Chapter 9

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_ CHAPTER IX

Well, Josiah went that day with Billy Huff, he santered off without any system or plan, and wouldn't take my pad though I offered it to him. But I guess they jest poked round miscelaneous, as you may say, seein' jest what they happened to run into. And in some of their travels they met Barzelia Trimble, a woman lecturer, she's young and good lookin' and smart as a whip, and I guess she made much of Josiah, 'tennyrate she gin him tickets to her lecture.

She said she'd met a man whose brother-in-law's cousin had bought a dog once of a neighbor of mine, and so feelin' so well acquainted with me she sent me the tickets, and did hope we would come. She said she felt that she knew us both so well that it would be a treat to her.

The way she come to see Josiah that day, Billy had met her at school where she lectured.

Josiah wuz very anxious that we should both go. He remembered the dog.

But I sez, "I thought you didn't believe in wimmen's lecturin' and havin' rights, Josiah."

"Well, I don't believe in 'em, but the tickets wuz gin to us, fifty cents right out of her pocket, and she'll expect us. She said it would make her feel more homelike to have us present."

"Well," sez I, "I don't know as I feel so very intimate with her, I never see the dog, but her idees on wimmen's rights is sensible, I've read about 'em."

And that kinder headed Josiah off onto a new tact; we had had a dretful good supper, and I believe Miss Trimble had made a sight on him, I believe she had flattered and pompeyed him and for the time bein' he felt soft in sperit towards the sex.

And 'tennyrate men's moods are like the onfathomable sea, sometimes turbulent, throwin' up stunny arguments and sandy ones, and agin flowin' calm and smooth as ile, and this wuz one of the gently swashin' ones.

"Id'no," sez he, "and I told her so, what wimmen want rights for, or to vote; I never wanted wimmen to vote, I told her they wuz too good, they wuz too near angels to have rights. You know I've always said so, Samantha, and I wuz readin' a piece a day or two ago, writ by one of the first ministers in the country, and he said that wimmen hadn't ort to want any rights; they ort to be riz up on a pedestal and I say so too."

And I sez, "No, Josiah, I can't go into that with all the rest I have to do, and it seems onreasonable in that minister to want wimmen to climb up onto pedestals when they have to do their own housework."

"Well, I say it hain't onreasonable. You ort to be up on one, Samantha."

(How much Miss Trimble must have made on him. He wuz so oncommon clever, and he never wuz megum, poor creeter!) I didn't really want to git into an argument at that time o' day, but I see he wuz on the wrong tact, and I felt I must convince him, so I sez in reasonable axents:

"I jest as lives be on a pedestal as not, I'd kinder love to if I could set, I always did enjoy bein' riz up, if I had nothin' to do only to stay up there some time, but wimmen have to git round so much it wouldn't work. How could I take a tower histed up like the car of Juggernaut or a Pope in a procession. I couldn't get carriers for one thing, and I wouldn't give a cent to be carried round anyway with my dizzy spells, I should more'n as likely as not fall off. But that hain't the main reason I'm agin it, it is too tuckerin' a job for wimmen."

"Tuckerin' to be enthroned on a pedestal with the male sect lookin' up to you and worshippin' you. You call that tuckerin'?" sez he.

"Yes," sez I, "I do. How under the sun can I or any other woman be up on a pedestal and do our own housework, cookin', washin' dishes, sweepin', moppin', cleanin' lamps, blackin' stoves, washin', ironin', makin' beds, quiltin' bed quilts, gittin' three meals a day, day after day, biled dinners and bag puddin's and mince pies and things, to say nothin' of custard and pumpkin pies that will slop over on the level, do the best you can; how could you keep 'em inside the crust histin' yourself up and down? And cleanin' house time----"

"Mebby," sez I honestly, "it would come handy in whitewashin' or fixin' the stovepipe, but where would it be in cleanin' mop-boards, or puttin' down carpets, or washin' winders, or doin' a three weeks washin', or bilin' soap? or pickin' geese? They act like fury shot up on the barn floor. How could you git our old gander up on a pedestal? His temper is that fiery, to say nothin' of settin' or standin' on it and holdin' on to the old thing and pickin' it. And raisin' chickens and washin' old trousers and overalls, and cleanin' sullers and paintin' floors and paperin', and droudgin' round all the time, as a woman has to to keep her house comfortable.

