Part 9
This very girl when she was a child, was left to his care by her dyin’ mother and she grew up as pretty as a half blown rose bud, and jest as innocent; an orphan, unbeknowin’ to the world, its glory, and its wickedness. And he learnt it all to her, all its glory, and all its wickedness; for she thought, innocent young lamb, that a new world of light and glory had swung down from heaven a purpose for him and her, in them days when he ransacked heaven and earth to find tender ways and tender words enough to tell his love for her, his admiration for her beauty, her brightness, her grace, her sweet confidin’ innocence. And so he held her heart, her life in his hands, and she would have been thankful to have laid them down for the handsome villain, if he had told her to. And holdin’ her heart as he did, he broke it. Holdin’ her life as he did, he ruined it. By every hellish art that could be called to aid him, he deliberately committed this sin. Brought her down from innocence and happiness, to ruin, wretchedness, disgrace, despair, drink, the streets. And then he was unanimously chosen by a majority of the people to make wise laws, such as legalizing sin and iniquity, and other noble statutes, for the purifyin’ of the nation. And she,—why, as she is too low and worthless for anything else, she is used as a capital illustration to enforce the fact, that wimmen like her are too sinful to vote.
Says I speakin’ right out, loud and very eloquent: “Sister Minkley, as sure as there is a God in heaven, such injustice will not be permitted to go on forever.”
I s’pose I skairt her, speakin’ out so sudden like, and she not knowin’ what performances had been a performin’ in my mind. And she murmured again almost mekanically:
“It would be the awfulest thing I ever hearn on, for such creeters to vote.”
Says I, “That old torment can vote can’t he, the one that brought her where she is?”
“No doubt but what _she_ was to blame,” says sister Minkley drawin’ her lips down in a real womanly way.
“Who said she wasn’t!” says I in real excited axents. “But this I will contend for, that her sin compared to his, wasn’t so much as a morphine powder to a barrell of flour.”
“She no need to have sunk down to where she is now,” says sister Minkley speakin’ again, in a real prudent, womanly tone.
Says I, “Sister Minkley, when that girl found out that the man she loved better than her own soul, that she looked up to as a God, as wimmen will, when she found that that man had betrayed her, ruined her, do you s’pose she had any faith left in God or man? The hull world reeled with her, and she went down with the shock. How low she went down, you nor I shall never know. And may the God above, who is able to keep us all from temptation, keep your childern and mine, sister Minkley.”
“Amen!” says sister Minkley jest as solemn as if she was to camp-meetin’. For danger never looks so dangerous, nor ruin so ruinous, as when a mother thinks of her own childern fallin’ onto it.
Says I, “Sister Minkley when I think it might have been my Tirzah Ann, what feelin’s I feel.”
“And jest so I feel,” says she. Sister Minkley does dretful well by her childern, thinks a sight on ’em, and the mother in her was touched.
Says I, “Sister Minkley, that girl had a mother once. A mother’s hand to guide her upwards—to lay on her brow when it ached. A mother’s love to keep her from temptation. A mother’s arms to hold her from evil, from coldness, from blame. A mother’s heart to rest on, when tired, tired out with the world. Less try to feel for her a little as that faithful heart would, if it wasn’t put away under the grasses.”
Says I, almost eloquently, “It don’t look well sister Minkley for mother’s hands that have held little trustin’ baby fingers in them, to be pinted out in mockery, or stun bruised in stunnin’ such as she. No! rather let them be lifted up to high heavens in prayer for ’em, or reached in help to ’em, or wipin’ away tears of pity and sorrow for ’em. Let mothers think for one half or even one third of a moment, what if death had unloosed their own claspin’ lovin’ hands from the baby fingers—tender trustin’ little fingers,—and so many different hands in the world reached out to clasp ’em, and they so weak, so confidin’, and so woefully ignorant what hands to lay holt of, little helpless, foolish lambs, that love guarded, love watched in safe homes, need such wise guidance, and prayers, and tears, and watchfulness—what would become of them wanderin’ alone in a world full of wolves, temptation, starvation, and more’n forty other old whelps, some of the fiercest ones so covered up with honest lookin’ wool, that the keenest spectacles are powerless for the time bein’ to tell ’em from sheep. Little white lambs travelin’ alone so dangerous and black a road, how can they keep themselves white unless God keeps ’em. We mothers ort to think _such_ thoughts sister Minkley, and pray prayers daily, not alone for our own childern, but for all of Gods little ones—for all of these poor wanderers; askin’ for heavenly wisdom and strength to save them, win them back to a better life.”
