 | Clovernook, or, Recollections of our
neighborhood in the West |  |
TWO VISITS.
1. I.
Two very excellent families were the Knights and Lytles,
neighbors of ours years ago. But they were most unlike each
other in disposition and character. Mrs. Knight was imbedded
in old-fashioned notions, out of which she could not be lifted by
any sort of modern invention, however skillfully contrived;
she was so meek that she considered herself unworthy of the
earnings of her own hands; she was also gloomy and dispondent;
but her friend Mrs. Lytle was altogether different.
Mrs. Knight had consolation for all the ills of life, in the comforting
reflection that it would soon be over, though she sometimes
said she would be happy in it if she had anything to
make her so. As to whether Mrs. Knight would have been
very cheerful under any circumstances, seems to me a little
doubtful, for no one but herself could see anything very adverse
in her fortune. She was really a kind woman at heart, but she
had no sight except for the dark side of things, and this, linked
with extreme modesty, amounting frequently to a painful diffidence,
made her singularly, and, as far as others could perceive,
needlessly wretched. She was the wife of what is termed a
well-to-do farmer, a man whose energy and upright dealing
had won for him the respect of all his acquaintances. When a
young man he had earned with his own hands the land on
which he lived, clearing off the timber, burning the brush,
rolling the logs together, and going through the various privations
and hardships, of which we know so little, except from
the reminiscences of pioneers. When a portion of the land
had been cleared, and fences made, a young orchard planted,
sowing and harvesting he set about building a house; and
when the wheat was stacked and the cornstocks rustling in the
autumn wind, the smoke from as snug a cabin as was to be
found in all the neighborhood, blew across the hills, pleasantly
reminding him of the young and pretty girl whom he had
scarcely learned to call his wife; and so he wrought with more
hope and energy than before. Of course, prosperity mated
herself with him, and the fields grew broader and wider, and
the shadows of the orchard trees covered all the ground, while
flocks of cattle and sheep dotted the pastures. But with these
years I have little to do, only as the light reflected from them
shows that Mrs. Knight had at least a provident husband.
At the time of which I write, they were in the maturity of
life—old people I thought them, for I was not so old as I am
now, and as we grow older we do not look on years as we do
in childhood and youth. How long are the days then, and the
years! it seems as if they would never end; but they pass
more and more fleetly, dropping one after another into the
strangely mingled sea that is behind us, and before we are
aware the shadows are lengthening from the sunset.
There was a sprinkle of gray among the yet thick locks of
Mr. Knight, and the smooth brown hair of the wife and mother
was now under a plain cap, though you might see a few betraying
lines of silver. Their home was no longer in the cabin
in which their first wedded years were passed, for there came
more to dwell in it than there was room for, and, with larger
means, an ampler and more convenient habitation had been
provided. They occupied a plain substantial brick house when
I knew them, having about them all the conveniences of comfort,
if not of elegance, and as I said “daughters and sons of beauty”
to gladden with the freshness of youth the worn experiences
and common realities of life.
“As the husband is, the wife is,” Tennyson says, and though
generally this may be true, it is not always so, and Mrs.
Knight was an exception to the rule. Had she evinced in the
management of her house and children the spirit and tact of
her husband in the management of his affairs, home would not
beautify and adorn and make comfortable the humblest cabin,
she knew nothing about. True, she had been in early life
accustomed to privations, for rigid economy was then necessary,
and nothing beyond actual wants was thought of. But with
more liberal means there came to her no desires transcending
any strict necessity.
The fashion of the times had changed, and the requirements
of people “in society” were greatly enlarged, but Mrs. Knight
remained far behind everybody else, partly that she thought
herself unworthy to fare better than her grandmother, and
partly that life seemed to her too sorrowful a thing to bedeck
with any ornaments, for, as I said before, she had a wonderfully
quick apprehension for what was evil; and perhaps, too, she
was over frugal.
It is a great while—I scarcely dare suggest how long—since
I first visited her, but all that then occurred is as fresh in my
memory as if it were an incident of yesterday. The chimney
tops were in view of my own home, and as Mr. Knight often
passed our house on his way to market, I knew him very well,
and he had often invited me to visit his wife, which I had never
felt at liberty, from her retiring manners, to do. At length,
however, I resolved, at least to show myself friendly, for perhaps,
thought I, the fault has not been all on her side. So, one
pleasant a ternoon in October, I arrayed myself in a gingham
dress, which had been washed and ironed, and with the stoutest
pair of shoes and the oldest bonnet I had—selecting my
costume with a view to the prejudices of the woman I was to
visit—speedily after dinner, which was at one o'clock, set out,
carrying a bundle of sewing which would have served me
at home for a week. I soon reached the farm, and, as I was
passing through the fennel that fringed the roadside, came to
an opening in the fence, where, seated on rails that slanted to
the ground, were two little black-eyed girls, whom I recognized
as the youngest children of Mr. and Mrs. Knight.
“What are you doing here, my little friends?” I said, pausing
a moment; but neither answered a word, and the youngest—
ten years old, perhaps—seized a rough club which lay beside
mostly fine milch cows, peaceably feeding in the pasture which
bordered the roadside.
The older sister, after picking the briars from her toes with a
brass pin, turned her blushing face half toward me, as I
repeated the question, and added, “I am just going to your
house,” and she told me, biting the hem of her sleeve, that
they were “tending the gap,” for that papa and mamma were
both gathering apples in the orchard beyond the meadow, and
the fence was down for them to drive home. As I spoke, I
saw the team approaching, and, leaning on the fence, waited its
coming near us, resolved to tell Mr. Knight of my good
intentions, and await a more opportune season for my visit.
But the good man would not hear a word of my returning
home, and forcing a dozen apples of different kinds into my
hands, he said, “A pretty piece of work, to-be-sure, that we
should be disappointed of seeing you. Rachel happens to be
in the orchard, but there is no need of it—Jane Anne!” he
cried to the little girls, “leave off your chasing them are critters,
and run and tell your mammy that company is at the house
—clicket, you good-for-nothings!” This last piece of advice I
thought quite gratuitous, for they set off at such a rate that
one might have said,
And the swift-winged arrows of light.”
2. II.
Mr. Knight informed me as he opened the gate, that he
should be at the cider-press till supper time, but that Rachel
and the girls would entertain me; and he added an expression
of regret that he was not himself more at leisure. As I
entered the yard, I saw that there were no walks cut through
the sod, and that the grass was trampled away as it chanced,
and beneath the tree (there was but one near the house) trodden
quite bare; and torn pieces of calico, bits of boards, and broken
china, spoke of a demolished play-house. There were no
Ladder” which grew in a broken teapot, beneath the parlor
window.
I rapt smartly at the front door, but received no answer.
Indeed, after listening a moment, I was satisfied I should not
be able to make myself heard, for from a chamber window
came a sound like small thunder. The young ladies were
spinning wool, and running races, as it seemed by the whurr,
buzz and tumult, that came to my ears; so, after a little
reflection, I concluded to sit down on the steps and wait the
coming of Mrs. Knight, but the husband, seeing this, called to
me to go right in and make myself at home, and feeling that
my delay would annoy him, I did so. But as he leaned back
over the three bundles of rye through which the gleam of the
red apples shone, I could see that he was not smiling. The
door opened immediately into the parlor, and seating myself
there, I had some leisure for a survey of the style in which our
neighbors were living. The walls were bare, but white-washed;
the floor was covered with a home-made carpet, striped alternately
with green and red and yellow; six black windsor chairs
stood in a straight line against the wall; a bed with a white
muslin tester was in one corner; and an old-fashioned bureau,
on which lay a Bible and hymn-book, and a breakfast table,
covered with a green and red oil-cloth, completed the furniture,
except that the windows were shaded with highly-colored wallpaper.
On one side of the chimney was a cupboard with glazed
doors, originally designed for china, but filled with a variety of
coverlids, varying in color from the faintest blue to the deepest
red that could be dyed with pokeberries and pumpkin rinds.
All was stiff and angular, and a smell of paint pervaded the
atmosphere.
