Part 7 (1/2)

Deep antiquarian conundrums; stern geological interests! In grapplin'

with 'em I leaned over the taff-rail of the boat and looked way down into the blue green depths, seekin' a answer. But the s.h.i.+nin' waves on top seemed to glitter mockin'ly and fur down, down in the green waves, there seemed to look back a sort of a pityin' gleam that said to me:

”Poor creeter! pa.s.s on with your little vague theories and conjectures; you don't know any more about me than the rest on 'em do, who have tried to write about me.” I felt kinder took back and queer.

So vain are we that we don't like to have our carefully constructed theories overthrown. But even as I mused, a voice said to the right of me--a woman talkin' to her little boy:

”The Lost Channel was named from the fact that durin' a war a large body of troops got lost here in the channel in the late autumn and could not find their way out, and was overtaken by the bitter cold and perished here.”

Well, mebby if is so, I d'no. But I wuzn't knowin' to it myself, nor Josiah wuzn't. Well, onheedin' our facts or fancies, the river bore us onwards on its breast. Past high green boulders risin' up from the water with nothin' on 'em, not even a tree; jest gray rock lookin'

some like a geni's castle frownin' down onto the intruders into their realm. Then anon a pile of high gray rocks crowned as the Sammist sez ”with livin' green.” Then in a minute more a little landlocked bay with placid water sweepin' back into a pretty harbor, tree shaded, and mebby a boat anch.o.r.ed there like a soul at rest, or mebby a sail-boat with two young hearts in it driftin' down the sea of their content, as the tiny waves rippled round their oars. Then a grand big mansion lookin' down onto us kinder superciliously. Then a small, pretty farm house with snug outbuildings, a man lookin' at us from the open barn door, and some children playin' round the doorstep. Then a big island with gra.s.sy sh.o.r.es or wooded depths; then a tiny island, not too big for a child's playhouse, and some that wuz only a bit of rock peekin'

out of the water.

And fur off all the time when we could see it wuz the blue hazy distance full of beauty; ever-changin' glimpses of loveliness, givin'

place to new beauties. Fur off, fur off sometimes we could see distant pinnacles and towers, all bathed in the blue s.h.i.+nin' mist. And as the rapt eyes of our Fancy gazed on 'em, they might have been the towers of the New Jerusalem, the Golden city, so dreamlike, so inexpressibly lovely did they seem faintly photographed aginst the soft blue distant heavens.

But cold Reality said in her chillin' practical whisper, ”It's nothin'

but Gananoque or Clayton,” and she went on, ”They hain't anything like the New Jerusalem, either of them.”

Alas for us poor mortals! who drive or are driv by the two contendin'

coharts of Imagination, Idealized Fancy and practical Reality. And she always will have the last word, Reality will, and her voice is loud and shrill, and it penetrates into the warm, sweet Indian summer air, where Fancy dwells and where we sometimes visit her for brief intervals. Too brief! too brief! for cold Reality is always hangin'

round; she is always up and dressed ready to put in her note.

I mentioned the metafor to Josiah and he sez, ”Yes, it minds me of the man who was brought up before the judge by his wife. She complained he hadn't spoke to her for five years. The judge ast him if that were so, and he said, 'Yes, that's so.' 'But why,' sez the judge, 'why hain't you spoke to your wife for five years?' And the man sez, 'Because I didn't want to interrupt her.'” Josiah declares it is true, but I believe it is jest a slur on wimmen.

