A SEA VOYAGE.

FILLIN’ WOMAN’S SPEAH UNDER DIFFICULTIES.

Says I, “That is just my opinion Horace! I have been cheated by pickin’ out a calico dress in the evenin’. Things look different by daylight, from what they do by candle light. Old beliefs that have looked first rate to you, may look different under the brighter light of new discoveries. As you rise higher above the earth you see stars you couldn’t ketch sight of in a suller way. And the world’s cry of fickle mindedness, may be the angels’ war whoop, settin’ us on to heavenly warfare’.”

Horace seemed agin to be almost lost in thought, and I waited respectfully, for him to find and recover himself. Finally he spake,

“I have been sincere Josiah Allen’s wife, in thinkin’ that matrimony was woman’s only spear, but the occurances of the past 25 or 30 minutes has convinced me that wimmen may be too zealous a carryin’ out that spear. I admit Josiah Allen’s wife, that any new state of public affairs that would make woman more independent of matrimony, less zealous, less reckless in handlein’ that spear, might be more or less beneficial both to herself, and to man.”

Here he paused and sithed. He thought of Betsey. But I spoke right up in glad and triumphant tones,

“Horace, I am ready to depart this minute for Jonesville. Now I can lay my head in peace upon my goose feather pillow.”

I riz up in deep emotion, and Horace he riz up too. It was a thrillin’ moment. At last he spoke in agitated tones, for he thought still of what he had jest passed through.

“My benefactor, I tremble to think what might have happened had you not been present.” And he ran his forefinger through his almost snowy hair.

“My kind preserver, I want to give you some little token of my friendship at parting. Will you accept as a slight token of my dethless gratitude, ‘What I know about Farming,’ and two papers of lettice seed?”

I hung back, I thought of Josiah. But Horace argued with me, says he, “I respect your constancy to Josiah, but intellect—spoken or written—scorns all the barriers of sex and circumstance, and is as free to all, as the sunshine that beats down on the just and the unjust, the Liberal Republicans and the Grant party, or the married and the single.” Says he, “take the book without any scruples, and as for the lettice seed, I can recommend it, I think Josiah would relish it.”

Says I, “On them grounds I will accept of it, and thank you.”

As we parted at the door, in the innocence of conscious rectitude, we shook hands, and says I, “Henceforth, Horace you will set up in a high chair in my mind, higher than ever before. Of course, Josiah sets first in my heart, and then his children, and then a few relations on my side, and on his’en. But next to them you will always set, for you have been weighed in the steelyards, and have been found not wantin’.”

He was to agitated to speak, I was awful agitated too. Our silver mounted spectacles met each other in a last glance of noble, firm principled sadness, and so Horace and I parted away from each other.

After I left Horace, I hastened on, for I was afraid I was behind time. Bein’ a large hefty woman, (my weight is 200 and 10 pounds by the steelyards now) I could not hasten as in former days when I weighed 100 pounds less. I was also encumbered with my umberell, my satchel bag, my cap box and “What I know about Farming.” But I hastened on with what speed I might. But alas! my apprehensions was too true, the cars had gone. What was to be done? Betsey sat on her portmanty at the depott, lookin’ so gloomy and depressted, that I knew that I could not depend on her for sukker, I must rely onto myself. There are minutes that try the sole, and show what timber it is built of. Not one trace of the wild storm of emotions that was ragin’ inside of me, could be traced on my firm brow, as Betsey looked up in a gloomy way and says,

“What are we going to do now?”

No, I rose nobly to meet the occasion, and said in a voice of marbel calm, “I don’t know Betsey.” Then I sot down, for I was beat out. Betsey looked wild, says she, “Josiah Allen’s wife I am sick of earth, the cold heartless ground looks hollow to me. I feel jest reckless enough to dare the briny deep.” Says she, in a bold darin’ way,

“Less go home on the canal.”

The canal boat run right by our house, and though at first I hung back in my mind, thinkin’ that Josiah would never consent to have me face the danger of the deep in the dead of the night, still the thought of stayin’ in New York village another night made me waver. And I thought to myself, if Josiah knew jest how it was—the circumstances environin’ us all round, and if he considered that my board bill would cost 3 dollars more if I staid another night, I felt that he would consent, though it seemed perilous, and almost hazardous in us. So I wavered, and wavered, Betsey see me waver, and took advantage of it, and urged me almost warmly.

But I didn’t give my consent in a minute. I am one that calmly weighs any great subject or undertakin’ in the ballances.

Says I, “Betsey have you considered the danger?” Says I, “The shore we was born on, may sometimes seem tame to us, but safety is there.” Says I, “more freedom may be upon the deep waters, but it is atreacherous element. Says I, “I never, tempted its perils in my life, only on a bridge.”

“Nor I neither,” says she. But she added in still more despairin’ tones, “What do I care for danger? What if it is a treacherous element? What have I got to live for in this desert life? And then,” says she, “the captain of a boat here, is mother’s cousin, he would let us go cheap.”

Says I in awful deep tones of principle. “Ihave got Josiah to live for—and the great cause of Right, and the children. And I feel for their sakes that I ought not to rush into danger.” But agin I thought of my board bill, and agin I felt that Josiah would give his consent for me to take the voyage.

Betsey had been to the village with her father on the canal, and she knew the way, and suffice it to say, as the sun descended into his gory bed in the west, its last light shone onto Betsey and me, a settin’ in the contracted cabin of the canal boat.

