Chapter VII: Part 7

“No!” says he, kinder puttin’ his hand over his pocket, as if he was afraid a cent would drop out of it. “No! I will do better than that. To-night is our conference meetin’, and I will talk powerful on the subject.”

Says I, coldly: “Wind is a powerful element, but it hain’t a goin’ to blow comfort into the Elder’s household, nor meat and flour into his empty buttery-shelves, nor fire-wood into his wood-box. Song and oritery are good in their place, but they hain’t goin’ to feed the starvin’ or clothe the naked.” Says I, in more reasonable tones: “As I said, wind is good in its place—I hain’t a word to say aginst it—but jest at the present time money is goin’ to do the Elder more good than the same amount of wind can.” And says I, in the same firm but mild tone: “I want a half a dollar out of you.” Says I: “The Elder is fairly sufferin’ for things to eat and drink and wear. And you know,” says I, “that if ever there was a good, earnest, Christian man, it is Elder Bamber. He is a Christian from the top of his head to the sole of his boots. He don’t wear his religion on the top of his head for a hat, and take it off Sunday nights. It goes clear through him, and works out from the inside.”

“Yes,” says Kellup, a clutchin’ his pocket with a firmer grip, “he is a worthy man, and I should think the thought of his noble and lofty mission would be meat and drink to him. It probable is. It would be to me—and clothin’. Oh!” says he, a rollin’ up his eyes still further in his head, “oh! the thought of savin’ souls; what a comfort that must be to the Elder; what a rich food for him.”

Says I, in colder tones than I had used yet, for I was fairly wore out with him: “The Elder can’t eat souls, and if he could he would starve to death on such souls as your’n, if he eat one every five minutes.”

He didn’t say nothin’ more, but onhitched his hearse and started off. I don’t know but he was mad, and don’t care. But though I didn’t get a cent from him or his father, I raised 50 dollars with my own hands and the might of my shoulder-blades, and sent it to him in a letter marked, “From friends of religion and the Elder.”

Wall, jest as Josiah driv up with the old mare, a hull load of company driv up from the other way—come to spend the day. I was disappinted, but I didn’t murmur. I took ’em as a dispensation, killed a fat duck, and made considerable of a fuss; done well by ’em. They come from a distance, and had to start for home the sun 2 hours high. And I told Josiah it was so pleasant I guessed we would go to Jonesville then, and he (havin’ that babe on his mind) consented to at once and immediately. So we sot off. About half a mile this side of Jonesville we met Thomas J. and Maggie jest a settin’ off for a ride. We stopped our 2 teams and visited a spell back and forth. I wouldn’t let ’em go back home, as they both offered and insisted on, but made an appintment to take dinner with ’em the next day, Providence and the weather permittin’. And then we drove on to Whitfield’s. And I don’t never want to see a prettier sight than I see as we driv up.

There Tirzah Ann sot out on the portico, all dressed up in a cool mull dress. It was one I had bought her before she was married, but it was washed and done up clean and fresh, and looked as good as new. It was pure white, with little bunches of blue forget-me-nots on it, and she had a bunch of the same posys and some pink rose-buds in her hair, and on the bosom of her frock. There is a hull bed of ’em in the yard. She is a master hand for dressin’ up and lookin’ pretty, but at the same time is very equinomical, and a first-rate housekeeper. She looked the very picture of health and enjoyment—plump and rosy, and happy as a queen; and she was a queen. Queen of her husband’s heart; and settin’ up on that pure and lofty throne of constant and deathless love, she looked first-rate, and felt so.

It had been a very warm day, nearly hot, and Whitfield I s’pose had come home kinder tired. So he had stretched himself out at full length on the grass in front of the portico, and there he lay with his hands under his head, a laughin’, and a lookin’ up into Tirzah Ann’s face as radiant and lovin’ as if she was the sun and he a sun-flower. But that simely, though very poetical and figurative, don’t half express the good looks, and health, and rest, and happiness on both their faces, as they looked at each other, and then at that _babe_.

That most beautifulest and intelligentest of childern was a toddlin’ round, first up to one of ’em and then the other, with her bright eyes a dancin’, and her cheeks red as roses. You see their yard is so large and shady, and the little thing havin’ got so it can run round alone, is out in the yard a playin’ most all the time, and it is dretful good for her. And she enjoys it the best that ever was, and Tirzah Ann enjoys it, too, for after she gets her work done up, all she has to do is to set in the door and watch the little thing a playin’ round, and bein’ perfectly happy. The minute she ketched sight of the old mare and me and her grandpa, she run down to the gate as fast as her little feet could carry her. She had a little pink dress on, and pink stockin’s, and white shoes, and a white ruffled apron, with her pretty, shining hair a hangin’ down in curls over it, and she did, jest as sure as I live and breathe—she _did_ look almost too beautiful for earth. I guess she got a pretty good kissin’ from Josiah and me, and then Whitfield and Tirzah Ann come a hurryin’ down to the gate, glad enough to see us, as they always be.

Josiah, of course, had to take that beautiful child for a little ride, and Whitfield said he guessed he would go, too. But I got out and went in, and as we sot there on the stoop, Tirzah Ann up and told me what she and Whitfield was a goin’ to do. They was goin’ off for the summer for a rest and change. And I thought from the first minute she spoke of it that it was foolish in her. Now rests are as likely things as ever was; so are changes.

