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Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife, a fiction by Marietta Holley |
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Chapter 12 |
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_ CHAPTER XII The shore of Manila looked dretful low and flat as we come up to it some as old Shelmadine's land lays along the lake shore. So you'd think that if it rained hard and raised the water a inch it would overflow it. And the houses looked dretful low and squatty, mebby it wuz on account of earthquakes they built 'em so. Josiah thought it wuz so they could shingle 'em standin' on the ground. I inclined to the earthquakes. Our boat wuz small enough to go over the surf and up the Pasig River. The water didn't look very clean, and on it wuz floatin' what looked like little cabbage heads. Josiah thought they wuz, and sez he real excited: "Thank fortin if they have cabbages to throw away here I shall be likely to git a good biled dinner, and mebby a biled puddin' with lemon sass." But they wuzn't cabbages, they wuz some kind of a water plant that growed right there in the water. As we sailed along some queer lookin' boats, lookin' some like corn houses standin' on end, bulged out towards us from the shore. They said they wuz cargo lighters to onload ships, and mebby they wuz. And one peculiarity I see that I despised. The natives all seemed to wear their shirts over their pantaloons, hangin' loose, and some on 'em didn't have on any pantaloons, jest the shirt, and some not even that, jest a sash or so tied round about 'em. I despised the sight and sez to Josiah: "They might do as much as Adam did anyway; they might wear some leaves round 'em, there is plenty of fig trees here I spoze." And he sez: "I have been thinkin' that it is a crackin' good idee to wear the shirt over the pantaloons; it would be cool and look all right after we got used to it; the bottom of the shirt could be ruffled or trimmed with tattin or red braid, and they would look as dressy agin as I've always wore 'em." I looked daggers at him out of my eyes and sez: "What won't you take it into your head to do next, Josiah Allen?" But our attention wuz drawed off by Arvilly, who approached us. She looked skornfully at the costoom of the natives, and I hearn her say to herself: "Not much chance to canvass here." But even as she spoke her eye fell hopefully on the opposite shore, like a good book agent scanning the earth and heavens for a possible subscriber. Miss Meechim, who had come on deck with Dorothy and Robert, looked benignantly at the natives and sez: "The poor ye shall always have with you," and she put her hand in the little bag that she always wore at her side and said: "I wonder if I have got a copy of that blessed tract with me, 'The Naked Sinner Clothed and in His Right Mind.'" But Robert sez to her: "They wouldn't thank you for clothes, Aunt Albina; you will have to wait until we reach New York; some of the naked there would be gladly covered up from the snow and storms." "Oh, don't compare our own blessed land with this heathen clime." "But," sez Robert, "the warm breezes here bring only joy and comfort to that sinner's naked limbs, and the sin of ignorance may be forgiven. But the shivering sinners, crouching on the cold stone doorsteps, hearing dimly through their benumbed senses prayers and thanksgivings to the Most High for mercies they have no part in, why that is quite a different matter." Aronette wuz standing a little ways apart, talking with a young man. He wuz payin' her compliments, I knew, for there wuz a pink flush on her pretty face, and his eyes had admiration in them. I didn't like his looks at all; he looked dissipated and kinder mean, and I thought I would warn her aginst him when I got a good chance. Lucia Wessel, too, wuz holding her young charge by the hand, but her attention wuz all drawed off by another young chap that I'd seen with her a number of times, and I didn't like his looks; he had the same sort of a dissipated look that the other young man had, but I see by the expression of Lucia's innocent eyes that she didn't share in my opinion; she looked as if she wuz fairly wropped up in him. I wondered what Elder Wessel would have said if he could have seen that look. But he wuz in blissful ignorance. He thought her bosom wuz composed of a equal mixture of snow and crystal, through which he could read every thought and emotion as soon as they wuz engraved on it. He thought there was no characters written there as yet by any manly hand save his own writ in characters of fatherly and daughterly love. He wuz holdin' forth to Arvilly, and she with her nose turned up as fur as nater would let it go, wuz listenin' because he wouldn't let her git away. I thought by her expression he wuz praisin' the license laws, for on no other subject wuz he so