We were the only females on board, and if it hadn’t been for Betsey’s bein’ his relation, we couldn’t have embarked, for the bark was heavily laden. The evening after we embarked, the boat sailin’ at the time under the pressure of 2 miles an hour, a storm began to come up, I didn’t say nothin’, but I wished I was a shore. The rain come down—the thunder roared in the distance—the wind howled at us, I felt sad. I thought of Josiah.

As the storm increased Betsey looked out of the window, and says she,

“Josiah Allen’s wife we are surrounded by dangers, one of the horses has got the heaves, can you not heah him above the wild roah of the tempest? And one of them is balky, I know it.” And liftin’ her gloomy eyes to the ceilin’ so I couldn’t see much of ’em but the whites, says she, “Look at the stove-pipe! see it sway in the storm, a little heavieh blast will unhinge it. And what a night it would be for pirates to be abroad, and give chase to us. But,” she continued, “my soul is in unison with the wild fury of the elements. I feel like warbling one of the wild sea odes of old,” and she begun to sing,

“My name is Robert Kidd,As I sailed, as I sailed.My name is Robert Kidd, as I sailed.”

“My name is Robert Kidd,

As I sailed, as I sailed.

My name is Robert Kidd, as I sailed.”

She sung it right through; I should say by my feelin’s, it took her nigh on to an hour, though my sufferin’s I know blinded me, and made my calculations of time less to be depended on than a clock. She sang it through once, and then she began it agin, she got as far the second time as this,

My name is Robert Kidd,And so wickedly I didAs I sailed, as I sailed,Oh! so wickedly I didAs I sailed.

My name is Robert Kidd,

And so wickedly I did

As I sailed, as I sailed,

Oh! so wickedly I did

As I sailed.

The cabin was dark, only lit by one kerosene lamp, with a chimbly dark with the smoke of years. Her voice was awful; the tune was awful; I stood it aslong as I could seemin’ly, and says I, in agitated tones,

“I wouldn’t sing any more Betsey, if I was in your place.”

Alas! better would it have been for my piece of mind, had I let her sing. For although she stopped the piece with a wild quaver that made me tremble, she spoke right up, and says she,

“My soul seems mountin’ up and in sympathy with the scene. My spirit is soarin’, and must have vent. Josiah Allen’s wife have you any objections to my writin’ a poem. I have got seven sheets of paper in my portmanty.”

The spirit of my 4 fathers rose up in me and says I, firmly,

“When I come onto the deep, I come expectin’ to face trouble—I am prepared for it,” says I, “a few verses more or less haint a goin’ to overthrow my principles.”

She sot down by the table and began to take off her tow curls and frizzles, I should think by a careless estimate that there was a six quart pan full. And then she went to untwistin’ her own hair, which was done up at the back side of her head in a little nubbin about as big as ½ a sweet walnut. Says she,

“I always let down my haih, and take out my teeth when I write poetry, I feel moah free and soahing in my mind.” Says she in a sort of a apoligy way,“Genious is full of excentricities, that seem strange to the world’s people.”

Says I, calmly “You can let down, and take out, all you want to, I can stand it.”

But it was a fearful scene. It was a night never to be forgot while memory sets up on her high chair in my mind. Outside, the rain poured down, overhead on deck, the wind shrieked at the bags and boxes, threatenin’ ’em with almost an instant destruction. The stove pipe that run up through the floor shook as if every blast would unjinte it, and then the thought would rise up, though I tried to put it out of my head, who would put it up again. One of the horses was balky, I knew, for I could hear the driver swear at him. And every time he swore, I thought of Josiah, and it kep’ him in my mind most all the time. Yes, the storm almost raved outside, and inside, a still more depressin’ and fearful sight to me—Betsey Bobbet sot with her few locks streamin’ down over her pale and holler cheeks, for her teeth was out, and she wrote rapidly, and I knew, jest as well as I know my name is Josiah Allen’s wife, that I had got to hear ’em read. Oh! the anguish of that night! I thought of the happy people on shore, in thier safe and peaceful feather beds, and then on the treacherous element I was a ridin’ on, and then I thought of Josiah. Sometimes mockin’ fancy would so mock at me that I could almost fancy that I heard him snore. But no!cold reality told me that it was only the heavey horse, or the wind a blowin’ through the stove pipe, and then I would rouse up to the agonizin’ thought that I was at sea, far, far from home and Josiah. And then a solemn voice would sometimes make itself heard in my sole, “Mebby you never will hear him snore agin.” And then I would sithe heavily.

And the driver on the tow path would loudly curse that dangerous animal and the wind would howl ’round the boxes, and the stove pipe would rattle, and Betsey would write poetry rapidly, and I knew I had got to hear it. And so the tegus night wore away. Finally at ½ past 2, wore out as I was with fateegue and wakefullness, Betsey ceased writin’ and says she.

“It is done! I will read them to you.”

I sithed so deeply that even Betsey almost trembled, and says she,

“Are you in pain, Josiah Allen’s wife?”

Says I, “only in my mind.”

“Wall,” says she, “It is indeed a fearful time. But somehow my soul exults strangely in the perils environing us. I feel like courtin’ and keepin’ company with danger to-night. I feel as if I could almost dare to mount that steed wildly careering along the tow path, if I only had a side saddle. I feel like rushin’ into dangeh, I feel reckless to-night.”

