Chapter II (2)

"To the 'mulberry' with both on ye, in a hurry," said the old man sternly. But the lads were not disposed to be in a "hurry," for the "mulberry" was the scene of all formal punishment administered during work hours in the field. Simon followed his father, however, but made, as he went along, all manner of "faces" at the old man's back; gesticulated as if he were going to strike him between the shoulders with his fists, and kicking at him so as almost to touch his coat tail with his shoe. In this style they walked on to the mulberry-tree, in whose shade Simon's brother Ben was resting.

It must not be supposed that, during the walk to the place of punishment, Simon's mind was either inactive, or engaged in suggesting the grimaces and contortions wherewith he was pantomimically expressing his irreverent sentiments toward his father. Far from it. The movements of his limbs and features were the mere workings of habit--the self-grinding of the corporeal machine--for which his reasoning half was only remotely responsible. For while Simon's person was thus, on its own account "making game" of old Jed'diah, his wits, in view of the anticipated flogging, were dashing, springing, bounding, darting about, in hot chase of some expedient suitable to the necessities of the case; much after the manner in which puss--when Betty, armed with the broom, and hotly seeking vengeance for pantry robbed or bed defiled, has closed upon her the garret doors and windows--attempts all sorts of impossible exits, to come down at last in the corner, with panting side and glaring eye, exhausted and defenseless. Our unfortunate hero could devise nothing by which he could reasonably expect to escape the heavy blows of his father. Having arrived at this conclusion and the "mulberry" about the same time, he stood with a dogged look, awaiting the issue.

The old man Suggs made no remark to any one while he was sizing up Bill,--a process which, though by no means novel to Simon, seemed to excite in him a sort of painful interest. He watched it closely, as if endeavoring to learn the precise fashion of his father's knot; and when at last Bill was swung up a-tiptoe to a limb, and the whipping commenced, Simon's eye followed every movement of his father's arm; and as each blow descended upon the bare shoulders of his sable friend, his own body writhed and "wriggled" in involuntary sympathy.

"It's the devil, it is," said Simon to himself, "to take such a wallopin' as that. Why, the old man looks like he wants to git to the holler, if he could,--rot his old picter! It's wuth, at the least, fifty cents--je-e-miny, how that hurt!--yes, it's wuth three-quarters of a dollar to take that 'ere lickin'! Wonder if I'm 'predestinated,' as old Jed'diah says, to git the feller to it? Lord, how daddy blows! I do wish to God he'd bust wide open, the durned old deer-face! If 'twa'n't for Ben helpin' him, I b'lieve I'd give the old dog a tussel when it comes to my turn. It couldn't make the thing no wuss, if it didn't make it no better. 'Drot it! what do boys have daddies for anyhow? 'Tain't for nuthin' but jist to beat 'em and work 'em. There's some use in mammies. I kin poke my finger right in the old 'oman's eye, and keep it thar; and if I say it ain't thar, she'll say so, too. I wish she was here to hold daddy off. If 'twa'n't so fur I'd holler for her, anyhow. How she would cling to the old fellow's coat-tail!"

Mr. Jedediah Suggs let down Bill and untied him. Approaching Simon, whose coat was off, "Come, Simon, son," said he, "cross them hands; I'm gwine to correct you."

"It ain't no use, daddy," said Simon.

"Why so, Simon?"

"Jist bekase it ain't. I'm gwine to play cards as long as I live. When I go off to myself, I'm gwine to make my livin' by it. So what's the use of beatin' me about it?"

Old Mr. Suggs groaned, as he was wont to do in the pulpit, at this display of Simon's viciousness.

"Simon," said he, "you're a poor ignunt creetur. You don't know nothin', and you've never been nowhars. If I was to turn you off, you'd starve in a week."

"I wish you'd try me," said Simon, "and jist see. I'd win more money in a week than you can make in a year. There ain't nobody round here kin make seed corn off o' me at cards. I'm rale smart," he added with great emphasis.

"Simon! Simon! you poor unlettered fool. Don't you know that all card-players and chicken-fighters and horse-racers go to hell? You crack-brained creetur, you! And don't you know that them that plays cards always loses their money, and--"

"Who wins it all, then, daddy?" asked Simon.

"Shet your mouth, you imperdent, slack-jawed dog! Your daddy's a-tryin' to give you some good advice, and you a-pickin' up his words that way. I knowed a young man once, when I lived in Ogletharp, as went down to Augusty and sold a hundred dollars' worth of cotton for his daddy, and some o' them gambollers got him to drinkin', and the _very first_ night he was with 'em they got every cent of his money."

"They couldn't get my money in a _week_," said Simon. "Anybody can git these here green feller's money; them's the sort I'm a-gwine to watch for myself. Here's what kin fix the papers jist about as nice as anybody."

"Well, it's no use to argify about the matter," said old Jed-diah. "What saith the Scriptur'? 'He that begetteth a fool, doeth it to his sorrow.' Hence, Simon, you're a poor, misubble fool,--so cross your hands!"

"You'd jist as well not, daddy; I tell you I'm gwine to follow playin' cards for a livin', and what's the use o' bangin' a feller about it? I'm as smart as any of 'em, and Bob Smith says them Augusty fellers can't make rent off o' me."

