that 100 dollar bill and handed it to Mr. Levins Clough, as a healing
plaster for his disappointed expectations, and gone home, hugging my
old man, and resolving to mend every rip in his coat, gloves, vest,
pants, and stockings, 'free gratis,' from that repentant hour, till
the millennial day. I'd hand him his cigar-case and slippers, put away
his cane, hang up his coat and hat, trim his beard and whiskers, give
him the strongest cup of tea, and the brownest slice of toast, and all
'the dark meat' of the turkey. I'd wink at his sherry cobblers, and
whiskey punches, and mint juleps. I'd help him get a 'ten strike' at
ninepins. I'd give him a 'night-key,' and be perfectly oblivious what
time in the small hours he tumbled into the front entry. I'd pet all
his stupid relatives, and help his country friends to 'beat down' the
city shop-keepers' prices. I'd frown at all offers of 'pin money.' I'd
let him sit and 'smoke' in my face till I was as brown as a herring,
and my eyes looked as if they were bound with pink tape; and I'd
invite that widow Delilah Wilkins to dinner, and run out to do some
shopping, and stay away till tea-time. Why! there's nothing I
_wouldn't_ do for him--he might have _knocked me down with a feather_,
after such a piece of magnanimity. That 'Levins Clough' could stand no
more chance than a woodpecker tapping at an iceberg."
LXXVII.
WHAT TO DO WHEN YOU ARE ANGRY.
"'When you are angry take three breaths before you speak.'
"I couldn't do it, said Mrs. Penlimmon. Long before that time I should
be as placid as an oyster. 'Three breaths!' I could double Cape Horn
in that time. I'm telegraphic wire; if I had to stop to reflect, I
should never be saucy. I can't hold anger any more than an April sky
can retain showers; the first thing I know, the sun is shining. You
may laugh, but that's better than one of your foggy dispositions,
drizzling drops of discomfort a month on a stretch; no computing
whether you'll have anything but gray clouds overhead the rest of your
life. No; a good heavy clap of thunder for me--a lightning flash; then
a bright blue sky and a clear atmosphere, and I am ready for the first
flower that springs up in my path.
"'Three breaths!' how absurd! as if people, when they get excited,
ever _have_ any breath, or if they have are conscious of it. I should
like to see the Solomon who got off that sage maxim. I should like
better still, to give him an opportunity to test his own theory! It's
very refreshing to see how good people can be, when they have no
temptation to sin; how they can sit down and make a code of laws for
the world in general and sinners in particular.
"'Three breaths!' I wouldn't give a three-cent piece for anybody who
is that long about anything. The days of stage coaches have gone by.
If you ever noticed it, nobody passes muster now but comets,
locomotives, and telegraph wires. Our forefathers and foremothers
would have to hold the hair on their heads if they should wake up in
1855. They'd be as crazy as a cat in a shower bath, at all our
whizzing and rushing. Nice old snails! it's a question with me whether
I should have crept on at their pace if I had been a cotemporary.
Christopher Columbus would have discovered the New World much quicker
than he did had I been at his elbow."
LXXVIII.
THE EARLY BLIGHT.--BY FANNY FERN.
"'As Love's wild prayer, dissolved in air,
Her woman's heart gave way,--
But the sin forgiven, by Christ in Heaven--
By man is curs't alway.'
"'Oh, _do not_ speak so harshly of her, Aunt Nancy! If you could see
how sorrowfully she looks upon that beautiful boy--how she starts at
the sound of a strange voice--how hopelessly she sits with her large
eyes fixed upon the ground, hour after hour,--so young and so
beautiful, too!'
"'Yes, yes,' broke in Aunt Nancy; 'I dare say! they're _always_
beautiful. I tell you there's no mercy for her in _this_ world, or
_t'other_, as I knows on,' and the indignant spinster drew up her long
crane neck. 'Why didn't she behave as she _oughter_? Did you ever hear
a word said against _me_? Beauty is nothing; behavior is everything.'
