sunrise, but if it is later it is no
matter, for the rooms will be darkened and we can dance until nine
o’clock, if we choose.”
I wuz speechless with my emotions; I couldn’t quell ’em and didn’t
want to, but Miss Greene Smythe didn’t notice ’em, for she seemed
all took up tellin’ her maid where to put the gorgeousest of the
gems she wuz sewin’ onto the satin, and then she sez sunthin’ about
seein’ Medora a minute and handed me a hull lapfull of books and
magazines, and sayin’ sunthin’ to the girl about refreshments, she
left the room. I wuz settin’ tryin’ to read them magazines she had
piled in my lap, but I didn’t git much interested in ’em, for they
wuz all about fashions and boleros, which I had always thought
wuz some kind of a Mexican steer, but found out it wuz sunthin’
to wear, and reveres, which sounded well, but meant fashionable
clothing, and so on lots of other strange names and descriptions,
but I didn’t care much for ’em.
Well, I had turned ’em over and had jest lit on sunthin’ so
important that they put it even into a fashionable magazine, a
long description of a football race and a college athletic contest
in which two young men had got maimed for life and one killed
outright, and more’n two hundred drunk as fools, and I wuz readin’
it with horrow when my companion come up crazy with a new idee, he
had heard there wuz goin’ to be a fancy ball, and he wanted to join
it in costoom and attend the ball.
Sez I, “Josiah Allen, I shall not stay here till twelve P. M., but,
if I wuz goin’, I should go as myself, and not as anybody else.”
“Why,” sez he, “the fancy dress is goin’ to be first. We can jine
in that and then go home, for I don’t want to dance,” sez he.
“I should think as much,” sez I coldly; “a deacon, and most dead
with rheumatiz, to say nothin’ of the grandchildren, why,” sez I,
“one pigeon wing, or one goin’ down through the middle, or all
hands round, would crumple you right up and be the death of you.”
“Well, I told you explicitly that I didn’t lay out to dance, nor
didn’t ask you to.”
Sez I coldly, “If you did it would be a outlay of politeness that
would be throwed away. Dance!” sez I, “when I can’t git up or set
down without groanin’, and my principles like iron.”
“Well, well, who said they wuzn’t? I told you we wouldn’t dance
this evenin’, but,” sez he impressively, “we can dress up fancy, or
I can, and swing out for once and be fashionable and gay.”
“I would like to know where you can git your things to swing out
in, and what character you would represent and what dress you would
go in.”
“Well,” sez he, crossin’ his legs and lookin’ real contented and
happy, “I thought I would go as a child.”
“As a child!” sez I, astounded at his idee.
“Yes,” sez he, “as a babe. I have planned it all out; I could
slip over to the store, this summer store they have got here to
accommodate the boarders, and buy twenty yards or so of sheetin’,
you could use it afterwards for sheets, you know, and you could
pin it onto me and tie it round the waist with a pale-blue sash. I
could buy a couple of yards of blue cambric and you could tear it
into, and tie it round my waist with a big bow, and there I would
be a babe.”
“What would you do with your whiskers?” sez I coldly. “And your
wrinkles and your gray bald head?”
“By Jimminy!” sez he, “I forgot them.”
He see himself, as quick as his attention wuz drawed to it, that a
babe in long white dresses ortn’t to have gray whiskers and a bald
head.
“Well,” sez he, “what do you say to a Pirate or a Bandit chief? I
could buy a piece of red and yeller creeton, figgered, and a piece
of striped for a sash. They’re always depictered in dime novels
as bein’ very dressy with feathers, and I could kinder jam in the
top of my hat and put some feathers in it, I could buy a couple of
turkey wings of Nate Enders, he deals in turkeys, and I have to go
most to his house to go to the store--what do you say, Samantha?
Or, would you go as a Shepherd Boy, or how would you go?”
I wuz wore out, and I sez, “I would go as a natteral fool, Josiah,
and you wouldn’t have to buy anything or change a mite to do it.”
“Yes, there it is; keep right on, I never knew it to fail in my
life; I never yet got a chance to enter fashionable life and show
off a little but you tried to break it up.” Sez he still more
pitiful, “I always wanted to look fancy, Samantha, and you’ve never
seemed willin’. I don’t say that you are jealous of my looks, for
I don’t think you are any such a woman, but I will say it looks
queer, but now there is a chance for me to look gay, and I am goin’
to embrace it.”
Jest that minute the girl with the cap on come into the room agin,
and I nudged him to keep still, but he wouldn’t. I enticed him over
to the winder and argued with him there. My voice wuz real low,
but he wuz so excited and spoke so loud the girl must have got a
inklin’ of what he wuz sayin’, and, seein’ the dilemma I wuz in,
she spoke right up and sez with her queer little axent:
“They wuz not all to appear in Fancy Dress, it wuz for the young
mostly, the aged were not expected to appear in costume.”
And that madded Josiah more than ever; he duz want to appear young;
he don’t grow old as graceful as I could wish, and he hollered out:
“Where are your aged folks? I don’t see any. I am in the prime of
life myself, and, as for Samantha, she don’t have to wear a cap,
anyway.”
“No, Moseer,” sez she, real polite, but she contended firm as iron,
bein’ my friend, as I could see, that “Madam and Moseer would not
be expected to appear in costoom.”
“Well, Modom can do as she is a mind to,” sez he, mocking the
girl’s way of pronouncin’ Madame, and it did sound some like
swearin’, but I didn’t mind, “Modom can do as she is a mind to, but
I am goin’ in costoom.”
But I whispered to him and sez, “When perfect strangers warn you
for your good, Josiah Allen, mebby you’ll listen to ’em if you
won’t to me.” I won’t put down the words he replied to me in a
savage whisper, nor his answer to my arguments, no it hain’t
best, he is my pardner, and I took him for better or worse, and
why should I flinch when the worst appears? No, I will pass over
the time till I got him subsided in a big armchair by my side (no
wonder he wuz tired) readin’ a portion of his World that he had
brung up in his hand.
The girl looked feelin’ly at me as he sot there, still mutterin’
occasionally, and she went out, and a little while after a waiter
appeared with a tray full of good vittles, splendid. Whether that
girl is married or single, she knows men’s naters and what is the
soothinest emolyent to apply to ’em. As he helped himself to
the third helpin’ of nice, tender chicken with accompaniments of
creamed potatoes and toast and coffee, good as I can make a most,
his mean relaxed and he put on a less madder look, and as he took
the fourth slice of some good cake and jelly, his axent wuz almost
tender as he sez, “Well, Samantha, my dear, when had we better go
down and jine the party?”
“There hain’t any party to jine now, but if you feel like it we
will go down pretty soon and walk round the grounds and along the
lake till the company comes, and,” sez I, “if I had mistrusted
before I left home that this thing didn’t begin till after bedtime,
I wouldn’t have stirred a step, and wouldn’t, anyway, if it hadn’t
been for that Heathen, but sence we are here we might as well stay
and see some of it, and then go home.”
“Yes,” sez he, “it won’t be no worse than watch meetin’, anyway.”
So this programmy wuz carried out by us. We walked round the
grounds, by this time all alive with men and wimmen and waiters
runnin’ every which way, puttin’ up lamps and lanterns and awnin’s,
and fixin’ booths and seats, etc., etc., and I thought to myself
how much that Heathen is havin’ done for him, and I wondered if he
realized it and appreciated it as he ort to.
We walked round till we got tired and then sot down on a bench by
the lake shore, and, bein’ tired, I d’no but we fell into a drowse,
’tennyrate we rested real good. The gentle swash of the waves on
the pebbly beach sounded sort o’ soothin’ and refreshin’, jinin’
in as it did with the soft night wind that wuz blowin’ in from the
west. Pretty soon the sun went down into the lake that looked as
if we might walk away on it clear into Glory if we tried to, and
then the stars come out and glistened in the clear sky overhead,
and the crescent moon hung in the east like a great silver hammock
for angels to lay down in and rest their wings some. And almost
simeltaneous with the stars overhead come the lightin’ of a
thousand lights around us, behind us, and before us, sparkling,
glittering, shining lights of all shapes and colors glancin’
through the evergreen boughs and soft foliage, and hung in long
lines of brilliant color from tree to tree. The hotel looked as if
it wuz a sea of light inside, and the big tent looked as brilliant
as Aladin’s palace, and the long line of little booths on each side
looked, too, as if they had been brought from Arabia and sot down
there, so strange and brilliant they looked with gorgeous curtains
and tables all heaped up with beautiful objects to sell and lights
sparklin’ everywhere.
Well, by the time we got rousted up and walkin’ round and viewin’
the seen the music had struck up in a tent by itself, enchantin’
music that seemed to roust up our souls and bodies, too. Pretty
girls and handsome wimmen wuz standin’ behind the tables in them
little booths sellin’ their wares for the benefit of that Heathen
to the brilliant crowd that wuz beginnin’ to fill the walks and
tents, a brilliant crowd indeed, for every costoom of every age wuz
represented.
And they wuz so beautiful, and the music wuz so soft and
enchantin’, that I did wish that Heathen could have looked on
that seen that wuz bein’ done for him. I believe it would have
shamed him if he had any shame, and he wouldn’t eat up any more
missionaries, not for some time, anyway, but then, as I told
Josiah, he probable wouldn’t feel to home here and probable wuzn’t
dressed decent for the occasion.
And he sez, pintin’ to a woman who wuz walkin’ round locked arms
with a man and holdin’ a gold eyeglass to her eye, “I d’no but he
would feel to home with her.”
And, as I looked on her, I see my pardner wuz right, her waist wuz
jest a mockery of a waist, a belt and a string over her shoulder
wuz about all, and her arms bare to her shoulders, only some gloves
drawed on part way. I drawed him away at a good jog and walked him
into what I thought wuz a place of safety, but, good land! I see
I had got him into a worse place by far, for whereas there had
been only one female heathen, as you may say, here wuz more than a
dozen. I was so took up with the seen that I didn’t realize what
wuz about us till I hearn Josiah gin a low chuckle, and I sez:
“What is the matter, Josiah Allen?”
And he sez, “Oh, nothin’.” But as I looked round I see plain what
he wuz chucklin’ over, and I hurried him away. As we went, he sez:
“You no need to worried, Samantha, about that naked Heathen not
feelin’ to home.”
“Well,” sez I, “they have got clothes enough on from their waist
down.” I will stand up for my sect, anyway.
“Yes,” sez Josiah, “if these wimmen and girls would take some of
the silk and gauzes that are straingin’ down on the ground to cover
up their nakedness they would look better, enough sight.”
Sez I, “You hain’t obleeged to look on ’em.”
“Well,” sez he, real impatient, “put girl blinders on me if you
want to, but I have got to look round some till you do.”
[Illustration: I DRAWED HIM AWAY AT A GOOD JOG, AND WALKED HIM INTO
WHAT I THOUGHT WUZ A PLACE OF SAFETY.
_Page 254._]
And I sez, “We will go into the booths and trade a little.” Here
he groaned pitiful, but I reminded him that the Heathen had got to
be helped some by us, and he sez, “That Heathen has more done for
him than I have, enough sight.”
CHAPTER XIX.
We had hard work to git through the gorgeous lookin’ crowd,
every country and every nation wuz represented. Queens, flashin’
with jewels; flower girls, carryin’ baskets of flowers; kings,
cardinals, monks, officers in brilliant uniform, fairies, Night
covered with stars and a pale pearl moon in her forehead, and
Mornin’ dressed in a rosy cloud with a sunburst of diamonds on her
brow; Injuns, male and female, clad in short embroidered skirts
and leggins and feathers in their long, straight locks. Eastern
men and wimmen with long flowin’ robes, the wimmen with veils on,
the men with strange simeters and weepons at their sides. And, in
fact, think of any costoom under the sun and there it wuz before
you. And, sure enough, the girl wuz right, lots and lots of folks
appeared in their own clothes and wuz here as themselves.
Well, at last we come to the first booth, and I bought a little
fan and a mite of a handkerchief for Delight, both dearer than
beautiful, but havin’ that sufferin’ Heathen in my mind I paid
quite cheerful, Josiah groanin’ some at the money I lavished on
them two articles. But I whispered, “Remember what is said of the
cheerful giver. Groans don’t become this enterprise and occasion,
Josiah Allen.”
And then, hearin’ the money clink merrily down into the boxes of
the booth tenders, I sez almost onbeknown to myself to the pretty
girl who wuz doin’ up my things:
“I hope it hain’t goin’ to make him vain and overbearin.” And she
asked me who I meant?
And sez I, “Why, that Heathen; he’ll be rich as a Jew by mornin’. I
am most afraid such onexpected riches will make him hold his head
and feet up above his mates.” Sez I, “If everything is sold as high
as the things you’ve sold me, he will be independent rich.” She
kinder laughed and said, “Oh, you know that things sold for charity
are always higher priced.”
“Oh, I don’t begrech the money, not at all, and shouldn’t if I
didn’t git nothin’ back. I wuz always sorry for that Heathen, and
am glad to take holt and help him, but,” sez I, “I wuz wonderin’
what effect such sudden wealth would have on him, whether it would
quell down his appetite for missionaries, or whet it up, you know
you can never tell what sudden prosperity will do to anybody’s
character.”
