a grievance." Taking this view of the case, it seems to me that men
generally deserve great praise for their assiduity in furnishing this
alleged requisite of feminine felicity. But that is not what I was going
to talk about. _I_ have "a grievance." My _fly_ has come! I say _my_
fly, because, as far as I can find out, he never goes to anybody else;
he is indifferent to the most attractive visitor; what he wants is
_me_--alas! _me_--_only_ me! The tortures I have endured from that
creature, no pen, tongue, or dictionary can ever express. His sleepless,
untiring, relentless persecution of a harmless female is quite fiendish.
His deliberate choice, and persistent retention of agonizing titillating
perches, shows a depth of "strategy" unequalled in one so young. Raps,
slaps, exclamations not in the hymn-book, handkerchief waving, sudden
startings to the feet--what do they all avail me? He dogs me like a
bailiff, from one corner of the room to another. All the long, hot day
he attends my steps; all night he hovers over my couch, ready for me at
the first glimmer of daybreak. The marvellous life-preserving way he has
of dodging instant and vengeful annihilation, would excite my
admiration, were not all my faculties required to soothe my nose after
his repeated visits. In vain I pull my hair over my ears to shield them.
In vain I try to decoy him into saucers of sweet things while I write.
Down goes my pen, while my hands fly like the wings of a windmill in the
vain attempt to dislodge him permanently. In vain I open the door, in
the hope he may be tempted out. In vain I seat myself by the open
window, trusting he will join the festive throng of happy Christian
flies, whizzing in the open air in squads, and harming nobody. If he
would _only_ go, you know, I would clap down my window, and die of
stifling, rather than of his harrowing tickling. See there! he goes just
near enough to raise my hopes, and then lights on the back of my neck. I
slap him--he retires an instant--I throw my slipper after him--it breaks
my Cologne bottle, and he comes back and alights on my nostril. Look!
here! I'm getting mad; now I'll just sit calmly down in that arm-chair,
and fix my eyes on that Madonna, and _let_ him bite. _Some time_ he will
surely get enough, and now I'll just stand it as long as he can.
Heavens! no, I can't; he is _inside_ my ear! Now, as I'm a sinner, I'll
tell you what I'll do. Good! I'll go a journey, and lose him! I'll go to
Lake George. Saints and angels, don't he follow me there too? To
Niagara--do the rapids rid me of him? To the White Mountains? Don't he
ascend with me? To the sea-shore? Is he afraid of the seventh wave?
Look here! a thought strikes me. Do you suppose that fly would cross
Jordan with me? for I can't stand this thing much longer.
* * * * *
STANDING ALONE.--Thank Heaven, _I_ can stand alone! Can you? Are you
yet at the end of your life journey? Have you yet stood over the dead body
of wife or child, snatched from you when life was at the flood-tide of
happiness? Did you ever close your weary eyes to the bright dawn of a
new day, and pray that you might never live to look at another? If a
woman, did you ever face poverty where luxury had been, and vainly look
hither and thither for the summer friends that you would never see again
till larder and coffer were replenished? Are you _sure_, when you boast
that you can "stand alone," that you have learned also how to _fall
alone_?
_CEMETERY MUSINGS._
When I am in a new place I always stroll into its principal cemetery. I
fancy that the average age of the dead tells its own story of the
healthfulness of the neighborhood, or the contrary. The style of
monumental inscription is also a good test of its educational and moral
progress. One delicious morning in July, I passed through the gateway of
the beautiful cemetery in the town of ----. Little birds were pluming
themselves on the moss-grown tombstones, or alighting, with eye askance,
on the pathway before me, or swaying on some light branch and singing as
if there were no such thing as sorrow or death in this bright world;
while the sunbeams slanted down through the trees, touching the
half-effaced inscriptions, as if lovingly, for the "stranger within the
gate." Now and then one heard the click of the chisel, as some new name
was being added to those already inscribed there; while in the distance
the mowers were busy, scythe in hand, laying low the tall grass, as they
carefully touched the many graves, and recited little homely histories
of those whom the Great Reaper had garnered. Little children were
playing innocently about, with eyes like gems, and flowing locks, and
graceful, gliding steps, now and then stooping to inhale the flowers,
or spell out with pretty blunders a passing inscription. Go not there,
my little ones--_that_ inscription is not for you--your God is love.
