Chapter 2

"Now," she said to herself, "you've done it! And you're just as nasty and hard-hearted and suspicious and mean as--as pusley!" And she wept to think of her hardness of heart. "He will never give me a chance to say 'I am sorry,'" she thought. And really, she might have spoken kindly to the poor man, and told him that she was much obliged to him, but that he really must not ask her to drink porter with him.

"But it's all over and done now," she said to herself as she sat at her window on Saturday night. And then she looked at the cornice, and saw the faithful little pewter pot traveling slowly toward her.

She was conquered. This act of Christian forbearance was too much for her kindly spirit. She read the inscription on the paper,

_porter is good for Flours but better for Fokes_

and she lifted the pot to her lips, which were not half so red as her cheeks, and took a good, hearty, grateful draught.

She sipped in thoughtful silence after this first plunge, and presently she was surprised to find the bottom of the pot in full view. On the table at her side a few pearl buttons were screwed up in a bit of white paper. She untwisted the paper and smoothed it out, and wrote in a tremulous hand--she _could_ write a very neat hand--

_Thanks._

This she laid on the top of the pot, and in a moment the bent two-foot rule appeared and drew the mail-carriage home. Then she sat still, enjoying the warm glow of the porter, which seemed to have permeated her entire being with a heat that was not at all like the unpleasant and oppressive heat of the atmosphere, an atmosphere heavy with the spring damp. A gritting on the tin aroused her. A piece of paper lay under her eyes.

_fine groing weather Smith_

Now it is unlikely that in the whole round and range of conversational commonplaces there was one other greeting that could have induced the seamstress to continue the exchange of communications. But this simple and homely phrase touched her country heart. What did "groing weather" matter to the toilers in this waste of brick and mortar? This stranger must be, like herself, a country-bred soul, longing for the new green and the upturned brown mold of the country fields. She took up the paper, and wrote under the first message:--

_Fine_

But that seemed curt: "for--" she added; "for" what? She did not know. At last in desperation she put down "potatoes." The piece of paper was withdrawn, and came back with an addition:--

_Too mist for potatos_

And when the little seamstress had read this, and grasped the fact that "m-i-s-t" represented the writer's pronunciation of "moist," she laughed softly to herself. A man whose mind at such a time was seriously bent upon potatoes was not a man to be feared. She found a half-sheet of note-paper, and wrote:--

_I lived in a small village before I came to New York, but I am afraid I do not know much about farming. Are you a farmer?_

The answer came:--

_have ben most Every thing farmed a Spel in Maine Smith_

As she read this, the seamstress heard the church clock strike nine.

"Bless me, is it so late?" she cried, and she hurriedly penciled _Good Night_, thrust the paper out, and closed the window. But a few minutes later, passing by, she saw yet another bit of paper on the cornice, fluttering in the evening breeze. It said only _good nite_, and after a moment's hesitation, the little seamstress took it in and gave it shelter.

* * * * *

After this they were the best of friends. Every evening the pot appeared, and while the seamstress drank from it at her window, Mr. Smith drank from its twin at his; and notes were exchanged as rapidly as Mr. Smith's early education permitted. They told each other their histories, and Mr. Smith's was one of travel and variety, which he seemed to consider quite a matter of course. He had followed the sea, he had farmed, he had been a logger and a hunter in the Maine woods. Now he was foreman of an East River lumber-yard, and he was prospering. In a year or two he would have enough laid by to go home to Bucksport and buy a share in a ship-building business. All this dribbled out in the course of a jerky but variegated correspondence, in which autobiographic details were mixed with reflections moral and philosophical.

A few samples will give an idea of Mr. Smith's style:--

_i was one trip to van demens land_

To which the seamstress replied:--

_It must have been very interesting._

But Mr. Smith disposed of this subject very briefly:--

_it wornt_

Further he vouchsafed:--

_i seen a Chinese cook in hong kong could cook flapjacks like your mother_

_a mishnery that sells Rum is the menest of Gods crechers_

_a bulfite is not what it is cract up to Be_

_the dagos are wussen the brutes_

_i am 6 1-3/4 but my Father was 6 foot 4_

The seamstress had taught school one winter, and she could not refrain from making an attempt to reform Mr. Smith's orthography. One evening, in answer to this communication,--

_i killd a Bare in Maine 600 lbs waight_

she wrote:--

_Isn't it generally spelled Bear?_

but she gave up the attempt when he responded:--

_a bare is a mene animle any way you spel him_

The spring wore on, and the summer came, and still the evening drink and the evening correspondence brightened the close of each day for the little seamstress. And the draught of porter put her to sleep each night, giving her a calmer rest than she had ever known during her stay in the noisy city; and it began, moreover, to make a little "meet" for her. And then the thought that she was going to have an hour of pleasant companionship somehow gave her courage to cook and eat her little dinner, however tired she was. The seamstress's cheeks began to blossom with the June roses.

