D
DEAR SISTERS:—You know, or can guess, at the anxious state of mind in which a sensitive female-woman must have found her experiences since the great Grand Duke left this country. I am told that the Imperial Court of Russia is hard to please in the way of marrying its sons—that nobility is not considered enough, and nothing but the child of an emperor or of a king will satisfy the pride of Czar Alexander.
But emperors are not to be found, like huckleberries, in the woods, and those among them that have lots and lots of children can't always find mates ready cut-out and made-up for all of them in the very uppermost crust of all the world.
When emperors are scarce, and imperial children plentiful, is it strange that some of them should be sent to a free country, where the highest royalty in all the world is to be found waiting for orders.
Republics have but one kingly order, that of individual genius, which ranks above kings all over the world, and is aspired to by queens, whenever a queen is gifted with superior ambition, as little Victoria Guelph was when she wrote her book of travels, and the life of her first-class husband.
That which a queen hankers after, the son of an emperor may be glad to mate himself with. Is it wonderful, then, that aGrand Duke of all the Russias should aspire to the first feminine genius of a free land, and to a certain modest extent receive encouragement from her?
A union between an archduke and the first lady writer of this country—excuse me, but truth is stranger than fiction—was a consummation that you as a Society ought to expect, and this nation, in its administrative capacity, ought to have insisted upon. If an aspiring and unprotected female cannot receive the support of her own Government, where can she go for it.
Sisters, this union between Sprucehill and Russia is a great national question, which ought to have agitated this country from the shores of the two oceans, the Mississippi and Rocky Mountains inclusive.
There has been considerable of an internal rumbling sort of a convulsion, earthquaky and threatening, in various sections, which ought to have given timely warning of what the true national feeling was; but somehow Russia don't seem to understand it, and I'm beginning to think that there is secret treason here at home—deep, double-dyed treason—of which your missionary is the object.
It is a shameful fact that the Government has taken no sort of interest in an engagement which would have linked the two great social centres of Russia and Sprucehill in a close and loving union.
From the day my Alexis had an interview with President Grant my heart-history has been allowed to drag like a lazy funeral train. Before, all was bright and luminous, with beautiful aspirations; but from that time suspense has coiled around me, hope has flared up, blinked, and almost died out. I did not understand it then. It seemed to me that fickleness was in the heart of the great Grand Duke.
But I did him a cruel injustice. If our two hearts and destinies are severed, it has been by the underground machinations of this Administration. General Grant saw what was going on, and has cruelly circumvented two young and unsophisticatedhearts that were knitting together, like ivy round an oak sapling.
I am determined on it. The country shall hear of my wrongs. Sprucehill shall have redress for the insult put upon her favorite daughter. In all that General Grant has done in the way of omission, nothing approaches the inactivity which has wrung my heart, as wet blankets are twisted in the strong hands of a washerwoman.
Hehas not written me a line. His letters must have been interrupted. Evil machinations have been at work. The Government detectives are everywhere scattering slanders and distrust. I shouldn't wonder a bit if they have been to our old homestead on Sprucehill, mousing among church registers, and interviewing family physicians. Well, let them. Since I learned to write, some figures have been changed in the old Family Bible, and, thank goodness! old Doctor Perry is dead. The keenest detective won't find much difference between 1830 and 1850. It only requires that the curve of the three should be rubbed out, and a dash sharpened to a point added. If they look for eighteen hundred and thirty there, I can tell them it isn't to be found. Let them search—that's all!
This was my state of mind three days ago. Now I am revivified with extra animation. Hope has perched on my white hat and sits there waving its feather like a pennant.
I am glad from the bottom of my heart that I didn't follow the duke across the ocean. After all a duke is only a man, hard to catch and expensive to cage. Why should we trouble ourselves about princes and dukes and lords, when we have the most genuine of all manly articles right under our feet. Dukes are scarce and hard to scare up, but there are as good fish in the sea as ever came out of it. That's my motto to-day.
S
SISTERS:—the atmosphere of Long Branch is propitious, not to say exhilarating, for close by this half-mile of a hotel is another, crowded full at this time of the year, in which we can hear fiddling and dancing every night of the week. The hotels at watering-places are celebrated for several things, particularly low ceilings, widows, youngish ladies, and girls like our Cecilia, who wonder every day of their lives how their mothers ever got along decently till they were born to tell them how.
Well, the most enterprising of these hotel accompaniments are the widows. Their superior advantages of experience is just overpowering, and these advantages are used with unscrupulous freedom. I say this with feeling, being one of the class that suffers from such unwarrantable competition.
A widow was in the hotel I have spoken of. Yes, what might be called two widows rolled into one, for she had put two husbands into their little beds, and tucked in the sods comfortably before she came to Long Branch in search of a third.