"And pickin' black-caps and strawberries, and churnin' big churnin's of butter, and pickin' wool, to say nothin' of onexpected company comin', and no girl. Let a lot of company come to stay all day the relations on your side and the work not done, and me posin' like a statute, lookin' down on you and your sect, you'd feel like a fool and jaw, you know you would. I presoom you'd throw your boot-jack at me and threaten to part with me, and how mean that would be in you when I did it at your request. 'Tain't anything any woman would go into if she wuz let alone."

"And then think of the thrashers and silo fillers comin' in hungry as bears, what would they say? No dinner cookin' and I on a pedestal, why it would be the town's talk. Or you comin' home from Jonesville on a cold night fraxious as a dog and sayin' you should die off if you didn't have supper in ten minutes. How could I git it on time perched up there?

"I say it can't be done, and it is onreasonable for men to want it, and at the same time want wimmen to do her own housework. For these men, every one on 'em, would act like fury if their house wuzn't clean and their clothes in order, and meals on time. And you must know it would jest about kill a woman to be doin' all this and histin' herself up and down a hundred times a day, and mebby half dead with rumatiz too. Why, it would be worse for me than all the rest of my work, and you hadn't ort to ask it of me."

Josiah looked real huffy and sez, "I hain't the only man that's wantin' it done; men have always been sot on it. There's been more'n a wagon load of poetry writ on it and you know it. Men have always said a sight about it, I hain't alone in it," he snapped out.

"No," sez I honestly, "I've hearn it before. But you see it wouldn't work, don't you? And I believe I could convince every man if I could git to 'em and talk it over with 'em. And I don't see where the beauty on't would come in; of course a woman couldn't change her clothes and put on Greek drapery right in the midst of cleanin' the buttery shelves or moppin' off the back steps. And to see a woman standin' up on a pedestal with an old calico dress pinned up round her waist and a slat sunbunnet on and her pardner's rubber boots, and her sleeves rolled up, and her face red as blood with hard work, and her hands all swelled up with hot soap suds and lye, what beauty would there be in it? It always did seem onreasonable besides bein' so tuckerin' no woman could stand it for a day."

He looked mad as a hen and sez he, "They could manage it if their minds wuz strong enough."

Sez I, "It seems to me it would depend more on the strength of their legs, specially if the pedestal wuz a high one. I never could git up onto it at all if I should go into it without gittin' up on a chair and then on a table. No woman no matter how strong she wuz could git more than two meals a day under the circumstances."

Josiah looked worried and sez, "Well, mebby there has been too much said about it, mebby it would be jest as well to leave pedestals to statters."

And I sez, "It is as well agin. Wimmen couldn't stand it with all they have to do."

And so we ended by bein' real congenial in our two minds and thinkin' considerable alike, which is indeed a comfort to pardners. And we read our chapter in the Bible and had family prayers jest as we do to home. For I would not leave off all the good old habits of my life because my body wuz moved round a little. And we had a good night's rest and sot out in good season the next mornin' for the Exposition.

The next mornin' grandpa Huff said to the breakfast table that he did wish he had someone to read to him that day, everybody wuz goin' to the Fair and he wuz goin' to be left alone. So Blandina, clever creeter that she is, said she would stay and read to him from his favorite volume, Foxe's Book of Martyr's, and also from Lamentations and Job. Billy said his grandpa wuz never happy only when he wuz perfectly miserable. We have all seen such folks.

So Josiah and I sot off alone, and he bein' in good sperits and bein' gin to new and strange projects, proposed that we should take an ortomobile. I didn't favor the idee and said:

"Id'no about it, Josiah, I feel kinder skairful about ortos, I fear that it might prove our last ride."

"But," sez he, "with a good shuffler there hain't any danger."

But I still wuz dubersome and sez, "Mebby it would end by our shufflin' off our mortal coils, as Mr. Shakespeare tells on."

"You don't wear 'em, Samantha, nor never did, nor I don't wear a pompodoor" (he meant this for a joke for his head is most as bare as a sass plate).