But to resoom. Swiftly, silently we sped on with the islands about us, the blue sky overhead and the shadow islands below. And innumerable boats appeared far and near, some with white sails lifted, and followed below by a white shadow sail, and anon a big steamer would glide along, loaded down to its gunwale with crowds of gay pleasure seekers, who would wave their snowy handkerchiefs and salute us, the steamer backin' 'em with its deep grum voice. Or anon we could see a big dark barge sailin' along, and Fancy would whisper to us as we gazed on its mysterious dark sides without a soul in sight:

”It may be the phantom of some old Pirate s.h.i.+p, condemned for its sins to cruise along forever in strange waters, homesick for its native seas.” But Reality spoke right up jest as she always will and said it wuz probable some big lake steamer heavy loaded with grain or some great Canadian boat. And then a new seen of beauty would drift into our vision and take our minds off and carry 'em away some distance. Oh, it is no wonder that Faith's soft eyes grew more tender and luminous.

Josiah felt the beauty of the seen, he felt it deeply, but everybody knows that beauty affects folks differently, it always seems to sharpen up my dear companion's appet.i.te, and three cookies in as many minutes wuz offered up on the shrine of his vivid appreciation, and two nut cakes.

We got back to our hotel, the sun about an hour high. Jest before our bark swep' into the haven, and while Josiah and Faith had crossed over to the opposite side of our bark, I hearn a voice on the off quarter windward, and I turned round and see to my dismay that it wuz Mr.

Pomper. He sez to me in a low voice, while his looks spoke volumes of yellow colored literatoor: ”I wish to speak a few words to you alone, mum. Can you give me the opportunity?”

I looked him full in that eye of hisen, a hauty cold look, a look as much as 40 degrees below freeze, and said nothin' else but jest that look.

”I have somethin' very important to say to you. Can you hear me?”

Words wuz risin' to my tongue that would wither him forever, and end the vile persecutions I wuz undergoin', when before I could speak the gang plank wuz charged back agin Mr. Pomper's foot in a way that made him leap back like a sportive elephant, and for the moment I wuz free.

But as I wended my pensive way up to the hotel, I made up my mind that if he ever approached me agin I would plainly tell him what wuz what, and so end my purturbations of mind; for I felt if it wuz to go on much longer I should lose a pound of flesh, and mebby a pound and a half, in the stiddy wearin' persecution I wuz undergoin'. And that night at dinner as I ketched the light smoulderin' in that lonely orb, as it wuz bent on our table, and the corner in parlor and piazza where we wuz ensconced, I wondered anew what wuz the attractions that kep'

Mr. Pomper so stiddy at my shrine, And I got so that I almost hated the good looks that wuz ondoin' him and me too. And I looked into the gla.s.s dreamily as I wadded up my back hair and did up the front, and pinned my cameo pin onto my rich cotton and wool parmetty, and wondered if it wuzn't my duty to leave off that pin, and change that parmetty for calico, and sort o' frowzle up my hair onbecomingly in order to wean him from me. But alas! my principles did not seem able to git up onto that bite, so weak are we poor mortals after all our aspirin' efforts.

One curious thing I have ever noticed among men (and wimmen too) and that is the ease and facility with which they will slip out of statements and idees they have promulgated, and turn around in their tracts as easy and graceful as a dummy before a show case. Now there wuz a party to be gin to the hotel for a charitable purpose, each man and woman present givin' 25 cents, and then havin' a social time afterwards, and as the object wuz good I sez to my pardner, ”I would like to attend to it.” And he acted fairly skairt and horrow struck at the idee and went on eloquent about old folks at our ages, and with our professions, and our rumatiz, follerin' up gayety and show. Sez he, ”The place for us evenin's is in our own room readin' our Bibles and Tracks.”

And I sez as I calmly wadded up my back hair and smoothed my foretop, ”Well, I spoze I can go alone if you feel so.”

Then another thought seemed to roust him up; Jealousy seemed to strike her sharp p.r.o.ngs into his slender side, and he sez bitterly, ”Yes, goin' down alone into a perfect mawlstrom of men flirtin' and actin'!”

”The mawlstrom won't hurt me,” sez I, ”I hain't goin' nigh it.” But even as I spoke I thought of Mr. Pomper, and sez to myself, Can I help him from comin' nigh me? And as if in answer to my onspoken thoughts my pardner sez: