THE GHOST IN THE MILL.
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COME, Sam, tell us a
story,” said I, as Harry
and I crept to his
knees, in the glow
of the bright evening
firelight; while Aunt
Lois was busily rattling
the tea-things,
and grandmamma, at
the other end of the fireplace, was quietly setting the
heel of a blue-mixed yarn stocking.
In those days we had no magazines and daily papers,
each reeling off a serial story. Once a week,
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“The Columbian Sentinel” came from Boston with
its slender stock of news and editorial; but all the
multiform devices — pictorial, narrative, and poetical—
which keep the mind of the present generation
ablaze with excitement, had not then even an existence.
There was no theatre, no opera; there were
in Oldtown no parties or balls, except, perhaps, the
annual election, or Thanksgiving festival; and when
winter came, and the sun went down at half-past
four o'clock, and left the long, dark hours of evening
to be provided for, the necessity of amusement became
urgent. Hence, in those days, chimney-corner
story-telling became an art and an accomplishment.
Society then was full of traditions and narratives
which had all the uncertain glow and shifting mystery
of the firelit hearth upon them. They were
told to sympathetic audiences, by the rising and falling
light of the solemn embers, with the hearthcrickets
filling up every pause. Then the aged told
their stories to the young, — tales of early life; tales
of war and adventure, of forest-days, of Indian captivities
and escapes, of bears and wild-cats and panthers,
of rattlesnakes, of witches and wizards, and
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“Do, do, tell us a story.”—Page 3.
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strange and wonderful dreams and appearances and
providences.
In those days of early Massachusetts, faith and
credence were in the very air. Two-thirds of New
England was then dark, unbroken forests, through
whose tangled paths the mysterious winter wind
groaned and shrieked and howled with weird noises
and unaccountable clamors. Along the iron-bound
shore, the stormful Atlantic raved and thundered,
and dashed its moaning waters, as if to deaden
and deafen any voice that might tell of the settled
life of the old civilized world, and shut us forever
into the wilderness. A good story-teller, in those
days, was always sure of a warm seat at the hearthstone,
and the delighted homage of children; and
in all Oldtown there was no better story-teller than
Sam Lawson.
“Do, do, tell us a story,” said Harry, pressing
upon him, and opening very wide blue eyes, in which
undoubting faith shone as in a mirror; “and let it
be something strange, and different from common.”
“Wal, I know lots o' strange things,” said Sam,
looking mysteriously into the fire. “Why, I know
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things, that ef I should tell, — why, people might say
they wa'n't so; but then they is so for all that.”
“Oh, do, do, tell us!”
“Why, I should scare ye to death, mebbe,” said
Sam doubtingly.
“Oh, pooh! no, you wouldn't,” we both burst out
at once.
But Sam was possessed by a reticent spirit, and
loved dearly to be wooed and importuned; and so
he only took up the great kitchen-tongs, and smote
on the hickory forestick, when it flew apart in the
middle, and scattered a shower of clear bright coals
all over the hearth.
“Mercy on us, Sam Lawson!” said Aunt Lois in
an indignant voice, spinning round from her dishwashing.
“Don't you worry a grain, Miss Lois,” said Sam
composedly. “I see that are stick was e'en a'most
in two, and I thought I'd jest settle it. I'll sweep
up the coals now,” he added, vigorously applying
a turkey-wing to the purpose, as he knelt on the
hearth, his spare, lean figure glowing in the blaze
of the firelight, and getting quite flushed with exertion.
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“There, now!” he said, when he had brushed over
and under and between the fire-irons, and pursued
the retreating ashes so far into the red, fiery citadel,
that his finger-ends were burning and tingling, “that
are's done now as well as Hepsy herself could 'a'
done it. I allers sweeps up the haarth: I think it's
part o' the man's bisness when he makes the fire.
But Hepsy's so used to seein' me a-doin' on't, that
she don't see no kind o' merit in't. It's just as
Parson Lothrop said in his sermon, — folks allers
overlook their common marcies” —
“But come, Sam, that story,” said Harry and I
coaxingly, pressing upon him, and pulling him down
into his seat in the corner.
“Lordy massy, these 'ere young uns!” said Sam.
“There's never no contentin' on 'em: ye tell 'em
one story, and they jest swallows it as a dog does
a gob o' meat; and they're all ready for another.
What do ye want to hear now?”
Now, the fact was, that Sam's stories had been told
us so often, that they were all arranged and ticketed
in our minds. We knew every word in them, and
could set him right if he varied a hair from the
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usual track; and still the interest in them was unabated.
Still we shivered, and clung to his knee, at
the mysterious parts, and felt gentle, cold chills run
down our spines at appropriate places. We were
always in the most receptive and sympathetic condition.
To-night, in particular, was one of those
thundering stormy ones, when the winds appeared
to be holding a perfect mad carnival over my grandfather's
house. They yelled and squealed round the
corners; they collected in troops, and came tumbling
and roaring down chimney; they shook and
rattled the buttery-door and the sinkroom-door
and the cellar-door and the chamber-door, with a
constant undertone of squeak and clatter, as if at
every door were a cold, discontented spirit, tired of
the chill outside, and longing for the warmth and
comfort within.
“Wal, boys,” said Sam confidentially, “what'll
ye have?”
“Tell us `Come down, come down!'” we both
shouted with one voice. This was, in our mind, an
“A No. 1” among Sam's stories.
“Ye mus'n't be frightened now,” said Sam paternally.
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“Oh, no! we ar'n't frightened ever,” said we both
in one breath.
“Not when ye go down the cellar arter cider?”
said Sam with severe scrutiny. “Ef ye should be
down cellar, and the candle should go out, now?”
“I ain't,” said I: “I ain't afraid of any thing. I
never knew what it was to be afraid in my life.”
“Wal, then,” said Sam, “I'll tell ye. This 'ere's
what Cap'n Eb Sawin told me when I was a boy
about your bigness, I reckon.
“Cap'n Eb Sawin was a most respectable man.
Your gran'ther knew him very well; and he was a
deacon in the church in Dedham afore he died. He
was at Lexington when the fust gun was fired agin
the British. He was a dreffle smart man, Cap'n Eb
was, and driv team a good many years atween here
and Boston. He married Lois Peabody, that was
cousin to your gran'ther then. Lois was a rael
sensible woman; and I've heard her tell the story
as he told her, and it was jest as he told it to me, —
jest exactly; and I shall never forget it if I live to
be nine hundred years old, like Mathuselah.
“Ye see, along back in them times, there used to
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be a fellow come round these 'ere parts, spring and
fall, a-peddlin' goods, with his pack on his back; and
his name was Jehiel Lommedieu. Nobody rightly
knew where he come from. He wasn't much of a
talker; but the women rather liked him, and kind
o' liked to have him round. Women will like some
fellows, when men can't see no sort o' reason why
they should; and they liked this 'ere Lommedieu,
though he was kind o' mournful and thin and shadbellied,
and hadn't nothin' to say for himself. But
it got to be so, that the women would count and
calculate so many weeks afore 'twas time for Lommedieu
to be along; and they'd make up gingersnaps
and preserves and pies, and make him stay
to tea at the houses, and feed him up on the best
there was: and the story went round, that he was
a-courtin' Phebe Ann Parker, or Phebe Ann was
a-courtin' him, — folks didn't rightly know which.
Wal, all of a sudden, Lommedieu stopped comin'
round; and nobody knew why, — only jest he didn't
come. It turned out that Phebe Ann Parker had
got a letter from him, sayin' he'd be along afore
Thanksgiving; but he didn't come, neither afore
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nor at Thanksgiving time, nor arter, nor next spring:
and finally the women they gin up lookin' for him.
Some said he was dead; some said he was gone to
Canada; and some said he hed gone over to the Old
Country.
“Wal, as to Phebe Ann, she acted like a gal o'
sense, and married 'Bijah Moss, and thought no more
'bout it. She took the right view on't, and said she
was sartin that all things was ordered out for the
best; and it was jest as well folks couldn't always
have their own way. And so, in time, Lommedieu
was gone out o' folks's minds, much as a last year's
apple-blossom.
“It's relly affectin' to think how little these 'ere
folks is missed that's so much sot by. There ain't
nobody, ef they's ever so important, but what the
world gets to goin' on without 'em, pretty much as
it did with 'em, though there's some little flurry
at fust. Wal, the last thing that was in anybody's
mind was, that they ever should hear from Lommedieu
agin. But there ain't nothin' but what has
its time o' turnin' up; and it seems his turn was to
come.
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“Wal, ye see, 'twas the 19th o' March, when
Cap'n Eb Sawin started with a team for Boston.
That day, there come on about the biggest
snow-storm that there'd been in them parts sence
the oldest man could remember. 'Twas this 'ere fine,
siftin' snow, that drives in your face like needles,
with a wind to cut your nose off: it made teamin'
pretty tedious work. Cap'n Eb was about the toughest
man in them parts. He'd spent days in the
woods a-loggin', and he'd been up to the deestrict
o' Maine a-lumberin', and was about up to any sort o'
thing a man gen'ally could be up to; but these 'ere
March winds sometimes does set on a fellow so, that
neither natur' nor grace can stan' 'em. The cap'n
used to say he could stan' any wind that blew one
way 't time for five minutes; but come to winds that
blew all four p'ints at the same minit, — why, they
flustered him.
“Wal, that was the sort o' weather it was all day:
and by sundown Cap'n Eb he got clean bewildered,
so that he lost his road; and, when night came on,
he didn't know nothin' where he was. Ye see the
country was all under drift, and the air so thick with
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snow, that he couldn't see a foot afore him; and the
fact was, he got off the Boston road without knowin'
it, and came out at a pair o' bars nigh upon Sherburn,
where old Cack Sparrock's mill is.
“Your gran'ther used to know old Cack, boys.
He was a drefful drinkin' old crittur, that lived there
all alone in the woods by himself a-tendin' saw and
grist mill. He wa'n't allers jest what he was then.
Time was that Cack was a pretty consid'ably likely
young man, and his wife was a very respectable
woman, — Deacon Amos Petengall's dater from
Sherburn.
“But ye see, the year arter his wife died, Cack he
gin up goin' to meetin' Sundays, and, all the tithingmen
and selectmen could do, they couldn't get him
out to meetin'; and, when a man neglects means o'
grace and sanctuary privileges, there ain't no sayin'
what he'll do next. Why, boys, jist think on't! —
an immortal crittur lyin' round loose all day Sunday,
and not puttin' on so much as a clean shirt, when
all 'spectable folks has on their best close, and is to
meetin' worshippin' the Lord! What can you spect
to come' of it, when he lies idlin' round in his old
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week-day close, fishing, or some sich, but what the
Devil should be arter him at last, as he was arter
old Cack?”
Here Sam winked impressively to my grandfather
in the opposite corner, to call his attention to the
moral which he was interweaving with his narrative.
“Wal, ye see, Cap'n Eb he told me, that when he
come to them bars and looked up, and saw the dark
a-comin' down, and the storm a-thickenin' up, he felt
that things was gettin' pretty consid'able serious.
There was a dark piece o' woods on ahead of him inside
the bars; and he knew, come to get in there, the
light would give out clean. So he jest thought he'd
take the hoss out o' the team, and go ahead a little,
and see where he was. So he driv his oxen up ag'in
the fence, and took out the hoss, and got on him, and
pushed along through the woods, not rightly knowin'
where he was goin'.
“Wal, afore long he see a light through the trees;
and, sure enough, he come out to Cack Sparrock's old
mill.
“It was a pretty consid'able gloomy sort of a place,
that are old mill was. There was a great fall of
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water that come rushin' down the rocks, and fell in a
deep pool; and it sounded sort o' wild and lonesome:
but Cap'n Eb he knocked on the door with his whip-handle,
and got in.
“There, to be sure, sot old Cack beside a great
blazin' fire, with his rum-jug at his elbow. He was a
drefful fellow to drink, Cack was! For all that, there
was some good in him, for he was pleasant-spoken and
'bliging; and he made the cap'n welcome.
“`Ye see, Cack,' said Cap'n Eb, `I 'm off my road,
and got snowed up down by your bars,' says he.
“`Want ter know!' says Cack. `Calculate you'll
jest have to camp down here till mornin',' says he.
“Wal, so old Cack he got out his tin lantern, and
went with Cap'n Eb back to the bars to help him
fetch along his critturs. He told him he could put 'em
under the mill-shed. So they got the critturs up to
the shed, and got the cart under; and by that time
the storm was awful.
“But Cack he made a great roarin' fire, 'cause, ye
see, Cack allers had slab-wood a plenty from his mill;
and a roarin' fire is jest so much company. It sort o'
keeps a fellow's spirits up, a good fire does. So Cack
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he sot on his old teakettle, and made a swingeing lot
o' toddy; and he and Cap'n Eb were havin' a tol'able
comfortable time there. Cack was a pretty good
hand to tell stories; and Cap'n Eb warn't no way backward
in that line, and kep' up his end pretty well:
and pretty soon they was a-roarin' and haw-hawin'
inside about as loud as the storm outside; when all of
a sudden, 'bout midnight, there come a loud rap on
the door.
“`Lordy massy! what's that?' says Cack. Folks
is rather startled allers to be checked up sudden when
they are a-carryin' on and laughin'; and it was such
an awful blowy night, it was a little scary to have a
rap on the door.
“Wal, they waited a minit, and didn't hear nothin'
but the wind a-screechin' round the chimbley; and
old Cack was jest goin' on with his story, when the
rap come ag'in, harder'n ever, as if it'd shook the
door open.
“`Wal,' says old Cack, `if 'tis the Devil, we'd
jest as good's open, and have it out with him to onst,'
says he; and so he got up and opened the door, and,
sure enough, there was old Ketury there. Expect
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you've heard your grandma tell about old Ketury.
She used to come to meetin's sometimes, and her husband
was one o' the prayin' Indians; but Ketury was
one of the rael wild sort, and you couldn't no more
convert her than you could convert a wild-cat or a
painter [panther]. Lordy massy! Ketury used to
come to meetin', and sit there on them Indian benches;
and when the second bell was a-tollin', and when Parson
Lothrop and his wife was comin' up the broad
aisle, and everybody in the house ris' up and stood,
Ketury would sit there, and look at 'em out o' the corner
o' her eyes; and folks used to say she rattled them
necklaces o' rattlesnakes' tails and wild-cat teeth, and
sich like heathen trumpery, and looked for all the
world as if the spirit of the old Sarpent himself was
in her. I've seen her sit and look at Lady Lothrop
out o' the corner o' her eyes; and her old brown baggy
neck would kind o' twist and work; and her eyes they
looked so, that 'twas enough to scare a body. For
all the world, she looked jest as if she was a-workin'
up to spring at her. Lady Lothrop was jest as kind
to Ketury as she always was to every poor crittur.
She'd bow and smile as gracious to her when meetin'
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was over, and she come down the aisle, passin' out o,
meetin'; but Ketury never took no notice. Ye see,
Ketury's father was one o' them great powwows down
to Martha's Vineyard; and people used to say she was
set apart, when she was a child, to the sarvice o' the
Devil: any way, she never could be made nothin' of
in a Christian way. She come down to Parson
Lothrop's study once or twice to be catechised; but
he couldn't get a word out o' her, and she kind o'
seemed to sit scornful while he was a-talkin'. Folks
said, if it was in old times, Ketury wouldn't have been
allowed to go on so; but Parson Lothrop's so sort
o' mild, he let her take pretty much her own way.
Everybody thought that Ketury was a witch: at least,
she knew consid'able more'n she ought to know, and
so they was kind o' 'fraid on her. Cap'n Eb says he
never see a fellow seem scareder than Cack did when
he see Ketury a-standin' there.
“Why, ye see, boys, she was as withered and wrinkled
and brown as an old frosted punkin-vine; and her
little snaky eyes sparkled and snapped, and it made
yer head kind o' dizzy to look at 'em; and folks used
to say that anybody that Ketury got mad at was
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sure to get the worst of it fust or last. And so, no
matter what day or hour Ketury had a mind to rap at
anybody's door, folks gen'lly thought it was best to
let her in; but then, they never thought her coming
was for any good, for she was just like the wind, — she
came when the fit was on her, she staid jest so long
as it pleased her, and went when she got ready, and
not before. Ketury understood English, and could
talk it well enough, but always seemed to scorn it,
and was allers mowin' and mutterin' to herself in Indian,
and winkin' and blinkin' as if she saw more
folks round than you did, so that she wa'n't no way
pleasant company; and yet everybody took good care
to be polite to her.
So old Cack asked her to come in, and didn't make
no question where she come from, or what she come
on; but he knew it was twelve good miles from where
she lived to his hut, and the snow was drifted above
her middle: and Cap'n Eb declared that there wa'n't
no track, nor sign o' a track, of anybody's coming
through that snow next morning.”
“How did she get there, then?” said I.
“Didn't ye never see brown leaves a-ridin' on the
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wind? Well,' Cap'n Eb he says, `she came on the
wind,' and I'm sure it was strong enough to fetch her.
But Cack he got her down into the warm corner,
and he poured her out a mug o' hot toddy, and give
her: but ye see her bein' there sort o' stopped the
conversation; for she sot there a-rockin' back'ards and
for'ards, a-sippin her toddy, and a-mutterin', and
lookin' up chimbley.
“Cap'n Eb says in all his born days he never hearn
such screeches and yells as the wind give over that
chimbley; and old Cack got so frightened, you could
fairly hear his teeth chatter.
“But Cap'n Eb he was a putty brave man, and he
wa'n't goin' to have conversation stopped by no woman,
witch or no witch; and so, when he see her mutterin',
and lookin' up chimbley, he spoke up, and says
he, `Well, Ketury, what do you see?' says he.
`Come, out with it; don't keep it to yourself.' Ye see
Cap'n Eb was a hearty fellow, and then he was a
leetle warmed up with the toddy.
“Then he said he see an evil kind o' smile on Ketury's
face, and she rattled her necklace o' bones and
snakes' tails; and her eyes seemed to snap; and she
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looked up the chimbley, and called out, `Come down,
come down! let 's see who ye be.'
“Then there was a scratchin' and a rumblin' and
a groan; and a pair of feet come down the chimbley,
and stood right in the middle of the haarth, the toes
pi'ntin' out'rds, with shoes and silver buckles a-shinin'
in the firelight. Cap'n Eb says he never come
so near bein' scared in his life; and, as to old Cack,
he jest wilted right down in his chair.
“Then old Ketury got up, and reached her stick up
chimbley, and called out louder, `Come down, come
down! let's see who ye be.' And, sure enough, down
came a pair o' legs, and j'ined right on to the feet:
good fair legs they was, with ribbed stockings and
leather breeches.
“`Wal, we're in for it now,' says Cap'n Eb. `Go
it, Ketury, and let's have the rest on him.'
“Ketury didn't seem to mind him: she stood there
as stiff as a stake, and kep' callin' out, `Come down,
come down! let's see who ye be.' And then come
down the body of a man with a brown coat and yellow
vest, and j'ined right on to the legs; but there wa'n't
no arms to it. Then Ketury shook her stick up
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chimbley, and called, `Come down, come down!' And there
came down a pair o' arms, and went on each side o'
the body; and there stood a man all finished, only
there wa'n't no head on him.
“`Wal, Ketury,' says Cap'n Eb, `this 'ere's getting
serious. I 'spec' you must finish him up, and let's
see what he wants of us.'
“Then Ketury called out once more, louder'n ever,
`Come down, come down! let's see who ye be.' And,
sure enough, down comes a man's head, and settled
on the shoulders straight enough; and Cap'n Eb, the
minit he sot eyes on him, knew he was Jehiel Lommedieu.
“Old Cack knew him too; and he fell flat on his face,
and prayed the Lord to have mercy on his soul: but
Cap'n Eb he was for gettin' to the bottom of matters,
and not have his scare for nothin'; so he says to him,
`What do you want, now you hev come?'
“The man he didn't speak; he only sort o' moaned,
and p'inted to the chimbley. He seemed to try to
speak, but couldn't; for ye see it isn't often that his
sort o' folks is permitted to speak: but just then
there came a screechin' blast o' wind, and blowed the
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“Old Cack knew him too.”—Page 20.
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One is a hunched woman wielding a stick. The second is a man with his arm crossed over his chest and his hair standing straight up. The third is a man looking confused. There is a great deal of billowing smoke in the background.[end figure description]
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door open, and blowed the smoke and fire all out
into the room, and there seemed to be a whirlwind and
darkness and moans and screeches; and, when it all
cleared up, Ketury and the man was both gone, and
only old Cack lay on the ground, rolling and moaning
as if he'd die.
“Wal, Cap'n Eb he picked him up, and built up
the fire, and sort o' comforted him up, 'cause the crittur
was in distress o' mind that was drefful. The
awful Providence, ye see, had awakened him, and his
sin had been set home to his soul; and he was under
such conviction, that it all had to come out, — how
old Cack's father had murdered poor Lommedieu for
his money, and Cack had been privy to it, and helped
his father build the body up in that very chimbley;
and he said that he hadn't had neither peace nor rest
since then, and that was what had driv' him away
from ordinances; for ye know sinnin' will always
make a man leave prayin'. Wal, Cack didn't live
but a day or two. Cap'n Eb he got the minister o'
Sherburn and one o' the selectmen down to see him;
and they took his deposition. He seemed railly quite
penitent; and Parson Carryl he prayed with him, and
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was faithful in settin' home the providence to his
soul: and so, at the eleventh hour, poor old Cack might
have got in; at least it looks a leetle like it. He was
distressed to think he couldn't live to be hung. He
sort o' seemed to think, that if he was fairly tried, and
hung, it would make it all square. He made Parson
Carryl promise to have the old mill pulled down, and
bury the body; and, after he was dead, they did it.
“Cap'n Eb he was one of a party o' eight that
pulled down the chimbley; and there, sure enough,
was the skeleton of poor Lommedieu.
“So there you see, boys, there can't be no iniquity
so hid but what it'll come out. The wild Indians of
the forest, and the stormy winds and tempests, j'ined
together to bring out this 'ere.”
“For my part,” said Aunt Lois sharply, “I never
believed that story.”
“Why, Lois,” said my grandmother, “Cap'n Eb
Sawin was a regular church-member, and a most respectable
man.”
“Law, mother! I don't doubt he thought so. I
suppose he and Cack got drinking toddy together, till
he got asleep, and dreamed it. I wouldn't believe
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such a thing if it did happen right before my face
and eyes. I should only think I was crazy, that's all.”
“Come, Lois, if I was you, I wouldn't talk so like
a Sadducee,” said my grandmother. “What would
become of all the accounts in Dr. Cotton Mather's
`Magnilly' if folks were like you?”
“Wal,” said Sam Lawson, drooping contemplatively
over the coals, and gazing into the fire, “there's a
putty consid'able sight o' things in this world that's
true; and then ag'in there's a sight o' things that
ain't true. Now, my old gran'ther used to say, `Boys,
says he, `if ye want to lead a pleasant and prosperous
life, ye must contrive allers to keep jest the happy
medium between truth and falsehood.' Now, that
are's my doctrine.”
Aunt Lois knit severely.
“Boys,” said Sam, “don't you want ter go down
with me and get a mug o' cider?”
Of course we did, and took down a basket to bring
up some apples to roast.
“Boys,” says Sam mysteriously, while he was
drawing the cider, “you jest ask your Aunt Lois to
tell you what she knows 'bout Ruth Sullivan.”
-- 024 --
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“Why, what is it?”
“Oh! you must ask her. These 'ere folks that's so
kind o' toppin' about sperits and sich, come sift 'em
down, you gen'lly find they knows one story that kind
o' puzzles 'em. Now you mind, and jist ask your
Aunt Lois about Ruth Sullivan.”
-- 025 -- p703-050
THE SULLIVAN LOOKING-GLASS.
[figure description] Page 025.[end figure description]
AUNT LOIS,” said I, “what was that
story about Ruth Sullivan?”
Aunt Lois's quick black eyes gave
a surprised flash; and she and my
grandmother looked at each other
a minute significantly.
“Who told you any thing about
Ruth Sullivan,” she said sharply.
“Nobody. Somebody said you knew something
about her,” said I.
I was holding a skein of yarn for Aunt Lois;
and she went on winding in silence, putting the ball
through loops and tangled places.
“Little boys shouldn't ask questions,” she concluded
at last sententiously. “Little boys that ask
too many questions get sent to bed.”
-- 026 --
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I knew that of old, and rather wondered at my
own hardihood.
Aunt Lois wound on in silence; but, looking in her
face, I could see plainly that I had started an
exciting topic.
“I should think,” pursued my grandmother in her
corner, “that Ruth's case might show you, Lois, that
a good many things may happen, — more than you
believe.”
“Oh, well, mother! Ruth's was a strange case;
but I suppose there are ways of accounting for it.”
“You believed Ruth, didn't you?”
“Oh, certainly, I believed Ruth! Why shouldn't
I? Ruth was one of my best friends, and as true a
girl as lives: there wasn't any nonsense about Ruth.
She was one of the sort,” said Aunt Lois reflectively,
“that I'd as soon trust as myself: when she said a
thing was so and so, I knew it was so.”
“Then, if you think Ruth's story was true,” pursued
my grandmother, “what's the reason you are
always cavilling at things just 'cause you can't understand
how they came to be so?”
Aunt Lois set her lips firmly, and wound with grim
-- 027 --
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resolve. She was the very impersonation of that
obstinate rationalism that grew up at the New-England
fireside, close alongside of the most undoubting
faith in the supernatural.
