Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife Part 28

Whose hands made them statutes? I don't know nor Josiah don't and I guess n.o.body duz. There wuz a thoughtful look on Dorothy's sweet face when she came home, and Robert Strong too seemed walkin' in a reverie, but Miss Meechim wuz as pert as ever; it takes more than a cave to dant her.

One place in Bombay I liked first rate, a hospital for dumb animals, it is kep' by a sect called the Jains. Sick animals of all kinds are cared for: horses, cows, dogs, cats, rats and I spoze any ailin'

creeter from a mouse up to a elephant is nursed with tender care.

Sez Josiah, "No matter what her creed is, Samantha, that Jane is a good creeter and is doin' a great work, I would send the old mair here in a minute if she wuz took with consumption or janders or anythin', if it wuzn't so fur, and I'd tell Jane jest how much I thought on her for her goodness."

Sez I, "Josiah, it is a sect, not a female."

But he wouldn't gin in and talks about Jane a sight now when he recalls about the horrers of vivisection or when he sees animals abused and horses driv too hard and overloaded--he always sez:

"I would like to have Jane see that, I guess Jane would put a stop to that pretty lively."

Well, it shows Josiah's good heart.

The Hindus have several temples in Bombay. One of the great days is the Festival of the Serpents. Snake charmers bring to this place the deadly snakes which are then fed to propitiate them, by the priests, I spoze.

Oh, how Miss Meechim went on about the idee of worshippin' snakes, and it wuz perfectly dretful to me too, I must confess. But Arvilly always puttin' her oar in and always hash on our govermunt, sez:

"Why, what is this different from what we do in America?"

Miss Meechim's eyes snapped, she wuz madder than a wet hen, but Arvilly went on, "Every 'lection time hain't the great serpent of the liquor power fed and pampered by the law-makers of our country?"

Miss Meechim didn't reply; I guess she da.s.sent, and I didn't say anything, and Arvilly went on:

"Our serpent worship is as bad agin as these Hindus', for after their snakes are fed and worshipped they shet 'em up agin so they can't do any harm. But after lawmakers propitiate the serpent with money and influence, they let it loose to wreathe round the bright young lives and n.o.ble manhood and crunch and destroy 'em in its deadly folds, leavin' the slime of agony and death in its tracks all over our country from North to South, East to West. It don't look well after all this for an American to act horrified at feedin' a snake a little milk and shettin' it up in a box." She wuz fairly shakin' with indignation, and Miss Meechim dast as well die as dispute her agin.

And I didn't say a word to harrer her up any more, for I knew well what she had went through.

We only stayed a few days in Bombay, and then took the steamer and went straight acrost the Arabian Sea, stopping at Aden for a little while, and then up the Red Sea; on one side on us, Arabia, and on the other, Africa.

Aden, where we stopped for a short time, is a dreary lookin' little place with seventy or eighty thousand natives livin' a little back from the sh.o.r.e, while the few English people there live near the coast. Beautiful ostrich feathers are obtained there from the many ostrich farmers living near, as well as the Mocha coffee, which made over a Jonesville stove by a Jonesville woman has so often cheered the heart and put to flight the worrisome pa.s.sions of a Josiah. But in most of these tropical countries, where you'd think you could git the best, I didn't find coffee half so good as I made it myself, though mebby I ortn't to say it.

We saw some wonderful jugglers here. They will draw out great bunches of natural flowers from most anywhere that you wouldn't expect 'em to be, and call birds down or out of some place onseen by us; mebby they come from the mysterious gardens of a Carabi's home, and those great bunches of roses, I d'no from what invisible rose bushes they wuz picked; mebby they growed up tall and stately on either side of the Ether avenues that surround us on every side. Mebby Carabi lives right under the shade of some on 'em, but 'tennyrate some of these flowers they made out of nothin' I took right into my hands, great, soft, dewy roses, with seemin'ly the same dew and perfume on 'em they have when picked in our earthly gardens. And we saw some wonderful divers there; they did such strange things that it wuz fairly skairful to see 'em.

If you would throw a small coin down into the water, they would dive way down, down with both hands full of b.a.l.l.s and bring up the coin in their teeth, showing that they picked it up offen the bottom without touching their hands to it. Good land! I couldn't do it to save my life in our cistern or wash bowl, let alone the deep, deep sea.