But I have said, and I say still, that I had ruther lay down to home, as the poet says, “on my own delightful feather-bed,” with a fan and a newspaper, and take a rest, than dress up and travel off 2 or 300 milds through the burnin’ sun, with achin’ body, wet with presperation and sweat, to take it. It seems to me that I would get more rest out of the former than out of the more latter course and proceedin’. Howsumever, everybody to their own mind.

Likewise with changes: I have said, and I say still, that changes are likely and respectable, if you can get holt of ’em; but how can you?

Havin’ such powerful and eloquent emotions as I have, havin’ such hefty principles a performin’ inside of my mind, enjoyin’ such idees, and faiths, and aspirations, and longin’s, and hopes, and despairs, and everything—I s’pose that is what makes me think that what is goin’ on round me, the outside of me, hain’t of so much consequence. I seem to live inside of myself (as it were) more than I do on the outside. And so it don’t seem of so much consequence what the lay of the land round me may happen to be, whether it is sort o’ hilly and mountainous or more level-like; or whether steam-cars may be a goin’ by me (on the outside of me), or boats a sailin’ round me, or milk-wagons.

You see the real change, the real rest, would have to be on the inside, and not on the outside. Nobody, no matter how much their weight may be by the steel-yards, can carry round such grand, hefty principles as I carry round without gettin’ tired; or enjoy the lofty hopes, and desires, and aspirations that I enjoy, and meditate on all the sad, and mysterious, and puzzlin’ conundrums of the old world as I meditate on ’em, without gettin’ fairly tuckered out.

Great hearts enjoy greatly and suffer greatly. And so sometimes, when heart-tired and brain-weary, if I could quell down them soarin’ emotions and make ’em lay still for a spell, and shet up my heart like a buro-draw, and hang up the key, and onscrew my head and lay it onto the manteltry-piece, then I could go off and enjoy a change that would be refreshin’ and truly delightful. But as it is, from Jonesville clear to the Antipithies, the puzzlin’ perplexities, the woes, and the cares of the old world foller right on after us tight as our shadders. Our pure and soarin’ desires, our blind mistakes, and deep despairs; our longin’s, strivin’s, memories, heartaches; all the joys and burdens of a soul, has to be carried by us up the steepest mountains or down into the lowest vallies. The same emotions that was a performin’ inside of our minds down in the Yo Semity, will be a performin’ jest the same up on the Pyramids.

The same questionin’ eyes, sort o’ glad and sort o’ sorrowful, that looked out over New York Harbor will look out over the Bay of Naples—and then beyond ’em both, out into a deeper, more mysterious ocean, the boundless sea that lays beyond everything, and before everything, and round everything, that great, misty sea of the Unknown, the Hereafter; tryin’ to see what we hain’t never seen, and wonderin’ when we shall see it, and how? and where? and wherefore? and if things be so? and why?

Tryin’ to hear the murmur of them waves that we know are a washin’ up round us on every side, that nobody hain’t never heard, but we know are there; the mighty Past, the mysterious Future. Tryin’ to ketch a glimpse of them shadowy sails that are floatin’ in and out forever more, with a freight of immortal souls, bearin’ them here, and away. We know we have sailed on ’em once, and have got to again—and can’t ketch no glimpse on ’em—can’t know nothin’ about ’em—sealed baby lips, silent, dead lips, never tellin’ nothin’ about ’em. Each soul has got to embark and sail out alone, out into the silence and the shadows—sail out into the mysterious Beyond.

We can’t get away from ourselves, and get a real change, nohow, unless we knock our heads in and make idiots and lunys of ourselves. Movin’ our bodies round here and there is only a shadow of a change, a mockery, as if I should dress up my Josiah in soldier coats or baby clothes. There he is inside of ’em, clear Josiah, no change in him, only a little difference in his outside circumstances.

Standin’ as we do on a narrow belt of land, which is the Present, and them endless seas a beatin’ round us on every side of us, bottomless, shoreless, ageless—and we a not seein’ either on ’em; under them awful, and lofty, and curious circumstances, what difference does it really make to us whether we are a layin’ down or a standin’ up—whether we are on a hill, or down in a valley—whether a lot on us get together in cities and villages, like aunts on a aunt-hill; or whether we are more alone, like storks or ostridges?

This is a very deep and curious subject. I have talked eloquent on it, I know, and my readers know. But I could go on and filosifize on it jest as powerful and deep for hours and hours. But I have already episoded too far, and to resoom and continue on. I told Tirzah Ann that I thought it was foolish in her.

And she said, “It was very genteel to go away from home for the summer.” She said, “Miss Skidmore was goin’.” She is the other lawyer’s wife to Jonesville, and Tirzah Ann said she was bound to not come in behind her. She said, “Miss Skidmore said that nobody who made any pretensions to bein’ genteel stayed to home durin’ the heated term.”

“What do they go away for, mostly?” says I, in a cool tone, for I didn’t over and above like the plan.

“Oh! for health and—”

“But,” says I, “hain’t you and Whitfield enjoyin’ good health?”

