The Gentleman from Everywhere Part 8

"Now, by the departure of our friend to look after his business, the doctor and the professor were thrown upon their own resources for enjoyment. After shooting at the wild pigs for a while, finding there was great danger of their being melted down into their boots, they threw off their clothes, and regardless of moccasins, regardless of spiders and the whole race of poisonous vermin, they plunged to their necks into the ditch by the roadside. For long weary hours we wallowed till the welcome form of our host appeared, and we recommenced the pitching and stumbling of the dangerous return voyage of this, our pleasure trip.

"For miles the tall, slender pine and cypress-trees festooned with moss and enormous Scuppernong grape-vines, were unbroken by a single clearing or a single shanty. The Scuppernong grapes, by the way, are a great luxury; from these are made a wine equal to anything that can be found (we believe) in the world. One vine is found on Roanoke Island, which is two miles in length, covers several acres of land, and was planted by Sir Walter Raleigh's expedition, centuries ago. For miles that afternoon, we wandered up and down the country seeking for water fit to drink and finding none; looking at the droves of rollicking darkies, making collections of souvenirs, gazing at the good-looking crops of corn, cotton, sweet potatoes, and still fighting the aborigines, the flies.

"We have seen some toothsome things in the South, some beautiful scenes, but at this season of the year, at least, the flies and mosquitoes ruined all as thoroughly as the harpies of olden times defiled the feast of the wandering Trojans.

"The great gala-day of Jamesville has dawned, to-day the great Norfolk steamer honors the town with its presence; everybody (and some more) comes down to the wharf to see the wonderful sight. Here are groups of 'F.F.'s' puffing their long pipes and talking the everlasting 'd--n n.i.g.g.e.r'; there are crowds of 'fifteenth amendments' laughing and frolicking like children, and here, too, the flea-bitten, mosquito-stabbed, black-fly tortured Doctor B. and Professor F., looking northward as the pilgrim to his loved and far-off Mecca. A scream, a hurrah, a waving of handkerchiefs, and away we go out of the howling wilderness, all that is left of us, and but little indeed that is.

"The _Astoria_, is but a wretched tub, and we crawl along at the rate of four or five miles per hour, halting here and there to avoid the wrecks of the war, panting for breath, longing, 'as the heart panteth for the water-brook,' to see once more the sh.o.r.es of our beloved New England. Never will this excruciating sail be forgotten. All day--all night, for long, long, weary hours, the wretched little steamer groaned and screamed its melancholy way over the yellow, nasty Roanoke.

"Hour after hour we sat gazing at the tall cypress-trees and the long trailing mosses, looking like the pale sickly shrouds enveloping a dead and ruined world. Here and there we saw huge nests of the size and shape of a barrel, and near, on the ruined branch of a lightning-struck tree, perched on its topmost bough, the great bald eagle of the South, keeping his sleepless watch and ward, while the wife-bird tended the household G.o.ds below. Deadly moccasins and huge turtles lay listless in the sun, and hundreds of bushels of blackberries were wasting their sweetness on the desert air. Now and then there came to us like an inspiration from heaven the ecstatic music of the mockingbird, carrying shame and despair to the b.r.e.a.s.t.s of all the other warblers of the aerial choir.

"Nothing could be more inspiring than the notes of this charming singer, as we listened to them here amid these melancholy swamps exhaling the sickly miasma beneath this blighting sun, with not a breath of air to lift the blood red banners of the trumpet creepers, or to cool the fevered brow. Melancholy waitings are heard from the swamps, and the waves in parting, look like fields of fire. The winds come to us, but with them no refreshing, for they came over mile after mile of suffocating, reeking lagoons, stifling with the hot breath of the miasma.

"Every now and then the Rip Van Winkle machinery breaks down, and for hours we are motionless, listening per force to the terrific cursing and pounding in the Vulcanic realms below. At length the sun, not like the rosy-fingered Aurora, daughter of the dawn, but like a huge red monster intent on devouring the world, shoots at us his blighting, withering lances of scorching heat. We touch once more at Plymouth, which greets us with its usual entertainment of murderous fleas, death-dealing watermelons and chain-lightning whiskey. Our ten minute touch here lengthened into three horrid sweltering hours owing to the fact, that the intelligent contrabands were paid by the hour for 'toting' the cargo; but off we are at last, thank heaven, and at length we enter the great ca.n.a.l leading to the North River of Norfolk.