And he went on, "It would be a very stylish and genteel ride. I'd love to tell brother Gowdey about it. The bretheren will expect it of me as a live progressive Jonesvillian minglin' here with the noblest in the land to cut sunthin' of a dash."

But seein' that I still looked dubersome he sez, "I don't feel very rugged this mornin' and I dread the crowded car; Id'no but I should faint away in 'em if I sot out."

That of course settled the matter. As his anxious chaperone I consented to the project and he went and got the showiest one he could find. He didn't look for character or stability, only for gildin' and red paint. And we embarked, Josiah with a proud liniment, as if he wuz introducin' me into gay life and fashionable amusements. The man wuz to take us to the Fair ground for so much, and Josiah feelin' so neat had paid him in advance, and there wuz another party waitin' for him. And the speed that shuffler put on wuz sunthin' awful.

The first few minutes before we got to goin' that terrific speed Josiah liked it, and seemed to look patronizin'ly down on the people walkin' afoot that we passed by and pity 'em. But anon the man got to goin' faster and faster and Josiah's liniment underwent a change and he hollered out to me, for the noise wuz so loud and skairful he had to yell:

"Samantha, I don't believe it is right for members of the meetin' house to be goin' at such a gait."

And I hollered back to him, "It hain't none of my doin's, it hain't nothin' I wanted," I a hangin' onto my bunnet strings and tryin' to keep my bunnet on. As for the tabs of my mantilly I had gin up tryin' to curb 'em down, and they waved out like a pirate's flag in a cyclone only a different color.

Finally Josiah hollered to the shuffler, "I want you to curb in your machine! I'm a deacon, and have got my station in the Jonesville meetin' house to think on. Hold it in, I say!"

The shuffler glanced round at us as calm as a goggle-eyed clam and never dained to answer, and seemin'ly urged on the orto to redoubled speed.

Oh, the awfulness of the seen! the terrific noise soundin' on my ear pans till it seemed as if them pans must break down, the dirt a flyin', my pardner standin' up with his whiskers and coat tails wavin' in the breeze. His hat blowed off and by almost superhuman exertions I ketched it and carried it in my hand, thinkin' it wuz safer than on his head.

He a yellin', "Stop, I tell you! Whoa! back up! Dum your dum picter, whoa I say!"

For the last few milds Josiah rid standin' all I could do and say. Yellin' at the shuffler, hollerin' whoa to him, and appealin' to Heaven and me simultaneous as it were, for mercy and succor.

And that shuffler payin' no more attention to him than as if he wuz a fly, not a hoss fly, but jest a common fly. Only he would look back at us once in awhile through them big goggles of hisen that most curdled my blood to see 'em.

At last Josiah, seemin' to give up all hope, sunk back and grasped holt of my tab and sez, "Good-bye, Samantha, if you git through alive remember I died tryin' to save you." His emotions and the dirt choked him, and he faintly added:

"Tell the bretheren and see that it is put in the Jonesville Augur, that I died a hero's death tryin' to save my pardner." And his grasp on my tabs become almost hysterical.

But at that minute the entrance gate wuz reached and the orto stopped so abruptly, that Josiah who had got up agin, wuz precipitated into my lap. But he got out immegiately, and the minute he and I stepped onto terry firmy he turned and shook his fist at the man and sez he, "If it wuzn't for the crowd and Samantha's feelin's, I would whip you within an inch of your life! Oh, if I only had you in a ten acre lot you'd feel the wrath of a lion when it wuz rousted up!"

But I laid my hand on him and led him away, I knowed such seens wuz bad for his nerve. He trembled like a popple leaf, and the minute we got through the gate I had to set down with him and deal out four nut-cakes before he wuz himself agin.

I wuz determined this day to go to the Palace of Fine Arts, so we did and I put in a time of almost perfect happiness there. We went into Government Building entrance that day, and I proposed to Josiah that we should stop at Liberal Arts Building on the way, and he at first demurred and sez:

"Samantha, you're too liberal by half now for folks with our means and Id'no as I want you to spend your time in such a display." He said he would rather take me to the display of Economics, and sez he, wantin' to persuade me to go with him, "Wimmen has countless virtues, but to my mind her crownin' excelence is to be equinomical."