And all this time Mr. Smith kept his vow of silence unbroken, though the seamstress sometimes tempted him with little ejaculations and exclamations to which he might have responded. He was silent and invisible. Only the smoke of his pipe, and the clink of his mug as he set it down on the cornice, told her that a living, material Smith was her correspondent. They never met on the stairs, for their hours of coming and going did not coincide. Once or twice they passed each other in the street--but Mr. Smith looked straight ahead of him about a foot over her head. The little seamstress thought he was a very fine-looking man, with his six feet one and three-quarters and his thick brown beard. Most people would have called him plain.

Once she spoke to him. She was coming home one summer evening, and a gang of corner-loafers stopped her and demanded money to buy beer, as is their custom. Before she had time to be frightened, Mr. Smith appeared,--whence, she knew not,--scattered the gang like chaff, and collaring two of the human hyenas, kicked them, with deliberate, ponderous, alternate kicks, until they writhed in ineffable agony. When he let them crawl away, she turned to him and thanked him warmly, looking very pretty now, with the color in her cheeks. But Mr. Smith answered no word. He stared over her head, grew red in the face, fidgeted nervously, but held his peace until his eyes fell on a rotund Teuton passing by.

"Say, Dutchy!" he roared. The German stood aghast. "I ain't got nothing to write with!" thundered Mr. Smith, looking him in the eye. And then the man of his word passed on his way.

And so the summer went on, and the two correspondents chatted silently from window to window, hid from sight of all the world below by the friendly cornice. And they looked out over the roof and saw the green of Tompkins Square grow darker and dustier as the months went on.

Mr. Smith was given to Sunday trips into the suburbs, and he never came back without a bunch of daisies or black-eyed Susans or, later, asters or golden-rod for the little seamstress. Sometimes, with a sagacity rare in his sex, he brought her a whole plant, with fresh loam for potting.

He gave her also a reel in a bottle, which, he wrote, he had "maid" himself, and some coral, and a dried flying-fish that was something fearful to look upon, with its sword-like fins and its hollow eyes. At first she could not go to sleep with that flying-fish hanging on the wall.

But he surprised the little seamstress very much one cool September evening, when he shoved this letter along the cornice:--

Respected and Honored Madam:

Having long and vainly sought an opportunity to convey to you the expression of my sentiments, I now avail myself of the privilege of epistolary communication to acquaint you with the fact that the Emotions, which you have raised in my breast, are those which should point to Connubial Love and Affection rather than to simple Friendship. In short, Madam, I have the Honor to approach you with a Proposal, the acceptance of which will fill me with ecstatic Gratitude, and enable me to extend to you those Protecting Cares, which the Matrimonial Bond makes at once the Duty and the Privilege of him, who would, at no distant date, lead to the Hymeneal Altar one whose charms and virtues should suffice to kindle its Flames, without extraneous Aid

I remain, Dear Madam, Your Humble Servant and Ardent Adorer, J. Smith.

The little seamstress gazed at this letter a long time. Perhaps she was wondering in what Ready Letter-Writer of the last century Mr. Smith had found his form. Perhaps she was amused at the results of his first attempt at punctuation. Perhaps she was thinking of something else, for there were tears in her eyes and a smile on her small mouth.

But it must have been a long time, and Mr. Smith must have grown nervous, for presently another communication came along the line where the top of the cornice was worn smooth. It read:

_If not understood will you mary me_

The little seamstress seized a piece of paper and wrote:--

_If I say Yes, will you speak to me?_

Then she rose and passed it out to him, leaning out of the window, and their faces met.

Copyright of Keppler and Schwarzmann.

THE WAY TO ARCADY

Oh, what's the way to Arcady, To Arcady, to Arcady; Oh, what's the way to Arcady, Where all the leaves are merry?

Oh, what's the way to Arcady? The spring is rustling in the tree-- The tree the wind is blowing through-- It sets the blossoms flickering white. I knew not skies could burn so blue Nor any breezes blow so light. They blow an old-time way for me, Across the world to Arcady.

Oh, what's the way to Arcady? Sir Poet, with the rusty coat, Quit mocking of the song-bird's note. How have you heart for any tune, You with the wayworn russet shoon? Your scrip, a-swinging by your side, Gapes with a gaunt mouth hungry-wide. I'll brim it well with pieces red, If you will tell the way to tread.

Oh, I am bound for Arcady, And if you but keep pace with me You tread the way to Arcady.

And where away lies Arcady, And how long yet may the journey be?

