Lion Ben of Elm Island
Page 6
CHAPTER V.
SALLY TELLS HER MOTHER ALL ABOUT IT.
Sally slept in the same room with her mother. The old lady waked, andfinding Sally’s bed not tumbled, called loudly for her daughter. Whenshe came, her mother said, “Why, Sally, your bed has not been tumbledthis live-long night; how flushed you look! your hair is all of afrizzle, and you’ve been crying: what is the matter with you?”
Poor Sally, nervous and excited after the night’s conflict, made aclean breast of it.
“Mother, I’ve said I’d have Ben, that is, if you are willing,” and,burying her face in the pillow, she burst into a flood of tears. Thegood old lady was not so much troubled by tears as Ben had been, but,putting her arms round her daughter, said, “That’s right, dear; cryas much as you please; it’ll ease your mind, and do you good;” and,wrapped up in her own reflections about an event she had long foreseen,patiently waited till Sally should think best to speak. Finding Sallynot inclined to break the silence, she said, “I think you could nothave done better than to be engaged to Ben; and I’m sure you could nothave done anything so pleasing to me; that is, if you love him, forthat is the main thing.
“I’ve always told you it is very wrong for a girl to marry a man whomshe doesn’t love; it isn’t right in the sight of God, and always leadsto misery. Ben isn’t so good-looking as some young men, nor rich inthis world’s goods; but he has good learning and good manners: he is ofa good family; can do more work than any three young men in town; andfor all he is such a giant, never gives a misbeholden word to any one.You’ve known him from childhood. It’s a great deal better to marry himwith only the clothes to his back, and the good principles that are inhim, than to marry some one who is rich and handsome now, may die adrunkard, and perhaps, some time, throw up to your poverty.”
“O, I know all that, mother; but there’s something else, which,perhaps, I ought not to have done without asking you. I’ve promised togo and live on Elm Island, right in the woods, and among the breakers;”and then she told her mother every word that she and Ben had said,from beginning to end, throwing in, as a sweetener, a circumstancewhich she knew would have great influence with her parent; “but then,you know, he has promised never to go to sea any more.”
She was most agreeably disappointed when the widow, after a littlepause, replied in her mild way, “I not only approve of what you’vedone, but should have been very sorry if you had done otherwise. Yourgrandmother, girl, was born in old Rowley, Massachusetts, was broughtup to have everything she wanted, and knew nothing of hardships; butshe married your grandfather because she loved him, though he wasa poor man. They came down here, and took up this farm when it wasall woods. I’ve stood in the door of our old house, and seen elevenwolves come off Birch Point and go on the ice to Oak Island: one ofthem had lost his leg in a trap, and could not keep up with the rest,and they would squat down on the ice and wait for him. They burnt uptheir first house in clearing the land, and had to live in a brushcamp till they built another. I’ve heard mother say, a hundred times,that the happiest years of her life were those hard years; that theanticipation of living easier by and by, and having a good farm, wasbetter than the good farm when they got it; that there was nothing inher well-to-do life afterwards to compare with the satisfaction oflooking back to those hard times when she had the strength to endurethose hardships. Then her face would light up, her eyes kindle, and thecolor come into her old cheeks; and as I looked at her, I used to hopethat I should live to see such pleasant hardships, to be glad of andtell about when I was old.
“Well, Sally, I’ve had _troubles_, and _bitter_ ones; the sea has beena devourer to me; but not _hardships_, because I married and lived athome; but you have the chance, girl, to know something about it. Don’tbe afraid of being poor; people here don’t know what poverty is. Go toLiverpool, if you want to see what real poverty is, as I have been manya time with your poor father, who is dead and gone. A man with a farmis sure of a living, and a good one, too; the farmers feed the world,and they are great fools if they don’t lick their own fingers. Twothirds of the merchants fail; a great many seamen die at sea, and it’sa dog’s life at best. The sailor is only anxious when the wind blows;but the wind blows all the time for the poor wife at home, and herpillow is often wet with tears.
“The last time I was in Rowley, I saw rich men’s sons; whose fathersscorned your grandfather because he was a farmer, going about killinghogs and cutting wood for folks. For a farmer to kill his own hogs,or to change work with his neighbors to kill theirs, then they helphim kill his, or to cut his own wood, is a very different thing fromwhat it is for people, who felt as large as they did once, and, intheir pride and prosperity, looked down on every one that labored, tohave to do it for a living. Your grandmother said, it used to make herblood run cold to see them come into the house of God with such an air,getting up and sitting down two or three times, flaunting with their‘ribbins,’ and chattering like a striped squirrel on the side of atree. I was up there the year before Sam was born; and now to see howthey live! just the least little scriffin of bread and butter, or alittle pie; the least little piece of meat, about as big as your hand,which they run to the butcher’s to get, for they never have anythingin the cellar; then, instead of doing as we do, cutting it thick, andtelling everybody to help themselves, they cut it into little slicesand help them, for fear, I suppose, they should take too much; and thenso many compliments to so little victuals! But they put it on theirbacks, Sally; that’s what they do with it; they put it on their backs.As they have no hearty victuals and hard work to give them color, theypaint their faces, and look out of the windows, as Jezebel did: theyspend most all their time looking out of the windows.”
Sally rejoiced to find that, when following the inclinations of her ownheart, she had done just right; and with a face from which every traceof tears had vanished, replied, “I thought I knew your mind, mother;but I must go and get breakfast, for I thought I heard Sam getting up.”