When we got back from Mount Vernon, and entered our boardin'-house, Cicely went right up to her room. But I, feelin' kinder beat out (eloquent emotions are very tuckerin' on a tower), thought I would set down a few minutes in the parlor to rest, before I mounted up the stairs to my room.
But truly, as it turned out, I had better have gone right up, breath or no breath.
For, while I was a settin' there, a tall, sepulchral lookin' female, that I had noticed at the breakfast-table, come up to me; and says she,—
“I beg your pardon, mom, but I believe you are the noble and eloquent Josiah Allen's wife, and I believe you are a stoppin' here.”
Says I calmly, “I hain't a stoppin'—I am stopped, as it were, for a few days.”
“Wall,” says she, “a friend of mine is comin' to-night, to my room, No. 17, to give a private seansy. And knowin' you are a great case to investigate into truths, I thought mebby you would love to come, and witness some of our glorious spirit manifestations.”
I thanked her for her kindness, but told her “I guessed I wouldn't go. I didn't seem to be sufferin' for a seancy.”
“Oh!” says she: “it is wonderful, wonderful to see. Why, we will tie the medium up, and he will ontie himself.”
“Oh!” says I. “I have seen that done, time and agin. I used to tie Thomas J. up when he was little, and naughty; and he would, in spite of me, ontie himself, and get away.”
“Who is Thomas J.?” says she.
“Josiah's child by his first wife,” says I.
“Wall,” says she, “if we have a good circle, and the conditions are favorable, the spirits will materialize,—come before us with a body.”
“Oh!” says I. “I have seen that. Thomas J. used to dress up as a ghost, and appear to us. But he didn't seem to think the conditions wus so favorable, and he didn't seem to appear so much, after his father ketched him at it, and give him a good whippin'.” And says I firmly, “I guess that would be about the way with your ghosts.”
And after I had said it, the idee struck me as bein' sort o' pitiful,—to go to whippin' a ghost. But she didn't seem to notice my remark, for she seemed to be a gazin' upward in a sort of a muse; and she says,—
“Oh! would you not like to talk with your departed kindred?”
“Wall, yes,” says I firmly, after a minute's thought. “I would like to.”
“Come to-night to our seansy, and we will call 'em, and you shall talk with 'em.”
“Wall,” says I candidly, “to tell the truth, bein' only wimmen present, I'll tell you, I have got to mend my petticoat to-night. My errents have took me round to such a extent, that it has got all frayed out round the bottom, and I have got to mend the fray. But, if any of my kindred are there, you jest mention it to 'em that she that wuz Samantha Smith is stopped at No. 16, and, if perfectly convenient, would love to see 'em. I can explain it to 'em,” says I, “bein' all in the family, why I couldn't leave my room.”
Says she, “You are makin' fun: you don't believe they will be there, do you?”
“Wall, to be honest with you, it looks dubersome to me. It does seem to me, that if my father or mother sot out from the other world, and come down to this boardin'-house, to No. 17, they would know, without havin' to be told, that I was in the next room to 'em; and they wouldn't want to stay with a passel of indifferent strangers, when their own child was so near.”
“You don't believe in the glorious manifestations of our seansys?” says she.
“Wall, to tell you the plain truth, I don't seem to believe 'em to any great extent. I believe, if God wants to speak to a human soul below, He can, without any of your performances and foolishness; and when I say performences and when I say foolishness, I say 'em in very polite ways: and I don't want to hurt anybody's feelin's by sayin' things hain't so, but I simply state my belief.”
“Don't you believe in the communion of saints? Don't you believe God ever reveals himself to man?”
“Yes, I do! I believe that now, as in the past, the pure in heart shall see God. Why, heaven is over all, and pretty nigh to some.”
And I thought of Cicely, and couldn't help it.
“I believe there are pure souls, especially when they are near to the other world, who can look in, and behold its beauty. Why, it hain't but a little ways from here,—it can't be, sense a breath of air will blow us into it. It takes sights of preparation to get ready to go, but it is only a short sail there. And you may go all over the land from house to house, and you will hear in almost every one of some dear friend who died with their faces lit up with the glow of the light shinin' from some one of the many mansions,—the dear home-light of the fatherland; died speakin' to some loved one, gone before. But I don't believe you can coax that light, and them voices, down into a cabinet, and let 'em shine and speak, at so much an evenin'.”
“I thought,” says she bitterly, “that you was one who never condemned any thing that you hadn't thoroughly investigated.”
“I don't,” says I. “I don't condemn nothin' nor nobody. I only tell my mind. I don't say there hain't no truth in it, because I don't know; and that is one of the best reasons in the world for not sayin' a thing hain't so. When you think how big a country the land of Truth is, and how many great unexplored regions lay in it, why should Josiah Allen's wife stand and lean up aginst a tree on the outmost edge of the frontier, and say what duz and what duzn't lay hid in them mysterius and beautiful regions that happier eyes than hern shall yet look into?
“No: the great future is the fulfillment of the prophecies, and blind gropin's of the present; and it is not for me, nor Josiah, nor anybody else, to talk too positive about what we hain't seen, and don't know.