The Reverend Mr. Suggs had once in his life gone to Augusta; an extent of travel which in those days was a little unusual. His consideration among his neighbors was considerably increased by the circumstance, as he had all the benefit of the popular inference that no man could visit the city of Augusta without acquiring a vast superiority over all his untraveled neighbors, in every department of human knowledge. Mr. Suggs, then, very naturally, felt ineffably indignant that an individual who had never seen any collection of human habitations larger than a log-house village--an individual, in short, no other or better than Bob Smith--should venture to express an opinion concerning the manners, customs, or anything else appertaining to, or in any wise connected with, the _Ultima Thule_ of backwoods Georgians. There were two propositions which witnessed their own truth to the mind of Mr. Suggs: the one was that a man who had never been at Augusta could not know anything about that city, or any place, or anything else; the other, that one who _had_ been there must, of necessity, be not only well informed as to all things connected with the city itself, but perfectly _au fait_ upon all subjects whatsoever. It was therefore in a tone of mingled indignation and contempt that he replied to the last remark of Simon.

"_Bob Smith_ says, does he? And who's _Bob Smith_? Much does _Bob Smith_ know about Augusty! He's _been thar_, I reckon! Slipped off yerly some mornin', when nobody warn't noticin', and got back afore night! It's _only_ a hundred and fifty mile. Oh, yes, _Bob Smith_ knows _all_ about it! _I_ don't know nothin' about it! _I_ ain't never been to Augusty--_I_ couldn't find the road thar, I reckon--ha, ha! _Bob_--_Sm-ith_! If he was only to see one of them fine gentlemen in Augusty, with his fine broadcloth, and bell-crown hat, and shoe-boots a-shinin' like silver, he'd take to the woods and kill himself a-runnin'. Bob Smith! That's whar all your devilment comes from, Simon."

"Bob Smith's as good as anybody else, I judge; and a heap smarter than some. He showed me how to cut Jack," continued Simon, "and that's more nor some people can do, if they _have_ been to Augusty."

"If Bob Smith kin do it," said the old man, "I kin, too. I don't know it by that name; but if it's book knowledge or plain sense, and Bob kin do it, it's reasonable to s'pose that old Jed'diah Suggs won't be bothered _bad_. Is it any ways similyar to the rule of three, Simon?"

"Pretty similyar, daddy, but not adzactly," said Simon, drawing a pack from his pocket to explain. "Now, daddy," he proceeded, "you see these here four cards is what we call the Jacks. Well, now, the idee is, if you'll take the pack and mix 'em all up together, I'll take off a passel from the top, and the bottom one of them I take off will be one of the Jacks."

"Me to mix 'em fust?" said old Jed'diah.

"Yes."

"And you not to see but the back of the top one, when you go to 'cut,' as you call it?"

"Jist so, daddy."

"And the backs all jist' as like as kin be?" said the senior Suggs, examining the cards.

"More alike nor cow-peas," said Simon.

"It can't be done, Simon," observed the old man, with great solemnity.

"Bob Smith kin do it, and so kin I."

"It's agin nater, Simon; thar ain't a man in Augusty, nor on top of the yearth, that kin do it!"

"Daddy," said our hero, "ef you'll bet me--"

"What!" thundered old Mr. Suggs. "_Bet_, did you says?" and he came down with a _scorer_ across Simon's shoulders. "Me, Jed-diah Suggs, that's been in the Lord's sarvice these twenty years,--_me_ bet, you nasty, sassy, triflin', ugly--"

"I didn't go to say _that_, daddy; that warn't what I meant adzactly. I went to say that ef you'd let me off from this her maulin' you owe me, and _give me_ 'Bunch,' if I cut Jack, I'd _give you_ all this here silver, ef I didn't,--that's all. To be sure, I allers knowed _you_ wouldn't _bet_."

Old Mr. Suggs ascertained the exact amount of the silver which his son handed him, in an old leathern pouch, for inspection. He also, mentally, compared that sum with an imaginary one, the supposed value of a certain Indian pony, called "Bunch," which he had bought for his "old woman's" Sunday riding, and which had sent the old lady into a fence corner the first and only time she ever mounted him. As he weighed the pouch of silver in his hand, Mr. Suggs also endeavored to analyze the character of the transaction proposed by Simon. "It sartinly _can't_ be nothin' but _givin_', no way it kin be twisted," he murmured to himself. "I _know_ he can't do it, so there's no resk. What makes bettin'? The resk. It's a one-sided business, and I'll jist let him give me all his money, and that'll put all his wild sportin' notions out of his head."

"Will you stand it, daddy?" asked Simon, by way of waking the old man up. "You mought as well, for the whippin' won't do you no good; and as for Bunch, nobody about the plantation won't ride him but me."

"Simon," replied the old man, "I agree to it. Your old daddy is in a close place about payin' for his land; and this here money--it's jist eleven dollars, lacking of twenty-five cents--will help out mightily. But mind, Simon, ef anything's said about this hereafter, remember, you _give_ me the money."

"Very well, daddy; and ef the thing works up instid o' down, I s'pose we'll say you give _me_ Bunch, eh?"

"You won't never be troubled to tell how you come by Bunch; the thing's agin nater, and can't be done. What old Jed'diah Suggs knows, he knows as good as anybody. Give me them fix-ments, Simon."

