The Clockmaker Part 13

"I allot you had ought to visit our great country Squire," said the Clockmaker, "afore you quit for good and all. I calculate you don't understand us. The most splendid location atween the Poles is the United States, and the first man alive is Gineral Jackson, the hero of the age, him that skeered the British out of their seven senses.

Then there's the great Danel Webster, it's generally allowed, he's the greatest orator on the face of the airth, by a long chalk; and Mr. Van Buren, and Mr. Clay, and Amos Kindle, and Judge White, and a whole raft of statesmen, up to everything and all manner of politics; there ain't the beat of 'em to be found anywhere. If you was to hear 'em, I consait you'd hear genuine pure English for once, anyhow; for it's generally allowed we speak English better than the British. They all know me to be an American citizen here, by my talk, for we speak it complete in New England.

"Yes, if you want to see a free people--them that makes their own laws, accordin' to their own notions--go to the States. Indeed, if you can falt them at all, they are a little grain too free. Our folks have their head a trifle too much, sometimes, particularly in elections, both in freedom of speech and freedom of press. One hadn't ought to blart right out always all that comes uppermost. A horse that's too free frets himself and his rider too, and both on 'em lose flesh in the long run. I'd e'enamost as lives use the whip sometimes, as to be for everlastinly a-pullin' at the rein. One's arm gets plaguy tired, that's a fact. I often think of a lesson I larnt Jehiel Quirk once, for lettin' his tongue outrun his good manners.

"I was down to Rhode Island one summer to larn gildin' and bronzin', so as to give the finis.h.i.+n' touch to my clocks. Well, the folks elected me a hog-reave, jist to poke fun at me, and Mr. Jehiel, a bean pole of a lawyer, was at the bottom of it. So one day, up to Town Hall, where there was an oration to be delivered on our Independence, jist afore the orator commenced, in runs Jehiel in a most all-fired hurry; and, says he, 'I wonder,' says he, 'if there's ary a hog-reave here? because if there be I require a turn of his office.' And then, said he, a-lookin' up to me and callin' out at the tip eend of his voice, 'Mr. Hog-reave Slick,' says he, 'here's a job out here for you.' Folks snickered a good deal, and I felt my s.p.u.n.k a-risin' like half flood, that's a fact; but I bit in my breath, and spoke quite cool. 'Possible?' says I; 'well, duty, I do suppose, must be done, though it ain't the most agreeable in the world. I've been a-thinkin',' says I, 'that I would be liable to a fine of fifty cents for sufferin' a hog to run at large, and as you are the biggest one, I presume, in all Rhode Island, I'll jist begin by ringin' your nose, to prevent you for the futur' from pokin' your snout where you hadn't ought to;' and I seized him by the nose and nearly wrung it off.

Well, you never heerd sich a shoutin' and clappin' of hands, and cheerin', in your life; they haw-hawed like thunder. Says I, 'Jehiel Quirk, that was a superb joke of your'n; how you made the folks larf, didn't you? You are e'enamost the wittiest critter I ever seed. I guess you'll mind your parts o' speech, and study the ACCIDENCE agin afore you let your clapper run arter that fas.h.i.+on, won't you?'"

"I thought," said I, "that among you republicans, there were no gradations of rank or office, and that all were equal, the hog-reave and the governor, the judge and the crier, the master and his servant; and although, from the natur' of things, more power might be entrusted to one than the other, yet that the rank of all was precisely the same."

"Well," said he, "it is so in theory, but not always in practice; and when we do pracTISE it, it seems to go a little agin the grain, as if it warn't quite right neither. When I was last to Baltimore there was a court there, and Chief Justice Marshall was detailed there for duty. Well, with us in New England, the sheriff attends the judge to court and, says I to the sheriff, 'Why don't you escort that 'ere venerable old judge to the State House? He's a credit to our nation that man, he's actilly the first pot hook on the crane; the whole weight is on him; if it warn't for him the fat would be in the fire in no time. I wonder you don't show him that respect--it wouldn't hurt you one morsel, I guess.' Says he, quite miffy like, 'Don't he know the way to court as well as I do? If I thought he didn't, I'd send one of my n.i.g.g.e.rs to show him the road. I wonder who was his lackey last year, that he wants me to be his'n this time. It don't convene to one of our free and enlightened citizens, to tag arter any man, that's a fact; it's too English and too foreign for our glorious inst.i.tutions. He's bound by law to be there at ten o'clock, and so be I, and we both know the way there I reckon.'

