Part 20

Says he, “I honor your sentiments, Josiah Allen’s wife, I think you are a firm principled woman, and a earnest, well wisher of your sect. But I do think you are in a error, I honestly think so. The Creator designed woman for a quiet, home life, it is there she finds her greatest happiness and content. God gave her jest those faculties that fit her for that life. God never designed her to go rantin’ round in public, preachin’ and lecturin’.”

Says I, “Horace, I agree with you in thinkin’ that home is the best place for most wimmen. But you say that wimmen have great influence, and great powers of perswasion, and why not use them powers to win men’s soles, and to influence men in the cause of Temperance and Justice, as well as to use ’em all up in teasin’ thier husbands to buy ’em a summer bunnet and a pair of earrings? And take such wimmen as Anna Dickinson--what under the sun did the Lord give her such powers of eloquence and perswasion for, if He didn’t calculate to have her use ’em? Why you would say a human bein’ was a fool, that would go to work and make a melodious piano, a calculatin’ to have it stand dumb forever, holdin’ back all the music in it not lettin’ any of it come out to chirk folks up, and make ’em better. When a man makes a cheese press, he don’t expect to get music out of it, it hain’t reasonable to expect a cheese press to play Yankee Doodle, and old Hundred. I, myself, wasn’t calculated for a preacher.

“I believe the Lord knows jest what He wants of his creeters here below from the biggest to the littlest. When He makes a grasshopper, He makes it loose jinted, on purpose to jump. Would that grasshopper be a fullfillin’ his mission and doin’ God’s will, if he should draw his long legs up under him, and crawl into a snail’s house and make a lame hermit of himself?”

Says Horace, in reasonable accents, “No, Josiah Allen’s wife, no, he wouldn’t.”

“Wall,” says I, “likewise with birds, if the Lord hadn’t wanted the sing to come out of thier throats, He wouldn’t have put it into ’em. And when the Lord has put eloquence, and inspiration, and enthusiasm into a human sole, you can’t help it from breakin’ out. I say it is right for a woman to talk, if she has got anything to say for God and humanity. I have heard men and wimmen both, talk when they hadn’t nothin’ to say, and it is jest as tiresome in a man, as it is in a woman in my opinion. Now I never had a call to preach, or if I had, I didn’t hear it, only to Josiah, I preach to him considerable, I have to. I should feel dreadful curious a standin’ up in the desk, and takin’ my text, I don’t deny it, but,” says I, in deep tones, “if the Lord calls a woman to preach--let her preach, Horace.”

“Paul says it is a shame for a woman to speak in public,” says Horace.

Oh what a rush of idees flowed under my foretop as Horace said this, but I spoke pretty calm, and says I,

“I hain’t nothin’ aginst Mr. Paul, I think he is a real likely old bachelder. But I put the words, and example of Jesus before them of any man, be he married, or be he single.”

“Men will quote Mr. Paul’s remarks concernin’ wimmen not preachin’, and say he was inspired when he said that, and I say to ’em, “how is it about folks not marryin’, he speaks full as pinted about that?” “Oh!” they say, “he wazzn’t inspired when he said that,” and I say to ’em, “how can you tell--when a man is 18 or 19 hundred years older than you be--how can you tell when he was inspired and when he wazzn’t, not bein’ a neighbor of his’en.” And after all, Mr. Paul didn’t seem to be so awful set on this subject, for he went right on to tell how a woman’s head ought to be fixed when she was a prayin’ and a prophecyin’. But in my opinion, all that talk about wimmen was meant for that church he was a writin’ to, for some reason confined to that time, and don’t apply to this day, or this village--and so with marryin’. When a man was liable to have his head cut off any minute, or to be eat up by lions, it wazzn’t convenient to marry and leave a widder and a few orphans. That is my opinion, other folks have thiern. But let folks quarell all they have a mind to, as to whether Mr. Paul was inspired when he wrote these things, or whether he wazzn’t, this _we know_, that Jesus is a divine pattern for us to follow, and He chose a woman to carry the glad tidin’s of His resurrection to the bretheren. There was one woman who received her commission to preach right from the Almighty.