“No: nor I hain't one to say it is the Devil's work, not claimin' such a close acquaintance with the gentleman named, as some do, who profess to know all his little social eccentricities. But I simply say, and say honest, that I hain't felt no drawin's towards seancys, nor felt like follerin' 'em up. But I am perfectly willin' you should have your own idees, and foller 'em.”
“Do you believe angels have appeared to men?”
“Yes, mom, I do. But I never heard of a angel bein' stanchelled up in a box-stall, and let out of it agin at stated times, like a yearlin' colt. (Excuse my metafor, mom, I am country bred and born.) And no angel that I ever heard on, has been harnessed and tackled up with any ropes or strings whatsoever. No! whenever we hear of angels appearin' to men, they have flown down, white-winged and radiant, right out of the heavens, which is their home, and appeared to men, entirely unbeknown to them. That is the way they appeared to the shephards at Bethlahem, to the disciples on the mountain, to the women at the tomb.”
“Don't you believe they could come jest as well now?”
“I don't say they couldn't. There is no place in the Bible, that I know of, where it says they shall never appear agin to man. But I s'pose, in the days I speak of, when the One Pure Heart was upon earth, Earth and Heaven drew nearer together, as it were,—the divine and the human. And if we now draw Heaven nearer to us by better, purer lives, who knows,” says I dreamily (forgettin' the mejum, and other trials), “who knows but what we might, in some fair day, look up into the still heavens, and see through the clear blue, in the distance, a glimpse of the beautiful city of the redeemed?
“Who knows,” says I, “if we lived for Heaven, as Jennie Dark lived for her country, in the story I have heard Thomas J. read about, but we might, like her, see visions, and hear voices, callin' us to heavenly duties? But,” says I, findin' and recoverin' myself, “I don't see no use in a seansy to help us.”
“Don't you admit that there is strange doin's at these seansys?”
“Yes,” says I. “I never see one myself; but, from what I have heard of 'em, they are very strange.”
“Don't you think there are things done that seem supernatural?”
“I don't know as they are any more supernatural than the telegraph and telefone and electric light, and many other seemin'ly supernatural works. And who knows but there may still be some hidden powers in nature that is the source of what you call supernatural?”
“Why not believe, with us, voices from Heaven speak through these means?”
“Because it looks dubersome to me—dretful dubersome. It don't look reasonable to me, that He, the mighty King of heaven and earth, would speak to His children through a senseless Indian jargon, or impossible and blasphemous speeches through a first sphere.”
“You say you believe God has spoken to men, and why not now?”
“I tell you, I don't know but He duz. But I don't believe it is in that manner. Way back to the creation, when we read of God's speakin' to man, the voice come directly down from heaven to their souls.
“In the hush of the twilight, when every thing was still and peaceful, and Adam was alone, then he heard God's voice. He didn't have to wait for favorable conditions, or set round a table; for, what is more convincin', I don't believe he had a table to set round.
“In the dreary lonesomeness of the great desert, God spoke to the heart-broken Hagar. She didn't have to try any tests to call down the spirits. Clear and sudden out of heaven come the Lord's voice speaking to her soul in comfort and in prophecy, and her eyes was opened, and she saw waters flowin' in the midst of the desert.
“Up on the mountain top, God's voice spoke to Abraham; and Lot in the quiet of evening, at the tent's door, received the angelic visitants. Sudden, unbeknown to them, they come. They didn't have to put nobody into a trance, nor holler, so we read.
“In the hush of the temple, through the quiet of her motherly dreams, Hannah heard a voice. Hannah didn't have to say, 'If you are a spirit, rap so many times.' No: she knew the voice. God prepares the listenin' soul His own self. 'They know my voice,' so the Lord said.
“Daniel and the lions didn't have to 'form a circle' for him to see the one in shinin' raiment. No: the angel guest came down from heaven unbidden, and appeared to Daniel alone, in peril; and as he stood by the 'great river,' it said, 'Be strong, be strong!' preparin' him for conflict. And Daniel was strengthened, so the Bible says.
“God's hand is not weaker to-day, and His conflicts are bein' waged on many a battle-field. And I dare not say that He does not send His angels to comfort and sustain them who from love to Him go out into rightous warfare. But I don't believe they come through a seansy. I don't, honestly. I don't believe Daniel would have felt strengthened a mite, by seein' a materialized rag-baby hung out by a wire in front of a hemlock box, and then drawed back sudden.
“No: Adam and Enoch, and Mary and Paul and St. John, didn't have to say, before they saw the heavenly guests, 'If you are a spirit, manifest it by liftin' up some table-legs.' And they didn't have to tie a mejum into a box before they could hear God's voice. No: we read in the Bible of eight different ones who come back from death, and appeared to their friends, besides the many who came forth from their graves at Jerusalem. But they didn't none of 'em come in this way from round under tables, and out of little coops, and etcetery.
“And as it was in the old days, so I believe it is to-day. I believe, if God wants to speak to a human soul, livin' or dead, He don't need the help of ropes and boxes and things. It don't look reasonable to think He has to employ such means. And it don't look reasonable to me to think, if He wants to speak to one of His children in comfort or consolation, He will try to drive a hard bargain with 'em, and make 'em pay from fifty cents to a dollar to hear Him, children half price. Howsomever, everybody to their own opinions.”
“You are a unbeliever,” says she bitterly.
