Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition Part 19

I didn't argy, but I bought a string of beads for Tirzah Ann and a pipe for Thomas J., the wood of which growed on the Mount of Olives, so the man said.

I told Josiah they would prize 'em high havin' come from Jerusalem.

And he said, "They never see Jerusalem," he said they wuz growed over in New Jersey, and when I asked him how he knew, he said he re_cog_nized the berries and the grain of the wood.

But he couldn't no such thing, and I presoom the man told considerable truth. And we see Rabbis, Turkish cavalry, common people livin' in the queer little housen jest as they did in Jerusalem, and the priests goin' through their religious ceremonies jest the same. And we went through the Citadel and the different public buildin's.

There wuz lots of wimmen and girls on the streets, some on 'em sellin' posies for charity, I bought two little bunches, one on 'em I put in Josiah's b.u.t.tonhole, though he objected and said it would probable make talk for a man of his age and dignity to be trimmed with flowers.

They wuz real pretty girls, with white veils on over their dark hair, their l.u.s.trous eyes lookin' out at us as they might have looked at the Postles.

And there wuz cunnin' little donkeys that anybody could ride if they wanted to, and camels with gorgeous trappings kneelin' down ready for folks to mount and be carried 'round the streets. Josiah stood ready to pay the ten cents apiece to give us the pleasure of a ride.

But I declined the treat. I sez, "We don't ride the old mair hoss back to home, and I don't hanker after bein' histed up onto a camel's hump, or to see you in that perilous poster."

He said he'd love to tell the bretheren we'd rid 'em, but seein' I wuz sot agin it he gin up.

The streets smell bad and are so narrer I don't see how they would manage if two buggies met; one would have to back out, they couldn't git by each other.

The old Roman barracks are bare and dreary lookin', but dretful interestin' to me for there our Lord stood to be judged by Caesar like a lamb before the shearer, and he said, "I wash my hands of this matter, I find no fault in this man."

I wish Caesar had had more gumption. His wife could see furder ahead than he could. But that is often the case, as I tell Josiah.

And we went through St. John's Hospice, and the Mosque of Omar. That is a monstrous big building with a great round dome on top, two broad flights of steps lead up into it, we clumb the nighest one and went inside. The high dome is lined with colored mosaic, and looks first-rate, but I didn't pay much attention to that for right underneath the centre is an exact reproduction of the rock where Abraham offered up Isaac, or got ready to. How Love and Duty tugged at Abraham's heart and most tore it into as he stood there, and what faith he had. It is heart-breakin' to think on't, though it all come out right in the end, as the hardest things will if we cling to Duty.

But Josiah wuz gittin' worrisome and wanted to go, but I sez, "Josiah, I must see Solomon's Temple."

It wuz quite a few steps away, but I didn't begrech the time or journey, and jest as we wuz goin' up the steps, who should we meet comin' out but Jane Olive Perkins (nay Gowdey) once a Jonesvillian, but now livin' in Chicago, but visitin' her old home and relation quite often.

She wuz dressed beautiful, her neck and bosom sparklin' with diamonds. I don't approve of such dressin' in the street, but Jane Olive wuz always showy.

She held out both hands in joyful greetin' (the meanin' of which I mistrusted afterwards). We talked about the splendor of the Fair and our own two healths, and the Jonesvillians, and then she sez:

"I am so delighted to meet you, Josiah Allen's wife, for I know you will want to give to a n.o.ble cause I am workin' for, you and dear Mr. Allen. It is a cause that ort to be first in every feelin' heart, and I knew you'd give liberal."

I'd forgot my portmoney that mornin' and didn't want right there in Solomon's Temple to d.i.c.ker with Josiah for money, I knowed it would make him fraxious. And I wuz havin' such a lot of lofty emotions there at Jerusalem, I didn't want to bring 'em down by havin' words with my pardner. And I knowed too that "dear Mr. Allen" would be apt to say hash things that would bring him down in Jane Olive's estimation, he's so clost and he never liked her to begin with.

So I said I couldn't very well stop and tend to it right there in Solomon's Temple, and she asked me for my address and told me she should come and see me. She wuz stayin' at a big tarven not so very fur from Miss Huff's, and said she'd brought her orto and shuffler with her from Chicago.

