"I'm a-goin' to buy that little picter, and I want to know if I can take it home now?""'m a-goin' to buy that little picter, and I want to know if I can take it home now in my vest pocket?"
"That picter," sez he, "is twenty thousand dollars. It is owned by the German National Gallery, and is loaned by them," and sez he, with a ready flow of knowledge inherent to them Guards, "the artist, Adolph Menzel, is to German art what Meissonier is to the French. His picters are all bought by the National Gallery, and bring enormous sums."
Josiah almost swooned away. Nothin' but pride kep him up—
I didn't say nothin' to add to his mortification. Only I simply said—
"Babe will prize that picter, Josiah Allen."
And he sez, "Be a fool if you want to; I'm a-goin' to git sunthin' to eat."
"Be a fool if you want to.""Be a fool if you want to."
And he hurried me along at almost a dog-trot, but I would stop to look at a "Spring Day in Bavaria," and the "Fish Market in Amsterdam," and the "Nun," and some others, I would—they wuz all beautiful in the extreme.
Wall, after we come back into the gallery agin, the first picter we went to see wuz "Christ Before Pilate," by Mr. Muncaxey.
There He stood, the Man of Sorrows, with His tall figure full of patient dignity, and His face full of love, and pity, and anguish, all bent into a indescribable majesty and power.
His hands wuz bound, He stood there the centre of that sneering, murderous crowd of priests and pharisees. On every side of Him He would meet a look of hate and savage exultation in His misery.
And He, like a lamb before the shearers, wuz dumb, bearing patiently the sins and sorrows of a world.
The fate of a universe looked out of His deep, sweet eyes.
He could bear it all—the hate, all the ignominy, the cruel death drawin' so near—He could bear it all through love and pity—the highest heights love ever went, and the deepest pity.
Only one face out of that jeerin', evil crowd had a look of pity on't, and that wuz the one woman in the throng, and she held a child in her arms.
Mebby Love had taught her the secret of Grief.
Anyway, she looked as if she pitied Him and would have loosed His bonds if she could. It wuz a dretful impressive picter, one that touched the most sacred feelin's of the beholder.
There wuz a great fuss made over Alma Tadema's picter of "Crowning Bachus."
But I didn't approve on't.
The girls' figgers in it wuz very beautiful, with the wonderful floatin' hair of red gold crowned with roses.
But I wanted to tell them girls that after they got Mr. Bachus all crowned, he'd turn on 'em, and jest as like as not pull out hull handfuls of that golden hair, and kick at 'em, and act.
Mr. Bachus is a villain of the deepest dye. I felt jest like warnin' 'em.
I like Miss Tadema's picters enough sight better—pretty little girls playin' innocent games, and dreamin' sweet fancies By the Fireside.
"The Flaggalants," by Carl Marr, is a enormous big picter, but fearful to look at.
It made me feel real bad to see how them men wuz a-hurtin' their own selves. They hadn't ort to.
Another picter by the same artist, called "A Summer Afternoon," I liked as well agin; the soul of the pleasant summer-time looked out of that picter, and the faces of the wimmen and children in it.
The little one clingin' to its mother's hand and feedin' the chickens looked cute enough to kiss. She favored Babe a good deal in her looks.
"The Cemetery in Delmatia" and the "Market Scene in Cairo," by Leopold Muller, struck hard blows onto my fancy. And so did three by Madame Weisenger—
"Mornin' by the Sea-shore," "Breakfast in the Country," and "The Laundress of the Mountain."
"Christ and the Children," by Julius Schmid, wuz beautiful as could be.
And so wuz "The Death of Autumn," by Franz Pensinger—they held in 'em all the sadly glorious beauty of the closing year.
"The Three Beggars of Cordova," by Edwin Weeks, wuz dretful interestin'.
Them tramps set there lookin' so sassy, and lazy, nateral as life. Lots of jest such ones have importuned me for food on my Jonesville door-step.
Them tramps set there lookin' so sassy and lazy, nateral as life.Them tramps set there lookin' so sassy and lazy, nateral as life.