“Yes, mom: I s'pose I am. I s'pose I should be called Samantha Allen, U.S., which Stands, Unbeliever in Spiritual Seansys, and also United States. It has a noble, martyrous look to me,” says I firmly. “It makes me think of my errent.”
She tosted her head in a high-headed way, which is gaulin' in the extreme to see in another female. And she says,—
“You are not receptive to truth.”
I s'pose she thought that would scare me, but it didn't. I says,—
“I believe in takin' truth direct from God's own hand and revelation. But I don't have any faith in modern spiritual seansys. They seem to me,—and I would say it in a polite, courtous way, for I wouldn't hurt your feelin's for the world,—all mixed up with modern greed and humbug.”
But, if you'll believe it, for all the pains I took to be almost over-polite to her, and not say a word to hurt her feelin's, that woman acted mad, and flounced out of the room as if she was sent.
Good land! what strange creeters there are in the world, anyway!
Wall, I had fairly forgot that the boy wus in the room. But 1,000 and 5 is a small estimate of the questions he asked me after she went out.
“What a seansy was? And did folks appear there? And would his papa appear if he should tie himself up in a box? And if I would be sorry if his papa didn't appear, if he didn't appear? And where the folks went to that I said, come out of their graves? And did they die again? Or did they keep on a livin' and a livin' and a livin'? And if I wished I could keep on a livin' and a livin' and a livin'?”
Good land! it made me feel wild as a loon, and Cicely put the boy to bed.
But I happened to go into the bedroom for something; and he opened his eyes, and says he,—
“Say! if the dead live men's little boys that had grown up and lived and died before their pa's come out, would they come out too? and would the dead live men know that they was their little boys? and say”—
But I went out immegiatly, and s'pose he went to sleep.
Wall, the next mornin' I got up feelin' kinder mauger. I felt sort o' weary in my mind as well as my body. For I had kep' up a powerful ammount of thinkin' and medetatin'. Mebby right when I would be a talkin' and a smilin' to folks about the weather or literatoor or any thing, my mind would be hard at work on problems, and I would be a takin' silent observations, and musin' on what my eyes beheld.
And I had felt more and more satisfied of the wisdom of the conclusion I reached on my first interview with Allen Arthur,—that I dast not, I dast not let my companion go from me into Washington.
No! I felt that I dast not, as his mind was, let him go into temptation.
I felt that he wanted to make money out of the Government I loved; and after I had looked round me, and observed persons and things, I felt that he would do it.
I felt that I dast not let him go.
I knew that he wanted to help them that helped him, without no deep thought as to the special fitness of uncle Nate Gowdy and Ury Henzy for governmental positions. And after I had enquired round a little, and considered the heft of his mind, and the weight of example, I felt he would do it.
And I dast not let him go.
And, though I knew his hand was middlin' free now, still I realized that other hands just as free once had had rings slipped into 'em, and was led by 'em whithersoever the ring-makers wished to lead them.
I dast not let him go.
I knew that now his morals, though small (he don't weigh more'n a hundred,—bones, moral sentiments, and all), was pretty sound and firm, the most of the time. But the powerful winds that blew through them broad streets of Washington from every side, and from the outside, and from the under side, powerful breezes, some cold, and some powerful hot ones—why, I felt that them small morals, more than as likely as not, would be upsot, and blowed down, and tore all to pieces.
I dast not let him go.
I knew he was willin' to buy votes. If willin' to buy,—the fearful thought hanted me,—mebby he would be willin' to sell; and, the more I looked round and observed, the more I felt that he would.
I felt that I dast not let him go.
No, no! I dast not let him go.
I was a musin' on this thought at the breakfast-table where I sot with Cicely, the boy not bein' up. I was settin' to the table as calm and cool as my toast (which was very cool), when the hired man brought me a letter; and I opened it right there, for I see by the post-mark it was from my Josiah. And I read as follers, in dismay and anguish, for I thought he was crazy:—
MI DEER WYF,—Kum hum, I hav got a crik in mi bak. Kum hum, mi deer Sam, kum hum, or I shal xpire. Mi gord has withurd, mi plan has faled, I am a undun Josire. Tung kant xpres mi yernin to see u. I kant tak no kumfort lookin at ure kam fisiognimy in ure fotogrof, it maks mi hart ake, u luk so swete, I fere u hav caut a bo. Kum hum, kum hum.
Ure luvin kompanien,
vers ov poetry.
Mi krik is bad, mi ink is pale: Mi luv for u shal never fale.
I dropt my knife and fork (I had got about through eatin', anyway), and hastened to my room. Cicely followed me, anxious-eyed, for I looked bad.
I dropped into a chair; and almost buryin' my face in my white linen handkerchief, I give vent to some moans of anguish, and a large number of sithes. And Cicely says,—
“What is the matter, aunt Samantha?”
And I says,—
“Your poor uncle! your poor uncle!”
“What is the matter with him?” says she.
And I says, “He is crazy as a loon. Crazy and got a creek, and I must start for home the first thing in the mornin'.”
She says, “What do you mean?” and then I showed her the letter, and says as I did so,—
“He has had too much strain on his mind, for the size of it. His plans have been too deep. He has grappled with too many public questions. I ortn't to have left him alone with politics. But I left him for his good. But never, never, will I leave that beloved man agin, crazy, or no crazy, creek, or no creek.
