VIII

I TALK ON WIMMEN'S EXTRAVAGANCE

It wuz a cam beautiful mornin'; old Mom Nater seemed agreeable and serene, goin' about her mornin's work of lightin' up and warmin' the world. And Samantha seemed as busy as old Nater herself, and as cam, as she went about her work of makin' the house comfortable and clean.

As I've mentioned prior and before this a better, cleaner housekeeper than Samantha Allen never trod on no shoe leather whatsoever, or went barefoot. Equinomical, industrious, and as a cook beyond any compare. If these words wuz the last I should ever write I'd die solemnly declarin' as a housekeeper and home maker Samantha Allen can't never be beat. Oh, if her principles about female suffragin', and the inferiority of her sect, and the superiority of my sect, wuz only equal to her housekeepin', what a treasure I would have in a earthen vessel (that is Bible; I don't really understand what it means, but I think it looks well for a deacon to patronize the Bible all he can conveniently, and bring into his literary work passages out on't).

I feelt meller and agreeable in my mind, as I sot there in my favorite corner almost immersed in the parfenalia of my perfession, two paper pads, a bottle of ink, a steeled pen, two lead pencils, a pen knife and the immense granny iron dish-pan containin' Betsy B.'s poetry.

And as I sot there with my steeled pen in my hand ready to begin work on my remarkable book, my mind become so impressed by the inestimable value it wuz goin' to be to the world and the male and female sect, that almost onbeknown to myself I uttered the words aloud that wuz seethin' through my large active brain.

Sez I, "Samantha, don't you believe this forthcomin' book of mine is goin' to be the greatest work of this age, or any age?"

She wuz pickin' the pin feathers offen a plump spring chicken for dinner, and she looked up at me over her specs in the cool deliberate way she has sometimes, and sez, "Josiah, a hen don't cackle till she lays her egg."

And then she resoomed her work agin, sayin' no more. Naterally my feelin's immediately hardened more hard than they had been, for I would ask any human bein' did not that one speech show what I've sot out to prove in my book, what wifflin' onstabled minds females have got, and how onfit for votin', onjinted, tottlin', wanderin' way off from the subject spoke on, flyin' down at one jump from literatoor onto poultry. For what connection, I ask, is there between the finest fruit in literature, and hens? Hens which are known to be the awkwardes and stupidest of any liven critters. What jinin' link is there between the most scathin' and convincin' arguments ever writ by mortal man, and eggs? Mute, onfeelin', onseein', eggs.

But I only gin a moment of my valuable time to contemplate this prominent phase of wimmen's folly. And bein' driv back as I have often been by a lack of congenial sympathy into my own interior (my mind), my inteleck seemed to flow freer than ever, and I devoted this propishous time to enlargin' on a important subject I had not had time to enlarge on before, and that wuz the well known extravagance of females and how fatally fatal that trait which is exclusively confined to her own sect would be if let loose on the political world. And so harrered up my mind got in contemplatin' that gigantic danger to my sect, and my country, that before I knowed it I wuz speakin' my thoughts and forebodin's aloud.

Sez I, "Another insurmountable objection agin female suffragin', another fearful danger facin' the country if females should have a free run in the political field, is their well known extravagance."

Sez I, "To a Female Researcher of the prudent, equinomical male sect, it is absolutely appallin' to witness the blind reckless extravagance of wimmen and their well known habits of follerin' each other's fashions blindly, like a flock of sheep jumpin' over the fence. If one woman gits a new dress the neighborin' wimmen have got to git one like it, or better, not a mite of independent sperit about 'em. Why can't they take pattern of us men who always wear jest what we please, and pay no attention to what any other male wears, pay no attention whatsumever to fashion or extravagance. In fact men would hardly know there wuz any such words as them, if it wuzn't for female doin's and the dictionary."

I knowed I had got Samantha in a corner then that she couldn't git out on and I waited with a dignified stately look on my linement to hear her say, "I gin up, Josiah; you're in the right on't." But did I hear her say this? Oh, no!

She lifted up the plump yeller skinned chicken in one hand, whilst she peered under its wings for a stray pin feather. And then she laid it down gently on the pages of the World that wuz spread for its benefit over the table, I spoze to keep her dress clean, and as she looked down on the smooth crisp folds of gingham she sez:

"Yes, lots of wimmen are extravagant. But as the fashion is now, Josiah, five or six yards will make a woman a dress, and have enough left to make her husband a vest, if he would wear anything so cheap. I've got enough left of this very dress, good green and white plaid gingham, costin' ten cents per yard to make you a good cool summer vest; it would wear like iron, and I stand ready to make it, and will you wear it, Josiah?"

She thought she had me in a corner then, but my mind works so quick I answered her almost instantaneously, "Id'no as a green and white plaid vest would be becomin' to my complexion, but I will wear it if the other bretheren will."

Sez she, "I thought you didn't care what any one else wore."

Is there any limit to a female's aggravatin'? I wouldn't dane a reply. But I took up Ayer's Albernack with a stern cold linement, and went to readin' the advertisements, and of course she didn't see the danger ahead on her, of irritatin' too fur a strong nater.

She kep' right on, "No doubt wimmen are sometimes extravagant, Josiah, no doubt they spend lots of money foolishly and worse than foolishly, but before we decide that it ort to deprive her of political rights, let us compare it with men's extravagance for a few minutes."