Well, she bid us a tender adoo, sayin' the last thing "owe Revwah," or sunthin' like that and Josiah sez to me:

"Who's she twittin' us on? I don't owe n.o.body by that name, nor never did, not a cent, I'm a man that pays my debts."

And I sez, "Dear Josiah, n.o.body that knows you can dispute it."

Jane Olive kinder smiled and pa.s.sed on, and I'dno but in Fancy I and the public may as well set down on the steps of Solomon's Temple, and I'll tell about who Jane Olive Perkins wuz. She wuz Jane Olive Gowdey, and married Samuel Perkins, old Eliphilet Perkinses second boy, and folks thought she done mizable when she married him. Sam hadn't been put to work much bein' sort o' weakly so his folks thought, he looked kinder peaked.

But I spoze Sam enjoyed pretty good health all the time onbeknown to his folks and wuz kinder savin' up his strength, layin' it up as you may say for the time o' need, so he had it all when he wuz married. A master hand he wuz to save things and make 'em count. For all he never did any work to speak on, he had more proppity laid up than any of the Perkins boys when he wuz married, he had saved so and sort o' speculated and laid up.

He wuz kinder mean too, runnin' after wimmen at that time, though onbeknown to Jane Olive or his folks, but it come out afterwards, he wuz awful sly. When he married Jane Olive Gowdey that wuz a surprise too, for Bill, the oldest boy, wanted her the worst way and everybody spozed they wuz engaged. A good creeter Bill wuz, virtuous as Joseph, or any of the old Bible Patriarchs, and virtuouser than lots of 'em.

But Sam, in jest that way of hisen, laid low and sort o' did the best he could with what he had to do with, sort o' speculated and increased her likin' for him on the sly (mean fellers will git ahead of good ones five times out of ten, wimmen are so queer). And lo and behold! the first Jonesville knew they up and got married.

They moved to a big city where Sam got a chance to travel for a grocery store, and Jane Olive opened a inteligence office, where for an ample consideration she furnished incompetent help to distracted housekeepers, receivin' pay from both victims, and they laid up money fast. Then he went into pork and first we knew Sam wuz a very rich man, lived in great style, kep' his carriage, but wuz awful mean, so we heard, hadn't no morals at all to speak on so fur as wimmen wuz concerned, and we had hearn that Jane Olive not bein' over and above happy in marriage, and forgittin' to all appearance she had ever d.i.c.kered with mistress and maid, wuz tryin' her best to work her way in among the aristockracy, she wuz dretful ambitious and so wuz Sam, they wanted to go with the first.

She did everything she could to foller their example, she dressed up in satin and diamonds and trailed 'round to theatres and operas and hung over dry goods counters, and kep' her maid and coachman and butler, or that's what folks say, I don't even know what a butler is expected to do, or Josiah don't. "Butler," sez I when I hearn on't, "I can't imagine what a butler duz."

And Josiah sez, "A coachman is to coach, and a waiter is to wait, and a butler must be to b.u.t.tle."

Sez I, "b.u.t.tle what? Or who? Or when?" But he couldn't tell. Well, Sam he did everything to git into the first and be fas.h.i.+onable, he embezzled a lot, broke down two or three times with enormous profit to himself, spent his money like water, wuz jest as mean as he could be, went over to Europe now and then, did everything he could do to be fas.h.i.+onable and act like a man of the world, and finally he led astray a little girl that lived with 'em, a motherless little girl they had took, pretty as a pink too, and affectionate dispositioned. Jane Olive turned her outdoors, of course, when she found it out. It wuz in the fall of the year, and the night before Christmas the girl with her baby in her arms jumped into the river and wuz drownded.

Her father had some s.p.u.n.k and took Sam up, but he wuz always sly and looked ahead, and he proved that she wuz a day or two older than the age of consent, and he got let off triumphant and her father had to pay the cost, besides the funeral expenses, and grave stun.