“How dare any man to try to tie up a woman’s tongue, and keep her from speakin’ of Him, when she was His most tender and faithful friend when He was on earth. It was wimmen who brought little children that He might bless ’em. Did He rebuke ’em for thus darin’ to speak to Him publicly? No; but He rebuked the men who tried to stop ’em.

“It was a women who annointed His feet, wet ’em with her tears, and wiped ’em with the hairs of her head. It was very precious ointment--but none too precious for Him she loved so. Some logical clear minded men present, thought it was too costly to waste on Him. And again Jesus rebuked ’em for troublin’ the woman. It was in comfortin’ a woman’s lovin’ achin’ heart that Jesus wept. It was wimmen that stood by the cross to the very last and who stood by his grave weepin’, when even Joseph had rolled a great stun aginst it and departed. And it was wimmen who came to the grave agin in the mornin’ while it was yet dark. And it was a woman that He first revealed Himself to after He rose. What if Mary had hung back, and refused to tell of Him, and the glory she had seen. Would He have been pleased? No; when God calls a woman to tell of the wonders of His love and glory that He has revealed to her out of the darkness of this life, in the Lord’s name let her answer. But let her be certain that it is the Lord that is callin’ her, there is lots of preachers of both sects in my opinion that pretend the Lord is a callin’ ’em, when it is nothin’ but their own vanity and selfishness that is hollerin’ to ’em.”

For pretty near ½ or ¾ of a minute, Horace set almost lost in deep thought, and when he broke out agin it was on the old theme. He said “wedlock was woman’s true spear. In the noble position of wife and mother, there lay her greatest happiness, and her only true spear.” He talked pretty near nine minutes, I should think on this theme. And he talked eloquent and grand, I will admit, and never did I see spectacles shine with such pure fervor and sincerity as his’en. It impressed me deeply. Says he in conclusion, “Marriage is God’s own Institution. To be the wife of a good man, and the mother of his children, ought to be a woman’s highest aim, and purest happiness. Jest as it is man’s highest happiness to have a woman entirely dependant on him. It rouses his noblest and most generous impulses, it moves his heart to do and dare and his arm to labor--to have a gentle bein’ clingin’ to his manly strength.”

His eloquence so impressed me, that I had no words to reply to him. And for the first time sense I had begun to foller up the subject, my mind wavered back and forth, as Bunker Hill monument might, in a eloquent earthquake. I says to myself, “mebbe I am mistaken, mebbe marriage is woman’s only true spear.” I didn’t know what to say to him, my spectacles wandered about the room, and happened to light onto Betsey--(I had been so took up with my mission to Horace that I had forgot to introduce her) and as they lit, Horace, who saw I was deeply impressed, repeated something about “clingin’” and I says to him in a foolish and almost mechanical tone,

“Yes Horace, I have seen clingers, here is one.”

Betsey riz right up, and come forrerd, and made a low curchy to him, and set down tight to him, and says she,

“Beloved and admired Mr. Horace Greeley, I am Betsey Bobbet the poetess of Jonesville, and you speak my sentiments exactly. I think, and I know that wedlock is woman’s only true speah. I do not think wimmen ought to have any rights at all. I do not think she ought to want any. I think it is real sweet and genteel in her not to have any rights. I think that to be the clinging, devoted wife of a noble husband would be almost a heaven below. I do not think she ought to have any other trade at all only wedlock. I think she ought to be perfectly dependent on men, and jest cling to them, and oh how sweet it would be to be in that state. How happyfying to males and to females that would be. I do not believe in wimmen having their way in anything, or to set up any beliefs of their own. For oh! how beautiful and perfectly sweet a noble manly mind is. How I do love your intellect, dearest Mr. Horace Greeley. How is your wife’s health dear man? Haint I read in the papers that her health was a failing? And if she should drop off, should you think of entering again into wedlock? and if you did, should you not prefer a woman of genius, a poetess, to a woman of clay?”

Her breath give out here, and she paused. But oh what a change had come over Horace’s noble and benign face, as Betsey spoke. As she begun, his head was thrown back, and a eloquent philosofical expression set onto it. But gradually it had changed to a expression of dread and almost anger, and as she finished, his head sunk down onto his breast, and he sithed. I pitied him, and I spoke up to Betsey, says I, “I haint no more nor less than a clay woman, but I know enough to know that no man can answer 25 or 26 questions to once. Give Horace time to find and recover himself.”

