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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/14051-0.txt b/14051-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4c503cb --- /dev/null +++ b/14051-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7151 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14051 *** + +[Illustration: THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER +_(Frontispiece. See page 40.)_] + +The End of the World. + + + +A LOVE STORY, + + + +BY + +EDWARD EGGLESTON + +AUTHOR OF "THE HOOSIER SCHOOLMASTER," ETC. + +WITH THIRTY-TWO ILLUSTRATIONS. + +1872 + + + + +PREFACE. + +[IN THE POTENTIAL MOOD.] + +It is the pretty unanimous conclusion of book-writers that prefaces are +most unnecessary and useless prependages, since nobody reads them. And +it is the pretty unanimous practice of book-writers to continue to write +them with such pains and elaborateness as would indicate a belief that +the success of a book depends upon the favorable prejudice begotten of u +graceful preface. My principal embarrassment is that it is not customary +for a book to have more than one. How then shall I choose between the +half-dozen letters of introduction I might give my story, each better +and worse on many accounts than either of the others? I am rather +inclined to adopt the following, which might for some reasons be +styled the + +PREFACE SENTIMENTAL. + +Perhaps no writer not infatuated with conceit, can send out a book full +of thought and feeling which, whatever they may be worth, are his own, +without a parental anxiety in regard to the fate of his offspring. And +there are few prefaces which do not in some way betray this nervousness. +I confess to a respect for even the prefatory doggerel of good Tinker +Bunyan--a respect for his paternal tenderness toward his book, not at +all for his villainous rhyming. When I saw, the other day, the white +handkerchiefs of my children waving an adieu as they sailed away from +me, a profound anxiety seized me. So now, as I part company with August +and Julia, with my beloved Jonas and my much-respected Cynthy Ann, with +the mud-clerk on the Iatan, and the shaggy lord of Shady-Hollow Castle, +and the rest, that have watched with me of nights and crossed the ferry +with me twice a day for half a year--even now, as I see them waving me +adieu with their red silk and "yaller" cotton "hand-kerchers," I know +how many rocks of misunderstanding and criticism and how many shoals of +damning faint praise are before them, and my heart is full of misgiving. + +--But it will never do to have misgivings in a preface. How often have +publishers told me this! Ah! if I could write with half the heart and +hope my publishers evince in their advertisements, where they talk about +"front rank" and "great American story" and all that, it would doubtless +be better for the book, provided anybody would read the preface or +believe it when they had read it. But at any rate let us not have a +preface in the minor key. + +A philosophical friend of mine, who is addicted to Carlyle, has +recommended that I try the following, which he calls + +THE HIGH PHILOSOPHICAL PREFACE. + +Why should I try to forestall the Verdict? Is it not foreordained in the +very nature of a Book and the Constitution of the Reader that a certain +very Definite Number of Readers will misunderstand and dislike a given +Book? And that another very Definite Number will understand it and +dislike it none the less? And that still a third class, also definitely +fixed in the Eternal Nature of Things, will misunderstand and like it, +and, what is more, like it only because of their misunderstanding? And +in relation to a true Book, there can not fail to be an Elect Few who +understand admiringly and understandingly admire. Why, then, make bows, +write prefaces, attempt to prejudice the Case? Can I change the Reader? +Will I change the Book? No? Then away with Preface! The destiny of the +Book is fixed. I can not foretell it, for I am no prophet. But let us +not hope to change the Fates by our prefatory bowing and scraping. + +--I was forced to confess to my friend who was so kind as to offer to +lend me this preface, that there was much truth in it and that truth is +nowhere more rare than in prefaces, but it was not possible to adopt it +for two reasons: one, that my proof-reader can not abide so many +capitals, maintaining that they disfigure the page, and what is a +preface of the high philosophical sort worth without a profusion of +capitals? Even Carlyle's columns would lose their greatest ornament if +their capitals were gone. The second reason for declining to use this +preface was that my publishers are not philosophers and would never be +content with an "Elect Few," and for my own part the pecuniary interest +I have in the copyright renders it quite desirable that as many as +possible should be elected to like it, or at least to buy it. + +After all it seems a pity that I can not bring myself to use a +straightforward + +APOLOGETIC AND EXPLANATORY PREFACE. + +In view of the favor bestowed upon the author's previous story, both by +the Public who Criticise and the Public who Buy, it seems a little +ungracious to present so soon, another, the scene of which is also laid +in the valley of the Ohio. But the picture of Western country life in +"The Hoosier School-Master" would not have been complete without this +companion-piece, which presents a different phase of it. And indeed +there is no provincial life richer in material if only one knew how to +get at it. + +Nothing is more reverent than a wholesome hatred of hypocrisy. If any +man think I have offended against his religion, I must believe that his +religion is not what it should be. If anybody shall imagine that this is +a work of religious controversy leveled at the Adventists, he will have +wholly mistaken my meaning. Literalism and fanaticism are not vices +confined to any one sect. They are, unfortunately, pretty widely +distributed. However, if-- + +--And so on. + +But why multiply examples of the half-dozen or more that I might, could, +would, or should have written? Since everybody is agreed that, nobody +reads a preface, I have concluded to let the book go without any. + +BROOKLYN, September, 1872. + +"_And as he [Wordsworth] mingled freely with all kinds of men, he found +a pith of sense and a solidity of judgment here and there among the +unlearned which he had failed to find in the most lettered; from obscure +men he heard high truths.... And love, true love and pure, he found was +no flower reared only in what was called refined society, and requiring +leisure and polished manners for its growth.... He believed that in +country people, what is permanent in human nature, the essential +feelings and passions of mankind, exist in greater simplicity and +strength_."--PRINCIPAL SHAIRP. + + * * * * * + +A DEDICATION. + +It would hardly be in character for me to dedicate this book in good, +stiff, old-fashioned tomb-stone style, but I could not have put in the +background of scenery without being reminded of the two boys, +inseparable as the Siamese twins, who gathered mussel-shells in the +river marge, played hide-and-seek in the hollow sycamores, and led a +happy life in the shadow of just such hills as those among which the +events of this story took place. And all the more that the generous boy +who was my playmate then is the generous man who has relieved me of many +burdens while I wrote this story, do I feel impelled to dedicate it to +GEORGE CARY EGGLESTON, a manly man and a brotherly brother. + + + +CONTENTS. + +CHAPTER I.--In Love with a Dutchman. +CHAPTER II.--An Explosion. +CHAPTER III.--A Farewell. +CHAPTER IV.--A Counter-Irritant. +CHAPTER V.--At the Castle. +CHAPTER VI.--The Backwoods Philosopher. +CHAPTER VII.--Within and Without. +CHAPTER VIII.--Figgers won't Lie. +CHAPTER IX.--The New Singing-Master. +CHAPTER X.--An Offer of Help. +CHAPTER XI.--The Coon-dog Argument. +CHAPTER XII.--Two Mistakes. +CHAPTER XIII.--The Spider Spins. +CHAPTER XIV.--The Spider's Web. +CHAPTER XV.--The Web Broken. +CHAPTER XVI.--Jonas Expounds the Subject. +CHAPTER XVII.--The Wrong Pew. +CHAPTER XVIII.--The Encounter. +CHAPTER XIX.--The Mother. +CHAPTER XX.--The Steam-Doctor. +CHAPTER XXI.--The Hawk in a New Part. +CHAPTER XXII.--Jonas Expresses his Opinion on Dutchmen. +CHAPTER XXIII.--Somethin' Ludikerous. +CHAPTER XXIV.--The Giant Great-heart. +CHAPTER XXV.--A Chapter of Betweens. +CHAPTER XXVI.--A Nice Little Game. +CHAPTER XXVII.--The Result of an Evening with Gentlemen. +CHAPTER XXVIII.--Waking up an Ugly Customer. +CHAPTER XXIX.--August and Norman. +CHAPTER XXX.--Aground. +CHAPTER XXXI.--Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice. +CHAPTER XXXII.--Julia's Enterprise. +CHAPTER XXXIII.--The Secret Stairway. +CHAPTER XXXIV.--The Interview. +CHAPTER XXXV.--Getting Ready for the End. +CHAPTER XXXVI.--The Sin of Sanctimony. +CHAPTER XXXVII.--The Deluge. +CHAPTER XXXVIII.--Scaring a Hawk. +CHAPTER XXXIX.--Jonas takes an Appeal. +CHAPTER XL.--Selling out. +CHAPTER XLI.--The Last Day and What Happened in it. +CHAPTER XLII.--For Ever and Ever. +CHAPTER XLIII.--The Midnight Alarm. +CHAPTER XLIV.--Squaring Accounts. +CHAPTER XLV.--New Plans. +CHAPTER XLVI.--The Shiveree. + + * * * * * + +ILLUSTRATIONS. + +BY FRANK BEARD + +The Backwoods Philosopher +Taking an Observation +A Talk with a Plowman +A little rustle brought her to consciousness +Gottlieb +The Castle +The Sedilium at the Castle +"Look at me" +"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas" +The Hawk +"Tell that to Jule" +Tempted +"Now I hate you" +At Cynthy's Door +Cynthy Ann had often said in class-meeting that temptations abounded on + every hand +Jonas +Julia sat down in mortification +"Good-by!" +The Mother's Blessing +Corn-Sweats and Calamus +"Fire! Murder! Help!" +Norman Anderson +Somethin' Ludikerous +To the Rescue +A Nice Little Game +The Mud-Clerk +Waking up an Ugly Customer +Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice +A Pastoral Visit +Brother Goshorn +"Say them words over again" +"I want to buy your place" + + + +THE END OF THE WORLD. + + * * * * * + +CHAPTER I. + +IN LOVE WITH A DUTCHMAN. + +"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a Dutchman! She +might as well as to marry some white folks I know." + +Samuel Anderson made no reply. It would be of no use to reply. Shrews +are tamed only by silence. Anderson had long since learned that the +little shred of influence which remained to him in his own house would +disappear whenever his teeth were no longer able to shut his tongue +securely in. So now, when his wife poured out this hot lava of +_argumentum ad hominem_, he closed the teeth down in a dead-lock way +over the tongue, and compressed the lips tightly over the teeth, and +shut his finger-nails into his work-hardened palms. And then, +distrusting all these precautions, fearing lest he should be unable to +hold on to his temper even with this grip, the little man strode out of +the house with his wife's shrill voice in his ears. + +Mrs. Anderson had good reason to fear that her daughter was in love with +a "Dutchman," as she phrased it in her contempt. The few Germans who had +penetrated to the West at that time were looked upon with hardly more +favor than the Californians feel for the almond-eyed Chinaman. They were +foreigners, who would talk gibberish instead of the plain English which +everybody could understand, and they were not yet civilized enough to +like the yellow saleratus-biscuit and the "salt-rising" bread of which +their neighbors were so fond. Reason enough to hate them! + +Only half an hour before this outburst of Mrs. Anderson's, she had set a +trap for her daughter Julia, and had fairly caught her. + +"Jule! Jule! O Jul-y-e-ee!" she had called. + +And Julia, who was down in the garden hoeing a bed in which she meant to +plant some "Johnny-Jump-ups," came quickly toward the house, though she +know it would be of no use to come quickly. Let her come quickly, or let +her come slowly, the rebuke was sure to greet her all the name. + +"Why don't you come when you're called, _I'd_ like to know! You're never +in reach when you're wanted, and you're good for nothing when you +are here!" + +Julia Anderson's earliest lesson from her mother's lips had been that +she was good for nothing. And every day and almost every hour since had +brought her repeated assurances that she was good for nothing. If she +had not been good for a great deal, she would long since have been good +for nothing as the result of such teaching. But though this was not the +first, nor the thousandth, nor the ten thousandth time that she had +been told that she was good for nothing, the accustomed insult seemed to +sting her now more than ever. Was it that, being almost eighteen, she +was beginning to feel the woman blossoming in her nature? Or, was it +that the tender words of August Wehle had made her sure that she was +good for something, that now her heart felt her mother's insult to be a +stale, selfish, ill-natured lie? + +"Take this cup of tea over to Mrs. Malcolm's, and tell her that it a'n't +quite as good as what I borried of her last week. And tell her that +they'll be a new-fangled preacher at the school-house a Sunday, a +Millerite or somethin', a preachin' about the end of the world." + +Julia did not say "Yes, ma'am," in her usually meek style. She smarted a +little yet from the harsh words, and so went away in silence. + +Why did she walk fast? Had she noticed that August Wehle, who was +"breaking up" her father's north field, was just plowing down the west +side of his land? If she hastened, she might reach the cross-fence as he +came round to it, and while he was yet hidden from the sight of the +house by the turn of the hill. And would not a few words from August +Wehle be pleasant to her ears after her mother's sharp depreciation? It +is at least safe to conjecture that some such feeling made her hurry +through the long, waving timothy of the meadow, and made her cross the +log that spanned the brook without ever so much as stopping to look at +the minnows glancing about in the water flecked with the sunlight that +struggled through the boughs of the water-willows. For, in her thorough +loneliness, Julia Anderson had come to love the birds, the squirrels, +and the fishes as companions, and in all her life she had never before +crossed the meadow brook without stooping to look at the minnows. + +All this haste Mrs. Anderson noticed. Having often scolded + +[Illustration: TAKING AN OBSERVATION.] + +Julia for "talking to the fishes like a fool," she noticed the omission. +And now she only waited until Julia was over the hill to take the path +round the fence under shelter of the blackberry thicket until she came +to the clump of alders, from the midst of which she could plainly see +if any conversation should take place between her Julia and the comely +young Dutchman. + +In fact, Julia need not have hurried so much. For August Wehle had kept +one eye on his horses and the other on the house all that day. It was +the quick look of intelligence between the two at dinner that had +aroused the mother's suspicions. And Wehle had noticed the work on the +garden-bed, the call to the house, and the starting of Julia on the path +toward Mrs. Malcolm's. His face had grown hot, and his hand had +trembled. For once he had failed to see the stone in his way, until the +plow was thrown clean from the furrow. And when he came to the shade of +the butternut-tree by which she must pass, it had seemed to him +imperative that the horses should rest. Besides, the hames-string wanted +tightening on the bay, and old Dick's throat-latch must need a little +fixing. He was not sure that the clevis-pin had not been loosened by the +collision with the stone just now. And so, upon one pretext and another, +he managed to delay starting his plow until Julia came by, and then, +though his heart had counted all her steps from the door-stone to the +tree, then he looked up surprised. Nothing could be so astonishing to +him as to see her there! For love is needlessly crafty, it has always an +instinct of concealment, of indirection about it. The boy, and +especially the girl, who will tell the truth frankly in regard to a love +affair is a miracle of veracity. But there are such, and they are to be +reverenced--with the reverence paid to martyrs. + +On her part, Julia Anderson had walked on as though she meant to pass +the young plowman by, until he spoke, and then she started, and blushed, +and stopped, and nervously broke off the top of a last year's iron-weed +and began to break it into bits while he talked, looking down most of +the time, but lifting her eyes to his now and then. And to the +sun-browned but delicate-faced young German it seemed, a vision of +Paradise--every glimpse of that fresh girl's face in the deep shade of +the sun-bonnet. For girls' faces can never look so sweet in this +generation as they did to the boys who caught sight of them, hidden +away, precious things, in the obscurity of a tunnel of pasteboard +and calico! + +This was not their first love-talk. Were they engaged? Yes, and no. By +all the speech their eyes were capable of in school, and of late by +words, they were engaged in loving one another, and in telling one +another of it. But they were young, and separated by circumstances, and +they had hardly begun to think of marriage yet. It was enough for the +present to love and be loved. The most delightful stage of a love affair +is that in which the present is sufficient and there is no past or +future. And so August hung his elbow around the top of the bay horse's +hames, and talked to Julia. + +It is the highest praise of the German heart that it loves flowers and +little children; and like a German and like a lover that he was, August +began to speak of the anemones and the violets that were already +blooming in the corners of the fence. Girls in love are not apt to say +any thing very fresh. And Julia only said she thought the flowers seemed +happy in the sunlight In answer to this speech, which seemed to the +lover a bit of inspiration, he quoted from Schiller the lines: + + "Yet weep, soft children of the Spring; + The feelings Love alone can bring + Have been denied to you!" + +With the quick and crafty modesty of her sex, Julia evaded this very +pleasant shaft by saying: "How much you know, August! How do you +learn it?" + +[Illustration: A TALK WITH A PLOWMAN.] + +And August was pleased, partly because of the compliment, but chiefly +because in saying it Julia had brought the sun-bonnet in such a range +that he could see the bright eyes and blushing face at the bottom of +this _camera-oscura_. He did not hasten to reply. While the vision +lasted he enjoyed the vision. Not until the sun-bonnet dropped did he +take up the answer to her question. + +"I don't know much, but what I do know I have learned out of your Uncle +Andrew's books." + +"Do you know my Uncle Andrew? What a strange man he is! He never comes +here, and we never go there, and my mother never speaks to him, and my +father doesn't often have anything to say to him. And so you have been +at his house. They say he has all up-stairs full of books, and ever so +many cats and dogs and birds and squirrels about. But I thought he never +let anybody go up-stairs." + +"He lets me," said August, when she had ended her speech and dropped her +sun-bonnet again out of the range of his eyes, which, in truth, were too +steadfast in their gaze. "I spend many evenings up-stairs." August had +just a trace of German in his idiom. + +"What makes Uncle Andrew so curious, I wonder?" + +"I don't exactly know. Some say he was treated not just right by a woman +when he was a young man. I don't know. He seems happy. I don't wonder a +man should be curious though when a woman that he loves treats him not +just right. Any way, if he loves her with all his heart, as I love Jule +Anderson!" + +These last words came with an effort. And Julia just then remembered +her errand, and said, "I must hurry," and, with a country girl's +agility, she climbed over the fence before August could help her, and +gave him another look through her bonnet-telescope from the other Hide, +and then hastened on to return the tea, und to tell Mrs. Malcolm that +there was to be a Millerite preacher at the school-house on Sunday +night. And August found that his horses were quite cool, while he was +quite hot. He cleaned his mold board, and swung his plow round, and +then, with a "Whoa! haw!" and a pull upon the single line which Western +plowmen use to guide their horses, he drew the team into their place, +and set himself to watching the turning of the rich, fragrant black +earth. And even as he set his plowshare, so he set his purpose to +overcome all obstacles, and to marry Julia Anderson. With the same +steady, irresistible, onward course would he overcome all that lay +between him and the soul that shone out of the face that dwelt in the +bottom of the sun-bonnet. + +From her covert in the elder-bushes Mrs. Anderson had seen the parley, +and her cheeks had also grown hot, but from a very different emotion. +She had not heard the words. She had seen the loitering girl and the +loitering plowboy, and she went back to the house vowing that she'd +"teach Jule Anderson how to spend her time talking to a Dutchman." And +yet the more she thought of it, the more she was satisfied that it +wasn't best to "make a fuss" just yet. She might hasten what she wanted +to prevent. For though Julia was obedient and mild in word, she was none +the less a little stubborn, and in a matter of this sort might take the +bit in her teeth. + +And so Mrs. Anderson had recourse, as usual, to her husband. She knew +she could browbeat him. She demanded that August Wehle should be paid +off and discharged. And when Anderson had hesitated, because he feared +he could not get another so good a hand, and for other reasons, she +burst out into the declaration: + +"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a Dutchman! She +might as well as to marry some white folks I know." + + + +CHAPTER II. + +AN EXPLOSION. + +It was settled that August was to be quietly discharged at the end of +his month, which was Saturday night. Neither he nor Julia must suspect +any opposition to their attachment, nor any discovery of it, indeed. +This was settled by Mrs. Anderson. She usually settled things. First, +she settled upon the course to be pursued. Then she settled her husband. +He always made a show of resistance. His dignity required a show of +resistance. But it was only a show. He always meant to surrender in the +end. Whenever his wife ceased her fire of small-arms and herself hung +out the flag of truce, he instantly capitulated. As in every other +dispute, so in this one about the discharge of the "miserable, impudent +Dutchman," Mrs. Anderson attacked her husband at all his weak points, +and she had learned by heart a catalogue of his weak points. Then, when +he was sufficiently galled to be entirely miserable; when she had +expressed her regret that she hadn't married somebody with some heart, +and that she had ever left her father's house, for her _father_ was +_always_ good to her; and when she had sufficiently reminded him of the +lover she had given up for him, and of how much _he_ had loved her, and +how miserable she had made _him_ by loving Samuel Anderson--when she had +conducted the quarrel through all the preliminary stages, she always +carried her point in the end by a _coup de partie_ somewhat in +this fashion: + +"That's just the way! Always the way with you men! I suppose I must give +up to you as usual. You've lorded it over me from the start. I can't +even have the management of my own daughter. But I do think that after +I've let you have your way in so many things, you might turn off that +fellow. You might let me have my way in one little thing, and you +_would_ if you cared for me. You know how liable I am to die at any +moment of heart-disease, and yet you will prolong this excitement in +this way." + +Now, there is nothing a weak man likes so much as to be considered +strong, nothing a henpecked man likes so much as to be regarded a +tyrant. If you ever hear a man boast of his determination to rule his +own house, you may feel sure that he is subdued. And a henpecked husband +always makes a great show of opposing everything that looks toward the +enlargement of the work or privileges of women. Such a man insists on +the shadow of authority because he can not have the substance. It is a +great satisfaction to him that his wife can never be president, and that +she can not make speeches in prayer-meeting. While he retains these +badges of superiority, he is still in some sense head of the family. + +So when Mrs. Anderson loyally reminded her husband that she had always +let him have his own way, he believed her because he wanted to, though +he could not just at the moment recall the particular instances. And +knowing that he must yield, he rather liked to yield as an act of +sovereign grace to the poor oppressed wife who begged it. + +"Well, if you insist on it, of course, I will not refuse you," he said; +"and perhaps you are right." He had yielded in this way almost every day +of his married life, and in this way he yielded to the demand that +August should he discharged. But he agreed with his wife that Julia +should not know anything about it, and that there must be no +leave-taking allowed. + +The very next day Julia sat sewing on the long porch in front of the +house. Cynthy Ann was getting dinner in the kitchen at the other end of +the hall, and Mrs. Anderson was busy in her usual battle with dirt. She +kept the house clean, because it gratified her combativeness and her +domineering disposition to have the house clean in spite of the +ever-encroaching dirt. And so she scrubbed and scolded, and scolded and +scrubbed, the scrubbing and scolding agreeing in time and rhythm. The +scolding was the vocal music, the scrubbing an accompaniment. The +concordant discord was perfect. Just at the moment I speak of there was +a lull in her scolding. The symphonious scrubbing went on as usual. +Julia, wishing to divert the next thunder-storm from herself, erected +what she imagined might prove a conversational lightning-rod, by asking +a question on a topic foreign to the theme of the last march her mother +had played and sung so sweetly with brush and voice. + +"Mother, what makes Uncle Andrew so queer?" + +"I don't know. He was always queer." This was spoken in a staccato, +snapping-turtle way. But when one has lived all one's life with a +snapping-turtle, one doesn't mind. Julia did not mind. She was curious +to know what was the matter with her uncle, Andrew Anderson. So +she said: + +"I've heard that some false woman treated him cruelly; is that so?" + +Julia did not see how red her mother's face was, for she was not +regarding her. + +"Who told you that?" Julia was so used to hearing her mother speak in an +excited way that she hardly noticed the strange tremor in this question. + +"August." + +The symphony ceased in a moment. The scrubbing-brush dropped in the pail +of soapsuds. But the vocal storm burst forth with a violence that +startled even Julia. "August said _that_, did he? And you listened, did +you? You listened to _that? You_ listened to that? _You listened_ to +_that_? Hey? He slandered your mother. You listened to him slander your +mother!" By this time Mrs. Anderson was at white heat. Julia was +speechless. "_I_ saw you yesterday flirting with that _Dutchman_, and +listening to his abuse of your mother! And now you _insult_ me! Well, +to-morrow will be the last day that that Dutchman will hold a plow on +this place. And you'd better look out for yourself, miss! You--" + +Here followed a volley of epithets which Julia received standing. But +when her mother's voice grew to a scream, Julia took the word. + +"Mother, hush!" + +It was the first word of resistance she had ever uttered. The agony +within must have been terrible to have wrung it from her. The mother was +stunned with anger and astonishment. She could not recover herself +enough to speak until Jule had fled half-way up the stairs. Then her +mother covered her defeat by screaming after her, "Go to your own room, +you impudent hussy! You know I am liable to die of heart-disease any +minute, and you want to kill me!" + + + +CHAPTER III. + +A FAREWELL. + +Mrs. Anderson felt that she had made a mistake. She had not meant to +tell Julia that August was to leave. But now that this stormy scene had +taken place, she thought she could make a good use of it. She knew that +her husband co-operated with her in her opposition to "the Dutchman," +only because he was afraid of his wife. In his heart, Samuel Anderson +could not refuse anything to his daughter. Denied any of the happiness +which most men find in loving their wives, he found consolation in the +love of his daughter. Secretly, as though his paternal affection were a +crime, he caressed Julia, and his wife was not long in discovering that +the father cared more for a loving daughter than for a shrewish wife. +She watched him jealously, and had come to regard her daughter as one +who had supplanted her in her husband's affections, and her husband as +robbing her of the love of her daughter. In truth, Mrs. Samuel Anderson +had come to stand so perpetually on guard against imaginary +encroachments on her rights, that she saw enemies everywhere. She hated +Wehle because he was a Dutchman; she would have hated him on a dozen +other scores if he had been an American. It was offense enough that +Julia loved him. + +So now she resolved to gain her husband to her side by her version of +the story, and before dinner she had told him how August had charged her +with being false and cruel to Andrew many years ago, and how Jule had +thrown it up to her, and how near she had come to dropping down with +palpitation of the heart. And Samuel Anderson reddened, and declared +that he would protect his wife from such insults. The notion that he +protected his wife was a pleasant fiction of the little man's, which +received a generous encouragement at the hands of his wife. It was a +favorite trick of hers to throw herself, in a metaphorical way, at his +feet, a helpless woman, and in her feebleness implore his protection. +And Samuel felt all the courage of knighthood in defending his +inoffensive wife. Under cover of this fiction, so flattering to the +vanity of an overawed husband, she had managed at one time or another to +embroil him with almost all the neighbors, and his refusal to join +fences had resulted in that crooked arrangement known as a "devil's +lane" on three sides of his farm. + +Julia dared not stay away from dinner, which was miserable enough. She +did not venture so much as to look at August, who sat opposite her, and +who was the most unhappy person at the table, because he did not know +what all the unhappiness was about. Mr. Anderson's brow foreboded a +storm, Mrs. Anderson's face was full of an earthquake, Cynthy Ann was +sitting in shadow, and Julia's countenance perplexed him. Whether she +was angry with him or not, he could not be sure. Of one thing he was +certain: she was suffering a great deal, and that was enough to make him +exceedingly unhappy. + +Sitting through his hurried meal in this atmosphere surcharged with +domestic electricity, he got the notion--he could hardly tell how--that +all this lowering of the sky had something to do with him. What had he +done? Nothing. His closest self-examination told him that he had done no +wrong. But his spirits were depressed, and his sensitive conscience +condemned him for some unknown crime that had brought about all this +disturbance of the elements. The ham did not seem very good, the cabbage +he could not eat, the corn-dodger choked him, he had no desire to wait +for the pie. He abridged his meal, and went out to the barn to keep +company with his horses and his misery until it should be time to return +to his plow. + +Julia sat and sewed in that tedious afternoon. She would have liked one +more interview with August before his departure. Looking through the +open hall, she saw him leave the barn and go toward his plowing. Not +that she looked up. Hawk never watched chicken more closely than Mrs. +Anderson watched poor Jule. But out of the corners of her eyes Julia saw +him drive his horses before him from the stable. At the field in which +he worked was on the other side of the house from where she sat she +could not so much as catch a glimpse of him as he held his plow on its +steady course. She wished she might have helped Cynthy Ann in the +kitchen, for then she could have seen him, but there was no chance for +such a transfer. + +Thus the tedious afternoon wore away, and just as the sun was settling +down so that the shadow of the elm in the front-yard stretched across +the road into the cow pasture, the dead silence was broken. Julia had +been wishing that somebody would speak. Her mother's sulky +speechlessness was worse than her scolding, and Julia had even wished +her to resume her storming. But the silence was broken by Cynthy Ann, +who came into the hall and called, "Jule, I wish you would go to the +barn and gether the eggs; I want to make some cake." + +Every evening of her life Julia gathered the eggs, and there was nothing +uncommon in Cynthy Ann's making cake, so that nothing could be more +innocent than this request. Julia sat opposite the front-door, her +mother sat farther along. Julia could see the face of Cynthy Ann. Her +mother could only hear the voice, which was dry and commonplace enough. +Julia thought she detected something peculiar in Cynthy's manner. She +would as soon have thought of the big oak gate-posts with their round +ball-like heads telegraphing her in a sly way, as to have suspected any +such craft on the part of Cynthy Ann, who was a good, pious, +simple-hearted, Methodist old maid, strict with herself, and censorious +toward others. But there stood Cynthy making some sort of gesture, which +Julia took to mean that she was to go quick. She did not dare to show +any eagerness. She laid down her work, and moved away listlessly. And +evidently she had been too slow. For if August had been in sight when +Cynthy Ann called her, he had now disappeared on the other side of the +hill. She loitered along, hoping that he would come in sight, but he did +not, and then she almost smiled to think how foolish she had been in +imagining that Cynthy Ann had any interest in her love affair. Doubtless +Cynthy sided with her mother. + +And so she climbed from mow to mow gathering the eggs. No place is +sweeter than a mow, no occupation can be more delightful than gathering +the fresh eggs--great glorious pearls, more beautiful than any that men +dive for, despised only because they are so common and so useful! But +Julia, gliding about noiselessly, did not think much of the eggs, did +not give much attention to the hens scratching for wheat kernels amongst +the straw, nor to the barn swallows chattering over the adobe dwellings +which they were building among the rafters above her. She had often +listened to the love-talk of these last, but now her heart was too heavy +to hear. She slid down to the edge of one of the mows, and sat there a +few feet above the threshing-floor with her bonnet in her hand, looking +off sadly and vacantly. It was pleasant to sit here alone and think, +without the feeling that her mother was penetrating her thoughts. + +A little rustle brought her to consciousness. Her face was fiery red in +a minute. There, in one corner of the threshing-floor, stood August, +gazing at her. He had come into the barn to find a single-tree in place +of one which had broken. While he was looking for it, Julia had come, +and he had stood and looked, unable to decide whether to speak or not, +uncertain how deeply she might be offended, since she had never once let +her eyes rest on him at dinner. And when she had come to the edge of the +mow and stopped there in a reverie, August had been utterly spell-bound. + +A minute she blushed. Then, perceiving her opportunity, she dropped +herself to the floor and walked up to August. + +"August, you are to be turned off to-morrow night." + +"What have I done? Anything wrong?" + +"No." + +"Why do they send me away?" + +"Because--because--" Julia stopped. + +But silence is often better than speech. A sudden intelligence came +into the blue eyes of August. "They turn me off because I love Jule +Anderson." + +[Illustration: A LITTLE RUSTLE BROUGHT HER TO CONSCIOUSNESS.] + +Julia blushed just a little. + +"I will love her all the same when I am gone. I will always love her." + +Julia did not know what to say to this passionate speech, so she +contented herself with looking a little grateful and very foolish. + +"But I am only a poor boy, and a Dutchman at that"--he said this +bitterly--"but if you will wait, Jule, I will show them I am of some +account. Not good enough for you, but good enough for _them_. +You will--" + +"I will wait--_forever_--for _you_, Gus." Her head was down, and her +voice could hardly be heard. "Good-by." She stretched out her hand, and +he took it trembling. + +"Wait a minute." He dropped the hand, and taking a pencil wrote on a +beam: + +"March 18th, 1843." + +"There, that's to remember the Dutchman by." + +"Don't call yourself a Dutchman, August. One day in school, when I was +sitting opposite to you, I learned this definition, 'August: grand, +magnificent,' and I looked at you and said, Yes, that he is. August is +grand and magnificent, and that's what you are. You're just grand!" + +I do not think he was to blame. I am sure he was not responsible. It was +done so quickly. He kissed her forehead and then her lips, and said +good-by and was gone. And she, with her apron full of eggs and her +cheeks very red--it makes one warm to climb--went back to the house, +resolved in some way to thank Cynthy Ann for sending her; but Cynthy +Ann's face was so serious and austere in its look that Julia concluded +she must have been mistaken, Cynthy Ann couldn't have known that August +was in the barn. For all she said was: + +"You got a right smart lot of eggs, didn't you? The hens is beginnin' to +lay more peart since the warm spell sot in." + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +A COUNTER-IRRITANT. + +"Vot you kits doornt off vor? Hey?" + +Gottlieb Wehle always spoke English, or what he called English, when he +was angry. + +"Vot for? Hey?" + +All the way home from Anderson's on that Saturday night, August had +been, in imagination, listening to the rough voice of his honest father +asking this question, and he had been trying to find a satisfactory +answer to it. He might say that Mr. Anderson did not want to keep a hand +any longer. But that would not be true. And a young man with August's +clear blue eyes was not likely to lie. + +"Vot vor ton't you not shpeak? Can't you virshta blain Eenglish ven you +hears it? Hey? You a'n't no teef vot shteels I shposes, unt you ton't +kit no troonks mit vishky? Vot you too tat you pe shamt of? Pin lazin' +rount? Kon you nicht Eenglish shprachen? Oot mit id do vonst!" + +"I did not do anything to be ashamed of," said August. And yet he looked +ashamed. + +"You tidn't pe no shamt, hey? You tidn't! Vot vor you loogs so leig a +teef in der bentenshry? Vot for you sprachen not mit me ven ich sprachs +der blainest zort ov Eenglish mit you? You kooms sneaggin heim Zaturtay +nocht leig a tog vots kot kigt, unt's got his dail dween his leks; and +ven I aks you in blain Eenglish vot's der madder, you loogs zheepish +leig, und says you a'n't tun nodin. I zay you tun sompin. If you a'n't +tun nodin den, vy don't you dell me vot it is dat you has tun? Hey?" + +[Illustration: GOTTLIEB.] + +All this time August found that it was getting harder and harder to tell +his father the real state of the case. But the old man, seeing that he +prevailed nothing, took a cajoling tone. + +"Koom, August, mine knabe, ton't shtand dare leig a vool. Vot tit +Anterson zay ven he shent you avay?" + +"He said that I'd been seen a-talking to his daughter, Jule Anderson." + +"Vell, you nebber said no hoorm doo Shule, tid you? If I dought you +said vot you zhoodn't zay doo Shule, I vood shust drash you on der +shpot! Tid you gwarl mit Shule, already?" + +"Quarrel with Jule! She's the last person in the world I'd think of +quarreling with. She's as good as--" + +"Oh! you pe in lieb mit Shule! You vool, you! Is dat all dat I raise you +vor? I dells you, unt dells you, unt _dells_ you to sprach nodin put +Deutsche, unt to marry a kood Deutsche vrau vot kood sprach mit you, unt +now you koes right shtraight off unt kits knee-teep in lieb mit a vool +of a Yangee kirl! You doo ant pe doornt off!" + +August's countenance brightened. All the way home he had felt that it +was somehow an unpardonable sin to be a Dutchman. Anderson had spoken +hardly to him in dismissing him, and now it was a great comfort to find +that his father returned the contempt of the Yankees at its full value. +All the conceit was not on the side of the Yankees. It was at least an +open question which was the most disgraced, he or Julia, by their little +love affair. + +But more comforting still was the quiet look of his sweet-faced mother, +who, moving about among her throng of children like a hen with more +chickens than she can hover[1], never forgot to be patient and +affectionate. If there had been a look of reproach on the face of the +mother, it would have been the hardest trial of all. But there was that +in her eyes--the dear Moravian mother--that gave courage to August. The +mother was an outside conscience, and now as Gottlieb, who had lapsed +into German for his wife's benefit, rattled on his denunciation of this +Cannanitish Yankee, with whom his son was in love, the son looked every +now and then into the eyes, the still German eyes of the mother, and +rejoiced that he saw there no reflection of his father's rebuke. The +older Wehle presently resumed his English, such as it was, as better +adapted to scolding. Whether he thought to make his children love German +by abusing them in English, I do not know, but it was his habit. + +[Footnote 1: Not until my attention was called to this word in the proof +did I know that in this sense it is a provincialism. It is so used, at +least in half the country, and yet neither of our American +dictionaries has it.] + +"I dells you tese Yangees is Yangees. Dere neber voz put shust von cood +vor zompin. Antrew Antershon is von. He shtaid mit us ven ve vos all +zick, unt he is zhust so cood as if he was porn in Deutschland. Put all +de rest is Yangees. Marry a Deutsche vrau vot's kot cood sense to ede +kraut unt shleep unter vedder peds ven it's kalt. Put shust led de +Yangees pe Yangees." + +Seeing August put on his hat and go to the door, he called out testily: + +"Vare you koes, already?" + +"Over to the castle." + +"Veil, das is koot. Ko doo de gassel. Antrew vlll dell you vat sorts do +Yangee kirls pe!" + + + +CHAPTER V. + +AT THE CASTLE. + +By the time August reached Andrew Anderson's castle it was dark. The +castle was built in a hollow, looking out toward the Ohio River, a river +that has this peculiarity, that it is all beautiful, from Pittsburgh to +Cairo. Through the trees, on which the buds were just bursting, August +looked out on the golden roadway made by the moonbeams on the river. And +into the tumult of his feelings there came the sweet benediction of +Nature. And what is Nature but the voice of God? + +Anderson's castle was a large log building of strange construction. +Everything about it had been built by the hands of Andrew, at once its +lord and its architect. Evidently a whimsical fancy had pleased itself +in the construction. It was an attempt to realize something of medieval +form in logs. There were buttresses and antique windows, and by an +ingenious transformation the chimney, usually such a disfigurement to a +log-house, was made to look like a round donjon keep. But it was +strangely composite, and I am afraid Mr. Ruskin would have considered it +somewhat confused; for while it looked like a rude castle to those who +approached it from the hills, it looked like something very different to +those who approached the front, for upon that side was a portico with +massive Doric columns, which were nothing more nor less than maple logs. +Andrew maintained that the natural form of the trunk of a tree was the +ideal and perfect form of a pillar. + +To this picturesque structure, half castle, half cabin, with hints of +church and temple, came August Wehle on Saturday evening. He did not go +round to the portico and knock at the front-door as a stranger would +have done, but in behind the donjon chimney he pulled an alarm-cord. +Immediately the head of Andrew Anderson was thrust out of a Gothic +hole--you could not call it a window. His uncut hair, rather darker than +auburn, fell down to his waist, and his shaggy red beard lay upon his +bosom. Instead of a coat he wore that unique garment of linsey-woolsey +known in the West as wa'mus (warm us?), a sort of over-shirt. He was +forty-five, but there were streaks of gray in his hair and board, and he +looked older by ten years. + +"What ho, good friend? Is that you?" he cried. "Come up, and right +welcome!" For his language was as archaic and perhaps as incongruous as +his architecture. And then throwing out of the window a rope-ladder, he +called out again, "Ascend! ascend! my brave young friend!" + +And young Wehle climbed up the ladder into the large upper room. For it +was one peculiarity of the castle that the upper part had no visible +communication with the lower. Except August, and now and then a literary +stranger, no one but the owner was ever admitted to the upper story of +the house, and the neighbors, who always had access to the lower rooms, +regarded the upper part of the castle with mysterious awe. August was +often plied with questions about it, but he always answered simply that +he didn't think Mr. Anderson would like to have it talked about. For the +owner there must have been some inside mode of access to the second +story, but he did not choose to let even August know of any other way +than that by the rope-ladder, and the few strangers who came to see his +books were taken in by the same drawbridge. + +[Illustration: THE CASTLE.] + +The room was filled with books arranged after whimsical associations. +One set of cases, for instance, was called the Academy, and into these +he only admitted the masters, following the guidance of his own +eccentric judgment quite as much as he followed traditional estimate. +Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Milton of course had undisputed possession of +the department devoted to the "Kings of Epic," as he styled them. +Sophocles, Calderon, Corneille, and Shakespeare were all that he +admitted to his list of "Kings of Tragedy." Lope he rejected on literary +grounds, and Goethe because he thought his moral tendency bad. He +rejected Rabelais from his chief humorists, but accepted Cervantes, Le +Sage, Molière, Swift, Hood, and the then fresh Pickwick of Boz. To these +he added the Georgia Scenes of Mr. Longstreet, insisting that they were +quite equal to Don Quixote. I can only stop to mention one other +department in his Academy. One case was devoted to the "Best Stories," +and an admirable set they were! I wish that anything of mine were worthy +to go into such company. His purity of feeling, almost ascetic, led him +to reject Boccaccio, but he admitted Chaucer and some of Balzac's, and +Smollett, Goldsmith, and De Foe, and Walter Scott's best, Irving's Rip +Van Winkle, Bernardin St. Pierre's "Paul and Virginia," and "Three +Months under the Snow," and Charles Lamb's generally overlooked +"Rosamund Gray." There were eases for "Socrates and his Friends," and +for other classes. He had amused himself for years in deciding what +books should be "crowned," as he called it, and what not. And then he +had another case, called "The Inferno." I wish there was space to give a +list of this department. Some were damned for dullness and some for +coarseness. Miss Edgeworth's Moral Tales, Darwin's Botanic Garden, +Rollin's Ancient History, and a hideously illustrated copy of the Book +of Martyrs were in the First-class, Don Juan and some French novels in +the second. Tupper, Swinburne, and Walt Whitman he did not know. + +In the corner next the donjon chimney was a little room with a small +fireplace. Thus the hermit economized wood, for wood meant time, and +time meant communion with his books. All of his domestic arrangements +were carried on after this frugal fashion. In the little room was a +writing-desk, covered with manuscripts and commonplace books. + +"Well, my young friend, you're thrice welcome," said Andrew, who never +dropped his book language. "What will you have? Will you resume your +apprenticeship under Goethe, or shall we canter to Canterbury with +Chaucer? Grand old Dan Chaucer! Or, shall we study magical philosophy +with Roger Bacon--the Friar, the Admirable Doctor? or read good Sir +Thomas More? What would Sir Thomas have said if he could have thought +that he would be admired by two such people as you and I, in the woods +of America, in the nineteenth century? But you do not want books! Ah! my +brave friend, you are not well. Come into my cell and let us talk. What +grieves you?" + +And Andrew took him by the hand with the courtesy of a knight, with the +tenderness of a woman, and with the air of an astrologer, and led him +into the apartment of a monk. + +[Illustration: THE SEDILIUM AT THE CASTLE.] + +"See!" he said, "I have made a new chair. It is the highest evidence of +my love for my Teutonic friend. You have now a right to this castle. You +shall be perpetually welcome. I said to myself, German scholarship shall +sit there, and the Backwoods Philosopher will sit here. So sit down on +my _sedilium_, and let us hear how this uncivil and inconstant world +treats you. It can not deal worse with you than it has with me. But I +have had my revenge on it! I have been revenged! I have done as I +pleased, and defied the world and all its hollow conventionalities." +These last words were spoken in a tone of misanthropic bitterness common +to Andrew. His love for August was the more intense that it stood upon a +background of general dislike, if not for the world, at least for that +portion of it which most immediately surrounded him. + +August took the chair, ingeniously woven and built of rye straw and +hickory splints. He knew that all this formality and apparent pedantry +was superficial. He and Andrew were bosom friends, and as he had often +opened his heart to the master of the castle before, so now he had no +difficulty in telling him his troubles, scarcely heeding the appropriate +quotations which Andrew made from time to time by way of embellishment. + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER. + +One reason for Andrew's love of August Wehle was that he was a German. +Far from sharing in the prejudices of his neighbors against foreigners, +Andrew had so thorough a contempt for his neighbors, that he liked +anybody who did not belong to his own people. If a Turk had emigrated to +Clark township, Andrew would have fallen in love with him, and built a +divan for his special accommodation. But he loved August also for the +sake of his gentle temper and his genuine love for books. And only +August or August's mother, upon whom Andrew sometimes called, could +exorcise his demon of misanthropy, which he had nursed so long that it +was now hard to dismiss it. + +Andrew Anderson belonged to a class noticed, I doubt not, by every acute +observer of provincial life in this country. In backwoods and +out-of-the-way communities literary culture produces marked +eccentricities in the life. Your bookish man at the West has never +learned to mark the distinction between the world of ideas and the +world of practical life. Instead of writing poems or romances, he falls +to living them, or at least trying to. Add a disappointment in love, and +you will surely throw him into the class of which Anderson was the +representative. For the education one gets from books is sadly +one-sided, unless it be balanced by a knowledge of the world. + +Andrew Anderson had always been regarded as an oddity. A man with a good +share of ideality and literary taste, placed against the dull background +of the society of a Western neighborhood in the former half of the +century, would necessarily appear odd. Had he drifted into communities +of more culture, his eccentricity, begotten of a sense of superiority to +his surroundings, would have worn away. Had he been happily married, his +oddities would have been softened; but neither of these things happened. +He told August a very different history. For the confidence of his +"Teutonic friend" had awakened in the solitary man a desire to uncover +that story which he had kept under lock and key for so many years. + +"Ah! my friend," said he with excitement, "don't trust the faith of a +woman." And then rising from his seat he said, "The Backwoods +Philosopher warns you. I pray you give good heed. I do not know Julia. +She is my niece. It ill becomes me to doubt her sincerity. But I know +whose daughter she is. I pray you give good heed, my Teutonic friend. _I +know whose daughter she is_! + +"I do not talk much. But you have arrived at a critical point--a point +of turning. Out of his own life, out of his own sorrow, the Backwoods +Philosopher warns you. I am at peace now. But look at me. Do you not see +the marks of the ravages of a great storm? A sort of a qualified +happiness I have in philosophy. But what I might have been if the +storm had not torn me to pieces in my youth--what I might have been, +that I am not. I pray you never trust in a woman's keeping the happiness +of your life!" + +[Illustration: "LOOK AT ME."] + +Here Andrew slipped his arm through Wehle's, and began to promenade with +him in the large apartment up and down an alley, dimly lighted by a +candle, between solid phalanxes of books. + +"I pray you give good heed," he said, resuming. "I was always eccentric. +People thought I was either a genius or fool. Perhaps I was much of +both. But this is a digression. I did not pay any attention to women. I +shunned them. I said that to be a great author and a philosophical +thinker, one must not be a man of society. I never went to a +wood-chopping, to an apple-peeling, to a corn-shucking, to a +barn-raising, nor indeed to any of our rustic feasts. I suppose this +piqued the vanity of the girls, and they set themselves to catch me. I +suppose they thought that I would be a trophy worth boasting. I have +noticed that hunters estimate game according to the difficulty of +getting it. But this is a digression. Let us return. + +"There came among us, at that time, Abigail Norman. She was pretty. I +swear by all the sacred cats of Egypt, that she was beautiful. She was +industrious. The best housekeeper in the state! She was high-strung. I +liked her all the more for that. You see a man of imagination is apt to +fall in love with a tragedy queen. But this is a digression. Let +us return. + +"She spread her toils in my path. While I was wandering through the +woods writing poetry to birds and squirrels, Abby Norman was ambitious +enough to hope to make me her slave, and she did. She read books that +she thought I liked. She planned in various ways to seem to like what I +liked, and yet she had sense enough to differ a little from me, and so +make herself the more interesting. I think a man of real intellect never +likes to have a man or woman agree with him entirely. But let us return. + +"I loved Abigail desperately. No, I did not love Abigail Norman at all. +I did not love her as she was, but I loved her as she seemed to my +imagination to be. I think most lovers love an ideal that hovers in the +air a little above the real recipient of their love. And I think we men +of genius and imagination are apt to love something very different from +the real person, which is unfortunate. + +"But I am digressing again. To return: I wrote poetry to Abby. I courted +her. I cut off my long hair for a woman, like Samson. I tried to dress +more decently, and made myself ridiculous no doubt, for a man can not +dress well unless he has a talent for it. And I never had a genius for +beau-knots. + +"But pardon the digression. Let us return. I was to have married her. +The day was set. Then I found accidentally that she was engaged to my +brother Samuel, a young man with better manners than mind. She made him +believe that she was only making a butt of me. But I think she really +loved me more than she knew. When I had discovered her treachery, I +shipped on the first flat-boat. I came near committing suicide, and +should have jumped into the river one night, only that I thought it +might flatter her vanity. I came back here and ignored her. She broke +with Samuel and tried to regain my affections. I scorned her. I trod on +her heart! I stamped her pride into the dust! I was cruel. I was +contemptuous. I was well-nigh insane. Then she went back to Samuel, and +_made_ him marry her. Then she forced my imbecile old father, on his +death-bed, to will all the property to Samuel, except this piece of +rough hill-land and one thousand dollars. But here I built this castle. +My thousand dollars I put in books. I learned how, to weave the +coverlets of which our country people are so fond, and by this means, +and by selling wood to the steamboats, I have made a living and bought +my library without having to work half of my time. I was determined +never to leave. I swore by all the arms of Vishnu she should never say +that she had driven me away. I don't know anything about Julia. But I +know whose daughter she is. My young friend, beware! I pray you take +good heed! The Backwoods Philosopher warns you!" + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +WITHIN AND WITHOUT. + +If the gentleman is not born in a man, it can not be bred in him. If it +is born in him, it can not be bred out of him. August Wehle had +inherited from his mother the instinct of true gentlemanliness. And now, +when Andrew relapsed into silence and abstraction, he did not attempt to +rouse him, but bidding him goodnight, with his own hands threw the +rope-ladder out the window and started up the hollow toward home. The +air was sultry and oppressive, the moon had been engulfed, and the first +thunder-cloud of the spring was pushing itself up toward the zenith, +while the boughs of the trees were quivering with a premonitory shudder. +But August did not hasten. The real storm was within. Andrew's story had +raised doubts. When he went down the ravine the love of Julia Anderson +shone upon his heart as benignly as the moon upon the waters. Now the +light was gone, and the black cloud of a doubt had shut out his peace. +Jule Anderson's father was rich. He had not thought of it before! But +now he remembered how much woodland he owned and how he had two large +farms. Jule Anderson would not marry a poor boy. And a Dutchman! She was +not sincere. She was trifling with him and teasing her parents. Or, if +she were sincere now, she would not be faithful to him against every +tempting offer. And he would have to drive on the rocks, too, as Andrew +had. At any rate, he would not marry her until he stood upon some sort +of equality with her. + +The wind was swaying him about in its fitful gusts, and he rather liked +it. In his anguish of spirit it was a pleasure to contend with the +storm. The wind, the lightning, the sudden sharp claps of thunder were +on his own key. He felt in the temper of old Lear. The winds might blow +and crack their cheeks. + +But it was not alone the suggestions of Andrew that aroused his +suspicions. He now recalled a strange statement that Samuel Anderson +made in discharging him. "You said what you had no right to say about my +wife, in talking to Julia." What had he said? Only that some woman had +not treated Andrew "just right." Who the woman might be he had not known +until his present interview with Andrew. Had Julia been making mischief +herself by repeating his words and giving them a direction he had not +intended? He could not have dreamed of her acting such a part but for +the strange influence of Andrew's strange story. And so he staggered on, +wet to the skin, defying in his heart the lightning and the wind, until +he came to the cabin of his father. Climbing the fence, for there was no +gate, he pulled the latch-string and entered. They were all asleep; the +hard-working family went to bed early. But chubby-faced Wilhelmina, the +favorite sister, had set up to wait for August, and he now found her +fast asleep in the chair. + +"Wilhelmina! wake up!" he said. + +"O August!" she said, opening the corner of one eye and yawning, "I +wasn't asleep. I only--uh--shut my eyes a minute. How wet you are! Did +you go to see the pretty girl up at Mr. Anderson's?" + +"No," said August. + +"O August! she is pretty, and she is good and sweet," and Wilhelmina +took his wet checks between her chubby hands and gave him a sleepy kiss, +and then crept off to bed. + +And, somehow, the faith of the child Wilhelmina counteracted the +skepticism of the and Andrew, and August felt the storm subsiding. + +When he looked out of the window of the loft in which he slept the +shower had ceased as suddenly as it had come, the thunder had retreated +behind the hills, the clouds were already breaking, and the white face +of the moon was peering through the ragged rifts. + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +FIGGERS WON'T LIE + +"Figgers won't lie," said Elder Hankins, the Millerite preacher. "I say +figgers won't lie. When a Methodis' talks about fallin' from grace he +has to argy the pint. And argyments can't be depended 'pon. And when a +Prisbyterian talks about parseverance he haint got the absolute +sartainty on his side. But figgers won't lie noways, and it's figgers +that shows this yer to be the last yer of the world, and that the final +eend of all things is approachin'. I don't ask you to listen to no +'mpressions of me own, to no reasonin' of nobody; all I ask is that you +should listen to the voice of the man in the linen-coat what spoke to +Dan'el, and then listen to the voice of the 'rithmetic, and to a sum in +simple addition, the simplest sort of addition." + +All the Millerite preachers of that day were not quite so illiterate as +Elder Hankins, and it is but fair to say that the Adventists of to-day +are a very respectable denomination, doing a work which deserves more +recognition from others than it receives. And for the delusion which +expects the world to come to an end immediately, the Adventist leaders +are not responsible in the first place. From Gnosticism to Mormonism, +every religious delusion has grown from some fundamental error in the +previous religious teaching of the people. By the narrowly verbal method +of reading the Scripture, so much in vogue in the polemical discussions +of the past generation, and still so fervently adhered to by many +people, the ground was prepared for Millerism. And to-day in many +regions the soil in made fallow for the next fanaticism. It is only a +question of who shall first sow and reap. To people educated as those +who gathered in Sugar Grove school-house had been to destroy the spirit +of the Scripture by distorting the letter in proving their own sect +right, nothing could be so overwhelming as Elder Hankins's "figgers." + +For he had clearly studied figgers to the neglect of the other branches +of a liberal education. His demonstration was printed on a large chart. +He began with the seventy weeks of Daniel, he added in the "time and +times and a half," and what Daniel declared that he "understood not when +he heard," was plain sailing to the enlightened and mathematical mind of +Elder Hankins. When he came to the thousand two hundred and ninety days, +he waxed more exultant than Kepler in his supreme moment, and on the +thousand three hundred and five and thirty days he did what Jonas +Harrison called "the blamedest tallest cipherin' he'd ever seed in all +his born days." + +Jonas was the new hired man, who had stopped into the shoes of August at +Samuel Anderson's. He sat by August and kept up a running commentary, in +a loud whisper, on the sermon, "My feller-citizen," said Jonas, +squeezing August's arm at a climax of the elder's discourse, "My +feller-citizen, looky thar, won't you? He'll cipher the world into +nothin' in no time. He's like the feller that tried to find out the +valoo of a fat shoat when wood was two dollars a cord. 'Ef I can't do it +by substraction I'll do it by long-division,' says he. And ef this +'rithmetic preacher can't make a finishment of this sub_lu_nary speer by +addition, he'll do it by multiplyin'. They's only one answer in his +book. Gin him any sum you please, and it all comes out 1843!" + +Now in all the region round about Sugar Grove school-house there was a +great dearth of sensation. The people liked the prospect of the end of +the world because it would be a spectacle, something to relieve the +fearful monotony of their lives. Funerals and weddings were commonplace, +and nothing could have been so interesting to them as the coming of the +end of the world, as described by Elder Hankins, unless it had been a +first-class circus (with two camels and a cage of monkeys attached, so +that scrupulous people might attend from a laudable desire to see the +menagerie!) A murder would have been delightful to the people of Clark +township. It would have given them something to think and talk about. +Into this still pool Elder Hankins threw the vials, the trumpets, the +thunders, the beast with ten horns, the he-goat, and all the other +apocalyptic symbols understood in an absurdly literal way. The world was +to come to an end in the following August. Here was an excitement, +something worth living for. + +All the way to their homes the people disputed learnedly about the "time +and times and a half," about "the seven heads and ten horns," and the +seventh vial. The fierce polemical discussions and the bold sectarian +dogmatism of the day had taught them anything but "the modesty of true +science," and now the unsolvable problems of the centuries were taken +out of the hands of puzzled scholars and settled as summarily and +positively as the relative merits of "gourd-seed" and "flint" corn. +Samuel Anderson had always planted his corn in the "light" of the moon +and his potatoes in the "dark" of that orb, had always killed his hogs +when the moon was on the increase lest the meat should all go to gravy, +and he and his wife had carefully guarded against the carrying of a hoe +through the house, for fear "somebody might die." Now, the preaching of +the elder impressed him powerfully. His life had always been not so much +a bad one as a cowardly one, and to get into heaven by a six months' +repentance, seemed to him a good transaction. Besides he remembered that +there men were never married, and that there, at last, Abigail would no +longer have any peculiar right to torture him. Hankins could not have +ciphered him into Millerism if his wife had not driven him into it as +the easiest means of getting a divorce. No doom in the next world could +have alarmed him much, unless it had been the prospect of continuing +lord and master of Mrs. Abigail. And as for that oppressed woman, she +was simply scared. She was quite unwilling to admit the coming of the +world's end so soon. Having some ugly accounts to settle, she would fain +have postponed the payday. Mrs. Anderson might truly have been called a +woman who feared God--she had reason to. + +And as for August, he would not have cared much if the world had come to +an end, if only he could have secured one glance of recognition from the +eyes of Julia. But Julia dared not look. The process of cowing her had +gone on from childhood, and now she was under a reign of terror. She did +not yet know that she could resist her mother. And then she lived in +mortal fear of her mother's heart-disease. By irritating her she might +kill her. This dread of matricide her mother held always over her. In +vain she watched for a chance. It did not come. Once, when her mother's +head was turned, she glanced at August. But he was at that moment +listening or trying to listen to one of Jonas Harrison's remarks. And +August, who did not understand the circumstances, was only able to +account for her apparent coldness on the theory suggested by Andrew's +universal unbelief in women, or by supposing that when she understood +his innocent remark about Andrew's disappointment to refer to her +mother, she had taken offense at it. And so, while the rest were +debating whether the world would come to an end or not, August had a +disconsolate feeling that the end of the world had already come. And it +did not make him feel better to have Wilhelmina whisper, "Oh! but she +_is_ pretty, that Anderson girl--a'n't she, August?" + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +THE NEW SINGING-MASTER + +"He sings like an owlingale!" + +Jonas Harrison was leaning against the well-curb, talking to Cynthy Ann. +He'd been down to the store at Brayville, he said, a listenin' to 'em +discuss Millerism, and seed a new singing-master there. "Could he sing +good?" Cynthy asked, rather to prolong the talk than to get information. + +"Sings like an owlingale, I reckon. He's got more seals to his ministry +a-hanging onto his watch-chain than I ever seed. Got a mustache onto the +top story of his mouth, somethin' like a tuft of grass on the roof of a +ole shed kitchen. Peart? He's the peartest-lookin' chap I ever seed. But +he a'n't no singin'-master--not of I'm any jedge of turnips. He warn't +born to sarve his day and generation with a tunin'-fork. I think he's +a-goin' to reckon-water a little in these parts and that he's only +a-playin' singin'-master. He kin play more fiddles'n one, you bet a +hoss! Says he come up here fer his wholesome, and I guess he did. Think +ef he'd a-staid where he was, he mout a-suffered a leetle from +confinement to his room, and that room p'raps not more nor five foot by +nine, and ruther dim-lighted and poor-provisioned, an' not much chance +fer takin' exercise in the fresh air!" + +[Illustration: "DON'T BE ONCHARITABLE, JONAS."] + +"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas, don't. We're all mis'able sinners, I +s'pose; and you know charity don't think no evil. The man may be all +right, ef he does wear hair on his lip. Charity kivers lots a sins." + +"Ya-as, but charity don't kiver no wolves with wool. An' ef he a'n't a +woolly wolf they's no snakes in Jarsey, as little Ridin' Hood said when +her granny tried to bite her head off. I'm dead sot in favor of charity, +and mean to gin her my vote at every election, but I a'n't a-goin' to +have her put a blind-bridle on to me. And when a man comes to Clark +township a-wearing straps to his breechaloons to keep hisself from +leaving terry-firmy altogether, and a weightin' hisself down with pewter +watch-seals, gold-washed, and a cultivating a crap of red-top hay onto +his upper lip, and a-lettin' on to be a singin'-master, I suspicions +him. They's too much in the git-up fer the come-out. Well, here's yer +health, Cynthy!" + +And having made this oracular speech and quaffed the hard limestone +water, Jonas hung the clean white gourd from which he had been drinking, +in its place against the well-curb, and started back to the field, while +Cynthy Ann carried her bucket of water into the kitchen, blaming herself +for standing so long talking to Jonas. To Cynthy everything pleasant had +a flavor of sinfulness. + +The pail of water was hardly set down in the sink when there came a +knock at the door, and Cynthy found standing by it the strapped +pantaloons, the "red-top" mustache, the watch-seals, and all the rest +that went to make up the new singing-master. He smiled when he saw her, +one of those smiles which are strictly limited to the lower half of the +face, and are wholly mechanical, as though certain strings inside were +pulled with malice aforethought and the mouth jerked out into a square +grin, such as an ingeniously-made automaton might display. + +"Is Mr. Anderson in?" + +"No, sir; he's gone to town." + +"Is Mrs. Anderson in?" + +And so he entered, and soon got into conversation with the lady of the +house, and despite the prejudice which she entertained for mustaches, +she soon came to like him. He smiled so artistically. He talked so +fluently. He humored all her whims, pitied all her complaints, and staid +to dinner, eating her best preserves with a graciousness that made Mrs. +Anderson feel how great was his condescension. For Mr. Humphreys, the +singing-master, had looked at the comely face of Julia, and looked over +Julia's shoulders at the broad acres beyond; and he thought that in +Clark township he had not met with so fine a landscape, so nice a +figure-piece. And with the quick eye of a man of the world, he had +measured Mrs. Anderson, and calculated on the ease with which he might +complete the picture to suit his taste. + +He staid to supper. He smiled that same fascinating square smile on +Samuel Anderson, treated him as head of the house, talked glibly of +farming, and listened better than he talked. He gave no account of +himself, except by way of allusion. He would begin a sentence thus, +"When I was traveling in France with my poor dear mother," etc., from +which Mrs. Anderson gathered that he had been a devoted son, and then he +would relate how he had seen something curious "when he was dining at +the house of the American minister at Berlin." "This hazy air reminds me +of my native mountains in Northern New York." And then he would allude +to his study of music in the Conservatory in Leipsic. To plain country +people in an out-of-the-way Western neighborhood, in 1843, such a man +was better than a lyceum full of lectures. He brought them the odor of +foreign travel, the flavor of city, the "otherness" that +everybody craves. + +[Illustration: THE HAWK.] + +He staid to dinner, as I have said, and to supper. He staid over night. +He took up his board at the house of Samuel Anderson. Who could resist +his entreaty? Did he not assure them that he felt the need of a home in +a cultivated family? And was it not the one golden opportunity to have +the daughter of the house taught music by a private master, and thus +give a special _eclat_ to her education? How Mrs. Anderson hoped that +this superior advantage would provoke jealous remarks on the part of her +neighbors! It was only necessary to the completion of her triumph that +they should say she was "stuck up." Then, too, to have so brilliant a +beau for Julia! A beau with watch-seals and a mustache, a beau who had +been to Paris with his mother, studied music in the Conservatory at +Leipsic, dined with the American minister in Berlin, and done ever so +many more wonderful things, was a prospect to delight the ambitious +heart of Mrs. Anderson, especially as he flattered the mother instead of +the daughter. + +"He's a independent citizen of this Federal Union," said Jonas to +Cynthy, "carries his head like he was intimately 'quainted with the +'merican eagle hisself. He's playin' this game sharp. He deals all the +trumps to hisself, and most everything besides. He'll carry off the gal +if something don't arrest him in his headlong career. Jist let me git a +chance at him when he's soarin' loftiest into the amber blue above, and +I'll cut his kite-string for him, and let him fall like fork-ed +lightnin' into a mud-puddle." + +Cynthy said she did see one great sin that he had committed for sure. +That was the puttin' on of gold and costly apparel. It was sot down in +the Bible and in the Methodist Discipline that it was a sin to wear +gold, and she should think the poor man hadn't no sort o' regard for his +soul, weighing it down with them things. + +But Jonas only remarked that he guessed his jewelry warn't no sin. He +didn't remember nothing agin wearin' pewter. + + + +CHAPTER X. + +AN OFFER OF HELP. + +The singing-master, Mr. Humphreys, went to singing-school and church +with Julia in a matter-of-course way, treating her with attention, but +taking care not to make himself too attentive. Except that Julia could +not endure his smile--which was, like some joint stock companies, +strictly limited--she liked him well enough. It was something to her, in +her monotonous life under the eye of her mother, who almost never left +her alone, and who cut off all chance for communication with August--it +was something to have the unobtrusive attentions of Mr. Humphreys, who +always interested her with his adventures. For indeed it really seemed +that he had had more adventures than any dozen other men. How should a +simple-hearted girl understand him? How should she read the riddle of a +life so full of duplicity--of _multiplicity_--as the life of Joshua +Humphreys, the music-teacher? Humphreys intended to make love to her, +but during the first two weeks he only aimed to gain her esteem. He felt +that there was a clue which he had not got. But at last the key dropped +into his hands, and he felt sure that the unsophisticated girl was in +his power. + +Among the girls that attended Humphreys's singing-school was Betsey +Malcolm, the near neighbor of the Andersons. The singing-master often +saw her at Mr. Anderson's, and he often wished that Julia were as easy +to win as he felt Betsey to be. The sensuous mouth, the giddy eyes of +Betsey, showed quickly her appreciation of every flattering attention he +paid her, and though in Julia's presence he was careful how he treated +her, yet when he, walking down the road one day, alone, met her, he +courted her assiduously. He had not to observe any caution in her case. +She greedily absorbed all the flattery he could give, only pettishly +responding after a while: "O dear! that's the way you talk to me, and +that's the way you talk to Jule sometimes, I s'pose. I guess she don't +mind keeping two of you as strings to her bow." + +"Two! What do you mean, my fair friend? I havn't seen one, yet." + +"Oh, no! You mean you haven't seen two. You see one whenever you look in +the glass. The other is a Dutchman, and she's dying after him. She may +flirt with you, but her mother watches her night and day, to keep her +from running off with Gus Wehle." + +Like many another crafty person, Betsey Malcolm had fairly overshot the +mark. In seeking to separate Humphreys from Julia, she had given him the +clue he desired, and he was not slow to use it, for he was almost the +only person that Mrs. Anderson trusted alone with Julia. + +In the dusk of the evening of the very day of his talk with Betsey, he +sat on the long front-porch with Julia. Julia liked him better, or +rather did not dislike him so much in the dark as she did in the light. +For when it was light she could see him smile, and though she had not +learned to connect a cold-blooded face with a villainous character, she +had that childish instinct which made her shrink from Humphreys's square +smile. It always seemed to her that the real Humphreys gazed at her out +of the cold, glittering eyes, and that the smile was something with +which he had nothing to do. + +Sitting thus in the dusk of the evening, and looking out over the green +pasture to where the nigher hills ceased and the distant seemed to come +immediately after, their distance only indicated by color, though the +whole Ohio "bottom" was between, she forgot the Mephistopheles who sat +not far away, and dreamed of August, the "grand," as she fancifully +called him. And he let her sit and dream undisturbed for a long time, +until the darkness settled down upon the hills. Then he spoke. + +"I--I thought," began Humphreys, with well-feigned hesitancy, "I +thought, I should venture to offer you my assistance as a true and +gallant man, in a matter--a matter of supreme delicacy--a matter that I +have no right to meddle with. I think I have heard that your mother is +not friendly to the suit of a young man who--who--well, let us say who +is not wholly disagreeable to you. I beg your pardon, don't tell me +anything that you prefer to keep locked in the privacy of your own +bosom. But if I can render any assistance, you know. I have some little +influence with your parents, maybe. If I could be the happy bearer of +any communications, command me as your obedient servant." + +Julia did not know what to say. To get a word to August was what she +most desired. But the thought of using Humphreys was repulsive to her. +She could not see his face in the gathering darkness, but she could +_feel_ him smile that same soulless, geometrical smile. She could not do +it. She did not know what to say. So she said nothing. Humphreys saw +that he must begin farther back. + +"I hear the young man spoken of as a praiseworthy person. German, I +believe? I have always noticed a peculiar manliness about Germans. A +peculiar refinement, indeed, and a courtesy that is often wanting in +Americans. I noticed this when I was in Leipsic. I don't think the +German girls are quite so refined. German gentlemen in this country seem +to prefer American girls oftentimes." + +All this might have sounded hollow enough to a disinterested listener. +To Julia the words were as sweet as the first rain after a tedious +drouth. She had heard complaint, censure, innuendo, and downright abuse +of poor Gus. These were the first generous words. They confirmed her +judgment, they comforted her heart, they made her feel grateful, even +affectionate toward the fop, in spite of his watch-seals, his curled +mustache, his straps, his cold eyes, and his artificial smile. Poor fool +you will call her, and poor fool she was. For she could have thrown +herself at the feet of Humphreys, and thanked him for his words. Thank +him she did in a stammering way, and he did not hesitate to repeat his +favorable impressions of Germans, after that. What he wanted was, not to +break the hold of August until he had placed himself in a position to be +next heir to her regard. + + + +CHAPTER XI. + +THE COON-DOG ARGUMENT. + +The reader must understand that all this time Elder Hankins continued to +bombard Clark township with the thunders and lightnings of the +Apocalypse, continued to whirl before the dazed imaginations of his +rustic hearers the wheels within wheels and the faces of the living +creatures of 'Zek'el, continued to cipher the world out of existence +according to formulas in Dan'el, marched out the he-goat, made the seven +heads and ten horns of the beast do service over and over again. And all +the sweet mysteries of Oriental imagery, the mystic figures which +unexpounded give so noble a depth to the perspective of Scripture, were +cut to pieces, pulled apart, and explained, as though they were tricks +of legerdemain. Julia was powerfully impressed, not by the declamations +of Hankins, for she had sensibility enough to recoil from his +vivisection of Scripture, though she had been all her life accustomed to +hear it from other than Millerites, but she was profoundly affected by +the excitement about her. Her father, attracted in part by the promise +that there should be no marrying there, had embraced Millerism with all +his heart, and was in such a state of excitement that he could not +attend to his business. Mrs. Anderson was in continual trepidation about +it, though she tried not to believe it. She was on the point of +rebelling and declaring that the world _should_ not come to an end. But +on the whole she felt that the government of the universe was one affair +in which she would have to give up all hope of having her own way. +Meantime there was no increase of religion. Some were frightened out of +their vices for a time, but a passionate terror of that sort is the +worst enemy of true piety. + +"Fer my part," said Cynthy Ann, as she walked home with Jonas, "fer my +part, I don't believe none of his nonsense. John Wesley" (Jonas was a +New-Light, and Cynthy always talked to him about Wesley) "knowed a heap +more about Scripter than all the Hankinses and Millerses that ever was +born, and he knowed how to cipher, too, I 'low. Why didn't he say the +world was goin' to wind up? An' our persidin' elder is a heap better +instructed than Hankins, and he says God don't tell nobody when the +world's goin' to wind up." + +"Goin' to run down, you mean, Cynthy Ann. 'Kordin' to Hankins it's a old +clock gin out in the springs, I 'low. How does Hankins know that +'Zek'el's livin' creeters means one thing more'n another? He talks about +them wheels as nateral as ef he was a wagon-maker fixin' a ole buggy. He +says the thing's a gone tater; no more craps of corn offen the bottom +land, no more electin' presidents of this free and glorious Columby, no +more Fourths, no more shootin' crackers nor spangled banners, no more +nothin'. He ciphers and ciphers, and then spits on his slate and wipes +us all out. Whenever Gabr'el blows I'll b'lieve it, but I won't take +none o' Hankins's tootin' in place of it. I shan't git skeered at no +tin-horns, and as for papaw whistles, why, I say Jericho wouldn't +a-tumbled for no sech music, and they won't fetch down no stars that +air way." + +Here old Gottlieb Wehle, who had just joined the Millerites, came up. +"Yonas, you mags shport of de Piple. Ef dem vaces in der veels, and dem +awvool veels in der veels, and dem figures vot always says aideen +huntert vordy dree, ef dem tond mean sompin awvool, vot does dey mean? +mean? Hey?" + +"My venerated friend and feller-citizen of forren birth," said Jonas, +"you hit the nail on the crown of the head squar, with the biggest sort +ov a sledge-hammer. You gripped a-holt of the truth that air time like +the American bird a-grippin' the arries on the shield. What do they +mean? That's jest the question, and you Millerites allers argies like +the man who warranted his dog to be a good coon-dog, bekase he warn't +good fer nothin' else under the amber blue. Now, my time-honored friend +and beloved German voter, jest let me tell you that _on the coon-dog +principle_ you could a-wound up the trade and traffic of this airth any +time. Fer ef they don't mean 1843, what do they mean? Why, 1842 or 1844, +of course. You don't come no coon-dog argyments over me, not while I +remain sound in wind and limb." + +"Goon-tog! Who zed goon-tog? Ich tidn't, Hankins tidn't, Ze'kel's wision +tidn't zay nodin pout no goon-tog. What's goon-togs cot do too mit de +end of de vorld? Yonas, you pe a vool, maype." + +"The same to yerself, my beloved friend and free and enlightened +feller-citizen. Long may you wave, like a green bay boss, and a +jimson-weed on the sunny side of a board-fence!" + +Gottlieb hurried on, finding Jonas much harder to understand than the +prophecies. + +"I hear the singing-master is goin' to jine," said Cynthy Ann. "Wonder +ef they'll take him with all his seals and straps, and hair on his upper +lip, with the plain words of the Bible agin gold and costly apparel? +Wonder ef he's tuck in, too?" + +"Tuck in? He an't one of that kind. He don't never git tuck in--he tucks +in. He knows which side of his bread's got quince preserves onto it. I +used to run second mate on the Dook of Orleans, and I know his kind. +He'll soar around like a turkey-buzzard fer a while. Presently he'll +'light. He's rusticatin' tell some scrape blows over. An' he'll make +somethin' outen it. Business afore pleasure is his motto. He don't hang +that seducin' grin under them hawky eyes fer nothin'. Wait till the +pious and disinterested example 'lights somewheres. Then look out for +the feathers, won't ye! He won't leave nary bone. But here we air. I +declare, Cynthy, this walk seems _the shortest_, when I'm in superfine, +number-one comp'ny!" + +Cynthy was so pleased with this remark, that she did penance in her mind +for a week afterwards. It was so wicked to enjoy one's self out of +class-meeting! + + + +CHAPTER XII. + +TWO MISTAKES. + +At the singing-school and at the church August waited as impatiently as +possible for some sign of recognition from Julia. He little knew the +fear that beset her. Having seen her hysterical mother prostrated for +weeks by the excitement of a dispute with her father, it seemed to her +that if she turned one look of love and longing toward young Wehle, +whose sweet German voice rang out above the rest in the hymns, she might +kill her mother as quickly as by plunging a knife into her heart. The +steam-doctor, who was the family physician, had warned her and her +father separately of the danger of exciting Mrs. Anderson's most +excitable temper, and now Julia was the slave of her mother's disease. +That lucky hysteria, which the steam-doctor thought a fearful +heart-disease, had given Mrs. Abigail the whip-hand of husband and +daughter, and she was not slow to know her advantage, using her heart in +a most heartless way. + +August could not blame Julia for not writing, for he had tried to break +the blockade by a letter sent through Jonas and Cynthy Ann, but the +latter had found herself so well watched that the note oppressed her +conscience and gave a hangdog look to her face for two weeks before she +got it out of her pocket, and then she put it under the pillow of +Julia's bed, and had reason to believe that the suspicious Mrs. Anderson +confiscated it within five minutes. For the severity of maternal +government was visibly increased thereafter, and Julia received many +reminders of her ingratitude and of her determination to kill her +self-sacrificing mother by her stubbornness. + +"Well," Mrs. Anderson would say, "it's all one to me whether the world +comes to an end or not. I should like to live to see the day of +judgment. But I shan't. No affectionate mother can stand such treatment +as I receive from my own daughter. If Norman was only at home!" + +It is proper to explain here that Norman was her son, in whom she took a +great deal of comfort when he was away, and whom she would have utterly +spoiled by indulgence if he had not been born past spoiling. He was the +only person to whom she was indulgent, and she was indulgent to him +chiefly because he was so weak of will that there was not much glory in +conquering him, and because her indulgence to him was a rod of +affliction to the rest of her family. + +Failing to open communication through Jonas and Cynthy Ann, August found +himself in a desperate strait, and with an impatience common to young +men he unhappily had recourse to Betsey Malcolm. She often visited +Julia, and twice, when Julia was not at meeting, he went home with the +ingenuous Betsey, who always pretended to have something to tell him +"about Jule," and who yet, for the pure love of mischief-making, tried +to make him think as poorly as possible of Julia's sincerity, and who, +from pure love of flirtation, puckered her red lips, and flashed at him +with her sensuous eyes, and sighed and blushed, or rather flushed, while +she sympathized with him in a way that might have been perilous if he +had been an American instead of a constant-hearted "Dutchman," wholly +absorbed with the image of Julia. But, so far as carrying messages was +concerned, Betsey was certainly a non-conductor. She professed never to +be able to run the blockade with any communication of his. She said to +herself that she wasn't going to help Jule Anderson to keep _all_ the +beaus. She meant to capture one or the other of them if she could. And, +indeed, she did not dream how grievous was the wrong she did. For she +could appreciate no other feeling in the matter than vanity, and she +could not see any particular harm in "taking Jule Anderson down a peg." +And so she assured the anxious and already suspicious August that if she +was in his place she should want that singing-master out of the way. +"Some girls can't stand people that wear jewelry and mustaches and +straps and such things. And Mr. Humphreys is very careful of her, won't +let her sit too late on the porch, and is very comforting in his way of +talking to her. And she seems to like it. I tell you what it is, Gus +"--and she looked at him so bewitchingly that the pure and sensitive +August blushed, he could hardly tell why--"I tell you Jule's a nice +girl, and got a nice property back of her, and I hope she won't act like +her mother. And, indeed, I can't hardly believe she will, though the way +she eyes that Humphreys makes me mad." She had suggested the old doubt. +A doubt is dangerous when its face grows familiar, and one recognizes +the "Monsieur Tonson come again." + +And all the message the disinterested and benevolent Betsey bore to +Julia was to tell her exultingly that Gus had twice walked home with +her. And they had had such a nice time! And Julia, girl that she was, +declared indignantly that she didn't care whom he went with; though she +did care, and her eyes and face said so. Thus the tongue sometimes +lies--or seems to lie--when the whole person is telling the truth. The +only excuse for the tongue is that it will not be believed, and it knows +that it will not be believed! It only speaks diplomatically, maybe. But +diplomatic talking is bad. Better the truth. If Jule had known that her +words would be reported to August, she would have bitten out her tongue +rather than to have let it utter words that were only the cry of her +wounded pride. Of course Betsey met August in the road the next morning, +in a quiet hollow by the brook, and told him, sympathizingly, almost +affectionately, that she had begun to talk to Julia about him, and that +Jule had said she didn't care. So while Julia uttered a lie she spoke +the truth, and while. Betsey uttered the truth she spoke a lie, willful, +malicious, and wicked. + +Now, in the mean time, Julia, on her side, had tried to open +communication through the only channel that offered itself. She did not +attempt it by means of Betsey, because, being a woman, she felt +instinctively that Betsey was not to be trusted. But there was only one +other to whom she was allowed to speak, except under a supervision as +complete as it was unacknowledged. That other was Mr. Humphreys. He +evinced a constant interest in her affairs, avowing that he always did +have a romantic desire to effect the union of suitable people, even +though it might pain his heart a little to see another more fortunate +than himself. Julia had given up all hope of communicating by letter, +and she could not bring herself to make any confessions to a man who had +such a smile and such eyes, but to a generous proposition of Mr. +Humphreys that he should see August and open the way for any +communication between them, she consented, scarcely concealing her +eagerness. + +August was not in a mood to receive Humphreys kindly. He hated him by +intuition, and a liking for him had not been begotten by Betsey's +assurances that he was making headway with Julia. August was riding +astride a bag of corn on his way to mill, when Humphreys, taking a +walk, met him. + +"A pleasant day, Mr. Wehle!" + +"Yes," said August, with a courtesy as mechanical as Humphreys's smile. + +The singing-master was rather pleased than otherwise to see that August +disliked him. It suited his purpose, just now to gall Wehle into saying +what he would not otherwise have said. + +"I hear you are in trouble," he proceeded. + +"How so?" + +"Oh! I hear that Mrs. Anderson doesn't like Dutchmen." The smile now +seemed to have something of a sneer in it. + +"I don't know that that is your affair," said August, all his +suspicions, by a sort of "resolution of force," changing into anger. + +"Oh! I beg pardon," with a tone half-mocking. "I did not know but I +might help settle matters. I think I have Mrs. Anderson's confidence; +and I know that I have Miss Anderson's confidence in an unusual degree. +I think a great deal of her. And she thinks me _her friend_ at least. I +thought that there might be some little matters yet unsettled between +you two, and she suggested that maybe there might be something you would +like to say, and that if you would say it to me, it would be all the +same as if it were said to her. She considers that in the relation I +bear to her and the family, a message delivered to me is the same in +effect as if given to her. I told her I did not think you would, as a +gentleman, wish to hold her to any promises that might be irksome to +her now." + +These words were spoken with a coolness and maliciousness of good-nature +quite devilish, and August's fist involuntarily doubled itself to strike +him, if only to make him cease smiling in that villainous rectangular +way. But he checked himself. + +"You are a puppy. Tell _that_ to Jule, if you choose. I shall send her a +release from all obligations, but not by the hand of a rascal!" + +Like all desperadoes, Humphreys was a coward. He could shoot, but he +could not fight, and just now he was affecting the pious or at least the +high moral role, and had left his pistols, brandy-flasks, and the other +necessary appurtenances of a gentleman, locked in his trunk. Besides it +would not at all have suited his purpose to shoot. So in lieu of +shooting he only smiled, as August rode off, that same old geometric +smile, the elements of which were all calculated. He seemed incapable of +any other facial contortion. It expressed one emotion, indeed, about as +well as another, and was therefore as convenient as those pocket-knives +which affect to contain a chest of tools in one. + +[Illustration: "TELL THAT TO JULE."] + +Julia was already stung to jealousy by Betsey Malcolm's +mischief-making, and it did not require much more to put her into a +frenzy. As they walked home from meeting the next night--they had +meeting all nights now, the world would soon end and there was so much +to be done--as they walked home Humphreys contrived to separate Julia +from the rest, and to tell her that he had had a conversation with +young Wehle. + +"It was painful, very painful," he said, "I think I had better not say +any more about it." + +"Why?" asked Julia in terror. + +"Well, I feel that your grief is mine. I have never felt so much +interest in any one before, and I must say that I was grievously +disappointed. This young man is not at all worthy of you." + +"What do you mean?" And there was a trace of indignation in her tone. + +"It does seem to me that the man who has your love should be the +happiest in the world; but he refused to send you any message, and says +that he will soon send you an entire release from all engagement to him. +He showed no tenderness and made no inquiry." + +The weakest woman and the strongest can faint. It is a woman's last +resort. When all else is gone, that remains. Julia drew a sharp quick +breath, and was just about to become unconscious. Humphreys stretched +his arms to catch her, but the sudden recollection that in case she +fainted he would carry her into the house, produced a reaction. She +released herself from his grasp, and hurried in alone, locking her door, +and refusing admittance to her mother. From Humphreys, who had put +himself into a delicate minor key, Mrs. Anderson got such an account of +the conversation as he thought best to give. She then opened and read a +note placed into her hand by a neighbor as she came out from meeting. It +was addressed to Julia, and ran: + +"If all they say is true, you have quickly changed. I do not hold you by +any promises you wish to break. + +"AUGUST WEHLE." + +Mrs. Anderson had no pity. She hesitated not an instant. Julia's door +was fast. But she went out upon the front upper porch, and pushing up +the window of her daughter's room as remorselessly as she had committed +the burglary on her private letter, she looked at her a moment, sobbing +on the bed, and then threw the letter into the room, saying: "It's good +for you. Read that, and see what a fellow your Dutchman is." + +Then Mrs. Anderson sought her couch, and slept with a serene sense, of +having done _her_ duty as a mother, whatever might be the result. + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +THE SPIDER SPINS. + +Julia got up from her bed the moment that her mother had gone. Her first +feeling was that her privacy had been shamefully outraged. A true mother +should honorably respect the reserve of the little child. But Julia was +now a woman, grown, with a woman's spirit. She rose from her bed, and +shut her window with a bang that was meant to be a protest. She then put +the tenpenny nail sometimes used to fasten the window down, in its +place, as if to say, "Come in, if you can." Then she pulled out the +folds of the chintz curtain, hanging on its draw-string half-way up the +window. If there had been any other precaution possible, she would have +taken it. But there was not. + +She took up the note, and read it. Julia was not a girl of keen +penetration. Her training was that of a country life. She did not read +between the lines of August's note, and could only understand that she +was dismissed. Outraged by her mother's tyranny, spurned by her lover, +she stood like a hunted creature, brought to bay, looking for the last +desperate chance for escape. + +Crushed? No. If she had been weaker, if she had been of the quieter, +frailer sort, instead of being, as she was, elastic, impulsive, +recuperative, she might have been crushed. She was wounded in her heart +of hearts, but all her pride and hardihood, of which she had not a +little, had now taken up arms against outrageous fortune. She was stung +at every thought of August and his letter, of Betsey Malcolm and her +victory, of the fact that her mother had read the letter and knew of her +humiliation. And she paced the floor of her room, and resolved to resist +and to be revenged. She would marry anybody, that she might show Betsey +and August they had not broken he heart and that her love did not +go begging. + +O Julia! take care. Many another woman has jumped off that precipice! + +And she would escape from her mother. The indications of affection +adroitly given by Humphreys were all remembered now. She could have him, +and she would. He would take her to Cincinnati. She would have her +revenge all around. I am sorry to show you my heroine in this mood. But +the fairest climes are sometimes subject to the fiercest hurricanes, the +frightfulest earthquakes! + +After an hour the room seemed hot. She pulled back the chintz curtain +and pushed up the window. The blue-grass in the pasture looked cool as +it drank the heavy dews. She climbed through the window on to the long, +old-fashioned upper porch. She sat down upon an old-fashioned settee +with rockers, and began to rock. The motion relieved her nervousness and +fanned her hot cheeks. Yes, she would accept the first respectable lover +that offered. She would go to the city with Humphreys, if he asked her. +It is only fair to say that Julia did not at all consider--she was not +in a temper to consider--what a marriage with Humphreys implied. She +only thought of it on two sides--the revenge upon August and Betsey, +and the escape from a thralldom now grown more bitter than death. True, +her conscience was beginning to awaken, and to take up arms against her +resolve. But nothing could be plainer. In marrying Mr. Humphreys she +should marry a friend, the only friend she had. In marrying him she +would satisfy her mother, and was it not her duty to sacrifice something +to her mother's happiness, perhaps her mother's life? + +[Illustration: TEMPTED.] + +Yes, yes, Julia, a false spirit of self-sacrifice is another path over +the cliff! In such a mood as this all paths lead into the abyss. + +Her mind was made up. She braced her will against all the relentings of +her heart. She wished that Humphreys, who had indirectly declared his +love so often, were there to offer at once. She would accept him +immediately, and then the whole neighborhood should not say that she had +been deserted by a Dutchman. For in her anger she found her mother's +epithets expressive. + +He was there! Was it the devil that planned it? Does he plan all those +opportunities for wrong that are so sure to offer themselves? Humphreys, +having led a life that turned night into day, sat at the farther end of +the long upper porch, smoking his cigar, waiting a bed-time nearer to +the one to which he was accustomed. + +Did he suspect the struggle in the heart of Julia Anderson? Did he guess +that her pride and defiance had by this time reached high-water mark? +Did he divine this from seeing her there? He rose and started in through +the door of the upper hall, the only opening to the porch, except the +window. But this was a feint. He turned back and sat himself down upon +the farther end of the settee from Julia. He understood human nature +perfectly, and had had long practice in making gradual approaches. He +begged her pardon for the bungling manner in which he had communicated +intelligence that must be so terrible to a heart so sensitive! Julia was +just going to declare that she did not care anything for what August +said or thought, but her natural truthfulness checked the transparent +falsehood. She had not gone far enough astray to lie consciously; she +was, as yet, only telling lies to herself. Very gradually and cautiously +did he proceed so as not to "flush the bird." Even as I saw, an hour +ago, a cat creep upon a sparrow with fascinating eyes, and a waving, +snake-like motion of the tail, and a treacherous feline smile upon her +face, even so, cautiously and by degrees, Humphreys felt his way with +velvet paws toward his prey. He knew the opportunity, that once gone +might not come again; he soon guessed that this was the hour and power +of darkness in the soul of Julia, the hour in which she would seek to +flee from her own pride and mortification. And if Humphreys knew how to +approach with a soft tread, very slowly and cautiously, he also +knew--men of his "profession" always know--when to spring. He saw the +moment, he made the spring, he seized the prey. + +"Will you trust your destiny to me, Miss Anderson? You seem beset by +troubles. I have means. I could not but he wholly devoted to your +welfare. Let me help you to flee away from--from all this mortification, +and this--this domestic tyranny. Will you intrust yourself to me?" + +He did not say anything about love. He had an instinctive feeling that +it would not be best. She felt herself environed with insurmountable +difficulties, threatened with agonies worse than death--so they seemed +to her. He simply, coolly opened the door, and bade her easily and +triumphantly escape. Had he said one word of tenderness the reaction +must have set in. + +She was silent. + +"I did hope, by sacrificing all my own hopes, to effect a +reconciliation. But when that young man spoke insulting words about you, +I determined at once to offer you my devoted protection. I ask no more +than you are able to give, your respect Will you accept my life-long +protection as your husband?" + +"Yes!" said the passionate girl in an agony of despair + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + +THE SPIDER'S WEB. + +Now that Humphreys had his prey he did not know just what to do with it. +Not knowing what to say, he said nothing, in which he showed his wisdom. +But he felt that saying nothing was almost as bad as saying something. +And he was right. For with people of impulsive temperament reactions are +sudden, and in one minute after Julia had said yes, there came to her +memory the vision of August standing in the barn and looking into her +eyes so purely and truly and loyally, and vowing such sweet vows of +love, and she looked back upon that perfect hour with some such fooling +perhaps as Dives felt looking out of torment across the great gulf into +paradise. Only that Dives had never known paradise, while she had. For +the man or woman that knows a pure, self-sacrificing love, returned in +kind, knows that which, of all things in this world, lies nearest to God +and heaven. There be those who have ears to hear this, and for them is +it written. Julia thought of August's love with a sinking into despair. +But then returned the memory of his faithlessness, of all she had been +compelled to believe and suffer. Then her agony came back, and she was +glad that she had taken a decided step. Any escape was a relief. I +suppose it is under some such impulse that people kill themselves. Julia +felt as though she had committed suicide and escaped. + +Humphreys on his part was not satisfied. I used the wrong figure of +speech awhile ago. He was not a cat with paw upon the prey. He was only +an angler, and had but hooked his fish. He had not landed it yet. He +felt how slender was the thread of committal by which he held Julia. +August had her heart. He had only a word. The slender vantage that he +had, he meant to use adroitly, craftily. And he knew that the first +thing was to close this interview without losing any ground. The longer +she remained bound, the better for him. And with his craft against the +country girl's simplicity it would have fared badly with Julia had it +not been for one defect which always inheres, in a bad man's plots in +such a case. A man like Humphreys never really understands a pure woman. +Certain detached facts he may know, but he can not "put himself in +her place." + +Humphreys remarked with tenderness that Julia must not stay in the night +air. She was too precious to be exposed. This flattery was comforting to +her wounded pride, and she found his words pleasant to her. Had he +stopped here he might have left the field victorious. But it was very +hard for an affianced lover to stop here. He must part from her in some +other way than this if he would leave on her mind the impression that +she was irrevocably bound to him. He stooped quickly with a +well-affected devotion and lifted her hand to kiss it. That act +awakened Julia Anderson. She must have awaked anyhow, sooner or later. +But when one is in the toils of such a man, sooner is better. The touch +of Humphreys's hand and lips sent a shudder through her frame that +Humphreys felt. Instantly there came to her a perception of all that +marriage with a repulsive man signifies. + +Not suicide, but perdition. + +She jerked her hand from his as though he were a snake. + +"Mr. Humphreys, what did I say? I can't have you. I don't love you. I'm +crazy to-night. I must take back what I said." + +"No, Julia. Let me call you _my_ Julia. You must not break my heart." +Humphreys had lost his cue, and every word of tenderness he spoke made +his case more hopeless. + +"I never can marry you--let me go in," she said, brushing past him. Then +she remembered that her door was fast on the inside. She had climbed out +the window. She turned back, and he saw his advantage. + +"I can not release you. Take time to think before you ask it. Go to +sleep now and do not act hastily." He stood between her and the window, +wishing to get some word to which he could hold. + +Julia's two black eyes grew brighter. "I see. You took advantage of my +trouble, and you want to hold me to my words, and you are bad, and +now--_now_ I hate you!" Then Julia felt better. Hate is the only +wholesome thing in such a case. She pushed him aside vigorously, stepped +upon the settee, slipped in at the window, and closed it. She drew the +curtain, but it seemed thin, and with characteristic impulsiveness she +put out her light that she might have the friendly drapery of +darkness about her. She heard the soft--for the first time it seemed +to her stealthy--tread of Humphreys, as he returned to his room. Whether +she swooned or whether she slept after that she never knew. It was +morning without any time intervening, she had a headache and could +scarcely walk, and there was August's note lying on the floor. She read +it again--if not with more intelligence, at least with more suspicion. +She wondered at her own hastiness. She tried to go about the house, but +the excitement of the previous night, added to all she had suffered +beside, had given her a headache, blinding and paralyzing, that sent her +back to bed. + +[Illustration: "NOW I HATE YOU!"] + +And there she lay in that half-asleep, half-awake mood, which a nervous +headache produces. She seemed to be a fly in a web, and the spider was +trying to fasten her. A very polite spider, with that smile which went +half-way up his face but which never seemed able to reach his eyes. He +had straps to his pantaloons, and a reddish mustache, and she shuddered +as he wound his fine webs about her. She tried to shake off the +illusion. But the more absurd an illusion, the more it will not be +shaken off. For see! the spider was kissing her hand! Then she seemed to +have made a great effort and to have broken the web. But her wings were +torn, and her feet were shackled by the fine strands that still adhered. +She could not get them off. Wouldn't somebody help her, even as she had +many a time picked off the webs from a fly's feet out of sheer pity? And +all day she would perpetually return into these half-conscious states +and feel the spider's web about her feet, and ask over and over again if +somebody wouldn't help her to get out of the meshes. + +Toward evening her mother brought her a cup of tea and a piece of +toast, and for the first time in the remembered life of the daughter +made an endeavor to show a little tenderness for her. It was a clumsy +endeavor, for when the great gulf is once fixed between mother and child +it is with difficulty bridged. And finding herself awkward in the new +role, Mrs. Anderson dropped it and resumed her old gait, remarking, as +she closed the door, that she was glad to know that Julia was coming to +her senses, and "had took the right road." For Mrs. Abigail was more +vigorous than grammatical. + +Julia did not see anything significant in this remark at first. But +after a while it came to her that Humphreys must have told her mother of +something that had passed during the preceding night, something on which +this commendation was founded. Then she fell into the same torpor and +was in the same old spider's web, and there was the same spider with the +limited smile and the mustache and the watch-seals and the straps! And +he was trying to fasten her, and she said "yes." And she could see the +little word. The spider caught it and spun it into a web and fastened +her with it. And she could break all the other webs but those woven out +of that one little word from her own lips. That clung to her, and she +could neither fly nor walk. August could not help her--he would not +come. Her mother was helping the spider. Just then Cynthy Ann came along +with her broom. Would she see her and sweep her free? She tried to call +her, but alas! she was a fly. She tried to buzz, but her wings were fast +bound with the webs. She was being smothered. The spider had seized her. +She could not move. He was smiling at her! + +Then she woke shuddering. It was after midnight. + + + +CHAPTER XV. + +THE WEB BROKEN. + +"Poverty," says Béranger, "is always superstitious." So indeed is human +extremity of any sort. Julia's healthy constitution had resisted the +threatened illness, the feverishness had gone with the headache. She +felt now only one thing: she must have a friend. But the hard piousness +of Cynthy Ann's face had never attracted her sympathy. It had always +seemed to her that Cynthy disapproved of her affection quite as much as +her mother did. Cynthy's face had indeed a chronic air of disapproval. A +nervous young minister said that he never had any "liberty" when sister +Cynthy Ann was in his congregation. She seemed averse to all he said. + +But now Julia felt that there was just one chance of getting advice and +help. Had she not in her dream seen Cynthy Ann with a broom? She would +ask help from Cynthy Ann. There must be a heart under her rind. + +But to get to her. Her mother's affectionate vigilance never left her +alone with Cynthy. Perhaps it was this very precaution that had +suggested Cynthy Ann to her as a possible ally. She must contrive to +have a talk with her somehow. But how? There was one way. Black-eyed +people do not delay. Bight or wrong, Julia acted with sharp decision. +Before she had any very definite view of her plan, she had arisen and +slipped on a calico dress. But there was one obstacle. Mr. Humphreys +kept late hours, and he might be on the front-porch. She might meet him +in the hall, and this seemed worse to her than would the chance of +meeting a tribe of Indians. She listened and looked out of her window; +but she could not be sure; she would run the risk. With silent feet and +loud-beating heart she went down the hall to the back upper porch, for +in that day porches were built at the back and front of houses, above +and below. Once on the back-porch she turned to the right and stood by +Cynthy Ann's door. But a new fear took possession of her. If Cynthy Ann +should be frightened and scream! + +[Illustration: AT CYNTHY'S DOOR.] + +"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!" she said, standing by the bed in the little bare +room which Cynthy Ann had occupied, for five years, but into which she +had made no endeavor to bring one ray of sentiment or one trace +of beauty. + +"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!" + +Had Cynthy Ann slept anywhere but in the L of the house, her +shriek--what woman could have helped shrieking a little when +startled?--her shriek must have alarmed the family. But it did not. +"Why, child! what are you doing here? You are out of your head, and you +must go back to your room at once." And Cynthy had arisen and was +already tugging at Julia's arm. + +"I a'n't out of my head, Cynthy Ann, and I _won't_ go back to my +room--not until I have had a talk with you." + +"What _is_ the matter, Jule?" said Cynthy, sitting on the bed and +preparing to begin again her old fight between duty and inclination. +Cynthy always expected temptation. She had often said in class-meeting +that temptations abounded on every hand, and as soon as Julia told her +she had a communication to make, Cynthy Ann was sure that she would find +in it some temptation of the devil to do something she "hadn't orter +do," according to the Bible or the Dis_cip_line, strictly construed. +And Cynthy was a "strict constructionist." + +Julia did not find it so easy to say anything now that she had announced +herself as determined to have a conversation and now that her auditor +was waiting. It is the worst beginning in the world for a conversation, +saying that you intend to converse. When an Indian has announced his +intention of having a "big talk," he immediately lights his pipe and +relapses into silence until the big talk shall break out accidentally +and naturally. But Julia, having neither the pipe nor the Indian's +stolidity, found herself under the necessity of beginning abruptly. +Every minute of delay made her position worse. For every minute +increased her doubt of Cynthy Ann's sympathy. + +"O Cynthy Ann! I'm so miserable!" + +"Yes, I told your ma this morning that you was looking mis'able, and +that you had orter have sassafras to purify the blood, but your ma is so +took up with steam-docterin' that she don't believe in nothin' but +corn-sweats and such like." + +"Oh! but, Cynthy, it a'n't that. I'm miserable in my mind. I wish I knew +what to do." + +"I thought you'd made up your mind. Your ma told me you was engaged to +Mr. Humphreys." + +Julia was appalled. How fast the spider spins his web! + +"I a'n't engaged to him, and I hate him. He got me to say yes when I was +crazy, and I believe he brought about the things that make me feel so +nigh crazy. Do you think he's a good man, Cynthy Ann?" + +"Well, no, though I don't want to set in no jedgment on nobody; but I +don't see as how as he kin be good and wear all of them costly apparels +that's so forbid in the Bible, to say nothing of the Dis_cip_line. The +Bible says you must know a tree by its fruits, and I 'low his'n is +mostly watch-seals. I think a good sound conversion at the mourners' +bench would make him strip off some of them things, and put them into +the missionary collection. Though maybe he a'n't so bad arter all, fer +Jonas says that liker'n not the things a'n't gold, but pewter washed +over. But I'm afeard he's wor'ly-minded. But I don't want to be too hard +on a feller-creatur'." + +[Illustration: CYNTHY ANN HAD OFTEN SAID IN CLASS-MEETING THAT +TEMPTATIONS ABOUNDED ON EVERY HAND.] + +"Cynthy, I drempt just now I was a fly and he was a spider, and that he +had me all wrapped up in his web, and that just then you came along +with a broom." + +"That must be a sign," said Cynthy Ann. "It's good you didn't dream +after daylight. Then 'twould a come true. But what about _him?_ I +thought you loved Gus Wehle, and though I'm afeard you're makin' a idol +out o' him, and though I'm afeard he's a onbeliever, and I don't noways +like marryin' with onbelievers, yet I did want to help you, and I +brought a note from him wunst and put it under the head of your bed. I +was afeard then I was doin' what Timothy forbids, when he says not to be +pertakers in other folks's sins, but, you see, how could I help doin' +it, when you was lookin' so woebegone like, and Jonas, he axed me to do +it. It's awful hard to say you won't to Jonas, you know. So I put the +letter there, and I don't doubt your ma mistrusted it, and got a holt +on it." + +"Did he write to me? A'n't he going with that Betsey Malcolm?" + +"Can't be, I 'low. On'y this evenin' Jonas said to me, says he, when I +tole him you was engaged to Mr. Humphreys, says he, in his way, 'The +hawk's lit, has he? That'll be the death of two,' says he, 'fer she'll +die on it, an' so'll poor Gus,' says he. And then he went on to tell as +how as Gus is all ready to leave, and had axed him to tell him of any +news; but he said he wouldn't tell him that. He'd leave him some hope. +Fer he says Gus was mighty nigh distracted to-day, that is yisterday, +fer its most mornin' I 'low." + +Now this speech did Julia a world of good. It showed her that Gus was +not faithless, that she might count on Cynthy, and that Jonas was her +friend, and that he did not like Humphreys. Jonas called him a hawk. +That agreed with her dream. He was a hawk and a spider. + +"But, Cynthy Ann, I got a letter night before last; ma threw it in the +window. In it Gus said he released me. I hadn't asked any release. What +did he mean?" + +"Honey, I wish I could help you. It's that hawk, as Jonas calls him, +that's at the bottom of all this trouble. I don't believe but what he's +told some lies or 'nother. I don't believe but what he's a bad man. I +allers said I didn't 'low no good could come of a man that puts on +costly apparel and wears straps. I'm afeard you're making a idol of Gus +Wehle. Don't do it. Ef you do, God'll take him. Misses Pearsons made a +idol of her baby, a kissin' it and huggin' it every minute, and I said, +says I, Misses Pearsons, you hadn't better make a idol of a perishin' +creature. And sure enough, God tuck it. He's jealous of our idols. But I +can't help helpin' you. You're a onbeliever yet yourself, and I 'low +taint no sin fer you to marry Gus. It's yokin' like with like. I wish +you was both Christians. I'll speak to Jonas. I don't know what I ought +to do, but I'll speak to Jonas. He's mighty peart about sech things, is +Jonas, and got as _good_ a heart as you ever see. And--" + +"Cynth-ee A-ann!" It was the energetic voice of Mrs. Anderson rousing +the house betimes. For the first time Julia and Cynthy Ann noticed the +early light creeping in at the window. They sat still, paralyzed. + +"Cynth-ee!" The voice was now at the top of the stairs, for Mrs. +Anderson always carried the war into Africa if Cynthy did not wake +at once. + +"Answer quick, Cynthy Ann, or she'll be in here!" said Julia, sliding +behind the bed. + +"Ma'am!" said Cynthy Ann, starting toward the door, where she met Mrs. +Abigail. "I'm up," said Cynthy. + +"Well, what makes you so long a-answerin' then? You make me climb the +steps, and you know I may drop down dead of heart-disease any day. I'll +go and wake Jule." + +"Better let her lay awhile," said Cynthy, reproaching herself instantly +for the deception. + +Mrs. Anderson hesitated at the top of the stairs. + +"Jul-yee!" she called. Poor Jule shook from head to foot. "I guess I'll +let her lay awhile; but I'm afraid I've already spoiled the child by +indulgence," said the mother, descending the stairs. She relented only +because she believed Julia was conquered. + +"I declare, child, it's a shame I should be helping you to disobey your +mother. I'm afeard the Lord'll bring some jedgment on us yet." For +Cynthy Ann had tied her conscience to her rather infirm logic. Better to +have married it to her generous heart. But before she had finished the +half-penitent lamentation, Jule was flying with swift and silent feet +down the hall. Arrived in her own room, she was so much relieved as to +be almost happy; and she was none too soon, for her industrious mother +had quickly repented her criminal leniency, and was again climbing the +stairs at the imminent risk of her precarious life, and calling +"Jul-yee!" + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + +JONAS EXPOUNDS THE SUBJECT. + +"I 'lowed I'd ketch you here, my venerable and reliable feller-citizen!" +said Jonas as he entered the lower story of Andrew Anderson's castle and +greeted August, sitting by Andrew's loom. It was the next evening after +Julia's interview with Cynthy Ann. "When do you 'low to leave this +terry-firmy and climb a ash-saplin'? To-night, hey? Goin' to the Queen +City to take to steamboat life in hopes of havin' your sperrits raised +by bein' blowed up? Take my advice and don't make haste in the downward +road to destruction, nor the up-hill one nuther. A game a'n't never +through tell it's played out, an' the American eagle's a chicken with +steel spurs. That air sweet singer of Israel that is so hifalugeon he +has to anchor hisself to his boots, knows all the tricks, and is +intimately acquainted with the kyards, whether it's faro, poker, euchre, +or French monte. But blamed ef Providence a'n't dealed you a better +hand'n you think. Never desperandum, as the Congressmen say, fer while +the lamp holds out to burn you may beat the blackleg all to flinders +and sing and shout forever. Last night I went to bed thinkin' 'Umphreys +had the stakes all in his pocket. This mornin' I found he was in a far +way to be beat outen his boots ef you stood yer ground like a man and a +gineological descendant of Plymouth Rock!" + +Andrew stopped his loom, and, looking at August, said: "Our friend Jonas +speaks somewhat periphrastically and euphuistically, and--he'll pardon +me--but he speaks a little ambiguously." + +"My love, I gin it up, as the fish-hawk said to the bald eagle one day. +I kin rattle off odd sayings and big words picked up at Fourth-of-Julys +and barbecues and big meetins, but when you begin to fire off your +forty-pound bomb-shell book-words, I climb down as suddent as Davy +Crockett's coon. Maybe I do speak unbiguously, as you say, but I was +givin' you the biggest talkin' I had in the basket. And as fer my good +news, a feller don't like to eat up all his country sugar to wunst, I +'low. But I says to our young and promisin' friend of German extraction, +beloved, says I, hold onto that air limb a little longer and +you're saved." + +"But, Jonas," said August, spinning Andrew's winding-blade round and +speaking slowly and bitterly, "a man don't like to be trifled with, if +he is a Dutchman!" + +"But sposin' a man hain't been trifled with, Dutchman or no +Dutchman? Sposin' it's all a optical delusion of the yeers? +There's a word fer _you_, Andrew, that a'n't nuther unbiguous +nor peri-what-you-may-call-it." + +"But," said August, "Betsey Malcolm--" + +"_Betsey Malcolm!_" said Jonas. "Betsey Malcolm to thunder!" and then he +whistled. "Set a dog to mind a basket of meat when his chops is +a-waterin' fer it! Set a kingfisher to take keer of a fish-pond! Set a +cat to raisin' your orphan chickens on the bottle! Set a spider to nuss +a fly sick with dyspepsy from eatin' too much molasses! I'd ruther trust +a hen-hawk with a flock of patridges than to trust Betsey Malcolm with +your affairs. I ha'n't walked behind you from meetin' and seed her head +a bobbin' like a bluebird's and her eyes a blazin an' all that, fer +nothin'. Like as not, Betsey Malcolm's more nor half your trouble in +that quarter." + +"But she said--" + +"It don't matter three quarters of a rotten rye-straw what she said, my +inexper'enced friend. She don't keer what she says, so long as it's fur +enough away from the truth to sarve her turn. An' she's told pay-tent +double-back-action lies that worked both ways. What do you 'low Jule +Anderson tho't when she hearn tell of your courtin' Betsey, as Betsey +told it, with all her nods an' little crowin'? Now looky here, Gus, I'm +your friend, as the Irishman said to the bar that hugged him, an' I want +to say about all that air that Betsey told you, spit on the slate an' +wipe that all off. They's lie in her soap an.' right smart chance of +saft-soap in her lie, I 'low." + +These rough words of Jonas brought a strange intelligence into the mind +of August. He saw so many things in a moment that had lain under his +eyes unnoticed. + +"There is much rough wisdom in your speech, Jonas," said Andrew. + +"That's a fact. You and me used to go to school to old Benefield +together when I was little and you was growed up. You allers beat +everybody all holler in books and spellin'-matches, Andy. But I 'low I +cut my eye-teeth 'bout as airly as some of you that's got more larnin' +under your skelp. Now, I say to our young friend and feller-citizen, +don't go 'way tell you've spoke a consolin' word to a girl as'll stick +to you tell the hour and article of death, and then remains yours truly +forever, amen." + +[Illustration: JONAS.] + +"How do you know that, Jonas?" said August, smiling in spite of himself. + +"How do I know it? Why, by the testimony of a uncorrupted and +disinterested witness, gentlemen of the jury, if the honorable court +pleases. What did that Jule Anderson do, poor thing, but spend some +time making a most onseasonable visit to Cynthy Ann last night? And I +'low ef there's a ole gal in this sublunary spear as tells the truth in +a bee-line and no nonsense, it's that there same, individooal, identical +Cynthy Ann. She's most afeard to drink cold water or breathe fresh air +fer fear she'll commit a unpard'nable sin. And that persecuted young +pigeon that thought herself forsooken, jest skeeted into Cynthy Ann's +budwoir afore daybreak this mornin' and told her all her sorrows, and +how your letter and your goin' with that Betsey Malcolm"--here August +winced--"had well nigh druv her to run off with the straps and +watch-seals to get rid of you and Betsey and her precious and mighty +affectionate ma." + +"But she won't look at me in meeting, and she sent Humphreys to me with +an insulting message." + +"Which text divides itself into two parts, my brethren and +feller-travelers to etarnity. To treat the last head first, beloved, I +admonish you not to believe a blackleg, unless it's under sarcumstances +when he's got onusual and airresistible temptations to tell the truth. I +don't advise yer to spit on the slate and rub it out in this case. Break +the slate and throw it away. To come to the second pertikeler, which is +the first in the order of my text, my attentive congregation. She didn't +look at you in meetin'. Now, I 'spose you don't know nothin' of her +mother's heart-disease. Heart-disease is trumps with Abigail Anderson. +She plays that every turn. Just think of a young gal who thinks that ef +she looks at her beau when her mother's by, she might kill her +invalooable parient of heart-disease. Fer my part, I don't take no stock +in Mrs. Abby Anderson's dyin' of heart-disease, no ways. Might as well +talk about a whale dyin' of footrot." + +"Well, Jonas, what counsel do you give our young friend? Your sagacity +is to be depended on." + +"Why, I advise him to speak face to face with the angel of his life. Let +him climb into my room to-night. Leave meetin' jest afore the +benediction--he kin do without that wunst--and go double-quick acrost +the fields, and git safe into my stoodio. Ferther pertikelers when the +time arrives." + + + +CHAPTER XVII. + +THE WRONG PEW. + +August's own good sense told him that the advice of Jonas was not good. +But he had made many mistakes of late, and was just now inclined to take +anybody's judgment in place of his own. All that was proud and +gentlemanly in him rebelled at the thought of creeping into another +man's house in the night. Modesty is doubtless a virtue, but it is a +virtue responsible for many offenses. Had August not felt so distrustful +of his own wisdom, nothing could have persuaded him to make his love for +Julia Anderson seem criminal by an action so wanting in dignity. But +back of Jonas's judgment was that of Andrew, whose weakness was +Quixotism. He wanted to live and to have others live on the +concert-pitch of romantic action. There was something of chivalry in the +proposal of Jonas, a spice of adventure that made him approve it on +purely sentimental grounds. + +The more August thought of it, and the nearer he was to its execution, +the more did he dislike it. But I have often noticed that people of a +rather quiet temperament, such as young Wehle's, show _vis inertiae_ in +both, ways--not very easily moved, they are not easily checked when once +in motion. August's velocity was not usually great, his momentum was +tremendous, and now that he had committed himself to the hands of Jonas +Harrison and set out upon this enterprise, he was determined, in his +quiet way, to go through to the end. + +Of course he understood the house, and having left the family in +meeting, he had nothing to do but to scale one of the pillars of the +front-porch. In those Arcadian days upper windows were hardly ever +fastened, except when the house was deserted by all its inmates for +days. Half-way up the post he was seized with a violent trembling. His +position brought to him a confused memory of a text of Scripture: "He +that entereth not by the door ... but climbeth up some other way, the +same is a thief and a robber." Bred under Moravian influence, he +half-believed the text to be supernaturally suggested to him. For a +moment his purpose wavered, but the habit of going through with an +undertaking took the place of his will, and he went on blindly, as Baker +the Nile explorer did, "more like a donkey than like a man." Once on the +upper porch he hesitated again. To break into a man's house in this way +was unlawful. His conscience troubled him. In vain he reasoned that Mrs. +Anderson's despotism was morally wrong, and that this action was right +as an offset to it. He knew that it was not right. + +I want to remark here that there are many situations in life in which a +conscience is dreadfully in the way. There are people who go straight +ahead to success--such as it is--with no embarrassments, no fire in the +rear from any scruples. Some of these days I mean to write an essay on +"The Inconvenience of having a Conscience," in which I shall proceed to +show that it costs more in the course of a year or two, than it would to +keep a stableful of fast horses. Many a man could afford to drive +Dexters and Flora Temples who would be ruined by a conscience. But I +must not write the essay here, for I am keeping August out in the night +air and his perplexity all this time. + +August Wehle had the habit, I think I have said, of going through with +an enterprise. He had another habit, a very inconvenient habit +doubtless, but a very manly one, of listening for the voice of his +conscience. And I think that this habit would have even yet turned him +back, as he had his hand on the window-sash, had it not been that while +he stood there trying to find out just what was the decision of his +conscience, he heard the voices of the returning family. There was no +time to lose, there was no shelter on the porch, in a minute more they +would be in sight. He must go ahead now, for retreat was cut off. He +lifted the window and climbed into the room, lowering the sash gently +behind him. As no one ever came into this room but Jonas, he felt safe +enough. Jonas would plan a meeting after midnight in Cynthy Ann's room, +and in Cynthy Ann's presence. + +In groping for a chair, August drew aside the curtain of the +gable-window, hoping to get some light. Had Jonas taken to cultivating +flowers in pots? Here was a "monthly" rose on the window-seat! Surely +this was the room. He had occupied it during his stay in the house. But +he did not know that Mrs. Anderson had changed the arrangement between +his leaving and the coming of Jonas. He noticed that the curtains were +not the same. He trembled from head to foot. He felt for the bureau, and +recognized by various little articles, a pincushion, a tuck-comb, and +the sun-bonnet hanging against the window-frame, that he was in Julia's +room. His first emotion was not alarm. It was awe, as pure and solemn as +the high-priest may have felt in the holy place. Everything pertaining +to Julia had a curious sacredness, and this room was a temple into which +it was sacrilege to intrude. But a more practical question took his +attention soon. The family had come in below, except Jonas and Cynthy +Ann--who had walked slowly, planning a meeting for August--and Mr. +Samuel Anderson, who stood at the front-gate with a neighbor. August +could hear his shrill voice discussing the seventh trumpet and the +thousand three hundred and thirty and five days. It would not do to be +discovered where he was. Beside the fright he would give to Julia, he +shuddered at the thought of compromising her in such a way. To go back +was to insure his exposure, for Samuel Anderson had not yet half-settled +the question of the trumpets. Indeed it seemed to August that the world +might come to an end before that conversation would. He heard Humphreys +enter his room. He was now persuaded that the room formerly occupied by +Julia must be Jonas's, and he determined to get to it if he could. He +felt like a villain already. He would have cheerfully gone to +State's-prison in preference to compromising Julia. At any rate, he +started out of Julia's room toward the one that was occupied by Jonas. +It was the only road open, and but for an unexpected encounter he would +have reached his hiding-place in safety, for the door was but fifteen +feet away. + +In order to explain the events that follow, I must ask the reader to go +back to Julia, and to events that had occurred two hours before. +Hitherto she had walked to and from meeting and "singing" with +Humphreys, as a matter of courtesy. On the evening in question she had +absolutely refused to walk with him. Her mother found that threats were +as vain as coaxing. Even her threat of dying with heart-disease, then +and there, killed by her daughter's disobedience, could not move Julia, +who would not even speak with the "spider." Her mother took her into the +sitting-room alone, and talked with her. + +"So this is the way you trifle with gentlemen, is it? Night before last +you engaged yourself to Mr. Humphreys, now you won't speak to him. To +think that my daughter should prove a heartless flirt!" + +I am afraid that the unfilial thought came into Julia's mind that +nothing could have been more in the usual order of things than that the +daughter of a coquette should be a flirt. + +"You'll kill me on the spot; you certainly will." Julia felt anxious, +for her mother showed signs of going into hysterics. But she put her +foot out and shook her head in a way that said that all her friends +might die and all the world might go to pieces before she would yield. +Mrs. Anderson had one forlorn hope. She determined to order that +forward. Leaving Julia alone, she went to her husband. + +"Samuel, if you value my life go and speak to your daughter. She's got +your own stubbornness of will in her. She is just like you; she _will_ +have her own way. I shall die." And Mrs. Abigail Anderson sank into a +chair with unmistakable symptoms of a hysterical attack. + +I am aware that I have so far let the reader hear not one word of Samuel +Anderson's conversation. He has played a rather insignificant part in +the story. Nothing could be more _comme il faut_. Insignificance was his +characteristic. It was not so much that he was small. It is not so bad a +thing to be a little man. But to be little and insignificant also is +bad. There is only one thing worse, which is to be big and +insignificant. If one is little and insignificant, one may be +overlooked, insignificance and all. But if one is big and insignificant, +it is to be an obtrusive cipher, a great lubber, not easily kept out +of sight. + +Appealed to by his wife, Samuel Anderson prepared to assert his +authority as the head of the family. He almost strutted into Julia's +presence. Julia had a real affection for her father, and nothing +mortified her more than to see him acting as a puppet, moved by her +mother, and yet vain enough to believe himself independent and supreme. +She would have yielded almost any other point to have saved herself the +mortification of seeing her father act the fool; but now she had +determined that she would die and let everybody else die rather than +walk with a man whose nature seemed to her corrupt, and whose touch was +pollution. I do not mean that she was able to make a distinct inventory +of her reasons for disliking him, or to analyze her feelings. She could +not have told just why she had so deep and utter a repugnance to walking +a quarter of a mile to the school-house in company with this man. She +followed that strong instinct of truth and purity which is the +surest guide. + +"Julia, my daughter," said Samuel Anderson, "really you must yield to me +as head of the house, and treat this gentleman politely. I thought you +respected him, or loved him, and he told me that you had given consent +to marry him, and had told him to ask my consent." + +In saying this, the "head of the house" was seesawing himself backward +and forward in his squeaky boots, speaking in a pompous manner, and with +an effort to swell an effeminate voice to a bass key, resulting in +something between a croak and a squeal. Julia sat down and cried in +mortification and disgust. Mr. Anderson understood this to be +acquiescence, and turned and went into the next room. + +[Illustration: JULIA SAT DOWN IN MORTIFICATION.] + +"Mr. Humphreys, my daughter will be glad to ask your pardon. She is over +her little pet; lovers always have pets. Even my wife and I have had our +disagreements in our time. Julia will be glad to see you in the +sitting-room." + +Humphreys drew the draw-strings and set his face into its broadest and +most parallelogrammatic smile, bowed to Mr. Anderson, and stepped into +the hall. But when he reached the sitting-room door he wished he had +staid away. Julia had heard his tread, and was standing again with her +foot advanced. Her eyes were very black, and were drawn to a sharp +focus. She had some of her mother's fire, though happily none of her +mother's meanness. It is hard to say whether she spoke or hissed. + +"Go away, you spider! I hate you! I told you I hated you, and you told +people I loved you and was engaged to you. Go away! You detestable +spider, you! I'll die right here, but I will not go with you." + +But the smirking Humphreys moved toward her, speaking soothingly, and +assuring her that there was some mistake. Julia dashed past him into the +parlor and laid hold of her father's arm. + +"Father, protect me from that--that--spider! I hate him!" + +Mr. Anderson stood irresolute a moment and looked appealingly to his +wife for a signal. She solved the difficulty herself. On the whole she +had concluded not to die of heart-disease until she saw Julia married to +suit her taste, and having found a hill she could not go through, she +went round. Seizing Julia's arm with more of energy than affection, she +walked off with her, or rather walked her off, in a sulky silence, while +Mr. Anderson kept Humphreys company. + +I thought best to keep August standing in the door of Julia's room all +this time while I explained these things to you, so that you might +understand what follows. In reality August did not stop at all, but +walked out into the hall and into difficulty. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + +THE ENCOUNTER. + +Just before August came out of the door of Julia's room he had heard +Humphreys enter his room on the opposite side of the hall. Humphreys had +lighted his cigar and was on his way to the porch to smoke off his +discomfiture when he met August coming out of Julia's door on the +opposite side of the hall. The candle in Humphreys's room threw its +light full on August's face, there was no escape from recognition, and +Wehle was too proud to retreat. He shut the door of Julia's room and +stood with back against the wall staring at Humphreys, who did not +forget to smile in his most aggravating way. + +"Thief! thief!" called Humphreys. + +In a moment Mrs. Anderson and Julia ran up the stairs, followed by Mr. +Anderson, who hearing the outcry had left the matter of the Apocalypse +unsettled, and by Jonas and Cynthy Ann, who had just arrived. + +"I knew it," cried Mrs. Anderson, turning on the mortified Julia, "I +never knew a Dutchman nor a foreigner of any sort that wouldn't steal. +Now you see what you get by taking a fancy to a Dutchman. And now _you_ +see"--to her husband--"what _you_ get by taking a Dutchman into your +house. I always wanted you to hire white men and not Dutchmen +nor thieves!" + +"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Anderson," said August, with very white lips, +"I am not a thief." + +"Not a thief, eh? What was he doing, Mr. Humphreys, when you first +detected him?" + +"Coming out of Miss Anderson's room," said Humphreys, smiling politely. + +"Do you invite gentlemen to your room?" said the frantic woman to Julia, +meaning by one blow to revenge herself and crush the stubbornness of her +daughter forever. But Julia was too anxious about August to notice the +shameless insult. + +"Mrs. Anderson, this visit is without any invitation from Julia. I did +wrong to enter your house in this way, but I only am responsible, and I +meant to enter Jonas's room. I did not know that Julia occupied this +room. I am to blame, she is not." + +"And what did you break in for if you didn't mean to steal? It is all +off between you and Jule, for I saw your letter. I shall have you +arrested to-morrow for burglary. And I think you ought to be searched. +Mr. Humphreys, won't you put him out?" + +Humphreys stopped forward toward August, but he noticed that the latter +had a hard look in his eyes, and had two stout German fists shut very +tight. He turned back. + +"These thieves are nearly always armed. I think I had best get a pistol +out of my trunk." + +"I have no arms, and you know it, coward," said August. "I will not be +put out by anybody, but I will go out whenever the master of this +house asks me to go out, and the rest of you open a free path." + +[Illustration: "GOOD-BY!"] + +"Jonas, put him out!" screamed Mrs. Anderson. + +"Couldn't do it," said Jonas, "couldn't do it ef I tried. They's too +much bone and sinnoo in them arms of his'n, and moreover he's a +gentleman. I axed him to come and see me sometime, and he come. He come +ruther late it's true, but I s'pose he thought that sence we got sech a +dee-splay of watch-seals and straps we had all got so stuck up, we +wouldn't receive calls afore fashionable hours. Any way, I 'low he +didn't mean no harm, and he's my visitor, seein' he meant to come into +my winder, knowin' the door was closed agin him. And he won't let no man +put him out, 'thout he's a man with more'n half a dozen watch-seals onto +him, to give him weight and influence." + +"Samuel, will you see me insulted in this way? Will you put this burglar +out of the house?" + +The "head of the house," thus appealed to, tried to look important; he +tried to swell up his size and his courage. But he did not dare +touch August. + +"Mr. Anderson, I beg _your_ pardon. I had no right to come In as I did. +I had no right so to enter a gentleman's house. If I had not known that +this cowardly fop--I don't know what _else_ he may be--was injuring me +by his lies I should not have come in. If it is a crime to love a young +lady, then I have committed a crime. You have only to exercise your +authority as master of this house and ask me to go." + +"I do ask you to go, Mr. Wehle." + +It was the first time that Samuel Anderson had ever called him Mr. +Wehle. It was an involuntary tribute to the dignity of the young man, as +he stood at bay. "Mr. Wehle, _indeed_!" said Mrs. Anderson. + +August had hoped Julia would say a word in his behalf. But she was too +much, cowed by her mother's fierce passion. So like a criminal going to +prison, like a man going to his own funeral, August Wehle went down the +hall toward the stairs, which were at the back of it. Humphreys +instinctively retreated into his room. Mrs. Anderson glared on the young +man as he went by, but he did not turn his head even when he passed +Julia. His heart and hope were all gone; in his mortification and defeat +there seemed to him nothing left but his unbroken pride to sustain him. +He had descended two or three steps, when Julia suddenly glided forward +and said with a tremulous voice: "You aren't going without telling me +good-by, August?" + +"Jule Anderson! what do you mean?" cried her mother. But the hall was +narrow by the stairway, and Jonas, by standing close to Cynthy Ann, in +an unconscious sort of a way managed to keep Mrs. Anderson back; else +she would have laid violent hands on her daughter. + +When August lifted his eyes and saw her face full of tenderness and her +hand reached over the balusters to him, he seemed to have been suddenly +lifted from perdition to bliss. The tears ran unrestrained upon his +cheeks, he reached up and took her hand. + +"Good-by, Jule! God bless you!" he said huskily, and went out into the +night, happy in spite of all. + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + +THE MOTHER. + +Out of the door he went, happy in spite of all the mistakes he had made +and of all the _contretemps_ of his provoking misadventure; happy in +spite of the threat of arrest for burglary. For nearly a minute August +Wehle was happy in that perfect way in which people of quiet tempers are +happy--happy without fluster. But before he had passed the gate, he +heard a scream and a wild hysterical laugh; he heard a hurrying of feet +and saw a moving of lights. He would fain have turned back to find out +what the matter was, he had so much of interest in that house, but he +remembered that he had been turned out and that he could not go back. +The feeling of outlawry mingled its bitterness with the feeling of +anxiety. He feared that something had happened to Julia; he lingered and +listened. Humphreys came out upon the upper porch and looked sharply up +and down the road. August felt instinctively that he was the object of +search and slunk into a fence-corner, remembering that he was now a +burglar and at the mercy of the man whose face was enough to show him +unrelenting. + +Presently Humphreys turned and went in, and then August came out of the +shadow and hurried away. When he had gone a mile, he heard the hoofs of +horses, and again he concealed himself with a cowardly feeling he had +never known before. But when he found that it was Jonas, riding one +horse and leading another, on his way to bring Dr. Ketchup, the +steam-doctor, he ran out. + +"Jonas! Jonas! what's the matter? Who's sick? Is it Julia?" + +"I'll be bound you ax fer Jule first, my much-respected comrade. But +it's only one of the ole woman's conniption fits, and you know she's got +nineteen lives. People of the catamount sort always has. You'd better +gin a thought to yourself now. I got you into this scrape, and I mean to +see you out, as the dog said to the 'possum in its hole. Git up onto +this four-legged quadruped and go as fur as I go on the road to peace +and safety. Now, I tell you what, the hawk's got a mighty good purchase +onto you, my chicken, and he's jest about to light, and when he lights, +look out fer feathers! Don't sleep under the paternal shingles, as they +say. Go to Andrew's castle, and he'll help you git acrost the river into +the glorious State of ole Kaintuck afore any warrant can be got out fer +takin' you up. Never once thought of your bein' took up. But don't +delay, as the preachers say. The time is short, and the human heart is +desperately wicked and mighty deceitful and onsartain." + +As far as Jonas traveled his way, he carried August upon the gray horse. +Then the latter hurried across the fields to his father's cabin. Little +Wilhelmina sat with face against the window waiting his return. + +"Where did you go, August? Did you see the pretty girl at Anderson's?" + +He stooped and kissed her, but, without speaking a word to her, he went +over to where his mother sat darning the last of her basket of +stockings. All the rest were asleep, and having assured himself of this, +he drew up a low chair and leaned his elbow on his knee and hi head on +his hand, and told the whole adventure of the evening to his mother, and +then dropped his head on her lap and wept in a still way. And the +sweet-eyed, weary Moravian mother laid her two hands upon his head and +prayed. And Wilhelmina knelt instinctively by the side of her brother. + +[Illustration: THE MOTHER'S BLESSING.] + +Perhaps there is no God. Or perhaps He is so great that our praying has +no effect. Perhaps this strong crying of our hearts to Him in our +extremity is no witness of his readiness to hear. Let him live in doubt +who can. Let me believe that the tender mother-heart and the loving +sister-heart in that little cabin _did_ reach up to the great Heart that +is over us all in Fatherly love, did find a real comfort for themselves, +and did bring a strength-giving and sanctifying something upon the head +of the young man, who straightway rose up refreshed, and departed out +into the night, leaving behind him mother and sister straining their +eyes after him in the blackness, and carrying with him thoughts and +memories, and--who shall doubt?--a genuine heavenly inspiration that +saved him in the trials in which we shall next meet him. + +At two o'clock that night August Wehle stood upon the shore of the Ohio +in company with Andrew Anderson, the Backwoods Philosopher. Andrew waved +a fire-brand at the steamboat "Isaac Shelby," which was coming round the +bend. And the captain tapped his bell three times and stopped his +engines. Then the yawl took the two men aboard, and two days afterward +Andrew came back alone. + + + +CHAPTER XX. + +THE STEAM-DOCTOR. + +To return to the house of Samuel Anderson. + +Scarcely had August passed out the door when Mrs. Anderson fell into a +fit of hysterics, and declared that she was dying of heart-disease. Her +time had come at last! She was murdered! Murdered by her own daughter's +ingratitude and disobedience! Struck down in her own house! And what +grieved her most was that she should never live to see the end of +the world! + +And indeed she seemed to be dying. Nothing is more frightful than a good +solid fit of hysterics. Cynthy Ann, inwardly condemning herself as she +always did, lifted the convulsed patient, who seemed to be anywhere in +her last ten breaths, and carried her, with Mr. Anderson's aid, down to +her room, and while Jonas saddled the horse, Mr. Anderson put on his hat +and prepared to go for the doctor. + +"Samuel! O Sam-u-el! Oh-h-h-h-h!" cried Mrs. Anderson, with rising and +falling inflections that even patient Dr. Rush could never have +analyzed, laughing insanely and weeping piteously in the same breath, in +the same word; running it up and down the gamut in an uncontrolled and +uncontrollable way; now whooping like a savage, and now sobbing like the +last breath of a broken-hearted. "Samuel! Sam-u-el! O Samuel! Ha! ha! +ha! h-a-a! Oh-h-h-h-h-h-h! You won't leave me to die alone! After the +wife I've been to you, you won't leave me to die alone! No-o-o-o-o! +HOO-HOO-oo-OO! You musn't. You shan't. Send Jonas, and you stay by me! +Think--" here her breath died away, and for a moment she seemed really +to be dying. "Think," she gasped, and then sank away again. After a +minute she opened her eyes, and, with characteristic pertinacity, took +up the sentence just where she had left off. She had carefully kept her +place throughout the period of unconsciousness. But now she spoke, not +with a gasp, but in that shrill, unnatural falsetto so characteristic of +hysteria; that voice--half yell--that makes every nerve of the listener +jangle with the discord. "Think, oh-h-h Samuel! why won't you think what +a wife I've been to you? Here I've drudged and scrubbed and scrubbed and +drudged all these years like a faithful and industrious wife, never +neglecting my duty. And now--oh-h-h-h--now to be left alone in my--" +Here she ceased to breathe again for a while. "In my last hours to die, +to die! to die with, out--without--Oh-h-h!" What Mrs. Anderson was left +to die without she never stated. Mr. Anderson had beckoned to Jonas when +he came in, and that worthy had gone off in a leisurely trot to get the +"steam-doctor." + +[Illustration: "CORN-SWEATS AND CALAMUS."] + +Dr. Ketchup had been a blacksmith, but bard work disagreed with his +constitution. He felt that he, was made for something better than +shoeing horses. This ambitious thought was first suggested to him by the +increasing portliness of his person, which, while it made stooping over +a horse's hoof inconvenient, also impressed him with the fact that his +aldermanic figure would really adorn a learned profession. So he bought +one of those little hand-books which the founder of the Thomsonian +system sold dirt-cheap at twenty dollars apiece, and which told how to +cure or kill in every case. The owners of these important treasures of +invaluable information were under bonds not to disclose the profound +secrets therein contained, the fathomless wisdom which taught them how +to decide in any given case whether ginseng or a corn-sweat was the +required remedy. And the invested twenty dollars had brought the shrewd +blacksmith a handsome return. + +"Hello!" said Jonas in true Western style, as he reined up in front of +Dr. Ketchup's house in the outskirts of Brayville. "Hello the house!" +But Dr. Ketchup was already asleep. "Takes a mighty long time to wake up +a fat man," soliloquized Jonas. "He gits so used to hearin' hisself +snore that he can't tell the difference 'twixt snorin' and thunder. +Hello! Hello the house! I say, hello the blacksmith-shop! Dr. Ketchup, +why don't you git up? Hello! Corn-sweats and calamus! Hello! Whoop! +Hurrah for Jackson and Dr. Ketchup! Hello! Thunderation! Stop thief! +Fire! Fire! Fire! Murder! Murder! Help! Help! Hurrah! Treed the coon +at last!" + +This last exclamation greeted the appearance of Dr. Ketchup's head at +the window. + +"Are you drunk, Jonas Harrison? Go 'way with your hollering, or I'll +have you took up," said Ketchup. + +"You'll find that tougher work than making horseshoes any day, my +respectable friend and feller-citizen. I'll have you took up fer +sleeping so sound and snorin' so loud as to disturb all creation and the +rest of your neighbors. I've heard you ever sence I left Anderson's, and +thought 'twas a steamboat. Come, my friend, git on your clothes and +accouterments, fer Mrs. Anderson is a-dyin' or a-lettin' on to be +a-dyin' fer a drink of ginseng-tea or a corn-sweat or some other +decoction of the healin' art. Come, I fotch two hosses, so you shouldn't +lose no time a saddlin' your'n, though I don't doubt the ole woman'd git +well ef you never gin her the light of your cheerful count'nance. +She'd git well fer spite, and hire a calomel-doctor jist to make you +mad. I'd jest as soon and a little sooner expect a female wasp to die of +heart-disease as her." + +[Illustration: "FIRE! MURDER!! HELP!!!"] + +The head of Dr. Ketchup had disappeared from the window about the middle +of this speech, and the remainder of it came by sheer force of internal +pressure, like the flowing of an artesian well. + +Dr. Ketchup walked out, with ruffled dignity, carefully dressed. His +immaculate clothes and his solemn face were the two halves of his stock +in trade. Under the clothes lay buried Ketchup the blacksmith; under the +wiseacre face was Ketchup the ignoramus. Ignoramus he was, but not a +fool. As he rode along back with Jonas, he plied the latter with +questions. If he could get the facts of the case out of Jonas, he would +pretend to have inferred them from the symptoms and thus add to +his credit. + +"What caused this attack, Jonas?" + +"I 'low she caused it herself. Generally does, my friend," said Jonas. + +"Had anything occurred to excite her?" + +"Well, yes, I 'low they had; consid'able, if not more." + +"What was it?" + +"Well, you see she'd been to Hankins's preachin'. Now, I 'low, my +medical friend, the day of jedgment a'n't a pleasin' prospeck to anybody +that's jilted one brother to marry another, and then cheated the jilted +one outen his sheer of his lamented father's estate. Do you think it is, +my learned friend?" + +But Dr. Ketchup could not be sure whether Jonas was making game of him +or not. So he changed the subject. + +"Nice hoss, this bay," said the "doctor." + +"Well, yes," said Jonas, "I don't 'low you ever put shoes on no better +hoss than this 'ere in all your days--as a blacksmith. Did you now, my +medical friend?" + +"No, I think not," said Ketchup testily, and was silent. + +Mrs. Anderson had grown impatient at the doctor's delay. "Samuel! Oo! +oo! oo! Samuel! My dear, I'm dying. Jonas don't care. He wouldn't hurry. +I wonder you trusted _him!_ If you had been dying, I should have gone +myself for the doctor. Oo! oo! oo! _oh!_ If I should die, nobody would +be sorry." + +Abigail Anderson was not to blame for telling the truth so exactly in +this last sentence. It was an accident. She might have recalled it but +that Dr. Ketchup walked in at that moment. + +He felt her pulse; looked at her tongue; said that it was heart-disease, +caused by excitement. He thought it must be religious excitement. She +should have a corn-sweat and some wafer-ash tea. The corn-sweat would +act as a tonic and strengthen the pericardium. The wafer-ash would cause +a tendency of blood to the head, and thus relieve the pressure on the +juggler-vein. Cynthy Ann listened admiringly to Dr. Ketchup's +incomprehensible, oracular utterances, and then speedily put a bushel of +ear-corn in the great wash-boiler, which was already full of hot water +in expectation of such a prescription, and set the wafer-ash to draw. + +Julia had, up to this time, stood outside her mother's door trembling +with fear, and not daring to enter. She longed to do something, but did +not know how it would be received. Now, while the deep, sonorous voice +of Ketchup occupied the attention of all, she crept in and stood at the +foot of Mrs. Anderson's bed. The mother, recovering from her twentieth +dying spell, saw her. + +"Take her away! She has killed me! She wants me to die! _I_ know! Take +her away!" + +And Julia went to her own room and shut herself up in darkness and in +wretchedness, but in all that miserable night there came to her not one +regret that she had reached her hand to the departing August. + +The neighbor-women came in and pretended to do something for the +invalid, but really they sat by the kitchen-stove and pumped Cynthy Ann +and the doctor, and managed in some way to connect Julia with her +mother's illness, and shook their heads. So that when Julia crept +down-stairs at midnight, in hope of being useful, she found herself +looked at inquisitively, and felt herself to be such an object of +attention that she was glad to take the advice of Cynthy Ann and find +refuge in her own room. On the stairs she met Jonas, who said as +she passed: + +"Don't fret yourself, little turtle-dove. Don't pay no 'tention to ole +Ketchup. Your ma won't die, not even with his corn-sweats to waft her on +to glory. You done your duty to-night like one of Fox's martyrs, and +like George Washi'ton with his little cherry-tree and hatchet. And +you'll git your reward, if not in the next world, you'll have it +in this." + +Julia lay down awhile, and then sat up, looking out into the darkness. +Perhaps God was angry with her for loving August; perhaps she was making +an idol of him. When Julia came to think that her love for August was in +antagonism to the love of God, she did not hesitate which she would +choose. All the best of her nature was loyal to August, whom she "had +seen," as the Apostle John has it. She could not reason it out, but a +God who seemed to be in opposition to the purest and best emotion of her +heart was a God she could not love. August and the love of August were +known quantities. God and the love of God were unknown, and the God of +whom Cynthy spoke (and of whom many a mistaken preacher has spoken), +that was jealous of Mrs. Pearson's love for her baby, and that killed it +because it was his rival, was not a God that she could love without +being a traitor to all the good that God had put in her heart. The God +that was keeping August away from her because he was jealous of the one +beautiful thing in her life was a Moloch, and she deliberately +determined that she would not worship or love him. The True God, who is +a Father, and who is not Supreme Selfishness, doing all for His own +glory, as men falsely declare; the True God--who does all things for the +good of others--loved her, I doubt not, for refusing to worship the +Conventional Deity thus presented to her mind. Even as He has pitied +many a mother that rebelled against the Governor of the Universe, +because she was told the Governor of the Universe, in a petty seeking +for his own glory, had taken away her "idols." + +But Julia looked up at the depths between the stars, and felt how great +God must be, and her rebellion against Him seemed a war at fearful odds. +And then the sense of God's omnipresence, of His being there alone with +her, so startled her and awakened such a feeling of her fearful +loneliness, orphanage, antagonism to God, that she could bear it no +longer, and at two o'clock she went down again; but Mrs. Brown looked +over at Mrs. Orcutt in a way that said: "Told you so! Guilty conscience! +Can't sleep!" And so Julia thought God, even as she conceived Him, +better company than men, or rather than women, for--well, I won't make +the ungallant remark; each sex has its besetting faults. + +Julia took back with her a candle, thinking that this awful God would +not seem so close if she had a light. There lay on her bureau a +Testament, one of those old editions of the American Bible Society, +printed on indifferent paper, and bound in a red muslin that was given +to fading, the like whereof in book-making has never been seen since. +She felt angry with God, who, she was sure, was persecuting her, as +Cynthy Ann had said, out of jealousy of her love for August, and she was +determined that she would not look into that red-cloth Testament, which +seemed to her full of condemnation. But there was a fascination about it +she could not resist. The discordant hysterical laughter of her mother, +which reached her ears from below, harrowed her sorely, and her grief +and despair at her own situation were so great that she was at last fain +to read the only book in the room in order that she might occupy her +mind. There is a strange superstition among certain pietists which loads +them to pray for a text to guide them, and then take any chance passage +as a divine direction. I do not mean to say that Julia had any +supernatural leading in her reading. The New Testament is so full of +comfort that one could hardly manage to miss it. She read the seventh +chapter of Luke: how the Lord healed the centurion's servant that was +"dear unto him," and noted that He did not rebuke the man for loving his +slave; how the Lord took pity on that poor widow who wept at the bier of +her only son, and brought him back to life again, and "restored him to +his mother." This did not seem to be just the Christ that Cynthy Ann +thought of as the foe of every human affection. She read more that she +did not understand so well, and then at the end of the chapter she read +about the woman that was a sinner, that washed His feet with grateful +tears and wiped them with her hair. And she would have taken the woman's +guilt to have had the woman's opportunity and her benediction. + +At last, turning over the leaves without any definite purpose, she +lighted on a place in Matthew, where three verses at the end of a +chapter happened to stand at the head of a column. I suppose she read +them because the beginning of the page and the end of the chapter made +them seem a short detached piece. And they melted into her mood so that +she seemed to know Christ and God for the first time. "Come unto me all +ye that labor and are heavy laden," she read, and stopped. That means +me, she thought with a heart ready to burst. And that saying is the +gateway of life. When the promises and injunctions mean me, I am saved. +Julia read on, "And I will give you rest." And so she drank in the +passage, clause by clause, until she came to the end about an easy yoke +and a light burden, and then God seemed to her so different. She prayed +for August, for now the two loves, the love for August and the love for +Christ, seemed not in any way inconsistent. She lay down saying over and +over, with tears in her eyes, "rest for your souls," and "weary and +heavy laden," and "come unto me," and "meek and lowly of heart," and +then she settled on one word and repeated it over and over, "rest, rest, +rest." The old feeling was gone. She was no more a rebel nor an orphan. +The presence of God was not a terror but a benediction. She had found +rest for her soul, and He gave His beloved sleep. For when she awoke +from what seemed a short slumber, the red light of a glorious dawn came +in at the window, and her candle was flickering its last in the bottom +of the socket. The Testament lay open as she had left it, and for days +she kept it open there, and did not dare read anything but these three +verses, lest she should lose the rest for her soul that she found here. + + + +CHAPTER XXI. + +THE HAWK IN A NEW PART. + +Humphreys was now in the last weeks of his singing-school. He had become +a devout Millerite, and was paying attentions to the not unwilling +Betsey Malcolm, though pretending at Anderson's to be absolutely +heart-broken at the conduct of Julia in jilting him after she had given +him every assurance of affection. And then to be jilted for a Dutchman, +you know! In this last regard his feeling was not all affectation. In +his soul, cupidity, vanity, and vindictiveness divided the narrow +territory between them. He inwardly swore that he'd get satisfaction +somehow. Debts which were due to his pride should be collected by +his revenge. + +Did you ever reflect on the uselessness of a landscape when one has no +eyes to see it with, or, what is worse, no soul to look through one's +eyes? Humphreys was going down to the castle to call on the Philosopher, +and "Shady Hollow," as Andrew called it, had surely never been more +glorious than on the morning which he chose for his walk. The black-haw +bushes hung over the roadside, the maples lifted up their great +trunk-pillars toward the sky, and the grape-vines, some of them four +and even six inches in diameter, reached up to the high boughs, fifty or +a hundred feet, without touching the trunk. They had been carried up by +the growth of the tree, tree and vine having always lived in each +other's embrace. Out through the opening in the hollow, Humphreys saw +the green sea of six-feet-high Indian corn in the fertile bottoms, the +two rows of sycamores on the sandy edges of the river, and the hazy +hills on the Kentucky side. But not one touch of sentiment, not a +perception of beauty, entered the soul of the singing-master as he +daintily-chose his steps so as to avoid soiling his glossy boots, and as +he knocked the leaves off the low-hanging beech boughs with his delicate +cane. He had his purpose in visiting Andrew, and his mind was bent +on his game. + +Charon, the guardian of the castle, bayed his great hoarse bark at the +Hawk, and with that keen insight into human nature for which dogs are so +remarkable, he absolutely forbade the dandy's entrance, until Andrew +appeared at the door and called the dog away. + +"I am delighted at having the opportunity of meeting a great light in +literature like yourself, Mr. Anderson. Here you sit weaving, earning +your bread with a manly simplicity that is truly admirable. You are like +Cincinnatus at his plow. I also am a literary man." + +He really was a college graduate, though doubtless he was as much of a +humbug in recitations and examinations as he had always been since. +Andrew's only reply to his assertion that he was a literary man was a +rather severe and prolonged scrutiny of his oily locks, his dainty +mustache, his breast-pin, his watch-seals, and finally his straps and +his boots. For Andrew firmly believed that neglected hair, Byron +collars, and unblackened boots were the first signs of literary taste. + +"You think I dress too well," said Humphreys with his ghastly smirk. +"You think that I care too much for appearances. I do. It is a weakness +of mine which comes from a residence abroad." + +These words touched the Philosopher a little. To have been abroad was +the next best thing to having been a foreigner _ab origine_. But still +he felt a little suspicious. He was superior to the popular prejudice +against the mustache, but he could not endure hair-oil. "Nature," he +maintained, "made the whole beard to be worn, and Nature provides an oil +for the hair. Let Nature have her way." He was suspicious of Humphreys, +not because he wore a mustache, but because he shaved the rest of his +face and greased his hair. He had, besides, a little intuitive +perception of the fact that a smile which breaks against the rock-bound +coast of cold cheek-bones and immovable eyes is a mask. And so he +determined to test the literary man. I have heard that Masonic lodges +have been deceived by impostors. I have never heard that a literary man +was made to believe in the genuineness of the attainments of a +charlatan. + +And yet Humphreys held his own well. He could talk glibly and +superficially about books; he simulated considerable enthusiasm for the +books which Andrew admired. His mistake and his consequent overthrow +came, as always in such cases, from a desire to overdo. It was after +half an hour of talking without tripping that Andrew suddenly asked: "Do +you like the ever-to-be-admired Xenophanes?" + +It certainly is no disgrace to any literary man not to know anything of +so remote a philosopher as Xenophanes. The first characteristic of a +genuine literary man is the frankness with which he confesses his +ignorance. But Humphreys did not really know but that Xenophanes was +part of the daily reading of a man of letters. + +"Oh! yes," said he. "I have his works in turkey morocco." + +"What do you think of his opinion that God is a sphere?" asked the +Philosopher, smiling. + +"Oh! yes--ahem; let me see--which God is it that he speaks of, Jupiter +or--well, you know he was a Greek." + +"But he only believed in one God," said Andrew sternly. + +"Oh! ah! I forgot that he was a Christian." + +So from blunder to blunder Andrew pushed him, Humphreys stumbling more +and more in his blind attempts to right himself, and leaving, at last, +with much internal confusion but with an unruffled smile. He dared not +broach his errand by asking the address of August. For Andrew did not +conceal his disgust, having resumed work at his loom, suffering the +bowing impostor to find his own way out without so much as a +courteous adieu. + + + +CHAPTER XXII. + +JONAS EXPRESSES HIS OPINION ON DUTCHMEN. + +Sometimes the virus of a family is all drawn off in one vial. I think it +is Emerson who makes this remark. We have all seen the vials. + +Such an one was Norman Anderson. The curious law of hereditary descent +had somehow worked him only evil. "Nater," observed Jonas to Cynthy, +when the latter had announced to him that Norman, on account of some +disgrace at school, had returned home, "nater ha'n't done him half +jestice, I 'low. It went through Sam'el Anderson and Abig'il, and picked +out the leetle weak pompous things in the illustrious father; and then +hunted out all the spiteful and hateful things in the lovin' and +much-esteemed mother, and somehow stuck 'em together, to make as ornery +a chap as ever bit a hoe-cake in two." + +"I'm afeard her brother's scrape and comin' home won't make Jule none +the peacefuller at the present time," said Cynthy Ann. + +"Wal," returned Jonas, "I don't think she keers much fer him. She +couldn't, you know. Love him? Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear"--here Cynthy Ann +began to reproach herself for listening to anything so pleasant as +these two last words--"Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear, you see you might maybe +love a cuckle-burr and nuss it; but I don't think you would be likely +to. I never heern tell of nobody carryin' jimson-weed pods in their +bosoms. You see they a'n't no place about Norman Anderson that love +could take a holt of 'thout gittin' scratched." + +"But his mother loves him, I reckon," said Cynthy Ann. + +"Wal, yes; so she do. Loves her shadder in the lookin'-glass, maybe, and +kinder loves Norman bekase he's got so much of her devil into him. It's +like lovin' like, I reckon. But I 'low they's a right smart difference +with Jule. Sence she was born, that Norman has took more delight in +tormentin' Jule than a yaller dog with a white tail does in worryin' a +brindle tom-cat up a peach-tree. And comin' home at this junction he'll +gin her a all-fired lot of trials and tribulation." + +At the time this conversation took place, two weeks had elapsed since +Mrs. Anderson's "attack." Julia had heard nothing from August yet. The +"Hawk" still made his head-quarters in the house, but was now watching +another quarry. Mrs. Anderson was able to scold as vigorously as ever, +if, indeed, that function had ever been suspended. And just now she was +engaged in scolding the teacher who had expelled Norman. The habit of +fighting teachers was as chronic as her heart-disease. Norman had always +been abused by the whole race of pedagogues. There was from the first a +conspiracy against him, and now he was cheated out of his last chance of +getting an education. All this Norman steadfastly believed. + +Of course Norman sided with his mother as against the Dutchman. The more +contemptible a man is, the more he contemns a man for not belonging to +his race or nation. And Norman felt that he would be eternally disgraced +by any alliance with a German. He threw himself into the fight with a +great deal of vigor. It helped him to forget other things. + +"Jule," said he, walking up to her as she sat alone on the porch, "I'm +ashamed of you. To go and fall in love with a Dutchman like Gus Wehle, +and disgrace us all!" + +"I wonder you didn't think about disgrace before," retorted Julia, "I am +ashamed to have August Wehle hear what you've been doing." + +[Illustration: NORMAN ANDERSON.] + +Dogs that have the most practice in cat-worrying are liable to get their +noses scratched sometimes. Norman took care never to attack Julia again +except under the guns of his mother's powerful battery. And he revenged +himself on her by appealing to his mother with a complaint that "Jule +had throwed up to him that he had been dismissed from school." And of +course Julia received a solemn lecture on her way of driving poor Norman +to destruction. She was determined to disgrace the family. If she could +not do it by marrying a Dutchman, she would do it by slandering +her brother. + +Norman thought to find an ally in Jonas. + +"Jonas, don't you think it's awful that Jule is in love with Dutchman +like Gus Wehle?" + +"I do, my love," responded Jonas. "I think a Dutchman is a Dutchman. I +don't keer how much he larns by burnin' the midnight ile by day and +night. My time-honored friend, he's a Dutchman arter all. The Dutch is +bred in the bone. It won't fade. A Dutchman may be a gentleman in his +way of doin' things, may be honest and industrious, and keep all the +commandments in the catalogue, but I say he is Dutch, and that's enough +to keep him out of the kingdom of heaven and out of this free and +enlightened republic. And an American may be a good-fer-nothin', ornery +little pertater-ball, wuthless alike to man and beast; he mayn't be good +fer nothin', nuther fer work nur study; he may git drunk and git turned +outen school and do any pertikeler number of disgraceful and +oncreditable things, he may be a reg'ler milksop and nincompoop, a fool +and a blackguard and a coward all rolled up into one piece of brown +paper, ef he wants to. And what's to hender? A'n't he a free-born an' +enlightened citizen of this glorious and civilized and Christian land of +Hail Columby? What business has a Dutchman, ef he's ever so smart and +honest and larned, got in our broad domains, resarved for civil and +religious liberty? What business has he got breathin' our atmosphere or +takin' refuge under the feathers of our American turkey-buzzard? No, my +beloved and respected feller-citizen of native birth, it's as plain to +me as the wheels of 'Zek'el and the year 1843. I say, Hip, hip, hoo-ray +fer liberty or death, and down with the Dutch!" + +Norman Anderson scratched his head. + +What did Jonas mean? + +He couldn't exactly divine; but it is safe to say that on the whole he +was not entirely satisfied with this boomerang speech. He rather thought +that he had better not depend on Jonas. + +But he was not long in finding allies enough in his war against Germany. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII. + +SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS. + +There was an egg-supper in the country store at Brayville. Mr. Mandluff, +the tall and raw-boned Hoosier who kept the store, was not unwilling to +have the boys get up an egg supper now and then in his store after he +had closed the front-door at night. For you must know that an egg-supper +is a peculiar Western institution. Sometimes it is a most enjoyable +institution--when it has its place in a store where there is no Kentucky +whisky to be had. But in Brayville, in the rather miscellaneous +establishment of the not very handsome and not very graceful Mr. +Mandluff, an egg-supper was not a great moral institution. It was +otherwise, and profanely called by its votaries a camp-meeting; it would +be hard to tell why, unless it was that some of the insiders grew very +happy before it was over. For an egg-supper at Mandluff's store was to +Brayville what an oyster-supper at Delmonico's is to New York. It was +one tenth hard eggs and nine tenths that beverage which bears the name +of an old royal house of France. + +How were the eggs cooked? I knew somebody would ask that impertinent +question. Well, they were not fried, they were not boiled, they were +not poached, they were not scrambled, they were not omeletted, they were +not roasted on the half-shell, they were not stuffed with garlic and +served with cranberries, they were not boiled and served with anchovy +sauce, they were not "_en salmi_." I think I had better stop there, lest +I betray my knowledge of cookery. It is sufficient to say that they were +not cooked in any of the above-named fashions, nor in any other way +mentioned in Catharine Beecher's or Marion Harland's cookbooks. They +were baked _à la mode_ backwoods. It is hardly proper for me to give a +recipe in this place, that belongs more properly to the "Household +Departments" of the newspapers. But to satisfy curiosity, and to tell +something about cooking, which Prof. Blot does not know, I may say that +they were broken and dropped on a piece of brown paper laid on the top +of the old box-stove. By the time the egg was cooked hard the paper was +burned to ashes, but the egg came off clean and nice from the stove, and +made as palatable and indigestible an article for a late supper as one +could wish. It only wanted the addition of Mandluff's peculiar whisky to +make it dissipation of the choicest kind. For the more a dissipation +costs in life and health, the more fascinating it is. + +There was an egg-supper, as I said, at Mandluff's store. There was to be +a "camp-meeting" in honor of Norman Anderson's successful return to his +liberty and his cronies. It gave Norman, the greatest pleasure to return +to a society where it was rather to his credit than otherwise that he +had gone on a big old time, got caught, and been sent adrift by the old +hunk that had tried to make him study Latin. + +The eggs were baked in the true "camp-meeting" style, the whisky was +drunk, and--so was the company. Bill Day's rather red eyes grew redder, +and his nose shone with delight as he shuffled the greasy pack of +"kyerds." The maudlin smile crossed the habitually melancholy lines of +his face in a way that split and splintered his visage into a curious +contradiction of emotions. + +"H--a--oo--p!" He shouted, throwing away the cards over the heads of his +companions. "Ha--oop! boys, thish is big--hoo! hoo! ha--oop! I say is +big. Let's do somethin'!" + +Here there was a confused cry that "it _was_ big, and that they had +better do somethin' or 'nother." + +"Let's blow up the ole school-house," said Bill Day, who was not +friendly to education. + +"I tell you what," said Bob Short, who was dealing the cards in another +set--"I tell you what," and Bob winked his eyes vigorously, and looked +more solemn and wise than he could have looked if it had not been for +the hard eggs and the whisky--"I tell you what," said Bob a third time, +and halted, for his mind's activity was a little choked by the fervor of +his emotions--"I tell you what, boys--" + +"Wal," piped Jim West in a cracked voice, "you've told us _what_ four +times, I 'low; now s'pose you tell us somethin' else." + +"I tell you what, boys," said Bob Short, suddenly remembering his +sentence, "don't let's do nothin' that'll git us into no trouble +arterwards. Ef we blow up the school-house we'll be 'rested fer bigamy +or--or--what d'ye call it?" + +"For larson," said Bill Day, hardly able to restrain another whoop. + +"No, 'taint larson," said Bob Short, looking wiser than a chief-justice, +"it's arsony. Now I say, don't let's go to penitentiary for no--no +larson--no arsony, I mean." + +"Ha--oop!" said Bill. "Let's do somethin' ludikerous. Hurrah for arsony +and larson! Dog-on the penitentiary! Ha--oop!" + +[Illustration: SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS.] + +"Let's go fer the Dutchman," said Norman Anderson, just drunk enough to +be good-naturedly murderous and to speak in dialect. "Gus is turned out +to committin' larson by breakin' into people's houses an' has run off. +Now let's tar and feather the ole one. Of course, he's a thief. Dutchmen +always is, I 'low. Clark township don't want none of 'em, I'll be +dog-oned if it do," and Norman got up and struck his fist on +the counter. + +"An' they won't nobody hurt you; you see, he's on'y a Dutchman," said +Bob Short "Larson on a Dutchman don't hold." + +"I say, let's hang him," said Bill Day. "Ha--oop! Let's hang him, or do +somethin' else ludikerous!" + +"I wouldn't mind," grinned Norman Anderson, delighted at the turn things +had taken. "I'd just like to see him hung." + +"So would I," said Bill Day, leaning over to Norman. "Ef a Dutchman wash +to court my sishter, I'd--" + +"He'd be a fool ef he did," piped Jim West. For Bill Day's sister was a +"maid not vendible," as Shakespeare has it. + +"See yer," said Bill, trying in vain to draw his coat. "Looky yer, +Jeems; ef you say anythin' agin Ann Marier, I'll commit the wust larson +on you you ever seed." + +"I didn't say nothin' agin Ann Marier," squeaked Jim. "I was talkin' +agin the Dutch." + +"Well, that'sh all right Ha--oop! Boys, let's do somethin', larson or +arsony or--somethin'." + +A bucket of tar and some feathers were bought, for which young Anderson +was made to pay, and Bill Day insisted on buying fifteen feet of rope. +"Bekase," as he said, "arter you git the feathers on the bird, you +may--you may want to help him to go to roosht you know, on a hickory +limb. Ha--oop! Come along, boys; I say let's do somethin' ludikerous, ef +it's nothin' but a little larson." + +And so they went galloping down the road, nine drunken fools. For it is +one of the beauties of lynch law, that, however justifiable it may seem +in some instances, it always opens the way to villainous outrages. Some +of my readers will protest that a man was never lynched for the crime of +being a Dutchman. Which only shows how little they know of the intense +prejudice and lawless violence of the early West. Some day people will +not believe that men have been killed in California for being Chinamen. + +Of the nine who started, one, the drunkest, fell off and broke his arm; +the rest rode up in front of the cabin of Gottlieb Wehle. I do not want +to tell how they alarmed the mother at her late sewing and dragged +Gottlieb out of his bed. I shudder now when I recall one such outrage to +which I was an unwilling witness. Norman threw the rope round Gottlieb's +neck and declared for hanging. Bill Day agreed. It would be so +ludikerous, you know! + +"Vot hash I tun? Hey? Vot vor you dries doo hanks me already, hey?" +cried the honest German, who was willing enough to have the end of the +world come, but who did not like the idea of ascending alone, and in +this fashion. + +Mrs. Wehle pushed her way into the mob and threw the rope off her +husband's neck, and began to talk with vehemence in German. For a moment +the drunken fellows hung back out of respect for a woman. Then Bill Day +was suddenly impressed with the fact that the duty of persuading Mrs. +Wehle to consent to her husband's execution devolved upon him. + +"Take keer, boys; let me talk to the ole woman. I'll argy the case." + +"You can't speak Dutch no more nor a hoss can," squeaked Jeems West. + +"Blam'd ef I can't, though. Hyer, ole woman, firshta Dutch?" + +"Ya." + +"Now," said Bill, turning to the others in triumph, "what did I tell +you? Well, you see, your boy August is a thief." + +"He's not a teef!" said the old man. + +"Shet up your jaw. I say he is. Now, your ole man's got to be hung." + +"Vot vor?" broke in Gottlieb. + +"Bekase it's all your own fault. You hadn't orter be a Dutchman." + +Here the crowd fell into a wrangle. It was not so easy to hang a man +when such a woman stood there pleading for him. Besides, Bob Short +insisted that hanging was arsony in the first degree, and they better +not do it. To this Bill Day assented. He said he 'sposed tar and +feathers was only larson in the second degree. And then it would be rale +ludikerous. And now confused cries of "Bring on the tar!" "Where's the +feathers?" "Take off his clothes!" began to be raised. Norman stood out +for hanging. Drink always intensified his meanness. But the tar couldn't +be found. The man whom they had left lying by the roadside with a broken +arm had carried the tar, and had been well coated with it himself in +his fall. + +"Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day. "Let's do somethin'. Dog-on the arsony! +Let's hang him as high as Dan'el." + +And with that the rope was thrown over Gottlieb's, neck and he was +hurried off to the nearest tree. The rope was then put over a limb, and +a drunken half-dozen got ready to pull, while Norman Anderson adjusted +the noose and valiant Bill Day undertook to keep off Mrs. Wehle. + +"All ready! Pull up! Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day, and the crowd pulled, +but Mrs. Wehle had slipped off the noose again, and the volunteer +executioners fell over one another in such a way as to excite the +derisive laughter of Bill Day, who thought it perfectly ludikerous. But +before the laugh had finished, the indignant Gottlieb had knocked Bill +Day over and sent Norman after him. The blow sobered them a little, and +suddenly destroyed Bill's ambition to commit "arsony," or do anything +else ludikerous. But Norman was furious, and under his lead Wehle's arms +were now bound with the rope and a consultation was held, during which +little Wilhelmina pleaded for her father effectively, and more by her +tears and cries and the wringing of her chubby hands than by any words. +Bill Day said he be blamed of that little Dutch gal's takin' on so +didn't kinder make him foul sorter scrimpshous you know. But the mob +could not quit without doing something. So it was resolved to give +Gottlieb a good ducking in the river and send him into Kentucky with a +warning not to come back. They went down the ravine past Andrew's castle +to the river. Mrs. Wehle followed, believing that her husband would be +drowned, and little Wilhelmina ran and pulled the alarm and awakened the +Backwoods Philosopher, who soon threw himself among them, but too late +to dissuade them from their purpose, for Andrew's own skiff, the +"Grisilde" by name, with three of the soberest of the party, had already +set out to convey Wehle, after one hasty immersion, to the other shore, +while the rest stood round hallooing like madmen to prevent any alarm +that Wehle might raise attracting attention on the other side. + + + +CHAPTER XXIV. + +THE GIANT GREAT-HEART. + +As soon as Andrew's skiff, the "Grisilde," was brought back and the +ruffians had gone off up the ravine, Andrew left Mrs. Wehle sitting by +the fire in the loom-room of the castle, while he crossed the river to +look after Gottlieb. Little Wilhelmina insisted on going with him, and +as she handled a steering-oar well he took her along. They found +Gottlieb with his arms cruelly pinioned sitting on a log in a state of +utter dejection, and dripping with water from his ducking. + +"Ich zay, Antroo, ish dish vat dey galls a vree goontry, already? A +blace vare troonk sheounders dosh vot ever dey hadn't ort! Dat is vree +koontry. Mein knabe ish roon off ver liebin a Yangee; unt a vool he ish, +doo. Unt ich ish hoong unt troundt unt darrdt unt vedderd unt drakt out +indoo de ribber, unt dolt if I ko back do mein vrau unt kinder I zhall +pe kilt vunst more already. Unt I shpose if ich shtays here der +Gainduckee beobles vill hang me unt dar me unt trown me all over in der +ribber, doo, already, pekoz I ish Deutsch. Ich zay de voorld ish all +pad, unt it aud doo pe vinished vunst already, I ton't gare how quick, +so ash dem droonk vools kit vot pelongs doo 'em venever Gabrel ploes his +drumbet." + +[Illustration: TO THE RESCUE.] + +"They'll get that in due time, my friend," said Andrew, untying the rope +with which Gottlieb had been pinioned. "Come, let us go back to our +own shore." + +"Bud daint my zhore no more. Dey said I'd god doo hang again vanst more +if I ever grossed de Ohio Ribber vunst again already, but I ton't vants +doo hang no more vor noddin already." + +"But I'll take care of that," said Andrew. "Before to-morrow night I'll +make your house the safest place in Clark township. I've got the rascals +by the throat now. Trust me." + +It took much entreaty on the part of Andrew and much weeping and kissing +on the part of Wilhelmina to move the heart of the terrified Gottlieb. +At last he got into the skiff and allowed himself to be rowed back +again, declaring all the way that he nebber zee no zich a vree koontry +ash dish voz already. + +When Bill Day and his comrades got up the next morning and began to +think of the transactions of the night, they did not seem nearly so +ludikerous as they had at the time. And when Norman Anderson and Bill +Day and Bob Short read the notice on the door of Mandluff's store they +felt that "arsony" might have a serious as well as a ludikerous side. + +Andrew at first intended to institute proceedings against the rioters, +but he knew that the law was very uncertain against the influences which +the eight or nine young men might bring to bear, and the prejudices of +the people against the Dutch. To prosecute would be to provoke another +riot. So he contented himself with this + + "PROCLAMATION! + + "TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: I have a list of eight men connected + with the riotous mob which broke into the house of Gottlieb + Wehle, a peaceable and unoffending citizen of the United + States. The said eight men proceeded to commit an assault + and battery on the person of the said Gottlieb Wehle, and + even endeavored at one time to take his life. And the said + riotous conduct was the result of a conspiracy, and the said + assault with intent to kill was with malice aforethought. The + said eight men, after having committed grievous outrages upon + him by dipping him in the water and by other means, warned + the said Wehle not to return to the State. Now, therefore, I + give notice to all and several of those concerned in these + criminal proceedings that the said Wehle has returned by my + advice; and that if so much as a hair of his head or a + splinter of his property is touched I will appear against + said parties and will prosecute them until I secure the + infliction of the severest penalties made and provided for + the punishment of such infamous crimes. I hope I am well + enough known here to render it certain that if I once begin + proceedings nothing but success or my death or the end of the + world can stop them. + + "ANDREW ANDERSON, + + "Backwoods Philosopher. + + "AT THE CASTLE, May 12th, 1843." + +"It don't look so ludikerous as it did, does it, Bill?" squeaked Jim +West, as he read the notice over Bill's shoulder. + +"Shet your mouth, you fool!" said Bill. "Don't you never peep. Ef I'd a +been sober I might a knowed ole Grizzly would interfere. He +always does." + +In truth, Andrew was a sort of Perpetual Champion of the Oppressed, and +those who did not like him feared him, which is the next best thing. + + + +CHAPTER XXV. + +A CHAPTER OF BETWEENS. + +Did you ever move? And, in moving, did you ever happen to notice how +many little things there are to be picked up? Now that I am about to +shift the scene of my story from Clark township, the narrow stage upon +which it has progressed through two dozen chapters, I find a great +number of little things to be picked up. + +One of the little things to be picked up is Norman Anderson. Very +little, if measured soul-wise. When his father had read the proclamation +of Andrew and divined that Norman was interested in the riot, he became +thoroughly indignant; the more so, that he felt his own lack of power to +do anything in the premises against his wife. But when Mrs. Abigail +heard of the case she was in genuine distress. It showed Andrew's +vindictiveness. He would follow her forever with his resentments, just +because she could not love him. It was not her fault that she did not +love him. Poor Norman had to suffer all the persecutions that usually +fall to such innocent creatures. She must send him away from home, +though it broke her mother's heart to do it; for if Andrew didn't have +him took up, the old Dutchman would, just because his son had turned out +a burglar. She said burglar rather emphatically, with a look at Julia. + +And so Samuel Anderson took his son to Louisville, and got him a place +in a commission and produce house on the levee, with which Mr. Anderson +had business influence. And Samuel warned him that he must do his best, +for he could not come back home now without danger of arrest, and Norman +made many promises of amendment; so many, that his future seemed to him +barren of all delight. And, by way of encouraging himself in the austere +life upon which he had resolved to enter, he attended the least +reputable place of amusement in the city, the first night after his +father's departure. + +In Clark township the Millerite excitement was at white heat. Some of +the preachers in other parts of the country had set one day, some +another. I believe that Mr. Miller, the founder, never had the temerity +to set a day. But his followers figured the thing more closely, and +Elder Hankins had put a fine point on the matter. He was certain, for +his part, that the time was at midnight on the eleventh of August. His +followers became very zealous, and such is the nature of an infection +that scarcely anybody was able to resist it. Mrs. Anderson, true to her +excitable temper, became fanatic--dreaming dreams, seeing visions, +hearing voices, praying twenty times a day[2], wearing a sourly pious +face, and making all around her more unhappy than ever. Jonas declared +that ef the noo airth and the noo heaven was to be chockful of sech as +she, 'most any other place in the univarse would be better, akordin' to +his way of thinkin'. He said she repented more of other folkses' sins +than anybody he ever seed. + +[Footnote 2: Mrs. Anderson was less devout than some of her +co-religionists; the wife of a well-known steamboat-clerk was accustomed +to pray in private fifty times a day, hoping by means of this praying +without ceasing to be found ready when the trumpet should sound.] + +As summer came on, Samuel Anderson, borne away on the tide of his own +and his wife's fanatical fever of sublimated devotion, discharged Jonas +and all his other _employés_, threw up business, and gave his whole +attention to the straightening of his accounts for the coming day of +judgment. Before Jonas left to seek a new place he told Cynthy Ann as +how as ef he'd met her alrlier 'twould a-settled his coffee fer life. He +was gittin' along into the middle of the week now, but he'd come to feel +like a boy since he'd been a livin' where he could have a few sweet and +pleasant words--ahem!--he thought December'd be as pleasant as May all +the year round ef he could live in the aurora borealis of her +countenance. And Cynthy Ann enjoyed his words so much that she prayed +for forgiveness for the next week and confessed in class-meeting that +she had yielded to temptation and sot her heart on the things of this +perishin' world. She was afeared she hadn't always remembered as how as +she was a poor unworthy dyin' worm of the dust, and that all the +beautiful things in this world perished with the usin'. + +And Brother Goshorn, the class-leader at Harden's Cross-Roads, exhorted +her to tear every idol from her heart. And still the sweet woman's +nature, God's divine law revealed in her heart, did assert itself a +little. She planted some pretty-by-nights in an old cracked +blue-and-white tea-pot and set it on her window-sill. Somehow the +pretty-by-nights would remind her of Jonas, and while she tried to +forget him with one half of her nature, the other and better part (the +depraved part, she would have told you) cherished the memory of his +smallest act and word. In fact, the flowers had no association with +Jonas except that along with the awakening of her love came this little +sentiment for flowers into the dry desert of her life. But one day Mrs. +Anderson discovered the old blue broken tea-pot with its young plants. + +"Why, Cynthy Ann!" she cried, "a body'd think you'd have more sense than +to do such a soft thing as to be raisin' posies at _your_ time of life! +And that when the world is drawing to a close, too! You'll be one of the +foolish virgins with no oil to your lamp, as sure as you see that day." + +As for Julia's flowers, Mrs. Anderson had rudely thrown them into the +road by way of removing temptation from her and turning her thoughts +toward the awful realities of the close of time. + +But Cynthy Ann blushed and repented, and kept her broken tea-pot, with a +fearful sense of sin in doing so. She never watered the pretty-by-nights +without the feeling that she was offering sacrifice to an idol. + + + +CHAPTER XXVI. + +A NICE LITTLE GAME. + +It was natural enough that the "mud-clerk" on the old steamboat Iatan +should take a fancy to the "striker," as the engineer's apprentice was +called. Especially since the striker know so much more than the +mud-clerk, and was able to advise him about many things. A striker with +so much general information was rather a novelty, and all the officers +fancied him, except Sam Munson, the second engineer, who had a natural +jealousy of a striker that knew more than he did. + +The striker had learned rapidly, and was trusted to stand a regular +watch. The first engineer and the third were together, and the second +engineer and the striker took the other watch. The boat in this way got +the services of a competent engineer while paying him only a +striker's wage. + +About the time the heavily-laden Iatan turned out of the Mississippi +into the Ohio at Cairo at six in the evening, the striker went off +watch, and he ought to have gone to bed to prepare himself for the +second watch of the night, especially as he would only have the +dog-watch between that and the forenoon. But a passenger had got aboard +at Cairo, whose face was familiar. The sight of it had aroused a throng +of old associations, pleasant and unpleasant, and a throng of emotions +the most tender and the most wrathful the striker had ever felt. Sleep +he could not, and so, knowing that the mud-clerk was on watch, he sought +the office after nine o'clock, and stood outside the bar talking to his +friend, who had little to do, since most of the freight had been shipped +through, and his bills for Paducah were all ready. The striker talked +with the mud-clerk, but watched the throng of passengers who drank with +each other at the bar, smoked in the "social hall," read and wrote at +the tables in the gentlemen's cabin, or sat with doffed hats and chatted +gallantly in the ladies' cabin, which was visible as a distant +background, seen over a long row of tables with green covers and under a +long row of gilded wooden stalactites, which were intended to be +ornamental. The little pendent prisms beneath the chandeliers rattled +gayly as the boat trembled at each stroke of her wheels, and gaping +backwoodsmen, abroad for the first time, looked at all the rusty +gingerbread-work, and wondered if kings were able to afford anything +half so fine as the cabin of the "palatial steamer Iatan," as she was +described on the bills. The confused murmur of many voices, mixed with +the merry tinkling of the glass pendants, gave the whole an air of +excitement. + +But the striker did not see the man he was looking for. "Who got on at +Cairo? I think I saw a man from our part of the country," he said. + +"I declare, I don't know," said the mud-clerk, who drawled his words in +a cold-blooded way. "Let me look. Here's A. Robertson, and T. Le Fevre, +and L.B. Sykes, and N. Anderson." + +"Where is Anderson going?" + +"Paid through to Louisville. Do you know him?" + +But just then Norman Anderson himself walked in, and went up to the bar +with a new acquaintance. They did not smoke the pipe of peace, like red +Americans, but, like white Americans, they had a mysterious liquid +carefully compounded, and by swallowing this they solemnly sealed their +new-made friendship after the curious and unexplained rite in use among +their people. + +Norman had been dispatched on a collecting trip, and having nine hundred +and fifty dollars in his pocket, he felt as much elated as if it had +been his own money. The gentleman with whom he drank, had a band of +crape around his white hat. He seemed very nearsighted. + +"If that greeny is a friend of yours, Gus, I declare you'd better tell +him not to tie to the serious-looking young fellow in the white hat and +gold specs, unless he means to part with all his loose change before +bed-time." + +That is what the mud-clerk drawled to August the striker, but the +striker seemed to hear the words as something spoken afar off. For just +then he was seeing a vision of a drunken mob, and a rope, and a pleading +woman, and a brave old man threatened with death. Just then he heard +harsh and muddled voices, rude oaths, and jeering laughter, and above it +all the sweet pleading of a little girl begging for a father's life. And +the quick blood came into his fair German face, and he felt that he +could not save this Norman Anderson from the toils of the gambler, +though he might, if provoked, pitch him over the guard of the boat. For +was not Andrew's letter, which described the mob, in his pocket, and +burning a hole in his pocket as it had been ever since he received it? + +But then this was Julia's brother, and there was nothing he would not +do for Julia. So, sometime after the mud-clerk had ceased to speak, the +striker gave utterance to both impulses by replying, "He's no friend of +mine," a little crisply, and then softly adding, "Though I shouldn't +like to see him fleeced." + +By this time a new actor had appeared on the scene in the person of a +man with a black mustache and side-whiskers, who took a seat behind a +card-table near the bar. + +"H'llo!" said the mud-clerk in a low and lazy voice, "Parkins is back +again. After his scrape at Paducah last February, he disappeared, and +he's been shady ever since. He's growed whiskers since, so's not to be +recognized. But he'll be skeerce enough when we get to Paducah. Now, see +how quick he'll catch the greenies, won't you?" The prospect was so +charming as almost to stimulate the mud-clerk to speak with some +animation. + +But August Wehle, the striker on the Iatan, had an uncomfortable feeling +that he had seen that face before, and that the long mustache and +side-whiskers had grown in a remarkably short space of time. Could it be +that there were two men who could spread a smile over the lower half of +their faces in that automatic way, while the spider-eyes had no sort of +sympathy with it? Surely, this man with black whiskers and mustache was +not just like the singing-master at Sugar-Grove school-house, who had +"red-top hay on to his upper lip," and yet--and yet-- + +"Gentlemen," said Parkins--his Dickensian name would be Smirkins--"I +want to play a little game just for the fun of the thing. It is a trick +with three cards. I put down three cards, face up. Here is six of +diamonds, eight of spades, and the ace of hearts. Now, I will turn them +over so quickly that I will defy any of you to tell which is the ace. +Do you see? Now, I would like to bet the wine for the company that no +gentleman here can turn up the ace. All I want is a little sport. +Something to pass away the evening and amuse the company. Who will bet +the wine? The Scripture says that the hand is quicker than the eye, and +I warn you that if you bet, you will probably lose." And here he turned +the cards back, with their faces up, and the card which everybody felt +sure was the ace proved apparently to be that card. Most of the +on-lookers regretted that they had not bet, seeing that they would +certainly have won. Again the cards were put face down, and the company +was bantered to bet the wine. Nobody would bet. + +[Illustration: A NICE LITTLE GAME.] + +After a good deal of fluent talk, and much dexterous handling of the +cards, in a way that seemed clear enough to everybody, and that showed +that everybody's guess was right as to the place of the ace, the +near-sighted gentleman, who had drunk with Norman, offered to bet +five dollars. + +"Five dollars!" returned Parkins, laughing in derision, "five dollars! +Do you think I'm a gambler? I don't want any gentleman's money. I've got +all the money I need. However, if you would like to bet the wine with +me, I am agreed." + +The near-sighted gentleman declined to wager anything but just the five +dollars, and Parkins spurned his proposition with the scorn of a +gentleman who would on no account bet a cent of money. But he grew +excited, and bantered the whole crowd. Was there no _gentleman_ in the +crowd who would lay a wager of wine for the company on this interesting +little trick? It was strange to him that no gentleman had spirit enough +to make the bet. But no gentleman had spirit enough to bet the wine. +Evidently there were no gentlemen in the company. + +However, the near-sighted man with the white hat adorned with crape now +proposed in a crusty tone to bet ten dollars that he could lift the ace. +He even took out a ten-dollar bill, and, after examining it, in holding +it close to his nose as a penurious man might, extended his hand with, +"If you're in earnest, let's know it. I'll bet you ten." + +At this Parkins grew furious. He had never been so persistently badgered +in all his life. He'd have the gentleman know that he was not a gambler. +He had all the money he wanted, and as for betting ten dollars, he +shouldn't think of it. But now that the gentleman--he said _gentleman_ +with an emphasis--now that the gentleman seemed determined to bet money, +he would show him that he was not to be backed down. If the young man +would like to wager a hundred dollars, he would cheerfully bet with him. +If the gentleman did not feel able to bet a hundred dollars, he hoped he +would not say any more about it. He hadn't intended to bet money at all. +But he wouldn't bet less than a hundred dollars with anybody. A man who +couldn't afford to lose a hundred dollars, ought not to bet. + +"Who is this fellow in the white hat with spectacles?" August asked of +the mud-clerk. + +"That is Smith, Parkins's partner. He is only splurging round to start +up the greenies." And the mud-clerk spoke with an indifference and yet a +sort of _dilettante_ interest in the game that shocked his friend, +the striker. + +"Why don't they set these blacklegs ashore?" said August, whose love of +justice was strong. + +"_You_ tell," drawled the mud-clerk. "The first clerk's tried it, but +the old man protects 'em, and" (in a whisper) "get's his share, I guess. +He can set them off whenever he wants to." (I must explain that there +is only one "old man" on a steamboat--that is, the captain.) + +By this time Parkins had turned and thrown his cards so that everybody +knew or thought he knew where the ace was. Smith, the man with the white +hat, now rose five dollars more and offered to bet fifteen. But Parkins +was more indignant than ever. He told Smith to go away. He thrust his +hand into his pocket and drew out a handful of twenty-dollar +gold-pieces. "If any gentleman wants to bet a hundred dollars, let him +come on. A man who couldn't lose a hundred would better keep still." + +Smith now made a big jump. He'd go fifty. Parkins wouldn't listen to +fifty. He had said that he wouldn't bet less than a hundred, and he +wouldn't. He now pulled out handful after handful of gold, and piled the +double-eagles up like a fortification in front of him, while the crowd +surged with excitement. + +At last Mr. Smith, the near-sighted gentleman in spectacles, the +gentleman who wore black crape on a white hat, concluded to bet a +hundred dollars. He took out his little porte-monnaie and lifted thence +a hundred-dollar bill. + +"Well," said he angrily, "I'll bet you a hundred." And he laid down the +bill. Parkins piled five twenty-dollar gold-pieces atop it. Each man +felt that he could lift the ace in a moment. That card at the dealer's +right was certainly the ace. Norman was sure of it. He wished it had +been his wager instead of Smith's. But Parkins stopped Smith a moment. + +"Now, young man," he said, "if you don't feel perfectly able to lose +that hundred dollars, you'd better take it back." + +"I am just as able to lose it as you are," said Smith snappishly, and to +everybody's disappointment he lifted not the card everybody had fixed +on, but the middle one, and so lost his money. + +"Why didn't you take the other?" said Norman boastfully. "I knew it was +the ace." + +"Why didn't you bet, then?" said Smith, grinning a little. Norman wished +he had. But he had not a hundred dollars of his own, and he had +scruples--faint, and yet scruples, or rather alarms--at the thought of +risking his employer's money on a wager. While he was weighing motive +against motive, Smith bet again, and again, to Norman's vexation, +selected a card that was so obviously wrong that Norman thought it a +pity that so near-sighted a man should bet and lose. He wished he had a +hundred dollars of his own and--There, Smith was betting again. This +time he consulted Norman before making his selection, and of course +turned up the right card, remarking that he wished his eyes were so +keen! He would win a thousand dollars before bed-time if his eyes were +so good! Then he took Norman into partnership, and Norman found himself +suddenly in possession of fifty dollars, gotten without trouble. This +turned his brain. Nothing is so intoxicating to a weak man as money +acquired without toil. So Norman continued to bet, sometimes +independently, sometimes in partnership with, the gentlemanly Smith. He +was borne on by the excitement of varying fortune, a varying fortune +absolutely under control of the dealer, whose sleight-of-hand was +perfect. And the varying fortune had an unvarying tendency in the long +run--to put three stakes out Of five into the pockets of the gamblers, +who found the little game very interesting amusement for gentlemen. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + +THE RESULT OF AN EVENING WITH GENTLEMEN. + +All the time that these smiling villains were by consummate art drawing +their weak-headed victim into their tolls, what was August doing? Where +were his prompt decision of character, his quick intelligence, his fine +German perseverance, that should have saved the brother of Julia +Anderson from harpies? Could our blue-eyed young countryman, who knew +how to cherish noble aspirations walking in a plowman's furrow--could he +stand there satisfying his revenge by witnessing the ruin of a young man +who, like many others, was wicked only because he was weak? + +In truth, August was a man whose feelings were persistent. His +resentment was--like his love--constant. But his love of justice was +higher and more persistent, and he could not have seen any one fleeced +in this merciless way without taking sides strongly with the victim. +Much less could he see the brother of Julia tempted on to the rocks by +the false lights of villainous wreckers without a great desire to save +him. For the letter of Andrew had ceased now to burn in his pocket. That +other letter--the only one that Julia had been able to send through +Cynthy Ann and Jonas--that other letter, written all over with such +tender extravagances as love feeds on; the thought of that other letter, +which told how beautiful and precious were the invitations to the weary +and heavy-laden, had stilled resentment, and there came instead a keen +desire to save Norman for the sake of Julia and justice. But how to do +it was an embarrassing question--a question that was more than August +could solve. There was a difficulty in the weakness and wrong-headedness +of Norman; a difficulty in Norman's prejudice against Dutchmen in +general and August in particular; a difficulty in the fact that August +was a sort of a fugitive, if not from justice, certainly from injustice. + +But when nearly a third of Norman's employer's money had gone into the +gamblers' heap, and when August began to understand that it was another +man's money that Norman was losing, and that the victim was threatened +by no half-way ruin, he determined to do something, even at the risk of +making himself known to Norman and to Parkins--was he Humphreys in +disguise?--and at the risk of arrest for house-breaking. August acted +with his eyes open to all the perils from gamblers' pistols and +gamblers' malice; and after he had started to interfere, the mud-clerk +called him back, and said, in his half-indifferent way: + +"Looky here, Gus, don't be a blamed fool. That's a purty little game. +That greeny's got to learn to let blacklegs alone, and he don't look +like one that'll take advice. Let him scorch a little; it'll do him +good. It's healthy for young men. That's the reason the old man don't +forbid it, I s'pose. And these fellows carry good shooting-irons with +hair-triggers, and I declare I don't want to be bothered writing home to +your mother, and explaining to her that you got killed in a fight with +blacklegs, I declare I don't, you see. And then you'll get the 'old man' +down on you, if you let a bird out of the trap in which he goes snucks; +you will, I declare. And you'll get walking-papers at Louisville. Let +the game alone. You haven't got any hand to play against Parkins, nohow; +and I reckon the greenhorns are his lawful prey. Cats couldn't live +without mice. You'll lose your place, I declare you will, if you say +a word." + +[Illustration: THE MUD-CLERK] + +August stopped long enough to take in the full measure of his sacrifice. +So far from being deterred by it, he was more than ever determined to +act. Not the love Julia, so much, now, but the farewell prayer and +benediction and the whole life and spirit of the sweet Moravian mother +in her child-full house at home were in his mind at this moment. Things +which a man will not do for the love of woman he may do for the love of +God--and it was with a sense of moral exaltation that August entered +into the lofty spirit of self-sacrifice he had seen in his mother, and +caught himself saying, in his heart, as he had heard her say, "Let us do +anything for the Father's sake!" Some will call this cant. So much the +worse for them. This motive, too little felt in our day--too little felt +in any day--is the great impulse that has enabled men to do the bravest +things that have been done. The sublimest self-sacrifice is only +possible to a man by the aid of some strong moral tonic. God's love is +the chief support of the strongest spirits. + +August touched Norman on the arm. The face of the latter expressed +anything but pleasure at meeting him, now that he felt guilty. But this +was not the uppermost feeling with Norman. He noticed that August's +clothes were spotted with engine-grease, and his first fear was of +compromising his respectability. + +In a hurried way August began to explain to him that he was betting with +gamblers, but Smith stood close to them, looking at August in such a +contemptuous way as to make Norman feel very uncomfortable, and Parkins +seeing the crowd attracted by August's explanations--which he made in +some detail, by way of adapting himself to Norman--of the trick by which +the upper card is thrown out first, Parkins said, "I see you understand +the game, young man. If you do, why don't you bet?" + +At this the crowd laughed, and Norman drew away from the striker's +greasy clothes, and said that he didn't want to speak any further to a +burglar, he believed. But August followed, determined to warn him +against Smith. Smith was ahead of him, however, saving to Norman, "Look +out for your pockets--that greasy fellow will rob you." + +And Norman, who was nothing if not highly respectable, resolved to +shake off the troublesome "Dutchman" at once. "I don't know what you are +up to now, but at home you are known as a thief. So please let me alone, +will you?" This Norman tried to say in an annihilating way. + +The crowd looked for a fight. August said loud enough to be heard, "You +know very well that you lie. I wanted to save you from being a thief, +but you are betting money now that is not yours." + +The company, of course, sympathized with the gentleman and against the +machine-oil on the striker's clothes, so that there arose quickly a +murmur, started by Smith, "Put the bully out," and August was "hustled." +It is well that he was not shot. + +It was quite time for him to go on watch now; for the loud-ticking +marine-clock over the window of the clerk's office pointed to three +minutes past twelve, and the striker hurried to his post at the +starboard engine, with the bitterness of defeat and the shame of insult +in his heart. He had sacrificed his place, doubtless, and risked much +beside, and all for nothing. The third engineer complained of his +tardiness in not having relieved him three minutes before, and August +went to his duties with a bitter heart. To a man who is persistent, as +August was, defeat of any sort is humiliating. + +As for Norman, he bet after this just to show his independence and to +show that the money was his own, as well as in the vain hope of winning +back what he had lost. He bet every cent. Then he lost his watch, and at +half-past one o'clock he went to his state-room, stripped of all loose +valuables, and sweating great drops. And the mud-clerk, who was still in +the office, remarked to himself, with a pleasant chuckle, that it was +good for him; he declared it was; teach the fellow to let monte alone, +and keep his eyes peeled when he traveled. It would so! + +The idea was a good one, and he went down to the starboard engine and +told the result of the nice little game to his friend the striker, +drawling it out in a relishful way, how the blamed idiot never stopped +till they'd got his watch, and then looked like as if he'd a notion to +jump into the "drink." But 'twould cure him of meddlin' with monte. +It would so! + +He walked away, and August was just reflecting on the heartlessness of +his friend, when the mud-clerk came back again, and began drawling his +words out as before, just as though each distinct word were of a +delightful flavor and he regretted that he must part with it. + +"I've got you even with Parkins, old fellow. He'll be strung up on a +lamp-post at Paducah, I reckon. I saw a Paducah man aboard, and I put a +flea in his ear. We've got to lay there an hour or two to put off a +hundred barrels of molasses and two hundred sacks of coffee and two lots +of plunder. There'll be a hot time for Parkins. He let on to marry a +girl and fooled her. They'll teach him a lesson. You'll be off watch, +and we'll have some fun looking on." And the mud-clerk evidently thought +that it would be even funnier to see Parkins hanged than it had been to +see him fleece Norman. Gus the striker did not see how either scene +could be very entertaining. But he was sick at heart, and one could not +expect him to show much interest in manly sports. + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + +WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER. + +The steady beat of the wheels and the incessant clank of the engines +went on as usual. The boat was loaded almost to her guards, and did not +make much speed. The wheels kept their persistent beat upon the water, +and the engines kept their rhythmical clangor going, until August found +himself getting drowsy. Trouble, with forced inaction, nearly always has +a soporific tendency, and a continuous noise is favorable to sleep. Once +or twice August roused himself to a sense of his responsibility and +battled with his heaviness. It was nearing the end of his watch, for the +dog-watch of two hours set in at four o'clock. But it seemed to him that +four o'clock would never come. + +An incident occurred just at this moment that helped him to keep his +eyes open. A man went aft through the engine-room with a red +handkerchief tied round his forehead. In spite of this partial disguise +August perceived that it was Parkins. He passed through to the place +where the steerage or deck passengers are, and then disappeared from +August's sight. He had meant to disembark at a wood-yard just below +Paducah, but for some reason the boat did not stop, and now, as August +guessed, he was hiding himself from Paducah eyes. He was not much too +soon, for the great bell on the hurricane-deck was already ringing for +Paducah, and the summer dawn was showing itself faintly through the +river fog. + +The alarm-bell rang in the engine-room, and Wehle stood by his engine. +Then the bell rang to stop the starboard engine, and August obeyed it. +The pilot of a Western steamboat depends much upon his engines for +steerage in making a landing, and the larboard engine was kept running a +while longer in order to bring the deeply-loaded boat round to her +landing at the primitive wharf-boat of that day. There is something fine +in the faith with which an engineer obeys the bell of the pilot, not +knowing what may be ahead, not inquiring what may be the effect of the +order, but only doing exactly what he is bid when he is bid. August had +stopped his engine, and stood trying to keep his mind off Parkins and +the events of the night, that he might be ready to obey the next signal +for his engine. But the bell rang next to stop the other engine, at +which the second engineer stood, and August was so free from +responsibility in regard to that that he hardly noticed the sound of the +bell, until it rang a second time more violently. Then he observed that +the larboard engine still ran. Was Munson dead or asleep? Clearly it was +August's duty to stand by his own engine. But then he was startled to +think what damage to property or life might take place from the failure +of the second engineer to stop his engine. While he hesitated, and all +these considerations flashed through his mind, the pilot's bell rang +again long and loud, and August then, obeying an impulse rather than a +conviction, ran over to the other engine, stopped it, and then, +considering that it had run so long against orders, he reversed it and +set it to backing without waiting instructions. Then he seized Munson +and woke him, and hurried back to his post. But the larboard engine had +not made three revolutions backward before the boat, hopelessly thrown +from her course by the previous neglect, struck the old wharf-boat and +sunk it. But for the promptness and presence of mind with which Wehle +acted, the steamboat itself would have suffered severely. The mate and +then the captain came rushing into the engine-room. Munson was +discharged at once, and the striker was promised engineer's wages. + +Gus went off watch at this moment, and the mud-clerk said to him, in his +characteristically indifferent voice, "Such luck, I declare! I was sure +you would be dismissed for meddling with Parkins, and here you are +promoted, I declare!" + +The mishap occasioned much delay to the boat, as it was very +inconvenient to deliver freight at that day and at that stage of water +without the intervention of the wharf-boat. A full hour was consumed in +finding a landing, and in rigging the double-staging and temporary +planks necessary to get the molasses and coffee and household "plunder" +ashore. Some hint that Parkins was on the river had already reached +Paducah, and the sheriff and two deputies and a small crowd were at the +landing looking for him. A search of the boat failed to discover him, +and the crowd would have left the landing but for occasional hints slyly +thrown out by the mud-clerk as he went about over the levee collecting +freight-bills. These hints, given in a non-committal way, kept the crowd +alive with expectation, and when the rumors thus started spread abroad, +the levee was soon filled with an excited and angry multitude. + +If it had been a question of delivering a criminal to justice, August +would not have hesitated to tell the sheriff where to look. But he very +well knew that the sheriff could not convey the man through the mob +alive, and to deliver even such a scoundrel to the summary vengeance of +a mob was something that he could not find it in his heart to do. + +In truth, the sheriff and his officers did not seek very zealously for +their man. Under the circumstances, it was probable he would not +surrender himself without a fight, in which somebody would be killed, +and besides there must ensue a battle with the mob. It was what they +called an ugly job, and they were not loth to accept the captain's +assurance that the gambler had gone ashore. + +While August was unwilling to deliver the hunted villain to a savage +death, he began to ask himself why he might not in some way use his +terror in the interest of justice. For he had just then seen the +wretched and bewildered face of Norman looking ghastly enough in the fog +of the morning. + +At last, full of this notion, and possessed, too, by his habit of +accomplishing at all hazards what he had begun, August strolled back +through the now quiet engine-room to the deck-passengers' quarter. It +was about half an hour before six o'clock, when the dog-watch would +expire and he must go on duty again. In one of the uppermost of the +filthy bunks, in the darkest corner, near the wheel, he discovered what +he thought to be his man. The deck-passengers were still asleep, lying +around stupidly. August paused a moment, checked by a sense of the +dangerousness of his undertaking. Then he picked up a stick of wood and +touched the gambler, who could not have been very sound asleep, lying in +hearing of the curses of the mob on the shore. At first Parkins did not +move, but August gave him a still more vigorous thrust. Then he peered +out between the blanket and the handkerchief over his forehead. + +"I will take that money you won last night from that young man, if you +please." + +[Illustration: WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER.] + +Parkins saw that it was useless to deny his identity. "Do you want to be +shot?" he asked fiercely. + +"Not any more than you want to be hung," said August. "The one would +follow the other in five minutes. Give back that money and I will +go away." + +The gambler trembled a minute. He was fairly at bay. He took out a roll +of bills and handed it to August. There was but five hundred. Smith had +the other four hundred and fifty, he said. But August had a quiet German +steadiness of nerve. He said that unless the other four hundred and +fifty were paid at once he should call in the sheriff or the crowd. +Parkins knew that every minute August stood there increased his peril, +and human nature is now very much like human nature in the days of Job. +The devil understood the subject very well when he said that all that a +man hath will he give for his life. Parkins paid the four hundred and +fifty in gold-pieces. He would have paid twice that if August had +demanded it. + + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + +AUGUST AND NORMAN. + +In a story such as I meant this to be, the development of character +stands for more than the evolution of the plot, and herein is the true +significance of this contact of Wehle with the gamblers, and, indeed, of +this whole steamboat life. It is not enough for one to be good in a +country neighborhood; the sharp contests and severe ordeals of more +exciting life are needed to give temper to the character. August Wehle +was hardly the same man on this morning at Paducah, with the nine +hundred and fifty dollars in his pocket, that he had been the evening +before, when he first felt the sharp resentment against the man who had +outraged his father. In acting on a high plane, one is unconsciously +lifted to that plane. Men become Christians sometimes from the effect of +sudden demands made upon their higher moral nature, demands which compel +them to choose between a life higher than their present living, or a +moral degradation. Such had been August's experience. He had been drawn +upward toward God by the opportunity and necessity for heroic action. I +have no doubt the good Samaritan got more out of his own kindness than +the robbed Jew did. + +Before he had a chance to restore the money to its rightful owner, the +two hours of dog-watch had expired, and he was obliged to go on watch +again, much to his annoyance. He had been nearly twenty-four hours +without sleep, and after a night of such excitement it was unpleasant as +well as perilous to have to hold this money, which did not belong to +him, for six hours longer, liable at any minute to get into difficulty +through any scheme of the gamblers and their allies, by which his +recovery of the money might be misinterpreted. The morning seemed to +wear away so slowly. All the possibilities of Parkins's attacking him, +of young Anderson's committing suicide, and of the misconstruction that +might be put upon his motives--the making of his disinterested action +seem robbery--haunted his excitable imagination. At last, while the +engines were shoving their monotonous shafts backward and forward, and +the "palatial steamer" Iatan was slowly pushing her way up the stream, +August grew so nervous over his money that he resolved to relieve +himself of part of it. So he sent for the mud-clerk by a passing +deck-hand. + +"I want you to keep this money for me until I get off watch," said +August. "I made Parkins stand and deliver this morning while we were +at Paducah." + +"You did?" said the mud-clerk, not offering to touch the money. "You +risked your life, I declare, for that fool that called you a thief. You +are a fool, Gus, and nothing but your blamed good luck can save you from +getting salivated, bright and early, some morning. Not a great deal I +won't take that money. I don't relish lead, and I've got to live among +these fellows all my days, and I don't hold that money for anybody. The +old man would ship me at Louisville, seeing I never stopped anybody's +engine and backed it in a hurry, as you did. If I'd known where Parkins +was, I'd a dropped a gentle word in the ear of the crowd outside, but I +wouldn't a pulled that greeny's coffee-nuts out of the fire, and I won't +hold the hot things for you. I declare I won't. Saltpeter wouldn't save +me if I did." + +So Gus had to content himself in his nervousness, not allayed by this +speech, und keep the money in his pocket until noon. And, after all the +presentiment he had had, noon came round. Presentiments generally come +from the nerves, and signify nothing; but nobody keeps a tally of the +presentiments and auguries that fail. When the first-engineer and a new +man took the engines at noon, Gus was advised by the former to get some +sleep, but there was no sleep for him until he had found Norman, who +trembled at the sight of him. + +"Where is your state-room?" said August sternly, for he couldn't bring +himself to speak kindly to the poor fellow, even in his misery. + +Norman turned pale. He had been thinking of suicide all the morning, but +he was a coward, and now he evidently felt sure that he was to be killed +by August. He did not dare disobey, but led the way, stopping to try to +apologize two or three times, but never getting any further +than "I--I--" + +Once in the state-room, he sat down on the berth and gasped, "I--I--" + +"Here is your money," said August, handing it to him. "I made the +gambler give it up." + +"I--I--" said the astonished and bewildered Norman. + +"You needn't say a word. You are a cowardly scoundrel, and if you say +anything, I'll knock you down for treating my father as you did. Only +for--for--well, I didn't want to see you fleeced." + +Norman was ashamed for once, and hung his head. It touched the heart of +August a little, but the remembrance of the attack of the mob on his +father made him feel hard again, and so his generous act was performed +ungraciously. + + + +CHAPTER XXX. + +AGROUND. + +Not the boat. The boat ran on safely enough to Louisville, and tied up +at the levee, and discharged her sugar und molasses, and took on a new +cargo of baled hay and corn and flour, and went back again, and made I +know not how many trips, and ender her existence I can not tell how or +when. What does become of the old steamboats? The Iatan ran for years +after she tied up at Louisville that summer morning, and then perhaps +she was blown up or burned up; perchance some cruel sawyer transfixed +her; perchance she was sunk by ice, or maybe she was robbed of her +engines and did duty as barge, or, what is more probable, she wore out +like the one-hoss shay, and just tumbled to pieces simultaneously. + +It was not the gambler who got aground that morning. He had yet other +nice little games, with three cards or more or none, to play. + +It was not the mud-clerk who ran aground--good, non-committal soul, who +never look sides where it would do him any harm, and who never worried +himself about anything. Dear, drawling, optimist philosopher, who could +see how other people's mishaps were best for them, and who took good +care not to have any himself! It was not he that ran aground. + +It was not Norman Anderson who ran aground. He walked into the store +with the proud and manly consciousness of having done his duty, he made +his returns of every cent of money that had come into his hands, and, +like all other faithful stewards, received the cordial commendation of +his master. + +But August Wehle the striker, just when he was to be made an engineer, +when he thought he had smooth sailing, suddenly and provokingly found +himself fast aground, with no spar or capstan by which he might help +himself off, with no friendly craft alongside to throw him a hawser and +pull him off. + +It seems that when the captain promised him promotion, he did not know +anything of August's interference with the gamblers. But when Parkins +filed his complaint, it touched the captain. It was generally believed +among the _employés_ of the boat that a percentage of gamblers' gains +was one of the "old man's" perquisites, and he was not the only +steamboat captain who profited by the nice little games in the cabin +upon which he closed both eyes. And this retrieved nine hundred and +fifty dollars was a dead loss of--well, it does not matter how much, to +the virtuous and highly honorable captain. His proportion would have +been large enough at least to pay his wife's pew-rent in St. James's +Church, with a little something over for charitable purposes. For the +captain did not mind giving a disinterested twenty-five dollars +occasionally to those charities that were willing to show their +gratitude by posting his name as director, or his wife's as "Lady +Manageress." In this case his right hand never knew what his left hand +did--how it got the money, for instance. + +So when August drew his pay he was informed that he was discharged. No +reason was given. He tried to see the captain. But the captain was in +the bosom of his family, kissing his own well-dressed little boys, and +enjoying the respect which only exemplary and provident fathers enjoy. +And never asking down in his heart if these boys might become gamblers' +victims, or gamblers, indeed. The captain could not see August the +striker, for he was at home, and must not be interfered with by any of +his subordinates. Besides, it was Sunday, and he could not be intruded +upon--the rector of St. James's was dining with him on his wife's +invitation, and it behooved him to walk circumspectly, not with +eye-service as a man-pleaser, but serving the Lord. + +So he refuted to see the anxious striker, and turned to compliment the +rector on his admirable sermon on the sin of Judas, who sold his master +for thirty pieces of silver. + +And August Wehle had nothing left to do. The river was falling fast, the +large boats above the Falls were, in steamboat-man's phrase, "laying up" +in the mouths of the tributaries and other convenient harbors, there +were plenty of engineers unemployed, and there were no vacancies. + + + +CHAPTER XXXI. + +CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE. + +Jonas had been all his life, as he expressed it in his mixed rhetoric, +"a wanderin' sand-hill crane, makin' many crooked paths, and, like the +cards in French monte, a-turnin' up suddently in mighty on-expected +places." He had been in every queer place from Halifax to Texas, and +then had come back to his home again. Naturally cautious, and especially +suspicious of the female sex, it is not strange that he had not married. +Only when he "tied up to the same w'arf-boat alongside of Cynthy Ann, he +thought he'd found somebody as was to be depended on in a fog or a +harricane." This he told to Cynthy Ann as a reason why she should accept +his offer of marriage. + +"Jonas," said Cynthy Ann, "don't flatter. My heart is dreadful weak, and +prone to the vanities of this world. It makes me abhor myself in dust +and sackcloth fer you to say such things about poor unworthy me." + +"Ef I think 'em, why shouldn't I say 'em? I don't know no law agin +tellin' the truth ef you git into a place where you can't no ways help +it. I don't call you angel, fer you a'n't; you ha'nt got no wings nor +feathers. I don't say as how as you're pertikeler knock-down handsome. +I don't pertend that you're a spring chicken. I don't lie nor flatter. I +a'n't goin' it blind, like young men in love. But I do say, with my eyes +open and in my right senses, and feelin' solemn, like a man a-makin' his +last will and testament, that they a'n't no sech another woman to be +found outside the leds of the Bible betwixt the Bay of Fundy and the Rio +Grande. I've 'sought round this burdened airth,' as the hymn says, and +they a'n't but jest one. Ef that one'll jest make me happy, I'll fold my +weary pinions and settle down in a rustic log-cabin and raise corn and +potaters till death do us part." + +Cynthy trembled. Cynthy was a saint, a martyr to religious feeling, a +medieval nun in her ascetic eschewing of the pleasures of life. But +Cynthy Ann was also a woman. And a woman whose spring-time had paused. +When love buds out thus late, when the opportunity for the woman's +nature to blossom comes unexpectedly upon one at her age, the temptation +is not easily resisted. Cynthy trembled, but did not quite yield up her +Christian constancy. + +"Jonas, I don't know whether I'd orto or not. I don't deny--I think I'd +better ax brother Goshorn, you know, sence what would it profit ef I +gained you or any joy in this world, and then come short by settin' you +up fer a idol in my heart? I don't know whether a New Light is a +onbeliever or not, and whether I'd be onequally yoked or not. I must ax +them as knows better nor I do." + +"Well, ef I'm a onbeliever, they's nobody as could teach me to believe +quicker'n you could. I never did believe much in women folks till I +believed in you." + +"But that's the sin of it, Jonas. I'd believe in you, and you'd believe +in me, and we'd be puttin' our trust in the creatur instid of the +Creator, and the Creator is mighty jealous of our idols, and He would +take us away fer idolatry." + +"No, but I wouldn't worship you, though I'd rather worship you than +anybody else ef I was goin' into the worshipin' business. But you see I +a'n't, honey. I wouldn't sacrifice to you no lambs nor sheep, I wouldn't +pray to you, nor I wouldn't kiss your shoes, like people does the +Pope's. An' I know you wouldn't make no idol of me like them Greek gods +that Andrew's got picters of. I a'n't handsome enough by a long shot fer +a Jupiter or a 'Pollo. An' I tell you, Cynthy, 'tain't no sin to love. +Love is the fullfilling of the law." + +But Cynthy Ann persisted that she must consult Brother Goshorn, the +antiquated class-leader at the cross-roads. Brother Goshorn was a good +man, but Jonas had a great contempt for him. He was a strainer out of +gnats, though I do not think he swallowed camels. He always stood at the +door of the love-feast and kept out every woman with jewelry, every girl +who had an "artificial" in her bonnet, every one who wore curls, every +man whose hair was beyond what he considered the regulation length of +Scripture, and every woman who wore a veil. In support of this last +prohibition he quoted Isaiah iii, 23: "The glasses and the fine linen +and the hoods and the veils." + +To him Cynthy Ann presented the case with much trepidation. All her +hopes for this world hung upon it. But this consideration did not +greatly affect Brother Goshorn. Hopes and joys were as nothing to him +where the strictness of discipline was involved. The Discipline meant +more to a mind of his cast than the Decalogue or the Beatitudes. He +shook his head. He did not know. He must consult Brother Hall. Now, +Brother Hall was the young preacher traveling his second year, very +young and very callow. Ten years of the sharp attritions of a Methodist +itinerant's life would take his unworldliness out of him and develop his +practical sense as no other school in the world could develop it. But as +yet Brother Hall had not rubbed off any of his sanctimoniousness, had +not lost any of his belief that the universe should be governed on high +general principles with no exceptions. + +So when Brother Goshorn informed him that one of his members, Sister +Cynthy Ann Dyke, wished to marry, and to marry a man that was a New +Light, and had asked his opinion, and that he did not certainly know +whether New Lights were believers or not, Brother Hall did not stop to +inquire what Jonas might be personally. He looked and felt very solemn, +and said that it was a pity for a Christian to marry a New Light. It was +clearly a sin, for a New Light was an Arian. And an Arian was just as +good as an infidel. An Arian robbed Christ of His supreme deity, and +since he did not worship the Trinity in the orthodox sense he must +worship a false god. He was an idolater therefore, and it was a sin to +be yoked together with such an one. + +Many men more learned than the callow but pious and sincere Brother Hall +have left us in print just such deductions. + +When this decision was communicated to the scrupulous Cynthy Ann, she +folded her hopes as one lays away the garment of a dead friend; she west +to her little room and prayed; she offered a sacrifice to God not less +costly than Abraham's, and in a like sublime spirit. She watered the +plant In the old cracked blue-and-white tea-pot, she noticed that it was +just about to bloom, and then she dropped one tear upon it, and because +it suggested Jonas in some way, she threw it away, resolved not to have +any idols in her heart. And, doubtless, God received the sacrifice, +mistaken and needless as it was, a token of the faithfulness of her +heart to her duty as she understood it. + +[Illustration: CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE.] + +Cynthy Ann explained it all to Jonas in a severe and irrevocable way. +Jonas looked at her a moment, stunned. + +"Did Brother Goshorn venture to send me any of his wisdom, in the way of +advice, layin' round loose, like counterfeit small change, cheap +as dirt?" + +"Well, yes," said Cynthy Ann, hesitating. + +"I'll bet the heft of my fortin', to be paid on receipt of the amount, +that I kin tell to a T what the good Christian wanted me to do." + +"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas. Brother Goshorn is a mighty sincere man." + +"So he is, but his bein' sincere don't do me no good. He wanted you to +advise me to jine the Methodist class as a way of gittin' out of the +difficulty. And you was too good a Christian to ask me to change fer any +sech reason, knowin' I wouldn't be fit for you ef I did." + +Cynthy Ann was silent. She would have liked to have Jonas join the +church with her, but if he had done it now she herself would have +doubted his sincerity. + +"Now, looky here, Cynthy, ef you'll say you don't love me, and never +can, I'll leave you to wunst, and fly away and mourn like a turtle-dove. +But so long as it's nobody but Goshorn, I'm goin' to stay and litigate +the question till the Millerite millennium comes. I appeal to Cæesar or +somebody else. Neither Brother Goshorn nor Brother Hall knows enough to +settle this question. I'm agoin' to the persidin' elder. And you can't +try a man and hang him and then send him to the penitentiary fer the +rest of his born days without givin' him one chance to speak fer hisself +agin the world and everybody else. I'm goin' to see the persidin' elder +myself and plead my own cause, and ef he goes agin me, I'll carry it up +to the bishop or the archbishop or the nex' highest man in the heap, +till I git plum to the top, and ef they all go agin me, I'll begin over +agin at the bottom with Brother Goshorn, and keep on till I find a man +that's got common-sense enough to salt his religion with." + + + +CHAPTER XXXII. + +JULIA'S ENTERPRISE. + +4 August was very sick at the castle. This wag the first news of his +return that reached Julia through Jonas and Cynthy Ann. + +But in my interest in Jonas and Cynthy Ann, of whom I think a great +deal, I forgot to say that long before the events mentioned in the last +chapter, Humphreys had been suddenly called away from his peaceful +retreat in the hill country of Clark township. In fact, the "important +business," or "the illness of a friend," whichever it was, occurred the +very next day after Norman Anderson's father returned from Louisville, +and reported that he had secured for his son an "outside situation," +that is to say, a place as a collector. + +When he had gone, Jonas remarked to Cynthy Ann, "Where the carcass is, +there the turkey-buzzards is gethered. That shinin' example of early +piety never plays but one game. That is, fox-and-geese. He's gone after +a green goslin' now, and he'll find him when he's fattest." + +But the gentle singing-master had come back from his excursion, and was +taking a profound interest in the coming end of the world. Jonas +observed that it "seemed like as ef he hed charge of the whole +performance, and meant to shet up the sky like a blue cotton umbrell. +He's got a single eye, and it's the same ole game. Fox and geese always, +and he's the fox." + +Humphreys still lived at Samuel Anderson's, still devoted himself to +pleasing Mrs. Abigail, still bowed regretfully to Julia, and spoke +caressingly to Betsey Malcolm at every opportunity. + +But August was sick at the castle. He was very sick. Every morning Dr. +Dibrell, a "calomel-doctor"--not a steam-doctor--rode by the house on +his way to Andrew's, and every morning Mrs. Anderson wondered afresh who +was sick down that way. But the doctor staid so long that Mrs. Abigail +made up her mind it must be somebody four or five miles away, and so +dismissed the matter from her mind. For August's return had been +kept secret. + +But Julia noticed, in her heart of hearts, and with ever-increasing +affliction, that the doctor staid longer each day than on the day +before, and she thought she noticed also an increasing anxiety on his +face as he rode home again. Her desire to know the real truth, and to +see August, to do for him, to give her life for him, were wearing her +away. It is hard to see a friend go from you when you have done +everything. But to have a friend die within your reach, while you are +yet unable to help him, is the saddest of all. All this anxiety Julia +suffered without even the blessed privilege of showing it. The pent-up +fire consumed her, and she was at times almost distract. Every morning +she managed to be on the upper porch when the doctor went by, and from +the same watch-tower she studied his face when he went back. + +Then came a morning when there were two doctors. A physician from the +county-seat village went by, in company with Dr. Dibrell. So there must +be a consultation at the castle. Julia knew then that the worst had to +be looked in the face. And she longed to get away from under the +searching black eyes of her mother and utter the long-pent cry of +anguish. Another day of such unuttered pain would drive her clean mad. + +That evening Jonas came over and sought an interview with Cynthy Ann. He +had not been to see her since his unsuccessful courtship. Julia felt +that he was the bearer of a message. But Mrs. Anderson was in one of her +most exacting humors, and it gave her not a little pleasure to keep +Cynthy Ann, on one pretext and another, all the evening at her side. Had +Cynthy Ann been less submissive and scrupulous, she might have broken +away from this restraint, but in truth she was censuring herself for +having any backsliding, rebellious wish to talk with Jonas after she had +imagined the idol cast out of her heart entirely. Her conscience was a +tank-master not less grievous than Mrs. Anderson, and, between the two, +Jonas had to go away without leaving his message. And Julia had to keep +her breaking heart in suspense a while longer. + +Why did she not elope long ago and get rid of her mother? Because she +was Julia, and being Julia, conscientious, true, and filial in spite of +her unhappy life, her own character built a wall against such a +disobedience. Nearly all limitations are inside. You could do almost +anything if you could give yourself up to it. To go in the teeth of +one's family is the one thing that a person of Julia's character and +habits finds next to impossible. A beneficent limitation of nature; for +the cases in which the judgment of a girl of eighteen is better than +that of her parents are very few. Besides, the inevitable +"heart-disease" was a specter that guarded the gates of Julia's prison. +Night after night she sat looking out over the hills sleeping in hazy +darkness, toward the hollow in which stood the castle; night after night +she had half-formed the purpose of visiting August, and then the +life-long habit of obedience and a certain sense of delicacy held her +back. But on this night, after the consultation, she felt that she would +see him if her seeing him brought down the heavens. + +It was a very dark night. She sat waiting for hours--very long hours +they seemed to her--and then, at midnight, she began to get ready +to start. + +Only those who have taken such a step can understand the pain of +deciding, the agony of misgivings in the execution, the trembling that +Julia felt when she turned the brass knob on the front door and lifted +the latch--lifted the latch slowly and cautiously, for it was near the +door of her mother's room--and then crept out like a guilty thing into +the dark dampness of the night, groping her way to the gate, and +stumbling along down the road. It had been raining, and there was not +one star-twinkle in the sky; the only light was that of glow-worms +illuminating here and there two or three blades of grass by feeble +shining. Now and then a fire-fly made a spot of light in the blackness, +only to leave a deeper spot of blackness when he shut off his +intermittent ray. And when at last Julia found herself at the place +where the path entered the woods, the blackness ahead seemed still more +frightful. She had to grope, recognizing every deviation from the +well-beaten path by the rustle of the dead leaves which lay, even in +summer, half a foot deep upon the ground. The "fox-fire," rotting logs +glowing with a faint luminosity, startled her several times, and the +hooting-owl's shuddering bass--hoo! hoo! hoo-oo-ah-h! (like the awful +keys of the organ which "touch the spinal cord of the universe")--sent +all her blood to her heart. Under ordinary circumstances, she surely +would not have started at the rustling made by the timid hare in the +thicket near by. There was no reason why she should shiver so when a +misstep caused her to scratch her face with the thorny twigs of a wild +plum-tree. But the effort necessary to the undertaking and the agony of +the long waiting had exhausted her nervous force, and she had none left +for fortitude. So that when she arrived at Andrew's fence and felt her +way along to the gate, and heard the hoarse, thunderous baying of his +great St. Bernard dog, she was ready to faint. But a true instinct makes +such a dog gallant. It is a vile cur that will harm a lady. Julia walked +trembling up to the front-door of the castle, growled at by the huge +black beast, and when the Philosopher admitted her, some time after she +had knocked, she sank down fainting into a chair. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII. + +THE SECRET STAIRWAY. + +"God bless you!" said Andrew as he handed her a gourd of water to revive +her. "You are as faithful as Hero. You are another Heloise. You are as +brave as the Maid of Orleans. I will never say that women are unfaithful +again. God bless you, my daughter! You have given me faith in your sex. +I have been a lonely man; a boughless, leafless trunk, shaken by the +winter winds. But _you_ are my niece. _You_ know how to be faithful. I +am proud of you! Henceforth I call you my daughter. If you _were_ my +daughter, you would be to me all that Margaret Roper was to Sir Thomas +More." And the shaggy man of egotistic and pedantic speech, but of +womanly sensibilities, was weeping. + +The reviving Julia begged to know how August was. + +"Ah, constant heart! And he is constant as you are. Noble fellow! I will +not deceive you. The doctors think that he will not live more than +twenty-four hours. But he is only dying to see you, now. Your coming may +revive him. We sent for you this morning by Jonas, hoping you might +escape and come in some way. But Jonas could not get his message to +you. Some angel must have brought you. It is an augury of good." + +The hopefulness of Andrew sprang out of his faith in an ideal, right +outcome. Julia could not conceal from herself the fact that his opinion +had no ground. But in such a strait as hers, she could not help clinging +even to this support. + +Andrew was a little perplexed. How to take Julia up-stairs? Mrs. Wehle +and Wilhelmina and the doctor went in regularly, not by the rope-ladder, +but by a more secure wooden one which he had planted against the outside +of the house. But Andrew had suddenly conceived so exalted an opinion of +his niece's virtues that he was unwilling to lead her into the upper +story in that fashion. His imagination had invested her with all the +glories of all the heroines, from Penelope to Beatrice, and from +Beatrice to Scott's Rebecca. At last a sudden impulse seized him. + +"My dear daughter, they say that genius is to madness close allied. When +I built this house I was in a state bordering on insanity, I suppose. I +pleased my whims--my whims were my only company--I pleased my whims in +building an American castle. These whims begin to seem childish to me +now. I put in a secret stairway. No human foot but my own has ever +trodden it. August, whom I love more than any other, and who is one of +the few admitted to my library, has always ascended by the rope-ladder. +But you are my niece; I would you were my daughter. I will signalize my +reverence for you by showing up the stairway the woman who knows how to +love and be faithful, the feet that would be worthy of golden steps if I +had them. Come." + +Spite of her grief and anxiety, Julia was impressed and oppressed with +the reverence shown her by her uncle. She had a veneration almost +superstitious for the Philosopher's learning. She was not accustomed to +even respectful treatment, and to be worshiped in this awful way by such +a man was something almost as painful as it was pleasant. + +The entrance to the stairway, if that could be called a stairway which +was as difficult of ascent as a ladder, was through a closet by the side +of the donjon chimney, and the logs had been so arranged without and +within that the space occupied by the narrow and zigzag stairs was not +apparent. Up these stairs he took Julia, leaving her in a closet above. +As this closet was situated alongside the chimney, it opened, of course, +into the small corner room which I have before described, and in which +August was now lying. Andrew descended the stairs and entered the upper +story again by the outside ladder. He thought best to prepare August for +the coming of Julia, lest joy should destroy a life that was so +far wasted. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV. + +THE INTERVIEW. + +We left August on that summer day on the levee at Louisville without +employment. He was not exactly disheartened, but he was homesick. That +he was forbidden to go back by threats of prosecution for his +burglarious manner of entering Samuel Anderson's house was reason enough +for wanting to go; that his father's family were not yet free from +danger was a stronger reason; but strongest of all, though he blushed to +own it to himself, was the longing to be where he might perchance +sometimes see the face he had seen that spring morning in the bottom of +a sun-bonnet. Right manfully did he fight against his discouragement and +his homesickness, and his longing to see Julia. It was better to stay +where he was. It was better not to go back beaten. If he surrendered so +easily, he would never put himself into a situation where he could claim +Julia with self-respect. He would stay and make his way in the world +somehow. But making his way in the world did not seem half so easy now +us it had on that other morning in March when he stood in the barn +talking to Julia. Making your fortune always seems so easy until you've +tried it. It seems rather easy in a novel, and still easier in a +biography. But no Samuel Smiles ever writes the history of those who +fail; the vessels that never came back from their venturous voyages left +us no log-books. Many have written the History of Success. What +melancholy Plutarch shall arise to record, with a pen dipped in +wormwood, the History of Failure? + +No! he would not go back defeated. August said this over bravely, but a +little too often, and with a less resolute tone at each repetition. He +contemned himself for his weakness, and tried, but tried in vain, to +form other plans. Had he known how much one's physical state has to do +with one's force of character, he might have guessed that he did not +deserve the blame he meted out to himself. He might have remembered what +Shakespeare's Portia says to Brutus, that "humour hath his hour with +every man." But with a dull and unaccountable aching in his head and +back he compromised with himself. He would go to the castle and pass a +day or two. Then he would return and fight it out. + +So he got on the packet Isaac Shelby, and was soon shaking with a chill +that showed how thoroughly malaria had pervaded his system. His very +bones seemed frozen. But if you ever shook with such a chill, or rather +if you were ever shaken by such a chill, taking hold of you like a +demoniacal possession; if you ever felt your brain congealing, your icy +bones breaking, your frosty heart becoming paralyzed, with a cold no +fire could reach, you know what it is; and if you have not felt it, no +words of mine can make you understand the sensations. After the chill +came the period when August felt himself between two parts of Milton's +hell, between a sea of ice and a sea of fire; sometimes the hot wave +scorched him, then it retired again before the icy one. At last it was +all hot, and the boiling blood scalded his palms and steamed to his +brain, bewildering his thoughts and almost blinding his eyes. He had +determined when he started to get off at a wood-yard three miles below +Andrew's castle, to avoid observation and the chance of arrest; and now +in his delirium the purpose as he had planned it remained fixed. He got +up at two o'clock, crazed with fever, dressed himself, and went out into +the rainy night. He went ashore in the mud and bushes, and, guided more +by instinct than by any conscious thought, he started up the wagon-track +along the river bank. His furious fever drove him on, talking to +himself, and splashing recklessly into the pools of rain-water standing +in the road. He never remembered his debarkation. He must have fallen +once or twice, for he was covered with mud when he rang the alarm at the +castle. In answer to Andrew's "Who's there?" he answered, "You'll have +to send a harder rain than that if you want to put this fire out!" + +And so, what with the original disease, the mental discouragement, and +the exposure to the rain, the fever had well-nigh consumed the life, and +now that the waves of the hot sea after days of fire and nights of +delirium had gone back, there was hardly any life left in the body, and +the doctors said there was no hope. One consuming desire remained. He +wanted to see Julia once before he went away; and that one desire it +seemed impossible to gratify. When he learned of the failure of Jonas to +get any message to Julia through Cynthy, he had felt the keenest +disappointment, and had evidently been sinking since the hope that kept +him up had been taken away. + +The mother sat by his bed, Gottlieb sat stupefied at the foot, with +Jonas by his side, and Wilhelmina was crying in a still fashion in one +corner of the room. August lay breathing feebly, and with his life +evidently ebbing. + +"August!" said Andrew, as he stood over his bed, having come to announce +the arrival of Julia. "August!" Andrew tried to speak quietly, but there +was a something of hope in the inflection, a tremor of eagerness in the +utterance, that made the mother look up quickly and inquiringly. + +August opened his eyes slowly and looked into the face of the +Philosopher. Then he slowly closed his eyes again, and a something, not +a smile--he was too weak for that--but a look of infinite content, +spread over his wan face. + +"I know," he whisperd. + +"Know what?" asked Andrew, leaning down to catch his words. + +"Julia." And a single tear crept out from under the closed lid. The +tender mother wiped it away. + +After resting a moment, August looked up at Andrew's face inquiringly. + +"She is coming," said the Philosopher. + +August smiled very faintly, but Andrew was sure he smiled, and again +leaned down his ear. + +"She is here," whispered August; "I heard Charon bark, and +I--saw--your--face." + +Andrew now stepped to the closet-door and opened it, and Julia came out. + +"Blamed ef he a'n't a witch!" whispered Jonas. "Cunjures a angel out of +his cupboard!" + +Julia did not see anybody or anything but the white and wasted face upon +the pillow. The eyes were now closed again, and she quickly crossed the +floor, and--not without a faint maidenly blush--stooped and kissed the +parched lips, from which the life seemed already to have fled. + +And August with difficulty disengaged his wasted hand from the cover, +and laid his nerveless fingers--alas! like a skeleton's now--In the warm +hand of Julia, and said--she leaned down to listen, an he whispered +feebly through his dry lips out of a full heart--"Thank God!" + +And the Philosopher, catching the words, said audibly, "Amen!" + +And the mother only wept. + + + +CHAPTER XXXV. + +GETTING READY FOR THE END. + +How Julia spent two hours of blessed sadness at the castle; how August +slept peacefully for five minutes at a time with his hand in hers, and +then awoke and looked at her, and then slumbered again; how she +moistened his parched lips for him, and gave him wine; how at last she +had to bid him a painful farewell; how the mother gave her a benediction +in German and a kiss; how Wilhelmina clung to her with tears; how Jonas +called her a turtle-dove angel; how Brother Hall, the preacher who had +been sent for at the mother's request, to converse with the dying man, +spoke a few consoling words to her; how Gottlieb confided to Jonas his +intention never to "sprach nodin 'pout Yangee kirls no more;" and how at +last Uncle Andrew walked home with her, I have not time to tell. When +the Philosopher bade her adieu, he called her names which she did not +understand. But she turned back to him, and after a minute's hesitation, +spoke huskily. "Uncle Andrew if he--if he should get worse--I want--" + +"I know, my daughter; you want him to die your husband?" + +"Yes, if he wishes it. Send for me day or night, and I'll come in spite +of everybody." + +"God bless you, my daughter!" said Andrew. And he watched until she got +safely into the house without discovery, and then he went back satisfied +and proud. + +Of course August died, and Julia devoted herself to philanthropic +labors. It is the fashion now for novels to end thus sadly, and you +would not have me be out of the fashion. + +But August did not die. Joy is a better stimulant than wine. Love is the +best tonic in the pharmacopeia. And from the hour in which August Wehle +looked into the eyes of Julia, the tide of life set back again. Not +perceptibly at first. For two days he was neither better nor worse. But +this was a gain. Then slowly he came back to life. But at Andrew's +instance he kept indoors while Humphreys staid. + +Humphreys, on his part, like Ananias, pretended to have disposed of all +his property, paid his debts, reserved enough to live on until the +approaching day of doom, and given the rest to the poor of the household +of faith, and there were several others who were sincere enough to do +what he only pretended. + +Among the leading Adventists was "Dr." Ketchup, who still dealt out +corn-sweats and ginseng-tea, but who refused to sell his property. He +excused himself by quoting the injunction, "Occupy till I come." But +others sold their estates for trifles, and gave themselves up to +proclaiming the millennium. + +Mrs. Abigail Anderson was a woman who did nothing by halves. She was +vixenish, she was selfish, she was dishonest and grasping; but she was +religious. If any man think this paradox impossible, he has observed +character superficially. There are criminals in State's-prison who have +been very devout all their lives. Religious questions took hold of Mrs. +Anderson's whole nature. She was superstitious, narrow, and intense. She +was as sure that the day of judgment would be proclaimed on the eleventh +of August, 1843, as she was of her life. No consideration in opposition +to any belief of hers weighed a feather with her. Her will mastered her +judgment and conscience. + +And so she determined that Samuel must sell his property for a trifle. +How far she was influenced in this by a sincere desire to square all +outstanding debts before the final settlement, how far by a longing to +be considered the foremost and most pious of all, and how far by +business shrewdness based on that feeling which still lurks in the most +protestant people, that such sacrifices do improve their state in a +future world, I can not tell. Doubtless fanaticism, hypocrisy, and a +self-interest that looked sordidly even at heaven, mingled in bringing +about the decision. At any rate, the property was to be sold for a few +hundred dollars. + +Getting wind of this decision, Andrew promptly appeared at his brother's +house and offered to buy it. But Mrs. Abigail couldn't think of it. +Andrew had always been her enemy, and though she forgave him, she would +not on any account sell him an inch of the land. It would not be right. +He had claimed that part of it belonged to him, and to let him have it +would be to admit his claim. + +"Andrew," she said, "you do not believe in the millennium, and people +say that you are a skeptic. You want to cheat us out of what you think a +valuable piece of property. And you'll find yourself at the last +judgment with the weight of this sin on your heart. You will, indeed!" + +"How clearly you reason about other people's duty!" said the +Philosopher. "If you had seen your own duty half so clearly, some of us +would have been better off, and your account would have been +straighter." + +Here Mrs. Anderson grew very angry, and vented her spleen in a solemn +exhortation to Andrew to get ready for the coming of the Master, not +three weeks off at the farthest, and she warned him that the archangel +might blow his trumpet at any moment. Then where would he be? she asked +in exultation. Human meanness is never so pitiful as when it tries to +seize on God's judgments as weapons with which to gratify its own +spites. I trust this remark will not be considered as applying only to +Mrs. Anderson. + +But Mrs. Anderson fired off all the heavenly small-shot she could find +in the teeth and eyes of Andrew, and then, to prevent a rejoinder, she +told him it was time for her to go to secret prayer, and she only +stopped upon the threshold to send back one Parthian arrow in the shape +of a warning to "watch and be ready." + +I wonder if a certain class of religious people have ever thought how +much their exclusiveness and Pharisaism have to do with the unhappy +fruitlessness of all their appeals! Had Mrs. Anderson been as blameless +as an angel, such exhortations would have driven a weaker than Andrew to +hate the name of religion. + +But I must not moralize, for Mr. Humphreys has already divulged his plan +of disposing of the property. He has a friend, one Thomas A. Parkins, +who has money, and who will buy the farm at two hundred dollars. He +could procure the money in advance any day by going to the village of +Bethany, the county-seat, and drawing on Mr. Parkins, and cashing the +draft. It was a matter of indifference to him, he said, only that he +would like to oblige so good a friend. + +This arrangement, by which the Anderson farm was to be sold for a song +to some distant stranger, pleased Mrs. Abigail. She could not bear that +one of her unbelieving neighbors should even for a fortnight rejoice in +a supposed good bargain at her expense. To sell to Mr. Humphreys's +friend in Louisville was just the thing. When pressed by some of her +neighbors who had not received the Adventist gospel, to tell on what +principle she could justify her sale of the farm at all, she answered +that if the farm would not be of any account after the end of the world, +neither would the money. + +Mr. Humphreys went down to the town of Bethany and came back, affecting +to have cashed a draft on his friend for two hundred dollars. The deeds +were drawn, and a justice of the peace was to come the next morning and +take the acknowledgment of Mr. and Mrs. Anderson. + +This was what Jonas learned as he sat in the kitchen talking to Cynthy +Ann. He had come to bring some message from the convalescent August, and +had been detained by the attraction of adhesion. + +"I told you it was fox-and-geese. Didn't I? And so Thomas A. Parkins +_is_ his name. Gus Wehle said he'd bet the two was one. Well, I must +drive this varmint off afore he gits his chickens." + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI. + +THE SIN OF SANCTIMONY. + +Just at this point arrived Mr. Hall, whom I have before described as the +good but callow Methodist preacher on the circuit. Some people think +that a minister of the gospel should be exempt from criticism, ridicule, +and military duty. But the manly minister takes his lot with the rest. +Nothing could be more pernicious than making the foibles of a minister +sacred. Doubtless Mr. Hall has long since come to laugh at his own early +follies, his official sanctimoniousness, and all that; and why should +not I, who have been a callow circuit-preacher myself in my day, laugh +at my Brother Hall, for the good of his kind? + +He had come to visit Sister Cynthy Ann, whose name had long stood on the +class-book at Harden's Cross-Roads as a good and acceptable member of +the church in full connection. He was visiting formally and officially +each family in which there was a member. Had he visited informally and +unofficially, and like a man instead of like a minister, he would have +done more good. But he came to Samuel Anderson's, and informed Mrs. +Anderson that he was visiting his members, and that as one of her +household was a member, he would like to have a little religious +conversation and prayer with the family. Would she please gather +them together? + +So Julia was called down-stairs, and Jonas was invited in from the +kitchen. The sight of him distressed Brother Hall. For was not this New +Light sent here by Satan to lead astray one of his flock? But, at least, +he would labor faithfully with him. + +He began with Mr. Samuel Anderson. But that worthy, after looking at his +wife in vain for a cue, darted off about the trumpets of the Apocalypse. + +"Mr. Anderson, as head of this family, your responsibility is very +great. Do you feel the full assurance, my brother?" asked Mr. Hall. + +"Yes," said Mr. Anderson, "I am standing with my lamp trimmed and ready. +I am listening for the midnight shout. To-night the trumpet may sound. I +am afraid you don't do your duty, or you would lift up your voice. The +tune and times and a half are almost out." + +Mr. Hall was a little dashed at this. A man whose religious conversation +is of a set and conventional type, is always shocked and jostled when he +is thrown from the track. And he himself, like everybody else, had felt +the Adventist infection, and did not want to commit himself. So he +turned to Mrs. Anderson. She answered like a seraph every question put +to her--the conventional questions never pierce the armor of a hypocrite +or startle the conscience of a self-deceiver. Mr. Hall congratulated her +in his most official tone (a compound of authority, awfulness, and +sanctity) on her deep experience of the things that made for her +everlasting peace. He told her that people of her high attainments +must beware of spiritual pride. And Mrs. Anderson took the warning with +beautiful meekness, sinking into forty fathoms of undisguised and rather +ostentatious humility, heaving solemn sighs in token of self-reproach--a +self-reproach that did not penetrate the cuticle. + +[Illustration: A PASTORAL VISIT.] + +"And you, Sister Cynthy Ann," he said, fighting shy of Jonas for the +present, "I trust you are trying to let your light shine. Do you feel +that you are pressing on?" + +Poor Cynthy Ann sank into a despondency deeper than usual. She was +afeard not. Seemed like as ef her heart was cold and dead to God. Seemed +like as ef she couldn't no ways gin up the world. It weighed her down +like a rock, and many was the fight she had with the enemy. No, she +wuzn't getting on. + +"My dear sister," said Mr. Hall, "let me warn you. Here is Mrs. +Anderson, who has given up the world entirely. I hope you'll follow so +good an example. Do not be led astray by worldly affections; they are +sure to entrap you. I am afraid you have not maintained your +steadfastness as you should." Here Mr. Hall's eye wandered doubtfully to +Jonas, of whom he felt a little afraid. Jonas, on his part, had no +reason to like Mr. Hall for his advice in Cynthy's love affair, and now +the minister's praises of Mrs. Anderson and condemnation of Cynthy Ann +had not put him in any mood to listen to exhortation. + +"Well, Mr. Harrison," said the young minister solemnly, approaching +Jonas much as a dog does a hedgehog, "how do you feel to-day?" + +"Middlin' peart, I thank you; how's yourself?" + +This upset the good man not a little, and convinced him that Jonas was +in a state of extreme wickedness. + +"Are you a Christian?" + +"Wal, I 'low I am. How about yourself, Mr. Hall?" + +"I believe you are a New Light. Now, do you believe in the Lord Jesus +Christ?" asked the minister in an annihilating tone. + +"Yes, I do, my aged friend, a heap sight more'n I do in some of them +that purtends to hev a paytent right on all his blessins, and that put +on solemn airs and call other denominations hard names. My friend, I +don't believe in no religion that's made up of sighs and groans and high +temper" (with a glance at Mrs. Anderson), "and that thinks a good deal +more of its bein' sound in doctrine than of the danger of bein' rotten +in life. They's lots o' bad eggs got slick and shiny shells!" + +Mr. Hall happened to think just here of the injunction against throwing +pearls before swine, and so turned to Humphreys, who made his heart glad +by witnessing a good confession, in soft and unctuous tones, and couched +in the regulation phrases which have worn smooth in long use. + +Julia had slunk away in a corner. But now he appealed to her also. + +"Blest with a praying mother, you, Miss Anderson, ought to repent of +your sins and flee from the wrath to come. You know the right way. You +have been pointed to it by the life of your parents from childhood. +Reared in the bosom of a Christian household, let me entreat you to seek +salvation immediately." + +I do not like to repeat this talk here. But it is an unfortunate fact +that goodness and self-sacrificing piety do not always go with practical +wisdom. The novelist, like the historian, must set down things as he +finds them. A man who talks in consecrated phrases is yet in the +poll-parrot state of mental development. + +"Do you feel a desire to flee from the wrath to come?" he asked. + +Julia gave some sort of inaudible assent. + +"My dear young sister, you have great reason to be thankful--very great +reason for gratitude to Almighty God." (Like many other pious young men, +Mr. Hall said _Gawd_.) "I met you the other night at your uncle's. The +young man whose life we then despaired of has recovered." And with more +of this, Mr. Hall told Julia's secret, while Mrs. Anderson, between her +anger and her rapt condition of mind, seemed to be petrifying. + +I trust the reader does not expect me to describe the feelings of Julia +while Mr. Hall read a chapter and prayed. Nor the emotions of Mrs. +Anderson. I think if Mr. Hall could have heard her grind her teeth while +he in his prayer gave thanks for the recovery of August, he would not +have thought so highly of her piety. But she managed to control her +emotions until the minister was fairly out of the house. In bidding +good-by, Mr. Hall saw how pale and tremulous Julia was, and with his +characteristic lack of sagacity, he took her emotion to be a sign of +religious feelings and told her he was pleased to see that she was +awakened to a sense of her condition. + +And then he left. And then came the deluge. + + + +CHAPTER XXXVII. + +THE DELUGE. + +The indescribable deluge! But, after all, the worst of anything of that +sort is the moment before it begins. A plunge-bath, a tooth-pulling, an +amputation, and a dress-party are all worse in anticipation than in the +moment of infliction. Julia, as she stood busily sticking a pin in the +window-sash, waiting for her mother to begin, wished that the storm +might burst, and be done with it. But Mrs. Anderson understood her +business too well for that. She knew the value of the awful moments of +silence before beginning. She had not practiced all her life without +learning the fine art of torture in its exquisite details. I doubt not +the black-robed fathers of the Holy Office were leisurely gentlemen, +giving their victims plenty of time for anticipatory meditation, laying +out their utensils quietly, inspecting the thumb-screw affectionately to +make sure that it would work smoothly, discussing the rack and wheel +with much tender forethought, as though torture were a sweet thing, to +be reserved like a little girl's candy lamb, and only resorted to when +the appetite has been duly whetted by contemplation. I never had the +pleasure of knowing an inquisitor, and I can not certify that they were +of this deliberate fashion. But it "stands to nature" that they were. +For the vixens who are vixens of the highest quality, are always +deliberate. + +Mrs. Anderson felt that the piece of invective which she was about to +undertake, was not to be taken in hand unadvisedly, "but reverently, +discreetly, and in the fear of God." And so she paused, and Julia +fumbled the tassel of the window-curtain, and trembled with the chill of +expectation. And Mrs. Abigail continued to debate how she might make +this, which would doubtless be her last outburst before the day of +judgment, her masterpiece--worthy song of the dying swan. And then she +hoped, she sincerely hoped, to be able by this awful _coup de main_ to +awaken Julia to a sense of her sinfulness. For there was such a jumble +of mixed motives in her mind, that one could never distinguish her +sincerity from her hypocrisy. + +Mrs. Anderson's conscience was quite an objective one. As Jonas often +remarked, "she had a feelin' sense of other folkses unworthiness." And +the sins which she appreciated were generally sins against herself. +Julia's disobedience to herself was darker in her mind than murder +committed on anybody else would have been. And now she sat deliberating, +not on the limit of the verbal punishment she meant to inflict--that +gave her no concern--but on her ability to do the matter justice. Even +as a tyrannical backwoods school-master straightens his long beech-rod +relishfully before applying it. + +Not that Mrs. Anderson was silent all this time. She was sighing and +groaning in a spasmodic devotion. She was "seeking strength from above +to do her whole duty," she would have told you. She was "agonizing" in +prayer for her daughter, and she contrived that her stage-whisper +praying should now and then reach the ears of its devoted object. +Humphreys remained seated, pretending to read the copy of "Josephus," +but watching the coming storm with the interest of a connoisseur. And +while he remained Jonas determined to stay, to keep Julia in +countenance, and he beckoned to Cynthy to stay also. And Samuel +Anderson, who loved his daughter and feared his wife, fled like a coward +from the coming scene. Everybody expected Mrs. Anderson to break out +like a fury. + +But she knew a better plan than that. She felt a new device come like an +inspiration. And perhaps it was. It really seemed to Jonas that the +devil helped her. For instead of breaking out into commonplace scolding, +the resources of which she had long since exhausted, she dropped upon +her knees, and began to pray for Julia. + +No swearer ever curses like the priest who veils his personal spites in +official and pious denunciations, and Mrs. Anderson had never dealt out +abuse so roundly and terribly and crushingly, as she did under the guise +of praying for the salvation of Julia's soul from well-deserved +perdition. But Abigail did not say perdition. She left that to weak +spirits. She thought it a virtue to say "hell" with unction and +emphasis, by way of alarming the consciences of sinners. Mrs. Anderson's +prayer is not reportable. That sort of profanity is too bad to write. +She capped her climax--even as I have heard a revivalist pray for a +scoffer that had vexed his righteous soul--by asking God to convert her +daughter, or if she could not be converted to take her away, that she +might not heap up wrath against the day of wrath. For that sort of +religious excitement which does not quiet the evil passions, seems to +inflame them, and Mrs. Anderson was not in any right sense sane. And the +prayer was addressed more to the frightened Julia than to God. She would +have been terribly afflicted had her petition been granted. + +Julia would have run away from the admonition which followed the prayer, +had it not been that Mrs. Anderson adroitly put it under cover of a +religious exhortation. She besought Julia to repent, and then, affecting +to show her her sinfulness, she proceeded to abuse her. + +Had Julia no temper? Yes, she had doubtless a spice of her mother's +anger without her meanness. She would have resisted, but that from +childhood she had felt paralyzed by the utter uselessness of all +resistance. The bravest of the villagers at the foot of Vesuvius never +dreamed of stopping the crater's mouth. + +But, happily, at last Mrs. Anderson's insane wrath went a little too +far. + +"You poor lost sinner," she said, "to think you should go to destruction +under my very eyes, disgracing us all, by running over the country at +night with bad men! But there's mercy even for such as you." + +Julia would not have understood the full meaning of this aspersion of +her purity, had she not caught Humphreys's eye. His expression, half +sneer, half leer, seemed to give her mother's saying its full +interpretation. She put out her hand. She turned white, and said: "Say +one word more, and I will go away from you and never come back! Never!" +And then she sat down and cried, and then Mrs. Anderson's maternal love, +her "unloving love," revived. To have her daughter leave her, too, would +be a sort of defeat. She hushed, and sat down in her splint-bottomed +rocking-chair, which snapped when she rocked, and which seemed to speak +for her after she had shut her mouth. Her face settled into a +martyr-like appeal to Heaven in proof of the justice of her cause. And +then she fell back on her forlorn hope. She wept hysterically, in +sincere self-pity, to think that an affectionate mother should have such +a daughter! + +Julia, finding that her mother had desisted, went to her room. She did +not exactly pray, but she talked to herself as she paced the floor. It +was a monologue, and yet there was a conscious appeal to an invisible +Presence, who could not misjudge her, and so she passed from talking to +herself to talking to God, and that without any of the formality of +prayer. Her mother had made God seem to be against her. Now she, like +David, protested her innocence to God. She recited half to herself, and +yet also to God--for is not every appeal to one's conscience in some +sense an appeal to God?--she recited all the struggles of that night +when she went to August at the castle. People talk of the consolation +there is in God's mercy. But Julia found comfort in God's justice. He +_could_ not judge her wrongly. + +Then she opened the Testament at the old place, and read the words long +since fixed in her memory. And then she--weary and heavy laden--came +again to Him who invites, and found rest. And then she found, as many +another has found, that coming to God is not, as theorists will have it, +a coming once for a lifetime, but a coming oft and ever repeated. + +Jonas and Cynthy Ann retired to the kitchen, and the former said hi his +irreverent way, "Blamed ef Abigail ha'nt got more devils into her'n Mary +Magdalene had the purtiest day she ever seed! I should think, arter a +life with her fer a mother, the bad place would be a healthy and +delightful clime. The devil a'n't a patchin' to her." + +"Don't, Jonas; you talk so cur'us, like as ef you was kinder sorter +wicked." + +"That's jest what I am, my dear, but Abigail Anderson's wicked without +the kinder sorter. She cusses when she's a-prayin'. She cusses that poar +gal right in the Lord's face. Good by, I must go. Smells so all-fired +like brimstone about here." This last was spoken in an undertone of +indignant soliloquy, as he crossed the threshold of Cynthy's +clean kitchen. + + + +CHAPTER XXXVIII. + +SCARING A HAWK. + +Jonas was thoroughly alarmed. He exaggerated the harm that Humphreys +might do to August, now that he knew where he was. August, on his part, +felt sure that Humphreys would not do anything against him; certainly +not in the way of legal proceedings. And as for the sale of Samuel +Anderson's farms, that did not disturb him. Like almost everybody else +at that time, August Wehle was strongly impressed by the assertions of +the Millerites, and if the world should be finished in the next month, +the farms were of no consequence. And if Millerism proved a delusion, +the loss of Samuel Anderson's property would only leave Julia on his +level, so far as worldly goods went. The happiness this last thought +brought him made him ashamed. Why should he rejoice in Mr. Anderson's +misfortune? Why should he wish to pull Julia down to him? But still the +thought remained a pleasant one. + +Jonas would not have it so. He had his plan. He went home from the +Adventist meeting that very night with Cynthy Ann, and then stood +talking to her at the corner of the porch, feeling very sure that +Humphreys would listen from above. He heard his stealthy tread, after a +while, disturb a loose board on the upper porch. Then he began to talk +to Cynthy Ann in this strain: + +"You see, I can't tell no secrets, Cynthy Ann, even to your Royal +Goodness, as I might say, seein' as how as you a'n't my wife, and a'n't +likely to be, if Brother Goshorn can have his way. But you're the Queen +of Hearts, anyhow. But s'pose I was to hint a secret?" + +"Sh--sh--h-h-h!" said Cynthy Ann, partly because she felt a sinful +pleasure in the flattery, and partly because she felt sure that +Humphreys was above. But Jonas paid no attention to the caution. + +"I'll give you a hint as strong as a Irishman's, which they do say'll +knock you down. Let's s'pose a case. They a'n't no harm in s'posin' a +case, you know. I've knowed boys who'd throw a rock at a fence-rail and +hit a stump, and then say, 'S'posin' they was a woodpecker on that air +stump, wouldn't I a keeled him over?' You can s'pose a case and make a +woodpecker wherever you want to. Well, s'posin' they was a inquisition +or somethin' of the kind from the guv'nor of the State of ole Kaintuck +to the guv'nor of the State of Injeanny? And s'posin' that the dokyment +got lodged in this 'ere identical county? And s'posin' it called fer the +body of one Thomas A. Parkins, a_li_as J.W. 'Umphreys? And s'posin' it +speecified as to sartain and sundry crimes committed in Paduky and all +along the shore, fer all I know? Now, s'posin' all of them air things, +what _would_ Clark township do to console itself when that toonful v'ice +and them air blazin' watch-seals had set in ignominy for ever and ever? +Selah! Good-night, and don't you breathe a word to a livin' soul, nur a +dead one, 'bout what I been a-sayin'. You'll know more by daylight +to-morry 'n you know now." + +And the last part of the speech was true, for by midnight the Hawk had +fled. And the sale of the Anderson farm to Humphreys was never +completed. For three days the end of the world was forgotten in the +interest which Clark township felt in the flight of its favorite. And by +degrees the story of Norman's encounter with the gamblers and of +August's recovery of the money became spread abroad through the +confidential hints of Jonas. And by degrees another story became known; +it could not long be concealed. It was the story of Betsey Malcolm, who +averred that she had been privately married to Humphreys on the occasion +of a certain trip they had made to Kentucky together, to attend a "big +meeting." The story was probably true, but uncharitable gossips shook +their heads. + +It was only a few evenings after the flight of Humphreys that Jonas had +another talk with Cynthy Ann, in which he confessed that all his +supposed case about a requisition from the governor of Kentucky for +Humphreys's arrest was pure fiction. + +"But, Jonas, is--is that air right? I'm afeard it a'n't right to tell an +ontruth." + +"So 'ta'n't; but I only s'posed a case, you know." + +"But Brother Hall said last Sunday two weeks, that anything that gin a +false impression was--was lying. Now, I don't think you meant it, but +then I thought I orto speak to you about it." + +"Well, maybe you're right. I see you last summer a-puttin' up a +skeercrow to keep the poor, hungry little birds of the air from gittin' +the peas that they needed to sustain life. An' I said, What a pity that +the best woman I ever seed should tell lies to the poor little birds +that can't defend theirselves from her wicked wiles! But I see that same +day a skeercrow, a mean, holler, high-percritical purtense of a ole hat +and coat, a-hanging in Brother Goshorn's garden down to the cross-roads. +An' I wondered ef it was your Methodis' trainin' that taught you +sech-like cheatin' of the little sparrys and blackbirds." + +"Yes; but Jonas--" said Cynthy, bewildered. + +"And I see a few days arterwards a Englishman with a humbug-fly onto his +line, a foolin' the poor, simple-hearted little fishes into swallerln' a +book that hadn't nary sign of a ginowine bait onto it. An' I says, says +I, What a deceitful thing the human heart is!" + +"Why, Jonas, you'd make a preacher!" said Cynthy Ann, touched with the +fervor of his utterance, and inly resolved never to set up another +scarecrow. + +"Not much, my dear. But then, you see, I make distinctions. Ef I was to +see a wolf a-goin' to eat a lamb, what would I do? Why, I'd skeer or +fool him with the very fust thing I could find. Wouldn' you, honey?" + +"In course," said Cynthy Ann. + +"And so, when I seed a wolf or a tiger or a painter, like that air +'Umphreys, about to gobble up fortins, and to do some harm to Gus, +maybe, I jest rigged up a skeercrow of words, like a ole hat and coat +stuck onto a stick, and run him off. Any harm done, my dear?" + +"Well, no, Jonas; I ruther 'low not." + +Whether Jonas's defense was good or not, I can not say, for I do not +know. But he is entitled to the benefit of it. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIX. + +JONAS TAKES AN APPEAL + +Jonas had waited for the coming of the quarterly meeting to carry his +appeal to the presiding elder. The quarterly meeting for the circuit was +held at the village of Brayvllle, and beds were made upon the floor for +the guests who crowded the town. Every visiting Methodist had a right to +entertainment, and every resident Methodist opened his doors very wide, +for Western people are hospitable in a fashion and with a bountifulness +unknown on the eastern side of the mountains. Who that has not known it, +can ever understand the delightfulness of a quarterly meeting? The +meeting of old friends--the social life--is all but heavenly. And then +the singing of the old Methodist hymns, such as + + "Oh! that will be joyful! + Joyful! joyful! + Oh! that will be joyful, + To meet to part no more." + +And that other solemnly-sweet refrain: + + "The reaping-time will surely come, + And angels shout the harvest home!" + +And who shall describe the joy of a Christian mother, when her +scapegrace son "laid down the arms of his rebellion" and was "soundly +converted"? Let those sneer who will, but such moral miracles as are +wrought in Methodist revivals are more wonderful than any healing of the +blind or raising of the dead could be. + +Jonas turned up, faithful to his promise, and called on the "elder" at +the place where he was staying, and asked for a private interview. He +found the old gentleman exercising his sweet voice in singing, + + "Come, let us anew + Our journey pursue, + Roll round with the year. + And never stand still till the Master appear. + His adorable will + Let us gladly fulfill, + And our talents improve + By the patience of hope and the labor of love." + +"When he concluded the verse he raised his half-closed eyes and saw +Jonas standing in the door. + +"Mr. Persidin' Elder," said Jonas, trying in vain to speak with some +seriousness and veneration, "I come to ax your consent to marry one of +your flock--the best lamb you've got in the whole fold." + +"Bless you, Mr. Harrison," said Father Williams, the old elder, +laughing, "bless you, I haven't any right to consent or forbid. Ask the +lady herself!" + +"Ax the lady!" said Jonas. "Didn't I though! And didn't Mr. Goshorn +forbid the lady to marry me, under the pains and penalties pervided; and +didn't Mr. Hall set his seal to the forbiddin' of Goshorn! An' I says to +her, 'I won't take nothin' less than a elder or a bishop on this 'ere +vital question.' When I want a sheep, I don't go to the underlin,' but +to the boss; and so I brought this appeal up to you on a writ of _habeas +corpus_, or whatever you may call it." + +The presiding elder laughed again, and looked closely at Jonas. Then he +stepped to the door and called in the circuit preacher, Mr. Hall, and +the class leader, Mr. Goshorn, both of whom happened to be in the next +room engaged in an excited discussion with a brother who was a little +touched with Millerism. + +"What's this Mr. Harrison tells me about your forbidding the banns in +his case?" + +"He's a New Light," said Brother Hall, showing his abhorrence in his +face, "and it seemed to me that for a Methodist to marry a New Light was +a sin--a being yoked together unequally with an unbeliever. You know, +Father Williams, that New Lights are Arians." + +The old man seemed more amused than ever. Turning to Jonas, he asked him +if he was an Arian. + +"Not as I knows on, my venerable friend. I may have caught the disease +when I had the measles, or I may have been a Arian in infancy, or I may +be a Arian on my mother's side, you know; but as I don't know who or +what it may be, I a'n't in no way accountable fer it--no more'n Brother +Goshorn is to blame fer his face bein' so humbly. But I take it Arian is +one of them air pleasant names you and the New Light preachers uses in +your Christian intercourse together to make one another mad. I'm one of +them as goes to heaven straight--never stoppin' to throw no donicks at +the Methodists, Presbyterians, nor no other misguided children of men. +They may ride in the packet, or go by flat-boat or keel-boat, ef they +chooses. I go by the swift-sailin' and palatial mail-boat New Light, and +I don't run no opposition line, nor bust my bilers tryin' to beat my +neighbors into the heavenly port." + +Brother Goshorn looked vexed. Brother Hall was scandalized at the +lightness of Jonas's conversation. But the old presiding elder, with +keen common-sense and an equally keen sense of the ludicrous, could not +look grave with all his effort to keep from laughing. + +[Illustration: BROTHER GOSHORN.] + +"Are you an unbeliever?" he asked. + +"I don't know what you call onbeliever. I believe in God and Christ, and +keep Sunday and the Fourth of July; but I don't believe in all of +Brother Goshorn's nonsense about wearing veils and artificials." + +"Well," said Brother Hall, "would you endeavor to induce your wife to +dress in a manner unbecoming a Methodist?" + +[Illustration: "SAY THEM WORDS OVER AGAIN."] + +"I wouldn't fer the world. If I git the article I want, I don't keer +what it's tied up in, calico or bombazine." + +"Couldn't you join the Methodist Church yourself, and keep your wife +company?" It was Brother Goshorn who spoke. + +"Couldn't I? I suppose I could ef I didn't think no more of religion +than some other folks. I could jine the Methodist Church, and have +everybody say I jined to git my wife. That may be serving God; but I +can't see how. And then how long would you keep me? The very fust time I +fired off my blunderbuss in class-meetin', and you heerd the buckshot +and the squirrel-shot and the slugs and all sorts of things a-rattlin' +around, you'd say I was makin' fun of the Gospel. I 'low they a'n't no +Methodist in me. I was cut out cur'us, you know, and made up crooked." + +"Is there anything against Mr. Harrison, Brother Goshorn?" asked the +elder. + +"He's a New Light," said Mr. Goshorn, in a tone that signified his +belief that to be a New Light was enough. + +"Is he honest and steady?" + +"Never heard anything against him as a moralist." + +"Well, then, it's my opinion that any member of your class would do +better to marry a good, faithful, honest New Light than to marry a +hickory Methodist." + +Jonas got up like one demented, and ran out of the door and across the +street. In a moment he came back, bringing Cynthy Ann in triumph. + +"Now, soy them words over again," he said to the presiding elder. + +"Sister Cynthy Ann," said the presiding elder, "you really love Brother +Harrison?" + +"I--I don't know whether it's right to set our sinful hearts on the +things of this perishin' world. But I think more of him, I'm afeard, +than I had ort to. He's got as good a heart as I ever seed. But Brother +Goshorn thought I hadn't orter marry him, seein' he is a onbeliever." + +"But I a'n't," said Jonas; "I believe in the Bible, and in everything in +it, and in Cynthy Ann and her good Methodist religion besides." + +"I think you can give up all your scruples and marry Mr. Harrison, and +love him and be happy," said the presiding elder. "Don't be afraid to be +happy, my sister. You'll be happy in good company in heaven, and you'd +just as well get used to it here." + +"I told you I'd find a man that had salt enough to keep his religion +sweet. And, Father Williams, you've got to marry us, whenever Cynthy +Ann's ready," said Jonas with enthusiasm. + +And for a moment the look of overstrained scrupulosity on Cynthy Ann's +face relaxed and a strange look of happiness came into her eyes. + +And the time was fixed then and there. + +Brother Hall was astonished. + +And Brother Goshorn drew down his face, and said that he didn't know +what was to become of good, old-fashioned Methodism and the rules of the +Discipline, if the presiding elders talked in that sort of a way. The +church was going to the dogs. + + + +CHAPTER XL. + +SELLING OUT. + +The flight of the Hawk did not long dampen the ardor of those who were +looking for signs in the heaven above and the earth beneath. I have +known a school-master to stand, switch in hand, and give a stubborn boy +a definite number of minutes to yield. The boy who would not have +submitted on account of any amount of punishment, was subdued by the +awful waiting. We have all read the old school-book story of the +prison-warden who brought a mob of criminals to subjection by the same +process. Millerism produced some such effect as this. The assured belief +of the believers had a great effect on others; the dreadful drawing on +of the set time day by day produced an effect in some regions absolutely +awful. An eminent divine, at that time a pastor in Boston, has told me +that the leaven of Adventism permeated all religious bodies, and that he +himself could not avoid the fearful sense of waiting for some +catastrophe--the impression that all this expectation of people must +have some significance. If this was the effect in Boston, imagine the +effect in a country neighborhood like Clark township. Andrew, skeptical +as he was visionary, was almost the only man that escaped the +infection. Jonas would have been as frankly irreverent if the day of +doom had come as he was at all times; but even Jonas had come to the +conclusion that "somethin' would happen, or else somethin' else." +August, with a young man's impressibility, was awe-stricken with +thoughts of the nearing end of the world, and Julia accepted it +as settled. + +It is a good thing that the invisible world is so thoroughly shut out +from this. The effect of too vivid a conception of it is never +wholesome. It was pernicious in the middle age, and clairvoyance and +spirit-rapping would be great evils to the world, if it were not that +the spirits, even of-the ablest men, in losing their bodies seem to lose +their wits. It is well that it is so, for if Washington Irving dictated +to a medium accounts of the other world in a style such as that of his +"Little Britain," for instance, we should lose all interest in the +affairs of this sphere, and nobody would buy our novels. + +This fever of excitement kept alive Samuel Anderson's determination to +sell his farms for a trifle as a testimony to unbelievers. He found that +fifty dollars would meet his expenses until the eleventh of August, and +so the price was set at that. + +As soon as Andrew heard of this, he privately arranged with Jonas to buy +it; but Mrs. Anderson utterly refused. She said she could see through it +all. Jonas was one of Andrew's fingers. Andrew had got to be a sort of a +king in Clark township, and Jonas was--was the king's fool. She did not +mean that any of her property should go into the hands of the clique +that were trying to rob her of her property and her daughter. Even for +two weeks they should not own her house! + +Before this speech was ended, Bob Walker entered the door. + +Bob was tall, stooped, good-natured, and desperately poor. With ton +children under twelve years of age, with an incorrigible fondness for +loafing and telling funny stories, Bob saw no chance to improve his +condition. A man may be either honest or lazy and got rich; but a man +who Is both honest and indolent is doomed. Bob lived in a cabin on the +Anderson farm, and when not hired by Samuel Anderson he did days' work +here and there, riding to and from his labor on a raw-boned mare, that +was the laughing-stock of the county. Bob pathetically called her +Splinter-shin, and he always rode bareback, for the very good reason +that he had neither saddle nor sheepskin. + +[Illustration: "I WANT TO BUY YOUR PLACE."] + +"Mr. Anderson," said Bob, standing in the door and trying to straighten +the chronic stoop out of his shoulders, "I want to buy your place." + +If Bob had said that he wanted to be elected president Samuel Anderson +could not have been more surprised. + +"You look astonished; but folks don't know everything. I 'low I know how +to lay by a little. But I never could git enough to buy a decent kind of +a tater-patch. So I says to my ole woman this mornin', 'Jane,' says I, +'let's git some ground. Let's buy out Mr. Anderson, and see how it'll +feel to be rich fer a few days. If she all burns up, let her burn, I +say. We've had a plaguey hard time of it, let's see how it goes to own +two farms fer awhile.' And so we thought we'd ruther hev the farms fer +two weeks than a little money in a ole stocking. What d'ye say?" + +Jonas here put in that he didn't see why they mightn't sell to him as +well as to Bob Walker. Cynthy Ann had worked fer Mrs. Anderson fer +years, and him and Cynthy was a-goin' to be one man soon. Why not +sell to them? + +"Because selling to you is selling to Andrew," said Mrs. Abigail, in a +conclusive way. + +And so Bob got the farms, possession to be given after the fourteenth of +August, thus giving the day of doom three days of grace. And Bob rode +round the county boasting that he was as rich a man as there was in +Clark Township. And Jonas declared that ef the eend did come in the +month of August, Abigail would find some onsettled bills agin her fer +cheatin' the brother outen the inheritance. And Clark Township +agreed with him. + +August was secretly pleased that one obstacle to his marriage was gone. +If Andrew should prove right, and the world should outlast the middle of +August, there would be nothing dishonorable in his marrying a girl that +would have nothing to sacrifice. + +Andrew, for his part, gave vent to his feelings, as usual, by two or +three bitter remarks leveled at the whole human race, though nowadays he +was inclined to make exceptions in favor of several people, of whom +Julia stood first. She was a woman of the old-fashioned kind, he said, +fit to go alongside Héloise or Chaucer's Grisilde. + + + +CHAPTER XLI. + +THE LAST DAY AND WHAT HAPPENED IN IT. + +The religious excitement reached its culmination as the tenth and +eleventh of August came on. Some made ascension-robes. Work was +suspended everywhere. The more abandoned, unwilling to yield to the +panic, showed its effects on them by deeper potations, and by a +recklessness of wickedness meant to conceal their fears. With tin horns +they blasphemously affected to be angels blowing trumpets. They imitated +the Millerite meetings in their drunken sprees, and learned Mr. +Hankins's arguments by heart. + +The sun of the eleventh of August rose gloriously. People pointed to it +with trembling, and said that it would rise no more. Soon after sunrise +there were crimson clouds stretching above and below it, and popular +terror seized upon this as a sign. But the sun mounted with a scorching +heat, which showed that at least his shining power was not impaired. +Then men said, "Behold the beginning of the fervent heat that is to melt +the elements!" Night drew on, and every "shooting-star" was a new sign +of the end. The meteors, as usual at this time of the year, were +plentiful, and the simple-hearted country-folk were convinced that the +stars were falling out of the sky. + +A large bald hill overlooking the Ohio was to be the mount of ascension. +Here gathered Elder Hankins's flock with that comfortable assurance of +being the elect that only a narrow bigotry can give. And here came +others of all denominations, consoling themselves that they were just as +well off if they were Christians as if they had made all this fuss about +the millennium. Here was August, too, now almost well, joining with the +rest in singing those sweet and inspiring Adventist hymns. His German +heart could not keep still where there was singing, and now, in +gratefulness at new-found health, he was more inclined to music than +ever. So he joined heartily and sincerely in the song that begins: + + "Shall Simon bear his cross alone, + And all the world go free? + No, there's a cross for every one, + And there's a cross for me. + I'll bear the consecrated cross + Till from the cross I'm free, + And then go home to wear the crown. + For there's a crown for me! + Yes, there's a crown in heaven above, + The purchase of a Saviour's love. + Oh I that's the crown for me!" + +When the concourse reached the lines, + + "The saints have heard the midnight cry, + Go meet him in the air!" + +neither August nor any one else could well resist the infection of the +profound and awful belief in the immediate coming of the end which +pervaded the throng. Strong men and women wept and shouted with the +excitement. + +Then Elder Hankins exhorted a little. He said that the time was short. +But men's hearts were hard. As in the days of the flood, they were +marrying and giving in marriage. Not half a mile away a wedding was at +that time taking place, and a man who called himself a minister could +not discern the signs of the times, but was solemnizing a marriage. + +This allusion was to the marriage of Jonas, which was to take place that +very evening at the castle. Mrs. Anderson had refused to have "such +wicked nonsense" at her house, and as Cynthy had no home, Andrew had +appointed it at the castle, partly to oblige Jonas, partly from habitual +opposition to Abigail, but chiefly to express his contempt for +Adventism. + +Mrs. Anderson herself was in a state of complete sublimation. She had +sent for Norman, that she might get him ready for the final judgment, +and Norman, without the slightest inclination to be genuinely religious, +was yet a coward, and made a provisional repentance, not meant to hold +good if Elder Hankins's figures should fail; just such a repentance as +many a man has made on what he supposed to be his death-bed. Do not I +remember a panic-stricken man, converted by typhoid fever and myself, +who laughed as soon as he began to eat gruel, to think that he had been +"such a fool as to send for the preacher"? + +Now, between Mrs. Anderson's joy at Norman's conversion, and her delight +that the world would soon be at an end and she on the winning side, and +her anticipation of the pleasure she would feel even in heaven in +saying, "I told you so!" to her unbelieving friends, she quite forgot +Julia. In fact she went from one fit of religious catalepsy to another, +falling into trances, or being struck down with what was mysteriously +called "the power." She had relaxed her vigilance about Julia, for +there were but three more hours of time, and she felt that the goal was +already gained, and she had carried her point to the very last. A +satisfaction for a saint! + +The neglected Julia naturally floated toward the outer edge of the +surging crowd, and she and August inevitably drifted together. + +"Let us go and see Jonas married," said August. "It is no harm. God can +take us to heaven from one place as well as another, if we are His +children." + +In truth, Julia was wearied and bewildered, not to say disgusted, with +her mother's peculiar religious exercises, and she gladly escaped with +August to the castle and the wedding of her faithful friends. + +Andrew, in a spirit of skeptical defiance, had made his castle look as +flowery and festive as possible. The wedding took place in the lower +story, but the library was illuminated, and the Adventists who had +occasion to pass by Andrew's on their way to the rendezvous accepted +this as a new fulfillment of prophecy to the very letter. They nodded +one to another, and said, "See! marrying and giving in marriage, as in +the days of Noah!" + +August and Julia were too much awe-stricken to say much on their way to +the castle. But in these last hours of a world grown old and ready for +its doom, they cleaved closer together. There could be neither heaven +nor millennium for one of them without the other! Loving one another +made them love God the more, and love cast out all fear. If this was the +Last, they would face it together, and if it proved the Beginning, they +would rejoice together. At sight of every shooting meteor, Julia clung +almost convulsively to August. + +When they entered the castle, Jonas and Cynthy were already standing up +before the presiding elder, and he was about to begin. Cynthy's face +showed her sense of the awfulness of marrying at a moment of such +fearful expectation, or perhaps she was troubling herself for fear that +so much happiness out of heaven was to be had only in the commission of +a capital sin. But, like most people whose consciences are stronger than +their intellects, she found great consolation in taking refuge under the +wing of ecclesiastical authority. To be married by a presiding elder was +the best thing in the world next to being married by a bishop. + +Whatever fear of the swift-coming judgment others might have felt, the +benignant old elder was at peace. Common-sense, a clean conscience, and +a child-like faith enlightened his countenance, and since he tried to be +always ready, and since his meditations made the things of the other +life ever present, his pulse would scarcely have quickened if he had +felt sure that the archangel's trump would sound in an hour. He neither +felt the subdued fear shown on the countenance of Cynthy Ann, nor the +strong skeptical opposition of Andrew, whose face of late had grown +almost into a sneer. + +"Do you take this woman to be your lawful and wedded wife--" + +And before the elder could finish it, Jonas blurted out, "You'd better +believe I do, my friend." + +And then when the old man smiled and finished his question down to, "so +long as ye both shall live," Jonas responded eagerly, "Tell death er the +jedgment-day, long or short." + +And Cynthy Ann answered demurely out of her frightened but too happy +heart, and the old man gave them his benediction in an apostolic fashion +that removed Cynthy Ann's scruples, and smoothed a little of the +primness out of her face, so that she almost smiled when Jonas said, +"Well! it's done now, and it can't be undone fer all the Goshorns in +Christendom er creation!" + +And then the old gentleman--for he was a gentleman, though he had always +been a backwoodsman--spoke of the excitement, and said that it was best +always to be ready--to be ready to live, and then you would be ready for +death or the judgment. That very night the end might come, but it was +not best to trouble one's self about it. And he smiled, and said that it +was none of his business, God could manage the universe; it was for him +to be found doing his duty as a faithful servant. And then it would be +just like stepping out of one door into another, whenever death or the +judgment should come. + +While the old man was getting ready to leave, Julia and August slipped +away, fearing lest their absence should be discovered. But the +peacefulness of the old elder's face had entered into their souls, and +they wished that they too were solemnly pronounced man and wife, with so +sweet a benediction upon their union. + +"I do not feel much anxious about the day of judgment or the +millennium," said August, whose idiom was sometimes a little broken. +"When I was so near dying I felt satisfied to die after you had kissed +my lips. But now that it seems we have come upon the world's last days, +I wish I were married to you. I do not know how things will be in the +new heaven and the new earth. But I should like you to be my wife there, +or at least to have been my wife on earth, if only for one hour." + +And then he proposed that they should be made man and wife now in the +world's last hour. It was not wrong. It could not give her mother +heart-disease, for she would not know of it till she should hear it in +the land where there are neither marriages nor sickness. Julia could not +see any sin in her disobedience under such circumstances. She did so +much want to go into the New Jerusalem as the wedded wife of August "the +grand," as she fondly called him. + +And so in the stillness of that awful night they walked back to Andrew's +castle, and found the venerable preacher, with saddle-bags on his arm, +ready to mount his horse, for the presiding elder of that day had no +leisure time. Jonas and Cynthy stood bidding him good-by. And the old +man was saying again that if we were always ready it would be like +stepping from one door into another. But he thought it as wrong to waste +time gazing up into heaven to see Christ come, as it had been to gaze +after Him when He went away. Even Jonas's voice was a little softened by +the fearful thought ever present of the coming on of that awful midnight +of the eleventh of August. All were surprised to see the two young +people come back. + +"Father Williams," said August, "we thought we should like to go into +the New Jerusalem man and wife. Will you marry us?" + +"Sensible to the last!" cried Jonas. + +"According to the laws of this State," said Mr. Williams, "you can not +be married without a license from the clerk of the county. Have you +a license?" + +"No," said August, his heart sinking. + +Just then Andrew came up and inquired what the conversation was about. + +"Why, Uncle Andrew," said Julia eagerly, "August and I don't want the +end of the world to come without being man and wife. And we have no +license, and August could not go seven miles and back to get a license +before midnight. It is too bad, isn't it? If it wasn't that we think the +end of the world is so near, I should be ashamed to say how much I want +to be married. But I shall be proud to have been August's wife, when I +am among the angels." + +"You are a noble woman," said Andrew. "Come in, let us see if anything +can be done." And he led the way, smiling. + + + +CHAPTER XLII. + +FOR EVER AND EVER. + +When they had all re-entered the castle, Andrew made them sit down. The +old minister did not see any escape from the fatal obstacle of a lack of +license, but Andrew was very mysterious. + +"Virtue is its own reward," said the Philosopher, "but it often finds an +incidental reward besides. Now, Julia, you are the noblest woman in +these degenerate times, according to my way of thinking." + +"That's true as preachin', ef you'll except one," chirped Jonas, with a +significant look at his Cynthy Ann. Julia blushed, and the old minister +looked inquiringly at Andrew and at Julia. This exaggerated praise from +a man so misanthropic as Andrew excited his curiosity. + +"Without exception," said Andrew emphatically, looking first at Jonas, +then at Mr. Williams, "my niece is the noblest woman I ever knew." + +"Please don't, Uncle Andrew!" begged Julia, almost speechless with +shame. Praise was something she could not bear. She was inured +to censure. + +"Do you remember that dark night--of course you do--when you braved +everything and came here to see August, who would have died but for your +coming?" Andrew was now looking at Julia, who answered him almost +inaudibly. + +"And do you remember when we got to your gate, on your return, what you +said to me?" + +"Yes, sir," said Julia. + +"To be sure you do, and" (turning to August) "I shall never forget her +words; she said, If he should get worse, I should like him to die my +husband, if he wishes it. Send for me, day or night, and I will come in +spite of everything." + +"Did you say that?" asked August, looking at her eagerly. + +And Julia nodded her head, and lifted her eyes, glistening with brimming +tears, to his. + +"You do not know," said Andrew to the preacher, "how much her proposal +meant, for you do not know through what she would have had to pass. But +I say that God does sometimes reward virtue in this world--a world not +quite worn out yet--and she is worthy of the reward in store for her." + +Saying this, Andrew went into the closet leading to his secret +stairway--secret no longer, since Julia had ascended by that way--and +soon came down from his library with a paper in his hand. + +"When you, my noble-hearted niece, proposed to make any sacrifice to +marry this studious, honest, true-hearted German gentleman, who is +worthy of you, if any man can be, I thought best to be ready for any +emergency, and so I went the next day and procured the license, the +clerk promising to keep my secret. A marriage-license is good for thirty +days. You will see, Mr. Williams, that this has not quite expired." + +The minister looked at it and then said, "I depend on your judgment, +Mr. Anderson. There seems to be something peculiar about the +circumstances of this marriage." + +"Very peculiar," said Andrew. + +"You give me your word, then, that it is a marriage I ought to +solemnize?" + +"The lady is my niece," said Andrew. "The marriage, taking place in this +castle, will shed more glory upon it than its whole history beside; and +you, sir, have never performed a marriage ceremony in a case where the +marriage was so excellent as this." + +"Except the last one," put in Jonas. + +I suppose Mr. Williams made the proper reductions for Andrew's +enthusiasm. But he was satisfied, and perhaps he was rather inclined to +be satisfied, for gentle-hearted old men are quite susceptible to a +romantic situation. + +When he asked August if he would live with this woman in holy matrimony +"so long as ye both shall live," August, thinking the two hours of time +left to him too short for the earnestness of his vows, looked the old +minister in the eyes, and said solemnly: "For ever and ever!" + +"No, my son," said the old man, smiling and almost weeping, "that is not +the right answer. I like your whole-hearted love. But it is far easier +to say 'for ever and ever,' standing as you think you do now on the +brink of eternity, than to say 'till death do us part,' looking down a +long and weary road of toil and sickness and poverty and change and +little vexations. You do not only take this woman, young and blooming, +but old and sick and withered and wearied, perhaps. Do you take her +for any lot?" + +"For any lot," said August solemnly and humbly. + +And Julia, on her part, could only bow her head in reply to the +questions, for the tears chased one another down her cheeks. And then +came the benediction. The inspired old man, full of hearty sympathy, +stretched his trembling hands with apostolic solemnity over the heads of +the two, and said slowly, with solemn pauses, as the words welled up out +of his soul: "The peace of God--that passeth all understanding" (here +his voice melted with emotion)--"keep your hearts--and minds--in the +knowledge and love of God.--And now, may grace--mercy--and peace from +God--_the Father_--and _our_ Lord Jesus Christ--be with +you--evermore--Amen!" And to the imagination of Julia the Spirit of God +descended like a dove into her heart, and the great mystery of wifely +love and the other greater mystery of love to God seemed to flow +together in her soul. And the quieter spirit of August was suffused with +a great peace. + +They soon left the castle to return to the mount of ascension, but they +walked slowly, and at first silently, over the intervening hill, which +gave them a view of the Ohio River, sleeping in its indescribable beauty +and stillness in the moonlight. + +Presently they heard the melodious voice of the old presiding elder, +riding up the road a little way off, singing the hopeful hymns in which +he so much delighted. The rich and earnest voice made the woods ring +with one verse of + + "Oh! how happy are they + Who the Saviour obey, + And have laid up their treasure above I + Tongue can never express + The sweet comfort and peace + Of a soul in its earliest love." + +And then he broke into Watts's + + "When I can read my title clear + To mansions in the skies, + I'll bid farewell to every fear + And wipe my weeping eyes!" + +There seemed to be some accord between the singing of the brave old man +and the peacefulness of the landscape. Soon he had reached the last +stanza, and in tones of subdued but ecstatic triumph he sang: + + "There I shall bathe my weary soul + In seas of heavenly rest, + And not a wave of trouble roll + Across my peaceful breast." + +And with these words he passed round the hill and out of the hearing of +the young people. + +"August," said Julia slowly, as if afraid to break a silence so blessed, +"August, it seems to me that the sky and the river and the hazy hills +and my own soul are all alike, just as full of happiness and peace as +they can be." + +"Yes," said August, smiling, "but the sky is clear, and your eyes are +raining, Julia. But can it be possible that God, who made this world so +beautiful, will burn it up to-night? It used to seem a hard world to me +when I was away from you, and I didn't care how quickly it burned up. +But now--" + +Somehow August forgot to finish that sentence. Words are of so little +use under such circumstances. A little pressure on Julia's arm which was +in his, told all that he meant. When love makes earth a heaven, it +is enough. + +"But how beautiful the new earth will be," said Julia, still looking at +the sleeping river, "the river of life will be clear as crystal!" + +"Yes," said August, "the Spanish version says, 'Most resplendent, like +unto crystal.'" + +"I think," said Julia, "that it must be something like this river. The +trees of life will stand on either side, like those great sycamores that +lean over the water so gracefully." + +Any landscape would have seemed heavenly to Julia on this night. A +venerable friend of mine, a true Christian philanthropist, whose praise +is in all the churches, wants me to undertake to reform fictitious +literature by leaving out the love. And so I may when God reforms His +universe by leaving out the love. Love is the best thing in novels; not +until love is turned out of heaven will I help turn it out of +literature. It is only the misrepresentation of love in literature that +is bad, as the poisoning of love in life is bad. It was the love of +August that had opened Julia's heart to the influences of heaven, and +Julia was to August a mediator of God's grace. + +By eleven o'clock August Wehle and his wife--it gives me nearly as much +pleasure as it did August to use that locution--were standing not far +away from the surging crowd of those who, in singing hymns and in +excited prayer, were waiting for the judgment. Jonas and Cynthy and +Andrew were with them. August, though not a recognized Millerite, almost +blamed himself that he should have been away these two hours from the +services. But why should he? The most sacramental of all the sacraments +is marriage. Is it not an arbitrary distinction of theologians, that +which makes two rites to be sacraments and others not? But if the +distinction is to be made at all, I should apply the solemn word to the +solemnest rite and the holiest ordinance of God's, even if I left out +the sacred washing in the name of the Trinity and the broken emblematic +bread and the wine. These are sacramental in their solemn symbolism, +that in the solemnest symbolism and the holiest reality. + +August's whole attention was now turned toward the coming judgment; and +as he stood thinking of the awfulness of this critical moment, the +exercises of the Adventists grated on the deep peacefulness of his +spirit, for from singing their more beautiful hymns, they had passed to +an excited shouting of the old camp-meeting ditty whose refrain is: + +"I hope to shout glory when this world's all on fire! Hallelujah!" + +He and Julia hung back a moment, but Mrs. Abigail, who had recovered +from her tenth trance, and had been for some time engaged in an active +search for Julia, now pounced upon her, and bore her off, before she had +time to think, to the place of the hottest excitement. + + + +CHAPTER XLIII. + +THE MIDNIGHT ALARM. + +At last the time drew on toward midnight, the hour upon which all +expectation was concentrated. For did not the Parable of the Ten Virgins +speak of the coming of the bridegroom at midnight? + +"My friends and brethren," said Elder Hankins, his voice shaking with +emotion, as he held his watch up in the moonlight, "My friends and +brethren, ef the Word is true, they is but five minutes more before the +comin' in of the new dispensation. Let us spend the last moments of time +in silent devotion." + +"I wonder ef he thinks the world runs down by his pay-tent-leever +watch?" said Jonas, who could not resist the impulse to make the remark, +even with the expectation of the immediate coming of the day of judgment +in his mind. + +"I wonder for what longitude he calculates prophecy?" said Andrew. "It +can not be midnight all round the world at the same moment." + +But Elder Hankins's flock did not take any astronomical difficulty into +consideration. And no spectator could look upon them, bowing silently in +prayer, awed by the expectation of the sudden coming of the Lord, +without feeling that, however much the expectation might be illusory, +the emotion was a fact absolutely awful. Events are only sublime as they +move the human soul, and the swift-coming end of time was subjectively a +great reality to these waiting people. Even Andrew was awe-stricken from +sympathy; as Coleridge, when he stood godfather for Keble's child, was +overwhelmed with a sense of the significance of the sacrament from +Keble's stand-point. As for Cynthy Ann, she trembled with fear as she +held fast to the arm of Jonas. And Jonas felt as much seriousness as was +possible to him, until he heard Norman Anderson's voice crying with +terror and excitement, and felt Cynthy shudder on his arm. + +"For my part," said Jonas, turning to Andrew, "it don't seem like as ef +it was much use to holler and make a furss about the corn crap when +October's fairly sot in, and the frost has nipped the blades. All the +plowin' and hoein' and weedin' and thinnin' out the suckers won't, +better the yield then. An' when wheat's ripe, they's nothin' to be done +fer it. It's got to be rep jest as it stan's. I'm rale sorry, to-night, +as my life a'n't no better, but what's the use of cryin' over it? They's +nothin' to do now but let it be gethered and shelled out, and measured +up in the standard half-bushel of the sanctuary. And I'm afeard they'll +be a heap of nubbins not wuth the shuckin'. But ef it don't come to six +bushels the acre, I can't help it now by takin' on." + +At twelve o'clock, even the scoffers were silent. But as the sultry +night drew on toward one o'clock, Bill Day and his party felt their +spirits revive a little. The calculation had failed in one part, and it +might in all. Bill resumed his burlesque exhortations to the +rough-looking "brethren" about him. He tried to lead them in singing +some ribald parody of Adventist hymns, but his terror and theirs was +too genuine, and their voices died down into husky whispers, and they +were more alarmed than ever at discovering the extent of their own +demoralization. The bottle, one of those small-necked, big-bodied +quart-bottles that Western topers carry in yellow-cotton handkerchiefs, +was passed round. But even the whisky seemed powerless to neutralize +their terror, rather increasing the panic by fuddling their faculties. + +"Boys!" said Bob Short, trembling, and sitting down on a stump, +"this--this ere thing--is a gittin' serious. Ef--well, ef it _was_ to +happen--you know--you don't s'pose--ahem--you don't think God A'mighty +would be _too_ heavy on a feller. Do ye? Ef it was to come to-night, it +would be blamed short notice." + +At one o'clock the moon was just about dipping behind the hills, and the +great sycamores, standing like giant sentinels on the river's marge, +cast long unearthly shadows across the water, which grew blacker every +minute. The deepening gloom gave all objects in the river valley a +weird, distorted look. This oppressed August. The landscape seemed an +enchanted one, a something seen in a dream or a delirium. It was as +though the change had already come, and the real tangible world had +passed away. He was the more susceptible from the depression caused by +the hot sultriness of the night, and his separation from Julia. + +He thought he would try to penetrate the crowd to the point where his +mother was; then he would be near her, and nearer to Julia if anything +happened. A curious infatuation had taken hold of August. He knew that +it was an infatuation, but he could not shake it off. He had resolved +that in case the trumpet should be heard in the heavens, he would seize +Julia and claim her in the very moment of universal dissolution. He +reached his mother, and as he looked into her calm face, ready for the +millennium or for anything else "the Father" should decree, he thought +she had never seemed more glorious than she did now, sitting with her +children about her, almost unmoved by the excitement. For Mrs. Wehle had +come to take everything as from the Heavenly Father. She had even +received honest but thick-headed Gottlieb in this spirit, when he had +fallen to her by the Moravian lot, a husband chosen for her by the Lord, +whose will was not to be questioned. + +August was just about to speak to his mother, when he was forced to hang +his head in shame, for there was his father rising to exhort. + +"O mine freunde! pe shust immediadely all of de dime retty. Ton't led +your vait vail already, and ton't let de debil git no unter holts on ye. +Vatch and pe retty!" + +And August could hear the derisive shouts of Bill Day's party, who had +recovered their courage, crying out, "Go it, ole Dutchman! I'll bet on +you!" He clenched his fist in anger, but his mother's eyes, looking at +him with quiet rebuke, pacified him in a moment. Yet he could not help +wondering whether blundering kinsfolk made people blush in the +next world. + +"Holt on doo de last ent!" continued Gottlieb. "It's pout goom! Kood +pye, ole moon! You koes town, you nebber gooms pack no more already." + +This exhortation might have proceeded in this strain indefinitely, to +the mortification of August and the amusement of the profane, had there +not just at that moment broken upon the sultry stillness of the night +one of those crescendo thunder-bursts, beginning in a distant rumble, +and swelling out louder and still louder, until it ended with a +tremendous detonation. In the strange light of the setting moon, while +everybody's attention was engrossed by the excitement, the swift +oncoming of a thunder-cloud had not been observed by any but Andrew, and +it had already climbed half-way to the zenith, blotting out a third of +the firmament. This inverted thunder-bolt produced a startling effect +upon the over-strained nerves of the crowd. Some cried out with terror, +some sobbed with hysterical agony, some shouted in triumph, and it was +generally believed that Virginia Waters, who died a maniac many years +afterward, lost her reason at that moment. Bill Day ceased his mocking, +and shook till his teeth chattered. And none of his party dared laugh at +him. The moon had now gone, and the vivid lightning followed the +thunder, and yet louder and more fearful thunder succeeded the +lightning. The people ran about as if demented, and Julia was left +alone. August had only one thought in all this confusion, and that was +to find Julia. Having found her, they clasped hands, and stood upon the +brow of the hill calmly watching the coming tempest, believing it to be +the coming of the end. Between the claps of thunder they could hear the +broken sentences of Elder Hankins, saying something about the lightning +that shineth from one part of heaven to the other, and about the +promised coming in the clouds. But they did not much heed the words. +They were looking the blinding lightning in the face, and in their +courageous trust they thought themselves ready to look into the flaming +countenance of the Almighty, if they should be called before Him. Every +fresh burst of thunder seemed to August to be the rocking of the world, +trembling in the throes of dissolution. But the world might crumble or +melt; there is something more enduring than the world. August felt the +everlastingness of love; as many another man in a supreme crisis +has felt it. + +But the swift cloud had already covered half the sky, and the bursts of +thunder followed one another now in quicker succession. And as suddenly +as the thunder had come, came the wind. A solitary old sycamore, leaning +over the water on the Kentucky shore, a mile away, was first to fall. In +the lurid darkness, August and Julia saw it meet its fate. Then the rail +fences on the nearer bank were scattered like kindling-wood, and some of +the sturdy old apple-trees of the orchard in the river-bottom were +uprooted, while others were stripped of their boughs. Julia clung to +August and said something, but he could only see her lips move; her +voice was drowned by the incessant roar of the thunder. And then the +hurricane struck them, and they half-ran and were half-carried down the +rear slope of the hill. Now they saw for the first time that the people +were gone. The instinct of self-preservation had proven stronger than +their fanaticism, and a contagious panic had carried them into a +hay-barn near by. + +Not knowing where the rest had gone, August and Julia only thought of +regaining the castle. They found the path blocked by fallen trees, and +it was slow and dangerous work, waiting for flashes of lightning to show +them their road. In making a long detour they lost the path. After some +minutes, in a lull in the thunder, August heard a shout, which he +answered, and presently Philosopher Andrew appeared with a lantern, his +grizzled hair and beard flying in the wind. + +"What ho, my friends!" he cried. "This is the way you go to heaven +together! You'll live through many a storm yet!" + +Guided by his thorough knowledge of the ground, they had almost reached +the castle, when they were startled by piteous cries. Leaving August +with Julia, Andrew climbed a fence, and went down into a ravine to find +poor Bill Day in an agony of terror, crying out in despair, believing +that the day of doom had already come, and that he was about to be sent +into well-deserved perdition. Andrew stooped over him with his lantern, +but the poor fellow, giving one look at the shaggy face, shrieked madly, +and rushed away into the woods. + +"I believe," said the Philosopher, when he got back to August, "I +believe he took me for the devil." + + + +CHAPTER XLIV. + +SQUARING ACCOUNTS. + +The summer storm had spent itself by daylight, and the sun rose on that +morning after the world's end much as it had risen on other mornings, +but it looked down upon prostrate trees and scattered fences and +roofless barns. And the minds of the people were in much the same +disheveled state as the landscape. One simple-minded girl was a maniac. +Some declared that the world had ended, and that this was the new earth, +if people only had faith to receive it; some still waited for the end, +and with some the reaction from credulity had already set in, a reaction +that carried them into the blankest atheism and boldest immorality. +People who had spent the summer in looking for a change that would +relieve them from all responsibility, now turned reluctantly +toward the commonplace drudgery of life. It is the evil of all +day-dreaming--day-dreaming about the other world included--that it +unfits us for duty in this world of tangible and inevitable facts. + +It was nearly daylight when Andrew and August and Julia reached the +castle. The Philosopher advised Julia to go home, and for the present +to let the marriage be as though it were not. August dreaded to see +Julia returned to her mother's tyranny, but Andrew was urgent in his +advice, and Julia said that she must not leave her mother in her +trouble. Julia reached home a little after daylight, and a little before +Mrs. Anderson was brought home in a fit of hysterics. + +Poor Mrs. Abigail still hoped that the end of the world for which she +had so fondly prepared would come, but as the days wore on she sank into +a numb despondency. When she thought of the loss of her property, she +groaned and turned her face to the wall. And Samuel Anderson sat about +the house in a dumb and shiftless attitude, as do most men upon whom +financial ruin comes in middle life. The disappointment of his faith and +the overthrow of his fortune had completely paralyzed him. He was +waiting for something, he hardly knew what. He had not even his wife's +driving voice to stimulate him to exertion. + +There was no one now to care for Mrs. Anderson but Julia, for Cynthy had +taken up her abode in the log-cabin which Jonas had bought, and a +happier housekeeper never lived. She watched Jonas till he disappeared +when he went to work in the morning, she carried him a "snack" at ten +o'clock, and headways found her standing "like a picter" at the gate, +when he came home to dinner. But Cynthy Ann generally spent her +afternoons at Anderson's, helping "that young thing" to bear her +responsibilities, though Mrs. Anderson would receive no personal +attentions now from any one but her daughter. She did not scold; her +querulous restlessness was but a reminiscence of her scolding. She lay, +disheartened, watching Julia, and exacting everything from Julia, and +the weary feet and weary heart of the girl almost sank under her +burdens. Mrs. Anderson had suddenly fallen from her position of an +exacting tyrant to that of an exacting and helpless infant. She followed +Julia with her eyes in a broken-spirited fashion, as if fearing that she +would leave her. Julia could read the fear in her mother's countenance; +she understood what her mother meant when she said querulously, "You'll +get married and leave me." If Mrs. Anderson had assumed her old +high-handed manner, it would have been easy for Julia to have declared +her secret. But how could she tell her now? It would be a blow, it might +be a fatal blow. And at the same time how could she satisfy August? He +thought she had bowed to the same old tyranny again for an indefinite +time. But she could not forsake her parents in their poverty and +afflictions. + +The fourteenth of August, the day on which possession was to have been +given to Bob Walker, came and went, but no Bob Walker appeared. A week +more passed, in which Samuel Anderson could not muster enough courage to +go to see Walker, in which Samuel Anderson and his wife waited in a +vague hope that something might happen. And every day of that week Julia +had a letter from August, which did not say one word of the trial that +it was for him to wait, but which said much of the wrong Julia was doing +to herself to submit so long. And Julia, like her father and mother, was +waiting for she knew not what. + +At last the suspense became to her unendurable. + +"Father," she said, "why don't you go to see Bob Walker? You might buy +the farm back again." + +"I don't know why he don't come and take it," said Mr. Anderson +dejectedly. + +This conversation roused Mrs. Abigail. There was some hope. She got up +in bed, and told Samuel to go to the county-seat and see if the deeds +had ever been recorded. And while her husband was gone she sat up and +looked better, and even scolded a little, so that Julia felt encouraged. +But she dreaded to see her father come back. + +Samuel Anderson entered the house on his return with a blank +countenance. Sitting down, he put his face between his hands a minute in +utter dejection. + +"Why don't you speak?" said Mrs. Anderson in a broken voice. + +"The land was all transferred to Andrew immediately, and he owns every +foot of it. He must have sent Bob Walker here to buy it." + +"Oh! I'm so glad!" cried Julia. + +But her mother only gave her one reproachful look and went off into +hysterical sobbing and crying over the wrong that Andrew had done her. +And all that night Julia watched by her mother, while Samuel Anderson +sat in dejection by the bed. As for Norman, he had quickly relapsed into +his old habits, and his former cronies had generously forgiven him his +temporary piety, considering the peculiar circumstances of the case some +extenuation. Now that there was trouble in the house he staid away, +which was a good thing so far as it went. + +The next afternoon Mrs. Anderson rallied a little, and, looking at +Julia, she said in her querulous way, "Why don't you go and see him?" + +"Who?" said Julia with a shiver, afraid that her mother was insane. + +"Andrew." + +Julia did not need any second hint. Leaving her mother with Cynthy, she +soon presented herself at the door of the castle. + +"Did _she_ send you?" asked Andrew dryly. + +"Yes, sir." + +"I've been expecting you for a long time. I'll go back with you. But +August must go along. He'll be glad of an excuse to see your face again. +You look thin, my poor girl." + +They went past Wehle's, and August was only too glad to join them, +rejoicing that some sort of a crisis had come, though how it was to help +him he did not know. With the restlessness of a man looking for some +indefinable thing to turn up, Samuel was out on the porch waiting the +return of his daughter. Jonas had come for Cynthy Ann, and was sitting +on a "shuck-bottom" chair in front of the house. + +Andrew reached out his hand and greeted his brother cordially, and spoke +civilly to Abigail. Then there was a pause, and Mrs. Anderson turned her +head to the wall and groaned. After a while she looked round and saw +August. A little of her old indignation came into her eyes as she +whimpered, "What did _he_ come for?" + +"I brought him," said Andrew. + +"Well, it's your house, do as you please. I suppose you'll turn us out +of our own home now." + +"As you did me," said the Philosopher, smiling. "Let me remind you that +I was living on the river farm. My father had promised it to me, and +given me possession. A week before his death you got the will changed, +by what means you know. You turned me off the farm which had virtually +been mine for two years. If I turn you off now, it will be no more +than fair." + +There was a look of pained surprise on Julia's face. She had not known +that the wrong her uncle had suffered was so great. She had not thought +that he would be so severe as to turn her father out. + +"I don't want to talk of these things," Andrew went on. "I ought to +have broken the will, but I was not a believer in the law. I tell this +story now because I must justify myself to these young people for what I +am going to do. You have had the use of that part of the estate which +was rightfully mine for twenty years. I suppose I may claim it all now." + +Julia's eyes looked at him pleadingly. + +"Why don't you send us off and be done with it then?" said Mrs. Abigail, +rising up and resuming her old vehemence. "You set out to ruin us, and +now you've done it. A nice brother you are! Ruining us by a conspiracy +with Bob Walker, and then sitting here and trying to make my own +daughter think you did right, and bringing that hateful fellow here to +hear it!" Her finger was leveled at August. + +"I am glad to see you are better, Abigail. I wanted to be sure you were +strong enough to bear all I have to say." + +"Say your worst and do your worst, you cruel, cruel man! I have borne +enough from you in these years, and now you can say and do what you +please; you can't do me any more harm. I suppose I must leave my old +home that I've lived in so long." + +"You need not worry yourself about leaving; that's what I came over to +say." + +"As if I'd stay in _your_ house an hour! I'll not take any favors at +_your_ hand." + +"Don't be rash, Abigail. I have deeded this hill farm to Samuel, and +here is the deed. I have given you back the best half of the property, +just what my father meant you to have. I have only kept the river land, +that should have been mine twenty years ago. I hope you will not stick +to your resolution not to receive anything at my hand." + +And Julia said: "Oh! I'm so--" + +But Mrs. Anderson had a convenient fit of hysterics, crying piteously. +Meantime Samuel gladly accepted the deed. + +"The deed is already recorded. I sent it down yesterday as soon as I saw +Samuel come back, and I got it back this morning. The farm is yours +without condition." + +This relieved Abigail, and she soon ceased her sobbing. Andrew could not +take it back then, whatever she might say. + +"Now," said Andrew, "I have only divided the farms without claiming any +damages. I want to ask a favor. Let Julia marry the man of her choice +in peace." + +"You have taken one farm, and therefore I must let my daughter marry a +man with nothing but his two hands," sobbed Mrs. Anderson. + +"Two hands and a good head and a noble heart," said Andrew. + +"Well, I won't consent," said she. "If Julia marries _him_," pointing to +August, "she will marry without my consent, and he will not get a cent +of the money he's after. Not a red cent!" + +"I don't want your money. I did not know you'd get your farm back, for I +did not know but that Walker owned it, and I--wanted--Julia all the +same." August had almost told that he had married Julia. + +"Wanted her and married her," said Andrew. "And I have not kept a +corn-stalk of the property I got from you. I have given Bob Walker a +ten-acre patch for his services, and all the rest I have deeded to the +two best people I know. This August Wehle married Julia Anderson when +they thought the world might be near its end, and believing that, at any +rate, she would not have a penny in the world. I have deeded the river +farm to August Wehle and his wife." + +"Married, eh? Come and ask my consent afterwards? That's a fine way!" +And Abigail grew white and grew silent with passion. + +"Come, August, I want to show you and Julia something," said Andrew. He +really wanted to give Abigail time to look the matter in the face +quietly before she committed herself too far. But he told the two young +people that they might make their home with him while their house was in +building. He had already had part of the material drawn, and from the +brow of the hill they looked down upon the site he had chosen near the +old tumble-down tenant's house. But Andrew saw that Julia looked +disappointed. + +"You are not satisfied, my brave girl. What is the matter?" + +"Oh! yes, I am very happy, and very thankful to you; and next to August +I love you more than anybody--except my parents." + +"But something is different to what you wished it. Doesn't the site suit +you? You can look off on to the river from the rise on which the house +will stand, and I do not know how it could be better." + +"It couldn't be better," said Julia, "but--' + +"But what? You must tell me." + +"I thought maybe you'd let us live at the castle and take the burden of +things off you. I should like to keep your house for you, just to show +you how much I love my dear, good uncle." + +Even an anchorite could not help feeling a pleasure at such a speech +from such a young woman, and this shaggy, solitary, misanthropic but +tender-hearted man felt a sudden rush of pleasure. August saw it, and +was delighted. What one's nearest friend thinks of one's wife is a vital +question, and August was happier at this moment than he had ever been. +Andrew's pleasure at Julia's loving speech was the climax. + +"Yes!" said the Philosopher, a little huskily. "You want to sacrifice +your pleasure by living in my gloomy old castle, and civilizing an old +heathen like me. You mustn't tempt me too far." + +"I don't see why you call it gloomy. It wasn't only for your sake that I +said it. I think it is the nicest old house I ever saw. And then the +books, and--and--you." Julia stumbled a little, she was not accustomed +to make speeches of this sort. + +"You flatterer!" burst out Andrew. "But no, you must have your own +house." + +Mrs. Anderson, on her part, had concluded to make the best of it. Julia +already married and the mistress of the Anderson river farm was quite a +different thing from Julia under her thumb. She was to be conciliated. +Besides, Mrs. Anderson did not want Julia's prosperity to be a lifelong +source of humiliation to her. She must take some stock in it at +the start. + +"Jule," she said, as her daughter re-entered the door, "I can let you +have two feather-beds and four pillows, and a good stock of linen and +blankets. And you can have the two heifers and the sorrel colt." + +The two "heifers" were six, and the sorrel "colt" was seven years of +age; but descriptive names often outlive the qualities to which they +owed their origin. Just as a judge is even yet addressed as "your +honor," and many a governor without anything to recommend him hears +himself called "your excellency." + +When Abigail surrendered in this graceful fashion, Julia was touched, +and was on the point of putting her arms around her mother and kissing +her. But Mrs. Anderson was not a person easily caressed, and Julia did +not yield to her impulse. + +"Cynthy Ann, my dear," said Jonas, as they walked home that evening, "do +you know what Abig'il Anderson reminds me of?" + +No; Cynthy Ann didn't exactly know. In fact, it would have been +difficult for anybody to have told what anything was likely to remind +Jonas of. There was no knowing what a thing might not suggest to him. + +"Well, Cynthy, my Imperial Sweetness, when I see Abig'il come down so +beautiful, it reminded me of a little fice-t dog I had when I was a +leetle codger. I called him Pick. His name was Picayune. Purty good +name, wasn't it?" + +"Yes, it was." + +"Well, now, that air little Pick wouldn't never own up as he was driv +outen the house. When he was whipped out, he wouldn't never tuck his +tail down, but curl it up over his back, and run acrost the yard and +through the fence and down the road a-barkin' fit to kill. Wanted to let +on like as ef he'd run out of his own accord, with malice aforethought, +you know. _That's_ Abig'il." + + + +CHAPTER XLV. + +NEW PLANS. + +Except Abigail Anderson and one other person, everybody in the little +world of Clark township approved mightily the justice and +disinterestedness of Andrew. He had righted himself and Julia at a +stroke, and people dearly love to have justice dealt out when it is not +at their own expense. Samuel, who cherished in secret a great love for +his daughter, was more than pleased that affairs had turned out in this +way. But there was one beside Abigail who was not wholly satisfied. +August spent half the night in protesting in vain against Andrew's +transfer of the river-farm to him. But Andrew said he had a right to +give away his own if he chose. And there was no turning him. For if +August refused a share in it, he would give it to Julia, and if she +refused it, he would find somebody who would accept it. + +The next day after the settlement at Samuel Anderson's, August came to +claim his wife. Mrs. Abigail had now employed a "help" in Cynthy Ann's +place, and Julia could be spared. August had refused all invitations to +take up his temporary residence with Julia's parents. The house had +unpleasant associations in his mind, and he wanted to relieve Julia at +once and forever from a despotism to which she could not offer any +effectual resistance. Mrs. Anderson had eagerly loaded the wagon with +feather-beds and other bridal property, and sent it over to the castle, +that Julia might appear to leave with her blessing. She kissed Julia +tenderly, and hoped she'd have a happy life, and told her that if her +husband should ever lose his property or treat her badly--such things +_may_ happen, you know--then she would always find a home with her +mother. Julia thanked her for the offer of a refuge to which she never +meant to flee under any circumstances. And yet one never turns away from +one's home without regret, and Julia looked back with tears in her eyes +at the chattering swifts whose nests were in the parlor chimney, and at +the pee-wee chirping on the gate-post. The place had entered into her +life. It looked lonesome now, but within a year afterward Norman +suddenly married Betsey Malcolm. Betsey's child had died soon after its +birth, and Mrs. Anderson set herself to manage both Norman and his wife, +who took up their abode with her. Nothing but a reign of terror could +have made either of them of any account, but Mrs. Anderson furnished +them this in any desirable quantity. They were never of much worth, even +under her management, but she kept them in bounds, so that Norman ceased +to get drunk more than five or six times a year, and Betsey flirted but +little and at her peril. + +Once the old house was out of sight, there were no shadows on Julia's +face as she looked forward toward the new life. She walked in a still +happiness by August as they went down through Shady Hollow. August had +intended to show her a letter that he had from the mud-clerk, +describing the bringing of Humphreys back to Paducah and his execution +by a mob. But there was something so repelling in the gusto with which +the story was told, and the story was so awful in itself, that he could +not bear to interrupt the peaceful happiness of this hour by saying +anything about it. + +August proposed to Julia that they should take a path through the meadow +of the river-farm--their own farm now--and see the foundation of the +little cottage Andrew had begun for them. And so in happiness they +walked on through the meadow-path to the place on which their home was +to stand. But, alas! there was not a stick of timber left. Every +particle of the material had been removed. It seemed that some great +disappointment threatened them at the moment of their happiness. They +hurried on in silent foreboding to the castle, but there the mystery was +explained. + +"I told you not to tempt me too far," said Andrew. "See! I have +concluded to build an addition to the castle and let you civilize me. We +will live together and I will reform. This lonely life is not healthy, +and now that I have children, why should I not let them live here +with me?" + +Julia looked happy. I have no authentic information in regard to the +exact words which she made use of to express her joy, but from what is +known of girls of her age in general, it is safe to infer that she +exclaimed, "Oh! I'm so glad!" + +While Andrew stood there smiling, with Julia near him, August having +gone to the assistance of the carpenters in a matter demanding a little +more ingenuity than they possessed, Jonas came up and drew the +Philosopher aside. Julia could not hear what was said, but she saw +Andrew's brow contract. + +"I'll shoot as sure as they come!" he said with passion. "I won't have +my niece or August insulted in my house by a parcel of vagabonds." + +"O Uncle Andrew! is it a shiveree?" asked Julia. + +"Yes." + +"Well, don't shoot. It'll be so funny to have a shiveree." + +"But it is an insult to you and to August and to me. This is meant +especially to be an expression of their feeling toward August as a +German, though really their envy of his good fortune has much to do with +it. It is a second edition of the riot of last spring, in which Gottlieb +came so near to being killed. Now, I mean to do my country service by +leaving one or two less of them alive if they come here to-night." For +Andrew was full of that destructive energy so characteristic of the +Western and Southern people. + +"Oh! no, don't shoot. Can't you think of some other way?" pleaded Julia. + +"Well, yes, I could get the sheriff to come and bag a few of them." + +"And that will make trouble for many years. Let me see. Can't we do +this?" And Julia rapidly unfolded to Andrew and Jonas her plan of +operations against the enemy. + +"Number one!" said Jonas. "They'll fall into that air amby-scade as sure +as shootin'. That plan is military and Christian and civilized and human +and angelical and tancy-crumptious. It ort to meet the 'proval of the +American Fish-hawk with all his pinions and talents. I'll help to +execute it, and beat the rascals or lay my bones a-bleachin' on the +desert sands of Shady Holler." + +"Well," said Andrew to Julia, "I knew, if I took you under my roof, +you'd make a Christian of me in spite of myself. And I _am_ a sort of +savage, that's a fact." + +Jonas hurried home and sent Cynthy over to the castle, and there was +much work going on that afternoon. Andrew said that the castle was being +made ready for its first siege. As night came on, Julia was in a perfect +glee. Reddened by standing over the stove, with sleeves above her elbows +and her black hair falling down upon her shoulders, she was such a +picture that August stopped and stood in the door a minute to look at +her as he came in to supper. + +"Why, Jule, how glorious you look!" he said. "I've a great mind to fall +in love with you, mein Liebchen!" + +"And I _have_ fallen in love with _you_, Cæsar Augustus!" And well she +might, for surely, as he stood in the door with his well-knit frame, his +fine German forehead, his pure, refined mouth, and his clear, honest, +amiable blue eyes, he was a man to fall in love with. + + + +CHAPTER XLVI. + +THE SHIVEREE. + +If Webster's "American Dictionary of the English Language" had not been +made wholly in New England, it would not have lacked so many words that +do duty as native-born or naturalized citizens in large sections of the +United States, and among these words is the one that stands at the head +of the present chapter. I know that some disdainful prig will assure me +that it is but a corruption of the French "_charivari,"_ and so it is; +but then "_charivari_" is a corruption of the low Latin "_charivarium_" +and that is a corruption of something else, and, indeed, almost every +word is a corruption of some other word. So that there is no good reason +why "shiveree," which lives in entire unconsciousness of its French +parentage and its Latin grand-parentage, should not find its place in an +"American Dictionary." + +But while I am writing a disquisition on the etymology of the word, the +"shiveree" is mustering at Mandluff's store. Bill Day has concluded that +he is in no immediate danger of perdition, and that a man is a "blamed +fool to git skeered about his soul." Bob Short is sure the Almighty will +not be too hard on a feller, and so thinks he will go on having "a +little fun" now and then. And among the manly recreations which they +have proposed to themselves is that of shivereeing "that Dutchman, Gus +Wehle." It is the solemn opinion of the whole crowd that "no Dutchman +hadn't orter be so lucky as to git sech a beauty of a gal and a hundred +acres of bottom lands to boot." + +The members of the party were all disguised, some in one way and some in +another, though most of them had their coats inside out. They thought it +necessary to be disguised, "bekase, you know," as Bill Day expressed it, +"ole Grizzly is apt to prosecute ef he gits evidence agin you." And many +were the conjectures as to whether he would shoot or not. + +The instruments provided by this orchestra were as various as their +musical tastes. It is likely that even Mr. Jubilee Gilmore never saw +such an outfit. Bob Short had a dumb-bull, a keg with a strip of +raw-hide stretched across one end like a drum-head, while the other +remained open. A waxed cord inserted in the middle of the drum-head, and +reaching down through the keg, completed the instrument. The pulling of +the hand over this cord made a hideous bellowing, hence its name. Bill +Day had a gigantic watchman's rattle, a hickory spring on a cog-wheel. +It is called in the West, a horse-fiddle, because it is so unlike either +a horse or a fiddle. Then there were melodious tin pans and conch-shells +and tin horns. But the most deadly noise was made by Jim West, who had +two iron skillet-lids ("leds" he called them) which, when placed face to +face, and rubbed, as you have seen children rub tumblers, made a sound +discordant and deafening enough to have suggested Milton's expression +about the hinges which "grated harsh thunder." + +One of this party was a tallish man, so dressed as to look like a +hunchback, and a hunchback so tall was a most singular figure. He had +joined them in the dark, and the rest were unable to guess who it could +be, and he, for his part, would not tell. They thumped him and pushed +him, but at each attack he only leaped from the ground like a circus +clown, and made his tin horn utter so doleful a complaint as set the +party in an uproar of laughter. They could not be sure who he was, but +he was a funny fellow to have along with them at any rate. + +He was not only funny, but he was evidently fearless. For when they came +to the castle it was all dark and still. Bill Day said that it looked +"powerful juberous to him. Ole Andy meant to use shootin'-ir'ns, and +didn't want to be pestered with no lights blazin' in his eyes." But the +tall hunchback cleared the fence at a bound, and told them to come on +"ef they had the sperrit of a two-weeks-old goslin into 'em." So the +bottle was passed round, and for very shame they followed their +ungainly leader. + +"Looky here, boys," said the hunchback, "they's one way that we can fix +it so's ole Grizzly can't shoot. They's a little shop-place, a sort of a +shed, agin the house, on the side next to the branch. Let's git in thar +afore we begin, and he can't shoot." + +The orchestra were a little stupefied with drink, and they took the idea +quickly, never stopping to ask how they could retreat if Andrew chose to +shoot. Jim West thought things looked scaly, but he warn't agoin' to +backslide arter he'd got so fur. + +When they got into Andrew's shop, where he had a new and beautiful +skiff in building, the tall hunchback shut the door, and the rest did +not notice that he put the key in his pocket. + +That serenade! Such a medley of discordant sounds, such a clatter and +clangor, such a rattle of horse-fiddle, such a bellowing of dumb-bull, +such a snorting of tin horns, such a ringing of tin pans, such a +grinding of skillet-lids! But the house remained quiet. Once Bill Day +thought that he heard a laugh within. Julia may have lost her +self-control. She was so happy, and a little unrestrained fun was so +strange a luxury! + +At last the door between the house and shop was suddenly opened, and +Julia, radiant as she could be, stood on the threshold with a candle +in her hand. + +"Come in, gentlemen." + +But the gentlemen essayed to go out. + +"Locked in, by thunder!" said Jim West, trying the outside door of the +shop. + +"We heard you were coming, gentlemen, and provided a little +entertainment. Come in!" + +"Come in, boys," said the hunchback, "don't be afeard of nobody." + +Mechanically they followed the hunchback into the room, for there was +nothing else to be done. A smell of hot coffee and the sight of a +well-spread table greeted their senses. + +"Welcome, my friends, thrice welcome!" said Andrew. "Put down your +instruments and have some supper." + +"Let me relieve you," said Julia, and she took the dumb-bull from Bob +Short and the "horse-fiddle" from Day, the tin horns and tin pans from +others, and the two skillet-lids from Jim West, who looked as sheepish +as possible. August escorted each of them to the table, though his face +did not look altogether cordial. Some old resentment for the treatment +of his father interfered with the heartiness of his hospitality. The +hunchback in this light proved to be Jonas, of course; and Bill Day +whispered to the one next to him that they had been "tuck in and done +fer that time." + +"Gentlemen," said Andrew, "we are much obliged for your music." And +Cynthy would certainly have laughed out if she had not been so perplexed +in her mind to know whether Andrew was speaking the truth. + +Such a motley set of wedding guests as they were, with their coats +inside out and their other disguises! Such a race of pied pipers! And +looking at their hangdog faces you would have said, "Such a lot of +sheep-thieves!" Though why a sheep-thief is considered to be a more +guilty-looking man than any other criminal, I do not know. Jonas looked +bright enough and ridiculous enough with his hunch. They all ate rather +heartily, for how could they resist the attentions of Cynthy Ann and the +persuasions of Julia, who poured them coffee and handed them biscuit, +and waited upon them as though they were royal guests! And, moreover, +the act of eating served to cover their confusion. + +As the meal drew to a close, Bill Day felt that he, being in some sense +the leader of the party, ought to speak. He was not quite sober, though +he could stand without much staggering. He had been trying for some time +to frame a little speech, but his faculties did not work smoothly. + +"Mr. President--I mean Mr. Anderson--permit me to offer you our pardon. +I mean to beg your apologies--to--ahem--hope that our--that +your--our--thousand--thanks--your--you know what I mean." And he sat +down in foolish confusion. + +"Oh! yes. All right; much obliged, my friend," said the Philosopher, +who had not felt so much boyish animal life in twenty-five years. + +And Jim West whispered to Bill: "You expressed my sentiments exactly." + +"Mr. Anderson," said Jonas, rising, and thus lifting up his hunched +shoulders and looking the picture of a long-legged heron standing in the +water, "Mr. Anderson, you and our young and happy friend, Mr. Wehle, +will accept our thanks. We thought that music was all you wanted to gin +a delightful--kinder--sorter--well, top-dressin', to this interestin' +occasion. Now they's nothin' sweeter'n a tin horn, 'thout 'tis a +melodious conch-shell utterin' its voice like a turkle-dove. Then we've +got the paytent double whirlymagig hoss-violeen, and the tin pannyforte, +and, better nor all, the grindin' skelletled cymbals. We've laid +ourselves out and done our purtiest--hain't we, feller-musicians?--to +prove that we was the best band on the Ohio River. An' all out of +affection and respect for this ere happy pair. And we're all happy to be +here. Hain't we?" (Here they all nodded assent, though they looked as +though they wished themselves far enough.) "Our enstruments is a leetle +out of toon, owin' to the dampness of the night air, and so I trust +you'll excuse us playin' a farewell piece." + +Jim West was so anxious to get away that he took advantage of this turn +to say good-evening, and though the mischievous Julia insisted that he +should select his instrument, he had not the face to confess to the +skillet-lids, and got out of it by assuring her that he hadn't brought +nothing, "only come along to see the fun." And each member of the party +repeated the transparent lie, so that Julia found herself supplied with +more musical instruments than any young housekeeper need want, and +Andrew hung them, horns, pans, conch-shell, dumb-bull, horse-fiddle, +skillet-lids, and all, in his library, as trophies captured from +the enemy. + +Much as I should like to tell you of the later events of the +Philosopher's life, and about Julia and August, and their oldest son, +whose name is Andrew, and all that, I do not know that I can do better +than to bow myself out with the abashed serenaders, letting this musical +epilogue harmoniously close the book; writing just here. + +THE END. + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The End Of The World, by Edward Eggleston + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14051 *** diff --git a/14051-h/14051-h.htm b/14051-h/14051-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3939a4c --- /dev/null +++ b/14051-h/14051-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,7202 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<html> +<head> +<meta name="generator" content= +"HTML Tidy for Windows (vers 1st February 2004), see www.w3.org"> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content= +"text/html; charset=UTF-8"> +<title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of The End of the World, by +Edward Eggleston.</title> + +<style type="text/css"> + <!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; } + blockquote {text-align: justify; + margin-left: 15%; + margin-right: 15%;} + IMG { + BORDER-RIGHT: 0px; + BORDER-TOP: 0px; + BORDER-LEFT: 0px; + BORDER-BOTTOM: 0px } + .loc { TEXT-ALIGN: right; + margin-left: 15%; + margin-right: 15%;} + .ctr { TEXT-ALIGN: center } + + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; } + HR { width: 33%; } + // --> +</style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14051 ***</div> + +<a name="Frontispiece.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/Frontispiece.jpg"><img src= +"images/Frontispiece.jpg" width="45%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER.</b><br> +<i>(Frontispiece. See page 40.)</i></p> +<br> +<h1>The End of the World.</h1> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2>A LOVE STORY,</h2> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h4>BY</h4> +<h3>EDWARD EGGLESTON</h3> +<h5>AUTHOR OF "THE HOOSIER SCHOOLMASTER," ETC.</h5> +<h4>WITH THIRTY-TWO ILLUSTRATIONS.</h4> +<h3>1872</h3> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2>PREFACE.</h2> +<h3>[IN THE POTENTIAL MOOD.]</h3> +<br> +<p>It is the pretty unanimous conclusion of book-writers that +prefaces are most unnecessary and useless prependages, since nobody +reads them. And it is the pretty unanimous practice of book-writers +to continue to write them with such pains and elaborateness as +would indicate a belief that the success of a book depends upon the +favorable prejudice begotten of u graceful preface. My principal +embarrassment is that it is not customary for a book to have more +than one. How then shall I choose between the half-dozen letters of +introduction I might give my story, each better and worse on many +accounts than either of the others? I am rather inclined to adopt +the following, which might for some reasons be styled the</p> +<h3>PREFACE SENTIMENTAL.</h3> +<p>Perhaps no writer not infatuated with conceit, can send out a +book full of thought and feeling which, whatever they may be worth, +are his own, without a parental anxiety in regard to the fate of +his offspring. And there are few prefaces which do not in some way +betray this nervousness. I confess to a respect for even the +prefatory doggerel of good Tinker Bunyan--a respect for his +paternal tenderness toward his book, not at all for his villainous +rhyming. When I saw, the other day, the white handkerchiefs of my +children waving an adieu as they sailed away from me, a profound +anxiety seized me. So now, as I part company with August and Julia, +with my beloved Jonas and my much-respected Cynthy Ann, with the +mud-clerk on the Iatan, and the shaggy lord of Shady-Hollow Castle, +and the rest, that have watched with me of nights and crossed the +ferry with me twice a day for half a year--even now, as I see them +waving me adieu with their red silk and "yaller" cotton +"hand-kerchers," I know how many rocks of misunderstanding and +criticism and how many shoals of damning faint praise are before +them, and my heart is full of misgiving.</p> +<p>--But it will never do to have misgivings in a preface. How +often have publishers told me this! Ah! if I could write with half +the heart and hope my publishers evince in their advertisements, +where they talk about "front rank" and "great American story" and +all that, it would doubtless be better for the book, provided +anybody would read the preface or believe it when they had read it. +But at any rate let us not have a preface in the minor key.</p> +<p>A philosophical friend of mine, who is addicted to Carlyle, has +recommended that I try the following, which he calls</p> +<h3>THE HIGH PHILOSOPHICAL PREFACE.</h3> +<p>Why should I try to forestall the Verdict? Is it not +foreordained in the very nature of a Book and the Constitution of +the Reader that a certain very Definite Number of Readers will +misunderstand and dislike a given Book? And that another very +Definite Number will understand it and dislike it none the less? +And that still a third class, also definitely fixed in the Eternal +Nature of Things, will misunderstand and like it, and, what is +more, like it only because of their misunderstanding? And in +relation to a true Book, there can not fail to be an Elect Few who +understand admiringly and understandingly admire. Why, then, make +bows, write prefaces, attempt to prejudice the Case? Can I change +the Reader? Will I change the Book? No? Then away with Preface! The +destiny of the Book is fixed. I can not foretell it, for I am no +prophet. But let us not hope to change the Fates by our prefatory +bowing and scraping.</p> +<p>--I was forced to confess to my friend who was so kind as to +offer to lend me this preface, that there was much truth in it and +that truth is nowhere more rare than in prefaces, but it was not +possible to adopt it for two reasons: one, that my proof-reader can +not abide so many capitals, maintaining that they disfigure the +page, and what is a preface of the high philosophical sort worth +without a profusion of capitals? Even Carlyle's columns would lose +their greatest ornament if their capitals were gone. The second +reason for declining to use this preface was that my publishers are +not philosophers and would never be content with an "Elect Few," +and for my own part the pecuniary interest I have in the copyright +renders it quite desirable that as many as possible should be +elected to like it, or at least to buy it.</p> +<p>After all it seems a pity that I can not bring myself to use a +straightforward</p> +<h3>APOLOGETIC AND EXPLANATORY PREFACE.</h3> +<p>In view of the favor bestowed upon the author's previous story, +both by the Public who Criticise and the Public who Buy, it seems a +little ungracious to present so soon, another, the scene of which +is also laid in the valley of the Ohio. But the picture of Western +country life in "The Hoosier School-Master" would not have been +complete without this companion-piece, which presents a different +phase of it. And indeed there is no provincial life richer in +material if only one knew how to get at it.</p> +<p>Nothing is more reverent than a wholesome hatred of hypocrisy. +If any man think I have offended against his religion, I must +believe that his religion is not what it should be. If anybody +shall imagine that this is a work of religious controversy leveled +at the Adventists, he will have wholly mistaken my meaning. +Literalism and fanaticism are not vices confined to any one sect. +They are, unfortunately, pretty widely distributed. However, +if--</p> +<p>--And so on.</p> +<p>But why multiply examples of the half-dozen or more that I +might, could, would, or should have written? Since everybody is +agreed that, nobody reads a preface, I have concluded to let the +book go without any.</p> +<p>BROOKLYN, September, 1872.</p> +<p>"<i>And as he [Wordsworth] mingled freely with all kinds of men, +he found a pith of sense and a solidity of judgment here and there +among the unlearned which he had failed to find in the most +lettered; from obscure men he heard high truths.... And love, true +love and pure, he found was no flower reared only in what was +called refined society, and requiring leisure and polished manners +for its growth.... He believed that in country people, what is +permanent in human nature, the essential feelings and passions of +mankind, exist in greater simplicity and strength</i>."--PRINCIPAL +SHAIRP.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<h3>A DEDICATION.</h3> +<p>It would hardly be in character for me to dedicate this book in +good, stiff, old-fashioned tomb-stone style, but I could not have +put in the background of scenery without being reminded of the two +boys, inseparable as the Siamese twins, who gathered mussel-shells +in the river marge, played hide-and-seek in the hollow sycamores, +and led a happy life in the shadow of just such hills as those +among which the events of this story took place. And all the more +that the generous boy who was my playmate then is the generous man +who has relieved me of many burdens while I wrote this story, do I +feel impelled to dedicate it to GEORGE CARY EGGLESTON, a manly man +and a brotherly brother.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CONTENTS.</h2> +<center> +<table summary=""> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_I.">I.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_I.">In Love with a Dutchman.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_II.">II.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_II.">An Explosion.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_III.">III.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_III.">A Farewell.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV.">IV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_IV.">A Counter-Irritant.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_V.">V.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_V.">At the Castle.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI.">VI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_VI.">The Backwoods Philosopher.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII.">VII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_VII.">Within and Without.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII.">VIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII.">Figgers won't Lie.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX.">IX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_IX.">The New Singing-Master.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_X.">X.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_X.">An Offer of Help.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI.">XI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XI.">The Coon-dog Argument.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII.">XII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XII.">Two Mistakes.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII.">XIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII.">The Spider Spins.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV.">XIV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV.">The Spider's Web.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV.">XV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XV.">The Web Broken.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI.">XVI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XVI.">Jonas Expounds the Subject.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII.">XVII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XVII.">The Wrong Pew.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII.">XVIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII.">The Encounter.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX.">XIX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XIX.">The Mother.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XX.">XX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XX.">The Steam-Doctor.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXI.">XXI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXI.">The Hawk in a New Part.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXII.">XXII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXII.">Jonas Expresses his Opinion on +Dutchmen.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII.">XXIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII.">Somethin' Ludikerous.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV.">XXIV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV.">The Giant Great-heart.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXV.">XXV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXV.">A Chapter of Betweens.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI.">XXVI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI.">A Nice Little Game.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII.">XXVII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII.">The Result of an Evening with +Gentlemen.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII.">XXVIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII.">Waking up an Ugly +Customer.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX.">XXIX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX.">August and Norman.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXX.">XXX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXX.">Aground.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI.">XXXI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI.">Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXII.">XXXII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXII.">Julia's Enterprise.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIII.">XXXIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIII.">The Secret Stairway.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIV.">XXXIV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIV.">The Interview.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXV.">XXXV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXV.">Getting Ready for the End.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVI.">XXXVI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVI.">The Sin of Sanctimony.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVII.">XXXVII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVII.">The Deluge.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVIII.">XXXVIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVIII.">Scaring a Hawk.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIX.">XXXIX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIX.">Jonas takes an Appeal.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XL.">XL.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XL.">Selling out.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLI.">XLI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLI.">The Last Day and What Happened in +it.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLII.">XLII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLII.">For Ever and Ever.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLIII.">XLIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLIII.">The Midnight Alarm.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLIV.">XLIV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLIV.">Squaring Accounts.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLV.">XLV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLV.">New Plans.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLVI.">XLVI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLVI.">The Shiveree.</a></td> +</tr> +</table> +</center> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<h2>ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2> +<h3>BY FRANK BEARD</h3> +<center> +<table summary=""> +<tr> +<td><a href="#Frontispiece.jpg">The Backwoods Philosopher</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#014.jpg">Taking an Observation</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#017.jpg">A Talk with a Plowman</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#031.jpg">A little rustle brought her to +consciousness</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#036.jpg">Gottlieb</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#041.jpg">The Castle</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#045.jpg">The Sedilium at the Castle</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#049.jpg">"Look at me"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#064.jpg">"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#067.jpg">The Hawk</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#085.jpg">"Tell that to Jule"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#091.jpg">Tempted</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#097.jpg">"Now I hate you"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#102.jpg">At Cynthy's Door</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#105.jpg">Cynthy Ann had often said in class-meeting +that temptations abounded on every hand</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#112.jpg">Jonas</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#121.jpg">Julia sat down in mortification</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#126.jpg">"Good-by!"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#131.jpg">The Mother's Blessing</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#134.jpg">Corn-Sweats and Calamus</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#137.jpg">"Fire! Murder! Help!"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#151.jpg">Norman Anderson</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#157.jpg">Somethin' Ludikerous</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#163.jpg">To the Rescue</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#175.jpg">A Nice Little Game</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#183.jpg">The Mud-Clerk</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#191.jpg">Waking up an Ugly Customer</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#204.jpg">Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#227.jpg">A Pastoral Visit</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#246.jpg">Brother Goshorn</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#248.jpg">"Say them words over again"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#253.jpg">"I want to buy your place"</a></td> +</tr> +</table> +</center> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h1>THE END OF THE WORLD.</h1> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I."></a>CHAPTER I.</h2> +<h3>IN LOVE WITH A DUTCHMAN.</h3> +<br> +<p>"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a +Dutchman! She might as well as to marry some white folks I +know."</p> +<p>Samuel Anderson made no reply. It would be of no use to reply. +Shrews are tamed only by silence. Anderson had long since learned +that the little shred of influence which remained to him in his own +house would disappear whenever his teeth were no longer able to +shut his tongue securely in. So now, when his wife poured out this +hot lava of <i>argumentum ad hominem</i>, he closed the teeth down +in a dead-lock way over the tongue, and compressed the lips tightly +over the teeth, and shut his finger-nails into his work-hardened +palms. And then, distrusting all these precautions, fearing lest he +should be unable to hold on to his temper even with this grip, the +little man strode out of the house with his wife's shrill voice in +his ears.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson had good reason to fear that her daughter was in +love with a "Dutchman," as she phrased it in her contempt. The few +Germans who had penetrated to the West at that time were looked +upon with hardly more favor than the Californians feel for the +almond-eyed Chinaman. They were foreigners, who would talk +gibberish instead of the plain English which everybody could +understand, and they were not yet civilized enough to like the +yellow saleratus-biscuit and the "salt-rising" bread of which their +neighbors were so fond. Reason enough to hate them!</p> +<p>Only half an hour before this outburst of Mrs. Anderson's, she +had set a trap for her daughter Julia, and had fairly caught +her.</p> +<p>"Jule! Jule! O Jul-y-e-ee!" she had called.</p> +<p>And Julia, who was down in the garden hoeing a bed in which she +meant to plant some "Johnny-Jump-ups," came quickly toward the +house, though she know it would be of no use to come quickly. Let +her come quickly, or let her come slowly, the rebuke was sure to +greet her all the name.</p> +<p>"Why don't you come when you're called, <i>I'd</i> like to know! +You're never in reach when you're wanted, and you're good for +nothing when you are here!"</p> +<p>Julia Anderson's earliest lesson from her mother's lips had been +that she was good for nothing. And every day and almost every hour +since had brought her repeated assurances that she was good for +nothing. If she had not been good for a great deal, she would long +since have been good for nothing as the result of such teaching. +But though this was not the first, nor the thousandth, nor the ten +thousandth time that she had been told that she was good for +nothing, the accustomed insult seemed to sting her now more than +ever. Was it that, being almost eighteen, she was beginning to feel +the woman blossoming in her nature? Or, was it that the tender +words of August Wehle had made her sure that she was good for +something, that now her heart felt her mother's insult to be a +stale, selfish, ill-natured lie?</p> +<p>"Take this cup of tea over to Mrs. Malcolm's, and tell her that +it a'n't quite as good as what I borried of her last week. And tell +her that they'll be a new-fangled preacher at the school-house a +Sunday, a Millerite or somethin', a preachin' about the end of the +world."</p> +<p>Julia did not say "Yes, ma'am," in her usually meek style. She +smarted a little yet from the harsh words, and so went away in +silence.</p> +<p>Why did she walk fast? Had she noticed that August Wehle, who +was "breaking up" her father's north field, was just plowing down +the west side of his land? If she hastened, she might reach the +cross-fence as he came round to it, and while he was yet hidden +from the sight of the house by the turn of the hill. And would not +a few words from August Wehle be pleasant to her ears after her +mother's sharp depreciation? It is at least safe to conjecture that +some such feeling made her hurry through the long, waving timothy +of the meadow, and made her cross the log that spanned the brook +without ever so much as stopping to look at the minnows glancing +about in the water flecked with the sunlight that struggled through +the boughs of the water-willows. For, in her thorough loneliness, +Julia Anderson had come to love the birds, the squirrels, and the +fishes as companions, and in all her life she had never before +crossed the meadow brook without stooping to look at the +minnows.</p> +<p>All this haste Mrs. Anderson noticed. Having often scolded</p> +<br> +<a name="014.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/014.jpg"><img src="images/014.jpg" +width="45%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>TAKING AN OBSERVATION.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Julia for "talking to the fishes like a fool," she noticed the +omission. And now she only waited until Julia was over the hill to +take the path round the fence under shelter of the blackberry +thicket until she came to the clump of alders, from the midst of +which she could plainly see if any conversation should take place +between her Julia and the comely young Dutchman.</p> +<p>In fact, Julia need not have hurried so much. For August Wehle +had kept one eye on his horses and the other on the house all that +day. It was the quick look of intelligence between the two at +dinner that had aroused the mother's suspicions. And Wehle had +noticed the work on the garden-bed, the call to the house, and the +starting of Julia on the path toward Mrs. Malcolm's. His face had +grown hot, and his hand had trembled. For once he had failed to see +the stone in his way, until the plow was thrown clean from the +furrow. And when he came to the shade of the butternut-tree by +which she must pass, it had seemed to him imperative that the +horses should rest. Besides, the hames-string wanted tightening on +the bay, and old Dick's throat-latch must need a little fixing. He +was not sure that the clevis-pin had not been loosened by the +collision with the stone just now. And so, upon one pretext and +another, he managed to delay starting his plow until Julia came by, +and then, though his heart had counted all her steps from the +door-stone to the tree, then he looked up surprised. Nothing could +be so astonishing to him as to see her there! For love is +needlessly crafty, it has always an instinct of concealment, of +indirection about it. The boy, and especially the girl, who will +tell the truth frankly in regard to a love affair is a miracle of +veracity. But there are such, and they are to be reverenced--with +the reverence paid to martyrs.</p> +<p>On her part, Julia Anderson had walked on as though she meant to +pass the young plowman by, until he spoke, and then she started, +and blushed, and stopped, and nervously broke off the top of a last +year's iron-weed and began to break it into bits while he talked, +looking down most of the time, but lifting her eyes to his now and +then. And to the sun-browned but delicate-faced young German it +seemed, a vision of Paradise--every glimpse of that fresh girl's +face in the deep shade of the sun-bonnet. For girls' faces can +never look so sweet in this generation as they did to the boys who +caught sight of them, hidden away, precious things, in the +obscurity of a tunnel of pasteboard and calico!</p> +<p>This was not their first love-talk. Were they engaged? Yes, and +no. By all the speech their eyes were capable of in school, and of +late by words, they were engaged in loving one another, and in +telling one another of it. But they were young, and separated by +circumstances, and they had hardly begun to think of marriage yet. +It was enough for the present to love and be loved. The most +delightful stage of a love affair is that in which the present is +sufficient and there is no past or future. And so August hung his +elbow around the top of the bay horse's hames, and talked to +Julia.</p> +<p>It is the highest praise of the German heart that it loves +flowers and little children; and like a German and like a lover +that he was, August began to speak of the anemones and the violets +that were already blooming in the corners of the fence. Girls in +love are not apt to say any thing very fresh. And Julia only said +she thought the flowers seemed happy in the sunlight In answer to +this speech, which seemed to the lover a bit of inspiration, he +quoted from Schiller the lines:</p> +<blockquote>"Yet weep, soft children of the Spring;<br> +The feelings Love alone can bring<br> +Have been denied to you!"</blockquote> +<p>With the quick and crafty modesty of her sex, Julia evaded this +very pleasant shaft by saying: "How much you know, August! How do +you learn it?"</p> +<br> +<a name="017.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/017.jpg"><img src="images/017.jpg" +width="70%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>A TALK WITH A PLOWMAN.</b></p> +<br> +<p>And August was pleased, partly because of the compliment, but +chiefly because in saying it Julia had brought the sun-bonnet in +such a range that he could see the bright eyes and blushing face at +the bottom of this <i>camera-oscura</i>. He did not hasten to +reply. While the vision lasted he enjoyed the vision. Not until the +sun-bonnet dropped did he take up the answer to her question.</p> +<p>"I don't know much, but what I do know I have learned out of +your Uncle Andrew's books."</p> +<p>"Do you know my Uncle Andrew? What a strange man he is! He never +comes here, and we never go there, and my mother never speaks to +him, and my father doesn't often have anything to say to him. And +so you have been at his house. They say he has all up-stairs full +of books, and ever so many cats and dogs and birds and squirrels +about. But I thought he never let anybody go up-stairs."</p> +<p>"He lets me," said August, when she had ended her speech and +dropped her sun-bonnet again out of the range of his eyes, which, +in truth, were too steadfast in their gaze. "I spend many evenings +up-stairs." August had just a trace of German in his idiom.</p> +<p>"What makes Uncle Andrew so curious, I wonder?"</p> +<p>"I don't exactly know. Some say he was treated not just right by +a woman when he was a young man. I don't know. He seems happy. I +don't wonder a man should be curious though when a woman that he +loves treats him not just right. Any way, if he loves her with all +his heart, as I love Jule Anderson!"</p> +<p>These last words came with an effort. And Julia just then +remembered her errand, and said, "I must hurry," and, with a +country girl's agility, she climbed over the fence before August +could help her, and gave him another look through her +bonnet-telescope from the other Hide, and then hastened on to +return the tea, und to tell Mrs. Malcolm that there was to be a +Millerite preacher at the school-house on Sunday night. And August +found that his horses were quite cool, while he was quite hot. He +cleaned his mold board, and swung his plow round, and then, with a +"Whoa! haw!" and a pull upon the single line which Western plowmen +use to guide their horses, he drew the team into their place, and +set himself to watching the turning of the rich, fragrant black +earth. And even as he set his plowshare, so he set his purpose to +overcome all obstacles, and to marry Julia Anderson. With the same +steady, irresistible, onward course would he overcome all that lay +between him and the soul that shone out of the face that dwelt in +the bottom of the sun-bonnet.</p> +<p>From her covert in the elder-bushes Mrs. Anderson had seen the +parley, and her cheeks had also grown hot, but from a very +different emotion. She had not heard the words. She had seen the +loitering girl and the loitering plowboy, and she went back to the +house vowing that she'd "teach Jule Anderson how to spend her time +talking to a Dutchman." And yet the more she thought of it, the +more she was satisfied that it wasn't best to "make a fuss" just +yet. She might hasten what she wanted to prevent. For though Julia +was obedient and mild in word, she was none the less a little +stubborn, and in a matter of this sort might take the bit in her +teeth.</p> +<p>And so Mrs. Anderson had recourse, as usual, to her husband. She +knew she could browbeat him. She demanded that August Wehle should +be paid off and discharged. And when Anderson had hesitated, +because he feared he could not get another so good a hand, and for +other reasons, she burst out into the declaration:</p> +<p>"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a +Dutchman! She might as well as to marry some white folks I +know."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II."></a>CHAPTER II.</h2> +<h3>AN EXPLOSION.</h3> +<br> +<p>It was settled that August was to be quietly discharged at the +end of his month, which was Saturday night. Neither he nor Julia +must suspect any opposition to their attachment, nor any discovery +of it, indeed. This was settled by Mrs. Anderson. She usually +settled things. First, she settled upon the course to be pursued. +Then she settled her husband. He always made a show of resistance. +His dignity required a show of resistance. But it was only a show. +He always meant to surrender in the end. Whenever his wife ceased +her fire of small-arms and herself hung out the flag of truce, he +instantly capitulated. As in every other dispute, so in this one +about the discharge of the "miserable, impudent Dutchman," Mrs. +Anderson attacked her husband at all his weak points, and she had +learned by heart a catalogue of his weak points. Then, when he was +sufficiently galled to be entirely miserable; when she had +expressed her regret that she hadn't married somebody with some +heart, and that she had ever left her father's house, for her +<i>father</i> was <i>always</i> good to her; and when she had +sufficiently reminded him of the lover she had given up for him, +and of how much <i>he</i> had loved her, and how miserable she had +made <i>him</i> by loving Samuel Anderson--when she had conducted +the quarrel through all the preliminary stages, she always carried +her point in the end by a <i>coup de partie</i> somewhat in this +fashion:</p> +<p>"That's just the way! Always the way with you men! I suppose I +must give up to you as usual. You've lorded it over me from the +start. I can't even have the management of my own daughter. But I +do think that after I've let you have your way in so many things, +you might turn off that fellow. You might let me have my way in one +little thing, and you <i>would</i> if you cared for me. You know +how liable I am to die at any moment of heart-disease, and yet you +will prolong this excitement in this way."</p> +<p>Now, there is nothing a weak man likes so much as to be +considered strong, nothing a henpecked man likes so much as to be +regarded a tyrant. If you ever hear a man boast of his +determination to rule his own house, you may feel sure that he is +subdued. And a henpecked husband always makes a great show of +opposing everything that looks toward the enlargement of the work +or privileges of women. Such a man insists on the shadow of +authority because he can not have the substance. It is a great +satisfaction to him that his wife can never be president, and that +she can not make speeches in prayer-meeting. While he retains these +badges of superiority, he is still in some sense head of the +family.</p> +<p>So when Mrs. Anderson loyally reminded her husband that she had +always let him have his own way, he believed her because he wanted +to, though he could not just at the moment recall the particular +instances. And knowing that he must yield, he rather liked to yield +as an act of sovereign grace to the poor oppressed wife who begged +it.</p> +<p>"Well, if you insist on it, of course, I will not refuse you," +he said; "and perhaps you are right." He had yielded in this way +almost every day of his married life, and in this way he yielded to +the demand that August should he discharged. But he agreed with his +wife that Julia should not know anything about it, and that there +must be no leave-taking allowed.</p> +<p>The very next day Julia sat sewing on the long porch in front of +the house. Cynthy Ann was getting dinner in the kitchen at the +other end of the hall, and Mrs. Anderson was busy in her usual +battle with dirt. She kept the house clean, because it gratified +her combativeness and her domineering disposition to have the house +clean in spite of the ever-encroaching dirt. And so she scrubbed +and scolded, and scolded and scrubbed, the scrubbing and scolding +agreeing in time and rhythm. The scolding was the vocal music, the +scrubbing an accompaniment. The concordant discord was perfect. +Just at the moment I speak of there was a lull in her scolding. The +symphonious scrubbing went on as usual. Julia, wishing to divert +the next thunder-storm from herself, erected what she imagined +might prove a conversational lightning-rod, by asking a question on +a topic foreign to the theme of the last march her mother had +played and sung so sweetly with brush and voice.</p> +<p>"Mother, what makes Uncle Andrew so queer?"</p> +<p>"I don't know. He was always queer." This was spoken in a +staccato, snapping-turtle way. But when one has lived all one's +life with a snapping-turtle, one doesn't mind. Julia did not mind. +She was curious to know what was the matter with her uncle, Andrew +Anderson. So she said:</p> +<p>"I've heard that some false woman treated him cruelly; is that +so?"</p> +<p>Julia did not see how red her mother's face was, for she was not +regarding her.</p> +<p>"Who told you that?" Julia was so used to hearing her mother +speak in an excited way that she hardly noticed the strange tremor +in this question.</p> +<p>"August."</p> +<p>The symphony ceased in a moment. The scrubbing-brush dropped in +the pail of soapsuds. But the vocal storm burst forth with a +violence that startled even Julia. "August said <i>that</i>, did +he? And you listened, did you? You listened to <i>that? You</i> +listened to that? <i>You listened</i> to <i>that</i>? Hey? He +slandered your mother. You listened to him slander your mother!" By +this time Mrs. Anderson was at white heat. Julia was speechless. +"<i>I</i> saw you yesterday flirting with that <i>Dutchman</i>, and +listening to his abuse of your mother! And now you <i>insult</i> +me! Well, to-morrow will be the last day that that Dutchman will +hold a plow on this place. And you'd better look out for yourself, +miss! You--"</p> +<p>Here followed a volley of epithets which Julia received +standing. But when her mother's voice grew to a scream, Julia took +the word.</p> +<p>"Mother, hush!"</p> +<p>It was the first word of resistance she had ever uttered. The +agony within must have been terrible to have wrung it from her. The +mother was stunned with anger and astonishment. She could not +recover herself enough to speak until Jule had fled half-way up the +stairs. Then her mother covered her defeat by screaming after her, +"Go to your own room, you impudent hussy! You know I am liable to +die of heart-disease any minute, and you want to kill me!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III."></a>CHAPTER III.</h2> +<h3>A FAREWELL.</h3> +<br> +<p>Mrs. Anderson felt that she had made a mistake. She had not +meant to tell Julia that August was to leave. But now that this +stormy scene had taken place, she thought she could make a good use +of it. She knew that her husband co-operated with her in her +opposition to "the Dutchman," only because he was afraid of his +wife. In his heart, Samuel Anderson could not refuse anything to +his daughter. Denied any of the happiness which most men find in +loving their wives, he found consolation in the love of his +daughter. Secretly, as though his paternal affection were a crime, +he caressed Julia, and his wife was not long in discovering that +the father cared more for a loving daughter than for a shrewish +wife. She watched him jealously, and had come to regard her +daughter as one who had supplanted her in her husband's affections, +and her husband as robbing her of the love of her daughter. In +truth, Mrs. Samuel Anderson had come to stand so perpetually on +guard against imaginary encroachments on her rights, that she saw +enemies everywhere. She hated Wehle because he was a Dutchman; she +would have hated him on a dozen other scores if he had been an +American. It was offense enough that Julia loved him.</p> +<p>So now she resolved to gain her husband to her side by her +version of the story, and before dinner she had told him how August +had charged her with being false and cruel to Andrew many years +ago, and how Jule had thrown it up to her, and how near she had +come to dropping down with palpitation of the heart. And Samuel +Anderson reddened, and declared that he would protect his wife from +such insults. The notion that he protected his wife was a pleasant +fiction of the little man's, which received a generous +encouragement at the hands of his wife. It was a favorite trick of +hers to throw herself, in a metaphorical way, at his feet, a +helpless woman, and in her feebleness implore his protection. And +Samuel felt all the courage of knighthood in defending his +inoffensive wife. Under cover of this fiction, so flattering to the +vanity of an overawed husband, she had managed at one time or +another to embroil him with almost all the neighbors, and his +refusal to join fences had resulted in that crooked arrangement +known as a "devil's lane" on three sides of his farm.</p> +<p>Julia dared not stay away from dinner, which was miserable +enough. She did not venture so much as to look at August, who sat +opposite her, and who was the most unhappy person at the table, +because he did not know what all the unhappiness was about. Mr. +Anderson's brow foreboded a storm, Mrs. Anderson's face was full of +an earthquake, Cynthy Ann was sitting in shadow, and Julia's +countenance perplexed him. Whether she was angry with him or not, +he could not be sure. Of one thing he was certain: she was +suffering a great deal, and that was enough to make him exceedingly +unhappy.</p> +<p>Sitting through his hurried meal in this atmosphere surcharged +with domestic electricity, he got the notion--he could hardly tell +how--that all this lowering of the sky had something to do with +him. What had he done? Nothing. His closest self-examination told +him that he had done no wrong. But his spirits were depressed, and +his sensitive conscience condemned him for some unknown crime that +had brought about all this disturbance of the elements. The ham did +not seem very good, the cabbage he could not eat, the corn-dodger +choked him, he had no desire to wait for the pie. He abridged his +meal, and went out to the barn to keep company with his horses and +his misery until it should be time to return to his plow.</p> +<p>Julia sat and sewed in that tedious afternoon. She would have +liked one more interview with August before his departure. Looking +through the open hall, she saw him leave the barn and go toward his +plowing. Not that she looked up. Hawk never watched chicken more +closely than Mrs. Anderson watched poor Jule. But out of the +corners of her eyes Julia saw him drive his horses before him from +the stable. At the field in which he worked was on the other side +of the house from where she sat she could not so much as catch a +glimpse of him as he held his plow on its steady course. She wished +she might have helped Cynthy Ann in the kitchen, for then she could +have seen him, but there was no chance for such a transfer.</p> +<p>Thus the tedious afternoon wore away, and just as the sun was +settling down so that the shadow of the elm in the front-yard +stretched across the road into the cow pasture, the dead silence +was broken. Julia had been wishing that somebody would speak. Her +mother's sulky speechlessness was worse than her scolding, and +Julia had even wished her to resume her storming. But the silence +was broken by Cynthy Ann, who came into the hall and called, "Jule, +I wish you would go to the barn and gether the eggs; I want to make +some cake."</p> +<p>Every evening of her life Julia gathered the eggs, and there was +nothing uncommon in Cynthy Ann's making cake, so that nothing could +be more innocent than this request. Julia sat opposite the +front-door, her mother sat farther along. Julia could see the face +of Cynthy Ann. Her mother could only hear the voice, which was dry +and commonplace enough. Julia thought she detected something +peculiar in Cynthy's manner. She would as soon have thought of the +big oak gate-posts with their round ball-like heads telegraphing +her in a sly way, as to have suspected any such craft on the part +of Cynthy Ann, who was a good, pious, simple-hearted, Methodist old +maid, strict with herself, and censorious toward others. But there +stood Cynthy making some sort of gesture, which Julia took to mean +that she was to go quick. She did not dare to show any eagerness. +She laid down her work, and moved away listlessly. And evidently +she had been too slow. For if August had been in sight when Cynthy +Ann called her, he had now disappeared on the other side of the +hill. She loitered along, hoping that he would come in sight, but +he did not, and then she almost smiled to think how foolish she had +been in imagining that Cynthy Ann had any interest in her love +affair. Doubtless Cynthy sided with her mother.</p> +<p>And so she climbed from mow to mow gathering the eggs. No place +is sweeter than a mow, no occupation can be more delightful than +gathering the fresh eggs--great glorious pearls, more beautiful +than any that men dive for, despised only because they are so +common and so useful! But Julia, gliding about noiselessly, did not +think much of the eggs, did not give much attention to the hens +scratching for wheat kernels amongst the straw, nor to the barn +swallows chattering over the adobe dwellings which they were +building among the rafters above her. She had often listened to the +love-talk of these last, but now her heart was too heavy to hear. +She slid down to the edge of one of the mows, and sat there a few +feet above the threshing-floor with her bonnet in her hand, looking +off sadly and vacantly. It was pleasant to sit here alone and +think, without the feeling that her mother was penetrating her +thoughts.</p> +<p>A little rustle brought her to consciousness. Her face was fiery +red in a minute. There, in one corner of the threshing-floor, stood +August, gazing at her. He had come into the barn to find a +single-tree in place of one which had broken. While he was looking +for it, Julia had come, and he had stood and looked, unable to +decide whether to speak or not, uncertain how deeply she might be +offended, since she had never once let her eyes rest on him at +dinner. And when she had come to the edge of the mow and stopped +there in a reverie, August had been utterly spell-bound.</p> +<p>A minute she blushed. Then, perceiving her opportunity, she +dropped herself to the floor and walked up to August.</p> +<p>"August, you are to be turned off to-morrow night."</p> +<p>"What have I done? Anything wrong?"</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>"Why do they send me away?"</p> +<p>"Because--because--" Julia stopped.</p> +<p>But silence is often better than speech. A sudden intelligence +came into the blue eyes of August. "They turn me off because I love +Jule Anderson."</p> +<br> +<a name="031.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/031.jpg"><img src="images/031.jpg" +width="70%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>A LITTLE RUSTLE BROUGHT HER TO CONSCIOUSNESS.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Julia blushed just a little.</p> +<p>"I will love her all the same when I am gone. I will always love +her."</p> +<p>Julia did not know what to say to this passionate speech, so she +contented herself with looking a little grateful and very +foolish.</p> +<p>"But I am only a poor boy, and a Dutchman at that"--he said this +bitterly--"but if you will wait, Jule, I will show them I am of +some account. Not good enough for you, but good enough for +<i>them</i>. You will--"</p> +<p>"I will wait--<i>forever</i>--for <i>you</i>, Gus." Her head was +down, and her voice could hardly be heard. "Good-by." She stretched +out her hand, and he took it trembling.</p> +<p>"Wait a minute." He dropped the hand, and taking a pencil wrote +on a beam:</p> +<p>"March 18th, 1843."</p> +<p>"There, that's to remember the Dutchman by."</p> +<p>"Don't call yourself a Dutchman, August. One day in school, when +I was sitting opposite to you, I learned this definition, 'August: +grand, magnificent,' and I looked at you and said, Yes, that he is. +August is grand and magnificent, and that's what you are. You're +just grand!"</p> +<p>I do not think he was to blame. I am sure he was not +responsible. It was done so quickly. He kissed her forehead and +then her lips, and said good-by and was gone. And she, with her +apron full of eggs and her cheeks very red--it makes one warm to +climb--went back to the house, resolved in some way to thank Cynthy +Ann for sending her; but Cynthy Ann's face was so serious and +austere in its look that Julia concluded she must have been +mistaken, Cynthy Ann couldn't have known that August was in the +barn. For all she said was:</p> +<p>"You got a right smart lot of eggs, didn't you? The hens is +beginnin' to lay more peart since the warm spell sot in."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV."></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2> +<h3>A COUNTER-IRRITANT.</h3> +<br> +<p>"Vot you kits doornt off vor? Hey?"</p> +<p>Gottlieb Wehle always spoke English, or what he called English, +when he was angry.</p> +<p>"Vot for? Hey?"</p> +<p>All the way home from Anderson's on that Saturday night, August +had been, in imagination, listening to the rough voice of his +honest father asking this question, and he had been trying to find +a satisfactory answer to it. He might say that Mr. Anderson did not +want to keep a hand any longer. But that would not be true. And a +young man with August's clear blue eyes was not likely to lie.</p> +<p>"Vot vor ton't you not shpeak? Can't you virshta blain Eenglish +ven you hears it? Hey? You a'n't no teef vot shteels I shposes, unt +you ton't kit no troonks mit vishky? Vot you too tat you pe shamt +of? Pin lazin' rount? Kon you nicht Eenglish shprachen? Oot mit id +do vonst!"</p> +<p>"I did not do anything to be ashamed of," said August. And yet +he looked ashamed.</p> +<p>"You tidn't pe no shamt, hey? You tidn't! Vot vor you loogs so +leig a teef in der bentenshry? Vot for you sprachen not mit me ven +ich sprachs der blainest zort ov Eenglish mit you? You kooms +sneaggin heim Zaturtay nocht leig a tog vots kot kigt, unt's got +his dail dween his leks; and ven I aks you in blain Eenglish vot's +der madder, you loogs zheepish leig, und says you a'n't tun nodin. +I zay you tun sompin. If you a'n't tun nodin den, vy don't you dell +me vot it is dat you has tun? Hey?"</p> +<br> +<a name="036.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/036.jpg"><img src="images/036.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>GOTTLIEB.</b></p> +<br> +<p>All this time August found that it was getting harder and harder +to tell his father the real state of the case. But the old man, +seeing that he prevailed nothing, took a cajoling tone.</p> +<p>"Koom, August, mine knabe, ton't shtand dare leig a vool. Vot +tit Anterson zay ven he shent you avay?"</p> +<p>"He said that I'd been seen a-talking to his daughter, Jule +Anderson."</p> +<p>"Vell, you nebber said no hoorm doo Shule, tid you? If I dought +you said vot you zhoodn't zay doo Shule, I vood shust drash you on +der shpot! Tid you gwarl mit Shule, already?"</p> +<p>"Quarrel with Jule! She's the last person in the world I'd think +of quarreling with. She's as good as--"</p> +<p>"Oh! you pe in lieb mit Shule! You vool, you! Is dat all dat I +raise you vor? I dells you, unt dells you, unt <i>dells</i> you to +sprach nodin put Deutsche, unt to marry a kood Deutsche vrau vot +kood sprach mit you, unt now you koes right shtraight off unt kits +knee-teep in lieb mit a vool of a Yangee kirl! You doo ant pe +doornt off!"</p> +<p>August's countenance brightened. All the way home he had felt +that it was somehow an unpardonable sin to be a Dutchman. Anderson +had spoken hardly to him in dismissing him, and now it was a great +comfort to find that his father returned the contempt of the +Yankees at its full value. All the conceit was not on the side of +the Yankees. It was at least an open question which was the most +disgraced, he or Julia, by their little love affair.</p> +<p>But more comforting still was the quiet look of his sweet-faced +mother, who, moving about among her throng of children like a hen +with more chickens than she can hover<a name= +"FNanchor1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1"><sup>[1]</sup></a>, never +forgot to be patient and affectionate. If there had been a look of +reproach on the face of the mother, it would have been the hardest +trial of all. But there was that in her eyes--the dear Moravian +mother--that gave courage to August. The mother was an outside +conscience, and now as Gottlieb, who had lapsed into German for his +wife's benefit, rattled on his denunciation of this Cannanitish +Yankee, with whom his son was in love, the son looked every now and +then into the eyes, the still German eyes of the mother, and +rejoiced that he saw there no reflection of his father's rebuke. +The older Wehle presently resumed his English, such as it was, as +better adapted to scolding. Whether he thought to make his children +love German by abusing them in English, I do not know, but it was +his habit.</p> +<blockquote><a name="Footnote_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor1">[1]</a> +Not until my attention was called to this word in the proof did I +know that in this sense it is a provincialism. It is so used, at +least in half the country, and yet neither of our American +dictionaries has it.</blockquote> +<p>"I dells you tese Yangees is Yangees. Dere neber voz put shust +von cood vor zompin. Antrew Antershon is von. He shtaid mit us ven +ve vos all zick, unt he is zhust so cood as if he was porn in +Deutschland. Put all de rest is Yangees. Marry a Deutsche vrau +vot's kot cood sense to ede kraut unt shleep unter vedder peds ven +it's kalt. Put shust led de Yangees pe Yangees."</p> +<p>Seeing August put on his hat and go to the door, he called out +testily:</p> +<p>"Vare you koes, already?"</p> +<p>"Over to the castle."</p> +<p>"Veil, das is koot. Ko doo de gassel. Antrew vlll dell you vat +sorts do Yangee kirls pe!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V."></a>CHAPTER V.</h2> +<h3>AT THE CASTLE.</h3> +<br> +<p>By the time August reached Andrew Anderson's castle it was dark. +The castle was built in a hollow, looking out toward the Ohio +River, a river that has this peculiarity, that it is all beautiful, +from Pittsburgh to Cairo. Through the trees, on which the buds were +just bursting, August looked out on the golden roadway made by the +moonbeams on the river. And into the tumult of his feelings there +came the sweet benediction of Nature. And what is Nature but the +voice of God?</p> +<p>Anderson's castle was a large log building of strange +construction. Everything about it had been built by the hands of +Andrew, at once its lord and its architect. Evidently a whimsical +fancy had pleased itself in the construction. It was an attempt to +realize something of medieval form in logs. There were buttresses +and antique windows, and by an ingenious transformation the +chimney, usually such a disfigurement to a log-house, was made to +look like a round donjon keep. But it was strangely composite, and +I am afraid Mr. Ruskin would have considered it somewhat confused; +for while it looked like a rude castle to those who approached it +from the hills, it looked like something very different to those +who approached the front, for upon that side was a portico with +massive Doric columns, which were nothing more nor less than maple +logs. Andrew maintained that the natural form of the trunk of a +tree was the ideal and perfect form of a pillar.</p> +<p>To this picturesque structure, half castle, half cabin, with +hints of church and temple, came August Wehle on Saturday evening. +He did not go round to the portico and knock at the front-door as a +stranger would have done, but in behind the donjon chimney he +pulled an alarm-cord. Immediately the head of Andrew Anderson was +thrust out of a Gothic hole--you could not call it a window. His +uncut hair, rather darker than auburn, fell down to his waist, and +his shaggy red beard lay upon his bosom. Instead of a coat he wore +that unique garment of linsey-woolsey known in the West as wa'mus +(warm us?), a sort of over-shirt. He was forty-five, but there were +streaks of gray in his hair and board, and he looked older by ten +years.</p> +<p>"What ho, good friend? Is that you?" he cried. "Come up, and +right welcome!" For his language was as archaic and perhaps as +incongruous as his architecture. And then throwing out of the +window a rope-ladder, he called out again, "Ascend! ascend! my +brave young friend!"</p> +<p>And young Wehle climbed up the ladder into the large upper room. +For it was one peculiarity of the castle that the upper part had no +visible communication with the lower. Except August, and now and +then a literary stranger, no one but the owner was ever admitted to +the upper story of the house, and the neighbors, who always had +access to the lower rooms, regarded the upper part of the castle +with mysterious awe. August was often plied with questions about +it, but he always answered simply that he didn't think Mr. Anderson +would like to have it talked about. For the owner there must have +been some inside mode of access to the second story, but he did not +choose to let even August know of any other way than that by the +rope-ladder, and the few strangers who came to see his books were +taken in by the same drawbridge.</p> +<br> +<a name="041.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/041.jpg"><img src="images/041.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE CASTLE.</b></p> +<br> +<p>The room was filled with books arranged after whimsical +associations. One set of cases, for instance, was called the +Academy, and into these he only admitted the masters, following the +guidance of his own eccentric judgment quite as much as he followed +traditional estimate. Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Milton of course +had undisputed possession of the department devoted to the "Kings +of Epic," as he styled them. Sophocles, Calderon, Corneille, and +Shakespeare were all that he admitted to his list of "Kings of +Tragedy." Lope he rejected on literary grounds, and Goethe because +he thought his moral tendency bad. He rejected Rabelais from his +chief humorists, but accepted Cervantes, Le Sage, Molière, +Swift, Hood, and the then fresh Pickwick of Boz. To these he added +the Georgia Scenes of Mr. Longstreet, insisting that they were +quite equal to Don Quixote. I can only stop to mention one other +department in his Academy. One case was devoted to the "Best +Stories," and an admirable set they were! I wish that anything of +mine were worthy to go into such company. His purity of feeling, +almost ascetic, led him to reject Boccaccio, but he admitted +Chaucer and some of Balzac's, and Smollett, Goldsmith, and De Foe, +and Walter Scott's best, Irving's Rip Van Winkle, Bernardin St. +Pierre's "Paul and Virginia," and "Three Months under the Snow," +and Charles Lamb's generally overlooked "Rosamund Gray." There were +eases for "Socrates and his Friends," and for other classes. He had +amused himself for years in deciding what books should be +"crowned," as he called it, and what not. And then he had another +case, called "The Inferno." I wish there was space to give a list +of this department. Some were damned for dullness and some for +coarseness. Miss Edgeworth's Moral Tales, Darwin's Botanic Garden, +Rollin's Ancient History, and a hideously illustrated copy of the +Book of Martyrs were in the First-class, Don Juan and some French +novels in the second. Tupper, Swinburne, and Walt Whitman he did +not know.</p> +<p>In the corner next the donjon chimney was a little room with a +small fireplace. Thus the hermit economized wood, for wood meant +time, and time meant communion with his books. All of his domestic +arrangements were carried on after this frugal fashion. In the +little room was a writing-desk, covered with manuscripts and +commonplace books.</p> +<p>"Well, my young friend, you're thrice welcome," said Andrew, who +never dropped his book language. "What will you have? Will you +resume your apprenticeship under Goethe, or shall we canter to +Canterbury with Chaucer? Grand old Dan Chaucer! Or, shall we study +magical philosophy with Roger Bacon--the Friar, the Admirable +Doctor? or read good Sir Thomas More? What would Sir Thomas have +said if he could have thought that he would be admired by two such +people as you and I, in the woods of America, in the nineteenth +century? But you do not want books! Ah! my brave friend, you are +not well. Come into my cell and let us talk. What grieves you?"</p> +<p>And Andrew took him by the hand with the courtesy of a knight, +with the tenderness of a woman, and with the air of an astrologer, +and led him into the apartment of a monk.</p> +<br> +<a name="045.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/045.jpg"><img src="images/045.jpg" +width="35%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE SEDILIUM AT THE CASTLE.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"See!" he said, "I have made a new chair. It is the highest +evidence of my love for my Teutonic friend. You have now a right to +this castle. You shall be perpetually welcome. I said to myself, +German scholarship shall sit there, and the Backwoods Philosopher +will sit here. So sit down on my <i>sedilium</i>, and let us hear +how this uncivil and inconstant world treats you. It can not deal +worse with you than it has with me. But I have had my revenge on +it! I have been revenged! I have done as I pleased, and defied the +world and all its hollow conventionalities." These last words were +spoken in a tone of misanthropic bitterness common to Andrew. His +love for August was the more intense that it stood upon a +background of general dislike, if not for the world, at least for +that portion of it which most immediately surrounded him.</p> +<p>August took the chair, ingeniously woven and built of rye straw +and hickory splints. He knew that all this formality and apparent +pedantry was superficial. He and Andrew were bosom friends, and as +he had often opened his heart to the master of the castle before, +so now he had no difficulty in telling him his troubles, scarcely +heeding the appropriate quotations which Andrew made from time to +time by way of embellishment.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI."></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2> +<h3>THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER.</h3> +<br> +<p>One reason for Andrew's love of August Wehle was that he was a +German. Far from sharing in the prejudices of his neighbors against +foreigners, Andrew had so thorough a contempt for his neighbors, +that he liked anybody who did not belong to his own people. If a +Turk had emigrated to Clark township, Andrew would have fallen in +love with him, and built a divan for his special accommodation. But +he loved August also for the sake of his gentle temper and his +genuine love for books. And only August or August's mother, upon +whom Andrew sometimes called, could exorcise his demon of +misanthropy, which he had nursed so long that it was now hard to +dismiss it.</p> +<p>Andrew Anderson belonged to a class noticed, I doubt not, by +every acute observer of provincial life in this country. In +backwoods and out-of-the-way communities literary culture produces +marked eccentricities in the life. Your bookish man at the West has +never learned to mark the distinction between the world of ideas +and the world of practical life. Instead of writing poems or +romances, he falls to living them, or at least trying to. Add a +disappointment in love, and you will surely throw him into the +class of which Anderson was the representative. For the education +one gets from books is sadly one-sided, unless it be balanced by a +knowledge of the world.</p> +<p>Andrew Anderson had always been regarded as an oddity. A man +with a good share of ideality and literary taste, placed against +the dull background of the society of a Western neighborhood in the +former half of the century, would necessarily appear odd. Had he +drifted into communities of more culture, his eccentricity, +begotten of a sense of superiority to his surroundings, would have +worn away. Had he been happily married, his oddities would have +been softened; but neither of these things happened. He told August +a very different history. For the confidence of his "Teutonic +friend" had awakened in the solitary man a desire to uncover that +story which he had kept under lock and key for so many years.</p> +<p>"Ah! my friend," said he with excitement, "don't trust the faith +of a woman." And then rising from his seat he said, "The Backwoods +Philosopher warns you. I pray you give good heed. I do not know +Julia. She is my niece. It ill becomes me to doubt her sincerity. +But I know whose daughter she is. I pray you give good heed, my +Teutonic friend. <i>I know whose daughter she is</i>!</p> +<p>"I do not talk much. But you have arrived at a critical point--a +point of turning. Out of his own life, out of his own sorrow, the +Backwoods Philosopher warns you. I am at peace now. But look at me. +Do you not see the marks of the ravages of a great storm? A sort of +a qualified happiness I have in philosophy. But what I might have +been if the storm had not torn me to pieces in my youth--what I +might have been, that I am not. I pray you never trust in a woman's +keeping the happiness of your life!"</p> +<br> +<a name="049.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/049.jpg"><img src="images/049.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"LOOK AT ME."</b></p> +<br> +<p>Here Andrew slipped his arm through Wehle's, and began to +promenade with him in the large apartment up and down an alley, +dimly lighted by a candle, between solid phalanxes of books.</p> +<p>"I pray you give good heed," he said, resuming. "I was always +eccentric. People thought I was either a genius or fool. Perhaps I +was much of both. But this is a digression. I did not pay any +attention to women. I shunned them. I said that to be a great +author and a philosophical thinker, one must not be a man of +society. I never went to a wood-chopping, to an apple-peeling, to a +corn-shucking, to a barn-raising, nor indeed to any of our rustic +feasts. I suppose this piqued the vanity of the girls, and they set +themselves to catch me. I suppose they thought that I would be a +trophy worth boasting. I have noticed that hunters estimate game +according to the difficulty of getting it. But this is a +digression. Let us return.</p> +<p>"There came among us, at that time, Abigail Norman. She was +pretty. I swear by all the sacred cats of Egypt, that she was +beautiful. She was industrious. The best housekeeper in the state! +She was high-strung. I liked her all the more for that. You see a +man of imagination is apt to fall in love with a tragedy queen. But +this is a digression. Let us return.</p> +<p>"She spread her toils in my path. While I was wandering through +the woods writing poetry to birds and squirrels, Abby Norman was +ambitious enough to hope to make me her slave, and she did. She +read books that she thought I liked. She planned in various ways to +seem to like what I liked, and yet she had sense enough to differ a +little from me, and so make herself the more interesting. I think a +man of real intellect never likes to have a man or woman agree with +him entirely. But let us return.</p> +<p>"I loved Abigail desperately. No, I did not love Abigail Norman +at all. I did not love her as she was, but I loved her as she +seemed to my imagination to be. I think most lovers love an ideal +that hovers in the air a little above the real recipient of their +love. And I think we men of genius and imagination are apt to love +something very different from the real person, which is +unfortunate.</p> +<p>"But I am digressing again. To return: I wrote poetry to Abby. I +courted her. I cut off my long hair for a woman, like Samson. I +tried to dress more decently, and made myself ridiculous no doubt, +for a man can not dress well unless he has a talent for it. And I +never had a genius for beau-knots.</p> +<p>"But pardon the digression. Let us return. I was to have married +her. The day was set. Then I found accidentally that she was +engaged to my brother Samuel, a young man with better manners than +mind. She made him believe that she was only making a butt of me. +But I think she really loved me more than she knew. When I had +discovered her treachery, I shipped on the first flat-boat. I came +near committing suicide, and should have jumped into the river one +night, only that I thought it might flatter her vanity. I came back +here and ignored her. She broke with Samuel and tried to regain my +affections. I scorned her. I trod on her heart! I stamped her pride +into the dust! I was cruel. I was contemptuous. I was well-nigh +insane. Then she went back to Samuel, and <i>made</i> him marry +her. Then she forced my imbecile old father, on his death-bed, to +will all the property to Samuel, except this piece of rough +hill-land and one thousand dollars. But here I built this castle. +My thousand dollars I put in books. I learned how, to weave the +coverlets of which our country people are so fond, and by this +means, and by selling wood to the steamboats, I have made a living +and bought my library without having to work half of my time. I was +determined never to leave. I swore by all the arms of Vishnu she +should never say that she had driven me away. I don't know anything +about Julia. But I know whose daughter she is. My young friend, +beware! I pray you take good heed! The Backwoods Philosopher warns +you!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII."></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2> +<h3>WITHIN AND WITHOUT.</h3> +<br> +<p>If the gentleman is not born in a man, it can not be bred in +him. If it is born in him, it can not be bred out of him. August +Wehle had inherited from his mother the instinct of true +gentlemanliness. And now, when Andrew relapsed into silence and +abstraction, he did not attempt to rouse him, but bidding him +goodnight, with his own hands threw the rope-ladder out the window +and started up the hollow toward home. The air was sultry and +oppressive, the moon had been engulfed, and the first thunder-cloud +of the spring was pushing itself up toward the zenith, while the +boughs of the trees were quivering with a premonitory shudder. But +August did not hasten. The real storm was within. Andrew's story +had raised doubts. When he went down the ravine the love of Julia +Anderson shone upon his heart as benignly as the moon upon the +waters. Now the light was gone, and the black cloud of a doubt had +shut out his peace. Jule Anderson's father was rich. He had not +thought of it before! But now he remembered how much woodland he +owned and how he had two large farms. Jule Anderson would not marry +a poor boy. And a Dutchman! She was not sincere. She was trifling +with him and teasing her parents. Or, if she were sincere now, she +would not be faithful to him against every tempting offer. And he +would have to drive on the rocks, too, as Andrew had. At any rate, +he would not marry her until he stood upon some sort of equality +with her.</p> +<p>The wind was swaying him about in its fitful gusts, and he +rather liked it. In his anguish of spirit it was a pleasure to +contend with the storm. The wind, the lightning, the sudden sharp +claps of thunder were on his own key. He felt in the temper of old +Lear. The winds might blow and crack their cheeks.</p> +<p>But it was not alone the suggestions of Andrew that aroused his +suspicions. He now recalled a strange statement that Samuel +Anderson made in discharging him. "You said what you had no right +to say about my wife, in talking to Julia." What had he said? Only +that some woman had not treated Andrew "just right." Who the woman +might be he had not known until his present interview with Andrew. +Had Julia been making mischief herself by repeating his words and +giving them a direction he had not intended? He could not have +dreamed of her acting such a part but for the strange influence of +Andrew's strange story. And so he staggered on, wet to the skin, +defying in his heart the lightning and the wind, until he came to +the cabin of his father. Climbing the fence, for there was no gate, +he pulled the latch-string and entered. They were all asleep; the +hard-working family went to bed early. But chubby-faced Wilhelmina, +the favorite sister, had set up to wait for August, and he now +found her fast asleep in the chair.</p> +<p>"Wilhelmina! wake up!" he said.</p> +<p>"O August!" she said, opening the corner of one eye and yawning, +"I wasn't asleep. I only--uh--shut my eyes a minute. How wet you +are! Did you go to see the pretty girl up at Mr. Anderson's?"</p> +<p>"No," said August.</p> +<p>"O August! she is pretty, and she is good and sweet," and +Wilhelmina took his wet checks between her chubby hands and gave +him a sleepy kiss, and then crept off to bed.</p> +<p>And, somehow, the faith of the child Wilhelmina counteracted the +skepticism of the and Andrew, and August felt the storm +subsiding.</p> +<p>When he looked out of the window of the loft in which he slept +the shower had ceased as suddenly as it had come, the thunder had +retreated behind the hills, the clouds were already breaking, and +the white face of the moon was peering through the ragged +rifts.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII."></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> +<h3>FIGGERS WON'T LIE</h3> +<br> +<p>"Figgers won't lie," said Elder Hankins, the Millerite preacher. +"I say figgers won't lie. When a Methodis' talks about fallin' from +grace he has to argy the pint. And argyments can't be depended +'pon. And when a Prisbyterian talks about parseverance he haint got +the absolute sartainty on his side. But figgers won't lie noways, +and it's figgers that shows this yer to be the last yer of the +world, and that the final eend of all things is approachin'. I +don't ask you to listen to no 'mpressions of me own, to no +reasonin' of nobody; all I ask is that you should listen to the +voice of the man in the linen-coat what spoke to Dan'el, and then +listen to the voice of the 'rithmetic, and to a sum in simple +addition, the simplest sort of addition."</p> +<p>All the Millerite preachers of that day were not quite so +illiterate as Elder Hankins, and it is but fair to say that the +Adventists of to-day are a very respectable denomination, doing a +work which deserves more recognition from others than it receives. +And for the delusion which expects the world to come to an end +immediately, the Adventist leaders are not responsible in the first +place. From Gnosticism to Mormonism, every religious delusion has +grown from some fundamental error in the previous religious +teaching of the people. By the narrowly verbal method of reading +the Scripture, so much in vogue in the polemical discussions of the +past generation, and still so fervently adhered to by many people, +the ground was prepared for Millerism. And to-day in many regions +the soil in made fallow for the next fanaticism. It is only a +question of who shall first sow and reap. To people educated as +those who gathered in Sugar Grove school-house had been to destroy +the spirit of the Scripture by distorting the letter in proving +their own sect right, nothing could be so overwhelming as Elder +Hankins's "figgers."</p> +<p>For he had clearly studied figgers to the neglect of the other +branches of a liberal education. His demonstration was printed on a +large chart. He began with the seventy weeks of Daniel, he added in +the "time and times and a half," and what Daniel declared that he +"understood not when he heard," was plain sailing to the +enlightened and mathematical mind of Elder Hankins. When he came to +the thousand two hundred and ninety days, he waxed more exultant +than Kepler in his supreme moment, and on the thousand three +hundred and five and thirty days he did what Jonas Harrison called +"the blamedest tallest cipherin' he'd ever seed in all his born +days."</p> +<p>Jonas was the new hired man, who had stopped into the shoes of +August at Samuel Anderson's. He sat by August and kept up a running +commentary, in a loud whisper, on the sermon, "My feller-citizen," +said Jonas, squeezing August's arm at a climax of the elder's +discourse, "My feller-citizen, looky thar, won't you? He'll cipher +the world into nothin' in no time. He's like the feller that tried +to find out the valoo of a fat shoat when wood was two dollars a +cord. 'Ef I can't do it by substraction I'll do it by +long-division,' says he. And ef this 'rithmetic preacher can't make +a finishment of this sub<i>lu</i>nary speer by addition, he'll do +it by multiplyin'. They's only one answer in his book. Gin him any +sum you please, and it all comes out 1843!"</p> +<p>Now in all the region round about Sugar Grove school-house there +was a great dearth of sensation. The people liked the prospect of +the end of the world because it would be a spectacle, something to +relieve the fearful monotony of their lives. Funerals and weddings +were commonplace, and nothing could have been so interesting to +them as the coming of the end of the world, as described by Elder +Hankins, unless it had been a first-class circus (with two camels +and a cage of monkeys attached, so that scrupulous people might +attend from a laudable desire to see the menagerie!) A murder would +have been delightful to the people of Clark township. It would have +given them something to think and talk about. Into this still pool +Elder Hankins threw the vials, the trumpets, the thunders, the +beast with ten horns, the he-goat, and all the other apocalyptic +symbols understood in an absurdly literal way. The world was to +come to an end in the following August. Here was an excitement, +something worth living for.</p> +<p>All the way to their homes the people disputed learnedly about +the "time and times and a half," about "the seven heads and ten +horns," and the seventh vial. The fierce polemical discussions and +the bold sectarian dogmatism of the day had taught them anything +but "the modesty of true science," and now the unsolvable problems +of the centuries were taken out of the hands of puzzled scholars +and settled as summarily and positively as the relative merits of +"gourd-seed" and "flint" corn. Samuel Anderson had always planted +his corn in the "light" of the moon and his potatoes in the "dark" +of that orb, had always killed his hogs when the moon was on the +increase lest the meat should all go to gravy, and he and his wife +had carefully guarded against the carrying of a hoe through the +house, for fear "somebody might die." Now, the preaching of the +elder impressed him powerfully. His life had always been not so +much a bad one as a cowardly one, and to get into heaven by a six +months' repentance, seemed to him a good transaction. Besides he +remembered that there men were never married, and that there, at +last, Abigail would no longer have any peculiar right to torture +him. Hankins could not have ciphered him into Millerism if his wife +had not driven him into it as the easiest means of getting a +divorce. No doom in the next world could have alarmed him much, +unless it had been the prospect of continuing lord and master of +Mrs. Abigail. And as for that oppressed woman, she was simply +scared. She was quite unwilling to admit the coming of the world's +end so soon. Having some ugly accounts to settle, she would fain +have postponed the payday. Mrs. Anderson might truly have been +called a woman who feared God--she had reason to.</p> +<p>And as for August, he would not have cared much if the world had +come to an end, if only he could have secured one glance of +recognition from the eyes of Julia. But Julia dared not look. The +process of cowing her had gone on from childhood, and now she was +under a reign of terror. She did not yet know that she could resist +her mother. And then she lived in mortal fear of her mother's +heart-disease. By irritating her she might kill her. This dread of +matricide her mother held always over her. In vain she watched for +a chance. It did not come. Once, when her mother's head was turned, +she glanced at August. But he was at that moment listening or +trying to listen to one of Jonas Harrison's remarks. And August, +who did not understand the circumstances, was only able to account +for her apparent coldness on the theory suggested by Andrew's +universal unbelief in women, or by supposing that when she +understood his innocent remark about Andrew's disappointment to +refer to her mother, she had taken offense at it. And so, while the +rest were debating whether the world would come to an end or not, +August had a disconsolate feeling that the end of the world had +already come. And it did not make him feel better to have +Wilhelmina whisper, "Oh! but she <i>is</i> pretty, that Anderson +girl--a'n't she, August?"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX."></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2> +<h3>THE NEW SINGING-MASTER</h3> +<br> +<p>"He sings like an owlingale!"</p> +<p>Jonas Harrison was leaning against the well-curb, talking to +Cynthy Ann. He'd been down to the store at Brayville, he said, a +listenin' to 'em discuss Millerism, and seed a new singing-master +there. "Could he sing good?" Cynthy asked, rather to prolong the +talk than to get information.</p> +<p>"Sings like an owlingale, I reckon. He's got more seals to his +ministry a-hanging onto his watch-chain than I ever seed. Got a +mustache onto the top story of his mouth, somethin' like a tuft of +grass on the roof of a ole shed kitchen. Peart? He's the +peartest-lookin' chap I ever seed. But he a'n't no +singin'-master--not of I'm any jedge of turnips. He warn't born to +sarve his day and generation with a tunin'-fork. I think he's +a-goin' to reckon-water a little in these parts and that he's only +a-playin' singin'-master. He kin play more fiddles'n one, you bet a +hoss! Says he come up here fer his wholesome, and I guess he did. +Think ef he'd a-staid where he was, he mout a-suffered a leetle +from confinement to his room, and that room p'raps not more nor +five foot by nine, and ruther dim-lighted and poor-provisioned, an' +not much chance fer takin' exercise in the fresh air!"</p> +<br> +<a name="064.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/064.jpg"><img src="images/064.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"DON'T BE ONCHARITABLE, JONAS."</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas, don't. We're all mis'able +sinners, I s'pose; and you know charity don't think no evil. The +man may be all right, ef he does wear hair on his lip. Charity +kivers lots a sins."</p> +<p>"Ya-as, but charity don't kiver no wolves with wool. An' ef he +a'n't a woolly wolf they's no snakes in Jarsey, as little Ridin' +Hood said when her granny tried to bite her head off. I'm dead sot +in favor of charity, and mean to gin her my vote at every election, +but I a'n't a-goin' to have her put a blind-bridle on to me. And +when a man comes to Clark township a-wearing straps to his +breechaloons to keep hisself from leaving terry-firmy altogether, +and a weightin' hisself down with pewter watch-seals, gold-washed, +and a cultivating a crap of red-top hay onto his upper lip, and +a-lettin' on to be a singin'-master, I suspicions him. They's too +much in the git-up fer the come-out. Well, here's yer health, +Cynthy!"</p> +<p>And having made this oracular speech and quaffed the hard +limestone water, Jonas hung the clean white gourd from which he had +been drinking, in its place against the well-curb, and started back +to the field, while Cynthy Ann carried her bucket of water into the +kitchen, blaming herself for standing so long talking to Jonas. To +Cynthy everything pleasant had a flavor of sinfulness.</p> +<p>The pail of water was hardly set down in the sink when there +came a knock at the door, and Cynthy found standing by it the +strapped pantaloons, the "red-top" mustache, the watch-seals, and +all the rest that went to make up the new singing-master. He smiled +when he saw her, one of those smiles which are strictly limited to +the lower half of the face, and are wholly mechanical, as though +certain strings inside were pulled with malice aforethought and the +mouth jerked out into a square grin, such as an ingeniously-made +automaton might display.</p> +<p>"Is Mr. Anderson in?"</p> +<p>"No, sir; he's gone to town."</p> +<p>"Is Mrs. Anderson in?"</p> +<p>And so he entered, and soon got into conversation with the lady +of the house, and despite the prejudice which she entertained for +mustaches, she soon came to like him. He smiled so artistically. He +talked so fluently. He humored all her whims, pitied all her +complaints, and staid to dinner, eating her best preserves with a +graciousness that made Mrs. Anderson feel how great was his +condescension. For Mr. Humphreys, the singing-master, had looked at +the comely face of Julia, and looked over Julia's shoulders at the +broad acres beyond; and he thought that in Clark township he had +not met with so fine a landscape, so nice a figure-piece. And with +the quick eye of a man of the world, he had measured Mrs. Anderson, +and calculated on the ease with which he might complete the picture +to suit his taste.</p> +<p>He staid to supper. He smiled that same fascinating square smile +on Samuel Anderson, treated him as head of the house, talked glibly +of farming, and listened better than he talked. He gave no account +of himself, except by way of allusion. He would begin a sentence +thus, "When I was traveling in France with my poor dear mother," +etc., from which Mrs. Anderson gathered that he had been a devoted +son, and then he would relate how he had seen something curious +"when he was dining at the house of the American minister at +Berlin." "This hazy air reminds me of my native mountains in +Northern New York." And then he would allude to his study of music +in the Conservatory in Leipsic. To plain country people in an +out-of-the-way Western neighborhood, in 1843, such a man was better +than a lyceum full of lectures. He brought them the odor of foreign +travel, the flavor of city, the "otherness" that everybody +craves.</p> +<br> +<a name="067.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/067.jpg"><img src="images/067.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE HAWK.</b></p> +<br> +<p>He staid to dinner, as I have said, and to supper. He staid over +night. He took up his board at the house of Samuel Anderson. Who +could resist his entreaty? Did he not assure them that he felt the +need of a home in a cultivated family? And was it not the one +golden opportunity to have the daughter of the house taught music +by a private master, and thus give a special <i>eclat</i> to her +education? How Mrs. Anderson hoped that this superior advantage +would provoke jealous remarks on the part of her neighbors! It was +only necessary to the completion of her triumph that they should +say she was "stuck up." Then, too, to have so brilliant a beau for +Julia! A beau with watch-seals and a mustache, a beau who had been +to Paris with his mother, studied music in the Conservatory at +Leipsic, dined with the American minister in Berlin, and done ever +so many more wonderful things, was a prospect to delight the +ambitious heart of Mrs. Anderson, especially as he flattered the +mother instead of the daughter.</p> +<p>"He's a independent citizen of this Federal Union," said Jonas +to Cynthy, "carries his head like he was intimately 'quainted with +the 'merican eagle hisself. He's playin' this game sharp. He deals +all the trumps to hisself, and most everything besides. He'll carry +off the gal if something don't arrest him in his headlong career. +Jist let me git a chance at him when he's soarin' loftiest into the +amber blue above, and I'll cut his kite-string for him, and let him +fall like fork-ed lightnin' into a mud-puddle."</p> +<p>Cynthy said she did see one great sin that he had committed for +sure. That was the puttin' on of gold and costly apparel. It was +sot down in the Bible and in the Methodist Discipline that it was a +sin to wear gold, and she should think the poor man hadn't no sort +o' regard for his soul, weighing it down with them things.</p> +<p>But Jonas only remarked that he guessed his jewelry warn't no +sin. He didn't remember nothing agin wearin' pewter.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X."></a>CHAPTER X.</h2> +<h3>AN OFFER OF HELP.</h3> +<br> +<p>The singing-master, Mr. Humphreys, went to singing-school and +church with Julia in a matter-of-course way, treating her with +attention, but taking care not to make himself too attentive. +Except that Julia could not endure his smile--which was, like some +joint stock companies, strictly limited--she liked him well enough. +It was something to her, in her monotonous life under the eye of +her mother, who almost never left her alone, and who cut off all +chance for communication with August--it was something to have the +unobtrusive attentions of Mr. Humphreys, who always interested her +with his adventures. For indeed it really seemed that he had had +more adventures than any dozen other men. How should a +simple-hearted girl understand him? How should she read the riddle +of a life so full of duplicity--of <i>multiplicity</i>--as the life +of Joshua Humphreys, the music-teacher? Humphreys intended to make +love to her, but during the first two weeks he only aimed to gain +her esteem. He felt that there was a clue which he had not got. But +at last the key dropped into his hands, and he felt sure that the +unsophisticated girl was in his power.</p> +<p>Among the girls that attended Humphreys's singing-school was +Betsey Malcolm, the near neighbor of the Andersons. The +singing-master often saw her at Mr. Anderson's, and he often wished +that Julia were as easy to win as he felt Betsey to be. The +sensuous mouth, the giddy eyes of Betsey, showed quickly her +appreciation of every flattering attention he paid her, and though +in Julia's presence he was careful how he treated her, yet when he, +walking down the road one day, alone, met her, he courted her +assiduously. He had not to observe any caution in her case. She +greedily absorbed all the flattery he could give, only pettishly +responding after a while: "O dear! that's the way you talk to me, +and that's the way you talk to Jule sometimes, I s'pose. I guess +she don't mind keeping two of you as strings to her bow."</p> +<p>"Two! What do you mean, my fair friend? I havn't seen one, +yet."</p> +<p>"Oh, no! You mean you haven't seen two. You see one whenever you +look in the glass. The other is a Dutchman, and she's dying after +him. She may flirt with you, but her mother watches her night and +day, to keep her from running off with Gus Wehle."</p> +<p>Like many another crafty person, Betsey Malcolm had fairly +overshot the mark. In seeking to separate Humphreys from Julia, she +had given him the clue he desired, and he was not slow to use it, +for he was almost the only person that Mrs. Anderson trusted alone +with Julia.</p> +<p>In the dusk of the evening of the very day of his talk with +Betsey, he sat on the long front-porch with Julia. Julia liked him +better, or rather did not dislike him so much in the dark as she +did in the light. For when it was light she could see him smile, +and though she had not learned to connect a cold-blooded face with +a villainous character, she had that childish instinct which made +her shrink from Humphreys's square smile. It always seemed to her +that the real Humphreys gazed at her out of the cold, glittering +eyes, and that the smile was something with which he had nothing to +do.</p> +<p>Sitting thus in the dusk of the evening, and looking out over +the green pasture to where the nigher hills ceased and the distant +seemed to come immediately after, their distance only indicated by +color, though the whole Ohio "bottom" was between, she forgot the +Mephistopheles who sat not far away, and dreamed of August, the +"grand," as she fancifully called him. And he let her sit and dream +undisturbed for a long time, until the darkness settled down upon +the hills. Then he spoke.</p> +<p>"I--I thought," began Humphreys, with well-feigned hesitancy, "I +thought, I should venture to offer you my assistance as a true and +gallant man, in a matter--a matter of supreme delicacy--a matter +that I have no right to meddle with. I think I have heard that your +mother is not friendly to the suit of a young man who--who--well, +let us say who is not wholly disagreeable to you. I beg your +pardon, don't tell me anything that you prefer to keep locked in +the privacy of your own bosom. But if I can render any assistance, +you know. I have some little influence with your parents, maybe. If +I could be the happy bearer of any communications, command me as +your obedient servant."</p> +<p>Julia did not know what to say. To get a word to August was what +she most desired. But the thought of using Humphreys was repulsive +to her. She could not see his face in the gathering darkness, but +she could <i>feel</i> him smile that same soulless, geometrical +smile. She could not do it. She did not know what to say. So she +said nothing. Humphreys saw that he must begin farther back.</p> +<p>"I hear the young man spoken of as a praiseworthy person. +German, I believe? I have always noticed a peculiar manliness about +Germans. A peculiar refinement, indeed, and a courtesy that is +often wanting in Americans. I noticed this when I was in Leipsic. I +don't think the German girls are quite so refined. German gentlemen +in this country seem to prefer American girls oftentimes."</p> +<p>All this might have sounded hollow enough to a disinterested +listener. To Julia the words were as sweet as the first rain after +a tedious drouth. She had heard complaint, censure, innuendo, and +downright abuse of poor Gus. These were the first generous words. +They confirmed her judgment, they comforted her heart, they made +her feel grateful, even affectionate toward the fop, in spite of +his watch-seals, his curled mustache, his straps, his cold eyes, +and his artificial smile. Poor fool you will call her, and poor +fool she was. For she could have thrown herself at the feet of +Humphreys, and thanked him for his words. Thank him she did in a +stammering way, and he did not hesitate to repeat his favorable +impressions of Germans, after that. What he wanted was, not to +break the hold of August until he had placed himself in a position +to be next heir to her regard.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI."></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2> +<h3>THE COON-DOG ARGUMENT.</h3> +<br> +<p>The reader must understand that all this time Elder Hankins +continued to bombard Clark township with the thunders and +lightnings of the Apocalypse, continued to whirl before the dazed +imaginations of his rustic hearers the wheels within wheels and the +faces of the living creatures of 'Zek'el, continued to cipher the +world out of existence according to formulas in Dan'el, marched out +the he-goat, made the seven heads and ten horns of the beast do +service over and over again. And all the sweet mysteries of +Oriental imagery, the mystic figures which unexpounded give so +noble a depth to the perspective of Scripture, were cut to pieces, +pulled apart, and explained, as though they were tricks of +legerdemain. Julia was powerfully impressed, not by the +declamations of Hankins, for she had sensibility enough to recoil +from his vivisection of Scripture, though she had been all her life +accustomed to hear it from other than Millerites, but she was +profoundly affected by the excitement about her. Her father, +attracted in part by the promise that there should be no marrying +there, had embraced Millerism with all his heart, and was in such a +state of excitement that he could not attend to his business. Mrs. +Anderson was in continual trepidation about it, though she tried +not to believe it. She was on the point of rebelling and declaring +that the world <i>should</i> not come to an end. But on the whole +she felt that the government of the universe was one affair in +which she would have to give up all hope of having her own way. +Meantime there was no increase of religion. Some were frightened +out of their vices for a time, but a passionate terror of that sort +is the worst enemy of true piety.</p> +<p>"Fer my part," said Cynthy Ann, as she walked home with Jonas, +"fer my part, I don't believe none of his nonsense. John Wesley" +(Jonas was a New-Light, and Cynthy always talked to him about +Wesley) "knowed a heap more about Scripter than all the Hankinses +and Millerses that ever was born, and he knowed how to cipher, too, +I 'low. Why didn't he say the world was goin' to wind up? An' our +persidin' elder is a heap better instructed than Hankins, and he +says God don't tell nobody when the world's goin' to wind up."</p> +<p>"Goin' to run down, you mean, Cynthy Ann. 'Kordin' to Hankins +it's a old clock gin out in the springs, I 'low. How does Hankins +know that 'Zek'el's livin' creeters means one thing more'n another? +He talks about them wheels as nateral as ef he was a wagon-maker +fixin' a ole buggy. He says the thing's a gone tater; no more craps +of corn offen the bottom land, no more electin' presidents of this +free and glorious Columby, no more Fourths, no more shootin' +crackers nor spangled banners, no more nothin'. He ciphers and +ciphers, and then spits on his slate and wipes us all out. Whenever +Gabr'el blows I'll b'lieve it, but I won't take none o' Hankins's +tootin' in place of it. I shan't git skeered at no tin-horns, and +as for papaw whistles, why, I say Jericho wouldn't a-tumbled for no +sech music, and they won't fetch down no stars that air way."</p> +<p>Here old Gottlieb Wehle, who had just joined the Millerites, +came up. "Yonas, you mags shport of de Piple. Ef dem vaces in der +veels, and dem awvool veels in der veels, and dem figures vot +always says aideen huntert vordy dree, ef dem tond mean sompin +awvool, vot does dey mean? Hey?"</p> +<p>"My venerated friend and feller-citizen of forren birth," said +Jonas, "you hit the nail on the crown of the head squar, with the +biggest sort ov a sledge-hammer. You gripped a-holt of the truth +that air time like the American bird a-grippin' the arries on the +shield. What do they mean? That's jest the question, and you +Millerites allers argies like the man who warranted his dog to be a +good coon-dog, bekase he warn't good fer nothin' else under the +amber blue. Now, my time-honored friend and beloved German voter, +jest let me tell you that <i>on the coon-dog principle</i> you +could a-wound up the trade and traffic of this airth any time. Fer +ef they don't mean 1843, what do they mean? Why, 1842 or 1844, of +course. You don't come no coon-dog argyments over me, not while I +remain sound in wind and limb."</p> +<p>"Goon-tog! Who zed goon-tog? Ich tidn't, Hankins tidn't, +Ze'kel's wision tidn't zay nodin pout no goon-tog. What's goon-togs +cot do too mit de end of de vorld? Yonas, you pe a vool, +maype."</p> +<p>"The same to yerself, my beloved friend and free and enlightened +feller-citizen. Long may you wave, like a green bay boss, and a +jimson-weed on the sunny side of a board-fence!"</p> +<p>Gottlieb hurried on, finding Jonas much harder to understand +than the prophecies.</p> +<p>"I hear the singing-master is goin' to jine," said Cynthy Ann. +"Wonder ef they'll take him with all his seals and straps, and hair +on his upper lip, with the plain words of the Bible agin gold and +costly apparel? Wonder ef he's tuck in, too?"</p> +<p>"Tuck in? He an't one of that kind. He don't never git tuck +in--he tucks in. He knows which side of his bread's got quince +preserves onto it. I used to run second mate on the Dook of +Orleans, and I know his kind. He'll soar around like a +turkey-buzzard fer a while. Presently he'll 'light. He's +rusticatin' tell some scrape blows over. An' he'll make somethin' +outen it. Business afore pleasure is his motto. He don't hang that +seducin' grin under them hawky eyes fer nothin'. Wait till the +pious and disinterested example 'lights somewheres. Then look out +for the feathers, won't ye! He won't leave nary bone. But here we +air. I declare, Cynthy, this walk seems <i>the shortest</i>, when +I'm in superfine, number-one comp'ny!"</p> +<p>Cynthy was so pleased with this remark, that she did penance in +her mind for a week afterwards. It was so wicked to enjoy one's +self out of class-meeting!</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII."></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2> +<h3>TWO MISTAKES.</h3> +<br> +<p>At the singing-school and at the church August waited as +impatiently as possible for some sign of recognition from Julia. He +little knew the fear that beset her. Having seen her hysterical +mother prostrated for weeks by the excitement of a dispute with her +father, it seemed to her that if she turned one look of love and +longing toward young Wehle, whose sweet German voice rang out above +the rest in the hymns, she might kill her mother as quickly as by +plunging a knife into her heart. The steam-doctor, who was the +family physician, had warned her and her father separately of the +danger of exciting Mrs. Anderson's most excitable temper, and now +Julia was the slave of her mother's disease. That lucky hysteria, +which the steam-doctor thought a fearful heart-disease, had given +Mrs. Abigail the whip-hand of husband and daughter, and she was not +slow to know her advantage, using her heart in a most heartless +way.</p> +<p>August could not blame Julia for not writing, for he had tried +to break the blockade by a letter sent through Jonas and Cynthy +Ann, but the latter had found herself so well watched that the note +oppressed her conscience and gave a hangdog look to her face for +two weeks before she got it out of her pocket, and then she put it +under the pillow of Julia's bed, and had reason to believe that the +suspicious Mrs. Anderson confiscated it within five minutes. For +the severity of maternal government was visibly increased +thereafter, and Julia received many reminders of her ingratitude +and of her determination to kill her self-sacrificing mother by her +stubbornness.</p> +<p>"Well," Mrs. Anderson would say, "it's all one to me whether the +world comes to an end or not. I should like to live to see the day +of judgment. But I shan't. No affectionate mother can stand such +treatment as I receive from my own daughter. If Norman was only at +home!"</p> +<p>It is proper to explain here that Norman was her son, in whom +she took a great deal of comfort when he was away, and whom she +would have utterly spoiled by indulgence if he had not been born +past spoiling. He was the only person to whom she was indulgent, +and she was indulgent to him chiefly because he was so weak of will +that there was not much glory in conquering him, and because her +indulgence to him was a rod of affliction to the rest of her +family.</p> +<p>Failing to open communication through Jonas and Cynthy Ann, +August found himself in a desperate strait, and with an impatience +common to young men he unhappily had recourse to Betsey Malcolm. +She often visited Julia, and twice, when Julia was not at meeting, +he went home with the ingenuous Betsey, who always pretended to +have something to tell him "about Jule," and who yet, for the pure +love of mischief-making, tried to make him think as poorly as +possible of Julia's sincerity, and who, from pure love of +flirtation, puckered her red lips, and flashed at him with her +sensuous eyes, and sighed and blushed, or rather flushed, while she +sympathized with him in a way that might have been perilous if he +had been an American instead of a constant-hearted "Dutchman," +wholly absorbed with the image of Julia. But, so far as carrying +messages was concerned, Betsey was certainly a non-conductor. She +professed never to be able to run the blockade with any +communication of his. She said to herself that she wasn't going to +help Jule Anderson to keep <i>all</i> the beaus. She meant to +capture one or the other of them if she could. And, indeed, she did +not dream how grievous was the wrong she did. For she could +appreciate no other feeling in the matter than vanity, and she +could not see any particular harm in "taking Jule Anderson down a +peg." And so she assured the anxious and already suspicious August +that if she was in his place she should want that singing-master +out of the way. "Some girls can't stand people that wear jewelry +and mustaches and straps and such things. And Mr. Humphreys is very +careful of her, won't let her sit too late on the porch, and is +very comforting in his way of talking to her. And she seems to like +it. I tell you what it is, Gus "--and she looked at him so +bewitchingly that the pure and sensitive August blushed, he could +hardly tell why--"I tell you Jule's a nice girl, and got a nice +property back of her, and I hope she won't act like her mother. +And, indeed, I can't hardly believe she will, though the way she +eyes that Humphreys makes me mad." She had suggested the old doubt. +A doubt is dangerous when its face grows familiar, and one +recognizes the "Monsieur Tonson come again."</p> +<p>And all the message the disinterested and benevolent Betsey bore +to Julia was to tell her exultingly that Gus had twice walked home +with her. And they had had such a nice time! And Julia, girl that +she was, declared indignantly that she didn't care whom he went +with; though she did care, and her eyes and face said so. Thus the +tongue sometimes lies--or seems to lie--when the whole person is +telling the truth. The only excuse for the tongue is that it will +not be believed, and it knows that it will not be believed! It only +speaks diplomatically, maybe. But diplomatic talking is bad. Better +the truth. If Jule had known that her words would be reported to +August, she would have bitten out her tongue rather than to have +let it utter words that were only the cry of her wounded pride. Of +course Betsey met August in the road the next morning, in a quiet +hollow by the brook, and told him, sympathizingly, almost +affectionately, that she had begun to talk to Julia about him, and +that Jule had said she didn't care. So while Julia uttered a lie +she spoke the truth, and while. Betsey uttered the truth she spoke +a lie, willful, malicious, and wicked.</p> +<p>Now, in the mean time, Julia, on her side, had tried to open +communication through the only channel that offered itself. She did +not attempt it by means of Betsey, because, being a woman, she felt +instinctively that Betsey was not to be trusted. But there was only +one other to whom she was allowed to speak, except under a +supervision as complete as it was unacknowledged. That other was +Mr. Humphreys. He evinced a constant interest in her affairs, +avowing that he always did have a romantic desire to effect the +union of suitable people, even though it might pain his heart a +little to see another more fortunate than himself. Julia had given +up all hope of communicating by letter, and she could not bring +herself to make any confessions to a man who had such a smile and +such eyes, but to a generous proposition of Mr. Humphreys that he +should see August and open the way for any communication between +them, she consented, scarcely concealing her eagerness.