Many times I fancied I heard the creak of the gate; and at
last, weary of waiting, I went to the window, assured that I
detected steps and voices. Nor was I mistaken, for beneath the
window, wringing a fleece of wool from the dye, and spreading
it out on the grass, was Mrs. Knight. I was about tapping
on the window, to inform her of my presence, when she spoke
so harshly to the children, who were getting their play-house to
and when her work was completed, with hands the color of an
indigo bag, I perceived that she bent her steps in the direction
of the kitchen.
The time I deemed sufficient for any little preparation she
might wish to make went by, and I began to find my position
rather awkward, especially as I could hear her, apparently
engaged in household duties, as though altogether unadvised of
my being in the house. The children now began to climb up
at the window, and looked in at me, laughing and hiding their
heads alternately.
“Is your mother at home?” I asked, thinking still she was
ignorant of my being there. It was some time before I could
get an intelligible response, and then I was told that she was
making bread in the kitchen.
I was half inclined to return home, but remembering Mr.
Knight's efforts toward sociability, I determined to press still
further, and, retreating from my position, I stepped to the door
of the kitchen, and made a sort of half apologetic observation in
answer to the unsmiling face which presented itself; and on
helping myself to a chair, as I was bidden, I followed my uneasy
salutation with some deprecatory remarks, in a subdued tone,
on the circumstances of our meeting, and of the pleasures of
agreeable neighborhood.
The day was warm, the sun streamed against uncurtained
windows, the wood blazed in the deep fire-place, and the numberless
flies blackened the air; but the woman wrought on unmoved.
I drew my chair to the open door, and, unfolding my work,
began to stitch, with great energy, talking the while of such
things as I supposed would interest her. She said little, however,
and that, as it were, by compulsion.
“Are the young ladies well?” I said, after a long silence,
during which I had been examining the array of pots and
skillets she was bringing about the hearth.
“The gals, if you mean them, are well enough,” she answered.
“I have not seen them for a long while,” I remarked.
“No, I guess you havn't,” she replied; “they are no gadabouts.”
I felt rebuked, but added that I was not often abroad myself,
and so should not be likely to meet them.
“They are spinning, probably?” I continued, after a moment.
She did not reply directly, but wiping her face with her
apron, exclaimed, `Marcysakes on us! I wish I was in Joppa
—it's so hot here!”
“Yes, it is very warm,” I said, “but you have cooler
rooms?”
“I have no time to sit in them,” she said, adding presently,
“I don't know as it is any difference about me—I am not fit
for anything but to work, as I know of.”
I attempted a smile, and suggested that she was fit for anything
proper for a woman, I supposed. She took her chin in
her hand and remained silent, looking as though she might be
musing of the dead.
At this point the youngest child, whose timidity was fast
vanishing, and who felt, no doubt, some desire to amuse me,
sprang upon the table, and seizing a newspaper, from among a
number that were strung over a cord attached to the wall near
the ceiling, began showing me a picture of the president, with
which it was embellished.
“Is that the way you sarve your father's papers!” exclaimed
Mrs. Knight; “I'll president you, if you don't put that up.”
Mr. Knight was a man of some intelligence, took a political
newspaper, which he read, and was pretty well versed in affairs
generally, but to the rest of the family, the paper might as well
have been written in Greek, for all they knew about it. It
was not thought possible, indeed, that they could read or understand
anything contained in it, and as soon as it was read
by the man of the house, it was hung above the reach of the
children, who learned to regard it as something especially
designed for old men in spectacles to look at on Sundays. I
felt in part to blame for the misdemeanor of the child, if misdemeanor
it were, as it was on my account she had violated
what seemed to be the law here. Therefore I was not sorry
when, taking a skimmer in her hand, Mrs. Knight went into the
made no explanation or apology. There was thus presented
a fine opportunity for the little girls to display the juvenile
spirit which paternal authority generally kept subdued within
them. They were perhaps a little ambitious too, for the
exhibition of some of their various accomplishments before a
visitor. So, concealing themselves from observation, though
not from hearing, they began.
“It rains, but it don't wet; it's night, but it's not dark;
and if I was at your house I'd go home,” said the youngest
evidently designing that I should make the application.
“Oh, Jane Anne, ain't you ashamed!” exclaimed the eldest,
and then, by way of diverting my thoughts, perhaps, she
repeated a puzzling enigma, which she defied anybody and
everybody to guess: “Four stiff-standers, four down-hangers,
two crook-abouts, two look-abouts, and a whisk-about.”
“Eh! who couldn't guess that?—it's nothing but a cow,”
replied Jane Anne; “I can tell one that's harder: now listen;”
and though probably the sister had heard the riddle a hundred
times before, she was as attentive as if it were the most startling
novelty:
Through an ancient spinning wheel—
Through the grass and in the skies,
If you guess this you'll be wise.”
“Well, then, I am wise, for it's frost,” replied Sally; but I
doubt whether she could have come to this conclusion so
readily from any meaning of the words. “Now I'll tell one
you can't guess:
Little head, and no eyes.”'
“Tongs, tongs!” shouted Jane Anne, and continued:
And all the king's oxen can't draw it up.”
“Who don't know that!” said Sally, disdainfully refusing
to guess.
I need not repeat more of the original and ingenious rhymes,
with which they tested each other's wit, further than to state
party, in the ceremonial of—
English minglish Jonathan Day—
One, two, three—out goes she!”
“Out goes she, I think!” exclaimed the mother, suddenly
appearing, with a great basin of milk in her hands, which,
having disposed of, she took the children, one at a time, by the
ear, and leading them directly before me, in order to make
them the more ashamed, imprisoned one in the pantry, and the
other in the smoke-house, where for the present I leave them.
“Dear me, I don't know what will become of us all,” said
the outraged mother, speaking rather to herself than to me, as
the excitement of the arrest subsided a little.
“Children will be children,” said I, by way of consolation,
and supposing she alluded to them.
She was seated on a low door step, near me but not facing
me, and, with her head dropt on her bosom, continued talking
to the air, something after this wise: “Massy on us! I don't
know what to do, nor what will become of us—all will go to
rack and ruin! Chasing the cows and one thing and another—
strange the child had no more consideration—her new frock—
she has torn a great three-cornered place in the skirt, and I
don't see how we are to make any money—apples don't bring
anything—nothing ever does that we have to sell—butter is
down to a quarter, and we eat half we make—if it wasn't, I
can't begin to count my troubles.”
“I suppose,” I interrupted, “we could all recollect some
troubles if we were to try; but if we look round, we may
commonly see people worse off;” and, to divert her thoughts, I
spoke of the widow Day, a poor woman with two little boys,
one of whom was lying sick.
“Yes,” she answered, “there are people even worse off than
we—but we'll all be done with life pretty soon: it won't be long.”
“It seems only a little time to those who stay here longest,”
I said; “but while we are here, it is best to avail ourselves of
every harmless means of enjoyment in our power, and you
have as much to make you happy as most persons.”
“I can work hard and fare hard, and yet no thanks,” she
replied, looking mournfully on the ground, her thin face full of
untimely wrinkles.
There was no need, that I could see, of her working hard or
faring hard. She seemed to like privation, to feel that sacrifice
was not only a duty, but a privilege.
While I was deliberating what I would say next, a man who
was carrying earthen pumps about the country, presented himself,
and asked whether her husband would not like to procure
one; saying, as he glanced at the well, “I see you use the
hard old-fashioned sweep?”
“Yes, and I expect to use it a good while longer,” she
replied: “we don't want any pump, and if we did, we are not
able to get it.”
“You own this farm, I suppose?” the man said, glancing
over the broad, well-cultivated fields.
“Yes, but money don't grow on bushes,” rejoined Mrs.
Knight, “and we have our taxes to pay, and the children will
all be wanting shoes, the first thing, you know—the frosts
come so airly of late years.”
“I sold one at the white house, yonder, and they are
delighted with it. You have no idea of the ease and comfort
and beauty of the thing; and, so far from adulterating the
water, I think it rather has purifying qualities.”
