Chapter VIII: Part 8

It was a lovely evenin’. It had been a very hot day, but the sun had sot down (as it were) behind the trees to cool himself off, and the earth, takin’ advantage of his temporary retirement, seemed to foller on and do likewise. So I walked along on the green grass, under the swayin’ branches of the apple-trees that bent down over the highway—great, liberal-hearted trees, stretching their strong brown arms out in blessing and benediction—out over their own rich, cultivated soil and the dusty highway, over foe and lover, tramp, and Josiah Allen’s wife. I liked that in the trees—liked it first-rate in ’em. It made me feel well to walk in their refreshin’ shade.

The apples were ripenin’ in the clusterin’ boughs, birds sang in the branches, the blue sky shone down lovin’ly. The wayside blossoms grew thick at my feet, the grass was like a velvet carpet under ’em, and, most beautiful scene of all, my Josiah stood in the barn-door, nailin’ on a board.

Oh! how first-rate I did feel and look. I knew I was a lookin’ well. I knew it jest as well as I wanted to, before I met my companion’s admirin’ look, as he asked me, in considerable tender tones, if I knew whether there was any more of them tenpenny nails left.

I told him there wuzn’t. And then, oh! how admirin’ he looked at me agin, as I told him he had better hurry and finish the door, as I was goin’ right in to put on the tea-kettle and get supper jest as quick as I could.

His smile was like sunshine to my heart, as he told me he would be in by the time I got it ready, and I’d better hurry up.

As I walked towards the house I was feelin’ beautiful, and very affectionate towards my pardner. For love, no matter how full and ardent it may be, will, like other great deeps, have its ebbs and flows, its high tides and its more dwindlin’ ones.

At that moment my love and my confidence in my Josiah swept up in my heart to the highest tide-level. And I thought, as I walked along, that I would shet up that eye of my spectacles—that I never would agin let distrust and a Widder Bump cause me a moment’s disquiet and unhappiness.

And though I could not deny to myself that Josiah Allen’s conduct, in the spring of the year, and on a Friday night, had been mysterious, I felt that I would look back upon it as I look on scriptural passages that I can’t make out the meanin’ of. I always feel in them cases that it is the fault of the translator. No matter how mysterious the meanin’ may seem, I know that the Scriptures are right, anyway. And I felt that I would look back in that way upon my companion’s strange words and demeaners. I felt that I would trust my Josiah.

And so, bein’ full of love and confidence in Josiah Allen and the world at large, I walked with a even step up to the door-step, and as I did so I see the kitchen-door was open. I thought that looked sort o’ strange, as I knew that my Josiah had been to the barn to work all the time I was gone. But I went in, and as I did so I see a man a standin’ by the stove. He was a short, stocky man, dressed middlin’ well, but he had a strange look.

He was considerable older than Josiah, I should think. His face was red and bloated, and his hair bein’ white as snow, and his white whiskers runnin’ all round his chin, and up the sides of his face, it give it considerable the look of a red pin-cushion with a white ruffle round it. Only the ruffle (still usin’ the poetical simely) wuzn’t white under his chin. No, he used too much tobacco for that. I s’pose he used it for the good looks of it; I s’pose that is what folks use tobacco for. But good land! I can’t see a single pretty look to it, nor never could, from the time a man takes in a half a plug or so, and wads it up in one side of his mouth, showin’ his yeller, nasty-lookin’ teeth, and lettin’ the black, filthy-lookin’ juice run down his mouth and whiskers, to the time he spits it all out agin onto carpets, stairways, church pews, concert halls, car floors, wimmen’s dresses, and et cetery.

_I_ can’t see a mite of pretty looks about it. But I am reasonable and always was. And there probable may be some beauty in it that I hain’t never seen, or there wouldn’t so many foller it up.

For it must be for the looks of it that they use it. I have studied on it a sight, and there hain’t no other reason that I can see. And if there had been any the keen eye of my spectacles would have ketched sight on it. They go awful deep into subjects, them spectacles do.

It can’t be for the taste of it that they use it, for it don’t taste good. That I _know_, for I got some into my mouth once by mistake, over to Miss Bobbet’s, and so what I know, I know; I can take my oath on the taste of it. No, they don’t use it for that.

It can’t be for the profit of it, for it hain’t profitable; quite the reverse. Why, there is about 30 million dollars’ worth raised in the United States a year, and somebody has got to pay for it.

Why, I s’pose some poor men chew enough of this stuff,—chew it jest to spit it out agin,—and smoke it,—draw the smoke into their mouth jest to blow it out agin,—why, I s’pose this proceedin’ costs ’em enough in ten or fifteen years to buy ’em a good little home. And there they are willin’ to live and die homeless, themselves and them they love, jest for looks, jest to try to look pretty.

For it must be for that. It can’t be for health, for doctors say it hurts the health awfully, makes folks weak and nervious, and sometimes leads to blindness and fits.

It hain’t for morals, for folks say, and stick to it, that it makes ’em totter. Weakens a man’s moral nature, his social and religious faculties, gives him a taste for the stronger stimulent of intoxicatin’ drinks, and so leads him down to ruin gradual.

No, it hain’t for the morals. I have most probable hit on the right reason. But good land! where the beauty is in it I can’t see. But I am a episodin’ fearfully.