"'But Aunt Nancy----'
"'Don't 'but' _me_; I tell you I won't have anything to do with
her--such a thing as _she_ is!'
"What crushing words to fall upon a broken heart! for Leila's quick
ear had caught them. Her features grew rigid and pallid, and little
Rudolph, frightened at their expression, climbed timidly to her lap.
"Leila's heart was full of bitterness--those cruel words yet rang in
her ears; and, for once, she pushed him rudely from her,--then the
_mother_ triumphed; and drawing him with a caressing motion to her
breast, she sobbed--'_God pity us!_'
"Those were long, weary hours, she passed in that solitary chamber, in
vacant listlessness, with her head leaning upon her hand, till poor
little Rudolph fell asleep amid his toys, from very weariness,--then
she would rouse herself, tie on his little hat, and wander out into
the green fields--on, on--as if trying to be rid of _herself_! But
there was no healing balm in nature. Just such sunny days, alas! had
dawned on her before, when her sky was pure and cloudless. She
accepted mechanically the little field-flowers that Rudolph placed in
her hand. Those eyes! that brow! those curling chestnut locks! No
_father's_ hand was there to bless them!
"Poor Leila! Her own sex pass by on the other side
_contemptuously_--and the _other_? (_God save her!_) She shrinks
nervously from their bold glance of admiration, and repels scornfully
any attempt at acquaintance. There is no bright spot in the future,
save the hope that the false promise made in God's hearing to the
unprotected orphan will yet be redeemed.
"Little Rudolph's cheeks crimson with fever. Leila says to herself,
''tis better he should die, than live to blush at his mother's name,'
and then she shudders,--for where on the desolate earth will she find
so loving a heart as his is now?
"The young physician knows her history. Leila answers his questions
with a cold dignity; but he is generous and noble-hearted, and would
scorn to remind her by word or glance of her sad secret. Fresh flowers
lay between Rudolph's thin fingers, and delicacies unattainable by
Leila, are daily offerings. Rudolph will need them no longer! Leila
sheds no tear, as the look that comes but once, passes over that waxen
face! But she trembles, and shudders, as if the last gleam of hope was
shut out by the closing of that coffin-lid. Even 'Aunt Nancy'
condescends to pity her, (at a distance!)
"Oh, shame! that woman's heart should be so relentlessly unforgiving
to her erring sister! Who shall say, in the absence of a _mother's_
angel watch, and with a _warmer heart_ than the one that now sits in
cold judgment upon her, Leila's sin might have been _yours_? Oh,
'Love her still!
Let no harsh, cold word,
Man! from lips of thine be heard!
Woman! with no lifted eye
Mock thou her deep misery;
Weep ye--tears, _tears alone_
For our world-forsaken one,--
Love her still!'
"Lelia sits alone--pale and passive. The young physician approaches
her respectfully. Leila looks at him with amazed wonder, as he would
raise her to the dignity of a '_wife_.' Tears of happy pride fall from
her eyes, at his generous avowal; and so she thanks him with a full
heart, but says, sadly, '_her heart is with Rudolph's father!_' and
Leila is left _again_ to her own sad thoughts. She wanders listlessly
about the house--she takes up a newspaper, (scarcely heeding what she
reads;) she glances at the list of 'deaths,'--it is there!--_his
name_! and it signs the death warrant of his _last_ victim! Leila
falls heavily to the floor. _Her heart is as still as his own!_
Betrayer and betrayed shall meet again; and _God_ shall be the
_Judge_!"
LXXIX.
THERE'S ROOM ENOUGH FOR ALL.
"'What need of all this fuss and strife,
Each warring with his brother?
Why should we in the crowd of life,
Keep trampling down each other?
Is there no goal that can be won,
Without a fight to gain it?
No other way of getting on,
But grappling to obtain it?'