“The folks in the white house are rich,” said the unhappy
woman, “and able to get a gold pump if they wanted it; but
I told you we had no money to spend for pumps, and I shouldn't
want it if we had, for we once had one that fairly made the
water blue.”
The man assured her his patent stone-ware pump was quite
unexceptionable, and saying he would call when her husband
was in, asked the privilege of lighting a cigar, which he had
been twirling in his fingers during the conversation. As he
stooped over the row of skillets, spiders, Dutch ovens, and
the like, in which bread was rising, before fire, hot enough to
roast an ox, he remarked that he was an agent for one of the
most celebrated cooking-stoves in use.
“Well,” said Mrs. Knight, seeing that he paused for a
the smell of your tobaccar.”
Though the pump had been far better than represented, she
would have had nothing to do with it. The old way, she said,
was good enough for her—she should not want anything long.
She seemed to think whatever lessened labor was a grievous
wrong; and whatever tended to pleasure, was something with
which she or her family by no possibility could have anything
to do.
Modern fashions were also prohibited; the cut of her gown
and the shape of her bonnet had been common ten or fifteen
years before—it required that length of time for the sinfulness
to get out of their cut, I suppose.
There are people, and Mrs. Knight was of them, who stand
aloof and seem to feel themselves fated to stand aloof from the
general interests and enjoyments of life.
If her husband prevailed on her to go and hear a Fourth of
July oration, she dressed her children like miniature men and
women, in long narrow skirt and fur hats, kept them sitting
stiff and upright close beside her during the blessed intermission,
when other children bought beer and gingercakes, and returned
home before the dinner was served under the long green
arbor; and while other girls marched in procession, with white
dresses, and roses in their hair, to partake of the roast pigs and
green peas, her daughters, in dark calico frocks and winter bonnets,
marched to their usual fried pork and sprouted potatoes.
If they were permitted to go to a quilting, they were
instructed to come home in time to milk, and thus were deprived
of all the real enjoyment of the occasion. It was not
for them to remain to the “play-party,” when the quilt was
swung up to the ceiling, and the young men came in, with candy
and cinnamon in their pockets. Many a time had the young
women gone to bed with aching hearts to hear in dreams the
music of—
And the drums are loudly beating,
America has gained the day
And the British are retreating.
The wars are o'er and we'll turn back,
And never more be parted;
That you think will prove true-hearted.”
They might both have been dreaming and spinning in the old
chamber to this day, as indeed one of them is, but for a little
stratagem, in which I had some share. But I am getting before
my story. The prisons of the little girls were opened at last,
and they came forth—each
As if its lid were charged with unshed tears;”
down and catching a couple of chickens for supper, soon produced
the wildest gayety.
“Now go long with you and wring off their heads,” said the
mother, “while I grind my butcher-knife.”
And with streaming hair, flushed faces, and dresses torn, they
bore off their captives to execution as jocundly as they would
have fed them. The fun was presently over, however; one of
the party, in racing, had bruised her naked foot on a stone, and
sitting on the ground she took it in her lap and bathed the injured
place with her tears. “If mother would let me wear shoes,”
she said, “I would not have done it,” and half in anger, half in
sorrow she cried aloud.
“Not another word out of your head,” exclaimed the mother;
“ain't you warm enough without your feet bundled up?”
“Yes; but Mary Whitfield wears shoes and stockings too,
all the time.”
“You can't be Mary Whitfield,” replied the mother; “so
twist up your hair and go out and help your sister hoe the currant
bushes.”
“Dingnation on it all!” cried the child, as the mother adjourned
to the vicinity of the pig-pen to pick the feathers from
her chickens, “I wish I had hurt myself so bad that I could not
work.”
“Come on, Sal,” said Jane, bringing two hoes from the smoke
house, “come on and cut your toe off;” and wiping her face,
bloody with her late murderous work, on her sleeves, she gave
a series of jumps beside the long hoe handles, calling it riding
on horseback, and disappeared in the garden. Sally prepared
to follow, hobbling on her heel to keep the bruised portion of
I called to her to wait a moment. It was not much, but I did
what I could; and when her foot had been bathed and bandaged,
her face washed, and her head combed, the grateful smile
that lit up her countenance made her almost beautiful. I could
not help feeling what a pity and shame it was that all refinement
must be drilled out of her nature, and all its graces
blunted and dimmed, by the drudgery of unwomanly tasks.
She was a much prettier and more springly girl than Mary
Whitfield; but so far from having her natural attractions heightened
by education and any familiarity with refined society, as
hers were, she was growing into womanhood, not merely in rusticity,
but so encrusted with actual vulgarity, that she would
not be able to break out of it by any efforts of maturer years.
Sally Knight sounded as well as Mary Whitfield, for ought I could
see, and with the same advantages the former would have been
vastly superior to the latter; but in her mother's opinion she
was proscribed. True, she was a farmer's daughter, and would
probably be a farmer's wife; but for that reason must she be
debarred all the little accomplishments which chiefly distinguish
civilized from savage life? I thought not. In this democratic
country, where the humblest girl may, under possible circumstances,
aspire to the highest positions, it is a wickedness for parents,
or any one in authority, to fasten a brand of ignominy
on a child, as it were, crippling her energies and circumscribing
her movements for life. If the complexion must be scorched
and roughened, the joints stiffened and enlarged by overtasks,
the mind vulgarized by epithets required or continually used in
coarse employments, let it be at the demand of inevitable misfortune,
not at that of a misguided will.
Mrs. Knight had been mortified when she found her daughters
indulging in the jargon I have reported, and so imprisoned them,
as I have described; but if she had accustomed herself to
spend some portion of the day devoted to scolding the children,
in their cultivation, few punishments of any kind would
have been required. If they had known anything sensible,
they would probably not have been repeating the nonsense
which seemed to please them so. But they had no books
only designed for wise old men and preachers; as for the
newspaper, they supposed it was all one long president's
message, or something of that sort, for none of its lighter
articles did they ever hear, and it was no wonder they grew
tired and fell asleep when required to sit still through the
reading of a congressional speech; and of course they never
touched the paper except to hang it against the ceiling. When
I told Mrs. Knight that I had some prettily illustrated stories
at home which might please her little girls, she said she had
something else for them to do; and when I asked if they were
to go to the new academy, she replied that they had as much
education now as ever their mother had, and besides, they had
not the money to spare, and their troubles were not to be lessened
in any way that she knew of; but if they were, academies
were not built for the like of her girls. She kept so busy
during all the afternoon, that I felt sadly intrusive, but she told
me I could never have been less troublesome than then, if I
had waited twenty years, and with this comforting assurance I
remained to tea.
3. III.
The sunshine was streaming across the porch where I was
sitting, and Mrs. Knight was preading her table, when the
children came galloping breathlessly in, informing her that Mr.
Sisco was coming. Suddenly the wheels ceased their rumbling
and a rap sounded on the front door.
“Mammy, mammy, shall I go?” asked the girls.
“No; if he want's to see folks, let him come where folks
are; go up-stairs and tell your sisters to get on with their
spinning;” and presently the wheels began to rumble, and
the young man came back to the kitchen.
He was evidently returning from a military muster, for a
dashing cockade ornamented his hat, strips of red tape covered
the outer seams of his trowsers, and a blue sash formed his
girdle, and hung in long floats over the scabbard of his sword.
He seemed from his flushed countenance and the bloody spurs
attached to his boots, to have been “pricking hard.” In his
had recently been deprived, and with this he inflicted a series
of sharp quick blows on his lower limbs, which, from their
shrinking and trembling, I could not help believing were quite
undeserving of such treatment. He perhaps intended it as a
penance for the sin he was committing in calling on the young
ladies in a busy week-day afternoon, for doubtless the visit was
designed for them, though he did not mention their names.
Mrs. Knight continued her preparations for supper, neither
making me acquainted with the stranger, nor saying anything
to him herself. His ostensible object was to procure a glass
of water, but from his wistful and embarrassed look I inferred
another motive, and so essayed my powers of detaining and
entertaining him, till Jemima and Hetty should come down.