I felt above replyin' to her, but kep' my eye on the bottle of medicine, and the woman raised from the tomb by a smell of the cork, and she went on:

"Which party is it in a workman's home that usually wants to buy an automobile before the little home is paid for? Mebby in some rare cases the woman eggs the man on, but I believe that it is safe to say that in seven cases out of ten, it is not the housekeeper and house mother that is willin' to risk losin' the ruff that covers her baby's pretty head, and councils waitin' a while before takin' on the extravagance of the added expense. And which party is it, Josiah, that turns and twists every way to save money so her boy and girl can present a decent appearance before her mates? How many millions a year duz the horse races, yot races and polo games and other manly amusements amount to? How many billions a year duz the useless extravagance of tobacco cost? Of course you can substract sunthin' for some wimmen's foolish habit of cigarette smoking, but in the great total it would hardly count. And in how many poor homes duz a woman toil into the night hours to mend and make so that her family may look respectable, while her husband is spendin' his spare hours and spare change in the corner saloon?"

Sez I, lookin' up from the Albernack with a scathin' irony that must have scathed her, whether she owned up to it or not, "I thought it wuz about time for you to drag in that saloon bizness."

"Yes," sez she, "it is time. How many billion dollars a year is spent mostly by men, in the ruinous extravagance of strong drink, and how many billions more in payin' for the effects on't, loss of labor, jails, prisons, hospitals, police force, pauper burials, etc., etc., and I might string out them etc.'s, Josiah, clear from here to Grout Hozleton's and then not begin to git in the perfectly useless and ruinous extravagance of the liquor bizness. And I guess that take all the wimmen's extravagance, it will count up so small in comparison as to be lost sight on. And unlike the liquor bizness if a woman dresses extravagantly, which no doubt she often duz, the dressmakers and merchants and jewelers reaps a profit, if she gives extravagant fashionable parties, the grocer, the florist, the laboring class gits some benefit from it; it is not a danger to human life, like the heart breakin', soul destroyin' extravagance and danger to the hull community of the liquor traffic."

I felt above arguin' with her agin on this subject I had so often wasted my finest eloquence on. She knowed how I felt, and I wouldn't demean myself by repeatin' my crushin' arguments in that direction, for I knowed as well as I sot there that she wouldn't act crushed, no matter if she felt flat as a pan-cake. So I passed on to another faze of woman's extravagance.

Sez I, "It hain't enough for her to spend money like water on her bridge parties, and maskerades, and theatre and tango parties, but she has to rack what little brain she's got, tryin' to git up new follies that other wimmen hain't thought on; she has to have her dog parties, and monkey parties, when them animals come dressed like human bein's with human folks to wait on 'em. Thank Heaven! you can't say but what male men would look down with abhorrence on such fool doin's."

But Samantha sez, "Id'no, take a stag party sometimes—mebby in the beginin' them stags might be able to look down on the monkeys, but after high-balls and cock-tails and gallons of shampain has been consumed, Id'no whether them stags could look down on sober temperate monkeys, or the monkeys look down on them, though no doubt some of the stags behave and can see straight."

I scorned to notice this slur onto my sect, brung up I knowed to make me swurve from my subject, but it didn't make me swurve a inch. I went right on and brung up wimmen's extravagance in their houses.

Sez I, "Look at her gorgeous Brussels carpets, her draperies hangin' from elegant brass poles, her superb black walnut furniture, her glossy black hair-cloth sofias and easy chairs, a perfect riot of extravagance, Samantha. Who can blame a man from kickin' agin it, kickin'," sez I, "with the hull strength of a outraged nater and a number nine shue."

"No doubt," sez Samantha, "wimmen are sometimes extravagant in makin' their homes beautiful, but their families and admirin' friends benefit by it. And how duz her velvet carpets and Persian rugs, her rose-wood furniture, statuary, and costly pictures and silken draperies compare with men's outlay and extravagance in Public Buildings; for instance, the Capitol at Albany; wimmen have had nothing to do with that, and I guess her most extravagant doin's in her house will compare favorably with the millions men have spent in that house for years, and no sign of there ever bein' an end to it."

I knowed by the look on her linement that she meant to intimidate that there had been shiftlessnes and stealin' goin' on in that direction, and in other public works through the country, but I refused to notice the slur on my sect. That slur that females love to sling at us and which we'd better treat with silent contemp, jest as I did now, for no knowin' if we'd stoop to argy with 'em about it, what figgers and statistics they may bring up, to prove their slurs, so as I say I passed it over with silent disdain, but I sez in a safe general way, fur removed from probable figgers she would be apt to throw at me to prove her reckless insertions, I sez, puttin' a sad look onto my linement:

"Wimmen's extravagance makes the heart of man to ache and often drives him to a ontimely tomb, strivin' for fashionable display, strivin' for rights she don't need." And bein' anxious to change the subject at that juncter (I always think it is best to change the flow of my thought occasionally) I put on a sort of a solemn, fraid look on my linement, "Such talk as you wimmen talk is revolutionary, Samantha, and is liable to lead to war."

And then, if you'll believe it, so contrary and hard to conquer is females, she took advantage of that speech of mine to invay on the expenditure of war. She asked me then and there how many billions wuz spent every year by male men on the extravagance of man-made war, its preperation and consequences.

I told her coldly and with a irony as iron as our old cook stove, that as much as she expected of me, she couldn't expect me to figger up to a cent what war had cost the nation. Sez I, "With the barn chores on my hands, and my great work of destroyin' Woman's Suffrage do you expect me to keep track of every cent the nation has spent on war?"