Sisters, she found him; her little traps and lines and baits had been all out to no sort of purpose for three or four weeks. She danced in the parlor, exhibited all the lines of a plumptitudinous figure at the bowling alley, which is a place I never saw, but have heard about; walked on the beach with a Leghorn hat on, curled up at the ears, and in front too, and Japanese umbrella, brown outside and yellow in the interior, which looked as if she had lots of money and meant to put it on the market with a dash.
There was a great deal said about this widow. Some observed that she was handsome. Some said she wasn't—mostly ladies. Some observed how graceful she was, at whichothers smiled and shook their heads. One person persisted in it that she was awful rich—two or three hundred thousand dollars, at least. Then that was contradicted. Forty thousand was more than any one could prove she had. Others persisted that her wealth, like her virtues, was unlimited. In fact, being a widow, she made the best of it and let people talk, minding her snares and traps and things all the same.
Last week a strange man came to that hotel. It was Saturday morning, and the first object that his eyes fell upon at breakfast was this widow, without the sign of a cap, and with a long curl straggling down to one shoulder, very fluffy and enticing. He looked at the curl; then his eyes wandered up to the widow's face. That face had smiled through a couple of matrimonial campaigns, and received the first battery of admiring eyes with a sweet, downcast look, innocent as blanc-mange. Then she lifted her eyes with slow modesty, and glanced wonderingly at her admirer, as if she were sort of bewildered by his looking so much that way.
The stranger did not smile, but a light came over his face when he caught that childlike glance. Then both these innocent creatures fell to eating. Then he happened to look up again. So did she—a romantic coincidence that sort of affinitized them to a great extent, before anybody saw what was going on.
After breakfast the stranger hunted up some one who knew him and the widow also. An introduction brought the two halves of that pair of scissors together, and the blades fitted beautifully. All they wanted was the rivet. But wait.
At twelve o'clock that day the stranger ventured to ask a favor. Would the widow give him a little music?
The widow said she would. The sweetness of a whole boiling of maple sugar was in her smile as she sat down by the parlor piano, and sent her two little hands fluttering over it like a pair of white pigeons with love-letters under their wings.
The widow flew her fingers; the widow looked at the strangerfrom under her eyelashes, and her voice thrilled through him till he began to think of magnolias and mocking-birds and other ornamental things which soften a man's feelings down to the fluffiness of a feather bed.
When she had done singing, he asked her to walk with him on the beach. She gave another slow lift of her eyelashes, said she would, and ran upstairs after the Leghorn and the Japanese umbrella, brown and yellow, with as many bones in it as the first April shad.
They walked the beach up and down, she leaning heavier and heavier on his arm at each turn. Then they sat down on the sand with their faces to the sea, and held the umbrella so as to shade off the people on the bank—they didn't care for the sun a bit—and in that condition they sat and talked and talked and talked.
By and by he got up from the sand. She lifted her eyes with a pitiful look of helplessness. He reached out his hand, and she rose to it gracefully, like a trout to a fly. The hand clung to his more than a minute after she got up—the sand was so uneven, you see. The stranger bore this with Christian fortitude, and really seemed as if he rather liked it. In fact, he encouraged her to hold on; and she did, with her sweet widowed face lifted to his just long enough to set his heart off like a windmill, when she dropped it again.
When they came up the flight of wooden steps that leads down from the bank, both her white hands were clasped over his arm as loving as the soft paws of a kitten, and he looked like a fellow that had been out shooting doves, and had come in with his net full.
They went in to lunch, and ate spring chickens; then they ended off with silly-bubs, which is a sweet froth that melts to nothing on the tongue—delicious, but not exactly hearty food.
Two hours after lunch, the stranger asked the widow to ride out with him; which she did, in the puffiest and silkiest of dresses, and with a lace parasol, lined with pink, between her and the sun. This was one of her snares, for she depended onthat pink lining for her blushes, having left them a good way behind her somewhere about the first wedding.
The drive was paradisical. They talked, they smiled, they said the loveliest little things to each other with delicious reciprocity. He drove, and divided his manly attentions between her and the horses, giving her a generous share, which was creditable to him as a man.
It was nearly twelve o'clock that night when those two people went up to their neglected couches—nothing but a widow would have stood the shock of such impropriety among the critical of her sex; but she didn't care a mite.
Early the next morning, which was Sunday, these two persons were seen coming out of the little cubby-houses under the beach in the queerest sort of dresses—I cannot describe them, because, up to this time, beach flirtations have been forbidden subjects with me.
But they came out on the beach, clasped hands, and walked right into the biggest waves they could find.
What she said to him there I cannot tell, but by and by they came back to the hotel, the sneakiest-looking creatures you ever set your two eyes on.
I don't know when it was that she brought him to the point, but the widow had netted him so close that he didn't even try to flounder.
That night there was sacred music in the hotel parlor, and, somehow, a minister of the Gospel dropped in, with a white cravat on, and waited for something, looking as if butter wouldn't melt in his mouth.
