A POLITICAL DIFFERENCE
Spring came at last, though some of us almost longed for the frozen
paths when we sank inches deep in the mud. We really were a city now
and had a mayor about whom there was still some contention. He had been
elected by the small majority. There were many citizens who objected to
this step and even then aldermen were looked upon with some suspicion.
Where was the money to come from for all the improvements planned? We
were going along comfortably, why not let well enough alone?
There were a few sidewalks, but the streets were a terror until they
settled a little. The wind helped; there were times when it swept from
the prairies and brought the inspiration of the far west, the promise of
what could be done shortly, visions of acres of wheat fields that were
to be powerful rivals to peltries and furs.
It was absolutely funny sometimes to hear the old men talk who gathered
about the wharf or strolled round the warehouse, which was stretching
out as well as running over. We, engaged in the heart of things, had
our hands full, and were not likely to "creak in the j'ints" for lack
of exercise.
"This 'ere Hubbard 'lows he knows most every thin'," old Hiram Green
would say, "'sif the Lord had gin him a kind of far-off sight and
called him into council t' settle things. Ther's some freightin', but
he didn't diskiver it. Fore he was born things come down from Detroit
an' Canady. 'N I've hearn tell that some old Frenchman talked this canal
business long time ago. Ther's nothin' new under the sun—Solomon said
so—an' 'though I don't hold altogether to Solomon, he had a clear head
there. Canal'l never be built more'n I be made over. Sho now! Country
was good enough forty year ago, when you could get your livin' huntin'
and fishin' and were livin' neighborly round the blockhouse."
"Ye ferget the Injun raids," said Abe Byers. "Had to git yer scalp
fasten'd on tight every mornin' er cut yer hair short. An' what's livin'
wuth if yer ain't improvin'? We want a good clear run to the Mississip—"
"An' be holpen them ther' towns all along the river. Ther's Saint Louis
an' Kasky an' Cahooky an' down to Noo Orleens, all them ther' places to
the east that are braggin' theirselves up, and we'm goin' to be jest a
sort o' isthmus between this and that," balancing his hands one way and
the other. "All they want is er right o' way jest to tromp thro' us, to
buy things down yender and sell 'em up ther'," nodding his head. "An'
who gits the money? I declar' to man I ain't seen a dollar in so long
that I'm 'feared I should drop dead if one kem my way."
"We can't spare you yit, Hi' Green, so we ain't goin' to put that ther'
kind o' sacrifice in your way," laughed a good-natured man. "Some day
when you're 'bout a hundred they'll be writin' a story of Chicago, an'
they'll want to know these 'ere old facts. So you jes' keep 'em safely
stored in that brain of yourn."
"Can't many remember furder back?" returned the old man, somewhat
mollified. "I've hearn granpop tell 'bout that old black fellow thet
come from some o' the islands down 'bout Gulf o' Mexico with his injun
wife when ther' were only a few tradin' cabins, an' ther' land was free
for anybody who could give a string o' beads to an Injun."
"Beads won't pass muster now, and I wonder if Pierre Menard didn't feel
sick afterward when he found what a good bargain he had unloaded on John
Kinzie. The Kinzie tribe will be rich enough presently."
"An' then'll come a flood er a fire and swoop down on everything."
"But the land can't be burned up, and it isn't ginerally drowned out.
Prairie sand can lick up a good deal of water."
I had been half listening to the rambling disputations, and now I turned
from my rough desk by the window, which was simply a board with four
legs, the two front ones shortened, to Mr. Harris, who stood by his,
that was my admiration, though not long afterward it was donated to me
and he had a much finer one.
"Is it true that Menard was sick of his bargain?" I asked doubtfully.
"I believe he was," Mr. Harris laughed. "I'd like to buy it now for
fifty dollars. I don't believe he has done any better. Le Mai, a French
trader, bought part of it. But Ouilmette's old house is still standing,
stone and logs and plaster."
Michigan Avenue came through it long ago. The Indian wife was quite
admired in her day, being tall and straight, and though many white women
could not read in those times, she was both shrewd and intelligent.
