Many are the tales concerning JOANNA's flashing wit. There appeared
many years back, in a modest shape that excited small interest amongst
the reviewing herd, a booklet whereof the title furnished little
if any indication to the contents. _The Spinster's Reticule_, for
so the name ran, came forth with no blare of journalistic trumpets
challenging approval from the towers of critical sagacity. It appeared
and lived. But between its cardboard covers the bruised heart of
JOANNA beats before the world. She shines most in these aphorisms. Her
private talk, too, has its own brilliancy, spun, as it was here and
there, out of a museful mind at the cooking of the dinner or of the
family accounts. She said of love that "it is the sputter of grease
in a frying-pan; where it falls the fire burns with a higher flame
to consume it."[1] Of man, that "he may navigate Mormon Bay, but he
cannot sail to Khiva Point." The meaning is too obvious it may be, but
the thought is well imaged.
She is delightful when she touches on life. "Two," she says, "may
sit at a feast, but the feast is not thereby doubled." And, again,
"Passion may lift us to Himalaya heights, but the hams are smoked in a
chimney." And this of the soul, "He who fashions a waterproof prevents
not the clouds from dripping moisture." Of stockings she observes
that, "The knitting-needles are long, but the turn of the heel is a
teaser." Here there is a delightful irony of which matrons and maids
may take note.
Such, then, was our JOANNA--JOANNA MERESIA SPRATT, to give her that
full name by which posterity is to know her--an ardent, bubbling,
bacon-loving girl-nature, with hands reaching from earth to the stars,
that blinked egregiously at the sight of her innocent beauty, and hid
themselves in winding clouds for very love of her.