Such smartness riz Sam up considerable amongst his mates and he wuz sent to Congress most immegiately afterwards, and it wuz owin' to his powerful arguments that the age of consent wuz lowered a year or two; I believe he brought it down to about ten years. He wuz thought a sight on by his genteel male friends, so they say, he worked so powerful for their interest. He brought down the licenses on saloons and bad housen a sight, and made almost Herculanean efforts to have saloons scattered broadcast through the country without any license to pay. I spoze there never wuz a more popular statesman. He worked too hard though, and had to retire to more private life to reap the fruits of his efforts. And he kep' right on, so they say reapin' 'em ever since, cuttin' up and actin', but always actin' jest inside the law and always cuttin' up the same.

He had the gift of gab and he made eloquent public speeches, tellin' what boons saloons and kindred places wuz to the community. I spoze there never wuz a more popular legislator.

But, of course, such high honors cast dark shadders, and one night after he'd made a powerful speech at the openin' of a saloon he owned, a old one made over into gorgeous beauty, he got a good hoss whippin', and by some wimmen too.

Perkins had made a great speech himself and wantin' to show off to the world that it wuz real respectable (they had this saloon kinder graded off, weaker drinks in one place leadin' up gradual to brandy and whiskey), he got a minister, a well-meanin' man, so I hearn, who made a prayer and then they all sung the Doxology:

Praise G.o.d from whom all blessings flow-

Askin' G.o.d to bless what He'd cursed. What must G.o.d thought on't! For He and they well knew all the sin and pain, poverty and crime that flowed out of saloons, the ontold losses and danger to community, the brutality, fights, murders, crimes of all kinds.

Praise Him all creatures here below-

When that minister knowed the stuff he wuz dedicatin' rendered all creeters here below, no matter how smart they wuz nachully, incapable of tellin' whether they wuz on their head or their heels, blessin' or cussin'. When a man is drunk as a fool how can he praise anything? It is all he can do to navigate his own legs within' and weavin' along under him, ready to crumple down any minute into the gutter. He'd look well tryin' to sing gospel hims when he can't tell what his own name is, or speak it if he could.

Praise Him above ye heavenly hosts

Why, I don't see how they dasted to sing that when they knowed that the Heavenly Host couldn't have flowed through such places without bein' liable to git their feathers pulled out in some of the drinkin' carouses held there. As liable agin for their pure eyes must be dimmed with tears, tears for the eighty thousand victims turned out yearly from these resorts. Innocent youth changed to reckless wickedness, n.o.ble manhood turned to brutes falling from honorable places in society down into drunkards' loathsome lives, drunkards' dishonored graves.

How could these pityin' sperits help weepin' over it? And the long, agonized procession follerin' on-pale, wretched mothers, once happy wives, now hungry, broken-hearted wrecks, with pinched, starved children clingin' to their ragged skirts. The idee of askin' this pure heavenly Host to praise G.o.d for what brought all this to pa.s.s!

Praise Father, Son and Holy Ghost.

Why, I believe that Satan himself, though he loved to see the work go on, would be ashamed to sing the Doxology there. I don't believe you'd ketch him at it, for he is so smart he would see in a minute how it would look to praise G.o.d for such a place as that when he had said plain:

"Cursed is he that putteth the cup to his neighbor's lips."

And Satan knowed jest as well as Josiah and I and the world did, that saloons wuz made a purpose for this.

"And no drunkard hath eternal life." And that minister wuz ordained to help people attain that life, not to help 'em lose it.

I don't see what he wuz thinkin' on. Of course, the top of the long slippery descent to ruin is quite cheerful lookin', lit up with false lights, hollow mirth, false hopes and dreams lurin' the victims on and down. But he knowed how slippery it wuz, how impossible it wuz for ordinary men to stand up when they got to slidin' down. He knew that nothin' but G.o.d's grace wuz strong enough to reach down and haul 'em up agin to level ground.

A few men are so strong-footed they can grip on and stay 'round the top for some time, and I presoom this minister, bein' a good-natered man would been glad to had 'em all hung on there, but he must have knowed they wouldn't and couldn't. He'd seen 'em leggo thousands and thousands every year, he knowed what made 'em fall. And he might jest as well made a prayer and sung a hymn over a murderer's knife, because he wanted it to cut bread but knowed it would and did murder, as to done this.

For no matter what he wanted he knowed intemperance is evil and only evil. And pattin' a pizen viper and callin' it "angel" and singin' the Doxology over it hain't goin' to change its nater, its nater is to sting, and its bite is death.