{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_50129/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_50129","id":"gutenberg_50129","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/50129","summary":null,"tags":["Category: American Literature","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Short Stories","New England -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction","Short stories, American","Storytelling -- Fiction"],"text":"SAM LAWSON'S OLDTOWN FIRESIDE STORIES\n\nBy Harriet Beecher Stowe\n\nWith Illustrations\n\nHoughton, Mifflin And Company\n\n1881.\n\n\n\n\nOLDTOWN FIRESIDE STORIES\n\n\n\n\nTHE GHOST IN THE MILL.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9013]\n\nOME, Sam, tell us a story,\u201d said I, as Hariet and I crept to his knees,\nin the glow of the bright evening firelight; while Aunt Lois was\nbusily rattling the tea-things, and grandmamma, at the other end of the\nfireplace, was quietly setting the heel of a blue-mixed yarn stocking.\n\nIn those days we had no magazines and daily papers, each reeling off\na serial story. Once a week, \u201cThe Columbian Sentinel\u201d came from Boston\nwith its slender stock of news and editorial; but all the multiform\ndevices--pictorial, narrative, and poetical--which keep the mind of\nthe present generation ablaze with excitement, had not then even an\nexistence. There was no theatre, no opera; there were in Oldtown no\nparties or balls, except, perhaps, the annual election, or Thanksgiving\nfestival; and when winter came, and the sun went down at half-past four\no'clock, and left the long, dark hours of evening to be provided\nfor, the necessity of amusement became urgent. Hence, in those days,\nchimney-corner story-telling became an art and an accomplishment.\nSociety then was full of traditions and narratives which had all the\nuncertain glow and shifting mystery of the firelit hearth upon them.\nThey were told to sympathetic audiences, by the rising and falling light\nof the solemn embers, with the hearth-crickets filling up every pause.\n\n[Illustration: 0015]\n\nThen the aged told their stories to the young,--tales of early life;\ntales of war and adventure, of forest-days, of Indian captivities\nand escapes, of bears and wild-cats and panthers, of rattlesnakes, of\nwitches and wizards, and strange and wonderful dreams and appearances\nand providences.\n\nIn those days of early Massachusetts, faith and credence were in the\nvery air. Two-thirds of New England was then dark, unbroken forests,\nthrough whose tangled paths the mysterious winter wind groaned and\nshrieked and howled with weird noises and unaccountable clamors. Along\nthe iron-bound shore, the stormful Atlantic raved and thundered, and\ndashed its moaning waters, as if to deaden and deafen any voice that\nmight tell of the settled life of the old civilized world, and shut us\nforever into the wilderness. A good story-teller, in those days, was\nalways sure of a warm seat at the hearthstone, and the delighted homage\nof children; and in all Oldtown there was no better story-teller than\nSam Lawson.\n\n\u201cDo, do, tell us a story,\u201d said Harry, pressing upon him, and opening\nvery wide blue eyes, in which undoubting faith shone as in a mirror;\n\u201cand let it be something strange, and different from common.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, I know lots o' strange things,\u201d said Sam, looking\nmysteriously into the fire. \u201cWhy, I know things, that ef I should\ntell,--why, people might say they wa'n't so; but then they _is so_ for\nall that.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, _do_, do, tell us!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, I should scare ye to death, mebbe,\u201d said Sam doubtingly.\n\n\u201cOh, pooh! no, you wouldn't,\u201d we both burst out at once.\n\nBut Sam was possessed by a reticent spirit, and loved dearly to be wooed\nand importuned; and so he only took up the great kitchen-tongs, and\nsmote on the hickory forestick, when it flew apart in the middle, and\nscattered a shower of clear bright coals all over the hearth.\n\n\u201cMercy on us, Sam Lawson!\u201d said Aunt Lois in an indignant voice,\nspinning round from her dishwashing.\n\n\u201cDon't you worry a grain, Miss Lois,\u201d said Sam composedly. \u201cI see that\nare stick was e'en a'most in two, and I thought I'd jest settle it. I 'll\nsweep up the coals now,\u201d he added, vigorously applying a turkey-wing to\nthe purpose, as he knelt on the hearth, his spare, lean figure glowing\nin the blaze of the firelight, and getting quite flashed with exertion.\n\n\u201cThere, now!\u201d he said, when he had brushed over and under and between\nthe fire-irons, and pursued the retreating ashes so far into the red,\nfiery citadel, that his finger-ends were burning and tingling, \u201cthat\n'are's done now as well as Hepsy herself could 'a' done it. I allers\nsweeps up the haarth: I think it's part o' the man's bisness when he\nmakes the fire. But Hepsy's so used to seein' me a-doin' on't, that she\ndon't see no kind o' merit in't. It's just as Parson Lothrop said in his\nsermon,--folks allers overlook their common marcies\u201d--\n\n\u201cBut come, Sam, that story,\u201d said Harry and I coaxingly, pressing upon\nhim, and pulling him down into his seat in the corner.\n\n\u201cLordy massy, these'ere young uns!\u201d said Sam.\n\n\u201cThere's never no contentin' on 'em: ye tell 'em one story, and they\njest swallows it as a dog does a gob o' meat; and they're all ready for\nanother. What do ye want to hear now?\u201d\n\nNow, the fact was, that Sam's stories had been told us so often, that\nthey were all arranged and ticketed in our minds. We knew every word in\nthem, and could set him right if he varied a hair from the usual track;\nand still the interest in them was unabated.\n\nStill we shivered, and clung to his knee, at the mysterious parts, and\nfelt gentle, cold chills run down our spines at appropriate places. We\nwere always in the most receptive and sympathetic condition. To-night,\nin particular, was one of those thundering stormy ones, when the winds\nappeared to be holding a perfect mad carnival over my grandfather's\nhouse. They yelled and squealed round the corners; they collected in\ntroops, and came tumbling and roaring down chimney; they shook and\nrattled the buttery-door and the sinkroom-door and the cellar-door and\nthe chamber-door, with a constant undertone of squeak and clatter, as\nif at every door were a cold, discontented spirit, tired of the chill\noutside, and longing for the warmth and comfort within.\n\n\u201cWal, boys,\u201d said Sam confidentially, \u201cwhat 'll ye have?\u201d\n\n\u201cTell us 'Come down, come down!'\u201d we both shouted with one voice. This\nwas, in our mind, an \u201cA No. 1\u201d among Sam's stories.\n\n\u201cYe mus'n't be frightened now,\u201d said Sam paternally.\n\n\u201cOh, no! we ar'n't frightened _ever_,\u201d said we both in one breath.\n\n\u201cNot when ye go down the cellar arter cider?\u201d said Sam with severe\nscrutiny. \u201cEf ye should be down cellar, and the candle should go out,\nnow?\u201d\n\n\u201cI ain't,\u201d said I: \u201cI ain't afraid of any thing. I never knew what it\nwas to be afraid in my life.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, then,\u201d said Sam, \u201cI 'll tell ye. This'ere's what Cap'n Eb Sawin\ntold me when I was a boy about your bigness, I reckon.\n\n\u201cCap'n Eb Sawin was a most respectable man. Your gran'ther knew him very\nwell; and he was a deacon in the church in Dedham afore he died. He was\nat Lexington when the fust gun was fired agin the British. He was a\ndreffle smart man, Cap'n Eb was, and driv team a good many years atween\nhere and Boston. He married Lois Peabody, that was cousin to your\ngran'ther then. Lois was a rael sensible woman; and I've heard her tell\nthe story as he told her, and it was jest as he told it to me,--jest\nexactly; and I shall never forget it if I live to be nine hundred years\nold, like Mathuselah.\n\n\u201cYe see, along back in them times, there used to be a fellow come round\nthese'ere parts, spring and fall, a-peddlin' goods, with his pack on his\nback; and his name was Jehiel Lommedieu. Nobody rightly knew where he\ncome from. He wasn't much of a talker; but the women rather liked him,\nand kind o' liked to have him round. Women will like some fellows, when\nmen can't see no sort o' reason why they should; and they liked this'ere\nLommedieu, though he was kind o' mournful and thin and shad-bellied, and\nhadn't nothin' to say for himself. But it got to be so, that the women\nwould count and calculate so many weeks afore 'twas time for Lommedieu\nto be along; and they'd make up ginger-snaps and preserves and pies, and\nmake him stay to tea at the houses, and feed him up on the best there\nwas: and the story went round, that he was a-courtin' Phebe Ann Parker,\nor Phebe Ann was a-courtin' him,--folks didn't rightly know which.\nWal, all of a sudden, Lommedieu stopped comin' round; and nobody knew\nwhy,--only jest he didn't come. It turned out that Phebe Ann Parker had\ngot a letter from him, sayin' he'd be along afore Thanksgiving; but he\ndidn't come, neither afore nor at Thanksgiving time, nor arter, nor next\nspring: and finally the women they gin up lookin' for him. Some said\nhe was dead; some said he was gone to Canada; and some said he hed gone\nover to the Old Country.\n\n\u201cWal, as to Phebe Ann, she acted like a gal o' sense, and married 'Bijah\nMoss, and thought no more 'bout it. She took the right view on't, and\nsaid she was sartin that all things was ordered out for the best; and\nit was jest as well folks couldn't always have their own way. And so,\nin time, Lommedieu was gone out o' folks's minds, much as a last year's\napple-blossom.\n\n\u201cIt's relly affectin' to think how little these'ere folks is missed\nthat's so much sot by. There ain't nobody, ef they's ever so important,\nbut what the world gets to goin' on without 'em, pretty much as it did\nwith 'em, though there's some little flurry at fust. Wal, the last\nthing that was in anybody's mind was, that they ever should hear from\nLommedieu agin. But there ain't nothin' but what has its time o' turnin'\nup; and it seems his turn was to come.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, 'twas the 19th o' March, when Cap'n Eb Sawin started with\na team for Boston. That day, there come on about the biggest\nsnow-storm that there'd been in them parts sence the oldest man could\nremember.'Twas this'ere fine, siftin' snow, that drives in your face\nlike needles, with a wind to cut your nose off: it made teamin' pretty\ntedious work. Cap'n Eb was about the toughest man in them parts. He'd\nspent days in the woods a-loggin', and he'd been up to the deestrict o'\nMaine a-lumberin', and was about up to any sort o' thing a man gen'ally\ncould be up to; but these'ere March winds sometimes does set on a fellow\nso, that neither natur' nor grace can stan' 'em. The cap'n used to say,\nhe could stan' any wind that blew one way 't time for five minutes; but\ncome to winds that blew all four p'ints at the same minit,--why, they\nflustered him.\n\n\u201cWal, that was the sort o' weather it was all day: and by sundown Cap'n\nEb he got clean bewildered, so that he lost his road; and, when night\ncame on, he didn't know nothin' where he was. Ye see the country was all\nunder drift, and the air so thick with snow, that he couldn't see a foot\nafore him; and the fact was, he got off the Boston road without knowin'\nit, and came out at a pair o' bars nigh upon Sherburn, where old Cack\nSparrock's mill is.\n\n\u201cYour gran'ther used to know old Cack, boys. He was a drefful drinkin'\nold crittur, that lived there all alone in the woods by himself\na-tendin' saw and grist mill. He wa'n't allers jest what he was then.\nTime was that Cack was a pretty consid'ably likely young man, and his\nwife was a very respectable woman,--Deacon Amos Petengall's dater from\nSherburn.\n\n\u201cBut ye see, the year arter his wife died, Cack he gin up goin' to\nmeetin' Sundays, and, all the tithing-men and selectmen could do, they\ncouldn't get him out to meetin'; and, when a man neglects means o' grace\nand sanctuary privileges, there ain't no sayin' _what_ he 'll do next.\nWhy, boys, jist think on't!--an immortal crittur lyin' round loose\nall day Sunday, and not puttin' on so much as a clean shirt, when\nall 'spectable folks has on their best close, and is to meetin'\nworshippin' the Lord! What can you spect to come of it, when he lies\nidlin' round in his old week-day close, fishing, or some sich, but what\nthe Devil should be arter him at last, as he was arter old Cack?\u201d\n\nHere Sam winked impressively to my grandfather in the opposite corner,\nto call his attention to the moral which he was interweaving with his\nnarrative.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, Cap'n Eb he told me, that when he come to them bars and\nlooked up, and saw the dark a-comin' down, and the storm a-thickenin'\nup, he felt that things was gettin' pretty consid'able serious. There\nwas a dark piece o' woods on ahead of him inside the bars; and he knew,\ncome to get in there, the light would give out clean. So he jest thought\nhe'd take the hoss out o' the team, and go ahead a little, and see where\nhe was. So he driv his oxen up ag'in the fence, and took out the hoss,\nand got on him, and pushed along through the woods, not rightly knowin'\nwhere he was goin'.\n\n\u201cWal, afore long he see a light through the trees; and, sure enough, he\ncome out to Cack Sparrock's old mill.\n\n\u201cIt was a pretty consid'able gloomy sort of a place, that are old mill\nwas. There was a great fall of water that come rushin' down the rocks,\nand fell in a deep pool; and it sounded sort o' wild and lonesome: but\nCap'n Eb he knocked on the door with his whip-handle, and got in.\n\n\u201cThere, to be sure, sot old Cack beside a great blazin' fire, with his\nrum-jug at his elbow. He was a drefful fellow to drink, Cack was! For\nall that, there was some good in him, for he was pleasant-spoken and\n'bliging; and he made the cap'n welcome.\n\n\u201c'Ye see, Cack,' said Cap'n Eb, 'I'm off my road, and got snowed up down\nby your bars,' says he.\n\n\u201c'Want ter know!' says Cack. 'Calculate you 'll jest have to camp down\nhere till mornin',' says he.\n\n\u201cWal, so old Cack he got out his tin lantern, and went with Cap'n Eb\nback to the bars to help him fetch along his critturs. He told him he\ncould put 'em under the mill-shed. So they got the critturs up to the\nshed, and got the cart under; and by that time the storm was awful.\n\n\u201cBut Cack he made a great roarin' fire, 'cause, ye see, Cack allers had\nslab-wood a plenty from his mill; and a roarin' fire is jest so much\ncompany. It sort o' keeps a fellow's spirits up, a good fire does. So\nCack he sot on his old teakettle, and made a swingeing lot o' toddy; and\nhe and Cap'n Eb were havin' a tol'able comfortable time there. Cack was\na pretty good hand to tell stories; and Cap'n Eb warn't no way backward\nin that line, and kep' up his end pretty well: and pretty soon they was\na-roarin' and haw-hawin' inside about as loud as the storm outside; when\nall of a sudden, 'bout midnight, there come a loud rap on the door.\n\n\u201c'Lordy massy! what's that?' says Cack. Folks is rather startled allers\nto be checked up sudden when they are a-carryin' on and laughin'; and\nit was such an awful blowy night, it was a little scary to have a rap on\nthe door.\n\n\u201cWal, they waited a minit, and didn't hear nothin' but the wind\na-screechin' round the chimbley; and old Cack was jest goin' on with his\nstory, when the rap come ag'in, harder'n ever, as if it'd shook the door\nopen.\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says old Cack, 'if 'tis the Devil, we'd jest as good's open, and\nhave it out with him to onst,' says he; and so he got up and opened the\ndoor, and, sure enough, there was old Ketury there. Expect you've\nheard your grandma tell about old Ketury. She used to come to meetin's\nsometimes, and her husband was one o' the prayin' Indians; but Ketury\nwas one of the rael wild sort, and you couldn't no more convert _her_\nthan you could convert a wild-cat or a painter [panther]. Lordy massy!\nKetury used to come to meetin', and sit there on them Indian benches;\nand when the second bell was a-tollin', and when Parson Lothrop and his\nwife was comin' up the broad aisle, and everybody in the house ris' up\nand stood, Ketury would sit there, and look at 'em out o' the corner\no' her eyes; and folks used to say she rattled them necklaces o'\nrattlesnakes' tails and wild-cat teeth, and sich like heathen trumpery,\nand looked for all the world as if the spirit of the old Sarpent himself\nwas in her. I've seen her sit and look at Lady Lothrop out o' the corner\no' her eyes; and her old brown baggy neck would kind o' twist and work;\nand her eyes they looked so, that 'twas enough to scare a body. For all\nthe world, she looked jest as if she was a-workin' up to spring at her.\nLady Lothrop was jest as kind to Ketury as she always was to every poor\ncrittur. She'd bow and smile as gracious to her when meetin'\nwas over, and she come down the aisle, passin' out o, meetin'; but\nKetury never took no notice. Ye see, Ketury's father was one o' them\ngreat powwows down to Martha's Vineyard; and people used to say she was\nset apart, when she was a child, to the sarvice o' the Devil: any way,\nshe never could be made nothin' of in a Christian way. She come down to\nParson Lothrop's study once or twice to be catechised; but he couldn't\nget a word out o' her, and she kind o' seemed to sit scornful while he\nwas a-talkin'. Folks said, if it was in old times, Ketury wouldn't have\nbeen allowed to go on so; but Parson Lothrop's so sort o' mild, he let\nher take pretty much her own way. Everybody thought that Ketury was a\nwitch: at least, she knew consid'able more'n she ought to know, and so\nthey was kind o' 'fraid on her. Cap'n Eb says he never see a fellow seem\nscareder than Cack did when he see Ketury a-standin' there.\n\n\u201cWhy, ye see, boys, she was as withered and wrinkled and brown as an old\nfrosted punkin-vine; and her little snaky eyes sparkled and snapped, and\nit made yer head kind o' dizzy to look at 'em; and folks used to say that\nanybody that Ketury got mad at was sure to get the worst of it fust or\nlast. And so, no matter what day or hour Ketury had a mind to rap at\nanybody's door, folks gen 'lly thought it was best to let her in; but\nthen, they never thought her coming was for any good, for she was just\nlike the wind,--she came when the fit was on her, she staid jest so long\nas it pleased her, and went when she got ready, and not before. Ketury\nunderstood English, and could talk it well enough, but always seemed to\nscorn it, and was allers mowin' and mutterin' to herself in Indian, and\nwinkin' and blinkin' as if she saw more folks round than you did, so\nthat she wa'n't no way pleasant company; and yet everybody took good\ncare to be polite to her.\n\n\u201cSo old Cack asked her to come in, and didn't make no question where she\ncome from, or what she come on; but he knew it was twelve good miles\nfrom where she lived to his hut, and the snow was drifted above her\nmiddle: and Cap'n Eb declared that there wa'n't no track, nor sign o' a\ntrack, of anybody's coming through that snow next morning.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow did she get there, then?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cDidn't ye never see brown leaves a-ridin' on the wind? Well,' Cap'n Eb\nhe says, 'she came on the wind,' and I'm sure it was strong enough to\nfetch her. But Cack he got her down into the warm corner, and he poured\nher out a mug o' hot toddy, and give her: but ye see her bein' there\nsort o' stopped the conversation; for she sot there a-rockin' back'ards\nand for'ards, a-sippin her toddy, and a-mutterin', and lookin' up\nchimbley.\n\n\u201cCap'n Eb says in all his born days he never hearn such screeches\nand yells as the wind give over that chimbley; and old Cack got so\nfrightened, you could fairly hear his teeth chatter.\n\n\u201cBut Cap'n Eb he was a putty brave man, and he wa'n't goin' to have\nconversation stopped by no woman, witch or no witch; and so, when he see\nher mutterin', and lookin' up chimbley, he spoke up, and says he, 'Well,\nKetury, what do you see?' says he. 'Come, out with it; don't keep it to\nyourself.' Ye see Cap'n Eb was a hearty fellow, and then he was a leetle\nwarmed up with the toddy.\n\n\u201cThen he said he see an evil kind o' smile on Ketury's face, and she\nrattled her necklace o' bones and snakes' tails; and her eyes seemed to\nsnap; and she looked up the chimbley, and called out, 'Come down, come\ndown! let's see who ye be.'\n\n\u201cThen there was a scratchin' and a rumblin' and a groan; and a pair\nof feet come down the chimbley, and stood right in the middle of\nthe haarth, the toes pi'ntin' out'rds, with shoes and silver buckles\na-shinin' in the firelight. Cap'n Eb says he never come so near bein'\nscared in his life; and, as to old Cack, he jest wilted right down in\nhis chair.\n\n\u201cThen old Ketury got up, and reached her stick up chimbley, and called\nout louder, 'Come down, come down! let's see who ye be.' And, sure\nenough, down came a pair o' legs, and j'ined right on to the feet: good\nfair legs they was, with ribbed stockings and leather breeches.\n\n\u201c'Wal, we're in for it now,' says Cap'n Eb. 'Go it, Ketury, and let's\nhave the rest on him.'\n\n\u201cKetury didn't seem to mind him: she stood there as stiff as a stake,\nand kep' callin' out, 'Come down, come down! let's see who ye be.' And\nthen come down the body of a man with a brown coat and yellow vest, and\nj'ined right on to the legs; but there wa'n't no arms to it. Then Ketury\nshook her stick up chimbley, and called, '_Come down, come down!_' And\nthere came down a pair o' arms, and went on each side o' the body; and\nthere stood a man all finished, only there wa'n't no head on him.\n\n\u201c'Wal, Ketury,' says Cap'n Eb, 'this 'ere's getting serious. I 'spec' you\nmust finish him up, and let's see what he wants of us.'\n\n\u201cThen Ketury called out once more, louder'n ever, 'Come down, come down!\nlet's see who ye be.' And, sure enough, down comes a man's head, and\nsettled on the shoulders straight enough; and Cap'n Eb, the minit he sot\neyes on him, knew he was Jehiel Lommedieu.\n\n[Illustration: 0035]\n\n\u201cOld Cack knew him too; and he fell flat on his face, and prayed the\nLord to have mercy on his soul: but Cap'n Eb he was for gettin' to the\nbottom of matters, and not have his scare for nothin'; so he says to\nhim, 'What do you want, now you hev come?'\n\n\u201cThe man he didn't speak; he only sort o' moaned, and p'inted to the\nchimbley. He seemed to try to speak, but couldn't; for ye see it isn't\noften that his sort o' folks is permitted to speak: but just then there\ncame a screechin' blast o' wind, and blowed the door open, and blowed\nthe smoke and fire all out into the room, and there seemed to be a\nwhirlwind and darkness and moans and screeches; and, when it all cleared\nup, Ketury and the man was both gone, and only old Cack lay on the\nground, rolling and moaning as if he'd die.\n\n\u201cWal, Cap'n Eb he picked him up, and built up the fire, and sort o'\ncomforted him up, 'cause the crittur was in distress o' mind that was\ndrefful. The awful Providence, ye see, had awakened him, and his sin had\nbeen set home to his soul; and he was under such conviction, that it all\nhad to come out,--how old Cack's father had murdered poor Lommedieu for\nhis money, and Cack had been privy to it, and helped his father build\nthe body up in that very chimbley; and he said that he hadn't had\nneither peace nor rest since then, and that was what had driv' him\naway from ordinances; for ye know sinnin' will always make a man leave\nprayin'. Wal, Cack didn't live but a day or two. Cap'n Eb he got the\nminister o' Sherburn and one o' the selectmen down to see him; and they\ntook his deposition. He seemed railly quite penitent; and Parson Carryl\nhe prayed with him, and was faithful in settin' home the providence to\nhis soul: and so, at the eleventh hour, poor old Cack might have got\nin; at least it looks a leetle like it. He was distressed to think he\ncouldn't live to be hung. He sort o' seemed to think, that if he was\nfairly tried, and hung, it would make it all square. He made Parson\nCarryl promise to have the old mill pulled down, and bury the body; and,\nafter he was dead, they did it.\n\n\u201cCap'n Eb he was one of a party o' eight that pulled down the chimbley;\nand there, sure enough, was the skeleton of poor Lommedieu.\n\n\u201cSo there you see, boys, there can't be no iniquity so hid but what\nit 'll come out. The wild Indians of the forest, and the stormy winds and\ntempests, j'ined together to bring out this'ere.\u201d\n\n\u201cFor my part,\u201d said Aunt Lois sharply, \u201cI never believed that story.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, Lois,\u201d said my grandmother, \u201cCap'n Eb Sawin was a regular\nchurch-member, and a most respectable man.\u201d\n\n\u201cLaw, mother! I don't doubt he thought so. I suppose he and Cack got\ndrinking toddy together, till he got asleep, and dreamed it. I wouldn't\nbelieve such a thing if it did happen right before my face and eyes. I\nshould only think I was crazy, that's all.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome, Lois, if I was you, I wouldn't talk so like a Sadducee,\u201d said\nmy grandmother. \u201cWhat would become of all the accounts in Dr. Cotton\nMather's 'Magnilly' if folks were like you?\u201d\n\n\u201cWal,\u201d said Sam Lawson, drooping contemplatively over the coals, and\ngazing into the fire, \u201cthere's a putty consid'able sight o' things in\nthis world that's true; and then ag'in there's a sight o' things that\nain't true. Now, my old gran'ther used to say, 'Boys, says he, 'if ye\nwant to lead a pleasant and prosperous life, ye must contrive allers\nto keep jest the _happy medium_ between truth and falsehood.' Now, that\nare's my doctrine.\u201d\n\nAunt Lois knit severely.\n\n\u201cBoys,\u201d said Sam, \u201cdon't you want ter go down with me and get a mug o'\ncider?\u201d\n\nOf course we did, and took down a basket to bring up some apples to\nroast.\n\n\u201cBoys,\u201d says Sam mysteriously, while he was drawing the cider, \u201cyou jest\nask your Aunt Lois to tell you what she knows 'bout Ruth Sullivan.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, what is it?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! you must ask _her_. These 'ere folks that's so kind o' toppin'\nabout sperits and sich, come sift 'em down, you gen 'lly find they knows\none story that kind o' puzzles 'em. Now you mind, and jist ask your Aunt\nLois about Ruth Sullivan.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: 5040]\n\n\n\n\nTHE SULLIVAN LOOKING-GLASS\n\n\n[Illustration: 9041]\n\nUNT LOIS,\u201d said I, \u201cwhat was that story about Ruth Sullivan?\u201d\n\nAunt Lois's quick black eyes gave a surprised flash; and she and my\ngrandmother looked at each other a minute significantly.\n\n\u201cWho told you any thing about Ruth Sullivan,\u201d she said sharply.\n\n\u201cNobody. Somebody said _you_ knew something about her,\u201d said I.\n\nI was holding a skein of yarn for Aunt Lois; and she went on winding in\nsilence, putting the ball through loops and tangled places.\n\n\u201cLittle boys shouldn't ask questions,\u201d she concluded at last\nsententiously. \u201cLittle boys that ask too many questions get sent to\nbed.\u201d\n\nI knew that of old, and rather wondered at my own hardihood.\n\nAunt Lois wound on in silence; but, looking in her face, I could see\nplainly that I had started an exciting topic.\n\n\u201cI should think,\u201d pursued my grandmother in her corner, \u201cthat Ruth's\ncase might show you, Lois, that a good many things may happen,--more\nthan you believe.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, well, mother! Ruth's was a strange case; but I suppose there are\nways of accounting for it.\u201d\n\n\u201cYou believed Ruth, didn't you?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, certainly, I believed Ruth! Why shouldn't I? Ruth was one of my\nbest friends, and as true a girl as lives: there wasn't any nonsense\nabout Ruth. She was one of the sort,\u201d said Aunt Lois reflectively, \u201cthat\nI'd as soon trust as myself: when she said a thing was so and so, I knew\nit was so.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen, if you think Ruth's story was true,\u201d pursued my grandmother,\n\u201cwhat's the reason you are always cavilling at things just 'cause you\ncan't understand how they came to be so?\u201d\n\nAunt Lois set her lips firmly, and wound with grim resolve. She was the\nvery impersonation of that obstinate rationalism that grew up at the\nNew-England fireside, close alongside of the most undoubting faith in\nthe supernatural.\n\n\u201cI don't believe such things,\u201d at last she snapped out, \u201cand I don't\ndisbelieve them. I just let 'em alone. What do I know about 'em? Ruth\ntells me a story; and I believe her. I know what she saw beforehand,\ncame true in a most remarkable way. Well, I'm sure I've no objection.\nOne thing may be true, or another, for all me; but, just because I\nbelieve Ruth Sullivan, I'm not going to believe, right and left, all the\nstories in Cotton Mather, and all that anybody can hawk up to tell. Not\nI.\u201d This whole conversation made me all the more curious to get at the\nstory thus dimly indicated; and so we beset Sam for information.\n\n\u201cSo your Aunt Lois wouldn't tell ye nothin',\u201d said Sam. \u201cWanter know,\nneow! sho!\u201d\n\n\u201cNo: she said we must go to bed if we asked her.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat 'are's a way folks has; but, ye see, boys,\u201d said Sam, while a\ndroll confidential expression crossed the lack-lustre dolefulness of\nhis visage, \u201cye see, I put ye up to it, 'cause Miss Lois is so large and\ncommandin' in her ways, and so kind o' up and down in all her doin's,\nthat I like once and a while to sort o' gravel her; and I knowed enough\nto know that that 'are question would git her in a tight place.\n\n\u201cYe see, yer Aunt Lois was knowin' to all this 'ere about Ruth, so\nthere wer'n't no gettin' away from it; and it's about as remarkable a\nprovidence as any o' them of Mister Cotton Marther's 'Magnilly.' So if\nyou 'll come up in the barn-chamber this arternoon, where I've got a lot\no' flax to hatchel out, I 'll tell ye all about it.\u201d\n\nSo that afternoon beheld Sam arranged at full length on a pile of\ntop-tow in the barn-chamber, hatchelling by proxy by putting Harry and\nmyself to the service.\n\n\u201cWal, now, boys, it's kind o' refreshing to see how wal ye take hold,\u201d\n he observed. \u201cNothin' like bein' industrious while ye'r young: gret\nsight better now than loafin off, down in them medders.\n\n               \u201c'In books and work and useful play\n\n                   Let my fust years be past:\n\n               So shall I give for every day\n\n                   Some good account at last.'\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, Sam, if we work for you, you must tell us that story about Ruth\nSullivan.\u201d\n\n\u201cLordy massy! yis,--course I will. I've had the best kind o' chances\nof knowin' all about that 'are. Wal, you see there was old Gineral\nSullivan, he lived in state and grande'r in the old Sullivan house out\nto Roxberry. I been to Roxberry, and seen that 'are house o' Gineral\nSullivan's. There was one time that I was a consid'able spell lookin'\nround in Roxberry, a kind o' seein' how things wuz there, and whether\nor no there mightn't be some sort o' providential openin' or suthin'. I\nused to stay with Aunt Polly Ginger. She was sister to Mehitable Ginger,\nGineral Sullivan's housekeeper, and hed the in and out o' the Sullivan\nhouse, and kind o' kept the run o' how things went and came in it. Polly\nshe was a kind o' cousin o' my mother's, and allers glad to see me. Fact\nwas, I was putty handy round house; and she used to save up her broken\nthings and sich till I come round in the fall; and then I'd mend 'em up,\nand put the clock right, and split her up a lot o' kindlings, and board\nup the cellar-windows, and kind o' make her sort o' comfortable,--she\nbein' a lone body, and no man round. As I said, it was sort o'\nconvenient to hev me; and so I jest got the run o' things in the\nSullivan house pretty much as ef I was one on 'em. Gineral Sullivan he\nkept a grand house, I tell you. You see, he cum from the old country,\nand felt sort o' lordly and grand; and they used to hev the gretest kind\no' doin's there to the Sullivan house. Ye ought ter a seen that 'are\nhouse,--gret big front hall and gret wide stairs; none o' your steep\nkind that breaks a feller's neck to get up and down, but gret broad\nstairs with easy risers, so they used to say you could a cantered a pony\nup that 'are stairway easy as not. Then there was gret wide rooms, and\nsofys, and curtains, and gret curtained bedsteads that looked sort o'\nlike fortifications, and pictur's that was got in Italy and Rome and all\nthem 'are heathen places. Ye see, the Gineral was a drefful worldly\nold critter, and was all for the pomps and the vanities. Lordy massy!\nI wonder what the poor old critter thinks about it all now, when his\nbody's all gone to dust and ashes in the graveyard, and his soul's gone\nto 'tarnity! Wal, that are ain't none o' my business; only it shows the\nvanity o' riches in a kind o' strikin' light, and makes me content that\nI never hed none.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, Sam, I hope General Sullivan wasn't a wicked man, _was_ he?\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, I wouldn't say he was railly wickeder than the run; but he was\none o' these 'ere high-stepping, big-feeling fellers, that seem to be\na hevin' their portion in this life. Drefful proud he was; and he was\npretty much sot on this world, and kep' a sort o' court goin' on round\nhim. Wal, I don't jedge him nor nobody: folks that hes the world is apt\nto get sot on it. Don't none on us do more than middlin' well.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, Sam, what about Ruth Sullivan?\u201d\n\n\u201cRuth?--Oh, yis!--Ruth--.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, the only crook in the old Gineral's lot was he didn't hev\nno children. Mis' Sullivan, she was a beautiful woman, as handsome as a\npictur'; but she never had but one child; and he was a son who died when\nhe was a baby, and about broke her heart. And then this 'ere Ruth was\nher sister's child, that was born about the same time; and, when the boy\ndied, they took Ruth home to sort o' fill his place, and kind o' comfort\nup Mis' Sullivan. And then Ruth's father and mother died; and they\nadopted her for their own, and brought her up.\n\n\u201cWal, she grew up to be amazin' handsome. Why, everybody said that she\nwas jest the light and glory of that 'are old Sullivan place, and worth\nmore'n all the pictur's and the silver and the jewels, and all there was\nin the house; and she was jest so innercent and sweet, that you never\nsee nothing to beat it. Wal, your Aunt Lois she got acquainted with Ruth\none summer when she was up to Old Town a visitin' at Parson Lothrop's.\nYour Aunt Lois was a gal then, and a pretty good-lookin' one too; and,\nsomehow or other, she took to Ruth, and Ruth took to her. And when Ruth\nwent home, they used to be a writin' backwards and forads; and I guess\nthe fact was, Ruth thought about as much of your Aunt Lois as she did o'\nanybody. Ye see, your aunt was a kind o' strong up-and-down woman that\nalways knew certain jest what she did know; and Ruth, she was one o'\nthem gals that seems sort o' like a stray lamb or a dove that's sort o'\nlost their way in the world, and wants some one to show 'em where to go\nnext. For, ye see, the fact was, the old Gineral and Madam, they\ndidn't agree very well. He wa'n't well pleased that she didn't have no\nchildren; and she was sort o' jealous o' him 'cause she got hold o' some\nsort of story about how he was to a married somebody else over there in\nEngland: so she got sort o' riled up, jest as wimmen will, the best on\n'em; and they was pretty apt to have spats, and one could give t'other\nas good as they sent; and, by all accounts, they fit putty lively\nsometimes. And, between the two, Ruth she was sort o' scared, and\nfluttered like a dove that didn't know jest where to settle. Ye see,\nthere she was in that 'are great wide house, where they was a feastin'\nand a prancin' and a dancin', and a goin' on like Ahashuerus and\nHerodias and all them old Scriptur' days. There was a comin' and goin,'\nand there was gret dinners and gret doin's, but no love; and, you know,\nthe Scriptur' says, 'Better is a dinner o' yarbs, where love is, than a\nstalled ox, and hatred therewith.'\n\n\u201cWal, I don't orter say _hatred_, arter all. I kind o reckon, the old\nGineral did the best he could: the fact is, when a woman gits a kink\nin her head agin a man, the best on us don't allers do jest the right\nthing.\n\n\u201cAny way, Ruth, she was sort o' forlorn, and didn't seem to take no\ncomfort in the goin's on. The Gineral he was mighty fond on her,\nand proud on her; and there wa'n't nothin' too good for Ruth. He was\nfree-handed, the Gineral wuz. He dressed her up in silks and satins, and\nshe hed a maid to wait on her, and she hed sets o' pearl and dimond; and\nMadam Sullivan she thought all the world on her, and kind o' worshipped\nthe ground she trod on. And yet Ruth was sort o' lonesome.\n\n\u201cYe see, Ruth wa'n't calculated for grande'r. Some folks ain't.\n\n\u201cWhy, that 'are summer she spent out to Old Town, she was jest as chirk\nand chipper as a wren, a wearin' her little sun-bunnet, and goin' a\nhuckle-berryin' and a black-berryin' and diggin' sweet-flag, and gettin\ncowslops and dandelions; and she hed a word for everybody. And everybody\nliked Ruth, and wished her well. Wal, she was sent for her health; and\nshe got that, and more too: she got a sweetheart.\n\n\u201cYe see, there was a Cap'n Oliver a visitin' at the minister's that\nsummer,--a nice, handsome young man as ever was. He and Ruth and your\nAunt Lois, they was together a good deal; and they was a ramblin' and\na ridin' and a sailin': and so Ruth and the Capting went the way o' all\nthe airth, and fell dead in love with each other. Your Aunt Lois she\nwas knowing to it and all about it, 'cause Ruth she was jest one of them\nthat couldn't take a step without somebody to talk to.\n\n\u201cCaptain Oliver was of a good family in England; and so, when he made\nbold to ask the old Gineral for Ruth, he didn't say him nay: and it was\nagreed, as they was young, they should wait a year or two. If he and\nshe was of the same mind, he should be free to marry her. Jest right on\nthat, the Captain's regiment was ordered home, and he had to go; and,\nthe next they heard, it was sent off to India. And poor little Ruth she\nkind o' drooped and pined; but she kept true, and wouldn't have nothin'\nto say to nobody that came arter her, for there was lots and cords o'\nfellows as did come arter her. Ye see, Ruth had a takin' way with her;\nand then she had the name of bein' a great heiress, and that allers\ndraws fellers, as molasses does flies.