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But Maxwell did not go right in. He knocked lightly at the door, which in a moment was opened by a young woman, whose girlish face and willowy figure presented a vision of loveliness to those in the outer room.
As Maxwell disappeared in the sitting-room, Dixon and his friend again exchanged glances which showed that they had changed their opinion in regard to the newcomer’s relations with the pawnbroker.
“Well,” asked Teague, “have the profits in this business met your expectations?”
“I have not been in it long enough to tell, for I have not had an auction,” replied Rumble. “In one respect, however, I have been disappointed. Very few articles on which I have loaned money have been redeemed. I don’t understand it.”
“Perhaps you are too liberal with your customers,” said Dixon.
“You would not have me be mean with them, would you?” answered Rumble. “Why, you know they must be in very straitened circumstances to come to me. If I took advantage of people’s poverty, I would expect that after their death all the old women who have pawned their shawls with me would send their ghosts back to haunt me.”
“Well, I never thought of that,” murmured Dixon. “If their ghosts do come back what very lively times some pawnbrokers must have!”
“But if your customers do not redeem their goods, how do you expect to get your money back?” asked Teague.
“From auctions,” replied the pawnbroker.
“Oh!” was Teague’s response.
“You should have a good auctioneer,” said Dixon.
“The goods will bring a fair return,” replied Rumble quietly.
Although it was apparent that the pawnbroker had begun to mistrust his methods of doing business, it was also evident that he had great faith in auctions. He had attended auctions in his time and had bid on articles, only to see them go beyond the length of his modest purse. Now, he said to himself, the auctioneer would be on his side. The bidding would go up and up and up, and every bid would bring just so much more money into his pocket. Altogether he was well satisfied.
The faces of his guests showed that they at once admired and pitied the old man. They admired his generosity and his faith in human nature, and wished that other pawnbrokers with whom they had dealt had been like him; they pitied him, for they knew that201he would have a rude awakening from his dream when the hammer of the auctioneer knocked down his goods and his hopes of getting back the money he had loaned on them.
“It is time we were going,” said Dixon, at last, as his eyes fell on a tall hall clock that stood in a corner, quietly marking the flight of time.
“Well, then let us go,” answered Teague, as he cast a dismal look at the windows, against which the snow was still driven in volleys by the wind that howled as loudly as ever.
It was the pawnbroker’s turn to pity his visitors.
“I am afraid you will take cold going from this warm room out into the storm,” he said to Teague. “Let me lend you an overcoat. You see I have more here than I have any use for,” he added jocosely.
“Oh, I could not think of letting you lend me one!” exclaimed Teague, blushing probably for the first time in his life.
Dixon laughed quietly as he enjoyed his friend’s confusion, while the pawnbroker looked among his stock for a coat that would fit Teague. Presently he advanced with one which he held out with both hands, as he said:
“Let me help you put it on.”
Teague protested.
“Why, you can bring it back to-morrow when you come this way,” added Rumble.
“But how do you know I will bring it back?” said Teague. “I am a stranger to you.”
“Oh, your friend is good surety for you,” replied the pawnbroker. “He is one of my few customers who have redeemed their pledges.”
A thundering blast struck the house. The wind beat at the windows as though it meant to smash them.
The sound of the tempest persuaded Teague to accept the pawnbroker’s offer. Without another word he caught the edge of either sleeve with his fingers and put his arms out behind, while Rumble put the overcoat on him. His arms, however, never found the ends of its capacious sleeves. It was almost large enough for a man of twice Teague’s size. Dixon had a fit of laughter at his friend’s expense, and even the pawnbroker could not forbear a smile.
“It is rather large for you, isn’t it?” said Rumble. “Let us try another.” And then he added: “Why, your own fits you best, of course.”
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Then seizing Teague’s ulster, which still lay on his counter, he threw it over its owner’s shoulders, and bade the two men a hearty good-night as they went forth into the storm.
When he had succeeded in closing the door in the face of the tempest, he turned the key in the lock, and then, with a shiver, returned to the fire. As he stood before the stove he smiled and seemed to be chuckling over the thought that he had made Teague wear his own coat. His face wore a happy look. He had a clear conscience. He knew that he was a philanthropist in a small way, and had helped many a poor soul when the light of hope was burning dimly. But he took no credit to himself for this. The opportunity of doing a little good had come in his way, and he had not let it pass; that was all. Besides, as he often said, he expected to make money in his business. He simply conducted it on more liberal principles than most pawnbrokers. When he went into it he was told that a large proportion of pawnbrokers’ customers never redeemed their pledges, and that by advancing on goods pawned only a small percentage of their value, a great deal of money was made in the sale of unredeemed articles. He thought, therefore, that it was only just to loan on whatever was brought to him nearly as much money as he deemed it would bring at auction. To do anything less would, in his opinion, have been to cheat his customers. Besides, if he loaned more money on goods, in proportion to their value, than other pawnbrokers, his return in interest was also greater when the goods were redeemed. This was the peculiar principle on which he did business, and it is needless to say that he did a very large business, much to the disgust of all other pawnbrokers having shops in his neighborhood.