"No," sez she, "one man couldn't reckon it up if he spent his hull lifetime at it, but jest the money spent on it yearly is two billion five hundred million. But," sez she, "it seems that the enormous extravagance of man in this direction and others don't unfit him for the franchise. And if you should spend a few years tryin' to reckon up the gigantic expenditure in money and misery, the horrors and extravagance of war and its effects, you might feel like talkin' less about wimmen's extravagance and how it makes her onfit to be a citizen of the country she's born into, and helps to support with her labor and taxes."

Oh, how aggravatin' a woman can be when she sets out to be. Much as I think of Samantha and the tendrils of my great heart are wropped completely round her, as big as she is round her waist—yet sometimes on occasions like this I almost wish I wuz a bacheldor, a fur off lonely man in some distant cave, or on some lonesome mountain peak, encumbered not by a female who thinks she has a right to argy with me and irritate me.

But these feelin's always come over me in the middle of the forenoon, or the middle of the afternoon. When it comes nigh meal time, my wild seethin' emotions gradually simmers down and as the appetizin' meals progress so duz my feelin's change and grow less dangerous; if they didn't I don't know what the effect would be to the world of females.

I spoze it is the way the overrulin' power has fixed it as a means of safety to females, for with my strong nater and massive inteleck, if it wuzn't for them three daily safety valves to let off the steam of my indignation at female doin's, and sayin's, Heaven only knows what would be the consequences. Things and folks would be tore to pieces for all that I knew and utterly destroyed. For how can you curb in a outraged and high sperited nature when it is fully rousted up, and aggravation has gone too fur? It is well that good vittles stand guard between me and them.

But as a man who loves peace and quiet, and despises female arguin' I wuz glad at this juncter to see the welcome form of Uncle Sime wendin' his way towards the barn. And I throwed down the Albernack with a hauty movement of my right hand, and strode off barnward with my head erect. And then we two valiant warriors in a noble cause held a meetin' of sweet sympathy and full understandin' in the horse barn.

IX

THE DANGER FROM WIMMEN'S EXAGGERATION

I told Samantha one day that another strong reason why wimmen hadn't ort to vote, and why they would be such a dangerous element in politics wuz that they prevaricated and exaggerated to such a alarmin' extent.

Sez I, "A woman can't tell a story straight to save her life—but has to put in so many exaggerations and stretch out facts so you couldn't reconize 'em when she gits 'em pulled out to the length she pulls 'em. They don't seem to have any idee of plain straightforward truthfulness such as my sect has. As long as they've seen men appearin' before 'em, tellin' the exact truth from day to day, and from year to year, they can't or won't foller his example.

"That trait of theirn," sez I, "is bad enough in the home and social circle, for there their men folks can head 'em off, and cover things up and make excuses for 'em, and tell the story straight. But if it wuz carried into public life where their men folks couldn't reach 'em, and quell 'em down, and ameliorate the effects on it, where would this nation be? It would be looked down on and shawed at by Foreign Powers as a nation of exaggerators and false witnessors, and it ort to be.

"Wimmen can't seem to learn to tell the truth and 'nothin' but the truth,' and that is the reason, Samantha," sez I, "that that clause wuz put in the law books; it wuz designed to try to skair female witnesses, and drive 'em into tellin' the truth. But it hain't done it."

I wuz gittin' real eloquent and riz up, for nothin' pleases a man more than to teach his wimmen folks great truths and enlighten 'em about laws. But Samantha had to bring me down from the hite I wuz on, in the aggravatin' way females have. And as it turned out I wuz kinder sorry I had dwelt on that trait of females that particular time, for she said in the irritatin' way wimmen have of bringin' up facts at times when there hain't no use of bringin' 'em up and when it is inconvenient for 'em to be brung.

Sez she, "I would talk about exaggeration in females, and men's love for exact truth, after what took place in this settin' room only last evenin'."

I didn't reply to her for there are times when silent disapproval is better than argument. I knowed what she meant, and I knowed she wanted to spile my argument, in the ornary way females have, so, as I say, I treated them words with silent contemp and went out to the barn. But I spoze I may as well tell you how it wuz, for if I don't she may tell it and make it out worse than it wuz. Condelick Henzy come over here last night after supper to borry my neck-yoke and Dr. Meezik from Zoar, where he used to live, went to see Condelick on bizness, and his wife told him he wuz here so he stopped here on his way home (I mistrust Condelick owes him though he didn't dun him before us).

They're both on 'em good natered easy-goin' men, and love to talk and tell stories. And I brung up a basin of good sick-no-furder apples, and they set and et apples and talked and talked. They both on 'em love to brag about what they've seen and hearn and naterally both on 'em want to tell the biggest story about it. Onfortinately Samantha wuz in the room to work on a new insane bed-quilt. And of course she has to find fault and cricketcise what they said and won't make allowances for high sperits.

Sez Dr. Meezik, "When I wuz a young man my folks lived on a farm that run along one side on a creek. And one day I wuz down on the creek lot hoein' corn and a bear come down on the ice from the big woods, and I rushed right out on the ice and killed that bear with my hoe."

Sez Condelick, "That's nothin' to what I did at about the same time. I lived on that same creek though furder south; it wuz dretful rich land. And I raised a cabbage there that wuz so big I hollered out the stem on't and made a boat of it, and used it to ferry me acrost that very stream of water."