Here the driver swore fearfully, and still more apaulin’ sight to me, Betsey opened her paper and commenced readin’:

STANZES, WRITTEN ON THE DEEP.BY BETSEY BOBBET.The ground seems hollow unto me;Men’s vests but mask deep perfidee;My life has towered so hard and steep,I seek the wild and raging deep.Such knawing pains my soul doth rack,That even the wild horse on the trackDoth madly prance, and snort and leap;Welcome the horrors of the deep.Oh, Jonesville! on that peaceful shoah,Methinks I’ll see thy towehs no moeh.When morn wakes happy, thoughtless sheepBetsey may slumbeh in the deep.If far from thee my bones are doomed,In these dark waves to be entoomed,Mermaids I hope will o’er her weep,Who drownded was, within the deep.Dear Augur hopes in ruin lays;My Ebineezah I could not raise;Deah lost gazelles, I can but weep,With gloomy eyes bent o’eh the deep.One Slimpsey star, whose name is Simon,Still twinkles faint, like a small sized diamond;Oh, star of hope, I sithe, I weep,Thou shinest so faint across the deep.

STANZES, WRITTEN ON THE DEEP.

BY BETSEY BOBBET.

The ground seems hollow unto me;Men’s vests but mask deep perfidee;My life has towered so hard and steep,I seek the wild and raging deep.

The ground seems hollow unto me;

Men’s vests but mask deep perfidee;

My life has towered so hard and steep,

I seek the wild and raging deep.

Such knawing pains my soul doth rack,That even the wild horse on the trackDoth madly prance, and snort and leap;Welcome the horrors of the deep.

Such knawing pains my soul doth rack,

That even the wild horse on the track

Doth madly prance, and snort and leap;

Welcome the horrors of the deep.

Oh, Jonesville! on that peaceful shoah,Methinks I’ll see thy towehs no moeh.When morn wakes happy, thoughtless sheepBetsey may slumbeh in the deep.

Oh, Jonesville! on that peaceful shoah,

Methinks I’ll see thy towehs no moeh.

When morn wakes happy, thoughtless sheep

Betsey may slumbeh in the deep.

If far from thee my bones are doomed,In these dark waves to be entoomed,Mermaids I hope will o’er her weep,Who drownded was, within the deep.

If far from thee my bones are doomed,

In these dark waves to be entoomed,

Mermaids I hope will o’er her weep,

Who drownded was, within the deep.

Dear Augur hopes in ruin lays;My Ebineezah I could not raise;Deah lost gazelles, I can but weep,With gloomy eyes bent o’eh the deep.

Dear Augur hopes in ruin lays;

My Ebineezah I could not raise;

Deah lost gazelles, I can but weep,

With gloomy eyes bent o’eh the deep.

One Slimpsey star, whose name is Simon,Still twinkles faint, like a small sized diamond;Oh, star of hope, I sithe, I weep,Thou shinest so faint across the deep.

One Slimpsey star, whose name is Simon,

Still twinkles faint, like a small sized diamond;

Oh, star of hope, I sithe, I weep,

Thou shinest so faint across the deep.

There was between 20 and 30 verses of ’em, but truly it is always the darkest jest before daylight, for as she was a readin’ of ’em, I—a leanin’ back in my chair—dropped off to sleep, and forgot my trouble. Betsey also went to sleep before she read the last of ’em. And when I waked up, the boat had stopped in front of our house, the wind had gone down, the sun was a shinin’, and Josiah was comin’ down to thebank. The danger was all past—Home and Josiah was mine agin. I grasped holt of his hand as he helped me get off, and in a voice tremulous with feelin’s I could not control I said,

“I have got home Josiah! is breakfast ready?”

There was a tenderness in his tone, and a happy smile on his face that reminded me of the sweet days of our courtship, as he answered me in a tone almost husky with emotion,

“Yes Samantha, all but settin’ the table.”

AT HOME.

Says I, “I’m glad of it, for I’m dreadful hungry.”

It was a lovely Monday forenoon some three or four weeks after my voyage. I was a sittin’ near the open back door enjoyin’ the pleasant prospect, and also washin’ some new potatoes for dinner. Truly it was a fair scene. The feathered hens was a singin’ in their innocent joy as they scratched the yieldin’ turf after bugs and worms. Old “Hail the Day” was proudly struttin’ round, standin’ first on one foot and then on the other, and crowin’ joyfully in his careless freedom and glee. The breezes blew sweetly from the west, and I thought with joy that my clothes on the clothes line would be ready to iron by the time I got dinner out of the way. The sun shone down out of a blue and cloudless sky, and I looked pensively at my green gages, and thought fondly how the sun was a ripenin’ ’em. All nature was peaceful and serene, and my mind as I gently scraped the large fair potatoes, and thought how good they was goin’ to be withthe baked lamb I had got in the oven, was as peaceful and serene as the same. Suddenly I heard the gate click to and I saw old Mr. Bobbet comin’ up to the house. He seemed dreadfully agitated, and I could hear him talkin’ to himself. He came right into the door and took his hat off in one hand, holdin’ his crooked cane in the other and swung ’em both over his head to once, and says he,

“It’s done! It’s done!”

“What’s done,” says I droppin’ my knife onto the floor.

“Betsey’s gone!” shouted he, and he run out the door like a luny.

I was a most skairt to death, and remained motionless nigh onto a minute, when I heard Josiah comin’ in. Little did I dream what a blow was comin’ onto me. He come and stood right in front of me, and I thought at the time, he looked at me dreadful curious, but I kep’ on a scrapin’ my potatoes, (I had got ’em most done.)

Finally all at once Josiah spoke up and says he,

“Betsey Bobbett is married.”

I dropped the pan of potatoes right down onto the floor for I was as weak as a weak white cat. “Who! Josiah Allen! who! is the man?”

“Simon Slimpsey,” says he, “They was married last night—as I was comin’ by the old cider mill——”

“I see all through it,” says I mournfully. “He and seven or eight of his children have been sick, and Betsey would go and take care of ’em.”