But I explained to him that exhibit didn't mean bein' liberal with money but it wuz jest a step behind Fine Arts, and sez I, "I should think you would want to see the place where this Exposition wuz dedicated in the presence of one of the biggest crowds that wuz ever gathered together."

So we stopped there a little while, and could have spent days there with interest and profit. The foreign countries have splendid exhibits here as well as our own.

Everything in typography and books, everything possible in photography; models of light-houses; dams; geographical maps; Egyptian, Hebrew and Imperial surveys. Scientific demonstrations in liquid hydrogen and that queer substance, radium.

I wuz dretfully interested in that wonderful new discovery and sez I to myself as I looked at it, "As little as there is of you there is enough to overturn big systems of science and philosophy, and begin a new history of the inside of the world." I wuz glad my sect had discovered this and thought it wuz one of the best things she had done in a number of years.

And there wuz all kinds of hygienic displays, chemical and engineering works. China had a dretful interestin' exhibit, ancient manuscripts, books published thousands of years before our kind of type wuz invented. Weapons that wuz old when Mr. Confucious wuz livin'. Armor, costumes, musical instruments, queer lookin' things them wuz as I ever see and nothin' I would want to play on. Photo engineering, electrotyping, lithography, typewriting; telescopes of all kinds from tiny ones up to ones that weigh four thousand pounds. The latest medical and surgical instruments. The piano from the first one made up to the present automatic instruments of all kinds; stringed instruments, church organs; displays in civil and military engineering; machinery for making good roads; rock crushers, water purifying, and so on and so on and so on.

The time spent in this buildin' is full of education as well as interest. There wuz some beautiful statutes too decoratin' this buildin', most on 'em I wuz proud to see wuz figgers of my own sect.

But having sot out for the Palace of Fine Arts we anon wended our way thither. It is a beautiful building, or ruther there are four massive buildings connected together to form this Palace of Art. There are three big buildings in front and an annex, the central building built of stone and brick is the only permanent buildin' in this enormous Exposition so naturally they would make it as perfect as possible.

And it is crowded full of beauty. In fact turn where you would you would see such glowing landscapes, such beautiful faces, such perfect sculpture that you git all mixed up, and when you thought it over you couldn't remember whether some picture or statute that stood out in your memory wuz in the U.S. exhibit or the French, or German, or Italian, or etc., etc.

In lookin' back and thinkin' on't and tryin' to git 'em in the right place in your mind it is as difficult as it would be in walking through a big clover meadow and tryin' to sort out the clover blossoms and describe 'em one by one and tell in jest what corner of the lot you found 'em. It can't be done; in such an immense field of art your brain sort o' fills up and turns round and round and you git mixed. But as I say some of the pictures and statutes stayed in my memory so I couldn't dislodge 'em and don't want to, no indeed!

Now there are three noble figgers at the entrance that you can't forgit. Inspiration standin' up above the main entrance is jest where she should be. Inspiration, breath of the Most High breathed into some of His children below anon or oftener, and then on each side is Truth and Nature. Nature, the kind All Mother, Truth, the divine one. How sweet to find 'em all there together guardin' and consecratin' these walls. You went in feelin' safer with such gardeens at the portal.

I must say though that Truth didn't have any clothes on, she wuz jest settin' there on top of the world jest as naked as she could be, she could have wore one of my bib aprons as well as not, durin' the Fair anyway, whilst there wuz so many folks round and she would have looked enough sight better to me and been jest as truthful. But howsumever I knew she wuz likely, her face wuz innocent and beautiful.

As I said it is some of the pictures and statutes that stand out clearest in my memory, but there wuz everything else there admirable and choice in art, paintings in oil, wax; on canvas, wood, enamel, metal, fresco paintings on walls and ceilings. Water colors, chalk, pastel, ivory, pyrography. Engravings, etchings, figgers in marble, metal, plaster. Carvings in ivory, stone, wood, etc. Architectural designs of all kinds; mosaics; art work in glass, earthen ware, leather, metal; artistic book binding and etc., etc., etc., and I might spread these out into volumes.