As we entered the Red Sea we pa.s.sed through the narrer channel called The Straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, Gate of Tears, named so on account of the many axidents that have happened there. But we got through safely and sailed on towards Suez.

So we went on past the coasts of Abyssinia, Nubia. Fur off we see Mount Sineii, sacred mount, where the Law wuz given to Moses.

Oh, my soul, think on't! To see the very spot where Moses stood and talked to the Almighty face to face. It is only three hundred milds from Suez.

We sailed directly over the place where the Israelites pa.s.sed over dry shod whilst their enemies, the Egyptians, wuz overwhelmed by the waters. The persecuted triumphant and walkin' a-foot into safety, while Tyranny and Oppression wuz drownded.

I wish them waters wuz swashin' up to-day and closin' in on the Oppressor, not to drownd 'em, mebby, but to give 'em a pretty good duckin'. But I spoze the walls of water like as not is risin' on each side on 'em onbeknown to them, and when the time comes, when the bugle sounds, they will rush in and overwhelm the armies of Greed and Tyranny and the oppressed. Them that are forced to make brick without straw, or without sand hardly, will be free, and go on rejoicin' into the land of Promise.

But to resoom: It is three thousand milds from Bombay to Suez, but it wuz all safely pa.s.sed and we found ourselves in Cairo in a most comfortable hotel, and felt after all our wanderings in fur off lands that we agin breathed the air of civilization almost equal to Jonesville.

We found some letters here from home. I had a letter from Tirzah Ann and one from Thomas Jefferson. His letter wuz full of grat.i.tude to heaven and his ma for his dear little boy's restored strength and health. He and Maggie wuz lookin' and waitin' with eager hearts and open arms to greet us, and the time wuz long to 'em I could see, though he didn't say so.

Tirzah Ann's letter contained strange news of our neighbor, Miss Deacon Sypher. Her devotion to her husband has been told by me more formally, it is worthy the pen of poet and historian. She lived and breathed in the Deacon, marked all her clothes, M. D. S., Miss Deacon Sypher. Her hull atmosphere wuz Deacon, her goal wuz his happiness, her heaven his presence.

Well, a year ago she got hurt on the sidewalk to Jonesville, and the Deacon sued the village and got five hundred dollars for her broken leg. He took the money and went out to the Ohio on a pleasure trip, and to visit some old neighbors. It made talk, for folks said that when she worshipped him so he ort to stayed by her, but he hired she that wuz Betsy Bobbett to stay with her, and he went off on this pleasure trip and had a splendid good time, and with the rest of the money he bought a span of mules. Miss Sypher wuz deadly afraid of 'em.

But the Deacon wanted 'em, and so they made her happily agonized, she wuz so afraid of their heels and their brays, and so highly tickled with the Deacon's joy. Well, it turned out queer as a dog, but just after we started on our trip abroad Tirzah said that the Deacon fell and broke his leg in the same place and the same spot on the sidewalk; the Jonesvillians are slack, it wuzn't mended proper. And Miss Sypher thought that she would git some money jest as he did. She didn't think on't for quite a spell, Tirzah writ. She wuz so bound up in the Deacon and never left his side night or day, nor took off her clothes only to wash 'em for two weeks, jest bent over his couch and drowged round waitin' on him, for he wuz dretful notional and hard to git along with. But she loved to be jawed at, dearly, for she said it made her think he would git along, and when he would find fault with her and throw things, she smiled gladly, thinkin' it wuz a good sign.

Well, when he got a little better so she could lay down herself and rest a little, the thought come to her that she would git some money for his broken leg jest as he had for hern. She thought that she would like to buy him a suit of very nice clothes and a gold chain, and build a mule barn for the mules, but the law wouldn't give Miss Deacon Sypher a cent; the law said that if anything wuz gin it would go to the Deacon's next of kin, a brother who lived way off in the Michigan.

The Deacon owned her bones, but she didn't own the Deacon's!