“Yes,” says Josiah, “As I was comin’ past the old cider mill——”

Says I with spirit, “It ought to be looked into. He was a helpless old man, and she has took the advantage of him.” I went on warmly, for I thought of his gloomy fourbodin’s, and I always felt for the oppressted and imposed upon. I had went on I presume as much as 2 minutes and a ½ when Josiah says he,

“I wouldn’t take on so about it Samantha, anybody to hear you talk would think you was a perfect farrago.”

Says I, “If I was a goin’ to abuse my wife and call her names I would do it accordin’ to grammar, you mean “virtigo” Josiah.”

“Wall I said virtigo, didn’t I?” Josiah never will own that he is in the wrong.

“And I didn’t say youwasa virtigo Samantha, only anybody would take you for a virtigo, that didn’t know you.”

I remained almost lost in sad thoughts for pretty nigh ½ a minute, and then I says, in mournful tones,

“Have you heard any of the particulars Josiah? Have you seen any of the relatives? was the old man any more reconciled to the last?”

“Yes,” says Josiah, “As I was comin’ by the old cider mill—”

“Wall do for conscience sakecomeby the old cidermill, and be done with it,” says I, feelin’ worried out in my mind and by the side of myself.

“How be I goin’ togetby Samantha? you are so agravatin’, you’ll never let me finish a story peacible, and I should think it was about dinner time.”

“So ’tis,” says I, soothin’ly, hangin’ on the tea-kettle, and puttin’ the potatoes over the stove in the summer kitchen. For a long and arduous study of the sect has convinced me that good vittles are more healin’ than oil to pour onto a man’s lacerated feelin’s. And the same deep study has warned meneverto get mad at the same time Josiah does, on these 2 great philisofical laws, hangs all the harmony of married life. Then I stepped out onto the stoop agin, and says to him in calm, affectionate accents,

“What is it about the old cider mill, Josiah?”

“Nothin’” says he, “Only I met one of the first mourners—I mean one of old Slimpsey’s sisters there, and she told me about it, she said that sense the Editer of the Auger was married, and sense Betsey had got back from New York she had acted like a wild critter. She seemed to think it was now or never. The awful doom of not bein’ married at all, seemed to fall upon her, and craze her with wild horror. And findin’ Slimpsey who was a weak sort of a man any way, and doubly weakened now by age and inflamatory rheumatism, she went and took care of him, and got the upper hand of him, made him a victim andmarried him, at his own house, Sunday night at half past seven.”

I was so lost in sorrowful thought as Josiah continued the mournful tale, that Josiah says, in a soothin’ tone,

“You ought to try to be reconciled to it Samantha, it seems to be the Lord’s will that she should marry him.”

“I don’t believe in layin’ every mean low lived thing to the Lord, Josiah, I lay this to Betsey Bobbet;” and I agin plunged down into gloomy thought, and was roused only by his concludin’ words,

“Seems to me Samantha, you might have a few griddle cakes, the bread—I see this mornin’—was gettin’ kinder dry.”

Mechanically I complied with his request, for my thoughts wasn’t there, they was with the afflicted, and down trodden.

One week after this I was goin’ up the post office steps, and I come face to face with Simon Slimpsey. He had grown 23 years older durin’ the past week. But he is a shiftless, harmless critter hurtin’ himself more’n any body else. He was naturally a small boned man. In the prime of his manhood he might have come up to Betsey’s shoulders, but now withered by age and grief the highest hat was futile to bring him up much above her belt ribbon. He looked sad indeed, my heart bled for him. But with the instinctive delicacy inherient to my sect, I put on a jokeuler tone, and says I, as I shook hands with him,

“How do you do, Simon? I hain’t seen you before, sense you was married, Simon Slimpsey.”

He looked at me almost wildly in the face, and says he in a despairin’ tone,

“I knew it would come to this, Miss Allen! I knew it. I told you how it would be, you know I did. She always said it was her spear to marry, I knew I should be the one, I always was the one.”

“Don’t she use you well, Simon Slimpsey?”

“She is pretty hard on me,” says he. “I hain’t had my way in anything sense the day she married me. She begun to ‘hold my nose to the grindstone,’ as the saying is, before we had been married 2 hours. And she hain’t no housekeeper, nor cook, I have had to live on pancakes most of the time sense it took place, and they are tougher than leather; I have been most tempted to cut some out of my boot legs to see if they wouldn’t be tenderer, but I never should hear the end of it, if I did. She jaws me awfully, and orders me round as if I was a dog, a yeller dog—” he added despairin’ly, “if I was a yeller dog, she couldn’t seem to look down on me any more, and treat me any worse.”

Says I, “I always did mistrust these wimmen that talk so much about not wantin’ any rights, and clingin’ and so forth. But,” says I, not wantin’ to run anybody to thier backs, “she thought it was her spear to marry.”

“I told you,” says he, in agonizin’ tones, “I toldyou that spear of hern would destroy me, and it has.”

He looked so sorrowful that I says to him in still more jokeuler tones than I had yet used, “Chirk up Simon Slimpsey, I wish you joy.” I felt that he needed it indeed. He give me an awful look that was jest about half reproach, and half anguish, and I see a tear begin to flow. I turned away respectin’ his feelin’s. As he went down the steps slowly, I see him put his hands in his pockets, as if searchin’ for his handkerchief, seemin’ly in vain. But he had on a long blue broadcloth swallow tailed coat that he was married in the first time long years ago, and as he went round the corner he took up the skirts of his coat and wiped his eyes. I said to myself with a deep sithe, “And this is woman’s only spear.” And the words awakened in my breast as many as 19 or 20 different emotions, and I don’t know but more.