“Oh!” says I, “will he never, never more be conscious of the presence of the partner of his youth and middle age? Will he never realize the deep, constant love that has lightened up our pathway?”
I wept some. But I thought that mebby he would know my cream biscuit and other vittles, I felt that he would recognise them.
But by this time Cicely had got the letter read through; and she said “he wuzn't crazy, it was the new-fashioned way of spelling;” she said she had seen it; and so I brightened up, and felt well: though, as I told her,—
“The creek would drive me home in the mornin'.” Says I, “Duty and Love draws me, a willin' captive, to the side of my sufferin' Josiah. I shall go home on that creek.” Says I, “Woman's first duty is to the man she loves.” Says I, “I come here on that duty, and on that duty I shall go back, and the creek.”
Cicely didn't feel as if she could go the next day, for there was to be a great meetin' of the friends of temperance, in a few days, there; and she wanted to attend to it; she wanted to help all she could; and then, there wus a person high in influence that she wanted to converse with on the subject. That good little thing was willin' to do any thing for the sake of the boy and the Right.
But I says to her, “I must go, for that word 'plan' worrys me; it worrys me far more than the creek: and I see my partner is all unstrung, and I must be there to try to string him up agin.”
So it wus decided, that I should start in the morning, and Cicely come on in a few days: she was all boyed up with the thought that at this meetin' she could get some help and hope for the boy.
But, after Cicely went to bed, I sot there, and got to thinkin' about the new spellin', and felt that I approved of it. My mind is such that instantly I can weigh and decide.
I took some of these words, photograph, philosophy, etc., in one hand, and in the other I took filosify and fotograf; and as I hefted 'em, I see the latter was easier to carry. I see they would make our language easier to learn by children and foreigners; it would lop off a lot of silent letters of no earthly use; it would make far less labor in writin', in printin', in cost of type, and would be better every way.
Cicely said a good many was opposed to it on account of bein' attached to the old way. But I don't feel so, though I love the old things with a love that makes my heart ache sometimes when changes come. But my reason tells me that it hain't best to be attached to the old way if the new is better.
Now, I s'pose our old 4 fathers was attached to the idee of hitchin' an ox onto a wagon, and ridin' after it. And our old 4 mothers liked the idee of bein' perched up on a pillion behind the old 4 fathers. I s'pose they hated the idee of gettin' off of that pillion, and onhitchin' that ox. But they had to, they had to get down, and get up into phaetons and railway cars, and steamboats.
And I s'pose them old 4 people (likely creeters they wuz too) hated the idee of usin' matches; used to love to strike fire with a flint, and trample off a mild to a neighber's on January mornin's (and their mornin's was very early) to borrow some coals if they had lost their flint. I s'pose they had got attached to that flint, some of 'em, and hated to give it up, thought it would be lonesome. But they had to; and the flint didn't care, it knew matches was better. The calm, everlasting forces of Nature don't murmur or rebel when they are changed for newer, greater helps. No: it is only human bein's who complain, and have the heartache, because they are so sot.
But whether we murmur, or whether we are calm, whether we like it, or whether we don't, we have to move our tents. We are only campin' out, here; and we have to move our tents along, and let the new things push us out of the way. The old things now, are the new ones of the past; and what seems new to us, will soon be the old.
Why, how long does it seem, only a minute, since we was a buildin' moss houses down in the woods back of the old schoolhouse? Beautiful, fresh rooms, carpeted with the green moss, with bright young faces bendin' down over 'em. Where are they now? The dust of how many years—I don't want to think how many—has sifted down over them velvet-carpeted mansions, turned them into dust.
And the same dust has sprinkled down onto the happy heads of the fresh, bright-faced little group gathered there.
Charley, and Alice! oh! the dust is very deep on her head,—the dust that shall at last lay over all our heads. And Louis! Bright blue eyes there may be to-day, old Time, but none truer and tenderer than his. But long ago, oh! long ago, the dust covered you—the dust that is older than the pyramids, old, and yet new; for on some mysterious breeze it was wafted to you, it drifted down, and covered the blue eyes and the brown eyes, hid the bright faces forever.
And the years have sprinkled down into Charley's grave business head tiresome dust of dividends and railway shares. Kate and Janet, and Will and Helen and Harry—where are you all to-day, I wonder? But though I do not know that, I do know this,—that Time has not stood still with any of you. The years have moved you along, hustled you forward, as they swept by. You have had to move along, and let other bright faces stand in front of you.
You are all buildin' houses to-day that you think are more endurin'. But what you build to-day—hopes built upon worldly wealth, worldly fame, household affection, political success—ah I will they not pass away like the green moss houses down in the woods back of the old schoolhouse?
Yes, they, too, will pass away, so utterly that only their dust will remain. But God grant that we may all meet, happy children again, young with the new life of the immortals, on some happy playground of the heavenly life!
But poor little houses of moss and cedar boughs, you are broken down years and years ago, trampled down into dust, and the dust blown away by the rushin' years. Blown away, but gathered up agin by careful old Nature, nourishin' with it a newer, fresher growth.
I don't s'pose any of us really hanker after growin' old; sometimes I kinder hate to; and so I told Josiah one day.