“Never could be better health than we both have got,” says she; “but folks go for health and pleasure.”

“Hain’t you a takin’ comfort now,” says I, “solid comfort?”

“Yes,” says she, “nobody can be happier than Whitfield and I are every day of our lives.”

“Wall,” says I coolly, “then you had better let well enough alone.”

“But,” says she, “folks go for a rest.”

“Rest from what?” says I. “It seems to me that I never in my hull life see nobody look more rested than you and Whitfield do.” Says I, askin’ her right out plain, “Don’t you feel rested, Tirzah Ann?”

“Why yes,” she said, “she did.”

“Wall,” says I, “I knew you did from your looks. Don’t you and Whitfield feel fresh and vigorous and rested every mornin’, ready to take up the labor of the day with a willin’ heart? Do you either of you have any more work to do than is for your health to do? Don’t you find plenty of time for rest and recreation every day as you go along?” Says I: “It is with health jest as it is with cleanin’ house. I don’t believe in lettin’ things get all run down, and nasty, and then once a year tear everything to pieces, and do up the hull cleanin’ of a year to once, and then let everything go again for another year. No! I believe in keepin’ everything slick and comfortable day by day, and year by year. In housens, have a daily mixture of cleanin’ and comfort. In health, have a daily mixture of labor, recreation, and rest. I mean for folks like you and Whitfield, who can do so. Of course some have to work beyond their strength, and stiddy; let them take their rest and comfort when they can get it; better take it once a year, like a box of pills, than not at all. But as for you and Whitfield, I say again, in the almost immortal words of the poet, ‘better let well enough alone.’”

“But,” says she, “I want to do as other folks do. I am bound not to let Miss Skidmore get the upper hands of me. I want to be genteel.”

“Wall,” says I, “if you are determined to foller them paths, Tirzah Ann, you mustn’t come to your ma for advice. She knows nothin’ about them pathways; she never walked in ’em.”

I could see jest where it was. I could see that Miss Skidmore was to the bottom of it all—she and Tirzah Ann’s ambition. I could lay the hull on it to them 2. The Skidmores hadn’t lived to Jonesville but a little while, and Miss Skidmore was awful big-feelin’ and was determined to lead the fashion. She wouldn’t associate with hardly anybody; wouldn’t speak to only jest a few. And when she wuz to parties, or anywhere, she would set kind o’ stunny and motionless—some as if her head was stiff and she couldn’t bend it.

Why, I s’posed the first time I see her appear—it was to quite a big party to Elder Bamber’ses—why, I s’posed jest as much as if I had it on myself, that she had a stiff neck; s’posed she had took cold, and it had settled there. I never mistrusted it was tryin’ to act genteel that ailed her. I see when I was introduced to her that she acted sort o’ curious and stunny, and I stood by and watched her (sunthin’ as I would a small circus), and I see that she acted in jest that way to most everybody that was introduced to her. And I knew, judgin’ her by myself, that she would want to move her head more and act more limber if she could, so I up and told her in a friendly way, that if I was in her place I would steep up some camfrey roots, and take ’em three times a day; and at night I would take some burdock leaves, and wilt ’em, and bind ’em on her neck. Says I:

“Burdock will take that stiffness out of your neck if anything will.”

But Sister Bamber winked me out, and told me what ailed her; told me she kep’ her head up in that sort of a stiff way, and sot in them stunny, motionless autitudes and postures, in order to be genteel and aristocratic. And I felt like a fool to think I had been a recommendin’ burdock for it. For I knew in a minute that when anybody held their neck craned up in that way in order to act genteel and aristocratic—good land! I knew burdock couldn’t help ’em any. I knew it was common sense they wanted, and a true dignity, and the sweet courtesy of gentle breeding,—burdock couldn’t help ’em. Why, some said she felt above old Skidmore himself, and thought she was kinder stoopin’ to associate with him, and talk with him. I don’t know how true that was, but I know she tried to be dretful genteel, and put on sights of airs. And Tirzah Ann bein’ ambitious, and knowin’ she looked a good deal better than she did, and knew as much agin’, and knowin’ that Whitfield was as good agin a lawyer as her husband was, and 3 times as well off, wasn’t goin’ to stand none of her airs. She did seem to sort o’ look down on Tirzah Ann, and feel above her, and it madded Tirzah Ann awfully, for she never felt as I did on that subject.

Now if anybody wanted to put on airs, and feel above me, I shouldn’t do a thing to break it up—not a thing. I should filosofize on it in this way: because they felt as if they was better than I was, that wouldn’t make ’em so; if it would, why I should probable get up more interest on the subject. But it wouldn’t. It wouldn’t make ’em a mite better, nor me a mite worse, so what hurt would it do, anyway? It wouldn’t hender me from feelin’ as cool and contented and happy as a cluster cowcumber at sunrise, and it would probable make them feel sort o’ comfortable and good, so I should be glad they felt.

But not bein’ jealous dispositioned by nater, and and havin’ so many other things to think of—soarin’ and divin’ so high and deep into curious and solemn subjects as I have soared and doven, I s’pose folks might feel milds and milds above me, and I not mistrust what they was a doin’; never find it out in the world unless I was told of it.