eloquent, and on no other did Arvilly's nose turn up to such a hite. Dorothy and Tommy wondered what those strange trees were that grew on the shore in front, and Robert Strong hastened to their side to help them to such information as he had on the subject. And he had knowledge on almost every subject under the heavens, so it seemed to me. Well, anon or a little after, we found ourselves on shore and I wuz glad to feel terry firmy under my feet once more. Lots of times on board ship the terry wuz so fur from the firmy that the solid land felt good under the soles of our shoes. Yes, indeed! And though for some time tables and chairs, and even beds and bureaus had a way of advancin' up towards us and then retreatin' away from us over and over, yet as I say terry wuz considerable more firmy than the deck had been. Well, it wuzn't long before we found ourselves at a comfortable hotel, not too comfortable, but decently so; and in the fulness of time we wuz seated at the table partaking of food which, though it didn't taste like my good Jonesville vittles, still I could eat and be thankful for. Josiah whispered to me: "Onions and garlicks and peppers; I never could bear any on 'em, and here I be filled up with 'em; there hain't a single dish on this table but what's full of 'em. Oh, Samantha!" sez he pitifully, "if I could only eat one of your good dinnerses or supperses agin' it seems as if I would be willin' to die." And I whispered back to him to be calm. Sez I, "Do be reasonable; it ain't logic or religion to expect to be to home and travellin' abroad at the same time." He see it wuzn't and subsided with a low groan, and begun to nibble agin' on his food, but his looks wuz mournful, and if I could I would have put on a apron willin'ly and gone down into the kitchen and cooked him a good square meal, but I knew it wouldn't be thought on, so I kep' calm. Well, our bed wuz kinder queer. It wuz quite noble lookin', four high posts with lace curtains looped up and mosquito nettin' danglin' down, and instead of springs a woven cane mattress stretched out lookin' some like our cane seat chairs. How to git under that canopy and not let in a swarm of mosquitoes wuz what we didn't know, but we did finally creep under and lay down. It wuz like layin' on the barn floor, the cane mattress didn't yield a mite, and Josiah's low groans mingled with my sithes for quite a spell. Tommy wuz fast asleep in his little bed and so didn't sense anything. Well, the tegus night passed away, happily I spoze for the attentive mosquitoes who shared the canopy with us, and mebby liked to sample foreign acquaintances, but tegus for us, and we wuz glad when it wuz time to git up. The first meal of the day wuz brought to our room; chocolate not over good, some bread and some eggs, almost raw, wuz what it consisted of. Josiah, who wanted some lamb chops, baked potatoes and coffee, wuz mad as a hen. "Heavens and earth!" sez he, "why I never sucked eggs when a boy; have I got to come to it in my old age? Raw eggs and chocklate you could cut with a knife. A few years of such food will leave you a widder, Samantha." "Well," sez I, "do let's make the best of it; when you're in Rome do as the Romans do." "I shan't suck eggs, for no Romans or for no Phillippine." "Eat 'em with your spoon," sez I, "as you'd ort to." "Or with my knife," sez he. "Did you see them officers last night to the table eatin' sass with a knife? I should thought they'd cut their mouths open." "Well, it is their way here, Josiah. Let's keep up and look forrerd to goin' home; that's the best fruit of travellin' abroad anyway, unless it is seein' Tommy so well and hearty." Josiah looked at his rosy face and didn't complain another word. He jest worships Thomas Josiah. Well, after we eat this meal we went out walkin', Josiah and I and Tommy, and I spoze Carabi went along, too, though we didn't see him. But then what two folks ever did see each other? Why I never see Josiah, and Josiah never see me, not the real us. Well, it wuz a strange, strange seen that wuz spread out before us; the place looked more'n half asleep, and as if it had been nappin' for some time; the low odd lookin' houses looked too as if they wuz in a sort of a dream or stupor. The American flag waved out here and there with a kind of a lazy bewildered floppin', as if it wuz wonderin' how under the sun it come to be there ten thousand milds from Washington, D. C., and it wuz wonderin' what on earth it floated out there in the first place for. But come to look at it clost you could see a kind of a determined and sot look in the Stars and Stripes that seemed to say, "Well, now I am here I hain't goin' to be driv out by no yeller grounded flags whatsumever." Some of the carriages that we met wuz queer lookin', rough wooden two-wheeled carts, that looked as if they'd been made by hand that mornin'. Josiah said that he could