"No, my gracious! no! We have to fight like ten thousand; contest
every inch of ground; and if you get one step forward of your
neighbor, envy and malice will be on your skirts in a twinkling;
trying to hoist themselves up, or pull you down--they are not
particular which. For every laurel you earn, you will gain the
everlasting hate of every distanced competitor; not that they won't
smile and congratulate you; but Judas left a few descendants, when he
'went to his own place.'
"'Room enough for all?' _not by a hemisphere!_ For every crumb Dame
Fortune tosses out of her lap, there's a regular pitched battle and no
place to fight in. Well, if your blood leaps through your veins as it
ought, instead of putting your thumbs in your mouth and whining about
it, you'll just set your teeth together, make a plunge for _your
share_ of the spoils, and _hold on to it after you get it_, too! My
gracious, yes. Peace, and love, and harmony are very pretty things, no
doubt, but you don't see 'em often in this latitude and longitude.
"Well, there's no help for it. You just go pussy-cat-ting through
creation once, with velvet claws, and see what _lean ribs_ you'll have
to show for it! At the mercy of every little pinafore ruffian that
knows English enough to cry 'scat!'
"If you earn anything beside cat-_nips_, I hope you'll come and tell
me! No--I'm persuaded it's no use to talk through your nose, and look
sanctified; male and female Moses-es always get imposed upon. Besides,
you heathen, if you look in Genesis, you'll find yourself a
fore-ordained victim--no dodging the curse. 'By the sweat of your
brow,' you must earn your bread and butter. The old serpent who
fetched it on us, knows we are all fulfilling our destiny! Eve wasn't
smart about that apple business. I know forty ways _I_ could have
fixed him--without burning my fingers, either. It makes me quite
frantic to think I lost such a prime chance to circumvent the old
sinner!"
LXXX.
THE CROSS AND THE CROWN.
"Are there no martyrs of whom the world never hears? Are there no
victories save on the battle-field? Are there no triumphs save where
one can grasp earth's laurel crown? See you none who rise early and
sit up late, and turn with a calm, proud scorn from a _gilded fetter_
to _honest toil_? Pass you never in your daily walks, slight forms
with calm brows, and mild eyes, whose whole life has been one
prolonged self-struggle? Lip, cheek and brow tell you no tale of the
spirit's unrest.
"The 'broad road' is passing fair to look upon. The coiled serpent is
not visible amid its luxurious foliage. The soft breeze fans the cheek
wooingly; laden with the music of happy, careless idlers. Youth, and
bloom, and beauty; ay! even _silver hairs_ are there! No tempest
lowers; the sky is clear and blue. _What stays yonder slender foot?_
Why pursue so courageously the thorny, rugged, stumbling path? The eye
is bright; the limbs are round and graceful; the blood flows warm and
free; the shining hair folds softly away from a pure, fair brow; there
are sweet voices _yonder_ to welcome! _there is an_ INWARD _voice to
hush_! there are _thrilling_ eyes _there_, to bewilder! _What stay
that slender foot?_
"Ah! _The foot-prints of Calvary's_ SUFFERER _are in that 'narrow
path_!' That youthful head bends low and unshrinkingly to meet its
'crown of thorns.' The '_Star in the East_' shines far above those
rugged heights, on which its follower reads:--'_To him that_
OVERCOMETH, will I give to eat of the Tree of Life!'
"Dear reader, for _a brief day_, the CROSS; for _uncounted ages_, the
CROWN!"
LXXXI.
TOM FAY'S SOLILOQUY.
"'Most any female lodger up a stair,
Occasions thought in him who lodges under.'
"Don't they, though? Not a deuced thing have I been able to do since
that little gipsy took the room overhead, about a week ago!