“I don't believe such things,” at last she snapped
out, “and I don't disbelieve them. I just let 'em
alone. What do I know about 'em? Ruth tells me
a story; and I believe her. I know what she saw
beforehand, came true in a most remarkable way.
Well, I'm sure I've no objection. One thing may
be true, or another, for all me; but, just because
I believe Ruth Sullivan, I'm not going to believe,
right and left, all the stories in Cotton Mather,
and all that anybody can hawk up to tell. Not I.”
This whole conversation made me all the more
curious to get at the story thus dimly indicated; and
so we beset Sam for information.
“So your Aunt Lois wouldn't tell ye nothin',” said
Sam. “Wanter know, neow! sho!”
“No: she said we must go to bed if we asked her.”
“That 'are's a way folks has; but, ye see, boys,”
said Sam, while a droll confidential expression
crossed the lack-lustre dolefulness of his visage, “ye
-- 028 --
[figure description] Page 028.[end figure description]
see, I put ye up to it, 'cause Miss Lois is so large and
commandin' in her ways, and so kind o' up and
down in all her doin's, that I like once and a while to
sort o' gravel her; and I knowed enough to know
that that 'are question would git her in a tight place.
“Ye see, yer Aunt Lois was knowin' to all this 'ere
about Ruth, so there wer'n't no gettin' away from it;
and it's about as remarkable a providence as any o'
them of Mister Cotton Marther's `Magnilly.' So if
you'll come up in the barn-chamber this arternoon,
where I've got a lot o' flax to hatchel out, I'll tell
ye all about it.”
So that afternoon beheld Sam arranged at full
length on a pile of top-tow in the barn-chamber,
hatchelling by proxy by putting Harry and myself to
the service.
“Wal, now, boys, it's kind o' refreshing to see how
wal ye take hold,” he observed. “Nothin' like bein'
industrious while ye'r young: gret sight better
now than loafin off, down in them medders.
“`In books and work and useful play
Let my fust years be past:
So shall I give for every day
Some good account at last.'”
-- 029 --
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“But, Sam, if we work for you, you must tell us
that story about Ruth Sullivan.”
“Lordy massy! yis, — course I will. I've had the
best kind o' chances of knowin' all about that 'are.
Wal, you see there was old Gineral Sullivan, he lived
in state and grande'r in the old Sullivan house out to
Roxberry. I been to Roxberry, and seen that 'are
house o' Gineral Sullivan's. There was one time
that I was a consid'able spell lookin' round in Roxberry,
a kind o' seein' how things wuz there, and
whether or no there mightn't be some sort o' providential
openin' or suthin'. I used to stay with Aunt
Polly Ginger. She was sister to Mehitable Ginger,
Gineral Sullivan's housekeeper, and hed the in and
out o' the Sullivan house, and kind o' kept the run o'
how things went and came in it. Polly she was a
kind o' cousin o' my mother's, and allers glad to see
me. Fact was, I was putty handy round house; and
she used to save up her broken things and sich till I
come round in the fall; and then I'd mend 'em up,
and put the clock right, and split her up a lot o' kindlings,
and board up the cellar-windows, and kind o'
make her sort o' comfortable, — she bein'a lone body,
-- 030 --
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and no man round. As I said, it was sort o' convenient
to hev me; and so I jest got the run o' things
in the Sullivan house pretty much as ef I was one on
'em. Gineral Sullivan he kept a grand house, I tell
you. You see, he cum from the old country, and felt
sort o' lordly and grand; and they used to hev the
gretest kind o' doin's there to the Sullivan house.
Ye ought ter a seen that 'are house, — gret big front
hall and gret wide stairs; none o' your steep kind
that breaks a feller's neck to get up and down, but
gret broad stairs with easy risers, so they used to say
you could a cantered a pony up that 'are stairway
easy as not. Then there was gret wide rooms, and
sofys, and curtains, and gret curtained bedsteads that
looked sort o' like fortifications, and pictur's that
was got in Italy and Rome and all them 'are heathen
places. Ye see, the Gineral was a drefful worldly
old critter, and was all for the pomps and the vanities.
Lordy massy! I wonder what the poor old
critter thinks about it all now, when his body's all
gone to dust and ashes in the graveyard, and his
soul's gone to 'tarnity! Wal, that are ain't none o'
my business; only it shows the vanity o' riches in a
-- 031 --
[figure description] Page 031.[end figure description]
kind o' strikin' light, and makes me content that I
never hed none.”
“But, Sam, I hope General Sullivan wasn't a
wicked man, was he?”
“Wal, I wouldn't say he was railly wickeder than
the run; but he was one o' these 'ere high-stepping,
big-feeling fellers, that seem to be a hevin' their portion
in this life. Drefful proud he was; and he was
pretty much sot on this world, and kep' a sort o' court
goin' on round him. Wal, I don't jedge him nor nobody:
folks that hes the world is apt to get sot on it.
Don't none on us do more than middlin' well.”
“But, Sam, what about Ruth Sullivan?”
“Ruth? — Oh, yis! — Ruth —
“Wal, ye see, the only crook in the old Gineral's
lot was he didn't hev no children. Mis' Sullivan, she
was a beautiful woman, as handsome as a pictur';
but she never had but one child; and he was a son
who died when he was a baby, and about broke her
heart. And then this 'ere Ruth was her sister's child,
that was born about the same time; and, when the
boy died, they took Ruth home to sort o' fill his place,
and kind o' comfort up Mis' Sullivan. And then
-- 032 --
[figure description] Page 032.[end figure description]
Ruth's father and mother died; and they adopted
her for their own, and brought her up.
“Wal, she grew up to be amazin' handsome. Why,
everybody said that she was jest the light and glory
of that 'are old Sullivan place, and worth more'n all
the pictur's and the silver and the jewels, and all
there was in the house; and she was jest so innercent
and sweet, that you never see nothing to beat it.
Wal, your Aunt Lois she got acquainted with Ruth
one summer when she was up to Old Town a visitin'
at Parson Lothrop's. Your Aunt Lois was a gal then,
and a pretty good-lookin' one too; and, somehow or
other, she took to Ruth, and Ruth took to her. And
when Ruth went home, they used to be a writin'
backwards and forads; and I guess the fact was, Ruth
thought about as much of your Aunt Lois as she did
o' anybody. Ye see, your aunt was a kind o' strong
up-and-down woman that always knew certain jest
what she did know; and Ruth, she was one o' them
gals that seems sort o' like a stray lamb or a dove
that's sort o' lost their way in the world, and wants
some one to show 'em where to go next. For, ye see,
the fact was, the old Gineral and Madam, they didn't
-- 033 --
[figure description] Page 033.[end figure description]
agree very well. He wa'n't well pleased that she
didn't have no children; and she was sort o' jealous
o' him 'cause she got hold o' some sort of story about
how he was to a married somebody else over there
in England: so she got sort o' riled up, jest as wimmen
will, the best on 'em; and they was pretty apt
to have spats, and one could give t'other as good as
they sent; and, by all accounts, they fit putty lively
sometimes. And, between the two, Ruth she was
sort o' scared, and fluttered like a dove that didn't
know jest where to settle. Ye see, there she was in
that 'are great wide house, where they was a feastin'
and a prancin' and a dancin', and a goin' on like
Ahashuerus and Herodias and all them old Scriptur'
days. There was a comin' and goin,' and there was
gret dinners and gret doin's, but no love; and, you
know, the Scriptur' says, `Better is a dinner o' yarbs,
where love is, than a stalled ox, and hatred therewith.
'
“Wal, I don't orter say hatred, arter all. I kind o'
reckon, the old Gineral did the best he could: the
fact is, when a woman gits a kink in her head agin
a man, the best on us don't allers do jest the right
thing.
-- 034 --
[figure description] Page 034.[end figure description]
“Any way, Ruth, she was sort o' forlorn, and didn't
seem to take no comfort in the goin's on. The Gineral
he was mighty fond on her, and proud on
her; and there wa'n't nothin' too good for Ruth. He
was free-handed, the Gineral wuz. He dressed her
up in silks and satins, and she hed a maid to wait
on her, and she hed sets o' pearl and dimond; and
Madam Sullivan she thought all the world on her,
and kind o' worshipped the ground she trod on. And
yet Ruth was sort o' lonesome.
“Ye see, Ruth wa'n't calculated for grande'r.
Some folks ain't.
“Why, that 'are summer she spent out to Old
Town, she was jest as chirk and chipper as a wren, a
wearin' her little sun-bunnet, and goin' a huckleberryin'
and a black-berryin' and diggin' sweet-flag,
and gettin cowslops and dandelions; and she hed a
word for everybody. And everybody liked Ruth,
and wished her well. Wal, she was sent for her
health; and she got that, and more too: she got a
sweetheart.
“Ye see, there was a Cap'n Oliver a visitin' at the
minister's that summer, — a nice, handsome young
-- 035 --
[figure description] Page 035.[end figure description]
man as ever was. He and Ruth and your Aunt Lois,
they was together a good deal; and they was a ramblin'
and a ridin' and a sailin': and so Ruth and the
Capting went the way o' all the airth, and fell dead
in love with each other. Your Aunt Lois she was
knowing to it and all about it, 'cause Ruth she was
jest one of them that couldn't take a step without
somebody to talk to.
“Captain Oliver was of a good family in England;
and so, when he made bold to ask the old
Gineral for Ruth, he didn't say him nay: and it was
agreed, as they was young, they should wait a year
or two. If he and she was of the same mind, he
should be free to marry her. Jest right on that, the
Captain's regiment was ordered home, and he had to
go; and, the next they heard, it was sent off to India.
And poor little Ruth she kind o' drooped and pined;
but she kept true, and wouldn't have nothin' to say
to nobody that came arter her, for there was lots and
cords o' fellows as did come arter her. Ye see, Ruth
had a takin' way with her; and then she had the
name of bein' a great heiress, and that allers draws
fellers, as molasses does flies.
-- 036 --
[figure description] Page 036.[end figure description]
“Wal, then the news came, that Captain Oliver
was comin' home to England, and the ship was took
by the Algerenes, and he was gone into slavery there
among them heathen Mahomedans and what not.
“Folks seemed to think it was all over with him,
and Ruth might jest as well give up fust as last.
And the old Gineral he'd come to think she might do
better; and he kep' a introducin' one and another,
and tryin' to marry her off; but Ruth she wouldn't.
She used to write sheets and sheets to your Aunt
Lois about it; and I think Aunt Lois she kep' her
grit up. Your Aunt Lois she'd a stuck by a man to
the end o' time ef't ben her case; and so she told
Ruth.
“Wal, then there was young Jeff Sullivan, the
Gineral's nephew, he turned up; and the Gineral he
took a gret fancy to him. He was next heir to the
Gineral; but he'd ben a pretty rackety youngster in
his young days, — off to sea, and what not, and sowed
a consid'able crop o' wild oats. People said he'd
been a pirating off there in South Ameriky. Lordy
massy! nobody rightly knew where he hed ben or
where he hadn't: all was, he turned up at last all
-- 037 --
[figure description] Page 037.[end figure description]
alive, and chipper as a skunk blackbird. Wal, of
course he made his court to Ruth; and the Gineral,
he rather backed him up in it; but Ruth she wouldn't
have nothin' to say to him. Wal, he come and took
up his lodgin' at the Gineral's; and he was jest as
slippery as an eel, and sort o' slid into every thing,
that was a goin' on in the house and about it. He
was here, and he was there, and he was everywhere,
and a havin' his say about this and that; and he got
everybody putty much under his thumb. And they
used to say, he wound the Gineral round and round
like a skein o' yarn; but he couldn't come it round
Ruth.
“Wal, the Gineral said she shouldn't be forced; and
Jeff, he was smooth as satin, and said he'd be willing
to wait as long as Jacob did for Rachel. And so there
he sot down, a watchin' as patient as a cat at a mousehole;
'cause the Gineral he was thick-set and short-necked,
and drank pretty free, and was one o' the sort
that might pop off any time.
“Wal, Mis' Sullivan, she beset the Gineral to make
a provision for Ruth; 'cause she told him very sensible,
that he'd brought her up in luxury, and that it
-- 038 --
[figure description] Page 038.[end figure description]
wa'n't fair not to settle somethin' on her; and so the
Gineral he said he'd make a will, and part the property
equally between them. And he says to Jeff, that,
if he played his part as a young fellow oughter know
how, it would all come to him in the end; 'cause they
hadn't heard nothing from Captain Oliver for three
or four years, and folks about settled it that he must
be dead.
“Wal, the Gineral he got a letter about an estate
that had come to him in England; and he had to go
over. Wal, livin' on the next estate, was the very
cousin of the Gineral's that he was to a married when
they was both young: the lands joined so that the
grounds run together. What came between them
two nobody knows; but she never married, and there
she was. There was high words between the Gineral
and Madam Sullivan about his goin' over. She
said there wa'n't no sort o' need on't, and he said
there was; and she said she hoped she should be in
her grave afore he come back; and he said she might
suit herself about that for all him. That 'are was the
story that the housekeeper told to Aunt Polly; and
Aunt Polly she told me. These 'ere squabbles
-- 039 --
[figure description] Page 039.[end figure description]
somehow allers does kind o' leak out one way or t'other.
Anyhow, it was a house divided agin itself at the
Gineral's, when he was a fixin' out for the voyage.
There was Ruth a goin' fust to one, and then to t'other,
and tryin' all she could to keep peace beteen 'em; and
there was this 'ere Master Slick Tongue talkin' this
way to one side, and that way to t'other, and the old
Gineral kind o' like a shuttle-cock atween 'em.
“Wal, then, the night afore he sailed, the Gineral he
hed his lawyer up in his library there, a lookin' over
all his papers and bonds and things, and a witnessing
his will; and Master Jeff was there, as lively as a
cricket, a goin' into all affairs, and offerin' to take
precious good care while he was gone; and the Gineral
he had his papers and letters out, a sortin' on
'em over, which was to be took to the old country, and
which was to be put in a trunk to go back to Lawyer
Dennis's office.
“Wal, Abner Ginger, Polly's boy, he that was
footman and waiter then at the Gineral's, he told me,
that, about eight o'clock that evening he went up with
hot water and lemons and sperits and sich, and he see
the gret green table in the library all strewed and
-- 040 --
[figure description] Page 040.[end figure description]
covered with piles o' papers; and there was tin boxes
a standin' round; and the Gineral a packin' a trunk,
and young Master Jeff, as lively and helpful as a rat
that smells cheese. And then the Gineral he says,
`Abner,' says he, `can you write your name?' — `I
should hope so, Gineral.' says Abner. — `Wal, then,
Abner,' says he, `this is my last will; and I want you
to witness it,' and so Abner he put down his name
opposite to a place with a wafer and a seal; and then
the Gineral, he says, `Abner, you tell Ginger to come
here.' That, you see, was his housekeeper, my Aunt
Polly's sister, and a likely woman as ever was. And
so they had her up, and she put down her name to
the will; and then Aunt Polly she was had up (she
was drinking tea there that night), and she put down
her name. And all of 'em did it with good heart,
'cause it had got about among 'em that the will was
to provide for Miss Ruth; for everybody loved
Ruth, ye see, and there was consid'ble many stories
kind o' goin' the rounds about Master Jeff and his
doin's. And they did say he sort o' kep' up the strife
atween the Gineral and my lady, and so they didn't
think none too well o' him; and, as he was next o'
-- 041 --
[figure description] Page 041.[end figure description]
kin, and Miss Ruth wa'n't none o' the Gineral's blood
(ye see, she was Mis' Sullivan's sister's child), of
course there wouldn't nothin' go to Miss Ruth in way
o' law, and so that was why the signin' o' that 'are
will was so much talked about among 'em.”
“Wal, you see, the Gineral he sailed the next
day; and Jeff he staid by to keep watch o' things.
“Wal, the old Gineral he got over safe; for Miss
Sullivan, she had a letter from him all right. When
he got away, his conscience sort o' nagged him, and
he was minded to be a good husband. At any rate, he
wrote a good loving letter to her, and sent his love to
Ruth, and sent over lots o' little keepsakes and things
for her, and told her that he left her under good protection,
and wanted her to try and make up her mind
to marry Jeff, as that would keep the property together.
“Wal, now there couldn't be no sort o' sugar
sweeter than Jeff was to them lone wimmen. Jeff
was one o' the sort that could be all things to all
wimmen. He waited and he tended, and he was as
humble as any snake in the grass that ever ye see;
and the old lady, she clean fell in with him, but Ruth,
-- 042 --
[figure description] Page 042.[end figure description]
she seemed to have a regular spite agin him. And she
that war as gentle as a lamb, that never had so much
as a hard thought of a mortal critter, and wouldn't
tread on a worm, she was so set agin Jeff, that she
wouldn't so much as touch his hand when she got
out o' her kerridge.
“Wal, now comes the strange part o' my story.
Ruth was one o' the kind that hes the gift o' seein'.
She was born with a veil over her face!”
This mysterious piece of physiological information
about Ruth was given with a look and air that
announced something very profound and awful; and
we both took up the inquiry, “Born with a veil over
her face? How should that make her see?”
“Wal, boys, how should I know? But the fact is
so. There's those as is wal known as hes the gift o'
seein' what others can't see: they can see through
walls and houses; they can see people's hearts; they
can see what's to come. They don't know nothin'
how 'tis, but this 'ere knowledge comes to 'em: it's a
gret gift; and that sort's born with the veil over
their faces. Ruth was o' these 'ere. Old Granny
Badger she was the knowingest old nuss in all these
-- 043 --
[figure description] Page 043.[end figure description]
parts; and she was with Ruth's mother when she was
born, and she told Lady Lothrop all about it. Says
she, `You may depend upon it that child 'll have the
“second-sight,'” says she. Oh, that 'are fact was wal
known! Wal, that was the reason why Jeff Sullivan
couldn't come it round Ruth tho' he was silkier
than a milkweed-pod, and jest about as patient as a
spider in his hole a watchin' to get his grip on a fly.
Ruth wouldn't argue with him, and she wouldn't
flout him; but she jest shut herself up in herself, and
kept a lookout on him; but she told your Aunt Lois
jest what she thought about him.
“Wal, in about six months, come the news that the
Gineral was dead. He dropped right down in his
tracks, dead with apoplexy, as if he had been shot;
and Lady Maxwell she writ a long letter to my lady
and Ruth. Ye see, he'd got to be Sir Thomas Sullivan
over there; and he was a comin' home to take 'em all
over to England to live in grande'r. Wal, my Lady
Sullivan (she was then, ye see) she took it drefful
hard. Ef they'd a been the lovingest couple in the
world, she couldn't a took it harder. Aunt Polly, she
said it was all 'cause she thought so much of him, that
-- 044 --
[figure description] Page 044.[end figure description]
she fit him so. There's women that thinks so much
o' their husbands, that they won't let 'em hev no
peace o' their life; and I expect it war so with her,
poor soul! Any way, she went right down smack,
when she heard he was dead. She was abed, sick,
when the news come; and she never spoke nor smiled,
jest turned her back to everybody, and kinder wilted
and wilted, and was dead in a week. And there was
poor little Ruth left all alone in the world, with
neither kith nor kin but Jeff.
“Wal, when the funeral was over, and the time
app'inted to read the will and settle up matters, there
wa'n't no will to be found nowhere, high nor low.
“Lawyer Dean he flew round like a parched pea on
a shovel. He said he thought he could a gone in the
darkest night, and put his hand on that 'ere will; but
when he went where he thought it was, he found it
warn't there, and he knowed he'd kep' it under lock
and key. What he thought was the will turned out
to be an old mortgage. Wal, there was an awful
row and a to-do about it, you may be sure. Ruth,
she jist said nothin' good or bad. And her not
speakin' made Jeff a sight more uncomfortable than
-- 045 --
[figure description] Page 045.[end figure description]
ef she'd a hed it out with him. He told her it
shouldn't make no sort o' difference; that he should
allers stand ready to give her all he hed, if she'd
only take him with it. And when it came to that
she only gin him a look, and went out o' the room.
“Jeff he flared and flounced and talked, and went
round and round a rumpussin' among the papers, but
no will was forthcomin', high or low. Wal, now
here comes what's remarkable. Ruth she told this
'ere, all the particulars, to yer Aunt Lois and Lady
Lothrop. She said that the night after the funeral
she went up to her chamber. Ruth had the gret
front chamber, opposite to Mis' Sullivan's. I've been
in it; it was a monstrous big room, with outlandish
furniture in it, that the Gineral brought over from an
old palace out to Italy. And there was a great big
lookin'-glass over the dressin'-table, that they said
come from Venice, that swung so that you could see
the whole room in it. Wal, she was a standin' front
o' this, jist goin' to undress herself, a hearin' the rain
drip on the leaves and the wind a whishin' and whisperin'
in the old elm-trees, and jist a thinkin' over
her lot, and what should she do now, all alone in the
-- 046 --
[figure description] Page 046.[end figure description]
world, when of a sudden she felt a kind o' lightness
in her head, and she thought she seemed to see
somebody in the glass a movin'. And she looked behind,
and there wa'n't nobody there. Then she
looked forward in the glass, and saw a strange big
room, that she'd never seen before, with a long
painted winder in it; and along side o' this stood a
tall cabinet with a good many drawers in it. And
she saw herself, and knew that it was herself, in this
room, along with another woman whose back was
turned towards her. She saw herself speak to this
woman, and p'int to the cabinet. She saw the woman
nod her head. She saw herself go to the cabinet,
and open the middle drawer, and take out a bundle
o' papers from the very back end on't. She saw
her take out a paper from the middle, and open it,
and hold it up; and she knew that there was the
missin' will. Wal, it all overcome her so that she
fainted clean away. And her maid found her a lyin'
front o' the dressin'-table on the floor.
“She was sick of a fever for a week or fortnight
a'ter; and your Aunt Lois she was down takin' care
of her; and, as soon as she got able to be moved, she
-- 047 --
[figure description] Page 047.[end figure description]
was took out to Lady Lothrop's. Jeff he was jist
as attentive and good as he could be; but she
wouldn't bear him near her room. If he so much as
set a foot on the stairs that led to it she'd know it,
and got so wild that he hed to be kept from comin'
into the front o' the house. But he was doin' his
best to buy up good words from everybody. He paid
all the servants double; he kept every one in their
places, and did so well by 'em all that the gen'l
word among 'em was that Miss Ruth couldn't do
better than to marry such a nice, open-handed gentleman.
“Wal, Lady Lothrop she wrote to Lady Maxwell
all that hed happened; and Lady Maxwell, she sent
over for Ruth to come over and be a companion for
her, and said she'd adopt her, and be as a mother to
her.
“Wal, then Ruth she went over with some gentlefolks
that was goin' back to England, and offered to
see her safe and sound; and so she was set down at
Lady Maxwell's manor. It was a grand place, she
said, and such as she never see before, — like them old
gentry places in England. And Lady Maxwell she
-- 048 --
[figure description] Page 048.[end figure description]
made much of her, and cosseted her up for the sake
of what the old Gineral had said about her. And
Ruth she told her all her story, and how she believed
that the will was to be found somewhere, and that
she should be led to see it yet.
“She told her, too, that she felt it in her that
Cap'n Oliver wasn't dead, and that he'd come back
yet. And Lady Maxwell she took up for her with
might and main, and said she'd stand by her. But
then, ye see, so long as there warn't no will to be
found, there warn't nothin' to be done. Jeff was the
next heir; and he'd got every thing, stock, and lot, and
the estate in England into the bargain. And folks was
beginnin' to think putty well of him, as folks allers
does when a body is up in the world, and hes houses
and lands. Lordy massy! riches allers covers a multitude
o' sins.
“Finally, when Ruth hed ben six months with
her, one day Lady Maxwell got to tellin' her all
about her history, and what hed ben atween her
and her cousin, when they was young, and how they
hed a quarrel and he flung off to Ameriky, and all
them things that it don't do folks no good to
-- 049 --
[figure description] Page 049.[end figure description]
remember when it's all over and can't be helped. But she
was a lone body, and it seemed to do her good to
talk about it.
“Finally, she says to Ruth, says she, `I'll show
you a room in this house you han't seen before.
It was the room where we hed that quarrel,' says
she; `and the last I saw of him was there, till he
come back to die,' says she.
“So she took a gret key out of her bunch; and she
led Ruth along a long passage-way to the other end
of the house, and opened on a great library. And the
minute Ruth came in, she threw up her hands and
gin a great cry. `Oh!' says she, `this is the room!
and there is the window! and there is the cabinet!
and there in that middle drawer at the back end in a
bundle of papers IS THE WILL!
“And Lady Maxwell she said, quite dazed, `Go
look,' says she. And Ruth went, jest as she seed herself
do, and opened the drawer, and drew forth from
the back part a yellow pile of old letters. And in
the middle of those was the will, sure enough. Ruth
drew it out, and opened it, and showed it to
her.
-- 050 --
[figure description] Page 050.[end figure description]
“Wal, you see that will give Ruth the whole of
the Gineral's property in America, tho' it did leave
the English estate to Jeff.
“Wal, the end on't was like a story-book.
“Jeff he made believe be mighty glad. And he
said it must a ben that the Gineral hed got flustered
with the sperit and water, and put that 'ere will in
among his letters that he was a doin' up to take back
to England. For it was in among Lady Maxwell's
letters that she writ him when they was young, and
that he'd a kep' all these years and was a takin'
back to her.