"I told the story to our minister, Mr. Hopewell (and he has some odd notions about him, that man, though he don't always let out what he thinks). Says he, 'Sam, that was in bad taste' (a great phrase of the old gentleman's that), 'in bad taste, Sam. That 'ere sheriff was a goney; don't cut your cloth arter his pattern, or your garment won't become you, I tell you. We are too enlightened to wors.h.i.+p our fellow citizens as the ancients did, but we ought to pay great respect to vartue and exalted talents in this life; and, arter their death, there should be statues of eminent men placed in our national temples, for the veneration of arter ages, and public ceremonies performed annually to their honour. Arter all, Sam,' said he (and he made a considerable of a long pause, as if he was dubersome whether he ought to speak out or not), 'arter all, Sam,' said he, 'atween ourselves (but you must not let on I said so, for the fullness of time hain't yet come), half a yard of blue ribbon is a plaguy cheap way of rewardin' merit, as the English do; and, although we larf at 'em (for folks always will larf at what they hain't got, and never can get), yet t.i.tles ain't bad things as objects of ambition, are they?' Then, tappin' me on the shoulder, and lookin' up and smilin', as he always did when he was pleased with an idee, 'Sir Samuel Slick would not sound bad, I guess, would it Sam?'

"'When I look at the English House of Lords,' said he, 'and see so much larning, piety, talent, honour, vartue, and refinement collected together, I ax myself this here question: can a system which produces and sustains such a body of men, as the world never saw before and never will see agin, be defective? Well, I answer myself, perhaps it is, for all human inst.i.tutions are so, but I guess it's e'enabout the best arter all. It wouldn't do here now, Sam, nor perhaps for a century to come, but it will come sooner or later with some variations. Now the Newtown pippin, when transplanted to England, don't produce such fruit as it does in Long Island, and English fruits don't preserve their flavour here, neither; allowance must be made for difference of soil and climate (Oh Lord! thinks I, if he turns in to his orchard, I'm done for; I'll have to give him the dodge somehow or another, through some hole in the fence, that's a fact; but he pa.s.sed on that time). 'So it is,' said he, 'with const.i.tutions; our'n will gradually approximate to their'n, and their'n to our'n. As they lose their strength of executive, they will varge to republicanism, and as we invigorate the form of government (as we must do, or go to the old boy), we shall tend towards a monarchy. If this comes on gradually, like the changes in the human body, by the slow approach of old age, so much the better; but I fear we shall have fevers, and convulsion-fits, and cholics, and an everlastin' gripin' of the intestines first; you and I won't live to see it Sam, but our posteriors will, you may depend.'

"I don't go the whole figur' with minister," said the Clockmaker, "but I do opinionate with him in part. In our business relations we belie our political principles; we say every man is equal in the Union, and should have an equal vote and voice in the Government; but in our banks, railroad companies, factory corporations, and so on, every man's vote is regilated by his share and proportion of stock; and if it warn't so, no man would take hold on these things at all.

"Natur' ordained it so--a father of a family is head, and rules supreme in his household; his eldest son and darter are like first leftenants under him, and then there is an overseer over the n.i.g.g.e.rs; it would not do for all to be equal there. So it is in the univa.r.s.e, it is ruled by one Superior Power; if all the angels had a voice in the government I guess--" Here I fell fast asleep; I had been nodding for some time, not in approbation of what he said, but in heaviness of slumber, for I had never before heard him so prosy since I first overtook him on the Colchester road. I hate politics as a subject of conversation; it is too wide a field for chit-chat, and too often ends in angry discussion. How long he continued this train of speculation I do not know, but, judging by the different aspect of the country, I must have slept an hour.

