DEAR SIR,—I have just read in the morning paper an account of
the art school which you have founded. I have been thinking the
matter over, for I am much interested in such philanthropic
movements, and I have a special reason for a peculiarly personal
interest in this one.
It is apparent, from the facts stated in the account of your
worthy undertaking, that you are an art patron, and are
therefore alive to the possibilities in the development of the
artistic effort. I am quite certain that a man with the name of
Hiram Briggs, and who is the proprietor of a button manufactory,
must be possessed of sound common sense and fully able to
appreciate and understand the proposition which I am about to
make.
I have a young girl friend who believes that she is well on the
way toward becoming a great artist, and who certainly has the
artistic temperament. Her ambition is to go abroad for the study
of art, but at present she has not the means to do this.
From the fact that the praiseworthy memorial which you have
built must have taken several years to complete, I assume that
Mrs. Briggs must have long since been laid to rest. My young
friend is eminently fitted to assist in the carrying out of the
plans which you have evidently made for this great work which
you have begun, and further, her education and accomplishments
are such as to enable her to take her place in any social
sphere.
I trust, my dear Mr. Briggs, that you will receive this
communication in the spirit in which it is written, and if at
any time you wish to call on me I should be pleased to welcome
you to my home in Whitfield.
Most sincerely yours,
ESTHER ADAMS.
The next morning Miss Esther was favored with a visit from her young
neighbor, Jack Remington. Jack was a social character and often dropped
in, apparently for no particular reason. These fortuitous calls were
liable to happen on baking days, or when he felt the need of Miss
Esther’s moral support in his seasons of tribulation. Ten years old,
sturdily built, stolidly minded, he was of the stuff of which Lincolns
are made, rather than Michael Angelos or Robert Brownings. Miss Esther
had been obliged to recognize this fact, but she still hoped to train
his young ideas into grooves of her own choosing. Though as yet no
visible progress had been made, she did not despair, but continued in a
course which gave her much pleasure and did not bother Jack.
The boy had a passion for battle-ships, and his highest ambition was to
build one. He had already begun it, but obstacles often confronted him,
and he depended on Miss Esther both for advice and for more material
assistance. She did not know much about battle-ships, but her elementary
knowledge was supplemented by furtive consultations of the encyclopedia
between Jack’s visits. Afterward, she conversed on these subjects with
much erudition, and Jack’s admiration grew, for she was the only woman
of his acquaintance who even knew on which end of a ship the bow was
placed. Miss Esther really cared very little about the technical
construction of any ship, but she was fond of the boy and had her own
notions as to his future career. Of these notions Jack was entirely
aware, but since, in his opinion, they were totally unnecessary to a
builder of ships, he ignored them with the superiority of a
ten-year-old.
With a view to gracious influences, the would-be architect of Jack’s
fortunes had endeavored to induce a friendship between him and a
golden-haired siren of four, who was her neighbor on the other side. Her
name was Amabel, but for obvious reasons she was known as Chub. Miss
Esther’s efforts toward the foundation of this friendship had resulted
disastrously. On their first introduction the children had cordially
approved of each other, and Amabel had not changed her mind. But just as
the friendship was ripening, Jack discovered Chub’s calamitous ignorance
concerning the necessity for guns on battle-ships. She had promised to
sail with him on his to the great naval battle which he assured her was
imminent. More, she had promised to assist in any capacity in the
working of the ship, when, in an impulsive burst of generosity, Jack
responded that she might man one of the guns.
“Gunth!” and Chub suddenly sat down on the floor and shrieked. Her
terror-stricken squeals brought Miss Esther to the scene. She looked
from the screaming baby on the floor to the disdainful ship-builder, who
stood with his legs apart and his hands in his pockets, surveying the
disturbance with an expression of absolute disgust.
“If she yells like that when I say guns,” said he, contemptuously, “I
wonder what she’ll do when the shooting begins.”
“Thooting!” exclaimed Chub, her demonstrations checked for the moment,
“who we going to thoot?”
“The enemy,” said Jack, tersely.
“Won’t it hurt ’em?”
“It’ll _kill_ ’em!”
Chub’s wails began again with redoubled force. “Take her away,” said
Jack. He turned to continue the building of his warship with the fixed
resolve that henceforth and forever womankind should have no part or
parcel in his life.
But the young misanthrope made an exception of Miss Esther Adams. He
relied implicitly upon her knowledge and judgment, not only in nautical
matters, but regarding all the vicissitudes which beset his somewhat
strenuous existence. His mother always accompanied the application of
court-plaster with a reproof. When Miss Esther bound up his wounds, a
delectable doughnut added largely to the healing qualities of her
ministrations.
On this particular morning, however, the doughnut was of minor
importance. He ate it, and even abstractedly took a second one, but
without enthusiasm. Not observing any necessity for sticking-plaster,
Miss Esther concluded the distress was mental and awaited developments.
Jack wriggled into one of the big veranda chairs opposite Miss Esther,
and with his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands stared
moodily into space. Miss Esther waited.
“I got to be a minister,” he said at last.
“Have you, dear? When?”
“Soon’s I’m big enough. ’Tain’t fair, jes’ ’s I got my ship most done,
and was goin’ to be a sailor like Dewey or somebody, and now I got to be
an old minister; mother told me so las’ night.”
“But perhaps you’ll like being a minister,” suggested Miss Esther.
“No sirree! I bet I won’t. I know the stunt. I was over to Dr.
Bushnell’s jes’ now, and I asked him what a fellow had to do to be a
minister, but he said, don’t be ’reverent, little boy, and I wasn’t. But
I know my own self what they got to do. Preach and bury people and marry
’em and baptize kids and have prayer-meetin’s and donations and wear
high hats and never smoke nor go to circuses nor go in swimmin,’—least
I never seen Dr. Bushnell in,—and where’s any fun in all that, I’d like
to know. But they was another man there a-visitin’ the minister, and he
asked me what I wanted to be, and I told him a sailor and he said ’s
that so. And I told him you and me was a-buildin’ a battle-ship and
asked him to come over ’n see it and he said he would and he’s comin’
to-morrow mornin’ and he give me this card with his name on it.”