Nature and Human Nature Part 35

"'Kick,' said I, 'oh, you wouldn't try that, I am sure, let me do what I would.'

"'Why not?' said she.

"'Why,' sais I, 'if you did you would have to kick so high, you would expose one of the larger limbs.'

"'Mr Slick,' said she, 'I trust you will not so far forget what is due to a lady, as to talk of showing her larger limbs, it's not decent.'

"'Well, I know it ain't decent,' said I, 'but you said you would do it, and I just remonstrated a little, that's all.'

"'You was saying about London and Paris,' said she, 'being no place for educating young ladies in.'

"'Yes,' sais I, 'that painful story of my two poor dear wives (which is 'all in my eye,' as plain as it was then), ill.u.s.trates my theory of education in those two capitals. In London, females, who are a great deal in society in the season, like a man who drinks, can't stop, they are at it all the time, and like him, sometimes forget the way home again. In Paris, galls are kept so much at home before marriage, when they once get out, they don't want to enter the cage again. They are the two extremes. If ever I marry, I'll tell you how I will lay down the law. Pleasure shall be the recreation and not the business of life with her. Home the rule--parties the exception. Duty first, amus.e.m.e.nt second. Her head-quarters shall always be in her own house, but the outposts will never be neglected.'

"'Nothin' like an American woman for an American man, is there?' said she, and she drew nearer, lookin' up in my face to read the answer, and didn't rock so hard.

"'It depends upon how they are brought up,' said I, looking wise.

'But, Liddy,' sais I, 'without joking, what an amazin' small foot that is of yours. It always was, and wunst when it slipt through a branch of the cherry-tree, do you recollect my saying, Well I vow that calf was suckled by two cows? now don't you, Liddy?'

"'No, Sir,' said she, 'I don't, though children may say many things that when they grow up they are ashamed to repeat; but I recollect now, wunst when you and I went through the long gra.s.s to the cherry-tree, your mother said, 'Liddy, beware you are not bit by a garter-snake, and I never knew her meanin' till now;' and she rose up and said, 'Mr Slick, I must bid you good morning.'

"'Liddy,' sais I, 'don't be so pesky starch, I'll be dod fetched if I meant any harm, but you beat me all holler. I only spoke of the calf, and you went a streak higher and talked of the garter.'

"'Sam,' said she, 'you was always the most impedent, forredest, and pertest boy that ever was, and travellin' hain't improved you one mite or morsel.'

"'I am sorry I have offended you, Liddy,' sais I, 'but really now, how do you manage to teach all them things with hard names, for we never even heard of them at Slickville? Have you any masters?'

"'Masters,' said she, 'the first one that entered this college would ruin it for ever. What, a man in this college! where the juvenile pupils belong to the first families--I guess not. I hire a young lady to teach rudiments.'

"'So I should think,' sais I, 'from the specimen I saw at your door, she was rude enough in all conscience.'

"'Pooh,' said she, 'well, I have a Swiss lady that teaches French, German, Spanish, and Italian, and an English one that instructs in music and drawing, and I teach history, geography, botany, and the sciences, and so on.'

"'How on earth did you learn them all?' said I, 'for it puzzles me.'

"'Between you and me, Sam,' said she, 'for you know my broughtens up, and it's no use to pretend--primary books does it all, there is question and answer. I read the question, and they learn the answer.

It's the easiest thing in the world to teach now-a-days.'

"'But suppose you get beyond the rudiments?'

"'Oh, they never remain long enough to do that. They are brought out before then. They go to Saratoga first in summer, and then to Was.h.i.+ngton in winter, and are married right off after that. The domestic, seclusive, and exclusive system, is found most conducive to a high state of refinement and delicacy. I am doing well, Sam,' said she, drawing nearer, and looking confidential in my face. 'I own all this college, and all the lands about, and have laid up forty thousand dollars besides;' and she nodded her head at me, and looked earnest, as much as to say, 'That is a fact, ain't it grand?'

"'The devil you have,' said I, as if I had taken the bait. 'I had a proposal to make.'