He hadn't been there long before the strange gentleman came in with a swallow-tailed coat on, a white vest and cravat, with ball-gloves on his hands.
Hanging on to his arm was that widow, in a long, white dress, that streamed after her in windrows, and with a shower of lace falling over her.
The minister got up, and opened his book. The people hanging about hushed their talk, and in less than ten minutesa third gold ring was chucked over the other two that weighed down the widow's finger, and she walked off with number three as proud as a white peacock.
It took this widow just two days and part of a night to spring her traps and draw her hooks—but, then, she was a widow.
Sisters, there is a good deal of commotion in our hotel just now. Rural single ladies talk of going over to the other place.
I had a little hankering in that direction at first, but, come to think it over, mean to stay where I am. It isn't the house that has done this, but the bland atmosphere of Long Branch. If that sort of thing is indigenous to the place—and I mean to test it thoroughly—Russia is welcome to the Grand Duke; a whole-souled American is good enough for me. Besides, Russia is an awful cold place, and I don't think I ever could bring myself to eat cabbage-soup or the roe of a sturgeon.
Sisters, if this sort of thing lies in the atmosphere, don't you think it would be a good thing for the whole Society to come down here next summer? A generous diffusion of masculine energy into the course might be a desirable change. For my part, I don't mean to leave this place till frost comes. I believe this thing is going to be an epidemic at the Branch, and when contagions rage I am sure to catch any disease that is going. I have had the measles twice, and two pretty severe tugs with the scarlet-fever. In fact, I was celebrated, as a child, for catching double. One thing is certain—I never ran away because a disease was catching, and I'm not going to do it here. On the contrary, I am making over one of my old alpaca skirts into a bathing-dress. If I know myself I shall fight it out on that line, if it takes all winter.
D
DEAR SISTERS:—I have gone and done it! Now let me give you a little wholesome advice. It comes out of my superior knowledge of the world, and experience of the human heart. Never say that you won't do a thing, because if you do, just as sure as you live it is the very thing that you are sure to plunge into, whether you want to or not. Besides, people who know enough to doubt themselves, understand that men and women are made up principally of human nature. Now human nature is a great fraud, and isn't to be trusted when he's found in the interior of your own heart, or anywhere else.
In one of my reports, I expressed myself as shocked out of a year's growth, when I heard about gentlemen and ladies going into the salt-sea waves together, and submerging themselves like mermaids in the swell and foam of the ocean. I said, in the heat and glow of modest feminine shrinkitiveness, that nothing on earth, or in the water, should induce me to do it; but circumstances alter cases, and the capacity of eternal change is the essence of genius, which is always making new combinations and discarding old prejudices.
I say it with reluctance, but truth demands frankness. Sometimes I am a little hasty in my conclusions.
Have I said enough—need I go on to explain that the result of a thing proves its propriety?
Now, bathing in company, in the abstract, does seem—well, peculiar. I might add other words which at one time came uppermost in my mind; but, looking toward results, I feel constrained to say nothing on the social aspect of multitudinous ablutions, but go into the high moral question which has slowly presented itself to my understanding.
Isn't there a passage of Scripture somewhere that speaksabout "fishers of men"? I think there is, and I am inclined to see that kind of business from a high moral stand-point. If men are to be legally caught with a dripping dress and an old straw hat for bait, who shall say that the thing is wrong? If men are told to go down to the sea in ships, what should prevent a female woman from going down in a four-cornered straw hat, a flannel tunic, and—well, pantalettes on? Everything depends on the point of view from which one sees a thing.
As a marine picture, salt-sea waves rushing in upon a sandy beach can hardly be considered complete without throwing a little life into the foreground; but when that life is composed of a flock of old straw hats, and a lot of staggery, blinded, dripping people under them, I can't say that I hanker after this particular marine view.
From an artistic stand-point then I reject the whole subject; but as the means of catching a heart afloat, that same picture offers numerous facilities.
Well, sisters, as a social institution I no longer sneer at sea-bath flirtations. When two days of them end in matrimony, it isn't worth while to fight out the question on that line any longer. I give in.
Such engagements may be unstable as water, but a damp engagement is better than none at all.
With these sentiments, I finished off my bathing-dress, and put a red ribbon over a high-crowned, square-brimmed hat, coarse and clumsy, which was to keep my face from the sun, and my flowing tresses from the briny ocean waves.
Early in the morning I went out into the veranda, and took a survey of the ocean—the broad infinite expanse of waters into which I was about to plunge in search of—well, health.
In front of the veranda, on the high bank, was a pole, like the liberty-poles we run up on almost every village green of New England. On that pole a pale yellow flag was flying.
A chill ran over me, and I know that my arms must have been roughened like a grater.
