 Section 12 of Life and Sains of Mrs. Partington. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Elsie Sawen. Life and Sains of Mrs. Partington and Others of the Family by B.P. Chillebert. Section 12. The Architectural Black Eye. We met old Guzzle one day with a terrible black eye. Ah, said we to the interesting individual. Bad eye, that. Yes, that ear is an architectural eye. We asked an explanation. I say this ear an architectural eye because I got it from the Elizabethan architecture of our house. We were in the dark as much as ever. To other night, continued he. I went home partially tight. I said partially for upon my honor. I had drank but seven times during the evening. I felt my way up by the Wayne Scotton because I didn't want to make a noise. And when I got to the top, I forgot what a ducid wide staircase it was. And when I turned to go towards any door, what does I do but walk right downstairs again. A good deal faster than when I went up and struck my head against the corner post and be hanging to it. Bad eye in it. And all for that infernal Elizabethan stairway. We thought that the fault lay with the rum. Seeking a comet. It was with anxious feeling that Mrs. Partington having smoked her specs directed her gaze towards the western sky and the quest of the Taylor's Comet of 1850. I can't see it. Said she and a shade of vexation was perceptible in the tone of her voice. I don't think much of this explanatory system. Continued she. That they praise so. Where the stars are mixed up so that I can't tell Jupiter from Satan nor the consternation of the great bear from the man and the moon. Ted all dark to me. I don't believe that there is any comet at all. Whoever heard of a comet without a tail. I should like to know it isn't natural. But the princess will make a tail for it fast enough for they're always getting up comical stories. With a complaint about the falling dew and a slight murmur of disappointment. The dame disappeared behind a deal door like a moon behind a cloud. Among the Roman priesthood was a class called augurs. There are many great boars among our modern priests. Benevolence unappreciated. Philanthropos was at a public meeting one evening where the heat was distressing. And observing a lady on a seat in front of him who appeared to be suffering from excessive warmth. He went out and bought a large fan which he delicately set in motion as a fanning himself. While he made every effort to give her the benefit of the artificial breeze becoming himself additionally heated from the exertion he made. Leasing all interest in the concert from his intentness in the benevolent action. And smiling to himself with the belief that his kindness was felt without its source being known. He was thus benevolently happy until he heard the lady tell her husband to go and shut down that odious window behind her. For she had felt cold on her neck all evening from the east wind. Philanthropos went out and sold the fan for seven cents that he had given a quarter for an hour before. An editor having stated in his paper that he had been presented with a number of varieties of plums. Old Roger declared his preference for the perpendicular. The parting word. In telling the story about a printer I am not about detailing the mysteries and difficulties of his occupation. Although a feeling and interesting sketch might be made of the business of his life with its care and toil for the good of the world. I love the printers from association and Long Habit and proud now their companionship and when walking arm in arm with my friend the president of the Franklin Typography Society. I feel as well as if the individual in the hook of my arm with the president of the United States. My intention in this little tale is simply to give the incidence of a printer's life wherein his heart was concerned and not to meddle with his profession in any way. Saved to dignify my hero by the association. The Freeman's Star was located in Patney the shire town of Seburn County in our state and exerted a great influence upon the mind and manners of the people. Society took its tone from the printing office. The magnates of the place owned its way perhaps through fear and the humblest looked towards it with reverence for they had heard of its power as the quote defender of the people's rights and quote. I never deemed how much of humbug there was in the profession. The editor was looked up to as a great man and people would touch one another as he passed and whisper. He had been foreman of a daily office in the city and his importance was unbounded on the assumption of his new honors and a proportionate degree all hands in the office were marked men. The single journeymen the grown-up apprentice from the neighboring town and the demon himself were all marked individuals and people treated them differentially for their connection with the mighty engine that had such power. Their opinions expressed at times about the weather or the elections or the crops were listened to attentively and everything that appeared in the Freeman's Star was imputed to one or the other of the printers by the particular friends of each. Let a piece of village poetry appear or a good story called from some city paper not once would be seen in it by the different parties traces of the mind of each of their favorites. They would have known it to be his if they had seen it in the moon if they were by accident located in that planet and had met with it there. It was in this office that I made the acquaintance of the hero of my story, the grown-up apprentice who bore the euthanous name of Jabez B. He was a spirited fellow very intelligent and as full of mischief as an egg is full of meat to use an expressive modernism. He was a constant attendant upon the tavern and all his leisure moments. We are attracting a crowd of countrymen around him. He would astonish them by the keenness of his wit and the extent of his information and many a marvelous story have his country friends carried home as latest news that originated in the teeming brain of Jabez. Steamboats were blown up and railroad accidents were as common then in this way as now when the melancholy realities need no draught upon the fancy for instances. But he gained a character for wit at the expense of his moral reputation, which is too often the case. And at 18, though everybody liked him and laughed with him, he was set down as not likely to turn out very well, a great phrase and patiny. People cautioned their sons and daughters about going in his company and evil communications corrupt good manners was written as a copy in every girl's and boy's writing book in town. But he laughed with them all and the boys joined him and the girls who somehow or other always seemed to set more by the wild and mischievous than by the staid and prudent love Jabez very sisterly. He was bold and generous qualities which no true woman can see in a man without admiring them far more discerning than older ones in matters of soul. They had discriminated long ago between the mischief and wildness of Jabez and his malice and wickedness and a large balance was set down in our heart in favor of his good qualities. They saw a sympathetic smile or tear where those who decried them saw but levity and heartlessness. They smiled upon him for striving to save the child's lamb from drowning in the well and rejoiced outright when he threw the bully over the fence who was maltreating the widow's son. The most beautiful girl on Patney was Susan Bray. She was a charming little creature with an eye as blue as a violet and spring, a voice as soft as the evening's bird, a cheek like the blush of the apple blossom, and a breath as sweet as its perfume breathed over the pearly purity of her teeth. Her form was slight and graceful and as lithe as the bending corn or the wavy pliancy of the yielding grass. I am not good at describing beauty in ladies. Tis not my forte, but I am determined hereafter to put myself under the hand of my friend Paul Creighton or some other master of art and become better versed in the science of drawing word portraits. Enough is it for my purpose to say that she was very beautiful and that over her beauty was thrown a fascination of manner and a propriety that was peculiarly delightful. She gained for herself from her admiring companions the expressive sobriquet of the lily of the val and her modesty and grace justified the title. She was the daughter of Mr. Bray, the village blacksmith, and having been educated in a distant town, her return to Patney was like the rising of a new star or the discovery of a new flower. The young men were delighted with her manners and the young women, pleasant creatures, gave her their hearts willingly for they feared rivalry from her no more than they would from the new moon. She moved in a circle that the bold printer boy did not enter. The blacksmith was a hard man and the reputation of Jebez was such that it did not commend itself very favorably to the old man's mind and he had discouraged acquaintance with him. From the time of her return, however, had Jebez be looked upon the fair Susan admiringly, but at a distance, he gazed upon her with a respectful feeling that had no affinity with the lighter and laughing affection he felt for the village girls of his acquaintance. He felt that she was a superior being to the whole of them and his soul bowed with reverence to her shrine, hoping nothing and asking nothing but to lay its silent offering at her feet. As the simple votary brings garlands in the still of the morning to hang upon the shrine of some favorite saint. It was a beautiful feeling and as pure as beautiful, the love at first, almost unconscious, became at length the absorbing feeling of his life. It marked his conducting conversation and the unconfessed passion he felt molded the impetuous and the wild boy into a dreamer and a visionary. He poured over books and the woods and glens and waterbrooks were familiar with his footsteps. He acted in short dear reader as you and I and almost all others have done or might have done under like circumstances. Made him so very ridiculous and the freemen's star literally groaned with the efforts of his awakened muse and well it might groan as everybody did that read what he wrote. The poetry was more truthful than lovely and its quantity like the Irishman's dance compensated for its quality. The change in his conduct was marked, business was more closely attended to and the tavern frequented less. He became a perfect marvel to his friends who wondered what had come over him. And as the spiritual knockings had just come along, some in levity gave it as their opinion that he had had an interview with the ghost of his grandmother that had rebuked his gracelessness but though he was less lively than formerly he was none the less kind to all and everybody loved him as well or better than ever. But fate, so-called, that officiates as a sort of junior providence in the affairs of men, decided that a passion so fostered and concealed should be known and that all the speculation with regard to J.Besby's mystery, grandmother's ghost and all, should be swallowed up by a knowledge of the fact. There was to be a great picnic in Patney. The freemen's star had announced it for a month in big type and in an editorial notice had apprised the people that it was to occur on such a day, weather permitting. The editor dwelling with great eloquence upon the happy combination of beauty and cold chicken, pancakes and poetry, crackers and conversation, cider and scenery and making up the sum total of its enjoyment. The day came auspiciously, the sun was bright and the air was balmy, the lads and lassos laughed lavishly and the birds sang sweetly in the bushes and a grove near the company held high carnival to pan and the archers of the woods were vocal with the noise of mirth. Nearby was a charming little lake, hummed in by trees and bordered by sedges dotted here and there by patches of lily pads amid whose deep green the waterflowers gleamed like stars and this lake wooed many to its brink to admire its beauty to splash in its cool water or sail upon its still bosom in a timey boat that was at hand. Jabez and Susan were of the party and through the atmosphere of her presence he saw a new and mystical beauty in everything. The trees were greener, the berries were brighter, the air was balmyer and the music of the pines had a new and sweeter melody. Susan was one of a few that had wandered towards the lake and Jabez had watched her at a distance fondly drinking in with every faculty of his being. Her charms as they became revealed to him and her playful movements among the trees and her smiles though not for him were sunshine to his heart and now his heart to that interesting organ throbs wildly as he sees her with playful recklessness step upon the tiny boat and push