PREFACE.
I may as well confess, what it would be affectation to conceal,
that I am more than pleased with the generous reception accorded
to this story as a serial in the columns of Hearth and Home. It has
been in my mind since I was a Hoosier boy to do something toward
describing life in the back-country districts of the Western States.
It used to be a matter of no little jealousy with us, I remember,
that the manners, customs, thoughts, and feelings of New England
country people filled so large a place in books, while our life, not
less interesting, not less romantic, and certainly not less filled
with humorous and grotesque material, had no place in literature.
It was as though we were shut out of good society. And, with
the single exception of Alice Cary, perhaps, our Western writers
did not dare speak of the West otherwise than as the unreal world
to which Cooper's lively imagination had given birth.
I had some anxiety lest Western readers should take offense at
my selecting what must always seem an exceptional phase of
life to those who have grown up in the more refined regions of
the West. But nowhere has the School-master been received
more kindly than in his own country and among his own people.
Some of those who have spoken kindly of the School-master
and his friends, have suggested that the story is an autobiography.
But it is not, save in the sense in which every work of
art is an autobiography, in that it is the result of the experience
and observation of the writer. Readers will therefore bear in
mind that not Ralph nor Bud nor Brother Sodom nor Dr.
Small represents the writer, nor do I appear, as Talleyrand said
of Madame de Stael, “disguised as a woman,” in the person of
Hannah or Mirandy. Some of the incidents have been drawn
from life; none of them, I believe, from my own. I should like
to be considered a member of the Church of the Best Licks,
however.
It has been in my mind to append some remarks, philological
and otherwise, upon the dialect, but Professor Lowell's admirable
and erudite preface to the Biglow Papers must be the despair of
every one who aspires to write on Americanisms. To Mr. Lowell
belongs the distinction of being the only one of our most eminent
authors and the only one of our most eminent scholars who
has given careful attention to American dialects. But while I
have not ventured to discuss the provincialisms of the Indiana
backwoods, I have been careful to preserve the true usus loquendi
of each locution, and I trust my little story may afford material
for some one better qualified than myself to criticise the dialect.
I wish to dedicate this book to Rev. Williamson Terrell, D.D.,
of Columbus, Indiana, the Hoosier that I know best, and the
best Hoosier that I know. This is not the place to express
the reverence and filial affection I feel for him, but I am glad of
the opportunity of saying that there is no one to whom Southern
Indiana owes a larger debt. Perhaps my dedication to so
orthodox a man may atone for any heresies in the book.
Brooklyn, December, 1871.