"The yellow-fever." I knew it was in the harbor, shut up there by the authorities. Had it escaped through Sandy Hook, and come poisoning the waters along shore? Now that I was ready for the first plunge, were my best hopes to be frustrated? Had I sat up all night sewing red braid on that tunic, and those—well, Turkish pantalettes, for nothing? Had I conquered a great New England prejudice, to be conquered myself by careless health officers? Why hadn't they taken an example by some of the old stock, and divided the whole thing among them in perquisites? I only wish they had.
Sisters, it was a keen disappointment. I was looking at that yellow flag, with tears in my eyes, when Cousin E. E. came on to the veranda.
"Come, Phœmie," says she, bright as a May morning, "where is the new bathing-dress? It will be splendid bathing!"
I looked at her, I looked at the ocean and at the path that led down to the beach, along which half a dozen real nice-looking gentlemen were picking their steps like rabbits toward a sweet-apple trap. It was tantalizing.
"Yes," says she, as contented as a lamb, "it will be lovely bathing this morning; I mean to try it."
"Try it," says I; "haven't you read that yellow-fever is in the harbor?"
"Well, what then?" says she. "It won't hurt us."
"Won't hurt us," says I. "Did you ever hear of poison getting into water that could be washed out? No, if it is in the harbor, some of it will drift down here. Look, you can see it sweltering in the waves now."
She looked out on the ocean, where a faint yellow tinge rippled and shone with treacherous temptatiousness.
"Oh, that is only the sunshine," says she.
"But the fever," says I, "I know it is in the harbor, for the newspapers said so. They have run up the yellow flag wherever it is to be found. See there."
Cousin E. E. sat down and dropped both hands in her lap.
"Cousin Phœmie," says she, "I really don't know whether you are a real genius or the greatest goose that ever lived. You are just a puzzle to me. Who ever heard of yellow-fever in the water?"
"I have," says I, "in the harbor, and isn't the harbor all water?"
"Yes," says she, "that is true."
"Then, isn't it dangerous to bathe in that water, and don't that flag give us warning not to do it?"
"Cousin," says she; "as I said before, you know too much for common ideas to make an impression. Now do try to understand. There is one ship in the harbor that has yellow-fever on board—that is all. It will not be allowed to spread from that one ship."
"Oh," says I, drawing a deep breath, "then it has not poisoned the water."
"Not at all."
"But the yellow flag?"
"That means good bathing, and plenty of it. Come along. Don't you see people crowding down to the shore?"
I
IRAN into my room, and came out with a bundle in one hand and a coarse straw hat in the other. That group of gentlemen was just dropping down the bank out of sight, and after them went a crowd of girls, with their parasols flaming in the sun like a bed of poppies.
"Come," says I, all joyful animation, "I am dying to begin."
E. E. spread her parasol, and off we marched.
We came to the steep bank, and went down a flight of wooden stairs to the sandy shore. Right under the bank was a long row of cubby-houses, made of boards.
"This is ours," says E. E., "come in."
I went in. Sisters, what happened in the privacy of that board sanctuary, is not for the public—let this satisfy the curious.
Two ladies went into that little retreat, with bunched-up skirts, beehive bonnets, and a general assortment of dry-goods, such as weighs down the ladies of the present generation to an extent that approaches martyrdom.
Two persons came out skimped down into nothingness. They had grown tall and slim, not to say spooky. There was a deficiency of glossy ringlets under the two hats that squared off in front and behind, and were flapped down over each ear.
E. E.'s plumptitudinous figure was mostly lost and gone, and I—well, I felt like a church steeple on a very high hill. I say nothing, the subject being one of great delicacy; but from my experience in those Turkish—well, pantalettes—the female that begrudges her husband that class of garments, must hanker after change more than I do. When I came out of the little house, Dempster stood on the sand with a pair—well, of garments like mine, only more so, on, and a flaming red upper garment, bright enough to set the waves on fire, covering his broad bosom.
Another gentleman stood near him—blue and brown in his sea-outfit, youngish, and with eyes that made me wilt like a poppy the moment they fell upon me.
My goodness, how I did feel in that dress! It was all I could do to keep from kind of scrouching down to hide my bare feet; but it was of no use, so I dug them deep into the sand, and felt myself blushing all over, while that gentleman in blue fixed his eyes upon them.
Anyway, there was nothing to be so mightily timorous about, for, according to my calculation, two smaller or whiter feet didn't leave their prints in the sand that day, though I do make that assertion with my own lips, that ought to be mute.
Cousin Dempster came forward, took both E. E. and my trembling self by the hand, and led us to the water.
I took one glance: a swarm of straw hats, a crowd of men, women, and children were floundering, swimming, screaming, laughing, tumbling through the waves, that lifted them up, flung them down, pitched them forward, and behaved in a way that no well-bred ocean would have thought of doing.
