 | CHAPTER II. Home as found |  |
2. CHAPTER II.
Where all heroic, ample thoughts did meet,
Where nature such a tenement had ta'en,
That other souls, to hers, dwelt in a lane.
John Norton.
The village of Templeton, it has been already intimated,
was a miniature town. Although it contained
within the circle of its houses, half-a-dozen residences
with grounds, and which were dignified with names,
as has been also said, it did not cover a surface of
more than a mile square; that disposition to concentration,
which is as peculiar to an American town, as
the disposition to diffusion is peculiar to the country
population, and which seems almost to prescribe that
a private dwelling shall have but three windows in
front, and a façade of twenty-five feet, having presided
at the birth of this spot, as well as at the birth of so
many of its predecessors and contemporaries. In one
of its more retired streets (for Templeton had its publicity
and retirement, the latter after a very village-fashion,
worldly means, five children, and of great capacity for
circulating intelligence. Mrs. Abbott, for so was this
demi-relict called, was just on the verge of what is
termed the “good society” of the village, the most uneasy
of all positions for an ambitious and ci-devant
pretty woman to be placed in. She had not yet abandoned
the hope of obtaining a divorce and its suites;
was singularly, nay, rabidly devout, if we may coin
the adverb; in her own eyes she was perfection, in
those of her neighbours slightly objectionable; and she
was altogether a droll, and by no means an unusual
compound of piety, censoriousness, charity, proscription,
gossip, kindness, meddling, ill-nature, and decency.
The establishment of Mrs. Abbott, like her house,
was necessarily very small, and she kept no servant
but a girl she called her help, a very suitable appellation,
by the way, as they did most of the work of the
mènage in common. This girl, in addition to cooking
and washing, was the confidant of all her employer's
wandering notions of mankind in general, and of her
neighbours in particular; as often helping her mistress
in circulating her comments on the latter, as in anything
else.
Mrs. Abbott knew nothing of the Effinghams, except
by a hearsay that got its intelligence from her own
school, being herself a late arrival in the place. She
had selected Templeton as a residence on account of
its cheapness, and, having neglected to comply with
the forms of the world, by hesitating about making the
customary visit to the Wigwam, she began to resent, in
her spirit at least, Eve's delicate forbearance from obtruding
herself, where, agreeably to all usage, she had
a perfect right to suppose she was not desired. It was
in this spirit, then, that she sat, conversing with Jenny,
as the maid of all work was called, the morning after
the conversation related in the last chapter, in her
snug little parlour, sometimes plying her needle, and
a view of the principal street of the place, in
order to see what her neighbours might be about.
“This is a most extraordinary course Mr. Effingham
has taken concerning the Point,” said Mrs. Abbott,
“and I do hope the people will bring him to his senses.
Why, Jenny, the public has used that place ever since
I can remember, and I have now lived in Templeton
quite fifteen months.—What can induce Mr. Howel to
go so often to that barber's shop, which stands directly
opposite the parlour windows of Mrs. Bennett—one
would think the man was all beard.”
“I suppose Mr. Howel gets shaved sometimes,” said
the logical Jenny.
“Not he; or if he does, no decent man would think
of posting himself before a lady's window to do such a
thing.—Orlando Furioso,” calling to her eldest son, a
boy of eleven, “run over to Mr. Jones's store, and
listen to what the people are talking about, and bring
me back the news, as soon as any thing worth hearing
drops from any body; and stop as you come back, my
son, and borrow neighbour Brown's gridiron. Jenny,
it is most time to think of putting over the potatoes.”
“Ma'—” cried Orlando Furioso, from the front door,
Mrs. Abbott being very rigid in requiring that all her
children should call her `ma',' being so much behind
the age as actually not to know that `mother' had got
to be much the genteeler term of the two; “Ma',” roared
Orlando Furioso, “suppose there is no news at Mr.
Jones's store?”
“Then go to the nearest tavern; something must be
stirring this fine morning, and I'm dying to know what
it can possibly be. Mind you bring something besides
the gridiron back with you. Hurry, or never come
home again as long as you live! As I was saying,
Jenny, the right of the public, which is our right, for
we are a part of the public, to this Point, is as clear as
day, and I am only astonished at the impudence of Mr.
French daughter has put him up to it. They say she
is monstrous arrogant!”
“Is Eve Effingham, French,” said Jenny, studiously
avoiding any of the usual terms of civility and propriety,
by way of showing her breeding—“well, I had
always thought her nothing but Templeton born!”
“What signifies where a person was born? where
they live, is the essential thing; and Eve Effingham has
lived so long in France, that she speaks nothing but
broken English; and Miss Debby told me last week,
that in drawing up a subscription paper for a new
cushion to the reading-desk of her people, she actually
spelt `charity' `carrotty.”'
“Is that French, Miss Abbott?”
“I rather think it is, Jenny; the French are very
niggardly, and give their poor carrots to live on, and
so they have adopted the word, I suppose. You, Byansy-Alzumy-Ann,
(Bianca-Alzuma-Ann!”)
“Marm!”
“Byansy-Alzumy-Ann! who taught you to call me
marm! Is this the way you have learned your catechism?
Say, ma', this instant.”
“Ma'.”
“Take your bonnet, my child, and run down to Mrs.
Wheaton's, and ask her if any thing new has turned
up about the Point, this morning; and, do you hear,
Byansy-Alzumy-Ann Abbott — how the child starts
away, as if she were sent on a matter of life and
death!”
“Why, ma', I want to hear the news, too.”
“Very likely, my dear, but, by stopping to get your
errand, you may learn more than by being in such a
hurry. Stop in at Mrs. Green's, and ask how the people
liked the lecture of the strange parson, last evening—and
ask her if she can lend me a watering-pot.
Now, run, and be back as soon as possible. Never
loiter when you carry news, child.”
“No one has a right to stop the mail, I believe, Miss
Abbott,” put in Jenny, very appositely.
“That, indeed, have they not, or else we could not
calculate the consequences. You may remember,
Jenny, the pious, even, had to give up that point, public
convenience being too strong for them. Roger-Demetrius-Benjamin!”—calling
to a second boy, two
years younger than his brother—“your eyes are better
than mine—who are all those people collected together
in the street. Is not Mr. Howel among them?”
“I do not know, ma'!” answered Roger-Demetrius-Benjamin,
gaping.
“Then run, this minute, and see, and don't stop to
look for your hat. As you come back, step into the
tailor's shop and ask if your new jacket is most done,
and what the news is? I rather think, Jenny, we shall
find out something worth hearing, in the course of the
day. By the way, they do say that Grace Van Cortlandt,
Eve Effingham's cousin, is under concern.”
“Well, she is the last person I should think would
be troubled about any thing, for every body says she
is so desperate rich she might eat off of silver, if she
liked; and she is sure of being married, some time or
other.”
“That ought to lighten her concern, you think. Oh!
it does my heart good when I see any of those flaunty
people right well exercised! Nothing would make me
happier than to see Eve Effingham groaning fairly in
the spirit! That would teach her to take away the people's
Points.”
“But, Miss Abbott, then she would become almost
as good a woman as you are yourself.”
“I am a miserable, graceless, awfully wicked sinner!
Twenty times a day do I doubt whether I am
actually converted or not. Sin has got such a hold
of my very heart-strings, that I sometimes think they
will crack before it lets go. Rinaldo-Rinaldini-Timothy,
my child, do you toddle across the way, and
if it be true that young Dickson, the lawyer, is
really engaged to Aspasia Tubbs or not? and borrow
a skimmer, or a tin pot, or any thing you can carry,
for we may want something of the sort in the course
of the day. I do believe, Jenny, that a worse creature
than myself is hardly to be found in Templeton.”
“Why, Miss Abbott,” returned Jenny, who had
heard too much of this self-abasement to be much
alarmed at it, “this is giving almost as bad an account
of yourself, as I heard somebody, that I won't name,
give of you last week.”
“And who is your somebody, I should like to
know? I dare say, one no better than a formalist,
who thinks that reading prayers out of a book, kneeling,
bowing, and changing gowns, is religion! Thank
Heaven, I'm pretty indifferent to the opinions of such
people. Harkee, Jenny; if I thought I was no better
than some persons I could name, I'd give the point
of salvation up, in despair!”
“Miss Abbott,” roared a rugged, dirty-faced, barefooted
boy, who entered without knocking, and stood
in the middle of the room, with his hat on, with a suddenness
that denoted great readiness in entering other
people's possessions; “Miss Abbott, ma' wants to
know if you are likely to go from home this week?”
“Why, what in nature can she want to know that
for, Ordeal Bumgrum?” Mrs. Abbott pronounced
this singular name, however, “Ordeel.”
“Oh! she warnts to know.”
“So do I warnt to know; and know I will. Run
home this instant, and ask your mother why she has
sent you here with this message. Jenny, I am much
exercised to find out the reason Mrs. Bumgrum should
have sent Ordeal over with such a question.”
“I did hear that Miss Bumgrum intended to make
a journey herself, and she may want your company.”
“Here comes Ordeal back, and we shall soon be
He is worth all my sons put together. You never see
him losing time by going round by the streets, but
away he goes over the garden fences like a cat, or he
will whip through a house, if standing in his way, as
if he were its owner, should the door happen to be
open. Well, Ordeal?”
But Ordeal was out of breath, and although Jenny
shook him, as if to shake the news out of him, and
Mrs. Abbott actually shook her fist, in her impatience
to be enlightened, nothing could induce the child to
speak, until he had recovered his wind.
“I believe he does it on purpose,” said the provoked
maid.
“It's just like him!” cried the mistress; “the very
best news-carrier in the village is actually spoilt,
because he is thick-winded.”
“I wish folks wouldn't make their fences so high,”
Ordeal exclaimed, the instant he found breath. “I
can't see of what use it is to make a fence people
can't climb!”
“What does your mother say?” cried Jenny,
repeating her shake, con amore.
“Ma, wants to know, Miss Abbott, if you don't
intend to use it yourself, if you will lend her your name
for a few days, to go to Utica with? She says folks
don't treat her half as well when she is called Bumgrum,
as when she has another name, and she thinks
she'd like to try yours, this time.”
“Is that all!—You need n't have been so hurried
about such a trifle, Ordeal. Give my compliments to
your mother, and tell her she is quite welcome to my
name, and I hope it will be serviceable to her.”
“She says she is willing to pay for the use of it, if
you will tell her what the damage will be.”
“Oh! it's not worth while to speak of such a trifle;
I dare say she will bring it back quite as good as when
she took it away. I am no such unneighbourly or aristocratical
myself. Tell your mother she is welcome to mine,
and to keep it as long as she likes, and not to say any
thing about pay; I may want to borrow hers, or something
else, one of these days, though, to say the truth,
my neighbours are apt to complain of me as unfriendly
and proud for not borrowing as much as a good neighbour
ought.”
Ordeal departed, leaving Mrs. Abbot in some such
condition as that of the man who had no shadow. A
rap at the door interrupted the further discussion of the
old subject, and Mr. Steadfast Dodge appeared in answer
to the permission to enter. Mr. Dodge and Mrs.
Abbott were congenial spirits, in the way of news, he
living by it, and she living on it.
“You are very welcome, Mr. Dodge,” the mistress
of the house commenced; “I hear you passed the day,
yesterday, up at the Effinghamses.”
“Why, yes, Mrs. Abbott, the Effinghams insisted on
it, and I could not well get over the sacrifice, after
having been their shipmate so long. Besides it is a
little relief to talk French, when one has been so long
in the daily practice of it.”
“I hear there is company at the house?”
“Two of our fellow-travellers, merely. An English
baronet, and a young man of whom less is known than
one could wish. He is a mysterious person, and I hate
mystery, Mrs. Abbott.”
“In that, then, Mr. Dodge, you and I are alike. I
think every thing should be known. Indeed, that is not
a free country in which there are any secrets. I keep
nothing from my neighbours, and, to own the truth, I
do not like my neighbours to keep any thing from me.”
“Then you'll hardly like the Effinghams, for I never
yet met with a more close-mouthed family. Although
I was so long in the ship with Miss Eve, I never heard
her once speak of her want of appetite, of sea-sickness,
or of any thing relating to her ailings even; nor
beaux; I do not think I ever heard her use the word,
or so much as allude to any walk or ride she ever took
with a single man. I set her down, Mrs. Abbott, as
unqualifiedly artful!”
“That you may with certainty, sir, for there is no
more sure sign that a young woman is all the while
thinking of the beaux, than her never mentioning
them.”
“That I believe to be human nature; no ingenuous
person ever thinks much of the particular subject of
conversation. What is your opinion, Mrs. Abbott, of
the contemplated match at the Wigwam?”
“Match!” exclaimed Mrs. Abbott.—“What, already!
It is the most indecent thing I ever heard of!
Why, Mr. Dodge, the family has not been home a fortnight,
and to think so soon of getting married! It is
quite as bad as a widower's marrying within the
month.”
Mrs. Abbott made a distinction, habitually, between
the cases of widowers and widows, as the first, she
maintained, might get married whenever they pleased,
and the latter only when they got offers; and she felt
just that sort of horror of a man's thinking of marrying
too soon after the death of his wife, as might be
expected in one who actually thought of a second husband
before the first was dead.
“Why, yes,” returned Steadfast, “it is a little premature,
perhaps, though they have been long acquainted.
Still, as you say, it would be more decent to wait and
see what may turn up in a country, that, to them, may
be said to be a foreign land.”
“But, who are the parties, Mr. Dodge.”
“Miss Eve Effingham, and Mr. John Effingham.”
“Mr. John Effingham!” exclaimed the lady, who
had lent her name to a neighbour, aghast, for this was
knocking one of her own day-dreams in the head;
“well this is too much! But he shall not marry her,
of laws. A man cannot marry his own niece.”
“It is excessively improper, and ought to be put a
stop to. And yet these Effinghams do very much as
they please.”
“I am very sorry to hear that; they are extremely
disagreeable,” said Mrs. Abbott, with a look of eager
inquiry, as if afraid the answer might be in the negative.
“As much so as possible; they have hardly a way
that you would like, my dear ma'am; and are as closemouthed
as if they were afraid of committing themselves.”
“Desperate bad news-carriers, I am told, Mr. Dodge.
There is Dorindy (Dorinda) Mudge, who was employed
there by Eve and Grace one day; she tells me she
tried all she could to get them to talk, by speaking of
the most common things; things that one of my children
knew all about; such as the affairs of the neighbourhood,
and how people are getting on; and, though
they would listen a little, and that is something, I admit,
not a syllable could she get in the way of answer,
or remark. She tells me that, several times, she had
a mind to quit, for it is monstrous unpleasant to associate
with your tongue-tied folks.”
“I dare say Miss Effingham could throw out a hint
now and then, concerning the voyage and her late fellow-travellers,”
said Steadfast, casting an uneasy
glance at his companion.
“Not she. Dorindy maintains that it is impossible
to get a sentiment out of her concerning a single fellow-creature.
When she talked of the late unpleasant
affair of poor neighbour Bronson's family—a melancholy
transaction that, Mr. Dodge, and I shouldn't wonder
if it went to nigh break Mrs. Bronson's heart—but
when Dorindy mentioned this, which is bad enough to
stir the sensibility of a frog, neither of my young ladies
replied, or put a single question. In this respect Grace
say. Instead of so much as seeming to wish to know
any more, what does my Miss Eve do, but turn to some
daubs of paintings, and point out to her cousin what
she was pleased to term peculiarities in Swiss usages.