\n\n\u201cWal, then the news came, that Captain Oliver was comin' home to\nEngland, and the ship was took by the Algerenes, and he was gone into\nslavery there among them heathen Mahomedans and what not.\n\n\u201cFolks seemed to think it was all over with him, and Ruth might jest as\nwell give up fust as last. And the old Gineral he'd come to think she\nmight do better; and he kep' a introducin' one and another, and tryin'\nto marry her off; but Ruth she wouldn't. She used to write sheets and\nsheets to your Aunt Lois about it; and I think Aunt Lois she kep' her\ngrit up. Your Aunt Lois she'd a stuck by a man to the end o' time ef't\nben her case; and so she told Ruth.\n\n\u201cWal, then there was young Jeff Sullivan, the Gineral's nephew, he\nturned up; and the Gineral he took a gret fancy to him. He was next heir\nto the Gineral; but he'd ben a pretty rackety youngster in his young\ndays,--off to sea, and what not, and sowed a consid'able crop o' wild\noats. People said he'd been a pirating off there in South Ameriky. Lordy\nmassy! nobody rightly knew where he hed ben or where he hadn't: all was,\nhe turned up at last all alive, and chipper as a skunk blackbird. Wal,\nof course he made his court to Ruth; and the Gineral, he rather backed\nhim up in it; but Ruth she wouldn't have nothin' to say to him. Wal,\nhe come and took up his lodgin' at the Gineral's; and he was jest as\nslippery as an eel, and sort o' slid into every thing, that was a goin'\non in the house and about it. He was here, and he was there, and he\nwas everywhere, and a havin' his say about this and that; and he got\neverybody putty much under his thumb. And they used to say, he wound the\nGineral round and round like a skein o' yarn; but he couldn't come it\nround Ruth.\n\n\u201cWal, the Gineral said she shouldn't be forced; and Jeff, he was smooth\nas satin, and said he'd be willing to wait as long as Jacob did for\nRachel. And so there he sot down, a watchin' as patient as a cat at a\nmousehole; 'cause the Gineral he was thick-set and shortnecked, and drank\npretty free, and was one o' the sort that might pop off any time.\n\n\u201cWal, Mis' Sullivan, she beset the Gineral to make a provision for\nRuth; 'cause she told him very sensible, that he'd brought her up in\nluxury, and that it wa'n't fair not to settle somethin' on her; and\nso the Gineral he said he'd make a will, and part the property equally\nbetween them. And he says to Jeff, that, if he played his part as\na young fellow oughter know how, it would all come to him in the\nend; 'cause they hadn't heard nothing from Captain Oliver for three or\nfour years, and folks about settled it that he must, be dead.\n\n\u201cWal, the Gineral he got a letter about an estate that had come to him\nin England; and he had to go over. Wal, livin' on the next estate, was\nthe very cousin of the Gineral's that he was to a married when they was\nboth young: the lands joined so that the grounds run together. What came\nbetween them two nobody knows; but she never married, and there she was.\nThere was high words between the Gineral and Madam Sullivan about his\ngoin' over. She said there wa'n't no sort o' need on't, and he said\nthere was; and she said she hoped _she_ should be in her grave afore he\ncome back; and he said she might suit herself about that for all him.\nThat 'are was the story that the housekeeper told to Aunt Polly; and\nAunt Polly she told me. These 'ere squabbles somehow allers does kind o'\nleak out one way or t'other. Anyhow, it was a house divided agin itself\nat the Gineral's, when he was a fixin' out for the voyage. There was\nRuth a goin' fust to one, and then to t'other, and tryin' all she could\nto keep peace beteen 'em; and there was this 'ere Master Slick Tongue\ntalkin' this way to one side, and that way to t'other, and the old\nGineral kind o' like a shuttle-cock atween 'em.\n\n\u201cWal, then, the night afore he sailed, the Gineral he hed his lawyer\nup in his library there, a lookin' over all his papers and bonds and\nthings, and a witnessing his will; and Master Jeff was there, as lively\nas a cricket, a goin' into all affairs, and offerin' to take precious\ngood care while he was gone; and the Gineral he had his papers and\nletters out, a sortin' on 'em over, which was to be took to the old\ncountry, and which was to be put in a trunk to go back to Lawyer\nDennis's office.\n\n\u201cWal, Abner Ginger, Polly's boy, he that was footman and waiter then\nat the Gineral's, he told me, that, about eight o'clock that evening he\nwent up with hot water and lemons and sperits and sich, and he see the\ngret green table in the library all strewed and covered with piles o'\npapers; and there was tin boxes a standin' round; and the Gineral a\npackin' a trunk, and young Master Jeff, as lively and helpful as a rat\nthat smells cheese. And then the Gineral he says, 'Abner,' says he, 'can\nyou write your name?'--'I should hope so, Gineral.' says Abner.--'Wal,\nthen, Abner,' says he, 'this is my last will; and I want you to witness\nit,' and so Abner he put down his name opposite to a place with a wafer\nand a seal; and then the Gineral, he says, 'Abner, you tell Ginger to\ncome here.' That, you see, was his housekeeper, my Aunt Polly's sister,\nand a likely woman as ever was. And so they had her up, and she put\ndown her name to the will; and then Aunt Polly she was had up (she was\ndrinking tea there that night), and she put down her name. And all of\n'em did it with good heart, 'cause it had got about among 'em that the\nwill was to provide for Miss Ruth; for everybody loved Ruth, ye see, and\nthere was consid'ble many stories kind o' goin' the rounds about Master\nJeff and his doin's. And they did say he sort o' kep' up the strife\natween the Gineral and my lady, and so they didn't think none too well\no' him; and, as he was next o' kin, and Miss Ruth wa'n't none o' the\nGineral's blood (ye see, she was Mis' Sullivan's sister's child), of\ncourse there wouldn't nothin' go to Miss Ruth in way o' law, and so that\nwas why the signin' o' that 'are will was so much talked about\namong 'em.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, you see, the Gineral he sailed the next day; and Jeff he staid by\nto keep watch o' things.\n\n\u201cWal, the old Gineral he got over safe; for Miss Sullivan, she had a\nletter from him all right. When he got away, his conscience sort o'\nnagged him, and he was minded to be a good husband. At any rate, he\nwrote a good loving letter to her, and sent his love to Ruth, and sent\nover lots o' little keepsakes and things for her, and told her that he\nleft her under good protection, and wanted her to try and make up her\nmind to marry Jeff, as that would keep the property together.\n\n\u201cWal, now there couldn't be no sort o' sugar sweeter than Jeff was to\nthem lone wimmen. Jeff was one o' the sort that could be all things to\nall wimmen. He waited and he tended, and he was as humble as any snake\nin the grass that ever ye see and the old lady, she clean fell in with\nhim, but Ruth, she seemed to have a regular spite agin him. And she that\nwar as gentle as a lamb, that never had so much as a hard thought of a\nmortal critter, and wouldn't tread on a worm, she was so set agin Jeff,\nthat she wouldn't so much as touch his hand when she got out o' her\nkerridge.\n\n\u201cWal, now comes the strange part o' my story: Ruth was one o' the kind\nthat _hes the gift o' seein'. She was born with a veil over her face!_\u201d\n\nThis mysterious piece of physiological information about Ruth was given\nwith a look and air that announced something very profound and awful;\nand we both took up the inquiry, \u201cBorn with a veil over her face? How\nshould _that_ make her see?\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, boys, how should I know? But the fact _is so_. There's those as is\nwal known as lies the gift o' seein' what others can't see: they can\nsee through walls and houses; they can see people's hearts; they can\nsee what's to come. They don't know nothin' how 'tis, but this 'ere\nknowledge comes to 'em: it's a gret gift; and that sort's born with the\nveil over their faces. Ruth was o' these 'ere. Old Granny Badger she\nwas the knowingest old nuss in all these parts; and she was with Ruth's\nmother when she was born, and she told Lady Lothrop all about it. Says\nshe, 'You may depend upon it that child 'll have the \u201c_second-sight_,\u201d'\nsays she. Oh, that 'are fact was wal known! Wal, that was the reason\nwhy Jeff Sullivan couldn't come it round Ruth tho' he was silkier than\na milkweed-pod, and jest about as patient as a spider in his hole a\nwatchin' to got his grip on a fly. Ruth wouldn't argue with him, and she\nwouldn't flout him; but she jest shut herself up in herself, and kept a\nlookout on him; but she told your Aunt Lois jest what she thought about\nhim.\n\n\u201cWal, in about six months, come the news that the Gineral was dead. He\ndropped right down in his tracks, dead with apoplexy, as if he had been\nshot; and Lady Maxwell she writ a long letter to my lady and Ruth. Ye\nsee, he'd got to be Sir Thomas Sullivan over there; and he was a comin'\nhome to take 'em all over to England to live in grande'r. Wal, my Lady\nSullivan (she was then, ye see) she took it drefful hard. Ef they'd a\nbeen the lovingest couple in the world, she couldn't a took it harder.\nAunt Polly, she said it was all 'cause she thought so much of him, that\nshe fit him so. There's women that thinks so much o' their husbands,\nthat they won't let 'em hev no peace o' their life; and I expect it war\nso with her poor soul! Any way, she went right down smack when she heard\nhe was dead. She was abed, sick, when the news come; and she never spoke\nnor smiled, jest turned her back to everybody, and kinder wilted and\nwilted, and was dead in a week. And there was poor little Ruth left all\nalone in the world, with neither kith nor kin but Jeff.\n\n\u201cWal, when the funeral was over, and the time app'inted to read the will\nand settle up matters, there wa'n't no will to be found nowhere, high\nnor low.\n\n\u201cLawyer Dean he flew round like a parched pea on a shovel. He said he\nthought he could a gone in the darkest night, and put his hand on that\n'ere will; but when he went where he thought it was, he found it warn't\nthere, and he knowed he'd kep' it under lock and key. What he thought\nwas the will turned out to be an old mortgage. Wal, there was an awful\nrow and a to-do about it, you may be sure. Ruth, she jist said nothin'\ngood or bad. And her not speakin' made Jeff a sight more uncomfortable\nthan ef she'd a hed it out with him. He told her it shouldn't make no\nsort o' difference; that he should allers stand ready to give her all he\nhed, if she'd only take him with it. And when it came to that she only\ngin him a look, and went out o' the room.\n\n\u201cJeff he flared and flounced and talked, and went round and round a\nrumpussin' among the papers, but no will was forthcoming high or low.\nWal, now here comes what's remarkable. Ruth she told this 'ere, all the\nparticulars, to yer Aunt Lois and Lady Lothrop. She said that the night\nafter the funeral she went up to her chamber. Ruth had the gret\nfront chamber, opposite to Mis' Sullivan's. I've been in it; it was a\nmonstrous big room, with outlandish furniture in it, that the Gineral\nbrought over from an old palace out to Italy. And there was a great big\nlookin'-glass over the dressin'-table, that they said come from Venice,\nthat swung so that you could see the whole room in it. Wal, she was a\nstandin' front o' this, jist goin' to undress herself, a hearin' the\nrain drip on the leaves and the wind a whishin' and whisperin' in the\nold elm-trees, and jist a thinkin' over her lot, and what should she\ndo now, all alone in the world, when of a sudden she felt a kind o'\nlightness in her head, and she thought she seemed to see somebody in the\nglass a movin'. And she looked behind, and there wa'n't nobody there.\nThen she looked forward in the glass, and saw a strange big room, that\nshe'd never seen before, with a long painted winder in it; and along\nside o' this stood a tall cabinet with a good many drawers in it. And\nshe saw herself, and knew that it was herself, in this room, along with\nanother woman whose back was turned towards her. She saw herself speak\nto this woman, and p'int to the cabinet. She saw the woman nod her head.\nShe saw herself go to the cabinet, and open the middle drawer, and take\nout a bundle o' papers from the very back end on't. She saw her take out\na paper from the middle, and open it, and hold it up; and she knew that\nthere was the missin' will. Wal, it all overcome her so that she fainted\nclean away. And her maid found her a lyin' front o' the dressin'-table\non the floor.\n\n\u201cShe was sick of a fever for a week or fortnight a'ter; and your Aunt\nLois she was down takin' care of her; and, as soon as she got able to be\nmoved, she was took out to Lady Lothrop's. Jeff he was jist as attentive\nand good as he could be; but she wouldn't bear him near her room. If he\nso much as set a foot on the stairs that led to it she'd know it, and\ngot so wild that he hed to be kept from comin' into the front o' the\nhouse. But he was doin' his best to buy up good words from everybody. He\npaid all the servants double; he kept every one in their places, and\ndid so well by 'em all that the gen'l word among 'em was that Miss Ruth\ncouldn't do better than to marry such a nice, open-handed gentleman.\n\n\u201cWal, Lady Lothrop she wrote to Lady Maxwell all that hed happened; and\nLady Maxwell, she sent over for Ruth to come over and be a companion for\nher, and said she'd adopt her, and be as a mother to her.\n\n\u201cWal, then Ruth she went over with some gentlefolks that was goin' back\nto England, and offered to see her safe and sound; and so she was set\ndown at Lady Maxwell's manor. It was a grand place, she said, and such\nas she never see before,--like them old gentry places in England. And\nLady Maxwell she made much of her, and cosseted her up for the sake of\nwhat the old Gineral had said about her. And Ruth she told her all her\nstory, and how she believed that the will was to be found somewhere, and\nthat she should be led to see it yet.\n\n\u201cShe told her, too, that she felt it in her that Cap'n Oliver wasn't\ndead, and that he'd come back yet. And Lady Maxwell she took up for her\nwith might and main, and said she'd stand by her. But then, ye see, so\nlong as there warn't no will to be found, there warn't nothin' to be\ndone. Jeff was the next heir; and he'd got every thing, stock, and lot,\nand the estate in England into the bargain. And folks was beginnin' to\nthink putty well of him, as folks allers does when a body is up in the\nworld, and hes houses and lands. Lordy massy! riches allers covers a\nmultitude o' sins.\n\n\u201cFinally, when Ruth hed ben six months with her, one day Lady Maxwell\ngot to tellin' her all about her history, and what hed ben atween her\nand her cousin, when they was young, and how they hed a quarrel and he\nflung off to Ameriky, and all them things that it don't do folks no good\nto remember when it's all over and can't be helped. But she was a lone\nbody, and it seemed to do her good to talk about it.\n\n\u201cFinally, she says to Ruth, says she, 'I 'll show you a room in this\nhouse you han't seen before. It was the room where we hed that quarrel,'\nsays she; 'and the last I saw of him was there, till he come back to\ndie,' says she.\n\n\u201cSo she took a gret key out of her bunch; and she led Ruth along a\nlong passage-way to the other end of the house, and opened on a great\nlibrary. And the minute Ruth came in, she threw up her hands and gin a\ngreat cry. 'Oh!' says she, 'this is the room! and there is the window!\nand there is the cabinet I and _there in that middle drawer at the back\nend in a bundle of papers is the will!_\n\n\u201cAnd Lady Maxwell she said, quite dazed, 'Go look,' says she. And Ruth\nwent, jest as she seed herself do, and opened the drawer, and drew forth\nfrom the back part a yellow pile of old letters. And in the middle of\nthose was the will, sure enough. Ruth drew it out, and opened it, and\nshowed it to her.\n\n\u201cWal, you see that will give Ruth the whole of the Gineral's property in\nAmerica, tho' it did leave the English estate to Jeff.\n\n\u201cWal, the end on't was like a story-book.\n\n\u201cJeff he made believe be mighty glad. And he said it must a ben that the\nGineral hed got flustered with the sperit and water, and put that\n'ere will in among his letters that he was a doin' up to take back to\nEngland. For it was in among Lady Maxwell's letters that she writ him\nwhen they was young, and that he'd a kep' all these years and was a\ntakin' back to her.\n\n\u201cWal, Lawyer Dean said he was sure that Jeff made himself quite busy and\nuseful that night, a tyin' up the papers with red tape, and a packin'\nthe Gin-eral's trunk; and that, when Jeff gin him his bundle to lock up\nin his box, he never mistrusted but what he'd got it all right.\n\n\u201cWal, you see it was jest one of them things that can't be known to the\njedgment-day. It might a ben an accident, and then agin it might not;\nand folks settled it one way or t'other, 'cordin' to their 'pinion\no' Jeff; but ye see how 'mazin' handy for him it happened! Why, ef it\nhadn't ben for the providence I've ben a tellin' about, there it might a\nlain in them old letters, that Lady Maxwell said she never hed the heart\nto look over! it never would a turned up in the world.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said I, \u201cwhat became of Ruth?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! Cap'n Oliver he came back all alive, and escaped from the\nAlgerines; and they was married in King's Chapel, and lived in the old\nSullivan House, in peace and prosperity. That's jest how the story was;\nand now Aunt Lois can make what she's a mind ter out on't.\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd what became of Jeff?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! he started to go over to England, and the ship was wrecked off\nthe Irish coast, and that was the last of him. He never got to his\nproperty.\u201d\n\n\u201cGood enough for him,\u201d said both of us.\n\n\u201cWal, I don't know: 'twas pretty hard on Jeff. Mebbe he did, and mebbe\nhe didn't. I'm glad I warn't in his shoes, tho' I'd rather never hed\nnothin'. This 'ere hastin' to be rich is sich a drefful temptation.\n\n\u201cWal, now, boys, ye've done a nice lot o' flax, and I guess we 'll go up\nto yer grand'ther's cellar and git a mug o' cyder. Talkin' always gits\nme dry.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: 5068]\n\n\n\n\nTHE MINISTER'S HOUSEKEEPER\n\n\n_Scene.--The shady side of a blueberry-pasture.--Sam Lawson with the\nboys, picking blueberries.--Sam, loq._\n\n[Illustration: 9069]\n\nAL, you see, boys, 'twas just here,--Parson Carryl's wife, she died along\nin the forepart o' March: my cousin Huldy, she undertook to keep house\nfor him. The way on't was, that Huldy, she went to take care o' Mis'\nCarryl in the fust on't, when she fust took sick. Huldy was a tailoress\nby trade; but then she was one o' these 'ere facultised persons that has\na gift for most any thing, and that was how Mis' Carryl come to set sech\nstore by her, that, when she was sick, nothin' would do for her but she\nmust have Huldy round all the time: and the minister, he said he'd make\nit good to her all the same, and she shouldn't lose nothin' by it. And\nso Huldy, she staid with Mis' Carryl full three months afore she died,\nand got to seein' to every thing pretty much round the place.\n\n\u201cWal, arter Mis' Carryl died, Parson Carryl, he'd got so kind o' used to\nhevin' on her 'round, takin' care o' things, that he wanted her to stay\nalong a spell; and so Huldy, she staid along a spell, and poured out\nhis tea, and mended his close, and made pies and cakes, and cooked and\nwashed and ironed, and kep' every thing as neat as a pin. Huldy was a\ndrefful chipper sort o' gal; and work sort o' rolled off from her like\nwater off a duck's back. There warn't no gal in Sherburne that could\nput sich a sight o' work through as Huldy; and yet, Sunday mornin', she\nalways come out in the singers' seat like one o' these 'ere June roses,\nlookin' so fresh and smilin', and her voice was jest as clear and sweet\nas a meadow lark's--Lordy massy! I 'member how she used to sing some o'\nthem 'are places where the treble and counter used to go together: her\nvoice kind o trembled a little, and it sort o' went thro' and thro' a\nfeller! tuck him right where he lived!\u201d\n\nHere Sam leaned contemplatively back with his head in a clump of sweet\nfern, and refreshed himself with a chew of young wintergreen. \u201cThis'ere\nyoung wintergreen, boys, is jest like a feller's thoughts o' things that\nhappened when he was young: it comes up jest so fresh and tender every\nyear, the longest time you hev to live; and you can't help chawin'\non't tho' 'tis sort o' stingin'. I don't never get over likin' young\nwintergreen.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut about Huldah, Sam?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, yes! about Huldy. Lordy massy! when a feller is Indianin' round,\nthese 'ere pleasant summer days, a feller's thoughts gits like a flock\no' young partridges: they's up and down and everywhere; 'cause one place\nis jest about as good as another, when they's all so kind o' comfortable\nand nice. Wal, about Huldy,--as I was a sayin'. She was jest as\nhandsome a gal to look at as a feller could have; and I think a nice,\nwell-behaved young gal in the singers' seat of a Sunday is a means o'\ngrace: it's sort o' drawin' to the unregenerate, you know.\n\n\u201cWhy, boys, in them days, I've walked ten miles over to Sherburne of a\nSunday mornin', jest to play the bass-viol in the same singers' seat\nwith Huldy. She was very much respected, Huldy was; and, when she went\nout to tailorin', she was allers bespoke six months ahead, and sent for\nin waggins up and down for ten miles round; for the young fellers was\nallers 'mazin' anxious to be sent after Huldy, and was quite free to\noffer to go for her. Wal, after Mis' Carryl died, Huldy got to be sort\no' housekeeper at the minister's, and saw to every thing, and did every\nthing: so that there warn't a pin out o' the way.\n\n\u201cBut you know how 'tis in parishes: there allers is women that thinks\nthe minister's affairs belongs to them, and they ought to have the\nrulin' and guidin' of 'em; and, if a minister's wife dies, there's folks\nthat allers has their eyes open on providences,--lookin' out who's to be\nthe next one.\n\n\u201cNow, there was Mis' Amaziah Pipperidge, a widder with snappin' black\neyes, and a hook nose,--kind o' like a hawk; and she was one o' them\nup-and-down commandin' sort o' women, that feel that they have a call to\nbe seein' to every thing that goes on in the parish, and 'specially to\nthe minister.\n\n\u201cFolks did say that Mis' Pipperidge sort o' sot her eye on the parson\nfor herself: wal, now that 'are might a been, or it might not. Some\nfolks thought it was a very suitable connection. You see she hed a good\nproperty of her own, right nigh to the minister's lot, and was allers\nkind o' active and busy; so, takin' one thing with another, I shouldn't\nwonder if Mis' Pipperidge should a thought that Providence p'inted that\nway. At any rate, she went up to Deakin Blodgett's wife, and they two\nsort o' put their heads together a mournin' and condolin' about the way.\nthings was likely to go on at the minister's now Mis' Carryl was dead.\nYe see, the parson's wife, she was one of them women who hed their eyes\neverywhere and on every thing. She was a little thin woman, but tough as\nInger rubber, and smart as a steel trap; and there warn't a hen laid an\negg, or cackled, but Mis' Carryl was right there to see about it; and\nshe hed the garden made in the spring, and the medders mowed in summer,\nand the cider made, and the corn husked, and the apples got in the\nfall; and the doctor, he hedn't nothin' to do but jest sit stock still a\nmeditatin' on Jerusalem and Jericho and them things that ministers think\nabout. But Lordy massy! he didn't know nothin' about where any thing he\neat or drunk or wore come from or went to: his wife jest led him 'round\nin temporal things and took care on him like a baby.\n\n\u201cWal, to be sure, Mis' Carryl looked up to him in spirituals, and\nthought all the world on him; for there warn't a smarter minister no\nwhere 'round. Why, when he preached on decrees and election, they used\nto come clear over from South Parish, and West Sherburne, and Old Town\nto hear him; and there was sich a row o' waggins tied along by the\nmeetin'-house that the stables was all full, and all the hitchin'-posts\nwas full clean up to the tavern, so that folks said the doctor made the\ntown look like a gineral trainin'-day a Sunday.\n\n\u201cHe was gret on texts, the doctor was. When he hed a p'int to prove,\nhe'd jest go thro' the Bible, and drive all the texts ahead o' him like\na flock o' sheep; and then, if there was a text that seemed gin him,\nwhy, he'd come out with his Greek and Hebrew, and kind o' chase it\n'round a spell, jest as ye see a fellar chase a contrary bell-wether,\nand make him jump the fence arter the rest. I tell you, there wa'n't no\ntext in the Bible that could stand agin the doctor when his blood was\nup. The year arter the doctor was app'inted to preach the 'lection\nsermon in Boston, he made such a figger that the Brattlestreet Church\nsent a committee right down to see if they couldn't get him to Boston;\nand then the Sherburne folks, they up and raised his salary; ye see,\nthere ain't nothin' wakes folks up like somebody else's wantin' what\nyou've got. Wal, that fall they made him a Doctor o' Divinity at\nCambridge College, and so they sot more by him than ever. Wal, you see,\nthe doctor, of course he felt kind o' lonesome and afflicted when Mis'\nCarryl was gone; but railly and truly, Huldy was so up to every thing\nabout house, that the doctor didn't miss nothin' in a temporal way.\nHis shirt-bosoms was pleated finer than they ever was, and them ruffles\n'round his wrists was kep' like the driven snow; and there warn't a\nbrack in his silk stockin's, and his shoe buckles was kep' polished up,\nand his coats brushed; and then there warn't no bread and biscuit like\nHuldy's; and her butter was like solid lumps o' gold; and there wern't\nno pies to equal hers; and so the doctor never felt the loss o' Miss\nCarryl at table. Then there was Huldy allers oppisite to him, with\nher blue eyes and her cheeks like two fresh peaches. She was kind o'\npleasant to look at; and the more the doctor looked at her the better\nhe liked her; and so things seemed to be goin' on quite quiet and\ncomfortable ef it hadn't been that Mis' Pipperidge and Mis' Deakin\nBlodgett and Mis' Sawin got their heads together a talkin' about things.\n\n\u201c'Poor man,' says Mis' Pipperidge, 'what can that child that he's got\nthere do towards takin' the care of all that place? It takes a mature\nwoman,' she says, 'to tread in Mis' Carryl's shoes.'\n\n\u201c'That it does,' said Mis' Blodgett; 'and, when things once get to\nrunnin' down hill, there ain't no stoppin' on 'em,' says she.\n\n\u201cThen Mis' Sawin she took it up. (Ye see, Mis' Sawin used to go out to\ndress-makin', and was sort o' jealous, 'cause folks sot more by Huldy\nthan they did by her). 'Well,' says she, 'Huldy Peters is well enough at\nher trade. I never denied that, though I do say I never did believe in\nher way o' makin' button-holes; and I must say, if 'twas the dearest\nfriend I hed, that I thought Huldy tryin' to fit Mis' Kittridge's\nplumb-colored silk was a clear piece o' presumption; the silk was jist\nspiled, so 'twarn't fit to come into the meetin'-house. I must say,\nHuldy's a gal that's always too ventersome about takin' 'spon-sibilities\nshe don't know nothin' about.'\n\n\u201c'Of course she don't,' said Mis' Deakin Blodgett. 'What does she know\nabout all the lookin' and see-in' to that there ought to be in guidin'\nthe minister's house. Huldy's well meanin', and she's good at her work,\nand good in the singers' seat; but Lordy massy I she hain't got no\nexperience. Parson Carryl ought to have an experienced woman to\nkeep house for him. There's the spring house-cleanin' and the fall\nhouse-cleanin' to be seen to, and the things to be put away from the\nmoths; and then the gettin' ready for the association and all the\nministers' meetin's; and the makin' the soap and the candles, and\nsettin' the hens and turkeys, watchin' the calves, and seein' after the\n'hired men and the garden; and there that 'are blessed man jist sets\nthere at home as serene, and has nobody 'round but that 'are gal, and\ndon't even know how things must be a runnin' to waste!'\n\n\u201cWal, the upshot on't was, they fussed and fuzzled and wuzzled till\nthey'd drinked up all the tea in the teapot; and then they went down and\ncalled on the parson, and wuzzled him all up talkin' about this, that,\nand t'other that wanted lookin' to, and that it was no way to leave\nevery thing to a young chit like Huldy, and that he ought to be lookin'\nabout for an experienced woman. The parson he thanked 'em kindly, and\nsaid he believed their motives was good, but he didn't go no further.\nHe didn't ask Mis' Pipperidge to come and stay there and help him, nor\nnothin' o' that kind; but he said he'd attend to matters himself. The\nfact was, the parson had got such a likin' for havin' Huldy 'round, that\nhe couldn't think o' such a thing as swappin' her off for the Widder\nPipperidge.\n\n\u201cBut he thought to himself, 'Huldy is a good girl; but I oughtn't to\nbe a leavin' every thing to her,--it's too hard on her. I ought to\nbe instructin' and guidin' and helpin' of her; 'cause 'tain't everybody\ncould be expected to know and do what Mis' Carryl did;' and so at it he\nwent; and Lordy massy! didn't Huldy hev a time on't when the minister\nbegan to come out of his study, and want to tew 'round and see to\nthings? Huldy, you see, thought all the world of the minister, and she\nwas 'most afraid to laugh; but she told me she couldn't, for the life of\nher, help it when his back was turned, for he wuzzled things up in the\nmost singular way. But Huldy she'd jest say 'Yes, sir,' and get him off\ninto his study, and go on her own way.\n\n\u201c'Huldy,' says the minister one day, 'you ain't experienced out doors;\nand, when you want to know any thing, you must come to me.'\n\n\u201c'Yes, sir,' says Huldy.\n\n\u201c'Now, Huldy,' says the parson,' you must be sure to save the\nturkey-eggs, so that we can have a lot of turkeys for Thanksgiving.'\n\n\u201c'Yes, sir,' says Huldy; and she opened the pantry-door, and showed\nhim a nice dishful she'd been a savin' up. Wal, the very next day the\nparson's hen-turkey was found killed up to old Jim Scroggs's barn. Folks\nsaid Scroggs killed it; though Scroggs, he stood to it he didn't: at\nany rate, the Scroggses, they made a meal on't; and Huldy, she felt bad\nabout it 'cause she'd set her heart on raisin' the turkeys; and says\nshe, 'Oh, dear! I don't know what I shall do. I was just ready to set\nher.'\n\n\u201c'Do, Huldy?' says the parson: 'why, there's the other turkey, out there\nby the door; and a fine bird, too, he is.'\n\n\u201cSure enough, there was the old tom-turkey a struttin' and a sidlin' and\na quitterin,' and a floutin' his tail-feathers in the sun, like a lively\nyoung widower, all ready to begin life over agin.\n\n\u201c'But,' says Huldy, 'you know _he_ can't set on eggs.'\n\n\u201c'He can't? I'd like to know why,' says the parson. 'He _shall_ set on\neggs, and hatch 'em too.'\n\n\u201c'O doctor!' says Huldy, all in a tremble; 'cause, you know, she\ndidn't want to contradict the minister, and she was afraid she should\nlaugh,--'I never heard that a tom-turkey would set on eggs.'\n\n\u201c'Why, they ought to,' said the parson, getting quite 'arnest: 'what\nelse be they good for? you just bring out the eggs, now, and put 'em in\nthe nest, and I 'll make him set on 'em.'\n\n\u201cSo Huldy she thought there wern't no way to convince him but to let him\ntry: so she took the eggs out, and fixed 'em all nice in the nest;\nand then she come back and found old Tom a skirmishin' with the parson\npretty lively, I tell ye. Ye see, old Tom he didn't take the idee at\nall; and he flopped and gobbled, and fit the parson; and the parson's\nwig got 'round so that his cue stuck straight out over his ear, but he'd\ngot his blood up. Ye see, the old doctor was used to carryin' his p'ints\no' doctrine; and he hadn't fit the Arminians and Socinians to be beat by\na tom-turkey; so finally he made a dive, and ketched him by the neck\nin spite o' his floppin', and stroked him down, and put Huldy's apron\n'round him.\n\n\u201c'There, Huldy,' he says, quite red in the face, 'we've got him now;'\nand he travelled off to the barn with him as lively as a cricket.\n\n\u201cHuldy came behind jist chokin' with laugh, and afraid the minister\nwould look 'round and see her.\n\n\u201c'Now, Huldy, we 'll crook his legs, and set him down,' says the parson,\nwhen they got him to the nest: 'you see he is getting quiet, and he 'll\nset there all right.'\n\n\u201cAnd the parson, he sot him down; and old Tom he sot there solemn\nenough, and held his head down all droopin', lookin' like a rail pious\nold cock, as long as the parson sot by him.\n\n\u201c'There: you see how still he sets,' says the parson to Huldy.\n\n[Illustration: 0083]\n\n\u201cHuldy was 'most dyin' for fear she should laugh, 'I'm afraid he 'll get\nup,' says she, 'when you do.'\n\n\u201c'Oh, no, he won't!' says the parson, quite confident. 'There, there,'\nsays he, layin' his hands on him, as if pronouncin' a blessin'. But when\nthe parson riz up, old Tom he riz up too, and began to march over the\neggs.\n\n\u201c'Stop, now!' says the parson. 'I 'll make him get down agin: hand me\nthat corn-basket; we 'll put that over him.'\n\n\u201cSo he crooked old Tom's legs, and got him down agin; and they put the\ncorn-basket over him, and then they both stood and waited.\n\n\u201c'That 'll do the thing, Huldy,' said the parson.\n\n\u201c'I don't know about it,' says Huldy.\n\n\u201c'Oh, yes, it will, child! I understand,' says he.\n\n\u201cJust as he spoke, the basket riz right up and stood, and they could see\nold Tom's long legs.\n\n\u201c'I 'll make him stay down, confound him,' says the parson; for, ye see,\nparsons is men, like the rest on us, and the doctor had got his spunk\nup.\n\n\u201c'You jist hold him a minute, and I 'll get something that 'll make him\nstay, I guess;' and out he went to the fence, and brought in a long,\nthin, flat stone, and laid it on old Tom's back.\n\n\u201cOld Tom he wilted down considerable under this, and looked railly as if\nhe was goin' to give in. He staid still there a good long spell, and\nthe minister and Huldy left him there and come up to the house; but\nthey hadn't more than got in the door before they see old Tom a hippin'\nalong, as high-steppin' as ever, say in' 'Talk! talk! and quitter!\nquitter!' and struttin' and gobblin' as if he'd come through the Red\nSea, and got the victory.\n\n\u201c'Oh, my eggs!' says Huldy. 'I'm afraid he's smashed 'em!'\n\n\u201cAnd sure enough, there they was, smashed flat enough under the stone.\n\n\u201c'I 'll have him killed,' said the parson: 'we won't have such a critter\n'round.'\n\n\u201cBut the parson, he slep' on't, and then didn't do it: he only come\nout next Sunday with a tip-top sermon on the ''Riginal Cuss' that was\npronounced on things in gineral, when Adam fell, and showed how every\nthing was allowed to go contrary ever since. There was pig-weed, and\npusley, and Canady thistles, cut-worms, and bag-worms, and canker-worms,\nto say nothin' of rattlesnakes. The doctor made it very impressive and\nsort o' improvin'; but Huldy, she told me, goin' home, that she hardly\ncould keep from laughin' two or three times in the sermon when she\nthought of old Tom a standin' up with the corn-basket on his back.\n\n\u201cWal, next week Huldy she jist borrowed the minister's horse\nand side-saddle, and rode over to South Parish to her Aunt\nBascome's,--Widder Bascome's, you know, that lives there by the\ntrout-brook,--and got a lot o' turkey-eggs o' her, and come back and set\na hen on 'em, and said nothin'; and in good time there was as nice a lot\no' turkey-chicks as ever ye see.\n\n\u201cHuldy never said a word to the minister about his experiment, and he\nnever said a word to her; but he sort o' kep' more to his books, and\ndidn't take it on him to advise so much.\n\n\u201cBut not long arter he took it into his head that Huldy ought to have a\npig to be a fattin' with the buttermilk. Mis' Pipperidge set him up to\nit; and jist then old Tim Bigelow, out to Juniper Hill, told him if he'd\ncall over he'd give him a little pig.\n\n\u201cSo he sent for a man, and told him to build a pigpen right out by the\nwell, and have it all ready when he came home with his pig.\n\n\u201cHuldy she said she wished he might put a curb round the well out there,\nbecause in the dark, sometimes, a body might stumble into it; and the\nparson, he told him he might do that.\n\n\u201cWal, old Aikin, the carpenter, he didn't come till most the middle of\nthe arternoon; and then he sort o' idled, so that he didn't get up the\nwell-curb till sun down; and then he went off and said he'd come and do\nthe pig-pen next day.\n\n\u201cWal, arter dark, Parson Carryl he driv into the yard, full chizel, with\nhis pig. He'd tied up his mouth to keep him from squeelin'; and he see\nwhat he thought was the pig-pen,--he was rather near-sighted,--and so\nhe ran and threw piggy over; and down he dropped into the water, and\nthe minister put out his horse and pranced off into the house quite\ndelighted.\n\n[Illustration: 0089]\n\n\u201c'There, Huldy, I've got you a nice little pig.'\n\n\u201c'Dear me!' says Huldy: 'where have you put him?'\n\n\u201c'Why, out there in the pig-pen, to be sure.'\n\n\u201c'Oh, dear me!' says Huldy: 'that's the well-curb; there ain't no\npig-pen built,' says she.\n\n\u201c'Lordy massy!' says the parson: 'then I've thrown the pig in the well!'\n\n\u201cWal, Huldy she worked and worked, and finally she fished piggy out in\nthe bucket, but he was dead as a door-nail; and she got him out o' the\nway quietly, and didn't say much; and the parson, he took to a\ngreat Hebrew book in his study; and says he, 'Huldy, I ain't much in\ntemporals,' says he. Huldy says she kind o' felt her heart go out to\nhim, he was so sort o' meek and helpless and larned; and says she, 'Wal,\nParson Carryl, don't trouble your head no more about it; I 'll see\nto things;' and sure enough, a week arter there was a nice pen, all\nship-shape, and two little white pigs that Huldy bought with the money\nfor the butter she sold at the store.\n\n\u201c'Wal, Huldy,' said the parson, 'you are a most amazin' child: you don't\nsay nothin', but you do more than most folks.'