Now when Tirzah Ann was about 14 or 15, she that was Keturah Allen, a haughty, high-headed sort of a woman, come to our house a visitin’; stayed most all winter. She was a woman who had seen better days; had been quite fore-handed; and she kep’ her fore-handed ways when her four hands (as you may say in a figirative way) was gone and used up. She was real poor now, hadn’t nothin’ to live on hardly, and I told Josiah that we would invite her to stay quite a spell, thinkin’ it would be a help to her. She was a distant cousin of Josiah; probable as fur off as 7th or 8th.

She had a very disagreeable, high-headed, patronizin’ way with her; very proud and domineerin’ and haughty in her demeanier. But I never had it pass my mind that she was a feelin’ above Josiah and me. But I s’pose she wuz. I s’pose, from what I found out afterwards, that she did feel above us, right there in our own house, for as much as 11 weeks, and I never mistrusted what was goin’ on. And I don’t s’pose I should have found it out to this day if Tirzah Ann hadn’t see it, and up and told me of it.

I see she was awful disagreeable, dretful hard on the nerves and the temper. But I took her as a dispensation, and done, if anything, better by her than I would if she had been more agreeabler. I felt a feelin’ of pity and kindness towards her, a kind of a Biblical feelin’ that should be felt towards the froward—my principles was a performing round her in a martyr way, and a performin’ first rate.

When Tirzah Ann come here (she had been off on a visit), and before she had been home a day, she found out what she was up to. She always had a sort of a jealous, mistrustin’ turn, Tirzah Ann had. And says she that night, as we was a washin’ the dishes to the sink, I a washin’ and she a wipin’:

“Cousin Keturah feels above you, mother.”

“Why, how you talk,” says I. “I never mistrusted what she was a doin’.”

And she had kept watch of little things that I hadn’t noticed or thought of, and says she:

“She did that, mother, because she felt above you.”

“Why, is that so?” says I. “I thought she done it because she thought so much of me.”

And I kep’ on, serene and calm, a washin’ my tea-plates. And Tirzah Ann looked keen at me, and says she:

“Don’t you believe I am tellin’ you the truth, mother? Don’t you believe she does feel above us?”

“Oh, yes,” says I, “I persume you are in the right on’t, though I never should have mistrusted such a thing in the world.”

“Wall, what makes you look so serene and happy over it?”

“Why, I am thinkin’, Tirzah Ann, whether she gets enough comfort out of it to pay her for her trouble. I hope she does, poor thing, for she hain’t got much else to make her happy.”

“You do beat all, mother,” says Tirzah Ann; “you don’t seem to care a mite whether anybody puts on airs and feels above you or not.”

And says I, “That is jest how it is, Tirzah Ann; I don’t.”

“Wall, it makes me mad!” says she, a rubbin’ the teapot hard.

Says I, “What earthly hurt does it do to us, Tirzah Ann? Can you tell?”

“Why, no!” She couldn’t really tell what particular hurt it done, and she rubbed the teapot a little slower and more reasonable.

“Wall,” says I, coolly, “then let her feel. It probable does her some good, or else she wouldn’t tackle the job.”

And jest as I had argued with Tirzah Ann about she that was Keturah Allen, jest so I had argued, and did argue about Miss Skidmore. But I couldn’t convince her—she stuck to it.

“It does look so poor, mother, so fairly sickish, to see anybody that hain’t got nothin’ under the sun to make ’em feel proud, put on such airs, and try to be so exclusive and haughty.”

And says I, “Such folks _have_ to, Tirzah Ann.” Says I, “You’ll find, as a general thing, that they are the very ones who do it. They are the very ones who put on the most airs, and they do it because they _have_ to. Why,” says I, “divin’ so deep into filosify as I have doven, it is jest as plain to me as anything can be, that if anybody has got uncommon goodness, or intellect, or beauty, or wealth, and an assured position, they don’t have to put on the haughtiness and airs that them do that hain’t got nothin’. They don’t _have_ to; they have got sunthin’ to hold ’em up, they can stand without airs.”

I had talked it all over with Tirzah Ann lots of times, but it hadn’t done her a mite of good, as I could see, for I hadn’t got through reveryin’ on the subject, nor begun to, when she up and says agin:

“Miss Skidmore says that all the high aristocracy of Jonesville, if they are aris_to_krits,” says Tirzah Ann—“that is the way she pronounces it, they say she can’t read hardly,—if they are aris_to_krits, and not imposters, they will go away during the summer for a change. And I say, if a change is necessary for her and old Skidmore, why Whitfield and I have got to have a change, if we die in the attempt.”

“A change!” says I, in low axents, a lookin’ round the charmin’, lovely prospect;—the clean, bright cottage, with its open doors and windows, and white ruffled curtains wavin’ on the cool breeze; the green velvet grass, the bright flower beds, the climbing, blossoming vines, the birds singin’ in the shady branches overhead, and in the orchard; the blue lake lyin’ so calm and peaceful in the distance, shining over the green hills and forests; and the wide, cloudless sky bending over all like a benediction.

“A change!” says I, in low, tremblin’ tones of emotion. “Eve wanted a change in Paradise, and she got it, too.”