It was not strange, therefore, that, as he stood before the fire on that New Year’s eve, the face of old John Rumble wore a contented smile. The knowledge of having done good brings content, if it brings nothing else; and the pawnbroker knew that he had done well by his customers, and he thought, also, that his customers had done well by him, as he surveyed his full shelves.
While he stood there musing, the door of the sitting-room was opened and his daughter appeared.
“Come, father,” said the girl. “If you don’t hurry you will not have the punch ready by midnight.”
The old man’s face assumed an anxious expression, and he started with a roll for the sitting-room.
Not to have the punch ready to drink in the New Year at the stroke203of midnight, would indeed be a calamity. He had never failed to welcome the New Year with a brimming cup. His father had done so before him, his daughter had done so with him, and he hoped his grandchildren would do so after him.
“Bring the punch-bowl, Fanny,” he said, as he went to a cupboard and took out a big black bottle.
His daughter brought him an old-fashioned blue china bowl and hot water, and while he made the punch, Maxwell told him of his plans for the coming year, about which he had been talking with Fanny.
Arthur Maxwell, who was a civil-engineer, had been followed by ill-fortune for some time. Indeed, he made Rumble’s acquaintance in a purely business way; but he called it good fortune that had led him to the pawnbroker’s door, for otherwise he would not have known Fanny. And now fortune seemed really to smile on him. He had secured a position with a railroad company, and was going to Colorado as an assistant of its chief engineer, who had charge of the construction of a railway there.
And then, hesitating, he told the old man that Fanny had promised to be his wife as soon as he could provide a home for her.
The pleasure which Rumble had expressed, as Maxwell told of his good fortune, was a little dashed by this last bit of information. Of course he had expected that his daughter would leave him sometime, and he had not been blind to the fact that Maxwell had gained a place in her affections; nevertheless, he was not quite prepared for this news, and it left a shadow on his kindly face.
“But, father,” said Fanny, advancing quickly, and placing her arm about his neck and her head on his shoulder, “Arthur and I hope that we shall all be together. He may return to New York; but if we have a home in the West you might live with us there.”
It was a loving, tender look which Rumble gave his daughter as she uttered these words.
At that moment the clock began to strike, horns were heard in the street, bells were rung, and in a lull in the storm the musical notes of a chime fell on their ears.
Rumble filled the cups, and then, raising his, he said:
“Here’s to the New Year, and here’s to your success, Arthur, and to Fanny’s happiness.”
And while the clock was still striking, the three drank in the New Year.
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That year, however, was not a fortunate one for Rumble. His little fund had dwindled. He had, as he thought, barely enough to conduct his business to the time when he could legally have an auction. But how was he to do this and pay his rent? That problem troubled him. It was finally solved by the consent of his landlord, in consideration of a high rate of interest, to wait for his rent until Rumble had his auction. When this arrangement was made, the pawnbroker, who had been gloomy for some time, again wore a cheerful look. His daughter had advised him to pay his rent and curtail his business for the time being; but that, he said, would never do; and when he had tided over the crisis in his affairs, he went on distributing his money among the people who brought him their old clothes and their all but worthless jewellery.
From time to time pawnbrokers called on him and tried to persuade him that his method of doing business was a mistake; that it was not only hurting their business, but was ruining himself. Rumble was not convinced. If his way of doing business took from the profits of other pawnbrokers, they were only meeting with justice, he said; they had made money enough out of the poor; he meant to treat his customers better. He admitted that he might not get his money back from some of his investments, but then the auction would make it all right; what he lost in one way he would get back in another. He looked to the auction as to a sort of Day of Judgment, when there would be a grand evening of accounts.
At last the great day came—the day of the auction. Rumble was full of the importance of the event, and had donned his best clothes in honor of the occasion. He had advertised the auction in several newspapers, and he expected a large attendance. He was somewhat disappointed when, a little while before the time set for the sale, it began to rain; but he hoped for the best.
When the auctioneer rapped on his desk and announced that he was about to open the sale, there were not more than a dozen people in the room. Among them Rumble recognized several pawnbrokers, and the others looked as though they might belong to the same guild. He wondered why they were there. Had they come to bid—to bid at his auction, on goods on which he had loaned more money than they would have loaned? He did not understand it.
When the sale began Rumble took a seat near the auctioneer and205watched the proceedings. He soon understood why the pawnbrokers were there. The prices obtained were absurdly small. There was very little competition, and the sale had not gone far before it dawned on Rumble’s mind that the pawnbrokers had a tacit understanding that they would not bid against one another, but would divide the stock among them.