And he says, “Why, we hain't the only ones that is growin' old. Why, everybody is as old as we be, that wuz born, at the same time; and lots of folks are older. Why, there is uncle Nate Gowdey, and aunt Seeny: they are as old agin, almost.”
Says I, “That is a great comfort to meditate on, Josiah; but it don't take away all the sting of growin' old.”
And he said “he didn't care a dumb about it, if he didn't have to work so hard.” He said “he'd fairly love to grow old if he could do it easy, kinder set down to it.”
(Now, that man don't work so very hard. But don't tell him I said so: he's real fractious on that subject, caused, I think, by rheumatiz, and mebby the Plan.)
I told Josiah that it wouldn't make growin' old any easier to set down, than it would to stand up.
I don't s'pose it makes much difference about our bodies, anyway; they are only wrappers for the soul: the real, person is within. But then, you know, you get sort o' attached to your own body, yourself, you know, if you have lived with yourself any length of time, as we have, a good many of us.
You may not be handsome, but you sort o' like your own looks, after all. Your eyes have a sort of a good look to you. Your hands are soft and white; and they are your own too, which makes 'em nearer to you; they have done sights for you, and you can't help likin' 'em. And your mouth looks sort o' agreable and natural to you.
You don't really like to see the dimpled, soft hands change into an older person's hands; you kinder hate to change the face for an older, more care-worn face; you get sick of lookin'-glasses.
And sometimes you feel a sort of a homesick longin' for your old self—for the bright, eager face that looked back to you from the old lookin'-glass on summer mornin's, when the winder was open out into the orchard, and the May birds was singin' amidst the apple-blows. The red lips parted with a happy smile; the bright, laughin' eyes, sort o' soft too, and wistful—wishful for the good that mebby come to you, and mebby didn't, but which the glowin' face was sure of, on that spring morning with the May birds singin' outside, and the May birds singin' inside.
Time may have brought you somethin' better—better than you dreamed of on that summer mornin'. But it is different, anyhow; and you can't help gettin' kinder homesick, longin', wantin' that pretty young face again, wantin' the heart back again that went with it.
Wall, I s'pose we shall have it back—sometime. I s'pose we shall get back our lost youth in the place where we first got it. And it is all right, anyway.
We must move on. You see, Time won't stop to argue with us, or dicker; and our settin' down, and coaxin' him to stop a minute, and whet his scythe, and give us a chance to get round the swath he cuts, won't ammount to nothin' only wastin' our breath. His scythe is one that don't need any grindstun, and his swath is one that must be cut.
No! Time won't lean up aginst fence corners, and wipe his brow on a bandanna, and hang round. He jest moves right on—up and down, up and down. On each side of us the ripe blades fall, and the flowers; and pretty soon the swath will come right towards us, the grass-blades will fall nearer and nearer—a turn of the gleamin' scythe, and we, too, will be gone. The sunlight will rest on the turf where our shadows were, and one blade of grass will be missed out of that broad harvest-field more than we will be, when a few short years have rolled by.
The beauty and the clamor of life will go on without us. You see, we hain't needed so much as we in our egotism think we are. The world will get along without us, while we rest in peace.
But until then we have got to move along: we can't set down anywhere, and set there. No: if we want to be fore mothers and fore fathers, we mustn't set still: we must give the babies a chance to be fore mothers and fore fathers too. It wouldn't be right to keep the babies from bein' ancestors.
We must keep a movin' on. How the summer follows the spring, and the winter follows the autumn, and the years go by! And the clouds sail on through the sky, and the shadows follow each other over the grass, and the grass fadeth.
And the sun moves down the west, and the twilight follows the sun, and at last the night comes—and then the stars shine.
Strange that all this long revery of my mind should spring from that letter of my pardner's. But so it is. Why, I sot probable 3 fourths of a hour—entirely by the side of myself. Why, I shouldn't have sensed whether I was settin' on a sofy in a Washington boarding-house (a hard one too), or a bed of flowers in Asia Minor, or in the middle of the Desert of Sarah. Why, I shouldn't have sensed Sarah or A. Minor at all, if they had stood right by me, I was so lost and unbeknown to myself.
But anon, or pretty nigh that time (for I know it was ten when I got into bed, and it probable took me 1/2 an hour to comb out my hair and wad it up, and ondress), I rousted up out of my revery, and realized I was Josiah Allen's wife on a tower of Principle and Discovery. I realized I was a forerunner, and on the eve of return to the bosom of my family (a linen bosom, with five pleats on a side).
Wall, I rose betimes in the mornin', or about that time, and eat a good, noble breakfast, so's to start feelin' well; embraced Cicely and the boy, who asked me 32 questions while I was embracin' him. I kissed him several times, with hugs according; and then I took leave of Sally and Bub Smith. I paid for my board honorable, although Sally said she would not take any pay for so short a board. But I knew, in her condition, boards of any length should be paid for. So I insisted, and the board was paid for. I also rewarded Bub Smith for his efforts at doin' my errents, in a way that made his blushes melt into a glowin' background of joyousness.
And then, havin' asked the hired man to get a covered carriage to convey my body to the depot, and my trunk, I left Washington, D.C.
The snort of the engine as it ketched sight of me, sounded friendly to me. It seemed to say to me,—
“Forerunner, your runnin' is done, and well done! Your labors of duty and anxiety is over. Soon, soon will you be with your beloved pardner at home.”