Then he had two Hindoo fakirs that wuz real interestin'. The fur-off Indian city, the river, and the fakir a-layin' in the boat, tired out, I presoom, a-makin' folks stand up in the air, and climb up ladders into Nowhere, and eatin' swords, and eatin' fire, and etcetry.
He wuz beat out, and no wonder. The colorin' of this picter is superb.
And so wuz his "Persian Horse Dealers" and others.
Mr. Melcher's "Sermon" and "Communion" wuz very impressive, as nateral as the meetin'-housen and congregation at Jonesville and Zoar.
In the Holland Exhibit wuz all kinds of clouds painted—
Clouds a-layin' low in sombre piles, and clouds with the sun almost a-shinin' through 'em. Wonderful effects as I ever see.
And I wuz a-lookin' at a picter there so glowin' and beautiful that it seemed to hold in it the very secret of summer. The heart fire and glow of summer shone through its fine atmosphere. And sez I, "Josiah, did you ever see anything like it?"
"Oh, yes," sez he; "it's quite fair."
"Fair!" sez I; "can't you say sunthin' more than that?"
"Wall, from fair to middlin', then," sez he.
"But for real beauty," sez he, "give me them picters made in corn, and oats, and beans. Give me that Dakota cow made out of grain, with a tail of timothy grass, and straw legs, and corn ear horns. There is real beauty," sez he.
"Or that picter in the State Buildin' of the hull farm made in seeds. The old bean farm-house, and barley well-sweep, and the fields bounded with corn twig fences, and horses made of silk-weed, and manes and tales of corn-silk—there is beauty," sez he.
"And as for statutes, I'd ruther see one of them figgers that Miss Brooks of Nebraska makes out of butter than a hull carload of marble figgers."
I sithed a deep, curious sithe, and he went on:
"Why," sez he, "it stands to reason they're more valuable; what good would the stun be to you if a marble statute got smashed? A dead loss on your hands.
"But let one of her Iolanthes git knocked over and broke to pieces, why there you are, good, solid butter, worth 30 cents of any man's money.
"Give me statuary that is ornamental in prosperity, and that you can eat up if reverses come to you," sez he.
"Why," sez he, "there is one hundred kinds of grain in that one model farm of Illinois.
"Now, if that picter should git torn to pieces by a cyclone, what would a ile paintin' be? A dead loss.
"But that grain farm-house, what food for hens that would make—such a variety. Why, the hens would jest pour out eggs fed on the ruins of that farm.
"Give me beauty and economy hitched together in one team."
"What food for hens that would make.""What food for hens that would make."
I sithed, and the sithe wuz deep, almost like a groan, and sez I—
"You tire me, Josiah Allen—you tire me almost to death."
"Wall," sez he, "I'm talkin' good horse sense."
Sez I, "I should think it wuz animal sense of some kind—nothin' spiritual about it and riz up."
"Wall," sez he, "you'll see five hundred folks a-standin' round and praisin' up them seed picters where there is one that gits carried away as you do over Wattses 'Love and Death' and Elihu Vedder's dum picters."
"Wall," sez I, in a tired-out axent, "that don't prove anything, Josiah Allen. The multitude chose Barrabus to the Divine One.
"Not," sez I reasonably, "that I would want to compare the seed picters and the butter females to a robber.
"They're extremely curious and interestin' to look at, and wonderful in their way as anything in the hull Exposition.
"But," sez I, "there is a height and a depth in the soul that them butter figgers can't touch—no, nor the pop-corn trees can't reach that height with their sorghum branches. It lays fur beyond the switchin' timothy tail of that seed horse or the wavin' raisen mane of that prune charger. It is a realm," sez I, "that I fear you will never stand in, Josiah Allen."
"No, indeed," sez he; "and I don't want to. I hain't no desires that way."
Again I sithed, and we walked off into another gallery.
Wall, I might write and keep a-writin' from Fourth of July to Christmas Eve, and then git up Christmas mornin' and say truly that the half hadn't been told of what we see there, and so what is the use of tryin' to relate it in this epistle.