Pat--pat--pat, go those little feet over the floor, till I am as
nervous as a cat in a china closet, (and _confounded_ pretty they
_are_, too, for I caught sight of 'em going up stairs.) Then I can
hear her little rocking-chair _creak_, as she sits there sewing, and
she keeps singing, '_Love not--love not_,' (just as if a fellow could
_help_ it.) Wish she wasn't quite so pretty; it makes me decidedly
uncomfortable. Wonder if she has any great six-footer of a brother, or
cousin with a sledge-hammer fist? Wish I was her washerwoman, or the
little nigger who brings her breakfast; wish she'd faint away on the
stairs; wish the house would catch fire to-night! Here I am, in this
great barn of a room (all alone;) chairs and things set up square
against the wall; no little feminine _fixins_ round; I shall have to
buy a second-hand _bonnet_, or a pair of little gaiter-boots, to cheat
myself into the delusion that there's _two of us_! Wish that little
gipsy wasn't as shy as a rabbit? I can't meet her on the stairs if I
die for it; I've upset my inkstand a dozen times, hopping up, when I
thought I heard her coming. Wonder if she knows (when she sits
vegetating there,) that Shakspeare, or Sam Slick, or somebody says,
that 'happiness is born a twin?' 'cause if she don't, I'm the
missionary that will enlighten her? Wonder if she earns her living,
(poor little soul!) It's time I had a wife, by Christopher! (Sitting
there, pricking her pretty little fingers with that murderous needle!)
If she was sewing on _my dickeys_, it would be worth while now.
_That's it_--by Jove! _I'll get her to make me some dickeys_--don't
_want_ 'em any more than Satan wants holy water, but _that's_ neither
here nor there. I shall insist upon her taking the _measure of my
throat_ (bachelors have a right to be _fussy_). There's a pretty
kettle of fish, now; either she'll have to stand on a cricket, or I
shall have to get on my knees to her! Solomon himself couldn't fix
any thing better; deuce take me, if I couldn't say the right thing
_then_! This fitting dickeys is a _work of time_, too. Dickeys _isn't_
to be got up in a hurry.
"Halloo! there's the door-bell! there's a great big trunk dumped down
in the entry! 'Is Mrs. Legare at home?' _M-r-s._ Legare?! I like _that_,
now! Have I been in love a whole week with M-R-S. Legare? Never mind,
_may be_ she's a _widow_! Tramp, tramp, come those masculine feet up
stairs--(handsome fellow, too!) N-e-b-u-c-h-a-d-n-ezzar! If I ever
heard a kiss in my life, I heard one then! I won't stand it!--it's an
invasion of my rights. I'll listen at the door, as I am a sinner! 'My
dear husband!!!'--p-h-e-w! What right have sea-captains on shore, I'd
like to know? Confound it all! Well, I always _knew_ women weren't
worth thinking of; a set of deceitful little monkeys; changeable as a
rainbow, superficial as parrots, as full of tricks as a conjuror,
stubborn as mules, vain as peacocks, noisy as magpies, and full of the
'old Harry' _all_ the time! There's 'Delilah,' now; didn't _she_ take
the 'strength' out of Sampson?--and weren't 'Sisera' and 'Judith' born
_fiends_? And didn't the little minx of an Herodias dance John the
Baptist's head off? Didn't Sarah 'raise _Cain_' with Abraham, till he
packed Hagar off? Then there was----(well, the least said about HER,
the better!) but didn't Eve, the _foremother_ of the whole concern,
_have one talk too many with the old 'serpent_?' OF course; (she
didn't do _nothing else_!!) Glad I never set _my_ young affections on
_any_ of 'em! Where's my cigar-case! How tormented hot this room is!"
LXXXII.
A CHAPTER ON CLERGYMEN.
"Oh, walk in, Mr. Jones, walk in; a minister's time isn't of much
account. He ought to expect to be always ready to see his
parishioners. What's the use of having a minister, if you can't use
him? Never mind scattering his thoughts to the four winds, just as he
gets them glowingly concentrated on some sublime subject; that's a
trifle. He's been through college, hasn't he? Then he ought to know a
thing or two; and be able to take up the thread of his argument where
he laid it down; else where's the almighty difference between him and
a layman? If he can't make a practical use of his Greek and Latin and
Theology, he had better strip off his black coat, _unshake_ his 'right
hand of fellowship,' and throw up his commission. Take a seat, Mr.