“But,” says Tirzah Ann, for my tone impressed her fearfully, “don’t you believe in a change for the summer? Don’t you think they are healthy?”

I thought I wouldn’t go into the heights and depths of felosophy in which I had flew and doven—she had heard me time and agin, and eloquence is very tuckerin’ especially after you have been doin’ a hard day’s work—so I merely said:

“When anybody is bakin’ up alive in crowded cities; when the hot sun is shinin’ back on him from brick walls and stony roads; when all the air that comes to them comes hot and suffocatin’, like a simon blowin’ over a desert; to such, a change of body is sweet, and is truly healthy. But,” says I, lookin’ round again on the cool and entrancin’ beauty and freshness of the land and other scape, “to you whom Providence has placed in a Eden of beauty and bloom, to you I again repeat for the 3d time that line of eloquent and beautiful poetry,—‘Better let well enough alone.’”

I could see by the looks of her face that I hadn’t convinced her. But at that very minute Josiah came back, and hollered to me that “he guessed we had better be goin’ back, for he was afraid the hens would get out, and get into the turnips.”

He had jest set out a new bed, and the hens was bewitched to eat the tops off. He had shut ’em up, but felt it was resky to not watch ’em. So we started off. But not before I had told Whitfield my mind about the plan. He looked more convinced than Tirzah Ann did, a good deal more. But I no need to have builded up any hopes on that, onto his mean, for I might have known that when a man loves a woman devotedly, and they haint been married—wall, anywheres from 1 to 4 or 5 years, her influence over him is powerful, and never can be told. She moulds him to her will as easy as clay is moulded in the hands of Mr. Potter. Sometimes she moulds honer into him, and then again dishoner; sometimes she moulds him comfortable, and then again she moulds him hard, and powerful oncomfortable. These things are curious, but useful and entertainin’ to study on, and very deep.

TIRZAH ANN TO A WATERIN’ PLACE.

Wall, if you’ll believe it, after all my eloquent talk, and reasonin’, and everything, the very next week they set off on their journey after a change, on that exertion after rest and pleasure. They come to see us the day before they went, but their plans was all laid, and tickets bought, (they was goin’ to the same place and the same hotel and tavern Skidmore’s folks was), so I didn’t say nothin more—what was the use? Thinkses I, bought wit is the best if you don’t pay too much for it; they’ll find out for themselves whether I was in the right on’t or not.

But bad as I thought it was goin’ to be, little did I think it was goin’ to be so bad as it wuz. Little did I think that Tirzah Ann would be brought home on a bed. But she was. And Whitfield walked with two canes, and had his right arm in a sling. But as I told Josiah, when anybody chased up pleasure so uncommon tight, it wasn’t no wonder they got lamed by it. For pleasure is one of the curiousest things in the world to ketch,—speakin’ in a coltish and parable way. Almost impossible to ketch by chasin’ her. And if anybody don’t believe me, let ’em get up some mornin’ before sunrise, and take a halter, and start off a purpose, and see if they can overtake her;—see if they can ketch her, and put a bit and martingill onto her. See if they don’t find she is skittish and balky, and shies off when they go to put the bits in her mouth. And see, when they think they have got the upper hands of her, whether she don’t throw ’em head over heels, and caper off agin in front of ’em.

I have spoke in a parable way, and would not wish to be understood a thinkin’ pleasure is a horse. Far from it. But this is a very deep subject, and would be apt to carry any one beyond their depth if not simplified and brought down to human comprehension.

The first time I went to see ’em after they got back, Tirzah Ann told me all about it. She could set up some then. But if it wasn’t a pitiful sight to see them three—Whitfield, Tirzah Ann, and the babe. To see how their means looked now, and then to look back and think how they had looked the last time I had seen ’em in that very place. Why, as I looked at ’em, and see how feeble, and mauger, and used up they all looked, there wasn’t hardly a dry eye in my head. Tirzah Ann told me it was a lesson that would last her through her hull life. Why, she said right out plain, that if she should live to be 3 or 400 years old, she shouldn’t never forget it, and I don’t believe myself that she would.

There they was, she and Whitfield, poor as 2 snails. I never see either of ’em in half so poor order before. They hadn’t no ambition nor strength to work. Their morals had all got run down. Their best clothes was all wore out. And that babe! I could have cried, and wept, to see how that pretty little thing was lookin’. Poor as a feeble young snail, and pale as a little white cotton piller-case. Her appetite was all gone, too. She had always been used to sweet, fresh milk—the milk from her own heifer, white as snow, with a brindle back, that her grandpa give her for the name of Samantha. It gives dretful sweet, rich milk. And the babe almost lived on it. And all the milk they could get for her there was sale milk, sour half the time, and at the best full of adultery, so Whitfield said. And I don’t think anything that happened to them on their hull tower made Josiah and me so mad as that did. To think of that sweet little babe’s sufferin’ from adulted and sour milk. It made us so awful indignant that we can’t hardly speak peacible now, a talkin’ about it.