The poor old man’s heart sank, and great beads of perspiration appeared on his brow, as lot after lot went for almost nothing. All his worldly possessions were melting away before his eyes, and he had not the power to put out his hand and save them. Was he dreaming? No, for he could hear the auctioneer’s voice, loud and clear, crying:
“Going—going—gone!”
He turned his head and saw his daughter standing in the sitting-room, near the open doorway, with her eyes fixed upon him. Her face was white, white as the ’kerchief about her neck. She understood it all. Yes, it was all too real.
“Going—going—gone!”
Again those terrible words rang like a knell in his ears, and every time he heard them he knew that he was a poorer man; he knew that more of his little stock had gone at a sacrifice.
At last he scarcely heeded the words of the auctioneer, but sat staring before him like one spell-bound. The buzz of conversation about him seemed like a sound coming from afar, like the roll of waves on the seashore; and through it all, at intervals, like the faint note of a bell warning seamen of danger, came those words telling of his own wreck:
“Going—going—gone!”
When the auction was over Fanny went to her father’s side. He was apparently dazed. She helped him to rise. He leaned heavily upon her as she led him into the sitting-room, where he sank back into a chair, and did not utter a word for a long time. At last, when he found voice, he said:
“Going—going—gone! It’s all gone, Fanny, all gone! We are ruined!”
The sale on which Rumble had built so many hopes, realized but little more than enough to pay the rent he owed. He did not have money enough to continue his business, and a few days after the auction his pawnshop was closed.
In the meantime, to add to their distress, Fanny had received a letter from Arthur Maxwell, informing her that the railroad company206with which he had found employment had failed, owing him several hundred dollars—all his savings. He wrote that there was a prospect that a labor-saving invention of his would be put in use in one of the mines. This was the only gleam of hope in the letter. Fanny answered it, giving Arthur an account of the misfortune which had befallen her father. Although she gave him the number of the new lodging into which they moved when her father’s shop was closed, she received no reply. She had hoped soon to have some cheering word from him, but none came. She could not understand his silence. This, in addition to her other troubles, seemed more than she could bear.
Since the auction Rumble had not been a well man. His nerves at that time had received a shock from which he had not recovered.
Between nursing her father, and earning what little she could by sewing, Fanny had a hard time. The pittance she got for her work did not go far toward meeting their expenses. Rumble had given up his shop in the early autumn, and the little money he had saved from the wreck had disappeared when winter set in. At last it became necessary to pawn some of their household goods. Fanny would not let her father go the pawnbroker’s, but went herself. When she returned, and showed him the little money she had obtained on the articles she had pledged, he said:
“Why, I would have given twice as much.”
“Yes, father,” answered Fanny, “but all pawnbrokers are not like you.”
“No, no,” muttered the old man. “If they were they would be poor like me.”
Although Rumble was not able to work, he was always talking of what he would do when he felt a little stronger. He worried continually because he was dependent upon his daughter, and every time she went to the pawnbroker’s he had a fit of melancholy.
At last, just before Christmas, he became seriously ill. The doctor, whom Fanny called in, said he had brain fever, and gave her little hope of his recovery. His mind wandered, and seemed to go back to the auction, of which he spoke almost constantly. Many times he repeated the words of the auctioneer, that had made such a deep impression on him: “Going—going—gone!”
It was a gloomy Christmas for Fanny, and when New Year’s eve came she was still watching by the bedside of her father, whose fever had reached its crisis.
Her thoughts went back to another New Year’s eve, when Arthur207Maxwell had told her of his plans for the future. And it had been so long since she had heard from him!
She had to get some medicine which the doctor had ordered, and while her father slept, asking an acquaintance who lodged on the same floor to watch over him, she went out, taking with her a gold locket which she meant to pawn.
Although she knew that a pawnbroker had opened a shop where her father had kept his, she had never gone to it. But something seemed to lead her there that evening. When she reached the place her heart almost failed her; but, summoning courage, she entered the shop, and presented the locket to the pawnbroker. While he was examining it two men entered. The pawnbroker’s clerk waited on them. She seemed to feel their eyes on her.
When she gave the pawnbroker her name, he said:
“Rumble? Frances Rumble? Why, a young man was here to-day inquiring for Mr. Rumble, and some time ago the carrier brought two letters here for you. I could not tell him where you lived, and he took them away.”
Fanny’s heart beat wildly. She was sure that the letters were from Arthur, and that it was he who had inquired for her father.
“Is this Miss Rumble?” said one of the men who had followed her into the shop.
She turned and recognized Dixon. The person with him was Teague. Dixon had just pawned a watch, and had remarked that he wished Rumble still kept the shop.
When Fanny told them of her father’s illness and of his misfortune, Dixon and Teague insisted on going home with her, meaning to lend assistance in some way.
