such a fate as this? Where is man's boasted wisdom and power? I could
have cared for myself, lived and died in happiness and safety, but
civilized man has ruined and destroyed the wild beast."
* * * * *
The rest of that seen is like a dream to me. I guess when the heavy
dread and fear I had carried so long, wuz lifted from my brain, it
made me light-headed. 'Tennyrate, it don't seem as if I come fully to
myself, till Josiah and I wuz takin' leave at Bildad's with tickets
for Jonesville in our pockets.
The agony I had went through there, and my joy in his recovery wuz
such, that I didn't throw Josiah's waywardness in his face (not much
of any). But if you'll believe it--and I don't spoze you will--he
turned the tables 'round, and blamed me. That is often done by
pardners of both sects, when they feel real guilty, to try to draw
attention off their own misdoin's, by findin' fault with their
pardners. It has been done time and agin, and I spoze will be, as long
as man is man, and woman is woman.
When I told him that I rid down there with Deacon Gansey, that man
acted jealous and mad as a hen. He never liked him, they fell out
years ago about a rail fence, and wuz hurt. But now he acted furious,
and his last words to Bildad wuz:
"I want you to have a funeral for Deacon Gansey before I see you agin,
and I'll pick out the him I want you to sing at his funeral:
"Believein', we rejoice,
To see the cuss removed."
But I spoke right up and sez, "Don't you bury him till he is dead,
Bildad, no matter who tells you to."
And Josiah didn't like that, or acted as if he didn't; mebby he wuz
subterfugin' to draw off attention. Truly, pardners is a mysterious
problem, and it takes sights of wisdom and patience to solve' em, and
sometimes you can't git the right answer to 'em then, male or female.
As we left Surf Avenue I looked back on the blackened ruins of what
had been the fair City of Dreamland, the broken totterin' remains of
that glorious tower, the black tangled masses of iron and steel, the
ruins of the great animal house mixed with the ashes of a hundred and
twenty animals, and I see with my mind's eye that great flat plain of
blackened ruins, all cleared away, and green velvety grass, and trees,
and fountains sprayin' over shrubs, and flowers, and white smooth
paths windin' through the bloom and verdure clear down to the clean
sand of the water's verge. And the high fence of Exclusion that shets
them from other fair parks along the shore removed, thousands and
thousands and thousands of happy children playin' there in the pure
air, takin' in in one summer day enough strength to last 'em through a
crowded, suffocatin', weary week. And grown folks, rich and poor,
tired of city sights and sounds, strollin' about or settin' on
comfortable seats lookin' off on the water, or watchin' the play of
their children, the fresh air blowin' some of their cares and troubles
away.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
WE RETURN TO JONESVILLE AND JOSIAH BUILDS TIRZAH ANN'S COTTAGE WITH
STRANGE INVENTIONS AND ADDITIONS
CHAPTER NINETEEN
WE RETURN TO JONESVILLE AND JOSIAH BUILDS TIRZAH ANN'S COTTAGE WITH
STRANGE INVENTIONS AND ADDITIONS
I told Josiah I hoped my vision would come true, and they would make
an open park of Dreamland, so the millions who visit Coney Island
could git a good look at Mom Nater and old Ocean. "And heaven knows,"
sez I, "there would be amusements enough left in Luny, and Steeple
Chase Park, and other resorts all along the shore." And he said he
didn't care a dum what they did with it. Sez he, "They needn't build
it up on my account, for I won't patronize 'em any more!" And I told
him, "I guessed he wouldn't be missed, specially Sundays and
holidays." And he said, "Miss me or not, they needn't try to git me
there agin, and they may jest as well give up hopin' to, first as
last."
Sez I, "Can't you be megum, Josiah? You wuz all carried away with it,
and now you're turned agin it; what makes you turn so _fur_? Can't
you see the good side to it?"
"No, I can't, and won't!"
So we went home some like the Baptist and the Methodist who had a
public meetin' to argy their two beliefs, on which they wuz dretful
sot, and they converted each other, so the Baptist went home a
Methodist, and the Methodist a Baptist.
I'd been considerable sot agin it, but I went home with the eye of my
spectacles able to look on both sides. The side I didn't like, that it
shares with other Pleasure Resorts. And its good side, as a care
lightener, and diversion to toil. And a golden Pleasure House to the
millions of children who go there every year, many of 'em poor
children who get there their only glimpse of rest and light hearted
enjoyment.
But my dear pardner can't be megum; that quality wuz left out when he
wuz manufactured. And now if anyone sez Coney Island, he starts for
the barn.
Serenus come home a few days after we did. He'd been on the Bowery of
Coney Island that night, Josiah havin' refused to go to such a lowdown
place with him. So as it often is in this strange world, the
wrong-doer comes out ahead, for the _present_. He made a night of it
with Jim Cobb, a rural cousin, and not a hair of his head wuz
scorched, nor the smell of fire on his garments.
But I wuz proud that Josiah withstood temptation, and told him that I
would ruther he had got afire, and burned considerable, than had him
yield to the tempter.
I myself never sot foot on the Bowery; I wuzn't goin' to nasty up my
mind with it, though I hearn there wuz some good things to be seen
there. Folks told me I'd ort to gone to Brighton, and Atlantic City,
and see the milds of beautiful Pleasure places along the ocean, but I
sez, "I thank you, but I've seen enough," though there wuz sights
there that I would loved to see.
Among 'em wuz that Mother's Camp, where thousands and thousands of
poor children and their mas go to spend a day in the bracin'
atmosphere. And the children have pure milk, and their mas good tea,
and they can go there day after day all they want to. How the children
look forward to it, and their mas too.
[Illustration: "_I myself never sot foot on the Bowery; I wuzn't goin'
to nasty up my mind with it, though I hearn there wuz some
good things to be seen there._" (_See page 313_)]
The goodness and helpfulness of such places along the beach, wrops
their bright mantillys over some of the other places not so good and
makes folks more lenitent to 'em, as they endure a poor husband for
the sake of his good wife, and visey versey.
A few days after we got home, Josiah took Penstock and they sot off
for a two weeks' stay at Shadow Island. And a few days after they got
there he writ me that they had broke ground for the cottage. And that
very day I got my feet wet down to the creek paster huntin' for a
turkey's nest, and come down with inflamatory rumatiz, and couldn't
walk a step for upwards of four weeks, and Ury's wife come and took
care on me. My head felt bad too, Coney Island had been too much for
me--
Well, Josiah would come home Sundays all wrought up and enthusiastick
boastin' what a model house it wuz, jest perfect, and what new and
magnificent discoveries he had made to lighten labor, which he wuz
goin' to git patented and probable make our everlastin' fortune, as
well as make Tirzah Ann perfectly happy. And I'd set with my foot on a
piller, and hear him go on and forebode and forebode, and I groaned
more about the house than I did with the pain in my lim, though that
wuz fearful.
Well, after it had been goin' on for about four weeks, one Saturday
when he come home over Sunday, he said the house wuz all up and
nearin' completion, and he carried the idee if he didn't come right
out and say it, that there wuzn't a mansion in the New Jerusalem that
went ahead on't. My rumatiz and head wuz quite a little better, and he
proposed that I should go back with him Monday mornin' on a short
tower and see the house, and be a humble witness and admirer of his
glorious triumph (he didn't say these words right out but carried the
idee plain in his linement, and hauty demeanor). Well, I concluded to
go, and Philury bandaged up my lim in soft flannel moistened with
anarky, and packed various bottles of linement, etc., in my portmanty
and Ury took us to the train.
Well I will pass over our voyage to Shadow Island, but in the fullness
of time we arrove there, and stood in front of the cottage. The seen
all round it wuz fair indeed, but the structure looked queer, queer as
a dog. There wuz piazzas and porticos, and ornament piled on ornament
cropped out on every side. It wuz weighted down with cheap little
sawed out peaks and pints, and triangles perforated with holes for
ornaments, but the hull thing looked shiftless, tippin' and lop sided.
I stood lookin' at it in silence for a long time, it looked so queer
that it sort o' stunted and brow beat me, and my first words wuz spoke
as much to my own soul as to my companion, "It looks strange, passin'
strange!"
"Yes," sez Josiah, "hain't it a uneek plan?"
"Yes," sez I, "a uneeker one wuz never seen on this planet." And agin
I seemed to lose myself in strange emotions, it looked so awful, a
kind of or mingled with my indignation and regret.
"Nobody will steal them idees!" sez he proudly.
"No," sez I sadly, "you're safe from that." And I sez, as I looked up
at the queer, lop sided, flighty, vain thing, "It leans over
considerable, Josiah Allen, it is very tippin'."
He looked worried, but sez in a sort of apology way, "I had it lean
over one side on account of havin' rain water dripp offen the eaves,
and have the snow slide off in drifty times. Ruffs have been known to
fall in, and I wanted to ensure Tirzah Ann's havin' a ruff over her
head anyway."
Agin I looked on in solemn or, and sez wonderin'ly, "What will Tirzah
Ann say when she sees it?"
"I don't care," sez he, "what she sez! if she don't like it she can
lump it!"
But I could see that the tippin' sides wuz done through a mistake, and
he wuz tryin' to cover it up with a mantilly of bravado and
boastfulness. I agin kep' silence for quite a spell, and my next
words, so fur as I remember 'em, wuz, "Where is the suller?"
He stood agast and repeated, "The suller!" He looked perfectly
dumb-foundered but wuzn't goin' to give in he made a mistake, it wuz
too mortifyin' to his pride, so sez he in faint axents:
"I laid out to build it after the house wuz done." Sez I, "What wuz
you goin' to do with the dirt?"
"Why, I laid out," sez he lookin' helplessly round for a excuse, "I
laid out to bring it up in baskets," and he went on brightenin' up as
a idee struck him--"I've observed, Samantha, that dirt is handy for
house plants, or to plant seeds in the spring of the year."
Sez I dryly, "I guess three or four hundred wagon loads won't be
needed for house plants, and after Tirzah Ann sees all that dirt
lugged up her suller stairs and through her kitchen she won't have
much time or ambition for posies."
[Illustration: "_'The suller!' He stood agast, perfectly dumb-foundered
but wuzn't goin' to give in he had made a mistake. It wuz
too mortifying to his pride._" (_See page 318_)]
"Well," sez he, a bright idee occurrin' to him, "it will be a first
rate job for the men to do rainy days. In buildin' a house there
hain't much a man can do durin' a hard thunder storm, or hail storm,
but they can go right on with the suller jest as well as though it wuz
a sunshiny day. That is one great thing that architects have
heretofore overlooked, work that men can do durin' cyclones--I have
met that want," sez he proudly.
"I should think as much," sez I mekanically, for my thoughts wuzn't
there, they wuz afar with Tirzah with her poor health, and the blow
that had got to come onto her, when she see this thing that wuz rared
up in front of me.
Well, I went round to the kitchen door, the winders all seemed sot in
tottlin' and shaky, and my pen fails me to tell the looks of them back
door steps, they wuz very high here, for the land sloped off sudden,
but suffice it to say that I wouldn't trust even one foot on 'em for a
dollar bill. There wuz a great long concern that looked like a huge
wooden arm that come out of the settin' room winder on that side and
seemed to reach down to the water, and sez I, "What, for the land's
sake! is that?"
"That," sez he proudly, "is the crownin' work of my life! that will
make me famous and enormously rich when it becomes known to the
world. That is a attachment to hitch onto the sewin' machine, the
churn, the coffee mill or any domestic article where foot or hand
power is used, and is to be used in pumpin' water."
"Pumpin' water!" sez I coldly, "what for?"
"Oh, for drinkin', for irrigatin', or for any use that water is used
for, puttin' out fires, or anything."
Sez I coldly, "Do you spoze that Tirzah Ann with her health, is goin'
to set at her sewin' machine and do fine sewin', and at the same time
pump water from hour to hour?"
"Yes," sez he, "and hain't it a beautiful thought, how it will add to
her sweet content and happiness as she sets sewin' on Whitfield's
shirts, and thinkin' at the same time she is benefittin' the world at
large, quietly and unostentatiously sewin' on gussets, and makin' the
desert blossom like a rosy all round her; how happy she will be," sez
he.
Sez I, "It is a crazy idee! crazy as a loon! What under the sun would
she want to pump hundreds and hundreds of barrels of water for? Half a
barrel would last 'em a day for all their work."
He murmured sunthin' about a fountain, that might be sprayin' up in
the front yard, and how beautiful it would be, and enjoyable.
And I sez, "Could you set and enjoy yourself lookin' on a fountain
risin' up and dashin' jewels of spray all round you, and thinkin' that
every drop wuz bein' pumped up by the weary feet of your own girl by
your first wife? That poor delicate little creeter's tired feet,
toilin' on hour by hour and day by day."
He looked real bad, he hadn't thought so fur, and I went on, "Don't
you know it would make the sewin' machine go so hard that no woman
could run it a minute, let alone for days and weeks?" His linement
fell two or three inches. I see he gin up it needed more strength to
run it. "And it looks like furiation too," sez I.
"Look!" He snapped out, "What do you spoze I care for looks!"
But I see his idees wuz all broke up, as well they might be, Tirzah
Ann pumpin' water all day with her feet! the idee!
Well, out on one side of the house I see a great pile of bricks, they
seemed to be divided in two piles, one wuz good sound bricks, and one
wuz broken some, and I sez, "What are these bricks divided off so
fur?"
"That," sez he, "is a sample of how men see into things."
"How?" sez I.
