your heart aches; it is to give confidence and receive none; it is
faithfully to keep your own promises, and never mind such a trifle as
having promises broken to you. It is never to have or to promulgate a
dissenting opinion. It is either to be born a fool, or in lack of that
to become a hypocrite, trying to become a "reasonable being."
_DO AMERICAN WOMEN LOVE NATURE?_
I read an article in _The Nation_ the other day, in which the writer
deplores "that American women are not lovers of Nature." Now, sins
enough both of omission and commission are laid to their charge, without
adding to the list those that are baseless. "American women not lovers
of Nature!" Where does the writer keep his eyes, that he does not see,
even here in the city, in mid-winter, the parlor-windows of almost every
house he passes, decorated by the American ladies who preside over it,
with hanging baskets of flowering plants, with ivies and geraniums
tastefully arranged, besides bouquets of fresh-cut flowers always upon
the mantel? Even the humblest house will have its cracked pitcher filled
with green moss; as if unwilling to do without that little suggestion of
Nature, although the fingers which tend it are coarse with washing, or
sewing on shirts at six cents apiece. Did the writer never notice the
"American women" going up and down Broadway? How impossible it is for
them to resist stopping at the street corners to invest a few pennies in
the little fragrant bunch of pansies or tuberoses, for private
delectation, and the adornment of their own pretty rooms at home! Then,
too, I am a great haunter of green-houses and florists' shops generally;
whom, by the way, I consider in the light of missionaries in this
work-a-day world, to educate and stimulate our artistic propensities, by
the various and beautiful arrangements of form and color, in their
floral offerings; and I find there plenty of "American women"
enthusiastic in their praises and lavish in their expenditures in this
direction. Many of them are flowers themselves, bright, beautiful,
lovely, beyond all the buds and sprays and tinted leaves they hover
over, like so many humming-birds.
Then, again, when I go into the country each summer, I find "American
ladies" rambling in the woods, with a keen appreciation of Nature in all
its varied forms, from a lovely sunrise to the last faint chirp of the
sleepiest little bird who is safely nestled for the night in his leafy
little home. I meet them too in the odorous warm autumn noons, with
branches and garlands of gay-tinted leaves, so embarrassed with their
wealth of richness that they cannot carry more, and yet unwilling to
leave so many "_real beauties_" still trembling, unplucked, on the
boughs above them. I see them taking infinite pains to press these
bright leaves in books prepared for the purpose, that they may beautify
their homes for the cold winter days. Sometimes the result of this
painstaking is seen in the form of an ingenious lamp-shade, far more
beautiful than one could purchase for any amount of money. Then, again,
it will be in the leafy frame for a favorite picture; then again in a
vase, the grouping of branches and tints in such perfect taste, that the
most trained artistic eye could find no flaw or blemish.
Now, with all due deference to _The Nation_, in which this article
appeared, I beg leave most emphatically to express a difference in
opinion; the more so as this increasing interest in floral decorations,
particularly those of the parlor windows, has been a matter of great
congratulation with me; since the latter gives pleasure to many a
passer-by who has neither the means nor time to spend in aught save the
bare necessities of life. How many times I have seen some ragged little
shivering child stand, spell-bound, before some sunlit window, gay with
blossoming plants, and forgetting for the time the dirt and chill and
squalor of her own wretched home! How many times the weary seamstress,
resting her bundle upon the fence outside, while her eyes drank in their
freshness! How many times the laboring man, with his little child beside
him, have I seen, as he raised him upon his shoulder to "see the pretty
flowers." And _this_ is principally why I rejoice that American women
_do_ love Nature. Those people who stop to look from the outside, are
being educated the while to the beautiful, quite unknown to themselves;
and these ladies are providing them this pleasure without cost.
I was very much struck, while in Newport last summer, with the educating
effect of the superb floral decorations about the villas of the wealthy
in that place; for no house there, how humble soever, but had its
little emulative patch of bright flowers, or its climbing vines, or its
window bouquet. No, no; _The Nation_ must have been taking a Rip Van
Winkle nap, I think, when it made this unfounded charge against
"American Women."