And she said, with a kinder shrewd look, that she guessed that
the Heathen wouldn’t be enriched to any alarmin’ extent, for, sez
she, lookin’ round the almost enchantin’ seen and down onto her
own gorgeous costoom, “The expenses to-night have been something
enormous, and the Heathen can’t have anything till the expenses are
paid. And then,” she said, “it is very expensive to get the funds
carried so far.”
“Why, yes,” sez I, “I know there would have to be a money order
bought or sunthin’ of that kind.” But she smiled and went to wait
on her next customers, and who should they be, for all the world,
but my own son and daughter, Thomas J. and Maggie? They wuz real
glad to see their Pa and Ma, and showed it. She looked very sweet
in a thin, black lace dress, a white lace bunnet with some pink
and white flowers in it, and some posies of the same color in her
belt and bosom, white gloves and a white fan completed her pretty
costoom. I wuz glad enough to see she, too, had come as herself,
and so had Thomas J. come as himself. She bought a number of
articles, and Thomas J. did, too.
But when I told them of my misgivin’s about the sudden wealth
settin’ up the Heathen too much, and wished that I could talk to
him a spell about the vanity of riches and the needecessity of his
behavin’ himself as he ort to under his sudden change of fortune,
Thomas J. said, “No need to worry, Mother, the Heathen won’t git
enough out of this to hurt his character.” And he sez, when I
commented on the fairy-like beauty of the seen:
“Yes, it is quite a change from a seen I witnessed to-day in
Jonesville” (he is real charitable, Thomas J. is). “I found a
family starving, Mother, really suffering for food--think of that,
not five miles from here. The father and mother sick with fever,
the children too young to work, they were too proud to beg, but at
last they did send for me; I used to know the man. And Maggie and I
carried enough to them for the present, and I sent for the doctor.
We must all take hold and help them out, Mother, they are deserving
and honest.”
And I told him warmly that I would. I would carry them a sack of
flour and some butter and meat in the morning.
And Josiah sez, “Half a sack will do, won’t it? They can’t bake.”
And I sez, “You are right, Josiah, I will bake the bread and carry
to them, and cook the meat.”
And Thomas J. resoomed, “Right round this very place, Mother,
within five miles, I will find you fifty families where children
are suffering for food and clothing.”
Sez Josiah (he don’t love to give and wuz afraid of the dreen on
his resources if I took it into my head to succor the hull fifty
families), “in lots of places the parents are lazy or drink.”
“But,” sez I warmly, “the children are not to blame, they are more
to be pitied.”
“That is so, Mother,” sez Thomas J.
“But,” sez Josiah, “the town ort to take care on ’em.”
“Sometimes they are too proud to apply to the town,” sez Thomas J.
Josiah wuz openin’ his mouth to argy some more (he is dretful
clost) when we felt and heard a great commotion runnin’ through
the crowd, we wuz standin’ out a little to one side, and Thomas
J. spoke real low, he had too good taste to openly show that
he thought that Heathen might divide up a little with native
sufferers. But, on advancin’ a little, we see the cause of the
excitement. Miss Greene Smythe wuz advancin’ out of the hotel
towards the big tent where she wuz goin’ to stand, and all who
wanted to wuz led in by a usher to take her hand and kiss it, or
jest shake it, as they wanted to.
Well, she wuz a sight, a sight as she passed onwards. She wuz
dressed as Queen Elizabeth in that identical dress I had seen
with the boddist a mass of jeweled embroidery, a great white ruff
standin’ up round her face, with strings of precious stuns hung
round her neck and blazin’ in her crown and strung on her dress
everywhere, and her velvet skirt behind her trailin’ more than as
fur from our front door to the gate, or so it seemed, all held up
by two pages, as they called ’em. But I recognized their faces;
they wuz two of the Danglers, I could see, with fancy dresses on,
one pink satin and the other pale yellow, and their satin knee
breeches only come down to their knees, where they wuz met by long
silk stockin’s with glitterin’ buckles on ’em and their low slips.
They had wigs powdered real gray and braided up on their backs
with ribbin bows on ’em. And the one who locked arms with her,
walkin’ by her side, they called him Leicester, but I knowed him,
he wuz the other Dangler. He wuz dressed in a white satin suit,
embroidered jacket, and knee breeches, and his breast all covered
with orders, stars and crosses, all a blaze of jewels.
He walked clost by her side, carryin’ her fan, which wuz also
shining with precious stuns, and he wuz fannin’ her most of the
time. And the other two Danglers wuz jealous as I could see. I
could see ’em knit their eyebrows, and I thought I hearn ’em
grate their teeth. But I know I see ’em shake their fists at him
onperceived by the gay crowd, so hollow is fashionable life, and
so the worm of jealousy gnaws even the empty breast of a Dangler.
Well, she entered the big tent follered by some Maids of Honor,
Medora wuz one of ’em, and Courtiers and Lords in Waiting, as I
hearn ’em called, and took up her position in the centre of the big
tent on a sort of dais, they called it. I should call it a little
platform covered with a velvet rug with the throne on it, a big
chair, I guess, covered with handsome drapery. And the folks went
up to speak to her, lots of the men, foolish lookin’ creeters, too,
Kings and Cardinals and such, knelt down at her feet and kissed her
hand.
Thomas J. didn’t, no, indeed! he addressed her as I remembered
afterwards as, “Your Royal Highness.” I never thought on’t at that
time, or I would mebby jined in the play, but somebody pushed on
ahead of Josiah and me, and Thomas J. and Maggie wuz swep’ on by
the crowd, so when I paused before her I jest sez, “How do you do,
Miss Greene Smythe?” And, bein’ all wrought up about that Heathen,
I couldn’t seem to help tacklin’ her then and there, for I felt
that a delay of even a day or two might be too late, sez I, “You
have got a splendid show here to-night and money is flowin’ like
water for that Heathen, but for mercy sake don’t let that money go
to him without a letter goin’ at the same time to warn that Heathen
of the deceitfulness of riches, for I d’no,” sez I, “but he would
break out and kick higher and devour more missionaries than ever if
he hain’t warned in time.”
She smiled sort o’ queer, and Leicester whispered sunthin’ to her
and sort o’ giggled, but I wuzn’t goin’ to be danted by a Dangler,
I turned my attention to him for a minute, “You know,” sez I, “how
soon pride can be overthrowed and trompled on.”
His face changed in a minute, the heels of that colt seemed to
enter his stomach agin, and he looked browbeat and mortified. The
Danglers behind her clapped their hands softly and seemed to enjoy
my remarks dretfully. But the crowd wuz pressin’ on my rear and
time wuz passin’, and I sez agin: “Come and see me if you can,
before you send that money; I have got a number of Bible verses I
would love to put in that letter, and a few tracks.”
She smiled agin that sort of a queer smile, and the crowd bore us
on, I feelin’ the sweet calm of one who hasn’t shrunk from duty.
Well, Josiah wuz bound to go into the big tent where more vittles
wuz spread out than it seemed a hull army could eat, everything
dainty and luxurious and rich wuz spread before us--kroketts,
pattys, salads, cakes of every kind, some on ’em big as a big
cheese, all covered with wreathes of posies made in the frostin’,
and smaller ones of every shape and kind, and jellies heaped up in
every color and form, all on ’em pretty, and moulds of ice-cream of
all colors, frozen in pyramids and stars and musical instruments
and everything else, and great banks of flowers banked up behind
’em, and tall vases of flowers standing amongst ’em, it wuz a
sight, a sight.
Josiah enjoyed himself here the best that ever wuz, and we had a
quiet corner all to ourselves, but anon, when so much time had
passed that I fondly imagined his hunger must be slaked, the crowd
had come in till the tent wuz full, and one man behind us spoke to
another one: “The wine flows here to-night like water.”
“Yes, champagne, too; this spread must cost something.”
“Yes,” sez the other, “I guess old Greene Smythe will realize it
when the bills come in.”
But I waited to hear no more. I ketched holt of Josiah’s arm, and
sez I, “Let us flee from this place to once!”
And he sez, “Why?”
And I sez, “Ask no questions but foller me.” He hung back, but see
I wuz firm. I had noticed that folks wuz drinkin’ sunthin’ out of
glasses, not good, respectable coffee like my pardner and me, but
spozed it wuz lemonade or sweetened water and vinegar, little did
I think I had got into a winebibbers’ resort. But I see it wuz too
true, for as we went out of the tent on another side I see a punch
bowl as big as our caldron kettle and two pretty girls ladlin’ out
the wretched stuff to the waitin’ crowd. We didn’t leave a minute
too soon, but after we got outside Josiah sez:
“Now, will you tell why you snaked a hungry man away from his food?
If it wuz anything besides pure meanness now is your time to tell
it.”
So I told him the fearful fact, and sez, “Josiah Allen, look not
upon wine when it is read.”
“Champagne hain’t red, nor punch, nuther.”
“Its effects are red with heart’s blood all the same.”
“Dum it all!” sez he, “don’t you spoze I know enough to not drink
liquor when I am a Good Templar?”
Sez I, “Better men than you have been drawn away from the straight
path, Josiah. Look at David,” and I wuz jest about to bring up
Solomon and Noah, but he interrupted:
“I hain’t goin’ into no Bible controversy at this time of night,
nor no dum W. C. T. U. talk.”
“Time of night,” sez I; “well said, Josiah Allen. Do you realize it
is after twelve P. M.? We can’t git home till after half-past one if
we start this minute.”
He recognized the wisdom of my remark, but still hankered, I could
see, for some more vittles. And knowin’ the needecessity of the
case, I sez, “It won’t take me but a minute to bile the teakettle;
I will git supper after we git home; I have got everything baked
up.” At this remark he yielded, and we walked along arm in arm,
for I still felt there wuz danger of his breakin’ away from me
and goin’ back into that place of temptation, and as we went by a
good-sized tent, standin’ a little to one side, I heard the voice
as of one elocutin’, and I immegiately sez to Josiah, “Less go in
here a minute, I dearly love eloquence.”
“Yes,” sez he, “I can go in and hear ‘Curfew Must Not Ring
To-Night,’ it will be a dretful treat!” and he added bitterly,
“there hain’t a dog in Jonesville but what knows that, and will run
from it; but I can tell you, Samantha Allen, Curfew will git tired
of ringin’ for us if we don’t start some time.”
Sez I mildly, “I love to see folks act with some evenness. I
couldn’t git you started from bodily food a few minutes ago, and
now I want to feed my mind hunger a little you are in a dretful tew
to start.”
“Well, come on then,” he sez. “I may as well starve here as on
the road!” and he hurried me into the tent. But it wuzn’t “Curfew
Musn’t Ring To-Night,” it wuz another piece, a sort of a tragedy,
and spoke real good; the young woman did first rate.
Then the band played another piece, and then there wuz a great
buzz of talkin’ and laughin’ goin’ on, but pretty soon Miss Greene
Smythe, who had come in on one side of the tent with her Danglers
danglin’ and her Lords in Waitin’ a-waitin’ and her Maids of Honor
honerin’, etc., etc., she stepped forward a little and sort o’
shooed down the biggest noise about her, and when it wuz kinder
still she said:
“We are going to have a great treat; we are going to have some
b-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l music.”
At that a girl minced forward with kinder nippy steps and planted
herself on the little raised platform and begun to yell and scream
at the very top of her voice with her face lookin’ like a trout
havin’ a fit, you know what immense mouths they’ve got. Well, if
yellin’ wuz a treat we got it. That female jest yelled herself
red as blood in the face, and on the very topmost notes lifted
herself up on her toes and shook herself as if she wuz goin’ into
a spazzum, and finally stepped back fairly exhausted and pantin’.
Miss Greene Smythe advanced and shook hands with her and told her
what a sweet treat they had had, and how splendidly in voice she
wuz to-night. And so she wuz if a car whistle or gong is ever in
voice when it is rippin’ out its loudest, ear-pan-crushinest notes.
But I wuz wonderin’ all the time when the music that Miss Greene
Smythe had spoke about wuz goin’ to commence, and I turned and
accosted a female woman who stood right by the side of me, and who
seemed to be guardin’ a brood of girls, she seemed to be watchin’
’em as clost as any old hen ever watched a brood of ducks she’d
hatched, but kinder mistrusted, not knowin’ what move they might
make.
But thinkses I she’d better begun her watchin’ and care before she
left home, for of all the sights they wuz I never see since I wuz
weaned, I don’t believe I ever see such low necks in my hull life
as they had, the hull caboodle on ’em. Why, my pardner jest glanced
at ’em and blushed as red as a piney. I wuz proud on him to see his
modesty, and instinctively stepped still furder between him and
them. The Ma’s neck wuz kinder fat and flabby and wrinkly, and the
girls’, the most on ’em, wuz real boney and scrawny. But one on ’em
wuz quite fat and had a real pretty figger, I know, for I could see
the hull on it, bones, fat or lean, they wuz all showed off to be
read by man or woman. But to resoom. I asked this woman when the
music wuz goin’ to commence?
“Why,” sez she, wonderin’, “we’ve had it.”
Sez I, “Wuz that music?”
She said, “Yes.”
“Well,” sez I, “I have seen strange sights since I come here and
hearn strange things, but none stranger than that, if that wuz
music. Why,” sez I, “I might have heard it for years and years and
never mistrusted what it wuz.”
“Well,” she said, “it wuz music, and be-a-utiful.”