I murmured mewsin’ly to myself, “It seems to me, if I was a woman I should about as lives be a constable.”

While I was still mewsin’, Betsey, his wife tore down the street, in a distracted way, and paused before me.

“Have you seen my husband?” says she, “can you tell a distracted wife—have you seen her husband Simon Slimpsey?”

She looked wild, as if she feared a catastrophe, and she cried out, loosin’ holt of her self control, in a firm constable like tone,

“He shall not escape me! I will telegraph to the next station house! I will have the creek dragged! the woods shall be scoured out!” says she.

“Be calm, and compose yourself,” says I frigidly, “Simon Slimpsey has gone up towards his house.”

She heaved a deep sithe of content, and triumph agin brooded down upon her eye-brow as she follered on after him.

I hadn’t no idee of callin’ on her, I wouldn’t, but the next day, Simon Slimpsey went by on his old white horse. It is a very dejected lookin’ horse in the face, besides carryin’ a couple of wash-boards in its sides, in the line of ribs. Thomas Jefferson says, “What gives it its mournful expression, it is mournin’ for the companions of its youth.” Says he, “you know Noah saved a pair of everything,” and says he, “his poor companion passed away several thousand years ago.” That boy worrys me, I don’t know what he is comin’ to. Slimpsey’s old horse haint more’n 35 or 40 years old, I don’t believe. They say Betsey is makin’ a pale blue cambric ridin’ dress, and is goin’ to ride him a horse back this fall. It don’t seem to me there would be much fun in it, he is so lame, besides havin’ a habit of fallin’ frequently with the blind staggers; howsomever it’s none of my business.

But as I was a sayin’ I stood silently in the door, to see old Slimpsey go by a horseback, and I thought to myself as I pensively turned out my tea grounds,(I was a gettin’ dinner) how much—how much it looks like a night mare that has broke out of its lawful night pastures, and is runnin’ away with a pale and harassed victim. So haggard and melancholy did they both look. And I sithed. I hadn’t much more’n got through sithin’, when he rode up, and says he,

“The seventh boy is worse, and the twin girls are took down with it, it would be a melankoly pleasure Miss Allen if you could go up.” I went.

Betsey had got the most of ’em to sleep, and was settin’ between a few cradles, and trundle beds, and high chairs all filled with measles, and a few mumps. Betsey’s teeth was out, and her tow frizzles lay on the table with a lot of paper—so I mistrusted she had been writin’ a poem. But she was now engaged in mendin’ a pair of pantaloons, the 8th pair—she told me—she had mended that day, for Simon Slimpsy was a poor man, and couldn’t afford to buy new ones. They was a hard and mournful lookin’ pair, and says I to her—in a tone in which pity and contempt was blended about half and half—

“Betsey are you happy?”

“I am at rest,” says she, “more at rest than I have been for years.”

“Are you happy?” says I, lookin’ keenly at her.

“I feel real dignified,” says she, “There isn’t no use in a woman trying to be dignified till she ismarried, for she can’t. I have tried it and I know. I can truly say Josiah Allen’s wife, that I neveh knew what dignity was, until one week ago last Sunday night at half past seven in the evenin’,” says she, turnin’ over the pantaloons, and attactin’ a ghastly hole of about 7 by 9 dimensions in the left knee.

I sot silently in my chair like a statute, while she remarked thus, and as she paused, I says to her agin, fixing my mild but stern grey eyes upon her weary form, bendin’ over the dilapitated folds of the 8th.

“Are you happy Betsey?”

“I have got something to lean on,” says she.

I thought of the fragile form bendin’ over the lean and haggard horse, and totterin’ away, withered by age and grief, in the swallow tailed coat, and says I in a pityin’ accent,

“Don’t lean too hard Betsey.”

“Why?” says she.

Says I, in a kind of a blind way, “You may be sorry if you do,” and then I says to her in clear and piercin’ accents these words,

“Do you love your husband Betsey?”

“I don’t think love is necessary,” says she, “I am married, which is enough to satisfy any woman who is more or less reasonable, that is the main and important thing, and as I have said, love and respect, and so forth are miners as—”

“Miners!” says I in a tone of deep indignity, “Miners! Betsey Bobbet—”

“Mrs Betsey Bobbet Slimpsey,” says she correctin’ of me proudly, as she attacted another mournful lookin’ hole as big as my two hands,

“Well! Betsey Slimpsey!” says I, beginnin’ agin, and wavin’ my right hand in a eloquent wave, “There hain’t no more beautiful sight on earth than to see two hunan soles, out of pure love to each other, gently approachin’ each other, as if they must. And at last all thier hopes and thoughts, and affections runnin’ in together, so you can’t seperate ’em nohow, jest like two drops of rain water, in a mornin’ glory blow. And to see ’em nestlin’ there, not carin’ for nobody outside the blow, contented and bound up in each other, till the sun evaporates ’em, (as it were) and draws ’em up together into the heaven, not seperatin’ of ’em up there—why such a marriage as that is a sight that does men and angels good to look at. But when a woman sells herself, swaps her purity, her self respect, her truth, and her sole, for barter of any kind, such as a house and lot, a few thousand dollars, the name of bein’ married, a horse and buggy, some jewellry, and etcetery, and not only sells herself, but worse than the Turk wimmen goes round herself, huntin’ up a buyer, crazy, wild eyed, afraid she won’t find none—when she does find one, suppose she does have a minister for salesman, my contempt for that female is unmitigable.”