Then the two hussies would talk of nature, “our beautiful
nature” Dorindy says Eve had the impudence to
call it, and, as if human nature and its failings and
backsliding were not a fitter subject for a young woman's
discourse, than a silly conversation about lakes,
and rocks, and trees, and as if she owned the nature
about Templeton. It is my opinion, Mr. Dodge, that
downright ignorance is at the bottom of it all, for Dorindy
says that they actually know no more of the
intricacies of the neighbourhood than if they lived in
Japan.”
“All pride, Mrs. Abbott; rank pride. They feel
themselves too great to enter into the minutiæ of common
folks' concerns. I often tried Miss Effingham,
coming from England; and things touching private
interests, that I know she did and must understand, she
always disdainfully refused to enter into. Oh! she is
a real Tartar, in her way; and what she does not wish
to do, you never can make her do!”
“Have you heard that Grace is under concern?”
“Not a breath of it; under whose preaching was
she sitting, Mrs. Abbott?”
“That is more than I can tell you; not under the
church parson's, I'll engage; no one ever heard of a
real, active, regenerating, soul-reviving, spirit-groaning,
and fruit-yielding conversion under his ministry.”
“No, there is very little unction in that persuasion
generally. How cold and apathetic they are, in these
soul-stirring times! Not a sinner has been writhing on
their floor, I'll engage, nor a wretch transferred into a
saint, in the twinkling of an eye, by that parson. Well,
we have every reason to be grateful, Mrs. Abbott.”
“That we have, for most glorious have been our
puff up a wretched, sinful being like Eve Effingham
to such a pass of conceit, as to induce her to think she
is raised above thinking of, and taking an interest in
the affairs of her neighbours. Now, for my part, conversion
has so far opened my heart, that I do actually
feel as if I wanted to know all about the meanest creature
in Templeton.”
“That's the true spirit, Mrs. Abbott; stick to that, and
your redemption is secure. I only edit a newspaper,
by way of showing an interest in mankind.”
“I hope, Mr. Dodge, the press does not mean to let
this matter of the Point sleep; the press is the true
guardian of the public rights, and I can tell you the
whole community looks to it for support, in this
crisis.”
“We shall not fail to do our duty,” said Mr. Dodge,
looking over his shoulder, and speaking lower.” “What!
shall one insignificant individual, who has not a single
right above that of the meanest citizen in the county,
oppress this great and powerful community! What if
Mr. Effingham does own this point of land—”
“But he does not own it,” interrupted Mrs. Abbott.
“Ever since I have known Templeton, the public has
owned it. The public, moreover, says it owns it, and
what the public says, in this happy country, is law.”
“But, allowing that the public does not own—”
“It does own it, Mr. Dodge,” the nameless repeated,
positively.
“Well, ma'am, own or no own, this is not a country
in which the press ought to be silent, when a solitary
individual undertakes to trample on the public. Leave
that matter to us, Mrs. Abbott; it is in good hands, and
shall be well taken care of.”
“I'm piously glad of it!”
“I mention this to you, as to a friend,” continued
Mr. Dodge, cautiously drawing from his pocket a manuscript,
which he prepared to read to his companion,
who sat with a devouring curiosity, ready to listen.
The manuscript of Mr. Dodge contained a professed
account of the affair of the Point. It was written obscurely,
and was not without its contradictions, but the
imagination of Mrs. Abbott supplied all the vacuums,
and reconciled all the contradictions. The article was
so liberal of its professions of contempt for Mr. Effingham,
that every rational man was compelled to wonder,
why a quality, that is usually so passive, should,
in this particular instance, be aroused to so sudden and
violent activity. In the way of facts, not one was
faithfully stated; and there were several deliberate, unmitigated
falsehoods, which went essentially to colour
the whole account.
“I think this will answer the purpose,” said Steadfast,
“and we have taken means to see that it shall be
well circulated.”
“This will do them good,” cried Mrs. Abbott;
almost breathless with delight. “I hope folks will
believe it.”
“No fear of that. If it were a party thing, now,
one half would believe it, as a matter of course, and
the other half would not believe it, as a matter of
course; but, in a private matter, lord bless you, ma'am,
people are always ready to believe any thing that will
give them something to talk about.”