But suffice it to say that we stayed there all day long, and that night we meandered home perfectly wore out, and perfectly riz up in our two minds, or at leastI wuz. Josiah's feelin's seemed to be clear fag, jest plain wore out fag.
The nights are always cool in Chicago—that is, if the weather is anyways comfortable durin' the day.
And this night it wuz so cool that a good woollen blanket and bedspread wuz none too much for comfort.
And it wuz with a sithe of contentment that I lay down on my peaceful goose-feather pillow, and drawed the blankets up over my weary frame and sunk to sleep.
I had been to sleep I know not how long when a angry, excited voice wakened me. It said, "Lay down, can't you!"
I hearn it as one in a dream. I couldn't sense where I wuz nor who wuz talkin', when agin I hearn—
"Dum it all! why can't you fall as you ort to?"
Wuz some struggle a-goin' on in my room? The bed wuz in an alcove, and I could not see the place from where the voice proceeded.
I reached my hand out. My worst apprehensions wuz realized. Josiah wuz not there.
Wuz some one a-killin' him, and a-orderin' him to lay still and fall as he ort to?
Wuz such boldness in crime possible?
I raised my head and looked out into the room, and then with a wild shriek I covered up my head. Then I discovered that there wuz only one thin sheet over me.
The sight I had seen had driv' the blood in my veins all back to my heart.
A tall white figger wuz a-standin' before the glass, draped from head to foot in heavy white drapery.
I'd often turned it over in my mind in hours of ease which I'd ruther have appear to me in the night—a burglar or a ghost.
And now in the tumultous beatin's of my heart I owned up that I would ruther a hundred times it would be a burglar.
Anything seemed to me better than to be alone at night with a ghost.
But anon, as I quaked and trembled under that sheet, the voice spoke agin—
"Samantha, are you awake?" And I sprung up in bed agin, and sez I—
"Josiah Allen, where are you? Oh, save me, Josiah! save me!"
The white figger turned. "Save you from what, Samantha? Is there a mouse under the bed, or is it a spider, or what?"
"Who be you?" sez I, almost incoherently. "Be you a ghost? Oh, Josiah, Josiah!" And I sunk back onto the pillow and busted into tears. The relief wuz too great.
But anon Wonder seized the place that Fear had held in my frame, and dried up the tear-drops, and I sprung up agin and sez—
"What be you a-doin', Josiah Allen, rigged up as you be in the middle of the night, with the lights all a-burnin'?"
For every gas jet in the room was a-blazin' high.
Sez he, "I am posin' for a statute, Samantha."
And come to look closter, I see he had took off the blanket and bedspread and had swathed 'em round his form some like a toga.
And I see it wuz them that he wuz apostrofizin' and orderin' to lay down in folds and fall graceful.
And somehow the idee of his takin' the bedclothes offen me seemed to mad me about as much as his foolishness and vanity did.
And sez I, "Do you take off them bedclothes offen you, and put 'em back agin, and come to bed!"
But he didn't heed me, he went on with his vain doin's and actin'.
"I am impersonatin' Apollo!" sez he, a-layin' his head onto one side and a-lookin' at me over his shoulder in a kind of a languishin' way.
Sez he, a-liftin' his heel, and holdin' it up a little ways, "I did think I would be Mercury, but I hadn't any wing handy for my off heel. I would be strikin' as Mercury," sez he, "but I think I would be at my best as Apollo. What do you think I had better be, Samantha?"
"I would be strikin' as Mercury, but I think I would be at my best as Apollo.""I would be strikin' as Mercury, but I think I would be at my best as Apollo."
"A loonatick would strike me as the right thing, Josiah Allen, or an idiot from birth.
"Or," sez I, speakin' more ironicler as my fear died away, leavin' in its void a great madness and tiredness, "if you'd brung your scythe along you might personate Old Father Time."
I guess this kinder madded him, and sez he, "Don't you want to pose, Samantha?
"Don't you want to be the Witch of Endor?" sez he.
"Yes," sez I, "I'd love to! If Iwuzher you'd see sights in this room that would bow your old bald head in horrow, and drive you, vain old creeter that you be, back where you belong."