“A very warm day, sir, for the season,” I said.
“Yes 'am, 'tis very warm.”
“It is time for us to expect the long autumn rains,” I continued,
“but I see no clouds.”
“No, mem.”
I was at a loss what to say, but his regalia suggested:
“Training day, it has been with you, I see.”
“Yes, mem.”
“There is some falling off of interest in these exercises of
late years?”
He made no immediate reply, but soon looked more directly
toward me, and said, “What did you observe?”
“Musters are not so attractive as they used to be.”
“No, mem.”
“I have been inclined to think the most undisciplined soldiers
fight as well as you who are skilled in arms,” I said; but the
compliment disconcerted him, and he abruptly said “Good
evening, mem,” and turned toward the door.
“What is your hurry?” asked Mr. Knight, just returned
home from the cider-press. “Sit down, sit down, and let me
take your hat.” So saying, he carried it off, cockade and all,
into the front room, where, when the windows were thrown
open, we were invited to sit.
“Mother,” he said, when, having performed his ablutions, he
in the world did n't you open the big room before?”
She made no reply; and the good man, having sent Jane
Anne above stairs to tell her sisters to come below, joined us
in the parlor.
“How is the potato crop with you?” he inquired, tipping his
chair against the bed, the starry counterpane of which was
surmounted by the young man's hat.
“Our late potaters are spilt with the rot, and our airly ones
were pretty much eat up with bugs—little yaller and black
fellers. Mammy took a bresh one morning and breshed them
out of the garden patch; it appeared like the whole kentry
would be overrun with them, there was so many, she said,
when they buzzed up.”
“The moles have been at work in mine pretty badly,” said
the farmer; “I wish I knew how to get rid of them.”
“If some dogs were as good to ketch moles as they be to
ketch sheep, you might get shut of them.”
“Why—any disturbance among the folds hereabouts?”
“Ourn was disturbed night-afore last a little, I should think;
we only lost fifteen!” And Mr. Sisco took a large bandanna
from one pocket and placed it in another.
“Is it possible!” exclaimed Mr. Knight; “and you knew
nothing of it?”
“I,” replied the military youth, “slep as sound as a roach,
but mammy said she was awake along in the night, and she
heard Towser bark as cross as he could be, and thought the
fence rattled too, she said; but she was dozy-like, and went to
sleep again, and in the mornin she alowed how if she had got
up she might have seen the dogs, for like enough they had one
of the old ewes down then.”
“Humph!” said Mr. Knight, and really I don't know what
better he could have said; and rising, he brought in a pitcher
of sweet cider, and a small basket of very fine apples.
Meantime the wheels stood still; and from the frequent
and lively snappings of the reel, it appeared that the yarn was
being wound from the spindles. Then came a creaking and
squeaking of the floor, as the bare fect pattered briskly across
young ladies were evidently preparing to descend. In this
opinion I was confirmed when Sally hobbled past the steps
with her bib full of fresh-gathered mullen leaves. Cheeks were
to be made red—there was no doubt about it. Half an hour
later, when the sun burned faintly through the tree tops, Mrs.
Knight took from the nail where it hung, a long tin horn, and
blew as though she meant to be heard half through the
country.
“Now run right along for the cows,” she said; and “forth
limped, with slow and crippled pace,” poor Sally, preceded by
the more nimble and light-hearted Jane. They did n't leave the
warm preeinets of the supper, however, without casting “many
a longing, lingering look behind.”
“Go 'long,” called the mother; “who do you think wants
you?”
Thus depreciated and warned, they skulked by the fenceside
as though they were scarcely privileged to walk directly
and upright, even to drive home the cows. Poor children—
their mother was quite too meek. Unless she taught them to
show in action that they respected themselves, how could she
hope for others to respect them!
Shaming the sunset, were the fiery spots, with jagged edges,
that burned in the cheeks of the young women, as they curtsied,
and shook hands across the plate of chicken; for they had
hurried past the parlor without making any salutation.
The arrangement of their hair was without any regard to
modern fashion; their dresses were neither new nor clean; they
were without stockings, and their shoes were of thick calfskin.
Though naturally intelligent enough, and pretty enough, under
their accumulated disadvantages, the woods certainly seemed to
be the fittest place for them, and when they had said “How do
you do, Mr. Francisco?” and he had replied, “Hearty as a buck
—how do you do yourselves?” there seemed to be nothing further
to say—especially in the terribly restraining presence of
the mother. When she had served the tea, and while the large-bladed
knives were going from hand to mouth, and indiscriminately
from dish to dish, she removed her chair half a yard from
on the dozen pins that were stuck in the upper part of her sleeve.
“What part of the chicken will you have, mother?” said the
husband, raising a piece on his fork, and looking toward her.
She shook her head, still looking at the pins.
“Don't eat the crust,” he said, passing a fresh slice of bread,
“it must hurt your teeth.”
“It's no difference,” she answered.
He next offered her a piece of apple-pie, baked on a red
earthen dish about as large as the full moon; but this she refused,
as also the dough-nuts. “Why, mother, ain't you going to
eat any supper?” he said, really distressed.
“I don't know as it would do any good, any way,” replied the
wife mournfully; and with lips pursed up, she continued to work
at the crust with her two or three front teeth. “Now, girls, go
right along and milk,” she said, as soon as we had risen from the
table.
And, mounting on his steed, the young man went his way, while
the girls, from the milk yard, waved their adieus to him; and
this was all the humanizing intercourse on which they ventured
during the gallant's visit.
I smiled as Hetty began to milk on the left-hand side of her
cow, but my attention was speedily arrested by the stepping on
to the porch of Mrs. Lytle. She looked tidy, brisk and smiling,
and was bearing on her arm a large basket of apples which she
had just gathered; for she was the tenant of Mr. Knight and
lived in the old cabin, with her two daughters, Kitty and Ady.
I could not help contrasting her dress, cheerful demeanor, and the
living interest she seemed to feel in the world, with the meek
despondency of Mrs. Knight, and when she insisted that I should
visit her the day after the next, I readily assented.
The reader must not suppose the Knights representatives of
country people generally—at least, they are not fair specimens
of such as I have known; but I am sorry to say there are some
such unhappy exceptions to the general character of the rural
population in all the farming states in which I have any
acquaintance. The young man I have introduced, is a species
of bumpkin found no where but in the country; nevertheless, it
deal more despicable order of being. Naturally simple-minded,
and with only the blood of a hundred generations of yeomen in
his veins, his thoughts seldom traveled beyond the market town
and the woods where the sun seemed to set, except when he
went to the election, and voted for the ticket which had been
supported by his father.
The lines which divide rusticity from the affluent life in country
places, or the experience of the middle classes in towns, are
very sharply defined; but there are a thousand little redeeming
graces belonging to all humanity alike, though uneducated persons
are hard to be persuaded that every thing pertaining to
gentle pleasures and courtesy, does not necessarily attach only to
the “rich and well-born.” Flowers are God's beautiful and free
gift, and they expand as purely white or as deeply scarlet under
the window of the poor man's cottage as in the gardens of kings.
4. IV.
On the day appointed I prepared for my visit to Mrs. Lytle,
with no very accurately defined expectations of pleasure or pain.
Memories of my late discomfiture kept down any of that pleasing
excitement so common at the prospect of a country visit,
which I might otherwise have felt awaking at the prospect of
enlarging my acquaintance in this part of our neighborhood. In
this work-day world new sensations are exceedingly precious,
and this more especially as the fast-coming shadows of years
give all the groundwork of life a sombre tinge. The circle that
rises from our first plunge in the sea of life is bright and bounding;
but as it widens, the sparkle becomes dull and the motion
heavy and sluggish, till at last it breaks on the shore of eternity.