"Well, I'll tell you." And he went on proudly, as if glad to git a
chance to show off how fur seem' and eqinomical he wuz, and to recover
from the machinness that had settled down on him like a dark mantilly,
while we discussed the suller and pump attachment.
"I got them bricks at a bargain. I hain't got enough good bricks for
the hull chimbly, and so I'm goin' to have 'em begin the chimbly on
top instead of the usual way of beginin' at the bottom, and then I can
see jest how fur my good bricks will go."
"How be you goin' to make the top bricks stay up?" sez I, "a layin' up
on nothin'?"
"That is a man's work," sez he, "a woman couldn't understand it if I
should explain it."
"No," sez I, "Heaven knows no woman on earth would ever understand
that idee!"
Well, all I could do he would go that very afternoon and engage a
mason to do the work, build the chimbly after his views, beginin' on
top instead of the bottom. But though deeply mortified at it, that wuz
jest the move that sot me free from my anxieties about the house, for
the mason, who wuz a great case for a joke, made so much fun of the
idee, and of the hull structure, that my companion threw up the hull
job and told me that the house might go to----for anything he cared. I
will never tell the place he said the house might go to, it is too
wicked to even think on calmly, it begun with an H and that is all
that I will ever tell to anybody.
Well, when Whitfield and Tirzah Ann come back from Maine and went to
Shadow Island to see that strange queer lookin' buildin, I spoze
Whitfield laughed till his sides ached. Tirzah cried, they say; cried
partly out of sentiment to think her Pa had showed such affection for
her as to build the cottage, and partly because it looked so awful, it
made her hystericky.
But Whitfield sobered down, and when he come back to Jonesville acted
good to Josiah, he seemed to be real thankful to Josiah and me for
buildin' it, and his grateful, affectionate ways kinder took the edge
offen Josiah's humiliation, but then he would probable have sprunted
up anyway--mortification never prayed on him for more'n a short time.
Well, the end on't wuz, Whitfield hired a good carpenter to oversee
the work, and some strong workmen who wuz able to lift and lug, there
wuz plenty of lumber, and in four weeks the house wuz transmogrified
into a good lookin' cottage. They built on a L, I believe they called
it, which they're to use as a store room, and under that Tirzah Ann is
to have her suller, Whitfield wuzn't the man to deprive her of that
comfort. And in some way they straightened up the house, and put in a
winder here and there, tore off lots of the ornaments, but left on
some of the piazzas, and balconies, and things, and it wuz a pretty
and commogious lookin' cottage. They painted the hull concern a soft
buff color, with red ruffs that looked real picturesque settin' back
aginst the dark green of the trees.
And sure enough the first week in September we had our party there. It
wuzn't a surprise--no, Heaven knows the surprise wuz when we first
laid eyes on the house as Josiah left it--but it wuz a very agreable
party. Tirzah Ann did well by us in cookin' (of course we helped her)
and we all stayed three days and two nights; Thomas J. and Maggie and
the children, and Josiah and me. Tirzah Ann and Whitfield stayed
longer, so's to leave everything in first rate order for another year.
They sot out some pretty shrubs and made some posy beds under the
winders, and planted bulbs in 'em, that they spozed would rise up and
break out in sunny smiles when they met 'em another summer. They lay
out to take sights of comfort in that house--yes indeed!
And I shouldn't be at all surprised if it ended by our all havin'
cottages there for summer comfort. It looks like it now. Though I told
'em I'd ruther have our cottage on the main land pretty nigh to 'em;
there's places where the land juts out into the river havin' all the
looks of a island on the fore side, and on the hindside more solidity
somehow.
And with the society of the Saint on the front side, and Safety on the
hind side, it seems as if anybody could take considerable comfort
there.
CHAPTER TWENTY
FAITH COMES TO VISIT US. WE ATTEND THE CAMP MEETIN' AT PILLER PINT,
AND FAITH MEETS THE LOVER OF HER YOUTH
CHAPTER TWENTY
FAITH COMES TO VISIT US. WE ATTEND THE CAMP MEETIN' AT PILLER PINT,
AND FAITH MEETS THE LOVER OF HER YOUTH
Accordin' to her promise Faithful Smith come to Jonesville in the fall
and we wuz glad enough to see her.
We had laid our plans to attend the Camp Meetin' at Piller Pint, and
at last the time arriv. The day before the great meetin', the sky wuz
rosy in the mornin', the distant lake looked blue, and everything bid
fair for a good spell of weather.
Josiah iled up the old double harness and washed the democrat off and
rubbed it down with shammy skin till it shone like glass. And I
prepared a glass can of baked beans brown and crispy, but sweet and
rich tastin' as beans know how to be when well cooked, then I briled
two young chickens a light yeller brown, and basted 'em well with
melted butter, and had a new quart basin of as good dressin' as
Jonesville ever turned out, and I've seen good dressers in my day.
