Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife by Marietta Holley (ebook reader android txt) 📖

he might from such an enconium from one of the first wimmen of the ages, and I resoomed: “General Grant,” sez I, “are you brave enough and good enough to tackle the worst foe America ever had?” 154

Sez he, “What foe do you allude to, mam?”

Sez I, “The foe that slays one hundred thousand a year, and causes ten thousand murders every year, steals the vittles and clothes from starvin’ wimmen and children, has its deadly grip on Church and State, and makes our civilization and Christianity a mock and byword amongst them that think.”

“You allude to Intemperance, I presume,” sez he. He’s dretful smart; he knew it in a minute from my description.

“Yes,” sez I, “a foe a million times as dangerous as any your army ever faced, and a million times as hard to chase out of its ambuscade.”

Sez I, “Frederic (I thought mebby it would sound more convincin’ and friendly if I called him Frederic, and I wanted to convince him; I wanted to like a dog), I don’t believe in war, but when your men died in battle they didn’t moulder out a livin’ death, chained to tender hearts, dragged along the putrid death path with ’em. Their country honored ’em; they wuzn’t thrust into dishonored graves, some as paupers, some as criminals swingin’ from scaffolds. Their country mourns for ’em and honors ’em. It wuzn’t glad to cover their faces away from the light, brutish faces to hant ’em with reproach, I should think, knowin’ how they died. Try to think of that, Frederic; try to take it to heart.”

I hearn Arvilly behind me breathin’ hard and kinder chokin’ seemin’ly, and I knew she wuz holdin’ herself in as tight as if she had a rope round her emotions and indignations to keep her from breakin’ in and jinin’ our talk, but she wuz as true as steel to her word and didn’t say nothin’ and I resoomed:

“You’ve got to take such things to hum to realize ’em,” sez I. “Owin’ to a sweet mother and a good father your boy mebby is safe. But spozein’ he wuzn’t, spozein’ you and his sweet ma had to look on as millions of other pas and mas have to and see his handsome, manly young face growin’ red, dissipated, brutal; his light, gay young heart changed 155 to a demon’s, and from bein’ your chief pride you had to hide him out of sight like the foul and loathsome leper he had become. Millions of other pas and mas that love their boys as well as you love yours have to do this. And if it wuz your boy what would you say of the legalized crime that made him so? Wouldn’t you turn the might of your great strength aginst it?”

He didn’t speak out loud, but I see from his looks that he would. “Then,” sez I, “do, do think of other pas and mas and sisters and sweethearts and wives weepin’ and wailin’ for husbands, sons and brothers slain by this enemy! I spoze,” sez I reasonably, “that you think it is an old story and monotonous, but Love is an old story and Grief and Death, but they are jest as true as at the creation and jest as solemn.” I thought he looked a good deal convinced, but he looked as if he wuz thinkin’ of the extreme difficulty of reachin’ and vanquishin’ this foe intrenched as it is in the lowest passions of men, hidin’ behind the highest legal barriers and barricaded behind meetin’ house doors, guarded by the ballots of saint and sinner; I read these thoughts on his forehead, and answered ’em jest as if he’d spoke.

Sez I, “When your illustrious father come up face to face with a foe no other general could manage, did he flinch and draw back because it had been called onmanageable by everybody else? No, he drawed a line between good and evil, black and white, and says, ‘I’ll fight it right out on this line.’ And he did, and before his courage and bravery and persistence the foe fell. Now, Frederic, here is the biggest foe that the American people are facin’ to-day; here are weak generals and incompetent ones. Nobody can manage it; them high in authority wink at it and dassent tackle it, and so on down through all the grades of society––Church and State––they dassent touch it. And what is the burnin’est shame, them that ort to fight it support it with all the political and moral help they can give it. Here is a chance, Frederic, for you to do tenfold more for your country’s good 156 than ever your revered father did, and you know and I know that if it wasn’t for this great evil and a few others, such as the big Trusts and a few other things, our country is the greatest and best that the sun ever shone on. If we loved our country as we ort to we would try to make her do away with these evils and stand up perfect under the heavens. It is the ma that loves her child that spanks her into doin’ right if she can’t coax her, and now do lay hold and help your country up onto the highest pedestal that a country ever stood on, and I’ll help boost all I can.” I hearn behind me a loud “amen,” turned into a cough. Arvilly wuzn’t to blame; it spoke itself onbeknown to her.

Sez I, “This is a hard job I am askin’ you to tackle. The foe your father fit was in front of him, but this foe is within and without, and has for allies, powers and principalities and the Prince of Darkness. And now will you, bearin’ the name you do, of General Grant, will you flinch before this black-hearted foe that aims at the heart and souls of your countrymen and countrywomen, or will you lead the Forlorn Hope? I believe that if you would raise the White Banner and lead on this army of the Cross, Church and State would rally to your battle-cry, angels would swarm round your standard and the Lord of Hosts go forward before you.”

He didn’t say he would, I spoze he wuz too agitated. But he sez sunthin’ in a real polite way about what a good Ambassador his country had in me.

But I sez sadly, “I can’t do much, Frederic. I am a woman, and the only weepon that is able to slay this demon is hung up there in Washington, D. C. Wimmen can’t reach up to it, they can’t vote. But you can; your arm is longer, and with that you can slay this demon as St. George slew the dragon. And heaven itself would drop down heavenly immortelles to mix with our laurel leaves to crown your forehead. Think on it, Frederic, no war wuz ever so holy, no war on earth wuz ever so full of immortal consequences.”

And here I riz up, for I felt that I must leave the Presence, 157 not wantin’ to make the Presence twice glad. I reached out my right hand and sez, “Good-by, and God bless you, for your own sake and for the sake of your noble pa.”

He looked earnest and thoughtful, that allusion to the boy he loved so, named after his illustrious grandpa, had touched his very soul. I felt that I had not lost my breath or the eloquence I had lavished. I felt that he would help save other bright young boys from the demon that sought their lives––the bloody demon that stalks up and down our country wrapped in a shelterin’ mantilly made of the Stars and Stripes––oh, for shame! for shame that it is so! But I felt that General Grant would come up to the help of the Lord aginst the mighty, I felt it in my bones. But I wuz brung down a good deal in my feelin’s as Arvilly advanced to the front. She had kep’ her word as to talkin’, though the indignant sniffs and sithes behind me showed how hard it had been for her to keep her word, but now she advanced and sez, as she drew out her two books from her work bag: “General Grant, I have two books here I would like to show you, one is the ‘Twin Crimes of America: Intemperance and Greed,’ that subject so ably presented to you by Samantha; the other is ‘The Wild, Wicked and Warlike Deeds of Men.’”

Sez General Grant, risin’ up: “I haven’t time, madam, to examine them, but put me down as a subscriber to both.” Arvilly wuz in high sperits all the way back. As we wended our way to the tarven agin who should we find but Waitstill Webb, and we wuz dretful glad on’t, for we wuz layin’ out to leave Manila in a few days, and this would be our last meetin’ for some time, if not forever. Though I wuz glad to see when questioned by me about her return that she didn’t act so determined as she had acted about devotin’ her hull life to nursin’ the sick.

She told Arvilly confidential that she had had a letter from Ernest White since we had seen her. Arvilly knew that he had wanted to make her his bride before she left Jonesville. But the two ghosts, her murdered love and her duty, 158 stalked between ’em then, and I spozed wuz stalkin’ some now. But as I said more previous, the sun will melt the snow, and no knowin’ what will take place. I even fancied that the cold snow wuz a little more soft and slushy than it had been, but couldn’t tell for certain.