“Wal, Lawyer Dean said he was sure that Jeff
made himself quite busy and useful that night, a tyin'
up the papers with red tape, and a packin' the Gineral's
trunk; and that, when Jeff gin him his bundle to
lock up in his box, he never mistrusted but what he'd
got it all right.
“Wal, you see it was jest one of them things that
can't be known to the jedgment-day. It might a ben
an accident, and then agin it might not; and folks
settled it one way or t'other, 'cordin' to their 'pinion
o' Jeff; but ye see how 'mazin' handy for him it
-- 051 --
[figure description] Page 051.[end figure description]
happened! Why, ef it hadn't ben for the providence
I've ben a tellin' about, there it might a lain
in them old letters, that Lady Maxwell said she
never hed the heart to look over! it never would a
turned up in the world.”
“Well,” said I, “what became of Ruth?”
“Oh! Cap'n Oliver he came back all alive, and
escaped from the Algerines; and they was married in
King's Chapel, and lived in the old Sullivan House, in
peace and prosperity. That's jest how the story was;
and now Aunt Lois can make what she's a mind ter
out on't.”
“And what became of Jeff?”
“Oh! he started to go over to England, and
the ship was wrecked off the Irish coast, and
that was the last of him. He never got to his
property.”
“Good enough for him,” said both of us.
“Wal, I don't know: 'twas pretty hard on Jeff.
Mebbe he did, and mebbe he didn't. I'm glad I
warn't in his shoes, tho'. I'd rather never hed
nothin'. This 'ere hastin' to be rich is sich a drefful
temptation.
-- 052 --
[figure description] Page 052.[end figure description]
“Wal, now, boys, ye've done a nice lot o' flax,
and I guess we'll go up to yer grand'ther's
cellar and git a mug o' cyder. Talkin' always
gits me dry.”
-- 053 -- p703-078
THE MINISTER'S HOUSEKEEPER.
[figure description] Page 053.[end figure description]
Scene. — The shady side of a blueberry-pasture. — Sam Lawson with the boys,
picking blueberries. — Sam, loq.
WAL, you see, boys, 'twas just here, —
Parson Carryl's wife, she died along
in the forepart o' March: my cousin
Huldy, she undertook to keep house
for him. The way on't was, that
Huldy, she went to take care o' Mis'
Carryl in the fust on't, when she
fust took sick. Huldy was a tailoress by trade; but
then she was one o' these 'ere facultised persons that
has a gift for most any thing, and that was how Mis'
Carryl come to set sech store by her, that, when she
was sick, nothin' would do for her but she must have
Huldy round all the time: and the minister, he said
-- 054 --
[figure description] Page 054.[end figure description]
he'd make it good to her all the same, and she
shouldn't lose nothin' by it. And so Huldy, she staid
with Mis' Carryl full three months afore she died,
and got to seein' to every thing pretty much round
the place.
“Wal, arter Mis' Carryl died, Parson Carryl, he'd
got so kind o' used to hevin' on her 'round, takin'
care o' things, that he wanted her to stay along a
spell; and so Huldy, she staid along a spell, and
poured out his tea, and mended his close, and made
pies and cakes, and cooked and washed and ironed,
and kep' every thing as neat as a pin. Huldy was a
drefful chipper sort o' gal; and work sort o' rolled off
from her like water off a duck's back. There warn't
no gal in Sherburne that could put sich a sight o'
work through as Huldy; and yet, Sunday mornin',
she always come out in the singers' seat like one o'
these 'ere June roses, lookin' so fresh and smilin',
and her voice was jest as clear and sweet as a
meadow lark's — Lordy massy! I 'member how she
used to sing some o' them 'are places where the
treble and counter used to go together: her voice
kind o' trembled a little, and it sort o' went
-- 055 --
[figure description] Page 055.[end figure description]
thro' and thro' a feller! tuck him right where he
lived!”
Here Sam leaned contemplatively back with his
head in a clump of sweet fern, and refreshed himself
with a chew of young wintergreen. “This 'ere
young wintergreen, boys, is jest like a feller's
thoughts o' things that happened when he was
young: it comes up jest so fresh and tender every
year, the longest time you hev to live; and you can't
help chawin' on't tho' 'tis sort o' stingin'. I don't
never get over likin' young wintergreen.”
“But about Huldah, Sam?”
“Oh, yes! about Huldy. Lordy massy! when a
feller is Indianin' round, these 'ere pleasant summer
days, a feller's thoughts gits like a flock o' young
partridges: they's up and down and everywhere;
'cause one place is jest about as good as another,
when they's all so kind o' comfortable and nice.
Wal, about Huldy, — as I was a sayin'. She was
jest as handsome a gal to look at as a feller could
have; and I think a nice, well-behaved young gal in
the singers' seat of a Sunday is a means o' grace: it's
sort o' drawin' to the unregenerate, you know.
-- 056 --
[figure description] Page 056.[end figure description]
Why, boys, in them days, I've walked ten miles over
to Sherburne of a Sunday mornin', jest to play the
bass-viol in the same singers' seat with Huldy. She
was very much respected, Huldy was; and, when she
went out to tailorin', she was allers bespoke six
months ahead, and sent for in waggins up and down
for ten miles round; for the young fellers was allers
'mazin' anxious to be sent after Huldy, and was
quite free to offer to go for her. Wal, after Mis'
Carryl died, Huldy got to be sort o' housekeeper
at the minister's, and saw to every thing, and did
every thing: so that there warn't a pin out o' the
way.
“But you know how 'tis in parishes: there allers is
women that thinks the minister's affairs belongs to
them, and they ought to have the rulin' and guidin'
of 'em; and, if a minister's wife dies, there's folks
that allers has their eyes open on providences, —
lookin' out who's to be the next one.
“Now, there was Mis' Amaziah Pipperidge, a widder
with snappin' black eyes, and a hook nose, — kind o'
like a hawk; and she was one o' them up-and-down
commandin' sort o' women, that feel that they have a
-- 057 --
[figure description] Page 057.[end figure description]
call to be seein' to every thing that goes on in the
parish, and 'specially to the minister.
“Folks did say that Mis' Pipperidge sort o' sot her
eye on the parson for herself: wal, now that 'are
might a been, or it might not. Some folks thought
it was a very suitable connection. You see she hed a
good property of her own, right night to the minister's
lot, and was allers kind o' active and busy; so, takin'
one thing with another, I shouldn't wonder if Mis'
Pipperidge should a thought that Providence p'inted
that way. At any rate, she went up to Deakin Blodgett's
wife, and they two sort o' put their heads
together a mournin' and condolin' about the way
things was likely to go on at the minister's now Mis'
Carryl was dead. Ye see, the parson's wife, she was
one of them women who hed their eyes everywhere
and on every thing. She was a little thin woman,
but tough as Inger rubber, and smart as a steel trap;
and there warn't a hen laid an egg, or cackled, but Mis'
Carryl was right there to see about it; and she hed
the garden made in the spring, and the medders
mowed in summer, and the cider made, and the corn
husked, and the apples got in the fall; and the doctor,
-- 058 --
[figure description] Page 058.[end figure description]
he hedn't nothin' to do but jest sit stock still a meditatin'
on Jerusalem and Jericho and them things that
ministers think about. But Lordy massy! he didn't
know nothin' about where any thing he eat or drunk
or wore come from or went to: his wife jest led
him 'round in temporal things and took care on him
like a baby.
“Wal, to be sure, Mis' Carryl looked up to him
in spirituals, and thought all the world on him; for
there warn't a smarter minister no where 'round.
Why, when he preached on decrees and election,
they used to come clear over from South Parish, and
West Sherburne, and Old Town to hear him; and
there was sich a row o' waggins tied along by the
meetin'-house that the stables was all full, and all
the hitchin'-posts was full clean up to the tavern, so
that folks said the doctor made the town look like a
gineral trainin'-day a Sunday.
“He was gret on texts, the doctor was. When
he hed a p'int to prove, he'd jest go thro' the Bible,
and drive all the texts ahead o' him like a flock o'
sheep; and then, if there was a text that seemed
agin him, why, he'd come out with his Greek and
-- 059 --
[figure description] Page 059.[end figure description]
Hebrew, and kind o' chase it 'round a spell, jest as ye
see a fellar chase a contrary bell-wether, and make
him jump the fence arter the rest. I tell you, there
wa'n't no text in the Bible that could stand agin the
doctor when his blood was up. The year arter the
doctor was app'inted to preach the 'lection sermon
in Boston, he made such a figger that the Brattlestreet
Church sent a committee right down to see if
they couldn't get him to Boston; and then the Sherburne
folks, they up and raised his salary; ye see,
there ain't nothin' wakes folks up like somebody
else's wantin' what you've got. Wal, that fall they
made him a Doctor o' Divinity at Cambridge College,
and so they sot more by him than ever. Wal, you
see, the doctor, of course he felt kind o' lonesome
and afflicted when Mis' Carryl was gone; but railly
and truly, Huldy was so up to every thing about
house, that the doctor didn't miss nothin' in a temporal
way. His shirt-bosoms was pleated finer
than they ever was, and them ruffles 'round his
wrists was kep' like the driven snow; and there
warn't a brack in his silk stockin's, and his shoe
buckles was kep' polished up, and his coats brushed;
-- 060 --
[figure description] Page 060.[end figure description]
and then there warn't no bread and biscuit like
Huldy's; and her butter was like solid lumps o' gold;
and there wern't no pies to equal hers; and so the
doctor never felt the loss o' Miss Carryl at table.
Then there was Huldy allers oppisite to him, with
her blue eyes and her cheeks like two fresh peaches.
She was kind o' pleasant to look at; and the more the
doctor looked at her the better he liked her; and so
things seemed to be goin' on quite quiet and comfortable
ef it hadn't been that Mis' Pipperidge and
Mis' Deakin Blodgett and Mis' Sawin got their
heads together a talkin' about things.
“`Poor man,' says Mis' Pipperidge, `what can that
child that he's got there do towards takin' the care
of all that place? It takes a mature woman,' she
says, `to tread in Mis' Carryl's shoes.'
“`That it does,' said Mis' Blodgett; `and, when
things once get to runnin' down hill, there ain't no
stoppin' on 'em,' says she.
“Then Mis' Sawin she took it up. (Ye see, Mis'
Sawin used to go out to dress-makin', and was sort o'
jealous, 'cause folks sot more by Huldy than they
did by her). `Well,' says she, `Huldy Peters is
-- 061 --
[figure description] Page 061.[end figure description]
well enough at her trade. I never denied that, though
I do say I never did believe in her way o' makin' button-holes;
and I must say, if 'twas the dearest friend
I hed, that I thought Huldy tryin' to fit Mis' Kittridge's
plumb-colored silk was a clear piece o' presumption;
the silk was jist spiled, so 'twarn't fit to
come into the meetin'-house. I must say, Huldy's a
gal that's always too ventersome about takin' 'sponsibilities
she don't know nothin' about.'
“`Of course she don't,' said Mis' Deakin Blodgett.
`What does she know about all the lookin' and seein'
to that there ought to be in guidin' the minister's
house. Huldy's well meanin', and she's good at her
work, and good in the singers' seat; but Lordy massy!
she hain't got no experience. Parson Carryl ought
to have an experienced woman to keep house for him.
There's the spring house-cleanin' and the fall house-cleanin'
to be seen to, and the things to be put
away from the moths; and then the gettin' ready
for the association and all the ministers' meetin's;
and the makin' the soap and the candles, and settin'
the hens and turkeys, watchin' the calves, and seein'
after the hired men and the garden; and there
-- 062 --
[figure description] Page 062.[end figure description]
that 'are blessed man jist sets there at home as serene,
and has nobody 'round but that 'are gal, and don't
even know how things must be a runnin' to waste!'
“Wal, the upshot on't was, they fussed and fuzzled
and wuzzled till they'd drinked up all the tea in the teapot;
and then they went down and called on the parson,
and wuzzled him all up talkin' about this, that,
and t'other that wanted lookin' to, and that it was no
way to leave every thing to a young chit like Huldy,
and that he ought to be lookin' about for an experienced
woman. The parson he thanked 'em kindly,
and said he believed their motives was good, but he
didn't go no further. He didn't ask Mis' Pipperidge
to come and stay there and help him, nor nothin' o'
that kind; but he said he'd attend to matters himself.
The fact was, the parson had got such a likin' for
havin' Huldy 'round, that he couldn't think o' such a
thing as swappin' her off for the Widder Pipperidge.
“But he thought to himself, `Huldy is a good girl;
but I oughtn't to be a leavin' every thing to her, — it's
too hard on her. I ought to be instructin' and guidin'
and helpin' of her; 'cause 'tain't everybody could be
expected to know and do what Mis' Carryl did;' and
-- 063 --
[figure description] Page 063.[end figure description]
so at it he went; and Lordy massy! didn't Huldy hev
a time on't when the minister began to come out of
his study, and want to tew 'round and see to things?
Huldy, you see, thought all the world of the minister,
and she was 'most afraid to laugh; but she told
me she couldn't, for the life of her, help it when his
back was turned, for he wuzzled things up in the
most singular way. But Huldy she'd jest say `Yes,
sir,' and get him off into his study, and go on her
own way.
“`Huldy,' says the minister one day, `you ain't experienced
out doors; and, when you want to know
any thing, you must come to me.'
“`Yes, sir,' says Huldy.
“`Now, Huldy,' says the parson, `you must be sure
to save the turkey-eggs, so that we can have a lot of
turkeys for Thanksgiving.'
“`Yes, sir,' says Huldy; and she opened the pantry-door,
and showed him a nice dishful she'd been a savin'
up. Wal, the very next day the parson's hen-turkey
was found killed up to old Jim Scroggs's barn.
Folks said Scroggs killed it; though Scroggs, he stood
to it he didn't: at any rate, the Scroggses, they made
-- 064 --
[figure description] Page 064.[end figure description]
a meal on't, and Huldy, she felt bad about it 'cause
she'd set her heart on raisin' the turkeys; and says
she, `Oh, dear! I don't know what I shall do. I was
just ready to see her.'
“`Do, Huldy?” says the parson: `why, there's the
other turkey, out there by the door; and a fine bird,
too, he is.'
Sure enough, there was the old tom-turkey a
struttin' and a sidlin' and a quitterin,' and a floutin'
his tail-feathers in the sun, like a lively young widower,
all ready to begin life over agin.
“`But,' says Huldy, `you know he can't set on
eggs.'
“`He can't? I'd like to know why,' says the parson.
`He shall set on eggs, and hatch 'em too.'
“`O doctor!' says Huldy, all in a tremble; 'cause,
you know, she didn't want to contradict the minister,
and she was afraid she should laugh, — `I never
heard that a tom-turkey would set on eggs.'
“`Why, they ought to,' said the parson, getting
quite 'arnest: `what else be they good for? you
just bring out the eggs, now, and put 'em in the nest,
and I'll make him set on 'em.'
-- --
[figure description] Blank Page.[end figure description]
-- --
“Huldy came behind, jist chokin' with laugh.”—Page 65.
[figure description] Illustration page. Image of a man looking down his nose and gesturing towards a turkey, while a woman stands behind him smiling, although she is attempting to cover it with her hand.[end figure description]
-- --
[figure description] Blank Page.[end figure description]
-- --
[figure description] Blank Page.[end figure description]
-- 065 --
[figure description] Page 065.[end figure description]
“So Huldy she thought there wern't no way to convince
him but to let him try: so she took the eggs
out, and fixed 'em all nice in the nest; and then she
come back and found old Tom a skirmishin' with the
parson pretty lively, I tell ye. Ye see, old Tom he
didn't take the idee at all; and he flopped and gobbled,
and fit the parson; and the parson's wig got 'round
so that his cue stuck straight out over his ear, but
he'd got his blood up. Ye see, the old doctor was
used to carryin' his p'ints o' doctrine; and he hadn't
fit the Arminians and Socinians to be beat by a tom-turkey;
so finally he made a dive, and ketched him
by the neck in spite o' his floppin', and stroked him
down, and put Huldy's apron 'round him.
“`There, Huldy,' he says, quite red in the face,
`we've got him now;' and he travelled off to the
barn with him as lively as a cricket.
“Huldy came behind jist chokin' with laugh, and
afraid the minister would look 'round and see her.
“`Now, Huldy, we'll crook his legs, and set him
down,' says the parson, when they got him to the
nest: `you see he is getting quiet, and he'll set there
all right.'
-- 066 --
[figure description] Page 066.[end figure description]
“And the parson, he sot him down; and old Tom he
sot there solemn enough, and held his head down all
droopin', lookin' like a rail pious old cock, as long as
the parson sot by him.
“`There: you see how still he sets,' says the parson
to Huldy.
“Huldy was 'most dyin' for fear she should laugh.
`I'm afraid he'll get up,' says she, `when you
do.'
“`Oh, no, he won't!' says the parson, quite confident.
`There, there,' says he, layin' his hands on him, as if
pronouncin' a blessin'. But when the parson riz up,
old Tom he riz up too, and began to march over the
eggs.
“`Stop, now!' says the parson. `I'll make him get
down agin: hand me that corn-basket; we'll put
that over him.'
“So he crooked old Tom's legs, and got him down
agin; and they put the corn-basket over him, and
then they both stood and waited.
“`That'll do the thing, Huldy,' said the parson.
“`I don't know about it,' says Huldy.
“`Oh, yes, it will, child! I understand,' says he.
-- 067 --
[figure description] Page 067.[end figure description]
“Just as he spoke, the basket riz right up and stood,
and they could see old Tom's long legs.
“`I'll make him stay down, confound him,' says
the parson; for, ye see, parsons is men, like the rest
on us, and the doctor had got his spunk up.
“`You jist hold him a minute, and I'll get something
that'll make him stay, I guess;' and out he
went to the fence, and brought in a long, thin, flat
stone, and laid it on old Tom's back.
“Old Tom he wilted down considerable under
this, and looked railly as if he was goin' to give in.
He staid still there a good long spell, and the minister
and Huldy left him there and come up to the
house; but they hadn't more than got in the door
before they see old Tom a hippin' along, as high-steppin'
as ever, sayin' `Talk! talk! and quitter!
quitter!' and struttin' and gobblin' as if he'd come
through the Red Sea, and got the victory.
“`Oh, my eggs!' says Huldy. `I'm afraid he's
smashed 'em!'
“And sure enough, there they was, smashed flat
enough under the stone.
“`I'll have him killed,' said the parson: `we
won't have such a critter 'round.'
-- 068 --
[figure description] Page 068.[end figure description]
“But the parson, he slep' on't, and then didn't do
it: he only come out next Sunday with a tip-top
sermon on the `'Riginal Cuss' that was pronounced
on things in gineral, when Adam fell, and showed
how every thing was allowed to go contrary ever
since. There was pig-weed, and pusley, and Canady
thistles, cut-worms, and bag-worms, and canker-worms,
to say nothin' of rattlesnakes. The doctor
made it very impressive and sort o' improvin'; but
Huldy, she told me, goin' home, that she hardly
could keep from laughin' two or three times in the
sermon when she thought of old Tom a standin' up
with the corn-basket on his back.
“Wal, next week Huldy she jist borrowed the minister's
horse and side-saddle, and rode over to South
Parish to her Aunt Bascome's, — Widder Bascome's,
you know, that lives there by the trout-brook, — and
got a lot o' turkey-eggs o' her, and come back and set
a hen on 'em, and said nothin'; and in good time there
was as nice a lot o' turkey-chicks as ever ye see.
“Huldy never said a word to the minister about his
experiment, and he never said a word to her; but he
sort o' kep' more to his books, and didn't take it on
him to advise so much.
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“But not long arter he took it into his head that
Huldy ought to have a pig to be a fattin' with the
buttermilk. Mis' Pipperidge set him up to it; and
jist then old Tim Bigelow, out to Juniper Hill, told
him if he'd call over he'd give him a little pig.
“So he sent for a man, and told him to build a pig-pen
right out by the well, and have it all ready when
he came home with his pig.
“Huldy she said she wished he might put a curb
round the well out there, because in the dark, sometimes,
a body might stumble into it; and the parson,
he told him he might do that.
“Wal, old Aikin, the carpenter, he didn't come till
most the middle of the arternoon; and then he sort o'
idled, so that he didn't get up the well-curb till sundown;
and then he went off and said he'd come and
do the pig-pen next day.
“Wal, arter dark, Parson Carryl he driv into the
yard, full chizel, with his pig. He'd tied up his
mouth to keep him from squeelin'; and he see what
he thought was the pig-pen, — he was rather nearsighted, —
and so he ran and threw piggy over; and
down he dropped into the water, and the minister
-- 070 --
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put out his horse and pranced off into the house
quite delighted.
“`There, Huldy, I've got you a nice little pig.'
“`Dear me!' says Huldy: `where have you put
him?'
“`Why, out there in the pig-pen, to be sure.'
“`Oh, dear me!' says Huldy: `that's the well-curb;
there ain't no pig-pen built,' says she.
“`Lordy massy!' says the parson: `then I've
thrown the pig in the well!'
“Wal, Huldy she worked and worked, and finally
she fished piggy out in the bucket, but he was dead
as a door-nail; and she got him out o' the way
quietly, and didn't say much; and the parson, he took
to a great Hebrew book in his study; and says he,
`Huldy, I ain't much in temporals,' says he. Huldy
says she kind o' felt her heart go out to him, he was
so sort o' meek and helpless and larned; and says she,
`Wal, Parson Carryl, don't trouble your head no
more about it; I'll see to things;' and sure enough,
a week arter there was a nice pen, all ship-shape, and
two little white pigs that Huldy bought with the
money for the butter she sold at the store.
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“I've thrown the pig in the well.”—Page 70.
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“`Wal, Huldy,' said the parson, `you are a most
amazin' child: you don't say nothin', but you do
more than most folks.'
“Arter that the parson set sich store by Huldy that
he come to her and asked her about every thing, and
it was amazin' how every thing she put her hand to
prospered. Huldy planted marigolds and larkspurs,
pinks and carnations, all up and down the path to the
front door, and trained up mornin' glories and scarlet-runners
round the windows. And she was always
a gettin' a root here, and a sprig there, and a seed
from somebody else: for Huldy was one o' them that
has the gift, so that ef you jist give 'em the leastest
sprig of any thing they make a great bush out of it
right away; so that in six months Huldy had roses
and geraniums and lilies, sich as it would a took a
gardener to raise. The parson, he took no notice at
fust; but when the yard was all ablaze with flowers he
used to come and stand in a kind o' maze at the front
door, and say, `Beautiful, beautiful: why, Huldy,
I never see any thing like it.' And then when her
work was done arternoons, Huldy would sit with her
sewin' in the porch, and sing and trill away till she'd
-- 072 --
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draw the meadow-larks and the bobolinks, and the
orioles to answer her, and the great big elm-tree
overhead would get perfectly rackety with the birds;
and the parson, settin' there in his study, would git
to kind o' dreamin' about the angels, and golden
harps, and the New Jerusalem; but he wouldn't
speak a word, 'cause Huldy she was jist like them
wood-thrushes, she never could sing so well when
she thought folks was hearin'. Folks noticed, about
this time, that the parson's sermons got to be like
Aaron's rod, that budded and blossomed: there was
things in 'em about flowers and birds, and more 'special
about the music o' heaven. And Huldy she
noticed, that ef there was a hymn run in her head
while she was 'round a workin' the minister was
sure to give it out next Sunday. You see, Huldy
was jist like a bee: she always sung when she was
workin', and you could hear her trillin', now down
in the corn-patch, while she was pickin' the corn;
and now in the buttery, while she was workin' the
butter; and now she'd go singin' down cellar, and
then she'd be singin' up over head, so that she
seemed to fill a house chock full o' music.
-- 073 --
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“Huldy was so sort o' chipper and fair spoken, that
she got the hired men all under her thumb: they
come to her and took her orders jist as meek as so
many calves; and she traded at the store, and kep'
the accounts, and she hed her eyes everywhere, and
tied up all the ends so tight that there want no gettin'
'round her. She wouldn't let nobody put nothin'
off on Parson Carryl, 'cause he was a minister. Huldy
was allers up to anybody that wanted to make a
hard bargain; and, afore he knew jist what he was
about, she'd got the best end of it, and everybody
said that Huldy was the most capable gal that they'd
ever traded with.
“Wal, come to the meetin' of the Association, Mis'
Deakin Blodgett and Mis' Pipperidge come callin' up
to the parson's, all in a stew, and offerin' their services
to get the house ready; but the doctor, he jist
thanked 'em quite quiet, and turned 'em over to Huldy;
and Huldy she told 'em that she'd got every
thing ready, and showed 'em her pantries, and her
cakes and her pies and her puddin's, and took 'em
all over the house; and they went peekin' and pokin',
openin' cupboard-doors, and lookin' into drawers; and
-- 074 --
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they couldn't find so much as a thread out o' the
way, from garret to cellar, and so they went off quite
discontented. Arter that the women set a new
trouble a brewin'. Then they begun to talk that it
was a year now since Mis' Carryl died; and it r'ally
wasn't proper such a young gal to be stayin' there,
who everybody could see was a settin' her cap for
the minister.