As I was a sayin’, this man, instead of beautifyin’ himself with it, had jest spilte the looks of his whiskers, in my eye. They looked yeller and nasty. And the sides of his mouth was all streaked with it. In some places it was sort o’ dried on. He looked to me as if it would do him good to put him asoak in weak lye, and let him lay in it 2 or 3 days till he got sweetened and cleansed.

His eyes was light-colored, and the lids was swelled and inflamed like. His mouth was drawed down into a dretful sanctimonious pucker; he had a awful big chew of tobacco in his mouth, and so it wasn’t all hypocracy that drawed it down; it was probable about half and half—half hypocracy and half tobacco. And under all the other expressions of his face was a dissipated, bad look. I didn’t like his looks a mite. But there he stood a kinder hangin’ onto the table (I found out afterwards that he had been drinkin’ all the hard cider he could to old Bobbet’ses).

He asked me, in a kind of a thick voice, for Josiah. And I, thinkin’ it was some one on business, asked him in a polite tone, though cool, “if he wouldn’t take a chair and set down.”

“I would,” says he, in that thick, husky voice, “I would set down, mum, but I am afraid if I should I couldn’t get up agin.”

And he looked at me in a curious, strange way; dretful wise, and yet foolish like.

Says I, gazin’ sternly at him: “I am afraid you have been a drinkin’, sir.”

“No! No! I hain’t! cider’s good; good for the blood. Will take a glass, if you please.”

“Not here you won’t,” says I firmly.

“I’ll take a glass if you _please_, I said,” says he, speakin’ up kinder loud. “Cider’s good; good for the blood.”

Says I: “It will be good for your blood if you get out of this house as quick as you can. And I would love to know,” says I, lookin’ at him keenly over my specks, “what you are here for, anyway.”

“I am here in the cause of—cider’s good for the blood. Will take a drink.”

Says I: “You start out of this house, or I’ll call Josiah.”

“I come, and I’m workin’ for the cause of religion, if you please—and I’ll take a glass of it, if you please.”

He’d make a sort of a drunken bow, every word or two, and smiled sort o’ foolish, and winked long, solemn winks.

Says I sternly: “You act as if you was a workin’ for the cause of religion.”

“Apple-cider’s good. Hain’t apples religious, easy entreated? Hain’t apples peacible, long sufferin’? Will take a drink, if you please.”

Says I, with a awful dignity: “I’d love to see myself givin’ you anything to drink. You are drunk as a fool now; that is what ails you.”

“Cider hain’t tox-tox-toxicatin’; Bobbet said ’twuzn’t. He said his cider-mill was harmless, easy ’ntreated, as peacible a one as he ever see. Will take a glass, if you please. I wouldn’t drink a tox-tox-toxin’ bevrig, not for dollar. Guess Bobbet knows what’s pious drink and what hain’t. Cider’s pious bevrig—called so—peacible, pious drink.”

“Pious drink!” says I, sternly. “I have seen more than one man made a fool and a wild man by it, pious or not. Oh!” says I, eppisodin’ out loud and eloquent, entirely unbeknown to me, “how Satan must laugh in his sleeves (if he wears sleeves) to see how good men are deceived and blindered in this matter. Nothin’ tickles Satan more than to get a good man, a church member, to work for him for nothin’. When he gets good, conscientious, christian folks to tackle his work of ruinin’ souls, unbeknown to them, and let him rest off a spell,—why it tickles him most to death.

“And when anyone plants the first seeds of drunkenness in a person, no matter how good-naturedly it is done, no matter how good the ones are who do it, they are workin’ for Satan and boardin’ themselves, entirely unbeknown to them. That is, the good ones are; some know and realize what they are a doin’, but keep at it through selfishness and love of gain.”

“Likker’s bad, wrong; but cider’s in’cent, in’cent as a babe, a prattlin’ little babe; it’s called so.”

“Good land!” says I, “do you s’pose I care a cent what a thing is called?” Says I: “I have seen cider that three glasses of it would fix a man out so he couldn’t tell how many childern he had, or fathers and mothers, no more than he could count the stars in the zodiact. And couldn’t walk straight and upright, no more than he could bump his old head aginst the moon. When a man is dead what difference does it make to him whether he died from a shotgun or billerous colic, or was skairt to death? And what difference does it make when a man is made a fool of, whether it is done by one spunefull or a dozen, or a quart? The important thing to him is, he is a fool.”

“Yes, ’n I’ll take a glass of cider, if you please.”

I started right straight for the back stoop and hollered to Josiah.

That skairt him. He started kinder sideways for the door, got holt of the latch, and says he:

“I come to labor with you, n’ I don’t want to leave you goin’ the broad road to destruction; but I will,” says he, with a simple sort of a smile, and as foolish a wink as I ever see wunk, “I will if you’ll give me a drink of cider, if you please.”

Says I, firmly, “You will take a broader road than you have calculated on, if you don’t clear out of this house, instantly and to once.” And as I still held my umberell in my hand, I held it up in a threatnin’ way in my left hand, some like a spear. And he started off and went staggerin’ down the road.

I was a wonderin’ awfully who he was, and what he come for, when Miss Bobbet come in to bring home a drawin’ of tea, and she was so full of news that she most fell aginst the door, as wimmen will when they are freighted too heavy with gossip. And she said it was Elder Judas Wart, a Mormon Elder, who had come back to Jonesville again.

