University of Virginia Library

A PIANO IN ARKANSAS.

We shall never forget the excitement which seized upon
the inhabitants of the little village of Hardscrabble, as
the report spread through the community, that a real
piano had actually arrived within its precincts.

Speculation was afloat as to its appearance and its
use. The name was familiar to every body; but what
it precisely meant, no one could tell. That it had legs
was certain;—for a stray volume of some literary traveller
was one of the most conspicuous works in the floating
library of Hardscrabble; and said traveller stated,
that he had seen a piano somewhere in New England
with pantalettes on—also, an old foreign paper was
brought forward, in which there was an advertisement
headed “Soiree,” which informed the “citizens generally,”
that Mr. Bobolink would preside at the piano.

This was presumed by several wiseacres, who had
been to a menagerie, to mean, that Mr. Bobolink stirred
the piano up with a long pole, in the same way that the
showman did the lions and rhi-no-ce-rus.

So, public opinion was in favor of its being an animal,
though a harmless one; for there had been a land
speculator through the village a few weeks previously,
who distributed circulars of a “Female Academy,” for
the accomplishment of young ladies. These circulars
distinctly stated “the use of the piano to be one dollar
per month.”

One knowing old chap said, if they would tell him
what so-i-rec meant, he would tell them what a piano
was, and no mistake.

The owner of this strange instrument was no less
than a very quiet and very respectable late merchant of
a little town somewhere “north,” who having failed at
home, had emigrated into the new and hospitable country
of Arkansas, for the purpose of bettering his fortune,
and escaping the heartless sympathy of his more
lucky neighbors, who seemed to consider him a very
bad and degraded man because he had become honestly
poor.

The new comers were strangers, of course. The
house in which they were setting up their furniture was
too little arranged “to admit of calls;” and as the family
seemed very little disposed to court society, all
prospects of immediately solving the mystery that hung
about the piano seemed hopeless. In the mean time
public opinion was “rife.”

The depository of this strange thing was looked upon
by the passers-by with indefinable awe; and as noises

unfamiliar, sometimes reached the street, it was presumed
that the piano made them, and the excitement
rose higher than ever—in the midst of it, one or two
old ladies, presuming upon their age and respectability,
called upon the strangers and inquired after their
health, and offered their services and friendship; meantime
every thing in the house was eyed with the greatest
intensity, but seeing nothing strange, a hint was
given about the piano. One of the new family observed
carelessly, “that it had been much injured by bringing
out, that the damp had affected its tones, and that one
of its legs was so injured that it would not stand up,
and for the present it would not ornament the parlor.”

Here was an explanation, indeed: injured in bringing
out—damp affecting its tones—leg broken. “Poor
thing!” ejaculated the old ladies with real sympathy,
as they proceeded homeward; “travelling has evidently
fatigued it; the Mass-is-sip fogs have given it a cold,
poor thing!” and they wished to see it with increased
curiosity.

The “village” agreed, that if Moses Mercer, familiarly
called Mo Mercer,” was in town, they would have
a description of the piano, and the uses to which it was
put; and fortunately, in the midst of the excitement,
“Mo” arrived, he having been temporarily absent on a
hunting expedition.

Moses Mercer was the only son of “old Mercer,”
who was, and had been, in the State Senate ever since

Arkansas was admitted into the “Union.” Mo, from
this fact, received great glory, of course; his father's
greatness alone would have stamped him with superiority;
but his having been twice to the “Capitol”
when the legislature was in session, stamped his claims
to pre-eminence over all competitors.

Mo Mercer was the oracle of the renowned village
of Hardscrabble.

“Mo” knew every thing; he had all the consequence
and complacency of a man who had never seen his
equal, and never expected to. “Mo” bragged extensively
upon his having been to the “Capitol” twice,—
of his there having been in the most “fashionable society,”—of
having seen the world. His return to town
was therefore received with a shout. The arrival of the
piano was announced to him, and he alone of all the
community, was not astonished at the news.

