It wuz so big that it wuz fairly skairful.It wuz so big that it wuz fairly skairful.
It wuz a St. Bernard; but I told Josiah, "Santi or not, I wouldn't want to meet it alone in the back lane in the evenin'."
It would skair a young child into fits to go through this department; some of them wild creeters look so ferocious, especially the painters, they made my blood fairly curdle.
Wall, we stayed here for some time, or until my ear-pans seemed to be ruined for life. And then we had a little time on our hands, and Josiah proposed that we should go out on the water and take a short voyage to rest off. I gin a glad consent, and we sot off.
Wall, after bein' on the water a little while, I begun to feel so much rested that I proposed that we should row round to the other end of the park, and pay attention to some of the State Buildin's.
"For," sez I, "if the different countries should hear on't that I have been here all this while, without payin' 'em any attention, they will feel hurt." And sez I, "I had ruther give a cent than to have Great Britain feel hurt, and lots of the rest on 'em.
"And then," sez I, "it hain't right to slight 'em, even if they never heard on't."
"Oh, shaw!" sez Josiah, "I guess that they would git along if you didn't go at all; I guess that they hain't a-sufferin' for company this year."
"But," sez I with dignity, "this is a fur different thing, and as fur as our own United States Buildin's are concerned, I feel bound to 'em, bein' such a intimate friend to their Father-in-law."
"What do you mean?" sez Josiah.
"Why, Uncle Sam," sez I—"U.S. Epluribus Unim."
Agin he sez, "Oh, shaw!" But I held firm, and at my request the boat headed that way.
And we landed as nigh 'em as we could.
You see, all the United States, and most of the Foreign Countries, have a separate buildin', mostly gin up to social and friendly purposes, where natives of that State and country can go in and rest, and recooperate—see some of their friends, and so on, and so forth.
Wall, we laid out to pay attention to a lot on 'em that day.
But, as it turned out, we didn't go to but jest three on 'em, the reasons of which I will set down, and recapitulate.
I felt that wehadto go to New York and Illinois. Loyalty and Politeness stood on both sides of us, a-leadin' us to the home of our own native State, and the folks we wuz a-visitin'; and we found New York a perfect palace, modelled after an Italian one. And the row of green plants a-standin' on the ruff all round made it look real uneek and dretful handsome. And inside it wuz fitted up as luxurious as any palace need to be, with a banquet hall eighty-four feet long and forty-six feet high; a glow of white, and gold, and red, and crystal.
Yes, the hull house wuz pleasant and horsepitable, as become the dwellin' place of the Empire State.
And Illinois! You might know what you'd expect to find inside, when you see what they had outside on't.
That statute, "Hide and Seek," before the entrance, wuz, I do believe, the very best thing I see to the hull Fair—
Five little children with merry, laughin' faces a-playin' at hide and seek in a broken gray old stump, and flowers, and vines, and mosses a-runnin' round it and over it as nateral as life.
Wall, I stood before that beautiful object till Josiah had to draw me away from it almost by main force.
But inside it come my time to draw him away.
When we see that picter of the old farm made in seeds, he wuz as rooted to the spot as if he intended to remain sot out there, and grow up with the State.
He wuz rooted to the spot.He wuz rooted to the spot.
And it wuz a dretful interestin' sight—the farm-house, the barns, the well, the old windmill, the long fields a-stretchin' back, and fenced off, with different crops on 'em, the good-lookin' men and wimmen, and the horses, with their glossy hides and silky manes and tails, and all made of different kinds of seeds and grasses. It wuz a sight to see the crowd that stood before that from mornin' till night, and you ask ten folks what impressed 'em the most at the Fair, and more'n half on 'em would most likely say that it wuz that seed picter in the Illinois Buildin'. Over one side on't wuz draped sunthin' that I took to be the very richest silk or velvet, all fringed out with a deep fringe on the end on't. But it wuz all made of grasses of different kinds—the idee! Fifteen young ladies of Illinois made that, and they done first-rate. I want 'em to know what I think on't, and what Josiah duz.