it from the shore. The treacherous twig to which the boat was tied broke at the strain it received and Susan Gray was afloat and alone upon the waters of the lake each effort she made to gain the shore was fruitless. When her paddle having become entangled in the lily pads she was thrown pale as one of her kindred lilies into the water, confusion immediately ensued and rash endeavor to save her only threatened her more sure destruction when Jabez rushed madly to the scene and in a minute was by her side. The water was very deep but with one arm grasping the boat and the other supporting his fair burden he held her above the current until assistance came when completely exhausted with the exertion. He fainted as he reached the shore and such a manner did the intimacy commence between Jabez the printer and the fair Susan Bray an intimacy that resulted in a mutual affection as pure and exalted as ever burned in the breast of more noted heroes or heroines of romance. The heroic conduct and generosity of her lover won her heart as her beauty and innocence had won his and they were mutually happy of course. But the Freeman star waned in its brilliancy as 400 subscribers did not pay buckets and applesauce in which subscribers generally paid had ceased to be negotiable articles in the payment for paper and ink and the star went down in darkness leaving poor Jabez minus employment but with plus hope. Love fed hope and hope held up her candle and faith grew strong within him that the future had great things in store for him. Lovers' partings have been so often described that the parting of Jabez and Susan must be imagined for as everyone will at once perceive it became necessary for them to part. We will merely state with regard to it that it was tender and interesting to themselves and also to the miller's maiden sister who watched the last kiss on the doorstep when he tore himself away the night before he went to Boston but she didn't hear what he said. Dear Susan said he keep up a good heart and I shall return to you don't fear and I will prove myself worthy of you too God bless you and when we meet again we will love each other all the better. Absence makes the heart grow fonder you know so wipe your eyes Susan dear and give me some word that I may remember when danger is nigh and will prove a love charm that evil and temptation cannot overcome. He pressed her to his beating heart as he spoke and put the imprint of a kiss upon her brow. Jabez said she smiling through her tears. Your affections may be sorely tried in the great city and temptation will be set your path but my prayer shall be offered for you and the word I would have you remember above all others is fidelity. Let us be faithful to each other remember fidelity. He kissed the lips that uttered the word and vowed to remember fidelity it is a strong word and embraces in its meaning the whole duty of man all of love truth honesty is comprised in its significance faithful of course he would be faithful and how could he be otherwise in the ardor of his young love it seemed the easiest thing in the world and now he is in the city a wandering and admiring stranger and after considerable difficulty a compositor on a morning paper day by day and night by night high under the eaves he is toiling breathing the fetid and smoky atmosphere of the printing office he has become the slave of the lamp he and all other slaves night which brings rest to the world brings no rest to him the holy Sabbath with its sweet influences brings no solace for him Christ has risen in vain the click of types at midnight as heard like a death watch denoting the flight of time telegraphs steamboats and railroads combined for his discomfort the reckless and the unhappy are his companions and grace struggles in vain to grow in an atmosphere impregnated with lamp smoke and sin it is the sacrifice of liberty and health of body and soul for money Jebus had a strong hope in him which sustained him he bears the rival jest often aimed at what he regards most sacred he sees the irreverence which bad men show for holy things at first he is shocked but the ingrained generosity of his associates leads him to think less unfavorably of their lack of morals and he laughs at what at first gave him pain fidelity was it a voice at his side that uttered the cabalistic word in his ear and that sunk down into his heart that word saved him was a good angel enshrined in his memory that came to warn him of danger and exhort him to faithfulness and his feelings became again pure and fresh as when he left their inspiration come Jebus said a brother typo to Saturday for this day at least we are free and now my boy what say you to having a good time let's go round and see the folks and with a laugh on his lip and the fire of fun in his eye and a sense of freedom in his mind he went with his good natured persuader plunged with him into dens where rum flowed like water and the horse shout of revelry smote his ear with the discordance of the bottomless pit it needed no friendly warning to save him for his spirit shrank instinctively at the sights he saw and the sounds he heard one after another of these places he visited in each time with a dimming sense of their abominations the light of conscience became foggy and the dawn of tobacco smoke and sensibility was blunted in the frequency of the vile exhibitions that met his gaze fidelity that word came again to him and the scales fell from his eyes the demon had lost his power and the serpent was revealed and all his hideousness from pleasure to pleasure through temptation after temptation in the dance and the saloons and the theater his secret monitor came to him like the voice of a fire bell and his spirit grew strong under its admonition and seasons of quiet and peaceful enjoyment too the word came to him approvingly and his soul received it as a beautiful token of unbroken love and hope revived it must be confessed I think that never yet was a printer attended by so faithful a monitor or by one that was half so well heated and now sickness pressed upon Jabez and he thought he was going to die I believe that it always happens that people in love or homesick people are more fearful of death than others it is your jolly debtor who honest man hopes by paying the debt of nature to pay all the rest he owes that is ready to die the poor printer was sad and said fidelity was heard but faintly in his dread to go he was delirious his mind wandered amid early scenes again with Susan Bray her voice he heard in his dreams exhorting him to fidelity again they stood together upon the old doorstep and patting and he was pouring into her listening ear the story of his temptations and his support and received from her sweet lips the desired approval of his faithfulness the meeting house came up in his dream of bliss and within its walls robed in white stood Susan Bray and by her side himself arrayed in the bravery of a holiday suit a happy bridegroom a new star arose in Patney boasting innumerable subscribers who all paid in money and not in buckets and applesauce himself its editor and himself the most important man in the village and whispered about as he walked along the street alas twas but the vagary of a diseased mind soon dispelled by the officious intrusion of a spoon with medicine beneath his nose day by day he was watched almost hopelessly at last however a youthful constitution triumphed over disease and medicine a fearful odds and he became conscious bright eyes were beaming over him blue eyes diffused with tears and affection reader can you guess whose eyes they were right you have guessed right the first time they were a Susan Brays as bright and true as when two years before he had left them at Patton though they had shed many tears over his prostrate form during his unconsciousness as if he or any printer that ever lived were worth such solicitude the first word they both pronounced was fidelity and their eyes proclaimed the fidelity of their hearts it is now about four years since the foregoing scene was enacted and the other day I received number one of a new paper called the Freeman's Star from Patney edited and printed by Jabez B. A letter accompanying the paper containing a request that I should visit him at home and that Susan, his wife would be delighted to see me as soon as spring opens I shall go success to the printers say I and when temptation is besetting them as it too often is may they have a voice to speak to their generous souls exhorting them to fidelity on ghosts do you believe in ghosts Mrs. Partington it was asked of the old lady somewhat timidly to be sure I do replied she as much as I believe that bright pulmonary there will rise in the yeast tomorrow morning if we live enough and happens two apprehensions have certainly appeared in our own family while I saw my dear Paul a fortnight before he died with my own eyes just as plain as I see you now and now it turned out art her words to be a rose bush with a nightcap on it I shall always thank to the day of my desolation that it was a forerunner sent to me tell the one came in the night when we were asleep and carried away the three candles and a pint of spirit that we kept in the house for an embarkment believe in ghosts indeed I guess I do and he must be a dreadful stick as doesn't and she piously turned to the part of the book relating to the witch of Endor stage companionship some folks are always talking and some with provoking test eternity are always saying nothing to use a left-handed expression we like a good talker intelligent quick ready whose happy conversational power tends to make the rough way of life pleasant and we have a corresponding dread of one who drones and hesitates and speaks only by monosyllables and then as if he took out each word and looked at it before he dared to utter it it is amusing at times to observe two of these human opposites come in contact to hear the lively laugh and playful jest of the one as he rattles on like a fast horse over the paving stones striking a spark at every step and the sombre glumness of the other who hardly dating to smile sits tongueless brooding over his thoughts like a hen at midnight put the two in a stagecoach or rail car to modernize a little and see how the former will shine while the latter poor dummy though perhaps morally and intellectually worth six of the former sits unnoted or regarded only as some cheap fellow of no consequence we were one of three who one day long ago occupied seats with the driver of the stage during a 50 mile ride and one of the company was the Marius fellow we ever saw he told stories song songs and laughed till all rang again with our accompaniment by the dim woods that we passed and over the hills that we climbed was a jolly ride surpassing that we think of the renowned Mr. Pickwick where the very correct Bob Sawyer occupied an equally outside position with our illustrious selves we were somewhat inclined to be merry in those days may heaven forgive us and that ride was an event to be remembered lifelong the whole party enjoyed it save one and he was the most woe gone looking customer we had ever seen joking wouldn't have moved him he was impenetrable to any missile of that kind and there he sat with accountants 50 miles long to his fair to reckon it by the length of the road gazing very sadly at the right ear of the nine horse our funny companion at last bend his whole battery upon the silent man and tried to draw him out it was an entire failure and the Joker a little chagrined at the others in perturbability asked him in a somewhat hasty tone why the something he didn't talk without moving his eyes from the contemplation of the horse's ear he opened his head and these words dropped out what's the use of talking my son said Mr. Smith to his little boy who is devouring an egg it was Mr. Smith's desire to instruct his boy my son do you know that chickens come out of eggs all they do father said young hopeful I thought the eggs came out of chickens the elder Smith drew back from the table sadly and gazed upon his son then put on his hat and went to his work Mr. slow upon moral worth then left you must try and be a good man always taught you that never let your name be at discount on change always mind and take up your notes because credit's everything in the world what's a man without credit he ain't nothing he ain't nowhere for a man to be without credit is about as bad as poverty in a man without money or credit is to be despised avoid such people as you would the smallpox look at your grandfather Bill Netsch there is a sample for you to follow he always acted right he never owed a dollar and never lost one because he was shrewd he never run round learning his money to folks not he mortgages did it and people used to love to have him foreclose on him because he did it so good naturally he was a good man his