When they reached Fanny’s humble lodging, and followed her into her father’s room, they found Maxwell at Rumble’s bedside.
A cry of joy escaped Fanny as her lover folded her in his arms. She soon learned from him that he had never received the letter in which she wrote him about her father’s trouble and their removal from the old shop. It had missed him while he was moving about in the West. And then he told her of the success of his invention.
Rumble, whose mind was lucid for the moment, said:
“You will be happy at last, Fanny. Arthur has come for you.”
“And you, too, will be happy with us, father,” replied Fanny, taking his hands in hers.
The old man smiled faintly, and rolled his head to and fro on his pillow, as if he thought differently.
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The clock began to strike; it was midnight, and the New Year was at hand. The sound of bells came to their ears, and a distant chime was heard.
Rumble’s mind once more began to wander; again he talked about the auction; again he muttered the words that had troubled him so much:
“Going—going—gone!”
They were his last words. The old man’s life went out with the old year.
Albert Roland Haven.
THE ROOT OF THE SPOILS SYSTEM.
What is known as the spoils system of politics, in a measure common to all times and all forms of government, seems to have reached its highest development in our Republic. This fact justifies the suspicion that something in our form of administration is favorable to such development; and whether we regard the spoils system as praiseworthy or reprehensible, it will be instructive to inquire why it has prevailed in this country as among no other free people.
Most persons who deplore the spoils system urge as one of its greatest evils that it substitutes for the discussion of principles a mere scramble for office; that it teaches men to value the material prizes incident to government above political truth. Such reasoners have strangely mistaken cause for effect. The rarity of ideas in our political discussions is not an effect, but the immediate cause of the spoils system; and behind both, as the direct cause of the latter and the remote cause of the former, lies the difficulty of expressing the popular will in legislative enactment. In other words, we have substituted the pursuit of place for the discussion of principles, because the relations of the people to the law-making body are not sufficiently close.
No reader of this periodical needs to be reminded that when our present constitution was written the mass of freemen had not, as now, come to believe that a constitutional government should include a legislature promptly obedient to the popular will; a ministry dependent upon the support of a majority in the popular branch of the law-making body; and an executive powerless to interfere in legislation. It was natural, then, that our forefathers, imperfectly acquainted with this modern device of free peoples, should have believed209that they had secured the prompt and certain efficacy of the popular will in government by placing no restriction as to national elections upon the wide suffrage already prevailing in most of the States, and providing that the chief magistrate and both branches of the national legislature should be elective and chosen for short terms. They could not foresee that in course of time a constitutional monarch would come to have less power than the executive head of the Republic; that an hereditary House of Lords less often than an elective Senate would dare to cross the will of the popular legislative body; that the popular branch of the legislature in a constitutional monarchy would, in effect, change at will the administrative head of the government, while in the new Republic premiers would retain power despite the adverse verdict of the people as expressed in legislative majorities; and, finally, that the enfranchised portion of a people dwelling under a constitutional monarchy would determine at the ballot-box every great question arising in their politics, and drive from power all men who should dissent from the popular decision, while the whole people of the Republic might be balked not only of their will in matters upon which they had distinctly made up their minds, but even of bringing questions thus potentially decided to the practical test of the ballot-box, and of introducing other important issues into the realm of popular discussion.
The difficulty of procuring from the people of the United States an unequivocal decision upon any political question, and of expressing that decision in legislative enactment, is familiar to every student of our history. The questions that occupy Congress now are in large part the same that were debated there forty years ago, save that the issue of slavery and the extreme States’ rights theory have disappeared. But even in these cases the exceptions prove the rule; for it is grimly significant of our legislative immobility that the two great questions of a century should finally have been settled by the sword. If the people declared for anything at the general election of 1884, they may be supposed to have declared for a revision of the tariff, since the platform of principles adopted by each great party at its National Convention affirmed the necessity of such revision; yet Congress not only failed to legislate for that object, but actually at one time refused to discuss a measure designed to meet the issue in question, and at another stopped in the midst of such legislation to test the popular will upon the very same matter. Furthermore, while it will be assumed by most persons that whatever the significance210of the election four years ago, the contest just ended sets the seal of disapproval upon the recent effort of the House of Representatives to revise the tariff; yet we hear already that the LI. Congress can hardly escape some such legislation as has just been attempted. The truth is, that the election of 1884, as all our elections, was in the main a struggle for spoils. The question at issue was not tariff revision or any other great economic idea, but which party should administer during the next four years the great patronage of the Federal Government. In the contest of November last the people for the first time in twenty years had a living issue presented, but so unused were they to the discussion of economic principles that it may be questioned whether the verdict just delivered with so much apparent emphasis was really the expression of a well-ascertained public opinion. It is worthy of note, too, that believers in the spoils system of politics are already taunting the vanquished with the folly of presenting a political idea to the American people, and prophesying a more rigid exclusion of principles from politics in all time to come.