Betsey still looked so wrapped up in dignity, as she bravely attacted the seat of another pair of trousers, that it fairly made me mad. Insted of that proud and triumphant mean I wanted her to look some stricken, and I resumed in a tone of indignaty, almost burnin’ enough to set fire to her apron,

“Nor I don’t want these wimmen that have sold themselves for a certificate with a man’s name on it—I don’t want to hear ’em talk about infamy; haint they infamous themselves? What have they done different from these other bad wimmen, only they have got a stiddy place, and a little better wages, such as respectability in the eyes of fools and etcetery. Do you suppose that a woman standin’ up in front of a minister and tellin’ a few pesky lies, such as, ‘I promise to love a man I hate, and respect a man that hain’t respectable, and honor and obey a man I calculate to make toe the mark’—do you suppose these few lies makes her any purer in the eyes of God, than if she had sold herself without tellin’ ’em, as the other infamous wimmen did? Not any. Marriage is like baptism, as I have said more’n a hundred times, you have got to have the inward grace and the outward form to make it lawful and right. What good does the water do, if your sole haint baptised with the love of God? It haint no better than fallin’ into the creek.”

I paused, spotted in the face from conflictin’ emotions, and Betsey begun in a haughty triumphant tone,

“Woman’s speah—”

Which words and tone combined with recollections of the aged sufferer in the blue swallow tailed coat, so worked on my indignation, that I walked out of the house without listenin’ to another word, and put on my bunnet out in the door yard.

But I hollered back to her from the bars—for Josiah Allen’s wife haint one to desert duty in any crisis—“that the four youngest boys ought to be sweat, and take some saffern tea, and I should give the five girls, and the twins, some catnip, and I’d let the rest of ’em be, till the docter come.”

I haint seen Betsey since, for she is havin’ a hard time of it. She has to work like a dog. For Simon Slimpsey bein’ so poor, and not bein’ no calculator, it makes it hard for ’em to get along. And the old man seems to have lost what little energy he had, since he was married, Betsey is so hard on him. He has the horrors awfully. Betsey takes in work, but they have a hard time to get along. Miss Gowdey says that Betsey told her that she didn’t mind workin’ so hard, but she did hate to give up writin’ poetry, but she didn’t get no time for it. So as is generally the case, a great good to the world has come out of her sufferin’.

I guess she haint wrote but one piece sense she was married and they was wrote I suppose the day I ketched her with her teeth out, for they come out in the next week’s Gimlet, for just as quick as the Editor of the Auger was married, Betsey changed her politix and wrote agin as formally for the Gimlet.

The following are some of the verses she wrote:

I AM MARRIED NOW.A Him of Victory.BY MRS. BETSEY SLIMPSEYkneeBOBBET.Fate, I defy thee! I have vanquished thee, old maid.Dost ask why thus, this proud triumphant brow?I answer thee, old Fate, with loud and joyful burstOf blissful laughteh, I am married now!Once grief did rave about my lonely head;Once I did droop, as droops a drooping willow bough;Once I did tune my liah to doleful strains;’Tis past! ’tis past my soul! I am married now!Then, sneering, venomed darts pierced my lone, lone heart;Then, mocking married fingers dragged me low,But now I tune my liah to sweet extatic strains,My teahs have all been shed,Iam married now!No gossip lean can wound me by her speech,I, no humilitatin’ neveh more shall know;Sorrow, stand off! I am beyond thy ghastly reach,For Mrs. Betsey Slimpsey (formerly Bobbet) is married now!Oh, mournful past, when I in Ingun fileClimbed single life’s, bleak, rocky, mounten’s brow,Blest lot! that unto wedlock’s glorious gladeHath led me. Betsey’s married now!Oh female hearts with anxious longings stirred,Cry Ho! for wimmen’s speah, and seal it with a vow,Take Mrs. Betsey Bobbet Slimpsey’s wordThat thou shalt triumph!Iam married now!Yes, Betsey’s married! sweet to meditate upon it,To tune my happy liah with haughty, laughing browTo these sweet, glorious words, the burden of my sonnet,That Mrs. Betsey Bobbet Slimpsey’s married now!

I AM MARRIED NOW.

A Him of Victory.

BY MRS. BETSEY SLIMPSEYkneeBOBBET.

Fate, I defy thee! I have vanquished thee, old maid.Dost ask why thus, this proud triumphant brow?I answer thee, old Fate, with loud and joyful burstOf blissful laughteh, I am married now!

Fate, I defy thee! I have vanquished thee, old maid.

Dost ask why thus, this proud triumphant brow?

I answer thee, old Fate, with loud and joyful burst

Of blissful laughteh, I am married now!

Once grief did rave about my lonely head;Once I did droop, as droops a drooping willow bough;Once I did tune my liah to doleful strains;’Tis past! ’tis past my soul! I am married now!

Once grief did rave about my lonely head;

Once I did droop, as droops a drooping willow bough;

Once I did tune my liah to doleful strains;

’Tis past! ’tis past my soul! I am married now!

Then, sneering, venomed darts pierced my lone, lone heart;Then, mocking married fingers dragged me low,But now I tune my liah to sweet extatic strains,My teahs have all been shed,Iam married now!

Then, sneering, venomed darts pierced my lone, lone heart;

Then, mocking married fingers dragged me low,

But now I tune my liah to sweet extatic strains,

My teahs have all been shed,Iam married now!

No gossip lean can wound me by her speech,I, no humilitatin’ neveh more shall know;Sorrow, stand off! I am beyond thy ghastly reach,For Mrs. Betsey Slimpsey (formerly Bobbet) is married now!