name was always right on change he could always get money let it be ever so hard you never catch him squandered his money on charitable humbugs and encouraging porpoises not he and when he died he was worth $200,000 and the ship's colors were histid half mass because a good man had fell in Israel Blimec must approve under such training and isn't it the world's teaching continually Mr. Slow off-soundings the Arif is round my son so Mr. Slow impressively taking an apple from a bin left hand and holding it up beneath his thumb and finger like an apple and revolves on its own axle tree round the sun just as regular as any machine you ever see the earth is made up of land and water and rocks besides vegetation and trees and things growing the mountains upon the service of the earth are very high more than a half mile I should think some of them are called white mountains because they ain't black the ocean is very deep and some folks think it ain't got no bottom this is all gamma everything's got a bottom my son the reason they can't find it is because the world is around they throw their stinker overboard and goes right through one side like this thrusting his knife through the apple and hands down underneath just so of course they can't find a bottom Mr. Slow gives his boy the apple and turned round much satisfied with himself what is a waxed end asked one not posted in a vocabulary of Lynn a waxed end was the reply as the end that receives the wax an editor a little heated copy Quotha copy with a thermometer at 96 degrees what an unconscionable dog it is to be sure to worry one so not one line so help us step in not one line Avant quitter site for the heat of the day is fused into our spirit and by that sword which gleams above us annihilation awaits you if you dare provoke us with your importunity the idea of writing at such time is abominable and no reasonable devil would insist on it a vile name thou art at best with thy sword and length jaws they're disintended balling for copy grin away you wait from the lake of Tartarus whose burning flood narrow yielded a more hideous wealth for our or the world's torment we tell these smart minion bio-merchory of inordinate jurors that copy thou can't not have what right when the atmosphere like hot lava reads the brow and sticks there with the tenacity of molten pitch and burns and burns upon the brain like the thirst for revenge or the seething scald of impending pecuniary obligation awake a tiff and tell thy master this and tell them to that we will see them hang ere we will write a line for them today vamo se mezzo scatter or by st. paul temper outrage shall take to its self-form and launch its funders on thy devoted head but stay this the abelian of our wrath is copy pour it best give it in don't cut it miss don't you think my dress much too long as seraphina the youngest of the seven of old roger don't cut it miss even if it is I beg of you as a friend not to cut it said the old man seriously why not inquired she timidly because miss I remember difficulty of my own once under like circumstances which was a source of much shame to me I was overtaken by a severe shower far from home I was terribly drenched and a new pair of sheepskin inexpressibles that I wore tied close to the knee was the fashion then received the dripping streams from my body and distended like a bad case of the dropsy fell below my calves like your dress they were too long and I cut them off of the knee but the warm sun came out and the skin contracted inch by inch I felt it creeping up my legs and by the time I got home you may be sure I was a sight to behold don't cut it miss unless you feel perfectly sure it will not shrink more there's a smile at the old gentleman's delicacy in the matter but there could be no fear of danger and they didn't see how the cases were parallel at all 29 cats Skya screamed Mrs. Partington from the head of the stairs as the noise of an interesting quadruped of the cat species in the kitchen below met her ears Skya I say she listened to ascertain the result of her command but the noise was resumed and the little kitchen echoed again with feline music spitting and mewing and growling with the concatenation of malignity and every note of it that reached her as she leaned over the banister Gracious Heaven cried she I should think that there were 20 of them watch how I do Skya she screamed again and the noise redoubled indeed it appeared to her excited fancy that a reinforcement had arrived and we're all in full chorus and now the crash of crockery added to her fear she dare not go down for of all things in the world she feared a spiteful cat it became suddenly still in a moment or so and she ventured downstairs a broken plate was on the floor with traces of molasses upon the fragments and Ike very demurely sat behind the stove counting his marbles is there by any cats in here Isaac asked the kind old lady looking anxious around the room 27 28 29 where for goodness sake did 29 cats come from asked she but I know there was a good many of them and there's a two sir continued Ike so counting and Chinese anything like the mouth taste Isaac inquired she I mean marbles ant said Ike and I mean cats Isaac submissive pardonson severely was a scene for a painter coffin should do it up her eyes alternated between the broken plate and the boy as of pondering the mystery of the sound she had heard and Ike wiped the molasses from his mouth on his sleeve didn't the molasses on the plate explain it he had to take a lecture you may depend on the certainty of roguish boys being awfully punished for plaguing the aged and he had to read the story aloud before he went to bed that night of the boys who were eaten up by the she bears and section 12 section 13 of life and sayings of Mrs. Partington this is the LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Elsie Selwyn life and sayings of Mrs. Partington and others of the family by BP Shillabair section 13 a coach containing a young man and woman with one trunk on behind behind the coaches meant is pleasingly suggestive of matrimony yes said old Roger sardonyly but a half a dozen young ones and seven handboxes are much more suggestive there's no mistaken signs like those Mrs. Partington on tobacco I know that tobacco is very delatorious since Mrs. Partington as Mr. Trask set conversing with her upon the body and soul destroying nature of the weed I know that tobacco is delatorious especially to a white floor and taking out her snuff box the broad one with a picture of Napoleon on the color she tapped it and offered a pinch to her guest snuff is just as bad said he is laying his finger gently on her arm and speaking earnestly snuff injures the intellect affects the nerves destroys the memory it is tobacco in its most subtle form the poison appears as the devil didn't Eden under a pleasing exterior she gazed upon him a moment in silence I know said she it has a tenderness to the head but I couldn't do without it and so I'll still right into me when I'm down to the hill and if it is a prison as you call it I should have been killed by it 40 years ago good stuff like good say is a great lesson and I don't see how folks who have no amusement can get along without it the box was dropped back to its receptacle and her friend took his leave sign that she would persist in shortening her days by the use of snuff and stopped a moment to lecture Ike who is enjoying a sugar cigar upon the front doorstep guitar and the head Mrs. Partington's neighbor Mrs. Sled complained one morning of her ringing in her ears a mouse bay I went to the guitar in your head dear so the old lady she knew every sort of human ailment and like the downcast doctor with death on fits I know what that ringing in the ears is continued she for my ears used to rig so bad sometimes as to wake Paul out of his sleep thinking it was a line of fire there was no doubt she was telling what was true but there were some that questioned it in a gentle cough we haven't a doubt in its truth a singular fact them were our very fat critters remarked Mrs. Partington as she stood viewing a yoke of splendid steers yes and reply the farmer and would you believe it mum they were fattened on nothing but oat straw and it hadn't been fresh neither yet outside said she for a moment doubt of the probability of the story occupied her mind it was but for a moment well I never continued she and turned aside to admire the beauties of a new cider press I had at the times brand by steam power screened Mrs. Partington as she heard Isaac commenced a paragraph about making bread by steam she laid down her work placed her hands upon her lap and looked broadly at the boy through her specs brand by steam said she what will the world do next I wonder if this is one of the labor-saving inventions now but I see what a well and is people fast enough already in all consciousness but what will they do when they come to be bred by steam power they act according to their bringing up Isaac people may be faster now but they are no better than they used to be Isaac explained that it was new mode of making bread she looked at him steadily for a moment when taking a thumb and finger full she put the cover on the box resuming her knitting and told Isaac to go on what she did the poor printer the poor and purse we mean reduced to penery and rags and asking alms about the printing offices is a melancholy site there is enough and one such spectacle to give any man the double-breasted horrors for a whole day there is a most well-begone miserable hopelessness in him as he asked your aid in the name of his profession of printing the noble art that he perhaps may have honored in his better days bad luck or worse liquor often symptoms of the latter predominate combined with a want of self-respect have reduced him to his present condition he is no common beggar there is a something in his tone as he asked for your aid that tells plainly it is not his true vocation that is forcing his nature into a most unnatural current and asking for assistance he has none of the same lies that appear already framed on the lips of common beggars no volcanoes have poured their burning lavas on his head or other property no furious tornadoes have swept away his earthly hopes in homestead and driven him forth a wanderer no overwhelming tide has pursued him relentlessly in other lands to give him a fortune here but he stands before you and his appearance pleads for him he looks like a lowcase dusty and pied or a form picked from sorts and squabbling under the accumulation of indulged dust there is a persuasion in his seedy coat button to the chin a coat in which a dim geniality struggles to overcome the poverty clouds or cobwebs that mar it there is persuasion in the hat that venerable tile whose form of three fashions past indicates certainly as an almanac the data the declension of his golden days there is persuasion in his familiar look at things and air that says this is nothing new to me I've seen all this before there is persuasion much more in the tone of the voice that asks the gift as if it were alone or the return of some money and you're keeping from him there's no servility in his asking and his story is a direct recital of his troubles he is sick has a disorder in his head his wife is dead his hope has all fled for days haven't seen the bed nor had one mouthful of bread and it's quite famous shed what a recital and you cry enough seed and the quarter comes at once from your yielding purse what a comfortable reflection it is as we place the coin in his extended hand and it forces home a question of great moment drawn from a contingency that grows something out of the nature of the art whose turn will come next and the richest of the journeymen feels more humble as he ponders on what may happen Mr. Slough on grave topics Bill Mack my son so Mr. Slough shaking his head with oracular and owl-like profundity it isn't well to know too much my boy your father never did and he know too much for that thoughts is perplexed and in the human mind Bill Mack is too precious the thing to be wore out with too much friction don't abuse the gifts a nighter my son because nighter is one of them she is don't investigate anything new my boy because there's a thousand old things of more content to look at her a first of which is number one no notions perplexes the mind dear there isn't full enough fools in the world who look to look at her such things without your trouble and benefit to you column all humbug and moonshine and them as believes in lunatics and scoundrels and I'll save you a good many discussions and give you a character for dignity and prudence and prudent folks make money philosophy and scions and then things as humbugs and everything as humbugs but money mind I tell you Mr. Slow ceased overcome by his own eloquence pain and old debt working out of debt is