"With chat and jest we were worrying away the leaden-winged hours, when suddenly thug, splash, and like a huge turtle we were floundering in the mud. 'No moving,' said the captain, 'till the tide comes up;'

and so for three mortal hours we lay stuck in the mud at the edge of the great dismal swamp of Virginia. 'Ah,' said the mate, 'there is the scene of many a horror, there the n.i.g.g.e.r was torn limb from limb by the bloodhounds, there the runaway slave chose to endure starvation and death amid deadly snakes and miasma rather than comfort in bondage; there I myself saw crowds of black men swinging from limb to limb like monkeys over reeking sc.u.ms to their fever-haunted dens to escape the lash.'

"Thus was the story of Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe verified by one of Virginia's own sons. All the fearful word paintings of Dred floated again before our mental vision, and we thanked G.o.d that the old horror of slavery is pa.s.sed, and that the old flag now floats indeed 'o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.'

"But these hours of waiting, like all things earthly, at length had their end, and just as the moon gilded the cypress-trees with golden glory, the wheels began to move and we again worried our tortuous way up the North River. 'Ah,' said the melancholy-looking man who had been long gazing in silence at the sad waves below, 'alas, here I am, friendless and alone in this wretched country, peddling beeswax and eggs for hog and hominy, chills and fever; but I was once a schoolmaster with $1,200 a year, down in Connecticut; wine and women did it. But,' said he, 'I'll be rich yet--I've got it--I've discovered perpetual motion, and the world will honor me yet.'

"'Wish you would apply it to this old tub at once,' said the professor; and the forlorn peddler went his way to cherish visions of coming glory. Just then we were electrified by a cheer from the doctor, as the lights of Norfolk flashed over this splendid harbor, yet to float the commerce of a great city.

"We bade farewell without a single regret to the old tub _Astoria_, and entered the narrow streets, reeking with the horrors of a thousand and one stenches, stumbling over the prostrate forms of sleeping negroes to the hotel, where we indulged once more in the luxury of a bath, which the nasty water of North Carolina had forbidden for many weary days. Suddenly the city was aroused by the roll of drums and the shouts of hundreds, calling to a ma.s.s meeting in Court House Square.

Thither we followed the crowd, listening for awhile to the blatant Southern orators roaring about the future greatness of the 'Mother of Presidents,' deploring the reign of carpet-baggers and calling for a white man's government amidst the shouts of the great unwashed; while the sons of Ham looked silently and sullenly on.

"We gladly responded to the steamer's shrill call and sailed away to our home in the great and glorious North."

CHAPTER XI.

IN ARCADIE.

I gladly returned, like a tired child, to the kindly faces and hearty greetings of my loving and much loved father, mother, brothers, green fields, and all the beautiful children of summer.

"Born where the night owl hooted to the stars, Cradled where sunshine crept through leafy bars; Reared where wild roses bloomed most fair, And songs of meadow larks made glad the summer air,

"Each dainty zephyr whispers follow me, Ten thousand leaflets beckon from each tree; All say, 'why give a life to longings vain?

Leave fame and gold: come home: come home again.'

"I hear the forest murmuring 'he has come'

A feathered chorus' joyous welcome home; Each flower that nods a greeting seems a part Of nature's welcome back to nature's heart."

The old home was much changed, and for the better. With much patient toil, the unsightly rocks and stumps had been removed from the fields which sloped gracefully to the little river and were covered with tall, waving, luxuriant gra.s.ses, starred with b.u.t.tercups, clover, and daisies. The dilapidated house and barn had given place to modern buildings; apple, pear, and peach-trees, covered with fragrant blossoms were subst.i.tuted for their decayed and skeleton prototypes; the narrow, crooked, muddy lane, where horses and wagons had struggled through the knee-deep, and often hub-deep sticky clay, had become a firm and fairly straight highway.

My house in the tree on the hilltop, where I had often rehea.r.s.ed my orations and sermons in such stentorian tones that the amazed cows lifted their tails on high and took to their heels, welcomed me back embowered in leafy new-grown branches.

My second brother, realizing that as "unto the bow the cord is, as unto the child the mother, so unto man the woman is--useless one without the other," had taken unto himself a good wife, the daughter of the deacon, our next neighbor. My mother thus had a much needed helper, as their farms, like their owners, were joined in wedlock.

[Ill.u.s.tration: I Rehea.r.s.ed My Orations with Startling Effect.]

The worthy deacon and my deeply religious father alternately led the family devotions, and peace and comfort prevailed. The mowing machine, horse-hoe, corn-planter and power-rake dispensed with the drudgery of the scythe and back-breaking hand tools. A protective tariff had set the mill wheels rolling in the neighboring cities, thus furnishing excellent markets for all the products of the farm. The sky-sc.r.a.ping shoe manufactories, where men, like automatons, delved night and day for a few weeks and then leaving them to semi-starvation for the rest of the year, had not yet arrived.