And then they was all cooped up together in a little mite of a room, and she was used to bein’ out-doors half the time, and had a great, cool, airy room to sleep in nights; and bein’ shet up so much, in such close, bad air, it all wore on her, and almost used her up. Oh! how pale she was, and mauger, and cross! Oh! how fearfully cross! She would almost take our heads off, Josiah’s and mine, (as it were,) every time we would speak to her. It was dretful affectin’ to me to see her so snappish; it reminded me so of her grandpa in his most fractious hours, and I told him it did. Josiah felt bad to see her so; it cut him down jest as bad as it did me.

And then to see Whitfield’s and Tirzah Ann’s demeaniers and means! Why jest as sure as I live and breathe they didn’t seem no more like their old means and demeaniers than if they belonged to perfect strangers, and I told Tirzah Ann so.

And she bust right out a-cryin’, and says she, “Mother, one week’s more rest would have tuckered me completely out. I could not have stood it, I should have died off.”

I wiped my own eyes, I was so affected, and says I, in choked-up axents, “You know I told you how it would be, I told you that you was happy enough to home, and you hadn’t better go off in search of pleasure.”

Says she, bustin’ right out agin, “One week more of pleasure and recreation would have been my death-blow.”

Says I, “I believe it. But,” says I, knowin’ it was my duty to be calm, “It is all over now, Tirzah Ann. You hain’t got to go through the pleasure agin. You hain’t got to rest any more. You must try to overcome your feelin’s. Tell your ma all about it,” says I, thinkin’ it would mebby do her good, and get her mind offen it quicker.

So she up and told me the hull story. And I see plain that Miss Skidmore was to the bottom of it all. She and Tirzah Ann’s determination to not let her get ahead of her, and be more genteel than she was. Tirzah Ann said she was jest about sick when they started, for she found out most the last minute that Miss Skidmore had one dress more than she had, and a polenay, and so she sent at once for materials and ingregients, and sot up day and night and worked till she had got hers made, full as good and a little ahead of Miss Skidmore’s.

Wall, they started the same day, and went to the same place, a fashionable summer resort, and put up to the same tavern, a genteel summer tavern, to rest and recreate. And Miss Skidmore bein’ a great, healthy, strong, raw-boned woman, could stand as much agin rest and recreation as Tirzah Ann could.

Why, Tirzah Ann said the rest was enough to wear out a leather woman, and how she ever stood it for two weeks was more than she could tell.

You see she wasn’t used to hard work. I had always favored her, and gone ahead with the work myself, when she lived to home; and Whitfield had been as careful of her as he could be, and jest as good as a woman to help her, and so the rest come tough on her; it was dretful hard on her. But as hard as the rest was for her, I s’pose the recreation was as bad agin; I s’pose it was twice as tough on her.

You see she had to dress up 3 or 4 times a day, and keep the babe dressed up slick. And she had to prominade down to the waterin’ place and drink at jest such a time. And go a-ridin’ out on the water in boats and yots; and had to play crokay, and be up till midnight every night to parties. You see she had to do all this, ruther than let Miss Skidmore get on ahead of her, and do more than she did, be more genteel than she was, and rest more.

Their room was a little mite of a room up four flights of stairs, and Tirzah Ann never could climb stairs worth a cent; and it leaked awful—the rain come down round the chimbley. But they had to take that room or none, the house bein’ so full and runnin’ over. And Whitfield thinkin’ they could rest better in it than they could on the fence or door-step, took it. But if there happened to come up a storm in the night, a thunder-storm or anything, they would have to histe their umberells and lay under ’em. They must have looked as curious as 2 dogs, and I told ’em so.

The room bein’ so high up, it wore on Tirzah Ann—she never could climb stairs worth a cent. And then it was so small, the air was close, nearly tight, and hot as a oven. And the babe bein’ used to large, cool rooms, full of fresh, pure air, couldn’t stand the hotness and the tightness, and it begun to enjoy poor health, and it cried most all the time. And to home it could play round out in the yard all day a’most, and here it hung right onto its ma. And before long she begun to enjoy poor health.

And then the room on one side of ’em was occupied by a young man who was learnin’ to play on the flute. He had been disappointed in love, and he would try to make up tunes as he went along, sort o’ tragedy style, and dirge-like. The most unearthly, and woe-begone, and soul-harrowin’ sounds, they say that they ever heard or read of. They say it was enough to make any one’s blood run cold in their vains to hear ’em. He kept his room most of the time, and played day and night. He had ruther be alone day times, and think of that girl, and lament over her, and play about her, than go into company; and nights he couldn’t sleep, owin’ to his trouble, so he would set up and play. They was sorry for him, they said they was. They said they knew he must have been in a awful state, and his sufferin’s intense, or he couldn’t harrow up anybody’s feelin’s so. But that didn’t make it none the easier for them.

Tirzah Ann and Whitfield are both tender-hearted and sympathetic by nature; if they hadn’t been, it wouldn’t have been so hard on ’em. But they both say that tongue never can express the sufferin’s they underwent from that flute, and from the feelin’s they felt for that young man. They expected every day to hear that he had made way with himself, his sufferin’s seemed so great. Such agonizin’ wails of woe he would blow into that flute! and he would groan and writhe so when he wasn’t a playin’.

Twice Whitfield went to bed with his clothes on, he was so certain the young feller couldn’t stand it till mornin’, and would need help.