"And it wuz jest about that time," sez Dr. Meezik, "le'me see, it wuz on my birthday about nine minutes past four o'clock in the afternoon, or it may have been nine and a half minutes past, I always want to be perfectly exact in my statements, but we will let it go at nine minutes.

"I wuz a great hunter in them days and fearless as a lion as you may know by my goin' out on the ice to meet that bear who had come to eat green corn, and killed him with my hoe handle.

"I had gone a little further north than I had ever gone before, and I come out to a big clearin' that I had never seen. I should say it wuz half a degree north of where we're settin' now, or it might have been half a pint further, a man can't be too exact and particular in telling such things, for some folks if they wanted to pick flaws and find fault might doubt his statement. But I didn't have my pocket compass with me and I wuz so surprised at what I see there that I don't know that I should thought to use it if I had had it.

"I must say that as many strange things as I've seen and heard I never wuz so surprised as I wuz at what I see there.

"Right there in that big clearin' there wuz a perfect army of tinkers makin' a immense brass kettle. There wuz jest one hundred of 'em, for I counted 'em over twice so's to be sure of gittin' the exact number. I am always so perfectly reliable in my statements, and am bound to git the smallest petickulars jest right. I spoze I got the habit partly from weighin' out my medicines so exact.

"And them tinkers wuz hammerin' away for all they wuz worth on that kettle, and you may judge of the size of it when I tell you them workmen wuz so fur apart they couldn't hear each other a hammerin'."

Even Condelick Henzy wuz took back and browbeat and sez mekanically, "What do you spoze they wuz goin' to do with the kettle?"

"Well," sez Dr. Meezik, "they didn't tell me, for I didn't want to act forward and ask, but I always spozed they wuz goin' to use it to bile your cabbage in."

Just at this epock of time Samantha gathered up her insane piece work and left the room. She didn't say nothin', but I knowed by the looks of her linement jest as well as I know now, that she'd throw that kettle and that cabbage in my face some time the most inconvenient for me, and you can see plain she's done it and now I hope she's satisfied.

As I said I went out to the barn and kinder fussed round cleanin' up some, and I never see Samantha agin till dinner time. I wuzn't afraid to go in and meet her and have her resoom her argument agin. No, I skorn the importation. I belong to a fearless sect, and am almost unacquainted with the word fear, though I know there is such a word in the Dictionary.

No, I had considerable putterin' round to do in the barn, and hen house, and so I stayed out there till I hearn the welcome sound of the dinner bell and smelt even from the barn door the agreable odors risin' from a first class dinner.

The smell and taste of the tender roast lamb and lushious vegetables softened my feelin's considerable, or would have if it hadn't been for the look on Samantha's face. It wuzn't a cross look nor a mean one, would that it wuz, for I could handle them looks better.

No, it wuz a kind of a superior look, as if she had conquored me in the argument about exaggeration and prevarication, and wuz gloatin' over the contrary temps that had occurred in the settin' room only the evenin' before, the little incident that broke down my excelent argument.

And of all the looks that mankind ever read on a woman's linement, the one a man can't stand is a superior look, a look that says as plain as words, "I like you and pity you, but I can't help lookin' down on you, Poor Thing!" That look from a inferior sect always aggravates a man so that he hain't skursly answerable for what he sez and duz.

And almost onbeknown to me I broke forth in a crushin' argument designed to crush her and change that look on her linement to one of humbleness becomin' to a female. Sez I, "Our sect has been the makin' of yourn, and it seems that when a female considers and thinks on all that men have done for wimmen and are willin' to do for 'em, they would have some feelin's of gratitude towards 'em, but they don't; they delight in argyin' with 'em and tryin' to git the better on 'em."

Instead of my smart reasonable words affectin' her favorably it seemed as if the look I despised deepened on her linement; not a sign did I see of meach, nor a sign of humble gratitude, and I wuz so irritated by it that I lanched right out in the crushin' argument that I had on my mind and that ort to bring female feathers droopin' down in the very dust.

Sez I, "Do you ever pause to think, Samantha, of the inestimable boon wimmen owe to men? Why," sez I, "if it hadn't been for a man, wimmen wouldn't had no souls to-day."

"How do you make that out?" sez Samantha, helpin' herself camly to some more dressin'.

"Why, it is a matter of history that way back in the centuries the preachers of that time had a meetin' to settle the question, and when they took a vote on't, the majority on 'em stood out on the popular side and cast their votes agin 'em, and vowed and declared that females hadn't no souls. And it wuz only by the vote of one single solitary man that it wuz carried in their favor and decided that they had souls.

"And I should think females would be so grateful to that noble man for what he done for 'em, for his bein' willin' to admit that they had souls, that they would honor the hull sect to which he belonged, and look up to 'em in humble and grateful gratitude, and never try to argy with 'em and aggravate 'em. For let me ask you, Samantha," sez I, in a solemn axent, "where would wimmen have been if that man had held out and jined in with the rest, and decided that wimmen hadn't got any soul? Where would they been then, and where would they be to-day?"

"Jest where they always wuz and are now," sez Samantha camly helpin' herself to a apple dumplin'. "It seems that it wuz men that started the question in the first place, and I spoze that if wimmen hadn't been so wore out and hampered by her hard work of takin' care of men, cookin', mendin', and cleanin' for 'em and bringin' up their children, etc., they might have had a jury of wimmen set on men to find out if they had souls. But I don't spoze they had a minute's time to spare from their hard work no more than I have, and I don't spoze it would make any difference either way. The main thing is whether men and wimmen have got souls to-day, and use them souls for the good of mankind, instead of lettin' 'em grow hard, or wither away in indifference to the woes and wants of the world, and the cause of Eternal Justice for every one, male and female."