And didn't my soul jest spread her wings here in delight, to speak in flowery language. What pictures of beauty dawned on my rapt eyesight, faces sweet as wuz ever dremp on, sad faces, tragic faces, old faces and young faces; children sweet and bonny as wuz ever seen. Youth and love, age and manhood and gratified ambition, princes and paupers, life and death.

Landscapes full of the dewy freshness and joy of the morning, night seens dark and full of mystery and melancholy. Mountain and valley, hill and dale, ocean and rivulet. Every phase of human joy and sorrow wuz depictered there, and every phase of peaceful and warlike life. It wuz a sight. If I could stayed there a year right in them walls I might have got round mebby and seen what I wanted to and as long as I wanted to.

But of course this wuzn't to be, for one thing the Fair would be closed before and then Josiah wouldn't gin his consent anyway. He got kinder worrisome as it wuz and didn't want to stay so long as we did, and after a hour or so I compromised with him, gin him nut cakes occasionally and anon when we would enter a new gallery he would set down by the door till I had got through lookin'.

As I said some of the pictures and statutes clung to my memory as if they'd been throwed at my mind so powerful that they jest stuck there and couldn't be dislodged even by all the later multitude of sights throwed over 'em.

There wuz one by Whistler full of the subtle mystery that he wrops round his figgers. Why you know he has painted one that to them that are sympathetic, the Little Lady in Black, will walk right out of the picture and come towards 'em, time and agin she's done it, I'm tellin' the truth that can be proved.

In the "Mystery of the Night," the female figger dimly discerned through the veil of mist seems the incarnation of the mystery of sky and sea, the infinite solemnity, and peace and loneliness of the night.

There wuz pictures that made you happy, and some that sort o' sent a chill to your sperit, like Millais' "Chill October," as you looked at it you almost felt the chill, mournful breeze that you knew wuz sweepin' along.

Some queer pictures like the "Ghost Dance" kinder lingered in the vestibule of your mind. You know your mind has got more different rooms in it than any house that wuz ever built, and some pictures and folks don't git into the very inmost rooms; they never git furder than the doorstep.

There are three pictures by the King and Queen of Portugal, all on 'em picturin' humble life. The King's show a peasant drivin' cattle to water. I wondered if he didn't wish, when he painted it, that he wuz that care-free herder, who could sing and whistle and wear easy shues, and throw on any old clothes, and santer out into the dewy mornin' and do as he wanted to.

One of the Queen's wuz a farm wagon, such as they carry farm produce in, but sometimes I spoze load up with merry girls and boys for a happy outing in the green woods.

I shouldn't wonder if when she wuz dead tired of the cares, formalities and burdens of a queen, she wished she wuz one of them happy young girls riding off in a cotton frock on the old farm wagon into some joyous picnic.

The other one of hern wuz a cute little donkey and over all on 'em wuz bright sunlight and soft shadow. They done well. I wished I could encouraged 'em by tellin' 'em so--a word of praise sometimes duz so much good, to anybody from peasant to king.

Among the statutes that I see to the Fair that stood up straight in my mind wuz Light and Darkness. Darkness wuz in the form of two men, one on 'em crouched low with his arm over his face drawin' his mantle to hide from the light. The other male is liftin' his head but his eyes are still shot, evidently he feels the dawn of sunthin' better and he's waking up, while standin' erect is the graceful figger of a female, beautiful and noble, full of boundin' life and light, holdin' up high over her head a star. She wants to wake up the hull world to the light.

Dakota wuz pictured as a lady with precious few clothes on; she looked old in her face, and I told Josiah it wuz a shame to see a woman that age with such a low-necked dress on. It wuz cut down to the bottom of her waist. And lots of the men staters wuz wearin' low necks. I didn't like it, but Josiah remarked that he'd always said:

"A vest and coat cut low neck would make a man look dressy, and he believed he should have one made for best."

I looked coldly at him and said it looked bad enough to see young folks dress in that way without old folks cuttin' up and actin'.