“Amen,” says sister Minkley, speakin’ up jest as prompt and serene as if she was carryin’ on a conference meetin’. She is as well meanin’ a woman as I ever see, and bein’ a Methodist by perswasion ‘Amens’ come jest as natural to her as the breath she breathes. They are truly her theme; but she means well.
Says I goin’ on and resumin’:
“After that girl gave her freshness and beauty to the little face that lay for a few months on her bosom—dear to her, dearer to her in all her shame and guilt, than her life, because she could see _his_ features in it—then Senator Vyse grew tired of her.
“And then her baby died. Perhaps God knew she was not fit to guide a deathless life, so he took to himself the little white soul. And she missed it. Missed the little constant hands that clung to her trustingly—the innocent eyes that never looked at her scornfully, and the little loving head that nestled fearlessly on her guilty breast.
“And then, the Senator bein’ very tired of her, and havin’ found a newer face that he liked better, turned her out doors, and she went ravin’ wild, they say, run off into the woods, tried to kill herself. They took her to the hospittle, and when she got over her wildness, she would set by the winder all day, pale as a ghost, jest for the chance of seein’ him ridin’ by—for she couldn’t kill her love for him, that was one of the hardest things for her; she couldn’t strangle it out no more’n she could kneel down and pray the sun out of the sky, because she had had a sunstroke. And what did she do to try to forget him and her agony? She took to drinkin’, and fell lower and lower; so low, that nothin’ but God’s mercy can ever reach down to her.”
Says I, “Her face used to be as innocent and sweet as your baby’s face, your little Katy; and look at it now, if you want to see what this man has done. Look at the shame there, where there used to be fearlessness and trust; look at the wretchedness, where there used to be happiness; look at the vicious look, the guilty look, where there was innocence and purity; see how she is shunned and despised by those who used to love and respect her; consider the gulf his hands have dug, deep as eternity, between her and the old life she weeps over but can never return to. If, when she was sweet, and innocent, and trustin’, and fitter for heaven than she ever will be again—when she was first left to his care—he had killed her with his own hands, it wouldn’t have been half the crime he has done now, for then he would only have harmed her body, not her immortal soul.
“And what seems to me the most pitiful thing, sister Minkley, is, he ruined that girl through the best part of her nater—her trust, her affection. Jest as a young deer is led to its death by an old panther mockin’ the voice of its dam, jest so did this old human panther lead this innocent young creeter astray by mockin’ the voice of love,—that holiest of voices—lead her down to destruction through her tenderness, her love for him. And now, after he has stole her happiness, her innocence, her purity, her self-respect, and the respect of others, all her earthly hopes of happiness and her hopes of heaven; after she has lost _all_ for his sake; after he has committed this crime against her, the greatest that man can commit, he crows over her and feels above her; says, ‘_you_ can’t vote, but _I_ can; oh yes, I am all right because I am a man.’ Good land! sister Minkley, how mad it makes me to see such injustice and iniquity.”
But sister Minkley’s mind had got to travelin’ again the ways of the world, and she spoke out in a sort of a preachin’ tone—I s’pose she kinder catched it from Brother Minkley, unbeknown to her:
“Listen to the voice of Solomon concernin’ strange wimmen. ‘She layeth in wait as for a prey. She increaseth the trangressions amongst men. My son rejoice with the wife of thy youth, be thou ravished always with her love. Beware of strange wimmen! Her feet go down to death. Her steps take hold on hell!’”
I was agitated and almost by the side of myself, and I spoke out quick like, before I had time to think how it would sound.
Says I, “That very same strange woman that Solomon was bewarin’ his son about, was innocent once, and in the first on’t some man led her astray, and I shouldn’t wonder a mite if it was old Solomon himself.”
“Good gracious!” says sister Minkley, “Why’e!”
