"She is a saucy wench,
Somewhat o'er full
Of pranks, I think--but then with growing years
She will outgrow her mischief and become
As staid and sober as our hearts could choose."
OLD PLAY.
Mr. Salsify Mumbles was a grocer in a small way, and his good wife took
boarders,--young ladies and gentlemen from different parts of the
country, who came to attend Cedar Hill Seminary, a school of high repute
and extended celebrity. Her number was limited to three this summer,
because she conceived her health to be delicate, and because Mr. Salsify
had communicated to her in private that he was certainly "rising in his
profession;" and the quick-sighted lady foresaw the day speedily
approaching when she would no longer be obliged to perplex herself with
so ungrateful a class of beings as boarders, but should roll through the
streets of Wimbledon in her coach and four, the "observed of all
observers."
Mrs. Mumbles had one fair daughter, Mary Madeline, upon whom she doted
with true maternal fondness. This young lady was most perversely inclined
to smile upon one Mr. Dick Giblet, a clerk in her father's grocery. Mrs.
Mumbles was inconsolable, and Mr. Giblet was banished from the premises,
and taken into employ by the firm of Edson & Co., the largest merchants
in Wimbledon.
Rumor said these gentlemen were so well pleased with the young man, that
they had offered him a yearly salary of several hundred dollars, and
proposed, should he continue to perform his duties as well as hitherto,
to take him into the firm, on his coming of age. Mrs. Salsify now began
to regard Dick with different eyes, as what prudent mother would not? She
sent Mary Madeline to the store of Edson & Co., whenever she was in want
of a spool of cotton or yard of tape; but the young clerk had grown so
vain with his elevation, that he looked very loftily down upon her, bowed
in the most distant manner, and never exchanged more words with her than
were necessary in the buying and selling of an article. So Mary Madeline
told her mother, and upbraided her as the cause of the young man's cold
treatment. Mrs. Salsify bade her daughter be of good cheer. "'Twas all a
feint on Dick's part, to conceal his love till he was sure of hers,--all
would come round right in time." But Mary Madeline would not believe it,
and said she should die if she had to stay in the back store alone so
much, sorting spices and writing labels, for she was constantly thinking
of Dick, who used to be with her. She must have something to divert her
attention; and, at length, Mrs. Salsify hit upon the project of sending
her to school at the seminary one term. It was fitting that the daughter
of the rich Mr. Mumbles that was to be, should be possessed of suitable
polish and refinement to adorn the high circles in which her position
would call her to move. So Miss Mumbles answered to her name among the
two hundred scholars, male and female, that had assembled in the halls of
Cedar Hill Seminary, for the summer term. Quite a sensation she produced
in her gay muslin dress and fiery-colored silk apron; for Mrs. Salsify
declared her resolve to dress her tip-top. She was not the woman to half
do a thing, when she undertook; she always came up to the mark, or went a
little beyond. Better overshoot than fall short, was her motto. And when
Mary Madeline came home, on the evening of her debut at the seminary,
walking between the two young lady boarders, Amy Seaton and Jenny
Andrews, Mrs. Mumbles could not avoid drawing a comparison between the
three; and her daughter appeared to her like a blazing star between two
sombre clouds, for Miss Seaton and Miss Andrews, who were both orphans,
wore plain, dark gingham frocks and linen aprons. The third boarder was a
little brother of Miss Seaton's, about a dozen years of age. Charlie was
his name; a bright, intelligent boy, brimful of mischief and fun.
Mrs. Salsify kept no girl;--she could not find a good one, she said,--a
bad one she would not have, as long as she could manage to perform her
work herself, which she thought she could do with Mary Madeline's
assistance nights and mornings. It would not be for long, she trusted,
this slavery to boarders, for Mr. Salsify continued to inform her, at
stated intervals, that he was certainly "rising in his profession."
The husband and wife sat alone one evening, indulging in confidential
discourse, as 'tis said conjugal mates are wont to do on certain
occasions.
"Really," exclaimed Mrs. Mumbles, "it is astonishing, the quantity of
victuals these boarders consume. It is so unfeminine and indelicate for
young ladies to have appetites. I declare it quite shocks me to see the
large slices of bread and butter disappearing down Jenny Andrews' little
throat, and, as for that Charles Seaton, I believe he would eat a whole
plum pudding if he could get it. I left off making them long ago."
"I have not noticed one on the table for several days," returned Mr.
Salsify, "and, as I saw the last one was sent away untouched, I feared
they had detected the musty raisins."
"O, la, no! the greedy mugs don't know the difference, I assure you,"
answered the wife, "'twas only because they had stuffed themselves so
full of veal pie, that the pudding was not devoured." Just then Amy
Seaton came in and asked if she might get a lunch for Charlie, as he was
not in season for supper.
"O, yes!" answered Mrs. Salsify, in her blandest tone; "here are the
keys. I lock the pantry because Mr. Mumbles is so absent-minded he often
leaves the door open, and the cat gets in and devours the victuals. Get
just what you want for Charlie and a lunch for yourself and Jenny if you
choose."
"Thank you," said Amy taking the bunch of keys from Mrs. Salsify's hand.
Wide swung the pantry door on its creaking hinges, and Amy's eyes
brightened as she stepped in, thinking of the little feast they were to
have up stairs on the good lady's sudden fit of generosity. She glanced
her light eagerly along the shelves in search of pies and sweet cakes,
for she had seen Mrs. Salsify baking a large amount of good things that
morning; but nothing met her wistful gaze save a plateful of burnt
gingerbread crusts which had been picked over and left after the
evening's meal, a plate of refuse meat, and a few bits of salt cod-fish
in a broken saucer. She was about to go and tell Mrs. Mumbles her pantry
was destitute of victuals, when she recollected that lady superintended
her own work, and she should only inform her of what she already knew.
Several similar instances of the lady's singular generosity now occurred
to her mind. She recollected one day, on coming in unexpectedly from
school, of finding Mrs. Salsify buying a large quantity of cherries, and
of her saying she was going to pick them over, and would set them on the
dairy shelf where she might go and eat of them whenever she chose. But
Amy could not find them anywhere, and when she innocently asked Mrs.
Salsify where she had put them, that good lady, after blushing and
stammering a good deal, said they proved so dirty she was obliged to
throw them away. This and other similar occurrences decided Amy to say
nothing of the destitution of the pantry. So she returned the keys to her
boarding mistress, and, without a word, ascended to her room, where she
gave Charlie the bit of fish and crust of gingerbread she had obtained.
"Is this all I'm to have for my supper?" said he, looking ruefully on the
scanty, unpalatable food.
"'Tis all I can find in the pantry, bub," answered Amy; "can't you make
it answer for to-night? and to-morrow I will buy you something nice at
the bakery."
"Why," said Jenny, raising her dark, fun-loving eyes from a problem in
Euclid, "I saw Mrs. Mumbles baking mince pies, and custards and plum
cake, this morning."
"Bah," said Charlie, "I don't want any of her plum cake if she puts the
same kind of raisins in it she does in her puddings. But, Jenny, I think
I know where she keeps her nice victuals."
"Where?" asked Jenny, with an earnest look on Charlie's cunning face.
"Have you never noticed that great tin boiler under her bed?" Jenny burst
into an uncontrollable fit of laughter, which Amy vainly endeavored to
silence, and directly Mary Madeline appeared and said, "Mother would like
to have a little less noise if they could favor her, as she had company
below." Then the three sat down on the floor, and Jenny and Charlie
planned a midnight attack upon the tin boiler. Amy, who was more sedate
and cautious, advised them to desist; but 'twas just the exploit for
Jenny's frolicsome, mischievous temperament. Charlie was to take a
pillow-case, and creep softly under the bed, and fill it from the
supposed contents of the mysterious boiler, while Jenny stood at the
kitchen door to assist him in bearing the precious burden to their room.
How slow the hours passed after the plot was formed ere it could be
carried into execution! Mrs. Salsify in the parlor below kept wishing her
visitors would go, for she had never seen the wicks in the camphene lamps
of so surprising a length. They flooded the whole room with light, and
she recollected Jenny Andrews had asked the privilege of trimming them
after they were last used. She dared not rise and pick them down, for
such narrow-souled persons as she are always fearful that the truth will
be known and their littleness exposed; so she sat in a perfect fever,
watching the fluid getting every moment lower, and scarcely heeding the
remarks of her guests. At length they took their departure, and Mrs.
Salsify rushed in a sort of frenzy to the lamps, and dropped the caps
over the blazing wicks.
"Mary Madeline," said Mr. Mumbles, reprovingly, "don't you know how to
trim a lamp properly? Enough fluid has been wasted to-night by means of
those long wicks to last two evenings with wicks of a proper length."
"'Tis none of Maddie's doings," returned Mrs. S., "she is more prudent
than that. 'Twas that hussy of a Jenny Andrews who trimmed them after
Miss Pinkerton was here the other night."
"Well, the girl ought to pay for the waste she has occasioned," said Mr.
Salsify, gruffly. "Let us retire now; I declare 'tis near eleven
o'clock." The conspirators in the room above heard with eager ears the
departure of the guests, and sat in perfect silence till midnight chimed
from the old clock tower. Then Charlie Seaton, pillow-case in hand, crept
silently down the stairs with Jenny close behind him. Mrs. Mumbles'
bed-room opened out of the kitchen, and the door was always standing
ajar. Thus Charlie's quick eye had detected the boiler while sitting at
the dining table directly opposite her room. As he now paused a moment in
the kitchen before crossing the forbidden precincts, the deep-drawn
sonorous breathings convinced him that Mr. and Mrs. Salsify Mumbles were
lulled in their deepest nocturnal slumbers. Gently dropping on his knees,
he crawled softly to the object of plunder. Lucky chance! the cover was
off, and the first thing his hand touched was a knife plunged to the hilt
in a large loaf. This he captured and deposited in his bag. Then followed
pies, tarts, etc., and last a small jar, which he took under his arm,
and, thus encumbered, crept on all-fours to the kitchen door, where Jenny
relieved him of the jar. They softly ascended the stairs, where Amy was
ready to receive them.
"How dared you take that jar?" said she; "what does it contain?"
"I don't know," said Charlie; "but I know what my pillow-case contains.
It was never so well lined before, Amy."
Thus saying, he commenced removing its contents, while Jenny pulled the
knife out of the loaf, which proved to be pound cake, uncovered the jar,
and pronounced it filled with cherry jam. "Ay," said Amy, "there's where
those cherries I saw her buying of Dilly Danforth went, then. She told me
they were so dirty she had to throw them away. But I think you had better
go and carry these things back."
"Never," said Charlie; "I am going to eat my fill once in Mrs. Mumbles'
house."
"But what will she say when she discovers her loss?"
"That is just what I'm anxious to know," said Jenny.
"So am I," returned Charlie, chopping off a large slice of pound cake and
dividing two pies in halves. "The old lady goes in for treating her
visitors well, don't she? I dare say these condiments were intended to
supply her guests for years. I wish we had some spoons to eat this cherry
jam."
"You had better carry that back," said Amy.
"No, I will not go down on my knees and crawl under Mrs. Salsify's bed
again to-night on any consideration."
"Neither would I," said Jenny, "the old adage is 'as well be killed for a
sheep as a lamb;' so let us enjoy ourselves to the utmost in our power.
Here is food enough, of the best kind too, to serve us well for the
remainder of our stay here, only a week longer you know. I'll keep it
locked in my trunk."
So saying, they cleared away, and Charlie bade good-night, and all
retired to bright visions of pound cake and cherry jelly.