His insensibility was considered wonderful. He
treated the piano as a thing that he was used to, and
went on, among other things to say, that he had seen
more pianos in the “Capitol” than he had ever seen
woodchucks; and that it was not an animal, but a musical
instrument, played upon by the ladies; and he wound
up his description by saying that the way “the dear
creeters could pull music out of it was a caution to
hoarse owls.”

The new turn given to the piano excitement in
Hardscrabble by Mo Mercer, was like pouring oil on

fire to extinguish it, for it blazed out with more vigor
than ever. That it was a musical instrument, made it a
rarer thing in that wild country than if it had been an
animal, and people of all sizes, colors, and degrees, were
dying to see and hear it.

Jim Cash was Mo Mercer's right-hand man; in the
language of refined society, he was “Mo's toady,”—in
the language of Hardscrabble, he was “Mo's wheel-horse.”
Cash believed in Mo Mercer with an abandonment
that was perfectly ridiculous. Mr. Cash was dying
to see the piano, and the first opportunity he had
alone with his Quixote, he expressed the desire that
was consuming his vitals.

“We'll go at once and see it,” said Mercer.

“Strangers!” echoed the frightened Cash.

`Humbug! Do you think I have visited the `Capitol'
twice, and don't know how to treat fashionable society?
Come along at once, Cash,” said Mercer.

Off the pair started, Mercer all confidence, and Cash
all fears, as to the propriety of the visit. These fears
Cash frankly expressed; but Mercer repeated, for the
thousandth time, his experience in the fashionable society
of the “Capitol, and pianos,” which he said “was
synonymous”—and he finally told Cash, to comfort him,
that however abashed and ashamed he might be in the
presence of the ladies, “that he needn't fear of sticking,
for he would pull him through.”

A few minutes' walk brought the parties on the

broad galleries of the house that contained the object
of so much curiosity. The doors and windows were
closed, and a suspicious look was on every thing.

“Do they always keep a house closed up this way
that has a piano in it?” asked Cash, mysteriously.

“Certainly,” replied Mercer; “the damp would destroy
its tones.”

Repeated knocks at the doors, and finally at the
windows, satisfied both Cash and Mercer that nobody
was at home. In the midst of their disappointment,
Cash discovered a singular machine at the end of the
gallery, crossed by bars and rollers, and surmounted
with an enormous crank. Cash approached it on tiptoe;
he had a presentiment that he beheld the object of
his curiosity, and as its intricate character unfolded itself,
he gazed with distended eyes, and asked Mercer,
with breathless anxiety, “What that strange and incomprehensible
box was?”

Mercer turned to the thing as coolly as a north wind
to an icicle, and said “that was it.”

“That IT!!” exclaimed Cash, opening his eyes still
wider; and then recovering himself, he asked to see
“the tones.”

Mercer pointed to the cross-bars and rollers. With
trembling hands, with a resolution that would enable a
man to be scalped without winking, Cash reached out
his hand, and seized the handle of the crank (Cash, at
heart, was a brave and fearless man); he gave it a turn,

the machinery grated harshly, and seemed to clamor for
something to be put in its maw.

“What delicious sounds!” said Cash.

“Beautiful!” observed the complacent Mercer, at
the same time seizing Cash's arm, and asking him to
desist, for fear of breaking the instrument, or getting it
out of tune.

The simple caution was sufficient; and Cash, in the
joy of the moment, at what he had done and seen, looked
as conceited as Mo Mercer himself.

Busy, indeed, was Cash, from this time forward, in
explaining to gaping crowds the exact appearance of the
piano, how he had actually taken hold of it, and, as
his friend Mo Mercer observed, “pulled music out
of it.”

The curiosity of the village was thus allayed, and
consequently died comparatively away; Cash, however,
having risen to almost as much importance as Mo Mercer,
for having seen and handled the thing.

Our “Northern family” knew little or nothing of all
this excitement; they received meanwhile the visits and
congratulations of the hospitable villagers, and resolved
to give a grand party to return some of the kindness
they had received, and the piano was, for the first time,
moved into the parlor. No invitation on this occasion
was neglected; early at the post was every visitor, for it
was rumored that Miss Patience Doolittle would, in the
course of the evening, “perform on the piano.”

The excitement was immense. The supper was passed
over with a contempt, rivalling that which is cast
upon an excellent farce played preparatory to a dull
tragedy, in which the star is to appear. The furniture
was all critically examined; but nothing could be discovered
answering Cash's description. An enormously
thick-leafed table, with a “spread” upon it, attracted
little attention, timber being so very cheap in a new
country, and so every body expected soon to see the
piano “brought in.”

Mercer, of course, was the hero of the evening;
he talked much and loudly. Cash, as well as several
young ladies, went into hysterics at his wit. Mercer,
as the evening wore away, grew exceedingly conceited,
even for him; and he graciously asserted that the company
present reminded him of his two visits to the “Capitol,”
and other associations, equally exclusive and peculiar.

The evening wore on apace, and still—no piano. That
hope deferred which maketh the heart sick, was felt by
some elderly ladies, and by a few younger ones; and
Mercer was solicited to ask Miss Patience Doolittle, to
favor the company with the presence of the piano.

“Certainly,” said Mercer, and with the grace of a
city dandy he called upon the lady to gratify all present
with a little music, prefacing his request with the remark,
that if she was fatigued, “his friend Cash would give the
machine a turn.”

Miss Patience smiled, and looked at Cash.

Cash's knees trembled.

All eyes in the room turned upon him.

Cash sweat all over.

Miss Patience said she was gratified to hear that Mr.
Cash was a musician; she admired people who had a
musical taste. Whereupon Cash fell into a chair, as he
afterwards observed, “chawed-up.”

Oh that Beau Brummel, or any of his admirers could
have seen Mo Mercer all this while! Calm as a summer
morning—complacent as a newly-painted sign—he
smiled and patronized, and was the only unexcited person
in the room.

Miss Patience rose,—a sigh escaped from all present,—the
piano was evidently to be brought in. She
approached the thick-leafed table, and removed the
covering, throwing it carelessly and gracefully aside;
opened the instrument, and presented the beautiful arrangement
of dark and white keys.

Mo Mercer at this, for the first time in his life, looked
confused; he was Cash's authority in his descriptions
of the appearance of the piano; while Cash himself, began
to recover the moment that he ceased to be an object
of attention. Many a whisper now ran through the
room as to the “tones,” and more particularly the
“crank;” none could see them.

Miss Patience took her seat, ran her fingers over a
few octaves, and if “Moses in Egypt” was not perfectly

executed, Moses in Hardscrabble was. The dulcet
sounds ceased. “Miss,” said Cash, the moment that
he could express himself, so entranced was he by the
music,—“Miss Doolittle, what was that instrument Mo
Mercer showed me in your gallery once, that went by a
crank, and had rollers in it?”

It was now the time for Miss Patience to blush; so
away went the blood from confusion to her cheeks; she
hesitated, stammered, and said, “if Mr. Cash must know,
it was a—a—a— Yankee washing machine.”

The name grated on Mo Mercer's ears as if rusty
nails had been thrust into them; the heretofore invulnerable
Mercer's knees trembled; the sweat started to
his brow as he heard the taunting whispers of “visiting
the Capitol twice,” and seeing pianos as plenty as wood-chucks.

The fashionable vices of envy and maliciousness, were
that moment sown in the village of Hardscrabble; and
Mo Mercer—the great—the confident—the happy and
self-possessed—surprising as it may seem, was the first
victim sacrificed to their influence.

Time wore on, and pianos became common, and Mo
Mercer less popular; and he finally disappeared altogether,
on the evening of the day on which a Yankee
peddler of notions sold, to the highest bidder, “six patent,
warranted, and improved Mo Mercer pianos.”