Says I, “I mean well sister Minkley; and there can’t nobody go ahead of me in honorin’ Solomon for what was honorable in him, and admirin’ what was admirable in him. He bilt one of the biggest meetin’ housen’s that ever was bilt, did lots of good, and some of his words are truly like ‘apples of gold in pitchers of silver,’ chuck full of wisdom and goodness. But I must speak the truth if I speak at all sister Minkley, especially where my sect is concerned. As you probable know, private investigation into the wrongs of my sect and tryin’ to right them wrongs, is at present my mission and my theme, (and also promiscous advisin’.) And I must say, that I think Solomon talked to his son a little too much about bewarin’ of strange wimmen, and exhortin’ him to stick to the wife of his youth, when he had ten hundred wimmen by him all the time, and then wasn’t satisfied but started off to git a couple more—upwards of a thousand wimmen. Good gracious! sister Minkley; I should have thought some of ’em would have looked strange to him.”
“Why sister Allen! why’e!”
“I mean well, sister Minkley; I mean first rate. And I’ll bet a cent if you should speak your mind right out, you would say that you don’t uphold Solomon in all his doin’s no more’n I do. He was altogether too familiar with wimmen, Solomon was, to suit _me_. Marryin’ seven hundred of ’em. Good land! And folks make a great fuss now-a-days if a man marries two; claps him right into jail quicker’n a wink, and good enough for him; he ort to go. One woman at a time is my theme, and that is the theme of the new testament, and what that says is good enough for me or anybody else; it is God’s own words to us sister Minkley.”
I had been dretful kinder agitated in tone, I felt so deeply what I said. But I continued on in some milder axents, but impressive as impressive could be—for I was a talkin’ on principle, and I keep a tone by me all the time on purpose for that, a dretful deep, lofty, eloquent tone; and I used it now, as I went on and proceeded.
As I said sister Minkley, I have made the subject of wimmen my theme for quite a number of years—ever sense the black African and the mortgage on our farm was released. I have meditated on what wimmen has done, and what she haint done; what treatment she has received, and what she haint received. Why sometimes, sister Minkley, when I have got onto that theme, my mind has soared to that extent that you wouldn’t have any idee of, if you never had seen anything done in the line of soarin’. It has sailed back to the year one, and sailed onwards through the centuries that lie between to that golden year we both believe in sister Minkley. It has soared clear from the east to the west, and seen sad eyed Eastern wimmen with veiled faces, toys, or beasts of burden, not darin’ to uncover their faces to the free air and light of heaven, because man willed it so. It has seen Western wimmen, long processions of savages, the wimmen carryin’ the babies, the house, and household furniture on their backs, while the men, unburdened and feathered out nobly, walked in front of ’em, smoking calmly, and meditatin’ on the inferiority of wimmen.
I never contended that wimmen was perfect, far from it. You have heerd me say in the past, that I thought wimmen was meaner than pusly about some things. I say so still. My mind haint changed about wimmen, nor about pusly. But justice is what I have been a contendin’ for; justice, and equal rights, and a fair dividin’ of the burdens of life is my theme; and I say they haint been used well.
Now in the year one, when Adam and Eve eat that apple, jest as quick as Adam swallowed it—probable he most choked himself with the core, he was in such a awful hurry to get his mouth clear, so he could lay the blame onto Eve. “The woman did tempt me, and I did eat.”
“But thank fortin, he didn’t make out much, for Eternal Goodness, which is God, is forever on the side of Right. And Adam and Eve—as any two ort to be who sin together—got turned out of Eden, side by side, out of the same gate, into the same wilderness; and the flaming sword that kept Eve back from her old life of beauty and innocence, kept Adam back, too. Sister Minkley, that is my theme. When two human souls turn the Eden of their innocence into a garden of guilt, punish ’em both alike, and don’t turn her out into the wilderness alone; don’t flash the flamin’ sword of your righteous indignation in her eyes and not in hisen.
