Not for strong minded wimmen
Do I now tune my liar;
Oh not for them would I kin-
dle up the sacred fire;
Oh modest bashful female
For you I tune my lay;
Although strong-minded wimmin sneer
We’ll conquer in the fray.
CHORUS—Press onward, do not fear, sisters,
Press onward, do not fear,
Remember womens spear, sisters,
Remember womens spear.
Twould cause some fun if poor Miss Wade,
Should say of her boy Harry,
“I shall not give him any trade,
But bring him up to marry;”
Twould cause some fun of course, dear maids,
If Mrs. Wade’ses Harry,
Should lose his end and aim in life,
And find no chance to marry.
CHORUS—Press onward, do not fear, sisters, etc.
Yes, wedlock is our only hope,
All o’er this mighty nation;
Men are brought up to other trades,
But this is our vocation.
Oh not for sense or love ask we,
We ask not to be courted;—
Our watch-word is to married be,
That we may be supported.
CHORUS—Press onward, do not fear, sisters, etc.
Say not you’r strong, and love to work,
Are healthier than your brother,
Who for a blacksmith is designed,
Such feelings you must smother;
Your restless hands fold up or gripe
Your waist unto a span,
And spend your strength in looking out
To hail the coming man.
CHORUS—Press onward, do not fear, sisters, etc.
Oh do not be discouraged, when
You find your hopes brought down;
And find sad and unwilling men,
Heed not their gloomy frown;
Heed not their wild despaier
We will not give no quarter;
In battle all is fair
We’ll win, for we had orter.
CHORUS—Press onward, do not fear, sisters,
Press onward, do not fear,
Remember womens spear, sisters,
Remember womens spear.
“Wall,” says I in an encouragin’ tone, as I handed him the paper
agin—“that haint much different from the piece she had in the _Gimlet_ a
spell ago, that was about womens spear.”
“It is that spear that is goin’ to destroy me,” says he, mournfully.
“Don’t give up so, Deacon Slimpsey. I hate to see you lookin’ so gloomy
and deprested.”
“It is the awful determination these lines breathe forth that appauls
me,” says he. “I have seen it in another.
“Betsey Bobbet reminds me dreadfully of another. And I don’t want to
marry agin, Miss Allen. I don’t want to,” says he, lookin’ me pitifully
in the face, “I didn’t want to marry the first time; I wanted to be a
bachelder. I think they have the easiest time of it by half. Now there is
a friend of mine that never was married, he is jest my age, or that is,
he is only half an hour younger, and that haint enough difference to make
any account of, is it Miss Allen?” says he in a pensive and enquirin’
tone.
“No,” says I in a reasonable accent. “No, Deacon Slimpsey, it haint.”
“Wall, that man has always been a bachelder, and you ought to see what
a head of hair he has got, sound at the roots now, not a lock missing.
I wanted to be one, and meant to be, but jest as I got my plans all
laid, she, my late wife, come and kept house for me, and married me. I
lived with her for twenty 5 years, and when she left me,” he murmured
with a contented look, “I was reconciled to it. I was reconciled before
it took place. I don’t want to say anything against nobody that haint
here, but I lost some hair by my late wife,” says he, putting his hand to
his bald head in an abstracted way. “I lost a good deal of hair by her,
and I haint much left as you can see,” says he in a melancholy tone. “I
don’t want to be married agin. I did want to save a lock or two, for my
children to keep as a relict of me.” And again he paused overcome by his
feelin’s. I knew not what to say to comfort him, and I poured onto him a
few comforting adjectives, sich as,
“Mebby you are borrowin’ trouble without a cause, Deacon. With life there
is hope, Deacon Slimpsey. It is always the darkest before daylight.” But
in vain. He only sighed mournfully.
“She’ll get round me yet, Miss Allen—mark my words, and when the time
comes you will think of what I told you.” His face was most black with
gloomy apprehensions, as he repeated again—“You see if she don’t get
round me,” and a tear began to flow; I turned away with instinctive
delicacy, and set my pan of onions in the sink, but when I glanced at him
again it was still flowing, and I said to him in a tone of two-thirds
pity and one comfort. “Chirk up, Deacon Slimpsey, be a man.”
“That is the trouble,” says he, “if I wasnt a man she would give me some
peace,” and he wept into his red silk handkerchief (with a yellow border)
bitterly.