Jest then a young feller come in with a dark, eager, earnest face
and sung a love song.
That wuz music. It wuz a song about how a slave loved a Princess,
and as you heard it you could almost see the shinin’ palm boughs,
the splash of the fountain, the white, shinin’ walks of the palace,
and the beautiful dark-eyed Princess lookin’ down from her latticed
window listenin’ to the words, every one of ’em had a heart throb,
a heart ache in it. For he said in the song that he wuz of a race,
“Who if they loved must die.” Well, they didn’t seem to like that
very well, but I did, it made my heart ache and beat, with its
passion and its power.
And then a modest, refined lookin’ woman with her neck and arms
covered up considerable, jest as they should be outside of
bedrooms, come forward modestly and recited a poem, as pitiful a
thing as I ever hearn in my life. About how a great, strong, manly,
lovin’ heart wuz cheated out of its happiness, its very life, by
the vanity and sinfulness of a woman and the villiany of a man,
of how he patient bore his sorrow, kneelin’ and prayin’ for her,
and blessin’ her for bearin’ with him all the time she did, and
how for his sake he begged the Lord to forgive her for runnin’ off
with the other man and leavin’ her husband and child. He lived
on heartbroken, but pious and good as they make ’em, loved her
all through her life of sin and shame, and then, when the villian
deserted her and she wuz dyin’ alone, he went to her and held her
dyin’ head on his bosom, and rared up a stun above her poor guilty
head and carved on it the sacred name of “Wife.”
Why, they wuzn’t a dry eye in my head, not one, when she had
finished it. And, though mebby it wouldn’t be my first choice to
recite to an evenin’ party, still I wuz jest melted down by it, and
so wuz Josiah Allen, as I glanced round at him he wuz jest puttin’
his bandanna back into his pocket and wuz winkin’ hard, he has got
a heart, Josiah Allen has.
But all of a sudden, jest before she got through recitin’ it,
this woman with the brood of girls gathered ’em in front of her,
as if danger wuz behind her, and shooed ’em out of the room. And
I declare for it, and I am tellin’ the truth, as she stood up
sweepin’ out, I see way down below their shoulder blades, every
single blade. They went into the room where they wuz dancing,
it wuz there they sought safety from indelicacy and unrefined
suggestions, but for them that see ’em come in the sight wuz fur
worse than the back view, yes fur worse.
But no sooner did the anxious mother chase her brood out in front
of her than another woman, whose dress wuz so low it is a wonder
it held onto her till she got out, she swep’ out with her two
daughters in front of her, one on ’em dressed in a string of pearls
and a ostrich tip, and the other one bare as she wuz born almost
from her waist up, every mite of their dresses almost layin’
on the carpet. They fled from the contagion of indelicacy into
the ballroom, and went to talkin’ Bible together and condemnin’
bitterly the low, immodest woman who had dared to recite such a
poem before their innocent daughters. They had guarded ’em so, they
said from everything and anything that could by any possibility
suggest an indelicate thought or act, and now in one moment to have
the veil dropped from their innocent eyes.
And thus the mothers complained until jest such men as the verses
described walked up and put their arms round the prettiest and
most naked of the girls, held ’em as close to their vile hearts as
if they wuz runnin’ away with ’em, and jumped round the room with
’em, the happy mothers lookin’ on and smilin’ placidly, seein’ the
girls’ pretty flushed faces layin’ right up against the villians’
breastbones. And it wuzn’t a great while before all the girls had
some strangers’ arms round ’em and wuz prancin’ round the room.
Well, a man I had met in Loontown come up to me and asked me
sunthin’ about my books, and that seemed to set the fashion, for I
don’t know how many come up to me and asked me about ’em. And most
every one on ’em said they had read my books to a dyin’ friend, or
to the aged, them that had lost their minds, as fur as I could make
out, or wuz so fur gone they couldn’t sense their trouble. But I
thanked ’em, every one on ’em, and felt it, too, it is so sweet to
think on that you have soothed last hours of the mentally shattered
and the infirm in intellect, I got quite a lot of comfort out of
the thought.
Two or three wimmen there had had friends who had read ’em, they
wuz in distant parts of the country, but I wuz glad to hear from
’em and hear they had read ’em. And then three or four, and mebby
more, asked me if I lived in Boston; I don’t know what under the
sun there wuz about me that put that thought into their heads,
unless it wuz my bunnet, the ribbin bow on it did rise up noble
and sort of majestic above my foretop; mebby it put ’em in mind
of Bunker Hill. I knew it wuz a bunnet calculated to impress
the beholder almost with awe, it wuz so sort o’ high headed and
literary lookin’. Josiah didn’t want me to git it, but I knew it
would give me a high learnt look, and, when they asked me if I
lived in Boston, I felt I had made a good choice.
Well, we got home perfectly beat out, and my pardner fearfully
cross, though, as I wuz as good as my word and got him a good
but hasty lunch, his crossness moderated and he went to bed in
considerable good sperits, and we slep’ late the next day and no
serious bad results follered.
CHAPTER XX.
The time drawed near for me to go to Tamer’s and visit with
Celestine, and I cooked up good vittles and sights of ’em, knowin’
that in my absence no paneky would soothe like that. I didn’t mean
to stay but two nights, but didn’t know what might happen, they wuz
such cases to urge me to stay when I got there.
I arrove on the appinted day with no casualities, and they wuz
dretful glad to see me, Anna and Jack specially, Tamer and
Cicero seemed to be sort o’ absent-minded, I most knew they had
got holt of some new novel, and so it turned out, it wuz “The
Roaring Avenger of the Bloody Path” that wuz under perusal, and
they couldn’t hardly brook to have their attentions drawed off a
minute, but Tamer finished it the afternoon of the day I got there,
and then she seemed inclined to talk more, but her talk wuz real
deprestin’. She had got the sinevetus she said beyend the doubt.
And I said, “Don’t you believe you got it runnin’ after Arabeller?”
And she said, with a sithe, “Mebby it wuz so, and,” sez she, “if it
wuzn’t so onfashionable to keep house without a servant I wouldn’t
keep her an hour, for she acts worse than ever and makes me more
trouble than she duz good, enough sight.”
Celestine seemed real glad to see me when she could git her
attentions offen her landscapes and views and placks and things.
She is a tall, wapey lookin’ woman and wears spectacles, and I
don’t spoze she sees much through them specks only her pictures,
and works of Art, as she calls ’em. She don’t seem to see her
little girl hardly any, a sweet, pretty child, too, a gentle, quiet
little thing with eyes that seem to be on the lookout for tender
looks, and a sweet, sad mouth that seems sort o’ grievin’ for the
kisses she don’t git.
For sure as I am alive durin’ them three days and two nights I wuz
there I didn’t see Celestine take one mite of notice of little
Mary, only to hook up her dress once or twice and tie back her
hair, and she did them in a kind of a absent-minded, dreamy way as
if the child’s waist might have been a distant range of mountains,
and her hair a waterfall or runnin’ stream. It wuz some such color,
anyway, some of the color of water with the gold light of sunset
burnin’ on it, and it hung all round her sweet face in waves and
ringlets. She wuz a dretful pretty child. And it seemed as if I
couldn’t keep my hands offen her, I wanted to hold her in my arms
and pat down them shinin’ tresses so. And it wuzn’t more’n several
minutes, anyway, till she wuz nestlin’ up aginst me and I wuz
holdin’ her real fondly on my left side while Jack wuz hangin’
round my right side. He didn’t act jealous a mite, either, for he
seemed to be jest as fond of little Mary as I wuz. They played
together real good. And I held that child in my arms and looked
down into the tender, confidin’ little face, a sort of believin’
face, jest the sort I like, and sez to myself:
“What under the sun can her Ma be thinkin’ of to be makin’ up fancy
pictures and set so much store by ’em and slight the sweetest and
prettiest livin’ picture, all finished off perfect, right before
her?” But Celestina did, she jest slighted her, and acted as if
she wuzn’t half so much worth as the blank pieces of canvas she
handled from day to day, for them she could cover with her own
idees and images. It seemed queer to me, queer as a dog.
Anna wuz not in very good sperits, but she went round the house
good tempered if ruther sad, helpin’ her Ma all she could, and, in
fact, takin’ the brunt of the work on herself, for Arabeller wuz
not to be depended on, and Tamer’s various diseases wuz worse and
more aggravatin’ than they had been. Cicero, as usual, wuz steeped
to the chin in cigarettes and his wild novels of buckaneers and
pirates and couldn’t be depended on for help only at meal times,
then he come out strong and helped to make way with the food in a
masterful way.
Hamen and his brother John wuz real busy about their bizness, and
I didn’t see much on ’em, only at the table when they partook of
their food hastily and departed. But Tamer seemed to want to make
it as pleasant as she could for me, and as Celestine spent so much
time outdoors engrossed with her painting, she and I had lots of
time to visit together, though, as I always did at Hamen’s, I see
lots of things I didn’t fancy, though I hain’t no hand to complain.
I don’t believe in relations findin’ fault with each other, and I
am very close mouthed, but of course I can’t help seein’ every time
I am there that Tamer is sot and overbearin’ and very onreasonable.
Why, she don’t think that Tirzah Ann is the best housekeeper in
Jonesville, she jest the same as told me there wuz others jest as
good. And she believes that in the big cities there is lawyers that
know as much as our Thomas Jefferson.
I pity Tamer from the bottom of my heart, she is failin’ in her
mind. But she can’t help it, she has weakened her faculties, I
think, broodin’ on her diseases, and then half the time she thinks
she is a female Amazon. And how I do pity little Jack! Tamer kep’
the best sort of clothes on him, dressed and fed him jest as
well as a child could be, only when she wuz down with the most
curiousest of her diseases, or in one of her tempers.
But while, as I have said, she took good care of his body, oh! how
she neglected and misused the mind, the heart, the imagination, the
true life of little Jack, misused it like a dog. She would fly at
him and whip him unmercifully for what he wuzn’t to blame for, and
then set over one of her novels and let him go on with what he ort
to have been stopped doin’. To use the words of another, she let
him do the things he ortn’t to do and whipped him for what he ort.
Her mind wuz such.
Now, to give a sample of her onjestice, the very next day after I
wuz there Jack wuz sent to a neighbor’s on a errent. His mother
told him to go cross lots, she wuz in such a hurry to have her
errent done she didn’t give him enough particulars about the way,
and when the poor little creeter wuz doin’ jest the best he could
and hurryin’ on jest as near as he could where his Ma told him to
go, he got into a swampy place and got his best clothes all dirty
and wuz too late to do his errent.
Tamer Ann wanted to send by the neighbor to the city where he wuz
goin’ for a certain new blood curdlin’ novel, jest issued, and,
owin’ to Jack’s misfortune in losin’ his way when he got there, the
man wuz gone. And when poor Jack come meachin’ home with his nice
clothes all muddy and wet, as forlorn lookin’ a little creeter as
I ever see, Tamer wuz voylently mad about his clothes, and when he
said (for Jack is naturally truthful) that he got there too late
to do the errent, Tamer’s face got red as blood with white patches
shinin’ through the red, like a lurid sky with white thunder caps
showin’ on it, and she took Jack by the hand and jerked him up the
stairs into her own room.
She jest tore the clothes offen him, as I learn afterwards, and
whipped him onmercifully, first with her hand, and then afterwards,
as Jack wouldn’t own up that he had been wicked and wuz sorry for
it, she grew madder and madder, and voyalenter and voyalenter, and
ketched off her slipper, not a soft one (that might be applied
with safety to the place best fitted for such blows), but one with
a high French heel, and she struck Jack with that till great blue
marks wuz left on his little quiverin’, shrinkin’ body.
She whipped him till the sharp pain made him yield, as greater
heroes have before, and he owned up that he had been awful wicked
and wuz sorry. And then Tamer wuz satisfied and dressed Jack in
a handsome suit and give him half a pound of candy and a lot of
indigestible fruit (which he threw up with great pain before
midnight), and come down lookin’ perfectly satisfied and contented,
and Jack went out to divide his spoils with Mary, jest as many
a outwardly successful hero has brung home his spoils obtained
by truckling to Evil to lavish on some beloved female. And that
evenin’, jest before sundown, I give Tamer a-talkin’ to, sez I,
“Jack thought he wuz doing right, he thought he wuz on the right
road.”
“If he had looked and kep’ his mind on it all the time he would
have come out right.”
Sez I, “Tamer Ann, mebby Jack didn’t think to look.”
“Well, I’ll let you know that Jack has got to think. I’ll whip him
jest as hard for not thinkin’ as I will for anything else, what
bizness has he not to think?”
Sez I, “Tamer Ann, do you and I always think before we do things?”
“I can’t speak for you,” sez she, “but as for me, I always do.”
Sez I, “Is it always easy for you to decide right, Tamer, when two
or three paths are in front of you to decide from? Do you always
choose the right one?”
“I always have!” sez she severely.
“Well,” sez I, “you’re different from most folks; most of us git
into the wrong paths time and agin, and go blunderin’ along over
rocks and sand and stun and weeds, etc., and we may count ourselves
happy if we ever git back into the right road agin.”
“Well,” sez Tamer, “Jack might have known he wuz goin’ wrong, it
wuzn’t a blunder, he chose deliberate.”