And I wonnered at it as much as Tommy ever wonnered over anything why her broken limb, and all the emoluments from it, belonged to him, and his broken leg and the proprietary rights in it belonged to a man way out in the Michigan that he hadn't seen for ten years and didn't speke to (owin' to trouble about property), and after Miss Deacon Sypher had worshipped him and waited on him for thirty years like a happy surf.

Well, so it wuz. I said it seemed queer, but Arvilly said that it wuzn't queer at all. She sez: "One of my letters from home to-day had a worse case in it than that." Sez she, "You remember Willie Henzy, Deacon Henzy's grandchild, in Brooklyn. You know how he got run over and killed by a trolley car."

"Yes," sez I, "sweet little creeter; Sister Henzy told me about it with the tears runnin' down her cheeks. They all worshipped that child, he wuz jest as pretty and bright as he could be, and he wuz the only boy amongst all the grandchildren; it is a blow Deacon Henzy will never git over. And his ma went into one faintin' fit after another when he wuz brought home, and will never be a well woman agin, and his pa's hair in three months grew gray as a rat; it 'most killed all on 'em."

"Well," sez Arvilly, "what verdict do you think that fool brought in?"

"What fool?" sez I.

"The law!" sez Arvilly sternly. "The judge brought in a verdict of one dollar damages; it said that children wuzn't wage-earners and therefore they wuzn't worth any more."

I throwed my arms 'round Tommy onbeknown to me, and sez I, "Millions and millions of money wouldn't pay your grandma for you." And Tommy wonnered and wonnered that a little boy's life wuzn't worth more than a dollar.

"Why," sez I, "the law gives twenty dollars for a two-year-old heifer."

"Yes," sez Arvilly, "the law don't reckon Willie Henzy's life worth so much as a yearlin' calf or a dog. But they can do jest as they please; these great monopolies have spun their golden web round politicians and office-seekers and office-holders and rule the whole country. They can set their own valuation on life and limb, and every dollar they can save in bruised flesh and death and agony, is one more dollar to divide amongst the stockholders."

"Well," sez I, "we mustn't forgit to be megum, Arvilly; we mustn't forgit in our indignation all the good they do carryin' folks from hether to yon for almost nothin'."

"Well, they no need to act more heartless than Nero or King Herod. I don't believe that old Nero himself would done this; I believe he would gin two dollars for Willie Henzy."

And I sez, "I never neighbored with Mr. Nero. But if I could git holt of that judge," sez I, "he would remember it to his dyin' day."

"He wouldn't care for what you said," sez Arvilly; "he got his pay.

There hain't any of these big monopolies got any more soul than a stun-boat."

It is only nine hours from Suez to Cairo. How often have I spoke of the great desert of Sarah in hours of Jonesville mirth and sadness, little thinkin' that I should ever cross it in this mortal spear, but we did pa.s.s through a corner on't and had a good view of the Suez Ca.n.a.l, about which so much has been said and done. For milds we went through the Valley of the Nile, that great wet nurse of Egypt. The banks on either side on't stand dressed in livin' green. There wuz a good many American and English people at the tarven in Cairo, but no one we knew. In the garden at the side of the tarven wuz a ostrich pen where a number of great ostriches wuz kep', and also several pelicans walked round in another part of the garden.

Tommy and I stood by the winder, very much interested in watchin' the ostriches, and though I hain't covetous or proud, yet I did wish I had one or two of them satiny, curly feathers to trim my best bunnet in Jonesville, they went so fur ahead of any sisters in the meetin'

house.

Josiah hadn't see 'em yet; he wuz layin' on the lounge, but he sez: "I don't see why you're so took up with them geese."

"Geese!" sez I; "look here, Josiah Allen"--and I took a cookie I had got for Tommy--"see here; see me feed these geese ten feet from the ground." He could see their heads come up to take it out of my hand.

"Good land!" sez he, "you don't say they stretch their necks clear up here." And he jined in our astonishment then and proposed that he should be let down from the winder in a sheet and git me a few feathers. But I rejected the idee to once. I sez: "I'd ruther go featherless for life than to have a pardner commit rapine for 'em."

And he sez: "If some Egyptian come to Jonesville and wanted a rooster's tail feather, we wouldn't say nuthin' aginst it."

But I sez: "This is different; this would spile the looks of the ostriches."