had a sewin’ machine in front of his wagon. We had the old mare and the
colt, and seein’ a strange horse come up so close behind us, the colt
started off full run towards Jonesville, and then run down a cross-road
and into a lot.
Says the man behind us, “I am a little younger than you be, Mr. Allen;
if you will hold my horse I will go after the colt with pleasure.”
Josiah was glad enough, and so he got into the feller’s wagon; but
before he started off, the man, says he:
“You can look at that machine in front of you while I am gone. I tell
you frankly, that there haint another machine equal to it in America; it
requires no strength at all; infants can run it for days at a time; or
idiots; if anybody knows enough to set and whistle, they can run this
machine; and it’s especially adapted to the blind—blind people can run
it jest as well as them that can see. A blind woman last year, in one
day, made 43 dollars a makin’ leather aprons; stitched them all round
the age two rows. She made two dozen of ’em, and then she made four
dozen gauze veils the same day, without changin’ the needle. That is one
of the beauties of the machine, its goin’ from leather to lace, and back
again, without changin’ the needle. It is so tryin’ for wimmen, every
time they want to go from leather, to gauze and book muslin, to have to
change the needle; but you can see for yourself that it haint got its
equal in North America.”
He heerd the colt whinner, and Josiah stood up in the wagon, and looked
after it. So he started off down the cross road.
And we sot there, feelin’ considerable like a procession; Josiah holdin’
the stranger’s horse, and I the old mare; and as we sot there, up driv
another slick lookin’ chap, and I bein’ ahead, he spoke to me, and says
he:
“Can you direct me, mom, to Josiah Allen’s house?”
“It is about a mile from here,” and I added in a friendly tone, “Josiah
is my husband.”
“Is he?” says he, in a genteel tone.
“Yes,” says I, “we have been to Jonesville, and our colt run down that
cross road, and-—”
“I see,” says he interruptin’ of me, “I see how it is.” And then he went
on in a lower tone, “If you think of buyin’ a sewin’ machine, don’t git
one of that feller in the wagon behind you—I know him well; he is one of
the most worthless shacks in the country, as you can plainly see by the
looks of his countenance. If I ever see a face in which knave and
villain is wrote down, it is on hisen. Any one with half an eye can see
that he would cheat his grandmother out of her snuff handkerchief, if he
got a chance.”
He talked so fast that I couldn’t git a chance to put in a word age ways
for Josiah.
“His sewin’ machines are utterly worthless; he haint never sold one yet;
he cant. His character has got out—folks know him. There was a lady
tellin’ me the other day that her machine she bought of him, all fell to
pieces in less than twenty-four hours after she bought it; fell onto her
infant, a sweet little babe, and crippled it for life. I see your
husband is havin’ a hard time of it with that colt. I will jest hitch my
horse here to the fence, and go down and help him; I want to have a
little talk with him before he comes back here.” So he started off on
the run.
I told Josiah what he said about him, for it madded me, but Josiah took
it cool. He seemed to love to set there and see them two men run. I
never _did_ see a colt act as that one did; they didn’t have time to
pass a word with each other, to find out their mistake, it kep’ ’em so
on a keen run. They would git it headed towards us, and then it would
kick up its heels, and run into some lot, and canter round in a circle
with its head up in the air, and then bring up short ag’inst the fence;
and then they would leap over the fence. The first one had white
pantaloons on, but he didn’t mind ’em; over he would go, right into
sikuta or elderbushes, and they would wave their hats at it, and holler,
and whistle, and bark like dogs, and the colt would whinner and start
off again right the wrong way, and them two men would go a pantin’ after
it. They had been a runnin’ nigh onto half an hour, when a good lookin’
young feller come along, and seein’ me a settin’ still and holdin’ the
old mare, he up and says:
“Are you in any trouble that I can assist you?”
Says I, “We are goin’ home from Jonesville, Josiah and me, and our colt
got away and—”
But Josiah interrupted me, and says he, “And them two fools a caperin’
after it, are sewin’ machine agents.”
The good lookin’ chap see all through it in a minute, and he broke out
into a laugh it would have done your soul good to hear, it was so clear
and hearty, and honest. But he didn’t say a word; he drove out to go by
us, and we see then that he had a sewin’ machine in the buggy.
“Are you a agent?” says Josiah.
“Yes,” says he.
“What sort of a machine is this here?” says Josiah, liftin’ up the cloth
from the machine in front of him.
“A pretty good one,” says the feller, lookin’ at the name on it.
[Illustration: THE SEWIN’ MACHINE AGENTS.]
“Is yours as good?” says Josiah.