We learn too soon the sorrowful wisdom that—
The future can but be the past;”
mildew take its place. One after another of our dear ones go
from us, either into new spheres of love and labor, or into that
darkness “where the eye cannot follow them,” and with our feet
stumbling among graves, the golden summer sunshine seems
for the just and the unjust. And pain knits itself with
pain, and complaint joins itself to complaint, till a thankless, if
not reproachful, undertone runs through the world. Mourning
for the lost or the unattainable, our hearts are insensible of the
blessings we have; listening to the low earth for some comfort
yet, we turn a deaf ear to the music from above. The cloud rises
and we forget the eternal splendor of the stars. We have need
of all thy mercy, Oh our Father, for daily and hourly forgetfulness
of thy goodness, for the world is full of beauty, and life,
though never so much vexed with adverse fortune; and this
being is a great thing—great, not only in its final results, and
as it grows to its perfect glory, or dwarfs in the fires of ultimate
wrath, but in its present capacities and powers—only
below Omnipotence. Shall we look abroad on the fashioning
of the Creator—we, the perfectest work of his hands, and
unsay the benediction, “It is very good.” They are wrong
who estimate this wonderful and beautiful existence either as a
mere chance and vapor that the winds may scatter and the
grave undo, or as a hard trial and temptation that it were good
to have past; even taking the saddest view of its narrowness
and darkness and burdens—even, if you will, limiting its
duration to the borders of the tomb, “this sensible, warm
being,” is a good thing. If we do not find it so, the fault is in
ourselves, for in our own perverse hearts is our greatest enemy.
We will not recognize the angels that sit at our hearthstones
while their wings are folding themselves about our bosoms,
but when they are lessening in the azure overhead we exclaim,
How beautiful! and reach forth our longing arms in vain.
We tread on the flowers at our feet; and sigh for the
gardens of paradise. We put from us the heart that is
throbbing with love, and go through the world tracking for
receding steps. Life is good, and I am glad to live, despite
the pain and the temptation and the sorrow; these must be
about it, and there is need that we oppose to them all that
within us which is loftiest and best. The basis of every great
fabric rests in the dark; so, even though the light of love he
gone out, and the star of hope shorn of its first warm splendors,
to work. There are plants hardy enough for the brown
baked earth by the cabin door, and birds to sing on the low
eaves as well as in the beautiful groves that environ palaces.
But all this is a digression.
I selected my toilet with more scrupulous care than on the
occasion of my visit to Mrs. Knight. I knew even my new
bonnet and best silk gown would not be deemed unpardonable
offences against propriety in the estimation of Mrs. Lytle, who
always, despite her disadvantages, looked tidy and smart.
Her daughters, too, Kitty and Ady, whom I had often
remarked at the village church, were in appearance no whit
behind the squire's or the deacon's daughters, except in years;
they were but just coming out, having lately made their debut
at an apple-cutting, where their pretty pink gingham dresses,
white aprons, and quietly agreeable manners, had been themes
of common admiration. True, some people, among whom was
Mrs. Knight, thought “such flirts of girls” were better kept in
tow frocks, and in the kitchen, or at the spinning-wheel; but
the general verdict, and especially that of the young men, was
in their favor. The house in which the Knights now lived, was
substantially built of brick, but with intelligent regard neither
for convenience nor taste; no trees grew about it, and standing
right up in the sun, with its surrounding pigstyes, henroosts,
stables, &c., in full view, it looked comfortless, though sufficiently
thrifty.
The windows of the chamber facing the sun were open as I
passed, and within the young women were pacing to and fro
rapidly, for their wheels sung invariably to the tune of “sixteen
cuts” per day. Hung over the window sills, in the sunshine,
were several small divisions of “rolls,” blue and gray, and in
the side yard, her cap border flying, and smoke blowing in her
face, appeared the mother, raking chips beneath a soap-kettle.
“All work and no play,” was still the order of her life.
In the hollow beyond this scene of rude bustle and hard
strife, I opened a gate, and, following a narrow and deeply worn
path, beside a clear deep brook, I soon found myself in view
of the tenant house—a cabin of two rooms, originally, but
little nook, at the head of the hollow traversed by the stream,
which had its source beneath the grassy mound, joined to the
hill on one side, and extending a little way over the stone wall
and door of slabs, on the other. A rude, irregular fence ran
round the base of the ascent, enclosing a small plot of ground,
with the cabin, and milk-house—the last still and cool, beneath
the mound of turf, and the first covered with vines and hedged
about with trees. How cosy and even pretty it looked, with
the boughs full of red apples close against the wall, and clusters
of black grapes depending from the eaves! The great flaunting
flowers of the trumpet-vine were gone, and the leaves on the
rose-withes beneath the window looked rusty and dull, for the
time of bright blossoms was long past, but the plenteous fruits
atoned for the lost flowers, and the waxen snow-berries, and
the scarlet buds of the jasmine, shining through the fading
leaves, helped to make the aspect of everything beautiful, even
in a forbidding season.
The fence about the yard was rude enough, but currant
bushes grew thick along its side, and over the golden ridge
they made, in crimson curves and tangles glistened the smooth
vines of the raspberry. There was no gate, and, standing on
the stile, by which there was admittance to the yard, I paused
a moment, in admiration of the pleasant sight before me.
The grass was level and pretty, save where it was broken up
for flower-beds—of pinks and hollihocks and poppies—and over
a stump that defined all present arts of removal, trailed the “old
man's beard,” so that what would else have been a deformity
added to the beauty of the scene.
The door of the parlor—as I judged it to be from the pots
of flowers in the windows, and the white curtains—was standing
open, and I could see the bright plaided carpet on the floor and
the snowy coverlid of the bed—for everybody who has been
in western country houses, knows that the parlor is also the
spare bedroom, in such places. It looked snug and homelike,
and I could not help comparing it with the naked and rude
style of things so lately under my observation. Turning in the
direction of my thoughts I saw the little girls, Sally and Jane,
me, they struck up a ditty, which was doubtless meant for my
benefit, and the day being still, and the wind blowing toward
me, I caught the whole distinctly: “Solomon Grundy, born on
Monday, christened on Tuesday, married on Wednesday, sick
on Thursday, worse on Friday, died on Saturday, buried on
Sunday—and that was the end of Solomon Grundy!”
My attention thus diverted, I did not hear the light steps of
the young women who had come forth to meet me, till their
voices spoke cordial welcomes, which seemed to come from
their merry hearts, while the smiles that glowed in their faces
made the atmosphere genial as spring.
The outward index had not been too favorable a voucher,
and that cabin parlor with its flowers and books, scrupulous
cleanliness, and tasteful arrangement, contrasted well with the
showy vulgarity of many more pretending houses, where the
furnishing speaks wealth, and nothing but wealth. The walls
and ceiling were white-washed, green boughs filled the deep
wide fire-place, the open cupboard, with its shining britannia and
pink-specked china, and the table with its basket of apples,
pears, and grapes—how nice it all was, and how suggestive of
comfort! But after all, the chief charm of the place was its
living occupants. The mother was not yet home, having the
previous night gone to market with her landlord—for it must
be remembered that Mrs. Lytle was poor, and did not even
own the cabin which was indebted for all its attractiveness to
her pains. Butter and eggs, and fruits and berries, beside
various things manufactured in the house, the provident woman
carried weekly to town, for which business Mr. Knight kindly
gave her room in his market-wagon; and while she generally
returned with her basket as full as she carried it away, he
returned with his empty. But notwithstanding these expenditures
Mrs. Lytle owed nothing, and though her purse was not
so heavy as her neighbor's, neither was her heart. Her children
had been kept at school for the most part, and she had even
managed to send them two quarters to the new academy, and
to dress them in a style, if less expensive, as neat and pretty
as anybody in the neighborhood. I can see them now as I saw
and white apron, with bare neck and arms, and Kitty in a pink
dress and black apron, till she tied over it a checked one to
assist about the preparation of supper.
