4. LETTER IV.
COUSIN NABBY ADVISES MR. DOWNING TO COME HOME.
Downingville, January 30, 1830.
[ILLUSTRATION]COUSIN NABBY ADVISES MR. DOWNING TO COME HOME.
[Description: 688EAF. Page 061. In-line image. A woman is beinding over a table writing. in her right hand she holds a quill and in her left hand she is hloding a long, thin bottle of ink. There is a flowerpot and some curtains in the background.]
Dear Cousin: If you were only here I
would break the handle of our old birch
broom over your back for serving me
such a caper. Here I have been waiting three weeks for that
cotton cloth you got for the footings; and you know the
meeting-house windows were to have been broke[1] a fortnight
ago, if I had got it. And then I had to tell Sam I was waiting
for some cotton cloth. He tried to keep in with all his
might, but he burst out a laughing so, I'm a good mind to
turn him off. But if I do, you and he will be both in the same
pickle. You had better let them legislaters alone; and if you
can't sell your ax-handles, take 'em and come home and mind
your business. There is Jemime Parsons romping about with
the school-master, fair weather and foul. Last Wednesday
she went a sleigh-riding with him, and to-night she's going
to the singing-school, and he is going to carry her. Last
night she came over to our house, and wanted me to go to
Uncle Zeke's to borrow their swifts, she said, when she knew
we had some, and had borried them a dozen times. I said
nothing, but went with her. When we got there who should
we find but the school-master. I know Jemime knew it, and
went there purpose to have him go home with her. She
never askt for the swifts. Coming home the master askt her
if she had seen your last letter. She said yes, and began to
laugh and talk about you, just as though I was no relation.
She said she guessed them legislaters would try to make a
Governor out of you next, if you staid there much longer.
One of them steers you sold to Jacob Small that week you
went to Portland died t'other day; and he says if we've no
Governor this year he won't pay you a cent for 'em. So you
have lost your steers and Jemime Parsons, jest by your dallying
about there among them legislaters. I say you had
better come home and see to your own business. I s'pose
father and brother Ephraim would like to have you stay there
all inter and tell 'em about the Governors and legislaters,
but aunt wants her tea, and I want my cotton cloth, so I wish
you'd make haste home and bring 'em.
Your loving cousin,
Nabby.
To Mr. Jack Downing.
[1]
Editorial Note.—The law “Down East” required that the intentions of
marriage between a couple should be posted up at the meeting-house by the
Town Clerk two or three weeks before the marriage; and this was called
breaking the meeting-house windows.