go out into the woods with Ury and cut down a tree and make a better lookin' wagon in half an hour, but I don't spoze he could. Some on 'em wuz drawed by a buffalo, which filled Josiah with new idees about drivin' one of our cows in the democrat. Sez he: "Samantha, it would be real uneek to take you to meetin' with old Line back or Brindle, and if the minister got dry in meetin', and you know ministers do git awful dry sometimes, I could just go out and milk a tumbler full and pass it round to him." But I drawed his attention off; I couldn't brook the idee of ridin' after a cow and havin' it bellerin' round the meetin' house. The native wimmen we met wuz some on 'em dressed American style, and some on 'em dressed in their own picturesque native costoom. It wuz sometimes quite pretty, and one not calculated to pinch the waist in. A thin waist, with immense flowing sleeves and embroidered chemise showing through the waist, a large handkerchief folded about the neck with ends crossed, a gay skirt with a train and a square of black cloth drawn tight around the body from waist to knees. Stockings are not worn very much, and the slippers are not much more than soles with little strips of leather going over the foot, and no heels. Anon we would meet some Chinamen, with eyes set in on a bias, and their hair hanging in two long tails down their backs; lots of them we see, then a priest would move slowly along, then a Spanish senora, then a sailor, then perhaps a native dressed partly in European costoom lookin' like a fright. The street cars are little things drawed by one horse, and the streets are badly paved when they're paved at all. There wuz some handsome houses in the residence portion of the city, but aside from the Cathedral there are few public buildings worth seeing. But one thing they have here always beautiful, and that is the luxuriant tropical vegetation, beautiful blossoming trees and shrubs, and the multitude of flowers, tall palms, bamboo, ebony, log-wood, mangoes, oranges, lemons, bread fruit, custard apples, and forty or fifty varieties of bananas, from little ones, not much more than a mouthful, to them eighteen or twenty inches long. Josiah enjoyed his walk, finding many things to emulate when he got back to Jonesville. Among 'em wuz the Chinamen's hair; he thought it wuz a dressy way to comb a man's hair, and he wondered dreamily how his would look if he let it grow out and braid it. But he said if he did, he should wear red ribbons on it, or baby blue. But I knew there wuz no danger of his hair ever stringin' down his back, for I could, if danger pressed too near, cut it off durin' his sleep, and would, too, even if it led to words. Wall, Arvilly's first work, after she had canvassed the hotel-keeper for the "Twin Crimes," and as many of the guests as she could, wuz to find out if Waitstill wuz there. And sure enough she found her. She wuz in one of the hospitals and doin' a good work, jest as she would anywhere she wuz put. She come to the hotel to see us as soon as she could, and Arvilly seemed to renew her age, having Waitstill with her agin. We writ to once to Cousin John Richard. Robert Strong and Dorothy wuz dretful interested in Waitstill, I could see, and they asked a great many questions about her work in the hospital. And I see that Robert wuz only grounded in his convictions when Waitstill told him of the sickness the doctors and nurses had to contend with, and how largely it wuz caused by liquor drinking. Hundreds of American saloons in Manila, so she said, and sez she, "How can the hospitals hope to undo the evils that these do to men's souls and bodies?" Sez she, "You know what a fearful disease and crime breeder it is in a temperate climate, but it is tenfold worse here in this tropical land." She wuz anxious to hear all the news from Jonesville, and I willin'ly told her what Phila Ann had told me about Elder White, and the noble work he was doin' in East Loontown, and I sez, "Missionary work is jest as necessary and jest as important and pleasin' to God if done in Loontown as in the Antipithies." And she said she knew it. And I sez: "Elder White is working himself to death, and don't have the comforts of life, to say nothin' of the happiness he ort to." Waitstill didn't say nothin', but I fancied a faint pink flush stole up into her white cheeks, some like the color that flashes up onto a snowbank at sunset. Life wuz all snow and sunset to her, I could see, but I knowed that she wuz the one woman in the world for Ernest White, the ideal woman his soul had always worshipped, and found realized in Waitstill--poor little creeter! I didn't know whether the warm sun of his love could melt the snow and frozen hail or not--the sun duz melt such things--and I knew love wuz the greatest thing in the world. Well, I had to leave the event to Providence, and wuz willin' to; but yet, after a