“And that is the reason I am so late home to-day,” Mrs. Lytle
said, beginning at the close of her story. “You see I got out
of the wagon just the other side of the school-house, and walked
across to Hathaway's, to see how little Henry was, for I heard
in market that the doctor had given him up. Poor child, he
seemed so sensible, and told me to tell his mother not to cry!”
and wiping her tears, she added, “Mrs. Knight was there, and
you know her way: so they all felt worse than they would have
done. As soon as she looked at Henry, she said he would not
live till morning, and then calling his brother, she told him that
Henry would never work or play with him again; and having
told them two or three times, that all their tears would not
make the child well, she went home to tend her soap-kettle,
leaving directions in reference to being sent for in case she was
needed.”
It was certainly characteristic that at such a time she should
bring forward her hard, dark realities, and needlessly torture
breaking hearts by allusions to the awful necessities of death.
I spoke of my visit at her house, and related some particulars
which tended to restore the cheerful tone of the conversation;
in fact we laughed outright, in view of the restraint and painful
embarrassment which the young women felt in consequence of
the visit of Mr. Francisco in open daylight.
“I hope, mother,” Kitty said, laughing and blushing, “you
will not be so cross when I have a beau, for poor Hetty will
never have a chance to get married I am sure.”
“I hope she will be cross,” said the sister, “if you have such
a clodhopper as he.”
“Come, come, girls,” answered the mother, “Mr. Francisco
is a good worthy young man, and though not given to match-making,
I feel inclined to help them forward—can't we facilitate
their happiness in some way?”
The appeal was to me, and I entered at once into the conspiracy.
Mr. Francisco was to plow a field for Mrs. Lytle the coming
invitation to the girls whose opportunities were so restricted,
to assist in cutting apples at the cottage on a specified afternoon.
The extent of this service cannot be estimated by those who
have never seen or felt the cold straits of division thrown between
themselves and some dear object, by the strict discipline
of parents or guardians, forgetting that they were ever lovers
themselves. But perhaps now and then a modern Hero and
Leander will appreciate it, and even if not, my conscience does
not condemn me, for I verily believe they might never have told
their love but through my harmless stratagem.
But I am lingering too long. With small talk of one kind
and another, and a little harmless gossip, as I have confessed,
the time passed rapidly, and through the vine-shaded window
we saw the heavy mist of red gold hanging over the withering
woods, and black forks of the walnuts darkening or the blood-red
top of the oaks shining through.
The girls were very happy, and chattering like birds, as they
prepared the supper, and great credit it did to their housewifery
when prepared. The broiled chicken bore slight resemblance to
Mrs. Knight's stewed roosters, and the clear, fresh jelly as little
to the candied and crumby fragments which the good woman
called preserves. The bread could not have been whiter, nor the
butter more golden; the cake was just done to a charm, and the
table linen was as white as snow. How well and how pleasantly
I remember it all, though so long ago! the pretty pink
china sparkling in the light of the candles—the two brass candlesticks
scoured, so that they looked like freshly wrought gold,
and our pleasant conversation as we sipped the delicious tea, and
my promise to visit them often.
According to the kindly custom of country people, Ady and
Kitty went “a piece of the way home with me,” telling me some
little secret hopes and fears they had not ventured upon in the
day. It is wonderful what an influence twilight and night exert
upon us; we draw closer to those we like, and sometimes, almost
unawares, give our hearts to their keeping; while from
those we hate or fear, we are a thousand times more repelled
than in the noon. Passion, of whatever nature, strengthens in
knit destinies together, owe their expression to the friendly stars.
And many a blow has been struck that would not have been
given, if the sunlight had shown the murderer clearly where to
do his work.
As we stood beneath the deeply crimson cone of a stunted
ash that grew by the roadside, making our adieus, the stage-coach,
its plethoric sides swinging one way and the other, rumbled past,
hurrying to their various destinations a motley crowd of dust-covered
passengers, and among them I noticed a slight and fair
faced youth, looking back from the window. “The schoolmaster,”
I said, addressing myself to Kitty, who blushed to find
herself detected in returning his earnest gaze, and hastily tied
on the white hood she had previously held in her hand. “I rather
think,” I continued, laughing, “he is all your fancy painted him;
and from the attention with which he regarded us, perhaps we
have, some of us, found favor in his eyes; but I will be generous,
having, as I shall, the advantage of first acquaintance, and
you shall know him as soon as may be.” So, jesting, we parted,
as the first star, large and white, came out above the tree tops.
The doors of the farm-houses stood open, the tables were
spread, and I could see the shirt sleeves busy, as hands were
moving from dish to dish, and the patient mother trying to still
the fretful baby, while she poured the tea. About the barnyards
stood the cows chewing their food, and waiting to be
milked.
5. V.
On my arrival home, I found that my anticipation had been
correct—the young schoolmaster had preceded me, and sat at
the parlor window deep in the mysteries and merits of—
And he stoppeth one of three!”
His manner and salutation were civil enough, and very
graceful withal, and I was struck at once with his beauty,
which was such as imagination gives the poet; but there was
an indefinable something in his manner which made me feel
myself an interruption to his pleasure, even before he resumed
talk about the beauty of the sunset. This, to confess
the truth, was vexatious, for most young ladies are pleased
with but that demeanor which seems to say they are the only
women in the world. The relations in which we stood involved
no obligation on the part of either of us farther than that of
common courtesy; and though, as I said, the young man
silently resumed his book, I felt it my privilege as it was my
pleasure to remain in the parlor, as his own apartment awaited
his occupation when he pleased. Moreover, he interested me,
and perhaps I was not without hope, that when the twilight
deepened a little more, he would begin some conversation. I
wish that with any word painting I could bring his picture
before you, but my poor skill is insufficient, and I cannot hope
to give the faintest idea of that dreamy and spiritual expression
which chiefly made him what he was, the most beautiful person
I had ever seen.
He was a little above the medium height, straight as an
arrow, and of faultless proportions. His hair was of a perfect
and glossy black, and hanging in wavy half curls down his
neck and temples, gave to his face a look almost girlish. His
eyes were very large and dark, but soft and melancholy, and
along the delicate whiteness of his cheek the color ran blushing
whenever he spoke. His hands too evinced his gentle origin.
Closer and closer to the page he bent his head, as ebbed away
the crimson tide in which, an hour ago, the sun had drifted out
of view, and not till star after star came sharpening its edges
of jagged gold in the blue, did he close the volume.
He did not speak, however, when this was done, but locking
his hands together like a child, watched the ashy and sombre
clouds which in the south were mingling into one, for a few
minutes, and then, absorbed, as it seemed, with his own
thoughts, walked slowly in the direction of the wood, that held
in its rough arms the waning splendor that rained off with
every sough of wind.
Every moment the atmosphere grew more sluggish and
oppressive, and the broad dim leaves of the sycamore, that
shadowed the well, drifted slowly slantwise to the ground.
and there was no broken rumble nor quick sharp rattle
to lend terrible grandeur to the autumn's dismal and pitiless
storms, for one of which the night was preparing.
The time was very still, and as I sat on the low mossy doorstep,
I could hear the voices of neighbors half a mile away, as
they hurried the milking, and the rattle of the dry boards
where the apple-sheds were being covered. Distinctly down
the clayey hill, a mile to the south, I heard the clatter of fast-falling
hoof-strokes, then it was lost in the damp hollow and up
the long dusty slope, but I pleased myself with guessing at
what points the horseman had arrived at such and such times,
till almost at the expected moment he appeared on the neighboring
hill, darkening through the lessening light. Holding
the ragged rim of his chip-hat with one hand, he reined in his
fiery sorrel at the gate of our house, and beckoned me to
approach. Before I reached him, or even recognized him, for
he was the young man I had met at Mrs. Knight's, I divined
from the straight rod balancing on the arched neck of his impatient
horse, the melancholy nature of his errand: little Henry
Hathaway was dead. Scarce any preparation was requisite,
and, wrapt in my shawl and hood, I was soon on the way.
