Samantha at Saratoga by Marietta Holley (online e book reader TXT) 📕

“Why,” he whispered, “you can drink all you are a mind to for 5 cents. I am bound for once, Samantha Allen, to get the worth of my money.”

And he drinked the tumbler full down at one swoller almost, and turned to the weary boy for another. He looked bad, and eager, and sez I, “How many have you drinked?”

Sez he, in a eager, animated whisper, “9.” And he whispered in the same axents, “5 times 9 is 45 ; if it had been to a fair, or Fourth of July, or anything, it would have cost me 45 cents, and if it had been to a church social - lemme see - 9 times 10 is 90. It would have cost me a dollar bill! And here I am a havin’ it all for 5 cents. Why,” sez he, “I never see the beat on’t in my life.”

And ag’in he drinked a tumbler full down, and motioned to the frightened boy for another.

But I took him by the vest and whispered to him, sez I, “Josiah Allen, do you want to die, because you can die cheap? Why,” sez I, “it will kill you to drink so much.”

“But think of the cheapness on’t Samantha! The chance I have of getting the worth of my money.”

But I whispered back to him in anxus axents and told him, that I guessed if funeral expenses wuz added to that 5 cents it wouldn’t come so cheap, and sez I, “you wont live through many more glasses, and you’ll see you wont. Why,” sez I, “you are a drowndin’ out your insides.”

He wuz fairly a gettin’ white round the mouth, and I finally got him to withdraw, though he looked back longingly at the tumblers and murmured even after I had got him to the door, that it wuz a dumb pity when anybody got a chance to get the worth of their money, which wuzn’t often, to think they couldn’t take advantage on it.

And I sez back to him in low deep axents, “There is such a thing as bein’ too graspin’, Josiah Allen.” Sez I, “The children of Israel used to want to lay up more manny than they wanted or needed, and it spilte on their hands.” And sez I, “you see if it haint jest so with you; you have been in too great haste to enrich yourself, and you’ll be sorry for it, you see if you haint.”

And he was. Though he uttered language I wouldn’t wish to repeat, about the children of Israel and about me for bringin’ of ’em up. But the man wuz dethly sick. Why he had drinked 11 tumblers full, and I trembled to think what would have follered on, and ensued, if I hadn’t interfered. As it wuz, he wuz confined to our abode for the rest of the day.

But I wouldn’t have Josiah Allen blamed more than is due for this little incedent, for it only illustrates a pervailin’ trait in men’s nater, and sometimes wimmen’s - a too great desire to amass sudden riches, and when opportunity offers, burden themselves with useless and wearysome and oft-times painful gear.

They don’t need it but seeing they have a chance to get it cheap, “dog cheap “ as the poet observes, why they weight themselves down with it, and then groan under the burden of unnecessary and wearin’ wealth. This is a deep subject, deep as the well from which my companion drinked, and nearly drinked himself into a untimely grave.

Men heap up more riches than they can enjoy and then groan and rithe under the taxes, the charity given, the envy, the noteriety, the glare, and the glitter, the crowd of fortune-hunters and greedy hangers-on, and the care and anxiety. They orniment the high front of their houses with the paint, the gildin’, the fashion, and the show of enormous wealth, and while the crowd of fashion-seekers and fortune-hunters pour in and out of the lofty doorway they set out on the back stoop a groanin’ and a sithin’ at the cares and sleepless anxietes of their big wealth, and then they git up and go down street and try their best to heap up more treasure to groan over.

And wimmen now, when wuz there ever a woman who could resist a good bargain? Her upper beauro draws may be a runnin’ over with laces and ribbons, but let her see a great bargain sold for nothin’ almost, and where is the female woman that can resist addin’ to that already too filled up beauro draw.

A baby, be he a male, or be he a female child, when he has got a appel in both hands, will try to lay holt of another, if you hold it out to him. It is human nater. Josiah must not be considered as one alone in layin’ up more riches than he needed. He suffered, and I also, for sech is the divine law of love, that if one member of the family suffers, the other members suffer also, specially when the sufferin’ member is impatient and voyalent is his distress, and talks loud and angry at them who truly are not to blame.

Now I didn’t make the springs nor I wuzn’t to blame for their bein’ discovered in the first place. But Josiah laid it to me. And though I tried to make him know that it wuz a Injun that discovered ’em first, he wouldn’t gin in and seemed to think they wouldn’t have been there if it hadn’t been for me.

I hated to hear him go on so. And in the cause of Duty, I brung up Sir William Johnson and others. But he lay there on the lounge, and kep’ his face turned resolute towards the wall, in a dretful oncomfertable position (sech wuz his temper of mind), and said, he never had heard of them, nor the springs nuther, and shouldn’t if it hadn’t been for me.

Why, sez I, “A Injun brought Sir William Johnson here on his back.”

“Wall,” sez he, cross as a bear, “that is the way you’ll have to take me back, if you go on in this way much longer.”

“In what way, Josiah?” sez I.

“Why a findin’ springs and draggin’ a man off to ’em, and makin’ him drink.”

“Why, Josiah Allen,” sez I, “I told you not to drink - don’t you remember?”

“No! I don’t remember nuthin’, nor don’t want to. I want to go to sleep!” sez he, snappish as anything, so I went out and let him think if he wanted to, that I made the Springs, and the Minerals, and the Gysers, and the Spoutin’ Rock, and everything. Good land! I knew I didn’t; but I had to rest under the unkind insinnuation. Such is some of the trials of pardners.

But Josiah waked up real clever. And I brung him up some delicate warm toast and some fragrant tea, and his smile on me wuz dretful good-natured, almost warm. And I forgot all his former petulence and basked in the rays of love and happiness that beamed on me out of the blue sky of my companion’s eyes. The clear blue sky that held two stars, to which my heart turned.

Such is some of the joys of pardners with which the world don’t meddle with, nor can’t destroy.

But to resoom. Ardelia sot down awhile in our room before she went back to her boardin’ house. I see she wuz a writin’ for she had a long lead pencil in her right hand and occasionally she would lean her forrerd down upon it, in deep thought, and before she went, she slipped the verses into my hand:

“STANZAS ON A MINERAL SPRING.

“Oh! waters that doth bubble up and spout
Oh, didst thou bubble down insted of up,
Thou couldest not with all thy minerals get out
We could not then arise and drink thee in a cup.

“Oh! human waves that float and seeth and tear
Oh wiltest thou not too a learn to bubble up
Instead of down, a lesson deep to bear,
Oh Soul, can here be learned, one smooth, or rough.

“A lesson deep of powerful min-er-als
That act with power the constitution on,[1]
And still that softly bubbles up, and tells
To souls unborn, how sweetly they have ron.

“Oh water that doth mount on slender tip,
And spoutest up some 30 feet, through pole;
Oh Hope, learn thou a lesson from the water’s lip,
Spout out, spout out, in peace from hollow soul.”

[1] As in the case of Mr. Allen, poor dear man.

Sez I, a lookin’ over my specks at Ardelia after I had finished readin’ the verses: “What does ‘ron’ mean? I never heerd of that word before, nor knew there wuz sech a one.”

Sez she, “I meant ran, but I s’pose it is a poetical license to say ‘ron,’ don’t you think so?”

“Oh, yes,” sez I, “I s’pose so, I don’t know much about licenses, nor don’t want to, they are suthin’ I never believed in. But,” sez I, for I