I shrank—I shivered—the heart seemed to die in my agitated bosom when the first wave kissed my feet; I gave a little scream, but checked myself bravely. The waves were full of men, some of them were looking at me.
I determined to act bravely, and be the heroine of the occasion. I let go of Dempster's hand. A wave struck me, my head went down and my feet went up. In my fright and anguish I remembered their size and whiteness, and found consolation in the thought while I strove to right myself.
It was in vain; while I staggered with one big wave, another took me unawares, like a thief in the night, and dragged me under, like a wild beast growling over some poor helpless lamb—it tore me away. I shrieked—I plunged—I fought madly for my life. Up through the vivid green of the waters the sunshine came toward me like light upon beaming emeralds. I clutched at it. I tried to scream; but my mouth filled with water, green flashes shot through and through my eyes. I began to pray. The Green Mountains, the farm, and all my life there shot through my brain; things I had forgotten came uppermost, and those thoughts grew pleasant while the waters seemed roaring me to sleep.
Something came toward me, bluish. Was it a monster of the deep hungry for the life that was so fast dying out?
It seized me. I was born upward on a great wave, and swept off into the light. The claws of some monster, or the arms of some friend, held me close. Which was it?
Some power of good or evil, beastly or human, had dragged me into the sand, where white foam curled around me, and the sun struck down upon my eyes like fire.
Some man was thanking another for a great favor; a crowd of people came swarming around me. I attempted to open my eyes, but the water dripping down from my hair came into them sharp and salt.
"Is she sick? Is she afraid? Do tell who it is?"
These questions came from women who had rushed up from the waters, and flocked around me like mermaids. I did not care about them, but by and by it came to me that men might be there as well. I lifted my hand, swept the wet hair back from my face, and, with a smarting pain in my eyes, saw my deliverer.
His blue garments were black with dripping water, the thick hair streamed over his forehead, his bare feet looked hard and powerful on the sand. It was the man under whose admiring eyes I had blushed and trembled.
"My preserver!" said I, clasping my wet fingers in an ecstasy of gratitude; "shall I ever live to thank you for the poor life you have saved?"
He smiled, he shook his head; I am afraid he laughed, such was his joy and exultation; yet the modesty of true greatness possessed him still.
"It is nothing," he said. "A wave knocked you head-foremost—that was all."
I knew better. It was the inherent greatness of a noble soul that impelled him to make nothing of his own heroic act. He must have supported me miles on miles in those stalwart arms. No protest of his could lessen the bravery of his action or the force of my gratitude. If woman's gratitude and woman's love are anything, his reward shall be great.
They bore me into that weather-beaten cubby-house, and there, with the help of E. E., my dripping garments were taken off, my wet hair done up snugly under the braids that had been left behind, and, filled with tender gratitude, I walked up to my hero in blue before going to my apartment in the hotel.
"Let me see you to-morrow," said I, pressing the hand ofthat heroic man. "Then I may find language to express my life-long gratitude."
He bowed; he drew his hand, with evident reluctance, from my clasp, and retreated.
Ah, sisters, my destiny has come! I feel it in every breath I draw, in every sweet thought that haunts my brain. To-morrow I shall see him again. To-morrow!
Oh, sisters, he has just left me. Alas! alas! for human aspirations. I had written thus far when he came.
I received him in my room, looking pale, and, I think, interesting, for the sweet romance of my feelings left its imprint on my features. He came in with hesitation, and sat down on the edge of his chair, looking ill at ease, as if wishing to escape a mention of his own heroism. I felt a glow of admiration, a thrill of tender gratitude.
"You have saved my life," I said, clasping my two hands, "and from this hour I devote that life to your happiness. Tell me how I can begin to repay you."
He sat uneasily; he shifted in his chair. Then he murmured:
"Anything you please; I never thought of asking. It was only my duty."
"Heroic man!" I exclaimed; "and brave as modest. It is my pleasure to be more than grateful. Never, never can I repay you save with the warmest and sweetest emotions of a woman's heart. I owe you—ah, how much—how much!"
My hands were clasped, my eyes were uplifted; emotion prevented me finishing my sentence. He spoke, while my soul halted for words—
"Well, if you think so much of just helping you out of the way of a seaward wave, supposing we say five dollars. It is my duty, as bathing-master, to help people up from the sand when they get face downwards, as you did; but as you insist, I don't mind a fiver."
Oh, sisters!
D
DEAR SISTERS:—I really do think that Cousin Dempster is one of the best creatures that ever lived. He seems to understand all the wounds and pains that a female woman's heart is exposed to, and sort of eases them off, so that you are cheated out of half your natural suffering.
I cannot say that the bathing in the salt-sea waves was not a failure as a matrimonial speculation; but that is my luck. In some respects, the future to me is like a mirage—I put my hand out hopefully, and grasp nothing but fog.
