Samantha at Saratoga by Marietta Holley (e book reader pc .TXT) š
- Author: Marietta Holley
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She had been brought up on the hull of the commandments but on that one in particeler; she wuz brung up sharp but good. But not one lie could I ketch him in. And he stuck to it, that his father wuz a banker and doinā a heavy business.
Wall, it kepā on, she a goinā with him through ambition, for I see plain, by signs I knoo, that she didnāt love him half as well as she did Abram. And I felt bad, dretful bad, to set still and see Ambition ondoinā of her. For oft and oft she would speak to me of Bialās fatherās bank and the heft of the business he wuz a doinā.
And I finally got so worked up in my mind that I gin a sly hint to Abram Gee, that if he ever wanted to get Ardelia Tutt, he had better make a summer trip to Saratoga. I never told Ardelia what I had done, but trusted to a overrulinā destiny, that seems to enrap babys, and lunatiks, and soft little wimmen, when their heads get kinder turned by a man, and to Abramās honest face when she should compare it with Bial Flamburgās, and to Abramās pure, sweet breath with that mixture of stale cigars, tobacco, beer, and peppermint.
But Abram wrote back to me that his mother wuz a lyinā at the pāint of death with a fever - that his sister Susan wuz sick a bed with the same fever and couldnāt come a nigh her and he couldnāt leave what might be his motherās death-bed. And he sez, if Ardelia had forgot him in so short a time, mebby it wuz the best thing he could do, to try and forget her. Anyway, he wouldnāt leave his dying mother for anything or anybody.
That wuz Abram Gee all over, a doinā his duty every time by bread and humanity. But he added a postscript and it wuz wrote in a agitated hand - that jest as soon as his mother got so he could leave her, he should come to Saratoga.
The verses that Ardelia sent over to me wuz as follers:
āA LAY ON A FEMALE TROUT IN CENTRAL PARK.
āBY ARDELIA TUTT.
āOh trout, sweet female trout, oh fain would I
In hottest day, perspirinā dretfelee
Desend, and dressed most cool like thee, would lie
As deep in water, some two feet, or three
Or even four.
āWho would not dress like thee on summer day?
How cool thy robesālo! not one boddice waist
Or corset stay, to make thee taper small.
Thou taperest without them, and not then with haste,
Or Bandaline.
āThou crimpest not, or bangest up thy hair;
Thou hast no hair to bang, sweet trout so dear,
Thou dost not dance round dances, nor repair
Unto the thronged piazzas, nor appear,
Sweet modest trout.
āIn long and haughty trains thou never dost appear
And switch them up and down the corredere and hall
With diamond jewels hanging to thy ear;
Thou hast not ears to hang them on, no! not at all.
No, not one ear.
āThou walkest not in high heeled shoes, thou cannest not
For reesons it were vain to now relate.
Ah no! But let us cast one eye adown thy grot
And see thee sweet and patient wear thy fate,
And wear it well.
āAt Garden parties, Race Course, Music Hall,
We neāer have set our weary eyes thy form upon;
Thou dost not ramble in the crowded maul,
Thou hast no legs sweet trout to ramble on;
Ah! no! dear one.
āAnd so thou seemest well content to saunter not,
Or waltz about in garments fine and gay;
Oh. Mortal Man! a lesson learn of Trout
If thou no legs hast got, why seek to waltz away,
Or promenade?
āAnd, beautius female, learn thou of dear trout
So move and swim in thine own native way;
Seek not high stations, titles great, and flout
Not thou at fate, but gently swim away
On native waves.
āCool blooded hold thy heart, like female trout;
Melt not at sweet, false words, that melt and seeth and burn;
She melteth not, oh no! she cooly turns about
And nibbles on, so thou, and follow on
Sweet female one.ā
JOSIAHāS FLIRTATIONS.
They say there is a sight of flirtinā done at Saratoga. I didnāt hear so much about it as Josiah did, naturally there are things that are talked of more amongst men than women. Night after night he would come home and tell me how fashionable it wuz, and pretty soon I could see that he kinder wanted to follow the fashion.
I told him from the first onāt that heād better let it entirely alone. Says I, āJosiah Allen, you wouldnāt never carry it through successful if you should undertake itāand then think of the wickedness onāt.ā
But he seemed sot. He said āit wuz more fashionable amongst married men and wimmen, than the more single ones,ā he said āit wuz dretful fashionable amongst pardners.ā
āWall,ā says I, āI shall have, nothinā to do with it, and I advise you, if you know when you are well off, to let it entirely alone.ā
āOf course,ā says he, fiercely, āYou neednāt have nothinā to do with it. It is nothinā you would want to foller up. And I would ruther see you sunk into the ground, or be sunk myself, than to see you goinā into it. Why,ā says he, savagely, āI would tear a man lim from lim, if I see him a tryinā to flirt with you.ā (Josiah Allen worships me.) āBut,ā says he, more placider like, āmen have to do things sometimes, that they know is too hard for their pardners to doāmen sometimes feel called upon to do things that their pardners donāt care aboutāthat they haint strong enough to tackle. Wimmen are fragile creeters anyway.ā
āOh, the fallacy of them argumentsāand the weakness of āem.