He wuz afraid he'd gone too fur, and sez he, "Mebby you'd ruther be Venus, Samantha? Mebby you'd ruther appear in the nude?"
Sez I, coldly, "I should think that you'd done your best to make me appear in that way, Josiah Allen. There's only one thin sheet to keep me from it.
"But," sez I, spruntin' up, "if you talk in that way any more to me I'll holler to Miss Plank!
"Pardner or no pardner, I hain't a-goin' to be imposed upon this time of night!"
Sez I, "I should be ashamed if I wuz in your place, the father and grandfather of a family, and the deacon in a meetin'-house, to be up at midnight a-posin' for statutes and actin'."
"But," sez he, "I didn't know but they would want to sculp me while I wuz here in Chicago, and I thought I'd git a attitude all ready. You never know what may happen, and it's always well to be prepared, and attitudes are dretful hard to catch onto at a minute's notice."
Sez I, "Do you come back to bed, Josiah Allen. What would they want of you for a statute?"
"Wall," sez he, reluctantly relinquishin' his toga, or, in other words the flannel blanket and bedspread—
"I see many a statute to-day with not half my good looks, and if Chicago wanted me to ornament it, I wanted to be prepared."
I sithed aloud, and sez I—
"Here I be waked up for good, as tired as I wuz, all for your vanity and actin'."
"Wall," sez he, "Samantha, my mind wuz all so stirred up and excited by seein' so many ile paintin's and statutes to-day, that I felt dretful." And as he sez this my madness all died away, as the way of pardners is, and a great pity stole into my heart.
I do spoze he wuz half delirous with seein' too much. Like a man who has oversot himself and come down on the floor.
That man had been led round too much that day, for my own pleasure; to gratify my own esthetik taste I had almost ruined the pardner of my youth and middle age.
His mind had been stretched too fur, for the size on't, so I sez soothin'ly—
"Wall, wall, Josiah, come back to bed and go to sleep, and to-morrow we'll go and see some live stock and some plows and things."
So at last I got him quieted down, though he did murmur once or twice in his sleep—Apollo! Hercules! etc., so I see what his inward state wuz.
But towards mornin' he seemed to git into a good sound sleep, and I did too, and we waked up feelin' quite considerable rested and refreshed.
And it wuzn't till I had a sick-headache bad, and he wuz more than good to me, and I see that he repented deep of it, that I forgive him fully.
But of course it broke up our goin' to fashionable places agin to eat—he come out conqueror, after all—men are deep.
Wall, this mornin'—it bein' kind of a muggy and cloudy one, I proposed that we should go and visit the Fishery Department.
And I d'no why I should a thought on it this mornin' more'n another one—only it wuz jest such a day as Josiah and Thomas Jefferson always took for goin' a-fishin' in the creek back of Jonesville.
And then we had fish for breakfast too—siscoes—mebby that put me in mind on it some.
But anyway, I wuz always interested in the subject of fishin', and the hull world is. For what wuz the Postles? Fishers. For what did the Great Master name His beloved? Fishers of men.
Why, the Bible is full of fishin' and fisherman, clear back to Jonah; and how took up he wuz with a fish, and how full the fish wuz of him!
Fishin' wuz the first industry in the New World.
When our Forefathers landed on Plymouth Rock they found the harbor shaped some like a fish-hook, and then consequently they went to fishin'.
Who got Washington and his army over the Delaware River that bitter cold night in 1777, when the fate of our country wuz a-hangin' over that sea of broken ice—ruin on this side, and possible success on the other, but the impassable gulf of bitter cold water and the crashing masses of ice between—who got 'em acrost? Fisherman.
Our country has always been noted in its interest in fishin'. Why, at the Internatial Exhibition at Berlin in 1880, America won the first prize given by the Emperor for its display.
And I knew when it done so well on a foreign shore, it wuzn't goin' to make any failure of itself here under its own line, and fish tree, so to speak.
Wall, as I said, Josiah expressed a willingness to go, and consequently and subsequently we went.
Wall, we found it wuz a group of buildin's on a beautiful island—in the northern part of the lagoon, joinin' the improved part of Jackson Park.