That bathing-master was a fine-looking man until he opened his mouth and attempted to sit down on a chair. He created a pleasant delusion in my bosom for a few moments, and then—well, we will say nothing more about that—the private sanctuary of a female woman's thoughts are too sacred for a Report.
If I wept in the stillness of the night, no one but the angel that records broken love-dreams will ever know of it. With this precious angel I am in full sympathy. He has done too much of that kind of writing for me not to feel the cruel pangs of the long list of disappointments with which his books are blotted.
Well, I arose the next morning after my experimental bath, heavy-eyed, heavy-hearted, and altogether blue as indigo. Cousin Dempster saw this, and his generous heart seized upon a remedy.
"Let us go down to Pleasure Bay," says he. "What do you think of a day's crabbing?"
"Crabbing?" says I, "just as if I didn't feel crabbed enough already. Do you want me to keep it up all day?"
Dempster laughed; so did E. E.; just as if I'd said somethingawful funny, which I wasn't in the least conscious of, not having a spark of fun left in me since that salt-water deluge and its consequences.
"Oh," says he, as good-natured as pie, "there is nothing like Pleasure Bay when one has the blues—a lunch under the trees, and a boat before the breeze."
I stopped him; the dear, good fellow was launching off into poetry without knowing it; association with genins is doing everything with him. There is no knowing where he might have ended, if I hadn't lifted my forefinger, for a whole gust of poetry was riling up in his earthly nature like yeast in a baking of bread.
"I'll go to Pleasure Bay," says I, "but, for goodness sake, don't try that sort of thing again; genius isn't catching, and though you have married into our family, don't expect that it will spread like an epidemic into yours, because it won't."
"Why not?" says he; "is there nothing in association?"
"Well, I can't exactly decide," says I; "strange things do happen in that direction. I have heard of young women marrying literary men who never wrote a line worth reading before, who burst out into full-blown geniuses right in the honeymoon. But it is wonderful how much their style was like their husbands'. Of course, those must be cases of especial affinity. When a woman has ransacked a poor fellow's heart, she naturally begins to pillage his brain, and I reckon he must like it at first; but after that, he subsides into himself, and she subsides into herself, and somehow she writes just as she did before, and so does he!"
"Then there are plenty of young ladies who carry their ambition and their flirtations in among the newspaper people and stray Bohemians," says E. E., kindling up to the subject; "for every time they get into a new flirtation, which is once in about three months, their style changes, giving them a wonderful versatility of talent that, somehow, dies out after awhile, as she grows old and homely."
"That is," says Dempster, laughing, "every time a literarylady of this stamp changes her lover, she changes her style, too."
"Exactly," answers E. E., "and where she hasn't any good-natured lover she retires into modest privacy till one comes along."
I just listened, holding my breath.
"What," says I, "does fraud and deception creep into the sacred literature of our country? I cannot believe it."
"Can't you?" says E. E.; "but you have never been in Bohemia."
"No," says I, "that is a part of Europe that I hope to visit, but never have. Is it a popular place for Americans?"
"Oh, wonderfully popular, for people who dash off things here and there, write for this and that, and are willing to give half that they earn and know to any adventurer that comes along, free gratis for nothing; or, on occasion, sell reputation by the line, and for a price. Oh, Bohemia is a splendid place for adventurers and adventuresses to forage in!"
"What!" says I, "genius sell itself?"
"Yes," says she, "and its readers, too."
"Cousin E. E.," says I, "you slander the grandest, the purest, the most sublime people on the earth."
"Do I?" says she, nodding her head and laughing. "Wait and see."
"Remember—you are speaking of authors, the first and purest aristocracy known to our free nation."
"No; I speak of would-be authors—guerillas in literature—men and women of erratic ability, who adore inspiration and scorn work; for authorship, I am told, and believe, requires the hardest work of any calling in the world."
"I'm afraid it does," said I, drawing a long breath, "but then such work brings its own prompt payment. The power to write is happiness in itself."
"But what has this to do with Pleasure Bay?" says Dempster; "we mean to go there—not to Bohemia."
"Just so," says I, a-tying on my bonnet.
We got into Dempster's carriage, and after a delightful drive, we came down on the edge of a little bay, with green grass growing close down to the shore, and great, tall trees clumped here and there all around it.
I was so charmed with the scenery that I didn't realize where we were till the carriage stopped before a white house, with a long wooden stoop in front, when we got out and walked right away down to the shore, where a plank platform ran out from the land, and a cunning little boat, with white sails, lay dipping up and down like a duck in the water.
Sisters, I'm not timersome, but getting into a boat that rocks like a cradle in the water tries me, I must own to that. With what holding on and keeping your dress well down upon the ankles, one is seized with a sense of being awfully unsteady. This riles up the constitution to a state of dizziness that makes your ears buz like a bumblebee's nest.