The room on the other side of ’em was occupied by a young woman who owned a melodeon. She went into company a good deal, and her spells to play would come on nights, after she got home from parties. She had a good many bo’s, and was happy dispositioned naturally, and they said some nights it seemed as if there wouldn’t be no end hardly to her playin’, quick pieces, waltzes, and pokeys bein’ her theme—and love songs, which she would sing very sentimental and impressive, and put in sights of quavers and shakes—they said it did seem as if they never see so many quavers and trills as she trilled and quavered.

Tirzah Ann and Whitfield both said that they knew what it was to be young, they had been young themselves, not much more’n two years ago, and they knew by experience what it was to be lovesick, and they wanted to sympathize with happiness and gayity of heart, and they didn’t want to do nothin’ to break up her highlarity of spirits. But still it come dretful tough on ’em. I s’pose the sufferin’s couldn’t never be told nor sung that they underwent from them 2 musicianers.

And the babe not bein’ used to such a racket nights would get skairt, and almost go into historical fits. And two or three nights Tirzah Ann had ’em, too—the historicks. I don’t see what kep’ Whitfield up; he says no money would tempt him to go through with it agin. I s’pose Tirzah Ann almost tore him to pieces. But she wasn’t to blame; she didn’t know what she was a doin’.

It hain’t no use to blame Tirzah Ann now, after it is all over with. And she sees it plain enough now; she is sufferin’ enough from the effects of it—her tryin’ to keep up with Miss Skidmore, and rest as much as she did, and recreate as fur, and do all that she done. And that is where her morals got all run down, and Whitfield’s, too.

To think of them two—she that was Tirzah Ann Allen, and Whitfield Minkley—to think of them two, brought up as they had been, havin’ such parents and step-parents as they had, settin’ under such a preacher as they had always set under—to think of them two a dancin’! and a flirtin’!

Why, if anybody had told me, if it had come through two or three, I would have despised the idee of believin’ of it. But it didn’t come through anybody; she owned it up to me herself. I couldn’t hardly believe my ear when she told me, but I had to.

They had parties there every evenin’ in the parlors of the tavern, and Miss Skidmore went to ’em all, and danced, and so they went, and they danced. I didn’t say nothin’ to hurt her feelin’s, her mean looked so dretful, and I see she was a gettin’ her pay for her sinfulness, but I groaned loud and frequent while she was a tellin’ me of this (entirely unbeknown to me).

Here was where Whitfield got so lame. He never had danced a step before in his life—nor Tirzah Ann, neither. But Skidmore and his wife danced every night till after midnight, and Tirzah Ann was so ambitious she was determined that she and Whitfield should recreate and dance as much as they did, if they fell dead a doin’ of it. And not bein’ used to it, it almost killed ’em. Besides loosenin’ their morals so that it will be weeks and weeks before they get as strong and firm as they was before. When morals get to tottlin’ and wobblin’ round, it is almost impossible to get ’em as firm as they was before.

But truly they got their pay. Whitfield not bein’ used to it, and bein’ so tuckered out with the recreation and rest he had been a havin’, it lamed him dretfully, rheumatiz sot in, and his sufferin’s was intense. And then a base-ball hit him—or anyway he got hurt awfully when he was a playin’ some game, base-ball, or billiards, or polo. That is a game, polo is, that I never heard on in my life before, and Josiah was awful interested in it when I told him about it. And he said he should deerly love to learn to play it. That man acts frisky now, a good deal of the time, and is a great case to foller up new idees.

But I told him it would be dretful foolish for him to try to learn it, for the old mare had enough to do now, without that. It is played on horseback, and from the name I s’pose they try to hit each other with poles, or hit the horses, or sunthin’. I don’t really understand it well enough to give directions about playin’ it straight and correct.

But Josiah was all carried away with the idee, and stuck to it he should love to play it, love to like a dog. Says he: “How I should enjoy to take a game with old Bobbet. Why,” says he, “let me get onto the old mare, and give me a good, strong hop-pole, and I believe I could fetch the old man down the first blow.”

But I discourage the idee, and don’t mean to let him undertake it. Says I, “Josiah Allen, it stands you in hand at your age to not go to caperin’ round, and actin’, and get all the other old men in Jonesville all rousted up about it, and a actin’. And I should think,” says I, “that one lame one in the family is enough, without your chasin’ after pleasure on the old mare, and mebby both of you get killed in the job.”

I guess I have kinder broke it up; I don’t believe he will try to learn the game. But as I was a sayin’, in that or some other of the games Whitfield got hit on his elbo, right on his crazy-bone, and I s’pose it made him most crazy. But the doctor thinks with the best of care he may get over it, and use his arm again.

Tirzah Ann’s dancin’ didn’t give her the rheumatiz; it seemed to hurt her more inwardly, the doctor says, brought on a kind of weakness. But where she got her death-blows (as it were), what laid her up, and made her bed-sick, was goin’ in bathin’, and drinkin’ so much mineral water. Ridin’ out on the water so much come hard on ’em both, for it made ’em sick as snipes. Every ride was so severe on ’em it almost spilte their stomachs. Tirzah Ann never could bear deep water—was always afraid of it. But she wasn’t goin’ to have Miss Skidmore bathe, and she not, not if she drounded herself in the operation. So she went in, and got skairt the minute the water was over her knees; it skairt her so she had sort o’ cramps, and gin up she was a droundin’. And that made it worse for her, and she did crumple right down in the water, and would have been drounded if a man hadn’t rescued her. She was a sinkin’ for the 3d time when he laid holt of her hair, and dragged her out. She hain’t got over the fright yet, and I am afraid she never will.

