My companion Josiah havin’ bought a quantity of fresh fish, I thought I
would carry one over to Miss Betsey Slimpsy,—she that was Betsey
Bobbet,—thinkin’ mebby it would taste good to her. Betsey hain’t well.
Some think she is in a gallopin’ consumption, but I don’t. I think it is
her workin’ so hard, and farin’ so hard. She has to support the family
herself, almost entirely; she don’t have enough to eat a good deal of
the time, so folks say; she hain’t got any clothes fit to wear; and she
has to be such a slave, and work so awful hard, that it don’t seem as if
she is half as bright as she used to be. As she says, if it wasn’t for
the dignity she got by bein’ married, it didn’t seem as if she could
keep up. But that, she says, is a great comfort to her.
But she looks bad. She don’t get no sleep at all, she says, or none to
speak of. Simon’s horrors are worse than I ever dremp’ horrors could be.
They are truly horrible. Every night he pounds on the headboard, yells
awful, prances round, and kicks. Why, Betsey says, and I believe her,
that she is black and blue most the hull time, jest from kicks. I am
sorry for Betsey.
[Illustration: A PRESENT FOR BETSEY.]
Wall, I give her the fish,—she seemed awful glad of it,—and visited with
her a little while, and then, as supper-time was approachin’ and drawin’
near, I histed my umberell, and started out on my homeward return.
It was a lovely evenin’. It had been a very hot day, but the sun had sot
down (as it were) behind the trees to cool himself off, and the earth,
takin’ advantage of his temporary retirement, seemed to foller on and do
likewise. So I walked along on the green grass, under the swayin’
branches of the apple-trees that bent down over the highway—great,
liberal-hearted trees, stretching their strong brown arms out in
blessing and benediction—out over their own rich, cultivated soil and
the dusty highway, over foe and lover, tramp, and Josiah Allen’s wife. I
liked that in the trees—liked it first-rate in ’em. It made me feel well
to walk in their refreshin’ shade.
[Illustration: FRIENDLY FEELIN’S]
The apples were ripenin’ in the clusterin’ boughs, birds sang in the
branches, the blue sky shone down lovin’ly. The wayside blossoms grew
thick at my feet, the grass was like a velvet carpet under ’em, and,
most beautiful scene of all, my Josiah stood in the barn-door, nailin’
on a board.
Oh! how first-rate I did feel and look. I knew I was a lookin’ well. I
knew it jest as well as I wanted to, before I met my companion’s
admirin’ look, as he asked me, in considerable tender tones, if I knew
whether there was any more of them tenpenny nails left.
I told him there wuzn’t. And then, oh! how admirin’ he looked at me
agin, as I told him he had better hurry and finish the door, as I was
goin’ right in to put on the tea-kettle and get supper jest as quick as
I could.
His smile was like sunshine to my heart, as he told me he would be in by
the time I got it ready, and I’d better hurry up.
As I walked towards the house I was feelin’ beautiful, and very
affectionate towards my pardner. For love, no matter how full and ardent
it may be, will, like other great deeps, have its ebbs and flows, its
high tides and its more dwindlin’ ones.
At that moment my love and my confidence in my Josiah swept up in my
heart to the highest tide-level. And I thought, as I walked along, that
I would shet up that eye of my spectacles—that I never would agin let
distrust and a Widder Bump cause me a moment’s disquiet and unhappiness.
And though I could not deny to myself that Josiah Allen’s conduct, in
the spring of the year, and on a Friday night, had been mysterious, I
felt that I would look back upon it as I look on scriptural passages
that I can’t make out the meanin’ of. I always feel in them cases that
it is the fault of the translator. No matter how mysterious the meanin’
may seem, I know that the Scriptures are right, anyway. And I felt that
I would look back in that way upon my companion’s strange words and
demeaners. I felt that I would trust my Josiah.
And so, bein’ full of love and confidence in Josiah Allen and the world
at large, I walked with a even step up to the door-step, and as I did so
I see the kitchen-door was open. I thought that looked sort o’ strange,
as I knew that my Josiah had been to the barn to work all the time I was
gone. But I went in, and as I did so I see a man a standin’ by the
stove. He was a short, stocky man, dressed middlin’ well, but he had a
strange look.
[Illustration: MEETING THE ELDER.]
He was considerable older than Josiah, I should think. His face was red
and bloated, and his hair bein’ white as snow, and his white whiskers
runnin’ all round his chin, and up the sides of his face, it give it
considerable the look of a red pin-cushion with a white ruffle round it.
Only the ruffle (still usin’ the poetical simely) wuzn’t white under his
chin. No, he used too much tobacco for that. I s’pose he used it for the
good looks of it; I s’pose that is what folks use tobacco for. But good
land! I can’t see a single pretty look to it, nor never could, from the
time a man takes in a half a plug or so, and wads it up in one side of
his mouth, showin’ his yeller, nasty-lookin’ teeth, and lettin’ the
black, filthy-lookin’ juice run down his mouth and whiskers, to the time
he spits it all out agin onto carpets, stairways, church pews, concert
halls, car floors, wimmen’s dresses, and et cetery.
_I_ can’t see a mite of pretty looks about it. But I am reasonable and
always was. And there probable may be some beauty in it that I hain’t
never seen, or there wouldn’t so many foller it up.
For it must be for the looks of it that they use it. I have studied on
it a sight, and there hain’t no other reason that I can see. And if
there had been any the keen eye of my spectacles would have ketched
sight on it. They go awful deep into subjects, them spectacles do.
It can’t be for the taste of it that they use it, for it don’t taste
good. That I _know_, for I got some into my mouth once by mistake, over
to Miss Bobbet’s, and so what I know, I know; I can take my oath on the
taste of it. No, they don’t use it for that.