Jones; talk to him about your crops; make him plough over a dozen
imaginary fields with you; he ought to be able to make a quick transit
from 'predestination' to potatoes. Why, just think of the man's
salary--_and you helping to pay it_! Nebuchadnezzar! haven't you hired
him, soul and body? He don't belong to himself at all, except when
he's asleep. Mind and give him a little wholesome advice before you
leave; inquire how many pounds of tea he uses per week, and ask him
how he came to be so unclerical as to take a ride on horseback the
other day; and how much the hostler charged him for the animal, and
whether he went on a gallop, or a canter, or an orthodox trot? Let him
know, very decidedly, that ministers are not expected to have nerves,
or head-aches, or side-aches, or heart aches. If they get weary
writing (which they've no business to,) let them go down cellar and
chop some wood. As to relaxation suggestive of beautiful thoughts,
which a gallop on a fleet horse through the country might furnish,
where the sweet air fans the aching temples caressingly, where fields
of golden grain wave in the glad sunlight, where the blended beauty of
sky and sea, and rock and river, and hill and valley, send a thrill of
pleasure through every inlet of the soul--pshaw! that's all
transcendental nonsense, fit only for green boarding-school girls and
silly scribbling women,--a minister ought to be above such things, and
have a heart as tough as the doctrine of election. He ought to be a
regular theological sledge-hammer, always sharpened up, and ready to
do execution without any unnecessary glitter. That's it!
"Fact is, Mr. Jones, (between you and I and the vestry door,) it is
lucky there are some philanthropic laymen like yourself who are
willing to look after these ministers. It's the more generous in you
because we are all aware it's a thing you don't take the _slightest
pleasure_ in doing(?) You may not get your reward for it in this
world, but if you don't in the next, I shall make up _my_ mind, that
Lucifer is remiss in his duty."
LXXXIII.
FANNY FERN ON HUSBANDS.
"'Husbands should by all means assist their wives in making
home happy, and strive to preserve the hearts they have won.
When you return from your daily avocations, meet your
beloved with a smile of joy and satisfaction--take her by
the hand--imprint an affectionate kiss upon her lips.'
"Isn't that _antimonial_? Don't you do any such thing! If you've made
a married woman of her, I'd like to know if that isn't an honor that
she might spend a life-time trying to repay you for; and come out at
the little end of the horn _at that_?
"Land of love! there's many a woman _dies_ of 'hope deferred.' Put
_that_ in her ear. Ask her what in mercy she thinks would have become
of her, if you hadn't taken pity on her. Make her sensible of her
beatified condition. Just tell her that any 'little favor' you do for
her now, is an extra touch of philanthropy; that you may possibly go
whole days without noticing her at all--except to stow away the food
she prepares for you;--that, as to thanking her for every button she
sews on, Cæsar! the boot is on the _other foot_! and should she lose
her beauty or get sickly, of course she can't expect you'll care as
much for her as when she was bran-new--the idea is absurd. She has no
business to grow ugly; and as to sickness, it _would_ be stepping off
your pedestal to be puttering round, inquiring whether your wife's
gruel was furnished at the right time or not; you've got other things
to do, of more importance; such as betting on elections, peeping into
concerts and theatres, and so forth.
"'He might take _me_, too.' You nonsensical little nuisance! In the
first place--he--he--he--well, the upshot of it is, _he don't want
you_! it would spoil all his fun. So just sit down in your
rocking-chair and contemplate your stocking-basket; and if your
spirits droop for change of scene, for a kind word, or a loving
glance--that's nothing! You can die any time you get ready; he will
stop mourning for you long before the weed on his hat gets rusty.
Besides, the world is full of women--a real crowd of 'em; he knows
that well enough; dare say he'd be obliged to you to pop off.
'Variety is the spice of life.'
"So there's the map before you, my dear. _That's all there is of
Life._ If you've got married, you've climbed to the top of the
hill--so now you can do as the rest of the wives do--stand still and
crow a little while; and then commence your descent. No new
discoveries to be made that _I know of_. Cry, if you feel like
it--pocket handkerchiefs are only ninepence a-piece now."