Wall, inside the buildin' wuz full and runnin' over with beautiful objects—lovely picters, noble statuary, beautiful works of art and industry done by the sons and daughters of the State.
It would take more'n a week to do any justice to it. Illinois done splendid. I want her to know how I appreciated it. She'll be glad to know how riz up I felt there.
Wall, when we left there we had a little dialogue—not mad exactly, but earnest.
I wanted to go and see Great Britain, and Josiah wanted to go to Vermont (he has got a third cousin a-livin' there, and he wanted to see him). "Wall," sez I, "we've got a mother to tend to; the Mother Country calls for a little filial attention."
"Oh, shaw!" sez he; "I guess you feel more related than they do; and," sez he, "I shall go to Vermont. Mebby I shall meet Bildad Allen right there in the settin'-room."
So there it wuz—we wuz both determined. I see by my companion's mean that it wouldn't do to insist on Great Britain.
But a woman hates to give in awful. So I suggested makin' a compromise on California.
A woman hates to give in awful, so I suggested a compromise on California.A woman hates to give in awful, so I suggested a compromise on California.
And he agreed to it. He, too, had seen a look of marble determination on my mean, and he dassent press the Vermont question too hard.
So we directed our steps towards the California Buildin'. It is a exact reproduction of the old Monastery of San Diego, and one hundred thousand square feet is the size on't.
It is full of the products of California. Sech fruit and flowers I never see, and don't expect to agin.
The flowers wuz gorgeous, and perfectly beautiful, and I spoze, though I don't really want to twit 'em of it, yet I do spoze they brought every mite of fruit out of California for this occasion. I don't spoze there wuz a orange left there, or a grape, nor anything else in the line of fruit. Mebby there might a been one or two green oranges left, but I doubt it.
And as for canned and dried fruit, I don't spoze there wuz a teacupful left in the hull State.
Why, jest think of the dried prunes it must have took to make that horse that wuz rared up there seven feet from the floor!
And wuzn't that horse a sight to see?—jest as nateral as though he wuz made of flesh instead of fruit.
I hearn, but mebby it come from some of their own folks—but I hearn thatCalifornia had the best exhibits of all kinds of any of the States. But I wouldn't want it told from me. I don't want to git thirty or forty States mad as a hen at me; the States are dretful touchy, anyway, in the matter of State Rights and pride.
But the show wuz impressive—dretful.
This house wuz built, I spoze, in honor of Spain, like a old Spanish Mission Buildin'; and up in the towers which rise up on the four corners are belfrys, in which are some of the old Spanish bells, that still ring out and call to prayers, when the good old Fathers that used to hear 'em, and the Injun converts, generations and generations of 'em, have slept so sound that the bells can't wake 'em.
And the bells still swing out over this restless and ambitious generation, and they will swing and echo jest the same when we too have gone to sleep, and sleep sound.
Queer, hain't it, that a little dead lump of metal should outlive the beatin' human heart—the active, outreachin' human life, with its world-wide activities and Heaven-high aspiration?
But so it is; generations and generations are born, live, and die, and the old bells, a-takin' life easy, jest swing on, and ring out jest as sweet and calm and kinder careless at our death as at our birth.
The bells sounded dretful melancholy and heart achin' to me; that day they seemed to be soundin' a requiem clear from California to Jonesville for the good Man who had passed away.
Jest as we went down the steps we hearn a bystander a-tellin' another one "that Leland Stanford wuz dead." And I wuz fearful rousted up about it; I felt like death to hear on't; and to think that I never had a chance to tell him what I thought on him. I was fearful agitated, and almost by the side of myself; but jest at that juncture—jest as I sez to Josiah, "I shouldn't felt so bad if I had had a chance to tell him what I thought on him, and encourage him in his noble doin's, and warn him in one or two things"—jest at that minit, sez Josiah, "I've lost my bandanny handkerchief;" and he told me, "To wait there for him, that he thought that he remembered where he had dropped it—back in a antick room in the back part of the house."
And I thought more'n like as not that wuz the last I should see of him for hours and hours, the crowd wuz so immense and the search wuz so oncertain.