There wuz three on em' in number. The middle one wuz a long buildin' with a high dome, and some towers in the centre on't, and the arches and the pillows wuz all ornamented off with figgers of fishes, and crabs, and lobsters, and all sorts of water growth. It looked uneek, and first-rate, too.
And when I say it wuz a long buildin', I don't want it understood that I mean length as we call it in Jonesville, but Chicago length—or rather Chicago Jackson Park length, which is fur longer than jest plain Chicago largeness.
In the centre of the big buildin' is a fish-pond all ornamented with rock work, and all sorts of aquatic plants.
And then all joined on to the main buildin', at each end and connected with it by carved arches, handsome as arches wuz ever made in the world, and trimmed off in the uneek way I've mentioned prior to and beforehand, wuz two other buildin's, each one on 'em 135 feet long.
The buildin' to the east is the aquarum, or live fish exhibit, and that to the west is to show off the anglin' exhibit. They wuz round and kinder double-breasted lookin' on both sides.
The shape on 'em is called pollygon—probable named after the man's wife that built it. It had a good many sides to it—mebby Polly had to her. I know wimmen are falsely called seven-sided lots of times.
Wall, in the middle of the buildin' designed for the aquarum is a big pool of water 26 feet in diameter; in the middle of the pool is a risin' up some rocks covered with moss andferns, from which cool streams of water are a-drippin' and a-drizzlin' down onto the reeds and rushes, where the most gorgeous-colored fishes you ever see are playin' round in the water, as cool and happy in the middle of a meltin' summer-day—not needin' no fans or parasols, jest a-divin' and a-splashin' down in the wet water, and enjoyin' themselves. I bet lots of swelterin' folks jest envied 'em.
Surroundin' this rotunda, under a glass ruff, runs two lines of aquarums, separated by a wide gallery—more'n fifty of 'em in all.
In the fresh water wuz all kinds of fishes from all parts of the country, and the world. Salmons, muskalunges, the great Mississippi cat-fish, alligators, trout, white-fish, sun-fishes, etc., and etcetry.
In the salt water wuz sharks, torpedoes, dog-fishes, goose-fishes, sheeps heads, blue-fishes, weak-fish, and strong ones, too, I should think—why, more'n I could name if I should talk all day.
In the salt water wuz sharks, torpedoes, dog fishes, goose-fishes, weak-fish.In the salt water wuz sharks, torpedoes, dog fishes, goose-fishes, weak-fish, and strong ones, too, I should think.
Why, I shouldn't a been surprised a mite if I had seen a-floatin' up to me that old Leviathan of Job's that "couldn't be pulled out with a hook, or his nose with a cord that wuz let down."
Why, I wouldn't a been surprised at nothin'—I felt a good deal of the time jest like that in all of the buildin's, and I said so to my Josiah when he'd try to surprise me by lookin' at some strange thing. "No, Josiah," I would say, "I can't be surprised no more, the time for that has gone by—gone by, a long time ago."
And then there wuz gobys, sticklebacks, sea-horses, devil-fishes, and I believe there wuz a jell fish, though I didn't see it.
Though so fur as jell goes, as I told Josiah, I would ruther make my own jell out of my own berries and crab-apples, and then I know how it's made.
But, howsumever, there wuz all the fishes that ever swum in America, Mexico, South America, Europe, and Asia, and I d'no but what there wuz a few from Africa. And to see on the bottom of them aquarums shells a-walkin' round, with the owners of them shells inside of 'em, wuz a sight to see.
Why, any one here would have 60 or 70 emotions a minute right along—a-seein' these, and a-meditatin' on the wonders of the deep.
And then there wuz the rainbow fish, which is found both on the Pacific and Atlantic coasts—it has all the colors the rainbow ever had, and more too.
And then to see our own magnificent water-lilies a-floatin' on top of the water, and then to see 'em down under the water, with fishes a-floatin' all amongst 'em—oh, what a sight! what a sight it wuz!
Outside of the buildin', when at last we did tear ourselves away from that seen of enchantment, and went outside, I upheld by my motive to see everything I could, and Josiah by the idee that we would step into a restaurant that wuzn't fur away.