I was thankful to get seated at last, and, tucking up my dress, prepared at once for a long sea-voyage. E. E. had slung a great straw gypsy hat on her arm, by the strings, when she left Long Branch, which she bent down over her head like an umbrella with herself for a handle; over that she spread a broad yellow parasol that blazed in the hot air like a great sunflower.
"Phœmie," says she, a-looking up from under her straw tent, "didn't you bring a flat?"
"No," says I; "the young fellows of that stamp didn't happen to be about when we started."
"Dear me! you'll burn your face up," says she; "that beehive is no protection."
"About as much as one of your York flats would be," says I. "But supposing I hoist my parasol, too—one don't need a beau for that."
The sun was pouring down like blazes, and I was mighty glad to spread my parasol, I can tell you; so I did it, and settled down on the same bench with E. E.
Dempster had been awful busy on shore, pulling out fish-lines, looking up nets that swung like a great hang-bird's nest, on the end of a pole: and now he was on his knees, hacking a fish into chunks, which he tied to a line and dropped into the bottom of the boat. At last he lifted his great straw hat, wiped the blazing warmth from his face, and jumped in.
O
OH, sisters! judge of my feelings, when directly after Dempster, came a splendid gentleman—a creature of romance, shaded from the vulgar gaze by a felt hat, and dressed like a mariner along-shore. He lifted his hat to me, and also to E. E.—with a lofty reservation in her case.
"Mr. Burke," says Dempster, with a degree of carelessness that, I am sorry to say, is characteristic—"he will teach you how to catch the creatures; for there is an art in it."
"Then I shall never succeed," says I, in a low, gentle tone of voice. "Where anything but pure nature is expected, I must always keep in the shade. You know, Cousin E. E., what an artless young thing I always was."
E. E. smiled—not at me but right up in the face of that strange gentleman. I declare, I never saw anything so bold in my life! But it was of no use; he came and sat down close to me. In fact, he took the parasol from my hand with a gallant air that made my heart beat like a partridge on a log. In one respect that movement wasn't an advantage: the parasol was not large enough to shade two, and he held it carelessly, as was natural to a dashing, splendid creature like him; but somehow the shade always fell on his side. I felt dreadfully certain that freckles were falling like split peas all over my face.Still he smiled so sweetly and looked so magnificent that, freckles or no freckles, I was ready to give him up my beehive, too, if he had only looked as if he wanted it.
Dear me, how that boat did heel up and rock as we went sailing off down to a green grassy point, where the gentleman told me the crabs swarmed like lady-bugs around a full-blown rose—pretty simliar, wasn't it, sisters, and so original?
I was dying to know what sort of a fish a crab was, never having seen any in our brooks. Were they like sun-fish, rainbowish and flat; or like trout, sparkled over with dripping jewels; or small and silvery, like shiners and pin-fish?
I did not like to ask that magnificent stranger about this, and let him believe that crabbing had been an amusement of my childhood up in the Green Mountains—not that I said so outright—but my idea of discretion is to say nothing of a thing you don't understand, but wait and find out. What is the good of telling the world how much you don't know?
Well, I hadn't the least idea what a crab was, but the name made me feel a little rily. The water was full of them; I was pretty sure to find out; so I waited.
By and by, Dempster flung a great stone co-slash into the water, and tied us up just below a little green point of land that took the sunshine in its long grass till it seemed full of drifting gold which spread out upon the water in soft, shiny ripples.
E. E. shut down her parasol. Mr. Burke shut mine. "Now," says he, "for the lines."
With this he took up a lump of raw fish, gave it a swing and a splash into the water, and handed me the other end. Dempster gave another line and a chunk of fish to his wife, and then took one of the hang-bird nets and stood by as if he meant to do business.
By and by I felt a sort of hungry nibbling at the end of my line, and gave it a jerk just as if it had been a brook trout, hard to catch.
"Oh, goodness!" I just dropped the line and screamed likeeverything, scared half to death. If ever an innocent female caught a claw-footed imp, I came near doing it then. Why the animal, varmint, double and twisted serpent—I don't know what to call it—clung to the bait till I hauled him clear out of the water, and then fell back with a big sprawl and an awful splash, sinking down again like a great mammoth spider that made the water bubble with disgust.
"What was it? What was it?" I said, turning my scared face on Mr. Burke. "What kind of young sea-devil is this?"
He laughed, and laid down the net he had just taken up.
"You pulled too quick," says he. "Crabs are like women."
"Like women," I shrieked. "What, those horrid things? Sir, I thank you!"
My voice shook so I could hardly get the words out with proper irony. A generous rage in behalf of my sex possessed me.
"You did not hear me out," says he, pleasant as a sweet apple. "I was going to say crabs were like women in this respect. They must be led along, enticed, persuaded up to the bait."
"Oh!" says I, "that is a sentiment I can appreciate, but the comparison is dreadful."
"There is hardly anything in nature which would not be dreadful compared to some females that I know of," says he.