Mr. Hathaway's house was nearly a mile south of ours,
and half that distance off the main road, to the west, so that to
reach it most conveniently I struck across the fields. From
the duty before me I shrank somewhat, not from any unwillingness
to lend my aid, but I was young, unused to death, and
half afraid; and when I reached the woods through which my
way led, the rustling leaves beneath my feet seemed to give
out the mournfulest sound I had ever heard. A few steps
aside from my path, sitting on a mossy log, beneath an arbor
of wild grapes, I beheld some vision of mortality, and suddenly
stopping, gazed with intensity of fear. That any sane person
should be in such place at such time, was not very probable,
for at that period our neighborhood was free from those troubled
wanderers who people the dreariest solitudes with the white-browed
children of the imagination, and soften the dull and
dead realities with atmospheres of song. I think, however, it
shape before me with that son of the morning, of whom
heaven disburthened itself so long ago. A shower of wet
leaves rained down on me, for the fine drops were already
drizzling and pattering on the interlocked branches overhead,
as I stood, more from inability to fly, than from courage, before
the object which my fancy alone made terrible—
Stand there silent, stand there steady,”
till another moment that I recognized the schoolmaster. When
I did so, flushing in the wake of fear came anger, and I replied,
“If you intend to enact fantastic tricks of this sort, I pray you
will choose an auditor next time who can fitly repay you—for
myself, I must remain your debtor.” Having spoken thus, I
swept along the rustling leaves, with an air that might have
done credit to an injured princess, as I fancied. Thoughtless
and ungentle as my manner was, it was productive of a maturity
of acquaintance, which greater civility would probably
not have induced; for immediately the young man joined me,
and so sweetly apologized that I could not but forgive him.
Of course he did not at first recognize me more than I him,
and so for a time remained silent under my scrutiny.
Though no longer afraid of shadows, having found one apparition
so harmless, I was not sorry to have the lonesome way
enlivened by the cheerful influence of my new friend's company.
I think, however, neither of us felt any real pleasure in the
other's society, and I may say, neither then nor ever after.
Upon this encounter, we had each felt bound to manifest cordial
feeling, but kept all the while a belligerent reserve force to fall
back on at any moment.
There was about Mr. Spencer—for that was his name—a
distant and measured formality, which I mistook for pride and
self-sufficiency; the sentences came from his thin lips with cold
regularity, as though chiseled in marble; I felt then and
always the disagreeable sensation of an utter impossibility of
saying or doing anything which could in the least interest him.
than he was. Had we both been some years older, I might
have recognized, under the blind and statue-like beauty that
could “view the ripened rose, nor seek to wear it,” the signs
of a passion that had burned itself to ashes.
In interchanges of words, and not of thoughts, we climbed
the fences, walked the logs over the runs, crossed the stubble
land, and struck into the lane where the yellow dust was dimpling
more and more with the steady and increasing rain. As
we drew near the house we became silent, for all about it
seemed an atmosphere of death. Our footsteps, on the moist
earth, did not break the hush; even the watch-dog seemed consciously
still, and, having turned his red eyes on us as we
passed, pressed his huge freckled nose close to the ground
again, whining low and piteously. A few sticks were burning
on the hearth—for the rain had chilled the air—the flames
flickering up, wan and bluish for a moment, and then dropping
down into a quivering and uncertain blaze; there was no crackling
and sparkling, no cheerfulness in it; and seated before it
was the mother, rocking to and fro, her tears falling silently
among the brown curls of the mateless little boy who rested
his head on her knees.
Two women, in very plain caps, and with sleeves turned
back from their wrists, were busying themselves about the
house, and in the intervals of work officiously comforting the
mourner. I could only take her hand in mine; I had no words
to illumine the steep black sides of the grave; in all the world
there was nothing that could fill her empty arms; why should
I essay it? One of the women directed us in a whisper to the
adjoining room. Little Henry was already dressed for the
coffin, and, kneeling beside the hard bed on which he lay, was
Kitty Lytle, combing and curling his hair, that he might appear
to his mother as life-like as possible. Her own rippling
lengths of golden yellow fell forward, half veiling her face,
which, in its expression of earnest tenderness, made her perfectly
beautiful. The young man stepped hurriedly toward the
dead, but his eyes rested on the girl.
On the mantle stood half a dozen empty phials, with small
the death-bed—the impression of his face still fresh in the
pillow. A napkin was pinned over the small looking-glass,
and the table was draped in white.
I wondered to see Kitty do her sad work so calmly, for she
was younger than I, who trembled even to touch the shroud,
but in thought and feeling, as I afterward learned, she had far
outgrown her years, and never lingered from the most painful
duty. While Ady timidly remained with her mother, she had
come through the night and the storm, and in her gentle ministries
of love seemed first to have entered into her proper
sphere.
The sash rattled in the window as the winds went and
came, and across the panes trailed darkly the leafless vines of
the wild rose, but little Henry slept very quietly all the while.
Silent for the most part, and conversing in low tones, when
speaking at all, we sat—young watchers with the dead. Hetty
Knight, who had also preceded me, kept in the dimmest corner,
too bashful to speak in the presence of a stranger, and Mr.
Spencer persisted in remaining, though I had twice informed
him that it was not at all needful, inasmuch as Mr. Francisco
was expected to sit with us. So, stormy and mournful, the
night wore on.
“Miss Hathaway,” spoke a coarse voice—a rough discord to
the time—“he says the coffin will be here by sunrise,” and,
dripping and streaming from the rain, Mr. Francisco entered
the apartment consecrated to silence by that awful shadow that
must ever make heavy the heart, with the shuffling step and
unquiet manner with which he would have gone into his father's
barn. Having thrown himself in a seat, in a graceless fashion
which left his legs drifting off to one side, as though hinged
at the knees very loosely, he asked, in a jocular tone, if we
were all skeert. There was an exchange of smiles and glances
between Kitty and the schoolmaster, as Hetty replied, that for
one, she was never scared before she was hurt. Destitute of
those common instincts of refinement, which are better and
more correct than all teachings, these two young persons fraternized
that night in a way that was visibly annoying to the
would be attributed to cowardice, and, therefore, in mistaken
pride of manhood, was unusually brusque. After some
pretending conversation between himself and Hetty—for they
evidently talked of what they were not thinking—they gradually
relapsed into silence. Leaning her head on the table Kitty had
fallen asleep, and, under pretence of chilliness, the schoolmaster
withdrew to the adjoining room, having first carefully wrapt
my shawl about the pretty plump shoulders of the sleeping
girl: I don't know why he should never have thought that I
might need it, but he did not.
I as heartily wished myself out of the way of the young
lovers as they could wish me, and more especially when, taking
an ear of corn from his pocket, the young man began shelling
off the grains and throwing them, two or three at a time, in the
face of Hetty, whose laughing reproofs were so gentle they did
not correct the offence, and probably were not designed to
do so. I could not make myself into thin air, but I did the
best for them which the circumstances permitted. Taking up
a torn newspaper, the only readable thing I could find, I turned
my face away, and read and re-read a pathetic article of that
sort which seems to have been invented for the first pages of
the country journals. I was not so absorbed, however, as not
to hear the facetious youth address his lady love with, “Did
you ever see a cob that was half red?”
“No,” was the reply; and thereupon, of course, he drew his
chair near Hetty's, as if to exhibit the phenomenon, but to her
surprise he said, “'T other half is red, too!”
“Oh, if you ain't the greatest torment!” said Hetty; and
the jostling of the chairs told of their closer proximity.
“'T is half red, any how,” said the beau; “red as your cheek,
and I could make that redder an what it is!”
Whether the boasted ability was vindicated by experiment,
I do not know; a rustling of capes and collars, and a sort of
playful warfare, were my only means of inference. Presently
the whispers became inaudible, and having read in the paper how
a queen's sumptuous breakfast was removed untasted on the
morning after her divorce, how the plumes failed to hide the
than the vanishing glory—with other interesting particulars
of the mournful story — I nestled beside Kitty and
feigned the sleep which had so softly wooed her, from pain and
all the world of love that fancy may have painted, to the
golden sphere of dreams; and though this pretence of sleep
did not much refresh me, it was all the same to the lovers, and
but for my accommodating artifice they might never have made
our clergyman the promises they did a year thereafter.