Sez I, “Jack said he thought he wuz goin’ right, and I believe
him. But even if he had chosen the wrong road deliberate, lots of
us look back onto times when we had to choose different paths to
walk in, and deliberately, though unbeknown to us, chose the wrong
way. There is so many paths to choose from in this life, the roads
branch out into so many different ways, why, if the compass had as
many pints on it as the porcupine has quills it couldn’t begin to
pint to the different paths we have to choose from.
“Sometimes,” sez I, growin’ real eloquent, “they go down into the
shadows with the pale shapes of Renunciation and Martyrdom, and a
cross shinin’ faint and far down in the gloom. Some through the
garden of the gods, where the air is fine and clear, and music and
chanted song float along down the beautiful pathway. Some through
the crowds of bizness, and gay pleasure-seekers through pleasures
and palaces. Some into the dark highways, where Want and Misery
walk hand in hand. Some down into the tomb, some up the mount of
crucifixion. There are paths, long, cold, shinin’, that go up the
mountain side, where the glitterin’ tops gleam and beckon, and we
are willin’ to drop every weight that would hender us from climbin’.
“Oh, those times to look back upon when life wuz to be chosen, or
what proved to be (onbeknown to us) a livin’ death! How calm the
fields lay under the light of that autumn sky, long flat fields,
green and calm and stretchin’ back to the quiet woods. How the road
in front lengthened out in a long, shinin’, yellow-brown ribbon
with cozy sheltered homes layin’ by its side. How soft and cloud
flecked wuz the sky overhead, broodin’ down over the sheltered
home nests. Only a question to be made and answered, a breath of
air, light thing indeed, lighter than the lightest fleck of soft
blue-gray cloud overhead, maybe a few tears, a farewell not so loud
as the lowest bird song in the branches along the brown wayside
fences. Ah! but has there not been times since when that low word
has risen into a mighty voice that filled the skies of the worlds,
this world and the onknown? The great dread that it wuz indeed
final, that nowhere, nowhere could the lives that touched each
other, and then drifted so wide asunder, would ever meet side by
side agin.
“Oh, the blindness, the fatal blindness of ignorance, the mistakes
that arise from pride, from ambition, from any and every cause, and
whose fatality cannot be seen until afterward, until the sun has
gone down and the night brings reflection and--heartache! These
are the true tragedies of life, enacted by them who weep with no
grave for their tears to fall upon. These are the real mourners who
do not go about the streets, but who sit inside the gayly curtained
box and see the play of life go on before them till the lights are
put out, the curtain down, and the real play of life is at an end.
“But they watch the gayly plumed puppets play and act their part,
and applaud and smile and the play goes on. Poor playgoers, poor
actors on the stage, all, all waiting for the finale of the seen.
“Everywhere, everywhere, on each side, before us, under us, over
us, the roads branch off, and we with our poor, weak eyesight
can’t choose right time and agin, we can’t and don’t. Even with
the experience of maturity, with all the wisdom gathered from the
words of them who have gone the way before, with all the experience
of the travelers through the past to guide us, with the lamp of
Caution in our hand, the shoes of Watchfulness to creep along on,
and the great book of God’s will open before us, His strength to
lean on--if with all these helps we stumble and blunder, how can
we condemn the children so harshly, with no guide but the waverin’
will, the undeveloped conscience and understandin’, if they make
mistakes?
“And you whipped Jack,” sez I impressively, “for making just a
little mistake; you whipped him till his poor back is black and
blue, Tamer.”
“I didn’t mean to whip so hard, Cousin Samantha, but my temper got
up so after I got to whippin’ him because he wouldn’t own that he
had been wicked and say he wuz sorry for it, that I whipped him
harder than I meant to.”
Sez I, “Then you wuz whippin’ him for not tellin’ a lie, and you
made him tell one, for, at last, to stop the cruel sting of the
blows on his poor little back, you did finally succeed in makin’
him say he had been wicked, when he hadn’t been, and sorry, when he
wuzn’t sorry, poor little creeter!”
“You always take Jack’s part, Samantha.”
“Not before Jack, Tamer Smith.”
“No, you don’t say anything before him, but you kinder act in such
a way that he knows you are on his side, that you are his friend.”
“Well, I should think he needed one, poor little creeter!”
“Don’t you spoze, Samantha Allen, a mother knows what is best and
right for her children? Don’t you spoze she acts for his best good?”
“Not when she leaves blue, livid marks on his back, not when she
whips him into tellin’ a lie.”
“What you mean by that, I don’t know,” sez Tamer.
“He wuzn’t sorry,” sez I; “not a particle, and you whipped him till
he said he wuz.”
“Well, he ought to be sorry if he wuzn’t, and I would like to know
what you would have me do.”
“I would have you never make a child say a thing that wuzn’t true,
and if you had sot your mind on havin’ him say he wuz sorry, reason
with him and tell him why he ort to be sorry till he wuz sorry. But
you jest sprung at him and whipped him, as sudden and voyalent as a
hailstorm that ravages down on a flower garden, cuttin’ and peltin’
and slashin’ and killin’ all the dainty leaves and blossoms. And
it didn’t do any more good and jest as much hurt as that voyalent
storm would, with no soft rain to go down to the root of the
flowers and nourish ’em.
“Why, if them posies ever lift their heads agin, which many of ’em
won’t, there will be on ’em the cuts and scars of the icy, drivin’
hailstuns. If the sweet posies of Truth and Candor and Honesty
hain’t entirely cut down and pelted out of sight in Jack’s poor
little soul I’ll be glad on’t, but if they do live, Tamer Ann,
there will be cuts and scars on ’em, and I’d advise you as a friend
to turn short round and do different by him.”
Sez Tamer, tosstin’ her head, “I shall probable do as I like with
my own child, he is mine.”
Sez I, “Tamer Smith, there is where you make another mistake. He is
not yours, as you may find out to your sorrow some day, he belongs
to Another who let you take him for a spell, to train him up for
higher service. He will claim him agin when He gits ready.”
And, though I didn’t say it outside of me, I said it inside, that I
should be most glad if He would take him, much as I loved him. It
would be such a comfort, I thought, to lay my head down at night on
my goose-feather pillow and think that dear little Jack wuz safe.
Safe from the cruel blows that fell on him anywhere, hard blows
that beat the little, tender body and soft, dimpled limbs, leavin’
blue, livid marks where there should be nothin’ but dimples. Safe
from the deeper marks and scars that deface the eager, seekin’
mind, the active, impressionable nature, the little white soul. But
while I wuz so sorry for Jack that my heart most melted inside of
me and the tears run down my face many a time faster than they did
down Jack’s when I would hear Tamer whippin’ him, and he cryin’----
Though I wuz sorry for Jack and pitiful towards him, as pitiful
could be, I tried to be and wuz about half the time, I should
say, sorry for Tamer, or mebby it wuz a quarter of the time I wuz
sorry for her, or half a quarter, I can’t tell exactly, because
I would have my ups and downs about it, for Jack it wuz a full,
deep, complete pity and sympathy and sorrow all the time. But
sometimes I would say to myself, now Tamer has got a bad temper,
she got it through Heaven only knows by what cause, ancestral or
local. If it come down to her with her Roman nose and thin lips
from some ancestor, then how fur is she to blame for not subduin’
it entirely? No amount of rubbin’ down and smoothin’ and grindin’
could make that nose of hers into a Greecy one. No amount of
stimulatin’ liniment could make them thin lips soften out into more
generous and sweeter curves. She might git up early and set up late
and she couldn’t make them changes, and who knows whether she could
with all her efforts entirely soften and make sweet that sour,
dissatisfied disposition and fiery temper?
And then would be the time, for four or five minutes mebby, I would
be sorry for Tamer. And then agin I would say to myself she has
lived in a onreal, onnatural world and is livin’ there still. And
when pirates and burglars and murderers and arsoners and rapiners
and robbers and Injuns are continually roamin’ and stalkin’ and
war-whoopin’ and murderin’ and dashin’ and skulkin’ and prancin’
through anybody’s brain, hain’t it reasonable that that brain
should be tuckered out, too tuckered, too trompled and beat down to
take fresh, vigorous thought on any subject?
I would say in such a wild, trompled, dust-blown, whoopin’ highway
what chance is there for such a little mite of a lonesome
wayfarer as Jack, and I don’t know that it is any wonder that he
is sometimes entirely overlooked, and sometimes ridin’ up in high
ease, and sometimes stomped and trompled on. Poor little creeter!
And then I would think of her different diseases, and wantin’ to do
my best for her even in my thoughts (for, though I gin her advice
through duty, I always tried to be charitable to her in my mind),
I would say over to myself some of her most lengthy distempers and
curious ones, I would say, in a low, deep voice, “basler mangetus,
sinevetus, singletus, tonsiletus, pironitus,” etc., etc., till
sometimes I would git real sorry for her as much as six minutes.
Well, just such seens as I have mentioned I would witness from
hour to hour and from day to day, and finally I got heartsick with
lookin’ at it and wuz glad when the time drawed near for me to
return to the bosom of my family (a gingham bosom week days, and
a fine linen one Sundays, with five pleats on a side). Jack cried
when I spoke of goin’ home, but Cicero didn’t care at all, he wuz
to school daytimes, and the very minute he got home at night he wuz
pourin’ over them novels, and his mother would proudly say to me:
“Cicero is so much like me, so different from Jack, he is so
studious, such a reader, he will make a great thinker.”
Not through the nourishment he gits from such food, I sez to
myself. And I tried several times to talk with Cicero about readin’
such books, but he would look up so coldy at me from across “The
Boody Gulch” or “The Fiend Haunted Hollow” that it fairly stunted
me. He would look up middlin’ respectful to hear my remonstrances
about readin’ ’em, would listen with his finger between the pages,
and the minute I stopped, resoom his occupation, in the meantime
answerin’ me nothin’, not a word, till I declare it stunted me, his
looks wuz so cold and resolved and sort o’ blood curdlin’, and his
mean so determined that I wuz positively afraid to tackle him.
But he had his thoughts, and while I wuz there one mornin’ it wuz
found that Cicero wuz missin’, he wuz searched for one day and two
nights; Tamer, in the meantime, fallin’ from one hysterick into
another, the third day he wuz found in the woods milds from there,
on top of a big rock; he had built a fortification in front of it,
and barricaded himself from enemies, had built a sort of an outlook
in a tree nigh by, where he could look out for prowlin’ foes, and
wuz found there smokin’ cigarettes and readin’ “The Lone Bandit of
the Haunted Woods” when he wuz discovered. He wuz made to go home,
though he rebelled and wuz moody for days afterwards.
CHAPTER XXI.
Though it is shootin’ ahead of the story and resoomin’ forward,
yet I d’no but I may as well tell of Cicero’s adventures, and
casualties now as any time, they have got to be told anyway, though
I hate to. But seed sown has got to spring up, and somebody has got
to harvest it. The cigarettes he smoked constantly weakened and
softened his mind, I believe, so the blood curdlin’ and dashin’
idees he partook of in them novels had a good chance to take root.
Four times durin’ the next year did he disappear mysteriously, jest
as some of his heroes had, to be brought back agin after a long
search by his agonized parents. The first time he run away with
Arabeller and wuz overtook before they had gone any great distance,
and she soon afterwards wuz shipped west by her folks, to the ranch
of an uncle in Colorado to be broke in as he broke his mustangs,
and I don’t know what did become of her, married some cowboy, I
spoze. And, bein’ foiled in his matrimonial ventures as some of his
wild ideals had, he lived for booty. He soon afterwards disappeared
into the forest, taking a neighbor’s little boy with him, little
Teddy Dewey, and sent back a note to the boy’s parents demandin’
ransom: “Teddy would be sent home if the sum of seventy-five cents
wuz put at the foot of a dead tree where the shadow at midnight
made the shape of a coffin; if the money wuz deposited there at
midnight Teddy would be found on their back doorsteps in the
mornin’.” Of course they hid at this rondevoo and ketched Cicero
and his victim, too.
Once he wuz found with a rifle fixed up in front of the cave rakin’
the road in front, and they had to skulk up a back way to ketch him.
The last time he went he took a girl with him, one of the prettiest
little girls in the neighborhood; he took his father’s old white
horse into the woods and a red woollen shawl of his mother’s and
had persuaded the girl to be a Captive Princess. And when found she
wuz settin’ on the horse, which wuz draped in scarlet, as become
the charger of a Princess, and Cicero wuz walkin’ by her side,
ornamented with feathers and wampum. Well, the girl’s father, bein’
ragin’ mad, horsewhipped Cicero hard, and then Cicero organized a
band of banditta, called the Bloody League, that ravaged the man,
stole his fruit, took his horses out of the lot and rode ’em, and
finally drove his flocks off into the woods and barricaded ’em
there.
That cost Hamen over forty-two dollars to settle, and Cicero didn’t
git into another scrape till most a month afterwards, when he got
mad at one of the neighbor’s boys and shot him, as a “dastardly
foe” should be attacked by a bold buckaneer or bandit. The ball
went through the boy’s leg, and, though it made him lame for life,
his folks, bein’ poor, settled for five hundred dollars, and Cicero
come home from jail and wuz fresh for new dime novels flavored by
cigarettes. The next time he got into trouble he hid himself behind
the bushes and shot at the man who had horsewhipped him, and for
whom he cherished a deep, invincible hatred and thirst for revenge.