That is jest the way with wimmen, they've got to talk and argy and try to have the last word. You can't seem to make 'em act meachin' and beholdin' to men anyway you can work it, and it seems to me I've tried every way there is from first to last.

But I wouldn't argy no more, I felt above it. I helped myself to my fourth apple dumplin' with a look of silent contemp on my linement, also I had the same look when I poured the lemon sass over it and took my third cup of coffee.

And my linement still showed to a clost observer the marks of a tried though hauty sperit, as I riz up from the table and retired with a high step to my sacred corner to resoom my literary efforts.

Sometimes pardners are real aggravatin' to each other and a trial to be borne with. And though I don't know what I'd do if I should ever lose Samantha, it don't seem as if I could ever eat another woman's vittles after livin' on the fat of the land as you may say for forty years.

Yet there are times when you set smartin' under wownds your pardner has gin your sperit and from arguments she no need to have brung up, and you see a widow man a passin' by, you have feelin's that can skursly be told on. You can see by the looks of his face and hands that he don't wash any oftener than he wants to, and never combs his hair and don't change his clothes till the Board of Health gits after him. And you know he never goes to meetin', and throws off girl blinders boldly, and stays out nights till as late as ten P.M. onquestioned and onscolded. And don't have to clean his shues when he goes in, and never curbs his appetite, but eats like a hog and enjoys himself.

Why, much as you love the dear pardner of your bosom, and prize the excelent food she cooks, and the clean comfortable home she makes for you—the air of freedom that seems to blow from that widow man (kinder stale air too) yet it fans your clean head and clean stiff shirt bosom like a breath from the Isle of Freedom.

And so after Samantha had hurt my feelin's and wownded my self respect by remindin' me of the incident mentioned, when if she had kep' still I should have come off victorious in my argument, I retired into the solitude of my corner in the settin' room where Betsy Bobbett's poetry lay heaped up in the dish-pan and I read with feelin' that I couldn't skursly describe the follerin' verses which I spoze Betsy writ after her husband had wownded her feelin's. And in readin' it I dedicate it silently to my brother men who have been aggravated by their pardners.

LONGIN'S OF THE SOLE

By Betsy Bobbett Slimpsey

Oh Gimlet! back again I float,
With broken wings, a weary bard;
I cannot write as once I wrote,
I have to work so very hard;
So hard my lot, so tossed about,
My muse is fairly tuckered out.

My muse aforesaid once hath flown,
But now her back is broke, and breast;
And yet she fain would crumple down;
On Gimlet's pages she would rest,
And sing plain words as there she's sot—
Haply they'll rhyme, and haply not.

I spake plain words in former days,
No guile I showed, clear was my plan;
My gole it matrimony was;
My earthly aim it was a man.
I gained my man, I won my gole;
Alas! I feel not as I fole.

Yes, ringing through my maiden thought
This clear voice rose: "Oh come up higher."
To speak plain truth with candor fraught,
To married be was my desire—
Now, sweeter still this lot doth seem,
To be a widder is my theme.

For toil hath claimed me for her own,
In wedlock I have found no ease;
I've cleaned and washed for neighbors round,
And took my pay in beans and pease;
In boiling sap no rest I took,
Or husking corn in barn and stook.

Or picking wool from house to house,
White-washing, painting, papering,
In stretching carpets, boiling souse;
E'en picking hops it hath a sting,
For spiders there assembled be,
Mosquitoes, bugs and etc.

I have to work oh! very hard;
Old Toil I know your breadth and length;
I'm tired to death, and in one word,
I have to work beyend my strength.
And mortal men are very tough
To get along with, nasty, rough.

Yes, tribulations doomed to her
Who weds a man, without no doubt,
In peace a man is singuler;
His ways they are past findin' out,
And oh! the wrath of mortal males—
To paint their ire, earth's language fails.

And thirteen children in our home
Their buttons rent their clothes they burst,
Much bread and such did they consume;
Of children they did seem the worst.
And Simon and I do disagree;
He's prone to sin continualee.

He horrors has, he oft doth kick,
He prances, yells—he will not work.
Sometimes I think he is too sick;
Sometimes I think he tries to shirk;
But 'tis hard for her in either case,
Who B. Bobbett was in happier days.

Happier? Away! such thoughts I spurn.
I count it true from spring to fall,
'Tis better to be wed, and groan,
Than never to be wed at all.
I'd work my hands down to the bone
Rather than rest a maiden lone.

This truth I cannot, will not shirk,
I feel it when I sorrow most:
I'd rather break my back with work,
And haggard look as any ghost,—
Rather than lonely vigils keep,
I'd wed and sigh and groan and weep.

Yes, I can say though tears fall quick
Can say, while briny tear-drops start,
I'd rather wed a crooked stick,
Than never wed no stick at all.
Sooner than laughed at be, as of yore
I'd ruther laugh myself no more.

I'd ruther go half clad and starved,
And mops and dish-cloths madly wave
Than have the name, B. Bobbett, carved
On head-stun rising o'er my grave.
Proud thought! now, when that stun is risen
'Twill bear two names—my name and hisen.