I was at length aroused by the report of his rifle, which he had discharged from the wagon. The last I recollected of his conversation was, I think, about American angels having no voice in the government, an a.s.sertion that struck my drowsy faculties as not strictly true; as I had often heard that the American ladies talked frequently and warmly on the subject of politics, and knew that one of them had very recently the credit of breaking up General Jackson's cabinet. When I awoke, the first I heard was "Well! I declare, if that ain't an amazin' fine shot, too, Considerin' how the critter was a-runnin' the whole blessed time; if I hain't cut her head off with a ball, jist below the throat, that's a fact. There's no mistake in a good Kentucky rifle! I tell you."

"Whose head?" said I, in great alarm, "whose head, Mr. Slick? For heaven's sake what have you done?" (for I had been dreaming of those angelic politicians, the American ladies.)

"Why that 'ere hen-partridge's head, to be sure," said he; "don't you see how special wonderful wise it looks, a-flutterin' about arter its head?"

"True," said I, rubbing my eyes, and opening them in time to see the last muscular spasms of the decapitated body; "true, Mr. Slick, it is a happy ill.u.s.tration of our previous conversation--A BODY WITHOUT A HEAD."

No. x.x.x

A Tale of Bunker's Hill.

Mr. Slick, like all his countrymen whom I have seen, felt that his own existence was involved in that of the Const.i.tution of the United States, and that it was his duty to uphold it upon all occasions. He affected to consider its government and its inst.i.tutions as perfect, and if any doubt was suggested as to the stability or character of either, would make the common reply of all Americans, "I guess you don't understand us," or else enter into a laboured defence. When left, however, to the free expression of his own thoughts, he would often give utterance to those apprehensions which most men feel in the event of an experiment not yet fairly tried, and which has in many parts evidently disappointed the sanguine hopes of its friends.

But, even on these occasions, when his vigilance seemed to slumber, he would generally cover them, by giving them as the remarks of others, or concealing them in a tale. It was this habit that gave his discourse rather the appearance of "thinking aloud," than a connected conversation.

"We are a great nation, Squire," he said, "that's sartain; but I'm afeard we didn't altogether start right. It's in politics as in racin', everything depends upon a fair start. If you are off too quick, you have to pull up and turn back agin, and your beast gets out of wind and is baffled, and if you lose in the start you hain't got a fair chance arterwards, and are plaguy apt to be jockied in the course. When we set up house-keepin', as it were for ourselves, we hated our stepmother, Old England, so dreadful bad, we wouldn't foller any of her ways of managin' at all, but made new receipts for ourselves. Well, we missed it in many things most consumedly, somehow or another. Did you ever see," said he, "a congregation split right in two by a quarrel, and one part go off and set up for themselves?"

"I am sorry to say," said I, "that I have seen some melancholy instances of the kind."

"Well, they shoot ahead, or drop astern, as the case may be, but they soon get on another tack, and leave the old s.h.i.+p clean out of sight.

When folks once take to emigratin' in religion in this way, they never know where to bide. First they try one location, and then they try another; some settle here and some improve there, but they don't hitch their horses together long. Some times they complain they HAVE TOO LITTLE WATER, at other times that they HAVE TOO MUCH; they are never satisfied, and, wherever these separatists go, they onsettle others as bad as themselves. I NEVER LOOK ON A DESARTER AS ANY GREAT SHAKES.