"I must hunt it up," I said. The little girl was always asking about
old places and strange things that we call legends now.
She had wondered about the name. I had inquired of several. It was an
old Indian appellation, it was said, and meant "wild onion." Once the
great Mississippi was called Chacaqua or Divine River, and was supposed
to be under the care of the Thunder god.
"Oh, that is very pretty," she declared, "though we do not believe there
is a god for everything, and gods living in various places."
"And another legend is that a great tribe of Tamaroras always called
their chiefs by this title 'Checaqua.'"
"That sounds much better than a fiery-smelling vegetable," the lines
about her mouth settling in a smile.
"And among the Sacs it was the name of one of their valiant warriors—'He
that stands by a tree,'"
"That is really fine. A tall straight Indian standing by a tree! But
you have few such splendid trees as we have at home."
That was true enough. The cottonwood flourished, but except for some
miles eastward and a long distance to the north there was little fine
timber.
The Little Girl and I generally took a walk on Sunday afternoon after
the Sunday School ended. Some of the churches had a sermon afterward,
the Methodists had theirs in the evening. It was quite nice walking now,
and gardens had been put in orderly trim. We hunted up the old Ouilmette
cabin, now a heap of ruins. The family had dispersed. But Mr. Kinzie
had made a very home-like place of the old estate.
"Sometime we will go and ask him to tell us about those old times," I
said.
Then there was Dr. Harmon's. That was really fine. A sod fence had been
put up around it and he had planted fruit trees and blossoming shrubbery
and made a pretty park of it. People often strolled along this south
path to the settlement just to view the beauty.
Householders were beginning to cultivate flowers somewhat, and roses
were trained over doors and porches. But the Little Girl sighed for the
wild flowers of her native State, many of which I knew nothing about.
I used to like to hear her talk of the trailing arbutus and the violets
that sprang up among the grass.
She began to go to school again. One afternoon in a week she came over
to our house and mother taught her sewing and spinning on the little
wheel. She always stayed that night and my brother Ben grew almost as
fond of her as I. Dan noticed her now and then, but she was quite too
small for him. He was a great favorite with the older girls, and was
always asked to their merry makings.
"I do hope he will marry young," said mother. "I'm tired of such a lot
of men kind about the house, an' the way they go through stockings! The
heels look as if they had been gnawed out by rats."
She had a way of cutting them out, picking up some stitches and knitting
in new heels. Ruth thought this a great achievement and wanted to learn
how.
"'Twould bother your little brains out," said mother with a sort of
amused kindliness.
"Are my brains very small?" she asked gravely.
"Not smaller than common. You're only a little girl. You'll grow."
"And my brains will grow too? Then I shall know a great deal more.
Suppose one didn't have any brains?"
"Then he'd be an idjit. Most people have some, but they're not always
put to a good use. Don't you worry, little one. You'll have brains
enough."
My father, too, grew fond of her, and I think was pleased to have her
ask questions. It always seemed to me the house took on a different
aspect when she was there and the boys were more gentle.
Mr. Gaynor had planted his prairie strip with wheat, and was surprised
at its astonishing fertility. Even then in a very dry time we practised
a sort of irrigation, wide spaces being left where you could drive oxen
and a hogshead of water through, letting it run out plentifully.
One of the next things that attracted attention was the raising of
pigs. Freighting up the lake and to Buffalo continued about as before.
Everything else was at a standstill. Not only was the Presidential
election approaching but that for representatives. Stephen A. Douglas
and John T. Stuart were competing candidates, and stumped all the sparse
towns where there were any voters.
Davis was most complimentary to the new town, and even predicted "that
the children of to-day would see a city of fifty thousand inhabitants
before they died."
This was received with yells of derision and much shouting of the catch
words of the day.
"Town lots! town lots! Shortest route through to China. Will it be duck
or drakes?"—in reference to the mud and a slight hit at the men.
Even the women quarrelled about their candidates and for weeks would
pass each other by with disdain. Harrison was one of the heroes of
the Indian wars—what had Martin Van Buren done to commend him to the
patriots of the country?