“And then, there was Hagar’ses case,—when Abraham turned Hagar and his baby out into the desert. If I had lived neighbor to ’em, at the time, I should have give him a talkin’ to about it; I should have freed my mind, and felt relieved so fur, anyway. I should have said to the old gentleman, in a pleasant way, so’s not to git him mad:—‘I think a sight of you, Abraham, in the patriarch way. You are a good man, in a great many respects; but standin’ up for wimmen is my theme, (and also promiscous advisin’,) and do you think you are doin’ the fair thing by Hagar, to send her and your baby off into the desert with nothin’ but one loaf of bread and a bottle of water between them and death?’ Says I, ‘It is your child, and if it hadn’t been for you, Hagar would probable now be a doin’ housework round in Beersheba, a happy woman with no incumbrances. It is your child as well as hern, and you, to say the least of it, are as guilty as she is; and don’t you think it is a little ungenerous and unmanly in you, to drive her off into the desert—to let her in her weakness, take all the consequences of the sin you and she committed, when she had paid for it already pretty well, in the line of sufferin’?’ Says I, ‘I think a sight of you, Abraham, but in the name of principle, I say with the poet,—that what is sass for the goose, ort to be sass for the gander—and if she is drove off into the desert, you ort to lock arms with her and go too.’
“I’ll bet a cent I could have convinced Abraham that he was doin’ a cowardly and ungenerous act by Hagar. But then I wasn’t there; I didn’t live neighbor to ’em. And I persume Sarah kep’ at him all the time; kep’ a tewin’ at him about her; kep’ him awake nights a twittin’ him about her, and askin’ him to start her off. I persume Sarah acted meaner than pusly.
“Human nater, and especially wimmen human nater is considerable the same in the year 18 and 1800, and I’ll bet a cent, (or I wouldn’t be afraid to bet a cent, if I believed in bettin’,) that if Sarah had had her way, Hagar wouldn’t have got even that loaf of bread and bottle of water. It says, Abraham got up early—probable before Sarah was up—and give ’em to her, and started her off. I shouldn’t wonder a mite if Sarah twitted Abraham about that loaf of bread every time she did a bakin’, for a number of years after. And that bottle. I dare persume to say, if the truth was known, that she throwed that bottle in his face more’n a hundred times, deplorin’ it as the toughest-hided, soundest bottle in all Beersheba.
“But as I said, I wasn’t there, and Abraham turned her out, and Hagar had a hard time of it out in the desert, toilin’ on alone through its dreary wastes, hungry for bread, and hungry for love; dying from starvation of soul and body; deceived; despised; wronged; deserted; lonely; broken-hearted; and carrying with all the rest of her sorrow—as mothers will—the burden of her child’s distress. Why, this woman’s wrongs and misery opened the very gates of Heaven, and God’s own voice comforted and consoled her; again Eternal Justice and Mercy spoke out of Heaven for wimmen. Why is it that his childern on earth will continue to be so deaf and dumb—deaf as a stun—for 6000 years.
“But from that time to this, take it between the Abrahams and the Sarahs of this world, the Hagars have fared hard, and the Abrahams have got along first rate; the Hagars have been turned out into the desert to die there, and the Abrahams that ruined ’em, have increased in flocks and herds; are thought a sight of and are high in the esteem of wimmen. Seems as though the more Hagars they fit out for the desert business, the more feathers it is in their cap. Every Hagar they start out is a new feather, till some get completely feathered out; then they send ’em to Congress, and think a sight on ’em.
“I declare for’t it is the singularest thing I ever see, or hearn tell on, how folks that are so just in every thing else, are so blinded in this one. And” says I almost wildly—for I grew more and more agitated every minute, and eloquent—“the female sect are to blame for this state of affairs;” says I, “men as a general thing, all good men, have better idees in this matter than we do, enough sight. Wimmen are to blame—meetin’ house wimmen and all,—you and I are to blame sister Minkley,” says I. “As a rule the female sect wink at men’s sins, but not a wink can you ever git out of them about our sins. Not a wink. _We_ have got to toe the mark in morals, and we ort to make _them_ toe the mark. And if we did, we should rise 25 cents in the estimation of every good man, and every mean one too, for they can’t respect us now, to toady and keep a winkin’ at ’em when they wont at us; they can’t respect us. We ort to require as much purity and virtue in them, as they do in us, and stop winkin’.” Says I, “Winkin’ at men’s sins is what is goin’ to ruin us all, the hull caboodle of us; ruin men, ruin wimmen, Jonesville, and the hull nation. Let the hull female race, fur and near, bond and free, in Jonesville and the world, stop winkin’.”