Such difficulties have beset us throughout all our history. Let men wince as they would under galling injustice and false economics, they could not work their will upon the body whose duty it is to express in legislation the political desires of the people. A mocking fate seemed to balk the accomplishment of our most earnest purposes, and men whose interests were adverse to the public good constantly took it upon themselves to declare that the people had not spoken upon whatever vital question was uppermost, or that their words had meant something other than they seemed to mean. The result of all this was what we see. A self-governing people must have some sort of political activity, and since it was early discovered that the discussion of principles was little better than a vain occupation, the pursuit of place soon became almost the sole object of political organization. If it was almost impossible to carry a question from the stage of popular discussion to that of legislative enactment, it was a very simple matter to elect presidents and congressmen who should see to a proper distribution of places. Since men could not accomplish the rational object of political endeavor, they strove for what was easily attainable. If they could not make the laws they could at least fill the offices. Then came the easy descent to Avernus. Politics having become a mere struggle for place, public affairs were left more and more in the hands of men who found such work congenial, and the mass of the people, to211whom the hope of office is but a shadowy illusion, became less and less interested in a struggle that held for most voters neither the promise of gain nor the incentive of high purpose. The spoils system having thus been established, the causes that bred it were in their turn intensified by its reaction, and the evil round was complete. To make matters worse, the struggle for wealth, stimulated by the marvellous richness of a part of the country, claimed the attention of thousands to the exclusion of politics, and those who would naturally have led in affairs of State adopted the evil philosophy that it is cheaper to be robbed by professional politicians than to neglect private business for the sake of public duty.
Having sought thus to trace the steps by which our form of administration has begotten the spoils system, let us endeavor to prove the conclusion by another process of reasoning. Were our government a parliamentary system, such as exists among the free peoples of the Old World, we should have a legislature promptly responsive to movements of the popular will, a ministry sitting in one or the other house of Congress, and dependent for continuance in power upon the support of a majority in the Lower House, and an executive disarmed in whole or in part of the power to negative legislative enactments. The result would be to concentrate interest not as now upon the election of a president whose chief function is to distribute places, and whose part in legislation is almost purely negative, but upon the choice of the legislative body whose majority should determine the political complexion of the president’s advisers and the general policy of the administration. At each general election for members of the Lower House the issue would be some well-defined question then under hot discussion, and in most instances Congress would have been dissolved for the express purpose of taking the sense of the people upon the matter at issue. Public interest in political discussion would return, because great principles, such as have an important bearing upon the lives of all men, would be under debate, and the mass of voters would have such an incentive to activity as the shadowy hope of place could never furnish. The knowledge that the popular will would find prompt expression through the law-making power would render it impossible for the people to be turned from their purpose by the jugglery of place-hunters.
With a whole people interested in political discussion no conceivable abuse of patronage could balk them of their will, and the spoils system would disappear because the factitious importance of212office-holders and office-seekers, favored by the defects of our present form of administration, could no longer obscure the vastly greater question of the public weal. This change in the popular attitude toward politics would be sufficient of itself to seal the doom of the spoils system; but if other influences were needed they would be found in the new relations of the ministry to the legislature and the people, since a cabinet bound to take the initiative in great lines of policy and required to give an account of itself to a hostile minority in Congress would have little time and less stomach for the nice apportionment of political rewards to partizan deserts. Finally, should we adopt the principle of a ministry dependent upon the support of a majority in the Lower House, the possibility of two changes of administration within a single year would make the spoils system, as we now have it, unendurable and unworkable. Indeed, it may be questioned whether a rigid application of the spoils system by the administration coming into office in March 1889 would not place the evils of that system in a peculiarly glaring light, when it is remembered that a very large number of those who would be asked to make places for party workers unversed in the routine of public office have exercised their official functions for barely four years, and but recently acquired the skill so necessary to the efficient transaction of business.
The attentive reader will have noted that it has been argued, first that the spoils system is the natural and inevitable outcome of the rigidity that seems unseparable from our form of administration; and second, that such a system, in its grossest development, is almost impossible under a parliamentary government. The latter line of argument has been taken less for its own sake than for the purpose of strengthening the conclusions reached by the former; and the writer would not be understood as insisting that to eliminate the spoils system we must adopt exactly such a parliamentary form as now exists among the free peoples of Europe. Any system that should make it easy to ascertain the popular will, and should insure the prompt and certain expression of that will in legislation, would accomplish the object of substituting principles for spoils in our politics. To suggest a plausible plan for grafting upon our system this far more democratic scheme of administration would be a stupendous work, calling for the highest exercise of trained political sagacity; but it is not difficult to indicate some of the things that need not be done. It is not necessary that the president should be reduced to any such mere figure-head as is the monarch in the half-dozen213parliamentary governments of Europe. Perhaps the principle of a ministry sitting in the houses of Congress might be omitted; and it is not clear that the president’s veto would have to be altogether sacrificed. It is not positive, indeed, that a formal amendment of the constitution would be necessary to obtain the essentials of the reform under consideration. We have amended the spirit of the constitution in one highly important feature without changing the letter of that instrument. Perhaps the nearest way to the object in view lies through a more intimate relation between the cabinet and the committees of the Lower House.
