Part 8 (1/2)

”All things are possible with G.o.d, and you must wait and hope.”

But she says, ”What will hope do for me when my boy is lost? I want to save him now.”

It did beat all, as I told Josiah, out to one side, to see such hefty principles and emotions in such a little body. Why, she didn't weigh much over 90, if she did any.

And Josiah whispered back, ”All women hain't like Cicely.”

And I says in the same low, deep tones, ”All men hain't like George Was.h.i.+ngton! Now get me a pail of water.”

And he went out. But it did beat all, how that little thing, when she stood ready, seemin'ly, to tackle the nation-I've seen her jump up in a chair, afraid of a mice. The idee of anybody bein' afraid of a mice, and ready to tackle the Const.i.tution!

And she'd blush up red as a rosy if a stranger would speak to her. But she would fight the hull nation for her boy.

And I'd try to sooth her (for that red spot on her cheeks skairt me, and I foreboded about her). I said to her after Josiah went out, a holdin' her little hot hands in mine,-for sometimes her hands would be hot and feverish, and then, agin, like two snowflakes,-

”Cicely, women's voting on intemperance would, as your uncle Josiah says, be a experiment. I candidly think and believe that it would be a good thing,-a blessin' to the youth of the land, a comfort to the females, and no harm to the males. But, after all, we don't know what it would do”-

”I know” says she. And her eyes had such a far-off, prophetic look in 'em, that I declare for't, if I didn't almost think she did know. I says to myself,-

”She's so sweet and unselfish and good, that I believe she's more than half-ways into heaven now. The Holy Scriptures, that I believe in, says, 'Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see G.o.d.' And it don't say where they shall see Him, or when. And it don't say that the light that fell from on high upon the blessed mother of our Lord, shall never fall again on other heart-broken mothers, on other pure souls beloved of Him.”

And it is the honest truth, that it would not have surprised me much sometimes, as she wus settin' in the twilight with the boy in her arms, if I had seen a halo round her head; and so I told Josiah one night, after she had been a settin' there a holdin' the boy, and a singin' low to him,-

”'A charge to keep I have,- A G.o.d to glorify; A never-dying soul to save, And fit it for the sky.'”

It wuzn't her soul she wus a thinkin' of, I knew. She didn't think of herself: she never did.

And after she went to bed, I mentioned the halo. And Josiah asked what that was. And I told him it was ”the inner glory that s.h.i.+nes out from a pure soul, and crowns a holy life.”

And he said ”he s'posed it was some sort of a headdress. Wimmen was so full of new names, he thought it was some new kind of a crowfar.”

I knew what he meant. He didn't mean crowfar, he meant crowfure. That is French. But I wouldn't hurt his feelin's by correctin' him; for I thought ”fur” or ”fure,” it didn't make much of any difference.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ”A CHARGE TO KEEP I HAVE.”]

Wall, the very next day, when Josiah came from Jonesville,-he had been to mill,-he brought Cicely a letter from her aunt Mary. She wanted her to come on at once; for her daughter, who wus a runnin' down, wus supposed to be a runnin' faster than she had run. And her aunt Mary was goin' to start for the Michigan very soon,-as soon as she got well enough: she wasn't feelin' well when she wrote. And she wanted Cicely to come at once.

So she went the next day, but promised that jest as quick as she got through visitin' her aunt and her other relations there, she would come back here.

So she went; and I missed her dretfully, and should have missed her more if it hadn't been for the state my companion returned in after he had carried Cicely to the train.

He come home rampant with a new idee. All wrought up about goin' into politics. He broached the subject to me before he onharnessed, hitchin' the old mair for the purpose. He wanted to be United-States senator. He said he thought the nation needed him.

”Needs you for what?” says I coldly, cold as a ice suckle.

”Why, it needs somebody it can lean on, and it needs somebody that can lean. I am a popular man,” says he. ”And if I can help the nation, I will be glad to do it; and if the nation can help me, I am willin'. The change from Jonesville to Was.h.i.+ngton will be agreeable and relaxin', and I lay out to try it.”

Says I, in sarkastick tones, ”It is a pity you hain't got your free pa.s.s to go on:-you remember that incident, don't you, Josiah Allen?”

”What of it?” he snapped out. ”What if I do?”