</p> +<p>August was not in a mood to receive Humphreys kindly. He hated +him by intuition, and a liking for him had not been begotten by +Betsey's assurances that he was making headway with Julia. August +was riding astride a bag of corn on his way to mill, when +Humphreys, taking a walk, met him.</p> +<p>"A pleasant day, Mr. Wehle!"</p> +<p>"Yes," said August, with a courtesy as mechanical as Humphreys's +smile.</p> +<p>The singing-master was rather pleased than otherwise to see that +August disliked him. It suited his purpose, just now to gall Wehle +into saying what he would not otherwise have said.</p> +<p>"I hear you are in trouble," he proceeded.</p> +<p>"How so?"</p> +<p>"Oh! I hear that Mrs. Anderson doesn't like Dutchmen." The smile +now seemed to have something of a sneer in it.</p> +<p>"I don't know that that is your affair," said August, all his +suspicions, by a sort of "resolution of force," changing into +anger.</p> +<p>"Oh! I beg pardon," with a tone half-mocking. "I did not know +but I might help settle matters. I think I have Mrs. Anderson's +confidence; and I know that I have Miss Anderson's confidence in an +unusual degree. I think a great deal of her. And she thinks me +<i>her friend</i> at least. I thought that there might be some +little matters yet unsettled between you two, and she suggested +that maybe there might be something you would like to say, and that +if you would say it to me, it would be all the same as if it were +said to her. She considers that in the relation I bear to her and +the family, a message delivered to me is the same in effect as if +given to her. I told her I did not think you would, as a gentleman, +wish to hold her to any promises that might be irksome to her +now."</p> +<p>These words were spoken with a coolness and maliciousness of +good-nature quite devilish, and August's fist involuntarily doubled +itself to strike him, if only to make him cease smiling in that +villainous rectangular way. But he checked himself.</p> +<p>"You are a puppy. Tell <i>that</i> to Jule, if you choose. I +shall send her a release from all obligations, but not by the hand +of a rascal!"</p> +<p>Like all desperadoes, Humphreys was a coward. He could shoot, +but he could not fight, and just now he was affecting the pious or +at least the high moral role, and had left his pistols, +brandy-flasks, and the other necessary appurtenances of a +gentleman, locked in his trunk. Besides it would not at all have +suited his purpose to shoot. So in lieu of shooting he only smiled, +as August rode off, that same old geometric smile, the elements of +which were all calculated. He seemed incapable of any other facial +contortion. It expressed one emotion, indeed, about as well as +another, and was therefore as convenient as those pocket-knives +which affect to contain a chest of tools in one.</p> +<br> +<a name="085.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/085.jpg"><img src="images/085.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"TELL THAT TO JULE."</b></p> +<br> +<p>Julia was already stung to jealousy by Betsey Malcolm's +mischief-making, and it did not require much more to put her into a +frenzy. As they walked home from meeting the next night--they had +meeting all nights now, the world would soon end and there was so +much to be done--as they walked home Humphreys contrived to +separate Julia from the rest, and to tell her that he had had a +conversation with young Wehle.</p> +<p>"It was painful, very painful," he said, "I think I had better +not say any more about it."</p> +<p>"Why?" asked Julia in terror.</p> +<p>"Well, I feel that your grief is mine. I have never felt so much +interest in any one before, and I must say that I was grievously +disappointed. This young man is not at all worthy of you."</p> +<p>"What do you mean?" And there was a trace of indignation in her +tone.</p> +<p>"It does seem to me that the man who has your love should be the +happiest in the world; but he refused to send you any message, and +says that he will soon send you an entire release from all +engagement to him. He showed no tenderness and made no +inquiry."</p> +<p>The weakest woman and the strongest can faint. It is a woman's +last resort. When all else is gone, that remains. Julia drew a +sharp quick breath, and was just about to become unconscious. +Humphreys stretched his arms to catch her, but the sudden +recollection that in case she fainted he would carry her into the +house, produced a reaction. She released herself from his grasp, +and hurried in alone, locking her door, and refusing admittance to +her mother. From Humphreys, who had put himself into a delicate +minor key, Mrs. Anderson got such an account of the conversation as +he thought best to give. She then opened and read a note placed +into her hand by a neighbor as she came out from meeting. It was +addressed to Julia, and ran:</p> +<p>"If all they say is true, you have quickly changed. I do not +hold you by any promises you wish to break.</p> +<p>"AUGUST WEHLE."</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson had no pity. She hesitated not an instant. Julia's +door was fast. But she went out upon the front upper porch, and +pushing up the window of her daughter's room as remorselessly as +she had committed the burglary on her private letter, she looked at +her a moment, sobbing on the bed, and then threw the letter into +the room, saying: "It's good for you. Read that, and see what a +fellow your Dutchman is."</p> +<p>Then Mrs. Anderson sought her couch, and slept with a serene +sense, of having done <i>her</i> duty as a mother, whatever might +be the result.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII."></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h2> +<h3>THE SPIDER SPINS.</h3> +<br> +<p>Julia got up from her bed the moment that her mother had gone. +Her first feeling was that her privacy had been shamefully +outraged. A true mother should honorably respect the reserve of the +little child. But Julia was now a woman, grown, with a woman's +spirit. She rose from her bed, and shut her window with a bang that +was meant to be a protest. She then put the tenpenny nail sometimes +used to fasten the window down, in its place, as if to say, "Come +in, if you can." Then she pulled out the folds of the chintz +curtain, hanging on its draw-string half-way up the window. If +there had been any other precaution possible, she would have taken +it. But there was not.</p> +<p>She took up the note, and read it. Julia was not a girl of keen +penetration. Her training was that of a country life. She did not +read between the lines of August's note, and could only understand +that she was dismissed. Outraged by her mother's tyranny, spurned +by her lover, she stood like a hunted creature, brought to bay, +looking for the last desperate chance for escape.</p> +<p>Crushed? No. If she had been weaker, if she had been of the +quieter, frailer sort, instead of being, as she was, elastic, +impulsive, recuperative, she might have been crushed. She was +wounded in her heart of hearts, but all her pride and hardihood, of +which she had not a little, had now taken up arms against +outrageous fortune. She was stung at every thought of August and +his letter, of Betsey Malcolm and her victory, of the fact that her +mother had read the letter and knew of her humiliation. And she +paced the floor of her room, and resolved to resist and to be +revenged. She would marry anybody, that she might show Betsey and +August they had not broken he heart and that her love did not go +begging.</p> +<p>O Julia! take care. Many another woman has jumped off that +precipice!</p> +<p>And she would escape from her mother. The indications of +affection adroitly given by Humphreys were all remembered now. She +could have him, and she would. He would take her to Cincinnati. She +would have her revenge all around. I am sorry to show you my +heroine in this mood. But the fairest climes are sometimes subject +to the fiercest hurricanes, the frightfulest earthquakes!</p> +<p>After an hour the room seemed hot. She pulled back the chintz +curtain and pushed up the window. The blue-grass in the pasture +looked cool as it drank the heavy dews. She climbed through the +window on to the long, old-fashioned upper porch. She sat down upon +an old-fashioned settee with rockers, and began to rock. The motion +relieved her nervousness and fanned her hot cheeks. Yes, she would +accept the first respectable lover that offered. She would go to +the city with Humphreys, if he asked her. It is only fair to say +that Julia did not at all consider--she was not in a temper to +consider--what a marriage with Humphreys implied. She only thought +of it on two sides--the revenge upon August and Betsey, and the +escape from a thralldom now grown more bitter than death. True, her +conscience was beginning to awaken, and to take up arms against her +resolve. But nothing could be plainer. In marrying Mr. Humphreys +she should marry a friend, the only friend she had. In marrying him +she would satisfy her mother, and was it not her duty to sacrifice +something to her mother's happiness, perhaps her mother's life?</p> +<br> +<a name="091.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/091.jpg"><img src="images/091.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>TEMPTED.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Yes, yes, Julia, a false spirit of self-sacrifice is another +path over the cliff! In such a mood as this all paths lead into the +abyss.</p> +<p>Her mind was made up. She braced her will against all the +relentings of her heart. She wished that Humphreys, who had +indirectly declared his love so often, were there to offer at once. +She would accept him immediately, and then the whole neighborhood +should not say that she had been deserted by a Dutchman. For in her +anger she found her mother's epithets expressive.</p> +<p>He was there! Was it the devil that planned it? Does he plan all +those opportunities for wrong that are so sure to offer themselves? +Humphreys, having led a life that turned night into day, sat at the +farther end of the long upper porch, smoking his cigar, waiting a +bed-time nearer to the one to which he was accustomed.</p> +<p>Did he suspect the struggle in the heart of Julia Anderson? Did +he guess that her pride and defiance had by this time reached +high-water mark? Did he divine this from seeing her there? He rose +and started in through the door of the upper hall, the only opening +to the porch, except the window. But this was a feint. He turned +back and sat himself down upon the farther end of the settee from +Julia. He understood human nature perfectly, and had had long +practice in making gradual approaches. He begged her pardon for the +bungling manner in which he had communicated intelligence that must +be so terrible to a heart so sensitive! Julia was just going to +declare that she did not care anything for what August said or +thought, but her natural truthfulness checked the transparent +falsehood. She had not gone far enough astray to lie consciously; +she was, as yet, only telling lies to herself. Very gradually and +cautiously did he proceed so as not to "flush the bird." Even as I +saw, an hour ago, a cat creep upon a sparrow with fascinating eyes, +and a waving, snake-like motion of the tail, and a treacherous +feline smile upon her face, even so, cautiously and by degrees, +Humphreys felt his way with velvet paws toward his prey. He knew +the opportunity, that once gone might not come again; he soon +guessed that this was the hour and power of darkness in the soul of +Julia, the hour in which she would seek to flee from her own pride +and mortification. And if Humphreys knew how to approach with a +soft tread, very slowly and cautiously, he also knew--men of his +"profession" always know--when to spring. He saw the moment, he +made the spring, he seized the prey.</p> +<p>"Will you trust your destiny to me, Miss Anderson? You seem +beset by troubles. I have means. I could not but he wholly devoted +to your welfare. Let me help you to flee away from--from all this +mortification, and this--this domestic tyranny. Will you intrust +yourself to me?"</p> +<p>He did not say anything about love. He had an instinctive +feeling that it would not be best. She felt herself environed with +insurmountable difficulties, threatened with agonies worse than +death--so they seemed to her. He simply, coolly opened the door, +and bade her easily and triumphantly escape. Had he said one word +of tenderness the reaction must have set in.</p> +<p>She was silent.</p> +<p>"I did hope, by sacrificing all my own hopes, to effect a +reconciliation. But when that young man spoke insulting words about +you, I determined at once to offer you my devoted protection. I ask +no more than you are able to give, your respect Will you accept my +life-long protection as your husband?"</p> +<p>"Yes!" said the passionate girl in an agony of despair</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV."></a>CHAPTER XIV.</h2> +<h3>THE SPIDER'S WEB.</h3> +<br> +<p>Now that Humphreys had his prey he did not know just what to do +with it. Not knowing what to say, he said nothing, in which he +showed his wisdom. But he felt that saying nothing was almost as +bad as saying something. And he was right. For with people of +impulsive temperament reactions are sudden, and in one minute after +Julia had said yes, there came to her memory the vision of August +standing in the barn and looking into her eyes so purely and truly +and loyally, and vowing such sweet vows of love, and she looked +back upon that perfect hour with some such fooling perhaps as Dives +felt looking out of torment across the great gulf into paradise. +Only that Dives had never known paradise, while she had. For the +man or woman that knows a pure, self-sacrificing love, returned in +kind, knows that which, of all things in this world, lies nearest +to God and heaven. There be those who have ears to hear this, and +for them is it written. Julia thought of August's love with a +sinking into despair. But then returned the memory of his +faithlessness, of all she had been compelled to believe and suffer. +Then her agony came back, and she was glad that she had taken a +decided step. Any escape was a relief. I suppose it is under some +such impulse that people kill themselves. Julia felt as though she +had committed suicide and escaped.</p> +<p>Humphreys on his part was not satisfied. I used the wrong figure +of speech awhile ago. He was not a cat with paw upon the prey. He +was only an angler, and had but hooked his fish. He had not landed +it yet. He felt how slender was the thread of committal by which he +held Julia. August had her heart. He had only a word. The slender +vantage that he had, he meant to use adroitly, craftily. And he +knew that the first thing was to close this interview without +losing any ground. The longer she remained bound, the better for +him. And with his craft against the country girl's simplicity it +would have fared badly with Julia had it not been for one defect +which always inheres, in a bad man's plots in such a case. A man +like Humphreys never really understands a pure woman. Certain +detached facts he may know, but he can not "put himself in her +place."</p> +<p>Humphreys remarked with tenderness that Julia must not stay in +the night air. She was too precious to be exposed. This flattery +was comforting to her wounded pride, and she found his words +pleasant to her. Had he stopped here he might have left the field +victorious. But it was very hard for an affianced lover to stop +here. He must part from her in some other way than this if he would +leave on her mind the impression that she was irrevocably bound to +him. He stooped quickly with a well-affected devotion and lifted +her hand to kiss it. That act awakened Julia Anderson. She must +have awaked anyhow, sooner or later. But when one is in the toils +of such a man, sooner is better. The touch of Humphreys's hand and +lips sent a shudder through her frame that Humphreys felt. +Instantly there came to her a perception of all that marriage with +a repulsive man signifies.</p> +<p>Not suicide, but perdition.</p> +<p>She jerked her hand from his as though he were a snake.</p> +<p>"Mr. Humphreys, what did I say? I can't have you. I don't love +you. I'm crazy to-night. I must take back what I said."</p> +<p>"No, Julia. Let me call you <i>my</i> Julia. You must not break +my heart." Humphreys had lost his cue, and every word of tenderness +he spoke made his case more hopeless.</p> +<p>"I never can marry you--let me go in," she said, brushing past +him. Then she remembered that her door was fast on the inside. She +had climbed out the window. She turned back, and he saw his +advantage.</p> +<p>"I can not release you. Take time to think before you ask it. Go +to sleep now and do not act hastily." He stood between her and the +window, wishing to get some word to which he could hold.</p> +<p>Julia's two black eyes grew brighter. "I see. You took advantage +of my trouble, and you want to hold me to my words, and you are +bad, and now--<i>now</i> I hate you!" Then Julia felt better. Hate +is the only wholesome thing in such a case. She pushed him aside +vigorously, stepped upon the settee, slipped in at the window, and +closed it. She drew the curtain, but it seemed thin, and with +characteristic impulsiveness she put out her light that she might +have the friendly drapery of darkness about her. She heard the +soft--for the first time it seemed to her stealthy--tread of +Humphreys, as he returned to his room. Whether she swooned or +whether she slept after that she never knew. It was morning without +any time intervening, she had a headache and could scarcely walk, +and there was August's note lying on the floor. She read it +again--if not with more intelligence, at least with more suspicion. +She wondered at her own hastiness. She tried to go about the house, +but the excitement of the previous night, added to all she had +suffered beside, had given her a headache, blinding and paralyzing, +that sent her back to bed.</p> +<br> +<a name="097.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/097.jpg"><img src="images/097.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"NOW I HATE YOU!"</b></p> +<br> +<p>And there she lay in that half-asleep, half-awake mood, which a +nervous headache produces. She seemed to be a fly in a web, and the +spider was trying to fasten her. A very polite spider, with that +smile which went half-way up his face but which never seemed able +to reach his eyes. He had straps to his pantaloons, and a reddish +mustache, and she shuddered as he wound his fine webs about her. +She tried to shake off the illusion. But the more absurd an +illusion, the more it will not be shaken off. For see! the spider +was kissing her hand! Then she seemed to have made a great effort +and to have broken the web. But her wings were torn, and her feet +were shackled by the fine strands that still adhered. She could not +get them off. Wouldn't somebody help her, even as she had many a +time picked off the webs from a fly's feet out of sheer pity? And +all day she would perpetually return into these half-conscious +states and feel the spider's web about her feet, and ask over and +over again if somebody wouldn't help her to get out of the +meshes.</p> +<p>Toward evening her mother brought her a cup of tea and a piece +of toast, and for the first time in the remembered life of the +daughter made an endeavor to show a little tenderness for her. It +was a clumsy endeavor, for when the great gulf is once fixed +between mother and child it is with difficulty bridged. And finding +herself awkward in the new role, Mrs. Anderson dropped it and +resumed her old gait, remarking, as she closed the door, that she +was glad to know that Julia was coming to her senses, and "had took +the right road." For Mrs. Abigail was more vigorous than +grammatical.</p> +<p>Julia did not see anything significant in this remark at first. +But after a while it came to her that Humphreys must have told her +mother of something that had passed during the preceding night, +something on which this commendation was founded. Then she fell +into the same torpor and was in the same old spider's web, and +there was the same spider with the limited smile and the mustache +and the watch-seals and the straps! And he was trying to fasten +her, and she said "yes." And she could see the little word. The +spider caught it and spun it into a web and fastened her with it. +And she could break all the other webs but those woven out of that +one little word from her own lips. That clung to her, and she could +neither fly nor walk. August could not help her--he would not come. +Her mother was helping the spider. Just then Cynthy Ann came along +with her broom. Would she see her and sweep her free? She tried to +call her, but alas! she was a fly. She tried to buzz, but her wings +were fast bound with the webs. She was being smothered. The spider +had seized her. She could not move. He was smiling at her!</p> +<p>Then she woke shuddering. It was after midnight.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV."></a>CHAPTER XV.</h2> +<h3>THE WEB BROKEN.</h3> +<br> +<p>"Poverty," says Béranger, "is always superstitious." So +indeed is human extremity of any sort. Julia's healthy constitution +had resisted the threatened illness, the feverishness had gone with +the headache. She felt now only one thing: she must have a friend. +But the hard piousness of Cynthy Ann's face had never attracted her +sympathy. It had always seemed to her that Cynthy disapproved of +her affection quite as much as her mother did. Cynthy's face had +indeed a chronic air of disapproval. A nervous young minister said +that he never had any "liberty" when sister Cynthy Ann was in his +congregation. She seemed averse to all he said.</p> +<p>But now Julia felt that there was just one chance of getting +advice and help. Had she not in her dream seen Cynthy Ann with a +broom? She would ask help from Cynthy Ann. There must be a heart +under her rind.</p> +<p>But to get to her. Her mother's affectionate vigilance never +left her alone with Cynthy. Perhaps it was this very precaution +that had suggested Cynthy Ann to her as a possible ally. She must +contrive to have a talk with her somehow. But how? There was one +way. Black-eyed people do not delay. Bight or wrong, Julia acted +with sharp decision. Before she had any very definite view of her +plan, she had arisen and slipped on a calico dress. But there was +one obstacle. Mr. Humphreys kept late hours, and he might be on the +front-porch. She might meet him in the hall, and this seemed worse +to her than would the chance of meeting a tribe of Indians. She +listened and looked out of her window; but she could not be sure; +she would run the risk. With silent feet and loud-beating heart she +went down the hall to the back upper porch, for in that day porches +were built at the back and front of houses, above and below. Once +on the back-porch she turned to the right and stood by Cynthy Ann's +door. But a new fear took possession of her. If Cynthy Ann should +be frightened and scream!</p> +<br> +<a name="102.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/102.jpg"><img src="images/102.jpg" +width="35%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>AT CYNTHY'S DOOR.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!" she said, standing by the bed in the +little bare room which Cynthy Ann had occupied, for five years, but +into which she had made no endeavor to bring one ray of sentiment +or one trace of beauty.</p> +<p>"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!"</p> +<p>Had Cynthy Ann slept anywhere but in the L of the house, her +shriek--what woman could have helped shrieking a little when +startled?--her shriek must have alarmed the family. But it did not. +"Why, child! what are you doing here? You are out of your head, and +you must go back to your room at once." And Cynthy had arisen and +was already tugging at Julia's arm.</p> +<p>"I a'n't out of my head, Cynthy Ann, and I <i>won't</i> go back +to my room--not until I have had a talk with you."</p> +<p>"What <i>is</i> the matter, Jule?" said Cynthy, sitting on the +bed and preparing to begin again her old fight between duty and +inclination. Cynthy always expected temptation. She had often said +in class-meeting that temptations abounded on every hand, and as +soon as Julia told her she had a communication to make, Cynthy Ann +was sure that she would find in it some temptation of the devil to +do something she "hadn't orter do," according to the Bible or the +Dis<i>cip</i>line, strictly construed. And Cynthy was a "strict +constructionist."</p> +<p>Julia did not find it so easy to say anything now that she had +announced herself as determined to have a conversation and now that +her auditor was waiting. It is the worst beginning in the world for +a conversation, saying that you intend to converse. When an Indian +has announced his intention of having a "big talk," he immediately +lights his pipe and relapses into silence until the big talk shall +break out accidentally and naturally. But Julia, having neither the +pipe nor the Indian's stolidity, found herself under the necessity +of beginning abruptly. Every minute of delay made her position +worse. For every minute increased her doubt of Cynthy Ann's +sympathy.</p> +<p>"O Cynthy Ann! I'm so miserable!"</p> +<p>"Yes, I told your ma this morning that you was looking mis'able, +and that you had orter have sassafras to purify the blood, but your +ma is so took up with steam-docterin' that she don't believe in +nothin' but corn-sweats and such like."</p> +<p>"Oh! but, Cynthy, it a'n't that. I'm miserable in my mind. I +wish I knew what to do."</p> +<p>"I thought you'd made up your mind. Your ma told me you was +engaged to Mr. Humphreys."</p> +<p>Julia was appalled. How fast the spider spins his web!</p> +<p>"I a'n't engaged to him, and I hate him. He got me to say yes +when I was crazy, and I believe he brought about the things that +make me feel so nigh crazy. Do you think he's a good man, Cynthy +Ann?"</p> +<p>"Well, no, though I don't want to set in no jedgment on nobody; +but I don't see as how as he kin be good and wear all of them +costly apparels that's so forbid in the Bible, to say nothing of +the Dis<i>cip</i>line. The Bible says you must know a tree by its +fruits, and I 'low his'n is mostly watch-seals. I think a good +sound conversion at the mourners' bench would make him strip off +some of them things, and put them into the missionary collection. +Though maybe he a'n't so bad arter all, fer Jonas says that liker'n +not the things a'n't gold, but pewter washed over. But I'm afeard +he's wor'ly-minded. But I don't want to be too hard on a +feller-creatur'."</p> +<br> +<a name="105.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/105.jpg"><img src="images/105.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>CYNTHY ANN HAD OFTEN SAID IN CLASS-MEETING<br> +THAT TEMPTATIONS ABOUNDED ON EVERY HAND.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Cynthy, I drempt just now I was a fly and he was a spider, and +that he had me all wrapped up in his web, and that just then you +came along with a broom."</p> +<p>"That must be a sign," said Cynthy Ann. "It's good you didn't +dream after daylight. Then 'twould a come true. But what about +<i>him?</i> I thought you loved Gus Wehle, and though I'm afeard +you're makin' a idol out o' him, and though I'm afeard he's a +onbeliever, and I don't noways like marryin' with onbelievers, yet +I did want to help you, and I brought a note from him wunst and put +it under the head of your bed. I was afeard then I was doin' what +Timothy forbids, when he says not to be pertakers in other folks's +sins, but, you see, how could I help doin' it, when you was lookin' +so woebegone like, and Jonas, he axed me to do it. It's awful hard +to say you won't to Jonas, you know. So I put the letter there, and +I don't doubt your ma mistrusted it, and got a holt on it."</p> +<p>"Did he write to me? A'n't he going with that Betsey +Malcolm?"</p> +<p>"Can't be, I 'low. On'y this evenin' Jonas said to me, says he, +when I tole him you was engaged to Mr. Humphreys, says he, in his +way, 'The hawk's lit, has he? That'll be the death of two,' says +he, 'fer she'll die on it, an' so'll poor Gus,' says he. And then +he went on to tell as how as Gus is all ready to leave, and had +axed him to tell him of any news; but he said he wouldn't tell him +that. He'd leave him some hope. Fer he says Gus was mighty nigh +distracted to-day, that is yisterday, fer its most mornin' I +'low."</p> +<p>Now this speech did Julia a world of good. It showed her that +Gus was not faithless, that she might count on Cynthy, and that +Jonas was her friend, and that he did not like Humphreys. Jonas +called him a hawk. That agreed with her dream. He was a hawk and a +spider.</p> +<p>"But, Cynthy Ann, I got a letter night before last; ma threw it +in the window. In it Gus said he released me. I hadn't asked any +release. What did he mean?"</p> +<p>"Honey, I wish I could help you. It's that hawk, as Jonas calls +him, that's at the bottom of all this trouble. I don't believe but +what he's told some lies or 'nother. I don't believe but what he's +a bad man. I allers said I didn't 'low no good could come of a man +that puts on costly apparel and wears straps. I'm afeard you're +making a idol of Gus Wehle. Don't do it. Ef you do, God'll take +him. Misses Pearsons made a idol of her baby, a kissin' it and +huggin' it every minute, and I said, says I, Misses Pearsons, you +hadn't better make a idol of a perishin' creature. And sure enough, +God tuck it. He's jealous of our idols. But I can't help helpin' +you. You're a onbeliever yet yourself, and I 'low taint no sin fer +you to marry Gus. It's yokin' like with like. I wish you was both +Christians. I'll speak to Jonas. I don't know what I ought to do, +but I'll speak to Jonas. He's mighty peart about sech things, is +Jonas, and got as <i>good</i> a heart as you ever see. And--"</p> +<p>"Cynth-ee A-ann!" It was the energetic voice of Mrs. Anderson +rousing the house betimes. For the first time Julia and Cynthy Ann +noticed the early light creeping in at the window. They sat still, +paralyzed.</p> +<p>"Cynth-ee!" The voice was now at the top of the stairs, for Mrs. +Anderson always carried the war into Africa if Cynthy did not wake +at once.</p> +<p>"Answer quick, Cynthy Ann, or she'll be in here!" said Julia, +sliding behind the bed.</p> +<p>"Ma'am!" said Cynthy Ann, starting toward the door, where she +met Mrs. Abigail. "I'm up," said Cynthy.</p> +<p>"Well, what makes you so long a-answerin' then? You make me +climb the steps, and you know I may drop down dead of heart-disease +any day. I'll go and wake Jule."</p> +<p>"Better let her lay awhile," said Cynthy, reproaching herself +instantly for the deception.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson hesitated at the top of the stairs.</p> +<p>"Jul-yee!" she called. Poor Jule shook from head to foot. "I +guess I'll let her lay awhile; but I'm afraid I've already spoiled +the child by indulgence," said the mother, descending the stairs. +She relented only because she believed Julia was conquered.</p> +<p>"I declare, child, it's a shame I should be helping you to +disobey your mother. I'm afeard the Lord'll bring some jedgment on +us yet." For Cynthy Ann had tied her conscience to her rather +infirm logic. Better to have married it to her generous heart. But +before she had finished the half-penitent lamentation, Jule was +flying with swift and silent feet down the hall. Arrived in her own +room, she was so much relieved as to be almost happy; and she was +none too soon, for her industrious mother had quickly repented her +criminal leniency, and was again climbing the stairs at the +imminent risk of her precarious life, and calling "Jul-yee!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI."></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h2> +<h3>JONAS EXPOUNDS THE SUBJECT.</h3> +<br> +<p>"I 'lowed I'd ketch you here, my venerable and reliable +feller-citizen!" said Jonas as he entered the lower story of Andrew +Anderson's castle and greeted August, sitting by Andrew's loom. It +was the next evening after Julia's interview with Cynthy Ann. "When +do you 'low to leave this terry-firmy and climb a ash-saplin'? +To-night, hey? Goin' to the Queen City to take to steamboat life in +hopes of havin' your sperrits raised by bein' blowed up? Take my +advice and don't make haste in the downward road to destruction, +nor the up-hill one nuther. A game a'n't never through tell it's +played out, an' the American eagle's a chicken with steel spurs. +That air sweet singer of Israel that is so hifalugeon he has to +anchor hisself to his boots, knows all the tricks, and is +intimately acquainted with the kyards, whether it's faro, poker, +euchre, or French monte. But blamed ef Providence a'n't dealed you +a better hand'n you think. Never desperandum, as the Congressmen +say, fer while the lamp holds out to burn you may beat the blackleg +all to flinders and sing and shout forever. Last night I went to +bed thinkin' 'Umphreys had the stakes all in his pocket. This +mornin' I found he was in a far way to be beat outen his boots ef +you stood yer ground like a man and a gineological descendant of +Plymouth Rock!"</p> +<p>Andrew stopped his loom, and, looking at August, said: "Our +friend Jonas speaks somewhat periphrastically and euphuistically, +and--he'll pardon me--but he speaks a little ambiguously."</p> +<p>"My love, I gin it up, as the fish-hawk said to the bald eagle +one day. I kin rattle off odd sayings and big words picked up at +Fourth-of-Julys and barbecues and big meetins, but when you begin +to fire off your forty-pound bomb-shell book-words, I climb down as +suddent as Davy Crockett's coon. Maybe I do speak unbiguously, as +you say, but I was givin' you the biggest talkin' I had in the +basket. And as fer my good news, a feller don't like to eat up all +his country sugar to wunst, I 'low. But I says to our young and +promisin' friend of German extraction, beloved, says I, hold onto +that air limb a little longer and you're saved."</p> +<p>"But, Jonas," said August, spinning Andrew's winding-blade round +and speaking slowly and bitterly, "a man don't like to be trifled +with, if he is a Dutchman!"</p> +<p>"But sposin' a man hain't been trifled with, Dutchman or no +Dutchman? Sposin' it's all a optical delusion of the yeers? There's +a word fer <i>you</i>, Andrew, that a'n't nuther unbiguous nor +peri-what-you-may-call-it."</p> +<p>"But," said August, "Betsey Malcolm--"</p> +<p>"<i>Betsey Malcolm!</i>" said Jonas. "Betsey Malcolm to +thunder!" and then he whistled. "Set a dog to mind a basket of meat +when his chops is a-waterin' fer it! Set a kingfisher to take keer +of a fish-pond! Set a cat to raisin' your orphan chickens on the +bottle! Set a spider to nuss a fly sick with dyspepsy from eatin' +too much molasses! I'd ruther trust a hen-hawk with a flock of +patridges than to trust Betsey Malcolm with your affairs. I ha'n't +walked behind you from meetin' and seed her head a bobbin' like a +bluebird's and her eyes a blazin an' all that, fer nothin'. Like as +not, Betsey Malcolm's more nor half your trouble in that +quarter."</p> +<p>"But she said--"</p> +<p>"It don't matter three quarters of a rotten rye-straw what she +said, my inexper'enced friend. She don't keer what she says, so +long as it's fur enough away from the truth to sarve her turn. An' +she's told pay-tent double-back-action lies that worked both ways. +What do you 'low Jule Anderson tho't when she hearn tell of your +courtin' Betsey, as Betsey told it, with all her nods an' little +crowin'? Now looky here, Gus, I'm your friend, as the Irishman said +to the bar that hugged him, an' I want to say about all that air +that Betsey told you, spit on the slate an' wipe that all off. +They's lie in her soap an.' right smart chance of saft-soap in her +lie, I 'low."</p> +<p>These rough words of Jonas brought a strange intelligence into +the mind of August. He saw so many things in a moment that had lain +under his eyes unnoticed.</p> +<p>"There is much rough wisdom in your speech, Jonas," said +Andrew.</p> +<p>"That's a fact. You and me used to go to school to old Benefield +together when I was little and you was growed up. You allers beat +everybody all holler in books and spellin'-matches, Andy. But I +'low I cut my eye-teeth 'bout as airly as some of you that's got +more larnin' under your skelp. Now, I say to our young friend and +feller-citizen, don't go 'way tell you've spoke a consolin' word to +a girl as'll stick to you tell the hour and article of death, and +then remains yours truly forever, amen."</p> +<br> +<a name="112.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/112.jpg"><img src="images/112.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>JONAS.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"How do you know that, Jonas?" said August, smiling in spite of +himself.</p> +<p>"How do I know it? Why, by the testimony of a uncorrupted and +disinterested witness, gentlemen of the jury, if the honorable +court pleases. What did that Jule Anderson do, poor thing, but +spend some time making a most onseasonable visit to Cynthy Ann last +night? And I 'low ef there's a ole gal in this sublunary spear as +tells the truth in a bee-line and no nonsense, it's that there +same, individooal, identical Cynthy Ann. She's most afeard to drink +cold water or breathe fresh air fer fear she'll commit a +unpard'nable sin. And that persecuted young pigeon that thought +herself forsooken, jest skeeted into Cynthy Ann's budwoir afore +daybreak this mornin' and told her all her sorrows, and how your +letter and your goin' with that Betsey Malcolm"--here August +winced--"had well nigh druv her to run off with the straps and +watch-seals to get rid of you and Betsey and her precious and +mighty affectionate ma."</p> +<p>"But she won't look at me in meeting, and she sent Humphreys to +me with an insulting message."</p> +<p>"Which text divides itself into two parts, my brethren and +feller-travelers to etarnity. To treat the last head first, +beloved, I admonish you not to believe a blackleg, unless it's +under sarcumstances when he's got onusual and airresistible +temptations to tell the truth. I don't advise yer to spit on the +slate and rub it out in this case. Break the slate and throw it +away. To come to the second pertikeler, which is the first in the +order of my text, my attentive congregation. She didn't look at you +in meetin'. Now, I 'spose you don't know nothin' of her mother's +heart-disease. Heart-disease is trumps with Abigail Anderson. She +plays that every turn. Just think of a young gal who thinks that ef +she looks at her beau when her mother's by, she might kill her +invalooable parient of heart-disease. Fer my part, I don't take no +stock in Mrs. Abby Anderson's dyin' of heart-disease, no ways. +Might as well talk about a whale dyin' of footrot."</p> +<p>"Well, Jonas, what counsel do you give our young friend? Your +sagacity is to be depended on."</p> +<p>"Why, I advise him to speak face to face with the angel of his +life. Let him climb into my room to-night. Leave meetin' jest afore +the benediction--he kin do without that wunst--and go double-quick +acrost the fields, and git safe into my stoodio. Ferther +pertikelers when the time arrives."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII."></a>CHAPTER XVII.</h2> +<h3>THE WRONG PEW.</h3> +<br> +<p>August's own good sense told him that the advice of Jonas was +not good. But he had made many mistakes of late, and was just now +inclined to take anybody's judgment in place of his own. All that +was proud and gentlemanly in him rebelled at the thought of +creeping into another man's house in the night. Modesty is +doubtless a virtue, but it is a virtue responsible for many +offenses. Had August not felt so distrustful of his own wisdom, +nothing could have persuaded him to make his love for Julia +Anderson seem criminal by an action so wanting in dignity. But back +of Jonas's judgment was that of Andrew, whose weakness was +Quixotism. He wanted to live and to have others live on the +concert-pitch of romantic action. There was something of chivalry +in the proposal of Jonas, a spice of adventure that made him +approve it on purely sentimental grounds.</p> +<p>The more August thought of it, and the nearer he was to its +execution, the more did he dislike it. But I have often noticed +that people of a rather quiet temperament, such as young Wehle's, +show <i>vis inertiae</i> in both, ways--not very easily moved, they +are not easily checked when once in motion. August's velocity was +not usually great, his momentum was tremendous, and now that he had +committed himself to the hands of Jonas Harrison and set out upon +this enterprise, he was determined, in his quiet way, to go through +to the end.</p> +<p>Of course he understood the house, and having left the family in +meeting, he had nothing to do but to scale one of the pillars of +the front-porch. In those Arcadian days upper windows were hardly +ever fastened, except when the house was deserted by all its +inmates for days. Half-way up the post he was seized with a violent +trembling. His position brought to him a confused memory of a text +of Scripture: "He that entereth not by the door ... but climbeth up +some other way, the same is a thief and a robber." Bred under +Moravian influence, he half-believed the text to be supernaturally +suggested to him. For a moment his purpose wavered, but the habit +of going through with an undertaking took the place of his will, +and he went on blindly, as Baker the Nile explorer did, "more like +a donkey than like a man." Once on the upper porch he hesitated +again. To break into a man's house in this way was unlawful. His +conscience troubled him. In vain he reasoned that Mrs. Anderson's +despotism was morally wrong, and that this action was right as an +offset to it. He knew that it was not right.</p> +<p>I want to remark here that there are many situations in life in +which a conscience is dreadfully in the way. There are people who +go straight ahead to success--such as it is--with no +embarrassments, no fire in the rear from any scruples. Some of +these days I mean to write an essay on "The Inconvenience of having +a Conscience," in which I shall proceed to show that it costs more +in the course of a year or two, than it would to keep a stableful +of fast horses. Many a man could afford to drive Dexters and Flora +Temples who would be ruined by a conscience. But I must not write +the essay here, for I am keeping August out in the night air and +his perplexity all this time.</p> +<p>August Wehle had the habit, I think I have said, of going +through with an enterprise. He had another habit, a very +inconvenient habit doubtless, but a very manly one, of listening +for the voice of his conscience. And I think that this habit would +have even yet turned him back, as he had his hand on the +window-sash, had it not been that while he stood there trying to +find out just what was the decision of his conscience, he heard the +voices of the returning family. There was no time to lose, there +was no shelter on the porch, in a minute more they would be in +sight. He must go ahead now, for retreat was cut off. He lifted the +window and climbed into the room, lowering the sash gently behind +him. As no one ever came into this room but Jonas, he felt safe +enough. Jonas would plan a meeting after midnight in Cynthy Ann's +room, and in Cynthy Ann's presence.</p> +<p>In groping for a chair, August drew aside the curtain of the +gable-window, hoping to get some light. Had Jonas taken to +cultivating flowers in pots? Here was a "monthly" rose on the +window-seat! Surely this was the room. He had occupied it during +his stay in the house. But he did not know that Mrs. Anderson had +changed the arrangement between his leaving and the coming of +Jonas. He noticed that the curtains were not the same. He trembled +from head to foot. He felt for the bureau, and recognized by +various little articles, a pincushion, a tuck-comb, and the +sun-bonnet hanging against the window-frame, that he was in Julia's +room. His first emotion was not alarm. It was awe, as pure and +solemn as the high-priest may have felt in the holy place. +Everything pertaining to Julia had a curious sacredness, and this +room was a temple into which it was sacrilege to intrude. But a +more practical question took his attention soon. The family had +come in below, except Jonas and Cynthy Ann--who had walked slowly, +planning a meeting for August--and Mr. Samuel Anderson, who stood +at the front-gate with a neighbor. August could hear his shrill +voice discussing the seventh trumpet and the thousand three hundred +and thirty and five days. It would not do to be discovered where he +was. Beside the fright he would give to Julia, he shuddered at the +thought of compromising her in such a way. To go back was to insure +his exposure, for Samuel Anderson had not yet half-settled the +question of the trumpets. Indeed it seemed to August that the world +might come to an end before that conversation would. He heard +Humphreys enter his room. He was now persuaded that the room +formerly occupied by Julia must be Jonas's, and he determined to +get to it if he could. He felt like a villain already. He would +have cheerfully gone to State's-prison in preference to +compromising Julia. At any rate, he started out of Julia's room +toward the one that was occupied by Jonas. It was the only road +open, and but for an unexpected encounter he would have reached his +hiding-place in safety, for the door was but fifteen feet away.</p> +<p>In order to explain the events that follow, I must ask the +reader to go back to Julia, and to events that had occurred two +hours before. Hitherto she had walked to and from meeting and +"singing" with Humphreys, as a matter of courtesy. On the evening +in question she had absolutely refused to walk with him. Her mother +found that threats were as vain as coaxing. Even her threat of +dying with heart-disease, then and there, killed by her daughter's +disobedience, could not move Julia, who would not even speak with +the "spider." Her mother took her into the sitting-room alone, and +talked with her.</p> +<p>"So this is the way you trifle with gentlemen, is it? Night +before last you engaged yourself to Mr. Humphreys, now you won't +speak to him. To think that my daughter should prove a heartless +flirt!"</p> +<p>I am afraid that the unfilial thought came into Julia's mind +that nothing could have been more in the usual order of things than +that the daughter of a coquette should be a flirt.</p> +<p>"You'll kill me on the spot; you certainly will." Julia felt +anxious, for her mother showed signs of going into hysterics. But +she put her foot out and shook her head in a way that said that all +her friends might die and all the world might go to pieces before +she would yield. Mrs. Anderson had one forlorn hope. She determined +to order that forward. Leaving Julia alone, she went to her +husband.</p> +<p>"Samuel, if you value my life go and speak to your daughter. +She's got your own stubbornness of will in her. She is just like +you; she <i>will</i> have her own way. I shall die." And Mrs. +Abigail Anderson sank into a chair with unmistakable symptoms of a +hysterical attack.</p> +<p>I am aware that I have so far let the reader hear not one word +of Samuel Anderson's conversation. He has played a rather +insignificant part in the story. Nothing could be more <i>comme il +faut</i>. Insignificance was his characteristic. It was not so much +that he was small. It is not so bad a thing to be a little man. But +to be little and insignificant also is bad. There is only one thing +worse, which is to be big and insignificant. If one is little and +insignificant, one may be overlooked, insignificance and all. But +if one is big and insignificant, it is to be an obtrusive cipher, a +great lubber, not easily kept out of sight.</p> +<p>Appealed to by his wife, Samuel Anderson prepared to assert his +authority as the head of the family. He almost strutted into +Julia's presence. Julia had a real affection for her father, and +nothing mortified her more than to see him acting as a puppet, +moved by her mother, and yet vain enough to believe himself +independent and supreme. She would have yielded almost any other +point to have saved herself the mortification of seeing her father +act the fool; but now she had determined that she would die and let +everybody else die rather than walk with a man whose nature seemed +to her corrupt, and whose touch was pollution. I do not mean that +she was able to make a distinct inventory of her reasons for +disliking him, or to analyze her feelings. She could not have told +just why she had so deep and utter a repugnance to walking a +quarter of a mile to the school-house in company with this man. She +followed that strong instinct of truth and purity which is the +surest guide.</p> +<p>"Julia, my daughter," said Samuel Anderson, "really you must +yield to me as head of the house, and treat this gentleman +politely. I thought you respected him, or loved him, and he told me +that you had given consent to marry him, and had told him to ask my +consent."</p> +<p>In saying this, the "head of the house" was seesawing himself +backward and forward in his squeaky boots, speaking in a pompous +manner, and with an effort to swell an effeminate voice to a bass +key, resulting in something between a croak and a squeal. Julia sat +down and cried in mortification and disgust. Mr. Anderson +understood this to be acquiescence, and turned and went into the +next room.</p> +<br> +<a name="121.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/121.jpg"><img src="images/121.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>JULIA SAT DOWN IN MORTIFICATION.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Mr. Humphreys, my daughter will be glad to ask your pardon. She +is over her little pet; lovers always have pets. Even my wife and I +have had our disagreements in our time. Julia will be glad to see +you in the sitting-room."</p> +<p>Humphreys drew the draw-strings and set his face into its +broadest and most parallelogrammatic smile, bowed to Mr. Anderson, +and stepped into the hall. But when he reached the sitting-room +door he wished he had staid away. Julia had heard his tread, and +was standing again with her foot advanced. Her eyes were very +black, and were drawn to a sharp focus. She had some of her +mother's fire, though happily none of her mother's meanness. It is +hard to say whether she spoke or hissed.</p> +<p>"Go away, you spider! I hate you! I told you I hated you, and +you told people I loved you and was engaged to you. Go away! You +detestable spider, you! I'll die right here, but I will not go with +you."</p> +<p>But the smirking Humphreys moved toward her, speaking +soothingly, and assuring her that there was some mistake. Julia +dashed past him into the parlor and laid hold of her father's +arm.</p> +<p>"Father, protect me from that--that--spider! I hate him!"</p> +<p>Mr. Anderson stood irresolute a moment and looked appealingly to +his wife for a signal. She solved the difficulty herself. On the +whole she had concluded not to die of heart-disease until she saw +Julia married to suit her taste, and having found a hill she could +not go through, she went round. Seizing Julia's arm with more of +energy than affection, she walked off with her, or rather walked +her off, in a sulky silence, while Mr. Anderson kept Humphreys +company.</p> +<p>I thought best to keep August standing in the door of Julia's +room all this time while I explained these things to you, so that +you might understand what follows. In reality August did not stop +at all, but walked out into the hall and into difficulty.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII."></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h2> +<h3>THE ENCOUNTER.</h3> +<br> +<p>Just before August came out of the door of Julia's room he had +heard Humphreys enter his room on the opposite side of the hall. +Humphreys had lighted his cigar and was on his way to the porch to +smoke off his discomfiture when he met August coming out of Julia's +door on the opposite side of the hall. The candle in Humphreys's +room threw its light full on August's face, there was no escape +from recognition, and Wehle was too proud to retreat. He shut the +door of Julia's room and stood with back against the wall staring +at Humphreys, who did not forget to smile in his most aggravating +way.</p> +<p>"Thief! thief!" called Humphreys.</p> +<p>In a moment Mrs. Anderson and Julia ran up the stairs, followed +by Mr. Anderson, who hearing the outcry had left the matter of the +Apocalypse unsettled, and by Jonas and Cynthy Ann, who had just +arrived.</p> +<p>"I knew it," cried Mrs. Anderson, turning on the mortified +Julia, "I never knew a Dutchman nor a foreigner of any sort that +wouldn't steal. Now you see what you get by taking a fancy to a +Dutchman. And now <i>you</i> see"--to her husband--"what <i>you</i> +get by taking a Dutchman into your house. I always wanted you to +hire white men and not Dutchmen nor thieves!"</p> +<p>"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Anderson," said August, with very white +lips, "I am not a thief."</p> +<p>"Not a thief, eh? What was he doing, Mr. Humphreys, when you +first detected him?"</p> +<p>"Coming out of Miss Anderson's room," said Humphreys, smiling +politely.</p> +<p>"Do you invite gentlemen to your room?" said the frantic woman +to Julia, meaning by one blow to revenge herself and crush the +stubbornness of her daughter forever. But Julia was too anxious +about August to notice the shameless insult.</p> +<p>"Mrs. Anderson, this visit is without any invitation from Julia. +I did wrong to enter your house in this way, but I only am +responsible, and I meant to enter Jonas's room. I did not know that +Julia occupied this room. I am to blame, she is not."</p> +<p>"And what did you break in for if you didn't mean to steal? It +is all off between you and Jule, for I saw your letter. I shall +have you arrested to-morrow for burglary. And I think you ought to +be searched. Mr. Humphreys, won't you put him out?"</p> +<p>Humphreys stopped forward toward August, but he noticed that the +latter had a hard look in his eyes, and had two stout German fists +shut very tight. He turned back.</p> +<p>"These thieves are nearly always armed. I think I had best get a +pistol out of my trunk."</p> +<p>"I have no arms, and you know it, coward," said August. "I will +not be put out by anybody, but I will go out whenever the master of +this house asks me to go out, and the rest of you open a free +path."</p> +<br> +<a name="126.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/126.jpg"><img src="images/126.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"GOOD-BY!"</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Jonas, put him out!" screamed Mrs. Anderson.</p> +<p>"Couldn't do it," said Jonas, "couldn't do it ef I tried. They's +too much bone and sinnoo in them arms of his'n, and moreover he's a +gentleman. I axed him to come and see me sometime, and he come. He +come ruther late it's true, but I s'pose he thought that sence we +got sech a dee-splay of watch-seals and straps we had all got so +stuck up, we wouldn't receive calls afore fashionable hours. Any +way, I 'low he didn't mean no harm, and he's my visitor, seein' he +meant to come into my winder, knowin' the door was closed agin him. +And he won't let no man put him out, 'thout he's a man with more'n +half a dozen watch-seals onto him, to give him weight and +influence."</p> +<p>"Samuel, will you see me insulted in this way? Will you put this +burglar out of the house?"</p> +<p>The "head of the house," thus appealed to, tried to look +important; he tried to swell up his size and his courage. But he +did not dare touch August.</p> +<p>"Mr. Anderson, I beg <i>your</i> pardon. I had no right to come +In as I did. I had no right so to enter a gentleman's house. If I +had not known that this cowardly fop--I don't know what <i>else</i> +he may be--was injuring me by his lies I should not have come in. +If it is a crime to love a young lady, then I have committed a +crime. You have only to exercise your authority as master of this +house and ask me to go."</p> +<p>"I do ask you to go, Mr. Wehle."</p> +<p>It was the first time that Samuel Anderson had ever called him +Mr. Wehle. It was an involuntary tribute to the dignity of the +young man, as he stood at bay. "Mr. Wehle, <i>indeed</i>!" said +Mrs. Anderson.</p> +<p>August had hoped Julia would say a word in his behalf. But she +was too much, cowed by her mother's fierce passion. So like a +criminal going to prison, like a man going to his own funeral, +August Wehle went down the hall toward the stairs, which were at +the back of it. Humphreys instinctively retreated into his room. +Mrs. Anderson glared on the young man as he went by, but he did not +turn his head even when he passed Julia. His heart and hope were +all gone; in his mortification and defeat there seemed to him +nothing left but his unbroken pride to sustain him. He had +descended two or three steps, when Julia suddenly glided forward +and said with a tremulous voice: "You aren't going without telling +me good-by, August?"</p> +<p>"Jule Anderson! what do you mean?" cried her mother. But the +hall was narrow by the stairway, and Jonas, by standing close to +Cynthy Ann, in an unconscious sort of a way managed to keep Mrs. +Anderson back; else she would have laid violent hands on her +daughter.</p> +<p>When August lifted his eyes and saw her face full of tenderness +and her hand reached over the balusters to him, he seemed to have +been suddenly lifted from perdition to bliss. The tears ran +unrestrained upon his cheeks, he reached up and took her hand.</p> +<p>"Good-by, Jule! God bless you!" he said huskily, and went out +into the night, happy in spite of all.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIX."></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h2> +<h3>THE MOTHER.</h3> +<br> +<p>Out of the door he went, happy in spite of all the mistakes he +had made and of all the <i>contretemps</i> of his provoking +misadventure; happy in spite of the threat of arrest for burglary. +For nearly a minute August Wehle was happy in that perfect way in +which people of quiet tempers are happy--happy without fluster. But +before he had passed the gate, he heard a scream and a wild +hysterical laugh; he heard a hurrying of feet and saw a moving of +lights. He would fain have turned back to find out what the matter +was, he had so much of interest in that house, but he remembered +that he had been turned out and that he could not go back. The +feeling of outlawry mingled its bitterness with the feeling of +anxiety. He feared that something had happened to Julia; he +lingered and listened. Humphreys came out upon the upper porch and +looked sharply up and down the road. August felt instinctively that +he was the object of search and slunk into a fence-corner, +remembering that he was now a burglar and at the mercy of the man +whose face was enough to show him unrelenting.</p> +<p>Presently Humphreys turned and went in, and then August came out +of the shadow and hurried away. When he had gone a mile, he heard +the hoofs of horses, and again he concealed himself with a cowardly +feeling he had never known before. But when he found that it was +Jonas, riding one horse and leading another, on his way to bring +Dr. Ketchup, the steam-doctor, he ran out.</p> +<p>"Jonas! Jonas! what's the matter? Who's sick? Is it Julia?"</p> +<p>"I'll be bound you ax fer Jule first, my much-respected comrade. +But it's only one of the ole woman's conniption fits, and you know +she's got nineteen lives. People of the catamount sort always has. +You'd better gin a thought to yourself now. I got you into this +scrape, and I mean to see you out, as the dog said to the 'possum +in its hole. Git up onto this four-legged quadruped and go as fur +as I go on the road to peace and safety. Now, I tell you what, the +hawk's got a mighty good purchase onto you, my chicken, and he's +jest about to light, and when he lights, look out fer feathers! +Don't sleep under the paternal shingles, as they say. Go to +Andrew's castle, and he'll help you git acrost the river into the +glorious State of ole Kaintuck afore any warrant can be got out fer +takin' you up. Never once thought of your bein' took up. But don't +delay, as the preachers say. The time is short, and the human heart +is desperately wicked and mighty deceitful and onsartain."</p> +<p>As far as Jonas traveled his way, he carried August upon the +gray horse. Then the latter hurried across the fields to his +father's cabin. Little Wilhelmina sat with face against the window +waiting his return.</p> +<p>"Where did you go, August? Did you see the pretty girl at +Anderson's?"</p> +<p>He stooped and kissed her, but, without speaking a word to her, +he went over to where his mother sat darning the last of her basket +of stockings. All the rest were asleep, and having assured himself +of this, he drew up a low chair and leaned his elbow on his knee +and hi head on his hand, and told the whole adventure of the +evening to his mother, and then dropped his head on her lap and +wept in a still way. And the sweet-eyed, weary Moravian mother laid +her two hands upon his head and prayed. And Wilhelmina knelt +instinctively by the side of her brother.</p> +<br> +<a name="131.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/131.jpg"><img src="images/131.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE MOTHER'S BLESSING.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Perhaps there is no God. Or perhaps He is so great that our +praying has no effect. Perhaps this strong crying of our hearts to +Him in our extremity is no witness of his readiness to hear. Let +him live in doubt who can. Let me believe that the tender +mother-heart and the loving sister-heart in that little cabin +<i>did</i> reach up to the great Heart that is over us all in +Fatherly love, did find a real comfort for themselves, and did +bring a strength-giving and sanctifying something upon the head of +the young man, who straightway rose up refreshed, and departed out +into the night, leaving behind him mother and sister straining +their eyes after him in the blackness, and carrying with him +thoughts and memories, and--who shall doubt?--a genuine heavenly +inspiration that saved him in the trials in which we shall next +meet him.</p> +<p>At two o'clock that night August Wehle stood upon the shore of +the Ohio in company with Andrew Anderson, the Backwoods +Philosopher. Andrew waved a fire-brand at the steamboat "Isaac +Shelby," which was coming round the bend. And the captain tapped +his bell three times and stopped his engines. Then the yawl took +the two men aboard, and two days afterward Andrew came back +alone.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XX."></a>CHAPTER XX.</h2> +<h3>THE STEAM-DOCTOR.</h3> +<br> +<p>To return to the house of Samuel Anderson.</p> +<p>Scarcely had August passed out the door when Mrs. Anderson fell +into a fit of hysterics, and declared that she was dying of +heart-disease. Her time had come at last! She was murdered! +Murdered by her own daughter's ingratitude and disobedience! Struck +down in her own house! And what grieved her most was that she +should never live to see the end of the world!</p> +<p>And indeed she seemed to be dying. Nothing is more frightful +than a good solid fit of hysterics. Cynthy Ann, inwardly condemning +herself as she always did, lifted the convulsed patient, who seemed +to be anywhere in her last ten breaths, and carried her, with Mr. +Anderson's aid, down to her room, and while Jonas saddled the +horse, Mr. Anderson put on his hat and prepared to go for the +doctor.</p> +<p>"Samuel! O Sam-u-el! Oh-h-h-h-h!" cried Mrs. Anderson, with +rising and falling inflections that even patient Dr. Rush could +never have analyzed, laughing insanely and weeping piteously in the +same breath, in the same word; running it up and down the gamut in +an uncontrolled and uncontrollable way; now whooping like a savage, +and now sobbing like the last breath of a broken-hearted. "Samuel! +Sam-u-el! O Samuel! Ha! ha! ha! h-a-a! Oh-h-h-h-h-h-h! You won't +leave me to die alone! After the wife I've been to you, you won't +leave me to die alone! No-o-o-o-o! HOO-HOO-oo-OO! You musn't. You +shan't. Send Jonas, and you stay by me! Think--" here her breath +died away, and for a moment she seemed really to be dying. "Think," +she gasped, and then sank away again. After a minute she opened her +eyes, and, with characteristic pertinacity, took up the sentence +just where she had left off. She had carefully kept her place +throughout the period of unconsciousness. But now she spoke, not +with a gasp, but in that shrill, unnatural falsetto so +characteristic of hysteria; that voice--half yell--that makes every +nerve of the listener jangle with the discord. "Think, oh-h-h +Samuel! why won't you think what a wife I've been to you? Here I've +drudged and scrubbed and scrubbed and drudged all these years like +a faithful and industrious wife, never neglecting my duty. And +now--oh-h-h-h--now to be left alone in my--" Here she ceased to +breathe again for a while. "In my last hours to die, to die! to die +with, out--without--Oh-h-h!" What Mrs. Anderson was left to die +without she never stated. Mr. Anderson had beckoned to Jonas when +he came in, and that worthy had gone off in a leisurely trot to get +the "steam-doctor."</p> +<br> +<a name="134.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/134.jpg"><img src="images/134.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"CORN-SWEATS AND CALAMUS."</b></p> +<br> +<p>Dr. Ketchup had been a blacksmith, but bard work disagreed with +his constitution. He felt that he, was made for something better +than shoeing horses. This ambitious thought was first suggested to +him by the increasing portliness of his person, which, while it +made stooping over a horse's hoof inconvenient, also impressed him +with the fact that his aldermanic figure would really adorn a +learned profession. So he bought one of those little hand-books +which the founder of the Thomsonian system sold dirt-cheap at +twenty dollars apiece, and which told how to cure or kill in every +case. The owners of these important treasures of invaluable +information were under bonds not to disclose the profound secrets +therein contained, the fathomless wisdom which taught them how to +decide in any given case whether ginseng or a corn-sweat was the +required remedy. And the invested twenty dollars had brought the +shrewd blacksmith a handsome return.</p> +<p>"Hello!" said Jonas in true Western style, as he reined up in +front of Dr. Ketchup's house in the outskirts of Brayville. "Hello +the house!" But Dr. Ketchup was already asleep. "Takes a mighty +long time to wake up a fat man," soliloquized Jonas. "He gits so +used to hearin' hisself snore that he can't tell the difference +'twixt snorin' and thunder. Hello! Hello the house! I say, hello +the blacksmith-shop! Dr. Ketchup, why don't you git up? Hello! +Corn-sweats and calamus! Hello! Whoop! Hurrah for Jackson and Dr. +Ketchup! Hello! Thunderation! Stop thief! Fire! Fire! Fire! Murder! +Murder! Help! Help! Hurrah! Treed the coon at last!"</p> +<p>This last exclamation greeted the appearance of Dr. Ketchup's +head at the window.</p> +<p>"Are you drunk, Jonas Harrison? Go 'way with your hollering, or +I'll have you took up," said Ketchup.</p> +<p>"You'll find that tougher work than making horseshoes any day, +my respectable friend and feller-citizen. I'll have you took up fer +sleeping so sound and snorin' so loud as to disturb all creation +and the rest of your neighbors. I've heard you ever sence I left +Anderson's, and thought 'twas a steamboat. Come, my friend, git on +your clothes and accouterments, fer Mrs. Anderson is a-dyin' or +a-lettin' on to be a-dyin' fer a drink of ginseng-tea or a +corn-sweat or some other decoction of the healin' art. Come, I +fotch two hosses, so you shouldn't lose no time a saddlin' your'n, +though I don't doubt the ole woman'd git well ef you never gin her +the light of your cheerful count'nance. She'd git well fer spite, +and hire a calomel-doctor jist to make you mad. I'd jest as soon +and a little sooner expect a female wasp to die of heart-disease as +her."</p> +<br> +<a name="137.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/137.jpg"><img src="images/137.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"FIRE! MURDER!! HELP!!!"</b></p> +<br> +<p>The head of Dr. Ketchup had disappeared from the window about +the middle of this speech, and the remainder of it came by sheer +force of internal pressure, like the flowing of an artesian +well.</p> +<p>Dr. Ketchup walked out, with ruffled dignity, carefully dressed. +His immaculate clothes and his solemn face were the two halves of +his stock in trade. Under the clothes lay buried Ketchup the +blacksmith; under the wiseacre face was Ketchup the ignoramus. +Ignoramus he was, but not a fool. As he rode along back with Jonas, +he plied the latter with questions. If he could get the facts of +the case out of Jonas, he would pretend to have inferred them from +the symptoms and thus add to his credit.</p> +<p>"What caused this attack, Jonas?"</p> +<p>"I 'low she caused it herself. Generally does, my friend," said +Jonas.</p> +<p>"Had anything occurred to excite her?"</p> +<p>"Well, yes, I 'low they had; consid'able, if not more."</p> +<p>"What was it?"</p> +<p>"Well, you see she'd been to Hankins's preachin'. Now, I 'low, +my medical friend, the day of jedgment a'n't a pleasin' prospeck to +anybody that's jilted one brother to marry another, and then +cheated the jilted one outen his sheer of his lamented father's +estate. Do you think it is, my learned friend?"</p> +<p>But Dr. Ketchup could not be sure whether Jonas was making game +of him or not. So he changed the subject.</p> +<p>"Nice hoss, this bay," said the "doctor."</p> +<p>"Well, yes," said Jonas, "I don't 'low you ever put shoes on no +better hoss than this 'ere in all your days--as a blacksmith. Did +you now, my medical friend?"</p> +<p>"No, I think not," said Ketchup testily, and was silent.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson had grown impatient at the doctor's delay. +"Samuel! Oo! oo! oo! Samuel! My dear, I'm dying. Jonas don't care. +He wouldn't hurry. I wonder you trusted <i>him!</i> If you had been +dying, I should have gone myself for the doctor. Oo! oo! oo! +<i>oh!</i> If I should die, nobody would be sorry."</p> +<p>Abigail Anderson was not to blame for telling the truth so +exactly in this last sentence. It was an accident. She might have +recalled it but that Dr. Ketchup walked in at that moment.</p> +<p>He felt her pulse; looked at her tongue; said that it was +heart-disease, caused by excitement. He thought it must be +religious excitement. She should have a corn-sweat and some +wafer-ash tea. The corn-sweat would act as a tonic and strengthen +the pericardium. The wafer-ash would cause a tendency of blood to +the head, and thus relieve the pressure on the juggler-vein. Cynthy +Ann listened admiringly to Dr. Ketchup's incomprehensible, oracular +utterances, and then speedily put a bushel of ear-corn in the great +wash-boiler, which was already full of hot water in expectation of +such a prescription, and set the wafer-ash to draw.</p> +<p>Julia had, up to this time, stood outside her mother's door +trembling with fear, and not daring to enter. She longed to do +something, but did not know how it would be received. Now, while +the deep, sonorous voice of Ketchup occupied the attention of all, +she crept in and stood at the foot of Mrs. Anderson's bed. The +mother, recovering from her twentieth dying spell, saw her.</p> +<p>"Take her away! She has killed me! She wants me to die! <i>I</i> +know! Take her away!"</p> +<p>And Julia went to her own room and shut herself up in darkness +and in wretchedness, but in all that miserable night there came to +her not one regret that she had reached her hand to the departing +August.</p> +<p>The neighbor-women came in and pretended to do something for the +invalid, but really they sat by the kitchen-stove and pumped Cynthy +Ann and the doctor, and managed in some way to connect Julia with +her mother's illness, and shook their heads. So that when Julia +crept down-stairs at midnight, in hope of being useful, she found +herself looked at inquisitively, and felt herself to be such an +object of attention that she was glad to take the advice of Cynthy +Ann and find refuge in her own room. On the stairs she met Jonas, +who said as she passed:</p> +<p>"Don't fret yourself, little turtle-dove. Don't pay no 'tention +to ole Ketchup. Your ma won't die, not even with his corn-sweats to +waft her on to glory. You done your duty to-night like one of Fox's +martyrs, and like George Washi'ton with his little cherry-tree and +hatchet. And you'll git your reward, if not in the next world, +you'll have it in this."</p> +<p>Julia lay down awhile, and then sat up, looking out into the +darkness. Perhaps God was angry with her for loving August; perhaps +she was making an idol of him. When Julia came to think that her +love for August was in antagonism to the love of God, she did not +hesitate which she would choose. All the best of her nature was +loyal to August, whom she "had seen," as the Apostle John has it. +She could not reason it out, but a God who seemed to be in +opposition to the purest and best emotion of her heart was a God +she could not love. August and the love of August were known +quantities. God and the love of God were unknown, and the God of +whom Cynthy spoke (and of whom many a mistaken preacher has +spoken), that was jealous of Mrs. Pearson's love for her baby, and +that killed it because it was his rival, was not a God that she +could love without being a traitor to all the good that God had put +in her heart. The God that was keeping August away from her because +he was jealous of the one beautiful thing in her life was a Moloch, +and she deliberately determined that she would not worship or love +him. The True God, who is a Father, and who is not Supreme +Selfishness, doing all for His own glory, as men falsely declare; +the True God--who does all things for the good of others--loved +her, I doubt not, for refusing to worship the Conventional Deity +thus presented to her mind. Even as He has pitied many a mother +that rebelled against the Governor of the Universe, because she was +told the Governor of the Universe, in a petty seeking for his own +glory, had taken away her "idols."</p> +<p>But Julia looked up at the depths between the stars, and felt +how great God must be, and her rebellion against Him seemed a war +at fearful odds. And then the sense of God's omnipresence, of His +being there alone with her, so startled her and awakened such a +feeling of her fearful loneliness, orphanage, antagonism to God, +that she could bear it no longer, and at two o'clock she went down +again; but Mrs. Brown looked over at Mrs. Orcutt in a way that +said: "Told you so! Guilty conscience! Can't sleep!" And so Julia +thought God, even as she conceived Him, better company than men, or +rather than women, for--well, I won't make the ungallant remark; +each sex has its besetting faults.</p> +<p>Julia took back with her a candle, thinking that this awful God +would not seem so close if she had a light. There lay on her bureau +a Testament, one of those old editions of the American Bible +Society, printed on indifferent paper, and bound in a red muslin +that was given to fading, the like whereof in book-making has never +been seen since. She felt angry with God, who, she was sure, was +persecuting her, as Cynthy Ann had said, out of jealousy of her +love for August, and she was determined that she would not look +into that red-cloth Testament, which seemed to her full of +condemnation. But there was a fascination about it she could not +resist. The discordant hysterical laughter of her mother, which +reached her ears from below, harrowed her sorely, and her grief and +despair at her own situation were so great that she was at last +fain to read the only book in the room in order that she might +occupy her mind. There is a strange superstition among certain +pietists which loads them to pray for a text to guide them, and +then take any chance passage as a divine direction. I do not mean +to say that Julia had any supernatural leading in her reading. The +New Testament is so full of comfort that one could hardly manage to +miss it. She read the seventh chapter of Luke: how the Lord healed +the centurion's servant that was "dear unto him," and noted that He +did not rebuke the man for loving his slave; how the Lord took pity +on that poor widow who wept at the bier of her only son, and +brought him back to life again, and "restored him to his mother." +This did not seem to be just the Christ that Cynthy Ann thought of +as the foe of every human affection. She read more that she did not +understand so well, and then at the end of the chapter she read +about the woman that was a sinner, that washed His feet with +grateful tears and wiped them with her hair. And she would have +taken the woman's guilt to have had the woman's opportunity and her +benediction.</p> +<p>At last, turning over the leaves without any definite purpose, +she lighted on a place in Matthew, where three verses at the end of +a chapter happened to stand at the head of a column. I suppose she +read them because the beginning of the page and the end of the +chapter made them seem a short detached piece. And they melted into +her mood so that she seemed to know Christ and God for the first +time. "Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden," she +read, and stopped. That means me, she thought with a heart ready to +burst. And that saying is the gateway of life. When the promises +and injunctions mean me, I am saved. Julia read on, "And I will +give you rest." And so she drank in the passage, clause by clause, +until she came to the end about an easy yoke and a light burden, +and then God seemed to her so different. She prayed for August, for +now the two loves, the love for August and the love for Christ, +seemed not in any way inconsistent. She lay down saying over and +over, with tears in her eyes, "rest for your souls," and "weary and +heavy laden," and "come unto me," and "meek and lowly of heart," +and then she settled on one word and repeated it over and over, +"rest, rest, rest." The old feeling was gone. She was no more a +rebel nor an orphan. The presence of God was not a terror but a +benediction. She had found rest for her soul, and He gave His +beloved sleep. For when she awoke from what seemed a short slumber, +the red light of a glorious dawn came in at the window, and her +candle was flickering its last in the bottom of the socket. The +Testament lay open as she had left it, and for days she kept it +open there, and did not dare read anything but these three verses, +lest she should lose the rest for her soul that she found here.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXI."></a>CHAPTER XXI.</h2> +<h3>THE HAWK IN A NEW PART.</h3> +<br> +<p>Humphreys was now in the last weeks of his singing-school. He +had become a devout Millerite, and was paying attentions to the not +unwilling Betsey Malcolm, though pretending at Anderson's to be +absolutely heart-broken at the conduct of Julia in jilting him +after she had given him every assurance of affection. And then to +be jilted for a Dutchman, you know! In this last regard his feeling +was not all affectation. In his soul, cupidity, vanity, and +vindictiveness divided the narrow territory between them. He +inwardly swore that he'd get satisfaction somehow. Debts which were +due to his pride should be collected by his revenge.</p> +<p>Did you ever reflect on the uselessness of a landscape when one +has no eyes to see it with, or, what is worse, no soul to look +through one's eyes? Humphreys was going down to the castle to call +on the Philosopher, and "Shady Hollow," as Andrew called it, had +surely never been more glorious than on the morning which he chose +for his walk. The black-haw bushes hung over the roadside, the +maples lifted up their great trunk-pillars toward the sky, and the +grape-vines, some of them four and even six inches in diameter, +reached up to the high boughs, fifty or a hundred feet, without +touching the trunk. They had been carried up by the growth of the +tree, tree and vine having always lived in each other's embrace. +Out through the opening in the hollow, Humphreys saw the green sea +of six-feet-high Indian corn in the fertile bottoms, the two rows +of sycamores on the sandy edges of the river, and the hazy hills on +the Kentucky side. But not one touch of sentiment, not a perception +of beauty, entered the soul of the singing-master as he +daintily-chose his steps so as to avoid soiling his glossy boots, +and as he knocked the leaves off the low-hanging beech boughs with +his delicate cane. He had his purpose in visiting Andrew, and his +mind was bent on his game.</p> +<p>Charon, the guardian of the castle, bayed his great hoarse bark +at the Hawk, and with that keen insight into human nature for which +dogs are so remarkable, he absolutely forbade the dandy's entrance, +until Andrew appeared at the door and called the dog away.</p> +<p>"I am delighted at having the opportunity of meeting a great +light in literature like yourself, Mr. Anderson. Here you sit +weaving, earning your bread with a manly simplicity that is truly +admirable. You are like Cincinnatus at his plow. I also am a +literary man."</p> +<p>He really was a college graduate, though doubtless he was as +much of a humbug in recitations and examinations as he had always +been since. Andrew's only reply to his assertion that he was a +literary man was a rather severe and prolonged scrutiny of his oily +locks, his dainty mustache, his breast-pin, his watch-seals, and +finally his straps and his boots. For Andrew firmly believed that +neglected hair, Byron collars, and unblackened boots were the first +signs of literary taste.</p> +<p>"You think I dress too well," said Humphreys with his ghastly +smirk. "You think that I care too much for appearances. I do. It is +a weakness of mine which comes from a residence abroad."</p> +<p>These words touched the Philosopher a little. To have been +abroad was the next best thing to having been a foreigner <i>ab +origine</i>. But still he felt a little suspicious. He was superior +to the popular prejudice against the mustache, but he could not +endure hair-oil. "Nature," he maintained, "made the whole beard to +be worn, and Nature provides an oil for the hair. Let Nature have +her way." He was suspicious of Humphreys, not because he wore a +mustache, but because he shaved the rest of his face and greased +his hair. He had, besides, a little intuitive perception of the +fact that a smile which breaks against the rock-bound coast of cold +cheek-bones and immovable eyes is a mask. And so he determined to +test the literary man. I have heard that Masonic lodges have been +deceived by impostors. I have never heard that a literary man was +made to believe in the genuineness of the attainments of a +charlatan.</p> +<p>And yet Humphreys held his own well. He could talk glibly and +superficially about books; he simulated considerable enthusiasm for +the books which Andrew admired. His mistake and his consequent +overthrow came, as always in such cases, from a desire to overdo. +It was after half an hour of talking without tripping that Andrew +suddenly asked: "Do you like the ever-to-be-admired +Xenophanes?"</p> +<p>It certainly is no disgrace to any literary man not to know +anything of so remote a philosopher as Xenophanes. The first +characteristic of a genuine literary man is the frankness with +which he confesses his ignorance. But Humphreys did not really know +but that Xenophanes was part of the daily reading of a man of +letters.</p> +<p>"Oh! yes," said he. "I have his works in turkey morocco."</p> +<p>"What do you think of his opinion that God is a sphere?" asked +the Philosopher, smiling.</p> +<p>"Oh! yes--ahem; let me see--which God is it that he speaks of, +Jupiter or--well, you know he was a Greek."</p> +<p>"But he only believed in one God," said Andrew sternly.</p> +<p>"Oh! ah! I forgot that he was a Christian."</p> +<p>So from blunder to blunder Andrew pushed him, Humphreys +stumbling more and more in his blind attempts to right himself, and +leaving, at last, with much internal confusion but with an +unruffled smile. He dared not broach his errand by asking the +address of August. For Andrew did not conceal his disgust, having +resumed work at his loom, suffering the bowing impostor to find his +own way out without so much as a courteous adieu.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXII."></a>CHAPTER XXII.</h2> +<h3>JONAS EXPRESSES HIS OPINION ON DUTCHMEN.</h3> +<br> +<p>Sometimes the virus of a family is all drawn off in one vial. I +think it is Emerson who makes this remark. We have all seen the +vials.</p> +<p>Such an one was Norman Anderson. The curious law of hereditary +descent had somehow worked him only evil. "Nater," observed Jonas +to Cynthy, when the latter had announced to him that Norman, on +account of some disgrace at school, had returned home, "nater +ha'n't done him half jestice, I 'low. It went through Sam'el +Anderson and Abig'il, and picked out the leetle weak pompous things +in the illustrious father; and then hunted out all the spiteful and +hateful things in the lovin' and much-esteemed mother, and somehow +stuck 'em together, to make as ornery a chap as ever bit a hoe-cake +in two."</p> +<p>"I'm afeard her brother's scrape and comin' home won't make Jule +none the peacefuller at the present time," said Cynthy Ann.</p> +<p>"Wal," returned Jonas, "I don't think she keers much fer him. +She couldn't, you know. Love him? Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear"--here +Cynthy Ann began to reproach herself for listening to anything so +pleasant as these two last words--"Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear, you +see you might maybe love a cuckle-burr and nuss it; but I don't +think you would be likely to. I never heern tell of nobody carryin' +jimson-weed pods in their bosoms. You see they a'n't no place about +Norman Anderson that love could take a holt of 'thout gittin' +scratched."</p> +<p>"But his mother loves him, I reckon," said Cynthy Ann.</p> +<p>"Wal, yes; so she do. Loves her shadder in the lookin'-glass, +maybe, and kinder loves Norman bekase he's got so much of her devil +into him. It's like lovin' like, I reckon. But I 'low they's a +right smart difference with Jule. Sence she was born, that Norman +has took more delight in tormentin' Jule than a yaller dog with a +white tail does in worryin' a brindle tom-cat up a peach-tree. And +comin' home at this junction he'll gin her a all-fired lot of +trials and tribulation."</p> +<p>At the time this conversation took place, two weeks had elapsed +since Mrs. Anderson's "attack." Julia had heard nothing from August +yet. The "Hawk" still made his head-quarters in the house, but was +now watching another quarry. Mrs. Anderson was able to scold as +vigorously as ever, if, indeed, that function had ever been +suspended. And just now she was engaged in scolding the teacher who +had expelled Norman. The habit of fighting teachers was as chronic +as her heart-disease. Norman had always been abused by the whole +race of pedagogues. There was from the first a conspiracy against +him, and now he was cheated out of his last chance of getting an +education. All this Norman steadfastly believed.</p> +<p>Of course Norman sided with his mother as against the Dutchman. +The more contemptible a man is, the more he contemns a man for not +belonging to his race or nation. And Norman felt that he would be +eternally disgraced by any alliance with a German. He threw himself +into the fight with a great deal of vigor. It helped him to forget +other things.</p> +<p>"Jule," said he, walking up to her as she sat alone on the +porch, "I'm ashamed of you. To go and fall in love with a Dutchman +like Gus Wehle, and disgrace us all!"</p> +<p>"I wonder you didn't think about disgrace before," retorted +Julia, "I am ashamed to have August Wehle hear what you've been +doing."</p> +<br> +<a name="151.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/151.jpg"><img src="images/151.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>NORMAN ANDERSON.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Dogs that have the most practice in cat-worrying are liable to +get their noses scratched sometimes. Norman took care never to +attack Julia again except under the guns of his mother's powerful +battery. And he revenged himself on her by appealing to his mother +with a complaint that "Jule had throwed up to him that he had been +dismissed from school." And of course Julia received a solemn +lecture on her way of driving poor Norman to destruction. She was +determined to disgrace the family. If she could not do it by +marrying a Dutchman, she would do it by slandering her brother.</p> +<p>Norman thought to find an ally in Jonas.</p> +<p>"Jonas, don't you think it's awful that Jule is in love with +Dutchman like Gus Wehle?"</p> +<p>"I do, my love," responded Jonas. "I think a Dutchman is a +Dutchman. I don't keer how much he larns by burnin' the midnight +ile by day and night. My time-honored friend, he's a Dutchman arter +all. The Dutch is bred in the bone. It won't fade. A Dutchman may +be a gentleman in his way of doin' things, may be honest and +industrious, and keep all the commandments in the catalogue, but I +say he is Dutch, and that's enough to keep him out of the kingdom +of heaven and out of this free and enlightened republic. And an +American may be a good-fer-nothin', ornery little pertater-ball, +wuthless alike to man and beast; he mayn't be good fer nothin', +nuther fer work nur study; he may git drunk and git turned outen +school and do any pertikeler number of disgraceful and oncreditable +things, he may be a reg'ler milksop and nincompoop, a fool and a +blackguard and a coward all rolled up into one piece of brown +paper, ef he wants to. And what's to hender? A'n't he a free-born +an' enlightened citizen of this glorious and civilized and +Christian land of Hail Columby? What business has a Dutchman, ef +he's ever so smart and honest and larned, got in our broad domains, +resarved for civil and religious liberty? What business has he got +breathin' our atmosphere or takin' refuge under the feathers of our +American turkey-buzzard? No, my beloved and respected +feller-citizen of native birth, it's as plain to me as the wheels +of 'Zek'el and the year 1843. I say, Hip, hip, hoo-ray fer liberty +or death, and down with the Dutch!"</p> +<p>Norman Anderson scratched his head.</p> +<p>What did Jonas mean?</p> +<p>He couldn't exactly divine; but it is safe to say that on the +whole he was not entirely satisfied with this boomerang speech. He +rather thought that he had better not depend on Jonas.</p> +<p>But he was not long in finding allies enough in his war against +Germany.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIII."></a>CHAPTER XXIII.</h2> +<h3>SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS.</h3> +<br> +<p>There was an egg-supper in the country store at Brayville. Mr. +Mandluff, the tall and raw-boned Hoosier who kept the store, was +not unwilling to have the boys get up an egg supper now and then in +his store after he had closed the front-door at night. For you must +know that an egg-supper is a peculiar Western institution. +Sometimes it is a most enjoyable institution--when it has its place +in a store where there is no Kentucky whisky to be had. But in +Brayville, in the rather miscellaneous establishment of the not +very handsome and not very graceful Mr. Mandluff, an egg-supper was +not a great moral institution. It was otherwise, and profanely +called by its votaries a camp-meeting; it would be hard to tell +why, unless it was that some of the insiders grew very happy before +it was over. For an egg-supper at Mandluff's store was to Brayville +what an oyster-supper at Delmonico's is to New York. It was one +tenth hard eggs and nine tenths that beverage which bears the name +of an old royal house of France.</p> +<p>How were the eggs cooked? I knew somebody would ask that +impertinent question. Well, they were not fried, they were not +boiled, they were not poached, they were not scrambled, they were +not omeletted, they were not roasted on the half-shell, they were +not stuffed with garlic and served with cranberries, they were not +boiled and served with anchovy sauce, they were not "<i>en +salmi</i>." I think I had better stop there, lest I betray my +knowledge of cookery. It is sufficient to say that they were not +cooked in any of the above-named fashions, nor in any other way +mentioned in Catharine Beecher's or Marion Harland's cookbooks. +They were baked <i>à la mode</i> backwoods. It is hardly +proper for me to give a recipe in this place, that belongs more +properly to the "Household Departments" of the newspapers. But to +satisfy curiosity, and to tell something about cooking, which Prof. +Blot does not know, I may say that they were broken and dropped on +a piece of brown paper laid on the top of the old box-stove. By the +time the egg was cooked hard the paper was burned to ashes, but the +egg came off clean and nice from the stove, and made as palatable +and indigestible an article for a late supper as one could wish. It +only wanted the addition of Mandluff's peculiar whisky to make it +dissipation of the choicest kind. For the more a dissipation costs +in life and health, the more fascinating it is.</p> +<p>There was an egg-supper, as I said, at Mandluff's store. There +was to be a "camp-meeting" in honor of Norman Anderson's successful +return to his liberty and his cronies. It gave Norman, the greatest +pleasure to return to a society where it was rather to his credit +than otherwise that he had gone on a big old time, got caught, and +been sent adrift by the old hunk that had tried to make him study +Latin.</p> +<p>The eggs were baked in the true "camp-meeting" style, the whisky +was drunk, and--so was the company. Bill Day's rather red eyes grew +redder, and his nose shone with delight as he shuffled the greasy +pack of "kyerds." The maudlin smile crossed the habitually +melancholy lines of his face in a way that split and splintered his +visage into a curious contradiction of emotions.</p> +<p>"H--a--oo--p!" He shouted, throwing away the cards over the +heads of his companions. "Ha--oop! boys, thish is big--hoo! hoo! +ha--oop! I say is big. Let's do somethin'!"</p> +<p>Here there was a confused cry that "it <i>was</i> big, and that +they had better do somethin' or 'nother."</p> +<p>"Let's blow up the ole school-house," said Bill Day, who was not +friendly to education.</p> +<p>"I tell you what," said Bob Short, who was dealing the cards in +another set--"I tell you what," and Bob winked his eyes vigorously, +and looked more solemn and wise than he could have looked if it had +not been for the hard eggs and the whisky--"I tell you what," said +Bob a third time, and halted, for his mind's activity was a little +choked by the fervor of his emotions--"I tell you what, boys--"</p> +<p>"Wal," piped Jim West in a cracked voice, "you've told us +<i>what</i> four times, I 'low; now s'pose you tell us somethin' +else."</p> +<p>"I tell you what, boys," said Bob Short, suddenly remembering +his sentence, "don't let's do nothin' that'll git us into no +trouble arterwards. Ef we blow up the school-house we'll be 'rested +fer bigamy or--or--what d'ye call it?"</p> +<p>"For larson," said Bill Day, hardly able to restrain another +whoop.</p> +<p>"No, 'taint larson," said Bob Short, looking wiser than a +chief-justice, "it's arsony. Now I say, don't let's go to +penitentiary for no--no larson--no arsony, I mean."</p> +<p>"Ha--oop!" said Bill. "Let's do somethin' ludikerous. Hurrah for +arsony and larson! Dog-on the penitentiary! Ha--oop!"</p> +<br> +<a name="157.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/157.jpg"><img src="images/157.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Let's go fer the Dutchman," said Norman Anderson, just drunk +enough to be good-naturedly murderous and to speak in dialect. "Gus +is turned out to committin' larson by breakin' into people's houses +an' has run off. Now let's tar and feather the ole one. Of course, +he's a thief. Dutchmen always is, I 'low. Clark township don't want +none of 'em, I'll be dog-oned if it do," and Norman got up and +struck his fist on the counter.</p> +<p>"An' they won't nobody hurt you; you see, he's on'y a Dutchman," +said Bob Short "Larson on a Dutchman don't hold."</p> +<p>"I say, let's hang him," said Bill Day. "Ha--oop! Let's hang +him, or do somethin' else ludikerous!"</p> +<p>"I wouldn't mind," grinned Norman Anderson, delighted at the +turn things had taken. "I'd just like to see him hung."</p> +<p>"So would I," said Bill Day, leaning over to Norman. "Ef a +Dutchman wash to court my sishter, I'd--"</p> +<p>"He'd be a fool ef he did," piped Jim West. For Bill Day's +sister was a "maid not vendible," as Shakespeare has it.</p> +<p>"See yer," said Bill, trying in vain to draw his coat. "Looky +yer, Jeems; ef you say anythin' agin Ann Marier, I'll commit the +wust larson on you you ever seed."</p> +<p>"I didn't say nothin' agin Ann Marier," squeaked Jim. "I was +talkin' agin the Dutch."</p> +<p>"Well, that'sh all right Ha--oop! Boys, let's do somethin', +larson or arsony or--somethin'."</p> +<p>A bucket of tar and some feathers were bought, for which young +Anderson was made to pay, and Bill Day insisted on buying fifteen +feet of rope. "Bekase," as he said, "arter you git the feathers on +the bird, you may--you may want to help him to go to roosht you +know, on a hickory limb. Ha--oop! Come along, boys; I say let's do +somethin' ludikerous, ef it's nothin' but a little larson."</p> +<p>And so they went galloping down the road, nine drunken fools. +For it is one of the beauties of lynch law, that, however +justifiable it may seem in some instances, it always opens the way +to villainous outrages. Some of my readers will protest that a man +was never lynched for the crime of being a Dutchman. Which only +shows how little they know of the intense prejudice and lawless +violence of the early West. Some day people will not believe that +men have been killed in California for being Chinamen.</p> +<p>Of the nine who started, one, the drunkest, fell off and broke +his arm; the rest rode up in front of the cabin of Gottlieb Wehle. +I do not want to tell how they alarmed the mother at her late +sewing and dragged Gottlieb out of his bed. I shudder now when I +recall one such outrage to which I was an unwilling witness. Norman +threw the rope round Gottlieb's neck and declared for hanging. Bill +Day agreed. It would be so ludikerous, you know!</p> +<p>"Vot hash I tun? Hey? Vot vor you dries doo hanks me already, +hey?" cried the honest German, who was willing enough to have the +end of the world come, but who did not like the idea of ascending +alone, and in this fashion.</p> +<p>Mrs. Wehle pushed her way into the mob and threw the rope off +her husband's neck, and began to talk with vehemence in German. For +a moment the drunken fellows hung back out of respect for a woman. +Then Bill Day was suddenly impressed with the fact that the duty of +persuading Mrs. Wehle to consent to her husband's execution +devolved upon him.</p> +<p>"Take keer, boys; let me talk to the ole woman. I'll argy the +case."</p> +<p>"You can't speak Dutch no more nor a hoss can," squeaked Jeems +West.</p> +<p>"Blam'd ef I can't, though. Hyer, ole woman, firshta Dutch?"</p> +<p>"Ya."</p> +<p>"Now," said Bill, turning to the others in triumph, "what did I +tell you? Well, you see, your boy August is a thief."</p> +<p>"He's not a teef!" said the old man.</p> +<p>"Shet up your jaw. I say he is. Now, your ole man's got to be +hung."</p> +<p>"Vot vor?" broke in Gottlieb.</p> +<p>"Bekase it's all your own fault. You hadn't orter be a +Dutchman."</p> +<p>Here the crowd fell into a wrangle. It was not so easy to hang a +man when such a woman stood there pleading for him. Besides, Bob +Short insisted that hanging was arsony in the first degree, and +they better not do it. To this Bill Day assented. He said he +'sposed tar and feathers was only larson in the second degree. And +then it would be rale ludikerous. And now confused cries of "Bring +on the tar!" "Where's the feathers?" "Take off his clothes!" began +to be raised. Norman stood out for hanging. Drink always +intensified his meanness. But the tar couldn't be found. The man +whom they had left lying by the roadside with a broken arm had +carried the tar, and had been well coated with it himself in his +fall.</p> +<p>"Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day. "Let's do somethin'. Dog-on the +arsony! Let's hang him as high as Dan'el."</p> +<p>And with that the rope was thrown over Gottlieb's, neck and he +was hurried off to the nearest tree. The rope was then put over a +limb, and a drunken half-dozen got ready to pull, while Norman +Anderson adjusted the noose and valiant Bill Day undertook to keep +off Mrs. Wehle.</p> +<p>"All ready! Pull up! Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day, and the crowd +pulled, but Mrs. Wehle had slipped off the noose again, and the +volunteer executioners fell over one another in such a way as to +excite the derisive laughter of Bill Day, who thought it perfectly +ludikerous. But before the laugh had finished, the indignant +Gottlieb had knocked Bill Day over and sent Norman after him. The +blow sobered them a little, and suddenly destroyed Bill's ambition +to commit "arsony," or do anything else ludikerous. But Norman was +furious, and under his lead Wehle's arms were now bound with the +rope and a consultation was held, during which little Wilhelmina +pleaded for her father effectively, and more by her tears and cries +and the wringing of her chubby hands than by any words. Bill Day +said he be blamed of that little Dutch gal's takin' on so didn't +kinder make him foul sorter scrimpshous you know. But the mob could +not quit without doing something. So it was resolved to give +Gottlieb a good ducking in the river and send him into Kentucky +with a warning not to come back. They went down the ravine past +Andrew's castle to the river. Mrs. Wehle followed, believing that +her husband would be drowned, and little Wilhelmina ran and pulled +the alarm and awakened the Backwoods Philosopher, who soon threw +himself among them, but too late to dissuade them from their +purpose, for Andrew's own skiff, the "Grisilde" by name, with three +of the soberest of the party, had already set out to convey Wehle, +after one hasty immersion, to the other shore, while the rest stood +round hallooing like madmen to prevent any alarm that Wehle might +raise attracting attention on the other side.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIV."></a>CHAPTER XXIV.</h2> +<h3>THE GIANT GREAT-HEART.</h3> +<br> +<p>As soon as Andrew's skiff, the "Grisilde," was brought back and +the ruffians had gone off up the ravine, Andrew left Mrs. Wehle +sitting by the fire in the loom-room of the castle, while he +crossed the river to look after Gottlieb. Little Wilhelmina +insisted on going with him, and as she handled a steering-oar well +he took her along. They found Gottlieb with his arms cruelly +pinioned sitting on a log in a state of utter dejection, and +dripping with water from his ducking.</p> +<p>"Ich zay, Antroo, ish dish vat dey galls a vree goontry, +already? A blace vare troonk sheounders dosh vot ever dey hadn't +ort! Dat is vree koontry. Mein knabe ish roon off ver liebin a +Yangee; unt a vool he ish, doo. Unt ich ish hoong unt troundt unt +darrdt unt vedderd unt drakt out indoo de ribber, unt dolt if I ko +back do mein vrau unt kinder I zhall pe kilt vunst more already. +Unt I shpose if ich shtays here der Gainduckee beobles vill hang me +unt dar me unt trown me all over in der ribber, doo, already, pekoz +I ish Deutsch. Ich zay de voorld ish all pad, unt it aud doo pe +vinished vunst already, I ton't gare how quick, so ash dem droonk +vools kit vot pelongs doo 'em venever Gabrel ploes his +drumbet."</p> +<br> +<a name="163.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/163.jpg"><img src="images/163.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>TO THE RESCUE.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"They'll get that in due time, my friend," said Andrew, untying +the rope with which Gottlieb had been pinioned. "Come, let us go +back to our own shore."</p> +<p>"Bud daint my zhore no more. Dey said I'd god doo hang again +vanst more if I ever grossed de Ohio Ribber vunst again already, +but I ton't vants doo hang no more vor noddin already."</p> +<p>"But I'll take care of that," said Andrew. "Before to-morrow +night I'll make your house the safest place in Clark township. I've +got the rascals by the throat now. Trust me."</p> +<p>It took much entreaty on the part of Andrew and much weeping and +kissing on the part of Wilhelmina to move the heart of the +terrified Gottlieb. At last he got into the skiff and allowed +himself to be rowed back again, declaring all the way that he +nebber zee no zich a vree koontry ash dish voz already.</p> +<p>When Bill Day and his comrades got up the next morning and began +to think of the transactions of the night, they did not seem nearly +so ludikerous as they had at the time. And when Norman Anderson and +Bill Day and Bob Short read the notice on the door of Mandluff's +store they felt that "arsony" might have a serious as well as a +ludikerous side.</p> +<p>Andrew at first intended to institute proceedings against the +rioters, but he knew that the law was very uncertain against the +influences which the eight or nine young men might bring to bear, +and the prejudices of the people against the Dutch. To prosecute +would be to provoke another riot. So he contented himself with +this</p> +<blockquote>"PROCLAMATION!<br> +<br> +"TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: I have a list of eight men connected with +the riotous mob which broke into the house of Gottlieb Wehle, a +peaceable and unoffending citizen of the United States. The said +eight men proceeded to commit an assault and battery on the person +of the said Gottlieb Wehle, and even endeavored at one time to take +his life. And the said riotous conduct was the result of a +conspiracy, and the said assault with intent to kill was with +malice aforethought. The said eight men, after having committed +grievous outrages upon him by dipping him in the water and by other +means, warned the said Wehle not to return to the State. Now, +therefore, I give notice to all and several of those concerned in +these criminal proceedings that the said Wehle has returned by my +advice; and that if so much as a hair of his head or a splinter of +his property is touched I will appear against said parties and will +prosecute them until I secure the infliction of the severest +penalties made and provided for the punishment of such infamous +crimes. I hope I am well enough known here to render it certain +that if I once begin proceedings nothing but success or my death or +the end of the world can stop them.<br> +<br> +"ANDREW ANDERSON,<br> +<br> +"Backwoods Philosopher.<br> +<br> +"AT THE CASTLE, May 12th, 1843."</blockquote> +<p>"It don't look so ludikerous as it did, does it, Bill?" squeaked +Jim West, as he read the notice over Bill's shoulder.</p> +<p>"Shet your mouth, you fool!" said Bill. "Don't you never peep. +Ef I'd a been sober I might a knowed ole Grizzly would interfere. +He always does."</p> +<p>In truth, Andrew was a sort of Perpetual Champion of the +Oppressed, and those who did not like him feared him, which is the +next best thing.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXV."></a>CHAPTER XXV.</h2> +<h3>A CHAPTER OF BETWEENS.</h3> +<br> +<p>Did you ever move? And, in moving, did you ever happen to notice +how many little things there are to be picked up? Now that I am +about to shift the scene of my story from Clark township, the +narrow stage upon which it has progressed through two dozen +chapters, I find a great number of little things to be picked +up.</p> +<p>One of the little things to be picked up is Norman Anderson. +Very little, if measured soul-wise. When his father had read the +proclamation of Andrew and divined that Norman was interested in +the riot, he became thoroughly indignant; the more so, that he felt +his own lack of power to do anything in the premises against his +wife. But when Mrs. Abigail heard of the case she was in genuine +distress. It showed Andrew's vindictiveness. He would follow her +forever with his resentments, just because she could not love him. +It was not her fault that she did not love him. Poor Norman had to +suffer all the persecutions that usually fall to such innocent +creatures. She must send him away from home, though it broke her +mother's heart to do it; for if Andrew didn't have him took up, the +old Dutchman would, just because his son had turned out a burglar. +She said burglar rather emphatically, with a look at Julia.</p> +<p>And so Samuel Anderson took his son to Louisville, and got him a +place in a commission and produce house on the levee, with which +Mr. Anderson had business influence. And Samuel warned him that he +must do his best, for he could not come back home now without +danger of arrest, and Norman made many promises of amendment; so +many, that his future seemed to him barren of all delight. And, by +way of encouraging himself in the austere life upon which he had +resolved to enter, he attended the least reputable place of +amusement in the city, the first night after his father's +departure.</p> +<p>In Clark township the Millerite excitement was at white heat. +Some of the preachers in other parts of the country had set one +day, some another. I believe that Mr. Miller, the founder, never +had the temerity to set a day. But his followers figured the thing +more closely, and Elder Hankins had put a fine point on the matter. +He was certain, for his part, that the time was at midnight on the +eleventh of August. His followers became very zealous, and such is +the nature of an infection that scarcely anybody was able to resist +it. Mrs. Anderson, true to her excitable temper, became +fanatic--dreaming dreams, seeing visions, hearing voices, praying +twenty times a day<a name="FNanchor2"></a><a href= +"#Footnote_2"><sup>[2]</sup></a>, wearing a sourly pious face, and +making all around her more unhappy than ever. Jonas declared that +ef the noo airth and the noo heaven was to be chockful of sech as +she, 'most any other place in the univarse would be better, +akordin' to his way of thinkin'. He said she repented more of other +folkses' sins than anybody he ever seed.</p> +<blockquote><a name="Footnote_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor2">[2]</a> +Mrs. Anderson was less devout than some of her co-religionists; the +wife of a well-known steamboat-clerk was accustomed to pray in +private fifty times a day, hoping by means of this praying without +ceasing to be found ready when the trumpet should +sound.</blockquote> +<p>As summer came on, Samuel Anderson, borne away on the tide of +his own and his wife's fanatical fever of sublimated devotion, +discharged Jonas and all his other <i>employés</i>, threw up +business, and gave his whole attention to the straightening of his +accounts for the coming day of judgment. Before Jonas left to seek +a new place he told Cynthy Ann as how as ef he'd met her alrlier +'twould a-settled his coffee fer life. He was gittin' along into +the middle of the week now, but he'd come to feel like a boy since +he'd been a livin' where he could have a few sweet and pleasant +words--ahem!--he thought December'd be as pleasant as May all the +year round ef he could live in the aurora borealis of her +countenance. And Cynthy Ann enjoyed his words so much that she +prayed for forgiveness for the next week and confessed in +class-meeting that she had yielded to temptation and sot her heart +on the things of this perishin' world. She was afeared she hadn't +always remembered as how as she was a poor unworthy dyin' worm of +the dust, and that all the beautiful things in this world perished +with the usin'.</p> +<p>And Brother Goshorn, the class-leader at Harden's Cross-Roads, +exhorted her to tear every idol from her heart. And still the sweet +woman's nature, God's divine law revealed in her heart, did assert +itself a little. She planted some pretty-by-nights in an old +cracked blue-and-white tea-pot and set it on her window-sill. +Somehow the pretty-by-nights would remind her of Jonas, and while +she tried to forget him with one half of her nature, the other and +better part (the depraved part, she would have told you) cherished +the memory of his smallest act and word. In fact, the flowers had +no association with Jonas except that along with the awakening of +her love came this little sentiment for flowers into the dry desert +of her life. But one day Mrs. Anderson discovered the old blue +broken tea-pot with its young plants.</p> +<p>"Why, Cynthy Ann!" she cried, "a body'd think you'd have more +sense than to do such a soft thing as to be raisin' posies at +<i>your</i> time of life! And that when the world is drawing to a +close, too! You'll be one of the foolish virgins with no oil to +your lamp, as sure as you see that day."</p> +<p>As for Julia's flowers, Mrs. Anderson had rudely thrown them +into the road by way of removing temptation from her and turning +her thoughts toward the awful realities of the close of time.</p> +<p>But Cynthy Ann blushed and repented, and kept her broken +tea-pot, with a fearful sense of sin in doing so. She never watered +the pretty-by-nights without the feeling that she was offering +sacrifice to an idol.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVI."></a>CHAPTER XXVI.</h2> +<h3>A NICE LITTLE GAME.</h3> +<br> +<p>It was natural enough that the "mud-clerk" on the old steamboat +Iatan should take a fancy to the "striker," as the engineer's +apprentice was called. Especially since the striker know so much +more than the mud-clerk, and was able to advise him about many +things. A striker with so much general information was rather a +novelty, and all the officers fancied him, except Sam Munson, the +second engineer, who had a natural jealousy of a striker that knew +more than he did.</p> +<p>The striker had learned rapidly, and was trusted to stand a +regular watch. The first engineer and the third were together, and +the second engineer and the striker took the other watch. The boat +in this way got the services of a competent engineer while paying +him only a striker's wage.</p> +<p>About the time the heavily-laden Iatan turned out of the +Mississippi into the Ohio at Cairo at six in the evening, the +striker went off watch, and he ought to have gone to bed to prepare +himself for the second watch of the night, especially as he would +only have the dog-watch between that and the forenoon. But a +passenger had got aboard at Cairo, whose face was familiar. The +sight of it had aroused a throng of old associations, pleasant and +unpleasant, and a throng of emotions the most tender and the most +wrathful the striker had ever felt. Sleep he could not, and so, +knowing that the mud-clerk was on watch, he sought the office after +nine o'clock, and stood outside the bar talking to his friend, who +had little to do, since most of the freight had been shipped +through, and his bills for Paducah were all ready. The striker +talked with the mud-clerk, but watched the throng of passengers who +drank with each other at the bar, smoked in the "social hall," read +and wrote at the tables in the gentlemen's cabin, or sat with +doffed hats and chatted gallantly in the ladies' cabin, which was +visible as a distant background, seen over a long row of tables +with green covers and under a long row of gilded wooden +stalactites, which were intended to be ornamental. The little +pendent prisms beneath the chandeliers rattled gayly as the boat +trembled at each stroke of her wheels, and gaping backwoodsmen, +abroad for the first time, looked at all the rusty +gingerbread-work, and wondered if kings were able to afford +anything half so fine as the cabin of the "palatial steamer Iatan," +as she was described on the bills. The confused murmur of many +voices, mixed with the merry tinkling of the glass pendants, gave +the whole an air of excitement.</p> +<p>But the striker did not see the man he was looking for. "Who got +on at Cairo? I think I saw a man from our part of the country," he +said.</p> +<p>"I declare, I don't know," said the mud-clerk, who drawled his +words in a cold-blooded way. "Let me look. Here's A. Robertson, and +T. Le Fevre, and L.B. Sykes, and N. Anderson."</p> +<p>"Where is Anderson going?"</p> +<p>"Paid through to Louisville. Do you know him?"</p> +<p>But just then Norman Anderson himself walked in, and went up to +the bar with a new acquaintance. They did not smoke the pipe of +peace, like red Americans, but, like white Americans, they had a +mysterious liquid carefully compounded, and by swallowing this they +solemnly sealed their new-made friendship after the curious and +unexplained rite in use among their people.</p> +<p>Norman had been dispatched on a collecting trip, and having nine +hundred and fifty dollars in his pocket, he felt as much elated as +if it had been his own money. The gentleman with whom he drank, had +a band of crape around his white hat. He seemed very +nearsighted.</p> +<p>"If that greeny is a friend of yours, Gus, I declare you'd +better tell him not to tie to the serious-looking young fellow in +the white hat and gold specs, unless he means to part with all his +loose change before bed-time."</p> +<p>That is what the mud-clerk drawled to August the striker, but +the striker seemed to hear the words as something spoken afar off. +For just then he was seeing a vision of a drunken mob, and a rope, +and a pleading woman, and a brave old man threatened with death. +Just then he heard harsh and muddled voices, rude oaths, and +jeering laughter, and above it all the sweet pleading of a little +girl begging for a father's life. And the quick blood came into his +fair German face, and he felt that he could not save this Norman +Anderson from the toils of the gambler, though he might, if +provoked, pitch him over the guard of the boat. For was not +Andrew's letter, which described the mob, in his pocket, and +burning a hole in his pocket as it had been ever since he received +it?</p> +<p>But then this was Julia's brother, and there was nothing he +would not do for Julia. So, sometime after the mud-clerk had ceased +to speak, the striker gave utterance to both impulses by replying, +"He's no friend of mine," a little crisply, and then softly adding, +"Though I shouldn't like to see him fleeced."</p> +<p>By this time a new actor had appeared on the scene in the person +of a man with a black mustache and side-whiskers, who took a seat +behind a card-table near the bar.</p> +<p>"H'llo!" said the mud-clerk in a low and lazy voice, "Parkins is +back again. After his scrape at Paducah last February, he +disappeared, and he's been shady ever since. He's growed whiskers +since, so's not to be recognized. But he'll be skeerce enough when +we get to Paducah. Now, see how quick he'll catch the greenies, +won't you?" The prospect was so charming as almost to stimulate the +mud-clerk to speak with some animation.</p> +<p>But August Wehle, the striker on the Iatan, had an uncomfortable +feeling that he had seen that face before, and that the long +mustache and side-whiskers had grown in a remarkably short space of +time. Could it be that there were two men who could spread a smile +over the lower half of their faces in that automatic way, while the +spider-eyes had no sort of sympathy with it? Surely, this man with +black whiskers and mustache was not just like the singing-master at +Sugar-Grove school-house, who had "red-top hay on to his upper +lip," and yet--and yet--</p> +<p>"Gentlemen," said Parkins--his Dickensian name would be +Smirkins--"I want to play a little game just for the fun of the +thing. It is a trick with three cards. I put down three cards, face +up. Here is six of diamonds, eight of spades, and the ace of +hearts. Now, I will turn them over so quickly that I will defy any +of you to tell which is the ace. Do you see? Now, I would like to +bet the wine for the company that no gentleman here can turn up the +ace. All I want is a little sport. Something to pass away the +evening and amuse the company. Who will bet the wine? The Scripture +says that the hand is quicker than the eye, and I warn you that if +you bet, you will probably lose." And here he turned the cards +back, with their faces up, and the card which everybody felt sure +was the ace proved apparently to be that card. Most of the +on-lookers regretted that they had not bet, seeing that they would +certainly have won. Again the cards were put face down, and the +company was bantered to bet the wine. Nobody would bet.</p> +<br> +<a name="175.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/175.jpg"><img src="images/175.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>A NICE LITTLE GAME.</b></p> +<br> +<p>After a good deal of fluent talk, and much dexterous handling of +the cards, in a way that seemed clear enough to everybody, and that +showed that everybody's guess was right as to the place of the ace, +the near-sighted gentleman, who had drunk with Norman, offered to +bet five dollars.</p> +<p>"Five dollars!" returned Parkins, laughing in derision, "five +dollars! Do you think I'm a gambler? I don't want any gentleman's +money. I've got all the money I need. However, if you would like to +bet the wine with me, I am agreed."</p> +<p>The near-sighted gentleman declined to wager anything but just +the five dollars, and Parkins spurned his proposition with the +scorn of a gentleman who would on no account bet a cent of money. +But he grew excited, and bantered the whole crowd. Was there no +<i>gentleman</i> in the crowd who would lay a wager of wine for the +company on this interesting little trick? It was strange to him +that no gentleman had spirit enough to make the bet. But no +gentleman had spirit enough to bet the wine. Evidently there were +no gentlemen in the company.</p> +<p>However, the near-sighted man with the white hat adorned with +crape now proposed in a crusty tone to bet ten dollars that he +could lift the ace. He even took out a ten-dollar bill, and, after +examining it, in holding it close to his nose as a penurious man +might, extended his hand with, "If you're in earnest, let's know +it. I'll bet you ten."</p> +<p>At this Parkins grew furious. He had never been so persistently +badgered in all his life. He'd have the gentleman know that he was +not a gambler. He had all the money he wanted, and as for betting +ten dollars, he shouldn't think of it. But now that the +gentleman--he said <i>gentleman</i> with an emphasis--now that the +gentleman seemed determined to bet money, he would show him that he +was not to be backed down. If the young man would like to wager a +hundred dollars, he would cheerfully bet with him. If the gentleman +did not feel able to bet a hundred dollars, he hoped he would not +say any more about it. He hadn't intended to bet money at all. But +he wouldn't bet less than a hundred dollars with anybody. A man who +couldn't afford to lose a hundred dollars, ought not to bet.</p> +<p>"Who is this fellow in the white hat with spectacles?" August +asked of the mud-clerk.</p> +<p>"That is Smith, Parkins's partner. He is only splurging round to +start up the greenies." And the mud-clerk spoke with an +indifference and yet a sort of <i>dilettante</i> interest in the +game that shocked his friend, the striker.</p> +<p>"Why don't they set these blacklegs ashore?" said August, whose +love of justice was strong.</p> +<p>"<i>You</i> tell," drawled the mud-clerk. "The first clerk's +tried it, but the old man protects 'em, and" (in a whisper) "get's +his share, I guess. He can set them off whenever he wants to." (I +must explain that there is only one "old man" on a steamboat--that +is, the captain.)</p> +<p>By this time Parkins had turned and thrown his cards so that +everybody knew or thought he knew where the ace was. Smith, the man +with the white hat, now rose five dollars more and offered to bet +fifteen. But Parkins was more indignant than ever. He told Smith to +go away. He thrust his hand into his pocket and drew out a handful +of twenty-dollar gold-pieces. "If any gentleman wants to bet a +hundred dollars, let him come on. A man who couldn't lose a hundred +would better keep still."</p> +<p>Smith now made a big jump. He'd go fifty. Parkins wouldn't +listen to fifty. He had said that he wouldn't bet less than a +hundred, and he wouldn't. He now pulled out handful after handful +of gold, and piled the double-eagles up like a fortification in +front of him, while the crowd surged with excitement.</p> +<p>At last Mr. Smith, the near-sighted gentleman in spectacles, the +gentleman who wore black crape on a white hat, concluded to bet a +hundred dollars. He took out his little porte-monnaie and lifted +thence a hundred-dollar bill.</p> +<p>"Well," said he angrily, "I'll bet you a hundred." And he laid +down the bill. Parkins piled five twenty-dollar gold-pieces atop +it. Each man felt that he could lift the ace in a moment. That card +at the dealer's right was certainly the ace. Norman was sure of it. +He wished it had been his wager instead of Smith's. But Parkins +stopped Smith a moment.</p> +<p>"Now, young man," he said, "if you don't feel perfectly able to +lose that hundred dollars, you'd better take it back."</p> +<p>"I am just as able to lose it as you are," said Smith +snappishly, and to everybody's disappointment he lifted not the +card everybody had fixed on, but the middle one, and so lost his +money.</p> +<p>"Why didn't you take the other?" said Norman boastfully. "I knew +it was the ace."</p> +<p>"Why didn't you bet, then?" said Smith, grinning a little. +Norman wished he had. But he had not a hundred dollars of his own, +and he had scruples--faint, and yet scruples, or rather alarms--at +the thought of risking his employer's money on a wager. While he +was weighing motive against motive, Smith bet again, and again, to +Norman's vexation, selected a card that was so obviously wrong that +Norman thought it a pity that so near-sighted a man should bet and +lose. He wished he had a hundred dollars of his own and--There, +Smith was betting again. This time he consulted Norman before +making his selection, and of course turned up the right card, +remarking that he wished his eyes were so keen! He would win a +thousand dollars before bed-time if his eyes were so good! Then he +took Norman into partnership, and Norman found himself suddenly in +possession of fifty dollars, gotten without trouble. This turned +his brain. Nothing is so intoxicating to a weak man as money +acquired without toil. So Norman continued to bet, sometimes +independently, sometimes in partnership with, the gentlemanly +Smith. He was borne on by the excitement of varying fortune, a +varying fortune absolutely under control of the dealer, whose +sleight-of-hand was perfect. And the varying fortune had an +unvarying tendency in the long run--to put three stakes out Of five +into the pockets of the gamblers, who found the little game very +interesting amusement for gentlemen.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVII."></a>CHAPTER XXVII.</h2> +<h3>THE RESULT OF AN EVENING WITH GENTLEMEN.</h3> +<br> +<p>All the time that these smiling villains were by consummate art +drawing their weak-headed victim into their tolls, what was August +doing? Where were his prompt decision of character, his quick +intelligence, his fine German perseverance, that should have saved +the brother of Julia Anderson from harpies? Could our blue-eyed +young countryman, who knew how to cherish noble aspirations walking +in a plowman's furrow--could he stand there satisfying his revenge +by witnessing the ruin of a young man who, like many others, was +wicked only because he was weak?</p> +<p>In truth, August was a man whose feelings were persistent. His +resentment was--like his love--constant. But his love of justice +was higher and more persistent, and he could not have seen any one +fleeced in this merciless way without taking sides strongly with +the victim. Much less could he see the brother of Julia tempted on +to the rocks by the false lights of villainous wreckers without a +great desire to save him. For the letter of Andrew had ceased now +to burn in his pocket. That other letter--the only one that Julia +had been able to send through Cynthy Ann and Jonas--that other +letter, written all over with such tender extravagances as love +feeds on; the thought of that other letter, which told how +beautiful and precious were the invitations to the weary and +heavy-laden, had stilled resentment, and there came instead a keen +desire to save Norman for the sake of Julia and justice. But how to +do it was an embarrassing question--a question that was more than +August could solve. There was a difficulty in the weakness and +wrong-headedness of Norman; a difficulty in Norman's prejudice +against Dutchmen in general and August in particular; a difficulty +in the fact that August was a sort of a fugitive, if not from +justice, certainly from injustice.</p> +<p>But when nearly a third of Norman's employer's money had gone +into the gamblers' heap, and when August began to understand that +it was another man's money that Norman was losing, and that the +victim was threatened by no half-way ruin, he determined to do +something, even at the risk of making himself known to Norman and +to Parkins--was he Humphreys in disguise?--and at the risk of +arrest for house-breaking. August acted with his eyes open to all +the perils from gamblers' pistols and gamblers' malice; and after +he had started to interfere, the mud-clerk called him back, and +said, in his half-indifferent way:</p> +<p>"Looky here, Gus, don't be a blamed fool. That's a purty little +game. That greeny's got to learn to let blacklegs alone, and he +don't look like one that'll take advice. Let him scorch a little; +it'll do him good. It's healthy for young men. That's the reason +the old man don't forbid it, I s'pose. And these fellows carry good +shooting-irons with hair-triggers, and I declare I don't want to be +bothered writing home to your mother, and explaining to her that +you got killed in a fight with blacklegs, I declare I don't, you +see. And then you'll get the 'old man' down on you, if you let a +bird out of the trap in which he goes snucks; you will, I declare. +And you'll get walking-papers at Louisville. Let the game alone. +You haven't got any hand to play against Parkins, nohow; and I +reckon the greenhorns are his lawful prey. Cats couldn't live +without mice. You'll lose your place, I declare you will, if you +say a word."</p> +<br> +<a name="183.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/183.jpg"><img src="images/183.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE MUD-CLERK.</b></p> +<br> +<p>August stopped long enough to take in the full measure of his +sacrifice. So far from being deterred by it, he was more than ever +determined to act. Not the love Julia, so much, now, but the +farewell prayer and benediction and the whole life and spirit of +the sweet Moravian mother in her child-full house at home were in +his mind at this moment. Things which a man will not do for the +love of woman he may do for the love of God--and it was with a +sense of moral exaltation that August entered into the lofty spirit +of self-sacrifice he had seen in his mother, and caught himself +saying, in his heart, as he had heard her say, "Let us do anything +for the Father's sake!" Some will call this cant. So much the worse +for them. This motive, too little felt in our day--too little felt +in any day--is the great impulse that has enabled men to do the +bravest things that have been done. The sublimest self-sacrifice is +only possible to a man by the aid of some strong moral tonic. God's +love is the chief support of the strongest spirits.</p> +<p>August touched Norman on the arm. The face of the latter +expressed anything but pleasure at meeting him, now that he felt +guilty. But this was not the uppermost feeling with Norman. He +noticed that August's clothes were spotted with engine-grease, and +his first fear was of compromising his respectability.</p> +<p>In a hurried way August began to explain to him that he was +betting with gamblers, but Smith stood close to them, looking at +August in such a contemptuous way as to make Norman feel very +uncomfortable, and Parkins seeing the crowd attracted by August's +explanations--which he made in some detail, by way of adapting +himself to Norman--of the trick by which the upper card is thrown +out first, Parkins said, "I see you understand the game, young man. +If you do, why don't you bet?"</p> +<p>At this the crowd laughed, and Norman drew away from the +striker's greasy clothes, and said that he didn't want to speak any +further to a burglar, he believed. But August followed, determined +to warn him against Smith. Smith was ahead of him, however, saving +to Norman, "Look out for your pockets--that greasy fellow will rob +you."</p> +<p>And Norman, who was nothing if not highly respectable, resolved +to shake off the troublesome "Dutchman" at once. "I don't know what +you are up to now, but at home you are known as a thief. So please +let me alone, will you?" This Norman tried to say in an +annihilating way.</p> +<p>The crowd looked for a fight. August said loud enough to be +heard, "You know very well that you lie. I wanted to save you from +being a thief, but you are betting money now that is not +yours."</p> +<p>The company, of course, sympathized with the gentleman and +against the machine-oil on the striker's clothes, so that there +arose quickly a murmur, started by Smith, "Put the bully out," and +August was "hustled." It is well that he was not shot.</p> +<p>It was quite time for him to go on watch now; for the +loud-ticking marine-clock over the window of the clerk's office +pointed to three minutes past twelve, and the striker hurried to +his post at the starboard engine, with the bitterness of defeat and +the shame of insult in his heart. He had sacrificed his place, +doubtless, and risked much beside, and all for nothing. The third +engineer complained of his tardiness in not having relieved him +three minutes before, and August went to his duties with a bitter +heart. To a man who is persistent, as August was, defeat of any +sort is humiliating.</p> +<p>As for Norman, he bet after this just to show his independence +and to show that the money was his own, as well as in the vain hope +of winning back what he had lost. He bet every cent. Then he lost +his watch, and at half-past one o'clock he went to his state-room, +stripped of all loose valuables, and sweating great drops. And the +mud-clerk, who was still in the office, remarked to himself, with a +pleasant chuckle, that it was good for him; he declared it was; +teach the fellow to let monte alone, and keep his eyes peeled when +he traveled. It would so!</p> +<p>The idea was a good one, and he went down to the starboard +engine and told the result of the nice little game to his friend +the striker, drawling it out in a relishful way, how the blamed +idiot never stopped till they'd got his watch, and then looked like +as if he'd a notion to jump into the "drink." But 'twould cure him +of meddlin' with monte. It would so!</p> +<p>He walked away, and August was just reflecting on the +heartlessness of his friend, when the mud-clerk came back again, +and began drawling his words out as before, just as though each +distinct word were of a delightful flavor and he regretted that he +must part with it.</p> +<p>"I've got you even with Parkins, old fellow. He'll be strung up +on a lamp-post at Paducah, I reckon. I saw a Paducah man aboard, +and I put a flea in his ear. We've got to lay there an hour or two +to put off a hundred barrels of molasses and two hundred sacks of +coffee and two lots of plunder. There'll be a hot time for Parkins. +He let on to marry a girl and fooled her. They'll teach him a +lesson. You'll be off watch, and we'll have some fun looking on." +And the mud-clerk evidently thought that it would be even funnier +to see Parkins hanged than it had been to see him fleece Norman. +Gus the striker did not see how either scene could be very +entertaining. But he was sick at heart, and one could not expect +him to show much interest in manly sports.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVIII."></a>CHAPTER XXVIII.</h2> +<h3>WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER.</h3> +<br> +<p>The steady beat of the wheels and the incessant clank of the +engines went on as usual. The boat was loaded almost to her guards, +and did not make much speed. The wheels kept their persistent beat +upon the water, and the engines kept their rhythmical clangor +going, until August found himself getting drowsy. Trouble, with +forced inaction, nearly always has a soporific tendency, and a +continuous noise is favorable to sleep. Once or twice August roused +himself to a sense of his responsibility and battled with his +heaviness. It was nearing the end of his watch, for the dog-watch +of two hours set in at four o'clock. But it seemed to him that four +o'clock would never come.</p> +<p>An incident occurred just at this moment that helped him to keep +his eyes open. A man went aft through the engine-room with a red +handkerchief tied round his forehead. In spite of this partial +disguise August perceived that it was Parkins. He passed through to +the place where the steerage or deck passengers are, and then +disappeared from August's sight. He had meant to disembark at a +wood-yard just below Paducah, but for some reason the boat did not +stop, and now, as August guessed, he was hiding himself from +Paducah eyes. He was not much too soon, for the great bell on the +hurricane-deck was already ringing for Paducah, and the summer dawn +was showing itself faintly through the river fog.</p> +<p>The alarm-bell rang in the engine-room, and Wehle stood by his +engine. Then the bell rang to stop the starboard engine, and August +obeyed it. The pilot of a Western steamboat depends much upon his +engines for steerage in making a landing, and the larboard engine +was kept running a while longer in order to bring the deeply-loaded +boat round to her landing at the primitive wharf-boat of that day. +There is something fine in the faith with which an engineer obeys +the bell of the pilot, not knowing what may be ahead, not inquiring +what may be the effect of the order, but only doing exactly what he +is bid when he is bid. August had stopped his engine, and stood +trying to keep his mind off Parkins and the events of the night, +that he might be ready to obey the next signal for his engine. But +the bell rang next to stop the other engine, at which the second +engineer stood, and August was so free from responsibility in +regard to that that he hardly noticed the sound of the bell, until +it rang a second time more violently. Then he observed that the +larboard engine still ran. Was Munson dead or asleep? Clearly it +was August's duty to stand by his own engine. But then he was +startled to think what damage to property or life might take place +from the failure of the second engineer to stop his engine. While +he hesitated, and all these considerations flashed through his +mind, the pilot's bell rang again long and loud, and August then, +obeying an impulse rather than a conviction, ran over to the other +engine, stopped it, and then, considering that it had run so long +against orders, he reversed it and set it to backing without +waiting instructions. Then he seized Munson and woke him, and +hurried back to his post. But the larboard engine had not made +three revolutions backward before the boat, hopelessly thrown from +her course by the previous neglect, struck the old wharf-boat and +sunk it. But for the promptness and presence of mind with which +Wehle acted, the steamboat itself would have suffered severely. The +mate and then the captain came rushing into the engine-room. Munson +was discharged at once, and the striker was promised engineer's +wages.</p> +<p>Gus went off watch at this moment, and the mud-clerk said to +him, in his characteristically indifferent voice, "Such luck, I +declare! I was sure you would be dismissed for meddling with +Parkins, and here you are promoted, I declare!"</p> +<p>The mishap occasioned much delay to the boat, as it was very +inconvenient to deliver freight at that day and at that stage of +water without the intervention of the wharf-boat. A full hour was +consumed in finding a landing, and in rigging the double-staging +and temporary planks necessary to get the molasses and coffee and +household "plunder" ashore. Some hint that Parkins was on the river +had already reached Paducah, and the sheriff and two deputies and a +small crowd were at the landing looking for him. A search of the +boat failed to discover him, and the crowd would have left the +landing but for occasional hints slyly thrown out by the mud-clerk +as he went about over the levee collecting freight-bills. These +hints, given in a non-committal way, kept the crowd alive with +expectation, and when the rumors thus started spread abroad, the +levee was soon filled with an excited and angry multitude.</p> +<p>If it had been a question of delivering a criminal to justice, +August would not have hesitated to tell the sheriff where to look. +But he very well knew that the sheriff could not convey the man +through the mob alive, and to deliver even such a scoundrel to the +summary vengeance of a mob was something that he could not find it +in his heart to do.</p> +<p>In truth, the sheriff and his officers did not seek very +zealously for their man. Under the circumstances, it was probable +he would not surrender himself without a fight, in which somebody +would be killed, and besides there must ensue a battle with the +mob. It was what they called an ugly job, and they were not loth to +accept the captain's assurance that the gambler had gone +ashore.</p> +<p>While August was unwilling to deliver the hunted villain to a +savage death, he began to ask himself why he might not in some way +use his terror in the interest of justice. For he had just then +seen the wretched and bewildered face of Norman looking ghastly +enough in the fog of the morning.</p> +<p>At last, full of this notion, and possessed, too, by his habit +of accomplishing at all hazards what he had begun, August strolled +back through the now quiet engine-room to the deck-passengers' +quarter. It was about half an hour before six o'clock, when the +dog-watch would expire and he must go on duty again. In one of the +uppermost of the filthy bunks, in the darkest corner, near the +wheel, he discovered what he thought to be his man. The +deck-passengers were still asleep, lying around stupidly. August +paused a moment, checked by a sense of the dangerousness of his +undertaking. Then he picked up a stick of wood and touched the +gambler, who could not have been very sound asleep, lying in +hearing of the curses of the mob on the shore. At first Parkins did +not move, but August gave him a still more vigorous thrust. Then he +peered out between the blanket and the handkerchief over his +forehead.</p> +<p>"I will take that money you won last night from that young man, +if you please."</p> +<br> +<a name="191.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/191.jpg"><img src="images/191.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Parkins saw that it was useless to deny his identity. "Do you +want to be shot?" he asked fiercely.</p> +<p>"Not any more than you want to be hung," said August. "The one +would follow the other in five minutes. Give back that money and I +will go away."</p> +<p>The gambler trembled a minute. He was fairly at bay. He took out +a roll of bills and handed it to August. There was but five +hundred. Smith had the other four hundred and fifty, he said. But +August had a quiet German steadiness of nerve. He said that unless +the other four hundred and fifty were paid at once he should call +in the sheriff or the crowd. Parkins knew that every minute August +stood there increased his peril, and human nature is now very much +like human nature in the days of Job. The devil understood the +subject very well when he said that all that a man hath will he +give for his life. Parkins paid the four hundred and fifty in +gold-pieces. He would have paid twice that if August had demanded +it.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIX."></a>CHAPTER XXIX.</h2> +<h3>AUGUST AND NORMAN.</h3> +<br> +<p>In a story such as I meant this to be, the development of +character stands for more than the evolution of the plot, and +herein is the true significance of this contact of Wehle with the +gamblers, and, indeed, of this whole steamboat life. It is not +enough for one to be good in a country neighborhood; the sharp +contests and severe ordeals of more exciting life are needed to +give temper to the character. August Wehle was hardly the same man +on this morning at Paducah, with the nine hundred and fifty dollars +in his pocket, that he had been the evening before, when he first +felt the sharp resentment against the man who had outraged his +father. In acting on a high plane, one is unconsciously lifted to +that plane. Men become Christians sometimes from the effect of +sudden demands made upon their higher moral nature, demands which +compel them to choose between a life higher than their present +living, or a moral degradation. Such had been August's experience. +He had been drawn upward toward God by the opportunity and +necessity for heroic action. I have no doubt the good Samaritan got +more out of his own kindness than the robbed Jew did.</p> +<p>Before he had a chance to restore the money to its rightful +owner, the two hours of dog-watch had expired, and he was obliged +to go on watch again, much to his annoyance. He had been nearly +twenty-four hours without sleep, and after a night of such +excitement it was unpleasant as well as perilous to have to hold +this money, which did not belong to him, for six hours longer, +liable at any minute to get into difficulty through any scheme of +the gamblers and their allies, by which his recovery of the money +might be misinterpreted. The morning seemed to wear away so slowly. +All the possibilities of Parkins's attacking him, of young +Anderson's committing suicide, and of the misconstruction that +might be put upon his motives--the making of his disinterested +action seem robbery--haunted his excitable imagination. At last, +while the engines were shoving their monotonous shafts backward and +forward, and the "palatial steamer" Iatan was slowly pushing her +way up the stream, August grew so nervous over his money that he +resolved to relieve himself of part of it. So he sent for the +mud-clerk by a passing deck-hand.</p> +<p>"I want you to keep this money for me until I get off watch," +said August. "I made Parkins stand and deliver this morning while +we were at Paducah."</p> +<p>"You did?" said the mud-clerk, not offering to touch the money. +"You risked your life, I declare, for that fool that called you a +thief. You are a fool, Gus, and nothing but your blamed good luck +can save you from getting salivated, bright and early, some +morning. Not a great deal I won't take that money. I don't relish +lead, and I've got to live among these fellows all my days, and I +don't hold that money for anybody. The old man would ship me at +Louisville, seeing I never stopped anybody's engine and backed it +in a hurry, as you did. If I'd known where Parkins was, I'd a +dropped a gentle word in the ear of the crowd outside, but I +wouldn't a pulled that greeny's coffee-nuts out of the fire, and I +won't hold the hot things for you. I declare I won't. Saltpeter +wouldn't save me if I did."</p> +<p>So Gus had to content himself in his nervousness, not allayed by +this speech, und keep the money in his pocket until noon. And, +after all the presentiment he had had, noon came round. +Presentiments generally come from the nerves, and signify nothing; +but nobody keeps a tally of the presentiments and auguries that +fail. When the first-engineer and a new man took the engines at +noon, Gus was advised by the former to get some sleep, but there +was no sleep for him until he had found Norman, who trembled at the +sight of him.</p> +<p>"Where is your state-room?" said August sternly, for he couldn't +bring himself to speak kindly to the poor fellow, even in his +misery.</p> +<p>Norman turned pale. He had been thinking of suicide all the +morning, but he was a coward, and now he evidently felt sure that +he was to be killed by August. He did not dare disobey, but led the +way, stopping to try to apologize two or three times, but never +getting any further than "I--I--"</p> +<p>Once in the state-room, he sat down on the berth and gasped, +"I--I--"</p> +<p>"Here is your money," said August, handing it to him. "I made +the gambler give it up."</p> +<p>"I--I--" said the astonished and bewildered Norman.</p> +<p>"You needn't say a word. You are a cowardly scoundrel, and if +you say anything, I'll knock you down for treating my father as you +did. Only for--for--well, I didn't want to see you fleeced."</p> +<p>Norman was ashamed for once, and hung his head. It touched the +heart of August a little, but the remembrance of the attack of the +mob on his father made him feel hard again, and so his generous act +was performed ungraciously.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXX."></a>CHAPTER XXX.</h2> +<h3>AGROUND.</h3> +<br> +<p>Not the boat. The boat ran on safely enough to Louisville, and +tied up at the levee, and discharged her sugar und molasses, and +took on a new cargo of baled hay and corn and flour, and went back +again, and made I know not how many trips, and ender her existence +I can not tell how or when. What does become of the old steamboats? +The Iatan ran for years after she tied up at Louisville that summer +morning, and then perhaps she was blown up or burned up; perchance +some cruel sawyer transfixed her; perchance she was sunk by ice, or +maybe she was robbed of her engines and did duty as barge, or, what +is more probable, she wore out like the one-hoss shay, and just +tumbled to pieces simultaneously.</p> +<p>It was not the gambler who got aground that morning. He had yet +other nice little games, with three cards or more or none, to +play.</p> +<p>It was not the mud-clerk who ran aground--good, non-committal +soul, who never look sides where it would do him any harm, and who +never worried himself about anything. Dear, drawling, optimist +philosopher, who could see how other people's mishaps were best for +them, and who took good care not to have any himself! It was not he +that ran aground.</p> +<p>It was not Norman Anderson who ran aground. He walked into the +store with the proud and manly consciousness of having done his +duty, he made his returns of every cent of money that had come into +his hands, and, like all other faithful stewards, received the +cordial commendation of his master.</p> +<p>But August Wehle the striker, just when he was to be made an +engineer, when he thought he had smooth sailing, suddenly and +provokingly found himself fast aground, with no spar or capstan by +which he might help himself off, with no friendly craft alongside +to throw him a hawser and pull him off.</p> +<p>It seems that when the captain promised him promotion, he did +not know anything of August's interference with the gamblers. But +when Parkins filed his complaint, it touched the captain. It was +generally believed among the <i>employés</i> of the boat +that a percentage of gamblers' gains was one of the "old man's" +perquisites, and he was not the only steamboat captain who profited +by the nice little games in the cabin upon which he closed both +eyes. And this retrieved nine hundred and fifty dollars was a dead +loss of--well, it does not matter how much, to the virtuous and +highly honorable captain. His proportion would have been large +enough at least to pay his wife's pew-rent in St. James's Church, +with a little something over for charitable purposes. For the +captain did not mind giving a disinterested twenty-five dollars +occasionally to those charities that were willing to show their +gratitude by posting his name as director, or his wife's as "Lady +Manageress." In this case his right hand never knew what his left +hand did--how it got the money, for instance.</p> +<p>So when August drew his pay he was informed that he was +discharged. No reason was given. He tried to see the captain. But +the captain was in the bosom of his family, kissing his own +well-dressed little boys, and enjoying the respect which only +exemplary and provident fathers enjoy. And never asking down in his +heart if these boys might become gamblers' victims, or gamblers, +indeed. The captain could not see August the striker, for he was at +home, and must not be interfered with by any of his subordinates. +Besides, it was Sunday, and he could not be intruded upon--the +rector of St. James's was dining with him on his wife's invitation, +and it behooved him to walk circumspectly, not with eye-service as +a man-pleaser, but serving the Lord.</p> +<p>So he refuted to see the anxious striker, and turned to +compliment the rector on his admirable sermon on the sin of Judas, +who sold his master for thirty pieces of silver.</p> +<p>And August Wehle had nothing left to do. The river was falling +fast, the large boats above the Falls were, in steamboat-man's +phrase, "laying up" in the mouths of the tributaries and other +convenient harbors, there were plenty of engineers unemployed, and +there were no vacancies.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXI."></a>CHAPTER XXXI.</h2> +<h3>CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE.</h3> +<br> +<p>Jonas had been all his life, as he expressed it in his mixed +rhetoric, "a wanderin' sand-hill crane, makin' many crooked paths, +and, like the cards in French monte, a-turnin' up suddently in +mighty on-expected places." He had been in every queer place from +Halifax to Texas, and then had come back to his home again. +Naturally cautious, and especially suspicious of the female sex, it +is not strange that he had not married. Only when he "tied up to +the same w'arf-boat alongside of Cynthy Ann, he thought he'd found +somebody as was to be depended on in a fog or a harricane." This he +told to Cynthy Ann as a reason why she should accept his offer of +marriage.</p> +<p>"Jonas," said Cynthy Ann, "don't flatter. My heart is dreadful +weak, and prone to the vanities of this world. It makes me abhor +myself in dust and sackcloth fer you to say such things about poor +unworthy me."</p> +<p>"Ef I think 'em, why shouldn't I say 'em? I don't know no law +agin tellin' the truth ef you git into a place where you can't no +ways help it. I don't call you angel, fer you a'n't; you ha'nt got +no wings nor feathers. I don't say as how as you're pertikeler +knock-down handsome. I don't pertend that you're a spring chicken. +I don't lie nor flatter. I a'n't goin' it blind, like young men in +love. But I do say, with my eyes open and in my right senses, and +feelin' solemn, like a man a-makin' his last will and testament, +that they a'n't no sech another woman to be found outside the leds +of the Bible betwixt the Bay of Fundy and the Rio Grande. I've +'sought round this burdened airth,' as the hymn says, and they +a'n't but jest one. Ef that one'll jest make me happy, I'll fold my +weary pinions and settle down in a rustic log-cabin and raise corn +and potaters till death do us part."</p> +<p>Cynthy trembled. Cynthy was a saint, a martyr to religious +feeling, a medieval nun in her ascetic eschewing of the pleasures +of life. But Cynthy Ann was also a woman. And a woman whose +spring-time had paused. When love buds out thus late, when the +opportunity for the woman's nature to blossom comes unexpectedly +upon one at her age, the temptation is not easily resisted. Cynthy +trembled, but did not quite yield up her Christian constancy.</p> +<p>"Jonas, I don't know whether I'd orto or not. I don't deny--I +think I'd better ax brother Goshorn, you know, sence what would it +profit ef I gained you or any joy in this world, and then come +short by settin' you up fer a idol in my heart? I don't know +whether a New Light is a onbeliever or not, and whether I'd be +onequally yoked or not. I must ax them as knows better nor I +do."</p> +<p>"Well, ef I'm a onbeliever, they's nobody as could teach me to +believe quicker'n you could. I never did believe much in women +folks till I believed in you."</p> +<p>"But that's the sin of it, Jonas. I'd believe in you, and you'd +believe in me, and we'd be puttin' our trust in the creatur instid +of the Creator, and the Creator is mighty jealous of our idols, and +He would take us away fer idolatry."</p> +<p>"No, but I wouldn't worship you, though I'd rather worship you +than anybody else ef I was goin' into the worshipin' business. But +you see I a'n't, honey. I wouldn't sacrifice to you no lambs nor +sheep, I wouldn't pray to you, nor I wouldn't kiss your shoes, like +people does the Pope's. An' I know you wouldn't make no idol of me +like them Greek gods that Andrew's got picters of. I a'n't handsome +enough by a long shot fer a Jupiter or a 'Pollo. An' I tell you, +Cynthy, 'tain't no sin to love. Love is the fullfilling of the +law."</p> +<p>But Cynthy Ann persisted that she must consult Brother Goshorn, +the antiquated class-leader at the cross-roads. Brother Goshorn was +a good man, but Jonas had a great contempt for him. He was a +strainer out of gnats, though I do not think he swallowed camels. +He always stood at the door of the love-feast and kept out every +woman with jewelry, every girl who had an "artificial" in her +bonnet, every one who wore curls, every man whose hair was beyond +what he considered the regulation length of Scripture, and every +woman who wore a veil. In support of this last prohibition he +quoted Isaiah iii, 23: "The glasses and the fine linen and the +hoods and the veils."</p> +<p>To him Cynthy Ann presented the case with much trepidation. All +her hopes for this world hung upon it. But this consideration did +not greatly affect Brother Goshorn. Hopes and joys were as nothing +to him where the strictness of discipline was involved. The +Discipline meant more to a mind of his cast than the Decalogue or +the Beatitudes. He shook his head. He did not know. He must consult +Brother Hall. Now, Brother Hall was the young preacher traveling +his second year, very young and very callow. Ten years of the sharp +attritions of a Methodist itinerant's life would take his +unworldliness out of him and develop his practical sense as no +other school in the world could develop it. But as yet Brother Hall +had not rubbed off any of his sanctimoniousness, had not lost any +of his belief that the universe should be governed on high general +principles with no exceptions.</p> +<p>So when Brother Goshorn informed him that one of his members, +Sister Cynthy Ann Dyke, wished to marry, and to marry a man that +was a New Light, and had asked his opinion, and that he did not +certainly know whether New Lights were believers or not, Brother +Hall did not stop to inquire what Jonas might be personally. He +looked and felt very solemn, and said that it was a pity for a +Christian to marry a New Light. It was clearly a sin, for a New +Light was an Arian. And an Arian was just as good as an infidel. An +Arian robbed Christ of His supreme deity, and since he did not +worship the Trinity in the orthodox sense he must worship a false +god. He was an idolater therefore, and it was a sin to be yoked +together with such an one.</p> +<p>Many men more learned than the callow but pious and sincere +Brother Hall have left us in print just such deductions.</p> +<p>When this decision was communicated to the scrupulous Cynthy +Ann, she folded her hopes as one lays away the garment of a dead +friend; she west to her little room and prayed; she offered a +sacrifice to God not less costly than Abraham's, and in a like +sublime spirit. She watered the plant In the old cracked +blue-and-white tea-pot, she noticed that it was just about to +bloom, and then she dropped one tear upon it, and because it +suggested Jonas in some way, she threw it away, resolved not to +have any idols in her heart. And, doubtless, God received the +sacrifice, mistaken and needless as it was, a token of the +faithfulness of her heart to her duty as she understood it.</p> +<br> +<a name="204.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/204.jpg"><img src="images/204.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Cynthy Ann explained it all to Jonas in a severe and irrevocable +way. Jonas looked at her a moment, stunned.</p> +<p>"Did Brother Goshorn venture to send me any of his wisdom, in +the way of advice, layin' round loose, like counterfeit small +change, cheap as dirt?"</p> +<p>"Well, yes," said Cynthy Ann, hesitating.</p> +<p>"I'll bet the heft of my fortin', to be paid on receipt of the +amount, that I kin tell to a T what the good Christian wanted me to +do."</p> +<p>"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas. Brother Goshorn is a mighty +sincere man."</p> +<p>"So he is, but his bein' sincere don't do me no good. He wanted +you to advise me to jine the Methodist class as a way of gittin' +out of the difficulty. And you was too good a Christian to ask me +to change fer any sech reason, knowin' I wouldn't be fit for you ef +I did."</p> +<p>Cynthy Ann was silent. She would have liked to have Jonas join +the church with her, but if he had done it now she herself would +have doubted his sincerity.</p> +<p>"Now, looky here, Cynthy, ef you'll say you don't love me, and +never can, I'll leave you to wunst, and fly away and mourn like a +turtle-dove. But so long as it's nobody but Goshorn, I'm goin' to +stay and litigate the question till the Millerite millennium comes. +I appeal to Cæesar or somebody else. Neither Brother Goshorn +nor Brother Hall knows enough to settle this question. I'm agoin' +to the persidin' elder. And you can't try a man and hang him and +then send him to the penitentiary fer the rest of his born days +without givin' him one chance to speak fer hisself agin the world +and everybody else. I'm goin' to see the persidin' elder myself and +plead my own cause, and ef he goes agin me, I'll carry it up to the +bishop or the archbishop or the nex' highest man in the heap, till +I git plum to the top, and ef they all go agin me, I'll begin over +agin at the bottom with Brother Goshorn, and keep on till I find a +man that's got common-sense enough to salt his religion with."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXII."></a>CHAPTER XXXII.</h2> +<h3>JULIA'S ENTERPRISE.</h3> +<br> +<p>August was very sick at the castle. This wag the first news of +his return that reached Julia through Jonas and Cynthy Ann.</p> +<p>But in my interest in Jonas and Cynthy Ann, of whom I think a +great deal, I forgot to say that long before the events mentioned +in the last chapter, Humphreys had been suddenly called away from +his peaceful retreat in the hill country of Clark township. In +fact, the "important business," or "the illness of a friend," +whichever it was, occurred the very next day after Norman +Anderson's father returned from Louisville, and reported that he +had secured for his son an "outside situation," that is to say, a +place as a collector.</p> +<p>When he had gone, Jonas remarked to Cynthy Ann, "Where the +carcass is, there the turkey-buzzards is gethered. That shinin' +example of early piety never plays but one game. That is, +fox-and-geese. He's gone after a green goslin' now, and he'll find +him when he's fattest."</p> +<p>But the gentle singing-master had come back from his excursion, +and was taking a profound interest in the coming end of the world. +Jonas observed that it "seemed like as ef he hed charge of the +whole performance, and meant to shet up the sky like a blue cotton +umbrell. He's got a single eye, and it's the same ole game. Fox and +geese always, and he's the fox."</p> +<p>Humphreys still lived at Samuel Anderson's, still devoted +himself to pleasing Mrs. Abigail, still bowed regretfully to Julia, +and spoke caressingly to Betsey Malcolm at every opportunity.</p> +<p>But August was sick at the castle. He was very sick. Every +morning Dr. Dibrell, a "calomel-doctor"--not a steam-doctor--rode +by the house on his way to Andrew's, and every morning Mrs. +Anderson wondered afresh who was sick down that way. But the doctor +staid so long that Mrs. Abigail made up her mind it must be +somebody four or five miles away, and so dismissed the matter from +her mind. For August's return had been kept secret.</p> +<p>But Julia noticed, in her heart of hearts, and with +ever-increasing affliction, that the doctor staid longer each day +than on the day before, and she thought she noticed also an +increasing anxiety on his face as he rode home again. Her desire to +know the real truth, and to see August, to do for him, to give her +life for him, were wearing her away. It is hard to see a friend go +from you when you have done everything. But to have a friend die +within your reach, while you are yet unable to help him, is the +saddest of all. All this anxiety Julia suffered without even the +blessed privilege of showing it. The pent-up fire consumed her, and +she was at times almost distract. Every morning she managed to be +on the upper porch when the doctor went by, and from the same +watch-tower she studied his face when he went back.</p> +<p>Then came a morning when there were two doctors. A physician +from the county-seat village went by, in company with Dr. Dibrell. +So there must be a consultation at the castle. Julia knew then that +the worst had to be looked in the face. And she longed to get away +from under the searching black eyes of her mother and utter the +long-pent cry of anguish. Another day of such unuttered pain would +drive her clean mad.</p> +<p>That evening Jonas came over and sought an interview with Cynthy +Ann. He had not been to see her since his unsuccessful courtship. +Julia felt that he was the bearer of a message. But Mrs. Anderson +was in one of her most exacting humors, and it gave her not a +little pleasure to keep Cynthy Ann, on one pretext and another, all +the evening at her side. Had Cynthy Ann been less submissive and +scrupulous, she might have broken away from this restraint, but in +truth she was censuring herself for having any backsliding, +rebellious wish to talk with Jonas after she had imagined the idol +cast out of her heart entirely. Her conscience was a tank-master +not less grievous than Mrs. Anderson, and, between the two, Jonas +had to go away without leaving his message. And Julia had to keep +her breaking heart in suspense a while longer.</p> +<p>Why did she not elope long ago and get rid of her mother? +Because she was Julia, and being Julia, conscientious, true, and +filial in spite of her unhappy life, her own character built a wall +against such a disobedience. Nearly all limitations are inside. You +could do almost anything if you could give yourself up to it. To go +in the teeth of one's family is the one thing that a person of +Julia's character and habits finds next to impossible. A beneficent +limitation of nature; for the cases in which the judgment of a girl +of eighteen is better than that of her parents are very few. +Besides, the inevitable "heart-disease" was a specter that guarded +the gates of Julia's prison. Night after night she sat looking out +over the hills sleeping in hazy darkness, toward the hollow in +which stood the castle; night after night she had half-formed the +purpose of visiting August, and then the life-long habit of +obedience and a certain sense of delicacy held her back. But on +this night, after the consultation, she felt that she would see him +if her seeing him brought down the heavens.</p> +<p>It was a very dark night. She sat waiting for hours--very long +hours they seemed to her--and then, at midnight, she began to get +ready to start.</p> +<p>Only those who have taken such a step can understand the pain of +deciding, the agony of misgivings in the execution, the trembling +that Julia felt when she turned the brass knob on the front door +and lifted the latch--lifted the latch slowly and cautiously, for +it was near the door of her mother's room--and then crept out like +a guilty thing into the dark dampness of the night, groping her way +to the gate, and stumbling along down the road. It had been +raining, and there was not one star-twinkle in the sky; the only +light was that of glow-worms illuminating here and there two or +three blades of grass by feeble shining. Now and then a fire-fly +made a spot of light in the blackness, only to leave a deeper spot +of blackness when he shut off his intermittent ray. And when at +last Julia found herself at the place where the path entered the +woods, the blackness ahead seemed still more frightful. She had to +grope, recognizing every deviation from the well-beaten path by the +rustle of the dead leaves which lay, even in summer, half a foot +deep upon the ground. The "fox-fire," rotting logs glowing with a +faint luminosity, startled her several times, and the hooting-owl's +shuddering bass--hoo! hoo! hoo-oo-ah-h! (like the awful keys of the +organ which "touch the spinal cord of the universe")--sent all her +blood to her heart. Under ordinary circumstances, she surely would +not have started at the rustling made by the timid hare in the +thicket near by. There was no reason why she should shiver so when +a misstep caused her to scratch her face with the thorny twigs of a +wild plum-tree. But the effort necessary to the undertaking and the +agony of the long waiting had exhausted her nervous force, and she +had none left for fortitude. So that when she arrived at Andrew's +fence and felt her way along to the gate, and heard the hoarse, +thunderous baying of his great St. Bernard dog, she was ready to +faint. But a true instinct makes such a dog gallant. It is a vile +cur that will harm a lady. Julia walked trembling up to the +front-door of the castle, growled at by the huge black beast, and +when the Philosopher admitted her, some time after she had knocked, +she sank down fainting into a chair.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIII."></a>CHAPTER XXXIII.</h2> +<h3>THE SECRET STAIRWAY.</h3> +<br> +<p>"God bless you!" said Andrew as he handed her a gourd of water +to revive her. "You are as faithful as Hero. You are another +Heloise. You are as brave as the Maid of Orleans. I will never say +that women are unfaithful again. God bless you, my daughter! You +have given me faith in your sex. I have been a lonely man; a +boughless, leafless trunk, shaken by the winter winds. But +<i>you</i> are my niece. <i>You</i> know how to be faithful. I am +proud of you! Henceforth I call you my daughter. If you <i>were</i> +my daughter, you would be to me all that Margaret Roper was to Sir +Thomas More." And the shaggy man of egotistic and pedantic speech, +but of womanly sensibilities, was weeping.</p> +<p>The reviving Julia begged to know how August was.</p> +<p>"Ah, constant heart! And he is constant as you are. Noble +fellow! I will not deceive you. The doctors think that he will not +live more than twenty-four hours. But he is only dying to see you, +now. Your coming may revive him. We sent for you this morning by +Jonas, hoping you might escape and come in some way. But Jonas +could not get his message to you. Some angel must have brought you. +It is an augury of good."</p> +<p>The hopefulness of Andrew sprang out of his faith in an ideal, +right outcome. Julia could not conceal from herself the fact that +his opinion had no ground. But in such a strait as hers, she could +not help clinging even to this support.</p> +<p>Andrew was a little perplexed. How to take Julia up-stairs? Mrs. +Wehle and Wilhelmina and the doctor went in regularly, not by the +rope-ladder, but by a more secure wooden one which he had planted +against the outside of the house. But Andrew had suddenly conceived +so exalted an opinion of his niece's virtues that he was unwilling +to lead her into the upper story in that fashion. His imagination +had invested her with all the glories of all the heroines, from +Penelope to Beatrice, and from Beatrice to Scott's Rebecca. At last +a sudden impulse seized him.</p> +<p>"My dear daughter, they say that genius is to madness close +allied. When I built this house I was in a state bordering on +insanity, I suppose. I pleased my whims--my whims were my only +company--I pleased my whims in building an American castle. These +whims begin to seem childish to me now. I put in a secret stairway. +No human foot but my own has ever trodden it. August, whom I love +more than any other, and who is one of the few admitted to my +library, has always ascended by the rope-ladder. But you are my +niece; I would you were my daughter. I will signalize my reverence +for you by showing up the stairway the woman who knows how to love +and be faithful, the feet that would be worthy of golden steps if I +had them. Come."</p> +<p>Spite of her grief and anxiety, Julia was impressed and +oppressed with the reverence shown her by her uncle. She had a +veneration almost superstitious for the Philosopher's learning. She +was not accustomed to even respectful treatment, and to be +worshiped in this awful way by such a man was something almost as +painful as it was pleasant.</p> +<p>The entrance to the stairway, if that could be called a stairway +which was as difficult of ascent as a ladder, was through a closet +by the side of the donjon chimney, and the logs had been so +arranged without and within that the space occupied by the narrow +and zigzag stairs was not apparent. Up these stairs he took Julia, +leaving her in a closet above. As this closet was situated +alongside the chimney, it opened, of course, into the small corner +room which I have before described, and in which August was now +lying. Andrew descended the stairs and entered the upper story +again by the outside ladder. He thought best to prepare August for +the coming of Julia, lest joy should destroy a life that was so far +wasted.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIV."></a>CHAPTER XXXIV.</h2> +<h3>THE INTERVIEW.</h3> +<br> +<p>We left August on that summer day on the levee at Louisville +without employment. He was not exactly disheartened, but he was +homesick. That he was forbidden to go back by threats of +prosecution for his burglarious manner of entering Samuel +Anderson's house was reason enough for wanting to go; that his +father's family were not yet free from danger was a stronger +reason; but strongest of all, though he blushed to own it to +himself, was the longing to be where he might perchance sometimes +see the face he had seen that spring morning in the bottom of a +sun-bonnet. Right manfully did he fight against his discouragement +and his homesickness, and his longing to see Julia. It was better +to stay where he was. It was better not to go back beaten. If he +surrendered so easily, he would never put himself into a situation +where he could claim Julia with self-respect. He would stay and +make his way in the world somehow. But making his way in the world +did not seem half so easy now us it had on that other morning in +March when he stood in the barn talking to Julia. Making your +fortune always seems so easy until you've tried it. It seems rather +easy in a novel, and still easier in a biography. But no Samuel +Smiles ever writes the history of those who fail; the vessels that +never came back from their venturous voyages left us no log-books. +Many have written the History of Success. What melancholy Plutarch +shall arise to record, with a pen dipped in wormwood, the History +of Failure?</p> +<p>No! he would not go back defeated. August said this over +bravely, but a little too often, and with a less resolute tone at +each repetition. He contemned himself for his weakness, and tried, +but tried in vain, to form other plans. Had he known how much one's +physical state has to do with one's force of character, he might +have guessed that he did not deserve the blame he meted out to +himself. He might have remembered what Shakespeare's Portia says to +Brutus, that "humour hath his hour with every man." But with a dull +and unaccountable aching in his head and back he compromised with +himself. He would go to the castle and pass a day or two. Then he +would return and fight it out.</p> +<p>So he got on the packet Isaac Shelby, and was soon shaking with +a chill that showed how thoroughly malaria had pervaded his system. +His very bones seemed frozen. But if you ever shook with such a +chill, or rather if you were ever shaken by such a chill, taking +hold of you like a demoniacal possession; if you ever felt your +brain congealing, your icy bones breaking, your frosty heart +becoming paralyzed, with a cold no fire could reach, you know what +it is; and if you have not felt it, no words of mine can make you +understand the sensations. After the chill came the period when +August felt himself between two parts of Milton's hell, between a +sea of ice and a sea of fire; sometimes the hot wave scorched him, +then it retired again before the icy one. At last it was all hot, +and the boiling blood scalded his palms and steamed to his brain, +bewildering his thoughts and almost blinding his eyes. He had +determined when he started to get off at a wood-yard three miles +below Andrew's castle, to avoid observation and the chance of +arrest; and now in his delirium the purpose as he had planned it +remained fixed. He got up at two o'clock, crazed with fever, +dressed himself, and went out into the rainy night. He went ashore +in the mud and bushes, and, guided more by instinct than by any +conscious thought, he started up the wagon-track along the river +bank. His furious fever drove him on, talking to himself, and +splashing recklessly into the pools of rain-water standing in the +road. He never remembered his debarkation. He must have fallen once +or twice, for he was covered with mud when he rang the alarm at the +castle. In answer to Andrew's "Who's there?" he answered, "You'll +have to send a harder rain than that if you want to put this fire +out!"</p> +<p>And so, what with the original disease, the mental +discouragement, and the exposure to the rain, the fever had +well-nigh consumed the life, and now that the waves of the hot sea +after days of fire and nights of delirium had gone back, there was +hardly any life left in the body, and the doctors said there was no +hope. One consuming desire remained. He wanted to see Julia once +before he went away; and that one desire it seemed impossible to +gratify. When he learned of the failure of Jonas to get any message +to Julia through Cynthy, he had felt the keenest disappointment, +and had evidently been sinking since the hope that kept him up had +been taken away.</p> +<p>The mother sat by his bed, Gottlieb sat stupefied at the foot, +with Jonas by his side, and Wilhelmina was crying in a still +fashion in one corner of the room. August lay breathing feebly, and +with his life evidently ebbing.</p> +<p>"August!" said Andrew, as he stood over his bed, having come to +announce the arrival of Julia. "August!" Andrew tried to speak +quietly, but there was a something of hope in the inflection, a +tremor of eagerness in the utterance, that made the mother look up +quickly and inquiringly.</p> +<p>August opened his eyes slowly and looked into the face of the +Philosopher. Then he slowly closed his eyes again, and a something, +not a smile--he was too weak for that--but a look of infinite +content, spread over his wan face.</p> +<p>"I know," he whisperd.</p> +<p>"Know what?" asked Andrew, leaning down to catch his words.</p> +<p>"Julia." And a single tear crept out from under the closed lid. +The tender mother wiped it away.</p> +<p>After resting a moment, August looked up at Andrew's face +inquiringly.</p> +<p>"She is coming," said the Philosopher.</p> +<p>August smiled very faintly, but Andrew was sure he smiled, and +again leaned down his ear.</p> +<p>"She is here," whispered August; "I heard Charon bark, and +I--saw--your--face."</p> +<p>Andrew now stepped to the closet-door and opened it, and Julia +came out.</p> +<p>"Blamed ef he a'n't a witch!" whispered Jonas. "Cunjures a angel +out of his cupboard!"</p> +<p>Julia did not see anybody or anything but the white and wasted +face upon the pillow. The eyes were now closed again, and she +quickly crossed the floor, and--not without a faint maidenly +blush--stooped and kissed the parched lips, from which the life +seemed already to have fled.</p> +<p>And August with difficulty disengaged his wasted hand from the +cover, and laid his nerveless fingers--alas! like a skeleton's +now--In the warm hand of Julia, and said--she leaned down to +listen, an he whispered feebly through his dry lips out of a full +heart--"Thank God!"</p> +<p>And the Philosopher, catching the words, said audibly, +"Amen!"</p> +<p>And the mother only wept.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXV."></a>CHAPTER XXXV.</h2> +<h3>GETTING READY FOR THE END.</h3> +<br> +<p>How Julia spent two hours of blessed sadness at the castle; how +August slept peacefully for five minutes at a time with his hand in +hers, and then awoke and looked at her, and then slumbered again; +how she moistened his parched lips for him, and gave him wine; how +at last she had to bid him a painful farewell; how the mother gave +her a benediction in German and a kiss; how Wilhelmina clung to her +with tears; how Jonas called her a turtle-dove angel; how Brother +Hall, the preacher who had been sent for at the mother's request, +to converse with the dying man, spoke a few consoling words to her; +how Gottlieb confided to Jonas his intention never to "sprach nodin +'pout Yangee kirls no more;" and how at last Uncle Andrew walked +home with her, I have not time to tell. When the Philosopher bade +her adieu, he called her names which she did not understand. But +she turned back to him, and after a minute's hesitation, spoke +huskily. "Uncle Andrew if he--if he should get worse--I want--"</p> +<p>"I know, my daughter; you want him to die your husband?"</p> +<p>"Yes, if he wishes it. Send for me day or night, and I'll come +in spite of everybody."</p> +<p>"God bless you, my daughter!" said Andrew. And he watched until +she got safely into the house without discovery, and then he went +back satisfied and proud.</p> +<p>Of course August died, and Julia devoted herself to +philanthropic labors. It is the fashion now for novels to end thus +sadly, and you would not have me be out of the fashion.</p> +<p>But August did not die. Joy is a better stimulant than wine. +Love is the best tonic in the pharmacopeia. And from the hour in +which August Wehle looked into the eyes of Julia, the tide of life +set back again. Not perceptibly at first. For two days he was +neither better nor worse. But this was a gain. Then slowly he came +back to life. But at Andrew's instance he kept indoors while +Humphreys staid.</p> +<p>Humphreys, on his part, like Ananias, pretended to have disposed +of all his property, paid his debts, reserved enough to live on +until the approaching day of doom, and given the rest to the poor +of the household of faith, and there were several others who were +sincere enough to do what he only pretended.</p> +<p>Among the leading Adventists was "Dr." Ketchup, who still dealt +out corn-sweats and ginseng-tea, but who refused to sell his +property. He excused himself by quoting the injunction, "Occupy +till I come." But others sold their estates for trifles, and gave +themselves up to proclaiming the millennium.</p> +<p>Mrs. Abigail Anderson was a woman who did nothing by halves. She +was vixenish, she was selfish, she was dishonest and grasping; but +she was religious. If any man think this paradox impossible, he has +observed character superficially. There are criminals in +State's-prison who have been very devout all their lives. Religious +questions took hold of Mrs. Anderson's whole nature. She was +superstitious, narrow, and intense. She was as sure that the day of +judgment would be proclaimed on the eleventh of August, 1843, as +she was of her life. No consideration in opposition to any belief +of hers weighed a feather with her. Her will mastered her judgment +and conscience.</p> +<p>And so she determined that Samuel must sell his property for a +trifle. How far she was influenced in this by a sincere desire to +square all outstanding debts before the final settlement, how far +by a longing to be considered the foremost and most pious of all, +and how far by business shrewdness based on that feeling which +still lurks in the most protestant people, that such sacrifices do +improve their state in a future world, I can not tell. Doubtless +fanaticism, hypocrisy, and a self-interest that looked sordidly +even at heaven, mingled in bringing about the decision. At any +rate, the property was to be sold for a few hundred dollars.</p> +<p>Getting wind of this decision, Andrew promptly appeared at his +brother's house and offered to buy it. But Mrs. Abigail couldn't +think of it. Andrew had always been her enemy, and though she +forgave him, she would not on any account sell him an inch of the +land. It would not be right. He had claimed that part of it +belonged to him, and to let him have it would be to admit his +claim.</p> +<p>"Andrew," she said, "you do not believe in the millennium, and +people say that you are a skeptic. You want to cheat us out of what +you think a valuable piece of property. And you'll find yourself at +the last judgment with the weight of this sin on your heart. You +will, indeed!"</p> +<p>"How clearly you reason about other people's duty!" said the +Philosopher. "If you had seen your own duty half so clearly, some +of us would have been better off, and your account would have been +straighter."</p> +<p>Here Mrs. Anderson grew very angry, and vented her spleen in a +solemn exhortation to Andrew to get ready for the coming of the +Master, not three weeks off at the farthest, and she warned him +that the archangel might blow his trumpet at any moment. Then where +would he be? she asked in exultation. Human meanness is never so +pitiful as when it tries to seize on God's judgments as weapons +with which to gratify its own spites. I trust this remark will not +be considered as applying only to Mrs. Anderson.</p> +<p>But Mrs. Anderson fired off all the heavenly small-shot she +could find in the teeth and eyes of Andrew, and then, to prevent a +rejoinder, she told him it was time for her to go to secret prayer, +and she only stopped upon the threshold to send back one Parthian +arrow in the shape of a warning to "watch and be ready."</p> +<p>I wonder if a certain class of religious people have ever +thought how much their exclusiveness and Pharisaism have to do with +the unhappy fruitlessness of all their appeals! Had Mrs. Anderson +been as blameless as an angel, such exhortations would have driven +a weaker than Andrew to hate the name of religion.</p> +<p>But I must not moralize, for Mr. Humphreys has already divulged +his plan of disposing of the property. He has a friend, one Thomas +A. Parkins, who has money, and who will buy the farm at two hundred +dollars. He could procure the money in advance any day by going to +the village of Bethany, the county-seat, and drawing on Mr. +Parkins, and cashing the draft. It was a matter of indifference to +him, he said, only that he would like to oblige so good a +friend.</p> +<p>This arrangement, by which the Anderson farm was to be sold for +a song to some distant stranger, pleased Mrs. Abigail. She could +not bear that one of her unbelieving neighbors should even for a +fortnight rejoice in a supposed good bargain at her expense. To +sell to Mr. Humphreys's friend in Louisville was just the thing. +When pressed by some of her neighbors who had not received the +Adventist gospel, to tell on what principle she could justify her +sale of the farm at all, she answered that if the farm would not be +of any account after the end of the world, neither would the +money.</p> +<p>Mr. Humphreys went down to the town of Bethany and came back, +affecting to have cashed a draft on his friend for two hundred +dollars. The deeds were drawn, and a justice of the peace was to +come the next morning and take the acknowledgment of Mr. and Mrs. +Anderson.</p> +<p>This was what Jonas learned as he sat in the kitchen talking to +Cynthy Ann. He had come to bring some message from the convalescent +August, and had been detained by the attraction of adhesion.</p> +<p>"I told you it was fox-and-geese. Didn't I? And so Thomas A. +Parkins <i>is</i> his name. Gus Wehle said he'd bet the two was +one. Well, I must drive this varmint off afore he gits his +chickens."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVI."></a>CHAPTER XXXVI.</h2> +<h3>THE SIN OF SANCTIMONY.</h3> +<br> +<p>Just at this point arrived Mr. Hall, whom I have before +described as the good but callow Methodist preacher on the circuit. +Some people think that a minister of the gospel should be exempt +from criticism, ridicule, and military duty. But the manly minister +takes his lot with the rest. Nothing could be more pernicious than +making the foibles of a minister sacred. Doubtless Mr. Hall has +long since come to laugh at his own early follies, his official +sanctimoniousness, and all that; and why should not I, who have +been a callow circuit-preacher myself in my day, laugh at my +Brother Hall, for the good of his kind?</p> +<p>He had come to visit Sister Cynthy Ann, whose name had long +stood on the class-book at Harden's Cross-Roads as a good and +acceptable member of the church in full connection. He was visiting +formally and officially each family in which there was a member. +Had he visited informally and unofficially, and like a man instead +of like a minister, he would have done more good. But he came to +Samuel Anderson's, and informed Mrs. Anderson that he was visiting +his members, and that as one of her household was a member, he +would like to have a little religious conversation and prayer with +the family. Would she please gather them together?</p> +<p>So Julia was called down-stairs, and Jonas was invited in from +the kitchen. The sight of him distressed Brother Hall. For was not +this New Light sent here by Satan to lead astray one of his flock? +But, at least, he would labor faithfully with him.</p> +<p>He began with Mr. Samuel Anderson. But that worthy, after +looking at his wife in vain for a cue, darted off about the +trumpets of the Apocalypse.</p> +<p>"Mr. Anderson, as head of this family, your responsibility is +very great. Do you feel the full assurance, my brother?" asked Mr. +Hall.</p> +<p>"Yes," said Mr. Anderson, "I am standing with my lamp trimmed +and ready. I am listening for the midnight shout. To-night the +trumpet may sound. I am afraid you don't do your duty, or you would +lift up your voice. The tune and times and a half are almost +out."</p> +<p>Mr. Hall was a little dashed at this. A man whose religious +conversation is of a set and conventional type, is always shocked +and jostled when he is thrown from the track. And he himself, like +everybody else, had felt the Adventist infection, and did not want +to commit himself. So he turned to Mrs. Anderson. She answered like +a seraph every question put to her--the conventional questions +never pierce the armor of a hypocrite or startle the conscience of +a self-deceiver. Mr. Hall congratulated her in his most official +tone (a compound of authority, awfulness, and sanctity) on her deep +experience of the things that made for her everlasting peace. He +told her that people of her high attainments must beware of +spiritual pride. And Mrs. Anderson took the warning with beautiful +meekness, sinking into forty fathoms of undisguised and rather +ostentatious humility, heaving solemn sighs in token of +self-reproach--a self-reproach that did not penetrate the +cuticle.</p> +<br> +<a name="227.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/227.jpg"><img src="images/227.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>A PASTORAL VISIT.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"And you, Sister Cynthy Ann," he said, fighting shy of Jonas for +the present, "I trust you are trying to let your light shine. Do +you feel that you are pressing on?"</p> +<p>Poor Cynthy Ann sank into a despondency deeper than usual. She +was afeard not. Seemed like as ef her heart was cold and dead to +God. Seemed like as ef she couldn't no ways gin up the world. It +weighed her down like a rock, and many was the fight she had with +the enemy. No, she wuzn't getting on.</p> +<p>"My dear sister," said Mr. Hall, "let me warn you. Here is Mrs. +Anderson, who has given up the world entirely. I hope you'll follow +so good an example. Do not be led astray by worldly affections; +they are sure to entrap you. I am afraid you have not maintained +your steadfastness as you should." Here Mr. Hall's eye wandered +doubtfully to Jonas, of whom he felt a little afraid. Jonas, on his +part, had no reason to like Mr. Hall for his advice in Cynthy's +love affair, and now the minister's praises of Mrs. Anderson and +condemnation of Cynthy Ann had not put him in any mood to listen to +exhortation.</p> +<p>"Well, Mr. Harrison," said the young minister solemnly, +approaching Jonas much as a dog does a hedgehog, "how do you feel +to-day?"</p> +<p>"Middlin' peart, I thank you; how's yourself?"</p> +<p>This upset the good man not a little, and convinced him that +Jonas was in a state of extreme wickedness.</p> +<p>"Are you a Christian?"</p> +<p>"Wal, I 'low I am. How about yourself, Mr. Hall?"</p> +<p>"I believe you are a New Light. Now, do you believe in the Lord +Jesus Christ?" asked the minister in an annihilating tone.</p> +<p>"Yes, I do, my aged friend, a heap sight more'n I do in some of +them that purtends to hev a paytent right on all his blessins, and +that put on solemn airs and call other denominations hard names. My +friend, I don't believe in no religion that's made up of sighs and +groans and high temper" (with a glance at Mrs. Anderson), "and that +thinks a good deal more of its bein' sound in doctrine than of the +danger of bein' rotten in life. They's lots o' bad eggs got slick +and shiny shells!"</p> +<p>Mr. Hall happened to think just here of the injunction against +throwing pearls before swine, and so turned to Humphreys, who made +his heart glad by witnessing a good confession, in soft and +unctuous tones, and couched in the regulation phrases which have +worn smooth in long use.</p> +<p>Julia had slunk away in a corner. But now he appealed to her +also.</p> +<p>"Blest with a praying mother, you, Miss Anderson, ought to +repent of your sins and flee from the wrath to come. You know the +right way. You have been pointed to it by the life of your parents +from childhood. Reared in the bosom of a Christian household, let +me entreat you to seek salvation immediately."</p> +<p>I do not like to repeat this talk here. But it is an unfortunate +fact that goodness and self-sacrificing piety do not always go with +practical wisdom. The novelist, like the historian, must set down +things as he finds them. A man who talks in consecrated phrases is +yet in the poll-parrot state of mental development.</p> +<p>"Do you feel a desire to flee from the wrath to come?" he +asked.</p> +<p>Julia gave some sort of inaudible assent.</p> +<p>"My dear young sister, you have great reason to be +thankful--very great reason for gratitude to Almighty God." (Like +many other pious young men, Mr. Hall said <i>Gawd</i>.) "I met you +the other night at your uncle's. The young man whose life we then +despaired of has recovered." And with more of this, Mr. Hall told +Julia's secret, while Mrs. Anderson, between her anger and her rapt +condition of mind, seemed to be petrifying.</p> +<p>I trust the reader does not expect me to describe the feelings +of Julia while Mr. Hall read a chapter and prayed. Nor the emotions +of Mrs. Anderson. I think if Mr. Hall could have heard her grind +her teeth while he in his prayer gave thanks for the recovery of +August, he would not have thought so highly of her piety. But she +managed to control her emotions until the minister was fairly out +of the house. In bidding good-by, Mr. Hall saw how pale and +tremulous Julia was, and with his characteristic lack of sagacity, +he took her emotion to be a sign of religious feelings and told her +he was pleased to see that she was awakened to a sense of her +condition.</p> +<p>And then he left. And then came the deluge.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVII."></a>CHAPTER XXXVII.</h2> +<h3>THE DELUGE.</h3> +<br> +<p>The indescribable deluge! But, after all, the worst of anything +of that sort is the moment before it begins. A plunge-bath, a +tooth-pulling, an amputation, and a dress-party are all worse in +anticipation than in the moment of infliction. Julia, as she stood +busily sticking a pin in the window-sash, waiting for her mother to +begin, wished that the storm might burst, and be done with it. But +Mrs. Anderson understood her business too well for that. She knew +the value of the awful moments of silence before beginning. She had +not practiced all her life without learning the fine art of torture +in its exquisite details. I doubt not the black-robed fathers of +the Holy Office were leisurely gentlemen, giving their victims +plenty of time for anticipatory meditation, laying out their +utensils quietly, inspecting the thumb-screw affectionately to make +sure that it would work smoothly, discussing the rack and wheel +with much tender forethought, as though torture were a sweet thing, +to be reserved like a little girl's candy lamb, and only resorted +to when the appetite has been duly whetted by contemplation. I +never had the pleasure of knowing an inquisitor, and I can not +certify that they were of this deliberate fashion. But it "stands +to nature" that they were. For the vixens who are vixens of the +highest quality, are always deliberate.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson felt that the piece of invective which she was +about to undertake, was not to be taken in hand unadvisedly, "but +reverently, discreetly, and in the fear of God." And so she paused, +and Julia fumbled the tassel of the window-curtain, and trembled +with the chill of expectation. And Mrs. Abigail continued to debate +how she might make this, which would doubtless be her last outburst +before the day of judgment, her masterpiece--worthy song of the +dying swan. And then she hoped, she sincerely hoped, to be able by +this awful <i>coup de main</i> to awaken Julia to a sense of her +sinfulness. For there was such a jumble of mixed motives in her +mind, that one could never distinguish her sincerity from her +hypocrisy.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson's conscience was quite an objective one. As Jonas +often remarked, "she had a feelin' sense of other folkses +unworthiness." And the sins which she appreciated were generally +sins against herself. Julia's disobedience to herself was darker in +her mind than murder committed on anybody else would have been. And +now she sat deliberating, not on the limit of the verbal punishment +she meant to inflict--that gave her no concern--but on her ability +to do the matter justice. Even as a tyrannical backwoods +school-master straightens his long beech-rod relishfully before +applying it.</p> +<p>Not that Mrs. Anderson was silent all this time. She was sighing +and groaning in a spasmodic devotion. She was "seeking strength +from above to do her whole duty," she would have told you. She was +"agonizing" in prayer for her daughter, and she contrived that her +stage-whisper praying should now and then reach the ears of its +devoted object. Humphreys remained seated, pretending to read the +copy of "Josephus," but watching the coming storm with the interest +of a connoisseur. And while he remained Jonas determined to stay, +to keep Julia in countenance, and he beckoned to Cynthy to stay +also. And Samuel Anderson, who loved his daughter and feared his +wife, fled like a coward from the coming scene. Everybody expected +Mrs. Anderson to break out like a fury.</p> +<p>But she knew a better plan than that. She felt a new device come +like an inspiration. And perhaps it was. It really seemed to Jonas +that the devil helped her. For instead of breaking out into +commonplace scolding, the resources of which she had long since +exhausted, she dropped upon her knees, and began to pray for +Julia.</p> +<p>No swearer ever curses like the priest who veils his personal +spites in official and pious denunciations, and Mrs. Anderson had +never dealt out abuse so roundly and terribly and crushingly, as +she did under the guise of praying for the salvation of Julia's +soul from well-deserved perdition. But Abigail did not say +perdition. She left that to weak spirits. She thought it a virtue +to say "hell" with unction and emphasis, by way of alarming the +consciences of sinners. Mrs. Anderson's prayer is not reportable. +That sort of profanity is too bad to write. She capped her +climax--even as I have heard a revivalist pray for a scoffer that +had vexed his righteous soul--by asking God to convert her +daughter, or if she could not be converted to take her away, that +she might not heap up wrath against the day of wrath. For that sort +of religious excitement which does not quiet the evil passions, +seems to inflame them, and Mrs. Anderson was not in any right sense +sane. And the prayer was addressed more to the frightened Julia +than to God. She would have been terribly afflicted had her +petition been granted.</p> +<p>Julia would have run away from the admonition which followed the +prayer, had it not been that Mrs. Anderson adroitly put it under +cover of a religious exhortation. She besought Julia to repent, and +then, affecting to show her her sinfulness, she proceeded to abuse +her.</p> +<p>Had Julia no temper? Yes, she had doubtless a spice of her +mother's anger without her meanness. She would have resisted, but +that from childhood she had felt paralyzed by the utter uselessness +of all resistance. The bravest of the villagers at the foot of +Vesuvius never dreamed of stopping the crater's mouth.</p> +<p>But, happily, at last Mrs. Anderson's insane wrath went a little +too far.</p> +<p>"You poor lost sinner," she said, "to think you should go to +destruction under my very eyes, disgracing us all, by running over +the country at night with bad men! But there's mercy even for such +as you."</p> +<p>Julia would not have understood the full meaning of this +aspersion of her purity, had she not caught Humphreys's eye. His +expression, half sneer, half leer, seemed to give her mother's +saying its full interpretation. She put out her hand. She turned +white, and said: "Say one word more, and I will go away from you +and never come back! Never!" And then she sat down and cried, and +then Mrs. Anderson's maternal love, her "unloving love," revived. +To have her daughter leave her, too, would be a sort of defeat. She +hushed, and sat down in her splint-bottomed rocking-chair, which +snapped when she rocked, and which seemed to speak for her after +she had shut her mouth. Her face settled into a martyr-like appeal +to Heaven in proof of the justice of her cause. And then she fell +back on her forlorn hope. She wept hysterically, in sincere +self-pity, to think that an affectionate mother should have such a +daughter!</p> +<p>Julia, finding that her mother had desisted, went to her room. +She did not exactly pray, but she talked to herself as she paced +the floor. It was a monologue, and yet there was a conscious appeal +to an invisible Presence, who could not misjudge her, and so she +passed from talking to herself to talking to God, and that without +any of the formality of prayer. Her mother had made God seem to be +against her. Now she, like David, protested her innocence to God. +She recited half to herself, and yet also to God--for is not every +appeal to one's conscience in some sense an appeal to God?--she +recited all the struggles of that night when she went to August at +the castle. People talk of the consolation there is in God's mercy. +But Julia found comfort in God's justice. He <i>could</i> not judge +her wrongly.</p> +<p>Then she opened the Testament at the old place, and read the +words long since fixed in her memory. And then she--weary and heavy +laden--came again to Him who invites, and found rest. And then she +found, as many another has found, that coming to God is not, as +theorists will have it, a coming once for a lifetime, but a coming +oft and ever repeated.</p> +<p>Jonas and Cynthy Ann retired to the kitchen, and the former said +hi his irreverent way, "Blamed ef Abigail ha'nt got more devils +into her'n Mary Magdalene had the purtiest day she ever seed! I +should think, arter a life with her fer a mother, the bad place +would be a healthy and delightful clime. The devil a'n't a patchin' +to her."</p> +<p>"Don't, Jonas; you talk so cur'us, like as ef you was kinder +sorter wicked."</p> +<p>"That's jest what I am, my dear, but Abigail Anderson's wicked +without the kinder sorter. She cusses when she's a-prayin'. She +cusses that poar gal right in the Lord's face. Good by, I must go. +Smells so all-fired like brimstone about here." This last was +spoken in an undertone of indignant soliloquy, as he crossed the +threshold of Cynthy's clean kitchen.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVIII."></a>CHAPTER XXXVIII.</h2> +<h3>SCARING A HAWK.</h3> +<br> +<p>Jonas was thoroughly alarmed. He exaggerated the harm that +Humphreys might do to August, now that he knew where he was. +August, on his part, felt sure that Humphreys would not do anything +against him; certainly not in the way of legal proceedings. And as +for the sale of Samuel Anderson's farms, that did not disturb him. +Like almost everybody else at that time, August Wehle was strongly +impressed by the assertions of the Millerites, and if the world +should be finished in the next month, the farms were of no +consequence. And if Millerism proved a delusion, the loss of Samuel +Anderson's property would only leave Julia on his level, so far as +worldly goods went. The happiness this last thought brought him +made him ashamed. Why should he rejoice in Mr. Anderson's +misfortune? Why should he wish to pull Julia down to him? But still +the thought remained a pleasant one.</p> +<p>Jonas would not have it so. He had his plan. He went home from +the Adventist meeting that very night with Cynthy Ann, and then +stood talking to her at the corner of the porch, feeling very sure +that Humphreys would listen from above. He heard his stealthy +tread, after a while, disturb a loose board on the upper porch. +Then he began to talk to Cynthy Ann in this strain:</p> +<p>"You see, I can't tell no secrets, Cynthy Ann, even to your +Royal Goodness, as I might say, seein' as how as you a'n't my wife, +and a'n't likely to be, if Brother Goshorn can have his way. But +you're the Queen of Hearts, anyhow. But s'pose I was to hint a +secret?"</p> +<p>"Sh--sh--h-h-h!" said Cynthy Ann, partly because she felt a +sinful pleasure in the flattery, and partly because she felt sure +that Humphreys was above. But Jonas paid no attention to the +caution.</p> +<p>"I'll give you a hint as strong as a Irishman's, which they do +say'll knock you down. Let's s'pose a case. They a'n't no harm in +s'posin' a case, you know. I've knowed boys who'd throw a rock at a +fence-rail and hit a stump, and then say, 'S'posin' they was a +woodpecker on that air stump, wouldn't I a keeled him over?' You +can s'pose a case and make a woodpecker wherever you want to. Well, +s'posin' they was a inquisition or somethin' of the kind from the +guv'nor of the State of ole Kaintuck to the guv'nor of the State of +Injeanny? And s'posin' that the dokyment got lodged in this 'ere +identical county? And s'posin' it called fer the body of one Thomas +A. Parkins, a<i>li</i>as J.W. 'Umphreys? And s'posin' it speecified +as to sartain and sundry crimes committed in Paduky and all along +the shore, fer all I know? Now, s'posin' all of them air things, +what <i>would</i> Clark township do to console itself when that +toonful v'ice and them air blazin' watch-seals had set in ignominy +for ever and ever? Selah! Good-night, and don't you breathe a word +to a livin' soul, nur a dead one, 'bout what I been a-sayin'. +You'll know more by daylight to-morry 'n you know now."</p> +<p>And the last part of the speech was true, for by midnight the +Hawk had fled. And the sale of the Anderson farm to Humphreys was +never completed. For three days the end of the world was forgotten +in the interest which Clark township felt in the flight of its +favorite. And by degrees the story of Norman's encounter with the +gamblers and of August's recovery of the money became spread abroad +through the confidential hints of Jonas. And by degrees another +story became known; it could not long be concealed. It was the +story of Betsey Malcolm, who averred that she had been privately +married to Humphreys on the occasion of a certain trip they had +made to Kentucky together, to attend a "big meeting." The story was +probably true, but uncharitable gossips shook their heads.</p> +<p>It was only a few evenings after the flight of Humphreys that +Jonas had another talk with Cynthy Ann, in which he confessed that +all his supposed case about a requisition from the governor of +Kentucky for Humphreys's arrest was pure fiction.</p> +<p>"But, Jonas, is--is that air right? I'm afeard it a'n't right to +tell an ontruth."</p> +<p>"So 'ta'n't; but I only s'posed a case, you know."</p> +<p>"But Brother Hall said last Sunday two weeks, that anything that +gin a false impression was--was lying. Now, I don't think you meant +it, but then I thought I orto speak to you about it."</p> +<p>"Well, maybe you're right. I see you last summer a-puttin' up a +skeercrow to keep the poor, hungry little birds of the air from +gittin' the peas that they needed to sustain life. An' I said, What +a pity that the best woman I ever seed should tell lies to the poor +little birds that can't defend theirselves from her wicked wiles! +But I see that same day a skeercrow, a mean, holler, +high-percritical purtense of a ole hat and coat, a-hanging in +Brother Goshorn's garden down to the cross-roads. An' I wondered ef +it was your Methodis' trainin' that taught you sech-like cheatin' +of the little sparrys and blackbirds."</p> +<p>"Yes; but Jonas--" said Cynthy, bewildered.</p> +<p>"And I see a few days arterwards a Englishman with a humbug-fly +onto his line, a foolin' the poor, simple-hearted little fishes +into swallerln' a book that hadn't nary sign of a ginowine bait +onto it. An' I says, says I, What a deceitful thing the human heart +is!"</p> +<p>"Why, Jonas, you'd make a preacher!" said Cynthy Ann, touched +with the fervor of his utterance, and inly resolved never to set up +another scarecrow.</p> +<p>"Not much, my dear. But then, you see, I make distinctions. Ef I +was to see a wolf a-goin' to eat a lamb, what would I do? Why, I'd +skeer or fool him with the very fust thing I could find. Wouldn' +you, honey?"</p> +<p>"In course," said Cynthy Ann.</p> +<p>"And so, when I seed a wolf or a tiger or a painter, like that +air 'Umphreys, about to gobble up fortins, and to do some harm to +Gus, maybe, I jest rigged up a skeercrow of words, like a ole hat +and coat stuck onto a stick, and run him off. Any harm done, my +dear?"</p> +<p>"Well, no, Jonas; I ruther 'low not."</p> +<p>Whether Jonas's defense was good or not, I can not say, for I do +not know. But he is entitled to the benefit of it.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIX."></a>CHAPTER XXXIX.</h2> +<h3>JONAS TAKES AN APPEAL</h3> +<br> +<p>Jonas had waited for the coming of the quarterly meeting to +carry his appeal to the presiding elder. The quarterly meeting for +the circuit was held at the village of Brayvllle, and beds were +made upon the floor for the guests who crowded the town. Every +visiting Methodist had a right to entertainment, and every resident +Methodist opened his doors very wide, for Western people are +hospitable in a fashion and with a bountifulness unknown on the +eastern side of the mountains. Who that has not known it, can ever +understand the delightfulness of a quarterly meeting? The meeting +of old friends--the social life--is all but heavenly. And then the +singing of the old Methodist hymns, such as</p> +<blockquote>"Oh! that will be joyful!<br> + Joyful! joyful!<br> +Oh! that will be joyful,<br> + To meet to part no more."</blockquote> +<p>And that other solemnly-sweet refrain:</p> +<blockquote>"The reaping-time will surely come,<br> +And angels shout the harvest home!"</blockquote> +<p>And who shall describe the joy of a Christian mother, when her +scapegrace son "laid down the arms of his rebellion" and was +"soundly converted"? Let those sneer who will, but such moral +miracles as are wrought in Methodist revivals are more wonderful +than any healing of the blind or raising of the dead could be.</p> +<p>Jonas turned up, faithful to his promise, and called on the +"elder" at the place where he was staying, and asked for a private +interview. He found the old gentleman exercising his sweet voice in +singing,</p> +<blockquote> "Come, let us anew<br> + Our journey pursue,<br> +Roll round with the year.<br> +And never stand still till the Master appear.<br> + His adorable will<br> + Let us gladly fulfill,<br> +And our talents improve<br> +By the patience of hope and the labor of love."</blockquote> +<p>"When he concluded the verse he raised his half-closed eyes and +saw Jonas standing in the door.</p> +<p>"Mr. Persidin' Elder," said Jonas, trying in vain to speak with +some seriousness and veneration, "I come to ax your consent to +marry one of your flock--the best lamb you've got in the whole +fold."</p> +<p>"Bless you, Mr. Harrison," said Father Williams, the old elder, +laughing, "bless you, I haven't any right to consent or forbid. Ask +the lady herself!"</p> +<p>"Ax the lady!" said Jonas. "Didn't I though! And didn't Mr. +Goshorn forbid the lady to marry me, under the pains and penalties +pervided; and didn't Mr. Hall set his seal to the forbiddin' of +Goshorn! An' I says to her, 'I won't take nothin' less than a elder +or a bishop on this 'ere vital question.' When I want a sheep, I +don't go to the underlin,' but to the boss; and so I brought this +appeal up to you on a writ of <i>habeas corpus</i>, or whatever you +may call it."</p> +<p>The presiding elder laughed again, and looked closely at Jonas. +Then he stepped to the door and called in the circuit preacher, Mr. +Hall, and the class leader, Mr. Goshorn, both of whom happened to +be in the next room engaged in an excited discussion with a brother +who was a little touched with Millerism.</p> +<p>"What's this Mr. Harrison tells me about your forbidding the +banns in his case?"</p> +<p>"He's a New Light," said Brother Hall, showing his abhorrence in +his face, "and it seemed to me that for a Methodist to marry a New +Light was a sin--a being yoked together unequally with an +unbeliever. You know, Father Williams, that New Lights are +Arians."</p> +<p>The old man seemed more amused than ever. Turning to Jonas, he +asked him if he was an Arian.</p> +<p>"Not as I knows on, my venerable friend. I may have caught the +disease when I had the measles, or I may have been a Arian in +infancy, or I may be a Arian on my mother's side, you know; but as +I don't know who or what it may be, I a'n't in no way accountable +fer it--no more'n Brother Goshorn is to blame fer his face bein' so +humbly. But I take it Arian is one of them air pleasant names you +and the New Light preachers uses in your Christian intercourse +together to make one another mad. I'm one of them as goes to heaven +straight--never stoppin' to throw no donicks at the Methodists, +Presbyterians, nor no other misguided children of men. They may +ride in the packet, or go by flat-boat or keel-boat, ef they +chooses. I go by the swift-sailin' and palatial mail-boat New +Light, and I don't run no opposition line, nor bust my bilers +tryin' to beat my neighbors into the heavenly port."</p> +<p>Brother Goshorn looked vexed. Brother Hall was scandalized at +the lightness of Jonas's conversation. But the old presiding elder, +with keen common-sense and an equally keen sense of the ludicrous, +could not look grave with all his effort to keep from laughing.</p> +<br> +<a name="246.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/246.jpg"><img src="images/246.jpg" +width="25%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>BROTHER GOSHORN.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Are you an unbeliever?" he asked.</p> +<p>"I don't know what you call onbeliever. I believe in God and +Christ, and keep Sunday and the Fourth of July; but I don't believe +in all of Brother Goshorn's nonsense about wearing veils and +artificials."</p> +<p>"Well," said Brother Hall, "would you endeavor to induce your +wife to dress in a manner unbecoming a Methodist?"</p> +<br> +<a name="248.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/248.jpg"><img src="images/248.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>SAY THEM WORDS OVER AGAIN.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"I wouldn't fer the world. If I git the article I want, I don't +keer what it's tied up in, calico or bombazine."</p> +<p>"Couldn't you join the Methodist Church yourself, and keep your +wife company?" It was Brother Goshorn who spoke.</p> +<p>"Couldn't I? I suppose I could ef I didn't think no more of +religion than some other folks. I could jine the Methodist Church, +and have everybody say I jined to git my wife. That may be serving +God; but I can't see how. And then how long would you keep me? The +very fust time I fired off my blunderbuss in class-meetin', and you +heerd the buckshot and the squirrel-shot and the slugs and all +sorts of things a-rattlin' around, you'd say I was makin' fun of +the Gospel. I 'low they a'n't no Methodist in me. I was cut out +cur'us, you know, and made up crooked."</p> +<p>"Is there anything against Mr. Harrison, Brother Goshorn?" asked +the elder.</p> +<p>"He's a New Light," said Mr. Goshorn, in a tone that signified +his belief that to be a New Light was enough.</p> +<p>"Is he honest and steady?"</p> +<p>"Never heard anything against him as a moralist."</p> +<p>"Well, then, it's my opinion that any member of your class would +do better to marry a good, faithful, honest New Light than to marry +a hickory Methodist."</p> +<p>Jonas got up like one demented, and ran out of the door and +across the street. In a moment he came back, bringing Cynthy Ann in +triumph.</p> +<p>"Now, soy them words over again," he said to the presiding +elder.</p> +<p>"Sister Cynthy Ann," said the presiding elder, "you really love +Brother Harrison?"</p> +<p>"I--I don't know whether it's right to set our sinful hearts on +the things of this perishin' world. But I think more of him, I'm +afeard, than I had ort to. He's got as good a heart as I ever seed. +But Brother Goshorn thought I hadn't orter marry him, seein' he is +a onbeliever."</p> +<p>"But I a'n't," said Jonas; "I believe in the Bible, and in +everything in it, and in Cynthy Ann and her good Methodist religion +besides."</p> +<p>"I think you can give up all your scruples and marry Mr. +Harrison, and love him and be happy," said the presiding elder. +"Don't be afraid to be happy, my sister. You'll be happy in good +company in heaven, and you'd just as well get used to it here."</p> +<p>"I told you I'd find a man that had salt enough to keep his +religion sweet. And, Father Williams, you've got to marry us, +whenever Cynthy Ann's ready," said Jonas with enthusiasm.</p> +<p>And for a moment the look of overstrained scrupulosity on Cynthy +Ann's face relaxed and a strange look of happiness came into her +eyes.</p> +<p>And the time was fixed then and there.</p> +<p>Brother Hall was astonished.</p> +<p>And Brother Goshorn drew down his face, and said that he didn't +know what was to become of good, old-fashioned Methodism and the +rules of the Discipline, if the presiding elders talked in that +sort of a way. The church was going to the dogs.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XL."></a>CHAPTER XL.</h2> +<h3>SELLING OUT.</h3> +<br> +<p>The flight of the Hawk did not long dampen the ardor of those +who were looking for signs in the heaven above and the earth +beneath. I have known a school-master to stand, switch in hand, and +give a stubborn boy a definite number of minutes to yield. The boy +who would not have submitted on account of any amount of +punishment, was subdued by the awful waiting. We have all read the +old school-book story of the prison-warden who brought a mob of +criminals to subjection by the same process. Millerism produced +some such effect as this. The assured belief of the believers had a +great effect on others; the dreadful drawing on of the set time day +by day produced an effect in some regions absolutely awful. An +eminent divine, at that time a pastor in Boston, has told me that +the leaven of Adventism permeated all religious bodies, and that he +himself could not avoid the fearful sense of waiting for some +catastrophe--the impression that all this expectation of people +must have some significance. If this was the effect in Boston, +imagine the effect in a country neighborhood like Clark township. +Andrew, skeptical as he was visionary, was almost the only man that +escaped the infection. Jonas would have been as frankly irreverent +if the day of doom had come as he was at all times; but even Jonas +had come to the conclusion that "somethin' would happen, or else +somethin' else." August, with a young man's impressibility, was +awe-stricken with thoughts of the nearing end of the world, and +Julia accepted it as settled.</p> +<p>It is a good thing that the invisible world is so thoroughly +shut out from this. The effect of too vivid a conception of it is +never wholesome. It was pernicious in the middle age, and +clairvoyance and spirit-rapping would be great evils to the world, +if it were not that the spirits, even of-the ablest men, in losing +their bodies seem to lose their wits. It is well that it is so, for +if Washington Irving dictated to a medium accounts of the other +world in a style such as that of his "Little Britain," for +instance, we should lose all interest in the affairs of this +sphere, and nobody would buy our novels.</p> +<p>This fever of excitement kept alive Samuel Anderson's +determination to sell his farms for a trifle as a testimony to +unbelievers. He found that fifty dollars would meet his expenses +until the eleventh of August, and so the price was set at that.</p> +<p>As soon as Andrew heard of this, he privately arranged with +Jonas to buy it; but Mrs. Anderson utterly refused. She said she +could see through it all. Jonas was one of Andrew's fingers. Andrew +had got to be a sort of a king in Clark township, and Jonas +was--was the king's fool. She did not mean that any of her property +should go into the hands of the clique that were trying to rob her +of her property and her daughter. Even for two weeks they should +not own her house!</p> +<p>Before this speech was ended, Bob Walker entered the door.</p> +<p>Bob was tall, stooped, good-natured, and desperately poor. With +ton children under twelve years of age, with an incorrigible +fondness for loafing and telling funny stories, Bob saw no chance +to improve his condition. A man may be either honest or lazy and +got rich; but a man who Is both honest and indolent is doomed. Bob +lived in a cabin on the Anderson farm, and when not hired by Samuel +Anderson he did days' work here and there, riding to and from his +labor on a raw-boned mare, that was the laughing-stock of the +county. Bob pathetically called her Splinter-shin, and he always +rode bareback, for the very good reason that he had neither saddle +nor sheepskin.</p> +<br> +<a name="253.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/253.jpg"><img src="images/253.jpg" +width="25%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"I WANT TO BUY YOUR PLACE."</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Mr. Anderson," said Bob, standing in the door and trying to +straighten the chronic stoop out of his shoulders, "I want to buy +your place."</p> +<p>If Bob had said that he wanted to be elected president Samuel +Anderson could not have been more surprised.</p> +<p>"You look astonished; but folks don't know everything. I 'low I +know how to lay by a little. But I never could git enough to buy a +decent kind of a tater-patch. So I says to my ole woman this +mornin', 'Jane,' says I, 'let's git some ground. Let's buy out Mr. +Anderson, and see how it'll feel to be rich fer a few days. If she +all burns up, let her burn, I say. We've had a plaguey hard time of +it, let's see how it goes to own two farms fer awhile.' And so we +thought we'd ruther hev the farms fer two weeks than a little money +in a ole stocking. What d'ye say?"</p> +<p>Jonas here put in that he didn't see why they mightn't sell to +him as well as to Bob Walker. Cynthy Ann had worked fer Mrs. +Anderson fer years, and him and Cynthy was a-goin' to be one man +soon. Why not sell to them?</p> +<p>"Because selling to you is selling to Andrew," said Mrs. +Abigail, in a conclusive way.</p> +<p>And so Bob got the farms, possession to be given after the +fourteenth of August, thus giving the day of doom three days of +grace. And Bob rode round the county boasting that he was as rich a +man as there was in Clark Township. And Jonas declared that ef the +eend did come in the month of August, Abigail would find some +onsettled bills agin her fer cheatin' the brother outen the +inheritance. And Clark Township agreed with him.</p> +<p>August was secretly pleased that one obstacle to his marriage +was gone. If Andrew should prove right, and the world should +outlast the middle of August, there would be nothing dishonorable +in his marrying a girl that would have nothing to sacrifice.</p> +<p>Andrew, for his part, gave vent to his feelings, as usual, by +two or three bitter remarks leveled at the whole human race, though +nowadays he was inclined to make exceptions in favor of several +people, of whom Julia stood first. She was a woman of the +old-fashioned kind, he said, fit to go alongside Héloise or +Chaucer's Grisilde.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLI."></a>CHAPTER XLI.</h2> +<h3>THE LAST DAY AND WHAT HAPPENED IN IT.</h3> +<br> +<p>The religious excitement reached its culmination as the tenth +and eleventh of August came on. Some made ascension-robes. Work was +suspended everywhere. The more abandoned, unwilling to yield to the +panic, showed its effects on them by deeper potations, and by a +recklessness of wickedness meant to conceal their fears. With tin +horns they blasphemously affected to be angels blowing trumpets. +They imitated the Millerite meetings in their drunken sprees, and +learned Mr. Hankins's arguments by heart.</p> +<p>The sun of the eleventh of August rose gloriously. People +pointed to it with trembling, and said that it would rise no more. +Soon after sunrise there were crimson clouds stretching above and +below it, and popular terror seized upon this as a sign. But the +sun mounted with a scorching heat, which showed that at least his +shining power was not impaired. Then men said, "Behold the +beginning of the fervent heat that is to melt the elements!" Night +drew on, and every "shooting-star" was a new sign of the end. The +meteors, as usual at this time of the year, were plentiful, and the +simple-hearted country-folk were convinced that the stars were +falling out of the sky.</p> +<p>A large bald hill overlooking the Ohio was to be the mount of +ascension. Here gathered Elder Hankins's flock with that +comfortable assurance of being the elect that only a narrow bigotry +can give. And here came others of all denominations, consoling +themselves that they were just as well off if they were Christians +as if they had made all this fuss about the millennium. Here was +August, too, now almost well, joining with the rest in singing +those sweet and inspiring Adventist hymns. His German heart could +not keep still where there was singing, and now, in gratefulness at +new-found health, he was more inclined to music than ever. So he +joined heartily and sincerely in the song that begins:</p> +<blockquote>"Shall Simon bear his cross alone,<br> + And all the world go free?<br> +No, there's a cross for every one,<br> + And there's a cross for me.<br> +I'll bear the consecrated cross<br> + Till from the cross I'm free,<br> +And then go home to wear the crown.<br> + For there's a crown for me!<br> +Yes, there's a crown in heaven above,<br> + The purchase of a Saviour's love.<br> +Oh I that's the crown for me!"</blockquote> +<p>When the concourse reached the lines,</p> +<blockquote>"The saints have heard the midnight cry,<br> +Go meet him in the air!"</blockquote> +<p>neither August nor any one else could well resist the infection +of the profound and awful belief in the immediate coming of the end +which pervaded the throng. Strong men and women wept and shouted +with the excitement.</p> +<p>Then Elder Hankins exhorted a little. He said that the time was +short. But men's hearts were hard. As in the days of the flood, +they were marrying and giving in marriage. Not half a mile away a +wedding was at that time taking place, and a man who called himself +a minister could not discern the signs of the times, but was +solemnizing a marriage.</p> +<p>This allusion was to the marriage of Jonas, which was to take +place that very evening at the castle. Mrs. Anderson had refused to +have "such wicked nonsense" at her house, and as Cynthy had no +home, Andrew had appointed it at the castle, partly to oblige +Jonas, partly from habitual opposition to Abigail, but chiefly to +express his contempt for Adventism.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson herself was in a state of complete sublimation. +She had sent for Norman, that she might get him ready for the final +judgment, and Norman, without the slightest inclination to be +genuinely religious, was yet a coward, and made a provisional +repentance, not meant to hold good if Elder Hankins's figures +should fail; just such a repentance as many a man has made on what +he supposed to be his death-bed. Do not I remember a panic-stricken +man, converted by typhoid fever and myself, who laughed as soon as +he began to eat gruel, to think that he had been "such a fool as to +send for the preacher"?</p> +<p>Now, between Mrs. Anderson's joy at Norman's conversion, and her +delight that the world would soon be at an end and she on the +winning side, and her anticipation of the pleasure she would feel +even in heaven in saying, "I told you so!" to her unbelieving +friends, she quite forgot Julia. In fact she went from one fit of +religious catalepsy to another, falling into trances, or being +struck down with what was mysteriously called "the power." She had +relaxed her vigilance about Julia, for there were but three more +hours of time, and she felt that the goal was already gained, and +she had carried her point to the very last. A satisfaction for a +saint!</p> +<p>The neglected Julia naturally floated toward the outer edge of +the surging crowd, and she and August inevitably drifted +together.</p> +<p>"Let us go and see Jonas married," said August. "It is no harm. +God can take us to heaven from one place as well as another, if we +are His children."</p> +<p>In truth, Julia was wearied and bewildered, not to say +disgusted, with her mother's peculiar religious exercises, and she +gladly escaped with August to the castle and the wedding of her +faithful friends.</p> +<p>Andrew, in a spirit of skeptical defiance, had made his castle +look as flowery and festive as possible. The wedding took place in +the lower story, but the library was illuminated, and the +Adventists who had occasion to pass by Andrew's on their way to the +rendezvous accepted this as a new fulfillment of prophecy to the +very letter. They nodded one to another, and said, "See! marrying +and giving in marriage, as in the days of Noah!"</p> +<p>August and Julia were too much awe-stricken to say much on their +way to the castle. But in these last hours of a world grown old and +ready for its doom, they cleaved closer together. There could be +neither heaven nor millennium for one of them without the other! +Loving one another made them love God the more, and love cast out +all fear. If this was the Last, they would face it together, and if +it proved the Beginning, they would rejoice together. At sight of +every shooting meteor, Julia clung almost convulsively to +August.</p> +<p>When they entered the castle, Jonas and Cynthy were already +standing up before the presiding elder, and he was about to begin. +Cynthy's face showed her sense of the awfulness of marrying at a +moment of such fearful expectation, or perhaps she was troubling +herself for fear that so much happiness out of heaven was to be had +only in the commission of a capital sin. But, like most people +whose consciences are stronger than their intellects, she found +great consolation in taking refuge under the wing of ecclesiastical +authority. To be married by a presiding elder was the best thing in +the world next to being married by a bishop.</p> +<p>Whatever fear of the swift-coming judgment others might have +felt, the benignant old elder was at peace. Common-sense, a clean +conscience, and a child-like faith enlightened his countenance, and +since he tried to be always ready, and since his meditations made +the things of the other life ever present, his pulse would scarcely +have quickened if he had felt sure that the archangel's trump would +sound in an hour. He neither felt the subdued fear shown on the +countenance of Cynthy Ann, nor the strong skeptical opposition of +Andrew, whose face of late had grown almost into a sneer.</p> +<p>"Do you take this woman to be your lawful and wedded wife--"</p> +<p>And before the elder could finish it, Jonas blurted out, "You'd +better believe I do, my friend."</p> +<p>And then when the old man smiled and finished his question down +to, "so long as ye both shall live," Jonas responded eagerly, "Tell +death er the jedgment-day, long or short."</p> +<p>And Cynthy Ann answered demurely out of her frightened but too +happy heart, and the old man gave them his benediction in an +apostolic fashion that removed Cynthy Ann's scruples, and smoothed +a little of the primness out of her face, so that she almost smiled +when Jonas said, "Well! it's done now, and it can't be undone fer +all the Goshorns in Christendom er creation!"</p> +<p>And then the old gentleman--for he was a gentleman, though he +had always been a backwoodsman--spoke of the excitement, and said +that it was best always to be ready--to be ready to live, and then +you would be ready for death or the judgment. That very night the +end might come, but it was not best to trouble one's self about it. +And he smiled, and said that it was none of his business, God could +manage the universe; it was for him to be found doing his duty as a +faithful servant. And then it would be just like stepping out of +one door into another, whenever death or the judgment should +come.</p> +<p>While the old man was getting ready to leave, Julia and August +slipped away, fearing lest their absence should be discovered. But +the peacefulness of the old elder's face had entered into their +souls, and they wished that they too were solemnly pronounced man +and wife, with so sweet a benediction upon their union.</p> +<p>"I do not feel much anxious about the day of judgment or the +millennium," said August, whose idiom was sometimes a little +broken. "When I was so near dying I felt satisfied to die after you +had kissed my lips. But now that it seems we have come upon the +world's last days, I wish I were married to you. I do not know how +things will be in the new heaven and the new earth. But I should +like you to be my wife there, or at least to have been my wife on +earth, if only for one hour."</p> +<p>And then he proposed that they should be made man and wife now +in the world's last hour. It was not wrong. It could not give her +mother heart-disease, for she would not know of it till she should +hear it in the land where there are neither marriages nor sickness. +Julia could not see any sin in her disobedience under such +circumstances. She did so much want to go into the New Jerusalem as +the wedded wife of August "the grand," as she fondly called +him.</p> +<p>And so in the stillness of that awful night they walked back to +Andrew's castle, and found the venerable preacher, with saddle-bags +on his arm, ready to mount his horse, for the presiding elder of +that day had no leisure time. Jonas and Cynthy stood bidding him +good-by. And the old man was saying again that if we were always +ready it would be like stepping from one door into another. But he +thought it as wrong to waste time gazing up into heaven to see +Christ come, as it had been to gaze after Him when He went away. +Even Jonas's voice was a little softened by the fearful thought +ever present of the coming on of that awful midnight of the +eleventh of August. All were surprised to see the two young people +come back.</p> +<p>"Father Williams," said August, "we thought we should like to go +into the New Jerusalem man and wife. Will you marry us?"</p> +<p>"Sensible to the last!" cried Jonas.</p> +<p>"According to the laws of this State," said Mr. Williams, "you +can not be married without a license from the clerk of the county. +Have you a license?"</p> +<p>"No," said August, his heart sinking.</p> +<p>Just then Andrew came up and inquired what the conversation was +about.</p> +<p>"Why, Uncle Andrew," said Julia eagerly, "August and I don't +want the end of the world to come without being man and wife. And +we have no license, and August could not go seven miles and back to +get a license before midnight. It is too bad, isn't it? If it +wasn't that we think the end of the world is so near, I should be +ashamed to say how much I want to be married. But I shall be proud +to have been August's wife, when I am among the angels."</p> +<p>"You are a noble woman," said Andrew. "Come in, let us see if +anything can be done." And he led the way, smiling.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLII."></a>CHAPTER XLII.</h2> +<h3>FOR EVER AND EVER.</h3> +<br> +<p>When they had all re-entered the castle, Andrew made them sit +down. The old minister did not see any escape from the fatal +obstacle of a lack of license, but Andrew was very mysterious.</p> +<p>"Virtue is its own reward," said the Philosopher, "but it often +finds an incidental reward besides. Now, Julia, you are the noblest +woman in these degenerate times, according to my way of +thinking."</p> +<p>"That's true as preachin', ef you'll except one," chirped Jonas, +with a significant look at his Cynthy Ann. Julia blushed, and the +old minister looked inquiringly at Andrew and at Julia. This +exaggerated praise from a man so misanthropic as Andrew excited his +curiosity.</p> +<p>"Without exception," said Andrew emphatically, looking first at +Jonas, then at Mr. Williams, "my niece is the noblest woman I ever +knew."</p> +<p>"Please don't, Uncle Andrew!" begged Julia, almost speechless +with shame. Praise was something she could not bear. She was inured +to censure.</p> +<p>"Do you remember that dark night--of course you do--when you +braved everything and came here to see August, who would have died +but for your coming?" Andrew was now looking at Julia, who answered +him almost inaudibly.</p> +<p>"And do you remember when we got to your gate, on your return, +what you said to me?"</p> +<p>"Yes, sir," said Julia.</p> +<p>"To be sure you do, and" (turning to August) "I shall never +forget her words; she said, If he should get worse, I should like +him to die my husband, if he wishes it. Send for me, day or night, +and I will come in spite of everything."</p> +<p>"Did you say that?" asked August, looking at her eagerly.</p> +<p>And Julia nodded her head, and lifted her eyes, glistening with +brimming tears, to his.</p> +<p>"You do not know," said Andrew to the preacher, "how much her +proposal meant, for you do not know through what she would have had +to pass. But I say that God does sometimes reward virtue in this +world--a world not quite worn out yet--and she is worthy of the +reward in store for her."</p> +<p>Saying this, Andrew went into the closet leading to his secret +stairway--secret no longer, since Julia had ascended by that +way--and soon came down from his library with a paper in his +hand.