Sweet Cicely β or Josiah Allen as a Politician by Marietta Holley (the best books of all time .TXT) π
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- Author: Marietta Holley
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And so he would go on from hour to hour, and from day to day; and I wus that dumbfoundered and wonderin' about it, that I couldn't for my life tell what to think of it. It worried me.
But from that day Josiah Allen rode on that pass, every chance he got. Why, he went to the Ohio on it, on a visit to his first wive's sister; and he went to Michigan on it, and to the South, and everywhere he could think of. Why, he fairly hunted up relations on it, and I told him so.
And after he got 'em hunted up, he'd take them onto that pass, and ride round with 'em on it.
And he told every one of 'em, he told everybody, that he thought as much agin of the honor as he did of the money. It showed that he wus thought so much of, not only in Jonesville, but the world at large.
Why, he took such solid comfort in it, that it did honestly seem as if he grew fat, he wus so puffed up by it, and proud. And some of the neighbors that he boasted so before, wus eat up with envy, and seemed mad to think he had come to such honor, and they hadn't. But the madder they acted, the tickleder he seemed, and more prouder, and high-headeder.
But I could not feel so. I felt that there wus sunthin' strange and curius about it. And it wus very, very seldom that Josiah could get me to ride on it. Though I did take a few short journeys on it, to please him. But I felt sort o' uneasy while I was a ridin' on it, same as you feel when you are goin' up-hill with a heavy load and a little horse. You kinder stand on your feet, and lean forward, as if your bein' oncomfortable, and standin' up, helped the horse some.
I had a good deal of that restless feelin', and oneasy. And as I told Josiah time and time again, βthat for stiddy ridin' I preferred a mare to a mystery.β
Wall, it run along for a year; and Josiah said he s'posed he'd have to write on, and get the pass renewed. As near as he could make out, it run out about the 4th day of April. So he wrote down to the head one in New-York village; and the answer came back by return mail, and wrote in plain writin' so we could read it.
It seemed there wus a mistake. It wuzn't a free pass, it wus a order for Josiah Allen to remove a pig-pen from his place on the railroad-track within three days.
There it wuz, a order to remove a nuisence; and Josiah Allen had been a ridin' on it for a year, with pride in his mean, and haughtiness in his demeanor.
Wall, I never see a man more mortified and cut up than Josiah Allen wuz. If he hadn't boasted so over its bein' gin to him on account of his bein' so smart and popular and etcetery, he wouldn't have felt so cut up. But as it was, it bowed down his bald head into the dust (allegory).
But he didn't stay bowed down for any length of time: truly, men are constituted in such a way that mortification don't show on 'em for any length of time.
But it made sights and sights of talk in Jonesville. The Jonesvillians made sights and sights of fun of him, poked fun at him, and snickered. I myself didn't say much: it hain't my way. I merely says this: says I,β
βYou thought you wus so awful popular, Josiah Allen, mebby you won't go round with so haughty a mean onto you right away.β
βThrow my mean in my face if you want to,β says he. βBut I guess,β says he, βit will learn 'em another time to take a little more pains with their duck's tracks, dumb 'em!β
Says I, βStop instantly.β And he knew what I meant, and stopped.
CHAPTER V.
Josiah is as kind-hearted a man as was ever made. And he loves me with a devotion, that though hidden sometimes, like volcanic fires, and other married men's affections for their wives, yet it bursts out occasionally in spurts and jets of unexpected tenderness.
Now, the very next mornin' after Cicely left for her aunt Mary's, he gave me a flaming proof of that hidden fire that burns but don't consume him.
A agent come to our dwelling, and with the bland and amiable air of their sect, asked me,β
βIf I would buy a encyclopedia?β
I was favorable to the idee, and showed it by my looks and words; but Josiah wus awful set against it. And the more favorable I talked about it, the more horrow-struck and skairt Josiah Allen looked. And finally he got behind the agent, and winked at me, and made motions for me to foller him into the buttery. He wunk several times before I paid much attention to 'em; but finally, the winks grew so violent, and the motions so imperious, yet clever, that I got up, and follered him into the buttery. He shet the door, and stood with his back against it; and says to me, with his voice fairly tremblin' with his emotions,β
βIt will throw you, Samantha! you don't want to buy it.β
βWhat will throw me? and when?β says I.
βWhy,β says he, βyou can't never ride it! How should I feel to see you on one of 'em! It skairs me most to death to see a boy ride 'em; and at your age, and with your rheumatiz, you'd get throwed, and get your neck broke, the first day.β Says he, βIf you have got to have something more stylish, and new-fangled than the old mair, I'd ruther buy you a philosopher. They are easier-going than a encyclopedia, anyway.β
βA philosopher?β says I dreamily.
βYes, such a one as Tom Gowdey has got.β
Says I, βYou mean a velocipede!β
βYes, and I'll get you one ruther than have you a ridin' round the country on a encyclopedia.β
His tender thoughtfulness touched my heart, and I explained to him all about 'em. He thought it was some kind of a bycicle. And he brightened up, and didn't make no objections to my gettin' one.