He felt the honor of the Bloody League wuz at stake, the example
of the braves wuz goadin’ him on. He hid behind a tall clump of
elderberry bushes and shot his dastardly foe as he wuz wendin’ his
way peacefully home from church on a Sunday night. The ball woonded
the man, but not fatally, and the next month saw Cicero in prison.
He wrote home for some novels and cigarettes, which Tamer Ann sent
to solace him in his confinement, and for a time the neighborhood
wuz at peace and breathed freely.
Hamen wuz jest crushed by the blow, and went round lookin’ like
an old man before his time. Tamer had to git a new box of novels
to comfort her, and she developed eight new diseases durin’ the
next two months. It wuz hard for ’em, I pitied ’em from nearly
the bottom of my heart. Clear down in the bottom of my heart lay
the conviction that Tamer had brought on all this sorrow and sin,
had opened the door and let her bandits and banditta come in,
luggin’ all this misery in with ’em, and so I told Josiah. Cicero’s
reputation wuz such they couldn’t git his sentence shortened; he
went for ten years.
As for the neighborin’ boy and girl, who used to pour over the
novels with Cicero, durin’ the next two years the boy shot another
one and killed him and wuz sent to prison for life, and the girl
run away with a circus man who had already several wives in
different parts of the country. She didn’t take all her clothin’
with her, for she left in haste, but she took “The Disguised Hero
of the Sawdust; or, The Clown Prince.” It wuz Tamer’s book.
The girl wuz brought back by her father, but she wuz ruined for
life in the estimation of her neighbors, Tamer wouldn’t allow Anna
to speak to her if she met her on the street; Tamer wuz dretful
bitter now on her, and said such low creeters ort to be made
examplers of. She would have been glad to had her stunned.
I myself pitied her, and in the cause of duty told Tamer when she
wuz goin’ on about her, I sez, “Tamer, your books have been one
great cause of that poor child’s ruination. When her young mind
wuz a calm, innocent, restful place you jest led into it to ravage
round and destroy and tromple and kick up the ground all the wild
villians and wicked wimmen and guirellas that possibly could be
drove into it, they went in and did their work, they destroyed
all the sweet blossoms of innocence, laid waste all the tender
beauty and purity they found there, and put up a wretched ideal
of romantic wickedness which she strove to realize, and has, and
you can set down here and watch the result, and the one that did
the work is the first to condemn her.” Tamer wuz mad, but I didn’t
care. I knew I wuz in the right on’t, and I said jest the same to
her about the boy, and agin Tamer Ann wuz mad, and agin I didn’t
care, for the same reason.
CHAPTER XXII.
Well, Tom Willis kep’ doin’ better and better and wuz gittin’ a
good salary, good enough, with what property he had, for him to
marry on, and Anna kep’ on lovin’ him and refusin’ to marry Von
Crank, and Tamer kep’ on naggin’ Anna, and things seemed to be at
a standstill. Since Cicero wuz shut up Tamer had acted worse than
ever, so it seemed; the trouble instead of softenin’ had seemed to
harden her.
There is some troubles you know jest like that, kinder sharp,
stiff, humiliatin’ troubles, and agin there is heart meltin’, heart
breakin’ griefs that soften the heart while it well nigh breaks
’em. Well, Tamer’s wuz one of them sharp, witherin’, humiliatin’
ones, and her heart seemed harder than ever and she seemed more
in favor of Von Crank, more sot against Tom Willis, more hard on
Jack and more naggin’. But a change wuz to come, when the right
time come the Lord softened Tamer’s heart, and Anna went out of her
servitude, out of the house of bondage into the Land of Promise,
into a happy useful life with the man of her choice.
But, oh, my dear little Jack! my poor boy!
But to resoom backwards agin and take up the thread of history, I
stayed at Hamen’s several days, visitin’ ostensibly with Celestine.
For as many as three times a day, when she would be brung in to
her meals from her engrossin’ Art work, Celestine would say to me:
“How glad I am, Josiah Allen’s wife, that you could come while I
am here, I am so glad to visit with you.” And then she would retire
agin into that remote world of her own and abide there in her own
pink castles set down on blue landscapes, amongst her own strange
lookin’ animals and birds and flowers and things.
And Tamer would say anon and every little while, “How glad I
am, Cousin Samantha, that you could come and visit with me and
Celestine.” And then she would retire into her own enchanted realm
amongst her own droves of pirates and outlaws and romantic heroines
and villians. It wuz a queer time, queer as a dog, but I had real
good visits with Anna, sweet girl, with the shadder of the deepest
sorrow of youth and life hangin’ black above her. And she wuz so
good and innocent and obedient that she said she had told Tom she
would never marry aginst her mother’s wishes, “For,” sez she, “Aunt
Samantha, with Ma’s health as it is she says it would kill her, and
as I tell Tom, what comfort could I ever take even as his wife if I
had been the cause of my mother’s death?”
So I didn’t really know how it wuz comin’ out. I couldn’t see much
chance for Anna’s future, for I expected jest as much to see a
mornin’ glory sproutin’ out of my dry oven as to see any blossom
of tenderness and consideration growin’ in the ambitious, sandy,
trompled sile of Tamer’s heart.
It looked dark before me, dark as Egyptian shades, blind creeter
that I wuz, and, oh! of little faith. I knew well whose hand wuz
at the hellum, and I might have trusted more, my faith might have
been as big as the pint of a pin, but I don’t spoze it wuz, or I
wouldn’t have felt as I did. If my faith had been as big as the
pint of a needle, it must have removed one or two of the hillocks
of gloom that towered up in high ranges in front of me when I
meditated on the future of the girl I loved so well. But I sot
crouched down there in the gloom, and had no idee how they wuz
goin’ to be leveled down and light break through, nor how many
heartaches wuz to go on below while the light broke through high
up, and as mysterious as all things earthly are if we come to
realize it.
Oh, my poor Jack! I never dreamed that it wuz your little hand that
wuz to touch these solid, gloomy pinnacles and shiver ’em down to
the earth. Dear little boy! how many times did I say I wished you
wuz safe from the trials and temptations of this world and its
tribulations? Wuz my wish took as a prayer, and did the Lord grant
it in mercy? But, oh, poor hearts below! how you must ache on as
long as you are wrapped up in this human clay, soft stuff this
human clay is, anyway, and as easy to take impressions as putty.
But to stop eppisodin’ and resoom backwards agin. The day I wuz to
return to the bosom of my family, that bosom incarnated in the form
of my beloved pardner appeared on the seen in good season, no later
than nine A. M. Celestine wuz also to depart that mornin’, she went
a few minutes previous to my companion’s arrival, for she went on
the Loontown stage that passed at a quarter to nine.
She got up very early and did her packin’, she had got most of her
easels and canvases and paint brushes packed up, and her landscapes
and panels and things all padded at the corners and wropped up safe
for the journey. But Celestine said she couldn’t leave till she
took a last look at the lake from the west piazza, the lake come
most up to that side of the house, and it wuz a beautiful sight, I
will admit, and the picture looked quite well, too, for she showed
it to me. The blue of the lake and the sky overhead wuz jest about
the color of little Mary’s eyes, and the light in the east wuz some
the color of her fluffy wavin’ hair, and I told her Ma so as I held
the little girl fondly in my arms. But she looked real indifferent
at the child, as if she see some panels through her and some
calenders and things and called my attention to the “cheri obscuro”
of the pictures, and the “alto releevo,” or I guess that is what
she called ’em, I didn’t have a idee what she meant, but not
wantin’ to act green, I told her I presumed so, “I spoze they’re
real favorites of yourn, but,” sez I candidly, “there hain’t a
doubt of this, this child here would be a prime favorite of mine if
I had her with me much.” And I hugged her to me agin real clost,
and she put her soft, white arm lovin’ly round my neck.
Agin she looked at her with a fur off look, some as if she wuz in
Hindoostan or Egypt or somewhere and sez: “I have never been able
to get such feelin’ into a picture as I have in this.”
And I sez, “Like as not,” and I added, “I know I have a real lovin’
feelin’ for little Mary.” And I smoothed back her hair with a
tender hand and made of her. And then I bid her good-by and went
upstairs, bein’ called there by Anna. And the stage hove in sight,
and Tamer had to draw Celestine offen her work and git into her
bunnet and shawl. The stage driver wuz real profane durin’ the
siege of gittin’ her started, but he got the easel in, and big
framed pictures and placks and panels, and she standin’ over him
and warnin’ him to be careful and not injure ’em, and he got her
little satchels and boxes in and she herself, and they wuz jest
drivin’ off when Hamen’s wife come runnin’ down the steps and
called out to her cousin:
“Celesteena, you have forgot little Mary!” And at that minute I
come downstairs and ketched sight of her and little Jack out in the
yard playin’. Celestine looked at her pictures and satchels and
things and seemed to come to a realizin’ sense that she did miss
sunthin’, so little Mary wuz called in and put in the stage jest
as she wuz, though her dress wuz fur too thin for that cool day,
and her face and hands wuzn’t what they should be to start off on a
journey, and she hadn’t a mite of a wrap on, but the pictures and
panels wuz protected by thick wrappers, and Celestine didn’t see
anything wrong. Little Mary kissed her hand to me as they went out
of the gate, and I threw a dozen to her, and hundreds of wishes for
her future happiness, but I must say I felt dubersome about it,
dretful dubersome.
Well, we got home that night in good season, I got a delicious
supper, and, oh! how good it did seem to be in my own home agin.
Everything looked good to me, even to the teakettle and broom. Oh,
truly, indeed, hath the poet said and sung, “There is no place like
home, there is no place like home.”
I found a lot of papers there Thomas J. had sent me, and I wuz
glad enough I didn’t read ’em till I eat supper and done up my
work. For I knew that no supper could I partook of had I seen the
dretful news these papers contained. And I didn’t see that fatal
article for quite a spell. The papers told about Miss Greene
Smythe’s Charity Bazar, and the first one I opened had a very full
description of the party, and over a column wuz devoted to her
dress, it wuz described as very shinin’ and glitterin’, and her
diamonds immense. It said this Charity Ball and Bazar wuz a great
success, and her city might be proud of such a woman, her native
land might be proud to own her as a child, and the Hottentot would
rise up and call her blessed; it wuz a powerful editorial.
Another daily paper, which I took up next, said it wuz a vulgar
affair; her dress wuz gaudy, her ornaments in poor taste, and it
said that after the expenses of that bazar wuz paid not over one
dollar and seventy-five cents would ever git to that heathen,
and it wuz very doubtful if even that sum would ever reach him,
owin’ to the cupidity and selfishness of the intermediate links,
Hottentot and American.
And the paper went on to say that the Hottentot didn’t need
clothin’, anyway, and it wuz doubtful if he would spend the money
for that purpose even if it ever reached him, for he had imbibed
from Americans a strong love for alcoholic stimulants, and it wuz
supposed by the editor that he would spend the money raised by the
bazar in gettin’ intoxicated on Boston whisky. It wuz a dretful
discouragin’ article. And in that same paper, right along in the
next column describin’ the affair Miss Greene Smythe had been
lookin’ forward to with such pride, wuz the dretful tragedy put
down, the thing that took the nip out of Miss Greene Smythe, and
made a different woman of her, so they say.
I hate to tell it; I hate to like a dog, but I must; it is the
truth and has got to be told. Poor little Angenora! poor little
thing! The nurse gin her too much of that opiate either through
carelessness or meanness or sunthin’; ’tennyrate, she gin her an
overdose that very night of the party. It wuz spozed the nurse
wanted to be free to flirt round and enjoy herself, and the child
bein’ over-excited and couldn’t sleep she dosed her double and
treble. ’Tennyrate, she gin her so much that the next mornin’ they
found her pretty little body layin’ cold and still, the sweet,
misused sperit gone clear out of it. Escaped! that’s the way my
mind pictured it to myself as I thought it over with the paper
dropped into my lap and the tears runnin’ down my face entirely
onbeknown to me.
Escaped! away from these bleak skies into a safer, happier realm.
The nurse run away when she discovered it, but wuz brung back by
officers of the law. Miss Greene Smythe went into spazzum after
spazzum, coniption fit after coniption fit, but recovered enough
to testify aginst the girl and send her to prison. The next work
she did wuz to dismiss the other girl and hire a good, middle-aged
woman, widder of a Lutherean minister, to take care of Algernon.
Well, I don’t envy that widder not a mite. But no missionary to
Africa nor India’s coral strand wuz ever needed more, and mebby
she will disseminate some gospel and some common sense into the
benighted jungles of Miss Greene Smythe’s mind. ’Tennyrate, I
hearn, it come quite straight too--Nancy Yerden hearn it from her
sister-in-law in Jonesville and she told me--that them Danglers
didn’t dangle nigh so much, Miss Greene Smythe seemin’ to not want
’em to.
But she left for the city a few weeks after little Angenora’s
death; she said she couldn’t bear the associations connected with
that house, and I hear she pays more attention to Mr. Greene Smythe
than she did; howsumever, I don’t know. Thomas J. gets bizness
letters from her occasionally--I guess he’ll git her free from
Emery Tweedie, he is a villian and a blackmailer, so Thomas J. sez.
As for Medora, he don’t see his way clear to free her from her
husband, and I guess as long as she lives she will have to suffer
from the effects of her early trainin’ and git along the best she
can.