It can’t be for the profit of it, for it hain’t profitable; quite the
reverse. Why, there is about 30 million dollars’ worth raised in the
United States a year, and somebody has got to pay for it.
Why, I s’pose some poor men chew enough of this stuff,—chew it jest to
spit it out agin,—and smoke it,—draw the smoke into their mouth jest to
blow it out agin,—why, I s’pose this proceedin’ costs ’em enough in ten
or fifteen years to buy ’em a good little home. And there they are
willin’ to live and die homeless, themselves and them they love, jest
for looks, jest to try to look pretty.
For it must be for that. It can’t be for health, for doctors say it
hurts the health awfully, makes folks weak and nervious, and sometimes
leads to blindness and fits.
It hain’t for morals, for folks say, and stick to it, that it makes ’em
totter. Weakens a man’s moral nature, his social and religious
faculties, gives him a taste for the stronger stimulent of intoxicatin’
drinks, and so leads him down to ruin gradual.
No, it hain’t for the morals. I have most probable hit on the right
reason. But good land! where the beauty is in it I can’t see. But I am a
episodin’ fearfully.
As I was a sayin’, this man, instead of beautifyin’ himself with it, had
jest spilte the looks of his whiskers, in my eye. They looked yeller and
nasty. And the sides of his mouth was all streaked with it. In some
places it was sort o’ dried on. He looked to me as if it would do him
good to put him asoak in weak lye, and let him lay in it 2 or 3 days
till he got sweetened and cleansed.
His eyes was light-colored, and the lids was swelled and inflamed like.
His mouth was drawed down into a dretful sanctimonious pucker; he had a
awful big chew of tobacco in his mouth, and so it wasn’t all hypocracy
that drawed it down; it was probable about half and half—half hypocracy
and half tobacco. And under all the other expressions of his face was a
dissipated, bad look. I didn’t like his looks a mite. But there he stood
a kinder hangin’ onto the table (I found out afterwards that he had been
drinkin’ all the hard cider he could to old Bobbet’ses).
He asked me, in a kind of a thick voice, for Josiah. And I, thinkin’ it
was some one on business, asked him in a polite tone, though cool, “if
he wouldn’t take a chair and set down.”
“I would,” says he, in that thick, husky voice, “I would set down, mum,
but I am afraid if I should I couldn’t get up agin.”
And he looked at me in a curious, strange way; dretful wise, and yet
foolish like.
Says I, gazin’ sternly at him: “I am afraid you have been a drinkin’,
sir.”
“No! No! I hain’t! cider’s good; good for the blood. Will take a glass,
if you please.”
“Not here you won’t,” says I firmly.
“I’ll take a glass if you _please_, I said,” says he, speakin’ up kinder
loud. “Cider’s good; good for the blood.”
Says I: “It will be good for your blood if you get out of this house as
quick as you can. And I would love to know,” says I, lookin’ at him
keenly over my specks, “what you are here for, anyway.”
“I am here in the cause of—cider’s good for the blood. Will take a
drink.”
Says I: “You start out of this house, or I’ll call Josiah.”
“I come, and I’m workin’ for the cause of religion, if you please—and
I’ll take a glass of it, if you please.”
He’d make a sort of a drunken bow, every word or two, and smiled sort o’
foolish, and winked long, solemn winks.
Says I sternly: “You act as if you was a workin’ for the cause of
religion.”
“Apple-cider’s good. Hain’t apples religious, easy entreated? Hain’t
apples peacible, long sufferin’? Will take a drink, if you please.”
Says I, with a awful dignity: “I’d love to see myself givin’ you
anything to drink. You are drunk as a fool now; that is what ails you.”
“Cider hain’t tox-tox-toxicatin’; Bobbet said ’twuzn’t. He said his
cider-mill was harmless, easy ’ntreated, as peacible a one as he ever
see. Will take a glass, if you please. I wouldn’t drink a tox-tox-toxin’
bevrig, not for dollar. Guess Bobbet knows what’s pious drink and what
hain’t. Cider’s pious bevrig—called so—peacible, pious drink.”
“Pious drink!” says I, sternly. “I have seen more than one man made a
fool and a wild man by it, pious or not. Oh!” says I, eppisodin’ out
loud and eloquent, entirely unbeknown to me, “how Satan must laugh in
his sleeves (if he wears sleeves) to see how good men are deceived and
blindered in this matter. Nothin’ tickles Satan more than to get a good
man, a church member, to work for him for nothin’. When he gets good,
conscientious, christian folks to tackle his work of ruinin’ souls,
unbeknown to them, and let him rest off a spell,—why it tickles him most
to death.
“And when anyone plants the first seeds of drunkenness in a person, no
matter how good-naturedly it is done, no matter how good the ones are
who do it, they are workin’ for Satan and boardin’ themselves, entirely
unbeknown to them. That is, the good ones are; some know and realize
what they are a doin’, but keep at it through selfishness and love of
gain.”
“Likker’s bad, wrong; but cider’s in’cent, in’cent as a babe, a
prattlin’ little babe; it’s called so.”
“Good land!” says I, “do you s’pose I care a cent what a thing is
called?” Says I: “I have seen cider that three glasses of it would fix a
man out so he couldn’t tell how many childern he had, or fathers and
mothers, no more than he could count the stars in the zodiact. And
couldn’t walk straight and upright, no more than he could bump his old
head aginst the moon. When a man is dead what difference does it make to
him whether he died from a shotgun or billerous colic, or was skairt to
death? And what difference does it make when a man is made a fool of,
whether it is done by one spunefull or a dozen, or a quart? The
important thing to him is, he is a fool.”
“Yes, ’n I’ll take a glass of cider, if you please.”