“Mis' Pipperidge said, that, so long as she looked
on Huldy as the hired gal, she hadn't thought much
about it; but Huldy was railly takin' on airs as an
equal, and appearin' as mistress o' the house in a
way that would make talk if it went on. And Mis'
Pipperidge she driv 'round up to Deakin Abner
Snow's, and down to Mis' 'Lijah Perry's, and asked
them if they wasn't afraid that the way the parson
and Huldy was a goin' on might make talk. And
they said they hadn't thought on't before, but now,
come to think on't, they was sure it would; and they
all went and talked with somebody else, and asked
them if they didn't think it would make talk. So
come Sunday, between meetin's there warn't nothin'
else talked about; and Huldy saw folks a noddin'
-- 075 --
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and a winkin', and a lookin' arter her, and she begun
to feel drefful sort o' disagreeable. Finally Mis'
Sawin she says to her, `My dear, didn't you, never
think folk would talk about you and the minister?'
“`No: why should they?' says Huldy, quite innocent.
“Wal, dear,' says she, `I think it's a shame; but
they say you're tryin' to catch him, and that it's so
bold and improper for you to be courtin' of him right
in his own house, — you know folks will talk, — I
thought I'd tell you 'cause I think so much of you,'
says she.
“Huldy was a gal of spirit, and she despised the
talk, but it made her drefful uncomfortable; and
when she got home at night she sat down in the mornin'-glory
porch, quite quiet, and didn't sing a word.
“The minister he had heard the same thing from
one of his deakins that day; and, when he saw Huldy
so kind o' silent, he says to her, `Why don't you
sing, my child?'
“He hed a pleasant sort o' way with him, the minister
had, and Huldy had got to likin' to be with him;
and it all come over her that perhaps she ought to go
-- 076 --
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away; and her throat kind o' filled up so she couldn't
hardly speak; and, says she, `I can't sing to-night.'
“Says he, `You don't know how much good you're
singin' has done me, nor how much good you have
done me in all ways, Huldy. I wish I knew how to
show my gratitude.'
“`O sir!' says Huldy, `is it improper for me to be
here?'
“`No, dear,' says the minister, `but ill-natured
folks will talk; but there is one way we can stop it,
Huldy — if you will marry me. You'll make me
very happy, and I'll do all I can to make you happy.
Will you?'
“Wal, Huldy never told me jist what she said to
the minister, — gals never does give you the particulars
of them 'are things jist as you'd like 'em, — only I
know the upshot and the hull on't was, that Huldy
she did a consid'able lot o' clear starchin' and ironin'
the next two days; and the Friday o' next week the
minister and she rode over together to Dr. Lothrop's
in Old Town; and the doctor, he jist made 'em man
and wife, `spite of envy of the Jews,' as the hymn
says. Wal, you'd better believe there was a starin'
-- 077 --
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and a wonderin' next Sunday mornin' when the second
bell was a tollin', and the minister walked up the
broad aisle with Huldy, all in white, arm in arm
with him, and he opened the minister's pew, and
handed her in as if she was a princess; for, you see,
Parson Carryl come of a good family, and was a
born gentleman, and had a sort o' grand way o' bein'
polite to women-folks. Wal, I guess there was a
rus'lin' among the bunnets. Mis' Pipperidge gin a
great bounce, like corn poppin' on a shovel, and her
eyes glared through her glasses at Huldy as if they'd
a sot her afire; and everybody in the meetin' house
was a starin', I tell yew. But they couldn't none of
'em say nothin' agin Huldy's looks; for there wa'n't
a crimp nor a frill about her that wa'n't jis' so; and
her frock was white as the driven snow, and she had
her bunnet all trimmed up with white ribbins; and
all the fellows said the old doctor had stole a march,
and got the handsomest gal in the parish.
“Wal, arter meetin' they all come 'round the parson
and Huldy at the door, shakin' hands and laughin';
for by that time they was about agreed that
they'd got to let putty well alone.
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“`Why, Parson Carryl,' says Mis' Deakin Blodgett,
`how you've come it over us.'
“`Yes,' says the parson, with a kind o' twinkle in
his eye. `I thought,' says he, `as folks wanted to
talk about Huldy and me, I'd give 'em somethin'
wuth talkin' about.'”
-- 079 -- p703-112
THE WIDOW'S BANDBOX.
[figure description] Page 079.[end figure description]
LORDY massy! Stick yer hat into the
nor'east, Horace, and see 'f ye can't
stop out this 'ere wind. I'm e'eny
most used up with it.”
So spake Sam Lawson, contemplating
mournfully a new broad-brimmed straw
hat in which my soul was rejoicing.
It was the dripping end of a sour November afternoon,
which closed up a “spell o' weather” that had
been steadily driving wind and rain for a week past;
and we boys sought the shelter and solace of his
shop, and, opening the door, let in the wind aforesaid.
Sam had been all day in one of his periodical fits
of desperate industry. The smoke and sparks had
-- 080 --
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been seen flying out of his shop-chimney in a frantic
manner; and the blows of his hammer had resounded
with a sort of feverish persistence, intermingled with
a doleful wailing of psalm-tunes of the most lugubrious
description.
These fits of industry on Sam's part were an affliction
to us boys, especially when they happened to
come on Saturday: for Sam was as much a part of
our Saturday-afternoon calculations as if we had a
regular deed of property in him; and we had been
all day hanging round his shop, looking in from time
to time, in the vague hope that he would propose
something to brighten up the dreary monotony of a
holiday in which it had been impossible to go anywhere
or do any thing.
“Sam, ain't you coming over to tell us some
stories to-night?”
“Bless your soul and body, boys! life ain't made
to be spent tellin' stories. Why, I shall hev to be
up here workin' till arter twelve o'clock,” said Sam,
who was suddenly possessed with a spirit of the
most austere diligence. “Here I be up to my neck
in work, — things kind o' comin' in a heap together.
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There's Mis' Cap'n Broad's andirons, she sent word
she must have 'em to-night; and there's Lady
Lothrop, she wants her warmin'-pan right off;
they can't non' on 'em wait a minit longer. I've
ben a drivin' and workin' all day like a nigger-slave.
Then there was Jeduth Pettybone, he brought down
them colts to-day, and I worked the biggest part o'
the mornin' shoein' on 'em; and then Jeduth he said
he couldn't make change to pay me, so there wa'n't
nothin' comin' in for 't; and then Hepsy she kep' a
jawin' at me all dinner-time 'bout that. Why, I
warn't to blame now, was I? I can't make everybody
do jest right and pay regular, can I? So ye
see it goes, boys, gettin' yer bread by the sweat o'
your brow; and sometimes sweatin' and not gettin'
yer bread. That 'ere's what I call the cuss, the
'riginal cuss, that come on man for hearkenin' to the
voice o' his wife, — that 'ere was what did it. It allers
kind o' riles me up with Mother Eve when I
think on't. The women hain't no bisness to fret as
they do, 'cause they sot this 'ere state o' things goin'
in the fust place.”
“But, Sam, Aunt Lois and Aunt Nabby are both
-- 082 --
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going over to Mis' Mehitabel's to tea. Now, you
just come over and eat supper with us and tell us a
story, do.”
“Gone out to tea, be they?” said Sam, relaxing
his hammering, with a brightening gleam stealing
gradually across his lanky visage. “Wal, that 'ere
looks like a providential openin', to be sure. Wal, I
guess I'll come. What's the use o' never havin' a
good time? Ef you work yourself up into shoe-strings
you don't get no thanks for it, and things in
this world's 'bout as broad as they is long: the women
'll scold, turn 'em which way ye will. A good
mug o' cider and some cold victuals over to the Deakin's
'll kind o' comfort a feller up; and your granny
she's sort o' merciful, she don't rub it into a fellow
all the time like Miss Lois.”
“Now, let's see, boys,” said Sam, when a comfortable
meal of pork and beans had been disposed of,
and a mug of cider was set down before the fire to
warm. “I s'pect ye'll like to hear a Down-East
story to-night.”
Of course we did, and tumbled over each other in
our eagerness to get the nearest place to the narrator.
-- 083 --
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Sam's method of telling a story was as leisurely as
that of some modern novel-writers. He would take
his time for it, and proceed by easy stages. It was
like the course of a dreamy, slow-moving river
through a tangled meadow-flat, — not a rush nor a
bush but was reflected in it; in short, Sam gave his
philosophy of matters and things in general as he
went along, and was especially careful to impress an
edifying moral.
“Wal, ye see, boys, ye know I was born down to
Newport, — there where it's all ships and shipping,
and sich. My old mother she kep' a boardin'-house
for sailors down there. Wal, ye see, I rolled and
tumbled round the world pretty consid'able afore I
got settled down here in Oldtown.
“Ye see, my mother she wanted to bind me out to
a blacksmith, but I kind o' sort o' didn't seem to take
to it. It was kind o' hard work, and boys is apt to
want to take life easy. Wal, I used to run off to the
sea-shore, and lie stretched out on them rocks there,
and look off on to the water; and it did use to look
so sort o' blue and peaceful, and the ships come a
sailin' in and out so sort o' easy and natural, that I
-- 084 --
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felt as if that are'd be jest the easiest kind o' life a
fellow could have. All he had to do was to get
aboard one o' them ships, and be off seekin' his
fortin at t'other end o' the rainbow, where gold
grows on bushes and there's valleys o' diamonds.
“So, nothin' would do but I gin my old mother
the slip; and away I went to sea, with my duds tied
up in a han'kercher.
“I tell ye what, boys, ef ye want to find an easy
life, don't ye never go to sea. I tell ye, life on shipboard
ain't what it looks to be on shore. I hadn't
been aboard more'n three hours afore I was the sickest
critter that ever ye did see; and I tell you, I
didn't get no kind o' compassion. Cap'ns and mates
they allers thinks boys hain't no kind o' business to
have no bowels nor nothin', and they put it on 'em
sick or well. It's jest a kick here, and a cuff there,
and a twitch by the ear in t'other place; one a
shovin' on 'em this way, and another hittin' on 'em a
clip, and all growlin' from mornin' to night. I believe
the way my ears got so long was bein' hauled
out o' my berth by 'em: that 'are's a sailor's regular
way o' wakin' up a boy.
-- 085 --
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“Wal, by time I got to the Penobscot country, all
I wanted to know was how to get back agin. That
'are's jest the way folks go all their lives, boys. It's
all fuss, fuss, and stew, stew, till ye get somewhere;
and then it's fuss, fuss, and stew, stew, to get back
agin; jump here and scratch yer eyes out, and jump
there and scratch 'em in agin, — that 'are's life.
“Wal, I kind o' poked round in Penobscot country
till I got a berth on `The Brilliant' that was lyin'
at Camden, goin' to sail to Boston.
“Ye see, `The Brilliant' she was a tight little sloop
in the government service: 'twas in the war-times,
ye see, and Commodore Tucker that is now (he was
Cap'n Tucker then), he had the command on her, —
used to run up and down all the coast takin' observations
o' the British, and keepin' his eye out on 'em,
and givin' on 'em a nip here and a clip there,' cordin'
as he got a good chance. Why, your grand'ther
knew old Commodore Tucker. It was he that took
Dr. Franklin over Minister, to France, and dodged
all the British vessels, right in the middle o' the war.
I tell you that 'are was like runnin' through the
drops in a thunder-shower. He got chased by the
-- 086 --
[figure description] Page 086.[end figure description]
British ships pretty consid'able, but he was too spry
for 'em. Arter the war was over, Commodore
Tucker took over John Adams, our fust Minister to
England. A drefful smart man the Commodore was,
but he most like to 'a' ben took in this 'ere time I'm
a tellin' ye about, and all 'cause he was sort o' soft-hearted
to the women. Tom Toothacre told me the
story. Tom he was the one that got me the berth
on the ship. Ye see, I used to know Tom at Newport;
and once when he took sick there my mother
nussed him up, and that was why Tom was friends
with me and got me the berth, and kep' me warm in
it too. Tom he was one of your rael Maine boys,
that's hatched out, so to speak, in water like ducks.
He was born away down there on Harpswell P'int;
and they say, if ye throw one o' them Harpswell babies
into the sea, he'll take to it nateral, and swim like a
cork: ef they hit their heads agin a rock it only
dents the rock, but don't hurt the baby. Tom he
was a great character on the ship. He could see
further, and knew more 'bout wind and water, than
most folks: the officers took Tom's judgment, and
the men all went by his say. My mother she chalked
-- 087 --
[figure description] Page 087.[end figure description]
a streak o' good luck for me when she nussed up
Tom.
“Wal, we wus a lyin' at Camden there, one arternoon,
goin' to sail for Boston that night. It was a
sort o' soft, pleasant arternoon, kind o' still, and
there wa'n't nothin' a goin' on but jest the hens a
craw-crawin', and a histin' up one foot, and holdin' it
a spell 'cause they didn't know when to set it down,
and the geese a sissin' and a pickin' at the grass. Ye
see, Camden wasn't nothin' of a place, — 'twas jest
as if somebody had emptied out a pocketful o' houses
and forgot 'em. There wer'n't nothin' a stirrin' or
goin' on; and so we was all took aback, when 'bout
four o'clock in the arternoon there come a boat
alongside, with a tall, elegant lady in it, all dressed in
deep mournin'. She rared up sort o' princess-like,
and come aboard our ship, and wanted to speak to
Cap'n Tucker. Where she come from, or what she
wanted, or where she was goin' to, we none on us
knew: she kep' her veil down so we couldn't get
sight o' her face. All was, she must see Cap'n
Tucker alone right away.
“Wal, Cap'n Tucker he was like the generality
-- 088 --
[figure description] Page 088.[end figure description]
o' cap'ns. He was up to 'bout every thing that any
man could do, but it was pretty easy for a woman to
come it over him. Ye see, cap'ns, they don't see
women as men do ashore. They don't have enough
of 'em to get tired on 'em; and every woman's an
angel to a sea-cap'n. Anyway, the cap'n he took
her into his cabin, and he sot her a chair, and was
her humble servant to command, and what would
she have of him? And we was all a winkin', and a
nudgin' each other, and a peekin' to see what was to
come o' it. And she see it; and so she asks, in a sort
o' princess' way, to speak to the cap'n alone; and so
the doors was shut, and we was left to our own ideas,
and a wonderin' what it was all to be about.
“Wal, you see, it come out arterwards all about
what went on; and things went this way. Jest as
soon as the doors was shut, and she was left alone
with the cap'n, she busted out a cryin' and a sobbin'
fit to break her heart.
“Wal, the cap'n he tried to comfort her up: but
no, she wouldn't be comforted, but went on a weepin'
and a wailin,' and a wringin' on her hands, till the
poor cap'n's heart was a'most broke; for the cap'n
-- 089 --
[figure description] Page 089.[end figure description]
was the tenderest-hearted critter that could be, and
couldn't bear to see a child or a woman in trouble
noways.
“`O cap'n!' said she, `I'm the most unfortunate
woman. I'm all alone in the world,' says she, `and
I don't know what'll become of me ef you don't
keep me,' says she.
“Wal, the cap'n thought it was time to run up his
colors; and so says he, `Ma'am, I'm a married man,
and love my wife,' says he, `and so I can feel for all
women in distress,' says he.
“Oh, well, then!' says she, `you can feel for me, and
know how to pity me. My dear husband's just died
suddenly when he was up the river. He was took
with the fever in the woods. I nussed him day and
night,' says she; `but he died there in a mis'able
little hut far from home and friends,' says she; `and
I've brought his body down with me, hopin' Providence
would open some way to get it back to our
home in Boston. And now, cap'n, you must help me.'
“Then the cap'n see what she was up to: and he
hated to do it, and tried to cut her off o' askin'; but
she wa'n't to be put off.
-- 090 --
[figure description] Page 090.[end figure description]
“`Now, cap'n,' says she, `ef you'll take me and
the body o' my husband on board to-night, I'd be
willin' to reward you to any amount. Money would
be no object to me,' says she.
“Wal, you see, the cap'n he kind o' hated to do it;
and he hemmed and hawed, and he tried to 'pologize.
He said 'twas a government vessel, and he didn't
know as he had a right to use it. He said sailors
was apt to be superstitious; and he didn't want 'em
to know as there was a corpse on board.
“`Wal,' says she, `why need they know?' For,
you see, she was up to every dodge; and she said
she'd come along with it at dusk, in a box, and have
it just carried to a state-room, and he needn't tell
nobody what it was.
“Wal, Cap'n Tucker he hung off; and he tried his
best to persuade her to have a funeral, all quiet,
there at Camden. He promised to get a minister,
and 'tend to it, and wait a day till it was all over,
and then take her on to Boston free gratis. But
'twas all no go. She wouldn't hear a word to 't.
And she reeled off the talk to him by the yard.
And, when talk failed, she took to her water-works
-- 091 --
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again, till finally the cap'n said his resolution was
clean washed away, and he jest give up hook and
line; and so 'twas all settled and arranged, that,
when evening come, she was to be alongside with her
boat, and took aboard.
“When she come out o' the cap'n's room to go off,
I see Tom Toothacre a watchin' on her. He stood
there by the railin's a shavin' up a plug o' baccy to
put in his pipe. He didn't say a word; but he sort o'
took the measure o' that 'are woman with his eye,
and kept a follerin' on her.
“She had a fine sort o' lively look, carried her
head up and shoulders back, and stepped as if she
had steel springs in her heels.
“`Wal, Tom, what do ye say to her?' says Ben
Bowdin.
“`I don't say nothin',' says Tom, and he lit his
pipe; 'tain't my busness,' says he.
“`Wal, what do you think?' says Ben. Tom gin
a hist to his trousers.
“`My thoughts is my own,' says he; `and I calculate
to keep 'em to myself,' says he. And then he
jest walked to the side of the vessel, and watched the
-- 092 --
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woman a gettin' ashore. There was a queer kind o'
look in Tom's eye.
“Wal, the cap'n he was drefful sort o' oneasy
arter she was gone. He had a long talk in the cabin
with Mr. More, the fust officer; and there was a sort
o' stir aboard as if somethin' was a goin' to happen,
we couldn't jest say what it was.
“Sometimes it seems as if, when things is goin' to
happen, a body kind o' feels 'em comin' in the air.
We boys was all that way: o' course we didn't
know nothin' 'bout what the woman wanted, or what
she come for, or whether she was comin' agin; 'n
fact, we didn't know nothin' about it, and yet we sort
o' expected suthin' to come o' it; and suthin' did
come, sure enough.
“Come on night, jest at dusk, we see a boat comin'
alongside; and there, sure enough, was the lady in
it.
“`There, she's comin' agin,' says I to Tom Toothacre.
“`Yes, and brought her baggage with her,' says
Tom; and he p'inted down to a long, narrow pine
box that was in the boat beside her.
-- 093 --
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“Jest then the cap'n called on Mr. More, and he
called on Tom Toothacre; and among 'em they lowered
a tackle, and swung the box aboard, and put it
in the state-room right alongside the cap'n's cabin.
“The lady she thanked the cap'n and Mr.
More, and her voice was jest as sweet as any nightingale;
and she went into the state-room arter they
put the body in, and was gone ever so long with it.
The cap'n and Mr. More they stood a whisperin' to
each other, and every once in a while they'd kind o'
nod at the door where the lady was.
“Wal, by and by she come out with her han'kerchief
to her eyes, and come on deck, and begun talkin'
to the cap'n and Mr. More, and a wishin' all
kinds o' blessin's on their heads.
“Wal, Tom Toothacre didn't say a word, good or
bad; but he jest kep' a lookin' at her, watchin' her as
a cat watches a mouse. Finally we up sail, and started
with a fair breeze. The lady she kep' a walkin' up and
down, up and down, and every time she turned on
her heel, I saw Tom a lookin' arter her and kind o'
noddin' to himself.
“`What makes you look arter her so, Tom?' says
I to him.
-- 094 --
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“`'Cause I think she wants lookin' arter,' says
Tom. `What's more,' says he, `if the cap'n don't
look sharp arter her the devil 'll have us all afore
mornin.' I tell ye, Sam, there's mischief under them
petticuts.'
“`Why, what do ye think?' says I.
“`Think! I don't think, I knows! That 'are's
no gal, nor widder neither, if my name's Tom Toothacre!
Look at her walk; look at the way she turns
on her heel! I've been a watchin' on her. There
ain't no woman livin' with a step like that!' says he.
“`Wal, who should the critter be, then?' says I.
“`Wal,' says Tom, `ef that 'are ain't a British
naval officer, I lose my bet. I've been used to the
ways on 'em, and I knows their build and their step.'
“`And what do you suppose she's got in that long
box?' says I.
“`What has she got?' says Tom. `Wal, folks
might say none o' my bisness; but I s'pects it'll turn
out some o' my bisness, and yourn too, if he don't
look sharp arter it,' says Tom. `It's no good, that
'are box ain't.'
“`Why don't you speak to Mr. More?' says I.
-- 095 --
[figure description] Page 095.[end figure description]
“`Wal, you see she's a chipperin' round and a makin'
herself agreeable to both on 'em, you see; she
don't mean to give nobody any chance for a talk with
'em; but I've got my eye on her, for all that. You
see I hain't no sort o' disposition to sarve out a
time on one o' them British prison-ships,' says Tom
Toothacre. `It might be almighty handy for them
British to have “The Brilliant” for a coast-vessel,'
says he; `but, ye see, it can't be spared jest yet.
So, madam,' says he, `I've got my eye on you.'
“Wal, Tom was as good as his word; for when Mr.
More came towards him at the wheel, Tom he up
and says to him, `Mr. More,' says he, `that 'are big
box in the state-room yonder wants lookin' into.'
“Tom was a sort o' privileged character, and had
a way o' speakin' up that the officers took in good
part, 'cause they knew he was a fust-rate hand.
“Wal, Mr. More he looks mysterious; and says he,
Tom, do the boys know what's in that 'are box?'
“`I bet they don't,' says Tom. `If they had, you
wouldn't a got 'em to help it aboard.'
“`Wal, you see, poor woman,' says Mr. More to
Tom, `she was so distressed. She wanted to get
-- 096 --
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her husband's body to Boston; and there wa'n't no
other way, and so the cap'n let it come aboard.
He didn't want the boys to suspect what it really
was.'
“`Husband's body be hanged!' said Tom. `Guess
that 'are corpse ain't so dead but what there'll be a
resurrection afore mornin', if it ain't looked arter,'
says he.
“`Why, what do you mean, Tom?' said Mr.
More, all in a blue maze.
“`I mean, that 'are gal that's ben a switchin' her
petticuts up and down our deck ain't no gal at all.
That are's a British officer, Mr. More. You give my
duty to the cap'n, and tell him to look into his widder's
bandbox, and see what he'll find there.'
“Wal, the mate he went and had a talk with the
cap'n; and they 'greed between 'em that Mr. More
was to hold her in talk while the cap'n went and
took observations in the state-room.
“So, down the cap'n goes into the state-room to
give a look at the box. Wal, he finds the state-room
door all locked to be sure, and my lady had the
key in her pocket; but then the cap'n he had a
-- 097 --
[figure description] Page 097.[end figure description]
master key to it; and so he puts it in, and opens the door
quite softly, and begins to take observations.
“Sure enough, he finds that the screws had been
drawed from the top o' the box, showin' that the
widder had been a tinkerin' on't when they thought
she was a cryin' over it; and then, lookin' close, he
sees a bit o' twine goin' from a crack in the box out
o' the winder, and up on deck.
“Wal, the cap'n he kind o' got in the sperit o' the
thing; and he thought he'd jest let the widder play
her play out, and see what it would come to. So he
jest calls Tom Toothacre down to him and whispered
to him. `Tom,' says he, `you jest crawl under
the berth in that 'are state-room, and watch that
'are box.' And Tom said he would.
“So Tom creeps under the berth, and lies there
still as a mouse; and the cap'n he slips out and turns
the key in the door, so that when madam comes
down she shouldn't s'pect nothin'.
“Putty soon, sure enough, Tom heard the lock
rattle, and the young widder come in; and then he
heard a bit o' conversation between her and the
corpse.
-- 098 --
[figure description] Page 098.[end figure description]
“`What time is it?' come in a kind o' hoarse
whisper out o' the box.
“`Well, 'bout nine o'clock,' says she.
“`How long afore you'll let me out?' says he.
“`Oh! you must have patience,' says she, `till
they're all gone off to sleep; when there ain't but
one man up. I can knock him down,' says she, `and
then I'll pull the string for you.'
“`The devil you will, ma'am!' says Tom to himself,
under the berth.
“`Well, it's darned close here,' says the fellow in
the box. He didn't say darned, boys; but he said
a wickeder word that I can't repeat, noways,” said
Sam, in a parenthesis: “these 'ere British officers
was drefful swearin' critters.
“`You must have patience a while longer,' says
the lady, `till I pull the string.' Tom Toothacre lay
there on his back a laughin'.
“`Is every thing goin' on right?' says the man in
the box.
“`All straight,' says she: `there don't none of 'em
suspect.'
“`You bet,' says Tom Toothacre, under the
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“And gin him a regular bear's hug.”—Page 99.
[figure description] Illustration page. Image of a man standing behind another man with his arms wrapped around him. The man in front is wearing a military uniform.[end figure description]
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-- 099 --
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berth; and he said he had the greatest mind to catch
the critter by the feet as she was a standin' there,
but somehow thought it would be better fun to see
the thing through 'cording as they'd planned it.
“Wal, then she went off switchin' and mincin' up
to the deck agin, and a flirtin' with the cap'n; for
you see 'twas 'greed to let 'em play their play out.
“Wal, Tom he lay there a waitin'; and he waited
and waited and waited, till he 'most got asleep; but
finally he heard a stirrin' in the box, as if the fellah
was a gettin' up. Tom he jest crawled out still and
kerful, and stood up tight agin the wall. Putty
soon he hears a grunt, and he sees the top o' the box
a risin' up, and a man jest gettin' out on't mighty
still.