Wall, that very afternoon he went to Jonesville, and come home, as I said, all rousted up about bein' a senator. I s'pose Elburtus'es bein' there, and talkin' so much on politics, had kinder sot him to thinkin' on it. Anyway, he come home from Jonesville perfectly rampant with the idee of bein' United-States senator. βHe said he had been approached on the subject.β
He said it in that sort of a haughty, high-headed way, such as men will sometimes assume when they think they have had some high honors heaped onto 'em.
Says I, βWho has approached you, Josiah Allen?β
βWall,β he said, βit might be a foreign minister, and it might be uncle Nate Gowdey.β He thought it wouldn't be best to tell who it was. βBut,β says he, βI am bound to be senator. Josiah Allen, M.C., will probable be wrote on my letters before another fall. I am bound to run.β
Says I coldly, βYou know you can't run. You are as lame as you can be. You have got the rheumatiz the worst kind.β
Says he, βI mean runnin' with political legsβand I do want to be a senator, Samantha. I want to, like a dog, I want the money there is in it, and I want the honor. You know they have elected me path-master, but I hain't a goin' to accept it. I tell you, when anybody gets into political life, ambition rousts up in 'em: path-master don't satisfy me. I want to be senator: I want to, like a dog. And I don't lay out to tackle the job as Elburtus did, and act too good.β
βNo!β says I sternly. βThere hain't no danger of your bein' too good.β
βNo: I have laid my plans, and laid 'em careful. The relation on your side was too willin', and too clever. And witnessin' his campaign has learnt me some deep lessons. I watched the rocks he hit aginst; and I have laid my plans, and laid 'em careful. I am going to act offish. I feel that offishness is my strong holtβand endearin' myself to the masses. Educatin' public sentiment up to lovin' me, and urgin' me not to be so offish, and to obleege 'em by takin' a officeβthem is my 2 strong holts. If I can only hang back, and act onwillin', and get the masses fierce to elect meβwhy, I'm made. And then, I've got a plan in my head.β
I groaned, in spite of myself.
βI have got a plan in my head, that, if every other plan fails, will elect me in spite of the old Harry.β
Oh! how that oath grated against my nerve! And how I hung back from this idee! I am one that looks ahead. And I says in firm tones,β
βYou never would get the nomination, Josiah Allen! And if you did, you never would be elected.β
βOh, yes, I should!β says he. But he continued dreamily, βThere would have to be considerable wire-pullin'.β
βWhere would the wires be?β says I sternly. βAnd who would pull 'em?β
βOh, most anywhere!β says he, lookin' dreamily up onto the kitchen ceilin', as if wires wus liable to be let down anywhere through the plasterin'.
Says I, βShould you have to go to pullin' wires?β
βOf course I should,β says he.
βWall,β says I, βyou may as well make up your mind in the first ont, that I hain't goin' to give my consent to have you go into any thing dangerous. I hain't goin' to have you break your neck, at your age.β
Says he, βI don't know but my age is as good a age to break my neck in as any other. I never sot any particular age to break my neck in.β
βMake fun all you are a mind to of a anxious Samantha,β says I, βbut I will never give my consent to have you plunge into such dangerous enterprizes. And talkin' about pullin' wires sounds dangerous: it sounds like a circus, somehow; and how would you, with your back, look and feel performin' like a circus?β
βOh, you don't understand, Samantha! the wires hain't pulled in that way. You don't pull 'em with your hands, you pull 'em with your minds.β
βOh, wall!β says I, brightenin' up. βYou are all right in that case: you won't pull hard enough to hurt you any.β
I knew the size and strength of his mind, jest as well as if I had took it out of his head, and weighed it on the steelyards. It was not over and above large. I knew it; and he knew that I knew it, because I have had to sometimes, in the cause of Right, remind him of it. But he knows that my love for him towers up like a dromedary, and moves off through life as stately as she duzβthe dromedary. Josiah was my choice out of a world full of men. I love Josiah Allen. But to resoom and continue on.
Josiah says, βWhich side had I better go on, Samantha?β Says he, kinder puttin' his head on one side, and lookin' shrewdly up at the stove-pipe, βWould you run as a Stalwart, or a Half-breed?β
Says I, βI guess you would run more like a lame hen than a Stalwart or a Half-breed; or,β says I, βit would depend on what breeds they wuz. If they wus half snails, and half Times in the primers, maybe you could get ahead of 'em.β
βI should think, Samantha Allen, in such a time as this, you would act like a rational bein'. I'll be hanged if I know what side to go on to get elected!β
Says I, βJosiah Allen, hain't you got any principle? Don't you know what side you are on?β
βWhy, yes, I s'pose I know as near as men in gineral. I'm a Democrat in times of peace. But it is human nater, to want to be on the side
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