Samantha at the World's Fair Part 19

That is the way Maggie and I felt; why, if you'll believe it, that sweet little creeter never took but one dress with her, besides a old wrapper to put on mornin's. She took a good plain black silk dress, with two waists to it--a thick one for cool days and a thin one for hot days--and some under-clothes, and some old shoes that didn't hurt her feet, and looked decent. And there she wuz all ready.

She never bought a thing, I don't believe, not one. You wouldn't ketch her waitin' to embroider night-s.h.i.+rts for Thomas Jefferson--no, indeed!

She felt jest as I did. What would the Christopher Columbus World's Fair care for the particular make of Thomas J's night-s.h.i.+rts? That had bigger things on its old mind than to stop and admire a particular posey or runnin' vine worked on a man's nightly bosom. Yes, indeed!

But Tirzah Ann felt jest that way, and I couldn't make her over at that late day, even if I had time to tackle the job. She took it honest--it come onto her from her Pa.

The preperations that man would have made if he had had his head would have outdone Tirzah Ann's, and that is sayin' enough, and more'n enough.

And the size of the shoes that man would have sot out with if he had been left alone would have been a shame and a disgrace to the name of decency as long as the world stands.

Why, his feet would have been two smokin' sacrifices laid on the altar of corns and bunions. Yes, indeed! But I broke it up.

I sez, "Do you lay out and calculate to hobble round in that pair of leather vises and toe-screws," sez I, "when you have got to be on foot from mornin' till night, day after day? Why under the sun don't you wear your good old leather shoes, and feel comfortable?"

And he said (true father of Tirzah Ann), "He wuz afraid it would make talk."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "Leather vises and toe-screws."]

Sez I, "The idee of the World's Fair, with all it has got on its mind, a noticin' or carin' whether you had on shoes or went barefoot! But if you are afraid of talk," sez I, "I guess that it would make full as much talk to see you a-goin' round a-groanin' and a-cryin' out loud. And that is what them shoes would bring you to," sez I.

"Now," sez I, "you jest do them shoes right up and carry 'em back to the store, and if you have got to have a new pair, git some that will be more becomin' to a human creeter, let alone a cla.s.s-leader, and a perfessor, and a grandfather."

So at last I prevailed--he a-forebodin' to the very last that it would make talk to see him in such shoes. But he got a pair that wuzn't more'n one size too small for him, and I presumed to think they would stretch some. And, anyway, I laid out to put his good, roomy old gaiters in my own trunk, so he could have a paneky to fall back on, and to soothe.

As for myself, I took my old slips, that had been my faithful companions for over two years, and a pair of good big roomy bootees.

I never bought nothin' new for any of my feet, not even a shoe-string.

And the only new thing that I bought, anyway, wuz a new muslin night-cap with a lace ruffle.

I bought that, and I spoze vanity and pride wuz to the bottom of it. I feel my own shortcomin's, I feel 'em deep, and try to repent, every now and then, I do.

But I did think in my own mind that in case of fire, and I knew that Chicago wuz a great case for burnin' itself up--I thought in case of fire in the night I wouldn't want to be ketched with a plain sheep's-head night-cap on, which, though comfortable, and my choice for stiddy wear, hain't beautiful.

And I thought if there wuz a fire, and I wuz to be depictered in the newspapers as a-bein' rescued, I did feel a little pride in havin' a becomin' night-cap on, and not bein' engraved with a sheep's head on.

Thinks'es I, the pictures in the newspapers are enough to bring on the cold chills onto anybody, even if took bareheaded, and what--what would be the horror of 'em took in a sheep's head!

There it wuz, there is my own weakness sot right down in black and white. But, anyway, it only cost thirty-five cents, and there wuzn't nothin' painful about it, like Josiah's shoes, nor protracted, like Tirzah Ann's stockin's.

Wall, Ury and Philury moved in the day before, and Josiah and I left in the very best of sperits and on the ten o'clock train, Maggie and Thomas Jefferson and Krit a-meetin' us to the depot.

Maggie looked as pretty as a pink, if she didn't make no preperations.

She had on her plain waist, black silk, and a little black velvet turban, and she had pinned a bunch of fresh rosies to her waist, and the rosies wuzn't any pinker than her pretty cheeks and lips, and the dew that had fell into them roses' hearts that night wuzn't any brighter than her sweet gray eyes.