“Wal, Tom he waited till he got fairly out on to
the floor, and had his hand on the lock o' the door,
when he jumps on him, and puts both arms round
him, and gin him a regular bear's hug.
“`Why, what's this?' says the man.
“`Guess ye'll find out, darn ye,' says Tom Toothacre.
`So, ye wanted our ship, did ye? Wal, ye
jest can't have our ship,' says Tom, says he; and I
-- 100 --
[figure description] Page 100.[end figure description]
tell you he jest run that 'are fellow up stairs lickety-split,
for Tom was strong as a giant.
“The fust thing they saw was Mr. More hed got
the widder by both arms, and was tying on 'em behind
her. `Ye see, madam, your game's up,' says
Mr. More, `but we'll give ye a free passage to Boston,
tho',' says he: `we wanted a couple o' prisoners
about these days, and you'll do nicely.'
“The fellers they was putty chopfallen, to be
sure, and the one in women's clothes 'specially:
'cause when he was found out, he felt foolish enough
in his petticuts; but they was both took to Boston,
and given over as prisoners.
“Ye see, come to look into matters, they found
these two young fellows, British officers, had formed
a regular plot to take Cap'n Tucker's vessel, and run
it into Halifax; and ye see, Cap'n Tucker he was so
sort o' spry, and knew all the Maine coast so well,
and was so 'cute at dodgin' in and out all them little
bays and creeks and places all 'long shore, that he
made the British considerable trouble, 'cause wherever
they didn't want him, that's where he was sure
to be.
-- 101 --
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“So they'd hatched up this 'ere plan. There was
one or two British sailors had been and shipped
aboard `The Brilliant' a week or two aforehand, and
'twas suspected they was to have helped in the plot
if things had gone as they laid out; but I tell you,
when the fellows see which way the cat jumped,
they took pretty good care to say that they hadn't
nothin' to do with it. Oh, no, by no manner o'
means! Wal, o' course, ye know, it couldn't be
proved on 'em, and so we let it go.
“But I tell you, Cap'n Tucker he felt pretty
cheap about his widder. The worst on't was, they
do say Ma'am Tucker got hold of it; and you might
know if a woman got hold of a thing like that she'd
use it as handy as a cat would her claws. The women
they can't no more help hittin' a fellow a clip
and a rap when they've fairly got him, than a cat
when she's ketched a mouse; and so I shouldn't
wonder if the Commodore heard something about
his widder every time he went home from his v'yages
the longest day he had to live. I don't know
nothin' 'bout it, ye know: I only kind o' jedge by
what looks, as human natur' goes.
-- 102 --
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“But, Lordy massy! boys, 't wa'n't nothin' to be
'shamed of in the cap'n. Folks 'll have to answer for
wus things at the last day than tryin' to do a kindness
to a poor widder, now, I tell you. It's better to
be took in doin' a good thing, than never try to do
good; and it's my settled opinion,” said Sam, taking
up his mug of cider and caressing it tenderly,
“it's my humble opinion, that the best sort o' folks is
the easiest took in, 'specially by the women. I
reely don't think I should a done a bit better myself.”
-- 103 -- p703-140
CAPTAIN KIDD'S MONEY.
[figure description] Page 103.[end figure description]
ONE of our most favorite legendary
resorts was the old barn.
Sam Lawson preferred it on many
accounts. It was quiet and retired,
that is to say, at such distance from his
own house, that he could not hear if
Hepsy called ever so loudly, and farther
off than it would be convenient for that industrious
and painstaking woman to follow him. Then there
was the soft fragrant cushion of hay, on which his
length of limb could be easily bestowed.
Our barn had an upper loft with a swinging outer
door that commanded a view of the old mill, the
waterfall, and the distant windings of the river, with
its grassy green banks, its graceful elm draperies, and
-- 104 --
[figure description] Page 104.[end figure description]
its white flocks of water-lilies; and then on this
Saturday afternoon we had Sam all to ourselves. It
was a drowsy, dreamy October day, when the hens
were lazily “craw, crawing,” in a soft, conversational
undertone with each other, as they scratched and
picked the hay-seed under the barn windows. Below
in the barn black Cæsar sat quietly hatchelling flax,
sometimes gurgling and giggling to himself with an
overflow of that interior jollity with which he
seemed to be always full. The African in New
England was a curious contrast to everybody around
him in the joy and satisfaction that he seemed to feel
in the mere fact of being alive. Every white person
was glad or sorry for some appreciable cause in the
past, present, or future, which was capable of being
definitely stated; but black Cæsar was in an eternal
giggle and frizzle and simmer of enjoyment for
which he could give no earthly reason: he was an
“embodied joy,” like Shelley's skylark.
“Jest hear him,” said Sam Lawson, looking pensively
over the hay-mow, and strewing hayseed down
on his wool. “How that 'are critter seems to tickle
and laugh all the while 'bout nothin'. Lordy massy!
-- 105 --
[figure description] Page 105.[end figure description]
he don't seem never to consider that `this life's a
dream, an empty show.'”
“Look here, Sam,” we broke in, anxious to cut
short a threatened stream of morality, “you promised
to tell us about Capt. Kidd, and how you dug
for his money.”
“Did I, now? Wal, boys, that 'are history o'
Kidd's is a warnin' to fellers. Why, Kidd had pious
parents and Bible and sanctuary privileges when he
was a boy, and yet come to be hanged. It's all in
this 'ere song I'm a goin' to sing ye. Lordy massy!
I wish I had my bass-viol now. — Cæsar,” he said,
calling down from his perch, “can't you strike the
pitch o' `Cap'n Kidd,' on your fiddle?”
Cæsar's fiddle was never far from him. It was, in
fact, tucked away in a nice little nook just over the
manger; and he often caught an interval from his
work to scrape a dancing-tune on it, keeping time
with his heels, to our great delight.
A most wailing minor-keyed tune was doled forth,
which seemed quite refreshing to Sam's pathetic vein,
as he sang in his most lugubrious tones, —
-- 106 --
[figure description] Page 106.[end figure description]
“`My name was Robert Kidd
As I sailed, as I sailed,
My name was Robert Kidd;
God's laws I did forbid,
And so wickedly I did,
As I sailed, as I sailed.'
“Now ye see, boys, he's a goin' to tell how he
abused his religious privileges; just hear now: —
“`My father taught me well,
As I sailed, as I sailed;
My father taught me well
To shun the gates of hell,
But yet I did rebel,
As I sailed, as I sailed.
“`He put a Bible in my hand,
As I sailed, as I sailed;
He put a Bible in my hand,
And I sunk it in the sand
Before I left the strand,
As I sailed, as I sailed.'
“Did ye ever hear o' such a hardened, contrary
critter, boys? It's awful to think on. Wal, ye see
that 'are's the way fellers allers begin the ways o'
-- 107 --
[figure description] Page 107.[end figure description]
sin, by turnin' their backs on the Bible and the advice
o' pious parents. Now hear what he come
to: —
“`Then I murdered William More,
As I sailed, as I sailed;
I murdered William More,
And left him in his gore,
Not many leagues from shore,
As I sailed, as I sailed.
“`To execution dock
I must go, I must go.
To execution dock,
While thousands round me flock,
To see me on the block,
I must go, I must go.'
“There was a good deal more on't,” said Sam,
pausing, “but I don't seem to remember it; but it's
real solemn and affectin'.”
“Who was Capt. Kidd, Sam?” said I.
“Wal, he was an officer in the British navy, and
he got to bein' a pirate: used to take ships and sink
'em, and murder the folks; and so they say he got
-- 108 --
[figure description] Page 108.[end figure description]
no end o' money, — gold and silver and precious
stones, as many as the wise men in the East. But
ye see, what good did it all do him? He couldn't
use it, and dar'sn't keep it; so he used to bury it in
spots round here and there in the awfullest heathen
way ye ever heard of. Why, they say he allers used
to kill one or two men or women or children of his
prisoners, and bury with it, so that their sperits
might keep watch on it ef anybody was to dig arter
it. That 'are thing has been tried and tried and
tried, but no man nor mother's son on 'em ever got a
cent that dug. 'Twas tried here'n Oldtown; and
they come pretty nigh gettin' on't, but it gin
'em the slip. Ye see, boys, it's the Devil's money,
and he holds a pretty tight grip on't.”
“Well, how was it about digging for it? Tell us,
did you do it? Were you there? Did you see it?
And why couldn't they get it?” we both asked
eagerly and in one breath.
“Why, Lordy massy! boys, your questions tumbles
over each other thick as martins out o' a martin-box.
Now, you jest be moderate and let alone, and I'll tell
you all about it from the beginnin' to the end. I
-- 109 --
[figure description] Page 109.[end figure description]
didn't railly have no hand in't, though I was knowin'
to 't, as I be to most things that goes on round
here; but my conscience wouldn't railly a let me start
on no sich undertakin'.
“Wal, the one that fust sot the thing a goin' was
old Mother Hokum, that used to live up in that
little tumble-down shed by the cranberry-pond up
beyond the spring pastur'. They had a putty bad
name, them Hokums. How they got a livin' nobody
knew; for they didn't seem to pay no attention to
raisin' nothin' but childun, but the duce knows,
there was plenty o' them. Their old hut was like
a rabbit-pen: there was a tow-head to every crack
and cranny. 'Member what old Cæsar said once
when the word come to the store that old Hokum
had got twins. `S'pose de Lord knows best,' says
Cæsar, `but I thought dere was Hokums enough
afore.' Wal, even poor workin' industrious folks
like me finds it's hard gettin' along when there's so
many mouths to feed. Lordy massy! there don't
never seem to be no end on't, and so it ain't wonderful,
come to think on't, ef folks like them Hokums
gets tempted to help along in ways that ain't quite
-- 110 --
[figure description] Page 110.[end figure description]
right. Anyhow, folks did use to think that old
Hokum was too sort o' familiar with their wood-piles
'long in the night, though they couldn't never prove
it on him; and when Mother Hokum come to houses
round to wash, folks use sometimes to miss pieces,
here and there, though they never could find 'em on
her; then they was allers a gettin' in debt here and a
gettin' in debt there. Why, they got to owin' two dollars
to Joe Gidger for butcher's meat. Joe was sort
o' good-natured and let 'em have meat, 'cause Hokum
he promised so fair to pay; but he couldn't never get
it out o' him. 'Member once Joe walked clear up to
the cranberry-pond arter that 'are two dollars; but
Mother Hokum she see him a comin' jest as he come
past the juniper-bush on the corner. She says to
Hokum, `Get into bed, old man, quick, and let me
tell the story,' says she. So she covered him up;
and when Gidger come in she come up to him, and
says she, `Why, Mr. Gidger, I'm jest ashamed to
see ye: why, Mr. Hokum was jest a comin' down to
pay ye that 'are money last week, but ye see he was
took down with the small-pox' — Joe didn't hear
no more: he just turned round, and he streaked it
-- 111 --
[figure description] Page 111.[end figure description]
out that 'are door with his coat-tails flyin' out
straight ahind him; and old Mother Hokum she jest
stood at the window holdin' her sides and laughin'
fit to split, to see him run. That 'are's jest a sample
o' the ways them Hokums cut up.
“Wal, you see, boys, there's a queer kind o' rock
down on the bank 'o the river, that looks sort o' like
a grave-stone. The biggest part on't is sunk down
under ground, and it's pretty well growed over with
blackberry-vines; but, when you scratch the bushes
away, they used to make out some queer marks on
that 'are rock. They was sort o' lines and crosses;
and folks would have it that them was Kidd's private
marks, and that there was one o' the places where
he hid his money.
“Wal, there's no sayin' fairly how it come to be
thought so; but fellers used to say so, and they used
sometimes to talk it over to the tahvern, and kind o'
wonder whether or no, if they should dig, they
wouldn't come to suthin'.
“Wal, old Mother Hokum she heard on't, and
she was a sort o' enterprisin' old crittur: fact was,
she had to be, 'cause the young Hokums was jest like
-- 112 --
[figure description] Page 112.[end figure description]
bag-worms, the more they growed the more they eat,
and I expect she found it pretty hard to fill their
mouths; and so she said ef there was any thing
under that 'are rock, they'd as good's have it as the
Devil; and so she didn't give old Hokum no peace
o' his life, but he must see what there was there.
“Wal, I was with 'em the night they was a talkin'
on't up. Ye see, Hokum he got thirty-seven
cents' worth o' lemons and sperit. I see him goin'
by as I was out a splittin' kindlin's; and says he,
`Sam, you jest go 'long up to our house to-night,'
says he: `Toddy Whitney and Harry Wiggin's comin'
up, and we're goin' to have a little suthin' hot,'
says he; and he kind o' showed me the lemons and
sperit. And I told him I guessed I would go 'long.
Wal, I kind o' wanted to see what they'd be up to,
ye know.
“Wal, come to find out, they was a talkin' about
Cap'n Kidd's treasures, and layin' out how they
should get it, and a settin' one another on with gret
stories about it.
“`I've heard that there was whole chists full o'
gold guineas,' says one.
-- 113 --
[figure description] Page 113.[end figure description]
“`And I've heard o' gold bracelets and ear-rings
and finger-rings all sparklin' with diamonds,' says
another.
“`Maybe it's old silver plate from some o' them
old West Indian grandees,' says another.
“`Wal, whatever it is,' says Mother Hokum, `I
want to be into it,' says she.
“`Wal, Sam, won't you jine?' says they.
“`Wal, boys,' says I, `I kind o' don't feel jest like
j'inin'. I sort o' ain't clear about the rights on't:
seems to me it's mighty nigh like goin' to the Devil
for money.'
“`Wal,' says Mother Hokum, `what if 'tis?
Money's money, get it how ye will; and the Devil's
money 'll buy as much meat as any. I'd go to the
Devil, if he gave good money.'
“`Wal, I guess I wouldn't,' says I. `Don't you
'member the sermon Parson Lothrop preached about
hastin' to be rich, last sabba' day?'
“`Parson Lothrop be hanged!' says she. `Wal,
now,' says she, `I like to see a parson with his silk
stockin's and great gold-headed cane, a lollopin' on
his carriage behind his fat, prancin' hosses, comin' to
-- 114 --
[figure description] Page 114.[end figure description]
meetin' to preach to us poor folks not to want to be
rich! How'd he like it to have forty-'leven children,
and nothin' to put onto 'em or into 'em, I wonder?
Guess if Lady Lothrop had to rub and scrub, and
wear her fingers to the bone as I do, she'd want to
be rich; and I guess the parson, if he couldn't get a
bellyful for a week, would be for diggin' up Kidd's
money, or doing 'most any thing else to make the pot
bile.'
“`Wal,' says I, `I'll kind o' go with ye, boys, and
sort o' see how things turn out; but I guess I won't
take no shere in't,' says I.
“Wal, they got it all planned out. They was to
wait till the full moon, and then they was to get
Primus King to go with 'em and help do the diggin'.
Ye see, Hokum and Toddy Whitney and Wiggin are
all putty softly fellers, and hate dreffully to work;
and I tell you the Kidd money ain't to be got without
a pretty tough piece o' diggin'. Why, it's jest like
diggin' a well to get at it. Now, Primus King was
the master hand for diggin' wells, and so they said
they'd get him by givin' on him a shere.
“Harry Wiggin he didn't want no nigger a sherin'
-- 115 --
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in it, he said; but Toddy and Hokum they said that
when there was such stiff diggin' to be done, they
didn't care if they did go in with a nigger.
“Wal, Wiggin he said he hadn't no objection to
havin' the nigger do the diggin,' it was sherin' the
profits he objected to.
“`Wal,' says Hokum, `you can't get him without,'
says he. `Primus knows too much,' says he: `you
can't fool him.' Finally they 'greed that they was to
give Primus twenty dollars, and shere the treasure
'mong themselves.
“Come to talk with Primus, he wouldn't stick in a
spade, unless they'd pay him aforehand. Ye see, Primus
was up to 'em; he knowed about Gidger, and
there wa'n't none on 'em that was particular good
pay; and so they all jest hed to rake and scrape, and
pay him down the twenty dollars among 'em; and
they 'greed for the fust full moon, at twelve o'clock
at night, the 9th of October.
“Wal, ye see I had to tell Hepsy I was goin' out to
watch. Wal, so I was; but not jest in the way she
took it: but, Lordy massy! a feller has to tell his wife
suthin' to keep her quiet, ye know, 'specially Hepsy.
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“Wal, wal, of all the moonlight nights that ever I
did see, I never did see one equal to that. Why,
you could see the color o' every thing. I 'member I
could see how the huckleberry-bushes on the rock
was red as blood when the moonlight shone through
'em; 'cause the leaves, you see, had begun to turn.
“Goin' on our way we got to talkin' about the
sperits.
“`I ain't afraid on 'em,' says Hokum. `What
harm can a sperit do me?' says he. `I don't care ef
there's a dozen on 'em;' and he took a swig at his
bottle.
“`Oh! there ain't no sperits,' says Harry Wiggin.
`That 'are talk's all nonsense;' and he took a swig
at his bottle.
“`Wal,' says Toddy, `I don't know 'bout that 'are.
Me and Ike Sanders has seen the sperits in the Cap'n
Brown house. We thought we'd jest have a peek
into the window one night; and there was a whole
flock o' black colts without no heads on come rushin'
on us and knocked us flat.'
“`I expect you'd been at the tahvern,' said Hokum.
“`Wal, yes, we had; but them was sperits: we
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wa'n't drunk, now; we was jest as sober as ever we
was.'
“`Wal, they won't get away my money,' says Primus,
for I put it safe away in Dinah's teapot afore I
come out;' and then he showed all his ivories from
ear to ear. `I think all this 'are's sort o' foolishness,'
says Primus.
“`Wal,' says I, `boys, I ain't a goin' to have no
part or lot in this 'ere matter, but I'll jest lay it off to
you how it's to be done. Ef Kidd's money is under
this rock, there's sperits that watch it, and you
mustn't give 'em no advantage. There mustn't be a
word spoke from the time ye get sight o' the treasure
till ye get it safe up on to firm ground,' says I.
`Ef ye do, it'll vanish right out o' sight. I've talked
with them that has dug down to it and seen it;
but they allers lost it, 'cause they'd call out and
say suthin'; and the minute they spoke, away it
went.'
“Wal, so they marked off the ground; and Primus
he begun to dig, and the rest kind o' sot round.
It was so still it was kind o' solemn. Ye see, it was
past twelve o'clock, and every critter in Oldtown
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was asleep; and there was two whippoorwills on the
great Cap'n Brown elm-trees, that kep' a answerin'
each other back and forward sort o' solitary like; and
then every once in a while there'd come a sort o'
strange whisper up among the elm-tree leaves, jest
as if there was talkin' goin' on; and every time Primus
struck his spade into the ground it sounded sort
o' holler, jest as if he'd been a diggin' a grave. `It's
kind o' melancholy,' says, I, `to think o' them poor
critters that had to be killed and buried jest to keep
this 'ere treasure. What awful things 'll be brought
to light in the judgment day! Them poor critters
they loved to live and hated to die as much as any
on us; but no, they hed to die jest to satisfy that
critter's wicked will. I've heard them as thought
they could tell the Cap'n Kidd places by layin' their
ear to the ground at midnight, and they'd hear
groans and wailin's.”
“Why, Sam! were there really people who could
tell where Kidd's money was?” I here interposed.
“Oh, sartin! why, yis. There was Shebna Bascom,
he was one. Shebna could always tell what was under
the earth. He'd cut a hazel-stick, and hold it in
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his hand when folks was wantin' to know where to
dig wells; and that 'are stick would jest turn in his
hand, and p'int down till it would fairly grind the
bark off; and ef you dug in that place you was sure
to find a spring. Oh, yis! Shebna he's told many
where the Kidd money was, and been with 'em when
they dug for it; but the pester on't was they allers
lost it, 'cause they would some on 'em speak afore
they thought.”
“But, Sam, what about this digging? Let's
know what came of it,” said we, as Sam appeared to
lose his way in his story.
“Wal, ye see, they dug down about five feet, when
Primus he struck his spade smack on something that
chincked like iron.
“Wal, then Hokum and Toddy Whitney was into
the hole in a minute: they made Primus get out, and
they took the spade, 'cause they wanted to be sure to
come on it themselves.
“Wal, they begun, and they dug and he scraped,
and sure enough they come to a gret iron pot as big
as your granny's dinner-pot, with an iron bale to it.
“Wal, then they put down a rope, and he put the
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rope through the handle; then Hokum and Toddy they
clambered upon the bank, and all on 'em began to draw
up jest as still and silent as could be. They drawed and
they drawed, till they jest got it even with the ground,
when Toddy spoke out all in a tremble, `There,'
says he, `we've got it!' And the minit he spoke
they was both struck by suthin' that knocked 'em
clean over; and the rope give a crack like a pistolshot,
and broke short off; and the pot went down,
down, down, and they heard it goin', jink, jink, jink;
and it went way down into the earth, and the ground
closed over it; and then they heard the screechin'est
laugh ye ever did hear.”
“I want to know, Sam, did you see that pot?” I
exclaimed at this part of the story.
“Wal, no, I didn't. Ye see, I jest happened to
drop asleep while they was diggin', I was so kind o'
tired, and I didn't wake up till it was all over.
“I was waked up, 'cause there was consid'able of
a scuffle; for Hokum was so mad at Toddy for
speakin', that he was a fistin' on him; and old Primus
he jest haw-hawed and laughed. `Wal, I got
my money safe, anyhow,' says he.
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“`Wal, come to,' says I. `'Tain't no use cryin'
for spilt milk: you've jest got to turn in now and fill
up this 'ere hole, else the selectmen 'll be down on
ye.'
“`Wal,' says Primus, `I didn't engage to fill up
no holes;' and he put his spade on his shoulder and
trudged off.
“Wal, it was putty hard work, fillin' in that hole;
but Hokum and Toddy and Wiggin had to do it,
'cause they didn't want to have everybody a laughin'
at 'em; and I kind o' tried to set it home to 'em,
showin' on 'em that 'twas all for the best.
“`Ef you'd a been left to get that 'are money,
there'd a come a cuss with it,' says I. `It shows the
vanity o' hastin' to be rich.'
“`Oh, you shet up!' says Hokum, says he. `You
never hasted to any thing,' says he. Ye see, he was
riled, that's why he spoke so.”
“Sam,” said we, after maturely reflecting over the
story, “what do you suppose was in that pot?”
“Lordy massy! boys: ye never will be done askin'
questions. Why, how should I know?”
-- 122 -- p703-163
“MIS' ELDERKIN'S PITCHER. ”
[figure description] Page 122.[end figure description]
YE see, boys,” said Sam Lawson, as we
were gathering young wintergreen on a
sunny hillside in June, — “ye see, folks
don't allers know what their marcies is
when they sees 'em. Folks is kind o'
blinded; and, when a providence comes
along, they don't seem to know how to
take it, and they growl and grumble about what turns
out the best things that ever happened to 'em in their
lives. It 's like Mis' Elderkin's pitcher.”
“What about Mis' Elderkin's pitcher?” said both
of us in one breath.
“Didn't I never tell ye, now?” said Sam: “why,
I wanter know?”
No, we were sure he never had told us; and Sam,
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as usual, began clearing the ground by a thorough introduction,
with statistical expositions.
“Wal, ye see, Mis' Elderkin she lives now over to
Sherburne in about the handsomest house in Sherburne, —
a high white house, with green blinds and
white pillars in front, — and she rides out in her own
kerridge; and Mr. Elderkin, he 's a deakin in the
church, and a colonel in the malitia, and a s'lectman,
and pretty much atop every thing there is goin' in
Sherburne, and it all come of that 'are pitcher.”
“What pitcher?” we shouted in chorus.
“Lordy massy! that 'are 's jest what I 'm a goin'
to tell you about; but, ye see, a feller's jest got to
make a beginnin' to all things.
“Mis' Elderkin she thinks she's a gret lady nowadays,
I s'pose; but I 'member when she was Miry
Brown over here 'n Oldtown, and I used to be waitin'
on her to singing-school.
“Miry and I was putty good friends along in them
days, — we was putty consid'able kind o' intimate.
Fact is, boys, there was times in them days when I
thought whether or no I wouldn't take Miry myself,”
said Sam, his face growing luminous with the
-- 124 --
[figure description] Page 124.[end figure description]
pleasing idea of his former masculine attractions and privileges.
“Yis,” he continued, “there was a time
when folks said I could a hed Miry ef I'd asked her;
and I putty much think so myself, but I didn't say
nothin': marriage is allers kind o' ventursome; an'
Miry had such up-and-down kind o' ways, I was sort
o' fraid on 't.
“But Lordy massy! boys, you mustn't never tell
Hepsy I said so, 'cause she'd be mad enough to bite a
shingle-nail in two. Not that she sets so very gret
by me neither; but then women's backs is allers up
ef they think anybody else could a hed you, whether
they want you themselves or not.
“Ye see, Miry she was old Black Hoss John
Brown's da'ter, and lived up there in that 'are big
brown house by the meetin'-house, that hes the red
hollyhock in the front yard. Miry was about the
handsomest gal that went into the singers' seat a
Sunday.
“I tell you she wa'n't none o' your milk-and-sugar
gals neither, — she was 'mazin' strong built. She
was the strongest gal in her arms that I ever see.
Why, I 've seen Miry take up a barrel o' flour, and lift
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it right into the kitchen; and it would jest make the
pink come into her cheeks like two roses, but she
never seemed to mind it a grain. She had a good
strong back of her own, and she was straight as a
poplar, with snappin' black eyes, and I tell you there
was a snap to her tongue too. Nobody never got
ahead o' Miry; she'd give every fellow as good as he
sent, but for all that she was a great favorite.
“Miry was one o' your briery, scratchy gals, that
seems to catch fellers in thorns. She allers fit and
flouted her beaux, and the more she fit and flouted
'em the more they 'd be arter her. There wa'n't a
gal in all Oldtown that led such a string o' fellers arter
her; 'cause, you see, she'd now and then throw
'em a good word over her shoulder, and then they 'd
all fight who should get it, and she'd jest laugh to
see 'em do it.
“Why, there was Tom Sawin, he was one o' her
beaux, and Jim Moss, and Ike Bacon; and there was
a Boston boy, Tom Beacon, he came up from Cambridge
to rusticate with Parson Lothrop; he thought
he must have his say with Miry, but he got pretty
well come up with. You see, he thought 'cause he
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[figure description] Page 126.[end figure description]
was Boston born that he was kind o' aristocracy, and
hed a right jest to pick and choose 'mong country
gals; but the way he got come up with by Miry was
too funny for any thing.”
“Do tell us about it,” we said, as Sam made an
artful pause, designed to draw forth solicitation.
“Wal, ye see, Tom Beacon he told Ike Bacon about
it, and Ike he told me. 'Twas this way. Ye see,
there was a quiltin' up to Mis' Cap'n Broad's, and
Tom Beacon he was there; and come to goin' home
with the gals, Tom he cut Ike out, and got Miry all
to himself; and 'twas a putty long piece of a walk
from Mis' Cap'n Broad's up past the swamp and the
stone pastur' clear up to old Black Hoss John's.
“Wal, Tom he was in high feather 'cause Miry
took him, so that he didn't reelly know how to behave;
and so, as they was walkin' along past Parson
Lothrop's apple-orchard, Tom thought he'd try bein'
familiar, and he undertook to put his arm round Miry.
Wal, if she didn't jest take that little fellow by his
two shoulders and whirl him over the fence into the
orchard quicker 'n no time. `Why,' says Tom, `the
fust I knew I was lyin' on my back under the
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[figure description] Page 127.[end figure description]
appletrees lookin' up at the stars.' Miry she jest walked
off home and said nothin' to nobody, — it wa'n't her
way to talk much about things; and, if it hedn't
ben for Tom Beacon himself, nobody need 'a' known
nothin' about it. Tom was a little fellow, you see,
and 'mazin' good-natured, and one o' the sort that
couldn't keep nothin' to himself; and so he let the
cat out o' the bag himself. Wal, there didn't nobody
think the worse o' Miry. When fellers find a gal
won't take saace from no man, they kind o' respect
her; and then fellers allers thinks ef it hed ben them,
now, things 'd 'a' been different. That's jest what
Jim Moss and Ike Bacon said: they said, why Tom
Beacon was a fool not to know better how to get
along with Miry, — they never had no trouble. The
fun of it was, that Tom Beacon himself was more
crazy after her than he was afore; and they say he
made Miry a right up-and-down offer, and Miry she
jest wouldn't have him.
“Wal, you see, that went agin old Black Hoss
John's idees: old Black Hoss was about as close as
a nut and as contrairy as a pipperage-tree. You
ought to 'a' seen him. Why, his face was all a
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[figure description] Page 128.[end figure description]
perfect crisscross o' wrinkles. There wa'n't a spot where
you could put a pin down that there wa'n't a wrinkle;
and they used to say that he held on to every
cent that went through his fingers till he'd pinched
it into two. You couldn't say that his god was his
belly, for he hedn't none, no more'n an old file: folks
said that he'd starved himself till the moon'd shine
through him.
“Old Black Hoss was awfully grouty about Miry's
refusin' Tom Beacon, 'cause there was his houses and
lots o' land in Boston. A drefful worldly old critter
Black Hoss John was: he was like the rich fool in
the gospel. Wal, he's dead and gone now, poor critter,
and what good has it all done him? It's as the
Scriptur' says, `He heapeth up riches, and knoweth
not who shall gather them.'
“Miry hed a pretty hard row to hoe with old Black
Hoss John. She was up early and down late, and
kep' every thing a goin'. She made the cheese and
made the butter, and between spells she braided herself
handsome straw bunnets, and fixed up her
clothes; and somehow she worked it so when she
sold her butter and cheese that there was somethin'
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[figure description] Page 129.[end figure description]
for ribbins and flowers. You know the Scriptur'
says, `Can a maid forget her ornaments?' Wal,
Miry didn't. I 'member I used to lead the singin' in
them days, and Miry she used to sing counter, so we
sot putty near together in the singers' seats; and I
used to think Sunday mornin's when she come to
meetin' in her white dress and her red cheeks, and
her bunnet all tipped off with laylock, that 'twas for
all the world jest like sunshine to have her come
into the singers' seats. Them was the days that I
didn't improve my privileges, boys,” said Sam, sighing
deeply. “There was times that ef I'd a spoke,
there's no knowin' what mightn't 'a' happened, 'cause,
you see, boys, I was better lookin' in them days than
I be now. Now you mind, boys, when you grow up,
ef you get to waitin' on a nice gal, and you're 'most
a mind to speak up to her, don't you go and put it
off, 'cause, ef you do, you may live to repent it.
“Wal, you see, from the time that Bill Elderkin
come and took the academy, I could see plain
enough that it was time for me to hang up my fiddle.
Bill he used to set in the singers' seats, too,
and he would have it that he sung tenor. He no
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[figure description] Page 130.[end figure description]
more sung tenor than a skunk-blackbird; but he
made b'lieve he did, jest to git next to Miry in the
singers' seats. They used to set there in the seats a
writin' backward and forward to each other till they
tore out all the leaves of the hymn-books, and the
singin'-books besides. Wal, I never thought that the
house o' the Lord was jest the place to be courtin'
in, and I used to get consid'able shocked at the way
things went on atween 'em. Why, they'd be a
writin' all sermon-time; and I've seen him a lookin'
at her all through the long prayer in a way that
wa'n't right, considerin' they was both professors of
religion. But then the fact was, old Black Hoss
John was to blame for it, 'cause he never let 'em
have no chance to hum. Ye see, old Black Hoss
he was sot agin Elderkin 'cause he was poor. You
see, his mother, the old Widdah Elderkin, she was
jest about the poorest, peakedest old body over to
Sherburne, and went out to days' works; and Bill
Elderkin he was all for books and larnin', and old
Black Hoss John he thought it was just shiftlessness:
but Miry she thought he was a genius; and she got
it sot in her mind that he was goin' to be President
o' the United States, or some sich.
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[figure description] Page 131.[end figure description]
“Wal, old Black Hoss he wa'n't none too polite
to Miry's beaux in gineral, but when Elderkin used
to come to see her he was snarlier than a saw: he
hadn't a good word for him noways; and he'd rake
up the fire right before his face and eyes, and rattle
about fastenin' up the windows, and tramp up to
bed, and call down the chamber-stairs to Miry to go
to bed, and was sort o' aggravatin' every way.
“Wal, ef folks wants to get a gal set on havin' a
man, that 'ere's the way to go to work. Miry had
a consid'able stiff will of her own; and, ef she didn't
care about Tom Beacon before, she hated him now;
and, if she liked Bill Elderkin before, she was clean
gone over to him now. And so she took to goin' to
the Wednesday-evenin' lecture, and the Friday-evenin'
prayer-meetin', and the singin'-school, jest as
regular as a clock, and so did he; and arterwards
they allers walked home the longest way. Fathers
may jest as well let their gals be courted in the
house, peaceable, 'cause, if they can't be courted
there, they'll find places where they can be: it's jest
human natur'.
“Wal, come fall, Elderkin he went to college up to
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[figure description] Page 132.[end figure description]
Brunswick; and then I used to see the letters as
regular up to the store every week, comin' in from
Brunswick, and old Black Hoss John he see 'em too,
and got a way of droppin' on 'em in his coat-pocket
when he come up to the store, and folks used to say
that the letters that went into his coat-pocket didn't
get to Miry. Anyhow, Miry she says to me one
day, says she, `Sam, you're up round the post-office
a good deal,' says she. `I wish, if you see any letters
for me, you'd jest bring 'em along.' I see right
into it, and I told her to be sure I would; and so I
used to have the carryin' of great thick letters every
week. Wal, I was waitin' on Hepsy along about
them times, and so Miry and I kind o' sympathized.
Hepsy was a pretty gal, and I thought it was all
best as 'twas; any way, I knew I couldn't get Miry,
and I could get Hepsy, and that made all the difference
in the world.
“Wal, that next winter old Black Hoss was took
down with rheumatism, and I tell you if Miry didn't
have a time on't! He wa'n't noways sweet-tempered
when he was well; but come to be crooked
up with the rheumatis' and kep' awake nights, it
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seemed as if he was determined there shouldn't nobody
have no peace so long as he couldn't.
“He'd get Miry up and down with him night
after night a makin' her heat flannels and vinegar,
and then he'd jaw and scold so that she was eenymost
beat out. He wouldn't have nobody set up with
him, though there was offers made. No: he said
Miry was his daughter, and 'twas her bisness to
take care on him.
“Miry was clear worked down: folks kind o'
pitied her. She was a strong gal, but there's things
that wears out the strongest. The worst on't was, it
hung on so. Old Black Hoss had a most amazin'
sight o' constitution. He'd go all down to death's
door, and seem hardly to have the breath o' life in
him, and then up he'd come agin! These 'ere old
folks that nobody wants to have live allers hev such
a sight o' wear in 'em, they jest last and last; and
it really did seem as if he'd wear Miry out and get
her into the grave fust, for she got a cough with
bein' up so much in the cold, and grew thin as a
shadder. 'Member one time I went up there to
offer to watch jest in the spring o' the year, when
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[figure description] Page 134.[end figure description]
the laylocks was jest a buddin' out, and Miry she
come and talked with me over the fence; and the
poor gal she fairly broke down, and sobbed as if her
heart would break, a tellin' me her trouble.
“Wal, it reelly affected me more to have Miry
give up so than most gals, 'cause she'd allers held
her head up, and hed sich a sight o' grit and resolution;
but she told me all about it.
“It seems old Black Hoss he wa'n't content with
worryin' on her, and gettin' on her up nights, but he
kep' a hectorin' her about Bill Elderkin, and wantin'
on her to promise that she wouldn't hev Bill when
he was dead and gone; and Miry she wouldn't promise,
and then the old man said she shouldn't have a
cent from him if she didn't, and so they had it back
and forth. Everybody in town was sayin' what a
shame 'twas that he should sarve her so; for though
he hed other children, they was married and gone,
and there wa'n't none of them to do for him but
jest Miry.
“Wal, he hung on till jest as the pinys in the
front yard was beginnin' to blow out, and then he
began to feel he was a goin', and he sent for Parson
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[figure description] Page 135.[end figure description]
Lothrop to know what was to be done about his
soul.
“`Wal,' says Parson Lothrop, `you must settle
up all your worldly affairs; you must be in peace
and love with all mankind; and, if you've wronged
anybody, you must make it good to 'em.'
“Old Black Hoss he bounced right over in his
bed with his back to the minister.
“`The devil!' says he: `'twill take all I've
got.' And he never spoke another word, though
Parson Lothrop he prayed with him, and did what
he could for him.
“Wal, that night I sot up with him; and he
went off 'tween two and three in the mornin', and
I laid him out regular. Of all the racks o' bone I
ever see, I never see a human critter so poor as
he was. 'Twa'n't nothin' but his awful will kep'
his soul in his body so long, as it was.
“We had the funeral in the meetin'-house a Sunday;
and Parson Lothrop he preached a sarmon on
contentment on the text, `We brought nothin' into
the world, and it's sartin we can carry nothin' out;
and having food and raiment, let us be therewith
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[figure description] Page 136.[end figure description]
content.' Parson Lothrop he got round the subject
about as handsome as he could: he didn't say what
a skinflint old Black Hoss was, but he talked in a gin
eral way about the vanity o' worryin' an' scrapin'
to heap up riches. Ye see, Parson Lothrop he could
say it all putty easy, too, 'cause since he married a
rich wife he never hed no occasion to worry about
temporal matters. Folks allers preaches better on
the vanity o' riches when they's in tol'able easy
circumstances. Ye see, when folks is pestered and
worried to pay their bills, and don't know where
the next dollar's to come from, it's a great temptation
to be kind o' valooin' riches, and mebbe envyin'
those that's got 'em; whereas when one's accounts
all pays themselves, and the money comes
jest when its wanted regular, a body feels sort o'
composed like, and able to take the right view o'
things, like Parson Lothrop.
“Wal, arter sermon the relations all went over to
the old house to hear the will read; and, as I was kind
o' friend with the family, I jest slipped in along with
the rest.
“Squire Jones he had the will; and so when they all
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got sot round all solemn, he broke the seals and unfolded
it, cracklin' it a good while afore he begun;
and it was so still you might a heard a pin drop when
he begun to read. Fust, there was the farm and
stock, he left to his son John Brown over in Sherburne.
Then there was the household stuff and all
them things, spoons and dishes, and beds and kiverlids,
and so on, to his da'ter Polly Blanchard. And
then, last of all, he says, he left to his da'ter Miry
the pitcher that was on the top o' the shelf in his bedroom
closet.
“That 'are was an old cracked pitcher that Miry allers
hed hated the sight of, and spring and fall she used
to beg her father to let her throw it away; but no,
he wouldn't let her touch it, and so it stood gatherin'
dust.
“Some on 'em run and handed it down; and it
seemed jest full o' scourin'-sand and nothin' else, and
they handed it to Miry.
“Wal, Miry she was wrathy then. She didn't so
much mind bein' left out in the will, 'cause she expected
that; but to have that 'are old pitcher poked at
her so sort o' scornful was more'n she could bear.
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“She took it and gin it a throw across the room
with all her might; and it hit agin the wall and broke
into a thousand bits, when out rolled hundreds of
gold pieces; great gold eagles and guineas flew round
the kitchen jest as thick as dandelions in a meadow.
I tell you, she scrabbled them up pretty quick, and
we all helped her.
“Come to count 'em over, Miry had the best fortin
of the whole, as 'twas right and proper she
should. Miry she was a sensible gal, and she invested
her money well; and so, when Bill Elderkin
got through his law-studies, he found a wife that
could make a nice beginnin' with him. And that's
the way, you see, they came to be doin' as well as
they be.
“So, boys, you jest mind and remember and allers
see what there is in a providence afore you quarrel
with it, 'cause there's a good many things in this
world turns out like Mis' Elderkin's pitcher.”
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“Great gold eagles and guineas flew round the kitchen.“—Page 138.
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-- 139 -- p703-184
THE GHOST IN THE CAP'N BROWN HOUSE.
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HOW, Sam, tell us certain true, is there
any such things as ghosts?”
“Be there ghosts?” said Sam, immediately
translating into his vernacular
grammar: “wal, now, that are's jest
the question, ye see.”
“Well, grandma thinks there are, and
Aunt Lois thinks it's all nonsense. Why, Aunt Lois
don't even believe the stories in Cotton Mather's
`Magnalia.'”
“Wanter know?” said Sam, with a tone of slow,
languid meditation.
We were sitting on a bank of the Charles River,
fishing. The soft melancholy red of evening was
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fading off in streaks on the glassy water, and the
houses of Oldtown were beginning to loom through
the gloom, solemn and ghostly. There are times
and tones and moods of nature that make all the
vulgar, daily real seem shadowy, vague, and supernatural,
as if the outlines of this hard material present
were fading into the invisible and unknown. So
Oldtown, with its elm-trees, its great square white
houses, its meeting-house and tavern and blacksmith's
shop and mill, which at high noon seem as
real and as commonplace as possible, at this hour of
the evening were dreamy and solemn. They rose up
blurred, indistinct, dark; here and there winking
candles sent long lines of light through the shadows,
and little drops of unforeseen rain rippled the sheeny
darkness of the water.
“Wal, you see, boys, in them things it's jest as
well to mind your granny. There's a consid'able
sight o' gumption in grandmas. You look at the
folks that's allus tellin' you what they don't believe,—
they don't believe this, and they don't believe
that, — and what sort o' folks is they? Why, like
yer Aunt Lois, sort o' stringy and dry. There ain't
no 'sorption got out o' not believin' nothin'.
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“Lord a massy! we don't know nothin' 'bout them
things. We hain't ben there, and can't say that
there ain't no ghosts and sich; can we, now?”
We agreed to that fact, and sat a little closer to
Sam in the gathering gloom.
“Tell us about the Cap'n Brown house, Sam.”
“Ye didn't never go over the Cap'n Brown
house?”
No, we had not that advantage.
“Wal, yer see, Cap'n Brown he made all his
money to sea, in furrin parts, and then come here to
Oldtown to settle down.
“Now, there ain't no knowin' 'bout these 'ere old
ship-masters, where they's ben, or what they's ben a
doin', or how they got their money. Ask me no
questions, and I'll tell ye no lies, is 'bout the best
philosophy for them. Wal, it didn't do no good to
ask Cap'n Brown questions too close, 'cause you
didn't git no satisfaction. Nobody rightly knew
'bout who his folks was, or where they come from;
and, ef a body asked him, he used to say that the
very fust he know'd 'bout himself he was a young
man walkin' the streets in London.
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“But, yer see, boys, he hed money, and that is
about all folks wanter know when a man comes to
settle down. And he bought that 'are place, and
built that 'are house. He built it all sea-cap'n
fashion, so's to feel as much at home as he could.
The parlor was like a ship's cabin. The table and
chairs was fastened down to the floor, and the closets
was made with holes to set the casters and the
decanters and bottles in, jest's they be at sea;
and there was stanchions to hold on by; and they
say that blowy nights the cap'n used to fire up
pretty well with his grog, till he hed about all he
could carry, and then he'd set and hold on, and hear
the wind blow, and kind o' feel out to sea right
there to hum. There wasn't no Mis' Cap'n Brown,
and there didn't seem likely to be none. And
whether there ever hed been one, nobody know'd.
He hed an old black Guinea nigger-woman, named
Quassia, that did his work. She was shaped pretty
much like one o' these 'ere great crookneck-squashes.
She wa'n't no gret beauty, I can tell you; and she
used to wear a gret red turban and a yaller short
gown and red petticoat, and a gret string o' gold
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beads round her neck, and gret big gold hoops in
her ears, made right in the middle o' Africa among
the heathen there. For all she was black, she
thought a heap o' herself, and was consid'able sort
o' predominative over the cap'n. Lordy massy!
boys, it's allus so. Get a man and a woman together, —
any sort o' woman you're a mind to, don't care
who 'tis, — and one way or another she gets the rule
over him, and he jest has to train to her fife. Some
does it one way, and some does it another; some does
it by jawin', and some does it by kissin', and some
does it by faculty and contrivance; but one way or
another they allers does it. Old Cap'n Brown was a
good stout, stocky kind o' John Bull sort o' fellow,
and a good judge o' sperits, and allers kep' the best
in them are cupboards o' his'n; but, fust and last,
things in his house went pretty much as old Quassia
said.
“Folks got to kind o' respectin' Quassia. She
come to meetin' Sunday regular, and sot all fixed up
in red and yaller and green, with glass beads and
what not, lookin' for all the world like one o' them
ugly Indian idols; but she was well-behaved as any
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Christian. She was a master hand at cookin'. Her
bread and biscuits couldn't be beat, and no couldn't
her pies, and there wa'n't no such pound-cake as she
made nowhere. Wal, this 'ere story I'm a goin' to
tell you was told me by Cinthy Pendleton. There
ain't a more respectable gal, old or young, than
Cinthy nowheres. She lives over to Sherburne now,
and I hear tell she's sot up a manty-makin' business;
but then she used to do tailorin' in Oldtown. She
was a member o' the church, and a good Christian as
ever was. Wal, ye see, Quassia she got Cinthy to
come up and spend a week to the Cap'n Brown
house, a doin' tailorin' and a fixin' over his close:
'twas along toward the fust o' March. Cinthy she
sot by the fire in the front parlor with her goose and
her press-board and her work: for there wa'n't no
company callin', and the snow was drifted four feet
deep right across the front door; so there wa'n't
much danger o' any body comin' in. And the cap'n
he was a perlite man to wimmen; and Cinthy she
liked it jest as well not to have company, 'cause the
cap'n he'd make himself entertainin' tellin' on her
sea-stories, and all about his adventures among the
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Ammonites, and Perresites, and Jebusites, and all
sorts o' heathen people he'd been among.
“Wal, that 'are week there come on the master
snow-storm. Of all the snow-storms that hed ben,
that 'are was the beater; and I tell you the wind blew
as if 'twas the last chance it was ever goin' to hev.
Wal, it's kind o' scary like to be shet up in a lone
house with all natur' a kind o' breakin' out, and goin'
on so, and the snow a comin' down so thick ye can't
see 'cross the street, and the wind a pipin' and a
squeelin' and a rumblin' and a tumblin' fust down this
chimney and then down that. I tell you, it sort o'
sets a feller thinkin' o' the three great things, —
death, judgment, and etarnaty; and I don't care who
the folks is, now how good they be, there's times
when they must be feelin' putty consid'able solemn.
“Wal, Cinthy she said she kind o' felt so along,
and she hed a sort o' queer feelin' come over her as
if there was somebody or somethin' round the house
more'n appeared. She said she sort o' felt it in the
air; but it seemed to her silly, and she tried to get
over it. But two or three times, she said, when it
got to be dusk, she felt somebody go by her up the
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stairs. The front entry wa'n't very light in the day-time,
and in the storm, come five o'clock, it was so
dark that all you could see was jest a gleam o' somethin',
and two or three times when she started to go
up stairs she see a soft white suthin' that seemed
goin' up before her, and she stopped with her heart a
beatin' like a trip-hammer, and she sort o' saw it go
up and along the entry to the cap'n's door, and then
it seemed to go right through, 'cause the door didn't
open.
“Wal, Cinthy says she to old Quassia, says she,
`Is there anybody lives in this house but us?'
“`Anybody lives here?' says Quassia: `what you
mean?' says she.
“Says Cinthy, `I thought somebody went past me
on the stairs last night and to-night.'
“Lordy massy! how old Quassia did screech and
laugh. `Good Lord!' says she, `how foolish white
folks is! Somebody went past you? Was't the
capt'in?'
“`No, it wa'n't the cap'n,' says she: `it was
somethin' soft and white, and moved very still; it
was like somethin' in the air,' says she.
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Then Quassia she haw-hawed louder. Says she,
`It's hy-sterikes, Miss Cinthy; that's all it is.'
“Wal, Cinthy she was kind o' 'shamed, but for all
that she couldn't help herself. Sometimes evenin's
she'd be a settin' with the cap'n, and she'd think she'd
hear somebody a movin' in his room overhead; and
she knowed it wa'n't Quassia, 'cause Quassia was
ironin' in the kitchen. She took pains once or twice
to find out that 'are.
“Wal, ye see, the cap'n's room was the gret front
upper chamber over the parlor, and then right oppisite
to it was the gret spare chamber where Cinthy
slept. It was jest as grand as could be, with a gret
four-post mahogany bedstead and damask curtains
brought over from England; but it was cold enough
to freeze a white bear solid, — the way spare chambers
allers is. Then there was the entry between,
run straight through the house: one side was old
Quassia's room, and the other was a sort o' store-room,
where the old cap'n kep' all sorts o' traps.
“Wal, Cinthy she kep' a hevin' things happen and
a seein' things, till she didn't railly know what was
in it. Once when she come into the parlor jest at
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sundown, she was sure she see a white figure a vanishin'
out o' the door that went towards the side
entry. She said it was so dusk, that all she could see
was jest this white figure, and it jest went out still as
a cat as she come in.
“Wal, Cinthy didn't like to speak to the cap'n
about it. She was a close woman, putty prudent,
Cinthy was.
“But one night, 'bout the middle o' the week, this
'ere thing kind o' come to a crisis.
“Cinthy said she'd ben up putty late a sewin' and
a finishin' off down in the parlor; and the cap'n he
sot up with her, and was consid'able cheerful and
entertainin', tellin' her all about things over in the
Bermudys, and off to Chiny and Japan, and round
the world ginerally. The storm that hed been a
blowin' all the week was about as furious as ever;
and the cap'n he stirred up a mess o' flip, and hed it
for her hot to go to bed on. He was a good-natured
critter, and allers had feelin's for lone women; and I
s'pose he knew 'twas sort o' desolate for Cinthy.
“Wal, takin' the flip so right the last thing afore
goin' to bed, she went right off to sleep as sound as
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“She stood there, lookin' right at Cinthy.”—Page 149.
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-- 149 --
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a nut, and slep' on till somewhere about mornin',
when she said somethin' waked her broad awake in a
minute. Her eyes flew wide open like a spring, and
the storm hed gone down and the moon come out;
and there, standin' right in the moonlight by her bed,
was a woman jest as white as a sheet, with black hair
hangin' down to her waist, and the brightest, mourn
fullest black eyes you ever see. She stood there
lookin' right at Cinthy; and Cinthy thinks that was
what waked her up; 'cause, you know, ef anybody
stands and looks steady at folks asleep it's apt to
wake 'em.
“Any way, Cinthy said she felt jest as ef she was
turnin' to stone. She couldn't move nor speak.
She lay a minute, and then she shut her eyes, and
begun to say her prayers; and a minute after she
opened 'em, and it was gone.
“Cinthy was a sensible gal, and one that allers
hed her thoughts about her; and she jest got up and
put a shawl round her shoulders, and went first and
looked at the doors, and they was both on 'em locked
jest as she left 'em when she went to bed. Then
she looked under the bed and in the closet, and
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felt all round the room: where she couldn't see she
felt her way, and there wa'n't nothin' there.
“Wal, next mornin' Cinthy got up and went
home, and she kep' it to herself a good while.
Finally, one day when she was workin' to our house
she told Hepsy about it, and Hepsy she told me.”
“Well, Sam,” we said, after a pause, in which we
heard only the rustle of leaves and the ticking of
branches against each other, “what do you suppose
it was?”
“Wal, there 'tis: you know jest as much about
it as I do. Hepsy told Cinthy it might 'a' ben a
dream; so it might, but Cinthy she was sure it
wa'n't a dream, 'cause she remembers plain hearin'
the old clock on the stairs strike four while she had
her eyes open lookin' at the woman; and then she
only shet 'em a minute, jest to say `Now I lay me,'
and opened 'em and she was gone.
“Wal, Cinthy told Hepsy, and Hepsy she kep' it
putty close. She didn't tell it to nobody except
Aunt Sally Dickerson and the Widder Bije Smith
and your Grandma Badger and the minister's wife;
and they every one o' 'em 'greed it ought to be kep'
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close, 'cause it would make talk. Wal, come spring,
somehow or other it seemed to 'a' got all over Oldtown.
I heard on 't to the store and up to the tavern;
and Jake Marshall he says to me one day,
`What's this 'ere about the cap'n's house?' And
the Widder Loker she says to me, `There's ben a
ghost seen in the cap'n's house;' and I heard on 't
clear over to Needham and Sherburne.
“Some o' the women they drew themselves up
putty stiff and proper. Your Aunt Lois was one on
'em.
“`Ghost,' says she; `don't tell me! Perhaps it
would be best ef 'twas a ghost,' says she. She
didn't think there ought to be no sich doin's in nobody's
house; and your grandma she shet her up,
and told her she didn't oughter talk so.”
“Talk how?” said I, interrupting Sam with wonder.
“What did Aunt Lois mean?”
“Why, you see,” said Sam mysteriously, “there
allers is folks in every town that's jest like the
Sadducees in old times: they won't believe in angel
nor sperit, no way you can fix it; and ef things is
seen and done in a house, why, they say, it's 'cause
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there's somebody there; there's some sort o' deviltry
or trick about it.
“So the story got round that there was a woman
kep' private in Cap'n Brown's house, and that he
brought her from furrin parts; and it growed and
growed, till there was all sorts o' ways o' tellin on 't.
“Some said they'd seen her a settin' at an open
winder. Some said that moonlight nights they'd
seen her a walkin' out in the back garden kind o' in
and out 'mong the bean-poles and squash-vines.
“You see, it come on spring and summer; and the
winders o' the Cap'n Brown house stood open, and
folks was all a watchin' on 'em day and night. Aunt
Sally Dickerson told the minister's wife that she'd
seen in plain daylight a woman a settin' at the
chamber winder atween four and five o'clock in the
mornin', — jist a settin' a lookin' out and a doin'
nothin', like anybody else. She was very white and
pale, and had black eyes.
“Some said that it was a nun the cap'n had
brought away from a Roman Catholic convent in
Spain, and some said he'd got her out o' the Inquisition.
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“Aunt Sally said she thought the minister ought
to call and inquire why she didn't come to meetin',
and who she was, and all about her: 'cause, you see,
she said it might be all right enough ef folks only
know'd jest how things was; but ef they didn't,
why, folks will talk.”
“Well, did the minister do it?”
“What, Parson Lothrop? Wal, no, he didn't.
He made a call on the cap'n in a regular way, and
asked arter his health and all his family. But the
cap'n he seemed jest as jolly and chipper as a spring
robin, and he gin the minister some o' his old
Jamaiky; and the minister he come away and said
he didn't see nothin'; and no he didn't. Folks
never does see nothin' when they aint' lookin' where
'tis. Fact is, Parson Lothrop wa'n't fond o' interferin';
he was a master hand to slick things over.
Your grandma she used to mourn about it, 'cause
she said he never gin no p'int to the doctrines; but
'twas all of a piece, he kind o' took every thing the
smooth way.
“But your grandma she believed in the ghost,
and so did Lady Lothrop. I was up to her house
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t'other day fixin' a door-knob, and says she, `Sam,
your wife told me a strange story about the Cap'n
Brown house.'
“`Yes, ma'am, she did,' says I.
“`Well, what do you think of it?' says she.
“`Wal, sometimes I think, and then agin I don't
know,' says I. `There's Cinthy she's a member o'
the church and a good pious gal,' says I.
“`Yes, Sam,' says Lady Lothrop, says she; `and
Sam,' says she, `it is jest like something that happened
once to my grandmother when she was livin'
in the old Province House in Bostin.' Says she,
`These 'ere things is the mysteries of Providence,
and it's jest as well not to have 'em too much talked
about.'
“`Jest so,' says I, — `jest so. That 'are's what
every woman I've talked with says; and I guess, fust
and last, I've talked with twenty, — good, safe
church-members, — and they's every one o' opinion
that this 'ere oughtn't to be talked about. Why,
over to the deakin's t'other night we went it all
over as much as two or three hours, and we concluded
that the best way was to keep quite still
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about it; and that's jest what they say over to Needham
and Sherburne. I've been all round a hushin'
this 'ere up, and I hain't found but a few people that
hedn't the particulars one way or another.' This 'ere
was what I says to Lady Lothrop. The fact was, I
never did see no report spread so, nor make sich sort
o' sarchin's o' heart, as this 'ere. It railly did beat
all; 'cause, ef 'twas a ghost, why there was the p'int
proved, ye see. Cinthy's a church-member, and she
see it, and got right up and sarched the room: but
then agin, ef 'twas a woman, why that 'are was kind
o' awful; it give cause, ye see, for thinkin' all sorts
o' things. There was Cap'n Brown, to be sure, he
wa'n't a church-member; but yet he was as honest
and regular a man as any goin', as fur as any on us
could see. To be sure, nobody know'd where he
come from, but that wa'n't no reason agin' him: this
'ere might a ben a crazy sister, or some poor critter
that he took out o' the best o' motives; and the
Scriptur' says, `Charity hopeth all things.' But
then, ye see, folks will talk, — that 'are's the pester
o' all these things, — and they did some on 'em
talk consid'able strong about the cap'n; but
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somehow or other, there didn't nobody come to the p'int
o' facin' on him down, and sayin' square out, `Cap'n
Brown, have you got a woman in your house, or
hain't you? or is it a ghost, or what is it?' Folks
somehow neverdoes come to that. Ye see, there was
the cap'n so respectable, a settin' up every Sunday
there in his pew, with his ruffles round his hands and
his red broadcloth cloak and his cocked hat. Why,
folks' hearts sort o' failed 'em when it come to sayin'
any thing right to him. They thought and kind o'
whispered round that the minister or the deakins
oughter do it: but Lordy massy! ministers, I s'pose,
has feelin's like the rest on us; they don't want to
eat all the hard cheeses that nobody else won't eat.
Anyhow, there wasn't nothin' said direct to the
cap'n; and jest for want o' that all the folks in Oldtown
kep' a bilin' and a bilin' like a kettle o' soap,
till it seemed all the time as if they'd bile over.
“Some o' the wimmen tried to get somethin' out
o' Quassy. Lordy massy! you might as well 'a' tried
to get it out an old tom-turkey, that'll strut and
gobble and quitter, and drag his wings on the ground,
and fly at you, but won't say nothin'. Quassy she
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screeched her queer sort o' laugh; and she told 'em
that they was a makin' fools o' themselves, and that
the cap'n's matters wa'n't none o' their bisness;
and that was true enough. As to goin' into Quassia's
room, or into any o' the store-rooms or closets
she kep' the keys of, you might as well hev gone
into a lion's den. She kep' all her places locked up
tight; and there was no gettin' at nothin' in the
Cap'n Brown house, else I believe some o' the wimmen
would 'a' sent a sarch-warrant.”
“Well,” said I, “what came of it? Didn't anybody
ever find out?”
“Wal,” said Sam, “it come to an end sort o', and
didn't come to an end. It was jest this 'ere way.
You see, along in October, jest in the cider-makin'
time, Abel Flint he was took down with dysentery
and died. You 'member the Flint house: it stood
on a little rise o' ground jest lookin' over towards
the Brown house. Wal, there was Aunt Sally
Dickerson and the Widder Bije Smith, they set up
with the corpse. He was laid out in the back chamber,
you see, over the milk-room and kitchen; but
there was cold victuals and sich in the front chamber,
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where the watchers sot. Wal, now, Aunt Sally she
told me that between three and four o'clock she
heard wheels a rumblin', and she went to the winder,
and it was clear starlight; and she see a coach come
up to the Cap'n Brown house; and she see the cap'n
come out bringin' a woman all wrapped in a cloak,
and old Quassy came arter with her arms full o' bundles;
and he put her into the kerridge, and shet her in,
and it driv off; and she see old Quassy stand lookin'
over the fence arter it. She tried to wake up the
widder, but 'twas towards mornin', and the widder
allers was a hard sleeper; so there wa'n't no witness
but her.”
“Well, then, it wasn't a ghost,” said I, “after all,
and it was a woman.”
“Wal, there 'tis, you see. Folks don't know that
'are yit, 'cause there it's jest as broad as 'tis long.
Now, look at it. There's Cinthy, she's a good, pious
gal: she locks her chamber-doors, both on 'em, and
goes to bed, and wakes up in the night, and there's a
woman there. She jest shets her eyes, and the woman's
gone. She gits up and looks, and both doors is
locked jest as she left 'em. That 'ere woman wa'n't
-- 159 --
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flesh and blood now, no way, — not such flesh and
blood as we knows on; but then they say Cinthy
might hev dreamed it!
“Wal, now, look at it t'other way. There's Aunt
Sally Dickerson; she's a good woman and a church-member:
wal, she sees a woman in a cloak with all
her bundles brought out o' Cap'n Brown's house, and
put into a kerridge, and driv off, atween three and
four o'clock in the mornin'. Wal, that 'ere shows
there must 'a' ben a real live woman kep' there privately,
and so what Cinthy saw wasn't a ghost.
“Wal, now, Cinthy says Aunt Sally might 'a'
dreamed it, — that she got her head so full o' stories
about the Cap'n Brown house, and watched it till she
got asleep, and hed this 'ere dream; and, as there
didn't nobody else see it, it might 'a' ben, you know.
Aunt Sally's clear she didn't dream, and then agin
Cinthy's clear she didn't dream; but which on 'em
was awake, or which on 'em was asleep, is what ain't
settled in Oldtown yet.”
-- 160 -- p703-209
COLONEL EPH'S SHOE-BUCKLES.
[figure description] Page 160.[end figure description]
YES, this 'ere's Tekawampait's grave,”
said Sam Lawson, sitting leisurely
down on an ancient grass-grown
mound, ornamented by a mossy black
slate-stone slab, with a rudely-carved
cherub head and wings on top.
“And who was Tekawampait?”
“I wanter know, now, if your granny hain't told
you who Tekawampait was?” said Sam, pushing
back his torn straw hat, and leaning against the old
slanting gravestone.
“No, she never told us.”
“Wal, ye see, Tekawampait he was the fust Christian
Indian minister o' the gospel there was in Oldtown.
He was a full-blooded Indian, but he was as
-- 161 --
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good a Christian as there was goin'; and he was
settled here over the church in Oldtown afore Parson
Peabody; and Parson Peabody he come afore
Parson Lothrop; and a very good minister Tekawampait
was too. Folks hes said that there couldn't
nothin' be made o' Indians; that they was nothin'
but sort o' bears and tigers a walkin' round on their
hind legs, a seekin' whom they might devour; but
Parson Eliot he didn't think so. `Christ died for
them as wal as for me,' says he; `and jest give 'em
the gospel,' says he, `and the rest'll come along o'
itself.' And so he come here to Oldtown, and sot
up a sort o' log-hut right on the spot where the old
Cap'n Brown house is now. Them two great elm-trees
that's a grown now each side o' the front gate
was two little switches then, that two Indians brought
up over their shoulders, and planted there for friendship
trees, as they called 'em; and now look what
trees they be! He used to stand under that 'are big
oak there, and preach to the Indians, long before
there was any meetin'-house to speak in here in
Oldtown.
“Wal, now, I tell you, it took putty good courage
-- 162 --
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in Parson Eliot to do that 'are. I tell you, in them
days it took putty consid'able faith to see any thing
in an Indian but jest a wild beast. Folks can't tell
by seein' on 'em now days what they was in the old
times when all the settlements was new, and the Indians
was stark, starin' wild, a ravin' and tarin' round
in the woods, and a fightin' each other and a fightin'
the white folks. Lordy massy! the stories I've heard
women tell in their chimbley-corners about the
things that used to happen when they was little was
enough to scare the very life out o' ye.”
“Oh, do, do tell us some of them!” said Henry
and I.
“Lordy massy, boys: why, ye wouldn't sleep for a
week. Why, ye don't know. Why, the Indians in
them days wa'n't like no critter ye ever did see.
They was jest the horridest, paintedest, screechin'est,
cussedest critters you ever heard on. They was jest
as artful as sarpents, and crueller than any tigers.
Good Dr. Cotton Mather calls 'em divils, and he was
a meek, good man, Dr. Cotton was; but they cut up
so in his days, it's no wonder he thought they was
divils, and not folks. Why, they kep' the whole
-- 163 --
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country in a broil for years and years. Nobody
knowed when they was safe; for they were so sly and
cunnin', and always watchin' behind fences and
bushes, and ready when a body was a least thinkin'
on't to be down on 'em. I've heard Abiel Jones tell
how his father's house was burnt down at the
time the Indians burnt Deerfield. About every house
in the settlement was burnt to the ground; and
then another time they burnt thirty-two houses in
Springfield, — the minister's house and all, with all
his library (and books was sca'ce in them days);
but the Indians made a clean sweep on't. They
burnt all the houses in Wendham down to the
ground; and they came down in Lancaster, and
burnt ever so many houses, and carried off forty or
fifty people with 'em into the woods.
“There was Mr. Rolandson, the minister, they
burnt his house, and carried off Mis' Rolandson and
all the children. There was Jerushy Pierce used
to work in his family and do washin' and chores,
she's told me about it. Jerushy she was away to
her uncle's that night, so she wa'n't took. Ye see,
the Lancaster folks had been afeard the Indians'd
-- 164 --
[figure description] Page 164.[end figure description]
be down on 'em, and so Parson Rolandson he'd
gone on to Boston to get help for 'em; and when
he come back the mischief was all done. Jerushy
said in all her life she never see nothin' so pitiful
as that 'are poor man's face when she met him, jest
as he come to the place where the house stood. At
fust he didn't say a word, she said, but he looked
kind o' dazed. Then he sort o' put his hand to
his forehead, and says he, `My God, my God, help
me!' Then he tried to ask her about it, but he
couldn't but jest speak. `Jerushy,' says he, `can't
you tell me, — where be they?' `Wal,' says Jerushy,
`they've been carried off.' And with that
he fell right down and moaned and groaned. `Oh!'
says he, `I'd rather heard that they were at peace
with the Lord.' And then he'd wring his hands:
`What shall I do? What shall I do?'
“Wal, 'twa'n't long after this that the Indians was
down on Medford, and burnt half the houses in town,
and killed fifty or sixty people there. Then they
came down on Northampton, but got driv' back; but
then they burnt up five houses, and killed four or
five of the folks afore they got the better of 'em
-- 165 --
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there. Then they burnt all the houses in Groton,
meetin'-house and all; and the pisen critters they
hollared and triumphed over the people, and called out
to 'em, `What will you do for a house to pray in
now? we've burnt your meetin'-house.' The fightin'
was goin' on all over the country at the same time.
The Indians set Marlborough afire, and it was all
blazin' at once, the same day that some others of 'em
was down on Springfield, and the same day Cap'n
Pierce, with forty-nine white men and twenty-six
Christian Indians, got drawn into an ambush, and
every one of 'em killed. Then a few days after this
they burnt forty houses at Rehoboth, and a little
while after they burnt thirty more at Providence.
And then when good Cap'n Wadsworth went with
seventy men to help the people in Sudbury, the
Indians came pourin' round 'em in the woods like so
many wolves, and killed all but four or five on 'em;
and those poor fellows had better hev been killed,
for the cruel critters jest tormented 'em to death, and
mocked and jeered at their screeches and screams like
so many divils. Then they went and broke loose on
Andover; and they was so cruel they couldn't even
-- 166 --
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let the dumb critters alone. They cut out the
tongues of oxen and cows, and left 'em bleedin', and
some they fastened up in barns and burnt alive.
There wa'n't no sort o' diviltry they wa'n't up to.
Why, it got to be so in them days that folks couldn't
go to bed in peace without startin' every time they
turned over for fear o' the Indians. Ef they heard
a noise in the night, or ef the wind squealed and
howled, as the wind will, they'd think sure enough
there was that horried yell a comin' down chimbley.
“There was Delily Severence; she says to me,
speakin' about them times, says she, `Why, Mr. Lawson,
you've no idee! Why, that 'are screech,' says
she, `wa'n't like no other noise in heaven above, or
earth beneath, or water under the earth,' says she.
`When it started ye out o' bed between two or three
o'clock in the mornin', and all your children a cryin',
and the Indians a screechin' and yellin' and a tossin'
up firebrands, fust at one window and then at another,
why,' says she, `Mr. Lawson, it was more like hell
upon earth than any thing I ever heard on.'
“Ye see, they come down on Delily's house when
she was but jest up arter her third baby. That 'are
-- 167 --
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woman hed a handsome head o' hair as ever ye see,
black as a crow's wing; and it turned jest as white
as a table-cloth, with nothin' but the fright o' that
night.”
“What did they do with her?”
“Oh! they took her and her poor little gal and boy,
that wa'n't no older than you be, and went off with
'em to Canada. The troubles them poor critters
went through! Her husband he was away that night;
and well he was, else they'd a tied him to a tree and
stuck pine slivers into him and sot 'em afire, and cut
gret pieces out 'o his flesh, and filled the places with
hot coals and ashes, and all sich kind o' things they
did to them men prisoners, when they catched 'em.
Delily was thankful enough he was away; but they
took her and the children off through the ice and
snow, jest half clothed and shiverin'; and when her
baby cried and worried, as it nat'rally would, the old
Indian jest took it by its heels, and dashed its brains
out agin a tree, and threw it into the crotch of a tree,
and left it dangling there; and then they would mock
and laugh at her, and mimic her baby's crying, and
try every way they could to aggravate her. They
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used to beat and torment her children right before
her eyes, and pull their hair out, and make believe
that they was goin' to burn 'em alive, jest for nothin'
but to frighten and worry her.”
“I wonder,” said I, “she ever got back alive.”
“Wal, the wimmen in them times hed a sight o'
wear in 'em. They was resolute, strong, hardworkin'
wimmen. They could all tackle a hoss, or load
and fire a gun. They was brought up hard, and they
was used to troubles and dangers. It's jest as folks
gets used to things how they takes 'em. In them
days folks was brought up to spect trouble; they
didn't look for no less. Why, in them days the men
allers took their guns into the field when they went
to hoe corn, and took their guns with 'em to meetin'
Sundays; and the wimmen they kep' a gun loaded
where they knew where to find it; and when trouble
come it was jest what they spected, and they was put
even with it. That's the sort o' wimmen they was.
Wal, Delily and her children was brought safe
through at last, but they hed a hard time on't.”
“Tell us some more stories about Indians, Sam,”
we said, with the usual hungry impatience of boys for
a story.
-- 169 --
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“Wal, let me see,” said Sam, with his hat pushed
back and his eyes fixed dreamily on the top of Eliot's
oak, which was now yellow with the sunset glory, —
“let me see. I hain't never told ye about Col. Eph
Miller, hev I?”
“No, indeed. What about him?”
“Wal, he was took prisoner by the Indians; and
they was goin' to roast him alive arter their fashion,
and he gin 'em the slip.”
“Do tell us all about it.”
“Wal, you see, Deliverance Scranton over to Sherburne,
she's Col. Eph's daughter; and she used to
hear her father tell about that, and she's told me
time and agin about it. It was this way, —
“You see, there hedn't ben no alarm about Indians
for some time, and folks hed got to feelin' kind o' easy,
as folks will. When there don't nothin' happen for
a good while, and it keeps a goin' on so, why, you
think finally there won't nothin' happen; and so it
was with Col. Eph and his wife. She told Deliverance
that the day before she reely hed forgot
all about that there was any Indians in the country;
and she'd been out after spruce and wintergreen and
-- 170 --
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hemlock, and got over her brass kettle to bile for
beer; and the child'n they brought in lots o' wild
grapes that they gathered out in the woods; and
they said when they came home that they thought
they see an Indian a lyin' all along squirmin' through
the bushes, and peekin' out at 'em like a snake, but
they wa'n't quite sure. Faith, the oldest gal, she
was sure she see him quite plain; but 'Bijah (he was
Col. Eph's oldest boy) he wa'n't so sure.
“Anyway, they didn't think no more about it;
and that night they hed prayers and went off to
bed.
“Arterwards, Col. Eph he said he remembered
the passage o' Scriptur' he read that night; it was,
`The race is not to the swift nor the battle to the
strong.' He didn't notice it much when he read it;
but he allers spoke of it arterwards as a remarkable
providence that that 'are passage should have come
jest so that night.
“Wal, atween twelve and one o'clock they was
waked up by the most awful screechin' that ever you
heard, as if twenty thousand devils was upon 'em.
Mis' Miller she was out o' bed in a minit, all
-- 171 --
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standin'. `O husband, husband, the Indians are on us!'
says she; and sure enough they was. The children,
'Bijah and Faith come a runnin' in. `O father,
father! what shall we do?'
“Col. Eph was a man that allers knew in a minit
what to do, and he kep' quite cool. `My dear,' says
he to his wife, `you take the children, and jest run
with 'em right out the buttery-door through the high
corn, and run as fast as you can over to your father
Stebbins', and tell him to rouse the town; and Bije,'
says he to the boy, `you jest get into the belfry window,
and ring the bell with all your might,' says he.
`And I'll stay and fight 'em off till the folks come.'
“All this while the Indians was a yellin' and
screechin' and a wavin' fire-brands front of the
house. Col. Eph he stood a lookin' through a hole in
the shutter and a sightin' his gun while he was a
talkin'. He see that they'd been a pilin' up a great
pile o' dry wood agin the door. But the fust Indian
that came up to put fire to't was shot right down
while he was a speakin'.
“Wal, Mis' Miller and Faith and Bije wa'n't long
a dressin', you may believe; and they jest put on
-- 172 --
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dark cloaks, and they jest streaked it out through
the buttery-door! There was thick pole-beans quite
up to the buttery-door, and then a field o' high corn,
so that they was hid, and the way they run wasn't
slow, I tell you.
“But Col. Eph he hed to stop so to load that they
got the pile o' brush afire, though he shot down
three or four on 'em, and that was some comfort.
But the long and the short o' the matter was, that
they driv the door in at last, and came a whoopin'
and yellin' into the house.
“Wal, they took Col. Eph, and then went searchin'
round to find somebody else; but jest then the
meetin'-house bell begun to ring, and that scart 'em,
and they took Col. Eph and made off with him. He
hedn't but jest time to get into his clothes and get
his shoes on, when they hurried him off. They
didn't do nothin' to him jest then, you see, these
Indians was so cur'ous. If a man made a good
fight, and killed three or four on 'em afore they could
take him, they sot great store by him, and called
him a brave man. And so they was 'mazin' careful
of Col. Eph, and treated him quite polite for Indians;
-- 173 --
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but he knew the ways on 'em well enough to know
what it was all for. They wanted a real brave man
to burn alive and stick slivers into and torment, and
Col. Eph was jest the pattern for 'em, and his fightin'
so brave made him all the better for what they
wanted.
“Wal, he was in hopes the town would be roused
in time for some of 'em to come arter him; but the
Indians got the start of 'em, and got 'way off in the
woods afore people hed fairly come together and
found out what the matter was. There was Col.
Eph's house a blazin' and a lightin' up all the country
for miles round; and the colonel he said it come
ruther hard on him to be lighted on his way through
the woods by such a bonfire.
“Wal, by mornin' they come to one o' their
camps, and there they hed a great rejoicin' over him.
They was going to hev a great feast, and a good time
a burnin' on him; and they tied him to a tree, and
sot an Indian to watch him while they went out to
cut pine knots and slivers to do him with.
`Wal, as I said, Col. Eph was a brave man, and a
man that always kep' his thoughts about him; and so
-- 174 --
[figure description] Page 174.[end figure description]
he kep' a workin' and a workin' with the withs that
was round his hands, and a prayin' in his heart to
the Lord, till he got his right hand free. Wal, he
didn't make no move, but kep' a loosenin' and a
loosenin' little by little, keepin' his eye on the Indian
who sot there on the ground by him.