Home, the dearest word that was ever said or sung.
The passengers all looked good to me. The men's hats looked like Josiah's. They looked out of their eyes some as he did out of hisen: they looked good to me. There was one man upbraidin' his wife about some domestic matter, with crossness in his tone, but affectionate care and interest in his mean. Oh, how good, and sort o' natural, he did look to me! it almost seemed as if my Josiah was there by my side.
Never, never, does the cords of love fairly pull at your heart-strings, a drawin' you along towards your heart's home, your heart's desire, as when you have been off a movin' round on a tower. I longed for my dear home, I yearned for my Josiah.
I arrove at Jonesville as night was a lettin' down her cloudy mantilly fringed with stars (there wuzn't a star: I jest put that in for oritory, and I don't think it is wrong if I tell of it right away).
Evidently Josiah's creek wus better; for he wus at the depot with the mair, to convey my body home. He wus stirred to the very depths of his heart to see me agin; but he struggled for calmness, and told me in a voice controlled by his firm will, to “hurry and get in, for the mair wus oneasy stand-in' so long.”
I, too, felt that I must emulate his calmness; and I says,—
“I can't get in no faster than I can. Do hold the mair still, or I can't get in at all.”
“Wall, wall! hain't I a holdin' it? Jump in: there is a team behind a waitin'.”
After these little interchanges of thought and affection, there was silence between us. Truly, there is happiness enough in bein' once more by the side of the one you love, whether you speak or not. And, to tell the truth, I was out of breath hurryin' so. But few words were interchanged until the peaceful haven of home was reached.
Some few words, peaceful, calm words were uttered, as to what we wus goin' to have for supper, and a desire on Josiah's part for a chicken-pie and vegitables of all kinds, and various warm cakes and pastries, compromised down to plans of tender steak, mashed potatoes, cream biscuit, lemon custard, and coffee. It wus settled in peace and calmness. He looked unstrung, very unstrung, and wan, considerable wan. But I knew that I and the supper could string him up agin; and I felt that I would not speak of the plan or the creek, or any agitatin' subject, until the supper was over, which resolve I follered. After the table was cleared, and Josiah looked like a new man,—the girl bein' out in the kitchen washin' the dishes,—I mentioned the creek; and he owned up that he didn't know as it was exactly a creek, but “it was a dumb pain, anyway, and he felt that he must see me.”
It is sweet, passing sweet, to be missed, to be necessary to the happiness of one you love. But, at the same time, it is bitter to know that your pardner has prevaricated to you, and so the sweet and the bitter is mixed all through life.
I smiled and sithed simultaneous, as it were, and dropped down the creek.
Then with a calm tone, but a beatin' heart, I took up the Plan, and presented it to him. I wanted to find out the heights and depths of that Plan before I said a word about my own adventures at Washington, D.C. Oh, how that plan had worried me! But the minute I mentioned it, Josiah looked as if he would sink. And at first he tried to move off the subject, but I wouldn't let him. I held him up firm to that plan, and, to use a poetical image, I hitched him there.
Says I, “You know what you told me, Josiah,—you said that plan would make you beloved and revered.”
He groaned.
Says I, “You know you said it would make you a lion, and me a lioness: do you remember, Josiah Allen?”
He groaned awful.
Says I firmly, “It didn't make you a lion, did it?”
He didn't speak, only sithed. But says I firmly, for I wus bound to come to the truth of it,—
“Are you a lion?”
“No,” say she, “I hain't.”
“Wall,” says I, “then what be you?”
“I am a fool,” says he bitterly, “a dumb fool.”
“Wall,” says I encouragingly, “you no need to have laid on plans, and I needn't have gone off on no towers of discovery, to have found that out. But now,” says I in softer axents, for I see he did indeed look agitated and melancholy,—
“Tell your Samantha all about it.”
Says he mournfully, “I have got to find 'The Gimlet.'”
“The Gimlet!” I sithed to myself; and the wild and harrowin' thought went through me like a arrow,—that my worst apprehensions had been realized, and that man had been a writing poetry.
But then I remembered that he had promised me years ago, that he never would tackle the job agin. He begun to make a poem when we was first married; but there wuzn't no great harm done, for he had only wrote two lines when I found it out and broke it up.
Bein' jest married, I had a good deal of influence over him; and he promised me sacred, to never, never, as long as he lived and breathed, try to write another line of poetry agin. We was married in the spring, and these 2 lines was as follers:—
“How happified this spring appears— More happier than I ever knew springs to be, shears.”
And I asked him what he put the “shears” in for, and he said he did it to rhyme. And then was the time, then and there, that I made him promise on the Old Testament, never to try to write a line of poetry agin. And I felt that he could not do himself and me the bitter wrong to try it agin, and still I trembled.
And right while I was tremblin', he returned, and silently laid “The Gimlet” in my lap, and sot down, and nearly buried his face in his hands. And the very first piece on which the eye of my spectacle rested, was this: “Josiah Allen on a Path-Master.”
And I dropped the paper in my lap, and says I,—
“What have you been doing now, Josiah Allen? Have you been a fightin'? What path-master have you been on?”
“I hain't been on any,” says he sadly, out from under his hand. “I headed it so, to have a strong, takin' title. You know they 'pinted me path-master some time ago.”