“And,” says she, hurryin’ to relieve herself, for her mind was truly loaded heavy with news beyond its strength, “what do you think now about the Widder Bump bein’ a Mormon. I told you she was one, a year ago, and other wimmen told you so, but you would stick to it that she was a camel.”

“Yes,” says I, “in the name of principle I have upholded that woman and called her a camel.”

“Wall,” says she, “camel or not, she was sealed to Elder Judas Wart last week. You know she went home to her mother’s in the spring. And he has been out there all summer holdin’ his meetin’s, and married her.

“He told us all about it to-day. He said he hadn’t hardly a wife by him but what was disabled in some way from workin’. He said he was fairly discouraged. Eleven of ’em was took down with the tyfus, violent. A few of ’em, he didn’t hardly know jest how many, but quite a number of ’em, had the chills. Two or three of ’em was bed-rid. Four of ’em had young babes; and he said he felt it was not good for man to be alone, and he needed a wife—so he married the Widder Bump and sent her on to Utah by express to take charge of things till he come. He had meetin’s to Jonesville last spring, and Bobbet went to ’em.”

“Bobbet went to ’em,” says I, mechanically. For oh! what strange and curious feelin’s was a tacklin’ of me. Memeries of that terrible crysis in my life when I heard the mutterin’s of a earthquake, a rumblin’ and a roarin’ unbeknown to me. When everything in life seemed uncertain and wobblin’ to a Samantha, and a Josiah talked in his slumbers of a Widder Bump.

“Yes,” says she, “Bobbet owned it all up to me, jest now. He wouldn’t, if the Elder hadn’t come in and acted so glad to see him. But, if you’ll believe it, Bobbet looked as if he would sink when he said he had married the Widder Bump. And he says he hain’t goin’ to have no new overcoat made this winter. And he has been sot on havin’ one.”

“Bobbet owned it all up to you,” says I, speakin’ agin mechanically, for I felt fairly stunted by the emotions that was rushin’ onto me.

“Yes, I remember he used to go evenin’s to Jonesville a sight, last spring, when I had the quinzy and was laid up. But I s’posed he went to the Methodist Conference meetin’s. But he didn’t, he went to hear Elder Judas Wart. And Bobbet says Josiah Allen went to ’em, too.”

At them fearful words I groaned aloud. I wouldn’t say a word aginst my pardner. But to save my life I couldn’t keep that groan back. It fairly groaned itself (as it were), my feelin’s was such.

It was a fearful groan, deep and melancholy in the extreme. I was determined to not say one word about my feelin’s concernin’ my pardner, and I didn’t, only jest that groan. She is quite a case to make mischief in families, but she hain’t got a thing to carry from me, only jest that groan. And there can’t be much done, even in a court of law, with one plain groan, and nothin’ else; there can’t be much proved by it.

She is a pryin’ woman, and I see she mistrusted sunthin’. Says she:

“What is the matter, Josiah Allen’s wife? What are you groanin’ for, so heavy?”

I wouldn’t come right out and tell the awful emotions that was performin’ through my mind—and at the same time I wouldn’t lie. So I broke out sort o’ eloquent, and says I:

“When I think what female wimmen have suffered, and are sufferin’, from this terrible sin of polygamy, it is enough to make anybody groan.” Says I, “I feel guilty, awful guilty, to think I hain’t done sunthin’ before now to stop it. Here I have,” says I, growin’ fearfully excited, “here I have jest sot down here, with my hands folded (as it were), and let them doin’s go on without doin’ a single thing to break it up. And it makes me feel fairly wicked when I think of that address the sufferin’ female wimmen of Utah sent out to Miss Hays and me.”

“To Miss Hays and you?” says Miss Bobbet, in a sort of a jealous way. “I don’t know as it was sent to you special. It said Miss Hays, and the other wimmen of the United States.”

“Wall,” says I, “hain’t I a woman, and hain’t Jonesville right in the very center of the United States?”

“Why yes,” says she. Miss Bobbet will always give up when she is convinced. I’ll say that for her.

“Wall,” says I, “that address that they sent out to us was one of the most powerful and touchin’ appeals for help ever sent out by sufferin’ humanity. And here I hain’t done a thing about it, and I don’t believe Emily has.”

“Emily who?” says she.

“Why, Emily Hays,” says I. “Rutherford Hays’es wife. She that was Emily Webb. As likely a woman as ever entered that White House. A woman of gentle dignity, sweet, womanly ways, earnest christian character, and firm principles. No better or better-loved woman has ever sot up in that high chair since Lady Washington got down out of it. A good-lookin’ woman, too,” says I proudly. “She has got a fair face and a fair soul. Her christian example is as pure and clear as the water she makes them old congressmen drink to her dinner-table, and is as refreshin’, and as much of a rarity to ’em. I can tell you,” says I, “it makes me and America proud, it tickles both of us most to death, to think our representative lady is one so admirable in every way. And foreigners can gaze at her all they are a mind to. We hain’t afraid to let ’em peruse her through the biggest telescopes they can get; they won’t find nothin’ in her face nor her nature but what we are proud of, both of us.

“But in this matter I’ll bet a cent Emily hain’t made a move, no more than I have. We have been slack in it, both on us. But as for me,” says I firmly, “I am determined to be up and a doin’.”