Finally, the consideration presents itself that if the conclusions reached here are correct, those persons who have sought by statutory restriction and appeals to public conscience to abolish the spoils system have not employed the wholesome policy of attacking the evil at its source. They seem to be mowing rather than uprooting the weeds. Doubtless our political garden has been tidied, but the roots of the evil growth and the aptitudes of the soil remain. The reform system, as applied to the great body of minor clerical offices, will probably prevail from now on; but we can scarcely hope that the broad spirit of civil service reform can reign in this land until the people shall have made themselves immediate masters of the legislative power.
Edward V. Vallandigham.
UNCLE SCIPIO.
Once more the wizard of the Christmas-time lifts his wand in our homes, brightening young eyes that look forward, dimming old ones that look backward. Thou hast prisms of hope for the young; prisms of tears for the old, but shining always in our souls with a light all thine own. We hail thee, lovely spirit of this matchless festival!
Would that words could paint to you a picture which I carry in my heart! I see it through a light brilliant, yet tender, that Christmas morning long ago in the old Georgia home. Those were dark days of war which I remember, and the shadow of death had already fallen on our house: but there was one day in the year when we did not feel its chill. What shadows can withstand the light of the Christmas fire in the heart of a child?
We had grown to be pretty thorough Bohemians, my little214brother and I, in those war days, and were ready to take any stray bit of sport, asking no questions whatever for conscience’ sake. But the outlook was rather bad for us, one dreary December. The holidays were very near, and we saw no preparations for rendering the big dining-room royal with holly and cedar, as usual, for King Cole’s reception. We had already ceased to press our grievances in the “big house,” for we felt, through a child’s instinct, that we were standing in the presence of griefs greater than our own.
We began to fear that Santa Claus had been killed in the war, or that maybe he would not care to come to us now since the fire had grown so small in the huge fire-place, where it used to roar and flash around the back-log, until the polished floor was flooded in light, and the candelabra’s lights shone cold and pale as stars through a conflagration. Even the crimson rugs and hangings, that used to brighten up the dark old floor and furniture, had disappeared, one by one, to be transformed into haversacks and warm garments for our poor boys at the front, whose hearts were stouter and courage more lasting than their regimentals. And so, we thought, poor little infants! that perhaps our deity would desert the altars on which the fires burned so low, and would go, with all his wonderful store, to the happy children away in the North. There, we were told, the cities blazed with light and merriment for weeks before his coming; there the snow sometimes fell whole days at a time, until it lay like a white carpet along the streets, where children could walk without fear, and which never echoed to the tramp of foes; for there the heavy booming cannon never sounded to drown the chiming bells, and blanch the children’s laughing lips with terror. Why, we argued, should he not go there instead of driving his reindeer across bloody fields and deserted highways, to bring gifts to two poor little children? Truly we would have been comfortless in that sad time but for one old standby, who had never yet failed us. Dear old Uncle Scipio—his ebony face shines in the light of memory as it used to shine in the light of the kitchen fire. To him we turned in our trouble. We did not know all his worth then, but we knew him for the sympathizer in all our childish griefs. Oh, those preposterous old stories he used to tell us! but they could raise the sheeted dead then in every corner of the old kitchen, as we sat in awed silence on his knee, and watched the supper fire die out.
And not to us only, was Uncle Scipio the stay and comfort in those dark days, but to our mother also. He had been the guardian,215playmate, and tyrant of two eager boys, my brothers, through infancy, and through the sunny college days, when, with the school boy’s profanation of the classics, they had stumbled on the story of his great prototype, and laughingly called him “Scipio Africanus.” Through tear-dimmed spectacles he watched them march away, two boy soldiers, with no premonition of misfortune on their faces, and minds full of great Shakespearian thoughts of “all the pomp and circumstance of glorious war.” And last of all, he stood by my father’s stirrup when he mounted to ride on his last journey, and took his final orders concerning us.
About this time, I remember, there was quite a disturbance among the negroes; some were for following in the wake of the first Union troops that should pass, as the only sure means of gaining their promised freedom. These, we knew, had been trying to persuade Uncle Scipio to join them. To us this was a thing too preposterous to think of; but I think that mother and grandmother really had some doubts on the subject. So one day the latter asked him what he should do if the opportunity should be offered him to go. I was balancing on the rockers of her chair at the time, and I shall never forget the look he gave her in reply.