woman duz leave things to the Most High to do, she loves to put in her oar and help things along; mebby that is the way of Providence--who knows? But 'tennyrate I gin another blind hint to her before we left the conversation. Sez I, "Ernest White is doin' the Lord's work if ever a man did, and I can't think it is the Lord's will that whilst he's doin' it he ort to eat such bread as he has to--milk emtin's and sour at that, to say nothin' of fried stuff that a anaconda couldn't digest. He deserves a sweet, love-guarded home, and to be tended to by a woman that he loves--one who could inspire him and help him on in the heavenly way he's treading alone and lonesome." Her cheeks did turn pink then, and her eyes looked like deep blue pools in which stars wuz shinin', but she didn't say anything, and Robert Strong resoomed his talk with her about her hospital work. And before she left he gin her a big check to use for her patients; I don't know exactly how big it wuz, but it went up into the hundreds, anyway; and Dorothy gin her one, too, for I see her write it; Miss Meechim gin her her blessin' and more'n a dozen tracts, which mebby will set well on the patients, if administered cautious. I myself gin her the receipt for the best mustard poultice that ever drawed, and two pairs of clouded blue-and-white wool socks I had knit on the way, and though it wuz a warm country she said they would come handy when her patients had chills. There wuz two young American girls at the hotel, and they happened to come into the parlor while we wuz talkin' and they sent a big present to the hospital. I guess they wuz real well off and good dispositioned. They wuz travellin' alone and seemed to be havin' a real good time. One on 'em wuz sunthin' of a invalid, but wuz outdoors all day, I spoze tryin' to git well. They minded their own bizness and didn't do any hurt so fur as I could see, but Elder Wessel couldn't bear 'em. Sez he to me one day: "I spoze they represent the new young woman?" He said it real skornful, and Arvilly, who wuz present, took him up real snappish. "Well, what of it? What have they done?" If that poor man had said that black wuz black and white wuz white, Arvilly would found fault with it. "I don't object to what they have done," sez he, "so much as to what they are. Young American women know too much." And Arvilly sez with a meanin' glance at him, "That is sunthin' that everybody don't have to stand." She might just as well have called him a fool, her axent wuz such. Arvilly is too hash. Sez he: "Now my Lucia is different. She knows nothing about sin and wickedness, and I got this position for her, so that as soon as she left the convent she was placed directly in the care of this good woman and her little innocent child. What does she know of sin or sorrow, or worldliness or vanity?" "Or danger?" sez I meanin'ly. "If she always has some one at her side to guard her, her perfect ignorance and innocence is a charm, but how would it be in the hour of danger and temptation? Why should anybody fear being burned if they had no knowledge of fire?" "Oh," sez he, "her divine innocence is her safeguard. Evil would retire abashed before the timid glance of her pure eyes." "I hope so," sez I dryly. "I hope so. But I never knew the whiteness of its wool to help a lamb if a wolfdog got after it. But mebby it will in her case," sez I reasonably. "I don't want to break up your happiness," sez I. "You cannot," sez he dogmatically. "You cannot. I have brought up my Lucia in the only right way for a young girl to be brought up. She has been completely separated from young people of the opposite sex; she knows nothing of fashionable flirting and folly. And when I see such abnormal creatures as the New Girl, as they call her, I am horrified, shocked beyond words at the spectacle of their brazen independence and what they call their freedom, their comradeship with the opposite sex, their fearlessness and boldness and frankness with gentlemen, talking with them really as if they were of the same sex as themselves. As I see this I thank God my Lucia is different." Well, she wuz a pretty little thing, with eyes as innocent and timid as a young fawn's that had never been outside its green covert in the great wilderness. But I knew that under her baby looks and baby ways wuz a woman's heart; a woman's emotions and impulses would roust up when the time come and the sun of love shone down on her. Why, Nater had layed down laws before Elder Wessel did; he couldn't keep her from thinkin' about her future mate; she would let her mind dwell on some one if it wuz only the man in the moon. And I knew the world wuz full of bad men as well as good men. How would it be with her if thrown with a wolf in sheep's clothing? If guarded and sheltered, all right, but if onguarded and onwarned and thrown into temptation and danger, I felt that trouble wuz