“Now, Col. Eph hed slipped his feet into his Sunday
shoes that stood there by the bed and hed great
silver shoe-buckles; and there was a providence in
his doin' so, for, ye see, Indians are 'mazin' fond o'
shiny things. And the old Indian he was took with
the shine o' these shoe-buckles, and he thought he
might as well hev 'em as anybody; so he jest laid
down his tommyhawk, and got down on his knees,
and was workin' away as earnest as could be to get
off the buckles, and Col. Eph he jest made a dart
forward and picked up the tommyhawk, and split
open the Indian's skull with one blow: then he cut
the withs that was round his legs, and in a minute
he was off on the run with the tommyhawk in his
hand. There was three Indians give chase to him,
but Col. Eph he kep' ahead of 'em. He said while
he was a runnin' he was cryin,' and callin' on the Lord
-- --
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-- --
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“He was taken with the shine o' these shoe-buckles.”—Page 174.
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-- 175 --
[figure description] Page 175.[end figure description]
with all his might, and the words come into his mind
he read at prayers the night afore, `The race is not
to the swift, nor the battle to the strong.'
“At last he see the Indians gained on him; and he
faced round suddenly, and struck the nighest one
smack on the head with his tommyhawk. Then
when the next one come up he cut him down too;
and the third one, when he see both the others cut
down, and Col. Eph comin' full blaze towards him
with his tommyhawk a swingin', he jest turned and
run for dear life. Then Col. Eph he turned and cut
for the settlement. He run, and he run, and he run,
he didn't well know how long, till, finally, he was
clear tuckered out, and he jest dropped down under a
tree and slept; and he lay there all the rest of that
day, and all night, and never woke till the next day
about sundown.
“Then he woke up, and found he was close by
home, and John Stebbins, his wife's father, and a
whole party, was out lookin' for him.
“Old Col. Eph used to tell the story as long as he
lived, and the tears used to run down his cheeks
when he told it.
-- 176 --
[figure description] Page 176.[end figure description]
“`There's a providence in every thing,' he used to
say, `even down to shoe-buckles. Ef my Sunday
shoes hadn't happened to 'a' set there so I could 'a'
slipped into 'em, I couldn't 'a' killed that Indian,
and I shouldn't 'a' been here to-day.' Wal, boys, he
was in the right on't. Some seem to think the Lord
don't look out only for gret things, but, ye see, little
things is kind o' hinges that gret ones turns on.
They say, take care o' pennies, and dollars'll take care
o' themselves. It's jest so in every thing; and, ef the
Lord don't look arter little things, he ain't so gret as
they say, anyway.
“Wal, wal,” said Sam in conclusion, “now, who'd
'a' thought that anybody could 'a' made any thing
out o' Indians? Yet there 'twas. All them Martha
Vineyard Indians turned Christians, and there was
Indian preachers and Indian teachers; and they reely
did settle down, and get to be quite like folks. But
I tell you, boys, it took faith to start with.”
-- 177 -- p703-230
THE BULL-FIGHT.
[figure description] Page 177.[end figure description]
IT was Saturday afternoon, — time of
blessed memory to boys, — and we were
free for a ramble after huckleberries;
and, with our pails in hand, were making
the best of our way to a noted spot
where that fruit was most abundant.
Sam was with us, his long legs striding over the
ground at a rate that kept us on a brisk trot, though
he himself was only lounging leisurely, with his
usual air of contemplation.
“Look 'ere, boys,” he suddenly said, pausing and
resting his elbow on the top of a rail-fence, “we
shall jest hev to go back and go round by Deakin
Blodgett's barn.”
“Why so?” we both burst forth in eager tones.
-- 178 --
[figure description] Page 178.[end figure description]
“Wal, don't ye see the deakin's turned in his
bull into this 'ere lot?”
“Who cares?” said I. “I ain't afraid.”
“Nor I,” said Harry. “Look at him: he looks
mild enough: he won't hurt us.”
“Not as you knows on,” said Sam; “and then,
agin, you don't know, — nobody never knows, what
one o' them 'ere critters will do: they's jest the most
contrary critters; and ef you think they're goin' to
do one way they're sure to do t'other. I could tell ye
a story now that'd jest make yer har stan' on eend.”
Of course we wanted to have our hair stand on
end, and beset Sam for the story; but he hung off.
“Lordy massy! boys, jest let's wait till ye've got yer
huckleberries: yer granny won't like it ef ye don't
bring her none, and Hepsy she'll be in my har, —
what's left on't,” said Sam, taking off his old torn
hat, and rubbing the loose shock of brash and grizzled
hair.
So we turned and made a détour, leaving the bull
on the right, though we longed amazingly to have a
bout with him, for the fun of the thing, and mentally
resolved to try it when our mentor was not round.
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It all comes back to me again, — the image of that
huckleberry-pasture, interwoven with fragrance of
sweet-fern, and the ground under our feet embroidered
with star-moss and wintergreen, or foamy patches of
mossy frost-work, that crushed and crackled delightfully
beneath our feet. Every now and then a tall,
straight fire-lily — black, spotted in its centre — rose
like a little jet of flame; and we gathered it eagerly,
though the fierce August sun wilted it in our hands.
The huckleberry-bushes, bending under their purple
weight, we gathered in large armfuls, and took them
under the shadow of the pine-trees, that we might
strip them at our leisure, without being scorched by
the intense glare of the sun. Armful after armful
we carried and deposited in the shade, and then sat
down to the task of picking them off into our pails.
It was one of those New-England days hotter than
the tropics. Not a breath of air was stirring, not a
bird sang a note, not a sound was heard, except the
drowsy grating of the locusts.
“Well, now, Sam, now tell us that story about
the bull.”
“Lordy massy, how hot 'tis!” said Sam, lying
-- 180 --
[figure description] Page 180.[end figure description]
back, and resting on the roots of a tree, with his
hands folded under his head. “I'm all in a drip of
sweat.”
“Well, Sam, we'll pick off your berries, if you'll
talk.”
“Wall, wall, be kerful yer don't git no green
ones in among 'em, else Hepsy 'll be down on me.
She's drefful partikelar, she is. Every thing has to
be jest so. Ef it ain't, you'll hear on't. Lordy
massy! boys, she's always telling me I don't do nothin'
for the support of the family. I leave it to you
if I didn't ketch her a nice mess o' fish a Tuesday.
I tell her folks can't expect to roll in money, and
allers to have every thing jess 'z they want it. We
brought nothin' into the world with us, and it's
sartain we ken carry nothin' out; and, having food
and raiment, we ought to be content. We have
ben better off'n we be now. Why, boys, I've seen
the time that I've spent thirty-seven cents a week
for nutmegs; but Hepsy hain't no gratitude: such
folks hez to be brought down. Take care, now, yer
ain't a-putting green ones in; be yer?”
“Sam, we sha'n't put in any at all, if you don't
tell us that story.”
-- 181 --
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“Lordy massy! you young ones, there ain't never
no contentin' yer, ef a fellow was to talk to the millennium.
Wonder now if there is going to be any
millennium. Wish I'd waited, and been born in
them days, 'spect things would a sorter come along
easier. Wall, I shall git through some way, I
s'pose.”
“Sam,” said I, sitting back, “we're putting all our
berries into your pail; and, if you don't begin to tell
us a story, we won't do it.”
“Lordy massy! boys, I'm kind o' collectin' my
idees. Ye have to talk a while to git a-goin',
everybody does. Wal, about this 'ere story. Ye
'member that old brown house, up on the hill there,
that we saw when we come round the corner?
That 'are was where old Mump Moss used to live.
Old Mump was consid'able of a nice man: he took
in Ike Sanders, Mis' Moss's sister's boy, to help him
on the farm, and did by him pretty much ez he did
by his own. Bill Moss, Mump's boy, he was a contrairy
kind o' critter, and he was allers a-hectorin'
Ike. He was allers puttin' off the heaviest end of
every thing on to him. He'd shirk his work, and git
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it off on to Ike every way he could. And he allers
threw it up at him that he was eatin' his father's
bread; and he watched every mouthful he ate, as if
he hated to see it go down. Wal, ye see, for all that,
Ike he growed up tall and strong, and a real handsome
young feller; and everybody liked him. And Bill he
was so gritty and contrairy, that his own mother and
sisters couldn't stan' him; and he was allers a-flingin'
it up at 'em that they liked Ike more'n they did him.
Finally his mother she said to him one day, `Why
shouldn't I,' sez she, `when Ike's allers pleasant to
me, and doin' every thing he ken fur me, and you
don't do nothin' but scold.' That 'are, you see, was
a kind o' home-thrust, and Bill he didn't like Ike a
bit the better for that. He did every thing he could
to plague him, and hector him, and sarcumvent him,
and set people agin him.
“Wal, ye see, 'twas the old story about Jacob and
Laban over agin. Every thing that Ike put his
hand to kind o' prospered. Everybody liked him,
everybody hed a good word for him, everybody
helped grease his wheels. Wal, come time when
he was twenty-one, old Mump he gin him a
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settin'-out. He gin him a freedom suit o' clothes, and
he gin him a good cow, and Mis' Moss she knit
him up a lot o' stockings, and the gals they made him
up his shirts. Then, Ike he got a place with Squire
Wells, and got good wages; and he bought a little
bit o' land, with a house on it, on Squire Wells's
place, and took a mortgage on't, to work off. He
used to work his own land, late at night and early
in the mornin', over and above givin' good days'
works to the squire; and the old squire he sot all
the world by him, and said he hedn't hed sich a man
to work since he didn't know when.
“Wal, a body might ha' thought that when Bill had
a got him out o' the house, he might ha' ben satisfied,
but he wasn't. He was an ugly fellow, Bill Moss
was; and a body would ha' thought that every thing
good that happened to Ike was jest so much took
from him. Come to be young men, growed up together,
and waitin' on the gals round, Ike he was
pretty apt to cut Bill out. Yer see, though Bill was
goin' to have the farm, and all old Mump's money,
he warn't pleasant-spoken; and so, when the gals
got a chance, they'd allers rather go with Ike than
-- 184 --
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him. Finally, there was Delily Sawin, she was
about the handsomest girl there was round, and
she hed all the fellers arter her; and her way was
to speak 'em all fair, and keep 'em all sort o' waitin'
and hopin', till she got ready to make her mind up.
She'd entertain Bill Saturday night, and she'd tell
Ike he might come Sunday night; and so Ike he was
well pleased, and Bill he growled.
“Wal, there come along a gret cattle-show.
Squire Wells he got it up: it was to be the gretest
kind of a time, and Squire Wells he give money
fur prizes. There was to be a prize on the best
cow, and the best bull, and the best ox, and the
best horse, and the biggest punkins and squashes
and beets, and there was a prize for the best loaf o'
bread, and the best pair o' stockin's, and the handsomest
bed-quilt, and the rest o' women's work.
Wal, yer see, there was a gret to-do about the
cattle-show; and the wagons they came in from all
around, — ten miles; and the gals all dressed up in
their best bunnits, and they had a ball in the evenin'.
Wal, ye see, it so happened that Bill and Ike each
on 'em sent a bull to the cattle-show; and Ike's bull
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took the prize. That put the cap-sheaf on for Bill.
He was jest about as much riled as a feller could be;
and that evenin' Delily she danced with Ike twice as
many times ez she did with him. Wal, Bill he got
it round among the fellers that the jedges hed been
partial; and he said, if them bulls was put together,
his bull would whip Ike's all to thunder. Wal, the
fellers thought 'twould be kind o' fun to try 'em, and
they put Ike up to it. And finally 'twas agreed that
Ike's bull should be driv over to old Mump's; and
the Monday after the cattle-show, they should let
'em out into the meadow together and see which
was the strongest. So there was a Sunday the bulls
they were both put up together in the same barn;
and the 'greement was, they wasn't to be looked at
nor touched till the time come to turn 'em out.
“Come Sunday mornin', they got up the wagon to
go to meetin'; and Mis' Moss and the gals and old
Mump, they was all ready; and the old yaller dog he
was standin' waitin' by the wagon, and Bill warn't
nowhere to be found. So they sent one o' the girls
up chamber to see what'd got him; and there he was
a-lyin' on the bed, and said he'd got a drefful
-- 186 --
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headache, and didn't think he could go to meetin'. Wal,
the second bell was a-tollin', and they had to drive
off without him: they never mistrusted but what
'twas jest so. Wal, yer see, boys, 'twas that 'are kind
o' Sunday headache that sort o' gets better when the
folks is all fairly into meetin'. So, when the wagon
was fairly out o' sight, Bill he thought he'd jest go
and have a peek at them bulls. Wal, he looked and
he peeked, and finally he thought they looked so
sort o' innocent 'twouldn't do no harm to jest let 'em
have a little run in the cow-yard aforehand. He
kind o' wanted to see how they was likely to cut up.
Now, ye see, the mischief about bulls is, that a body
never knows what they's goin' to do, 'cause whatever
notion takes 'em allers comes into their heads so
kind o' sudden, and it's jest a word and a blow with
'em. Wal, so fust he let out his bull, and then he
went in and let out Ike's. Wal, the very fust thing
that critter did he run up to Bill's bull, full tilt, and
jest gin one rip with his horns right in the side of
him, and knocked him over and killed him. Didn't
die right off, but he was done for; and Bill he gin a
yell, and run right up and hit him with a stick, and
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“He bethought him of old Mump's gun.”—Page 187.
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the old feller turned right round, and come at him.
I tell you, Bill he turned and made a straight coat-tail,
rippin' and peelin' it towards the house, and the
bull tearin' on right arter him. Into the kitchen he
went, and he hedn't no time to shut the door, and
the bull arter him; and into the keepin'-room, and
the bull arter him there. And he hedn't but jest
time to git up the chamber-stairs, when he heard the
old feller roarin' and tearin' round there like all natur.
Fust he went to the lookin'-glass, and smashed
that all to pieces. Then he histed the table over,
and he rattled and smashed the chairs round, and made
such a roarin' and noise, ye'd ha' thought there was
seven devils there; and in the midst of it Bill he
looked out of the window, and see the wagon
a-comin' back; and `Lordy massy!' he thought to
himself, `the bull 'll kill every one on 'em,' and he
run to the window and yelled and shouted, and they
saw him, and thought the house must be afire.
Finally, he bethought him of old Mump's gun, and
he run round and got it, and poked it through a
crack of the chamber-door, and fired off bang! and
shot him dead, jest as Mis' Moss and the girls was
comin' into the kitchen-door.
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“Wal, there was, to be sure, the 'bomination o'
desolation when they come in and found every thing
all up in a heap and broke to pieces, and the old
critter a-kickin' and bleedin' all over the carpet, and
Bill as pale as his shirt-tail on the chamber-stairs.
They had an awful mess on't; and there was the two
bulls dead and to be took care uv.
“`Wal, Bill,” said his father, “I hope yer satisfied
now. All that comes o' stayin' to home from
meetin', and keepin' temporal things in yer head all
day Sunday. You've lost your own bull, you've got
Ike's to pay for, and ye'll have the laugh on yer all
round the country.'
“`I expect, father, we ken corn the meat,' says
Mis' Moss, `and maybe the hide'll sell for something,
' sez she; for she felt kind o' tender for Bill,
and didn't want to bear down too hard on him.
“Wal, the story got round, and everybody was
a-throwin' it up at Bill; and Delily, in partikelar,
hectored him about it till he wished the bulls had been
in the Red Sea afore he'd ever seen one on 'em.
Wal, it really driv him out o' town, and he went off
out West to settle, and nobody missed him much;
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and Ike he married Delily, and they grew from better
to better, till now they own jest about as pretty
a farm as there is round. Yer remember that white
house with green blinds, that we passed when we
was goin' to the trout-brook? Wal, that 'ere's the
one.”
-- 190 -- p703-247
HOW TO FIGHT THE DEVIL.
[figure description] Page 190.[end figure description]
LOOK here, boys,” said Sam, “don't
you want to go with me up to the
Devil's Den this arternoon?”
“Where is the Devil's Den,” said I,
with a little awe.
“Wal, it's a longer tramp than I've
ever took ye. It's clear up past the
pickerel pond, and beyond old Skunk John's pasturelot.
It's a 'mazin' good place for raspberries;
shouldn't wonder if we should get two three quarts
there. Great rocks there higher 'n yer head; kinder
solemn, 'tis.”
This was a delightful and seductive account, and
we arranged for a walk that very afternoon.
In almost every New-England village the
-- 191 --
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personality of Satan has been acknowledged by calling by
his name some particular rock or cave, or other natural
object whose singularity would seem to suggest a
more than mortal occupancy. “The Devil's Punchbowl,”
“The Devil's Wash-bowl,” “The Devil's Kettle,”
“The Devil's Pulpit,” and “The Devil's Den,”
have been designations that marked places or objects
of some striking natural peculiarity. Often these are
found in the midst of the most beautiful and romantic
scenery, and the sinister name seems to have no effect in
lessening its attractions. To me, the very idea of
going to the Devil's Den was full of a pleasing horror.
When a boy, I always lived in the shadowy edge of that
line which divides spirit land from mortal life, and it
was my delight to walk among its half lights and
shadows. The old graveyard where, side by side,
mouldered the remains of Indian sachems and the
ancients of English blood, was my favorite haunt. I
loved to sit on the graves while the evening mists
arose from them, and to fancy cloudy forms waving
and beckoning. To me, this spirit land was my only
refuge from the dry details of a hard, prosaic life.
The schoolroom — with its hard seats rudely fashioned
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from slabs of rough wood, with its clumsy desks,
hacked and ink-stained, with its unintelligible textbooks
and its unsympathetic teacher — was to me a
prison out of whose weary windows I watched the
pomp and glory of nature, — the free birds singing,
the clouds sailing, the trees waving and whispering,—
and longed, as earnestly as ever did the Psalmist,
to flee far away, and wander in the wilderness.
Hence, no joy of after life — nothing that the
world has now to give — can equal that joyous sense
of freedom and full possession which came over me
on Saturday afternoons, when I started off on a tramp
with the world all before me, — the mighty, unexplored
world of mysteries and possibilities, bounded
only by the horizon. Ignorant alike of all science,
neither botanist nor naturalist, I was studying at firsthand
all that lore out of which science is made.
Every plant and flower had a familiar face to me,
and said something to my imagination. I knew
where each was to be found, its time of coming and
going, and met them year after year as returning
friends.
So it was with joyous freedom that we boys
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rambled off with Sam this afternoon, intent to find the
Devil's Den. It was a ledge of granite rocks rising in
the midst of a grove of pines and white birches. The
ground was yellow and slippery with the fallen
needles of the pines of other days, and the glistening
white stems of the birches shone through the shadows
like ivory pillars. Underneath the great granite
ledges, all sorts of roots and plants grappled and kept
foothold; and whole armies of wild raspberries matured
their fruit, rounder and juicier for growing in
the shade.
In one place yawned a great rift, or cavern, as if
the rocks had been violently twisted and wrenched
apart, and a mighty bowlder lodging in the rift had
roofed it over, making a cavern of most seductive
darkness and depth. This was the Devil's Den; and
after we had picked our pail full of berries, we sat
down there to rest.
“Sam, do you suppose the Devil ever was here?”
said I. “What do they call this his den for?”
“Massy, child! that 'are was in old witch times.
There used to be witch meetins' held here, and awful
doins'; they used to have witch sabba' days and
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witch sacraments, and sell their souls to the old
boy.”
“What should they want to do that for?”
“Wal, sure enough; what was it for? I can't
make out that the Devil ever gin 'em any thing, any
on 'em. They warn't no richer, nor didn't get no
more 'n this world than the rest; and they was took
and hung; and then ef they went to torment after
that, they hed a pretty bad bargain on't, I say.”
“Well, people don't do such things any more, do
they?” said I.
“No,” said Sam. “Since the gret fuss and row-dedow
about it, it's kind o' died out; but there's those,
I s'pose, that hez dealins' with the old boy. Folks
du say that old Ketury was a witch, and that, ef 't
ben in old times, she'd a hed her neck stretched; but
she lived and died in peace.”
“But do you think,” said I, now proposing the
question that lay nearest my heart, “that the Devil
can hurt us?”
“That depends consid'able on how you take him,”
said Sam. “Ye see, come to a straight out-an'-out
fight with him, he'll git the better on yer.”
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“But,” said I, “Christian did fight Apollyon, and
got him down too.”
I had no more doubt in those days that this was an
historic fact than I had of the existence of Romulus
and Remus and the wolf.
“Wal, that 'ere warn't jest like real things: they
say that 'ere's an allegory. But I'll tell ye how old
Sarah Bunganuck fit the Devil, when he 'peared to
her. Ye see, old Sarah she was one of the converted
Injuns, and a good old critter she was too;
worked hard, and got her livin' honest. She made
baskets, and she made brooms, and she used to pick
young wintergreen and tie it up in bunches, and dig
sassafras and ginsing to make beer; and she got her
a little bit o' land, right alongside o' Old Black Hoss
John's white-birch wood-lot.
“Now, I've heerd some o' these 'ere modern ministers
that come down from Cambridge college, and
are larnt about every thing in creation, they say
there ain't no devil, and the reason on't is, 'cause
there can't be none. These 'ere fellers is so sort o'
green! — they don't mean no harm, but they don't
know nothin' about nobody that does. If they'd ha'
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known old Black Hoss John, they'd ha' been putty
sure there was a devil. He was jest the crossest,
ugliest critter that ever ye see, and he was ugly
jest for the sake o' ugliness. He couldn't bear
to let the boys pick huckleberries in his paster lots,
when he didn't pick 'em himself; and he was allers
jawin' me 'cause I would go trout-fishin' in one o'
his pasters. Jest ez if the trout that swims warn't
the Lord's, and jest ez much mine as his. He grudged
every critter every thing; and if he'd ha' hed his
will and way, every bird would ha' fell down dead
that picked up a worm on his grounds. He was jest
as nippin' as a black frost. Old Black Hoss didn't
git drunk in a regerlar way, like Uncle Eph and
Toddy Whitney, and the rest o' them boys. But he
jest sot at home, a-soakin' on cider, till he was
crosser'n a bear with a sore head. Old Black Hoss
hed a special spite agin old Sarah. He said she
was an old witch and an old thief, and that she stole
things off'n his grounds, when everybody knew that
she was a regerlar church-member, and as decent an
old critter as there was goin'. As to her stealin',
she didn't do nothin' but pick huckleberries and
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grapes, and git chesnuts and wannuts, and butternuts,
and them 'ere wild things that's the Lord's,
grow on whose land they will, and is free to all.
I've hearn 'em tell that, over in the old country, the
poor was kept under so, that they couldn't shoot a
bird, nor ketch a fish, nor gather no nuts, nor do
nothin' to keep from starvin', 'cause the quality
folks they thought they owned every thing, 'way
down to the middle of the earth and clear up to
the stars. We never hed no sech doin's this side of
the water, thank the Lord! We've allers been free to
have the chesnuts and the wannuts and the grapes
and the huckleberries and the strawberries, ef we
could git 'em, and ketch fish when and where we
was a mind to. Lordy massy! your grandthur's old
Cesar, he used to call the pond his pork-pot. He'd
jest go down and throw in a line and ketch his dinner.
Wal, Old Black Hoss he know'd the law was so,
and he couldn't do nothin' agin her by law; but he
sarved her out every mean trick he could think of.
He used to go and stan' and lean over her garden-gate
and jaw at her an hour at a time; but old
Sarah she had the Injun in her; she didn't run to talk
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much: she used to jest keep on with her weedin'
and her work, jest's if he warn't there, and that made
Old Black Hoss madder'n ever; and he thought he'd
try and frighten her off'n the ground, by makin' on
her believe he was the Devil. So one time, when he'd
been killin' a beef critter, they took off the skin
with the horns and all on; and Old Black Hoss he says
to Toddy and Eph and Loker, `You jest come up to-night,
and see how I'll frighten old Sarah Bunganuck.
'
“Wal, Toddy and Eph and Loker, they hedn't no
better to do, and they thought they'd jest go round
and see. Ye see 'twas a moonlight night, and old
Sarah — she was an industrious critter — she was
cuttin' white-birch brush for brooms in the paster-lot.
Wal, Old Black Hoss he wrapped the critter's skin
round him, with the horns on his head, and come
and stood by the fence, and begun to roar and make a
noise. Old Sarah she kept right on with her work,
cuttin' her brush and pilin' on't up, and jest let him
roar. Wal, Old Black Hoss felt putty foolish, 'specially
ez the fellers were waitin' to see how she took
it. So he calls out in a grum voice, —
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“Wal, I'm the Devil, sez he.”—Page 199.
[figure description] Illustration page. Image of a thin, ragged looking man kneeling in a field in front of a fence. Ther is a bull on the other side of the fence. The man and bull are looking at one another. The bull's mouth is open and the man's mouth is closed, making it appear that the bull is the one who is speaking.[end figure description]
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“`Woman, don't yer know who I be?”
“`No,' says she quite quiet, `I don't know who
yer be.'
“`Wal, I'm the Devil,' sez he.
“`Ye be?' says old Sarah. `Poor old critter,
how I pity ye!' and she never gin him another word,
but jest bundled up her broom-stuff, and took it on
her back and walked off, and Old Black Hoss he stood
there mighty foolish with his skin and horns; and so
he had the laugh agin him, 'cause Eph and Loker
they went and told the story down to the tavern, and
he felt awful cheap to think old Sarah had got
the upper hands on him.
“Wal, ye see, boys, that 'ere's jest the way to fight
the Devil. Jest keep straight on with what ye're
doin', and don't ye mind him, and he can't do
nothin' to ye.”
Back matter
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Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 1811-1896 [1872], Oldtown fireside stories (James R. Osgood & Company, Boston) [word count] [eaf703T].