No gossip lean can wound me by her speech,

I, no humilitatin’ neveh more shall know;

Sorrow, stand off! I am beyond thy ghastly reach,

For Mrs. Betsey Slimpsey (formerly Bobbet) is married now!

Oh, mournful past, when I in Ingun fileClimbed single life’s, bleak, rocky, mounten’s brow,Blest lot! that unto wedlock’s glorious gladeHath led me. Betsey’s married now!

Oh, mournful past, when I in Ingun file

Climbed single life’s, bleak, rocky, mounten’s brow,

Blest lot! that unto wedlock’s glorious glade

Hath led me. Betsey’s married now!

Oh female hearts with anxious longings stirred,Cry Ho! for wimmen’s speah, and seal it with a vow,Take Mrs. Betsey Bobbet Slimpsey’s wordThat thou shalt triumph!Iam married now!

Oh female hearts with anxious longings stirred,

Cry Ho! for wimmen’s speah, and seal it with a vow,

Take Mrs. Betsey Bobbet Slimpsey’s word

That thou shalt triumph!Iam married now!

Yes, Betsey’s married! sweet to meditate upon it,To tune my happy liah with haughty, laughing browTo these sweet, glorious words, the burden of my sonnet,That Mrs. Betsey Bobbet Slimpsey’s married now!

Yes, Betsey’s married! sweet to meditate upon it,

To tune my happy liah with haughty, laughing brow

To these sweet, glorious words, the burden of my sonnet,

That Mrs. Betsey Bobbet Slimpsey’s married now!

When the news come to me that Horace Greely was dead I almost cried. The tears did just run down my face like rain-water, I don’t know when I have come nearer cryin’ than I did then. And my first thought was, they have tried awful hard to keep him out of the White House, but he has got into one whiter than any they have got in Washington, D. C. And then my very next thought was, Josiah Allen’s wife did you say anything to hurt that man’s feelin’s, when you was a tryin’ to influence him on your tower?

I believe if folks would only realize how every harsh word, and cold look they stab lovin’ hearts with, would just turn round like bayonets, and pierce their own heart in a time like this—they would be more careful how they handled ’em. But glad enough was I to think that I didn’t say a hard word to him, but had freed my mind, and told him jest how good Ithought he was, and how much he had done for the Black African, and the Human Race, before it was too late. Glad enough was I that I didn’t wait till that noble heart was cold and lifeless, and couldn’t be pained by unkindness, or made gladder by sympathy, before I gin him mine.

But in the time of trouble, the love that had been his best reward for all the successes of his hard workin’ life, had gone from him. And I know jest how that great heart ached for that love and sympathy. I know jest how poor the praise of the world would have looked to him, if he couldn’t have seen it a shinin’ through them lovin’ eyes—and how hard it was for him to bear its blame alone. Tired out, defeated the world called him, but he only had to fold his hands, and shet his eyes up and he was crowned with success in that world where He, who was once rejected by a majority, crowned with thorns of earthly defeat waits now to give the crown of Eternal Repose to all true souls, all the weary warriors on life’s battle field who give their lives for the right. And it seemed so kinder beautiful too, to think that before she he loved so, hardly had time to feel strange in them a “many mansions,” he was with her agin, and they could keep house together all through Eternity.

Yet,—though as I say, I don’t know when I have come so near cryin’ as I did then—I said to myself as I wiped my eyes on my apron, I wouldn’t call himback from that happy rest he had earnt so well if I could.

But there are other things that are worrysome to me, and make me a sight of trouble. It was a day or 2 after this, and I was settin’ alone, for Josiah had gone to mill, and Thomas Jefferson and Maggy Snow and Tirzah Ann and Whitfield Minkley had gone a slay ridin’, (them two affairs is in a flourishin’ condition and it isveryaggreeable to Josiah and me, though I make no matches, nor break none—or that is, I don’t make none, only by talkin’ in a encouragin’ manner, nor break none only with thoroughwert in a mild way).

I sot all alone, a cuttin’ carpet rags, and a musin’ sadly. Victory in jail! And though I felt that she richly deserved it, and I should liked to have shut her up myself in our suller way, for darin’ to slander Beecher, still to me who knows her sect so well, it seemed kinder hard that a woman should be where she couldn’t go a visatin’. And then to think the good talkin’ to, I give her when I was on my tower hadn’t ammounted to nothin’, seemin’ly. I wasn’t sorry I had labored with her—not a mite, I had did my duty anyway. And I knew jest as well as I know that my name was formally Smith, that when anybody is a workin’ in the Cause of Right, they hadn’t ought to be discouraged if they didn’t get their pay down, for you can’t sow your seeds and pick your posysthe same day anyway. And I know that great idees was enough sight harder to get rooted and a growin’ than the Century plant, and that takes a hundred years for it to blow out.

I know all this, but human nater gets kinder tired a waitin’, and there seems no end to the snows that lay between us and that summer that all earnest souls are a workin’ for. And then I want my sect to do right,—I want ’em to be real respectable, and I felt that take Victory all together she wasn’t a orniment to it. I thought of my sect, and then I thought of Victory, and then I sithed. Beecher a bein’ lied about, Tilton ditto and the same, for you seeIdon’t nor won’t believe what Victory says against ’em, although they don’t come out and deny the truth of it, either of ’em, just to satisfy some folks who say that they ought to. Miss Anthony havin’ a hard tussle of it at Rochester.