The mineral water, they say, tasted awfully. And Tirzah Ann bein’ very dainty always about what she eat and drunk, it went against her stomach so she couldn’t hardly get a tumbler-full of it down. But Miss Skidmore, bein’ so tough, could drink 8 tumblers-full right down, and it seems it lifted her up dretfully. They said she acted haughty and overbearin’ because Tirzah Ann couldn’t drink so much as she could, into a quart or two. She put on airs about it. And Tirzah Ann couldn’t stand that, so one day, (it was the day before they come home,) she drinked 5 tumblers-full right down. And I s’pose a sicker critter never lived than she was.

I s’pose they was awful skairt about her, and she was skairt about herself. She thought she was a dyin’, and made Whitfield promise on a Testament to carry her back to Jonesville the next day, dead or alive. And he, bein’ a master hand to keep his promise, was as good as his word, and brought her home the next day on a bed.

She got up in a day or two so as to be about the house. But they have been laid up for repairs, as you may say, ever since. They are sick critters now, both on ’em. I have seen awful and deplorable effects from rest and recreation before, but never, _never_ did I see awfuller or deplorabler than they are both a sufferin’ from. They both say that one week’s rest more would have been their death blows, and finished ’em for this world, and I believe it.

And besides the outward sufferin’s that are plain to be seen, there are inward hurts that are fur, fur worse. Outside bruises and hurts can be reached with arneky and wormwood, but who can put a mustard poultice on a bruised spirit, and a weakened moral? Nobody can’t do it.

Now what I am a goin’ to say, what I am a goin’ to tell now, I wouldn’t have get round for the world—_it must be kept_! If I didn’t feel it to be my boundin’ duty to write the truth, and the hull truth, and if it wuzn’t for its bein’ a solemn warnin’ to them who may have felt a hankerin’ to go off on a tower after rest; if it wuzn’t for this I couldn’t write the awful words. But I wouldn’t have it told for anything; I wouldn’t have it get round for the world. It _must_ be kept. But sense I am on the subject I will tell it jest as it is. But it _must_ not go no further. Tirzah Ann didn’t tell it right out to me, but I gathered it from little things I heard her and Whitfield say, and from what I heard from others that was there. I mistrust, and pretty much know, that Tirzah Ann flirted. Flirted with a man!

You see, Miss Skidmore wantin’ to appear fashionable and genteel, and do as other genteel wimmen did, flirted with men. And I know jest as well as I want to know that Tirzah Ann did, not wantin’ to be outdone. I know she and Whitfield quarreled dretfully, for the first time in their lives,—that I had right from Tirzah Ann’s own mouth. But she didn’t tell me what it was about. She looked sort o’ meachin’, and turned the subject, and I hain’t one to pump. But I s’pose, from what they both told me, that they come pretty nigh partin’. And I know, jest as well as if I see her at it, that Tirzah Ann bein’ so ambitious, and not wantin’ to be outdone by Miss Skidmore, went to flirtin’, and I mistrust it was with old Skidmore himself. I know he and Whitfield don’t speak. Tirzah Ann never could bear the sight of him, but I s’pose she wanted to gaul Miss Skidmore.

Oh! such doin’s, such doin’s! It worked up me and Josiah dretfully. As I told him, “where would their morals have been, if they had rested and recreated much longer?”

And he groaned aloud, and said what gauled him the worst was to think of the piles and piles of money they had throwed away. Says he: “It will cramp ’em for months and months,”—and it will.

MISS BOBBET LETS THE CAT OUT.

My companion Josiah havin’ bought a quantity of fresh fish, I thought I would carry one over to Miss Betsey Slimpsy,—she that was Betsey Bobbet,—thinkin’ mebby it would taste good to her. Betsey hain’t well. Some think she is in a gallopin’ consumption, but I don’t. I think it is her workin’ so hard, and farin’ so hard. She has to support the family herself, almost entirely; she don’t have enough to eat a good deal of the time, so folks say; she hain’t got any clothes fit to wear; and she has to be such a slave, and work so awful hard, that it don’t seem as if she is half as bright as she used to be. As she says, if it wasn’t for the dignity she got by bein’ married, it didn’t seem as if she could keep up. But that, she says, is a great comfort to her.

But she looks bad. She don’t get no sleep at all, she says, or none to speak of. Simon’s horrors are worse than I ever dremp’ horrors could be. They are truly horrible. Every night he pounds on the headboard, yells awful, prances round, and kicks. Why, Betsey says, and I believe her, that she is black and blue most the hull time, jest from kicks. I am sorry for Betsey.

Wall, I give her the fish,—she seemed awful glad of it,—and visited with her a little while, and then, as supper-time was approachin’ and drawin’ near, I histed my umberell, and started out on my homeward return.