I groaned and sithed to that extent that I was almost skairt at myself, not knowin' but I would have the highstericks unbeknown to me (never havin' had 'em, I didn't know exactly what the symptoms was), and I felt dredfully. But anon, or pretty nigh anon, I grew calmer, and opened the paper, and read. It seemed to be in answer to the men who had nominated him for path-master, and it read as follers:—
Feller Constituents and Male Men of Jonesville and the surroundin' and adjacent worlds!
I thank you, fellow and male citizents, I thank you heartily, and from the depths of my bein', for the honor you have heaped onto me, in pintin' me path-master.
But I feel it to be my duty to decline it. I feel that I must keep entirely out of political matters, and that I cannot be induced to be path-master, or President, or even United-States senator. I have not got the constitution to stand it. I don't feel well a good deal of the time. My liver is out of order, I am liable to have the ganders any minute, I am bilious, am troubled with rheumatiz and colic, my blood don't circulate proper, I have got a weak back, and lumbago, and biles. And I hain't a bit well. And I dassent put too much strain on myself, I dassent.
And then, I am a husband and a father. I have sacred duties to perform about, nearer and more sacred duties, that I dast not put aside for any others.
I am a husband. I took a tender and confidin' woman away from a happy home (Mother Smith's, in the east part of Jonesville), and transplanted her (carried her in a one-horse wagon and a mare) into my own home. And I feel that it is my first duty to make that home the brightest spot on earth to her. That home is my dearest and most sacred treasure. And how can I disturb its sweet peace with the wild turmoil of politics? I can not. I dast not.
And politics are dangerous to enter into. There is bad folks in Jonesville 'lection day,—bad men, and bad women. And I am liable to be led astray. I don't want to be led astray, but I feel that I am liable to.
I have to hear swearin'. Now, I don't swear myself. (I don't call “dumb” swearin', nor never did.) I don't swear, but I think of them oaths afterwards. Twice I thought of 'em right in prayer-meetin' time, and it worrys me.
I have to see drinkin' goin' on. I don't want to drink; but they offer to treat me, old friends do, and Samantha is afraid I shall yield to the temptation; and I am most afraid of it myself.
Yes, politics is dangerous and hardenin'; and, should I enter into the wild conflict, I feel that I am in danger of losin' all them tender, winnin' qualities that first won me the love of my Samantha. I dare not imperil her peace, and mine, by the effort.
I can not, I dast not, put aside these sacred duties that Providence has laid upon me. My wive's happiness is the first thing I must consider. Can I leave her lonely and unhappy while I plunge into the wild turmoil of caurkusses and town-meetin's, and while I go to 'lection, and vote? No.
And the time I would have to spend in study in order to vote intelligent, I feel as if that time I must use in strugglin' to promote the welfare and happiness of my Samantha. No, I dassent vote, I dassent another time.
Again, another reason. I have a little grandchild growin' up around me. I owe a duty to her. I must dandle her on my knee. I must teach her the path of virtue and happiness. If I do not, who will? For though there are plenty to make laws, and to vote, little Samantha Joe has but one grandpa on her mother's side.
And then, I have sights of cares. The Methodist church is to be kep' up: I am one of the pillows of the church, and sometimes it rests heavy on me. Sometimes I have to manage every way to get the preacher's salary. I am school-trustee: I have to grapple with the deestrict every spring and fall. The teachers are high-headed, the parents always dissatisfied, and the children act like the Old Harry. I am the salesman in the cheese-factory. Anarky and quarellin' rains over me offen that cheese-factory; and its fault-findin', mistrustin' patrons, embitters my life, and rends my mind with cares.
The care of providin' for my family wears onto me; for though Samantha tends to things on the inside of the house, I have to tend to things outside, and I have to provide the food she cooks.
And then, I have a great deal of work to do. Besides my barn-chores, and all the wearin' cares I have mentioned, I have five acres of potatoes to hoe and dig, a barn to shingle, a pig-pen to new cover, a smoke-house to fix, a bed of beets and a bed of turnips to dig,—ruty bagys,—and four big beds of onions to weed—dumb 'em! and six acres of corn to husk. My barn-floor at this time is nearly covered with stooks. How dare I leave my barn in confusion, and, by my disorderly doin's, run the risk of my wive's bein' so disgusted with my want of neatness and shiftlessness, as to cause her to get dissatisfied with home and husband, and wander off into paths of dissipation and vice? Oh! I dassent, I dassent, take the resk! When I think of all the terrible evils that are liable to come onto me, I feel that I dassent vote agin, as long as I live and breathe—I dast not have any thing whatever to do with politics.
I read it all out loud, every word of it, interrupted now and then, and sometimes oftener, by the groans of my pardner. And as I finished, I looked round at him, and I see his looks was dretful. And I says in soothin' tones—for oh! how a companion's distress calls up the tender feelin's of a lovin' female pardner!
Says I, “It hain't the worst piece in the world, Josiah Allen! It is as sensible as lots of political pieces I have read.” Says I, “Chirk up!”
“It hain't the piece! It is the way it was took,” says he. “Life has been a burden to me ever sense that appeared in 'The Gimlet.' Tongue can't tell the way them Jonesvillians has sneered and jeered at me, and run me down, and sot on me.”
