In order to regain my spirits, I shook hands with the handsome giant inbrass buttons; and speaking of giants leads me to the subject of all_lusus naturae_, particularly the Circassian young lady, the dwarf, theliving skeleton, the Albinos, and What-is-it. I have dropped more thanone tear at the fate of these unfortunate beings; for what is morehorribly solitary than to live in a strange crowd, with
"No one to love, None to caress?"
Noah was human. When he retired to the ark, he selected two of a kindfrom all the animal kingdom for the sake of sociability as well as formore practical purposes. Showmen should be equally considerate. To thinkof those Albino sisters with never an Albino beau, of the Circassianbeauty with never a Circassian sweetheart, of the living skeleton withnever another skeleton in his closet (how he can look so good-naturedwould be most mysterious, were not his digestion pronounced perfect), tothink of the wretched What-is-it with never a Mrs. What-is-it, producesunspeakable anguish. May they meet their affinities in another and amore sympathetic world, where monstrosities are impossible for thereason that we leave our bones on earth. Since gazing at the What-is-it,I have become a convert to Darwin. It is too true. Our ancestors stoodon their hind legs, and the less we talk about pedigree the better. Thenoble democrat in search of a coat-of-arms and a grandfather shouldvisit a grand moral circus. Let us assume a virtue, though we have itnot; let our pride _ape_ humility.
Were I asked which I thought the greater necessity of civilization,lectures or circuses, I should lay my right hand upon my left heart, andexclaim, "Circuses!"
YAWCOB STRAUSS
BY CHARLES FOLLEN ADAMS
I haf von funny leedle poy, Vot gomes schust to mine knee; Der queerest schap, der createst rogue, As efer you dit see.
He runs, und schumps, und schmashes dings In all barts off der house: But vot off dot? he vas mine son, Mine leedle Yawcob Strauss.
He gets der measles und der mumbs, Und eferyding dot's oudt; He sbills mine glass off lager bier, Poots schnuff indo mine kraut.
He fills mine pipe mit Limburg cheese,-- Dot vas der roughest chouse: I'd dake dot vrom no oder poy But leedle Yawcob Strauss.
He dakes der milk-ban for a dhrum, Und cuts mine cane in dwo, To make der schticks to beat it mit,-- Mine cracious, dot vas drue!
I dinks mine hed vas schplit abart, He kicks oup sooch a touse: But nefer mind; der poys vas few Like dot young Yawcob Strauss.
He asks me questions sooch as dese: Who baints mine nose so red? Who vas it cuts dot schmoodth blace oudt Vrom der hair ubon mine hed?
Und vhere der plaze goes vrom der lamp Vene'er der glim I douse. How gan I all dose dings eggsblain To dot schmall Yawcob Strauss?
I somedimes dink I schall go vild Mit sooch a grazy poy, Und vish vonce more I gould haf rest, Und beaceful dimes enshoy;
But ven he vas ashleep in ped, So guiet as a mouse, I prays der Lord, "Dake anyding, But leaf dot Yawcob Strauss."
SEFFY AND SALLY
BY JOHN LUTHER LONG
The place was the porch of the store, the time was about ten o'clock inthe morning of a summer day, the people were the amiable loafers--andOld Baumgartner. The person he was discoursing about was his sonSephenijah. I am not sure that the name was not the ripe fruit of hisfather's fancy--with, perhaps, the Scriptural suggestion which is likelyto be present in the affairs of a Pennsylvania-German--whether acommunicant or not--even if he live in Maryland.
"Yas--always last; expecial at funerals and weddings. Except hisown--he's sure to be on time at his own funeral. Right out in front!Hah? But sometimes he misses his wedding. Why, I knowed a feller--yousall knowed him, begoshens!--that didn't git there tell another feller'dmarried her--'bout more'n a year afterward. Wasn't it more'n a year,boys? Yas--Bill Eisenkrout. Or, now, was it his brother--BaltzerIron-Cabbage? Seems to me now like it was Baltz. Somesing wiss a B atthe front end, anyhow."
Henry Wasserman diffidently intimated that there was a curious butsatisfactory element of safety in being last--a "fastnacht" in theirlanguage, in fact. Those in front were the ones usually hurt in railroadaccidents, Alexander Althoff remembered.
