For years and years I've been deeply wownded in my most sacred feelin's
and my reason has been outraged by my pardner, Samantha's, writin' agin
the righteous cause of man's superiority to wimmen.
But though my feelin's have been rasped and almost bleedin' from the
unjust wownds I've kep' still and let her go on with other headstrong
and blinded females, and argey and deny man's sole and indefrangible
right to oversee and order the affairs of the universe, and specially
the weak helpless female sect, the justice of which, it seems to me, a
infant babe might see without spectacles.
I have curbed in my wownded sperit and my mighty inteleck with almost
giant strength, and never let 'em have free play in public print to
dispute and overthrow them uroneous doctrines.
And my reason for this course has been twofold. First, as any male
Filosifer and female Researcher knows, that owin' to her weakness of
inteleck and soft nater, a woman's mind gits ruffled up easy, and
that rufflin' up affects her cookin'. And under a too severe strain a
female has sometimes forgot to be promp with her meals, and not notice
seemin'ly that her pies wuz runnin' out, and the cookie jar gittin'
empty. Such things, no matter how strong a man's inteleck is, has a
deleterious effeck on his internal systern, which reacts on his branial
cranium. And I've been afraid of the consequences if I onleashed the
lion in me, and answered and crushed her onholy arguments in cold type.
And my second reason wuz that in spite of her almost blasphemous
doctrine that wimmen are equal to men, I knowed that under them mistook
idees it wuz a lackage of good horse sense and not inherient depravity
that ailed her. I knowed that if Samantha wuz only willin' to settle
down peacefully in the shelter and shade of man's powerful strength and
personality, there never wuz a better woman or a neater, equinomicler
housekeeper on earth than Samantha Smith Allen, and as a maker of cream
biscuit and apple dumplin's, and a frier and briler of spring chickens
never outdone and seldom equalled. I've argued in private life with
her till my jaws ached and my lungs wheezed with incessant labor. Have
experimented in various ways and appeared before her daily for years
as a shinin' sample of man's superiority. But never, never have I been
able to make her own up how inferior her sect is to the more opposite
one. But as I say, as long as I've suffered, I have never before took
my rightful place in literatoor, never took the high peak waitin'
for me to set down on, while I hurled the thunderbolts of convincin'
eloquence down upon the female wimmen squirmin' beneath me.
But I dassent wait a minute longer. I have got to put a stop to the
awful doin's goin' on around me. And if my worst forebodin's are
realized, and I've got to starve it out, I will offer myself a hungry
victim to Duty, and die with my manly principles enfoldin' my gant form
like a halo of glory. But mebby I've waited too long. I tremble to
think on't. I ort to made the move sooner.
For things are growin' worse and worse all the time, female wimmen
are risin' up on every side claimin' to be equal to men, talkin',
preachin', hikin', paradin' with lyin' banners, vowin' with brazen
impudence that since they bear the financial and legal burdens of
citizenship, they ort to be citizens of the U.S., and since they bear
children they want to protect 'em in the house and outdoors, and so on
to the end of their windy arguments. Want to be citizens! how can they
be? Hain't the eagle a male bird? And what duz E Pluribus Unum mean?
Why, we men translated it years ago--Eminent People Us--Us males. And
every fool knows that wimmen hain't a people, hain't a citizen and
never has been. Jest think on't, weak wimmen, underlin's, as they've
always been legally and politically considered, dashin' and hikin'
about, bilin' up like foamin' billers of froth and folly threatenin'
to engulf our noble Ship of State. I've knowed how a strong minded
man wuz needed to grasp holt of the hellum and try to steer that poor
staggerin' wobblin' wimmen tosted craft into a haven of safety, into
some place where men can agin enjoy their Heaven born rights to rule
the world and boss round the female sect, and to turn that frothy
turbulent feminist tide sweepin' out into broad paths never meant for
it to sweep in, into the shaller narrer safe channels it is fitted for.
I had decided not to tell Samantha about my great book aginst Female
Suffrage till it wuz writ and published and the crash come. But the
very day I begun my immortal work she wuz cookin' a young duck with
dressin', and the delicious uroma come like incense to my nostrils,
and insensibly it softened my feelin's. And I thought mebby I ort
to prepare her for what would be the effect of my book on her sect,
and the world at large. We'd lived together for years and outside of
her uroneous beliefs she'd been a kind and agreeable companion, a fur
better cook and housekeeper than any Aunty Suffragist I ever see or
hearn on, and had been a help and comfort to me; she wuz bakin' a plum
puddin' too, and some Hubbard squash. And as I inhaled the delicious
odors I felt more and more soft and meller towards her, most as soft as
the squash. And so I broached the subject to her.