When outside we see a lot of ponds all illustratin' the best way of pond culture, and all sorts of aquatic plants.
Wall, at Josiah's request, we went to the nighest place and had a cup of tea and a good little lunch.
And then we went back to see the fish-hooks and things that is in the west buildin' of the group.
Josiah said mebby he could git his eye on some new kind of a fish-hook. He said he'd love to go beyend Deacon Henzy and Sime Yerden if he could—they boasted so over their tackle.
And truly I should have thought he might have gone ahead of anything, or anybody, if he could have carried 'em home. There wuz everything that could be thought on, or that ever wuz seen in the form of fishin' apparatus—every kind of hook, and spear, and rod, and queer-lookin' baskets and pots, and tackle to catch eels and lobsters, and then there wuz models of fishin' boats and vessels, and everything else under the sun that any fisherman ever sot eyes on, from Josiah back to the Postles, and from the Postles down to any fishin' club in 1893.
Why, if you'll believe it—and I d'no as I would blame you if you wouldn't, it bein' a fish story, as it were—but we did see some fish-hooks from Pompeii that had been buried 2000 years, and come out fish-hooks after all—a good deal like them Josiah uses in Jonesville creek.
And speakin' of old things, we see some fishes that day—the oldest in the world; they come from Colorado—dug out of the rocks of ages ago; they wuz covered with bone instead of scales, which showed that they had had a pretty hard time on't.
They wuz covered with bone instead of scales.They wuz covered with bone instead of scales.
And then there wuz a big collection of nets made by the Indians from seal sinew, seal-skin braided, roots of willow tree, and whalebone.
Of these last it took four men three weeks to make one, and two of these wuz gin in exchange for a jug of molasses to make rum with.
A shame and a disgrace! No savage would have cheated so—no, it takes a white man to do that.
And we see artificial flies so nateral that a spider would go to weavin' a net to catch it.
And artificial grasshoppers, and crickets, and frogs, and little artificial minney fish made of metal, glass, pearl, and rubber. Why, if I had seen one of 'em in the brook that runs through our paster, I should have been tempted to have bent a pin, and take some weltin' cord out of my pocket and go to fishin' for it.
And if they fooled me, who am often called very wise, what would you think of their foolin' a fish, who hain't got any bump of wisdom on their heads?
And then there wuz trollin' spoons of all kinds and shapes, in all kinds of metal, and trollin' squids—I'd never hearn of that name before—squid! but they had 'em of all kinds; and tackle boxes, and floats, and landin' nets, and gaff hooks; there is sunthin' else I never hearn on—gaff hooks! and snells, and gimps, and spinners.
Why, I'd never hearn on 'em, and Josiah hadn't either, though he acted dretful knowin', and put on a face of extreme enjoyment and appreciation. And he sez, "How a man duz enjoy seein' such things that he's ust to and knows all about!"
And I sez, "What do you do with squids, anyway, or gaffs, or snells?"
"Why," sez he, "I should snell with 'em, and gaff, and squid. What do you spoze?"
"How do you do it?" sez I. "How do you snell?"
And then he had to own up that he didn't know how it wuz done.
Truly it has been said that three questions will floor the biggest philosopher. But it only took two to take the pride and vainglory out of Josiah Allen.
Wall, the information gathered together here from all parts of the world, and disseminated out to individuals of the collected world, will probable make a great difference in the enjoyment and practical benefit of the fisherman, and tell hard on the fishes of 1894.
Wall, we stayed round here a-lookin' at 'em different buildin's till dark, and then we didn't see a thousandth nor a millionth part of what wuz to be seen there.
And I hain't half described its wonders and glories as I'd ort to, and one reason is, nobody can describe any of the buildin's—no, not if they had the tongue of men and angels.
No, they are too stupendous to describe.
And then, agin, I have had a kind of a feelin' of delicacy that has kind of held me back—I have been hampered.
For I have kep such a tight grip holt of my principle all the while I've been describin' it, that it has weakened the grasp of my good right hand on my steel pen.
I knew well how hard, how almost impossible it wuz to talk about fishin' for any length of time without lyin'.