Betsey took a bottle of hartshorn and a pair of scissors, outen her pocket, and advanced onto him, and says she in tender cooin’ tones. “Does your intellectual head ache? Let me bathe that lofty forwerd. And oh! dearest man, will you hear my one request that I have dreampt of day and night, will you--will you give me a lock of your noble hair?”

Horace rose up from his chair precipitately and come close to me and sot down, bringin’ me between him and Betsey, and then he says to her in a fearless tone, “You can’t have a hair of my head, I haint got much as you can see, but what little I have got belongs to my wife, and to America. My wife’s health is better, and in case of her droppin’ off, I shouldn’t never marry agin, and it wouldn’t be a poetess! though,” says he wipin’ his heated forwerd,

“I respect ’em as a Race.”

Betsey was mad. Says she to me, “I am a goin. I will wait for you to the depott.” And before I could say a word, she started off. As the door closed I says in clear tones, “Horace, I have watched you for years--a laberin’ for truth and justice and liftin’ up the oppressed, I have realized what you have done for the Black African. You have done more for that Race than any other man in America, and I have respected you for it, as much as if I was a Black African myself. But never! never did I respect you as I do this minute.” Says I, “if every married man and woman had your firm and almost cast iron principles, there wouldn’t be such a call for powder and bullets among married folks as there is now. You have riz in my estimation 25 cents within the last 7 or 8 minutes.”

Horace was still almost lost in thought, and he didn’t reply to me. He was a settin’ about half or 3 quarters of a yard from me, and I says to him mildly,

“Horace, it may be as well for you to go back now to your former place of settin’, which was about 2 and a half yards from me.” He complied with my request, mechanically as it was. But he seemed still to be almost lost in thought. Finally he spoke--as he wiped the sweat off that had started out onto his eye brow--these words,

“I am not afraid, nor ashamed to change my mind, Josiah Allen’s wife, when I am honestly convinced I have been in an error.” Says he, “It is cowards only that cling outwardly to thier old mouldy beliefs, for fear they shall be accused of being inconsistent and fickle minded.”

Says I, “That is just my opinion Horace! I have been cheated by pickin’ out a calico dress in the evenin’. Things look different by daylight, from what they do by candle light. Old beliefs that have looked first rate to you, may look different under the brighter light of new discoveries. As you rise higher above the earth you see stars you couldn’t ketch sight of in a suller way. And the world’s cry of fickle mindedness, may be the angels’ war whoop, settin’ us on to heavenly warfare’.”

Horace seemed agin to be almost lost in thought, and I waited respectfully, for him to find and recover himself. Finally he spake,

“I have been sincere Josiah Allen’s wife, in thinkin’ that matrimony was woman’s only spear, but the occurances of the past 25 or 30 minutes has convinced me that wimmen may be too zealous a carryin’ out that spear. I admit Josiah Allen’s wife, that any new state of public affairs that would make woman more independent of matrimony, less zealous, less reckless in handlein’ that spear, might be more or less beneficial both to herself, and to man.”

Here he paused and sithed. He thought of Betsey. But I spoke right up in glad and triumphant tones,

“Horace, I am ready to depart this minute for Jonesville. Now I can lay my head in peace upon my goose feather pillow.”

I riz up in deep emotion, and Horace he riz up too. It was a thrillin’ moment. At last he spoke in agitated tones, for he thought still of what he had jest passed through.

“My benefactor, I tremble to think what might have happened had you not been present.” And he ran his forefinger through his almost snowy hair.

“My kind preserver, I want to give you some little token of my friendship at parting. Will you accept as a slight token of my dethless gratitude, ‘What I know about Farming,’ and two papers of lettice seed?”

I hung back, I thought of Josiah. But Horace argued with me, says he, “I respect your constancy to Josiah, but intellect--spoken or written--scorns all the barriers of sex and circumstance, and is as free to all, as the sunshine that beats down on the just and the unjust, the Liberal Republicans and the Grant party, or the married and the single.” Says he, “take the book without any scruples, and as for the lettice seed, I can recommend it, I think Josiah would relish it.”

Says I, “On them grounds I will accept of it, and thank you.”