“I can’t go, ole missus,” he said, shaking his gray head, as he rose from emptying an armful of lightwood knots into the wood box, and dusted the splinters from his sleeve. “I can’t go, nohow, and leave young missus and de chillun in dese yere times. Mars Ben he done die, and lef’ me to take care o’ dese yere darlins o’ hisen, and no kind o’ proclamation, dis side de Jordan o’ def, gwine to free ole Scipio from dat charge.”
“But don’t you want to be free if the rest are?”
“Yes, ole missus, but ef de Lord mean to bring freedom to dis ole nigger, he kin fin’ him here. Ef He mean to fetch our people dry shod tru dis Red Sea o’ blood, outen de house o’ bondage, den when I hears de soun’ o’ dem timbrels, and de dancin’, an’ de shoutin’, I praise Him too; but I don’t tink He gwine to be angry kase one ole man love his home so much ’til he got to stay behind and weep wid dem in de house where de eldest born am slain.”
And faithfully he kept his promise to the slain. But see! I began to tell you the story of that memorable Christmas-time, and am letting the shadows of the intervening years crowd between me and the Yule-log. Avaunt! ye ghosts of bitter days of want, of hatred and contention; the spirit of peace and good-will exorcise ye from the hearth of Christmas memories!
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I was going to tell you how Uncle Scipio undertook to save us from despair in that terrible time.
We, the much abused community of infants, had submitted with tolerable fortitude to taking our rye substitute for coffee, sweetened with sorghum, and similar hardships; but now, as the holidays approached, and we saw no signs of festivity, we began to feel great apprehensions.
We resolved to confide our fears to Scipio.
“Do you think,” I asked him one evening, as we sat in our usual evening attitudes before the fire, “that old ‘Santy’ will forget us this year because it is so cold and dark, and because everybody is so sad, and?—”
Here my griefs overcame utterance: I could say no more.
“Now, Lawd o’ messy!” cried the dear old creature, taking a closer look at my tearful face. “What dat yer sayin’, chile? Ole Santy Claus forgit yer, honey? What make yer tink he gwine to forgit yer? Well, well! You’s a funny little chile, sho’—yer makes me laugh ’til I cries; sho’ yer do.”
I noticed that he did take off his “specs” and wipe them with his yellow bandana, but I didn’t see anything to laugh at. He gazed sadly enough, I thought, into the embers for awhile, and smoothed my hair in a thoughtful way. Then an inspiration seized him; he saw his way through the dilemma. He straightened himself in his chair, and readjusted his glittering ornaments across his nose. He assumed the air which all the country ’round knew as the precursor of something oracular, for he was “not ’zactly a preacher, no sah! but sort of a ’zorter ’mongst de breren.”
“Now, my dear little chillun,” he began, “I dunno who tuk an’ turned in an’ put dat funny notion in yer heads ’bout ole Santa Claus forgitten yer, but pay ’tickler extension to what I’se gwine to say to yer. You mustn’t go to kalklatin’ on none o’ dem high-falutin’ tings what he used to fotch here fo’ de wah sot in, fur de times is mighty hard, and de ole feller’ll have to run de blockade to git yere t’all—sho’ he will. But ef you sez you’ll be powerful good til’ dat time, an’ don’t go to pesterin’ yer ma ’bout it, I’ll promise yer dat he aint gwine to forgit yer altogedder.”
This was surely consolation; but it required all our faith in Uncle Scipio to keep our courage alive until the great day. It drew near and nearer, and still we saw no unusual stir in the house, and our hearts began to sink a little. At last it wanted but one day, and I shall never forget that Christmas eve.
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Uncle Scipio was very much preoccupied, and could not be disturbed by any means, that day; so we betook ourselves to the society of our elders. But there matters were worse. There was little of privation and bad news that we had not become pretty familiar with by this time, and war, I remember, seemed to me the normal condition of things. But it soon became clear to me that something a little worse than usual was apprehended that day.
There were whispered conversations going on above our heads, but we caught enough of it to know that a piece of terrible news had arrived. A party of refugees had passed through our town in the early morning. They were a company of fragile women and children, with a few faithful negroes, fleeing from their homes as from a pestilence. They told us that a large company of Yankees had made their appearance a few miles above us, and if they followed the most direct route to the railroad, would, in all probability, reach us that night or the following day. Our little town being on the line of the railroad, rarely escaped the military visitations. Besides, it was at this time the depository of a great deal of cotton, which it was feared might be the occasion of its being burned.
I have heard mother say that this day before Christmas there were just three able-bodied men in the town—the hospital doctor, the miller, and the conscript officer; not a very formidable defence against a hostile invasion. But I suppose those two lonely women, my mother and grandmother, must have looked for help in this extremity, towards the everlasting hills where the twelve legions of angels lay encamped, for they bore their anxiety like Spartans.
