Daddy-Long-Legs - Jean Webster (best e reader for academics txt) š
- Author: Jean Webster
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Iāll write a nicer letter in a few days and tell you all the farm news.
We need rain. Yours as ever, Judy
10th August Mr. Daddy-Long-Legs,
SIR: I address you from the second crotch in the willow tree by the pool in the pasture. Thereās a frog croaking underneath, a locust singing overhead and two little `devil downheadsā darting up and down the trunk. Iāve been here for an hour; itās a very comfortable crotch, especially after being upholstered with two sofa cushions. I came up with a pen and tablet hoping to write an immortal short story, but Iāve been having a dreadful time with my heroineāI CANāT make her behave as I want her to behave; so Iāve abandoned her for the moment, and am writing to you. (Not much relief though, for I canāt make you behave as I want you to, either.)
If you are in that dreadful New York, I wish I could send you some of this lovely, breezy, sunshiny outlook. The country is Heaven after a week of rain.
Speaking of Heavenādo you remember Mr. Kellogg that I told you about last summer?āthe minister of the little white church at the Corners. Well, the poor old soul is deadālast winter of pneumonia. I went half a dozen times to hear him preach and got very well acquainted with his theology. He believed to the end exactly the same things he started with. It seems to me that a man who can think straight along for forty-seven years without changing a single idea ought to be kept in a cabinet as a curiosity. I hope he is enjoying his harp and golden crown; he was so perfectly sure of finding them! Thereās a new young man, very consequential, in his place. The congregation is pretty dubious, especially the faction led by Deacon Cummings. It looks as though there was going to be an awful split in the church. We donāt care for innovations in religion in this neighbourhood.
During our week of rain I sat up in the attic and had an orgy of readingāStevenson, mostly. He himself is more entertaining than any of the characters in his books; I dare say he made himself into the kind of hero that would look well in print. Donāt you think it was perfect of him to spend all the ten thousand dollars his father left, for a yacht, and go sailing off to the South Seas? He lived up to his adventurous creed. If my father had left me ten thousand dollars, Iād do it, too. The thought of Vailima makes me wild. I want to see the tropics. I want to see the whole world. I am going to be a great author, or artist, or actress, or playwrightā or whatever sort of a great person I turn out to be. I have a terrible wanderthirst; the very sight of a map makes me want to put on my hat and take an umbrella and start. `I shall see before I die the palms and temples of the South.ā
Thursday evening at twilight, sitting on the doorstep.
Very hard to get any news into this letter! Judy is becoming so philosophical of late, that she wishes to discourse largely of the world in general, instead of descending to the trivial details of daily life. But if you MUST have news, here it is:
Our nine young pigs waded across the brook and ran away last Tuesday, and only eight came back. We donāt want to accuse anyone unjustly, but we suspect that Widow Dowd has one more than she ought to have.
Mr. Weaver has painted his barn and his two silos a bright pumpkin yellowā a very ugly colour, but he says it will wear.
The Brewers have company this week; Mrs. Brewerās sister and two nieces from Ohio.
One of our Rhode Island Reds only brought off three chicks out of fifteen eggs. We canāt imagine what was the trouble. Rhode island Reds, in my opinion, are a very inferior breed. I prefer Buff Orpingtons.
The new clerk in the post office at Bonnyrigg Four Corners drank every drop of Jamaica ginger they had in stockāseven dollarsā worthābefore he was discovered.
Old Ira Hatch has rheumatism and canāt work any more; he never saved his money when he was earning good wages, so now he has to live on the town.
Thereās to be an ice-cream social at the schoolhouse next Saturday evening. Come and bring your families.
I have a new hat that I bought for twenty-five cents at the post office. This is my latest portrait, on my way to rake the hay.
Itās getting too dark to see; anyway, the news is all used up. Good night, Judy
Friday
Good morning! Here is some news! What do you think? Youād never, never, never guess whoās coming to Lock Willow. A letter to Mrs. Semple from Mr. Pendleton. Heās motoring through the Berkshires, and is tired and wants to rest on a nice quiet farmāif he climbs out at her doorstep some night will she have a room ready for him? Maybe heāll stay one week, or maybe two, or maybe three; heāll see how restful it is when he gets here.
Such a flutter as we are in! The whole house is being cleaned and all the curtains washed. I am driving to the Corners this morning to get some new oilcloth for the entry, and two cans of brown floor paint for the hall and back stairs. Mrs. Dowd is engaged to come tomorrow to wash the windows (in the exigency of the moment, we waive our suspicions in regard to the piglet). You might think, from this account of our activities, that the house was not already immaculate; but I assure you it was! Whatever Mrs. Sempleās limitations, she is a HOUSEKEEPER.