Whitfield Minkley had told me too that day that Miss Aster didn’t keep tavern herself, and there I had had all my trouble about her for nothin’, demeanin’ myself by offerin’ to wash dishes for—I know not who. And to think that Jonothan Beans’es ex-wife should have deceived me so, when I befriended her so much when she first went to grass. And then when I thought how all the good advice I had given Victory hadn’t done her no good, and how Mr. Greely had died, before the seeds I sowed in hisbosom on the great question of Wimmen’s Rights had sprouted and brought forth fruit, when I see my tower had been in vain, say nothin’ of the money it cost, oh! how holler the world looked to me, it almost seemed as if it would break in and let me through, rockin’ chair and all.

As I sot there a mewsin’ over it, and a cuttin’ my rags, I almost made up my mind that I would have the dark stripe in my carpet black as a coal, the whole on it, a sort of mournin’ stripe. But better feelin’s got up inside of my mind, and I felt that I would put in my but’nut color rather than waste it.

Yet oh how holler and onstiddy everything looked to me; who could I trust, whose apron string could I cling to, without expectin’ it would break off short with me? For pretty nigh 2 minutes and a half I had the horrors almost as bad as Simon Slimpsey, (he has ’em now every day stiddy, Betsey is so hard on him), but oh how sweetly in that solemn time there came to me the thought of Josiah. Yes, on that worrysome time I can truly say that Josiah Allen was my theme, and I thought to myself, there may be handsomer men than he is, and men that weigh more by the steelyards, but there hain’t one to be found that has heftier morals, or more well seasoned principles than he has. Yes, Josiah Allen wasmy theme, I felt that I could trust my Josiah. I guess I had got mewsin’ agin on jails and wickedness, and so 4th, for all of a sudden the thought knocked aginst my heart,

“What if Josiah Allen should go to cuttin’ up, and behavin’?”

I wouldn’t let the thought in, I ordered it out. But it kep’ a hangin’ round,—

“What if your Josiah should go to cuttin’ up?”

I argued with it; says I to myself, I guess I know Josiah Allen, a likelier man never trod shoe leather. I know him like a book.

But then thinks’es I—what strange critters men and wimmin be. Now you may live with one for years, and think you know every crook and turn in that critter’s mind, jest like a book; when lo! and behold! all of a sudden a leaf will be turned over, that had been glued together by some circumstance or other, and there will be readin’ that you never set eyes on before. Sometimes it is in an unknown tongue—sometimes it is good readin’, and then again, it is bad. Oh how gloomy and depressted I was. But Josiah Allen’s wife haint one to give up to the horrers without a tussle, and though inwardly so tosted about, I rose up and with a brow of calm, I sot my basket of carpet rags behind the door, and quietly put on the tea-kettle, for it was about time for Josiah to come.

Then I looked round to see if there was anything I could do to make it look more pleasant than it did for Josiah Allen when he came home cold and tired from the Jonesville mill. It never was my way to stand stun still in the middle of the floor and smile at him from half to three-quarters of an hour. Yet it was always my idee that if a woman can’t make home the pleasantest spot in the world for her husband, she needn’t complain if he won’t stay there any more than he can help. I believe there wouldn’t be so many men a meanderin’ off nights into grog shops, and all sorts of wickedness, if they had a bright home and a cheerful companion to draw ’em back, (not but what men have to be corrected occasionally, I have to correct Josiah every little while.) But good land! It is all I can do to get Josiah Allen and Thomas Jefferson out of the house long enough to mop.

I looked round the room, as I said, but not a thing did I see that I could alter for the better; it was slick as a pin. The painted floor was a shinin’ like yaller glass, (I had mopped jest before dinner.) The braided mats, mostly red and green, was a layin’ smooth and clean in front of the looking-glass, and before the stove, and table. Two or three pictures, that Thomas Jefferson had framed, hung up aginst the wall, which was papered with a light colored buff ground work with a red rose on it. The lounge and two or threerockin’ chairs was cushioned with handsome copper plate. And Tirzah Ann had got a hangin’ basket of ivy on the west winder that made that winder look like summer. I’ll bet her canary hangin’ there in the thickest of the green leaves, thought it was summer, he sang like it. The stove hearth shone like a silver dollar, and there was a bright fire, and in a minute the tea-kettle began to sing most as loud as Whitey, that is her canary’s name. (I mistrust she named it in that kinder underhanded way, after Whitfield Minkley—though I never let her know I mistrusted it, but I never could think of any other earthly reason why she should call it Whitey, for it is as yaller as any goslin’ I ever laid eyes on.)

I felt that I couldn’t alter a thing round the house for the better. But as I happened to glance up into the lookin’-glass, I see that although I looked well, my hair was slick and I had on a clean gingham dress, my brown and black plaid, still I felt that if I should pin on one of Tirzah Ann’s bows that lay on the little shelf under the lookin’-glass I might look more cheerful and pleasant in the eyes of my companion Josiah. I haint made a practice of wearin’ bows sense I jined the meetin’-house. And then agin I felt that I was too old to wear ’em. Not that I felt bad about growin’ old. If it was best for us to have summer all the year round, I know we should have it. As I have said to JosiahAllen more’n once when he got kinder doun hearted, says I, Josiah Allen look up where the stars are shinin’ and tell me if you think that with all them countless worlds, with all that wealth in His hands, and His lovin’ heart, the Lord begruches anything that is for His children’s good. No! I am willin’ to take God’s year as it comes, summer and winter.

And then do you s’pose I would if I could by turning my hand over, go back into my youth agin, and leave Josiah part way down hill alone? No! the sunshine and the mornin’ are on the other side of the hill, and we are goin’ down into the shadders, my pardner Josiah and me. But we will go like Mr. and Mrs. Joseph John, that Tirzah Ann sings about—

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