Into His hand yours is now placed confidingly, lead wheresoever He may,
to fall asleep on His bosom in His own good time. Why should _you_ read,
"Prepare each day the funeral shroud." Why should you fetter your
simple, sweet faith in "Our Father" by chains of _fear_, through which,
all your lifetime, you "should be subject to bondage"? Why for _you_
should skulls be disinterred and dry bones held up to startle and
affright? Step away, little children. Think not of "shrouds" and
"coffins;" _this_ is the lesson He taught you: "Little children, love
one another." When He giveth His beloved sleep, neither you nor I shall
know, nor does it matter.
And as I moved through this lovely place, breathing of beauty, and balm,
and the song of birds, and the scent of flowers, I said to myself, Oh
why, when the warm, throbbing heart of life is so slow to comprehend the
_unseen_, and so tenaciously clings to the things seen, should it have
_hindrance_, instead of help, in its efforts to spell out _immortality_!
Why fetter it from childhood with those gloomy clogs and burdens? How
many _good_ men and _good_ women have struggled vainly through a
lifetime with these physical, funereal terrors. And so I turned away to
the graves of the "Little Annies" and "Little Freddys," where love had
placed its freshly gathered flowers, and said: "_This is wiser; this is
better._"
_THE SCRUBBING-BRUSH MANIA._
Did you ever see a woman who was possessed by the house-cleaning fiend?
Not periodically, but at all times. Who would go about drawing her
finger over every lounge, and table, and chair, speering into cracks and
crannies for crooked pins and lint; holding tumblers up to the light for
finger marks; in short, so utterly absorbed in the pursuit of dirt that
every other pursuit was as nothing in comparison.
Now, being New England born, I know what neatness is, and value it as
only a New Englander can; but when it takes such shape as this, and robs
life of all its charms, I turn my back upon it with righteous disgust.
Who thanks these zealous furies for their self-imposed labors? Certainly
not their husbands, who flee into remote corners from dust-pans and
dust-brushes, and weary of the recitals of their prowess day by day.
Certainly not their children, who have no place to stow away their
little sacred property in the shape of bright bits of silk or paper, or
broken cups, which are dear and precious to them, and should always be
held in respect within proper, innocent limits.
Oh, ye careful and troubled Marthas of the household, stop and take
breath. Place a flower on the mantel, that you and your household may
perhaps have some in their lives. While you stop to rest, read. So shall
the cobwebs be brushed from your neglected brain, and you shall learn
that something else besides cleanliness is necessary to make home
_really_ home for those dependent on your care.
Throw your broom out of doors; take your children by the hand, and let
the fresh wind touch your wrinkled forehead. If your house is wound up
to such an immaculate pitch of cleanliness, it can run on a few hours
without your care. Laugh and talk with them, or better still, listen to
their foolish-wise talk. Bring home a bit of gingerbread for each of
them, and play some simple game with them. Put on the freshest dress you
have, and ask your husband, when he comes in, if he recognizes his wife.
"I wish my mother looked as pretty as you," said a little girl, one day,
to a neighbor.
"But your mamma is much prettier than I," replied the neighbor. The
truth was that the child's mother always was in a wrapper, unless
company was expected. The rest of the time she was under the dominion of
the house-cleaning fiend, and the children fled from such a joyless
utilitarian home, where no flower of beauty could ever get time to take
root and blossom.
There is little need to misinterpret my meaning. Many a ruined life has
come of a joyless home. Your children take to the sunlight as naturally
as do the flowers. Shut it out of your houses and they will go abroad
in search of it, you may be sure of that. Isn't this worth thinking
about, O ye mothers? careful and troubled about many things, and yet so
blind to your first and greatest duty.
* * * * *
CO-OPERATIVE HOUSEKEEPING.--When the millennium comes, or when women
stand by one another as men do--though I'm free to say, the reason why
men do it is, that when one man does anything bad, all the rest defend
him, because _they don't know but they may want to do it too_--but, as I
was saying, when women will stand by each other, then we will talk about
"Co-operative Housekeeping." Or, when men will help their wives out of
scrapes with other women, instead of running away, or "pooh-poohing" it,
_then_ we will talk about a dozen families living in one house. At
present Mrs. Smith's boy John _will_ slap your little Sarah in the face,
just to show her that he is going to be a man some day. Now, there's but
one common staircase, and little Sarah can't go up and down after that
without a body-guard; and Johnny's pa and your daughter Sarah's pa are
business friends, and "What are you going to do about it?" coolly asks
Sarah's pa, of Sarah's irritated ma.
