Sweet Cicely or Josiah Allen as a Politician Part 36

I sithed, and remained a few moments almost lost in thought; and then says I,- "Now, if you are more composed and gathered together, will you tell your companion how you come to write it? what you did it for?"

"I did it to be populer," says he, out from under his hand. "I thought I would branch off, and take a new turn, and not act so fierce and wolfish after office as most of 'em did. I thought I would get up something new and uneek."

"Wall, you have, uneeker than you probable ever will agin. But, if you wanted to be a senator, why did you refuse to have any thing to do with politics?"

"I did it to be urged," says he, in the same sad, despairin' tones. "I made the move to be loved-to be the favorite of the Nation. I thought after they read that, they would be fierce to promote me, fierce as blood- hounds. I thought it would make me the most populer man in Jonesville, and that I should be sought after, and praised up, and follered."

"What give you that idee?" says I calmly.

"Why, don't you remember Let.i.tia Lanfear? She wrote a article sunthin' like this, only not half so smart and deep, when she was nominated for school-trustee, and it jest lifted her right up. She never had been thought any thing off in Jonesville till she wrote that, and that was the makin' of her. And she hadn't half the reason to write it that I have. She hadn't half nor a quarter the cares that I have got. She was a widder, educated high, without any children, with a comfortable income, and she lived in her brother's family, and didn't have no cares at all.

"And only see how that piece lifted her right up! They all said, what right feelin', what delicacy, what a n.o.ble, heart-stirrin', masterly doc.u.ment hern was! And I hankered, I jest hankered, after bein' praised up as she was. And I thought," says he with a deep sithe, "I thought I should get as much agin praise as she did. I thought I should be twice as populer, because it wus sunthin' new for a man to write such a article. I thought I should be all the rage in Jonesville. I thought I should be a lion."

[Ill.u.s.tration: LEt.i.tIA LANFEAR.]

"Wall, accordin' to your tell, they treat you like one, don't they?"

"Yes," says he, "speakin' in a wild animal way." Says he, growin' excited, "I wish I wuz a African lion right out of a jungle: I'd teach them Jonesvillians to get out of my way. I'd love, when they was snickerin', and pokin' fun at me, and actin' and jeerin' and sneerin', and callin' me all to nort, I'd love to spring onto 'em, and roar."

"Hush, Josiah," says I. "Be calm! be calm!"

"I won't be calm! I can't see into it," he hollered. "Why, what lifted Let.i.tia Lanfear right up, didn't lift me up. Hain't what's sa.s.s for the goose, sa.s.s for the gander?"

"No," says I sadly. "It hain't the same sa.s.s. The geese have to get the same strength from it,-strength to swim in the same water, fly over the same fences, from the same pursuers and avengers; and they have to grow the same feathers out of it; but the sa.s.s, the sa.s.s is fur different.

"But," says I, "I don't approve of all your piece. A man, as a general thing, has as much time as a woman has. And I'd love to see the time that I couldn't do a job as short as puttin' a letter in the post-office. Why, I never see the time, even when the children was little, and in cleanin' house, or sugarin'-time, but what I could ride into Jonesville every day, to say nothin' of once a year, and lay a vote onto a pole. And you have as much time as I do, unless it is springs and falls and hayin'-time. And if I could do it, you could. I don't approve of such talk.

"And you know very well that you and I had better spend a little of our spare time a studyin' into matters, so as to vote intelligently; study into the laws that govern us both,-that hang us if we break 'em, and protect us if we obey 'em,-than to spend it a whittling s.h.i.+ngles, or wonderin' whether Miss Bobbet's next baby will be a boy or a girl."

"Wall," says he, takin' his hand down, and winkin',-a sort of a shrewd, knowin' wink, but a sad and dejected one, too, as I ever see wunk,-

"I didn't have no idee of stoppin' votin'."

Says I coldly, as cold as Zero, or pretty nigh as coldblooded as the old man,-

"Did you write that article jest for the speech of people? Didn't you have no principle to back it up?"

"Wall," says he mournfully, "I wouldn't want it to get out of the family, but I'll tell you the truth. I didn't write it on a single principle, not a darn principle. I wrote it jest for popularity, and to make 'em fierce to promote me."

I groaned aloud, and he groaned. It wus a sad and groanful time.

Says he, "I pinned my faith onto Let.i.tia Lanfear. And I can't understand now, why a thing that made Let.i.tia so populer, makes me a perfect outcast. Hain't we both human bein's-human Methodists and Jonesvillians?" Says he, in despairin', agonized tone, "I can't see through it."