Methinks 'twould colder make the stun
If but one name, the name of she,
Should linger there alone—alone.
How different when the name of he
Does also deck the funeral urn;
Two wedded names, his name and hurn.

And sweeter yet, oh blessed lot!
Oh state most dignified and blest!
To be a widder calmly sot,
And have both dignity and rest.
Oh Simon, strangely sweet 'twould be
To be a widder unto thee.

The warfare past, the horrors done,
With maiden's ease and pride of wife,
The dignity of wedded one,
The calm and peace of single life,—
Oh, strangely sweet this lot doth seem;
A female widder is my theme.

I would not hurt a hair of he,
Yet did he from earth's toil escape,
I could most reconciléd be,
Could sweetly mourn e'en without crape.
Could say without a pang of pain
That Simon's loss was Betsy's gain.

I've told the plain tale of my woes,
With no deceit or language vain,
Have told whereon my hopes are rose,
Have sung my mournful song of pain.
And now I e'en will end my tale,
I've sung my song, and wailed my wail.

X

THE MODERN WIMMEN CONDEMNED

The Vice President of the Creation Searchin' Society of Jonesville wuz here yesterday mornin', and as soon as he'd gone through the usual neighborly talk about the weather, the hens, his wife, and the neighbors, etc., he tipped back in his chair and pushed back his hat a little furder on his head. He never took off his hat in my sight; Samantha asked me once "if I spozed he took it off nights, or slep in it."

But I explained it to her as a kind man is always willin' to do if a female asks him properly for information.

Sez I, "I hearn him say once, Samantha, that the way he got in the habit of not takin' off his hat before wimmen wuz to impress 'em with the fact of male superiority, and to let 'em know that he wuzn't goin' to bow down before 'em and act meachin'. He wuz always a big feelin' feller and after he got to be such a high official in the C.S.S. he naterally is hautier actin'."

Well, almost to once he begun to Samantha about wimmen's votin', runnin' the idee down to the very lowest notch it could go on the masculine stillyards. You see my forthcomin' great work agin Wimmen Rights has excited the male Jonesvillians dretfully, and emboldened 'em, till they act as fierce and bold as lions when they're talkin' to females.

They realize that when that immortal work is lanched onto the waitin' world the cause of Woman's Suffrage will collapse like the bladders we used to blow up in childhood, jest as sharp and sudden and jest as windy. They know that them that uphold such uroneous beliefs won't be nothin' nor nobody then, and so they begin beforehand to act more hauty and uppish towards Suffragists, and browbeat 'em. And he poked fun at the cause and slurred at it, and sneered at it till I didn't know but Samantha would take lumbago from his remarks, but she didn't seem to.

She had got her mornin's work all did up slick, her gingham apron hung up behind the kitchen door, and she'd resoomed her white one trimmed with tattin'. And she sot knittin' on a pair of blue woosted socks for me, her linement as smooth and onrumpled as her hair, which wuz combed smooth round her forward. And she kep' on with her knittin', only once in a while she would look up at him over her specs in the queer way she has at times, but still kep' lookin' cam, and sayin' nothin'.

And her camness and her silence seemed to spur him on and make him bolder and more aggressiver. He thought she wuz afraid on him, but I knowed she wuzn't.

At last he flung out the remark to her that if wimmen could vote it would be the bad wimmen who would flock to the poles; Samantha wuz jest turnin' the heel in my sock and after she made the turn she said that that wuzn't so, and she brought up statisticks and throwed at him (still a knittin' and seamin' two and two) provin' that it is the educated conscientious wimmen who want to help the good men of the country to make the laws to try to make the world a safer place for their children, a better, cleaner place for every one, and she threw some statements at him from States that had Woman's Suffrage for years and years to prove her insertion, but the statisticks, the figgers and the proofs piled about him onheeded, for he had got hot and excited by this time and it seemed as if Samantha's very camness madded him, and her knittin', and her seamin' two and two, and her countin' "one—two," to herself once in a while.

And sez he agin in a overbearin' skairful voice, intended to intimidate females, "I tell you it is the bad wimmen who will rush to the poles, and I can prove what I say." Sez he, "The meaner anybody is the more and the oftener they want to vote; my father is one of the best of men and you can't hardly git him to stir his stumps 'lection day. And my wife's father is the meanest man in the country and he will vote from mornin' till night for either party and sell his vote where he can git the highest figger—(he don't live happy with his wife, and he went on) and so will her Uncle Josh sell his vote to anybody for a glass of whiskey, and most all the men on her side will sell their vote and make money by it. And I know more'n a dozen men right round here who do the same thing. I don't spoze you wimmen read much of any, but if you did you'd see how common graft and fraud is in politics, all the way from Jonesville to Washington. So you see," sez he, "I can prove right out what I said that it is the bad wimmen who would vote."

Samantha counted "two and two" to herself, and then said in a mild axent, "Why would a bad woman's vote be worse than a bad man's?" The Vice President see in a minute into what a deep hole his excitement and voylent desire to prove his argument had led him, and he acted sheepish as a sheep.

But anon he revived and ketched holt of the first argument he could lay his hand on, to prop up his side of the question. It wuz a argument he had read about, he didn't believe it himself, but ketched at it in his hurry.

Sez he, "We expect more from wimmen than we do from men; they're naterally better than men and we want to keep 'em so, keep 'em out of the dirt of public affairs."