* * * * *
GOOD-NIGHT.--How commonplace is this expression, and yet what volumes it
may speak for all future time! We never listen to it, in passing, that
this thought does not force itself upon us, be the tones in which it is
uttered ever so gay. The lapse of a few fatal hours or minutes may so
surround and hedge it in with horror, that of all the millions of words
which a lifetime has recorded, these two little words alone shall seem
to be remembered.
Good-night!
The little child has lisped it, as it passed, smiling, to a brighter
morn than ours; the lover, with his gay dreams of the nuptial morrow;
the wife and mother, with all the tangled threads of household care
still in her fingers; the father, with the appealing eye of childhood
all unanswered.
Good-night!
That seal upon days passed, and days to come. What hand so rash as to
rend aside the veil that covers its morrow?
_RAINY-DAY PLEASURES._
I like a rainy day. None of your drizzling, half-and-half affairs, but
an uncompromising, driving, wholesale, gusty whirlwind of water, that
comes rattling, pell-mell, against the windows, that floods sidewalks,
and swells gutters, and turns umbrellas inside out, and gives the trees
a good shaking. I am sure on that day of slippers and a morning dress
till bedtime. I am sure of time to look over the piles of magazines and
newspapers that have been accumulating. I can answer some of those
haunting letters, or write autographs; I can loll and think; I can put
that wretched-looking desk to rights; I can polish up that time-worn
gold pen; I can empty and refill my inkstand. I can do a thousand
necessary things which a bright, sunshiny day would veto. Of course I
don't want it to keep on raining a month. I shall want to wake some day
and find a bright sky and clean pavements; but meanwhile I delight in
these rattling windows, which make the bright coal-fire look so
pleasant, and secure to me an uninterrupted morning; for whoso robs me
of my morning, robs me of that which does not enrich him, and leaves me
poor indeed. After midday, "come one, come all," etc. But how to make
anybody save a writer understand this, is the question. Why you can't
write at another portion of the day just as well; why you can't make an
exception in their particular case; why an interruption of half an hour
or an hour more or less in the morning should matter--this is
incomprehensible to persons who, at the same time, would think you quite
an idiot, should you undertake to explain to them why uncorked champagne
should be after a while flat and stale. "But I can't come at any other
time," once urged a person, with more frankness than consideration, who
came on her own personal business. Now it is very disagreeable to be
obliged to say "no" more than once to the same person; and yet when
one's necessary and imperative arrangements of time are disregarded, it
is manifestly pardonable. It is a curious fact, however, that authors
themselves, who better than anybody else should understand the
necessities of the case, are often culpable in this regard; they who,
more than anybody else, revel in rainy mornings, or any morning which
secures to them uninterrupted time and thought. I am not sure, after all
my preaching, of not doing the same thing myself. If I should, I trust
nobody will have any scruples about turning me out.
_CHIT-CHAT WITH SOME OF MY CORRESPONDENTS._
The epistles which public persons receive, if published, would not be
credible. Begging letters are a matter of course; often in the
highwayman style of, "hand over and deliver." I had one recently from a
perfect stranger, who wished a cool hundred or so, and mapped out the
circuitous way in which it was to be sent, so that "his folks needn't
know it," with a belief in my spooniness, which an acquaintance with me
would scarcely have warranted. Following close on the heels of this,
came another from a woman, whose ideas of my spare time and common-sense
were about equally balanced. This stranger of the female persuasion,
being hard-up for amusement, wished "a long, racy letter from me, such
as I alone could write, with no religion in it, because she got enough
of that from the minister's wife." It is unnecessary to add that both
these missives found a home in my waste-paper basket. Autograph letters
I do not object to, as they keep me in postage stamps, and my little
"Bright Eyes" in cards to draw dogs and horses upon.
A friend of mine has been delivered from manuscripts sent for perusal,
with the modest accompanying request to find a publisher for the same,
by stating her price to be $200. She has received no request of the kind
since this announcement.
These are some of the annoyances of authors; but, verily, they have
their rewards too. Here comes a letter from my native State, Maine, with
a box of wood mosses and berries to place round the roots of my
house-plants; and as an expression of affection from a stranger who
knows from my writings how well I love such things. She says, in
closing, that she hopes that myself and Mr. Beecher will continue to
write so long as she lives to read. Mr. Beecher may step up and take his
half of this sugar-plum, since he has announced himself a champion of
"candy."
Then before me on my desk is a smiling baby face sent by its parents,
who are strangers to me, if those can be strangers whose hearts warm
toward each other; sent me, they add, "not for a silver cup, but because
some chance words of mine touched their hearts, and so this little one
was named Fanny Fern."
She smiles down upon me whether my sky be cloudy or clear, and in the
light of that smile I will try to write worthily; for "their angels do
always behold the face of my Father."
Here lie two letters on my desk from strangers regarding an article of
mine. One warmly indorses the sentiments therein expressed, and calls
upon "God to bless me" for their expression. The other dissents
entirely, and commends me to the notice of a _far different Power_, for
disseminating such wrong-headed notions. Thank you both! I am used to
both styles of epistles. There's nothing I contend for more than
individuality of opinion; this would be a stupid world enough if we all
thought, felt, and acted after one universal programme; everybody must
see things from their own standpoint and through their own spectacles;
and, provided they use civil language, should "have the floor" in turn
to air their ideas. It might be well to suggest that, in commenting on a
newspaper article, care should be taken that it be first thoroughly
read, that the writer's meaning be not misinterpreted; if this were done
in many cases, the foundation for an adverse opinion would be quite
knocked from under. Authors must expect the penalties as well as the
rewards of their labors; but one of the most trying is to be accused of
sentiments and feelings which they hold in utter abhorrence. Still, he
would make small progress on a journey, who should stop to hurl a stone
at every barking creature at his heels; therefore, in such cases, let
patience have her perfect work, and let the victim keep steadily moving
on, with an eye fixed upon the goal in the distance. But when you have
unintentionally wounded a gentle spirit, which grieves all the more
because it conscientiously believes that you have done harm, ah! then,
none would be sorrier than the present writer; none would go farther to
soothe the hurt; none would try harder to agree in opinion, consistently
with self-respect. But if every writer stopped to consider whether his
readers would be pleased, or the contrary, with his sentiments, instead
of busying himself with the subject on hand for the moment, it would be
like the clouding in of the sun on a clear morning. Everything would be
reduced to one colorless level. The bright tints taken away, made
brighter by the sometime shadows, could give a landscape tame enough,
spiritless enough, to engender hypochondria. Surely the world of to-day
is more liberal than this. Surely it is learning "to agree to differ."
Surely it knows by this time that a good life is of more importance than
creeds or beliefs. Surely in this year of our Lord, 1867, the days of
the Inquisition are past both for editors and writers, and the watchword
of to-day--and, thank God, for to-morrow, and the day after--is
progress, not paralysis.
Having said this, I consider that I have cleared the deck for action, as
far as my own ship is concerned. A stray shot won't frighten or
discourage me; on the contrary, it only makes me step round the
livelier, to see that my guns are in working order. Then, again, any one
who wishes to hail me, and haul alongside in a friendly manner, shall be
always certain of a kind salute from me.
A lady whose life, like that of many others, has not run smoothly
through a bed of flowers, writes me "to tell her the secret of courage,
which she is sure I know."
I do not profess to speak for others, but the secret of all the courage
I ever had is a firm belief in immortality, and in its satisfactory
unriddling of this life of _seeming_ cross-purposes. Without this I can
never tell how either man or woman can learn to look their dead in the
face, or what is oftener much harder to do, to look their living in the
face. I can never tell how they can lay their distracted heads upon
their pillows at night, without praying that they may never wake to
another sunrise, or how they can stagger to their feet seventy times
seven, after prostrations of body and spirit, which come one after
another, like the blows of some avenging fiend. I cannot tell else how
they can see the good crushed and defeated and apparently extinguished,
and the unscrupulous and bad receiving all homage, and sitting
triumphant in high places. I cannot tell else how the wretched mother
can take, lovingly and patiently, to her heart _another_ little one,
when her failing strength is already tasked to the utmost to care for
little brothers and sisters, who, having a father, are yet fatherless.