Now, can any one tell by what occult law or onseen enactment it is,
or what strange, mysterious jury sets on the case and determines it
thus or so, but is there one among my readers who will contradict
me when I say that when one thing happens in this world other
things like it will keep on happenin’, pleasant things and sad
things? Now, if people have one pleasant thing happen to ’em they
will keep on happenin’, and the same with sad things; if one
suicide takes place don’t folks look for another? And they do not
look in vain; the same with embezzlements, murders, war, and rumors
of wars.
Alas! the grass wuz not yet green on little Angenora’s grave
when---- But I can’t put it down yet; no, I have got to lead up to
it gradual or I can’t stand it; I have got to kinder stiddy myself
by relating other things first.
CHAPTER XXIII.
Things went on in their usual roteen in our home in Jonesville,
Josiah good, over-good at times, anon puggicky and hard to
git along with, softened into amiability agin by his own good
principles and his pardner’s oncommon tact and cookin’. Meetin’s,
socials, visitors, agents, and colporters varied the calm roteen as
of yore; the children had been home frequent, and Hamenses folks
had been down on a visit and stayed several days.
One day Aunt Polly Worden come to spend the day with me. She lives
with her brother and his wife, and is pretty well off if she only
knew it, but she don’t know it, and probable never will. She will
go on and complain of her sister-in-law by the hour if folks will
listen to her. But I always git her attention off as soon as I can
onto other subjects, knittin’ or piecin’ up, or the minister’s
wife, or sunthin’ or ruther. Well, little Delight wuz stayin’ with
us for a few days, and Aunt Polly seemed to forget her grievances
lookin’ at the dear little creeter and hearin’ her pretty talk as
she played with her dollys and books and toys.
I got a oncommon good dinner--Aunt Polly loves her vittles--and
she brightened up considerable and wuz talkin’ real agreeable for
her, and that afternoon Thomas J. and Maggie stopped in for a few
minutes with their baby. They wuz out ridin’ and come in for a few
minutes, and Thomas J. went to find his Pa, wantin’ to see him on
bizness. The baby looked sweet as a rosebud, and Maggie looked like
the parent rose on the same stem.
Maggie couldn’t take off her bunnet even, for they had to be back
before noon, but she said they wuz comin’ down that week to stay
all day. But I did take off the baby’s little white silk hood and
snowy cashmere cloak, and made of it a sight, Delight lookin’ on as
happy as a little queen. After they went away I spoke as is nateral
to Aunt Polly about the charms and loveliness of that baby, and
Aunt Polly winked at me real knowin’ and sez to Delight:
“Your nose is broke now, young lady.”
Delight put her little finger up to her nose and felt of it
anxiously, and I wunk at Aunt Polly to say no more, for I knew what
she meant--it wuz that this new babe of Thomas Jefferson’s would
push little Delight out of my heart. But Aunt Polly is real kinder
obstinate; I guess her sister-in-law is right when she sez, “No
mule wuz ever more balky than Polly Worden.”
But then I realize that she is a old maiden and has had five
disappointments and some say seven, and they have embittered her.
She heeded not the wink I wunk at her and kep’ right on:
“The little new baby will take your place now in Grandma’s heart.”
Delight looked troubled, on her smooth little brow I could see
fall the first faint shadow of that great, black shape that we
call jealousy. Her sweet eyes looked as if they wuz cloudin’
up ready for tears. And I wunk severer and more voyalent winks
at Aunt Polly; if ever a wink spoke them did, and said, “Stop
immegiately.” But she kep’ right on (poor creeter! I spoze them
disappintments wuz the cause on’t), and sez:
“You won’t be Grandma’s baby any more; she has got somebody else to
love now.”
And then the cloud did burst into a rainfall of tears. Delight jest
burst out a-cryin’ and snuggled down in my arms and laid her wet
cheeks on my bosom through the power of old custom, and anon (how
much like human creeters accordin’ to her size) she drew her head
away agin as if sayin’, “I can’t lay my head there any more; if the
love has gone out of the heart it won’t rest or comfort me any more
to lay there.”
And pride woke up in her; she wuz too proud to make a fuss or beg
for love (how much, how much like big children), so she set up
kinder straight on my lap with her pretty lips quiverin’ and the
tears runnin’ silent down her cheeks, and I riz right up with her
and went out of the room.
Josiah wuz there, and I wouldn’t bring Miss Worden to terms before
a male, owin’ to the five or seven things mentioned by me; but I
felt that I must make it right with Delight that very minute. I
knew how she felt, woonded pride and love and jealousy, a few hard
syllables of the hardest lessons of life had come to Delight, and I
must help her spell ’em, I must help her with her lesson.
So I took her into the parlor and sot down with her in the big
chair and never said a word for a minute or two, only held her
clost to me and kissed the shinin’ hair that lay up aginst my
cheeks, she strugglin’ at first, Jealousy and Pride naggin’ her,
and at first not bein’ able to hear any voices only jest them of
J. and P. (jest like older children exactly). But, after a while,
I held her so warm and clost, with my cheek layin’ on the pretty
head, the stiddy firm clasp and contact sort o’ calmed her, and
then anon she drew one little arm up around my neck, and anon the
other one, and I looked down deep into her eyes, right into the
little true soul, and that little true soul see the truth in mine.
Words couldn’t have convinced Delight so well as that look she had
learnt to depend on. Love has a language that, though mebby it
can’t be exactly parsed and analyzed, yet it can be understood,
entirely understood, and Delight see that I loved her. And then wuz
the time the little creeter put up her lips and kissed me, and I
sez sort o’ low but very tender:
“Sweetheart, you know jest how much I love you, don’t you?”
And she said, “Yes.”
And then I kissed her several times in various places on her face,
every one on ’em sweet places. And went on and talked dretful good
to her about the new baby. I confided in her, told her all about
how the little new soul had come onbeknown to itself into a great,
strange world, how helpless it wuz, how weak, and how we must all
help it and try to make it feel at home amongst us.
And I tried to explain it to her, that as she wuz here first she
owed a courtesy to the newcomer, and that she must be ready and
willin’ to neighbor with her; I didn’t use jest the words, but them
wuz my idees.
I told her how blind the little creeter wuz, and Delight, if only
out of politeness, must try to see for her, lead her straight over
ways she knew nothin’ about, and keep her from harmin’ herself. How
baby couldn’t talk for herself at all now, and Delight must talk
for her, good talk that the little one could learn of her bimeby.
How she couldn’t walk, and Delight, bein’ stronger, must go ahead
of her and make a pretty path for her to foller when she got big
enough. I told her jest how hard it wuz for the baby to be put here
so helpless in the midst of sorrows and troubles and dangers, and
how we must all of us be jest as good to her as we could out of
pity for the dear little creeter.
So I rousted up Delight’s pity for her, and she wuz all animated
about helpin’ her, and I told her the baby had come to be a great
blessin’ and comfort to her, but she must take great care of it and
not let it get harmed in any way, for it would need her care and
love for a long time.
And don’t you see that the fact of Delight havin’ to do a kindness
to the baby, havin’ to take thought and study out good things to do
for her, wuz the surest way to make her love her? For it is a great
fact in our human nater that you can’t love them you have injured
in any way, and at the same time if you have ever been good to
anybody you always feel softer toward ’em and more mellerer.
Curious, hain’t it? But it is a fact, and I spoze the reason
on’t is you have sort o’ lowered yourself in your own estimation
by doing a onkind act, and so in order to satisfy your mental
criticism on yourself and try to make it right, you lay hold and
bring up all the faults of that person you can to justify your
own act, and so you keep on that mental naggin’ at ’em, that
oncomfortable sort of a feelin’ toward ’em makes you restless and
oneasy, and you are glad every time you can stand justified to
your own consciousness by ketchin’ ’em in a bad act--hain’t that
so, now? Why, I know it is, so I made sure Delight shouldn’t begin
wrong. For when you do a good, helpful thing for a person your
hull soul feels comfortable and you bring up unconscious mental
reasons why you did it, it wuz because they wuz so good, so smart,
and so you keep on feelin’ good and comfortable, you keep on
praisin’ ’em to your own self till you git fairly in love with ’em,
as it were.
A very curious thing. But the way I do when I git hold of a strange
fact or truth, I don’t wait to explain it full to myself before I
act on it; no, I grasp hold of it and use it for my own benefit and
afterwards wonder at it to my heart’s content.
So Delight got to thinkin’ she wuz necessary to the baby’s
happiness, and that tickled her little self-esteem jest as though
she wuz a older child (only accordin’ to her weight). She got to
thinkin’ she must watch over her or she might git hurt, which
called out all the good motherly protectin’ impulses of her little
soul which wuz in her (still accordin’ to her weight, forty pounds
more or less). And day by day Delight’s love for the little creeter
grew till it wuz fairly beautiful to see ’em together, and so
Josiah said, and her Pa and Ma and the neighbors.
But to resoom backwards a little. As for Miss Worden, I thought to
myself, disappintments or not, I have got to give her a-talkin’
to, and so I did, the very next time I see her. She had gone when
Delight and I went out of the parlor, Delight with bright, happy
eyes, and I with kinder thoughtful, pityin’ ones, and all four on
’em kinder wet. But the next time I see her alone I tackled her,
and she jest as good as promised she wouldn’t ever say to any human
child agin what she had said to Delight. And I don’t believe she
will. She hain’t such a bad creeter after all, and, good land!
what can you expect, six or seven right along one after the other?
Well, I guess it wuz the afternoon of the very day I tackled Aunt
Polly Worden and got her promise, or as good as a promise, I got
a letter from Jack, he don’t write to me often, but like all
congenial souls I felt we wuz nigh each other whether we communed
in spoken or written words or not, his letters are printed and are
sights of work, I know. Josiah brung the letter in when he come in
to dinner. Jack’s letter wuz written on Sunday, it run as follers:
“My deer Ant,
“We want you to come over a visitin’ ma sez so and i say so i
want to see you bad I’ve been to meetin’ to day Ma told me to
remember what the minister sed and tell you i don’t Remember
nothin’ only i Herd him say more’n twenty times my herers i
will close my remarks
“deer Ant i hate lyin
“All day if i moved ma Told me i never would be a little joseph
or a little sammel i don’t want to be a little joseph i drather
be a colt they can move sundays they can kick up their Heels
and Run lass night father made me go to bed at ate he sed it
wood make me grow sez i father you lett anna set up she is
bigger sez he then she ort to sleep more sez i for there is
more of her to git tired Father never stopped readin but sez he
you are a cute one sez i father what is cute you run along to
Bed that is all father sed when i wuz goin upstairs to bed i
called out to mother mother what is cute and she never looked
up from her book but sez run right along to bed Jack Then i
gripped right onto the hired girl and sez i you shall tell me
what cute is i’ll cute you sez she and she snaked me right into
bed and Blowed out the lamp deer Ant they won’t never tell me
nothin there is lots and lots of things i feel i must know
about and if i ask them they say a little boy should be seen
and not Herd deer Ant i don’t want to be seen i drather be Herd
how be i goin’ to find out things if they won’t tell me, Youre
shure nuff you answer questions deer Ant i like you and we want
you to come here a visitin so no more
“remaining your respected friend,
“JACK.
“P. S.
“I want you to come here a visitin the worst kind,
“your obedient servant
“JACK.
“P. S. agin
“ma told me to tell you to come wednesday for shure do come to
see your respected cousin
“JACK.
“P. S. agin
“Ma is goin to have a party and wants you to stay all night and
so duz yours truly
“JACK.
“P. S. ma told me to ask you and unkel Josiah to come
“P. S. be sure and come J.”
Well, a letter come from Tamer by the same mail or mails, by Ury,
brung in by Josiah.
Jack wuz in the right on’t. Tamer wuz goin’ to have a afternoon
party of the Allen race and dynasty and wanted Josiah and I to
be sure and come and stay all night, for the rest wuz comin’ and
goin’ by train and stage, and they would all go home that night
but us and mebby Celestine, and she begged Josiah and me to stay a
few days. Well, bein’ through with his hardest work and owin’ the
visit, Josiah consented to go and we sot off in good season and
arrove there about ten A. M. We see the house looked real stirred
up when we got there, the winders open above and below, and the
piazzas on both sides full of little groups of the relations; we
wuz about the last ones there, owin’ to most all the rest havin’
come on the cars or the stage from Zoar and Loontown.
Uncle Submit Allen and Aunt Patience and their three daughters
and their children, and Tamer’s brother’s folks and her Uncle
Preserved, and Aunt Priscilla and Aunt Nancy John and Aunt Nancy
Joe, widders of the old twins, John and Joseph Allen, and Uncle
Ichabod Allen, poor creeter! he had lost his wife, but he kep’ his
old maid girl to keep house for him; yes, Huldy wuz there, too,
takin’ first rate care of her Pa; Cousin Joel and his wife and
Marii, she is a kind of a widder, that is, her husband, Jotham
Allen, left her a year ago this comin’ fall, run away with Elam
Snyderses widder and a three-year-old colt that belonged to Marii,
and, as I told her, I should mourn some for the colt, but should
consider it wuz a colt well lost to git red of Jotham. A poor,
whifflin’ creeter, drinkin’ and behavin’, and had ever sence they
wuz married. Marii is a good deal better off without him, and she
begins to think so, too; she is a tailoress and gits good wages and
don’t have to have her heart and mind on a strain all the time.
Why, sometimes I think it is easier to settle down and be real
onhappy than it is to be between and betwixt, and not know what
roll you will be called to play the next minute. If you know you
are onhappy you can set down and mourn and give your hull time to
it as it were, and not strain your mind, not knowin’ what you are
goin’ to do next.
But to resoom. These relations I have named all pressed forwards in
the stoop to greet me; after Tamer and Anna and Jack, bless him!
had met us with a hearty welcome, Hamen, havin’ gin me a cordial
greetin’, had gone on to the horse barn with the mair and my
pardner. I see Celestine settin’ at the other end of the stoop with
her easel all up a’ready, and she paintin’ away at some landscape
or ruther, not mindin’ seemin’ly the waves of relationship surgin’
round her on every side. But, as I drawed near, she did take her
brush in her other hand and shake hands with me, but her hand wuz
real limpsy, she didn’t realize me much of any, her mind wuzn’t in
our world at all as I could see.
She wuz paintin’ the cloud effects on the water, she said, and
her canvas did look all kinder swashy and blue with some storks
storkin’ along in front, to give the picture character, she said,
and she said she never see the cloud effects more strikin’ than
they wuz that mornin’.
And I sez, “Yes, like as not.” And I looked off dreamily for a
number of minutes. The lake lay like a long, bright mirror, and all
the tiny white and pink clouds that wuz floatin’ on the clear, blue
sky above wuz reflected on the face of the water, the willers that
grew along the banks on one side wuz reproduced and living agin
down in that strange underworld, and the big oak tree that sort o’
bent over the water with a bluebird settin’ out on one branch and
singin’ sweet and clear.
There they wuz livin’ agin, bluebird and all, it wuz a fair seen,
a fair seen, and I didn’t wonder that Celestine admired it. But
with all my admiration, and, though I wuz borne off a considerable
ways by my almost boundless delight in the seen, yet some practical
common sense remained with me. When anybody is in danger of
bein’ carried away by their emotions they ort to tie a string to
themselves as it were to bring themselves back to this life as long
as they have got to stay in it. And so I give a little hitch to
this string and found myself back in this world agin, and I sez,
“Where is little Mary!”
“Oh,” sez Celestine, in a rapt way, “how sweetly the bird song
blends in with the tender feeling of the landscape, and yet a stork
is a more striking adjunct,” sez she.
But I sez agin, “Where is little Mary?”
And after repeating the question for the third time, she sez,
looking round her in a vague way, “Oh, I guess she is playing
somewhere with some of the children.” And I left her, she not
sensin’ it at all, and went down the steps towards the lake where I
heard the sound of children’s voices. I found little Mary settin’
on a stun and lookin’ fur off onto the water, she had been throwing
pebbles into the clear depths, but sot still now, seemin’ly wropped
up in her thoughts.
She seemed dretful glad to see me, and I her visey versey, sweet
little creeter! Jack joined us pretty soon, and we sot there for
some time, and I told ’em quite a number of stories, and I held
Mary in one arm and Jack in the other, and we enjoyed ourselves
first rate. But the voices of Duty and Tamer called me back to the
house and the assembled guests. Von Crank wuz there, for Tamer
would have it so, and he paid Anna all the attention he possibly
could, and she repulsed it all she could, so it made quite queer
times and quite romantic. But Anna told me out on the west piazza,
when we happened to be there alone, that since Cicero had been sent
to the penitentiary her Ma had not acted quite so headstrong and
stern about Von Crank, “But yet,” sez she, “I see her mind is still
set on our union, and what shall I do, Aunt Samantha? She has been
through so much trouble with Cicero. I am afraid any other blow
would be the means of killing her.” And she sez agin, as she had
said before, “I could never be happy, never, if I wuz the means of
breaking her heart, and so I don’t know what to do.”
“Well,” sez I, “you’re young yet, you and Tom; you can wait a spell
and trust the Lord and ask Him to help you out of your wilderness.”
“Oh, I do, Aunt Samantha! I ask Him, and I trust Him, or I couldn’t
live. He has seemed so much nearer than ever before since I have
been so wretched and haven’t known what to do.”
“Well, you know who said that all things work together for good to
them that love God, and if you do love Him the promise is made to
you, and you must lay holt of it.”
And then she went on and told me more about Tamer, and I did pity
her, pity her like a dog. She said when Cicero wuz sent away
her Pa, in the first hours when he wuz most dead with shame and
mortification, told his wife she wuz the cause of it all; she had
filled his brain with stories of vice and crime, and Cicero had
acted out what his brain had been filled with, and from what Anna
said I guess Hamen throwed Arabeller in her face and told her she
had, for the sake of convenience and what she called gentility,
just schooled Cicero in morbid romance and vicious adventure, and
he sez, “You are now reaping what you have sown.” Anna said her Ma
went into one hysterick fit after another, and she had to git her
Pa out of the room and take care of her herself day after day, and
sez she, “They are so cool to each other, now, I don’t believe they
will ever be even friends agin, and everything is so sad, Aunt
Samantha,” sez she.
And agin I told her, “It is always the darkest jest before day,
Anna.”
But little did I think whose small hand it wuz that wuz goin’
to lift the cloud and let the light of reconciliation into the
darkened home life of Hamen and Tamer and bring their hearts
together agin. A Hamen realizin’ his own weaknesses and waywardness
and softenin’ into a feeling of pity for the blind mistakes of a
Tamer, and being willin’ to jine hands and hearts with her agin and
pick up the tangled threads of life and try to straighten ’em out
into plain runnin’ agin. Oh, poor little Jack! dear little creeter!
CHAPTER XXIV.
But to resoom backwards agin. Anna said her Ma had not only acted
dretful cool and distant to her Pa ever since, but kep’ up a cool,
icy demeanor towards everybody who pitied her over Cicero’s fate.
And the thought her idee in givin’ the party wuz to show she could
still keep up and hold her ground, and wuz not such a forlorn
object of pity as they all seemed to think. Well, Tamer did look
queer, her face put me in mind some of our creek before it breaks
up in the spring, sort o’ cold and smooth and ice bound, and as if
you would be apt to slip up if you ventured a foot on it.
Not one of the relations had dasted, so fur as I could make out,
to say one word to her about Cicero, and if relations don’t dast,
then who will! I myself didn’t feel like mentionin’ his name, no,
my feelin’s wuz so deep no plummet might sound ’em in regard to
that boy and his folks. Deep pity, knowledge of first causes, and
prophetic feelings I had as to sure results to spring from dime
novels, cigarettes, etc., made my feelin’s queer as a dog’s, a
black dog’s. And I didn’t feel like sayin’ one word, no, indeed,
I felt I had had my say, and, as I watched Tamer’s icy face, I
thought to myself I didn’t want to be anywhere round when the ice
broke up and the waves of remorse and regret washed tumultous.
Well, she had an elegant dinner and supper, waited on in first
class style by a new girl, and I dassent for my life congratulate
Tamer on her efficient and neat lookin’ handmaid, no, I dassent
bring back any reminiscences of Arabeller, I kep’ still, and,
follerin’ the Scripter, I partook of what wuz set before me and
asked no questions for conscience sake.
Uncle Ichabod, bein’ the oldest perfessor present, asked splendid
blessin’s at both meals, and everything moved on as smooth as
clockwork; the relations visited together and talked about the
news of the day and about the absent relation, as is their wont
to do on such occasions. The old ones settin’ with their heads
clost together tradin’ stories of the past; the middle-aged ones
strollin’ round or gossippin’ together on the porches or lawn,
talkin’ together of the present, their business, their failures and
successes; the young ones playin’ on the pianny, and the children
shoutin’ and laughin’ and havin’ the best time of all.
And Celestine paintin’ away at that landscape and perfectin’ the
feathers of that stork. Two or three times I see little Mary
approach her and snuggle up against her and seem to want some
attention, but every time her Ma wuz too busy to notice her, some
of the tiny feathers on that stork’s legs callin’ for concentrated
attention, and the bulrushes on the bank had to be shaded jest
right, and so she told little Mary to run away, she couldn’t spend
any time with her.
Well, the relations all went home on the evenin’ train and stage,
all but one or two of the business men, who had to go earlier,
them men took their pleasure grudgingly as if they didn’t really
know how to spend in social enjoyment and leisure the time that
should been devoted to pilin’ up treasures on earth. All went but
Celestine and little Mary and my pardner and me. By the urgent
requests of Tamer and Hamen, and the still more urgent pleas of
Anna and Jack, we stayed for several days, Josiah and Hamen goin’
out for two days a-runnin’ to neighborin’ farmers to see the
operations of a new and curiously constructed windmill. Josiah
talks of rarin’ one up to home, and so duz Hamen. So, as Josiah
seemed to be contented and happy, I tried to be the same, though I
felt I wuz confronted by more curious, complicated problems than
any windmill that ever beat the air.
Oh, how Tamer’s cold, icy demeanor chilled my heart! How Anna’s
sweet, patient, submissive air wrung the same almost to burstin’
on’t! How the actions of Hamen and his brother to little Jack,
foolin’ him, deceivin’ him, and Tamer’s scrupulous attention to his
clothes and hair, and paying no attention whatever to his childish
soul needs, how all that wrought on the heart aforesaid!
Von Crank went home on the train the relation took, so there wuz
one queer element less to contend with, and I trust I wuz thankful
for that mercy. After Von Crank left the queerest element that wuz
left I think in our soul atmosphere wuz Celestine’s pictures. They
looked queer, yes, indeed, they did! but her mind wuz all entangled
in their strange scenery, forgittin’ she had a sweet, lovely child
right by her side. And she wuz a lovely child. I realized it more
and more durin’ the days when we wuz so much together, her Ma bein’
on the piazza and not to be disturbed. Mary’s eyes wuz so bright
and big and soft and had the very same look in ’em that Jack’s had
sometimes, they seemed to be lookin’ fur off into mysteries we
couldn’t see. And I spoze they see ’em, too, though in a strange
fashion, too pure and fine to be uttered in our language.
I never looked at ’em when they wuz in these moods (alternated
on Jack’s part by loud yellin’ and kickin’ up), I never see that
dreamy, rapt look in their faces without bein’ reminded of the
verse about the children who always behold the face of the Father.
And I believe they did see Him, not in the divine form mebby, but
some mysterious afterglow of the divine brightness.
And they wuz believin’ children, too, trustin’ children naturally,
though Jack, by hard experience, wuz learnin’ to doubt, and how
any one could look into their sweet, believin’ eyes and tell ’em
wrong stories, tryin’ to fool ’em, jest as if their sweet, childish
wisdom wuzn’t milds beyend their poor earthly knowledge, wuz more
than I could see.
But Hamen and his brother had got so in the habit of tellin’ Jack
every story they could think of, would tell the same things to
Mary, and Celestine wuz too took up with her Art to notice. Truly
her pictures seemed to be a necessity of life to her, when, as
it seemed to me, she had more than enough for comfort, she wuz
hurryin’ to produce more. She offered to paint me a calendar, but I
mildly rejected the overtoor. I sez to her that the days and weeks
brought so many strange things as they went on that I guessed I had
jest as soon take ’em plain. I wuz polite to her, but gin her to
understand I wuzn’t sufferin’ for it.
But Tamer wuz enthusiastick about ’em, and Celestine painted her
one with every week, showin’ a new animal kinder sprawlin’ round
it, amongst some strange flowers and things, I couldn’t have stood
it myself to had it round, but Tamer liked it, and Celestine said
she would paint one for the hull family. And, bein’ so wrought up
ornamentin’ the days of the week on paper, she entirely forgot
that the days and years of God held any duty for her, forgot the
sweet little soul he had gin to her charge for weal or woe, forgot
to speak a word to her from mornin’ till night. Why, it wuz worse
than the children mentioned in Scripter when they asked for bread
and got a stun, poor little Mary asked for the bread of love and
got nothin’ but a piece of paper, though there hain’t a stun on
the face of the earth, from Gibrialtar down to a slate stun, that
I wouldn’t ruther had gin to me than to have owned one of them
picters and had to look at it. But she kep’ at ’em.
Well, it wuz the third day we had been there, and it wuz a
beautiful evenin’. I wuz settin’ in my winder overlookin’ the lake,
and, seein’ how bright the stars looked reflected in the smooth
water and how the crescent moon lay down there like a big golden
boat all full and flashin’ with light, and the glowin’ path that
led to it shone so it looked like one of them streets of gold we
read about in the New Jerusalem, it seemed so solid and bright that
it fairly tempted one to walk out on it and set sail in that great
dazzlin’ boat for the golden shores and fairy pinnacles of that
city that lay becalmed in the west.
And as I sot there I heard, with a small part of my brain, the
other part bein’ occupied with my rapt musin’s, little Mary’s voice
talkin’ down under the winder on the stoop with her Uncle Hamen,
she had always lived inland and had never seen such a glorious
show on the water, the nights she had stayed there bein’ cloudy or
stormy, I hearn her say in her earnest way, “What is that light,
Uncle Hamen, way off there on the water? It looks like a great
shinin’ boat.”
And then I hearn, as one who did not hear, Hamen say, “It is a
boat, Mary.”
“Well, what are the little bright lights all round it? Are they
little playhouses for children? They look so small and bright, and
there is such a pretty path to ’em over the water.”