ahead for Lucia Wessel. But I knew it wuz no use for me to hist up a danger flag in front of her, for her father wouldn't let me. But I felt dubersome about her, dretful dubersome. She and Aronette had formed a real girl attachment for each other, and some way I didn't like the idee on't, but don't know as I could have told why. Well, we didn't lay out to stay long in Manila, but we did stay long enough so Dorothy and Miss Meechim and Robert Strong went round and see the different islands. They went to Illollo and wuz gone for three days, Aronette stayin' with me at the tarven, and Dorothy told me when she got back how beautiful the journey wuz. The water wuz like glass, the sunrise and sunset marvellous, thickly wooded shores on either side filled with oncounted wealth. Great forests of sandal-wood, enough to build houses of, and how we treasure little snips on't in fan sticks. Mahogany trees enough to build barns and cow stables on, and how we gloat over a old clock case or lamp stand made on't. She said that Illollo wuz like most old Spanish towns, dretful old lookin' and kinder run down. The natives dressed like others she had seen, but spoke a different language. They went to the American general's headquarters some two milds off. A hundred varieties of palm trees grow along the road and every sort of tropical tree. The natives wuz all dark complected, but some good lookin', most all bareheaded or else with a gay turban and knives stuck in the sashes of their gay tunics. One day whilst the party wuz gone Tommy and I wuz takin' a little walk; Josiah couldn't go, he had got hold of a New York paper of three weeks before, and was readin' it through from title page to Lost and Found column. We wandered into a little cross street lined on each side with little shops with the shopkeepers squattin' in the door, and outside the native wives and children. Everything under the sun almost wuz to be found in these shops, and we had wandered along for quite a good ways lookin' at the curious things, and still more curious people, when we met Aronette and Lucia, accompanied by the two young men I had seen with 'em on the boat; they wuz on the stoop of one of the old business buildin's, gigglin' and laughin' like a bevy of swallers round the eaves of a Jonesville barn. But, as I said before, I didn't like the looks of the young men, and on Aronette's return I told her so, feelin' I wuz in a measure responsible for her safety whilst her mistress wuz away. Aronette wuz combin' Tommy's hair and curlin' it over her finger as I talked to her, which made me feel some mean to attact her whilst in my service, but Duty's apron string fluttered down before me and I stiddied myself on it as I spoke real good warnin' words to her. Sez I, "My dear, I didn't like the looks of the young men I saw you walkin' with to-night." Sez I, "I saw them two young men coming out of a saloon not a half hour before, and" sez I, "they look to me dissipated and mean. They drink; I know by their looks they do." And she sez, "Oh, dear madam, I only went out to take the air a little while. You know I care for nobody in this country. My heart is in old Normandie," sez she, the tears welling up to the blue well of her eyes. "My heart is with my Pierre, but," sez she, kinder tossin' her head, not a high toss, only a little vain pretty motion of a pretty, thoughtless girl, some like a bluebird in the spring of the year, "if a young man insists on paying you a little attention what can a poor little girl do? The days are long when one is young and her own Pierre so far away, and, dear madam, Lucia was with me." "Another innocent, ignorant young creature," sez I; "two little butterflies fluttering about instead of one, not thinkin' or carin' for the fouler's net," sez I, smilin' on her pleasant, for I couldn't help it. For I knew the heart of youth, and the monotony of life, and the need of young hearts for each other. But I didn't like the young men's looks and told her so agin, and she laughed, and said she didn't like their looks either. Sez she, "Their breath always smells of the whiskey. Faugh!" sez she, "it makes me sick," and she shrugged her shoulders in the true French way. And I sez agin, lookin' solemn, "No young man whose breath smells of whiskey is safe for any young girl to associate with. It is a pizen atmosphere that blasts every sweet and pure thing that comes nigh it." And I sithed. And she said in her own sweet way that she knew I was telling the truth, for I talked just as her own sweet mother did. And she bent down with one of her pretty foreign ways and kissed my hand. Dear little thing, I didn't spoze my talk had done her much good, but then I considered it couldn't do her any hurt 'tennyrate. And so I left the event to the overruling Power, just as we poor weak mortals have to. _ |
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