She talked real eloquent about it, and kinder begun to shed tears. She's
a capital hand to git money, she could always cry when she wanted to
when she went to school, did it by holdin' her breath or sunthin'.
And when I say that I don't want it understood that I believe she did
all her cryin' that way. No, I spoze she could draw on her imagination
and feelin's to that extent and git 'em so rousted up that she did
actually shed tears, wet tears jest like anybody, some of the time, and
some she made, so I spoze.
Well, when she begun to cry I looked keen at her and sez, how much she
made me think of herself when we went to school together. And she
stopped sheddin' tears to once and acted more natural and went on to
tell about her skeem. She said female vice wuz stalkin' round fearful,
fallen wimmen appeared on the streets with shockin' frequency, sunthin'
must be done for these lost souls or their blood would be on our dress
skirts.
She told me how much she'd gin to this object and how much ministers had
gin and how they wuz all goin' to preach sermons about these poor lost
wimmen and try to wake the public up to the fact of the enormity of
their sins and the burnin' need of such an institution.
She talked powerful about it, and I sez: "Jane Olive, I've gin a good
deal of thought to this subject, and I think this house of yourn is a
good idee, but to my mind it don't cover the hull ground. Now I will
give five dollars for the Home for Fallen Wimmen and the other five for
the Home for Fallen Men."
Sez she, and she screamed the words right out: "There hain't any such
institution in the hull city!"
"Why, there must be!" sez I. "It hain't reasonable that there shouldn't
be. Why, if a man and a woman go along over a bridge together, and both
fall through, and are maimed and broke to pieces, they are carried to a
male and female hospital to be mended up. Or if they fall through a
sidewalk or anywhere else they have to both be doctored up and have the
same splints on and rubbed with the same anarky, etc."
"That's very different," sez Jane Olive.
"Why different?" sez I. "If they both fall morally their morals ort to
be mended up agin both on 'em. The woman ort to be carried to the Home
for Fallen Wimmen, the Home for Magdalenes, and the men to the Home for
Fallen Men, the Home for Mikels."
"There hain't no such place!" sez Jane Olive agin decidedly.
Sez I, "Did you ever inquire?"
"No," sez she, "I wouldn't make a fool of myself by inquirin' for such a
thing as that, Home for Mikels! I don't know what you mean by that
anyway."
"Why," sez I, "fallen men angels. You know Mikel wuz a angel once and he
fell."
"Well, there is no such place," sez she, tossin' her head a little.
"Well," sez I, "you ort to know, you're from the city and I hain't; but
I know that if there hain't such a place it's a wicked thing. Just look
at them poor fallen men that are walkin' the streets night after night,
poor creeters goin' right down to ruin and nobody trying to lead 'em up
agin to the way of safety and virtue--poor fallen, ruined men! I feel to
pity 'em."
Sez Jane Olive, "Oh, shaw! they don't feel ruined, they're all right,
I'll resk them."
"How do you know how they feel? Take a tender hearted, innocent man,
that some bad, designin' woman has led astray, led him on till she has
betrayed and ruined him, and he feels that the screen door of society is
shet aginst him----"
"Oh, shaw!" sez Jane Olive agin. "The door of society hain't shet aginst
the man, it never is."
"Then," sez I, "there is sunthin' wrong with the door and it ort to be
tended to."
Sez she, "Things are winked at in a bad man that hain't in a bad woman."
"Not by me," sez I firmly. "The man won't git a wink out of me more or
less than I would give to the woman."
"It don't hurt a man," sez Jane Olive. "And," sez she, "no self
respectin' man goes to any place that hain't licensed and respectable."
"If such houses are respectable," sez I, "and the law makes 'em so, why
hain't the wimmen called so that keep 'em? Why hain't the wimmen looked
up to that work there?"
Sez Jane Olive, "You don't talk no good sense at all."
Sez I, "Jane Olive, I am spozin'. Mark you well, I don't say they are
respectable; I say they are the depths of infamy. But I am talkin' from
the standpoint of legislators and highest officials, and if they call
'em respectable, and throw the mantilly of law and order over 'em it is
only justice to let the mantilly spread out, so it will cover the males
and females too. Agin I quote the words of the poet to you, 'what is
sass for the goose ort to be sass for the gander.'"
Says she, "Such things are looked on so different in a man, they can
hold their heads up jest as high as they did before."