</p> +<p>"When you, my noble-hearted niece, proposed to make any +sacrifice to marry this studious, honest, true-hearted German +gentleman, who is worthy of you, if any man can be, I thought best +to be ready for any emergency, and so I went the next day and +procured the license, the clerk promising to keep my secret. A +marriage-license is good for thirty days. You will see, Mr. +Williams, that this has not quite expired."</p> +<p>The minister looked at it and then said, "I depend on your +judgment, Mr. Anderson. There seems to be something peculiar about +the circumstances of this marriage."</p> +<p>"Very peculiar," said Andrew.</p> +<p>"You give me your word, then, that it is a marriage I ought to +solemnize?"</p> +<p>"The lady is my niece," said Andrew. "The marriage, taking place +in this castle, will shed more glory upon it than its whole history +beside; and you, sir, have never performed a marriage ceremony in a +case where the marriage was so excellent as this."</p> +<p>"Except the last one," put in Jonas.</p> +<p>I suppose Mr. Williams made the proper reductions for Andrew's +enthusiasm. But he was satisfied, and perhaps he was rather +inclined to be satisfied, for gentle-hearted old men are quite +susceptible to a romantic situation.</p> +<p>When he asked August if he would live with this woman in holy +matrimony "so long as ye both shall live," August, thinking the two +hours of time left to him too short for the earnestness of his +vows, looked the old minister in the eyes, and said solemnly: "For +ever and ever!"</p> +<p>"No, my son," said the old man, smiling and almost weeping, +"that is not the right answer. I like your whole-hearted love. But +it is far easier to say 'for ever and ever,' standing as you think +you do now on the brink of eternity, than to say 'till death do us +part,' looking down a long and weary road of toil and sickness and +poverty and change and little vexations. You do not only take this +woman, young and blooming, but old and sick and withered and +wearied, perhaps. Do you take her for any lot?"</p> +<p>"For any lot," said August solemnly and humbly.</p> +<p>And Julia, on her part, could only bow her head in reply to the +questions, for the tears chased one another down her cheeks. And +then came the benediction. The inspired old man, full of hearty +sympathy, stretched his trembling hands with apostolic solemnity +over the heads of the two, and said slowly, with solemn pauses, as +the words welled up out of his soul: "The peace of God--that +passeth all understanding" (here his voice melted with +emotion)--"keep your hearts--and minds--in the knowledge and love +of God.--And now, may grace--mercy--and peace from God--<i>the +Father</i>--and <i>our</i> Lord Jesus Christ--be with +you--evermore--Amen!" And to the imagination of Julia the Spirit of +God descended like a dove into her heart, and the great mystery of +wifely love and the other greater mystery of love to God seemed to +flow together in her soul. And the quieter spirit of August was +suffused with a great peace.</p> +<p>They soon left the castle to return to the mount of ascension, +but they walked slowly, and at first silently, over the intervening +hill, which gave them a view of the Ohio River, sleeping in its +indescribable beauty and stillness in the moonlight.</p> +<p>Presently they heard the melodious voice of the old presiding +elder, riding up the road a little way off, singing the hopeful +hymns in which he so much delighted. The rich and earnest voice +made the woods ring with one verse of</p> +<blockquote>"Oh! how happy are they<br> + Who the Saviour obey,<br> +And have laid up their treasure above I<br> + Tongue can never express<br> + The sweet comfort and peace<br> +Of a soul in its earliest love."</blockquote> +<p>And then he broke into Watts's</p> +<blockquote>"When I can read my title clear<br> + To mansions in the skies,<br> +I'll bid farewell to every fear<br> + And wipe my weeping eyes!"</blockquote> +<p>There seemed to be some accord between the singing of the brave +old man and the peacefulness of the landscape. Soon he had reached +the last stanza, and in tones of subdued but ecstatic triumph he +sang:</p> +<blockquote>"There I shall bathe my weary soul<br> + In seas of heavenly rest,<br> +And not a wave of trouble roll<br> + Across my peaceful breast."</blockquote> +<p>And with these words he passed round the hill and out of the +hearing of the young people.</p> +<p>"August," said Julia slowly, as if afraid to break a silence so +blessed, "August, it seems to me that the sky and the river and the +hazy hills and my own soul are all alike, just as full of happiness +and peace as they can be."</p> +<p>"Yes," said August, smiling, "but the sky is clear, and your +eyes are raining, Julia. But can it be possible that God, who made +this world so beautiful, will burn it up to-night? It used to seem +a hard world to me when I was away from you, and I didn't care how +quickly it burned up. But now--"</p> +<p>Somehow August forgot to finish that sentence. Words are of so +little use under such circumstances. A little pressure on Julia's +arm which was in his, told all that he meant. When love makes earth +a heaven, it is enough.</p> +<p>"But how beautiful the new earth will be," said Julia, still +looking at the sleeping river, "the river of life will be clear as +crystal!"</p> +<p>"Yes," said August, "the Spanish version says, 'Most +resplendent, like unto crystal.'"</p> +<p>"I think," said Julia, "that it must be something like this +river. The trees of life will stand on either side, like those +great sycamores that lean over the water so gracefully."</p> +<p>Any landscape would have seemed heavenly to Julia on this night. +A venerable friend of mine, a true Christian philanthropist, whose +praise is in all the churches, wants me to undertake to reform +fictitious literature by leaving out the love. And so I may when +God reforms His universe by leaving out the love. Love is the best +thing in novels; not until love is turned out of heaven will I help +turn it out of literature. It is only the misrepresentation of love +in literature that is bad, as the poisoning of love in life is bad. +It was the love of August that had opened Julia's heart to the +influences of heaven, and Julia was to August a mediator of God's +grace.</p> +<p>By eleven o'clock August Wehle and his wife--it gives me nearly +as much pleasure as it did August to use that locution--were +standing not far away from the surging crowd of those who, in +singing hymns and in excited prayer, were waiting for the judgment. +Jonas and Cynthy and Andrew were with them. August, though not a +recognized Millerite, almost blamed himself that he should have +been away these two hours from the services. But why should he? The +most sacramental of all the sacraments is marriage. Is it not an +arbitrary distinction of theologians, that which makes two rites to +be sacraments and others not? But if the distinction is to be made +at all, I should apply the solemn word to the solemnest rite and +the holiest ordinance of God's, even if I left out the sacred +washing in the name of the Trinity and the broken emblematic bread +and the wine. These are sacramental in their solemn symbolism, that +in the solemnest symbolism and the holiest reality.</p> +<p>August's whole attention was now turned toward the coming +judgment; and as he stood thinking of the awfulness of this +critical moment, the exercises of the Adventists grated on the deep +peacefulness of his spirit, for from singing their more beautiful +hymns, they had passed to an excited shouting of the old +camp-meeting ditty whose refrain is:</p> +<p>"I hope to shout glory when this world's all on fire! +Hallelujah!"</p> +<p>He and Julia hung back a moment, but Mrs. Abigail, who had +recovered from her tenth trance, and had been for some time engaged +in an active search for Julia, now pounced upon her, and bore her +off, before she had time to think, to the place of the hottest +excitement.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLIII."></a>CHAPTER XLIII.</h2> +<h3>THE MIDNIGHT ALARM.</h3> +<br> +<p>At last the time drew on toward midnight, the hour upon which +all expectation was concentrated. For did not the Parable of the +Ten Virgins speak of the coming of the bridegroom at midnight?</p> +<p>"My friends and brethren," said Elder Hankins, his voice shaking +with emotion, as he held his watch up in the moonlight, "My friends +and brethren, ef the Word is true, they is but five minutes more +before the comin' in of the new dispensation. Let us spend the last +moments of time in silent devotion."</p> +<p>"I wonder ef he thinks the world runs down by his +pay-tent-leever watch?" said Jonas, who could not resist the +impulse to make the remark, even with the expectation of the +immediate coming of the day of judgment in his mind.</p> +<p>"I wonder for what longitude he calculates prophecy?" said +Andrew. "It can not be midnight all round the world at the same +moment."</p> +<p>But Elder Hankins's flock did not take any astronomical +difficulty into consideration. And no spectator could look upon +them, bowing silently in prayer, awed by the expectation of the +sudden coming of the Lord, without feeling that, however much the +expectation might be illusory, the emotion was a fact absolutely +awful. Events are only sublime as they move the human soul, and the +swift-coming end of time was subjectively a great reality to these +waiting people. Even Andrew was awe-stricken from sympathy; as +Coleridge, when he stood godfather for Keble's child, was +overwhelmed with a sense of the significance of the sacrament from +Keble's stand-point. As for Cynthy Ann, she trembled with fear as +she held fast to the arm of Jonas. And Jonas felt as much +seriousness as was possible to him, until he heard Norman +Anderson's voice crying with terror and excitement, and felt Cynthy +shudder on his arm.</p> +<p>"For my part," said Jonas, turning to Andrew, "it don't seem +like as ef it was much use to holler and make a furss about the +corn crap when October's fairly sot in, and the frost has nipped +the blades. All the plowin' and hoein' and weedin' and thinnin' out +the suckers won't, better the yield then. An' when wheat's ripe, +they's nothin' to be done fer it. It's got to be rep jest as it +stan's. I'm rale sorry, to-night, as my life a'n't no better, but +what's the use of cryin' over it? They's nothin' to do now but let +it be gethered and shelled out, and measured up in the standard +half-bushel of the sanctuary. And I'm afeard they'll be a heap of +nubbins not wuth the shuckin'. But ef it don't come to six bushels +the acre, I can't help it now by takin' on."</p> +<p>At twelve o'clock, even the scoffers were silent. But as the +sultry night drew on toward one o'clock, Bill Day and his party +felt their spirits revive a little. The calculation had failed in +one part, and it might in all. Bill resumed his burlesque +exhortations to the rough-looking "brethren" about him. He tried to +lead them in singing some ribald parody of Adventist hymns, but his +terror and theirs was too genuine, and their voices died down into +husky whispers, and they were more alarmed than ever at discovering +the extent of their own demoralization. The bottle, one of those +small-necked, big-bodied quart-bottles that Western topers carry in +yellow-cotton handkerchiefs, was passed round. But even the whisky +seemed powerless to neutralize their terror, rather increasing the +panic by fuddling their faculties.</p> +<p>"Boys!" said Bob Short, trembling, and sitting down on a stump, +"this--this ere thing--is a gittin' serious. Ef--well, ef it +<i>was</i> to happen--you know--you don't s'pose--ahem--you don't +think God A'mighty would be <i>too</i> heavy on a feller. Do ye? Ef +it was to come to-night, it would be blamed short notice."</p> +<p>At one o'clock the moon was just about dipping behind the hills, +and the great sycamores, standing like giant sentinels on the +river's marge, cast long unearthly shadows across the water, which +grew blacker every minute. The deepening gloom gave all objects in +the river valley a weird, distorted look. This oppressed August. +The landscape seemed an enchanted one, a something seen in a dream +or a delirium. It was as though the change had already come, and +the real tangible world had passed away. He was the more +susceptible from the depression caused by the hot sultriness of the +night, and his separation from Julia.</p> +<p>He thought he would try to penetrate the crowd to the point +where his mother was; then he would be near her, and nearer to +Julia if anything happened. A curious infatuation had taken hold of +August. He knew that it was an infatuation, but he could not shake +it off. He had resolved that in case the trumpet should be heard in +the heavens, he would seize Julia and claim her in the very moment +of universal dissolution. He reached his mother, and as he looked +into her calm face, ready for the millennium or for anything else +"the Father" should decree, he thought she had never seemed more +glorious than she did now, sitting with her children about her, +almost unmoved by the excitement. For Mrs. Wehle had come to take +everything as from the Heavenly Father. She had even received +honest but thick-headed Gottlieb in this spirit, when he had fallen +to her by the Moravian lot, a husband chosen for her by the Lord, +whose will was not to be questioned.</p> +<p>August was just about to speak to his mother, when he was forced +to hang his head in shame, for there was his father rising to +exhort.</p> +<p>"O mine freunde! pe shust immediadely all of de dime retty. +Ton't led your vait vail already, and ton't let de debil git no +unter holts on ye. Vatch and pe retty!"</p> +<p>And August could hear the derisive shouts of Bill Day's party, +who had recovered their courage, crying out, "Go it, ole Dutchman! +I'll bet on you!" He clenched his fist in anger, but his mother's +eyes, looking at him with quiet rebuke, pacified him in a moment. +Yet he could not help wondering whether blundering kinsfolk made +people blush in the next world.</p> +<p>"Holt on doo de last ent!" continued Gottlieb. "It's pout goom! +Kood pye, ole moon! You koes town, you nebber gooms pack no more +already."</p> +<p>This exhortation might have proceeded in this strain +indefinitely, to the mortification of August and the amusement of +the profane, had there not just at that moment broken upon the +sultry stillness of the night one of those crescendo +thunder-bursts, beginning in a distant rumble, and swelling out +louder and still louder, until it ended with a tremendous +detonation. In the strange light of the setting moon, while +everybody's attention was engrossed by the excitement, the swift +oncoming of a thunder-cloud had not been observed by any but +Andrew, and it had already climbed half-way to the zenith, blotting +out a third of the firmament. This inverted thunder-bolt produced a +startling effect upon the over-strained nerves of the crowd. Some +cried out with terror, some sobbed with hysterical agony, some +shouted in triumph, and it was generally believed that Virginia +Waters, who died a maniac many years afterward, lost her reason at +that moment. Bill Day ceased his mocking, and shook till his teeth +chattered. And none of his party dared laugh at him. The moon had +now gone, and the vivid lightning followed the thunder, and yet +louder and more fearful thunder succeeded the lightning. The people +ran about as if demented, and Julia was left alone. August had only +one thought in all this confusion, and that was to find Julia. +Having found her, they clasped hands, and stood upon the brow of +the hill calmly watching the coming tempest, believing it to be the +coming of the end. Between the claps of thunder they could hear the +broken sentences of Elder Hankins, saying something about the +lightning that shineth from one part of heaven to the other, and +about the promised coming in the clouds. But they did not much heed +the words. They were looking the blinding lightning in the face, +and in their courageous trust they thought themselves ready to look +into the flaming countenance of the Almighty, if they should be +called before Him. Every fresh burst of thunder seemed to August to +be the rocking of the world, trembling in the throes of +dissolution. But the world might crumble or melt; there is +something more enduring than the world. August felt the +everlastingness of love; as many another man in a supreme crisis +has felt it.</p> +<p>But the swift cloud had already covered half the sky, and the +bursts of thunder followed one another now in quicker succession. +And as suddenly as the thunder had come, came the wind. A solitary +old sycamore, leaning over the water on the Kentucky shore, a mile +away, was first to fall. In the lurid darkness, August and Julia +saw it meet its fate. Then the rail fences on the nearer bank were +scattered like kindling-wood, and some of the sturdy old +apple-trees of the orchard in the river-bottom were uprooted, while +others were stripped of their boughs. Julia clung to August and +said something, but he could only see her lips move; her voice was +drowned by the incessant roar of the thunder. And then the +hurricane struck them, and they half-ran and were half-carried down +the rear slope of the hill. Now they saw for the first time that +the people were gone. The instinct of self-preservation had proven +stronger than their fanaticism, and a contagious panic had carried +them into a hay-barn near by.</p> +<p>Not knowing where the rest had gone, August and Julia only +thought of regaining the castle. They found the path blocked by +fallen trees, and it was slow and dangerous work, waiting for +flashes of lightning to show them their road. In making a long +detour they lost the path. After some minutes, in a lull in the +thunder, August heard a shout, which he answered, and presently +Philosopher Andrew appeared with a lantern, his grizzled hair and +beard flying in the wind.</p> +<p>"What ho, my friends!" he cried. "This is the way you go to +heaven together! You'll live through many a storm yet!"</p> +<p>Guided by his thorough knowledge of the ground, they had almost +reached the castle, when they were startled by piteous cries. +Leaving August with Julia, Andrew climbed a fence, and went down +into a ravine to find poor Bill Day in an agony of terror, crying +out in despair, believing that the day of doom had already come, +and that he was about to be sent into well-deserved perdition. +Andrew stooped over him with his lantern, but the poor fellow, +giving one look at the shaggy face, shrieked madly, and rushed away +into the woods.</p> +<p>"I believe," said the Philosopher, when he got back to August, +"I believe he took me for the devil."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLIV."></a>CHAPTER XLIV.</h2> +<h3>SQUARING ACCOUNTS.</h3> +<br> +<p>The summer storm had spent itself by daylight, and the sun rose +on that morning after the world's end much as it had risen on other +mornings, but it looked down upon prostrate trees and scattered +fences and roofless barns. And the minds of the people were in much +the same disheveled state as the landscape. One simple-minded girl +was a maniac. Some declared that the world had ended, and that this +was the new earth, if people only had faith to receive it; some +still waited for the end, and with some the reaction from credulity +had already set in, a reaction that carried them into the blankest +atheism and boldest immorality. People who had spent the summer in +looking for a change that would relieve them from all +responsibility, now turned reluctantly toward the commonplace +drudgery of life. It is the evil of all day-dreaming--day-dreaming +about the other world included--that it unfits us for duty in this +world of tangible and inevitable facts.</p> +<p>It was nearly daylight when Andrew and August and Julia reached +the castle. The Philosopher advised Julia to go home, and for the +present to let the marriage be as though it were not. August +dreaded to see Julia returned to her mother's tyranny, but Andrew +was urgent in his advice, and Julia said that she must not leave +her mother in her trouble. Julia reached home a little after +daylight, and a little before Mrs. Anderson was brought home in a +fit of hysterics.</p> +<p>Poor Mrs. Abigail still hoped that the end of the world for +which she had so fondly prepared would come, but as the days wore +on she sank into a numb despondency. When she thought of the loss +of her property, she groaned and turned her face to the wall. And +Samuel Anderson sat about the house in a dumb and shiftless +attitude, as do most men upon whom financial ruin comes in middle +life. The disappointment of his faith and the overthrow of his +fortune had completely paralyzed him. He was waiting for something, +he hardly knew what. He had not even his wife's driving voice to +stimulate him to exertion.</p> +<p>There was no one now to care for Mrs. Anderson but Julia, for +Cynthy had taken up her abode in the log-cabin which Jonas had +bought, and a happier housekeeper never lived. She watched Jonas +till he disappeared when he went to work in the morning, she +carried him a "snack" at ten o'clock, and headways found her +standing "like a picter" at the gate, when he came home to dinner. +But Cynthy Ann generally spent her afternoons at Anderson's, +helping "that young thing" to bear her responsibilities, though +Mrs. Anderson would receive no personal attentions now from any one +but her daughter. She did not scold; her querulous restlessness was +but a reminiscence of her scolding. She lay, disheartened, watching +Julia, and exacting everything from Julia, and the weary feet and +weary heart of the girl almost sank under her burdens. Mrs. +Anderson had suddenly fallen from her position of an exacting +tyrant to that of an exacting and helpless infant. She followed +Julia with her eyes in a broken-spirited fashion, as if fearing +that she would leave her. Julia could read the fear in her mother's +countenance; she understood what her mother meant when she said +querulously, "You'll get married and leave me." If Mrs. Anderson +had assumed her old high-handed manner, it would have been easy for +Julia to have declared her secret. But how could she tell her now? +It would be a blow, it might be a fatal blow. And at the same time +how could she satisfy August? He thought she had bowed to the same +old tyranny again for an indefinite time. But she could not forsake +her parents in their poverty and afflictions.</p> +<p>The fourteenth of August, the day on which possession was to +have been given to Bob Walker, came and went, but no Bob Walker +appeared. A week more passed, in which Samuel Anderson could not +muster enough courage to go to see Walker, in which Samuel Anderson +and his wife waited in a vague hope that something might happen. +And every day of that week Julia had a letter from August, which +did not say one word of the trial that it was for him to wait, but +which said much of the wrong Julia was doing to herself to submit +so long. And Julia, like her father and mother, was waiting for she +knew not what.</p> +<p>At last the suspense became to her unendurable.</p> +<p>"Father," she said, "why don't you go to see Bob Walker? You +might buy the farm back again."</p> +<p>"I don't know why he don't come and take it," said Mr. Anderson +dejectedly.</p> +<p>This conversation roused Mrs. Abigail. There was some hope. She +got up in bed, and told Samuel to go to the county-seat and see if +the deeds had ever been recorded. And while her husband was gone +she sat up and looked better, and even scolded a little, so that +Julia felt encouraged. But she dreaded to see her father come +back.</p> +<p>Samuel Anderson entered the house on his return with a blank +countenance. Sitting down, he put his face between his hands a +minute in utter dejection.</p> +<p>"Why don't you speak?" said Mrs. Anderson in a broken voice.</p> +<p>"The land was all transferred to Andrew immediately, and he owns +every foot of it. He must have sent Bob Walker here to buy it."</p> +<p>"Oh! I'm so glad!" cried Julia.</p> +<p>But her mother only gave her one reproachful look and went off +into hysterical sobbing and crying over the wrong that Andrew had +done her. And all that night Julia watched by her mother, while +Samuel Anderson sat in dejection by the bed. As for Norman, he had +quickly relapsed into his old habits, and his former cronies had +generously forgiven him his temporary piety, considering the +peculiar circumstances of the case some extenuation. Now that there +was trouble in the house he staid away, which was a good thing so +far as it went.</p> +<p>The next afternoon Mrs. Anderson rallied a little, and, looking +at Julia, she said in her querulous way, "Why don't you go and see +him?"</p> +<p>"Who?" said Julia with a shiver, afraid that her mother was +insane.</p> +<p>"Andrew."</p> +<p>Julia did not need any second hint. Leaving her mother with +Cynthy, she soon presented herself at the door of the castle.</p> +<p>"Did <i>she</i> send you?" asked Andrew dryly.</p> +<p>"Yes, sir."</p> +<p>"I've been expecting you for a long time. I'll go back with you. +But August must go along. He'll be glad of an excuse to see your +face again. You look thin, my poor girl."</p> +<p>They went past Wehle's, and August was only too glad to join +them, rejoicing that some sort of a crisis had come, though how it +was to help him he did not know. With the restlessness of a man +looking for some indefinable thing to turn up, Samuel was out on +the porch waiting the return of his daughter. Jonas had come for +Cynthy Ann, and was sitting on a "shuck-bottom" chair in front of +the house.</p> +<p>Andrew reached out his hand and greeted his brother cordially, +and spoke civilly to Abigail. Then there was a pause, and Mrs. +Anderson turned her head to the wall and groaned. After a while she +looked round and saw August. A little of her old indignation came +into her eyes as she whimpered, "What did <i>he</i> come for?"</p> +<p>"I brought him," said Andrew.</p> +<p>"Well, it's your house, do as you please. I suppose you'll turn +us out of our own home now."</p> +<p>"As you did me," said the Philosopher, smiling. "Let me remind +you that I was living on the river farm. My father had promised it +to me, and given me possession. A week before his death you got the +will changed, by what means you know. You turned me off the farm +which had virtually been mine for two years. If I turn you off now, +it will be no more than fair."</p> +<p>There was a look of pained surprise on Julia's face. She had not +known that the wrong her uncle had suffered was so great. She had +not thought that he would be so severe as to turn her father +out.</p> +<p>"I don't want to talk of these things," Andrew went on. "I ought +to have broken the will, but I was not a believer in the law. I +tell this story now because I must justify myself to these young +people for what I am going to do. You have had the use of that part +of the estate which was rightfully mine for twenty years. I suppose +I may claim it all now."</p> +<p>Julia's eyes looked at him pleadingly.</p> +<p>"Why don't you send us off and be done with it then?" said Mrs. +Abigail, rising up and resuming her old vehemence. "You set out to +ruin us, and now you've done it. A nice brother you are! Ruining us +by a conspiracy with Bob Walker, and then sitting here and trying +to make my own daughter think you did right, and bringing that +hateful fellow here to hear it!" Her finger was leveled at +August.</p> +<p>"I am glad to see you are better, Abigail. I wanted to be sure +you were strong enough to bear all I have to say."</p> +<p>"Say your worst and do your worst, you cruel, cruel man! I have +borne enough from you in these years, and now you can say and do +what you please; you can't do me any more harm. I suppose I must +leave my old home that I've lived in so long."</p> +<p>"You need not worry yourself about leaving; that's what I came +over to say."</p> +<p>"As if I'd stay in <i>your</i> house an hour! I'll not take any +favors at <i>your</i> hand."</p> +<p>"Don't be rash, Abigail. I have deeded this hill farm to Samuel, +and here is the deed. I have given you back the best half of the +property, just what my father meant you to have. I have only kept +the river land, that should have been mine twenty years ago. I hope +you will not stick to your resolution not to receive anything at my +hand."</p> +<p>And Julia said: "Oh! I'm so--"</p> +<p>But Mrs. Anderson had a convenient fit of hysterics, crying +piteously. Meantime Samuel gladly accepted the deed.</p> +<p>"The deed is already recorded. I sent it down yesterday as soon +as I saw Samuel come back, and I got it back this morning. The farm +is yours without condition."</p> +<p>This relieved Abigail, and she soon ceased her sobbing. Andrew +could not take it back then, whatever she might say.</p> +<p>"Now," said Andrew, "I have only divided the farms without +claiming any damages. I want to ask a favor. Let Julia marry the +man of her choice in peace."</p> +<p>"You have taken one farm, and therefore I must let my daughter +marry a man with nothing but his two hands," sobbed Mrs. +Anderson.</p> +<p>"Two hands and a good head and a noble heart," said Andrew.</p> +<p>"Well, I won't consent," said she. "If Julia marries +<i>him</i>," pointing to August, "she will marry without my +consent, and he will not get a cent of the money he's after. Not a +red cent!"</p> +<p>"I don't want your money. I did not know you'd get your farm +back, for I did not know but that Walker owned it, and +I--wanted--Julia all the same." August had almost told that he had +married Julia.</p> +<p>"Wanted her and married her," said Andrew. "And I have not kept +a corn-stalk of the property I got from you. I have given Bob +Walker a ten-acre patch for his services, and all the rest I have +deeded to the two best people I know. This August Wehle married +Julia Anderson when they thought the world might be near its end, +and believing that, at any rate, she would not have a penny in the +world. I have deeded the river farm to August Wehle and his +wife."</p> +<p>"Married, eh? Come and ask my consent afterwards? That's a fine +way!" And Abigail grew white and grew silent with passion.</p> +<p>"Come, August, I want to show you and Julia something," said +Andrew. He really wanted to give Abigail time to look the matter in +the face quietly before she committed herself too far. But he told +the two young people that they might make their home with him while +their house was in building. He had already had part of the +material drawn, and from the brow of the hill they looked down upon +the site he had chosen near the old tumble-down tenant's house. But +Andrew saw that Julia looked disappointed.</p> +<p>"You are not satisfied, my brave girl. What is the matter?"</p> +<p>"Oh! yes, I am very happy, and very thankful to you; and next to +August I love you more than anybody--except my parents."</p> +<p>"But something is different to what you wished it. Doesn't the +site suit you? You can look off on to the river from the rise on +which the house will stand, and I do not know how it could be +better."</p> +<p>"It couldn't be better," said Julia, "but--'</p> +<p>"But what? You must tell me."</p> +<p>"I thought maybe you'd let us live at the castle and take the +burden of things off you. I should like to keep your house for you, +just to show you how much I love my dear, good uncle."</p> +<p>Even an anchorite could not help feeling a pleasure at such a +speech from such a young woman, and this shaggy, solitary, +misanthropic but tender-hearted man felt a sudden rush of pleasure. +August saw it, and was delighted. What one's nearest friend thinks +of one's wife is a vital question, and August was happier at this +moment than he had ever been. Andrew's pleasure at Julia's loving +speech was the climax.</p> +<p>"Yes!" said the Philosopher, a little huskily. "You want to +sacrifice your pleasure by living in my gloomy old castle, and +civilizing an old heathen like me. You mustn't tempt me too +far."</p> +<p>"I don't see why you call it gloomy. It wasn't only for your +sake that I said it. I think it is the nicest old house I ever saw. +And then the books, and--and--you." Julia stumbled a little, she +was not accustomed to make speeches of this sort.</p> +<p>"You flatterer!" burst out Andrew. "But no, you must have your +own house."</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson, on her part, had concluded to make the best of +it. Julia already married and the mistress of the Anderson river +farm was quite a different thing from Julia under her thumb. She +was to be conciliated. Besides, Mrs. Anderson did not want Julia's +prosperity to be a lifelong source of humiliation to her. She must +take some stock in it at the start.</p> +<p>"Jule," she said, as her daughter re-entered the door, "I can +let you have two feather-beds and four pillows, and a good stock of +linen and blankets. And you can have the two heifers and the sorrel +colt."</p> +<p>The two "heifers" were six, and the sorrel "colt" was seven +years of age; but descriptive names often outlive the qualities to +which they owed their origin. Just as a judge is even yet addressed +as "your honor," and many a governor without anything to recommend +him hears himself called "your excellency."</p> +<p>When Abigail surrendered in this graceful fashion, Julia was +touched, and was on the point of putting her arms around her mother +and kissing her. But Mrs. Anderson was not a person easily +caressed, and Julia did not yield to her impulse.</p> +<p>"Cynthy Ann, my dear," said Jonas, as they walked home that +evening, "do you know what Abig'il Anderson reminds me of?"</p> +<p>No; Cynthy Ann didn't exactly know. In fact, it would have been +difficult for anybody to have told what anything was likely to +remind Jonas of. There was no knowing what a thing might not +suggest to him.</p> +<p>"Well, Cynthy, my Imperial Sweetness, when I see Abig'il come +down so beautiful, it reminded me of a little fice-t dog I had when +I was a leetle codger. I called him Pick. His name was Picayune. +Purty good name, wasn't it?"</p> +<p>"Yes, it was."</p> +<p>"Well, now, that air little Pick wouldn't never own up as he was +driv outen the house. When he was whipped out, he wouldn't never +tuck his tail down, but curl it up over his back, and run acrost +the yard and through the fence and down the road a-barkin' fit to +kill. Wanted to let on like as ef he'd run out of his own accord, +with malice aforethought, you know. <i>That's</i> Abig'il."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLV."></a>CHAPTER XLV.</h2> +<h3>NEW PLANS.</h3> +<br> +<p>Except Abigail Anderson and one other person, everybody in the +little world of Clark township approved mightily the justice and +disinterestedness of Andrew. He had righted himself and Julia at a +stroke, and people dearly love to have justice dealt out when it is +not at their own expense. Samuel, who cherished in secret a great +love for his daughter, was more than pleased that affairs had +turned out in this way. But there was one beside Abigail who was +not wholly satisfied. August spent half the night in protesting in +vain against Andrew's transfer of the river-farm to him. But Andrew +said he had a right to give away his own if he chose. And there was +no turning him. For if August refused a share in it, he would give +it to Julia, and if she refused it, he would find somebody who +would accept it.</p> +<p>The next day after the settlement at Samuel Anderson's, August +came to claim his wife. Mrs. Abigail had now employed a "help" in +Cynthy Ann's place, and Julia could be spared. August had refused +all invitations to take up his temporary residence with Julia's +parents. The house had unpleasant associations in his mind, and he +wanted to relieve Julia at once and forever from a despotism to +which she could not offer any effectual resistance. Mrs. Anderson +had eagerly loaded the wagon with feather-beds and other bridal +property, and sent it over to the castle, that Julia might appear +to leave with her blessing. She kissed Julia tenderly, and hoped +she'd have a happy life, and told her that if her husband should +ever lose his property or treat her badly--such things <i>may</i> +happen, you know--then she would always find a home with her +mother. Julia thanked her for the offer of a refuge to which she +never meant to flee under any circumstances. And yet one never +turns away from one's home without regret, and Julia looked back +with tears in her eyes at the chattering swifts whose nests were in +the parlor chimney, and at the pee-wee chirping on the gate-post. +The place had entered into her life. It looked lonesome now, but +within a year afterward Norman suddenly married Betsey Malcolm. +Betsey's child had died soon after its birth, and Mrs. Anderson set +herself to manage both Norman and his wife, who took up their abode +with her. Nothing but a reign of terror could have made either of +them of any account, but Mrs. Anderson furnished them this in any +desirable quantity. They were never of much worth, even under her +management, but she kept them in bounds, so that Norman ceased to +get drunk more than five or six times a year, and Betsey flirted +but little and at her peril.</p> +<p>Once the old house was out of sight, there were no shadows on +Julia's face as she looked forward toward the new life. She walked +in a still happiness by August as they went down through Shady +Hollow. August had intended to show her a letter that he had from +the mud-clerk, describing the bringing of Humphreys back to Paducah +and his execution by a mob. But there was something so repelling in +the gusto with which the story was told, and the story was so awful +in itself, that he could not bear to interrupt the peaceful +happiness of this hour by saying anything about it.</p> +<p>August proposed to Julia that they should take a path through +the meadow of the river-farm--their own farm now--and see the +foundation of the little cottage Andrew had begun for them. And so +in happiness they walked on through the meadow-path to the place on +which their home was to stand. But, alas! there was not a stick of +timber left. Every particle of the material had been removed. It +seemed that some great disappointment threatened them at the moment +of their happiness. They hurried on in silent foreboding to the +castle, but there the mystery was explained.</p> +<p>"I told you not to tempt me too far," said Andrew. "See! I have +concluded to build an addition to the castle and let you civilize +me. We will live together and I will reform. This lonely life is +not healthy, and now that I have children, why should I not let +them live here with me?"</p> +<p>Julia looked happy. I have no authentic information in regard to +the exact words which she made use of to express her joy, but from +what is known of girls of her age in general, it is safe to infer +that she exclaimed, "Oh! I'm so glad!"</p> +<p>While Andrew stood there smiling, with Julia near him, August +having gone to the assistance of the carpenters in a matter +demanding a little more ingenuity than they possessed, Jonas came +up and drew the Philosopher aside. Julia could not hear what was +said, but she saw Andrew's brow contract.</p> +<p>"I'll shoot as sure as they come!" he said with passion. "I +won't have my niece or August insulted in my house by a parcel of +vagabonds."</p> +<p>"O Uncle Andrew! is it a shiveree?" asked Julia.</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"Well, don't shoot. It'll be so funny to have a shiveree."</p> +<p>"But it is an insult to you and to August and to me. This is +meant especially to be an expression of their feeling toward August +as a German, though really their envy of his good fortune has much +to do with it. It is a second edition of the riot of last spring, +in which Gottlieb came so near to being killed. Now, I mean to do +my country service by leaving one or two less of them alive if they +come here to-night." For Andrew was full of that destructive energy +so characteristic of the Western and Southern people.</p> +<p>"Oh! no, don't shoot. Can't you think of some other way?" +pleaded Julia.</p> +<p>"Well, yes, I could get the sheriff to come and bag a few of +them."</p> +<p>"And that will make trouble for many years. Let me see. Can't we +do this?" And Julia rapidly unfolded to Andrew and Jonas her plan +of operations against the enemy.</p> +<p>"Number one!" said Jonas. "They'll fall into that air amby-scade +as sure as shootin'. That plan is military and Christian and +civilized and human and angelical and tancy-crumptious. It ort to +meet the 'proval of the American Fish-hawk with all his pinions and +talents. I'll help to execute it, and beat the rascals or lay my +bones a-bleachin' on the desert sands of Shady Holler."</p> +<p>"Well," said Andrew to Julia, "I knew, if I took you under my +roof, you'd make a Christian of me in spite of myself. And I +<i>am</i> a sort of savage, that's a fact."</p> +<p>Jonas hurried home and sent Cynthy over to the castle, and there +was much work going on that afternoon. Andrew said that the castle +was being made ready for its first siege. As night came on, Julia +was in a perfect glee. Reddened by standing over the stove, with +sleeves above her elbows and her black hair falling down upon her +shoulders, she was such a picture that August stopped and stood in +the door a minute to look at her as he came in to supper.</p> +<p>"Why, Jule, how glorious you look!" he said. "I've a great mind +to fall in love with you, mein Liebchen!"</p> +<p>"And I <i>have</i> fallen in love with <i>you</i>, Cæsar +Augustus!" And well she might, for surely, as he stood in the door +with his well-knit frame, his fine German forehead, his pure, +refined mouth, and his clear, honest, amiable blue eyes, he was a +man to fall in love with.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLVI."></a>CHAPTER XLVI.</h2> +<h3>THE SHIVEREE.</h3> +<br> +<p>If Webster's "American Dictionary of the English Language" had +not been made wholly in New England, it would not have lacked so +many words that do duty as native-born or naturalized citizens in +large sections of the United States, and among these words is the +one that stands at the head of the present chapter. I know that +some disdainful prig will assure me that it is but a corruption of +the French "<i>charivari,"</i> and so it is; but then +"<i>charivari</i>" is a corruption of the low Latin +"<i>charivarium</i>" and that is a corruption of something else, +and, indeed, almost every word is a corruption of some other word. +So that there is no good reason why "shiveree," which lives in +entire unconsciousness of its French parentage and its Latin +grand-parentage, should not find its place in an "American +Dictionary."</p> +<p>But while I am writing a disquisition on the etymology of the +word, the "shiveree" is mustering at Mandluff's store. Bill Day has +concluded that he is in no immediate danger of perdition, and that +a man is a "blamed fool to git skeered about his soul." Bob Short +is sure the Almighty will not be too hard on a feller, and so +thinks he will go on having "a little fun" now and then. And among +the manly recreations which they have proposed to themselves is +that of shivereeing "that Dutchman, Gus Wehle." It is the solemn +opinion of the whole crowd that "no Dutchman hadn't orter be so +lucky as to git sech a beauty of a gal and a hundred acres of +bottom lands to boot."</p> +<p>The members of the party were all disguised, some in one way and +some in another, though most of them had their coats inside out. +They thought it necessary to be disguised, "bekase, you know," as +Bill Day expressed it, "ole Grizzly is apt to prosecute ef he gits +evidence agin you." And many were the conjectures as to whether he +would shoot or not.</p> +<p>The instruments provided by this orchestra were as various as +their musical tastes. It is likely that even Mr. Jubilee Gilmore +never saw such an outfit. Bob Short had a dumb-bull, a keg with a +strip of raw-hide stretched across one end like a drum-head, while +the other remained open. A waxed cord inserted in the middle of the +drum-head, and reaching down through the keg, completed the +instrument. The pulling of the hand over this cord made a hideous +bellowing, hence its name. Bill Day had a gigantic watchman's +rattle, a hickory spring on a cog-wheel. It is called in the West, +a horse-fiddle, because it is so unlike either a horse or a fiddle. +Then there were melodious tin pans and conch-shells and tin horns. +But the most deadly noise was made by Jim West, who had two iron +skillet-lids ("leds" he called them) which, when placed face to +face, and rubbed, as you have seen children rub tumblers, made a +sound discordant and deafening enough to have suggested Milton's +expression about the hinges which "grated harsh thunder."</p> +<p>One of this party was a tallish man, so dressed as to look like +a hunchback, and a hunchback so tall was a most singular figure. He +had joined them in the dark, and the rest were unable to guess who +it could be, and he, for his part, would not tell. They thumped him +and pushed him, but at each attack he only leaped from the ground +like a circus clown, and made his tin horn utter so doleful a +complaint as set the party in an uproar of laughter. They could not +be sure who he was, but he was a funny fellow to have along with +them at any rate.</p> +<p>He was not only funny, but he was evidently fearless. For when +they came to the castle it was all dark and still. Bill Day said +that it looked "powerful juberous to him. Ole Andy meant to use +shootin'-ir'ns, and didn't want to be pestered with no lights +blazin' in his eyes." But the tall hunchback cleared the fence at a +bound, and told them to come on "ef they had the sperrit of a +two-weeks-old goslin into 'em." So the bottle was passed round, and +for very shame they followed their ungainly leader.</p> +<p>"Looky here, boys," said the hunchback, "they's one way that we +can fix it so's ole Grizzly can't shoot. They's a little +shop-place, a sort of a shed, agin the house, on the side next to +the branch. Let's git in thar afore we begin, and he can't +shoot."</p> +<p>The orchestra were a little stupefied with drink, and they took +the idea quickly, never stopping to ask how they could retreat if +Andrew chose to shoot. Jim West thought things looked scaly, but he +warn't agoin' to backslide arter he'd got so fur.</p> +<p>When they got into Andrew's shop, where he had a new and +beautiful skiff in building, the tall hunchback shut the door, and +the rest did not notice that he put the key in his pocket.</p> +<p>That serenade! Such a medley of discordant sounds, such a +clatter and clangor, such a rattle of horse-fiddle, such a +bellowing of dumb-bull, such a snorting of tin horns, such a +ringing of tin pans, such a grinding of skillet-lids! But the house +remained quiet. Once Bill Day thought that he heard a laugh within. +Julia may have lost her self-control. She was so happy, and a +little unrestrained fun was so strange a luxury!</p> +<p>At last the door between the house and shop was suddenly opened, +and Julia, radiant as she could be, stood on the threshold with a +candle in her hand.</p> +<p>"Come in, gentlemen."</p> +<p>But the gentlemen essayed to go out.</p> +<p>"Locked in, by thunder!" said Jim West, trying the outside door +of the shop.</p> +<p>"We heard you were coming, gentlemen, and provided a little +entertainment. Come in!"</p> +<p>"Come in, boys," said the hunchback, "don't be afeard of +nobody."</p> +<p>Mechanically they followed the hunchback into the room, for +there was nothing else to be done. A smell of hot coffee and the +sight of a well-spread table greeted their senses.</p> +<p>"Welcome, my friends, thrice welcome!" said Andrew. "Put down +your instruments and have some supper."</p> +<p>"Let me relieve you," said Julia, and she took the dumb-bull +from Bob Short and the "horse-fiddle" from Day, the tin horns and +tin pans from others, and the two skillet-lids from Jim West, who +looked as sheepish as possible. August escorted each of them to the +table, though his face did not look altogether cordial. Some old +resentment for the treatment of his father interfered with the +heartiness of his hospitality. The hunchback in this light proved +to be Jonas, of course; and Bill Day whispered to the one next to +him that they had been "tuck in and done fer that time."</p> +<p>"Gentlemen," said Andrew, "we are much obliged for your music." +And Cynthy would certainly have laughed out if she had not been so +perplexed in her mind to know whether Andrew was speaking the +truth.</p> +<p>Such a motley set of wedding guests as they were, with their +coats inside out and their other disguises! Such a race of pied +pipers! And looking at their hangdog faces you would have said, +"Such a lot of sheep-thieves!" Though why a sheep-thief is +considered to be a more guilty-looking man than any other criminal, +I do not know. Jonas looked bright enough and ridiculous enough +with his hunch. They all ate rather heartily, for how could they +resist the attentions of Cynthy Ann and the persuasions of Julia, +who poured them coffee and handed them biscuit, and waited upon +them as though they were royal guests! And, moreover, the act of +eating served to cover their confusion.</p> +<p>As the meal drew to a close, Bill Day felt that he, being in +some sense the leader of the party, ought to speak. He was not +quite sober, though he could stand without much staggering. He had +been trying for some time to frame a little speech, but his +faculties did not work smoothly.</p> +<p>"Mr. President--I mean Mr. Anderson--permit me to offer you our +pardon. I mean to beg your apologies--to--ahem--hope that our--that +your--our--thousand--thanks--your--you know what I mean." And he +sat down in foolish confusion.</p> +<p>"Oh! yes. All right; much obliged, my friend," said the +Philosopher, who had not felt so much boyish animal life in +twenty-five years.</p> +<p>And Jim West whispered to Bill: "You expressed my sentiments +exactly."</p> +<p>"Mr. Anderson," said Jonas, rising, and thus lifting up his +hunched shoulders and looking the picture of a long-legged heron +standing in the water, "Mr. Anderson, you and our young and happy +friend, Mr. Wehle, will accept our thanks. We thought that music +was all you wanted to gin a delightful--kinder--sorter--well, +top-dressin', to this interestin' occasion. Now they's nothin' +sweeter'n a tin horn, 'thout 'tis a melodious conch-shell utterin' +its voice like a turkle-dove. Then we've got the paytent double +whirlymagig hoss-violeen, and the tin pannyforte, and, better nor +all, the grindin' skelletled cymbals. We've laid ourselves out and +done our purtiest--hain't we, feller-musicians?--to prove that we +was the best band on the Ohio River. An' all out of affection and +respect for this ere happy pair. And we're all happy to be here. +Hain't we?" (Here they all nodded assent, though they looked as +though they wished themselves far enough.) "Our enstruments is a +leetle out of toon, owin' to the dampness of the night air, and so +I trust you'll excuse us playin' a farewell piece."</p> +<p>Jim West was so anxious to get away that he took advantage of +this turn to say good-evening, and though the mischievous Julia +insisted that he should select his instrument, he had not the face +to confess to the skillet-lids, and got out of it by assuring her +that he hadn't brought nothing, "only come along to see the fun." +And each member of the party repeated the transparent lie, so that +Julia found herself supplied with more musical instruments than any +young housekeeper need want, and Andrew hung them, horns, pans, +conch-shell, dumb-bull, horse-fiddle, skillet-lids, and all, in his +library, as trophies captured from the enemy.</p> +<p>Much as I should like to tell you of the later events of the +Philosopher's life, and about Julia and August, and their oldest +son, whose name is Andrew, and all that, I do not know that I can +do better than to bow myself out with the abashed serenaders, +letting this musical epilogue harmoniously close the book; writing +just here.</p> +<br> +<h3>THE END.</h3> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14051 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/14051-h/images/014.jpg b/14051-h/images/014.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..aeb0eda --- /dev/null +++ b/14051-h/images/014.jpg diff --git a/14051-h/images/017.jpg b/14051-h/images/017.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f55b3cd --- /dev/null +++ b/14051-h/images/017.jpg diff --git a/14051-h/images/031.jpg b/14051-h/images/031.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..af2e092 --- /dev/null +++ b/14051-h/images/031.jpg diff --git a/14051-h/images/036.jpg b/14051-h/images/036.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..aabdf1e --- /dev/null +++ b/14051-h/images/036.jpg diff --git a/14051-h/images/041.jpg b/14051-h/images/041.jpg Binary files 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+Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6696d04 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #14051 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14051) diff --git a/old/14051-8.txt b/old/14051-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..cb76ddb --- /dev/null +++ b/old/14051-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7540 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The End Of The World, by Edward Eggleston + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The End Of The World + A Love Story + +Author: Edward Eggleston + +Release Date: November 15, 2004 [EBook #14051] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE END OF THE WORLD *** + + + + +Produced by Rick Niles, John Hagerson, Charlie Kirschner and the PG +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + + +[Illustration: THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER +_(Frontispiece. See page 40.)_] + +The End of the World. + + + +A LOVE STORY, + + + +BY + +EDWARD EGGLESTON + +AUTHOR OF "THE HOOSIER SCHOOLMASTER," ETC. + +WITH THIRTY-TWO ILLUSTRATIONS. + +1872 + + + + +PREFACE. + +[IN THE POTENTIAL MOOD.] + +It is the pretty unanimous conclusion of book-writers that prefaces are +most unnecessary and useless prependages, since nobody reads them. And +it is the pretty unanimous practice of book-writers to continue to write +them with such pains and elaborateness as would indicate a belief that +the success of a book depends upon the favorable prejudice begotten of u +graceful preface. My principal embarrassment is that it is not customary +for a book to have more than one. How then shall I choose between the +half-dozen letters of introduction I might give my story, each better +and worse on many accounts than either of the others? I am rather +inclined to adopt the following, which might for some reasons be +styled the + +PREFACE SENTIMENTAL. + +Perhaps no writer not infatuated with conceit, can send out a book full +of thought and feeling which, whatever they may be worth, are his own, +without a parental anxiety in regard to the fate of his offspring. And +there are few prefaces which do not in some way betray this nervousness. +I confess to a respect for even the prefatory doggerel of good Tinker +Bunyan--a respect for his paternal tenderness toward his book, not at +all for his villainous rhyming. When I saw, the other day, the white +handkerchiefs of my children waving an adieu as they sailed away from +me, a profound anxiety seized me. So now, as I part company with August +and Julia, with my beloved Jonas and my much-respected Cynthy Ann, with +the mud-clerk on the Iatan, and the shaggy lord of Shady-Hollow Castle, +and the rest, that have watched with me of nights and crossed the ferry +with me twice a day for half a year--even now, as I see them waving me +adieu with their red silk and "yaller" cotton "hand-kerchers," I know +how many rocks of misunderstanding and criticism and how many shoals of +damning faint praise are before them, and my heart is full of misgiving. + +--But it will never do to have misgivings in a preface. How often have +publishers told me this! Ah! if I could write with half the heart and +hope my publishers evince in their advertisements, where they talk about +"front rank" and "great American story" and all that, it would doubtless +be better for the book, provided anybody would read the preface or +believe it when they had read it. But at any rate let us not have a +preface in the minor key. + +A philosophical friend of mine, who is addicted to Carlyle, has +recommended that I try the following, which he calls + +THE HIGH PHILOSOPHICAL PREFACE. + +Why should I try to forestall the Verdict? Is it not foreordained in the +very nature of a Book and the Constitution of the Reader that a certain +very Definite Number of Readers will misunderstand and dislike a given +Book? And that another very Definite Number will understand it and +dislike it none the less? And that still a third class, also definitely +fixed in the Eternal Nature of Things, will misunderstand and like it, +and, what is more, like it only because of their misunderstanding? And +in relation to a true Book, there can not fail to be an Elect Few who +understand admiringly and understandingly admire. Why, then, make bows, +write prefaces, attempt to prejudice the Case? Can I change the Reader? +Will I change the Book? No? Then away with Preface! The destiny of the +Book is fixed. I can not foretell it, for I am no prophet. But let us +not hope to change the Fates by our prefatory bowing and scraping. + +--I was forced to confess to my friend who was so kind as to offer to +lend me this preface, that there was much truth in it and that truth is +nowhere more rare than in prefaces, but it was not possible to adopt it +for two reasons: one, that my proof-reader can not abide so many +capitals, maintaining that they disfigure the page, and what is a +preface of the high philosophical sort worth without a profusion of +capitals? Even Carlyle's columns would lose their greatest ornament if +their capitals were gone. The second reason for declining to use this +preface was that my publishers are not philosophers and would never be +content with an "Elect Few," and for my own part the pecuniary interest +I have in the copyright renders it quite desirable that as many as +possible should be elected to like it, or at least to buy it. + +After all it seems a pity that I can not bring myself to use a +straightforward + +APOLOGETIC AND EXPLANATORY PREFACE. + +In view of the favor bestowed upon the author's previous story, both by +the Public who Criticise and the Public who Buy, it seems a little +ungracious to present so soon, another, the scene of which is also laid +in the valley of the Ohio. But the picture of Western country life in +"The Hoosier School-Master" would not have been complete without this +companion-piece, which presents a different phase of it. And indeed +there is no provincial life richer in material if only one knew how to +get at it. + +Nothing is more reverent than a wholesome hatred of hypocrisy. If any +man think I have offended against his religion, I must believe that his +religion is not what it should be. If anybody shall imagine that this is +a work of religious controversy leveled at the Adventists, he will have +wholly mistaken my meaning. Literalism and fanaticism are not vices +confined to any one sect. They are, unfortunately, pretty widely +distributed. However, if-- + +--And so on. + +But why multiply examples of the half-dozen or more that I might, could, +would, or should have written? Since everybody is agreed that, nobody +reads a preface, I have concluded to let the book go without any. + +BROOKLYN, September, 1872. + +"_And as he [Wordsworth] mingled freely with all kinds of men, he found +a pith of sense and a solidity of judgment here and there among the +unlearned which he had failed to find in the most lettered; from obscure +men he heard high truths.... And love, true love and pure, he found was +no flower reared only in what was called refined society, and requiring +leisure and polished manners for its growth.... He believed that in +country people, what is permanent in human nature, the essential +feelings and passions of mankind, exist in greater simplicity and +strength_."--PRINCIPAL SHAIRP. + + * * * * * + +A DEDICATION. + +It would hardly be in character for me to dedicate this book in good, +stiff, old-fashioned tomb-stone style, but I could not have put in the +background of scenery without being reminded of the two boys, +inseparable as the Siamese twins, who gathered mussel-shells in the +river marge, played hide-and-seek in the hollow sycamores, and led a +happy life in the shadow of just such hills as those among which the +events of this story took place. And all the more that the generous boy +who was my playmate then is the generous man who has relieved me of many +burdens while I wrote this story, do I feel impelled to dedicate it to +GEORGE CARY EGGLESTON, a manly man and a brotherly brother. + + + +CONTENTS. + +CHAPTER I.--In Love with a Dutchman. +CHAPTER II.--An Explosion. +CHAPTER III.--A Farewell. +CHAPTER IV.--A Counter-Irritant. +CHAPTER V.--At the Castle. +CHAPTER VI.--The Backwoods Philosopher. +CHAPTER VII.--Within and Without. +CHAPTER VIII.--Figgers won't Lie. +CHAPTER IX.--The New Singing-Master. +CHAPTER X.--An Offer of Help. +CHAPTER XI.--The Coon-dog Argument. +CHAPTER XII.--Two Mistakes. +CHAPTER XIII.--The Spider Spins. +CHAPTER XIV.--The Spider's Web. +CHAPTER XV.--The Web Broken. +CHAPTER XVI.--Jonas Expounds the Subject. +CHAPTER XVII.--The Wrong Pew. +CHAPTER XVIII.--The Encounter. +CHAPTER XIX.--The Mother. +CHAPTER XX.--The Steam-Doctor. +CHAPTER XXI.--The Hawk in a New Part. +CHAPTER XXII.--Jonas Expresses his Opinion on Dutchmen. +CHAPTER XXIII.--Somethin' Ludikerous. +CHAPTER XXIV.--The Giant Great-heart. +CHAPTER XXV.--A Chapter of Betweens. +CHAPTER XXVI.--A Nice Little Game. +CHAPTER XXVII.--The Result of an Evening with Gentlemen. +CHAPTER XXVIII.--Waking up an Ugly Customer. +CHAPTER XXIX.--August and Norman. +CHAPTER XXX.--Aground. +CHAPTER XXXI.--Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice. +CHAPTER XXXII.--Julia's Enterprise. +CHAPTER XXXIII.--The Secret Stairway. +CHAPTER XXXIV.--The Interview. +CHAPTER XXXV.--Getting Ready for the End. +CHAPTER XXXVI.--The Sin of Sanctimony. +CHAPTER XXXVII.--The Deluge. +CHAPTER XXXVIII.--Scaring a Hawk. +CHAPTER XXXIX.--Jonas takes an Appeal. +CHAPTER XL.--Selling out. +CHAPTER XLI.--The Last Day and What Happened in it. +CHAPTER XLII.--For Ever and Ever. +CHAPTER XLIII.--The Midnight Alarm. +CHAPTER XLIV.--Squaring Accounts. +CHAPTER XLV.--New Plans. +CHAPTER XLVI.--The Shiveree. + + * * * * * + +ILLUSTRATIONS. + +BY FRANK BEARD + +The Backwoods Philosopher +Taking an Observation +A Talk with a Plowman +A little rustle brought her to consciousness +Gottlieb +The Castle +The Sedilium at the Castle +"Look at me" +"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas" +The Hawk +"Tell that to Jule" +Tempted +"Now I hate you" +At Cynthy's Door +Cynthy Ann had often said in class-meeting that temptations abounded on + every hand +Jonas +Julia sat down in mortification +"Good-by!" +The Mother's Blessing +Corn-Sweats and Calamus +"Fire! Murder! Help!" +Norman Anderson +Somethin' Ludikerous +To the Rescue +A Nice Little Game +The Mud-Clerk +Waking up an Ugly Customer +Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice +A Pastoral Visit +Brother Goshorn +"Say them words over again" +"I want to buy your place" + + + +THE END OF THE WORLD. + + * * * * * + +CHAPTER I. + +IN LOVE WITH A DUTCHMAN. + +"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a Dutchman! She +might as well as to marry some white folks I know." + +Samuel Anderson made no reply. It would be of no use to reply. Shrews +are tamed only by silence. Anderson had long since learned that the +little shred of influence which remained to him in his own house would +disappear whenever his teeth were no longer able to shut his tongue +securely in. So now, when his wife poured out this hot lava of +_argumentum ad hominem_, he closed the teeth down in a dead-lock way +over the tongue, and compressed the lips tightly over the teeth, and +shut his finger-nails into his work-hardened palms. And then, +distrusting all these precautions, fearing lest he should be unable to +hold on to his temper even with this grip, the little man strode out of +the house with his wife's shrill voice in his ears. + +Mrs. Anderson had good reason to fear that her daughter was in love with +a "Dutchman," as she phrased it in her contempt. The few Germans who had +penetrated to the West at that time were looked upon with hardly more +favor than the Californians feel for the almond-eyed Chinaman. They were +foreigners, who would talk gibberish instead of the plain English which +everybody could understand, and they were not yet civilized enough to +like the yellow saleratus-biscuit and the "salt-rising" bread of which +their neighbors were so fond. Reason enough to hate them! + +Only half an hour before this outburst of Mrs. Anderson's, she had set a +trap for her daughter Julia, and had fairly caught her. + +"Jule! Jule! O Jul-y-e-ee!" she had called. + +And Julia, who was down in the garden hoeing a bed in which she meant to +plant some "Johnny-Jump-ups," came quickly toward the house, though she +know it would be of no use to come quickly. Let her come quickly, or let +her come slowly, the rebuke was sure to greet her all the name. + +"Why don't you come when you're called, _I'd_ like to know! You're never +in reach when you're wanted, and you're good for nothing when you +are here!" + +Julia Anderson's earliest lesson from her mother's lips had been that +she was good for nothing. And every day and almost every hour since had +brought her repeated assurances that she was good for nothing. If she +had not been good for a great deal, she would long since have been good +for nothing as the result of such teaching. But though this was not the +first, nor the thousandth, nor the ten thousandth time that she had +been told that she was good for nothing, the accustomed insult seemed to +sting her now more than ever. Was it that, being almost eighteen, she +was beginning to feel the woman blossoming in her nature? Or, was it +that the tender words of August Wehle had made her sure that she was +good for something, that now her heart felt her mother's insult to be a +stale, selfish, ill-natured lie? + +"Take this cup of tea over to Mrs. Malcolm's, and tell her that it a'n't +quite as good as what I borried of her last week. And tell her that +they'll be a new-fangled preacher at the school-house a Sunday, a +Millerite or somethin', a preachin' about the end of the world." + +Julia did not say "Yes, ma'am," in her usually meek style. She smarted a +little yet from the harsh words, and so went away in silence. + +Why did she walk fast? Had she noticed that August Wehle, who was +"breaking up" her father's north field, was just plowing down the west +side of his land? If she hastened, she might reach the cross-fence as he +came round to it, and while he was yet hidden from the sight of the +house by the turn of the hill. And would not a few words from August +Wehle be pleasant to her ears after her mother's sharp depreciation? It +is at least safe to conjecture that some such feeling made her hurry +through the long, waving timothy of the meadow, and made her cross the +log that spanned the brook without ever so much as stopping to look at +the minnows glancing about in the water flecked with the sunlight that +struggled through the boughs of the water-willows. For, in her thorough +loneliness, Julia Anderson had come to love the birds, the squirrels, +and the fishes as companions, and in all her life she had never before +crossed the meadow brook without stooping to look at the minnows. + +All this haste Mrs. Anderson noticed. Having often scolded + +[Illustration: TAKING AN OBSERVATION.] + +Julia for "talking to the fishes like a fool," she noticed the omission. +And now she only waited until Julia was over the hill to take the path +round the fence under shelter of the blackberry thicket until she came +to the clump of alders, from the midst of which she could plainly see +if any conversation should take place between her Julia and the comely +young Dutchman. + +In fact, Julia need not have hurried so much. For August Wehle had kept +one eye on his horses and the other on the house all that day. It was +the quick look of intelligence between the two at dinner that had +aroused the mother's suspicions. And Wehle had noticed the work on the +garden-bed, the call to the house, and the starting of Julia on the path +toward Mrs. Malcolm's. His face had grown hot, and his hand had +trembled. For once he had failed to see the stone in his way, until the +plow was thrown clean from the furrow. And when he came to the shade of +the butternut-tree by which she must pass, it had seemed to him +imperative that the horses should rest. Besides, the hames-string wanted +tightening on the bay, and old Dick's throat-latch must need a little +fixing. He was not sure that the clevis-pin had not been loosened by the +collision with the stone just now. And so, upon one pretext and another, +he managed to delay starting his plow until Julia came by, and then, +though his heart had counted all her steps from the door-stone to the +tree, then he looked up surprised. Nothing could be so astonishing to +him as to see her there! For love is needlessly crafty, it has always an +instinct of concealment, of indirection about it. The boy, and +especially the girl, who will tell the truth frankly in regard to a love +affair is a miracle of veracity. But there are such, and they are to be +reverenced--with the reverence paid to martyrs. + +On her part, Julia Anderson had walked on as though she meant to pass +the young plowman by, until he spoke, and then she started, and blushed, +and stopped, and nervously broke off the top of a last year's iron-weed +and began to break it into bits while he talked, looking down most of +the time, but lifting her eyes to his now and then. And to the +sun-browned but delicate-faced young German it seemed, a vision of +Paradise--every glimpse of that fresh girl's face in the deep shade of +the sun-bonnet. For girls' faces can never look so sweet in this +generation as they did to the boys who caught sight of them, hidden +away, precious things, in the obscurity of a tunnel of pasteboard +and calico! + +This was not their first love-talk. Were they engaged? Yes, and no. By +all the speech their eyes were capable of in school, and of late by +words, they were engaged in loving one another, and in telling one +another of it. But they were young, and separated by circumstances, and +they had hardly begun to think of marriage yet. It was enough for the +present to love and be loved. The most delightful stage of a love affair +is that in which the present is sufficient and there is no past or +future. And so August hung his elbow around the top of the bay horse's +hames, and talked to Julia. + +It is the highest praise of the German heart that it loves flowers and +little children; and like a German and like a lover that he was, August +began to speak of the anemones and the violets that were already +blooming in the corners of the fence. Girls in love are not apt to say +any thing very fresh. And Julia only said she thought the flowers seemed +happy in the sunlight In answer to this speech, which seemed to the +lover a bit of inspiration, he quoted from Schiller the lines: + + "Yet weep, soft children of the Spring; + The feelings Love alone can bring + Have been denied to you!" + +With the quick and crafty modesty of her sex, Julia evaded this very +pleasant shaft by saying: "How much you know, August! How do you +learn it?" + +[Illustration: A TALK WITH A PLOWMAN.] + +And August was pleased, partly because of the compliment, but chiefly +because in saying it Julia had brought the sun-bonnet in such a range +that he could see the bright eyes and blushing face at the bottom of +this _camera-oscura_. He did not hasten to reply. While the vision +lasted he enjoyed the vision. Not until the sun-bonnet dropped did he +take up the answer to her question. + +"I don't know much, but what I do know I have learned out of your Uncle +Andrew's books." + +"Do you know my Uncle Andrew? What a strange man he is! He never comes +here, and we never go there, and my mother never speaks to him, and my +father doesn't often have anything to say to him. And so you have been +at his house. They say he has all up-stairs full of books, and ever so +many cats and dogs and birds and squirrels about. But I thought he never +let anybody go up-stairs." + +"He lets me," said August, when she had ended her speech and dropped her +sun-bonnet again out of the range of his eyes, which, in truth, were too +steadfast in their gaze. "I spend many evenings up-stairs." August had +just a trace of German in his idiom. + +"What makes Uncle Andrew so curious, I wonder?" + +"I don't exactly know. Some say he was treated not just right by a woman +when he was a young man. I don't know. He seems happy. I don't wonder a +man should be curious though when a woman that he loves treats him not +just right. Any way, if he loves her with all his heart, as I love Jule +Anderson!" + +These last words came with an effort. And Julia just then remembered +her errand, and said, "I must hurry," and, with a country girl's +agility, she climbed over the fence before August could help her, and +gave him another look through her bonnet-telescope from the other Hide, +and then hastened on to return the tea, und to tell Mrs. Malcolm that +there was to be a Millerite preacher at the school-house on Sunday +night. And August found that his horses were quite cool, while he was +quite hot. He cleaned his mold board, and swung his plow round, and +then, with a "Whoa! haw!" and a pull upon the single line which Western +plowmen use to guide their horses, he drew the team into their place, +and set himself to watching the turning of the rich, fragrant black +earth. And even as he set his plowshare, so he set his purpose to +overcome all obstacles, and to marry Julia Anderson. With the same +steady, irresistible, onward course would he overcome all that lay +between him and the soul that shone out of the face that dwelt in the +bottom of the sun-bonnet. + +From her covert in the elder-bushes Mrs. Anderson had seen the parley, +and her cheeks had also grown hot, but from a very different emotion. +She had not heard the words. She had seen the loitering girl and the +loitering plowboy, and she went back to the house vowing that she'd +"teach Jule Anderson how to spend her time talking to a Dutchman." And +yet the more she thought of it, the more she was satisfied that it +wasn't best to "make a fuss" just yet. She might hasten what she wanted +to prevent. For though Julia was obedient and mild in word, she was none +the less a little stubborn, and in a matter of this sort might take the +bit in her teeth. + +And so Mrs. Anderson had recourse, as usual, to her husband. She knew +she could browbeat him. She demanded that August Wehle should be paid +off and discharged. And when Anderson had hesitated, because he feared +he could not get another so good a hand, and for other reasons, she +burst out into the declaration: + +"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a Dutchman! She +might as well as to marry some white folks I know." + + + +CHAPTER II. + +AN EXPLOSION. + +It was settled that August was to be quietly discharged at the end of +his month, which was Saturday night. Neither he nor Julia must suspect +any opposition to their attachment, nor any discovery of it, indeed. +This was settled by Mrs. Anderson. She usually settled things. First, +she settled upon the course to be pursued. Then she settled her husband. +He always made a show of resistance. His dignity required a show of +resistance. But it was only a show. He always meant to surrender in the +end. Whenever his wife ceased her fire of small-arms and herself hung +out the flag of truce, he instantly capitulated. As in every other +dispute, so in this one about the discharge of the "miserable, impudent +Dutchman," Mrs. Anderson attacked her husband at all his weak points, +and she had learned by heart a catalogue of his weak points. Then, when +he was sufficiently galled to be entirely miserable; when she had +expressed her regret that she hadn't married somebody with some heart, +and that she had ever left her father's house, for her _father_ was +_always_ good to her; and when she had sufficiently reminded him of the +lover she had given up for him, and of how much _he_ had loved her, and +how miserable she had made _him_ by loving Samuel Anderson--when she had +conducted the quarrel through all the preliminary stages, she always +carried her point in the end by a _coup de partie_ somewhat in +this fashion: + +"That's just the way! Always the way with you men! I suppose I must give +up to you as usual. You've lorded it over me from the start. I can't +even have the management of my own daughter. But I do think that after +I've let you have your way in so many things, you might turn off that +fellow. You might let me have my way in one little thing, and you +_would_ if you cared for me. You know how liable I am to die at any +moment of heart-disease, and yet you will prolong this excitement in +this way." + +Now, there is nothing a weak man likes so much as to be considered +strong, nothing a henpecked man likes so much as to be regarded a +tyrant. If you ever hear a man boast of his determination to rule his +own house, you may feel sure that he is subdued. And a henpecked husband +always makes a great show of opposing everything that looks toward the +enlargement of the work or privileges of women. Such a man insists on +the shadow of authority because he can not have the substance. It is a +great satisfaction to him that his wife can never be president, and that +she can not make speeches in prayer-meeting. While he retains these +badges of superiority, he is still in some sense head of the family. + +So when Mrs. Anderson loyally reminded her husband that she had always +let him have his own way, he believed her because he wanted to, though +he could not just at the moment recall the particular instances. And +knowing that he must yield, he rather liked to yield as an act of +sovereign grace to the poor oppressed wife who begged it. + +"Well, if you insist on it, of course, I will not refuse you," he said; +"and perhaps you are right." He had yielded in this way almost every day +of his married life, and in this way he yielded to the demand that +August should he discharged. But he agreed with his wife that Julia +should not know anything about it, and that there must be no +leave-taking allowed. + +The very next day Julia sat sewing on the long porch in front of the +house. Cynthy Ann was getting dinner in the kitchen at the other end of +the hall, and Mrs. Anderson was busy in her usual battle with dirt. She +kept the house clean, because it gratified her combativeness and her +domineering disposition to have the house clean in spite of the +ever-encroaching dirt. And so she scrubbed and scolded, and scolded and +scrubbed, the scrubbing and scolding agreeing in time and rhythm. The +scolding was the vocal music, the scrubbing an accompaniment. The +concordant discord was perfect. Just at the moment I speak of there was +a lull in her scolding. The symphonious scrubbing went on as usual. +Julia, wishing to divert the next thunder-storm from herself, erected +what she imagined might prove a conversational lightning-rod, by asking +a question on a topic foreign to the theme of the last march her mother +had played and sung so sweetly with brush and voice. + +"Mother, what makes Uncle Andrew so queer?" + +"I don't know. He was always queer." This was spoken in a staccato, +snapping-turtle way. But when one has lived all one's life with a +snapping-turtle, one doesn't mind. Julia did not mind. She was curious +to know what was the matter with her uncle, Andrew Anderson. So +she said: + +"I've heard that some false woman treated him cruelly; is that so?" + +Julia did not see how red her mother's face was, for she was not +regarding her. + +"Who told you that?" Julia was so used to hearing her mother speak in an +excited way that she hardly noticed the strange tremor in this question. + +"August." + +The symphony ceased in a moment. The scrubbing-brush dropped in the pail +of soapsuds. But the vocal storm burst forth with a violence that +startled even Julia. "August said _that_, did he? And you listened, did +you? You listened to _that? You_ listened to that? _You listened_ to +_that_? Hey? He slandered your mother. You listened to him slander your +mother!" By this time Mrs. Anderson was at white heat. Julia was +speechless. "_I_ saw you yesterday flirting with that _Dutchman_, and +listening to his abuse of your mother! And now you _insult_ me! Well, +to-morrow will be the last day that that Dutchman will hold a plow on +this place. And you'd better look out for yourself, miss! You--" + +Here followed a volley of epithets which Julia received standing. But +when her mother's voice grew to a scream, Julia took the word. + +"Mother, hush!" + +It was the first word of resistance she had ever uttered. The agony +within must have been terrible to have wrung it from her. The mother was +stunned with anger and astonishment. She could not recover herself +enough to speak until Jule had fled half-way up the stairs. Then her +mother covered her defeat by screaming after her, "Go to your own room, +you impudent hussy! You know I am liable to die of heart-disease any +minute, and you want to kill me!" + + + +CHAPTER III. + +A FAREWELL. + +Mrs. Anderson felt that she had made a mistake. She had not meant to +tell Julia that August was to leave. But now that this stormy scene had +taken place, she thought she could make a good use of it. She knew that +her husband co-operated with her in her opposition to "the Dutchman," +only because he was afraid of his wife. In his heart, Samuel Anderson +could not refuse anything to his daughter. Denied any of the happiness +which most men find in loving their wives, he found consolation in the +love of his daughter. Secretly, as though his paternal affection were a +crime, he caressed Julia, and his wife was not long in discovering that +the father cared more for a loving daughter than for a shrewish wife. +She watched him jealously, and had come to regard her daughter as one +who had supplanted her in her husband's affections, and her husband as +robbing her of the love of her daughter. In truth, Mrs. Samuel Anderson +had come to stand so perpetually on guard against imaginary +encroachments on her rights, that she saw enemies everywhere. She hated +Wehle because he was a Dutchman; she would have hated him on a dozen +other scores if he had been an American. It was offense enough that +Julia loved him. + +So now she resolved to gain her husband to her side by her version of +the story, and before dinner she had told him how August had charged her +with being false and cruel to Andrew many years ago, and how Jule had +thrown it up to her, and how near she had come to dropping down with +palpitation of the heart. And Samuel Anderson reddened, and declared +that he would protect his wife from such insults. The notion that he +protected his wife was a pleasant fiction of the little man's, which +received a generous encouragement at the hands of his wife. It was a +favorite trick of hers to throw herself, in a metaphorical way, at his +feet, a helpless woman, and in her feebleness implore his protection. +And Samuel felt all the courage of knighthood in defending his +inoffensive wife. Under cover of this fiction, so flattering to the +vanity of an overawed husband, she had managed at one time or another to +embroil him with almost all the neighbors, and his refusal to join +fences had resulted in that crooked arrangement known as a "devil's +lane" on three sides of his farm. + +Julia dared not stay away from dinner, which was miserable enough. She +did not venture so much as to look at August, who sat opposite her, and +who was the most unhappy person at the table, because he did not know +what all the unhappiness was about. Mr. Anderson's brow foreboded a +storm, Mrs. Anderson's face was full of an earthquake, Cynthy Ann was +sitting in shadow, and Julia's countenance perplexed him. Whether she +was angry with him or not, he could not be sure. Of one thing he was +certain: she was suffering a great deal, and that was enough to make him +exceedingly unhappy. + +Sitting through his hurried meal in this atmosphere surcharged with +domestic electricity, he got the notion--he could hardly tell how--that +all this lowering of the sky had something to do with him. What had he +done? Nothing. His closest self-examination told him that he had done no +wrong. But his spirits were depressed, and his sensitive conscience +condemned him for some unknown crime that had brought about all this +disturbance of the elements. The ham did not seem very good, the cabbage +he could not eat, the corn-dodger choked him, he had no desire to wait +for the pie. He abridged his meal, and went out to the barn to keep +company with his horses and his misery until it should be time to return +to his plow. + +Julia sat and sewed in that tedious afternoon. She would have liked one +more interview with August before his departure. Looking through the +open hall, she saw him leave the barn and go toward his plowing. Not +that she looked up. Hawk never watched chicken more closely than Mrs. +Anderson watched poor Jule. But out of the corners of her eyes Julia saw +him drive his horses before him from the stable. At the field in which +he worked was on the other side of the house from where she sat she +could not so much as catch a glimpse of him as he held his plow on its +steady course. She wished she might have helped Cynthy Ann in the +kitchen, for then she could have seen him, but there was no chance for +such a transfer. + +Thus the tedious afternoon wore away, and just as the sun was settling +down so that the shadow of the elm in the front-yard stretched across +the road into the cow pasture, the dead silence was broken. Julia had +been wishing that somebody would speak. Her mother's sulky +speechlessness was worse than her scolding, and Julia had even wished +her to resume her storming. But the silence was broken by Cynthy Ann, +who came into the hall and called, "Jule, I wish you would go to the +barn and gether the eggs; I want to make some cake." + +Every evening of her life Julia gathered the eggs, and there was nothing +uncommon in Cynthy Ann's making cake, so that nothing could be more +innocent than this request. Julia sat opposite the front-door, her +mother sat farther along. Julia could see the face of Cynthy Ann. Her +mother could only hear the voice, which was dry and commonplace enough. +Julia thought she detected something peculiar in Cynthy's manner. She +would as soon have thought of the big oak gate-posts with their round +ball-like heads telegraphing her in a sly way, as to have suspected any +such craft on the part of Cynthy Ann, who was a good, pious, +simple-hearted, Methodist old maid, strict with herself, and censorious +toward others. But there stood Cynthy making some sort of gesture, which +Julia took to mean that she was to go quick. She did not dare to show +any eagerness. She laid down her work, and moved away listlessly. And +evidently she had been too slow. For if August had been in sight when +Cynthy Ann called her, he had now disappeared on the other side of the +hill. She loitered along, hoping that he would come in sight, but he did +not, and then she almost smiled to think how foolish she had been in +imagining that Cynthy Ann had any interest in her love affair. Doubtless +Cynthy sided with her mother. + +And so she climbed from mow to mow gathering the eggs. No place is +sweeter than a mow, no occupation can be more delightful than gathering +the fresh eggs--great glorious pearls, more beautiful than any that men +dive for, despised only because they are so common and so useful! But +Julia, gliding about noiselessly, did not think much of the eggs, did +not give much attention to the hens scratching for wheat kernels amongst +the straw, nor to the barn swallows chattering over the adobe dwellings +which they were building among the rafters above her. She had often +listened to the love-talk of these last, but now her heart was too heavy +to hear. She slid down to the edge of one of the mows, and sat there a +few feet above the threshing-floor with her bonnet in her hand, looking +off sadly and vacantly. It was pleasant to sit here alone and think, +without the feeling that her mother was penetrating her thoughts. + +A little rustle brought her to consciousness. Her face was fiery red in +a minute. There, in one corner of the threshing-floor, stood August, +gazing at her. He had come into the barn to find a single-tree in place +of one which had broken. While he was looking for it, Julia had come, +and he had stood and looked, unable to decide whether to speak or not, +uncertain how deeply she might be offended, since she had never once let +her eyes rest on him at dinner. And when she had come to the edge of the +mow and stopped there in a reverie, August had been utterly spell-bound. + +A minute she blushed. Then, perceiving her opportunity, she dropped +herself to the floor and walked up to August. + +"August, you are to be turned off to-morrow night." + +"What have I done? Anything wrong?" + +"No." + +"Why do they send me away?" + +"Because--because--" Julia stopped. + +But silence is often better than speech. A sudden intelligence came +into the blue eyes of August. "They turn me off because I love Jule +Anderson." + +[Illustration: A LITTLE RUSTLE BROUGHT HER TO CONSCIOUSNESS.] + +Julia blushed just a little. + +"I will love her all the same when I am gone. I will always love her." + +Julia did not know what to say to this passionate speech, so she +contented herself with looking a little grateful and very foolish. + +"But I am only a poor boy, and a Dutchman at that"--he said this +bitterly--"but if you will wait, Jule, I will show them I am of some +account. Not good enough for you, but good enough for _them_. +You will--" + +"I will wait--_forever_--for _you_, Gus." Her head was down, and her +voice could hardly be heard. "Good-by." She stretched out her hand, and +he took it trembling. + +"Wait a minute." He dropped the hand, and taking a pencil wrote on a +beam: + +"March 18th, 1843." + +"There, that's to remember the Dutchman by." + +"Don't call yourself a Dutchman, August. One day in school, when I was +sitting opposite to you, I learned this definition, 'August: grand, +magnificent,' and I looked at you and said, Yes, that he is. August is +grand and magnificent, and that's what you are. You're just grand!" + +I do not think he was to blame. I am sure he was not responsible. It was +done so quickly. He kissed her forehead and then her lips, and said +good-by and was gone. And she, with her apron full of eggs and her +cheeks very red--it makes one warm to climb--went back to the house, +resolved in some way to thank Cynthy Ann for sending her; but Cynthy +Ann's face was so serious and austere in its look that Julia concluded +she must have been mistaken, Cynthy Ann couldn't have known that August +was in the barn. For all she said was: + +"You got a right smart lot of eggs, didn't you? The hens is beginnin' to +lay more peart since the warm spell sot in." + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +A COUNTER-IRRITANT. + +"Vot you kits doornt off vor? Hey?" + +Gottlieb Wehle always spoke English, or what he called English, when he +was angry. + +"Vot for? Hey?" + +All the way home from Anderson's on that Saturday night, August had +been, in imagination, listening to the rough voice of his honest father +asking this question, and he had been trying to find a satisfactory +answer to it. He might say that Mr. Anderson did not want to keep a hand +any longer. But that would not be true. And a young man with August's +clear blue eyes was not likely to lie. + +"Vot vor ton't you not shpeak? Can't you virshta blain Eenglish ven you +hears it? Hey? You a'n't no teef vot shteels I shposes, unt you ton't +kit no troonks mit vishky? Vot you too tat you pe shamt of? Pin lazin' +rount? Kon you nicht Eenglish shprachen? Oot mit id do vonst!" + +"I did not do anything to be ashamed of," said August. And yet he looked +ashamed. + +"You tidn't pe no shamt, hey? You tidn't! Vot vor you loogs so leig a +teef in der bentenshry? Vot for you sprachen not mit me ven ich sprachs +der blainest zort ov Eenglish mit you? You kooms sneaggin heim Zaturtay +nocht leig a tog vots kot kigt, unt's got his dail dween his leks; and +ven I aks you in blain Eenglish vot's der madder, you loogs zheepish +leig, und says you a'n't tun nodin. I zay you tun sompin. If you a'n't +tun nodin den, vy don't you dell me vot it is dat you has tun? Hey?" + +[Illustration: GOTTLIEB.] + +All this time August found that it was getting harder and harder to tell +his father the real state of the case. But the old man, seeing that he +prevailed nothing, took a cajoling tone. + +"Koom, August, mine knabe, ton't shtand dare leig a vool. Vot tit +Anterson zay ven he shent you avay?" + +"He said that I'd been seen a-talking to his daughter, Jule Anderson." + +"Vell, you nebber said no hoorm doo Shule, tid you? If I dought you +said vot you zhoodn't zay doo Shule, I vood shust drash you on der +shpot! Tid you gwarl mit Shule, already?" + +"Quarrel with Jule! She's the last person in the world I'd think of +quarreling with. She's as good as--" + +"Oh! you pe in lieb mit Shule! You vool, you! Is dat all dat I raise you +vor? I dells you, unt dells you, unt _dells_ you to sprach nodin put +Deutsche, unt to marry a kood Deutsche vrau vot kood sprach mit you, unt +now you koes right shtraight off unt kits knee-teep in lieb mit a vool +of a Yangee kirl! You doo ant pe doornt off!" + +August's countenance brightened. All the way home he had felt that it +was somehow an unpardonable sin to be a Dutchman. Anderson had spoken +hardly to him in dismissing him, and now it was a great comfort to find +that his father returned the contempt of the Yankees at its full value. +All the conceit was not on the side of the Yankees. It was at least an +open question which was the most disgraced, he or Julia, by their little +love affair. + +But more comforting still was the quiet look of his sweet-faced mother, +who, moving about among her throng of children like a hen with more +chickens than she can hover[1], never forgot to be patient and +affectionate. If there had been a look of reproach on the face of the +mother, it would have been the hardest trial of all. But there was that +in her eyes--the dear Moravian mother--that gave courage to August. The +mother was an outside conscience, and now as Gottlieb, who had lapsed +into German for his wife's benefit, rattled on his denunciation of this +Cannanitish Yankee, with whom his son was in love, the son looked every +now and then into the eyes, the still German eyes of the mother, and +rejoiced that he saw there no reflection of his father's rebuke. The +older Wehle presently resumed his English, such as it was, as better +adapted to scolding. Whether he thought to make his children love German +by abusing them in English, I do not know, but it was his habit. + +[Footnote 1: Not until my attention was called to this word in the proof +did I know that in this sense it is a provincialism. It is so used, at +least in half the country, and yet neither of our American +dictionaries has it.] + +"I dells you tese Yangees is Yangees. Dere neber voz put shust von cood +vor zompin. Antrew Antershon is von. He shtaid mit us ven ve vos all +zick, unt he is zhust so cood as if he was porn in Deutschland. Put all +de rest is Yangees. Marry a Deutsche vrau vot's kot cood sense to ede +kraut unt shleep unter vedder peds ven it's kalt. Put shust led de +Yangees pe Yangees." + +Seeing August put on his hat and go to the door, he called out testily: + +"Vare you koes, already?" + +"Over to the castle." + +"Veil, das is koot. Ko doo de gassel. Antrew vlll dell you vat sorts do +Yangee kirls pe!" + + + +CHAPTER V. + +AT THE CASTLE. + +By the time August reached Andrew Anderson's castle it was dark. The +castle was built in a hollow, looking out toward the Ohio River, a river +that has this peculiarity, that it is all beautiful, from Pittsburgh to +Cairo. Through the trees, on which the buds were just bursting, August +looked out on the golden roadway made by the moonbeams on the river. And +into the tumult of his feelings there came the sweet benediction of +Nature. And what is Nature but the voice of God? + +Anderson's castle was a large log building of strange construction. +Everything about it had been built by the hands of Andrew, at once its +lord and its architect. Evidently a whimsical fancy had pleased itself +in the construction. It was an attempt to realize something of medieval +form in logs. There were buttresses and antique windows, and by an +ingenious transformation the chimney, usually such a disfigurement to a +log-house, was made to look like a round donjon keep. But it was +strangely composite, and I am afraid Mr. Ruskin would have considered it +somewhat confused; for while it looked like a rude castle to those who +approached it from the hills, it looked like something very different to +those who approached the front, for upon that side was a portico with +massive Doric columns, which were nothing more nor less than maple logs. +Andrew maintained that the natural form of the trunk of a tree was the +ideal and perfect form of a pillar. + +To this picturesque structure, half castle, half cabin, with hints of +church and temple, came August Wehle on Saturday evening. He did not go +round to the portico and knock at the front-door as a stranger would +have done, but in behind the donjon chimney he pulled an alarm-cord. +Immediately the head of Andrew Anderson was thrust out of a Gothic +hole--you could not call it a window. His uncut hair, rather darker than +auburn, fell down to his waist, and his shaggy red beard lay upon his +bosom. Instead of a coat he wore that unique garment of linsey-woolsey +known in the West as wa'mus (warm us?), a sort of over-shirt. He was +forty-five, but there were streaks of gray in his hair and board, and he +looked older by ten years. + +"What ho, good friend? Is that you?" he cried. "Come up, and right +welcome!" For his language was as archaic and perhaps as incongruous as +his architecture. And then throwing out of the window a rope-ladder, he +called out again, "Ascend! ascend! my brave young friend!" + +And young Wehle climbed up the ladder into the large upper room. For it +was one peculiarity of the castle that the upper part had no visible +communication with the lower. Except August, and now and then a literary +stranger, no one but the owner was ever admitted to the upper story of +the house, and the neighbors, who always had access to the lower rooms, +regarded the upper part of the castle with mysterious awe. August was +often plied with questions about it, but he always answered simply that +he didn't think Mr. Anderson would like to have it talked about. For the +owner there must have been some inside mode of access to the second +story, but he did not choose to let even August know of any other way +than that by the rope-ladder, and the few strangers who came to see his +books were taken in by the same drawbridge. + +[Illustration: THE CASTLE.] + +The room was filled with books arranged after whimsical associations. +One set of cases, for instance, was called the Academy, and into these +he only admitted the masters, following the guidance of his own +eccentric judgment quite as much as he followed traditional estimate. +Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Milton of course had undisputed possession of +the department devoted to the "Kings of Epic," as he styled them. +Sophocles, Calderon, Corneille, and Shakespeare were all that he +admitted to his list of "Kings of Tragedy." Lope he rejected on literary +grounds, and Goethe because he thought his moral tendency bad. He +rejected Rabelais from his chief humorists, but accepted Cervantes, Le +Sage, Molière, Swift, Hood, and the then fresh Pickwick of Boz. To these +he added the Georgia Scenes of Mr. Longstreet, insisting that they were +quite equal to Don Quixote. I can only stop to mention one other +department in his Academy. One case was devoted to the "Best Stories," +and an admirable set they were! I wish that anything of mine were worthy +to go into such company. His purity of feeling, almost ascetic, led him +to reject Boccaccio, but he admitted Chaucer and some of Balzac's, and +Smollett, Goldsmith, and De Foe, and Walter Scott's best, Irving's Rip +Van Winkle, Bernardin St. Pierre's "Paul and Virginia," and "Three +Months under the Snow," and Charles Lamb's generally overlooked +"Rosamund Gray." There were eases for "Socrates and his Friends," and +for other classes. He had amused himself for years in deciding what +books should be "crowned," as he called it, and what not. And then he +had another case, called "The Inferno." I wish there was space to give a +list of this department. Some were damned for dullness and some for +coarseness. Miss Edgeworth's Moral Tales, Darwin's Botanic Garden, +Rollin's Ancient History, and a hideously illustrated copy of the Book +of Martyrs were in the First-class, Don Juan and some French novels in +the second. Tupper, Swinburne, and Walt Whitman he did not know. + +In the corner next the donjon chimney was a little room with a small +fireplace. Thus the hermit economized wood, for wood meant time, and +time meant communion with his books. All of his domestic arrangements +were carried on after this frugal fashion. In the little room was a +writing-desk, covered with manuscripts and commonplace books. + +"Well, my young friend, you're thrice welcome," said Andrew, who never +dropped his book language. "What will you have? Will you resume your +apprenticeship under Goethe, or shall we canter to Canterbury with +Chaucer? Grand old Dan Chaucer! Or, shall we study magical philosophy +with Roger Bacon--the Friar, the Admirable Doctor? or read good Sir +Thomas More? What would Sir Thomas have said if he could have thought +that he would be admired by two such people as you and I, in the woods +of America, in the nineteenth century? But you do not want books! Ah! my +brave friend, you are not well. Come into my cell and let us talk. What +grieves you?" + +And Andrew took him by the hand with the courtesy of a knight, with the +tenderness of a woman, and with the air of an astrologer, and led him +into the apartment of a monk. + +[Illustration: THE SEDILIUM AT THE CASTLE.] + +"See!" he said, "I have made a new chair. It is the highest evidence of +my love for my Teutonic friend. You have now a right to this castle. You +shall be perpetually welcome. I said to myself, German scholarship shall +sit there, and the Backwoods Philosopher will sit here. So sit down on +my _sedilium_, and let us hear how this uncivil and inconstant world +treats you. It can not deal worse with you than it has with me. But I +have had my revenge on it! I have been revenged! I have done as I +pleased, and defied the world and all its hollow conventionalities." +These last words were spoken in a tone of misanthropic bitterness common +to Andrew. His love for August was the more intense that it stood upon a +background of general dislike, if not for the world, at least for that +portion of it which most immediately surrounded him. + +August took the chair, ingeniously woven and built of rye straw and +hickory splints. He knew that all this formality and apparent pedantry +was superficial. He and Andrew were bosom friends, and as he had often +opened his heart to the master of the castle before, so now he had no +difficulty in telling him his troubles, scarcely heeding the appropriate +quotations which Andrew made from time to time by way of embellishment. + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER. + +One reason for Andrew's love of August Wehle was that he was a German. +Far from sharing in the prejudices of his neighbors against foreigners, +Andrew had so thorough a contempt for his neighbors, that he liked +anybody who did not belong to his own people. If a Turk had emigrated to +Clark township, Andrew would have fallen in love with him, and built a +divan for his special accommodation. But he loved August also for the +sake of his gentle temper and his genuine love for books. And only +August or August's mother, upon whom Andrew sometimes called, could +exorcise his demon of misanthropy, which he had nursed so long that it +was now hard to dismiss it. + +Andrew Anderson belonged to a class noticed, I doubt not, by every acute +observer of provincial life in this country. In backwoods and +out-of-the-way communities literary culture produces marked +eccentricities in the life. Your bookish man at the West has never +learned to mark the distinction between the world of ideas and the +world of practical life. Instead of writing poems or romances, he falls +to living them, or at least trying to. Add a disappointment in love, and +you will surely throw him into the class of which Anderson was the +representative. For the education one gets from books is sadly +one-sided, unless it be balanced by a knowledge of the world. + +Andrew Anderson had always been regarded as an oddity. A man with a good +share of ideality and literary taste, placed against the dull background +of the society of a Western neighborhood in the former half of the +century, would necessarily appear odd. Had he drifted into communities +of more culture, his eccentricity, begotten of a sense of superiority to +his surroundings, would have worn away. Had he been happily married, his +oddities would have been softened; but neither of these things happened. +He told August a very different history. For the confidence of his +"Teutonic friend" had awakened in the solitary man a desire to uncover +that story which he had kept under lock and key for so many years. + +"Ah! my friend," said he with excitement, "don't trust the faith of a +woman." And then rising from his seat he said, "The Backwoods +Philosopher warns you. I pray you give good heed. I do not know Julia. +She is my niece. It ill becomes me to doubt her sincerity. But I know +whose daughter she is. I pray you give good heed, my Teutonic friend. _I +know whose daughter she is_! + +"I do not talk much. But you have arrived at a critical point--a point +of turning. Out of his own life, out of his own sorrow, the Backwoods +Philosopher warns you. I am at peace now. But look at me. Do you not see +the marks of the ravages of a great storm? A sort of a qualified +happiness I have in philosophy. But what I might have been if the +storm had not torn me to pieces in my youth--what I might have been, +that I am not. I pray you never trust in a woman's keeping the happiness +of your life!" + +[Illustration: "LOOK AT ME."] + +Here Andrew slipped his arm through Wehle's, and began to promenade with +him in the large apartment up and down an alley, dimly lighted by a +candle, between solid phalanxes of books. + +"I pray you give good heed," he said, resuming. "I was always eccentric. +People thought I was either a genius or fool. Perhaps I was much of +both. But this is a digression. I did not pay any attention to women. I +shunned them. I said that to be a great author and a philosophical +thinker, one must not be a man of society. I never went to a +wood-chopping, to an apple-peeling, to a corn-shucking, to a +barn-raising, nor indeed to any of our rustic feasts. I suppose this +piqued the vanity of the girls, and they set themselves to catch me. I +suppose they thought that I would be a trophy worth boasting. I have +noticed that hunters estimate game according to the difficulty of +getting it. But this is a digression. Let us return. + +"There came among us, at that time, Abigail Norman. She was pretty. I +swear by all the sacred cats of Egypt, that she was beautiful. She was +industrious. The best housekeeper in the state! She was high-strung. I +liked her all the more for that. You see a man of imagination is apt to +fall in love with a tragedy queen. But this is a digression. Let +us return. + +"She spread her toils in my path. While I was wandering through the +woods writing poetry to birds and squirrels, Abby Norman was ambitious +enough to hope to make me her slave, and she did. She read books that +she thought I liked. She planned in various ways to seem to like what I +liked, and yet she had sense enough to differ a little from me, and so +make herself the more interesting. I think a man of real intellect never +likes to have a man or woman agree with him entirely. But let us return. + +"I loved Abigail desperately. No, I did not love Abigail Norman at all. +I did not love her as she was, but I loved her as she seemed to my +imagination to be. I think most lovers love an ideal that hovers in the +air a little above the real recipient of their love. And I think we men +of genius and imagination are apt to love something very different from +the real person, which is unfortunate. + +"But I am digressing again. To return: I wrote poetry to Abby. I courted +her. I cut off my long hair for a woman, like Samson. I tried to dress +more decently, and made myself ridiculous no doubt, for a man can not +dress well unless he has a talent for it. And I never had a genius for +beau-knots. + +"But pardon the digression. Let us return. I was to have married her. +The day was set. Then I found accidentally that she was engaged to my +brother Samuel, a young man with better manners than mind. She made him +believe that she was only making a butt of me. But I think she really +loved me more than she knew. When I had discovered her treachery, I +shipped on the first flat-boat. I came near committing suicide, and +should have jumped into the river one night, only that I thought it +might flatter her vanity. I came back here and ignored her. She broke +with Samuel and tried to regain my affections. I scorned her. I trod on +her heart! I stamped her pride into the dust! I was cruel. I was +contemptuous. I was well-nigh insane. Then she went back to Samuel, and +_made_ him marry her. Then she forced my imbecile old father, on his +death-bed, to will all the property to Samuel, except this piece of +rough hill-land and one thousand dollars. But here I built this castle. +My thousand dollars I put in books. I learned how, to weave the +coverlets of which our country people are so fond, and by this means, +and by selling wood to the steamboats, I have made a living and bought +my library without having to work half of my time. I was determined +never to leave. I swore by all the arms of Vishnu she should never say +that she had driven me away. I don't know anything about Julia. But I +know whose daughter she is. My young friend, beware! I pray you take +good heed! The Backwoods Philosopher warns you!" + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +WITHIN AND WITHOUT. + +If the gentleman is not born in a man, it can not be bred in him. If it +is born in him, it can not be bred out of him. August Wehle had +inherited from his mother the instinct of true gentlemanliness. And now, +when Andrew relapsed into silence and abstraction, he did not attempt to +rouse him, but bidding him goodnight, with his own hands threw the +rope-ladder out the window and started up the hollow toward home. The +air was sultry and oppressive, the moon had been engulfed, and the first +thunder-cloud of the spring was pushing itself up toward the zenith, +while the boughs of the trees were quivering with a premonitory shudder. +But August did not hasten. The real storm was within. Andrew's story had +raised doubts. When he went down the ravine the love of Julia Anderson +shone upon his heart as benignly as the moon upon the waters. Now the +light was gone, and the black cloud of a doubt had shut out his peace. +Jule Anderson's father was rich. He had not thought of it before! But +now he remembered how much woodland he owned and how he had two large +farms. Jule Anderson would not marry a poor boy. And a Dutchman! She was +not sincere. She was trifling with him and teasing her parents. Or, if +she were sincere now, she would not be faithful to him against every +tempting offer. And he would have to drive on the rocks, too, as Andrew +had. At any rate, he would not marry her until he stood upon some sort +of equality with her. + +The wind was swaying him about in its fitful gusts, and he rather liked +it. In his anguish of spirit it was a pleasure to contend with the +storm. The wind, the lightning, the sudden sharp claps of thunder were +on his own key. He felt in the temper of old Lear. The winds might blow +and crack their cheeks. + +But it was not alone the suggestions of Andrew that aroused his +suspicions. He now recalled a strange statement that Samuel Anderson +made in discharging him. "You said what you had no right to say about my +wife, in talking to Julia." What had he said? Only that some woman had +not treated Andrew "just right." Who the woman might be he had not known +until his present interview with Andrew. Had Julia been making mischief +herself by repeating his words and giving them a direction he had not +intended? He could not have dreamed of her acting such a part but for +the strange influence of Andrew's strange story. And so he staggered on, +wet to the skin, defying in his heart the lightning and the wind, until +he came to the cabin of his father. Climbing the fence, for there was no +gate, he pulled the latch-string and entered. They were all asleep; the +hard-working family went to bed early. But chubby-faced Wilhelmina, the +favorite sister, had set up to wait for August, and he now found her +fast asleep in the chair. + +"Wilhelmina! wake up!" he said. + +"O August!" she said, opening the corner of one eye and yawning, "I +wasn't asleep. I only--uh--shut my eyes a minute. How wet you are! Did +you go to see the pretty girl up at Mr. Anderson's?" + +"No," said August. + +"O August! she is pretty, and she is good and sweet," and Wilhelmina +took his wet checks between her chubby hands and gave him a sleepy kiss, +and then crept off to bed. + +And, somehow, the faith of the child Wilhelmina counteracted the +skepticism of the and Andrew, and August felt the storm subsiding. + +When he looked out of the window of the loft in which he slept the +shower had ceased as suddenly as it had come, the thunder had retreated +behind the hills, the clouds were already breaking, and the white face +of the moon was peering through the ragged rifts. + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +FIGGERS WON'T LIE + +"Figgers won't lie," said Elder Hankins, the Millerite preacher. "I say +figgers won't lie. When a Methodis' talks about fallin' from grace he +has to argy the pint. And argyments can't be depended 'pon. And when a +Prisbyterian talks about parseverance he haint got the absolute +sartainty on his side. But figgers won't lie noways, and it's figgers +that shows this yer to be the last yer of the world, and that the final +eend of all things is approachin'. I don't ask you to listen to no +'mpressions of me own, to no reasonin' of nobody; all I ask is that you +should listen to the voice of the man in the linen-coat what spoke to +Dan'el, and then listen to the voice of the 'rithmetic, and to a sum in +simple addition, the simplest sort of addition." + +All the Millerite preachers of that day were not quite so illiterate as +Elder Hankins, and it is but fair to say that the Adventists of to-day +are a very respectable denomination, doing a work which deserves more +recognition from others than it receives. And for the delusion which +expects the world to come to an end immediately, the Adventist leaders +are not responsible in the first place. From Gnosticism to Mormonism, +every religious delusion has grown from some fundamental error in the +previous religious teaching of the people. By the narrowly verbal method +of reading the Scripture, so much in vogue in the polemical discussions +of the past generation, and still so fervently adhered to by many +people, the ground was prepared for Millerism. And to-day in many +regions the soil in made fallow for the next fanaticism. It is only a +question of who shall first sow and reap. To people educated as those +who gathered in Sugar Grove school-house had been to destroy the spirit +of the Scripture by distorting the letter in proving their own sect +right, nothing could be so overwhelming as Elder Hankins's "figgers." + +For he had clearly studied figgers to the neglect of the other branches +of a liberal education. His demonstration was printed on a large chart. +He began with the seventy weeks of Daniel, he added in the "time and +times and a half," and what Daniel declared that he "understood not when +he heard," was plain sailing to the enlightened and mathematical mind of +Elder Hankins. When he came to the thousand two hundred and ninety days, +he waxed more exultant than Kepler in his supreme moment, and on the +thousand three hundred and five and thirty days he did what Jonas +Harrison called "the blamedest tallest cipherin' he'd ever seed in all +his born days." + +Jonas was the new hired man, who had stopped into the shoes of August at +Samuel Anderson's. He sat by August and kept up a running commentary, in +a loud whisper, on the sermon, "My feller-citizen," said Jonas, +squeezing August's arm at a climax of the elder's discourse, "My +feller-citizen, looky thar, won't you? He'll cipher the world into +nothin' in no time. He's like the feller that tried to find out the +valoo of a fat shoat when wood was two dollars a cord. 'Ef I can't do it +by substraction I'll do it by long-division,' says he. And ef this +'rithmetic preacher can't make a finishment of this sub_lu_nary speer by +addition, he'll do it by multiplyin'. They's only one answer in his +book. Gin him any sum you please, and it all comes out 1843!" + +Now in all the region round about Sugar Grove school-house there was a +great dearth of sensation. The people liked the prospect of the end of +the world because it would be a spectacle, something to relieve the +fearful monotony of their lives. Funerals and weddings were commonplace, +and nothing could have been so interesting to them as the coming of the +end of the world, as described by Elder Hankins, unless it had been a +first-class circus (with two camels and a cage of monkeys attached, so +that scrupulous people might attend from a laudable desire to see the +menagerie!) A murder would have been delightful to the people of Clark +township. It would have given them something to think and talk about. +Into this still pool Elder Hankins threw the vials, the trumpets, the +thunders, the beast with ten horns, the he-goat, and all the other +apocalyptic symbols understood in an absurdly literal way. The world was +to come to an end in the following August. Here was an excitement, +something worth living for. + +All the way to their homes the people disputed learnedly about the "time +and times and a half," about "the seven heads and ten horns," and the +seventh vial. The fierce polemical discussions and the bold sectarian +dogmatism of the day had taught them anything but "the modesty of true +science," and now the unsolvable problems of the centuries were taken +out of the hands of puzzled scholars and settled as summarily and +positively as the relative merits of "gourd-seed" and "flint" corn. +Samuel Anderson had always planted his corn in the "light" of the moon +and his potatoes in the "dark" of that orb, had always killed his hogs +when the moon was on the increase lest the meat should all go to gravy, +and he and his wife had carefully guarded against the carrying of a hoe +through the house, for fear "somebody might die." Now, the preaching of +the elder impressed him powerfully. His life had always been not so much +a bad one as a cowardly one, and to get into heaven by a six months' +repentance, seemed to him a good transaction. Besides he remembered that +there men were never married, and that there, at last, Abigail would no +longer have any peculiar right to torture him. Hankins could not have +ciphered him into Millerism if his wife had not driven him into it as +the easiest means of getting a divorce. No doom in the next world could +have alarmed him much, unless it had been the prospect of continuing +lord and master of Mrs. Abigail. And as for that oppressed woman, she +was simply scared. She was quite unwilling to admit the coming of the +world's end so soon. Having some ugly accounts to settle, she would fain +have postponed the payday. Mrs. Anderson might truly have been called a +woman who feared God--she had reason to. + +And as for August, he would not have cared much if the world had come to +an end, if only he could have secured one glance of recognition from the +eyes of Julia. But Julia dared not look. The process of cowing her had +gone on from childhood, and now she was under a reign of terror. She did +not yet know that she could resist her mother. And then she lived in +mortal fear of her mother's heart-disease. By irritating her she might +kill her. This dread of matricide her mother held always over her. In +vain she watched for a chance. It did not come. Once, when her mother's +head was turned, she glanced at August. But he was at that moment +listening or trying to listen to one of Jonas Harrison's remarks. And +August, who did not understand the circumstances, was only able to +account for her apparent coldness on the theory suggested by Andrew's +universal unbelief in women, or by supposing that when she understood +his innocent remark about Andrew's disappointment to refer to her +mother, she had taken offense at it. And so, while the rest were +debating whether the world would come to an end or not, August had a +disconsolate feeling that the end of the world had already come. And it +did not make him feel better to have Wilhelmina whisper, "Oh! but she +_is_ pretty, that Anderson girl--a'n't she, August?" + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +THE NEW SINGING-MASTER + +"He sings like an owlingale!" + +Jonas Harrison was leaning against the well-curb, talking to Cynthy Ann. +He'd been down to the store at Brayville, he said, a listenin' to 'em +discuss Millerism, and seed a new singing-master there. "Could he sing +good?" Cynthy asked, rather to prolong the talk than to get information. + +"Sings like an owlingale, I reckon. He's got more seals to his ministry +a-hanging onto his watch-chain than I ever seed. Got a mustache onto the +top story of his mouth, somethin' like a tuft of grass on the roof of a +ole shed kitchen. Peart? He's the peartest-lookin' chap I ever seed. But +he a'n't no singin'-master--not of I'm any jedge of turnips. He warn't +born to sarve his day and generation with a tunin'-fork. I think he's +a-goin' to reckon-water a little in these parts and that he's only +a-playin' singin'-master. He kin play more fiddles'n one, you bet a +hoss! Says he come up here fer his wholesome, and I guess he did. Think +ef he'd a-staid where he was, he mout a-suffered a leetle from +confinement to his room, and that room p'raps not more nor five foot by +nine, and ruther dim-lighted and poor-provisioned, an' not much chance +fer takin' exercise in the fresh air!" + +[Illustration: "DON'T BE ONCHARITABLE, JONAS."] + +"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas, don't. We're all mis'able sinners, I +s'pose; and you know charity don't think no evil. The man may be all +right, ef he does wear hair on his lip. Charity kivers lots a sins." + +"Ya-as, but charity don't kiver no wolves with wool. An' ef he a'n't a +woolly wolf they's no snakes in Jarsey, as little Ridin' Hood said when +her granny tried to bite her head off. I'm dead sot in favor of charity, +and mean to gin her my vote at every election, but I a'n't a-goin' to +have her put a blind-bridle on to me. And when a man comes to Clark +township a-wearing straps to his breechaloons to keep hisself from +leaving terry-firmy altogether, and a weightin' hisself down with pewter +watch-seals, gold-washed, and a cultivating a crap of red-top hay onto +his upper lip, and a-lettin' on to be a singin'-master, I suspicions +him. They's too much in the git-up fer the come-out. Well, here's yer +health, Cynthy!" + +And having made this oracular speech and quaffed the hard limestone +water, Jonas hung the clean white gourd from which he had been drinking, +in its place against the well-curb, and started back to the field, while +Cynthy Ann carried her bucket of water into the kitchen, blaming herself +for standing so long talking to Jonas. To Cynthy everything pleasant had +a flavor of sinfulness. + +The pail of water was hardly set down in the sink when there came a +knock at the door, and Cynthy found standing by it the strapped +pantaloons, the "red-top" mustache, the watch-seals, and all the rest +that went to make up the new singing-master. He smiled when he saw her, +one of those smiles which are strictly limited to the lower half of the +face, and are wholly mechanical, as though certain strings inside were +pulled with malice aforethought and the mouth jerked out into a square +grin, such as an ingeniously-made automaton might display. + +"Is Mr. Anderson in?" + +"No, sir; he's gone to town." + +"Is Mrs. Anderson in?" + +And so he entered, and soon got into conversation with the lady of the +house, and despite the prejudice which she entertained for mustaches, +she soon came to like him. He smiled so artistically. He talked so +fluently. He humored all her whims, pitied all her complaints, and staid +to dinner, eating her best preserves with a graciousness that made Mrs. +Anderson feel how great was his condescension. For Mr. Humphreys, the +singing-master, had looked at the comely face of Julia, and looked over +Julia's shoulders at the broad acres beyond; and he thought that in +Clark township he had not met with so fine a landscape, so nice a +figure-piece. And with the quick eye of a man of the world, he had +measured Mrs. Anderson, and calculated on the ease with which he might +complete the picture to suit his taste. + +He staid to supper. He smiled that same fascinating square smile on +Samuel Anderson, treated him as head of the house, talked glibly of +farming, and listened better than he talked. He gave no account of +himself, except by way of allusion. He would begin a sentence thus, +"When I was traveling in France with my poor dear mother," etc., from +which Mrs. Anderson gathered that he had been a devoted son, and then he +would relate how he had seen something curious "when he was dining at +the house of the American minister at Berlin." "This hazy air reminds me +of my native mountains in Northern New York." And then he would allude +to his study of music in the Conservatory in Leipsic. To plain country +people in an out-of-the-way Western neighborhood, in 1843, such a man +was better than a lyceum full of lectures. He brought them the odor of +foreign travel, the flavor of city, the "otherness" that +everybody craves. + +[Illustration: THE HAWK.] + +He staid to dinner, as I have said, and to supper. He staid over night. +He took up his board at the house of Samuel Anderson. Who could resist +his entreaty? Did he not assure them that he felt the need of a home in +a cultivated family? And was it not the one golden opportunity to have +the daughter of the house taught music by a private master, and thus +give a special _eclat_ to her education? How Mrs. Anderson hoped that +this superior advantage would provoke jealous remarks on the part of her +neighbors! It was only necessary to the completion of her triumph that +they should say she was "stuck up." Then, too, to have so brilliant a +beau for Julia! A beau with watch-seals and a mustache, a beau who had +been to Paris with his mother, studied music in the Conservatory at +Leipsic, dined with the American minister in Berlin, and done ever so +many more wonderful things, was a prospect to delight the ambitious +heart of Mrs. Anderson, especially as he flattered the mother instead of +the daughter. + +"He's a independent citizen of this Federal Union," said Jonas to +Cynthy, "carries his head like he was intimately 'quainted with the +'merican eagle hisself. He's playin' this game sharp. He deals all the +trumps to hisself, and most everything besides. He'll carry off the gal +if something don't arrest him in his headlong career. Jist let me git a +chance at him when he's soarin' loftiest into the amber blue above, and +I'll cut his kite-string for him, and let him fall like fork-ed +lightnin' into a mud-puddle." + +Cynthy said she did see one great sin that he had committed for sure. +That was the puttin' on of gold and costly apparel. It was sot down in +the Bible and in the Methodist Discipline that it was a sin to wear +gold, and she should think the poor man hadn't no sort o' regard for his +soul, weighing it down with them things. + +But Jonas only remarked that he guessed his jewelry warn't no sin. He +didn't remember nothing agin wearin' pewter. + + + +CHAPTER X. + +AN OFFER OF HELP. + +The singing-master, Mr. Humphreys, went to singing-school and church +with Julia in a matter-of-course way, treating her with attention, but +taking care not to make himself too attentive. Except that Julia could +not endure his smile--which was, like some joint stock companies, +strictly limited--she liked him well enough. It was something to her, in +her monotonous life under the eye of her mother, who almost never left +her alone, and who cut off all chance for communication with August--it +was something to have the unobtrusive attentions of Mr. Humphreys, who +always interested her with his adventures. For indeed it really seemed +that he had had more adventures than any dozen other men. How should a +simple-hearted girl understand him? How should she read the riddle of a +life so full of duplicity--of _multiplicity_--as the life of Joshua +Humphreys, the music-teacher? Humphreys intended to make love to her, +but during the first two weeks he only aimed to gain her esteem. He felt +that there was a clue which he had not got. But at last the key dropped +into his hands, and he felt sure that the unsophisticated girl was in +his power. + +Among the girls that attended Humphreys's singing-school was Betsey +Malcolm, the near neighbor of the Andersons. The singing-master often +saw her at Mr. Anderson's, and he often wished that Julia were as easy +to win as he felt Betsey to be. The sensuous mouth, the giddy eyes of +Betsey, showed quickly her appreciation of every flattering attention he +paid her, and though in Julia's presence he was careful how he treated +her, yet when he, walking down the road one day, alone, met her, he +courted her assiduously. He had not to observe any caution in her case. +She greedily absorbed all the flattery he could give, only pettishly +responding after a while: "O dear! that's the way you talk to me, and +that's the way you talk to Jule sometimes, I s'pose. I guess she don't +mind keeping two of you as strings to her bow." + +"Two! What do you mean, my fair friend? I havn't seen one, yet." + +"Oh, no! You mean you haven't seen two. You see one whenever you look in +the glass. The other is a Dutchman, and she's dying after him. She may +flirt with you, but her mother watches her night and day, to keep her +from running off with Gus Wehle." + +Like many another crafty person, Betsey Malcolm had fairly overshot the +mark. In seeking to separate Humphreys from Julia, she had given him the +clue he desired, and he was not slow to use it, for he was almost the +only person that Mrs. Anderson trusted alone with Julia. + +In the dusk of the evening of the very day of his talk with Betsey, he +sat on the long front-porch with Julia. Julia liked him better, or +rather did not dislike him so much in the dark as she did in the light. +For when it was light she could see him smile, and though she had not +learned to connect a cold-blooded face with a villainous character, she +had that childish instinct which made her shrink from Humphreys's square +smile. It always seemed to her that the real Humphreys gazed at her out +of the cold, glittering eyes, and that the smile was something with +which he had nothing to do. + +Sitting thus in the dusk of the evening, and looking out over the green +pasture to where the nigher hills ceased and the distant seemed to come +immediately after, their distance only indicated by color, though the +whole Ohio "bottom" was between, she forgot the Mephistopheles who sat +not far away, and dreamed of August, the "grand," as she fancifully +called him. And he let her sit and dream undisturbed for a long time, +until the darkness settled down upon the hills. Then he spoke. + +"I--I thought," began Humphreys, with well-feigned hesitancy, "I +thought, I should venture to offer you my assistance as a true and +gallant man, in a matter--a matter of supreme delicacy--a matter that I +have no right to meddle with. I think I have heard that your mother is +not friendly to the suit of a young man who--who--well, let us say who +is not wholly disagreeable to you. I beg your pardon, don't tell me +anything that you prefer to keep locked in the privacy of your own +bosom. But if I can render any assistance, you know. I have some little +influence with your parents, maybe. If I could be the happy bearer of +any communications, command me as your obedient servant." + +Julia did not know what to say. To get a word to August was what she +most desired. But the thought of using Humphreys was repulsive to her. +She could not see his face in the gathering darkness, but she could +_feel_ him smile that same soulless, geometrical smile. She could not do +it. She did not know what to say. So she said nothing. Humphreys saw +that he must begin farther back. + +"I hear the young man spoken of as a praiseworthy person. German, I +believe? I have always noticed a peculiar manliness about Germans. A +peculiar refinement, indeed, and a courtesy that is often wanting in +Americans. I noticed this when I was in Leipsic. I don't think the +German girls are quite so refined. German gentlemen in this country seem +to prefer American girls oftentimes." + +All this might have sounded hollow enough to a disinterested listener. +To Julia the words were as sweet as the first rain after a tedious +drouth. She had heard complaint, censure, innuendo, and downright abuse +of poor Gus. These were the first generous words. They confirmed her +judgment, they comforted her heart, they made her feel grateful, even +affectionate toward the fop, in spite of his watch-seals, his curled +mustache, his straps, his cold eyes, and his artificial smile. Poor fool +you will call her, and poor fool she was. For she could have thrown +herself at the feet of Humphreys, and thanked him for his words. Thank +him she did in a stammering way, and he did not hesitate to repeat his +favorable impressions of Germans, after that. What he wanted was, not to +break the hold of August until he had placed himself in a position to be +next heir to her regard. + + + +CHAPTER XI. + +THE COON-DOG ARGUMENT. + +The reader must understand that all this time Elder Hankins continued to +bombard Clark township with the thunders and lightnings of the +Apocalypse, continued to whirl before the dazed imaginations of his +rustic hearers the wheels within wheels and the faces of the living +creatures of 'Zek'el, continued to cipher the world out of existence +according to formulas in Dan'el, marched out the he-goat, made the seven +heads and ten horns of the beast do service over and over again. And all +the sweet mysteries of Oriental imagery, the mystic figures which +unexpounded give so noble a depth to the perspective of Scripture, were +cut to pieces, pulled apart, and explained, as though they were tricks +of legerdemain. Julia was powerfully impressed, not by the declamations +of Hankins, for she had sensibility enough to recoil from his +vivisection of Scripture, though she had been all her life accustomed to +hear it from other than Millerites, but she was profoundly affected by +the excitement about her. Her father, attracted in part by the promise +that there should be no marrying there, had embraced Millerism with all +his heart, and was in such a state of excitement that he could not +attend to his business. Mrs. Anderson was in continual trepidation about +it, though she tried not to believe it. She was on the point of +rebelling and declaring that the world _should_ not come to an end. But +on the whole she felt that the government of the universe was one affair +in which she would have to give up all hope of having her own way. +Meantime there was no increase of religion. Some were frightened out of +their vices for a time, but a passionate terror of that sort is the +worst enemy of true piety. + +"Fer my part," said Cynthy Ann, as she walked home with Jonas, "fer my +part, I don't believe none of his nonsense. John Wesley" (Jonas was a +New-Light, and Cynthy always talked to him about Wesley) "knowed a heap +more about Scripter than all the Hankinses and Millerses that ever was +born, and he knowed how to cipher, too, I 'low. Why didn't he say the +world was goin' to wind up? An' our persidin' elder is a heap better +instructed than Hankins, and he says God don't tell nobody when the +world's goin' to wind up." + +"Goin' to run down, you mean, Cynthy Ann. 'Kordin' to Hankins it's a old +clock gin out in the springs, I 'low. How does Hankins know that +'Zek'el's livin' creeters means one thing more'n another? He talks about +them wheels as nateral as ef he was a wagon-maker fixin' a ole buggy. He +says the thing's a gone tater; no more craps of corn offen the bottom +land, no more electin' presidents of this free and glorious Columby, no +more Fourths, no more shootin' crackers nor spangled banners, no more +nothin'. He ciphers and ciphers, and then spits on his slate and wipes +us all out. Whenever Gabr'el blows I'll b'lieve it, but I won't take +none o' Hankins's tootin' in place of it. I shan't git skeered at no +tin-horns, and as for papaw whistles, why, I say Jericho wouldn't +a-tumbled for no sech music, and they won't fetch down no stars that +air way." + +Here old Gottlieb Wehle, who had just joined the Millerites, came up. +"Yonas, you mags shport of de Piple. Ef dem vaces in der veels, and dem +awvool veels in der veels, and dem figures vot always says aideen +huntert vordy dree, ef dem tond mean sompin awvool, vot does dey mean? +mean? Hey?" + +"My venerated friend and feller-citizen of forren birth," said Jonas, +"you hit the nail on the crown of the head squar, with the biggest sort +ov a sledge-hammer. You gripped a-holt of the truth that air time like +the American bird a-grippin' the arries on the shield. What do they +mean? That's jest the question, and you Millerites allers argies like +the man who warranted his dog to be a good coon-dog, bekase he warn't +good fer nothin' else under the amber blue. Now, my time-honored friend +and beloved German voter, jest let me tell you that _on the coon-dog +principle_ you could a-wound up the trade and traffic of this airth any +time. Fer ef they don't mean 1843, what do they mean? Why, 1842 or 1844, +of course. You don't come no coon-dog argyments over me, not while I +remain sound in wind and limb." + +"Goon-tog! Who zed goon-tog? Ich tidn't, Hankins tidn't, Ze'kel's wision +tidn't zay nodin pout no goon-tog. What's goon-togs cot do too mit de +end of de vorld? Yonas, you pe a vool, maype." + +"The same to yerself, my beloved friend and free and enlightened +feller-citizen. Long may you wave, like a green bay boss, and a +jimson-weed on the sunny side of a board-fence!" + +Gottlieb hurried on, finding Jonas much harder to understand than the +prophecies. + +"I hear the singing-master is goin' to jine," said Cynthy Ann. "Wonder +ef they'll take him with all his seals and straps, and hair on his upper +lip, with the plain words of the Bible agin gold and costly apparel? +Wonder ef he's tuck in, too?" + +"Tuck in? He an't one of that kind. He don't never git tuck in--he tucks +in. He knows which side of his bread's got quince preserves onto it. I +used to run second mate on the Dook of Orleans, and I know his kind. +He'll soar around like a turkey-buzzard fer a while. Presently he'll +'light. He's rusticatin' tell some scrape blows over. An' he'll make +somethin' outen it. Business afore pleasure is his motto. He don't hang +that seducin' grin under them hawky eyes fer nothin'. Wait till the +pious and disinterested example 'lights somewheres. Then look out for +the feathers, won't ye! He won't leave nary bone. But here we air. I +declare, Cynthy, this walk seems _the shortest_, when I'm in superfine, +number-one comp'ny!" + +Cynthy was so pleased with this remark, that she did penance in her mind +for a week afterwards. It was so wicked to enjoy one's self out of +class-meeting! + + + +CHAPTER XII. + +TWO MISTAKES. + +At the singing-school and at the church August waited as impatiently as +possible for some sign of recognition from Julia. He little knew the +fear that beset her. Having seen her hysterical mother prostrated for +weeks by the excitement of a dispute with her father, it seemed to her +that if she turned one look of love and longing toward young Wehle, +whose sweet German voice rang out above the rest in the hymns, she might +kill her mother as quickly as by plunging a knife into her heart. The +steam-doctor, who was the family physician, had warned her and her +father separately of the danger of exciting Mrs. Anderson's most +excitable temper, and now Julia was the slave of her mother's disease. +That lucky hysteria, which the steam-doctor thought a fearful +heart-disease, had given Mrs. Abigail the whip-hand of husband and +daughter, and she was not slow to know her advantage, using her heart in +a most heartless way. + +August could not blame Julia for not writing, for he had tried to break +the blockade by a letter sent through Jonas and Cynthy Ann, but the +latter had found herself so well watched that the note oppressed her +conscience and gave a hangdog look to her face for two weeks before she +got it out of her pocket, and then she put it under the pillow of +Julia's bed, and had reason to believe that the suspicious Mrs. Anderson +confiscated it within five minutes. For the severity of maternal +government was visibly increased thereafter, and Julia received many +reminders of her ingratitude and of her determination to kill her +self-sacrificing mother by her stubbornness. + +"Well," Mrs. Anderson would say, "it's all one to me whether the world +comes to an end or not. I should like to live to see the day of +judgment. But I shan't. No affectionate mother can stand such treatment +as I receive from my own daughter. If Norman was only at home!" + +It is proper to explain here that Norman was her son, in whom she took a +great deal of comfort when he was away, and whom she would have utterly +spoiled by indulgence if he had not been born past spoiling. He was the +only person to whom she was indulgent, and she was indulgent to him +chiefly because he was so weak of will that there was not much glory in +conquering him, and because her indulgence to him was a rod of +affliction to the rest of her family. + +Failing to open communication through Jonas and Cynthy Ann, August found +himself in a desperate strait, and with an impatience common to young +men he unhappily had recourse to Betsey Malcolm. She often visited +Julia, and twice, when Julia was not at meeting, he went home with the +ingenuous Betsey, who always pretended to have something to tell him +"about Jule," and who yet, for the pure love of mischief-making, tried +to make him think as poorly as possible of Julia's sincerity, and who, +from pure love of flirtation, puckered her red lips, and flashed at him +with her sensuous eyes, and sighed and blushed, or rather flushed, while +she sympathized with him in a way that might have been perilous if he +had been an American instead of a constant-hearted "Dutchman," wholly +absorbed with the image of Julia. But, so far as carrying messages was +concerned, Betsey was certainly a non-conductor. She professed never to +be able to run the blockade with any communication of his. She said to +herself that she wasn't going to help Jule Anderson to keep _all_ the +beaus. She meant to capture one or the other of them if she could. And, +indeed, she did not dream how grievous was the wrong she did. For she +could appreciate no other feeling in the matter than vanity, and she +could not see any particular harm in "taking Jule Anderson down a peg." +And so she assured the anxious and already suspicious August that if she +was in his place she should want that singing-master out of the way. +"Some girls can't stand people that wear jewelry and mustaches and +straps and such things. And Mr. Humphreys is very careful of her, won't +let her sit too late on the porch, and is very comforting in his way of +talking to her. And she seems to like it. I tell you what it is, Gus +"--and she looked at him so bewitchingly that the pure and sensitive +August blushed, he could hardly tell why--"I tell you Jule's a nice +girl, and got a nice property back of her, and I hope she won't act like +her mother. And, indeed, I can't hardly believe she will, though the way +she eyes that Humphreys makes me mad." She had suggested the old doubt. +A doubt is dangerous when its face grows familiar, and one recognizes +the "Monsieur Tonson come again." + +And all the message the disinterested and benevolent Betsey bore to +Julia was to tell her exultingly that Gus had twice walked home with +her. And they had had such a nice time! And Julia, girl that she was, +declared indignantly that she didn't care whom he went with; though she +did care, and her eyes and face said so. Thus the tongue sometimes +lies--or seems to lie--when the whole person is telling the truth. The +only excuse for the tongue is that it will not be believed, and it knows +that it will not be believed! It only speaks diplomatically, maybe. But +diplomatic talking is bad. Better the truth. If Jule had known that her +words would be reported to August, she would have bitten out her tongue +rather than to have let it utter words that were only the cry of her +wounded pride. Of course Betsey met August in the road the next morning, +in a quiet hollow by the brook, and told him, sympathizingly, almost +affectionately, that she had begun to talk to Julia about him, and that +Jule had said she didn't care. So while Julia uttered a lie she spoke +the truth, and while. Betsey uttered the truth she spoke a lie, willful, +malicious, and wicked. + +Now, in the mean time, Julia, on her side, had tried to open +communication through the only channel that offered itself. She did not +attempt it by means of Betsey, because, being a woman, she felt +instinctively that Betsey was not to be trusted. But there was only one +other to whom she was allowed to speak, except under a supervision as +complete as it was unacknowledged. That other was Mr. Humphreys. He +evinced a constant interest in her affairs, avowing that he always did +have a romantic desire to effect the union of suitable people, even +though it might pain his heart a little to see another more fortunate +than himself. Julia had given up all hope of communicating by letter, +and she could not bring herself to make any confessions to a man who had +such a smile and such eyes, but to a generous proposition of Mr. +Humphreys that he should see August and open the way for any +communication between them, she consented, scarcely concealing her +eagerness. + +August was not in a mood to receive Humphreys kindly. He hated him by +intuition, and a liking for him had not been begotten by Betsey's +assurances that he was making headway with Julia. August was riding +astride a bag of corn on his way to mill, when Humphreys, taking a +walk, met him. + +"A pleasant day, Mr. Wehle!" + +"Yes," said August, with a courtesy as mechanical as Humphreys's smile. + +The singing-master was rather pleased than otherwise to see that August +disliked him. It suited his purpose, just now to gall Wehle into saying +what he would not otherwise have said. + +"I hear you are in trouble," he proceeded. + +"How so?" + +"Oh! I hear that Mrs. Anderson doesn't like Dutchmen." The smile now +seemed to have something of a sneer in it. + +"I don't know that that is your affair," said August, all his +suspicions, by a sort of "resolution of force," changing into anger. + +"Oh! I beg pardon," with a tone half-mocking. "I did not know but I +might help settle matters. I think I have Mrs. Anderson's confidence; +and I know that I have Miss Anderson's confidence in an unusual degree. +I think a great deal of her. And she thinks me _her friend_ at least. I +thought that there might be some little matters yet unsettled between +you two, and she suggested that maybe there might be something you would +like to say, and that if you would say it to me, it would be all the +same as if it were said to her. She considers that in the relation I +bear to her and the family, a message delivered to me is the same in +effect as if given to her. I told her I did not think you would, as a +gentleman, wish to hold her to any promises that might be irksome to +her now." + +These words were spoken with a coolness and maliciousness of good-nature +quite devilish, and August's fist involuntarily doubled itself to strike +him, if only to make him cease smiling in that villainous rectangular +way. But he checked himself. + +"You are a puppy. Tell _that_ to Jule, if you choose. I shall send her a +release from all obligations, but not by the hand of a rascal!" + +Like all desperadoes, Humphreys was a coward. He could shoot, but he +could not fight, and just now he was affecting the pious or at least the +high moral role, and had left his pistols, brandy-flasks, and the other +necessary appurtenances of a gentleman, locked in his trunk. Besides it +would not at all have suited his purpose to shoot. So in lieu of +shooting he only smiled, as August rode off, that same old geometric +smile, the elements of which were all calculated. He seemed incapable of +any other facial contortion. It expressed one emotion, indeed, about as +well as another, and was therefore as convenient as those pocket-knives +which affect to contain a chest of tools in one. + +[Illustration: "TELL THAT TO JULE."] + +Julia was already stung to jealousy by Betsey Malcolm's +mischief-making, and it did not require much more to put her into a +frenzy. As they walked home from meeting the next night--they had +meeting all nights now, the world would soon end and there was so much +to be done--as they walked home Humphreys contrived to separate Julia +from the rest, and to tell her that he had had a conversation with +young Wehle. + +"It was painful, very painful," he said, "I think I had better not say +any more about it." + +"Why?" asked Julia in terror. + +"Well, I feel that your grief is mine. I have never felt so much +interest in any one before, and I must say that I was grievously +disappointed. This young man is not at all worthy of you." + +"What do you mean?" And there was a trace of indignation in her tone. + +"It does seem to me that the man who has your love should be the +happiest in the world; but he refused to send you any message, and says +that he will soon send you an entire release from all engagement to him. +He showed no tenderness and made no inquiry." + +The weakest woman and the strongest can faint. It is a woman's last +resort. When all else is gone, that remains. Julia drew a sharp quick +breath, and was just about to become unconscious. Humphreys stretched +his arms to catch her, but the sudden recollection that in case she +fainted he would carry her into the house, produced a reaction. She +released herself from his grasp, and hurried in alone, locking her door, +and refusing admittance to her mother. From Humphreys, who had put +himself into a delicate minor key, Mrs. Anderson got such an account of +the conversation as he thought best to give. She then opened and read a +note placed into her hand by a neighbor as she came out from meeting. It +was addressed to Julia, and ran: + +"If all they say is true, you have quickly changed. I do not hold you by +any promises you wish to break. + +"AUGUST WEHLE." + +Mrs. Anderson had no pity. She hesitated not an instant. Julia's door +was fast. But she went out upon the front upper porch, and pushing up +the window of her daughter's room as remorselessly as she had committed +the burglary on her private letter, she looked at her a moment, sobbing +on the bed, and then threw the letter into the room, saying: "It's good +for you. Read that, and see what a fellow your Dutchman is." + +Then Mrs. Anderson sought her couch, and slept with a serene sense, of +having done _her_ duty as a mother, whatever might be the result. + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +THE SPIDER SPINS. + +Julia got up from her bed the moment that her mother had gone. Her first +feeling was that her privacy had been shamefully outraged. A true mother +should honorably respect the reserve of the little child. But Julia was +now a woman, grown, with a woman's spirit. She rose from her bed, and +shut her window with a bang that was meant to be a protest. She then put +the tenpenny nail sometimes used to fasten the window down, in its +place, as if to say, "Come in, if you can." Then she pulled out the +folds of the chintz curtain, hanging on its draw-string half-way up the +window. If there had been any other precaution possible, she would have +taken it. But there was not. + +She took up the note, and read it. Julia was not a girl of keen +penetration. Her training was that of a country life. She did not read +between the lines of August's note, and could only understand that she +was dismissed. Outraged by her mother's tyranny, spurned by her lover, +she stood like a hunted creature, brought to bay, looking for the last +desperate chance for escape. + +Crushed? No. If she had been weaker, if she had been of the quieter, +frailer sort, instead of being, as she was, elastic, impulsive, +recuperative, she might have been crushed. She was wounded in her heart +of hearts, but all her pride and hardihood, of which she had not a +little, had now taken up arms against outrageous fortune. She was stung +at every thought of August and his letter, of Betsey Malcolm and her +victory, of the fact that her mother had read the letter and knew of her +humiliation. And she paced the floor of her room, and resolved to resist +and to be revenged. She would marry anybody, that she might show Betsey +and August they had not broken he heart and that her love did not +go begging. + +O Julia! take care. Many another woman has jumped off that precipice! + +And she would escape from her mother. The indications of affection +adroitly given by Humphreys were all remembered now. She could have him, +and she would. He would take her to Cincinnati. She would have her +revenge all around. I am sorry to show you my heroine in this mood. But +the fairest climes are sometimes subject to the fiercest hurricanes, the +frightfulest earthquakes! + +After an hour the room seemed hot. She pulled back the chintz curtain +and pushed up the window. The blue-grass in the pasture looked cool as +it drank the heavy dews. She climbed through the window on to the long, +old-fashioned upper porch. She sat down upon an old-fashioned settee +with rockers, and began to rock. The motion relieved her nervousness and +fanned her hot cheeks. Yes, she would accept the first respectable lover +that offered. She would go to the city with Humphreys, if he asked her. +It is only fair to say that Julia did not at all consider--she was not +in a temper to consider--what a marriage with Humphreys implied. She +only thought of it on two sides--the revenge upon August and Betsey, +and the escape from a thralldom now grown more bitter than death. True, +her conscience was beginning to awaken, and to take up arms against her +resolve. But nothing could be plainer. In marrying Mr. Humphreys she +should marry a friend, the only friend she had. In marrying him she +would satisfy her mother, and was it not her duty to sacrifice something +to her mother's happiness, perhaps her mother's life? + +[Illustration: TEMPTED.] + +Yes, yes, Julia, a false spirit of self-sacrifice is another path over +the cliff! In such a mood as this all paths lead into the abyss. + +Her mind was made up. She braced her will against all the relentings of +her heart. She wished that Humphreys, who had indirectly declared his +love so often, were there to offer at once. She would accept him +immediately, and then the whole neighborhood should not say that she had +been deserted by a Dutchman. For in her anger she found her mother's +epithets expressive. + +He was there! Was it the devil that planned it? Does he plan all those +opportunities for wrong that are so sure to offer themselves? Humphreys, +having led a life that turned night into day, sat at the farther end of +the long upper porch, smoking his cigar, waiting a bed-time nearer to +the one to which he was accustomed. + +Did he suspect the struggle in the heart of Julia Anderson? Did he guess +that her pride and defiance had by this time reached high-water mark? +Did he divine this from seeing her there? He rose and started in through +the door of the upper hall, the only opening to the porch, except the +window. But this was a feint. He turned back and sat himself down upon +the farther end of the settee from Julia. He understood human nature +perfectly, and had had long practice in making gradual approaches. He +begged her pardon for the bungling manner in which he had communicated +intelligence that must be so terrible to a heart so sensitive! Julia was +just going to declare that she did not care anything for what August +said or thought, but her natural truthfulness checked the transparent +falsehood. She had not gone far enough astray to lie consciously; she +was, as yet, only telling lies to herself. Very gradually and cautiously +did he proceed so as not to "flush the bird." Even as I saw, an hour +ago, a cat creep upon a sparrow with fascinating eyes, and a waving, +snake-like motion of the tail, and a treacherous feline smile upon her +face, even so, cautiously and by degrees, Humphreys felt his way with +velvet paws toward his prey. He knew the opportunity, that once gone +might not come again; he soon guessed that this was the hour and power +of darkness in the soul of Julia, the hour in which she would seek to +flee from her own pride and mortification. And if Humphreys knew how to +approach with a soft tread, very slowly and cautiously, he also +knew--men of his "profession" always know--when to spring. He saw the +moment, he made the spring, he seized the prey. + +"Will you trust your destiny to me, Miss Anderson? You seem beset by +troubles. I have means. I could not but he wholly devoted to your +welfare. Let me help you to flee away from--from all this mortification, +and this--this domestic tyranny. Will you intrust yourself to me?" + +He did not say anything about love. He had an instinctive feeling that +it would not be best. She felt herself environed with insurmountable +difficulties, threatened with agonies worse than death--so they seemed +to her. He simply, coolly opened the door, and bade her easily and +triumphantly escape. Had he said one word of tenderness the reaction +must have set in. + +She was silent. + +"I did hope, by sacrificing all my own hopes, to effect a +reconciliation. But when that young man spoke insulting words about you, +I determined at once to offer you my devoted protection. I ask no more +than you are able to give, your respect Will you accept my life-long +protection as your husband?" + +"Yes!" said the passionate girl in an agony of despair + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + +THE SPIDER'S WEB. + +Now that Humphreys had his prey he did not know just what to do with it. +Not knowing what to say, he said nothing, in which he showed his wisdom. +But he felt that saying nothing was almost as bad as saying something. +And he was right. For with people of impulsive temperament reactions are +sudden, and in one minute after Julia had said yes, there came to her +memory the vision of August standing in the barn and looking into her +eyes so purely and truly and loyally, and vowing such sweet vows of +love, and she looked back upon that perfect hour with some such fooling +perhaps as Dives felt looking out of torment across the great gulf into +paradise. Only that Dives had never known paradise, while she had. For +the man or woman that knows a pure, self-sacrificing love, returned in +kind, knows that which, of all things in this world, lies nearest to God +and heaven. There be those who have ears to hear this, and for them is +it written. Julia thought of August's love with a sinking into despair. +But then returned the memory of his faithlessness, of all she had been +compelled to believe and suffer. Then her agony came back, and she was +glad that she had taken a decided step. Any escape was a relief. I +suppose it is under some such impulse that people kill themselves. Julia +felt as though she had committed suicide and escaped. + +Humphreys on his part was not satisfied. I used the wrong figure of +speech awhile ago. He was not a cat with paw upon the prey. He was only +an angler, and had but hooked his fish. He had not landed it yet. He +felt how slender was the thread of committal by which he held Julia. +August had her heart. He had only a word. The slender vantage that he +had, he meant to use adroitly, craftily. And he knew that the first +thing was to close this interview without losing any ground. The longer +she remained bound, the better for him. And with his craft against the +country girl's simplicity it would have fared badly with Julia had it +not been for one defect which always inheres, in a bad man's plots in +such a case. A man like Humphreys never really understands a pure woman. +Certain detached facts he may know, but he can not "put himself in +her place." + +Humphreys remarked with tenderness that Julia must not stay in the night +air. She was too precious to be exposed. This flattery was comforting to +her wounded pride, and she found his words pleasant to her. Had he +stopped here he might have left the field victorious. But it was very +hard for an affianced lover to stop here. He must part from her in some +other way than this if he would leave on her mind the impression that +she was irrevocably bound to him. He stooped quickly with a +well-affected devotion and lifted her hand to kiss it. That act +awakened Julia Anderson. She must have awaked anyhow, sooner or later. +But when one is in the toils of such a man, sooner is better. The touch +of Humphreys's hand and lips sent a shudder through her frame that +Humphreys felt. Instantly there came to her a perception of all that +marriage with a repulsive man signifies. + +Not suicide, but perdition. + +She jerked her hand from his as though he were a snake. + +"Mr. Humphreys, what did I say? I can't have you. I don't love you. I'm +crazy to-night. I must take back what I said." + +"No, Julia. Let me call you _my_ Julia. You must not break my heart." +Humphreys had lost his cue, and every word of tenderness he spoke made +his case more hopeless. + +"I never can marry you--let me go in," she said, brushing past him. Then +she remembered that her door was fast on the inside. She had climbed out +the window. She turned back, and he saw his advantage. + +"I can not release you. Take time to think before you ask it. Go to +sleep now and do not act hastily." He stood between her and the window, +wishing to get some word to which he could hold. + +Julia's two black eyes grew brighter. "I see. You took advantage of my +trouble, and you want to hold me to my words, and you are bad, and +now--_now_ I hate you!" Then Julia felt better. Hate is the only +wholesome thing in such a case. She pushed him aside vigorously, stepped +upon the settee, slipped in at the window, and closed it. She drew the +curtain, but it seemed thin, and with characteristic impulsiveness she +put out her light that she might have the friendly drapery of +darkness about her. She heard the soft--for the first time it seemed +to her stealthy--tread of Humphreys, as he returned to his room. Whether +she swooned or whether she slept after that she never knew. It was +morning without any time intervening, she had a headache and could +scarcely walk, and there was August's note lying on the floor. She read +it again--if not with more intelligence, at least with more suspicion. +She wondered at her own hastiness. She tried to go about the house, but +the excitement of the previous night, added to all she had suffered +beside, had given her a headache, blinding and paralyzing, that sent her +back to bed. + +[Illustration: "NOW I HATE YOU!"] + +And there she lay in that half-asleep, half-awake mood, which a nervous +headache produces. She seemed to be a fly in a web, and the spider was +trying to fasten her. A very polite spider, with that smile which went +half-way up his face but which never seemed able to reach his eyes. He +had straps to his pantaloons, and a reddish mustache, and she shuddered +as he wound his fine webs about her. She tried to shake off the +illusion. But the more absurd an illusion, the more it will not be +shaken off. For see! the spider was kissing her hand! Then she seemed to +have made a great effort and to have broken the web. But her wings were +torn, and her feet were shackled by the fine strands that still adhered. +She could not get them off. Wouldn't somebody help her, even as she had +many a time picked off the webs from a fly's feet out of sheer pity? And +all day she would perpetually return into these half-conscious states +and feel the spider's web about her feet, and ask over and over again if +somebody wouldn't help her to get out of the meshes. + +Toward evening her mother brought her a cup of tea and a piece of +toast, and for the first time in the remembered life of the daughter +made an endeavor to show a little tenderness for her. It was a clumsy +endeavor, for when the great gulf is once fixed between mother and child +it is with difficulty bridged. And finding herself awkward in the new +role, Mrs. Anderson dropped it and resumed her old gait, remarking, as +she closed the door, that she was glad to know that Julia was coming to +her senses, and "had took the right road." For Mrs. Abigail was more +vigorous than grammatical. + +Julia did not see anything significant in this remark at first. But +after a while it came to her that Humphreys must have told her mother of +something that had passed during the preceding night, something on which +this commendation was founded. Then she fell into the same torpor and +was in the same old spider's web, and there was the same spider with the +limited smile and the mustache and the watch-seals and the straps! And +he was trying to fasten her, and she said "yes." And she could see the +little word. The spider caught it and spun it into a web and fastened +her with it. And she could break all the other webs but those woven out +of that one little word from her own lips. That clung to her, and she +could neither fly nor walk. August could not help her--he would not +come. Her mother was helping the spider. Just then Cynthy Ann came along +with her broom. Would she see her and sweep her free? She tried to call +her, but alas! she was a fly. She tried to buzz, but her wings were fast +bound with the webs. She was being smothered. The spider had seized her. +She could not move. He was smiling at her! + +Then she woke shuddering. It was after midnight. + + + +CHAPTER XV. + +THE WEB BROKEN. + +"Poverty," says Béranger, "is always superstitious." So indeed is human +extremity of any sort. Julia's healthy constitution had resisted the +threatened illness, the feverishness had gone with the headache. She +felt now only one thing: she must have a friend. But the hard piousness +of Cynthy Ann's face had never attracted her sympathy. It had always +seemed to her that Cynthy disapproved of her affection quite as much as +her mother did. Cynthy's face had indeed a chronic air of disapproval. A +nervous young minister said that he never had any "liberty" when sister +Cynthy Ann was in his congregation. She seemed averse to all he said. + +But now Julia felt that there was just one chance of getting advice and +help. Had she not in her dream seen Cynthy Ann with a broom? She would +ask help from Cynthy Ann. There must be a heart under her rind. + +But to get to her. Her mother's affectionate vigilance never left her +alone with Cynthy. Perhaps it was this very precaution that had +suggested Cynthy Ann to her as a possible ally. She must contrive to +have a talk with her somehow. But how? There was one way. Black-eyed +people do not delay. Bight or wrong, Julia acted with sharp decision. +Before she had any very definite view of her plan, she had arisen and +slipped on a calico dress. But there was one obstacle. Mr. Humphreys +kept late hours, and he might be on the front-porch. She might meet him +in the hall, and this seemed worse to her than would the chance of +meeting a tribe of Indians. She listened and looked out of her window; +but she could not be sure; she would run the risk. With silent feet and +loud-beating heart she went down the hall to the back upper porch, for +in that day porches were built at the back and front of houses, above +and below. Once on the back-porch she turned to the right and stood by +Cynthy Ann's door. But a new fear took possession of her. If Cynthy Ann +should be frightened and scream! + +[Illustration: AT CYNTHY'S DOOR.] + +"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!" she said, standing by the bed in the little bare +room which Cynthy Ann had occupied, for five years, but into which she +had made no endeavor to bring one ray of sentiment or one trace +of beauty. + +"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!" + +Had Cynthy Ann slept anywhere but in the L of the house, her +shriek--what woman could have helped shrieking a little when +startled?--her shriek must have alarmed the family. But it did not. +"Why, child! what are you doing here? You are out of your head, and you +must go back to your room at once." And Cynthy had arisen and was +already tugging at Julia's arm. + +"I a'n't out of my head, Cynthy Ann, and I _won't_ go back to my +room--not until I have had a talk with you." + +"What _is_ the matter, Jule?" said Cynthy, sitting on the bed and +preparing to begin again her old fight between duty and inclination. +Cynthy always expected temptation. She had often said in class-meeting +that temptations abounded on every hand, and as soon as Julia told her +she had a communication to make, Cynthy Ann was sure that she would find +in it some temptation of the devil to do something she "hadn't orter +do," according to the Bible or the Dis_cip_line, strictly construed. +And Cynthy was a "strict constructionist." + +Julia did not find it so easy to say anything now that she had announced +herself as determined to have a conversation and now that her auditor +was waiting. It is the worst beginning in the world for a conversation, +saying that you intend to converse. When an Indian has announced his +intention of having a "big talk," he immediately lights his pipe and +relapses into silence until the big talk shall break out accidentally +and naturally. But Julia, having neither the pipe nor the Indian's +stolidity, found herself under the necessity of beginning abruptly. +Every minute of delay made her position worse. For every minute +increased her doubt of Cynthy Ann's sympathy. + +"O Cynthy Ann! I'm so miserable!" + +"Yes, I told your ma this morning that you was looking mis'able, and +that you had orter have sassafras to purify the blood, but your ma is so +took up with steam-docterin' that she don't believe in nothin' but +corn-sweats and such like." + +"Oh! but, Cynthy, it a'n't that. I'm miserable in my mind. I wish I knew +what to do." + +"I thought you'd made up your mind. Your ma told me you was engaged to +Mr. Humphreys." + +Julia was appalled. How fast the spider spins his web! + +"I a'n't engaged to him, and I hate him. He got me to say yes when I was +crazy, and I believe he brought about the things that make me feel so +nigh crazy. Do you think he's a good man, Cynthy Ann?" + +"Well, no, though I don't want to set in no jedgment on nobody; but I +don't see as how as he kin be good and wear all of them costly apparels +that's so forbid in the Bible, to say nothing of the Dis_cip_line. The +Bible says you must know a tree by its fruits, and I 'low his'n is +mostly watch-seals. I think a good sound conversion at the mourners' +bench would make him strip off some of them things, and put them into +the missionary collection. Though maybe he a'n't so bad arter all, fer +Jonas says that liker'n not the things a'n't gold, but pewter washed +over. But I'm afeard he's wor'ly-minded. But I don't want to be too hard +on a feller-creatur'." + +[Illustration: CYNTHY ANN HAD OFTEN SAID IN CLASS-MEETING THAT +TEMPTATIONS ABOUNDED ON EVERY HAND.] + +"Cynthy, I drempt just now I was a fly and he was a spider, and that he +had me all wrapped up in his web, and that just then you came along +with a broom." + +"That must be a sign," said Cynthy Ann. "It's good you didn't dream +after daylight. Then 'twould a come true. But what about _him?_ I +thought you loved Gus Wehle, and though I'm afeard you're makin' a idol +out o' him, and though I'm afeard he's a onbeliever, and I don't noways +like marryin' with onbelievers, yet I did want to help you, and I +brought a note from him wunst and put it under the head of your bed. I +was afeard then I was doin' what Timothy forbids, when he says not to be +pertakers in other folks's sins, but, you see, how could I help doin' +it, when you was lookin' so woebegone like, and Jonas, he axed me to do +it. It's awful hard to say you won't to Jonas, you know. So I put the +letter there, and I don't doubt your ma mistrusted it, and got a holt +on it." + +"Did he write to me? A'n't he going with that Betsey Malcolm?" + +"Can't be, I 'low. On'y this evenin' Jonas said to me, says he, when I +tole him you was engaged to Mr. Humphreys, says he, in his way, 'The +hawk's lit, has he? That'll be the death of two,' says he, 'fer she'll +die on it, an' so'll poor Gus,' says he. And then he went on to tell as +how as Gus is all ready to leave, and had axed him to tell him of any +news; but he said he wouldn't tell him that. He'd leave him some hope. +Fer he says Gus was mighty nigh distracted to-day, that is yisterday, +fer its most mornin' I 'low." + +Now this speech did Julia a world of good. It showed her that Gus was +not faithless, that she might count on Cynthy, and that Jonas was her +friend, and that he did not like Humphreys. Jonas called him a hawk. +That agreed with her dream. He was a hawk and a spider. + +"But, Cynthy Ann, I got a letter night before last; ma threw it in the +window. In it Gus said he released me. I hadn't asked any release. What +did he mean?" + +"Honey, I wish I could help you. It's that hawk, as Jonas calls him, +that's at the bottom of all this trouble. I don't believe but what he's +told some lies or 'nother. I don't believe but what he's a bad man. I +allers said I didn't 'low no good could come of a man that puts on +costly apparel and wears straps. I'm afeard you're making a idol of Gus +Wehle. Don't do it. Ef you do, God'll take him. Misses Pearsons made a +idol of her baby, a kissin' it and huggin' it every minute, and I said, +says I, Misses Pearsons, you hadn't better make a idol of a perishin' +creature. And sure enough, God tuck it. He's jealous of our idols. But I +can't help helpin' you. You're a onbeliever yet yourself, and I 'low +taint no sin fer you to marry Gus. It's yokin' like with like. I wish +you was both Christians. I'll speak to Jonas. I don't know what I ought +to do, but I'll speak to Jonas. He's mighty peart about sech things, is +Jonas, and got as _good_ a heart as you ever see. And--" + +"Cynth-ee A-ann!" It was the energetic voice of Mrs. Anderson rousing +the house betimes. For the first time Julia and Cynthy Ann noticed the +early light creeping in at the window. They sat still, paralyzed. + +"Cynth-ee!" The voice was now at the top of the stairs, for Mrs. +Anderson always carried the war into Africa if Cynthy did not wake +at once. + +"Answer quick, Cynthy Ann, or she'll be in here!" said Julia, sliding +behind the bed. + +"Ma'am!" said Cynthy Ann, starting toward the door, where she met Mrs. +Abigail. "I'm up," said Cynthy. + +"Well, what makes you so long a-answerin' then? You make me climb the +steps, and you know I may drop down dead of heart-disease any day. I'll +go and wake Jule." + +"Better let her lay awhile," said Cynthy, reproaching herself instantly +for the deception. + +Mrs. Anderson hesitated at the top of the stairs. + +"Jul-yee!" she called. Poor Jule shook from head to foot. "I guess I'll +let her lay awhile; but I'm afraid I've already spoiled the child by +indulgence," said the mother, descending the stairs. She relented only +because she believed Julia was conquered. + +"I declare, child, it's a shame I should be helping you to disobey your +mother. I'm afeard the Lord'll bring some jedgment on us yet." For +Cynthy Ann had tied her conscience to her rather infirm logic. Better to +have married it to her generous heart. But before she had finished the +half-penitent lamentation, Jule was flying with swift and silent feet +down the hall. Arrived in her own room, she was so much relieved as to +be almost happy; and she was none too soon, for her industrious mother +had quickly repented her criminal leniency, and was again climbing the +stairs at the imminent risk of her precarious life, and calling +"Jul-yee!" + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + +JONAS EXPOUNDS THE SUBJECT. + +"I 'lowed I'd ketch you here, my venerable and reliable feller-citizen!" +said Jonas as he entered the lower story of Andrew Anderson's castle and +greeted August, sitting by Andrew's loom. It was the next evening after +Julia's interview with Cynthy Ann. "When do you 'low to leave this +terry-firmy and climb a ash-saplin'? To-night, hey? Goin' to the Queen +City to take to steamboat life in hopes of havin' your sperrits raised +by bein' blowed up? Take my advice and don't make haste in the downward +road to destruction, nor the up-hill one nuther. A game a'n't never +through tell it's played out, an' the American eagle's a chicken with +steel spurs. That air sweet singer of Israel that is so hifalugeon he +has to anchor hisself to his boots, knows all the tricks, and is +intimately acquainted with the kyards, whether it's faro, poker, euchre, +or French monte. But blamed ef Providence a'n't dealed you a better +hand'n you think. Never desperandum, as the Congressmen say, fer while +the lamp holds out to burn you may beat the blackleg all to flinders +and sing and shout forever. Last night I went to bed thinkin' 'Umphreys +had the stakes all in his pocket. This mornin' I found he was in a far +way to be beat outen his boots ef you stood yer ground like a man and a +gineological descendant of Plymouth Rock!" + +Andrew stopped his loom, and, looking at August, said: "Our friend Jonas +speaks somewhat periphrastically and euphuistically, and--he'll pardon +me--but he speaks a little ambiguously." + +"My love, I gin it up, as the fish-hawk said to the bald eagle one day. +I kin rattle off odd sayings and big words picked up at Fourth-of-Julys +and barbecues and big meetins, but when you begin to fire off your +forty-pound bomb-shell book-words, I climb down as suddent as Davy +Crockett's coon. Maybe I do speak unbiguously, as you say, but I was +givin' you the biggest talkin' I had in the basket. And as fer my good +news, a feller don't like to eat up all his country sugar to wunst, I +'low. But I says to our young and promisin' friend of German extraction, +beloved, says I, hold onto that air limb a little longer and +you're saved." + +"But, Jonas," said August, spinning Andrew's winding-blade round and +speaking slowly and bitterly, "a man don't like to be trifled with, if +he is a Dutchman!" + +"But sposin' a man hain't been trifled with, Dutchman or no +Dutchman? Sposin' it's all a optical delusion of the yeers? +There's a word fer _you_, Andrew, that a'n't nuther unbiguous +nor peri-what-you-may-call-it." + +"But," said August, "Betsey Malcolm--" + +"_Betsey Malcolm!_" said Jonas. "Betsey Malcolm to thunder!" and then he +whistled. "Set a dog to mind a basket of meat when his chops is +a-waterin' fer it! Set a kingfisher to take keer of a fish-pond! Set a +cat to raisin' your orphan chickens on the bottle! Set a spider to nuss +a fly sick with dyspepsy from eatin' too much molasses! I'd ruther trust +a hen-hawk with a flock of patridges than to trust Betsey Malcolm with +your affairs. I ha'n't walked behind you from meetin' and seed her head +a bobbin' like a bluebird's and her eyes a blazin an' all that, fer +nothin'. Like as not, Betsey Malcolm's more nor half your trouble in +that quarter." + +"But she said--" + +"It don't matter three quarters of a rotten rye-straw what she said, my +inexper'enced friend. She don't keer what she says, so long as it's fur +enough away from the truth to sarve her turn. An' she's told pay-tent +double-back-action lies that worked both ways. What do you 'low Jule +Anderson tho't when she hearn tell of your courtin' Betsey, as Betsey +told it, with all her nods an' little crowin'? Now looky here, Gus, I'm +your friend, as the Irishman said to the bar that hugged him, an' I want +to say about all that air that Betsey told you, spit on the slate an' +wipe that all off. They's lie in her soap an.' right smart chance of +saft-soap in her lie, I 'low." + +These rough words of Jonas brought a strange intelligence into the mind +of August. He saw so many things in a moment that had lain under his +eyes unnoticed. + +"There is much rough wisdom in your speech, Jonas," said Andrew. + +"That's a fact. You and me used to go to school to old Benefield +together when I was little and you was growed up. You allers beat +everybody all holler in books and spellin'-matches, Andy. But I 'low I +cut my eye-teeth 'bout as airly as some of you that's got more larnin' +under your skelp. Now, I say to our young friend and feller-citizen, +don't go 'way tell you've spoke a consolin' word to a girl as'll stick +to you tell the hour and article of death, and then remains yours truly +forever, amen." + +[Illustration: JONAS.] + +"How do you know that, Jonas?" said August, smiling in spite of himself. + +"How do I know it? Why, by the testimony of a uncorrupted and +disinterested witness, gentlemen of the jury, if the honorable court +pleases. What did that Jule Anderson do, poor thing, but spend some +time making a most onseasonable visit to Cynthy Ann last night? And I +'low ef there's a ole gal in this sublunary spear as tells the truth in +a bee-line and no nonsense, it's that there same, individooal, identical +Cynthy Ann. She's most afeard to drink cold water or breathe fresh air +fer fear she'll commit a unpard'nable sin. And that persecuted young +pigeon that thought herself forsooken, jest skeeted into Cynthy Ann's +budwoir afore daybreak this mornin' and told her all her sorrows, and +how your letter and your goin' with that Betsey Malcolm"--here August +winced--"had well nigh druv her to run off with the straps and +watch-seals to get rid of you and Betsey and her precious and mighty +affectionate ma." + +"But she won't look at me in meeting, and she sent Humphreys to me with +an insulting message." + +"Which text divides itself into two parts, my brethren and +feller-travelers to etarnity. To treat the last head first, beloved, I +admonish you not to believe a blackleg, unless it's under sarcumstances +when he's got onusual and airresistible temptations to tell the truth. I +don't advise yer to spit on the slate and rub it out in this case. Break +the slate and throw it away. To come to the second pertikeler, which is +the first in the order of my text, my attentive congregation. She didn't +look at you in meetin'. Now, I 'spose you don't know nothin' of her +mother's heart-disease. Heart-disease is trumps with Abigail Anderson. +She plays that every turn. Just think of a young gal who thinks that ef +she looks at her beau when her mother's by, she might kill her +invalooable parient of heart-disease. Fer my part, I don't take no stock +in Mrs. Abby Anderson's dyin' of heart-disease, no ways. Might as well +talk about a whale dyin' of footrot." + +"Well, Jonas, what counsel do you give our young friend? Your sagacity +is to be depended on." + +"Why, I advise him to speak face to face with the angel of his life. Let +him climb into my room to-night. Leave meetin' jest afore the +benediction--he kin do without that wunst--and go double-quick acrost +the fields, and git safe into my stoodio. Ferther pertikelers when the +time arrives." + + + +CHAPTER XVII. + +THE WRONG PEW. + +August's own good sense told him that the advice of Jonas was not good. +But he had made many mistakes of late, and was just now inclined to take +anybody's judgment in place of his own. All that was proud and +gentlemanly in him rebelled at the thought of creeping into another +man's house in the night. Modesty is doubtless a virtue, but it is a +virtue responsible for many offenses. Had August not felt so distrustful +of his own wisdom, nothing could have persuaded him to make his love for +Julia Anderson seem criminal by an action so wanting in dignity. But +back of Jonas's judgment was that of Andrew, whose weakness was +Quixotism. He wanted to live and to have others live on the +concert-pitch of romantic action. There was something of chivalry in the +proposal of Jonas, a spice of adventure that made him approve it on +purely sentimental grounds. + +The more August thought of it, and the nearer he was to its execution, +the more did he dislike it. But I have often noticed that people of a +rather quiet temperament, such as young Wehle's, show _vis inertiae_ in +both, ways--not very easily moved, they are not easily checked when once +in motion. August's velocity was not usually great, his momentum was +tremendous, and now that he had committed himself to the hands of Jonas +Harrison and set out upon this enterprise, he was determined, in his +quiet way, to go through to the end. + +Of course he understood the house, and having left the family in +meeting, he had nothing to do but to scale one of the pillars of the +front-porch. In those Arcadian days upper windows were hardly ever +fastened, except when the house was deserted by all its inmates for +days. Half-way up the post he was seized with a violent trembling. His +position brought to him a confused memory of a text of Scripture: "He +that entereth not by the door ... but climbeth up some other way, the +same is a thief and a robber." Bred under Moravian influence, he +half-believed the text to be supernaturally suggested to him. For a +moment his purpose wavered, but the habit of going through with an +undertaking took the place of his will, and he went on blindly, as Baker +the Nile explorer did, "more like a donkey than like a man." Once on the +upper porch he hesitated again. To break into a man's house in this way +was unlawful. His conscience troubled him. In vain he reasoned that Mrs. +Anderson's despotism was morally wrong, and that this action was right +as an offset to it. He knew that it was not right. + +I want to remark here that there are many situations in life in which a +conscience is dreadfully in the way. There are people who go straight +ahead to success--such as it is--with no embarrassments, no fire in the +rear from any scruples. Some of these days I mean to write an essay on +"The Inconvenience of having a Conscience," in which I shall proceed to +show that it costs more in the course of a year or two, than it would to +keep a stableful of fast horses. Many a man could afford to drive +Dexters and Flora Temples who would be ruined by a conscience. But I +must not write the essay here, for I am keeping August out in the night +air and his perplexity all this time. + +August Wehle had the habit, I think I have said, of going through with +an enterprise. He had another habit, a very inconvenient habit +doubtless, but a very manly one, of listening for the voice of his +conscience. And I think that this habit would have even yet turned him +back, as he had his hand on the window-sash, had it not been that while +he stood there trying to find out just what was the decision of his +conscience, he heard the voices of the returning family. There was no +time to lose, there was no shelter on the porch, in a minute more they +would be in sight. He must go ahead now, for retreat was cut off. He +lifted the window and climbed into the room, lowering the sash gently +behind him. As no one ever came into this room but Jonas, he felt safe +enough. Jonas would plan a meeting after midnight in Cynthy Ann's room, +and in Cynthy Ann's presence. + +In groping for a chair, August drew aside the curtain of the +gable-window, hoping to get some light. Had Jonas taken to cultivating +flowers in pots? Here was a "monthly" rose on the window-seat! Surely +this was the room. He had occupied it during his stay in the house. But +he did not know that Mrs. Anderson had changed the arrangement between +his leaving and the coming of Jonas. He noticed that the curtains were +not the same. He trembled from head to foot. He felt for the bureau, and +recognized by various little articles, a pincushion, a tuck-comb, and +the sun-bonnet hanging against the window-frame, that he was in Julia's +room. His first emotion was not alarm. It was awe, as pure and solemn as +the high-priest may have felt in the holy place. Everything pertaining +to Julia had a curious sacredness, and this room was a temple into which +it was sacrilege to intrude. But a more practical question took his +attention soon. The family had come in below, except Jonas and Cynthy +Ann--who had walked slowly, planning a meeting for August--and Mr. +Samuel Anderson, who stood at the front-gate with a neighbor. August +could hear his shrill voice discussing the seventh trumpet and the +thousand three hundred and thirty and five days. It would not do to be +discovered where he was. Beside the fright he would give to Julia, he +shuddered at the thought of compromising her in such a way. To go back +was to insure his exposure, for Samuel Anderson had not yet half-settled +the question of the trumpets. Indeed it seemed to August that the world +might come to an end before that conversation would. He heard Humphreys +enter his room. He was now persuaded that the room formerly occupied by +Julia must be Jonas's, and he determined to get to it if he could. He +felt like a villain already. He would have cheerfully gone to +State's-prison in preference to compromising Julia. At any rate, he +started out of Julia's room toward the one that was occupied by Jonas. +It was the only road open, and but for an unexpected encounter he would +have reached his hiding-place in safety, for the door was but fifteen +feet away. + +In order to explain the events that follow, I must ask the reader to go +back to Julia, and to events that had occurred two hours before. +Hitherto she had walked to and from meeting and "singing" with +Humphreys, as a matter of courtesy. On the evening in question she had +absolutely refused to walk with him. Her mother found that threats were +as vain as coaxing. Even her threat of dying with heart-disease, then +and there, killed by her daughter's disobedience, could not move Julia, +who would not even speak with the "spider." Her mother took her into the +sitting-room alone, and talked with her. + +"So this is the way you trifle with gentlemen, is it? Night before last +you engaged yourself to Mr. Humphreys, now you won't speak to him. To +think that my daughter should prove a heartless flirt!" + +I am afraid that the unfilial thought came into Julia's mind that +nothing could have been more in the usual order of things than that the +daughter of a coquette should be a flirt. + +"You'll kill me on the spot; you certainly will." Julia felt anxious, +for her mother showed signs of going into hysterics. But she put her +foot out and shook her head in a way that said that all her friends +might die and all the world might go to pieces before she would yield. +Mrs. Anderson had one forlorn hope. She determined to order that +forward. Leaving Julia alone, she went to her husband. + +"Samuel, if you value my life go and speak to your daughter. She's got +your own stubbornness of will in her. She is just like you; she _will_ +have her own way. I shall die." And Mrs. Abigail Anderson sank into a +chair with unmistakable symptoms of a hysterical attack. + +I am aware that I have so far let the reader hear not one word of Samuel +Anderson's conversation. He has played a rather insignificant part in +the story. Nothing could be more _comme il faut_. Insignificance was his +characteristic. It was not so much that he was small. It is not so bad a +thing to be a little man. But to be little and insignificant also is +bad. There is only one thing worse, which is to be big and +insignificant. If one is little and insignificant, one may be +overlooked, insignificance and all. But if one is big and insignificant, +it is to be an obtrusive cipher, a great lubber, not easily kept out +of sight. + +Appealed to by his wife, Samuel Anderson prepared to assert his +authority as the head of the family. He almost strutted into Julia's +presence. Julia had a real affection for her father, and nothing +mortified her more than to see him acting as a puppet, moved by her +mother, and yet vain enough to believe himself independent and supreme. +She would have yielded almost any other point to have saved herself the +mortification of seeing her father act the fool; but now she had +determined that she would die and let everybody else die rather than +walk with a man whose nature seemed to her corrupt, and whose touch was +pollution. I do not mean that she was able to make a distinct inventory +of her reasons for disliking him, or to analyze her feelings. She could +not have told just why she had so deep and utter a repugnance to walking +a quarter of a mile to the school-house in company with this man. She +followed that strong instinct of truth and purity which is the +surest guide. + +"Julia, my daughter," said Samuel Anderson, "really you must yield to me +as head of the house, and treat this gentleman politely. I thought you +respected him, or loved him, and he told me that you had given consent +to marry him, and had told him to ask my consent." + +In saying this, the "head of the house" was seesawing himself backward +and forward in his squeaky boots, speaking in a pompous manner, and with +an effort to swell an effeminate voice to a bass key, resulting in +something between a croak and a squeal. Julia sat down and cried in +mortification and disgust. Mr. Anderson understood this to be +acquiescence, and turned and went into the next room. + +[Illustration: JULIA SAT DOWN IN MORTIFICATION.] + +"Mr. Humphreys, my daughter will be glad to ask your pardon. She is over +her little pet; lovers always have pets. Even my wife and I have had our +disagreements in our time. Julia will be glad to see you in the +sitting-room." + +Humphreys drew the draw-strings and set his face into its broadest and +most parallelogrammatic smile, bowed to Mr. Anderson, and stepped into +the hall. But when he reached the sitting-room door he wished he had +staid away. Julia had heard his tread, and was standing again with her +foot advanced. Her eyes were very black, and were drawn to a sharp +focus. She had some of her mother's fire, though happily none of her +mother's meanness. It is hard to say whether she spoke or hissed. + +"Go away, you spider! I hate you! I told you I hated you, and you told +people I loved you and was engaged to you. Go away! You detestable +spider, you! I'll die right here, but I will not go with you." + +But the smirking Humphreys moved toward her, speaking soothingly, and +assuring her that there was some mistake. Julia dashed past him into the +parlor and laid hold of her father's arm. + +"Father, protect me from that--that--spider! I hate him!" + +Mr. Anderson stood irresolute a moment and looked appealingly to his +wife for a signal. She solved the difficulty herself. On the whole she +had concluded not to die of heart-disease until she saw Julia married to +suit her taste, and having found a hill she could not go through, she +went round. Seizing Julia's arm with more of energy than affection, she +walked off with her, or rather walked her off, in a sulky silence, while +Mr. Anderson kept Humphreys company. + +I thought best to keep August standing in the door of Julia's room all +this time while I explained these things to you, so that you might +understand what follows. In reality August did not stop at all, but +walked out into the hall and into difficulty. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + +THE ENCOUNTER. + +Just before August came out of the door of Julia's room he had heard +Humphreys enter his room on the opposite side of the hall. Humphreys had +lighted his cigar and was on his way to the porch to smoke off his +discomfiture when he met August coming out of Julia's door on the +opposite side of the hall. The candle in Humphreys's room threw its +light full on August's face, there was no escape from recognition, and +Wehle was too proud to retreat. He shut the door of Julia's room and +stood with back against the wall staring at Humphreys, who did not +forget to smile in his most aggravating way. + +"Thief! thief!" called Humphreys. + +In a moment Mrs. Anderson and Julia ran up the stairs, followed by Mr. +Anderson, who hearing the outcry had left the matter of the Apocalypse +unsettled, and by Jonas and Cynthy Ann, who had just arrived. + +"I knew it," cried Mrs. Anderson, turning on the mortified Julia, "I +never knew a Dutchman nor a foreigner of any sort that wouldn't steal. +Now you see what you get by taking a fancy to a Dutchman. And now _you_ +see"--to her husband--"what _you_ get by taking a Dutchman into your +house. I always wanted you to hire white men and not Dutchmen +nor thieves!" + +"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Anderson," said August, with very white lips, +"I am not a thief." + +"Not a thief, eh? What was he doing, Mr. Humphreys, when you first +detected him?" + +"Coming out of Miss Anderson's room," said Humphreys, smiling politely. + +"Do you invite gentlemen to your room?" said the frantic woman to Julia, +meaning by one blow to revenge herself and crush the stubbornness of her +daughter forever. But Julia was too anxious about August to notice the +shameless insult. + +"Mrs. Anderson, this visit is without any invitation from Julia. I did +wrong to enter your house in this way, but I only am responsible, and I +meant to enter Jonas's room. I did not know that Julia occupied this +room. I am to blame, she is not." + +"And what did you break in for if you didn't mean to steal? It is all +off between you and Jule, for I saw your letter. I shall have you +arrested to-morrow for burglary. And I think you ought to be searched. +Mr. Humphreys, won't you put him out?" + +Humphreys stopped forward toward August, but he noticed that the latter +had a hard look in his eyes, and had two stout German fists shut very +tight. He turned back. + +"These thieves are nearly always armed. I think I had best get a pistol +out of my trunk." + +"I have no arms, and you know it, coward," said August. "I will not be +put out by anybody, but I will go out whenever the master of this +house asks me to go out, and the rest of you open a free path." + +[Illustration: "GOOD-BY!"] + +"Jonas, put him out!" screamed Mrs. Anderson. + +"Couldn't do it," said Jonas, "couldn't do it ef I tried. They's too +much bone and sinnoo in them arms of his'n, and moreover he's a +gentleman. I axed him to come and see me sometime, and he come. He come +ruther late it's true, but I s'pose he thought that sence we got sech a +dee-splay of watch-seals and straps we had all got so stuck up, we +wouldn't receive calls afore fashionable hours. Any way, I 'low he +didn't mean no harm, and he's my visitor, seein' he meant to come into +my winder, knowin' the door was closed agin him. And he won't let no man +put him out, 'thout he's a man with more'n half a dozen watch-seals onto +him, to give him weight and influence." + +"Samuel, will you see me insulted in this way? Will you put this burglar +out of the house?" + +The "head of the house," thus appealed to, tried to look important; he +tried to swell up his size and his courage. But he did not dare +touch August. + +"Mr. Anderson, I beg _your_ pardon. I had no right to come In as I did. +I had no right so to enter a gentleman's house. If I had not known that +this cowardly fop--I don't know what _else_ he may be--was injuring me +by his lies I should not have come in. If it is a crime to love a young +lady, then I have committed a crime. You have only to exercise your +authority as master of this house and ask me to go." + +"I do ask you to go, Mr. Wehle." + +It was the first time that Samuel Anderson had ever called him Mr. +Wehle. It was an involuntary tribute to the dignity of the young man, as +he stood at bay. "Mr. Wehle, _indeed_!" said Mrs. Anderson. + +August had hoped Julia would say a word in his behalf. But she was too +much, cowed by her mother's fierce passion. So like a criminal going to +prison, like a man going to his own funeral, August Wehle went down the +hall toward the stairs, which were at the back of it. Humphreys +instinctively retreated into his room. Mrs. Anderson glared on the young +man as he went by, but he did not turn his head even when he passed +Julia. His heart and hope were all gone; in his mortification and defeat +there seemed to him nothing left but his unbroken pride to sustain him. +He had descended two or three steps, when Julia suddenly glided forward +and said with a tremulous voice: "You aren't going without telling me +good-by, August?" + +"Jule Anderson! what do you mean?" cried her mother. But the hall was +narrow by the stairway, and Jonas, by standing close to Cynthy Ann, in +an unconscious sort of a way managed to keep Mrs. Anderson back; else +she would have laid violent hands on her daughter. + +When August lifted his eyes and saw her face full of tenderness and her +hand reached over the balusters to him, he seemed to have been suddenly +lifted from perdition to bliss. The tears ran unrestrained upon his +cheeks, he reached up and took her hand. + +"Good-by, Jule! God bless you!" he said huskily, and went out into the +night, happy in spite of all. + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + +THE MOTHER. + +Out of the door he went, happy in spite of all the mistakes he had made +and of all the _contretemps_ of his provoking misadventure; happy in +spite of the threat of arrest for burglary. For nearly a minute August +Wehle was happy in that perfect way in which people of quiet tempers are +happy--happy without fluster. But before he had passed the gate, he +heard a scream and a wild hysterical laugh; he heard a hurrying of feet +and saw a moving of lights. He would fain have turned back to find out +what the matter was, he had so much of interest in that house, but he +remembered that he had been turned out and that he could not go back. +The feeling of outlawry mingled its bitterness with the feeling of +anxiety. He feared that something had happened to Julia; he lingered and +listened. Humphreys came out upon the upper porch and looked sharply up +and down the road. August felt instinctively that he was the object of +search and slunk into a fence-corner, remembering that he was now a +burglar and at the mercy of the man whose face was enough to show him +unrelenting. + +Presently Humphreys turned and went in, and then August came out of the +shadow and hurried away. When he had gone a mile, he heard the hoofs of +horses, and again he concealed himself with a cowardly feeling he had +never known before. But when he found that it was Jonas, riding one +horse and leading another, on his way to bring Dr. Ketchup, the +steam-doctor, he ran out. + +"Jonas! Jonas! what's the matter? Who's sick? Is it Julia?" + +"I'll be bound you ax fer Jule first, my much-respected comrade. But +it's only one of the ole woman's conniption fits, and you know she's got +nineteen lives. People of the catamount sort always has. You'd better +gin a thought to yourself now. I got you into this scrape, and I mean to +see you out, as the dog said to the 'possum in its hole. Git up onto +this four-legged quadruped and go as fur as I go on the road to peace +and safety. Now, I tell you what, the hawk's got a mighty good purchase +onto you, my chicken, and he's jest about to light, and when he lights, +look out fer feathers! Don't sleep under the paternal shingles, as they +say. Go to Andrew's castle, and he'll help you git acrost the river into +the glorious State of ole Kaintuck afore any warrant can be got out fer +takin' you up. Never once thought of your bein' took up. But don't +delay, as the preachers say. The time is short, and the human heart is +desperately wicked and mighty deceitful and onsartain." + +As far as Jonas traveled his way, he carried August upon the gray horse. +Then the latter hurried across the fields to his father's cabin. Little +Wilhelmina sat with face against the window waiting his return. + +"Where did you go, August? Did you see the pretty girl at Anderson's?" + +He stooped and kissed her, but, without speaking a word to her, he went +over to where his mother sat darning the last of her basket of +stockings. All the rest were asleep, and having assured himself of this, +he drew up a low chair and leaned his elbow on his knee and hi head on +his hand, and told the whole adventure of the evening to his mother, and +then dropped his head on her lap and wept in a still way. And the +sweet-eyed, weary Moravian mother laid her two hands upon his head and +prayed. And Wilhelmina knelt instinctively by the side of her brother. + +[Illustration: THE MOTHER'S BLESSING.] + +Perhaps there is no God. Or perhaps He is so great that our praying has +no effect. Perhaps this strong crying of our hearts to Him in our +extremity is no witness of his readiness to hear. Let him live in doubt +who can. Let me believe that the tender mother-heart and the loving +sister-heart in that little cabin _did_ reach up to the great Heart that +is over us all in Fatherly love, did find a real comfort for themselves, +and did bring a strength-giving and sanctifying something upon the head +of the young man, who straightway rose up refreshed, and departed out +into the night, leaving behind him mother and sister straining their +eyes after him in the blackness, and carrying with him thoughts and +memories, and--who shall doubt?--a genuine heavenly inspiration that +saved him in the trials in which we shall next meet him. + +At two o'clock that night August Wehle stood upon the shore of the Ohio +in company with Andrew Anderson, the Backwoods Philosopher. Andrew waved +a fire-brand at the steamboat "Isaac Shelby," which was coming round the +bend. And the captain tapped his bell three times and stopped his +engines. Then the yawl took the two men aboard, and two days afterward +Andrew came back alone. + + + +CHAPTER XX. + +THE STEAM-DOCTOR. + +To return to the house of Samuel Anderson. + +Scarcely had August passed out the door when Mrs. Anderson fell into a +fit of hysterics, and declared that she was dying of heart-disease. Her +time had come at last! She was murdered! Murdered by her own daughter's +ingratitude and disobedience! Struck down in her own house! And what +grieved her most was that she should never live to see the end of +the world! + +And indeed she seemed to be dying. Nothing is more frightful than a good +solid fit of hysterics. Cynthy Ann, inwardly condemning herself as she +always did, lifted the convulsed patient, who seemed to be anywhere in +her last ten breaths, and carried her, with Mr. Anderson's aid, down to +her room, and while Jonas saddled the horse, Mr. Anderson put on his hat +and prepared to go for the doctor. + +"Samuel! O Sam-u-el! Oh-h-h-h-h!" cried Mrs. Anderson, with rising and +falling inflections that even patient Dr. Rush could never have +analyzed, laughing insanely and weeping piteously in the same breath, in +the same word; running it up and down the gamut in an uncontrolled and +uncontrollable way; now whooping like a savage, and now sobbing like the +last breath of a broken-hearted. "Samuel! Sam-u-el! O Samuel! Ha! ha! +ha! h-a-a! Oh-h-h-h-h-h-h! You won't leave me to die alone! After the +wife I've been to you, you won't leave me to die alone! No-o-o-o-o! +HOO-HOO-oo-OO! You musn't. You shan't. Send Jonas, and you stay by me! +Think--" here her breath died away, and for a moment she seemed really +to be dying. "Think," she gasped, and then sank away again. After a +minute she opened her eyes, and, with characteristic pertinacity, took +up the sentence just where she had left off. She had carefully kept her +place throughout the period of unconsciousness. But now she spoke, not +with a gasp, but in that shrill, unnatural falsetto so characteristic of +hysteria; that voice--half yell--that makes every nerve of the listener +jangle with the discord. "Think, oh-h-h Samuel! why won't you think what +a wife I've been to you? Here I've drudged and scrubbed and scrubbed and +drudged all these years like a faithful and industrious wife, never +neglecting my duty. And now--oh-h-h-h--now to be left alone in my--" +Here she ceased to breathe again for a while. "In my last hours to die, +to die! to die with, out--without--Oh-h-h!" What Mrs. Anderson was left +to die without she never stated. Mr. Anderson had beckoned to Jonas when +he came in, and that worthy had gone off in a leisurely trot to get the +"steam-doctor." + +[Illustration: "CORN-SWEATS AND CALAMUS."] + +Dr. Ketchup had been a blacksmith, but bard work disagreed with his +constitution. He felt that he, was made for something better than +shoeing horses. This ambitious thought was first suggested to him by the +increasing portliness of his person, which, while it made stooping over +a horse's hoof inconvenient, also impressed him with the fact that his +aldermanic figure would really adorn a learned profession. So he bought +one of those little hand-books which the founder of the Thomsonian +system sold dirt-cheap at twenty dollars apiece, and which told how to +cure or kill in every case. The owners of these important treasures of +invaluable information were under bonds not to disclose the profound +secrets therein contained, the fathomless wisdom which taught them how +to decide in any given case whether ginseng or a corn-sweat was the +required remedy. And the invested twenty dollars had brought the shrewd +blacksmith a handsome return. + +"Hello!" said Jonas in true Western style, as he reined up in front of +Dr. Ketchup's house in the outskirts of Brayville. "Hello the house!" +But Dr. Ketchup was already asleep. "Takes a mighty long time to wake up +a fat man," soliloquized Jonas. "He gits so used to hearin' hisself +snore that he can't tell the difference 'twixt snorin' and thunder. +Hello! Hello the house! I say, hello the blacksmith-shop! Dr. Ketchup, +why don't you git up? Hello! Corn-sweats and calamus! Hello! Whoop! +Hurrah for Jackson and Dr. Ketchup! Hello! Thunderation! Stop thief! +Fire! Fire! Fire! Murder! Murder! Help! Help! Hurrah! Treed the coon +at last!" + +This last exclamation greeted the appearance of Dr. Ketchup's head at +the window. + +"Are you drunk, Jonas Harrison? Go 'way with your hollering, or I'll +have you took up," said Ketchup. + +"You'll find that tougher work than making horseshoes any day, my +respectable friend and feller-citizen. I'll have you took up fer +sleeping so sound and snorin' so loud as to disturb all creation and the +rest of your neighbors. I've heard you ever sence I left Anderson's, and +thought 'twas a steamboat. Come, my friend, git on your clothes and +accouterments, fer Mrs. Anderson is a-dyin' or a-lettin' on to be +a-dyin' fer a drink of ginseng-tea or a corn-sweat or some other +decoction of the healin' art. Come, I fotch two hosses, so you shouldn't +lose no time a saddlin' your'n, though I don't doubt the ole woman'd git +well ef you never gin her the light of your cheerful count'nance. +She'd git well fer spite, and hire a calomel-doctor jist to make you +mad. I'd jest as soon and a little sooner expect a female wasp to die of +heart-disease as her." + +[Illustration: "FIRE! MURDER!! HELP!!!"] + +The head of Dr. Ketchup had disappeared from the window about the middle +of this speech, and the remainder of it came by sheer force of internal +pressure, like the flowing of an artesian well. + +Dr. Ketchup walked out, with ruffled dignity, carefully dressed. His +immaculate clothes and his solemn face were the two halves of his stock +in trade. Under the clothes lay buried Ketchup the blacksmith; under the +wiseacre face was Ketchup the ignoramus. Ignoramus he was, but not a +fool. As he rode along back with Jonas, he plied the latter with +questions. If he could get the facts of the case out of Jonas, he would +pretend to have inferred them from the symptoms and thus add to +his credit. + +"What caused this attack, Jonas?" + +"I 'low she caused it herself. Generally does, my friend," said Jonas. + +"Had anything occurred to excite her?" + +"Well, yes, I 'low they had; consid'able, if not more." + +"What was it?" + +"Well, you see she'd been to Hankins's preachin'. Now, I 'low, my +medical friend, the day of jedgment a'n't a pleasin' prospeck to anybody +that's jilted one brother to marry another, and then cheated the jilted +one outen his sheer of his lamented father's estate. Do you think it is, +my learned friend?" + +But Dr. Ketchup could not be sure whether Jonas was making game of him +or not. So he changed the subject. + +"Nice hoss, this bay," said the "doctor." + +"Well, yes," said Jonas, "I don't 'low you ever put shoes on no better +hoss than this 'ere in all your days--as a blacksmith. Did you now, my +medical friend?" + +"No, I think not," said Ketchup testily, and was silent. + +Mrs. Anderson had grown impatient at the doctor's delay. "Samuel! Oo! +oo! oo! Samuel! My dear, I'm dying. Jonas don't care. He wouldn't hurry. +I wonder you trusted _him!_ If you had been dying, I should have gone +myself for the doctor. Oo! oo! oo! _oh!_ If I should die, nobody would +be sorry." + +Abigail Anderson was not to blame for telling the truth so exactly in +this last sentence. It was an accident. She might have recalled it but +that Dr. Ketchup walked in at that moment. + +He felt her pulse; looked at her tongue; said that it was heart-disease, +caused by excitement. He thought it must be religious excitement. She +should have a corn-sweat and some wafer-ash tea. The corn-sweat would +act as a tonic and strengthen the pericardium. The wafer-ash would cause +a tendency of blood to the head, and thus relieve the pressure on the +juggler-vein. Cynthy Ann listened admiringly to Dr. Ketchup's +incomprehensible, oracular utterances, and then speedily put a bushel of +ear-corn in the great wash-boiler, which was already full of hot water +in expectation of such a prescription, and set the wafer-ash to draw. + +Julia had, up to this time, stood outside her mother's door trembling +with fear, and not daring to enter. She longed to do something, but did +not know how it would be received. Now, while the deep, sonorous voice +of Ketchup occupied the attention of all, she crept in and stood at the +foot of Mrs. Anderson's bed. The mother, recovering from her twentieth +dying spell, saw her. + +"Take her away! She has killed me! She wants me to die! _I_ know! Take +her away!" + +And Julia went to her own room and shut herself up in darkness and in +wretchedness, but in all that miserable night there came to her not one +regret that she had reached her hand to the departing August. + +The neighbor-women came in and pretended to do something for the +invalid, but really they sat by the kitchen-stove and pumped Cynthy Ann +and the doctor, and managed in some way to connect Julia with her +mother's illness, and shook their heads. So that when Julia crept +down-stairs at midnight, in hope of being useful, she found herself +looked at inquisitively, and felt herself to be such an object of +attention that she was glad to take the advice of Cynthy Ann and find +refuge in her own room. On the stairs she met Jonas, who said as +she passed: + +"Don't fret yourself, little turtle-dove. Don't pay no 'tention to ole +Ketchup. Your ma won't die, not even with his corn-sweats to waft her on +to glory. You done your duty to-night like one of Fox's martyrs, and +like George Washi'ton with his little cherry-tree and hatchet. And +you'll git your reward, if not in the next world, you'll have it +in this." + +Julia lay down awhile, and then sat up, looking out into the darkness. +Perhaps God was angry with her for loving August; perhaps she was making +an idol of him. When Julia came to think that her love for August was in +antagonism to the love of God, she did not hesitate which she would +choose. All the best of her nature was loyal to August, whom she "had +seen," as the Apostle John has it. She could not reason it out, but a +God who seemed to be in opposition to the purest and best emotion of her +heart was a God she could not love. August and the love of August were +known quantities. God and the love of God were unknown, and the God of +whom Cynthy spoke (and of whom many a mistaken preacher has spoken), +that was jealous of Mrs. Pearson's love for her baby, and that killed it +because it was his rival, was not a God that she could love without +being a traitor to all the good that God had put in her heart. The God +that was keeping August away from her because he was jealous of the one +beautiful thing in her life was a Moloch, and she deliberately +determined that she would not worship or love him. The True God, who is +a Father, and who is not Supreme Selfishness, doing all for His own +glory, as men falsely declare; the True God--who does all things for the +good of others--loved her, I doubt not, for refusing to worship the +Conventional Deity thus presented to her mind. Even as He has pitied +many a mother that rebelled against the Governor of the Universe, +because she was told the Governor of the Universe, in a petty seeking +for his own glory, had taken away her "idols." + +But Julia looked up at the depths between the stars, and felt how great +God must be, and her rebellion against Him seemed a war at fearful odds. +And then the sense of God's omnipresence, of His being there alone with +her, so startled her and awakened such a feeling of her fearful +loneliness, orphanage, antagonism to God, that she could bear it no +longer, and at two o'clock she went down again; but Mrs. Brown looked +over at Mrs. Orcutt in a way that said: "Told you so! Guilty conscience! +Can't sleep!" And so Julia thought God, even as she conceived Him, +better company than men, or rather than women, for--well, I won't make +the ungallant remark; each sex has its besetting faults. + +Julia took back with her a candle, thinking that this awful God would +not seem so close if she had a light. There lay on her bureau a +Testament, one of those old editions of the American Bible Society, +printed on indifferent paper, and bound in a red muslin that was given +to fading, the like whereof in book-making has never been seen since. +She felt angry with God, who, she was sure, was persecuting her, as +Cynthy Ann had said, out of jealousy of her love for August, and she was +determined that she would not look into that red-cloth Testament, which +seemed to her full of condemnation. But there was a fascination about it +she could not resist. The discordant hysterical laughter of her mother, +which reached her ears from below, harrowed her sorely, and her grief +and despair at her own situation were so great that she was at last fain +to read the only book in the room in order that she might occupy her +mind. There is a strange superstition among certain pietists which loads +them to pray for a text to guide them, and then take any chance passage +as a divine direction. I do not mean to say that Julia had any +supernatural leading in her reading. The New Testament is so full of +comfort that one could hardly manage to miss it. She read the seventh +chapter of Luke: how the Lord healed the centurion's servant that was +"dear unto him," and noted that He did not rebuke the man for loving his +slave; how the Lord took pity on that poor widow who wept at the bier of +her only son, and brought him back to life again, and "restored him to +his mother." This did not seem to be just the Christ that Cynthy Ann +thought of as the foe of every human affection. She read more that she +did not understand so well, and then at the end of the chapter she read +about the woman that was a sinner, that washed His feet with grateful +tears and wiped them with her hair. And she would have taken the woman's +guilt to have had the woman's opportunity and her benediction. + +At last, turning over the leaves without any definite purpose, she +lighted on a place in Matthew, where three verses at the end of a +chapter happened to stand at the head of a column. I suppose she read +them because the beginning of the page and the end of the chapter made +them seem a short detached piece. And they melted into her mood so that +she seemed to know Christ and God for the first time. "Come unto me all +ye that labor and are heavy laden," she read, and stopped. That means +me, she thought with a heart ready to burst. And that saying is the +gateway of life. When the promises and injunctions mean me, I am saved. +Julia read on, "And I will give you rest." And so she drank in the +passage, clause by clause, until she came to the end about an easy yoke +and a light burden, and then God seemed to her so different. She prayed +for August, for now the two loves, the love for August and the love for +Christ, seemed not in any way inconsistent. She lay down saying over and +over, with tears in her eyes, "rest for your souls," and "weary and +heavy laden," and "come unto me," and "meek and lowly of heart," and +then she settled on one word and repeated it over and over, "rest, rest, +rest." The old feeling was gone. She was no more a rebel nor an orphan. +The presence of God was not a terror but a benediction. She had found +rest for her soul, and He gave His beloved sleep. For when she awoke +from what seemed a short slumber, the red light of a glorious dawn came +in at the window, and her candle was flickering its last in the bottom +of the socket. The Testament lay open as she had left it, and for days +she kept it open there, and did not dare read anything but these three +verses, lest she should lose the rest for her soul that she found here. + + + +CHAPTER XXI. + +THE HAWK IN A NEW PART. + +Humphreys was now in the last weeks of his singing-school. He had become +a devout Millerite, and was paying attentions to the not unwilling +Betsey Malcolm, though pretending at Anderson's to be absolutely +heart-broken at the conduct of Julia in jilting him after she had given +him every assurance of affection. And then to be jilted for a Dutchman, +you know! In this last regard his feeling was not all affectation. In +his soul, cupidity, vanity, and vindictiveness divided the narrow +territory between them. He inwardly swore that he'd get satisfaction +somehow. Debts which were due to his pride should be collected by +his revenge. + +Did you ever reflect on the uselessness of a landscape when one has no +eyes to see it with, or, what is worse, no soul to look through one's +eyes? Humphreys was going down to the castle to call on the Philosopher, +and "Shady Hollow," as Andrew called it, had surely never been more +glorious than on the morning which he chose for his walk. The black-haw +bushes hung over the roadside, the maples lifted up their great +trunk-pillars toward the sky, and the grape-vines, some of them four +and even six inches in diameter, reached up to the high boughs, fifty or +a hundred feet, without touching the trunk. They had been carried up by +the growth of the tree, tree and vine having always lived in each +other's embrace. Out through the opening in the hollow, Humphreys saw +the green sea of six-feet-high Indian corn in the fertile bottoms, the +two rows of sycamores on the sandy edges of the river, and the hazy +hills on the Kentucky side. But not one touch of sentiment, not a +perception of beauty, entered the soul of the singing-master as he +daintily-chose his steps so as to avoid soiling his glossy boots, and as +he knocked the leaves off the low-hanging beech boughs with his delicate +cane. He had his purpose in visiting Andrew, and his mind was bent +on his game. + +Charon, the guardian of the castle, bayed his great hoarse bark at the +Hawk, and with that keen insight into human nature for which dogs are so +remarkable, he absolutely forbade the dandy's entrance, until Andrew +appeared at the door and called the dog away. + +"I am delighted at having the opportunity of meeting a great light in +literature like yourself, Mr. Anderson. Here you sit weaving, earning +your bread with a manly simplicity that is truly admirable. You are like +Cincinnatus at his plow. I also am a literary man." + +He really was a college graduate, though doubtless he was as much of a +humbug in recitations and examinations as he had always been since. +Andrew's only reply to his assertion that he was a literary man was a +rather severe and prolonged scrutiny of his oily locks, his dainty +mustache, his breast-pin, his watch-seals, and finally his straps and +his boots. For Andrew firmly believed that neglected hair, Byron +collars, and unblackened boots were the first signs of literary taste. + +"You think I dress too well," said Humphreys with his ghastly smirk. +"You think that I care too much for appearances. I do. It is a weakness +of mine which comes from a residence abroad." + +These words touched the Philosopher a little. To have been abroad was +the next best thing to having been a foreigner _ab origine_. But still +he felt a little suspicious. He was superior to the popular prejudice +against the mustache, but he could not endure hair-oil. "Nature," he +maintained, "made the whole beard to be worn, and Nature provides an oil +for the hair. Let Nature have her way." He was suspicious of Humphreys, +not because he wore a mustache, but because he shaved the rest of his +face and greased his hair. He had, besides, a little intuitive +perception of the fact that a smile which breaks against the rock-bound +coast of cold cheek-bones and immovable eyes is a mask. And so he +determined to test the literary man. I have heard that Masonic lodges +have been deceived by impostors. I have never heard that a literary man +was made to believe in the genuineness of the attainments of a +charlatan. + +And yet Humphreys held his own well. He could talk glibly and +superficially about books; he simulated considerable enthusiasm for the +books which Andrew admired. His mistake and his consequent overthrow +came, as always in such cases, from a desire to overdo. It was after +half an hour of talking without tripping that Andrew suddenly asked: "Do +you like the ever-to-be-admired Xenophanes?" + +It certainly is no disgrace to any literary man not to know anything of +so remote a philosopher as Xenophanes. The first characteristic of a +genuine literary man is the frankness with which he confesses his +ignorance. But Humphreys did not really know but that Xenophanes was +part of the daily reading of a man of letters. + +"Oh! yes," said he. "I have his works in turkey morocco." + +"What do you think of his opinion that God is a sphere?" asked the +Philosopher, smiling. + +"Oh! yes--ahem; let me see--which God is it that he speaks of, Jupiter +or--well, you know he was a Greek." + +"But he only believed in one God," said Andrew sternly. + +"Oh! ah! I forgot that he was a Christian." + +So from blunder to blunder Andrew pushed him, Humphreys stumbling more +and more in his blind attempts to right himself, and leaving, at last, +with much internal confusion but with an unruffled smile. He dared not +broach his errand by asking the address of August. For Andrew did not +conceal his disgust, having resumed work at his loom, suffering the +bowing impostor to find his own way out without so much as a +courteous adieu. + + + +CHAPTER XXII. + +JONAS EXPRESSES HIS OPINION ON DUTCHMEN. + +Sometimes the virus of a family is all drawn off in one vial. I think it +is Emerson who makes this remark. We have all seen the vials. + +Such an one was Norman Anderson. The curious law of hereditary descent +had somehow worked him only evil. "Nater," observed Jonas to Cynthy, +when the latter had announced to him that Norman, on account of some +disgrace at school, had returned home, "nater ha'n't done him half +jestice, I 'low. It went through Sam'el Anderson and Abig'il, and picked +out the leetle weak pompous things in the illustrious father; and then +hunted out all the spiteful and hateful things in the lovin' and +much-esteemed mother, and somehow stuck 'em together, to make as ornery +a chap as ever bit a hoe-cake in two." + +"I'm afeard her brother's scrape and comin' home won't make Jule none +the peacefuller at the present time," said Cynthy Ann. + +"Wal," returned Jonas, "I don't think she keers much fer him. She +couldn't, you know. Love him? Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear"--here Cynthy Ann +began to reproach herself for listening to anything so pleasant as +these two last words--"Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear, you see you might maybe +love a cuckle-burr and nuss it; but I don't think you would be likely +to. I never heern tell of nobody carryin' jimson-weed pods in their +bosoms. You see they a'n't no place about Norman Anderson that love +could take a holt of 'thout gittin' scratched." + +"But his mother loves him, I reckon," said Cynthy Ann. + +"Wal, yes; so she do. Loves her shadder in the lookin'-glass, maybe, and +kinder loves Norman bekase he's got so much of her devil into him. It's +like lovin' like, I reckon. But I 'low they's a right smart difference +with Jule. Sence she was born, that Norman has took more delight in +tormentin' Jule than a yaller dog with a white tail does in worryin' a +brindle tom-cat up a peach-tree. And comin' home at this junction he'll +gin her a all-fired lot of trials and tribulation." + +At the time this conversation took place, two weeks had elapsed since +Mrs. Anderson's "attack." Julia had heard nothing from August yet. The +"Hawk" still made his head-quarters in the house, but was now watching +another quarry. Mrs. Anderson was able to scold as vigorously as ever, +if, indeed, that function had ever been suspended. And just now she was +engaged in scolding the teacher who had expelled Norman. The habit of +fighting teachers was as chronic as her heart-disease. Norman had always +been abused by the whole race of pedagogues. There was from the first a +conspiracy against him, and now he was cheated out of his last chance of +getting an education. All this Norman steadfastly believed. + +Of course Norman sided with his mother as against the Dutchman. The more +contemptible a man is, the more he contemns a man for not belonging to +his race or nation. And Norman felt that he would be eternally disgraced +by any alliance with a German. He threw himself into the fight with a +great deal of vigor. It helped him to forget other things. + +"Jule," said he, walking up to her as she sat alone on the porch, "I'm +ashamed of you. To go and fall in love with a Dutchman like Gus Wehle, +and disgrace us all!" + +"I wonder you didn't think about disgrace before," retorted Julia, "I am +ashamed to have August Wehle hear what you've been doing." + +[Illustration: NORMAN ANDERSON.] + +Dogs that have the most practice in cat-worrying are liable to get their +noses scratched sometimes. Norman took care never to attack Julia again +except under the guns of his mother's powerful battery. And he revenged +himself on her by appealing to his mother with a complaint that "Jule +had throwed up to him that he had been dismissed from school." And of +course Julia received a solemn lecture on her way of driving poor Norman +to destruction. She was determined to disgrace the family. If she could +not do it by marrying a Dutchman, she would do it by slandering +her brother. + +Norman thought to find an ally in Jonas. + +"Jonas, don't you think it's awful that Jule is in love with Dutchman +like Gus Wehle?" + +"I do, my love," responded Jonas. "I think a Dutchman is a Dutchman. I +don't keer how much he larns by burnin' the midnight ile by day and +night. My time-honored friend, he's a Dutchman arter all. The Dutch is +bred in the bone. It won't fade. A Dutchman may be a gentleman in his +way of doin' things, may be honest and industrious, and keep all the +commandments in the catalogue, but I say he is Dutch, and that's enough +to keep him out of the kingdom of heaven and out of this free and +enlightened republic. And an American may be a good-fer-nothin', ornery +little pertater-ball, wuthless alike to man and beast; he mayn't be good +fer nothin', nuther fer work nur study; he may git drunk and git turned +outen school and do any pertikeler number of disgraceful and +oncreditable things, he may be a reg'ler milksop and nincompoop, a fool +and a blackguard and a coward all rolled up into one piece of brown +paper, ef he wants to. And what's to hender? A'n't he a free-born an' +enlightened citizen of this glorious and civilized and Christian land of +Hail Columby? What business has a Dutchman, ef he's ever so smart and +honest and larned, got in our broad domains, resarved for civil and +religious liberty? What business has he got breathin' our atmosphere or +takin' refuge under the feathers of our American turkey-buzzard? No, my +beloved and respected feller-citizen of native birth, it's as plain to +me as the wheels of 'Zek'el and the year 1843. I say, Hip, hip, hoo-ray +fer liberty or death, and down with the Dutch!" + +Norman Anderson scratched his head. + +What did Jonas mean? + +He couldn't exactly divine; but it is safe to say that on the whole he +was not entirely satisfied with this boomerang speech. He rather thought +that he had better not depend on Jonas. + +But he was not long in finding allies enough in his war against Germany. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII. + +SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS. + +There was an egg-supper in the country store at Brayville. Mr. Mandluff, +the tall and raw-boned Hoosier who kept the store, was not unwilling to +have the boys get up an egg supper now and then in his store after he +had closed the front-door at night. For you must know that an egg-supper +is a peculiar Western institution. Sometimes it is a most enjoyable +institution--when it has its place in a store where there is no Kentucky +whisky to be had. But in Brayville, in the rather miscellaneous +establishment of the not very handsome and not very graceful Mr. +Mandluff, an egg-supper was not a great moral institution. It was +otherwise, and profanely called by its votaries a camp-meeting; it would +be hard to tell why, unless it was that some of the insiders grew very +happy before it was over. For an egg-supper at Mandluff's store was to +Brayville what an oyster-supper at Delmonico's is to New York. It was +one tenth hard eggs and nine tenths that beverage which bears the name +of an old royal house of France. + +How were the eggs cooked? I knew somebody would ask that impertinent +question. Well, they were not fried, they were not boiled, they were +not poached, they were not scrambled, they were not omeletted, they were +not roasted on the half-shell, they were not stuffed with garlic and +served with cranberries, they were not boiled and served with anchovy +sauce, they were not "_en salmi_." I think I had better stop there, lest +I betray my knowledge of cookery. It is sufficient to say that they were +not cooked in any of the above-named fashions, nor in any other way +mentioned in Catharine Beecher's or Marion Harland's cookbooks. They +were baked _à la mode_ backwoods. It is hardly proper for me to give a +recipe in this place, that belongs more properly to the "Household +Departments" of the newspapers. But to satisfy curiosity, and to tell +something about cooking, which Prof. Blot does not know, I may say that +they were broken and dropped on a piece of brown paper laid on the top +of the old box-stove. By the time the egg was cooked hard the paper was +burned to ashes, but the egg came off clean and nice from the stove, and +made as palatable and indigestible an article for a late supper as one +could wish. It only wanted the addition of Mandluff's peculiar whisky to +make it dissipation of the choicest kind. For the more a dissipation +costs in life and health, the more fascinating it is. + +There was an egg-supper, as I said, at Mandluff's store. There was to be +a "camp-meeting" in honor of Norman Anderson's successful return to his +liberty and his cronies. It gave Norman, the greatest pleasure to return +to a society where it was rather to his credit than otherwise that he +had gone on a big old time, got caught, and been sent adrift by the old +hunk that had tried to make him study Latin. + +The eggs were baked in the true "camp-meeting" style, the whisky was +drunk, and--so was the company. Bill Day's rather red eyes grew redder, +and his nose shone with delight as he shuffled the greasy pack of +"kyerds." The maudlin smile crossed the habitually melancholy lines of +his face in a way that split and splintered his visage into a curious +contradiction of emotions. + +"H--a--oo--p!" He shouted, throwing away the cards over the heads of his +companions. "Ha--oop! boys, thish is big--hoo! hoo! ha--oop! I say is +big. Let's do somethin'!" + +Here there was a confused cry that "it _was_ big, and that they had +better do somethin' or 'nother." + +"Let's blow up the ole school-house," said Bill Day, who was not +friendly to education. + +"I tell you what," said Bob Short, who was dealing the cards in another +set--"I tell you what," and Bob winked his eyes vigorously, and looked +more solemn and wise than he could have looked if it had not been for +the hard eggs and the whisky--"I tell you what," said Bob a third time, +and halted, for his mind's activity was a little choked by the fervor of +his emotions--"I tell you what, boys--" + +"Wal," piped Jim West in a cracked voice, "you've told us _what_ four +times, I 'low; now s'pose you tell us somethin' else." + +"I tell you what, boys," said Bob Short, suddenly remembering his +sentence, "don't let's do nothin' that'll git us into no trouble +arterwards. Ef we blow up the school-house we'll be 'rested fer bigamy +or--or--what d'ye call it?" + +"For larson," said Bill Day, hardly able to restrain another whoop. + +"No, 'taint larson," said Bob Short, looking wiser than a chief-justice, +"it's arsony. Now I say, don't let's go to penitentiary for no--no +larson--no arsony, I mean." + +"Ha--oop!" said Bill. "Let's do somethin' ludikerous. Hurrah for arsony +and larson! Dog-on the penitentiary! Ha--oop!" + +[Illustration: SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS.] + +"Let's go fer the Dutchman," said Norman Anderson, just drunk enough to +be good-naturedly murderous and to speak in dialect. "Gus is turned out +to committin' larson by breakin' into people's houses an' has run off. +Now let's tar and feather the ole one. Of course, he's a thief. Dutchmen +always is, I 'low. Clark township don't want none of 'em, I'll be +dog-oned if it do," and Norman got up and struck his fist on +the counter. + +"An' they won't nobody hurt you; you see, he's on'y a Dutchman," said +Bob Short "Larson on a Dutchman don't hold." + +"I say, let's hang him," said Bill Day. "Ha--oop! Let's hang him, or do +somethin' else ludikerous!" + +"I wouldn't mind," grinned Norman Anderson, delighted at the turn things +had taken. "I'd just like to see him hung." + +"So would I," said Bill Day, leaning over to Norman. "Ef a Dutchman wash +to court my sishter, I'd--" + +"He'd be a fool ef he did," piped Jim West. For Bill Day's sister was a +"maid not vendible," as Shakespeare has it. + +"See yer," said Bill, trying in vain to draw his coat. "Looky yer, +Jeems; ef you say anythin' agin Ann Marier, I'll commit the wust larson +on you you ever seed." + +"I didn't say nothin' agin Ann Marier," squeaked Jim. "I was talkin' +agin the Dutch." + +"Well, that'sh all right Ha--oop! Boys, let's do somethin', larson or +arsony or--somethin'." + +A bucket of tar and some feathers were bought, for which young Anderson +was made to pay, and Bill Day insisted on buying fifteen feet of rope. +"Bekase," as he said, "arter you git the feathers on the bird, you +may--you may want to help him to go to roosht you know, on a hickory +limb. Ha--oop! Come along, boys; I say let's do somethin' ludikerous, ef +it's nothin' but a little larson." + +And so they went galloping down the road, nine drunken fools. For it is +one of the beauties of lynch law, that, however justifiable it may seem +in some instances, it always opens the way to villainous outrages. Some +of my readers will protest that a man was never lynched for the crime of +being a Dutchman. Which only shows how little they know of the intense +prejudice and lawless violence of the early West. Some day people will +not believe that men have been killed in California for being Chinamen. + +Of the nine who started, one, the drunkest, fell off and broke his arm; +the rest rode up in front of the cabin of Gottlieb Wehle. I do not want +to tell how they alarmed the mother at her late sewing and dragged +Gottlieb out of his bed. I shudder now when I recall one such outrage to +which I was an unwilling witness. Norman threw the rope round Gottlieb's +neck and declared for hanging. Bill Day agreed. It would be so +ludikerous, you know! + +"Vot hash I tun? Hey? Vot vor you dries doo hanks me already, hey?" +cried the honest German, who was willing enough to have the end of the +world come, but who did not like the idea of ascending alone, and in +this fashion. + +Mrs. Wehle pushed her way into the mob and threw the rope off her +husband's neck, and began to talk with vehemence in German. For a moment +the drunken fellows hung back out of respect for a woman. Then Bill Day +was suddenly impressed with the fact that the duty of persuading Mrs. +Wehle to consent to her husband's execution devolved upon him. + +"Take keer, boys; let me talk to the ole woman. I'll argy the case." + +"You can't speak Dutch no more nor a hoss can," squeaked Jeems West. + +"Blam'd ef I can't, though. Hyer, ole woman, firshta Dutch?" + +"Ya." + +"Now," said Bill, turning to the others in triumph, "what did I tell +you? Well, you see, your boy August is a thief." + +"He's not a teef!" said the old man. + +"Shet up your jaw. I say he is. Now, your ole man's got to be hung." + +"Vot vor?" broke in Gottlieb. + +"Bekase it's all your own fault. You hadn't orter be a Dutchman." + +Here the crowd fell into a wrangle. It was not so easy to hang a man +when such a woman stood there pleading for him. Besides, Bob Short +insisted that hanging was arsony in the first degree, and they better +not do it. To this Bill Day assented. He said he 'sposed tar and +feathers was only larson in the second degree. And then it would be rale +ludikerous. And now confused cries of "Bring on the tar!" "Where's the +feathers?" "Take off his clothes!" began to be raised. Norman stood out +for hanging. Drink always intensified his meanness. But the tar couldn't +be found. The man whom they had left lying by the roadside with a broken +arm had carried the tar, and had been well coated with it himself in +his fall. + +"Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day. "Let's do somethin'. Dog-on the arsony! +Let's hang him as high as Dan'el." + +And with that the rope was thrown over Gottlieb's, neck and he was +hurried off to the nearest tree. The rope was then put over a limb, and +a drunken half-dozen got ready to pull, while Norman Anderson adjusted +the noose and valiant Bill Day undertook to keep off Mrs. Wehle. + +"All ready! Pull up! Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day, and the crowd pulled, +but Mrs. Wehle had slipped off the noose again, and the volunteer +executioners fell over one another in such a way as to excite the +derisive laughter of Bill Day, who thought it perfectly ludikerous. But +before the laugh had finished, the indignant Gottlieb had knocked Bill +Day over and sent Norman after him. The blow sobered them a little, and +suddenly destroyed Bill's ambition to commit "arsony," or do anything +else ludikerous. But Norman was furious, and under his lead Wehle's arms +were now bound with the rope and a consultation was held, during which +little Wilhelmina pleaded for her father effectively, and more by her +tears and cries and the wringing of her chubby hands than by any words. +Bill Day said he be blamed of that little Dutch gal's takin' on so +didn't kinder make him foul sorter scrimpshous you know. But the mob +could not quit without doing something. So it was resolved to give +Gottlieb a good ducking in the river and send him into Kentucky with a +warning not to come back. They went down the ravine past Andrew's castle +to the river. Mrs. Wehle followed, believing that her husband would be +drowned, and little Wilhelmina ran and pulled the alarm and awakened the +Backwoods Philosopher, who soon threw himself among them, but too late +to dissuade them from their purpose, for Andrew's own skiff, the +"Grisilde" by name, with three of the soberest of the party, had already +set out to convey Wehle, after one hasty immersion, to the other shore, +while the rest stood round hallooing like madmen to prevent any alarm +that Wehle might raise attracting attention on the other side. + + + +CHAPTER XXIV. + +THE GIANT GREAT-HEART. + +As soon as Andrew's skiff, the "Grisilde," was brought back and the +ruffians had gone off up the ravine, Andrew left Mrs. Wehle sitting by +the fire in the loom-room of the castle, while he crossed the river to +look after Gottlieb. Little Wilhelmina insisted on going with him, and +as she handled a steering-oar well he took her along. They found +Gottlieb with his arms cruelly pinioned sitting on a log in a state of +utter dejection, and dripping with water from his ducking. + +"Ich zay, Antroo, ish dish vat dey galls a vree goontry, already? A +blace vare troonk sheounders dosh vot ever dey hadn't ort! Dat is vree +koontry. Mein knabe ish roon off ver liebin a Yangee; unt a vool he ish, +doo. Unt ich ish hoong unt troundt unt darrdt unt vedderd unt drakt out +indoo de ribber, unt dolt if I ko back do mein vrau unt kinder I zhall +pe kilt vunst more already. Unt I shpose if ich shtays here der +Gainduckee beobles vill hang me unt dar me unt trown me all over in der +ribber, doo, already, pekoz I ish Deutsch. Ich zay de voorld ish all +pad, unt it aud doo pe vinished vunst already, I ton't gare how quick, +so ash dem droonk vools kit vot pelongs doo 'em venever Gabrel ploes his +drumbet." + +[Illustration: TO THE RESCUE.] + +"They'll get that in due time, my friend," said Andrew, untying the rope +with which Gottlieb had been pinioned. "Come, let us go back to our +own shore." + +"Bud daint my zhore no more. Dey said I'd god doo hang again vanst more +if I ever grossed de Ohio Ribber vunst again already, but I ton't vants +doo hang no more vor noddin already." + +"But I'll take care of that," said Andrew. "Before to-morrow night I'll +make your house the safest place in Clark township. I've got the rascals +by the throat now. Trust me." + +It took much entreaty on the part of Andrew and much weeping and kissing +on the part of Wilhelmina to move the heart of the terrified Gottlieb. +At last he got into the skiff and allowed himself to be rowed back +again, declaring all the way that he nebber zee no zich a vree koontry +ash dish voz already. + +When Bill Day and his comrades got up the next morning and began to +think of the transactions of the night, they did not seem nearly so +ludikerous as they had at the time. And when Norman Anderson and Bill +Day and Bob Short read the notice on the door of Mandluff's store they +felt that "arsony" might have a serious as well as a ludikerous side. + +Andrew at first intended to institute proceedings against the rioters, +but he knew that the law was very uncertain against the influences which +the eight or nine young men might bring to bear, and the prejudices of +the people against the Dutch. To prosecute would be to provoke another +riot. So he contented himself with this + + "PROCLAMATION! + + "TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: I have a list of eight men connected + with the riotous mob which broke into the house of Gottlieb + Wehle, a peaceable and unoffending citizen of the United + States. The said eight men proceeded to commit an assault + and battery on the person of the said Gottlieb Wehle, and + even endeavored at one time to take his life. And the said + riotous conduct was the result of a conspiracy, and the said + assault with intent to kill was with malice aforethought. The + said eight men, after having committed grievous outrages upon + him by dipping him in the water and by other means, warned + the said Wehle not to return to the State. Now, therefore, I + give notice to all and several of those concerned in these + criminal proceedings that the said Wehle has returned by my + advice; and that if so much as a hair of his head or a + splinter of his property is touched I will appear against + said parties and will prosecute them until I secure the + infliction of the severest penalties made and provided for + the punishment of such infamous crimes. I hope I am well + enough known here to render it certain that if I once begin + proceedings nothing but success or my death or the end of the + world can stop them. + + "ANDREW ANDERSON, + + "Backwoods Philosopher. + + "AT THE CASTLE, May 12th, 1843." + +"It don't look so ludikerous as it did, does it, Bill?" squeaked Jim +West, as he read the notice over Bill's shoulder. + +"Shet your mouth, you fool!" said Bill. "Don't you never peep. Ef I'd a +been sober I might a knowed ole Grizzly would interfere. He +always does." + +In truth, Andrew was a sort of Perpetual Champion of the Oppressed, and +those who did not like him feared him, which is the next best thing. + + + +CHAPTER XXV. + +A CHAPTER OF BETWEENS. + +Did you ever move? And, in moving, did you ever happen to notice how +many little things there are to be picked up? Now that I am about to +shift the scene of my story from Clark township, the narrow stage upon +which it has progressed through two dozen chapters, I find a great +number of little things to be picked up. + +One of the little things to be picked up is Norman Anderson. Very +little, if measured soul-wise. When his father had read the proclamation +of Andrew and divined that Norman was interested in the riot, he became +thoroughly indignant; the more so, that he felt his own lack of power to +do anything in the premises against his wife. But when Mrs. Abigail +heard of the case she was in genuine distress. It showed Andrew's +vindictiveness. He would follow her forever with his resentments, just +because she could not love him. It was not her fault that she did not +love him. Poor Norman had to suffer all the persecutions that usually +fall to such innocent creatures. She must send him away from home, +though it broke her mother's heart to do it; for if Andrew didn't have +him took up, the old Dutchman would, just because his son had turned out +a burglar. She said burglar rather emphatically, with a look at Julia. + +And so Samuel Anderson took his son to Louisville, and got him a place +in a commission and produce house on the levee, with which Mr. Anderson +had business influence. And Samuel warned him that he must do his best, +for he could not come back home now without danger of arrest, and Norman +made many promises of amendment; so many, that his future seemed to him +barren of all delight. And, by way of encouraging himself in the austere +life upon which he had resolved to enter, he attended the least +reputable place of amusement in the city, the first night after his +father's departure. + +In Clark township the Millerite excitement was at white heat. Some of +the preachers in other parts of the country had set one day, some +another. I believe that Mr. Miller, the founder, never had the temerity +to set a day. But his followers figured the thing more closely, and +Elder Hankins had put a fine point on the matter. He was certain, for +his part, that the time was at midnight on the eleventh of August. His +followers became very zealous, and such is the nature of an infection +that scarcely anybody was able to resist it. Mrs. Anderson, true to her +excitable temper, became fanatic--dreaming dreams, seeing visions, +hearing voices, praying twenty times a day[2], wearing a sourly pious +face, and making all around her more unhappy than ever. Jonas declared +that ef the noo airth and the noo heaven was to be chockful of sech as +she, 'most any other place in the univarse would be better, akordin' to +his way of thinkin'. He said she repented more of other folkses' sins +than anybody he ever seed. + +[Footnote 2: Mrs. Anderson was less devout than some of her +co-religionists; the wife of a well-known steamboat-clerk was accustomed +to pray in private fifty times a day, hoping by means of this praying +without ceasing to be found ready when the trumpet should sound.] + +As summer came on, Samuel Anderson, borne away on the tide of his own +and his wife's fanatical fever of sublimated devotion, discharged Jonas +and all his other _employés_, threw up business, and gave his whole +attention to the straightening of his accounts for the coming day of +judgment. Before Jonas left to seek a new place he told Cynthy Ann as +how as ef he'd met her alrlier 'twould a-settled his coffee fer life. He +was gittin' along into the middle of the week now, but he'd come to feel +like a boy since he'd been a livin' where he could have a few sweet and +pleasant words--ahem!--he thought December'd be as pleasant as May all +the year round ef he could live in the aurora borealis of her +countenance. And Cynthy Ann enjoyed his words so much that she prayed +for forgiveness for the next week and confessed in class-meeting that +she had yielded to temptation and sot her heart on the things of this +perishin' world. She was afeared she hadn't always remembered as how as +she was a poor unworthy dyin' worm of the dust, and that all the +beautiful things in this world perished with the usin'. + +And Brother Goshorn, the class-leader at Harden's Cross-Roads, exhorted +her to tear every idol from her heart. And still the sweet woman's +nature, God's divine law revealed in her heart, did assert itself a +little. She planted some pretty-by-nights in an old cracked +blue-and-white tea-pot and set it on her window-sill. Somehow the +pretty-by-nights would remind her of Jonas, and while she tried to +forget him with one half of her nature, the other and better part (the +depraved part, she would have told you) cherished the memory of his +smallest act and word. In fact, the flowers had no association with +Jonas except that along with the awakening of her love came this little +sentiment for flowers into the dry desert of her life. But one day Mrs. +Anderson discovered the old blue broken tea-pot with its young plants. + +"Why, Cynthy Ann!" she cried, "a body'd think you'd have more sense than +to do such a soft thing as to be raisin' posies at _your_ time of life! +And that when the world is drawing to a close, too! You'll be one of the +foolish virgins with no oil to your lamp, as sure as you see that day." + +As for Julia's flowers, Mrs. Anderson had rudely thrown them into the +road by way of removing temptation from her and turning her thoughts +toward the awful realities of the close of time. + +But Cynthy Ann blushed and repented, and kept her broken tea-pot, with a +fearful sense of sin in doing so. She never watered the pretty-by-nights +without the feeling that she was offering sacrifice to an idol. + + + +CHAPTER XXVI. + +A NICE LITTLE GAME. + +It was natural enough that the "mud-clerk" on the old steamboat Iatan +should take a fancy to the "striker," as the engineer's apprentice was +called. Especially since the striker know so much more than the +mud-clerk, and was able to advise him about many things. A striker with +so much general information was rather a novelty, and all the officers +fancied him, except Sam Munson, the second engineer, who had a natural +jealousy of a striker that knew more than he did. + +The striker had learned rapidly, and was trusted to stand a regular +watch. The first engineer and the third were together, and the second +engineer and the striker took the other watch. The boat in this way got +the services of a competent engineer while paying him only a +striker's wage. + +About the time the heavily-laden Iatan turned out of the Mississippi +into the Ohio at Cairo at six in the evening, the striker went off +watch, and he ought to have gone to bed to prepare himself for the +second watch of the night, especially as he would only have the +dog-watch between that and the forenoon. But a passenger had got aboard +at Cairo, whose face was familiar. The sight of it had aroused a throng +of old associations, pleasant and unpleasant, and a throng of emotions +the most tender and the most wrathful the striker had ever felt. Sleep +he could not, and so, knowing that the mud-clerk was on watch, he sought +the office after nine o'clock, and stood outside the bar talking to his +friend, who had little to do, since most of the freight had been shipped +through, and his bills for Paducah were all ready. The striker talked +with the mud-clerk, but watched the throng of passengers who drank with +each other at the bar, smoked in the "social hall," read and wrote at +the tables in the gentlemen's cabin, or sat with doffed hats and chatted +gallantly in the ladies' cabin, which was visible as a distant +background, seen over a long row of tables with green covers and under a +long row of gilded wooden stalactites, which were intended to be +ornamental. The little pendent prisms beneath the chandeliers rattled +gayly as the boat trembled at each stroke of her wheels, and gaping +backwoodsmen, abroad for the first time, looked at all the rusty +gingerbread-work, and wondered if kings were able to afford anything +half so fine as the cabin of the "palatial steamer Iatan," as she was +described on the bills. The confused murmur of many voices, mixed with +the merry tinkling of the glass pendants, gave the whole an air of +excitement. + +But the striker did not see the man he was looking for. "Who got on at +Cairo? I think I saw a man from our part of the country," he said. + +"I declare, I don't know," said the mud-clerk, who drawled his words in +a cold-blooded way. "Let me look. Here's A. Robertson, and T. Le Fevre, +and L.B. Sykes, and N. Anderson." + +"Where is Anderson going?" + +"Paid through to Louisville. Do you know him?" + +But just then Norman Anderson himself walked in, and went up to the bar +with a new acquaintance. They did not smoke the pipe of peace, like red +Americans, but, like white Americans, they had a mysterious liquid +carefully compounded, and by swallowing this they solemnly sealed their +new-made friendship after the curious and unexplained rite in use among +their people. + +Norman had been dispatched on a collecting trip, and having nine hundred +and fifty dollars in his pocket, he felt as much elated as if it had +been his own money. The gentleman with whom he drank, had a band of +crape around his white hat. He seemed very nearsighted. + +"If that greeny is a friend of yours, Gus, I declare you'd better tell +him not to tie to the serious-looking young fellow in the white hat and +gold specs, unless he means to part with all his loose change before +bed-time." + +That is what the mud-clerk drawled to August the striker, but the +striker seemed to hear the words as something spoken afar off. For just +then he was seeing a vision of a drunken mob, and a rope, and a pleading +woman, and a brave old man threatened with death. Just then he heard +harsh and muddled voices, rude oaths, and jeering laughter, and above it +all the sweet pleading of a little girl begging for a father's life. And +the quick blood came into his fair German face, and he felt that he +could not save this Norman Anderson from the toils of the gambler, +though he might, if provoked, pitch him over the guard of the boat. For +was not Andrew's letter, which described the mob, in his pocket, and +burning a hole in his pocket as it had been ever since he received it? + +But then this was Julia's brother, and there was nothing he would not +do for Julia. So, sometime after the mud-clerk had ceased to speak, the +striker gave utterance to both impulses by replying, "He's no friend of +mine," a little crisply, and then softly adding, "Though I shouldn't +like to see him fleeced." + +By this time a new actor had appeared on the scene in the person of a +man with a black mustache and side-whiskers, who took a seat behind a +card-table near the bar. + +"H'llo!" said the mud-clerk in a low and lazy voice, "Parkins is back +again. After his scrape at Paducah last February, he disappeared, and +he's been shady ever since. He's growed whiskers since, so's not to be +recognized. But he'll be skeerce enough when we get to Paducah. Now, see +how quick he'll catch the greenies, won't you?" The prospect was so +charming as almost to stimulate the mud-clerk to speak with some +animation. + +But August Wehle, the striker on the Iatan, had an uncomfortable feeling +that he had seen that face before, and that the long mustache and +side-whiskers had grown in a remarkably short space of time. Could it be +that there were two men who could spread a smile over the lower half of +their faces in that automatic way, while the spider-eyes had no sort of +sympathy with it? Surely, this man with black whiskers and mustache was +not just like the singing-master at Sugar-Grove school-house, who had +"red-top hay on to his upper lip," and yet--and yet-- + +"Gentlemen," said Parkins--his Dickensian name would be Smirkins--"I +want to play a little game just for the fun of the thing. It is a trick +with three cards. I put down three cards, face up. Here is six of +diamonds, eight of spades, and the ace of hearts. Now, I will turn them +over so quickly that I will defy any of you to tell which is the ace. +Do you see? Now, I would like to bet the wine for the company that no +gentleman here can turn up the ace. All I want is a little sport. +Something to pass away the evening and amuse the company. Who will bet +the wine? The Scripture says that the hand is quicker than the eye, and +I warn you that if you bet, you will probably lose." And here he turned +the cards back, with their faces up, and the card which everybody felt +sure was the ace proved apparently to be that card. Most of the +on-lookers regretted that they had not bet, seeing that they would +certainly have won. Again the cards were put face down, and the company +was bantered to bet the wine. Nobody would bet. + +[Illustration: A NICE LITTLE GAME.] + +After a good deal of fluent talk, and much dexterous handling of the +cards, in a way that seemed clear enough to everybody, and that showed +that everybody's guess was right as to the place of the ace, the +near-sighted gentleman, who had drunk with Norman, offered to bet +five dollars. + +"Five dollars!" returned Parkins, laughing in derision, "five dollars! +Do you think I'm a gambler? I don't want any gentleman's money. I've got +all the money I need. However, if you would like to bet the wine with +me, I am agreed." + +The near-sighted gentleman declined to wager anything but just the five +dollars, and Parkins spurned his proposition with the scorn of a +gentleman who would on no account bet a cent of money. But he grew +excited, and bantered the whole crowd. Was there no _gentleman_ in the +crowd who would lay a wager of wine for the company on this interesting +little trick? It was strange to him that no gentleman had spirit enough +to make the bet. But no gentleman had spirit enough to bet the wine. +Evidently there were no gentlemen in the company. + +However, the near-sighted man with the white hat adorned with crape now +proposed in a crusty tone to bet ten dollars that he could lift the ace. +He even took out a ten-dollar bill, and, after examining it, in holding +it close to his nose as a penurious man might, extended his hand with, +"If you're in earnest, let's know it. I'll bet you ten." + +At this Parkins grew furious. He had never been so persistently badgered +in all his life. He'd have the gentleman know that he was not a gambler. +He had all the money he wanted, and as for betting ten dollars, he +shouldn't think of it. But now that the gentleman--he said _gentleman_ +with an emphasis--now that the gentleman seemed determined to bet money, +he would show him that he was not to be backed down. If the young man +would like to wager a hundred dollars, he would cheerfully bet with him. +If the gentleman did not feel able to bet a hundred dollars, he hoped he +would not say any more about it. He hadn't intended to bet money at all. +But he wouldn't bet less than a hundred dollars with anybody. A man who +couldn't afford to lose a hundred dollars, ought not to bet. + +"Who is this fellow in the white hat with spectacles?" August asked of +the mud-clerk. + +"That is Smith, Parkins's partner. He is only splurging round to start +up the greenies." And the mud-clerk spoke with an indifference and yet a +sort of _dilettante_ interest in the game that shocked his friend, +the striker. + +"Why don't they set these blacklegs ashore?" said August, whose love of +justice was strong. + +"_You_ tell," drawled the mud-clerk. "The first clerk's tried it, but +the old man protects 'em, and" (in a whisper) "get's his share, I guess. +He can set them off whenever he wants to." (I must explain that there +is only one "old man" on a steamboat--that is, the captain.) + +By this time Parkins had turned and thrown his cards so that everybody +knew or thought he knew where the ace was. Smith, the man with the white +hat, now rose five dollars more and offered to bet fifteen. But Parkins +was more indignant than ever. He told Smith to go away. He thrust his +hand into his pocket and drew out a handful of twenty-dollar +gold-pieces. "If any gentleman wants to bet a hundred dollars, let him +come on. A man who couldn't lose a hundred would better keep still." + +Smith now made a big jump. He'd go fifty. Parkins wouldn't listen to +fifty. He had said that he wouldn't bet less than a hundred, and he +wouldn't. He now pulled out handful after handful of gold, and piled the +double-eagles up like a fortification in front of him, while the crowd +surged with excitement. + +At last Mr. Smith, the near-sighted gentleman in spectacles, the +gentleman who wore black crape on a white hat, concluded to bet a +hundred dollars. He took out his little porte-monnaie and lifted thence +a hundred-dollar bill. + +"Well," said he angrily, "I'll bet you a hundred." And he laid down the +bill. Parkins piled five twenty-dollar gold-pieces atop it. Each man +felt that he could lift the ace in a moment. That card at the dealer's +right was certainly the ace. Norman was sure of it. He wished it had +been his wager instead of Smith's. But Parkins stopped Smith a moment. + +"Now, young man," he said, "if you don't feel perfectly able to lose +that hundred dollars, you'd better take it back." + +"I am just as able to lose it as you are," said Smith snappishly, and to +everybody's disappointment he lifted not the card everybody had fixed +on, but the middle one, and so lost his money. + +"Why didn't you take the other?" said Norman boastfully. "I knew it was +the ace." + +"Why didn't you bet, then?" said Smith, grinning a little. Norman wished +he had. But he had not a hundred dollars of his own, and he had +scruples--faint, and yet scruples, or rather alarms--at the thought of +risking his employer's money on a wager. While he was weighing motive +against motive, Smith bet again, and again, to Norman's vexation, +selected a card that was so obviously wrong that Norman thought it a +pity that so near-sighted a man should bet and lose. He wished he had a +hundred dollars of his own and--There, Smith was betting again. This +time he consulted Norman before making his selection, and of course +turned up the right card, remarking that he wished his eyes were so +keen! He would win a thousand dollars before bed-time if his eyes were +so good! Then he took Norman into partnership, and Norman found himself +suddenly in possession of fifty dollars, gotten without trouble. This +turned his brain. Nothing is so intoxicating to a weak man as money +acquired without toil. So Norman continued to bet, sometimes +independently, sometimes in partnership with, the gentlemanly Smith. He +was borne on by the excitement of varying fortune, a varying fortune +absolutely under control of the dealer, whose sleight-of-hand was +perfect. And the varying fortune had an unvarying tendency in the long +run--to put three stakes out Of five into the pockets of the gamblers, +who found the little game very interesting amusement for gentlemen. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + +THE RESULT OF AN EVENING WITH GENTLEMEN. + +All the time that these smiling villains were by consummate art drawing +their weak-headed victim into their tolls, what was August doing? Where +were his prompt decision of character, his quick intelligence, his fine +German perseverance, that should have saved the brother of Julia +Anderson from harpies? Could our blue-eyed young countryman, who knew +how to cherish noble aspirations walking in a plowman's furrow--could he +stand there satisfying his revenge by witnessing the ruin of a young man +who, like many others, was wicked only because he was weak? + +In truth, August was a man whose feelings were persistent. His +resentment was--like his love--constant. But his love of justice was +higher and more persistent, and he could not have seen any one fleeced +in this merciless way without taking sides strongly with the victim. +Much less could he see the brother of Julia tempted on to the rocks by +the false lights of villainous wreckers without a great desire to save +him. For the letter of Andrew had ceased now to burn in his pocket. That +other letter--the only one that Julia had been able to send through +Cynthy Ann and Jonas--that other letter, written all over with such +tender extravagances as love feeds on; the thought of that other letter, +which told how beautiful and precious were the invitations to the weary +and heavy-laden, had stilled resentment, and there came instead a keen +desire to save Norman for the sake of Julia and justice. But how to do +it was an embarrassing question--a question that was more than August +could solve. There was a difficulty in the weakness and wrong-headedness +of Norman; a difficulty in Norman's prejudice against Dutchmen in +general and August in particular; a difficulty in the fact that August +was a sort of a fugitive, if not from justice, certainly from injustice. + +But when nearly a third of Norman's employer's money had gone into the +gamblers' heap, and when August began to understand that it was another +man's money that Norman was losing, and that the victim was threatened +by no half-way ruin, he determined to do something, even at the risk of +making himself known to Norman and to Parkins--was he Humphreys in +disguise?--and at the risk of arrest for house-breaking. August acted +with his eyes open to all the perils from gamblers' pistols and +gamblers' malice; and after he had started to interfere, the mud-clerk +called him back, and said, in his half-indifferent way: + +"Looky here, Gus, don't be a blamed fool. That's a purty little game. +That greeny's got to learn to let blacklegs alone, and he don't look +like one that'll take advice. Let him scorch a little; it'll do him +good. It's healthy for young men. That's the reason the old man don't +forbid it, I s'pose. And these fellows carry good shooting-irons with +hair-triggers, and I declare I don't want to be bothered writing home to +your mother, and explaining to her that you got killed in a fight with +blacklegs, I declare I don't, you see. And then you'll get the 'old man' +down on you, if you let a bird out of the trap in which he goes snucks; +you will, I declare. And you'll get walking-papers at Louisville. Let +the game alone. You haven't got any hand to play against Parkins, nohow; +and I reckon the greenhorns are his lawful prey. Cats couldn't live +without mice. You'll lose your place, I declare you will, if you say +a word." + +[Illustration: THE MUD-CLERK] + +August stopped long enough to take in the full measure of his sacrifice. +So far from being deterred by it, he was more than ever determined to +act. Not the love Julia, so much, now, but the farewell prayer and +benediction and the whole life and spirit of the sweet Moravian mother +in her child-full house at home were in his mind at this moment. Things +which a man will not do for the love of woman he may do for the love of +God--and it was with a sense of moral exaltation that August entered +into the lofty spirit of self-sacrifice he had seen in his mother, and +caught himself saying, in his heart, as he had heard her say, "Let us do +anything for the Father's sake!" Some will call this cant. So much the +worse for them. This motive, too little felt in our day--too little felt +in any day--is the great impulse that has enabled men to do the bravest +things that have been done. The sublimest self-sacrifice is only +possible to a man by the aid of some strong moral tonic. God's love is +the chief support of the strongest spirits. + +August touched Norman on the arm. The face of the latter expressed +anything but pleasure at meeting him, now that he felt guilty. But this +was not the uppermost feeling with Norman. He noticed that August's +clothes were spotted with engine-grease, and his first fear was of +compromising his respectability. + +In a hurried way August began to explain to him that he was betting with +gamblers, but Smith stood close to them, looking at August in such a +contemptuous way as to make Norman feel very uncomfortable, and Parkins +seeing the crowd attracted by August's explanations--which he made in +some detail, by way of adapting himself to Norman--of the trick by which +the upper card is thrown out first, Parkins said, "I see you understand +the game, young man. If you do, why don't you bet?" + +At this the crowd laughed, and Norman drew away from the striker's +greasy clothes, and said that he didn't want to speak any further to a +burglar, he believed. But August followed, determined to warn him +against Smith. Smith was ahead of him, however, saving to Norman, "Look +out for your pockets--that greasy fellow will rob you." + +And Norman, who was nothing if not highly respectable, resolved to +shake off the troublesome "Dutchman" at once. "I don't know what you are +up to now, but at home you are known as a thief. So please let me alone, +will you?" This Norman tried to say in an annihilating way. + +The crowd looked for a fight. August said loud enough to be heard, "You +know very well that you lie. I wanted to save you from being a thief, +but you are betting money now that is not yours." + +The company, of course, sympathized with the gentleman and against the +machine-oil on the striker's clothes, so that there arose quickly a +murmur, started by Smith, "Put the bully out," and August was "hustled." +It is well that he was not shot. + +It was quite time for him to go on watch now; for the loud-ticking +marine-clock over the window of the clerk's office pointed to three +minutes past twelve, and the striker hurried to his post at the +starboard engine, with the bitterness of defeat and the shame of insult +in his heart. He had sacrificed his place, doubtless, and risked much +beside, and all for nothing. The third engineer complained of his +tardiness in not having relieved him three minutes before, and August +went to his duties with a bitter heart. To a man who is persistent, as +August was, defeat of any sort is humiliating. + +As for Norman, he bet after this just to show his independence and to +show that the money was his own, as well as in the vain hope of winning +back what he had lost. He bet every cent. Then he lost his watch, and at +half-past one o'clock he went to his state-room, stripped of all loose +valuables, and sweating great drops. And the mud-clerk, who was still in +the office, remarked to himself, with a pleasant chuckle, that it was +good for him; he declared it was; teach the fellow to let monte alone, +and keep his eyes peeled when he traveled. It would so! + +The idea was a good one, and he went down to the starboard engine and +told the result of the nice little game to his friend the striker, +drawling it out in a relishful way, how the blamed idiot never stopped +till they'd got his watch, and then looked like as if he'd a notion to +jump into the "drink." But 'twould cure him of meddlin' with monte. +It would so! + +He walked away, and August was just reflecting on the heartlessness of +his friend, when the mud-clerk came back again, and began drawling his +words out as before, just as though each distinct word were of a +delightful flavor and he regretted that he must part with it. + +"I've got you even with Parkins, old fellow. He'll be strung up on a +lamp-post at Paducah, I reckon. I saw a Paducah man aboard, and I put a +flea in his ear. We've got to lay there an hour or two to put off a +hundred barrels of molasses and two hundred sacks of coffee and two lots +of plunder. There'll be a hot time for Parkins. He let on to marry a +girl and fooled her. They'll teach him a lesson. You'll be off watch, +and we'll have some fun looking on." And the mud-clerk evidently thought +that it would be even funnier to see Parkins hanged than it had been to +see him fleece Norman. Gus the striker did not see how either scene +could be very entertaining. But he was sick at heart, and one could not +expect him to show much interest in manly sports. + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + +WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER. + +The steady beat of the wheels and the incessant clank of the engines +went on as usual. The boat was loaded almost to her guards, and did not +make much speed. The wheels kept their persistent beat upon the water, +and the engines kept their rhythmical clangor going, until August found +himself getting drowsy. Trouble, with forced inaction, nearly always has +a soporific tendency, and a continuous noise is favorable to sleep. Once +or twice August roused himself to a sense of his responsibility and +battled with his heaviness. It was nearing the end of his watch, for the +dog-watch of two hours set in at four o'clock. But it seemed to him that +four o'clock would never come. + +An incident occurred just at this moment that helped him to keep his +eyes open. A man went aft through the engine-room with a red +handkerchief tied round his forehead. In spite of this partial disguise +August perceived that it was Parkins. He passed through to the place +where the steerage or deck passengers are, and then disappeared from +August's sight. He had meant to disembark at a wood-yard just below +Paducah, but for some reason the boat did not stop, and now, as August +guessed, he was hiding himself from Paducah eyes. He was not much too +soon, for the great bell on the hurricane-deck was already ringing for +Paducah, and the summer dawn was showing itself faintly through the +river fog. + +The alarm-bell rang in the engine-room, and Wehle stood by his engine. +Then the bell rang to stop the starboard engine, and August obeyed it. +The pilot of a Western steamboat depends much upon his engines for +steerage in making a landing, and the larboard engine was kept running a +while longer in order to bring the deeply-loaded boat round to her +landing at the primitive wharf-boat of that day. There is something fine +in the faith with which an engineer obeys the bell of the pilot, not +knowing what may be ahead, not inquiring what may be the effect of the +order, but only doing exactly what he is bid when he is bid. August had +stopped his engine, and stood trying to keep his mind off Parkins and +the events of the night, that he might be ready to obey the next signal +for his engine. But the bell rang next to stop the other engine, at +which the second engineer stood, and August was so free from +responsibility in regard to that that he hardly noticed the sound of the +bell, until it rang a second time more violently. Then he observed that +the larboard engine still ran. Was Munson dead or asleep? Clearly it was +August's duty to stand by his own engine. But then he was startled to +think what damage to property or life might take place from the failure +of the second engineer to stop his engine. While he hesitated, and all +these considerations flashed through his mind, the pilot's bell rang +again long and loud, and August then, obeying an impulse rather than a +conviction, ran over to the other engine, stopped it, and then, +considering that it had run so long against orders, he reversed it and +set it to backing without waiting instructions. Then he seized Munson +and woke him, and hurried back to his post. But the larboard engine had +not made three revolutions backward before the boat, hopelessly thrown +from her course by the previous neglect, struck the old wharf-boat and +sunk it. But for the promptness and presence of mind with which Wehle +acted, the steamboat itself would have suffered severely. The mate and +then the captain came rushing into the engine-room. Munson was +discharged at once, and the striker was promised engineer's wages. + +Gus went off watch at this moment, and the mud-clerk said to him, in his +characteristically indifferent voice, "Such luck, I declare! I was sure +you would be dismissed for meddling with Parkins, and here you are +promoted, I declare!" + +The mishap occasioned much delay to the boat, as it was very +inconvenient to deliver freight at that day and at that stage of water +without the intervention of the wharf-boat. A full hour was consumed in +finding a landing, and in rigging the double-staging and temporary +planks necessary to get the molasses and coffee and household "plunder" +ashore. Some hint that Parkins was on the river had already reached +Paducah, and the sheriff and two deputies and a small crowd were at the +landing looking for him. A search of the boat failed to discover him, +and the crowd would have left the landing but for occasional hints slyly +thrown out by the mud-clerk as he went about over the levee collecting +freight-bills. These hints, given in a non-committal way, kept the crowd +alive with expectation, and when the rumors thus started spread abroad, +the levee was soon filled with an excited and angry multitude. + +If it had been a question of delivering a criminal to justice, August +would not have hesitated to tell the sheriff where to look. But he very +well knew that the sheriff could not convey the man through the mob +alive, and to deliver even such a scoundrel to the summary vengeance of +a mob was something that he could not find it in his heart to do. + +In truth, the sheriff and his officers did not seek very zealously for +their man. Under the circumstances, it was probable he would not +surrender himself without a fight, in which somebody would be killed, +and besides there must ensue a battle with the mob. It was what they +called an ugly job, and they were not loth to accept the captain's +assurance that the gambler had gone ashore. + +While August was unwilling to deliver the hunted villain to a savage +death, he began to ask himself why he might not in some way use his +terror in the interest of justice. For he had just then seen the +wretched and bewildered face of Norman looking ghastly enough in the fog +of the morning. + +At last, full of this notion, and possessed, too, by his habit of +accomplishing at all hazards what he had begun, August strolled back +through the now quiet engine-room to the deck-passengers' quarter. It +was about half an hour before six o'clock, when the dog-watch would +expire and he must go on duty again. In one of the uppermost of the +filthy bunks, in the darkest corner, near the wheel, he discovered what +he thought to be his man. The deck-passengers were still asleep, lying +around stupidly. August paused a moment, checked by a sense of the +dangerousness of his undertaking. Then he picked up a stick of wood and +touched the gambler, who could not have been very sound asleep, lying in +hearing of the curses of the mob on the shore. At first Parkins did not +move, but August gave him a still more vigorous thrust. Then he peered +out between the blanket and the handkerchief over his forehead. + +"I will take that money you won last night from that young man, if you +please." + +[Illustration: WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER.] + +Parkins saw that it was useless to deny his identity. "Do you want to be +shot?" he asked fiercely. + +"Not any more than you want to be hung," said August. "The one would +follow the other in five minutes. Give back that money and I will +go away." + +The gambler trembled a minute. He was fairly at bay. He took out a roll +of bills and handed it to August. There was but five hundred. Smith had +the other four hundred and fifty, he said. But August had a quiet German +steadiness of nerve. He said that unless the other four hundred and +fifty were paid at once he should call in the sheriff or the crowd. +Parkins knew that every minute August stood there increased his peril, +and human nature is now very much like human nature in the days of Job. +The devil understood the subject very well when he said that all that a +man hath will he give for his life. Parkins paid the four hundred and +fifty in gold-pieces. He would have paid twice that if August had +demanded it. + + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + +AUGUST AND NORMAN. + +In a story such as I meant this to be, the development of character +stands for more than the evolution of the plot, and herein is the true +significance of this contact of Wehle with the gamblers, and, indeed, of +this whole steamboat life. It is not enough for one to be good in a +country neighborhood; the sharp contests and severe ordeals of more +exciting life are needed to give temper to the character. August Wehle +was hardly the same man on this morning at Paducah, with the nine +hundred and fifty dollars in his pocket, that he had been the evening +before, when he first felt the sharp resentment against the man who had +outraged his father. In acting on a high plane, one is unconsciously +lifted to that plane. Men become Christians sometimes from the effect of +sudden demands made upon their higher moral nature, demands which compel +them to choose between a life higher than their present living, or a +moral degradation. Such had been August's experience. He had been drawn +upward toward God by the opportunity and necessity for heroic action. I +have no doubt the good Samaritan got more out of his own kindness than +the robbed Jew did. + +Before he had a chance to restore the money to its rightful owner, the +two hours of dog-watch had expired, and he was obliged to go on watch +again, much to his annoyance. He had been nearly twenty-four hours +without sleep, and after a night of such excitement it was unpleasant as +well as perilous to have to hold this money, which did not belong to +him, for six hours longer, liable at any minute to get into difficulty +through any scheme of the gamblers and their allies, by which his +recovery of the money might be misinterpreted. The morning seemed to +wear away so slowly. All the possibilities of Parkins's attacking him, +of young Anderson's committing suicide, and of the misconstruction that +might be put upon his motives--the making of his disinterested action +seem robbery--haunted his excitable imagination. At last, while the +engines were shoving their monotonous shafts backward and forward, and +the "palatial steamer" Iatan was slowly pushing her way up the stream, +August grew so nervous over his money that he resolved to relieve +himself of part of it. So he sent for the mud-clerk by a passing +deck-hand. + +"I want you to keep this money for me until I get off watch," said +August. "I made Parkins stand and deliver this morning while we were +at Paducah." + +"You did?" said the mud-clerk, not offering to touch the money. "You +risked your life, I declare, for that fool that called you a thief. You +are a fool, Gus, and nothing but your blamed good luck can save you from +getting salivated, bright and early, some morning. Not a great deal I +won't take that money. I don't relish lead, and I've got to live among +these fellows all my days, and I don't hold that money for anybody. The +old man would ship me at Louisville, seeing I never stopped anybody's +engine and backed it in a hurry, as you did. If I'd known where Parkins +was, I'd a dropped a gentle word in the ear of the crowd outside, but I +wouldn't a pulled that greeny's coffee-nuts out of the fire, and I won't +hold the hot things for you. I declare I won't. Saltpeter wouldn't save +me if I did." + +So Gus had to content himself in his nervousness, not allayed by this +speech, und keep the money in his pocket until noon. And, after all the +presentiment he had had, noon came round. Presentiments generally come +from the nerves, and signify nothing; but nobody keeps a tally of the +presentiments and auguries that fail. When the first-engineer and a new +man took the engines at noon, Gus was advised by the former to get some +sleep, but there was no sleep for him until he had found Norman, who +trembled at the sight of him. + +"Where is your state-room?" said August sternly, for he couldn't bring +himself to speak kindly to the poor fellow, even in his misery. + +Norman turned pale. He had been thinking of suicide all the morning, but +he was a coward, and now he evidently felt sure that he was to be killed +by August. He did not dare disobey, but led the way, stopping to try to +apologize two or three times, but never getting any further +than "I--I--" + +Once in the state-room, he sat down on the berth and gasped, "I--I--" + +"Here is your money," said August, handing it to him. "I made the +gambler give it up." + +"I--I--" said the astonished and bewildered Norman. + +"You needn't say a word. You are a cowardly scoundrel, and if you say +anything, I'll knock you down for treating my father as you did. Only +for--for--well, I didn't want to see you fleeced." + +Norman was ashamed for once, and hung his head. It touched the heart of +August a little, but the remembrance of the attack of the mob on his +father made him feel hard again, and so his generous act was performed +ungraciously. + + + +CHAPTER XXX. + +AGROUND. + +Not the boat. The boat ran on safely enough to Louisville, and tied up +at the levee, and discharged her sugar und molasses, and took on a new +cargo of baled hay and corn and flour, and went back again, and made I +know not how many trips, and ender her existence I can not tell how or +when. What does become of the old steamboats? The Iatan ran for years +after she tied up at Louisville that summer morning, and then perhaps +she was blown up or burned up; perchance some cruel sawyer transfixed +her; perchance she was sunk by ice, or maybe she was robbed of her +engines and did duty as barge, or, what is more probable, she wore out +like the one-hoss shay, and just tumbled to pieces simultaneously. + +It was not the gambler who got aground that morning. He had yet other +nice little games, with three cards or more or none, to play. + +It was not the mud-clerk who ran aground--good, non-committal soul, who +never look sides where it would do him any harm, and who never worried +himself about anything. Dear, drawling, optimist philosopher, who could +see how other people's mishaps were best for them, and who took good +care not to have any himself! It was not he that ran aground. + +It was not Norman Anderson who ran aground. He walked into the store +with the proud and manly consciousness of having done his duty, he made +his returns of every cent of money that had come into his hands, and, +like all other faithful stewards, received the cordial commendation of +his master. + +But August Wehle the striker, just when he was to be made an engineer, +when he thought he had smooth sailing, suddenly and provokingly found +himself fast aground, with no spar or capstan by which he might help +himself off, with no friendly craft alongside to throw him a hawser and +pull him off. + +It seems that when the captain promised him promotion, he did not know +anything of August's interference with the gamblers. But when Parkins +filed his complaint, it touched the captain. It was generally believed +among the _employés_ of the boat that a percentage of gamblers' gains +was one of the "old man's" perquisites, and he was not the only +steamboat captain who profited by the nice little games in the cabin +upon which he closed both eyes. And this retrieved nine hundred and +fifty dollars was a dead loss of--well, it does not matter how much, to +the virtuous and highly honorable captain. His proportion would have +been large enough at least to pay his wife's pew-rent in St. James's +Church, with a little something over for charitable purposes. For the +captain did not mind giving a disinterested twenty-five dollars +occasionally to those charities that were willing to show their +gratitude by posting his name as director, or his wife's as "Lady +Manageress." In this case his right hand never knew what his left hand +did--how it got the money, for instance. + +So when August drew his pay he was informed that he was discharged. No +reason was given. He tried to see the captain. But the captain was in +the bosom of his family, kissing his own well-dressed little boys, and +enjoying the respect which only exemplary and provident fathers enjoy. +And never asking down in his heart if these boys might become gamblers' +victims, or gamblers, indeed. The captain could not see August the +striker, for he was at home, and must not be interfered with by any of +his subordinates. Besides, it was Sunday, and he could not be intruded +upon--the rector of St. James's was dining with him on his wife's +invitation, and it behooved him to walk circumspectly, not with +eye-service as a man-pleaser, but serving the Lord. + +So he refuted to see the anxious striker, and turned to compliment the +rector on his admirable sermon on the sin of Judas, who sold his master +for thirty pieces of silver. + +And August Wehle had nothing left to do. The river was falling fast, the +large boats above the Falls were, in steamboat-man's phrase, "laying up" +in the mouths of the tributaries and other convenient harbors, there +were plenty of engineers unemployed, and there were no vacancies. + + + +CHAPTER XXXI. + +CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE. + +Jonas had been all his life, as he expressed it in his mixed rhetoric, +"a wanderin' sand-hill crane, makin' many crooked paths, and, like the +cards in French monte, a-turnin' up suddently in mighty on-expected +places." He had been in every queer place from Halifax to Texas, and +then had come back to his home again. Naturally cautious, and especially +suspicious of the female sex, it is not strange that he had not married. +Only when he "tied up to the same w'arf-boat alongside of Cynthy Ann, he +thought he'd found somebody as was to be depended on in a fog or a +harricane." This he told to Cynthy Ann as a reason why she should accept +his offer of marriage. + +"Jonas," said Cynthy Ann, "don't flatter. My heart is dreadful weak, and +prone to the vanities of this world. It makes me abhor myself in dust +and sackcloth fer you to say such things about poor unworthy me." + +"Ef I think 'em, why shouldn't I say 'em? I don't know no law agin +tellin' the truth ef you git into a place where you can't no ways help +it. I don't call you angel, fer you a'n't; you ha'nt got no wings nor +feathers. I don't say as how as you're pertikeler knock-down handsome. +I don't pertend that you're a spring chicken. I don't lie nor flatter. I +a'n't goin' it blind, like young men in love. But I do say, with my eyes +open and in my right senses, and feelin' solemn, like a man a-makin' his +last will and testament, that they a'n't no sech another woman to be +found outside the leds of the Bible betwixt the Bay of Fundy and the Rio +Grande. I've 'sought round this burdened airth,' as the hymn says, and +they a'n't but jest one. Ef that one'll jest make me happy, I'll fold my +weary pinions and settle down in a rustic log-cabin and raise corn and +potaters till death do us part." + +Cynthy trembled. Cynthy was a saint, a martyr to religious feeling, a +medieval nun in her ascetic eschewing of the pleasures of life. But +Cynthy Ann was also a woman. And a woman whose spring-time had paused. +When love buds out thus late, when the opportunity for the woman's +nature to blossom comes unexpectedly upon one at her age, the temptation +is not easily resisted. Cynthy trembled, but did not quite yield up her +Christian constancy. + +"Jonas, I don't know whether I'd orto or not. I don't deny--I think I'd +better ax brother Goshorn, you know, sence what would it profit ef I +gained you or any joy in this world, and then come short by settin' you +up fer a idol in my heart? I don't know whether a New Light is a +onbeliever or not, and whether I'd be onequally yoked or not. I must ax +them as knows better nor I do." + +"Well, ef I'm a onbeliever, they's nobody as could teach me to believe +quicker'n you could. I never did believe much in women folks till I +believed in you." + +"But that's the sin of it, Jonas. I'd believe in you, and you'd believe +in me, and we'd be puttin' our trust in the creatur instid of the +Creator, and the Creator is mighty jealous of our idols, and He would +take us away fer idolatry." + +"No, but I wouldn't worship you, though I'd rather worship you than +anybody else ef I was goin' into the worshipin' business. But you see I +a'n't, honey. I wouldn't sacrifice to you no lambs nor sheep, I wouldn't +pray to you, nor I wouldn't kiss your shoes, like people does the +Pope's. An' I know you wouldn't make no idol of me like them Greek gods +that Andrew's got picters of. I a'n't handsome enough by a long shot fer +a Jupiter or a 'Pollo. An' I tell you, Cynthy, 'tain't no sin to love. +Love is the fullfilling of the law." + +But Cynthy Ann persisted that she must consult Brother Goshorn, the +antiquated class-leader at the cross-roads. Brother Goshorn was a good +man, but Jonas had a great contempt for him. He was a strainer out of +gnats, though I do not think he swallowed camels. He always stood at the +door of the love-feast and kept out every woman with jewelry, every girl +who had an "artificial" in her bonnet, every one who wore curls, every +man whose hair was beyond what he considered the regulation length of +Scripture, and every woman who wore a veil. In support of this last +prohibition he quoted Isaiah iii, 23: "The glasses and the fine linen +and the hoods and the veils." + +To him Cynthy Ann presented the case with much trepidation. All her +hopes for this world hung upon it. But this consideration did not +greatly affect Brother Goshorn. Hopes and joys were as nothing to him +where the strictness of discipline was involved. The Discipline meant +more to a mind of his cast than the Decalogue or the Beatitudes. He +shook his head. He did not know. He must consult Brother Hall. Now, +Brother Hall was the young preacher traveling his second year, very +young and very callow. Ten years of the sharp attritions of a Methodist +itinerant's life would take his unworldliness out of him and develop his +practical sense as no other school in the world could develop it. But as +yet Brother Hall had not rubbed off any of his sanctimoniousness, had +not lost any of his belief that the universe should be governed on high +general principles with no exceptions. + +So when Brother Goshorn informed him that one of his members, Sister +Cynthy Ann Dyke, wished to marry, and to marry a man that was a New +Light, and had asked his opinion, and that he did not certainly know +whether New Lights were believers or not, Brother Hall did not stop to +inquire what Jonas might be personally. He looked and felt very solemn, +and said that it was a pity for a Christian to marry a New Light. It was +clearly a sin, for a New Light was an Arian. And an Arian was just as +good as an infidel. An Arian robbed Christ of His supreme deity, and +since he did not worship the Trinity in the orthodox sense he must +worship a false god. He was an idolater therefore, and it was a sin to +be yoked together with such an one. + +Many men more learned than the callow but pious and sincere Brother Hall +have left us in print just such deductions. + +When this decision was communicated to the scrupulous Cynthy Ann, she +folded her hopes as one lays away the garment of a dead friend; she west +to her little room and prayed; she offered a sacrifice to God not less +costly than Abraham's, and in a like sublime spirit. She watered the +plant In the old cracked blue-and-white tea-pot, she noticed that it was +just about to bloom, and then she dropped one tear upon it, and because +it suggested Jonas in some way, she threw it away, resolved not to have +any idols in her heart. And, doubtless, God received the sacrifice, +mistaken and needless as it was, a token of the faithfulness of her +heart to her duty as she understood it. + +[Illustration: CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE.] + +Cynthy Ann explained it all to Jonas in a severe and irrevocable way. +Jonas looked at her a moment, stunned. + +"Did Brother Goshorn venture to send me any of his wisdom, in the way of +advice, layin' round loose, like counterfeit small change, cheap +as dirt?" + +"Well, yes," said Cynthy Ann, hesitating. + +"I'll bet the heft of my fortin', to be paid on receipt of the amount, +that I kin tell to a T what the good Christian wanted me to do." + +"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas. Brother Goshorn is a mighty sincere man." + +"So he is, but his bein' sincere don't do me no good. He wanted you to +advise me to jine the Methodist class as a way of gittin' out of the +difficulty. And you was too good a Christian to ask me to change fer any +sech reason, knowin' I wouldn't be fit for you ef I did." + +Cynthy Ann was silent. She would have liked to have Jonas join the +church with her, but if he had done it now she herself would have +doubted his sincerity. + +"Now, looky here, Cynthy, ef you'll say you don't love me, and never +can, I'll leave you to wunst, and fly away and mourn like a turtle-dove. +But so long as it's nobody but Goshorn, I'm goin' to stay and litigate +the question till the Millerite millennium comes. I appeal to Cæesar or +somebody else. Neither Brother Goshorn nor Brother Hall knows enough to +settle this question. I'm agoin' to the persidin' elder. And you can't +try a man and hang him and then send him to the penitentiary fer the +rest of his born days without givin' him one chance to speak fer hisself +agin the world and everybody else. I'm goin' to see the persidin' elder +myself and plead my own cause, and ef he goes agin me, I'll carry it up +to the bishop or the archbishop or the nex' highest man in the heap, +till I git plum to the top, and ef they all go agin me, I'll begin over +agin at the bottom with Brother Goshorn, and keep on till I find a man +that's got common-sense enough to salt his religion with." + + + +CHAPTER XXXII. + +JULIA'S ENTERPRISE. + +4 August was very sick at the castle. This wag the first news of his +return that reached Julia through Jonas and Cynthy Ann. + +But in my interest in Jonas and Cynthy Ann, of whom I think a great +deal, I forgot to say that long before the events mentioned in the last +chapter, Humphreys had been suddenly called away from his peaceful +retreat in the hill country of Clark township. In fact, the "important +business," or "the illness of a friend," whichever it was, occurred the +very next day after Norman Anderson's father returned from Louisville, +and reported that he had secured for his son an "outside situation," +that is to say, a place as a collector. + +When he had gone, Jonas remarked to Cynthy Ann, "Where the carcass is, +there the turkey-buzzards is gethered. That shinin' example of early +piety never plays but one game. That is, fox-and-geese. He's gone after +a green goslin' now, and he'll find him when he's fattest." + +But the gentle singing-master had come back from his excursion, and was +taking a profound interest in the coming end of the world. Jonas +observed that it "seemed like as ef he hed charge of the whole +performance, and meant to shet up the sky like a blue cotton umbrell. +He's got a single eye, and it's the same ole game. Fox and geese always, +and he's the fox." + +Humphreys still lived at Samuel Anderson's, still devoted himself to +pleasing Mrs. Abigail, still bowed regretfully to Julia, and spoke +caressingly to Betsey Malcolm at every opportunity. + +But August was sick at the castle. He was very sick. Every morning Dr. +Dibrell, a "calomel-doctor"--not a steam-doctor--rode by the house on +his way to Andrew's, and every morning Mrs. Anderson wondered afresh who +was sick down that way. But the doctor staid so long that Mrs. Abigail +made up her mind it must be somebody four or five miles away, and so +dismissed the matter from her mind. For August's return had been +kept secret. + +But Julia noticed, in her heart of hearts, and with ever-increasing +affliction, that the doctor staid longer each day than on the day +before, and she thought she noticed also an increasing anxiety on his +face as he rode home again. Her desire to know the real truth, and to +see August, to do for him, to give her life for him, were wearing her +away. It is hard to see a friend go from you when you have done +everything. But to have a friend die within your reach, while you are +yet unable to help him, is the saddest of all. All this anxiety Julia +suffered without even the blessed privilege of showing it. The pent-up +fire consumed her, and she was at times almost distract. Every morning +she managed to be on the upper porch when the doctor went by, and from +the same watch-tower she studied his face when he went back. + +Then came a morning when there were two doctors. A physician from the +county-seat village went by, in company with Dr. Dibrell. So there must +be a consultation at the castle. Julia knew then that the worst had to +be looked in the face. And she longed to get away from under the +searching black eyes of her mother and utter the long-pent cry of +anguish. Another day of such unuttered pain would drive her clean mad. + +That evening Jonas came over and sought an interview with Cynthy Ann. He +had not been to see her since his unsuccessful courtship. Julia felt +that he was the bearer of a message. But Mrs. Anderson was in one of her +most exacting humors, and it gave her not a little pleasure to keep +Cynthy Ann, on one pretext and another, all the evening at her side. Had +Cynthy Ann been less submissive and scrupulous, she might have broken +away from this restraint, but in truth she was censuring herself for +having any backsliding, rebellious wish to talk with Jonas after she had +imagined the idol cast out of her heart entirely. Her conscience was a +tank-master not less grievous than Mrs. Anderson, and, between the two, +Jonas had to go away without leaving his message. And Julia had to keep +her breaking heart in suspense a while longer. + +Why did she not elope long ago and get rid of her mother? Because she +was Julia, and being Julia, conscientious, true, and filial in spite of +her unhappy life, her own character built a wall against such a +disobedience. Nearly all limitations are inside. You could do almost +anything if you could give yourself up to it. To go in the teeth of +one's family is the one thing that a person of Julia's character and +habits finds next to impossible. A beneficent limitation of nature; for +the cases in which the judgment of a girl of eighteen is better than +that of her parents are very few. Besides, the inevitable +"heart-disease" was a specter that guarded the gates of Julia's prison. +Night after night she sat looking out over the hills sleeping in hazy +darkness, toward the hollow in which stood the castle; night after night +she had half-formed the purpose of visiting August, and then the +life-long habit of obedience and a certain sense of delicacy held her +back. But on this night, after the consultation, she felt that she would +see him if her seeing him brought down the heavens. + +It was a very dark night. She sat waiting for hours--very long hours +they seemed to her--and then, at midnight, she began to get ready +to start. + +Only those who have taken such a step can understand the pain of +deciding, the agony of misgivings in the execution, the trembling that +Julia felt when she turned the brass knob on the front door and lifted +the latch--lifted the latch slowly and cautiously, for it was near the +door of her mother's room--and then crept out like a guilty thing into +the dark dampness of the night, groping her way to the gate, and +stumbling along down the road. It had been raining, and there was not +one star-twinkle in the sky; the only light was that of glow-worms +illuminating here and there two or three blades of grass by feeble +shining. Now and then a fire-fly made a spot of light in the blackness, +only to leave a deeper spot of blackness when he shut off his +intermittent ray. And when at last Julia found herself at the place +where the path entered the woods, the blackness ahead seemed still more +frightful. She had to grope, recognizing every deviation from the +well-beaten path by the rustle of the dead leaves which lay, even in +summer, half a foot deep upon the ground. The "fox-fire," rotting logs +glowing with a faint luminosity, startled her several times, and the +hooting-owl's shuddering bass--hoo! hoo! hoo-oo-ah-h! (like the awful +keys of the organ which "touch the spinal cord of the universe")--sent +all her blood to her heart. Under ordinary circumstances, she surely +would not have started at the rustling made by the timid hare in the +thicket near by. There was no reason why she should shiver so when a +misstep caused her to scratch her face with the thorny twigs of a wild +plum-tree. But the effort necessary to the undertaking and the agony of +the long waiting had exhausted her nervous force, and she had none left +for fortitude. So that when she arrived at Andrew's fence and felt her +way along to the gate, and heard the hoarse, thunderous baying of his +great St. Bernard dog, she was ready to faint. But a true instinct makes +such a dog gallant. It is a vile cur that will harm a lady. Julia walked +trembling up to the front-door of the castle, growled at by the huge +black beast, and when the Philosopher admitted her, some time after she +had knocked, she sank down fainting into a chair. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII. + +THE SECRET STAIRWAY. + +"God bless you!" said Andrew as he handed her a gourd of water to revive +her. "You are as faithful as Hero. You are another Heloise. You are as +brave as the Maid of Orleans. I will never say that women are unfaithful +again. God bless you, my daughter! You have given me faith in your sex. +I have been a lonely man; a boughless, leafless trunk, shaken by the +winter winds. But _you_ are my niece. _You_ know how to be faithful. I +am proud of you! Henceforth I call you my daughter. If you _were_ my +daughter, you would be to me all that Margaret Roper was to Sir Thomas +More." And the shaggy man of egotistic and pedantic speech, but of +womanly sensibilities, was weeping. + +The reviving Julia begged to know how August was. + +"Ah, constant heart! And he is constant as you are. Noble fellow! I will +not deceive you. The doctors think that he will not live more than +twenty-four hours. But he is only dying to see you, now. Your coming may +revive him. We sent for you this morning by Jonas, hoping you might +escape and come in some way. But Jonas could not get his message to +you. Some angel must have brought you. It is an augury of good." + +The hopefulness of Andrew sprang out of his faith in an ideal, right +outcome. Julia could not conceal from herself the fact that his opinion +had no ground. But in such a strait as hers, she could not help clinging +even to this support. + +Andrew was a little perplexed. How to take Julia up-stairs? Mrs. Wehle +and Wilhelmina and the doctor went in regularly, not by the rope-ladder, +but by a more secure wooden one which he had planted against the outside +of the house. But Andrew had suddenly conceived so exalted an opinion of +his niece's virtues that he was unwilling to lead her into the upper +story in that fashion. His imagination had invested her with all the +glories of all the heroines, from Penelope to Beatrice, and from +Beatrice to Scott's Rebecca. At last a sudden impulse seized him. + +"My dear daughter, they say that genius is to madness close allied. When +I built this house I was in a state bordering on insanity, I suppose. I +pleased my whims--my whims were my only company--I pleased my whims in +building an American castle. These whims begin to seem childish to me +now. I put in a secret stairway. No human foot but my own has ever +trodden it. August, whom I love more than any other, and who is one of +the few admitted to my library, has always ascended by the rope-ladder. +But you are my niece; I would you were my daughter. I will signalize my +reverence for you by showing up the stairway the woman who knows how to +love and be faithful, the feet that would be worthy of golden steps if I +had them. Come." + +Spite of her grief and anxiety, Julia was impressed and oppressed with +the reverence shown her by her uncle. She had a veneration almost +superstitious for the Philosopher's learning. She was not accustomed to +even respectful treatment, and to be worshiped in this awful way by such +a man was something almost as painful as it was pleasant. + +The entrance to the stairway, if that could be called a stairway which +was as difficult of ascent as a ladder, was through a closet by the side +of the donjon chimney, and the logs had been so arranged without and +within that the space occupied by the narrow and zigzag stairs was not +apparent. Up these stairs he took Julia, leaving her in a closet above. +As this closet was situated alongside the chimney, it opened, of course, +into the small corner room which I have before described, and in which +August was now lying. Andrew descended the stairs and entered the upper +story again by the outside ladder. He thought best to prepare August for +the coming of Julia, lest joy should destroy a life that was so +far wasted. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV. + +THE INTERVIEW. + +We left August on that summer day on the levee at Louisville without +employment. He was not exactly disheartened, but he was homesick. That +he was forbidden to go back by threats of prosecution for his +burglarious manner of entering Samuel Anderson's house was reason enough +for wanting to go; that his father's family were not yet free from +danger was a stronger reason; but strongest of all, though he blushed to +own it to himself, was the longing to be where he might perchance +sometimes see the face he had seen that spring morning in the bottom of +a sun-bonnet. Right manfully did he fight against his discouragement and +his homesickness, and his longing to see Julia. It was better to stay +where he was. It was better not to go back beaten. If he surrendered so +easily, he would never put himself into a situation where he could claim +Julia with self-respect. He would stay and make his way in the world +somehow. But making his way in the world did not seem half so easy now +us it had on that other morning in March when he stood in the barn +talking to Julia. Making your fortune always seems so easy until you've +tried it. It seems rather easy in a novel, and still easier in a +biography. But no Samuel Smiles ever writes the history of those who +fail; the vessels that never came back from their venturous voyages left +us no log-books. Many have written the History of Success. What +melancholy Plutarch shall arise to record, with a pen dipped in +wormwood, the History of Failure? + +No! he would not go back defeated. August said this over bravely, but a +little too often, and with a less resolute tone at each repetition. He +contemned himself for his weakness, and tried, but tried in vain, to +form other plans. Had he known how much one's physical state has to do +with one's force of character, he might have guessed that he did not +deserve the blame he meted out to himself. He might have remembered what +Shakespeare's Portia says to Brutus, that "humour hath his hour with +every man." But with a dull and unaccountable aching in his head and +back he compromised with himself. He would go to the castle and pass a +day or two. Then he would return and fight it out. + +So he got on the packet Isaac Shelby, and was soon shaking with a chill +that showed how thoroughly malaria had pervaded his system. His very +bones seemed frozen. But if you ever shook with such a chill, or rather +if you were ever shaken by such a chill, taking hold of you like a +demoniacal possession; if you ever felt your brain congealing, your icy +bones breaking, your frosty heart becoming paralyzed, with a cold no +fire could reach, you know what it is; and if you have not felt it, no +words of mine can make you understand the sensations. After the chill +came the period when August felt himself between two parts of Milton's +hell, between a sea of ice and a sea of fire; sometimes the hot wave +scorched him, then it retired again before the icy one. At last it was +all hot, and the boiling blood scalded his palms and steamed to his +brain, bewildering his thoughts and almost blinding his eyes. He had +determined when he started to get off at a wood-yard three miles below +Andrew's castle, to avoid observation and the chance of arrest; and now +in his delirium the purpose as he had planned it remained fixed. He got +up at two o'clock, crazed with fever, dressed himself, and went out into +the rainy night. He went ashore in the mud and bushes, and, guided more +by instinct than by any conscious thought, he started up the wagon-track +along the river bank. His furious fever drove him on, talking to +himself, and splashing recklessly into the pools of rain-water standing +in the road. He never remembered his debarkation. He must have fallen +once or twice, for he was covered with mud when he rang the alarm at the +castle. In answer to Andrew's "Who's there?" he answered, "You'll have +to send a harder rain than that if you want to put this fire out!" + +And so, what with the original disease, the mental discouragement, and +the exposure to the rain, the fever had well-nigh consumed the life, and +now that the waves of the hot sea after days of fire and nights of +delirium had gone back, there was hardly any life left in the body, and +the doctors said there was no hope. One consuming desire remained. He +wanted to see Julia once before he went away; and that one desire it +seemed impossible to gratify. When he learned of the failure of Jonas to +get any message to Julia through Cynthy, he had felt the keenest +disappointment, and had evidently been sinking since the hope that kept +him up had been taken away. + +The mother sat by his bed, Gottlieb sat stupefied at the foot, with +Jonas by his side, and Wilhelmina was crying in a still fashion in one +corner of the room. August lay breathing feebly, and with his life +evidently ebbing. + +"August!" said Andrew, as he stood over his bed, having come to announce +the arrival of Julia. "August!" Andrew tried to speak quietly, but there +was a something of hope in the inflection, a tremor of eagerness in the +utterance, that made the mother look up quickly and inquiringly. + +August opened his eyes slowly and looked into the face of the +Philosopher. Then he slowly closed his eyes again, and a something, not +a smile--he was too weak for that--but a look of infinite content, +spread over his wan face. + +"I know," he whisperd. + +"Know what?" asked Andrew, leaning down to catch his words. + +"Julia." And a single tear crept out from under the closed lid. The +tender mother wiped it away. + +After resting a moment, August looked up at Andrew's face inquiringly. + +"She is coming," said the Philosopher. + +August smiled very faintly, but Andrew was sure he smiled, and again +leaned down his ear. + +"She is here," whispered August; "I heard Charon bark, and +I--saw--your--face." + +Andrew now stepped to the closet-door and opened it, and Julia came out. + +"Blamed ef he a'n't a witch!" whispered Jonas. "Cunjures a angel out of +his cupboard!" + +Julia did not see anybody or anything but the white and wasted face upon +the pillow. The eyes were now closed again, and she quickly crossed the +floor, and--not without a faint maidenly blush--stooped and kissed the +parched lips, from which the life seemed already to have fled. + +And August with difficulty disengaged his wasted hand from the cover, +and laid his nerveless fingers--alas! like a skeleton's now--In the warm +hand of Julia, and said--she leaned down to listen, an he whispered +feebly through his dry lips out of a full heart--"Thank God!" + +And the Philosopher, catching the words, said audibly, "Amen!" + +And the mother only wept. + + + +CHAPTER XXXV. + +GETTING READY FOR THE END. + +How Julia spent two hours of blessed sadness at the castle; how August +slept peacefully for five minutes at a time with his hand in hers, and +then awoke and looked at her, and then slumbered again; how she +moistened his parched lips for him, and gave him wine; how at last she +had to bid him a painful farewell; how the mother gave her a benediction +in German and a kiss; how Wilhelmina clung to her with tears; how Jonas +called her a turtle-dove angel; how Brother Hall, the preacher who had +been sent for at the mother's request, to converse with the dying man, +spoke a few consoling words to her; how Gottlieb confided to Jonas his +intention never to "sprach nodin 'pout Yangee kirls no more;" and how at +last Uncle Andrew walked home with her, I have not time to tell. When +the Philosopher bade her adieu, he called her names which she did not +understand. But she turned back to him, and after a minute's hesitation, +spoke huskily. "Uncle Andrew if he--if he should get worse--I want--" + +"I know, my daughter; you want him to die your husband?" + +"Yes, if he wishes it. Send for me day or night, and I'll come in spite +of everybody." + +"God bless you, my daughter!" said Andrew. And he watched until she got +safely into the house without discovery, and then he went back satisfied +and proud. + +Of course August died, and Julia devoted herself to philanthropic +labors. It is the fashion now for novels to end thus sadly, and you +would not have me be out of the fashion. + +But August did not die. Joy is a better stimulant than wine. Love is the +best tonic in the pharmacopeia. And from the hour in which August Wehle +looked into the eyes of Julia, the tide of life set back again. Not +perceptibly at first. For two days he was neither better nor worse. But +this was a gain. Then slowly he came back to life. But at Andrew's +instance he kept indoors while Humphreys staid. + +Humphreys, on his part, like Ananias, pretended to have disposed of all +his property, paid his debts, reserved enough to live on until the +approaching day of doom, and given the rest to the poor of the household +of faith, and there were several others who were sincere enough to do +what he only pretended. + +Among the leading Adventists was "Dr." Ketchup, who still dealt out +corn-sweats and ginseng-tea, but who refused to sell his property. He +excused himself by quoting the injunction, "Occupy till I come." But +others sold their estates for trifles, and gave themselves up to +proclaiming the millennium. + +Mrs. Abigail Anderson was a woman who did nothing by halves. She was +vixenish, she was selfish, she was dishonest and grasping; but she was +religious. If any man think this paradox impossible, he has observed +character superficially. There are criminals in State's-prison who have +been very devout all their lives. Religious questions took hold of Mrs. +Anderson's whole nature. She was superstitious, narrow, and intense. She +was as sure that the day of judgment would be proclaimed on the eleventh +of August, 1843, as she was of her life. No consideration in opposition +to any belief of hers weighed a feather with her. Her will mastered her +judgment and conscience. + +And so she determined that Samuel must sell his property for a trifle. +How far she was influenced in this by a sincere desire to square all +outstanding debts before the final settlement, how far by a longing to +be considered the foremost and most pious of all, and how far by +business shrewdness based on that feeling which still lurks in the most +protestant people, that such sacrifices do improve their state in a +future world, I can not tell. Doubtless fanaticism, hypocrisy, and a +self-interest that looked sordidly even at heaven, mingled in bringing +about the decision. At any rate, the property was to be sold for a few +hundred dollars. + +Getting wind of this decision, Andrew promptly appeared at his brother's +house and offered to buy it. But Mrs. Abigail couldn't think of it. +Andrew had always been her enemy, and though she forgave him, she would +not on any account sell him an inch of the land. It would not be right. +He had claimed that part of it belonged to him, and to let him have it +would be to admit his claim. + +"Andrew," she said, "you do not believe in the millennium, and people +say that you are a skeptic. You want to cheat us out of what you think a +valuable piece of property. And you'll find yourself at the last +judgment with the weight of this sin on your heart. You will, indeed!" + +"How clearly you reason about other people's duty!" said the +Philosopher. "If you had seen your own duty half so clearly, some of us +would have been better off, and your account would have been +straighter." + +Here Mrs. Anderson grew very angry, and vented her spleen in a solemn +exhortation to Andrew to get ready for the coming of the Master, not +three weeks off at the farthest, and she warned him that the archangel +might blow his trumpet at any moment. Then where would he be? she asked +in exultation. Human meanness is never so pitiful as when it tries to +seize on God's judgments as weapons with which to gratify its own +spites. I trust this remark will not be considered as applying only to +Mrs. Anderson. + +But Mrs. Anderson fired off all the heavenly small-shot she could find +in the teeth and eyes of Andrew, and then, to prevent a rejoinder, she +told him it was time for her to go to secret prayer, and she only +stopped upon the threshold to send back one Parthian arrow in the shape +of a warning to "watch and be ready." + +I wonder if a certain class of religious people have ever thought how +much their exclusiveness and Pharisaism have to do with the unhappy +fruitlessness of all their appeals! Had Mrs. Anderson been as blameless +as an angel, such exhortations would have driven a weaker than Andrew to +hate the name of religion. + +But I must not moralize, for Mr. Humphreys has already divulged his plan +of disposing of the property. He has a friend, one Thomas A. Parkins, +who has money, and who will buy the farm at two hundred dollars. He +could procure the money in advance any day by going to the village of +Bethany, the county-seat, and drawing on Mr. Parkins, and cashing the +draft. It was a matter of indifference to him, he said, only that he +would like to oblige so good a friend. + +This arrangement, by which the Anderson farm was to be sold for a song +to some distant stranger, pleased Mrs. Abigail. She could not bear that +one of her unbelieving neighbors should even for a fortnight rejoice in +a supposed good bargain at her expense. To sell to Mr. Humphreys's +friend in Louisville was just the thing. When pressed by some of her +neighbors who had not received the Adventist gospel, to tell on what +principle she could justify her sale of the farm at all, she answered +that if the farm would not be of any account after the end of the world, +neither would the money. + +Mr. Humphreys went down to the town of Bethany and came back, affecting +to have cashed a draft on his friend for two hundred dollars. The deeds +were drawn, and a justice of the peace was to come the next morning and +take the acknowledgment of Mr. and Mrs. Anderson. + +This was what Jonas learned as he sat in the kitchen talking to Cynthy +Ann. He had come to bring some message from the convalescent August, and +had been detained by the attraction of adhesion. + +"I told you it was fox-and-geese. Didn't I? And so Thomas A. Parkins +_is_ his name. Gus Wehle said he'd bet the two was one. Well, I must +drive this varmint off afore he gits his chickens." + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI. + +THE SIN OF SANCTIMONY. + +Just at this point arrived Mr. Hall, whom I have before described as the +good but callow Methodist preacher on the circuit. Some people think +that a minister of the gospel should be exempt from criticism, ridicule, +and military duty. But the manly minister takes his lot with the rest. +Nothing could be more pernicious than making the foibles of a minister +sacred. Doubtless Mr. Hall has long since come to laugh at his own early +follies, his official sanctimoniousness, and all that; and why should +not I, who have been a callow circuit-preacher myself in my day, laugh +at my Brother Hall, for the good of his kind? + +He had come to visit Sister Cynthy Ann, whose name had long stood on the +class-book at Harden's Cross-Roads as a good and acceptable member of +the church in full connection. He was visiting formally and officially +each family in which there was a member. Had he visited informally and +unofficially, and like a man instead of like a minister, he would have +done more good. But he came to Samuel Anderson's, and informed Mrs. +Anderson that he was visiting his members, and that as one of her +household was a member, he would like to have a little religious +conversation and prayer with the family. Would she please gather +them together? + +So Julia was called down-stairs, and Jonas was invited in from the +kitchen. The sight of him distressed Brother Hall. For was not this New +Light sent here by Satan to lead astray one of his flock? But, at least, +he would labor faithfully with him. + +He began with Mr. Samuel Anderson. But that worthy, after looking at his +wife in vain for a cue, darted off about the trumpets of the Apocalypse. + +"Mr. Anderson, as head of this family, your responsibility is very +great. Do you feel the full assurance, my brother?" asked Mr. Hall. + +"Yes," said Mr. Anderson, "I am standing with my lamp trimmed and ready. +I am listening for the midnight shout. To-night the trumpet may sound. I +am afraid you don't do your duty, or you would lift up your voice. The +tune and times and a half are almost out." + +Mr. Hall was a little dashed at this. A man whose religious conversation +is of a set and conventional type, is always shocked and jostled when he +is thrown from the track. And he himself, like everybody else, had felt +the Adventist infection, and did not want to commit himself. So he +turned to Mrs. Anderson. She answered like a seraph every question put +to her--the conventional questions never pierce the armor of a hypocrite +or startle the conscience of a self-deceiver. Mr. Hall congratulated her +in his most official tone (a compound of authority, awfulness, and +sanctity) on her deep experience of the things that made for her +everlasting peace. He told her that people of her high attainments +must beware of spiritual pride. And Mrs. Anderson took the warning with +beautiful meekness, sinking into forty fathoms of undisguised and rather +ostentatious humility, heaving solemn sighs in token of self-reproach--a +self-reproach that did not penetrate the cuticle. + +[Illustration: A PASTORAL VISIT.] + +"And you, Sister Cynthy Ann," he said, fighting shy of Jonas for the +present, "I trust you are trying to let your light shine. Do you feel +that you are pressing on?" + +Poor Cynthy Ann sank into a despondency deeper than usual. She was +afeard not. Seemed like as ef her heart was cold and dead to God. Seemed +like as ef she couldn't no ways gin up the world. It weighed her down +like a rock, and many was the fight she had with the enemy. No, she +wuzn't getting on. + +"My dear sister," said Mr. Hall, "let me warn you. Here is Mrs. +Anderson, who has given up the world entirely. I hope you'll follow so +good an example. Do not be led astray by worldly affections; they are +sure to entrap you. I am afraid you have not maintained your +steadfastness as you should." Here Mr. Hall's eye wandered doubtfully to +Jonas, of whom he felt a little afraid. Jonas, on his part, had no +reason to like Mr. Hall for his advice in Cynthy's love affair, and now +the minister's praises of Mrs. Anderson and condemnation of Cynthy Ann +had not put him in any mood to listen to exhortation. + +"Well, Mr. Harrison," said the young minister solemnly, approaching +Jonas much as a dog does a hedgehog, "how do you feel to-day?" + +"Middlin' peart, I thank you; how's yourself?" + +This upset the good man not a little, and convinced him that Jonas was +in a state of extreme wickedness. + +"Are you a Christian?" + +"Wal, I 'low I am. How about yourself, Mr. Hall?" + +"I believe you are a New Light. Now, do you believe in the Lord Jesus +Christ?" asked the minister in an annihilating tone. + +"Yes, I do, my aged friend, a heap sight more'n I do in some of them +that purtends to hev a paytent right on all his blessins, and that put +on solemn airs and call other denominations hard names. My friend, I +don't believe in no religion that's made up of sighs and groans and high +temper" (with a glance at Mrs. Anderson), "and that thinks a good deal +more of its bein' sound in doctrine than of the danger of bein' rotten +in life. They's lots o' bad eggs got slick and shiny shells!" + +Mr. Hall happened to think just here of the injunction against throwing +pearls before swine, and so turned to Humphreys, who made his heart glad +by witnessing a good confession, in soft and unctuous tones, and couched +in the regulation phrases which have worn smooth in long use. + +Julia had slunk away in a corner. But now he appealed to her also. + +"Blest with a praying mother, you, Miss Anderson, ought to repent of +your sins and flee from the wrath to come. You know the right way. You +have been pointed to it by the life of your parents from childhood. +Reared in the bosom of a Christian household, let me entreat you to seek +salvation immediately." + +I do not like to repeat this talk here. But it is an unfortunate fact +that goodness and self-sacrificing piety do not always go with practical +wisdom. The novelist, like the historian, must set down things as he +finds them. A man who talks in consecrated phrases is yet in the +poll-parrot state of mental development. + +"Do you feel a desire to flee from the wrath to come?" he asked. + +Julia gave some sort of inaudible assent. + +"My dear young sister, you have great reason to be thankful--very great +reason for gratitude to Almighty God." (Like many other pious young men, +Mr. Hall said _Gawd_.) "I met you the other night at your uncle's. The +young man whose life we then despaired of has recovered." And with more +of this, Mr. Hall told Julia's secret, while Mrs. Anderson, between her +anger and her rapt condition of mind, seemed to be petrifying. + +I trust the reader does not expect me to describe the feelings of Julia +while Mr. Hall read a chapter and prayed. Nor the emotions of Mrs. +Anderson. I think if Mr. Hall could have heard her grind her teeth while +he in his prayer gave thanks for the recovery of August, he would not +have thought so highly of her piety. But she managed to control her +emotions until the minister was fairly out of the house. In bidding +good-by, Mr. Hall saw how pale and tremulous Julia was, and with his +characteristic lack of sagacity, he took her emotion to be a sign of +religious feelings and told her he was pleased to see that she was +awakened to a sense of her condition. + +And then he left. And then came the deluge. + + + +CHAPTER XXXVII. + +THE DELUGE. + +The indescribable deluge! But, after all, the worst of anything of that +sort is the moment before it begins. A plunge-bath, a tooth-pulling, an +amputation, and a dress-party are all worse in anticipation than in the +moment of infliction. Julia, as she stood busily sticking a pin in the +window-sash, waiting for her mother to begin, wished that the storm +might burst, and be done with it. But Mrs. Anderson understood her +business too well for that. She knew the value of the awful moments of +silence before beginning. She had not practiced all her life without +learning the fine art of torture in its exquisite details. I doubt not +the black-robed fathers of the Holy Office were leisurely gentlemen, +giving their victims plenty of time for anticipatory meditation, laying +out their utensils quietly, inspecting the thumb-screw affectionately to +make sure that it would work smoothly, discussing the rack and wheel +with much tender forethought, as though torture were a sweet thing, to +be reserved like a little girl's candy lamb, and only resorted to when +the appetite has been duly whetted by contemplation. I never had the +pleasure of knowing an inquisitor, and I can not certify that they were +of this deliberate fashion. But it "stands to nature" that they were. +For the vixens who are vixens of the highest quality, are always +deliberate. + +Mrs. Anderson felt that the piece of invective which she was about to +undertake, was not to be taken in hand unadvisedly, "but reverently, +discreetly, and in the fear of God." And so she paused, and Julia +fumbled the tassel of the window-curtain, and trembled with the chill of +expectation. And Mrs. Abigail continued to debate how she might make +this, which would doubtless be her last outburst before the day of +judgment, her masterpiece--worthy song of the dying swan. And then she +hoped, she sincerely hoped, to be able by this awful _coup de main_ to +awaken Julia to a sense of her sinfulness. For there was such a jumble +of mixed motives in her mind, that one could never distinguish her +sincerity from her hypocrisy. + +Mrs. Anderson's conscience was quite an objective one. As Jonas often +remarked, "she had a feelin' sense of other folkses unworthiness." And +the sins which she appreciated were generally sins against herself. +Julia's disobedience to herself was darker in her mind than murder +committed on anybody else would have been. And now she sat deliberating, +not on the limit of the verbal punishment she meant to inflict--that +gave her no concern--but on her ability to do the matter justice. Even +as a tyrannical backwoods school-master straightens his long beech-rod +relishfully before applying it. + +Not that Mrs. Anderson was silent all this time. She was sighing and +groaning in a spasmodic devotion. She was "seeking strength from above +to do her whole duty," she would have told you. She was "agonizing" in +prayer for her daughter, and she contrived that her stage-whisper +praying should now and then reach the ears of its devoted object. +Humphreys remained seated, pretending to read the copy of "Josephus," +but watching the coming storm with the interest of a connoisseur. And +while he remained Jonas determined to stay, to keep Julia in +countenance, and he beckoned to Cynthy to stay also. And Samuel +Anderson, who loved his daughter and feared his wife, fled like a coward +from the coming scene. Everybody expected Mrs. Anderson to break out +like a fury. + +But she knew a better plan than that. She felt a new device come like an +inspiration. And perhaps it was. It really seemed to Jonas that the +devil helped her. For instead of breaking out into commonplace scolding, +the resources of which she had long since exhausted, she dropped upon +her knees, and began to pray for Julia. + +No swearer ever curses like the priest who veils his personal spites in +official and pious denunciations, and Mrs. Anderson had never dealt out +abuse so roundly and terribly and crushingly, as she did under the guise +of praying for the salvation of Julia's soul from well-deserved +perdition. But Abigail did not say perdition. She left that to weak +spirits. She thought it a virtue to say "hell" with unction and +emphasis, by way of alarming the consciences of sinners. Mrs. Anderson's +prayer is not reportable. That sort of profanity is too bad to write. +She capped her climax--even as I have heard a revivalist pray for a +scoffer that had vexed his righteous soul--by asking God to convert her +daughter, or if she could not be converted to take her away, that she +might not heap up wrath against the day of wrath. For that sort of +religious excitement which does not quiet the evil passions, seems to +inflame them, and Mrs. Anderson was not in any right sense sane. And the +prayer was addressed more to the frightened Julia than to God. She would +have been terribly afflicted had her petition been granted. + +Julia would have run away from the admonition which followed the prayer, +had it not been that Mrs. Anderson adroitly put it under cover of a +religious exhortation. She besought Julia to repent, and then, affecting +to show her her sinfulness, she proceeded to abuse her. + +Had Julia no temper? Yes, she had doubtless a spice of her mother's +anger without her meanness. She would have resisted, but that from +childhood she had felt paralyzed by the utter uselessness of all +resistance. The bravest of the villagers at the foot of Vesuvius never +dreamed of stopping the crater's mouth. + +But, happily, at last Mrs. Anderson's insane wrath went a little too +far. + +"You poor lost sinner," she said, "to think you should go to destruction +under my very eyes, disgracing us all, by running over the country at +night with bad men! But there's mercy even for such as you." + +Julia would not have understood the full meaning of this aspersion of +her purity, had she not caught Humphreys's eye. His expression, half +sneer, half leer, seemed to give her mother's saying its full +interpretation. She put out her hand. She turned white, and said: "Say +one word more, and I will go away from you and never come back! Never!" +And then she sat down and cried, and then Mrs. Anderson's maternal love, +her "unloving love," revived. To have her daughter leave her, too, would +be a sort of defeat. She hushed, and sat down in her splint-bottomed +rocking-chair, which snapped when she rocked, and which seemed to speak +for her after she had shut her mouth. Her face settled into a +martyr-like appeal to Heaven in proof of the justice of her cause. And +then she fell back on her forlorn hope. She wept hysterically, in +sincere self-pity, to think that an affectionate mother should have such +a daughter! + +Julia, finding that her mother had desisted, went to her room. She did +not exactly pray, but she talked to herself as she paced the floor. It +was a monologue, and yet there was a conscious appeal to an invisible +Presence, who could not misjudge her, and so she passed from talking to +herself to talking to God, and that without any of the formality of +prayer. Her mother had made God seem to be against her. Now she, like +David, protested her innocence to God. She recited half to herself, and +yet also to God--for is not every appeal to one's conscience in some +sense an appeal to God?--she recited all the struggles of that night +when she went to August at the castle. People talk of the consolation +there is in God's mercy. But Julia found comfort in God's justice. He +_could_ not judge her wrongly. + +Then she opened the Testament at the old place, and read the words long +since fixed in her memory. And then she--weary and heavy laden--came +again to Him who invites, and found rest. And then she found, as many +another has found, that coming to God is not, as theorists will have it, +a coming once for a lifetime, but a coming oft and ever repeated. + +Jonas and Cynthy Ann retired to the kitchen, and the former said hi his +irreverent way, "Blamed ef Abigail ha'nt got more devils into her'n Mary +Magdalene had the purtiest day she ever seed! I should think, arter a +life with her fer a mother, the bad place would be a healthy and +delightful clime. The devil a'n't a patchin' to her." + +"Don't, Jonas; you talk so cur'us, like as ef you was kinder sorter +wicked." + +"That's jest what I am, my dear, but Abigail Anderson's wicked without +the kinder sorter. She cusses when she's a-prayin'. She cusses that poar +gal right in the Lord's face. Good by, I must go. Smells so all-fired +like brimstone about here." This last was spoken in an undertone of +indignant soliloquy, as he crossed the threshold of Cynthy's +clean kitchen. + + + +CHAPTER XXXVIII. + +SCARING A HAWK. + +Jonas was thoroughly alarmed. He exaggerated the harm that Humphreys +might do to August, now that he knew where he was. August, on his part, +felt sure that Humphreys would not do anything against him; certainly +not in the way of legal proceedings. And as for the sale of Samuel +Anderson's farms, that did not disturb him. Like almost everybody else +at that time, August Wehle was strongly impressed by the assertions of +the Millerites, and if the world should be finished in the next month, +the farms were of no consequence. And if Millerism proved a delusion, +the loss of Samuel Anderson's property would only leave Julia on his +level, so far as worldly goods went. The happiness this last thought +brought him made him ashamed. Why should he rejoice in Mr. Anderson's +misfortune? Why should he wish to pull Julia down to him? But still the +thought remained a pleasant one. + +Jonas would not have it so. He had his plan. He went home from the +Adventist meeting that very night with Cynthy Ann, and then stood +talking to her at the corner of the porch, feeling very sure that +Humphreys would listen from above. He heard his stealthy tread, after a +while, disturb a loose board on the upper porch. Then he began to talk +to Cynthy Ann in this strain: + +"You see, I can't tell no secrets, Cynthy Ann, even to your Royal +Goodness, as I might say, seein' as how as you a'n't my wife, and a'n't +likely to be, if Brother Goshorn can have his way. But you're the Queen +of Hearts, anyhow. But s'pose I was to hint a secret?" + +"Sh--sh--h-h-h!" said Cynthy Ann, partly because she felt a sinful +pleasure in the flattery, and partly because she felt sure that +Humphreys was above. But Jonas paid no attention to the caution. + +"I'll give you a hint as strong as a Irishman's, which they do say'll +knock you down. Let's s'pose a case. They a'n't no harm in s'posin' a +case, you know. I've knowed boys who'd throw a rock at a fence-rail and +hit a stump, and then say, 'S'posin' they was a woodpecker on that air +stump, wouldn't I a keeled him over?' You can s'pose a case and make a +woodpecker wherever you want to. Well, s'posin' they was a inquisition +or somethin' of the kind from the guv'nor of the State of ole Kaintuck +to the guv'nor of the State of Injeanny? And s'posin' that the dokyment +got lodged in this 'ere identical county? And s'posin' it called fer the +body of one Thomas A. Parkins, a_li_as J.W. 'Umphreys? And s'posin' it +speecified as to sartain and sundry crimes committed in Paduky and all +along the shore, fer all I know? Now, s'posin' all of them air things, +what _would_ Clark township do to console itself when that toonful v'ice +and them air blazin' watch-seals had set in ignominy for ever and ever? +Selah! Good-night, and don't you breathe a word to a livin' soul, nur a +dead one, 'bout what I been a-sayin'. You'll know more by daylight +to-morry 'n you know now." + +And the last part of the speech was true, for by midnight the Hawk had +fled. And the sale of the Anderson farm to Humphreys was never +completed. For three days the end of the world was forgotten in the +interest which Clark township felt in the flight of its favorite. And by +degrees the story of Norman's encounter with the gamblers and of +August's recovery of the money became spread abroad through the +confidential hints of Jonas. And by degrees another story became known; +it could not long be concealed. It was the story of Betsey Malcolm, who +averred that she had been privately married to Humphreys on the occasion +of a certain trip they had made to Kentucky together, to attend a "big +meeting." The story was probably true, but uncharitable gossips shook +their heads. + +It was only a few evenings after the flight of Humphreys that Jonas had +another talk with Cynthy Ann, in which he confessed that all his +supposed case about a requisition from the governor of Kentucky for +Humphreys's arrest was pure fiction. + +"But, Jonas, is--is that air right? I'm afeard it a'n't right to tell an +ontruth." + +"So 'ta'n't; but I only s'posed a case, you know." + +"But Brother Hall said last Sunday two weeks, that anything that gin a +false impression was--was lying. Now, I don't think you meant it, but +then I thought I orto speak to you about it." + +"Well, maybe you're right. I see you last summer a-puttin' up a +skeercrow to keep the poor, hungry little birds of the air from gittin' +the peas that they needed to sustain life. An' I said, What a pity that +the best woman I ever seed should tell lies to the poor little birds +that can't defend theirselves from her wicked wiles! But I see that same +day a skeercrow, a mean, holler, high-percritical purtense of a ole hat +and coat, a-hanging in Brother Goshorn's garden down to the cross-roads. +An' I wondered ef it was your Methodis' trainin' that taught you +sech-like cheatin' of the little sparrys and blackbirds." + +"Yes; but Jonas--" said Cynthy, bewildered. + +"And I see a few days arterwards a Englishman with a humbug-fly onto his +line, a foolin' the poor, simple-hearted little fishes into swallerln' a +book that hadn't nary sign of a ginowine bait onto it. An' I says, says +I, What a deceitful thing the human heart is!" + +"Why, Jonas, you'd make a preacher!" said Cynthy Ann, touched with the +fervor of his utterance, and inly resolved never to set up another +scarecrow. + +"Not much, my dear. But then, you see, I make distinctions. Ef I was to +see a wolf a-goin' to eat a lamb, what would I do? Why, I'd skeer or +fool him with the very fust thing I could find. Wouldn' you, honey?" + +"In course," said Cynthy Ann. + +"And so, when I seed a wolf or a tiger or a painter, like that air +'Umphreys, about to gobble up fortins, and to do some harm to Gus, +maybe, I jest rigged up a skeercrow of words, like a ole hat and coat +stuck onto a stick, and run him off. Any harm done, my dear?" + +"Well, no, Jonas; I ruther 'low not." + +Whether Jonas's defense was good or not, I can not say, for I do not +know. But he is entitled to the benefit of it. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIX. + +JONAS TAKES AN APPEAL + +Jonas had waited for the coming of the quarterly meeting to carry his +appeal to the presiding elder. The quarterly meeting for the circuit was +held at the village of Brayvllle, and beds were made upon the floor for +the guests who crowded the town. Every visiting Methodist had a right to +entertainment, and every resident Methodist opened his doors very wide, +for Western people are hospitable in a fashion and with a bountifulness +unknown on the eastern side of the mountains. Who that has not known it, +can ever understand the delightfulness of a quarterly meeting? The +meeting of old friends--the social life--is all but heavenly. And then +the singing of the old Methodist hymns, such as + + "Oh! that will be joyful! + Joyful! joyful! + Oh! that will be joyful, + To meet to part no more." + +And that other solemnly-sweet refrain: + + "The reaping-time will surely come, + And angels shout the harvest home!" + +And who shall describe the joy of a Christian mother, when her +scapegrace son "laid down the arms of his rebellion" and was "soundly +converted"? Let those sneer who will, but such moral miracles as are +wrought in Methodist revivals are more wonderful than any healing of the +blind or raising of the dead could be. + +Jonas turned up, faithful to his promise, and called on the "elder" at +the place where he was staying, and asked for a private interview. He +found the old gentleman exercising his sweet voice in singing, + + "Come, let us anew + Our journey pursue, + Roll round with the year. + And never stand still till the Master appear. + His adorable will + Let us gladly fulfill, + And our talents improve + By the patience of hope and the labor of love." + +"When he concluded the verse he raised his half-closed eyes and saw +Jonas standing in the door. + +"Mr. Persidin' Elder," said Jonas, trying in vain to speak with some +seriousness and veneration, "I come to ax your consent to marry one of +your flock--the best lamb you've got in the whole fold." + +"Bless you, Mr. Harrison," said Father Williams, the old elder, +laughing, "bless you, I haven't any right to consent or forbid. Ask the +lady herself!" + +"Ax the lady!" said Jonas. "Didn't I though! And didn't Mr. Goshorn +forbid the lady to marry me, under the pains and penalties pervided; and +didn't Mr. Hall set his seal to the forbiddin' of Goshorn! An' I says to +her, 'I won't take nothin' less than a elder or a bishop on this 'ere +vital question.' When I want a sheep, I don't go to the underlin,' but +to the boss; and so I brought this appeal up to you on a writ of _habeas +corpus_, or whatever you may call it." + +The presiding elder laughed again, and looked closely at Jonas. Then he +stepped to the door and called in the circuit preacher, Mr. Hall, and +the class leader, Mr. Goshorn, both of whom happened to be in the next +room engaged in an excited discussion with a brother who was a little +touched with Millerism. + +"What's this Mr. Harrison tells me about your forbidding the banns in +his case?" + +"He's a New Light," said Brother Hall, showing his abhorrence in his +face, "and it seemed to me that for a Methodist to marry a New Light was +a sin--a being yoked together unequally with an unbeliever. You know, +Father Williams, that New Lights are Arians." + +The old man seemed more amused than ever. Turning to Jonas, he asked him +if he was an Arian. + +"Not as I knows on, my venerable friend. I may have caught the disease +when I had the measles, or I may have been a Arian in infancy, or I may +be a Arian on my mother's side, you know; but as I don't know who or +what it may be, I a'n't in no way accountable fer it--no more'n Brother +Goshorn is to blame fer his face bein' so humbly. But I take it Arian is +one of them air pleasant names you and the New Light preachers uses in +your Christian intercourse together to make one another mad. I'm one of +them as goes to heaven straight--never stoppin' to throw no donicks at +the Methodists, Presbyterians, nor no other misguided children of men. +They may ride in the packet, or go by flat-boat or keel-boat, ef they +chooses. I go by the swift-sailin' and palatial mail-boat New Light, and +I don't run no opposition line, nor bust my bilers tryin' to beat my +neighbors into the heavenly port." + +Brother Goshorn looked vexed. Brother Hall was scandalized at the +lightness of Jonas's conversation. But the old presiding elder, with +keen common-sense and an equally keen sense of the ludicrous, could not +look grave with all his effort to keep from laughing. + +[Illustration: BROTHER GOSHORN.] + +"Are you an unbeliever?" he asked. + +"I don't know what you call onbeliever. I believe in God and Christ, and +keep Sunday and the Fourth of July; but I don't believe in all of +Brother Goshorn's nonsense about wearing veils and artificials." + +"Well," said Brother Hall, "would you endeavor to induce your wife to +dress in a manner unbecoming a Methodist?" + +[Illustration: "SAY THEM WORDS OVER AGAIN."] + +"I wouldn't fer the world. If I git the article I want, I don't keer +what it's tied up in, calico or bombazine." + +"Couldn't you join the Methodist Church yourself, and keep your wife +company?" It was Brother Goshorn who spoke. + +"Couldn't I? I suppose I could ef I didn't think no more of religion +than some other folks. I could jine the Methodist Church, and have +everybody say I jined to git my wife. That may be serving God; but I +can't see how. And then how long would you keep me? The very fust time I +fired off my blunderbuss in class-meetin', and you heerd the buckshot +and the squirrel-shot and the slugs and all sorts of things a-rattlin' +around, you'd say I was makin' fun of the Gospel. I 'low they a'n't no +Methodist in me. I was cut out cur'us, you know, and made up crooked." + +"Is there anything against Mr. Harrison, Brother Goshorn?" asked the +elder. + +"He's a New Light," said Mr. Goshorn, in a tone that signified his +belief that to be a New Light was enough. + +"Is he honest and steady?" + +"Never heard anything against him as a moralist." + +"Well, then, it's my opinion that any member of your class would do +better to marry a good, faithful, honest New Light than to marry a +hickory Methodist." + +Jonas got up like one demented, and ran out of the door and across the +street. In a moment he came back, bringing Cynthy Ann in triumph. + +"Now, soy them words over again," he said to the presiding elder. + +"Sister Cynthy Ann," said the presiding elder, "you really love Brother +Harrison?" + +"I--I don't know whether it's right to set our sinful hearts on the +things of this perishin' world. But I think more of him, I'm afeard, +than I had ort to. He's got as good a heart as I ever seed. But Brother +Goshorn thought I hadn't orter marry him, seein' he is a onbeliever." + +"But I a'n't," said Jonas; "I believe in the Bible, and in everything in +it, and in Cynthy Ann and her good Methodist religion besides." + +"I think you can give up all your scruples and marry Mr. Harrison, and +love him and be happy," said the presiding elder. "Don't be afraid to be +happy, my sister. You'll be happy in good company in heaven, and you'd +just as well get used to it here." + +"I told you I'd find a man that had salt enough to keep his religion +sweet. And, Father Williams, you've got to marry us, whenever Cynthy +Ann's ready," said Jonas with enthusiasm. + +And for a moment the look of overstrained scrupulosity on Cynthy Ann's +face relaxed and a strange look of happiness came into her eyes. + +And the time was fixed then and there. + +Brother Hall was astonished. + +And Brother Goshorn drew down his face, and said that he didn't know +what was to become of good, old-fashioned Methodism and the rules of the +Discipline, if the presiding elders talked in that sort of a way. The +church was going to the dogs. + + + +CHAPTER XL. + +SELLING OUT. + +The flight of the Hawk did not long dampen the ardor of those who were +looking for signs in the heaven above and the earth beneath. I have +known a school-master to stand, switch in hand, and give a stubborn boy +a definite number of minutes to yield. The boy who would not have +submitted on account of any amount of punishment, was subdued by the +awful waiting. We have all read the old school-book story of the +prison-warden who brought a mob of criminals to subjection by the same +process. Millerism produced some such effect as this. The assured belief +of the believers had a great effect on others; the dreadful drawing on +of the set time day by day produced an effect in some regions absolutely +awful. An eminent divine, at that time a pastor in Boston, has told me +that the leaven of Adventism permeated all religious bodies, and that he +himself could not avoid the fearful sense of waiting for some +catastrophe--the impression that all this expectation of people must +have some significance. If this was the effect in Boston, imagine the +effect in a country neighborhood like Clark township. Andrew, skeptical +as he was visionary, was almost the only man that escaped the +infection. Jonas would have been as frankly irreverent if the day of +doom had come as he was at all times; but even Jonas had come to the +conclusion that "somethin' would happen, or else somethin' else." +August, with a young man's impressibility, was awe-stricken with +thoughts of the nearing end of the world, and Julia accepted it +as settled. + +It is a good thing that the invisible world is so thoroughly shut out +from this. The effect of too vivid a conception of it is never +wholesome. It was pernicious in the middle age, and clairvoyance and +spirit-rapping would be great evils to the world, if it were not that +the spirits, even of-the ablest men, in losing their bodies seem to lose +their wits. It is well that it is so, for if Washington Irving dictated +to a medium accounts of the other world in a style such as that of his +"Little Britain," for instance, we should lose all interest in the +affairs of this sphere, and nobody would buy our novels. + +This fever of excitement kept alive Samuel Anderson's determination to +sell his farms for a trifle as a testimony to unbelievers. He found that +fifty dollars would meet his expenses until the eleventh of August, and +so the price was set at that. + +As soon as Andrew heard of this, he privately arranged with Jonas to buy +it; but Mrs. Anderson utterly refused. She said she could see through it +all. Jonas was one of Andrew's fingers. Andrew had got to be a sort of a +king in Clark township, and Jonas was--was the king's fool. She did not +mean that any of her property should go into the hands of the clique +that were trying to rob her of her property and her daughter. Even for +two weeks they should not own her house! + +Before this speech was ended, Bob Walker entered the door. + +Bob was tall, stooped, good-natured, and desperately poor. With ton +children under twelve years of age, with an incorrigible fondness for +loafing and telling funny stories, Bob saw no chance to improve his +condition. A man may be either honest or lazy and got rich; but a man +who Is both honest and indolent is doomed. Bob lived in a cabin on the +Anderson farm, and when not hired by Samuel Anderson he did days' work +here and there, riding to and from his labor on a raw-boned mare, that +was the laughing-stock of the county. Bob pathetically called her +Splinter-shin, and he always rode bareback, for the very good reason +that he had neither saddle nor sheepskin. + +[Illustration: "I WANT TO BUY YOUR PLACE."] + +"Mr. Anderson," said Bob, standing in the door and trying to straighten +the chronic stoop out of his shoulders, "I want to buy your place." + +If Bob had said that he wanted to be elected president Samuel Anderson +could not have been more surprised. + +"You look astonished; but folks don't know everything. I 'low I know how +to lay by a little. But I never could git enough to buy a decent kind of +a tater-patch. So I says to my ole woman this mornin', 'Jane,' says I, +'let's git some ground. Let's buy out Mr. Anderson, and see how it'll +feel to be rich fer a few days. If she all burns up, let her burn, I +say. We've had a plaguey hard time of it, let's see how it goes to own +two farms fer awhile.' And so we thought we'd ruther hev the farms fer +two weeks than a little money in a ole stocking. What d'ye say?" + +Jonas here put in that he didn't see why they mightn't sell to him as +well as to Bob Walker. Cynthy Ann had worked fer Mrs. Anderson fer +years, and him and Cynthy was a-goin' to be one man soon. Why not +sell to them? + +"Because selling to you is selling to Andrew," said Mrs. Abigail, in a +conclusive way. + +And so Bob got the farms, possession to be given after the fourteenth of +August, thus giving the day of doom three days of grace. And Bob rode +round the county boasting that he was as rich a man as there was in +Clark Township. And Jonas declared that ef the eend did come in the +month of August, Abigail would find some onsettled bills agin her fer +cheatin' the brother outen the inheritance. And Clark Township +agreed with him. + +August was secretly pleased that one obstacle to his marriage was gone. +If Andrew should prove right, and the world should outlast the middle of +August, there would be nothing dishonorable in his marrying a girl that +would have nothing to sacrifice. + +Andrew, for his part, gave vent to his feelings, as usual, by two or +three bitter remarks leveled at the whole human race, though nowadays he +was inclined to make exceptions in favor of several people, of whom +Julia stood first. She was a woman of the old-fashioned kind, he said, +fit to go alongside Héloise or Chaucer's Grisilde. + + + +CHAPTER XLI. + +THE LAST DAY AND WHAT HAPPENED IN IT. + +The religious excitement reached its culmination as the tenth and +eleventh of August came on. Some made ascension-robes. Work was +suspended everywhere. The more abandoned, unwilling to yield to the +panic, showed its effects on them by deeper potations, and by a +recklessness of wickedness meant to conceal their fears. With tin horns +they blasphemously affected to be angels blowing trumpets. They imitated +the Millerite meetings in their drunken sprees, and learned Mr. +Hankins's arguments by heart. + +The sun of the eleventh of August rose gloriously. People pointed to it +with trembling, and said that it would rise no more. Soon after sunrise +there were crimson clouds stretching above and below it, and popular +terror seized upon this as a sign. But the sun mounted with a scorching +heat, which showed that at least his shining power was not impaired. +Then men said, "Behold the beginning of the fervent heat that is to melt +the elements!" Night drew on, and every "shooting-star" was a new sign +of the end. The meteors, as usual at this time of the year, were +plentiful, and the simple-hearted country-folk were convinced that the +stars were falling out of the sky. + +A large bald hill overlooking the Ohio was to be the mount of ascension. +Here gathered Elder Hankins's flock with that comfortable assurance of +being the elect that only a narrow bigotry can give. And here came +others of all denominations, consoling themselves that they were just as +well off if they were Christians as if they had made all this fuss about +the millennium. Here was August, too, now almost well, joining with the +rest in singing those sweet and inspiring Adventist hymns. His German +heart could not keep still where there was singing, and now, in +gratefulness at new-found health, he was more inclined to music than +ever. So he joined heartily and sincerely in the song that begins: + + "Shall Simon bear his cross alone, + And all the world go free? + No, there's a cross for every one, + And there's a cross for me. + I'll bear the consecrated cross + Till from the cross I'm free, + And then go home to wear the crown. + For there's a crown for me! + Yes, there's a crown in heaven above, + The purchase of a Saviour's love. + Oh I that's the crown for me!" + +When the concourse reached the lines, + + "The saints have heard the midnight cry, + Go meet him in the air!" + +neither August nor any one else could well resist the infection of the +profound and awful belief in the immediate coming of the end which +pervaded the throng. Strong men and women wept and shouted with the +excitement. + +Then Elder Hankins exhorted a little. He said that the time was short. +But men's hearts were hard. As in the days of the flood, they were +marrying and giving in marriage. Not half a mile away a wedding was at +that time taking place, and a man who called himself a minister could +not discern the signs of the times, but was solemnizing a marriage. + +This allusion was to the marriage of Jonas, which was to take place that +very evening at the castle. Mrs. Anderson had refused to have "such +wicked nonsense" at her house, and as Cynthy had no home, Andrew had +appointed it at the castle, partly to oblige Jonas, partly from habitual +opposition to Abigail, but chiefly to express his contempt for +Adventism. + +Mrs. Anderson herself was in a state of complete sublimation. She had +sent for Norman, that she might get him ready for the final judgment, +and Norman, without the slightest inclination to be genuinely religious, +was yet a coward, and made a provisional repentance, not meant to hold +good if Elder Hankins's figures should fail; just such a repentance as +many a man has made on what he supposed to be his death-bed. Do not I +remember a panic-stricken man, converted by typhoid fever and myself, +who laughed as soon as he began to eat gruel, to think that he had been +"such a fool as to send for the preacher"? + +Now, between Mrs. Anderson's joy at Norman's conversion, and her delight +that the world would soon be at an end and she on the winning side, and +her anticipation of the pleasure she would feel even in heaven in +saying, "I told you so!" to her unbelieving friends, she quite forgot +Julia. In fact she went from one fit of religious catalepsy to another, +falling into trances, or being struck down with what was mysteriously +called "the power." She had relaxed her vigilance about Julia, for +there were but three more hours of time, and she felt that the goal was +already gained, and she had carried her point to the very last. A +satisfaction for a saint! + +The neglected Julia naturally floated toward the outer edge of the +surging crowd, and she and August inevitably drifted together. + +"Let us go and see Jonas married," said August. "It is no harm. God can +take us to heaven from one place as well as another, if we are His +children." + +In truth, Julia was wearied and bewildered, not to say disgusted, with +her mother's peculiar religious exercises, and she gladly escaped with +August to the castle and the wedding of her faithful friends. + +Andrew, in a spirit of skeptical defiance, had made his castle look as +flowery and festive as possible. The wedding took place in the lower +story, but the library was illuminated, and the Adventists who had +occasion to pass by Andrew's on their way to the rendezvous accepted +this as a new fulfillment of prophecy to the very letter. They nodded +one to another, and said, "See! marrying and giving in marriage, as in +the days of Noah!" + +August and Julia were too much awe-stricken to say much on their way to +the castle. But in these last hours of a world grown old and ready for +its doom, they cleaved closer together. There could be neither heaven +nor millennium for one of them without the other! Loving one another +made them love God the more, and love cast out all fear. If this was the +Last, they would face it together, and if it proved the Beginning, they +would rejoice together. At sight of every shooting meteor, Julia clung +almost convulsively to August. + +When they entered the castle, Jonas and Cynthy were already standing up +before the presiding elder, and he was about to begin. Cynthy's face +showed her sense of the awfulness of marrying at a moment of such +fearful expectation, or perhaps she was troubling herself for fear that +so much happiness out of heaven was to be had only in the commission of +a capital sin. But, like most people whose consciences are stronger than +their intellects, she found great consolation in taking refuge under the +wing of ecclesiastical authority. To be married by a presiding elder was +the best thing in the world next to being married by a bishop. + +Whatever fear of the swift-coming judgment others might have felt, the +benignant old elder was at peace. Common-sense, a clean conscience, and +a child-like faith enlightened his countenance, and since he tried to be +always ready, and since his meditations made the things of the other +life ever present, his pulse would scarcely have quickened if he had +felt sure that the archangel's trump would sound in an hour. He neither +felt the subdued fear shown on the countenance of Cynthy Ann, nor the +strong skeptical opposition of Andrew, whose face of late had grown +almost into a sneer. + +"Do you take this woman to be your lawful and wedded wife--" + +And before the elder could finish it, Jonas blurted out, "You'd better +believe I do, my friend." + +And then when the old man smiled and finished his question down to, "so +long as ye both shall live," Jonas responded eagerly, "Tell death er the +jedgment-day, long or short." + +And Cynthy Ann answered demurely out of her frightened but too happy +heart, and the old man gave them his benediction in an apostolic fashion +that removed Cynthy Ann's scruples, and smoothed a little of the +primness out of her face, so that she almost smiled when Jonas said, +"Well! it's done now, and it can't be undone fer all the Goshorns in +Christendom er creation!" + +And then the old gentleman--for he was a gentleman, though he had always +been a backwoodsman--spoke of the excitement, and said that it was best +always to be ready--to be ready to live, and then you would be ready for +death or the judgment. That very night the end might come, but it was +not best to trouble one's self about it. And he smiled, and said that it +was none of his business, God could manage the universe; it was for him +to be found doing his duty as a faithful servant. And then it would be +just like stepping out of one door into another, whenever death or the +judgment should come. + +While the old man was getting ready to leave, Julia and August slipped +away, fearing lest their absence should be discovered. But the +peacefulness of the old elder's face had entered into their souls, and +they wished that they too were solemnly pronounced man and wife, with so +sweet a benediction upon their union. + +"I do not feel much anxious about the day of judgment or the +millennium," said August, whose idiom was sometimes a little broken. +"When I was so near dying I felt satisfied to die after you had kissed +my lips. But now that it seems we have come upon the world's last days, +I wish I were married to you. I do not know how things will be in the +new heaven and the new earth. But I should like you to be my wife there, +or at least to have been my wife on earth, if only for one hour." + +And then he proposed that they should be made man and wife now in the +world's last hour. It was not wrong. It could not give her mother +heart-disease, for she would not know of it till she should hear it in +the land where there are neither marriages nor sickness. Julia could not +see any sin in her disobedience under such circumstances. She did so +much want to go into the New Jerusalem as the wedded wife of August "the +grand," as she fondly called him. + +And so in the stillness of that awful night they walked back to Andrew's +castle, and found the venerable preacher, with saddle-bags on his arm, +ready to mount his horse, for the presiding elder of that day had no +leisure time. Jonas and Cynthy stood bidding him good-by. And the old +man was saying again that if we were always ready it would be like +stepping from one door into another. But he thought it as wrong to waste +time gazing up into heaven to see Christ come, as it had been to gaze +after Him when He went away. Even Jonas's voice was a little softened by +the fearful thought ever present of the coming on of that awful midnight +of the eleventh of August. All were surprised to see the two young +people come back. + +"Father Williams," said August, "we thought we should like to go into +the New Jerusalem man and wife. Will you marry us?" + +"Sensible to the last!" cried Jonas. + +"According to the laws of this State," said Mr. Williams, "you can not +be married without a license from the clerk of the county. Have you +a license?" + +"No," said August, his heart sinking. + +Just then Andrew came up and inquired what the conversation was about. + +"Why, Uncle Andrew," said Julia eagerly, "August and I don't want the +end of the world to come without being man and wife. And we have no +license, and August could not go seven miles and back to get a license +before midnight. It is too bad, isn't it? If it wasn't that we think the +end of the world is so near, I should be ashamed to say how much I want +to be married. But I shall be proud to have been August's wife, when I +am among the angels." + +"You are a noble woman," said Andrew. "Come in, let us see if anything +can be done." And he led the way, smiling. + + + +CHAPTER XLII. + +FOR EVER AND EVER. + +When they had all re-entered the castle, Andrew made them sit down. The +old minister did not see any escape from the fatal obstacle of a lack of +license, but Andrew was very mysterious. + +"Virtue is its own reward," said the Philosopher, "but it often finds an +incidental reward besides. Now, Julia, you are the noblest woman in +these degenerate times, according to my way of thinking." + +"That's true as preachin', ef you'll except one," chirped Jonas, with a +significant look at his Cynthy Ann. Julia blushed, and the old minister +looked inquiringly at Andrew and at Julia. This exaggerated praise from +a man so misanthropic as Andrew excited his curiosity. + +"Without exception," said Andrew emphatically, looking first at Jonas, +then at Mr. Williams, "my niece is the noblest woman I ever knew." + +"Please don't, Uncle Andrew!" begged Julia, almost speechless with +shame. Praise was something she could not bear. She was inured +to censure. + +"Do you remember that dark night--of course you do--when you braved +everything and came here to see August, who would have died but for your +coming?" Andrew was now looking at Julia, who answered him almost +inaudibly. + +"And do you remember when we got to your gate, on your return, what you +said to me?" + +"Yes, sir," said Julia. + +"To be sure you do, and" (turning to August) "I shall never forget her +words; she said, If he should get worse, I should like him to die my +husband, if he wishes it. Send for me, day or night, and I will come in +spite of everything." + +"Did you say that?" asked August, looking at her eagerly. + +And Julia nodded her head, and lifted her eyes, glistening with brimming +tears, to his. + +"You do not know," said Andrew to the preacher, "how much her proposal +meant, for you do not know through what she would have had to pass. But +I say that God does sometimes reward virtue in this world--a world not +quite worn out yet--and she is worthy of the reward in store for her." + +Saying this, Andrew went into the closet leading to his secret +stairway--secret no longer, since Julia had ascended by that way--and +soon came down from his library with a paper in his hand. + +"When you, my noble-hearted niece, proposed to make any sacrifice to +marry this studious, honest, true-hearted German gentleman, who is +worthy of you, if any man can be, I thought best to be ready for any +emergency, and so I went the next day and procured the license, the +clerk promising to keep my secret. A marriage-license is good for thirty +days. You will see, Mr. Williams, that this has not quite expired." + +The minister looked at it and then said, "I depend on your judgment, +Mr. Anderson. There seems to be something peculiar about the +circumstances of this marriage." + +"Very peculiar," said Andrew. + +"You give me your word, then, that it is a marriage I ought to +solemnize?" + +"The lady is my niece," said Andrew. "The marriage, taking place in this +castle, will shed more glory upon it than its whole history beside; and +you, sir, have never performed a marriage ceremony in a case where the +marriage was so excellent as this." + +"Except the last one," put in Jonas. + +I suppose Mr. Williams made the proper reductions for Andrew's +enthusiasm. But he was satisfied, and perhaps he was rather inclined to +be satisfied, for gentle-hearted old men are quite susceptible to a +romantic situation. + +When he asked August if he would live with this woman in holy matrimony +"so long as ye both shall live," August, thinking the two hours of time +left to him too short for the earnestness of his vows, looked the old +minister in the eyes, and said solemnly: "For ever and ever!" + +"No, my son," said the old man, smiling and almost weeping, "that is not +the right answer. I like your whole-hearted love. But it is far easier +to say 'for ever and ever,' standing as you think you do now on the +brink of eternity, than to say 'till death do us part,' looking down a +long and weary road of toil and sickness and poverty and change and +little vexations. You do not only take this woman, young and blooming, +but old and sick and withered and wearied, perhaps. Do you take her +for any lot?" + +"For any lot," said August solemnly and humbly. + +And Julia, on her part, could only bow her head in reply to the +questions, for the tears chased one another down her cheeks. And then +came the benediction. The inspired old man, full of hearty sympathy, +stretched his trembling hands with apostolic solemnity over the heads of +the two, and said slowly, with solemn pauses, as the words welled up out +of his soul: "The peace of God--that passeth all understanding" (here +his voice melted with emotion)--"keep your hearts--and minds--in the +knowledge and love of God.--And now, may grace--mercy--and peace from +God--_the Father_--and _our_ Lord Jesus Christ--be with +you--evermore--Amen!" And to the imagination of Julia the Spirit of God +descended like a dove into her heart, and the great mystery of wifely +love and the other greater mystery of love to God seemed to flow +together in her soul. And the quieter spirit of August was suffused with +a great peace. + +They soon left the castle to return to the mount of ascension, but they +walked slowly, and at first silently, over the intervening hill, which +gave them a view of the Ohio River, sleeping in its indescribable beauty +and stillness in the moonlight. + +Presently they heard the melodious voice of the old presiding elder, +riding up the road a little way off, singing the hopeful hymns in which +he so much delighted. The rich and earnest voice made the woods ring +with one verse of + + "Oh! how happy are they + Who the Saviour obey, + And have laid up their treasure above I + Tongue can never express + The sweet comfort and peace + Of a soul in its earliest love." + +And then he broke into Watts's + + "When I can read my title clear + To mansions in the skies, + I'll bid farewell to every fear + And wipe my weeping eyes!" + +There seemed to be some accord between the singing of the brave old man +and the peacefulness of the landscape. Soon he had reached the last +stanza, and in tones of subdued but ecstatic triumph he sang: + + "There I shall bathe my weary soul + In seas of heavenly rest, + And not a wave of trouble roll + Across my peaceful breast." + +And with these words he passed round the hill and out of the hearing of +the young people. + +"August," said Julia slowly, as if afraid to break a silence so blessed, +"August, it seems to me that the sky and the river and the hazy hills +and my own soul are all alike, just as full of happiness and peace as +they can be." + +"Yes," said August, smiling, "but the sky is clear, and your eyes are +raining, Julia. But can it be possible that God, who made this world so +beautiful, will burn it up to-night? It used to seem a hard world to me +when I was away from you, and I didn't care how quickly it burned up. +But now--" + +Somehow August forgot to finish that sentence. Words are of so little +use under such circumstances. A little pressure on Julia's arm which was +in his, told all that he meant. When love makes earth a heaven, it +is enough. + +"But how beautiful the new earth will be," said Julia, still looking at +the sleeping river, "the river of life will be clear as crystal!" + +"Yes," said August, "the Spanish version says, 'Most resplendent, like +unto crystal.'" + +"I think," said Julia, "that it must be something like this river. The +trees of life will stand on either side, like those great sycamores that +lean over the water so gracefully." + +Any landscape would have seemed heavenly to Julia on this night. A +venerable friend of mine, a true Christian philanthropist, whose praise +is in all the churches, wants me to undertake to reform fictitious +literature by leaving out the love. And so I may when God reforms His +universe by leaving out the love. Love is the best thing in novels; not +until love is turned out of heaven will I help turn it out of +literature. It is only the misrepresentation of love in literature that +is bad, as the poisoning of love in life is bad. It was the love of +August that had opened Julia's heart to the influences of heaven, and +Julia was to August a mediator of God's grace. + +By eleven o'clock August Wehle and his wife--it gives me nearly as much +pleasure as it did August to use that locution--were standing not far +away from the surging crowd of those who, in singing hymns and in +excited prayer, were waiting for the judgment. Jonas and Cynthy and +Andrew were with them. August, though not a recognized Millerite, almost +blamed himself that he should have been away these two hours from the +services. But why should he? The most sacramental of all the sacraments +is marriage. Is it not an arbitrary distinction of theologians, that +which makes two rites to be sacraments and others not? But if the +distinction is to be made at all, I should apply the solemn word to the +solemnest rite and the holiest ordinance of God's, even if I left out +the sacred washing in the name of the Trinity and the broken emblematic +bread and the wine. These are sacramental in their solemn symbolism, +that in the solemnest symbolism and the holiest reality. + +August's whole attention was now turned toward the coming judgment; and +as he stood thinking of the awfulness of this critical moment, the +exercises of the Adventists grated on the deep peacefulness of his +spirit, for from singing their more beautiful hymns, they had passed to +an excited shouting of the old camp-meeting ditty whose refrain is: + +"I hope to shout glory when this world's all on fire! Hallelujah!" + +He and Julia hung back a moment, but Mrs. Abigail, who had recovered +from her tenth trance, and had been for some time engaged in an active +search for Julia, now pounced upon her, and bore her off, before she had +time to think, to the place of the hottest excitement. + + + +CHAPTER XLIII. + +THE MIDNIGHT ALARM. + +At last the time drew on toward midnight, the hour upon which all +expectation was concentrated. For did not the Parable of the Ten Virgins +speak of the coming of the bridegroom at midnight? + +"My friends and brethren," said Elder Hankins, his voice shaking with +emotion, as he held his watch up in the moonlight, "My friends and +brethren, ef the Word is true, they is but five minutes more before the +comin' in of the new dispensation. Let us spend the last moments of time +in silent devotion." + +"I wonder ef he thinks the world runs down by his pay-tent-leever +watch?" said Jonas, who could not resist the impulse to make the remark, +even with the expectation of the immediate coming of the day of judgment +in his mind. + +"I wonder for what longitude he calculates prophecy?" said Andrew. "It +can not be midnight all round the world at the same moment." + +But Elder Hankins's flock did not take any astronomical difficulty into +consideration. And no spectator could look upon them, bowing silently in +prayer, awed by the expectation of the sudden coming of the Lord, +without feeling that, however much the expectation might be illusory, +the emotion was a fact absolutely awful. Events are only sublime as they +move the human soul, and the swift-coming end of time was subjectively a +great reality to these waiting people. Even Andrew was awe-stricken from +sympathy; as Coleridge, when he stood godfather for Keble's child, was +overwhelmed with a sense of the significance of the sacrament from +Keble's stand-point. As for Cynthy Ann, she trembled with fear as she +held fast to the arm of Jonas. And Jonas felt as much seriousness as was +possible to him, until he heard Norman Anderson's voice crying with +terror and excitement, and felt Cynthy shudder on his arm. + +"For my part," said Jonas, turning to Andrew, "it don't seem like as ef +it was much use to holler and make a furss about the corn crap when +October's fairly sot in, and the frost has nipped the blades. All the +plowin' and hoein' and weedin' and thinnin' out the suckers won't, +better the yield then. An' when wheat's ripe, they's nothin' to be done +fer it. It's got to be rep jest as it stan's. I'm rale sorry, to-night, +as my life a'n't no better, but what's the use of cryin' over it? They's +nothin' to do now but let it be gethered and shelled out, and measured +up in the standard half-bushel of the sanctuary. And I'm afeard they'll +be a heap of nubbins not wuth the shuckin'. But ef it don't come to six +bushels the acre, I can't help it now by takin' on." + +At twelve o'clock, even the scoffers were silent. But as the sultry +night drew on toward one o'clock, Bill Day and his party felt their +spirits revive a little. The calculation had failed in one part, and it +might in all. Bill resumed his burlesque exhortations to the +rough-looking "brethren" about him. He tried to lead them in singing +some ribald parody of Adventist hymns, but his terror and theirs was +too genuine, and their voices died down into husky whispers, and they +were more alarmed than ever at discovering the extent of their own +demoralization. The bottle, one of those small-necked, big-bodied +quart-bottles that Western topers carry in yellow-cotton handkerchiefs, +was passed round. But even the whisky seemed powerless to neutralize +their terror, rather increasing the panic by fuddling their faculties. + +"Boys!" said Bob Short, trembling, and sitting down on a stump, +"this--this ere thing--is a gittin' serious. Ef--well, ef it _was_ to +happen--you know--you don't s'pose--ahem--you don't think God A'mighty +would be _too_ heavy on a feller. Do ye? Ef it was to come to-night, it +would be blamed short notice." + +At one o'clock the moon was just about dipping behind the hills, and the +great sycamores, standing like giant sentinels on the river's marge, +cast long unearthly shadows across the water, which grew blacker every +minute. The deepening gloom gave all objects in the river valley a +weird, distorted look. This oppressed August. The landscape seemed an +enchanted one, a something seen in a dream or a delirium. It was as +though the change had already come, and the real tangible world had +passed away. He was the more susceptible from the depression caused by +the hot sultriness of the night, and his separation from Julia. + +He thought he would try to penetrate the crowd to the point where his +mother was; then he would be near her, and nearer to Julia if anything +happened. A curious infatuation had taken hold of August. He knew that +it was an infatuation, but he could not shake it off. He had resolved +that in case the trumpet should be heard in the heavens, he would seize +Julia and claim her in the very moment of universal dissolution. He +reached his mother, and as he looked into her calm face, ready for the +millennium or for anything else "the Father" should decree, he thought +she had never seemed more glorious than she did now, sitting with her +children about her, almost unmoved by the excitement. For Mrs. Wehle had +come to take everything as from the Heavenly Father. She had even +received honest but thick-headed Gottlieb in this spirit, when he had +fallen to her by the Moravian lot, a husband chosen for her by the Lord, +whose will was not to be questioned. + +August was just about to speak to his mother, when he was forced to hang +his head in shame, for there was his father rising to exhort. + +"O mine freunde! pe shust immediadely all of de dime retty. Ton't led +your vait vail already, and ton't let de debil git no unter holts on ye. +Vatch and pe retty!" + +And August could hear the derisive shouts of Bill Day's party, who had +recovered their courage, crying out, "Go it, ole Dutchman! I'll bet on +you!" He clenched his fist in anger, but his mother's eyes, looking at +him with quiet rebuke, pacified him in a moment. Yet he could not help +wondering whether blundering kinsfolk made people blush in the +next world. + +"Holt on doo de last ent!" continued Gottlieb. "It's pout goom! Kood +pye, ole moon! You koes town, you nebber gooms pack no more already." + +This exhortation might have proceeded in this strain indefinitely, to +the mortification of August and the amusement of the profane, had there +not just at that moment broken upon the sultry stillness of the night +one of those crescendo thunder-bursts, beginning in a distant rumble, +and swelling out louder and still louder, until it ended with a +tremendous detonation. In the strange light of the setting moon, while +everybody's attention was engrossed by the excitement, the swift +oncoming of a thunder-cloud had not been observed by any but Andrew, and +it had already climbed half-way to the zenith, blotting out a third of +the firmament. This inverted thunder-bolt produced a startling effect +upon the over-strained nerves of the crowd. Some cried out with terror, +some sobbed with hysterical agony, some shouted in triumph, and it was +generally believed that Virginia Waters, who died a maniac many years +afterward, lost her reason at that moment. Bill Day ceased his mocking, +and shook till his teeth chattered. And none of his party dared laugh at +him. The moon had now gone, and the vivid lightning followed the +thunder, and yet louder and more fearful thunder succeeded the +lightning. The people ran about as if demented, and Julia was left +alone. August had only one thought in all this confusion, and that was +to find Julia. Having found her, they clasped hands, and stood upon the +brow of the hill calmly watching the coming tempest, believing it to be +the coming of the end. Between the claps of thunder they could hear the +broken sentences of Elder Hankins, saying something about the lightning +that shineth from one part of heaven to the other, and about the +promised coming in the clouds. But they did not much heed the words. +They were looking the blinding lightning in the face, and in their +courageous trust they thought themselves ready to look into the flaming +countenance of the Almighty, if they should be called before Him. Every +fresh burst of thunder seemed to August to be the rocking of the world, +trembling in the throes of dissolution. But the world might crumble or +melt; there is something more enduring than the world. August felt the +everlastingness of love; as many another man in a supreme crisis +has felt it. + +But the swift cloud had already covered half the sky, and the bursts of +thunder followed one another now in quicker succession. And as suddenly +as the thunder had come, came the wind. A solitary old sycamore, leaning +over the water on the Kentucky shore, a mile away, was first to fall. In +the lurid darkness, August and Julia saw it meet its fate. Then the rail +fences on the nearer bank were scattered like kindling-wood, and some of +the sturdy old apple-trees of the orchard in the river-bottom were +uprooted, while others were stripped of their boughs. Julia clung to +August and said something, but he could only see her lips move; her +voice was drowned by the incessant roar of the thunder. And then the +hurricane struck them, and they half-ran and were half-carried down the +rear slope of the hill. Now they saw for the first time that the people +were gone. The instinct of self-preservation had proven stronger than +their fanaticism, and a contagious panic had carried them into a +hay-barn near by. + +Not knowing where the rest had gone, August and Julia only thought of +regaining the castle. They found the path blocked by fallen trees, and +it was slow and dangerous work, waiting for flashes of lightning to show +them their road. In making a long detour they lost the path. After some +minutes, in a lull in the thunder, August heard a shout, which he +answered, and presently Philosopher Andrew appeared with a lantern, his +grizzled hair and beard flying in the wind. + +"What ho, my friends!" he cried. "This is the way you go to heaven +together! You'll live through many a storm yet!" + +Guided by his thorough knowledge of the ground, they had almost reached +the castle, when they were startled by piteous cries. Leaving August +with Julia, Andrew climbed a fence, and went down into a ravine to find +poor Bill Day in an agony of terror, crying out in despair, believing +that the day of doom had already come, and that he was about to be sent +into well-deserved perdition. Andrew stooped over him with his lantern, +but the poor fellow, giving one look at the shaggy face, shrieked madly, +and rushed away into the woods. + +"I believe," said the Philosopher, when he got back to August, "I +believe he took me for the devil." + + + +CHAPTER XLIV. + +SQUARING ACCOUNTS. + +The summer storm had spent itself by daylight, and the sun rose on that +morning after the world's end much as it had risen on other mornings, +but it looked down upon prostrate trees and scattered fences and +roofless barns. And the minds of the people were in much the same +disheveled state as the landscape. One simple-minded girl was a maniac. +Some declared that the world had ended, and that this was the new earth, +if people only had faith to receive it; some still waited for the end, +and with some the reaction from credulity had already set in, a reaction +that carried them into the blankest atheism and boldest immorality. +People who had spent the summer in looking for a change that would +relieve them from all responsibility, now turned reluctantly +toward the commonplace drudgery of life. It is the evil of all +day-dreaming--day-dreaming about the other world included--that it +unfits us for duty in this world of tangible and inevitable facts. + +It was nearly daylight when Andrew and August and Julia reached the +castle. The Philosopher advised Julia to go home, and for the present +to let the marriage be as though it were not. August dreaded to see +Julia returned to her mother's tyranny, but Andrew was urgent in his +advice, and Julia said that she must not leave her mother in her +trouble. Julia reached home a little after daylight, and a little before +Mrs. Anderson was brought home in a fit of hysterics. + +Poor Mrs. Abigail still hoped that the end of the world for which she +had so fondly prepared would come, but as the days wore on she sank into +a numb despondency. When she thought of the loss of her property, she +groaned and turned her face to the wall. And Samuel Anderson sat about +the house in a dumb and shiftless attitude, as do most men upon whom +financial ruin comes in middle life. The disappointment of his faith and +the overthrow of his fortune had completely paralyzed him. He was +waiting for something, he hardly knew what. He had not even his wife's +driving voice to stimulate him to exertion. + +There was no one now to care for Mrs. Anderson but Julia, for Cynthy had +taken up her abode in the log-cabin which Jonas had bought, and a +happier housekeeper never lived. She watched Jonas till he disappeared +when he went to work in the morning, she carried him a "snack" at ten +o'clock, and headways found her standing "like a picter" at the gate, +when he came home to dinner. But Cynthy Ann generally spent her +afternoons at Anderson's, helping "that young thing" to bear her +responsibilities, though Mrs. Anderson would receive no personal +attentions now from any one but her daughter. She did not scold; her +querulous restlessness was but a reminiscence of her scolding. She lay, +disheartened, watching Julia, and exacting everything from Julia, and +the weary feet and weary heart of the girl almost sank under her +burdens. Mrs. Anderson had suddenly fallen from her position of an +exacting tyrant to that of an exacting and helpless infant. She followed +Julia with her eyes in a broken-spirited fashion, as if fearing that she +would leave her. Julia could read the fear in her mother's countenance; +she understood what her mother meant when she said querulously, "You'll +get married and leave me." If Mrs. Anderson had assumed her old +high-handed manner, it would have been easy for Julia to have declared +her secret. But how could she tell her now? It would be a blow, it might +be a fatal blow. And at the same time how could she satisfy August? He +thought she had bowed to the same old tyranny again for an indefinite +time. But she could not forsake her parents in their poverty and +afflictions. + +The fourteenth of August, the day on which possession was to have been +given to Bob Walker, came and went, but no Bob Walker appeared. A week +more passed, in which Samuel Anderson could not muster enough courage to +go to see Walker, in which Samuel Anderson and his wife waited in a +vague hope that something might happen. And every day of that week Julia +had a letter from August, which did not say one word of the trial that +it was for him to wait, but which said much of the wrong Julia was doing +to herself to submit so long. And Julia, like her father and mother, was +waiting for she knew not what. + +At last the suspense became to her unendurable. + +"Father," she said, "why don't you go to see Bob Walker? You might buy +the farm back again." + +"I don't know why he don't come and take it," said Mr. Anderson +dejectedly. + +This conversation roused Mrs. Abigail. There was some hope. She got up +in bed, and told Samuel to go to the county-seat and see if the deeds +had ever been recorded. And while her husband was gone she sat up and +looked better, and even scolded a little, so that Julia felt encouraged. +But she dreaded to see her father come back. + +Samuel Anderson entered the house on his return with a blank +countenance. Sitting down, he put his face between his hands a minute in +utter dejection. + +"Why don't you speak?" said Mrs. Anderson in a broken voice. + +"The land was all transferred to Andrew immediately, and he owns every +foot of it. He must have sent Bob Walker here to buy it." + +"Oh! I'm so glad!" cried Julia. + +But her mother only gave her one reproachful look and went off into +hysterical sobbing and crying over the wrong that Andrew had done her. +And all that night Julia watched by her mother, while Samuel Anderson +sat in dejection by the bed. As for Norman, he had quickly relapsed into +his old habits, and his former cronies had generously forgiven him his +temporary piety, considering the peculiar circumstances of the case some +extenuation. Now that there was trouble in the house he staid away, +which was a good thing so far as it went. + +The next afternoon Mrs. Anderson rallied a little, and, looking at +Julia, she said in her querulous way, "Why don't you go and see him?" + +"Who?" said Julia with a shiver, afraid that her mother was insane. + +"Andrew." + +Julia did not need any second hint. Leaving her mother with Cynthy, she +soon presented herself at the door of the castle. + +"Did _she_ send you?" asked Andrew dryly. + +"Yes, sir." + +"I've been expecting you for a long time. I'll go back with you. But +August must go along. He'll be glad of an excuse to see your face again. +You look thin, my poor girl." + +They went past Wehle's, and August was only too glad to join them, +rejoicing that some sort of a crisis had come, though how it was to help +him he did not know. With the restlessness of a man looking for some +indefinable thing to turn up, Samuel was out on the porch waiting the +return of his daughter. Jonas had come for Cynthy Ann, and was sitting +on a "shuck-bottom" chair in front of the house. + +Andrew reached out his hand and greeted his brother cordially, and spoke +civilly to Abigail. Then there was a pause, and Mrs. Anderson turned her +head to the wall and groaned. After a while she looked round and saw +August. A little of her old indignation came into her eyes as she +whimpered, "What did _he_ come for?" + +"I brought him," said Andrew. + +"Well, it's your house, do as you please. I suppose you'll turn us out +of our own home now." + +"As you did me," said the Philosopher, smiling. "Let me remind you that +I was living on the river farm. My father had promised it to me, and +given me possession. A week before his death you got the will changed, +by what means you know. You turned me off the farm which had virtually +been mine for two years. If I turn you off now, it will be no more +than fair." + +There was a look of pained surprise on Julia's face. She had not known +that the wrong her uncle had suffered was so great. She had not thought +that he would be so severe as to turn her father out. + +"I don't want to talk of these things," Andrew went on. "I ought to +have broken the will, but I was not a believer in the law. I tell this +story now because I must justify myself to these young people for what I +am going to do. You have had the use of that part of the estate which +was rightfully mine for twenty years. I suppose I may claim it all now." + +Julia's eyes looked at him pleadingly. + +"Why don't you send us off and be done with it then?" said Mrs. Abigail, +rising up and resuming her old vehemence. "You set out to ruin us, and +now you've done it. A nice brother you are! Ruining us by a conspiracy +with Bob Walker, and then sitting here and trying to make my own +daughter think you did right, and bringing that hateful fellow here to +hear it!" Her finger was leveled at August. + +"I am glad to see you are better, Abigail. I wanted to be sure you were +strong enough to bear all I have to say." + +"Say your worst and do your worst, you cruel, cruel man! I have borne +enough from you in these years, and now you can say and do what you +please; you can't do me any more harm. I suppose I must leave my old +home that I've lived in so long." + +"You need not worry yourself about leaving; that's what I came over to +say." + +"As if I'd stay in _your_ house an hour! I'll not take any favors at +_your_ hand." + +"Don't be rash, Abigail. I have deeded this hill farm to Samuel, and +here is the deed. I have given you back the best half of the property, +just what my father meant you to have. I have only kept the river land, +that should have been mine twenty years ago. I hope you will not stick +to your resolution not to receive anything at my hand." + +And Julia said: "Oh! I'm so--" + +But Mrs. Anderson had a convenient fit of hysterics, crying piteously. +Meantime Samuel gladly accepted the deed. + +"The deed is already recorded. I sent it down yesterday as soon as I saw +Samuel come back, and I got it back this morning. The farm is yours +without condition." + +This relieved Abigail, and she soon ceased her sobbing. Andrew could not +take it back then, whatever she might say. + +"Now," said Andrew, "I have only divided the farms without claiming any +damages. I want to ask a favor. Let Julia marry the man of her choice +in peace." + +"You have taken one farm, and therefore I must let my daughter marry a +man with nothing but his two hands," sobbed Mrs. Anderson. + +"Two hands and a good head and a noble heart," said Andrew. + +"Well, I won't consent," said she. "If Julia marries _him_," pointing to +August, "she will marry without my consent, and he will not get a cent +of the money he's after. Not a red cent!" + +"I don't want your money. I did not know you'd get your farm back, for I +did not know but that Walker owned it, and I--wanted--Julia all the +same." August had almost told that he had married Julia. + +"Wanted her and married her," said Andrew. "And I have not kept a +corn-stalk of the property I got from you. I have given Bob Walker a +ten-acre patch for his services, and all the rest I have deeded to the +two best people I know. This August Wehle married Julia Anderson when +they thought the world might be near its end, and believing that, at any +rate, she would not have a penny in the world. I have deeded the river +farm to August Wehle and his wife." + +"Married, eh? Come and ask my consent afterwards? That's a fine way!" +And Abigail grew white and grew silent with passion. + +"Come, August, I want to show you and Julia something," said Andrew. He +really wanted to give Abigail time to look the matter in the face +quietly before she committed herself too far. But he told the two young +people that they might make their home with him while their house was in +building. He had already had part of the material drawn, and from the +brow of the hill they looked down upon the site he had chosen near the +old tumble-down tenant's house. But Andrew saw that Julia looked +disappointed. + +"You are not satisfied, my brave girl. What is the matter?" + +"Oh! yes, I am very happy, and very thankful to you; and next to August +I love you more than anybody--except my parents." + +"But something is different to what you wished it. Doesn't the site suit +you? You can look off on to the river from the rise on which the house +will stand, and I do not know how it could be better." + +"It couldn't be better," said Julia, "but--' + +"But what? You must tell me." + +"I thought maybe you'd let us live at the castle and take the burden of +things off you. I should like to keep your house for you, just to show +you how much I love my dear, good uncle." + +Even an anchorite could not help feeling a pleasure at such a speech +from such a young woman, and this shaggy, solitary, misanthropic but +tender-hearted man felt a sudden rush of pleasure. August saw it, and +was delighted. What one's nearest friend thinks of one's wife is a vital +question, and August was happier at this moment than he had ever been. +Andrew's pleasure at Julia's loving speech was the climax. + +"Yes!" said the Philosopher, a little huskily. "You want to sacrifice +your pleasure by living in my gloomy old castle, and civilizing an old +heathen like me. You mustn't tempt me too far." + +"I don't see why you call it gloomy. It wasn't only for your sake that I +said it. I think it is the nicest old house I ever saw. And then the +books, and--and--you." Julia stumbled a little, she was not accustomed +to make speeches of this sort. + +"You flatterer!" burst out Andrew. "But no, you must have your own +house." + +Mrs. Anderson, on her part, had concluded to make the best of it. Julia +already married and the mistress of the Anderson river farm was quite a +different thing from Julia under her thumb. She was to be conciliated. +Besides, Mrs. Anderson did not want Julia's prosperity to be a lifelong +source of humiliation to her. She must take some stock in it at +the start. + +"Jule," she said, as her daughter re-entered the door, "I can let you +have two feather-beds and four pillows, and a good stock of linen and +blankets. And you can have the two heifers and the sorrel colt." + +The two "heifers" were six, and the sorrel "colt" was seven years of +age; but descriptive names often outlive the qualities to which they +owed their origin. Just as a judge is even yet addressed as "your +honor," and many a governor without anything to recommend him hears +himself called "your excellency." + +When Abigail surrendered in this graceful fashion, Julia was touched, +and was on the point of putting her arms around her mother and kissing +her. But Mrs. Anderson was not a person easily caressed, and Julia did +not yield to her impulse. + +"Cynthy Ann, my dear," said Jonas, as they walked home that evening, "do +you know what Abig'il Anderson reminds me of?" + +No; Cynthy Ann didn't exactly know. In fact, it would have been +difficult for anybody to have told what anything was likely to remind +Jonas of. There was no knowing what a thing might not suggest to him. + +"Well, Cynthy, my Imperial Sweetness, when I see Abig'il come down so +beautiful, it reminded me of a little fice-t dog I had when I was a +leetle codger. I called him Pick. His name was Picayune. Purty good +name, wasn't it?" + +"Yes, it was." + +"Well, now, that air little Pick wouldn't never own up as he was driv +outen the house. When he was whipped out, he wouldn't never tuck his +tail down, but curl it up over his back, and run acrost the yard and +through the fence and down the road a-barkin' fit to kill. Wanted to let +on like as ef he'd run out of his own accord, with malice aforethought, +you know. _That's_ Abig'il." + + + +CHAPTER XLV. + +NEW PLANS. + +Except Abigail Anderson and one other person, everybody in the little +world of Clark township approved mightily the justice and +disinterestedness of Andrew. He had righted himself and Julia at a +stroke, and people dearly love to have justice dealt out when it is not +at their own expense. Samuel, who cherished in secret a great love for +his daughter, was more than pleased that affairs had turned out in this +way. But there was one beside Abigail who was not wholly satisfied. +August spent half the night in protesting in vain against Andrew's +transfer of the river-farm to him. But Andrew said he had a right to +give away his own if he chose. And there was no turning him. For if +August refused a share in it, he would give it to Julia, and if she +refused it, he would find somebody who would accept it. + +The next day after the settlement at Samuel Anderson's, August came to +claim his wife. Mrs. Abigail had now employed a "help" in Cynthy Ann's +place, and Julia could be spared. August had refused all invitations to +take up his temporary residence with Julia's parents. The house had +unpleasant associations in his mind, and he wanted to relieve Julia at +once and forever from a despotism to which she could not offer any +effectual resistance. Mrs. Anderson had eagerly loaded the wagon with +feather-beds and other bridal property, and sent it over to the castle, +that Julia might appear to leave with her blessing. She kissed Julia +tenderly, and hoped she'd have a happy life, and told her that if her +husband should ever lose his property or treat her badly--such things +_may_ happen, you know--then she would always find a home with her +mother. Julia thanked her for the offer of a refuge to which she never +meant to flee under any circumstances. And yet one never turns away from +one's home without regret, and Julia looked back with tears in her eyes +at the chattering swifts whose nests were in the parlor chimney, and at +the pee-wee chirping on the gate-post. The place had entered into her +life. It looked lonesome now, but within a year afterward Norman +suddenly married Betsey Malcolm. Betsey's child had died soon after its +birth, and Mrs. Anderson set herself to manage both Norman and his wife, +who took up their abode with her. Nothing but a reign of terror could +have made either of them of any account, but Mrs. Anderson furnished +them this in any desirable quantity. They were never of much worth, even +under her management, but she kept them in bounds, so that Norman ceased +to get drunk more than five or six times a year, and Betsey flirted but +little and at her peril. + +Once the old house was out of sight, there were no shadows on Julia's +face as she looked forward toward the new life. She walked in a still +happiness by August as they went down through Shady Hollow. August had +intended to show her a letter that he had from the mud-clerk, +describing the bringing of Humphreys back to Paducah and his execution +by a mob. But there was something so repelling in the gusto with which +the story was told, and the story was so awful in itself, that he could +not bear to interrupt the peaceful happiness of this hour by saying +anything about it. + +August proposed to Julia that they should take a path through the meadow +of the river-farm--their own farm now--and see the foundation of the +little cottage Andrew had begun for them. And so in happiness they +walked on through the meadow-path to the place on which their home was +to stand. But, alas! there was not a stick of timber left. Every +particle of the material had been removed. It seemed that some great +disappointment threatened them at the moment of their happiness. They +hurried on in silent foreboding to the castle, but there the mystery was +explained. + +"I told you not to tempt me too far," said Andrew. "See! I have +concluded to build an addition to the castle and let you civilize me. We +will live together and I will reform. This lonely life is not healthy, +and now that I have children, why should I not let them live here +with me?" + +Julia looked happy. I have no authentic information in regard to the +exact words which she made use of to express her joy, but from what is +known of girls of her age in general, it is safe to infer that she +exclaimed, "Oh! I'm so glad!" + +While Andrew stood there smiling, with Julia near him, August having +gone to the assistance of the carpenters in a matter demanding a little +more ingenuity than they possessed, Jonas came up and drew the +Philosopher aside. Julia could not hear what was said, but she saw +Andrew's brow contract. + +"I'll shoot as sure as they come!" he said with passion. "I won't have +my niece or August insulted in my house by a parcel of vagabonds." + +"O Uncle Andrew! is it a shiveree?" asked Julia. + +"Yes." + +"Well, don't shoot. It'll be so funny to have a shiveree." + +"But it is an insult to you and to August and to me. This is meant +especially to be an expression of their feeling toward August as a +German, though really their envy of his good fortune has much to do with +it. It is a second edition of the riot of last spring, in which Gottlieb +came so near to being killed. Now, I mean to do my country service by +leaving one or two less of them alive if they come here to-night." For +Andrew was full of that destructive energy so characteristic of the +Western and Southern people. + +"Oh! no, don't shoot. Can't you think of some other way?" pleaded Julia. + +"Well, yes, I could get the sheriff to come and bag a few of them." + +"And that will make trouble for many years. Let me see. Can't we do +this?" And Julia rapidly unfolded to Andrew and Jonas her plan of +operations against the enemy. + +"Number one!" said Jonas. "They'll fall into that air amby-scade as sure +as shootin'. That plan is military and Christian and civilized and human +and angelical and tancy-crumptious. It ort to meet the 'proval of the +American Fish-hawk with all his pinions and talents. I'll help to +execute it, and beat the rascals or lay my bones a-bleachin' on the +desert sands of Shady Holler." + +"Well," said Andrew to Julia, "I knew, if I took you under my roof, +you'd make a Christian of me in spite of myself. And I _am_ a sort of +savage, that's a fact." + +Jonas hurried home and sent Cynthy over to the castle, and there was +much work going on that afternoon. Andrew said that the castle was being +made ready for its first siege. As night came on, Julia was in a perfect +glee. Reddened by standing over the stove, with sleeves above her elbows +and her black hair falling down upon her shoulders, she was such a +picture that August stopped and stood in the door a minute to look at +her as he came in to supper. + +"Why, Jule, how glorious you look!" he said. "I've a great mind to fall +in love with you, mein Liebchen!" + +"And I _have_ fallen in love with _you_, Cæsar Augustus!" And well she +might, for surely, as he stood in the door with his well-knit frame, his +fine German forehead, his pure, refined mouth, and his clear, honest, +amiable blue eyes, he was a man to fall in love with. + + + +CHAPTER XLVI. + +THE SHIVEREE. + +If Webster's "American Dictionary of the English Language" had not been +made wholly in New England, it would not have lacked so many words that +do duty as native-born or naturalized citizens in large sections of the +United States, and among these words is the one that stands at the head +of the present chapter. I know that some disdainful prig will assure me +that it is but a corruption of the French "_charivari,"_ and so it is; +but then "_charivari_" is a corruption of the low Latin "_charivarium_" +and that is a corruption of something else, and, indeed, almost every +word is a corruption of some other word. So that there is no good reason +why "shiveree," which lives in entire unconsciousness of its French +parentage and its Latin grand-parentage, should not find its place in an +"American Dictionary." + +But while I am writing a disquisition on the etymology of the word, the +"shiveree" is mustering at Mandluff's store. Bill Day has concluded that +he is in no immediate danger of perdition, and that a man is a "blamed +fool to git skeered about his soul." Bob Short is sure the Almighty will +not be too hard on a feller, and so thinks he will go on having "a +little fun" now and then. And among the manly recreations which they +have proposed to themselves is that of shivereeing "that Dutchman, Gus +Wehle." It is the solemn opinion of the whole crowd that "no Dutchman +hadn't orter be so lucky as to git sech a beauty of a gal and a hundred +acres of bottom lands to boot." + +The members of the party were all disguised, some in one way and some in +another, though most of them had their coats inside out. They thought it +necessary to be disguised, "bekase, you know," as Bill Day expressed it, +"ole Grizzly is apt to prosecute ef he gits evidence agin you." And many +were the conjectures as to whether he would shoot or not. + +The instruments provided by this orchestra were as various as their +musical tastes. It is likely that even Mr. Jubilee Gilmore never saw +such an outfit. Bob Short had a dumb-bull, a keg with a strip of +raw-hide stretched across one end like a drum-head, while the other +remained open. A waxed cord inserted in the middle of the drum-head, and +reaching down through the keg, completed the instrument. The pulling of +the hand over this cord made a hideous bellowing, hence its name. Bill +Day had a gigantic watchman's rattle, a hickory spring on a cog-wheel. +It is called in the West, a horse-fiddle, because it is so unlike either +a horse or a fiddle. Then there were melodious tin pans and conch-shells +and tin horns. But the most deadly noise was made by Jim West, who had +two iron skillet-lids ("leds" he called them) which, when placed face to +face, and rubbed, as you have seen children rub tumblers, made a sound +discordant and deafening enough to have suggested Milton's expression +about the hinges which "grated harsh thunder." + +One of this party was a tallish man, so dressed as to look like a +hunchback, and a hunchback so tall was a most singular figure. He had +joined them in the dark, and the rest were unable to guess who it could +be, and he, for his part, would not tell. They thumped him and pushed +him, but at each attack he only leaped from the ground like a circus +clown, and made his tin horn utter so doleful a complaint as set the +party in an uproar of laughter. They could not be sure who he was, but +he was a funny fellow to have along with them at any rate. + +He was not only funny, but he was evidently fearless. For when they came +to the castle it was all dark and still. Bill Day said that it looked +"powerful juberous to him. Ole Andy meant to use shootin'-ir'ns, and +didn't want to be pestered with no lights blazin' in his eyes." But the +tall hunchback cleared the fence at a bound, and told them to come on +"ef they had the sperrit of a two-weeks-old goslin into 'em." So the +bottle was passed round, and for very shame they followed their +ungainly leader. + +"Looky here, boys," said the hunchback, "they's one way that we can fix +it so's ole Grizzly can't shoot. They's a little shop-place, a sort of a +shed, agin the house, on the side next to the branch. Let's git in thar +afore we begin, and he can't shoot." + +The orchestra were a little stupefied with drink, and they took the idea +quickly, never stopping to ask how they could retreat if Andrew chose to +shoot. Jim West thought things looked scaly, but he warn't agoin' to +backslide arter he'd got so fur. + +When they got into Andrew's shop, where he had a new and beautiful +skiff in building, the tall hunchback shut the door, and the rest did +not notice that he put the key in his pocket. + +That serenade! Such a medley of discordant sounds, such a clatter and +clangor, such a rattle of horse-fiddle, such a bellowing of dumb-bull, +such a snorting of tin horns, such a ringing of tin pans, such a +grinding of skillet-lids! But the house remained quiet. Once Bill Day +thought that he heard a laugh within. Julia may have lost her +self-control. She was so happy, and a little unrestrained fun was so +strange a luxury! + +At last the door between the house and shop was suddenly opened, and +Julia, radiant as she could be, stood on the threshold with a candle +in her hand. + +"Come in, gentlemen." + +But the gentlemen essayed to go out. + +"Locked in, by thunder!" said Jim West, trying the outside door of the +shop. + +"We heard you were coming, gentlemen, and provided a little +entertainment. Come in!" + +"Come in, boys," said the hunchback, "don't be afeard of nobody." + +Mechanically they followed the hunchback into the room, for there was +nothing else to be done. A smell of hot coffee and the sight of a +well-spread table greeted their senses. + +"Welcome, my friends, thrice welcome!" said Andrew. "Put down your +instruments and have some supper." + +"Let me relieve you," said Julia, and she took the dumb-bull from Bob +Short and the "horse-fiddle" from Day, the tin horns and tin pans from +others, and the two skillet-lids from Jim West, who looked as sheepish +as possible. August escorted each of them to the table, though his face +did not look altogether cordial. Some old resentment for the treatment +of his father interfered with the heartiness of his hospitality. The +hunchback in this light proved to be Jonas, of course; and Bill Day +whispered to the one next to him that they had been "tuck in and done +fer that time." + +"Gentlemen," said Andrew, "we are much obliged for your music." And +Cynthy would certainly have laughed out if she had not been so perplexed +in her mind to know whether Andrew was speaking the truth. + +Such a motley set of wedding guests as they were, with their coats +inside out and their other disguises! Such a race of pied pipers! And +looking at their hangdog faces you would have said, "Such a lot of +sheep-thieves!" Though why a sheep-thief is considered to be a more +guilty-looking man than any other criminal, I do not know. Jonas looked +bright enough and ridiculous enough with his hunch. They all ate rather +heartily, for how could they resist the attentions of Cynthy Ann and the +persuasions of Julia, who poured them coffee and handed them biscuit, +and waited upon them as though they were royal guests! And, moreover, +the act of eating served to cover their confusion. + +As the meal drew to a close, Bill Day felt that he, being in some sense +the leader of the party, ought to speak. He was not quite sober, though +he could stand without much staggering. He had been trying for some time +to frame a little speech, but his faculties did not work smoothly. + +"Mr. President--I mean Mr. Anderson--permit me to offer you our pardon. +I mean to beg your apologies--to--ahem--hope that our--that +your--our--thousand--thanks--your--you know what I mean." And he sat +down in foolish confusion. + +"Oh! yes. All right; much obliged, my friend," said the Philosopher, +who had not felt so much boyish animal life in twenty-five years. + +And Jim West whispered to Bill: "You expressed my sentiments exactly." + +"Mr. Anderson," said Jonas, rising, and thus lifting up his hunched +shoulders and looking the picture of a long-legged heron standing in the +water, "Mr. Anderson, you and our young and happy friend, Mr. Wehle, +will accept our thanks. We thought that music was all you wanted to gin +a delightful--kinder--sorter--well, top-dressin', to this interestin' +occasion. Now they's nothin' sweeter'n a tin horn, 'thout 'tis a +melodious conch-shell utterin' its voice like a turkle-dove. Then we've +got the paytent double whirlymagig hoss-violeen, and the tin pannyforte, +and, better nor all, the grindin' skelletled cymbals. We've laid +ourselves out and done our purtiest--hain't we, feller-musicians?--to +prove that we was the best band on the Ohio River. An' all out of +affection and respect for this ere happy pair. And we're all happy to be +here. Hain't we?" (Here they all nodded assent, though they looked as +though they wished themselves far enough.) "Our enstruments is a leetle +out of toon, owin' to the dampness of the night air, and so I trust +you'll excuse us playin' a farewell piece." + +Jim West was so anxious to get away that he took advantage of this turn +to say good-evening, and though the mischievous Julia insisted that he +should select his instrument, he had not the face to confess to the +skillet-lids, and got out of it by assuring her that he hadn't brought +nothing, "only come along to see the fun." And each member of the party +repeated the transparent lie, so that Julia found herself supplied with +more musical instruments than any young housekeeper need want, and +Andrew hung them, horns, pans, conch-shell, dumb-bull, horse-fiddle, +skillet-lids, and all, in his library, as trophies captured from +the enemy. + +Much as I should like to tell you of the later events of the +Philosopher's life, and about Julia and August, and their oldest son, +whose name is Andrew, and all that, I do not know that I can do better +than to bow myself out with the abashed serenaders, letting this musical +epilogue harmoniously close the book; writing just here. + +THE END. + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The End Of The World, by Edward Eggleston + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE END OF THE WORLD *** + +***** This file should be named 14051-8.txt or 14051-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/4/0/5/14051/ + +Produced by Rick Niles, John Hagerson, Charlie Kirschner and the PG +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The End Of The World + A Love Story + +Author: Edward Eggleston + +Release Date: November 15, 2004 [EBook #14051] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE END OF THE WORLD *** + + + + +Produced by Rick Niles, John Hagerson, Charlie Kirschner and the PG +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + + + +</pre> + +<a name="Frontispiece.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/Frontispiece.jpg"><img src= +"images/Frontispiece.jpg" width="45%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER.</b><br> +<i>(Frontispiece. See page 40.)</i></p> +<br> +<h1>The End of the World.</h1> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2>A LOVE STORY,</h2> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h4>BY</h4> +<h3>EDWARD EGGLESTON</h3> +<h5>AUTHOR OF "THE HOOSIER SCHOOLMASTER," ETC.</h5> +<h4>WITH THIRTY-TWO ILLUSTRATIONS.</h4> +<h3>1872</h3> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2>PREFACE.</h2> +<h3>[IN THE POTENTIAL MOOD.]</h3> +<br> +<p>It is the pretty unanimous conclusion of book-writers that +prefaces are most unnecessary and useless prependages, since nobody +reads them. And it is the pretty unanimous practice of book-writers +to continue to write them with such pains and elaborateness as +would indicate a belief that the success of a book depends upon the +favorable prejudice begotten of u graceful preface. My principal +embarrassment is that it is not customary for a book to have more +than one. How then shall I choose between the half-dozen letters of +introduction I might give my story, each better and worse on many +accounts than either of the others? I am rather inclined to adopt +the following, which might for some reasons be styled the</p> +<h3>PREFACE SENTIMENTAL.</h3> +<p>Perhaps no writer not infatuated with conceit, can send out a +book full of thought and feeling which, whatever they may be worth, +are his own, without a parental anxiety in regard to the fate of +his offspring. And there are few prefaces which do not in some way +betray this nervousness. I confess to a respect for even the +prefatory doggerel of good Tinker Bunyan--a respect for his +paternal tenderness toward his book, not at all for his villainous +rhyming. When I saw, the other day, the white handkerchiefs of my +children waving an adieu as they sailed away from me, a profound +anxiety seized me. So now, as I part company with August and Julia, +with my beloved Jonas and my much-respected Cynthy Ann, with the +mud-clerk on the Iatan, and the shaggy lord of Shady-Hollow Castle, +and the rest, that have watched with me of nights and crossed the +ferry with me twice a day for half a year--even now, as I see them +waving me adieu with their red silk and "yaller" cotton +"hand-kerchers," I know how many rocks of misunderstanding and +criticism and how many shoals of damning faint praise are before +them, and my heart is full of misgiving.</p> +<p>--But it will never do to have misgivings in a preface. How +often have publishers told me this! Ah! if I could write with half +the heart and hope my publishers evince in their advertisements, +where they talk about "front rank" and "great American story" and +all that, it would doubtless be better for the book, provided +anybody would read the preface or believe it when they had read it. +But at any rate let us not have a preface in the minor key.</p> +<p>A philosophical friend of mine, who is addicted to Carlyle, has +recommended that I try the following, which he calls</p> +<h3>THE HIGH PHILOSOPHICAL PREFACE.</h3> +<p>Why should I try to forestall the Verdict? Is it not +foreordained in the very nature of a Book and the Constitution of +the Reader that a certain very Definite Number of Readers will +misunderstand and dislike a given Book? And that another very +Definite Number will understand it and dislike it none the less? +And that still a third class, also definitely fixed in the Eternal +Nature of Things, will misunderstand and like it, and, what is +more, like it only because of their misunderstanding? And in +relation to a true Book, there can not fail to be an Elect Few who +understand admiringly and understandingly admire. Why, then, make +bows, write prefaces, attempt to prejudice the Case? Can I change +the Reader? Will I change the Book? No? Then away with Preface! The +destiny of the Book is fixed. I can not foretell it, for I am no +prophet. But let us not hope to change the Fates by our prefatory +bowing and scraping.</p> +<p>--I was forced to confess to my friend who was so kind as to +offer to lend me this preface, that there was much truth in it and +that truth is nowhere more rare than in prefaces, but it was not +possible to adopt it for two reasons: one, that my proof-reader can +not abide so many capitals, maintaining that they disfigure the +page, and what is a preface of the high philosophical sort worth +without a profusion of capitals? Even Carlyle's columns would lose +their greatest ornament if their capitals were gone. The second +reason for declining to use this preface was that my publishers are +not philosophers and would never be content with an "Elect Few," +and for my own part the pecuniary interest I have in the copyright +renders it quite desirable that as many as possible should be +elected to like it, or at least to buy it.</p> +<p>After all it seems a pity that I can not bring myself to use a +straightforward</p> +<h3>APOLOGETIC AND EXPLANATORY PREFACE.</h3> +<p>In view of the favor bestowed upon the author's previous story, +both by the Public who Criticise and the Public who Buy, it seems a +little ungracious to present so soon, another, the scene of which +is also laid in the valley of the Ohio. But the picture of Western +country life in "The Hoosier School-Master" would not have been +complete without this companion-piece, which presents a different +phase of it. And indeed there is no provincial life richer in +material if only one knew how to get at it.</p> +<p>Nothing is more reverent than a wholesome hatred of hypocrisy. +If any man think I have offended against his religion, I must +believe that his religion is not what it should be. If anybody +shall imagine that this is a work of religious controversy leveled +at the Adventists, he will have wholly mistaken my meaning. +Literalism and fanaticism are not vices confined to any one sect. +They are, unfortunately, pretty widely distributed. However, +if--</p> +<p>--And so on.</p> +<p>But why multiply examples of the half-dozen or more that I +might, could, would, or should have written? Since everybody is +agreed that, nobody reads a preface, I have concluded to let the +book go without any.</p> +<p>BROOKLYN, September, 1872.</p> +<p>"<i>And as he [Wordsworth] mingled freely with all kinds of men, +he found a pith of sense and a solidity of judgment here and there +among the unlearned which he had failed to find in the most +lettered; from obscure men he heard high truths.... And love, true +love and pure, he found was no flower reared only in what was +called refined society, and requiring leisure and polished manners +for its growth.... He believed that in country people, what is +permanent in human nature, the essential feelings and passions of +mankind, exist in greater simplicity and strength</i>."--PRINCIPAL +SHAIRP.</p> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<h3>A DEDICATION.</h3> +<p>It would hardly be in character for me to dedicate this book in +good, stiff, old-fashioned tomb-stone style, but I could not have +put in the background of scenery without being reminded of the two +boys, inseparable as the Siamese twins, who gathered mussel-shells +in the river marge, played hide-and-seek in the hollow sycamores, +and led a happy life in the shadow of just such hills as those +among which the events of this story took place. And all the more +that the generous boy who was my playmate then is the generous man +who has relieved me of many burdens while I wrote this story, do I +feel impelled to dedicate it to GEORGE CARY EGGLESTON, a manly man +and a brotherly brother.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2>CONTENTS.</h2> +<center> +<table summary=""> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_I.">I.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_I.">In Love with a Dutchman.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_II.">II.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_II.">An Explosion.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_III.">III.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_III.">A Farewell.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV.">IV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_IV.">A Counter-Irritant.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_V.">V.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_V.">At the Castle.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI.">VI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_VI.">The Backwoods Philosopher.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII.">VII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_VII.">Within and Without.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII.">VIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_VIII.">Figgers won't Lie.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX.">IX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_IX.">The New Singing-Master.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_X.">X.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_X.">An Offer of Help.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI.">XI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XI.">The Coon-dog Argument.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII.">XII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XII.">Two Mistakes.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII.">XIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XIII.">The Spider Spins.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV.">XIV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XIV.">The Spider's Web.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV.">XV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XV.">The Web Broken.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI.">XVI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XVI.">Jonas Expounds the Subject.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII.">XVII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XVII.">The Wrong Pew.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII.">XVIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII.">The Encounter.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX.">XIX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XIX.">The Mother.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XX.">XX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XX.">The Steam-Doctor.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXI.">XXI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXI.">The Hawk in a New Part.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXII.">XXII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXII.">Jonas Expresses his Opinion on +Dutchmen.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII.">XXIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII.">Somethin' Ludikerous.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV.">XXIV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV.">The Giant Great-heart.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXV.">XXV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXV.">A Chapter of Betweens.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI.">XXVI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI.">A Nice Little Game.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII.">XXVII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII.">The Result of an Evening with +Gentlemen.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII.">XXVIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII.">Waking up an Ugly +Customer.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX.">XXIX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX.">August and Norman.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXX.">XXX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXX.">Aground.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI.">XXXI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI.">Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXII.">XXXII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXII.">Julia's Enterprise.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIII.">XXXIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIII.">The Secret Stairway.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIV.">XXXIV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIV.">The Interview.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXV.">XXXV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXV.">Getting Ready for the End.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVI.">XXXVI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVI.">The Sin of Sanctimony.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVII.">XXXVII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVII.">The Deluge.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVIII.">XXXVIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXVIII.">Scaring a Hawk.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIX.">XXXIX.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIX.">Jonas takes an Appeal.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XL.">XL.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XL.">Selling out.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLI.">XLI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLI.">The Last Day and What Happened in +it.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLII.">XLII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLII.">For Ever and Ever.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLIII.">XLIII.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLIII.">The Midnight Alarm.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLIV.">XLIV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLIV.">Squaring Accounts.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLV.">XLV.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLV.">New Plans.</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td>CHAPTER</td> +<td align="right"><a href="#CHAPTER_XLVI.">XLVI.</a></td> +<td>--<a href="#CHAPTER_XLVI.">The Shiveree.</a></td> +</tr> +</table> +</center> +<br> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<h2>ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2> +<h3>BY FRANK BEARD</h3> +<center> +<table summary=""> +<tr> +<td><a href="#Frontispiece.jpg">The Backwoods Philosopher</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#014.jpg">Taking an Observation</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#017.jpg">A Talk with a Plowman</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#031.jpg">A little rustle brought her to +consciousness</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#036.jpg">Gottlieb</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#041.jpg">The Castle</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#045.jpg">The Sedilium at the Castle</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#049.jpg">"Look at me"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#064.jpg">"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#067.jpg">The Hawk</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#085.jpg">"Tell that to Jule"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#091.jpg">Tempted</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#097.jpg">"Now I hate you"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#102.jpg">At Cynthy's Door</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#105.jpg">Cynthy Ann had often said in class-meeting +that temptations abounded on every hand</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#112.jpg">Jonas</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#121.jpg">Julia sat down in mortification</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#126.jpg">"Good-by!"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#131.jpg">The Mother's Blessing</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#134.jpg">Corn-Sweats and Calamus</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#137.jpg">"Fire! Murder! Help!"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#151.jpg">Norman Anderson</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#157.jpg">Somethin' Ludikerous</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#163.jpg">To the Rescue</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#175.jpg">A Nice Little Game</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#183.jpg">The Mud-Clerk</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#191.jpg">Waking up an Ugly Customer</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#204.jpg">Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#227.jpg">A Pastoral Visit</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#246.jpg">Brother Goshorn</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#248.jpg">"Say them words over again"</a></td> +</tr> +<tr> +<td><a href="#253.jpg">"I want to buy your place"</a></td> +</tr> +</table> +</center> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h1>THE END OF THE WORLD.</h1> +<hr style="width: 25%;"> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I."></a>CHAPTER I.</h2> +<h3>IN LOVE WITH A DUTCHMAN.</h3> +<br> +<p>"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a +Dutchman! She might as well as to marry some white folks I +know."</p> +<p>Samuel Anderson made no reply. It would be of no use to reply. +Shrews are tamed only by silence. Anderson had long since learned +that the little shred of influence which remained to him in his own +house would disappear whenever his teeth were no longer able to +shut his tongue securely in. So now, when his wife poured out this +hot lava of <i>argumentum ad hominem</i>, he closed the teeth down +in a dead-lock way over the tongue, and compressed the lips tightly +over the teeth, and shut his finger-nails into his work-hardened +palms. And then, distrusting all these precautions, fearing lest he +should be unable to hold on to his temper even with this grip, the +little man strode out of the house with his wife's shrill voice in +his ears.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson had good reason to fear that her daughter was in +love with a "Dutchman," as she phrased it in her contempt. The few +Germans who had penetrated to the West at that time were looked +upon with hardly more favor than the Californians feel for the +almond-eyed Chinaman. They were foreigners, who would talk +gibberish instead of the plain English which everybody could +understand, and they were not yet civilized enough to like the +yellow saleratus-biscuit and the "salt-rising" bread of which their +neighbors were so fond. Reason enough to hate them!</p> +<p>Only half an hour before this outburst of Mrs. Anderson's, she +had set a trap for her daughter Julia, and had fairly caught +her.</p> +<p>"Jule! Jule! O Jul-y-e-ee!" she had called.</p> +<p>And Julia, who was down in the garden hoeing a bed in which she +meant to plant some "Johnny-Jump-ups," came quickly toward the +house, though she know it would be of no use to come quickly. Let +her come quickly, or let her come slowly, the rebuke was sure to +greet her all the name.</p> +<p>"Why don't you come when you're called, <i>I'd</i> like to know! +You're never in reach when you're wanted, and you're good for +nothing when you are here!"</p> +<p>Julia Anderson's earliest lesson from her mother's lips had been +that she was good for nothing. And every day and almost every hour +since had brought her repeated assurances that she was good for +nothing. If she had not been good for a great deal, she would long +since have been good for nothing as the result of such teaching. +But though this was not the first, nor the thousandth, nor the ten +thousandth time that she had been told that she was good for +nothing, the accustomed insult seemed to sting her now more than +ever. Was it that, being almost eighteen, she was beginning to feel +the woman blossoming in her nature? Or, was it that the tender +words of August Wehle had made her sure that she was good for +something, that now her heart felt her mother's insult to be a +stale, selfish, ill-natured lie?</p> +<p>"Take this cup of tea over to Mrs. Malcolm's, and tell her that +it a'n't quite as good as what I borried of her last week. And tell +her that they'll be a new-fangled preacher at the school-house a +Sunday, a Millerite or somethin', a preachin' about the end of the +world."</p> +<p>Julia did not say "Yes, ma'am," in her usually meek style. She +smarted a little yet from the harsh words, and so went away in +silence.</p> +<p>Why did she walk fast? Had she noticed that August Wehle, who +was "breaking up" her father's north field, was just plowing down +the west side of his land? If she hastened, she might reach the +cross-fence as he came round to it, and while he was yet hidden +from the sight of the house by the turn of the hill. And would not +a few words from August Wehle be pleasant to her ears after her +mother's sharp depreciation? It is at least safe to conjecture that +some such feeling made her hurry through the long, waving timothy +of the meadow, and made her cross the log that spanned the brook +without ever so much as stopping to look at the minnows glancing +about in the water flecked with the sunlight that struggled through +the boughs of the water-willows. For, in her thorough loneliness, +Julia Anderson had come to love the birds, the squirrels, and the +fishes as companions, and in all her life she had never before +crossed the meadow brook without stooping to look at the +minnows.</p> +<p>All this haste Mrs. Anderson noticed. Having often scolded</p> +<br> +<a name="014.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/014.jpg"><img src="images/014.jpg" +width="45%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>TAKING AN OBSERVATION.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Julia for "talking to the fishes like a fool," she noticed the +omission. And now she only waited until Julia was over the hill to +take the path round the fence under shelter of the blackberry +thicket until she came to the clump of alders, from the midst of +which she could plainly see if any conversation should take place +between her Julia and the comely young Dutchman.</p> +<p>In fact, Julia need not have hurried so much. For August Wehle +had kept one eye on his horses and the other on the house all that +day. It was the quick look of intelligence between the two at +dinner that had aroused the mother's suspicions. And Wehle had +noticed the work on the garden-bed, the call to the house, and the +starting of Julia on the path toward Mrs. Malcolm's. His face had +grown hot, and his hand had trembled. For once he had failed to see +the stone in his way, until the plow was thrown clean from the +furrow. And when he came to the shade of the butternut-tree by +which she must pass, it had seemed to him imperative that the +horses should rest. Besides, the hames-string wanted tightening on +the bay, and old Dick's throat-latch must need a little fixing. He +was not sure that the clevis-pin had not been loosened by the +collision with the stone just now. And so, upon one pretext and +another, he managed to delay starting his plow until Julia came by, +and then, though his heart had counted all her steps from the +door-stone to the tree, then he looked up surprised. Nothing could +be so astonishing to him as to see her there! For love is +needlessly crafty, it has always an instinct of concealment, of +indirection about it. The boy, and especially the girl, who will +tell the truth frankly in regard to a love affair is a miracle of +veracity. But there are such, and they are to be reverenced--with +the reverence paid to martyrs.</p> +<p>On her part, Julia Anderson had walked on as though she meant to +pass the young plowman by, until he spoke, and then she started, +and blushed, and stopped, and nervously broke off the top of a last +year's iron-weed and began to break it into bits while he talked, +looking down most of the time, but lifting her eyes to his now and +then. And to the sun-browned but delicate-faced young German it +seemed, a vision of Paradise--every glimpse of that fresh girl's +face in the deep shade of the sun-bonnet. For girls' faces can +never look so sweet in this generation as they did to the boys who +caught sight of them, hidden away, precious things, in the +obscurity of a tunnel of pasteboard and calico!</p> +<p>This was not their first love-talk. Were they engaged? Yes, and +no. By all the speech their eyes were capable of in school, and of +late by words, they were engaged in loving one another, and in +telling one another of it. But they were young, and separated by +circumstances, and they had hardly begun to think of marriage yet. +It was enough for the present to love and be loved. The most +delightful stage of a love affair is that in which the present is +sufficient and there is no past or future. And so August hung his +elbow around the top of the bay horse's hames, and talked to +Julia.</p> +<p>It is the highest praise of the German heart that it loves +flowers and little children; and like a German and like a lover +that he was, August began to speak of the anemones and the violets +that were already blooming in the corners of the fence. Girls in +love are not apt to say any thing very fresh. And Julia only said +she thought the flowers seemed happy in the sunlight In answer to +this speech, which seemed to the lover a bit of inspiration, he +quoted from Schiller the lines:</p> +<blockquote>"Yet weep, soft children of the Spring;<br> +The feelings Love alone can bring<br> +Have been denied to you!"</blockquote> +<p>With the quick and crafty modesty of her sex, Julia evaded this +very pleasant shaft by saying: "How much you know, August! How do +you learn it?"</p> +<br> +<a name="017.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/017.jpg"><img src="images/017.jpg" +width="70%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>A TALK WITH A PLOWMAN.</b></p> +<br> +<p>And August was pleased, partly because of the compliment, but +chiefly because in saying it Julia had brought the sun-bonnet in +such a range that he could see the bright eyes and blushing face at +the bottom of this <i>camera-oscura</i>. He did not hasten to +reply. While the vision lasted he enjoyed the vision. Not until the +sun-bonnet dropped did he take up the answer to her question.</p> +<p>"I don't know much, but what I do know I have learned out of +your Uncle Andrew's books."</p> +<p>"Do you know my Uncle Andrew? What a strange man he is! He never +comes here, and we never go there, and my mother never speaks to +him, and my father doesn't often have anything to say to him. And +so you have been at his house. They say he has all up-stairs full +of books, and ever so many cats and dogs and birds and squirrels +about. But I thought he never let anybody go up-stairs."</p> +<p>"He lets me," said August, when she had ended her speech and +dropped her sun-bonnet again out of the range of his eyes, which, +in truth, were too steadfast in their gaze. "I spend many evenings +up-stairs." August had just a trace of German in his idiom.</p> +<p>"What makes Uncle Andrew so curious, I wonder?"</p> +<p>"I don't exactly know. Some say he was treated not just right by +a woman when he was a young man. I don't know. He seems happy. I +don't wonder a man should be curious though when a woman that he +loves treats him not just right. Any way, if he loves her with all +his heart, as I love Jule Anderson!"</p> +<p>These last words came with an effort. And Julia just then +remembered her errand, and said, "I must hurry," and, with a +country girl's agility, she climbed over the fence before August +could help her, and gave him another look through her +bonnet-telescope from the other Hide, and then hastened on to +return the tea, und to tell Mrs. Malcolm that there was to be a +Millerite preacher at the school-house on Sunday night. And August +found that his horses were quite cool, while he was quite hot. He +cleaned his mold board, and swung his plow round, and then, with a +"Whoa! haw!" and a pull upon the single line which Western plowmen +use to guide their horses, he drew the team into their place, and +set himself to watching the turning of the rich, fragrant black +earth. And even as he set his plowshare, so he set his purpose to +overcome all obstacles, and to marry Julia Anderson. With the same +steady, irresistible, onward course would he overcome all that lay +between him and the soul that shone out of the face that dwelt in +the bottom of the sun-bonnet.</p> +<p>From her covert in the elder-bushes Mrs. Anderson had seen the +parley, and her cheeks had also grown hot, but from a very +different emotion. She had not heard the words. She had seen the +loitering girl and the loitering plowboy, and she went back to the +house vowing that she'd "teach Jule Anderson how to spend her time +talking to a Dutchman." And yet the more she thought of it, the +more she was satisfied that it wasn't best to "make a fuss" just +yet. She might hasten what she wanted to prevent. For though Julia +was obedient and mild in word, she was none the less a little +stubborn, and in a matter of this sort might take the bit in her +teeth.</p> +<p>And so Mrs. Anderson had recourse, as usual, to her husband. She +knew she could browbeat him. She demanded that August Wehle should +be paid off and discharged. And when Anderson had hesitated, +because he feared he could not get another so good a hand, and for +other reasons, she burst out into the declaration:</p> +<p>"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a +Dutchman! She might as well as to marry some white folks I +know."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II."></a>CHAPTER II.</h2> +<h3>AN EXPLOSION.</h3> +<br> +<p>It was settled that August was to be quietly discharged at the +end of his month, which was Saturday night. Neither he nor Julia +must suspect any opposition to their attachment, nor any discovery +of it, indeed. This was settled by Mrs. Anderson. She usually +settled things. First, she settled upon the course to be pursued. +Then she settled her husband. He always made a show of resistance. +His dignity required a show of resistance. But it was only a show. +He always meant to surrender in the end. Whenever his wife ceased +her fire of small-arms and herself hung out the flag of truce, he +instantly capitulated. As in every other dispute, so in this one +about the discharge of the "miserable, impudent Dutchman," Mrs. +Anderson attacked her husband at all his weak points, and she had +learned by heart a catalogue of his weak points. Then, when he was +sufficiently galled to be entirely miserable; when she had +expressed her regret that she hadn't married somebody with some +heart, and that she had ever left her father's house, for her +<i>father</i> was <i>always</i> good to her; and when she had +sufficiently reminded him of the lover she had given up for him, +and of how much <i>he</i> had loved her, and how miserable she had +made <i>him</i> by loving Samuel Anderson--when she had conducted +the quarrel through all the preliminary stages, she always carried +her point in the end by a <i>coup de partie</i> somewhat in this +fashion:</p> +<p>"That's just the way! Always the way with you men! I suppose I +must give up to you as usual. You've lorded it over me from the +start. I can't even have the management of my own daughter. But I +do think that after I've let you have your way in so many things, +you might turn off that fellow. You might let me have my way in one +little thing, and you <i>would</i> if you cared for me. You know +how liable I am to die at any moment of heart-disease, and yet you +will prolong this excitement in this way."</p> +<p>Now, there is nothing a weak man likes so much as to be +considered strong, nothing a henpecked man likes so much as to be +regarded a tyrant. If you ever hear a man boast of his +determination to rule his own house, you may feel sure that he is +subdued. And a henpecked husband always makes a great show of +opposing everything that looks toward the enlargement of the work +or privileges of women. Such a man insists on the shadow of +authority because he can not have the substance. It is a great +satisfaction to him that his wife can never be president, and that +she can not make speeches in prayer-meeting. While he retains these +badges of superiority, he is still in some sense head of the +family.</p> +<p>So when Mrs. Anderson loyally reminded her husband that she had +always let him have his own way, he believed her because he wanted +to, though he could not just at the moment recall the particular +instances. And knowing that he must yield, he rather liked to yield +as an act of sovereign grace to the poor oppressed wife who begged +it.</p> +<p>"Well, if you insist on it, of course, I will not refuse you," +he said; "and perhaps you are right." He had yielded in this way +almost every day of his married life, and in this way he yielded to +the demand that August should he discharged. But he agreed with his +wife that Julia should not know anything about it, and that there +must be no leave-taking allowed.</p> +<p>The very next day Julia sat sewing on the long porch in front of +the house. Cynthy Ann was getting dinner in the kitchen at the +other end of the hall, and Mrs. Anderson was busy in her usual +battle with dirt. She kept the house clean, because it gratified +her combativeness and her domineering disposition to have the house +clean in spite of the ever-encroaching dirt. And so she scrubbed +and scolded, and scolded and scrubbed, the scrubbing and scolding +agreeing in time and rhythm. The scolding was the vocal music, the +scrubbing an accompaniment. The concordant discord was perfect. +Just at the moment I speak of there was a lull in her scolding. The +symphonious scrubbing went on as usual. Julia, wishing to divert +the next thunder-storm from herself, erected what she imagined +might prove a conversational lightning-rod, by asking a question on +a topic foreign to the theme of the last march her mother had +played and sung so sweetly with brush and voice.</p> +<p>"Mother, what makes Uncle Andrew so queer?"</p> +<p>"I don't know. He was always queer." This was spoken in a +staccato, snapping-turtle way. But when one has lived all one's +life with a snapping-turtle, one doesn't mind. Julia did not mind. +She was curious to know what was the matter with her uncle, Andrew +Anderson. So she said:</p> +<p>"I've heard that some false woman treated him cruelly; is that +so?"</p> +<p>Julia did not see how red her mother's face was, for she was not +regarding her.</p> +<p>"Who told you that?" Julia was so used to hearing her mother +speak in an excited way that she hardly noticed the strange tremor +in this question.</p> +<p>"August."</p> +<p>The symphony ceased in a moment. The scrubbing-brush dropped in +the pail of soapsuds. But the vocal storm burst forth with a +violence that startled even Julia. "August said <i>that</i>, did +he? And you listened, did you? You listened to <i>that? You</i> +listened to that? <i>You listened</i> to <i>that</i>? Hey? He +slandered your mother. You listened to him slander your mother!" By +this time Mrs. Anderson was at white heat. Julia was speechless. +"<i>I</i> saw you yesterday flirting with that <i>Dutchman</i>, and +listening to his abuse of your mother! And now you <i>insult</i> +me! Well, to-morrow will be the last day that that Dutchman will +hold a plow on this place. And you'd better look out for yourself, +miss! You--"</p> +<p>Here followed a volley of epithets which Julia received +standing. But when her mother's voice grew to a scream, Julia took +the word.</p> +<p>"Mother, hush!"</p> +<p>It was the first word of resistance she had ever uttered. The +agony within must have been terrible to have wrung it from her. The +mother was stunned with anger and astonishment. She could not +recover herself enough to speak until Jule had fled half-way up the +stairs. Then her mother covered her defeat by screaming after her, +"Go to your own room, you impudent hussy! You know I am liable to +die of heart-disease any minute, and you want to kill me!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III."></a>CHAPTER III.</h2> +<h3>A FAREWELL.</h3> +<br> +<p>Mrs. Anderson felt that she had made a mistake. She had not +meant to tell Julia that August was to leave. But now that this +stormy scene had taken place, she thought she could make a good use +of it. She knew that her husband co-operated with her in her +opposition to "the Dutchman," only because he was afraid of his +wife. In his heart, Samuel Anderson could not refuse anything to +his daughter. Denied any of the happiness which most men find in +loving their wives, he found consolation in the love of his +daughter. Secretly, as though his paternal affection were a crime, +he caressed Julia, and his wife was not long in discovering that +the father cared more for a loving daughter than for a shrewish +wife. She watched him jealously, and had come to regard her +daughter as one who had supplanted her in her husband's affections, +and her husband as robbing her of the love of her daughter. In +truth, Mrs. Samuel Anderson had come to stand so perpetually on +guard against imaginary encroachments on her rights, that she saw +enemies everywhere. She hated Wehle because he was a Dutchman; she +would have hated him on a dozen other scores if he had been an +American. It was offense enough that Julia loved him.</p> +<p>So now she resolved to gain her husband to her side by her +version of the story, and before dinner she had told him how August +had charged her with being false and cruel to Andrew many years +ago, and how Jule had thrown it up to her, and how near she had +come to dropping down with palpitation of the heart. And Samuel +Anderson reddened, and declared that he would protect his wife from +such insults. The notion that he protected his wife was a pleasant +fiction of the little man's, which received a generous +encouragement at the hands of his wife. It was a favorite trick of +hers to throw herself, in a metaphorical way, at his feet, a +helpless woman, and in her feebleness implore his protection. And +Samuel felt all the courage of knighthood in defending his +inoffensive wife. Under cover of this fiction, so flattering to the +vanity of an overawed husband, she had managed at one time or +another to embroil him with almost all the neighbors, and his +refusal to join fences had resulted in that crooked arrangement +known as a "devil's lane" on three sides of his farm.</p> +<p>Julia dared not stay away from dinner, which was miserable +enough. She did not venture so much as to look at August, who sat +opposite her, and who was the most unhappy person at the table, +because he did not know what all the unhappiness was about. Mr. +Anderson's brow foreboded a storm, Mrs. Anderson's face was full of +an earthquake, Cynthy Ann was sitting in shadow, and Julia's +countenance perplexed him. Whether she was angry with him or not, +he could not be sure. Of one thing he was certain: she was +suffering a great deal, and that was enough to make him exceedingly +unhappy.</p> +<p>Sitting through his hurried meal in this atmosphere surcharged +with domestic electricity, he got the notion--he could hardly tell +how--that all this lowering of the sky had something to do with +him. What had he done? Nothing. His closest self-examination told +him that he had done no wrong. But his spirits were depressed, and +his sensitive conscience condemned him for some unknown crime that +had brought about all this disturbance of the elements. The ham did +not seem very good, the cabbage he could not eat, the corn-dodger +choked him, he had no desire to wait for the pie. He abridged his +meal, and went out to the barn to keep company with his horses and +his misery until it should be time to return to his plow.</p> +<p>Julia sat and sewed in that tedious afternoon. She would have +liked one more interview with August before his departure. Looking +through the open hall, she saw him leave the barn and go toward his +plowing. Not that she looked up. Hawk never watched chicken more +closely than Mrs. Anderson watched poor Jule. But out of the +corners of her eyes Julia saw him drive his horses before him from +the stable. At the field in which he worked was on the other side +of the house from where she sat she could not so much as catch a +glimpse of him as he held his plow on its steady course. She wished +she might have helped Cynthy Ann in the kitchen, for then she could +have seen him, but there was no chance for such a transfer.</p> +<p>Thus the tedious afternoon wore away, and just as the sun was +settling down so that the shadow of the elm in the front-yard +stretched across the road into the cow pasture, the dead silence +was broken. Julia had been wishing that somebody would speak. Her +mother's sulky speechlessness was worse than her scolding, and +Julia had even wished her to resume her storming. But the silence +was broken by Cynthy Ann, who came into the hall and called, "Jule, +I wish you would go to the barn and gether the eggs; I want to make +some cake."</p> +<p>Every evening of her life Julia gathered the eggs, and there was +nothing uncommon in Cynthy Ann's making cake, so that nothing could +be more innocent than this request. Julia sat opposite the +front-door, her mother sat farther along. Julia could see the face +of Cynthy Ann. Her mother could only hear the voice, which was dry +and commonplace enough. Julia thought she detected something +peculiar in Cynthy's manner. She would as soon have thought of the +big oak gate-posts with their round ball-like heads telegraphing +her in a sly way, as to have suspected any such craft on the part +of Cynthy Ann, who was a good, pious, simple-hearted, Methodist old +maid, strict with herself, and censorious toward others. But there +stood Cynthy making some sort of gesture, which Julia took to mean +that she was to go quick. She did not dare to show any eagerness. +She laid down her work, and moved away listlessly. And evidently +she had been too slow. For if August had been in sight when Cynthy +Ann called her, he had now disappeared on the other side of the +hill. She loitered along, hoping that he would come in sight, but +he did not, and then she almost smiled to think how foolish she had +been in imagining that Cynthy Ann had any interest in her love +affair. Doubtless Cynthy sided with her mother.</p> +<p>And so she climbed from mow to mow gathering the eggs. No place +is sweeter than a mow, no occupation can be more delightful than +gathering the fresh eggs--great glorious pearls, more beautiful +than any that men dive for, despised only because they are so +common and so useful! But Julia, gliding about noiselessly, did not +think much of the eggs, did not give much attention to the hens +scratching for wheat kernels amongst the straw, nor to the barn +swallows chattering over the adobe dwellings which they were +building among the rafters above her. She had often listened to the +love-talk of these last, but now her heart was too heavy to hear. +She slid down to the edge of one of the mows, and sat there a few +feet above the threshing-floor with her bonnet in her hand, looking +off sadly and vacantly. It was pleasant to sit here alone and +think, without the feeling that her mother was penetrating her +thoughts.</p> +<p>A little rustle brought her to consciousness. Her face was fiery +red in a minute. There, in one corner of the threshing-floor, stood +August, gazing at her. He had come into the barn to find a +single-tree in place of one which had broken. While he was looking +for it, Julia had come, and he had stood and looked, unable to +decide whether to speak or not, uncertain how deeply she might be +offended, since she had never once let her eyes rest on him at +dinner. And when she had come to the edge of the mow and stopped +there in a reverie, August had been utterly spell-bound.</p> +<p>A minute she blushed. Then, perceiving her opportunity, she +dropped herself to the floor and walked up to August.</p> +<p>"August, you are to be turned off to-morrow night."</p> +<p>"What have I done? Anything wrong?"</p> +<p>"No."</p> +<p>"Why do they send me away?"</p> +<p>"Because--because--" Julia stopped.</p> +<p>But silence is often better than speech. A sudden intelligence +came into the blue eyes of August. "They turn me off because I love +Jule Anderson."</p> +<br> +<a name="031.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/031.jpg"><img src="images/031.jpg" +width="70%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>A LITTLE RUSTLE BROUGHT HER TO CONSCIOUSNESS.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Julia blushed just a little.</p> +<p>"I will love her all the same when I am gone. I will always love +her."</p> +<p>Julia did not know what to say to this passionate speech, so she +contented herself with looking a little grateful and very +foolish.</p> +<p>"But I am only a poor boy, and a Dutchman at that"--he said this +bitterly--"but if you will wait, Jule, I will show them I am of +some account. Not good enough for you, but good enough for +<i>them</i>. You will--"</p> +<p>"I will wait--<i>forever</i>--for <i>you</i>, Gus." Her head was +down, and her voice could hardly be heard. "Good-by." She stretched +out her hand, and he took it trembling.</p> +<p>"Wait a minute." He dropped the hand, and taking a pencil wrote +on a beam:</p> +<p>"March 18th, 1843."</p> +<p>"There, that's to remember the Dutchman by."</p> +<p>"Don't call yourself a Dutchman, August. One day in school, when +I was sitting opposite to you, I learned this definition, 'August: +grand, magnificent,' and I looked at you and said, Yes, that he is. +August is grand and magnificent, and that's what you are. You're +just grand!"</p> +<p>I do not think he was to blame. I am sure he was not +responsible. It was done so quickly. He kissed her forehead and +then her lips, and said good-by and was gone. And she, with her +apron full of eggs and her cheeks very red--it makes one warm to +climb--went back to the house, resolved in some way to thank Cynthy +Ann for sending her; but Cynthy Ann's face was so serious and +austere in its look that Julia concluded she must have been +mistaken, Cynthy Ann couldn't have known that August was in the +barn. For all she said was:</p> +<p>"You got a right smart lot of eggs, didn't you? The hens is +beginnin' to lay more peart since the warm spell sot in."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV."></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2> +<h3>A COUNTER-IRRITANT.</h3> +<br> +<p>"Vot you kits doornt off vor? Hey?"</p> +<p>Gottlieb Wehle always spoke English, or what he called English, +when he was angry.</p> +<p>"Vot for? Hey?"</p> +<p>All the way home from Anderson's on that Saturday night, August +had been, in imagination, listening to the rough voice of his +honest father asking this question, and he had been trying to find +a satisfactory answer to it. He might say that Mr. Anderson did not +want to keep a hand any longer. But that would not be true. And a +young man with August's clear blue eyes was not likely to lie.</p> +<p>"Vot vor ton't you not shpeak? Can't you virshta blain Eenglish +ven you hears it? Hey? You a'n't no teef vot shteels I shposes, unt +you ton't kit no troonks mit vishky? Vot you too tat you pe shamt +of? Pin lazin' rount? Kon you nicht Eenglish shprachen? Oot mit id +do vonst!"</p> +<p>"I did not do anything to be ashamed of," said August. And yet +he looked ashamed.</p> +<p>"You tidn't pe no shamt, hey? You tidn't! Vot vor you loogs so +leig a teef in der bentenshry? Vot for you sprachen not mit me ven +ich sprachs der blainest zort ov Eenglish mit you? You kooms +sneaggin heim Zaturtay nocht leig a tog vots kot kigt, unt's got +his dail dween his leks; and ven I aks you in blain Eenglish vot's +der madder, you loogs zheepish leig, und says you a'n't tun nodin. +I zay you tun sompin. If you a'n't tun nodin den, vy don't you dell +me vot it is dat you has tun? Hey?"</p> +<br> +<a name="036.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/036.jpg"><img src="images/036.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>GOTTLIEB.</b></p> +<br> +<p>All this time August found that it was getting harder and harder +to tell his father the real state of the case. But the old man, +seeing that he prevailed nothing, took a cajoling tone.</p> +<p>"Koom, August, mine knabe, ton't shtand dare leig a vool. Vot +tit Anterson zay ven he shent you avay?"</p> +<p>"He said that I'd been seen a-talking to his daughter, Jule +Anderson."</p> +<p>"Vell, you nebber said no hoorm doo Shule, tid you? If I dought +you said vot you zhoodn't zay doo Shule, I vood shust drash you on +der shpot! Tid you gwarl mit Shule, already?"</p> +<p>"Quarrel with Jule! She's the last person in the world I'd think +of quarreling with. She's as good as--"</p> +<p>"Oh! you pe in lieb mit Shule! You vool, you! Is dat all dat I +raise you vor? I dells you, unt dells you, unt <i>dells</i> you to +sprach nodin put Deutsche, unt to marry a kood Deutsche vrau vot +kood sprach mit you, unt now you koes right shtraight off unt kits +knee-teep in lieb mit a vool of a Yangee kirl! You doo ant pe +doornt off!"</p> +<p>August's countenance brightened. All the way home he had felt +that it was somehow an unpardonable sin to be a Dutchman. Anderson +had spoken hardly to him in dismissing him, and now it was a great +comfort to find that his father returned the contempt of the +Yankees at its full value. All the conceit was not on the side of +the Yankees. It was at least an open question which was the most +disgraced, he or Julia, by their little love affair.</p> +<p>But more comforting still was the quiet look of his sweet-faced +mother, who, moving about among her throng of children like a hen +with more chickens than she can hover<a name= +"FNanchor1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1"><sup>[1]</sup></a>, never +forgot to be patient and affectionate. If there had been a look of +reproach on the face of the mother, it would have been the hardest +trial of all. But there was that in her eyes--the dear Moravian +mother--that gave courage to August. The mother was an outside +conscience, and now as Gottlieb, who had lapsed into German for his +wife's benefit, rattled on his denunciation of this Cannanitish +Yankee, with whom his son was in love, the son looked every now and +then into the eyes, the still German eyes of the mother, and +rejoiced that he saw there no reflection of his father's rebuke. +The older Wehle presently resumed his English, such as it was, as +better adapted to scolding. Whether he thought to make his children +love German by abusing them in English, I do not know, but it was +his habit.</p> +<blockquote><a name="Footnote_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor1">[1]</a> +Not until my attention was called to this word in the proof did I +know that in this sense it is a provincialism. It is so used, at +least in half the country, and yet neither of our American +dictionaries has it.</blockquote> +<p>"I dells you tese Yangees is Yangees. Dere neber voz put shust +von cood vor zompin. Antrew Antershon is von. He shtaid mit us ven +ve vos all zick, unt he is zhust so cood as if he was porn in +Deutschland. Put all de rest is Yangees. Marry a Deutsche vrau +vot's kot cood sense to ede kraut unt shleep unter vedder peds ven +it's kalt. Put shust led de Yangees pe Yangees."</p> +<p>Seeing August put on his hat and go to the door, he called out +testily:</p> +<p>"Vare you koes, already?"</p> +<p>"Over to the castle."</p> +<p>"Veil, das is koot. Ko doo de gassel. Antrew vlll dell you vat +sorts do Yangee kirls pe!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V."></a>CHAPTER V.</h2> +<h3>AT THE CASTLE.