Ah, that (quoth he) I do not know: Across the clover and the snow-- Across the forest, across the flowers-- Through summer seconds and winter hours. I've trod the way my whole life long, And know not now where it may be; My guide is but the stir to song, That tells me I cannot go wrong, Or clear or dark the pathway be Upon the road to Arcady.

But how shall I do who cannot sing? I was wont to sing, once on a time-- There is never an echo now to ring Remembrance back to the trick of rhyme.

'Tis strange you cannot sing (quoth he), The folk all sing in Arcady.

But how may he find Arcady Who hath nor youth nor melody?

What, know you not, old man (quoth he)-- Your hair is white, your face is wise-- That Love must kiss that Mortal's eyes Who hopes to see fair Arcady? No gold can buy you entrance, there, But beggared Love may go all bare; No wisdom won with weariness, But Love goes in with Folly's dress; No fame that wit could ever win, But only Love, may lead Love in To Arcady, to Arcady.

Ah, woe is me, through all my days Wisdom and wealth I both have got, And fame and name, and great men's praise; But Love, ah Love! I have it not. There was a time, when life was new-- But far away, and half forgot-- I only know her eyes were blue; But Love--I fear I knew it not. We did not wed, for lack of gold, And she is dead, and I am old. All things have come since then to me, Save Love, ah Love! and Arcady.

Ah, then I fear we part (quoth he), My way's for Love and Arcady.

But you, you fare alone like me; The gray is likewise in your hair. What love have you to lead you there. To Arcady, to Arcady?

Ah, no, not lonely do I fare: My true companion's Memory. With Love he fills the Spring-time air; With Love he clothes the Winter tree. Oh, past this poor horizon's bound My song goes straight to one who stands-- Her face all gladdening at the sound-- To lead me to the Spring-green lands, To wander with enlacing hands. The songs within my breast that stir Are all of her, are all of her. My maid is dead long years (quoth he), She waits for me in Arcady.

Oh, yon's the way to Arcady, To Arcady, to Arcady; Oh, yon's the way to Arcady, Where all the leaves are merry.

Copyrighted by Charles Scribner's Sons.

CHANT-ROYAL

I would that all men my hard case might know; How grievously I suffer for no sin: I, Adolphe Culpepper Ferguson, for lo! I of my landlady am lockèd in, For being short on this sad Saturday, Nor having shekels of silver wherewith to pay: She has turned and is departed with my key; Wherefore, not even as other boarders free, I sing (as prisoners to their dungeon stones When for ten days they expiate a spree): Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!

One night and one day have I wept my woe; Nor wot I, when the morrow doth begin, If I shall have to write to Briggs & Co., To pray them to advance the requisite tin For ransom of their salesman, that he may Go forth as other boarders go alway-- As those I hear now flocking from their tea, Led by the daughter of my landlady Piano-ward. This day, for all my moans, Dry bread and water have been servèd me. Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!

Miss Amabel Jones is musical, and so The heart of the young he-boardér doth win, Playing 'The Maiden's Prayer' _adagio_-- That fetcheth him, as fetcheth the banco skin The innocent rustic. For my part, I pray That Badarjewska maid may wait for aye Ere sits she with a lover, as did we Once sit together, Amabel! Can it be That all that arduous wooing not atones For Saturday shortness of trade dollars three? _Behold_ the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!

Yea! she forgets the arm was wont to go Around her waist. She wears a buckle, whose pin Galleth the crook of the young man's elbów. _I_ forget not, for I that youth have been. Smith was aforetime the Lothario gay. Yet once, I mind me, Smith was forced to stay Close in his room. Not calm, as I, was he; But his noise brought no pleasaunce, verily. Small ease he got of playing on the bones Or hammering on his stove-pipe, that I see. Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!

Thou, for whose fear the figurative crow I eat, accursed be thou and all thy kin! Thee will I show up--yea, up will I show Thy too thick buckwheats, and thy tea too thin. Ay! here I dare thee, ready for the fray: Thou dost _not_ "keep a first-class house," I say! It does not with the advertisements agree. Thou lodgest a Briton with a puggaree, And thou hast harbored Jacobses and Cohns, Also a Mulligan. Thus denounce I thee! Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!

ENVOY

Boarders! the worst I have not told to ye: She hath stolen my trousers, that I may not flee Privily by the window. Hence these groans. There is no fleeing in a _robe de nuit_. Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!

Copyrighted by Charles Scribner's Sons.