Our hero handed the cards to his father, who, dropping the plow-line with which he had intended to tie Simon's hands, turned his back to that individual, in order to prevent his witnessing the operation of _mixing_. He then sat down, and very leisurely commenced shuffling the cards, making, however, an exceedingly awkward job of it. Restive _kings_ and _queens_ jumped from his hands, or obstinately refused to slide into the company of the rest of the pack. Occasionally a sprightly _knave_ would insist on _facing_ his neighbor; or, pressing his edge against another's, half double himself up, and then skip away. But Elder Jed'diah perseveringly continued his attempts to subdue the refractory, while heavy drops burst from his forehead, and ran down his cheeks. All of a sudden an idea, quick and penetrating as a rifle-ball, seemed to have entered the cranium of the old man. He chuckled audibly. The devil had suggested to Mr. Suggs an _impromptu_ "stock," which would place the chances of Simon, already sufficiently slim in the old man's opinion, without the range of possibility. Mr. Suggs forthwith proceeded to cut all the _picter ones_, so as to be certain to include the _Jacks_, and place them at the bottom, with the evident intention of keeping Simon's fingers above these when he should cut. Our hero, who was quietly looking over his father's shoulders all the time, did not seem alarmed by this disposition of the cards; on the contrary, he smiled, as if he felt perfectly confident of success, in spite of it.

"Now, daddy," said Simon, when his father had announced himself ready, "narry one of us ain't got to look at the cards, while I'm a-cuttin'; if we do, it'll spile the conjuration."

"Very well."

"And another thing: you've got to look me right dead in the eye, daddy; will you?"

"To be sure,--to be sure," said Mr. Suggs; "fire away."

Simon walked up close to his father, and placed his hand on the pack. Old Mr. Suggs looked in Simon's eye, and Simon returned the look for about three seconds, during which a close observer might have detected a suspicious working of the wrist of the hand on the cards, but the elder Suggs did not remark it.

"Wake snakes! day's a-breakin'! Rise, Jack!" said Simon, cutting half a dozen cards from the top of the pack, and presenting the face of the bottom one for the inspection of his father.

It was the Jack of hearts!

Old Mr. Suggs staggered back several steps, with uplifted eyes and hands!

"Marciful master!" he exclaimed, "ef the boy hain't! Well, how in the round creation of the--! Ben, did you ever? To be sure and sartain, Satan has power on this yearth!" and Mr. Suggs groaned in very bitterness.

"You never seed nothin' like that in _Augusty_, did ye, daddy?" asked Simon, with a malicious wink at Ben.

"Simon, how _did_ you do it?" queried the old man, without noticing his son's question.

"Do it, daddy? Do it? 'Tain't nothin'. I done it jist as easy as--shootin'."

Whether this explanation was entirely, or in any degree, satisfactory to the perplexed mind of Elder Jed'diah Suggs can not, after the lapse of the time which has intervened, be sufficiently ascertained. It is certain, however, that he pressed the investigation no farther, but merely requested his son Benjamin to witness the fact that, in consideration of his love and affection for his son Simon, and in order to furnish the donee with the means of leaving that portion of the State of Georgia, he bestowed upon him the impracticable pony, Bunch.

"Jist so, daddy; jist so; I'll witness that. But it 'minds me mightily of the way mammy _give_ old Trailler the side of bacon last week. She a-sweepin' up the h'a'th; the meat on the table; old Trailler jumps up, gethers the bacon, and darts! Mammy arter him with the broom-stick as fur as the door, but seein' the dog has got the start, she shakes the stick at him, and hollers, 'You sassy, aigsukkin', roguish, gnatty, flop-eared varmint! take it along! take it along! I only wish 'twas full of a'snic, and ox-vomit, and blue vitrul, so as 'twould cut your interls into chitlins!' That's about the way you give Bunch to Simon."

"Oh, shuh, Ben," remarked Simon, "I wouldn't run on that way. Daddy couldn't help it; it was _predestinated_: 'Whom he hath, he will,' you know," and the rascal pulled down the under lid of his left eye at his brother. Then addressing his father, he asked, "War'n't it, daddy?"

"To be sure--to be sure--all fixed aforehand," was old Mr. Suggs' reply.

"Didn't I tell you so, Ben?" said Simon. "_I_ knowed it was all fixed aforehand," and he laughed until he was purple in the face.

"What's in ye? What are ye laughin' about?" asked the old man wrothily.

"Oh, it's so funny that it could all 'a' been _fixed aforehand_!" said Simon, and laughed louder than before. The obtusity of the Reverend Mr. Suggs, however, prevented his making any discoveries. He fell into a brown study, and no further allusion was made to the matter.

It was evident to our hero that his father intended he should remain but one more night beneath the paternal roof. What mattered it to Simon?

He went home at night; curried and fed Bunch; whispered confidentially in his ear that he was the "fastest piece of hossflesh, accordin' to size, that ever shaded the yearth;" and then busied himself in preparing for an early start on the morrow.

Old Mr. Suggs' big red rooster had hardly ceased crowing in announcement of the coming dawn, when Simon mounted the intractable Bunch. Both were in high spirits: our hero at the idea of unrestrained license in future; and Bunch from a mesmerical transmission to himself of a portion of his master's deviltry. Simon raised himself in the stirrups, yelled a tolerably fair imitation of the Creek war-whoop, and shouted:

"I'm off, old stud! Remember the Jack-a-hearts!"

Bunch shook his little head, tucked down his tail, ran sideways, as if going to fall, and then suddenly reared, squealed, and struck off at a brisk gallop.

A PIANO IN ARKANSAS

BY THOMAS BANGS THORPE

We shall never forget the excitement which seized upon the inhabitants of the little village of Hardscrabble as the report spread through the community that a real piano had actually arrived within its precincts.

Speculation was afloat as to its appearance and its use. The name was familiar to everybody; but what it precisely meant, no one could tell. That it had legs was certain; for a stray volume of some literary traveler was one of the most conspicuous works in the floating library of Hardscrabble, and said traveler stated that he had seen a piano somewhere in New England with pantalets on; also, an old foreign paper was brought forward, in which there was an advertisement headed "Soirée," which informed the "citizens, generally," that Mr. Bobolink would preside at the piano.

This was presumed by several wiseacres, who had been to a menagerie, to mean that Mr. Bobolink stirred the piano with a long pole, in the same way that the showman did the lions and rhi-no-ce-rus.

So, public opinion was in favor of its being an animal, though a harmless one; for there had been a land-speculator through the village a few weeks previously, who distributed circulars of a "Female Academy" for the accomplishment of young ladies. These circulars distinctly stated "the use of the piano to be one dollar per month."

One knowing old chap said, if they would tell him what so-i-ree meant, he would tell them what a piano was, and no mistake.

The owner of this strange instrument was no less than a very quiet and very respectable late merchant of a little town somewhere "north," who, having failed at home, had emigrated into the new and hospitable country of Arkansas, for the purpose of bettering his fortune and escaping the heartless sympathy of his more lucky neighbors, who seemed to consider him a very bad and degraded man because he had become honestly poor.

The new-comers were strangers, of course. The house in which they were setting up their furniture was too little arranged "to admit of calls;" and, as the family seemed very little disposed to court society, all prospects of immediately solving the mystery that hung about the piano seemed hopeless. In the meantime, public opinion was "rife."

The depository of this strange thing was looked upon by the passers-by with indefinable awe; and, as noises unfamiliar sometimes reached the street, it was presumed that the piano made them, and the excitement rose higher than ever. In the midst of it, one or two old ladies, presuming upon their age and respectability, called upon the strangers and inquired after their health, and offered their services and friendship; meantime, everything in the house was eyed with great intensity, but, seeing nothing strange, a hint was given about the piano. One of the new family observed, carelessly, "that it had been much injured by bringing out, that the damp had affected its tones, and that one of its legs was so injured that it would not stand up, and for the present it would not ornament the parlor."

Here was an explanation indeed: injured in bringing out; damp affecting its tones; leg broken. "Poor thing!" ejaculated the old ladies, with real sympathy, as they proceeded homeward; "traveling has evidently fatigued it; the Mass-is-sip fogs has given it a cold, poor thing!" and they wished to see it with increased curiosity.

The "village" agreed that if Moses Mercer, familiarly called "Mo Mercer," was in town, they would have a description of the piano, and the uses to which it was put; and, fortunately, in the midst of the excitement "Mo" arrived, he having been temporarily absent on a hunting-expedition.

Moses Mercer was the only son of "old Mercer," who was, and had been, in the State Senate ever since Arkansas was admitted into the "Union." Mo from this fact received great glory, of course; his father's greatness alone would have stamped him with superiority; but his having been twice in the "Capitol" when the legislature was in session stamped his claims to pre-eminence over all competitors.

Mo Mercer was the oracle of the renowned village of Hardscrabble.

"Mo" knew everything; he had all the consequence and complacency of a man who had never seen his equal, and never expected to. "Mo" bragged extensively upon his having been to the "Capitol" twice,--of his there having been in the most "fashionable society,"--of having seen the world. His return to town was therefore received with a shout. The arrival of the piano was announced to him, and he alone of all the community was not astonished at the news.

His insensibility was considered wonderful. He treated the piano as a thing that he was used to, and went on, among other things, to say that he had seen more pianos in the "Capitol," than he had ever seen woodchucks, and that it was not an animal, but a musical instrument played upon by the ladies; and he wound up his description by saying that the way "the dear creatures could pull music out of it was a caution to hoarse owls."

The new turn given to the piano-excitement in Hardscrabble by Mo Mercer was like pouring oil on fire to extinguish it, for it blazed out with more vigor than ever. That it was a musical instrument made it a rarer thing in that wild country than if it had been an animal, and people of all sizes, colors, and degrees were dying to see and hear it.

Jim Cash was Mo Mercer's right-hand man: in the language of refined society, he was "Mo's toady;" in the language of Hardscrabble, he was "Mo's wheel-horse." Cash believed in Mo Mercer with an abandonment that was perfectly ridiculous. Mr. Cash was dying to see the piano, and the first opportunity he had alone with his Quixote he expressed the desire that was consuming his vitals.

"We'll go at once and see it," said Mercer.

"Strangers!" echoed the frightened Cash.

"Humbug! Do you think I have visited the 'Capitol' twice, and don't know how to treat fashionable society? Come along at once, Cash," said Mercer.

Off the pair started, Mercer all confidence, and Cash all fears as to the propriety of the visit. These fears Cash frankly expressed; but Mercer repeated for the thousandth time his experience in the fashionable society of the "Capitol, and pianos," which he said "was synonymous;" and he finally told Cash, to comfort him, that, however abashed and ashamed he might be in the presence of the ladies, "he needn't fear of sticking, for he would pull him through."

A few minutes' walk brought the parties on the broad galleries of the house that contained the object of so much curiosity. The doors and windows were closed, and a suspicious look was on everything.

"Do they always keep a house closed up this way that has a piano in it?" asked Cash mysteriously.

"Certainly," replied Mercer: "the damp would destroy its tones."

Repeated knocks at the doors, and finally at the windows, satisfied both Cash and Mercer that nobody was at home. In the midst of their disappointment, Cash discovered a singular machine at the end of the gallery, crossed by bars and rollers and surmounted with an enormous crank. Cash approached it on tiptoe; he had a presentiment that he beheld the object of his curiosity, and, as its intricate character unfolded itself, he gazed with distended eyes, and asked Mercer, with breathless anxiety, what that strange and incomprehensible box was.

Mercer turned to the thing as coolly as a north wind to an icicle, and said, that was _it_.