often called working a dead horse and we think not in aptly the more especially when a man is poor with a family depending upon him for support then a pickaxe becomes a weary thing and every shovel full of dirt weighs four times as much as when the heart of the laborers cheered by the hope of the dollar dead but it is well to pay one's debts though it is far better not to owe anything a piece of advice that Saint Paul utters with great earnestness as if he were practically sensible of the disadvantage of indebtedness a man who had run up a long score at a shop for liquor cigars another creature comforts found himself utterly unable to pay a stiver of it in vain was he urged to pay the bill and in vain was he threatened if he didn't he hadn't any money the true secret of his getting in the first place and the creditor gave it up at last he thought he would compromise the matter and let the man work the debt off the creditor had a large pile of wood in his barn several cords of it nicely sawed and split and he forthwith set the debtor at work to throw the wood into the street and then pile it back again at the rate of a shilling an hour until the whole debt would be wiped out the man took hold with a will and in short time the wood was all in the street then went back with equal celerity and then out again and then in everybody wondering what it could mean some charitably intimated that he was crazy and others equally charitable said he was drunk he toiled on thus the whole day throwing the wood back and forth but every hour seemed full 60 minutes longer than its predecessor as he watched the clock on the old church in the neighborhood he was working a dead horse and it was hard making him go with the longest road must have an end and the hour neared when the labor and debt would cease together and as the hammer of the clock told the hour of his release the freedman threw the last stick of wood into the street with a shout of triumph the shout brought the owner of the wood to the door who found his late debtor putting on his coat to go away hello said he you're not going away without putting the wood back again are you I'll put it back again for a shilling an hour said the man the proprietor of the wood saw that he had been done but good nature told his late debtor to go ahead and put it back he went about it but it was strange to say it took him just three times as long to put it back as it did to throw it out Mrs. Partington having been asked what the consequences would be if an irresistible should come in contact with a movable body replied that she thought one or another of them would get hurt operatic rebuke I can't catch the melody said Mrs. Partington at the opera as she stood upon tiptoe and the lobby of Howard a thin I am in vain attempting to look over the heads before her she had received a ticket but it secured nothing but an outside position and she had gone wandering round like a jolly planet without any particular orbit I was in the gallery eating a penny's worth of peanuts and throwing the shells into the parquet below I can't catch the melody of the uproar and more half the words are all Dutch to me this is the first opiotic performance I ever went to and if I can't get a say I can't stand it to come again she said it very firmly as she was going down the stairs a young gentleman with curly hair reached over the banisters and blandly informed her that he could furnish her with a seat she turned her benevolent spectacles and face attached towards him and told him I was rather late after the evening had half gone to think of politeness it was a picture the young curly had bending over the banister and the spectacles and the black bonnet and the widow of the purple paw on the stairs looking up it was sublime Smith and Blank it gives us a mournful feeling every time the above sign on a business street meets our eye it is simply a white pine sign with the letters upon it done in black there is nothing peculiar in its construction but the blank termination with the ampersand once the connecting character of a prosperous firm maybe but now seeming to exist only with reference to some future contingency denote separation and thus as indicating this the sign becomes an important sign of the times the name that formally graced it though no longer needed there is still to be traced through the white coat spread over it as if yet asserting its claim to consideration alas poor ghost is it better to let Smith have it all to himself what's caused the separation did the Jones whom we see dimly through the white lead which covers him like a shroud shuffle off this mortal coil and leave Smith there alone like a boy tilting on one end of a plank how Jones a wife and children and do they yet look up wistfully at the sign as they pass it by as if with a sort of undefined hope in their minds that Jones may be in there somewhere now or do they weep as they gaze upon it at its suggestion of their own loneliness or has the widow forgotten long ago the man under the mold and another Jones with another name taken his place in the domestic firm or does she yet stand like the ampersand on the sign beckoning some other Jones to write his name on the blank space in her heart and begin anew it may have been a separation in strife where uncongeniality of mind temper and habits and gendered bitterness and the hours flew by freighted with mutual curses upon the ill-starred union of Smith and Jones and separation was the result how happy were they maybe at the beginning as they sat down to talk over their business schemes while hope held her candle for them as they ciphered out a path to fortune through the intricacies of trade talking as lovers talk never dreaming like lovers that the elements might exist in themselves for the destruction of their hopes and happiness we can fancy the bitter days the reproaches abuse and violence that ended in the painter's brush upon the sign and the announcement in the post of dissolution but why is that ampersand left there does Smith with his bitter experience on another Jones to torment him perhaps Smith and Jones were well-meaning men who tried the firm on and found it unable to carry double and then divided good-naturely and are now carrying on trade each by himself and each having a knowledge of the good qualities of the other each ready to endorse the other's note each having for the other a cordial salutation when meeting and how are you Smith and how are you Jones sounding heartily as if they meant something more than the words they imply and inquiring about each other's business with as much earnestness as formerly went together each referring to that time of satisfaction and speaking of my old partner Smith or Jones with affection and respect it is some comfort to conjure up a picture like this and regret that Jones should be cut off in his goodness Smith and blank we don't like to see it anyhow if Smith should choose to let his name stand there forever he may do so if he can nobody can hinder him or will want to but Smith should not allow that ampersand to remain there as if hinting at something it is afraid to say trembling upon the verge of it and holding back without venturing upon it the bond is broken that united the twain and why should Mr. Smith offender chased I by leaving that ampersand to drag along behind his name now there is no use for it like the end of a broken chain beneath a cart pull away ma'am pull away said old Roger in the omnibus as he saw a heavy lady dragging vigorously at the check string another such jerk is that and he must come through tarware asked she sharply why through the hole there to be sure you were trying to get him through it wasn't you now I wasn't I was only stopped in the horses Mr. impudence oh said the old gentleman was that all excuse me she got out in the bus moved on a woman that one could love now there is a woman that one could love settled Roger delightedly as he saw a figure arrayed in the full feather of fashion and a window in Washington Street a long life could be spent very quietly in such company no quarreling for precedence no jealousy no strife of any kind no teasing for dress and follies till one's purse strings aching sympathy with aching heartstrings at unchecked extravagance even I could love such a woman as that perhaps you could responded a sweet voice at his side but would it love you back again thank you there would be no return for your investment of affection here in this heartless thing this mere frame you should turn your attention to something worthy of your love for a small outlay of affection a tenfold return would be made you in domestic joy alas said the old bachelor where shall I find this but the beautiful eyes that met his proved how easily the question might be answered and with a melancholy step he passed along he was more a bachelor from habit than from choice after all introducing the water blast me explained Mrs. Pardington coming in out of breath and dropping down into a chair like a jolly old keg anchor at the same time fanning herself with an imaginary fan she did not say blast me because she was in want of any particular blessing at that time it was merely an ejaculation of hers expressive of deep emotion blast me said she I don't see why the water commissionaries were so much more infredded about introducing the caquituate water for I think it is the easiest thing in the world to get acquainted with look at that bonnet now holding up the antiquated but well preserved bit of crepe dripping with water drops like the umbrella of Aquarius look at that bonnet now ruined to all tents and porpoises by the pesky waterworks introduce it indeed continued she ironically looking severely at the wrecked article in her hand take no use of introducing an acquaintance that makes so free with you at first sight when Ike, who was hanging upon the back of her chair fell heavily against the window and thrust the rear portion of his person through four panes of glass I, Isaac, said she you'll be the ruination of me if I was rich as Cressotay I couldn't stand it Isaac gathered himself from among the fragments of glass and seems quite tickled with an idea that he could sell the pieces in conjunction with a reserve of old iron and half of the clothesline and three junk bottles to raise funds for the Fourth of July rather funny, old Roger was standing in State Street and saw an Irishman rolling a keg of speci from his cart to the institution for which it was intended there, said the old fellow to the foreign gentleman who was standing by him there you see the benefit of our free institutions there is a man who came to this country six months ago as poor as poor could be and now you see he is actually rolling in riches he said this and turned round very red in the face and struck his cane several times violently on the side-box and waited for his friend to explode hearing no sound of cacination he turned and found the gentleman vainly endeavouring to decipher the emblems on the merchant's exchange he evidently hadn't understood the joke on one string the prayer of Moses executed on one string submissive Pardeton prayer not supposed to be cut down poor Moses said she executed on one string well I don't know as ever if I heard of anybody who's been executed on two strings unless the rope broke and she went on wondering how it could be seeking the light I declare I don't know what to think on it submissive Pardeton as she looked intently into the water pail the attitude was peculiar and the iron-bowed specks were on duty like a sentry on a bridge keeping a bright look out over the water I can't say it to it this was wrong if we take it literally because the water was as pure and transparent as her own benevolence I can't say it to it and the more I preponderate upon it the more I'm in our bewilderness how Mr. Pang can make light of water is more than I can see I can't throw no light on it I think it's made of some sort of gin my poor Paul's head used to be made light by gin and water but it didn't burn us to say this well her listeners stood hapless almost breathless as her voice came up through her cat-border like the steam from around the cover of a wash boiler while I put the experiment to a practical test by pouring a dipper of water into the stove judging virtue by its smell it smells virtuous said Mrs. Pardeton as she smelt of the heart-shorn bottle that had long laying in an old-fashioned high closet before which the old lady stood on a tall chair exploring the dark interior of the receptacle for unconsidered trifles it smells virtuous we had often heard of the peculiar odor of goodness that rises like frankincense amid an atmosphere of vice and here was a practical application that attested the justness of the term it was sublime and the figures standing there on the high chair like truth on a pedestal with the specs and the