"My poor father used to say, 'Sam, mind what I tell you, if a man don't agree in all particulars with his church, and can't go the whole hog with 'em, he ain't justified on that account, no how, to separate from them, for Sam, SCHISM IS A SIN IN THE EYE OF G.o.d. The whole Christian world,' he would say, 'is divided into two great families, the Catholic and Protestant. Well, the Catholic is a united family, a happy family, and a strong family, all governed by one head; and Sam, as sure as eggs is eggs, that 'ere family will grub out t'other one, stalk, branch and root; it won't so much as leave the seed of it in the ground, to grow by chance as a nateral curiosity. Now the Protestant family is like a bundle of refuse s.h.i.+ngles, when withed up together (which it never was and never will be to all etarnity), no great of a bundle arter all; you might take it up under one arm, and walk off with it without winkin'. But, when all lyin' loose as it always is, jist look at it, and see what a sight it is, all blowin' about by every wind of doctrine, some away up e'enamost out of sight, others rollin' over and over in the dirt, some split to pieces, and others so warped by the weather and cracked by the sun--no two of 'em will lie so as to make a close j'int. They are all divided into sects, railin', quarrellin', separatin', and agreein' in nothin', but hatin' each other. It is awful to think on.

T'other family will some day or other gather them all up, put them into a bundle and bind them up tight, and condemn 'em as fit for nothin' under the sun, but the fire. Now he who splits one of these here sects by schism, or he who preaches schism, commits a grievous sin; and Sam, if you vally your own peace of mind, have nothin' to do with such folks.

"'It's pretty much the same in Politics. I ain't quite clear in my conscience, Sam, about our glorious revolution. If that 'ere blood was shed justly in the rebellion, then it was the Lord's doin', but if unlawfully, how am I to answer for my share in it? I was at Bunker's Hill (the most splendid battle it's generally allowed that ever was fought); what effect my shots had, I can't tell, and I am glad I can't, all except one, Sam, and that shot--' Here the old gentleman became dreadful agitated, he shook like an ague fit, and he walked up and down the room, and wrung his hands, and groaned bitterly. 'I have wrastled with the Lord, Sam, and have prayed to him to enlighten me on that p'int, and to wash out the stain of that 'ere blood from my hands. I never told you that 'ere story, nor your mother neither, for she could not stand it, poor critter, she's kinder narvous.

"'Well, Doctor Warren (the first soldier of his age, though he never fought afore) commanded us all to resarve our fire till the British came within p'int-blank shot, and we could cleverly see the whites of their eyes, and we did so; and we mowed them down like gra.s.s, and we repeated our fire with awful effect. I was among the last that remained behind the breast-work, for most on 'em, arter the second shot, cut and run full split. The British were close to us; and an officer, with his sword drawn, was leading on his men, and encouragin' them to the charge. I could see his features; he was a real handsum man, I can see him now with his white breeches and black gaiters, and red coat, and three-cornered c.o.c.ked hat, as plain as if it was yesterday, instead of the year '75. Well, I took a steady aim at him and fired. He didn't move for a s.p.a.ce, and I thought I had missed him, when all of a sudden, he sprung right straight up an eend, his sword slipped through his hands up to the p'int, and then he fell flat on his face atop of the blade, and it came straight out through his back. He was fairly skivered. I never seed anything so awful since I was raised; I actilly screamed out with horror; and I threw away my gun, and joined them that were retreatin' over the neck to Charlestown. Sam, that 'ere British officer, if our rebellion was onjust or onlawful, was murdered, that's a fact; and the idee, now I am growin' old, haunts me day and night. Sometimes I begin with the Stamp Act, and I go over all our grievances, one by one, and say ain't they a sufficient justification? Well, it makes a long list, and I get kinder satisfied, and it appears as clear as anything. But sometimes there come doubts in my mind, jist like a guest that's not invited or not expected, and takes you at a short like, and I say, warn't the Stamp Act repealed, and concessions made, and warn't offers sent to settle all fairly? and I get troubled and oneasy agin.