I don’t believe I had been any more eloquent sense war times; I used to get awful eloquent then, talkin’ about the colored niggers. And I declare I don’t know where, to what heights and depths my eloquence would have flown me off to, if I hadn’t jest that minute heard a low, lady-like snore—sister Minkley was asleep. Yes, she had forgot her troubles; she was leanin’ up ag’inst the high pile of rag carpetin’, that kinder fenced us in, fast asleep. But truly, she haint to blame. She has bad spells,—a sort of weakness she can’t help. But jest at that very minute my Josiah came up and says he:
“Come Samantha! haint you about ready to go?”
“Yes,” says I, for truly principle had tuckered me out. Josiah’s voice had waked up sister Minkley, and she give a kind of a start, and says she:
“Amen, sister Allen! I can say amen to that with all my heart. You talked well sister Allen, especially towards the last. You argued powerful.”
I wasn’t goin’ to twit her of not hearin’ a word of it. Brother Minkley jest that minute sent in word that he was ready, and to hurry up, for the colts wouldn’t stand. (He had hired a neighborin’ team.) And so we two wimmen, sister Minkley and I started home from ’lection.
I don’t know as I ever see Josiah Allen in any better spirits, than he was, as we started off on our tower homewards. He had been to the clothin’ store and bought him a new Sentinal neck-tie, red, white and blue. It was too young for him by forty years, and I told him so; but he said he liked it the minute he sot his eyes on it, it was so dressy. That man is vain. And then ’lection bid fair to go the way he wanted it to. He was awful animated, his face was almost wreathed in a smile, and before the old mare had gone several rods, he begun what a neat thing it was, and what a lucky hit for the nation, that wimmen couldn’t vote. And he kep’ on a talkin’, that man did, as he was a carryin’ me home from ’lection, about how it would break a woman’s modesty down to go to the pole, and how it would devour her time and so 4th, and so 4th. And I was that tired out and fatigued a talkin’ to sister Minkley that I let him go on for more’n a mile, and never put in my note at all. Good land! I’d heerd it all over from him, word for word, more’n a hundred times, and so I sot still. I s’pose he never thought how it was my lungs that ailed me, that I had used ’em almost completely up in principle, how I was almost entirely out of wind. And though a woman’s will may be good, and her principles lofty, still she can’t talk without wind. For truly in the words of a poem, I once perused:
“What’s Paul, or Pollus, when a sinner’s dead? dead for want of breath.”
I don’t s’pose he thought of my bein’ tuckered out, but honestly s’pose he thought he was convincin’ of me; for his mean grew gradually sort of overbearin’ like, and contemptible, till he got to be more big feelin’ and hauty in his mean than I had ever known him to be, and independenter. And he ended up as follers:
“Now, we have purity, and honesty, and unswervin’ virtue, and incorruptible patriotism at the pole. Now, if corruption tries to stalk, honest, firm, lofty minded men stand ready to grip it by the throat. How can it stalk, when it is a chokin’? Wimmen haint got the knowledge, the deep wisdom and insight into things that we men have. They haint got the lofty idees of national honor, and purity, that we men have. Wimmen may mean well—”
He was feelin’ so neat that he felt kinder clever towards the hull world, hemale, and female. “Wimmen _may_ mean well, and for arguments sake, we’ll say they _do_ mean well. But that haint the pint, the pint is here—”
And he pinted his forefinger right towards the old mare. Josiah can’t gesture worth a cent. He wouldn’t make a oriter, if he should learn the trade for years. But ever sense he has been to the Debatin’ school, he has seemed to have a hankerin’ that way. “The pint is here. Not knowin’ so much as we men know, not bein’ so firm and lofty minded as we be, if wimmen should vote corruption would stalk; they not havin’ a firm enough grip to choke it off. They would in the language of the ’postle be ‘blowed about by every windy doctor.’ They would be tempted by filthy lucre to ‘sell their birth-right for a mess of pottery,’ or crockery, I s’pose the text means. They haint got firmness; they are whifflin’, their minds haint stabled. And if that black hour should ever come to the nation, that wimmen should ever go to the pole—where would be the lofty virtue, the firm high-minded honesty, the incorruptible patriotism that now shines forth from politics? Where would be the purity of the pole? Where? oh! where?”
I’ll be hanged if I could stand it another minute, and my lungs havin’ got considerable rested, I spoke up, and says I: