AUCTIONS.
“Going, going, gone.”
Next came the excitement of auctions, great occasions, and of vital
importance to me, as I was ambitious to furnish the entire house for
one hundred dollars.
When the head of a family dies a settlement of the estate seems to make
an auction necessary. I am glad of the custom, it proved of invaluable
service to me, and the mortality among old people was quite phenomenal
at Gooseville and thereabouts last year. While I deeply regretted the
demise of each and all, still this general taking off was opportune for
my needs.
There were seventeen auctions last season, and all but two were
attended by me or my representatives.
A country auction is not so exciting as one in the city; still you must
be wide-awake and cool, or you will be fleeced. An experienced friend,
acquainted with the auctioneer, piloted me through my first sale, and
for ten dollars I bought enough really valuable furniture to fill a
large express wagon—as a large desk with drawers, little and big,
fascinating pigeon holes, and a secret drawer, for two dollars; queer
old table, ten cents; good solid chairs, nine cents each; mahogany
center-table, one dollar and sixteen cents; and, best of all, a tall
and venerable clock for the landing, only eight dollars! Its “innards”
sadly demoralized, but capable of resuscitation, the weights being
tin-cans filled with sand and attached by strong twine to the “works.”
It has to be wound twice daily, and when the hour hand points to six
and the other to ten, I guess that it is about quarter past two, and in
five minutes I hear the senile timepiece strike eleven!
The scene was unique. The sale had been advertised in post-office and
stores as beginning at 10 A.M., but at eleven the farmers and their
women folks were driving toward the house. A dozen old men, chewing
tobacco and looking wise, were in the barn yard examining the stock to
be sold, the carts and farming tools; a flock of hens were also to be
disposed of, at forty cents each.
On such occasions the families from far and near who want to dispose
of any old truck are allowed to bring it to add to the motley display.
The really valuable possessions, if any, are kept back, either for
private sale or to be divided among the heirs. I saw genuine antiques
occasionally—old oak chests, finely carved oaken chairs—but these
were rare. After the horses have been driven up and down the street,
and with the other stock disposed of, it is time for lunch. Following
the crowd into the kitchen, you see two barrels of crackers open, a
mammoth cheese of the skim-milk species with a big knife by it, and on
the stove a giant kettle in which cotton bags full of coffee are being
distilled in boiling water. You are expected to dip a heavy white mug
into the kettle for your share of the fragrant reviving beverage, cut
off a hunk of cheese, and eat as many crackers as you can. It tasted
well, that informal “free lunch.”
Finding after one or two trials that the interested parties raised
rapidly on anything I desired. I used to send Gusta and John, nicknamed
very properly “Omniscience and Omnipotence,” which names did equally
well when reversed (like a paper cuff), and they, less verdant than
their mistress, would return with an amazing array of stuff. We now
have everything but a second-hand pulpit, a wooden leg, and a coffin
plate. We utilized a cradle and antique churn as a composite flower
stand; an immense spinning-wheel looks pretty covered with running
vines, an old carriage lantern gleams brightly on my piazza every
evening. I nearly bought a horse for fifteen dollars, and did secure
a wagon for one dollar and a half, which, after a few needed repairs,
costing only twenty-six dollars, was my pride, delight and comfort, and
the envy of the neighborhood. Men came from near and far to examine
that wagon, felt critically of every wheel, admired the shining coat
of dark-green paint, and would always wind up with: “I vum, if that
’ere wagon ain’t fine! Why, it’s wuth fifty dollars, now, ef it’s wuth
a cent!” After a hard day’s work, it seemed a gratification to them
to come with lanterns to renew their critical survey, making a fine
Rembrandtish study as they stood around it and wondered. A sleigh was
bought for three dollars which, when painted by our home artist, is
both comfortable and effective.
At one auction, where I was the only woman present, I bid on three
shovels (needed to dig worms for my prize hens!) and, as the excitement
increased with a rise in bids from two cents to ten, I cried, “Eleven!”
And the gallant old fellow in command roared out as a man opened his
mouth for “Twelve!”: “I wouldn’t bid ag’in a woman ef I’se you. Let ’er
have ’em! Madam, Mum, or Miss—I can’t pernounce your name and don’t
rightly know how to spell it—but the shovels are yourn!”
Attending auctions may be an acquired taste, but it grows on one
like any other habit, and whenever a new and tempting announcement
calls, I rise to the occasion and hasten to the scene of action, be
the weather what it may. And many a treasure has been picked up in
this way. Quaint old mirrors with the queerest pictures above, brass
knockers, candlesticks of queer patterns, cups and saucers and plates,
mugs of all sizes, from one generous enough to satisfy the capacities
of a lager-soaked Dutchman to a dear little child’s mug, evidently
once belonging to a series. Mine was for March. A mother sitting on a
bench, with a bowl of possibly Lenten soup by her side, is reproving
a fat little fellow for his gross appetite at this solemn season. He
is weeping, and on her other side a pet dog is pleading to be fed. The
rhyme explains the reason:
The jovial days of feasting past,
’Tis pious prudence come at last;
And eager gluttony is taught
To be content with what it ought.
A warming pan and a foot stove, just as it was brought home from a merry
sleigh-ride, or a solemn hour at the “meetin’-house,” recalling that
line of Thomas Gray’s:
E’en in our ashes live their wonted fires.
Sometimes I would offer a little more to gain some coveted treasure
already bid off. How a city friend enjoyed the confidences of a man who
had agreed to sell for a profit! How he chuckled as he told of “one of
them women who he guessed was a leetle crazy.” “Why, jest think on’t! I
only paid ten cents for that hull lot on the table yonder, and _she_”
(pointing to me) “_she_ gin me a quarter for that old pair o’ tongs!”
One day I heard some comments on myself after I had bid on a rag carpet
and offered more than the other women knew it was worth.
“She’s got a million, I hear.”
“Wanter know—merried?”
“No; just an old maid.”
“Judas Priest! Howd she git it?”
“Writin’, I ’spoze. She writes love stories and sich for city papers.
Some on ’em makes a lot.”
It is not always cheering to overhear too much. When some of my
friends, whom I had taken to a favorite junk shop, felt after two hours
of purchase and exploration that they must not keep me waiting any
longer, the man, in his eagerness to make a few more sales, exclaimed:
“Let her wait; _her_ time ain’t wuth nothin’!”
At an auction last summer, one man told me of a very venerable lantern,
an heirloom in his first wife’s family, _so_ long, measuring nearly a
yard with his hands. I said I should like to go with him to see it, as
I was making a collection of lanterns. He looked rather dazed, and as I
turned away he inquired of my friend “if I wusn’t _rather_—” She never
allowed him to finish, and his lantern is now mine.
People seem to have but little sentiment about their associations with
furniture long in the family.
The family and a few intimate friends usually sit at the upper windows
gazing curiously on the crowd, with no evidence of feeling or pathetic
recollections.
I lately heard a daughter say less than a month after her father’s
death, pointing to a small cretonne-covered lounge: “Father made me
that lounge with his own hands when I’s a little girl. He tho’t a sight
on’t it, and allers kep’ it ’round. But my house is full now. I ain’t
got no room for’t.” It sold for twelve cents!
Arthur Helps says that human nature craves, nay _enjoys_, tragedy; and
when away from dramatic representation of crime and horrors and sudden
death, as in this quiet country life, the people gratify their needs in
the sorrows, sins, and calamities that befall their neighbors.
I strongly incline to Hawthorne’s idea that furniture becomes
magnetized, permeated, semi-vitalized, so that the chairs, sofas, and
tables that have outlived their dear owners in my own family have
almost a sacred value to me.
Still, why moralize. Estates must be settled, and auctions are a
blessing in disguise.
Of course, buying so much by substitutes, I amassed a lot of curious
things, of which I did not know the use or value, and therefore greatly
enjoyed the experience of the Spectator as given in the Christian Union.
He attended an auction with the following result: “A long table was
covered with china, earthenware, and glass; and the mantel beyond, a
narrow shelf quite near the ceiling, glittered with a tangled maze of
clean brass candlesticks, steel snuffers, and plated trays. At one
end dangled a huge warming pan, and on the wall near it hung a bit of
canvas in a gilded frame, from which the portrait had as utterly faded
as he whom it represented had vanished into thin air. It was a strange
place, a room from which many a colonial citizen had passed to take a
stroll upon the village street; and here, in sad confusion to be sure,
the dishes that graced his breakfast table. The Spectator could have
lingered there if alone for half a day, but not willingly for half an
hour in such a crowd. The crowd, however, closed every exit and he
had to submit. A possible chance to secure some odd bit was his only
consolation. Why the good old soul who last occupied the house, and
who was born in it fourscore years ago, should necessarily have had
only her grandmother’s tableware, why every generation of this family
should have suffered no losses by breakage, was not asked. Every bit,
even to baking-powder prizes of green and greasy glass, antedated the
Revolution, and the wise and mighty of Smalltown knew no better. A bit
of egg shell sticking to a cracked teacup was stolen as a relic of
Washington’s last breakfast in Smalltown.
* * * * *
“While willow-pattern china was passing into other hands the Spectator
made a discovery. A curious piece of polished, crooked mahogany was
seen lying between soup tureens and gravy boats. He picked it up
cautiously, fearing to attract attention, and, with one eye everywhere
else, scanned it closely. What a curious paper-knife! he thought, and
slyly tucked it back of a pile of plates. This must be kept track of;
it may prove a veritable prize. But all his care went for naught. A
curious old lady at his elbow had seen every action. ‘What is it?’
she asked, and the wooden wonder was brought to light. ‘It’s an
old-fashioned wooden butter knife. I’ve seen ’em ’afore this. Don’t
you know in old times it wasn’t everybody as had silver, and mahogany
knives for butter was put on the table for big folks. We folks each
used our own knife.’ All this was dribbled into the Spectator’s
willing ears, and have the relic he would at any cost. Time and again
he nervously turned it over to be sure that it was on the table, and
so excited another’s curiosity. ‘What is it?’ a second and still
older lady asked. ‘A colonial butter knife,’ the Spectator replied
with an air of much antiquarian lore. ‘A butter knife! No such thing.
My grandfather had one just like this, and it’s a pruning knife. He
wouldn’t use a steel knife because it poisoned the sap.’ What next?
Paper knife, butter knife, and pruning knife! At all events every new
name added a dollar to its value, and the Spectator wondered what the
crowd would say, for now it was in the auctioneer’s hands. He looked
at it with a puzzled expression and merely cried: ‘What is bid for
_this_?’ His ignorance was encouraging. It started at a dime and the
Spectator secured it for a quarter. For a moment he little wondered at
the fascination of public sales. The past was forgiven, for now luck
had turned and he gloried in the possession of a prize.
“To seek the outer world was a perilous undertaking for fear that the
triply-named knife might come to grief; but a snug harbor was reached
at last, and hugging the precious bit, the Spectator mysteriously
disappeared on reaching his home. No one must know of his success until
the mystery was cleaned, brightened, and restored to pristine beauty.
The Spectator rubbed the gummy surface with kerosene, and then polished
it with flannel. Then warm water and a tooth brush were brought into
play, and the oil all removed. Then a long dry polishing, and the
restoration was complete. Certainly no other Smalltowner had such a
wooden knife; and it was indeed beautiful. Black in a cross light, red
in direct light, and kaleidoscopic by gaslight. Ah, such a prize! The
family knew that something strange was transpiring, but what no one
had an inkling. They must wait patiently, and they did. The Spectator
proudly appeared, his prize in hand. ‘See there!’ he cried in triumph,
and they all looked eagerly; and when the Spectator’s pride was soaring
at its highest, a younger daughter cried, ‘Why, papa, it’s the back of
a hair-brush!’ And it was.”
An auctioneer usually tries to be off-hand, waggish, and brisk—a cross
between a street peddler and a circus clown, with a hint of the forced
mirth of the after-dinner speaker. Occasionally the jokes are good and
the answers from the audience show the ready Yankee wit.
Once an exceedingly fat man, too obese to descend from his high wagon,
bought an immense dinner bell and he was hit unmercifully. A rusty
old fly-catcher elicited many remarks—as “no flies on that.” I bought
several chests, half full of rubbish, but found, alas! no hidden
treasure, no missing jewels, no money hid away by miserly fingers and
forgotten. Jake Corey, who was doing some work for me, encouraged me to
hope. He said: “I hear ye patronize auctions putty reg’lar; sometimes
there is a good deal to be made that way, and then ag’in there isn’t.
I never had no luck that way, but it’s like getting married, it’s a
lottery! Folks git queer and put money in some spot, where they’re apt
to forgit all about it. Now I knew a man who bought an old hat and a
sight of other stuff; jest threw in the hat. And when he got home and
come to examine it ef thar warn’t three hundred dollars in good bills,
chucked in under the sweater!”
“You ought to git over to Mason’s auction to Milldon, sure. It’s day
after to-morrow at nine sharp. You see he’d a fortune left him, but he
run straight through it buying the goldarndest things you ever heerd
tell on—calves with six legs, dogs with three eyes or two tails, steers
that could be druv most as well as hosses (Barnum he got hold o’ ’em
and tuk ’em round with his show); all sorts o’ curious fowl and every
outlandish critter he could lay his hands on. ’T stands to reason he
couldn’t run that rig many years. Your goin’s on here made me think o’
Mason. He cut a wide swath for a time.
“Wall, I hope you’ll come off better’n he did. He sunk such a pile that
he got discouraged and took to drink; then his wife, a mighty likely
woman she is (one o’ the Batchelders of Dull Corner), couldn’t stand it
and went back to her old home, and he died ragged and friendless about
a month ago. Ef I’s you, I’d go over, just to take warning and hold up
in time.”