And then I say to myself, says I, oh yes, but them offers came too late. I do nothin' now, when I am alone, but argue it over and over agin. I actilly dream on that man in my sleep sometimes, and then I see him as plain as if he was afore me, and I go over it all agin till I come to that 'ere shot, and then I leap right up in bed and scream like all vengeance, and your mother, poor old critter, says, "Sam," says she, "what on airth ails you to make you act so like Old Scratch in your sleep? I do believe there's somethin' or another on your conscience." And I say, "Polly dear, I guess we're a-goin' to have rain, for that plaguy cute rheumatis has seized my foot and it does antagonize me so I have no peace. It always does so when it's like for a change." "Dear heart," she says (the poor simple critter), "then I guess I had better rub it, hadn't I, Sam?" and she crawls out of bed and gets her red flannel petticoat, and rubs away at my foot ever so long. Oh, Sam, if she could rub it out of my heart as easy as she thinks she rubs it out of my foot, I should be in peace, that's a fact.

"'What's done, Sam, can't be helped, there is no use in cryin' over spilt milk, but still one can't help a-thinkin' on it. But I don't love schisms and I don't love rebellion.

"'Our revolution has made us grow faster and grow richer; but Sam, when we were younger and poorer, we were more pious and more happy.

We have nothin' fixed either in religion or politics. What connection there ought to be atween Church and State, I am not availed, but some there ought to be as sure as the Lord made Moses. Religion when left to itself, as with us, grows too rank and luxuriant. Suckers and sprouts, and intersecting shoots, and superfluous wood, make a nice shady tree to look at, but where's the fruit, Sam? That's the question--where's the fruit? No; the pride of human wisdom, and the presumption it breeds will ruinate us. Jefferson was an infidel, and avowed it, and gloried in it, and called it the enlightenment of the age. Cambridge College is Unitarian, 'cause it looks wise to doubt, and every drumstick of a boy ridicules the belief of his forefathers.

If our country is to be darkened by infidelity, our Government defied by every State, and every State ruled by mobs--then, Sam, the blood we shed in our revolution will be atoned for in the blood and suffering of our fellow citizens. The murders of that civil war will be expiated by a political suicide of the State.'

"I am somewhat of father's opinion," said the Clockmaker, "though I don't go the whole figur' with him, but he needn't have made such an everlastin' touss about fixin' that 'ere British officer's flint for him, for he'd a died of himself by this time, I do suppose, if he had a missed his shot at him. P'r'aps we might have done a little better, and p'r'aps we mightn't, by stickin' a little closer to the old const.i.tution. But one thing I will say, I think arter all, your Colony Government is about as happy and as a good a one as I know on.

A man's life and property are well protected here at little cost, and he can go where he likes and do what he likes provided he don't trespa.s.s on his neighbour.

"I guess that's enough for any on us, now ain't it?"

No. x.x.xI

Gulling a Bluenose.

"I allot," said Mr. Slick, "that the Bluenoses are the most gullible folks on the face of the airth--rigular soft horns, that's a fact.

Politics and such stuff set 'em a-gapin', like children in a chimbley corner listenin' to tales of ghosts, Salem witches, and Nova Scotia snowstorms; and while they stand starin' and yawpin' all eyes and mouth, they get their pockets picked of every cent that's in 'em.

One candidate chap says 'Feller citizens, this country is goin' to the dogs hand over hand; look at your rivers, you have no bridges; at your wild lands, you have no roads; at your treasury, you hain't got a cent in it; at your markets, things don't fetch nothin'; at your fish, the Yankees ketch 'em all. There's nothin' behind you but sufferin', around you but poverty, afore you but slavery and death.

What's the cause of this unheerd of awful state of things, ay, what's the cause? Why judges, and banks, and lawyers, and great folks, have swallered all the money. They've got you down, and they'll keep you down to all etarnity, you and your posteriors arter you. Rise up like men, arouse yourselves like freemen, and elect me to the legislatur', and I'll lead on the small but patriotic band, I'll put the big wigs through their facins, I'll make 'em shake in their shoes, I'll knock off your chains and make you free.' Well, the goneys fall tu and elect him, and he desarts right away, with b.a.l.l.s, rifle, powder, horn and all. HE PROMISED TOO MUCH.