We sat out on the doorstep one evening. Mr. Gaynor was down to the
old Green Tree Tavern, though now it had taken on the more dignified
appellation of hotel. Quite a party of Whigs assembled there.
"Norman," the Little Girl began after a long silence, "are you a Whig
or a Democrat?"
"I"—I seldom thought of politics except to be amused at the old men
"jawin'" about it when they hung around the warehouse and passed
opinions on the boats and the truck.
"Yes, you must be one or the other," a little severely.
"But I don't need to until I am twenty-one. I can't vote before that."
"But you can make up your mind."
"Father is a great Jackson man. He would not mind if they put him in
again. And he has been a brave soldier. Look at the Indian wars, and
that splendid battle of New Orleans! And Dan believes in him. They don't
seem to know much about this new man."
"Father is a Whig. I am too," holding up her head proudly. "They are
the party that wanted us to be free of England, and they fought for
liberty."
"I think there wasn't much difference of opinion then. They were all
patriots."
"Then how did they come to differ?"
"Well—" I really did not know, and hesitated.
"The Whigs don't believe in slavery."
"Father doesn't either," I said with a touch of triumph.
"And there are a good many other things. They have a hero for a
candidate, while the Democrats have put up a dandy, who curls his hair
and scents his handkerchief."
Many puerile objections were made to the Democratic candidate.
"But he has been in the Senate, and he has been Minister abroad—to
England, and _is_ a gentleman," I retorted.
"Why do we want a Minister to England?" she returned with a sort of
royal indifference. "Tell me that?"
"Countries always send Ministers to each other. There are questions
coming up all the time that have to be settled."
"I thought everything was settled in the last war."
"I'll try and find out. I'm paying more attention to business than
to politics. And there are two sides to everything, to all great
questions."
I thought this was rather a fine way of ending the argument. Then a
quick step came pattering down the board walk.
"I declare the good Lord never said a truer thing than that he made man
upright and he sought out many inventions. I'm not quite sure the Lord
said that either. I haven't read the Bible much latterly, but 'pears to
me there's no end of foolish and dishonest inventions when a man talks
politics. There's been the greatest lot of idiots up there to-night. If
I didn't know more than some of 'em I'd hold my tongue forever. I don't
have much to say in this crowd anyhow. 'Twouldn't be quite safe, seein'
as I'm a Yankee. I'll do my part when voting comes, and I ain't bragging
about it, either. Votes can talk then. Hillo, young fellow, I believe
your folks are on the other side. Well—we'll just pass the time of day
till the new man gets in. I've observed then the political pot simmers
down wonderfully and you can shake hands across it without getting steam
burned. Good-night, I must go shut up my chickens."
I was standing up. "And I must go. Good-night," I said.
She had been sitting on a little bench inside the porch. Now she rose
and shook the curls out of her eyes, and responded in the coolest
fashion.
I walked away rather dazed. It had not occurred to me that anything
could happen between the Little Girl and myself. And why should we be
less friends for the sake of two strangers who were really nothing to
us?
Father and Dan were coming in the opposite direction and we just met at
the path to the doorway.
"Where you been, Norme?" Dan inquired roughly. "With that ther' blasted
Whig from Yankeeland, listenin' an' believin' all sorts of lies. See
here, you're born of good, staunch, Democratic people, and you'll vote
that ticket when you're of age er I'll know the reason why," and he
seized me by the ear.
"Dan!" exclaimed father, in a stern voice, loosing his hand, "you've
been drinking too much whiskey. I'm ashamed of you! You are taking just
the way to make people despise the Democrats. Go to bed and sober up and
don't let me see you in this condition again or I'll horsewhip you. Not
a word, sir."
Dan went shuffling off, grumbling to himself.
It was no uncommon thing for young men to drink, but the self-respecting
class was seldom drunk.
"I wish they'd put a President in for ten years," said father angrily.
"I don't know but we will begin to fight each other pretty soon. Let
Dan get asleep before you go upstairs, and don't make no note of it in
the morning. Dan's a nice lad, generally speaking."