\n\n\u201cArter that the parson set sich store by Huldy that he come to her and\nasked her about every thing, and it was amazin' how every thing she put\nher hand to prospered. Huldy planted marigolds and larkspurs, pinks and\ncarnations, all up and down the path to the front door, and trained up\nmornin' glories and scar-, let-runners round the windows. And she\nwas always a gettin' a root here, and a sprig there, and a seed from\nsomebody else: for Huldy was one o' them that has the gift, so that ef\nyou jist give 'em the leastest sprig of any thing they make a great\nbush out of it right away; so that in six months Huldy had roses and\ngeraniums and lilies, sich as it would a took a gardener to raise. The\nparson, he took no notice at fust; but when the yard was all ablaze with\nflowers he used to come and stand in a kind o' maze at the front door,\nand say, 'Beautiful, beautiful: why, Huldy, I never see any thing like\nit.' And then when her work was done arternoons, Huldy would sit with\nher sewin' in the porch, and sing and trill away till she'd draw the\nmeadow-larks and the bobolinks, and the orioles to answer her, and the\ngreat big elm-tree overhead would get perfectly rackety with the\nbirds; and the parson, settin' there in his study, would git to kind o'\ndreamin' about the angels, and golden harps, and the New Jerusalem;\nbut he wouldn't speak a word, 'cause Huldy she was jist like them\nwood-thrushes, she never could sing so well when she thought folks was\nhearin'. Folks noticed, about this time, that the parson's sermons got\nto be like Aaron's rod, that budded and blossomed: there was things\nin 'em about flowers and birds, and more 'special about the music o'\nheaven. And Huldy she noticed, that ef there was a hymn run in her head\nwhile she was 'round a workin' the minister was sure to give it out next\nSunday. You see, Huldy was jist like a bee: she always sung when she was\nworkin', and you could hear her trillin', now down in the corn-patch,\nwhile she was pickin' the corn; and now in the buttery, while she was\nworkin' the butter; and now she'd go singin' down cellar, and then she'd\nbe singin' up over head, so that she seemed to fill a house chock full\no' music.\n\n\u201cHuldy was so sort o' chipper and fair spoken, that she got the hired\nmen all under her thumb: they come to her and took her orders jist\nas meek as so many calves; and she traded at the store, and kep' the\naccounts, and she hed her eyes everywhere, and tied up all the ends so\ntight that there want no get-tin' 'round her. She wouldn't let nobody\nput nothin' off on Parson Carryl, 'cause he was a minister. Huldy was\nallers up to anybody that wanted to make a hard bargain; and, afore he\nknew jist what he was about, she'd got the best end of it, and everybody\nsaid that Huldy was the most capable gal that they'd ever traded with.\n\n\u201cWal, come to the meetin' of the Association, Mis' Deakin Blodgett and\nMis' Pipperidge come callin' up to the parson's, all in a stew, and\nofferin' their services to get the house ready; but the doctor, he jist\nthanked 'em quite quiet, and turned 'em over to Huldy; and Huldy she\ntold 'em that she'd got every thing ready, and showed 'em her pantries,\nand her cakes and her pies and her puddin's, and took 'em all over the\nhouse; and they went peekin' and pokin', openin' cupboard-doors, and\nlookin' into drawers; and they couldn't find so much as a thread out o'\nthe way, from garret to cellar, and so they went off quite discontented.\nArter that the women set a new trouble a brewin'. Then they begun to\ntalk that it was a year now since Mis' Carryl died; and it r'ally wasn't\nproper such a young gal to be stayin' there, who everybody could see was\na settin' her cap for the minister.\n\n\u201cMis' Pipperidge said, that, so long as she looked on Huldy as the hired\ngal, she hadn't thought much about it; but Huldy was railly takin' on\nairs as an equal, and appearin' as mistress o' the house in a way that\nwould make talk if it went on. And Mis' Pipperidge she driv 'round up to\nDeakin Abner Snow's, and down to Mis' 'Lijah Perry's, and asked them\nif they wasn't afraid that the way the parson and Huldy was a goin' on\nmight make talk. And they said they hadn't thought on't before, but now,\ncome to think on't, they was sure it would; and they all went and talked\nwith somebody else, and asked them if they didn't think it would make\ntalk. So come Sunday, between meetin's there warn't nothin' else talked\nabout; and Huldy saw folks a noddin' and a winkin', and a lookin' arter\nher, and she begun to feel drefful sort o' disagreeable. Finally Mis'\nSawin she says to her, 'My dear, didn't you, never think folk would talk\nabout you and the minister?'\n\n\u201c'No: why should they?' says Huldy, quite innocent.\n\n\u201cWal, dear,' says she, 'I think it's a shame; but they say you're tryin'\nto catch him, and that it's so bold and improper for you to be courtin'\nof him right in his own house,--you know folks will talk,--I thought I'd\ntell you 'cause I think so much of you,' says she.\n\n\u201cHuldy was a gal of spirit, and she despised the talk, but it made her\ndrefful uncomfortable; and when she got home at night she sat down in\nthe mor-nin'-glory porch, quite quiet, and didn't sing a word.\n\n\u201cThe minister he had heard the same thing from one of his deakins that\nday; and, when he saw Huldy so kind o' silent, he says to her, 'Why\ndon't you sing, my child?'\n\n\u201cHe hed a pleasant sort o' way with him, the minister had, and Huldy had\ngot to likin' to be with him, and it all come over her that perhaps\nshe ought to go away; and her throat kind o' filled up so she couldn't\nhardly speak; and, says she, 'I can't sing to-night.'\n\n\u201cSays he, 'You don't know how much good you're singin' has done me, nor\nhow much good _you_ have done me in all ways, Huldy. I wish I knew how\nto show my gratitude.'\n\n\u201c'O sir!' says Huldy, '_is_ it improper for me to be here?'\n\n\u201c'No, dear,' says the minister, 'but ill-natured folks will talk; but\nthere is one way we can stop it, Huldy--if you will marry me. You 'll\nmake me very happy, and I 'll do all I can to make you happy. Will you?'\n\n\u201cWal, Huldy never told me jist what she said to the minister,--gals\nnever does give you the particulars of them 'are things jist as you'd\nlike 'em,--only I know the upshot and the hull on't was, that Huldy she\ndid a consid'able lot o' clear starchin' and ironin' the next two days;\nand the Friday o' next week the minister and she rode over together\nto Dr. Lothrop's in Old Town; and the doctor, he jist made 'em man and\nwife, 'spite of envy of the Jews,' as the hymn says. Wal, you'd better\nbelieve there was a starin' and a wonderin' next Sunday mornin' when the\nsecond bell was a tollin', and the minister walked up the broad aisle\nwith Huldy, all in white, arm in arm with him, and he opened the\nminister's pew, and handed her in as if she was a princess; for, you\nsee, Parson Carryl come of a good family, and was a born gentleman, and\nhad a sort o' grand way o' bein' polite to women-folks. Wal, I guess\nthere was a rus'lin' among the bunnets. Mis' Pipperidge gin a great\nbounce, like corn poppin' on a shovel, and her eyes glared through her\nglasses at Huldy as if they'd a sot her afire; and everybody in the\nmeetin' house was a starin', I tell _yew_. But they couldn't none of\n'em say nothin' agin Huldy's looks; for there wa'n't a crimp nor a frill\nabout her that wa'n't jis' _so_; and her frock was white as the driven\nsnow, and she had her bunnet all trimmed up with white ribbins; and\nall the fellows said the old doctor had stole a march, and got the\nhandsomest gal in the parish.\n\n\u201cWal, arter meetin' they all come 'round the parson and Huldy at the\ndoor, shakin' hands and laughin'; for by that time they was about agreed\nthat they'd got to let putty well alone.\n\n\u201c'Why, Parson Carryl,' says Mis' Deakin Blodgett, 'how you've come it\nover us.'\n\n\u201c'Yes,' says the parson, with a kind o' twinkle in his eye. 'I thought,'\nsays he, 'as folks wanted to talk about Huldy and me, I'd give 'em\nsomethin' wuth talkin' about.'\u201d\n\n[Illustration: 5098]\n\n\n\n\nTHE WIDOW'S BANDBOX.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9099]\n\nORDY massy! Stick yer hat into the nor'east, Horace, and see 'f ye can't\nstop out this 'ere wind. I'm e'eny most used up with it.\u201d\n\nSo spake Sam Lawson, contemplating mournfully a new broad-brimmed straw\nhat in which my soul was rejoicing.\n\nIt was the dripping end of a sour November afternoon, which closed up\na \u201cspell o' weather\u201d that had been steadily driving wind and rain for a\nweek past; and we boys sought the shelter and solace of his shop, and,\nopening the door, let in the wind aforesaid.\n\nSam had been all day in one of his periodical fits of desperate\nindustry. The smoke and sparks had been seen flying out of his\nshop-chimney in a frantic manner; and the blows of his hammer had\nresounded with a sort of feverish persistence, intermingled with a\ndoleful wailing of psalm-tunes of the most lugubrious description.\n\nThese fits of industry on Sam's part were an affliction to us boys,\nespecially when they happened to come on Saturday: for Sam was as much a\npart of our Saturday-afternoon calculations as if we had a regular deed\nof property in him; and we had been all day hanging round his shop,\nlooking in from time to time, in the vague hope that he would propose\nsomething to brighten up the dreary monotony of a holiday in which it\nhad been impossible to go anywhere or do any thing.\n\n\u201cSam, ain't you coming over to tell us some stories to-night?\u201d\n\n\u201cBless your soul and body, boys! life ain't made to be spent tellin'\nstories. Why, I shall hev to be up here workin' till arter twelve\no'clock,\u201d said Sam, who was suddenly possessed with a spirit of the most\naustere diligence. \u201cHere I be up to my neck in work,--things kind o'\ncomin' in a heap together.\n\n\u201cThere's Mis' Cap'n Broad's andirons, she sent word she must have 'em\nto-night; and there's Lady Lothrop, she wants her warmin'-pan right\noff; they can't non' on 'em wait a minit longer. I've ben a drivin' and\nworkin' all day like a nigger-slave. Then there was Jeduth Pettybone,\nhe brought down them colts to-day, and I worked the biggest part o' the\nmornin' shoein' on 'em; and then Jeduth he said he couldn't make change\nto pay me, so there wa'n't nothin' comin' in for 't; and then Hepsy she\nkep' a jawin' at me all dinner-time 'bout that. Why, I warn't to blame\nnow, was I? I can't make everybody do jest right and pay regular, can\nI? So ye see it goes, boys, gettin' yer bread by the sweat o' your brow;\nand sometimes sweatin' and not gettin' yer bread. That 'ere's what I call\nthe _cuss_, the 'riginal cuss, that come on man for hearkenin' to the\nvoice o' his wife,--that 'ere was what did it. It allers kind o' riles\nme up with Mother Eve when I think on't. The women hain't no bisness to\nfret as they do, 'cause they sot this 'ere state o' things goin' in the\nfust place.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, Sam, Aunt Lois and Aunt Nabby are both going over to Mis'\nMehitabel's to tea. Now, you just come over and eat supper with us and\ntell us a story, do.\u201d\n\n\u201cGone out to tea, be they?\u201d said Sam, relaxing his hammering, with a\nbrightening gleam stealing gradually across his lanky visage. \u201cWal, that\n'ere looks like a providential openin', to be sure. Wal, I guess I 'll\ncome. What's the use o' never havin' a good time? Ef you work yourself\nup into shoestrings you don't get no thanks for it, and things in this\nworld's 'bout as broad as they is long: the women 'll scold, turn 'em\nwhich way ye will. A good mug o' cider and some cold victuals over to\nthe Deakin's 'll kind o' comfort a feller up; and your granny she's\nsort o' merciful, she don't rub it into a fellow all the time like Miss\nLois.\u201d\n\n\u201cNow, let's see, boys,\u201d said Sam, when a comfortable meal of pork and\nbeans had been disposed of, and a mug of cider was set down before the\nfire to warm. \u201cI s'pect ye 'll like to hear a Down-East story to-night.\u201d\n\nOf course we did, and tumbled over each other in our eagerness to get\nthe nearest place to the narrator.\n\nSam's method of telling a story was as leisurely as that of some modern\nnovel-writers. He would take his time for it, and proceed by easy\nstages. It was like the course of a dreamy, slow-moving river through a\ntangled meadow-flat,--not a rush nor a bush but was reflected in it; in\nshort, Sam gave his philosophy of matters and things in general as he\nwent along, and was especially careful to impress an edifying moral.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, boys, ye know I was born down to Newport,--there where\nit's all ships and shipping, and sich. My old mother she kep' a\nboardin'-house for sailors down there. Wal, ye see, I rolled and tumbled\nround the world pretty consid'able afore I got settled down here in\nOldtown.\n\n\u201cYe see, my mother she wanted to bind me out to a blacksmith, but I kind\no' sort o' didn't seem to take to it. It was kind o' hard work, and\nboys is apt to want to take life easy. Wal, I used to run off to the\nsea-shore, and lie stretched out on them rocks there, and look off on to\nthe water; and it did use to look so sort o' blue and peaceful, and the\nships come a sailin' in and out so sort o' easy and natural, that I felt\nas if that are 'd be jest the easiest kind o' life a fellow could have.\nAll he had to do was to get aboard one o' them ships, and be off seekin'\nhis fortin at t'other end o' the rainbow, where gold grows on bushes and\nthere's valleys o' diamonds.\n\n\u201cSo, nothin' would do but I gin my old mother the slip; and away I went\nto sea, with my duds tied up in a han'kercher.\n\n\u201cI tell ye what, boys, ef ye want to find an easy life, don't ye never\ngo to sea. I tell ye, life on shipboard ain't what it looks to be on\nshore. I hadn't been aboard more'n three hours afore I was the sickest\ncritter that ever ye did see; and I tell you, I didn't get no kind o'\ncompassion. Cap'ns and mates they allers thinks boys hain't no kind o'\nbusiness to have no bowels nor nothin', and they put it on 'em sick or\nwell. It's jest a kick here, and a cuff there, and a twitch by the ear\nin t'other place; one a shovin' on 'em this way, and another hittin' on\n'em a clip, and all growlin' from mornin' to night. I believe the way my\nears got so long was bein' hauled out o' my berth by 'em: that 'are's a\nsailor's regular way o' wakin' up a boy.\n\n\u201cWal, by time I got to the Penobscot country, all I wanted to know was\nhow to get back agin. That 'are's jest the way folks go all their lives,\nboys. It's all fuss, fuss, and stew, stew, till ye get somewhere; and\nthen it's fuss, fuss, and stew, stew, to get back agin; jump here and\nscratch yer eyes out, and jump there and scratch 'em in agin,--that\n'are's life'.\n\n\u201cWal, I kind o' poked round in Penobscot country till I got a berth on\n'The Brilliant' that was lyin' at Camden, goin' to sail to Boston.\n\n\u201cYe see, 'The Brilliant' she was a tight little sloop in the government\nservice: 'twas in the war-times, ye see, and Commodore Tucker that is now\n(he was Cap'n Tucker then), he had the command on her,--used to run up\nand down all the coast takin' observations o' the British, and keepin'\nhis eye out on 'em and givin' on 'em a nip here and a clip there,'\ncordin' as he got a good chance. Why, your grand'ther knew old Commodore\nTucker. It was he that took Dr. Franklin over Minister, to France, and\ndodged all the British vessels, right in the middle o' the war I tell\nyou that 'are was like runnin' through the drops in a thunder-shower. He\ngot chased by the British ships pretty consid'able, but he was too spry\nfor 'em. Arter the war was over, Commodore Tucker took over John Adams,\nour fust Minister to England. A drefful smart man the Commodore was, but\nhe most like to 'a' ben took in this'ere time I'm a tellin' ye about,\nand all 'cause he was sort o' softhearted to the women. Tom Toothacre\ntold me the story. Tom he was the one that got me the berth on the ship.\nYe see, I used to know Tom at Newport; and once when he took sick there\nmy mother nussed him up, and that was why Tom was friends with me and\ngot me the berth, and kep' me warm in it too. Tom he was one of your\nrael Maine boys, that's hatched out, so to speak, in water like ducks.\nHe was born away down there on Harpswell P'int; and they say, if ye\nthrow one o' them Harpswell babies into the sea, he 'll take to it\nnateral, and swim like a cork: ef they hit their heads agin a rock\nit only dents the rock, but don't hurt the baby. Tom he was a great\ncharacter on the ship. He could see further, and knew more 'bout wind\nand water, than most folks: the officers took Tom's judgment, and the\nmen all went by his say. My mother she chalked a streak o' good luck for\nme when she nussed up Tom.\n\n\u201cWal, we wus a lyin' at Camden there, one arter-noon, goin' to sail for\nBoston that night. It was a sort o' soft, pleasant arternoon, kind\no' still, and there wa'n't nothin' a goin' on but jest the hens a\ncraw-crawin', and a histin' up one foot, and holdin' it a spell 'cause\nthey didn't know when to set it down, and the geese a sissin' and a\npickin' at the grass. Ye see, Camden wasn't nothin' of a place,--'twas\njest as if somebody had emptied out a pocketful o' houses and forgot\n'em. There wer'n't nothin' a stirrin' or goin' on; and so we was all\ntook aback, when 'bout four o'clock in the arternoon there come a\nboat alongside, with a tall, elegant lady in it, all dressed in deep\nmournin'. She rared up sort o' princess-like, and come aboard our ship,\nand wanted to speak to Cap 'll Tucker. Where she come from, or what she\nwanted, or where she was goin' to, we none on us knew: she kep' her veil\ndown so we couldn't get sight o' her face. All was, she must see Cap'n\nTucker alone right away.\n\n\u201cWal, Cap'n Tucker he was like the generality o' cap'ns. He was up to\n'bout every thing that any _man_ could do, but it was pretty easy for a\nwoman to come it over him. Ye see, cap'ns, they don't see women as men\ndo ashore. They don't have enough of 'em to get tired on 'em; and every\nwoman's an angel to a sea-cap'n. Anyway, the cap'n he took her into his\ncabin, and he sot her a chair, and was her humble servant to command,\nand what would she have of him? And we was all a winkin', and a nudgin'\neach other, and a peekin' to see what was to come o' it. And she see\nit; and so she asks, in a sort o' princess' way, to speak to the cap'n\nalone; and so the doors was shut, and we was left to our own ideas, and\na wonderin' what it was all to be about.\n\n\u201cWal, you see, it come out arterwards all about what went on; and things\nwent this way. Jest as soon as the doors was shut, and she was left\nalone with the cap'n, she busted out a cryin' and a sobbin'. lit to\nbreak her heart.\n\n\u201cWal, the cap'n he tried to comfort her up: but no, she wouldn't be\ncomforted, but went on a weepin' and a wailin,' and a wringin' on her\nhands, till the poor cap'n's heart was a'most broke; for the cap'n was\nthe tenderest-hearted critter that could be, and couldn't bear to see a\nchild or a woman in trouble noways.\n\n\u201c'O cap'n!' said she, 'I'm the most unfortunate woman. I'm all alone\nin the world,' says she, 'and I don't know what 'll become of me ef you\ndon't keep me,' says she.\n\n\u201cWal, the cap'n thought it was time to run up his colors; and so says\nhe, 'Ma'am, I'm a married man, and love my wife,' says he, 'and so I can\nfeel for all women in distress,' says he.\n\n\u201cOh, well, then!' says she, 'you can feel for me, and know how to pity\nme. My dear husband's just died suddenly when he was up the river. He\nwas took with the fever in the woods. I nussed him day and night,'\nsays she; 'but he died there in a mis'able little hut far from home\nand friends,' says she; 'and I've brought his body down with me, hopin'\nProvidence would open some way to get it back to our home in Boston. And\nnow, cap'n, you must help me.'\n\n\u201cThen the cap'n see what she was up to: and he hated to do it, and tried\nto cut her off o' askin'; but she wa'n't to be put off.\n\n\u201c'Now, cap'n,' says she, 'ef you 'll take me and the body o' my husband\non board to-night, I'd be willin' to reward you to any amount. Money\nwould be no object to me,' says she.\n\n\u201cWal, you see, the cap'n he kind o' hated to do it; and he hemmed and\nhawed, and he tried to 'pologize. He said 'twas a government vessel, and\nhe didn't know as he had a right to use it. He said sailors was apt to\nbe superstitious; and he didn't want 'em to know as there was a corpse\non board.\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says she, 'why need they know?' For, you see, she was up to\nevery dodge; and she said she'd come along with it at dusk, in a box,\nand have it just carried to a state-room, and he needn't tell nobody\nwhat it was.\n\n\u201cWal, Cap'n Tucker he hung off; and he tried his best to persuade her\nto have a funeral, all quiet, there at Camden. He promised to get a\nminister, and 'tend to it, and wait a day till it was all over, and then\ntake her on to Boston free gratis. But 'twas all no go. She wouldn't\nhear a word to 't. And she reeled off the talk to him by the yard. And,\nwhen talk failed, she took to her water-works again, till finally the\ncap'n said his resolution was clean washed away, and he jest give up\nhook and line; and so 'twas all settled and arranged, that, when evening\ncome, she was to be alongside with her boat, and took aboard.\n\n\u201cWhen she come out o' the cap'n's room to go off, I see Tom Toothacre a\nwatchin' on her. He stood there by the railin's a shavin' up a plug o'\nbaccy to put in his pipe. He didn't say a word; but he sort o' took the\nmeasure o' that 'are woman with his eye, and kept a follerin' on her.\n\n\u201cShe had a fine sort o' lively look, carried her head up and shoulders\nback, and stepped as if she had steel springs in her heels.\n\n\u201c'Wal, Tom, what do ye say to her?' says Ben Bowdin.\n\n\u201c'I don't _say_ nothin',' says Tom, and he lit his pipe; 'tain't _my_\nbusness,' says he.\n\n\u201c'Wal, what do you _think?_' says Ben. Tom gin a hist to his trousers.\n\n\u201c'My thoughts is my own,' says he; 'and I calculate to keep 'em to\nmyself,' says he. And then he jest walked to the side of the vessel,\nand watched the woman a gettin' ashore. There was a queer kind o look in\nTom's eye.\n\n\u201cWal, the cap'n he was drefful sort o' oneasy arter she was gone. He had\na long talk in the cabin with Mr. More, the fust officer; and there was\na sort o' stir aboard as if somethin' was a goin' to happen, we couldn't\njest say what it was.\n\n\u201cSometimes it seems as if, when things is goin' to happen, a body kind\no' feels 'em comin' in the air. We boys was all that way: o' course we\ndidn't know nothin' 'bout what the woman wanted, or what she come for,\nor whether she was comin' agin; 'n fact, we didn't know nothin' about it,\nand yet we sort o' expected suthin' to come o' it; and suthin' did come,\nsure enough.\n\n\u201cCome on night, jest at dusk, we see a boat comin' alongside; and there,\nsure enough, was the lady in it.\n\n\u201c'There, she's comin' agin,' says I to Tom Tooth acre.\n\n\u201c'Yes, and brought her baggage with her,' says Tom; and he p'inted down\nto a long, narrow pine box that was in the boat beside her.\n\n\u201cJest then the cap'n called on Mr. More, and he called on Tom Toothacre;\nand among 'em they lowered a tackle, and swung the box aboard, and put\nit in the state-room right alongside the cap'n's cabin.\n\n\u201cThe lady she thanked the cap'n and Mr. More, and her voice was jest as\nsweet as any nightingale; and she went into the state-room arter they\nput the body in, and was gone ever so long with it. The cap'n and Mr.\nMore they stood a whisperin' to each other, and every once in a while\nthey'd kind o' nod at the door where the lady was.\n\n\u201cWal, by and by she come out with her han'ker-chief to her eyes, and\ncome on deck, and begun talkin' to the cap'n and Mr. More, and a wishin'\nall kinds o' blessin's on their heads.\n\n\u201cWal, Tom Toothacre didn't say a word, good or bad; but he jest kep'\na lookin' at her, watchin' her as a cat watches a mouse. Finally we up\nsail, and started with a fair breeze. The lady she kep' a walkin' up and\ndown, up and down, and every time she turned on her heel, I saw Tom a\nlookin' arter her and kind o' noddin' to himself.\n\n\u201c'What makes you look arter her so, Tom?' says I to him.\n\n\u201c''Cause I think she _wants_ lookin' arter,' says Tom. 'What's more,'\nsays he, 'if the cap'n don't look sharp arter her the devil 'll have\nus all afore mornin.' I tell ye, Sam, there's mischief under them\npetticuts.'\n\n\u201c'Why, what do ye think?' says I.\n\n\u201c'Think! I don't think, I knows! That 'are's no gal, nor widder neither,\nif my name's Tom Tooth-acre! Look at her walk; look at the way she turns\non her heel! I've been a watchin' on her. There ain't no woman livin'\nwith a step like that!' says he.\n\n\u201c'Wal, who should the critter be, then?' says I.\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says Tom, 'ef that 'are ain't a British naval officer, I lose\nmy bet. I've been used to the ways on 'em, and I knows their build and\ntheir step.'\n\n\u201c'And what do you suppose she's got in that long box?' says I.\n\n\u201c'What has she got?' says Tom. 'Wal, folks might say none o' my bisness;\nbut I s'pects it 'll turn out some o' my bisness, and yourn too, if\nhe don't look sharp arter it,' says Tom. 'It's no good, that 'are box\nain't.'\n\n\u201c'Why don't you speak to Mr. More?' says I.\n\n\u201c'Wal, you see she's a chipperin' round and a-makin' herself agreeable\nto both on 'em, you see; she don't mean to give nobody any chance for\na talk with 'em; but I've got my eye on her, for all that. You see I\nhain't no sort o' disposition to sarve out a time on one o' them British\nprison-ships,' says Tom Toothacre. 'It might be almighty handy for them\nBritish to have \u201cThe Brilliant\u201d for a coast-vessel,' says he; 'but, ye\nsee, it can't be spared jest yet. So, madam,' says he, 'I've got my eye\non you.'\n\n\u201cWal, Tom was as good as his word; for when Mr. More came towards him at\nthe wheel, Tom he up and says to him, 'Mr. More,' says he, that 'are big\nbox in the state-room yonder wants lookin' into.'\n\n\u201cTom was a sort o' privileged character, and had a way o' speakin' up\nthat the officers took in good part, 'cause they knew he was a fust-rate\nhand.\n\n\u201cWal, Mr. More he looks mysterious; and says he, Tom, do the boys know\nwhat's in that 'are box?'\n\n\u201c'I bet they don't,' says Tom. 'If they had, you wouldn't a got 'em to\nhelp it aboard.'\n\n\u201c'Wal, you see, poor woman,' says Mr. More to Tom, 'she was so\ndistressed. She wanted to get her husband's body to Boston; and there\nwa'n't no other way, and so the cap'n let it come aboard. He didn't want\nthe boys to suspect what it really was.'\n\n\u201c'Husband's body be hanged!' said Tom. 'Guess that 'are corpse ain't\nso dead but what there 'll be a resurrection afore mornin', if it ain't\nlooked arter,' says he.\n\n\u201c'Why, what do you mean, Tom?' said Mr. More, all in a blue maze.\n\n\u201c'I mean, that 'are gal that's ben a switchin' her petticuts up and down\nour deck ain't no gal at all. That are's a British officer, Mr. More.\nYou give my duty to the cap'n, and tell him to look into his widder's\nbandbox, and see what he 'll find there.'\n\n\u201cWal, the mate he went and had a talk with the cap'n; and they 'greed\nbetween 'em that Mr. More was to hold her in talk while the cap'n went\nand took observations in the state-room.\n\n\u201cSo, down the cap'n goes into the state-room to give a look at the box.\nWal, he finds the stateroom door all locked to be sure, and my lady had\nthe key in her pocket; but then the cap'n he had a master key to it; and\nso he puts it in, and opens the door quite softly, and begins to take\nobservations.\n\n\u201cSure enough, he finds that the screws had been drawed from the top o'\nthe box, showin' that the widder had been a tinkerin' on't when they\nthought she was a cryin' over it; and then, lookin' close, he sees a\nbit o' twine goin' from a crack in the box out o' the winder, and up on\ndeck.\n\n\u201cWal, the cap'n he kind o' got in the sperit o' the thing; and he\nthought he'd jest let the widder play her play out, and see what it\nwould come to. So he jest calls Tom Toothacre down to him and whispered\nto him. 'Tom,' says he, 'you jest crawl under the berth in that 'are\nstate-room, and watch that 'are box.' And Tom said he would.\n\n\u201cSo Tom creeps under the berth, and lies there still as a mouse; and\nthe cap'n he slips out and turns the key in the door, so that when madam\ncomes down she shouldn't s'pect nothin'.\n\n\u201cPutty soon, sure enough, Tom heard the lock rattle, and the young\nwidder come in; and then he heard a bit o' conversation between her and\nthe corpse.\n\n\u201c'What time is it?' come in a kind o' hoarse whisper out o' the box.\n\n\u201c'Well, 'bout nine o'clock,' says she.\n\n\u201c'How long afore you 'll let me out?' says he.\n\n\u201c'Oh! you must have patience,' says she, 'till they're all gone off to\nsleep; when there ain't but one man up. I can knock him down,' says she,\n'and then I 'll pull the string for you.'\n\n\u201c'The devil you will, ma'am!' says Tom to himself, under the berth.\n\n\u201c'Well, it's darned close here,' says the fellow in the box. He didn't\nsay darned, boys; but he said a wickeder word that I can't repeat,\nnoways,\u201d said Sam, in a parenthesis: \u201cthese 'ere British officers was\ndrefful swearin' critters.\n\n\u201c'You must have patience a while longer,' says the lady, 'till I pull\nthe string.' Tom Toothacre lay there on his back a laughin'.\n\n\u201c'Is every thing goin' on right?' says the man in the box.\n\n\u201c'All straight,' says she: 'there don't none of 'em suspect.'\n\n\u201c'You bet,' says Tom Toothacre, under the berth; and he said he had the\ngreatest mind to catch the critter by the feet as she was a standin'\nthere, but somehow thought it would be better fun to see the thing\nthrough 'cording as they'd planned it.\n\n\u201cWal, then she went off switchin' and mincin' up to the deck agin, and a\nflirtin' with the cap'n; for you see 'twas 'greed to let 'em play their\nplay out.\n\n\u201cWal, Tom he lay there a waitin'; and he waited and waited and waited,\ntill he 'most got asleep; but finally he heard a stirrin' in the box,\nas if the fellah was a gettin' up. Tom he jest crawled out still and\nkerful, and stood up tight agin the wall. Putty soon he hears a grunt,\nand he sees the top o' the box a risin' up, and a man jest gettin' out\non't mighty still.\n\n[Illustration: 0119]\n\n\u201cWal, Tom he waited till he got fairly out on to the floor, and had his\nhand on the lock o' the door, when he jumps on him, and puts both arms\nround him, and gin him a regular bear's hug.\n\n\u201c'Why, what's this?' says the man.\n\n\u201c'Guess ye 'll find out, darn ye,' says Tom Tooth-acre. 'So, ye wanted\nour ship, did ye? Wal, ye jest can't have our ship,' says Tom, says he;\nand I tell you he jest run that 'are fellow up stairs lickety-split, for\nTom was strong as a giant.\n\n\u201cThe fust thing they saw was Mr. More hed got the widder by both arms,\nand was tying on 'em behind her. 'Ye see, madam, your game's up,' says\nMr. More, 'but we 'll give ye a free passage to Boston, tho',' says\nhe: 'we wanted a couple o' prisoners about these days, and you 'll do\nnicely.'\n\n\u201cThe fellers they was putty chopfallen, to be sure, and the one in\nwomen's clothes 'specially: 'cause when he was found out, he felt\nfoolish enough in his petticuts; but they was both took to Boston, and\ngiven over as prisoners.\n\n\u201cYe see, come to look into matters, they found these two young fellows,\nBritish officers, had formed a regular plot to take Cap'n Tucker's\nvessel, and run it into Halifax; and ye see, Cap'n Tucker he was so\nsort o' spry, and knew all the Maine coast so well, and was so 'cute at\ndodgin' in and out all them little bays and creeks and places all 'long\nshore, that he made the British considerable trouble, 'cause wherever\nthey didn't want him, that's where he was sure to be.\n\n\u201cSo they'd hatched up this 'ere plan. There was one or two British\nsailors had been and shipped aboard 'The Brilliant' a week or two\naforehand, and 'twas suspected they was to have helped in the plot if\nthings had gone as they laid out; but I tell you, when the fellows see\nwhich way the cat jumped, they took pretty good care to say that they\nhadn't nothin' to do with it. Oh, no, by no manner o' means! Wal, o'\ncourse, ye know, it couldn't be proved on 'em, and so we let it go.\n\n\u201cBut I tell you, Cap'n Tucker he felt pretty cheap about his widder. The\nworst on't was, they do say Ma'am Tucker got hold of it; and you might\nknow if a woman got hold of a thing like that she'd use it as handy as a\ncat would her claws. The women they can't no more help hittin' a fellow\na clip and a rap when they've fairly got him, than a cat when she's\nketched a mouse; and so I shouldn't wonder if the Commodore heard\nsomething about his widder every time he went home from his v'yages the\nlongest day he had to live. I don't know nothin' 'bout it, ye know: I\nonly kind o' jedge by what looks, as human natur' goes.\n\n\u201cBut, Lordy massy! boys,' 't wa'n't nothin' to be 'shamed of in the\ncap'n. Folks 'll have to answer for wus things at the last day than\ntryin' to do a kindness to a poor widder, now, I tell _you_. It's better\nto be took in doin' a good thing, than never try to do good; and it's my\nsettled opinion,\u201d said Sam, taking up his mug of cider and caressing it\ntenderly, \u201cit's my humble opinion, that the best sort o' folks is the\neasiest took in, 'specially by the women. I reely don't think I should a\ndone a bit better myself.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: 5124]\n\n\n\n\nCAPTAIN KIDD'S MONEY.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9125]\n\nNE of our most favorite legendary resorts was the old barn.\n\nSam Lawson preferred it on many accounts. It was quiet and retired, that\nis to say, at such distance from his own house, that he could not\nhear if Hepsy called ever so loudly, and farther off than it would be\nconvenient for that industrious and painstaking woman to follow him.\nThen there was the soft fragrant cushion of hay, on which his length of\nlimb could be easily bestowed.\n\nOur barn had an upper loft with a swinging outer door that commanded\na view of the old mill, the waterfall, and the distant windings of the\nriver, with its grassy green banks, its graceful elm draperies, and its\nwhite flocks of water-lilies; and then on this Saturday afternoon we had\nSam all to ourselves. It was a drowsy, dreamy October day, when the hens\nwere lazily \u201ccraw, crawing,\u201d in a soft, conversational undertone with\neach other, as they scratched and picked the hay-seed under the barn\nwindows. Below in the barn black Caesar sat quietly hatchelling flax,\nsometimes gurgling and giggling to himself with an overflow of that\ninterior jollity with which he seemed to be always full. The African in\nNew England was a curious contrast to everybody around him in the joy\nand satisfaction that he seemed to feel in the mere fact of being alive.\nEvery white person was glad or sorry for some appreciable cause in the\npast, present, or future, which was capable of being definitely stated;\nbut black Caesar was in an eternal giggle and frizzle and simmer of\nenjoyment for which he could give no earthly reason: he was an \u201cembodied\njoy,\u201d like Shelley's skylark.\n\n\u201cJest hear him,\u201d said Sam Lawson, looking pensively over the hay-mow,\nand strewing hayseed down on his wool. \u201cHow that 'are critter seems to\ntickle and laugh all the while 'bout nothin'. Lordy massy! he don't seem\nnever to consider that 'this life's a dream, an empty show.'\u201d\n\n\u201cLook here, Sam,\u201d we broke in, anxious to cut short a threatened stream\nof morality, \u201cyou promised to tell us about Capt. Kidd, and how you dug\nfor his money.\u201d\n\n\u201cDid I, now? Wal, boys, that 'are history o' Kidd's is a warnin' to\nfellers. Why, Kidd had pious parents and Bible and sanctuary privileges\nwhen he was a boy, and yet come to be hanged. It's all in this 'ere\nsong I'm a goin' to sing ye. Lordy massy! I wish I had my bass-viol\nnow.--Caesar,\u201d he said, calling down from his perch, \u201ccan't you strike\nthe pitch o' 'Cap'n Kidd,' on your fiddle?\u201d\n\nCaesar's fiddle was never far from him. It was, in fact, tucked away in\na nice little nook just over the manger; and he often caught an interval\nfrom his work to scrape a dancing-tune on it, keeping time with his\nheels, to our great delight.\n\nA most wailing minor-keyed tune was doled forth, which seemed quite\nrefreshing to Sam's pathetic vein, as he sang in his most lugubrious\ntones,--\n\n                   \u201c'My name was Robert Kidd\n\n                        As I sailed, as I sailed,\n\n                   My name was Robert Kidd;\n\n                   God's laws I did forbid,\n\n                   And so wickedly I did,\n\n                        As I sailed, as I sailed.'\n\n\u201cNow ye see, boys, he's a goin' to tell how he abused his religious\nprivileges; just hear now:--\n\n                   \u201c'My father taught me well,\n\n                        As I sailed, as I sailed;\n\n                   My father taught me well\n\n                   To shun the gates of hell,\n\n                   But yet I did rebel,\n\n                        As I sailed, as I sailed.\n\n\n                   \u201c'He put a Bible in my hand,\n\n                        As I sailed, as I sailed;\n\n                   He put a Bible in my hand,\n\n                   And I sunk it in the sand\n\n                   Before I left the strand,\n\n                        As I sailed, as I sailed.'\n\n\u201cDid ye ever hear o' such a hardened, contrary critter, boys? It's awful\nto think on. Wal, ye see that 'are's the way fellers allers begin the\nways o' sin, by turnin' their backs on the Bible and the advice o' pious\nparents. Now hear what he come to:--\n\n                   \u201c'Then I murdered William More,\n\n                        As I sailed, as I sailed;\n\n                   I murdered William More,\n\n                   And left him in his gore,\n\n                   Not many leagues from shore,\n\n                        As I sailed, as I sailed.\n\n\n                   \u201c'To execution dock\n\n                        I must go, I must go.\n\n                   To execution dock,\n\n                   While thousands round me flock,\n\n                   To see me on the block,\n\n                        I must go, I must go.\n\n\u201cThere was a good deal more on't,\u201d said Sam, pausing, \u201cbut I don't seem\nto remember it; but it's real solemn and affectin'.\u201d\n\n\u201cWho was Capt. Kidd, Sam?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cWal, he was an officer in the British navy, and he got to bein' a\npirate: used to take ships and sink 'em, and murder the folks; and so\nthey say he got no end o' money,--gold and silver and precious stones,\nas many as the wise men in the East. But ye see, what good did it all do\nhim? He couldn't use it, and dar'sn't keep it; so he used to bury it in\nspots round here and there in the awfullest heathen way ye ever heard\nof. Why, they say he allers used to kill one or two men or women or\nchildren of his prisoners, and bury with it, so that their sperits might\nkeep watch on it ef anybody was to dig arter it. That 'are thing has\nbeen tried and tried and tried, but no man nor mother's son on 'em ever\ngot a cent that dug. 'Twas tried here'n Oldtown; and they come pretty\nnigh gettin' on't, but it gin 'em the slip. Ye see, boys, _it's the\nDevil's money_, and he holds a pretty tight grip on't.\u201d.