"That _it_!" exclaimed Cash, opening his eyes still wider; and then, recovering himself, he asked to see "the tone."

Mercer pointed to the cross-bars and rollers. With trembling hands, with a resolution that would enable a man to be scalped without winking, Cash reached out his hand and seized the handle of the crank (Cash, at heart, was a brave and fearless man). He gave it a turn: the machinery grated harshly, and seemed to clamor for something to be put in its maw.

"What delicious sounds!" said Cash.

"Beautiful!" observed the complacent Mercer, at the same time seizing Cash's arm and asking him to desist, for fear of breaking the instrument or getting it out of tune.

The simple caution was sufficient; and Cash, in the joy of the moment at what he had done and seen, looked as conceited as Mo Mercer himself.

Busy indeed was Cash, from this time forward, in explaining to gaping crowds the exact appearance of the piano, how he had actually taken hold of it, and, as his friend Mo Mercer observed, "pulled music out of it."

The curiosity of the village was thus allayed, and consequently died comparatively away,--Cash, however, having risen to almost as much importance as Mo Mercer, for having seen and handled the thing.

Our "Northern family" knew little or nothing of all this excitement; they received meanwhile the visits and congratulations of the hospitable villagers, and resolved to give a grand party to return some of the kindness they had received, and the piano was, for the first time, moved into the parlor. No invitation on this occasion was neglected; early at the post was every visitor, for it was rumored that Miss Patience Doolittle would, in the course of the evening, "perform on the piano."

The excitement was immense. The supper was passed over with a contempt rivaling that which is cast upon an excellent farce played preparatory to a dull tragedy in which the star is to appear. The furniture was all critically examined, but nothing could be discovered answering Cash's description. An enormously thick-leafed table with a "spread" upon it attracted little attention, timber being so very cheap in a new country, and so everybody expected soon to see the piano "brought in."

Mercer, of course, was the hero of the evening: he talked much and loudly. Cash, as well as several young ladies, went into hysterics at his wit. Mercer, as the evening wore away, grew exceedingly conceited, even for him; and he graciously asserted that the company present reminded him of his two visits to the "Capitol," and other associations equally exclusive and peculiar.

The evening wore on apace, and still no piano. That hope deferred which maketh the heart sick was felt by some elderly ladies and by a few younger ones; and Mercer was solicited to ask Miss Patience Doolittle to favor the company with the presence of the piano.

"Certainly," said Mercer and with the grace of a city dandy he called upon the lady to gratify all present with a little music, prefacing his request with the remark that if she was fatigued "his friend Cash would give the machine a turn."

Miss Patience smiled, and looked at Cash.

Cash's knees trembled.

All eyes in the room turned upon him.

Cash trembled all over.

Miss Patience said she was gratified to hear that Mr. Cash was a musician; she admired people who had a musical taste. Whereupon Cash fell into a chair, as he afterward observed, "chawed up."

Oh that Beau Brummel or any of his admirers could have seen Mo Mercer all this while! Calm as a summer morning, complacent as a newly-painted sign, he smiled and patronized, and was the only unexcited person in the room.

Miss Patience rose. A sigh escaped from all present: the piano was evidently to be brought in. She approached the thick-leafed table and removed the covering, throwing it carelessly and gracefully aside, opened the instrument, and presented the beautiful arrangement of dark and white keys.

Mo Mercer at this, for the first time in his life, looked confused: he was Cash's authority in his descriptions of the appearance of the piano; while Cash himself began to recover the moment that he ceased to be an object of attention. Many a whisper now ran through the room as to the "tones," and more particularly the "crank"; none could see them.

Miss Patience took her seat, ran her fingers over a few octaves, and if "Moses in Egypt" was not perfectly _executed_, Moses in Hardscrabble _was_. The dulcet sound ceased. "Miss," said Cash, the moment that he could express himself, so entranced was he by the music,--"Miss Doolittle, what was the instrument Mo Mercer showed me in your gallery once, it went by a crank and had rollers in it?"

It was now the time for Miss Patience to blush: so away went the blood from confusion to her cheeks. She hesitated, stammered, and said, if Mr. Cash must know, it was a-a-a-_Yankee washing-machine_.

The name grated on Mo Mercer's ears as if rusty nails had been thrust into them; the heretofore invulnerable Mercer's knees trembled, the sweat started to his brow, as he heard the taunting whispers of "visiting the Capitol twice" and seeing pianos as plenty as woodchucks.

The fashionable vices of envy and maliciousness were that moment sown in the village of Hardscrabble; and Mo Mercer, the great, the confident, the happy and self-possessed, surprising as it may seem, was the first victim sacrificed to their influence.

Time wore on, and pianos became common, and Mo Mercer less popular; and he finally disappeared altogether, on the evening of the day on which a Yankee peddler of notions sold to the highest bidder, "six patent, warranted, and improved Mo Mercer pianos."

WHAR DEM SINFUL APPLES GROW

BY ANNE VIRGINIA CULBERTSON

Ol' Adam he live in de Gyardin uv Eden,
('Way down yonner)
He didn' know writin' an' he didn' know readin',
('Way down yonner)
He stay dar erlone jes' eatin' an' a-sleepin',
He say, "Dis mighty po' comp'ny I'se a-keepin',"
'Way down yonner whar dem sinful apples grow.

So dey tuck ol' Adam an' dey putt him a-nappin',
('Way down yonner)
An' de fus' thing you know dish yer w'at happen,
('Way down yonner)
Dey tucken his rib an' dey made a 'ooman,
She mighty peart an' she spry an' she bloomin',
'Way down yonner whar dem sinful apples grow.