But it wuz a good new handkerchief—red and yeller, with a palm-tree pattern on it—and I couldn't discourage him from huntin' for it.
And jest as he turned to go back, he sez—
"Why, if there hain't Deacon Rogers of Loontown!"
And he advanced onto a good-lookin' man, who wuz a-standin' some distance off.
My pardner put out his hand and stepped forward with a glad face till he got to within three feet of him, and then his gladness died out, and he looked meachin'.
It wuzn't Rogers. And my pardner jest turned on his tracks, and disappeared round the buildin'. A bystander who wuz a-standin' by spoke up and sez:
"That is Governor Markham, of California."
"Why'ee!" sez I, "is that so?" and then the thought come to me that the pityin' Providence that had removed Senator Stanford from my encouragement, and warnin', had throwed this man in my way.
I see in a minit what would be expected of me both by the nation and by my own Gardeen Angel of Duty.
I must encourage him by tellin' him what I thought of the noble doin's of one of his folks, and I must warn him on a few things, and git him to turn round in his tracks.
So I advanced, and accosted him.
He was a-standin' out a little ways to one side a-lookin' up to the handsome front of the house, and I sez to him, in a voice nearly tremblin' with emotion—
"I have wanted to tell you, Governor Markham, how I feel, and how Josiah feels."
He turned round and looked kinder surprised, but good-natered, and I see then that he wuz a real good-lookin' man, and sez he—"Who is Josiah?"
And I sez, "My own pardner. I am Josiah Allen's Wife."
And as I sez this, bein' very polite, I kinder bowed my head, and he kinder bowed his head too. We appeared real well, both on us.
And sez I, "We feel it dretful, the passin' away and expirin' of one of your folks."
And sez he, "You allude to Senator Stanford?"
And I sez, "Yes; when I think of that noble school of hisen that he has sot up there in your great State—the finest school in the world for poor boys and poor girls, as well as rich ones—when I think what that great educational power is a-goin' to do for the children of this great country, rich and poor, I think on him almost by the side of Christopher Columbus. For if Christopher discovered a new world, Senator Stanford wuz a-takin' the youth of this country into a new realm—a-sailin' 'em out into a new world, and a grander one than they'd any idee on—a-sailin' 'em out on the great ship of his magnificent Charity; and that Ship," sez I, in a kind of a tremblin' voice, "wuz wafted out at first on the sombre wings of a heart-breakin' sorrow; but they grew white," sez I—"they grew silver white as that great Ship sailed on and on.
"And up through the cloudless blue overhead I believe an angel looks down smilin'ly and lovin'ly on what has been done, and what is a-doin' now—that youth whose tender heart, while he walked with man, wuz so tender and compassionate to the poor, and so wise to help 'em."
The Governor showed plain in his good-lookin' face how deeply he felt what I said, and I hastened to add—
"I wanted to thank him who is gone for this great and noble work; and as he has passed on beyend this world's praise, or blame, I want to tell you about it, seein' that you're at the head of the family.
"I speak," sez I, "in the name of Jonesville!"
"Whose name?" sez he.
And I sez, "My own native land, Jonesville, nigh to Loontown, seven milds from Zoar."
"Oh!" sez he.
"Yes," sez I, "Jonesville wuz proud of his doin's, and she thinks a sight of California.
"But in one thing she feels bad: she don't want California to make so much wine; she wishes you'd stop it.
"She's proud of your fruit, your flowers, your big trees, and other products, but she wishes you'd stop makin' so much wine. Jonesville wouldn't care if you made a couple of quarts for sickness or jell, but she feels as if she couldn't bear to see you swing out and make so much." Sez I, "Jonesville and I want you to stop makin' it—we want you to like dogs."
And then sez I, in still firmer axents, "It hain't a-settin' a good example to the schoolchildren in Palo Alto and the United States."
He looked real downcasted and sad, some as if he'd never thought on't in that light before.
He didn't really promise me, but I presoom to say that he won't never make another drop.
But his face looked dretful deprested. I see that he felt it deeply to think I had found fault with him.