That's the idea; and Co-operative Housekeeping, allow me to tell you, is
planned by bachelors and single ladies, and to them we'll leave it.
_SAUCE FOR THE GANDER._
Every written or spoken sentence, not calculated to benefit mankind,
carries with it, I verily believe, its own antidote in the shape of
narrowness and bigotry.
This comforting thought occurred to me on leaving a lecture hall the
other evening, where the speaker, in saying some very good things, had
mentioned all female employments, save housekeeping, especially those of
writing and lecturing, with utter contempt, averring that the education
and training of children were the only things worthy their notice. He
did not stop to explain what was to become of all the old maids and
single women generally; or whether they might be excused for earning an
honest support by pen and ink, or even stepping upon the platform, when
they had no "home," and consequently no "home duties" to attend to; and
whether, if the lecture they should deliver were as narrow and illogical
as his own, the patient public might not, as in his case, be willing to
_pay_ and _listen_. Also, while insisting upon every woman being a
mother, and desiring nothing beyond her nursery walls, not even her own
intellectual progression, to qualify her to meet the questioning
_youth_, as well as the dependent _infancy_ of her children, I heard
not one syllable from him upon the home duty devolving on the _father_
and _the husband_, as to his share in their government and _home_
education, which, in my opinion, is more important than that of school;
nor of the cultivation of his companionable qualities, to assist in
making home pleasant. Not a word did he say on this head, no more than
as if these things were not binding equally on him as on the wife. As if
that _could_ be "home," in any true sense, where _both_ did not know and
practise these duties. He told us it was "of course more pleasant for
women to be like the noisy cascade, and to mount the platform, than to
imitate the gentle, silent rivulet, and stay quietly at home out of the
public eye." As the lecturer had a home himself, and was a husband and
father, and not particularly in need of any emolument from lecturing, it
occurred to me that the propriety of his own absence from the "gentle
rivulet" of home duties might admit of a doubt. It could not be possible
that he who could map out a wife's home duty by such strict latitude and
longitude, should himself have wearied of their tameness, and "mounted
the platform to keep in the public eye."
What nonsense even a male lecturer may utter! said I, as I left his
presence. As if there were no women, good and earnest as well as gifted,
who neglected no duties while mounting the platform, but who honored it
with their womanly, dignified presence, and made every large-souled,
large-brained man who listened to them rejoice that they were there.
This "vine and oak" style of talk is getting monotonous. There is more
"oak" to the women of to-day than there was to those of the past. Else
how could the great army of drunken, incompetent, unpractical, idle
husbands be supported as they are by wives, who can't stop to be
"gentle, silent rivulets," but have to "keep in the public eye" as
business women? Our lecturer didn't mention this little fact--not he!
* * * * *
LEAVING HOME FOR THE SUMMER.--There is always a certain sadness in
leaving home for the pleasant summer jaunt in the country, however glad
we may be to get rid of our cares. As we close the door and turn the
key, the thought _will_ come: Shall we ever see this home again? Have we
really left it, not only for a time, but forever? Of course, new scenes
and new objects soon dissipate these thoughts; and it is well it is so,
or we should not gain the relief we seek; but we doubt if the thought
does not obtrude itself for the moment, even in the case of the most
habitually thoughtless.
_MY FIRST CONVERT._
I have just received a letter from a soldier, who was with us in our
late four-years struggle for the "Stars and Stripes," announcing himself
a convert to the renunciation of tobacco, through my ministrations on
this subject. He says that "he has to thank me for the kind
encouragement I have held out to him to persevere in this resolve, and
for the freedom he enjoys, now that he is no longer a slave to that
filthy habit; and that he shall, while he lives, hold me in grateful
remembrance for the same."
Now that's encouraging, even though I shouldn't add another member to my
congregation. If any other "brother" feels like "speaking out in
_meetin'_" and relating a similar experience, so much the better; but in
any event I shall not cease doing my best to make proselytes. "You ought
to let up on a poor fellow a little," said a smoker to me not long
since; "you ought to have a little charity for a fellow." Now I don't
think that. My charity is for those who silently suffer from this
selfish indulgence. For the poor girls, who stand on their weary feet
hours behind the counters of shops, where the master sits with his feet
up, smoking till their poor heads ache, and their cheeks crimson with
the polluted air, roaring for them to shut the door or window if they so
much as open a crevice for relief. My charity is for myself, when,
seated in a car or omnibus, some "gentleman" who has just thrown away
his cigar stump, places himself next to me, and compels me to inhale his
horrible breath and touch his noxious coat-sleeve. My charity is for
myself, when Mike O'Brien, who is in my cellar, getting in coal, sits
down on the top of it, lights his pipe, and sends up the nasty fumes
into the parlor and all over the house. My charity is for myself, when
the proofs of my forthcoming book are sent me to read, to be obliged to
hang them out of the window, like signals of distress, before I can
correct them without absolute nausea. Nor am I to be mollified by the
sample-package of "Fanny Fern Tobacco" once sent me. Now I felt
complimented, when a little waif of a black baby, picked up in the
streets of a neighboring city, was named for me; also when a handcart
was christened ditto; also a mud-scow; but tobacco--excuse me!
I read in a paper, the other day, of an ancient institution called
"smoking-tongs," constructed to hold a live coal so securely, as to
admit of its being passed round the room; _women_, at that time, as an
act of hospitality, used to approach their male guests with the same,
and light their pipes for them. I should have liked to have had that
office; but I _don't_ think I should have applied the live coal to the
_pipes_!
_COUNTRY HOUSEWIVES._
I think that between country housewives and their city boarders there is
a sort of antagonism, in the very nature of things, intensified, of
course, when there is unreasonableness on both sides.
The country housewife rises betimes, and betaking herself to a hot
kitchen, either prepares or oversees the preparing of the expected
breakfast; and this not only for the boarders, but the "help," men and
women, belonging to the establishment. Perhaps her husband, regarding
her only in the light of a "farm hand," never speaks to her except on
topics relating to the business of the household, and objects to the
baby crying, which her diverted attention necessitates, as a "nuisance,"
while he swallows his breakfast.
Heated and worried, she sees her city boarders come down to breakfast in
cool dresses and fresh ribbons, to enjoy the result of her toil, perhaps
to find fault with it. She sees them after breakfast driving out to
enjoy the delicious morning air, while she must iron clothes, or wash
dishes, or prepare their dinner. Now don't you see in the differing
positions of the two parties material for an explosion? It is no use to
reply, if they had each attained a proper and high degree of
civilization there would be no need of this. Remember you have to take
human nature as you _find_ it, and not as you _wish_ to find it.
_Incessant_ toil coarsens and roughens, especially woman nature. It
chokes the graces in the bud, and leaves only thorns and prickers. From
my heart I pity such women, with not a flower in their desert lives.
Still, you know city boarders had not the ordering of it; and should
not, as they often are, be disliked merely for being able to lead a life
of comparative ease. Ease does not always involve happiness; remember
this, discouraged country housewife. _Somebody_ has had to work hard for
that ease, and it may be the very woman you envy and dislike for it. She
has her Gethsemane with it, of which you know nothing, though she wear a
smiling face. The landscape upon which she gazes may bring tears to her
eyes instead of joy to her heart, as she drives away from your door,
where you stand thinking of her only as a heartless idler for whom you
are to toil.
Could you sit down together, woman and woman, and talk this all over,
how different often would be your judgment of each other! She thinks,
perhaps, of graves far away, or worse, _living_ sorrows, which she
cannot forget, and that will not bear thinking of, and may only be
poured into the ear of "Our Father." She has learned to shut them in,
and therefore you see no sign; but they are there all the same. I want
you to try and remember this, because else I think many, situated as
you are, make themselves unnecessary misery.
Then, again, do not call everything city boarders consider important
"only a notion." If you have done making bread because your folks like
pies better, try and understand that tastes and opinions may differ on
so vital a point of "vittles" and digestion. If your house and its
belongings are so constructed that the decencies of life are impossible,
remember that because _you_ "don't mind your husband or the men on the
farm," your lady boarders _may_, even at the risk of being called
"fussy."
To sum all up, there must be consideration on both sides. Still, the
cases are rare in which farm-houses can be the best boarding-places for
city people. The ideas of the two parties on the most vital questions
relating to the topics I have touched upon are so widely apart, that
assimilation is next to impossible. The country housewife knows much
more on many subjects than her city boarder. In return, the former might
often be enlightened by the latter, even on purely physical matters. But
while one side starts with the "I'm as good as you" motto, and the other
feels it necessary to fence this feeling at all points, the millennium
of peace and good-will must of course be indefinitely postponed.
_FIRST MORNING IN THE COUNTRY._
Peace, new-mown hay, and a sniff of the sea; I'm content. "Don't the
country make you sleepy?" asked a lady of me. Sleepy! why, every part of
me is so wide-awake to bliss, that I doubt whether it were not a sin to
sleep, lest I might lose some fine note of Nature the while. The music
of the shivering leaves, swelling, then dying away so softly; the
exquisite trill of some little bird near my window; the march of the
waves to the shore; the soft lights and shadows on the far hills; the
happy laugh of the little brown children in the hay! I'm afraid I shall
quite forget "female suffrage" here! The whirl out of which I have
emerged into this temporary heaven seems like a horrid nightmare, from
which I have been roused to find myself encircled in loving arms, and
looked down upon by a smiling face. I dare say omnibusses are still
thundering down Broadway, and piles of stone, and chaos generally, reign
therein; but I can scarce conceive it in this sweet hush and prayer of
Nature.
I have no doubt doctors may still be found there, giving nauseous pills
by the pound, and awful "mixtures" by the quart, when all their deluded
patients want is hay--and fresh milk. And I suppose ministers are there,
preaching about "hell," and I don't wonder at it; but if they came here,
I think heaven would come more naturally to their lips. But where _is_
"here"? you ask. As if I should tell you! I shall want all the fresh air
for myself. I need a great deal of breath, and the world is wide. The
Great Artist too decorates it all over; so that in every spot lovely
flowers shall be tinted all the same, though you may never chance to
light upon them; and the clouds shall be heavenly blue; and the giant
trees shall spread their sheltering, graceful arms, though you may never
happen to lie on the grass beneath; and the birds in their branches will
have as much melody in their throats as if you had promised to come and
listen. So, you see, I may be stingy of my little paradise, and not
defraud you either!
It is often very oppressive to me, the sight of so much beauty, the
sound of so much harmony, that none but God perhaps may ever hear or
see. Nothing expresses _Omnipotence_ so well to me as this: the perfect
finish of every leaf and blade; nothing left unworkmanlike; even the old
rocks coated with soft moss--even the decayed tree-trunk wreathed with a
graceful vine. I know there are good, lovely Quakers, but God is no
Quaker. The _red_ wild roses from yonder hedge, advertising their
presence with wafts of incense on every passing breeze, make that fact
patent. The richness of the red clover and yellow buttercups, and the
myriad rainbow hues on every field and hedge-row, are anti-Quaker. So
that, good as they are, I'm glad they didn't make this world. I'm sure
that glorious red and yellow oriole looks better on yonder branch than
would a _drab_ bird. I like his saucy little ways, too. But there's one
thing for which I will always shake hands with all Quakerdom: they allow
their women _to speak in_ "_meetin'_!" Nothing hurts a woman like
shutting down the escape-valves of talk; but men never learn that until
they find them getting dangerous, and then, when a terrible explosion
comes off, they wonder "_what's got into 'em_!"
* * * * *
A HINT TO GENTLEMEN CRITICS.--It is a pity men don't praise women when
they _are_ sensible in dress. Now, notwithstanding the pressure which
fashion has brought to bear upon them to return to the long trailing
skirts for street wear, they have courageously resisted it, and sensibly
insisted upon the comfortable, cleanly, short walking skirt for the
street; and yet men keep on growling all the same about minor matters of
no consequence; so that women may well exclaim, "There's no suiting
them; so we will just please ourselves." A word to the wise is
sufficient.
_CONSCIENCE KILLING._