Dey 'spute sometimes an' he say, ol' Adam,
('Way down yonner)
"You nuttin' but spar'-rib, nohow, madam,"
('Way down yonner)
She say, "Dat de trufe an' hit ain' a-hu't'n',
Fer de spar'-rib's made f'um a hawg, dat's sut'n,"
'Way down yonner whar dem sinful apples grow.

De Sarpint he slip in de Gyardin uv Eden,
('Way down yonner)
He seed Mis' Eve an' he 'gun his pleadin',
('Way down yonner)
'Twel she tucken de apple an' den he quit 'er,
Hissin', "Ho! ho! dat fruit mighty bitter."
'Way down yonner whar dem sinful apples grow.

Ol' Adam he say, "W'at dat you eatin'?"
('Way down yonner)
"Please gimme a bite er dat summer-sweetin',"
('Way down yonner)
She gin de big haff wid de core an' de seed in,
An' dar whar she show her manners an' her breedin',
'Way down yonner whar dem sinful apples grow.

Den Adam he ac' right sneakin' sho'ly,
('Way down yonner)
An' mek his 'scuse ter de Lawd right po'ly,
('Way down yonner)
Blamin' Eve 'kase she do w'at he tell 'er,
An' settin' dat 'zample fer many a feller,
'Way down yonner whar dem sinful apples grow.

Den de Lawd He say in de Gyardin uv Eden,
('Way down yonner)
"No sech a man shell do my weedin',"
('Way down yonner)
So fo'th f'um de Gyardin de Lawd He bid him,
An' o' co'se Mis' Eve she up an' went wid him,
'Way down yonner whar dem sinful apples grow.

Oh, sinner, is you in de Gyardin uv Eden?
('Way down yonner)
Is you on dem sinful apples feedin'?
('Way down yonner)
Come out, oh, sinner, befo' youse driven,
De debil gwine git you ef you goes on livin'
'Way down yonner whar dem sinful apples grow!

A NIGHT IN A ROCKING-CHAIR

BY KATE FIELD

It may be true that America is going to perdition; that all Americans are rascals; that there are no American gentlemen; that culture, refinement, and social manners can only be found in the Old World: but if it be true, what an extraordinary anomaly it is that women, old and young, ugly and handsome, can travel alone from one end of this great country to the other, receiving only such attention as is acceptable. Having journeyed up and down the land to the extent of twenty thousand miles, I am persuaded that a woman can go anywhere and do anything, provided she conducts herself properly. Of course it would be absurd to deny that it is not infinitely more agreeable to be accompanied by the "tyrant" called "man"; but when there is no tyrant to come to lovely woman's rescue, it is astonishing how well lovely woman can rescue herself, if she exerts the brain and muscle, given her thousands of years ago, and not entirely annihilated by long disuse. I have been nowhere that I have not been treated with greater consideration than if I had belonged to the other sex. There is not a country in Europe of which this can be said; and if a nation's civilization is gauged--as the wise declare--by its treatment of women, then America, rough as it may be, badly dressed as it is, tobacco-chewing as it often is, stands head, shoulders, and heart above all the rest of the world. The Frenchwoman was right in declaring America to be _le paradis des dames_, and those women who exalt European gallantry above American honesty are as blind to their own interests as an owl at high noon.

There is no royal railroad to lecturing. At best it is hard work, but lecture committees "do their possible," as the Italians say, to lessen the weight, and that "possible" is heartily appreciated by such of us as inwardly long for a natural bridge between stations and hotels. A woman is never so forlorn as when getting out of a car or entering a strange hotel.

However, there never was a rule without its exception, and though courtesy has marked the majority of lecture committees for its own, a lecturer may occasionally find himself stranded upon a desert of indifference, and languish for the comforts of a home not twenty miles distant. Thus it happened that once upon arriving at my destination when the shades of evening were falling fast, and glancing about for the customary smiling gentlemen who smooth out the rough places by carrying bags, superintending the transportation of luggage, and driving you to your abiding-place in the best carriage of the period, I found no gentlemen, smiling or otherwise, to deliver me from my own ignorance.

"Carriage, ma'am?" screamed a Jehu in top-boots ornamented with a grotesque tracery of mud.

Well, yes, I would take a carriage; so up I clambered and sat down upon what in the darkness I supposed was a seat, but what gave such palpable evidences of animation in howls and attempts at assault and battery, as to prove its right to be called a boy. "An' sure the lady didn't mane to hurt ye, Jimmy," expostulated something that turned out to be the boy's mother, whereupon a baby and a small sister of the small boy sent forth their voices in unison with that of their extinguished brother.

"Driver, let me get out," I said pathetically.

"Certainly, ma'am, but where will you go to? There ain't no other carriage left."

True; and I remained, and when I was asked where I wanted to stop, I really did not know. Was there a hotel? Yes. Was there more than one hotel? No. I breathed more freely, and said I would go to the hotel.

The driver evidently entertained a poor opinion of my mental capacity, for he mumbled to himself that "people who didn't know where they was agoin' had nuff sight better stay at home," and deposited me at the hotel with a caution against pickpockets. This was sufficiently humiliating, yet were there lower depths. Entering the parlor, I found it monopolized by a young lady in green silk and red ribbons, and a pink young man with his hair parted in the middle and his shirt-bosom resplendent with brilliants of the last water. They were at the piano, singing "Days of Absence" in a manner calculated to depress the most buoyant spirits. I rang the bell, and the green young lady and pink young man began on the second verse. No answer. Again I rang the bell, and the songsters began on the third verse. No answer. Once more I rang the bell, and the green young lady and pink young man piped upon the touching lay of "No one to love." Little cared those "two souls with but a single thought, two hearts that beat as one," for the third heart and soul, victim of misplaced confidence. Ring! I rang that bell until I ached to be a man for one brief moment. Does a man ever endure such torture? No. He puts on his hat, walks into the hotel office, gives somebody a piece of his mind, and demands the satisfaction of a gentleman. But a woman can go to no office. She must remain up stairs and cultivate patience on hunger and thirst and a general mortification of the senses. "Victory, or destruction to the bell!" I said at last, and pulled the rope with the desperation of a maniac.