Says I soothenly, "Don't worry about that, Josiah, for n.o.body can. It is too deep a conundrum to be seen through: n.o.body has ever seen through it."

But it seemed as if he couldn't be soothed; and agin he kinder sithed out,-

"I pinned my faith onto Let.i.tia, and it has ondone me;" and he kinder whimpered.

But I says firmly, but gently,-

"You will hear to your companion another time, will you not? and pin your faith onto truth and justice and right?"

"No, I won't. I won't pin it onto nothin' nor n.o.body. I'm done with politics from this day."

And bad as we both felt, this last speech of hisen made a glimmer of light streak up, and s.h.i.+ne into my future. Some like heat lightenin' on summer evenin's. It hain't so much enjoyment at the time, but you know it is goin' to clear the cloudy air of the to-morrow. And so its light is sweet to you, though very curious, and crinkley.

And as mournful and sort o' curious as this time seemed to me and to Josiah, yet this speech of hisen made me know that all private and public peril connected with Hon. Josiah Allen was forever past away. And that thought cast a rosy glow onto my to-morrows.

CHAPTER XI.

I found, on lookin' round the house the next mornin', that Philury had kep' things in quite good shape. Although truly the b.u.t.tery looked like a lonesome desert, and the cubbards like empty tents the Arabs had left desolate.

But I knew I could soon make 'em blossom like the rosy with provisions, which I proceeded at once to do, with Philury's help.

While I wus a rollin' out the pie-crust, Philury told me "she had changed her mind about long engagements."

And while I wus a makin' the cookies, she broached it to me that "she and Ury was goin' to be married the next week."

I wus agreable to the idee, and told her so. I like 'em both. Ury is a tall, limber-jinted sort of a chap, sandy complected, and a little round shouldered, but hard-workin' and industrious, and seems to take a interest.

His habits are good: he never drinks any thing stronger than root-beer, and he never uses tobacco-never has chawed any thing to our house stronger than gum. He used that, I have thought sometimes, more than wuz for his good. And I thought it must be expensive, he consumed such quant.i.ties of it. But he told me he made it himself out of beeswax and rozum.

And I told Josiah that I shouldn't say no more about it; because, although it might be a foolish habit, gum was not what you might call inebriatin'; it was not a intoxicatin' beverage, and didn't endanger the publick safety. So he kep' on a chawin' it, to home and abroad. He kep' at it all day, and at night if he felt lonesome.

I had mistrusted this, because I found a great chunk now and then on the head-board; and I tackled him about it, and he owned up.

"When he felt lonesome in the night," he said, "gum sort o' consoled him."

[Ill.u.s.tration: URY.]

Well, I thought that in a great lonesome world, that needed comfort so much, if he found gum a consoler, I wouldn't break it up. So I kep' still, and would clean the head-board silently with kerosine and a woolen rag.

And Philury is a likely girl. Very freckled, but modest and una.s.suming. She is little, and has nice little features, and a round little face; and though she can't be said to resemble it in every particular, yet I never could think of any thing whenever I see her, but a nice little turkey-egg.

She is very obligin', and would always curchy and smile, and say "Yes'm" whenever I asked her to do any thing. She always would, and always will, I s'pose, do jest what you tell her to,-as near as she can; and she is thought a good deal of.

Wall, she has liked Ury for some time-that has been plain to see: she thought her eyes of him, and he of her. He has got eight or nine hundred dollars laid up; and I thought it was well enough for 'em to marry if they wanted to, and so I told Josiah the first time he come into the house that forenoon.

And he said "he guessed our thinkin' about it wouldn't alter it much, one way or the other."

And I said "I s'posed not." But says I, "I spoke out, because I feel quite well about it. I like 'em both, and think they'll make a happy couple: and to show my willin'ness still further, I mean to make a weddin' for her; for she hain't got no mothers, and Miss Gowdy won't have it there, for you know there has been such a hardness between 'em about that grindstun. So I'll have it here, get a good supper, and have 'em married off respectable."

He hung back a little at first, but I argued him down. Says I,-

"I have heerd you say, time and agin, that you liked 'em, and wanted 'em to do well: now, what do good wishes ammount to, unless you are willin' to back 'em up with good acts?" Says I, "I might say that I wished 'em well and happy, and that would be only a small expendature of wind, that wouldn't be no loss to me, and no petickuler help to them. But if I show my good will towards 'em by stirrin' up fruit-cakes and bride-cake, and pickin' chickens, and pressin' 'em, and makin' ice-cream and coffee and sandwitches, and workin' myself completely tired out, a wis.h.i.+n' 'em well, why, then they can depend on it that I am sincere in my good wishes."