Lots of the statutes would looked as well agin if they'd had me to advise 'em about their clothes, but still take the pictures and statutes of the Fair as a hull they're magnificent and a honor to the nations. There are a thousand statutes, all beautiful and inspirin', to be seen there on the Exposition grounds.

I wuz glad to see the statute of Dr. Jenner, who discovered vaccination, tryin' it first on his own son. When it is the law for doctors to try their medicine first on their own folks, miscelaneous patients will feel safer. Dr. Jenner acted honorable toward humanity at large. I told Josiah I hoped the boy got along well and didn't git hit on the arm while it wuz sore.

And he said, "I wouldn't worry over folks I never neighbored with, and I'd better tend to my own companion, who wuz starvin' slowly by my side."

He couldn't been so very hungry havin' eat so many nut-cakes since breakfast, but I dealt out some more to him.

Well, we stayed in the Art Gallery a long time, so long that Josiah complained bitterly and sez, "If you stay as long in every buildin' when will we git round to see the Pike?" Truly Josiah longed for that place day by day, but as first chaperone of the party I tried to delay him from goin', knowin' that it must come sometime but gladly puttin' off the day.

But I sez soothin'ly, "I shan't want to stay so long at any other place." And it bein' past our lunch time we went and had a good meal, and of course Josiah's crossness subsided with every mouthful he took and his liniment looked like a cosset lamb's in amiability when I proposed we should go to the Fishery Buildin', it wuzn't so very fur from there considerin', though as I have said before every place is a good ways off from anywhere else. You'd have knowed the buildin' by the great fish that wuz sculped over the entrance. It wuz a bigger fish than wuz ever lied about in male fish stories, and that's sayin' enough; connected with this is also an exhibit of forestry and game. We went into the part devoted to forestry first, there are several acres outdoors as well as inside devoted to this display, and what didn't we see there in trees, plants, woods of every kind, forest growth tree planting, all sorts of useful wood, pine, spruce, hemlock, cedar, all the hard woods, and everything made of wood; wood pulp, barrels, baskets, turpentine, alcohol.

In the United States exhibit wuz immense pictures illustrating our forests, methods of lumbering, lumber camps, forest fires, etc., etc. There wuz displays of different species of trees and plants, forest botany, structure and anatomy of woods, saw-mills, seeds and plants of all kinds, and all the different woods and products of wood from Egypt to Japan, barks, roots, cork, rubber, gums, oils, quinine, camphor, varnish, wax, dye-woods, lumber, staves, why there wuz over two hundred different kinds of wood from Argentina alone.

Josiah, who wuz real interested here, sez, "I'd love to have brother Gowdey step in here a minute; he's proud as a peacock of his strip of woodland, he thought he covered the hull field of forestry with his wood pulp and maple sugar. I guess his pride would be took down a little."

"Well," sez I, "let's look on it as showin' the greatness and wonder of Providence and be humble and admire."

"I shall look at it as I'm a minter!" he sez. But I guess he wuz more reverential for a spell.

And there wuz all the plants and leaves used in medicine, and mushrooms, truffles, seeds and plants and implements for gathering and preserving; drying houses, nurseries, basket work, grass work. It seemed as if everything that could be known about trees and plants could be learnt here, and though we knowed we hadn't time or convenience to take all the knowledge in, no, our heads wuzn't big enough, but they felt crowded full as we left this buildin'. And that I felt wuz the crownin' glory of this fair, the new idees and knowledge of better ways and things that wuz learnt in all these exhibits, and wuz destined in the future to bear fruit and bless the world.

In the Fishery department we see all the products of the great water world that makes up more than half of our earth. Every kind of fish that ever swum, from a whale to a minnie, salt water and fresh water fish, and them that are half fish and half animal, and aquatic birds and aquatic plants of all kinds, and plants that seem half way between vegetable and animal. Sea grass, shells of all kinds, pearls, pearl-shells, corals, sponges, skins and furs, illustrations, paintings and casts illustrating water life of all kinds, fishing grounds. All kinds of boats, nets, traps, rods, reels, lines, fish curing establishments, aquariums, and so and so on and so on, and I might write them "so ons," indefinitely but what would be the use?

Jest imagine everything that is discovered and brought to light by them that go down to the sea in ships and there it wuz. _

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