“I think it is better,” says he. And then he started up his horse.
“Hello! stop!” says Josiah.
The feller stopped.
“Why don’t you run down other fellers’ machines, and beset us to buy
yourn?”
“Because I don’t make a practice of stoppin’ people on the street.”
“Do you haunt folks day and night; foller ’em up ladders, through
trap-doors, down sullers, and under barns?”
“No,” says the young chap, “I show people how my machine works; if they
want it, I sell it; and if they don’t, I leave.”
“How much is your machine?” says Josiah.
“75 dollars.”
“Can’t you,” says Josiah, “because I look so much like your old father,
or because I am a Methodist, or because my wife’s mother used to live
neighbor to your grandmother—let me have it for 25 dollars?”
The feller got up on his wagon, and turned his machine round so we could
see it plain—it was a beauty—and says he:
“You see this machine, sir; I think it is the best one made, although
there is no great difference between this and the one over there; but I
think what difference there is, is in this one’s favor. You can have it
for 75 dollars if you want it; if not, I will drive on.”
“How do you like the looks on it, Samantha?”
Says I, “It is the kind I wanted to git.”
Josiah took out his wallet, and counted out 75 dollars, and says he:
“Put that machine into that wagon where Samantha is.”
The good lookin’ feller was jest liftin’ of it in, and countin’ over his
money, when the two fellers come up with the colt. It seemed that they
had had a explanation as they was comin’ back; I see they had as quick
as I catched sight on ’em, for they was a walkin’ one on one side of the
road, and the other on the other, most tight up to the fence. They was
most dead the colt had run ’em so, and it did seem as if their faces
couldn’t look no redder nor more madder than they did as we catched
sight on ’em and Josiah thanked ’em for drivin’ back the colt; but when
they see that the other feller had sold us a machine, their faces _did_
look redder and madder.
But I didn’t care a mite; we drove off tickled enough that we had got
through with our sufferin’s with agents. And the colt had got so beat
out a runnin’ and racin’, that he drove home first-rate, walkin’ along
by the old mare as stiddy as a deacon.
[Illustration]
PREPARIN’ FOR OUR TOWER.
It was on a fair and lovely mornin’, though middlin’ cool, that I told
my Josiah that if he and I was a goin’ to see the Sentinal it was time
for us to be makin’ some preparations. Thomas J. haint a goin’ till
bime-by. He wants to go in company with Maggy Snow and her father, and I
don’t blame him a mite—I was young once myself. The Squire is laid up
now with rheumatiz, can’t step a step on his left foot. I was out on the
back stoop, a shakin’ my table cloth and Josiah was out there a grindin’
his jack knife on the grindstun, and I says to him, again:
“Josiah Allen it is time for us to prepare.”
Says he, “I thought mebby you’d want to give up goin’, Samantha.”
“_I want to give up goin’!_” says I, in a almost mekanical tone, but
very cold.
“Yes,” says he in a sickly and almost foolish tone. “I didn’t know but
you’d want to wait till the next one; I didn’t know but you’d drather.”
“_Drather!_” I repeated still more icily. “I would wait if I was in your
place Josiah Allen, till we are as old as the hills; if we was alive
we’d be carried there in a side show, and you know it;” and I folded up
my table cloth almost severely.
“Well,” says he, tryin’ the age of the knife with his fingers, “I don’t
think _I_ shall go anyway.”
[Illustration: “IT HAINT ALWAYS BEST TO TELL REASONS.”]
Says I layin’ the table cloth over my left arm, and foldin’ my right and
left arm, tryin’ hard to keep some composed (on the outside):
“What are your reasons, Josiah Allen?”
“Oh,” says he in a kind of a blind way—goin’ to grindin’ again,—“I have
my reasons, but it haint always best to tell reasons to everybody.”
And jest so he kep’ a grindin’ and a hangin’ back and a actin’. It was a
curious time, very. I a standin’ there erect and firm on the stoop, with
my table cloth on my left arm and earnestness on my eyebrow, and he half
bent, a grindin’ away on that old jack knife, with obstinacy on his
brow, a tellin’ me in a blind mysterious way that he had his reasons and
wouldn’t tell ’em. Oh! how offish and strange men will act. Truly,
truly, doth the poet observe, “that men are wild, and have their
spells.”
There Josiah Allen had acted to the Debatin’-school all up in arms about
goin’. He knew the nation would expect me to be present. He knew well
what a gloom it would cast over the Sentinal if I wasn’t there, a
shadder that would spread (as you may say) from pole to pole. Josiah
Allen knew all about it; he knew well how I had lotted on makin’ a
martyr of myself in the cause of Right and Wimmen, and here he had to
baulk in the harness. Truly, men are as contrary creeters as the earth
affords, when they are a mind to be. Every married woman will join with
me in sayin’, that there are moments in married life, when mules seem to
be patterns of yieldin’ sweetness and obligin’ness compared with lawful
pardners.