"'Oh,' said she, and she coloured up all over, and got up and said, 'Sam, won't you have a gla.s.s of wine, dear?' She intended it to give me courage to speak out, and she went to a closet, and brought out a tray with a decanter, and two or three gla.s.ses on it, and some frosted plum-cake. 'Try that cake, dear,' she said, 'I made it myself, and your dear old mother taught me how to do it;' and then she laid back her head, and larfed like anything. 'Sam,' said she, 'what a memory you have; I had forgot all about the cherry-tree, I don't recollect a word of it.'

"'And the calf?' said I.

"'Get along,' said she, 'do get out;' and she took up some crumbs of the cake, and made 'em into a ball as big as a cherry, and fired it at me, and struck me in the eye with it, and nearly put it out. She jumped up in a minit: 'Did she hurt her own poor cossy's eye?' she said, 'and put it een amost out,' and she kissed it. 'It didn't hurt his little peeper much, did it?'

"Hullo, sais I to myself, she's coming it too peeowerful strong altogether. The sooner I dig out the better for my wholesomes.

However, let her went, she is wrathy. 'I came to propose to you--'

"'Dear me,' said she, 'I feel dreadful, I warn't prepared for this; it's very onexpected. What is it, Sam? I am all over of a twiteration.'

"'I know you will refuse me,' sais I, 'when I look round and see how comfortable and how happy you are, even if you ain't engaged.'

"'Sam, I told you I weren't engaged,' she said: 'that story of General Smith is all a fabrication, therefore don't mention that again.'

"'I feel,' said I, 'it's no use. I know what you will say, you can't quit.'

"'You have a strange way,' said she, rather tart, 'for you ask questions, and then answer them yourself. What do you mean?'

"'Well,' sais I, 'I'll tell you, Liddy.'

"'Do, dear,' said she, and she put her hand over her eyes, as if to stop her from hearing distinctly. 'I came to propose to you--'

"'Oh, Sam,' said she, 'to think of that!'

"'To take a seat in my buggy,' sais I, 'and come and spend a month with sister Sally and me, at the old location.'

"Poor thing, I pitied her; she had one knee over the other, and, as I said, one hand over her eyes, and there she sot, and the way the upper foot went bobbin' up and down was like the palsy, only a little quicker. She never said another word, nor sighed, nor groaned, nor anything, only her head hung lower. Well, I felt streaked, Doctor, I tell you. I felt like a man who had stabbed another, and knew he ought to be hanged for it; and I looked at her as such a critter would, if he had to look on, and see his enemy bleed to death. I knew I had done wrong--I had acted spider-like to her--got her into the web--tied her hand and foot, and tantalized her. I am given to brag, I know, Doctor, when I am in the saddle, and up in the stirrups, and leavin' all others behind; but when a beast is choaked and down in the dirt, no man ever heard me brag I had rode the critter to death.

"No, I did wrong, she was a woman, and I was a man, and if she did act a part, why, I ought to have known the game she had to play, and made allowances for it. I dropt the trump card under the table that time, and though I got the odd trick, she had the honours. It warn't manly in me, that's a fact; but confound her, why the plague did she call me 'Mr,' and act formal, and give me the bag to hold, when she knew me of old, and minded the cherry-tree, and all that? Still she was a woman, and a defenceless one too, and I did'nt do the pretty. But if she was a woman, doctor, she had more clear grit than most men have. After a while she took her hand off her eyes and rubbed them, and she opened her mouth and yawned so, you could see down to her garters amost.

"'Dear me!' said she, trying to smile; but, oh me! how she looked! Her eyes had no more expression than a China-aster, and her face was so deadly pale, it made the rouge she had put on look like the hectic of a dying consumption. Her ugly was out in full bloom, I tell you. 'Dear cousin Sam,' said she, 'I am so fatigued with my labours as presidentess of this inst.i.tution, that I can hardly keep my peepers open. I think, if I recollect--for I am ashamed to say I was a noddin'--that you proposed (that word lit her eyes up) that I should go with you to visit dear Sally. Oh, Sam!' said she (how she bit in her temper that hitch, didn't she?) 'you see, and you saw it at first, I can't leave on so short a notice; but if my sweet Sally would come and visit me, how delighted I should be! Sam, I must join my cla.s.s now. How happy it has made me to see you again after so many years!