But to resoom. Sez I—for here my gardeen angel hunched me hard and told me that here wuz a chance to do good—mebby the Governor could carry out the wishes of him that wuz gone—sez I, "Another great thing that Jonesville and I approve of wuz Senator Stanford's bill about lendin' money." Sez I, "There never wuz a better bill brought before America, and if Uncle Sam don't pass it, he hain't the old man I think he is.
"For," sez I, "jest take the case of Jim Widrig alone; that would pay for the trouble of passin' it.
"He has got a big farm of more'n two hundred acres, but the land is all run down—he can't raise nothin' on it hardly, it needs enrichin' so; he hain't no stock, and, as he often sez, 'If I should run in debt for 'em, we should soon be landed in the Poor-House.' He's got a wife and seven boys.
"Wall, now if he could only borry 2000 dollars of Uncle Sam, and only pay forty dollars a year for it—why, they would be jest made.
"They could put on twenty young cows on the place, two good horses, and go right on to success, for Jim is hard-workin', and Mahala Widrig is one of the best hard-workin' wimmen in the precincks of Jonesville, and I don't believe she has got a second dress to her back."
The Governor murmured sunthin' about a engagement he had. He looked worried and anxious, but I and my Gardeen Angel hadn't no idee of lettin' him go while there wuz a chance for us to plead for the Right.
And I hastened to say, "Uncle Sam needn't be 'fraid of lendin' money on that farm, for it is there solid, clear down to China; it can't run away."
The Governor kinder moved off a little, as if meditatin' flight, and I spoke up some louder, bein' determined to do all I could for Mahala Widrig—good, honest, hard-workin' creeter.
Sez I, "It will be the makin' of Jim Widrigses folks and more'n fifty others right there round Jonesville, to say nothin' about the hull of the United States; and it will be money in Uncle Sam's pocket, too, in the end, and he will own up to me that it is."
The Governor here took out his watch and looked at it almost onbeknown to me, I wuz so took up a-talkin' for Justice and Mahala.
The Governor took out his watch.The Governor took out his watch.
Sez I, "This bill will bring money into Uncle Samuel's pocket in the end, for it will keep the boys to hum on the old farm." Sez I, "It is Poverty that has driv the boys off—hard work, high taxes, and ruinous mortgages drives to the city lots of 'em, to add to the pauper and criminal classes—boys that Uncle Sam might have kep to hum by the means I speak of, to grow up into sober, respectable, prosperous citizens, a strength and a safeguard to the Republic, but whom he now will have to support in prisons and almshouses, a danger and menace to the Goverment.
"Poor Uncle Sam!—poor, well-meanin', but oft misguided old creeter! It would be easier for him, if he only knew it, to do what Mr. Stanford wanted him to.
"Besides, think of the masses of fosterin' crime he would be a-pressin' back and a-turnin' into good, pure influences to bless the world! And besides, the oncounted gain to Heaven and earth! Uncle Sam would git the two-cent mortgages back a dozen times in the increase of taxable property."
The Governor murmured agin that he wuz wanted to once, in a distant part of the city—he must start for California imegatly, and on the next train. Sez he incoherently, "That school wuz about to open; he must be to the University to once."
He wuz nearly delirious—I spoze he wuz nearly overcome by my remarkable eloquence, but don't know.
But as he sot off, a-movin' backward in a polite way but swift, entirely onbeknown to him he come up aginst a big tree, and with a hopeless look of resignation he leaned up aginst it, while I, a-feelin' that Providence had interfered to give me another chance at him, advanced onwards, and sez to him in a real eloquent way, "That bill will do more than any amount of beggin', or jawin', or preachin', towards keepin' the boys to humon the old deserted farms that are so thick in the country; and," sez I, "now that bill has fell out of his hands, I want you to take it up and pass it on to success."
Sez I, "Let Uncle Sam and you go out, as I have, in the country byroads in Jonesville, and Loontown, and Zoar, and you'll both gin in that I'm a-tellin' the truth."
Sez I, "If it hain't a pitiful sight in one short mornin's ride to go by more'n a dozen of them poor deserted old homes, as I have many a time, and I spoze they lay jest as thick scattered all over the State and country as they do round Jonesville."