close cap and the blue yarn stockings formed a subject for a sculptor poorer than which had immortalized hundreds of stitches of the press the printing press as a great steam engine but I don't believe Dr. Franklin ever invented it to commit outrages on a poor female woman like me it makes me say everything Mrs. Slatt and some of the things I know must have been said when I was out for I can't remember them and she dropped three stitches in her excitement they're out to know that them who make spore of the agent don't never live to grow up mouse hunting an incident in the life of Mrs. Partington it was midnight deep and still in the mansion of Mrs. Partington as it was very generally about town on a cold night in March so profound was the silence that it awakened Mrs. P and she raised herself upon her elbow to listen no sound greeted her ears save the tick of the old wooden clock in the next room which stood there in the dark like an old crone whispering and gibbering to itself Mrs. Partington she was wrapped beneath the folds of the blankets and had one eye again well coaxed towards the realm of dreams while the other was holding by a very frail tenure upon the world of reality when her ear was saluted by the nibble of a mouse directly beneath her chamber window and the mouse was evidently gnawing her chamber carpet now if there is an animal in the catalogue of creation that she dreads and detests it is a mouse and she has a vague and indefinite idea that rats and mice were made with a special regard for her individual torment as she heard the sound of the nibble by the window she arose again upon her elbow and cried show show energetically several times the sound ceased and she fondly fancy that her trouble was over again she laid herself away as carefully as she would have laying eggs that 45 cents a dozen when nibble nibble nibble she once more heard the odious sound by the window show cry the old lady again at the same time hurling her shoe at the spot from whence the sound proceeded where the little midnight marauder was carrying on his depredations a light burned upon the hearth she couldn't sleep without a light and she strained her eyes in vain to catch a glimpse of her tormentor playing about amid the shadows of the room all again was silent and the clock giving an admonitory tremble struck 12 midnight and Mrs. Partington countered the tinta numbulous knots as they ran off the reel of time with a saddened heart nibble nibble nibble again that sound the old lady sighed as she hurled the other shoe at her invisible annoyance was all without a veil and the shoeing was bootless for the sound came again to her wakeful ear at this point her patients gave out and conquering her dread of the cold she arose and opened the door of her room that led to a corridor and a shoe in the other she made the circuit of the room and explored every nook and cranny in which a mouse could ensconce himself she looked under the bed and under the old chest of drawers and under the wash stand and shewed until she could shoe no more the reader's own imagination if he has an imagination skilled in limney must draw the picture of the old lady while upon this exploring expedition accounted as she was in search of the ridiculous mouse we have our own opinion upon the subject with all due deference to the years and virtues of mrs. p and with all regard for personal attractions very striking in one of her years we should judge that she cut a very queer figure indeed satisfying herself that the mouse must have left the room she closed the door deposited the light upon the hearth and again sought repose how gratefully a warm bed feels when exposure to the night air has chilled us as we crawl to its unfolding cover it how we nestle down like an infant by its mother's breast and own no joy superior to that we feel coveting no regal luxury while reveling in the elysium of feathers so felt mrs. p as she again ensconced herself in bed the clock in the next rooms struck one she was again near the attainment of the state when dreams are rife when close by her chamber door outside she heard that hateful nibble renewed which had marred her peace before with a groan she arose in seizing her lamp she opened the door and had the satisfaction to hear the mouse drop step by step until he reached the floor below convinced that she was now rid of him for the night she returned to bed and addressed herself to sleep the room grew dim and the weariness of her spirit the chest of drawers in the corner was fast losing its identity and becoming something else and a moment more nibble nibble nibble again outside of the chamber door as the clock in the next room struck two anger disappointment desperation fired her mind with a new determination once more she arose but this time she put on a shoe her dexter shoe ominous movement it is said that when a woman wets her finger flees had better fly the star of that mouse's destiny was setting was now near the horizon she opened the door quickly and as she listened a moment she heard him drop again from stair to stair on a speedy passage down the entry below was closely secured and no door was open to admit of his escape this she knew and a triumphant gleam shot a thwart her features revealed by the rays of the lamp she went slowly down the stairs until she arrived at the floor below where snugly in a corner with his little bead like black eyes looking up at her roguishly was the gnar of her carpet and the annoyer of her comfort she moved towards him and he not coveting the closer to the end of her journey the the mouse in an attempt to run by her presumed too much upon former success he came to near her upraised foot and fell upon his most similar beauties like an avalanche of snow upon a new tile tile, and he was dead for ever. Mrs. Partington gazed upon him as he laid before her, though she was glad at the result. She could but sigh at the necessity which impelled the violence, but for which the mouse might have long continued a blessing to society in which he moved. Slowly and sadly she marched upstairs, with her shoe all sullied and gory, and the watch, who saw it through the front door-squares, told us this part of the story. That mouse did not trouble Mrs. Partington again that night, and the old clock in the next room struck three before sleep again visited the eyelids of the relic of Corporal Paul. End of Section 13. Section 14 of Life and Sains of Mrs. Partington. This is the LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Elsie Selwyn. Life and Sains of Mrs. Partington and Others of the Family by B. P. Shillabair. Section 14. Star Gazing. Out beneath the starry heavens, Mr. Slow took his son, Abel Nelech, to point out to him, to read to him from the broad page of Nature the wonders of this vicious furnishment on high, as he called it. All these air-stars muslin, said Mr. S, pointing up to the studded sky above them, that you say up there, stationary and unmovable, marching along in sublime grandeur and winking at the air with their jolly yellow eyes like gold eagles. Them are called fixed stars, and… But what's that, father? Said young Abel Nelech, as a meteor like a racer darted across the southerly sky. Mr. Slow was prompt with his answer. That, said he, I guess, is one of them that's got unfixed. Mrs. P. and Mount Vesuvius. So there's been another rock show of Mount Vesuvius, said Mrs. Partington, as she put down the paper and put up her specs. The paper tells all about the burning lather running down the mountain, but I don't tell us how it got a fire. I wonder if it was set fire, too. But are many people full wicked enough to do it, or perhaps it was caused by children playing with frictious matches? I wish they had sent for a fireman. They would have put a stop to the raging element, and I dare say Mr. Barnacle and all of them would have gone, for they are what I call real civil engineers. There was a whole broadside of commendation of the fire department in the impressive gesture accompanying her words. Time and space for a moment became annihilated, and imagination figured the city engines pouring their subduing streams upon the flames of Vesuvius and, out on sewing, and break her down twelve, rising above the vain rogues of the smothering crater. The picnic, a grand domestic drama, and many acts, in which are detailed the fun and drawbacks attending a pleasure execution in the town of Budzledon. Mr. Homespun, who has something to say to all and about everybody, Jemima Short, a sweet little country rose, Mr. Blisby, a gentleman from the city, Ms. Primrose, a refined lady of thirty-five, full of sentiment and some snuff, Mr. Brindle, a bachelor of fifty-eight and a justice of the peace, Ms. Pigeon, a bird too tough for sentiment, auxiliaries, horses, pigeon-pie, etc. by the company. The morn as bright in Bozledon and kindly beams the sun and spreads his choicest rays around as if he dreamt of fun. The girls are up and wide awake, the lads are spruce and gay, for a picnic party is arranged for this bright summer day. And while we have the time of it, just see the bag of donuts that Jemima Short has thrown out of the window into the wagon. And there go three chickens and four pies and a jug of cider. Goodness gracious, Jemima, you're an angel of a provider you are. You don't mean to put us on a regimen today, do you? You look like an earthly goddess, too, and your new pink calico, I vow it looks first-rate. I took it for Chinchilia rod-off, Jemima. I don't know, I don't think much of it, but folks tell me it's becoming, Miss James, that a railwinner got the pattern from the city, and how do you day, Miss Short, winning the picnic? Miss Short, with a cord in her head. No, guess not, don't feel smart, Saxley, and the old man's got the romantic ascension in his leg, it can't go another. But I must go in, and she has had her hair and paper as a whole weaned, and mine can all look pretty. Jemima, why mother, how do you talk? But here they come, oh what a host of them, how proud Betsy Bab feels of her new dress. I guess some folks can look full as well, as some folks, and there's that everlasting old maid Miss Pigeon, how I hate her with her scraggy neck and long tongue, and there's Paddy Spig's city view, oh I wouldn't be hard to be seen with such a fright. The wagons packed with eatables go groany over the road. The long carts filled with girls imbue show an attractive load, and laughter rules the pleasant hour, and eyes shine gay and bright, the only kind of stars that show as well by day as night. Laughter, guess you'd think so to hear it. Now the cart settles down into a rut. Dear me, says Miss Tibbs, we shall all be upsot, topsy-turvy, do hold on to me. And then everybody thinks that they must be held on to, and everybody else is trying to hold on to somebody. Oh, how frightened the city beauty is. Do you apprehend any danger of tear-giversation? No, says Joe Hayes. The slack men look artier than things, and everybody is not collated for it. Female voice. Be still, won't you, O you Satan, see how you have tumbled my collar with your pesky nonsense, and my face burns like firecalls, right before a city gentleman too will for shame. City gentleman, upon my honour, Miss, I was entirely oblivious to any impropriety. I wasn't very improper either, he he he, only such things shouldn't be done perfectly, you know. Miss Pigeon, if Susan Frye isn't sitting on Sam Sled's knees, I ain't a living sinner, such conduct I must think improper, I was never guilty of such indiscretion, I never was. Boys singing, there's fun in a country cart, and life on a dusty road, where mirth warms every heart, and pleasure finds the boat. The town may boast of its joys, its racket and its din, but give a hunt away from its noise, some quiet nook within. Far from the busy din of town and some secluded grove, the happy parties sit them down in an unrestricted rove. All the stirrups that bind the world are here thrown far aside, and reveling in mirth bright beam, how fleet the moments glide. Arm in arm under the shady tree they now wander, picking posies or bright berries, and such fun, Miss Primrose smiles languidly, a sort of sky-blue benignity upon old Brindle, the bachelor. Miss Primrose, sentimentally, how delightfully those pines sigh in the gentle breeze, like the soft music of love in their ear of youth. Old Brindle, yes and so it does, Miss Primrose, oh I do so love the pines. Old Brindle, their veteran may, Mum, when the sliver is thick and creamy, come out here then, Mum, out with your jackknife, throw away your tobacco, cut out a square and sliver up the tree, I'll sliver up, Mum, some slivers down, that's when you'd know the pines, Mum. Miss Primrose, that's an entirely no aspect, I meant their romantic beauty. Old Brindle, yes and beautiful wood very, worth four dollars a cord in Boston. Here comes Patty Sprague and a