Here the tête à tête was interrupted by the return of
Mrs. Abbott's different messengers, all of whom, unlike
the dove sent forth from the ark, brought back something
in the way of hopes. The Point was a general
theme, and, though the several accounts flatly contradicted
each other, Mrs. Abbott, in the general benevolence
of her pious heart, found the means to extract
corroboration of her wishes from each.
Mr. Dodge was as good as his word, and the
account appeared. The press throughout the country
seized with avidity on any thing that helped to fill its
columns. No one appeared disposed to inquire into
the truth of the account, or after the character of the
great majority of the editors and their readers, as a
sufficient sanction. Few, indeed, were they, who lived
so much under a proper self-control, as to hesitate; and
this rank injustice was done a private citizen, as much
without moral restraint, as without remorse, by those,
who, to take their own accounts of the matter, were
the regular and habitual champions of human rights!
John Effingham pointed out this extraordinary scene
of reckless wrong, to his wondering cousin, with the
cool sarcasm, with which he was apt to assail the
weaknesses and crimes of the country. His firmness,
united to that of his cousin, however, put a stop to the
publication of the resolutions of Aristabulus's meeting,
and when a sufficient time had elapsed to prove that
these prurient denouncers of their fellow-citizens had
taken wit in their anger, he procured them, and had
them published himself, as the most effectual means of
exposing the real character of the senseless mob, that
had thus disgraced liberty, by assuming its professions
and its usages.
To an observer of men, the end of this affair presented
several strong points for comment. As soon as
the truth became generally known, in reference to the
real ownership, and the public came to ascertain that
instead of hitherto possessing a right, it had, in fact,
been merely enjoying a favour, those who had committed
themselves by their arrogant assumptions of facts,
and their indecent outrages, fell back on their self-love,
and began to find excuses for their conduct in that of
the other party. Mr. Effingham was loudly condemned
for not having done the very thing, he, in truth, had
done, viz: telling the public it did not own his property;
and when this was shown to be an absurdity,
the complaint followed that what he had done, had
been done in precisely such a mode, although it was
the mode constantly used by every one else. From
these vague and indefinite accusations, those most implicated
original assertions, by insisting that they had known
all along, that Mr. Effingham owned the property, but
that they did not choose he, or any other man, should
presume to tell them what they knew already. In
short, the end of this affair exhibited human nature in
its usual aspects of prevarication, untruth, contradiction,
and inconsistency, notwithstanding the high profession
of liberty made by those implicated; and they
who had been the most guilty of wrong, were loudest
in their complaints, as if they alone had suffered.
“This is not exhibiting the country to us, certainly,
after so long an absence, in its best appearance,” said
Mr. Effingham, “I must admit, John; but error belongs
to all regions, and to all classes of institutions.”
“Ay, Ned, make the best of it, as usual; but, if you
do not come round to my way of thinking, before you
are a twelvemonth older, I shall renounce prophesying.
I wish we could get at the bottom of Miss Effingham's
thoughts, on this occasion.”
“Miss Effingham has been grieved, disappointed,
nay, shocked,” said Eve, “but, still she will not despair
of the republic. None of our respectable neighbours,
in the first place, have shared in this transaction,
and that is something; though I confess I feel
some surprise that any considerable portion of a community,
that respects itself, should quietly allow an ignorant
fragment of its own numbers, to misrepresent
it so grossly, in an affair that so nearly touches its own
character for common sense and justice.”
“You have yet to learn, Miss Effingham, that men
can get to be so saturated with liberty, that they become
insensible to the nicer feelings. The grossest
enormities are constantly committed in this good republic
of ours, under the pretence of being done by
the public, and for the public. The public have got to
bow to that bugbear, quite as submissively as Gesler
could have wished the Swiss to bow to his own cap,
idols, and the Americans have merely set up themselves.”
“And yet, cousin Jack, you would be wretched
were you doomed to live under a system less free. I
fear you have the affectation of sometimes saying that
which you do not exactly feel.”
| CHAPTER II. Home as found | |