Sez I, "To see them old brown ruffs a-humpin' themselves up jest as lonesome-lookin' and cold—no smoke a-comin' out of the chimblys to cheer 'em up—to see the bare winders a-facin' the west, and no bright eyes a-lookin' out, nor curly locks for the sunlight to git tangled in—to see the poor old door-step a-settin' there alone, as if a-tellin' over its troubles to the front gate, and that a-creakin' back to it on lonesome nights or cold, fair mornin's—
"And the old well-sweep a-pintin' up into the sky overhead, as if a-callin' Heaven to witness that it wuzn't to blame for the state of things—
"And the apple trees, with low swingin' branches, with no bare brown feet to press on 'em on the way up to the robin's nest overhead—empty barns, ruins, weedy gardens, long, lonesome stretches of paster and medder lands—
"Why, if Uncle Sam could look on sech sights, and have me right by him to tell him the reason on't—to tell him that two thousand dollars lent on easy interest would turn every one of them worthless, decayin' pieces of property into beautiful, flourishin', prosperous homes, he'd probable feel different about passin' the bill from what he duz now—
"If Uncle Sam could have me right by him to tell him the reason.""If Uncle Sam could have me right by him to tell him the reason."
"When I told him that most generally out behind the barn, and under the apple trees and gambrul ruff, wuz crouchin' the monster that had sapped the life out of the hum—the bloated, misshapen form of a mortgage at six per cent, and that old, insatiable monster had devoured and drinked down every cent of the earnin's that the hull family could bring to appease it with—
"It would open its snappin' old jaws and swaller 'em all down, and then set down refreshed but unappeased to wait for the next earnin's to be brung him.
"Wall, now, if they could pay off that mortgage, and git rid of it, they could walk over its prostrate form into prosperity; they could afford to lighten up the bare poverty of a country farm, so repellin' to the young, with some touches of brightness. Books, music, good horses, carriages would preach louder lessons of content to the children than any they would hear from their pa's or ma's or ministers.
"They would love their hums—would make them yield, instead of ruin and depressin' influences, a good income to themselves, and good tax-payin' property to help Uncle Sam—
"Decrease vice, increase virtue—lead away from prisons and almshousen, lead toward meetin'-housen, and the halls of justice, mebby. For in the highest places of trust and honor in the United States to-day is to be found the sons and daughters of country homes."
Here, at jest this juncture, my umbrell fell out of my hand, and it brung my eyes down to earth agin; for some time, entirely onbeknown to me, I had been a-lookin' up into the encirclin' heavens, and a-soarin' round there in oratory.
But as my eyes fell onto the Governor, I noticed the extreme weariness and mute agony on his liniment; he picked up my umbrell and handed it to me, and sez he, a-speakin' fast and agitated, as if in fear of sunthin' or ruther:—
"Your remarks are truly eloquent, and I believe every word on 'em; but," sez he, "I have an engagement of nearly life and death; I must leave you," and he sot off nearly on a run.
And I spread my umbrell and walked off with composure and dignity to tackle the next buildin', which wuz Oregon.
But my pardner jined me at that minit with his handkerchief held triumphantly in his hand.
And at his earnest request we didn't examine clost any of the State buildin's—that is, we didn't go in and look 'em over; but, from the outside view, we had a high opinion on 'em.
They wuz beautiful and extremely gorgeous, some on 'em.
And they looked real good, too, and wuz comfortable inside, I hain't a doubt on't.
I felt bad not to pay attention to every State jest as they come, and I know that they'll feel it if they ever hear on't.
But, as Josiah said, there wuz so many to pay attention to 'em, that they wouldn't mind so much as if they wuz more alone and lonely.
Wall, Josiah felt as if he'd got to have a bite of sunthin' to eat, and so we sot off at a pretty good jog for the nearest restaurant, and there we got a good lunch, and after we had done eatin', and Josiah wuz in a real good frame of mind, to all human appearance, I sez, "I'm a-goin' to see Hatye, if I don't see nothin' else."
And Josiah sez, "Where is Hatye?"