JOHN BUNYAN

(1628-1688)

BY REV. EDWIN P. PARKER

John Bunyan, son of Thomas Bunnionn Junior and Margaret Bentley, was born 1628, in the quaint old village of Elstow, one mile southwest of Bedford, near the spot where, three hundred years before, his ancestor William Boynon resided. His father was a poor tinker or "braseyer," and his mother's lineage is unknown. He says,--"I never went to school to Aristotle or Plato, but was brought up at my father's house in a very mean condition, among a company of poor countrymen."

He learned to read and write "according to the rate of other poor men's children"; but soon lost "almost utterly" the little he had learned. Shortly after his mother's death, when he was about seventeen years of age, he served as a soldier for several months, probably in the Parliamentary army. Not long afterward he married a woman as poor as himself, by whose gentle influence he was gradually led into the way of those severe spiritual conflicts and "painful exercises of mind" from which he finally came forth, at great cost, victorious. These religious experiences, vividly described in his 'Grace Abounding,' traceable in the course of his chief Pilgrim, and frequently referred to in his discourses, have been too literally interpreted by some, and too much explained away as unreal by others; but present no special difficulty to those who will but consider Bunyan's own explanations.

From boyhood he had lived a roving and non-religious life, although possessing no little tenderness of conscience. He was neither intemperate nor dishonest; he was not a law-breaker; he explicitly and indignantly declares:--"If all the fornicators and adulterers in England were hanged by the neck till they be dead, John Bunyan would still be alive and well!" The particular sins of which he was guilty, so far as he specifies them, were profane swearing, from which he suddenly ceased at a woman's reproof, and certain sports, innocent enough in themselves, which the prevailing Puritan rigor severely condemned. What, then, of that vague and exceeding sinfulness of which he so bitterly accuses and repents himself? It was that vision of sin, however disproportionate, which a deeply wounded and graciously healed spirit often has, in looking back upon the past from that theological standpoint whence all want of conformity to the perfect law of God seems heinous and dreadful.

"A sinner may be comparatively a little sinner, and sensibly a great one. There are two sorts of greatness in sin: greatness by reason of number; greatness by reason of the horrible nature of sin. In the last sense, he that has but one sin, if such an one could be found, may in his own eyes find himself the biggest sinner in the world."

"Visions of God break the heart, because, by the sight the soul then has of His perfections, it sees its own infinite and unspeakable disproportion."

"The best saints are most sensible of their sins, and most apt to make mountains of their molehills."

Such sentences from Bunyan's own writings--and many like them might be quoted--shed more light upon the much-debated question of his "wickedness" than all that his biographers have written.

In John Gifford, pastor of a little Free Church in Bedford, Bunyan found a wise friend, and in 1653 he joined that church. He soon discovered his gifts among the brethren, and in due time was appointed to the office of a gospel minister, in which he labored with indefatigable industry and zeal, and with ever-increasing fame and success, until his death. His hard personal fortunes between the Restoration of 1660 and the Declaration of Indulgence of 1672, including his imprisonment for twelve years in Bedford Gaol; his subsequent imprisonment in 1675-6, when the first part of the 'Pilgrim's Progress' was probably written; and the arduous engagements of his later and comparatively peaceful years,--must be sought in biographies, the latest and perhaps the best of which is that by Rev. John Brown, minister of the Bunyan Church at Bedford. The statute under which Bunyan suffered is the 35th Eliz., Cap. 1, re-enacted with rigor in the 16th Charles II., Cap. 4, 1662; and the spirit of it appears in the indictment preferred against him:--"that he hath devilishly and perniciously abstained from coming to Church to hear Divine service, and is a common upholder of several unlawful meetings and conventicles, to the great disturbance and distraction of the good subjects of this Kingdom," etc., etc.

The story of Bunyan's life up to the time of his imprisonment, and particularly that of his arrests and examinations before the justices, and also the account of his experiences in prison, should be read in his own most graphic narrative, in the 'Grace Abounding,' which is one of the most precious portions of all autobiographic literature. Bunyan was born and bred, he lived and labored, among the common people, with whom his sympathies were strong and tender, and by whom he was regarded with the utmost veneration and affection. He understood them, and they him. For nearly a century they were almost the only readers of his published writings. They came to call him Bishop Bunyan. His native genius, his great human-heartedness and loving-kindness, his burning zeal and indomitable courage, his racy humor and kindling imagination, all vitalized by the spiritual force which came upon him through the encompassing atmosphere of devout Puritanism, were consecrated to the welfare of his fellow-men. His personal friend, Mr. Doe, describes him as "tall in stature, strong-boned, of a ruddy face, with sparkling eyes, nose well set, mouth moderately large, forehead something high, and his habit always plain and modest." His portrait, painted in 1685, shows a vigorous, kindly face, with mustachios and imperial, and abundance of hair falling in long wavy masses about the neck and shoulders,--more Cavalier-like than Roundhead.