And a quart can of beautiful creamed potatoes all ready to warm up,
two dozen light white biscuit, a canned strawberry pie, and a dozen
sugar cookies reposed side by side in a clean market basket, and by
'em lay peacefully a little can of rich yeller butter and one of
brittle cowcumber pickles, and one dozen deviled eggs.
A better lunch wuz never prepared in the precincts of Jonesville.
Oh! and I had some jell too, and cream cheese, and the next mornin' I
made two quarts of coffee all ready to warm up in Sister Meechum's
tent (she had gin permission), and a can of sweet cream to add
richness to it, and lump sugar accordin'.
I felt that these wuz extraordinary preparations, but didn't begrech
'em, part on 'em wuz on Faith's account. Well, as I say, the
preparations wuz all completed the day before exceptin' the coffee and
creamed potatoes, and them wuz accomplised early in the mornin' while
I wuz gittin' breakfast, and we all sot off triumphant at nine A.M.
It wuz a clear cool mornin' in lovely autumn. Old Nater hadn't as you
may say finished up her fall job of colorin' and paintin', but she wuz
all rousted up tendin' to it.
All along the smooth highway leadin' to the lake, trees and bushes
bent over the roadside tinged with crimson and yeller and russet
brown, and red, and shaded gold colors mingled with the rich green of
the faithful cedars and hemlocks and pines. Sometimes up a high pine
tree or ellum a wild ivy had clum and wuz hangin' on with one hand and
wavin' out to us its banner of gold and crimson as we passed. And fur
off the maple forest looked like a vast mass of rose and amber and
golden brown, mingled with the deep green of spruces and cedars, and
furder off still a blue haze lay over all like a soft veil partly
hidin' and partly revealin' the glory of the seen. And ever and anon
the blue flashin' waters of the lake could be seen like the soul in a
woman's face, givin' life and meanin' to the picture.
Well, anon as we clumb a hill, the hull lake bust out on our vision,
it lay spread out broad and beautiful and calm, with the breezes
ripplin' its blue surface into waves, and the sunshine sparkling on
its bosom, and down under the hill on a pint of land that stretched
out into the water stood the noble grove of trees where the camp
meetin' wuz held. That wuz Piller Pint.
We descended a hill, driv along half a mild or so till we come to a
fence and a open pair of bars, in front of which stood two muscular
attendants and one on 'em sez, "We take a small fee from them that
enter."
Sez Josiah, lookin' gloomy, "I spozed religion wuz free."
"It is free," sez the man, "but this is only to smooth its way, put up
seats and such."
Sez Josiah, "I didn't know that Religion had to set down."
"Sinners have to set," sez the man.
Sez Josiah, "We hain't sinners." But I hunched him and sez, "Pay your
fee and go on." So after a deep sithe he produced his old leather
wallet and fished up ten cents out of its depths, and we proceeded
on.
The grove wuz a large one, acres and acres of big trees on every side,
and vehicles of every description from smart canopy top buggies, and
Sarah's, and automobiles, down to one horse sulkies and rickety
buck-boards, and horses of every size and color wuz hitched to 'em.
And on the fallen tree trunks sot wimmen and girls, young boys,
children, and pairs of lovers wuz walkin' afoot amidst the deep green
aisles. Way in the green depths of the woods you could see the glimpse
of a woman's dress, or see the head of a horse lookin' out peaceful.
But we advanced a little furder as the road led out amongst the trees
and pretty soon we come in sight of a large round tent where the
meetin' wuz held, and from which we could hear the voice of hims and
oratory, along on both sides of the immense tent, so's to leave a road
between, wuz rows of small tents where the campers dwelt. They
stretched on like two rows of white dwellings way off into the green
of the woods. Josiah and I are well thought on in Jonesville, and as
fur out as Loontown and Piller Pint, and a man soon advanced and gin
us an advantageous position, and Josiah hitched the mair and we
advanced into the amphitheatre.
The tent riz up like a big white umbrell, or like great broodin' wings
overhead, leavin' the sides free for the soft air to enter. There wuz
rows of seats, boards laid on wooden supports and on one side a high
wooden structure, open towards the seats, in which the preachers sot
or stood. A wooden railin' run along in front of that rough pulpit.
Under foot wuz the green moss and rich mold of the onbroken forest.
And way up over the white tent the tall tree tops arched, and you
could look way up into the green aisles of light with glimpses of
sunshine between, castin' shady shadows and golden ones on the grass
and moss below.