And oh! how I sithed (to myself) as I thought it over. Emily hadn’t had the fearful lesson that I had had. Her pardner’s morals never had wobbled round and tottered under the pressure of this pernicious doctrine, and a Widder Bump. My sithes was fearful, as I thought it over, but they was inward and silent ones. For my devotion to my pardner is such that I would not give even the testimony of a sithe against my Josiah.

When necessary, and occasion demands it, I scold Josiah myself, powerful; I have to. But I will protect him from all other blame and peril, as long as I have a breath left in my lung, or a strength left in my armpit.

But oh! what feelin’s I felt, what deep, though silent, sithes I sithed, as I thought it over to myself. How the posy will not give out its perfume; will hang right onto it with its little, dainty, invisible hands till it is trod on; then it gives it up—has to. And gold won’t drop a mite of its dross; obstinate, haughty, holdin’ right onto it till it is throwed into the fire, and heat put to it.

And to foller up the simelys, Josiah Allen’s wife’s heart had to be tried in the fiery furnace of pain and mortifacture before it would give up and do its duty.

Oh! how my conscience smoted me as I thought it over. Thought how the hand of personal sufferin’ had to fairly whip me into the right. There had hundreds and thousands of my own sect been for year after year a sufferin’ and a agonizin’. Bearin’ the heaviest of crosses with bleedin’ hands, and eyes so blinded with tears they could hardly ketch a glimpse of the sweet heavens of promise above ’em. And how at last, bein’ fairly drove to it in their despair, they writ to Emily and me for help: help to escape out of the deeps of personal and moral degradation; help to rescue them and the whole land from barberism and ruin. And there we hadn’t paid no more attention to that letter than if it hadn’t been wrote to us.

Oh! how guilty I felt. I felt as if I was more to blame than Emily was, for her house was bigger than mine, and she had more to do. And she hadn’t had the warnin’ I had. I was the guilty one. In the spring of the year, and on a Friday night, right up on the ceilin’ of our kitchen had those fearful words been writ, jest as they was in Bellshazzer’ses time:

“_Mean! mean!_ tea-kettle!” and et cetery. Which bein’ interpreted in various ways, held awful meanin’s in every one of ’em. “_Mean! mean!_” showin’ there was mean doin’s a goin’ on; “tea-kettle!” showin’ there was bilin’ water a heatin’ to scald and torture me. And takin’ it all together this awful meanin’ could be read: “Josiah Allen is weighed in the ballances, and is found wantin’.”

I hadn’t heeded those fiery words of warnin’. I had covered my eyes, and turned away from interpretations (as it were). Forebodin’s had foreboded, and I hadn’t minded their ’bodin’s. Forerunners had run right in front of me, and I wouldn’t look at these forerunners, or see ’em run.

Blind trust and affection for a Josiah had blinded the eyes of a Samantha; but now, when the truth was brought to light by a Miss Bobbet, when I could see the awful danger that had hung over me on a Friday night and in the spring of the year, when I could almost hear the whizzin’ of the fatal arrow aimed at my heart, my very life—now I could realize how them hearts felt where the arrows struck, where they was a quiverin’ and a smartin’ and a ranklin’.

Now, it felt a feelin’, my heart did, that it was willin’, while a throb of life remained in it, to give that throb to them fellow-sufferers (fellow-female-sufferers). And when Miss Bobbet said, jest as she started for home, that Elder Judas Wart wanted to have a talk with me on religion and mormonism, I said, in a loud, eloquent voice:

“Fetch him on! Bring him to me instantly! and let me argue with him, and convert him.”

I s’pose my tone and my mean skairt her, she not knowin’ what powerful performances had been a performin’ in my mind. And I heard that she went right from our house and reported that I was after the Elder. So little is worldly judgment to be relied upon. But nobody believed it, and if they had, I shouldn’t have cared, no more than I should have cared for the murmurin’ of the summer breeze. When the conscience is easy, the mind is at rest. I knew there was three that knew the truth on’t: the Lord, Elder Judas Wart, and myself. I count Josiah and me as one, which is lawful, though Josiah says that I am the one the biggest heft of the time. He said “he made calculations when he married me, when we was jined together as one, that he would be that one.”

And I told him, “Man’s calculations was blindin’, and oft deceivin’.”

I said it in a jokin’ way. I let him be the “one” a good deal of the time, and he knows it.

But, as I was a sayin’, them three that knew it was all that was necessary to my comfort and peace of mind.

Josiah looked sad and depressted, and I knew, for I see old Bobbet leanin’ over the barnyard fence while he was a milkin’, and I knew they had been talkin’ over the news. And when he come in with his second pail-full of milk, lookin’ so extra depressted, my mean was some colder, probable about like ice cream, only not sweet; no, not at all sweet—quite the reverse.

After Miss Bobbet’s departure, the night that ensued and followed on was fearful and agonizin’. What to do with Josiah Allen I knew not. But I made my mind up not to tackle him on the subject then, but wait till I was more calm and composed down. I also thought I would do better to take the daylight to it. So I treated him considerable the same as my common run of treatment towards him was, only a little more cool—not cold as ice, but coolish.