"Not if I had my way," sez I. "If the female is dragged off to the Home
for Fallen Wimmen let the same team come back and haul the men off to
the Home for Fallen Men, tie 'em up with the same rope, preach to 'em
from the same text, let 'em out when they've both repented and want to
do better. That's my scheme," sez I.
"Oh, shaw!" sez Jane Olive, "it wouldn't work."
"Why not?" sez I. "I'll bet if that course wuz took for the next five
years with fallen men you wouldn't have to raise so much money for
fallen wimmen; I'll bet it would ameliorate their condition more than
anything else would."
"It don't hurt a man," sez Jane Olive agin.
"Why don't it hurt 'em?" sez I. "If it makes a woman so bad the hull
world calls her ruined and lost, and prints her name out in the daily
papers, as they always do, givin' her full name and address and sayin'
some wild young man (but nameless) of respectable family was implicated,
and talks of her as if Heaven wuz shet aginst her, and she has got to
pray and repent in sack-cloth and ashes all the rest of her days, and
never, never git her old place back in the eyes of the community, it
hain't reasonable to spoze it don't hurt a man a mite to fall at the
same time and in the same way. There is no sense in it, and I'll bet if
you hunt round in your city you'll find where fallen men are kep' hid
away till they can repent and reform.
"Why," sez I, "men's hearts and souls and morals are made out of exactly
the same stuff that wimmens be. And as I said before, let a man and a
woman fall out of a high winder together it smashes him jest as bad as
it duz her. They have to be carried off to hospitals jest the same, the
same doctor tends 'em, the same medicine has to be administered to 'em
and they have to come back slowly to health agin. It takes the same
length of time to lose the marks of the woonds and bruises, and they
have to hobble round on the same kind of crutches. And why under the
sun, moon and stars there is any difference in the woonds on their souls
and morals I can't see, nor I don't believe you can."
Agin she snorted and acted real high headed, and sez she, "There hain't
no such a Home as that you're talkin' about, and never wuz."
"Well," sez I, "then it is high time there wuz." And I went on real
eloquent, "Poor fallen men have been neglected too long and their ruin
will lay on our doorsteps if we don't do sunthin' to help 'em; I won't
give a cent to help fallen wimmen, who have had ten times as much
preachin' to 'em and as much done for 'em, till justice has been done to
fallen men. Poor mizable creeters! They'll find out they've got one
friend that will stand by 'em if they've never had a mite of pity or
help or encouragement held out to 'em before in the world. It is high
time sunthin' wuz done for 'em; and when you who live right in the midst
of fallen men come here and say you've started a home for 'em, where
there will be preachin' to 'em, and encouragement gin 'em to repent and
reform, when you've come and told me you've started this job I'll give,
and give liberal."
She sot kinder demute for a minute, and I went right on, and sez I, "I'd
have a immense big house built if I had my way so's to accommodate 'em
if I could git a house big enough. And I would set 'em there in immense
rows and let 'em meditate on their sins a spell and I'd have good likely
preachers of both sects go and preach to 'em about fallen men and fallen
wimmen, and how they could git up agin with God's help if they tried
hard enough to. And I'd have pictures hung on the wall of Mikel and
Magdaline and them old fallen men castin' stuns at fallen wimmen and
what the Lord said about it. And then to kinder encourage 'em and show
'em to what they might rise up to, if they repented and reformed, I
would have pictures of some likely he angels flyin' round up in a purer
air and----"
I wuz almost carried away and by the side of myself with this beautiful
and inspirin' picture I'd cunjered up in my heated brain, when she broke
in all wrought up with excitement and horrow with a new thought that had
dawned on her:
"Why," sez she, "if you did that, if you shet up such men there wouldn't
be a man left outside." And she sort o' screamed out, "Where would I git
a coachman to drive for me or a butler?"
"Drive yourself," sez I sternly, "and buttle too; if that is so, but I
don't believe it."
But she still looked most wild with excitement and horrow, and agin she
sez, "It would take away every man in the world! and what would we do
for men?" sez she.
"Do!" sez I, all wrought up, "Do without 'em if that is the case, though
I don't believe it; but if it is so it's high time we begun fresh,
educate and bring up men babys in the right way, and begin agin; start a
new world with 'em, jest as you'd start a new kind of gooseberry or
anything. But I don't believe a word on't, not a word. I believe there
are good men in the world, lots and lots of 'em."
"I know there hain't," sez she.
And I sez, "I know there is."