But I know I have told Josiah time and agin that it wuz possible to do it, if you kep a firm holt of the hellum, and leaned heavy on principle.
I have done it, and I am proud and happy in the thought.
Unless, mebby, I have lied the other way. Good land! I didn't think of that; I wuz so determined to keep within bounds, that I am actually afraid that I've lied that way; in order not to tell the fish story too big, I hain't told it big enough.
Good land! I guess I won't boast any more.
Wall, seein' that I am in sunthin' of a hurry, I will let it go, and mebby if I should go over it agin I should lie the other way.
Good land! good land! what a world this is, and with all your care and watchfulness, how hard it is to keep walkin' right along, in Injun file, along the narrer rope walk of megumness and exact truth.
But I am a-eppisodin', and to resoom.
Wall, as I said, we didn't git home till pitch dark, and then I drempt of fish all night, and eels, and alligators, and such. It wuz tegus.
I drempt of fish all night.I drempt of fish all night.
The next mornin' Josiah Allen met me all riz up with a new idee.
He had been out to buy a new pair of suspenders, his havin' gin out the day before; and he come to our room, where I wuz calmly settin' a-bastin' in some clean cotton lace into the sleeves of my alpaca dress.
And sez he right out abrup, with no preamble, "Samantha, less go down to the Fair Ground in a whale."
"In a whale?" sez I; "are you a loonatick, or what duz ail you, to try to make a pair of Jonahses of us at our age?"
"Wall," sez he, "they have 'em here to carry folks down to the Fair, I know, for I hearn it straight, and I should think we wuz jest the right age to go as easy as possible, and try experiments."
"Wall," sez I firmly, "I hain't a-goin' to try no such experiment as that. If the Lord called me to tackle a whale, I would tackle it, but I hain't had no callin', and I hain't goin' to try to ride out in no whale."
"I'm a-callin' you," sez he.
"Wall," sez I dryly, "you hain't the Deity—no, indeed, fur from it."
"Wall," sez he, "I'd love to go, Samantha. What a glorious piece of news to carry back to Jonesville, that we rid out in a whale. In the old Jonesville meetin'-house now, when Elder Minkley is a-preachin' on Jonah—and you know he trots him out a dozen times a year as a warnin'—how you and I could lift up our heads and tost 'em, and how the necks of the Jonesvillians would be craned round to look at us—we two, who had rid out in a whale—we had been right there, and knew how it wuz."
"I don't want to show off," sez I, "and I don't want any necks craned or tosted on account of my gettin' into a whale and ridin' it;" and then I sez, "Good land! what won't Chicago do next?"
And I added, "It don't surprise me a mite; it hain't no more of a wonder than lots of things I have seen here. I might a known if Chicago had sot its mind on havin' a whale to transport folks to the World's Fair she'd a done it, but I won't tackle the job."
"There it is," sez he gloomily, "I never make arrangements to distinguish myself and make a name, but you must break it up. I had lotted on this, Samantha," sez he.
He looked sad and deprested, and though I was bound not to give in and go, yet I made some inquiries.
"How many does the whale carry? What makes you think we could both git into it?"
Sez Josiah, "It carries 5000 at a time."
I felt weak as a cat, jest as I had felt time and agin sence I had come to Chicago.
"Wall," sez I in weak axents, and dumbfoundered, "any whale story I could hear about Chicago wouldn't surprise me a mite."
And I wiped my brow on my white linen handkerchief, for though the idee didn't surprise me none, it started the sweat.
Sez Josiah, "It is 225 feet long, and has a fountain in it, and a skylight 138 feet long."
But jest at that minute, before I could frame a reply, even if I could have found a frame queer-shaped enough to hold my curious—curious feelin's—
Miss Plank knocked at the door and said she wuz ready to go—we had made arrangements to go together that mornin'—and Josiah tackled her about the whale; and sez she briskly—
"Oh, yes; the whaleback Christopher Columbus! It would be a good idee to go to the grounds in it; you can go down in it in half an hour—it is only seven or eight milds."