Sez Samantha still a knittin' and still a lookin' cam, "You must use clean water to cleanse dirty things. I don't believe as you do. I think the good qualities of men and wimmen would heft jest about equal, and need equal treatment. But accordin' to your tell if men are so much worse than wimmen they need her help to clean up things."

Agin the Vice President see where his hasty talk and anxiety to prove his pint had led him. He wiggled round in his chair till I trembled for the legs on it, for he wuz still leanin' back in it too fur for safety. He kinder run his hand up under his hat and scratched his head, but didn't seem to root any new idees out of his hair, and he finally give up, settled his hat back more firmly on his head agin, let his chair down sudden and got up and sez:

"I come over this mornin' to borry Josiah's sheep shears."

And after he went out with 'em I asked Samantha, "What do you spoze the Vice President wanted of sheep shears this time of year?" And she sez:

"He looked sheepish enough to use 'em on himself."

Well, it wuz gittin' along towards noon, as I reminded Samantha, and she riz up and put her knittin' work on the mantelry piece, resoomed her gingham apron and went out into the kitchen and soon I hearn the welcome sounds so sweet to a man's ear whether literary or profane, that preperations wuz goin' on for a good square meal.

And as I sot there peaceful and happy in my mind who should come in but my dear and congenial friend, Uncle Sime Bentley. He had been on a visit to Illenoy. And after his first words of greetin' and his anxious inquiries as to how my great work wuz progressin' and gittin' along, he went on and gin me the petickulars about his journey.

He'd been on a visit to the city to see his nephew, Bill Bentley. Bill is well off and smart, and his father-in-law is rich and sent his only child, Bill's wife, to college; "jest like a fool," Uncle Sime said. "For what duz a female want with such a eddication." Sez he, "The three R's, Readin', Ritin' and Rithmetic are enough for her and would be for any woman if they worked and tended to things as my ma, Bill's grandma did.

"Up at four every mornin' summer and winter, milkin' five or six cows and then gittin' breakfast for her big fambly, hired men and all, and doin' every mite of the housework, and spinnin', weavin', makin' and mendin', and takin' sole care of her eight children, in sickness and health, and takin' care of her mother who had been as big a worker and stay-at-home as she wuz, and who wuz now melancholy crazy in a little room done off the woodshed.

"How ma did work," sez Uncle Sime in a reminescin' axent, "stiddy at it from mornin' till night, never stirrin' out of the house from year to year. Oh! if she could only have lived to set a sample for Bill's wife, and instruct her in a wife's duty.

"I told Bill so," sez Uncle Sime. "And if you please," sez he, "Bill resented it, and said, ketch him a killin' his wife with work hard enough for four wimmen, and not stirrin' out of the house from year to year, he thought too much of her; sez he, 'if I wanted a slave I'd buy one and pay cash for her.'

"He didn't seem to appreciate ma's doin's no more than nothin', though as I told him, There wuz a woman whose price wuz above rubies, so different from the slack forward wimmen of to-day. So retirin', so modest and womanly, willin' to work her fingers to the bone and not complain. Never puttin' forward her opinion about anything, always lookin' up to pa and knowin' he wuz always right. And if she ever did seem curious about anything outside her housework and fambly, pa would shet her up and bring her back to her duty pretty quick. Yes indeed! pa wuz the head of the house, and laid out to be. But Bill didn't seem to have no gumption and self respect at all, and wuz perfectly willin' to be on equal terms with his wife. And Bill told him she had a household allowance and a private bank account. Private bank account! I told Bill it wuz enough to make his grandma rise from her grave to see such bold onwomanly doin's.

"And Bill said 'it would be a good thing for her to rise, if she could stay up, for mebby she would take a little comfort and rest her mind and her bones a little, at this epock of time.'"

I sez, "I spoze, Simon, you didn't have nothin' fit to eat there and everything goin' to rack and ruin about the house."

"No," Uncle Sime said, "I must own up that things run pretty smooth, and Bill's wife sot a good table. They had a stout woman who helped about the work and takin' care of the children, leavin' Bill's wife free to go round with Bill to meetin's and clubs and a fishin' and motor ridin', and picknickin' with him and the kids."

"I spoze she wuz high headed and disagreable," sez I.

"No," sez Uncle Sime, "she wuz always good natered and dressed pretty, and why shouldn't she?" sez he bitterly, "havin' her own way and runnin' things to suit herself. And why shouldn't she dress pretty? Lanchin' out and buyin' everything she wanted. Not curbed down by Bill, nor askin' a man's advice at all about her clothes or housen stuff so fur as I could see."

Sez I, "Mebby Bill didn't like it so well as you thought, Simon; mebby he wuz chafin' inside on him."

"No, he wuzn't, he liked it, there's one of the pints I'm comin' at, how these modern wimmen will pull the wool over men's eyes, no matter how smart he is naterally. They did seem to have good times together, laughin' and talkin' together, settin' to the table a hour or so, a visitin' away as if they hadn't seen each other for a month. But merciful heavens! the subjects they talked on and discussed over! It seemed that she knew every crook and turn on subjects that Bill's grandma never had heard on by name. Hygeen, books, Street Cleanin', Hospital work, Charities, Political affairs from pole to pole and Scientific subjects—Radium, Electricity, Spiritualism, Woman's Suffrage, which they both believed in. There seemed to be no end to the subjects they talked about. So different from pa and ma's talk. They eat their meals in perfect and solemn silence most all the time, ma always waitin' on him. And if she did venter any remarks to him they usually didn't fly no higher than hen's eggs or neighborhood doin's. Do you spoze that pa would stood it havin' a wife that acted as if she knew as much as he did? Not much.