As we parted at the door, in the innocence of conscious rectitude, we shook hands, and says I, “Henceforth, Horace you will set up in a high chair in my mind, higher than ever before. Of course, Josiah sets first in my heart, and then his children, and then a few relations on my side, and on his’en. But next to them you will always set, for you have been weighed in the steelyards, and have been found not wantin’.”

He was to agitated to speak, I was awful agitated too. Our silver mounted spectacles met each other in a last glance of noble, firm principled sadness, and so Horace and I parted away from each other.

A SEA VOYAGE.

After I left Horace, I hastened on, for I was afraid I was behind time. Bein’ a large hefty woman, (my weight is 200 and 10 pounds by the steelyards now) I could not hasten as in former days when I weighed 100 pounds less. I was also encumbered with my umberell, my satchel bag, my cap box and “What I know about Farming.” But I hastened on with what speed I might. But alas! my apprehensions was too true, the cars had gone. What was to be done? Betsey sat on her portmanty at the depott, lookin’ so gloomy and depressted, that I knew that I could not depend on her for sukker, I must rely onto myself. There are minutes that try the sole, and show what timber it is built of. Not one trace of the wild storm of emotions that was ragin’ inside of me, could be traced on my firm brow, as Betsey looked up in a gloomy way and says,

“What are we going to do now?”

No, I rose nobly to meet the occasion, and said in a voice of marbel calm, “I don’t know Betsey.” Then I sot down, for I was beat out. Betsey looked wild, says she, “Josiah Allen’s wife I am sick of earth, the cold heartless ground looks hollow to me. I feel jest reckless enough to dare the briny deep.” Says she, in a bold darin’ way,

“Less go home on the canal.”

The canal boat run right by our house, and though at first I hung back in my mind, thinkin’ that Josiah would never consent to have me face the danger of the deep in the dead of the night, still the thought of stayin’ in New York village another night made me waver. And I thought to myself, if Josiah knew jest how it was--the circumstances environin’ us all round, and if he considered that my board bill would cost 3 dollars more if I staid another night, I felt that he would consent, though it seemed perilous, and almost hazardous in us. So I wavered, and wavered, Betsey see me waver, and took advantage of it, and urged me almost warmly.

But I didn’t give my consent in a minute. I am one that calmly weighs any great subject or undertakin’ in the ballances.

Says I, “Betsey have you considered the danger?” Says I, “The shore we was born on, may sometimes seem tame to us, but safety is there.” Says I, “more freedom may be upon the deep waters, but it is a treacherous element. Says I, “I never, tempted its perils in my life, only on a bridge.”

“Nor I neither,” says she. But she added in still more despairin’ tones, “What do I care for danger? What if it is a treacherous element? What have I got to live for in this desert life? And then,” says she, “the captain of a boat here, is mother’s cousin, he would let us go cheap.”

Says I in awful deep tones of principle. “_I_ have got Josiah to live for--and the great cause of Right, and the children. And I feel for their sakes that I ought not to rush into danger.” But agin I thought of my board bill, and agin I felt that Josiah would give his consent for me to take the voyage.

Betsey had been to the village with her father on the canal, and she knew the way, and suffice it to say, as the sun descended into his gory bed in the west, its last light shone onto Betsey and me, a settin’ in the contracted cabin of the canal boat.

We were the only females on board, and if it hadn’t been for Betsey’s bein’ his relation, we couldn’t have embarked, for the bark was heavily laden. The evening after we embarked, the boat sailin’ at the time under the pressure of 2 miles an hour, a storm began to come up, I didn’t say nothin’, but I wished I was a shore. The rain come down--the thunder roared in the distance--the wind howled at us, I felt sad. I thought of Josiah.

As the storm increased Betsey looked out of the window, and says she,

“Josiah Allen’s wife we are surrounded by dangers, one of the horses has got the heaves, can you not heah him above the wild roah of the tempest? And one of them is balky, I know it.” And liftin’ her gloomy eyes to the ceilin’ so I couldn’t see much of ’em but the whites, says she, “Look at the stove-pipe! see it sway in the storm, a little heavieh blast will unhinge it. And what a night it would be for pirates to be abroad, and give chase to us. But,” she continued, “my soul is in unison with the wild fury of the elements. I feel like warbling one of the wild sea odes of old,” and she begun to sing,

“My name is Robert Kidd, As I sailed, as I sailed. My name is Robert Kidd, as I sailed.”