\n\n\u201cWell, how was it about digging for it? Tell us, did _you_ do it? Were\n_you_ there? Did you see it? And why couldn't they get it?\u201d we both\nasked eagerly and in one breath.\n\n\u201cWhy, Lordy massy I boys, your questions tumbles over each other thick\nas martins out o' a martin-box. Now, you jest be moderate and let alone,\nand I 'll tell you all about it from the beginnin' to the end. I didn't\nrailly have no hand in't, though I was knowin' to 't, as I be to most\nthings that goes on round here; but my conscience wouldn't railly a let\nme start on no sich undertakin'.\n\n\u201cWal, the one that fust sot the thing a goin' was old Mother Hokum, that\nused to live up in that little tumble-down shed by the cranberry-pond up\nbeyond the spring pastur'. They had a putty bad name, them Hokums. How\nthey got a livin' nobody knew; for they didn't seem to pay no attention\nto raisin' nothin' but childun, but the duce knows, there was plenty o'\nthem. Their old hut was like a rabbit-pen: there was a tow-head to every\ncrack and cranny. 'Member what old Caesar said once when the word come\nto the store that old Hokum had got twins. 'S'pose de Lord knows best,'\nsays Caesar, 'but _I_ thought dere was Hokums enough afore.' Wal, even\npoor workin' industrious folks like me finds it's hard gettin' along\nwhen there's so many mouths to feed. Lordy massy! there don't never seem\nto be no end on't, and so it ain't wonderful, come to think on't, ef\nfolks like them Hokums gets tempted to help along in ways that ain't\nquite right. Anyhow, folks did use to think that old Hokum was too\nsort o' familiar with their wood-piles 'long in the night, though they\ncouldn't never prove it on him; and when Mother Hokum come to houses\nround to wash, folks use sometimes to miss pieces, here and there,\nthough they never could find 'em on her; then they was allers a gettin'\nin debt here and a gettin' in debt there. Why, they got to owin' two\ndollars to Joe Gidger for butcher's meat. Joe was sort o' good-natured\nand let 'em have meat, 'cause Hokum he promised so fair to pay; but he\ncouldn't never get it out o' him. 'Member once Joe walked clear up to\nthe cranberry-pond arter that 'are two dollars; but Mother Hokum she see\nhim a comin' jest as he come past the juniper-bush on the corner.\nShe says to Hokum, 'Get into bed, old man, quick, and let me tell the\nstory,' says she. So she covered him up; and when Gidger come in she\ncome up to him, and says she, 'Why, Mr. Gidger, I'm jest ashamed to see\nye: why, Mr. Hokum was jest a comin' down to pay ye that 'are money last\nweek, but ye see he was took down with the small-pox'--Joe didn't hear\nno more: he just turned round, and he streaked it out that 'are door\nwith his coat-tails flyin' out straight ahind him; and old Mother Hokum\nshe jest stood at the window holdin' her sides and laughin' fit to\nsplit, to see him run. That 'are's jest a sample o' the ways them Hokums\ncut up.\n\n\u201cWal, you see, boys, there's a queer kind o' rock down on the bank 'o the\nriver, that looks sort o' like a grave-stone. The biggest part on't\nis sunk down under ground, and it's pretty well growed over with\nblackberry-vines; but, when you scratch the bushes away, they used to\nmake out some queer marks on that 'are rock. They was sort o' lines and\ncrosses; and folks would have it that them was Kidd's private marks, and\nthat there was one o' the places where he hid his money.\n\n\u201cWal, there's no sayin' fairly how it come to be thought so; but fellers\nused to say so, and they used sometimes to talk it over to the tahvern,\nand kind o' wonder whether or no, if they should dig, they wouldn't come\nto suthin'.\n\n\u201cWal, old Mother Hokum she heard on't, and she was a sort o'\nenterprisin' old crittur: fact was, she had to be, 'cause the young\nHokums was jest like bag-worms, the more they growed the more they eat,\nand I expect she found it pretty hard to fill their mouths; and so she\nsaid ef there _was_ any thing under that 'are rock, they'd as good's\nhave it as the Devil; and so she didn't give old Hokum no peace o' his\nlife, but he must see what there was there.\n\n\u201cWal, I was with 'em the night they was a talkin' on't up. Ye see, Hokum\nhe got thirty-seven cents' worth o' lemons and sperit. I see him goin'\nby as I was out a splittin' kindlin's; and says he, 'Sam, you jest\ngo 'long up to our house to-night,' says he: 'Toddy Whitney and Harry\nWiggin's comin' up, and we're goin' to have a little suthin' hot,' says\nhe; and he kind o' showed me the lemons and sperit. And I told him I\nguessed I would go 'long. Wal, I kind o' wanted to see what they'd be up\nto, ye know.\n\n\u201cWal, come to find out, they was a talkin' about Cap'n Kidd's treasures,\nand layin' out how they should get it, and a settin' one another on with\ngret stories about it.\n\n\u201c'I've heard that there was whole chists full o gold guineas,' says one.\n\n\u201c'And I've heard o' gold bracelets and ear-rings and finger-rings all\nsparklin' with diamonds,' says another.\n\n\u201c'Maybe it's old silver plate from some o' them old West Indian\ngrandees,' says another.\n\n\u201c'Wal, whatever it is,' says Mother Hokum, 'I want to be into it,' says\nshe.\n\n\u201c'Wal, Sam, won't you jine?' says they.\n\n\u201c'Wal, boys,' says I, 'I kind a' don't feel jest like j'inin'. I sort\no' ain't clear about the rights on't: seems to me it's mighty nigh like\ngoin' to the Devil for money.'\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says Mother Hokum, 'what if 'tis? Money's money, get it how ye\nwill; and the Devil's money 'll buy as much meat as any. I'd go to the\nDevil, if he gave good money.'\n\n\u201c'Wal, I guess I wouldn't,' says I. 'Don't you 'member the sermon Parson\nLothrop preached about hastin' to be rich, last sabba' day?'\n\n\u201c'Parson Lothrop be hanged!' says she. 'Wal, now,' says she, 'I like\nto see a parson with his silk stockin's and great gold-headed cane, a\nlollopin' on his carriage behind his fat, prancin' hosses, comin' to\nmeetin' to preach to us poor folks not to want to be rich! How'd he like\nit to have forty-'leven children, and nothin' to put onto 'em or into\n'em, I wonder? Guess if Lady Lothrop had to rub and scrub, and wear\nher fingers to the bone as I do, she'd want to be rich; and I guess the\nparson, if he couldn't get a bellyful for a week, would be for diggin'\nup Kidd's money, or doing 'most any thing else to make the pot bile.'\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says I, 'I 'll kind o' go with ye, boys, and sort o' see how\nthings turn out; but I guess I won't take no shere in't,' says I.\n\n\u201cWal, they got it all planned out. They was to wait till the full moon,\nand then they was to get Primus King to go with 'em and help do the\ndiggin'. Ye see, Hokum and Toddy Whitney and Wiggin are all putty softly\nfellers, and hate dreffully to work; and I tell you the Kidd money ain't\nto be got without a pretty tough piece o' diggin'. Why, it's jest like\ndiggin' a well to get at it. Now, Primus King was the master hand for\ndiggin' wells, and so they said they'd get him by givin' on him a shere.\n\n\u201cHarry Wiggin he didn't want no nigger a sherin in it, he said; but\nToddy and Hokum they said that when there was such stiff diggin' to be\ndone, they didn't care if they did go in with a nigger.\n\n\u201cWal, Wiggin he said he hadn't no objection to havin' the nigger do the\ndiggin,' it was _alterin' the profits_ he objected to.\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says Hokum, 'you can't get him without,' says he. 'Primus knows\ntoo much,' says he: 'you can't fool him.' Finally they 'greed that\nthey was to give Primus twenty dollars, and shere the treasure 'mong\nthemselves.\n\n\u201cCome to talk with Primus, he wouldn't stick in a spade, unless they'd\npay him aforehand. Ye see, Primus was up to 'em; he knowed about Gidger,\nand there wa'n't none on 'em that was particular good pay; and so they\nall jest hed to rake and scrape, and pay him down the twenty dollars\namong 'em; and they 'greed for the fust full moon, at twelve o'clock at\nnight, the 9th of October.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see I had to tell Hepsy I was goin' out to watch. Wal, so I\nwas; but not jest in the way she took it: but, Lordy massy! a feller has\nto tell his wife suthin' to keep her quiet, ye know, 'specially Hepsy.\n\n\u201cWal, wal, of all the moonlight nights that ever I did see, I never did\nsee one equal to that. Why, you could see the color o' every thing. I\n'member I could see how the huckleberry-bushes on the rock was red as\nblood when the moonlight shone through 'em; 'cause the leaves, you see,\nhad begun to turn.\n\n\u201cGoin' on our way we got to talkin' about the sperits.\n\n\u201c'I ain't afraid on 'em,' says Hokum. 'What harm can a sperit do me?'\nsays he. 'I don't care ef there's a dozen on 'em;' and he took a swig at\nhis bottle.\n\n\u201c'Oh! there ain't no sperits,' says Harry Wiggin. 'That 'are talk's all\nnonsense;' and he took a swig at _his_ bottle.\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says Toddy, 'I don't know 'bout that 'are. Me and Ike Sanders\nhas seen the sperits in the Cap'n Brown house. We thought we'd jest have\na peek into the window one night; and there was a whole flock o' black\ncolts without no heads on come rushin' on us and knocked us flat.'\n\n\u201c'I expect you'd been at the tahvern,' said Hokum.\n\n\u201c'Wal, yes, we had; but them was sperits: we wa'n't drunk, now; we was\njest as sober as ever we was.'\n\n\u201c'Wal, they won't get away my money,' says Primus, for I put it safe\naway in Dinah's teapot afore I come out;' and then he showed all his\nivories from ear to ear. 'I think all this 'are's sort o' foolishness,'\nsays Primus.\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says I, 'boys, I ain't a goin' to have no part or lot in this\n'ere matter, but I 'll jest lay it off to you how it's to be done. Ef\nKidd's money is under this rock, there's _sperits_ that watch it, and\nyou mustn't give 'em no advantage. There mustn't be a word spoke from\nthe time ye get sight o' the treasure till ye get it safe up on to firm\nground,' says I. 'Ef ye do, it 'll vanish right out o' sight. I've talked\nwith them that has dug down to it and seen it; but they allers lost it,\n'cause they'd call out and say suthin'; and the minute they spoke, away\nit went.'\n\n\u201cWal, so they marked off the ground; and Primus he begun to dig, and the\nrest kind o' sot round. It was so still it was kind o' solemn. Ye see,\nit was past twelve o'clock, and every critter in Oldtown was asleep;\nand there was two whippoorwills on the great Cap'n Brown elm-trees, that\nkep' a answerin' each other back and forward sort o' solitary like; and\nthen every once in a while there'd come a sort o' strange whisper up\namong the elm-tree leaves, jest as if there was talkin' goin' on; and\nevery time Primus struck his spade into the ground it sounded sort\no' holler, jest as if he'd been a diggin' a grave. 'It's kind o'\nmelancholy,' says I, 'to think o' them poor critters that had to be\nkilled and buried jest to keep this 'ere treasure. What awful things 'll\nbe brought to light in the judgment day! Them poor critters they loved\nto live and hated to die as much as any on us; but no, they hed to die\njest to satisfy that critter's wicked will. I've heard them as thought\nthey could tell the Cap'n Kidd places by layin' their ear to the ground\nat midnight, and they'd hear groans and wailin's.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, Sam! were there really people who could tell where Kidd's money\nwas?\u201d I here interposed.\n\n\u201c'Oh, sartin! why, yis. There was Shebna Bascom, he was one. Shebna\ncould always tell what was under the earth. He'd cut a hazel-stick, and\nhold it in his hand when folks was wantin' to know where to dig wells;\nand that 'are stick would jest turn in his hand, and p'int down till it\nwould fairly grind the bark off; and ef you dug in that place you was\nsure to find a spring. Oh, yis! Shebna he's told many where the Kidd\nmoney was, and been with 'em when they dug for it; but the pester on't\nwas they allers lost it, 'cause they would some on 'em speak afore they\nthought.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, Sam, what about this digging? Let's know what came of it,\u201d said\nwe, as Sam appeared to lose his way in his story.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, they dug down about five feet, when Primus he struck his\nspade smack on something that chincked like iron.\n\n[Illustration: 0141]\n\n\u201cWal, then Hokum and Toddy Whitney was into the hole in a minute: they\nmade Primus get out, and they took the spade, 'cause they wanted to be\nsure to come on it themselves.\n\n\u201cWal, they begun, and they dug and he scraped, and sure enough they come\nto a gret iron pot as big as your granny's dinner-pot, with an iron bale\nto it.\n\n\u201cWal, then they put down a rope, and he put the rope through the handle;\nthen Hokum and Toddy they clambered upon the bank, and all on 'em began\nto draw up jest as still and silent as could be. They drawed and they\ndrawed, till they jest got it even with the ground, when Toddy spoke out\nall in a tremble, 'There,' says he, _we've got it!_' And the minit he\nspoke they was both struck by _suthin'_ that knocked 'em clean over; and\nthe rope give a crack like a pistol-shot, and broke short off; and the\npot went down, down, down, and they heard it goin', jink, jink, jink;\nand it went way down into the earth, and the ground closed over it; and\nthen they heard the screechin'est laugh ye ever did hear.\u201d\n\n\u201cI want to know, Sam, did you see that pot?\u201d I exclaimed at this part of\nthe story.\n\n\u201cWal, no, I didn't. Ye see, I jest happened to drop asleep while they\nwas diggin', I was so kind o' tired, and I didn't wake up till it was\nall over.\n\n\u201cI was waked up, 'cause there was consid'able of a scuffle; for Hokum\nwas so mad at Toddy for speakin', that he was a fistin' on him; and\nold Primus he jest haw-hawed and laughed. 'Wal, I got _my_ money safe,\nanyhow,' says he.\n\n\u201c'Wal, come to,' says I. ''Tain't no use cryin' for spilt milk:\nyou've jest got to turn in now and fill up this 'ere hole, else the\nselectmen 'll be down on ye.'\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says Primus, 'I didn't engage to fill up no holes;' and he put\nhis spade on his shoulder and trudged off.\n\n\u201cWal, it was putty hard work, fillin' in that hole; but Hokum and Toddy\nand Wiggin had to do it, 'cause they didn't want to have everybody a\nlaughin' at 'em; and I kind o' tried to set it home to 'em, showin' on\n'em that 'twas all for the best.\n\n\u201c'Ef you'd a been left to get that 'are money, there'd a come a cuss\nwith it,' says I. 'It shows the vanity o' hastin' to be rich.'\n\n\u201c'Oh, you shet up!' says Hokum, says he. 'You never hasted to any\nthing,' says he. Ye see, he was riled, that's why he spoke so.\u201d\n\n\u201cSam,\u201d said we, after maturely reflecting over the story, \u201cwhat do you\nsuppose was in that pot?\u201d\n\n\u201cLordy massy! boys: ye never will be done askin' questions. Why, how\nshould I know?\u201d\n\n\n\n\n\u201cMIS' ELDERKIN'S PITCHER.\u201d\n\n\n[Illustration: 9146]\n\nE see, boys,\u201d said Sam Lawson, as we were gathering young wintergreen on\na sunny hillside in June,--\u201cye see, folks don't allers know what their\nmarcies is when they sees 'em. Folks is kind o' blinded; and, when a\nprovidence comes along, they don't seem to know how to take it, and\nthey growl and grumble about what turns out the best things that ever\nhappened to 'em in their lives. It's like Mis' Elderkin's pitcher.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat about Mis' Elderkin's pitcher?\u201d said both of us in one breath.\n\n\u201cDidn't I never tell ye, now?\u201d said Sam: \u201cwhy, I wanter know?\u201d\n\nNo, we were sure he never had told us; and Sam as usual, began clearing\nthe ground by a thorough introduction, with statistical expositions.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, Mis' Elderkin she lives now over to Sherburne in about the\nhandsomest house in Sherburne,--a high white house, with green blinds\nand white pillars in front,--and she rides out in her own kerridge; and\nMr. Elderkin, he's a deakin in the church, and a colonel in the malitia,\nand a s'lectman, and pretty much atop every thing there is goin' in\nSherburne, and it all come of that 'are pitcher.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat pitcher?\u201d we shouted in chorus.\n\n\u201cLordy massy! that 'are's jest what I'm a goin' to tell you about; but,\nye see, a feller's jest got to make a beginnin' to all things.\n\n\u201cMis' Elderkin she thinks she's a gret lady nowadays, I s'pose; but\nI 'member when she was Miry Brown over here'n Oldtown, and I used to be\nwaitin' on her to singing-school.\n\n\u201cMiry and I was putty good friends along in them days,--we was putty\nconsid'able kind o' intimate. Fact is, boys, there was times in them\ndays when I thought whether or no I wouldn't _take_ Miry myself,\u201d said\nSam, his face growing luminous with the pleasing idea of his former\nmasculine attractions and privileges. \u201cYis,\u201d he continued, \u201cthere was\na time when folks said I could a hed Miry ef I'd asked her; and I putty\nmuch think so myself, but I didn't say nothin': marriage is allers kind\no'ventursome; an' Miry had such up-and-down kind o' ways, I was sort o'\nfraid on't.\n\n\u201cBut Lordy massy! boys, you mustn't never tell Hepsy I said so, 'cause\nshe'd be mad enough to bite a shingle-nail in two. Not that she sets\nso very gret by me neither; but then women's backs is allers up ef they\nthink anybody else could a hed you, whether they want you themselves or\nnot.\n\n\u201cYe see, Miry she was old Black Hoss John Brown's da'ter, and lived up\nthere in that 'are big brown house by the meetin'-house, that 'hes the\nred hollyhock in the front yard. Miry was about the handsomest gal that\nwent into the singers' seat a Sunday.\n\n\u201cI tell you she wa'n't none o' your milk-and-sugar gals neither,--she\nwas 'mazin' strong built. She was the strongest gal in her arms that\nI ever see. Why, I've seen Miry take up a barrel o' flour, and lift it\nright into the kitchen; and it would jest make the pink come into her\ncheeks like two roses, but she never seemed to mind it a grain. She had\na good strong back of her own, and she was straight as a poplar, with\nsnappin' black eyes, and I tell you there was a snap to her tongue too.\nNobody never got ahead o' Miry; she'd give every fellow as good as he\nsent, but for all that she was a gret favorite.\n\n\u201cMiry was one o' your briery, scratchy gals, that seems to catch fellers\nin thorns. She allers fit and flouted her beaux, and the more she fit\nand flouted 'em the more they'd be arter her. There wa'n't a gal in all\nOldtown that led such a string o' fellers arter her; 'cause, you see,\nshe'd now and then throw 'em a good word over her shoulder, and then\nthey'd all fight who should get it, and she'd jest laugh to see 'em do\nit.\n\n\u201cWhy, there was Tom Sawin, he was one o' her beaux, and Jim Moss, and\nIke Bacon; and there was a Boston boy, Tom Beacon, he came up from\nCambridge to rusticate with Parson Lothrop; he thought he must have his\nsay with Miry, but he got pretty well come up with. You see, he thought\n'cause he was Boston born that he was kind o' aristocracy, and hed a\nright jest to pick and choose 'mong country gals; but the way he got\ncome up with by Miry was too funny for any thing.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo tell us about it,\u201d we said, as Sam made an artful pause, designed to\ndraw forth solicitation.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, Tom Beacon he told Ike Bacon about it, and Ike he told me.\n'Twas this way. Ye see, there was a quiltin' up to Mis' Cap'n Broad's,\nand Tom Beacon he was there; and come to goin' home with the gals, Tom\nhe cut Ike out, and got Miry all to himself; and 'twas a putty long\npiece of a walk from Mis' Cap'n Broad's up past the swamp and the stone\npastur' clear up to old Black Hoss John's.\n\n\u201cWal, Tom he was in high feather 'cause Miry took him, so that he didn't\nreelly know how to behave; and so, as they was walkin' along past Parson\nLothrop's apple-orchard, Tom thought he'd try bein' familiar, and he\nundertook to put his arm round Miry. Wal, if she didn't jest take that\nlittle fellow by his two shoulders and whirl him over the fence into the\norchard quicker'n no time. 'Why,' says Tom, 'the fust I knew I was lyin'\non my back under the appletrees lookin' up at the stars.' Miry she jest\nwalked off home and said nothin' to nobody,--it wa'n't her way to talk\nmuch about things; and, if it hedn't ben for Tom Beacon himself, nobody\nneed 'a' known nothin' about it. Tom was a little fellow, you see, and\n'mazin' good-natured, and one o' the sort that couldn't keep nothin' to\nhimself; and so he let the cat out o' the bag himself. Wal, there didn't\nnobody think the worse o' Miry. When fellers find a gal won't take saace\nfrom no man, they kind o' respect her; and then fellers allers thinks ef\nit hed ben _them_, now, things 'd 'a' been different. That's jest what\nJim Moss and Ike Bacon said: they said, why Tom Beacon was a fool not\nto know better how to get along with Miry,--_they_ never had no trouble.\nThe fun of it was, that Tom Beacon himself was more crazy after her than\nhe was afore; and they say he made Miry a right up-and-down offer, and\nMiry she jest wouldn't have him.\n\n\u201cWal, you see, that went agin old Black Hoss John's idees: old Black\nHoss was about as close as a nut and as contrairy as a pipperage-tree.\nYou ought to 'a' seen him. Why, his face was all a perfect crisscross o'\nwrinkles. There wa'n't a spot where you could put a pin down that there\nwa'n't a wrinkle; and they used to say that he held on to every cent\nthat went through his fingers till he'd pinched it into two. You\ncouldn't say that his god was his belly, for he hedn't none, no more'n\nan old file: folks said that he'd starved himself till the moon'd shine\nthrough him.\n\n\u201cOld Black Hoss was awfully grouty about Miry's refusin' Tom Beacon,\n'cause there was his houses and lots o' land in Boston. A drefful\nworldly old critter Black Hoss John was: he was like the rich fool in\nthe gospel. Wal, he's dead and gone now, poor critter, and what good has\nit all done him? It's as the Scriptur' says, 'He heapeth up riches, and\nknoweth not who shall gather them.'\n\n\u201cMiry hed a pretty hard row to hoe with old Black Hoss John. She was up\nearly and down late, and kep' every thing a goin'. She made the cheese\nand made the butter, and between spells she braided herself handsome\nstraw bunnets, and fixed up her clothes; and somehow she worked it so\nwhen she sold her butter and cheese that there was somethin' for\nribbins and flowers. You know the Scriptur' says, 'Can a maid forget her\nornaments?' Wal, Miry didn't. I 'member I used to lead the singin'\nin them days, and Miry she used to sing counter, so we sot putty near\ntogether in the singers' seats; and I used to think Sunday mornin's\nwhen she come to meetin' in her white dress and her red cheeks, and her\nbunnet all tipped off with laylock, that 'twas for all the world jest\nlike sunshine to have her come into the singers' seats. Them was the\ndays that I didn't improve my privileges, boys,\u201d said Sam, sighing\ndeeply. \u201cThere was times that ef I'd a spoke, there's no knowin' what\nmightn't 'a' happened, 'cause, you see, boys, I was better lookin' in\nthem days than I be now. Now you mind, boys, when you grow up, ef you\nget to waitin' on a nice gal, and you're 'most a mind to speak up to her,\ndon't you go and put it off, 'cause, ef you do, you may live to repent\nit.\n\n\u201cWal, you see, from the time that Bill Elderkin come and took the\nacademy, I could see plain enough that it was time for me to hang up\nmy fiddle. Bill he used to set in the singers' seats, too, and he\nwould have it that he sung tenor. He no more sung tenor than a\nskunk-blackbird, but he made b'lieve he did, jest to git next to Miry\nin the singers' seats. They used to set there in the seats a writin'\nbackward and forward to each other till they tore out all the leaves of\nthe hymn-books, and the singin'-books besides. Wal, I never thought that\nthe house o' the Lord was jest the place to be courtin' in, and I used\nto get consid'able shocked at the way things went on atween 'em. Why,\nthey'd be a writin' all sermon-time; and I've seen him a lookin' at her\nall through the long prayer in a way that wa'n't right, considerin' they\nwas both professors of religion. But then the fact was, old Black Hoss\nJohn was to blame for it, 'cause he never let 'em have no chance to hum.\nYe see, old Black Hoss he was sot agin Elderkin 'cause he was poor.\nYou see, his mother, the old Widdah Elderkin, she was jest about the\npoorest, peakedest old body over to Sherburne, and went out to days'\nworks; and Bill Elderkin he was all for books and larnin', and old Black\nHoss John he thought it was just shiftlessness: but Miry she thought\nhe was a genius; and she got it sot in her mind that he was goin' to be\nPresident o' the United States, or some sich.\n\n\u201cWal, old Black Hoss he wa'n't none too polite to Miry's beaux in\ngineral, but when Elderkin used to come to see her he was snarlier than\na saw: he hadn't a good word for him noways; and he'd rake up the\nfire right before his face and eyes, and rattle about fastenin' up the\nwindows, and tramp up to bed, and call down the chamber-stairs to Miry\nto go to bed, and was sort o' aggravatin' every way.\n\n\u201cWal, ef folks wants to get a gal set on havin' a man, that 'ere's the\nway to go to work. Miry had a consid'able stiff will of her own; and, ef\nshe didn't care about Tom Beacon before, she hated him now; and, if she\nliked Bill Elderkin before, she was clean gone over to him now. And\nso she took to 'goin' to the Wednesday-evenin' lecture, and the\nFriday-even-in' prayer-meetin', and the singin'-school, jest as regular\nas a clock, and so did he; and arterwards they allers walked home the\nlongest way. Fathers may jest as well let their gals be courted in the\nhouse, peaceable, 'cause, if they can't be courted there, they 'll find\nplaces where they can be: it's jest human natur'.\n\n\u201cWal, come fall, Elderkin he went to college up to Brunswick; and then I\nused to see the letters as regular up to the store every week, comin' in\nfrom Brunswick, and old Black Hoss John he see 'em too, and got a way\nof droppin' on 'em in his coat-pocket when he come up to the store, and\nfolks used to say that the letters that went into his coat-pocket didn't\nget to Miry. Anyhow, Miry she says to me one day, says she, 'Sam, you're\nup round the post-office a good deal,' says she. 'I wish, if you see any\nletters for me, you'd jest bring 'em along.' I see right into it, and I\ntold her to be sure I would; and so I used to have the carryin' of great\nthick letters every week. Wal, I was waitin' on Hepsy' along about them\ntimes, and so Miry and I kind o' sympathized. Hepsy was a pretty gal,\nand I thought it was all best as 'twas; any way, I knew I couldn't get\nMiry, and I could get Hepsy, and that made all the difference in the\nworld.\n\n\u201cWal, that next winter old Black Hoss was took down with rheumatism,\nand I tell you if Miry didn't have a time on't! He wa'n't noways\nsweet-tempered when he was well; but come to be crooked up with the\nrheumatis' and kep' awake nights, it seemed as if he was determined\nthere shouldn't nobody have no peace so long as he couldn't.\n\n\u201cHe'd get Miry up and down with him night after night a makin' her\nheat flannels and vinegar, and then he'd jaw and scold so that she was\neenymost beat out. He wouldn't have nobody set up with him, though\nthere was offers made. No: he said Miry was his daughter, and 'twas her\nbisness to take care on him.\n\n\u201cMiry was clear worked down: folks kind o' pitied her. She was a strong\ngal, but there's things that wears out the strongest. The worst\non't was, it hung on so. Old Black Hoss had a most amazin' sight o'\nconstitution. He'd go all down to death's door, and seem hardly to have\nthe breath o' life in him, and then up he'd come agin! These 'ere old\nfolks that nobody wants to have live allers hev such a sight o' wear\nin 'em, they jest last and last; and it really did seem as if he'd wear\nMiry out and get her into the grave fust, for she got a cough with bein'\nup so much in the cold, and grew thin as a shadder. 'Member one time I\nwent up there to offer to watch jest in the spring o' the year, when the\nlaylocks was jest a buddin' out, and Miry she come and talked with me\nover the fence; and the poor gal she fairly broke down, and sobbed as if\nher heart would break, a tellin' me her trouble.\n\n\u201cWal, it reelly affected me more to have Miry give up so than most gals,\n'cause she'd allers held her head up, and hed sich a sight o' grit and\nresolution; but she told me all about it.\n\n\u201cIt seems old Black Hoss he wa'n't content with worryin' on her,\nand gettin' on her up nights, but he kep' a hectorin' her about Bill\nElderkin, and wantin' on her to promise that she wouldn't hev Bill when\nhe was dead and gone; and Miry she wouldn't promise, and then the old\nman said she shouldn't have a cent from him if she didn't, and so they\nhad it back and forth. Everybody in town was sayin' what a shame 'twas\nthat he should sarve her so; for though he hed other children, they was\nmarried and gone, and there wa'n't none of them to do for him but jest\nMiry.\n\n\u201cWal, he hung on till jest as the pinys in the front yard was beginnin'\nto blow out, and then he began to feel he was a goin', and he sent for\nParson Lothrop to know what was to be done about his soul.\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says Parson Lothrop, 'you must settle up all your worldly\naffairs; you must be in peace and love with all mankind; and, if you've\nwronged anybody, you must make it good to 'em.'\n\n\u201cOld Black Hoss he bounced right over in his bed with his back to the\nminister.\n\n\u201c'The devil!' says he: ''twill take all I've got.' And he never spoke\nanother word, though Parson Lothrop he prayed with him, and did what he\ncould for him.\n\n\u201cWal, that night I sot up with him; and he went off 'tween two and three\nin the mornin', and I laid him out regular. Of all the racks o' bone\nI ever see, I never see a human critter so poor as he was. 'Twa'n't\nnothin' but his awful will kep' his soul in his body so long, as it was.\n\n\u201cWe had the funeral in the meetin'-house a Sunday; and Parson Lothrop he\npreached a sarmon on contentment on the text, 'We brought nothin' into\nthe world, and it's sartin we can carry nothin' out; and having food and\nraiment, let us be therewith content.' Parson Lothrop he got round the\nsubject about as handsome as he could: he didn't say what a skinflint\nold Black Hoss was, but he talked in a gineral way about the vanity o'\nworryin' an' scrapin to heap up riches. Ye see, Parson Lothrop he could\nsay it all putty easy, too, 'cause since he married a rich wife he never\nhed no occasion to worry about temporal matters. Folks allers\npreaches better on the vanity o' riches when they's in tol'able easy\ncircumstances. Ye see, when folks is pestered and worried to pay their\nbills, and don't know where the next dollar's to come from, it's a great\ntemptation to be kind o' valooin' riches, and mebbe envyin' those that's\ngot 'em; whereas when one's accounts all pays themselves, and the money\ncomes jest when its wanted regular, a body feels sort o' composed like,\nand able to take the right view o' things, like Parson Lothrop.\n\n\u201cWal, arter sermon the relations all went over to the old house to hear\nthe will read; and, as I was kind o' friend with the family, I jest\nslipped in along with the rest.\n\n\u201cSquire Jones he had the will; and so when they all got sot round all\nsolemn, he broke the seals and unfolded it, cracklin' it a good while\nafore he begun and it was so still you might a heard a pin drop when he\nbegun to read. Fust, there was the farm and stock, he left to his son\nJohn Brown over in Sherburne. Then there was the household stuff and all\nthem things, spoons and dishes, and beds and kiver-lids, and so on, to\nhis da'ter Polly Blanchard. And then, last of all, he says, he left to\nhis da'ter Miry _the pitcher that was on the top o' the shelf in his\nbed-room closet._\n\n\u201cThat' 'are was an old cracked pitcher that Miry allers hed hated the\nsight of, and spring and fall she used to beg her father to let her\nthrow it away; but no, he wouldn't let her touch it, and so it stood\ngatherin' dust.\n\n\u201cSome on 'em run and handed it down; and it seemed jest full o'\nscourin'-sand and nothin' else, and they handed it to Miry.\n\n\u201cWal, Miry she was wrathy then. She didn't so much mind bein' left out\nin the will, 'cause she expected that; but to have that 'are old pitcher\npoked at her so sort o' scornful was more'n she could bear.\n\n\u201cShe took it and gin it a throw across the room with all her might; and\nit hit agin the wall and broke into a thousand bits, when out rolled\nhundreds of gold pieces; great gold eagles and guineas flew round\nthe kitchen jest as thick as dandelions in a meadow. I tell you, she\nscrabbled them up pretty quick, and we all helped her.\n\n[Illustration: 0163]\n\n\u201cCome to count 'em over, Miry had the best fortin of the whole, as\n'twas right and proper she should. Miry she was a sensible gal, and\nshe invested her money well; and so, when Bill Elderkin got through his\nlaw-studies, he found a wife that could make a nice beginnin' with him.\nAnd that's the way, you see, they came to be doin' as well as they be.\n\n\u201cSo, boys, you jest mind and remember and allers see what there is in a\nprovidence afore you quarrel with it, 'cause there's a good many things\nin this world turns out like Mis' Elderkin's pitcher.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nTHE GHOST IN THE CAP'N BROWN HOUSE.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9165]\n\nOW, Sam, tell us certain true, is there any such things as ghosts?\u201d\n\n\u201cBe there ghosts?\u201d said Sam, immediately translating into his vernacular\ngrammar: \u201cwal, now, that are's jest the question, ye see.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, grandma thinks there are, and Aunt Lois thinks it's all nonsense.\nWhy, Aunt Lois don't even believe the stories in Cotton Mather's\n'Magnalia.'\u201d\n\n\u201cWanter know?\u201d said Sam, with a tone of slow, languid meditation.\n\nWe were sitting on a bank of the Charles River, fishing. The soft\nmelancholy red of evening was fading off in streaks on the glassy water,\nand the houses of Oldtown were beginning to loom through the gloom,\nsolemn and ghostly. There are times and tones and moods of nature that\nmake all the vulgar, daily real seem shadowy, vague, and supernatural,\nas if the outlines of this hard material present were fading into the\ninvisible and unknown. So Oldtown, with its elm-trees, its great square\nwhite houses, its meeting-house and tavern and blacksmith's shop and\nmill, which at high noon seem as real and as commonplace as possible, at\nthis hour of the evening were dreamy and solemn. They rose up blurred,\nindistinct, dark; here and there winking candles sent long lines of\nlight through the shadows, and little drops of unforeseen rain rippled\nthe sheeny darkness of the water.\n\n\u201cWal, you see, boys, in them things it's jest as well to mind your\ngranny. There's a consid'able sight o' gumption in grandmas. You look at\nthe folks that's allus tellin' you what they don't believe,--they don't\nbelieve this, and they don't believe that,--and what sort o' folks is\nthey? Why, like yer Aunt Lois, sort o' stringy and dry. There ain't no\n'sorption got out o' not believin' nothin'.\n\n\u201cLord a massy! we don't know nothin' 'bout them things. We hain't ben\nthere, and can't say that there ain't no ghosts and sich; can we, now?\u201d\n\nWe agreed to that fact, and sat a little closer to Sam in the gathering\ngloom.\n\n\u201cTell us about the Cap'n Brown house, Sam.\u201d\n\n\u201cYe didn't never go over the Cap'n Brown house?\u201d\n\nNo, we had not that advantage.\n\n\u201cWal, yer see, Cap'n Brown he made all his money to sea, in furrin\nparts, and then come here to Oldtown to settle down.\n\n\u201cNow, there ain't no knowin' 'bout these 'ere old ship-masters, where\nthey's ben, or what they's ben a doin', or how they got their money. Ask\nme no questions, and I 'll tell ye no lies, is 'bout the best philosophy\nfor them. Wal, it didn't do no good to ask Cap'n Brown questions too\nclose, 'cause you didn't git no satisfaction. Nobody rightly knew 'bout\nwho his folks was, or where they come from; and, ef a body asked him,\nhe used to say that the very fust he know'd 'bout himself he was a young\nman walkin' the streets in London.\n\n\u201cBut, yer see, boys, he hed money, and that is about all folks wanter\nknow when a man comes to settle down. And he bought that 'are place, and\nbuilt that 'are house. He built it all sea-cap'n fashion, so's to feel\nas much at home as he could. The parlor was like a ship's cabin. The\ntable and chairs was fastened down to the floor, and the closets was\nmade with holes to set the casters and the decanters and bottles in,\njest's they be at sea; and there was stanchions to hold on by; and they\nsay that blowy nights the cap'n used to fire up pretty well with his\ngrog, till he hed about all he could carry, and then he'd set and hold\non, and hear the wind blow, and kind o' feel out to sea right there to\nhum. There wasn't no Mis' Cap'n Brown, and there didn't seem likely to\nbe none. And whether there ever hed been one, nobody know'd. He hed an\nold black Guinea nigger-woman, named Quassia, that did his work. She was\nshaped pretty much like one o' these 'ere great crookneck-squashes. She\nwa'n't no gret beauty, I can tell you; and she used to wear a gret red\nturban and a yaller short gown and red petticoat, and a gret string o'\ngold beads round her neck, and gret big gold hoops in her ears, made\nright in the middle o' Africa among the heathen there. For all she\nwas black, she thought a heap o' herself, and was consid'able sort o'\npredominative over the cap'n. Lordy massy! boys, it's alius so. Get a\nman and a woman together,--any sort o' woman you're a mind to, don't\ncare who 'tis,--? and one way or another she gets the rule over him, and\nhe jest has to train to her fife. Some does it one way, and some does it\nanother; some does it by jawin', and some does it by 'kissin', and some\ndoes it by faculty and contrivance; but one way or another they allers\ndoes it. Old Cap'n Brown was a good stout, stocky kind o' John Bull sort\no' fellow, and a good judge o' sperits, and allers kep' the best in them\nare cupboards o' his'n; but, fust and last, things in his house went\npretty much as old Quassia said.\n\n\u201cFolks got to kind o' respectin' Quassia. She come to meetin' Sunday\nregular, and sot all fixed up in red and yaller and green, with glass\nbeads and what not, lookin' for all the world like one o' them ugly\nIndian idols; but she was well-behaved as any Christian. She was a\nmaster hand at cookin'. Her bread and biscuits couldn't be beat, and\nno couldn't her pies, and there wa'n't no such pound-cake as she made\nnowhere. Wal, this 'ere story I'm a goin' to tell you was told me by\nCinthy Pendleton. There ain't a more respectable gal, old or young, than\nCinthy nowheres. She lives over to Sherburne now, and I hear tell she's\nsot up a manty-makin' business; but then she used to do tailorin' in\nOldtown. She was a member o' the church, and a good Christian as ever\nwas. Wal, ye see, Quassia she got Cinthy to come up and spend a week to\nthe Cap'n Brown house, a doin' tailorin' and a fixin' over his close:\n'twas along toward the fust o' March. Cinthy she sot by the fire in the\nfront' parlor with her goose and her press-board and her work: for there\nwa'n't no company callin', and the snow was drifted four feet deep right\nacross the front door; so there wa'n't much danger o' any body comin'\nin. And the cap'n he was a perlite man to wimmen; and Cinthy she liked\nit jest as well not to have company, 'cause the cap'n he'd make himself\nentertainin' tellin' on her sea-stories, and all about his adventures\namong the Ammonites, and Perresites, and Jebusites, and all sorts o'\nheathen people he'd been among.\n\n\u201cWal, that 'are week there come on the master snow-storm. Of all the\nsnow-storms that hed ben, that 'are was the beater; and I tell you the\nwind blew as if 'twas the last chance it was ever goin' to hev.\n\n\u201cWal, it's kind o' scary like to be shet up in a lone house with all\nnatur' a kind o' breakin' out, and goin' on so, and the snow a comin'\ndown so thick ye can't see 'cross the street, and the wind a pipin' and\na squeelin' and a rumblin' and a tumblin' fust down this chimney and\nthen down that. I tell you, it sort o' sets a feller thinkin' o' the\nthree great things,--death, judgment, and etarnaty; and I don't care\nwho the folks is, nor how good they be, there's times when they must be\nfeelin' putty consid'able solemn.\n\n\u201cWal, Cinthy she said she kind o' felt so along, and she hed a sort o'\nqueer feelin' come over her as if there was somebody or somethin' round\nthe house more'n appeared. She said she sort o' felt it in the air; but\nit seemed to her silly, and she tried to get over it. But two or three\ntimes, she said, when it got to be dusk, she felt somebody go by her up\nthe stairs. The front entry wa'n't very light in the daytime, and in the\nstorm, come five o'clock, it was so dark that all you could see was jest\na gleam o' somethin', and two or three times when she started to go up\nstairs she see a soft white suthin' that seemed goin' up before her, and\nshe stopped with her heart a beatin' like a trip-hammer, and she sort o'\nsaw it go up and along the entry to the cap'n's door, and then it seemed\nto go right through, 'cause the door didn't open.\n\n\u201cWal, Cinthy says she to old Quassia, says she, 'Is there anybody lives\nin this house but us?'\n\n\u201c'Anybody lives here?' says Quassia: 'what you mean?' says she.\n\n\u201cSays Ointhy, 'I thought somebody went past me on the stairs last night\nand to-night.'\n\n\u201cLordy massy! how old Quassia did screech and laugh. 'Good Lord!' says\nshe, 'how foolish white folks is! Somebody went past you? Was 't the\ncapt'in?'\n\n\u201c'No, it wa'n't the cap'n,' says she: 'it was somethin' soft and white,\nand moved very still; it was like somethin' in the air,' says she.\nThen Quassia she haw-hawed louder. Says she, 'It's hy-sterikes, Miss\nCinthy; that's all it is.'\n\n\u201cWal, Cinthy she was kind o ' 'shamed, but for all that she couldn't help\nherself. Sometimes evenin's she'd be a settin' with the cap'n, and she'd\nthink she'd hear somebody a movin' in his room overhead; and she knowed\nit wa'n't Quassia, 'cause Quassia was ironin' in the kitchen. She took\npains once or twice to find out that 'are.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, the cap'n's room was the gret front upper chamber over the\nparlor, and then right oppi-site to it was the gret spare chamber where\nCinthy slept. It was jest as grand as could be, with a gret four-post\nmahogany bedstead and damask curtains brought over from England; but it\nwas cold enough to freeze a white bear solid,--the way spare chambers\nallers is. Then there was the entry between, run straight through the\nhouse: one side was old Quassia's room, and the other was a sort o'\nstoreroom, where the old cap'n kep' all sorts o' traps.\n\n\u201cWal, Cinthy she kep' a hevin' things happen and a seein' things, till\nshe didn't railly know what was in it. Once when she come into the\nparlor jest at sundown, she was sure she see a white figure a vanishin'\nout o' the door that went towards the side entry. She said it was so\ndusk, that all she could see was jest this white figure, and it jest\nwent out still as a cat as she come in.\n\n\u201cWal, Cinthy didn't like to speak to the cap'n about it. She was a close\nwoman, putty prudent, Cinthy was.\n\n\u201cBut one night, 'bout the middle o' the week, this 'ere thing kind o'\ncome to a crisis.\n\n\u201cCinthy said she'd ben up putty late a sewin' and a finishin' off down\nin the parlor; and the cap'n he sot up with her, and was consid'able\ncheerful and entertainin', tellin' her all about things over in the\nBermudys, and off to Chiny and Japan, and round the world ginerally. The\nstorm that hed been a blowin' all the week was about as furious as ever;\nand the cap'n he stirred up a mess o' flip, and hed it for her hot to\ngo to bed on. He was a good-natured critter, and allers had feelin's for\nlone women; and I s'pose he knew 'twas sort o' desolate for Cinthy.\n\n\u201cWal, takin' the flip so right the last thing afore goin' to bed, she\nwent right off to sleep as sound as a nut, and slep' on till somewhere\nabout mornin', when she said somethin' waked her broad awake in a\nminute. Her eyes flew wide open like a spring, and the storm hed gone\ndown and the moon come out; and there, standin' right in the moonlight\nby her bed, was a woman jest as white as a sheet, with black hair\nbangin' down to her waist, and the brightest, mourn fullest black eyes\nyou ever see. She stood there lookin' right at Cinthy; and Cinthy thinks\nthat was what waked her up; 'cause, you know, ef anybody stands and\nlooks steady at folks asleep it's apt to wake 'em.\n\n[Illustration: 0175]\n\n\u201cAny way, Cinthy said she felt jest as ef she was turnin' to stone. She\ncouldn't move nor speak. She lay a minute, and then she shut her eyes,\nand begun to say her prayers; and a minute after she opened 'em, and it\nwas gone.\n\n\u201cCinthy was a sensible gal, and one that allers hed her thoughts about\nher; and she jest got up and put a shawl round her shoulders, and went\nfirst and looked at the doors, and they was both on 'em locked jest as\nshe left 'em when she went to bed. Then she looked under the bed and in\nthe closet, and felt all round the room: where she couldn't see she felt\nher way, and there wa'n't nothin' there.\n\n\u201cWal, next mornin' Cinthy got up and went home, and she kep' it to\nherself a good while. Finally, one day when she was workin' to our house\nshe told Hepsy about it, and Hepsy she told me.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, Sam,\u201d we said, after a pause, in which we heard only the rustle\nof leaves and the ticking of branches against each other, \u201cwhat do you\nsuppose it was?\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, there 'tis: you know jest as much about it as I do. Hepsy told\nCinthy it might 'a' ben a dream; so it might, but Cinthy she was sure it\nwa'n't a dream, 'cause she remembers plain hearin' the old clock on the\nstairs strike four while she had her eyes open lookin' at the woman; and\nthen she only shet 'em a minute, jest to say 'Now I lay me,' and opened\n'em and she was gone.\n\n\u201cWal, Cinthy told Hepsy, and Hepsy she kep' it putty close. She didn't\ntell it to nobody except Aunt Sally Dickerson and the Widder Bije Smith\nand your Grandma Badger and the minister's wife; and they every one o'\n'em 'greed it ought to be kep' close, 'cause it would make talk. Wal,\ncome spring somehow or other it seemed to 'a' got all over Old town. I\nheard on't to the store and up to the tavern; and Jake Marshall he\nsays to me one day, 'What's this 'ere about the cap'n's house?' And the\nWidder Loker she says to me, 'There's ben a ghost seen in the cap'n's\nhouse;' and I heard on 't clear over to Needham and Sherburne.\n\n\u201cSome o' the women they drew themselves up putty stiff and proper. Your\nAunt Lois was one on 'em.\n\n\u201c'Ghost,' says she; 'don't tell me! Perhaps it would be best ef 'twas a\nghost,' says she. She didn't think there ought to be no sich doin's\nin nobody's house; and your grandma she shet her up, and told her she\ndidn't oughter talk so.\u201d\n\n\u201cTalk how?\u201d said I, interrupting Sam with wonder. \u201cWhat did Aunt Lois\nmean?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, you see,\u201d said Sam mysteriously, \u201cthere allers is folks in every\ntown that's jest like the Sadducees in old times: they won't believe in\nangel nor sperit, no way you can fix it; and ef things is seen and done\nin a house, why, they say, it's 'cause there's somebody there; there's\nsome sort o' deviltry or trick about it.\n\n\u201cSo the story got round that there was a woman kep' private in Cap'n\nBrown's house, and that he brought her from furrin parts; and it growed\nand growed, till there was all sorts o' ways o' tellin on 't.\n\n\u201cSome said they'd seen her a settin' at an open winder. Some said that\nmoonlight nights they'd seen her a walkin' out in the back garden kind\no' in and out 'mong the bean-poles and squash-vines.\n\n\u201cYou see, it come on spring and summer; and the winders o' the Cap'n\nBrown house stood open, and folks was all a watchin' on 'em day and\nnight. Aunt Sally Dickerson told the minister's wife that she'd seen in\nplain daylight a woman a settin' at the chamber winder atween four and\nfive o'clock in the mornin',--jist a settin' a lookin' out and a doin'\nnothin', like anybody else. She was very white and pale, and had black\neyes.\n\n\u201cSome said that it was a nun the cap'n had brought away from a Roman\nCatholic convent in Spain, and some said he'd got her out o' the\nInquisition.\n\n\u201cAunt Sally said she thought the minister ought to call and inquire why\nshe didn't come to meetin', and who she was, and all about her: 'cause,\nyou see, she said it might be all right enough ef folks only know'd jest\nhow things was; but ef they didn't, why, folks will talk.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, did the minister do it?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat, Parson Lothrop? Wal, no, he didn't. He made a call on the cap'n\nin a regular way, and asked arter his health and all his family. But the\ncap'n he seemed jest as jolly and chipper as a spring robin, and he gin'\nthe minister some o' his old Jamaiky; and the minister he come away and\nsaid he didn't see nothin'; and no he didn't. Folks---never does see\nnothin' when they aint' lookin' where 'tis. Fact is, Parson Lothrop\nwa'n't fond o' interferin'; he was a master hand to slick things over.\nYour grandma she used to mourn about it, 'cause she said he never gin no\np'int to the doctrines; but 'twas all of a piece, he kind o' took every\nthing the smooth way.\n\n\u201cBut your grandma she believed in the ghost, and so did Lady Lothrop. I\nwas up to her house t'other day fixin' a door-knob, and says she, 'Sam\nyour wife told me a strange story about the Cap'n Brown house.'\n\n\u201c'Yes, ma'am, she did,' says I.\n\n\u201c'Well, what do you think of it?' says she.\n\n\u201c'Wal, sometimes I think, and then agin I don't know,' says I. 'There's\nCinthy she's a member o' the church and a good pious gal,' says I.\n\n\u201c'Yes, Sam,' says Lady Lothrop, says she; 'and Sam,' says she, 'it is\njest like something that happened once to my grandmother when she was\nlivin' in the old Province House in Bostin.' Says she, 'These 'ere\nthings is the mysteries of Providence, and it's jest as well not to have\n'em too much talked about.'\n\n\u201c'Jest so,' says I,--'jest so. That 'are's what every woman I've talked\nwith says; and I guess, fust and last, I've talked with twenty,--good,\nsafe church-members,--and they's every one o' opinion that this 'ere\noughtn't to be talked about. Why, over to the deakin's t'other night we\nwent it all over as much as two or three hours, and we concluded that\nthe best way was to keep quite still about it; and that's jest what they\nsay over to Needham and Sherburne. I've been all round a hushin' this\n'ere up, and I hain't found but a few people that hedn't the particulars\none way or another.' This 'ere was what I says to Lady Lothrop. The\nfact was, I never did see no report spread so, nor make sich sort o'\nsarchin's o' heart, as this 'ere. It railly did beat all; 'cause,\nef 'twas a ghost, why there was the p'int proved, ye see. Cinthy's a\nchurch-member, and she _see_ it, and got right up and sarched the room:\nbut then agin, ef 'twas a woman, why that 'are was kind o' awful; it\ngive cause, ye see, for thinkin' all sorts o' things. There was Cap'n\nBrown, to be sure, he wa'n't a church-member; but yet he was as honest\nand regular a man as any goin', as fur as any on us could see. To be\nsure, nobody know'd where he come from, but that wa'n't no reason agin'\nhim: this 'ere might a ben a crazy sister, or some poor critter that he\ntook out o' the best o' motives; and the Scriptur' says, 'Charity hopeth\nall things.' But then, ye see, folks will talk,--that 'are's the pester\no' all these things,--and they did some on 'em talk consid'able strong\nabout the cap'n; but somehow or other, there didn't nobody come to the\np'int o' facin' on him down, and sayin' square out, 'Cap'n Brown, have\nyou got a woman in your house, or hain't you? or is it a ghost, or what\nis it?' Folks somehow never does come to that. Ye see, there was the\ncap'n so respectable, a settin' up every Sunday there in his pew, with\nhis ruffles round his hands and his red broadcloth cloak and his cocked\nhat. Why, folks' hearts sort o' failed 'em when it come to sayin' any\nthing right to him. They thought and kind o' whispered round that the\nminister or the deakins oughter do it: but Lordy massy! ministers, I\ns'pose, has feelin's like the rest on us; they don't want to eat all the\nhard cheeses that nobody else won't eat. Anyhow, there wasn't nothin'\nsaid direct to the cap'n; and jest for want o' that all the folks in\nOldtown kep' a bilin' and a bilin' like a kettle o' soap, till it seemed\nall the time as if they'd bile over.\n\n\u201cSome o' the wimmen tried to get somethin' out o' Quassy. Lordy massy!\nyou might as well 'a' tried to get it out an old tom-turkey, that 'll\nstrut and gobble and quitter, and drag his wings on the ground, and fly\nat you, but won't say nothin'. Quassy she screeched her queer sort o'\nlaugh; and she told 'em that they was a makin' fools o' themselves, and\nthat the cap'n's matters wa'n't none o' their bisness; and that was true\nenough. As to goin' into Quassia's room, or into any o' the store-rooms\nor closets she kep' the keys of, you might as well hev gone into a\nlion's den. She kep' all her places locked up tight; and there was no\ngettin' at nothin' in the Cap'n Brown house, else I believe some o' the\nwim-men would 'a' sent a sarch-warrant.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said I, \u201cwhat came of it? Didn't anybody ever find out?\u201d\n\n\u201cWal,\u201d said Sam, \u201cit come to an end sort o', and didn't come to an\nend. It was jest this 'ere way. You see, along in October, jest in the\ncider-makin' time, Abel Flint he was took down with dysentery and died.\nYou 'member the Flint house: it stood on a little rise o' ground\njest lookin' over towards the Brown house. Wal, there was Aunt Sally\nDickerson and the Widder Bije Smith, they set up with the corpse. He was\nlaid out in the back chamber, you see, over the milk-room and kitchen;\nbut there was cold victuals and sich in the front chamber, where the\nwatchers sot. Wal, now, Aunt Sally she told me that between three and\nfour o'clock she heard wheels a rumblin', and she went to the winder,\nand it was clear starlight; and she see a coach come up to the Cap'n\nBrown house; and she see the cap'n come out bringin' a woman all wrapped\nin a cloak, and old Quassy came arter with her arms full o' bundles; and\nhe put her into the kerridge, and shet her in, and it driv off; and she\nsee old Quassy stand lookin' over the fence arter it. She tried to wake\nup the widder, but 'twas towards mornin', and the widder allers was a\nhard sleeper; so there wa'n't no witness but her.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, then, it wasn't a ghost,\u201d said I, \u201cafter all, and it _was_ a\nwoman.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, there 'tis, you see. Folks don't know that 'are yit, 'cause there\nit's jest as broad as 'tis long. Now, look at it. There's Cinthy, she's\na good, pious gal: she locks her chamber-doors, both on 'em, and goes\nto bed, and wakes up in the night, and there's a woman there. She jest\nshets her eyes, and the woman's gone. She gits up and looks, and both\ndoors is locked jest as she left 'em. That 'ere woman wa'n't flesh and\nblood now, no way,--not such flesh and blood as we knows on; but then\nthey say Cinthy might hev dreamed it!\n\n\u201cWal, now, look at it t'other way. There's Aunt Sally Dickerson; she's\na good woman and a church-member: wal, she sees a woman in a cloak\nwith all her bundles brought out o' Cap'n Brown's house, and put into\na kerridge, and driv off, atween three and four o'clock in the mornin'.\nWal, that 'ere shows there must 'a' ben a real live woman kep' there\nprivately, and so what Cinthy saw wasn't a ghost.\n\n\u201cWal, now, Cinthy says Aunt Sally might 'a' dreamed it,--that she got\nher head so full o' stories about the Cap'n Brown house, and watched\nit till she got asleep, and hed this 'ere dream; and, as there didn't\nnobody else see it, it might 'a' ben, you know. Aunt Sally's clear she\ndidn't dream, and then agin Cinthy's clear _she_ didn't dream; but which\non 'em was awake, or which on 'em was asleep, is what ain't settled in\nOldtown yet.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nCOLONEL EPH'S SHOE-BUCKLES.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9188]\n\nES, this 'ere's Tekawampait's grave,\u201d said Sam Lawson, sitting leisurely\ndown on an ancient grass-grown mound, ornamented by a mossy black\nslate-stone slab, with a rudely-carved cherub head and wings on top.\n\n\u201cAnd who was Tekawampait?\u201d\n\n\u201cI wanter know, now, if your granny hain't told you who Tekawampait\nwas?\u201d said Sam, pushing back his torn straw hat, and leaning against the\nold slanting gravestone.\n\n\u201cNo, she never told us.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, Tekawampait he was the fust Christian Indian minister o'\nthe gospel there was in Old-town. He was a full-blooded Indian, but he\nwas as good a Christian as there was goin'; and he was settled here over\nthe church in Oldtown afore Parson Peabody; and Parson Peabody he come\nafore Parson Lothrop; and a very good minister Teka-wampait was too.\nFolks hes said that there couldn't nothin' be made o' Indians; that they\nwas nothin' but sort o' bears and tigers a walkin' round on their hind\nlegs, a seekin' whom they might devour; but Parson Eliot he didn't think\nso. 'Christ died for them as wal as for me,' says he; 'and jest give\n'em the gospel,' says he, 'and the rest 'll come along o' itself.' And so\nhe come here to Oldtown, and sot up a sort o' log-hut right on the spot\nwhere the old Cap'n Brown house is now. Them two great elm-trees that's\na grown now each side o' the front gate was two little switches then,\nthat two Indians brought up over their shoulders, and planted there for\nfriendship trees, as they called 'em; and now look what trees they\nbe! He used to stand under that 'are big oak there, and preach to the\nIndians, long before there was any meetin'-house to speak in here in\nOldtown.\n\n\u201cWal, now, I tell you, it took putty good courage in Parson Eliot to do\nthat 'are. I tell you, in them days it took putty consid'able faith to\nsee any thing in an Indian but jest a wild beast. Folks can't tell\nby seein' on 'em now days what they was in the old times when all the\nsettlements was new, and the Indians was stark, starin' wild, a ravin'\nand tarin' round in the woods, and a fightin' each other and a fightin'\nthe white folks. Lordy massy! the stories I've heard women tell in their\nchimbley-corners about the things that used to happen when they was\nlittle was enough to scare the very life out o' ye.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, do, do tell us some of them!\u201d said Henry and I.\n\n\u201cLordy massy, boys: why, ye wouldn't sleep for a week. Why, ye don't\nknow. Why, the Indians in them days wa'n't like no critter ye ever did\nsee. They was jest the horridest, paintedest, screeehinest, cussedest\ncritters you ever heard on. They was jest as artful as sarpents, and\ncrueller than any tigers. Good Dr. Cotton Mather calls 'em divils, and\nhe was a meek, good man, Dr. Cotton was; but they cut up so in his days,\nit's no wonder he thought they was divils, and not folks. Why, they kep'\nthe whole country in a broil for years and years. Nobody knowed when\nthey was safe; for they were so sly and cunnin', and always watchin'\nbehind fences and bushes, and ready when a body was a least thinkin'\non't to be down on 'em. I've heard Abiel Jones tell how his father's\nhouse was burnt down at the time the Indians burnt Deerfield. About\nevery house in the settlement was burnt to the ground; and then another\ntime they burnt thirty-two houses in Springfield,--the minister's house\nand all, with all his library (and books was sca'ce in them days);\nbut the Indians made a clean sweep on't. They burnt all the houses in\nWendham down to the ground; and they came down in Lancaster, and burnt\never so many houses, and carried off forty or fifty people with 'em into\nthe woods.\n\n\u201cThere was Mr. Rolandson, the minister, they burnt his house, and\ncarried off Mis' Rolandson and all the children. There was Jerushy\nPierce used to work in his family and do washin' and chores, she's told\nme about it. Jerushy she was away to her uncle's that night, so she\nwa'n't took. Ye see, the Lancaster folks had been afeard the Indians'd\nbe down on 'em, and so Parson Rolandson he'd gone on to Boston to get\nhelp for 'em; and when he come back the mischief was all done. Jerushy\nsaid in all her life she never see nothin' so pitiful as that 'are poor\nman's face when she met him, jest as he come to the place where the\nhouse stood. At fust he didn't say a word, she said, but he looked kind\no' dazed. Then he sort o' put his hand to his forehead, and says he,\n'My God, my God, help me!' Then he tried to ask her about it, but he\ncouldn't but jest speak. 'Jerushy,' says he, 'can't you tell me,--where\nbe they?' 'Wal,' says Jerushy, 'they've been carried off.' And with\nthat he fell right down and moaned and groaned. 'Oh!' says he, I'd rather\nheard that they were at peace with the Lord.' And then he'd wring his\nhands: 'What shall I do? What shall I do?'\n\n\u201cWal, 'twa'n't long after this that the Indians was down on Medford, and\nburnt half the houses in town, and killed fifty or sixty people there.\nThen they came down on Northampton, but got driv' back; but then they\nburnt up five houses, and killed four or five of the folks afore they\ngot the better of 'em there. Then they burnt all the houses in Groton,\nmeetin'-house and all; and the pisen critters they hollared and\ntriumphed over the people, and called out to 'em, 'What will you do for\na house to pray in now? we've burnt your meetin'-house.' The fightin'\nwas goin' on all over the country at the same time. The Indians set\nMarlborough afire, and it was all blazin' at once, the same day that\nsome others of 'em was down on Springfield, and the same day Cap'n\nPierce, with forty-nine white men and twenty-six Christian Indians, got\ndrawn into an ambush, and every one of 'em killed. Then a few days after\nthis they burnt forty houses at Rehoboth, and a little while after they\nburnt thirty more at Providence. And then when good Cap'n Wadsworth went\nwith seventy men to help the people in Sudbury, the Indians came pourin'\nround 'em in the woods like so many wolves, and killed all but four or\nfive on 'em; and those poor fellows had better hev been killed, for the\ncruel critters jest tormented 'em to death, and mocked and jeered at\ntheir screeches and screams like so many divils. Then they went and\nbroke loose on Andover; and they was so cruel they couldn't even let the\ndumb critters alone. They cut out the tongues of oxen and cows, and left\n'em bleedin', and some they fastened up in barns and burnt alive. There\nwa'n't no sort o' diviltry they wa'n't up to. Why, it got to be so in\nthem days that folks couldn't go to bed in peace without startin' every\ntime they turned over for fear o' the Indians. Ef they heard a noise in\nthe night, or ef the wind squealed and howled, as the wind will, they'd\nthink sure enough there was that horrid yell a comin' down chimbley.\n\n\u201cThere was Delily Severence; she says to me, speakin' about them times,\nsays she, 'Why, Mr. Lawson, you've no idee! Why, that 'are screech,'\nsays she, 'wa'n't like no other noise in heaven above, or earth beneath,\nor water under the earth,' says she. 'When it started ye out o' bed\nbetween two or three o'clock in the mornin', and all your children\na cryin', and the Indians a screechin' and yellin' and a tossin' up\nfirebrands, fust at one window and then at another, why,' says she, 'Mr.\nLawson, it was more like hell upon earth than any thing I ever heard\non.'\n\n\u201cYe see, they come down on Delily's house when she was but jest up arter\nher third baby. That 'are woman hed a handsome head o' hair as ever\nye see, black as a crow's wing; and it turned jest as white as a\ntable-cloth, with nothin' but the fright o' that night.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat did they do with her?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! they took her and her poor little gal and boy, that wa'n't no older\nthan you be, and went off with 'em to Canada. The troubles them poor\ncritters went through! Her husband he was away that night; and well he\nwas, else they'd a tied him to a tree and stuck pine slivers into him\nand sot 'em afire, and cut gret pieces out'o his flesh, and filled the\nplaces with hot coals and ashes, and all sich kind o' things they did to\nthem men prisoners, when they catched 'em. Delily was thankful enough\nhe was away; but they took her and the children off through the ice\nand snow, jest half clothed and shiverin'; and when her baby cried\nand worried, as it nat'rally would, the old Indian jest took it by its\nheels, and dashed its brains out agin a tree, and threw it into the\ncrotch of a tree, and left it dangling there; and then they would mock\nand laugh at her, and mimic her baby's crying, and try every way they\ncould to aggravate her. They used to beat and torment her children right\nbefore her eyes, and pull their hair out, and make believe that they\nwas goin' to burn 'em alive, jest for nothin' but to frighten and worry\nher.\u201d\n\n\u201cI wonder,\u201d said I, \u201cshe ever got back alive.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, the wimmen in them times hed a sight o' wear in 'em. They was\nresolute, strong, hard-workin' wimmen. They could all tackle a hoss,\nor load and fire a gun. They was brought up hard, and they was used to\ntroubles and dangers. It's jest as folks gets used to things how they\ntakes 'em. In them days folks was brought up to spect trouble; they\ndidn't look for no less. Why, in them days the men allers took their\nguns into the field when they went to hoe corn, and took their guns with\n'em to meetin' Sundays; and the wimmen they kep' a gun loaded where\nthey knew where to find it; and when trouble come it was jest what they\nspected, and they was put even with it. That's the sort o' wimmen they\nwas. Wal, Delily and her children was brought safe through at last, but\nthey hed a hard time on't.\u201d\n\n\u201cTell us some more stories about Indians, Sam,\u201d we said, with the usual\nhungry impatience of boys for a story.\n\n\u201cWal, let me see,\u201d said Sam, with his hat pushed back and his eyes fixed\ndreamily on the top of Eliot's oak, which was now yellow with the sunset\nglory,--\u201clet me see. I hain't never told ye about Col. Eph Miller, hev\nI?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, indeed. What about him?\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, he was took prisoner by the Indians; and they was goin' to roast\nhim alive arter their fashion, and he gin 'em the slip.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo tell us all about it.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, you see, Deliverance Scranton over to Sherburne, she's Col. Eph's\ndaughter; and she used to hear her father tell about that, and she's\ntold me time and agin about it. It was this way,--You see, there hedn't\nben no alarm about Indians for some time, and folks hed got to feelin'\nkind o' easy, as folks will. When there don't nothin' happen for a good\nwhile, and it keeps a goin' on so, why, you think finally there won't\nnothin' happen; and so it was with Col. Eph and his wife. She told\nDeliverance that the day before she reely hed forgot all about that\nthere was any Indians in the country; and she'd been out after spruce\nand wintergreen and hemlock, and got over her brass kettle to bile for\nbeer; and the child'n they brought in lots o' wild grapes that they\ngathered out in the woods; and they said when they came home that they\nthought they see an Indian a lyin' all along squirmin' through the\nbushes, and peekin' out at 'em like a snake, but they wa'n't quite sure.\nFaith, the oldest gal, she was sure she see him quite plain; but 'Bijah\n(he was Col. Eph's oldest boy) he wa'n't so sure.\n\n\u201cAnyway, they didn't think no more about it, and that night they hed\nprayers and went off to bed.\n\n\u201cArterwards, Col. Eph he said he remembered the passage o' Scriptur' he\nread that night; it was, 'The race is not to the swift nor the battle\nto the strong.' He didn't notice it much when he read it; but he allers\nspoke of it arterwards as a remarkable providence that that 'are passage\nshould have come jest so that night.\n\n\u201cWal, atween twelve and one o'clock they was waked up by the most awful\nscreechin' that ever you heard, as if twenty thousand devils was\nupon 'em. Mis' Miller she was out o' bed in a minit, all standin'. 'O\nhusband, husband, the Indians are on us!' says she; and sure enough\nthey was. The children, 'Bijah and Faith come a runnin' in. 'O father,\nfather! what shall we do?'\n\n\u201cCol. Eph was a man that allers knew in a minit what to do, and he kep'\nquite cool. 'My dear,' says he to his wife, 'you take the children, and\njest run with 'em right out the buttery-door through the high corn, and\nrun as fast as you can over to your father Stebbins', and tell him to\nrouse the town; and Bije,' says he to the boy, 'you jest get into the\nbelfry window, and ring the bell with all your might,' says he. 'And\nI 'll stay and fight 'em off till the folks come.'\n\n\u201cAll this while the Indians was a yellin' and screechin' and a wavin'\nfire-brands front of the house. Col. Eph he stood a lookin' through a\nhole in the shutter and a sightin' his gun while he was a talkin'. He\nsee that they'd been a pilin' up a great pile o' dry wood agin the door.\nBut the fust Indian that came up to put fire to't was shot right down\nwhile he was a speakin'.\n\n\u201cWal, Mis' Miller and Faith and Bije wa'n't long a dressin', you may\nbelieve; and they jest put on dark cloaks, and they jest streaked it\nout through the buttery-door! There was thick pole-beans quite up to the\nbuttery-door, and then a field o' high corn, so that they was hid, and\nthe way they run wasn't slow, I tell you.\n\n\u201cBut Col. Eph he hed to stop so to load that they got the pile o' brush\nafire, though he shot down three or four on 'em, and that was some\ncomfort. But the long and the short o' the matter was, that they driv\nthe door in at last, and came a whoopin' and yellin' into the house.\n\n\u201cWal, they took Col. Eph, and then went search-in' round to find\nsomebody else; but jest then the meetin'-house bell begun to ring, and\nthat scart 'em, and they took Col. Eph and made off with him. He hedn't\nbut jest time to get into his clothes and get his shoes on, when they\nhurried him off. They didn't do nothin' to him jest then, you see, these\nIndians was so cur'ous. If a man made a good fight, and killed three or\nfour on 'em afore they could take him, they sot great store by him, and\ncalled him a brave man. And so they was 'mazin' careful of Col. Eph, and\ntreated him quite polite for Indians; but he knew the ways on 'em well\nenough to know what it was all for. They wanted a real brave man to\nburn alive and stick slivers into and torment, and Col. Eph was jest the\npattern for 'em, and his fight-in' so brave made him all the better for\nwhat they wanted.\n\n\u201cWal, he was in hopes the town would be roused in time for some of 'em\nto come arter him; but the Indians got the start of 'em, and got 'way\noff in the woods afore people hed fairly come together and found out\nwhat the matter was. There was Col. Eph's house a blazin' and a lightin'\nup all the country for miles round; and the colonel he said it come\nruther hard on him to be lighted on his way through the woods by such a\nbonfire.\n\n\u201cWal, by mornin' they come to one o' their camps, and there they hed\na great rejoicin' over him. They was going to hev a great feast, and\na good time a burnin' on him; and they tied him to a tree, and sot an\nIndian to watch him while they went out to cut pine knots and slivers to\ndo him with.\n\n\u201cWal, as I said, Col. Eph was a brave man, and a man that always kep'\nhis thoughts about him; and so he kep' a workin' and a workin' with the\nwiths that was round his hands, and a prayin' in his heart to the Lord,\ntill he got his right hand free. Wal, he didn't make no move, but kep'\na loosenin' and a loosenin' little by little, keepin' his eye on the\nIndian who sot there on the ground by him.\n\n\u201cNow, Col. Eph hed slipped his feet into his Sunday shoes that stood\nthere by the bed and hed great silver shoe-buckles; and there was a\nprovidence in his doin' so, for, ye see, Indians are 'mazin' fond o'\nshiny things.\n\n[Illustration: 0203]\n\n\u201cAnd the old Indian he was took with the shine o' these shoe-buckles, and\nhe thought he might as well hev 'em as anybody; so he jest laid down his\ntommyhawk, and got down on his knees, and was workin' away as earnest\nas could be to get off the buckles, and Col. Eph he jest made a dart\nforward and picked up the tommyhawk, and split open the Indian's skull\nwith one blow: then he cut the withs that was round his legs, and in a\nminute he was off on the run with the tommyhawk in his hand. There was\nthree Indians give chase to him, but Col. Eph he kep' ahead of 'em. He\nsaid while he was a runnin' he was cryin,' and callin' on the Lord with\nall his might, and the words come into his mind he read at prayers\nthe night afore, 'The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the\nstrong.'\n\n\u201cAt last he see the Indians gained on him; and he faced round suddenly,\nand struck the nighest one smack on the head with his tommyhawk. Then\nwhen the next one come up he cut him down too; and the third one, when\nhe see both the others cut down, and Col. Eph comin' full blaze towards\nhim with his tommyhawk a swingin', he jest turned and run for dear life.\nThen Col. Eph he turned and cut for the settlement. He run, and he run,\nand he run, he didn't well know how long, till, finally, he was clear\ntuckered out, and he jest dropped down under a tree and slept; and he\nlay there all the rest of that day, and all night, and never woke till\nthe next day about sundown.\n\n\u201cThen he woke up, and found he was close by home, and John Stebbins, his\nwife's father, and a whole party, was out lookin' for him.\n\n\u201cOld Col. Eph used to tell the story as long as he lived, and the tears\nused to run down his cheeks when he told it.\n\n\u201c'There's a providence in every thing,' he used to say, 'even down to\nshoe-buckles. Ef my Sunday shoes hadn't happened to 'a' set there so\nI could 'a' slipped into 'em, I couldn't 'a' killed that Indian, and I\nshouldn't 'a' been here to-day.' Wal, boys, he was in the right on't.\nSome seem to think the Lord don't look out only for gret things, but, ye\nsee, little things is kind o' hinges that gret ones turns on. They say,\ntake care o' pennies, and dollars 'll take care o' themselves. It's jest\nso in every thing; and, ef the Lord don't look arter little things, he\nain't so gret as they say, anyway.\n\n\u201cWal, wal,\u201d said Sam in conclusion, \u201cnow, who'd 'a' thought that anybody\ncould 'a' made any thing out o' Indians? Yet there 'twas. All them\nMartha Vineyard Indians turned Christians, and there was Indian\npreachers and Indian teachers; and they reely did settle down, and get\nto be quite like folks. But I tell you, boys, it took faith to start\nwith.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nTHE BULL-FIGHT.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9207]\n\nT was Saturday afternoon,--time of blessed memory to boys,--and we were\nfree for a ramble after huckleberries; and, with our pails in hand, were\nmaking the best of our way to a noted spot where that fruit was most\nabundant.\n\nSam was with us, his long legs striding over the ground at a rate that\nkept us on a brisk trot, though he himself was only lounging leisurely,\nwith his usual air of contemplation.\n\n\u201cLook 'ere, boys,\u201d he suddenly said, pausing and resting his elbow on\nthe top of a rail-fence, \u201cwe shall jest hev to go back and go round by\nDeakin Blodgett's barn.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy so?\u201d we both burst forth in eager tones.\n\n\u201cWal, don't ye see the deakin's turned in his bull into this 'ere lot?\u201d\n\n\u201cWho cares?\u201d said I. \u201cI ain't afraid.\u201d\n\n\u201cNor I,\u201d said Harry. \u201cLook at him: he looks mild enough: he won't hurt\nus.\u201d\n\n\u201cNot as you knows on,\u201d said Sam; \u201cand then, agin, you don't\nknow,--nobody never knows, what one o' them 'ere critters will do:\nthey's jest the most contrary critters; and ef you think they're goin'\nto do one way they're sure to do t'other. I could tell ye a story now\nthat'd jest make yer har stan' on eend.\u201d Of course we wanted to have our\nhair stand on end, and beset Sam for the story; but he hung off.\n\n\u201cLordy massy! boys, jest let's wait till ye've got yer huckleberries:\nyer granny won't like it ef ye don't bring her none, and Hepsy she 'll\nbe in my har,--what's left on't,\u201d said Sam, taking off his old torn hat,\nand rubbing the loose shock of brash and grizzled hair.\n\nSo we turned and made a _detour_, leaving the bull on the right, though\nwe longed amazingly to have a bout with him, for the fun of the thing,\nand mentally resolved to try it when our mentor was not round.\n\nIt all comes back to me again,--the image of that huckleberry-pasture,\ninterwoven with fragrance of sweet-fern, and the ground under our feet\nembroidered with star-moss and wintergreen, or foamy patches of mossy\nfrost-work, that crushed and crackled delightfully beneath our feet.