And we disputed back and forth several times but didn't convince each
other. You can see jest how it wuz, it wuz the example of our own
companions that wuz influencin' us in our opinions. She havin' lived
with a perfect sardeen and he-wretch, thought all men wuz like him, I
nerved up by the thought of my noble-minded (though small) companion
held my faith firm as a iron anchor that the world wuz full of good men,
scattered here and there like good wheat among the tares, and I felt and
knowed that the tearers wuz fur scurser than the wheat.
But Jane Olive riz up and kinder let her train flop out over the floor,
she'd held it up as she come in.
I bid her a cordial good-by and told her to come and see me in
Jonesville, but she acted kinder cold and hauty and I hain't much hopes
that she will foller my advice.
Josiah came in pretty soon, and when I told him about it he acted real
huffy and agreed with Jane Olive, and resented the idee of a Home for
Fallen Men. Blandina, who come while we wuz talkin' about it to borry a
few needlefuls of white thread, she shed tears and said she wouldn't
mortify men by namin' a home like that for thousands of worlds like
this.
And Josiah acted puggicky all the evenin'. But I knowed I wuz in the
right on't. Truly the path of duty is a thorny one anon or oftener.
We went into the Fair the next mornin' by what they call the Skinker
Entrance, and we hadn't hardly got in when Josiah sez to me, pintin' to
a small low house, "What do you spoze they show there, Samantha? It must
be pretty poor if they can't afford shingles or a tar ruff."
And sure enough the ruff wuz covered with straw. It wuz a low buildin'
built of sunthin' that looked like stun. But come to find out it wuz the
cottage of Robert Burns, and I hastened my steps, Josiah and Blandina
follerin' on.
For low as that buildin' is, lookin' like a ant hill almost by the side
of the high red granite administration buildin', that little cabin holds
memories that soar up higher than the peakedest, highest ruffs on the
Fair ground. The Home of Robert Burns, the Poet of the People. How his
inimitable poetry come troopin' through my mind as I walked through the
low rooms, there is only four on 'em, kitchen, settin' room, store room
and stables.
I didn't approve of havin' the stables so nigh the livin' rooms, and
should have advised Robert's wife to stood her ground and not had it.
But I wuzn't there, and she gin in probable, and mebby she wanted it so,
it wuz handy, you could open the door and milk into your coffee cup if
so inclined. The bed is built in the kitchen wall; I spoze they couldn't
afford anything better, and 'tennyrate that humble bed pillowed the form
that will walk down the ages crowned with honor and lovin' memories,
while many monarchs who at that time rested on carved rose-wood have
sunk into oblivion.
The people are not goin' to forgit their poet. He who taught that no
matter what the rank, a man wuz a man "for a' that." Who sung and
dignified the humble pleasures of the poor. "The Cotter's Saturday
Night" will be remembered when many a scientific tome and eloquent poem
writ in long words is dust and ashes. And the scathing irony and wit
satirizing the ignorant rich, the scorn of meanness and bigotry, the
love of liberty and justice the melting tenderness of his love poems,
the People he loved and wrote for, will not forget.
The big open fireplace might have been the one immortalized in his
poetry. There wuz a high clock like the one that told him the hours,
anxious hours, weary hours, happy hours, hours radiant with the poet's
inspiration. Despairin' hours full of anxiety and dread for the wife and
children he loved. It told the hours of day and night too, for Robert
did love what he called a good time, and I presoom Bonnie Jean read the
face of that old clock with anxiety and weariness writ in her own face
when the small hours struck and her Robbie wuz away with gay companions.
And with what despairin' grief did she read its calm old face while her
poet writ this sad truth:
"I'm wearin' awa' to the Land o' the Leal."
And there wuz a cupboard with blue and white dishes and a sugar bowl
that he and Bonnie Jean had used. Oh, warm fingers, tired fingers! how
long you've been dust, and the little piece of metal still endures. Oh,
my soul! the wonder and the pity on't.
There are chairs, tables, spinning wheel, etc., similar to those that
were in the Burns cottage. But there is a reel that wuz used by Bonnie
Jean herself, I took holt on't tryin' to bring to my mind what emotions
she had time and agin as she reeled her threads on and off, love,
anxiety, ambition, fear, hopes and sorrows; how they twined and ontwined
in her faithful breast as the reel turned, emotions stilled long ago,
long ago.