"Safe?" cried the speaker. "Of course! But for why--say, for why?" OldBaumgartner challenged defiantly.
No one answered and he let several impressive minutes intervene.
"You don't know! Hang you, none of yous knows! Well--because he ain'tthere when anysing occurs--always a little late!"
They agreed with him by a series of sage nods.
"But, fellers, the worst is about courting. It's no way to be alwayslate. Everybody else gits there first, and it's nossing for thefastnacht but weeping and wailing and gnashing of the teeth. And mebbythe other feller gits considerable happiness--and a good farm."
There was complaint in the old man's voice, and they knew that he meanthis own son Seffy. To add to their embarrassment, this same son was nowappearing over the Lustich Hill--an opportune moment for a pleasingdigression. For you must be told early concerning Old Baumgartner'slonging for certain lands, tenements and hereditaments--using his ownphrase--which were not his own, but which adjoined his. It had passedinto a proverb of the vicinage; indeed, though the property in questionbelonged to one Sarah Pressel, it was known colloquially as"Baumgartner's Yearn."
And the reason of it was this: Between his own farm and the public road(and the railroad station when it came) lay the fairest meadow-landfarmer's eye had ever rested upon. (I am speaking again for the fatherof Seffy and with his hyperbole.) Save in one particular, it was like anenemy's beautiful territory lying between one's less beautiful own andthe open sea--keeping one a poor inlander who is mad for the seas--whosecrops must either pass across the land of his adversary and pay tithesto him, or go by long distances around him at the cost of greater tithesto the soulless owners of the turnpikes--who aggravatingly fix a gateeach way to make their tithes more sure. So, I say, it was like havingthe territory of his enemy lying between him and the deep water--save,as I have also said, in one particular, to wit: that the owner--theSarah Pressel I have mentioned--was not Old Baumgartner's enemy.
In fact, they were tremendous friends. And it was by thisfriendship--and one other thing which I mean to mention later--that OldBaumgartner hoped, before he died, to attain the wish of his life, andsee, not only the Elysian pasture-field, but the whole of the adjoiningfarm, with the line fences down, a part of his. The other thing Ipromised to mention as an aid to this ambition--was Seffy. And, sincethe said Sarah was of nearly the same age as Seffy, perhaps I need notexplain further, except to say that the only obstruction the old mancould see now to acquiring the title by marriage was--Seffy himself. Hewas, and always had been, afraid of girls--especially such aggressive,flirtatious, pretty and tempestuous girls as this Sarah.
These things, however, were hereditary with the girl. It was historical,in fact, that, during the life of Sarah's good-looking father, soimportunate had been Old Baumgartner for the purchase of at least themeadow--he could not have ventured more at that time--and so obstinatehad been the father of the present owner--(he had red hair precisely ashis daughter had)--that they had come to blows about it, to thediscomfiture of Old Baumgartner; and, afterward, they did not speak.Yet, when the loafers at the store laughed, Baumgartner swore that hewould, nevertheless, have that pasture before he died.
But then, as if fate, too, were against him, the railroad was built, andits station was placed so that the Pressel farm lay directly between itand him, and of course the "life" went more and more in the directionof the station--left him more and more "out of it"--and made him poorerand poorer, and Pressel richer and richer. And, when the store laughedat _that_, Baumgartner swore that he would possess half of the farmbefore he died; and as Pressel and his wife died, and Seffy grew up, andas he noticed the fondness of the little red-headed girl for his littletow-headed boy, he added to his adj
uration that he would be harrowingthat whole farm before _he_ died,--_without paying a cent for it_!
But both Seffy and Sally had grown to a marriageable age withoutanything happening. Seffy had become inordinately shy, while thecoquettish Sally had accepted the attentions of Sam Pritz, the clerk atthe store, as an antagonist more worthy of her, and in a fashion whichsometimes made the father of Seffy swear and lose his temper--withSeffy. Though, of course, in the final disposition of the matter, he wassure that no girl so nice as Sally would marry such a person as SamPritz, with no extremely visible means of support--a salary of fourdollars a week, and an odious reputation for liquor. And it was forthese things, all of which were known (for Baumgartner had not a singlesecret) that the company at the store detected the personal equation inOld Baumgartner's communications.