Toward morning, listening to the winds as they cried about
the lonesome homestead, and the vines, creaking against the
window pane, where the rain pattered and plashed, I passed
over the borders of consciousness, and woke, not till the lamp
was struggling with the day, that was breaking whitely through
the crimson—the clouds lifting and drifting away, and the rain
done.
In the dimmest corner the two most wakeful watchers still
kept their places, and by the mingling light the schoolmaster
was reading to Kitty, in a softly, eloquent tone, that most
beautiful creation, beginning—
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
All but ministers of love,
And feed his sacred flame.”
his own? or why ran the blushes so often along his cheek, and
why beneath his dark eyes burned those of the listener?
From the cherry tree came the cock, not flapping his wings
and crowing proudly, but with the water dripping from his tail,
drenched into one drooping feather; in the milk-yard were dry
and dusty spots, where the cattle had slept; the doves came
down in flocks, pecking, now themselves and now their scanty
breakfasts; and warm and yellow across the hills came the sunshine,
to comfort the desolate earth for her lost leaves and
flowers. But no one bent over the white bed of little Henry,
saying, “Wake, it is day;” and silently the mother laid her
hand on his forehead, in placid repose under its golden crown
of curls; silently her quivering lips pressed his—and that was all.
6. VI.
But I am lingering too long. Often while the soft hazy
autumn was stretching away to the dreary and chill winter, the
schoolmaster's walk was along the sheltering hollow where,
from the westward, as twilight fell, brightened the lights of
Mrs. Lytle's cabin. Often, too, when the cheery blaze reddened
across the drifted snow without, he smiled among the happy
group at the hearth-stone. And Kitty—“already had his wild
eyes unlocked her heart's springs.” But, though drawn toward
her, I could never believe his heart was much touched; rather to
escape from some haunting phantom than to embrace a new hope,
it seemed to me he sought her. Alas for her, she could not see,
for her own blind love, that it was no rapturous glow that burned
in his cheek; she could not hear, for her own trembling tones, that
there was no fervor in his. If such things even were, I saw them
not. We can scarcely imagine a young and timid girl, giving from
its close folding, the treasure of her affection into the hands of
indifference—but I seek not to uncover from the dust the heart
that was once bright with the insanity of a dream. And for
the living, whether guilty or guiltless, I judge him not. Between
ourselves, the acquaintance never ripened into any sort of confidence.
Sometimes, in the midst of our most earnest conversations,
he would break off abruptly and seek solitude in his chamber
or with the stars; at other times he would answer so vaguely
that I knew he received no meaning from my words. He often
amused his leisure with making sketches in pencil—sometimes
of scenery about the neighborhood, sometimes of the faces of his
pupils; and more than one drawing of Mrs. Lytle's cottage
graced his portfolio; but there was one picture which he seemed
to prize more than all others, returning to it again and again,
and working at it with the most patient and elaborate care. When
I rallied him about it, he said I should see it when completed,
but that time never came; and when I guessed, one day, it was
the portrait of Kitty, he blushed, but in the end shook his head
sadly, and left me alone. The favorite picture was never left on
the table with the others.
When that rough hunter of the young hardy flowers, March,
home with an invalid relation, in the hope that restoration, in
some other clime, would “hang its medicine upon her lips.”
Previously to leaving I visited Mrs. Lytle's cabin. How busy
and cheerful they all were—the girls pruning the lilacs and roses,
and planning the new flower-bed, and the mother arranging a bed
of oat-straw for the tall, awkwardly walking calf, white, and with
a pinkish nose and red specks along its sides, which the dove-colored
heifer, “Beauty,” had just brought home.
We talked gayly at first, partly to conceal our sadness; and
I remember telling Kitty it made no difference about her flowers—she
could not be there to see them bloom; little thinking
how sadly my prophecy would be fulfilled. She and I were become
fast friends, and when I had said good-bye, to the mother
and sister, she tied on her bonnet, as her custom was, to walk
part of the way home with me. We chose an indirect path
through the woods, to protract the sweet sorrow of parting, and
had nearly reached the spot where the last sad word must be
said, when, sitting where the shadows of the naked boughs and
the sunshine flecked the greenly sprouting grass, we saw the
schoolmaster. He was leaning against the trunk of a tree, and
on his knee rested his portfolio. “Let us steal a march on him,”
I said, “and get a glimpse of the cherished picture;” and repressing
our laughter, and on tip-toe, we drew near, and peeping over
his shoulder the secret was revealed. Pained and startled, I retreated
as lightly as I had approached, while, pale and trembling,
Kitty remained transfixed. The schoolmaster was fast asleep,
and the pleasant surprise we meant for him terminated in our
own discomfiture. Without the least intention of doing so, we
had broken over a charmed circle sacred to private sorrow—
the drawing was of a mountain side, with pines and hemlocks
stretching bearded boughs above a grave, beside which the artist
himself was kneeling, and beneath which was written—
Though doomed a little while to part,
Thy grave, God knoweth, is the shrine
Of all the worship of my heart.”
By what strange impulse prompted, or by what authority
had deciphered all.
I pushed back the curls that had fallen over her face, kissed
her forehead, white and damp now, and left her without speaking
a word; love's goldenest dream was breaking and fading
in her heart; though she smiled, it was a smile that brought
tears to my eyes. So we parted.
The fields were checked with furrows, and the corn planted;
the winds chased the waves over the grain fields; the sheep were
plunged in the full-flowing streams of the early summer, and,
shorn thin of their fleeces, bleated along the hills; nature went
on with her work, and was bringing home the autumn to the
music of threshing flails and the dancing of bright leaves along
the woodland, when from my searching for the lost waters of
health, I came back to the shelter of the homestead.
For my summer absence, I regarded every thing with fresh
interest; the shutters of the schoolhouse were closed, and the
rusty padlock hung at the door; just beyond was the graveyard,
and in the corner beneath the willow where the elders had long
grown thick offering vainly their snowy blossoms and shining
berries to the schoolboys, a little space was cleared away, and
the dark pit was waiting for the victim. Two men leaned over
the stone wall, looking weary and impatient toward the north;
they were evidently expecting a funeral, while their spades, sticking
upright in the fresh-heaped earth, waited to do their work.
I would have asked who was dead, but just then between me
and the grave swept a gay train of twenty or thirty equestrians,
with low, clumsy old horses, and tall, gaunt colts already bearing
marks of collars and traces, with stubborn ponies and slim-limbed
pacers—all prancing and trotting and galloping together.
A confused glimpse of the blue and crimson and green velvet
of the side-saddles met my eyes, with smiling faces beneath the
broad-rimmed flats, flapping up and down, and with veils
streaming back, and white dresses gathered up and falling over
the left arm, showing liberally the pretty petticoats of dimities,
and scollops and ruffles. And further, I had some notion of a
dozen or more trimly dressed youths, with bronzed faces newly
apprehended, before the cavalcade disappeared, in a cloud of
dust.
Darkening out of it in the distance came a slow-moving train.
The two impatient men would not be required to wait much
longer. The road was narrow, and on a hill beneath an old oak,
we waited for the procession to pass. It drew nearer and nearer,
and as the foremost wagon stopped in the hollow, I saw plainly
the long slender coffin, from which had slipped partly aside the
folding-sheet. Next came the clergyman's carriage, and beside
the venerable man, his good wife, her loving eyes shrouded from
view; and the carriage held, also, two more comfortless mourners
than they; and as they passed, I trembled to recognize beneath
their black veils Ady Lytle and her mother—Kitty was
gone before.
They were not many who followed her; she was but a young
girl, and the daughter of a poor widow; a few of the near neighbors
were all. The mother, pale and patient, held her baby
close, as the wagon jolted and rattled by, and the young girl
riding on horseback, looked thoughtfully on the sturdy brother
at her side. Behind the rest walked a dozen little boys, now
and then pausing to make curious prints in the dust with their
bare feet, by way of diverting their thoughts. So from the hill
we saw cross each other, the bridal train of Hetty Knight and
the funeral of Kitty Lytle.
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