musty choked man from the city. City man. Miss Sprague, how delightfully rural it is here, always thought I should like to live among the beauties of nature. It's a great pity we can't have any nature in town, a great pity. I've heard some of human nature around here, but never seen any of it. Patty Sprague. I should think they might bring it in by package, as they did the coat of city man. Are those ground nuts? Patty Sprague. No, my dear, no, don't eat them. They're toadstools. Thus we go on chatting, walking, voices ringing with the pines, nothing our gay fancies balking, doing all our heart and climes. Now on the green, in beautuitous sod, the varied vines spread, and appetite shall wait on health and with its influence shed. The social tongue with music rife flunts with the platter's noise, as Earth's rude jarring interferes with its harmonious joys. Here's a tongue in ham and sausages, and pumpkin, pie, and cheese, mercy, what a bill of fare, Miss Pewitt. Shall I help you to piece of tongue? No, thank you. I've had enough of my own, but I'll trouble you for a piece of chicken. Chicken, did you say? From his toughness I should say he was a grandfather to thousands. Pass the pigeon yonder, will you? What's the odd maid? No, no, the pie. There's the plate. The pigeon is unavoidably detained. Miss Pigeon, I'd thank people who use my name to speak so that I can hear I don't like being backbitten. We were speaking of pigeon pie, ma'am, something more tender aside. Say, Tom, what have you got in the dish there? Pickled grasshoppers, I should think. Will you have some? Miss Primrose, do allow me to help you. Here's some ham, delicate as your own nature, ma'am. Miss Primrose, I declare you are quite complimentary, comparing my nature with smoked hog. Will Mr. Blisby, the gentleman from the city, favour us with a song? Silence, ye gentlemen and ladies, all that grace this famous picnic. Mr. Blisby's going to sing, Mr. Blisby. I'd rather be excused, but though I am not exactly in tune, I'll endeavour for the occasion. Mr. Blisby sings, My love is fair, she is fair. Her lips are red, her eyes like snow. A golden glory is her hair, fathering over shoulders, white as snow. And when her eyes upon me turn, in burn with radiance divine, My ardent gaze encounters her, the same as her encounters mine. Child, young mother, give me another piece of pie. Mother, hush my darling, there ain't any. Boy, I say there is, I want a piece of pie. Oh, such a mingling of talking and jingling. The noise and glee sound merrily, and set our ears a-tingling. A dance, a dance, and gleefully a-sut as forthwith planned, a fiddle most mysteriously has happened here at hand, and here beneath a dark tree shade with leaves and berries crowned, each happy lad and laughing maid whirling the dance around. Go at my top, Sawyer, on the pussy-gut. Work your elbows lively, and we'll put her through by daylight. Oh, dear, I'm all of a perspiration with sweat, how slippery it is underfoot. Ain't slippery anywhere else. As well to man, there's Bill Natter and Jemima Short both down. Up and try it again, clumsies. Miss Permos, how these old woods echo with the music, Mr. Brindle, like the Arcadian groves with the dulcet notes of the satires. Mr. Brindle. I've never heard of them. I guess they never was in these woods. They never was that I can remember. I declare there's Mr. Blisbee dancing like an animated beanpole. He's on all fours. Not all he wants is a tail. Then moving to the tuning of the fiddle and the bow, how sparkles every eye with mirth as round and round we go. No ballroom-artists now are here to circumscribe our sport, and nature smiles approvingly, for here she holds her court. A lake-romantic lion-near tempts to its cooling veil, and tiny boats in swift career recross its bosom sail, and waving handkerchiefs respond in answer to the song, that rising from the venturers is born the breeze along. Jump into the boat-paddy, not the least danger in the world of it tipping over. Oh my, I've got my shoe all satiated with water. I shall get my death a cold. You've got your foot in it this time. That's a fact. Mr. Blisbee, is there any danger of seasickness? Now just say that, Bo. How she scoops it. I vow a paddy-sprig. I haven't got a whole of Bo-art and pools away like a little Satan. If I thought that spindle shank from the city was gone to have that gal, I'd cut his eternal acquaintance. I would. I am in the most sad throat. But that would be manslaughter, and I don't say how it could be, neither for killing such a thing as he is. A voice. Some love to roam over the dark sea's foam, where the shrill winds whistle free. Well, they do. Hello, here's Jim Sly. What have you gotten that bottle of fellow haven't seen you today for? Jim Sly drunk. I've got some cough drops to cure the seasickness with a little rum tea with some sparrot in it to keep it. Sally twists his sweetheart. You, Jim Sly, you drunken miserable fellow, you, you sot, you brute, you individual, you, you, you, Jim Sly. Jim. Go, it's Sly, and I'll hold your bonnet. What you're going to do about it. Sally, you'll see when we get home, you sot, you brute, you vagabond. Sam, literally an elder. Wine cures the gout, boys, the colic, and the seasickness. Who cares for Sly? Can you tell me, Jimima, why Miss Pigeon Yonder is like 49 big apples? No, I'm sure I can't, unless it's because she's sour. No, Tite, it's because she's a virgin 950. But gracious what an awful cloud has risen in the west, and what a frightful lightning flash then swept across its breast. I feel a drop upon my hand, the pine trees rock and roar, the waves like blacks with nightcaps on, rush madly to the shore. Oh, what shall we do? Where shall we go? What will become of us? screams everybody. Do, dear Mr. Wigan, says Miss Pigeon. Tell us what we shall do, Mr. Wigan. Why, Tite, no use to rungs, I see, for the rain is here, and there ain't a house within a mile, and my opinion is that we get in the woods and make ourselves comfortable. But don't the lightning always strike trees? But there's more danger from your eyes, Jimima. Lightning's attracted by anything bright, you'd better shut them up. Jimima, your wit isn't bright enough to attract it any more, Mr. Impudence. How does that strike ye, old Mrs. Fogg? Oh, that folks should joke and trifle so, when there's so much to make them solemn. Ain't you afraid the thunder'll kill you? And where would you go if you died laughing? The rain pours down and torrent force among the forest shades, and timid men the closer cling to timid shrinking maids. The whitened cheek and blanching eye denote the force of fear, and many a head bows low with dread the thunder loud to hear. Well, this is the comfort, see where Ms. Primrose is cornered, old Brindle, cheek by jowl. That's right, go it, old gal, my eye's how it rains, if Pan is the presiding genius of these woods, in my opinion, he's a dripping Pan. Oh, Brindle, young man, I'm a justice of the peace, in this irred jurisdiction, and if you commit that again, I shall commit you for contempt of court. Here comes Jim Sly through the wet, pitching like a mackerel catcher in a chopsy. Hello, Jim, where's Polly, like a widowed hand refusing to be comforted? Jim sobered. Sally, would you forgive me? Sally, no, you disreputable individual, to think that you should go away and leave me to— Jim, there don't cry, and I'll go and take the total pledge, main liqueur law and all, and become a useful membrane of society, and if I drink any more, I hope I may never starve. See, Mr. Blisby, why we are soaking, how the horses outside are smoking. Mr. Blisby, do horses in the country smoke? Yes, and we've got a filly at home who throws all our chews tobacco. You don't say so. Thus, while the rain is pouring so, fun may mingle with our fear, and while the wind is roaring so, so many awaken words of cheer, the rain clears up, the burnish sun comes out with scorching rain, dispelling from the sky and heart, all shapes of gloom away, and laughter now bursts forth once more in cheerful merry peal, and home again is sung with glee as o'er the road we wheel. Are you comfortable, set close as possible? Here we go, and now on the road for home, let us be merry as we can be. Ms. Pigeon, did you enjoy your duck? You are a goose, so to talk so. Ms. Primrose, you look refreshed since you're sprinkling from nature's water pot. Mr. Blisby, this is fine, a subject for a letter, Mr. Blisby. Jemima, my dear. You look as blooming as a rose in June and twice as sweet. There's the Baselton factory rising above the trees, and the old vein, little vanity, pluming itself in the sunshine. Hurrah for home, old lady with the mob cup, take your head indoors. Urchins and quarter-rice scatter, young maiden with the milking pail. Who are you looking at? Mr. Blisby, rising. Before we part, I should like to say that the pleasure I've experienced has far exceeded my expectations, and that I shall always entertain a pleasing recollection of the delightful moments spent in this hay cart. Three cheers for Blisby! Ladies and gentlemen, if it is your opinion that we have enjoyed ourselves a great way over this sinister, you will please to manifest it. Yes, then we'll adjourn with the chorus. Some seek for glee by the heaving sea, some rush on a railroad train, but give us a part on a country cart and a picnic out in the rain. Absuant omnibus. An excellent test of affection. This summer is no more to try the strength of affection, so, Ms. Partington, though it's pretty well to sing love songs beneath the window at midnight and rainstorm and stand billowing and cooling on the doorstep till two o'clock in the morning. The winter season is the one. Many, the time my poor pal have rid far miles to see me in the coldest weather, and often the dear creature had been found in the morning fast asleep in the middle of the cow yard, with a saddle on high shoulders, for fatigue with cart and me, and riding a hard-trotten horse that was devotion. I never seen a cow without thinking of poor pal, and same which the good old lady went to bed. High Dutch versus politeness. Has the Washington Street trying gone by here? As Mrs. Partington of a gentleman with a huge moustache who stood picking his teeth on the steps of the Revere House, the old lady met the Washington Street omnibus that runs between the low old depot and Dover Street. The gentleman still picked his teeth and looked gravely at her but said not a word. Has the Washington Street trying passed by here? She asked again, thinking the gentleman hadn't heard her. He still stood and stood still and looked and picked but said nothing. Well, said the old dame, half musing and half addressing the man with the moustache. It was only a civil question, and I didn't think there was anything harmonious in asking it, but some people think it's a great hardship to do any one a favor. It wouldn't have required much effort. I should think I've answered me, nor took a great deal of ambas time nor interfered with anybody's occupancy. If anybody has got focal organs, I should think they might use them. Nine first done, responded the man with the moustache as he put his hands beneath his coattails and walked up the steps, leaving Mrs. Partington standing like a note of interrogation at the end of her speech while the omnibus which had passed while she was speaking was seen far in the distance. Good taste! I can't bear children, said Miss Prim disdainfully. Mrs. Partington looked at her over her spectacles mildly before she replied. Perhaps if you could you would like them better, she said at last. But why is it that unmarried old maids and single bachelors are always railing at children? It seems as if they have never read the command given to our forefathers to increase and multiply and punish the earth. From my part I love the little dears and I have rather hair a child cry any day than hear the brass band and she went right to work covering a ball for Ike. Old Roger much excited. Mrs. Thames, said Old Roger one morning to his landlady at the breakfast table. He was an old bachelor with Roger and as such was an object of considerable interest both with the landlady and three antiquated spinsters who boarded with her. Mrs. Thames, what sort of house do you keep? What sort of neighborhood is this that you live in and why is it that you have such a bad character round town, ma'am? The landlady was astonished and while she might be before he looked excited and sensed. I've boarded here, ma'am, continued he, just seven weeks and every week we have had a track left here and every track is against some cardinal sin, ma'am, that you, nor me, nor the young ladies here I hope ever committed. Here's junkiness and gambling and swearing and lying and stealing and adultery and bearing fouls witness. Almost all the scenes in the church calendar, ma'am, and when I come next I can't