Sez I, "What do you think, Samantha, about my great projeck of
destroyin' female suffrage? What do you think of my writin' the book?"
I said the words and paused for a reply. The kitchen wuz clean and
cozy, the cheerful fire blazed; Samantha sot with smooth hair and
serene face in a new gingham dress and white apron, choppin' some
cabbage and celery for a salad; all wuz peace and happiness.
As I spoke the fateful words it seemed as if old Nater herself wuz
listenin' and peakin' in through the kitchen door to see what would
happen. What would be the effect on Samantha? I dreaded, yet waited for
the result. Would she overwhelm me with reproaches and entreaties to
stop and not ruin her sect? Would she be overcome and swoon away? And
the appaulin' thought come to me onbid, if she did who would finish up
the dinner? As I asked the question she paused with the choppin' knife
in her hand and sez:
"When I wuz a girl we had a Debatin' School, and there wuz one feller
that we always tried to git on the side opposite to us, his talk and
arguments wuz such a help to us. I hain't no objections to your writin'
the book, Josiah." And then she resoomed her work with her linement cam
as ever. I felt relieved, but couldn't see what sot her off to tellin'
that old story at this juncter, and can't to this day, but set it down
to female's inability to grasp holt of important questions, and answer
'em in a straightforward way as males do.
I knowed when I begun my great work of stompin' out Woman's Suffrage
that I must proceed careful; wimmen had clogged up the road to Truth
and Reason so with their fool arguments, lectures, parades, etc., I
must plough through 'em and make my way clear every step I took so no
clackin' arguin' female could rise up and dispute 'em.
I laid out to chase females back to the very beginin', and there in the
dim light of the dawnin' day of Time to grasp holt of the unanswerable
argument that proves to every reasonable mind wimmen's inferiority and
man's greatness. And then chase 'em back agin through the centuries up
to the present time, and there corner 'em and break down their flimsy
arguments of equality, and crush 'em forever. And make an end to this
male disturbin', world opsettin' bizness of Wimmen's Rights. And in
divin' back into history as fur as I've doven I want to give suitable
credit to my chumb, Uncle Simon Bentley. Bein' a bacheldor without no
hamperin' female ties drawin' on him and holdin' him back, he's had
more time than I have to devote to arjous study and research on the
subject, and has been a help to me. Not but what I could have equalled
him or gone ahead on him if I'd been foot-loose. But Samantha and the
barn stock wuz on my back, and fambly cares kep' me down. But after he
mentioned to me certain things he had studied out, I told him I had
thought of them very things more than one hundred times, but hadn't had
time to write 'em down.
Why, in the very first beginin' of time, we find the great fact that
smashes female equality down into the dirt where it belongs. We find
that wimmen wuz made and manufactured jest because men wuz kinder
lonesome. As Uncle Sime well sez, "It wuz jest a happen that wimmen
wuz made at all. Adam happened to feel kinder lonesome alone on that
big farm, and probable needed wimmen's help. And he happened to have
a extra rib he could spare as well as not, and so wimmen wuz made out
of that spare rib. But," sez Uncle Sime, "Adam would have been as
well agin off if Eve hadn't been made, and I should have told him so
if I had been there." Sez he bitterly, "Men hain't been lonesome since
wimmen wuz made. Oh, no! she has kep' her clack goin', and kep' men's
noses down on the grindstun ever sence."
"Well," sez I, "Simon, it wuz noble in Adam to be willin' to lose one
of his ribs to make her, for who knows to what hites men might have riz
up if he hadn't parted with it. If us men have riz up to such a hite
with one rib lackin' who knows how fur we should have gone up with the
hull on 'em."
"That hain't the pint," sez Uncle Sime. "The pint is, how dast wimmen
feel so big and claim to be equal to us men, when they think how, and
why, and what out of they wuz created. Wimmen ort to feel thankful and
grateful to men that she wuz made at all. How would she felt if she
hadn't been made? I guess she would feel pretty cheap and not put on so
many airs, and be hikein' round preachin' to her superiors."
In his excitement Uncle Sime had enunciated that crushin' argument
in a ruther loud tone. We wuz settin' on the back stoop and Samantha
comin' out to shake the table-cloth must have hearn it. But instead of
actin' humiliated and crushed by that masterly argument she looked at
us kinder queer over her specs, folded her table-cloth camly and said
nothin'.