</h3> +<br> +<p>By the time August reached Andrew Anderson's castle it was dark. +The castle was built in a hollow, looking out toward the Ohio +River, a river that has this peculiarity, that it is all beautiful, +from Pittsburgh to Cairo. Through the trees, on which the buds were +just bursting, August looked out on the golden roadway made by the +moonbeams on the river. And into the tumult of his feelings there +came the sweet benediction of Nature. And what is Nature but the +voice of God?</p> +<p>Anderson's castle was a large log building of strange +construction. Everything about it had been built by the hands of +Andrew, at once its lord and its architect. Evidently a whimsical +fancy had pleased itself in the construction. It was an attempt to +realize something of medieval form in logs. There were buttresses +and antique windows, and by an ingenious transformation the +chimney, usually such a disfigurement to a log-house, was made to +look like a round donjon keep. But it was strangely composite, and +I am afraid Mr. Ruskin would have considered it somewhat confused; +for while it looked like a rude castle to those who approached it +from the hills, it looked like something very different to those +who approached the front, for upon that side was a portico with +massive Doric columns, which were nothing more nor less than maple +logs. Andrew maintained that the natural form of the trunk of a +tree was the ideal and perfect form of a pillar.</p> +<p>To this picturesque structure, half castle, half cabin, with +hints of church and temple, came August Wehle on Saturday evening. +He did not go round to the portico and knock at the front-door as a +stranger would have done, but in behind the donjon chimney he +pulled an alarm-cord. Immediately the head of Andrew Anderson was +thrust out of a Gothic hole--you could not call it a window. His +uncut hair, rather darker than auburn, fell down to his waist, and +his shaggy red beard lay upon his bosom. Instead of a coat he wore +that unique garment of linsey-woolsey known in the West as wa'mus +(warm us?), a sort of over-shirt. He was forty-five, but there were +streaks of gray in his hair and board, and he looked older by ten +years.</p> +<p>"What ho, good friend? Is that you?" he cried. "Come up, and +right welcome!" For his language was as archaic and perhaps as +incongruous as his architecture. And then throwing out of the +window a rope-ladder, he called out again, "Ascend! ascend! my +brave young friend!"</p> +<p>And young Wehle climbed up the ladder into the large upper room. +For it was one peculiarity of the castle that the upper part had no +visible communication with the lower. Except August, and now and +then a literary stranger, no one but the owner was ever admitted to +the upper story of the house, and the neighbors, who always had +access to the lower rooms, regarded the upper part of the castle +with mysterious awe. August was often plied with questions about +it, but he always answered simply that he didn't think Mr. Anderson +would like to have it talked about. For the owner there must have +been some inside mode of access to the second story, but he did not +choose to let even August know of any other way than that by the +rope-ladder, and the few strangers who came to see his books were +taken in by the same drawbridge.</p> +<br> +<a name="041.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/041.jpg"><img src="images/041.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE CASTLE.</b></p> +<br> +<p>The room was filled with books arranged after whimsical +associations. One set of cases, for instance, was called the +Academy, and into these he only admitted the masters, following the +guidance of his own eccentric judgment quite as much as he followed +traditional estimate. Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Milton of course +had undisputed possession of the department devoted to the "Kings +of Epic," as he styled them. Sophocles, Calderon, Corneille, and +Shakespeare were all that he admitted to his list of "Kings of +Tragedy." Lope he rejected on literary grounds, and Goethe because +he thought his moral tendency bad. He rejected Rabelais from his +chief humorists, but accepted Cervantes, Le Sage, Molière, +Swift, Hood, and the then fresh Pickwick of Boz. To these he added +the Georgia Scenes of Mr. Longstreet, insisting that they were +quite equal to Don Quixote. I can only stop to mention one other +department in his Academy. One case was devoted to the "Best +Stories," and an admirable set they were! I wish that anything of +mine were worthy to go into such company. His purity of feeling, +almost ascetic, led him to reject Boccaccio, but he admitted +Chaucer and some of Balzac's, and Smollett, Goldsmith, and De Foe, +and Walter Scott's best, Irving's Rip Van Winkle, Bernardin St. +Pierre's "Paul and Virginia," and "Three Months under the Snow," +and Charles Lamb's generally overlooked "Rosamund Gray." There were +eases for "Socrates and his Friends," and for other classes. He had +amused himself for years in deciding what books should be +"crowned," as he called it, and what not. And then he had another +case, called "The Inferno." I wish there was space to give a list +of this department. Some were damned for dullness and some for +coarseness. Miss Edgeworth's Moral Tales, Darwin's Botanic Garden, +Rollin's Ancient History, and a hideously illustrated copy of the +Book of Martyrs were in the First-class, Don Juan and some French +novels in the second. Tupper, Swinburne, and Walt Whitman he did +not know.</p> +<p>In the corner next the donjon chimney was a little room with a +small fireplace. Thus the hermit economized wood, for wood meant +time, and time meant communion with his books. All of his domestic +arrangements were carried on after this frugal fashion. In the +little room was a writing-desk, covered with manuscripts and +commonplace books.</p> +<p>"Well, my young friend, you're thrice welcome," said Andrew, who +never dropped his book language. "What will you have? Will you +resume your apprenticeship under Goethe, or shall we canter to +Canterbury with Chaucer? Grand old Dan Chaucer! Or, shall we study +magical philosophy with Roger Bacon--the Friar, the Admirable +Doctor? or read good Sir Thomas More? What would Sir Thomas have +said if he could have thought that he would be admired by two such +people as you and I, in the woods of America, in the nineteenth +century? But you do not want books! Ah! my brave friend, you are +not well. Come into my cell and let us talk. What grieves you?"</p> +<p>And Andrew took him by the hand with the courtesy of a knight, +with the tenderness of a woman, and with the air of an astrologer, +and led him into the apartment of a monk.</p> +<br> +<a name="045.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/045.jpg"><img src="images/045.jpg" +width="35%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE SEDILIUM AT THE CASTLE.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"See!" he said, "I have made a new chair. It is the highest +evidence of my love for my Teutonic friend. You have now a right to +this castle. You shall be perpetually welcome. I said to myself, +German scholarship shall sit there, and the Backwoods Philosopher +will sit here. So sit down on my <i>sedilium</i>, and let us hear +how this uncivil and inconstant world treats you. It can not deal +worse with you than it has with me. But I have had my revenge on +it! I have been revenged! I have done as I pleased, and defied the +world and all its hollow conventionalities." These last words were +spoken in a tone of misanthropic bitterness common to Andrew. His +love for August was the more intense that it stood upon a +background of general dislike, if not for the world, at least for +that portion of it which most immediately surrounded him.</p> +<p>August took the chair, ingeniously woven and built of rye straw +and hickory splints. He knew that all this formality and apparent +pedantry was superficial. He and Andrew were bosom friends, and as +he had often opened his heart to the master of the castle before, +so now he had no difficulty in telling him his troubles, scarcely +heeding the appropriate quotations which Andrew made from time to +time by way of embellishment.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI."></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2> +<h3>THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER.</h3> +<br> +<p>One reason for Andrew's love of August Wehle was that he was a +German. Far from sharing in the prejudices of his neighbors against +foreigners, Andrew had so thorough a contempt for his neighbors, +that he liked anybody who did not belong to his own people. If a +Turk had emigrated to Clark township, Andrew would have fallen in +love with him, and built a divan for his special accommodation. But +he loved August also for the sake of his gentle temper and his +genuine love for books. And only August or August's mother, upon +whom Andrew sometimes called, could exorcise his demon of +misanthropy, which he had nursed so long that it was now hard to +dismiss it.</p> +<p>Andrew Anderson belonged to a class noticed, I doubt not, by +every acute observer of provincial life in this country. In +backwoods and out-of-the-way communities literary culture produces +marked eccentricities in the life. Your bookish man at the West has +never learned to mark the distinction between the world of ideas +and the world of practical life. Instead of writing poems or +romances, he falls to living them, or at least trying to. Add a +disappointment in love, and you will surely throw him into the +class of which Anderson was the representative. For the education +one gets from books is sadly one-sided, unless it be balanced by a +knowledge of the world.</p> +<p>Andrew Anderson had always been regarded as an oddity. A man +with a good share of ideality and literary taste, placed against +the dull background of the society of a Western neighborhood in the +former half of the century, would necessarily appear odd. Had he +drifted into communities of more culture, his eccentricity, +begotten of a sense of superiority to his surroundings, would have +worn away. Had he been happily married, his oddities would have +been softened; but neither of these things happened. He told August +a very different history. For the confidence of his "Teutonic +friend" had awakened in the solitary man a desire to uncover that +story which he had kept under lock and key for so many years.</p> +<p>"Ah! my friend," said he with excitement, "don't trust the faith +of a woman." And then rising from his seat he said, "The Backwoods +Philosopher warns you. I pray you give good heed. I do not know +Julia. She is my niece. It ill becomes me to doubt her sincerity. +But I know whose daughter she is. I pray you give good heed, my +Teutonic friend. <i>I know whose daughter she is</i>!</p> +<p>"I do not talk much. But you have arrived at a critical point--a +point of turning. Out of his own life, out of his own sorrow, the +Backwoods Philosopher warns you. I am at peace now. But look at me. +Do you not see the marks of the ravages of a great storm? A sort of +a qualified happiness I have in philosophy. But what I might have +been if the storm had not torn me to pieces in my youth--what I +might have been, that I am not. I pray you never trust in a woman's +keeping the happiness of your life!"</p> +<br> +<a name="049.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/049.jpg"><img src="images/049.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"LOOK AT ME."</b></p> +<br> +<p>Here Andrew slipped his arm through Wehle's, and began to +promenade with him in the large apartment up and down an alley, +dimly lighted by a candle, between solid phalanxes of books.</p> +<p>"I pray you give good heed," he said, resuming. "I was always +eccentric. People thought I was either a genius or fool. Perhaps I +was much of both. But this is a digression. I did not pay any +attention to women. I shunned them. I said that to be a great +author and a philosophical thinker, one must not be a man of +society. I never went to a wood-chopping, to an apple-peeling, to a +corn-shucking, to a barn-raising, nor indeed to any of our rustic +feasts. I suppose this piqued the vanity of the girls, and they set +themselves to catch me. I suppose they thought that I would be a +trophy worth boasting. I have noticed that hunters estimate game +according to the difficulty of getting it. But this is a +digression. Let us return.</p> +<p>"There came among us, at that time, Abigail Norman. She was +pretty. I swear by all the sacred cats of Egypt, that she was +beautiful. She was industrious. The best housekeeper in the state! +She was high-strung. I liked her all the more for that. You see a +man of imagination is apt to fall in love with a tragedy queen. But +this is a digression. Let us return.</p> +<p>"She spread her toils in my path. While I was wandering through +the woods writing poetry to birds and squirrels, Abby Norman was +ambitious enough to hope to make me her slave, and she did. She +read books that she thought I liked. She planned in various ways to +seem to like what I liked, and yet she had sense enough to differ a +little from me, and so make herself the more interesting. I think a +man of real intellect never likes to have a man or woman agree with +him entirely. But let us return.</p> +<p>"I loved Abigail desperately. No, I did not love Abigail Norman +at all. I did not love her as she was, but I loved her as she +seemed to my imagination to be. I think most lovers love an ideal +that hovers in the air a little above the real recipient of their +love. And I think we men of genius and imagination are apt to love +something very different from the real person, which is +unfortunate.</p> +<p>"But I am digressing again. To return: I wrote poetry to Abby. I +courted her. I cut off my long hair for a woman, like Samson. I +tried to dress more decently, and made myself ridiculous no doubt, +for a man can not dress well unless he has a talent for it. And I +never had a genius for beau-knots.</p> +<p>"But pardon the digression. Let us return. I was to have married +her. The day was set. Then I found accidentally that she was +engaged to my brother Samuel, a young man with better manners than +mind. She made him believe that she was only making a butt of me. +But I think she really loved me more than she knew. When I had +discovered her treachery, I shipped on the first flat-boat. I came +near committing suicide, and should have jumped into the river one +night, only that I thought it might flatter her vanity. I came back +here and ignored her. She broke with Samuel and tried to regain my +affections. I scorned her. I trod on her heart! I stamped her pride +into the dust! I was cruel. I was contemptuous. I was well-nigh +insane. Then she went back to Samuel, and <i>made</i> him marry +her. Then she forced my imbecile old father, on his death-bed, to +will all the property to Samuel, except this piece of rough +hill-land and one thousand dollars. But here I built this castle. +My thousand dollars I put in books. I learned how, to weave the +coverlets of which our country people are so fond, and by this +means, and by selling wood to the steamboats, I have made a living +and bought my library without having to work half of my time. I was +determined never to leave. I swore by all the arms of Vishnu she +should never say that she had driven me away. I don't know anything +about Julia. But I know whose daughter she is. My young friend, +beware! I pray you take good heed! The Backwoods Philosopher warns +you!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII."></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2> +<h3>WITHIN AND WITHOUT.</h3> +<br> +<p>If the gentleman is not born in a man, it can not be bred in +him. If it is born in him, it can not be bred out of him. August +Wehle had inherited from his mother the instinct of true +gentlemanliness. And now, when Andrew relapsed into silence and +abstraction, he did not attempt to rouse him, but bidding him +goodnight, with his own hands threw the rope-ladder out the window +and started up the hollow toward home. The air was sultry and +oppressive, the moon had been engulfed, and the first thunder-cloud +of the spring was pushing itself up toward the zenith, while the +boughs of the trees were quivering with a premonitory shudder. But +August did not hasten. The real storm was within. Andrew's story +had raised doubts. When he went down the ravine the love of Julia +Anderson shone upon his heart as benignly as the moon upon the +waters. Now the light was gone, and the black cloud of a doubt had +shut out his peace. Jule Anderson's father was rich. He had not +thought of it before! But now he remembered how much woodland he +owned and how he had two large farms. Jule Anderson would not marry +a poor boy. And a Dutchman! She was not sincere. She was trifling +with him and teasing her parents. Or, if she were sincere now, she +would not be faithful to him against every tempting offer. And he +would have to drive on the rocks, too, as Andrew had. At any rate, +he would not marry her until he stood upon some sort of equality +with her.</p> +<p>The wind was swaying him about in its fitful gusts, and he +rather liked it. In his anguish of spirit it was a pleasure to +contend with the storm. The wind, the lightning, the sudden sharp +claps of thunder were on his own key. He felt in the temper of old +Lear. The winds might blow and crack their cheeks.</p> +<p>But it was not alone the suggestions of Andrew that aroused his +suspicions. He now recalled a strange statement that Samuel +Anderson made in discharging him. "You said what you had no right +to say about my wife, in talking to Julia." What had he said? Only +that some woman had not treated Andrew "just right." Who the woman +might be he had not known until his present interview with Andrew. +Had Julia been making mischief herself by repeating his words and +giving them a direction he had not intended? He could not have +dreamed of her acting such a part but for the strange influence of +Andrew's strange story. And so he staggered on, wet to the skin, +defying in his heart the lightning and the wind, until he came to +the cabin of his father. Climbing the fence, for there was no gate, +he pulled the latch-string and entered. They were all asleep; the +hard-working family went to bed early. But chubby-faced Wilhelmina, +the favorite sister, had set up to wait for August, and he now +found her fast asleep in the chair.</p> +<p>"Wilhelmina! wake up!" he said.</p> +<p>"O August!" she said, opening the corner of one eye and yawning, +"I wasn't asleep. I only--uh--shut my eyes a minute. How wet you +are! Did you go to see the pretty girl up at Mr. Anderson's?"</p> +<p>"No," said August.</p> +<p>"O August! she is pretty, and she is good and sweet," and +Wilhelmina took his wet checks between her chubby hands and gave +him a sleepy kiss, and then crept off to bed.</p> +<p>And, somehow, the faith of the child Wilhelmina counteracted the +skepticism of the and Andrew, and August felt the storm +subsiding.</p> +<p>When he looked out of the window of the loft in which he slept +the shower had ceased as suddenly as it had come, the thunder had +retreated behind the hills, the clouds were already breaking, and +the white face of the moon was peering through the ragged +rifts.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII."></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2> +<h3>FIGGERS WON'T LIE</h3> +<br> +<p>"Figgers won't lie," said Elder Hankins, the Millerite preacher. +"I say figgers won't lie. When a Methodis' talks about fallin' from +grace he has to argy the pint. And argyments can't be depended +'pon. And when a Prisbyterian talks about parseverance he haint got +the absolute sartainty on his side. But figgers won't lie noways, +and it's figgers that shows this yer to be the last yer of the +world, and that the final eend of all things is approachin'. I +don't ask you to listen to no 'mpressions of me own, to no +reasonin' of nobody; all I ask is that you should listen to the +voice of the man in the linen-coat what spoke to Dan'el, and then +listen to the voice of the 'rithmetic, and to a sum in simple +addition, the simplest sort of addition."</p> +<p>All the Millerite preachers of that day were not quite so +illiterate as Elder Hankins, and it is but fair to say that the +Adventists of to-day are a very respectable denomination, doing a +work which deserves more recognition from others than it receives. +And for the delusion which expects the world to come to an end +immediately, the Adventist leaders are not responsible in the first +place. From Gnosticism to Mormonism, every religious delusion has +grown from some fundamental error in the previous religious +teaching of the people. By the narrowly verbal method of reading +the Scripture, so much in vogue in the polemical discussions of the +past generation, and still so fervently adhered to by many people, +the ground was prepared for Millerism. And to-day in many regions +the soil in made fallow for the next fanaticism. It is only a +question of who shall first sow and reap. To people educated as +those who gathered in Sugar Grove school-house had been to destroy +the spirit of the Scripture by distorting the letter in proving +their own sect right, nothing could be so overwhelming as Elder +Hankins's "figgers."</p> +<p>For he had clearly studied figgers to the neglect of the other +branches of a liberal education. His demonstration was printed on a +large chart. He began with the seventy weeks of Daniel, he added in +the "time and times and a half," and what Daniel declared that he +"understood not when he heard," was plain sailing to the +enlightened and mathematical mind of Elder Hankins. When he came to +the thousand two hundred and ninety days, he waxed more exultant +than Kepler in his supreme moment, and on the thousand three +hundred and five and thirty days he did what Jonas Harrison called +"the blamedest tallest cipherin' he'd ever seed in all his born +days."</p> +<p>Jonas was the new hired man, who had stopped into the shoes of +August at Samuel Anderson's. He sat by August and kept up a running +commentary, in a loud whisper, on the sermon, "My feller-citizen," +said Jonas, squeezing August's arm at a climax of the elder's +discourse, "My feller-citizen, looky thar, won't you? He'll cipher +the world into nothin' in no time. He's like the feller that tried +to find out the valoo of a fat shoat when wood was two dollars a +cord. 'Ef I can't do it by substraction I'll do it by +long-division,' says he. And ef this 'rithmetic preacher can't make +a finishment of this sub<i>lu</i>nary speer by addition, he'll do +it by multiplyin'. They's only one answer in his book. Gin him any +sum you please, and it all comes out 1843!"</p> +<p>Now in all the region round about Sugar Grove school-house there +was a great dearth of sensation. The people liked the prospect of +the end of the world because it would be a spectacle, something to +relieve the fearful monotony of their lives. Funerals and weddings +were commonplace, and nothing could have been so interesting to +them as the coming of the end of the world, as described by Elder +Hankins, unless it had been a first-class circus (with two camels +and a cage of monkeys attached, so that scrupulous people might +attend from a laudable desire to see the menagerie!) A murder would +have been delightful to the people of Clark township. It would have +given them something to think and talk about. Into this still pool +Elder Hankins threw the vials, the trumpets, the thunders, the +beast with ten horns, the he-goat, and all the other apocalyptic +symbols understood in an absurdly literal way. The world was to +come to an end in the following August. Here was an excitement, +something worth living for.</p> +<p>All the way to their homes the people disputed learnedly about +the "time and times and a half," about "the seven heads and ten +horns," and the seventh vial. The fierce polemical discussions and +the bold sectarian dogmatism of the day had taught them anything +but "the modesty of true science," and now the unsolvable problems +of the centuries were taken out of the hands of puzzled scholars +and settled as summarily and positively as the relative merits of +"gourd-seed" and "flint" corn. Samuel Anderson had always planted +his corn in the "light" of the moon and his potatoes in the "dark" +of that orb, had always killed his hogs when the moon was on the +increase lest the meat should all go to gravy, and he and his wife +had carefully guarded against the carrying of a hoe through the +house, for fear "somebody might die." Now, the preaching of the +elder impressed him powerfully. His life had always been not so +much a bad one as a cowardly one, and to get into heaven by a six +months' repentance, seemed to him a good transaction. Besides he +remembered that there men were never married, and that there, at +last, Abigail would no longer have any peculiar right to torture +him. Hankins could not have ciphered him into Millerism if his wife +had not driven him into it as the easiest means of getting a +divorce. No doom in the next world could have alarmed him much, +unless it had been the prospect of continuing lord and master of +Mrs. Abigail. And as for that oppressed woman, she was simply +scared. She was quite unwilling to admit the coming of the world's +end so soon. Having some ugly accounts to settle, she would fain +have postponed the payday. Mrs. Anderson might truly have been +called a woman who feared God--she had reason to.</p> +<p>And as for August, he would not have cared much if the world had +come to an end, if only he could have secured one glance of +recognition from the eyes of Julia. But Julia dared not look. The +process of cowing her had gone on from childhood, and now she was +under a reign of terror. She did not yet know that she could resist +her mother. And then she lived in mortal fear of her mother's +heart-disease. By irritating her she might kill her. This dread of +matricide her mother held always over her. In vain she watched for +a chance. It did not come. Once, when her mother's head was turned, +she glanced at August. But he was at that moment listening or +trying to listen to one of Jonas Harrison's remarks. And August, +who did not understand the circumstances, was only able to account +for her apparent coldness on the theory suggested by Andrew's +universal unbelief in women, or by supposing that when she +understood his innocent remark about Andrew's disappointment to +refer to her mother, she had taken offense at it. And so, while the +rest were debating whether the world would come to an end or not, +August had a disconsolate feeling that the end of the world had +already come. And it did not make him feel better to have +Wilhelmina whisper, "Oh! but she <i>is</i> pretty, that Anderson +girl--a'n't she, August?"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX."></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2> +<h3>THE NEW SINGING-MASTER</h3> +<br> +<p>"He sings like an owlingale!"</p> +<p>Jonas Harrison was leaning against the well-curb, talking to +Cynthy Ann. He'd been down to the store at Brayville, he said, a +listenin' to 'em discuss Millerism, and seed a new singing-master +there. "Could he sing good?" Cynthy asked, rather to prolong the +talk than to get information.</p> +<p>"Sings like an owlingale, I reckon. He's got more seals to his +ministry a-hanging onto his watch-chain than I ever seed. Got a +mustache onto the top story of his mouth, somethin' like a tuft of +grass on the roof of a ole shed kitchen. Peart? He's the +peartest-lookin' chap I ever seed. But he a'n't no +singin'-master--not of I'm any jedge of turnips. He warn't born to +sarve his day and generation with a tunin'-fork. I think he's +a-goin' to reckon-water a little in these parts and that he's only +a-playin' singin'-master. He kin play more fiddles'n one, you bet a +hoss! Says he come up here fer his wholesome, and I guess he did. +Think ef he'd a-staid where he was, he mout a-suffered a leetle +from confinement to his room, and that room p'raps not more nor +five foot by nine, and ruther dim-lighted and poor-provisioned, an' +not much chance fer takin' exercise in the fresh air!"</p> +<br> +<a name="064.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/064.jpg"><img src="images/064.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"DON'T BE ONCHARITABLE, JONAS."</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas, don't. We're all mis'able +sinners, I s'pose; and you know charity don't think no evil. The +man may be all right, ef he does wear hair on his lip. Charity +kivers lots a sins."</p> +<p>"Ya-as, but charity don't kiver no wolves with wool. An' ef he +a'n't a woolly wolf they's no snakes in Jarsey, as little Ridin' +Hood said when her granny tried to bite her head off. I'm dead sot +in favor of charity, and mean to gin her my vote at every election, +but I a'n't a-goin' to have her put a blind-bridle on to me. And +when a man comes to Clark township a-wearing straps to his +breechaloons to keep hisself from leaving terry-firmy altogether, +and a weightin' hisself down with pewter watch-seals, gold-washed, +and a cultivating a crap of red-top hay onto his upper lip, and +a-lettin' on to be a singin'-master, I suspicions him. They's too +much in the git-up fer the come-out. Well, here's yer health, +Cynthy!"</p> +<p>And having made this oracular speech and quaffed the hard +limestone water, Jonas hung the clean white gourd from which he had +been drinking, in its place against the well-curb, and started back +to the field, while Cynthy Ann carried her bucket of water into the +kitchen, blaming herself for standing so long talking to Jonas. To +Cynthy everything pleasant had a flavor of sinfulness.</p> +<p>The pail of water was hardly set down in the sink when there +came a knock at the door, and Cynthy found standing by it the +strapped pantaloons, the "red-top" mustache, the watch-seals, and +all the rest that went to make up the new singing-master. He smiled +when he saw her, one of those smiles which are strictly limited to +the lower half of the face, and are wholly mechanical, as though +certain strings inside were pulled with malice aforethought and the +mouth jerked out into a square grin, such as an ingeniously-made +automaton might display.</p> +<p>"Is Mr. Anderson in?"</p> +<p>"No, sir; he's gone to town."</p> +<p>"Is Mrs. Anderson in?"</p> +<p>And so he entered, and soon got into conversation with the lady +of the house, and despite the prejudice which she entertained for +mustaches, she soon came to like him. He smiled so artistically. He +talked so fluently. He humored all her whims, pitied all her +complaints, and staid to dinner, eating her best preserves with a +graciousness that made Mrs. Anderson feel how great was his +condescension. For Mr. Humphreys, the singing-master, had looked at +the comely face of Julia, and looked over Julia's shoulders at the +broad acres beyond; and he thought that in Clark township he had +not met with so fine a landscape, so nice a figure-piece. And with +the quick eye of a man of the world, he had measured Mrs. Anderson, +and calculated on the ease with which he might complete the picture +to suit his taste.</p> +<p>He staid to supper. He smiled that same fascinating square smile +on Samuel Anderson, treated him as head of the house, talked glibly +of farming, and listened better than he talked. He gave no account +of himself, except by way of allusion. He would begin a sentence +thus, "When I was traveling in France with my poor dear mother," +etc., from which Mrs. Anderson gathered that he had been a devoted +son, and then he would relate how he had seen something curious +"when he was dining at the house of the American minister at +Berlin." "This hazy air reminds me of my native mountains in +Northern New York." And then he would allude to his study of music +in the Conservatory in Leipsic. To plain country people in an +out-of-the-way Western neighborhood, in 1843, such a man was better +than a lyceum full of lectures. He brought them the odor of foreign +travel, the flavor of city, the "otherness" that everybody +craves.</p> +<br> +<a name="067.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/067.jpg"><img src="images/067.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE HAWK.</b></p> +<br> +<p>He staid to dinner, as I have said, and to supper. He staid over +night. He took up his board at the house of Samuel Anderson. Who +could resist his entreaty? Did he not assure them that he felt the +need of a home in a cultivated family? And was it not the one +golden opportunity to have the daughter of the house taught music +by a private master, and thus give a special <i>eclat</i> to her +education? How Mrs. Anderson hoped that this superior advantage +would provoke jealous remarks on the part of her neighbors! It was +only necessary to the completion of her triumph that they should +say she was "stuck up." Then, too, to have so brilliant a beau for +Julia! A beau with watch-seals and a mustache, a beau who had been +to Paris with his mother, studied music in the Conservatory at +Leipsic, dined with the American minister in Berlin, and done ever +so many more wonderful things, was a prospect to delight the +ambitious heart of Mrs. Anderson, especially as he flattered the +mother instead of the daughter.</p> +<p>"He's a independent citizen of this Federal Union," said Jonas +to Cynthy, "carries his head like he was intimately 'quainted with +the 'merican eagle hisself. He's playin' this game sharp. He deals +all the trumps to hisself, and most everything besides. He'll carry +off the gal if something don't arrest him in his headlong career. +Jist let me git a chance at him when he's soarin' loftiest into the +amber blue above, and I'll cut his kite-string for him, and let him +fall like fork-ed lightnin' into a mud-puddle."</p> +<p>Cynthy said she did see one great sin that he had committed for +sure. That was the puttin' on of gold and costly apparel. It was +sot down in the Bible and in the Methodist Discipline that it was a +sin to wear gold, and she should think the poor man hadn't no sort +o' regard for his soul, weighing it down with them things.</p> +<p>But Jonas only remarked that he guessed his jewelry warn't no +sin. He didn't remember nothing agin wearin' pewter.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X."></a>CHAPTER X.</h2> +<h3>AN OFFER OF HELP.</h3> +<br> +<p>The singing-master, Mr. Humphreys, went to singing-school and +church with Julia in a matter-of-course way, treating her with +attention, but taking care not to make himself too attentive. +Except that Julia could not endure his smile--which was, like some +joint stock companies, strictly limited--she liked him well enough. +It was something to her, in her monotonous life under the eye of +her mother, who almost never left her alone, and who cut off all +chance for communication with August--it was something to have the +unobtrusive attentions of Mr. Humphreys, who always interested her +with his adventures. For indeed it really seemed that he had had +more adventures than any dozen other men. How should a +simple-hearted girl understand him? How should she read the riddle +of a life so full of duplicity--of <i>multiplicity</i>--as the life +of Joshua Humphreys, the music-teacher? Humphreys intended to make +love to her, but during the first two weeks he only aimed to gain +her esteem. He felt that there was a clue which he had not got. But +at last the key dropped into his hands, and he felt sure that the +unsophisticated girl was in his power.</p> +<p>Among the girls that attended Humphreys's singing-school was +Betsey Malcolm, the near neighbor of the Andersons. The +singing-master often saw her at Mr. Anderson's, and he often wished +that Julia were as easy to win as he felt Betsey to be. The +sensuous mouth, the giddy eyes of Betsey, showed quickly her +appreciation of every flattering attention he paid her, and though +in Julia's presence he was careful how he treated her, yet when he, +walking down the road one day, alone, met her, he courted her +assiduously. He had not to observe any caution in her case. She +greedily absorbed all the flattery he could give, only pettishly +responding after a while: "O dear! that's the way you talk to me, +and that's the way you talk to Jule sometimes, I s'pose. I guess +she don't mind keeping two of you as strings to her bow."</p> +<p>"Two! What do you mean, my fair friend? I havn't seen one, +yet."</p> +<p>"Oh, no! You mean you haven't seen two. You see one whenever you +look in the glass. The other is a Dutchman, and she's dying after +him. She may flirt with you, but her mother watches her night and +day, to keep her from running off with Gus Wehle."</p> +<p>Like many another crafty person, Betsey Malcolm had fairly +overshot the mark. In seeking to separate Humphreys from Julia, she +had given him the clue he desired, and he was not slow to use it, +for he was almost the only person that Mrs. Anderson trusted alone +with Julia.</p> +<p>In the dusk of the evening of the very day of his talk with +Betsey, he sat on the long front-porch with Julia. Julia liked him +better, or rather did not dislike him so much in the dark as she +did in the light. For when it was light she could see him smile, +and though she had not learned to connect a cold-blooded face with +a villainous character, she had that childish instinct which made +her shrink from Humphreys's square smile. It always seemed to her +that the real Humphreys gazed at her out of the cold, glittering +eyes, and that the smile was something with which he had nothing to +do.</p> +<p>Sitting thus in the dusk of the evening, and looking out over +the green pasture to where the nigher hills ceased and the distant +seemed to come immediately after, their distance only indicated by +color, though the whole Ohio "bottom" was between, she forgot the +Mephistopheles who sat not far away, and dreamed of August, the +"grand," as she fancifully called him. And he let her sit and dream +undisturbed for a long time, until the darkness settled down upon +the hills. Then he spoke.</p> +<p>"I--I thought," began Humphreys, with well-feigned hesitancy, "I +thought, I should venture to offer you my assistance as a true and +gallant man, in a matter--a matter of supreme delicacy--a matter +that I have no right to meddle with. I think I have heard that your +mother is not friendly to the suit of a young man who--who--well, +let us say who is not wholly disagreeable to you. I beg your +pardon, don't tell me anything that you prefer to keep locked in +the privacy of your own bosom. But if I can render any assistance, +you know. I have some little influence with your parents, maybe. If +I could be the happy bearer of any communications, command me as +your obedient servant."</p> +<p>Julia did not know what to say. To get a word to August was what +she most desired. But the thought of using Humphreys was repulsive +to her. She could not see his face in the gathering darkness, but +she could <i>feel</i> him smile that same soulless, geometrical +smile. She could not do it. She did not know what to say. So she +said nothing. Humphreys saw that he must begin farther back.</p> +<p>"I hear the young man spoken of as a praiseworthy person. +German, I believe? I have always noticed a peculiar manliness about +Germans. A peculiar refinement, indeed, and a courtesy that is +often wanting in Americans. I noticed this when I was in Leipsic. I +don't think the German girls are quite so refined. German gentlemen +in this country seem to prefer American girls oftentimes."</p> +<p>All this might have sounded hollow enough to a disinterested +listener. To Julia the words were as sweet as the first rain after +a tedious drouth. She had heard complaint, censure, innuendo, and +downright abuse of poor Gus. These were the first generous words. +They confirmed her judgment, they comforted her heart, they made +her feel grateful, even affectionate toward the fop, in spite of +his watch-seals, his curled mustache, his straps, his cold eyes, +and his artificial smile. Poor fool you will call her, and poor +fool she was. For she could have thrown herself at the feet of +Humphreys, and thanked him for his words. Thank him she did in a +stammering way, and he did not hesitate to repeat his favorable +impressions of Germans, after that. What he wanted was, not to +break the hold of August until he had placed himself in a position +to be next heir to her regard.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI."></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2> +<h3>THE COON-DOG ARGUMENT.</h3> +<br> +<p>The reader must understand that all this time Elder Hankins +continued to bombard Clark township with the thunders and +lightnings of the Apocalypse, continued to whirl before the dazed +imaginations of his rustic hearers the wheels within wheels and the +faces of the living creatures of 'Zek'el, continued to cipher the +world out of existence according to formulas in Dan'el, marched out +the he-goat, made the seven heads and ten horns of the beast do +service over and over again. And all the sweet mysteries of +Oriental imagery, the mystic figures which unexpounded give so +noble a depth to the perspective of Scripture, were cut to pieces, +pulled apart, and explained, as though they were tricks of +legerdemain. Julia was powerfully impressed, not by the +declamations of Hankins, for she had sensibility enough to recoil +from his vivisection of Scripture, though she had been all her life +accustomed to hear it from other than Millerites, but she was +profoundly affected by the excitement about her. Her father, +attracted in part by the promise that there should be no marrying +there, had embraced Millerism with all his heart, and was in such a +state of excitement that he could not attend to his business. Mrs. +Anderson was in continual trepidation about it, though she tried +not to believe it. She was on the point of rebelling and declaring +that the world <i>should</i> not come to an end. But on the whole +she felt that the government of the universe was one affair in +which she would have to give up all hope of having her own way. +Meantime there was no increase of religion. Some were frightened +out of their vices for a time, but a passionate terror of that sort +is the worst enemy of true piety.</p> +<p>"Fer my part," said Cynthy Ann, as she walked home with Jonas, +"fer my part, I don't believe none of his nonsense. John Wesley" +(Jonas was a New-Light, and Cynthy always talked to him about +Wesley) "knowed a heap more about Scripter than all the Hankinses +and Millerses that ever was born, and he knowed how to cipher, too, +I 'low. Why didn't he say the world was goin' to wind up? An' our +persidin' elder is a heap better instructed than Hankins, and he +says God don't tell nobody when the world's goin' to wind up."</p> +<p>"Goin' to run down, you mean, Cynthy Ann. 'Kordin' to Hankins +it's a old clock gin out in the springs, I 'low. How does Hankins +know that 'Zek'el's livin' creeters means one thing more'n another? +He talks about them wheels as nateral as ef he was a wagon-maker +fixin' a ole buggy. He says the thing's a gone tater; no more craps +of corn offen the bottom land, no more electin' presidents of this +free and glorious Columby, no more Fourths, no more shootin' +crackers nor spangled banners, no more nothin'. He ciphers and +ciphers, and then spits on his slate and wipes us all out. Whenever +Gabr'el blows I'll b'lieve it, but I won't take none o' Hankins's +tootin' in place of it. I shan't git skeered at no tin-horns, and +as for papaw whistles, why, I say Jericho wouldn't a-tumbled for no +sech music, and they won't fetch down no stars that air way."</p> +<p>Here old Gottlieb Wehle, who had just joined the Millerites, +came up. "Yonas, you mags shport of de Piple. Ef dem vaces in der +veels, and dem awvool veels in der veels, and dem figures vot +always says aideen huntert vordy dree, ef dem tond mean sompin +awvool, vot does dey mean? Hey?"</p> +<p>"My venerated friend and feller-citizen of forren birth," said +Jonas, "you hit the nail on the crown of the head squar, with the +biggest sort ov a sledge-hammer. You gripped a-holt of the truth +that air time like the American bird a-grippin' the arries on the +shield. What do they mean? That's jest the question, and you +Millerites allers argies like the man who warranted his dog to be a +good coon-dog, bekase he warn't good fer nothin' else under the +amber blue. Now, my time-honored friend and beloved German voter, +jest let me tell you that <i>on the coon-dog principle</i> you +could a-wound up the trade and traffic of this airth any time. Fer +ef they don't mean 1843, what do they mean? Why, 1842 or 1844, of +course. You don't come no coon-dog argyments over me, not while I +remain sound in wind and limb."</p> +<p>"Goon-tog! Who zed goon-tog? Ich tidn't, Hankins tidn't, +Ze'kel's wision tidn't zay nodin pout no goon-tog. What's goon-togs +cot do too mit de end of de vorld? Yonas, you pe a vool, +maype."</p> +<p>"The same to yerself, my beloved friend and free and enlightened +feller-citizen. Long may you wave, like a green bay boss, and a +jimson-weed on the sunny side of a board-fence!"</p> +<p>Gottlieb hurried on, finding Jonas much harder to understand +than the prophecies.</p> +<p>"I hear the singing-master is goin' to jine," said Cynthy Ann. +"Wonder ef they'll take him with all his seals and straps, and hair +on his upper lip, with the plain words of the Bible agin gold and +costly apparel? Wonder ef he's tuck in, too?"</p> +<p>"Tuck in? He an't one of that kind. He don't never git tuck +in--he tucks in. He knows which side of his bread's got quince +preserves onto it. I used to run second mate on the Dook of +Orleans, and I know his kind. He'll soar around like a +turkey-buzzard fer a while. Presently he'll 'light. He's +rusticatin' tell some scrape blows over. An' he'll make somethin' +outen it. Business afore pleasure is his motto. He don't hang that +seducin' grin under them hawky eyes fer nothin'. Wait till the +pious and disinterested example 'lights somewheres. Then look out +for the feathers, won't ye! He won't leave nary bone. But here we +air. I declare, Cynthy, this walk seems <i>the shortest</i>, when +I'm in superfine, number-one comp'ny!"</p> +<p>Cynthy was so pleased with this remark, that she did penance in +her mind for a week afterwards. It was so wicked to enjoy one's +self out of class-meeting!</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII."></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2> +<h3>TWO MISTAKES.</h3> +<br> +<p>At the singing-school and at the church August waited as +impatiently as possible for some sign of recognition from Julia. He +little knew the fear that beset her. Having seen her hysterical +mother prostrated for weeks by the excitement of a dispute with her +father, it seemed to her that if she turned one look of love and +longing toward young Wehle, whose sweet German voice rang out above +the rest in the hymns, she might kill her mother as quickly as by +plunging a knife into her heart. The steam-doctor, who was the +family physician, had warned her and her father separately of the +danger of exciting Mrs. Anderson's most excitable temper, and now +Julia was the slave of her mother's disease. That lucky hysteria, +which the steam-doctor thought a fearful heart-disease, had given +Mrs. Abigail the whip-hand of husband and daughter, and she was not +slow to know her advantage, using her heart in a most heartless +way.</p> +<p>August could not blame Julia for not writing, for he had tried +to break the blockade by a letter sent through Jonas and Cynthy +Ann, but the latter had found herself so well watched that the note +oppressed her conscience and gave a hangdog look to her face for +two weeks before she got it out of her pocket, and then she put it +under the pillow of Julia's bed, and had reason to believe that the +suspicious Mrs. Anderson confiscated it within five minutes. For +the severity of maternal government was visibly increased +thereafter, and Julia received many reminders of her ingratitude +and of her determination to kill her self-sacrificing mother by her +stubbornness.</p> +<p>"Well," Mrs. Anderson would say, "it's all one to me whether the +world comes to an end or not. I should like to live to see the day +of judgment. But I shan't. No affectionate mother can stand such +treatment as I receive from my own daughter. If Norman was only at +home!"</p> +<p>It is proper to explain here that Norman was her son, in whom +she took a great deal of comfort when he was away, and whom she +would have utterly spoiled by indulgence if he had not been born +past spoiling. He was the only person to whom she was indulgent, +and she was indulgent to him chiefly because he was so weak of will +that there was not much glory in conquering him, and because her +indulgence to him was a rod of affliction to the rest of her +family.</p> +<p>Failing to open communication through Jonas and Cynthy Ann, +August found himself in a desperate strait, and with an impatience +common to young men he unhappily had recourse to Betsey Malcolm. +She often visited Julia, and twice, when Julia was not at meeting, +he went home with the ingenuous Betsey, who always pretended to +have something to tell him "about Jule," and who yet, for the pure +love of mischief-making, tried to make him think as poorly as +possible of Julia's sincerity, and who, from pure love of +flirtation, puckered her red lips, and flashed at him with her +sensuous eyes, and sighed and blushed, or rather flushed, while she +sympathized with him in a way that might have been perilous if he +had been an American instead of a constant-hearted "Dutchman," +wholly absorbed with the image of Julia. But, so far as carrying +messages was concerned, Betsey was certainly a non-conductor. She +professed never to be able to run the blockade with any +communication of his. She said to herself that she wasn't going to +help Jule Anderson to keep <i>all</i> the beaus. She meant to +capture one or the other of them if she could. And, indeed, she did +not dream how grievous was the wrong she did. For she could +appreciate no other feeling in the matter than vanity, and she +could not see any particular harm in "taking Jule Anderson down a +peg." And so she assured the anxious and already suspicious August +that if she was in his place she should want that singing-master +out of the way. "Some girls can't stand people that wear jewelry +and mustaches and straps and such things. And Mr. Humphreys is very +careful of her, won't let her sit too late on the porch, and is +very comforting in his way of talking to her. And she seems to like +it. I tell you what it is, Gus "--and she looked at him so +bewitchingly that the pure and sensitive August blushed, he could +hardly tell why--"I tell you Jule's a nice girl, and got a nice +property back of her, and I hope she won't act like her mother. +And, indeed, I can't hardly believe she will, though the way she +eyes that Humphreys makes me mad." She had suggested the old doubt. +A doubt is dangerous when its face grows familiar, and one +recognizes the "Monsieur Tonson come again."</p> +<p>And all the message the disinterested and benevolent Betsey bore +to Julia was to tell her exultingly that Gus had twice walked home +with her. And they had had such a nice time! And Julia, girl that +she was, declared indignantly that she didn't care whom he went +with; though she did care, and her eyes and face said so. Thus the +tongue sometimes lies--or seems to lie--when the whole person is +telling the truth. The only excuse for the tongue is that it will +not be believed, and it knows that it will not be believed! It only +speaks diplomatically, maybe. But diplomatic talking is bad. Better +the truth. If Jule had known that her words would be reported to +August, she would have bitten out her tongue rather than to have +let it utter words that were only the cry of her wounded pride. Of +course Betsey met August in the road the next morning, in a quiet +hollow by the brook, and told him, sympathizingly, almost +affectionately, that she had begun to talk to Julia about him, and +that Jule had said she didn't care. So while Julia uttered a lie +she spoke the truth, and while. Betsey uttered the truth she spoke +a lie, willful, malicious, and wicked.</p> +<p>Now, in the mean time, Julia, on her side, had tried to open +communication through the only channel that offered itself. She did +not attempt it by means of Betsey, because, being a woman, she felt +instinctively that Betsey was not to be trusted. But there was only +one other to whom she was allowed to speak, except under a +supervision as complete as it was unacknowledged. That other was +Mr. Humphreys. He evinced a constant interest in her affairs, +avowing that he always did have a romantic desire to effect the +union of suitable people, even though it might pain his heart a +little to see another more fortunate than himself. Julia had given +up all hope of communicating by letter, and she could not bring +herself to make any confessions to a man who had such a smile and +such eyes, but to a generous proposition of Mr. Humphreys that he +should see August and open the way for any communication between +them, she consented, scarcely concealing her eagerness.</p> +<p>August was not in a mood to receive Humphreys kindly. He hated +him by intuition, and a liking for him had not been begotten by +Betsey's assurances that he was making headway with Julia. August +was riding astride a bag of corn on his way to mill, when +Humphreys, taking a walk, met him.</p> +<p>"A pleasant day, Mr. Wehle!"</p> +<p>"Yes," said August, with a courtesy as mechanical as Humphreys's +smile.</p> +<p>The singing-master was rather pleased than otherwise to see that +August disliked him. It suited his purpose, just now to gall Wehle +into saying what he would not otherwise have said.</p> +<p>"I hear you are in trouble," he proceeded.</p> +<p>"How so?"</p> +<p>"Oh! I hear that Mrs. Anderson doesn't like Dutchmen." The smile +now seemed to have something of a sneer in it.</p> +<p>"I don't know that that is your affair," said August, all his +suspicions, by a sort of "resolution of force," changing into +anger.</p> +<p>"Oh! I beg pardon," with a tone half-mocking. "I did not know +but I might help settle matters. I think I have Mrs. Anderson's +confidence; and I know that I have Miss Anderson's confidence in an +unusual degree. I think a great deal of her. And she thinks me +<i>her friend</i> at least. I thought that there might be some +little matters yet unsettled between you two, and she suggested +that maybe there might be something you would like to say, and that +if you would say it to me, it would be all the same as if it were +said to her. She considers that in the relation I bear to her and +the family, a message delivered to me is the same in effect as if +given to her. I told her I did not think you would, as a gentleman, +wish to hold her to any promises that might be irksome to her +now."</p> +<p>These words were spoken with a coolness and maliciousness of +good-nature quite devilish, and August's fist involuntarily doubled +itself to strike him, if only to make him cease smiling in that +villainous rectangular way. But he checked himself.</p> +<p>"You are a puppy. Tell <i>that</i> to Jule, if you choose. I +shall send her a release from all obligations, but not by the hand +of a rascal!"</p> +<p>Like all desperadoes, Humphreys was a coward. He could shoot, +but he could not fight, and just now he was affecting the pious or +at least the high moral role, and had left his pistols, +brandy-flasks, and the other necessary appurtenances of a +gentleman, locked in his trunk. Besides it would not at all have +suited his purpose to shoot. So in lieu of shooting he only smiled, +as August rode off, that same old geometric smile, the elements of +which were all calculated. He seemed incapable of any other facial +contortion. It expressed one emotion, indeed, about as well as +another, and was therefore as convenient as those pocket-knives +which affect to contain a chest of tools in one.</p> +<br> +<a name="085.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/085.jpg"><img src="images/085.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"TELL THAT TO JULE."</b></p> +<br> +<p>Julia was already stung to jealousy by Betsey Malcolm's +mischief-making, and it did not require much more to put her into a +frenzy. As they walked home from meeting the next night--they had +meeting all nights now, the world would soon end and there was so +much to be done--as they walked home Humphreys contrived to +separate Julia from the rest, and to tell her that he had had a +conversation with young Wehle.</p> +<p>"It was painful, very painful," he said, "I think I had better +not say any more about it."</p> +<p>"Why?" asked Julia in terror.</p> +<p>"Well, I feel that your grief is mine. I have never felt so much +interest in any one before, and I must say that I was grievously +disappointed. This young man is not at all worthy of you."</p> +<p>"What do you mean?" And there was a trace of indignation in her +tone.</p> +<p>"It does seem to me that the man who has your love should be the +happiest in the world; but he refused to send you any message, and +says that he will soon send you an entire release from all +engagement to him. He showed no tenderness and made no +inquiry."</p> +<p>The weakest woman and the strongest can faint. It is a woman's +last resort. When all else is gone, that remains. Julia drew a +sharp quick breath, and was just about to become unconscious. +Humphreys stretched his arms to catch her, but the sudden +recollection that in case she fainted he would carry her into the +house, produced a reaction. She released herself from his grasp, +and hurried in alone, locking her door, and refusing admittance to +her mother. From Humphreys, who had put himself into a delicate +minor key, Mrs. Anderson got such an account of the conversation as +he thought best to give. She then opened and read a note placed +into her hand by a neighbor as she came out from meeting. It was +addressed to Julia, and ran:</p> +<p>"If all they say is true, you have quickly changed. I do not +hold you by any promises you wish to break.</p> +<p>"AUGUST WEHLE."</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson had no pity. She hesitated not an instant. Julia's +door was fast. But she went out upon the front upper porch, and +pushing up the window of her daughter's room as remorselessly as +she had committed the burglary on her private letter, she looked at +her a moment, sobbing on the bed, and then threw the letter into +the room, saying: "It's good for you. Read that, and see what a +fellow your Dutchman is."</p> +<p>Then Mrs. Anderson sought her couch, and slept with a serene +sense, of having done <i>her</i> duty as a mother, whatever might +be the result.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII."></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h2> +<h3>THE SPIDER SPINS.</h3> +<br> +<p>Julia got up from her bed the moment that her mother had gone. +Her first feeling was that her privacy had been shamefully +outraged. A true mother should honorably respect the reserve of the +little child. But Julia was now a woman, grown, with a woman's +spirit. She rose from her bed, and shut her window with a bang that +was meant to be a protest. She then put the tenpenny nail sometimes +used to fasten the window down, in its place, as if to say, "Come +in, if you can." Then she pulled out the folds of the chintz +curtain, hanging on its draw-string half-way up the window. If +there had been any other precaution possible, she would have taken +it. But there was not.</p> +<p>She took up the note, and read it. Julia was not a girl of keen +penetration. Her training was that of a country life. She did not +read between the lines of August's note, and could only understand +that she was dismissed. Outraged by her mother's tyranny, spurned +by her lover, she stood like a hunted creature, brought to bay, +looking for the last desperate chance for escape.</p> +<p>Crushed? No. If she had been weaker, if she had been of the +quieter, frailer sort, instead of being, as she was, elastic, +impulsive, recuperative, she might have been crushed. She was +wounded in her heart of hearts, but all her pride and hardihood, of +which she had not a little, had now taken up arms against +outrageous fortune. She was stung at every thought of August and +his letter, of Betsey Malcolm and her victory, of the fact that her +mother had read the letter and knew of her humiliation. And she +paced the floor of her room, and resolved to resist and to be +revenged. She would marry anybody, that she might show Betsey and +August they had not broken he heart and that her love did not go +begging.</p> +<p>O Julia! take care. Many another woman has jumped off that +precipice!</p> +<p>And she would escape from her mother. The indications of +affection adroitly given by Humphreys were all remembered now. She +could have him, and she would. He would take her to Cincinnati. She +would have her revenge all around. I am sorry to show you my +heroine in this mood. But the fairest climes are sometimes subject +to the fiercest hurricanes, the frightfulest earthquakes!</p> +<p>After an hour the room seemed hot. She pulled back the chintz +curtain and pushed up the window. The blue-grass in the pasture +looked cool as it drank the heavy dews. She climbed through the +window on to the long, old-fashioned upper porch. She sat down upon +an old-fashioned settee with rockers, and began to rock. The motion +relieved her nervousness and fanned her hot cheeks. Yes, she would +accept the first respectable lover that offered. She would go to +the city with Humphreys, if he asked her. It is only fair to say +that Julia did not at all consider--she was not in a temper to +consider--what a marriage with Humphreys implied. She only thought +of it on two sides--the revenge upon August and Betsey, and the +escape from a thralldom now grown more bitter than death. True, her +conscience was beginning to awaken, and to take up arms against her +resolve. But nothing could be plainer. In marrying Mr. Humphreys +she should marry a friend, the only friend she had. In marrying him +she would satisfy her mother, and was it not her duty to sacrifice +something to her mother's happiness, perhaps her mother's life?</p> +<br> +<a name="091.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/091.jpg"><img src="images/091.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>TEMPTED.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Yes, yes, Julia, a false spirit of self-sacrifice is another +path over the cliff! In such a mood as this all paths lead into the +abyss.</p> +<p>Her mind was made up. She braced her will against all the +relentings of her heart. She wished that Humphreys, who had +indirectly declared his love so often, were there to offer at once. +She would accept him immediately, and then the whole neighborhood +should not say that she had been deserted by a Dutchman. For in her +anger she found her mother's epithets expressive.</p> +<p>He was there! Was it the devil that planned it? Does he plan all +those opportunities for wrong that are so sure to offer themselves? +Humphreys, having led a life that turned night into day, sat at the +farther end of the long upper porch, smoking his cigar, waiting a +bed-time nearer to the one to which he was accustomed.</p> +<p>Did he suspect the struggle in the heart of Julia Anderson? Did +he guess that her pride and defiance had by this time reached +high-water mark? Did he divine this from seeing her there? He rose +and started in through the door of the upper hall, the only opening +to the porch, except the window. But this was a feint. He turned +back and sat himself down upon the farther end of the settee from +Julia. He understood human nature perfectly, and had had long +practice in making gradual approaches. He begged her pardon for the +bungling manner in which he had communicated intelligence that must +be so terrible to a heart so sensitive! Julia was just going to +declare that she did not care anything for what August said or +thought, but her natural truthfulness checked the transparent +falsehood. She had not gone far enough astray to lie consciously; +she was, as yet, only telling lies to herself. Very gradually and +cautiously did he proceed so as not to "flush the bird." Even as I +saw, an hour ago, a cat creep upon a sparrow with fascinating eyes, +and a waving, snake-like motion of the tail, and a treacherous +feline smile upon her face, even so, cautiously and by degrees, +Humphreys felt his way with velvet paws toward his prey. He knew +the opportunity, that once gone might not come again; he soon +guessed that this was the hour and power of darkness in the soul of +Julia, the hour in which she would seek to flee from her own pride +and mortification. And if Humphreys knew how to approach with a +soft tread, very slowly and cautiously, he also knew--men of his +"profession" always know--when to spring. He saw the moment, he +made the spring, he seized the prey.</p> +<p>"Will you trust your destiny to me, Miss Anderson? You seem +beset by troubles. I have means. I could not but he wholly devoted +to your welfare. Let me help you to flee away from--from all this +mortification, and this--this domestic tyranny. Will you intrust +yourself to me?"</p> +<p>He did not say anything about love. He had an instinctive +feeling that it would not be best. She felt herself environed with +insurmountable difficulties, threatened with agonies worse than +death--so they seemed to her. He simply, coolly opened the door, +and bade her easily and triumphantly escape. Had he said one word +of tenderness the reaction must have set in.</p> +<p>She was silent.</p> +<p>"I did hope, by sacrificing all my own hopes, to effect a +reconciliation. But when that young man spoke insulting words about +you, I determined at once to offer you my devoted protection. I ask +no more than you are able to give, your respect Will you accept my +life-long protection as your husband?"</p> +<p>"Yes!" said the passionate girl in an agony of despair</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV."></a>CHAPTER XIV.</h2> +<h3>THE SPIDER'S WEB.</h3> +<br> +<p>Now that Humphreys had his prey he did not know just what to do +with it. Not knowing what to say, he said nothing, in which he +showed his wisdom. But he felt that saying nothing was almost as +bad as saying something. And he was right. For with people of +impulsive temperament reactions are sudden, and in one minute after +Julia had said yes, there came to her memory the vision of August +standing in the barn and looking into her eyes so purely and truly +and loyally, and vowing such sweet vows of love, and she looked +back upon that perfect hour with some such fooling perhaps as Dives +felt looking out of torment across the great gulf into paradise. +Only that Dives had never known paradise, while she had. For the +man or woman that knows a pure, self-sacrificing love, returned in +kind, knows that which, of all things in this world, lies nearest +to God and heaven. There be those who have ears to hear this, and +for them is it written. Julia thought of August's love with a +sinking into despair. But then returned the memory of his +faithlessness, of all she had been compelled to believe and suffer. +Then her agony came back, and she was glad that she had taken a +decided step. Any escape was a relief. I suppose it is under some +such impulse that people kill themselves. Julia felt as though she +had committed suicide and escaped.</p> +<p>Humphreys on his part was not satisfied. I used the wrong figure +of speech awhile ago. He was not a cat with paw upon the prey. He +was only an angler, and had but hooked his fish. He had not landed +it yet. He felt how slender was the thread of committal by which he +held Julia. August had her heart. He had only a word. The slender +vantage that he had, he meant to use adroitly, craftily. And he +knew that the first thing was to close this interview without +losing any ground. The longer she remained bound, the better for +him. And with his craft against the country girl's simplicity it +would have fared badly with Julia had it not been for one defect +which always inheres, in a bad man's plots in such a case. A man +like Humphreys never really understands a pure woman. Certain +detached facts he may know, but he can not "put himself in her +place."</p> +<p>Humphreys remarked with tenderness that Julia must not stay in +the night air. She was too precious to be exposed. This flattery +was comforting to her wounded pride, and she found his words +pleasant to her. Had he stopped here he might have left the field +victorious. But it was very hard for an affianced lover to stop +here. He must part from her in some other way than this if he would +leave on her mind the impression that she was irrevocably bound to +him. He stooped quickly with a well-affected devotion and lifted +her hand to kiss it. That act awakened Julia Anderson. She must +have awaked anyhow, sooner or later. But when one is in the toils +of such a man, sooner is better. The touch of Humphreys's hand and +lips sent a shudder through her frame that Humphreys felt. +Instantly there came to her a perception of all that marriage with +a repulsive man signifies.</p> +<p>Not suicide, but perdition.</p> +<p>She jerked her hand from his as though he were a snake.</p> +<p>"Mr. Humphreys, what did I say? I can't have you. I don't love +you. I'm crazy to-night. I must take back what I said."</p> +<p>"No, Julia. Let me call you <i>my</i> Julia. You must not break +my heart." Humphreys had lost his cue, and every word of tenderness +he spoke made his case more hopeless.</p> +<p>"I never can marry you--let me go in," she said, brushing past +him. Then she remembered that her door was fast on the inside. She +had climbed out the window. She turned back, and he saw his +advantage.</p> +<p>"I can not release you. Take time to think before you ask it. Go +to sleep now and do not act hastily." He stood between her and the +window, wishing to get some word to which he could hold.</p> +<p>Julia's two black eyes grew brighter. "I see. You took advantage +of my trouble, and you want to hold me to my words, and you are +bad, and now--<i>now</i> I hate you!" Then Julia felt better. Hate +is the only wholesome thing in such a case. She pushed him aside +vigorously, stepped upon the settee, slipped in at the window, and +closed it. She drew the curtain, but it seemed thin, and with +characteristic impulsiveness she put out her light that she might +have the friendly drapery of darkness about her. She heard the +soft--for the first time it seemed to her stealthy--tread of +Humphreys, as he returned to his room. Whether she swooned or +whether she slept after that she never knew. It was morning without +any time intervening, she had a headache and could scarcely walk, +and there was August's note lying on the floor. She read it +again--if not with more intelligence, at least with more suspicion. +She wondered at her own hastiness. She tried to go about the house, +but the excitement of the previous night, added to all she had +suffered beside, had given her a headache, blinding and paralyzing, +that sent her back to bed.</p> +<br> +<a name="097.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/097.jpg"><img src="images/097.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"NOW I HATE YOU!"</b></p> +<br> +<p>And there she lay in that half-asleep, half-awake mood, which a +nervous headache produces. She seemed to be a fly in a web, and the +spider was trying to fasten her. A very polite spider, with that +smile which went half-way up his face but which never seemed able +to reach his eyes. He had straps to his pantaloons, and a reddish +mustache, and she shuddered as he wound his fine webs about her. +She tried to shake off the illusion. But the more absurd an +illusion, the more it will not be shaken off. For see! the spider +was kissing her hand! Then she seemed to have made a great effort +and to have broken the web. But her wings were torn, and her feet +were shackled by the fine strands that still adhered. She could not +get them off. Wouldn't somebody help her, even as she had many a +time picked off the webs from a fly's feet out of sheer pity? And +all day she would perpetually return into these half-conscious +states and feel the spider's web about her feet, and ask over and +over again if somebody wouldn't help her to get out of the +meshes.</p> +<p>Toward evening her mother brought her a cup of tea and a piece +of toast, and for the first time in the remembered life of the +daughter made an endeavor to show a little tenderness for her. It +was a clumsy endeavor, for when the great gulf is once fixed +between mother and child it is with difficulty bridged. And finding +herself awkward in the new role, Mrs. Anderson dropped it and +resumed her old gait, remarking, as she closed the door, that she +was glad to know that Julia was coming to her senses, and "had took +the right road." For Mrs. Abigail was more vigorous than +grammatical.</p> +<p>Julia did not see anything significant in this remark at first. +But after a while it came to her that Humphreys must have told her +mother of something that had passed during the preceding night, +something on which this commendation was founded. Then she fell +into the same torpor and was in the same old spider's web, and +there was the same spider with the limited smile and the mustache +and the watch-seals and the straps! And he was trying to fasten +her, and she said "yes." And she could see the little word. The +spider caught it and spun it into a web and fastened her with it. +And she could break all the other webs but those woven out of that +one little word from her own lips. That clung to her, and she could +neither fly nor walk. August could not help her--he would not come. +Her mother was helping the spider. Just then Cynthy Ann came along +with her broom. Would she see her and sweep her free? She tried to +call her, but alas! she was a fly. She tried to buzz, but her wings +were fast bound with the webs. She was being smothered. The spider +had seized her. She could not move. He was smiling at her!</p> +<p>Then she woke shuddering. It was after midnight.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV."></a>CHAPTER XV.</h2> +<h3>THE WEB BROKEN.</h3> +<br> +<p>"Poverty," says Béranger, "is always superstitious." So +indeed is human extremity of any sort. Julia's healthy constitution +had resisted the threatened illness, the feverishness had gone with +the headache. She felt now only one thing: she must have a friend. +But the hard piousness of Cynthy Ann's face had never attracted her +sympathy. It had always seemed to her that Cynthy disapproved of +her affection quite as much as her mother did. Cynthy's face had +indeed a chronic air of disapproval. A nervous young minister said +that he never had any "liberty" when sister Cynthy Ann was in his +congregation. She seemed averse to all he said.</p> +<p>But now Julia felt that there was just one chance of getting +advice and help. Had she not in her dream seen Cynthy Ann with a +broom? She would ask help from Cynthy Ann. There must be a heart +under her rind.</p> +<p>But to get to her. Her mother's affectionate vigilance never +left her alone with Cynthy. Perhaps it was this very precaution +that had suggested Cynthy Ann to her as a possible ally. She must +contrive to have a talk with her somehow. But how? There was one +way. Black-eyed people do not delay. Bight or wrong, Julia acted +with sharp decision. Before she had any very definite view of her +plan, she had arisen and slipped on a calico dress. But there was +one obstacle. Mr. Humphreys kept late hours, and he might be on the +front-porch. She might meet him in the hall, and this seemed worse +to her than would the chance of meeting a tribe of Indians. She +listened and looked out of her window; but she could not be sure; +she would run the risk. With silent feet and loud-beating heart she +went down the hall to the back upper porch, for in that day porches +were built at the back and front of houses, above and below. Once +on the back-porch she turned to the right and stood by Cynthy Ann's +door. But a new fear took possession of her. If Cynthy Ann should +be frightened and scream!</p> +<br> +<a name="102.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/102.jpg"><img src="images/102.jpg" +width="35%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>AT CYNTHY'S DOOR.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!" she said, standing by the bed in the +little bare room which Cynthy Ann had occupied, for five years, but +into which she had made no endeavor to bring one ray of sentiment +or one trace of beauty.</p> +<p>"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!"</p> +<p>Had Cynthy Ann slept anywhere but in the L of the house, her +shriek--what woman could have helped shrieking a little when +startled?--her shriek must have alarmed the family. But it did not. +"Why, child! what are you doing here? You are out of your head, and +you must go back to your room at once." And Cynthy had arisen and +was already tugging at Julia's arm.</p> +<p>"I a'n't out of my head, Cynthy Ann, and I <i>won't</i> go back +to my room--not until I have had a talk with you."</p> +<p>"What <i>is</i> the matter, Jule?" said Cynthy, sitting on the +bed and preparing to begin again her old fight between duty and +inclination. Cynthy always expected temptation. She had often said +in class-meeting that temptations abounded on every hand, and as +soon as Julia told her she had a communication to make, Cynthy Ann +was sure that she would find in it some temptation of the devil to +do something she "hadn't orter do," according to the Bible or the +Dis<i>cip</i>line, strictly construed. And Cynthy was a "strict +constructionist."</p> +<p>Julia did not find it so easy to say anything now that she had +announced herself as determined to have a conversation and now that +her auditor was waiting. It is the worst beginning in the world for +a conversation, saying that you intend to converse. When an Indian +has announced his intention of having a "big talk," he immediately +lights his pipe and relapses into silence until the big talk shall +break out accidentally and naturally. But Julia, having neither the +pipe nor the Indian's stolidity, found herself under the necessity +of beginning abruptly. Every minute of delay made her position +worse. For every minute increased her doubt of Cynthy Ann's +sympathy.</p> +<p>"O Cynthy Ann! I'm so miserable!"</p> +<p>"Yes, I told your ma this morning that you was looking mis'able, +and that you had orter have sassafras to purify the blood, but your +ma is so took up with steam-docterin' that she don't believe in +nothin' but corn-sweats and such like."</p> +<p>"Oh! but, Cynthy, it a'n't that. I'm miserable in my mind. I +wish I knew what to do."</p> +<p>"I thought you'd made up your mind. Your ma told me you was +engaged to Mr. Humphreys."</p> +<p>Julia was appalled. How fast the spider spins his web!</p> +<p>"I a'n't engaged to him, and I hate him. He got me to say yes +when I was crazy, and I believe he brought about the things that +make me feel so nigh crazy. Do you think he's a good man, Cynthy +Ann?"</p> +<p>"Well, no, though I don't want to set in no jedgment on nobody; +but I don't see as how as he kin be good and wear all of them +costly apparels that's so forbid in the Bible, to say nothing of +the Dis<i>cip</i>line. The Bible says you must know a tree by its +fruits, and I 'low his'n is mostly watch-seals. I think a good +sound conversion at the mourners' bench would make him strip off +some of them things, and put them into the missionary collection. +Though maybe he a'n't so bad arter all, fer Jonas says that liker'n +not the things a'n't gold, but pewter washed over. But I'm afeard +he's wor'ly-minded. But I don't want to be too hard on a +feller-creatur'."</p> +<br> +<a name="105.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/105.jpg"><img src="images/105.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>CYNTHY ANN HAD OFTEN SAID IN CLASS-MEETING<br> +THAT TEMPTATIONS ABOUNDED ON EVERY HAND.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Cynthy, I drempt just now I was a fly and he was a spider, and +that he had me all wrapped up in his web, and that just then you +came along with a broom."</p> +<p>"That must be a sign," said Cynthy Ann. "It's good you didn't +dream after daylight. Then 'twould a come true. But what about +<i>him?</i> I thought you loved Gus Wehle, and though I'm afeard +you're makin' a idol out o' him, and though I'm afeard he's a +onbeliever, and I don't noways like marryin' with onbelievers, yet +I did want to help you, and I brought a note from him wunst and put +it under the head of your bed. I was afeard then I was doin' what +Timothy forbids, when he says not to be pertakers in other folks's +sins, but, you see, how could I help doin' it, when you was lookin' +so woebegone like, and Jonas, he axed me to do it. It's awful hard +to say you won't to Jonas, you know. So I put the letter there, and +I don't doubt your ma mistrusted it, and got a holt on it."</p> +<p>"Did he write to me? A'n't he going with that Betsey +Malcolm?"</p> +<p>"Can't be, I 'low. On'y this evenin' Jonas said to me, says he, +when I tole him you was engaged to Mr. Humphreys, says he, in his +way, 'The hawk's lit, has he? That'll be the death of two,' says +he, 'fer she'll die on it, an' so'll poor Gus,' says he. And then +he went on to tell as how as Gus is all ready to leave, and had +axed him to tell him of any news; but he said he wouldn't tell him +that. He'd leave him some hope. Fer he says Gus was mighty nigh +distracted to-day, that is yisterday, fer its most mornin' I +'low."</p> +<p>Now this speech did Julia a world of good. It showed her that +Gus was not faithless, that she might count on Cynthy, and that +Jonas was her friend, and that he did not like Humphreys. Jonas +called him a hawk. That agreed with her dream. He was a hawk and a +spider.</p> +<p>"But, Cynthy Ann, I got a letter night before last; ma threw it +in the window. In it Gus said he released me. I hadn't asked any +release. What did he mean?"</p> +<p>"Honey, I wish I could help you. It's that hawk, as Jonas calls +him, that's at the bottom of all this trouble. I don't believe but +what he's told some lies or 'nother. I don't believe but what he's +a bad man. I allers said I didn't 'low no good could come of a man +that puts on costly apparel and wears straps. I'm afeard you're +making a idol of Gus Wehle. Don't do it. Ef you do, God'll take +him. Misses Pearsons made a idol of her baby, a kissin' it and +huggin' it every minute, and I said, says I, Misses Pearsons, you +hadn't better make a idol of a perishin' creature. And sure enough, +God tuck it. He's jealous of our idols. But I can't help helpin' +you. You're a onbeliever yet yourself, and I 'low taint no sin fer +you to marry Gus. It's yokin' like with like. I wish you was both +Christians. I'll speak to Jonas. I don't know what I ought to do, +but I'll speak to Jonas. He's mighty peart about sech things, is +Jonas, and got as <i>good</i> a heart as you ever see. And--"</p> +<p>"Cynth-ee A-ann!" It was the energetic voice of Mrs. Anderson +rousing the house betimes. For the first time Julia and Cynthy Ann +noticed the early light creeping in at the window. They sat still, +paralyzed.</p> +<p>"Cynth-ee!" The voice was now at the top of the stairs, for Mrs. +Anderson always carried the war into Africa if Cynthy did not wake +at once.</p> +<p>"Answer quick, Cynthy Ann, or she'll be in here!" said Julia, +sliding behind the bed.</p> +<p>"Ma'am!" said Cynthy Ann, starting toward the door, where she +met Mrs. Abigail. "I'm up," said Cynthy.</p> +<p>"Well, what makes you so long a-answerin' then? You make me +climb the steps, and you know I may drop down dead of heart-disease +any day. I'll go and wake Jule."</p> +<p>"Better let her lay awhile," said Cynthy, reproaching herself +instantly for the deception.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson hesitated at the top of the stairs.</p> +<p>"Jul-yee!" she called. Poor Jule shook from head to foot. "I +guess I'll let her lay awhile; but I'm afraid I've already spoiled +the child by indulgence," said the mother, descending the stairs. +She relented only because she believed Julia was conquered.</p> +<p>"I declare, child, it's a shame I should be helping you to +disobey your mother. I'm afeard the Lord'll bring some jedgment on +us yet." For Cynthy Ann had tied her conscience to her rather +infirm logic. Better to have married it to her generous heart. But +before she had finished the half-penitent lamentation, Jule was +flying with swift and silent feet down the hall. Arrived in her own +room, she was so much relieved as to be almost happy; and she was +none too soon, for her industrious mother had quickly repented her +criminal leniency, and was again climbing the stairs at the +imminent risk of her precarious life, and calling "Jul-yee!"</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI."></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h2> +<h3>JONAS EXPOUNDS THE SUBJECT.</h3> +<br> +<p>"I 'lowed I'd ketch you here, my venerable and reliable +feller-citizen!" said Jonas as he entered the lower story of Andrew +Anderson's castle and greeted August, sitting by Andrew's loom. It +was the next evening after Julia's interview with Cynthy Ann. "When +do you 'low to leave this terry-firmy and climb a ash-saplin'? +To-night, hey? Goin' to the Queen City to take to steamboat life in +hopes of havin' your sperrits raised by bein' blowed up? Take my +advice and don't make haste in the downward road to destruction, +nor the up-hill one nuther. A game a'n't never through tell it's +played out, an' the American eagle's a chicken with steel spurs. +That air sweet singer of Israel that is so hifalugeon he has to +anchor hisself to his boots, knows all the tricks, and is +intimately acquainted with the kyards, whether it's faro, poker, +euchre, or French monte. But blamed ef Providence a'n't dealed you +a better hand'n you think. Never desperandum, as the Congressmen +say, fer while the lamp holds out to burn you may beat the blackleg +all to flinders and sing and shout forever. Last night I went to +bed thinkin' 'Umphreys had the stakes all in his pocket. This +mornin' I found he was in a far way to be beat outen his boots ef +you stood yer ground like a man and a gineological descendant of +Plymouth Rock!"</p> +<p>Andrew stopped his loom, and, looking at August, said: "Our +friend Jonas speaks somewhat periphrastically and euphuistically, +and--he'll pardon me--but he speaks a little ambiguously."</p> +<p>"My love, I gin it up, as the fish-hawk said to the bald eagle +one day. I kin rattle off odd sayings and big words picked up at +Fourth-of-Julys and barbecues and big meetins, but when you begin +to fire off your forty-pound bomb-shell book-words, I climb down as +suddent as Davy Crockett's coon. Maybe I do speak unbiguously, as +you say, but I was givin' you the biggest talkin' I had in the +basket. And as fer my good news, a feller don't like to eat up all +his country sugar to wunst, I 'low. But I says to our young and +promisin' friend of German extraction, beloved, says I, hold onto +that air limb a little longer and you're saved."</p> +<p>"But, Jonas," said August, spinning Andrew's winding-blade round +and speaking slowly and bitterly, "a man don't like to be trifled +with, if he is a Dutchman!"</p> +<p>"But sposin' a man hain't been trifled with, Dutchman or no +Dutchman? Sposin' it's all a optical delusion of the yeers? There's +a word fer <i>you</i>, Andrew, that a'n't nuther unbiguous nor +peri-what-you-may-call-it."</p> +<p>"But," said August, "Betsey Malcolm--"</p> +<p>"<i>Betsey Malcolm!</i>" said Jonas. "Betsey Malcolm to +thunder!" and then he whistled. "Set a dog to mind a basket of meat +when his chops is a-waterin' fer it! Set a kingfisher to take keer +of a fish-pond! Set a cat to raisin' your orphan chickens on the +bottle! Set a spider to nuss a fly sick with dyspepsy from eatin' +too much molasses! I'd ruther trust a hen-hawk with a flock of +patridges than to trust Betsey Malcolm with your affairs. I ha'n't +walked behind you from meetin' and seed her head a bobbin' like a +bluebird's and her eyes a blazin an' all that, fer nothin'. Like as +not, Betsey Malcolm's more nor half your trouble in that +quarter."</p> +<p>"But she said--"</p> +<p>"It don't matter three quarters of a rotten rye-straw what she +said, my inexper'enced friend. She don't keer what she says, so +long as it's fur enough away from the truth to sarve her turn. An' +she's told pay-tent double-back-action lies that worked both ways. +What do you 'low Jule Anderson tho't when she hearn tell of your +courtin' Betsey, as Betsey told it, with all her nods an' little +crowin'? Now looky here, Gus, I'm your friend, as the Irishman said +to the bar that hugged him, an' I want to say about all that air +that Betsey told you, spit on the slate an' wipe that all off. +They's lie in her soap an.' right smart chance of saft-soap in her +lie, I 'low."</p> +<p>These rough words of Jonas brought a strange intelligence into +the mind of August. He saw so many things in a moment that had lain +under his eyes unnoticed.</p> +<p>"There is much rough wisdom in your speech, Jonas," said +Andrew.</p> +<p>"That's a fact. You and me used to go to school to old Benefield +together when I was little and you was growed up. You allers beat +everybody all holler in books and spellin'-matches, Andy. But I +'low I cut my eye-teeth 'bout as airly as some of you that's got +more larnin' under your skelp. Now, I say to our young friend and +feller-citizen, don't go 'way tell you've spoke a consolin' word to +a girl as'll stick to you tell the hour and article of death, and +then remains yours truly forever, amen."</p> +<br> +<a name="112.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/112.jpg"><img src="images/112.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>JONAS.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"How do you know that, Jonas?" said August, smiling in spite of +himself.</p> +<p>"How do I know it? Why, by the testimony of a uncorrupted and +disinterested witness, gentlemen of the jury, if the honorable +court pleases. What did that Jule Anderson do, poor thing, but +spend some time making a most onseasonable visit to Cynthy Ann last +night? And I 'low ef there's a ole gal in this sublunary spear as +tells the truth in a bee-line and no nonsense, it's that there +same, individooal, identical Cynthy Ann. She's most afeard to drink +cold water or breathe fresh air fer fear she'll commit a +unpard'nable sin. And that persecuted young pigeon that thought +herself forsooken, jest skeeted into Cynthy Ann's budwoir afore +daybreak this mornin' and told her all her sorrows, and how your +letter and your goin' with that Betsey Malcolm"--here August +winced--"had well nigh druv her to run off with the straps and +watch-seals to get rid of you and Betsey and her precious and +mighty affectionate ma."</p> +<p>"But she won't look at me in meeting, and she sent Humphreys to +me with an insulting message."</p> +<p>"Which text divides itself into two parts, my brethren and +feller-travelers to etarnity. To treat the last head first, +beloved, I admonish you not to believe a blackleg, unless it's +under sarcumstances when he's got onusual and airresistible +temptations to tell the truth. I don't advise yer to spit on the +slate and rub it out in this case. Break the slate and throw it +away. To come to the second pertikeler, which is the first in the +order of my text, my attentive congregation. She didn't look at you +in meetin'. Now, I 'spose you don't know nothin' of her mother's +heart-disease. Heart-disease is trumps with Abigail Anderson. She +plays that every turn. Just think of a young gal who thinks that ef +she looks at her beau when her mother's by, she might kill her +invalooable parient of heart-disease. Fer my part, I don't take no +stock in Mrs. Abby Anderson's dyin' of heart-disease, no ways. +Might as well talk about a whale dyin' of footrot."</p> +<p>"Well, Jonas, what counsel do you give our young friend? Your +sagacity is to be depended on."</p> +<p>"Why, I advise him to speak face to face with the angel of his +life. Let him climb into my room to-night. Leave meetin' jest afore +the benediction--he kin do without that wunst--and go double-quick +acrost the fields, and git safe into my stoodio. Ferther +pertikelers when the time arrives."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII."></a>CHAPTER XVII.</h2> +<h3>THE WRONG PEW.</h3> +<br> +<p>August's own good sense told him that the advice of Jonas was +not good. But he had made many mistakes of late, and was just now +inclined to take anybody's judgment in place of his own. All that +was proud and gentlemanly in him rebelled at the thought of +creeping into another man's house in the night. Modesty is +doubtless a virtue, but it is a virtue responsible for many +offenses. Had August not felt so distrustful of his own wisdom, +nothing could have persuaded him to make his love for Julia +Anderson seem criminal by an action so wanting in dignity. But back +of Jonas's judgment was that of Andrew, whose weakness was +Quixotism. He wanted to live and to have others live on the +concert-pitch of romantic action. There was something of chivalry +in the proposal of Jonas, a spice of adventure that made him +approve it on purely sentimental grounds.</p> +<p>The more August thought of it, and the nearer he was to its +execution, the more did he dislike it. But I have often noticed +that people of a rather quiet temperament, such as young Wehle's, +show <i>vis inertiae</i> in both, ways--not very easily moved, they +are not easily checked when once in motion. August's velocity was +not usually great, his momentum was tremendous, and now that he had +committed himself to the hands of Jonas Harrison and set out upon +this enterprise, he was determined, in his quiet way, to go through +to the end.</p> +<p>Of course he understood the house, and having left the family in +meeting, he had nothing to do but to scale one of the pillars of +the front-porch. In those Arcadian days upper windows were hardly +ever fastened, except when the house was deserted by all its +inmates for days. Half-way up the post he was seized with a violent +trembling. His position brought to him a confused memory of a text +of Scripture: "He that entereth not by the door ... but climbeth up +some other way, the same is a thief and a robber." Bred under +Moravian influence, he half-believed the text to be supernaturally +suggested to him. For a moment his purpose wavered, but the habit +of going through with an undertaking took the place of his will, +and he went on blindly, as Baker the Nile explorer did, "more like +a donkey than like a man." Once on the upper porch he hesitated +again. To break into a man's house in this way was unlawful. His +conscience troubled him. In vain he reasoned that Mrs. Anderson's +despotism was morally wrong, and that this action was right as an +offset to it. He knew that it was not right.</p> +<p>I want to remark here that there are many situations in life in +which a conscience is dreadfully in the way. There are people who +go straight ahead to success--such as it is--with no +embarrassments, no fire in the rear from any scruples. Some of +these days I mean to write an essay on "The Inconvenience of having +a Conscience," in which I shall proceed to show that it costs more +in the course of a year or two, than it would to keep a stableful +of fast horses. Many a man could afford to drive Dexters and Flora +Temples who would be ruined by a conscience. But I must not write +the essay here, for I am keeping August out in the night air and +his perplexity all this time.</p> +<p>August Wehle had the habit, I think I have said, of going +through with an enterprise. He had another habit, a very +inconvenient habit doubtless, but a very manly one, of listening +for the voice of his conscience. And I think that this habit would +have even yet turned him back, as he had his hand on the +window-sash, had it not been that while he stood there trying to +find out just what was the decision of his conscience, he heard the +voices of the returning family. There was no time to lose, there +was no shelter on the porch, in a minute more they would be in +sight. He must go ahead now, for retreat was cut off. He lifted the +window and climbed into the room, lowering the sash gently behind +him. As no one ever came into this room but Jonas, he felt safe +enough. Jonas would plan a meeting after midnight in Cynthy Ann's +room, and in Cynthy Ann's presence.</p> +<p>In groping for a chair, August drew aside the curtain of the +gable-window, hoping to get some light. Had Jonas taken to +cultivating flowers in pots? Here was a "monthly" rose on the +window-seat! Surely this was the room. He had occupied it during +his stay in the house. But he did not know that Mrs. Anderson had +changed the arrangement between his leaving and the coming of +Jonas. He noticed that the curtains were not the same. He trembled +from head to foot. He felt for the bureau, and recognized by +various little articles, a pincushion, a tuck-comb, and the +sun-bonnet hanging against the window-frame, that he was in Julia's +room. His first emotion was not alarm. It was awe, as pure and +solemn as the high-priest may have felt in the holy place. +Everything pertaining to Julia had a curious sacredness, and this +room was a temple into which it was sacrilege to intrude. But a +more practical question took his attention soon. The family had +come in below, except Jonas and Cynthy Ann--who had walked slowly, +planning a meeting for August--and Mr. Samuel Anderson, who stood +at the front-gate with a neighbor. August could hear his shrill +voice discussing the seventh trumpet and the thousand three hundred +and thirty and five days. It would not do to be discovered where he +was. Beside the fright he would give to Julia, he shuddered at the +thought of compromising her in such a way. To go back was to insure +his exposure, for Samuel Anderson had not yet half-settled the +question of the trumpets. Indeed it seemed to August that the world +might come to an end before that conversation would. He heard +Humphreys enter his room. He was now persuaded that the room +formerly occupied by Julia must be Jonas's, and he determined to +get to it if he could. He felt like a villain already. He would +have cheerfully gone to State's-prison in preference to +compromising Julia. At any rate, he started out of Julia's room +toward the one that was occupied by Jonas. It was the only road +open, and but for an unexpected encounter he would have reached his +hiding-place in safety, for the door was but fifteen feet away.</p> +<p>In order to explain the events that follow, I must ask the +reader to go back to Julia, and to events that had occurred two +hours before. Hitherto she had walked to and from meeting and +"singing" with Humphreys, as a matter of courtesy. On the evening +in question she had absolutely refused to walk with him. Her mother +found that threats were as vain as coaxing. Even her threat of +dying with heart-disease, then and there, killed by her daughter's +disobedience, could not move Julia, who would not even speak with +the "spider." Her mother took her into the sitting-room alone, and +talked with her.</p> +<p>"So this is the way you trifle with gentlemen, is it? Night +before last you engaged yourself to Mr. Humphreys, now you won't +speak to him. To think that my daughter should prove a heartless +flirt!"</p> +<p>I am afraid that the unfilial thought came into Julia's mind +that nothing could have been more in the usual order of things than +that the daughter of a coquette should be a flirt.</p> +<p>"You'll kill me on the spot; you certainly will." Julia felt +anxious, for her mother showed signs of going into hysterics. But +she put her foot out and shook her head in a way that said that all +her friends might die and all the world might go to pieces before +she would yield. Mrs. Anderson had one forlorn hope. She determined +to order that forward. Leaving Julia alone, she went to her +husband.</p> +<p>"Samuel, if you value my life go and speak to your daughter. +She's got your own stubbornness of will in her. She is just like +you; she <i>will</i> have her own way. I shall die." And Mrs. +Abigail Anderson sank into a chair with unmistakable symptoms of a +hysterical attack.</p> +<p>I am aware that I have so far let the reader hear not one word +of Samuel Anderson's conversation. He has played a rather +insignificant part in the story. Nothing could be more <i>comme il +faut</i>. Insignificance was his characteristic. It was not so much +that he was small. It is not so bad a thing to be a little man. But +to be little and insignificant also is bad. There is only one thing +worse, which is to be big and insignificant. If one is little and +insignificant, one may be overlooked, insignificance and all. But +if one is big and insignificant, it is to be an obtrusive cipher, a +great lubber, not easily kept out of sight.</p> +<p>Appealed to by his wife, Samuel Anderson prepared to assert his +authority as the head of the family. He almost strutted into +Julia's presence. Julia had a real affection for her father, and +nothing mortified her more than to see him acting as a puppet, +moved by her mother, and yet vain enough to believe himself +independent and supreme. She would have yielded almost any other +point to have saved herself the mortification of seeing her father +act the fool; but now she had determined that she would die and let +everybody else die rather than walk with a man whose nature seemed +to her corrupt, and whose touch was pollution. I do not mean that +she was able to make a distinct inventory of her reasons for +disliking him, or to analyze her feelings. She could not have told +just why she had so deep and utter a repugnance to walking a +quarter of a mile to the school-house in company with this man. She +followed that strong instinct of truth and purity which is the +surest guide.</p> +<p>"Julia, my daughter," said Samuel Anderson, "really you must +yield to me as head of the house, and treat this gentleman +politely. I thought you respected him, or loved him, and he told me +that you had given consent to marry him, and had told him to ask my +consent."</p> +<p>In saying this, the "head of the house" was seesawing himself +backward and forward in his squeaky boots, speaking in a pompous +manner, and with an effort to swell an effeminate voice to a bass +key, resulting in something between a croak and a squeal. Julia sat +down and cried in mortification and disgust. Mr. Anderson +understood this to be acquiescence, and turned and went into the +next room.</p> +<br> +<a name="121.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/121.jpg"><img src="images/121.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>JULIA SAT DOWN IN MORTIFICATION.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Mr. Humphreys, my daughter will be glad to ask your pardon. She +is over her little pet; lovers always have pets. Even my wife and I +have had our disagreements in our time. Julia will be glad to see +you in the sitting-room."</p> +<p>Humphreys drew the draw-strings and set his face into its +broadest and most parallelogrammatic smile, bowed to Mr. Anderson, +and stepped into the hall. But when he reached the sitting-room +door he wished he had staid away. Julia had heard his tread, and +was standing again with her foot advanced. Her eyes were very +black, and were drawn to a sharp focus. She had some of her +mother's fire, though happily none of her mother's meanness. It is +hard to say whether she spoke or hissed.</p> +<p>"Go away, you spider! I hate you! I told you I hated you, and +you told people I loved you and was engaged to you. Go away! You +detestable spider, you! I'll die right here, but I will not go with +you."</p> +<p>But the smirking Humphreys moved toward her, speaking +soothingly, and assuring her that there was some mistake. Julia +dashed past him into the parlor and laid hold of her father's +arm.</p> +<p>"Father, protect me from that--that--spider! I hate him!"</p> +<p>Mr. Anderson stood irresolute a moment and looked appealingly to +his wife for a signal. She solved the difficulty herself. On the +whole she had concluded not to die of heart-disease until she saw +Julia married to suit her taste, and having found a hill she could +not go through, she went round. Seizing Julia's arm with more of +energy than affection, she walked off with her, or rather walked +her off, in a sulky silence, while Mr. Anderson kept Humphreys +company.</p> +<p>I thought best to keep August standing in the door of Julia's +room all this time while I explained these things to you, so that +you might understand what follows. In reality August did not stop +at all, but walked out into the hall and into difficulty.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII."></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h2> +<h3>THE ENCOUNTER.</h3> +<br> +<p>Just before August came out of the door of Julia's room he had +heard Humphreys enter his room on the opposite side of the hall. +Humphreys had lighted his cigar and was on his way to the porch to +smoke off his discomfiture when he met August coming out of Julia's +door on the opposite side of the hall. The candle in Humphreys's +room threw its light full on August's face, there was no escape +from recognition, and Wehle was too proud to retreat. He shut the +door of Julia's room and stood with back against the wall staring +at Humphreys, who did not forget to smile in his most aggravating +way.</p> +<p>"Thief! thief!" called Humphreys.</p> +<p>In a moment Mrs. Anderson and Julia ran up the stairs, followed +by Mr. Anderson, who hearing the outcry had left the matter of the +Apocalypse unsettled, and by Jonas and Cynthy Ann, who had just +arrived.</p> +<p>"I knew it," cried Mrs. Anderson, turning on the mortified +Julia, "I never knew a Dutchman nor a foreigner of any sort that +wouldn't steal. Now you see what you get by taking a fancy to a +Dutchman. And now <i>you</i> see"--to her husband--"what <i>you</i> +get by taking a Dutchman into your house. I always wanted you to +hire white men and not Dutchmen nor thieves!"</p> +<p>"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Anderson," said August, with very white +lips, "I am not a thief."</p> +<p>"Not a thief, eh? What was he doing, Mr. Humphreys, when you +first detected him?"</p> +<p>"Coming out of Miss Anderson's room," said Humphreys, smiling +politely.</p> +<p>"Do you invite gentlemen to your room?" said the frantic woman +to Julia, meaning by one blow to revenge herself and crush the +stubbornness of her daughter forever. But Julia was too anxious +about August to notice the shameless insult.</p> +<p>"Mrs. Anderson, this visit is without any invitation from Julia. +I did wrong to enter your house in this way, but I only am +responsible, and I meant to enter Jonas's room. I did not know that +Julia occupied this room. I am to blame, she is not."</p> +<p>"And what did you break in for if you didn't mean to steal? It +is all off between you and Jule, for I saw your letter. I shall +have you arrested to-morrow for burglary. And I think you ought to +be searched. Mr. Humphreys, won't you put him out?"</p> +<p>Humphreys stopped forward toward August, but he noticed that the +latter had a hard look in his eyes, and had two stout German fists +shut very tight. He turned back.</p> +<p>"These thieves are nearly always armed. I think I had best get a +pistol out of my trunk."</p> +<p>"I have no arms, and you know it, coward," said August. "I will +not be put out by anybody, but I will go out whenever the master of +this house asks me to go out, and the rest of you open a free +path."</p> +<br> +<a name="126.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/126.jpg"><img src="images/126.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"GOOD-BY!"</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Jonas, put him out!" screamed Mrs. Anderson.</p> +<p>"Couldn't do it," said Jonas, "couldn't do it ef I tried. They's +too much bone and sinnoo in them arms of his'n, and moreover he's a +gentleman. I axed him to come and see me sometime, and he come. He +come ruther late it's true, but I s'pose he thought that sence we +got sech a dee-splay of watch-seals and straps we had all got so +stuck up, we wouldn't receive calls afore fashionable hours. Any +way, I 'low he didn't mean no harm, and he's my visitor, seein' he +meant to come into my winder, knowin' the door was closed agin him. +And he won't let no man put him out, 'thout he's a man with more'n +half a dozen watch-seals onto him, to give him weight and +influence."</p> +<p>"Samuel, will you see me insulted in this way? Will you put this +burglar out of the house?"</p> +<p>The "head of the house," thus appealed to, tried to look +important; he tried to swell up his size and his courage. But he +did not dare touch August.</p> +<p>"Mr. Anderson, I beg <i>your</i> pardon. I had no right to come +In as I did. I had no right so to enter a gentleman's house. If I +had not known that this cowardly fop--I don't know what <i>else</i> +he may be--was injuring me by his lies I should not have come in. +If it is a crime to love a young lady, then I have committed a +crime. You have only to exercise your authority as master of this +house and ask me to go."</p> +<p>"I do ask you to go, Mr. Wehle."</p> +<p>It was the first time that Samuel Anderson had ever called him +Mr. Wehle. It was an involuntary tribute to the dignity of the +young man, as he stood at bay. "Mr. Wehle, <i>indeed</i>!" said +Mrs. Anderson.</p> +<p>August had hoped Julia would say a word in his behalf. But she +was too much, cowed by her mother's fierce passion. So like a +criminal going to prison, like a man going to his own funeral, +August Wehle went down the hall toward the stairs, which were at +the back of it. Humphreys instinctively retreated into his room. +Mrs. Anderson glared on the young man as he went by, but he did not +turn his head even when he passed Julia. His heart and hope were +all gone; in his mortification and defeat there seemed to him +nothing left but his unbroken pride to sustain him. He had +descended two or three steps, when Julia suddenly glided forward +and said with a tremulous voice: "You aren't going without telling +me good-by, August?"</p> +<p>"Jule Anderson! what do you mean?" cried her mother. But the +hall was narrow by the stairway, and Jonas, by standing close to +Cynthy Ann, in an unconscious sort of a way managed to keep Mrs. +Anderson back; else she would have laid violent hands on her +daughter.</p> +<p>When August lifted his eyes and saw her face full of tenderness +and her hand reached over the balusters to him, he seemed to have +been suddenly lifted from perdition to bliss. The tears ran +unrestrained upon his cheeks, he reached up and took her hand.</p> +<p>"Good-by, Jule! God bless you!" he said huskily, and went out +into the night, happy in spite of all.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIX."></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h2> +<h3>THE MOTHER.</h3> +<br> +<p>Out of the door he went, happy in spite of all the mistakes he +had made and of all the <i>contretemps</i> of his provoking +misadventure; happy in spite of the threat of arrest for burglary. +For nearly a minute August Wehle was happy in that perfect way in +which people of quiet tempers are happy--happy without fluster. But +before he had passed the gate, he heard a scream and a wild +hysterical laugh; he heard a hurrying of feet and saw a moving of +lights. He would fain have turned back to find out what the matter +was, he had so much of interest in that house, but he remembered +that he had been turned out and that he could not go back. The +feeling of outlawry mingled its bitterness with the feeling of +anxiety. He feared that something had happened to Julia; he +lingered and listened. Humphreys came out upon the upper porch and +looked sharply up and down the road. August felt instinctively that +he was the object of search and slunk into a fence-corner, +remembering that he was now a burglar and at the mercy of the man +whose face was enough to show him unrelenting.</p> +<p>Presently Humphreys turned and went in, and then August came out +of the shadow and hurried away. When he had gone a mile, he heard +the hoofs of horses, and again he concealed himself with a cowardly +feeling he had never known before. But when he found that it was +Jonas, riding one horse and leading another, on his way to bring +Dr. Ketchup, the steam-doctor, he ran out.</p> +<p>"Jonas! Jonas! what's the matter? Who's sick? Is it Julia?"</p> +<p>"I'll be bound you ax fer Jule first, my much-respected comrade. +But it's only one of the ole woman's conniption fits, and you know +she's got nineteen lives. People of the catamount sort always has. +You'd better gin a thought to yourself now. I got you into this +scrape, and I mean to see you out, as the dog said to the 'possum +in its hole. Git up onto this four-legged quadruped and go as fur +as I go on the road to peace and safety. Now, I tell you what, the +hawk's got a mighty good purchase onto you, my chicken, and he's +jest about to light, and when he lights, look out fer feathers! +Don't sleep under the paternal shingles, as they say. Go to +Andrew's castle, and he'll help you git acrost the river into the +glorious State of ole Kaintuck afore any warrant can be got out fer +takin' you up. Never once thought of your bein' took up. But don't +delay, as the preachers say. The time is short, and the human heart +is desperately wicked and mighty deceitful and onsartain."</p> +<p>As far as Jonas traveled his way, he carried August upon the +gray horse. Then the latter hurried across the fields to his +father's cabin. Little Wilhelmina sat with face against the window +waiting his return.</p> +<p>"Where did you go, August? Did you see the pretty girl at +Anderson's?"</p> +<p>He stooped and kissed her, but, without speaking a word to her, +he went over to where his mother sat darning the last of her basket +of stockings. All the rest were asleep, and having assured himself +of this, he drew up a low chair and leaned his elbow on his knee +and hi head on his hand, and told the whole adventure of the +evening to his mother, and then dropped his head on her lap and +wept in a still way. And the sweet-eyed, weary Moravian mother laid +her two hands upon his head and prayed. And Wilhelmina knelt +instinctively by the side of her brother.</p> +<br> +<a name="131.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/131.jpg"><img src="images/131.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE MOTHER'S BLESSING.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Perhaps there is no God. Or perhaps He is so great that our +praying has no effect. Perhaps this strong crying of our hearts to +Him in our extremity is no witness of his readiness to hear. Let +him live in doubt who can. Let me believe that the tender +mother-heart and the loving sister-heart in that little cabin +<i>did</i> reach up to the great Heart that is over us all in +Fatherly love, did find a real comfort for themselves, and did +bring a strength-giving and sanctifying something upon the head of +the young man, who straightway rose up refreshed, and departed out +into the night, leaving behind him mother and sister straining +their eyes after him in the blackness, and carrying with him +thoughts and memories, and--who shall doubt?--a genuine heavenly +inspiration that saved him in the trials in which we shall next +meet him.</p> +<p>At two o'clock that night August Wehle stood upon the shore of +the Ohio in company with Andrew Anderson, the Backwoods +Philosopher. Andrew waved a fire-brand at the steamboat "Isaac +Shelby," which was coming round the bend. And the captain tapped +his bell three times and stopped his engines. Then the yawl took +the two men aboard, and two days afterward Andrew came back +alone.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XX."></a>CHAPTER XX.</h2> +<h3>THE STEAM-DOCTOR.</h3> +<br> +<p>To return to the house of Samuel Anderson.</p> +<p>Scarcely had August passed out the door when Mrs. Anderson fell +into a fit of hysterics, and declared that she was dying of +heart-disease. Her time had come at last! She was murdered! +Murdered by her own daughter's ingratitude and disobedience! Struck +down in her own house! And what grieved her most was that she +should never live to see the end of the world!</p> +<p>And indeed she seemed to be dying. Nothing is more frightful +than a good solid fit of hysterics. Cynthy Ann, inwardly condemning +herself as she always did, lifted the convulsed patient, who seemed +to be anywhere in her last ten breaths, and carried her, with Mr. +Anderson's aid, down to her room, and while Jonas saddled the +horse, Mr. Anderson put on his hat and prepared to go for the +doctor.</p> +<p>"Samuel! O Sam-u-el! Oh-h-h-h-h!" cried Mrs. Anderson, with +rising and falling inflections that even patient Dr. Rush could +never have analyzed, laughing insanely and weeping piteously in the +same breath, in the same word; running it up and down the gamut in +an uncontrolled and uncontrollable way; now whooping like a savage, +and now sobbing like the last breath of a broken-hearted. "Samuel! +Sam-u-el! O Samuel! Ha! ha! ha! h-a-a! Oh-h-h-h-h-h-h! You won't +leave me to die alone! After the wife I've been to you, you won't +leave me to die alone! No-o-o-o-o! HOO-HOO-oo-OO! You musn't. You +shan't. Send Jonas, and you stay by me! Think--" here her breath +died away, and for a moment she seemed really to be dying. "Think," +she gasped, and then sank away again. After a minute she opened her +eyes, and, with characteristic pertinacity, took up the sentence +just where she had left off. She had carefully kept her place +throughout the period of unconsciousness. But now she spoke, not +with a gasp, but in that shrill, unnatural falsetto so +characteristic of hysteria; that voice--half yell--that makes every +nerve of the listener jangle with the discord. "Think, oh-h-h +Samuel! why won't you think what a wife I've been to you? Here I've +drudged and scrubbed and scrubbed and drudged all these years like +a faithful and industrious wife, never neglecting my duty. And +now--oh-h-h-h--now to be left alone in my--" Here she ceased to +breathe again for a while. "In my last hours to die, to die! to die +with, out--without--Oh-h-h!" What Mrs. Anderson was left to die +without she never stated. Mr. Anderson had beckoned to Jonas when +he came in, and that worthy had gone off in a leisurely trot to get +the "steam-doctor."</p> +<br> +<a name="134.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/134.jpg"><img src="images/134.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"CORN-SWEATS AND CALAMUS."</b></p> +<br> +<p>Dr. Ketchup had been a blacksmith, but bard work disagreed with +his constitution. He felt that he, was made for something better +than shoeing horses. This ambitious thought was first suggested to +him by the increasing portliness of his person, which, while it +made stooping over a horse's hoof inconvenient, also impressed him +with the fact that his aldermanic figure would really adorn a +learned profession. So he bought one of those little hand-books +which the founder of the Thomsonian system sold dirt-cheap at +twenty dollars apiece, and which told how to cure or kill in every +case. The owners of these important treasures of invaluable +information were under bonds not to disclose the profound secrets +therein contained, the fathomless wisdom which taught them how to +decide in any given case whether ginseng or a corn-sweat was the +required remedy. And the invested twenty dollars had brought the +shrewd blacksmith a handsome return.</p> +<p>"Hello!" said Jonas in true Western style, as he reined up in +front of Dr. Ketchup's house in the outskirts of Brayville. "Hello +the house!" But Dr. Ketchup was already asleep. "Takes a mighty +long time to wake up a fat man," soliloquized Jonas. "He gits so +used to hearin' hisself snore that he can't tell the difference +'twixt snorin' and thunder. Hello! Hello the house! I say, hello +the blacksmith-shop! Dr. Ketchup, why don't you git up? Hello! +Corn-sweats and calamus! Hello! Whoop! Hurrah for Jackson and Dr. +Ketchup! Hello! Thunderation! Stop thief! Fire! Fire! Fire! Murder! +Murder! Help! Help! Hurrah! Treed the coon at last!"</p> +<p>This last exclamation greeted the appearance of Dr. Ketchup's +head at the window.</p> +<p>"Are you drunk, Jonas Harrison? Go 'way with your hollering, or +I'll have you took up," said Ketchup.</p> +<p>"You'll find that tougher work than making horseshoes any day, +my respectable friend and feller-citizen. I'll have you took up fer +sleeping so sound and snorin' so loud as to disturb all creation +and the rest of your neighbors. I've heard you ever sence I left +Anderson's, and thought 'twas a steamboat. Come, my friend, git on +your clothes and accouterments, fer Mrs. Anderson is a-dyin' or +a-lettin' on to be a-dyin' fer a drink of ginseng-tea or a +corn-sweat or some other decoction of the healin' art. Come, I +fotch two hosses, so you shouldn't lose no time a saddlin' your'n, +though I don't doubt the ole woman'd git well ef you never gin her +the light of your cheerful count'nance. She'd git well fer spite, +and hire a calomel-doctor jist to make you mad. I'd jest as soon +and a little sooner expect a female wasp to die of heart-disease as +her."</p> +<br> +<a name="137.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/137.jpg"><img src="images/137.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"FIRE! MURDER!! HELP!!!"</b></p> +<br> +<p>The head of Dr. Ketchup had disappeared from the window about +the middle of this speech, and the remainder of it came by sheer +force of internal pressure, like the flowing of an artesian +well.</p> +<p>Dr. Ketchup walked out, with ruffled dignity, carefully dressed. +His immaculate clothes and his solemn face were the two halves of +his stock in trade. Under the clothes lay buried Ketchup the +blacksmith; under the wiseacre face was Ketchup the ignoramus. +Ignoramus he was, but not a fool. As he rode along back with Jonas, +he plied the latter with questions. If he could get the facts of +the case out of Jonas, he would pretend to have inferred them from +the symptoms and thus add to his credit.</p> +<p>"What caused this attack, Jonas?"</p> +<p>"I 'low she caused it herself. Generally does, my friend," said +Jonas.</p> +<p>"Had anything occurred to excite her?"</p> +<p>"Well, yes, I 'low they had; consid'able, if not more."</p> +<p>"What was it?"</p> +<p>"Well, you see she'd been to Hankins's preachin'. Now, I 'low, +my medical friend, the day of jedgment a'n't a pleasin' prospeck to +anybody that's jilted one brother to marry another, and then +cheated the jilted one outen his sheer of his lamented father's +estate. Do you think it is, my learned friend?"</p> +<p>But Dr. Ketchup could not be sure whether Jonas was making game +of him or not. So he changed the subject.</p> +<p>"Nice hoss, this bay," said the "doctor."</p> +<p>"Well, yes," said Jonas, "I don't 'low you ever put shoes on no +better hoss than this 'ere in all your days--as a blacksmith. Did +you now, my medical friend?"</p> +<p>"No, I think not," said Ketchup testily, and was silent.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson had grown impatient at the doctor's delay. +"Samuel! Oo! oo! oo! Samuel! My dear, I'm dying. Jonas don't care. +He wouldn't hurry. I wonder you trusted <i>him!</i> If you had been +dying, I should have gone myself for the doctor. Oo! oo! oo! +<i>oh!</i> If I should die, nobody would be sorry."</p> +<p>Abigail Anderson was not to blame for telling the truth so +exactly in this last sentence. It was an accident. She might have +recalled it but that Dr. Ketchup walked in at that moment.</p> +<p>He felt her pulse; looked at her tongue; said that it was +heart-disease, caused by excitement. He thought it must be +religious excitement. She should have a corn-sweat and some +wafer-ash tea. The corn-sweat would act as a tonic and strengthen +the pericardium. The wafer-ash would cause a tendency of blood to +the head, and thus relieve the pressure on the juggler-vein. Cynthy +Ann listened admiringly to Dr. Ketchup's incomprehensible, oracular +utterances, and then speedily put a bushel of ear-corn in the great +wash-boiler, which was already full of hot water in expectation of +such a prescription, and set the wafer-ash to draw.</p> +<p>Julia had, up to this time, stood outside her mother's door +trembling with fear, and not daring to enter. She longed to do +something, but did not know how it would be received. Now, while +the deep, sonorous voice of Ketchup occupied the attention of all, +she crept in and stood at the foot of Mrs. Anderson's bed. The +mother, recovering from her twentieth dying spell, saw her.</p> +<p>"Take her away! She has killed me! She wants me to die! <i>I</i> +know! Take her away!"</p> +<p>And Julia went to her own room and shut herself up in darkness +and in wretchedness, but in all that miserable night there came to +her not one regret that she had reached her hand to the departing +August.</p> +<p>The neighbor-women came in and pretended to do something for the +invalid, but really they sat by the kitchen-stove and pumped Cynthy +Ann and the doctor, and managed in some way to connect Julia with +her mother's illness, and shook their heads. So that when Julia +crept down-stairs at midnight, in hope of being useful, she found +herself looked at inquisitively, and felt herself to be such an +object of attention that she was glad to take the advice of Cynthy +Ann and find refuge in her own room. On the stairs she met Jonas, +who said as she passed:</p> +<p>"Don't fret yourself, little turtle-dove. Don't pay no 'tention +to ole Ketchup. Your ma won't die, not even with his corn-sweats to +waft her on to glory. You done your duty to-night like one of Fox's +martyrs, and like George Washi'ton with his little cherry-tree and +hatchet. And you'll git your reward, if not in the next world, +you'll have it in this."</p> +<p>Julia lay down awhile, and then sat up, looking out into the +darkness. Perhaps God was angry with her for loving August; perhaps +she was making an idol of him. When Julia came to think that her +love for August was in antagonism to the love of God, she did not +hesitate which she would choose. All the best of her nature was +loyal to August, whom she "had seen," as the Apostle John has it. +She could not reason it out, but a God who seemed to be in +opposition to the purest and best emotion of her heart was a God +she could not love. August and the love of August were known +quantities. God and the love of God were unknown, and the God of +whom Cynthy spoke (and of whom many a mistaken preacher has +spoken), that was jealous of Mrs. Pearson's love for her baby, and +that killed it because it was his rival, was not a God that she +could love without being a traitor to all the good that God had put +in her heart. The God that was keeping August away from her because +he was jealous of the one beautiful thing in her life was a Moloch, +and she deliberately determined that she would not worship or love +him. The True God, who is a Father, and who is not Supreme +Selfishness, doing all for His own glory, as men falsely declare; +the True God--who does all things for the good of others--loved +her, I doubt not, for refusing to worship the Conventional Deity +thus presented to her mind. Even as He has pitied many a mother +that rebelled against the Governor of the Universe, because she was +told the Governor of the Universe, in a petty seeking for his own +glory, had taken away her "idols."</p> +<p>But Julia looked up at the depths between the stars, and felt +how great God must be, and her rebellion against Him seemed a war +at fearful odds. And then the sense of God's omnipresence, of His +being there alone with her, so startled her and awakened such a +feeling of her fearful loneliness, orphanage, antagonism to God, +that she could bear it no longer, and at two o'clock she went down +again; but Mrs. Brown looked over at Mrs. Orcutt in a way that +said: "Told you so! Guilty conscience! Can't sleep!" And so Julia +thought God, even as she conceived Him, better company than men, or +rather than women, for--well, I won't make the ungallant remark; +each sex has its besetting faults.</p> +<p>Julia took back with her a candle, thinking that this awful God +would not seem so close if she had a light. There lay on her bureau +a Testament, one of those old editions of the American Bible +Society, printed on indifferent paper, and bound in a red muslin +that was given to fading, the like whereof in book-making has never +been seen since. She felt angry with God, who, she was sure, was +persecuting her, as Cynthy Ann had said, out of jealousy of her +love for August, and she was determined that she would not look +into that red-cloth Testament, which seemed to her full of +condemnation. But there was a fascination about it she could not +resist. The discordant hysterical laughter of her mother, which +reached her ears from below, harrowed her sorely, and her grief and +despair at her own situation were so great that she was at last +fain to read the only book in the room in order that she might +occupy her mind. There is a strange superstition among certain +pietists which loads them to pray for a text to guide them, and +then take any chance passage as a divine direction. I do not mean +to say that Julia had any supernatural leading in her reading. The +New Testament is so full of comfort that one could hardly manage to +miss it. She read the seventh chapter of Luke: how the Lord healed +the centurion's servant that was "dear unto him," and noted that He +did not rebuke the man for loving his slave; how the Lord took pity +on that poor widow who wept at the bier of her only son, and +brought him back to life again, and "restored him to his mother." +This did not seem to be just the Christ that Cynthy Ann thought of +as the foe of every human affection. She read more that she did not +understand so well, and then at the end of the chapter she read +about the woman that was a sinner, that washed His feet with +grateful tears and wiped them with her hair. And she would have +taken the woman's guilt to have had the woman's opportunity and her +benediction.</p> +<p>At last, turning over the leaves without any definite purpose, +she lighted on a place in Matthew, where three verses at the end of +a chapter happened to stand at the head of a column. I suppose she +read them because the beginning of the page and the end of the +chapter made them seem a short detached piece. And they melted into +her mood so that she seemed to know Christ and God for the first +time. "Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden," she +read, and stopped. That means me, she thought with a heart ready to +burst. And that saying is the gateway of life. When the promises +and injunctions mean me, I am saved. Julia read on, "And I will +give you rest." And so she drank in the passage, clause by clause, +until she came to the end about an easy yoke and a light burden, +and then God seemed to her so different. She prayed for August, for +now the two loves, the love for August and the love for Christ, +seemed not in any way inconsistent. She lay down saying over and +over, with tears in her eyes, "rest for your souls," and "weary and +heavy laden," and "come unto me," and "meek and lowly of heart," +and then she settled on one word and repeated it over and over, +"rest, rest, rest." The old feeling was gone. She was no more a +rebel nor an orphan. The presence of God was not a terror but a +benediction. She had found rest for her soul, and He gave His +beloved sleep. For when she awoke from what seemed a short slumber, +the red light of a glorious dawn came in at the window, and her +candle was flickering its last in the bottom of the socket. The +Testament lay open as she had left it, and for days she kept it +open there, and did not dare read anything but these three verses, +lest she should lose the rest for her soul that she found here.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXI."></a>CHAPTER XXI.</h2> +<h3>THE HAWK IN A NEW PART.</h3> +<br> +<p>Humphreys was now in the last weeks of his singing-school. He +had become a devout Millerite, and was paying attentions to the not +unwilling Betsey Malcolm, though pretending at Anderson's to be +absolutely heart-broken at the conduct of Julia in jilting him +after she had given him every assurance of affection. And then to +be jilted for a Dutchman, you know! In this last regard his feeling +was not all affectation. In his soul, cupidity, vanity, and +vindictiveness divided the narrow territory between them. He +inwardly swore that he'd get satisfaction somehow. Debts which were +due to his pride should be collected by his revenge.</p> +<p>Did you ever reflect on the uselessness of a landscape when one +has no eyes to see it with, or, what is worse, no soul to look +through one's eyes? Humphreys was going down to the castle to call +on the Philosopher, and "Shady Hollow," as Andrew called it, had +surely never been more glorious than on the morning which he chose +for his walk. The black-haw bushes hung over the roadside, the +maples lifted up their great trunk-pillars toward the sky, and the +grape-vines, some of them four and even six inches in diameter, +reached up to the high boughs, fifty or a hundred feet, without +touching the trunk. They had been carried up by the growth of the +tree, tree and vine having always lived in each other's embrace. +Out through the opening in the hollow, Humphreys saw the green sea +of six-feet-high Indian corn in the fertile bottoms, the two rows +of sycamores on the sandy edges of the river, and the hazy hills on +the Kentucky side. But not one touch of sentiment, not a perception +of beauty, entered the soul of the singing-master as he +daintily-chose his steps so as to avoid soiling his glossy boots, +and as he knocked the leaves off the low-hanging beech boughs with +his delicate cane. He had his purpose in visiting Andrew, and his +mind was bent on his game.</p> +<p>Charon, the guardian of the castle, bayed his great hoarse bark +at the Hawk, and with that keen insight into human nature for which +dogs are so remarkable, he absolutely forbade the dandy's entrance, +until Andrew appeared at the door and called the dog away.</p> +<p>"I am delighted at having the opportunity of meeting a great +light in literature like yourself, Mr. Anderson. Here you sit +weaving, earning your bread with a manly simplicity that is truly +admirable. You are like Cincinnatus at his plow. I also am a +literary man."</p> +<p>He really was a college graduate, though doubtless he was as +much of a humbug in recitations and examinations as he had always +been since. Andrew's only reply to his assertion that he was a +literary man was a rather severe and prolonged scrutiny of his oily +locks, his dainty mustache, his breast-pin, his watch-seals, and +finally his straps and his boots. For Andrew firmly believed that +neglected hair, Byron collars, and unblackened boots were the first +signs of literary taste.</p> +<p>"You think I dress too well," said Humphreys with his ghastly +smirk. "You think that I care too much for appearances. I do. It is +a weakness of mine which comes from a residence abroad."</p> +<p>These words touched the Philosopher a little. To have been +abroad was the next best thing to having been a foreigner <i>ab +origine</i>. But still he felt a little suspicious. He was superior +to the popular prejudice against the mustache, but he could not +endure hair-oil. "Nature," he maintained, "made the whole beard to +be worn, and Nature provides an oil for the hair. Let Nature have +her way." He was suspicious of Humphreys, not because he wore a +mustache, but because he shaved the rest of his face and greased +his hair. He had, besides, a little intuitive perception of the +fact that a smile which breaks against the rock-bound coast of cold +cheek-bones and immovable eyes is a mask. And so he determined to +test the literary man. I have heard that Masonic lodges have been +deceived by impostors. I have never heard that a literary man was +made to believe in the genuineness of the attainments of a +charlatan.</p> +<p>And yet Humphreys held his own well. He could talk glibly and +superficially about books; he simulated considerable enthusiasm for +the books which Andrew admired. His mistake and his consequent +overthrow came, as always in such cases, from a desire to overdo. +It was after half an hour of talking without tripping that Andrew +suddenly asked: "Do you like the ever-to-be-admired +Xenophanes?"</p> +<p>It certainly is no disgrace to any literary man not to know +anything of so remote a philosopher as Xenophanes. The first +characteristic of a genuine literary man is the frankness with +which he confesses his ignorance. But Humphreys did not really know +but that Xenophanes was part of the daily reading of a man of +letters.</p> +<p>"Oh! yes," said he. "I have his works in turkey morocco."</p> +<p>"What do you think of his opinion that God is a sphere?" asked +the Philosopher, smiling.</p> +<p>"Oh! yes--ahem; let me see--which God is it that he speaks of, +Jupiter or--well, you know he was a Greek."</p> +<p>"But he only believed in one God," said Andrew sternly.</p> +<p>"Oh! ah! I forgot that he was a Christian."</p> +<p>So from blunder to blunder Andrew pushed him, Humphreys +stumbling more and more in his blind attempts to right himself, and +leaving, at last, with much internal confusion but with an +unruffled smile. He dared not broach his errand by asking the +address of August. For Andrew did not conceal his disgust, having +resumed work at his loom, suffering the bowing impostor to find his +own way out without so much as a courteous adieu.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXII."></a>CHAPTER XXII.</h2> +<h3>JONAS EXPRESSES HIS OPINION ON DUTCHMEN.</h3> +<br> +<p>Sometimes the virus of a family is all drawn off in one vial. I +think it is Emerson who makes this remark. We have all seen the +vials.</p> +<p>Such an one was Norman Anderson. The curious law of hereditary +descent had somehow worked him only evil. "Nater," observed Jonas +to Cynthy, when the latter had announced to him that Norman, on +account of some disgrace at school, had returned home, "nater +ha'n't done him half jestice, I 'low. It went through Sam'el +Anderson and Abig'il, and picked out the leetle weak pompous things +in the illustrious father; and then hunted out all the spiteful and +hateful things in the lovin' and much-esteemed mother, and somehow +stuck 'em together, to make as ornery a chap as ever bit a hoe-cake +in two."</p> +<p>"I'm afeard her brother's scrape and comin' home won't make Jule +none the peacefuller at the present time," said Cynthy Ann.</p> +<p>"Wal," returned Jonas, "I don't think she keers much fer him. +She couldn't, you know. Love him? Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear"--here +Cynthy Ann began to reproach herself for listening to anything so +pleasant as these two last words--"Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear, you +see you might maybe love a cuckle-burr and nuss it; but I don't +think you would be likely to. I never heern tell of nobody carryin' +jimson-weed pods in their bosoms. You see they a'n't no place about +Norman Anderson that love could take a holt of 'thout gittin' +scratched."</p> +<p>"But his mother loves him, I reckon," said Cynthy Ann.</p> +<p>"Wal, yes; so she do. Loves her shadder in the lookin'-glass, +maybe, and kinder loves Norman bekase he's got so much of her devil +into him. It's like lovin' like, I reckon. But I 'low they's a +right smart difference with Jule. Sence she was born, that Norman +has took more delight in tormentin' Jule than a yaller dog with a +white tail does in worryin' a brindle tom-cat up a peach-tree. And +comin' home at this junction he'll gin her a all-fired lot of +trials and tribulation."</p> +<p>At the time this conversation took place, two weeks had elapsed +since Mrs. Anderson's "attack." Julia had heard nothing from August +yet. The "Hawk" still made his head-quarters in the house, but was +now watching another quarry. Mrs. Anderson was able to scold as +vigorously as ever, if, indeed, that function had ever been +suspended. And just now she was engaged in scolding the teacher who +had expelled Norman. The habit of fighting teachers was as chronic +as her heart-disease. Norman had always been abused by the whole +race of pedagogues. There was from the first a conspiracy against +him, and now he was cheated out of his last chance of getting an +education. All this Norman steadfastly believed.</p> +<p>Of course Norman sided with his mother as against the Dutchman. +The more contemptible a man is, the more he contemns a man for not +belonging to his race or nation. And Norman felt that he would be +eternally disgraced by any alliance with a German. He threw himself +into the fight with a great deal of vigor. It helped him to forget +other things.</p> +<p>"Jule," said he, walking up to her as she sat alone on the +porch, "I'm ashamed of you. To go and fall in love with a Dutchman +like Gus Wehle, and disgrace us all!"</p> +<p>"I wonder you didn't think about disgrace before," retorted +Julia, "I am ashamed to have August Wehle hear what you've been +doing."</p> +<br> +<a name="151.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/151.jpg"><img src="images/151.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>NORMAN ANDERSON.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Dogs that have the most practice in cat-worrying are liable to +get their noses scratched sometimes. Norman took care never to +attack Julia again except under the guns of his mother's powerful +battery. And he revenged himself on her by appealing to his mother +with a complaint that "Jule had throwed up to him that he had been +dismissed from school." And of course Julia received a solemn +lecture on her way of driving poor Norman to destruction. She was +determined to disgrace the family. If she could not do it by +marrying a Dutchman, she would do it by slandering her brother.</p> +<p>Norman thought to find an ally in Jonas.</p> +<p>"Jonas, don't you think it's awful that Jule is in love with +Dutchman like Gus Wehle?"</p> +<p>"I do, my love," responded Jonas. "I think a Dutchman is a +Dutchman. I don't keer how much he larns by burnin' the midnight +ile by day and night. My time-honored friend, he's a Dutchman arter +all. The Dutch is bred in the bone. It won't fade. A Dutchman may +be a gentleman in his way of doin' things, may be honest and +industrious, and keep all the commandments in the catalogue, but I +say he is Dutch, and that's enough to keep him out of the kingdom +of heaven and out of this free and enlightened republic. And an +American may be a good-fer-nothin', ornery little pertater-ball, +wuthless alike to man and beast; he mayn't be good fer nothin', +nuther fer work nur study; he may git drunk and git turned outen +school and do any pertikeler number of disgraceful and oncreditable +things, he may be a reg'ler milksop and nincompoop, a fool and a +blackguard and a coward all rolled up into one piece of brown +paper, ef he wants to. And what's to hender? A'n't he a free-born +an' enlightened citizen of this glorious and civilized and +Christian land of Hail Columby? What business has a Dutchman, ef +he's ever so smart and honest and larned, got in our broad domains, +resarved for civil and religious liberty? What business has he got +breathin' our atmosphere or takin' refuge under the feathers of our +American turkey-buzzard? No, my beloved and respected +feller-citizen of native birth, it's as plain to me as the wheels +of 'Zek'el and the year 1843. I say, Hip, hip, hoo-ray fer liberty +or death, and down with the Dutch!"</p> +<p>Norman Anderson scratched his head.</p> +<p>What did Jonas mean?</p> +<p>He couldn't exactly divine; but it is safe to say that on the +whole he was not entirely satisfied with this boomerang speech. He +rather thought that he had better not depend on Jonas.</p> +<p>But he was not long in finding allies enough in his war against +Germany.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIII."></a>CHAPTER XXIII.</h2> +<h3>SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS.</h3> +<br> +<p>There was an egg-supper in the country store at Brayville. Mr. +Mandluff, the tall and raw-boned Hoosier who kept the store, was +not unwilling to have the boys get up an egg supper now and then in +his store after he had closed the front-door at night. For you must +know that an egg-supper is a peculiar Western institution. +Sometimes it is a most enjoyable institution--when it has its place +in a store where there is no Kentucky whisky to be had. But in +Brayville, in the rather miscellaneous establishment of the not +very handsome and not very graceful Mr. Mandluff, an egg-supper was +not a great moral institution. It was otherwise, and profanely +called by its votaries a camp-meeting; it would be hard to tell +why, unless it was that some of the insiders grew very happy before +it was over. For an egg-supper at Mandluff's store was to Brayville +what an oyster-supper at Delmonico's is to New York. It was one +tenth hard eggs and nine tenths that beverage which bears the name +of an old royal house of France.</p> +<p>How were the eggs cooked? I knew somebody would ask that +impertinent question. Well, they were not fried, they were not +boiled, they were not poached, they were not scrambled, they were +not omeletted, they were not roasted on the half-shell, they were +not stuffed with garlic and served with cranberries, they were not +boiled and served with anchovy sauce, they were not "<i>en +salmi</i>." I think I had better stop there, lest I betray my +knowledge of cookery. It is sufficient to say that they were not +cooked in any of the above-named fashions, nor in any other way +mentioned in Catharine Beecher's or Marion Harland's cookbooks. +They were baked <i>à la mode</i> backwoods. It is hardly +proper for me to give a recipe in this place, that belongs more +properly to the "Household Departments" of the newspapers. But to +satisfy curiosity, and to tell something about cooking, which Prof. +Blot does not know, I may say that they were broken and dropped on +a piece of brown paper laid on the top of the old box-stove. By the +time the egg was cooked hard the paper was burned to ashes, but the +egg came off clean and nice from the stove, and made as palatable +and indigestible an article for a late supper as one could wish. It +only wanted the addition of Mandluff's peculiar whisky to make it +dissipation of the choicest kind. For the more a dissipation costs +in life and health, the more fascinating it is.</p> +<p>There was an egg-supper, as I said, at Mandluff's store. There +was to be a "camp-meeting" in honor of Norman Anderson's successful +return to his liberty and his cronies. It gave Norman, the greatest +pleasure to return to a society where it was rather to his credit +than otherwise that he had gone on a big old time, got caught, and +been sent adrift by the old hunk that had tried to make him study +Latin.</p> +<p>The eggs were baked in the true "camp-meeting" style, the whisky +was drunk, and--so was the company. Bill Day's rather red eyes grew +redder, and his nose shone with delight as he shuffled the greasy +pack of "kyerds." The maudlin smile crossed the habitually +melancholy lines of his face in a way that split and splintered his +visage into a curious contradiction of emotions.</p> +<p>"H--a--oo--p!" He shouted, throwing away the cards over the +heads of his companions. "Ha--oop! boys, thish is big--hoo! hoo! +ha--oop! I say is big. Let's do somethin'!"</p> +<p>Here there was a confused cry that "it <i>was</i> big, and that +they had better do somethin' or 'nother."</p> +<p>"Let's blow up the ole school-house," said Bill Day, who was not +friendly to education.</p> +<p>"I tell you what," said Bob Short, who was dealing the cards in +another set--"I tell you what," and Bob winked his eyes vigorously, +and looked more solemn and wise than he could have looked if it had +not been for the hard eggs and the whisky--"I tell you what," said +Bob a third time, and halted, for his mind's activity was a little +choked by the fervor of his emotions--"I tell you what, boys--"</p> +<p>"Wal," piped Jim West in a cracked voice, "you've told us +<i>what</i> four times, I 'low; now s'pose you tell us somethin' +else."</p> +<p>"I tell you what, boys," said Bob Short, suddenly remembering +his sentence, "don't let's do nothin' that'll git us into no +trouble arterwards. Ef we blow up the school-house we'll be 'rested +fer bigamy or--or--what d'ye call it?"</p> +<p>"For larson," said Bill Day, hardly able to restrain another +whoop.</p> +<p>"No, 'taint larson," said Bob Short, looking wiser than a +chief-justice, "it's arsony. Now I say, don't let's go to +penitentiary for no--no larson--no arsony, I mean."</p> +<p>"Ha--oop!" said Bill. "Let's do somethin' ludikerous. Hurrah for +arsony and larson! Dog-on the penitentiary! Ha--oop!"</p> +<br> +<a name="157.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/157.jpg"><img src="images/157.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Let's go fer the Dutchman," said Norman Anderson, just drunk +enough to be good-naturedly murderous and to speak in dialect. "Gus +is turned out to committin' larson by breakin' into people's houses +an' has run off. Now let's tar and feather the ole one. Of course, +he's a thief. Dutchmen always is, I 'low. Clark township don't want +none of 'em, I'll be dog-oned if it do," and Norman got up and +struck his fist on the counter.</p> +<p>"An' they won't nobody hurt you; you see, he's on'y a Dutchman," +said Bob Short "Larson on a Dutchman don't hold."</p> +<p>"I say, let's hang him," said Bill Day. "Ha--oop! Let's hang +him, or do somethin' else ludikerous!"</p> +<p>"I wouldn't mind," grinned Norman Anderson, delighted at the +turn things had taken. "I'd just like to see him hung."</p> +<p>"So would I," said Bill Day, leaning over to Norman. "Ef a +Dutchman wash to court my sishter, I'd--"</p> +<p>"He'd be a fool ef he did," piped Jim West. For Bill Day's +sister was a "maid not vendible," as Shakespeare has it.</p> +<p>"See yer," said Bill, trying in vain to draw his coat. "Looky +yer, Jeems; ef you say anythin' agin Ann Marier, I'll commit the +wust larson on you you ever seed."</p> +<p>"I didn't say nothin' agin Ann Marier," squeaked Jim. "I was +talkin' agin the Dutch."</p> +<p>"Well, that'sh all right Ha--oop! Boys, let's do somethin', +larson or arsony or--somethin'."</p> +<p>A bucket of tar and some feathers were bought, for which young +Anderson was made to pay, and Bill Day insisted on buying fifteen +feet of rope. "Bekase," as he said, "arter you git the feathers on +the bird, you may--you may want to help him to go to roosht you +know, on a hickory limb. Ha--oop! Come along, boys; I say let's do +somethin' ludikerous, ef it's nothin' but a little larson."</p> +<p>And so they went galloping down the road, nine drunken fools. +For it is one of the beauties of lynch law, that, however +justifiable it may seem in some instances, it always opens the way +to villainous outrages. Some of my readers will protest that a man +was never lynched for the crime of being a Dutchman. Which only +shows how little they know of the intense prejudice and lawless +violence of the early West. Some day people will not believe that +men have been killed in California for being Chinamen.</p> +<p>Of the nine who started, one, the drunkest, fell off and broke +his arm; the rest rode up in front of the cabin of Gottlieb Wehle. +I do not want to tell how they alarmed the mother at her late +sewing and dragged Gottlieb out of his bed. I shudder now when I +recall one such outrage to which I was an unwilling witness. Norman +threw the rope round Gottlieb's neck and declared for hanging. Bill +Day agreed. It would be so ludikerous, you know!</p> +<p>"Vot hash I tun? Hey? Vot vor you dries doo hanks me already, +hey?" cried the honest German, who was willing enough to have the +end of the world come, but who did not like the idea of ascending +alone, and in this fashion.</p> +<p>Mrs. Wehle pushed her way into the mob and threw the rope off +her husband's neck, and began to talk with vehemence in German. For +a moment the drunken fellows hung back out of respect for a woman. +Then Bill Day was suddenly impressed with the fact that the duty of +persuading Mrs. Wehle to consent to her husband's execution +devolved upon him.</p> +<p>"Take keer, boys; let me talk to the ole woman. I'll argy the +case."</p> +<p>"You can't speak Dutch no more nor a hoss can," squeaked Jeems +West.</p> +<p>"Blam'd ef I can't, though. Hyer, ole woman, firshta Dutch?"</p> +<p>"Ya."</p> +<p>"Now," said Bill, turning to the others in triumph, "what did I +tell you? Well, you see, your boy August is a thief."</p> +<p>"He's not a teef!" said the old man.</p> +<p>"Shet up your jaw. I say he is. Now, your ole man's got to be +hung."</p> +<p>"Vot vor?" broke in Gottlieb.</p> +<p>"Bekase it's all your own fault. You hadn't orter be a +Dutchman."</p> +<p>Here the crowd fell into a wrangle. It was not so easy to hang a +man when such a woman stood there pleading for him. Besides, Bob +Short insisted that hanging was arsony in the first degree, and +they better not do it. To this Bill Day assented. He said he +'sposed tar and feathers was only larson in the second degree. And +then it would be rale ludikerous. And now confused cries of "Bring +on the tar!" "Where's the feathers?" "Take off his clothes!" began +to be raised. Norman stood out for hanging. Drink always +intensified his meanness. But the tar couldn't be found. The man +whom they had left lying by the roadside with a broken arm had +carried the tar, and had been well coated with it himself in his +fall.</p> +<p>"Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day. "Let's do somethin'. Dog-on the +arsony! Let's hang him as high as Dan'el."</p> +<p>And with that the rope was thrown over Gottlieb's, neck and he +was hurried off to the nearest tree. The rope was then put over a +limb, and a drunken half-dozen got ready to pull, while Norman +Anderson adjusted the noose and valiant Bill Day undertook to keep +off Mrs. Wehle.</p> +<p>"All ready! Pull up! Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day, and the crowd +pulled, but Mrs. Wehle had slipped off the noose again, and the +volunteer executioners fell over one another in such a way as to +excite the derisive laughter of Bill Day, who thought it perfectly +ludikerous. But before the laugh had finished, the indignant +Gottlieb had knocked Bill Day over and sent Norman after him. The +blow sobered them a little, and suddenly destroyed Bill's ambition +to commit "arsony," or do anything else ludikerous. But Norman was +furious, and under his lead Wehle's arms were now bound with the +rope and a consultation was held, during which little Wilhelmina +pleaded for her father effectively, and more by her tears and cries +and the wringing of her chubby hands than by any words. Bill Day +said he be blamed of that little Dutch gal's takin' on so didn't +kinder make him foul sorter scrimpshous you know. But the mob could +not quit without doing something. So it was resolved to give +Gottlieb a good ducking in the river and send him into Kentucky +with a warning not to come back. They went down the ravine past +Andrew's castle to the river. Mrs. Wehle followed, believing that +her husband would be drowned, and little Wilhelmina ran and pulled +the alarm and awakened the Backwoods Philosopher, who soon threw +himself among them, but too late to dissuade them from their +purpose, for Andrew's own skiff, the "Grisilde" by name, with three +of the soberest of the party, had already set out to convey Wehle, +after one hasty immersion, to the other shore, while the rest stood +round hallooing like madmen to prevent any alarm that Wehle might +raise attracting attention on the other side.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIV."></a>CHAPTER XXIV.</h2> +<h3>THE GIANT GREAT-HEART.</h3> +<br> +<p>As soon as Andrew's skiff, the "Grisilde," was brought back and +the ruffians had gone off up the ravine, Andrew left Mrs. Wehle +sitting by the fire in the loom-room of the castle, while he +crossed the river to look after Gottlieb. Little Wilhelmina +insisted on going with him, and as she handled a steering-oar well +he took her along. They found Gottlieb with his arms cruelly +pinioned sitting on a log in a state of utter dejection, and +dripping with water from his ducking.</p> +<p>"Ich zay, Antroo, ish dish vat dey galls a vree goontry, +already? A blace vare troonk sheounders dosh vot ever dey hadn't +ort! Dat is vree koontry. Mein knabe ish roon off ver liebin a +Yangee; unt a vool he ish, doo. Unt ich ish hoong unt troundt unt +darrdt unt vedderd unt drakt out indoo de ribber, unt dolt if I ko +back do mein vrau unt kinder I zhall pe kilt vunst more already. +Unt I shpose if ich shtays here der Gainduckee beobles vill hang me +unt dar me unt trown me all over in der ribber, doo, already, pekoz +I ish Deutsch. Ich zay de voorld ish all pad, unt it aud doo pe +vinished vunst already, I ton't gare how quick, so ash dem droonk +vools kit vot pelongs doo 'em venever Gabrel ploes his +drumbet."</p> +<br> +<a name="163.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/163.jpg"><img src="images/163.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>TO THE RESCUE.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"They'll get that in due time, my friend," said Andrew, untying +the rope with which Gottlieb had been pinioned. "Come, let us go +back to our own shore."</p> +<p>"Bud daint my zhore no more. Dey said I'd god doo hang again +vanst more if I ever grossed de Ohio Ribber vunst again already, +but I ton't vants doo hang no more vor noddin already."</p> +<p>"But I'll take care of that," said Andrew. "Before to-morrow +night I'll make your house the safest place in Clark township. I've +got the rascals by the throat now. Trust me."</p> +<p>It took much entreaty on the part of Andrew and much weeping and +kissing on the part of Wilhelmina to move the heart of the +terrified Gottlieb. At last he got into the skiff and allowed +himself to be rowed back again, declaring all the way that he +nebber zee no zich a vree koontry ash dish voz already.</p> +<p>When Bill Day and his comrades got up the next morning and began +to think of the transactions of the night, they did not seem nearly +so ludikerous as they had at the time. And when Norman Anderson and +Bill Day and Bob Short read the notice on the door of Mandluff's +store they felt that "arsony" might have a serious as well as a +ludikerous side.</p> +<p>Andrew at first intended to institute proceedings against the +rioters, but he knew that the law was very uncertain against the +influences which the eight or nine young men might bring to bear, +and the prejudices of the people against the Dutch. To prosecute +would be to provoke another riot. So he contented himself with +this</p> +<blockquote>"PROCLAMATION!<br> +<br> +"TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: I have a list of eight men connected with +the riotous mob which broke into the house of Gottlieb Wehle, a +peaceable and unoffending citizen of the United States. The said +eight men proceeded to commit an assault and battery on the person +of the said Gottlieb Wehle, and even endeavored at one time to take +his life. And the said riotous conduct was the result of a +conspiracy, and the said assault with intent to kill was with +malice aforethought. The said eight men, after having committed +grievous outrages upon him by dipping him in the water and by other +means, warned the said Wehle not to return to the State. Now, +therefore, I give notice to all and several of those concerned in +these criminal proceedings that the said Wehle has returned by my +advice; and that if so much as a hair of his head or a splinter of +his property is touched I will appear against said parties and will +prosecute them until I secure the infliction of the severest +penalties made and provided for the punishment of such infamous +crimes. I hope I am well enough known here to render it certain +that if I once begin proceedings nothing but success or my death or +the end of the world can stop them.<br> +<br> +"ANDREW ANDERSON,<br> +<br> +"Backwoods Philosopher.<br> +<br> +"AT THE CASTLE, May 12th, 1843."</blockquote> +<p>"It don't look so ludikerous as it did, does it, Bill?" squeaked +Jim West, as he read the notice over Bill's shoulder.</p> +<p>"Shet your mouth, you fool!" said Bill. "Don't you never peep. +Ef I'd a been sober I might a knowed ole Grizzly would interfere. +He always does."</p> +<p>In truth, Andrew was a sort of Perpetual Champion of the +Oppressed, and those who did not like him feared him, which is the +next best thing.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXV."></a>CHAPTER XXV.</h2> +<h3>A CHAPTER OF BETWEENS.</h3> +<br> +<p>Did you ever move? And, in moving, did you ever happen to notice +how many little things there are to be picked up? Now that I am +about to shift the scene of my story from Clark township, the +narrow stage upon which it has progressed through two dozen +chapters, I find a great number of little things to be picked +up.</p> +<p>One of the little things to be picked up is Norman Anderson. +Very little, if measured soul-wise. When his father had read the +proclamation of Andrew and divined that Norman was interested in +the riot, he became thoroughly indignant; the more so, that he felt +his own lack of power to do anything in the premises against his +wife. But when Mrs. Abigail heard of the case she was in genuine +distress. It showed Andrew's vindictiveness. He would follow her +forever with his resentments, just because she could not love him. +It was not her fault that she did not love him. Poor Norman had to +suffer all the persecutions that usually fall to such innocent +creatures. She must send him away from home, though it broke her +mother's heart to do it; for if Andrew didn't have him took up, the +old Dutchman would, just because his son had turned out a burglar. +She said burglar rather emphatically, with a look at Julia.</p> +<p>And so Samuel Anderson took his son to Louisville, and got him a +place in a commission and produce house on the levee, with which +Mr. Anderson had business influence. And Samuel warned him that he +must do his best, for he could not come back home now without +danger of arrest, and Norman made many promises of amendment; so +many, that his future seemed to him barren of all delight. And, by +way of encouraging himself in the austere life upon which he had +resolved to enter, he attended the least reputable place of +amusement in the city, the first night after his father's +departure.</p> +<p>In Clark township the Millerite excitement was at white heat. +Some of the preachers in other parts of the country had set one +day, some another. I believe that Mr. Miller, the founder, never +had the temerity to set a day. But his followers figured the thing +more closely, and Elder Hankins had put a fine point on the matter. +He was certain, for his part, that the time was at midnight on the +eleventh of August. His followers became very zealous, and such is +the nature of an infection that scarcely anybody was able to resist +it. Mrs. Anderson, true to her excitable temper, became +fanatic--dreaming dreams, seeing visions, hearing voices, praying +twenty times a day<a name="FNanchor2"></a><a href= +"#Footnote_2"><sup>[2]</sup></a>, wearing a sourly pious face, and +making all around her more unhappy than ever. Jonas declared that +ef the noo airth and the noo heaven was to be chockful of sech as +she, 'most any other place in the univarse would be better, +akordin' to his way of thinkin'. He said she repented more of other +folkses' sins than anybody he ever seed.</p> +<blockquote><a name="Footnote_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor2">[2]</a> +Mrs. Anderson was less devout than some of her co-religionists; the +wife of a well-known steamboat-clerk was accustomed to pray in +private fifty times a day, hoping by means of this praying without +ceasing to be found ready when the trumpet should +sound.</blockquote> +<p>As summer came on, Samuel Anderson, borne away on the tide of +his own and his wife's fanatical fever of sublimated devotion, +discharged Jonas and all his other <i>employés</i>, threw up +business, and gave his whole attention to the straightening of his +accounts for the coming day of judgment. Before Jonas left to seek +a new place he told Cynthy Ann as how as ef he'd met her alrlier +'twould a-settled his coffee fer life. He was gittin' along into +the middle of the week now, but he'd come to feel like a boy since +he'd been a livin' where he could have a few sweet and pleasant +words--ahem!--he thought December'd be as pleasant as May all the +year round ef he could live in the aurora borealis of her +countenance. And Cynthy Ann enjoyed his words so much that she +prayed for forgiveness for the next week and confessed in +class-meeting that she had yielded to temptation and sot her heart +on the things of this perishin' world. She was afeared she hadn't +always remembered as how as she was a poor unworthy dyin' worm of +the dust, and that all the beautiful things in this world perished +with the usin'.</p> +<p>And Brother Goshorn, the class-leader at Harden's Cross-Roads, +exhorted her to tear every idol from her heart. And still the sweet +woman's nature, God's divine law revealed in her heart, did assert +itself a little. She planted some pretty-by-nights in an old +cracked blue-and-white tea-pot and set it on her window-sill. +Somehow the pretty-by-nights would remind her of Jonas, and while +she tried to forget him with one half of her nature, the other and +better part (the depraved part, she would have told you) cherished +the memory of his smallest act and word. In fact, the flowers had +no association with Jonas except that along with the awakening of +her love came this little sentiment for flowers into the dry desert +of her life. But one day Mrs. Anderson discovered the old blue +broken tea-pot with its young plants.</p> +<p>"Why, Cynthy Ann!" she cried, "a body'd think you'd have more +sense than to do such a soft thing as to be raisin' posies at +<i>your</i> time of life! And that when the world is drawing to a +close, too! You'll be one of the foolish virgins with no oil to +your lamp, as sure as you see that day."</p> +<p>As for Julia's flowers, Mrs. Anderson had rudely thrown them +into the road by way of removing temptation from her and turning +her thoughts toward the awful realities of the close of time.</p> +<p>But Cynthy Ann blushed and repented, and kept her broken +tea-pot, with a fearful sense of sin in doing so. She never watered +the pretty-by-nights without the feeling that she was offering +sacrifice to an idol.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVI."></a>CHAPTER XXVI.</h2> +<h3>A NICE LITTLE GAME.</h3> +<br> +<p>It was natural enough that the "mud-clerk" on the old steamboat +Iatan should take a fancy to the "striker," as the engineer's +apprentice was called. Especially since the striker know so much +more than the mud-clerk, and was able to advise him about many +things. A striker with so much general information was rather a +novelty, and all the officers fancied him, except Sam Munson, the +second engineer, who had a natural jealousy of a striker that knew +more than he did.</p> +<p>The striker had learned rapidly, and was trusted to stand a +regular watch. The first engineer and the third were together, and +the second engineer and the striker took the other watch. The boat +in this way got the services of a competent engineer while paying +him only a striker's wage.</p> +<p>About the time the heavily-laden Iatan turned out of the +Mississippi into the Ohio at Cairo at six in the evening, the +striker went off watch, and he ought to have gone to bed to prepare +himself for the second watch of the night, especially as he would +only have the dog-watch between that and the forenoon. But a +passenger had got aboard at Cairo, whose face was familiar. The +sight of it had aroused a throng of old associations, pleasant and +unpleasant, and a throng of emotions the most tender and the most +wrathful the striker had ever felt. Sleep he could not, and so, +knowing that the mud-clerk was on watch, he sought the office after +nine o'clock, and stood outside the bar talking to his friend, who +had little to do, since most of the freight had been shipped +through, and his bills for Paducah were all ready. The striker +talked with the mud-clerk, but watched the throng of passengers who +drank with each other at the bar, smoked in the "social hall," read +and wrote at the tables in the gentlemen's cabin, or sat with +doffed hats and chatted gallantly in the ladies' cabin, which was +visible as a distant background, seen over a long row of tables +with green covers and under a long row of gilded wooden +stalactites, which were intended to be ornamental. The little +pendent prisms beneath the chandeliers rattled gayly as the boat +trembled at each stroke of her wheels, and gaping backwoodsmen, +abroad for the first time, looked at all the rusty +gingerbread-work, and wondered if kings were able to afford +anything half so fine as the cabin of the "palatial steamer Iatan," +as she was described on the bills. The confused murmur of many +voices, mixed with the merry tinkling of the glass pendants, gave +the whole an air of excitement.</p> +<p>But the striker did not see the man he was looking for. "Who got +on at Cairo? I think I saw a man from our part of the country," he +said.</p> +<p>"I declare, I don't know," said the mud-clerk, who drawled his +words in a cold-blooded way. "Let me look. Here's A. Robertson, and +T. Le Fevre, and L.B. Sykes, and N. Anderson."</p> +<p>"Where is Anderson going?"</p> +<p>"Paid through to Louisville. Do you know him?"</p> +<p>But just then Norman Anderson himself walked in, and went up to +the bar with a new acquaintance. They did not smoke the pipe of +peace, like red Americans, but, like white Americans, they had a +mysterious liquid carefully compounded, and by swallowing this they +solemnly sealed their new-made friendship after the curious and +unexplained rite in use among their people.</p> +<p>Norman had been dispatched on a collecting trip, and having nine +hundred and fifty dollars in his pocket, he felt as much elated as +if it had been his own money. The gentleman with whom he drank, had +a band of crape around his white hat. He seemed very +nearsighted.</p> +<p>"If that greeny is a friend of yours, Gus, I declare you'd +better tell him not to tie to the serious-looking young fellow in +the white hat and gold specs, unless he means to part with all his +loose change before bed-time."</p> +<p>That is what the mud-clerk drawled to August the striker, but +the striker seemed to hear the words as something spoken afar off. +For just then he was seeing a vision of a drunken mob, and a rope, +and a pleading woman, and a brave old man threatened with death. +Just then he heard harsh and muddled voices, rude oaths, and +jeering laughter, and above it all the sweet pleading of a little +girl begging for a father's life. And the quick blood came into his +fair German face, and he felt that he could not save this Norman +Anderson from the toils of the gambler, though he might, if +provoked, pitch him over the guard of the boat. For was not +Andrew's letter, which described the mob, in his pocket, and +burning a hole in his pocket as it had been ever since he received +it?</p> +<p>But then this was Julia's brother, and there was nothing he +would not do for Julia. So, sometime after the mud-clerk had ceased +to speak, the striker gave utterance to both impulses by replying, +"He's no friend of mine," a little crisply, and then softly adding, +"Though I shouldn't like to see him fleeced."</p> +<p>By this time a new actor had appeared on the scene in the person +of a man with a black mustache and side-whiskers, who took a seat +behind a card-table near the bar.</p> +<p>"H'llo!" said the mud-clerk in a low and lazy voice, "Parkins is +back again. After his scrape at Paducah last February, he +disappeared, and he's been shady ever since. He's growed whiskers +since, so's not to be recognized. But he'll be skeerce enough when +we get to Paducah. Now, see how quick he'll catch the greenies, +won't you?" The prospect was so charming as almost to stimulate the +mud-clerk to speak with some animation.</p> +<p>But August Wehle, the striker on the Iatan, had an uncomfortable +feeling that he had seen that face before, and that the long +mustache and side-whiskers had grown in a remarkably short space of +time. Could it be that there were two men who could spread a smile +over the lower half of their faces in that automatic way, while the +spider-eyes had no sort of sympathy with it? Surely, this man with +black whiskers and mustache was not just like the singing-master at +Sugar-Grove school-house, who had "red-top hay on to his upper +lip," and yet--and yet--</p> +<p>"Gentlemen," said Parkins--his Dickensian name would be +Smirkins--"I want to play a little game just for the fun of the +thing. It is a trick with three cards. I put down three cards, face +up. Here is six of diamonds, eight of spades, and the ace of +hearts. Now, I will turn them over so quickly that I will defy any +of you to tell which is the ace. Do you see? Now, I would like to +bet the wine for the company that no gentleman here can turn up the +ace. All I want is a little sport. Something to pass away the +evening and amuse the company. Who will bet the wine? The Scripture +says that the hand is quicker than the eye, and I warn you that if +you bet, you will probably lose." And here he turned the cards +back, with their faces up, and the card which everybody felt sure +was the ace proved apparently to be that card. Most of the +on-lookers regretted that they had not bet, seeing that they would +certainly have won. Again the cards were put face down, and the +company was bantered to bet the wine. Nobody would bet.</p> +<br> +<a name="175.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/175.jpg"><img src="images/175.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>A NICE LITTLE GAME.</b></p> +<br> +<p>After a good deal of fluent talk, and much dexterous handling of +the cards, in a way that seemed clear enough to everybody, and that +showed that everybody's guess was right as to the place of the ace, +the near-sighted gentleman, who had drunk with Norman, offered to +bet five dollars.</p> +<p>"Five dollars!" returned Parkins, laughing in derision, "five +dollars! Do you think I'm a gambler? I don't want any gentleman's +money. I've got all the money I need. However, if you would like to +bet the wine with me, I am agreed."</p> +<p>The near-sighted gentleman declined to wager anything but just +the five dollars, and Parkins spurned his proposition with the +scorn of a gentleman who would on no account bet a cent of money. +But he grew excited, and bantered the whole crowd. Was there no +<i>gentleman</i> in the crowd who would lay a wager of wine for the +company on this interesting little trick? It was strange to him +that no gentleman had spirit enough to make the bet. But no +gentleman had spirit enough to bet the wine. Evidently there were +no gentlemen in the company.</p> +<p>However, the near-sighted man with the white hat adorned with +crape now proposed in a crusty tone to bet ten dollars that he +could lift the ace. He even took out a ten-dollar bill, and, after +examining it, in holding it close to his nose as a penurious man +might, extended his hand with, "If you're in earnest, let's know +it. I'll bet you ten."</p> +<p>At this Parkins grew furious. He had never been so persistently +badgered in all his life. He'd have the gentleman know that he was +not a gambler. He had all the money he wanted, and as for betting +ten dollars, he shouldn't think of it. But now that the +gentleman--he said <i>gentleman</i> with an emphasis--now that the +gentleman seemed determined to bet money, he would show him that he +was not to be backed down. If the young man would like to wager a +hundred dollars, he would cheerfully bet with him. If the gentleman +did not feel able to bet a hundred dollars, he hoped he would not +say any more about it. He hadn't intended to bet money at all. But +he wouldn't bet less than a hundred dollars with anybody. A man who +couldn't afford to lose a hundred dollars, ought not to bet.</p> +<p>"Who is this fellow in the white hat with spectacles?" August +asked of the mud-clerk.</p> +<p>"That is Smith, Parkins's partner. He is only splurging round to +start up the greenies." And the mud-clerk spoke with an +indifference and yet a sort of <i>dilettante</i> interest in the +game that shocked his friend, the striker.</p> +<p>"Why don't they set these blacklegs ashore?" said August, whose +love of justice was strong.</p> +<p>"<i>You</i> tell," drawled the mud-clerk. "The first clerk's +tried it, but the old man protects 'em, and" (in a whisper) "get's +his share, I guess. He can set them off whenever he wants to." (I +must explain that there is only one "old man" on a steamboat--that +is, the captain.)</p> +<p>By this time Parkins had turned and thrown his cards so that +everybody knew or thought he knew where the ace was. Smith, the man +with the white hat, now rose five dollars more and offered to bet +fifteen. But Parkins was more indignant than ever. He told Smith to +go away. He thrust his hand into his pocket and drew out a handful +of twenty-dollar gold-pieces. "If any gentleman wants to bet a +hundred dollars, let him come on. A man who couldn't lose a hundred +would better keep still."</p> +<p>Smith now made a big jump. He'd go fifty. Parkins wouldn't +listen to fifty. He had said that he wouldn't bet less than a +hundred, and he wouldn't. He now pulled out handful after handful +of gold, and piled the double-eagles up like a fortification in +front of him, while the crowd surged with excitement.</p> +<p>At last Mr. Smith, the near-sighted gentleman in spectacles, the +gentleman who wore black crape on a white hat, concluded to bet a +hundred dollars. He took out his little porte-monnaie and lifted +thence a hundred-dollar bill.</p> +<p>"Well," said he angrily, "I'll bet you a hundred." And he laid +down the bill. Parkins piled five twenty-dollar gold-pieces atop +it. Each man felt that he could lift the ace in a moment. That card +at the dealer's right was certainly the ace. Norman was sure of it. +He wished it had been his wager instead of Smith's. But Parkins +stopped Smith a moment.</p> +<p>"Now, young man," he said, "if you don't feel perfectly able to +lose that hundred dollars, you'd better take it back."</p> +<p>"I am just as able to lose it as you are," said Smith +snappishly, and to everybody's disappointment he lifted not the +card everybody had fixed on, but the middle one, and so lost his +money.</p> +<p>"Why didn't you take the other?" said Norman boastfully. "I knew +it was the ace."</p> +<p>"Why didn't you bet, then?" said Smith, grinning a little. +Norman wished he had. But he had not a hundred dollars of his own, +and he had scruples--faint, and yet scruples, or rather alarms--at +the thought of risking his employer's money on a wager. While he +was weighing motive against motive, Smith bet again, and again, to +Norman's vexation, selected a card that was so obviously wrong that +Norman thought it a pity that so near-sighted a man should bet and +lose. He wished he had a hundred dollars of his own and--There, +Smith was betting again. This time he consulted Norman before +making his selection, and of course turned up the right card, +remarking that he wished his eyes were so keen! He would win a +thousand dollars before bed-time if his eyes were so good! Then he +took Norman into partnership, and Norman found himself suddenly in +possession of fifty dollars, gotten without trouble. This turned +his brain. Nothing is so intoxicating to a weak man as money +acquired without toil. So Norman continued to bet, sometimes +independently, sometimes in partnership with, the gentlemanly +Smith. He was borne on by the excitement of varying fortune, a +varying fortune absolutely under control of the dealer, whose +sleight-of-hand was perfect. And the varying fortune had an +unvarying tendency in the long run--to put three stakes out Of five +into the pockets of the gamblers, who found the little game very +interesting amusement for gentlemen.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVII."></a>CHAPTER XXVII.</h2> +<h3>THE RESULT OF AN EVENING WITH GENTLEMEN.</h3> +<br> +<p>All the time that these smiling villains were by consummate art +drawing their weak-headed victim into their tolls, what was August +doing? Where were his prompt decision of character, his quick +intelligence, his fine German perseverance, that should have saved +the brother of Julia Anderson from harpies? Could our blue-eyed +young countryman, who knew how to cherish noble aspirations walking +in a plowman's furrow--could he stand there satisfying his revenge +by witnessing the ruin of a young man who, like many others, was +wicked only because he was weak?</p> +<p>In truth, August was a man whose feelings were persistent. His +resentment was--like his love--constant. But his love of justice +was higher and more persistent, and he could not have seen any one +fleeced in this merciless way without taking sides strongly with +the victim. Much less could he see the brother of Julia tempted on +to the rocks by the false lights of villainous wreckers without a +great desire to save him. For the letter of Andrew had ceased now +to burn in his pocket. That other letter--the only one that Julia +had been able to send through Cynthy Ann and Jonas--that other +letter, written all over with such tender extravagances as love +feeds on; the thought of that other letter, which told how +beautiful and precious were the invitations to the weary and +heavy-laden, had stilled resentment, and there came instead a keen +desire to save Norman for the sake of Julia and justice. But how to +do it was an embarrassing question--a question that was more than +August could solve. There was a difficulty in the weakness and +wrong-headedness of Norman; a difficulty in Norman's prejudice +against Dutchmen in general and August in particular; a difficulty +in the fact that August was a sort of a fugitive, if not from +justice, certainly from injustice.</p> +<p>But when nearly a third of Norman's employer's money had gone +into the gamblers' heap, and when August began to understand that +it was another man's money that Norman was losing, and that the +victim was threatened by no half-way ruin, he determined to do +something, even at the risk of making himself known to Norman and +to Parkins--was he Humphreys in disguise?--and at the risk of +arrest for house-breaking. August acted with his eyes open to all +the perils from gamblers' pistols and gamblers' malice; and after +he had started to interfere, the mud-clerk called him back, and +said, in his half-indifferent way:</p> +<p>"Looky here, Gus, don't be a blamed fool. That's a purty little +game. That greeny's got to learn to let blacklegs alone, and he +don't look like one that'll take advice. Let him scorch a little; +it'll do him good. It's healthy for young men. That's the reason +the old man don't forbid it, I s'pose. And these fellows carry good +shooting-irons with hair-triggers, and I declare I don't want to be +bothered writing home to your mother, and explaining to her that +you got killed in a fight with blacklegs, I declare I don't, you +see. And then you'll get the 'old man' down on you, if you let a +bird out of the trap in which he goes snucks; you will, I declare. +And you'll get walking-papers at Louisville. Let the game alone. +You haven't got any hand to play against Parkins, nohow; and I +reckon the greenhorns are his lawful prey. Cats couldn't live +without mice. You'll lose your place, I declare you will, if you +say a word."</p> +<br> +<a name="183.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/183.jpg"><img src="images/183.jpg" +width="30%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>THE MUD-CLERK.</b></p> +<br> +<p>August stopped long enough to take in the full measure of his +sacrifice. So far from being deterred by it, he was more than ever +determined to act. Not the love Julia, so much, now, but the +farewell prayer and benediction and the whole life and spirit of +the sweet Moravian mother in her child-full house at home were in +his mind at this moment. Things which a man will not do for the +love of woman he may do for the love of God--and it was with a +sense of moral exaltation that August entered into the lofty spirit +of self-sacrifice he had seen in his mother, and caught himself +saying, in his heart, as he had heard her say, "Let us do anything +for the Father's sake!" Some will call this cant. So much the worse +for them. This motive, too little felt in our day--too little felt +in any day--is the great impulse that has enabled men to do the +bravest things that have been done. The sublimest self-sacrifice is +only possible to a man by the aid of some strong moral tonic. God's +love is the chief support of the strongest spirits.</p> +<p>August touched Norman on the arm. The face of the latter +expressed anything but pleasure at meeting him, now that he felt +guilty. But this was not the uppermost feeling with Norman. He +noticed that August's clothes were spotted with engine-grease, and +his first fear was of compromising his respectability.</p> +<p>In a hurried way August began to explain to him that he was +betting with gamblers, but Smith stood close to them, looking at +August in such a contemptuous way as to make Norman feel very +uncomfortable, and Parkins seeing the crowd attracted by August's +explanations--which he made in some detail, by way of adapting +himself to Norman--of the trick by which the upper card is thrown +out first, Parkins said, "I see you understand the game, young man. +If you do, why don't you bet?"</p> +<p>At this the crowd laughed, and Norman drew away from the +striker's greasy clothes, and said that he didn't want to speak any +further to a burglar, he believed. But August followed, determined +to warn him against Smith. Smith was ahead of him, however, saving +to Norman, "Look out for your pockets--that greasy fellow will rob +you."</p> +<p>And Norman, who was nothing if not highly respectable, resolved +to shake off the troublesome "Dutchman" at once. "I don't know what +you are up to now, but at home you are known as a thief. So please +let me alone, will you?" This Norman tried to say in an +annihilating way.</p> +<p>The crowd looked for a fight. August said loud enough to be +heard, "You know very well that you lie. I wanted to save you from +being a thief, but you are betting money now that is not +yours."</p> +<p>The company, of course, sympathized with the gentleman and +against the machine-oil on the striker's clothes, so that there +arose quickly a murmur, started by Smith, "Put the bully out," and +August was "hustled." It is well that he was not shot.</p> +<p>It was quite time for him to go on watch now; for the +loud-ticking marine-clock over the window of the clerk's office +pointed to three minutes past twelve, and the striker hurried to +his post at the starboard engine, with the bitterness of defeat and +the shame of insult in his heart. He had sacrificed his place, +doubtless, and risked much beside, and all for nothing. The third +engineer complained of his tardiness in not having relieved him +three minutes before, and August went to his duties with a bitter +heart. To a man who is persistent, as August was, defeat of any +sort is humiliating.</p> +<p>As for Norman, he bet after this just to show his independence +and to show that the money was his own, as well as in the vain hope +of winning back what he had lost. He bet every cent. Then he lost +his watch, and at half-past one o'clock he went to his state-room, +stripped of all loose valuables, and sweating great drops. And the +mud-clerk, who was still in the office, remarked to himself, with a +pleasant chuckle, that it was good for him; he declared it was; +teach the fellow to let monte alone, and keep his eyes peeled when +he traveled. It would so!</p> +<p>The idea was a good one, and he went down to the starboard +engine and told the result of the nice little game to his friend +the striker, drawling it out in a relishful way, how the blamed +idiot never stopped till they'd got his watch, and then looked like +as if he'd a notion to jump into the "drink." But 'twould cure him +of meddlin' with monte. It would so!</p> +<p>He walked away, and August was just reflecting on the +heartlessness of his friend, when the mud-clerk came back again, +and began drawling his words out as before, just as though each +distinct word were of a delightful flavor and he regretted that he +must part with it.</p> +<p>"I've got you even with Parkins, old fellow. He'll be strung up +on a lamp-post at Paducah, I reckon. I saw a Paducah man aboard, +and I put a flea in his ear. We've got to lay there an hour or two +to put off a hundred barrels of molasses and two hundred sacks of +coffee and two lots of plunder. There'll be a hot time for Parkins. +He let on to marry a girl and fooled her. They'll teach him a +lesson. You'll be off watch, and we'll have some fun looking on." +And the mud-clerk evidently thought that it would be even funnier +to see Parkins hanged than it had been to see him fleece Norman. +Gus the striker did not see how either scene could be very +entertaining. But he was sick at heart, and one could not expect +him to show much interest in manly sports.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVIII."></a>CHAPTER XXVIII.</h2> +<h3>WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER.</h3> +<br> +<p>The steady beat of the wheels and the incessant clank of the +engines went on as usual. The boat was loaded almost to her guards, +and did not make much speed. The wheels kept their persistent beat +upon the water, and the engines kept their rhythmical clangor +going, until August found himself getting drowsy. Trouble, with +forced inaction, nearly always has a soporific tendency, and a +continuous noise is favorable to sleep. Once or twice August roused +himself to a sense of his responsibility and battled with his +heaviness. It was nearing the end of his watch, for the dog-watch +of two hours set in at four o'clock. But it seemed to him that four +o'clock would never come.</p> +<p>An incident occurred just at this moment that helped him to keep +his eyes open. A man went aft through the engine-room with a red +handkerchief tied round his forehead. In spite of this partial +disguise August perceived that it was Parkins. He passed through to +the place where the steerage or deck passengers are, and then +disappeared from August's sight. He had meant to disembark at a +wood-yard just below Paducah, but for some reason the boat did not +stop, and now, as August guessed, he was hiding himself from +Paducah eyes. He was not much too soon, for the great bell on the +hurricane-deck was already ringing for Paducah, and the summer dawn +was showing itself faintly through the river fog.</p> +<p>The alarm-bell rang in the engine-room, and Wehle stood by his +engine. Then the bell rang to stop the starboard engine, and August +obeyed it. The pilot of a Western steamboat depends much upon his +engines for steerage in making a landing, and the larboard engine +was kept running a while longer in order to bring the deeply-loaded +boat round to her landing at the primitive wharf-boat of that day. +There is something fine in the faith with which an engineer obeys +the bell of the pilot, not knowing what may be ahead, not inquiring +what may be the effect of the order, but only doing exactly what he +is bid when he is bid. August had stopped his engine, and stood +trying to keep his mind off Parkins and the events of the night, +that he might be ready to obey the next signal for his engine. But +the bell rang next to stop the other engine, at which the second +engineer stood, and August was so free from responsibility in +regard to that that he hardly noticed the sound of the bell, until +it rang a second time more violently. Then he observed that the +larboard engine still ran. Was Munson dead or asleep? Clearly it +was August's duty to stand by his own engine. But then he was +startled to think what damage to property or life might take place +from the failure of the second engineer to stop his engine. While +he hesitated, and all these considerations flashed through his +mind, the pilot's bell rang again long and loud, and August then, +obeying an impulse rather than a conviction, ran over to the other +engine, stopped it, and then, considering that it had run so long +against orders, he reversed it and set it to backing without +waiting instructions. Then he seized Munson and woke him, and +hurried back to his post. But the larboard engine had not made +three revolutions backward before the boat, hopelessly thrown from +her course by the previous neglect, struck the old wharf-boat and +sunk it. But for the promptness and presence of mind with which +Wehle acted, the steamboat itself would have suffered severely. The +mate and then the captain came rushing into the engine-room. Munson +was discharged at once, and the striker was promised engineer's +wages.</p> +<p>Gus went off watch at this moment, and the mud-clerk said to +him, in his characteristically indifferent voice, "Such luck, I +declare! I was sure you would be dismissed for meddling with +Parkins, and here you are promoted, I declare!"</p> +<p>The mishap occasioned much delay to the boat, as it was very +inconvenient to deliver freight at that day and at that stage of +water without the intervention of the wharf-boat. A full hour was +consumed in finding a landing, and in rigging the double-staging +and temporary planks necessary to get the molasses and coffee and +household "plunder" ashore. Some hint that Parkins was on the river +had already reached Paducah, and the sheriff and two deputies and a +small crowd were at the landing looking for him. A search of the +boat failed to discover him, and the crowd would have left the +landing but for occasional hints slyly thrown out by the mud-clerk +as he went about over the levee collecting freight-bills. These +hints, given in a non-committal way, kept the crowd alive with +expectation, and when the rumors thus started spread abroad, the +levee was soon filled with an excited and angry multitude.</p> +<p>If it had been a question of delivering a criminal to justice, +August would not have hesitated to tell the sheriff where to look. +But he very well knew that the sheriff could not convey the man +through the mob alive, and to deliver even such a scoundrel to the +summary vengeance of a mob was something that he could not find it +in his heart to do.</p> +<p>In truth, the sheriff and his officers did not seek very +zealously for their man. Under the circumstances, it was probable +he would not surrender himself without a fight, in which somebody +would be killed, and besides there must ensue a battle with the +mob. It was what they called an ugly job, and they were not loth to +accept the captain's assurance that the gambler had gone +ashore.</p> +<p>While August was unwilling to deliver the hunted villain to a +savage death, he began to ask himself why he might not in some way +use his terror in the interest of justice. For he had just then +seen the wretched and bewildered face of Norman looking ghastly +enough in the fog of the morning.</p> +<p>At last, full of this notion, and possessed, too, by his habit +of accomplishing at all hazards what he had begun, August strolled +back through the now quiet engine-room to the deck-passengers' +quarter. It was about half an hour before six o'clock, when the +dog-watch would expire and he must go on duty again. In one of the +uppermost of the filthy bunks, in the darkest corner, near the +wheel, he discovered what he thought to be his man. The +deck-passengers were still asleep, lying around stupidly. August +paused a moment, checked by a sense of the dangerousness of his +undertaking. Then he picked up a stick of wood and touched the +gambler, who could not have been very sound asleep, lying in +hearing of the curses of the mob on the shore. At first Parkins did +not move, but August gave him a still more vigorous thrust. Then he +peered out between the blanket and the handkerchief over his +forehead.</p> +<p>"I will take that money you won last night from that young man, +if you please."</p> +<br> +<a name="191.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/191.jpg"><img src="images/191.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Parkins saw that it was useless to deny his identity. "Do you +want to be shot?" he asked fiercely.</p> +<p>"Not any more than you want to be hung," said August. "The one +would follow the other in five minutes. Give back that money and I +will go away."</p> +<p>The gambler trembled a minute. He was fairly at bay. He took out +a roll of bills and handed it to August. There was but five +hundred. Smith had the other four hundred and fifty, he said. But +August had a quiet German steadiness of nerve. He said that unless +the other four hundred and fifty were paid at once he should call +in the sheriff or the crowd. Parkins knew that every minute August +stood there increased his peril, and human nature is now very much +like human nature in the days of Job. The devil understood the +subject very well when he said that all that a man hath will he +give for his life. Parkins paid the four hundred and fifty in +gold-pieces. He would have paid twice that if August had demanded +it.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIX."></a>CHAPTER XXIX.</h2> +<h3>AUGUST AND NORMAN.</h3> +<br> +<p>In a story such as I meant this to be, the development of +character stands for more than the evolution of the plot, and +herein is the true significance of this contact of Wehle with the +gamblers, and, indeed, of this whole steamboat life. It is not +enough for one to be good in a country neighborhood; the sharp +contests and severe ordeals of more exciting life are needed to +give temper to the character. August Wehle was hardly the same man +on this morning at Paducah, with the nine hundred and fifty dollars +in his pocket, that he had been the evening before, when he first +felt the sharp resentment against the man who had outraged his +father. In acting on a high plane, one is unconsciously lifted to +that plane. Men become Christians sometimes from the effect of +sudden demands made upon their higher moral nature, demands which +compel them to choose between a life higher than their present +living, or a moral degradation. Such had been August's experience. +He had been drawn upward toward God by the opportunity and +necessity for heroic action. I have no doubt the good Samaritan got +more out of his own kindness than the robbed Jew did.</p> +<p>Before he had a chance to restore the money to its rightful +owner, the two hours of dog-watch had expired, and he was obliged +to go on watch again, much to his annoyance. He had been nearly +twenty-four hours without sleep, and after a night of such +excitement it was unpleasant as well as perilous to have to hold +this money, which did not belong to him, for six hours longer, +liable at any minute to get into difficulty through any scheme of +the gamblers and their allies, by which his recovery of the money +might be misinterpreted. The morning seemed to wear away so slowly. +All the possibilities of Parkins's attacking him, of young +Anderson's committing suicide, and of the misconstruction that +might be put upon his motives--the making of his disinterested +action seem robbery--haunted his excitable imagination. At last, +while the engines were shoving their monotonous shafts backward and +forward, and the "palatial steamer" Iatan was slowly pushing her +way up the stream, August grew so nervous over his money that he +resolved to relieve himself of part of it. So he sent for the +mud-clerk by a passing deck-hand.</p> +<p>"I want you to keep this money for me until I get off watch," +said August. "I made Parkins stand and deliver this morning while +we were at Paducah."</p> +<p>"You did?" said the mud-clerk, not offering to touch the money. +"You risked your life, I declare, for that fool that called you a +thief. You are a fool, Gus, and nothing but your blamed good luck +can save you from getting salivated, bright and early, some +morning. Not a great deal I won't take that money. I don't relish +lead, and I've got to live among these fellows all my days, and I +don't hold that money for anybody. The old man would ship me at +Louisville, seeing I never stopped anybody's engine and backed it +in a hurry, as you did. If I'd known where Parkins was, I'd a +dropped a gentle word in the ear of the crowd outside, but I +wouldn't a pulled that greeny's coffee-nuts out of the fire, and I +won't hold the hot things for you. I declare I won't. Saltpeter +wouldn't save me if I did."</p> +<p>So Gus had to content himself in his nervousness, not allayed by +this speech, und keep the money in his pocket until noon. And, +after all the presentiment he had had, noon came round. +Presentiments generally come from the nerves, and signify nothing; +but nobody keeps a tally of the presentiments and auguries that +fail. When the first-engineer and a new man took the engines at +noon, Gus was advised by the former to get some sleep, but there +was no sleep for him until he had found Norman, who trembled at the +sight of him.</p> +<p>"Where is your state-room?" said August sternly, for he couldn't +bring himself to speak kindly to the poor fellow, even in his +misery.</p> +<p>Norman turned pale. He had been thinking of suicide all the +morning, but he was a coward, and now he evidently felt sure that +he was to be killed by August. He did not dare disobey, but led the +way, stopping to try to apologize two or three times, but never +getting any further than "I--I--"</p> +<p>Once in the state-room, he sat down on the berth and gasped, +"I--I--"</p> +<p>"Here is your money," said August, handing it to him. "I made +the gambler give it up."</p> +<p>"I--I--" said the astonished and bewildered Norman.</p> +<p>"You needn't say a word. You are a cowardly scoundrel, and if +you say anything, I'll knock you down for treating my father as you +did. Only for--for--well, I didn't want to see you fleeced."</p> +<p>Norman was ashamed for once, and hung his head. It touched the +heart of August a little, but the remembrance of the attack of the +mob on his father made him feel hard again, and so his generous act +was performed ungraciously.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXX."></a>CHAPTER XXX.</h2> +<h3>AGROUND.</h3> +<br> +<p>Not the boat. The boat ran on safely enough to Louisville, and +tied up at the levee, and discharged her sugar und molasses, and +took on a new cargo of baled hay and corn and flour, and went back +again, and made I know not how many trips, and ender her existence +I can not tell how or when. What does become of the old steamboats? +The Iatan ran for years after she tied up at Louisville that summer +morning, and then perhaps she was blown up or burned up; perchance +some cruel sawyer transfixed her; perchance she was sunk by ice, or +maybe she was robbed of her engines and did duty as barge, or, what +is more probable, she wore out like the one-hoss shay, and just +tumbled to pieces simultaneously.</p> +<p>It was not the gambler who got aground that morning. He had yet +other nice little games, with three cards or more or none, to +play.</p> +<p>It was not the mud-clerk who ran aground--good, non-committal +soul, who never look sides where it would do him any harm, and who +never worried himself about anything. Dear, drawling, optimist +philosopher, who could see how other people's mishaps were best for +them, and who took good care not to have any himself! It was not he +that ran aground.</p> +<p>It was not Norman Anderson who ran aground. He walked into the +store with the proud and manly consciousness of having done his +duty, he made his returns of every cent of money that had come into +his hands, and, like all other faithful stewards, received the +cordial commendation of his master.</p> +<p>But August Wehle the striker, just when he was to be made an +engineer, when he thought he had smooth sailing, suddenly and +provokingly found himself fast aground, with no spar or capstan by +which he might help himself off, with no friendly craft alongside +to throw him a hawser and pull him off.</p> +<p>It seems that when the captain promised him promotion, he did +not know anything of August's interference with the gamblers. But +when Parkins filed his complaint, it touched the captain. It was +generally believed among the <i>employés</i> of the boat +that a percentage of gamblers' gains was one of the "old man's" +perquisites, and he was not the only steamboat captain who profited +by the nice little games in the cabin upon which he closed both +eyes. And this retrieved nine hundred and fifty dollars was a dead +loss of--well, it does not matter how much, to the virtuous and +highly honorable captain. His proportion would have been large +enough at least to pay his wife's pew-rent in St. James's Church, +with a little something over for charitable purposes. For the +captain did not mind giving a disinterested twenty-five dollars +occasionally to those charities that were willing to show their +gratitude by posting his name as director, or his wife's as "Lady +Manageress." In this case his right hand never knew what his left +hand did--how it got the money, for instance.</p> +<p>So when August drew his pay he was informed that he was +discharged. No reason was given. He tried to see the captain. But +the captain was in the bosom of his family, kissing his own +well-dressed little boys, and enjoying the respect which only +exemplary and provident fathers enjoy. And never asking down in his +heart if these boys might become gamblers' victims, or gamblers, +indeed. The captain could not see August the striker, for he was at +home, and must not be interfered with by any of his subordinates. +Besides, it was Sunday, and he could not be intruded upon--the +rector of St. James's was dining with him on his wife's invitation, +and it behooved him to walk circumspectly, not with eye-service as +a man-pleaser, but serving the Lord.</p> +<p>So he refuted to see the anxious striker, and turned to +compliment the rector on his admirable sermon on the sin of Judas, +who sold his master for thirty pieces of silver.</p> +<p>And August Wehle had nothing left to do. The river was falling +fast, the large boats above the Falls were, in steamboat-man's +phrase, "laying up" in the mouths of the tributaries and other +convenient harbors, there were plenty of engineers unemployed, and +there were no vacancies.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXI."></a>CHAPTER XXXI.</h2> +<h3>CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE.</h3> +<br> +<p>Jonas had been all his life, as he expressed it in his mixed +rhetoric, "a wanderin' sand-hill crane, makin' many crooked paths, +and, like the cards in French monte, a-turnin' up suddently in +mighty on-expected places." He had been in every queer place from +Halifax to Texas, and then had come back to his home again. +Naturally cautious, and especially suspicious of the female sex, it +is not strange that he had not married. Only when he "tied up to +the same w'arf-boat alongside of Cynthy Ann, he thought he'd found +somebody as was to be depended on in a fog or a harricane." This he +told to Cynthy Ann as a reason why she should accept his offer of +marriage.</p> +<p>"Jonas," said Cynthy Ann, "don't flatter. My heart is dreadful +weak, and prone to the vanities of this world. It makes me abhor +myself in dust and sackcloth fer you to say such things about poor +unworthy me."</p> +<p>"Ef I think 'em, why shouldn't I say 'em? I don't know no law +agin tellin' the truth ef you git into a place where you can't no +ways help it. I don't call you angel, fer you a'n't; you ha'nt got +no wings nor feathers. I don't say as how as you're pertikeler +knock-down handsome. I don't pertend that you're a spring chicken. +I don't lie nor flatter. I a'n't goin' it blind, like young men in +love. But I do say, with my eyes open and in my right senses, and +feelin' solemn, like a man a-makin' his last will and testament, +that they a'n't no sech another woman to be found outside the leds +of the Bible betwixt the Bay of Fundy and the Rio Grande. I've +'sought round this burdened airth,' as the hymn says, and they +a'n't but jest one. Ef that one'll jest make me happy, I'll fold my +weary pinions and settle down in a rustic log-cabin and raise corn +and potaters till death do us part."</p> +<p>Cynthy trembled. Cynthy was a saint, a martyr to religious +feeling, a medieval nun in her ascetic eschewing of the pleasures +of life. But Cynthy Ann was also a woman. And a woman whose +spring-time had paused. When love buds out thus late, when the +opportunity for the woman's nature to blossom comes unexpectedly +upon one at her age, the temptation is not easily resisted. Cynthy +trembled, but did not quite yield up her Christian constancy.</p> +<p>"Jonas, I don't know whether I'd orto or not. I don't deny--I +think I'd better ax brother Goshorn, you know, sence what would it +profit ef I gained you or any joy in this world, and then come +short by settin' you up fer a idol in my heart? I don't know +whether a New Light is a onbeliever or not, and whether I'd be +onequally yoked or not. I must ax them as knows better nor I +do."</p> +<p>"Well, ef I'm a onbeliever, they's nobody as could teach me to +believe quicker'n you could. I never did believe much in women +folks till I believed in you."</p> +<p>"But that's the sin of it, Jonas. I'd believe in you, and you'd +believe in me, and we'd be puttin' our trust in the creatur instid +of the Creator, and the Creator is mighty jealous of our idols, and +He would take us away fer idolatry."</p> +<p>"No, but I wouldn't worship you, though I'd rather worship you +than anybody else ef I was goin' into the worshipin' business. But +you see I a'n't, honey. I wouldn't sacrifice to you no lambs nor +sheep, I wouldn't pray to you, nor I wouldn't kiss your shoes, like +people does the Pope's. An' I know you wouldn't make no idol of me +like them Greek gods that Andrew's got picters of. I a'n't handsome +enough by a long shot fer a Jupiter or a 'Pollo. An' I tell you, +Cynthy, 'tain't no sin to love. Love is the fullfilling of the +law."</p> +<p>But Cynthy Ann persisted that she must consult Brother Goshorn, +the antiquated class-leader at the cross-roads. Brother Goshorn was +a good man, but Jonas had a great contempt for him. He was a +strainer out of gnats, though I do not think he swallowed camels. +He always stood at the door of the love-feast and kept out every +woman with jewelry, every girl who had an "artificial" in her +bonnet, every one who wore curls, every man whose hair was beyond +what he considered the regulation length of Scripture, and every +woman who wore a veil. In support of this last prohibition he +quoted Isaiah iii, 23: "The glasses and the fine linen and the +hoods and the veils."</p> +<p>To him Cynthy Ann presented the case with much trepidation. All +her hopes for this world hung upon it. But this consideration did +not greatly affect Brother Goshorn. Hopes and joys were as nothing +to him where the strictness of discipline was involved. The +Discipline meant more to a mind of his cast than the Decalogue or +the Beatitudes. He shook his head. He did not know. He must consult +Brother Hall. Now, Brother Hall was the young preacher traveling +his second year, very young and very callow. Ten years of the sharp +attritions of a Methodist itinerant's life would take his +unworldliness out of him and develop his practical sense as no +other school in the world could develop it. But as yet Brother Hall +had not rubbed off any of his sanctimoniousness, had not lost any +of his belief that the universe should be governed on high general +principles with no exceptions.</p> +<p>So when Brother Goshorn informed him that one of his members, +Sister Cynthy Ann Dyke, wished to marry, and to marry a man that +was a New Light, and had asked his opinion, and that he did not +certainly know whether New Lights were believers or not, Brother +Hall did not stop to inquire what Jonas might be personally. He +looked and felt very solemn, and said that it was a pity for a +Christian to marry a New Light. It was clearly a sin, for a New +Light was an Arian. And an Arian was just as good as an infidel. An +Arian robbed Christ of His supreme deity, and since he did not +worship the Trinity in the orthodox sense he must worship a false +god. He was an idolater therefore, and it was a sin to be yoked +together with such an one.</p> +<p>Many men more learned than the callow but pious and sincere +Brother Hall have left us in print just such deductions.</p> +<p>When this decision was communicated to the scrupulous Cynthy +Ann, she folded her hopes as one lays away the garment of a dead +friend; she west to her little room and prayed; she offered a +sacrifice to God not less costly than Abraham's, and in a like +sublime spirit. She watered the plant In the old cracked +blue-and-white tea-pot, she noticed that it was just about to +bloom, and then she dropped one tear upon it, and because it +suggested Jonas in some way, she threw it away, resolved not to +have any idols in her heart. And, doubtless, God received the +sacrifice, mistaken and needless as it was, a token of the +faithfulness of her heart to her duty as she understood it.</p> +<br> +<a name="204.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/204.jpg"><img src="images/204.jpg" +width="40%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE.</b></p> +<br> +<p>Cynthy Ann explained it all to Jonas in a severe and irrevocable +way. Jonas looked at her a moment, stunned.</p> +<p>"Did Brother Goshorn venture to send me any of his wisdom, in +the way of advice, layin' round loose, like counterfeit small +change, cheap as dirt?"</p> +<p>"Well, yes," said Cynthy Ann, hesitating.</p> +<p>"I'll bet the heft of my fortin', to be paid on receipt of the +amount, that I kin tell to a T what the good Christian wanted me to +do."</p> +<p>"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas. Brother Goshorn is a mighty +sincere man."</p> +<p>"So he is, but his bein' sincere don't do me no good. He wanted +you to advise me to jine the Methodist class as a way of gittin' +out of the difficulty. And you was too good a Christian to ask me +to change fer any sech reason, knowin' I wouldn't be fit for you ef +I did."</p> +<p>Cynthy Ann was silent. She would have liked to have Jonas join +the church with her, but if he had done it now she herself would +have doubted his sincerity.</p> +<p>"Now, looky here, Cynthy, ef you'll say you don't love me, and +never can, I'll leave you to wunst, and fly away and mourn like a +turtle-dove. But so long as it's nobody but Goshorn, I'm goin' to +stay and litigate the question till the Millerite millennium comes. +I appeal to Cæesar or somebody else. Neither Brother Goshorn +nor Brother Hall knows enough to settle this question. I'm agoin' +to the persidin' elder. And you can't try a man and hang him and +then send him to the penitentiary fer the rest of his born days +without givin' him one chance to speak fer hisself agin the world +and everybody else. I'm goin' to see the persidin' elder myself and +plead my own cause, and ef he goes agin me, I'll carry it up to the +bishop or the archbishop or the nex' highest man in the heap, till +I git plum to the top, and ef they all go agin me, I'll begin over +agin at the bottom with Brother Goshorn, and keep on till I find a +man that's got common-sense enough to salt his religion with."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXII."></a>CHAPTER XXXII.</h2> +<h3>JULIA'S ENTERPRISE.</h3> +<br> +<p>August was very sick at the castle. This wag the first news of +his return that reached Julia through Jonas and Cynthy Ann.</p> +<p>But in my interest in Jonas and Cynthy Ann, of whom I think a +great deal, I forgot to say that long before the events mentioned +in the last chapter, Humphreys had been suddenly called away from +his peaceful retreat in the hill country of Clark township. In +fact, the "important business," or "the illness of a friend," +whichever it was, occurred the very next day after Norman +Anderson's father returned from Louisville, and reported that he +had secured for his son an "outside situation," that is to say, a +place as a collector.</p> +<p>When he had gone, Jonas remarked to Cynthy Ann, "Where the +carcass is, there the turkey-buzzards is gethered. That shinin' +example of early piety never plays but one game. That is, +fox-and-geese. He's gone after a green goslin' now, and he'll find +him when he's fattest."</p> +<p>But the gentle singing-master had come back from his excursion, +and was taking a profound interest in the coming end of the world. +Jonas observed that it "seemed like as ef he hed charge of the +whole performance, and meant to shet up the sky like a blue cotton +umbrell. He's got a single eye, and it's the same ole game. Fox and +geese always, and he's the fox."</p> +<p>Humphreys still lived at Samuel Anderson's, still devoted +himself to pleasing Mrs. Abigail, still bowed regretfully to Julia, +and spoke caressingly to Betsey Malcolm at every opportunity.</p> +<p>But August was sick at the castle. He was very sick. Every +morning Dr. Dibrell, a "calomel-doctor"--not a steam-doctor--rode +by the house on his way to Andrew's, and every morning Mrs. +Anderson wondered afresh who was sick down that way. But the doctor +staid so long that Mrs. Abigail made up her mind it must be +somebody four or five miles away, and so dismissed the matter from +her mind. For August's return had been kept secret.</p> +<p>But Julia noticed, in her heart of hearts, and with +ever-increasing affliction, that the doctor staid longer each day +than on the day before, and she thought she noticed also an +increasing anxiety on his face as he rode home again. Her desire to +know the real truth, and to see August, to do for him, to give her +life for him, were wearing her away. It is hard to see a friend go +from you when you have done everything. But to have a friend die +within your reach, while you are yet unable to help him, is the +saddest of all. All this anxiety Julia suffered without even the +blessed privilege of showing it. The pent-up fire consumed her, and +she was at times almost distract. Every morning she managed to be +on the upper porch when the doctor went by, and from the same +watch-tower she studied his face when he went back.</p> +<p>Then came a morning when there were two doctors. A physician +from the county-seat village went by, in company with Dr. Dibrell. +So there must be a consultation at the castle. Julia knew then that +the worst had to be looked in the face. And she longed to get away +from under the searching black eyes of her mother and utter the +long-pent cry of anguish. Another day of such unuttered pain would +drive her clean mad.</p> +<p>That evening Jonas came over and sought an interview with Cynthy +Ann. He had not been to see her since his unsuccessful courtship. +Julia felt that he was the bearer of a message. But Mrs. Anderson +was in one of her most exacting humors, and it gave her not a +little pleasure to keep Cynthy Ann, on one pretext and another, all +the evening at her side. Had Cynthy Ann been less submissive and +scrupulous, she might have broken away from this restraint, but in +truth she was censuring herself for having any backsliding, +rebellious wish to talk with Jonas after she had imagined the idol +cast out of her heart entirely. Her conscience was a tank-master +not less grievous than Mrs. Anderson, and, between the two, Jonas +had to go away without leaving his message. And Julia had to keep +her breaking heart in suspense a while longer.</p> +<p>Why did she not elope long ago and get rid of her mother? +Because she was Julia, and being Julia, conscientious, true, and +filial in spite of her unhappy life, her own character built a wall +against such a disobedience. Nearly all limitations are inside. You +could do almost anything if you could give yourself up to it. To go +in the teeth of one's family is the one thing that a person of +Julia's character and habits finds next to impossible. A beneficent +limitation of nature; for the cases in which the judgment of a girl +of eighteen is better than that of her parents are very few. +Besides, the inevitable "heart-disease" was a specter that guarded +the gates of Julia's prison. Night after night she sat looking out +over the hills sleeping in hazy darkness, toward the hollow in +which stood the castle; night after night she had half-formed the +purpose of visiting August, and then the life-long habit of +obedience and a certain sense of delicacy held her back. But on +this night, after the consultation, she felt that she would see him +if her seeing him brought down the heavens.</p> +<p>It was a very dark night. She sat waiting for hours--very long +hours they seemed to her--and then, at midnight, she began to get +ready to start.</p> +<p>Only those who have taken such a step can understand the pain of +deciding, the agony of misgivings in the execution, the trembling +that Julia felt when she turned the brass knob on the front door +and lifted the latch--lifted the latch slowly and cautiously, for +it was near the door of her mother's room--and then crept out like +a guilty thing into the dark dampness of the night, groping her way +to the gate, and stumbling along down the road. It had been +raining, and there was not one star-twinkle in the sky; the only +light was that of glow-worms illuminating here and there two or +three blades of grass by feeble shining. Now and then a fire-fly +made a spot of light in the blackness, only to leave a deeper spot +of blackness when he shut off his intermittent ray. And when at +last Julia found herself at the place where the path entered the +woods, the blackness ahead seemed still more frightful. She had to +grope, recognizing every deviation from the well-beaten path by the +rustle of the dead leaves which lay, even in summer, half a foot +deep upon the ground. The "fox-fire," rotting logs glowing with a +faint luminosity, startled her several times, and the hooting-owl's +shuddering bass--hoo! hoo! hoo-oo-ah-h! (like the awful keys of the +organ which "touch the spinal cord of the universe")--sent all her +blood to her heart. Under ordinary circumstances, she surely would +not have started at the rustling made by the timid hare in the +thicket near by. There was no reason why she should shiver so when +a misstep caused her to scratch her face with the thorny twigs of a +wild plum-tree. But the effort necessary to the undertaking and the +agony of the long waiting had exhausted her nervous force, and she +had none left for fortitude. So that when she arrived at Andrew's +fence and felt her way along to the gate, and heard the hoarse, +thunderous baying of his great St. Bernard dog, she was ready to +faint. But a true instinct makes such a dog gallant. It is a vile +cur that will harm a lady. Julia walked trembling up to the +front-door of the castle, growled at by the huge black beast, and +when the Philosopher admitted her, some time after she had knocked, +she sank down fainting into a chair.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIII."></a>CHAPTER XXXIII.</h2> +<h3>THE SECRET STAIRWAY.</h3> +<br> +<p>"God bless you!" said Andrew as he handed her a gourd of water +to revive her. "You are as faithful as Hero. You are another +Heloise. You are as brave as the Maid of Orleans. I will never say +that women are unfaithful again. God bless you, my daughter! You +have given me faith in your sex. I have been a lonely man; a +boughless, leafless trunk, shaken by the winter winds. But +<i>you</i> are my niece. <i>You</i> know how to be faithful. I am +proud of you! Henceforth I call you my daughter. If you <i>were</i> +my daughter, you would be to me all that Margaret Roper was to Sir +Thomas More." And the shaggy man of egotistic and pedantic speech, +but of womanly sensibilities, was weeping.</p> +<p>The reviving Julia begged to know how August was.</p> +<p>"Ah, constant heart! And he is constant as you are. Noble +fellow! I will not deceive you. The doctors think that he will not +live more than twenty-four hours. But he is only dying to see you, +now. Your coming may revive him. We sent for you this morning by +Jonas, hoping you might escape and come in some way. But Jonas +could not get his message to you. Some angel must have brought you. +It is an augury of good."</p> +<p>The hopefulness of Andrew sprang out of his faith in an ideal, +right outcome. Julia could not conceal from herself the fact that +his opinion had no ground. But in such a strait as hers, she could +not help clinging even to this support.</p> +<p>Andrew was a little perplexed. How to take Julia up-stairs? Mrs. +Wehle and Wilhelmina and the doctor went in regularly, not by the +rope-ladder, but by a more secure wooden one which he had planted +against the outside of the house. But Andrew had suddenly conceived +so exalted an opinion of his niece's virtues that he was unwilling +to lead her into the upper story in that fashion. His imagination +had invested her with all the glories of all the heroines, from +Penelope to Beatrice, and from Beatrice to Scott's Rebecca. At last +a sudden impulse seized him.</p> +<p>"My dear daughter, they say that genius is to madness close +allied. When I built this house I was in a state bordering on +insanity, I suppose. I pleased my whims--my whims were my only +company--I pleased my whims in building an American castle. These +whims begin to seem childish to me now. I put in a secret stairway. +No human foot but my own has ever trodden it. August, whom I love +more than any other, and who is one of the few admitted to my +library, has always ascended by the rope-ladder. But you are my +niece; I would you were my daughter. I will signalize my reverence +for you by showing up the stairway the woman who knows how to love +and be faithful, the feet that would be worthy of golden steps if I +had them. Come."</p> +<p>Spite of her grief and anxiety, Julia was impressed and +oppressed with the reverence shown her by her uncle. She had a +veneration almost superstitious for the Philosopher's learning. She +was not accustomed to even respectful treatment, and to be +worshiped in this awful way by such a man was something almost as +painful as it was pleasant.</p> +<p>The entrance to the stairway, if that could be called a stairway +which was as difficult of ascent as a ladder, was through a closet +by the side of the donjon chimney, and the logs had been so +arranged without and within that the space occupied by the narrow +and zigzag stairs was not apparent. Up these stairs he took Julia, +leaving her in a closet above. As this closet was situated +alongside the chimney, it opened, of course, into the small corner +room which I have before described, and in which August was now +lying. Andrew descended the stairs and entered the upper story +again by the outside ladder. He thought best to prepare August for +the coming of Julia, lest joy should destroy a life that was so far +wasted.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIV."></a>CHAPTER XXXIV.</h2> +<h3>THE INTERVIEW.</h3> +<br> +<p>We left August on that summer day on the levee at Louisville +without employment. He was not exactly disheartened, but he was +homesick. That he was forbidden to go back by threats of +prosecution for his burglarious manner of entering Samuel +Anderson's house was reason enough for wanting to go; that his +father's family were not yet free from danger was a stronger +reason; but strongest of all, though he blushed to own it to +himself, was the longing to be where he might perchance sometimes +see the face he had seen that spring morning in the bottom of a +sun-bonnet. Right manfully did he fight against his discouragement +and his homesickness, and his longing to see Julia. It was better +to stay where he was. It was better not to go back beaten. If he +surrendered so easily, he would never put himself into a situation +where he could claim Julia with self-respect. He would stay and +make his way in the world somehow. But making his way in the world +did not seem half so easy now us it had on that other morning in +March when he stood in the barn talking to Julia. Making your +fortune always seems so easy until you've tried it. It seems rather +easy in a novel, and still easier in a biography. But no Samuel +Smiles ever writes the history of those who fail; the vessels that +never came back from their venturous voyages left us no log-books. +Many have written the History of Success. What melancholy Plutarch +shall arise to record, with a pen dipped in wormwood, the History +of Failure?</p> +<p>No! he would not go back defeated. August said this over +bravely, but a little too often, and with a less resolute tone at +each repetition. He contemned himself for his weakness, and tried, +but tried in vain, to form other plans. Had he known how much one's +physical state has to do with one's force of character, he might +have guessed that he did not deserve the blame he meted out to +himself. He might have remembered what Shakespeare's Portia says to +Brutus, that "humour hath his hour with every man." But with a dull +and unaccountable aching in his head and back he compromised with +himself. He would go to the castle and pass a day or two. Then he +would return and fight it out.</p> +<p>So he got on the packet Isaac Shelby, and was soon shaking with +a chill that showed how thoroughly malaria had pervaded his system. +His very bones seemed frozen. But if you ever shook with such a +chill, or rather if you were ever shaken by such a chill, taking +hold of you like a demoniacal possession; if you ever felt your +brain congealing, your icy bones breaking, your frosty heart +becoming paralyzed, with a cold no fire could reach, you know what +it is; and if you have not felt it, no words of mine can make you +understand the sensations. After the chill came the period when +August felt himself between two parts of Milton's hell, between a +sea of ice and a sea of fire; sometimes the hot wave scorched him, +then it retired again before the icy one. At last it was all hot, +and the boiling blood scalded his palms and steamed to his brain, +bewildering his thoughts and almost blinding his eyes. He had +determined when he started to get off at a wood-yard three miles +below Andrew's castle, to avoid observation and the chance of +arrest; and now in his delirium the purpose as he had planned it +remained fixed. He got up at two o'clock, crazed with fever, +dressed himself, and went out into the rainy night. He went ashore +in the mud and bushes, and, guided more by instinct than by any +conscious thought, he started up the wagon-track along the river +bank. His furious fever drove him on, talking to himself, and +splashing recklessly into the pools of rain-water standing in the +road. He never remembered his debarkation. He must have fallen once +or twice, for he was covered with mud when he rang the alarm at the +castle. In answer to Andrew's "Who's there?" he answered, "You'll +have to send a harder rain than that if you want to put this fire +out!"</p> +<p>And so, what with the original disease, the mental +discouragement, and the exposure to the rain, the fever had +well-nigh consumed the life, and now that the waves of the hot sea +after days of fire and nights of delirium had gone back, there was +hardly any life left in the body, and the doctors said there was no +hope. One consuming desire remained. He wanted to see Julia once +before he went away; and that one desire it seemed impossible to +gratify. When he learned of the failure of Jonas to get any message +to Julia through Cynthy, he had felt the keenest disappointment, +and had evidently been sinking since the hope that kept him up had +been taken away.</p> +<p>The mother sat by his bed, Gottlieb sat stupefied at the foot, +with Jonas by his side, and Wilhelmina was crying in a still +fashion in one corner of the room. August lay breathing feebly, and +with his life evidently ebbing.</p> +<p>"August!" said Andrew, as he stood over his bed, having come to +announce the arrival of Julia. "August!" Andrew tried to speak +quietly, but there was a something of hope in the inflection, a +tremor of eagerness in the utterance, that made the mother look up +quickly and inquiringly.</p> +<p>August opened his eyes slowly and looked into the face of the +Philosopher. Then he slowly closed his eyes again, and a something, +not a smile--he was too weak for that--but a look of infinite +content, spread over his wan face.</p> +<p>"I know," he whisperd.</p> +<p>"Know what?" asked Andrew, leaning down to catch his words.</p> +<p>"Julia." And a single tear crept out from under the closed lid. +The tender mother wiped it away.</p> +<p>After resting a moment, August looked up at Andrew's face +inquiringly.</p> +<p>"She is coming," said the Philosopher.</p> +<p>August smiled very faintly, but Andrew was sure he smiled, and +again leaned down his ear.</p> +<p>"She is here," whispered August; "I heard Charon bark, and +I--saw--your--face."</p> +<p>Andrew now stepped to the closet-door and opened it, and Julia +came out.</p> +<p>"Blamed ef he a'n't a witch!" whispered Jonas. "Cunjures a angel +out of his cupboard!"</p> +<p>Julia did not see anybody or anything but the white and wasted +face upon the pillow. The eyes were now closed again, and she +quickly crossed the floor, and--not without a faint maidenly +blush--stooped and kissed the parched lips, from which the life +seemed already to have fled.</p> +<p>And August with difficulty disengaged his wasted hand from the +cover, and laid his nerveless fingers--alas! like a skeleton's +now--In the warm hand of Julia, and said--she leaned down to +listen, an he whispered feebly through his dry lips out of a full +heart--"Thank God!"</p> +<p>And the Philosopher, catching the words, said audibly, +"Amen!"</p> +<p>And the mother only wept.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXV."></a>CHAPTER XXXV.</h2> +<h3>GETTING READY FOR THE END.</h3> +<br> +<p>How Julia spent two hours of blessed sadness at the castle; how +August slept peacefully for five minutes at a time with his hand in +hers, and then awoke and looked at her, and then slumbered again; +how she moistened his parched lips for him, and gave him wine; how +at last she had to bid him a painful farewell; how the mother gave +her a benediction in German and a kiss; how Wilhelmina clung to her +with tears; how Jonas called her a turtle-dove angel; how Brother +Hall, the preacher who had been sent for at the mother's request, +to converse with the dying man, spoke a few consoling words to her; +how Gottlieb confided to Jonas his intention never to "sprach nodin +'pout Yangee kirls no more;" and how at last Uncle Andrew walked +home with her, I have not time to tell. When the Philosopher bade +her adieu, he called her names which she did not understand. But +she turned back to him, and after a minute's hesitation, spoke +huskily. "Uncle Andrew if he--if he should get worse--I want--"</p> +<p>"I know, my daughter; you want him to die your husband?"</p> +<p>"Yes, if he wishes it. Send for me day or night, and I'll come +in spite of everybody."</p> +<p>"God bless you, my daughter!" said Andrew. And he watched until +she got safely into the house without discovery, and then he went +back satisfied and proud.</p> +<p>Of course August died, and Julia devoted herself to +philanthropic labors. It is the fashion now for novels to end thus +sadly, and you would not have me be out of the fashion.</p> +<p>But August did not die. Joy is a better stimulant than wine. +Love is the best tonic in the pharmacopeia. And from the hour in +which August Wehle looked into the eyes of Julia, the tide of life +set back again. Not perceptibly at first. For two days he was +neither better nor worse. But this was a gain. Then slowly he came +back to life. But at Andrew's instance he kept indoors while +Humphreys staid.</p> +<p>Humphreys, on his part, like Ananias, pretended to have disposed +of all his property, paid his debts, reserved enough to live on +until the approaching day of doom, and given the rest to the poor +of the household of faith, and there were several others who were +sincere enough to do what he only pretended.</p> +<p>Among the leading Adventists was "Dr." Ketchup, who still dealt +out corn-sweats and ginseng-tea, but who refused to sell his +property. He excused himself by quoting the injunction, "Occupy +till I come." But others sold their estates for trifles, and gave +themselves up to proclaiming the millennium.</p> +<p>Mrs. Abigail Anderson was a woman who did nothing by halves. She +was vixenish, she was selfish, she was dishonest and grasping; but +she was religious. If any man think this paradox impossible, he has +observed character superficially. There are criminals in +State's-prison who have been very devout all their lives. Religious +questions took hold of Mrs. Anderson's whole nature. She was +superstitious, narrow, and intense. She was as sure that the day of +judgment would be proclaimed on the eleventh of August, 1843, as +she was of her life. No consideration in opposition to any belief +of hers weighed a feather with her. Her will mastered her judgment +and conscience.</p> +<p>And so she determined that Samuel must sell his property for a +trifle. How far she was influenced in this by a sincere desire to +square all outstanding debts before the final settlement, how far +by a longing to be considered the foremost and most pious of all, +and how far by business shrewdness based on that feeling which +still lurks in the most protestant people, that such sacrifices do +improve their state in a future world, I can not tell. Doubtless +fanaticism, hypocrisy, and a self-interest that looked sordidly +even at heaven, mingled in bringing about the decision. At any +rate, the property was to be sold for a few hundred dollars.</p> +<p>Getting wind of this decision, Andrew promptly appeared at his +brother's house and offered to buy it. But Mrs. Abigail couldn't +think of it. Andrew had always been her enemy, and though she +forgave him, she would not on any account sell him an inch of the +land. It would not be right. He had claimed that part of it +belonged to him, and to let him have it would be to admit his +claim.</p> +<p>"Andrew," she said, "you do not believe in the millennium, and +people say that you are a skeptic. You want to cheat us out of what +you think a valuable piece of property. And you'll find yourself at +the last judgment with the weight of this sin on your heart. You +will, indeed!"</p> +<p>"How clearly you reason about other people's duty!" said the +Philosopher. "If you had seen your own duty half so clearly, some +of us would have been better off, and your account would have been +straighter."</p> +<p>Here Mrs. Anderson grew very angry, and vented her spleen in a +solemn exhortation to Andrew to get ready for the coming of the +Master, not three weeks off at the farthest, and she warned him +that the archangel might blow his trumpet at any moment. Then where +would he be? she asked in exultation. Human meanness is never so +pitiful as when it tries to seize on God's judgments as weapons +with which to gratify its own spites. I trust this remark will not +be considered as applying only to Mrs. Anderson.</p> +<p>But Mrs. Anderson fired off all the heavenly small-shot she +could find in the teeth and eyes of Andrew, and then, to prevent a +rejoinder, she told him it was time for her to go to secret prayer, +and she only stopped upon the threshold to send back one Parthian +arrow in the shape of a warning to "watch and be ready."</p> +<p>I wonder if a certain class of religious people have ever +thought how much their exclusiveness and Pharisaism have to do with +the unhappy fruitlessness of all their appeals! Had Mrs. Anderson +been as blameless as an angel, such exhortations would have driven +a weaker than Andrew to hate the name of religion.</p> +<p>But I must not moralize, for Mr. Humphreys has already divulged +his plan of disposing of the property. He has a friend, one Thomas +A. Parkins, who has money, and who will buy the farm at two hundred +dollars. He could procure the money in advance any day by going to +the village of Bethany, the county-seat, and drawing on Mr. +Parkins, and cashing the draft. It was a matter of indifference to +him, he said, only that he would like to oblige so good a +friend.