I laid one hand on my bosom and bowed, but the next instant I felt one of those scraggly fiends pulling at my line, and I drew it softly in, hand-over-hand. Oh, how the beastly thing crept and crawled, and spread its scraggles as it nibbled and rose with the bait! I declare it made the flesh creep on my bones.
"That's right, draw gently—lure him up. Ho!"
As he spoke Mr. Burke just slid his net under the varmint, and flashed him up into the air, bait and all.
Sisters, there is no use in talking; if these creatures they call crabs ain't great salt-sea spiders, no such animals exist; and eels ain't fish, that's all.
Oh, I wish you could see them crawl up through the sea-grass and spread themselves. I declare it is just awful.
Well, down went this crab—which they all gloried in, being a great big gridiron of a fellow—into a hole in one end of the boat, and out went my bait after another.
At one great pull I brought up two wapping big fellows at a time, and trolled them on while Mr. Burke scooped them up. Chasing dragon flies in the old times was nothing to it.
E. E. was busy as a bee on her side of the boat, Dempster ladled the animals up for her, till we had a couple of dozen trying to creep away, and fighting each other like chickens in a coop.
By this time I could see that E. E., like a good many other people I could mention, was getting sort of restless for other attentions than those her husband could give. She kept casting side-glances at Mr. Burke, and at last says she to Dempster:
"Dempster, it isn't expected that a man should always be a-hanging about his wife. It's time for you to do some netting for Phœmie."
E. E. said this almost in a whisper, but I heard it, and all the temper in me riled up to my throat.
Sisters, this married woman was just dying to change off her husband for the beau that was devoting all his energies to me. I felt that the crisis had come that self-interest and a high moral standard demanded that I should keep this man from the lure of a married woman. I owed it to myself, to Dempster, and, above all, to the cause of morality, to hold that man firmly to his post.
"Phœmie," says Dempster, coming up to me and looking as if butter wouldn't melt in his mouth, "let me scoop for you?"
Before I could speak Mr. Burke took that nefarious hint and went over to E. E.
I gave Dempster a look of withering contempt, and flung my bait out with a splash that must have scared all the crabs out of a year's growth.
"No," says I, "you may be willing to desert the marital outposts, but I will not help you. Go back to your wife; I can catch all the crabs I want without help."
"Well, just as you like," says Dempster, and, settling down on the bow of the boat, he pulled his hat over his eyes and went to sleep, then and there.
Three crabs come up to my bait—nibble, nibble, nibble. I drew in the line, they crawled through the water after it. Still I drew and drew. Three great plump fellows came to the top of the water. It was a good chance to call Burke away. He was leaning over E. E. and whispering, while she listened.
"Here, here!" screamed I, "three at a haul. Will nobody help me?"
That man did not seem to hear me, but kept on whispering, while E. E. listened with a smile on her lips and her eyes half shut. The sight made me awful mad.
"I'll catch them myself," says I, and down I plunged my hand into the water. I meant to grip the crab, but he gripped me.
Oh, mercy, how he pinched and bit, and screwed his claws around my hand. It seemed as if he were twisting it into a corkscrew. I shrieked—I yelled—I tried to shake the varmint off—to dash him to atoms against the side of the boat. It was of no use: his sharp claws dug into me in fifty places; he bit like fury. The blood ran down my fingers, my voice grew weaker, but it broke up that flirtation. It was a cruel price, but I paid it cheerfully. While I retain my moral sense, no married woman shall degrade her sex by a flirtation in my presence. Never, never!
Yes, my screams broke up that well-arranged plan to delude Mr. Burke from my side, and it broke up the crabbing party too.
Dempster woke up and hauled in the lines. We had thirty crabs floundering in the hold, all fighting like imps of darkness.
"We'll have them for dinner," says Dempster, ferociously, "they won't be so lively half an hour from now."
He was right, it took us just fifteen minutes to sail back to that white house with the long stoop. Fifteen minutes after that, every crab was in water so hot that they gave up clawing and began to turn furiously red.
Half an hour after we sat around a long table out under the trees, with a great platter of those scrawny creatures lying with their red shells uppermost, a good deal easier to catch than they had been, I can tell you.
Mr. Burke was busy as could be, telling me how to put in my knife under the red shell, so as to lay the sweet white flesh open.
I say nothing, but it seemed to me there was one jealous female around those premises, and that female certainly was not me.
The meat of those creatures is just delicious—what there is of it.
Take it altogether, sisters, it seems to me that catching and eating crabs is an amusement which promises better than bathing.
If I am not very much mistaken, Mr. Burke held my hand longer than was quite necessary when he said good-night after we reached the hotel. I saw E. E. looking at us sideways, and I let it rest—rest lovingly in his clasp long enough to wring her heart. What right has she to have any feeling about it, I should like to know? Isn't she married?