And there wuz the very griddle and toaster with which Bonnie Jean
toasted the bread for her Robbie. Many and many a time her heart, I
presoom to say seemin' to git seared in the burnin' fires of jealousy
whilst the bread wuz toastin'. For Robert wuz a man of many fancies, and
though a wife through pride or affection may seem blind to such things,
yet burns will smart and "jealousy is as cruel as the grave."
But many a time also whilst she toasted her bread her heart would bound
with joy and pride thinkin' of some triumph the man she loved had won,
or rememberin' some words of love and appreciation he had whispered in
her ear, which made the dark world over in a minute into a bright one,
for wimmen's hearts beat the same in Ayr or Jonesville, and Bonnie Jean
wuz proud of her poet lover and loved him. And he loved her the biggest
heft of the time, and mebby all the time; men are queer in such things
and their ways past findin' out.
'Tennyrate my heart bent in homage to his genius and his bravely borne
poverty and sufferin'. And I wished, oh, how I wished that some of the
pride and honor showered on him now the world over could have brightened
his hard life when it wuz needed. But it wuzn't to be, I wuzn't there to
advise folks, or to cheer him and Jean up by my warm appreciation and
good vittles. And I reluctantly tore myself away from the memory-hanted
spot.
Molly wuz dretful interested here too, but naterally wanted to ride in
the Intremoral railway and see all she could, it bein' her first visit.
So as I had spoke of wantin' to see the air-ships we went there next and
then to the Philippines.
Sister Sylvester Bobbett laughed when I told her that probable Josiah
and I would go to the next Exposition through the air.
Sez she, "You might jest as well talk about goin' through the ground."
But I wuz glad to see that other folks realized the importance of the
subject, for they have given as much space to air navigation as for all
the other modes of transportation put together. The buildin' covers
about fourteen acres--I wonder what Sister Bobbett would say to that,
the walls are thirty feet high, the lower twelve feet, air tight, the
upper eighteen feet lattice work.
Part on't is a sort of a harbor for their air-ships to light in. They
say they need a still harbor away from boisterous winds jest as much as
water ships do. This is the first Air-Ship harbor ever built. Josiah
said it wuz the humbliest buildin' on the Fair ground, and it wuzn't a
beauty so fur as architecture goes.
But I sez, "Handsome is as handsome duz! I don't spoze," sez I, "that
Noah's Ark wuz a beauty, but he started a new world with it, and I
believe this buildin' holds the great hope and promise of the future in
the way of transportation, and it looks good to me."
It stands between Physical Culture Hall and the Hall of Lady Managers. I
wuz glad it wuz where wimmen could keep an eye on 'em and keep 'em from
bein' run on. In one corner on't is two stalls, jest as they have horse
stalls in barns, but these stalls are one hundred and eighty feet long
and forty feet wide. There wuz most ninety entries for the contest. If
they make a speed of twenty milds an hour they git a prize of one
hundred thousand. I would like to know what Sister Bobbett would think
of that.
Josiah said he believed they wuz dangerous, but the head of this company
told me with his own mouth that he had traveled over fifteen States in
air-ships and had never been hurt or even skairt, and I told Josiah that
wuz more than he could say of our wheel-barrow that had never been out
of Jonesville. Josiah went out one dark night to shet the barn door and
fell over it, and it rared up on him and throwed him; he wuz skairt to
death thinkin' it wuz a burglar who wuz tryin' to fight him.
I had to take the lantern and go out and rescue him, and I hain't goin'
to tell how he kicked that wheel-barrow when he re_cog_nized it, and the
language he hurled at it. It wuz onbecomin' a deacon, and I told him so.
Next to the Hall of Electricity, the great onseen Wizard that sways the
world, this Hall of Air-Ships wuz interestin' to me, for it is the
transportation of the future. Baby eyes blinkin' now at the canopys of
their cribs will look up and see the blue sky above 'em cleft by the
white wings of great ships of the air sailin' to and fro with no
treacherous rocks to dash aginst, no forests to subdue or mountains to
tunnel, no roads to break, to and fro, back and forth shining white
aginst the crimson sunset, aginst the rosy dawn, and the cloudless noon.
Oh, what a sight for the eyes that will behold 'em! I wish I could stand
it till then, but most probable I can't, and I wouldn't want to anyway
if Josiah couldn't be there to see 'em with me; and his health hain't
what it wuz, his liver is bad. But I think sometimes that Josiah and I
may look on and behold this glorious sight from some cloudy terrace of
the Better Country; I'd love to if we could. But 'tennyrate it will be
seen by them that live long enough.