But oh! what emotions goared me that night, as I lay on my goose-feather pillow, with Josiah by my side a groanin’ in his sleep frequent and mournful. He couldn’t keep awake, that man couldn’t, not if all the plagues of Egypt was a plaguin’ him, as I often remarked to him.

But while such emotions was a performin’ in my mind, there wuzn’t no sleep for me. Some of the time I was mad at Josiah Allen, and then agin I was mad at the Government. Some of the time I would feel indignant at Josiah, clear Josiah; and then agin, as he would sithe out loud and heart-breakin’ sithes, my affection for him would rise up powerful, and I would say to myself—oritorin’ eloquent right there in the dead of the night—“Why should I lay all the blame of a pernicious system onto my sufferin’ pardner? Human nater is weak and prone to evil, especially man human nater, which is proner. And when Government keeps such abysses for men to walk off of, and break their necks (morally), who should be scolded the most—them men after their necks are broke, or the ones who dug the abysses, or let ’em be dug?

“Let this band of banditty flourish on shore—furnished land for ’em to flourish on—and furnished ships to go out over the ocian and hunt round for foreign souls to ruin. Who calmly looked on and beheld its ships bear to our shores hundreds and thousands of the ignorant peasantry of the old world—fair-faced Swedish and Danish maidens, blue-eyed German girls, and bright English and Irish lassies—lookin’ with innocent, wonderin’ eyes toward a new life—innocent youth, deceived by specious falsehoods, pourin’ onto our shores like pure rills of water, to fall into that muddy gulf of corruption and become putrid also—and our Government lookin’ calmly on, happy as a king, and pretendin’ to be religious.”

I declare! as I thought it all over, I was as mad with the Government as I was with my pardner, and I don’t know but madder.

Scolded, Josiah Allen had got to be—that I knew. But I hankered, I hankered awfully, right there in the dead of the night, to tackle the Government, too, and scold it fearfully. I felt that I must be up and a doin’. I yearned to tackle Elder Judas Wart, and argue with him with a giant strength. But little did I think that in a few days I should be a doin’ of it.

A SERENADING EPISODE, &c.

These verses of Betsey’s come out in the last week’s _Gimlet_, and I call it foolish stuff. Though (on measurin’ ’em in a careless way with a yard-stick) I found the lines was pretty nigh of a equal length, and so I s’pose it would be called poetry.

A WIFE’S STORY.

Oh Gimlet! back again I float,
With broken wings, a weary bard;
I cannot write as once I wrote,
I have to work so very hard;
So hard my lot, so tossed about,
My muse is fairly tuckered out.

My muse aforesaid once hath flown,
But now her back is broke, and breast;
And yet she fain would crumple down;
On Gimlet pages she would rest,
And sing plain words as there she’s sot—
Haply they’ll rhyme, and haply not.

I spake plain words in former days,
No guile I showed, clear was my plan;
My gole it matrimony was;
My earthly aim it was a man.
I gained my man, I won my gole;
Alas! I feel not as I fole.

Yes, ringing through my maiden thought
This clear voice rose: “Oh come up higher.”
To speak plain truth, with candor fraught,
To married be was my desire.
Now, sweeter still this lot shall seem,
To be a widder is my theme.

For toil hath claimed me for her own,
In wedlock I have found no ease;
I’ve cleaned and washed for neighbors round,
And took my pay in beans and pease;
In boiling sap no rest I took,
Or husking corn, in barn, and shock.

Or picking wool from house to house,
White washing, painting, papering;
In stretching carpets, boiling souse;
E’en picking hops, it hath a sting,
For spiders there assembled be,
Mosquitoes, bugs, and e t c.

I have to work, oh! very hard;
Old Toil, I know your breadth and length;
I’m tired to death, and, in one word,
I have to work beyond my strength.
And mortal men are very tough
To get along with,—hasty, rough.

Yes, tribulation’s doomed to her
Who weds a man, without no doubt.
In peace a man is singuler;
His ways they are past findin’ out.
And oh! the wrath of mortal males—
To point their ire, earth’s language fails.

And thirteen children in our home
Their buttons rend, their clothes they burst,
Much bread and such do they consume;
Of children they do seem the worst.
And Simon and I do disagree;
He’s prone to sin continuallee.

He horrors has, he oft doth kick,
He prances, yells,—he will not work.
Sometimes I think he is too sick;
Sometimes I think he tries to shirk.
But ’tis hard for her, in either case,
Who B. Bobbet was in happier days.

Happier? Away! such thoughts I spurn.
I count it true, from spring to fall,
’Tis better to be wed, and groan,
Than never to be wed at all.
I’d work my hands down to the bone
Rather than rest a maiden lone.

This truth I will not, cannot shirk,
I feel it when I sorrow most:
I’d rather break my back with work,
And haggard look as any ghost,—
Rather than lonely vigils keep,
I’d wed and sigh, and groan and weep.

Yes, I can say, though tears fall quick,
Can say, while briny tear-drops start,
I’d rather wed a crooked stick
Than never wed no stick at all.
Sooner than laughed at be, as of yore,
I’d rather laugh myself no more.

I’d rather go half-clad and starved,
And mops and dish-cloths madly wave,
Than have the words “B. Bobbet” carved
On headstun rising o’er my grave.
Proud thought! now, when that stun is risen,
’Twill bear two names—my name and hisen.

Methinks ’twould colder make the stun
If but one name, the name of she,
Should linger there alone—alone.
How different when the name of he
Does also deck the funeral urn;
Two wedded names,—his name and hurn.

And sweeter yet, oh blessed lot!
Oh state most dignified and blest!
To be a widder, calmly sot,
And have both dignity and rest.
Oh, Simon! strangely sweet ’twould be
To be a widder unto thee.

The warfare past, the horrors done,
With maiden’s ease and pride of wife,
The dignity of wedded one,
The calm and peace of single life,—
Oh, strangely sweet this lot doth seem;
A female widder is my theme.

I would not hurt a hair of he,
Yet, did he from earth’s toils escape,
I could most reconciléd be,
Could sweetly mourn, e’en without crape,
Could say, without a pang of pain,
That Simon’s loss was Betsey’s gain.

I’ve told the plain tale of my woes,
With no deceit, or language vain,
Have told whereon my hopes are rose,
Have sung my mournful song of pain.
And now I e’en will end my tale,
I’ve sung my song, and wailed my wail.

_I_ have made a practice of callin’ that Poetry, bein’ one that despises envy and jealousy amongst female authoresses. No, you never ketch me at it, bein’ one that would sooner help ’em up the ladder than upset ’em, and it is ever my practice so to do. But truth must be spoke if subjects are brung up. Uronious views must be condemned by Warriors of the Right, whether ladders be upset or stand firm on their legs—poetesses also.

I felt that this poetry attacted a tender subject, a subject dearer to me than all the world besides—the subject of Josiah. Josiah is a man.

And I say it, and I say it plain, that men hain’t no such creeters as she tries to make out they be. Men are first-rate creeters in lots of things, and are as good as wimmen be any day of the week.

Of course I agree with Betsey, that husbands are tryin’ in lots of things; they need a firm hand to the hellum to guide ’em along through the tempestuous waves of married life, and get along with ’em. They are lots of trouble, but then I think they pay after all. Why, I wouldn’t swap my Josiah for the best house and lot in Jonesville, or the crown of the Widder Albert. I love Josiah Allen. And I don’t know but the very trouble he has caused me makes me cling closer to him. You know the harder a horse’s head beats aginst burdock burs the tighter the burdocks will cling to its mane. Josiah makes me sights of trouble, but I cling to him closely.

I admit that men are curious creeters, and very vain, and they hain’t willin’ to let well enough alone. They over-do, and go beyond all sense and reason. A instance of these two strong traits of their’s has jest occurred and took place, which, as a true historian relatin’ solemn facts, I will relate in this epistol.

Yes, men are tejus creeters a good deal of the time. But then agin, so be wimmen, jest as tejus, and I don’t know but tejuser. I believe my soul, if I had got to be born agin, I had jest as lieves be born a man as a woman, and I don’t know but I drather.

No, I don’t think one sect ort to boast over the other one. They are both about equally foolish and disagreeable, and both have their goodnesses and nobilities, and both ort to have their rights.

Now I hain’t one to set up and say men hadn’t ort to vote, that they don’t know enough, and hain’t good enough, and so forth and so on. No, you don’t ketch me at it. I am one that stands up for justice and reason.

Now, the other day a wild-eyed woman, with short hair, who goes round a lecturin’ on wimmen’s rights, come to see me, a tryin’ to inviggle me into a plot to keep men from votin’. Says she, “The time is a drawin’ near when wimmen are a goin’ to vote, without no doubt.”

“Amen!” says I. “I can say amen to that with my hull heart and soul.”

“And then,” says she, “when the staff is in our own hands, less we wimmen all put in together and try to keep men from votin’.”

“Never!” says I, “never will you get me into such a scrape as that,” says I. “Men have jest exactly as good a right to vote as wimmen have. They are condemned, and protected, and controlled by the same laws that wimmen are, and so of course are equally interested in makin’ ’em. And I won’t hear another word of such talk. You needn’t try to inviggle me into no plot to keep men from votin’, for justice is ever my theme, and also Josiah.”

Says she, bitterly, “I’d love to make these miserable sneaks try it once, and see how they would like it, to have to spend their property, and be hauled around, and hung by laws they hadn’t no hand in makin’.”

But I still says, with marble firmness, “Men have jest as good a right to vote as wimmen have. And you needn’t try to inviggle me into no such plans, for I won’t be inviggled.”

And so she stopped invigglin’, and went off.

And then again in Betsey’s poetry (though as a neighbor and a female author I never would speak a word aginst it, and what I say I say as a warrior, and would wish to be so took) I would say in kindness, and strictly as a warrior, that besides the deep under-current of foolishness that is runnin’ through it, there is another thought that I deeply condemn. Betsey sot out in married life expectin’ too much. Now, she didn’t marry in the right way, and so she ort to have expected tougher times than the usual run of married females ort to expect; more than the ordinary tribulations of matrimony. But she didn’t; she expected too much.

And it won’t do to expect too much in this world, anyway. If you can only bring your mind down to it, it is a sight better to expect nothing, and then you won’t be disappointed if you get it, as you most probable will. And if you get something it will be a joyful surprise to you. But there are few indeed who has ever sot down on this calm hite of filosify.