It must be only because _her_ eyes can see clearly "Our Father who art
in heaven." I look with sorrowing wonder upon those who, passing in and
out of their pleasant, and as yet unbroken, homes, refuse to see the
marks of blood upon their door-post, betokening the death of the
first-born. I marvel that these steppers upon flowers childishly make no
provision for the pitfalls concealed beneath them. I wonder at those
who, laying their treasure all up in _one_ place, never think, in this
world of change, of the day of bankruptcy.
I do _not_ wonder, when their household gods are shivered, that such
exclaim, "Ye have taken away my idols, and _what have I left_?" or that
suicide or lunacy are often the results.
It is only they who, in such crises, believe in "Him who doeth all
things well," that have anything "left." It is only such who have
courage for what sorrow soever is yet in store for them, in a life which
for the moment seems robbed of all its sunshine. It is only they who
have learned to live out of themselves, and who can yield--tearfully it
may be, but unrepiningly--their earthly hopes and treasures up.
This is all the "courage" I know which will help us to look upon the
dear dead face with patient resignation, or take up again the next
morning the weary, vexed burden of life, until we are summoned to lay it
down.
LUCIA:--I am sorry that in your innocence you should have placed any
dependence upon the statements of "a New York Correspondent." It is a
pity to pull down any of the fine air-castles they are in the habit of
building; still it is my duty to inform you that these gentry often
describe, with the greatest minuteness, authors and authoresses whom
they have never seen, manufacturing at the same time little personal
histories concerning these celebrities, valuable only as ingenious
specimen "bricks, made without straw." It matters little to the writers
whether nature has furnished the authoress about whom they romance with
black eyes or blue, brown hair or flaxen; whether nature made her a
six-foot grenadier, or a symmetrical pocket edition of womanhood; the
description answers all the same for the provincial paper for which it
was intended, and these Ananias and Sapphira gentry find that a spicy
lie pays as well as the truth--at least till they are found out. No,
madam; notwithstanding the statements of your valuable "New York
Correspondent" for the ----, I have no "daughters married;" I never
"wear a black stocking on one foot and a white one on the other, at the
same time, to attract attention;" I never "rode on the top of an
omnibus;" I don't "smoke cigarettes or chew opium;" I have no personal
knowledge concerning the "mud-scow," "handcart," "cooking stove," and
"hotel," that you have his authority for saying have been severally
"named for me." I am not "married to Mr. Bonner," who has a most
estimable wife of his own. I "never delivered an address in public;" and
with regard to "the amount I have made by my pen," you and the special
"New York Correspondent" are quite at liberty to speculate about it,
without any assistance from me. As to my "religious creed," the first
article in it is, "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy
neighbor."
A gentleman writes me to know "if it is true that I boldly, and
unwinkingly, and unblushingly stated, over my own signature, and
contrary to the usual custom of my sex, that I was fifty-eight years
old."
Well, sir, I did. Why not? I feel prouder of that fact, and of my being
the grandmother of the handsomest and smartest grandchild in this or any
other country, than of any other two facts I have knowledge of. I can't
conceive why men, or women either--for this squeamishness about one's
age, I find, is not at all a thing of sex--should care one penny about
it. I say again, I _am_ "fifty-eight," and I am glad of it. I have had
my day, and I am quite willing that every other woman should have hers.
* * * * *
WILL PARENTS TAKE HEED?--On all hands complaints are made of the
increasing ill-health of our school-children. Now who is to take this
matter in hand? Who is to say there shall be absolutely _no_ lessons
learned out of school, unless the present duration of school hours shall
be shortened? It needs, we think, only that the parents shall themselves
_insist_ upon this to effect it. Why wait till brain-fever has set in?
Why wait till little spines are irretrievably crooked? And of what
mortal use is it to keep on pouring anything into a vessel when it is
incapable of holding any more, and is only wasted upon the ground?
_MY LIKING FOR PRETTY THINGS._
"Oh, you luxurious puss!" That remark was addressed to me, because I
said I would like to be lulled to sleep each night, and awoke each
morning by strains of sweet music. There's no harm in imagining things,
I hope, provided one goes quietly and ploddingly on in what the
ministers call "the path of duty." Now, for instance, sometimes I amuse
myself planning beautiful forms for dishes, and cups, and plates, and
glasses; beautiful patterns for carpets and wallpapers; beautiful and
odd frames for pictures; beautiful loopings and draperies for
window-curtains; and beautiful shapes for chairs and tables. Sometimes I
eat an imaginary breakfast in a room with long windows, opening out into
a lovely garden full of sweet flowers; like lilies of the valley and
roses and mignonette and heliotrope and violets--oh, yes! violets
_everywhere_. Then those lovely "pond lilies" should grow in the water,
at the bottom of the garden, and some of them should be brought in,
fresh, dewy, and cool, and placed on the breakfast-table; and little
birds should hop in, over the threshold of the breakfast-room, for
crumbs, and sing me a song of thanks; and a great, monstrous dog should
lie prone upon the piazza; and vines should wreathe themselves round the
pillars thereof; clematis and sweet pea, and honeysuckles, white and
red, and the gorgeous trumpet-flower; and nobody should be able to find
the chimneys at all, for the lovely blooming Wisteria that should
clamber over the roof. _Such_ trees and such velvet grass as I'd have
around the house! Giant horse-chestnuts and elms and oaks and maples;
and here and there a lovely statue peeping out in some unexpected place.
And then I'd invite you, and you, and you; not because I would like to
make a show-thing of it, but because I would like to see you enjoy it as
much as myself.
Wouldn't it be nice? I _do_ hate _ugly_ things--there's no use in
denying it. Sometimes Mr. Librario brings in one of his profound books,
and lays it, _pro tem._, on my parlor-table; he looks for it shortly,
and finds it not. "I knew it would be banished when I put it there," he
says, "because the binding was so homely."
He pretends, too, that water tastes just as cool poured out from an
ugly-shaped pitcher as out of my pet china one, with the graceful lip,
and vine-wreathed sides and handle; and when I send for "a
headache-cup-of-tea," and add, "Now be sure you bring it in my lovely
blue-tinted cup-and-saucer," he laughs, and asks, "if _that_ will make
my head any better?" Why, of course it will. Now, you see, if I, like a
coward, dodged work and bother, and the disagreeables of life, when they
had to be met, that would be one thing; but I don't; I just take 'em
vigorously by the horns till I get through with them; and so I maintain
that I have a right to my luxurious dreams and my _pretties_, if they do
me any good. Now haven't I? And speaking of that, as I was looking round
the other day, I saw such a dreadful waste of ingenuity that my heart
bled for the misapplied talent of the inventor. It was a straw-colored
butter-dish in the shape of a _man's hat_, ribbon and all complete. The
rim thereof did duty as a saucer, while the divorcible crown was clapped
over the butter. Horrible! Then I saw an egg dish, with an executive
_sitting_ hen, awfully natural, doing duty as a cover. I left the
locality abruptly, fearing I might see a meat-dish cover, in the form of
a pig--snout, tail, bristles and all.
Why, I ask in this connection, am I daily tortured with the sight of
lamps supported by bronze cherubs, appealing piteously to my wide-awake
maternal instincts? And why are my evenings at public places of
amusement spoiled by the sight of galleries of heartless people held up
whole evenings by wretchedly carved female figures, in every stage of
contorted legs, knees, heads, and arms.
"Didn't I tell you that it would be better if you hadn't quite so much
imagination," triumphantly retorts Mr. Cynic.
Very true, you did; but still I don't agree with you; because looking at
_some_ people through that glorified medium, I have been able to
discover virtues--which--otherwise----Yes, sir!
_UNSOUGHT HAPPINESS._
Old stagers know that the way to be happy is to give up all attempts to
be so. In other words, the cream of enjoyment in this life is always
impromptu. The _chance_ walk; the unexpected visit; the unpremeditated
journey; the unsought conversation or acquaintance.