But here, in this tryin’ moment was where mind stepped in to the relief
of matter and Samantha. Some wimmen when they see their pardners act so
strange and curious, would have give up. Not so Samantha. Here was where
the deep and arduous study of her life-time into the heights and depths
of the manly mind soared up and triumphed. I didn’t act skairt at all by
him, neither did I show out that I was mad—though I was inwardly—to see
him act so offish and obstinate. No! I looked down on him a grindin’,
and a actin’, with a almost marble calm; and with a resolution nearly
cast-iron I concealed my opinion of him and kep’ my tongue in my head,
and with a slow, even, and almost majestic tread I turned round and went
back into the house, laid my table-cloth on the buttery shelf, and begun
my preparations to conquer and to triumph. At jest noon, I called him
into the house to as good a dinner as Jonesville ever offered to man or
beast.
Again science, philosophy and Samantha conquered. Josiah had got through
with the turkey and vegetables of all kinds, and there was a sweet smile
on his face as I brought on the cherry puddin’, and a tender,
affectionate look to his eyes as he looked up at me when I sot the bowl
of sweet sass to eat on it in front of him. Then I knew the time had
come, the hour was ripe, and I boldly and confidently tackled him as to
what his reasons was. And without a struggle or a murmur he says in
gentle axents:
“Samantha, my pantaloons haint suitable to wear to the Sentimental, they
are all frayed out round the bottoms, and you can see your face in the
knees, they are so shiny, they are as good as lookin’ glasses.”
I felt dretful well to think I had come off conqueror, and awful
relieved to think my pardner’s reasons was them I could grapple with and
overthrow. I see that my mission could be preformed about, my tower gone
off on. And then my companion’s affectionate mean endeared him to me
dretfully for the time bein’, and take it altogether I felt so dretful
eloquent, I soared right up in half a minute to a height of happiness
and eloquence that I hadn’t sot on for days and days, and I broke right
out in a noble oriterin’ tone, and as affectionate as they make:
“Josiah Allen that pure and heavenly blossom of True Love never floated
down from Eden bowers into this troublesome world, without its whiteness
makin’ the soul whiter that it lighted down on. It never warmed the
heart with a breath of the heavenly climate it was born in without
inspirin’ that heart with a desire and a inspiration to help the beloved
object.” Says I firmly, “Store clothes are not a goin’ to part my
companion and happiness;” and I added—in still more lofty tones for I
felt noble in spirit as I said it—“take the last churnin’ of butter
Josiah Allen, and go to Jonesville and git the cloth for a new pair of
pantaloons, and I will make them for you or perish on the press board.”
“Well,” says he sweetly, as he helped himself to the sweet sass, “then
we will go to the Sentimental.”
(I have give up tryin’ to have Josiah call it anything but Sentimental,
because I see plain after arguin’ for several weeks on it, that argument
was wasted, and breath spent in vain. He says he has spelt the word over
time and again, and studied on it a sight, and he knows it is as near
that as anything, and he _will_ call it Sentimental.)
Well, the very day I finished his trowsers, he broached a new idee to
me. We had been a layin’ out to go on the cars, but Josiah says to me,
says he:
“What do you say Samantha to goin’ with the old mare, and kinder
visitin’ along the road; we have got lots of relations that live all
along the way, some on my side, and some on yourn. They’ve all visited
us time and again, and we haint never been nigh ’em to visit ’em. What
do you say Samantha, to goin’ in our own conveniance.”
“You mean conveyance,” says I firmly.
“Well I said so didn’t I; what do you say to it, Samantha?”
Says I, “I haint a goin’ in that old buggy of ourn.”
Says he, “That buggy was high-toned enough for father, and for
grandfather, and it ort to be for us.”
Says I, “It is dangerous Josiah Allen and you know it. Have you forgot,”
says I, “how sister Minkley went right down through the bottom the other
day when you was a helpin’ her in?” Says I, “It skairt you Josiah Allen,
and you know it; the minute you leggo of her, to have her go right down
through the bottom, and set down on the ex. It was enough to start
anybody.”
“Well, what business has a woman to weigh more’n a ton? I’ve mended it.”
Says I, “Truly in the matter of heft Josiah Allen, let everybody be
fully perswaded in their own mind. And she don’t weigh near a ton, she
don’t weigh more’n three hundred and fifty.”