The day dragged through, however, and the last sun rays showed us no blue coats on the western road towards which aching eyes had turned through the heavy hours. Things began to look a little more hopeful. We began to feel that reaction from anxiety which is almost sure to come when the candles are lighted.
We sat close together in the sitting-room, and took our very frugal supper there in quite a hysterical sort of cheerfulness.
The day had passed without disaster, and we had been told that in case the “Yankees” should make their appearance during the night, and our garrison of three be obliged to evacuate the town, the village church-bell would be rung to apprize the citizens of the situation.
No, we felt sure the enemycouldnot come on Christmas eve. We even ventured to hang up our stockings in the accustomed place.
We knelt, my brother and I, by dear old grandmother’s knee, and218said our prayers to Him who, she told us, knew what it was to spend His first Christmas days here under the shadow of the sword, and would not that one of His little ones should perish. Then tossed by hope and fear, we slept.
It was a notable fact, but one which escaped comment in the general anxiety of that night, that Uncle Scipio had not appeared as usual, after his out-of-door tasks were finished. It had gone pretty hard with us all not to be able to confide everything to this faithful old friend; but the strictest injunctions had been laid upon us to keep the whole matter a secret from the negroes, for many reasons. So he knew nothing, and went about his tasks all day, singing his most dirge-like tunes, which meant some pleasant preoccupation of mind. We had learned that. We knew soon after what it was that occupied his heart and head that day.
I do not know how long we had slept in our trundle bed, but I know I had travelled in my dreams over many leagues of fairy land, walking under endless avenues of lighted Christmas trees, when suddenly, I thought, from some unseen source, the deep tones of a bell struck discord on the radiant air. It seemed so out of place in that enchanted region; and at the sound all the lights on the trees flickered and went out, and we were lost in the dark. Louder and nearer the bell still sounded; and then we awoke and our hearts stood still with terror.
We knew it was the village church-bell, proclaiming its story to the sleeping town. The enemy were upon us, and our Christmas fires would be the light of blazing homes. Oh, such awakening after such dreams! So eloquent was every face, of horrible certainty, that scarcely a word was spoken. It was only about midnight, but I was dressed by trembling hands—mother had not been undressed at all. And then we waited—for what? We could not have told precisely. But after a little the bell ceased to ring, and then we listened for the tramp of horses and the quick Northern voices speaking words of command to the men. We had heard it before, and knew the sound well. Once before I had awakened from sleep and seen the distorted shadows of horsemen chase one another across the strip of moonlight just over my bed, and looked from my window to see the moonlight glittering on the sabres and gun barrels of an armed host surrounding our house. That is not a sight to be forgotten, let me tell you, children who are born and reared in the lap of peace and plenty.
For quite a while—it seemed ages to me—we sat in silence looking219at one another. But though the lights twinkled in all the neighboring windows, telling of other anxious watchers, no unusual sound disturbed the air.
What could it mean? Surprise began to succeed to alarm. It occurred to some one to call up Uncle Scipio, and get him to investigate. But it was wonder on top of wonder—he was not to be found; neither had his bed been disturbed during the night. Had he deserted us and gone over to the enemy, then? No, we could not really doubt him, even yet; but his absence was too significant; there must be some plot hatching somewhere in the dark.
There was nothing for us to do but wait. But we had not to wait much longer; for presently in walked the absentee, clothed in his most majestic air, but a little non-plussed to see us all up and dressed.
“Oh, Scipio! where have you been?” we exclaimed indignantly. “How could you leave us at such a time and the town full of soldiers? Which way are they coming? What shall we do?”
“Well, I clar,” he answered, in a bewildered sort of way, “dis yere proceedin’ clean tops my cotton! Is you all clar outen yer minds, or what’s de matter wid yer? I aint seed nary a Yankee dis night, and I jes bin way up to de Mef’dis chache, ringing de Christmas chimes fur to cheer you up a little. Did’n ole Scip tell you, honeys, dat dis was gwine to be de boss Christmas? And he done kep his word. I met ole Santy out yonder, sittin’ on de pump and he sez he’s comin’ here soon’s iver he kin; so you better git to bed ’mejitly, ef not sooner; ef you don’t he’ll be here and ketch you ‘Christmas gif’ fust, sho’ he will.”
And so this was the end of it all. The dear old soul had taken it into his funny old head to give us a surprise and ring the Christmas chimes as in the old times.
Well, we tried to soften the blow, when we told him what a blunder he had made; but we knew it would be a long time ere he would recover from his chagrin. He had long been a terror to the idle young darkies about town, and they were only too glad to get something to use against him. Of course there was general indignation among the citizens when they learned that they had suffered a false alarm; but when they considered the beautiful motive that prompted the action, the tide of reproach was turned aside, and it all ended in a general laugh at Uncle Scipio’s expense.
It still wanted several hours till day, when our fears were relieved by his appearance, and we went to bed again.