</p> +<p>This arrangement, by which the Anderson farm was to be sold for +a song to some distant stranger, pleased Mrs. Abigail. She could +not bear that one of her unbelieving neighbors should even for a +fortnight rejoice in a supposed good bargain at her expense. To +sell to Mr. Humphreys's friend in Louisville was just the thing. +When pressed by some of her neighbors who had not received the +Adventist gospel, to tell on what principle she could justify her +sale of the farm at all, she answered that if the farm would not be +of any account after the end of the world, neither would the +money.</p> +<p>Mr. Humphreys went down to the town of Bethany and came back, +affecting to have cashed a draft on his friend for two hundred +dollars. The deeds were drawn, and a justice of the peace was to +come the next morning and take the acknowledgment of Mr. and Mrs. +Anderson.</p> +<p>This was what Jonas learned as he sat in the kitchen talking to +Cynthy Ann. He had come to bring some message from the convalescent +August, and had been detained by the attraction of adhesion.</p> +<p>"I told you it was fox-and-geese. Didn't I? And so Thomas A. +Parkins <i>is</i> his name. Gus Wehle said he'd bet the two was +one. Well, I must drive this varmint off afore he gits his +chickens."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVI."></a>CHAPTER XXXVI.</h2> +<h3>THE SIN OF SANCTIMONY.</h3> +<br> +<p>Just at this point arrived Mr. Hall, whom I have before +described as the good but callow Methodist preacher on the circuit. +Some people think that a minister of the gospel should be exempt +from criticism, ridicule, and military duty. But the manly minister +takes his lot with the rest. Nothing could be more pernicious than +making the foibles of a minister sacred. Doubtless Mr. Hall has +long since come to laugh at his own early follies, his official +sanctimoniousness, and all that; and why should not I, who have +been a callow circuit-preacher myself in my day, laugh at my +Brother Hall, for the good of his kind?</p> +<p>He had come to visit Sister Cynthy Ann, whose name had long +stood on the class-book at Harden's Cross-Roads as a good and +acceptable member of the church in full connection. He was visiting +formally and officially each family in which there was a member. +Had he visited informally and unofficially, and like a man instead +of like a minister, he would have done more good. But he came to +Samuel Anderson's, and informed Mrs. Anderson that he was visiting +his members, and that as one of her household was a member, he +would like to have a little religious conversation and prayer with +the family. Would she please gather them together?</p> +<p>So Julia was called down-stairs, and Jonas was invited in from +the kitchen. The sight of him distressed Brother Hall. For was not +this New Light sent here by Satan to lead astray one of his flock? +But, at least, he would labor faithfully with him.</p> +<p>He began with Mr. Samuel Anderson. But that worthy, after +looking at his wife in vain for a cue, darted off about the +trumpets of the Apocalypse.</p> +<p>"Mr. Anderson, as head of this family, your responsibility is +very great. Do you feel the full assurance, my brother?" asked Mr. +Hall.</p> +<p>"Yes," said Mr. Anderson, "I am standing with my lamp trimmed +and ready. I am listening for the midnight shout. To-night the +trumpet may sound. I am afraid you don't do your duty, or you would +lift up your voice. The tune and times and a half are almost +out."</p> +<p>Mr. Hall was a little dashed at this. A man whose religious +conversation is of a set and conventional type, is always shocked +and jostled when he is thrown from the track. And he himself, like +everybody else, had felt the Adventist infection, and did not want +to commit himself. So he turned to Mrs. Anderson. She answered like +a seraph every question put to her--the conventional questions +never pierce the armor of a hypocrite or startle the conscience of +a self-deceiver. Mr. Hall congratulated her in his most official +tone (a compound of authority, awfulness, and sanctity) on her deep +experience of the things that made for her everlasting peace. He +told her that people of her high attainments must beware of +spiritual pride. And Mrs. Anderson took the warning with beautiful +meekness, sinking into forty fathoms of undisguised and rather +ostentatious humility, heaving solemn sighs in token of +self-reproach--a self-reproach that did not penetrate the +cuticle.</p> +<br> +<a name="227.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/227.jpg"><img src="images/227.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>A PASTORAL VISIT.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"And you, Sister Cynthy Ann," he said, fighting shy of Jonas for +the present, "I trust you are trying to let your light shine. Do +you feel that you are pressing on?"</p> +<p>Poor Cynthy Ann sank into a despondency deeper than usual. She +was afeard not. Seemed like as ef her heart was cold and dead to +God. Seemed like as ef she couldn't no ways gin up the world. It +weighed her down like a rock, and many was the fight she had with +the enemy. No, she wuzn't getting on.</p> +<p>"My dear sister," said Mr. Hall, "let me warn you. Here is Mrs. +Anderson, who has given up the world entirely. I hope you'll follow +so good an example. Do not be led astray by worldly affections; +they are sure to entrap you. I am afraid you have not maintained +your steadfastness as you should." Here Mr. Hall's eye wandered +doubtfully to Jonas, of whom he felt a little afraid. Jonas, on his +part, had no reason to like Mr. Hall for his advice in Cynthy's +love affair, and now the minister's praises of Mrs. Anderson and +condemnation of Cynthy Ann had not put him in any mood to listen to +exhortation.</p> +<p>"Well, Mr. Harrison," said the young minister solemnly, +approaching Jonas much as a dog does a hedgehog, "how do you feel +to-day?"</p> +<p>"Middlin' peart, I thank you; how's yourself?"</p> +<p>This upset the good man not a little, and convinced him that +Jonas was in a state of extreme wickedness.</p> +<p>"Are you a Christian?"</p> +<p>"Wal, I 'low I am. How about yourself, Mr. Hall?"</p> +<p>"I believe you are a New Light. Now, do you believe in the Lord +Jesus Christ?" asked the minister in an annihilating tone.</p> +<p>"Yes, I do, my aged friend, a heap sight more'n I do in some of +them that purtends to hev a paytent right on all his blessins, and +that put on solemn airs and call other denominations hard names. My +friend, I don't believe in no religion that's made up of sighs and +groans and high temper" (with a glance at Mrs. Anderson), "and that +thinks a good deal more of its bein' sound in doctrine than of the +danger of bein' rotten in life. They's lots o' bad eggs got slick +and shiny shells!"</p> +<p>Mr. Hall happened to think just here of the injunction against +throwing pearls before swine, and so turned to Humphreys, who made +his heart glad by witnessing a good confession, in soft and +unctuous tones, and couched in the regulation phrases which have +worn smooth in long use.</p> +<p>Julia had slunk away in a corner. But now he appealed to her +also.</p> +<p>"Blest with a praying mother, you, Miss Anderson, ought to +repent of your sins and flee from the wrath to come. You know the +right way. You have been pointed to it by the life of your parents +from childhood. Reared in the bosom of a Christian household, let +me entreat you to seek salvation immediately."</p> +<p>I do not like to repeat this talk here. But it is an unfortunate +fact that goodness and self-sacrificing piety do not always go with +practical wisdom. The novelist, like the historian, must set down +things as he finds them. A man who talks in consecrated phrases is +yet in the poll-parrot state of mental development.</p> +<p>"Do you feel a desire to flee from the wrath to come?" he +asked.</p> +<p>Julia gave some sort of inaudible assent.</p> +<p>"My dear young sister, you have great reason to be +thankful--very great reason for gratitude to Almighty God." (Like +many other pious young men, Mr. Hall said <i>Gawd</i>.) "I met you +the other night at your uncle's. The young man whose life we then +despaired of has recovered." And with more of this, Mr. Hall told +Julia's secret, while Mrs. Anderson, between her anger and her rapt +condition of mind, seemed to be petrifying.</p> +<p>I trust the reader does not expect me to describe the feelings +of Julia while Mr. Hall read a chapter and prayed. Nor the emotions +of Mrs. Anderson. I think if Mr. Hall could have heard her grind +her teeth while he in his prayer gave thanks for the recovery of +August, he would not have thought so highly of her piety. But she +managed to control her emotions until the minister was fairly out +of the house. In bidding good-by, Mr. Hall saw how pale and +tremulous Julia was, and with his characteristic lack of sagacity, +he took her emotion to be a sign of religious feelings and told her +he was pleased to see that she was awakened to a sense of her +condition.</p> +<p>And then he left. And then came the deluge.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVII."></a>CHAPTER XXXVII.</h2> +<h3>THE DELUGE.</h3> +<br> +<p>The indescribable deluge! But, after all, the worst of anything +of that sort is the moment before it begins. A plunge-bath, a +tooth-pulling, an amputation, and a dress-party are all worse in +anticipation than in the moment of infliction. Julia, as she stood +busily sticking a pin in the window-sash, waiting for her mother to +begin, wished that the storm might burst, and be done with it. But +Mrs. Anderson understood her business too well for that. She knew +the value of the awful moments of silence before beginning. She had +not practiced all her life without learning the fine art of torture +in its exquisite details. I doubt not the black-robed fathers of +the Holy Office were leisurely gentlemen, giving their victims +plenty of time for anticipatory meditation, laying out their +utensils quietly, inspecting the thumb-screw affectionately to make +sure that it would work smoothly, discussing the rack and wheel +with much tender forethought, as though torture were a sweet thing, +to be reserved like a little girl's candy lamb, and only resorted +to when the appetite has been duly whetted by contemplation. I +never had the pleasure of knowing an inquisitor, and I can not +certify that they were of this deliberate fashion. But it "stands +to nature" that they were. For the vixens who are vixens of the +highest quality, are always deliberate.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson felt that the piece of invective which she was +about to undertake, was not to be taken in hand unadvisedly, "but +reverently, discreetly, and in the fear of God." And so she paused, +and Julia fumbled the tassel of the window-curtain, and trembled +with the chill of expectation. And Mrs. Abigail continued to debate +how she might make this, which would doubtless be her last outburst +before the day of judgment, her masterpiece--worthy song of the +dying swan. And then she hoped, she sincerely hoped, to be able by +this awful <i>coup de main</i> to awaken Julia to a sense of her +sinfulness. For there was such a jumble of mixed motives in her +mind, that one could never distinguish her sincerity from her +hypocrisy.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson's conscience was quite an objective one. As Jonas +often remarked, "she had a feelin' sense of other folkses +unworthiness." And the sins which she appreciated were generally +sins against herself. Julia's disobedience to herself was darker in +her mind than murder committed on anybody else would have been. And +now she sat deliberating, not on the limit of the verbal punishment +she meant to inflict--that gave her no concern--but on her ability +to do the matter justice. Even as a tyrannical backwoods +school-master straightens his long beech-rod relishfully before +applying it.</p> +<p>Not that Mrs. Anderson was silent all this time. She was sighing +and groaning in a spasmodic devotion. She was "seeking strength +from above to do her whole duty," she would have told you. She was +"agonizing" in prayer for her daughter, and she contrived that her +stage-whisper praying should now and then reach the ears of its +devoted object. Humphreys remained seated, pretending to read the +copy of "Josephus," but watching the coming storm with the interest +of a connoisseur. And while he remained Jonas determined to stay, +to keep Julia in countenance, and he beckoned to Cynthy to stay +also. And Samuel Anderson, who loved his daughter and feared his +wife, fled like a coward from the coming scene. Everybody expected +Mrs. Anderson to break out like a fury.</p> +<p>But she knew a better plan than that. She felt a new device come +like an inspiration. And perhaps it was. It really seemed to Jonas +that the devil helped her. For instead of breaking out into +commonplace scolding, the resources of which she had long since +exhausted, she dropped upon her knees, and began to pray for +Julia.</p> +<p>No swearer ever curses like the priest who veils his personal +spites in official and pious denunciations, and Mrs. Anderson had +never dealt out abuse so roundly and terribly and crushingly, as +she did under the guise of praying for the salvation of Julia's +soul from well-deserved perdition. But Abigail did not say +perdition. She left that to weak spirits. She thought it a virtue +to say "hell" with unction and emphasis, by way of alarming the +consciences of sinners. Mrs. Anderson's prayer is not reportable. +That sort of profanity is too bad to write. She capped her +climax--even as I have heard a revivalist pray for a scoffer that +had vexed his righteous soul--by asking God to convert her +daughter, or if she could not be converted to take her away, that +she might not heap up wrath against the day of wrath. For that sort +of religious excitement which does not quiet the evil passions, +seems to inflame them, and Mrs. Anderson was not in any right sense +sane. And the prayer was addressed more to the frightened Julia +than to God. She would have been terribly afflicted had her +petition been granted.</p> +<p>Julia would have run away from the admonition which followed the +prayer, had it not been that Mrs. Anderson adroitly put it under +cover of a religious exhortation. She besought Julia to repent, and +then, affecting to show her her sinfulness, she proceeded to abuse +her.</p> +<p>Had Julia no temper? Yes, she had doubtless a spice of her +mother's anger without her meanness. She would have resisted, but +that from childhood she had felt paralyzed by the utter uselessness +of all resistance. The bravest of the villagers at the foot of +Vesuvius never dreamed of stopping the crater's mouth.</p> +<p>But, happily, at last Mrs. Anderson's insane wrath went a little +too far.</p> +<p>"You poor lost sinner," she said, "to think you should go to +destruction under my very eyes, disgracing us all, by running over +the country at night with bad men! But there's mercy even for such +as you."</p> +<p>Julia would not have understood the full meaning of this +aspersion of her purity, had she not caught Humphreys's eye. His +expression, half sneer, half leer, seemed to give her mother's +saying its full interpretation. She put out her hand. She turned +white, and said: "Say one word more, and I will go away from you +and never come back! Never!" And then she sat down and cried, and +then Mrs. Anderson's maternal love, her "unloving love," revived. +To have her daughter leave her, too, would be a sort of defeat. She +hushed, and sat down in her splint-bottomed rocking-chair, which +snapped when she rocked, and which seemed to speak for her after +she had shut her mouth. Her face settled into a martyr-like appeal +to Heaven in proof of the justice of her cause. And then she fell +back on her forlorn hope. She wept hysterically, in sincere +self-pity, to think that an affectionate mother should have such a +daughter!</p> +<p>Julia, finding that her mother had desisted, went to her room. +She did not exactly pray, but she talked to herself as she paced +the floor. It was a monologue, and yet there was a conscious appeal +to an invisible Presence, who could not misjudge her, and so she +passed from talking to herself to talking to God, and that without +any of the formality of prayer. Her mother had made God seem to be +against her. Now she, like David, protested her innocence to God. +She recited half to herself, and yet also to God--for is not every +appeal to one's conscience in some sense an appeal to God?--she +recited all the struggles of that night when she went to August at +the castle. People talk of the consolation there is in God's mercy. +But Julia found comfort in God's justice. He <i>could</i> not judge +her wrongly.</p> +<p>Then she opened the Testament at the old place, and read the +words long since fixed in her memory. And then she--weary and heavy +laden--came again to Him who invites, and found rest. And then she +found, as many another has found, that coming to God is not, as +theorists will have it, a coming once for a lifetime, but a coming +oft and ever repeated.</p> +<p>Jonas and Cynthy Ann retired to the kitchen, and the former said +hi his irreverent way, "Blamed ef Abigail ha'nt got more devils +into her'n Mary Magdalene had the purtiest day she ever seed! I +should think, arter a life with her fer a mother, the bad place +would be a healthy and delightful clime. The devil a'n't a patchin' +to her."</p> +<p>"Don't, Jonas; you talk so cur'us, like as ef you was kinder +sorter wicked."</p> +<p>"That's jest what I am, my dear, but Abigail Anderson's wicked +without the kinder sorter. She cusses when she's a-prayin'. She +cusses that poar gal right in the Lord's face. Good by, I must go. +Smells so all-fired like brimstone about here." This last was +spoken in an undertone of indignant soliloquy, as he crossed the +threshold of Cynthy's clean kitchen.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXVIII."></a>CHAPTER XXXVIII.</h2> +<h3>SCARING A HAWK.</h3> +<br> +<p>Jonas was thoroughly alarmed. He exaggerated the harm that +Humphreys might do to August, now that he knew where he was. +August, on his part, felt sure that Humphreys would not do anything +against him; certainly not in the way of legal proceedings. And as +for the sale of Samuel Anderson's farms, that did not disturb him. +Like almost everybody else at that time, August Wehle was strongly +impressed by the assertions of the Millerites, and if the world +should be finished in the next month, the farms were of no +consequence. And if Millerism proved a delusion, the loss of Samuel +Anderson's property would only leave Julia on his level, so far as +worldly goods went. The happiness this last thought brought him +made him ashamed. Why should he rejoice in Mr. Anderson's +misfortune? Why should he wish to pull Julia down to him? But still +the thought remained a pleasant one.</p> +<p>Jonas would not have it so. He had his plan. He went home from +the Adventist meeting that very night with Cynthy Ann, and then +stood talking to her at the corner of the porch, feeling very sure +that Humphreys would listen from above. He heard his stealthy +tread, after a while, disturb a loose board on the upper porch. +Then he began to talk to Cynthy Ann in this strain:</p> +<p>"You see, I can't tell no secrets, Cynthy Ann, even to your +Royal Goodness, as I might say, seein' as how as you a'n't my wife, +and a'n't likely to be, if Brother Goshorn can have his way. But +you're the Queen of Hearts, anyhow. But s'pose I was to hint a +secret?"</p> +<p>"Sh--sh--h-h-h!" said Cynthy Ann, partly because she felt a +sinful pleasure in the flattery, and partly because she felt sure +that Humphreys was above. But Jonas paid no attention to the +caution.</p> +<p>"I'll give you a hint as strong as a Irishman's, which they do +say'll knock you down. Let's s'pose a case. They a'n't no harm in +s'posin' a case, you know. I've knowed boys who'd throw a rock at a +fence-rail and hit a stump, and then say, 'S'posin' they was a +woodpecker on that air stump, wouldn't I a keeled him over?' You +can s'pose a case and make a woodpecker wherever you want to. Well, +s'posin' they was a inquisition or somethin' of the kind from the +guv'nor of the State of ole Kaintuck to the guv'nor of the State of +Injeanny? And s'posin' that the dokyment got lodged in this 'ere +identical county? And s'posin' it called fer the body of one Thomas +A. Parkins, a<i>li</i>as J.W. 'Umphreys? And s'posin' it speecified +as to sartain and sundry crimes committed in Paduky and all along +the shore, fer all I know? Now, s'posin' all of them air things, +what <i>would</i> Clark township do to console itself when that +toonful v'ice and them air blazin' watch-seals had set in ignominy +for ever and ever? Selah! Good-night, and don't you breathe a word +to a livin' soul, nur a dead one, 'bout what I been a-sayin'. +You'll know more by daylight to-morry 'n you know now."</p> +<p>And the last part of the speech was true, for by midnight the +Hawk had fled. And the sale of the Anderson farm to Humphreys was +never completed. For three days the end of the world was forgotten +in the interest which Clark township felt in the flight of its +favorite. And by degrees the story of Norman's encounter with the +gamblers and of August's recovery of the money became spread abroad +through the confidential hints of Jonas. And by degrees another +story became known; it could not long be concealed. It was the +story of Betsey Malcolm, who averred that she had been privately +married to Humphreys on the occasion of a certain trip they had +made to Kentucky together, to attend a "big meeting." The story was +probably true, but uncharitable gossips shook their heads.</p> +<p>It was only a few evenings after the flight of Humphreys that +Jonas had another talk with Cynthy Ann, in which he confessed that +all his supposed case about a requisition from the governor of +Kentucky for Humphreys's arrest was pure fiction.</p> +<p>"But, Jonas, is--is that air right? I'm afeard it a'n't right to +tell an ontruth."</p> +<p>"So 'ta'n't; but I only s'posed a case, you know."</p> +<p>"But Brother Hall said last Sunday two weeks, that anything that +gin a false impression was--was lying. Now, I don't think you meant +it, but then I thought I orto speak to you about it."</p> +<p>"Well, maybe you're right. I see you last summer a-puttin' up a +skeercrow to keep the poor, hungry little birds of the air from +gittin' the peas that they needed to sustain life. An' I said, What +a pity that the best woman I ever seed should tell lies to the poor +little birds that can't defend theirselves from her wicked wiles! +But I see that same day a skeercrow, a mean, holler, +high-percritical purtense of a ole hat and coat, a-hanging in +Brother Goshorn's garden down to the cross-roads. An' I wondered ef +it was your Methodis' trainin' that taught you sech-like cheatin' +of the little sparrys and blackbirds."</p> +<p>"Yes; but Jonas--" said Cynthy, bewildered.</p> +<p>"And I see a few days arterwards a Englishman with a humbug-fly +onto his line, a foolin' the poor, simple-hearted little fishes +into swallerln' a book that hadn't nary sign of a ginowine bait +onto it. An' I says, says I, What a deceitful thing the human heart +is!"</p> +<p>"Why, Jonas, you'd make a preacher!" said Cynthy Ann, touched +with the fervor of his utterance, and inly resolved never to set up +another scarecrow.</p> +<p>"Not much, my dear. But then, you see, I make distinctions. Ef I +was to see a wolf a-goin' to eat a lamb, what would I do? Why, I'd +skeer or fool him with the very fust thing I could find. Wouldn' +you, honey?"</p> +<p>"In course," said Cynthy Ann.</p> +<p>"And so, when I seed a wolf or a tiger or a painter, like that +air 'Umphreys, about to gobble up fortins, and to do some harm to +Gus, maybe, I jest rigged up a skeercrow of words, like a ole hat +and coat stuck onto a stick, and run him off. Any harm done, my +dear?"</p> +<p>"Well, no, Jonas; I ruther 'low not."</p> +<p>Whether Jonas's defense was good or not, I can not say, for I do +not know. But he is entitled to the benefit of it.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIX."></a>CHAPTER XXXIX.</h2> +<h3>JONAS TAKES AN APPEAL</h3> +<br> +<p>Jonas had waited for the coming of the quarterly meeting to +carry his appeal to the presiding elder. The quarterly meeting for +the circuit was held at the village of Brayvllle, and beds were +made upon the floor for the guests who crowded the town. Every +visiting Methodist had a right to entertainment, and every resident +Methodist opened his doors very wide, for Western people are +hospitable in a fashion and with a bountifulness unknown on the +eastern side of the mountains. Who that has not known it, can ever +understand the delightfulness of a quarterly meeting? The meeting +of old friends--the social life--is all but heavenly. And then the +singing of the old Methodist hymns, such as</p> +<blockquote>"Oh! that will be joyful!<br> + Joyful! joyful!<br> +Oh! that will be joyful,<br> + To meet to part no more."</blockquote> +<p>And that other solemnly-sweet refrain:</p> +<blockquote>"The reaping-time will surely come,<br> +And angels shout the harvest home!"</blockquote> +<p>And who shall describe the joy of a Christian mother, when her +scapegrace son "laid down the arms of his rebellion" and was +"soundly converted"? Let those sneer who will, but such moral +miracles as are wrought in Methodist revivals are more wonderful +than any healing of the blind or raising of the dead could be.</p> +<p>Jonas turned up, faithful to his promise, and called on the +"elder" at the place where he was staying, and asked for a private +interview. He found the old gentleman exercising his sweet voice in +singing,</p> +<blockquote> "Come, let us anew<br> + Our journey pursue,<br> +Roll round with the year.<br> +And never stand still till the Master appear.<br> + His adorable will<br> + Let us gladly fulfill,<br> +And our talents improve<br> +By the patience of hope and the labor of love."</blockquote> +<p>"When he concluded the verse he raised his half-closed eyes and +saw Jonas standing in the door.</p> +<p>"Mr. Persidin' Elder," said Jonas, trying in vain to speak with +some seriousness and veneration, "I come to ax your consent to +marry one of your flock--the best lamb you've got in the whole +fold."</p> +<p>"Bless you, Mr. Harrison," said Father Williams, the old elder, +laughing, "bless you, I haven't any right to consent or forbid. Ask +the lady herself!"</p> +<p>"Ax the lady!" said Jonas. "Didn't I though! And didn't Mr. +Goshorn forbid the lady to marry me, under the pains and penalties +pervided; and didn't Mr. Hall set his seal to the forbiddin' of +Goshorn! An' I says to her, 'I won't take nothin' less than a elder +or a bishop on this 'ere vital question.' When I want a sheep, I +don't go to the underlin,' but to the boss; and so I brought this +appeal up to you on a writ of <i>habeas corpus</i>, or whatever you +may call it."</p> +<p>The presiding elder laughed again, and looked closely at Jonas. +Then he stepped to the door and called in the circuit preacher, Mr. +Hall, and the class leader, Mr. Goshorn, both of whom happened to +be in the next room engaged in an excited discussion with a brother +who was a little touched with Millerism.</p> +<p>"What's this Mr. Harrison tells me about your forbidding the +banns in his case?"</p> +<p>"He's a New Light," said Brother Hall, showing his abhorrence in +his face, "and it seemed to me that for a Methodist to marry a New +Light was a sin--a being yoked together unequally with an +unbeliever. You know, Father Williams, that New Lights are +Arians."</p> +<p>The old man seemed more amused than ever. Turning to Jonas, he +asked him if he was an Arian.</p> +<p>"Not as I knows on, my venerable friend. I may have caught the +disease when I had the measles, or I may have been a Arian in +infancy, or I may be a Arian on my mother's side, you know; but as +I don't know who or what it may be, I a'n't in no way accountable +fer it--no more'n Brother Goshorn is to blame fer his face bein' so +humbly. But I take it Arian is one of them air pleasant names you +and the New Light preachers uses in your Christian intercourse +together to make one another mad. I'm one of them as goes to heaven +straight--never stoppin' to throw no donicks at the Methodists, +Presbyterians, nor no other misguided children of men. They may +ride in the packet, or go by flat-boat or keel-boat, ef they +chooses. I go by the swift-sailin' and palatial mail-boat New +Light, and I don't run no opposition line, nor bust my bilers +tryin' to beat my neighbors into the heavenly port."</p> +<p>Brother Goshorn looked vexed. Brother Hall was scandalized at +the lightness of Jonas's conversation. But the old presiding elder, +with keen common-sense and an equally keen sense of the ludicrous, +could not look grave with all his effort to keep from laughing.</p> +<br> +<a name="246.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/246.jpg"><img src="images/246.jpg" +width="25%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>BROTHER GOSHORN.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Are you an unbeliever?" he asked.</p> +<p>"I don't know what you call onbeliever. I believe in God and +Christ, and keep Sunday and the Fourth of July; but I don't believe +in all of Brother Goshorn's nonsense about wearing veils and +artificials."</p> +<p>"Well," said Brother Hall, "would you endeavor to induce your +wife to dress in a manner unbecoming a Methodist?"</p> +<br> +<a name="248.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/248.jpg"><img src="images/248.jpg" +width="65%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>SAY THEM WORDS OVER AGAIN.</b></p> +<br> +<p>"I wouldn't fer the world. If I git the article I want, I don't +keer what it's tied up in, calico or bombazine."</p> +<p>"Couldn't you join the Methodist Church yourself, and keep your +wife company?" It was Brother Goshorn who spoke.</p> +<p>"Couldn't I? I suppose I could ef I didn't think no more of +religion than some other folks. I could jine the Methodist Church, +and have everybody say I jined to git my wife. That may be serving +God; but I can't see how. And then how long would you keep me? The +very fust time I fired off my blunderbuss in class-meetin', and you +heerd the buckshot and the squirrel-shot and the slugs and all +sorts of things a-rattlin' around, you'd say I was makin' fun of +the Gospel. I 'low they a'n't no Methodist in me. I was cut out +cur'us, you know, and made up crooked."</p> +<p>"Is there anything against Mr. Harrison, Brother Goshorn?" asked +the elder.</p> +<p>"He's a New Light," said Mr. Goshorn, in a tone that signified +his belief that to be a New Light was enough.</p> +<p>"Is he honest and steady?"</p> +<p>"Never heard anything against him as a moralist."</p> +<p>"Well, then, it's my opinion that any member of your class would +do better to marry a good, faithful, honest New Light than to marry +a hickory Methodist."</p> +<p>Jonas got up like one demented, and ran out of the door and +across the street. In a moment he came back, bringing Cynthy Ann in +triumph.</p> +<p>"Now, soy them words over again," he said to the presiding +elder.</p> +<p>"Sister Cynthy Ann," said the presiding elder, "you really love +Brother Harrison?"</p> +<p>"I--I don't know whether it's right to set our sinful hearts on +the things of this perishin' world. But I think more of him, I'm +afeard, than I had ort to. He's got as good a heart as I ever seed. +But Brother Goshorn thought I hadn't orter marry him, seein' he is +a onbeliever."</p> +<p>"But I a'n't," said Jonas; "I believe in the Bible, and in +everything in it, and in Cynthy Ann and her good Methodist religion +besides."</p> +<p>"I think you can give up all your scruples and marry Mr. +Harrison, and love him and be happy," said the presiding elder. +"Don't be afraid to be happy, my sister. You'll be happy in good +company in heaven, and you'd just as well get used to it here."</p> +<p>"I told you I'd find a man that had salt enough to keep his +religion sweet. And, Father Williams, you've got to marry us, +whenever Cynthy Ann's ready," said Jonas with enthusiasm.</p> +<p>And for a moment the look of overstrained scrupulosity on Cynthy +Ann's face relaxed and a strange look of happiness came into her +eyes.</p> +<p>And the time was fixed then and there.</p> +<p>Brother Hall was astonished.</p> +<p>And Brother Goshorn drew down his face, and said that he didn't +know what was to become of good, old-fashioned Methodism and the +rules of the Discipline, if the presiding elders talked in that +sort of a way. The church was going to the dogs.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XL."></a>CHAPTER XL.</h2> +<h3>SELLING OUT.</h3> +<br> +<p>The flight of the Hawk did not long dampen the ardor of those +who were looking for signs in the heaven above and the earth +beneath. I have known a school-master to stand, switch in hand, and +give a stubborn boy a definite number of minutes to yield. The boy +who would not have submitted on account of any amount of +punishment, was subdued by the awful waiting. We have all read the +old school-book story of the prison-warden who brought a mob of +criminals to subjection by the same process. Millerism produced +some such effect as this. The assured belief of the believers had a +great effect on others; the dreadful drawing on of the set time day +by day produced an effect in some regions absolutely awful. An +eminent divine, at that time a pastor in Boston, has told me that +the leaven of Adventism permeated all religious bodies, and that he +himself could not avoid the fearful sense of waiting for some +catastrophe--the impression that all this expectation of people +must have some significance. If this was the effect in Boston, +imagine the effect in a country neighborhood like Clark township. +Andrew, skeptical as he was visionary, was almost the only man that +escaped the infection. Jonas would have been as frankly irreverent +if the day of doom had come as he was at all times; but even Jonas +had come to the conclusion that "somethin' would happen, or else +somethin' else." August, with a young man's impressibility, was +awe-stricken with thoughts of the nearing end of the world, and +Julia accepted it as settled.</p> +<p>It is a good thing that the invisible world is so thoroughly +shut out from this. The effect of too vivid a conception of it is +never wholesome. It was pernicious in the middle age, and +clairvoyance and spirit-rapping would be great evils to the world, +if it were not that the spirits, even of-the ablest men, in losing +their bodies seem to lose their wits. It is well that it is so, for +if Washington Irving dictated to a medium accounts of the other +world in a style such as that of his "Little Britain," for +instance, we should lose all interest in the affairs of this +sphere, and nobody would buy our novels.</p> +<p>This fever of excitement kept alive Samuel Anderson's +determination to sell his farms for a trifle as a testimony to +unbelievers. He found that fifty dollars would meet his expenses +until the eleventh of August, and so the price was set at that.</p> +<p>As soon as Andrew heard of this, he privately arranged with +Jonas to buy it; but Mrs. Anderson utterly refused. She said she +could see through it all. Jonas was one of Andrew's fingers. Andrew +had got to be a sort of a king in Clark township, and Jonas +was--was the king's fool. She did not mean that any of her property +should go into the hands of the clique that were trying to rob her +of her property and her daughter. Even for two weeks they should +not own her house!</p> +<p>Before this speech was ended, Bob Walker entered the door.</p> +<p>Bob was tall, stooped, good-natured, and desperately poor. With +ton children under twelve years of age, with an incorrigible +fondness for loafing and telling funny stories, Bob saw no chance +to improve his condition. A man may be either honest or lazy and +got rich; but a man who Is both honest and indolent is doomed. Bob +lived in a cabin on the Anderson farm, and when not hired by Samuel +Anderson he did days' work here and there, riding to and from his +labor on a raw-boned mare, that was the laughing-stock of the +county. Bob pathetically called her Splinter-shin, and he always +rode bareback, for the very good reason that he had neither saddle +nor sheepskin.</p> +<br> +<a name="253.jpg"></a> +<p class="ctr"><a href="images/253.jpg"><img src="images/253.jpg" +width="25%" alt=""></a><br> +<b>"I WANT TO BUY YOUR PLACE."</b></p> +<br> +<p>"Mr. Anderson," said Bob, standing in the door and trying to +straighten the chronic stoop out of his shoulders, "I want to buy +your place."</p> +<p>If Bob had said that he wanted to be elected president Samuel +Anderson could not have been more surprised.</p> +<p>"You look astonished; but folks don't know everything. I 'low I +know how to lay by a little. But I never could git enough to buy a +decent kind of a tater-patch. So I says to my ole woman this +mornin', 'Jane,' says I, 'let's git some ground. Let's buy out Mr. +Anderson, and see how it'll feel to be rich fer a few days. If she +all burns up, let her burn, I say. We've had a plaguey hard time of +it, let's see how it goes to own two farms fer awhile.' And so we +thought we'd ruther hev the farms fer two weeks than a little money +in a ole stocking. What d'ye say?"</p> +<p>Jonas here put in that he didn't see why they mightn't sell to +him as well as to Bob Walker. Cynthy Ann had worked fer Mrs. +Anderson fer years, and him and Cynthy was a-goin' to be one man +soon. Why not sell to them?</p> +<p>"Because selling to you is selling to Andrew," said Mrs. +Abigail, in a conclusive way.</p> +<p>And so Bob got the farms, possession to be given after the +fourteenth of August, thus giving the day of doom three days of +grace. And Bob rode round the county boasting that he was as rich a +man as there was in Clark Township. And Jonas declared that ef the +eend did come in the month of August, Abigail would find some +onsettled bills agin her fer cheatin' the brother outen the +inheritance. And Clark Township agreed with him.</p> +<p>August was secretly pleased that one obstacle to his marriage +was gone. If Andrew should prove right, and the world should +outlast the middle of August, there would be nothing dishonorable +in his marrying a girl that would have nothing to sacrifice.</p> +<p>Andrew, for his part, gave vent to his feelings, as usual, by +two or three bitter remarks leveled at the whole human race, though +nowadays he was inclined to make exceptions in favor of several +people, of whom Julia stood first. She was a woman of the +old-fashioned kind, he said, fit to go alongside Héloise or +Chaucer's Grisilde.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLI."></a>CHAPTER XLI.</h2> +<h3>THE LAST DAY AND WHAT HAPPENED IN IT.</h3> +<br> +<p>The religious excitement reached its culmination as the tenth +and eleventh of August came on. Some made ascension-robes. Work was +suspended everywhere. The more abandoned, unwilling to yield to the +panic, showed its effects on them by deeper potations, and by a +recklessness of wickedness meant to conceal their fears. With tin +horns they blasphemously affected to be angels blowing trumpets. +They imitated the Millerite meetings in their drunken sprees, and +learned Mr. Hankins's arguments by heart.</p> +<p>The sun of the eleventh of August rose gloriously. People +pointed to it with trembling, and said that it would rise no more. +Soon after sunrise there were crimson clouds stretching above and +below it, and popular terror seized upon this as a sign. But the +sun mounted with a scorching heat, which showed that at least his +shining power was not impaired. Then men said, "Behold the +beginning of the fervent heat that is to melt the elements!" Night +drew on, and every "shooting-star" was a new sign of the end. The +meteors, as usual at this time of the year, were plentiful, and the +simple-hearted country-folk were convinced that the stars were +falling out of the sky.</p> +<p>A large bald hill overlooking the Ohio was to be the mount of +ascension. Here gathered Elder Hankins's flock with that +comfortable assurance of being the elect that only a narrow bigotry +can give. And here came others of all denominations, consoling +themselves that they were just as well off if they were Christians +as if they had made all this fuss about the millennium. Here was +August, too, now almost well, joining with the rest in singing +those sweet and inspiring Adventist hymns. His German heart could +not keep still where there was singing, and now, in gratefulness at +new-found health, he was more inclined to music than ever. So he +joined heartily and sincerely in the song that begins:</p> +<blockquote>"Shall Simon bear his cross alone,<br> + And all the world go free?<br> +No, there's a cross for every one,<br> + And there's a cross for me.<br> +I'll bear the consecrated cross<br> + Till from the cross I'm free,<br> +And then go home to wear the crown.<br> + For there's a crown for me!<br> +Yes, there's a crown in heaven above,<br> + The purchase of a Saviour's love.<br> +Oh I that's the crown for me!"</blockquote> +<p>When the concourse reached the lines,</p> +<blockquote>"The saints have heard the midnight cry,<br> +Go meet him in the air!"</blockquote> +<p>neither August nor any one else could well resist the infection +of the profound and awful belief in the immediate coming of the end +which pervaded the throng. Strong men and women wept and shouted +with the excitement.</p> +<p>Then Elder Hankins exhorted a little. He said that the time was +short. But men's hearts were hard. As in the days of the flood, +they were marrying and giving in marriage. Not half a mile away a +wedding was at that time taking place, and a man who called himself +a minister could not discern the signs of the times, but was +solemnizing a marriage.</p> +<p>This allusion was to the marriage of Jonas, which was to take +place that very evening at the castle. Mrs. Anderson had refused to +have "such wicked nonsense" at her house, and as Cynthy had no +home, Andrew had appointed it at the castle, partly to oblige +Jonas, partly from habitual opposition to Abigail, but chiefly to +express his contempt for Adventism.</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson herself was in a state of complete sublimation. +She had sent for Norman, that she might get him ready for the final +judgment, and Norman, without the slightest inclination to be +genuinely religious, was yet a coward, and made a provisional +repentance, not meant to hold good if Elder Hankins's figures +should fail; just such a repentance as many a man has made on what +he supposed to be his death-bed. Do not I remember a panic-stricken +man, converted by typhoid fever and myself, who laughed as soon as +he began to eat gruel, to think that he had been "such a fool as to +send for the preacher"?</p> +<p>Now, between Mrs. Anderson's joy at Norman's conversion, and her +delight that the world would soon be at an end and she on the +winning side, and her anticipation of the pleasure she would feel +even in heaven in saying, "I told you so!" to her unbelieving +friends, she quite forgot Julia. In fact she went from one fit of +religious catalepsy to another, falling into trances, or being +struck down with what was mysteriously called "the power." She had +relaxed her vigilance about Julia, for there were but three more +hours of time, and she felt that the goal was already gained, and +she had carried her point to the very last. A satisfaction for a +saint!</p> +<p>The neglected Julia naturally floated toward the outer edge of +the surging crowd, and she and August inevitably drifted +together.</p> +<p>"Let us go and see Jonas married," said August. "It is no harm. +God can take us to heaven from one place as well as another, if we +are His children."</p> +<p>In truth, Julia was wearied and bewildered, not to say +disgusted, with her mother's peculiar religious exercises, and she +gladly escaped with August to the castle and the wedding of her +faithful friends.</p> +<p>Andrew, in a spirit of skeptical defiance, had made his castle +look as flowery and festive as possible. The wedding took place in +the lower story, but the library was illuminated, and the +Adventists who had occasion to pass by Andrew's on their way to the +rendezvous accepted this as a new fulfillment of prophecy to the +very letter. They nodded one to another, and said, "See! marrying +and giving in marriage, as in the days of Noah!"</p> +<p>August and Julia were too much awe-stricken to say much on their +way to the castle. But in these last hours of a world grown old and +ready for its doom, they cleaved closer together. There could be +neither heaven nor millennium for one of them without the other! +Loving one another made them love God the more, and love cast out +all fear. If this was the Last, they would face it together, and if +it proved the Beginning, they would rejoice together. At sight of +every shooting meteor, Julia clung almost convulsively to +August.</p> +<p>When they entered the castle, Jonas and Cynthy were already +standing up before the presiding elder, and he was about to begin. +Cynthy's face showed her sense of the awfulness of marrying at a +moment of such fearful expectation, or perhaps she was troubling +herself for fear that so much happiness out of heaven was to be had +only in the commission of a capital sin. But, like most people +whose consciences are stronger than their intellects, she found +great consolation in taking refuge under the wing of ecclesiastical +authority. To be married by a presiding elder was the best thing in +the world next to being married by a bishop.</p> +<p>Whatever fear of the swift-coming judgment others might have +felt, the benignant old elder was at peace. Common-sense, a clean +conscience, and a child-like faith enlightened his countenance, and +since he tried to be always ready, and since his meditations made +the things of the other life ever present, his pulse would scarcely +have quickened if he had felt sure that the archangel's trump would +sound in an hour. He neither felt the subdued fear shown on the +countenance of Cynthy Ann, nor the strong skeptical opposition of +Andrew, whose face of late had grown almost into a sneer.</p> +<p>"Do you take this woman to be your lawful and wedded wife--"</p> +<p>And before the elder could finish it, Jonas blurted out, "You'd +better believe I do, my friend."</p> +<p>And then when the old man smiled and finished his question down +to, "so long as ye both shall live," Jonas responded eagerly, "Tell +death er the jedgment-day, long or short."</p> +<p>And Cynthy Ann answered demurely out of her frightened but too +happy heart, and the old man gave them his benediction in an +apostolic fashion that removed Cynthy Ann's scruples, and smoothed +a little of the primness out of her face, so that she almost smiled +when Jonas said, "Well! it's done now, and it can't be undone fer +all the Goshorns in Christendom er creation!"</p> +<p>And then the old gentleman--for he was a gentleman, though he +had always been a backwoodsman--spoke of the excitement, and said +that it was best always to be ready--to be ready to live, and then +you would be ready for death or the judgment. That very night the +end might come, but it was not best to trouble one's self about it. +And he smiled, and said that it was none of his business, God could +manage the universe; it was for him to be found doing his duty as a +faithful servant. And then it would be just like stepping out of +one door into another, whenever death or the judgment should +come.</p> +<p>While the old man was getting ready to leave, Julia and August +slipped away, fearing lest their absence should be discovered. But +the peacefulness of the old elder's face had entered into their +souls, and they wished that they too were solemnly pronounced man +and wife, with so sweet a benediction upon their union.</p> +<p>"I do not feel much anxious about the day of judgment or the +millennium," said August, whose idiom was sometimes a little +broken. "When I was so near dying I felt satisfied to die after you +had kissed my lips. But now that it seems we have come upon the +world's last days, I wish I were married to you. I do not know how +things will be in the new heaven and the new earth. But I should +like you to be my wife there, or at least to have been my wife on +earth, if only for one hour."</p> +<p>And then he proposed that they should be made man and wife now +in the world's last hour. It was not wrong. It could not give her +mother heart-disease, for she would not know of it till she should +hear it in the land where there are neither marriages nor sickness. +Julia could not see any sin in her disobedience under such +circumstances. She did so much want to go into the New Jerusalem as +the wedded wife of August "the grand," as she fondly called +him.</p> +<p>And so in the stillness of that awful night they walked back to +Andrew's castle, and found the venerable preacher, with saddle-bags +on his arm, ready to mount his horse, for the presiding elder of +that day had no leisure time. Jonas and Cynthy stood bidding him +good-by. And the old man was saying again that if we were always +ready it would be like stepping from one door into another. But he +thought it as wrong to waste time gazing up into heaven to see +Christ come, as it had been to gaze after Him when He went away. +Even Jonas's voice was a little softened by the fearful thought +ever present of the coming on of that awful midnight of the +eleventh of August. All were surprised to see the two young people +come back.</p> +<p>"Father Williams," said August, "we thought we should like to go +into the New Jerusalem man and wife. Will you marry us?"</p> +<p>"Sensible to the last!" cried Jonas.</p> +<p>"According to the laws of this State," said Mr. Williams, "you +can not be married without a license from the clerk of the county. +Have you a license?"</p> +<p>"No," said August, his heart sinking.</p> +<p>Just then Andrew came up and inquired what the conversation was +about.</p> +<p>"Why, Uncle Andrew," said Julia eagerly, "August and I don't +want the end of the world to come without being man and wife. And +we have no license, and August could not go seven miles and back to +get a license before midnight. It is too bad, isn't it? If it +wasn't that we think the end of the world is so near, I should be +ashamed to say how much I want to be married. But I shall be proud +to have been August's wife, when I am among the angels."</p> +<p>"You are a noble woman," said Andrew. "Come in, let us see if +anything can be done." And he led the way, smiling.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLII."></a>CHAPTER XLII.</h2> +<h3>FOR EVER AND EVER.</h3> +<br> +<p>When they had all re-entered the castle, Andrew made them sit +down. The old minister did not see any escape from the fatal +obstacle of a lack of license, but Andrew was very mysterious.</p> +<p>"Virtue is its own reward," said the Philosopher, "but it often +finds an incidental reward besides. Now, Julia, you are the noblest +woman in these degenerate times, according to my way of +thinking."</p> +<p>"That's true as preachin', ef you'll except one," chirped Jonas, +with a significant look at his Cynthy Ann. Julia blushed, and the +old minister looked inquiringly at Andrew and at Julia. This +exaggerated praise from a man so misanthropic as Andrew excited his +curiosity.</p> +<p>"Without exception," said Andrew emphatically, looking first at +Jonas, then at Mr. Williams, "my niece is the noblest woman I ever +knew."</p> +<p>"Please don't, Uncle Andrew!" begged Julia, almost speechless +with shame. Praise was something she could not bear. She was inured +to censure.</p> +<p>"Do you remember that dark night--of course you do--when you +braved everything and came here to see August, who would have died +but for your coming?" Andrew was now looking at Julia, who answered +him almost inaudibly.</p> +<p>"And do you remember when we got to your gate, on your return, +what you said to me?"</p> +<p>"Yes, sir," said Julia.</p> +<p>"To be sure you do, and" (turning to August) "I shall never +forget her words; she said, If he should get worse, I should like +him to die my husband, if he wishes it. Send for me, day or night, +and I will come in spite of everything."</p> +<p>"Did you say that?" asked August, looking at her eagerly.</p> +<p>And Julia nodded her head, and lifted her eyes, glistening with +brimming tears, to his.</p> +<p>"You do not know," said Andrew to the preacher, "how much her +proposal meant, for you do not know through what she would have had +to pass. But I say that God does sometimes reward virtue in this +world--a world not quite worn out yet--and she is worthy of the +reward in store for her."</p> +<p>Saying this, Andrew went into the closet leading to his secret +stairway--secret no longer, since Julia had ascended by that +way--and soon came down from his library with a paper in his +hand.</p> +<p>"When you, my noble-hearted niece, proposed to make any +sacrifice to marry this studious, honest, true-hearted German +gentleman, who is worthy of you, if any man can be, I thought best +to be ready for any emergency, and so I went the next day and +procured the license, the clerk promising to keep my secret. A +marriage-license is good for thirty days. You will see, Mr. +Williams, that this has not quite expired."</p> +<p>The minister looked at it and then said, "I depend on your +judgment, Mr. Anderson. There seems to be something peculiar about +the circumstances of this marriage."</p> +<p>"Very peculiar," said Andrew.</p> +<p>"You give me your word, then, that it is a marriage I ought to +solemnize?"</p> +<p>"The lady is my niece," said Andrew. "The marriage, taking place +in this castle, will shed more glory upon it than its whole history +beside; and you, sir, have never performed a marriage ceremony in a +case where the marriage was so excellent as this."</p> +<p>"Except the last one," put in Jonas.</p> +<p>I suppose Mr. Williams made the proper reductions for Andrew's +enthusiasm. But he was satisfied, and perhaps he was rather +inclined to be satisfied, for gentle-hearted old men are quite +susceptible to a romantic situation.</p> +<p>When he asked August if he would live with this woman in holy +matrimony "so long as ye both shall live," August, thinking the two +hours of time left to him too short for the earnestness of his +vows, looked the old minister in the eyes, and said solemnly: "For +ever and ever!"</p> +<p>"No, my son," said the old man, smiling and almost weeping, +"that is not the right answer. I like your whole-hearted love. But +it is far easier to say 'for ever and ever,' standing as you think +you do now on the brink of eternity, than to say 'till death do us +part,' looking down a long and weary road of toil and sickness and +poverty and change and little vexations. You do not only take this +woman, young and blooming, but old and sick and withered and +wearied, perhaps. Do you take her for any lot?"</p> +<p>"For any lot," said August solemnly and humbly.</p> +<p>And Julia, on her part, could only bow her head in reply to the +questions, for the tears chased one another down her cheeks. And +then came the benediction. The inspired old man, full of hearty +sympathy, stretched his trembling hands with apostolic solemnity +over the heads of the two, and said slowly, with solemn pauses, as +the words welled up out of his soul: "The peace of God--that +passeth all understanding" (here his voice melted with +emotion)--"keep your hearts--and minds--in the knowledge and love +of God.--And now, may grace--mercy--and peace from God--<i>the +Father</i>--and <i>our</i> Lord Jesus Christ--be with +you--evermore--Amen!" And to the imagination of Julia the Spirit of +God descended like a dove into her heart, and the great mystery of +wifely love and the other greater mystery of love to God seemed to +flow together in her soul. And the quieter spirit of August was +suffused with a great peace.</p> +<p>They soon left the castle to return to the mount of ascension, +but they walked slowly, and at first silently, over the intervening +hill, which gave them a view of the Ohio River, sleeping in its +indescribable beauty and stillness in the moonlight.</p> +<p>Presently they heard the melodious voice of the old presiding +elder, riding up the road a little way off, singing the hopeful +hymns in which he so much delighted. The rich and earnest voice +made the woods ring with one verse of</p> +<blockquote>"Oh! how happy are they<br> + Who the Saviour obey,<br> +And have laid up their treasure above I<br> + Tongue can never express<br> + The sweet comfort and peace<br> +Of a soul in its earliest love."</blockquote> +<p>And then he broke into Watts's</p> +<blockquote>"When I can read my title clear<br> + To mansions in the skies,<br> +I'll bid farewell to every fear<br> + And wipe my weeping eyes!"</blockquote> +<p>There seemed to be some accord between the singing of the brave +old man and the peacefulness of the landscape. Soon he had reached +the last stanza, and in tones of subdued but ecstatic triumph he +sang:</p> +<blockquote>"There I shall bathe my weary soul<br> + In seas of heavenly rest,<br> +And not a wave of trouble roll<br> + Across my peaceful breast."</blockquote> +<p>And with these words he passed round the hill and out of the +hearing of the young people.</p> +<p>"August," said Julia slowly, as if afraid to break a silence so +blessed, "August, it seems to me that the sky and the river and the +hazy hills and my own soul are all alike, just as full of happiness +and peace as they can be."</p> +<p>"Yes," said August, smiling, "but the sky is clear, and your +eyes are raining, Julia. But can it be possible that God, who made +this world so beautiful, will burn it up to-night? It used to seem +a hard world to me when I was away from you, and I didn't care how +quickly it burned up. But now--"</p> +<p>Somehow August forgot to finish that sentence. Words are of so +little use under such circumstances. A little pressure on Julia's +arm which was in his, told all that he meant. When love makes earth +a heaven, it is enough.</p> +<p>"But how beautiful the new earth will be," said Julia, still +looking at the sleeping river, "the river of life will be clear as +crystal!"</p> +<p>"Yes," said August, "the Spanish version says, 'Most +resplendent, like unto crystal.'"</p> +<p>"I think," said Julia, "that it must be something like this +river. The trees of life will stand on either side, like those +great sycamores that lean over the water so gracefully."</p> +<p>Any landscape would have seemed heavenly to Julia on this night. +A venerable friend of mine, a true Christian philanthropist, whose +praise is in all the churches, wants me to undertake to reform +fictitious literature by leaving out the love. And so I may when +God reforms His universe by leaving out the love. Love is the best +thing in novels; not until love is turned out of heaven will I help +turn it out of literature. It is only the misrepresentation of love +in literature that is bad, as the poisoning of love in life is bad. +It was the love of August that had opened Julia's heart to the +influences of heaven, and Julia was to August a mediator of God's +grace.</p> +<p>By eleven o'clock August Wehle and his wife--it gives me nearly +as much pleasure as it did August to use that locution--were +standing not far away from the surging crowd of those who, in +singing hymns and in excited prayer, were waiting for the judgment. +Jonas and Cynthy and Andrew were with them. August, though not a +recognized Millerite, almost blamed himself that he should have +been away these two hours from the services. But why should he? The +most sacramental of all the sacraments is marriage. Is it not an +arbitrary distinction of theologians, that which makes two rites to +be sacraments and others not? But if the distinction is to be made +at all, I should apply the solemn word to the solemnest rite and +the holiest ordinance of God's, even if I left out the sacred +washing in the name of the Trinity and the broken emblematic bread +and the wine. These are sacramental in their solemn symbolism, that +in the solemnest symbolism and the holiest reality.</p> +<p>August's whole attention was now turned toward the coming +judgment; and as he stood thinking of the awfulness of this +critical moment, the exercises of the Adventists grated on the deep +peacefulness of his spirit, for from singing their more beautiful +hymns, they had passed to an excited shouting of the old +camp-meeting ditty whose refrain is:</p> +<p>"I hope to shout glory when this world's all on fire! +Hallelujah!"</p> +<p>He and Julia hung back a moment, but Mrs. Abigail, who had +recovered from her tenth trance, and had been for some time engaged +in an active search for Julia, now pounced upon her, and bore her +off, before she had time to think, to the place of the hottest +excitement.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLIII."></a>CHAPTER XLIII.</h2> +<h3>THE MIDNIGHT ALARM.</h3> +<br> +<p>At last the time drew on toward midnight, the hour upon which +all expectation was concentrated. For did not the Parable of the +Ten Virgins speak of the coming of the bridegroom at midnight?</p> +<p>"My friends and brethren," said Elder Hankins, his voice shaking +with emotion, as he held his watch up in the moonlight, "My friends +and brethren, ef the Word is true, they is but five minutes more +before the comin' in of the new dispensation. Let us spend the last +moments of time in silent devotion."</p> +<p>"I wonder ef he thinks the world runs down by his +pay-tent-leever watch?" said Jonas, who could not resist the +impulse to make the remark, even with the expectation of the +immediate coming of the day of judgment in his mind.</p> +<p>"I wonder for what longitude he calculates prophecy?" said +Andrew. "It can not be midnight all round the world at the same +moment."</p> +<p>But Elder Hankins's flock did not take any astronomical +difficulty into consideration. And no spectator could look upon +them, bowing silently in prayer, awed by the expectation of the +sudden coming of the Lord, without feeling that, however much the +expectation might be illusory, the emotion was a fact absolutely +awful. Events are only sublime as they move the human soul, and the +swift-coming end of time was subjectively a great reality to these +waiting people. Even Andrew was awe-stricken from sympathy; as +Coleridge, when he stood godfather for Keble's child, was +overwhelmed with a sense of the significance of the sacrament from +Keble's stand-point. As for Cynthy Ann, she trembled with fear as +she held fast to the arm of Jonas. And Jonas felt as much +seriousness as was possible to him, until he heard Norman +Anderson's voice crying with terror and excitement, and felt Cynthy +shudder on his arm.</p> +<p>"For my part," said Jonas, turning to Andrew, "it don't seem +like as ef it was much use to holler and make a furss about the +corn crap when October's fairly sot in, and the frost has nipped +the blades. All the plowin' and hoein' and weedin' and thinnin' out +the suckers won't, better the yield then. An' when wheat's ripe, +they's nothin' to be done fer it. It's got to be rep jest as it +stan's. I'm rale sorry, to-night, as my life a'n't no better, but +what's the use of cryin' over it? They's nothin' to do now but let +it be gethered and shelled out, and measured up in the standard +half-bushel of the sanctuary. And I'm afeard they'll be a heap of +nubbins not wuth the shuckin'. But ef it don't come to six bushels +the acre, I can't help it now by takin' on."</p> +<p>At twelve o'clock, even the scoffers were silent. But as the +sultry night drew on toward one o'clock, Bill Day and his party +felt their spirits revive a little. The calculation had failed in +one part, and it might in all. Bill resumed his burlesque +exhortations to the rough-looking "brethren" about him. He tried to +lead them in singing some ribald parody of Adventist hymns, but his +terror and theirs was too genuine, and their voices died down into +husky whispers, and they were more alarmed than ever at discovering +the extent of their own demoralization. The bottle, one of those +small-necked, big-bodied quart-bottles that Western topers carry in +yellow-cotton handkerchiefs, was passed round. But even the whisky +seemed powerless to neutralize their terror, rather increasing the +panic by fuddling their faculties.</p> +<p>"Boys!" said Bob Short, trembling, and sitting down on a stump, +"this--this ere thing--is a gittin' serious. Ef--well, ef it +<i>was</i> to happen--you know--you don't s'pose--ahem--you don't +think God A'mighty would be <i>too</i> heavy on a feller. Do ye? Ef +it was to come to-night, it would be blamed short notice."</p> +<p>At one o'clock the moon was just about dipping behind the hills, +and the great sycamores, standing like giant sentinels on the +river's marge, cast long unearthly shadows across the water, which +grew blacker every minute. The deepening gloom gave all objects in +the river valley a weird, distorted look. This oppressed August. +The landscape seemed an enchanted one, a something seen in a dream +or a delirium. It was as though the change had already come, and +the real tangible world had passed away. He was the more +susceptible from the depression caused by the hot sultriness of the +night, and his separation from Julia.</p> +<p>He thought he would try to penetrate the crowd to the point +where his mother was; then he would be near her, and nearer to +Julia if anything happened. A curious infatuation had taken hold of +August. He knew that it was an infatuation, but he could not shake +it off. He had resolved that in case the trumpet should be heard in +the heavens, he would seize Julia and claim her in the very moment +of universal dissolution. He reached his mother, and as he looked +into her calm face, ready for the millennium or for anything else +"the Father" should decree, he thought she had never seemed more +glorious than she did now, sitting with her children about her, +almost unmoved by the excitement. For Mrs. Wehle had come to take +everything as from the Heavenly Father. She had even received +honest but thick-headed Gottlieb in this spirit, when he had fallen +to her by the Moravian lot, a husband chosen for her by the Lord, +whose will was not to be questioned.</p> +<p>August was just about to speak to his mother, when he was forced +to hang his head in shame, for there was his father rising to +exhort.</p> +<p>"O mine freunde! pe shust immediadely all of de dime retty. +Ton't led your vait vail already, and ton't let de debil git no +unter holts on ye. Vatch and pe retty!"</p> +<p>And August could hear the derisive shouts of Bill Day's party, +who had recovered their courage, crying out, "Go it, ole Dutchman! +I'll bet on you!" He clenched his fist in anger, but his mother's +eyes, looking at him with quiet rebuke, pacified him in a moment. +Yet he could not help wondering whether blundering kinsfolk made +people blush in the next world.</p> +<p>"Holt on doo de last ent!" continued Gottlieb. "It's pout goom! +Kood pye, ole moon! You koes town, you nebber gooms pack no more +already."</p> +<p>This exhortation might have proceeded in this strain +indefinitely, to the mortification of August and the amusement of +the profane, had there not just at that moment broken upon the +sultry stillness of the night one of those crescendo +thunder-bursts, beginning in a distant rumble, and swelling out +louder and still louder, until it ended with a tremendous +detonation. In the strange light of the setting moon, while +everybody's attention was engrossed by the excitement, the swift +oncoming of a thunder-cloud had not been observed by any but +Andrew, and it had already climbed half-way to the zenith, blotting +out a third of the firmament. This inverted thunder-bolt produced a +startling effect upon the over-strained nerves of the crowd. Some +cried out with terror, some sobbed with hysterical agony, some +shouted in triumph, and it was generally believed that Virginia +Waters, who died a maniac many years afterward, lost her reason at +that moment. Bill Day ceased his mocking, and shook till his teeth +chattered. And none of his party dared laugh at him. The moon had +now gone, and the vivid lightning followed the thunder, and yet +louder and more fearful thunder succeeded the lightning. The people +ran about as if demented, and Julia was left alone. August had only +one thought in all this confusion, and that was to find Julia. +Having found her, they clasped hands, and stood upon the brow of +the hill calmly watching the coming tempest, believing it to be the +coming of the end. Between the claps of thunder they could hear the +broken sentences of Elder Hankins, saying something about the +lightning that shineth from one part of heaven to the other, and +about the promised coming in the clouds. But they did not much heed +the words. They were looking the blinding lightning in the face, +and in their courageous trust they thought themselves ready to look +into the flaming countenance of the Almighty, if they should be +called before Him. Every fresh burst of thunder seemed to August to +be the rocking of the world, trembling in the throes of +dissolution. But the world might crumble or melt; there is +something more enduring than the world. August felt the +everlastingness of love; as many another man in a supreme crisis +has felt it.</p> +<p>But the swift cloud had already covered half the sky, and the +bursts of thunder followed one another now in quicker succession. +And as suddenly as the thunder had come, came the wind. A solitary +old sycamore, leaning over the water on the Kentucky shore, a mile +away, was first to fall. In the lurid darkness, August and Julia +saw it meet its fate. Then the rail fences on the nearer bank were +scattered like kindling-wood, and some of the sturdy old +apple-trees of the orchard in the river-bottom were uprooted, while +others were stripped of their boughs. Julia clung to August and +said something, but he could only see her lips move; her voice was +drowned by the incessant roar of the thunder. And then the +hurricane struck them, and they half-ran and were half-carried down +the rear slope of the hill. Now they saw for the first time that +the people were gone. The instinct of self-preservation had proven +stronger than their fanaticism, and a contagious panic had carried +them into a hay-barn near by.</p> +<p>Not knowing where the rest had gone, August and Julia only +thought of regaining the castle. They found the path blocked by +fallen trees, and it was slow and dangerous work, waiting for +flashes of lightning to show them their road. In making a long +detour they lost the path. After some minutes, in a lull in the +thunder, August heard a shout, which he answered, and presently +Philosopher Andrew appeared with a lantern, his grizzled hair and +beard flying in the wind.</p> +<p>"What ho, my friends!" he cried. "This is the way you go to +heaven together! You'll live through many a storm yet!"</p> +<p>Guided by his thorough knowledge of the ground, they had almost +reached the castle, when they were startled by piteous cries. +Leaving August with Julia, Andrew climbed a fence, and went down +into a ravine to find poor Bill Day in an agony of terror, crying +out in despair, believing that the day of doom had already come, +and that he was about to be sent into well-deserved perdition. +Andrew stooped over him with his lantern, but the poor fellow, +giving one look at the shaggy face, shrieked madly, and rushed away +into the woods.</p> +<p>"I believe," said the Philosopher, when he got back to August, +"I believe he took me for the devil."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLIV."></a>CHAPTER XLIV.</h2> +<h3>SQUARING ACCOUNTS.</h3> +<br> +<p>The summer storm had spent itself by daylight, and the sun rose +on that morning after the world's end much as it had risen on other +mornings, but it looked down upon prostrate trees and scattered +fences and roofless barns. And the minds of the people were in much +the same disheveled state as the landscape. One simple-minded girl +was a maniac. Some declared that the world had ended, and that this +was the new earth, if people only had faith to receive it; some +still waited for the end, and with some the reaction from credulity +had already set in, a reaction that carried them into the blankest +atheism and boldest immorality. People who had spent the summer in +looking for a change that would relieve them from all +responsibility, now turned reluctantly toward the commonplace +drudgery of life. It is the evil of all day-dreaming--day-dreaming +about the other world included--that it unfits us for duty in this +world of tangible and inevitable facts.</p> +<p>It was nearly daylight when Andrew and August and Julia reached +the castle. The Philosopher advised Julia to go home, and for the +present to let the marriage be as though it were not. August +dreaded to see Julia returned to her mother's tyranny, but Andrew +was urgent in his advice, and Julia said that she must not leave +her mother in her trouble. Julia reached home a little after +daylight, and a little before Mrs. Anderson was brought home in a +fit of hysterics.</p> +<p>Poor Mrs. Abigail still hoped that the end of the world for +which she had so fondly prepared would come, but as the days wore +on she sank into a numb despondency. When she thought of the loss +of her property, she groaned and turned her face to the wall. And +Samuel Anderson sat about the house in a dumb and shiftless +attitude, as do most men upon whom financial ruin comes in middle +life. The disappointment of his faith and the overthrow of his +fortune had completely paralyzed him. He was waiting for something, +he hardly knew what. He had not even his wife's driving voice to +stimulate him to exertion.</p> +<p>There was no one now to care for Mrs. Anderson but Julia, for +Cynthy had taken up her abode in the log-cabin which Jonas had +bought, and a happier housekeeper never lived. She watched Jonas +till he disappeared when he went to work in the morning, she +carried him a "snack" at ten o'clock, and headways found her +standing "like a picter" at the gate, when he came home to dinner. +But Cynthy Ann generally spent her afternoons at Anderson's, +helping "that young thing" to bear her responsibilities, though +Mrs. Anderson would receive no personal attentions now from any one +but her daughter. She did not scold; her querulous restlessness was +but a reminiscence of her scolding. She lay, disheartened, watching +Julia, and exacting everything from Julia, and the weary feet and +weary heart of the girl almost sank under her burdens. Mrs. +Anderson had suddenly fallen from her position of an exacting +tyrant to that of an exacting and helpless infant. She followed +Julia with her eyes in a broken-spirited fashion, as if fearing +that she would leave her. Julia could read the fear in her mother's +countenance; she understood what her mother meant when she said +querulously, "You'll get married and leave me." If Mrs. Anderson +had assumed her old high-handed manner, it would have been easy for +Julia to have declared her secret. But how could she tell her now? +It would be a blow, it might be a fatal blow. And at the same time +how could she satisfy August? He thought she had bowed to the same +old tyranny again for an indefinite time. But she could not forsake +her parents in their poverty and afflictions.</p> +<p>The fourteenth of August, the day on which possession was to +have been given to Bob Walker, came and went, but no Bob Walker +appeared. A week more passed, in which Samuel Anderson could not +muster enough courage to go to see Walker, in which Samuel Anderson +and his wife waited in a vague hope that something might happen. +And every day of that week Julia had a letter from August, which +did not say one word of the trial that it was for him to wait, but +which said much of the wrong Julia was doing to herself to submit +so long. And Julia, like her father and mother, was waiting for she +knew not what.</p> +<p>At last the suspense became to her unendurable.</p> +<p>"Father," she said, "why don't you go to see Bob Walker? You +might buy the farm back again."</p> +<p>"I don't know why he don't come and take it," said Mr. Anderson +dejectedly.</p> +<p>This conversation roused Mrs. Abigail. There was some hope. She +got up in bed, and told Samuel to go to the county-seat and see if +the deeds had ever been recorded. And while her husband was gone +she sat up and looked better, and even scolded a little, so that +Julia felt encouraged. But she dreaded to see her father come +back.</p> +<p>Samuel Anderson entered the house on his return with a blank +countenance. Sitting down, he put his face between his hands a +minute in utter dejection.</p> +<p>"Why don't you speak?" said Mrs. Anderson in a broken voice.</p> +<p>"The land was all transferred to Andrew immediately, and he owns +every foot of it. He must have sent Bob Walker here to buy it."</p> +<p>"Oh! I'm so glad!" cried Julia.</p> +<p>But her mother only gave her one reproachful look and went off +into hysterical sobbing and crying over the wrong that Andrew had +done her. And all that night Julia watched by her mother, while +Samuel Anderson sat in dejection by the bed. As for Norman, he had +quickly relapsed into his old habits, and his former cronies had +generously forgiven him his temporary piety, considering the +peculiar circumstances of the case some extenuation. Now that there +was trouble in the house he staid away, which was a good thing so +far as it went.</p> +<p>The next afternoon Mrs. Anderson rallied a little, and, looking +at Julia, she said in her querulous way, "Why don't you go and see +him?"</p> +<p>"Who?" said Julia with a shiver, afraid that her mother was +insane.</p> +<p>"Andrew."</p> +<p>Julia did not need any second hint. Leaving her mother with +Cynthy, she soon presented herself at the door of the castle.</p> +<p>"Did <i>she</i> send you?" asked Andrew dryly.</p> +<p>"Yes, sir."</p> +<p>"I've been expecting you for a long time. I'll go back with you. +But August must go along. He'll be glad of an excuse to see your +face again. You look thin, my poor girl."</p> +<p>They went past Wehle's, and August was only too glad to join +them, rejoicing that some sort of a crisis had come, though how it +was to help him he did not know. With the restlessness of a man +looking for some indefinable thing to turn up, Samuel was out on +the porch waiting the return of his daughter. Jonas had come for +Cynthy Ann, and was sitting on a "shuck-bottom" chair in front of +the house.</p> +<p>Andrew reached out his hand and greeted his brother cordially, +and spoke civilly to Abigail. Then there was a pause, and Mrs. +Anderson turned her head to the wall and groaned. After a while she +looked round and saw August. A little of her old indignation came +into her eyes as she whimpered, "What did <i>he</i> come for?"</p> +<p>"I brought him," said Andrew.</p> +<p>"Well, it's your house, do as you please. I suppose you'll turn +us out of our own home now."</p> +<p>"As you did me," said the Philosopher, smiling. "Let me remind +you that I was living on the river farm. My father had promised it +to me, and given me possession. A week before his death you got the +will changed, by what means you know. You turned me off the farm +which had virtually been mine for two years. If I turn you off now, +it will be no more than fair."</p> +<p>There was a look of pained surprise on Julia's face. She had not +known that the wrong her uncle had suffered was so great. She had +not thought that he would be so severe as to turn her father +out.</p> +<p>"I don't want to talk of these things," Andrew went on. "I ought +to have broken the will, but I was not a believer in the law. I +tell this story now because I must justify myself to these young +people for what I am going to do. You have had the use of that part +of the estate which was rightfully mine for twenty years. I suppose +I may claim it all now."</p> +<p>Julia's eyes looked at him pleadingly.</p> +<p>"Why don't you send us off and be done with it then?" said Mrs. +Abigail, rising up and resuming her old vehemence. "You set out to +ruin us, and now you've done it. A nice brother you are! Ruining us +by a conspiracy with Bob Walker, and then sitting here and trying +to make my own daughter think you did right, and bringing that +hateful fellow here to hear it!" Her finger was leveled at +August.</p> +<p>"I am glad to see you are better, Abigail. I wanted to be sure +you were strong enough to bear all I have to say."</p> +<p>"Say your worst and do your worst, you cruel, cruel man! I have +borne enough from you in these years, and now you can say and do +what you please; you can't do me any more harm. I suppose I must +leave my old home that I've lived in so long."</p> +<p>"You need not worry yourself about leaving; that's what I came +over to say."</p> +<p>"As if I'd stay in <i>your</i> house an hour! I'll not take any +favors at <i>your</i> hand."</p> +<p>"Don't be rash, Abigail. I have deeded this hill farm to Samuel, +and here is the deed. I have given you back the best half of the +property, just what my father meant you to have. I have only kept +the river land, that should have been mine twenty years ago. I hope +you will not stick to your resolution not to receive anything at my +hand."</p> +<p>And Julia said: "Oh! I'm so--"</p> +<p>But Mrs. Anderson had a convenient fit of hysterics, crying +piteously. Meantime Samuel gladly accepted the deed.</p> +<p>"The deed is already recorded. I sent it down yesterday as soon +as I saw Samuel come back, and I got it back this morning. The farm +is yours without condition."</p> +<p>This relieved Abigail, and she soon ceased her sobbing. Andrew +could not take it back then, whatever she might say.</p> +<p>"Now," said Andrew, "I have only divided the farms without +claiming any damages. I want to ask a favor. Let Julia marry the +man of her choice in peace."</p> +<p>"You have taken one farm, and therefore I must let my daughter +marry a man with nothing but his two hands," sobbed Mrs. +Anderson.</p> +<p>"Two hands and a good head and a noble heart," said Andrew.</p> +<p>"Well, I won't consent," said she. "If Julia marries +<i>him</i>," pointing to August, "she will marry without my +consent, and he will not get a cent of the money he's after. Not a +red cent!"</p> +<p>"I don't want your money. I did not know you'd get your farm +back, for I did not know but that Walker owned it, and +I--wanted--Julia all the same." August had almost told that he had +married Julia.</p> +<p>"Wanted her and married her," said Andrew. "And I have not kept +a corn-stalk of the property I got from you. I have given Bob +Walker a ten-acre patch for his services, and all the rest I have +deeded to the two best people I know. This August Wehle married +Julia Anderson when they thought the world might be near its end, +and believing that, at any rate, she would not have a penny in the +world. I have deeded the river farm to August Wehle and his +wife."</p> +<p>"Married, eh? Come and ask my consent afterwards? That's a fine +way!" And Abigail grew white and grew silent with passion.</p> +<p>"Come, August, I want to show you and Julia something," said +Andrew. He really wanted to give Abigail time to look the matter in +the face quietly before she committed herself too far. But he told +the two young people that they might make their home with him while +their house was in building. He had already had part of the +material drawn, and from the brow of the hill they looked down upon +the site he had chosen near the old tumble-down tenant's house. But +Andrew saw that Julia looked disappointed.</p> +<p>"You are not satisfied, my brave girl. What is the matter?"</p> +<p>"Oh! yes, I am very happy, and very thankful to you; and next to +August I love you more than anybody--except my parents."</p> +<p>"But something is different to what you wished it. Doesn't the +site suit you? You can look off on to the river from the rise on +which the house will stand, and I do not know how it could be +better."</p> +<p>"It couldn't be better," said Julia, "but--'</p> +<p>"But what? You must tell me."</p> +<p>"I thought maybe you'd let us live at the castle and take the +burden of things off you. I should like to keep your house for you, +just to show you how much I love my dear, good uncle."</p> +<p>Even an anchorite could not help feeling a pleasure at such a +speech from such a young woman, and this shaggy, solitary, +misanthropic but tender-hearted man felt a sudden rush of pleasure. +August saw it, and was delighted. What one's nearest friend thinks +of one's wife is a vital question, and August was happier at this +moment than he had ever been. Andrew's pleasure at Julia's loving +speech was the climax.</p> +<p>"Yes!" said the Philosopher, a little huskily. "You want to +sacrifice your pleasure by living in my gloomy old castle, and +civilizing an old heathen like me. You mustn't tempt me too +far."</p> +<p>"I don't see why you call it gloomy. It wasn't only for your +sake that I said it. I think it is the nicest old house I ever saw. +And then the books, and--and--you." Julia stumbled a little, she +was not accustomed to make speeches of this sort.</p> +<p>"You flatterer!" burst out Andrew. "But no, you must have your +own house."</p> +<p>Mrs. Anderson, on her part, had concluded to make the best of +it. Julia already married and the mistress of the Anderson river +farm was quite a different thing from Julia under her thumb. She +was to be conciliated. Besides, Mrs. Anderson did not want Julia's +prosperity to be a lifelong source of humiliation to her. She must +take some stock in it at the start.</p> +<p>"Jule," she said, as her daughter re-entered the door, "I can +let you have two feather-beds and four pillows, and a good stock of +linen and blankets. And you can have the two heifers and the sorrel +colt."</p> +<p>The two "heifers" were six, and the sorrel "colt" was seven +years of age; but descriptive names often outlive the qualities to +which they owed their origin. Just as a judge is even yet addressed +as "your honor," and many a governor without anything to recommend +him hears himself called "your excellency."</p> +<p>When Abigail surrendered in this graceful fashion, Julia was +touched, and was on the point of putting her arms around her mother +and kissing her. But Mrs. Anderson was not a person easily +caressed, and Julia did not yield to her impulse.</p> +<p>"Cynthy Ann, my dear," said Jonas, as they walked home that +evening, "do you know what Abig'il Anderson reminds me of?"</p> +<p>No; Cynthy Ann didn't exactly know. In fact, it would have been +difficult for anybody to have told what anything was likely to +remind Jonas of. There was no knowing what a thing might not +suggest to him.</p> +<p>"Well, Cynthy, my Imperial Sweetness, when I see Abig'il come +down so beautiful, it reminded me of a little fice-t dog I had when +I was a leetle codger. I called him Pick. His name was Picayune. +Purty good name, wasn't it?"</p> +<p>"Yes, it was."</p> +<p>"Well, now, that air little Pick wouldn't never own up as he was +driv outen the house. When he was whipped out, he wouldn't never +tuck his tail down, but curl it up over his back, and run acrost +the yard and through the fence and down the road a-barkin' fit to +kill. Wanted to let on like as ef he'd run out of his own accord, +with malice aforethought, you know. <i>That's</i> Abig'il."</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLV."></a>CHAPTER XLV.</h2> +<h3>NEW PLANS.</h3> +<br> +<p>Except Abigail Anderson and one other person, everybody in the +little world of Clark township approved mightily the justice and +disinterestedness of Andrew. He had righted himself and Julia at a +stroke, and people dearly love to have justice dealt out when it is +not at their own expense. Samuel, who cherished in secret a great +love for his daughter, was more than pleased that affairs had +turned out in this way. But there was one beside Abigail who was +not wholly satisfied. August spent half the night in protesting in +vain against Andrew's transfer of the river-farm to him. But Andrew +said he had a right to give away his own if he chose. And there was +no turning him. For if August refused a share in it, he would give +it to Julia, and if she refused it, he would find somebody who +would accept it.</p> +<p>The next day after the settlement at Samuel Anderson's, August +came to claim his wife. Mrs. Abigail had now employed a "help" in +Cynthy Ann's place, and Julia could be spared. August had refused +all invitations to take up his temporary residence with Julia's +parents. The house had unpleasant associations in his mind, and he +wanted to relieve Julia at once and forever from a despotism to +which she could not offer any effectual resistance. Mrs. Anderson +had eagerly loaded the wagon with feather-beds and other bridal +property, and sent it over to the castle, that Julia might appear +to leave with her blessing. She kissed Julia tenderly, and hoped +she'd have a happy life, and told her that if her husband should +ever lose his property or treat her badly--such things <i>may</i> +happen, you know--then she would always find a home with her +mother. Julia thanked her for the offer of a refuge to which she +never meant to flee under any circumstances. And yet one never +turns away from one's home without regret, and Julia looked back +with tears in her eyes at the chattering swifts whose nests were in +the parlor chimney, and at the pee-wee chirping on the gate-post. +The place had entered into her life. It looked lonesome now, but +within a year afterward Norman suddenly married Betsey Malcolm. +Betsey's child had died soon after its birth, and Mrs. Anderson set +herself to manage both Norman and his wife, who took up their abode +with her. Nothing but a reign of terror could have made either of +them of any account, but Mrs. Anderson furnished them this in any +desirable quantity. They were never of much worth, even under her +management, but she kept them in bounds, so that Norman ceased to +get drunk more than five or six times a year, and Betsey flirted +but little and at her peril.</p> +<p>Once the old house was out of sight, there were no shadows on +Julia's face as she looked forward toward the new life. She walked +in a still happiness by August as they went down through Shady +Hollow. August had intended to show her a letter that he had from +the mud-clerk, describing the bringing of Humphreys back to Paducah +and his execution by a mob. But there was something so repelling in +the gusto with which the story was told, and the story was so awful +in itself, that he could not bear to interrupt the peaceful +happiness of this hour by saying anything about it.</p> +<p>August proposed to Julia that they should take a path through +the meadow of the river-farm--their own farm now--and see the +foundation of the little cottage Andrew had begun for them. And so +in happiness they walked on through the meadow-path to the place on +which their home was to stand. But, alas! there was not a stick of +timber left. Every particle of the material had been removed. It +seemed that some great disappointment threatened them at the moment +of their happiness. They hurried on in silent foreboding to the +castle, but there the mystery was explained.</p> +<p>"I told you not to tempt me too far," said Andrew. "See! I have +concluded to build an addition to the castle and let you civilize +me. We will live together and I will reform. This lonely life is +not healthy, and now that I have children, why should I not let +them live here with me?"</p> +<p>Julia looked happy. I have no authentic information in regard to +the exact words which she made use of to express her joy, but from +what is known of girls of her age in general, it is safe to infer +that she exclaimed, "Oh! I'm so glad!"</p> +<p>While Andrew stood there smiling, with Julia near him, August +having gone to the assistance of the carpenters in a matter +demanding a little more ingenuity than they possessed, Jonas came +up and drew the Philosopher aside. Julia could not hear what was +said, but she saw Andrew's brow contract.</p> +<p>"I'll shoot as sure as they come!" he said with passion. "I +won't have my niece or August insulted in my house by a parcel of +vagabonds."</p> +<p>"O Uncle Andrew! is it a shiveree?" asked Julia.</p> +<p>"Yes."</p> +<p>"Well, don't shoot. It'll be so funny to have a shiveree."</p> +<p>"But it is an insult to you and to August and to me. This is +meant especially to be an expression of their feeling toward August +as a German, though really their envy of his good fortune has much +to do with it. It is a second edition of the riot of last spring, +in which Gottlieb came so near to being killed. Now, I mean to do +my country service by leaving one or two less of them alive if they +come here to-night." For Andrew was full of that destructive energy +so characteristic of the Western and Southern people.</p> +<p>"Oh! no, don't shoot. Can't you think of some other way?" +pleaded Julia.</p> +<p>"Well, yes, I could get the sheriff to come and bag a few of +them."</p> +<p>"And that will make trouble for many years. Let me see. Can't we +do this?" And Julia rapidly unfolded to Andrew and Jonas her plan +of operations against the enemy.</p> +<p>"Number one!" said Jonas. "They'll fall into that air amby-scade +as sure as shootin'. That plan is military and Christian and +civilized and human and angelical and tancy-crumptious. It ort to +meet the 'proval of the American Fish-hawk with all his pinions and +talents. I'll help to execute it, and beat the rascals or lay my +bones a-bleachin' on the desert sands of Shady Holler."</p> +<p>"Well," said Andrew to Julia, "I knew, if I took you under my +roof, you'd make a Christian of me in spite of myself. And I +<i>am</i> a sort of savage, that's a fact."</p> +<p>Jonas hurried home and sent Cynthy over to the castle, and there +was much work going on that afternoon. Andrew said that the castle +was being made ready for its first siege. As night came on, Julia +was in a perfect glee. Reddened by standing over the stove, with +sleeves above her elbows and her black hair falling down upon her +shoulders, she was such a picture that August stopped and stood in +the door a minute to look at her as he came in to supper.</p> +<p>"Why, Jule, how glorious you look!" he said. "I've a great mind +to fall in love with you, mein Liebchen!"</p> +<p>"And I <i>have</i> fallen in love with <i>you</i>, Cæsar +Augustus!" And well she might, for surely, as he stood in the door +with his well-knit frame, his fine German forehead, his pure, +refined mouth, and his clear, honest, amiable blue eyes, he was a +man to fall in love with.</p> +<br> +<br> +<hr style="width: 35%;"> +<br> +<br> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XLVI."></a>CHAPTER XLVI.</h2> +<h3>THE SHIVEREE.</h3> +<br> +<p>If Webster's "American Dictionary of the English Language" had +not been made wholly in New England, it would not have lacked so +many words that do duty as native-born or naturalized citizens in +large sections of the United States, and among these words is the +one that stands at the head of the present chapter. I know that +some disdainful prig will assure me that it is but a corruption of +the French "<i>charivari,"</i> and so it is; but then +"<i>charivari</i>" is a corruption of the low Latin +"<i>charivarium</i>" and that is a corruption of something else, +and, indeed, almost every word is a corruption of some other word. +So that there is no good reason why "shiveree," which lives in +entire unconsciousness of its French parentage and its Latin +grand-parentage, should not find its place in an "American +Dictionary."</p> +<p>But while I am writing a disquisition on the etymology of the +word, the "shiveree" is mustering at Mandluff's store. Bill Day has +concluded that he is in no immediate danger of perdition, and that +a man is a "blamed fool to git skeered about his soul." Bob Short +is sure the Almighty will not be too hard on a feller, and so +thinks he will go on having "a little fun" now and then. And among +the manly recreations which they have proposed to themselves is +that of shivereeing "that Dutchman, Gus Wehle." It is the solemn +opinion of the whole crowd that "no Dutchman hadn't orter be so +lucky as to git sech a beauty of a gal and a hundred acres of +bottom lands to boot."</p> +<p>The members of the party were all disguised, some in one way and +some in another, though most of them had their coats inside out. +They thought it necessary to be disguised, "bekase, you know," as +Bill Day expressed it, "ole Grizzly is apt to prosecute ef he gits +evidence agin you." And many were the conjectures as to whether he +would shoot or not.</p> +<p>The instruments provided by this orchestra were as various as +their musical tastes. It is likely that even Mr. Jubilee Gilmore +never saw such an outfit. Bob Short had a dumb-bull, a keg with a +strip of raw-hide stretched across one end like a drum-head, while +the other remained open. A waxed cord inserted in the middle of the +drum-head, and reaching down through the keg, completed the +instrument. The pulling of the hand over this cord made a hideous +bellowing, hence its name. Bill Day had a gigantic watchman's +rattle, a hickory spring on a cog-wheel. It is called in the West, +a horse-fiddle, because it is so unlike either a horse or a fiddle. +Then there were melodious tin pans and conch-shells and tin horns. +But the most deadly noise was made by Jim West, who had two iron +skillet-lids ("leds" he called them) which, when placed face to +face, and rubbed, as you have seen children rub tumblers, made a +sound discordant and deafening enough to have suggested Milton's +expression about the hinges which "grated harsh thunder."</p> +<p>One of this party was a tallish man, so dressed as to look like +a hunchback, and a hunchback so tall was a most singular figure. He +had joined them in the dark, and the rest were unable to guess who +it could be, and he, for his part, would not tell. They thumped him +and pushed him, but at each attack he only leaped from the ground +like a circus clown, and made his tin horn utter so doleful a +complaint as set the party in an uproar of laughter. They could not +be sure who he was, but he was a funny fellow to have along with +them at any rate.</p> +<p>He was not only funny, but he was evidently fearless. For when +they came to the castle it was all dark and still. Bill Day said +that it looked "powerful juberous to him. Ole Andy meant to use +shootin'-ir'ns, and didn't want to be pestered with no lights +blazin' in his eyes." But the tall hunchback cleared the fence at a +bound, and told them to come on "ef they had the sperrit of a +two-weeks-old goslin into 'em." So the bottle was passed round, and +for very shame they followed their ungainly leader.</p> +<p>"Looky here, boys," said the hunchback, "they's one way that we +can fix it so's ole Grizzly can't shoot. They's a little +shop-place, a sort of a shed, agin the house, on the side next to +the branch. Let's git in thar afore we begin, and he can't +shoot."</p> +<p>The orchestra were a little stupefied with drink, and they took +the idea quickly, never stopping to ask how they could retreat if +Andrew chose to shoot. Jim West thought things looked scaly, but he +warn't agoin' to backslide arter he'd got so fur.</p> +<p>When they got into Andrew's shop, where he had a new and +beautiful skiff in building, the tall hunchback shut the door, and +the rest did not notice that he put the key in his pocket.</p> +<p>That serenade! Such a medley of discordant sounds, such a +clatter and clangor, such a rattle of horse-fiddle, such a +bellowing of dumb-bull, such a snorting of tin horns, such a +ringing of tin pans, such a grinding of skillet-lids! But the house +remained quiet. Once Bill Day thought that he heard a laugh within. +Julia may have lost her self-control. She was so happy, and a +little unrestrained fun was so strange a luxury!</p> +<p>At last the door between the house and shop was suddenly opened, +and Julia, radiant as she could be, stood on the threshold with a +candle in her hand.</p> +<p>"Come in, gentlemen."</p> +<p>But the gentlemen essayed to go out.</p> +<p>"Locked in, by thunder!" said Jim West, trying the outside door +of the shop.</p> +<p>"We heard you were coming, gentlemen, and provided a little +entertainment. Come in!"</p> +<p>"Come in, boys," said the hunchback, "don't be afeard of +nobody."</p> +<p>Mechanically they followed the hunchback into the room, for +there was nothing else to be done. A smell of hot coffee and the +sight of a well-spread table greeted their senses.</p> +<p>"Welcome, my friends, thrice welcome!" said Andrew. "Put down +your instruments and have some supper."</p> +<p>"Let me relieve you," said Julia, and she took the dumb-bull +from Bob Short and the "horse-fiddle" from Day, the tin horns and +tin pans from others, and the two skillet-lids from Jim West, who +looked as sheepish as possible. August escorted each of them to the +table, though his face did not look altogether cordial. Some old +resentment for the treatment of his father interfered with the +heartiness of his hospitality. The hunchback in this light proved +to be Jonas, of course; and Bill Day whispered to the one next to +him that they had been "tuck in and done fer that time."</p> +<p>"Gentlemen," said Andrew, "we are much obliged for your music." +And Cynthy would certainly have laughed out if she had not been so +perplexed in her mind to know whether Andrew was speaking the +truth.</p> +<p>Such a motley set of wedding guests as they were, with their +coats inside out and their other disguises! Such a race of pied +pipers! And looking at their hangdog faces you would have said, +"Such a lot of sheep-thieves!" Though why a sheep-thief is +considered to be a more guilty-looking man than any other criminal, +I do not know. Jonas looked bright enough and ridiculous enough +with his hunch. They all ate rather heartily, for how could they +resist the attentions of Cynthy Ann and the persuasions of Julia, +who poured them coffee and handed them biscuit, and waited upon +them as though they were royal guests! And, moreover, the act of +eating served to cover their confusion.</p> +<p>As the meal drew to a close, Bill Day felt that he, being in +some sense the leader of the party, ought to speak. He was not +quite sober, though he could stand without much staggering. He had +been trying for some time to frame a little speech, but his +faculties did not work smoothly.</p> +<p>"Mr. President--I mean Mr. Anderson--permit me to offer you our +pardon. I mean to beg your apologies--to--ahem--hope that our--that +your--our--thousand--thanks--your--you know what I mean." And he +sat down in foolish confusion.</p> +<p>"Oh! yes. All right; much obliged, my friend," said the +Philosopher, who had not felt so much boyish animal life in +twenty-five years.</p> +<p>And Jim West whispered to Bill: "You expressed my sentiments +exactly."</p> +<p>"Mr. Anderson," said Jonas, rising, and thus lifting up his +hunched shoulders and looking the picture of a long-legged heron +standing in the water, "Mr. Anderson, you and our young and happy +friend, Mr. Wehle, will accept our thanks. We thought that music +was all you wanted to gin a delightful--kinder--sorter--well, +top-dressin', to this interestin' occasion. Now they's nothin' +sweeter'n a tin horn, 'thout 'tis a melodious conch-shell utterin' +its voice like a turkle-dove. Then we've got the paytent double +whirlymagig hoss-violeen, and the tin pannyforte, and, better nor +all, the grindin' skelletled cymbals. We've laid ourselves out and +done our purtiest--hain't we, feller-musicians?--to prove that we +was the best band on the Ohio River. An' all out of affection and +respect for this ere happy pair. And we're all happy to be here. +Hain't we?" (Here they all nodded assent, though they looked as +though they wished themselves far enough.) "Our enstruments is a +leetle out of toon, owin' to the dampness of the night air, and so +I trust you'll excuse us playin' a farewell piece."</p> +<p>Jim West was so anxious to get away that he took advantage of +this turn to say good-evening, and though the mischievous Julia +insisted that he should select his instrument, he had not the face +to confess to the skillet-lids, and got out of it by assuring her +that he hadn't brought nothing, "only come along to see the fun." +And each member of the party repeated the transparent lie, so that +Julia found herself supplied with more musical instruments than any +young housekeeper need want, and Andrew hung them, horns, pans, +conch-shell, dumb-bull, horse-fiddle, skillet-lids, and all, in his +library, as trophies captured from the enemy.</p> +<p>Much as I should like to tell you of the later events of the +Philosopher's life, and about Julia and August, and their oldest +son, whose name is Andrew, and all that, I do not know that I can +do better than to bow myself out with the abashed serenaders, +letting this musical epilogue harmoniously close the book; writing +just here.</p> +<br> +<h3>THE END.</h3> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The End Of The World, by Edward Eggleston + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE END OF THE WORLD *** + +***** This file should be named 14051-h.htm or 14051-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/4/0/5/14051/ + +Produced by Rick Niles, John Hagerson, Charlie Kirschner and the PG +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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0000000..f5b29ef --- /dev/null +++ b/old/14051-h/images/253.jpg diff --git a/old/14051-h/images/Frontispiece.jpg b/old/14051-h/images/Frontispiece.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d8952a6 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/14051-h/images/Frontispiece.jpg diff --git a/old/14051.txt b/old/14051.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d23f146 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/14051.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7540 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The End Of The World, by Edward Eggleston + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The End Of The World + A Love Story + +Author: Edward Eggleston + +Release Date: November 15, 2004 [EBook #14051] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE END OF THE WORLD *** + + + + +Produced by Rick Niles, John Hagerson, Charlie Kirschner and the PG +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + + + + +[Illustration: THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER +_(Frontispiece. See page 40.)_] + +The End of the World. + + + +A LOVE STORY, + + + +BY + +EDWARD EGGLESTON + +AUTHOR OF "THE HOOSIER SCHOOLMASTER," ETC. + +WITH THIRTY-TWO ILLUSTRATIONS. + +1872 + + + + +PREFACE. + +[IN THE POTENTIAL MOOD.] + +It is the pretty unanimous conclusion of book-writers that prefaces are +most unnecessary and useless prependages, since nobody reads them. And +it is the pretty unanimous practice of book-writers to continue to write +them with such pains and elaborateness as would indicate a belief that +the success of a book depends upon the favorable prejudice begotten of u +graceful preface. My principal embarrassment is that it is not customary +for a book to have more than one. How then shall I choose between the +half-dozen letters of introduction I might give my story, each better +and worse on many accounts than either of the others? I am rather +inclined to adopt the following, which might for some reasons be +styled the + +PREFACE SENTIMENTAL. + +Perhaps no writer not infatuated with conceit, can send out a book full +of thought and feeling which, whatever they may be worth, are his own, +without a parental anxiety in regard to the fate of his offspring. And +there are few prefaces which do not in some way betray this nervousness. +I confess to a respect for even the prefatory doggerel of good Tinker +Bunyan--a respect for his paternal tenderness toward his book, not at +all for his villainous rhyming. When I saw, the other day, the white +handkerchiefs of my children waving an adieu as they sailed away from +me, a profound anxiety seized me. So now, as I part company with August +and Julia, with my beloved Jonas and my much-respected Cynthy Ann, with +the mud-clerk on the Iatan, and the shaggy lord of Shady-Hollow Castle, +and the rest, that have watched with me of nights and crossed the ferry +with me twice a day for half a year--even now, as I see them waving me +adieu with their red silk and "yaller" cotton "hand-kerchers," I know +how many rocks of misunderstanding and criticism and how many shoals of +damning faint praise are before them, and my heart is full of misgiving. + +--But it will never do to have misgivings in a preface. How often have +publishers told me this! Ah! if I could write with half the heart and +hope my publishers evince in their advertisements, where they talk about +"front rank" and "great American story" and all that, it would doubtless +be better for the book, provided anybody would read the preface or +believe it when they had read it. But at any rate let us not have a +preface in the minor key. + +A philosophical friend of mine, who is addicted to Carlyle, has +recommended that I try the following, which he calls + +THE HIGH PHILOSOPHICAL PREFACE. + +Why should I try to forestall the Verdict? Is it not foreordained in the +very nature of a Book and the Constitution of the Reader that a certain +very Definite Number of Readers will misunderstand and dislike a given +Book? And that another very Definite Number will understand it and +dislike it none the less? And that still a third class, also definitely +fixed in the Eternal Nature of Things, will misunderstand and like it, +and, what is more, like it only because of their misunderstanding? And +in relation to a true Book, there can not fail to be an Elect Few who +understand admiringly and understandingly admire. Why, then, make bows, +write prefaces, attempt to prejudice the Case? Can I change the Reader? +Will I change the Book? No? Then away with Preface! The destiny of the +Book is fixed. I can not foretell it, for I am no prophet. But let us +not hope to change the Fates by our prefatory bowing and scraping. + +--I was forced to confess to my friend who was so kind as to offer to +lend me this preface, that there was much truth in it and that truth is +nowhere more rare than in prefaces, but it was not possible to adopt it +for two reasons: one, that my proof-reader can not abide so many +capitals, maintaining that they disfigure the page, and what is a +preface of the high philosophical sort worth without a profusion of +capitals? Even Carlyle's columns would lose their greatest ornament if +their capitals were gone. The second reason for declining to use this +preface was that my publishers are not philosophers and would never be +content with an "Elect Few," and for my own part the pecuniary interest +I have in the copyright renders it quite desirable that as many as +possible should be elected to like it, or at least to buy it. + +After all it seems a pity that I can not bring myself to use a +straightforward + +APOLOGETIC AND EXPLANATORY PREFACE. + +In view of the favor bestowed upon the author's previous story, both by +the Public who Criticise and the Public who Buy, it seems a little +ungracious to present so soon, another, the scene of which is also laid +in the valley of the Ohio. But the picture of Western country life in +"The Hoosier School-Master" would not have been complete without this +companion-piece, which presents a different phase of it. And indeed +there is no provincial life richer in material if only one knew how to +get at it. + +Nothing is more reverent than a wholesome hatred of hypocrisy. If any +man think I have offended against his religion, I must believe that his +religion is not what it should be. If anybody shall imagine that this is +a work of religious controversy leveled at the Adventists, he will have +wholly mistaken my meaning. Literalism and fanaticism are not vices +confined to any one sect. They are, unfortunately, pretty widely +distributed. However, if-- + +--And so on. + +But why multiply examples of the half-dozen or more that I might, could, +would, or should have written? Since everybody is agreed that, nobody +reads a preface, I have concluded to let the book go without any. + +BROOKLYN, September, 1872. + +"_And as he [Wordsworth] mingled freely with all kinds of men, he found +a pith of sense and a solidity of judgment here and there among the +unlearned which he had failed to find in the most lettered; from obscure +men he heard high truths.... And love, true love and pure, he found was +no flower reared only in what was called refined society, and requiring +leisure and polished manners for its growth.... He believed that in +country people, what is permanent in human nature, the essential +feelings and passions of mankind, exist in greater simplicity and +strength_."--PRINCIPAL SHAIRP. + + * * * * * + +A DEDICATION. + +It would hardly be in character for me to dedicate this book in good, +stiff, old-fashioned tomb-stone style, but I could not have put in the +background of scenery without being reminded of the two boys, +inseparable as the Siamese twins, who gathered mussel-shells in the +river marge, played hide-and-seek in the hollow sycamores, and led a +happy life in the shadow of just such hills as those among which the +events of this story took place. And all the more that the generous boy +who was my playmate then is the generous man who has relieved me of many +burdens while I wrote this story, do I feel impelled to dedicate it to +GEORGE CARY EGGLESTON, a manly man and a brotherly brother. + + + +CONTENTS. + +CHAPTER I.--In Love with a Dutchman. +CHAPTER II.--An Explosion. +CHAPTER III.--A Farewell. +CHAPTER IV.--A Counter-Irritant. +CHAPTER V.--At the Castle. +CHAPTER VI.--The Backwoods Philosopher. +CHAPTER VII.--Within and Without. +CHAPTER VIII.--Figgers won't Lie. +CHAPTER IX.--The New Singing-Master. +CHAPTER X.--An Offer of Help. +CHAPTER XI.--The Coon-dog Argument. +CHAPTER XII.--Two Mistakes. +CHAPTER XIII.--The Spider Spins. +CHAPTER XIV.--The Spider's Web. +CHAPTER XV.--The Web Broken. +CHAPTER XVI.--Jonas Expounds the Subject. +CHAPTER XVII.--The Wrong Pew. +CHAPTER XVIII.--The Encounter. +CHAPTER XIX.--The Mother. +CHAPTER XX.--The Steam-Doctor. +CHAPTER XXI.--The Hawk in a New Part. +CHAPTER XXII.--Jonas Expresses his Opinion on Dutchmen. +CHAPTER XXIII.--Somethin' Ludikerous. +CHAPTER XXIV.--The Giant Great-heart. +CHAPTER XXV.--A Chapter of Betweens. +CHAPTER XXVI.--A Nice Little Game. +CHAPTER XXVII.--The Result of an Evening with Gentlemen. +CHAPTER XXVIII.--Waking up an Ugly Customer. +CHAPTER XXIX.--August and Norman. +CHAPTER XXX.--Aground. +CHAPTER XXXI.--Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice. +CHAPTER XXXII.--Julia's Enterprise. +CHAPTER XXXIII.--The Secret Stairway. +CHAPTER XXXIV.--The Interview. +CHAPTER XXXV.--Getting Ready for the End. +CHAPTER XXXVI.--The Sin of Sanctimony. +CHAPTER XXXVII.--The Deluge. +CHAPTER XXXVIII.--Scaring a Hawk. +CHAPTER XXXIX.--Jonas takes an Appeal. +CHAPTER XL.--Selling out. +CHAPTER XLI.--The Last Day and What Happened in it. +CHAPTER XLII.--For Ever and Ever. +CHAPTER XLIII.--The Midnight Alarm. +CHAPTER XLIV.--Squaring Accounts. +CHAPTER XLV.--New Plans. +CHAPTER XLVI.--The Shiveree. + + * * * * * + +ILLUSTRATIONS. + +BY FRANK BEARD + +The Backwoods Philosopher +Taking an Observation +A Talk with a Plowman +A little rustle brought her to consciousness +Gottlieb +The Castle +The Sedilium at the Castle +"Look at me" +"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas" +The Hawk +"Tell that to Jule" +Tempted +"Now I hate you" +At Cynthy's Door +Cynthy Ann had often said in class-meeting that temptations abounded on + every hand +Jonas +Julia sat down in mortification +"Good-by!" +The Mother's Blessing +Corn-Sweats and Calamus +"Fire! Murder! Help!" +Norman Anderson +Somethin' Ludikerous +To the Rescue +A Nice Little Game +The Mud-Clerk +Waking up an Ugly Customer +Cynthy Ann's Sacrifice +A Pastoral Visit +Brother Goshorn +"Say them words over again" +"I want to buy your place" + + + +THE END OF THE WORLD. + + * * * * * + +CHAPTER I. + +IN LOVE WITH A DUTCHMAN. + +"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a Dutchman! She +might as well as to marry some white folks I know." + +Samuel Anderson made no reply. It would be of no use to reply. Shrews +are tamed only by silence. Anderson had long since learned that the +little shred of influence which remained to him in his own house would +disappear whenever his teeth were no longer able to shut his tongue +securely in. So now, when his wife poured out this hot lava of +_argumentum ad hominem_, he closed the teeth down in a dead-lock way +over the tongue, and compressed the lips tightly over the teeth, and +shut his finger-nails into his work-hardened palms. And then, +distrusting all these precautions, fearing lest he should be unable to +hold on to his temper even with this grip, the little man strode out of +the house with his wife's shrill voice in his ears. + +Mrs. Anderson had good reason to fear that her daughter was in love with +a "Dutchman," as she phrased it in her contempt. The few Germans who had +penetrated to the West at that time were looked upon with hardly more +favor than the Californians feel for the almond-eyed Chinaman. They were +foreigners, who would talk gibberish instead of the plain English which +everybody could understand, and they were not yet civilized enough to +like the yellow saleratus-biscuit and the "salt-rising" bread of which +their neighbors were so fond. Reason enough to hate them! + +Only half an hour before this outburst of Mrs. Anderson's, she had set a +trap for her daughter Julia, and had fairly caught her. + +"Jule! Jule! O Jul-y-e-ee!" she had called. + +And Julia, who was down in the garden hoeing a bed in which she meant to +plant some "Johnny-Jump-ups," came quickly toward the house, though she +know it would be of no use to come quickly. Let her come quickly, or let +her come slowly, the rebuke was sure to greet her all the name. + +"Why don't you come when you're called, _I'd_ like to know! You're never +in reach when you're wanted, and you're good for nothing when you +are here!" + +Julia Anderson's earliest lesson from her mother's lips had been that +she was good for nothing. And every day and almost every hour since had +brought her repeated assurances that she was good for nothing. If she +had not been good for a great deal, she would long since have been good +for nothing as the result of such teaching. But though this was not the +first, nor the thousandth, nor the ten thousandth time that she had +been told that she was good for nothing, the accustomed insult seemed to +sting her now more than ever. Was it that, being almost eighteen, she +was beginning to feel the woman blossoming in her nature? Or, was it +that the tender words of August Wehle had made her sure that she was +good for something, that now her heart felt her mother's insult to be a +stale, selfish, ill-natured lie? + +"Take this cup of tea over to Mrs. Malcolm's, and tell her that it a'n't +quite as good as what I borried of her last week. And tell her that +they'll be a new-fangled preacher at the school-house a Sunday, a +Millerite or somethin', a preachin' about the end of the world." + +Julia did not say "Yes, ma'am," in her usually meek style. She smarted a +little yet from the harsh words, and so went away in silence. + +Why did she walk fast? Had she noticed that August Wehle, who was +"breaking up" her father's north field, was just plowing down the west +side of his land? If she hastened, she might reach the cross-fence as he +came round to it, and while he was yet hidden from the sight of the +house by the turn of the hill. And would not a few words from August +Wehle be pleasant to her ears after her mother's sharp depreciation? It +is at least safe to conjecture that some such feeling made her hurry +through the long, waving timothy of the meadow, and made her cross the +log that spanned the brook without ever so much as stopping to look at +the minnows glancing about in the water flecked with the sunlight that +struggled through the boughs of the water-willows. For, in her thorough +loneliness, Julia Anderson had come to love the birds, the squirrels, +and the fishes as companions, and in all her life she had never before +crossed the meadow brook without stooping to look at the minnows. + +All this haste Mrs. Anderson noticed. Having often scolded + +[Illustration: TAKING AN OBSERVATION.] + +Julia for "talking to the fishes like a fool," she noticed the omission. +And now she only waited until Julia was over the hill to take the path +round the fence under shelter of the blackberry thicket until she came +to the clump of alders, from the midst of which she could plainly see +if any conversation should take place between her Julia and the comely +young Dutchman. + +In fact, Julia need not have hurried so much. For August Wehle had kept +one eye on his horses and the other on the house all that day. It was +the quick look of intelligence between the two at dinner that had +aroused the mother's suspicions. And Wehle had noticed the work on the +garden-bed, the call to the house, and the starting of Julia on the path +toward Mrs. Malcolm's. His face had grown hot, and his hand had +trembled. For once he had failed to see the stone in his way, until the +plow was thrown clean from the furrow. And when he came to the shade of +the butternut-tree by which she must pass, it had seemed to him +imperative that the horses should rest. Besides, the hames-string wanted +tightening on the bay, and old Dick's throat-latch must need a little +fixing. He was not sure that the clevis-pin had not been loosened by the +collision with the stone just now. And so, upon one pretext and another, +he managed to delay starting his plow until Julia came by, and then, +though his heart had counted all her steps from the door-stone to the +tree, then he looked up surprised. Nothing could be so astonishing to +him as to see her there! For love is needlessly crafty, it has always an +instinct of concealment, of indirection about it. The boy, and +especially the girl, who will tell the truth frankly in regard to a love +affair is a miracle of veracity. But there are such, and they are to be +reverenced--with the reverence paid to martyrs. + +On her part, Julia Anderson had walked on as though she meant to pass +the young plowman by, until he spoke, and then she started, and blushed, +and stopped, and nervously broke off the top of a last year's iron-weed +and began to break it into bits while he talked, looking down most of +the time, but lifting her eyes to his now and then. And to the +sun-browned but delicate-faced young German it seemed, a vision of +Paradise--every glimpse of that fresh girl's face in the deep shade of +the sun-bonnet. For girls' faces can never look so sweet in this +generation as they did to the boys who caught sight of them, hidden +away, precious things, in the obscurity of a tunnel of pasteboard +and calico! + +This was not their first love-talk. Were they engaged? Yes, and no. By +all the speech their eyes were capable of in school, and of late by +words, they were engaged in loving one another, and in telling one +another of it. But they were young, and separated by circumstances, and +they had hardly begun to think of marriage yet. It was enough for the +present to love and be loved. The most delightful stage of a love affair +is that in which the present is sufficient and there is no past or +future. And so August hung his elbow around the top of the bay horse's +hames, and talked to Julia. + +It is the highest praise of the German heart that it loves flowers and +little children; and like a German and like a lover that he was, August +began to speak of the anemones and the violets that were already +blooming in the corners of the fence. Girls in love are not apt to say +any thing very fresh. And Julia only said she thought the flowers seemed +happy in the sunlight In answer to this speech, which seemed to the +lover a bit of inspiration, he quoted from Schiller the lines: + + "Yet weep, soft children of the Spring; + The feelings Love alone can bring + Have been denied to you!" + +With the quick and crafty modesty of her sex, Julia evaded this very +pleasant shaft by saying: "How much you know, August! How do you +learn it?" + +[Illustration: A TALK WITH A PLOWMAN.] + +And August was pleased, partly because of the compliment, but chiefly +because in saying it Julia had brought the sun-bonnet in such a range +that he could see the bright eyes and blushing face at the bottom of +this _camera-oscura_. He did not hasten to reply. While the vision +lasted he enjoyed the vision. Not until the sun-bonnet dropped did he +take up the answer to her question. + +"I don't know much, but what I do know I have learned out of your Uncle +Andrew's books." + +"Do you know my Uncle Andrew? What a strange man he is! He never comes +here, and we never go there, and my mother never speaks to him, and my +father doesn't often have anything to say to him. And so you have been +at his house. They say he has all up-stairs full of books, and ever so +many cats and dogs and birds and squirrels about. But I thought he never +let anybody go up-stairs." + +"He lets me," said August, when she had ended her speech and dropped her +sun-bonnet again out of the range of his eyes, which, in truth, were too +steadfast in their gaze. "I spend many evenings up-stairs." August had +just a trace of German in his idiom. + +"What makes Uncle Andrew so curious, I wonder?" + +"I don't exactly know. Some say he was treated not just right by a woman +when he was a young man. I don't know. He seems happy. I don't wonder a +man should be curious though when a woman that he loves treats him not +just right. Any way, if he loves her with all his heart, as I love Jule +Anderson!" + +These last words came with an effort. And Julia just then remembered +her errand, and said, "I must hurry," and, with a country girl's +agility, she climbed over the fence before August could help her, and +gave him another look through her bonnet-telescope from the other Hide, +and then hastened on to return the tea, und to tell Mrs. Malcolm that +there was to be a Millerite preacher at the school-house on Sunday +night. And August found that his horses were quite cool, while he was +quite hot. He cleaned his mold board, and swung his plow round, and +then, with a "Whoa! haw!" and a pull upon the single line which Western +plowmen use to guide their horses, he drew the team into their place, +and set himself to watching the turning of the rich, fragrant black +earth. And even as he set his plowshare, so he set his purpose to +overcome all obstacles, and to marry Julia Anderson. With the same +steady, irresistible, onward course would he overcome all that lay +between him and the soul that shone out of the face that dwelt in the +bottom of the sun-bonnet. + +From her covert in the elder-bushes Mrs. Anderson had seen the parley, +and her cheeks had also grown hot, but from a very different emotion. +She had not heard the words. She had seen the loitering girl and the +loitering plowboy, and she went back to the house vowing that she'd +"teach Jule Anderson how to spend her time talking to a Dutchman." And +yet the more she thought of it, the more she was satisfied that it +wasn't best to "make a fuss" just yet. She might hasten what she wanted +to prevent. For though Julia was obedient and mild in word, she was none +the less a little stubborn, and in a matter of this sort might take the +bit in her teeth. + +And so Mrs. Anderson had recourse, as usual, to her husband. She knew +she could browbeat him. She demanded that August Wehle should be paid +off and discharged. And when Anderson had hesitated, because he feared +he could not get another so good a hand, and for other reasons, she +burst out into the declaration: + +"I don't believe that you'd care a cent if she did marry a Dutchman! She +might as well as to marry some white folks I know." + + + +CHAPTER II. + +AN EXPLOSION. + +It was settled that August was to be quietly discharged at the end of +his month, which was Saturday night. Neither he nor Julia must suspect +any opposition to their attachment, nor any discovery of it, indeed. +This was settled by Mrs. Anderson. She usually settled things. First, +she settled upon the course to be pursued. Then she settled her husband. +He always made a show of resistance. His dignity required a show of +resistance. But it was only a show. He always meant to surrender in the +end. Whenever his wife ceased her fire of small-arms and herself hung +out the flag of truce, he instantly capitulated. As in every other +dispute, so in this one about the discharge of the "miserable, impudent +Dutchman," Mrs. Anderson attacked her husband at all his weak points, +and she had learned by heart a catalogue of his weak points. Then, when +he was sufficiently galled to be entirely miserable; when she had +expressed her regret that she hadn't married somebody with some heart, +and that she had ever left her father's house, for her _father_ was +_always_ good to her; and when she had sufficiently reminded him of the +lover she had given up for him, and of how much _he_ had loved her, and +how miserable she had made _him_ by loving Samuel Anderson--when she had +conducted the quarrel through all the preliminary stages, she always +carried her point in the end by a _coup de partie_ somewhat in +this fashion: + +"That's just the way! Always the way with you men! I suppose I must give +up to you as usual. You've lorded it over me from the start. I can't +even have the management of my own daughter. But I do think that after +I've let you have your way in so many things, you might turn off that +fellow. You might let me have my way in one little thing, and you +_would_ if you cared for me. You know how liable I am to die at any +moment of heart-disease, and yet you will prolong this excitement in +this way." + +Now, there is nothing a weak man likes so much as to be considered +strong, nothing a henpecked man likes so much as to be regarded a +tyrant. If you ever hear a man boast of his determination to rule his +own house, you may feel sure that he is subdued. And a henpecked husband +always makes a great show of opposing everything that looks toward the +enlargement of the work or privileges of women. Such a man insists on +the shadow of authority because he can not have the substance. It is a +great satisfaction to him that his wife can never be president, and that +she can not make speeches in prayer-meeting. While he retains these +badges of superiority, he is still in some sense head of the family. + +So when Mrs. Anderson loyally reminded her husband that she had always +let him have his own way, he believed her because he wanted to, though +he could not just at the moment recall the particular instances. And +knowing that he must yield, he rather liked to yield as an act of +sovereign grace to the poor oppressed wife who begged it. + +"Well, if you insist on it, of course, I will not refuse you," he said; +"and perhaps you are right." He had yielded in this way almost every day +of his married life, and in this way he yielded to the demand that +August should he discharged. But he agreed with his wife that Julia +should not know anything about it, and that there must be no +leave-taking allowed. + +The very next day Julia sat sewing on the long porch in front of the +house. Cynthy Ann was getting dinner in the kitchen at the other end of +the hall, and Mrs. Anderson was busy in her usual battle with dirt. She +kept the house clean, because it gratified her combativeness and her +domineering disposition to have the house clean in spite of the +ever-encroaching dirt. And so she scrubbed and scolded, and scolded and +scrubbed, the scrubbing and scolding agreeing in time and rhythm. The +scolding was the vocal music, the scrubbing an accompaniment. The +concordant discord was perfect. Just at the moment I speak of there was +a lull in her scolding. The symphonious scrubbing went on as usual. +Julia, wishing to divert the next thunder-storm from herself, erected +what she imagined might prove a conversational lightning-rod, by asking +a question on a topic foreign to the theme of the last march her mother +had played and sung so sweetly with brush and voice. + +"Mother, what makes Uncle Andrew so queer?" + +"I don't know. He was always queer." This was spoken in a staccato, +snapping-turtle way. But when one has lived all one's life with a +snapping-turtle, one doesn't mind. Julia did not mind. She was curious +to know what was the matter with her uncle, Andrew Anderson. So +she said: + +"I've heard that some false woman treated him cruelly; is that so?" + +Julia did not see how red her mother's face was, for she was not +regarding her. + +"Who told you that?" Julia was so used to hearing her mother speak in an +excited way that she hardly noticed the strange tremor in this question. + +"August." + +The symphony ceased in a moment. The scrubbing-brush dropped in the pail +of soapsuds. But the vocal storm burst forth with a violence that +startled even Julia. "August said _that_, did he? And you listened, did +you? You listened to _that? You_ listened to that? _You listened_ to +_that_? Hey? He slandered your mother. You listened to him slander your +mother!" By this time Mrs. Anderson was at white heat. Julia was +speechless. "_I_ saw you yesterday flirting with that _Dutchman_, and +listening to his abuse of your mother! And now you _insult_ me! Well, +to-morrow will be the last day that that Dutchman will hold a plow on +this place. And you'd better look out for yourself, miss! You--" + +Here followed a volley of epithets which Julia received standing. But +when her mother's voice grew to a scream, Julia took the word. + +"Mother, hush!" + +It was the first word of resistance she had ever uttered. The agony +within must have been terrible to have wrung it from her. The mother was +stunned with anger and astonishment. She could not recover herself +enough to speak until Jule had fled half-way up the stairs. Then her +mother covered her defeat by screaming after her, "Go to your own room, +you impudent hussy! You know I am liable to die of heart-disease any +minute, and you want to kill me!" + + + +CHAPTER III. + +A FAREWELL. + +Mrs. Anderson felt that she had made a mistake. She had not meant to +tell Julia that August was to leave. But now that this stormy scene had +taken place, she thought she could make a good use of it. She knew that +her husband co-operated with her in her opposition to "the Dutchman," +only because he was afraid of his wife. In his heart, Samuel Anderson +could not refuse anything to his daughter. Denied any of the happiness +which most men find in loving their wives, he found consolation in the +love of his daughter. Secretly, as though his paternal affection were a +crime, he caressed Julia, and his wife was not long in discovering that +the father cared more for a loving daughter than for a shrewish wife. +She watched him jealously, and had come to regard her daughter as one +who had supplanted her in her husband's affections, and her husband as +robbing her of the love of her daughter. In truth, Mrs. Samuel Anderson +had come to stand so perpetually on guard against imaginary +encroachments on her rights, that she saw enemies everywhere. She hated +Wehle because he was a Dutchman; she would have hated him on a dozen +other scores if he had been an American. It was offense enough that +Julia loved him. + +So now she resolved to gain her husband to her side by her version of +the story, and before dinner she had told him how August had charged her +with being false and cruel to Andrew many years ago, and how Jule had +thrown it up to her, and how near she had come to dropping down with +palpitation of the heart. And Samuel Anderson reddened, and declared +that he would protect his wife from such insults. The notion that he +protected his wife was a pleasant fiction of the little man's, which +received a generous encouragement at the hands of his wife. It was a +favorite trick of hers to throw herself, in a metaphorical way, at his +feet, a helpless woman, and in her feebleness implore his protection. +And Samuel felt all the courage of knighthood in defending his +inoffensive wife. Under cover of this fiction, so flattering to the +vanity of an overawed husband, she had managed at one time or another to +embroil him with almost all the neighbors, and his refusal to join +fences had resulted in that crooked arrangement known as a "devil's +lane" on three sides of his farm. + +Julia dared not stay away from dinner, which was miserable enough. She +did not venture so much as to look at August, who sat opposite her, and +who was the most unhappy person at the table, because he did not know +what all the unhappiness was about. Mr. Anderson's brow foreboded a +storm, Mrs. Anderson's face was full of an earthquake, Cynthy Ann was +sitting in shadow, and Julia's countenance perplexed him. Whether she +was angry with him or not, he could not be sure. Of one thing he was +certain: she was suffering a great deal, and that was enough to make him +exceedingly unhappy. + +Sitting through his hurried meal in this atmosphere surcharged with +domestic electricity, he got the notion--he could hardly tell how--that +all this lowering of the sky had something to do with him. What had he +done? Nothing. His closest self-examination told him that he had done no +wrong. But his spirits were depressed, and his sensitive conscience +condemned him for some unknown crime that had brought about all this +disturbance of the elements. The ham did not seem very good, the cabbage +he could not eat, the corn-dodger choked him, he had no desire to wait +for the pie. He abridged his meal, and went out to the barn to keep +company with his horses and his misery until it should be time to return +to his plow. + +Julia sat and sewed in that tedious afternoon. She would have liked one +more interview with August before his departure. Looking through the +open hall, she saw him leave the barn and go toward his plowing. Not +that she looked up. Hawk never watched chicken more closely than Mrs. +Anderson watched poor Jule. But out of the corners of her eyes Julia saw +him drive his horses before him from the stable. At the field in which +he worked was on the other side of the house from where she sat she +could not so much as catch a glimpse of him as he held his plow on its +steady course. She wished she might have helped Cynthy Ann in the +kitchen, for then she could have seen him, but there was no chance for +such a transfer. + +Thus the tedious afternoon wore away, and just as the sun was settling +down so that the shadow of the elm in the front-yard stretched across +the road into the cow pasture, the dead silence was broken. Julia had +been wishing that somebody would speak. Her mother's sulky +speechlessness was worse than her scolding, and Julia had even wished +her to resume her storming. But the silence was broken by Cynthy Ann, +who came into the hall and called, "Jule, I wish you would go to the +barn and gether the eggs; I want to make some cake." + +Every evening of her life Julia gathered the eggs, and there was nothing +uncommon in Cynthy Ann's making cake, so that nothing could be more +innocent than this request. Julia sat opposite the front-door, her +mother sat farther along. Julia could see the face of Cynthy Ann. Her +mother could only hear the voice, which was dry and commonplace enough. +Julia thought she detected something peculiar in Cynthy's manner. She +would as soon have thought of the big oak gate-posts with their round +ball-like heads telegraphing her in a sly way, as to have suspected any +such craft on the part of Cynthy Ann, who was a good, pious, +simple-hearted, Methodist old maid, strict with herself, and censorious +toward others. But there stood Cynthy making some sort of gesture, which +Julia took to mean that she was to go quick. She did not dare to show +any eagerness. She laid down her work, and moved away listlessly. And +evidently she had been too slow. For if August had been in sight when +Cynthy Ann called her, he had now disappeared on the other side of the +hill. She loitered along, hoping that he would come in sight, but he did +not, and then she almost smiled to think how foolish she had been in +imagining that Cynthy Ann had any interest in her love affair. Doubtless +Cynthy sided with her mother. + +And so she climbed from mow to mow gathering the eggs. No place is +sweeter than a mow, no occupation can be more delightful than gathering +the fresh eggs--great glorious pearls, more beautiful than any that men +dive for, despised only because they are so common and so useful! But +Julia, gliding about noiselessly, did not think much of the eggs, did +not give much attention to the hens scratching for wheat kernels amongst +the straw, nor to the barn swallows chattering over the adobe dwellings +which they were building among the rafters above her. She had often +listened to the love-talk of these last, but now her heart was too heavy +to hear. She slid down to the edge of one of the mows, and sat there a +few feet above the threshing-floor with her bonnet in her hand, looking +off sadly and vacantly. It was pleasant to sit here alone and think, +without the feeling that her mother was penetrating her thoughts. + +A little rustle brought her to consciousness. Her face was fiery red in +a minute. There, in one corner of the threshing-floor, stood August, +gazing at her. He had come into the barn to find a single-tree in place +of one which had broken. While he was looking for it, Julia had come, +and he had stood and looked, unable to decide whether to speak or not, +uncertain how deeply she might be offended, since she had never once let +her eyes rest on him at dinner. And when she had come to the edge of the +mow and stopped there in a reverie, August had been utterly spell-bound. + +A minute she blushed. Then, perceiving her opportunity, she dropped +herself to the floor and walked up to August. + +"August, you are to be turned off to-morrow night." + +"What have I done? Anything wrong?" + +"No." + +"Why do they send me away?" + +"Because--because--" Julia stopped. + +But silence is often better than speech. A sudden intelligence came +into the blue eyes of August. "They turn me off because I love Jule +Anderson." + +[Illustration: A LITTLE RUSTLE BROUGHT HER TO CONSCIOUSNESS.] + +Julia blushed just a little. + +"I will love her all the same when I am gone. I will always love her." + +Julia did not know what to say to this passionate speech, so she +contented herself with looking a little grateful and very foolish. + +"But I am only a poor boy, and a Dutchman at that"--he said this +bitterly--"but if you will wait, Jule, I will show them I am of some +account. Not good enough for you, but good enough for _them_. +You will--" + +"I will wait--_forever_--for _you_, Gus." Her head was down, and her +voice could hardly be heard. "Good-by." She stretched out her hand, and +he took it trembling. + +"Wait a minute." He dropped the hand, and taking a pencil wrote on a +beam: + +"March 18th, 1843." + +"There, that's to remember the Dutchman by." + +"Don't call yourself a Dutchman, August. One day in school, when I was +sitting opposite to you, I learned this definition, 'August: grand, +magnificent,' and I looked at you and said, Yes, that he is. August is +grand and magnificent, and that's what you are. You're just grand!" + +I do not think he was to blame. I am sure he was not responsible. It was +done so quickly. He kissed her forehead and then her lips, and said +good-by and was gone. And she, with her apron full of eggs and her +cheeks very red--it makes one warm to climb--went back to the house, +resolved in some way to thank Cynthy Ann for sending her; but Cynthy +Ann's face was so serious and austere in its look that Julia concluded +she must have been mistaken, Cynthy Ann couldn't have known that August +was in the barn. For all she said was: + +"You got a right smart lot of eggs, didn't you? The hens is beginnin' to +lay more peart since the warm spell sot in." + + + +CHAPTER IV. + +A COUNTER-IRRITANT. + +"Vot you kits doornt off vor? Hey?" + +Gottlieb Wehle always spoke English, or what he called English, when he +was angry. + +"Vot for? Hey?" + +All the way home from Anderson's on that Saturday night, August had +been, in imagination, listening to the rough voice of his honest father +asking this question, and he had been trying to find a satisfactory +answer to it. He might say that Mr. Anderson did not want to keep a hand +any longer. But that would not be true. And a young man with August's +clear blue eyes was not likely to lie. + +"Vot vor ton't you not shpeak? Can't you virshta blain Eenglish ven you +hears it? Hey? You a'n't no teef vot shteels I shposes, unt you ton't +kit no troonks mit vishky? Vot you too tat you pe shamt of? Pin lazin' +rount? Kon you nicht Eenglish shprachen? Oot mit id do vonst!" + +"I did not do anything to be ashamed of," said August. And yet he looked +ashamed. + +"You tidn't pe no shamt, hey? You tidn't! Vot vor you loogs so leig a +teef in der bentenshry? Vot for you sprachen not mit me ven ich sprachs +der blainest zort ov Eenglish mit you? You kooms sneaggin heim Zaturtay +nocht leig a tog vots kot kigt, unt's got his dail dween his leks; and +ven I aks you in blain Eenglish vot's der madder, you loogs zheepish +leig, und says you a'n't tun nodin. I zay you tun sompin. If you a'n't +tun nodin den, vy don't you dell me vot it is dat you has tun? Hey?" + +[Illustration: GOTTLIEB.] + +All this time August found that it was getting harder and harder to tell +his father the real state of the case. But the old man, seeing that he +prevailed nothing, took a cajoling tone. + +"Koom, August, mine knabe, ton't shtand dare leig a vool. Vot tit +Anterson zay ven he shent you avay?" + +"He said that I'd been seen a-talking to his daughter, Jule Anderson." + +"Vell, you nebber said no hoorm doo Shule, tid you? If I dought you +said vot you zhoodn't zay doo Shule, I vood shust drash you on der +shpot! Tid you gwarl mit Shule, already?" + +"Quarrel with Jule! She's the last person in the world I'd think of +quarreling with. She's as good as--" + +"Oh! you pe in lieb mit Shule! You vool, you! Is dat all dat I raise you +vor? I dells you, unt dells you, unt _dells_ you to sprach nodin put +Deutsche, unt to marry a kood Deutsche vrau vot kood sprach mit you, unt +now you koes right shtraight off unt kits knee-teep in lieb mit a vool +of a Yangee kirl! You doo ant pe doornt off!" + +August's countenance brightened. All the way home he had felt that it +was somehow an unpardonable sin to be a Dutchman. Anderson had spoken +hardly to him in dismissing him, and now it was a great comfort to find +that his father returned the contempt of the Yankees at its full value. +All the conceit was not on the side of the Yankees. It was at least an +open question which was the most disgraced, he or Julia, by their little +love affair. + +But more comforting still was the quiet look of his sweet-faced mother, +who, moving about among her throng of children like a hen with more +chickens than she can hover[1], never forgot to be patient and +affectionate. If there had been a look of reproach on the face of the +mother, it would have been the hardest trial of all. But there was that +in her eyes--the dear Moravian mother--that gave courage to August. The +mother was an outside conscience, and now as Gottlieb, who had lapsed +into German for his wife's benefit, rattled on his denunciation of this +Cannanitish Yankee, with whom his son was in love, the son looked every +now and then into the eyes, the still German eyes of the mother, and +rejoiced that he saw there no reflection of his father's rebuke. The +older Wehle presently resumed his English, such as it was, as better +adapted to scolding. Whether he thought to make his children love German +by abusing them in English, I do not know, but it was his habit. + +[Footnote 1: Not until my attention was called to this word in the proof +did I know that in this sense it is a provincialism. It is so used, at +least in half the country, and yet neither of our American +dictionaries has it.] + +"I dells you tese Yangees is Yangees. Dere neber voz put shust von cood +vor zompin. Antrew Antershon is von. He shtaid mit us ven ve vos all +zick, unt he is zhust so cood as if he was porn in Deutschland. Put all +de rest is Yangees. Marry a Deutsche vrau vot's kot cood sense to ede +kraut unt shleep unter vedder peds ven it's kalt. Put shust led de +Yangees pe Yangees." + +Seeing August put on his hat and go to the door, he called out testily: + +"Vare you koes, already?" + +"Over to the castle." + +"Veil, das is koot. Ko doo de gassel. Antrew vlll dell you vat sorts do +Yangee kirls pe!" + + + +CHAPTER V. + +AT THE CASTLE. + +By the time August reached Andrew Anderson's castle it was dark. The +castle was built in a hollow, looking out toward the Ohio River, a river +that has this peculiarity, that it is all beautiful, from Pittsburgh to +Cairo. Through the trees, on which the buds were just bursting, August +looked out on the golden roadway made by the moonbeams on the river. And +into the tumult of his feelings there came the sweet benediction of +Nature. And what is Nature but the voice of God? + +Anderson's castle was a large log building of strange construction. +Everything about it had been built by the hands of Andrew, at once its +lord and its architect. Evidently a whimsical fancy had pleased itself +in the construction. It was an attempt to realize something of medieval +form in logs. There were buttresses and antique windows, and by an +ingenious transformation the chimney, usually such a disfigurement to a +log-house, was made to look like a round donjon keep. But it was +strangely composite, and I am afraid Mr. Ruskin would have considered it +somewhat confused; for while it looked like a rude castle to those who +approached it from the hills, it looked like something very different to +those who approached the front, for upon that side was a portico with +massive Doric columns, which were nothing more nor less than maple logs. +Andrew maintained that the natural form of the trunk of a tree was the +ideal and perfect form of a pillar. + +To this picturesque structure, half castle, half cabin, with hints of +church and temple, came August Wehle on Saturday evening. He did not go +round to the portico and knock at the front-door as a stranger would +have done, but in behind the donjon chimney he pulled an alarm-cord. +Immediately the head of Andrew Anderson was thrust out of a Gothic +hole--you could not call it a window. His uncut hair, rather darker than +auburn, fell down to his waist, and his shaggy red beard lay upon his +bosom. Instead of a coat he wore that unique garment of linsey-woolsey +known in the West as wa'mus (warm us?), a sort of over-shirt. He was +forty-five, but there were streaks of gray in his hair and board, and he +looked older by ten years. + +"What ho, good friend? Is that you?" he cried. "Come up, and right +welcome!" For his language was as archaic and perhaps as incongruous as +his architecture. And then throwing out of the window a rope-ladder, he +called out again, "Ascend! ascend! my brave young friend!" + +And young Wehle climbed up the ladder into the large upper room. For it +was one peculiarity of the castle that the upper part had no visible +communication with the lower. Except August, and now and then a literary +stranger, no one but the owner was ever admitted to the upper story of +the house, and the neighbors, who always had access to the lower rooms, +regarded the upper part of the castle with mysterious awe. August was +often plied with questions about it, but he always answered simply that +he didn't think Mr. Anderson would like to have it talked about. For the +owner there must have been some inside mode of access to the second +story, but he did not choose to let even August know of any other way +than that by the rope-ladder, and the few strangers who came to see his +books were taken in by the same drawbridge. + +[Illustration: THE CASTLE.] + +The room was filled with books arranged after whimsical associations. +One set of cases, for instance, was called the Academy, and into these +he only admitted the masters, following the guidance of his own +eccentric judgment quite as much as he followed traditional estimate. +Homer, Virgil, Dante, and Milton of course had undisputed possession of +the department devoted to the "Kings of Epic," as he styled them. +Sophocles, Calderon, Corneille, and Shakespeare were all that he +admitted to his list of "Kings of Tragedy." Lope he rejected on literary +grounds, and Goethe because he thought his moral tendency bad. He +rejected Rabelais from his chief humorists, but accepted Cervantes, Le +Sage, Moliere, Swift, Hood, and the then fresh Pickwick of Boz. To these +he added the Georgia Scenes of Mr. Longstreet, insisting that they were +quite equal to Don Quixote. I can only stop to mention one other +department in his Academy. One case was devoted to the "Best Stories," +and an admirable set they were! I wish that anything of mine were worthy +to go into such company. His purity of feeling, almost ascetic, led him +to reject Boccaccio, but he admitted Chaucer and some of Balzac's, and +Smollett, Goldsmith, and De Foe, and Walter Scott's best, Irving's Rip +Van Winkle, Bernardin St. Pierre's "Paul and Virginia," and "Three +Months under the Snow," and Charles Lamb's generally overlooked +"Rosamund Gray." There were eases for "Socrates and his Friends," and +for other classes. He had amused himself for years in deciding what +books should be "crowned," as he called it, and what not. And then he +had another case, called "The Inferno." I wish there was space to give a +list of this department. Some were damned for dullness and some for +coarseness. Miss Edgeworth's Moral Tales, Darwin's Botanic Garden, +Rollin's Ancient History, and a hideously illustrated copy of the Book +of Martyrs were in the First-class, Don Juan and some French novels in +the second. Tupper, Swinburne, and Walt Whitman he did not know. + +In the corner next the donjon chimney was a little room with a small +fireplace. Thus the hermit economized wood, for wood meant time, and +time meant communion with his books. All of his domestic arrangements +were carried on after this frugal fashion. In the little room was a +writing-desk, covered with manuscripts and commonplace books. + +"Well, my young friend, you're thrice welcome," said Andrew, who never +dropped his book language. "What will you have? Will you resume your +apprenticeship under Goethe, or shall we canter to Canterbury with +Chaucer? Grand old Dan Chaucer! Or, shall we study magical philosophy +with Roger Bacon--the Friar, the Admirable Doctor? or read good Sir +Thomas More? What would Sir Thomas have said if he could have thought +that he would be admired by two such people as you and I, in the woods +of America, in the nineteenth century? But you do not want books! Ah! my +brave friend, you are not well. Come into my cell and let us talk. What +grieves you?" + +And Andrew took him by the hand with the courtesy of a knight, with the +tenderness of a woman, and with the air of an astrologer, and led him +into the apartment of a monk. + +[Illustration: THE SEDILIUM AT THE CASTLE.] + +"See!" he said, "I have made a new chair. It is the highest evidence of +my love for my Teutonic friend. You have now a right to this castle. You +shall be perpetually welcome. I said to myself, German scholarship shall +sit there, and the Backwoods Philosopher will sit here. So sit down on +my _sedilium_, and let us hear how this uncivil and inconstant world +treats you. It can not deal worse with you than it has with me. But I +have had my revenge on it! I have been revenged! I have done as I +pleased, and defied the world and all its hollow conventionalities." +These last words were spoken in a tone of misanthropic bitterness common +to Andrew. His love for August was the more intense that it stood upon a +background of general dislike, if not for the world, at least for that +portion of it which most immediately surrounded him. + +August took the chair, ingeniously woven and built of rye straw and +hickory splints. He knew that all this formality and apparent pedantry +was superficial. He and Andrew were bosom friends, and as he had often +opened his heart to the master of the castle before, so now he had no +difficulty in telling him his troubles, scarcely heeding the appropriate +quotations which Andrew made from time to time by way of embellishment. + + + +CHAPTER VI. + +THE BACKWOODS PHILOSOPHER. + +One reason for Andrew's love of August Wehle was that he was a German. +Far from sharing in the prejudices of his neighbors against foreigners, +Andrew had so thorough a contempt for his neighbors, that he liked +anybody who did not belong to his own people. If a Turk had emigrated to +Clark township, Andrew would have fallen in love with him, and built a +divan for his special accommodation. But he loved August also for the +sake of his gentle temper and his genuine love for books. And only +August or August's mother, upon whom Andrew sometimes called, could +exorcise his demon of misanthropy, which he had nursed so long that it +was now hard to dismiss it. + +Andrew Anderson belonged to a class noticed, I doubt not, by every acute +observer of provincial life in this country. In backwoods and +out-of-the-way communities literary culture produces marked +eccentricities in the life. Your bookish man at the West has never +learned to mark the distinction between the world of ideas and the +world of practical life. Instead of writing poems or romances, he falls +to living them, or at least trying to. Add a disappointment in love, and +you will surely throw him into the class of which Anderson was the +representative. For the education one gets from books is sadly +one-sided, unless it be balanced by a knowledge of the world. + +Andrew Anderson had always been regarded as an oddity. A man with a good +share of ideality and literary taste, placed against the dull background +of the society of a Western neighborhood in the former half of the +century, would necessarily appear odd. Had he drifted into communities +of more culture, his eccentricity, begotten of a sense of superiority to +his surroundings, would have worn away. Had he been happily married, his +oddities would have been softened; but neither of these things happened. +He told August a very different history. For the confidence of his +"Teutonic friend" had awakened in the solitary man a desire to uncover +that story which he had kept under lock and key for so many years. + +"Ah! my friend," said he with excitement, "don't trust the faith of a +woman." And then rising from his seat he said, "The Backwoods +Philosopher warns you. I pray you give good heed. I do not know Julia. +She is my niece. It ill becomes me to doubt her sincerity. But I know +whose daughter she is. I pray you give good heed, my Teutonic friend. _I +know whose daughter she is_! + +"I do not talk much. But you have arrived at a critical point--a point +of turning. Out of his own life, out of his own sorrow, the Backwoods +Philosopher warns you. I am at peace now. But look at me. Do you not see +the marks of the ravages of a great storm? A sort of a qualified +happiness I have in philosophy. But what I might have been if the +storm had not torn me to pieces in my youth--what I might have been, +that I am not. I pray you never trust in a woman's keeping the happiness +of your life!" + +[Illustration: "LOOK AT ME."] + +Here Andrew slipped his arm through Wehle's, and began to promenade with +him in the large apartment up and down an alley, dimly lighted by a +candle, between solid phalanxes of books. + +"I pray you give good heed," he said, resuming. "I was always eccentric. +People thought I was either a genius or fool. Perhaps I was much of +both. But this is a digression. I did not pay any attention to women. I +shunned them. I said that to be a great author and a philosophical +thinker, one must not be a man of society. I never went to a +wood-chopping, to an apple-peeling, to a corn-shucking, to a +barn-raising, nor indeed to any of our rustic feasts. I suppose this +piqued the vanity of the girls, and they set themselves to catch me. I +suppose they thought that I would be a trophy worth boasting. I have +noticed that hunters estimate game according to the difficulty of +getting it. But this is a digression. Let us return. + +"There came among us, at that time, Abigail Norman. She was pretty. I +swear by all the sacred cats of Egypt, that she was beautiful. She was +industrious. The best housekeeper in the state! She was high-strung. I +liked her all the more for that. You see a man of imagination is apt to +fall in love with a tragedy queen. But this is a digression. Let +us return. + +"She spread her toils in my path. While I was wandering through the +woods writing poetry to birds and squirrels, Abby Norman was ambitious +enough to hope to make me her slave, and she did. She read books that +she thought I liked. She planned in various ways to seem to like what I +liked, and yet she had sense enough to differ a little from me, and so +make herself the more interesting. I think a man of real intellect never +likes to have a man or woman agree with him entirely. But let us return. + +"I loved Abigail desperately. No, I did not love Abigail Norman at all. +I did not love her as she was, but I loved her as she seemed to my +imagination to be. I think most lovers love an ideal that hovers in the +air a little above the real recipient of their love. And I think we men +of genius and imagination are apt to love something very different from +the real person, which is unfortunate. + +"But I am digressing again. To return: I wrote poetry to Abby. I courted +her. I cut off my long hair for a woman, like Samson. I tried to dress +more decently, and made myself ridiculous no doubt, for a man can not +dress well unless he has a talent for it. And I never had a genius for +beau-knots. + +"But pardon the digression. Let us return. I was to have married her. +The day was set. Then I found accidentally that she was engaged to my +brother Samuel, a young man with better manners than mind. She made him +believe that she was only making a butt of me. But I think she really +loved me more than she knew. When I had discovered her treachery, I +shipped on the first flat-boat. I came near committing suicide, and +should have jumped into the river one night, only that I thought it +might flatter her vanity. I came back here and ignored her. She broke +with Samuel and tried to regain my affections. I scorned her. I trod on +her heart! I stamped her pride into the dust! I was cruel. I was +contemptuous. I was well-nigh insane. Then she went back to Samuel, and +_made_ him marry her. Then she forced my imbecile old father, on his +death-bed, to will all the property to Samuel, except this piece of +rough hill-land and one thousand dollars. But here I built this castle. +My thousand dollars I put in books. I learned how, to weave the +coverlets of which our country people are so fond, and by this means, +and by selling wood to the steamboats, I have made a living and bought +my library without having to work half of my time. I was determined +never to leave. I swore by all the arms of Vishnu she should never say +that she had driven me away. I don't know anything about Julia. But I +know whose daughter she is. My young friend, beware! I pray you take +good heed! The Backwoods Philosopher warns you!" + + + +CHAPTER VII. + +WITHIN AND WITHOUT. + +If the gentleman is not born in a man, it can not be bred in him. If it +is born in him, it can not be bred out of him. August Wehle had +inherited from his mother the instinct of true gentlemanliness. And now, +when Andrew relapsed into silence and abstraction, he did not attempt to +rouse him, but bidding him goodnight, with his own hands threw the +rope-ladder out the window and started up the hollow toward home. The +air was sultry and oppressive, the moon had been engulfed, and the first +thunder-cloud of the spring was pushing itself up toward the zenith, +while the boughs of the trees were quivering with a premonitory shudder. +But August did not hasten. The real storm was within. Andrew's story had +raised doubts. When he went down the ravine the love of Julia Anderson +shone upon his heart as benignly as the moon upon the waters. Now the +light was gone, and the black cloud of a doubt had shut out his peace. +Jule Anderson's father was rich. He had not thought of it before! But +now he remembered how much woodland he owned and how he had two large +farms. Jule Anderson would not marry a poor boy. And a Dutchman! She was +not sincere. She was trifling with him and teasing her parents. Or, if +she were sincere now, she would not be faithful to him against every +tempting offer. And he would have to drive on the rocks, too, as Andrew +had. At any rate, he would not marry her until he stood upon some sort +of equality with her. + +The wind was swaying him about in its fitful gusts, and he rather liked +it. In his anguish of spirit it was a pleasure to contend with the +storm. The wind, the lightning, the sudden sharp claps of thunder were +on his own key. He felt in the temper of old Lear. The winds might blow +and crack their cheeks. + +But it was not alone the suggestions of Andrew that aroused his +suspicions. He now recalled a strange statement that Samuel Anderson +made in discharging him. "You said what you had no right to say about my +wife, in talking to Julia." What had he said? Only that some woman had +not treated Andrew "just right." Who the woman might be he had not known +until his present interview with Andrew. Had Julia been making mischief +herself by repeating his words and giving them a direction he had not +intended? He could not have dreamed of her acting such a part but for +the strange influence of Andrew's strange story. And so he staggered on, +wet to the skin, defying in his heart the lightning and the wind, until +he came to the cabin of his father. Climbing the fence, for there was no +gate, he pulled the latch-string and entered. They were all asleep; the +hard-working family went to bed early. But chubby-faced Wilhelmina, the +favorite sister, had set up to wait for August, and he now found her +fast asleep in the chair. + +"Wilhelmina! wake up!" he said. + +"O August!" she said, opening the corner of one eye and yawning, "I +wasn't asleep. I only--uh--shut my eyes a minute. How wet you are! Did +you go to see the pretty girl up at Mr. Anderson's?" + +"No," said August. + +"O August! she is pretty, and she is good and sweet," and Wilhelmina +took his wet checks between her chubby hands and gave him a sleepy kiss, +and then crept off to bed. + +And, somehow, the faith of the child Wilhelmina counteracted the +skepticism of the and Andrew, and August felt the storm subsiding. + +When he looked out of the window of the loft in which he slept the +shower had ceased as suddenly as it had come, the thunder had retreated +behind the hills, the clouds were already breaking, and the white face +of the moon was peering through the ragged rifts. + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + +FIGGERS WON'T LIE + +"Figgers won't lie," said Elder Hankins, the Millerite preacher. "I say +figgers won't lie. When a Methodis' talks about fallin' from grace he +has to argy the pint. And argyments can't be depended 'pon. And when a +Prisbyterian talks about parseverance he haint got the absolute +sartainty on his side. But figgers won't lie noways, and it's figgers +that shows this yer to be the last yer of the world, and that the final +eend of all things is approachin'. I don't ask you to listen to no +'mpressions of me own, to no reasonin' of nobody; all I ask is that you +should listen to the voice of the man in the linen-coat what spoke to +Dan'el, and then listen to the voice of the 'rithmetic, and to a sum in +simple addition, the simplest sort of addition." + +All the Millerite preachers of that day were not quite so illiterate as +Elder Hankins, and it is but fair to say that the Adventists of to-day +are a very respectable denomination, doing a work which deserves more +recognition from others than it receives. And for the delusion which +expects the world to come to an end immediately, the Adventist leaders +are not responsible in the first place. From Gnosticism to Mormonism, +every religious delusion has grown from some fundamental error in the +previous religious teaching of the people. By the narrowly verbal method +of reading the Scripture, so much in vogue in the polemical discussions +of the past generation, and still so fervently adhered to by many +people, the ground was prepared for Millerism. And to-day in many +regions the soil in made fallow for the next fanaticism. It is only a +question of who shall first sow and reap. To people educated as those +who gathered in Sugar Grove school-house had been to destroy the spirit +of the Scripture by distorting the letter in proving their own sect +right, nothing could be so overwhelming as Elder Hankins's "figgers." + +For he had clearly studied figgers to the neglect of the other branches +of a liberal education. His demonstration was printed on a large chart. +He began with the seventy weeks of Daniel, he added in the "time and +times and a half," and what Daniel declared that he "understood not when +he heard," was plain sailing to the enlightened and mathematical mind of +Elder Hankins. When he came to the thousand two hundred and ninety days, +he waxed more exultant than Kepler in his supreme moment, and on the +thousand three hundred and five and thirty days he did what Jonas +Harrison called "the blamedest tallest cipherin' he'd ever seed in all +his born days." + +Jonas was the new hired man, who had stopped into the shoes of August at +Samuel Anderson's. He sat by August and kept up a running commentary, in +a loud whisper, on the sermon, "My feller-citizen," said Jonas, +squeezing August's arm at a climax of the elder's discourse, "My +feller-citizen, looky thar, won't you? He'll cipher the world into +nothin' in no time. He's like the feller that tried to find out the +valoo of a fat shoat when wood was two dollars a cord. 'Ef I can't do it +by substraction I'll do it by long-division,' says he. And ef this +'rithmetic preacher can't make a finishment of this sub_lu_nary speer by +addition, he'll do it by multiplyin'. They's only one answer in his +book. Gin him any sum you please, and it all comes out 1843!" + +Now in all the region round about Sugar Grove school-house there was a +great dearth of sensation. The people liked the prospect of the end of +the world because it would be a spectacle, something to relieve the +fearful monotony of their lives. Funerals and weddings were commonplace, +and nothing could have been so interesting to them as the coming of the +end of the world, as described by Elder Hankins, unless it had been a +first-class circus (with two camels and a cage of monkeys attached, so +that scrupulous people might attend from a laudable desire to see the +menagerie!) A murder would have been delightful to the people of Clark +township. It would have given them something to think and talk about. +Into this still pool Elder Hankins threw the vials, the trumpets, the +thunders, the beast with ten horns, the he-goat, and all the other +apocalyptic symbols understood in an absurdly literal way. The world was +to come to an end in the following August. Here was an excitement, +something worth living for. + +All the way to their homes the people disputed learnedly about the "time +and times and a half," about "the seven heads and ten horns," and the +seventh vial. The fierce polemical discussions and the bold sectarian +dogmatism of the day had taught them anything but "the modesty of true +science," and now the unsolvable problems of the centuries were taken +out of the hands of puzzled scholars and settled as summarily and +positively as the relative merits of "gourd-seed" and "flint" corn. +Samuel Anderson had always planted his corn in the "light" of the moon +and his potatoes in the "dark" of that orb, had always killed his hogs +when the moon was on the increase lest the meat should all go to gravy, +and he and his wife had carefully guarded against the carrying of a hoe +through the house, for fear "somebody might die." Now, the preaching of +the elder impressed him powerfully. His life had always been not so much +a bad one as a cowardly one, and to get into heaven by a six months' +repentance, seemed to him a good transaction. Besides he remembered that +there men were never married, and that there, at last, Abigail would no +longer have any peculiar right to torture him. Hankins could not have +ciphered him into Millerism if his wife had not driven him into it as +the easiest means of getting a divorce. No doom in the next world could +have alarmed him much, unless it had been the prospect of continuing +lord and master of Mrs. Abigail. And as for that oppressed woman, she +was simply scared. She was quite unwilling to admit the coming of the +world's end so soon. Having some ugly accounts to settle, she would fain +have postponed the payday. Mrs. Anderson might truly have been called a +woman who feared God--she had reason to. + +And as for August, he would not have cared much if the world had come to +an end, if only he could have secured one glance of recognition from the +eyes of Julia. But Julia dared not look. The process of cowing her had +gone on from childhood, and now she was under a reign of terror. She did +not yet know that she could resist her mother. And then she lived in +mortal fear of her mother's heart-disease. By irritating her she might +kill her. This dread of matricide her mother held always over her. In +vain she watched for a chance. It did not come. Once, when her mother's +head was turned, she glanced at August. But he was at that moment +listening or trying to listen to one of Jonas Harrison's remarks. And +August, who did not understand the circumstances, was only able to +account for her apparent coldness on the theory suggested by Andrew's +universal unbelief in women, or by supposing that when she understood +his innocent remark about Andrew's disappointment to refer to her +mother, she had taken offense at it. And so, while the rest were +debating whether the world would come to an end or not, August had a +disconsolate feeling that the end of the world had already come. And it +did not make him feel better to have Wilhelmina whisper, "Oh! but she +_is_ pretty, that Anderson girl--a'n't she, August?" + + + +CHAPTER IX. + +THE NEW SINGING-MASTER + +"He sings like an owlingale!" + +Jonas Harrison was leaning against the well-curb, talking to Cynthy Ann. +He'd been down to the store at Brayville, he said, a listenin' to 'em +discuss Millerism, and seed a new singing-master there. "Could he sing +good?" Cynthy asked, rather to prolong the talk than to get information. + +"Sings like an owlingale, I reckon. He's got more seals to his ministry +a-hanging onto his watch-chain than I ever seed. Got a mustache onto the +top story of his mouth, somethin' like a tuft of grass on the roof of a +ole shed kitchen. Peart? He's the peartest-lookin' chap I ever seed. But +he a'n't no singin'-master--not of I'm any jedge of turnips. He warn't +born to sarve his day and generation with a tunin'-fork. I think he's +a-goin' to reckon-water a little in these parts and that he's only +a-playin' singin'-master. He kin play more fiddles'n one, you bet a +hoss! Says he come up here fer his wholesome, and I guess he did. Think +ef he'd a-staid where he was, he mout a-suffered a leetle from +confinement to his room, and that room p'raps not more nor five foot by +nine, and ruther dim-lighted and poor-provisioned, an' not much chance +fer takin' exercise in the fresh air!" + +[Illustration: "DON'T BE ONCHARITABLE, JONAS."] + +"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas, don't. We're all mis'able sinners, I +s'pose; and you know charity don't think no evil. The man may be all +right, ef he does wear hair on his lip. Charity kivers lots a sins." + +"Ya-as, but charity don't kiver no wolves with wool. An' ef he a'n't a +woolly wolf they's no snakes in Jarsey, as little Ridin' Hood said when +her granny tried to bite her head off. I'm dead sot in favor of charity, +and mean to gin her my vote at every election, but I a'n't a-goin' to +have her put a blind-bridle on to me. And when a man comes to Clark +township a-wearing straps to his breechaloons to keep hisself from +leaving terry-firmy altogether, and a weightin' hisself down with pewter +watch-seals, gold-washed, and a cultivating a crap of red-top hay onto +his upper lip, and a-lettin' on to be a singin'-master, I suspicions +him. They's too much in the git-up fer the come-out. Well, here's yer +health, Cynthy!" + +And having made this oracular speech and quaffed the hard limestone +water, Jonas hung the clean white gourd from which he had been drinking, +in its place against the well-curb, and started back to the field, while +Cynthy Ann carried her bucket of water into the kitchen, blaming herself +for standing so long talking to Jonas. To Cynthy everything pleasant had +a flavor of sinfulness. + +The pail of water was hardly set down in the sink when there came a +knock at the door, and Cynthy found standing by it the strapped +pantaloons, the "red-top" mustache, the watch-seals, and all the rest +that went to make up the new singing-master. He smiled when he saw her, +one of those smiles which are strictly limited to the lower half of the +face, and are wholly mechanical, as though certain strings inside were +pulled with malice aforethought and the mouth jerked out into a square +grin, such as an ingeniously-made automaton might display. + +"Is Mr. Anderson in?" + +"No, sir; he's gone to town." + +"Is Mrs. Anderson in?" + +And so he entered, and soon got into conversation with the lady of the +house, and despite the prejudice which she entertained for mustaches, +she soon came to like him. He smiled so artistically. He talked so +fluently. He humored all her whims, pitied all her complaints, and staid +to dinner, eating her best preserves with a graciousness that made Mrs. +Anderson feel how great was his condescension. For Mr. Humphreys, the +singing-master, had looked at the comely face of Julia, and looked over +Julia's shoulders at the broad acres beyond; and he thought that in +Clark township he had not met with so fine a landscape, so nice a +figure-piece. And with the quick eye of a man of the world, he had +measured Mrs. Anderson, and calculated on the ease with which he might +complete the picture to suit his taste. + +He staid to supper. He smiled that same fascinating square smile on +Samuel Anderson, treated him as head of the house, talked glibly of +farming, and listened better than he talked. He gave no account of +himself, except by way of allusion. He would begin a sentence thus, +"When I was traveling in France with my poor dear mother," etc., from +which Mrs. Anderson gathered that he had been a devoted son, and then he +would relate how he had seen something curious "when he was dining at +the house of the American minister at Berlin." "This hazy air reminds me +of my native mountains in Northern New York." And then he would allude +to his study of music in the Conservatory in Leipsic. To plain country +people in an out-of-the-way Western neighborhood, in 1843, such a man +was better than a lyceum full of lectures. He brought them the odor of +foreign travel, the flavor of city, the "otherness" that +everybody craves. + +[Illustration: THE HAWK.] + +He staid to dinner, as I have said, and to supper. He staid over night. +He took up his board at the house of Samuel Anderson. Who could resist +his entreaty? Did he not assure them that he felt the need of a home in +a cultivated family? And was it not the one golden opportunity to have +the daughter of the house taught music by a private master, and thus +give a special _eclat_ to her education? How Mrs. Anderson hoped that +this superior advantage would provoke jealous remarks on the part of her +neighbors! It was only necessary to the completion of her triumph that +they should say she was "stuck up." Then, too, to have so brilliant a +beau for Julia! A beau with watch-seals and a mustache, a beau who had +been to Paris with his mother, studied music in the Conservatory at +Leipsic, dined with the American minister in Berlin, and done ever so +many more wonderful things, was a prospect to delight the ambitious +heart of Mrs. Anderson, especially as he flattered the mother instead of +the daughter. + +"He's a independent citizen of this Federal Union," said Jonas to +Cynthy, "carries his head like he was intimately 'quainted with the +'merican eagle hisself. He's playin' this game sharp. He deals all the +trumps to hisself, and most everything besides. He'll carry off the gal +if something don't arrest him in his headlong career. Jist let me git a +chance at him when he's soarin' loftiest into the amber blue above, and +I'll cut his kite-string for him, and let him fall like fork-ed +lightnin' into a mud-puddle." + +Cynthy said she did see one great sin that he had committed for sure. +That was the puttin' on of gold and costly apparel. It was sot down in +the Bible and in the Methodist Discipline that it was a sin to wear +gold, and she should think the poor man hadn't no sort o' regard for his +soul, weighing it down with them things. + +But Jonas only remarked that he guessed his jewelry warn't no sin. He +didn't remember nothing agin wearin' pewter. + + + +CHAPTER X. + +AN OFFER OF HELP. + +The singing-master, Mr. Humphreys, went to singing-school and church +with Julia in a matter-of-course way, treating her with attention, but +taking care not to make himself too attentive. Except that Julia could +not endure his smile--which was, like some joint stock companies, +strictly limited--she liked him well enough. It was something to her, in +her monotonous life under the eye of her mother, who almost never left +her alone, and who cut off all chance for communication with August--it +was something to have the unobtrusive attentions of Mr. Humphreys, who +always interested her with his adventures. For indeed it really seemed +that he had had more adventures than any dozen other men. How should a +simple-hearted girl understand him? How should she read the riddle of a +life so full of duplicity--of _multiplicity_--as the life of Joshua +Humphreys, the music-teacher? Humphreys intended to make love to her, +but during the first two weeks he only aimed to gain her esteem. He felt +that there was a clue which he had not got. But at last the key dropped +into his hands, and he felt sure that the unsophisticated girl was in +his power. + +Among the girls that attended Humphreys's singing-school was Betsey +Malcolm, the near neighbor of the Andersons. The singing-master often +saw her at Mr. Anderson's, and he often wished that Julia were as easy +to win as he felt Betsey to be. The sensuous mouth, the giddy eyes of +Betsey, showed quickly her appreciation of every flattering attention he +paid her, and though in Julia's presence he was careful how he treated +her, yet when he, walking down the road one day, alone, met her, he +courted her assiduously. He had not to observe any caution in her case. +She greedily absorbed all the flattery he could give, only pettishly +responding after a while: "O dear! that's the way you talk to me, and +that's the way you talk to Jule sometimes, I s'pose. I guess she don't +mind keeping two of you as strings to her bow." + +"Two! What do you mean, my fair friend? I havn't seen one, yet." + +"Oh, no! You mean you haven't seen two. You see one whenever you look in +the glass. The other is a Dutchman, and she's dying after him. She may +flirt with you, but her mother watches her night and day, to keep her +from running off with Gus Wehle." + +Like many another crafty person, Betsey Malcolm had fairly overshot the +mark. In seeking to separate Humphreys from Julia, she had given him the +clue he desired, and he was not slow to use it, for he was almost the +only person that Mrs. Anderson trusted alone with Julia. + +In the dusk of the evening of the very day of his talk with Betsey, he +sat on the long front-porch with Julia. Julia liked him better, or +rather did not dislike him so much in the dark as she did in the light. +For when it was light she could see him smile, and though she had not +learned to connect a cold-blooded face with a villainous character, she +had that childish instinct which made her shrink from Humphreys's square +smile. It always seemed to her that the real Humphreys gazed at her out +of the cold, glittering eyes, and that the smile was something with +which he had nothing to do. + +Sitting thus in the dusk of the evening, and looking out over the green +pasture to where the nigher hills ceased and the distant seemed to come +immediately after, their distance only indicated by color, though the +whole Ohio "bottom" was between, she forgot the Mephistopheles who sat +not far away, and dreamed of August, the "grand," as she fancifully +called him. And he let her sit and dream undisturbed for a long time, +until the darkness settled down upon the hills. Then he spoke. + +"I--I thought," began Humphreys, with well-feigned hesitancy, "I +thought, I should venture to offer you my assistance as a true and +gallant man, in a matter--a matter of supreme delicacy--a matter that I +have no right to meddle with. I think I have heard that your mother is +not friendly to the suit of a young man who--who--well, let us say who +is not wholly disagreeable to you. I beg your pardon, don't tell me +anything that you prefer to keep locked in the privacy of your own +bosom. But if I can render any assistance, you know. I have some little +influence with your parents, maybe. If I could be the happy bearer of +any communications, command me as your obedient servant." + +Julia did not know what to say. To get a word to August was what she +most desired. But the thought of using Humphreys was repulsive to her. +She could not see his face in the gathering darkness, but she could +_feel_ him smile that same soulless, geometrical smile. She could not do +it. She did not know what to say. So she said nothing. Humphreys saw +that he must begin farther back. + +"I hear the young man spoken of as a praiseworthy person. German, I +believe? I have always noticed a peculiar manliness about Germans. A +peculiar refinement, indeed, and a courtesy that is often wanting in +Americans. I noticed this when I was in Leipsic. I don't think the +German girls are quite so refined. German gentlemen in this country seem +to prefer American girls oftentimes." + +All this might have sounded hollow enough to a disinterested listener. +To Julia the words were as sweet as the first rain after a tedious +drouth. She had heard complaint, censure, innuendo, and downright abuse +of poor Gus. These were the first generous words. They confirmed her +judgment, they comforted her heart, they made her feel grateful, even +affectionate toward the fop, in spite of his watch-seals, his curled +mustache, his straps, his cold eyes, and his artificial smile. Poor fool +you will call her, and poor fool she was. For she could have thrown +herself at the feet of Humphreys, and thanked him for his words. Thank +him she did in a stammering way, and he did not hesitate to repeat his +favorable impressions of Germans, after that. What he wanted was, not to +break the hold of August until he had placed himself in a position to be +next heir to her regard. + + + +CHAPTER XI. + +THE COON-DOG ARGUMENT. + +The reader must understand that all this time Elder Hankins continued to +bombard Clark township with the thunders and lightnings of the +Apocalypse, continued to whirl before the dazed imaginations of his +rustic hearers the wheels within wheels and the faces of the living +creatures of 'Zek'el, continued to cipher the world out of existence +according to formulas in Dan'el, marched out the he-goat, made the seven +heads and ten horns of the beast do service over and over again. And all +the sweet mysteries of Oriental imagery, the mystic figures which +unexpounded give so noble a depth to the perspective of Scripture, were +cut to pieces, pulled apart, and explained, as though they were tricks +of legerdemain. Julia was powerfully impressed, not by the declamations +of Hankins, for she had sensibility enough to recoil from his +vivisection of Scripture, though she had been all her life accustomed to +hear it from other than Millerites, but she was profoundly affected by +the excitement about her. Her father, attracted in part by the promise +that there should be no marrying there, had embraced Millerism with all +his heart, and was in such a state of excitement that he could not +attend to his business. Mrs. Anderson was in continual trepidation about +it, though she tried not to believe it. She was on the point of +rebelling and declaring that the world _should_ not come to an end. But +on the whole she felt that the government of the universe was one affair +in which she would have to give up all hope of having her own way. +Meantime there was no increase of religion. Some were frightened out of +their vices for a time, but a passionate terror of that sort is the +worst enemy of true piety. + +"Fer my part," said Cynthy Ann, as she walked home with Jonas, "fer my +part, I don't believe none of his nonsense. John Wesley" (Jonas was a +New-Light, and Cynthy always talked to him about Wesley) "knowed a heap +more about Scripter than all the Hankinses and Millerses that ever was +born, and he knowed how to cipher, too, I 'low. Why didn't he say the +world was goin' to wind up? An' our persidin' elder is a heap better +instructed than Hankins, and he says God don't tell nobody when the +world's goin' to wind up." + +"Goin' to run down, you mean, Cynthy Ann. 'Kordin' to Hankins it's a old +clock gin out in the springs, I 'low. How does Hankins know that +'Zek'el's livin' creeters means one thing more'n another? He talks about +them wheels as nateral as ef he was a wagon-maker fixin' a ole buggy. He +says the thing's a gone tater; no more craps of corn offen the bottom +land, no more electin' presidents of this free and glorious Columby, no +more Fourths, no more shootin' crackers nor spangled banners, no more +nothin'. He ciphers and ciphers, and then spits on his slate and wipes +us all out. Whenever Gabr'el blows I'll b'lieve it, but I won't take +none o' Hankins's tootin' in place of it. I shan't git skeered at no +tin-horns, and as for papaw whistles, why, I say Jericho wouldn't +a-tumbled for no sech music, and they won't fetch down no stars that +air way." + +Here old Gottlieb Wehle, who had just joined the Millerites, came up. +"Yonas, you mags shport of de Piple. Ef dem vaces in der veels, and dem +awvool veels in der veels, and dem figures vot always says aideen +huntert vordy dree, ef dem tond mean sompin awvool, vot does dey mean? +mean? Hey?" + +"My venerated friend and feller-citizen of forren birth," said Jonas, +"you hit the nail on the crown of the head squar, with the biggest sort +ov a sledge-hammer. You gripped a-holt of the truth that air time like +the American bird a-grippin' the arries on the shield. What do they +mean? That's jest the question, and you Millerites allers argies like +the man who warranted his dog to be a good coon-dog, bekase he warn't +good fer nothin' else under the amber blue. Now, my time-honored friend +and beloved German voter, jest let me tell you that _on the coon-dog +principle_ you could a-wound up the trade and traffic of this airth any +time. Fer ef they don't mean 1843, what do they mean? Why, 1842 or 1844, +of course. You don't come no coon-dog argyments over me, not while I +remain sound in wind and limb." + +"Goon-tog! Who zed goon-tog? Ich tidn't, Hankins tidn't, Ze'kel's wision +tidn't zay nodin pout no goon-tog. What's goon-togs cot do too mit de +end of de vorld? Yonas, you pe a vool, maype." + +"The same to yerself, my beloved friend and free and enlightened +feller-citizen. Long may you wave, like a green bay boss, and a +jimson-weed on the sunny side of a board-fence!" + +Gottlieb hurried on, finding Jonas much harder to understand than the +prophecies. + +"I hear the singing-master is goin' to jine," said Cynthy Ann. "Wonder +ef they'll take him with all his seals and straps, and hair on his upper +lip, with the plain words of the Bible agin gold and costly apparel? +Wonder ef he's tuck in, too?" + +"Tuck in? He an't one of that kind. He don't never git tuck in--he tucks +in. He knows which side of his bread's got quince preserves onto it. I +used to run second mate on the Dook of Orleans, and I know his kind. +He'll soar around like a turkey-buzzard fer a while. Presently he'll +'light. He's rusticatin' tell some scrape blows over. An' he'll make +somethin' outen it. Business afore pleasure is his motto. He don't hang +that seducin' grin under them hawky eyes fer nothin'. Wait till the +pious and disinterested example 'lights somewheres. Then look out for +the feathers, won't ye! He won't leave nary bone. But here we air. I +declare, Cynthy, this walk seems _the shortest_, when I'm in superfine, +number-one comp'ny!" + +Cynthy was so pleased with this remark, that she did penance in her mind +for a week afterwards. It was so wicked to enjoy one's self out of +class-meeting! + + + +CHAPTER XII. + +TWO MISTAKES. + +At the singing-school and at the church August waited as impatiently as +possible for some sign of recognition from Julia. He little knew the +fear that beset her. Having seen her hysterical mother prostrated for +weeks by the excitement of a dispute with her father, it seemed to her +that if she turned one look of love and longing toward young Wehle, +whose sweet German voice rang out above the rest in the hymns, she might +kill her mother as quickly as by plunging a knife into her heart. The +steam-doctor, who was the family physician, had warned her and her +father separately of the danger of exciting Mrs. Anderson's most +excitable temper, and now Julia was the slave of her mother's disease. +That lucky hysteria, which the steam-doctor thought a fearful +heart-disease, had given Mrs. Abigail the whip-hand of husband and +daughter, and she was not slow to know her advantage, using her heart in +a most heartless way. + +August could not blame Julia for not writing, for he had tried to break +the blockade by a letter sent through Jonas and Cynthy Ann, but the +latter had found herself so well watched that the note oppressed her +conscience and gave a hangdog look to her face for two weeks before she +got it out of her pocket, and then she put it under the pillow of +Julia's bed, and had reason to believe that the suspicious Mrs. Anderson +confiscated it within five minutes. For the severity of maternal +government was visibly increased thereafter, and Julia received many +reminders of her ingratitude and of her determination to kill her +self-sacrificing mother by her stubbornness. + +"Well," Mrs. Anderson would say, "it's all one to me whether the world +comes to an end or not. I should like to live to see the day of +judgment. But I shan't. No affectionate mother can stand such treatment +as I receive from my own daughter. If Norman was only at home!" + +It is proper to explain here that Norman was her son, in whom she took a +great deal of comfort when he was away, and whom she would have utterly +spoiled by indulgence if he had not been born past spoiling. He was the +only person to whom she was indulgent, and she was indulgent to him +chiefly because he was so weak of will that there was not much glory in +conquering him, and because her indulgence to him was a rod of +affliction to the rest of her family. + +Failing to open communication through Jonas and Cynthy Ann, August found +himself in a desperate strait, and with an impatience common to young +men he unhappily had recourse to Betsey Malcolm. She often visited +Julia, and twice, when Julia was not at meeting, he went home with the +ingenuous Betsey, who always pretended to have something to tell him +"about Jule," and who yet, for the pure love of mischief-making, tried +to make him think as poorly as possible of Julia's sincerity, and who, +from pure love of flirtation, puckered her red lips, and flashed at him +with her sensuous eyes, and sighed and blushed, or rather flushed, while +she sympathized with him in a way that might have been perilous if he +had been an American instead of a constant-hearted "Dutchman," wholly +absorbed with the image of Julia. But, so far as carrying messages was +concerned, Betsey was certainly a non-conductor. She professed never to +be able to run the blockade with any communication of his. She said to +herself that she wasn't going to help Jule Anderson to keep _all_ the +beaus. She meant to capture one or the other of them if she could. And, +indeed, she did not dream how grievous was the wrong she did. For she +could appreciate no other feeling in the matter than vanity, and she +could not see any particular harm in "taking Jule Anderson down a peg." +And so she assured the anxious and already suspicious August that if she +was in his place she should want that singing-master out of the way. +"Some girls can't stand people that wear jewelry and mustaches and +straps and such things. And Mr. Humphreys is very careful of her, won't +let her sit too late on the porch, and is very comforting in his way of +talking to her. And she seems to like it. I tell you what it is, Gus +"--and she looked at him so bewitchingly that the pure and sensitive +August blushed, he could hardly tell why--"I tell you Jule's a nice +girl, and got a nice property back of her, and I hope she won't act like +her mother. And, indeed, I can't hardly believe she will, though the way +she eyes that Humphreys makes me mad." She had suggested the old doubt. +A doubt is dangerous when its face grows familiar, and one recognizes +the "Monsieur Tonson come again." + +And all the message the disinterested and benevolent Betsey bore to +Julia was to tell her exultingly that Gus had twice walked home with +her. And they had had such a nice time! And Julia, girl that she was, +declared indignantly that she didn't care whom he went with; though she +did care, and her eyes and face said so. Thus the tongue sometimes +lies--or seems to lie--when the whole person is telling the truth. The +only excuse for the tongue is that it will not be believed, and it knows +that it will not be believed! It only speaks diplomatically, maybe. But +diplomatic talking is bad. Better the truth. If Jule had known that her +words would be reported to August, she would have bitten out her tongue +rather than to have let it utter words that were only the cry of her +wounded pride. Of course Betsey met August in the road the next morning, +in a quiet hollow by the brook, and told him, sympathizingly, almost +affectionately, that she had begun to talk to Julia about him, and that +Jule had said she didn't care. So while Julia uttered a lie she spoke +the truth, and while. Betsey uttered the truth she spoke a lie, willful, +malicious, and wicked. + +Now, in the mean time, Julia, on her side, had tried to open +communication through the only channel that offered itself. She did not +attempt it by means of Betsey, because, being a woman, she felt +instinctively that Betsey was not to be trusted. But there was only one +other to whom she was allowed to speak, except under a supervision as +complete as it was unacknowledged. That other was Mr. Humphreys. He +evinced a constant interest in her affairs, avowing that he always did +have a romantic desire to effect the union of suitable people, even +though it might pain his heart a little to see another more fortunate +than himself. Julia had given up all hope of communicating by letter, +and she could not bring herself to make any confessions to a man who had +such a smile and such eyes, but to a generous proposition of Mr. +Humphreys that he should see August and open the way for any +communication between them, she consented, scarcely concealing her +eagerness. + +August was not in a mood to receive Humphreys kindly. He hated him by +intuition, and a liking for him had not been begotten by Betsey's +assurances that he was making headway with Julia. August was riding +astride a bag of corn on his way to mill, when Humphreys, taking a +walk, met him. + +"A pleasant day, Mr. Wehle!" + +"Yes," said August, with a courtesy as mechanical as Humphreys's smile. + +The singing-master was rather pleased than otherwise to see that August +disliked him. It suited his purpose, just now to gall Wehle into saying +what he would not otherwise have said. + +"I hear you are in trouble," he proceeded. + +"How so?" + +"Oh! I hear that Mrs. Anderson doesn't like Dutchmen." The smile now +seemed to have something of a sneer in it. + +"I don't know that that is your affair," said August, all his +suspicions, by a sort of "resolution of force," changing into anger. + +"Oh! I beg pardon," with a tone half-mocking. "I did not know but I +might help settle matters. I think I have Mrs. Anderson's confidence; +and I know that I have Miss Anderson's confidence in an unusual degree. +I think a great deal of her. And she thinks me _her friend_ at least. I +thought that there might be some little matters yet unsettled between +you two, and she suggested that maybe there might be something you would +like to say, and that if you would say it to me, it would be all the +same as if it were said to her. She considers that in the relation I +bear to her and the family, a message delivered to me is the same in +effect as if given to her. I told her I did not think you would, as a +gentleman, wish to hold her to any promises that might be irksome to +her now." + +These words were spoken with a coolness and maliciousness of good-nature +quite devilish, and August's fist involuntarily doubled itself to strike +him, if only to make him cease smiling in that villainous rectangular +way. But he checked himself. + +"You are a puppy. Tell _that_ to Jule, if you choose. I shall send her a +release from all obligations, but not by the hand of a rascal!" + +Like all desperadoes, Humphreys was a coward. He could shoot, but he +could not fight, and just now he was affecting the pious or at least the +high moral role, and had left his pistols, brandy-flasks, and the other +necessary appurtenances of a gentleman, locked in his trunk. Besides it +would not at all have suited his purpose to shoot. So in lieu of +shooting he only smiled, as August rode off, that same old geometric +smile, the elements of which were all calculated. He seemed incapable of +any other facial contortion. It expressed one emotion, indeed, about as +well as another, and was therefore as convenient as those pocket-knives +which affect to contain a chest of tools in one. + +[Illustration: "TELL THAT TO JULE."] + +Julia was already stung to jealousy by Betsey Malcolm's +mischief-making, and it did not require much more to put her into a +frenzy. As they walked home from meeting the next night--they had +meeting all nights now, the world would soon end and there was so much +to be done--as they walked home Humphreys contrived to separate Julia +from the rest, and to tell her that he had had a conversation with +young Wehle. + +"It was painful, very painful," he said, "I think I had better not say +any more about it." + +"Why?" asked Julia in terror. + +"Well, I feel that your grief is mine. I have never felt so much +interest in any one before, and I must say that I was grievously +disappointed. This young man is not at all worthy of you." + +"What do you mean?" And there was a trace of indignation in her tone. + +"It does seem to me that the man who has your love should be the +happiest in the world; but he refused to send you any message, and says +that he will soon send you an entire release from all engagement to him. +He showed no tenderness and made no inquiry." + +The weakest woman and the strongest can faint. It is a woman's last +resort. When all else is gone, that remains. Julia drew a sharp quick +breath, and was just about to become unconscious. Humphreys stretched +his arms to catch her, but the sudden recollection that in case she +fainted he would carry her into the house, produced a reaction. She +released herself from his grasp, and hurried in alone, locking her door, +and refusing admittance to her mother. From Humphreys, who had put +himself into a delicate minor key, Mrs. Anderson got such an account of +the conversation as he thought best to give. She then opened and read a +note placed into her hand by a neighbor as she came out from meeting. It +was addressed to Julia, and ran: + +"If all they say is true, you have quickly changed. I do not hold you by +any promises you wish to break. + +"AUGUST WEHLE." + +Mrs. Anderson had no pity. She hesitated not an instant. Julia's door +was fast. But she went out upon the front upper porch, and pushing up +the window of her daughter's room as remorselessly as she had committed +the burglary on her private letter, she looked at her a moment, sobbing +on the bed, and then threw the letter into the room, saying: "It's good +for you. Read that, and see what a fellow your Dutchman is." + +Then Mrs. Anderson sought her couch, and slept with a serene sense, of +having done _her_ duty as a mother, whatever might be the result. + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +THE SPIDER SPINS. + +Julia got up from her bed the moment that her mother had gone. Her first +feeling was that her privacy had been shamefully outraged. A true mother +should honorably respect the reserve of the little child. But Julia was +now a woman, grown, with a woman's spirit. She rose from her bed, and +shut her window with a bang that was meant to be a protest. She then put +the tenpenny nail sometimes used to fasten the window down, in its +place, as if to say, "Come in, if you can." Then she pulled out the +folds of the chintz curtain, hanging on its draw-string half-way up the +window. If there had been any other precaution possible, she would have +taken it. But there was not. + +She took up the note, and read it. Julia was not a girl of keen +penetration. Her training was that of a country life. She did not read +between the lines of August's note, and could only understand that she +was dismissed. Outraged by her mother's tyranny, spurned by her lover, +she stood like a hunted creature, brought to bay, looking for the last +desperate chance for escape. + +Crushed? No. If she had been weaker, if she had been of the quieter, +frailer sort, instead of being, as she was, elastic, impulsive, +recuperative, she might have been crushed. She was wounded in her heart +of hearts, but all her pride and hardihood, of which she had not a +little, had now taken up arms against outrageous fortune. She was stung +at every thought of August and his letter, of Betsey Malcolm and her +victory, of the fact that her mother had read the letter and knew of her +humiliation. And she paced the floor of her room, and resolved to resist +and to be revenged. She would marry anybody, that she might show Betsey +and August they had not broken he heart and that her love did not +go begging. + +O Julia! take care. Many another woman has jumped off that precipice! + +And she would escape from her mother. The indications of affection +adroitly given by Humphreys were all remembered now. She could have him, +and she would. He would take her to Cincinnati. She would have her +revenge all around. I am sorry to show you my heroine in this mood. But +the fairest climes are sometimes subject to the fiercest hurricanes, the +frightfulest earthquakes! + +After an hour the room seemed hot. She pulled back the chintz curtain +and pushed up the window. The blue-grass in the pasture looked cool as +it drank the heavy dews. She climbed through the window on to the long, +old-fashioned upper porch. She sat down upon an old-fashioned settee +with rockers, and began to rock. The motion relieved her nervousness and +fanned her hot cheeks. Yes, she would accept the first respectable lover +that offered. She would go to the city with Humphreys, if he asked her. +It is only fair to say that Julia did not at all consider--she was not +in a temper to consider--what a marriage with Humphreys implied. She +only thought of it on two sides--the revenge upon August and Betsey, +and the escape from a thralldom now grown more bitter than death. True, +her conscience was beginning to awaken, and to take up arms against her +resolve. But nothing could be plainer. In marrying Mr. Humphreys she +should marry a friend, the only friend she had. In marrying him she +would satisfy her mother, and was it not her duty to sacrifice something +to her mother's happiness, perhaps her mother's life? + +[Illustration: TEMPTED.] + +Yes, yes, Julia, a false spirit of self-sacrifice is another path over +the cliff! In such a mood as this all paths lead into the abyss. + +Her mind was made up. She braced her will against all the relentings of +her heart. She wished that Humphreys, who had indirectly declared his +love so often, were there to offer at once. She would accept him +immediately, and then the whole neighborhood should not say that she had +been deserted by a Dutchman. For in her anger she found her mother's +epithets expressive. + +He was there! Was it the devil that planned it? Does he plan all those +opportunities for wrong that are so sure to offer themselves? Humphreys, +having led a life that turned night into day, sat at the farther end of +the long upper porch, smoking his cigar, waiting a bed-time nearer to +the one to which he was accustomed. + +Did he suspect the struggle in the heart of Julia Anderson? Did he guess +that her pride and defiance had by this time reached high-water mark? +Did he divine this from seeing her there? He rose and started in through +the door of the upper hall, the only opening to the porch, except the +window. But this was a feint. He turned back and sat himself down upon +the farther end of the settee from Julia. He understood human nature +perfectly, and had had long practice in making gradual approaches. He +begged her pardon for the bungling manner in which he had communicated +intelligence that must be so terrible to a heart so sensitive! Julia was +just going to declare that she did not care anything for what August +said or thought, but her natural truthfulness checked the transparent +falsehood. She had not gone far enough astray to lie consciously; she +was, as yet, only telling lies to herself. Very gradually and cautiously +did he proceed so as not to "flush the bird." Even as I saw, an hour +ago, a cat creep upon a sparrow with fascinating eyes, and a waving, +snake-like motion of the tail, and a treacherous feline smile upon her +face, even so, cautiously and by degrees, Humphreys felt his way with +velvet paws toward his prey. He knew the opportunity, that once gone +might not come again; he soon guessed that this was the hour and power +of darkness in the soul of Julia, the hour in which she would seek to +flee from her own pride and mortification. And if Humphreys knew how to +approach with a soft tread, very slowly and cautiously, he also +knew--men of his "profession" always know--when to spring. He saw the +moment, he made the spring, he seized the prey. + +"Will you trust your destiny to me, Miss Anderson? You seem beset by +troubles. I have means. I could not but he wholly devoted to your +welfare. Let me help you to flee away from--from all this mortification, +and this--this domestic tyranny. Will you intrust yourself to me?" + +He did not say anything about love. He had an instinctive feeling that +it would not be best. She felt herself environed with insurmountable +difficulties, threatened with agonies worse than death--so they seemed +to her. He simply, coolly opened the door, and bade her easily and +triumphantly escape. Had he said one word of tenderness the reaction +must have set in. + +She was silent. + +"I did hope, by sacrificing all my own hopes, to effect a +reconciliation. But when that young man spoke insulting words about you, +I determined at once to offer you my devoted protection. I ask no more +than you are able to give, your respect Will you accept my life-long +protection as your husband?" + +"Yes!" said the passionate girl in an agony of despair + + + +CHAPTER XIV. + +THE SPIDER'S WEB. + +Now that Humphreys had his prey he did not know just what to do with it. +Not knowing what to say, he said nothing, in which he showed his wisdom. +But he felt that saying nothing was almost as bad as saying something. +And he was right. For with people of impulsive temperament reactions are +sudden, and in one minute after Julia had said yes, there came to her +memory the vision of August standing in the barn and looking into her +eyes so purely and truly and loyally, and vowing such sweet vows of +love, and she looked back upon that perfect hour with some such fooling +perhaps as Dives felt looking out of torment across the great gulf into +paradise. Only that Dives had never known paradise, while she had. For +the man or woman that knows a pure, self-sacrificing love, returned in +kind, knows that which, of all things in this world, lies nearest to God +and heaven. There be those who have ears to hear this, and for them is +it written. Julia thought of August's love with a sinking into despair. +But then returned the memory of his faithlessness, of all she had been +compelled to believe and suffer. Then her agony came back, and she was +glad that she had taken a decided step. Any escape was a relief. I +suppose it is under some such impulse that people kill themselves. Julia +felt as though she had committed suicide and escaped. + +Humphreys on his part was not satisfied. I used the wrong figure of +speech awhile ago. He was not a cat with paw upon the prey. He was only +an angler, and had but hooked his fish. He had not landed it yet. He +felt how slender was the thread of committal by which he held Julia. +August had her heart. He had only a word. The slender vantage that he +had, he meant to use adroitly, craftily. And he knew that the first +thing was to close this interview without losing any ground. The longer +she remained bound, the better for him. And with his craft against the +country girl's simplicity it would have fared badly with Julia had it +not been for one defect which always inheres, in a bad man's plots in +such a case. A man like Humphreys never really understands a pure woman. +Certain detached facts he may know, but he can not "put himself in +her place." + +Humphreys remarked with tenderness that Julia must not stay in the night +air. She was too precious to be exposed. This flattery was comforting to +her wounded pride, and she found his words pleasant to her. Had he +stopped here he might have left the field victorious. But it was very +hard for an affianced lover to stop here. He must part from her in some +other way than this if he would leave on her mind the impression that +she was irrevocably bound to him. He stooped quickly with a +well-affected devotion and lifted her hand to kiss it. That act +awakened Julia Anderson. She must have awaked anyhow, sooner or later. +But when one is in the toils of such a man, sooner is better. The touch +of Humphreys's hand and lips sent a shudder through her frame that +Humphreys felt. Instantly there came to her a perception of all that +marriage with a repulsive man signifies. + +Not suicide, but perdition. + +She jerked her hand from his as though he were a snake. + +"Mr. Humphreys, what did I say? I can't have you. I don't love you. I'm +crazy to-night. I must take back what I said." + +"No, Julia. Let me call you _my_ Julia. You must not break my heart." +Humphreys had lost his cue, and every word of tenderness he spoke made +his case more hopeless. + +"I never can marry you--let me go in," she said, brushing past him. Then +she remembered that her door was fast on the inside. She had climbed out +the window. She turned back, and he saw his advantage. + +"I can not release you. Take time to think before you ask it. Go to +sleep now and do not act hastily." He stood between her and the window, +wishing to get some word to which he could hold. + +Julia's two black eyes grew brighter. "I see. You took advantage of my +trouble, and you want to hold me to my words, and you are bad, and +now--_now_ I hate you!" Then Julia felt better. Hate is the only +wholesome thing in such a case. She pushed him aside vigorously, stepped +upon the settee, slipped in at the window, and closed it. She drew the +curtain, but it seemed thin, and with characteristic impulsiveness she +put out her light that she might have the friendly drapery of +darkness about her. She heard the soft--for the first time it seemed +to her stealthy--tread of Humphreys, as he returned to his room. Whether +she swooned or whether she slept after that she never knew. It was +morning without any time intervening, she had a headache and could +scarcely walk, and there was August's note lying on the floor. She read +it again--if not with more intelligence, at least with more suspicion. +She wondered at her own hastiness. She tried to go about the house, but +the excitement of the previous night, added to all she had suffered +beside, had given her a headache, blinding and paralyzing, that sent her +back to bed. + +[Illustration: "NOW I HATE YOU!"] + +And there she lay in that half-asleep, half-awake mood, which a nervous +headache produces. She seemed to be a fly in a web, and the spider was +trying to fasten her. A very polite spider, with that smile which went +half-way up his face but which never seemed able to reach his eyes. He +had straps to his pantaloons, and a reddish mustache, and she shuddered +as he wound his fine webs about her. She tried to shake off the +illusion. But the more absurd an illusion, the more it will not be +shaken off. For see! the spider was kissing her hand! Then she seemed to +have made a great effort and to have broken the web. But her wings were +torn, and her feet were shackled by the fine strands that still adhered. +She could not get them off. Wouldn't somebody help her, even as she had +many a time picked off the webs from a fly's feet out of sheer pity? And +all day she would perpetually return into these half-conscious states +and feel the spider's web about her feet, and ask over and over again if +somebody wouldn't help her to get out of the meshes. + +Toward evening her mother brought her a cup of tea and a piece of +toast, and for the first time in the remembered life of the daughter +made an endeavor to show a little tenderness for her. It was a clumsy +endeavor, for when the great gulf is once fixed between mother and child +it is with difficulty bridged. And finding herself awkward in the new +role, Mrs. Anderson dropped it and resumed her old gait, remarking, as +she closed the door, that she was glad to know that Julia was coming to +her senses, and "had took the right road." For Mrs. Abigail was more +vigorous than grammatical. + +Julia did not see anything significant in this remark at first. But +after a while it came to her that Humphreys must have told her mother of +something that had passed during the preceding night, something on which +this commendation was founded. Then she fell into the same torpor and +was in the same old spider's web, and there was the same spider with the +limited smile and the mustache and the watch-seals and the straps! And +he was trying to fasten her, and she said "yes." And she could see the +little word. The spider caught it and spun it into a web and fastened +her with it. And she could break all the other webs but those woven out +of that one little word from her own lips. That clung to her, and she +could neither fly nor walk. August could not help her--he would not +come. Her mother was helping the spider. Just then Cynthy Ann came along +with her broom. Would she see her and sweep her free? She tried to call +her, but alas! she was a fly. She tried to buzz, but her wings were fast +bound with the webs. She was being smothered. The spider had seized her. +She could not move. He was smiling at her! + +Then she woke shuddering. It was after midnight. + + + +CHAPTER XV. + +THE WEB BROKEN. + +"Poverty," says Beranger, "is always superstitious." So indeed is human +extremity of any sort. Julia's healthy constitution had resisted the +threatened illness, the feverishness had gone with the headache. She +felt now only one thing: she must have a friend. But the hard piousness +of Cynthy Ann's face had never attracted her sympathy. It had always +seemed to her that Cynthy disapproved of her affection quite as much as +her mother did. Cynthy's face had indeed a chronic air of disapproval. A +nervous young minister said that he never had any "liberty" when sister +Cynthy Ann was in his congregation. She seemed averse to all he said. + +But now Julia felt that there was just one chance of getting advice and +help. Had she not in her dream seen Cynthy Ann with a broom? She would +ask help from Cynthy Ann. There must be a heart under her rind. + +But to get to her. Her mother's affectionate vigilance never left her +alone with Cynthy. Perhaps it was this very precaution that had +suggested Cynthy Ann to her as a possible ally. She must contrive to +have a talk with her somehow. But how? There was one way. Black-eyed +people do not delay. Bight or wrong, Julia acted with sharp decision. +Before she had any very definite view of her plan, she had arisen and +slipped on a calico dress. But there was one obstacle. Mr. Humphreys +kept late hours, and he might be on the front-porch. She might meet him +in the hall, and this seemed worse to her than would the chance of +meeting a tribe of Indians. She listened and looked out of her window; +but she could not be sure; she would run the risk. With silent feet and +loud-beating heart she went down the hall to the back upper porch, for +in that day porches were built at the back and front of houses, above +and below. Once on the back-porch she turned to the right and stood by +Cynthy Ann's door. But a new fear took possession of her. If Cynthy Ann +should be frightened and scream! + +[Illustration: AT CYNTHY'S DOOR.] + +"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!" she said, standing by the bed in the little bare +room which Cynthy Ann had occupied, for five years, but into which she +had made no endeavor to bring one ray of sentiment or one trace +of beauty. + +"Cynthy! Cynthy Ann!" + +Had Cynthy Ann slept anywhere but in the L of the house, her +shriek--what woman could have helped shrieking a little when +startled?--her shriek must have alarmed the family. But it did not. +"Why, child! what are you doing here? You are out of your head, and you +must go back to your room at once." And Cynthy had arisen and was +already tugging at Julia's arm. + +"I a'n't out of my head, Cynthy Ann, and I _won't_ go back to my +room--not until I have had a talk with you." + +"What _is_ the matter, Jule?" said Cynthy, sitting on the bed and +preparing to begin again her old fight between duty and inclination. +Cynthy always expected temptation. She had often said in class-meeting +that temptations abounded on every hand, and as soon as Julia told her +she had a communication to make, Cynthy Ann was sure that she would find +in it some temptation of the devil to do something she "hadn't orter +do," according to the Bible or the Dis_cip_line, strictly construed. +And Cynthy was a "strict constructionist." + +Julia did not find it so easy to say anything now that she had announced +herself as determined to have a conversation and now that her auditor +was waiting. It is the worst beginning in the world for a conversation, +saying that you intend to converse. When an Indian has announced his +intention of having a "big talk," he immediately lights his pipe and +relapses into silence until the big talk shall break out accidentally +and naturally. But Julia, having neither the pipe nor the Indian's +stolidity, found herself under the necessity of beginning abruptly. +Every minute of delay made her position worse. For every minute +increased her doubt of Cynthy Ann's sympathy. + +"O Cynthy Ann! I'm so miserable!" + +"Yes, I told your ma this morning that you was looking mis'able, and +that you had orter have sassafras to purify the blood, but your ma is so +took up with steam-docterin' that she don't believe in nothin' but +corn-sweats and such like." + +"Oh! but, Cynthy, it a'n't that. I'm miserable in my mind. I wish I knew +what to do." + +"I thought you'd made up your mind. Your ma told me you was engaged to +Mr. Humphreys." + +Julia was appalled. How fast the spider spins his web! + +"I a'n't engaged to him, and I hate him. He got me to say yes when I was +crazy, and I believe he brought about the things that make me feel so +nigh crazy. Do you think he's a good man, Cynthy Ann?" + +"Well, no, though I don't want to set in no jedgment on nobody; but I +don't see as how as he kin be good and wear all of them costly apparels +that's so forbid in the Bible, to say nothing of the Dis_cip_line. The +Bible says you must know a tree by its fruits, and I 'low his'n is +mostly watch-seals. I think a good sound conversion at the mourners' +bench would make him strip off some of them things, and put them into +the missionary collection. Though maybe he a'n't so bad arter all, fer +Jonas says that liker'n not the things a'n't gold, but pewter washed +over. But I'm afeard he's wor'ly-minded. But I don't want to be too hard +on a feller-creatur'." + +[Illustration: CYNTHY ANN HAD OFTEN SAID IN CLASS-MEETING THAT +TEMPTATIONS ABOUNDED ON EVERY HAND.] + +"Cynthy, I drempt just now I was a fly and he was a spider, and that he +had me all wrapped up in his web, and that just then you came along +with a broom." + +"That must be a sign," said Cynthy Ann. "It's good you didn't dream +after daylight. Then 'twould a come true. But what about _him?_ I +thought you loved Gus Wehle, and though I'm afeard you're makin' a idol +out o' him, and though I'm afeard he's a onbeliever, and I don't noways +like marryin' with onbelievers, yet I did want to help you, and I +brought a note from him wunst and put it under the head of your bed. I +was afeard then I was doin' what Timothy forbids, when he says not to be +pertakers in other folks's sins, but, you see, how could I help doin' +it, when you was lookin' so woebegone like, and Jonas, he axed me to do +it. It's awful hard to say you won't to Jonas, you know. So I put the +letter there, and I don't doubt your ma mistrusted it, and got a holt +on it." + +"Did he write to me? A'n't he going with that Betsey Malcolm?" + +"Can't be, I 'low. On'y this evenin' Jonas said to me, says he, when I +tole him you was engaged to Mr. Humphreys, says he, in his way, 'The +hawk's lit, has he? That'll be the death of two,' says he, 'fer she'll +die on it, an' so'll poor Gus,' says he. And then he went on to tell as +how as Gus is all ready to leave, and had axed him to tell him of any +news; but he said he wouldn't tell him that. He'd leave him some hope. +Fer he says Gus was mighty nigh distracted to-day, that is yisterday, +fer its most mornin' I 'low." + +Now this speech did Julia a world of good. It showed her that Gus was +not faithless, that she might count on Cynthy, and that Jonas was her +friend, and that he did not like Humphreys. Jonas called him a hawk. +That agreed with her dream. He was a hawk and a spider. + +"But, Cynthy Ann, I got a letter night before last; ma threw it in the +window. In it Gus said he released me. I hadn't asked any release. What +did he mean?" + +"Honey, I wish I could help you. It's that hawk, as Jonas calls him, +that's at the bottom of all this trouble. I don't believe but what he's +told some lies or 'nother. I don't believe but what he's a bad man. I +allers said I didn't 'low no good could come of a man that puts on +costly apparel and wears straps. I'm afeard you're making a idol of Gus +Wehle. Don't do it. Ef you do, God'll take him. Misses Pearsons made a +idol of her baby, a kissin' it and huggin' it every minute, and I said, +says I, Misses Pearsons, you hadn't better make a idol of a perishin' +creature. And sure enough, God tuck it. He's jealous of our idols. But I +can't help helpin' you. You're a onbeliever yet yourself, and I 'low +taint no sin fer you to marry Gus. It's yokin' like with like. I wish +you was both Christians. I'll speak to Jonas. I don't know what I ought +to do, but I'll speak to Jonas. He's mighty peart about sech things, is +Jonas, and got as _good_ a heart as you ever see. And--" + +"Cynth-ee A-ann!" It was the energetic voice of Mrs. Anderson rousing +the house betimes. For the first time Julia and Cynthy Ann noticed the +early light creeping in at the window. They sat still, paralyzed. + +"Cynth-ee!" The voice was now at the top of the stairs, for Mrs. +Anderson always carried the war into Africa if Cynthy did not wake +at once. + +"Answer quick, Cynthy Ann, or she'll be in here!" said Julia, sliding +behind the bed. + +"Ma'am!" said Cynthy Ann, starting toward the door, where she met Mrs. +Abigail. "I'm up," said Cynthy. + +"Well, what makes you so long a-answerin' then? You make me climb the +steps, and you know I may drop down dead of heart-disease any day. I'll +go and wake Jule." + +"Better let her lay awhile," said Cynthy, reproaching herself instantly +for the deception. + +Mrs. Anderson hesitated at the top of the stairs. + +"Jul-yee!" she called. Poor Jule shook from head to foot. "I guess I'll +let her lay awhile; but I'm afraid I've already spoiled the child by +indulgence," said the mother, descending the stairs. She relented only +because she believed Julia was conquered. + +"I declare, child, it's a shame I should be helping you to disobey your +mother. I'm afeard the Lord'll bring some jedgment on us yet." For +Cynthy Ann had tied her conscience to her rather infirm logic. Better to +have married it to her generous heart. But before she had finished the +half-penitent lamentation, Jule was flying with swift and silent feet +down the hall. Arrived in her own room, she was so much relieved as to +be almost happy; and she was none too soon, for her industrious mother +had quickly repented her criminal leniency, and was again climbing the +stairs at the imminent risk of her precarious life, and calling +"Jul-yee!" + + + +CHAPTER XVI. + +JONAS EXPOUNDS THE SUBJECT. + +"I 'lowed I'd ketch you here, my venerable and reliable feller-citizen!" +said Jonas as he entered the lower story of Andrew Anderson's castle and +greeted August, sitting by Andrew's loom. It was the next evening after +Julia's interview with Cynthy Ann. "When do you 'low to leave this +terry-firmy and climb a ash-saplin'? To-night, hey? Goin' to the Queen +City to take to steamboat life in hopes of havin' your sperrits raised +by bein' blowed up? Take my advice and don't make haste in the downward +road to destruction, nor the up-hill one nuther. A game a'n't never +through tell it's played out, an' the American eagle's a chicken with +steel spurs. That air sweet singer of Israel that is so hifalugeon he +has to anchor hisself to his boots, knows all the tricks, and is +intimately acquainted with the kyards, whether it's faro, poker, euchre, +or French monte. But blamed ef Providence a'n't dealed you a better +hand'n you think. Never desperandum, as the Congressmen say, fer while +the lamp holds out to burn you may beat the blackleg all to flinders +and sing and shout forever. Last night I went to bed thinkin' 'Umphreys +had the stakes all in his pocket. This mornin' I found he was in a far +way to be beat outen his boots ef you stood yer ground like a man and a +gineological descendant of Plymouth Rock!" + +Andrew stopped his loom, and, looking at August, said: "Our friend Jonas +speaks somewhat periphrastically and euphuistically, and--he'll pardon +me--but he speaks a little ambiguously." + +"My love, I gin it up, as the fish-hawk said to the bald eagle one day. +I kin rattle off odd sayings and big words picked up at Fourth-of-Julys +and barbecues and big meetins, but when you begin to fire off your +forty-pound bomb-shell book-words, I climb down as suddent as Davy +Crockett's coon. Maybe I do speak unbiguously, as you say, but I was +givin' you the biggest talkin' I had in the basket. And as fer my good +news, a feller don't like to eat up all his country sugar to wunst, I +'low. But I says to our young and promisin' friend of German extraction, +beloved, says I, hold onto that air limb a little longer and +you're saved." + +"But, Jonas," said August, spinning Andrew's winding-blade round and +speaking slowly and bitterly, "a man don't like to be trifled with, if +he is a Dutchman!" + +"But sposin' a man hain't been trifled with, Dutchman or no +Dutchman? Sposin' it's all a optical delusion of the yeers? +There's a word fer _you_, Andrew, that a'n't nuther unbiguous +nor peri-what-you-may-call-it." + +"But," said August, "Betsey Malcolm--" + +"_Betsey Malcolm!_" said Jonas. "Betsey Malcolm to thunder!" and then he +whistled. "Set a dog to mind a basket of meat when his chops is +a-waterin' fer it! Set a kingfisher to take keer of a fish-pond! Set a +cat to raisin' your orphan chickens on the bottle! Set a spider to nuss +a fly sick with dyspepsy from eatin' too much molasses! I'd ruther trust +a hen-hawk with a flock of patridges than to trust Betsey Malcolm with +your affairs. I ha'n't walked behind you from meetin' and seed her head +a bobbin' like a bluebird's and her eyes a blazin an' all that, fer +nothin'. Like as not, Betsey Malcolm's more nor half your trouble in +that quarter." + +"But she said--" + +"It don't matter three quarters of a rotten rye-straw what she said, my +inexper'enced friend. She don't keer what she says, so long as it's fur +enough away from the truth to sarve her turn. An' she's told pay-tent +double-back-action lies that worked both ways. What do you 'low Jule +Anderson tho't when she hearn tell of your courtin' Betsey, as Betsey +told it, with all her nods an' little crowin'? Now looky here, Gus, I'm +your friend, as the Irishman said to the bar that hugged him, an' I want +to say about all that air that Betsey told you, spit on the slate an' +wipe that all off. They's lie in her soap an.' right smart chance of +saft-soap in her lie, I 'low." + +These rough words of Jonas brought a strange intelligence into the mind +of August. He saw so many things in a moment that had lain under his +eyes unnoticed. + +"There is much rough wisdom in your speech, Jonas," said Andrew. + +"That's a fact. You and me used to go to school to old Benefield +together when I was little and you was growed up. You allers beat +everybody all holler in books and spellin'-matches, Andy. But I 'low I +cut my eye-teeth 'bout as airly as some of you that's got more larnin' +under your skelp. Now, I say to our young friend and feller-citizen, +don't go 'way tell you've spoke a consolin' word to a girl as'll stick +to you tell the hour and article of death, and then remains yours truly +forever, amen." + +[Illustration: JONAS.] + +"How do you know that, Jonas?" said August, smiling in spite of himself. + +"How do I know it? Why, by the testimony of a uncorrupted and +disinterested witness, gentlemen of the jury, if the honorable court +pleases. What did that Jule Anderson do, poor thing, but spend some +time making a most onseasonable visit to Cynthy Ann last night? And I +'low ef there's a ole gal in this sublunary spear as tells the truth in +a bee-line and no nonsense, it's that there same, individooal, identical +Cynthy Ann. She's most afeard to drink cold water or breathe fresh air +fer fear she'll commit a unpard'nable sin. And that persecuted young +pigeon that thought herself forsooken, jest skeeted into Cynthy Ann's +budwoir afore daybreak this mornin' and told her all her sorrows, and +how your letter and your goin' with that Betsey Malcolm"--here August +winced--"had well nigh druv her to run off with the straps and +watch-seals to get rid of you and Betsey and her precious and mighty +affectionate ma." + +"But she won't look at me in meeting, and she sent Humphreys to me with +an insulting message." + +"Which text divides itself into two parts, my brethren and +feller-travelers to etarnity. To treat the last head first, beloved, I +admonish you not to believe a blackleg, unless it's under sarcumstances +when he's got onusual and airresistible temptations to tell the truth. I +don't advise yer to spit on the slate and rub it out in this case. Break +the slate and throw it away. To come to the second pertikeler, which is +the first in the order of my text, my attentive congregation. She didn't +look at you in meetin'. Now, I 'spose you don't know nothin' of her +mother's heart-disease. Heart-disease is trumps with Abigail Anderson. +She plays that every turn. Just think of a young gal who thinks that ef +she looks at her beau when her mother's by, she might kill her +invalooable parient of heart-disease. Fer my part, I don't take no stock +in Mrs. Abby Anderson's dyin' of heart-disease, no ways. Might as well +talk about a whale dyin' of footrot." + +"Well, Jonas, what counsel do you give our young friend? Your sagacity +is to be depended on." + +"Why, I advise him to speak face to face with the angel of his life. Let +him climb into my room to-night. Leave meetin' jest afore the +benediction--he kin do without that wunst--and go double-quick acrost +the fields, and git safe into my stoodio. Ferther pertikelers when the +time arrives." + + + +CHAPTER XVII. + +THE WRONG PEW. + +August's own good sense told him that the advice of Jonas was not good. +But he had made many mistakes of late, and was just now inclined to take +anybody's judgment in place of his own. All that was proud and +gentlemanly in him rebelled at the thought of creeping into another +man's house in the night. Modesty is doubtless a virtue, but it is a +virtue responsible for many offenses. Had August not felt so distrustful +of his own wisdom, nothing could have persuaded him to make his love for +Julia Anderson seem criminal by an action so wanting in dignity. But +back of Jonas's judgment was that of Andrew, whose weakness was +Quixotism. He wanted to live and to have others live on the +concert-pitch of romantic action. There was something of chivalry in the +proposal of Jonas, a spice of adventure that made him approve it on +purely sentimental grounds. + +The more August thought of it, and the nearer he was to its execution, +the more did he dislike it. But I have often noticed that people of a +rather quiet temperament, such as young Wehle's, show _vis inertiae_ in +both, ways--not very easily moved, they are not easily checked when once +in motion. August's velocity was not usually great, his momentum was +tremendous, and now that he had committed himself to the hands of Jonas +Harrison and set out upon this enterprise, he was determined, in his +quiet way, to go through to the end. + +Of course he understood the house, and having left the family in +meeting, he had nothing to do but to scale one of the pillars of the +front-porch. In those Arcadian days upper windows were hardly ever +fastened, except when the house was deserted by all its inmates for +days. Half-way up the post he was seized with a violent trembling. His +position brought to him a confused memory of a text of Scripture: "He +that entereth not by the door ... but climbeth up some other way, the +same is a thief and a robber." Bred under Moravian influence, he +half-believed the text to be supernaturally suggested to him. For a +moment his purpose wavered, but the habit of going through with an +undertaking took the place of his will, and he went on blindly, as Baker +the Nile explorer did, "more like a donkey than like a man." Once on the +upper porch he hesitated again. To break into a man's house in this way +was unlawful. His conscience troubled him. In vain he reasoned that Mrs. +Anderson's despotism was morally wrong, and that this action was right +as an offset to it. He knew that it was not right. + +I want to remark here that there are many situations in life in which a +conscience is dreadfully in the way. There are people who go straight +ahead to success--such as it is--with no embarrassments, no fire in the +rear from any scruples. Some of these days I mean to write an essay on +"The Inconvenience of having a Conscience," in which I shall proceed to +show that it costs more in the course of a year or two, than it would to +keep a stableful of fast horses. Many a man could afford to drive +Dexters and Flora Temples who would be ruined by a conscience. But I +must not write the essay here, for I am keeping August out in the night +air and his perplexity all this time. + +August Wehle had the habit, I think I have said, of going through with +an enterprise. He had another habit, a very inconvenient habit +doubtless, but a very manly one, of listening for the voice of his +conscience. And I think that this habit would have even yet turned him +back, as he had his hand on the window-sash, had it not been that while +he stood there trying to find out just what was the decision of his +conscience, he heard the voices of the returning family. There was no +time to lose, there was no shelter on the porch, in a minute more they +would be in sight. He must go ahead now, for retreat was cut off. He +lifted the window and climbed into the room, lowering the sash gently +behind him. As no one ever came into this room but Jonas, he felt safe +enough. Jonas would plan a meeting after midnight in Cynthy Ann's room, +and in Cynthy Ann's presence. + +In groping for a chair, August drew aside the curtain of the +gable-window, hoping to get some light. Had Jonas taken to cultivating +flowers in pots? Here was a "monthly" rose on the window-seat! Surely +this was the room. He had occupied it during his stay in the house. But +he did not know that Mrs. Anderson had changed the arrangement between +his leaving and the coming of Jonas. He noticed that the curtains were +not the same. He trembled from head to foot. He felt for the bureau, and +recognized by various little articles, a pincushion, a tuck-comb, and +the sun-bonnet hanging against the window-frame, that he was in Julia's +room. His first emotion was not alarm. It was awe, as pure and solemn as +the high-priest may have felt in the holy place. Everything pertaining +to Julia had a curious sacredness, and this room was a temple into which +it was sacrilege to intrude. But a more practical question took his +attention soon. The family had come in below, except Jonas and Cynthy +Ann--who had walked slowly, planning a meeting for August--and Mr. +Samuel Anderson, who stood at the front-gate with a neighbor. August +could hear his shrill voice discussing the seventh trumpet and the +thousand three hundred and thirty and five days. It would not do to be +discovered where he was. Beside the fright he would give to Julia, he +shuddered at the thought of compromising her in such a way. To go back +was to insure his exposure, for Samuel Anderson had not yet half-settled +the question of the trumpets. Indeed it seemed to August that the world +might come to an end before that conversation would. He heard Humphreys +enter his room. He was now persuaded that the room formerly occupied by +Julia must be Jonas's, and he determined to get to it if he could. He +felt like a villain already. He would have cheerfully gone to +State's-prison in preference to compromising Julia. At any rate, he +started out of Julia's room toward the one that was occupied by Jonas. +It was the only road open, and but for an unexpected encounter he would +have reached his hiding-place in safety, for the door was but fifteen +feet away. + +In order to explain the events that follow, I must ask the reader to go +back to Julia, and to events that had occurred two hours before. +Hitherto she had walked to and from meeting and "singing" with +Humphreys, as a matter of courtesy. On the evening in question she had +absolutely refused to walk with him. Her mother found that threats were +as vain as coaxing. Even her threat of dying with heart-disease, then +and there, killed by her daughter's disobedience, could not move Julia, +who would not even speak with the "spider." Her mother took her into the +sitting-room alone, and talked with her. + +"So this is the way you trifle with gentlemen, is it? Night before last +you engaged yourself to Mr. Humphreys, now you won't speak to him. To +think that my daughter should prove a heartless flirt!" + +I am afraid that the unfilial thought came into Julia's mind that +nothing could have been more in the usual order of things than that the +daughter of a coquette should be a flirt. + +"You'll kill me on the spot; you certainly will." Julia felt anxious, +for her mother showed signs of going into hysterics. But she put her +foot out and shook her head in a way that said that all her friends +might die and all the world might go to pieces before she would yield. +Mrs. Anderson had one forlorn hope. She determined to order that +forward. Leaving Julia alone, she went to her husband. + +"Samuel, if you value my life go and speak to your daughter. She's got +your own stubbornness of will in her. She is just like you; she _will_ +have her own way. I shall die." And Mrs. Abigail Anderson sank into a +chair with unmistakable symptoms of a hysterical attack. + +I am aware that I have so far let the reader hear not one word of Samuel +Anderson's conversation. He has played a rather insignificant part in +the story. Nothing could be more _comme il faut_. Insignificance was his +characteristic. It was not so much that he was small. It is not so bad a +thing to be a little man. But to be little and insignificant also is +bad. There is only one thing worse, which is to be big and +insignificant. If one is little and insignificant, one may be +overlooked, insignificance and all. But if one is big and insignificant, +it is to be an obtrusive cipher, a great lubber, not easily kept out +of sight. + +Appealed to by his wife, Samuel Anderson prepared to assert his +authority as the head of the family. He almost strutted into Julia's +presence. Julia had a real affection for her father, and nothing +mortified her more than to see him acting as a puppet, moved by her +mother, and yet vain enough to believe himself independent and supreme. +She would have yielded almost any other point to have saved herself the +mortification of seeing her father act the fool; but now she had +determined that she would die and let everybody else die rather than +walk with a man whose nature seemed to her corrupt, and whose touch was +pollution. I do not mean that she was able to make a distinct inventory +of her reasons for disliking him, or to analyze her feelings. She could +not have told just why she had so deep and utter a repugnance to walking +a quarter of a mile to the school-house in company with this man. She +followed that strong instinct of truth and purity which is the +surest guide. + +"Julia, my daughter," said Samuel Anderson, "really you must yield to me +as head of the house, and treat this gentleman politely. I thought you +respected him, or loved him, and he told me that you had given consent +to marry him, and had told him to ask my consent." + +In saying this, the "head of the house" was seesawing himself backward +and forward in his squeaky boots, speaking in a pompous manner, and with +an effort to swell an effeminate voice to a bass key, resulting in +something between a croak and a squeal. Julia sat down and cried in +mortification and disgust. Mr. Anderson understood this to be +acquiescence, and turned and went into the next room. + +[Illustration: JULIA SAT DOWN IN MORTIFICATION.] + +"Mr. Humphreys, my daughter will be glad to ask your pardon. She is over +her little pet; lovers always have pets. Even my wife and I have had our +disagreements in our time. Julia will be glad to see you in the +sitting-room." + +Humphreys drew the draw-strings and set his face into its broadest and +most parallelogrammatic smile, bowed to Mr. Anderson, and stepped into +the hall. But when he reached the sitting-room door he wished he had +staid away. Julia had heard his tread, and was standing again with her +foot advanced. Her eyes were very black, and were drawn to a sharp +focus. She had some of her mother's fire, though happily none of her +mother's meanness. It is hard to say whether she spoke or hissed. + +"Go away, you spider! I hate you! I told you I hated you, and you told +people I loved you and was engaged to you. Go away! You detestable +spider, you! I'll die right here, but I will not go with you." + +But the smirking Humphreys moved toward her, speaking soothingly, and +assuring her that there was some mistake. Julia dashed past him into the +parlor and laid hold of her father's arm. + +"Father, protect me from that--that--spider! I hate him!" + +Mr. Anderson stood irresolute a moment and looked appealingly to his +wife for a signal. She solved the difficulty herself. On the whole she +had concluded not to die of heart-disease until she saw Julia married to +suit her taste, and having found a hill she could not go through, she +went round. Seizing Julia's arm with more of energy than affection, she +walked off with her, or rather walked her off, in a sulky silence, while +Mr. Anderson kept Humphreys company. + +I thought best to keep August standing in the door of Julia's room all +this time while I explained these things to you, so that you might +understand what follows. In reality August did not stop at all, but +walked out into the hall and into difficulty. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. + +THE ENCOUNTER. + +Just before August came out of the door of Julia's room he had heard +Humphreys enter his room on the opposite side of the hall. Humphreys had +lighted his cigar and was on his way to the porch to smoke off his +discomfiture when he met August coming out of Julia's door on the +opposite side of the hall. The candle in Humphreys's room threw its +light full on August's face, there was no escape from recognition, and +Wehle was too proud to retreat. He shut the door of Julia's room and +stood with back against the wall staring at Humphreys, who did not +forget to smile in his most aggravating way. + +"Thief! thief!" called Humphreys. + +In a moment Mrs. Anderson and Julia ran up the stairs, followed by Mr. +Anderson, who hearing the outcry had left the matter of the Apocalypse +unsettled, and by Jonas and Cynthy Ann, who had just arrived. + +"I knew it," cried Mrs. Anderson, turning on the mortified Julia, "I +never knew a Dutchman nor a foreigner of any sort that wouldn't steal. +Now you see what you get by taking a fancy to a Dutchman. And now _you_ +see"--to her husband--"what _you_ get by taking a Dutchman into your +house. I always wanted you to hire white men and not Dutchmen +nor thieves!" + +"I beg your pardon, Mrs. Anderson," said August, with very white lips, +"I am not a thief." + +"Not a thief, eh? What was he doing, Mr. Humphreys, when you first +detected him?" + +"Coming out of Miss Anderson's room," said Humphreys, smiling politely. + +"Do you invite gentlemen to your room?" said the frantic woman to Julia, +meaning by one blow to revenge herself and crush the stubbornness of her +daughter forever. But Julia was too anxious about August to notice the +shameless insult. + +"Mrs. Anderson, this visit is without any invitation from Julia. I did +wrong to enter your house in this way, but I only am responsible, and I +meant to enter Jonas's room. I did not know that Julia occupied this +room. I am to blame, she is not." + +"And what did you break in for if you didn't mean to steal? It is all +off between you and Jule, for I saw your letter. I shall have you +arrested to-morrow for burglary. And I think you ought to be searched. +Mr. Humphreys, won't you put him out?" + +Humphreys stopped forward toward August, but he noticed that the latter +had a hard look in his eyes, and had two stout German fists shut very +tight. He turned back. + +"These thieves are nearly always armed. I think I had best get a pistol +out of my trunk." + +"I have no arms, and you know it, coward," said August. "I will not be +put out by anybody, but I will go out whenever the master of this +house asks me to go out, and the rest of you open a free path." + +[Illustration: "GOOD-BY!"] + +"Jonas, put him out!" screamed Mrs. Anderson. + +"Couldn't do it," said Jonas, "couldn't do it ef I tried. They's too +much bone and sinnoo in them arms of his'n, and moreover he's a +gentleman. I axed him to come and see me sometime, and he come. He come +ruther late it's true, but I s'pose he thought that sence we got sech a +dee-splay of watch-seals and straps we had all got so stuck up, we +wouldn't receive calls afore fashionable hours. Any way, I 'low he +didn't mean no harm, and he's my visitor, seein' he meant to come into +my winder, knowin' the door was closed agin him. And he won't let no man +put him out, 'thout he's a man with more'n half a dozen watch-seals onto +him, to give him weight and influence." + +"Samuel, will you see me insulted in this way? Will you put this burglar +out of the house?" + +The "head of the house," thus appealed to, tried to look important; he +tried to swell up his size and his courage. But he did not dare +touch August. + +"Mr. Anderson, I beg _your_ pardon. I had no right to come In as I did. +I had no right so to enter a gentleman's house. If I had not known that +this cowardly fop--I don't know what _else_ he may be--was injuring me +by his lies I should not have come in. If it is a crime to love a young +lady, then I have committed a crime. You have only to exercise your +authority as master of this house and ask me to go." + +"I do ask you to go, Mr. Wehle." + +It was the first time that Samuel Anderson had ever called him Mr. +Wehle. It was an involuntary tribute to the dignity of the young man, as +he stood at bay. "Mr. Wehle, _indeed_!" said Mrs. Anderson. + +August had hoped Julia would say a word in his behalf. But she was too +much, cowed by her mother's fierce passion. So like a criminal going to +prison, like a man going to his own funeral, August Wehle went down the +hall toward the stairs, which were at the back of it. Humphreys +instinctively retreated into his room. Mrs. Anderson glared on the young +man as he went by, but he did not turn his head even when he passed +Julia. His heart and hope were all gone; in his mortification and defeat +there seemed to him nothing left but his unbroken pride to sustain him. +He had descended two or three steps, when Julia suddenly glided forward +and said with a tremulous voice: "You aren't going without telling me +good-by, August?" + +"Jule Anderson! what do you mean?" cried her mother. But the hall was +narrow by the stairway, and Jonas, by standing close to Cynthy Ann, in +an unconscious sort of a way managed to keep Mrs. Anderson back; else +she would have laid violent hands on her daughter. + +When August lifted his eyes and saw her face full of tenderness and her +hand reached over the balusters to him, he seemed to have been suddenly +lifted from perdition to bliss. The tears ran unrestrained upon his +cheeks, he reached up and took her hand. + +"Good-by, Jule! God bless you!" he said huskily, and went out into the +night, happy in spite of all. + + + +CHAPTER XIX. + +THE MOTHER. + +Out of the door he went, happy in spite of all the mistakes he had made +and of all the _contretemps_ of his provoking misadventure; happy in +spite of the threat of arrest for burglary. For nearly a minute August +Wehle was happy in that perfect way in which people of quiet tempers are +happy--happy without fluster. But before he had passed the gate, he +heard a scream and a wild hysterical laugh; he heard a hurrying of feet +and saw a moving of lights. He would fain have turned back to find out +what the matter was, he had so much of interest in that house, but he +remembered that he had been turned out and that he could not go back. +The feeling of outlawry mingled its bitterness with the feeling of +anxiety. He feared that something had happened to Julia; he lingered and +listened. Humphreys came out upon the upper porch and looked sharply up +and down the road. August felt instinctively that he was the object of +search and slunk into a fence-corner, remembering that he was now a +burglar and at the mercy of the man whose face was enough to show him +unrelenting. + +Presently Humphreys turned and went in, and then August came out of the +shadow and hurried away. When he had gone a mile, he heard the hoofs of +horses, and again he concealed himself with a cowardly feeling he had +never known before. But when he found that it was Jonas, riding one +horse and leading another, on his way to bring Dr. Ketchup, the +steam-doctor, he ran out. + +"Jonas! Jonas! what's the matter? Who's sick? Is it Julia?" + +"I'll be bound you ax fer Jule first, my much-respected comrade. But +it's only one of the ole woman's conniption fits, and you know she's got +nineteen lives. People of the catamount sort always has. You'd better +gin a thought to yourself now. I got you into this scrape, and I mean to +see you out, as the dog said to the 'possum in its hole. Git up onto +this four-legged quadruped and go as fur as I go on the road to peace +and safety. Now, I tell you what, the hawk's got a mighty good purchase +onto you, my chicken, and he's jest about to light, and when he lights, +look out fer feathers! Don't sleep under the paternal shingles, as they +say. Go to Andrew's castle, and he'll help you git acrost the river into +the glorious State of ole Kaintuck afore any warrant can be got out fer +takin' you up. Never once thought of your bein' took up. But don't +delay, as the preachers say. The time is short, and the human heart is +desperately wicked and mighty deceitful and onsartain." + +As far as Jonas traveled his way, he carried August upon the gray horse. +Then the latter hurried across the fields to his father's cabin. Little +Wilhelmina sat with face against the window waiting his return. + +"Where did you go, August? Did you see the pretty girl at Anderson's?" + +He stooped and kissed her, but, without speaking a word to her, he went +over to where his mother sat darning the last of her basket of +stockings. All the rest were asleep, and having assured himself of this, +he drew up a low chair and leaned his elbow on his knee and hi head on +his hand, and told the whole adventure of the evening to his mother, and +then dropped his head on her lap and wept in a still way. And the +sweet-eyed, weary Moravian mother laid her two hands upon his head and +prayed. And Wilhelmina knelt instinctively by the side of her brother. + +[Illustration: THE MOTHER'S BLESSING.] + +Perhaps there is no God. Or perhaps He is so great that our praying has +no effect. Perhaps this strong crying of our hearts to Him in our +extremity is no witness of his readiness to hear. Let him live in doubt +who can. Let me believe that the tender mother-heart and the loving +sister-heart in that little cabin _did_ reach up to the great Heart that +is over us all in Fatherly love, did find a real comfort for themselves, +and did bring a strength-giving and sanctifying something upon the head +of the young man, who straightway rose up refreshed, and departed out +into the night, leaving behind him mother and sister straining their +eyes after him in the blackness, and carrying with him thoughts and +memories, and--who shall doubt?--a genuine heavenly inspiration that +saved him in the trials in which we shall next meet him. + +At two o'clock that night August Wehle stood upon the shore of the Ohio +in company with Andrew Anderson, the Backwoods Philosopher. Andrew waved +a fire-brand at the steamboat "Isaac Shelby," which was coming round the +bend. And the captain tapped his bell three times and stopped his +engines. Then the yawl took the two men aboard, and two days afterward +Andrew came back alone. + + + +CHAPTER XX. + +THE STEAM-DOCTOR. + +To return to the house of Samuel Anderson. + +Scarcely had August passed out the door when Mrs. Anderson fell into a +fit of hysterics, and declared that she was dying of heart-disease. Her +time had come at last! She was murdered! Murdered by her own daughter's +ingratitude and disobedience! Struck down in her own house! And what +grieved her most was that she should never live to see the end of +the world! + +And indeed she seemed to be dying. Nothing is more frightful than a good +solid fit of hysterics. Cynthy Ann, inwardly condemning herself as she +always did, lifted the convulsed patient, who seemed to be anywhere in +her last ten breaths, and carried her, with Mr. Anderson's aid, down to +her room, and while Jonas saddled the horse, Mr. Anderson put on his hat +and prepared to go for the doctor. + +"Samuel! O Sam-u-el! Oh-h-h-h-h!" cried Mrs. Anderson, with rising and +falling inflections that even patient Dr. Rush could never have +analyzed, laughing insanely and weeping piteously in the same breath, in +the same word; running it up and down the gamut in an uncontrolled and +uncontrollable way; now whooping like a savage, and now sobbing like the +last breath of a broken-hearted. "Samuel! Sam-u-el! O Samuel! Ha! ha! +ha! h-a-a! Oh-h-h-h-h-h-h! You won't leave me to die alone! After the +wife I've been to you, you won't leave me to die alone! No-o-o-o-o! +HOO-HOO-oo-OO! You musn't. You shan't. Send Jonas, and you stay by me! +Think--" here her breath died away, and for a moment she seemed really +to be dying. "Think," she gasped, and then sank away again. After a +minute she opened her eyes, and, with characteristic pertinacity, took +up the sentence just where she had left off. She had carefully kept her +place throughout the period of unconsciousness. But now she spoke, not +with a gasp, but in that shrill, unnatural falsetto so characteristic of +hysteria; that voice--half yell--that makes every nerve of the listener +jangle with the discord. "Think, oh-h-h Samuel! why won't you think what +a wife I've been to you? Here I've drudged and scrubbed and scrubbed and +drudged all these years like a faithful and industrious wife, never +neglecting my duty. And now--oh-h-h-h--now to be left alone in my--" +Here she ceased to breathe again for a while. "In my last hours to die, +to die! to die with, out--without--Oh-h-h!" What Mrs. Anderson was left +to die without she never stated. Mr. Anderson had beckoned to Jonas when +he came in, and that worthy had gone off in a leisurely trot to get the +"steam-doctor." + +[Illustration: "CORN-SWEATS AND CALAMUS."] + +Dr. Ketchup had been a blacksmith, but bard work disagreed with his +constitution. He felt that he, was made for something better than +shoeing horses. This ambitious thought was first suggested to him by the +increasing portliness of his person, which, while it made stooping over +a horse's hoof inconvenient, also impressed him with the fact that his +aldermanic figure would really adorn a learned profession. So he bought +one of those little hand-books which the founder of the Thomsonian +system sold dirt-cheap at twenty dollars apiece, and which told how to +cure or kill in every case. The owners of these important treasures of +invaluable information were under bonds not to disclose the profound +secrets therein contained, the fathomless wisdom which taught them how +to decide in any given case whether ginseng or a corn-sweat was the +required remedy. And the invested twenty dollars had brought the shrewd +blacksmith a handsome return. + +"Hello!" said Jonas in true Western style, as he reined up in front of +Dr. Ketchup's house in the outskirts of Brayville. "Hello the house!" +But Dr. Ketchup was already asleep. "Takes a mighty long time to wake up +a fat man," soliloquized Jonas. "He gits so used to hearin' hisself +snore that he can't tell the difference 'twixt snorin' and thunder. +Hello! Hello the house! I say, hello the blacksmith-shop! Dr. Ketchup, +why don't you git up? Hello! Corn-sweats and calamus! Hello! Whoop! +Hurrah for Jackson and Dr. Ketchup! Hello! Thunderation! Stop thief! +Fire! Fire! Fire! Murder! Murder! Help! Help! Hurrah! Treed the coon +at last!" + +This last exclamation greeted the appearance of Dr. Ketchup's head at +the window. + +"Are you drunk, Jonas Harrison? Go 'way with your hollering, or I'll +have you took up," said Ketchup. + +"You'll find that tougher work than making horseshoes any day, my +respectable friend and feller-citizen. I'll have you took up fer +sleeping so sound and snorin' so loud as to disturb all creation and the +rest of your neighbors. I've heard you ever sence I left Anderson's, and +thought 'twas a steamboat. Come, my friend, git on your clothes and +accouterments, fer Mrs. Anderson is a-dyin' or a-lettin' on to be +a-dyin' fer a drink of ginseng-tea or a corn-sweat or some other +decoction of the healin' art. Come, I fotch two hosses, so you shouldn't +lose no time a saddlin' your'n, though I don't doubt the ole woman'd git +well ef you never gin her the light of your cheerful count'nance. +She'd git well fer spite, and hire a calomel-doctor jist to make you +mad. I'd jest as soon and a little sooner expect a female wasp to die of +heart-disease as her." + +[Illustration: "FIRE! MURDER!! HELP!!!"] + +The head of Dr. Ketchup had disappeared from the window about the middle +of this speech, and the remainder of it came by sheer force of internal +pressure, like the flowing of an artesian well. + +Dr. Ketchup walked out, with ruffled dignity, carefully dressed. His +immaculate clothes and his solemn face were the two halves of his stock +in trade. Under the clothes lay buried Ketchup the blacksmith; under the +wiseacre face was Ketchup the ignoramus. Ignoramus he was, but not a +fool. As he rode along back with Jonas, he plied the latter with +questions. If he could get the facts of the case out of Jonas, he would +pretend to have inferred them from the symptoms and thus add to +his credit. + +"What caused this attack, Jonas?" + +"I 'low she caused it herself. Generally does, my friend," said Jonas. + +"Had anything occurred to excite her?" + +"Well, yes, I 'low they had; consid'able, if not more." + +"What was it?" + +"Well, you see she'd been to Hankins's preachin'. Now, I 'low, my +medical friend, the day of jedgment a'n't a pleasin' prospeck to anybody +that's jilted one brother to marry another, and then cheated the jilted +one outen his sheer of his lamented father's estate. Do you think it is, +my learned friend?" + +But Dr. Ketchup could not be sure whether Jonas was making game of him +or not. So he changed the subject. + +"Nice hoss, this bay," said the "doctor." + +"Well, yes," said Jonas, "I don't 'low you ever put shoes on no better +hoss than this 'ere in all your days--as a blacksmith. Did you now, my +medical friend?" + +"No, I think not," said Ketchup testily, and was silent. + +Mrs. Anderson had grown impatient at the doctor's delay. "Samuel! Oo! +oo! oo! Samuel! My dear, I'm dying. Jonas don't care. He wouldn't hurry. +I wonder you trusted _him!_ If you had been dying, I should have gone +myself for the doctor. Oo! oo! oo! _oh!_ If I should die, nobody would +be sorry." + +Abigail Anderson was not to blame for telling the truth so exactly in +this last sentence. It was an accident. She might have recalled it but +that Dr. Ketchup walked in at that moment. + +He felt her pulse; looked at her tongue; said that it was heart-disease, +caused by excitement. He thought it must be religious excitement. She +should have a corn-sweat and some wafer-ash tea. The corn-sweat would +act as a tonic and strengthen the pericardium. The wafer-ash would cause +a tendency of blood to the head, and thus relieve the pressure on the +juggler-vein. Cynthy Ann listened admiringly to Dr. Ketchup's +incomprehensible, oracular utterances, and then speedily put a bushel of +ear-corn in the great wash-boiler, which was already full of hot water +in expectation of such a prescription, and set the wafer-ash to draw. + +Julia had, up to this time, stood outside her mother's door trembling +with fear, and not daring to enter. She longed to do something, but did +not know how it would be received. Now, while the deep, sonorous voice +of Ketchup occupied the attention of all, she crept in and stood at the +foot of Mrs. Anderson's bed. The mother, recovering from her twentieth +dying spell, saw her. + +"Take her away! She has killed me! She wants me to die! _I_ know! Take +her away!" + +And Julia went to her own room and shut herself up in darkness and in +wretchedness, but in all that miserable night there came to her not one +regret that she had reached her hand to the departing August. + +The neighbor-women came in and pretended to do something for the +invalid, but really they sat by the kitchen-stove and pumped Cynthy Ann +and the doctor, and managed in some way to connect Julia with her +mother's illness, and shook their heads. So that when Julia crept +down-stairs at midnight, in hope of being useful, she found herself +looked at inquisitively, and felt herself to be such an object of +attention that she was glad to take the advice of Cynthy Ann and find +refuge in her own room. On the stairs she met Jonas, who said as +she passed: + +"Don't fret yourself, little turtle-dove. Don't pay no 'tention to ole +Ketchup. Your ma won't die, not even with his corn-sweats to waft her on +to glory. You done your duty to-night like one of Fox's martyrs, and +like George Washi'ton with his little cherry-tree and hatchet. And +you'll git your reward, if not in the next world, you'll have it +in this." + +Julia lay down awhile, and then sat up, looking out into the darkness. +Perhaps God was angry with her for loving August; perhaps she was making +an idol of him. When Julia came to think that her love for August was in +antagonism to the love of God, she did not hesitate which she would +choose. All the best of her nature was loyal to August, whom she "had +seen," as the Apostle John has it. She could not reason it out, but a +God who seemed to be in opposition to the purest and best emotion of her +heart was a God she could not love. August and the love of August were +known quantities. God and the love of God were unknown, and the God of +whom Cynthy spoke (and of whom many a mistaken preacher has spoken), +that was jealous of Mrs. Pearson's love for her baby, and that killed it +because it was his rival, was not a God that she could love without +being a traitor to all the good that God had put in her heart. The God +that was keeping August away from her because he was jealous of the one +beautiful thing in her life was a Moloch, and she deliberately +determined that she would not worship or love him. The True God, who is +a Father, and who is not Supreme Selfishness, doing all for His own +glory, as men falsely declare; the True God--who does all things for the +good of others--loved her, I doubt not, for refusing to worship the +Conventional Deity thus presented to her mind. Even as He has pitied +many a mother that rebelled against the Governor of the Universe, +because she was told the Governor of the Universe, in a petty seeking +for his own glory, had taken away her "idols." + +But Julia looked up at the depths between the stars, and felt how great +God must be, and her rebellion against Him seemed a war at fearful odds. +And then the sense of God's omnipresence, of His being there alone with +her, so startled her and awakened such a feeling of her fearful +loneliness, orphanage, antagonism to God, that she could bear it no +longer, and at two o'clock she went down again; but Mrs. Brown looked +over at Mrs. Orcutt in a way that said: "Told you so! Guilty conscience! +Can't sleep!" And so Julia thought God, even as she conceived Him, +better company than men, or rather than women, for--well, I won't make +the ungallant remark; each sex has its besetting faults. + +Julia took back with her a candle, thinking that this awful God would +not seem so close if she had a light. There lay on her bureau a +Testament, one of those old editions of the American Bible Society, +printed on indifferent paper, and bound in a red muslin that was given +to fading, the like whereof in book-making has never been seen since. +She felt angry with God, who, she was sure, was persecuting her, as +Cynthy Ann had said, out of jealousy of her love for August, and she was +determined that she would not look into that red-cloth Testament, which +seemed to her full of condemnation. But there was a fascination about it +she could not resist. The discordant hysterical laughter of her mother, +which reached her ears from below, harrowed her sorely, and her grief +and despair at her own situation were so great that she was at last fain +to read the only book in the room in order that she might occupy her +mind. There is a strange superstition among certain pietists which loads +them to pray for a text to guide them, and then take any chance passage +as a divine direction. I do not mean to say that Julia had any +supernatural leading in her reading. The New Testament is so full of +comfort that one could hardly manage to miss it. She read the seventh +chapter of Luke: how the Lord healed the centurion's servant that was +"dear unto him," and noted that He did not rebuke the man for loving his +slave; how the Lord took pity on that poor widow who wept at the bier of +her only son, and brought him back to life again, and "restored him to +his mother." This did not seem to be just the Christ that Cynthy Ann +thought of as the foe of every human affection. She read more that she +did not understand so well, and then at the end of the chapter she read +about the woman that was a sinner, that washed His feet with grateful +tears and wiped them with her hair. And she would have taken the woman's +guilt to have had the woman's opportunity and her benediction. + +At last, turning over the leaves without any definite purpose, she +lighted on a place in Matthew, where three verses at the end of a +chapter happened to stand at the head of a column. I suppose she read +them because the beginning of the page and the end of the chapter made +them seem a short detached piece. And they melted into her mood so that +she seemed to know Christ and God for the first time. "Come unto me all +ye that labor and are heavy laden," she read, and stopped. That means +me, she thought with a heart ready to burst. And that saying is the +gateway of life. When the promises and injunctions mean me, I am saved. +Julia read on, "And I will give you rest." And so she drank in the +passage, clause by clause, until she came to the end about an easy yoke +and a light burden, and then God seemed to her so different. She prayed +for August, for now the two loves, the love for August and the love for +Christ, seemed not in any way inconsistent. She lay down saying over and +over, with tears in her eyes, "rest for your souls," and "weary and +heavy laden," and "come unto me," and "meek and lowly of heart," and +then she settled on one word and repeated it over and over, "rest, rest, +rest." The old feeling was gone. She was no more a rebel nor an orphan. +The presence of God was not a terror but a benediction. She had found +rest for her soul, and He gave His beloved sleep. For when she awoke +from what seemed a short slumber, the red light of a glorious dawn came +in at the window, and her candle was flickering its last in the bottom +of the socket. The Testament lay open as she had left it, and for days +she kept it open there, and did not dare read anything but these three +verses, lest she should lose the rest for her soul that she found here. + + + +CHAPTER XXI. + +THE HAWK IN A NEW PART. + +Humphreys was now in the last weeks of his singing-school. He had become +a devout Millerite, and was paying attentions to the not unwilling +Betsey Malcolm, though pretending at Anderson's to be absolutely +heart-broken at the conduct of Julia in jilting him after she had given +him every assurance of affection. And then to be jilted for a Dutchman, +you know! In this last regard his feeling was not all affectation. In +his soul, cupidity, vanity, and vindictiveness divided the narrow +territory between them. He inwardly swore that he'd get satisfaction +somehow. Debts which were due to his pride should be collected by +his revenge. + +Did you ever reflect on the uselessness of a landscape when one has no +eyes to see it with, or, what is worse, no soul to look through one's +eyes? Humphreys was going down to the castle to call on the Philosopher, +and "Shady Hollow," as Andrew called it, had surely never been more +glorious than on the morning which he chose for his walk. The black-haw +bushes hung over the roadside, the maples lifted up their great +trunk-pillars toward the sky, and the grape-vines, some of them four +and even six inches in diameter, reached up to the high boughs, fifty or +a hundred feet, without touching the trunk. They had been carried up by +the growth of the tree, tree and vine having always lived in each +other's embrace. Out through the opening in the hollow, Humphreys saw +the green sea of six-feet-high Indian corn in the fertile bottoms, the +two rows of sycamores on the sandy edges of the river, and the hazy +hills on the Kentucky side. But not one touch of sentiment, not a +perception of beauty, entered the soul of the singing-master as he +daintily-chose his steps so as to avoid soiling his glossy boots, and as +he knocked the leaves off the low-hanging beech boughs with his delicate +cane. He had his purpose in visiting Andrew, and his mind was bent +on his game. + +Charon, the guardian of the castle, bayed his great hoarse bark at the +Hawk, and with that keen insight into human nature for which dogs are so +remarkable, he absolutely forbade the dandy's entrance, until Andrew +appeared at the door and called the dog away. + +"I am delighted at having the opportunity of meeting a great light in +literature like yourself, Mr. Anderson. Here you sit weaving, earning +your bread with a manly simplicity that is truly admirable. You are like +Cincinnatus at his plow. I also am a literary man." + +He really was a college graduate, though doubtless he was as much of a +humbug in recitations and examinations as he had always been since. +Andrew's only reply to his assertion that he was a literary man was a +rather severe and prolonged scrutiny of his oily locks, his dainty +mustache, his breast-pin, his watch-seals, and finally his straps and +his boots. For Andrew firmly believed that neglected hair, Byron +collars, and unblackened boots were the first signs of literary taste. + +"You think I dress too well," said Humphreys with his ghastly smirk. +"You think that I care too much for appearances. I do. It is a weakness +of mine which comes from a residence abroad." + +These words touched the Philosopher a little. To have been abroad was +the next best thing to having been a foreigner _ab origine_. But still +he felt a little suspicious. He was superior to the popular prejudice +against the mustache, but he could not endure hair-oil. "Nature," he +maintained, "made the whole beard to be worn, and Nature provides an oil +for the hair. Let Nature have her way." He was suspicious of Humphreys, +not because he wore a mustache, but because he shaved the rest of his +face and greased his hair. He had, besides, a little intuitive +perception of the fact that a smile which breaks against the rock-bound +coast of cold cheek-bones and immovable eyes is a mask. And so he +determined to test the literary man. I have heard that Masonic lodges +have been deceived by impostors. I have never heard that a literary man +was made to believe in the genuineness of the attainments of a +charlatan. + +And yet Humphreys held his own well. He could talk glibly and +superficially about books; he simulated considerable enthusiasm for the +books which Andrew admired. His mistake and his consequent overthrow +came, as always in such cases, from a desire to overdo. It was after +half an hour of talking without tripping that Andrew suddenly asked: "Do +you like the ever-to-be-admired Xenophanes?" + +It certainly is no disgrace to any literary man not to know anything of +so remote a philosopher as Xenophanes. The first characteristic of a +genuine literary man is the frankness with which he confesses his +ignorance. But Humphreys did not really know but that Xenophanes was +part of the daily reading of a man of letters. + +"Oh! yes," said he. "I have his works in turkey morocco." + +"What do you think of his opinion that God is a sphere?" asked the +Philosopher, smiling. + +"Oh! yes--ahem; let me see--which God is it that he speaks of, Jupiter +or--well, you know he was a Greek." + +"But he only believed in one God," said Andrew sternly. + +"Oh! ah! I forgot that he was a Christian." + +So from blunder to blunder Andrew pushed him, Humphreys stumbling more +and more in his blind attempts to right himself, and leaving, at last, +with much internal confusion but with an unruffled smile. He dared not +broach his errand by asking the address of August. For Andrew did not +conceal his disgust, having resumed work at his loom, suffering the +bowing impostor to find his own way out without so much as a +courteous adieu. + + + +CHAPTER XXII. + +JONAS EXPRESSES HIS OPINION ON DUTCHMEN. + +Sometimes the virus of a family is all drawn off in one vial. I think it +is Emerson who makes this remark. We have all seen the vials. + +Such an one was Norman Anderson. The curious law of hereditary descent +had somehow worked him only evil. "Nater," observed Jonas to Cynthy, +when the latter had announced to him that Norman, on account of some +disgrace at school, had returned home, "nater ha'n't done him half +jestice, I 'low. It went through Sam'el Anderson and Abig'il, and picked +out the leetle weak pompous things in the illustrious father; and then +hunted out all the spiteful and hateful things in the lovin' and +much-esteemed mother, and somehow stuck 'em together, to make as ornery +a chap as ever bit a hoe-cake in two." + +"I'm afeard her brother's scrape and comin' home won't make Jule none +the peacefuller at the present time," said Cynthy Ann. + +"Wal," returned Jonas, "I don't think she keers much fer him. She +couldn't, you know. Love him? Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear"--here Cynthy Ann +began to reproach herself for listening to anything so pleasant as +these two last words--"Now, Cynthy Ann, my dear, you see you might maybe +love a cuckle-burr and nuss it; but I don't think you would be likely +to. I never heern tell of nobody carryin' jimson-weed pods in their +bosoms. You see they a'n't no place about Norman Anderson that love +could take a holt of 'thout gittin' scratched." + +"But his mother loves him, I reckon," said Cynthy Ann. + +"Wal, yes; so she do. Loves her shadder in the lookin'-glass, maybe, and +kinder loves Norman bekase he's got so much of her devil into him. It's +like lovin' like, I reckon. But I 'low they's a right smart difference +with Jule. Sence she was born, that Norman has took more delight in +tormentin' Jule than a yaller dog with a white tail does in worryin' a +brindle tom-cat up a peach-tree. And comin' home at this junction he'll +gin her a all-fired lot of trials and tribulation." + +At the time this conversation took place, two weeks had elapsed since +Mrs. Anderson's "attack." Julia had heard nothing from August yet. The +"Hawk" still made his head-quarters in the house, but was now watching +another quarry. Mrs. Anderson was able to scold as vigorously as ever, +if, indeed, that function had ever been suspended. And just now she was +engaged in scolding the teacher who had expelled Norman. The habit of +fighting teachers was as chronic as her heart-disease. Norman had always +been abused by the whole race of pedagogues. There was from the first a +conspiracy against him, and now he was cheated out of his last chance of +getting an education. All this Norman steadfastly believed. + +Of course Norman sided with his mother as against the Dutchman. The more +contemptible a man is, the more he contemns a man for not belonging to +his race or nation. And Norman felt that he would be eternally disgraced +by any alliance with a German. He threw himself into the fight with a +great deal of vigor. It helped him to forget other things. + +"Jule," said he, walking up to her as she sat alone on the porch, "I'm +ashamed of you. To go and fall in love with a Dutchman like Gus Wehle, +and disgrace us all!" + +"I wonder you didn't think about disgrace before," retorted Julia, "I am +ashamed to have August Wehle hear what you've been doing." + +[Illustration: NORMAN ANDERSON.] + +Dogs that have the most practice in cat-worrying are liable to get their +noses scratched sometimes. Norman took care never to attack Julia again +except under the guns of his mother's powerful battery. And he revenged +himself on her by appealing to his mother with a complaint that "Jule +had throwed up to him that he had been dismissed from school." And of +course Julia received a solemn lecture on her way of driving poor Norman +to destruction. She was determined to disgrace the family. If she could +not do it by marrying a Dutchman, she would do it by slandering +her brother. + +Norman thought to find an ally in Jonas. + +"Jonas, don't you think it's awful that Jule is in love with Dutchman +like Gus Wehle?" + +"I do, my love," responded Jonas. "I think a Dutchman is a Dutchman. I +don't keer how much he larns by burnin' the midnight ile by day and +night. My time-honored friend, he's a Dutchman arter all. The Dutch is +bred in the bone. It won't fade. A Dutchman may be a gentleman in his +way of doin' things, may be honest and industrious, and keep all the +commandments in the catalogue, but I say he is Dutch, and that's enough +to keep him out of the kingdom of heaven and out of this free and +enlightened republic. And an American may be a good-fer-nothin', ornery +little pertater-ball, wuthless alike to man and beast; he mayn't be good +fer nothin', nuther fer work nur study; he may git drunk and git turned +outen school and do any pertikeler number of disgraceful and +oncreditable things, he may be a reg'ler milksop and nincompoop, a fool +and a blackguard and a coward all rolled up into one piece of brown +paper, ef he wants to. And what's to hender? A'n't he a free-born an' +enlightened citizen of this glorious and civilized and Christian land of +Hail Columby? What business has a Dutchman, ef he's ever so smart and +honest and larned, got in our broad domains, resarved for civil and +religious liberty? What business has he got breathin' our atmosphere or +takin' refuge under the feathers of our American turkey-buzzard? No, my +beloved and respected feller-citizen of native birth, it's as plain to +me as the wheels of 'Zek'el and the year 1843. I say, Hip, hip, hoo-ray +fer liberty or death, and down with the Dutch!" + +Norman Anderson scratched his head. + +What did Jonas mean? + +He couldn't exactly divine; but it is safe to say that on the whole he +was not entirely satisfied with this boomerang speech. He rather thought +that he had better not depend on Jonas. + +But he was not long in finding allies enough in his war against Germany. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII. + +SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS. + +There was an egg-supper in the country store at Brayville. Mr. Mandluff, +the tall and raw-boned Hoosier who kept the store, was not unwilling to +have the boys get up an egg supper now and then in his store after he +had closed the front-door at night. For you must know that an egg-supper +is a peculiar Western institution. Sometimes it is a most enjoyable +institution--when it has its place in a store where there is no Kentucky +whisky to be had. But in Brayville, in the rather miscellaneous +establishment of the not very handsome and not very graceful Mr. +Mandluff, an egg-supper was not a great moral institution. It was +otherwise, and profanely called by its votaries a camp-meeting; it would +be hard to tell why, unless it was that some of the insiders grew very +happy before it was over. For an egg-supper at Mandluff's store was to +Brayville what an oyster-supper at Delmonico's is to New York. It was +one tenth hard eggs and nine tenths that beverage which bears the name +of an old royal house of France. + +How were the eggs cooked? I knew somebody would ask that impertinent +question. Well, they were not fried, they were not boiled, they were +not poached, they were not scrambled, they were not omeletted, they were +not roasted on the half-shell, they were not stuffed with garlic and +served with cranberries, they were not boiled and served with anchovy +sauce, they were not "_en salmi_." I think I had better stop there, lest +I betray my knowledge of cookery. It is sufficient to say that they were +not cooked in any of the above-named fashions, nor in any other way +mentioned in Catharine Beecher's or Marion Harland's cookbooks. They +were baked _a la mode_ backwoods. It is hardly proper for me to give a +recipe in this place, that belongs more properly to the "Household +Departments" of the newspapers. But to satisfy curiosity, and to tell +something about cooking, which Prof. Blot does not know, I may say that +they were broken and dropped on a piece of brown paper laid on the top +of the old box-stove. By the time the egg was cooked hard the paper was +burned to ashes, but the egg came off clean and nice from the stove, and +made as palatable and indigestible an article for a late supper as one +could wish. It only wanted the addition of Mandluff's peculiar whisky to +make it dissipation of the choicest kind. For the more a dissipation +costs in life and health, the more fascinating it is. + +There was an egg-supper, as I said, at Mandluff's store. There was to be +a "camp-meeting" in honor of Norman Anderson's successful return to his +liberty and his cronies. It gave Norman, the greatest pleasure to return +to a society where it was rather to his credit than otherwise that he +had gone on a big old time, got caught, and been sent adrift by the old +hunk that had tried to make him study Latin. + +The eggs were baked in the true "camp-meeting" style, the whisky was +drunk, and--so was the company. Bill Day's rather red eyes grew redder, +and his nose shone with delight as he shuffled the greasy pack of +"kyerds." The maudlin smile crossed the habitually melancholy lines of +his face in a way that split and splintered his visage into a curious +contradiction of emotions. + +"H--a--oo--p!" He shouted, throwing away the cards over the heads of his +companions. "Ha--oop! boys, thish is big--hoo! hoo! ha--oop! I say is +big. Let's do somethin'!" + +Here there was a confused cry that "it _was_ big, and that they had +better do somethin' or 'nother." + +"Let's blow up the ole school-house," said Bill Day, who was not +friendly to education. + +"I tell you what," said Bob Short, who was dealing the cards in another +set--"I tell you what," and Bob winked his eyes vigorously, and looked +more solemn and wise than he could have looked if it had not been for +the hard eggs and the whisky--"I tell you what," said Bob a third time, +and halted, for his mind's activity was a little choked by the fervor of +his emotions--"I tell you what, boys--" + +"Wal," piped Jim West in a cracked voice, "you've told us _what_ four +times, I 'low; now s'pose you tell us somethin' else." + +"I tell you what, boys," said Bob Short, suddenly remembering his +sentence, "don't let's do nothin' that'll git us into no trouble +arterwards. Ef we blow up the school-house we'll be 'rested fer bigamy +or--or--what d'ye call it?" + +"For larson," said Bill Day, hardly able to restrain another whoop. + +"No, 'taint larson," said Bob Short, looking wiser than a chief-justice, +"it's arsony. Now I say, don't let's go to penitentiary for no--no +larson--no arsony, I mean." + +"Ha--oop!" said Bill. "Let's do somethin' ludikerous. Hurrah for arsony +and larson! Dog-on the penitentiary! Ha--oop!" + +[Illustration: SOMETHIN' LUDIKEROUS.] + +"Let's go fer the Dutchman," said Norman Anderson, just drunk enough to +be good-naturedly murderous and to speak in dialect. "Gus is turned out +to committin' larson by breakin' into people's houses an' has run off. +Now let's tar and feather the ole one. Of course, he's a thief. Dutchmen +always is, I 'low. Clark township don't want none of 'em, I'll be +dog-oned if it do," and Norman got up and struck his fist on +the counter. + +"An' they won't nobody hurt you; you see, he's on'y a Dutchman," said +Bob Short "Larson on a Dutchman don't hold." + +"I say, let's hang him," said Bill Day. "Ha--oop! Let's hang him, or do +somethin' else ludikerous!" + +"I wouldn't mind," grinned Norman Anderson, delighted at the turn things +had taken. "I'd just like to see him hung." + +"So would I," said Bill Day, leaning over to Norman. "Ef a Dutchman wash +to court my sishter, I'd--" + +"He'd be a fool ef he did," piped Jim West. For Bill Day's sister was a +"maid not vendible," as Shakespeare has it. + +"See yer," said Bill, trying in vain to draw his coat. "Looky yer, +Jeems; ef you say anythin' agin Ann Marier, I'll commit the wust larson +on you you ever seed." + +"I didn't say nothin' agin Ann Marier," squeaked Jim. "I was talkin' +agin the Dutch." + +"Well, that'sh all right Ha--oop! Boys, let's do somethin', larson or +arsony or--somethin'." + +A bucket of tar and some feathers were bought, for which young Anderson +was made to pay, and Bill Day insisted on buying fifteen feet of rope. +"Bekase," as he said, "arter you git the feathers on the bird, you +may--you may want to help him to go to roosht you know, on a hickory +limb. Ha--oop! Come along, boys; I say let's do somethin' ludikerous, ef +it's nothin' but a little larson." + +And so they went galloping down the road, nine drunken fools. For it is +one of the beauties of lynch law, that, however justifiable it may seem +in some instances, it always opens the way to villainous outrages. Some +of my readers will protest that a man was never lynched for the crime of +being a Dutchman. Which only shows how little they know of the intense +prejudice and lawless violence of the early West. Some day people will +not believe that men have been killed in California for being Chinamen. + +Of the nine who started, one, the drunkest, fell off and broke his arm; +the rest rode up in front of the cabin of Gottlieb Wehle. I do not want +to tell how they alarmed the mother at her late sewing and dragged +Gottlieb out of his bed. I shudder now when I recall one such outrage to +which I was an unwilling witness. Norman threw the rope round Gottlieb's +neck and declared for hanging. Bill Day agreed. It would be so +ludikerous, you know! + +"Vot hash I tun? Hey? Vot vor you dries doo hanks me already, hey?" +cried the honest German, who was willing enough to have the end of the +world come, but who did not like the idea of ascending alone, and in +this fashion. + +Mrs. Wehle pushed her way into the mob and threw the rope off her +husband's neck, and began to talk with vehemence in German. For a moment +the drunken fellows hung back out of respect for a woman. Then Bill Day +was suddenly impressed with the fact that the duty of persuading Mrs. +Wehle to consent to her husband's execution devolved upon him. + +"Take keer, boys; let me talk to the ole woman. I'll argy the case." + +"You can't speak Dutch no more nor a hoss can," squeaked Jeems West. + +"Blam'd ef I can't, though. Hyer, ole woman, firshta Dutch?" + +"Ya." + +"Now," said Bill, turning to the others in triumph, "what did I tell +you? Well, you see, your boy August is a thief." + +"He's not a teef!" said the old man. + +"Shet up your jaw. I say he is. Now, your ole man's got to be hung." + +"Vot vor?" broke in Gottlieb. + +"Bekase it's all your own fault. You hadn't orter be a Dutchman." + +Here the crowd fell into a wrangle. It was not so easy to hang a man +when such a woman stood there pleading for him. Besides, Bob Short +insisted that hanging was arsony in the first degree, and they better +not do it. To this Bill Day assented. He said he 'sposed tar and +feathers was only larson in the second degree. And then it would be rale +ludikerous. And now confused cries of "Bring on the tar!" "Where's the +feathers?" "Take off his clothes!" began to be raised. Norman stood out +for hanging. Drink always intensified his meanness. But the tar couldn't +be found. The man whom they had left lying by the roadside with a broken +arm had carried the tar, and had been well coated with it himself in +his fall. + +"Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day. "Let's do somethin'. Dog-on the arsony! +Let's hang him as high as Dan'el." + +And with that the rope was thrown over Gottlieb's, neck and he was +hurried off to the nearest tree. The rope was then put over a limb, and +a drunken half-dozen got ready to pull, while Norman Anderson adjusted +the noose and valiant Bill Day undertook to keep off Mrs. Wehle. + +"All ready! Pull up! Ha-oop!" shouted Bill Day, and the crowd pulled, +but Mrs. Wehle had slipped off the noose again, and the volunteer +executioners fell over one another in such a way as to excite the +derisive laughter of Bill Day, who thought it perfectly ludikerous. But +before the laugh had finished, the indignant Gottlieb had knocked Bill +Day over and sent Norman after him. The blow sobered them a little, and +suddenly destroyed Bill's ambition to commit "arsony," or do anything +else ludikerous. But Norman was furious, and under his lead Wehle's arms +were now bound with the rope and a consultation was held, during which +little Wilhelmina pleaded for her father effectively, and more by her +tears and cries and the wringing of her chubby hands than by any words. +Bill Day said he be blamed of that little Dutch gal's takin' on so +didn't kinder make him foul sorter scrimpshous you know. But the mob +could not quit without doing something. So it was resolved to give +Gottlieb a good ducking in the river and send him into Kentucky with a +warning not to come back. They went down the ravine past Andrew's castle +to the river. Mrs. Wehle followed, believing that her husband would be +drowned, and little Wilhelmina ran and pulled the alarm and awakened the +Backwoods Philosopher, who soon threw himself among them, but too late +to dissuade them from their purpose, for Andrew's own skiff, the +"Grisilde" by name, with three of the soberest of the party, had already +set out to convey Wehle, after one hasty immersion, to the other shore, +while the rest stood round hallooing like madmen to prevent any alarm +that Wehle might raise attracting attention on the other side. + + + +CHAPTER XXIV. + +THE GIANT GREAT-HEART. + +As soon as Andrew's skiff, the "Grisilde," was brought back and the +ruffians had gone off up the ravine, Andrew left Mrs. Wehle sitting by +the fire in the loom-room of the castle, while he crossed the river to +look after Gottlieb. Little Wilhelmina insisted on going with him, and +as she handled a steering-oar well he took her along. They found +Gottlieb with his arms cruelly pinioned sitting on a log in a state of +utter dejection, and dripping with water from his ducking. + +"Ich zay, Antroo, ish dish vat dey galls a vree goontry, already? A +blace vare troonk sheounders dosh vot ever dey hadn't ort! Dat is vree +koontry. Mein knabe ish roon off ver liebin a Yangee; unt a vool he ish, +doo. Unt ich ish hoong unt troundt unt darrdt unt vedderd unt drakt out +indoo de ribber, unt dolt if I ko back do mein vrau unt kinder I zhall +pe kilt vunst more already. Unt I shpose if ich shtays here der +Gainduckee beobles vill hang me unt dar me unt trown me all over in der +ribber, doo, already, pekoz I ish Deutsch. Ich zay de voorld ish all +pad, unt it aud doo pe vinished vunst already, I ton't gare how quick, +so ash dem droonk vools kit vot pelongs doo 'em venever Gabrel ploes his +drumbet." + +[Illustration: TO THE RESCUE.] + +"They'll get that in due time, my friend," said Andrew, untying the rope +with which Gottlieb had been pinioned. "Come, let us go back to our +own shore." + +"Bud daint my zhore no more. Dey said I'd god doo hang again vanst more +if I ever grossed de Ohio Ribber vunst again already, but I ton't vants +doo hang no more vor noddin already." + +"But I'll take care of that," said Andrew. "Before to-morrow night I'll +make your house the safest place in Clark township. I've got the rascals +by the throat now. Trust me." + +It took much entreaty on the part of Andrew and much weeping and kissing +on the part of Wilhelmina to move the heart of the terrified Gottlieb. +At last he got into the skiff and allowed himself to be rowed back +again, declaring all the way that he nebber zee no zich a vree koontry +ash dish voz already. + +When Bill Day and his comrades got up the next morning and began to +think of the transactions of the night, they did not seem nearly so +ludikerous as they had at the time. And when Norman Anderson and Bill +Day and Bob Short read the notice on the door of Mandluff's store they +felt that "arsony" might have a serious as well as a ludikerous side. + +Andrew at first intended to institute proceedings against the rioters, +but he knew that the law was very uncertain against the influences which +the eight or nine young men might bring to bear, and the prejudices of +the people against the Dutch. To prosecute would be to provoke another +riot. So he contented himself with this + + "PROCLAMATION! + + "TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN: I have a list of eight men connected + with the riotous mob which broke into the house of Gottlieb + Wehle, a peaceable and unoffending citizen of the United + States. The said eight men proceeded to commit an assault + and battery on the person of the said Gottlieb Wehle, and + even endeavored at one time to take his life. And the said + riotous conduct was the result of a conspiracy, and the said + assault with intent to kill was with malice aforethought. The + said eight men, after having committed grievous outrages upon + him by dipping him in the water and by other means, warned + the said Wehle not to return to the State. Now, therefore, I + give notice to all and several of those concerned in these + criminal proceedings that the said Wehle has returned by my + advice; and that if so much as a hair of his head or a + splinter of his property is touched I will appear against + said parties and will prosecute them until I secure the + infliction of the severest penalties made and provided for + the punishment of such infamous crimes. I hope I am well + enough known here to render it certain that if I once begin + proceedings nothing but success or my death or the end of the + world can stop them. + + "ANDREW ANDERSON, + + "Backwoods Philosopher. + + "AT THE CASTLE, May 12th, 1843." + +"It don't look so ludikerous as it did, does it, Bill?" squeaked Jim +West, as he read the notice over Bill's shoulder. + +"Shet your mouth, you fool!" said Bill. "Don't you never peep. Ef I'd a +been sober I might a knowed ole Grizzly would interfere. He +always does." + +In truth, Andrew was a sort of Perpetual Champion of the Oppressed, and +those who did not like him feared him, which is the next best thing. + + + +CHAPTER XXV. + +A CHAPTER OF BETWEENS. + +Did you ever move? And, in moving, did you ever happen to notice how +many little things there are to be picked up? Now that I am about to +shift the scene of my story from Clark township, the narrow stage upon +which it has progressed through two dozen chapters, I find a great +number of little things to be picked up. + +One of the little things to be picked up is Norman Anderson. Very +little, if measured soul-wise. When his father had read the proclamation +of Andrew and divined that Norman was interested in the riot, he became +thoroughly indignant; the more so, that he felt his own lack of power to +do anything in the premises against his wife. But when Mrs. Abigail +heard of the case she was in genuine distress. It showed Andrew's +vindictiveness. He would follow her forever with his resentments, just +because she could not love him. It was not her fault that she did not +love him. Poor Norman had to suffer all the persecutions that usually +fall to such innocent creatures. She must send him away from home, +though it broke her mother's heart to do it; for if Andrew didn't have +him took up, the old Dutchman would, just because his son had turned out +a burglar. She said burglar rather emphatically, with a look at Julia. + +And so Samuel Anderson took his son to Louisville, and got him a place +in a commission and produce house on the levee, with which Mr. Anderson +had business influence. And Samuel warned him that he must do his best, +for he could not come back home now without danger of arrest, and Norman +made many promises of amendment; so many, that his future seemed to him +barren of all delight. And, by way of encouraging himself in the austere +life upon which he had resolved to enter, he attended the least +reputable place of amusement in the city, the first night after his +father's departure. + +In Clark township the Millerite excitement was at white heat. Some of +the preachers in other parts of the country had set one day, some +another. I believe that Mr. Miller, the founder, never had the temerity +to set a day. But his followers figured the thing more closely, and +Elder Hankins had put a fine point on the matter. He was certain, for +his part, that the time was at midnight on the eleventh of August. His +followers became very zealous, and such is the nature of an infection +that scarcely anybody was able to resist it. Mrs. Anderson, true to her +excitable temper, became fanatic--dreaming dreams, seeing visions, +hearing voices, praying twenty times a day[2], wearing a sourly pious +face, and making all around her more unhappy than ever. Jonas declared +that ef the noo airth and the noo heaven was to be chockful of sech as +she, 'most any other place in the univarse would be better, akordin' to +his way of thinkin'. He said she repented more of other folkses' sins +than anybody he ever seed. + +[Footnote 2: Mrs. Anderson was less devout than some of her +co-religionists; the wife of a well-known steamboat-clerk was accustomed +to pray in private fifty times a day, hoping by means of this praying +without ceasing to be found ready when the trumpet should sound.] + +As summer came on, Samuel Anderson, borne away on the tide of his own +and his wife's fanatical fever of sublimated devotion, discharged Jonas +and all his other _employes_, threw up business, and gave his whole +attention to the straightening of his accounts for the coming day of +judgment. Before Jonas left to seek a new place he told Cynthy Ann as +how as ef he'd met her alrlier 'twould a-settled his coffee fer life. He +was gittin' along into the middle of the week now, but he'd come to feel +like a boy since he'd been a livin' where he could have a few sweet and +pleasant words--ahem!--he thought December'd be as pleasant as May all +the year round ef he could live in the aurora borealis of her +countenance. And Cynthy Ann enjoyed his words so much that she prayed +for forgiveness for the next week and confessed in class-meeting that +she had yielded to temptation and sot her heart on the things of this +perishin' world. She was afeared she hadn't always remembered as how as +she was a poor unworthy dyin' worm of the dust, and that all the +beautiful things in this world perished with the usin'. + +And Brother Goshorn, the class-leader at Harden's Cross-Roads, exhorted +her to tear every idol from her heart. And still the sweet woman's +nature, God's divine law revealed in her heart, did assert itself a +little. She planted some pretty-by-nights in an old cracked +blue-and-white tea-pot and set it on her window-sill. Somehow the +pretty-by-nights would remind her of Jonas, and while she tried to +forget him with one half of her nature, the other and better part (the +depraved part, she would have told you) cherished the memory of his +smallest act and word. In fact, the flowers had no association with +Jonas except that along with the awakening of her love came this little +sentiment for flowers into the dry desert of her life. But one day Mrs. +Anderson discovered the old blue broken tea-pot with its young plants. + +"Why, Cynthy Ann!" she cried, "a body'd think you'd have more sense than +to do such a soft thing as to be raisin' posies at _your_ time of life! +And that when the world is drawing to a close, too! You'll be one of the +foolish virgins with no oil to your lamp, as sure as you see that day." + +As for Julia's flowers, Mrs. Anderson had rudely thrown them into the +road by way of removing temptation from her and turning her thoughts +toward the awful realities of the close of time. + +But Cynthy Ann blushed and repented, and kept her broken tea-pot, with a +fearful sense of sin in doing so. She never watered the pretty-by-nights +without the feeling that she was offering sacrifice to an idol. + + + +CHAPTER XXVI. + +A NICE LITTLE GAME. + +It was natural enough that the "mud-clerk" on the old steamboat Iatan +should take a fancy to the "striker," as the engineer's apprentice was +called. Especially since the striker know so much more than the +mud-clerk, and was able to advise him about many things. A striker with +so much general information was rather a novelty, and all the officers +fancied him, except Sam Munson, the second engineer, who had a natural +jealousy of a striker that knew more than he did. + +The striker had learned rapidly, and was trusted to stand a regular +watch. The first engineer and the third were together, and the second +engineer and the striker took the other watch. The boat in this way got +the services of a competent engineer while paying him only a +striker's wage. + +About the time the heavily-laden Iatan turned out of the Mississippi +into the Ohio at Cairo at six in the evening, the striker went off +watch, and he ought to have gone to bed to prepare himself for the +second watch of the night, especially as he would only have the +dog-watch between that and the forenoon. But a passenger had got aboard +at Cairo, whose face was familiar. The sight of it had aroused a throng +of old associations, pleasant and unpleasant, and a throng of emotions +the most tender and the most wrathful the striker had ever felt. Sleep +he could not, and so, knowing that the mud-clerk was on watch, he sought +the office after nine o'clock, and stood outside the bar talking to his +friend, who had little to do, since most of the freight had been shipped +through, and his bills for Paducah were all ready. The striker talked +with the mud-clerk, but watched the throng of passengers who drank with +each other at the bar, smoked in the "social hall," read and wrote at +the tables in the gentlemen's cabin, or sat with doffed hats and chatted +gallantly in the ladies' cabin, which was visible as a distant +background, seen over a long row of tables with green covers and under a +long row of gilded wooden stalactites, which were intended to be +ornamental. The little pendent prisms beneath the chandeliers rattled +gayly as the boat trembled at each stroke of her wheels, and gaping +backwoodsmen, abroad for the first time, looked at all the rusty +gingerbread-work, and wondered if kings were able to afford anything +half so fine as the cabin of the "palatial steamer Iatan," as she was +described on the bills. The confused murmur of many voices, mixed with +the merry tinkling of the glass pendants, gave the whole an air of +excitement. + +But the striker did not see the man he was looking for. "Who got on at +Cairo? I think I saw a man from our part of the country," he said. + +"I declare, I don't know," said the mud-clerk, who drawled his words in +a cold-blooded way. "Let me look. Here's A. Robertson, and T. Le Fevre, +and L.B. Sykes, and N. Anderson." + +"Where is Anderson going?" + +"Paid through to Louisville. Do you know him?" + +But just then Norman Anderson himself walked in, and went up to the bar +with a new acquaintance. They did not smoke the pipe of peace, like red +Americans, but, like white Americans, they had a mysterious liquid +carefully compounded, and by swallowing this they solemnly sealed their +new-made friendship after the curious and unexplained rite in use among +their people. + +Norman had been dispatched on a collecting trip, and having nine hundred +and fifty dollars in his pocket, he felt as much elated as if it had +been his own money. The gentleman with whom he drank, had a band of +crape around his white hat. He seemed very nearsighted. + +"If that greeny is a friend of yours, Gus, I declare you'd better tell +him not to tie to the serious-looking young fellow in the white hat and +gold specs, unless he means to part with all his loose change before +bed-time." + +That is what the mud-clerk drawled to August the striker, but the +striker seemed to hear the words as something spoken afar off. For just +then he was seeing a vision of a drunken mob, and a rope, and a pleading +woman, and a brave old man threatened with death. Just then he heard +harsh and muddled voices, rude oaths, and jeering laughter, and above it +all the sweet pleading of a little girl begging for a father's life. And +the quick blood came into his fair German face, and he felt that he +could not save this Norman Anderson from the toils of the gambler, +though he might, if provoked, pitch him over the guard of the boat. For +was not Andrew's letter, which described the mob, in his pocket, and +burning a hole in his pocket as it had been ever since he received it? + +But then this was Julia's brother, and there was nothing he would not +do for Julia. So, sometime after the mud-clerk had ceased to speak, the +striker gave utterance to both impulses by replying, "He's no friend of +mine," a little crisply, and then softly adding, "Though I shouldn't +like to see him fleeced." + +By this time a new actor had appeared on the scene in the person of a +man with a black mustache and side-whiskers, who took a seat behind a +card-table near the bar. + +"H'llo!" said the mud-clerk in a low and lazy voice, "Parkins is back +again. After his scrape at Paducah last February, he disappeared, and +he's been shady ever since. He's growed whiskers since, so's not to be +recognized. But he'll be skeerce enough when we get to Paducah. Now, see +how quick he'll catch the greenies, won't you?" The prospect was so +charming as almost to stimulate the mud-clerk to speak with some +animation. + +But August Wehle, the striker on the Iatan, had an uncomfortable feeling +that he had seen that face before, and that the long mustache and +side-whiskers had grown in a remarkably short space of time. Could it be +that there were two men who could spread a smile over the lower half of +their faces in that automatic way, while the spider-eyes had no sort of +sympathy with it? Surely, this man with black whiskers and mustache was +not just like the singing-master at Sugar-Grove school-house, who had +"red-top hay on to his upper lip," and yet--and yet-- + +"Gentlemen," said Parkins--his Dickensian name would be Smirkins--"I +want to play a little game just for the fun of the thing. It is a trick +with three cards. I put down three cards, face up. Here is six of +diamonds, eight of spades, and the ace of hearts. Now, I will turn them +over so quickly that I will defy any of you to tell which is the ace. +Do you see? Now, I would like to bet the wine for the company that no +gentleman here can turn up the ace. All I want is a little sport. +Something to pass away the evening and amuse the company. Who will bet +the wine? The Scripture says that the hand is quicker than the eye, and +I warn you that if you bet, you will probably lose." And here he turned +the cards back, with their faces up, and the card which everybody felt +sure was the ace proved apparently to be that card. Most of the +on-lookers regretted that they had not bet, seeing that they would +certainly have won. Again the cards were put face down, and the company +was bantered to bet the wine. Nobody would bet. + +[Illustration: A NICE LITTLE GAME.] + +After a good deal of fluent talk, and much dexterous handling of the +cards, in a way that seemed clear enough to everybody, and that showed +that everybody's guess was right as to the place of the ace, the +near-sighted gentleman, who had drunk with Norman, offered to bet +five dollars. + +"Five dollars!" returned Parkins, laughing in derision, "five dollars! +Do you think I'm a gambler? I don't want any gentleman's money. I've got +all the money I need. However, if you would like to bet the wine with +me, I am agreed." + +The near-sighted gentleman declined to wager anything but just the five +dollars, and Parkins spurned his proposition with the scorn of a +gentleman who would on no account bet a cent of money. But he grew +excited, and bantered the whole crowd. Was there no _gentleman_ in the +crowd who would lay a wager of wine for the company on this interesting +little trick? It was strange to him that no gentleman had spirit enough +to make the bet. But no gentleman had spirit enough to bet the wine. +Evidently there were no gentlemen in the company. + +However, the near-sighted man with the white hat adorned with crape now +proposed in a crusty tone to bet ten dollars that he could lift the ace. +He even took out a ten-dollar bill, and, after examining it, in holding +it close to his nose as a penurious man might, extended his hand with, +"If you're in earnest, let's know it. I'll bet you ten." + +At this Parkins grew furious. He had never been so persistently badgered +in all his life. He'd have the gentleman know that he was not a gambler. +He had all the money he wanted, and as for betting ten dollars, he +shouldn't think of it. But now that the gentleman--he said _gentleman_ +with an emphasis--now that the gentleman seemed determined to bet money, +he would show him that he was not to be backed down. If the young man +would like to wager a hundred dollars, he would cheerfully bet with him. +If the gentleman did not feel able to bet a hundred dollars, he hoped he +would not say any more about it. He hadn't intended to bet money at all. +But he wouldn't bet less than a hundred dollars with anybody. A man who +couldn't afford to lose a hundred dollars, ought not to bet. + +"Who is this fellow in the white hat with spectacles?" August asked of +the mud-clerk. + +"That is Smith, Parkins's partner. He is only splurging round to start +up the greenies." And the mud-clerk spoke with an indifference and yet a +sort of _dilettante_ interest in the game that shocked his friend, +the striker. + +"Why don't they set these blacklegs ashore?" said August, whose love of +justice was strong. + +"_You_ tell," drawled the mud-clerk. "The first clerk's tried it, but +the old man protects 'em, and" (in a whisper) "get's his share, I guess. +He can set them off whenever he wants to." (I must explain that there +is only one "old man" on a steamboat--that is, the captain.) + +By this time Parkins had turned and thrown his cards so that everybody +knew or thought he knew where the ace was. Smith, the man with the white +hat, now rose five dollars more and offered to bet fifteen. But Parkins +was more indignant than ever. He told Smith to go away. He thrust his +hand into his pocket and drew out a handful of twenty-dollar +gold-pieces. "If any gentleman wants to bet a hundred dollars, let him +come on. A man who couldn't lose a hundred would better keep still." + +Smith now made a big jump. He'd go fifty. Parkins wouldn't listen to +fifty. He had said that he wouldn't bet less than a hundred, and he +wouldn't. He now pulled out handful after handful of gold, and piled the +double-eagles up like a fortification in front of him, while the crowd +surged with excitement. + +At last Mr. Smith, the near-sighted gentleman in spectacles, the +gentleman who wore black crape on a white hat, concluded to bet a +hundred dollars. He took out his little porte-monnaie and lifted thence +a hundred-dollar bill. + +"Well," said he angrily, "I'll bet you a hundred." And he laid down the +bill. Parkins piled five twenty-dollar gold-pieces atop it. Each man +felt that he could lift the ace in a moment. That card at the dealer's +right was certainly the ace. Norman was sure of it. He wished it had +been his wager instead of Smith's. But Parkins stopped Smith a moment. + +"Now, young man," he said, "if you don't feel perfectly able to lose +that hundred dollars, you'd better take it back." + +"I am just as able to lose it as you are," said Smith snappishly, and to +everybody's disappointment he lifted not the card everybody had fixed +on, but the middle one, and so lost his money. + +"Why didn't you take the other?" said Norman boastfully. "I knew it was +the ace." + +"Why didn't you bet, then?" said Smith, grinning a little. Norman wished +he had. But he had not a hundred dollars of his own, and he had +scruples--faint, and yet scruples, or rather alarms--at the thought of +risking his employer's money on a wager. While he was weighing motive +against motive, Smith bet again, and again, to Norman's vexation, +selected a card that was so obviously wrong that Norman thought it a +pity that so near-sighted a man should bet and lose. He wished he had a +hundred dollars of his own and--There, Smith was betting again. This +time he consulted Norman before making his selection, and of course +turned up the right card, remarking that he wished his eyes were so +keen! He would win a thousand dollars before bed-time if his eyes were +so good! Then he took Norman into partnership, and Norman found himself +suddenly in possession of fifty dollars, gotten without trouble. This +turned his brain. Nothing is so intoxicating to a weak man as money +acquired without toil. So Norman continued to bet, sometimes +independently, sometimes in partnership with, the gentlemanly Smith. He +was borne on by the excitement of varying fortune, a varying fortune +absolutely under control of the dealer, whose sleight-of-hand was +perfect. And the varying fortune had an unvarying tendency in the long +run--to put three stakes out Of five into the pockets of the gamblers, +who found the little game very interesting amusement for gentlemen. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII. + +THE RESULT OF AN EVENING WITH GENTLEMEN. + +All the time that these smiling villains were by consummate art drawing +their weak-headed victim into their tolls, what was August doing? Where +were his prompt decision of character, his quick intelligence, his fine +German perseverance, that should have saved the brother of Julia +Anderson from harpies? Could our blue-eyed young countryman, who knew +how to cherish noble aspirations walking in a plowman's furrow--could he +stand there satisfying his revenge by witnessing the ruin of a young man +who, like many others, was wicked only because he was weak? + +In truth, August was a man whose feelings were persistent. His +resentment was--like his love--constant. But his love of justice was +higher and more persistent, and he could not have seen any one fleeced +in this merciless way without taking sides strongly with the victim. +Much less could he see the brother of Julia tempted on to the rocks by +the false lights of villainous wreckers without a great desire to save +him. For the letter of Andrew had ceased now to burn in his pocket. That +other letter--the only one that Julia had been able to send through +Cynthy Ann and Jonas--that other letter, written all over with such +tender extravagances as love feeds on; the thought of that other letter, +which told how beautiful and precious were the invitations to the weary +and heavy-laden, had stilled resentment, and there came instead a keen +desire to save Norman for the sake of Julia and justice. But how to do +it was an embarrassing question--a question that was more than August +could solve. There was a difficulty in the weakness and wrong-headedness +of Norman; a difficulty in Norman's prejudice against Dutchmen in +general and August in particular; a difficulty in the fact that August +was a sort of a fugitive, if not from justice, certainly from injustice. + +But when nearly a third of Norman's employer's money had gone into the +gamblers' heap, and when August began to understand that it was another +man's money that Norman was losing, and that the victim was threatened +by no half-way ruin, he determined to do something, even at the risk of +making himself known to Norman and to Parkins--was he Humphreys in +disguise?--and at the risk of arrest for house-breaking. August acted +with his eyes open to all the perils from gamblers' pistols and +gamblers' malice; and after he had started to interfere, the mud-clerk +called him back, and said, in his half-indifferent way: + +"Looky here, Gus, don't be a blamed fool. That's a purty little game. +That greeny's got to learn to let blacklegs alone, and he don't look +like one that'll take advice. Let him scorch a little; it'll do him +good. It's healthy for young men. That's the reason the old man don't +forbid it, I s'pose. And these fellows carry good shooting-irons with +hair-triggers, and I declare I don't want to be bothered writing home to +your mother, and explaining to her that you got killed in a fight with +blacklegs, I declare I don't, you see. And then you'll get the 'old man' +down on you, if you let a bird out of the trap in which he goes snucks; +you will, I declare. And you'll get walking-papers at Louisville. Let +the game alone. You haven't got any hand to play against Parkins, nohow; +and I reckon the greenhorns are his lawful prey. Cats couldn't live +without mice. You'll lose your place, I declare you will, if you say +a word." + +[Illustration: THE MUD-CLERK] + +August stopped long enough to take in the full measure of his sacrifice. +So far from being deterred by it, he was more than ever determined to +act. Not the love Julia, so much, now, but the farewell prayer and +benediction and the whole life and spirit of the sweet Moravian mother +in her child-full house at home were in his mind at this moment. Things +which a man will not do for the love of woman he may do for the love of +God--and it was with a sense of moral exaltation that August entered +into the lofty spirit of self-sacrifice he had seen in his mother, and +caught himself saying, in his heart, as he had heard her say, "Let us do +anything for the Father's sake!" Some will call this cant. So much the +worse for them. This motive, too little felt in our day--too little felt +in any day--is the great impulse that has enabled men to do the bravest +things that have been done. The sublimest self-sacrifice is only +possible to a man by the aid of some strong moral tonic. God's love is +the chief support of the strongest spirits. + +August touched Norman on the arm. The face of the latter expressed +anything but pleasure at meeting him, now that he felt guilty. But this +was not the uppermost feeling with Norman. He noticed that August's +clothes were spotted with engine-grease, and his first fear was of +compromising his respectability. + +In a hurried way August began to explain to him that he was betting with +gamblers, but Smith stood close to them, looking at August in such a +contemptuous way as to make Norman feel very uncomfortable, and Parkins +seeing the crowd attracted by August's explanations--which he made in +some detail, by way of adapting himself to Norman--of the trick by which +the upper card is thrown out first, Parkins said, "I see you understand +the game, young man. If you do, why don't you bet?" + +At this the crowd laughed, and Norman drew away from the striker's +greasy clothes, and said that he didn't want to speak any further to a +burglar, he believed. But August followed, determined to warn him +against Smith. Smith was ahead of him, however, saving to Norman, "Look +out for your pockets--that greasy fellow will rob you." + +And Norman, who was nothing if not highly respectable, resolved to +shake off the troublesome "Dutchman" at once. "I don't know what you are +up to now, but at home you are known as a thief. So please let me alone, +will you?" This Norman tried to say in an annihilating way. + +The crowd looked for a fight. August said loud enough to be heard, "You +know very well that you lie. I wanted to save you from being a thief, +but you are betting money now that is not yours." + +The company, of course, sympathized with the gentleman and against the +machine-oil on the striker's clothes, so that there arose quickly a +murmur, started by Smith, "Put the bully out," and August was "hustled." +It is well that he was not shot. + +It was quite time for him to go on watch now; for the loud-ticking +marine-clock over the window of the clerk's office pointed to three +minutes past twelve, and the striker hurried to his post at the +starboard engine, with the bitterness of defeat and the shame of insult +in his heart. He had sacrificed his place, doubtless, and risked much +beside, and all for nothing. The third engineer complained of his +tardiness in not having relieved him three minutes before, and August +went to his duties with a bitter heart. To a man who is persistent, as +August was, defeat of any sort is humiliating. + +As for Norman, he bet after this just to show his independence and to +show that the money was his own, as well as in the vain hope of winning +back what he had lost. He bet every cent. Then he lost his watch, and at +half-past one o'clock he went to his state-room, stripped of all loose +valuables, and sweating great drops. And the mud-clerk, who was still in +the office, remarked to himself, with a pleasant chuckle, that it was +good for him; he declared it was; teach the fellow to let monte alone, +and keep his eyes peeled when he traveled. It would so! + +The idea was a good one, and he went down to the starboard engine and +told the result of the nice little game to his friend the striker, +drawling it out in a relishful way, how the blamed idiot never stopped +till they'd got his watch, and then looked like as if he'd a notion to +jump into the "drink." But 'twould cure him of meddlin' with monte. +It would so! + +He walked away, and August was just reflecting on the heartlessness of +his friend, when the mud-clerk came back again, and began drawling his +words out as before, just as though each distinct word were of a +delightful flavor and he regretted that he must part with it. + +"I've got you even with Parkins, old fellow. He'll be strung up on a +lamp-post at Paducah, I reckon. I saw a Paducah man aboard, and I put a +flea in his ear. We've got to lay there an hour or two to put off a +hundred barrels of molasses and two hundred sacks of coffee and two lots +of plunder. There'll be a hot time for Parkins. He let on to marry a +girl and fooled her. They'll teach him a lesson. You'll be off watch, +and we'll have some fun looking on." And the mud-clerk evidently thought +that it would be even funnier to see Parkins hanged than it had been to +see him fleece Norman. Gus the striker did not see how either scene +could be very entertaining. But he was sick at heart, and one could not +expect him to show much interest in manly sports. + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII. + +WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER. + +The steady beat of the wheels and the incessant clank of the engines +went on as usual. The boat was loaded almost to her guards, and did not +make much speed. The wheels kept their persistent beat upon the water, +and the engines kept their rhythmical clangor going, until August found +himself getting drowsy. Trouble, with forced inaction, nearly always has +a soporific tendency, and a continuous noise is favorable to sleep. Once +or twice August roused himself to a sense of his responsibility and +battled with his heaviness. It was nearing the end of his watch, for the +dog-watch of two hours set in at four o'clock. But it seemed to him that +four o'clock would never come. + +An incident occurred just at this moment that helped him to keep his +eyes open. A man went aft through the engine-room with a red +handkerchief tied round his forehead. In spite of this partial disguise +August perceived that it was Parkins. He passed through to the place +where the steerage or deck passengers are, and then disappeared from +August's sight. He had meant to disembark at a wood-yard just below +Paducah, but for some reason the boat did not stop, and now, as August +guessed, he was hiding himself from Paducah eyes. He was not much too +soon, for the great bell on the hurricane-deck was already ringing for +Paducah, and the summer dawn was showing itself faintly through the +river fog. + +The alarm-bell rang in the engine-room, and Wehle stood by his engine. +Then the bell rang to stop the starboard engine, and August obeyed it. +The pilot of a Western steamboat depends much upon his engines for +steerage in making a landing, and the larboard engine was kept running a +while longer in order to bring the deeply-loaded boat round to her +landing at the primitive wharf-boat of that day. There is something fine +in the faith with which an engineer obeys the bell of the pilot, not +knowing what may be ahead, not inquiring what may be the effect of the +order, but only doing exactly what he is bid when he is bid. August had +stopped his engine, and stood trying to keep his mind off Parkins and +the events of the night, that he might be ready to obey the next signal +for his engine. But the bell rang next to stop the other engine, at +which the second engineer stood, and August was so free from +responsibility in regard to that that he hardly noticed the sound of the +bell, until it rang a second time more violently. Then he observed that +the larboard engine still ran. Was Munson dead or asleep? Clearly it was +August's duty to stand by his own engine. But then he was startled to +think what damage to property or life might take place from the failure +of the second engineer to stop his engine. While he hesitated, and all +these considerations flashed through his mind, the pilot's bell rang +again long and loud, and August then, obeying an impulse rather than a +conviction, ran over to the other engine, stopped it, and then, +considering that it had run so long against orders, he reversed it and +set it to backing without waiting instructions. Then he seized Munson +and woke him, and hurried back to his post. But the larboard engine had +not made three revolutions backward before the boat, hopelessly thrown +from her course by the previous neglect, struck the old wharf-boat and +sunk it. But for the promptness and presence of mind with which Wehle +acted, the steamboat itself would have suffered severely. The mate and +then the captain came rushing into the engine-room. Munson was +discharged at once, and the striker was promised engineer's wages. + +Gus went off watch at this moment, and the mud-clerk said to him, in his +characteristically indifferent voice, "Such luck, I declare! I was sure +you would be dismissed for meddling with Parkins, and here you are +promoted, I declare!" + +The mishap occasioned much delay to the boat, as it was very +inconvenient to deliver freight at that day and at that stage of water +without the intervention of the wharf-boat. A full hour was consumed in +finding a landing, and in rigging the double-staging and temporary +planks necessary to get the molasses and coffee and household "plunder" +ashore. Some hint that Parkins was on the river had already reached +Paducah, and the sheriff and two deputies and a small crowd were at the +landing looking for him. A search of the boat failed to discover him, +and the crowd would have left the landing but for occasional hints slyly +thrown out by the mud-clerk as he went about over the levee collecting +freight-bills. These hints, given in a non-committal way, kept the crowd +alive with expectation, and when the rumors thus started spread abroad, +the levee was soon filled with an excited and angry multitude. + +If it had been a question of delivering a criminal to justice, August +would not have hesitated to tell the sheriff where to look. But he very +well knew that the sheriff could not convey the man through the mob +alive, and to deliver even such a scoundrel to the summary vengeance of +a mob was something that he could not find it in his heart to do. + +In truth, the sheriff and his officers did not seek very zealously for +their man. Under the circumstances, it was probable he would not +surrender himself without a fight, in which somebody would be killed, +and besides there must ensue a battle with the mob. It was what they +called an ugly job, and they were not loth to accept the captain's +assurance that the gambler had gone ashore. + +While August was unwilling to deliver the hunted villain to a savage +death, he began to ask himself why he might not in some way use his +terror in the interest of justice. For he had just then seen the +wretched and bewildered face of Norman looking ghastly enough in the fog +of the morning. + +At last, full of this notion, and possessed, too, by his habit of +accomplishing at all hazards what he had begun, August strolled back +through the now quiet engine-room to the deck-passengers' quarter. It +was about half an hour before six o'clock, when the dog-watch would +expire and he must go on duty again. In one of the uppermost of the +filthy bunks, in the darkest corner, near the wheel, he discovered what +he thought to be his man. The deck-passengers were still asleep, lying +around stupidly. August paused a moment, checked by a sense of the +dangerousness of his undertaking. Then he picked up a stick of wood and +touched the gambler, who could not have been very sound asleep, lying in +hearing of the curses of the mob on the shore. At first Parkins did not +move, but August gave him a still more vigorous thrust. Then he peered +out between the blanket and the handkerchief over his forehead. + +"I will take that money you won last night from that young man, if you +please." + +[Illustration: WAKING UP AN UGLY CUSTOMER.] + +Parkins saw that it was useless to deny his identity. "Do you want to be +shot?" he asked fiercely. + +"Not any more than you want to be hung," said August. "The one would +follow the other in five minutes. Give back that money and I will +go away." + +The gambler trembled a minute. He was fairly at bay. He took out a roll +of bills and handed it to August. There was but five hundred. Smith had +the other four hundred and fifty, he said. But August had a quiet German +steadiness of nerve. He said that unless the other four hundred and +fifty were paid at once he should call in the sheriff or the crowd. +Parkins knew that every minute August stood there increased his peril, +and human nature is now very much like human nature in the days of Job. +The devil understood the subject very well when he said that all that a +man hath will he give for his life. Parkins paid the four hundred and +fifty in gold-pieces. He would have paid twice that if August had +demanded it. + + + +CHAPTER XXIX. + +AUGUST AND NORMAN. + +In a story such as I meant this to be, the development of character +stands for more than the evolution of the plot, and herein is the true +significance of this contact of Wehle with the gamblers, and, indeed, of +this whole steamboat life. It is not enough for one to be good in a +country neighborhood; the sharp contests and severe ordeals of more +exciting life are needed to give temper to the character. August Wehle +was hardly the same man on this morning at Paducah, with the nine +hundred and fifty dollars in his pocket, that he had been the evening +before, when he first felt the sharp resentment against the man who had +outraged his father. In acting on a high plane, one is unconsciously +lifted to that plane. Men become Christians sometimes from the effect of +sudden demands made upon their higher moral nature, demands which compel +them to choose between a life higher than their present living, or a +moral degradation. Such had been August's experience. He had been drawn +upward toward God by the opportunity and necessity for heroic action. I +have no doubt the good Samaritan got more out of his own kindness than +the robbed Jew did. + +Before he had a chance to restore the money to its rightful owner, the +two hours of dog-watch had expired, and he was obliged to go on watch +again, much to his annoyance. He had been nearly twenty-four hours +without sleep, and after a night of such excitement it was unpleasant as +well as perilous to have to hold this money, which did not belong to +him, for six hours longer, liable at any minute to get into difficulty +through any scheme of the gamblers and their allies, by which his +recovery of the money might be misinterpreted. The morning seemed to +wear away so slowly. All the possibilities of Parkins's attacking him, +of young Anderson's committing suicide, and of the misconstruction that +might be put upon his motives--the making of his disinterested action +seem robbery--haunted his excitable imagination. At last, while the +engines were shoving their monotonous shafts backward and forward, and +the "palatial steamer" Iatan was slowly pushing her way up the stream, +August grew so nervous over his money that he resolved to relieve +himself of part of it. So he sent for the mud-clerk by a passing +deck-hand. + +"I want you to keep this money for me until I get off watch," said +August. "I made Parkins stand and deliver this morning while we were +at Paducah." + +"You did?" said the mud-clerk, not offering to touch the money. "You +risked your life, I declare, for that fool that called you a thief. You +are a fool, Gus, and nothing but your blamed good luck can save you from +getting salivated, bright and early, some morning. Not a great deal I +won't take that money. I don't relish lead, and I've got to live among +these fellows all my days, and I don't hold that money for anybody. The +old man would ship me at Louisville, seeing I never stopped anybody's +engine and backed it in a hurry, as you did. If I'd known where Parkins +was, I'd a dropped a gentle word in the ear of the crowd outside, but I +wouldn't a pulled that greeny's coffee-nuts out of the fire, and I won't +hold the hot things for you. I declare I won't. Saltpeter wouldn't save +me if I did." + +So Gus had to content himself in his nervousness, not allayed by this +speech, und keep the money in his pocket until noon. And, after all the +presentiment he had had, noon came round. Presentiments generally come +from the nerves, and signify nothing; but nobody keeps a tally of the +presentiments and auguries that fail. When the first-engineer and a new +man took the engines at noon, Gus was advised by the former to get some +sleep, but there was no sleep for him until he had found Norman, who +trembled at the sight of him. + +"Where is your state-room?" said August sternly, for he couldn't bring +himself to speak kindly to the poor fellow, even in his misery. + +Norman turned pale. He had been thinking of suicide all the morning, but +he was a coward, and now he evidently felt sure that he was to be killed +by August. He did not dare disobey, but led the way, stopping to try to +apologize two or three times, but never getting any further +than "I--I--" + +Once in the state-room, he sat down on the berth and gasped, "I--I--" + +"Here is your money," said August, handing it to him. "I made the +gambler give it up." + +"I--I--" said the astonished and bewildered Norman. + +"You needn't say a word. You are a cowardly scoundrel, and if you say +anything, I'll knock you down for treating my father as you did. Only +for--for--well, I didn't want to see you fleeced." + +Norman was ashamed for once, and hung his head. It touched the heart of +August a little, but the remembrance of the attack of the mob on his +father made him feel hard again, and so his generous act was performed +ungraciously. + + + +CHAPTER XXX. + +AGROUND. + +Not the boat. The boat ran on safely enough to Louisville, and tied up +at the levee, and discharged her sugar und molasses, and took on a new +cargo of baled hay and corn and flour, and went back again, and made I +know not how many trips, and ender her existence I can not tell how or +when. What does become of the old steamboats? The Iatan ran for years +after she tied up at Louisville that summer morning, and then perhaps +she was blown up or burned up; perchance some cruel sawyer transfixed +her; perchance she was sunk by ice, or maybe she was robbed of her +engines and did duty as barge, or, what is more probable, she wore out +like the one-hoss shay, and just tumbled to pieces simultaneously. + +It was not the gambler who got aground that morning. He had yet other +nice little games, with three cards or more or none, to play. + +It was not the mud-clerk who ran aground--good, non-committal soul, who +never look sides where it would do him any harm, and who never worried +himself about anything. Dear, drawling, optimist philosopher, who could +see how other people's mishaps were best for them, and who took good +care not to have any himself! It was not he that ran aground. + +It was not Norman Anderson who ran aground. He walked into the store +with the proud and manly consciousness of having done his duty, he made +his returns of every cent of money that had come into his hands, and, +like all other faithful stewards, received the cordial commendation of +his master. + +But August Wehle the striker, just when he was to be made an engineer, +when he thought he had smooth sailing, suddenly and provokingly found +himself fast aground, with no spar or capstan by which he might help +himself off, with no friendly craft alongside to throw him a hawser and +pull him off. + +It seems that when the captain promised him promotion, he did not know +anything of August's interference with the gamblers. But when Parkins +filed his complaint, it touched the captain. It was generally believed +among the _employes_ of the boat that a percentage of gamblers' gains +was one of the "old man's" perquisites, and he was not the only +steamboat captain who profited by the nice little games in the cabin +upon which he closed both eyes. And this retrieved nine hundred and +fifty dollars was a dead loss of--well, it does not matter how much, to +the virtuous and highly honorable captain. His proportion would have +been large enough at least to pay his wife's pew-rent in St. James's +Church, with a little something over for charitable purposes. For the +captain did not mind giving a disinterested twenty-five dollars +occasionally to those charities that were willing to show their +gratitude by posting his name as director, or his wife's as "Lady +Manageress." In this case his right hand never knew what his left hand +did--how it got the money, for instance. + +So when August drew his pay he was informed that he was discharged. No +reason was given. He tried to see the captain. But the captain was in +the bosom of his family, kissing his own well-dressed little boys, and +enjoying the respect which only exemplary and provident fathers enjoy. +And never asking down in his heart if these boys might become gamblers' +victims, or gamblers, indeed. The captain could not see August the +striker, for he was at home, and must not be interfered with by any of +his subordinates. Besides, it was Sunday, and he could not be intruded +upon--the rector of St. James's was dining with him on his wife's +invitation, and it behooved him to walk circumspectly, not with +eye-service as a man-pleaser, but serving the Lord. + +So he refuted to see the anxious striker, and turned to compliment the +rector on his admirable sermon on the sin of Judas, who sold his master +for thirty pieces of silver. + +And August Wehle had nothing left to do. The river was falling fast, the +large boats above the Falls were, in steamboat-man's phrase, "laying up" +in the mouths of the tributaries and other convenient harbors, there +were plenty of engineers unemployed, and there were no vacancies. + + + +CHAPTER XXXI. + +CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE. + +Jonas had been all his life, as he expressed it in his mixed rhetoric, +"a wanderin' sand-hill crane, makin' many crooked paths, and, like the +cards in French monte, a-turnin' up suddently in mighty on-expected +places." He had been in every queer place from Halifax to Texas, and +then had come back to his home again. Naturally cautious, and especially +suspicious of the female sex, it is not strange that he had not married. +Only when he "tied up to the same w'arf-boat alongside of Cynthy Ann, he +thought he'd found somebody as was to be depended on in a fog or a +harricane." This he told to Cynthy Ann as a reason why she should accept +his offer of marriage. + +"Jonas," said Cynthy Ann, "don't flatter. My heart is dreadful weak, and +prone to the vanities of this world. It makes me abhor myself in dust +and sackcloth fer you to say such things about poor unworthy me." + +"Ef I think 'em, why shouldn't I say 'em? I don't know no law agin +tellin' the truth ef you git into a place where you can't no ways help +it. I don't call you angel, fer you a'n't; you ha'nt got no wings nor +feathers. I don't say as how as you're pertikeler knock-down handsome. +I don't pertend that you're a spring chicken. I don't lie nor flatter. I +a'n't goin' it blind, like young men in love. But I do say, with my eyes +open and in my right senses, and feelin' solemn, like a man a-makin' his +last will and testament, that they a'n't no sech another woman to be +found outside the leds of the Bible betwixt the Bay of Fundy and the Rio +Grande. I've 'sought round this burdened airth,' as the hymn says, and +they a'n't but jest one. Ef that one'll jest make me happy, I'll fold my +weary pinions and settle down in a rustic log-cabin and raise corn and +potaters till death do us part." + +Cynthy trembled. Cynthy was a saint, a martyr to religious feeling, a +medieval nun in her ascetic eschewing of the pleasures of life. But +Cynthy Ann was also a woman. And a woman whose spring-time had paused. +When love buds out thus late, when the opportunity for the woman's +nature to blossom comes unexpectedly upon one at her age, the temptation +is not easily resisted. Cynthy trembled, but did not quite yield up her +Christian constancy. + +"Jonas, I don't know whether I'd orto or not. I don't deny--I think I'd +better ax brother Goshorn, you know, sence what would it profit ef I +gained you or any joy in this world, and then come short by settin' you +up fer a idol in my heart? I don't know whether a New Light is a +onbeliever or not, and whether I'd be onequally yoked or not. I must ax +them as knows better nor I do." + +"Well, ef I'm a onbeliever, they's nobody as could teach me to believe +quicker'n you could. I never did believe much in women folks till I +believed in you." + +"But that's the sin of it, Jonas. I'd believe in you, and you'd believe +in me, and we'd be puttin' our trust in the creatur instid of the +Creator, and the Creator is mighty jealous of our idols, and He would +take us away fer idolatry." + +"No, but I wouldn't worship you, though I'd rather worship you than +anybody else ef I was goin' into the worshipin' business. But you see I +a'n't, honey. I wouldn't sacrifice to you no lambs nor sheep, I wouldn't +pray to you, nor I wouldn't kiss your shoes, like people does the +Pope's. An' I know you wouldn't make no idol of me like them Greek gods +that Andrew's got picters of. I a'n't handsome enough by a long shot fer +a Jupiter or a 'Pollo. An' I tell you, Cynthy, 'tain't no sin to love. +Love is the fullfilling of the law." + +But Cynthy Ann persisted that she must consult Brother Goshorn, the +antiquated class-leader at the cross-roads. Brother Goshorn was a good +man, but Jonas had a great contempt for him. He was a strainer out of +gnats, though I do not think he swallowed camels. He always stood at the +door of the love-feast and kept out every woman with jewelry, every girl +who had an "artificial" in her bonnet, every one who wore curls, every +man whose hair was beyond what he considered the regulation length of +Scripture, and every woman who wore a veil. In support of this last +prohibition he quoted Isaiah iii, 23: "The glasses and the fine linen +and the hoods and the veils." + +To him Cynthy Ann presented the case with much trepidation. All her +hopes for this world hung upon it. But this consideration did not +greatly affect Brother Goshorn. Hopes and joys were as nothing to him +where the strictness of discipline was involved. The Discipline meant +more to a mind of his cast than the Decalogue or the Beatitudes. He +shook his head. He did not know. He must consult Brother Hall. Now, +Brother Hall was the young preacher traveling his second year, very +young and very callow. Ten years of the sharp attritions of a Methodist +itinerant's life would take his unworldliness out of him and develop his +practical sense as no other school in the world could develop it. But as +yet Brother Hall had not rubbed off any of his sanctimoniousness, had +not lost any of his belief that the universe should be governed on high +general principles with no exceptions. + +So when Brother Goshorn informed him that one of his members, Sister +Cynthy Ann Dyke, wished to marry, and to marry a man that was a New +Light, and had asked his opinion, and that he did not certainly know +whether New Lights were believers or not, Brother Hall did not stop to +inquire what Jonas might be personally. He looked and felt very solemn, +and said that it was a pity for a Christian to marry a New Light. It was +clearly a sin, for a New Light was an Arian. And an Arian was just as +good as an infidel. An Arian robbed Christ of His supreme deity, and +since he did not worship the Trinity in the orthodox sense he must +worship a false god. He was an idolater therefore, and it was a sin to +be yoked together with such an one. + +Many men more learned than the callow but pious and sincere Brother Hall +have left us in print just such deductions. + +When this decision was communicated to the scrupulous Cynthy Ann, she +folded her hopes as one lays away the garment of a dead friend; she west +to her little room and prayed; she offered a sacrifice to God not less +costly than Abraham's, and in a like sublime spirit. She watered the +plant In the old cracked blue-and-white tea-pot, she noticed that it was +just about to bloom, and then she dropped one tear upon it, and because +it suggested Jonas in some way, she threw it away, resolved not to have +any idols in her heart. And, doubtless, God received the sacrifice, +mistaken and needless as it was, a token of the faithfulness of her +heart to her duty as she understood it. + +[Illustration: CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE.] + +Cynthy Ann explained it all to Jonas in a severe and irrevocable way. +Jonas looked at her a moment, stunned. + +"Did Brother Goshorn venture to send me any of his wisdom, in the way of +advice, layin' round loose, like counterfeit small change, cheap +as dirt?" + +"Well, yes," said Cynthy Ann, hesitating. + +"I'll bet the heft of my fortin', to be paid on receipt of the amount, +that I kin tell to a T what the good Christian wanted me to do." + +"Don't be oncharitable, Jonas. Brother Goshorn is a mighty sincere man." + +"So he is, but his bein' sincere don't do me no good. He wanted you to +advise me to jine the Methodist class as a way of gittin' out of the +difficulty. And you was too good a Christian to ask me to change fer any +sech reason, knowin' I wouldn't be fit for you ef I did." + +Cynthy Ann was silent. She would have liked to have Jonas join the +church with her, but if he had done it now she herself would have +doubted his sincerity. + +"Now, looky here, Cynthy, ef you'll say you don't love me, and never +can, I'll leave you to wunst, and fly away and mourn like a turtle-dove. +But so long as it's nobody but Goshorn, I'm goin' to stay and litigate +the question till the Millerite millennium comes. I appeal to Caeesar or +somebody else. Neither Brother Goshorn nor Brother Hall knows enough to +settle this question. I'm agoin' to the persidin' elder. And you can't +try a man and hang him and then send him to the penitentiary fer the +rest of his born days without givin' him one chance to speak fer hisself +agin the world and everybody else. I'm goin' to see the persidin' elder +myself and plead my own cause, and ef he goes agin me, I'll carry it up +to the bishop or the archbishop or the nex' highest man in the heap, +till I git plum to the top, and ef they all go agin me, I'll begin over +agin at the bottom with Brother Goshorn, and keep on till I find a man +that's got common-sense enough to salt his religion with." + + + +CHAPTER XXXII. + +JULIA'S ENTERPRISE. + +4 August was very sick at the castle. This wag the first news of his +return that reached Julia through Jonas and Cynthy Ann. + +But in my interest in Jonas and Cynthy Ann, of whom I think a great +deal, I forgot to say that long before the events mentioned in the last +chapter, Humphreys had been suddenly called away from his peaceful +retreat in the hill country of Clark township. In fact, the "important +business," or "the illness of a friend," whichever it was, occurred the +very next day after Norman Anderson's father returned from Louisville, +and reported that he had secured for his son an "outside situation," +that is to say, a place as a collector. + +When he had gone, Jonas remarked to Cynthy Ann, "Where the carcass is, +there the turkey-buzzards is gethered. That shinin' example of early +piety never plays but one game. That is, fox-and-geese. He's gone after +a green goslin' now, and he'll find him when he's fattest." + +But the gentle singing-master had come back from his excursion, and was +taking a profound interest in the coming end of the world. Jonas +observed that it "seemed like as ef he hed charge of the whole +performance, and meant to shet up the sky like a blue cotton umbrell. +He's got a single eye, and it's the same ole game. Fox and geese always, +and he's the fox." + +Humphreys still lived at Samuel Anderson's, still devoted himself to +pleasing Mrs. Abigail, still bowed regretfully to Julia, and spoke +caressingly to Betsey Malcolm at every opportunity. + +But August was sick at the castle. He was very sick. Every morning Dr. +Dibrell, a "calomel-doctor"--not a steam-doctor--rode by the house on +his way to Andrew's, and every morning Mrs. Anderson wondered afresh who +was sick down that way. But the doctor staid so long that Mrs. Abigail +made up her mind it must be somebody four or five miles away, and so +dismissed the matter from her mind. For August's return had been +kept secret. + +But Julia noticed, in her heart of hearts, and with ever-increasing +affliction, that the doctor staid longer each day than on the day +before, and she thought she noticed also an increasing anxiety on his +face as he rode home again. Her desire to know the real truth, and to +see August, to do for him, to give her life for him, were wearing her +away. It is hard to see a friend go from you when you have done +everything. But to have a friend die within your reach, while you are +yet unable to help him, is the saddest of all. All this anxiety Julia +suffered without even the blessed privilege of showing it. The pent-up +fire consumed her, and she was at times almost distract. Every morning +she managed to be on the upper porch when the doctor went by, and from +the same watch-tower she studied his face when he went back. + +Then came a morning when there were two doctors. A physician from the +county-seat village went by, in company with Dr. Dibrell. So there must +be a consultation at the castle. Julia knew then that the worst had to +be looked in the face. And she longed to get away from under the +searching black eyes of her mother and utter the long-pent cry of +anguish. Another day of such unuttered pain would drive her clean mad. + +That evening Jonas came over and sought an interview with Cynthy Ann. He +had not been to see her since his unsuccessful courtship. Julia felt +that he was the bearer of a message. But Mrs. Anderson was in one of her +most exacting humors, and it gave her not a little pleasure to keep +Cynthy Ann, on one pretext and another, all the evening at her side. Had +Cynthy Ann been less submissive and scrupulous, she might have broken +away from this restraint, but in truth she was censuring herself for +having any backsliding, rebellious wish to talk with Jonas after she had +imagined the idol cast out of her heart entirely. Her conscience was a +tank-master not less grievous than Mrs. Anderson, and, between the two, +Jonas had to go away without leaving his message. And Julia had to keep +her breaking heart in suspense a while longer. + +Why did she not elope long ago and get rid of her mother? Because she +was Julia, and being Julia, conscientious, true, and filial in spite of +her unhappy life, her own character built a wall against such a +disobedience. Nearly all limitations are inside. You could do almost +anything if you could give yourself up to it. To go in the teeth of +one's family is the one thing that a person of Julia's character and +habits finds next to impossible. A beneficent limitation of nature; for +the cases in which the judgment of a girl of eighteen is better than +that of her parents are very few. Besides, the inevitable +"heart-disease" was a specter that guarded the gates of Julia's prison. +Night after night she sat looking out over the hills sleeping in hazy +darkness, toward the hollow in which stood the castle; night after night +she had half-formed the purpose of visiting August, and then the +life-long habit of obedience and a certain sense of delicacy held her +back. But on this night, after the consultation, she felt that she would +see him if her seeing him brought down the heavens. + +It was a very dark night. She sat waiting for hours--very long hours +they seemed to her--and then, at midnight, she began to get ready +to start. + +Only those who have taken such a step can understand the pain of +deciding, the agony of misgivings in the execution, the trembling that +Julia felt when she turned the brass knob on the front door and lifted +the latch--lifted the latch slowly and cautiously, for it was near the +door of her mother's room--and then crept out like a guilty thing into +the dark dampness of the night, groping her way to the gate, and +stumbling along down the road. It had been raining, and there was not +one star-twinkle in the sky; the only light was that of glow-worms +illuminating here and there two or three blades of grass by feeble +shining. Now and then a fire-fly made a spot of light in the blackness, +only to leave a deeper spot of blackness when he shut off his +intermittent ray. And when at last Julia found herself at the place +where the path entered the woods, the blackness ahead seemed still more +frightful. She had to grope, recognizing every deviation from the +well-beaten path by the rustle of the dead leaves which lay, even in +summer, half a foot deep upon the ground. The "fox-fire," rotting logs +glowing with a faint luminosity, startled her several times, and the +hooting-owl's shuddering bass--hoo! hoo! hoo-oo-ah-h! (like the awful +keys of the organ which "touch the spinal cord of the universe")--sent +all her blood to her heart. Under ordinary circumstances, she surely +would not have started at the rustling made by the timid hare in the +thicket near by. There was no reason why she should shiver so when a +misstep caused her to scratch her face with the thorny twigs of a wild +plum-tree. But the effort necessary to the undertaking and the agony of +the long waiting had exhausted her nervous force, and she had none left +for fortitude. So that when she arrived at Andrew's fence and felt her +way along to the gate, and heard the hoarse, thunderous baying of his +great St. Bernard dog, she was ready to faint. But a true instinct makes +such a dog gallant. It is a vile cur that will harm a lady. Julia walked +trembling up to the front-door of the castle, growled at by the huge +black beast, and when the Philosopher admitted her, some time after she +had knocked, she sank down fainting into a chair. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII. + +THE SECRET STAIRWAY. + +"God bless you!" said Andrew as he handed her a gourd of water to revive +her. "You are as faithful as Hero. You are another Heloise. You are as +brave as the Maid of Orleans. I will never say that women are unfaithful +again. God bless you, my daughter! You have given me faith in your sex. +I have been a lonely man; a boughless, leafless trunk, shaken by the +winter winds. But _you_ are my niece. _You_ know how to be faithful. I +am proud of you! Henceforth I call you my daughter. If you _were_ my +daughter, you would be to me all that Margaret Roper was to Sir Thomas +More." And the shaggy man of egotistic and pedantic speech, but of +womanly sensibilities, was weeping. + +The reviving Julia begged to know how August was. + +"Ah, constant heart! And he is constant as you are. Noble fellow! I will +not deceive you. The doctors think that he will not live more than +twenty-four hours. But he is only dying to see you, now. Your coming may +revive him. We sent for you this morning by Jonas, hoping you might +escape and come in some way. But Jonas could not get his message to +you. Some angel must have brought you. It is an augury of good." + +The hopefulness of Andrew sprang out of his faith in an ideal, right +outcome. Julia could not conceal from herself the fact that his opinion +had no ground. But in such a strait as hers, she could not help clinging +even to this support. + +Andrew was a little perplexed. How to take Julia up-stairs? Mrs. Wehle +and Wilhelmina and the doctor went in regularly, not by the rope-ladder, +but by a more secure wooden one which he had planted against the outside +of the house. But Andrew had suddenly conceived so exalted an opinion of +his niece's virtues that he was unwilling to lead her into the upper +story in that fashion. His imagination had invested her with all the +glories of all the heroines, from Penelope to Beatrice, and from +Beatrice to Scott's Rebecca. At last a sudden impulse seized him. + +"My dear daughter, they say that genius is to madness close allied. When +I built this house I was in a state bordering on insanity, I suppose. I +pleased my whims--my whims were my only company--I pleased my whims in +building an American castle. These whims begin to seem childish to me +now. I put in a secret stairway. No human foot but my own has ever +trodden it. August, whom I love more than any other, and who is one of +the few admitted to my library, has always ascended by the rope-ladder. +But you are my niece; I would you were my daughter. I will signalize my +reverence for you by showing up the stairway the woman who knows how to +love and be faithful, the feet that would be worthy of golden steps if I +had them. Come." + +Spite of her grief and anxiety, Julia was impressed and oppressed with +the reverence shown her by her uncle. She had a veneration almost +superstitious for the Philosopher's learning. She was not accustomed to +even respectful treatment, and to be worshiped in this awful way by such +a man was something almost as painful as it was pleasant. + +The entrance to the stairway, if that could be called a stairway which +was as difficult of ascent as a ladder, was through a closet by the side +of the donjon chimney, and the logs had been so arranged without and +within that the space occupied by the narrow and zigzag stairs was not +apparent. Up these stairs he took Julia, leaving her in a closet above. +As this closet was situated alongside the chimney, it opened, of course, +into the small corner room which I have before described, and in which +August was now lying. Andrew descended the stairs and entered the upper +story again by the outside ladder. He thought best to prepare August for +the coming of Julia, lest joy should destroy a life that was so +far wasted. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV. + +THE INTERVIEW. + +We left August on that summer day on the levee at Louisville without +employment. He was not exactly disheartened, but he was homesick. That +he was forbidden to go back by threats of prosecution for his +burglarious manner of entering Samuel Anderson's house was reason enough +for wanting to go; that his father's family were not yet free from +danger was a stronger reason; but strongest of all, though he blushed to +own it to himself, was the longing to be where he might perchance +sometimes see the face he had seen that spring morning in the bottom of +a sun-bonnet. Right manfully did he fight against his discouragement and +his homesickness, and his longing to see Julia. It was better to stay +where he was. It was better not to go back beaten. If he surrendered so +easily, he would never put himself into a situation where he could claim +Julia with self-respect. He would stay and make his way in the world +somehow. But making his way in the world did not seem half so easy now +us it had on that other morning in March when he stood in the barn +talking to Julia. Making your fortune always seems so easy until you've +tried it. It seems rather easy in a novel, and still easier in a +biography. But no Samuel Smiles ever writes the history of those who +fail; the vessels that never came back from their venturous voyages left +us no log-books. Many have written the History of Success. What +melancholy Plutarch shall arise to record, with a pen dipped in +wormwood, the History of Failure? + +No! he would not go back defeated. August said this over bravely, but a +little too often, and with a less resolute tone at each repetition. He +contemned himself for his weakness, and tried, but tried in vain, to +form other plans. Had he known how much one's physical state has to do +with one's force of character, he might have guessed that he did not +deserve the blame he meted out to himself. He might have remembered what +Shakespeare's Portia says to Brutus, that "humour hath his hour with +every man." But with a dull and unaccountable aching in his head and +back he compromised with himself. He would go to the castle and pass a +day or two. Then he would return and fight it out. + +So he got on the packet Isaac Shelby, and was soon shaking with a chill +that showed how thoroughly malaria had pervaded his system. His very +bones seemed frozen. But if you ever shook with such a chill, or rather +if you were ever shaken by such a chill, taking hold of you like a +demoniacal possession; if you ever felt your brain congealing, your icy +bones breaking, your frosty heart becoming paralyzed, with a cold no +fire could reach, you know what it is; and if you have not felt it, no +words of mine can make you understand the sensations. After the chill +came the period when August felt himself between two parts of Milton's +hell, between a sea of ice and a sea of fire; sometimes the hot wave +scorched him, then it retired again before the icy one. At last it was +all hot, and the boiling blood scalded his palms and steamed to his +brain, bewildering his thoughts and almost blinding his eyes. He had +determined when he started to get off at a wood-yard three miles below +Andrew's castle, to avoid observation and the chance of arrest; and now +in his delirium the purpose as he had planned it remained fixed. He got +up at two o'clock, crazed with fever, dressed himself, and went out into +the rainy night. He went ashore in the mud and bushes, and, guided more +by instinct than by any conscious thought, he started up the wagon-track +along the river bank. His furious fever drove him on, talking to +himself, and splashing recklessly into the pools of rain-water standing +in the road. He never remembered his debarkation. He must have fallen +once or twice, for he was covered with mud when he rang the alarm at the +castle. In answer to Andrew's "Who's there?" he answered, "You'll have +to send a harder rain than that if you want to put this fire out!" + +And so, what with the original disease, the mental discouragement, and +the exposure to the rain, the fever had well-nigh consumed the life, and +now that the waves of the hot sea after days of fire and nights of +delirium had gone back, there was hardly any life left in the body, and +the doctors said there was no hope. One consuming desire remained. He +wanted to see Julia once before he went away; and that one desire it +seemed impossible to gratify. When he learned of the failure of Jonas to +get any message to Julia through Cynthy, he had felt the keenest +disappointment, and had evidently been sinking since the hope that kept +him up had been taken away. + +The mother sat by his bed, Gottlieb sat stupefied at the foot, with +Jonas by his side, and Wilhelmina was crying in a still fashion in one +corner of the room. August lay breathing feebly, and with his life +evidently ebbing. + +"August!" said Andrew, as he stood over his bed, having come to announce +the arrival of Julia. "August!" Andrew tried to speak quietly, but there +was a something of hope in the inflection, a tremor of eagerness in the +utterance, that made the mother look up quickly and inquiringly. + +August opened his eyes slowly and looked into the face of the +Philosopher. Then he slowly closed his eyes again, and a something, not +a smile--he was too weak for that--but a look of infinite content, +spread over his wan face. + +"I know," he whisperd. + +"Know what?" asked Andrew, leaning down to catch his words. + +"Julia." And a single tear crept out from under the closed lid. The +tender mother wiped it away. + +After resting a moment, August looked up at Andrew's face inquiringly. + +"She is coming," said the Philosopher. + +August smiled very faintly, but Andrew was sure he smiled, and again +leaned down his ear. + +"She is here," whispered August; "I heard Charon bark, and +I--saw--your--face." + +Andrew now stepped to the closet-door and opened it, and Julia came out. + +"Blamed ef he a'n't a witch!" whispered Jonas. "Cunjures a angel out of +his cupboard!" + +Julia did not see anybody or anything but the white and wasted face upon +the pillow. The eyes were now closed again, and she quickly crossed the +floor, and--not without a faint maidenly blush--stooped and kissed the +parched lips, from which the life seemed already to have fled. + +And August with difficulty disengaged his wasted hand from the cover, +and laid his nerveless fingers--alas! like a skeleton's now--In the warm +hand of Julia, and said--she leaned down to listen, an he whispered +feebly through his dry lips out of a full heart--"Thank God!" + +And the Philosopher, catching the words, said audibly, "Amen!" + +And the mother only wept. + + + +CHAPTER XXXV. + +GETTING READY FOR THE END. + +How Julia spent two hours of blessed sadness at the castle; how August +slept peacefully for five minutes at a time with his hand in hers, and +then awoke and looked at her, and then slumbered again; how she +moistened his parched lips for him, and gave him wine; how at last she +had to bid him a painful farewell; how the mother gave her a benediction +in German and a kiss; how Wilhelmina clung to her with tears; how Jonas +called her a turtle-dove angel; how Brother Hall, the preacher who had +been sent for at the mother's request, to converse with the dying man, +spoke a few consoling words to her; how Gottlieb confided to Jonas his +intention never to "sprach nodin 'pout Yangee kirls no more;" and how at +last Uncle Andrew walked home with her, I have not time to tell. When +the Philosopher bade her adieu, he called her names which she did not +understand. But she turned back to him, and after a minute's hesitation, +spoke huskily. "Uncle Andrew if he--if he should get worse--I want--" + +"I know, my daughter; you want him to die your husband?" + +"Yes, if he wishes it. Send for me day or night, and I'll come in spite +of everybody." + +"God bless you, my daughter!" said Andrew. And he watched until she got +safely into the house without discovery, and then he went back satisfied +and proud. + +Of course August died, and Julia devoted herself to philanthropic +labors. It is the fashion now for novels to end thus sadly, and you +would not have me be out of the fashion. + +But August did not die. Joy is a better stimulant than wine. Love is the +best tonic in the pharmacopeia. And from the hour in which August Wehle +looked into the eyes of Julia, the tide of life set back again. Not +perceptibly at first. For two days he was neither better nor worse. But +this was a gain. Then slowly he came back to life. But at Andrew's +instance he kept indoors while Humphreys staid. + +Humphreys, on his part, like Ananias, pretended to have disposed of all +his property, paid his debts, reserved enough to live on until the +approaching day of doom, and given the rest to the poor of the household +of faith, and there were several others who were sincere enough to do +what he only pretended. + +Among the leading Adventists was "Dr." Ketchup, who still dealt out +corn-sweats and ginseng-tea, but who refused to sell his property. He +excused himself by quoting the injunction, "Occupy till I come." But +others sold their estates for trifles, and gave themselves up to +proclaiming the millennium. + +Mrs. Abigail Anderson was a woman who did nothing by halves. She was +vixenish, she was selfish, she was dishonest and grasping; but she was +religious. If any man think this paradox impossible, he has observed +character superficially. There are criminals in State's-prison who have +been very devout all their lives. Religious questions took hold of Mrs. +Anderson's whole nature. She was superstitious, narrow, and intense. She +was as sure that the day of judgment would be proclaimed on the eleventh +of August, 1843, as she was of her life. No consideration in opposition +to any belief of hers weighed a feather with her. Her will mastered her +judgment and conscience. + +And so she determined that Samuel must sell his property for a trifle. +How far she was influenced in this by a sincere desire to square all +outstanding debts before the final settlement, how far by a longing to +be considered the foremost and most pious of all, and how far by +business shrewdness based on that feeling which still lurks in the most +protestant people, that such sacrifices do improve their state in a +future world, I can not tell. Doubtless fanaticism, hypocrisy, and a +self-interest that looked sordidly even at heaven, mingled in bringing +about the decision. At any rate, the property was to be sold for a few +hundred dollars. + +Getting wind of this decision, Andrew promptly appeared at his brother's +house and offered to buy it. But Mrs. Abigail couldn't think of it. +Andrew had always been her enemy, and though she forgave him, she would +not on any account sell him an inch of the land. It would not be right. +He had claimed that part of it belonged to him, and to let him have it +would be to admit his claim. + +"Andrew," she said, "you do not believe in the millennium, and people +say that you are a skeptic. You want to cheat us out of what you think a +valuable piece of property. And you'll find yourself at the last +judgment with the weight of this sin on your heart. You will, indeed!" + +"How clearly you reason about other people's duty!" said the +Philosopher. "If you had seen your own duty half so clearly, some of us +would have been better off, and your account would have been +straighter." + +Here Mrs. Anderson grew very angry, and vented her spleen in a solemn +exhortation to Andrew to get ready for the coming of the Master, not +three weeks off at the farthest, and she warned him that the archangel +might blow his trumpet at any moment. Then where would he be? she asked +in exultation. Human meanness is never so pitiful as when it tries to +seize on God's judgments as weapons with which to gratify its own +spites. I trust this remark will not be considered as applying only to +Mrs. Anderson. + +But Mrs. Anderson fired off all the heavenly small-shot she could find +in the teeth and eyes of Andrew, and then, to prevent a rejoinder, she +told him it was time for her to go to secret prayer, and she only +stopped upon the threshold to send back one Parthian arrow in the shape +of a warning to "watch and be ready." + +I wonder if a certain class of religious people have ever thought how +much their exclusiveness and Pharisaism have to do with the unhappy +fruitlessness of all their appeals! Had Mrs. Anderson been as blameless +as an angel, such exhortations would have driven a weaker than Andrew to +hate the name of religion. + +But I must not moralize, for Mr. Humphreys has already divulged his plan +of disposing of the property. He has a friend, one Thomas A. Parkins, +who has money, and who will buy the farm at two hundred dollars. He +could procure the money in advance any day by going to the village of +Bethany, the county-seat, and drawing on Mr. Parkins, and cashing the +draft. It was a matter of indifference to him, he said, only that he +would like to oblige so good a friend. + +This arrangement, by which the Anderson farm was to be sold for a song +to some distant stranger, pleased Mrs. Abigail. She could not bear that +one of her unbelieving neighbors should even for a fortnight rejoice in +a supposed good bargain at her expense. To sell to Mr. Humphreys's +friend in Louisville was just the thing. When pressed by some of her +neighbors who had not received the Adventist gospel, to tell on what +principle she could justify her sale of the farm at all, she answered +that if the farm would not be of any account after the end of the world, +neither would the money. + +Mr. Humphreys went down to the town of Bethany and came back, affecting +to have cashed a draft on his friend for two hundred dollars. The deeds +were drawn, and a justice of the peace was to come the next morning and +take the acknowledgment of Mr. and Mrs. Anderson. + +This was what Jonas learned as he sat in the kitchen talking to Cynthy +Ann. He had come to bring some message from the convalescent August, and +had been detained by the attraction of adhesion. + +"I told you it was fox-and-geese. Didn't I? And so Thomas A. Parkins +_is_ his name. Gus Wehle said he'd bet the two was one. Well, I must +drive this varmint off afore he gits his chickens." + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI. + +THE SIN OF SANCTIMONY. + +Just at this point arrived Mr. Hall, whom I have before described as the +good but callow Methodist preacher on the circuit. Some people think +that a minister of the gospel should be exempt from criticism, ridicule, +and military duty. But the manly minister takes his lot with the rest. +Nothing could be more pernicious than making the foibles of a minister +sacred. Doubtless Mr. Hall has long since come to laugh at his own early +follies, his official sanctimoniousness, and all that; and why should +not I, who have been a callow circuit-preacher myself in my day, laugh +at my Brother Hall, for the good of his kind? + +He had come to visit Sister Cynthy Ann, whose name had long stood on the +class-book at Harden's Cross-Roads as a good and acceptable member of +the church in full connection. He was visiting formally and officially +each family in which there was a member. Had he visited informally and +unofficially, and like a man instead of like a minister, he would have +done more good. But he came to Samuel Anderson's, and informed Mrs. +Anderson that he was visiting his members, and that as one of her +household was a member, he would like to have a little religious +conversation and prayer with the family. Would she please gather +them together? + +So Julia was called down-stairs, and Jonas was invited in from the +kitchen. The sight of him distressed Brother Hall. For was not this New +Light sent here by Satan to lead astray one of his flock? But, at least, +he would labor faithfully with him. + +He began with Mr. Samuel Anderson. But that worthy, after looking at his +wife in vain for a cue, darted off about the trumpets of the Apocalypse. + +"Mr. Anderson, as head of this family, your responsibility is very +great. Do you feel the full assurance, my brother?" asked Mr. Hall. + +"Yes," said Mr. Anderson, "I am standing with my lamp trimmed and ready. +I am listening for the midnight shout. To-night the trumpet may sound. I +am afraid you don't do your duty, or you would lift up your voice. The +tune and times and a half are almost out." + +Mr. Hall was a little dashed at this. A man whose religious conversation +is of a set and conventional type, is always shocked and jostled when he +is thrown from the track. And he himself, like everybody else, had felt +the Adventist infection, and did not want to commit himself. So he +turned to Mrs. Anderson. She answered like a seraph every question put +to her--the conventional questions never pierce the armor of a hypocrite +or startle the conscience of a self-deceiver. Mr. Hall congratulated her +in his most official tone (a compound of authority, awfulness, and +sanctity) on her deep experience of the things that made for her +everlasting peace. He told her that people of her high attainments +must beware of spiritual pride. And Mrs. Anderson took the warning with +beautiful meekness, sinking into forty fathoms of undisguised and rather +ostentatious humility, heaving solemn sighs in token of self-reproach--a +self-reproach that did not penetrate the cuticle. + +[Illustration: A PASTORAL VISIT.] + +"And you, Sister Cynthy Ann," he said, fighting shy of Jonas for the +present, "I trust you are trying to let your light shine. Do you feel +that you are pressing on?" + +Poor Cynthy Ann sank into a despondency deeper than usual. She was +afeard not. Seemed like as ef her heart was cold and dead to God. Seemed +like as ef she couldn't no ways gin up the world. It weighed her down +like a rock, and many was the fight she had with the enemy. No, she +wuzn't getting on. + +"My dear sister," said Mr. Hall, "let me warn you. Here is Mrs. +Anderson, who has given up the world entirely. I hope you'll follow so +good an example. Do not be led astray by worldly affections; they are +sure to entrap you. I am afraid you have not maintained your +steadfastness as you should." Here Mr. Hall's eye wandered doubtfully to +Jonas, of whom he felt a little afraid. Jonas, on his part, had no +reason to like Mr. Hall for his advice in Cynthy's love affair, and now +the minister's praises of Mrs. Anderson and condemnation of Cynthy Ann +had not put him in any mood to listen to exhortation. + +"Well, Mr. Harrison," said the young minister solemnly, approaching +Jonas much as a dog does a hedgehog, "how do you feel to-day?" + +"Middlin' peart, I thank you; how's yourself?" + +This upset the good man not a little, and convinced him that Jonas was +in a state of extreme wickedness. + +"Are you a Christian?" + +"Wal, I 'low I am. How about yourself, Mr. Hall?" + +"I believe you are a New Light. Now, do you believe in the Lord Jesus +Christ?" asked the minister in an annihilating tone. + +"Yes, I do, my aged friend, a heap sight more'n I do in some of them +that purtends to hev a paytent right on all his blessins, and that put +on solemn airs and call other denominations hard names. My friend, I +don't believe in no religion that's made up of sighs and groans and high +temper" (with a glance at Mrs. Anderson), "and that thinks a good deal +more of its bein' sound in doctrine than of the danger of bein' rotten +in life. They's lots o' bad eggs got slick and shiny shells!" + +Mr. Hall happened to think just here of the injunction against throwing +pearls before swine, and so turned to Humphreys, who made his heart glad +by witnessing a good confession, in soft and unctuous tones, and couched +in the regulation phrases which have worn smooth in long use. + +Julia had slunk away in a corner. But now he appealed to her also. + +"Blest with a praying mother, you, Miss Anderson, ought to repent of +your sins and flee from the wrath to come. You know the right way. You +have been pointed to it by the life of your parents from childhood. +Reared in the bosom of a Christian household, let me entreat you to seek +salvation immediately." + +I do not like to repeat this talk here. But it is an unfortunate fact +that goodness and self-sacrificing piety do not always go with practical +wisdom. The novelist, like the historian, must set down things as he +finds them. A man who talks in consecrated phrases is yet in the +poll-parrot state of mental development. + +"Do you feel a desire to flee from the wrath to come?" he asked. + +Julia gave some sort of inaudible assent. + +"My dear young sister, you have great reason to be thankful--very great +reason for gratitude to Almighty God." (Like many other pious young men, +Mr. Hall said _Gawd_.) "I met you the other night at your uncle's. The +young man whose life we then despaired of has recovered." And with more +of this, Mr. Hall told Julia's secret, while Mrs. Anderson, between her +anger and her rapt condition of mind, seemed to be petrifying. + +I trust the reader does not expect me to describe the feelings of Julia +while Mr. Hall read a chapter and prayed. Nor the emotions of Mrs. +Anderson. I think if Mr. Hall could have heard her grind her teeth while +he in his prayer gave thanks for the recovery of August, he would not +have thought so highly of her piety. But she managed to control her +emotions until the minister was fairly out of the house. In bidding +good-by, Mr. Hall saw how pale and tremulous Julia was, and with his +characteristic lack of sagacity, he took her emotion to be a sign of +religious feelings and told her he was pleased to see that she was +awakened to a sense of her condition. + +And then he left. And then came the deluge. + + + +CHAPTER XXXVII. + +THE DELUGE. + +The indescribable deluge! But, after all, the worst of anything of that +sort is the moment before it begins. A plunge-bath, a tooth-pulling, an +amputation, and a dress-party are all worse in anticipation than in the +moment of infliction. Julia, as she stood busily sticking a pin in the +window-sash, waiting for her mother to begin, wished that the storm +might burst, and be done with it. But Mrs. Anderson understood her +business too well for that. She knew the value of the awful moments of +silence before beginning. She had not practiced all her life without +learning the fine art of torture in its exquisite details. I doubt not +the black-robed fathers of the Holy Office were leisurely gentlemen, +giving their victims plenty of time for anticipatory meditation, laying +out their utensils quietly, inspecting the thumb-screw affectionately to +make sure that it would work smoothly, discussing the rack and wheel +with much tender forethought, as though torture were a sweet thing, to +be reserved like a little girl's candy lamb, and only resorted to when +the appetite has been duly whetted by contemplation. I never had the +pleasure of knowing an inquisitor, and I can not certify that they were +of this deliberate fashion. But it "stands to nature" that they were. +For the vixens who are vixens of the highest quality, are always +deliberate. + +Mrs. Anderson felt that the piece of invective which she was about to +undertake, was not to be taken in hand unadvisedly, "but reverently, +discreetly, and in the fear of God." And so she paused, and Julia +fumbled the tassel of the window-curtain, and trembled with the chill of +expectation. And Mrs. Abigail continued to debate how she might make +this, which would doubtless be her last outburst before the day of +judgment, her masterpiece--worthy song of the dying swan. And then she +hoped, she sincerely hoped, to be able by this awful _coup de main_ to +awaken Julia to a sense of her sinfulness. For there was such a jumble +of mixed motives in her mind, that one could never distinguish her +sincerity from her hypocrisy. + +Mrs. Anderson's conscience was quite an objective one. As Jonas often +remarked, "she had a feelin' sense of other folkses unworthiness." And +the sins which she appreciated were generally sins against herself. +Julia's disobedience to herself was darker in her mind than murder +committed on anybody else would have been. And now she sat deliberating, +not on the limit of the verbal punishment she meant to inflict--that +gave her no concern--but on her ability to do the matter justice. Even +as a tyrannical backwoods school-master straightens his long beech-rod +relishfully before applying it. + +Not that Mrs. Anderson was silent all this time. She was sighing and +groaning in a spasmodic devotion. She was "seeking strength from above +to do her whole duty," she would have told you. She was "agonizing" in +prayer for her daughter, and she contrived that her stage-whisper +praying should now and then reach the ears of its devoted object. +Humphreys remained seated, pretending to read the copy of "Josephus," +but watching the coming storm with the interest of a connoisseur. And +while he remained Jonas determined to stay, to keep Julia in +countenance, and he beckoned to Cynthy to stay also. And Samuel +Anderson, who loved his daughter and feared his wife, fled like a coward +from the coming scene. Everybody expected Mrs. Anderson to break out +like a fury. + +But she knew a better plan than that. She felt a new device come like an +inspiration. And perhaps it was. It really seemed to Jonas that the +devil helped her. For instead of breaking out into commonplace scolding, +the resources of which she had long since exhausted, she dropped upon +her knees, and began to pray for Julia. + +No swearer ever curses like the priest who veils his personal spites in +official and pious denunciations, and Mrs. Anderson had never dealt out +abuse so roundly and terribly and crushingly, as she did under the guise +of praying for the salvation of Julia's soul from well-deserved +perdition. But Abigail did not say perdition. She left that to weak +spirits. She thought it a virtue to say "hell" with unction and +emphasis, by way of alarming the consciences of sinners. Mrs. Anderson's +prayer is not reportable. That sort of profanity is too bad to write. +She capped her climax--even as I have heard a revivalist pray for a +scoffer that had vexed his righteous soul--by asking God to convert her +daughter, or if she could not be converted to take her away, that she +might not heap up wrath against the day of wrath. For that sort of +religious excitement which does not quiet the evil passions, seems to +inflame them, and Mrs. Anderson was not in any right sense sane. And the +prayer was addressed more to the frightened Julia than to God. She would +have been terribly afflicted had her petition been granted. + +Julia would have run away from the admonition which followed the prayer, +had it not been that Mrs. Anderson adroitly put it under cover of a +religious exhortation. She besought Julia to repent, and then, affecting +to show her her sinfulness, she proceeded to abuse her. + +Had Julia no temper? Yes, she had doubtless a spice of her mother's +anger without her meanness. She would have resisted, but that from +childhood she had felt paralyzed by the utter uselessness of all +resistance. The bravest of the villagers at the foot of Vesuvius never +dreamed of stopping the crater's mouth. + +But, happily, at last Mrs. Anderson's insane wrath went a little too +far. + +"You poor lost sinner," she said, "to think you should go to destruction +under my very eyes, disgracing us all, by running over the country at +night with bad men! But there's mercy even for such as you." + +Julia would not have understood the full meaning of this aspersion of +her purity, had she not caught Humphreys's eye. His expression, half +sneer, half leer, seemed to give her mother's saying its full +interpretation. She put out her hand. She turned white, and said: "Say +one word more, and I will go away from you and never come back! Never!" +And then she sat down and cried, and then Mrs. Anderson's maternal love, +her "unloving love," revived. To have her daughter leave her, too, would +be a sort of defeat. She hushed, and sat down in her splint-bottomed +rocking-chair, which snapped when she rocked, and which seemed to speak +for her after she had shut her mouth. Her face settled into a +martyr-like appeal to Heaven in proof of the justice of her cause. And +then she fell back on her forlorn hope. She wept hysterically, in +sincere self-pity, to think that an affectionate mother should have such +a daughter! + +Julia, finding that her mother had desisted, went to her room. She did +not exactly pray, but she talked to herself as she paced the floor. It +was a monologue, and yet there was a conscious appeal to an invisible +Presence, who could not misjudge her, and so she passed from talking to +herself to talking to God, and that without any of the formality of +prayer. Her mother had made God seem to be against her. Now she, like +David, protested her innocence to God. She recited half to herself, and +yet also to God--for is not every appeal to one's conscience in some +sense an appeal to God?--she recited all the struggles of that night +when she went to August at the castle. People talk of the consolation +there is in God's mercy. But Julia found comfort in God's justice. He +_could_ not judge her wrongly. + +Then she opened the Testament at the old place, and read the words long +since fixed in her memory. And then she--weary and heavy laden--came +again to Him who invites, and found rest. And then she found, as many +another has found, that coming to God is not, as theorists will have it, +a coming once for a lifetime, but a coming oft and ever repeated. + +Jonas and Cynthy Ann retired to the kitchen, and the former said hi his +irreverent way, "Blamed ef Abigail ha'nt got more devils into her'n Mary +Magdalene had the purtiest day she ever seed! I should think, arter a +life with her fer a mother, the bad place would be a healthy and +delightful clime. The devil a'n't a patchin' to her." + +"Don't, Jonas; you talk so cur'us, like as ef you was kinder sorter +wicked." + +"That's jest what I am, my dear, but Abigail Anderson's wicked without +the kinder sorter. She cusses when she's a-prayin'. She cusses that poar +gal right in the Lord's face. Good by, I must go. Smells so all-fired +like brimstone about here." This last was spoken in an undertone of +indignant soliloquy, as he crossed the threshold of Cynthy's +clean kitchen. + + + +CHAPTER XXXVIII. + +SCARING A HAWK. + +Jonas was thoroughly alarmed. He exaggerated the harm that Humphreys +might do to August, now that he knew where he was. August, on his part, +felt sure that Humphreys would not do anything against him; certainly +not in the way of legal proceedings. And as for the sale of Samuel +Anderson's farms, that did not disturb him. Like almost everybody else +at that time, August Wehle was strongly impressed by the assertions of +the Millerites, and if the world should be finished in the next month, +the farms were of no consequence. And if Millerism proved a delusion, +the loss of Samuel Anderson's property would only leave Julia on his +level, so far as worldly goods went. The happiness this last thought +brought him made him ashamed. Why should he rejoice in Mr. Anderson's +misfortune? Why should he wish to pull Julia down to him? But still the +thought remained a pleasant one. + +Jonas would not have it so. He had his plan. He went home from the +Adventist meeting that very night with Cynthy Ann, and then stood +talking to her at the corner of the porch, feeling very sure that +Humphreys would listen from above. He heard his stealthy tread, after a +while, disturb a loose board on the upper porch. Then he began to talk +to Cynthy Ann in this strain: + +"You see, I can't tell no secrets, Cynthy Ann, even to your Royal +Goodness, as I might say, seein' as how as you a'n't my wife, and a'n't +likely to be, if Brother Goshorn can have his way. But you're the Queen +of Hearts, anyhow. But s'pose I was to hint a secret?" + +"Sh--sh--h-h-h!" said Cynthy Ann, partly because she felt a sinful +pleasure in the flattery, and partly because she felt sure that +Humphreys was above. But Jonas paid no attention to the caution. + +"I'll give you a hint as strong as a Irishman's, which they do say'll +knock you down. Let's s'pose a case. They a'n't no harm in s'posin' a +case, you know. I've knowed boys who'd throw a rock at a fence-rail and +hit a stump, and then say, 'S'posin' they was a woodpecker on that air +stump, wouldn't I a keeled him over?' You can s'pose a case and make a +woodpecker wherever you want to. Well, s'posin' they was a inquisition +or somethin' of the kind from the guv'nor of the State of ole Kaintuck +to the guv'nor of the State of Injeanny? And s'posin' that the dokyment +got lodged in this 'ere identical county? And s'posin' it called fer the +body of one Thomas A. Parkins, a_li_as J.W. 'Umphreys? And s'posin' it +speecified as to sartain and sundry crimes committed in Paduky and all +along the shore, fer all I know? Now, s'posin' all of them air things, +what _would_ Clark township do to console itself when that toonful v'ice +and them air blazin' watch-seals had set in ignominy for ever and ever? +Selah! Good-night, and don't you breathe a word to a livin' soul, nur a +dead one, 'bout what I been a-sayin'. You'll know more by daylight +to-morry 'n you know now." + +And the last part of the speech was true, for by midnight the Hawk had +fled. And the sale of the Anderson farm to Humphreys was never +completed. For three days the end of the world was forgotten in the +interest which Clark township felt in the flight of its favorite. And by +degrees the story of Norman's encounter with the gamblers and of +August's recovery of the money became spread abroad through the +confidential hints of Jonas. And by degrees another story became known; +it could not long be concealed. It was the story of Betsey Malcolm, who +averred that she had been privately married to Humphreys on the occasion +of a certain trip they had made to Kentucky together, to attend a "big +meeting." The story was probably true, but uncharitable gossips shook +their heads. + +It was only a few evenings after the flight of Humphreys that Jonas had +another talk with Cynthy Ann, in which he confessed that all his +supposed case about a requisition from the governor of Kentucky for +Humphreys's arrest was pure fiction. + +"But, Jonas, is--is that air right? I'm afeard it a'n't right to tell an +ontruth." + +"So 'ta'n't; but I only s'posed a case, you know." + +"But Brother Hall said last Sunday two weeks, that anything that gin a +false impression was--was lying. Now, I don't think you meant it, but +then I thought I orto speak to you about it." + +"Well, maybe you're right. I see you last summer a-puttin' up a +skeercrow to keep the poor, hungry little birds of the air from gittin' +the peas that they needed to sustain life. An' I said, What a pity that +the best woman I ever seed should tell lies to the poor little birds +that can't defend theirselves from her wicked wiles! But I see that same +day a skeercrow, a mean, holler, high-percritical purtense of a ole hat +and coat, a-hanging in Brother Goshorn's garden down to the cross-roads. +An' I wondered ef it was your Methodis' trainin' that taught you +sech-like cheatin' of the little sparrys and blackbirds." + +"Yes; but Jonas--" said Cynthy, bewildered. + +"And I see a few days arterwards a Englishman with a humbug-fly onto his +line, a foolin' the poor, simple-hearted little fishes into swallerln' a +book that hadn't nary sign of a ginowine bait onto it. An' I says, says +I, What a deceitful thing the human heart is!" + +"Why, Jonas, you'd make a preacher!" said Cynthy Ann, touched with the +fervor of his utterance, and inly resolved never to set up another +scarecrow. + +"Not much, my dear. But then, you see, I make distinctions. Ef I was to +see a wolf a-goin' to eat a lamb, what would I do? Why, I'd skeer or +fool him with the very fust thing I could find. Wouldn' you, honey?" + +"In course," said Cynthy Ann. + +"And so, when I seed a wolf or a tiger or a painter, like that air +'Umphreys, about to gobble up fortins, and to do some harm to Gus, +maybe, I jest rigged up a skeercrow of words, like a ole hat and coat +stuck onto a stick, and run him off. Any harm done, my dear?" + +"Well, no, Jonas; I ruther 'low not." + +Whether Jonas's defense was good or not, I can not say, for I do not +know. But he is entitled to the benefit of it. + + + +CHAPTER XXXIX. + +JONAS TAKES AN APPEAL + +Jonas had waited for the coming of the quarterly meeting to carry his +appeal to the presiding elder. The quarterly meeting for the circuit was +held at the village of Brayvllle, and beds were made upon the floor for +the guests who crowded the town. Every visiting Methodist had a right to +entertainment, and every resident Methodist opened his doors very wide, +for Western people are hospitable in a fashion and with a bountifulness +unknown on the eastern side of the mountains. Who that has not known it, +can ever understand the delightfulness of a quarterly meeting? The +meeting of old friends--the social life--is all but heavenly. And then +the singing of the old Methodist hymns, such as + + "Oh! that will be joyful! + Joyful! joyful! + Oh! that will be joyful, + To meet to part no more." + +And that other solemnly-sweet refrain: + + "The reaping-time will surely come, + And angels shout the harvest home!" + +And who shall describe the joy of a Christian mother, when her +scapegrace son "laid down the arms of his rebellion" and was "soundly +converted"? Let those sneer who will, but such moral miracles as are +wrought in Methodist revivals are more wonderful than any healing of the +blind or raising of the dead could be. + +Jonas turned up, faithful to his promise, and called on the "elder" at +the place where he was staying, and asked for a private interview. He +found the old gentleman exercising his sweet voice in singing, + + "Come, let us anew + Our journey pursue, + Roll round with the year. + And never stand still till the Master appear. + His adorable will + Let us gladly fulfill, + And our talents improve + By the patience of hope and the labor of love." + +"When he concluded the verse he raised his half-closed eyes and saw +Jonas standing in the door. + +"Mr. Persidin' Elder," said Jonas, trying in vain to speak with some +seriousness and veneration, "I come to ax your consent to marry one of +your flock--the best lamb you've got in the whole fold." + +"Bless you, Mr. Harrison," said Father Williams, the old elder, +laughing, "bless you, I haven't any right to consent or forbid. Ask the +lady herself!" + +"Ax the lady!" said Jonas. "Didn't I though! And didn't Mr. Goshorn +forbid the lady to marry me, under the pains and penalties pervided; and +didn't Mr. Hall set his seal to the forbiddin' of Goshorn! An' I says to +her, 'I won't take nothin' less than a elder or a bishop on this 'ere +vital question.' When I want a sheep, I don't go to the underlin,' but +to the boss; and so I brought this appeal up to you on a writ of _habeas +corpus_, or whatever you may call it." + +The presiding elder laughed again, and looked closely at Jonas. Then he +stepped to the door and called in the circuit preacher, Mr. Hall, and +the class leader, Mr. Goshorn, both of whom happened to be in the next +room engaged in an excited discussion with a brother who was a little +touched with Millerism. + +"What's this Mr. Harrison tells me about your forbidding the banns in +his case?" + +"He's a New Light," said Brother Hall, showing his abhorrence in his +face, "and it seemed to me that for a Methodist to marry a New Light was +a sin--a being yoked together unequally with an unbeliever. You know, +Father Williams, that New Lights are Arians." + +The old man seemed more amused than ever. Turning to Jonas, he asked him +if he was an Arian. + +"Not as I knows on, my venerable friend. I may have caught the disease +when I had the measles, or I may have been a Arian in infancy, or I may +be a Arian on my mother's side, you know; but as I don't know who or +what it may be, I a'n't in no way accountable fer it--no more'n Brother +Goshorn is to blame fer his face bein' so humbly. But I take it Arian is +one of them air pleasant names you and the New Light preachers uses in +your Christian intercourse together to make one another mad. I'm one of +them as goes to heaven straight--never stoppin' to throw no donicks at +the Methodists, Presbyterians, nor no other misguided children of men. +They may ride in the packet, or go by flat-boat or keel-boat, ef they +chooses. I go by the swift-sailin' and palatial mail-boat New Light, and +I don't run no opposition line, nor bust my bilers tryin' to beat my +neighbors into the heavenly port." + +Brother Goshorn looked vexed. Brother Hall was scandalized at the +lightness of Jonas's conversation. But the old presiding elder, with +keen common-sense and an equally keen sense of the ludicrous, could not +look grave with all his effort to keep from laughing. + +[Illustration: BROTHER GOSHORN.] + +"Are you an unbeliever?" he asked. + +"I don't know what you call onbeliever. I believe in God and Christ, and +keep Sunday and the Fourth of July; but I don't believe in all of +Brother Goshorn's nonsense about wearing veils and artificials." + +"Well," said Brother Hall, "would you endeavor to induce your wife to +dress in a manner unbecoming a Methodist?" + +[Illustration: "SAY THEM WORDS OVER AGAIN."] + +"I wouldn't fer the world. If I git the article I want, I don't keer +what it's tied up in, calico or bombazine." + +"Couldn't you join the Methodist Church yourself, and keep your wife +company?" It was Brother Goshorn who spoke. + +"Couldn't I? I suppose I could ef I didn't think no more of religion +than some other folks. I could jine the Methodist Church, and have +everybody say I jined to git my wife. That may be serving God; but I +can't see how. And then how long would you keep me? The very fust time I +fired off my blunderbuss in class-meetin', and you heerd the buckshot +and the squirrel-shot and the slugs and all sorts of things a-rattlin' +around, you'd say I was makin' fun of the Gospel. I 'low they a'n't no +Methodist in me. I was cut out cur'us, you know, and made up crooked." + +"Is there anything against Mr. Harrison, Brother Goshorn?" asked the +elder. + +"He's a New Light," said Mr. Goshorn, in a tone that signified his +belief that to be a New Light was enough. + +"Is he honest and steady?" + +"Never heard anything against him as a moralist." + +"Well, then, it's my opinion that any member of your class would do +better to marry a good, faithful, honest New Light than to marry a +hickory Methodist." + +Jonas got up like one demented, and ran out of the door and across the +street. In a moment he came back, bringing Cynthy Ann in triumph. + +"Now, soy them words over again," he said to the presiding elder. + +"Sister Cynthy Ann," said the presiding elder, "you really love Brother +Harrison?" + +"I--I don't know whether it's right to set our sinful hearts on the +things of this perishin' world. But I think more of him, I'm afeard, +than I had ort to. He's got as good a heart as I ever seed. But Brother +Goshorn thought I hadn't orter marry him, seein' he is a onbeliever." + +"But I a'n't," said Jonas; "I believe in the Bible, and in everything in +it, and in Cynthy Ann and her good Methodist religion besides." + +"I think you can give up all your scruples and marry Mr. Harrison, and +love him and be happy," said the presiding elder. "Don't be afraid to be +happy, my sister. You'll be happy in good company in heaven, and you'd +just as well get used to it here." + +"I told you I'd find a man that had salt enough to keep his religion +sweet. And, Father Williams, you've got to marry us, whenever Cynthy +Ann's ready," said Jonas with enthusiasm. + +And for a moment the look of overstrained scrupulosity on Cynthy Ann's +face relaxed and a strange look of happiness came into her eyes. + +And the time was fixed then and there. + +Brother Hall was astonished. + +And Brother Goshorn drew down his face, and said that he didn't know +what was to become of good, old-fashioned Methodism and the rules of the +Discipline, if the presiding elders talked in that sort of a way. The +church was going to the dogs. + + + +CHAPTER XL. + +SELLING OUT. + +The flight of the Hawk did not long dampen the ardor of those who were +looking for signs in the heaven above and the earth beneath. I have +known a school-master to stand, switch in hand, and give a stubborn boy +a definite number of minutes to yield. The boy who would not have +submitted on account of any amount of punishment, was subdued by the +awful waiting. We have all read the old school-book story of the +prison-warden who brought a mob of criminals to subjection by the same +process. Millerism produced some such effect as this. The assured belief +of the believers had a great effect on others; the dreadful drawing on +of the set time day by day produced an effect in some regions absolutely +awful. An eminent divine, at that time a pastor in Boston, has told me +that the leaven of Adventism permeated all religious bodies, and that he +himself could not avoid the fearful sense of waiting for some +catastrophe--the impression that all this expectation of people must +have some significance. If this was the effect in Boston, imagine the +effect in a country neighborhood like Clark township. Andrew, skeptical +as he was visionary, was almost the only man that escaped the +infection. Jonas would have been as frankly irreverent if the day of +doom had come as he was at all times; but even Jonas had come to the +conclusion that "somethin' would happen, or else somethin' else." +August, with a young man's impressibility, was awe-stricken with +thoughts of the nearing end of the world, and Julia accepted it +as settled. + +It is a good thing that the invisible world is so thoroughly shut out +from this. The effect of too vivid a conception of it is never +wholesome. It was pernicious in the middle age, and clairvoyance and +spirit-rapping would be great evils to the world, if it were not that +the spirits, even of-the ablest men, in losing their bodies seem to lose +their wits. It is well that it is so, for if Washington Irving dictated +to a medium accounts of the other world in a style such as that of his +"Little Britain," for instance, we should lose all interest in the +affairs of this sphere, and nobody would buy our novels. + +This fever of excitement kept alive Samuel Anderson's determination to +sell his farms for a trifle as a testimony to unbelievers. He found that +fifty dollars would meet his expenses until the eleventh of August, and +so the price was set at that. + +As soon as Andrew heard of this, he privately arranged with Jonas to buy +it; but Mrs. Anderson utterly refused. She said she could see through it +all. Jonas was one of Andrew's fingers. Andrew had got to be a sort of a +king in Clark township, and Jonas was--was the king's fool. She did not +mean that any of her property should go into the hands of the clique +that were trying to rob her of her property and her daughter. Even for +two weeks they should not own her house! + +Before this speech was ended, Bob Walker entered the door. + +Bob was tall, stooped, good-natured, and desperately poor. With ton +children under twelve years of age, with an incorrigible fondness for +loafing and telling funny stories, Bob saw no chance to improve his +condition. A man may be either honest or lazy and got rich; but a man +who Is both honest and indolent is doomed. Bob lived in a cabin on the +Anderson farm, and when not hired by Samuel Anderson he did days' work +here and there, riding to and from his labor on a raw-boned mare, that +was the laughing-stock of the county. Bob pathetically called her +Splinter-shin, and he always rode bareback, for the very good reason +that he had neither saddle nor sheepskin. + +[Illustration: "I WANT TO BUY YOUR PLACE."] + +"Mr. Anderson," said Bob, standing in the door and trying to straighten +the chronic stoop out of his shoulders, "I want to buy your place." + +If Bob had said that he wanted to be elected president Samuel Anderson +could not have been more surprised. + +"You look astonished; but folks don't know everything. I 'low I know how +to lay by a little. But I never could git enough to buy a decent kind of +a tater-patch. So I says to my ole woman this mornin', 'Jane,' says I, +'let's git some ground. Let's buy out Mr. Anderson, and see how it'll +feel to be rich fer a few days. If she all burns up, let her burn, I +say. We've had a plaguey hard time of it, let's see how it goes to own +two farms fer awhile.' And so we thought we'd ruther hev the farms fer +two weeks than a little money in a ole stocking. What d'ye say?" + +Jonas here put in that he didn't see why they mightn't sell to him as +well as to Bob Walker. Cynthy Ann had worked fer Mrs. Anderson fer +years, and him and Cynthy was a-goin' to be one man soon. Why not +sell to them? + +"Because selling to you is selling to Andrew," said Mrs. Abigail, in a +conclusive way. + +And so Bob got the farms, possession to be given after the fourteenth of +August, thus giving the day of doom three days of grace. And Bob rode +round the county boasting that he was as rich a man as there was in +Clark Township. And Jonas declared that ef the eend did come in the +month of August, Abigail would find some onsettled bills agin her fer +cheatin' the brother outen the inheritance. And Clark Township +agreed with him. + +August was secretly pleased that one obstacle to his marriage was gone. +If Andrew should prove right, and the world should outlast the middle of +August, there would be nothing dishonorable in his marrying a girl that +would have nothing to sacrifice. + +Andrew, for his part, gave vent to his feelings, as usual, by two or +three bitter remarks leveled at the whole human race, though nowadays he +was inclined to make exceptions in favor of several people, of whom +Julia stood first. She was a woman of the old-fashioned kind, he said, +fit to go alongside Heloise or Chaucer's Grisilde. + + + +CHAPTER XLI. + +THE LAST DAY AND WHAT HAPPENED IN IT. + +The religious excitement reached its culmination as the tenth and +eleventh of August came on. Some made ascension-robes. Work was +suspended everywhere. The more abandoned, unwilling to yield to the +panic, showed its effects on them by deeper potations, and by a +recklessness of wickedness meant to conceal their fears. With tin horns +they blasphemously affected to be angels blowing trumpets. They imitated +the Millerite meetings in their drunken sprees, and learned Mr. +Hankins's arguments by heart. + +The sun of the eleventh of August rose gloriously. People pointed to it +with trembling, and said that it would rise no more. Soon after sunrise +there were crimson clouds stretching above and below it, and popular +terror seized upon this as a sign. But the sun mounted with a scorching +heat, which showed that at least his shining power was not impaired. +Then men said, "Behold the beginning of the fervent heat that is to melt +the elements!" Night drew on, and every "shooting-star" was a new sign +of the end. The meteors, as usual at this time of the year, were +plentiful, and the simple-hearted country-folk were convinced that the +stars were falling out of the sky. + +A large bald hill overlooking the Ohio was to be the mount of ascension. +Here gathered Elder Hankins's flock with that comfortable assurance of +being the elect that only a narrow bigotry can give. And here came +others of all denominations, consoling themselves that they were just as +well off if they were Christians as if they had made all this fuss about +the millennium. Here was August, too, now almost well, joining with the +rest in singing those sweet and inspiring Adventist hymns. His German +heart could not keep still where there was singing, and now, in +gratefulness at new-found health, he was more inclined to music than +ever. So he joined heartily and sincerely in the song that begins: + + "Shall Simon bear his cross alone, + And all the world go free? + No, there's a cross for every one, + And there's a cross for me. + I'll bear the consecrated cross + Till from the cross I'm free, + And then go home to wear the crown. + For there's a crown for me! + Yes, there's a crown in heaven above, + The purchase of a Saviour's love. + Oh I that's the crown for me!" + +When the concourse reached the lines, + + "The saints have heard the midnight cry, + Go meet him in the air!" + +neither August nor any one else could well resist the infection of the +profound and awful belief in the immediate coming of the end which +pervaded the throng. Strong men and women wept and shouted with the +excitement. + +Then Elder Hankins exhorted a little. He said that the time was short. +But men's hearts were hard. As in the days of the flood, they were +marrying and giving in marriage. Not half a mile away a wedding was at +that time taking place, and a man who called himself a minister could +not discern the signs of the times, but was solemnizing a marriage. + +This allusion was to the marriage of Jonas, which was to take place that +very evening at the castle. Mrs. Anderson had refused to have "such +wicked nonsense" at her house, and as Cynthy had no home, Andrew had +appointed it at the castle, partly to oblige Jonas, partly from habitual +opposition to Abigail, but chiefly to express his contempt for +Adventism. + +Mrs. Anderson herself was in a state of complete sublimation. She had +sent for Norman, that she might get him ready for the final judgment, +and Norman, without the slightest inclination to be genuinely religious, +was yet a coward, and made a provisional repentance, not meant to hold +good if Elder Hankins's figures should fail; just such a repentance as +many a man has made on what he supposed to be his death-bed. Do not I +remember a panic-stricken man, converted by typhoid fever and myself, +who laughed as soon as he began to eat gruel, to think that he had been +"such a fool as to send for the preacher"? + +Now, between Mrs. Anderson's joy at Norman's conversion, and her delight +that the world would soon be at an end and she on the winning side, and +her anticipation of the pleasure she would feel even in heaven in +saying, "I told you so!" to her unbelieving friends, she quite forgot +Julia. In fact she went from one fit of religious catalepsy to another, +falling into trances, or being struck down with what was mysteriously +called "the power." She had relaxed her vigilance about Julia, for +there were but three more hours of time, and she felt that the goal was +already gained, and she had carried her point to the very last. A +satisfaction for a saint! + +The neglected Julia naturally floated toward the outer edge of the +surging crowd, and she and August inevitably drifted together. + +"Let us go and see Jonas married," said August. "It is no harm. God can +take us to heaven from one place as well as another, if we are His +children." + +In truth, Julia was wearied and bewildered, not to say disgusted, with +her mother's peculiar religious exercises, and she gladly escaped with +August to the castle and the wedding of her faithful friends. + +Andrew, in a spirit of skeptical defiance, had made his castle look as +flowery and festive as possible. The wedding took place in the lower +story, but the library was illuminated, and the Adventists who had +occasion to pass by Andrew's on their way to the rendezvous accepted +this as a new fulfillment of prophecy to the very letter. They nodded +one to another, and said, "See! marrying and giving in marriage, as in +the days of Noah!" + +August and Julia were too much awe-stricken to say much on their way to +the castle. But in these last hours of a world grown old and ready for +its doom, they cleaved closer together. There could be neither heaven +nor millennium for one of them without the other! Loving one another +made them love God the more, and love cast out all fear. If this was the +Last, they would face it together, and if it proved the Beginning, they +would rejoice together. At sight of every shooting meteor, Julia clung +almost convulsively to August. + +When they entered the castle, Jonas and Cynthy were already standing up +before the presiding elder, and he was about to begin. Cynthy's face +showed her sense of the awfulness of marrying at a moment of such +fearful expectation, or perhaps she was troubling herself for fear that +so much happiness out of heaven was to be had only in the commission of +a capital sin. But, like most people whose consciences are stronger than +their intellects, she found great consolation in taking refuge under the +wing of ecclesiastical authority. To be married by a presiding elder was +the best thing in the world next to being married by a bishop. + +Whatever fear of the swift-coming judgment others might have felt, the +benignant old elder was at peace. Common-sense, a clean conscience, and +a child-like faith enlightened his countenance, and since he tried to be +always ready, and since his meditations made the things of the other +life ever present, his pulse would scarcely have quickened if he had +felt sure that the archangel's trump would sound in an hour. He neither +felt the subdued fear shown on the countenance of Cynthy Ann, nor the +strong skeptical opposition of Andrew, whose face of late had grown +almost into a sneer. + +"Do you take this woman to be your lawful and wedded wife--" + +And before the elder could finish it, Jonas blurted out, "You'd better +believe I do, my friend." + +And then when the old man smiled and finished his question down to, "so +long as ye both shall live," Jonas responded eagerly, "Tell death er the +jedgment-day, long or short." + +And Cynthy Ann answered demurely out of her frightened but too happy +heart, and the old man gave them his benediction in an apostolic fashion +that removed Cynthy Ann's scruples, and smoothed a little of the +primness out of her face, so that she almost smiled when Jonas said, +"Well! it's done now, and it can't be undone fer all the Goshorns in +Christendom er creation!" + +And then the old gentleman--for he was a gentleman, though he had always +been a backwoodsman--spoke of the excitement, and said that it was best +always to be ready--to be ready to live, and then you would be ready for +death or the judgment. That very night the end might come, but it was +not best to trouble one's self about it. And he smiled, and said that it +was none of his business, God could manage the universe; it was for him +to be found doing his duty as a faithful servant. And then it would be +just like stepping out of one door into another, whenever death or the +judgment should come. + +While the old man was getting ready to leave, Julia and August slipped +away, fearing lest their absence should be discovered. But the +peacefulness of the old elder's face had entered into their souls, and +they wished that they too were solemnly pronounced man and wife, with so +sweet a benediction upon their union. + +"I do not feel much anxious about the day of judgment or the +millennium," said August, whose idiom was sometimes a little broken. +"When I was so near dying I felt satisfied to die after you had kissed +my lips. But now that it seems we have come upon the world's last days, +I wish I were married to you. I do not know how things will be in the +new heaven and the new earth. But I should like you to be my wife there, +or at least to have been my wife on earth, if only for one hour." + +And then he proposed that they should be made man and wife now in the +world's last hour. It was not wrong. It could not give her mother +heart-disease, for she would not know of it till she should hear it in +the land where there are neither marriages nor sickness. Julia could not +see any sin in her disobedience under such circumstances. She did so +much want to go into the New Jerusalem as the wedded wife of August "the +grand," as she fondly called him. + +And so in the stillness of that awful night they walked back to Andrew's +castle, and found the venerable preacher, with saddle-bags on his arm, +ready to mount his horse, for the presiding elder of that day had no +leisure time. Jonas and Cynthy stood bidding him good-by. And the old +man was saying again that if we were always ready it would be like +stepping from one door into another. But he thought it as wrong to waste +time gazing up into heaven to see Christ come, as it had been to gaze +after Him when He went away. Even Jonas's voice was a little softened by +the fearful thought ever present of the coming on of that awful midnight +of the eleventh of August. All were surprised to see the two young +people come back. + +"Father Williams," said August, "we thought we should like to go into +the New Jerusalem man and wife. Will you marry us?" + +"Sensible to the last!" cried Jonas. + +"According to the laws of this State," said Mr. Williams, "you can not +be married without a license from the clerk of the county. Have you +a license?" + +"No," said August, his heart sinking. + +Just then Andrew came up and inquired what the conversation was about. + +"Why, Uncle Andrew," said Julia eagerly, "August and I don't want the +end of the world to come without being man and wife. And we have no +license, and August could not go seven miles and back to get a license +before midnight. It is too bad, isn't it? If it wasn't that we think the +end of the world is so near, I should be ashamed to say how much I want +to be married. But I shall be proud to have been August's wife, when I +am among the angels." + +"You are a noble woman," said Andrew. "Come in, let us see if anything +can be done." And he led the way, smiling. + + + +CHAPTER XLII. + +FOR EVER AND EVER. + +When they had all re-entered the castle, Andrew made them sit down. The +old minister did not see any escape from the fatal obstacle of a lack of +license, but Andrew was very mysterious. + +"Virtue is its own reward," said the Philosopher, "but it often finds an +incidental reward besides. Now, Julia, you are the noblest woman in +these degenerate times, according to my way of thinking." + +"That's true as preachin', ef you'll except one," chirped Jonas, with a +significant look at his Cynthy Ann. Julia blushed, and the old minister +looked inquiringly at Andrew and at Julia. This exaggerated praise from +a man so misanthropic as Andrew excited his curiosity. + +"Without exception," said Andrew emphatically, looking first at Jonas, +then at Mr. Williams, "my niece is the noblest woman I ever knew." + +"Please don't, Uncle Andrew!" begged Julia, almost speechless with +shame. Praise was something she could not bear. She was inured +to censure. + +"Do you remember that dark night--of course you do--when you braved +everything and came here to see August, who would have died but for your +coming?" Andrew was now looking at Julia, who answered him almost +inaudibly. + +"And do you remember when we got to your gate, on your return, what you +said to me?" + +"Yes, sir," said Julia. + +"To be sure you do, and" (turning to August) "I shall never forget her +words; she said, If he should get worse, I should like him to die my +husband, if he wishes it. Send for me, day or night, and I will come in +spite of everything." + +"Did you say that?" asked August, looking at her eagerly. + +And Julia nodded her head, and lifted her eyes, glistening with brimming +tears, to his. + +"You do not know," said Andrew to the preacher, "how much her proposal +meant, for you do not know through what she would have had to pass. But +I say that God does sometimes reward virtue in this world--a world not +quite worn out yet--and she is worthy of the reward in store for her." + +Saying this, Andrew went into the closet leading to his secret +stairway--secret no longer, since Julia had ascended by that way--and +soon came down from his library with a paper in his hand. + +"When you, my noble-hearted niece, proposed to make any sacrifice to +marry this studious, honest, true-hearted German gentleman, who is +worthy of you, if any man can be, I thought best to be ready for any +emergency, and so I went the next day and procured the license, the +clerk promising to keep my secret. A marriage-license is good for thirty +days. You will see, Mr. Williams, that this has not quite expired." + +The minister looked at it and then said, "I depend on your judgment, +Mr. Anderson. There seems to be something peculiar about the +circumstances of this marriage." + +"Very peculiar," said Andrew. + +"You give me your word, then, that it is a marriage I ought to +solemnize?" + +"The lady is my niece," said Andrew. "The marriage, taking place in this +castle, will shed more glory upon it than its whole history beside; and +you, sir, have never performed a marriage ceremony in a case where the +marriage was so excellent as this." + +"Except the last one," put in Jonas. + +I suppose Mr. Williams made the proper reductions for Andrew's +enthusiasm. But he was satisfied, and perhaps he was rather inclined to +be satisfied, for gentle-hearted old men are quite susceptible to a +romantic situation. + +When he asked August if he would live with this woman in holy matrimony +"so long as ye both shall live," August, thinking the two hours of time +left to him too short for the earnestness of his vows, looked the old +minister in the eyes, and said solemnly: "For ever and ever!" + +"No, my son," said the old man, smiling and almost weeping, "that is not +the right answer. I like your whole-hearted love. But it is far easier +to say 'for ever and ever,' standing as you think you do now on the +brink of eternity, than to say 'till death do us part,' looking down a +long and weary road of toil and sickness and poverty and change and +little vexations. You do not only take this woman, young and blooming, +but old and sick and withered and wearied, perhaps. Do you take her +for any lot?" + +"For any lot," said August solemnly and humbly. + +And Julia, on her part, could only bow her head in reply to the +questions, for the tears chased one another down her cheeks. And then +came the benediction. The inspired old man, full of hearty sympathy, +stretched his trembling hands with apostolic solemnity over the heads of +the two, and said slowly, with solemn pauses, as the words welled up out +of his soul: "The peace of God--that passeth all understanding" (here +his voice melted with emotion)--"keep your hearts--and minds--in the +knowledge and love of God.--And now, may grace--mercy--and peace from +God--_the Father_--and _our_ Lord Jesus Christ--be with +you--evermore--Amen!" And to the imagination of Julia the Spirit of God +descended like a dove into her heart, and the great mystery of wifely +love and the other greater mystery of love to God seemed to flow +together in her soul. And the quieter spirit of August was suffused with +a great peace. + +They soon left the castle to return to the mount of ascension, but they +walked slowly, and at first silently, over the intervening hill, which +gave them a view of the Ohio River, sleeping in its indescribable beauty +and stillness in the moonlight. + +Presently they heard the melodious voice of the old presiding elder, +riding up the road a little way off, singing the hopeful hymns in which +he so much delighted. The rich and earnest voice made the woods ring +with one verse of + + "Oh! how happy are they + Who the Saviour obey, + And have laid up their treasure above I + Tongue can never express + The sweet comfort and peace + Of a soul in its earliest love." + +And then he broke into Watts's + + "When I can read my title clear + To mansions in the skies, + I'll bid farewell to every fear + And wipe my weeping eyes!" + +There seemed to be some accord between the singing of the brave old man +and the peacefulness of the landscape. Soon he had reached the last +stanza, and in tones of subdued but ecstatic triumph he sang: + + "There I shall bathe my weary soul + In seas of heavenly rest, + And not a wave of trouble roll + Across my peaceful breast." + +And with these words he passed round the hill and out of the hearing of +the young people. + +"August," said Julia slowly, as if afraid to break a silence so blessed, +"August, it seems to me that the sky and the river and the hazy hills +and my own soul are all alike, just as full of happiness and peace as +they can be." + +"Yes," said August, smiling, "but the sky is clear, and your eyes are +raining, Julia. But can it be possible that God, who made this world so +beautiful, will burn it up to-night? It used to seem a hard world to me +when I was away from you, and I didn't care how quickly it burned up. +But now--" + +Somehow August forgot to finish that sentence. Words are of so little +use under such circumstances. A little pressure on Julia's arm which was +in his, told all that he meant. When love makes earth a heaven, it +is enough. + +"But how beautiful the new earth will be," said Julia, still looking at +the sleeping river, "the river of life will be clear as crystal!" + +"Yes," said August, "the Spanish version says, 'Most resplendent, like +unto crystal.'" + +"I think," said Julia, "that it must be something like this river. The +trees of life will stand on either side, like those great sycamores that +lean over the water so gracefully." + +Any landscape would have seemed heavenly to Julia on this night. A +venerable friend of mine, a true Christian philanthropist, whose praise +is in all the churches, wants me to undertake to reform fictitious +literature by leaving out the love. And so I may when God reforms His +universe by leaving out the love. Love is the best thing in novels; not +until love is turned out of heaven will I help turn it out of +literature. It is only the misrepresentation of love in literature that +is bad, as the poisoning of love in life is bad. It was the love of +August that had opened Julia's heart to the influences of heaven, and +Julia was to August a mediator of God's grace. + +By eleven o'clock August Wehle and his wife--it gives me nearly as much +pleasure as it did August to use that locution--were standing not far +away from the surging crowd of those who, in singing hymns and in +excited prayer, were waiting for the judgment. Jonas and Cynthy and +Andrew were with them. August, though not a recognized Millerite, almost +blamed himself that he should have been away these two hours from the +services. But why should he? The most sacramental of all the sacraments +is marriage. Is it not an arbitrary distinction of theologians, that +which makes two rites to be sacraments and others not? But if the +distinction is to be made at all, I should apply the solemn word to the +solemnest rite and the holiest ordinance of God's, even if I left out +the sacred washing in the name of the Trinity and the broken emblematic +bread and the wine. These are sacramental in their solemn symbolism, +that in the solemnest symbolism and the holiest reality. + +August's whole attention was now turned toward the coming judgment; and +as he stood thinking of the awfulness of this critical moment, the +exercises of the Adventists grated on the deep peacefulness of his +spirit, for from singing their more beautiful hymns, they had passed to +an excited shouting of the old camp-meeting ditty whose refrain is: + +"I hope to shout glory when this world's all on fire! Hallelujah!" + +He and Julia hung back a moment, but Mrs. Abigail, who had recovered +from her tenth trance, and had been for some time engaged in an active +search for Julia, now pounced upon her, and bore her off, before she had +time to think, to the place of the hottest excitement. + + + +CHAPTER XLIII. + +THE MIDNIGHT ALARM. + +At last the time drew on toward midnight, the hour upon which all +expectation was concentrated. For did not the Parable of the Ten Virgins +speak of the coming of the bridegroom at midnight? + +"My friends and brethren," said Elder Hankins, his voice shaking with +emotion, as he held his watch up in the moonlight, "My friends and +brethren, ef the Word is true, they is but five minutes more before the +comin' in of the new dispensation. Let us spend the last moments of time +in silent devotion." + +"I wonder ef he thinks the world runs down by his pay-tent-leever +watch?" said Jonas, who could not resist the impulse to make the remark, +even with the expectation of the immediate coming of the day of judgment +in his mind. + +"I wonder for what longitude he calculates prophecy?" said Andrew. "It +can not be midnight all round the world at the same moment." + +But Elder Hankins's flock did not take any astronomical difficulty into +consideration. And no spectator could look upon them, bowing silently in +prayer, awed by the expectation of the sudden coming of the Lord, +without feeling that, however much the expectation might be illusory, +the emotion was a fact absolutely awful. Events are only sublime as they +move the human soul, and the swift-coming end of time was subjectively a +great reality to these waiting people. Even Andrew was awe-stricken from +sympathy; as Coleridge, when he stood godfather for Keble's child, was +overwhelmed with a sense of the significance of the sacrament from +Keble's stand-point. As for Cynthy Ann, she trembled with fear as she +held fast to the arm of Jonas. And Jonas felt as much seriousness as was +possible to him, until he heard Norman Anderson's voice crying with +terror and excitement, and felt Cynthy shudder on his arm. + +"For my part," said Jonas, turning to Andrew, "it don't seem like as ef +it was much use to holler and make a furss about the corn crap when +October's fairly sot in, and the frost has nipped the blades. All the +plowin' and hoein' and weedin' and thinnin' out the suckers won't, +better the yield then. An' when wheat's ripe, they's nothin' to be done +fer it. It's got to be rep jest as it stan's. I'm rale sorry, to-night, +as my life a'n't no better, but what's the use of cryin' over it? They's +nothin' to do now but let it be gethered and shelled out, and measured +up in the standard half-bushel of the sanctuary. And I'm afeard they'll +be a heap of nubbins not wuth the shuckin'. But ef it don't come to six +bushels the acre, I can't help it now by takin' on." + +At twelve o'clock, even the scoffers were silent. But as the sultry +night drew on toward one o'clock, Bill Day and his party felt their +spirits revive a little. The calculation had failed in one part, and it +might in all. Bill resumed his burlesque exhortations to the +rough-looking "brethren" about him. He tried to lead them in singing +some ribald parody of Adventist hymns, but his terror and theirs was +too genuine, and their voices died down into husky whispers, and they +were more alarmed than ever at discovering the extent of their own +demoralization. The bottle, one of those small-necked, big-bodied +quart-bottles that Western topers carry in yellow-cotton handkerchiefs, +was passed round. But even the whisky seemed powerless to neutralize +their terror, rather increasing the panic by fuddling their faculties. + +"Boys!" said Bob Short, trembling, and sitting down on a stump, +"this--this ere thing--is a gittin' serious. Ef--well, ef it _was_ to +happen--you know--you don't s'pose--ahem--you don't think God A'mighty +would be _too_ heavy on a feller. Do ye? Ef it was to come to-night, it +would be blamed short notice." + +At one o'clock the moon was just about dipping behind the hills, and the +great sycamores, standing like giant sentinels on the river's marge, +cast long unearthly shadows across the water, which grew blacker every +minute. The deepening gloom gave all objects in the river valley a +weird, distorted look. This oppressed August. The landscape seemed an +enchanted one, a something seen in a dream or a delirium. It was as +though the change had already come, and the real tangible world had +passed away. He was the more susceptible from the depression caused by +the hot sultriness of the night, and his separation from Julia. + +He thought he would try to penetrate the crowd to the point where his +mother was; then he would be near her, and nearer to Julia if anything +happened. A curious infatuation had taken hold of August. He knew that +it was an infatuation, but he could not shake it off. He had resolved +that in case the trumpet should be heard in the heavens, he would seize +Julia and claim her in the very moment of universal dissolution. He +reached his mother, and as he looked into her calm face, ready for the +millennium or for anything else "the Father" should decree, he thought +she had never seemed more glorious than she did now, sitting with her +children about her, almost unmoved by the excitement. For Mrs. Wehle had +come to take everything as from the Heavenly Father. She had even +received honest but thick-headed Gottlieb in this spirit, when he had +fallen to her by the Moravian lot, a husband chosen for her by the Lord, +whose will was not to be questioned. + +August was just about to speak to his mother, when he was forced to hang +his head in shame, for there was his father rising to exhort. + +"O mine freunde! pe shust immediadely all of de dime retty. Ton't led +your vait vail already, and ton't let de debil git no unter holts on ye. +Vatch and pe retty!" + +And August could hear the derisive shouts of Bill Day's party, who had +recovered their courage, crying out, "Go it, ole Dutchman! I'll bet on +you!" He clenched his fist in anger, but his mother's eyes, looking at +him with quiet rebuke, pacified him in a moment. Yet he could not help +wondering whether blundering kinsfolk made people blush in the +next world. + +"Holt on doo de last ent!" continued Gottlieb. "It's pout goom! Kood +pye, ole moon! You koes town, you nebber gooms pack no more already." + +This exhortation might have proceeded in this strain indefinitely, to +the mortification of August and the amusement of the profane, had there +not just at that moment broken upon the sultry stillness of the night +one of those crescendo thunder-bursts, beginning in a distant rumble, +and swelling out louder and still louder, until it ended with a +tremendous detonation. In the strange light of the setting moon, while +everybody's attention was engrossed by the excitement, the swift +oncoming of a thunder-cloud had not been observed by any but Andrew, and +it had already climbed half-way to the zenith, blotting out a third of +the firmament. This inverted thunder-bolt produced a startling effect +upon the over-strained nerves of the crowd. Some cried out with terror, +some sobbed with hysterical agony, some shouted in triumph, and it was +generally believed that Virginia Waters, who died a maniac many years +afterward, lost her reason at that moment. Bill Day ceased his mocking, +and shook till his teeth chattered. And none of his party dared laugh at +him. The moon had now gone, and the vivid lightning followed the +thunder, and yet louder and more fearful thunder succeeded the +lightning. The people ran about as if demented, and Julia was left +alone. August had only one thought in all this confusion, and that was +to find Julia. Having found her, they clasped hands, and stood upon the +brow of the hill calmly watching the coming tempest, believing it to be +the coming of the end. Between the claps of thunder they could hear the +broken sentences of Elder Hankins, saying something about the lightning +that shineth from one part of heaven to the other, and about the +promised coming in the clouds. But they did not much heed the words. +They were looking the blinding lightning in the face, and in their +courageous trust they thought themselves ready to look into the flaming +countenance of the Almighty, if they should be called before Him. Every +fresh burst of thunder seemed to August to be the rocking of the world, +trembling in the throes of dissolution. But the world might crumble or +melt; there is something more enduring than the world. August felt the +everlastingness of love; as many another man in a supreme crisis +has felt it. + +But the swift cloud had already covered half the sky, and the bursts of +thunder followed one another now in quicker succession. And as suddenly +as the thunder had come, came the wind. A solitary old sycamore, leaning +over the water on the Kentucky shore, a mile away, was first to fall. In +the lurid darkness, August and Julia saw it meet its fate. Then the rail +fences on the nearer bank were scattered like kindling-wood, and some of +the sturdy old apple-trees of the orchard in the river-bottom were +uprooted, while others were stripped of their boughs. Julia clung to +August and said something, but he could only see her lips move; her +voice was drowned by the incessant roar of the thunder. And then the +hurricane struck them, and they half-ran and were half-carried down the +rear slope of the hill. Now they saw for the first time that the people +were gone. The instinct of self-preservation had proven stronger than +their fanaticism, and a contagious panic had carried them into a +hay-barn near by. + +Not knowing where the rest had gone, August and Julia only thought of +regaining the castle. They found the path blocked by fallen trees, and +it was slow and dangerous work, waiting for flashes of lightning to show +them their road. In making a long detour they lost the path. After some +minutes, in a lull in the thunder, August heard a shout, which he +answered, and presently Philosopher Andrew appeared with a lantern, his +grizzled hair and beard flying in the wind. + +"What ho, my friends!" he cried. "This is the way you go to heaven +together! You'll live through many a storm yet!" + +Guided by his thorough knowledge of the ground, they had almost reached +the castle, when they were startled by piteous cries. Leaving August +with Julia, Andrew climbed a fence, and went down into a ravine to find +poor Bill Day in an agony of terror, crying out in despair, believing +that the day of doom had already come, and that he was about to be sent +into well-deserved perdition. Andrew stooped over him with his lantern, +but the poor fellow, giving one look at the shaggy face, shrieked madly, +and rushed away into the woods. + +"I believe," said the Philosopher, when he got back to August, "I +believe he took me for the devil." + + + +CHAPTER XLIV. + +SQUARING ACCOUNTS. + +The summer storm had spent itself by daylight, and the sun rose on that +morning after the world's end much as it had risen on other mornings, +but it looked down upon prostrate trees and scattered fences and +roofless barns. And the minds of the people were in much the same +disheveled state as the landscape. One simple-minded girl was a maniac. +Some declared that the world had ended, and that this was the new earth, +if people only had faith to receive it; some still waited for the end, +and with some the reaction from credulity had already set in, a reaction +that carried them into the blankest atheism and boldest immorality. +People who had spent the summer in looking for a change that would +relieve them from all responsibility, now turned reluctantly +toward the commonplace drudgery of life. It is the evil of all +day-dreaming--day-dreaming about the other world included--that it +unfits us for duty in this world of tangible and inevitable facts. + +It was nearly daylight when Andrew and August and Julia reached the +castle. The Philosopher advised Julia to go home, and for the present +to let the marriage be as though it were not. August dreaded to see +Julia returned to her mother's tyranny, but Andrew was urgent in his +advice, and Julia said that she must not leave her mother in her +trouble. Julia reached home a little after daylight, and a little before +Mrs. Anderson was brought home in a fit of hysterics. + +Poor Mrs. Abigail still hoped that the end of the world for which she +had so fondly prepared would come, but as the days wore on she sank into +a numb despondency. When she thought of the loss of her property, she +groaned and turned her face to the wall. And Samuel Anderson sat about +the house in a dumb and shiftless attitude, as do most men upon whom +financial ruin comes in middle life. The disappointment of his faith and +the overthrow of his fortune had completely paralyzed him. He was +waiting for something, he hardly knew what. He had not even his wife's +driving voice to stimulate him to exertion. + +There was no one now to care for Mrs. Anderson but Julia, for Cynthy had +taken up her abode in the log-cabin which Jonas had bought, and a +happier housekeeper never lived. She watched Jonas till he disappeared +when he went to work in the morning, she carried him a "snack" at ten +o'clock, and headways found her standing "like a picter" at the gate, +when he came home to dinner. But Cynthy Ann generally spent her +afternoons at Anderson's, helping "that young thing" to bear her +responsibilities, though Mrs. Anderson would receive no personal +attentions now from any one but her daughter. She did not scold; her +querulous restlessness was but a reminiscence of her scolding. She lay, +disheartened, watching Julia, and exacting everything from Julia, and +the weary feet and weary heart of the girl almost sank under her +burdens. Mrs. Anderson had suddenly fallen from her position of an +exacting tyrant to that of an exacting and helpless infant. She followed +Julia with her eyes in a broken-spirited fashion, as if fearing that she +would leave her. Julia could read the fear in her mother's countenance; +she understood what her mother meant when she said querulously, "You'll +get married and leave me." If Mrs. Anderson had assumed her old +high-handed manner, it would have been easy for Julia to have declared +her secret. But how could she tell her now? It would be a blow, it might +be a fatal blow. And at the same time how could she satisfy August? He +thought she had bowed to the same old tyranny again for an indefinite +time. But she could not forsake her parents in their poverty and +afflictions. + +The fourteenth of August, the day on which possession was to have been +given to Bob Walker, came and went, but no Bob Walker appeared. A week +more passed, in which Samuel Anderson could not muster enough courage to +go to see Walker, in which Samuel Anderson and his wife waited in a +vague hope that something might happen. And every day of that week Julia +had a letter from August, which did not say one word of the trial that +it was for him to wait, but which said much of the wrong Julia was doing +to herself to submit so long. And Julia, like her father and mother, was +waiting for she knew not what. + +At last the suspense became to her unendurable. + +"Father," she said, "why don't you go to see Bob Walker? You might buy +the farm back again." + +"I don't know why he don't come and take it," said Mr. Anderson +dejectedly. + +This conversation roused Mrs. Abigail. There was some hope. She got up +in bed, and told Samuel to go to the county-seat and see if the deeds +had ever been recorded. And while her husband was gone she sat up and +looked better, and even scolded a little, so that Julia felt encouraged. +But she dreaded to see her father come back. + +Samuel Anderson entered the house on his return with a blank +countenance. Sitting down, he put his face between his hands a minute in +utter dejection. + +"Why don't you speak?" said Mrs. Anderson in a broken voice. + +"The land was all transferred to Andrew immediately, and he owns every +foot of it. He must have sent Bob Walker here to buy it." + +"Oh! I'm so glad!" cried Julia. + +But her mother only gave her one reproachful look and went off into +hysterical sobbing and crying over the wrong that Andrew had done her. +And all that night Julia watched by her mother, while Samuel Anderson +sat in dejection by the bed. As for Norman, he had quickly relapsed into +his old habits, and his former cronies had generously forgiven him his +temporary piety, considering the peculiar circumstances of the case some +extenuation. Now that there was trouble in the house he staid away, +which was a good thing so far as it went. + +The next afternoon Mrs. Anderson rallied a little, and, looking at +Julia, she said in her querulous way, "Why don't you go and see him?" + +"Who?" said Julia with a shiver, afraid that her mother was insane. + +"Andrew." + +Julia did not need any second hint. Leaving her mother with Cynthy, she +soon presented herself at the door of the castle. + +"Did _she_ send you?" asked Andrew dryly. + +"Yes, sir." + +"I've been expecting you for a long time. I'll go back with you. But +August must go along. He'll be glad of an excuse to see your face again. +You look thin, my poor girl." + +They went past Wehle's, and August was only too glad to join them, +rejoicing that some sort of a crisis had come, though how it was to help +him he did not know. With the restlessness of a man looking for some +indefinable thing to turn up, Samuel was out on the porch waiting the +return of his daughter. Jonas had come for Cynthy Ann, and was sitting +on a "shuck-bottom" chair in front of the house. + +Andrew reached out his hand and greeted his brother cordially, and spoke +civilly to Abigail. Then there was a pause, and Mrs. Anderson turned her +head to the wall and groaned. After a while she looked round and saw +August. A little of her old indignation came into her eyes as she +whimpered, "What did _he_ come for?" + +"I brought him," said Andrew. + +"Well, it's your house, do as you please. I suppose you'll turn us out +of our own home now." + +"As you did me," said the Philosopher, smiling. "Let me remind you that +I was living on the river farm. My father had promised it to me, and +given me possession. A week before his death you got the will changed, +by what means you know. You turned me off the farm which had virtually +been mine for two years. If I turn you off now, it will be no more +than fair." + +There was a look of pained surprise on Julia's face. She had not known +that the wrong her uncle had suffered was so great. She had not thought +that he would be so severe as to turn her father out. + +"I don't want to talk of these things," Andrew went on. "I ought to +have broken the will, but I was not a believer in the law. I tell this +story now because I must justify myself to these young people for what I +am going to do. You have had the use of that part of the estate which +was rightfully mine for twenty years. I suppose I may claim it all now." + +Julia's eyes looked at him pleadingly. + +"Why don't you send us off and be done with it then?" said Mrs. Abigail, +rising up and resuming her old vehemence. "You set out to ruin us, and +now you've done it. A nice brother you are! Ruining us by a conspiracy +with Bob Walker, and then sitting here and trying to make my own +daughter think you did right, and bringing that hateful fellow here to +hear it!" Her finger was leveled at August. + +"I am glad to see you are better, Abigail. I wanted to be sure you were +strong enough to bear all I have to say." + +"Say your worst and do your worst, you cruel, cruel man! I have borne +enough from you in these years, and now you can say and do what you +please; you can't do me any more harm. I suppose I must leave my old +home that I've lived in so long." + +"You need not worry yourself about leaving; that's what I came over to +say." + +"As if I'd stay in _your_ house an hour! I'll not take any favors at +_your_ hand." + +"Don't be rash, Abigail. I have deeded this hill farm to Samuel, and +here is the deed. I have given you back the best half of the property, +just what my father meant you to have. I have only kept the river land, +that should have been mine twenty years ago. I hope you will not stick +to your resolution not to receive anything at my hand." + +And Julia said: "Oh! I'm so--" + +But Mrs. Anderson had a convenient fit of hysterics, crying piteously. +Meantime Samuel gladly accepted the deed. + +"The deed is already recorded. I sent it down yesterday as soon as I saw +Samuel come back, and I got it back this morning. The farm is yours +without condition." + +This relieved Abigail, and she soon ceased her sobbing. Andrew could not +take it back then, whatever she might say. + +"Now," said Andrew, "I have only divided the farms without claiming any +damages. I want to ask a favor. Let Julia marry the man of her choice +in peace." + +"You have taken one farm, and therefore I must let my daughter marry a +man with nothing but his two hands," sobbed Mrs. Anderson. + +"Two hands and a good head and a noble heart," said Andrew. + +"Well, I won't consent," said she. "If Julia marries _him_," pointing to +August, "she will marry without my consent, and he will not get a cent +of the money he's after. Not a red cent!" + +"I don't want your money. I did not know you'd get your farm back, for I +did not know but that Walker owned it, and I--wanted--Julia all the +same." August had almost told that he had married Julia. + +"Wanted her and married her," said Andrew. "And I have not kept a +corn-stalk of the property I got from you. I have given Bob Walker a +ten-acre patch for his services, and all the rest I have deeded to the +two best people I know. This August Wehle married Julia Anderson when +they thought the world might be near its end, and believing that, at any +rate, she would not have a penny in the world. I have deeded the river +farm to August Wehle and his wife." + +"Married, eh? Come and ask my consent afterwards? That's a fine way!" +And Abigail grew white and grew silent with passion. + +"Come, August, I want to show you and Julia something," said Andrew. He +really wanted to give Abigail time to look the matter in the face +quietly before she committed herself too far. But he told the two young +people that they might make their home with him while their house was in +building. He had already had part of the material drawn, and from the +brow of the hill they looked down upon the site he had chosen near the +old tumble-down tenant's house. But Andrew saw that Julia looked +disappointed. + +"You are not satisfied, my brave girl. What is the matter?" + +"Oh! yes, I am very happy, and very thankful to you; and next to August +I love you more than anybody--except my parents." + +"But something is different to what you wished it. Doesn't the site suit +you? You can look off on to the river from the rise on which the house +will stand, and I do not know how it could be better." + +"It couldn't be better," said Julia, "but--' + +"But what? You must tell me." + +"I thought maybe you'd let us live at the castle and take the burden of +things off you. I should like to keep your house for you, just to show +you how much I love my dear, good uncle." + +Even an anchorite could not help feeling a pleasure at such a speech +from such a young woman, and this shaggy, solitary, misanthropic but +tender-hearted man felt a sudden rush of pleasure. August saw it, and +was delighted. What one's nearest friend thinks of one's wife is a vital +question, and August was happier at this moment than he had ever been. +Andrew's pleasure at Julia's loving speech was the climax. + +"Yes!" said the Philosopher, a little huskily. "You want to sacrifice +your pleasure by living in my gloomy old castle, and civilizing an old +heathen like me. You mustn't tempt me too far." + +"I don't see why you call it gloomy. It wasn't only for your sake that I +said it. I think it is the nicest old house I ever saw. And then the +books, and--and--you." Julia stumbled a little, she was not accustomed +to make speeches of this sort. + +"You flatterer!" burst out Andrew. "But no, you must have your own +house." + +Mrs. Anderson, on her part, had concluded to make the best of it. Julia +already married and the mistress of the Anderson river farm was quite a +different thing from Julia under her thumb. She was to be conciliated. +Besides, Mrs. Anderson did not want Julia's prosperity to be a lifelong +source of humiliation to her. She must take some stock in it at +the start. + +"Jule," she said, as her daughter re-entered the door, "I can let you +have two feather-beds and four pillows, and a good stock of linen and +blankets. And you can have the two heifers and the sorrel colt." + +The two "heifers" were six, and the sorrel "colt" was seven years of +age; but descriptive names often outlive the qualities to which they +owed their origin. Just as a judge is even yet addressed as "your +honor," and many a governor without anything to recommend him hears +himself called "your excellency." + +When Abigail surrendered in this graceful fashion, Julia was touched, +and was on the point of putting her arms around her mother and kissing +her. But Mrs. Anderson was not a person easily caressed, and Julia did +not yield to her impulse. + +"Cynthy Ann, my dear," said Jonas, as they walked home that evening, "do +you know what Abig'il Anderson reminds me of?" + +No; Cynthy Ann didn't exactly know. In fact, it would have been +difficult for anybody to have told what anything was likely to remind +Jonas of. There was no knowing what a thing might not suggest to him. + +"Well, Cynthy, my Imperial Sweetness, when I see Abig'il come down so +beautiful, it reminded me of a little fice-t dog I had when I was a +leetle codger. I called him Pick. His name was Picayune. Purty good +name, wasn't it?" + +"Yes, it was." + +"Well, now, that air little Pick wouldn't never own up as he was driv +outen the house. When he was whipped out, he wouldn't never tuck his +tail down, but curl it up over his back, and run acrost the yard and +through the fence and down the road a-barkin' fit to kill. Wanted to let +on like as ef he'd run out of his own accord, with malice aforethought, +you know. _That's_ Abig'il." + + + +CHAPTER XLV. + +NEW PLANS. + +Except Abigail Anderson and one other person, everybody in the little +world of Clark township approved mightily the justice and +disinterestedness of Andrew. He had righted himself and Julia at a +stroke, and people dearly love to have justice dealt out when it is not +at their own expense. Samuel, who cherished in secret a great love for +his daughter, was more than pleased that affairs had turned out in this +way. But there was one beside Abigail who was not wholly satisfied. +August spent half the night in protesting in vain against Andrew's +transfer of the river-farm to him. But Andrew said he had a right to +give away his own if he chose. And there was no turning him. For if +August refused a share in it, he would give it to Julia, and if she +refused it, he would find somebody who would accept it. + +The next day after the settlement at Samuel Anderson's, August came to +claim his wife. Mrs. Abigail had now employed a "help" in Cynthy Ann's +place, and Julia could be spared. August had refused all invitations to +take up his temporary residence with Julia's parents. The house had +unpleasant associations in his mind, and he wanted to relieve Julia at +once and forever from a despotism to which she could not offer any +effectual resistance. Mrs. Anderson had eagerly loaded the wagon with +feather-beds and other bridal property, and sent it over to the castle, +that Julia might appear to leave with her blessing. She kissed Julia +tenderly, and hoped she'd have a happy life, and told her that if her +husband should ever lose his property or treat her badly--such things +_may_ happen, you know--then she would always find a home with her +mother. Julia thanked her for the offer of a refuge to which she never +meant to flee under any circumstances. And yet one never turns away from +one's home without regret, and Julia looked back with tears in her eyes +at the chattering swifts whose nests were in the parlor chimney, and at +the pee-wee chirping on the gate-post. The place had entered into her +life. It looked lonesome now, but within a year afterward Norman +suddenly married Betsey Malcolm. Betsey's child had died soon after its +birth, and Mrs. Anderson set herself to manage both Norman and his wife, +who took up their abode with her. Nothing but a reign of terror could +have made either of them of any account, but Mrs. Anderson furnished +them this in any desirable quantity. They were never of much worth, even +under her management, but she kept them in bounds, so that Norman ceased +to get drunk more than five or six times a year, and Betsey flirted but +little and at her peril. + +Once the old house was out of sight, there were no shadows on Julia's +face as she looked forward toward the new life. She walked in a still +happiness by August as they went down through Shady Hollow. August had +intended to show her a letter that he had from the mud-clerk, +describing the bringing of Humphreys back to Paducah and his execution +by a mob. But there was something so repelling in the gusto with which +the story was told, and the story was so awful in itself, that he could +not bear to interrupt the peaceful happiness of this hour by saying +anything about it. + +August proposed to Julia that they should take a path through the meadow +of the river-farm--their own farm now--and see the foundation of the +little cottage Andrew had begun for them. And so in happiness they +walked on through the meadow-path to the place on which their home was +to stand. But, alas! there was not a stick of timber left. Every +particle of the material had been removed. It seemed that some great +disappointment threatened them at the moment of their happiness. They +hurried on in silent foreboding to the castle, but there the mystery was +explained. + +"I told you not to tempt me too far," said Andrew. "See! I have +concluded to build an addition to the castle and let you civilize me. We +will live together and I will reform. This lonely life is not healthy, +and now that I have children, why should I not let them live here +with me?" + +Julia looked happy. I have no authentic information in regard to the +exact words which she made use of to express her joy, but from what is +known of girls of her age in general, it is safe to infer that she +exclaimed, "Oh! I'm so glad!" + +While Andrew stood there smiling, with Julia near him, August having +gone to the assistance of the carpenters in a matter demanding a little +more ingenuity than they possessed, Jonas came up and drew the +Philosopher aside. Julia could not hear what was said, but she saw +Andrew's brow contract. + +"I'll shoot as sure as they come!" he said with passion. "I won't have +my niece or August insulted in my house by a parcel of vagabonds." + +"O Uncle Andrew! is it a shiveree?" asked Julia. + +"Yes." + +"Well, don't shoot. It'll be so funny to have a shiveree." + +"But it is an insult to you and to August and to me. This is meant +especially to be an expression of their feeling toward August as a +German, though really their envy of his good fortune has much to do with +it. It is a second edition of the riot of last spring, in which Gottlieb +came so near to being killed. Now, I mean to do my country service by +leaving one or two less of them alive if they come here to-night." For +Andrew was full of that destructive energy so characteristic of the +Western and Southern people. + +"Oh! no, don't shoot. Can't you think of some other way?" pleaded Julia. + +"Well, yes, I could get the sheriff to come and bag a few of them." + +"And that will make trouble for many years. Let me see. Can't we do +this?" And Julia rapidly unfolded to Andrew and Jonas her plan of +operations against the enemy. + +"Number one!" said Jonas. "They'll fall into that air amby-scade as sure +as shootin'. That plan is military and Christian and civilized and human +and angelical and tancy-crumptious. It ort to meet the 'proval of the +American Fish-hawk with all his pinions and talents. I'll help to +execute it, and beat the rascals or lay my bones a-bleachin' on the +desert sands of Shady Holler." + +"Well," said Andrew to Julia, "I knew, if I took you under my roof, +you'd make a Christian of me in spite of myself. And I _am_ a sort of +savage, that's a fact." + +Jonas hurried home and sent Cynthy over to the castle, and there was +much work going on that afternoon. Andrew said that the castle was being +made ready for its first siege. As night came on, Julia was in a perfect +glee. Reddened by standing over the stove, with sleeves above her elbows +and her black hair falling down upon her shoulders, she was such a +picture that August stopped and stood in the door a minute to look at +her as he came in to supper. + +"Why, Jule, how glorious you look!" he said. "I've a great mind to fall +in love with you, mein Liebchen!" + +"And I _have_ fallen in love with _you_, Caesar Augustus!" And well she +might, for surely, as he stood in the door with his well-knit frame, his +fine German forehead, his pure, refined mouth, and his clear, honest, +amiable blue eyes, he was a man to fall in love with. + + + +CHAPTER XLVI. + +THE SHIVEREE. + +If Webster's "American Dictionary of the English Language" had not been +made wholly in New England, it would not have lacked so many words that +do duty as native-born or naturalized citizens in large sections of the +United States, and among these words is the one that stands at the head +of the present chapter. I know that some disdainful prig will assure me +that it is but a corruption of the French "_charivari,"_ and so it is; +but then "_charivari_" is a corruption of the low Latin "_charivarium_" +and that is a corruption of something else, and, indeed, almost every +word is a corruption of some other word. So that there is no good reason +why "shiveree," which lives in entire unconsciousness of its French +parentage and its Latin grand-parentage, should not find its place in an +"American Dictionary." + +But while I am writing a disquisition on the etymology of the word, the +"shiveree" is mustering at Mandluff's store. Bill Day has concluded that +he is in no immediate danger of perdition, and that a man is a "blamed +fool to git skeered about his soul." Bob Short is sure the Almighty will +not be too hard on a feller, and so thinks he will go on having "a +little fun" now and then. And among the manly recreations which they +have proposed to themselves is that of shivereeing "that Dutchman, Gus +Wehle." It is the solemn opinion of the whole crowd that "no Dutchman +hadn't orter be so lucky as to git sech a beauty of a gal and a hundred +acres of bottom lands to boot." + +The members of the party were all disguised, some in one way and some in +another, though most of them had their coats inside out. They thought it +necessary to be disguised, "bekase, you know," as Bill Day expressed it, +"ole Grizzly is apt to prosecute ef he gits evidence agin you." And many +were the conjectures as to whether he would shoot or not. + +The instruments provided by this orchestra were as various as their +musical tastes. It is likely that even Mr. Jubilee Gilmore never saw +such an outfit. Bob Short had a dumb-bull, a keg with a strip of +raw-hide stretched across one end like a drum-head, while the other +remained open. A waxed cord inserted in the middle of the drum-head, and +reaching down through the keg, completed the instrument. The pulling of +the hand over this cord made a hideous bellowing, hence its name. Bill +Day had a gigantic watchman's rattle, a hickory spring on a cog-wheel. +It is called in the West, a horse-fiddle, because it is so unlike either +a horse or a fiddle. Then there were melodious tin pans and conch-shells +and tin horns. But the most deadly noise was made by Jim West, who had +two iron skillet-lids ("leds" he called them) which, when placed face to +face, and rubbed, as you have seen children rub tumblers, made a sound +discordant and deafening enough to have suggested Milton's expression +about the hinges which "grated harsh thunder." + +One of this party was a tallish man, so dressed as to look like a +hunchback, and a hunchback so tall was a most singular figure. He had +joined them in the dark, and the rest were unable to guess who it could +be, and he, for his part, would not tell. They thumped him and pushed +him, but at each attack he only leaped from the ground like a circus +clown, and made his tin horn utter so doleful a complaint as set the +party in an uproar of laughter. They could not be sure who he was, but +he was a funny fellow to have along with them at any rate. + +He was not only funny, but he was evidently fearless. For when they came +to the castle it was all dark and still. Bill Day said that it looked +"powerful juberous to him. Ole Andy meant to use shootin'-ir'ns, and +didn't want to be pestered with no lights blazin' in his eyes." But the +tall hunchback cleared the fence at a bound, and told them to come on +"ef they had the sperrit of a two-weeks-old goslin into 'em." So the +bottle was passed round, and for very shame they followed their +ungainly leader. + +"Looky here, boys," said the hunchback, "they's one way that we can fix +it so's ole Grizzly can't shoot. They's a little shop-place, a sort of a +shed, agin the house, on the side next to the branch. Let's git in thar +afore we begin, and he can't shoot." + +The orchestra were a little stupefied with drink, and they took the idea +quickly, never stopping to ask how they could retreat if Andrew chose to +shoot. Jim West thought things looked scaly, but he warn't agoin' to +backslide arter he'd got so fur. + +When they got into Andrew's shop, where he had a new and beautiful +skiff in building, the tall hunchback shut the door, and the rest did +not notice that he put the key in his pocket. + +That serenade! Such a medley of discordant sounds, such a clatter and +clangor, such a rattle of horse-fiddle, such a bellowing of dumb-bull, +such a snorting of tin horns, such a ringing of tin pans, such a +grinding of skillet-lids! But the house remained quiet. Once Bill Day +thought that he heard a laugh within. Julia may have lost her +self-control. She was so happy, and a little unrestrained fun was so +strange a luxury! + +At last the door between the house and shop was suddenly opened, and +Julia, radiant as she could be, stood on the threshold with a candle +in her hand. + +"Come in, gentlemen." + +But the gentlemen essayed to go out. + +"Locked in, by thunder!" said Jim West, trying the outside door of the +shop. + +"We heard you were coming, gentlemen, and provided a little +entertainment. Come in!" + +"Come in, boys," said the hunchback, "don't be afeard of nobody." + +Mechanically they followed the hunchback into the room, for there was +nothing else to be done. A smell of hot coffee and the sight of a +well-spread table greeted their senses. + +"Welcome, my friends, thrice welcome!" said Andrew. "Put down your +instruments and have some supper." + +"Let me relieve you," said Julia, and she took the dumb-bull from Bob +Short and the "horse-fiddle" from Day, the tin horns and tin pans from +others, and the two skillet-lids from Jim West, who looked as sheepish +as possible. August escorted each of them to the table, though his face +did not look altogether cordial. Some old resentment for the treatment +of his father interfered with the heartiness of his hospitality. The +hunchback in this light proved to be Jonas, of course; and Bill Day +whispered to the one next to him that they had been "tuck in and done +fer that time." + +"Gentlemen," said Andrew, "we are much obliged for your music." And +Cynthy would certainly have laughed out if she had not been so perplexed +in her mind to know whether Andrew was speaking the truth. + +Such a motley set of wedding guests as they were, with their coats +inside out and their other disguises! Such a race of pied pipers! And +looking at their hangdog faces you would have said, "Such a lot of +sheep-thieves!" Though why a sheep-thief is considered to be a more +guilty-looking man than any other criminal, I do not know. Jonas looked +bright enough and ridiculous enough with his hunch. They all ate rather +heartily, for how could they resist the attentions of Cynthy Ann and the +persuasions of Julia, who poured them coffee and handed them biscuit, +and waited upon them as though they were royal guests! And, moreover, +the act of eating served to cover their confusion. + +As the meal drew to a close, Bill Day felt that he, being in some sense +the leader of the party, ought to speak. He was not quite sober, though +he could stand without much staggering. He had been trying for some time +to frame a little speech, but his faculties did not work smoothly. + +"Mr. President--I mean Mr. Anderson--permit me to offer you our pardon. +I mean to beg your apologies--to--ahem--hope that our--that +your--our--thousand--thanks--your--you know what I mean." And he sat +down in foolish confusion. + +"Oh! yes. All right; much obliged, my friend," said the Philosopher, +who had not felt so much boyish animal life in twenty-five years. + +And Jim West whispered to Bill: "You expressed my sentiments exactly." + +"Mr. Anderson," said Jonas, rising, and thus lifting up his hunched +shoulders and looking the picture of a long-legged heron standing in the +water, "Mr. Anderson, you and our young and happy friend, Mr. Wehle, +will accept our thanks. We thought that music was all you wanted to gin +a delightful--kinder--sorter--well, top-dressin', to this interestin' +occasion. Now they's nothin' sweeter'n a tin horn, 'thout 'tis a +melodious conch-shell utterin' its voice like a turkle-dove. Then we've +got the paytent double whirlymagig hoss-violeen, and the tin pannyforte, +and, better nor all, the grindin' skelletled cymbals. We've laid +ourselves out and done our purtiest--hain't we, feller-musicians?--to +prove that we was the best band on the Ohio River. An' all out of +affection and respect for this ere happy pair. And we're all happy to be +here. Hain't we?" (Here they all nodded assent, though they looked as +though they wished themselves far enough.) "Our enstruments is a leetle +out of toon, owin' to the dampness of the night air, and so I trust +you'll excuse us playin' a farewell piece." + +Jim West was so anxious to get away that he took advantage of this turn +to say good-evening, and though the mischievous Julia insisted that he +should select his instrument, he had not the face to confess to the +skillet-lids, and got out of it by assuring her that he hadn't brought +nothing, "only come along to see the fun." And each member of the party +repeated the transparent lie, so that Julia found herself supplied with +more musical instruments than any young housekeeper need want, and +Andrew hung them, horns, pans, conch-shell, dumb-bull, horse-fiddle, +skillet-lids, and all, in his library, as trophies captured from +the enemy. + +Much as I should like to tell you of the later events of the +Philosopher's life, and about Julia and August, and their oldest son, +whose name is Andrew, and all that, I do not know that I can do better +than to bow myself out with the abashed serenaders, letting this musical +epilogue harmoniously close the book; writing just here. + +THE END. + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The End Of The World, by Edward Eggleston + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE END OF THE WORLD *** + +***** This file should be named 14051.txt or 14051.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/4/0/5/14051/ + +Produced by Rick Niles, John Hagerson, Charlie Kirschner and the PG +Online Distributed Proofreading Team. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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