But isnāt it just like a man, Daddy? He doesnāt give the remotest hint as to whether he will land on the doorstep today, or two weeks from today. We shall live in a perpetual breathlessness until he comesā and if he doesnāt hurry, the cleaning may all have to be done over again.
Thereās Amasai waiting below with the buckboard and Grover. I drive aloneābut if you could see old Grove, you wouldnāt be worried as to my safety.
With my hand on my heartāfarewell. Judy
PS. Isnāt that a nice ending? I got it out of Stevensonās letters.
Saturday Good morning again! I didnāt get this ENVELOPED yesterday before the postman came, so Iāll add some more. We have one mail a day at twelve oāclock. Rural delivery is a blessing to the farmers! Our postman not only delivers letters, but he runs errands for us in town, at five cents an errand. Yesterday he brought me some shoestrings and a jar of cold cream (I sunburned all the skin off my nose before I got my new hat) and a blue Windsor tie and a bottle of blacking all for ten cents. That was an unusual bargain, owing to the largeness of my order.
Also he tells us what is happening in the Great World. Several people on the route take daily papers, and he reads them as he jogs along, and repeats the news to the ones who donāt subscribe. So in case a war breaks out between the United States and Japan, or the president is assassinated, or Mr. Rockefeller leaves a million dollars to the John Grier Home, you neednāt bother to write; Iāll hear it anyway.
No sign yet of Master Jervie. But you should see how clean our house isāand with what anxiety we wipe our feet before we step in!
I hope heāll come soon; I am longing for someone to talk to. Mrs. Semple, to tell you the truth, gets rather monotonous. She never lets ideas interrupt the easy flow of her conversation. Itās a funny thing about the people here. Their world is just this single hilltop. They are not a bit universal, if you know what I mean. Itās exactly the same as at the John Grier Home. Our ideas there were bounded by the four sides of the iron fence, only I didnāt mind it so much because I was younger, and was so awfully busy. By the time Iād got all my beds made and my babiesā faces washed and had gone to school and come home and had washed their faces again and darned their stockings and mended Freddie Perkinsās trousers (he tore them every day of his life) and learned my lessons in betweenāI was ready to go to bed, and I didnāt notice any lack of social intercourse. But after two years in a conversational college, I do miss it; and I shall be glad to see somebody who speaks my language.
I really believe Iāve finished, Daddy. Nothing else occurs to me at the momentāIāll try to write a longer letter next time. Yours always, Judy
PS. The lettuce hasnāt done at all well this year. It was so dry early in the season.
25th AugustWell, Daddy, Master Jervieās here. And such a nice time as weāre having! At least I am, and I think he is, tooāhe has been here ten days and he doesnāt show any signs of going. The way Mrs. Semple pampers that man is scandalous. If she indulged him as much when he was a baby, I donāt know how he ever turned out so well.
He and I eat at a little table set on the side porch, or sometimes under the trees, orāwhen it rains or is coldāin the best parlour. He just picks out the spot he wants to eat in and Carrie trots after him with the table. Then if it has been an awful nuisance, and she has had to carry the dishes very far, she finds a dollar under the sugar bowl.
He is an awfully companionable sort of man, though you would never believe it to see him casually; he looks at first glance like a true Pendleton, but he isnāt in the least. He is just as simple and unaffected and sweet as he can beāthat seems a funny way to describe a man, but itās true. Heās extremely nice with the farmers around here; he meets them in a sort of man-to-man fashion that disarms them immediately. They were very suspicious at first. They didnāt care for his clothes! And I will say that his clothes are rather amazing. He wears knickerbockers and pleated jackets and white flannels and riding clothes with puffed trousers. Whenever he comes down in anything new, Mrs. Semple, beaming with pride, walks around and views him from every angle, and urges him to be careful where he sits down; she is so afraid he will pick up some dust. It bores him dreadfully. Heās always saying to her:
`Run along, Lizzie, and tend to your work. You canāt boss me any longer. Iāve grown up.ā
Itās awfully funny to think of that great big, long-legged man (heās nearly as long-legged as you, Daddy) ever sitting in Mrs. Sempleās lap and having his face washed. Particularly funny when you see her lap! She has two laps now, and three chins. But he says that once she was thin and wiry and spry and could run faster than he.
Such a lot of adventures weāre having! Weāve explored the country for miles, and Iāve learned to fish with funny little flies made of
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