She makes a beautiful woman, Maggie Allen duz; and she ort to, to correspond with her husband, for my boy, Thomas Jefferson, is a young man of a thousand, and it is admitted that he is by all the Jonesvillians--nearly every villian of 'em admits it.

Tirzah Ann and the babe wuz to the depot to see us off, and she said that she should come on jest as soon as she got through with her preperations.

But I felt dubersome about her comin' very soon, for she took out her knittin' work (we had to wait quite a good while for the cars), and I see that she hadn't got the first one only to the instep.

It is slow knittin'--sh.e.l.ls are dretful slow anyway--and she wuz too proud sperited to have 'em plain clam-sh.e.l.l pattern, which are bigger and coa.r.s.er; she had to have 'em oyster-sh.e.l.l pattern, in ridges.

Wall, as I say, I felt dubersome, but I spoke up cheerful on the outside--

"If you git your stockin's done, Tirzah Ann, you must be sure and come."

And she said she would.

The way she said it wuz: "One, two, three, four, yes, mother; five, six, seven, I will."

She had to count every sh.e.l.l from top to toe of 'em, which made it hard and wearin' both for her and them she wuz conversin' with.

Why, they do say--it come to me straight, too--that Whitfield got that wore out with them oyster-sh.e.l.l stockin's that he won't look at a oyster sence--he used to be devoted to 'em, raw or cooked; but they say that you can't git him to look at one sence the stockin' episode, specially scolloped ones.

No, he sez "that he has had enough oysters for a lifetime."

Poor fellow! I pity him. I know what them actions of hern is; hain't I suffered from the one she took 'em from?

But to resoom, and continue on.

Miss Gowdey come to the depot to see me off, and so did Miss Bobbet and the Widder Pooler.

Miss Gowdey wuz a-comin' to the World's Fair as soon as she made her rag-carpet for her summer kitchen; she said "she wouldn't go off and leave her work ondone, and she hadn't got more'n half of the rags cut, and she hadn't colored butnut yet, nor copperas; she would not leave her house a-sufferin' and her rags oncut."

I thought she looked sort o' reprovin' at me, for she knew that I had a carpet begun.

But I spoke up, and sez, "Truly rags will be always here with us, and most likely butnut and copperas; but the World's Fair comes but once in a lifetime, and I believe in embracin' it now, and makin' the most of it." Sez I, "We can embrace rags at any time."

"Wall," she said, "she couldn't take no comfort with the memory of things ondone a-weighin' down on her." She said "some folks wuz different," and she looked clost at me as she said it. "Some folks could go off on towers and be happy with the thought of rags oncut and warp oncolored, or spooled, or anything. But she wuzn't one of 'em; she could not, and would not, take comfort with things ondone on her mind."

And I sez, "If folks don't take any comfort with the memories of things ondone on 'em, I guess that there wouldn't be much comfort took, for, do the best we can in this world, we have to leave some things ondone. We can't do everything."

"Wall," she said, "she should, never should, go off on towers till everything wuz done."

And agin I sez, "It is hard to git everything done, and if folks waited for them circ.u.mstances, I guess there wouldn't be many towers gone off on."

But she didn't give in, nor I nuther. But jest then Miss Bobbet spoke up, and said, "She laid out to go to the World's Fair--she wouldn't miss it for anything; it wuz the oppurtunity of a lifetime for education and pleasure; but she wuz a-goin' to finish that borrow-and-lend bedquilt of hern before she started a step. And then the woodwork had got to be painted all over the house, and _he_ was so busy with his spring's work that she had got to do it herself."

And I sez, "Couldn't you let those things be till you come back?"

And she said, "She couldn't, for she mistrusted she would be all beat out, and wouldn't feel like it when she got back; paintin' wuz hard work, and so wuz piecin' up."

And I sez, "Then you had ruther go there all tired out, had you?" sez I.

"Seems to me I had ruther go to the World's Fair fresh and strong, and ready to learn and enjoy, even if I let my borrow-and-lend bedquilt go till another year. For," sez I, "bedquilts will be protracted fur beyend the time of seein' the World's Fair--and I believe in livin' up to my priveleges."

And she said, "That she wouldn't want to put it off, for it had been a-layin' round for several years, and she felt that she wouldn't go away so fur from home, and leave it onfinished."

And I see that it wouldn't do any good to argy with her. Her mind wuz made up.