guess. I can't stand it, ma'am. Why the devil himself can't stand it. And his brow looked hot and steamy and he bore the look of a man injured by an implied reflection on heretofore bright reputation. Rare done. One morning old sledge got capsized out of his weary hellobot and all at the spring market in P. Blank under the old dinastiness of that institution and was nearly drowned when they got him out. He was so near death that the ones who caught him couldn't see any signs of life in him, but they roared him over and robbed him and shook him and sent off among the neighbors for warm blankets to put him in. Old Mrs. Twist, who lived on Church Hill, and the kindness of her heart stripped her beds at once and left her work all hanging, as she said, by sixes and sevens. To go and help bring the man too, she warmed the blankets and rubbed away vigorously at the inanimate sledge, working as if her heart was in the operation as undoubtedly it was. After a while the rubbing took effect, or as some suggested, his ugly nature refused to die, and he revived, slowly, slowly. First a gape and then a groan, then he opened his eyes, and the first person he looked upon was Mrs. Twist, busily engaged in her benevolent manipulations. He looked at her a moment, and consciousness returned, ah, said he as he spit the saltwater out of his cod-like mouth. Glad to see you've been looking out on you for a long time. Would like to have you pay me the two shillings you owe me? Mrs. Twist assured us it was the most unthankfulest thing she ever heard of, and we think so too. The bearskins. Here comes the sogasant! cried Ike at the door. Here they come in the bearskins. In the bearskins? Sunrises parted in, glancing out of the window into the cold, towards the weather cock that had looked obstinately east for three days, much to the danger of a return of her rheumatism that in east wind always induced, so much so that she had declared her determination to move in the vicinity of some catholic church, whose vein always points one way. In their bearskins, such as a day as this, ha lenders, I guess. She hastened to the door, in a company with huge and hideous caps, worth of marching by it, she saw that she was sold. Ah! said she, this is one of the oars of roar. To go look and sow, and suppose one of them poor creatures should fall down, he said top heavy his heels would go up in the air like a corn stalk witch, and all his brains would run down into his head. I can't bear to look at him. She closed the door carefully, but she stood in the entry and beat time to the music till had gone far past the house. Awful dewy. Old Rogers stood looking from the window out upon the solitary tiger lily, the only one that could be coaxed to grow for the summer, and the meagre atmosphere of the boarding house yard. The sickly lily held its head up stoutly beneath the refreshing dew that had fallen upon it during the night, and the shed top and the ashes bale in the yard, and the few blades of grass that sturdily struggled against difficulty, and managed to grow in spite of circumstances, were all wet. Old Rogers turned around, and all new by his looks that something was coming, and were prepared for it. Why? said he in a cheerful tone. Was this last night that has just passed like a certain very eminent clergyman? All guessed it at once, except the deaf milliner, who hadn't heard a word of it, but they didn't say so and gave it up. It is because it is awfully dewy. What a laugh grew to the answer, in the midst of which the jolly old brick put on his hat and went off like a rocket in a blaze of glory. A slight misapprehension. How do you like the bustle and confusion of Boston? asked the shopkeeper as Mrs. Partington stood by the counter. It gives me confusion to say them, said the old lady. Folks didn't do so when I was a girl, and besides, what an awful sight a brand and carton it takes to say nothing of their awkwardness when they get slipped up on one side. I mean, broken the shopkeeper, the bustle and confusion of the streets. Oh, said Mrs. Pete, that is quite another thing. And immediately left the store. The steak was terrible tough one morning. An old roger worked away at it in silence. I'd length his patience and masticators gave out, and turning to the landlady. Madam, said he, your borders should all have been umpires at horse races. Why so? said she, coloring highly, because being accustomed to tender steaks, there would have none of the difficulty that I experienced that could obviate it. There was an unpardonable thing in him, thus to expose her before all the borders, and she thought they outraged more than offset the tough meat. End of section 14. Section 15 of Life and Sayings of Mrs. Partington This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, recording by John Brandon. Life and Sayings of Mrs. Partington and Others of the Family by B. P. Shillebur. A Remembered Mistake It is all very true, Mr. Nicker Bottom, said Mrs. Partington, as she read in the Nickerbocker something concerning brevity and simplicity of expression. It's true, as you say, and how many mistakes there does happen when folks don't understand each other. While last summer I told a dressmaker to make me a long visit to wear. And would you believe it? She came in state a fortnight with me. Since then I've made it a pint, always to speak just what I say. Her mouth grew down to a determined pucker at the end of the sentence, and the snuffbox was tapped energetically, as if the fortnight of unrequited bread and butter was laying heavy on her memory. Faith is a great thing, and confidence in the cook, and the trust that what you have before you is the true representative of the name it bears, said old Roger, in his lecture over the bread pudding. And he peered intently into his plate, as at some mysterious thing which had there arisen to perplex him. But, he continued, can I be expected to swallow everything, always in blind credulity, or go so far as to construe porkskins and cheese rinds to mean breadcrumbs? And he gently pushed his plate away, and took a piece of the pie. Mrs. Partington and Jenny Lind. I never liked the Sweden virgins, said Mrs. Partington. She was orthodox, and always sat in the asylum pew in the northeast corner of the gallery, and had charge of the children in sermon time. Her raised finger was an admonition that brought young refractories to their obedience at once. Every Sunday was she there, and people expected to see the faded black bonnet above the railings in prayer time, as much as they did the parson. I never liked the Sweden virgins, but I ain't one that believes nothing good can come out of Lazarus for all that. Now there's Jenny Lind. May heaven shower bags of dollars on her head. That is so very good to everybody, and who sings so sweet that everybody's fallen in love with her, tipsy turvy, and gives away so much to poor indigent people. They call her an angel. And who knows? But she may be a syrup in disguise, for the papers say her singing is like the music of the spears. How I should love to hear her. She grasps hastily at the long bead purse in her reticule, but an unsatisfactory response came back from it to her hopes, and she laid it back again with a sigh. The use of the Aztecs We are fearfully and wonderfully made, said Mrs. Partington, after she had stood for a long time contemplating the Aztec children. Her hands were resting upon the back of a chair, as she said this, and she made the remark so loud that a tall gentleman who stood near her, stooped down to get a look under her black bonnet. He thought she had spoken to him. We are fearfully and wonderfully made, continued she, especially some of us. The ways of Providence is past finding out, and we don't know what these haystack children are made for. No more than we do why the mermaids were made or the man in the moon. Perhaps they are made a purpose for curiosities, and nothing but Providence could make anything more so, unless Mr. Barnum should try. Human nature never come down up in so queer a wrapper before. They say they are distended from the haystacks long ago gone to grass. And Isaac, said she, turning to Ike who was teasing one of them with a stick. Isaac, look upon him, and pray you may never be born so. The people had gathered around and were listening to the words as they fell, like the notes of a hand organ from her lips. And when she ceased they turned with renewed eagerness to inspect the objects that her remarks had rendered classic. The mystery of the brazen nose, or the maiden's revenge. Chapter 1 The Hero of the Story Night closed around the field at Agincourt. Sir Hilda brand heli to split, who had been watching its approach for an hour from a neighbouring hill with a spy-glass, turned his horse's head towards his quarters. With a sad heart, for the day had been destructive to horse-flesh, and thousands of the French and Norman chivalry bit the mud, not dust, of Agincourt. He sought his tent. His brow was dark and gloomy, as could be plainly seen through his iron helmet, and an unevenness of gait as he strode along betrayed great agitation of the nervous system. Walter D'Corsi stubs, said he hoarsely to his squire in attendance, hang up my horse, and give my cask some oats and water, and hark he disturbed me not until the Connecticut wooden horror-log in the vestibule strikeeth the hour of seving, now away. Sir Hilda brand heli to split, slowly divested himself of his armour, which clanged upon the stillness of the night like a tin kitchen. And then taking a match from his vest pocket, he lighteth a three-cent regalia, and puffed away at it in moody silence. He stretched himself upon three chairs, with a bundle of old newspapers under his head, and dropped asleep, and then caught a nap. But his sleep was troubled. Anon he started and shouted, Say Dennis for France, give him fits! Again a clammy sweat covered his brow, and he muttered, Ha! Thrice today hath the brazen nose leamed upon me in the battlefield. Down, old copperhead, down! But soon his slumbers grew calm, and not a sound disturbed the silence, save the man at arms who sat wetting his jackknife on a brick in the entry, and indulging in whistling some old familiar psalm tunes, as if his mind were elsewhere, for that man at arms had a heart he had. Chapter 2 The Brazen Nose It was midnight, within about ten minutes, and Sir Hilda brand heli to split still slept. At this moment a slight noise was heard at the door, and bearing in his hand a tin lantern a night of gigantic size, some five feet six in height, in complete armor, strode into the tent. He gazed intently upon the sleeper, and then in a suppressed voice of great anguish sighed out, Ah! Oh! Um! And sank into a seat, like a cooking stove. His face could not be seen, but there was a dignity about the strange night that be tokened a gentile bringing up, which had won the respect of the man at arms, who had been bribed by a ninepence to admit him to the tent on the plea of special business. His armor was of complete black, with no distinguishing mark, save a huge nose of brass. Born upon the cask, which gleamed in the light of the lantern like a quart pot. Taking a pencil from one pocket and a card from another, he wrote a few hurried lines. When, whispering to the man at arms for an envelope and a wafer, he sealed the missive, and deposited it by the side of the sleeping Sir Hilda brand, saying to the admiring attendant, No trouble, sirib, about mailing letters here. We can mail them with our own mailed hands, eh? It were better he had not uttered this for the man who hoped for further largesse laughed loudly at the pleasantry. The light in the lantern disappeared, as Sir Hilda brand helly displayed awoke, and starting upon his elbow he cried aloud, What ho! without there? What in thunder's all that noise about? The men at arms and squires came rushing in, rubbing their eyes. None had heard the noise, and at the suggestion of Walter to course he stubs that he had been awakened by his own snoring, Sir Hilda brand turned over, and went to sleep again. Keep shady was the parting word of the stranger night, as he placed a quarter in the hand of Walter, and strode forth from the tent. Mystery crowned the hour. Chapter 3 The Game Is Up Scarcely had the wooden clock done striking the hour of seven the next morning, when Walter did course he stubs, stood by his master's side to awaken him from his slumbers, which he accomplished by pulling one of the chairs from beneath him. Sir Hilda brand helly to split wiped his eyes with his hand, and combed his hair with his fingers. And then, as was his want, commenced pummeling his attendant by way of gentle exercise, after which he proceeded to dress himself in a panoply of war, stooping to pick up one of the stove-pipes that encased his legs. Sir Hilda brand aspired the letter, left by the stranger, lying upon the ground. He gazed upon the writing, and a mortal paleness covered his face. His limbs trembled in every joint and ribbit and his teeth, which were not metallic, shook like a set of props, he read. Perfidious wretch, your hour is come. Meet me tomorrow, outside the English lines, and I'll give you Jesse. Yours, respectively, nosy. Sir Hilda brand helly to split drank his coffee in silence, after which, arming himself with two spears, a battle ax, a sword, mace, and shield. Besides filling his belt with boy knives, revolvers, and slung shot, he walked forth into the fields in the rear of the English camp, where he soon discovered the night of the brazen nose, sitting on a rock reading a newspaper, who sprang to his feet and pulled out his sword. The contest was speedily begun and quicker ended, for Sir Hilda brand had too many irons in the fire and he couldn't come in well. One blow from the powerful arm of him of the nose, and the head of Sir Hilda brand helly to split, like an iron pot, rolled at the feet of the victor. Uttering a fearful cry of agony at this consummation, the strange knight tore off his helmet, revealing beneath, a head of hair like a pound of flax, the fair but hard countenance of Judy O'Brien, the washerwoman. Gentlemen, said she, he was a perjured man, and I have avenged myself upon him. He owed me a bill for washing, but alas, in wiping out that score, I flummoxed myself. Tell this to my country women, never seek for vengeance, tis better to forgive a little, if they lose a shilling on the pound. Farewell, saying which she disappeared up a tall tree, that was nearby, and they never saw her more. Coroner de Smythe, under the circumstances, did not think it advisable to summon a jury, and informed Sir Hilda brand's friends by telegraph, that they had better come on and look after his effects, as he wasn't exactly in a condition to do it for himself. A Flemish Jew, Watson Hilda brand held it to split's wardrobe, after a few keepsakes had been taken by friends for about the price of an old iron. Going to California, dear me, exclaimed Mrs. Partington sorrowfully, how much a man will bear, and how far he will go to get this soldered dross, as Parson Martin called it, when he refused the beggar a sixpence. For fear it might lead him into extravagance. Everybody is going to California, and Chagrin utter gold. Cousin Jones and the three Smiths have gone, and Mr. Chip the Carpenter has left his wife and seven children, and a blessed old mother-in-law to seek his fortune, too. This is the strangest yet, and I don't see how he could have done it. It looks so ungrateful to treat heaven's blessings so lightly. But there we are told that the love of money is the root of all evil, and how true it is. For they are now rooting Arthur it, like pigs, Arthur groundnuts. Why, it is a perfect money-media among everybody. And she shook her head doubtingly, as she pensively watched a small mug of cider with an apple in it simmering by the winter fire. She was somewhat fond of drink made in this way. A tough customer. Will you help me to a piece of chicken? asked Miss Sarafina of Old Roger on Thanksgiving Day. The old man was engaged, elbow deep in the intricate task of carving. The perspiration stood upon his brow, from his exertions truly herculean efforts in dissecting a large fowl. Chicken! muttered he. Do you call this a chicken? Why, it has been the father of thousands, Miss. He hadn't a very thankful spirit that day, and the older boarders with bad teeth joined with him in questioning the propriety of being thankful. Old Roger's boarding house, having failed, and the furniture being taken to be sold on mean process, as he called it, he asked one of the chamber-mates, who always had been saucy to him, if she was to be sold with the rest of the furniture. She answered him, no, as sharp as vinegar. Oh! said he coolly, mutting up his coat. I supposed you were, for the advertisement reads that the house is to be sold with all the impertnances there to be longing. He very cruelly laughed at the indignant look she gave him, and stepped out. Funeral Obstacles How solemn these funeral obstacles is, said Mrs. Pardington, as she looked down from an upper chamber window on the day of a mock funeral of one of the presidents. She took off respects to wipe the moisture from their discs, tapped her box mournfully to the measured time of the distant drum, and looked anxiously down the street to catch the first glimpse of the funeral train. Here it comes at last, quotes she, with the soldiers all playing with muzzle-drums and their flags flying at half-mast. Is that the catastrophe? whispered she to a gentleman near her. That is a catafalque, madam, replied he. Well, well, said she no matter. I know there was a cat about it, and I didn't know, but it might be a catapalasm. Will you tell me when the artillery flies over, that come on here to tend the funeral? Good gracious, madam, cried he testily. They don't fly? They are artillery men on horseback merely. Dear me, replied she, I thought it was one of the wings of the army and flew. How easy it is to get mistaken. She pensively gazed upon the pageant that slowly passed before her. What a pity it is, said she, that we don't valley people till utter they are dead. But then what paragories we pour on them? She here paused. A silence pervaded the chamber. The procession had passed, the company had departed, and two hours after the old lady was found still sitting by the open window, fast asleep. So powerful is grief. Excellent advice. Never get in debt, Isaac, said Mrs. Partington, as she raised her teaspoon with an irrocular air, and held it thus, as if from it were suspended the threads of a fine argument on economy, discernible to her eye alone. And she was watching an opportunity to make it tangible. Never get in debt, no matter whether you are creditable or not. It is better to live on a crust of bread and water, and a herring or two, than cows and oxen cut up into rump steaks and owe for it. Think of our neighbor. What a failing he had, and had all his goods and impertenences took away on a mean procession and sold, and his poor wife reduced to a calico gown, starvation, and shushan tea. And he in California. Some tea, please, said Ike, as he handed over his tin dipper. The tea, like her own reflections, trickled out musically, and she passed along the caution with the cream and sugar. Never to get in debt. Timely Reflection Dear me, exclaimed Mrs. Partington, and her hands were raised above a basket of potatoes in a provision store, as if she were asking a blessing upon it. It was in response to the shopkeeper, who had told her in sepulchral tones, that the potatoes were all rotting. Oh, dear me, said she, if the potatoes is all rotting, what on earth will poor people do for bread? What will the poor Patagonians do that don't eat nothing else, and flowers very high too? They tell us every now and then of an improvement in the market, but flowers always just as dear after it, and we have to pay full as much for half a dollar's worth. It takes almost a remissness of California gold every week to get along nowadays. Heaven helped the poor. What a heartiness there was in that simple prayer. The provision-dealer was affected. He dropped the long red he had been holding pensively into the basket again, and wiped his eyes on the sleeve of his white frock. That stern man, who had unrelentingly cut up tons of beef, nor shed one tear over the struggles of expiring lamkins, showing no quarter, while quartering them, that stern man wiped his eyes on his frock sleeve and murmured, Yes, him. It was touching. Everything was sixteen ounces to the pound with him for that day. Preparing to see the President Mother wants to know, if you'll lend her a little Merlases to start a cap, to go and see the President, said a little girl, coming into Mrs. Fardington's kitchen, bearing in her hand a tin cup. Certainly, dear, said the good dame pleasantly. She never thought of the unreasonable-ness of the request. She never dreamed of guile. The treacle depository was brought out, the golden liquid filled the tin receptacle, and the child departed. Well, said the old lady, everybody's going to see the President. But what is a President, or a King, or a Justice of the Peace? But a man, after all, with flesh and blood and bones and hair, like any of us. And thousands will come further to see him than they would to see St. Paul, or Hebrews, or Revelations, or any of them. Sitch man worship. Sitch man worship. The President's coming, Aunt, said Ike, bursting in, and he's going by our door. And the little fellow was half-crazy with delight, and threw his cap in a pan of milk upon the table in his enthusiasm. How do I look, Isaac? said the dame with animation. Is my hair combed? And my handkerchief digested right on my neck and my capboarder even? And she took her place by the window, when these questions were answered, as eager as any one to see the President. And Ike stepped out. But her eyes were strangely dim, and those hitherto faithful specs gave indications now of failing her. She took them off to wipe them, and both glasses were gone. An hour before, Ike had borrowed them for a telescopic experiment. But it didn't make any odds, for the procession had turned down another street, and didn't go by her door at all. A church incident. The bell had told for some minutes, after the time of meeting, and some signs of impatience were manifest. A stranger, touching the occupant of a pew in front of him, asked, Is your preacher often as late as this? Oh, yes, sir, replied the interrogated. It often happens that he don't get here till the sermon is half-thru. The stranger looked at him intently a little while, and then made a memorandum of this fact in his notebook. A dry-good lesson. Have you any stout, dark marines? said Mrs. Partington to the shopkeeper. He was one of those good-humored young men whose hair nicely curled the tokens and elegant taste, and he stood swaying back and forth, leaning on his yardstick, and smiled amiably as the old lady spoke. Have you any dark marines, suitable for thick ladies outside undergarments? We have dark marines, ma'am, replied he, and cast his eyes towards a brother-clerk and winked arcsly. She gazed upon him a moment before she spoke again. Well, well, young man, it was only a slip of the tongue, and if you never make a greater slip in measuring cloth, you will be much more honest than many clerks I know. The clerk colored and stammered out an apology, but it was needless. There was no unkindness in her looks. The spectacles bent their bows upon him steadily from the cavernous gloom of the big bonnet, but his perturbed fancy alone made them terrible. She made the purchase, she intended, and in measure it proved full half a quarter over what she had bargained for. A glance at poverty. It must be very inconvenient to be poor, said Mrs. Partington, as she glanced with honest pride at her high-back chairs and old-fashioned chest of drawers, and continued her eye onto the open cupboard in the corner. How people can contrive to get along with so little I don't see. There is our poor neighbor down the yard now so pinched for room that she has to have a bed in the very room where she sleeps. Kind old lady, her benevolence walked ahead of her grammar, but a trifling error in speech is as pardonable in Mrs. Partington as in Henry Clay. SLANDERERS If there is anybody under the canister of heaven that I have in utter excrescence, said Mrs. Partington, it is a tale-bearer and slanderer, going about like a vile boa constructor, circulating his calamel about honest folks. I always know one by his fizz mahogany. It seems as if Belzebub had stamped him with his private signal. And everything he looks at appears to turn yaller. And having uttered this somewhat elaborate speech, she was seized with a fit of coughing and took some demulsant drops. A Stormy Season Cease, rude bolus, blustering Raylor, said Mrs. Partington, as she reached out into the storm to secure a refactory shutter, and the wind rushed in and extinguished her light and slammed to the door and fanned the fire and the grate, and rustled the calico flounce upon the quilt and peeped into the closet and under the bed, and contemptuously shook Mrs. Partington's night-jacket as it hung airing on the chair by the fire and flirted with her cap-border. As she looked out upon the night, it was a saucy gust. How it blows, said she, as she shut down the window. I hope heaven will keep the poor sailors safe that go down on the sea in vessels. This must be the obnoxious storm, continued she, when the sun crosses the Penobscot. She daunt her specks and sat down to consult her almanac. Next to her Bible, in importance, and she found she was right. While the wind howled around the house most ismaly and yelled wildly down the old chimney.