\nEvery now and then a tall, straight fire-lily--black, spotted in its\ncentre--rose like a little jet of flame; and we gathered it\neagerly, though the fierce August sun wilted it in our hands. The\nhuckleberry-bushes, bending under their purple weight, we gathered in\nlarge armfuls, and took them under the shadow of the pine-trees, that we\nmight strip them at our leisure, without being scorched by the intense\nglare of the sun. Armful after armful we carried and deposited in the\nshade, and then sat down to the task of picking them off into our pails.\nIt was one of those New-England days hotter than the tropics, Not a\nbreath of air was stirring, not a bird sang a note, not a sound was\nheard, except the drowsy grating of the locusts.\n\n\u201cWell, now, Sam, now tell us that story about the bull.\u201d\n\n\u201cLordy massy, how hot 'tis!\u201d said Sam, lying back, and resting on the\nroots of a tree, with his hands folded under his head. \u201cI'm all in a\ndrip of sweat.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, Sam, we 'll pick off your berries, if you 'll talk.\u201d\n\n\u201cWall, wall, be kerful yer don't git no green ones in among 'em, else\nHepsy 'll be down on me. She's drefful partikelar, she is. Every thing\nhas to be jest so. Ef it ain't, you 'll hear on't. Lordy massy I boys,\nshe's always telling me I don't do nothin' for the support of the\nfamily. I leave it to you if I didn't ketch her a nice mess o' fish a\nTuesday. I tell her folks can't expect to roll in money, and allers to\nhave every thing jess 'z they want it. We brought nothin' into the world\nwith us, and it's sartain we ken carry nothin' out; and, having food\nand raiment, we ought to be content. We have ben better off'n we be now.\nWhy, boys, I've seen the time that I've spent thirty-seven cents a week\nfor nutmegs; but Hepsy hain't no gratitude: such folks hez to be brought\ndown. Take care, now, yer ain't a-putting green ones in; be yer?\u201d\n\n\u201cSam, we sha'n't put in any at all, if you don't tell us that story.\u201d\n\n\u201cLordy massy! you young ones, there ain't never no contentin' yer, ef a\nfellow was to talk to the millennium. Wonder now if there is going to\nbe any millennium. Wish I'd waited, and been born in them days, 'spect\nthings would a sorter come along easier. Wall, I shall git through some\nway, I s'pose.\u201d\n\n\u201cSam,\u201d said I, sitting back, \u201cwe're putting all our berries into your\npail; and, if you don't begin to tell us a story, we won't do it.\u201d\n\n\u201cLordy massy! boys, I'm kind o' collectin' my idees. Ye have to talk\na while to git a-goin', everybody does. Wal, about this 'ere story. Ye\n'member that old brown house, up on the hill there, that we saw when we\ncome round the corner? That 'are was where old Mump Moss used to live.\nOld Mump was consid'able of a nice man: he took in Ike Sanders, Mis'\nMoss's sister's boy, to help him on the farm, and did by him pretty much\nez, he did by his own. Bill Moss, Mump's boy, he was a con-trairy kind\no' critter, and he was allers a-hectorin' Ike. He was allers puttin'\noff the heaviest end of every thing on to him. He'd shirk his work, and\ngit it off on to Ike every way he could. And he allers threw it up at\nhim that he was eatin' his father's bread; and he watched every mouthful\nhe ate, as if he hated to see it go down. Wal, ye see, for all that.\nIke he growed up tall and strong, and a real handsome young feller; and\neverybody liked him. And Bill he was so gritty and contrairy, that his\nown mother and sisters couldn't stan' him; and he was allers a-flingin'\nit up at 'em that they liked Ike more'n they did him. Finally his mother\nshe said to him one day, 'Why shouldn't I,' sez she, 'when Ike's allers\npleasant to me, and doin' every thing he ken fur me, and you don't do\nnothin' but scold.' That 'are, you see, was a kind o' home-thrust, and\nBill he didn't like Ike a bit the better for that. He did every thing he\ncould to plague him, and hector him, and sarcumvent him, and set people\nagin him.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, 'twas the old story about Jacob and Laban over agin. Every\nthing that Ike put his hand to kind o' prospered. Everybody liked him,\neverybody hed a good word for him, everybody helped grease his wheels.\nWal, come time when he was twenty-one, old Mump he gin him a settin'\nout. He gin him a freedom suit o' clothes, and he gin him a good cow,\nand Mis' Moss she knit him up a lot o' stockings, and the gals they made\nhim up his shirts. Then, Ike he got a place with Squire Wells, and got\ngood wages; and he bought a little bit o' land, with a house on it, on\nSquire Wells's place, and took a mortgage on't, to work off. He used\nto work his own land, late at night and early in the mornin', over and\nabove givin' good days' works to the squire; and the old squire he sot\nall the world by him, and said he hedn't hed sich a man to work since he\ndidn't know when.\n\n\u201cWal, a body might ha' thought that when Bill had a got him out o' the\nhouse, he might ha' ben satisfied, but he wasn't. He was an ugly fellow,\nBill Moss was; and a body would ha' thought that every thing good that\nhappened to Ike was jest so much took from him. Come to be young men,\ngrowed up together, and waitin' on the gals round, Ike he was pretty apt\nto cut Bill out. Yer see, though Bill was goin' to have the farm, and\nall old Mump's money, he warn't pleasant-spoken; and so, when the gals\ngot a chance, they'd allers rather go with Ike than him. Finally, there\nwas Delily Sawin, she was about the handsomest girl there was round,\nand she hed all the fellers arter her; and her way was to speak 'em all\nfair, and keep 'em all sort o' waitin' and hopin', till she got ready\nto make her mind up. She'd entertain Bill Saturday night, and she'd tell\nIke he might come Sunday night; and so Ike he was well pleased, and Bill\nhe growled.\n\n\u201cWal, there come along a gret cattle-show. Squire Wells he got it up: it\nwas to be the gretest kind of a time, and Squire Wells he give money fur\nprizes. There was to be a prize on the best cow, and the best bull, and\nthe best ox, and the best horse, and the biggest punkins and squashes\nand beets, and there was a prize for the best loaf o' bread, and the\nbest pair o' stockin's, and the handsomest bed-quilt, and the rest\no' women's work. Wal, yer see, there was a gret to-do about the\ncattle-show; and the wagons they came in from all around,--ten miles;\nand the gals all dressed up in their best bunnits, and they had a ball\nin the evenin'. Wal, ye see, it so happened that Bill and Ike each on\n'em sent a bull to the cattle-show; and Ike's bull took the prize. That\nput the cap-sheaf on for Bill. He was jest about as much riled as a\nfeller could be; and that evenin' Delily she danced with Ike twice as\nmany times ez she did with him. Wal, Bill he got it round among the\nfellers that the jedges hed been partial; and he said, if them bulls was\nput together, his bull would whip Ike's all to thunder. Wal, the fellers\nthought 'twould be kind o' fun to try 'em, and they put Ike up to it.\nAnd finally 'twas agreed that Ike's bull should be driv over to old\nMump's; and the Monday after the cattle-show, they should let 'em out\ninto the meadow together and see which was the strongest. So there was\na Sunday the bulls they were both put up together in the same barn; and\nthe 'greement was, they wasn't to be looked at nor touched till the time\ncome to turn 'em out.\n\n\u201cCome Sunday mornin', they got up the wagon to go to meetin'; and Mis'\nMoss and the gals and old Mump, they was all ready; and the old yaller\ndog he was standrn' waitin' by the wagon, and Bill warn't nowhere to be\nfound. So they sent one o' the girls up chamber to see what'd got\nhim; and there he was a-lyin' on the bed, and said he'd got a drefful\nheadache, and didn't think he could go to meetin'. Wal, the second\nbell was a-tollin', and they had to drive off without him: they never\nmistrusted but what 'twas jest so. Wal, yer see, boys, 'twas that 'are\nkind o' Sunday headache that sort o' gets better when the folks is all\nfairly into meetin'. So, when the wagon was fairly out o' sight, Bill he\nthought he'd jest go and have a peek at them bulls. Wal, he looked\nand he peeked, and finally he thought they looked so sort o' innocent\n'twouldn't do no harm to jest let 'em have a little run in the cow-yard\naforehand. He kind o' wanted to see how they was likely to cut up. Now,\nye see, the mischief about bulls is, that a body never knows what they's\ngoin' to do, 'cause whatever notion takes 'em allers comes into their\nheads so kind o' suddin, and it's jest a word and a blow with 'em. Wal,\nfust he let out his bull, and then he went in and let out Ike's. Wal,\nthe very fust thing that critter did he run up to Bill's bull, full\ntilt, and jest gin one rip with his horns right in the side of him, and\nknocked him over and killed him. Didn't die right off, but he was done\nfor; and Bill he gin a the old feller turned right round, and come at\n_him_. I tell you, Bill he turned and made a straight coattail, rippin'\nand peelin' it towards the house, and the bull tearin' on right arter\nhim. Into the kitchen he went, and he hedn't no time to shut the door,\nand the bull arter him; and into the keepin'-room, and the bull arter\nhim there. And he hedn't but jest time to git up the chamber-stairs,\nwhen he heard the old feller roarin' and tearin' round there like all\nnatur. Fust he went to the lookin'-glass, and smashed that all to\npieces. Then he histed the table over, and he rattled and smashed the\nchairs round, and made such a roaring and noise, ye'd ha' thought there\nwas seven devils there; and in the midst of it Bill he looked out of the\nwindow, and see the wagon a-comin' back; and 'Lordy massy!' he thought\nto himself, 'the bull 'll kill every one on 'em,' and he run to the\nwindow and yelled and shouted, and they saw him, and thought the house\nmust be afire.\n\n[Illustration: 0217]\n\n\u201cFinally, he bethought him of old Mump's gun, and he run round and got\nit, and poked it through a crack of the chamber-door, and fired off\nbang! and shot him dead, jest as Mis' Moss and the girls was comin' into\nthe kitchen-door.\n\n\u201cWal, there was, to be sure, the 'bomination o' desolation when they\ncome in and found every thing all up in a heap and broke to pieces, and\nthe old critter a-kickin' and bleedin' all over the carpet, and Bill\nas pale as his shirt-tail on the chamber-stairs. They had an awful mess\non't; and there was the two bulls dead and to be took care uv.\n\n\u201c'Wal, Bill,\u201d said his father, \u201c'I hope yer satisfied now. All that comes\no' stayin' to home from meetin', and keepin' temporal things in yer head\nall day Sunday. You've lost your own bull, you've got Ike's to pay for,\nand ye 'll have the laugh on yer all round the country.'\n\n\u201c'I expect, father, we ken corn the meat,' says Mis' Moss, 'and maybe\nthe hide 'll sell for something,' sez she; for she felt kind o' tender\nfor Bill, and didn't want to bear down too hard on him.\n\n\u201cWal, the story got round, and everybody was a-throwin' it up at Bill;\nand Delily, in partikelar, hectored him about it till he wished the\nbulls had been in the Red Sea afore he'd ever seen one on 'em. Wal, it\nreally driv him out o' town, and he went off out West to settle, and\nnobody missed him much; and Ike he married Delily, and they grew from\nbetter to better, till now they own jest about as pretty a farm as\nthere is round. Yer remember that white house with green blinds, that we\npassed when we was goin' to the trout-brook? Wal, that 'ere's the one.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: 5221]\n\n\n\n\nHOW TO FIGHT THE DEVIL\n\n\n[Illustration: 9222]\n\nOOK here, boys,\u201d said Sam, \u201cdon't you want to go with me up to the\nDevil's Den this arternoon?\u201d\n\n\u201cWhere is the Devil's Den,\u201d said I, with a little awe.\n\n\u201cWal, it's a longer tramp than I've ever took ye. It's clear up past the\npickerel pond, and beyond old Skunk John's pasture-lot. It's a 'mazin'\ngood place for raspberries; shouldn't wonder if we should get two, three\nquarts there. Great rocks there higher'n yer head; kinder solemn, 'tis.\u201d\n\nThis was a delightful and seductive account, and we arranged for a walk\nthat very afternoon.\n\nIn almost every New-England village the personality of Satan has been\nacknowledged by calling by his name some particular rock or cave, or\nother natural object whose singularity would seem to suggest a more than\nmortal occupancy. \u201cThe Devil's Punchbowl,\u201d \u201cThe Devil's Wash-bowl,\u201d \u201cThe\nDevil's Kettle,\u201d \u201cThe Devil's Pulpit,\u201d and \u201cThe Devil's Den,\u201d have been\ndesignations that marked places or objects of some striking natural\npeculiarity. Often these are found in the midst of the most beautiful\nand romantic scenery, and the sinister name seems to have no effect in\nlessening its attractions. To me, the very idea of going to the Devil's\nDen was full of a pleasing horror. When a boy, I always lived in the\nshadowy edge of that line which divides spirit land from mortal life,\nand it was my delight to walk among its half lights and shadows. The old\ngraveyard where, side by side, mouldered the remains of Indian sachems\nand the ancients of English blood, was my favorite haunt. I loved to\nsit on the graves while the evening mists arose from them, and to fancy\ncloudy forms waving and beckoning. To me, this spirit land was my\nonly refuge from the dry details of a hard, prosaic life. The\nschoolroom--with its hard seats rudely fashioned from slabs of\nrough wood, with its clumsy desks, hacked and ink-stained, with its\nunintelligible textbooks and its unsympathetic teacher--was to me\na prison out of whose weary windows I watched the pomp and glory of\nnature,--the free birds singing, the clouds sailing, the trees waving\nand whispering,--and longed, as earnestly as ever did the Psalmist, to\nflee far away, and wander in the wilderness.\n\nHence, no joy of after life--nothing that the world has now to give--can\nequal that joyous sense of freedom and full possession which came over\nme on Saturday afternoons, when I started off on a tramp with the\nworld all before me,--the mighty, unexplored world of mysteries and\npossibilities, bounded only by the horizon. Ignorant alike of all\nscience, neither botanist nor naturalist, I was studying at firsthand\nall that lore out of which science is made. Every plant and flower had a\nfamiliar face to me, and said something to my imagination. I knew where\neach was to be found, its time of coming and going, and met them year\nafter year as returning friends.\n\nSo it was with joyous freedom that we boys ram bled off with Sam this\nafternoon, intent to find the Devil's Den. It was a ledge of granite\nrocks rising in the midst of a grove of pines and white birches. The\nground was yellow and slippery with the fallen needles of the pines of\nother days, and the glistening white stems of the birches shone through\nthe shadows like ivory pillars. Underneath the great granite ledges, all\nsorts of roots and plants grappled and kept foothold; and whole armies\nof wild raspberries matured their fruit, rounder and juicier for growing\nin the shade.\n\nIn one place yawned a great rift, or cavern, as if the rocks had been\nviolently twisted and wrenched apart, and a mighty bowlder lodging in\nthe rift had roofed it over, making a cavern of most seductive darkness\nand depth. This was the Devil's Den; and after we had picked our pail\nfull of berries, we sat down there to rest.\n\n\u201cSam, do you suppose the Devil ever was here?\u201d said I. \u201cWhat do they\ncall this his den for?\u201d\n\n\u201cMassy, child! that 'are was in old witch times. There used to be witch\nmeetins' held here, and awful doins'; they used to have witch sabba'\ndays and witch sacraments, and sell their souls to the old boy.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat should they want to do that for?\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, sure enough; what was it for? I can't make out that the Devil ever\ngin 'em any thing, any on 'em. They warn't no richer, nor didn't get no\nmore'n this world than the rest; and they was took and hung; and then ef\nthey went to torment after that, they hed a pretty bad bargain on't, I\nsay.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, people don't do such things any more, do they?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said Sam. \u201cSince the gret fuss and row-de-dow about it, it's kind\no' died out; but there's those, I s'pose, that hez dealins' with the old\nboy. Folks du say that old Ketury was a witch, and that, ef't ben in old\ntimes, she'd a hed her neck stretched; but she lived and died in peace.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut do you think,\u201d said I, now proposing the question that lay nearest\nmy heart, \u201cthat the Devil can hurt us?\u201d\n\n\u201cThat depends consid'able on how you take him,\u201d said Sam. \u201cYe see, come\nto a straight out-an'-out fight with him, he 'll git the better on yer.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut,\u201d said I, \u201cChristian did fight Apollyon, and got him down too.\u201d\n\nI had no more doubt in those days that this was an historic fact than I\nhad of the existence of Romulus and Remus and the wolf.\n\n\u201cWal, that 'ere warn't jest like real things: they say that 'ere's an\nallegory. But I 'll tell ye how old Sarah Bunganuck fit the Devil,\nwhen he 'peared to her. Ye see, old Sarah she was one of the converted\nInjuns, and a good old critter she was too; worked hard, and got her\nlivin' honest. She made baskets, and she made brooms, and she used to\npick young wintergreen and tie it up in bunches, and dig sassafras\nand ginsing to make beer; and she got her a little bit o' land, right\nalongside o' Old Black Hoss John's white-birch wood-lot.\n\n\u201cNow, I've heerd some o' these 'ere modern ministers that come down from\nCambridge college, and are larnt about every thing in creation, they\nsay there ain't no devil, and the reason on't is, 'cause there can't be\nnone. These 'ere fellers is so sort o' green!--they don't mean no harm,\nbut they don't know nothin' about nobody that does. If they'd ha' known\nold Black Hoss John, they'd ha' been putty sure there was a devil. He\nwas jest the crossest, ugliest critter that ever ye see, and he was ugly\njest for the sake o' ugliness. He couldn't bear to let the boys pick\nhuckleberries in his paster lots, when he didn't pick 'em himself; and\nhe was allers jawin' me 'cause I would go trout-fishin' in one o' his\npasters. Jest ez if the trout that swims warn't, the Lord's, and jest ez\nmuch mine as his. He grudged every critter every thing; and if he'd ha'\nhed his will and way, every bird would ha' fell down dead that picked\nup a worm on his grounds. He was jest as nippin' as a black frost. Old\nBlack Hoss didn't git drunk in a regerlar way, like Uncle Eph and Toddy\nWhitney, and the rest o' them boys. But he jest sot at home, a-soakin'\non cider, till he was crosser'n a bear with a sore head. Old Black Hoss\nhed a special spite agin old Sarah. He said she was an old witch and an\nold thief, and that she stole things off'n his grounds, when everybody\nknew that she was a regerlar church-member, and as decent an old critter\nas there was goin'. As to her stealin', she didn't do nothin' but pick\nhuckleberries and grapes, and git chesnuts and wannuts, and butternuts,\nand them 'ere wild things that's the Lord's, grow on whose land they\nwill, and is free to all. I've hearn 'em tell that, over in the old\ncountry, the poor was kept under so, that they couldn't shoot a bird,\nnor ketch a fish, nor gather no nuts, nor do nothin' to keep from\nstarvin', 'cause the quality folks they thought they owned every\nthing, 'way-down to the middle of the earth and clear up to the stars. We\nnever hed no sech doin's this side of the water, thank the Lord! We've\nallers been free to have the chesnuts and the wannuts and the grapes and\nthe huckleberries and the strawberries, ef we could git 'em, and ketch\nfish when and where we was a mind to. Lordy massy! your grandthur's\nold Cesar, he used to call the pond his pork-pot. He'd jest go down and\nthrow in a line and ketch his dinner. Wal, Old Black Hoss he know'd the\nlaw was so, and he couldn't do nothin' agin her by law; but he sarved\nher out every mean trick he could think of. He used to go and stan'\nand lean over her garden-gate and jaw at her an hour at a time; but old\nSarah she had the Injun in her; she didn't run to talk much: she used\nto jest keep on with her weedin and her work, jest's if he warn't there,\nand that made Old Black Hoss madder'n ever; and he thought he'd try and\nfrighten her off'n the ground, by makin' on her believe he was the Devil.\nSo one time, when he'd been killin' a beef critter, they took off the\nskin with the horns and all on; and Old Black Hoss he says to Toddy and\nEph and Loker, 'You jest come up tonight, and see how I 'll frighten old\nSarah Bunganuck.'\n\n\u201cWal, Toddy and Eph and Loker, they hedn't no better to do, and they\nthought they'd jest go round and see. Ye see 'twas a moonlight\nnight, and old Sarah--she was an industrious critter--she was cuttin'\nwhite-birch brush for brooms in the paster-lot.\n\n\u201cWal, Old Black Hoss he wrapped the critter's skin round him, with the\nhorns on his head, and come and stood by the fence, and begun to roar\nand make a noise.\n\n[Illustration: 0223]\n\n\u201cOld Sarah she kept right on with her work, cuttin' her brush and\npilin' on't up, and jest let him roar. Wal, Old Black Hoss felt putty\nfoolish, 'specially ez the fellers were waitin' to see how she took it.\nSo he calls out in a grum voice,--\n\n\u201c'Woman, don't yer know who I be?\u201d\n\n\u201c'No,' says she quite quiet, 'I don't know who yer be.'\n\n\u201c'Wal, I'm the Devil,' sez he.\n\n\u201c'Ye be?' says old Sarah. 'Poor old critter, how I pity ye!' and she\nnever gin him another word, but jest bundled up her broom-stuff, and\ntook it on her back and walked off, and Old Black Hoss he stood there\nmighty foolish with his skin and horns; and so he had the laugh agin\nhim, 'cause Eph and Loker they went and told the story down to the\ntavern, and he felt awful cheap to think old Sarah had got the upper\nhands on him.\n\n\u201cWal, ye see, boys, that 'ere's jest the way to fight the Devil. Jest\nkeep straight on with what ye're doin', and don't ye mind him, and he\ncan't do nothin' to ye.\u201d\n\n[Illustration: 5233]\n\n\n\n\nLAUGHIN' IN MEETIN'\n\n\n[Illustration: 9234]\n\nE were in disgrace, we boys; and the reason of it was this: we had\nlaughed out in meeting-time! To be sure, the occasion was a trying one,\neven to more disciplined nerves. Parson Lothrop had exchanged pulpits\nwith Parson Summeral, of North Wearem. Now, Parson Summeral was a man\nin the very outset likely to provoke the risibles of unspiritualized\njuveniles. He was a thin, wiry, frisky little man, in a powdered white\nwig, black tights, and silk stockings, with bright knee-buckles and\nshoe-buckles; with round, dark, snapping eyes; and a curious, high,\ncracked, squeaking voice, the very first tones of which made all the\nchildren stare and giggle. The news that Parson Summeral was going to\npreach in our village spread abroad among us as a prelude to something\nfunny. It had a flavor like the charm of circus-acting; and, on the\nSunday morning of our story, we went to the house of God in a very\nhilarious state, all ready to set off in a laugh on the slightest\nprovocation.\n\nThe occasion was not long wanting. Parson Lo-throp had a favorite dog\nyclept Trip, whose behavior in meeting was notoriously far from that\nedifying pattern which befits a minister's dog on Sundays. Trip was\na nervous dog, and a dog that never could be taught to conceal his\nemotions or to respect conventionalities. If any thing about the\nperformance in the singers' seat did not please him, he was apt to\nexpress himself in a lugubrious howl. If the sermon was longer than\nsuited him, he would gape with such a loud creak of his jaws as would\narouse everybody's attention. If the flies disturbed his afternoon's\nnap, he would give sudden snarls or snaps; or, if anything troubled his\ndreams, he would bark out in his sleep in a manner not only to dispel\nhis own slumbers, but those of certain worthy deacons and old ladies,\nwhose sanctuary repose was thereby sorely broken and troubled. For all\nthese reasons, Madame Lo-throp had been forced, as a general thing, to\ndeny Trip the usual sanctuary privileges of good family dogs in that\nage, and shut him up on Sundays to private meditation. Trip, of course,\nwas only the more set on attendance, and would hide behind doors, jump\nout of windows, sneak through by-ways and alleys, and lie hid till the\nsecond bell had done tolling, when suddenly he would appear in the broad\naisle, innocent and happy, and take his seat as composedly as any member\nof the congregation.\n\nImagine us youngsters on the _qui vive_ with excitement at seeing Parson\nSummeral frisk up into the pulpit with all the vivacity of a black\ngrasshopper. We looked at each other, and giggled very cautiously, with\ndue respect to Aunt Lois's sharp observation.\n\nAt first, there was only a mild, quiet simmering of giggle, compressed\ndecorously within the bounds of propriety; and we pursed our muscles up\nwith stringent resolution, whenever we caught the apprehensive eye of\nour elders.\n\nBut when, directly after the closing notes of the tolling second bell,\nMaster Trip walked gravely up the front aisle, and, seating himself\nsquarely in front of the pulpit, raised his nose with a critical air\ntoward the scene of the forthcoming performance, it was too much for us:\nthe repression was almost convulsive. Trip wore an alert, attentive air,\nbefitting a sound, orthodox dog, who smells a possible heresy, and deems\nit his duty to watch the performances narrowly.\n\nEvidently he felt called upon to see who and what were to occupy that\npulpit in his master's absence.\n\nUp rose Parson Summeral; and up went Trip's nose, vibrating with intense\nattention.\n\nThe parson began in his high-cracked voice to intone the hymn,--\n\n                   \u201cSing to the Lord aloud,\u201d\n\nwhen Trip broke into a dismal howl.\n\nThe parson went on to give directions to the deacon, in the same\nvoice in which he had been reading, so that the whole effect of the\nperformance was somewhat as follows:--\n\n                   \u201c'Sing to the Lord aloud.'\n\n\u201c(Please to turn out that dog),--\n\n                   \u201c'And make a joyful noise.,\u201d\n\nThe dog was turned out, and the choir did their best to make a joyful\nnoise; but we boys were upset for the day, delivered over to the\ntemptations of Satan, and plunged in waves and billows of hysterical\ngiggle, from which neither winks nor frowns from Aunt Lois, nor the\nawful fear of the tithing-man, nor the comforting bits of fennel and\norange-peel passed us by grandmother, could recover us.\n\nEverybody felt, to be sure, that here was a trial that called for some\nindulgence. Hard faces, even among the stoniest saints, betrayed a\ntransient quiver of the risible muscles; old ladies put up their fans;\nyouths and maidens in the singers' seat laughed outright; and, for the\nmoment, a general snicker among the children was pardoned. But I was one\nof that luckless kind, whose nerves, once set in vibration, could not be\ncomposed. When the reign of gravity and decorum had returned, Harry and\nI sat by each other, shaking with suppressed laughter. Every thing in\nthe subsequent exercises took a funny turn; and in the long prayer, when\neverybody else was still and decorous, the whole scene came over me with\nsuch overpowering force, that I exploded with laughter, and had to\nbe taken out of meeting and marched home by Aunt Lois, as a convicted\ncriminal. What especially moved her indignation was, that, the more she\nrebuked and upbraided, the more I laughed, till the tears rolled down\nmy cheeks; which Aunt Lois construed into wilful disrespect to her\nauthority, and resented accordingly.\n\nBy Sunday evening, as we gathered around the fire, the re-action from\nundue gayety to sobriety had taken place; and we were in a pensive and\npenitent state. Grandmother was gracious and forgiving; but Aunt Lois\nstill preserved that frosty air of reprobation which she held to be a\nsalutary means of quickening our consciences for the future. It was,\ntherefore, with unusual delight that we saw our old friend Sam come in,\nand sit himself quietly down on the block in the chimney corner. With\nSam we felt assured of indulgence and patronage; for, though always\nrigidly moral and instructive in his turn of mind, he had that\nfellow-feeling for transgressors which is characteristic of the\nloose-jointed, easy-going style of his individuality.\n\n\u201cLordy massy, boys--yis,\u201d said Sam virtuously, in view of some of Aunt\nLois's thrusts, \u201cye ought never to laugh nor cut up in meetin'; that\n'are's so: but then there is times when the best on us gets took down.\nWe gets took unawares, ye see,--even ministers does. Yis, natur' will\ngit the upper hand afore they know it.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, Sam, _ministers_ don't ever laugh in meetin'! do they?\u201d\n\nWe put the question with wide eyes. Such a supposition bordered on\nprofanity, we thought: it was approaching the sin of Uzzah, who unwarily\ntouched the ark of the Lord.\n\n\u201cLaws, yes. Why, heven't you never heard how there was a council held to\ntry Parson Morrel for laughin' out in prayer-time?\u201d\n\n\u201cLaughing in prayer-time!\u201d we both repeated, with uplifted hands and\neyes.\n\nMy grandfather's mild face became luminous with a suppressed smile,\nwhich brightened it as the moon does a cloud; but he said nothing.\n\n\u201cYes, yes,\u201d said my grandmother, \u201cthat affair did make a dreadful\nscandal in the time on't! But Parson Morrel was a good man; and I'm glad\nthe council wasn't hard on him.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal,\u201d said Sam Lawson, \u201cafter all, it was more Ike Babbit's fault than\n'twas anybody's. Ye see, Ike he was allers for gettin' what he could\nout o' the town; and he would feed his sheep on the meetin'-house\ngreen. Somehow or other, Ike's fences allers contrived to give out, come\nSunday, and up would come his sheep; and Ike was too pious to drive 'em\nback Sunday, and so there they was. He was talked to enough about it:\n'cause, ye see, to hev sheep and lambs a ba-a-in' and a blatin'\nall prayer and sermon time wa'n't the thing. 'Member that 'are old\nmeet-in'-house up to the North End, down under Blueberry Hill, the land\nsort o' sloped down, so as a body hed to come into the meetin'-house\nsteppin' down instead o' up.\n\n\u201cFact was, they said 'twas put there 'cause the land wa'n't good for\nnothin' else; and the folks thought puttin' a meetin'-house on't would\nbe a clear savin'. But Parson Morrel he didn't like it, and was free to\ntell 'em his mind on't,--that 'twas like bringin' the lame and the blind\nto the Lord's sarvice; but there 'twas.\n\n\u201cThere wa'n't a better minister, nor no one more set by in all the\nState, than Parson Morrel. His doctrines was right up and down, good and\nsharp; and he give saints and sinners their meat in due season; and for\nconsolin' and comfortin' widders and orphans, Parson Morrel hedn't his\nmatch. The women sot lots by him; and he was allus' ready to take tea\nround, and make things pleasant and comfortable; and he hed a good story\nfor every one, and a word for the children, and maybe an apple or a\ncookey in his pocket for 'em. Wal, you know there an't no pleasin'\neverybody; and ef Gabriel himself, right down out o' heaven, was to come\nand be a minister, I expect there'd be a pickin' at his wings, and sort\no' fault-findin'. Now, Aunt Jerushy Scran and Aunt Polly Hokun they sed\nParson Morrel wa'n't solemn enough. Ye see, there's them that thinks\nthat a minister ought to be jest like the town hearse, so that ye think\nof death, judgment, and eternity, and nothin' else, when ye see him\nround; and ef they see a man rosy and chipper, and hevin' a pretty nice,\nsociable sort of a time, why they say he an't spiritooal minded. But, in\nmy times, I've seen ministers the most awakenin' kind in the pulpit\nthat was the liveliest when they was out on't. There is a time to laugh,\nScriptur' says; tho' some folks never seem to remember that 'are.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, Sam, how came you to say it was Ike Babbit's fault? What was it\nabout the sheep?\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, wal, yis! I'm a comin' to that 'are. It was all about them sheep.\nI expect they was the instrument the Devil sot to work to tempt Parson\nMorrel to laugh in prayer-time.\n\n\u201cYe see, there was old Dick, Ike's bell-wether, was the fightin'est old\ncrittur that ever yer see. Why, Dick would butt at his own shadder;\nand everybody said it was a shame the old crittur should be left to\nrun loose, 'cause he run at the children, and scared the women half out\ntheir wits. Wal, I used to live out in that parish in them days. And\nLem Sudoc and I used to go out sparkin' Sunday nights, to see the Larkin\ngals; and we had to go right 'cross the lot where Dick was: so we used\nto go and stand at the fence, and call. And Dick would see us, and put\ndown his head, and run at us full chisel, and come bunt agin the fence;\nand then I'd ketch him by the horns, and hold him while Lem run and got\nover the fence t'other side the lot; and then I'd let go: and Lem would\nholler, and shake a stick at him, and away he'd go full butt at Lem; and\nLem would ketch his horns, and hold him till I came over,--that was\nthe way we managed Dick; but, I tell you, ef he come sudden up behind\na fellow, he'd give him a butt in the small of his back that would make\nhim run on all fours one while. He was a great rogue,--Dick was. Wal,\nthat summer, I remember they hed old Deacon Titkins for tithing-man; and\nI tell you he give it to the boys lively. There wa'n't no sleepin' nor\nno playin'; for the deacon hed eyes like a gimblet, and he was quick as\na cat, and the youngsters hed to look out for themselves. It did really\nseem as if the deacon was like them four beasts in the Revelations that\nwas full o' eyes behind and before; for which ever way he was standin',\nif you gave only a wink, he was down on you, and hit you a tap with his\nstick. I know once Lem Sudoc jist wrote two words in the psalm-book and\npassed to Kesiah Larkin; and the deacon give him such a tap that Lem\ngrew red as a beet, and vowed he'd be up with him some day for that.\n\n\u201cWell, Lordy Massy, folks that is so chipper and high steppin' has to\nhev their come downs; and the deacon he hed to hev his.\n\n\u201cThat 'are Sunday,--I 'member it now jest as well as if 'twas\nyesterday,--the parson he give us his gre't sermon, reconcilin' decrees\nand free agency: everybody said that 'are sermon was a masterpiece.\nHe preached it up to Cambridge at Commencement, that year. Wal, it so\nhappened it was one o' them bilin' hot days that come in August, when\nyou can fairly hear the huckleberries a sizzlin', and cookin' on the\nbushes, and the locust keeps a gratin' like a red-hot saw. Wal, such\ntimes, decrees or no decrees, the best on us will get sleepy. The old\nmeetin'-house stood right down at the foot of a hill that kep' off all\nthe wind; and the sun blazed away at them gre't west winders: and there\nwas pretty sleepy times there. Wal, the deacon, he flew round a spell,\nand woke up the children, and tapped the boys on the head, and kep'\nevery thing straight as he could, till the sermon was most through, when\nhe railly got most tuckered out; and he took a chair, and he sot down\nin the door right opposite the minister, and fairly got asleep himself,\njest as the minister got up to make the last prayer.\n\n\u201cWal, Parson Morrel hed a way o' prayin' with his eyes open. Folks said\nit wa'n't the best way: but it was Parson Morrel's way, anyhow; and so,\nas he was prayin', he couldn't help seein' that Deacon Tit-kins was a\nnoddin' and a bobbin' out toward the place where old Dick was feedin'\nwith the sheep, front o' the meetin'-house door.\n\n\u201cLem and me we was sittin' where we could look out; and we jest sees old\nDick stop feedin' and look at the deacon. The deacon hed a little round\nhead as smooth as an apple, with a nice powdered wig on it: and he sot\nthere makin' bobs and bows; and Dick begun to think it was suthin sort\no' pussonal. Lem and me was sittin' jest where we could look out and see\nthe hull picter; and Lem was fit to split.\n\n\u201c'Good, now,' says he: 'that crittur 'll pay the deacon off lively,\npretty soon.'\n\n\u201cThe deacon bobbed his head a spell; and old Dick he shook his horns,\nand stamped at him sort o' threat-nin'. Finally the deacon he give a\ngreat bow, and brought his head right down at him; and old Dick he sot\nout full tilt and come down on him ker chunk, and knocked him head over\nheels into the broad aisle: and his wig flew one way and he t'other; and\nDick made a lunge at it, as it flew, and carried it off on his horns.\n\n[Illustration: 0247]\n\n\u201cWal, you may believe, that broke up the meetin' for one while: for\nParson Morrel laughed out; and all the gals and boys they stomped and\nroared. And the old deacon he got up and begun rubbin' his shins, 'cause\nhe didn't see the joke on't.\n\n\u201c'You don't orter laugh,' says he: 'it's no laughin' matter; it's a\nsolemn thing,' says he. 'I might hev been sent into 'tarnity by that\ndarned crittur,' says he. Then they all roared and haw-hawed the more,\nto see the deacon dancin' round with his little shiny head, so smooth a\nfly would trip up on't. 'I believe, my soul, you'd laugh to see me in my\ngrave,' says he.\n\n\u201cWal, the truth on't was, 'twas jist one of them bustin' up times that\nnatur has, when there an't nothin' for it but to give in: 'twas jest\nlike the ice breakin' up in the Charles River,--it all come at once,\nand no whoa to't. Sunday or no Sunday, sin or no sin, the most on 'em\nlaughed till they cried, and couldn't help it.\n\n\u201cBut the deacon, he went home feelin' pretty sore about it. Lem Sudoc,\nhe picked up his wig, and handed it to him. Says he, 'Old Dick was\nplayin' tithin'-man, wa'n't he, deacon? Teach you to make allowance for\nother folks that get sleepy.'\n\n\u201cThen Miss Titkins she went over to Aunt Jerushy Scran's and Aunt Polly\nHokum's; and they hed a pot o' tea over it, and 'greed it was awful of\nParson Morrel to set sich an example, and suthin' hed got to be done\nabout it. Miss Hokum said she allers knew that Parson Morrel hedn't no\nspiritooality; and now it hed broke out into open sin, and led all the\nrest of 'em into it; and Miss Titkins, she said such a man wa'n't fit\nto preach; and Miss Hokum said she couldn't never hear him agin: and the\nnext Sunday the deacon and his wife they hitched up and driv eight miles\nover to Parson Lothrop's and took Aunt Polly on the back seat.\n\n\u201cWal, the thing growed and growed, till it seemed as if there wa'n't\nnothin' else talked about, 'cause Aunt Polly and Miss Titkins and\nJerushy Scran they didn't do nothin' but talk about it; and that sot\neverybody else a-talkin'.\n\n\u201cFinally, it was 'greed they must hev a council to settle the hash. So\nall the wimmen they went to choppin' mince, and makin' up pumpkin\npies and cranberry tarts, andb'ilin' doughnuts,--gettin' ready for the\nministers and delegates; 'cause councils always eats powerful: and they\nhed quite a stir, like a gineral trainin'. The hosses they was hitched\nall up and down the stalls, a-stompin' and switchin' their tails;\nand all the wimmen was a-talkin'; and they hed up everybody round for\nwitnesses. And finally Parson Morrel he says, 'Brethren,' says he, 'jest\nlet me tell you the story jest as it happened; and, if you don't every\none of you laugh as hard as I did, why, then, I 'll give up.'\n\n\u201cThe parson he was a master-hand at settin' off a story; and, afore he'd\ndone, he got 'em all in sich a roar they didn't know where to leave off.\nFinally, they give sentence that there hedn't no temptation took him but\nsuch as is common to man; but they advised him afterwards allers to pray\nwith his eyes shet; and the parson he confessed he orter 'a done it, and\nmeant to do better in future: and so they settled it.\n\n\u201cSo, boys,\u201d said Sam, who always drew a moral, \u201cye see, it larns you,\nyou must take care what ye look at, ef ye want to keep from laughin' in\nmeetin'\u201d.\n\n[Illustration: 5252]\n\n\n\n\nTOM TOOTHACHE'S GHOST STORY.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9253]\n\nHAT is it about that old house in Sherbourne?\u201d said Aunt Nabby to Sam\nLawson, as he sat drooping over the coals of a great fire one October\nevening.\n\nAunt Lois was gone to Boston on a visit; and, the smart spice of\nher scepticism being absent, we felt the more freedom to start our\nstory-teller on one of his legends.\n\nAunt Nabby sat trotting her knitting-needles on a blue-mixed yarn\nstocking. Grandmamma was knitting in unison at the other side of the\nfire. Grandfather sat studying \u201cThe Boston Courier.\u201d The wind outside\nwas sighing in fitful wails, creaking the pantry-doors, occasionally\npuffing in a vicious gust down the broad throat of the chimney. It was\na drizzly, sleety evening; and the wet lilac-bushes now and then rattled\nand splashed against the window as the wind moaned and whispered through\nthem.\n\nWe boys had made preparation for a comfortable evening. We had enticed\nSam to the chimney-corner, and drawn him a mug of cider. We had set down\na row of apples to roast on the hearth, which even now were giving faint\nsighs and sputters as their plump sides burst in the genial heat. The\nbig oak back-log simmered and bubbled, and distilled large drops down\namid the ashes; and the great hickory forestick had just burned out into\nsolid bright coals, faintly skimmed over with white ashes. The whole\narea of the big chimney was full of a sleepy warmth and brightness just\ncalculated to call forth fancies and visions. It only wanted somebody\nnow to set Sam off; and Aunt Nabby broached the ever-interesting subject\nof haunted houses.\n\n\u201cWal, now, Miss Badger,\u201d said Sam, \u201cI ben over there, and walked round\nthat are house consid'able; and I talked with Granny Hokum and Aunt\nPolly, and they've putty much come to the conclusion that they 'll hev to\nmove out on't. Ye see these 'ere noises, they keep 'em awake nights; and\nAunt Polly, she gets 'stericky; and Hannah Jane, she says, ef they stay\nin the house, _she_ can't live with 'em no longer. And what can them\nlone women do without Hannah Jane? Why, Hannah Jane, she says these two\nmonths past she's seen a woman, regular, walking up and down the front\nhall between twelve and one o'clock at night; and it's jist the image\nand body of old Ma'am Tillotson, Parson Hokum's mother, that everybody\nknow'd was a thunderin' kind o' woman, that kep' every thing in a muss\nwhile she was alive. What the old crittur's up to now there ain't no\nknowin'. Some folks seems to think it's a sign Granny Hokum's time's\ncomin'. But Lordy massy! says she to me, says she, 'Why, Sam, I don't\nknow nothin' what I've done, that Ma'am Tillotson should be set loose\non me.' Anyway they've all got so narvy, that Jed Hokum has ben up from\nNeedham, and is goin' to cart 'em all over to live with him. Jed,\nhe's for hushin' on't up, 'cause he says it brings a bad name on the\nproperty.\n\n\u201cWal, I talked with Jed about it; and says I to Jed, says I, 'Now,\nef you 'll take my advice, jist you give that are old house a regular\noverhaulin', and paint it over with tew coats o' paint, and that are 'll\nclear 'em out, if any thing will. Ghosts is like bedbugs,--they can't\nstan' fresh paint,' says I. 'They allers clear out. I've seen it tried\non a ship that got haunted.'\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, Sam, do ships get haunted?\u201d\n\n\u201cTo be sure they do!--haunted the wust kind. Why, I could tell ye a\nstory'd make your har rise on e'end, only I'm 'fraid of frightening boys\nwhen they're jist going to bed.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh! you can't frighten Horace,\u201d said my grandmother. \u201cHe will go and\nsit out there in the graveyard till nine o'clock nights, spite of all I\ntell him.\u201d\n\n\u201cDo tell, Sam!\u201d we urged. \u201cWhat was it about the ship?\u201d\n\nSam lifted his mug of cider, deliberately turned it round and round in\nhis hands, eyed it affectionately, took a long drink, and set it down in\nfront of him on the hearth, and began:--\n\n\u201cYe 'member I telled you how I went to sea down East, when I was a boy,\n'long with Tom Toothacre. Wal, Tom, he reeled off a yarn one night\nthat was 'bout the toughest I ever hed the pullin' on. And it come all\nstraight, too, from Tom. 'Twa'n't none o' yer hearsay: 'twas what he\nseen with his own eyes. Now, there wa'n't no nonsense 'bout Tom, not a\nbit on't; and he wa'n't afeard o' the divil himse'f; and he ginally saw\nthrough things about as straight as things could be seen through.\nThis 'ere happened when Tom was mate o' 'The Albatross,' and they was\na-runnin' up to the Banks for a fare o' fish. 'The Albatross' was as\nhandsome a craft as ever ye see; and Cap'n Sim Witherspoon, he was\nskipper--a rail nice likely man he was. I heard Tom tell this 'ere one\nnight to the boys on 'The Brilliant,' when they was all a-settin'\nround the stove in the cabin one foggy night that we was to anchor in\nFrenchman's Bay, and all kind o' lavin' off loose.\n\n\u201cTom, he said they was having a famous run up to the Banks. There was a\nspankin' southerly, that blew 'em along like all natur'; and they was\nhevin' the best kind of a time, when this 'ere southerly brought a pesky\nfog down on 'em, and it grew thicker than hasty-puddin'. Ye see,\nthat are's the pester o' these 'ere southerlies: they's the biggest\nfog-breeders there is goin'. And so, putty soon, you couldn't see half\nship's length afore you.\n\n\u201cWal, they all was down to supper, except Dan Sawyer at the wheel, when\nthere come sich a crash as if heaven and earth was a-splittin', and then\na scrapin' and thump bumpin' under the ship, and gin 'em sich a h'ist\nthat the pot o' beans went rollin', and brought up jam ag'in the\nbulk-head; and the fellers was keeled over,--men and pork and beans\nkinder permiscus.\n\n\u201c'The divil!' says Tom Toothacre, 'we've run down somebody. Look out, up\nthere!'\n\n\u201cDan, he shoved the helm hard down, and put her up to the wind, and sung\nout, 'Lordy massy! we've struck her right amidships!'\n\n\u201c'Struck what?' they all yelled, and tumbled up on deck.\n\n\u201c'Why, a little schooner,' says Dan. 'Didn't see her till we was right\non her. She's gone down tack and sheet. Look! there's part o' the wreck\na-floating off: don't ye see?'\n\n\u201cWal, they didn't see, 'cause it was so thick you couldn't hardly see\nyour hand afore your face. But they put about, and sent out a boat, and\nkind o' sarched round; but, Lordy massy! ye might as well looked for a\ndrop of water in the Atlantic Ocean. Whoever they was, it was all done\ngone and over with 'em for this life, poor critturs!\n\n\u201cTom says they felt confoundedly about it; but what could they do? Lordy\nmassy! what can any on us do? There's places where folks jest lets go\n'cause they hes to. Things ain't as they want 'em, and they can't alter\n'em. Sailors ain't so rough as they look: they'z feelin' critturs, come\nto put things right to 'em. And there wasn't one on 'em who wouldn't 'a'\nworked all night for a chance o' saving some o' them poor fellows. But\nthere 'twas, and 'twa'n't no use trying.\n\n\u201cWal, so they sailed on; and by'm by the wind kind o' chopped round\nno'theast, and then come round east, and sot in for one of them regular\neast blows and drizzles that takes the starch out o' fellers more'n a\nregular storm. So they concluded they might as well put into a little\nbay there, and come to anchor.\n\n\u201cSo they sot an anchor-watch, and all turned in.\n\n\u201cWal, now comes the particular curus part o' Tom's story: and it more\ncurus 'cause Tom was one that wouldn't 'a' believed no other man that\nhad told it. Tom was one o' your sort of philosophers. He was fer\nlookin' into things, and wa'n't in no hurry 'bout believin'; so that\nthis 'un was more 'markablfe on account of it's bein' Tom that seen it\nthan ef it had ben others.\n\n\u201cTom says that night he hed a pesky toothache that sort o' kep'\ngrumblin' and jumpin' so he couldn't go to sleep; and he lay in his\nbunk, a-turnin' this way and that, till long past twelve o clock.\n\n\u201cTom had a'thwart-ship bunk where he could see into every bunk on board,\nexcept Bob Coffin's; and Bob was on the anchor-watch. Wal, he lay there,\ntryin' to go to sleep, hearin' the men snorin' like bull-frogs in a\nswamp, and watchin' the lantern a-swingin' back and forward; and the\nsou'westers and pea-jackets were kinder throwin' their long shadders\nup and down as the vessel sort o' rolled and pitched,--for there was a\nheavy swell on,--and then he'd hear Bob Coffin tramp, tramp, trampin'\noverhead,--for Bob had a pretty heavy foot of his own,--and all sort\no' mixed up together with Tom's toothache, so he couldn't get to sleep.\nFinally, Tom, he bit off a great chaw o' 'baccy, and got it well sot in\nhis cheek, and kind o' turned over to lie on't, and ease the pain. Wal,\nhe says he laid a spell, and dropped off in a sort o' doze, when he woke\nin sich a chill his teeth chattered, and the pain come on like a 'knife,\nand he bounced over, thinking the fire had gone out in the stove.\n\n\u201cWal, sure enough, he see a man a-crouchin' over the stove, with\nhis back to him, a-stretchin' out his hands to warm 'em. He had on a\nsou'wester and a pea-jacket, with a red tippet round his neck; and his\nclothes was drippin' as if he'd just come in from a rain.\n\n\u201c'What the divil!' says Tom. And he riz right up, and rubbed his eyes.\n'Bill Bridges,' says he, 'what shine be you up to now?' For Bill was a\nmaster oneasy crittur, and allers a-gettin' up and walkin' nights; and\nTom, he thought it was Bill. But in a minute he looked over, and there,\nsure enough, was Bill, fast asleep in his bunk, mouth wide open, snoring\nlike a Jericho ram's-horn. Tom looked round, and counted every man in\nhis bunk, and then says he, 'Who the devil is this? for there's Bob\nCoffin on deck, and the rest is all here.'\n\n\u201cWal, Tom wa'n't a man to be put under too easy. He hed his thoughts\nabout him allers; and the fust he thought in every pinch was what to do.\nSo he sot considerin' a minute, sort o' winkin' his eyes to be sure he\nsaw straight, when, sure enough, there come another man backin' down the\ncompanion-way.\n\n\u201c'Wal, there's Bob Coffin, anyhow,' says Tom to himself. But no, the\nother man, he turned: Tom see his face; and, sure as you live, it was\nthe face of a dead corpse. Its eyes was sot, and it jest came as still\nacross the cabin, and sot down by the stove, and kind o' shivered, and\nput out its hands as if it was gettin' warm.\n\n\u201cTom said that there was a cold air round in the cabin, as if an iceberg\nwas comin' near, and he felt cold chills running down his back; but he\njumped out of his bunk, and took a step forward. 'Speak!' says he. 'Who\nbe you? and what do you want?'\n\n\u201cThey never spoke, nor looked up, but kept kind o' shivering and\ncrouching over the stove.\n\n\u201c'Wal,' says Tom, 'I 'll see who you be, anyhow.' And he walked right\nup to the last man that come in, and reached out to catch hold of his\ncoat-collar; but his hand jest went through him like moonshine, and in\na minute he all faded away; and when he turned round the other one was\ngone too. Tom stood there, looking this way and that; but there warn't\nnothing but the old stove, and the lantern swingin', and the men all\nsnorin' round in their bunks. Tom, he sung out to Bob Coffin. 'Hullo,\nup there!' says he. But Bob never answered, and Tom, he went up, and\nfound Bob down on his knees, his teeth a-chatterin' like a bag o' nails,\ntrying to say his prayers; and all he could think of was, 'Now I lay\nme,' and he kep' going that over and over. Ye see, boys, Bob was a\ndrefful wicked, swearin' crittur, and hadn't said no prayers since he\nwas tew years old, and it didn't come natural to him. Tom give a grip on\nhis collar, and shook him. 'Hold yer yawp,' said he. 'What you howlin'\nabout? What's up?'\n\n\u201c'Oh, Lordy massy!' says Bob, 'we're sent for,--all on us,--there's been\ntwo on 'em: both on 'em went right by me!'\n\n\u201cWal, Tom, he hed his own thoughts; but he was bound to get to the\nbottom of things, anyway. Ef 'twas the devil, well and good--he\nwanted to know it. Tom jest wanted to hev the matter settled one way or\nt'other: so he got Bob sort o' stroked down, and made him tell what he\nsaw.\n\n\u201cBob, he stood to it that he was a-standin' right for'ard, a-leanin' on\nthe windlass, and kind o' hummin' a tune, when he looked down, and see\na sort o' queer light in the fog; and he went and took a look over the\nbows, when up came a man's head in a sort of sou'wester, and then a pair\nof hands, and catched at the bob-stay; and then the hull figger of a man\nriz right out o' the water, and clim up on the martingale till he could\nreach the jib-stay with his hands, and then he swung himself right up\nonto the bowsprit, and stepped aboard, and went past Bob, right aft,\nand down into the cabin. And he hadn't more'n got down, afore he turned\nround, and there was another comin' in over the bowsprit, and he went\nby him, and down below: so there was two on 'em, jest as Tom had seen in\nthe cabin.\n\n\u201cTom he studied on it a spell, and finally says he, 'Bob, let you and me\nkeep this 'ere to ourselves, and see ef it 'll come again. Ef it don't,\nwell and good: ef it does--why, we 'll see about it.'\n\n\u201cBut Tom he told Cap'n Witherspoon, and the Cap'n he agreed to keep an\neye out the next night. But there warn't nothing said to the rest o' the\nmen.\n\n\u201cWal, the next night they put Bill Bridges on the watch. The fog had\nlifted, and they had a fair wind, and was going on steady. The men all\nturned in, and went fast asleep, except Cap'n Witherspoon, Tom, and Bob\nCoffin. Wal, sure enough, 'twixt twelve and one o'clock, the same thing\ncame over, only there war four men 'stead o' two. They come in jes' so\nover the bowsprit, and they looked neither to right nor left, but dim\ndown stairs, and sot down, and crouched and shivered over the stove\njist like the others. Wal, Bill Bridges, he came tearin' down like a\nwild-cat, frightened half out o' his wits, screechin' 'Lord, have mercy!\nwe're all goin' to the devil!' And then they all vanished.\n\n\u201c'Now, Cap'n, what's to be done?' says Tom. 'Ef these 'ere fellows is to\ntake passage, we can't do nothin' with the boys: that's clear.'\n\n\u201cWal, so it turned out; for, come next night, there was six on 'em come\nin, and the story got round, and the boys was all on eend. There wa'n't\nno doin' nothin' with 'em. Ye see, it's allers jest so. Not but what\ndead folks is jest as 'spectable as they was afore they's dead. These\nmight 'a' been as good fellers as any aboard; but it's human natur'. The\nminute a feller's dead, why, you sort o' don't know 'bout him; and it's\nkind o' skeery hevin' on him round; and so 'twan't no wonder the boys\ndidn't feel as if they could go on with the vy'ge, ef these 'ere fellers\nwas all to take passage. Come to look, too, there war consid'able of a\nleak stove in the vessel; and the boys, they all stood to it, ef they\nwent farther, that they'd all go to the bottom. For, ye see, once the\nstory got a-goin', every one on 'em saw a new thing every night. One\non 'em saw the bait-mill a-grindin', without no hands to grind it; and\nanother saw fellers up aloft, workin' in the sails. Wal, the fact war,\nthey jest had to put about,--run back to Castine.\n\n\u201cWal, the owners, they hushed up things the best they could; and they\nput the vessel on the stocks, and worked her over, and put a new coat o'\npaint on her, and called her 'The Betsey Ann;' and she went a good vy'ge\nto the Banks, and brought home the biggest fare o' fish that had been\nfor a long time; and she's made good vy'ges ever since; and that jest\nproves what I've been a-saying,--that there's nothin' to drive out\nghosts like fresh paint.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nTHE PARSON'S HORSE-RACE.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9268]\n\nAL, now, this 'ere does beat all! I wouldn't 'a' thought it o' the\ndeacon.\n\nSo spoke Sam Lawson, drooping in a discouraged, contemplative attitude\nin front of an equally discouraged looking horse, that had just been\nbrought to him by the Widow Simpkins for medical treatment. Among Sam's\nmany accomplishments he was reckoned in the neighborhood an oracle in\nall matters of this kind, especially by women, whose helplessness in\nmeeting such emergencies found unfailing solace under his compassionate\nwillingness to attend to any business that did not strictly belong to\nhim, and from which no pecuniary return was to be expected.\n\nThe Widow Simpkins had bought this horse of Deacon Atkins, apparently\na fairly well-appointed brute, and capable as he was good-looking. A\nshort, easy drive, when the deacon held the reins, had shown off his\npoints to advantage; and the widow's small stock of ready savings had\ncome forth freely in payment for what she thought was a bargain. When,\nsoon after coming into possession, she discovered that her horse, if\ndriven with any haste, panted in a fearful manner, and that he appeared\nto be growing lame, she waxed wroth, and went to the deacon in anger, to\nbe met only with the smooth reminder that the animal was all right when\nshe took him; that she had seen him tried herself. The widow was of a\nnature somewhat spicy, and expressed herself warmly: \u201cIt's a cheat and a\nshame, and I 'll take the law on ye!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat law will you take?\u201d said the unmoved deacon. \u201cWasn't it a fair\nbargain?\u201d\n\n\u201cI 'll take the law of God,\u201d said the widow with impotent indignation;\nand she departed to pour her cares and trials into the ever ready ear of\nSam. Having assumed the care of the animal, he now sat contemplating it\nin a sort of trance of melancholy reflection.\n\n\u201cWhy, boys!\u201d he broke out, \u201cwhy didn't she come to me afore she bought\nthis crittur? Why, I knew all about him! That 'are crittur was jest\nruined a year ago last summer, when Tom, the deacon's boy there, come\nhome from college. Tom driv him over to Sherburn and back that 'are hot\nFourth of July. 'Member it, 'cause I saw the crittur when he come home.\nI sot up with Tom takin' care of him all night. That 'are crittur had\nthe thumps all night, and he hain't never been good for nothin' since.\nI telled the deacon he was a gone hoss then, and wouldn't never be\ngood for nothin'. The deacon, he took off his shoes, and let him run to\npastur' all summer, and he's ben a-feedin' and nussin' on him up; and\nnow he's put him off on the widder. I wouldn't 'a' thought it o' the\ndeacon! Why, this hoss 'll never be no good to her! That 'are's a used-up\ncrittur, any fool may see! He 'll mabbe do for about a quarter of an hour\non a smooth road; but come to drive him as a body wants to drive, why,\nhe blows like my bellowsis; and the deacon knew it--must 'a' known it!\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, Sam!\u201d we exclaimed, \u201cain't the deacon a good man?\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, now, there's where the shoe pinches! In a gin'al way the deacon\n_is_ a good man--he's con-sid'able more than middlin' good: gin'ally\nhe adorns his perfession. On most p'ints I don't hev nothin' agin the\ndeacon; and this 'ere ain't a bit like him. But there 'tis! Come to\nhosses, there's where the unsanctified natur' comes out. Folks will\ncheat about hosses when they won't about 'most nothin' else.\u201d And Sam\nleaned back on his cold forge, now empty of coal, and seemed to deliver\nhimself to a mournful train of general reflection. \u201cYes, hosses does\nseem to be sort o' unregenerate critturs,\u201d he broke out: \u201cthere's\nsuthin' about hosses that deceives the very elect. The best o' folks\ngets tripped up when they come to deal in hosses.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, Sam, is there any thing bad in horses?\u201d we interjected timidly.\n\n\u201c'Tain't the hosses, boys,\u201d said Sam with solemnity. \u201cLordy massy! the\nhosses is all right enough! Hosses is scriptural animals. Elijah went up\nto heaven in a chari't with hosses; and then all them lots o' hosses in\nthe Ravelations,--black and white and red, and all sorts o' colors. That\n'are shows hosses goes to heaven; but it's more'n the folks that hev 'em\nis likely to, ef they don't look out.\n\n\u201cMinisters, now,\u201d continued Sam in a soliloquizing vein--\u201cfolks allers\nthinks it's suthin' sort o' shaky in a minister to hev much to do with\nhosses,--sure to get 'em into trouble. There was old Parson Williams\nof North Billriky got into a drefful mess about a hoss. Lordy massy! he\nwarn't to blame, neither; but he got into the dreffulest scrape you ever\nheard on--come nigh to unsettlin' him.\u201d\n\n\u201cO Sam! tell us all about it,\u201d we boys shouted, delighted with the\nprospect of a story.\n\n\u201cWal, wait now till I get off this crittur's shoes, and we 'll take him\nup to pastur', and then we can kind o' set by the river, and fish. Hepsy\nwanted a mess o' fish for supper, and I was cal'latin' to git some for\nher. You boys go and be digging bait, and git yer lines.\u201d\n\nAnd so, as we were sitting tranquilly beside the Charles River, watching\nour lines, Sam's narrative began:--\n\n\u201cYe see, boys, Parson Williams--he's dead now, but when I was a boy he\nwas one of the gret men round here. He writ books. He writ a tract\nagin the Armenians, and put 'em down; and he writ a big book on the\nmillennium (I've got that 'are book now); and he was a smart preacher.\nFolks said he had invitations to settle in Boston, and there ain't no\ndoubt he might 'a' hed a Boston parish ef he'd 'a' ben a mind ter\ntake it; but he'd got a good settlement and a handsome farm in North\nBillriky, and didn't care to move: thought, I s'pose, that 'twas better\nto be number one in a little place than number two in a big un. Anyway,\nhe carried all before him where he was.\n\n\u201cParson Williams was a tall, straight, personable man; come of good\nfamily--father and grand'ther before him all ministers. He was putty up\nand down, and commandin' in his ways, and things had to go putty much\nas he said. He was a good deal sot by, Parson Williams was, and his wife\nwas a Derby,--one o' them rich Salem Derbys,--and brought him a lot\no' money; and so they lived putty easy and comfortable so fur as this\nworld's goods goes. Well, now, the parson wan't reely what you call\nworldly-minded; but then he was one o' them folks that _knows what's\ngood_ in temporals as well as sperituals, and allers liked to hev the\nbest that there was goin'; and he allers had an eye to a good boss.\n\n\u201cNow, there was Parson Adams and Parson Scranton, and most of the other\nministers: they didn't know and didn't care what hoss they hed; jest\njogged round with these 'ere poundin', potbellied, sleepy critturs\nthat ministers mostly hes,--good enough to crawl round to funerals and\nministers' meetin's and associations and sich; but Parson Williams, he\nallers would hev a hoss as was a hoss. He looked out for _blood_;\nand, when these 'ere Vermont fellers would come down with a drove, the\nparson, he hed his eyes open, and knew what was what. Couldn't none of\n'em cheat him on hoss flesh. And so one time when Zach Buel was down\nwith a drove, the doctor, he bought the best hoss in the lot. Zach said\nhe never see a parson afore that he couldn't cheat; but he said the\ndoctor reely knew as much as he did, and got the very one he'd meant to\n'a' kept for himself.\n\n\u201cThis 'ere hoss was a peeler, I 'll tell you! They'd called him\nTamerlane, from some heathen feller or other: the boys called him Tam,\nfor short. Tam was a gret character. All the fellers for miles round\nknew the doctor's Tam, and used to come clear over from the other\nparishes to see him.\n\n\u201cWal, this 'ere sot up Cuff's back high, I tell you! Cuff was the\ndoctor's nigger man, and he was nat 'lly a drefful proud crittur. The way\nhe would swell and strut and brag about the doctor and his folks and\nhis things! The doctor used to give Cuff his cast-off clothes; and Cuff\nwould prance round in 'em, and seem to think he was a doctor of divinity\nhimself, and had the charge of all natur'.\n\n\u201cWell, Cuff he reely made an idol o' that 'are hoss,--a reg'lar graven\nimage, and bowed down and worshipped him. He didn't think nothin' was\ntoo good for him. He washed and brushed and curried him, and rubbed\nhim down till he shone like a lady's satin dress; and he took pride\nin ridin' and drivin' him, 'cause it was what the doctor wouldn't let\nnobody else do but himself. You see, Tam warn't no lady's hoss. Miss\nWilliams was 'fraid as death of him; and the parson, he hed to git her a\nsort o' low-sperited crittur that she could drive herself. But he liked\nto drive Tam; and he liked to go round the country on his back, and a\nfine figure of a man he was on him too. He didn't let nobody else back\nhim, or handle the reins, but Cuff; and Cuff was drefful set up about\nit, and he swelled and bragged about that ar boss all round the country.\nNobody couldn't put in a word 'bout any other hoss, without Cuff's\nfeathers would be all up, stiff as a tom-turkey's tail; and that's how\nCuff got the doctor into trouble.\n\n\u201cYe see, there nat 'lly was others that thought they'd got horses, and\ndidn't want to be crowed over. There was Bill Atkins out to the west\nparish, and Ike Sanders, that kep' a stable up to Pequot Holler: they\nwas down a-lookin' at the parson's hoss, and a-bettin' on their'n, and\na-darin' Cuff to race with 'em.\n\n\u201cWal, Cuff, he couldn't stan' it, and, when the doctor's back was\nturned, he'd be off on the sly, and they'd hev their race; and Tam, he\nbeat 'em all. Tam, ye see, boys, was a hoss that couldn't and wouldn't\nhev a hoss ahead of him--he jest _wouldn't!_ Ef he dropped down dead in\nhis tracks the next minit, he _would_ be ahead; and he allers got ahead.\nAnd so his name got up, and fellers kep' comin' to try their horses;\nand Cuff'd take Tam out to race with fust one and then another till this\n'ere got to be a reg'lar thing, and begun to be talked about.\n\n\u201cFolks sort o' wondered if the doctor knew; but Cuff was sly as a\nweasel, and allers had a story ready for every turn. Cuff was one of\nthem fellers that could talk a bird off a bush,--master hand he was to\nslick things over!\n\n\u201cThere was folks as said they believed the doctor was knowin' to it, and\nthat he felt a sort o' carnal pride sech as a minister oughtn't fer to\nhev, and so shet his eyes to what was a-goin' on. Aunt Sally Nickerson\nsaid she was sure on't.'Twas all talked over down to old Miss Bummiger's\nfuneral, and Aunt Sally, she said the church ought to look into't. But\neverybody knew Aunt Sally: she was allers watchin' for folks' haltin's,\nand settin' on herself up to jedge her neighbors.\n\n\u201cWal, I never believed nothin' agin Parson Williams: it was all Cuff's\ncontrivances. But the fact was, the fellers all got their blood up, and\nthere was hoss-racin' in all the parishes; and it got so they'd even\nrace hosses a Sunday.\n\n\u201cWal, of course they never got the doctor's hoss out a Sunday. Cuff\nwouldn't 'a', durst to do that, Lordy massy, no! He was allers there\nin church, settin' up in the doctor's clothes, rollin' up his eyes,\nand lookin' as pious as ef he never thought o' racin' hosses. He was an\nawful solemn-lookin' nigger in church, Cuff was.\n\n\u201cBut there was a lot o' them fellers up to Pequot Holler--Bill Atkins,\nand Ike Sanders, and Tom Peters, and them Hokum boys--used to go out\narter meetin' Sunday arternoon, and race hosses. Ye see, it was jest\nclose to the State-line, and, if the s'lectmen was to come down on 'em,\nthey could jest whip over the line, and they couldn't take 'em.\n\n\u201cWal, it got to be a great scandal. The fellers talked about it up to\nthe tavern, and the deacons and the tithingman, they took it up and went\nto Parson Williams about it; and the parson he told 'em jest to keep\nstill, not let the fellers know that they was bein' watched, and next\nSunday he and the tithingman and the constable, they'd ride over, and\ncatch 'em in the very act.\n\n\u201cSo next Sunday arternoon Parson Williams and Deacon Popkins and Ben\nBradley (he was constable that year), they got on to their hosses, and\nrode over to Pequot Holler. The doctor's blood was up, and he meant to\ncome down on 'em strong; for that was his way of doin' in his parish.\nAnd they was in a sort o' day o'-jedgment frame o' mind, and jogged along\nsolemn as a hearse, till, come to rise the hill above the holler, they\nsee three or four fellers with their hosses gittin' ready to race; and\nthe parson says he, 'Let's come on quiet, and get behind these bushes,\nand we 'll see what they're up to, and catch 'em in the act.'\n\n\u201cBut the mischief on't was, that Ike Sanders see 'em comin', and he\nknowed Tam in a minit,--Ike knowed Tam of old,--and he jest tipped the\nwink to the rest. 'Wait, boys,' says he: 'let 'em git close up, and\nthen I 'll give the word, and the doctor's hoss will be racin' ahead like\nthunder.'\n\n\u201cWal, so the doctor and his folks, they drew up behind the bushes, and\nstood there innocent as could be, and saw 'em gittin' ready to start.\nTam, he begun to snuffle and paw; but the doctor never mistrusted\nwhat he was up to till Ike sung out, 'Go it, boys!' and the hosses all\nstarted, when, sure as you live, boys! Tam give one fly, and was over\nthe bushes, and in among 'em, goin' it like chain-lightnin' ahead of 'em\nall.\n\n\u201cDeacon Popkins and Ben Bradley jest stood and held their breath to see\nem all goin' it so like thunder; and the doctor, he was took so sudden\nit was all he could do to jest hold on anyway: so away he went, and\ntrees and bushes and fences streaked by him like ribbins. His hat flew\noff behind him, and his wig arter, and got catched in a barberry-bush;\nbut Lordy massy! he couldn't stop to think o' them. He jest leaned down,\nand caught Tam round the neck, and held on for dear life till they come\nto the stopping-place.\n\n\u201cWal, Tam was ahead of them all, sure enough, and was snorting and\nsnuffling as if he'd got the very old boy in him, and was up to racing\nsome more on the spot.\n\n\u201cThat 'ere Ike Sanders was the impudentest feller that ever you see, and\nhe roared and rawhawed at the doctor. 'Good for you, parson!' says he.\n'You beat us all holler,' says he. 'Takes a parson for that, don't it,\nboys?' he said. And then he and Ike and Ton; and the two Hokum boys,\nthey jest roared, and danced round like wild critturs. Wal, now, only\nthink on't, boys, what a situation that 'are was for a minister,--a\nman that had come out with the best of motives to put a stop to\nsabbath-breakin' I There he was all rumpled up and dusty, and his wig\nhangin' in the bushes, and these 'ere ungodly fellers gettin' the laugh\non him, and all acause o' that 'are hoss. There's times, boys, when\nministers must be tempted to swear if there ain't preventin' grace, and\nthis was one o' them times to Parson Williams. They say he got red in\nthe face, and looked as if he should bust, but he didn't say nothin': he\nscorned to answer. The sons o' Zeruiah was too hard for him, and he let\n'em hev their say. But when they'd got through, and Ben had brought him\nhis hat and wig, and brushed and settled him ag'in, the parson, he says,\n'Well, boys, ye've had your say and your laugh; but I warn you now\nI won't have this thing going on here any more,' says he: 'so mind\nyourselves.'\n\n\u201cWal, the boys see that the doctor's blood was up, and they rode off\npretty quiet; and I believe they never raced no more in that spot.\n\n\u201cBut there ain't no tellin' the talk this 'ere thing made. Folks will\ntalk, you know; and there warn't a house in all Billriky, nor in the\nsouth parish nor centre, where it warn't had over and discussed. There\nwas the deacon, and Ben Bradley was there, to witness and show jest how\nthe thing was, and that the doctor was jest in the way of his duty; but\nfolks said it made a great scandal; that a minister hadn't no business\nto hev that kind o' hoss, and that he'd give the enemy occasion to speak\nreproachfully. It reely did seem as if Tam's sins was imputed to the\ndoctor; and folks said he ought to sell Tam right away, and get a sober\nminister's hoss.\n\n\u201cBut others said it was Cuff that had got Tam into bad ways, and they\ndo say that Cuff had to catch it pretty lively when the doctor come to\nsettle with him. Cuff thought his time had come, sure enough, and was\nso scairt that he turned blacker'n ever: he got enough to cure him o'\nhoss-racin' for one while. But Cuff got over it arter a while, and so\ndid the doctor. Lordy massy! there ain't nothin' lasts forever! Wait\nlong enough, and 'most every thing blows over. So it turned out about the\ndoctor. There was a rumpus and a fuss, and folks talked and talked, and\nadvised; everybody had their say: but the doctor kep' right straight on,\nand kep' his hoss all the same.\n\n\u201cThe ministers, they took it up in the association; but, come to tell\nthe story, it sot 'em all a-laughin', so they couldn't be very hard on\nthe doctor.\n\n\u201cThe doctor felt sort o' streaked at fust when they told the story on\nhim; he didn't jest like it: but he got used to it, and finally, when\nhe was twitted on't, he'd sort o' smile, and say, 'Anyway, Tam beat 'em:\nthat's one comfort.'\u201d\n\n\n\n\nOLDTOWN FIRESIDE TALKS OF THE REVOLUTION.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9284]\n\nHE sacred work of preparation for Thanksgiving was at hand. Our kitchen\nwas fragrant with the smell of cinnamon, cloves, and allspice which we\nboys were daily set to pound in the great lignum-vitae mortar. Daily the\ngreat oven flamed without cessation; and the splitting of oven-wood kept\nus youngsters so busy, that we scarce had a moment to play: yet we\ndid it with a cheerful mind, inspired by the general aroma of coming\nfestivity abroad in the house.\n\nBehold us this evening around the kitchen-fire, which crackled and\nroared up the wide chimney, brightening with its fluttering radiance the\nfarthest corner of the ample room. A tub of rosy-cheeked apples, another\nof golden quinces, and a bushel-basket filled with ruby cranberries,\nstood in the midst of the circle. All hands were busy. Grandmother in\none corner was superintending us boys as we peeled and quartered the\nfruit,--an operation in which grandfather took a helping hand; Aunt Lois\nwas busily looking over and sorting cranberries, when a knock at the\ndoor announced a visitor.\n\n\u201cWell, now, I s'pose that's Sam Lawson, of course,\u201d snapped Aunt Lois.\n\n\nAunt Lois generally spoke with a snap; but about Thanksgiving time it\nhad a cheery ring, like the snapping of our brisk kitchen-fire.\n\n\u201cGood-evenin', Miss Badger and Miss Lois,\u201d said Sam. \u201cI see yer winders\nso bright, I couldn't help wantin' to come in and help ye pare apples,\nor suthin'.\u201d\n\nWe boys made haste to give Sam the warmest welcome, and warmest place\nin the chimney-corner, and to accommodate him with a tin pan full of\nquinces, and a knife, when he was soon settled among us.\n\n\u201cWal, this 'ere does look cheerful,--looks like Thanksgiving,\u201d he began.\n\u201cWal, Lordy massy! we've got a great deal to be thankful for in this\n'ere land o' privileges; hain't we, deacon? I was a-comin' 'round by\nMis' Lothrop's to-day; and her Dinah, she told me the Doctor was gettin'\na great sermon out on the hundred and twenty-fourth Psalm: 'If it had\nnot been the Lord who was on our side when men rose up against us, then\nthey had swallowed us up.' He's a-goin' to show all our deliverances\nin the war. I expect it 'll be a whale of a sermon, 'cause, when our\nminister sets out to do a thing, he mos' generally does it up to the\nhandle. Tell ye what, boys, you must listen with all your ears: you 'll\nnever know what times them was if you don't--you don't know what liberty\ncost us all. There's your gran'ther, now, he could tell ye: he 'members\nwhen he went off to Lexington with his gun on his shoulders.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, grandfather! did _you_ go?\u201d we both exclaimed with wide eyes.\n\n\u201cWell, boys,\u201d said my grandfather, \u201c'tain't worth talkin' about what I\ndid. I was in my mill that day, minding my business, when brother Con,\nhe burst in, and says he, 'Look here, Bill, the regulars are goin' up to\nConcord to destroy our stores, and we must all go. Come, get your gun.'\nWell, I said I was a miller, and millers were exempt from duty; but\nCon wouldn't let me alone. 'Get down your gun,' says he. 'Suppose we're\ngoing to let them British fellers walk over us?' says he. Well, Con\nalways had his way of me; and I got my gun, and we started out through\nthe woods over to Concord. We lived at Weston then, ye see. Well, when\nwe got on the brow of the hill, we looked over, and, sure enough, there\non burying-ground hill was the British regulars. The hill was all alive\nwith 'em, marching here and there in their scarlet coats like so many\nbees out of a hive.\n\n\u201c'Con,' says I, 'jest look there. What are you going to do?'\n\n\u201c'Shoot some of 'em, I know,' says Con.\n\n\u201cAnd so we ran along, hiding behind trees and bushes and stone walls,\ntill we got near enough to get a shot at 'em. You see, they broke up\ninto companies, and went here and there about town, looking for the\nstores; and then, as we got a chance here and there, we marked our men,\nand popped, and then we'd run, and take aim somewhere else.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, now, that are wa'n't the hull on't,\u201d said Sam. \u201cWhy, there\nwas hundreds of fellers doin' just the same all round: it was jest\npop-pop-pop! from every barn, and every bush, and clump o' trees, all\nalong the way. Men was picked off all the time; and they couldn't\nsee who did it, and it made 'em mad as fury. Why, I 'member Mis' Tom\nBigelow, she that was Sary Jones, told me how they sot her mother's\nhouse afire and burnt it down, 'cause their nigger man Caesar popped at\n'em out o' the buttery window. They didn't tell him to; but Caesar, he\nwas full of fight, like all the rest on 'em. Lordy massy! the niggers\nwent for suthin' in them times! Their blood was up as quick as\nanybody's. Why, there was old Pompey Lovejoy lived over by Pomp's pond\nin Andover, he hitched up his wagon, and driv over with two barrels o'\ncider and some tin dippers, and was round all day givin' drinks o' cider\nto our men when they got het and thirsty and tired. It was a pretty warm\nday for April, that was. Pomp has told me the story many a time. 'Twas\nall the cider he had; but cider goes for suthin', as well as gunpowder\nin its place, and Pomp's cider come jest right that day.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut grandfather,\u201d said I, \u201cwhat happened to you over there?\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, you see,\u201d said grandfather placidly, \u201cI wasn't killed; but I come\npretty nigh it. You see, they sent into Boston for re-enforcements; and,\nby the time we got to Lexington, Earl Percy was marching out with fresh\ntroops and cannon. Con and I were standing on the meetin'-house steps,\nwhen there come a terrible bang, and something struck right over our\nheads, and went into the meetin'-house. 'Why, Bill!' says Con, 'what's\nthat?'--'They've got cannon: that's what that is,' says I. 'Let's run\n'round the other side.' So we did; but just as we got round there, there\ncome another bang, and a ball crashed right through the meetin'-house,\nand come out of the pulpit window. Well, we saw there was no staying\nthere: so we run then, and got into a little clump of trees behind a\nstone wall; and there we saw 'em go by,--Earl Percy on his horse, and\nall his troops, ever so grand. He went on up to Concord. Fact is, if it\nhadn't been for him and his men, those regulars would all have been cut\noff: they wouldn't one of 'em have got back, for the whole country was\nup and fighting. The militia came pouring in from Weston and Acton and\nBillriky,--all the towns round. Then their Col. Smith was wounded, and\na good many others, and lots of 'em killed, and our minute-men coming\non 'em before and behind, and all around. But ye see, we couldn't stand\nregular troops and cannon; and so, when they come on, we had to give\nback. Earl Percy came up, and formed a hollow square, and they marched\ninto it, and so gave 'em time to rest.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, there was need enough on't,\u201d said Sam. \u201cThe regulars had been\nhectored and picked, and driv 'round so from piller to post, that they\nwas dog tired. Jimmy Irwin, he was a little chap then; but he telled\nme how he see the men jest threw 'emselves down on the ground, their\ntongues trailing out o' their mouths like hunting-dogs. You see, they\nhad about two hundred wounded, and twenty eight or nine was taken\nprisoners, and sixty-four killed outright: so Lord Percy had his hands\nfull o' takin' care o' the mess they'd got up.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said my grandfather, \u201cthere were dead men lying all around the\nroad as we came back. There, boys!\u201d he said, pointing to a gun and\npowder-horn over the chimney, \u201cwe picked up these when we were coming\nhome. We found them on a poor fellow who lay there dead in the road:\nthere's some blood of his on it to this day. We couldn't help feeling it\nwas most too bad too.\u201d\n\n\u201cPoor fellow! he wa'n't to blame,\u201d said my grand-mother. \u201cSoldiers have\nto go as they're bid. War's an awful thing.\u201d\n\n\u201cThen they shouldn't have begun it,\u201d interposed Aunt Lois. \u201c'They that\ntake the sword shall perish by the sword.'\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, grandpapa,\u201d said I, \u201cwhat were the stores they went up to get?\u201d\n\n\u201cThey were stores laid up to enable us to go to war, and they were\n'round in different places. There were two twenty-four-pounders that\nthey spiked, and they threw about five hundred pounds of ball into the\nriver or wells, and broke up sixty barrels of flour, and scattered it\nabout.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal,\u201d said Sam triumphantly, \u201cthere was one lot they didn't get. Cap'n\nTim Wheeler had about the biggest lot o' wheat, and rye-flour, and\ncorn-meal stored up in his barn, with some barrels of his own. So when\nthis 'ere fine jay-bird of an officer came to him all so grand, and told\nhim to open his barn and let him look in, the cap'n, he took his key,\nand walked right out, and opened the barndoor; and the officer was\ntickled to pieces. He thought he'd got such a haul!\n\n\u201c'If you please, sir,' says the cap'n, 'I'm a miller, and got my living\nby grinding grain. I'm a poor man. You can see my mill out there. I\ngrind up a lot o' grain in the winter, and get it ready to sell in the\nspring. Some's wheat, and some's rye, and some's corn-meal; and this\nwheat is mine, and this rye is mine, and this corn-meal is mine;' and,\nwhen he spoke, he put his hand on his own barrels.\n\n\u201c'Oh! if this is your private property,' says the officer, 'we sha'n't\ntouch that: we don't meddle with private property.' And so he turned on\nhis heel, and the cap'n, he locked up his barn.\u201d\n\n\u201cWas that telling the truth?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cWal, you see it was true what he said,\u201d said Sam. \u201cThem bar'ls he laid\nhis hands on was hisn.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut Aunt Lois told me yesterday it was as bad to act a lie as to speak\none,\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cWell, so I did,\u201d said Aunt Lois. \u201cThe truth is the truth, and I 'll\nstick to it.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut, Aunt Lois, would you have told him, and let him break up all those\nbarrels?\u201d\n\n\u201cNo, I shouldn't,\u201d said Aunt Lois. \u201cI should have done just as Cap'n Tim\ndid; but I should have done _wrong_. Right is right, and wrong is wrong,\neven if I can't come up to it always.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat would you have done, grandfather?\u201d said I.\n\nMy grandfather's mild face slowly irradiated, as when moonbeams pass\nover a rock.\n\n\u201cWell, boys,\u201d he said, \u201cI don't think I should have let him break up\nthose barrels. If it was wrong to do as Cap'n Wheeler did, I think most\nlikely I should 'a' done it. I don't suppose I'm any better than he\nwas.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, at any rate,\u201d said Aunt Lois, \u201cwhat folks' do in war time is no\nrule for ordinary times: every thing is upset then. There ain't any of\nthe things they do in war time that are according to gospel teaching;\nbut, if you boys were to do just as Cap'n Wheeler did, I should say you\nlied by speaking the truth.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, well,\u201d said my grandmother, \u201cthose were dreadful times. Thank the\nLord that they are past and gone, and we don't have such awful cases of\nconscience as we did then. I never could quite see how we did right to\nresist the king at all.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhy, the Bible says, 'Resist the devil,'\u201d said Aunt Lois.\n\nA general laugh followed this sally.\n\n\u201cI always heard,\u201d said my grandfather, by way of changing the subject,\n\u201cthat they meant to have taken Mr. Adams and Mr. Hancock and hung 'em.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, to be sure they did,\u201d said Sam Lawson. \u201cI know all about that are.\nSapphira Clark, up to Lexington, she told me all about that are, one day\nwhen I was to her house puttin' down her best parlor carpet. Sapphira\nwa'n't but ten or eleven years old when the war broke out; but she\nremembered all about it. Ye see, Mr. Hancock and Mr. Adams was a-staying\nhid up at their house. Her father, Mr. Jonas Clark, was minister of\nLexington; and he kep' 'em quite private, and didn't let nobody know\nthey was there. Wal, Sapphira said they was all a-settin' at supper,\nwhen her father, he heard a great rapping at the front-door; and her\nfather got up and went and opened it; and she looked after him into the\nentry, and could just see a man in a scarlet uniform standing at the\ndoor, and she heard him ask, 'Are Sam Adams and John Hancock here?'\nAnd her father answered, 'Oh, hush! Don't mention those names\nhere.'--'Then,' says the man, 'I come to tell you the British troops\nwill be along by sunrise; and, if they are in your house, they'd better\nescape right away.'\u201d\n\n\u201cThat must have been Col. Paul Revere,\u201d said Aunt Lois. \u201cHe went all\nthrough the country, from Boston to Concord, rousing up people, and\ntelling 'em to be ready.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, what did Mr. Adams and Hancock do?\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, they got ready right away, and slipped quietly out the back-door,\nand made their way over to Burlington, and staid in the minister's house\nover there out of the way of the battle.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat would the British have done with 'em, if they had caught them?\u201d\n said I.\n\n\u201cHung 'em--high as Haman,\u201d said my Aunt Lois sententiously. \u201cThat's\nwhat they'd have done. That's what they'd 'a' done to them, and to Gen.\nWashington, and lots more, if they'd had their way.\u201d\n\n\u201cOh, yes!\u201d said grandfather, \u201cthey were mighty high-stepping at first.\nThey thought they had only to come over and show themselves, and they\ncould walk through the land, and hang and burn and slay just whom they'd\na mind to.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, they found 'twas like jumping into a hornets' nest,\u201d said Sam\nLawson. \u201cThey found that out at Lexington and Bunker Hill.\u201d\n\n\u201cBrother Con was in those trenches at Bunker Hill,\u201d said grandfather.\n\u201cThere they dug away at the breastworks, with the bom'-shells firing\nround 'em. They didn't mind them more than if they'd been hickory-nuts.\nThey kep' fellows ready to pour water on 'em as they fell.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, I never want to feel again as I did that day,\u201d said grandmother.\n\u201cI was in Boston, visiting cousin Jemima Russel, and we were all out on\nthe roof of the house. The roofs everywhere were all alive with people\nlooking through spy-glasses; and we could hear the firing, but couldn't\ntell how the day was going. And then they set Charlestown on fire; and\nthe blaze and smoke and flame rose up, and there was such a snapping and\ncrackling, and we could hear roofs and timbers falling, and see people\nrunning this way and that with their children--women scared half to\ndeath a-flying; and we knew all the time there was cousin Jane Wilkinson\nin that town sick in bed, with a baby only a few days old. It's a wonder\nhow Jane ever lived through it; but they did get her through alive, and\nher baby too. That burning Charlestown settled to fight it through: it\nwas so mean and cruel needless.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said my grandfather, \u201cthat day settled the question that we would\nbe free and independent, or die; and, though our men had to retreat,\nyet it was as good as a defeat to the British. They lost ten hundred and\nfifty-four in point with a good many. They determined then killed and\nwounded, and we only four hundred and fifty-three; and our men learned\nthat they could fight as well as the British. Congress went right to\nwork to raise an army, and appointed Gen. Washington commander. Your\ngran'ther Stowe, boys, was orderly of the day when Gen. Washington took\nthe command at Cambridge.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal,\u201d said Sam, \u201cI was in Cambridge that day and saw it all. Ye see,\nthe army was drawn up under the big elm there; and Ike Newel and I, we\nclim up into a tree, and got a place where we could look down and see.\nI wa'n't but ten year old then; but, if ever a mortal man looked like\nthe angel of the Lord, the gineral looked like it that day.\u201d\n\n\u201cSome said that there was trouble about having Gen. Ward give up the\ncommand to a Southern man,\u201d said my grandfather. \u201cGen. Ward was a brave\nman and very popular; but everybody was satisfied when they came to know\nGen. Washington.\u201d\n\n\u201cThere couldn't no minister have seemed more godly than he did that\nday,\u201d said Sam. \u201cHe read out of the hymn-book the hundred and first\nPsalm.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat is that psalm?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cLaws, boys! I know it by heart,\u201d said Sam, \u201cI was so impressed hearin'\non him read it. I can say it to you:--\n\n                   '\u201dMercy and judgment are my song,\n\n                   And since they both to thee belong,\n\n                   My gracious God, my righteous King,\n\n                   To thee my songs and vows I bring.\n\n                   If I am raised to bear the sword,\n\n                   I 'll take my counsels from thy word.\n\n                   Thy justice and thy heavenly grace\n\n                   Shall be the pattern of my ways.\n\n                   I 'll search the land, and raise the just\n\n                   To posts of honor, wealth, and trust:\n\n               The men who work thy righteous will\n\n                   Shall be my friends and favorites still.\n\n               The impious crew, the factious band,\n\n                   Shall hold their peace, or quit the land;\n\n                   And all who break the public rest,\n\n                   Where I have power, shall be suppressed.'\u201d\n\n\u201cAnd he did it too,\u201d remarked Aunt Lois.\n\n\u201cHe trusted in the Lord, and the Lord brought him to honor,\u201d said my\ngrandmother. \u201cWhen he took the army, every thing was agin' us: it didn't\nseem possible we should succeed.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, he was awful put to it sometimes,\u201d said Sam Lawson. \u201cI 'member\nUncle David Morse was a-tellin' me 'bout that are time down in New York\nwhen the' Massachusetts and Connecticut boys all broke and run.\u201d\n\n\u201cMassachusetts boys run? How came that Sam?\u201d said I.\n\n\u201cWal, you see, sometimes fellows will get a-runnin'; and it jest goes\nfrom one to another like fire, and ye can't stop it. It was after the\nbattle of Long Island, when our men had been fighting day after day, and\nhad to retreat. A good many were wounded, and a good many of 'em were\nsick and half-sick; and they'd got sort o' tired and discouraged.\n\n\u201cWell, Lord Howe and the British came to make a landing at Kipp's Bay\nround by New York; and the troops set to guard the landing began to run,\nand the Massachusetts and Connecticut men were sent to help 'em. Uncle\nDavid says that the fellows that run spread the panic among 'em; and\nthey looked ahead, and saw an ox-drag on top of a hill they was to pass,\nand they thought 'twas a cannon pintin' right at 'em; and the boys, they\njest broke and run,--cut right across the road, and cleared over the\nfence, and streaked it off cross-lots and up hill like a flock o' sheep.\nUncle David, he run too; but he'd been sick o' dysentary, and was so\nweak he couldn't climb the fence: so he stopped and looked back, and\nsaw Gineral Washington cantering up behind 'em, shouting, and waving\nhis sword, looking like a flamin' fire. Oh, he was thunderin' mad, the\ngineral was! And, when he see the fellows skittering off cross-lots, he\njest slammed his hat down on the ground, and give up. 'Great heavens!'\nsays he, 'are these the men I've got to fight this battle with?'\n\n\u201cWal, Uncle David, he picked up the gineral's hat, and come up and made\nhis bow, and said, 'Gineral, here's your hat.'\n\n\u201c'Thank you, sir!' said the gineral. 'I'm glad to see one brave fellow\nthat can stand his ground. _You_ didn't run.'\n\n\u201cUncle David said he felt pretty cheap, 'cause he know'd in his own\nheart that he would 'a' run, only he was too weak to git over the fence;\nbut he didn't tell the gineral that, I bet He put the compliment in his\npocket, and said nothing; for now the gineral's aides came riding up\nfull drive, and told him they must be off out of the field in a minute,\nor the British would have 'em, and so one on 'em took Uncle David up\nbehind him, and away they cantered. It was a pretty close shave too: the\nBritish was only a few rods behind 'em.\n\n\u201cOh, dear, if they had caught him!\u201d said I. \u201cOnly think!\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, they would have hung him; but we should have had another in his\nplace,\u201d said Aunt Lois. \u201cThe war wouldn't 'a' stopped.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, 'twas to be as 'twas,\u201d said my grandmother. \u201cThe Lord had respect\nto the prayers of our fathers, and he'd decreed that America should be\nfree.\u201d\n\n\u201cYes,\u201d said Sam: \u201cParson Badger said in one o' his sermons, that men\nalways was safe when they was goin' in the line o' God's decrees: I\nguess that are was about it. But, massy! is that are the nine o'clock\nbell? I must make haste home, or I dun' know what Hetty 'll say to me.\u201d\n\n\n\n\nA STUDENT'S SEA STORY.\n\n\n[Illustration: 9303]\n\nMONG the pleasantest of my recollections of old Bowdoin is the salt-air\nflavor of its sea experiences. The site of Brunswick is a sandy plain,\non which the college buildings seem to have been dropped for the good\nold Yankee economic reason of using land for public buildings that could\nnot be used for any thing else. The soil was a fathomless depth of\ndry, sharp, barren sand, out of whose bosom nothing but pitch-pines\nand blueberry-bushes emerged, or ever could emerge without superhuman\nefforts of cultivation. But these sandy plains, these pine forests, were\nneighbors to the great, lively, musical blue ocean, whose life-giving\npresence made itself seen, heard, and felt every hour of the day and\nnight. The beautiful peculiarity of the Maine coast, where the sea\ninterpenetrates the land in picturesque fiords and lakes, brought a\nconstant romantic element into the landscape. White-winged ships from\nIndia or China came gliding into the forest recesses bringing news from\nstrange lands, and tidings of wild adventure, into secluded farmhouses,\nthat, for the most part, seemed to be dreaming in woodland solitude. In\nthe early days of my college life the shipping interest of Maine gave it\nan outlook into all the countries of the earth. Ships and ship-building\nand ship-launching were the drift of the popular thought; and the very\nminds of the people by this commerce had apparently\n\n                        \u201cSuffered a sea change\n\n                   Into something rare and strange.\u201d\n\nThere was a quaintness, shrewdness, and vivacity of lonely solitude\nabout these men, (half skipper, half farmer!) that half skip was piquant\nand enlivening.\n\nIt was in the auspicious period of approaching Thanksgiving that my chum\nand I resolved to antedate for a few days our vacation, and take passage\non the little sloop \u201cBrilliant,\u201d that lay courtesying and teetering on\nthe bright waters of Maquoit Bay, loading up to make her Thanksgiving\ntrip to Boston.\n\nIt was a bright Indian-summer afternoon that saw us all on board the\nlittle craft. She was laden deep with dainties and rarities for the\nfestal appetites of Boston nabobs,--loads of those mealy potatoes\nfor which the fields of Maine were justly famed, barrels of ruby\ncranberries, boxes of solid golden butter (ventures of a thrifty\nhousemother emulous to gather kindred gold in the Boston market). Then\nthere were dressed chickens, turkeys, and geese, all going the same\nway, on the same errand; and there were sides and saddles of that choice\nmutton for which the sea islands of Maine were as famous as the South\nDowns of England.\n\nEvery thing in such a stowage was suggestive of good cheer. The little\ncraft itself had a sociable, friendly, domestic air. The captain and\nmate were cousins: the men were all neighbors, sons of families who had\ngrown up together. There was a kindly home flavor in the very stowage of\nthe cargo. Here were Melissa's cranberries, and by many a joke and wink\nwe were apprised that the mate had a tender interest in that venture.\nThere was Widder Toothacre's butter, concerning which there were various\ncomments and speculations, but which was handled and cared for with the\nconsideration the Maine sailor-boy always gives to \u201cthe widder.\u201d There\nwas a private keg of very choice eggs, over which the name of Lucindy\nAnn was breathed by a bright-eyed, lively youngster, who had promised\nto bring her back the change, and as to the precise particulars of this\nchange many a witticism was expended.\n\nOur mode of living on the \u201cBrilliant\u201d was of the simplest and most\nprimitive kind. On each side the staircase that led down to the cabin,\nhooped strongly to the partition, was a barrel, which on the one side\ncontained salt beef, and on the other salt pork. A piece out of each\nbarrel, delivered regularly to the cook, formed the foundation of our\ndaily meals; and sea-biscuit and potatoes, with the sauce of salt-water\nappetites, made this a feast for a king. I make no mention here of\ngingerbread and doughnuts, and such like ornamental accessories, which\nwere not wanting, nor of nuts and sweet cider, which were to be had for\nthe asking. At meal-times a swing-shelf, which at other seasons hung\nflat against the wall, was propped up, and our meals were eaten thereon\nin joyous satisfaction.\n\nA joyous, rollicking set we were, and the whole expedition was a\nfrolic of the first water. One of the drollest features of these little\nimpromptu voyages often was the woe-begone aspect of some unsuspecting\nland-lubber, who had been beguiled into thinking that he would like\na trip to Boston by seeing the pretty \u201cBrilliant\u201d courtesying in the\nsmooth waters of Maquoit, and so had embarked, in innocent ignorance of\nthe physiological resets of such enterprises.\n\nI remember the first morning out. As we were driving ahead, under a\nstiff breeze, I came on deck, and found the respectable Deacon Muggins,\nwho in his Sunday coat had serenely embarked the day before, now\ndesolately clinging to the railing, very white about the gills, and\ncontemplating the sea with a most suggestive expression of disgust and\nhorror.\n\n\u201cWhy, deacon, good-morning! How are you? Splendid morning!\u201d said I\nmaliciously.\n\nHe drew a deep breath, surveyed me with a mixture of indignation and\ndespair, and then gave vent to his feelings: \u201cTell ye what: there was\none darned old fool up to Brunswick yesterday! but he ain't there now:\nhe's _here_.\u201d The deacon, in the weekly prayer-meeting at Brunswick,\nused to talk of the necessity of being \u201cemptied of self:\u201d he seemed to\nbe in the way of it in the most literal manner at the present moment.\nIn a few minutes he was extended on the deck, the most utterly limp and\ndejected of deacons, and vowing with energy, if he ever got out o' this\n'ere, you wouldn't catch him again. Of course, my chum and I were not\nseasick. We were prosperous young sophomores in Bowdoin College, and\nwould have scorned to acknowledge such a weakness. In fact, we were\nin that happy state of self-opinion where we surveyed every thing\nin creation, as birds do, from above, and were disposed to patronize\neverybody we met, with a pleasing conviction that there was nothing\nworth knowing, but what we were likely to know, or worth doing, but what\nwe could do.\n\nCapt. Stanwood liked us, and we liked him: we patronized him, and he was\nquietly amused at our patronage, and returned it in kind. He was a\ngood specimen of the sea-captain in those early days in Maine: a man in\nmiddle life, tall, thin, wiry, and active, full of resource and shrewd\nmother-wit; a man very confident in his opinions, because his knowledge\nwas all got at first-hand,--the result of a careful use of his own five\nsenses. From his childhood he had followed the seas, and, as he grew\nolder, made voyages to Archangel, to Messina, to the West Indies, and\nfinally round the Horn; and, having carried a very sharp and careful\npair of eyes, he had acquired not only a snug competency of worldly\ngoods, but a large stock of facts and inductions, which stood him in\nstead of an education. He was master of a thriving farm at Harpswell,\nand, being tethered somewhat by love of wife and children, was mostly\nstationary there, yet solaced himself by running a little schooner to\nBoston, and driving a thriving bit of trade by the means. With that\nreverence for learning' which never deserts the New-Englander, he liked\nus the better for being collegians, and amiably conceded that there were\nthings quite worth knowing taught \u201cup to Brunswick there,\u201d though he\ndelighted now and then to show his superiority in talking about what he\nknew better than we.\n\nJim Larned, the mate, was a lusty youngster, a sister's son whom he had\ntaken in training in the way he should go. Jim had already made a\nvoyage to Liverpool and the East Indies, and felt himself also quite an\nauthority in his own way.\n\nThe evenings were raw and cool; and we generally gathered round the\ncabin stove, cracking walnuts, smoking, and telling stories, and having\na jolly time generally. It is but due to those old days to say that a\nmost respectable Puritan flavor penetrated even the recesses of those\ncoasters,--a sort of gentle Bible and psalm-book aroma, so that there\nwas not a word or a joke among the men to annoy the susceptibilities\neven of a deacon. Our deacon, somewhat consoled and amended, lay serene\nin his berth, rather enjoying the yarns that we were spinning. The web,\nof course, was many-colored,--of quaint and strange and wonderful;\nand, as the night wore on, it was dyed in certain weird tints of the\nsupernatural.\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said Jim Larned, \u201cfolks may say what they're a mind to: there\nare things that there's no sort o' way o' 'countin' for,--things you've\njist got to say. Well, here's suthin' to work that I don't know nothin'\nabout; and, come to question any man up sharp, you 'll find he's seen\n_one_ thing o' that sort' himself; and this 'ere I'm going to tell's\n_my_ story:--\n\n\u201cFour years ago I went down to aunt Jerushy's at Fair Haven. Her\nhusband's in the oysterin' business, and I used to go out with him\nconsiderable. Well, there was Bill Jones there,--a real bright fellow,\none of your open-handed, lively fellows,--and he took a fancy to me, and\nI to him, and he and I struck up a friendship. He run an oyster-smack\nto New York, and did a considerable good business for a young man. Well,\nBill had a fellow on his smack that I never looks of. He was from the\nMalays, or foreign crittur, or other; spoke broken English; had eyes\nset kind o' edgeways 'n his head: homely as sin he was, and I always\nmistrusted him. 'Bill,' I used to say, 'you look out for that fellow:\ndon't you trust him. If I was you, I'd ship him off short metre.' But\nBill, he only laughed. 'Why,' says he, 'I can get double work for the\nsame pay out o' that fellow; and what do I care if he ain't handsome?'\nI remember how chipper an' cheery Bill looked when he was sayin' that,\njust as he was going down to New York with his load o' oysters. Well,\nthe next night I was sound asleep in aunt Jerusha's front-chamber that\nopens towards the Sound, and I was waked right clear out o' sleep by\nBill's voice screaming to me. I got up and run to the window, and looked\nliked the some out, and I heard it again, plain as any thing: 'Jim, Jim!\nHelp, help!' It wasn't a common cry, neither: it was screeched out, as\nif somebody was murdering him. I tell you, it rung through my head for\nweeks afterwards.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, what came of it?\u201d said my chum, as the narrator made a pause, and\nwe all looked at him in silence.\n\n\u201cWell, as nigh as we can make it out, that very night poor Bill _was_\nmurdered by that very Malay feller: leastways, his body was found in his\nboat. He'd been stabbed, and all his money and watch and things taken,\nand this Malay was gone nobody knew where. That's all that was ever\nknown about it.\u201d\n\n\u201cBut surely,\u201d said my chum, who was of a very literal and rationalistic\nturn of mind, \u201cit couldn't have been his voice you heard: he must have\nbeen down to the other end of the Sound, close by New York, by that\ntime.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said the mate, \u201call I know is, that I was waked out of sleep by\nBill's voice calling my name, screaming in a real agony. It went through\nme like lightning; and then I find he was murdered that night. Now, I\ndon't know any thing about it. I know I heard him calling me; I know\nhe was murdered: but _how_ it was, or _what_ it was, or _why_ it was, I\ndon't know.\u201d\n\n\u201cThese 'ere college boys can tell ye,\u201d said the captain. \u201cOf course,\nthey've got into sophomore year, and there ain't nothing in heaven or\nearth that they don't know.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo,\u201d said I, \u201cI say with Hamlet, 'There are more things in heaven and\nearth, Horatio, than are dreamed of in your philosophy.'\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said my chum, with the air of a philosopher, \u201cwhat shakes\nmy faith in all supernatural stories is, that I can't see any use or\npurpose in them.\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, if there couldn't nothin' happen nor be except what _you_ could\nsee a use in, there wouldn't _much_ happen nor be,\u201d quoth the captain.\n\nA laugh went round at the expense of my friend.\n\n\u201cWal, now, I 'll tell ye what, boys,\u201d piped the thin voice of the deacon,\n\u201cfolks mustn't be too presumptuous: there is providences permitted that\nwe don't see no use in; but they do happen,--yes, they do. Now, what Jim\nLarned's been a-tell-in' is a good deal like what happened to me once,\nwhen I was up to Umbagog, in the lumberin' business.\u201d\n\n\u201cHalloo!\u201d called out Jim, \u201chere's the deacon's story! I told you every\nman had one.--Give it to us, deacon! Speak out, and don't be bashful!\u201d\n\n\u201cWal, really, it ain't what I like to talk about,\u201d said the deacon, in a\nquavering, uncertain voice; \u201cbut I don't know but I may as well, though.\n\n\u201cIt was that winter I was up to Umbagog. I was clerk, and kep'\nthe 'counts and books, and all that; and Tom Huly,--he was surveyor and\nmarker,--he was there with me, and we chummed together. And there\nwas Jack Cutter; he was jest out o' college: he was there practising\nsurveyin' with him. We three had a kind o' pine-board sort o' shanty,\nbuilt out on a plain near by the camp: it had a fire-place, and two\nwindows, and our bunks, and each of us had our tables and books and\nthings.\n\n\u201cWell, Huly, he started with a party of three or four to go up through\nthe woods to look out a new tract. It was two or three days' journey\nthrough the woods; and jest about that time the Indians up there was\ngetting sort o' uneasy, and we all thought mabbe 'twas sort o' risky:\nhowsomdever, Tom had gone off in high spirits, and told us to be sure\nand take care of his books and papers. Tom had a lot of books, and\nthought every thing of 'em, and was sort o' particular and nice about\nhis papers. His table sot up one side, by the winder, where he could see\nto read and write. Well, he'd been gone four days, when one night--it\nwas a bright 'moonlight night--Jack and I were sitting by the fire,\nreading, and between nine and ten o'clock there came a strong, regular\nknock on the window over by Tom's table. We were sitting with our backs\nto the window. 'Halloo!' says Jack, 'who's that?' We both jumped up, and\nwent to the window and looked out, and see there warn't nobody there.\n\n\u201c'This is curus,' said I.\n\n\u201c'Some of the boys trying to trick us,' says he. 'Let's keep watch:\nperhaps they 'll do it again,' says he.\n\n\u201cWe sot down by the fire, and 'fore long it came again.\n\n\u201cThen Jack and I both cut out the door, and run round the house,--he one\nway, and I the other. It was light as day, and nothin' for anybody to\nhide behind, and there warn't a critter in sight. Well, we come in and\nsot down, and looked at each other kind o' puzzled, when it come agin,\nharder'n ever; and Jack looked to the window, and got as white as a\nsheet.\n\n\u201c'For the Lord's sake, do look!' says he. And you may believe me or not;\nbut I tell you it's a solemn fact: Tom's books was movin',--jest as if\nsomebody was pickin' 'em up, and putting 'em down again, jest as I've\nseen him do a hundred times.\n\n\u201c'Jack,' says I, 'something's happened to Tom.'\n\n\u201cWal, there had. That very night Tom was murdered by the Indians. We put\ndown the date, and a week arter the news came.\u201d\n\n\u201cCome now, captain,\u201d said I, breaking the pause that followed the\ndeacon's story, \u201cgive us your story. You've been all over the world, in\nall times and all weathers, and you ain't a man to be taken in. Did you\never see any thing of this sort?\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, now, boys, since you put it straight at me, I don't care if I say\nI have,--on these 'ere very waters we're a-sailin' over now, on board\nthis very schooner, in this very cabin.\u201d\n\nThis was bringing matters close home. We felt an agreeable shiver, and\nlooked over our shoulders: the deacon, in his berth, raised up on his\nelbow, and ejaculated, \u201cDew tell! ye don't say so!\u201d\n\n\u201cTell us about it, captain,\u201d we both insisted. \u201cWe 'll take your word for\nmost any thing.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell, it happened about five years ago. It's goin' on now eight years\nago that my father died. He sailed out of Gloucester: had his house\nthere; and, after he died, mother, she jest kep' on in the old place.\nI went down at first to see her fixed up about right, and after that\nI went now and then, and now and then I sent money. Well, it was about\nThanksgiving time, as it is now, and I'd ben down to Boston, and was\ncoming back pretty well loaded with the things I'd been buying in Boston\nfor Thanksgiving at home,--raisins and sugar, and all sorts of West Ingy\ngoods, for the folks in Harpswell. Well, I meant to have gone down to\nGloucester to see mother; but I had so many ways to run, and so much to\ndo, I was afraid I wouldn't be back on time; and so I didn't see her.\n\n\u201cWell, we was driving back with a good stiff breeze, and we'd got past\nCape Ann, and I'd gone down and turned in, and was fast asleep in my\nberth. It was past midnight: every one on the schooner asleep, except\nthe mate, who was up on the watch. I was sleepin' as sound as ever I\nslept in my life,--not a dream, nor a feelin', no more'n if I had been\ndead,--when suddenly I waked square up. My eyes flew open like a spring,\nwith my mind clear and wide awake, and, sure as I ever see any thing, I\nsee my father standing right in the middle of the cabin, looking right\nat me. I rose right up in my berth, and says I,--\n\n\u201c'Father, is that you?'\n\n\u201c'Yes,' says he, 'it is me.'\n\n\u201c'Father,' says I, 'what do you come for?'\n\n\u201c'Sam,' says he, 'do you go right back to Gloucester, and take your\nmother home with you, and keep her there as long as she lives.'\n\n\u201cAnd says I, 'Father, I will.' And as I said this he faded out and was\ngone. I got right up, and run up on deck, and called out, ''Bout ship!'\nMr. More--he was my mate then--stared at me as if he didn't believe his\nears. ''Bout ship!' says I. 'I'm going to Gloucester.'\n\n\u201cWell, he put the ship about, and then came to me, and says, 'What the\ndevil does this mean? We're way past Cape Ann. It's forty miles right\nback to Gloucester.'\n\n\u201c'Can't help it,' I said. 'To Gloucester I must go as quick as wind and\nwater will carry me. I've thought of matters there that I _must_ attend\nto, no matter what happens.'\n\n\u201cWell, Ben More and I were good friends always; but I tell you all that\nday he watched me, in a curious kind of way, to see if I weren't took\nwith a fever, or suthin; and the men, they whispered and talked among\nthemselves. You see, they all had their own reasons for wanting to be\nback to Thanksgiving, and it was hard on 'em.\n\n\u201cWell, it was just about sun up we got into Gloucester, and I went\nashore. And there was mother, looking pretty poorly, jest making her\nfire, and getting on her kettle. When she saw me, she held up her hands,\nand burst out crying,--\n\n\u201c'Why, Sam, the Lord must 'a' sent you! I've time, and I've felt as if I\ncouldn't hold our much longer.'\n\n\u201c'Well,' says I, 'mother, pack up your things, and come right aboard the\nsloop; for I've come to take you home, and take care of you: so put up\nyour things.'\n\n\u201cWell, I took hold and helped her, and we put ben sick and all alone,\nhaving a drefful hard things together lively, and packed up her\ntrunks, and tied up the bed and pillows and bedclothes, and took her\nrocking-chair and bureau and tables and chairs down to the sloop. And\nwhen I came down, bringing her and all her things, Ben More seemed to\nsee what I was after; but how or why the idea came into my head I never\ntold him. There's things that a man feels shy of tellin',' and I didn't\nwant to talk about it.\n\n\u201cWell, when we was all aboard, the wind sprung up fair and steady, and\nwe went on at a right spanking pace; and the fellows said the Harpswell\ngirls had got hold of our rope, and was pulling us with all their might;\nand we came in all right the very day before Thanksgiving. And my wife\nwas as glad to see mother as if she'd expected her, and fixed up the\nfront-chamber for her, with a stove in't, and plenty of kindlings. And\nthe children was all so glad to see grandma, and we had the best kind of\na Thanksgiving!\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said I, \u201cnobody could say there wasn't any use in _that_\nspirit's coming (if spirit it was): it had a most practical purpose.\u201d\n\n\u201cWell,\u201d said the captain, \u201cI've been all round the world, in all sorts\nof countries, seen all sorts of queer, strange things, and seen so many\nthings that I never could have believed if I hadn't seen 'em, that I\nnever say I won't believe this or that. If I see a thing right straight\nunder my eyes, I don't say it couldn't 'a' ben there 'cause\ncollege-folks say there ain't no such things.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow do you know it wasn't all a dream?\u201d said my chum.\n\n\u201cHow do I know?' Cause I was broad awake, and I gen 'lly know when I'm\nawake and when I'm asleep. I think Mr. More found me pretty wide awake.\u201d\n\nIt was now time to turn in, and we slept soundly while the \u201cBrilliant\u201d\n ploughed her way. By daybreak the dome of the State House was in sight.\n\n\u201cI've settled the captain's story,\u201d said my chum to me. \u201cIt can all be\naccounted for on the theory of cerebral hallucination.\u201d\n\n\u201cAll right,\u201d said I; \u201cbut it answered the purpose beautifully for the\nold mother.\u201d","title":"Sam Lawson's Oldtown Fireside Stories: With Illustrations","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":57350}