One of my brothers had, like most of the farmers of that day, his little shop where in winter he coined a few hundred dollars making boots and shoes, and where I earned many precious pennies, blackballing the edges and occasionally pegging by hand, all of which is now done by machinery.

We could now afford occasional holidays, when we all gaily sailed down the river, dug clams, caught lobsters in nets, regaled ourselves with toothsome chowders, broils and stews in the open air, and had many rollicking good times swimming in the breakers, frolicking, old and young, like children. We pitched our tents on old Bar Island, slept on the fragrant hay at night, played ball, and renewed our youth inhaling deep draughts of the salty wind which bloweth in from the sea.

When sailing home one day with a wet sheet, a flowing main, and a breeze following far abaft, we espied a boat submerged to the gunwhale floating out to sea. Throwing our yacht up into the wind, we took the craft in tow to the landing, and were surprised and delighted beyond measure to find it nearly half full of fine large lobsters, held there by a wire netting. For weeks we and all the neighbors held high carnival boiling and eating the luscious crustaceans.

We had much merriment one day on a fishing excursion at the expense of a parsimonious member of our crew. At first he alone pulled in the much prized tomcods and flounders. "Well," said he, "I think we better go in, each one for himself." "All right," was the reply, but soon stingy ceased to catch any, while the rest of us pulled in the fish as fast as we could throw the hooks. Mr. Greedy looked very solemn, and at last, unable to repress his selfishness longer, shouted: "I think we better share all alike!" "Too late," was the chorus, and while he carried home but a beggarly string, the rest rejoiced in our great abundance.

These seem like little incidents, light as airy nothings, but they come back to memory in the twilight of life when other and greater events are all forgotten.

When the crops were all harvested, and the winds and snows of winter shut me out from my woodland, river, and seash.o.r.e haunts, I grew weary of the monotony of the indoor country life, and once more went to the city of Boston in the endless quest of the unattainable.

Restless as the sea, we are never satisfied this side the stars; but we are all looking forward to that sweet by and by, "as the hart panteth for the water brook."

I shall be satisfied, not here, not here Not where the sparkling waters fade into mocking sands as we draw near, Where in the wilderness each footstep falters, I shall be satisfied; but, oh, not here.

Not here, where every dream of bliss deceives us, Where the worn spirit never finds its goal, But haunted ever by thoughts that grieve us, Across our souls floods of bitter memories roll.

Satisfied, satisfied, the soul's vague longing, The aching void, which nothing earthly fills, Oh, what desires upon my mind are thronging, As my eyes turn upward to the heavenly hills!

Shall they be satisfied, the spirit's yearning, For sweet communion with kindred minds?

The silent love that here meets no returning, The inspiration, which no language finds?

There is a land, where every pulse is thrilling, With rapture, earth's sojourners may not know, Where heaven's repose the weary heart is stilling, And peacefully earth's storm-tossed currents flow.

Far out of sight, while yet the flesh enfolds us, Lies that fair country, where our hearts abide, And, of its bliss, naught more wondrous is told us, Than these few words, I shall be satisfied.

CHAPTER XII.

FROM PHILISTINE TO BENEDICT AND A HONEYMOON.

The fates, who lead the willing-and drive the unwilling, guided me to the old time firm of B. & T. publishers. They were overwhelmed with applications from the great army of the impecunious, and did not wish to pay any more salaries; but "mercy tempers the blast to the shorn lamb," and they persuaded me, by a tender of large profits on their Worcester's Dictionaries, to strike out on my own hook and endeavor to induce a reluctant public to buy these instead of the popular dictionaries written by "Noah Webster who came over in the ark."

The special prices granted by the publishers enabled me to undersell the wholesalers, and by securing their adoption as regular text-books by school boards, I made more money than ever before in my life, sometimes from $25 to $100 per day, consequently the firm finding I was filling the markets and my own pockets so that they had no sales at regular prices, hired me at a liberal salary as representative of all their publications.

In this business I won my "double stars," although the compet.i.tion was intense. I often found as many as twenty agents at the same time and in the same town, log-rolling with school committees for the adoption of their books, the merits of the publications "cut but little ice."

Nearly every school official "had his price," wanting to know what there was in his vote for him, and the agent who best concealed the bribery hook by dining and wining teachers and committeemen, filling their libraries with complimentary books and their pockets with secret commissions, "caught the most fish."