LXXXIV.
FANNY'S IDEAS ABOUT MONEY MATTERS.
"'The Military Argus has a long and prosy article headed
'How to make Home Happy.' A friend of ours has now a work in
preparation, which solves the question--'It is to give your
wife as much money as she asks for.' This entirely abolishes
the necessity of kisses and soft sawder.'
_True Flag, Aug. 28._
"Betty! throw up the windows, loosen my belt, and bring me my
vinaigrette!
"It's no use to faint, or go into hysterics, because there's nobody
here just now that understands my case! but I'd have you to
understand, sir----(fan me, Betty!) that----o-o-h!----that----(Julius
Cæsar, what a Hottentot!) that if you have a wife _as is a wife_,
neither 'kisses,' 'soft sawder,' or 'money,' can ever repay her for
what she is to you!
"Listen to me! Do you remember when you were sick? _Who_ tip-toe-d
round your room, arranging the shutters and curtain-folds with an
instinctive knowledge of light, to a ray, that your tortured head
could bear? Who turned your pillow on the cool side, and parted the
thick, matted locks from your hot temples? Who moved glasses and
spoons and phials without collision or _jingle_? Who looked at you
with a compassionate smile, when you persisted you 'wouldn't take your
medicine because it tasted so bad;' and kept a sober face, when you
lay chafing there like a caged lion, calling for cigars and
newspapers, and mint-juleps, and whiskey punches? Who migrated,
unceasingly and uncomplainingly, from the big baby before her to the
little baby in the cradle, without sleep, food, or rest? Who tempted
your convalescent appetite with some rare dainty of her own making,
and got fretted at because there was 'not sugar enough in it?' Who was
omnipresent in chamber, kitchen, parlor and nursery, keeping the
domestic wheels in motion that there should be no jar in the
machinery? Who oiled the creaking door, that set your quivering nerves
in a twitter? Who ordered tan to be strewn before the house, that your
slumbers might be unbroken by noisy carriage wheels? Who never spoke
of weary feet or shooting pains in the side, or chest, as she toiled
up and down stairs to satisfy imaginary wants, that 'nobody but wife'
could attend to? and who, when you got well and moved about the house
just as good as new, choked down the tears, as you poised the half
dollar she asked you for, on your forefinger, while you inquired 'how
she spent the last one?'
"'_Give her what money she_ ASKS for!' Julius Cæsar! (Betty! come here
and carry away my miserable remains!) Nobody but a _polar bear_ or a
_Hottentot_ would WAIT to have a wife '_ask_' for 'money!'"
LXXXV.
A LETTER TO A SELF-EXILED FRIEND IN THE COUNTRY.
"Dear Norah:--'Tell you the news!' Ah, I _knew you'd come to it_! I
was _sure_ you'd tire of your _oyster life_, up there in the
mountains. Pleasant, isn't it--after dandelions and buttercups have
ceased to be a novelty--after you know who lives in the little brown
house opposite, and who in the hut at the end of the lane? After you
have read through that 'Alpha and Omega' of a country library--_the
Almanac_! After you've watched your landlady wash dishes, and feed
pigs, and make butter, till you are qualified to take a diploma in
those branches yourself! After you've seen the old rooster fight his
hen-harem till they are subjugated to his lordly mind! After you've
listened to the drowsy hum of insect life, till you are _half a
vegetable_ yourself! After you have seen the old ricketty front door
fastened up, when the hens go to roost, and every soul in the house in
the 'land of Nod,' and you sitting at your window, _expiring_ for a
new sensation, though it come in the shape of a lightning stroke, or a
tornado! listening compulsorily to the doleful doxology of the
cricket, and the _base_ voluntary of the bullfrog, and lamenting that
brick and mortar are _unfashionable_ in dog-days! True, 'tis a
pity--pity 'tis true--that the _mind rusts_, while the _body
flourishes_, in the country.