Folks expect too much. As many and many times as their hopes have proved to be uronious, they think, well now, if I only had that certain thing, or was in that certain place, I should be happy. But they hain’t. They find when they reach that certain gole, and have clim up and sot down on it, they’ll find that somebody has got onto the gole before ’em, and is there a settin’ on it. No matter how spry anybody may be, they’ll find that Sorrow can climb faster than they can, and can set down on goles quicker. Yes, they’ll find her there.

It hain’t no matter how easy a seat anybody sets down in in this world, they’ll find that they’ll have to hunch along, and let Disappointment set down with ’em, and Anxiety, and Weariness, and et cetery, et cetery.

Now, the scholar thinks if he can only stand up on that certain hite of scientific discovery, he will be happy, for he will know all that he cares about or wants to. But when he gets up there, he’ll see plain; for the higher he is riz above the mists of ignorance that floats around the lower lands, the clearer his vision; and he will see another peak right ahead of him, steeper and loftier and icier than the last, and so on ad infinitum, ad infinity.

Jest as it was with old Miss Peedick, our present Miss Peedick’s mother-in-law. She said (she told me with her own lips) that she knew she should be happy when she got a glass butter-dish. But she said she wasn’t; she told me with her own lips that jest as quick as she got that she wanted a sugar-bowl.

The lover thinks when he can once claim his sweetheart, call her his own, he will be blessed and content; but he hain’t. No matter how well he loves her, no matter how fond she is of him, and how blest they are in each other’s love, they must think, anyway, that the blessedness lacks one thing—permanence.

And though he calls her his own, yet he must feel, if he knows anything, that she is not his own; he must know that he has to dispute for the possession of her daily with one stronger than he is. And if he is tender-hearted and sensitive, the haunting fear must almost rack his soul; the horrible dread of seeing her slip away from him altogether; of sometime reaching out his arms, and finding that nowhere, nowhere can he find her; that in place of her warm, beating heart, whose every throb was full of love for him, is only the vacant spaces, the mysterious wave-beats of emptyness and void; in place of the tender sweetness of her voice, the everlasting silences of eternity.

And though he seek her forever and forever, he can never meet her; never, never, through all this earthly life, find her again. She, the nearest and the dearest, so lately a part of his own life, his own soul, gone from him so swiftly and so utterly, over such a trackless road, as to leave no trace of her footsteps that he may follow her. And though he throw himself upon the turf that covers her, and weary the calm heavens with his wild prayers and questionings, no answer comes; his words fall back again upon his heart, like dust upon dust.

And then, those who love him tell him that the loving hands were unclasped from his that he might forever reach upward, yearning, longing to clasp them again, that he might make his own hands purer, fitter to clasp an angel’s fingers.

That the bright tresses were hidden away under the coffin-lid, that their immortal sheen might gleam through every sunset and every dawning; heaven’s golden seal on the sunset of his joy, the morning of his hope, his faith. That the sweet eyes were darkened here that they might become to his sad heart the glowing light of the future. They say this to him, and he listens to them—maybe.

But if this does not happen to him, if his sweetheart lives on beside him, he finds that this mighty presence steals away—not love, for that is a bit of the infinite dropped down into our souls unbeknown to us, and so is immortal; but he steals the golden sheen of the hair, the eye’s bright luster, the young form’s strength and rounded beauty. Every day, every hour, he is losing something of what he proudly called his own.

You see we don’t own much of anything in this world: it’s curious, but so it is. And what we call our own don’t belong to us, not at all. That is one of the things that makes this such an extremely curious world to live in. Yes, we are situated extremely curious, as much so as the robins and swallows who build their nests on the waving tree-boughs.

We smile at the robin, with our wise, amused pity, who builds her tiny nest with such laborious care high up, out on the waving tree-top, swinging back and forth, back and forth, in every idle wind. Gathering her straws and bits of wood with such patient and tireless care to weave about the frail homes that are to be blown away by the chilly autumn winds, and they also to be driven southward before the snows.

But are not our homes, the sweet homes of our tenderest love, built upon just as insecure foundations, hanging over more mysterious depths, rocking to and fro, and swept to their ruin by a breath from the Unknown? Our dreams, our hopes, our ambitions: what are ye all but the sticks and straws that we weave about our frail nests? Throwing our whole hearts and souls into them, toiling over them, building them for an evanescent summer, to be swept away by the autumn winds. And we also, poor voyagers, blown away through a pathless waste.

But shall we not go unfearing, believing that He who made a balmy south to fulfill the little summer bird’s intuition, her blind hope and trust, has also prepared a place to fulfill our deathless longin’s, our soul’s strongest desires? And over the lonely way, the untried, desolate fields of the future, He will gently guide us thither.

But I am eppisodin’. I said I would relate in this epistol a instance of the devourin’ and insatiable vanity of man, and their invincible unwillingness to let well enough alone. And so, although it is gaulin’ to me, gaulin’ in the extreme, to speak of my companion’s weaknesses, yet, if medicine was not spread before patients, how could colic be cured, and cramps, and etcetery?

Yes, in the name of Duty, as a warnin’ to the sect, dear to me (in a meetin’-house way) for his sake of whom I write, I will proceed, and give a plain and unvarnished history of Josiah’s serenade.