I took solid comfort and lots and lots of it wandering round seeing
these immense Travelers of the Sky and askin' questions and lookin'
forward towards the glories that is to be.
Josiah and Blandina didn't enjoy it so much as I did, though Josiah,
always wantin' to embark in some new enterprise, thought he should go up
in one whilst he wuz there. He said he wanted to brag on't to Deacon
Henzy and Deacon Huffer. And I told him that wuzn't the right sperit to
show, it wuzn't the sperit of a true Discoverer tryin' to solve the
problems of the future through love for God and humanity.
And he said he guessed he knew what he took comfort in and what he
didn't.
Well, we rid round considerable so's to give Molly a view of the
Cascades and big buildin's, and then we went on to the Philippines. This
is the largest single exhibit at the Fair and covers forty-seven acres
of beautiful woodland and water spaces, and is the largest colonial
display ever made. I told Josiah as we walked towards it, Molly and
Blandina goin' a little ahead, "What wuz the use of travelin' so fur to
see our new possessions?"
"Yes," sez he; "no use spendin' so much money."
This wuz to me one of the most interestin' exhibits at the Fair. And I
thought it a first rate idee to show off to the world the almost
limitless wealth as well as the hard problems that face Uncle Sam in his
new possessions, for like a careful pa he will see that they learn how
to take care of themselves before he sets 'em up in independent
housekeepin'.
We went over a fine bridge, copied from one of their own into the walled
city of Manila. Here in one room you see all of its war exhibits,
immense cannons, the blow guns of the Negritos; axes the Iggorote
head-hunters used to cut off the heads of their enemies. The Moro cris,
the wooden guns and bamboo cannons and home-made powder used in 'em by
the insurgent army with the rough machinery used in makin' it.
Wanderin' on you see the nita huts of the Visayans, big handsome fellows
they are and pretty refined wimmen, and hear their weird melodies as
they are at work making their beautiful bamboo furniture, and weaving
their handsome blankets, etc.
You see on the hillside the huts of the Negritos, black little creeters.
Then you see the Iggrotes, a real village, some of the housen brought
from their own land and the rest built here by them from their own
materials. It is jest as though you stepped over to the mountains of
Luzon and see 'em at their simple housekeepin'.
I whispered anxiously to Josiah to keep clost watch of his own head, for
though they promised to not pursue their favorite pastime till they got
back home agin, yet I didn't know what might happen, though I felt he
wuzn't in so much danger, his bald head bein' so slippery and nothin' to
lay holt on, still I kep' a clost watch on that dear head all the while
we wuz there.
Josiah didn't sense his own danger, but whispered, "I'm glad enough
Bruno is to home." They will eat dogs and dance their war dances, but I
spoze I couldn't hender 'em, so didn't try to advise 'em. Some on 'em
didn't have clothes enough on to be decent unless you call the tatooin'
on their naked bodies, clothes. I see Josiah looked at 'em with
interest, and he wondered if common ink and diamond dyes could be used,
and if Ury could handle 'em.
And I hurried him on to the encampment of the Moros. Here we see the men
and wimmen dressed in silk and satin, but cut after patterns I would
never let Josiah wear or wear myself. Some of these Moro girls are quite
handsome in their bright striped mantillys, their long hair hanging down
under their gay turbans. One of these villages is on land and one built
on bamboo poles over the water. Jest open sheds covered with nipa
leaves. Anyone with rumatiz couldn't stand it in 'em.
But what took Josiah most of all wuz the tree dwellers, their houses are
built up in the highest trees they can find, and they git to 'em by
ladders they pull up after 'em; as he looked on 'em I see in Josiah's
reminescent eye dreams of summer housen in our ellums and maples, and I
hurried him on. Blandina said she could be perfectly happy up there with
a congenial companion, and I knowed she wuz thinkin' of Aspire Todd; but
she never could git him up there, for his tongue is the strongest part
on him.
We all admired the Native Scouts; they live in a little village of tents
in a beautiful piece of woodland. There are four companies, Visayan,
Tagalog, Maccabebe and Ilicano. Their band of music, and the band of
eighty pieces of the native constabulary are called the finest at the
Exposition. When they march they all seem to be one body; so smooth and
even are their movements, they are called the most perfectly drilled
soldiers in the country.
Jest think on't, if they show off so now what will they do at the next
Exposition. There are ten large buildings containing their enormous
display of art and science, education, agriculture, horticulture,
manufactures, commerce, etc. Some of the statutes and pictures are
beautiful; you couldn't tell some of 'em from them brought from abroad.
But folks don't seem to realize that some of the Filippinos are as
refined and cultured as if they come from the middle of Boston.
Their forestry exhibit is the finest ever brought to any Exposition and
contains everything relating to the fifty million acres of Philippine
forests, splendid timber, over fifteen hundred different kinds of wood,
rattans, gutta percha, dye stuffs, trees yielding oil, gums, rosin, etc.
The mineral exhibit shows how rich these islands are in gold, copper,
coal and other minerals. In agriculture you see the great display of
fibres, Manila hemp which brought 'em over twenty-two millions last
year, ropes made from bamboo, cocoa-nut, rattan. Sugar, tobacco, coffee,
hats, baskets and other articles made from palm leaves, bamboo, rattan
and nito, colored by their own native dyes. In the flower display are
the most rare and exquisite orchids growing jest as common there as
weeds along the Jonesville road. One interestin' display wuz a map built
out doors showin' more than 2,000 islands, their shape and comparitive
size.
But most of all I wuz interested in the educational exhibit. So anxious
have they been to learn night schools have had to be established. The
big normal school building in Manila is handsome enough for any American
city, and the smaller district and industrial schools are doing jest as
good work. Our Government sent five hundred and forty teachers there in
1901, and now we have about seven hundred there. I took comfort in
seein' the great work they have done, as well as the church and private
schools, and how well they're learning and getting along.
Anyone could spend five weeks at least jest at the Philippine display,
and find abundance to interest 'em all the time in the educational, art,
manufacturing, horticultural, agricultural and other displays, but we
hadn't no five weeks to spend, so we had to move on, but I felt proud
enough to see what my revered Uncle Sam had done and wuz doing.
Truly he took a big job on his hands to take care of such an immense
family, and differin' so widely in cultivation, temperament and clothes,
to lead the ignorant ones into civilization and keep peace in the family
and among his own folks.
He'll have as hard work to do it as that widower I hearn on who had
three or four children of his own, and married a widow who also had a
number, and then they had several, and one day she came callin' to her
husband, "Come quick! come quick! Your children and my children are
fightin' with our children."
But Uncle Sam will be on hand, he'll wade right in with a birch gad or a
spellin' book, jest which he thinks they need most at the time, and
settle the differences all right, and I believe it will be a star in his
crown in time to come: turning the savages and cannibals that inhabit
part of these new possessions into good American citizens.
I don't spoze I shall see the day when this shall fully come to pass,
and mebby the babies of to-day will be great-grandpas before it takes
place, but it will be, I believe, and so duz Josiah.
Yes, he's doin' a good job by his step-children, I guess they would be
called that seein' he stepped in when they wuz poor and oppressed and
took 'em under his care.
I honor him for it, but wish he would do as well by his steal children,
the dark complexioned ones stole away from their own land to be slaves
and drudges for his white children.
He'll mebby tell me they wuz ignorant and degraded and wuz better off
here than in their own land, but I'll say back to him, "Samuel, Josiah
and I would probable be in a better house and more high-toned society if
some king or other should steal us and carry us away from our humble
farm to their palace. But do you spoze we would enjoy ourselves as well?
No indeed!"
And 'tennyrate they're here, the problem that lays so heavy on the
Southern and Northern heart and conscience and the riddle gits harder
and harder to solve. The lurid blaze of livin' torches makes bloody
blindness in the eyes of them that look on and light them fires. The
disgraceful glare flames out, shamin' you in the eyes of the world, and
streams up to the pityin' heavens askin' for justice.
Mebby you'll tell me you don't see how you can help it, but Samuel, you
must try, for though there are here and there oasises in the gloom
lighted up by education and inteligence still there remains the great
multitude of your steel children that you ort to help, you ort to do as
well by them settin' in long rows right on your very doorstep as you're
doin' for them six thousand milds off. Sinners must be punished by law,
else what is law made for? Order must be kep', the helpless protected,
but you know, Samuel, that if some of the disgraceful seens that are
bein' enacted here right under your dear old nose took place amongst
your adopted Philippine children or even amongst your protejays in
Turkey or China you would send out a warship to once. I am sorry for
you, Samuel, and think the world on you, but faithful are the woonds of
a friend; you must hear the truth once in awhile or who knows what would
become on you, you might puff up with proud flesh and have to have an
operation, and I guess you will anyway before you git through with this
problem.
I presoom you want me to advise you what to do, only bein' a man you
hain't really wanted to come out and ask me. Josiah acts jest like that
lots of times.
So I'll say to you, I honor you, Samuel, for what you're doin' for these
foreign children, but I want you to do jest as much to home. I want you
to send teachers and found schools at your own expense; you're four
handed and able to do it. And Id'no but you had better buy land in their
own home you stole them from, buy a small farm for each one that wants
to go. Travelers say that in the Valley of the Nile, a country with
similar climate and soil to the south land where they wuz born, is an
unoccupied place big enough for each one to have a small farm of their
own. I want you, Samuel, to buy this land for 'em, take 'em back there
at your own expense, all that want to go. There are plenty of the young
and enterprising who would go full of the hope of foundin' a new
republic for their own race, where they can expand and grow strong away
from parlyzing influence of racial and social hatred.
There would be lots of 'em who wouldn't want to go, and why can't you,
Samuel, I'd say, buy them a little home here, for instance, on the vast
unoccupied area of Florida? Let 'em have the hull state if necessary;
let each family have their little piece of land, and then make 'em work
it; send teachers, found schools, teach 'em to be self sustaining and
self respecting.
Samuel would probable sass me back and say, You can't teach a nigger to
respect himself and stand upright.
And I'd say, "'Tain't so, Sam, but if it wuz, centuries have been spent
by the white race in teachin' this people to be dependent and helpless,
to not think for themselves, to lean entirely on the judgment and
justice of the white people (weak reeds to lean on anon or oftener)."
And then I'd say, "Samuel, you did a foolish thing after the Civil war,
you did it with the best of motives, and you needn't be skairt, I hain't
goin' to scold you for it, but it wuz jest like turnin' a company of
babies out into the world and tellin' 'em they wuz jest as tall and
inteligent as their pas and mas and they must go on and take care of
themselves, and with their utter lack of all knowledge and strength take
an equal part in public affairs. How could these babies do it, Samuel, I
would say. But you wuz gropin' along most blind in them dark days, and
you did the best you knowed how to then. But when you see you've made a
mis-step you must draw your foot back and start off agin jest like a
elephant crossin' a weak bridge, I've seen 'em go down into the water
and wade ruther than resk it. You may have to wade through deep waters
to fix it all right, but that would be better than to fall through a
weak bridge and break your neck.
"It is because I think so much on you, Samuel, that I talk so plain to
you, for I don't want you to git the name Miss Eben Simmons got. She
jest spent her hull mind and income on foreign missions and let her own
children go so dirty and ragged they wuz a disgrace to Jonesville. I
want you and Miss Simmons to not scrimp in your foreign charities but
begin to home and make your own dependent ones comfortable."
I presume I could convince him if I had time enough, but we are busy
creeters, Samuel and I, both on us, and Id'no as he'd have time to argy
back and forth with me, but it would be well for him if he did, men must
have wimmen advise 'em if they ever expect to amount to anything.
But to resoom forwards. These thoughts wuz runnin' through my head as we
wended our way around, it did my soul good, as I said, to see the
progress these Filipinos are makin', and to meditate on the fact how
enterprisin' Uncle Samuel is when he sets out. Why jest think on't, he's
taught them Filipinos more English in four years than the Spaniards
taught 'em their language in the four hundred years they took care on
'em.
I wuz so proud and happy as I thought on't that I stepped considerable
high as I walked along, and I hearn a profane bystander say (wicked
creeter to think on't),
"That woman has took too much stimulant."
And Josiah sez, "What ails you, Samantha? You walk as if you wuz
follerin' a band of music."
And I wuz, it wuz the music of the Future that sounds out in my ears
anon or oftener, sweet inspirin' strains that even Josiah can't hear if
his head lays on the same piller.
It sings of an ignorant, oppressed race changed into an enlightened
prosperous one, this great work done by our own country, this song comes
floatin' into my ears over the wide Pacific. And another louder strain
comes from nigher by made tender and pathetic by years of oppression and
suppressed suffering that could find expression in no other way than
this heart searching pathos. And blending with it, ringing over and
above it, triumphant happy echoes telling of real freedom of mind and
conscience, the true liberty.