"Did you ring?" asked a mild clerk, entering on the tips of his toes as if there were not enough of him to warrant so extravagant an expenditure as the use of his whole sole. Did I ring? I who had been doing nothing else for half an hour! I who had but forty-five minutes in which to eat my supper and dress for the lecture!

Presenting my card, I desired the mild clerk to show me to my room. The mild clerk was exceedingly sorry, but the committee had left no order, and there was not a vacant room in the house!

"What am I to do?" I asked in agony of spirit. "I _must_ have a room."

_Must_ is an overpowering word. Only say _must_ with all the emphasis of which it is capable, and longings are likely to be realized.

Well, the mild clerk didn't know but as how he might turn out and let me have _his_ room.

Blessed man! Had I been pope, he should have been canonized on the spot. Following him up several steep flights of stairs, lighted by a kerosene lamp that perfumed the air as only kerosene can, I was at last ushered into a room where sat a young girl knitting. She seemed to be no more astonished at my appearance than were the chairs and table, merely remarking, when we were left alone, "That's my father. I suppose you won't have any objections to my staying here as long as I please." How could I, an interloper, say "no" to the rightful proprietor of that room? I smiled feebly, and the damsel pursued her knitting with her fingers and me with her eyes, until everything in the room seemed to turn into eyes. The frightful thought came o'er me that perhaps my companion was "our own correspondent" for the "Daily Slasher!"--a thought that sent my supper down the wrong way, deprived me of appetite, and made me thankful that my back hair did not come off! The damsel sat and sat, knitted and knitted, until she had superintended every preparation, and then, like an Arab, silently stole away.

What next? Why, the committee called for me at the appointed hour, seemed blandly ignorant of the fact that they had not done their whole duty to woman, and maintained that walking was much better than driving. The wind blew, dust sought shelter within the recesses of eyes and ears and nose, but patient Griselda could not have behaved better than I. In fact, a woman who lectures must endure quietly what a singer or actress would stoutly protest against, for the reason that lecturing brings down upon her the taunt of being "strong-minded," and any assertion of rights or exhibition of temper is sure to be misconstrued into violent hatred of men and an insane desire to be President of the United States. This can hardly be called logic, but it _is_ truth. Logic is an unknown quantity in the ordinary public estimation of women lecturers.

Inwardly cross and outwardly cold, I delivered my lecture, and went back to that much-populated room, thinking that at least I should obtain a few hours' sleep before starting off at "five o'clock in the morning,"--a nice hour to sing about, but a horrible one at which to get up. I approached the bed. Shade of that virtue which is next to godliness! the linen was--was--yes, it was--second-hand! and calmly reposing on a pillow of doubtful color, my startled vision beheld an

"... ugly, creepin', blastit wonner,
Detested, shunn'd, by saunt an' sinner."

That I should come to this! I sought for a bell. Alas, there was none! Should I scream? No, that might bring out the fire-engines. Should I go in search of the housekeeper? How to find her at that hour of the night? No; rather than wander about a strange house in a strange place, I would sit up. Of course there was a rocking-chair; in that I took refuge, and there I sat with a quaint old-fashioned clock for company, with such stout lungs as to render sleep an impossibility. No fairy godmother came in at the key-hole to transform my chair into a couch and that talkative clock into a handmaiden. No ghosts beguiled the weary hours. Eleven, twelve, one, two, three, four! As the clock struck this last hour, a porter pounded on the door, and, not long after, I was being driven through the cold, dark morning to a railroad station. My Jehu was he of the previous day, and a very nice fellow he turned out to be. "I didn't know it was you yesterday, you see, miss, or I wouldn't have said nothing about pickpockets. You don't look like a lecturer, you see, and that's what's the matter."

"Indeed, and how ought a lecturer to look?"

"Well, I don't exactly know, but I always supposed they didn't look like you. Reckon you don't enjoy staying around here in the dark, so I'll just wait here till the train comes," and there that good creature remained until the belated train snatched me up and whisked off to the city. When the express agent passed through the car to take the baggage-checks, it was as good as a play to see the different ways in which people woke up. Some turned over and wouldn't wake up at all; others sat bolt upright and blinked; some were very cross, and wondered why they could not be let alone; others, again, rubbed their eyes, scratched their heads, said "All right," and would have gone to sleep again had not the agent shaken them into consciousness.

"Where do you go?" asked the agent of a quiet old gentleman sitting before me, who had previously given up his checks.

"Yes, exactly; that's my name," replied the old gentleman.

"Where do you go?" again asked the agent in a somewhat louder tone.

"Exactly, I told you so." And the old gentleman put a pocket handkerchief over his face as a preliminary to sleep.

"Well, I never," exclaimed the agent, who returned to the charge. "I asked you where you wanted to go?"

"Precisely; that's my name."

"Confound your name!" muttered the agent. "You're either deaf or insane, and I guess you're deaf." So putting his mouth to the old gentleman's ear, he shouted, "Where--do--you--want--to--go?"