And after she went in Uncle Sime resoomed his unanswerable arguments.
"Why, beside Bible proofs I can prove it in a scientific way. Weigh up
a man's bones in the stillyards and they'll weigh one hundred pounds
more or less, jest the bones. And now jest think on the preposterous
idee of that one little rib bone a risin' up right in the face of
science and reason, and pretendin' to be equal to the hull carcass.
And worse yet tryin' to stomp on him and bring him down to her level
by votin'. Why, if Adam had hearn to me and kep' that rib bone where
it wuz, jest think what the world would have escaped, think of the
jealousies, angers, revenges, weariness, expenses, wars, ruin and
bloodshed caused through the centuries by changin' that rib bone into a
female!"
I wuz astounded to see how deep Uncle Sime had doven into the great
mysteries of human existence, not but what I'd have thought it out
myself, if I'd had time from fambly cares.
But Uncle Sime went on, "Jest think, Josiah, of wimmen's wild and
turbulent doin's and the commotions and troubles and sufferin's wimmen
has caused males, and then think how quiet and peaceable that rib wuz
before it had been meddled with, and brought into the woman question.
A layin' there in Adam's side onquestionin' and cam. Never startin'
up and argyin' with the liver or diafram, never sassin' the spinal
collar, or disputin' the knee jints, that one small bone risin' up, and
demandin' the rights that justly belong to the hull carcass. Oh, what
lessons to female suffragists can be drawed from that scientific fact,
and how fur they can be drawed."
As long as I'd knowed Uncle Sime I never had realized before he wuz
such a deep thinker, and had such a fund of scientific knowledge to
back up his arguments. Of course I had 'em too, all on 'em, layin'
dormer inside on me.
* * * * *
Of course it made a tremendous stir in Jonesville when the startlin'
news got out that I wuz writin' a book agin female suffrage with the
settled intention and firm determination of puttin' an end to it
forever. It lifted me up to such a tottlin' hite in the estimation of
the male Jonesvillians that it would have gin a weaker man the Big
Head and made 'em liable to fall off. But such is my strength of mind
that I kep' cool on the outside, talked in a friendly and patronizin'
way to Samantha and the neighborin' wimmen, associated with the folks
that had the honor to live round me, and wore the same hat. The
Creation Searchin' Society of Jonesville called a special meetin' to
congratulate me and themselves on havin' their views on the inferiority
of wimmen disseminated in my book through the entire habitable globe. I
knowed my beliefs regardin' wimmen wuz the same as theirn, for we had
often laid them views out side by side and compared 'em together. And
Uncle Sime Bentley when I first told him on't shed tears of joy and sez
he:
"At _last_, at _last_ the men of Jonesville, the male men, are goin'
to be hearn from, and did justice to." And he grip holt of my hand in
one of hisen, and with the other he wep' onto his bandanna handkerchief
tears of pure joy and thankfulness.
Deacon Henzy, Solomon Sypher, Deacon Bobbett and a lot of other
bretheren in the meetin' house, talked to me about the forthcomin' book
with a solemn joy and triump in their linements and told me to consider
and weigh well every word I writ, up to the very ounce, "For," sez
they, "the broad onwinkin' eye of the World is on you and in that eye
we male Jonesvillians have been demeaned and lowered and looked down
on by the abominable things that wuz writ by----"
But I riz up my right hand and arm in a noble jester of warn, and sez
I, "Not one word agin Samantha, bretheren, not a word!"
They see the stern wild glare in my eye, and turned it off by sayin',
"Things have been writ by a female who shall be nameless, that has had
a tendency to make us male Jonesvillians objects of contemp. And the
uroneous and blasphemous idee has been disseminted in them writin's
that females are equal to males, and want rights that we know they
don't need or deserve, rights that will bring 'em to the brink of
ruin if not held back by a manly arm. Now it is in the power of a
male Jonesvillian to lift his sect up on the hite he's been partially
knocked off of, by them writin's, and put the weaker inferior sect down
into the holler place where they belong. It is your honor and your
privelige, Josiah Allen, to let the hull world see how superior to
females, how noble, how grand is the male manhood of Jonesville U.S.A."
It wuz a solemn occasion, but I riz up to it and told 'em I laid out in
my book to make such a change in public opinion that it would shake the
very pillows of society, but sez I, "After the shake and the quake is
over, things will settle down in their proper place agin. And then as
of old, men will take their position as master and females their proper
place as the tenderly governed class, lookin' up agin meekly to male
men as their nateral gardeens and protectors."