Seffy had almost arrived by this time, and Sally was in the store! WithSam! The situation was highly dramatic. But the old man consummatelyignored this complication and directed attention to his son. For him,the molasses-tapper did not exist. The fact is he was overjoyed. Seffy,for once in his life, would be on time! He would do the rest.
"Now, boys, chust look at 'em! Dogged if they ain't bose like oneanother! How's the proferb? Birds of a feather flock wiss one another?I dunno. Anyhow, Sef flocks wiss Betz constant. And they understand oneanother good. Trotting like a sidewise dog of a hot summer's day!" Andhe showed the company, up and down the store-porch, just how a sidewisedog would be likely to trot on a hot summer day--and then laughedjoyously.
If there had been an artist eye to see they would have been well worthits while--Seffy and the mare so affectionately disparaged. And, afterall, I am not sure that the speaker himself had not an artist's eye. Fora spring pasture, or a fallow upland, or a drove of goodly cows deep inhis clover, I know he had. (Perhaps you, too, have?) And this was hisbest mare and his only son.
The big bay, clad in broad-banded harness, soft with oil and glitteringwith brasses, was shambling indolently down the hill, resisting her ownmomentum by the diagonal motion the old man had likened to a dog'ssidewise trot. The looped trace-chains were jingling a merry dithyramb,her head was nodding, her tail swaying, and Seffy, propped by his elbowon her broad back, one leg swung between the hames, the other keepingtime on her ribs, was singing:
"'I want to be an angel And with the angels stand, A crown upon my forehead A harp within my hand--'"
His adoring father chuckled. "I wonder what for kind of anchel he'dmake, anyhow? And Betz--they'll have to go together. Say, I wonder if it_is_ horse-anchels?"
No one knew; no one offered a suggestion.
"Well, it ought to be. Say--he ken perform circus wiss ol' Betz!"
They expressed their polite surprise at this for perhaps the hundredthtime.
"Yas--they have a kind of circus-ring in the barnyard. He stands on onefoot, then on another, and on his hands wiss his feet kicking, and thenhe says words--like hokey-pokey--and Betz she kicks up behind and throwshim off in the dung and we all laugh--happy efer after--Betz most ofall!"
After the applause he said:
"I guess I'd better wake 'em up! What you sink?"
They one and all thought he had. They knew he would do it, no matterwhat they thought. His method, as usual, was his own. He stepped to theadjoining field, and, selecting a clod with the steely polish of theplowshare upon it, threw it at the mare. It struck her on the flank. Shegathered her feet under her in sudden alarm, then slowly relaxed, lookedslyly for the old man, found him, and understanding, suddenly wheeledand ambled off home, leaving Seffy prone on the ground as her part ofthe joke.
The old man brought Seffy in triumph to the store-porch.
"Chust stopped you afore you got to be a anchel!" he was saying. "Wecouldn't bear to sink about you being a anchel--an' wiss the anchelsstand--a harp upon your forehead, a crown within your hand, Iexpect--when it's corn-planting time."
Seffy grinned cheerfully, brushed off the dust and contemplated hisfather's watch--held accusingly against him. Old Baumgartner went ongaily.
"About an inch and a half apast ten! Seffy, I'm glad you ain't breakingyour reputation for being fastnachtich. Chust about a quarter of an inchtoo late for the prize wiss flour on its hair and arms and its frockpinned up to show its new petticoat! Uhu! If I had such a nicepetticoat--" he imitated the lady in question, to the tremendous delightof the gentle loafers.
Seffy stared a little and rubbed some dust out of his eyes. He waspleasant but dull.
"Yassir, Sef, if you'd a-got yere at a inch and a quarter apast! NowSam's got her. Down in the cellar a-licking molasses together! Doggoneif Sam don't git eferysing--except his due bills. He don't want to be noanchel tell he dies. He's got fun enough yere--but Seffy--you're likethe flow of molasses in January--at courting."