And I sez, "Not but a little ways from the German Buildin'."
And sez he, "Who is Hatye, anyway?"
And I sez, "Hatye is one of the first islands that Columbus discovered, and it ort to take a front rank in his doin's, and for lots of other reasons, too," sez I. "It is there that we see the exhibit of our colored men and bretheren."
We found Hatye a good-lookin' buildin', a story and a half high, with a good-lookin' dome a-risin' out of the centre.
And inside on't we found exhibits in fruit, grain, and machinery, and all sorts of products, and in the picters and other works of art we see that the Hatyeans wuz a-doin' first rate.
And, as I remarked to Josiah, sez I, "If Christopher Columbus stood right here by my side, he'd say—
"'Josiah Allen's wife, Hatye has done real well, and I am glad that I discovered it.'"
"Josiah Allen's wife, Hatye has done real well, and I am glad that I discovered it.""Josiah Allen's wife, Hatye has done real well, and I am glad that I discovered it."
Wall, that night, when I got back to Miss Plankses, I found a letter from Tirzah Ann, and my worst apprehensions I had apprehended in her case wuz realized.
She and Whitfield wuzn't a-comin' to the Fair at all.
By the time she got her oyster-shell stockin's done, the weather had moderated, so it wuz too cool to wear 'em, and it was too late then to begin woosted ones (of course, she could buy stockin's, but she wuz sot on havin' hand-made ones, bein' so much nicer, and so much more liable to attract respect and admiration)—
And then by that time the weather wuz so variable that she didn't know whether to take summer clothes or winter ones, and so she dallied along till it got so late thatWhitfield didn't dast to take her out at all, she wuz so kinder mauger.
She had wore herself all out a-bonin' down and knittin' them stockin's, and embroiderin' them night-shirts, and preparin' for the Fair, so they gin up comin'.
I felt bad.
Wall, it wuz all settled as I wanted it to be. Them two angels, as I couldn't hardly keep callin' 'em, if one of 'em wuz a he angel—them two lovely good creeters wuz married right in the place where I wanted 'em to be married—right in our parlor, in front of the picter of Grant, and not fur back of the hangin' lamp, but fur enough back so's to allow of a lovely bell of white roses and lilies to swing over their heads.
The bell wuz made of the white roses, and a fair white lily hung down, a-swingin' its noiseless music out into the hearts below—sacred music which we all seemed to hear in our inmost hearts as we looked into the faces that stood under that magic bell.
Isabelle had on a white muslin gown, plain, but shear and fine, and she wore a bunch of white roses at her belt and at her white throat, and she carried in her hand a bunch of rare ones.
But it all corresponded, for she wuz the white lily herself, as tall, and fair, and queenly.
Only when the words wuz said that made her Tom's wife, her cheeks flushed up as no white lily ever did, even under the sun's rosiest rays.
But a sun wuz a-shinin' on her that went beyend any earthly sun—it wuz the rays of the great planet Love that illuminated her face, and lit up her glorified eyes with the light that wuz never on sea nor on shore.
Her husband looked right into her face all the while the Elder wuz a-unitin' 'em, a-lookin' at her as if he could not quite believe in his happiness yet—looked at her as one looks at a pearl of great price, when he has recovered it after a long loss.
I sez to Josiah, as I see that look on his face—
"Many waters may not quench it, Josiah Allen, nor floods drown it, can they?"
And he brung me back to the present by remarkin'—
"I wouldn't bring up drowndins and conflagrations at such a time as this, Samantha."
And I sithed and sez to myself, what I have said so many times to she that wuz Samantha Smith, in strict confidence—
"How different, how different Josiah Allen and I look at things! And still we worship each other, jest about."
Wall, Thomas Jefferson and Maggie wuz there, and Tirzah Ann and Whitfield, and the children, and Krit. The two girls, our daughters, wuz dressed in white, and the Babe stood up by the bride dressed in white, and holdin' a cunnin' little basket of posies in her hand, and they all looked pretty, and felt pretty, and acted so.
We had good refreshments to refresh ourselves with, and everything went off happy and joyous, as weddings should, and will, if True Love stands up with 'em; and she is the only Bridesmaid worth a cent.