“The buggy was good enough for father and grandfather,” he kep’ a
arguin’.
“But,” says I in reasonable axents, “them two old men never sot out on
towers of Principle. They never sot out as Promiscous Advisors in the
cause of Right; if they had, they would have wanted to feel free and
promiscous in their minds. They wouldn’t have wanted to feel liable in
the loftiest moments of their high mission, to break through and come
down acrost a ex. They would have felt that a top buggy was none too
high-toned to bear ’em onwards.”
Says he, “It will make talk, Samantha. The neighbors will think we are
too loose-principled, and hauty.”
Says I, “The neighbors say now we are too tight to git a new one. I had
jest as lives be called too loose, as too tight. And you know,”—says I
in reasonable tones, “you know Josiah Allen, that we have got to be
called sunthin’ by ’em, anyway. We have got money out at interest, and
we are goin’ down the hill of life, and if we can go down any easier in
a top buggy, I don’t see why we shouldn’t have it to go in.”
So finally after considerable urgin’, I got Josiah headed towards
Jonesville after a top buggy. And I and the Widder Doodle kep’ watch to
the winder all day, expectin’ to see the new buggy a comin’ home with
Josiah; but he come back at night empty-handed but all worked up with
another new idee, and says he:
“What do you say Samantha to buyin’ a phantom,—a pony phantom. The man
says they are easier ridin’, easier to get into, and he thought you
would like it better than a top buggy. And he said they was all the
fashion too.”
But I answered him calmly. “Fashion, or no fashion, I shant ride no
_phantom_ Josiah Allen. I shant go to the Sentinal on my lofty mission,
a ridin’ a phantom. Though,” says I more mildly, “phantoms may be
willin’ critters to go, and easy ridin’, but I don’t seem to have no
drawin’ towards ’em. A top buggy is my theme.”
So I held firm, and finally Josiah bought one. It was a second-handed
one, and fair lookin’, big and roomy. In shape it wasn’t the height of
fashion, bein’ kind o’ bowin’ up at the back, and sort o’ spread out
like in front; a curious shape. I never see none exactly like it, before
nor sense. They said the man that built it, made up the pattern in his
own head, and there hadn’t nobody ever follered it. He died a few weeks
after he made it; Thomas Jefferson said he guessed it killed him, the
shape was so curious that it skairt the man to death. But it wasn’t no
such thing; he had the billerous colic.
Josiah was so perfectly delighted with it that he would go out to the
barn and look at it for hours, and I was most afraid he was settin’ his
heart too much on it; and I told Thomas Jefferson so, but he told me not
to worry; says he, “it wouldn’t be a mite wicked for father to worship
it.”
Says I, “Thomas Jefferson do you realize what you are a talkin’ about?”
says I, “it scares me to hear you talk so wicked when I brought you up
in such a Bible way.”
Says he, “There is where I got it, mother. I got it out of the Bible;
you know it says you shall not worship anything that is in the shape of
anything on earth, or in the heavens, or in the waters under the earth.
And that is why it would be perfectly safe for father to worship the
buggy.”
I see through it in a minute; though I never should have thought on it
myself. What a mind that boy has got; he grows deep every day.
Josiah said he couldn’t leave the colt to home, as the old mare would be
liable to turn right round in the road with us any time, and start back
for home; but I told him that when anybody sot off on a tower as a
martyr and a Promiscous Advisor, a few colts more or less wasn’t a goin’
to overthrow ’em and their principles. Says I, we will hitch the colt to
the old mare, Josiah Allen, and march onwards nobly in the cause of
Right.
But still there was a kind of a straggler of a thought hangin’ round the
age of my mind, to worry me a very little; and I says to my Josiah
dreamily:
“I wonder if they’ll be glad to see us. Anything but bringin’ trouble
onto folks, because they are unfortunate enough to be born cousins to
you, unbeknown to them.”
“But,” says Josiah, “we owe a visit to every one on ’em, and some on ’em
two or three.”
And so we did. They had all of ’em visited us years ago, more or less on
’em out of every family. There was Zebulin Coffin’ses wife and four of
his boys; Philander Spicer’ses wife and Philander—they all made us long
visits; and Serepta Simmons—she that was Serepta Smith—made it her home
with mother and me for years before she was married—we helped to bring
her up on a bottle. And then there was Delila, Melankton Spicer’ses wife
had visited us with Philander’ses folks when they was first married; she
was Philander’s wife’s sister. We had promised to pay their visits back,
and laid out to, but it hadn’t seemed to come right, somehow. But now,
everything seemed to promise fair for a first-rate time for us and them.
We would be journeyin’ onwards towards the Sentinal, and the cause of
Right. Our clothes (now Josiah had got some new pantaloons and I a new
dress) would look well, and almost foamin’. We had a beautiful top
buggy, and take it altogether, it did truly seem almost as Josiah said,
that we was havin’ our good things all on earth. But anon, or a very
little after, a new question come up; what should we do with the Widder
Doodle; she didn’t want to go, and she didn’t want to stay. And so, what
should we do with her to do right?
I am sot on doin’ by the Widder as I would wish to be done by if I
should come onto the town and have to be took in and done for; and so
day and night this deep and wearin’ thought kep’ a hauntin’ me—though I
tried to keep cool on the outside—“she don’t want to go, and she don’t
want to stay; and so what shall I do with the Widder Doodle?”
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
THE WIDDER AND WIDOWER.
Solomon Cypher is a widower! Yes, he has lost his wife with the tyfus;
she was a likely woman, had a swelled neck, but that wasn’t nothin’
ag’inst her; I never laid it up ag’inst her for a minute. I told Thomas
J. when he brought me the news, that I wished he and I was as likely a
woman as she was, and says I still more warmly, “if the hull world was
as likely a woman as she was, there wouldn’t be so much cuttin’ up, and
actin’ as there is now.” And says I, “Thomas J., it stands us in hand to
be prepared.”
But somehow it is awful hard to git that boy to take a realizin’ sense
of things; his morals are dretful sound, but a good deal of the time he
is light and triflin’ in his demeanor and his talk; and his mind don’t
seem to be so stabled as I could wish it to be.
Now I don’t s’pose there would anybody believe me, but the very next day
but one after Nancy Cypher’ses death, that boy begun to laugh at his
aunt Doodle about the relict. I told him I never see anything in my hull
life so wicked and awful, and I asked him where he s’posed he’d go to.
He was fixin’ on a paper collar to the lookin’ glass, and he says in a
kind of a chirk way, and in a fine polite tone: “I s’pose I shall go to
the weddin’.”
Good land! you might jest as well exhort the wind to stop blowin’ when
it is out on a regular spree, as to stop him when he gits to behavin’.
But I guess he got the worst of it this time, I guess his aunt Doodle
skairt him—she took on so when he sejested the idee of her marryin’ to
another man.
She bust right out cryin’, took out her snuff handkerchief, and rubbed
her eyes with both hands, her elbo’s standin’ out most straight; she
took it awful.
“Oh Doodle! Doodle!” says she, “what if you had lived to hear your
relict laughed at about marryin’ to another man. What agony it would
have brung to your dear linement; I can’t bear it, I can’t. Oh! when I
think how he worshipped the ground I walked on; and the neighbors said
he did; they said he thought more of the ground than he did of me: but
he didn’t, he worshipped us both. And what would his feelin’s be if he’d
lived to see his Widder laughed at about another man.”
She sobbed like a infant babe; and I come to the buttery door with my
nutmeg grater in my hand, and winked at Thomas Jefferson two or three
times, not to say another word to hurt her feelin’s. They was real firm
and severe winks and he knew I meant ’em, and he took up one of his law
books and went to readin’, and I went back to makin’ my fruit cake and
cherry pies. But I kep’ one eye out at her, not knowin’ what trouble of
mind would lead her into; she kep’ her snuff handkerchief over her eyes
and groaned bad for nearly nine moments I should judge, and then she
spoke out from under it:
“Do you think Solomon Cypher is good lookin’ Tommy?”
“Oh! from fair to middlin’,” says Thomas J.
And then she bust out again: “Oh what a linement my Doodle had on him;
how can I think of any other man. I can’t! I can’t!” And she groaned the
hardest she had yet. And I come to the buttery door again, and shook my
head and winked at Thomas Jefferson again, severer and more reprovin’
winks than they was before, and more of ’em; and he, feelin’ sorry I
guess for what he had done, got up and said he guessed he’d go out to
the barn, and help his father. Josiah was puttin’ some new stanchils in
the stable.
Thomas J. hadn’t much more’n got to the barn, and I had finished my
cake, and had jest got my hands into the pie crust a mixin’ it up, when
there come a knock to the door, and my hands bein’ in the dough, the
Widder stopped groanin’ for the time bein’, and opened it. It was
Solomon Cypher himself come to borry my bombazeen dress and crape veil
for some of the mourners. Bein’ engaged and busy, I thought I wouldn’t
go out till I had finished my pies; he and the Widder bein’ some
acquainted. He hadn’t sot but a few minutes when he spoke up, and says
he: