If I were forced to be a boy, and a boy in the country,--the best kind
of boy to be in the summer,--I would be about ten years of age. As soon
as I got any older, I would quit it. The trouble with a boy is, that
just as he begins to enjoy himself he is too old, and has to be set to
doing something else. If a country boy were wise, he would stay at just
that age when he could enjoy himself most, and have the least expected
of him in the way of work.
Of course the perfectly good boy will always prefer to work and to do
“chores” for his father and errands for his mother and sisters, rather
than enjoy himself in his own way. I never saw but one such boy. He
lived in the town of Goshen,--not the place where the butter is made,
but a much better Goshen than that. And I never saw him, but I heard of
him; and being about the same age, as I supposed, I was taken once from
Zoah, where I lived, to Goshen to see him. But he was dead. He had been
dead almost a year, so that it was impossible to see him. He died of the
most singular disease: it was from not eating green apples in the season
of them. This boy, whose name was Solomon, before he died, would
rather split up kindling-wood for his mother than go a-fishing,--the
consequence was, that he was kept at splitting kindling-wood and such
work most of the time, and grew a better and more useful boy day by day.
Solomon would not disobey his parents and eat green apples,--not even
when they were ripe enough to knock off with a stick, but he had such
a longing for them, that he pined, and passed away. If he had eaten the
green apples, he would have died of them, probably; so that his example
is a difficult one to follow. In fact, a boy is a hard subject to get
a moral from. All his little playmates who ate green apples came to
Solomon's funeral, and were very sorry for what they had done.
John was a very different boy from Solomon, not half so good, nor half
so dead. He was a farmer's boy, as Solomon was, but he did not take so
much interest in the farm. If John could have had his way, he would
have discovered a cave full of diamonds, and lots of nail-kegs full of
gold-pieces and Spanish dollars, with a pretty little girl living in
the cave, and two beautifully caparisoned horses, upon which, taking the
jewels and money, they would have ridden off together, he did not know
where. John had got thus far in his studies, which were apparently
arithmetic and geography, but were in reality the Arabian Nights, and
other books of high and mighty adventure. He was a simple country-boy,
and did not know much about the world as it is, but he had one of his
own imagination, in which he lived a good deal. I daresay he found out
soon enough what the world is, and he had a lesson or two when he was
quite young, in two incidents, which I may as well relate.
If you had seen John at this time, you might have thought he was only
a shabbily dressed country lad, and you never would have guessed what
beautiful thoughts he sometimes had as he went stubbing his toes along
the dusty road, nor what a chivalrous little fellow he was. You would
have seen a short boy, barefooted, with trousers at once too big and too
short, held up perhaps by one suspender only, a checked cotton shirt,
and a hat of braided palm-leaf, frayed at the edges and bulged up in
the crown. It is impossible to keep a hat neat if you use it to catch
bumblebees and whisk 'em; to bail the water from a leaky boat; to catch
minnows in; to put over honey-bees' nests, and to transport pebbles,
strawberries, and hens' eggs. John usually carried a sling in his hand,
or a bow, or a limber stick, sharp at one end, from which he could sling
apples a great distance. If he walked in the road, he walked in the
middle of it, shuffling up the dust; or if he went elsewhere, he was
likely to be running on the top of the fence or the stone wall, and
chasing chipmunks.
John knew the best place to dig sweet-flag in all the farm; it was in a
meadow by the river, where the bobolinks sang so gayly. He never liked
to hear the bobolink sing, however, for he said it always reminded him
of the whetting of a scythe, and that reminded him of spreading hay; and
if there was anything he hated, it was spreading hay after the mowers.
“I guess you wouldn't like it yourself,” said John, “with the stubbs
getting into your feet, and the hot sun, and the men getting ahead of
you, all you could do.”
Towards evening, once, John was coming along the road home with some
stalks of the sweet-flag in his hand; there is a succulent pith in the
end of the stalk which is very good to eat,--tender, and not so strong
as the root; and John liked to pull it, and carry home what he did not
eat on the way. As he was walking along he met a carriage, which stopped
opposite to him; he also stopped and bowed, as country boys used to bow
in John's day. A lady leaned from the carriage, and said:
“What have you got, little boy?”
She seemed to be the most beautiful woman John had ever seen; with light
hair, dark, tender eyes, and the sweetest smile. There was that in her
gracious mien and in her dress which reminded John of the beautiful
castle ladies, with whom he was well acquainted in books. He felt that
he knew her at once, and he also seemed to be a sort of young prince
himself. I fancy he didn't look much like one. But of his own
appearance he thought not at all, as he replied to the lady's question,
without the least embarrassment:
“It's sweet-flag stalk; would you like some?”
“Indeed, I should like to taste it,” said the lady, with a most winning
smile. “I used to be very fond of it when I was a little girl.”
John was delighted that the lady should like sweet-flag, and that she
was pleased to accept it from him. He thought himself that it was about
the best thing to eat he knew. He handed up a large bunch of it. The
lady took two or three stalks, and was about to return the rest, when
John said:
“Please keep it all, ma'am. I can get lots more.
I know where it's ever so thick.”
“Thank you, thank you,” said the lady; and as the carriage started, she
reached out her hand to John. He did not understand the motion, until he
saw a cent drop in the road at his feet. Instantly all his illusion
and his pleasure vanished. Something like tears were in his eyes as he
shouted:
“I don't want your cent. I don't sell flag!”
John was intensely mortified. “I suppose,” he said, “she thought I was a
sort of beggar-boy. To think of selling flag!”
At any rate, he walked away and left the cent in the road, a humiliated
boy. The next day he told Jim Gates about it. Jim said he was green not
to take the money; he'd go and look for it now, if he would tell him
about where it dropped. And Jim did spend an hour poking about in the
dirt, but he did not find the cent. Jim, however, had an idea; he said
he was going to dig sweet-flag, and see if another carriage wouldn't
come along.
John's next rebuff and knowledge of the world was of another sort. He
was again walking the road at twilight, when he was overtaken by a wagon
with one seat, upon which were two pretty girls, and a young gentleman
sat between them, driving. It was a merry party, and John could hear
them laughing and singing as they approached him. The wagon stopped when
it overtook him, and one of the sweet-faced girls leaned from the seat
and said, quite seriously and pleasantly:
“Little boy, how's your mar?”
John was surprised and puzzled for a moment. He had never seen the young
lady, but he thought that she perhaps knew his mother; at any rate, his
instinct of politeness made him say:
“She's pretty well, I thank you.”
“Does she know you are out?”
And thereupon all three in the wagon burst into a roar of laughter, and
dashed on.
It flashed upon John in a moment that he had been imposed on, and it
hurt him dreadfully. His self-respect was injured somehow, and he felt
as if his lovely, gentle mother had been insulted. He would like to have
thrown a stone at the wagon, and in a rage he cried:
“You're a nice....” but he couldn't think of any hard, bitter words
quick enough.
Probably the young lady, who might have been almost any young lady,
never knew what a cruel thing she had done.