But I didnāt say nothinā only to reiterate my utterance, that āif he went into it, he would have to foller it up alone, that he musnāt expect any help from me.ā
āOh no!ā says he. āOh! certainly not.ā
His tone wuz very genteel, but there seemed to be sumthinā strange in it. And I looked at him pityināly over my specks. The hull idea on it wuz extremely distasteful to me, this talk about flirtinā, and etc., at our ages, and with our stations in the Jonesville meetinā house, and with our grandchildren.
But I see from day to day that he wuz a hankerinā after it, and I almost made up my mind that I should have to let him make a trial, knowinā that experience wuz the best teacher, and knowinā that his morals wuz sound, and he wuz devoted to me, and only went into the enterprize because he thought it wuz fashionable.
There wuz a young English girl a boardinā to the same place we did. She dressed some like a young man, carried a cane, etc. But she wuz one of the upper 10, and wuz as pretty as a picture, and I see Josiah had kinder sot his eyes on her as beinā a good one to try his experiment with. He thought she wuz beautiful. But good land! I didnāt care. I liked her myself. But I could see, though he couldnāt see it, that she wuz one of the girls who would flirt with the town pump, or the meetinā house steeple, if she couldnāt get nobody else to flirt with. She wuz born so, but I suppose ontirely unbeknown to her when she wuz born.
Wall, Josiah Allen would set and look at her by the hourādretful admirinā. But good land! I didnāt care. I loved to look at her myself. And then too I had this feelinā that his morals wuz sound. But after awhile, I could see, and couldnāt help seeinā, that he wuz a tryinā in his feeble way to flirt with her. And I told him kindly, but firmly, āthat it wuz somethinā that I hated to see a goinā on.ā
But he says, āWell, dumb it all, Samantha, if anybody goes to a fashionable place, they ort to try to be fashionable. āTaint nothinā I want to do, and you ort to know it.ā
And I says in pityinā axents but firm, āIf you donāt want to, Josiah, I wouldnāt, fashion or no fashion.ā
But I see I couldnāt convince him, and there happened to be a skercity of men jest thenāand he kepā it up, and it kepā me on the key veav, as Maggie says, when she is on the tenter hooks of suspense.
I felt bad to see it go on, not that I wuz jealous, no, my foretop lay smooth from day to day, not a jealous hair in it, not oneābut I felt sorry for my companion. I see that while the endurinā of it wuz hard and tejus for him (for truly he was not a addep at the business; it come tuff, feerful tuff on him), the endinā wuz sure to be harder. And I tried to convince him, from a sense of duty, that she wuz makinā fun of himāhe had told me lots of the pretty things she had said to himāand out of principle I told him that she didnāt mean one word of āem. But I couldnāt convince him, and as is the way of pardners, after I had sot the reasen and the sense before him, and he wouldnāt hear to me, why then I had to set down and bear it. Such is some of the trials of pardners?
Wall, it kepā agoinā on, and a goinā on, and I kepā a hatinā to see it, for if anybody has got to flirt, which I am far from approvinā of, but if I have got to see it a goinā on, I would fain see it well done, and Josiahās efforts to flirt wuz like an effort of our old mair to play a tune on the melodian, no grace in it, no system, nor comfort to him, nor me.
I sāpose the girl got some fun out of it; I hope she did, for if she didnāt it wuz a wearisome job all round.
Wall, a week or so rolled on, and it wuz still in progress. And one day an old friend of ours, Miss Ezra Balch, from the east part of Jonesville, come to see me. She come to Saratoga for the rheumatiz, and wuz gettinā well fast, and Ezra was gettinā entirely cured of biles, for which he had come, carbunkles.
Wall, she invited Josiah and me to take a ride with āem, and we both accepted of it, and at the appointed time I wuz ready to the minute, down on the piazza, with my brown cotton gloves on, and my mantilly hung gracefully over my arm. But at the last minute, Josiah Allen said āhe couldnāt go.ā
I says āWhy canāt you go?ā
āOh,ā he says, kinder drawinā up his collar, and smoothinā down his vest, āOh, I have got another engagement.ā
He looked real high-headed, and I says to him:
āJosiah Allen didnāt you promise Druzilla Balch that you would go with her and Ezra to-day?ā
āWall yes,ā says he, ābut I canāt.ā
āWhy not?ā says I.
āWall, Samantha, though they are well meaninā, good people, they haint what you may call fashionable, they haint the upper 10.ā
Says I, āJosiah Allen you have fell over 15 cents in my estimation, sense we have begun talkinā, you wonāt go with āem because they haint fashionable. They are good, honest Christian Methodists, and have stood by you and me many a time, in times of trouble, and now,ā says I, āyou turn against āem because they haint fashionable.ā Says I, āJosiah Allen where do you think youāll go to?ā
āOh, probable down through Congress Park, and we may walk up as fur as the Indian Encampment. I feel kinder mauger to-day, and my corns ache feerful.ā (His boots wuz that small that they wuz sights to behold, sights!) āWe probably shanāt walk fur,ā says he.
I see how ātwuze in a minute. That English girl had asked him to walk with her, and my pardner had broken a solemn engagement with Ezra and Druzilla Balch to go a walkinā with her. I see how ātwuz, but I sot in silence and one of the big rockinā chairs, and didnāt say nothinā.
Finally he says, with a sort of a anxious look onto his foreward:
āYou donāt feel bad, do you Samantha? You haint
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