"O, really, the ---- House," was the mild answer to a question that so startled everybody else as to cause one man to jump up and cry, "Fire!" very much to the gratification of his fellow-passengers. There is nothing more pleasing to human beings than to see somebody else make himself ridiculous, and the amusement extracted from the contemplation of that car-load of men and women almost compensated me for the previous experience.

I have since traveled in the far West, but have never looked upon the counterpart of that New England hotel.

ROLLO LEARNING TO PLAY

BY ROBERT J. BURDETTE

Early in the afternoon of the same day, Mr. Holliday came home bearing a large package in his arms. Not only seldom, but rarely, did anything come into the Holliday homestead that did not afford the head of the family a text for sermonic instruction, if not, indeed, rational discourse. Depositing the package upon a hall table, he called to his son in a mandatory manner:

"Rollo, come to me."

Rollo approached, but started with reluctant steps. He became reminiscently aware as he hastily reviewed the events of the day, that in carrying out one or two measures for the good of the house, he had laid himself open to an investigation by a strictly partisan committee, and the possibility of such an inquiry, with its subsequent report, grieved him. However, he hoped for the worst, so that in any event he would not be disagreeably disappointed, and came running to his father, calling "Yes, sir!" in his cheeriest tones.

This is the correct form in which to meet any possible adversity which is not yet in sight. Because, if it should not meet you, you are happy anyhow, and if it should meet you, you have been happy before the collision. See?

"Now, Rollo," said his father, "you are too large and strong to be spending your leisure time playing baby games with your little brother Thanny. It is time for you to begin to be athletic."

"What is athletic?" asked Rollo.

"Well," replied his father, who was an alumnus (pronounced ahloomnoose) himself, "in a general way it means to wear a pair of pantaloons either eighteen inches too short or six inches too long for you, and stand around and yell while other men do your playing for you. The reputation for being an athlete may also be acquired by wearing a golf suit to church, or carrying a tennis racket to your meals. However, as I was about to say, I do not wish you to work all the time, like a woman, or even a small part of the time, like a hired man. I wish you to adopt for your recreation games of sport and pastime."

Rollo interrupted his father to say that indeed he preferred games of that description to games of toil and labor, but as he concluded, little Thanny, who was sitting on the porch step with his book, suddenly read aloud, in a staccato measure.

"I-be-lieve-you-my-boy,-re-plied-the-man-heart-i-ly."

"Read to yourself, Thanny," said his father kindly, "and do not speak your syllables in that jerky manner."

Thanny subsided into silence, after making two or three strange gurgling noises in his throat, which Rollo, after several efforts, succeeded in imitating quite well. Being older than Thanny, Rollo, of course, could not invent so many new noises every day as his little brother. But he could take Thanny's noises, they being unprotected by copyright, and not only reproduce them, but even improve upon them.

This shows the advantage of the higher education. "A little learning is a dangerous thing." It is well for every boy to learn that dynamite is an explosive of great power, after which it is still better for him to learn of how great power. Then he will not hit a cartridge with a hammer in order to find out, and when he dines in good society he can still lift his pie gracefully in his hand, and will not be compelled to harpoon it with an iron hook at the end of his fore-arm.

Rollo's father looked at the two boys attentively as they swallowed their noises, and then said:

"Now, Rollo, there is no sense in learning to play a man's game with a toy outfit. Here are the implements of a game which is called base-ball, and which I am going to teach you to play."

So saying he opened the package and handed Rollo a bat, a wagon tongue terror that would knock the leather off a planet, and Rollo's eyes danced as he balanced it and pronounced it a "la-la."

"It is a bat," his father said sternly, "a base-ball bat."

"Is that a base-ball bat?" exclaimed Rollo, innocently.

"Yes, my son," replied his father, "and here is a protector for the hand."

Rollo took the large leather pillow and said:

"That's an infielder."

"It is a mitt," his father said, "and here is the ball."

As Rollo took the ball in his hands he danced with glee.

"That's a peach," he cried.

"It is a base-ball," his father said, "that is what you play base-ball with."

"Is it?" exclaimed Rollo, inquiringly.

"Now," said Mr. Holliday, as they went into the back yard, followed by Thanny, "I will go to bat first, and I will let you pitch, so that I may teach you how. I will stand here at the end of the barn, then when you miss my bat with the ball, as you may sometimes do, for you do not yet know how to pitch accurately, the barn will prevent the ball from going too far."

"That's the back-stop," said Rollo.

"Do not try to be funny, my son," replied his father, "in this great republic only a President of the United States is permitted to coin phrases which nobody can understand. Now, observe me; when you are at bat you stand in this manner."

And Mr. Holliday assumed the attitude of a timid man who has just stepped on the tail of a strange and irascible dog, and is holding his legs so that the animal, if he can pull his tail out, can escape without biting either of them. He then held the bat up before his face as though he was carrying a banner.

"Now, Rollo, you must pitch the ball directly toward the end of my bat. Do not pitch too hard at first, or you will tire yourself out before we begin."

Rollo held the ball in his hands and gazed at it thoughtfully for a moment; he turned and looked at the kitchen windows as though he had half a mind to break one of them; then wheeling suddenly he sent the ball whizzing through the air like a bullet. It passed so close to Mr. Holliday's face that he dropped the bat and his grammar in his nervousness and shouted:

"Whata you throw nat? That's no way to pitch a ball! Pitch it as though you were playing a gentleman's game; not as though you were trying to kill a cat! Now, pitch it right here; right at this place on my bat. And pitch more gently; the first thing you know you'll sprain your wrist and have to go to bed. Now, try again."