Kiss me, dear; good bye--G.o.d bless you!' and she yawned again till she nearly dislocated her jaw. 'Go on and write books, Sam, for no man is better skilled in human natur and spares it less than yourself.' What a reproachful look she gave me then! 'Good bye, dear!'

"Well, when I closed the door, and was opening of the outer one, I heard a crash. I paused a moment, for I knew what it was. She had fainted and fell into a conniption fit.

"'Sam,' sais I to myself, 'shall I go back?'

"'No,' sais I, 'if you return there will be a scene; and if you don't, if she can't account naterally for it, the devil can't, that's all.'

"Doctor, I felt guilty, I tell you. I had taken a great many rises out of folks in my time, but that's the only one I repent of. Tell you what, Doctor, folks may talk about their southern gentlemen, their New York prince-merchants, and so on, but the clear grit, bottom and game, is New England (Yankee-doodle-dum). Male or female, young or old, I'll back 'em agin all creation."

Squire, show this chapter to Lord Tandembery, if you know him; and if you don't, Uncle Tom Lavender will give you a letter of introduction to him; and then ask him if ever he has suffered half so much as Sam Slick has in the cause of edication.

CHAPTER XV.

GIPSEYING.

We tried the deck again, but the fog was too disagreeable to remain there, for the water fell from the ropes in such large drops, and the planks were so wet and slippery, we soon adjourned again to the cabin.

"I have to thank you, Doctor," said I, "for a most charming day at the Beaver-Dam. That was indeed a day in the woods, and I believe every one there knew how to enjoy it. How different it is from people in a town here, who go out to the country for a pic-nic! A citizen thinks the pleasure of gipseying, as they call it in England, consists solely in the abundance and variety of the viands, the quality and quant.i.ty of the wines, and as near an approach to a city dinner as it is possible to have, where there are neither tables, chairs, sideboards, nor removes. He selects his place for the encampment in the first opening adjoining the clearing, as it commands a n.o.ble view of the harbour, and there is gra.s.s enough to recline upon. The woods are gloomy, the footing is slippery, and there is nothing to be seen in a forest but trees, windfalls which are difficult to climb, and boggy ground that wets your feet, and makes you feel uncomfortable. The limbs are eternally knocking your hat off, and the spruce gum ruins your clothes, while ladies, like sheep, are for ever leaving fragments of their dress on every bush. He chooses the skirts of the forest therefore, the background is a glorious wood, and the foreground is diversified by the s.h.i.+pping. The o-heave-o of the sailors, as it rises and falls in the distance, is music to his ears, and suggestive of agreeable reflections, or profitable conversation peculiarly appropriate to the place and the occasion. The price of fish in the West Indies, or of deals in Liverpool, or the probable rise of flour in the market, amuse the vacant mind of himself and his partner, not his wife, for she is only his sleeping partner, but the wide-awake partner of the firm, one of those who are embraced in the comprehensive term the 'Co.' He is the depository of his secrets, the other of his complaints.

"His wife is equally happy, she enjoys it uncommonly, for she knows it will spite those horrid Mudges. She is determined not to invite them, for they make too much noise, it gives her the headache, and their flirting is too bad. Mrs White called them garrison hacks. And besides (for women always put the real reason last--they live in a postscript) they don't deserve it, for they left her girls out when they had the lobster-spearing party by torch-light, with the officers of the flag-s.h.i.+p, though that was no loss, for by all accounts it was a very romping party, knocking off the men's hats, and then exchanging their bonnets for them. And how any mother could allow her daughter to be held round the waist by the flag-lieutenant, while she leaned over the boat to spear the fish, is a mystery to her. The polka is bad enough, but, to her mind, that is not decent, and then she has something to whisper about it, that she says is too bad (this is a secret though, and she must whisper it, for walls have ears, and who knows but trees have, and besides, the good things are never repeated, but the too bad always is), and Mrs Black lifts up both her hands, and the whites of both eyes in perfect horror.