Part 11 (1/2)

Says I coldly, ”You know you can't run. You are as lame as you can be. You have got the rheumatiz the worst kind.”

Says he, ”I mean runnin' with political legs-and I do want to be a senator, Samantha. I want to, like a dog, I want the money there is in it, and I want the honor. You know they have elected me path-master, but I hain't a goin' to accept it. I tell you, when anybody gets into political life, ambition rousts up in 'em: path-master don't satisfy me. I want to be senator: I want to, like a dog. And I don't lay out to tackle the job as Elburtus did, and act too good.”

”No!” says I sternly. ”There hain't no danger of your bein' too good.”

”No: I have laid my plans, and laid 'em careful. The relation on your side was too willin', and too clever. And witnessin' his campaign has learnt me some deep lessons. I watched the rocks he hit aginst; and I have laid my plans, and laid 'em careful. I am going to act offish. I feel that offishness is my strong holt-and endearin' myself to the ma.s.ses. Educatin' public sentiment up to lovin' me, and urgin' me not to be so offish, and to obleege 'em by takin' a office-them is my 2 strong holts. If I can only hang back, and act onwillin', and get the ma.s.ses fierce to elect me-why, I'm made. And then, I've got a plan in my head.”

I groaned, in spite of myself.

”I have got a plan in my head, that, if every other plan fails, will elect me in spite of the old Harry.”

Oh! how that oath grated against my nerve! And how I hung back from this idee! I am one that looks ahead. And I says in firm tones,-

”You never would get the nomination, Josiah Allen! And if you did, you never would be elected.”

”Oh, yes, I should!” says he. But he continued dreamily, ”There would have to be considerable wire-pullin'.”

”Where would the wires be?” says I sternly. ”And who would pull 'em?”

”Oh, most anywhere!” says he, lookin' dreamily up onto the kitchen ceilin', as if wires wus liable to be let down anywhere through the plasterin'.

Says I, ”Should you have to go to pullin' wires?”

”Of course I should,” says he.

”Wall,” says I, ”you may as well make up your mind in the first ont, that I hain't goin' to give my consent to have you go into any thing dangerous.

I hain't goin' to have you break your neck, at your age.”

Says he, ”I don't know but my age is as good a age to break my neck in as any other. I never sot any particular age to break my neck in.”

”Make fun all you are a mind to of a anxious Samantha,” says I, ”but I will never give my consent to have you plunge into such dangerous enterprizes. And talkin' about pullin' wires sounds dangerous: it sounds like a circus, somehow; and how would you, with your back, look and feel performin' like a circus?”

”Oh, you don't understand, Samantha! the wires hain't pulled in that way.

You don't pull 'em with your hands, you pull 'em with your minds.”

”Oh, wall!” says I, brightenin' up. ”You are all right in that case: you won't pull hard enough to hurt you any.”

I knew the size and strength of his mind, jest as well as if I had took it out of his head, and weighed it on the steelyards. It was not over and above large. I knew it; and he knew that I knew it, because I have had to sometimes, in the cause of Right, remind him of it. But he knows that my love for him towers up like a dromedary, and moves off through life as stately as she duz-the dromedary. Josiah was my choice out of a world full of men. I love Josiah Allen. But to resoom and continue on.

Josiah says, ”Which side had I better go on, Samantha?” Says he, kinder puttin' his head on one side, and lookin' shrewdly up at the stove-pipe, ”Would you run as a Stalwart, or a Half-breed?”

Says I, ”I guess you would run more like a lame hen than a Stalwart or a Half-breed; or,” says I, ”it would depend on what breeds they wuz. If they wus half snails, and half Times in the primers, maybe you could get ahead of 'em.”

”I should think, Samantha Allen, in such a time as this, you would act like a rational bein'. I'll be hanged if I know what side to go on to get elected!”

Says I, ”Josiah Allen, hain't you got any principle? Don't you know what side you are on?”

”Why, yes, I s'pose I know as near as men in gineral. I'm a Democrat in times of peace. But it is human nater, to want to be on the side that beats.”

I sithed, and murmured instinctively, ”George Was.h.i.+ngton!”