"What is the great difference between the parties?" I inquired.
"Well—I'll be hanged if I know, only 't seems as if men wanted to make
it wider all the time. Ther's high and low tariff, and I can't tell
which is best. Then ther's slavery, and northern Democrats are pretty
much agin that. And money—one paper says one thing, one the other. Both
men are good enough fur's I can see. From the bottom of my soul I wish
Tippecanoe had been our candidate and a Democrat. Ther's the battle of
Miami Rapids and Tippecanoe and Fort Meigs and the Thames. He's a good,
brave soldier, and he's shown a wise head about Indian affairs and such,
and he's been to Congress. I'd like it to be so you could vote for the
best fellow. But it's party, party. Thank the Lord you're not old enough
to have anything to do with it."
Dan was all right the next morning, but not as boisterous as usual. I
went over to the warehouse in a rather troubled frame of mind, with a
misgiving that I had been warned on both sides. At our nooning hour I
questioned Mr. Harris about the merits of each party.
"You'd better read up history and the Constitution and the Declaration
of Independence, and see where you come out. I guess there'll always be
two parties. Now England's a monarchy and there's two parties there.
Sometimes one rules the House of Commons, sometimes the other. But it
is a queer thing that reforms start with the weaker party and have a
hard time to get a hearing, but they grow and grow, and one is always a
check on the other. Yes, you're old enough to begin to understand some
of these things, but don't get to be a rabid politician, or you'll be
served with walking-papers;" and he laughed.
Thursday Ruth Gaynor went home direct from school and did not take her
sewing lesson.
"I do wonder what has happened to Ruth," mother said when I came home
to supper. "Was she well last night? You were there?"
"Yes, she was well. She did not say anything about not coming."
"She'll be in then to-morrow, I reckon."
I had a guilty feeling. What if it spoiled the friendship? I wanted to
go down at noon, but pride held me back. She was more than any political
feeling—why for her sake I would have been Whig or anything.
I saw her in Sunday School and my heart gave a great bound. Hers was
a girls' class across the room. She had on a white frock and a pretty
white ruffled sunbonnet. The lesson dragged, the singing lost its
melody, but at last came the benediction. The children loitered in
little groups outside. I hung back, glad to talk to a boy about muskrat
trapping. Ben went up to her boldly.
"Why didn't you come? We missed you so. Mother couldn't think what got
yer."
"Got yer," she returned with a soft little laugh. "What kind of an
animal is it?"
Ben's face was scarlet. We were used to the town vernacular, which was
a conglomeration of Virginia, Kentucky, trapper and rough boatman's
speech, as is often the case with immigrant tongue. She was dainty in
all she did and said.
"Oh, you know what I mean," with a protesting boyish gesture. "Come home
with us now. Even pop wondered what if you were sick."
"No—I was busy. I was trying to do—some things, and—"
I came around the other side, and gained courage enough to look in
the sunbonnet. A tumultuous color hovered over the sweet face, the
lips had fluttering curves, the long lashes glittered with the light
shining through. I could not have put it in words, but it was one of the
remembrances I set along side of my first glance of her. Her hand hung
down by her side, a slim little hand, not much sunburned. She kept her
fair complexion through wind and sun.
A sudden accession of courage seized me, and I caught it very gently.
It was not withdrawn, and my heart went up with a bound, though she was
answering Ben.
"You'll come home with us now. Coax her, Norme. Ther' was the grandest
chicken potpie for dinner, an' some left, an' I picked berries for Mr.
Kinzie, an' ther's lots of 'em left. They're lickin' good."
"Don't be so economical with your letters, Ben," she returned drolly.
"And what is lickin' good?"
"As if any one with half a wit couldn't guess!" returned Ben with a very
red face. "Why, when you want to lick off your lips and your fingers,
maybe," emphasizing the words he seldom took the trouble to pronounce
correctly. "And—the batter left in the cake dish, though Chris always
seizes on that now."
She gave a soft ripple of laughter.
"Say—" Bessie Hale pushed in front of us, a big, energetic girl with
reddish hair and flaming red cheeks, fanning herself with the skirt of
her frock—"ther's goin' to be a frolic out in the woods if they can git
things and folks together. Take your dinner an' swings put up, an' race
an' run, an' have a good time. I heard Mis' Eastman talkin'. It'll be
all planned out by next Sunday an' word give out. All the boys an' girls
an' mothers an' gran' ma'ams, and jes' to have fun all day long."
I had heard a whisper of it, and some dissenting voices among the
stricter ones as to whether it really was religious. Camp meetings had
been held, but a picnic!
All the group of children talked at once and kept going on in a huddle
until a few discovered they were in the wrong direction, and then
thinned out reluctantly. We kept so close to Ruth that, in a manner, we
impelled her to turn up our street, though it looked not much more than
a lane.
Mother sat out on the bench in a white sort of short gown with a ruffle
about the neck, and a rather coarse white muslin apron, but she looked
cool and sweet.
"Oh, Ruth," she exclaimed. "I was afraid you were sick or something.
What happened?"
"Did you miss me so much? I am afraid of being a trouble sometimes,"
she returned with a delicate evasion that I noticed.
"Well, you needn't be; that's some of your father's notions. An' a girl
without a mother needs a lot of training, though I must say you do pick
up things mighty easy. Oh, boys, don't eat her up jes' if you hadn't
had a dinner."
"If you poured some milk over her you could eat her up," said Chris,
laughing, "an' some sugar on top of her head."
"Think of the sticky mess in my hair!"
"Oh, but you'd jes' dissolve an' be like—" rolling his eyes about to
assist his brain in capturing a comparison—"like a lovely pudding."
"What an idea!" and Ben made a wry face.
"Bring out a stool," said mother. "So M'liss Hatch comes now. Is she
good for anything?"
"Yes, I like her ever so much. Aunt Becky grew very cross and she and
father had some words, and M'liss likes to show me about things. We have
real good times when I'm home from school."
Mother nodded. "She goes home at night?"
"Yes."
"She's got a beau. Pa'son Walker's 'visin' young people to marry, an'
it does smart up the young fellows and keep them out of taverns. An'
then they get thinking 'bout a house. Well, you jes' make the most out
of M'liss. Is your father's garden turning out much? We've had quite a
dry spell."
"Father had it all wet one day. Yes, it is in good order. I hope next
year we'll have ever so many berries."
"Chicago won't ever be the garden of the Lord, but Adam an' Eve were
turned out of that. Even a thistle wouldn't grow here unless you planted
and watered it. What people ever see in this place to come an' settle
passes me; an' ther's so many splendid places in the world where things
grow fairly wild. I don't wonder people sell out an' go away."
"We're going to be a big port sometime," I announced.
"Sho, that's the men's talk. I've heard men talk before. Where's all the
people comin' from, I'd like to know? To hear em brag sometimes you'd
think they'd be crossin' the Rocky Mountains 'cause there wasn't any
room on this side!"
Mother threw back her head and laughed.
Father was walking up the path and then she declared she must get supper.
"Oh, let me put on the dishes," and Ruth rose, hanging her bonnet
carefully on a wooden peg.
Father greeted her cordially and said it had been a full month since he
set eyes on her. We all filed indoors, even to the big tiger cat, who
kept following Ruth about wistfully. The boys never tormented him when
Ruth was around. They came to the table with cleaner hands, and were
much more mannerly, I noticed.
We had a rather jolly meal even if it was Sunday. Afterward we sung
some hymns. Mother was very fond of them. Then I walked home with Ruth,
though Ben glanced at us large-eyed and wistful.
"Were you very—very much affronted?" I asked, as we were nearing her
house.
She seemed considering.
"Because," in a hurried voice, as if I wasn't quite sure I was
right—"I've thought it over. I'd just as leave be a Whig as not."
"I shouldn't like you to quarrel with father."
"I'm not going to," I protested earnestly. "And—I want to be good
friends."
"Oh, I want us always to be good friends," and the strong sweetness of
her tone enraptured me.
She held out her hand, and so we renewed our friendship.