"Then comes a real good man, and an everlastin' fine preacher, a most a special spiritual man; renounces the world, the flesh, and the devil, preaches and prays day and night, so kind to the poor, and so humble, he has no more pride than a babe, and so short-handed he's no b.u.t.ter to his bread--all self denial, mortifyin' the flesh. Well, as soon as he can work it, he marries the richest gal in all his flock, and then his bread is b.u.t.tered on both sides. HE PROMISED TOO MUCH.

"Then comes a doctor, and a prime article he is too, 'I've got,' says he, 'a screw auger emetic and hot crop, and if I can't cure all sorts o' things in natur' my name ain't Quack.' Well, he turns stomach and pocket, both inside out, and leaves poor Bluenose--a dead man. HE PROMISED TOO MUCH.

"Then comes a lawyer, an honest lawyer too, a real wonder under the sun, as straight as a s.h.i.+ngle in all his dealin's. He's so honest he can't bear to hear tell of other lawyers; he writes agin 'em, raves agin 'em, votes agin 'em, they are all rogues but him. He's jist the man to take a case in hand, 'cause HE will see justice done. Well, he wins his case, and fobs all for costs, 'cause he's sworn to see justice done to--himself. HE PROMISED TOO MUCH.

"Then comes a Yankee Clockmaker" (and here Mr. Slick looked up and smiled), "with his 'soft sawder,' and 'human natur',' and he sells clocks warranted to run from July to Etarnity, stoppages included, and I must say they do run as long as--as long as wooden clocks commonly do, that's a fact. But I'll show you presently how I put the leak into 'em, for here's a feller a little bit ahead on us, whose flint I've made up my mind to fix this while past." Here we were nearly thrown out of the wagon by the breaking down of one of those small wooden bridges, which prove so annoying and so dangerous to travellers. "Did you hear that 'ere snap?" said he; "well, as sure as fate, I'll break my clocks over them 'ere etarnal log bridges, if Old Clay clips over them arter that fas.h.i.+on. Them 'ere poles are plaguy treacherous, they are jist like old Marm Patience Doesgood's teeth, that keeps the great United Independent Democratic Hotel, at Squaw Neck Creek, in Ma.s.sachusetts--one half gone, and t'other half rotten eends."

"I thought you had disposed of your last clock," said I, "at Colchester, to Deacon Flint."

"So I did," he replied, "the last one I had to sell to HIM, but I got a few left for other folks yet. Now there is a man on this road, one Zeb Allen, a real genuINE skinflint, a proper close-fisted customer as you'll a'most see anywhere, and one that's not altogether the straight thing in his dealin' neither. He don't want no one to live but himself; and he's mighty handsum to me, sayin' my clocks are all a cheat, and that we ruinate the country, a-drainin' every drop of money out of it, a-callin' me a Yankee broom and what not. But it ain't all jist Gospel that he says. Now I'll put a clock on him afore he knows it, I'll go right into him as slick as a whistle, and play him to the eend of my line like a trout. I'll have a hook in his gills, while he's a-thinkin' he's only smellin' at the bait. There he is now, I'll be darned if he ain't, standin' afore his shop door, lookin' as strong as high proof Jamaiky; I guess I'll whip it out o'

the bung while he's a-lookin' arter the spicket, and p'r'aps he'll be none o' the wiser till he finds it out, neither."

"Well, Squire, how do you do," said he, "how's all at home?"

"Reasonable well, I give you thanks, won't you alight?"

"Can't today," said Mr. Slick, "I'm in a considerable of a hurry to katch the packet, have you any commands for Sou'west? I'm goin' to the Island, and across the Bay to Windsor. Any word that way?"

"No," says Mr. Allen, "none that I can think on, unless it be to enquire how b.u.t.ter's goin'; they tell me cheese is down, and proDUCE of all kind particular dull this fall."

"Well, I'm glad I can tell you that question," said Slick, "for I don't calculate to return to these parts; b.u.t.ter is risin' a cent or two; I put mine off mind at tenpence."

"Don't return! possible? why, how you talk. Have you done with the clock trade?"