This oblique suasion made no impression on Seffy. It is doubtful if heunderstood it at all. The loafers began to smile. One laughed. The oldman checked him with a threat of personal harm.
"Hold on there, Jefferson Dafis Busby," he chid. "I don't allow no oneto laugh at my Seffy--except chust me--account I'm his daddy. It's afight-word the next time you do it."
Mr. Busby straightened his countenance.
"He don't seem to notice--nor keer--'bout gals--do he?"
No one spoke.
"No, durn him, he ain't no good. Say--what'll you give for him, hah?Yere he goes to the highest bidder--for richer, for poorer, for better,for worser, up and down, in and out, swing your partners--what's bid? Heken plow as crooked as a mule's hind leg, sleep hard as a 'possum inwintertime, eat like a snake, git left efery time--but he ken ketchfish. They wait on him. What's bid?"
No one would hazard a bid.
"Yit a minute," shouted the old fellow, pulling out his bull's-eyewatch again, "what's bid? Going--going--all done--going--"
"A dollar!"
The bid came from behind him, and the voice was beautiful to hear. Agleam came into the old man's eyes as he heard it. He deliberately putthe watch back in its pocket, put on his spectacles, and turned, as ifshe were a stranger.
"Gone!" he announced then. "Who's the purchaser? Come forwards and takeaway you' property. What's the name, please?" Then he pretended torecognize her. "Oach! Sally! Well, that's lucky! He goes in good hands.He's sound and kind, but needs the whip." He held out his hand for thedollar.
It was the girl of whom he had spoken accurately as a prize. Her sleeveswere turned up as far as they would go, revealing some soft lace-trimmedwhiteness, and there _was_ flour on her arms. Some patches of it on herface gave a petal-like effect to her otherwise aggressive color. Thepretty dress was pinned far enough back to reveal the prettierpetticoat--plus a pair of trimly-clad ankles.
Perhaps these were neither the garments nor the airs in which everyfarmer-maiden did her baking. But then, Sally was no ordinaryfarmer-maiden. She was all this, it is true, but she was, besides, graceand color and charm itself. And if she chose to bake in such attire--or,even, if she chose to pretend to do so, where was the churl to say hernay, even though the flour was part of a deliberate "make up"? Certainlyhe was not at the store that summer morning.
And Seffy was there. Her hair escaped redness by only a little. But thatlittle was just the difference between ugliness and beauty. For, whetherSally were beautiful or not--about which we might contend a bit--herhair was, and perhaps that is the reason why it was nearly alwaysuncovered--or, possibly, again, because it was so much uncovered was thereason it was beautiful. It seemed to catch some of the glory of thesun. Her face had a few freckles and her mouth was a trifle too large.But, in it were splendid teeth.
In short, by the magic of brilliant color and natural grace she narrowlyescaped being extremely handsome--in the way of a sunburned peach, or amaiden's-blush apple. And even if you should think she were nothandsome, you would admit that there was an indescribable rustic charmabout her. She was like the aroma of the hay-fields, or the woods, or afield of daisies, or dandelions.
The girl,
laughing, surrendered the money, and the old man, taking anarm of each, marched them peremptorily away.
"Come to the house and git his clothes. Eferysing goes in--stofepipehat, butterfly necktie, diamond pin, toothbrush, hair-oil, razor andsoap."
They had got far enough around the corner to be out of sight of thestore, during this gaiety, and the old man now shoved Seffy and the girlout in front of him, linked their arms, and retreated to the rear.
"What Sephenijah P. Baumgartner, Senior, hath j'ined together, letnobody put athunder, begoshens!" he announced.
The proceeding appeared to be painful to Seffy, but not to Sally. Shefrankly accepted the situation and promptly put into action itsopportunities for coquetry. She begged him, first, with consummateaplomb, to aid her in adjusting her parcels more securely, insistingupon carrying them herself, and it would be impossible to describeadequately her allures. The electrical touches, half-caress,half-defiance; the confidential whisperings, so that the wily old man inthe rear might not hear; the surges up against him; the recoveries--onlyto surge again--these would require a mechanical contrivance whichreports not only speech but action--and even this might easily fail, sosubtle was it all!
The Wit and Humor of America, Volume II. (of X.) Page 12