And then I hearn Hamen go on, a little I heard there with my ears
onbeknown to me and a little I hearn afterwards from the lips of
a too late remorse, but ’tennyrate Hamen told her they wuz little
playhouses where good little boys and girls went to play, and asked
if she didn’t want to go and play in one of ’em.
And she told him in her believin’, trustin’ way that she guessed
she would go out and live in one of them with Jack.
And Hamen said it would be a good idee, they could take some dishes
and things and keep house there, and told her to talk to Jack about
it. And she pattered off to find Jack, and Hamen told his brother
about it, and they both tittered and laughed. But that I did hear
afterwards, I am truthful and will not lie even in moments of
excitement and tragedy, I did not hear the titters.
Well, it wuzn’t long after that that Jack come into my room, and I,
bein’ so wropped round with my reverie, didn’t notice anything in
particular, but remember thinkin’ in a dreamy way that he looked
dretful buttoned up as if he wuz ready to start off somewhere, and
his pockets seemed kinder bulgin’ out, but if I thought anything,
I thought it wuz some of his and little Mary’s play, they played
keepin’ house and doctorin’ and visitin’ and everything. Well, he
come to me and asked me if folks ever lived in the stars?
And I sez, “Sometimes I have thought so, Jack.”
“You’re always sure nuff, Aunt Samantha, and that is why I asked
you. Do you spoze they are playgrounds where folks that are tired
out, wore out with folks here, can go with somebody they love and
have a good time?”
I declare for’t I had been thinkin’ them very thoughts as I sot
there lookin’ at the stars and their bright reflections in the
water. I had been thinkin’ of how sweet it would be for them who
are unhappy, seperated by some cruel chance from them they love,
how sweet it would be if them shinin’ worlds wuz indeed restful,
lovely playgrounds where they could wander together like happy
children full of the delight and wonder of readin’ new truths and
new happiness in each other’s eyes.
I had jest been thinkin’ of this when Jack come to me, and I
rousted up partly from my reverie some like one half asleep. But
even in the hours of meditation and reverie I cling to the apron
string of truth, and when he sez:
“Do you spoze, Aunt Samantha, the stars are playgrounds?”
I spozein’ he meant after this life instead of the present,
spozein’ he referred to the Over World, the Beautiful Hereafter
that is the groundwork of all my thoughts, no matter what set
flowers of reality is painted on it, I spozed he meant that, and I
sez half sadly, half hopefully:
“I have thought it wuz, Jack, a place of beautiful play and
beautiful work.”
And as I looked out agin on the lovely cloudy surface of the water,
gemmed by them gleaming orbs, sunthin’ like a sad life lit by a
glowin’ love and hope, I added:
“Sometimes I have been sure of it.”
And Jack sez, “Do you spoze there will be anybody there to answer
questions?” And I, thinkin’ of the strange riddles of this life,
and how much we need heavenly light on ’em, sez:
“Yes, I am sure of that, Jack.”
“Well, I sot for a spell longer lookin’ out dreamily and never took
particular notice of his warm kiss as he left me, he wuz always
kissin’ me, except thinkin’ mekanically it wuz a long and sticky
one, as they often wuz, owin’ to love and molasses candy. And it
wuzn’t more’n a spell after that before I ondressed and went to
bed, Josiah havin’ been reposin’ on his peaceful piller for some
time. And I, too, fell asleep. When all of a sudden I hearn steps
runnin’ round and excited talk goin’ on below, my first thought wuz
of burglars, but as the excitement seemed to increase I thought of
a conflagration and rousted up my companion, and sez:
“Sunthin’ is the matter, Josiah Allen, you will have to git up and
see about it.”
“Which is it to-night, Samantha,” sez he, in a sarcastick axent
that I despise, “is it a mouse or a burglar!”
I looked witherin’ at him, and he sez, “I merely asked you so I
should know how to prepare to meet the foe, with a mouse trap or a
sord.”
I deny that I git him up very often to tend to such things, not
oftener than once in a while, not oftener than the common run of
wimmen do. But the excitement continued to rain, and finally he
hearn it rain himself, and he sez:
“Well, I guess there is sunthin’ the matter.”
And jest then we hearn a rap on our door, and Josiah sez, “Who is
there? What is the matter?”
And a voice answered, “Jack and Mary can’t be found!”
And I riz right up and dressed me, and so did Josiah, I forebodin’
all the time, a shadder of the great Onknown seemin’ to fall over
my mind and heart, as if preparin’ me for what wuz to come.
When we got downstairs Tamer wuz in highstericks, and Celestine,
forgittin’ her art, wuz rushin’ round to and fro with a white
wrapper on and a whiter face, callin’ on little Mary in axents so
pitiful it almost seemed it would roust up a dead baby, let alone
a lovin’, livin’ child. Where wuz them strange animals in that
hour? They had walked clean away and left her in agony and despair.
She seemed to know from the first on’t that sunthin’ dretful had
happened, and so did Tamer. There are awful secrets that mothers
learn down in the Valley of Death where they go to claim their
babies, they learn things there and keep ’em in their inmost nater,
so clost that art or literatoor, however lurid, can’t dislodge ’em.
They felt what they couldn’t explain, hence the highstericks,
shriekin’, etc.
Hamen and John, though lookin’ dretful troubled, kep’ on sayin’
they wuz hid somewhere, they would be found, all right, they wuz
safe, but goin’ round at a good jog, nevertheless, tryin’ to find
’em. But it wuz my own pardner and myself that found them babies.
Alas, for the awful sight! alas, for the woeful sight! Yes, we
found ’em.
There wuz a certain place quite a good ways from the house where
I knew the children often went to play at keepin’ house. An old
gnarled willow tree hung over the water, and in its crooked trunk
wuz a holler place where they kep’ their little dishes and things,
and one or two old dolls for children. Sunthin’ told me to look
there, and, follered by my faithful pardner, I went to the little
holler jest out of sight of the house.
And there, with the moonlight fallin’ as sorrowful as if some
weepin’ angel of compassion wuz holdin’ down a lantern to light us
in our search, we found ’em.
Jack had held up little Mary till his arms had fairly froze into
that poster of heroism, so she hadn’t been in the water nigh so
long. We knew he had tried to save her till his strength gin way
and his faithful little arms could no longer do the biddin’ of his
generous, lovin’ heart. Little hero! Many a man standin’ up above
the multitude on top of a monument did not die half so glorious a
death as you did.
And, whether Jack went in after Mary to save her or whether he,
too, believed the story of the shinin’ playgrounds (alas! alas!
confirmed by me onbeknown to myself) and sot out for ’em with her,
we shall never know. All she could remember, sweet little soul! wuz
that she sot out to go to them happy playgrounds and sunk down,
down into blackness and night.
But for half an hour little Mary’s soul wuz gone away, I wonder
where it wuz, anyway, it wuzn’t here. No, her white, cold body
didn’t have any tenant in it, no sign of one, there wuz no fire in
it, the light wuz blowed out, she wuz gone.
The sweet little soul had gone away visitin’, and I would give--oh!
I don’t know what I wouldn’t give to know where it had gone. It
couldn’t be the Great Home we move into when our life lease ends
here on our earthly property. No, for when we once move out of this
earthly body we don’t move back into it agin, that is one of the
conditions of the transfer. No, it wuzn’t there, and where then
wuz it? I don’t know, nor Josiah don’t. But after a long, long time
it come back slowly, lingerin’ly, as if it hated to come.
Celestine hung over her with a look on her face that made me
believe that if she ever did come back she would come into a new
world where love and care rained instead of art exclusively. Yes,
she come back agin, but Jack, dear little boy, he had gone away for
good. Yes, I say that word a-purpose, he had gone for good, good
for him, but for them who loved him so, what shall we say?
I wonder if he wuz permitted to look forward and see what wuz to
be in the future; Tamer and Hamen brung together by the awful hand
of Grief and mutual remorse, Hamen a different, more Christian
man. Tamer’s icy, cold mean broke up and pulverized by the hand of
Grief, the flood of awakened remorse sweepin’ away on its current
old foolish ambitions, pride and self-will. Anna left free to
marry the man of her choice, Tamer and Hamen rousted up to good
deeds and the performance of duty, so layin’ up a store of blessed
remembrances to replace the old wretched ones. Cicero comin’ home
repentant to begin a new life under the guardianship of a new
father and mother, all this and more.
But yet, oh, my poor Jack! that your dear little ice cold form wuz
to be the centre from which such blessed events should flow out!
Icy cold forehead with the brown curls layin’ on it like gleams of
gold, not warmin’ it up any; roses heaped in the tiny cold fingers
that did not close on what they loved so; tears falling on the
sweet face onnoticed and in vain.
Good-by, dear little Jack--good-by!
+-------------------------------------------+
| =A FEW FROM HUNDREDS OF PRESS NOTICES OF |
| |
| Around the World with Josiah Allen’s Wife |
| |
| By MARIETTA HOLLEY= |
+-------------------------------------------+
“The persons who do not love quaint Josiah Allen’s wife have
something serious the matter with them. A more original and
delightful character does not exist. The homely old philosopher,
with her rugged sense, her quick wit, her unfailing humor, and
her lively faculty of observation, will make her old friends
more steadfast than ever and gain a host of new ones, by her
latest adventures. It is a rare privilege to read a book which
combines so happily the qualities of being both amusing and
wholesome.”--_Albany Times-Union._
“The author besides having a marked talent for humor, possesses
an effective capacity for pathos, and this book, besides being
excellent fiction, is an instructive geographical excursion.”--_New
York Evening Telegram._
“Josiah Allen’s wife is a familiar character in households all
over this broad land. Her doings in the past have been so closely
watched that she has secured a place at the family hearth, which
cannot be shaken. Her doings have been related and read aloud in
the family circle and when ‘the end’ was reached there has ever
been a sigh of regret.”--_Albany Evening News._
“A good many readers are acquainted with Josiah Allen’s wife
and have laughed with her as she philosophizes her smiling
way about this country. In this last book Josiah Allen’s wife
extends her territory and broadens her views as she covers the
ground.”--_Seattle Post-Intelligencer._
“True pathos, as well, is not lacking in Samantha’s reflections
upon what she sees and hears that is sad, and her true insight
into the springs of human action is often expressed in kindly and
humorous ridicule.”--_Milwaukee Evening Wisconsin._
“Pathetic and humorous incidents tumbling over each other in rapid
succession is the best the author has given to the public.”--_St.
Louis Mirror._
“Samantha has had her admirers these many years. Her humor has
caught the fancy of the people far and wide, while they have
been moved by her pathos at times. Samantha in this book is as
wise and witty in her own shrewd way as ever. She is entirely an
American character and one needs only to know her to appreciate
her.”--_Philadelphia Press._
“Provides you with a view of the universe through homely
spectacles, and stands by the while uttering good housewifely
philosophies calculated to make you laugh.”--_St. Louis Republic._
“Those who have enjoyed the discursive descriptions of Samantha’s
experiences at the great expositions and under other and varied
circumstances, will without doubt also enjoy this new book, ‘Around
the World with Josiah Allen’s Wife.’”--_New York Tribune._
“The best of her books.”--_Albany Press._
“One of the ‘classics’ of literary comedy.”--_Toledo Blade._
=A large, handsome Volume, profusely illustrated and beautifully
bound in cloth. Price, $1.50=
=G. W. DILLINGHAM CO. Publishers, NEW YORK=
=TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE=
Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.
Bold text is denoted by =equal signs=.
Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been
corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within
the text and consultation of external sources.
Except for those changes noted below, all misspellings in the
text, and inconsistent or archaic usage, have been retained.
Some hyphens in words have been silently removed, some added, when
a predominant preference was found in the original book.
Frontispiece: ‘_Frontispiece. Page 18._’ replaced by
‘_Frontispiece_.’
Illustrations Page: ‘_Frontispiece_ 18’ replaced by
‘_Frontispiece_’.
Pg 91: Removed duplicate line ‘young man I ever set. He wuz
good’.
Pg 123: Removed duplicate lines ‘relations; I don’t think it the
right thing to do. But I can’t help sayin’ that I did see
lots of things that’.
Pg 133: ‘Beatious Ballet Girl’ replaced by ‘Beauteous Ballet Girl’.
Pg 133: ‘hosuehold money’ replaced by ‘household money’.
Pg 141: ‘It it were’ replaced by ‘If it were’.
Pg 153: ‘it stand to’ replaced by ‘it stands to’.
Pg 183: ‘that the children’ replaced by ‘than the children’.
Pg 209: ‘right into our our’ replaced by ‘right into our’.
Pg 213: ‘in not in Anna’ replaced by ‘is not in Anna’.
Pg 230: ‘told me atferwards’ replaced by ‘told me afterwards’.
Pg 230: ‘it took sights’ replaced by ‘It took sights’.
Pg 241: ‘he stood still’ replaced by ‘she stood still’.
Pg 258: ‘there is wuz’ replaced by ‘there it wuz’.
Pg 263: ‘after twelve P.?’ replaced by ‘after twelve P. M.?’.
Pg 270: ‘after Arabella’ replaced by ‘after Arabeller’.
Pg 273: ‘cothes all muddy’ replaced by ‘clothes all muddy’.
Pg 275: ‘“Nell,” sez Tamer’ replaced by ‘“Well,” sez Tamer’.
Pg 276: ‘lighter that’ replaced by ‘lighter than’.
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