Eliab Gansey, or E. Wellington Gansey, as he has rote his name for years, has been here to Jonesville on a visit. He lives to the Ohio. He is jest about Josiah’s age, and used to be a neighbor of his’n. He was born here, and lived round here till he got to be a young man. But he went to the Ohio to live when he was quite a young chap, and made money fast, and got high in station. Why, some say he got as high as clerk to town meetin’; I don’t know about that, but we do know that he got to be a real big man anyway, and come home here on a visit, forehanded and weighin’ over 300. He was slim as a lucifer match when he went away, or a darnin’-needle.

Wall, his comin’ back as he did made a real commotion and stir in the neighberhood. The neighbers all wanted to do sunthin’ to honor him, and make him happy, and we all sort o’ clubbed together and got up a party for him, got as good a dinner as ever Jonesville afforded, and held it in old Squire Gansey’s dinin’-room. He was cousin to Liab on his father’s side, and had a big house and lived alone, and urged us to have the party there.

Wall, I approved of that dinner, and did all I could to help it along. Talked encouragin’ about it to all the neighberin’ wimmen, and baked two chicken-pies, and roasted a duck, and other vittles accordin’.

And the dinner was a great success. Liab seemed to enjoy himself dretfully, and eat more than was for his good, and so did Josiah; I told Josiah so afterwards.

Wall, we had that dinner for him, all together (as it were). And then we all of us invited him to our own homes seperate, to dinner or supper, as the case might be. We used him first-rate, and he appreciated it, that man did, and he would have gone home feelin’ perfectly delighted with our treatment of him, and leavin’ us feelin’ first-rate, if it hadn’t been for Josiah Allen, if he had been willin’ to take my advice and let well enough alone. And what a happyfyin’ thing that is, if folks would only realize it, happyfyin’ to the folks that let well enough alone, and happyfyin’ to them that are let.

But some are bound to over-do and go beyond all sense and reason. And Josiah wasn’t contented with what he had done for Liab, but wanted to do more—he was bound to serenade him. I argued and argued with him, and tried to get the idee out of his head, but the more I argued aginst the idee, the more firm he was sot onto it.

He said it stood Jonesville in hand to treat that man to all the honors they could heap onto him. And then he told me sunthin’ that I hadn’t heard on before; that Liab talked some of comin’ back here to live: he was so pleased with his old neighbors, they had all used him so well, and seemed to think so much of him.

“And,” says Josiah, “it will be the makin’ of Jonesville if he comes back; and of me, too, for he talks of buyin’ my west lot for a house-lot, and he has offered me 4 times what it is worth, of his own accord,—that is, if he makes up his mind to come back.”

“Wall,” says I, “you wouldn’t take advantage of him, and take 4 times what it is worth, would you?” Says I sternly: “If you do you won’t never prosper in your undertakin’s.”

“He offered it himself,” says Josiah. “I didn’t set no price; he sot it himself. And it wouldn’t be no cheatin’, nor nothin’ out of the way, to take it, and I would take it with a easy conscience and a willin’ mind. But the stick is,” says he dreamily, “the stick is to get him to come back. He likes us now, and if we can only endear ourselves to him a little mite more he will come. And I am goin’ to work for it; I am bound to serenade him.”

Says I coldly: “If you want to endear yourself to him you are goin’ to work in the wrong way.” And says I, still more frigidly: “Was you a layin’ out to sing yourself, Josiah Allen?”

“Yes,” says he, in a animated way. “The way I thought of workin’ it was to have about 8 of us old men, who used to be boys with him, get together and sing some affectin’ piece under his winder; make up a piece a purpose for him. And I don’t know but we might let some wimmen take a hand in it. Mebby you would want to, Samantha.”

“No sir!” says I very coldly. “You needn’t make no calculations on me. I shall have no hand in it at all. And,” says I firmly, “if you know what is best for yourself, Josiah Allen, you will give up the idee. You will see trouble if you don’t.”

“Wall, I s’pose it will be some trouble to us; but I am willin’ to take trouble to please Liab, as I know it will. Why, if I can carry it out, as I think we can, it will tickle that man most to death. Why, I’ll bet after hearin’ us sing, as we shall sing, you couldn’t dog him from Jonesville. And it will be the makin’ of the place if we can only keep him here, and will put more money into my pocket than I have seen for one spell. And I know we can sing perfectly beautiful, if we only set out to. I can speak for myself, anyway; I am a crackin’ good singer, one of the best there is, if I only set out to do my best.”

Oh! what a deep streak of vanity runs through the naters of human men. As many times as it had been proved right out to his face that he couldn’t sing no more than a ginny-hen, or a fannin’-mill, that man still kep’ up a calm and perennial idee that he was a sweet singer.

Yes, it is a deep scientific fact, as I have often remarked to Josiah Allen, that the spring of vanity that gushes up in men’s naters can’t be clogged up and choked. It is a gushin’ fountain that forever bubbles over the brink with perennial and joyful freshness. No matter how many impediments you may put in its way, no matter how many hard stuns of disappointment and revilin’ and agony you may throw into that fountain, it won’t do no more than to check the foamin’ current for a moment. But presently, or sometimes even before that, the irrepressible fountain will soar up as foamin’ly as ever.

As many times, and times agin, as Josiah’s vanity had been trampled on and beat down and stunned, yet how constant and clear it was a bubblin’ up and meanderin’ right before my sight. And before I had got through allegorin’ in my own mind about the curious and scientific subject, he gave me another proof of it.