(I am aware that it is usual to call Love a he, but I believe in fair play, and you may as well call it a she once in a while, specially as the female sect are as lovin' agin as the he ones, so I think.)
Wall, they had lots and lots of presents—nice ones too. Mr. Freeman's gift to her wuz two diamond and ruby bracelets, that shone on her white wrists like sparks of fire and dew.
Them diamonds seemed to be the mates of the ones that had burned on her finger ever sence a day or two after they met at the World's Fair.
So you see, though she gin her jewels away in her youth, she found 'em agin in her ripe, sweet womanhood. She gin away the jewels of her ambition, her glowin' hopes and desires, for a career, and she found 'em more than all made up to her.
But the jewels her husband prized most in her wuz the calm light of patience, and love, and womanliness that shone on her face. They wuz made, them pure pearls of hern, as pearls always are, by long sufferin' and endurance, and the "constant anguish of patience."
Krit give her for his gift a beautiful cross of precious stones, and I mistrusted, from what I see in her face when he gin it to her, that he meant it to be symbolical, and then agin I don't know. But, anyway, she wore it a-fastenin' the lace at her white throat.
Krit give her a beautiful cross.Krit give her a beautiful cross.
But I do know that the girls and I gin her some good linen napkins, and towels, and table-cloths, and the boys a handsome set of books.
And I do know that the supper afterwards wuz, although well I know the impoliteness of my even hintin' at it—I do know, and I should lie if I said that I didn't know it, thatthat supper wuz a good one—as good a one, so fur as my knowledge goes, as wuz ever put on a table in the town of Lyme, or the village of Jonesville.
And Josiah Allen, he eat too much—fur, fur too much. And I hunched him three times to that effect at the time, to no avail.
And once I stepped on his toe—a dretful warnin' steppin'—and he asked me out loud and snappish (I hit a corn, I spoze, onbeknown to me)—and he asked me right out before 'em all, voyalent, "What I wuz a-steppin' on his toe for?"
I stepped on his toe.I stepped on his toe.
And so, of course, that curbed me in, and I had to let him go on, and cut a full swath in the vittles. But it wuz some comfort for me to think that most likely he wouldn't be tempted by a weddin' supper agin—not for some time, anyway. For the Babe wuz but young yet, and we wuz gettin' along.
Yes, that hull weddin' went off perfectly beautiful, and there wuzn't but one drawback to my happiness on that golden day that united them two happy lovers.
Yes, onbeknown to me a feelin' of sadness come over me—sadness and regret.
It wuzn't any worriment and concern about the fate of Isabelle and her husband—no; True Love wuz a-goin' out with 'em on their weddin' tower, and I knew if he went ahead of 'em, and they wuz a-walkin' in the light of his torch, their way wuz a-goin' to be a radiant and a satisfyin' one, whether it led up hill or down or over the deep waters—yea, even over the swellin' of Jordan.
No, it wuzn't that, nor anything relatin' to the children, or my dress, or anything—
No, my dress—a new lilock gray alpaca—sot out noble round my form, and my new head-dress wuz foamin' lookin', but it didn't foam too much.
No, it wuzn't that, nor anything about the neighbors—no; they looked some envious at our noble doin's, and walked by the house considerable, and the wimmen made errents, and borrowed more tea and sugar, durin' the preparations, than it seemed as if they could use in two years; but I pitied 'em, and forgive 'em—
And it wuzn't anything about the children or Krit.
For the children wuz happy in their happy and prosperous hums, and Krit, they say—I don't tell it for certain—but they say that he come back engaged to a sweet young girl of Chicago—
Come back from the great New World of the World's Fair, as his illustrious namesake went home so long ago, in chains—
Only Krit's chains wuz wrought of linked love and blessedness instead of iron—so they say.
I've seen her picter; but good land! how can I tell who or what it is? It is pretty as a doll, and Krit seems to think his eyes on it; but he's so full of fun, I can't git any straight story out of him.
But Thomas Jefferson says she is a bonny fidy girl—a good one and a pretty one, and has got a father dretful well off; and he sez that she and Krit are engaged. So I spoze more'n like as not they be.
And I also learnt, through a letter received that very day, that Mr. Bolster has led Miss Plank to the altar, or she has led him—it don't make much difference. Anyway, she has walked offen the Plank of widowhood, and settled down onto a Bolster for life.
Mr. Bolster led Miss Plank to the altar.Mr. Bolster led Miss Plank to the altar.
I wuz glad on't. She wanted a companion, and he loves to converse, Heaven knows; and he is sure of one thing—he's almost certain, or as certain as we can be of anything in this life, that he will have the best pancakes that hands can make or spoons stir up.
I learnt also from her letter—Miss Bolster's, knee Plankses—that Nony Piddock wuz a-goin into the ministery. What a case for funerals he willbe, and shockin' casualities! But he won't be good for much on a weddin' occasion.
And speakin' of weddin's brings me back to my subject agin.
No, it wuzn't any of these things that cast that mournful shadder on my eyebrows, anon, and even oftener, when I wuz out by myself—
And I spoze that I might as well tell what it wuz that I regretted and missed—
It wuz Christopher Columbus! the Brave Admiral! good, noble creeter!
I felt, in view of all he had done for America and the world, it wuz too bad that he had to die without havin' the privilege of seein' Jonesville, and bein' with us that day, and seein' what we see, and hearin' what we heard, and eatin' what we eat—
It wuz his doin's, the hull on't wuz Christopher Columbuses doin's. For if he hadn't discovered America, why, he wouldn't had no World's Fair for him. And then it stands to reason that Josiah and I shouldn't have gone to it. And if we hadn't gone to Miss Plankses, Mr. Freeman and Isabelle wouldn't have met.
Yes, I felt to lay the praise of it all to that blessed old mariner—I felt that I hadn't done nothin' towards it to what he had. And I kep on a-sayin' to myself—
"Oh, if he could only have been here, and seen with his own eyes what he had done!"
And when I thought how he walked hungry through the streets of Genoa, oh, how I did wish he could have had some of my scolloped oysters, and pressed chickens, and jell-cake, and tarts, and my heartfelt pity and sympathy, to say nothin' of other vittles, and well-meanin' actions accordin'.
How I did wish he could have had some of my scolloped oysters, and jell-cake, and tarts.How I did wish he could have had some of my scolloped oysters, and jell-cake, and tarts.
Of course, I would have been pleased to have had Queen Isabelle and Ferdinand there—
There wuz cake enough, and ice-cream, and oysters, and everything. And everybody that knows me knows that I hain't one to begrech havin' one or two more visitors to wait on and provide for than I had planned havin'.
Yes, I should have been glad to seen 'em, and wait on 'em. But I didn't seem to care anything about seein' 'em, compared to my feelin's about Christopher Columbus.
Yes, Christopher wuz my theme, and my constant burden of mind.
But I had to gin it up. I couldn't expect a man to live four or five hundred years jest to please me, and gratify Jonesville.
No, Columbus wuzn't there. He wuz off somewhere a-discoverin' new continents, or planets, mebby.
For I don't believe he crumpled right down, and sot down forever on them golden streets.
No; I believe the eager, active mind would be a-reachin' out, a-findin' out new truths, new discoveries, so great that it would probable make us shet our eyes before the blindin' glory of 'em, if we could only git a glimpse of 'em.
But there, in that New World that lays beyend the sunset, he is happy at last—blest in the companionship of other true prophetic ones, whose deepest strivin's wuz, like his, to make the world better and wiser—them who longed for deeper, fuller understandin', and who walked the narrer streets of earth, like him, in chains and soul-hunger.
I love to think that now, onhampered by mutinous foes, or mortal weakness, they are a-sailin' out on that broad sea of full knowledge, and comprehension, and divine sympathy. Lit by the sunshine of infinite love, they sail on, and on, and on.
THE END.
A Charming Volume of Poetry. Beautifully Illustrated byW. Hamilton Gibsonand other Artists. Bound in Colors. Square 12mo, 216 pp. Cloth, $2.00.