I sithed, and remained a few moments almost lost in thought; and then says I,—
“Now, if you are more composed and gathered together, will you tell your companion how you come to write it? what you did it for?”
“I did it to be populer,” says he, out from under his hand. “I thought I would branch off, and take a new turn, and not act so fierce and wolfish after office as most of 'em did. I thought I would get up something new and uneek.”
“Wall, you have, uneeker than you probable ever will agin. But, if you wanted to be a senator, why did you refuse to have any thing to do with politics?”
“I did it to be urged,” says he, in the same sad, despairin' tones. “I made the move to be loved—to be the favorite of the Nation. I thought after they read that, they would be fierce to promote me, fierce as blood-hounds. I thought it would make me the most populer man in Jonesville, and that I should be sought after, and praised up, and follered.”
“What give you that idee?” says I calmly.
“Why, don't you remember Letitia Lanfear? She wrote a article sunthin' like this, only not half so smart and deep, when she was nominated for school-trustee, and it jest lifted her right up. She never had been thought any thing off in Jonesville till she wrote that, and that was the makin' of her. And she hadn't half the reason to write it that I have. She hadn't half nor a quarter the cares that I have got. She was a widder, educated high, without any children, with a comfortable income, and she lived in her brother's family, and didn't have no cares at all.
“And only see how that piece lifted her right up! They all said, what right feelin', what delicacy, what a noble, heart-stirrin', masterly document hern was! And I hankered, I jest hankered, after bein' praised up as she was. And I thought,” says he with a deep sithe, “I thought I should get as much agin praise as she did. I thought I should be twice as populer, because it wus sunthin' new for a man to write such a article. I thought I should be all the rage in Jonesville. I thought I should be a lion.”
“Wall, accordin' to your tell, they treat you like one, don't they?”
“Yes,” says he, “speakin' in a wild animal way.” Says he, growin' excited, “I wish I wuz a African lion right out of a jungle: I'd teach them Jonesvillians to get out of my way. I'd love, when they was snickerin', and pokin' fun at me, and actin' and jeerin' and sneerin', and callin' me all to nort, I'd love to spring onto 'em, and roar.”
“Hush, Josiah,” says I. “Be calm! be calm!”
“I won't be calm! I can't see into it,” he hollered. “Why, what lifted Letitia Lanfear right up, didn't lift me up. Hain't what's sass for the goose, sass for the gander?”
“No,” says I sadly. “It hain't the same sass. The geese have to get the same strength from it,—strength to swim in the same water, fly over the same fences, from the same pursuers and avengers; and they have to grow the same feathers out of it; but the sass, the sass is fur different.
“But,” says I, “I don't approve of all your piece. A man, as a general thing, has as much time as a woman has. And I'd love to see the time that I couldn't do a job as short as puttin' a letter in the post-office. Why, I never see the time, even when the children was little, and in cleanin' house, or sugarin'-time, but what I could ride into Jonesville every day, to say nothin' of once a year, and lay a vote onto a pole. And you have as much time as I do, unless it is springs and falls and hayin'-time. And if I could do it, you could. I don't approve of such talk.
“And you know very well that you and I had better spend a little of our spare time a studyin' into matters, so as to vote intelligently; study into the laws that govern us both,—that hang us if we break 'em, and protect us if we obey 'em,—than to spend it a whittling shingles, or wonderin' whether Miss Bobbet's next baby will be a boy or a girl.”
“Wall,” says he, takin' his hand down, and winkin',—a sort of a shrewd, knowin' wink, but a sad and dejected one, too, as I ever see wunk,—
“I didn't have no idee of stoppin' votin'.”
Says I coldly, as cold as Zero, or pretty nigh as coldblooded as the old man,—
“Did you write that article jest for the speech of people? Didn't you have no principle to back it up?”
“Wall,” says he mournfully, “I wouldn't want it to get out of the family, but I'll tell you the truth. I didn't write it on a single principle, not a darn principle. I wrote it jest for popularity, and to make 'em fierce to promote me.”
I groaned aloud, and he groaned. It wus a sad and groanful time.
Says he, “I pinned my faith onto Letitia Lanfear. And I can't understand now, why a thing that made Letitia so populer, makes me a perfect outcast. Hain't we both human bein's—human Methodists and Jonesvillians?” Says he, in despairin', agonized tone, “I can't see through it.”
Says I soothenly, “Don't worry about that, Josiah, for nobody can. It is too deep a conundrum to be seen through: nobody has ever seen through it.”
But it seemed as if he couldn't be soothed; and agin he kinder sithed out,—
“I pinned my faith onto Letitia, and it has ondone me;” and he kinder whimpered.
But I says firmly, but gently,—
“You will hear to your companion another time, will you not? and pin your faith onto truth and justice and right?”
“No, I won't. I won't pin it onto nothin' nor nobody. I'm done with politics from this day.”
And bad as we both felt, this last speech of hisen made a glimmer of light streak up, and shine into my future. Some like heat lightenin' on summer evenin's. It hain't so much enjoyment at the time, but you know it is goin' to clear the cloudy air of the to-morrow. And so its light is sweet to you, though very curious, and crinkley.
And as mournful and sort o' curious as this time seemed to me and to Josiah, yet this speech of hisen made me know that all private and public thought cast a rosy glow onto my to-morrows.
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