So we fell in with her idee; and bein' ust to the place, she took the lead, and also the street cars, and we soon found ourselves on board the biggest floatin' ship I ever laid eyes on. And I couldn't see as it looked much like a whale, unless it wuz that it wuz long, and kinder pinted, and turned up at both ends, some the shape of a whale.
Wall, I guess the hull five thousand folks wuz on board, and had brung their relations on both sides. It looked like it, and we steamed along by the shore for quite a spell, the city a-layin' in plain view for mild after mild—or that is, in as plain view as it could be under its envelopin' curtain of smoke.
But bimeby the smoke all cleared away, the air wuz clear and pure, and the lake lay fair and placid fur off as we could see. It might a been the ocean, for all we could tell, for you can't see no further than youcan, anyway, and you can't see no further than that on the Atlantic or the Pacific.
Way beyend what you can't see might stretch thousands and thousands of milds and a new continent; or it might be a loggin' camp, or Kalamazoo. It don't make no difference to your feelin's, it has all the illimitable expanse, the vastness of the great ocean.
So it wuz with the outlook on the flashin' blue waters on that magic mornin'.
And pretty soon the White City riz up like a city of bewilderin' beauty and enchantment, with the sun a-lookin' down from a blue sky, and lightin' up the tall, white walls, and gilded domes, and towers, and minarets. And as we floated along by Jackson Park, and could git a plain view of the perfect buildin's—the lagoons with fairy boats a-skimmin' over the sparklin' surface—in fact, in plain view of the hull vast, bewilderin' seen of matchless splendor—why, I declare I felt almost as if I wuz took back clear into the Arabian Nights Entertainments, and magic seens wuz bein' unfolded before my enraptured vision.
Why, I almost felt that my Josiah wuz a genii, and Miss Plank a geniess. I wouldn't a wondered a mite any minute if a carpet had dropped down for us to git onto, and we floated off into Bagdad. I felt queer—extremely.
But Bagdad nor no other Dad wuz ever so enchantin'ly lovely as the seen outspread before our eyes. As surpassin'ly beautiful as the Exposition is from every side, hind side and fore side, and from top to bottom, it is, I do believe, most radiantly lovely from the water approach.
You needn't be a mite afraid of gittin' your idees too riz up about the onspeakable beauty of the seen. No matter if they wuz riz up higher than you ever drempt of rizin' 'em up, instead of fallin', they will, so to speak, find themselves onthe ground floor—in the suller, as you may say—so fur up beyend your highest imagination is the reality of that wonderful White City of the West—
Magic city that has sprung up there amidst the blue waters and green forests like a dream of enchantment, a hymn of glory, with not one false, harsh note in it to mar the glory and perfectness of the song.
Now, I have had my idees riz up lots of times—they have riz and fell so much that my muse has fairly lamed herself time and agin, and went round limpin' for some time.
And Josiah had told me time and agin, as I would go on about the beauty I expected to see at the World's Fair, "Samantha, you expect too much; you will get dissapinted; tain't Heaven you are goin' to; anybody would most expect, to hear you go on, that you expected to see the New Jerusalem—you are goin' to be dissapinted."
Wall, sure enough I wuz, but the dissapintment wuz on the other side—I hadn't expected half nor a quarter nor a millionth part enough. My muse instead of comin' down from the heights that I spozed she wuz on a-cungerin' up that seen—to use metafor—she had always, as you may say, sot down flat on the ground.
Why, I couldn't do justice to it in words, nor Josiah couldn't, nor Miss Plank couldn't, not if we all on us had a dictionary in one hand and a English reader in the other, and had travelled down there that beautiful mornin' with a brass band.
I wuz so wropped up in my bewildered and extatic admiration that my companions wuz entirely lost from sight, when Miss Plank sez—
"Here we are, ready to land." And indeed I see on comin' to myself that the hull 5000, and their relations on both sides, wuz on the move, and it wuz time for me to disembark myself, which I proceeded to do, a-follered by the forms of my Josiah and Miss Plank. She stepped out quite briskly over her namesake, and so did Josiah. They didn't take in the full beauty and grandeur of the seen as I did—no, indeed.