"But Bill's wife wuz right up to snuff as well informed as Bill wuz, and Bill didn't seem to know enough to be jealous and mad about a wife actin' as if she wuz on a equality with him. It made me ashamed to think a male relation on my own side should act so meachin'. And in one thing she even went ahead of Bill, owin' to the money men had spent on her. She sung like a bird, and evenin's Bill would lay back in his chair before the open fireplace and listen to her singin' and playin' them old songs and look at her as if he worshipped her. He didn't seem to want to stir out of the house evenin's unless she went too, lost all his ambition to go out and have a good man time, seemed perfectly happy where he wuz. And he used to be a great case to be out nights and act like a man amongst men.

"But," sez Uncle Sime, "I believe that one of the things that galded me most amongst all the galdin' things I see and hearn there, wuz Bill's wife's independence in money matters. Economic Independence! That wuz one of her fool idees. Oh, how often I thought of you, Josiah, and wished you wuz there to put down what I see and hearn in the beautiful language you know so well how to use."

My feelin's wuz touched and I sez solemnly, "Simon, I would loved to been there, and if I couldn't help you I could have sot and sympathized with you."

Sez Simon, "Never once durin' them six weeks I wuz there did I see her ask Bill for a cent, and how well I remember," sez Simon, "when if ma wanted the money for a pair of shues, or a gingham dress for herself, how she would have to coax pa and git him extra vittles and pompey him and beg for the money in such a womanly and becomin' way. And sometimes pa wuz real short with her and would deny her. Not but what he meant to git 'em in the end, for he wuz a noble man. But he held off, wantin' her to realize he wuz the head of the fambly, and to be looked up to."

Sez Simon, "Ma would have to manage every way for days and days to git them shues and that dress and when he did git any clothes for her pa picked 'em out himself, for ma had been brought up to think his taste wuz better'n hern."

Sez I, "Probable it wuz better, probable he got things that wore like iron."

"Yes, he did," sez Simon, "he did. He never cared so much for looks as he did the solid wear of anything." And for a few minutes Uncle Sime seemed lost in a silent contemplation of his pa's oncommon good qualities, and then he resoomed agin. "The news come right whilst I wuz there, about the leven hundred saloons closed durin' the few months since wimmen voted in that state. And Bill never resented it and even jined in with the idee that it wuz owin' to wimmen's votes largely that that and the other big temperance victories of late wuz accomplished. He didn't seem to have no more self respect than a snipe. And if you'll believe it, Josiah, Bill's wife made a public speech right whilst I wuz there, sunthin' about school matters she thought wuz wrong and ort to be set right."

"How did Bill like that, Simon?" sez I. "I guess that kinder opened his eyes."

"Like it!" sez Uncle Sime in a indignant axent. "Why, instead of actin' ashamed and resentin' it as a man of sperit would, he went with her and made a speech too, and they carried the day and beat the side they said wuz usin' the school to make money. And I hearn 'em with my own ears comin' in at ten P.M. laughin' and jokin' together like two kids. Makin' a speech before men! Oh, what would Bill's great-grandma thought on't? She'd say she had reason for her melancholy madness, and his grandma would say she wuz glad she wuz dead."

"Most probable that is so, Simon," sez I, sympathizin' with him. "As I've intimidated to you before, Simon, time and agin, this is a turrible epock of time us male men are a passin' through, jest like a see-saw gone crazy, wimmen up and stayin' up, and men down and held down. But wait till my great work agin Female Suffrage is lanched onto the world and then see what will happen, and jest as soon as I git a little ahead with my outdoor work I'm a goin' to lanch it. Then will come the upheaval and the crash, follered by peace and happiness. Men will resoom their heaven-born station as rulers and protectors of the weaker sect, and females will sink down agin into hern, lookin' up to man as their nateral gardeens and masters."

"Ma knowed it in her day and practiced it," sez Simon. "And pa knowed it and acted his part nobly. Ma wuz so retirin' and so womanly. Why, if once in a great while she took it in her head to ask about such things as Bill's wife boldly lectured about, do you spoze she'd go before any strange man to talk out about it? No, she would always ask pa to explain it to her. And I remember well how kinder wishful and wonderin' her eyes looked and yet timid and becomin'. And pa actin' his part in life as a man of sperit should, would most always tell her to tend to her housework and let men run them things. But if he did feel good natered and explain 'em to her she took his word for law and gospel and acted meek and grateful to him.

"Yes, pa wuz to the head of his house and kep' females down where they belonged, and her actions wuz a pattern for wimmen to foller. And it wuz such a pity and a wonder that she had to die so early, only thirty years old when the Lord took her before her virtues wuz known to the world at large.

"I remember well the night she passed away," sez Simon, in a softer reminescener axent.

"She wanted her bed drawed up to the open winder. And she lay lookin' up to the full moon and stars a shinin' in the great clear sky. She looked up and up and kinder smiled and sez in a sort of a wishful, wonderin' axents:

"'Oh, how big! And how free!'

"And I always spozed she meant sunthin' about how big pa wuz, and how free to understand things she didn't, and hadn't ort to."

Sez I, "I hain't a doubt, Simon, but that wuz what she meant, not a doubt on't!"

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