She sung it right through; I should say by my feelin’s, it took her nigh on to an hour, though my sufferin’s I know blinded me, and made my calculations of time less to be depended on than a clock. She sang it through once, and then she began it agin, she got as far the second time as this,

My name is Robert Kidd, And so wickedly I did As I sailed, as I sailed, Oh! so wickedly I did As I sailed.

The cabin was dark, only lit by one kerosene lamp, with a chimbly dark with the smoke of years. Her voice was awful; the tune was awful; I stood it as long as I could seemin’ly, and says I, in agitated tones,

“I wouldn’t sing any more Betsey, if I was in your place.”

Alas! better would it have been for my piece of mind, had I let her sing. For although she stopped the piece with a wild quaver that made me tremble, she spoke right up, and says she,

“My soul seems mountin’ up and in sympathy with the scene. My spirit is soarin’, and must have vent. Josiah Allen’s wife have you any objections to my writin’ a poem. I have got seven sheets of paper in my portmanty.”

The spirit of my 4 fathers rose up in me and says I, firmly,

“When I come onto the deep, I come expectin’ to face trouble--I am prepared for it,” says I, “a few verses more or less haint a goin’ to overthrow my principles.”

She sot down by the table and began to take off her tow curls and frizzles, I should think by a careless estimate that there was a six quart pan full. And then she went to untwistin’ her own hair, which was done up at the back side of her head in a little nubbin about as big as ½ a sweet walnut. Says she,

“I always let down my haih, and take out my teeth when I write poetry, I feel moah free and soahing in my mind.” Says she in a sort of a apoligy way, “Genious is full of excentricities, that seem strange to the world’s people.”

Says I, calmly “You can let down, and take out, all you want to, I can stand it.”

But it was a fearful scene. It was a night never to be forgot while memory sets up on her high chair in my mind. Outside, the rain poured down, overhead on deck, the wind shrieked at the bags and boxes, threatenin’ ’em with almost an instant destruction. The stove pipe that run up through the floor shook as if every blast would unjinte it, and then the thought would rise up, though I tried to put it out of my head, who would put it up again. One of the horses was balky, I knew, for I could hear the driver swear at him. And every time he swore, I thought of Josiah, and it kep’ him in my mind most all the time. Yes, the storm almost raved outside, and inside, a still more depressin’ and fearful sight to me--Betsey Bobbet sot with her few locks streamin’ down over her pale and holler cheeks, for her teeth was out, and she wrote rapidly, and I knew, jest as well as I know my name is Josiah Allen’s wife, that I had got to hear ’em read. Oh! the anguish of that night! I thought of the happy people on shore, in thier safe and peaceful feather beds, and then on the treacherous element I was a ridin’ on, and then I thought of Josiah. Sometimes mockin’ fancy would so mock at me that I could almost fancy that I heard him snore. But no! cold reality told me that it was only the heavey horse, or the wind a blowin’ through the stove pipe, and then I would rouse up to the agonizin’ thought that I was at sea, far, far from home and Josiah. And then a solemn voice would sometimes make itself heard in my sole, “Mebby you never will hear him snore agin.” And then I would sithe heavily.

And the driver on the tow path would loudly curse that dangerous animal and the wind would howl ’round the boxes, and the stove pipe would rattle, and Betsey would write poetry rapidly, and I knew I had got to hear it. And so the tegus night wore away. Finally at ½ past 2, wore out as I was with fateegue and wakefullness, Betsey ceased writin’ and says she.

“It is done! I will read them to you.”

I sithed so deeply that even Betsey almost trembled, and says she,

“Are you in pain, Josiah Allen’s wife?”

Says I, “only in my mind.”

“Wall,” says she, “It is indeed a fearful time. But somehow my soul exults strangely in the perils environing us. I feel like courtin’ and keepin’ company with danger to-night. I feel as if I could almost dare to mount that steed wildly careering along the tow path, if I only had a side saddle. I feel like rushin’ into dangeh, I feel reckless to-night.”

Here the driver swore fearfully, and still more apaulin’ sight to me, Betsey opened her paper and commenced readin’:

STANZES, WRITTEN ON THE DEEP.

BY BETSEY BOBBET.