Samantha on the Woman Question, Marietta Holley [epub ebook reader .txt] 📗
- Author: Marietta Holley
Book online «Samantha on the Woman Question, Marietta Holley [epub ebook reader .txt] 📗». Author Marietta Holley
He dropped that skairful look and put on a firm judicial one. He see that he could not skair me to death; an’ sez he, “Oh, yes, they’ve been changed in cases of necessity.”
Sez I, “For instance durin’ the Oncivil war it wuz changed to make Northern men cheap bloodhounds and hunters.”
“Yes,” he said, “it seemed to be a case of necessity and economy.”
“I know it,” sez I; “men wuz cheaper than any other breed of bloodhounds the slave-holders could employ to hunt men and wimmen with, and more faithful.”
“Yes,” he said, “it wuz a case of clear economy.”
And sez I: “The laws have been changed to benefit liquor dealers.”
“Well, yes,” he said, “it had been changed to enable whiskey dealers to utilize the surplus liquor they import.”
Sez he, gittin’ kinder animated, for he wuz on a congenial and familar theme, “Nobody, the best calculators in drunkards, can exactly calculate how much whiskey will be drunk in a year; and so, ruther than have the whiskey dealers suffer loss, the law had to be changed. And then,” sez he, growin’ still more candid in his excitement, “we are makin’ a powerful effort to change the laws now so as to take the tax off of whiskey, so it can be sold cheaper, and obtained in greater quantities by the masses. Any such great laws would justify a change in the Constitution and the laws; but for any frivolous cause, any trivial cause, madam, we male custodians of the sacred Constitution stand as walls of iron before it, guarding it from any shadow of change. Faithful we will be, faithful unto death.”
Sez I, “As it has been changed, it can be agin. And you jest said I had convinced you that Serepta’s errents wuz errents of truth and justice, and you would love to do ’em.”
“Well, yes, yes—I would love to—as it were—. But, my dear madam, much as I would like to oblige you, I have not the time to devote to the cause of Right and Justice. I don’t think you realize the constant pressure of hard work that is ageing us and wearing us out, before our day.
“As I said, we have to watch the liquor interest constantly to see that the liquor dealers suffer no loss—we have to do that, of course.”
And he continued dreamily, as if losin’ sight of me and talkin’ to himself: “The wealthy Corporations and Trusts, we have to condemn them loudly to please the common people, and help ’em secretly to please ourselves, or our richest perkisits are lost. The Canal Ring, the Indian Agency, the Land Grabbers, the political bosses. In fact, we are surrounded by a host of bandits that we have to appease and profit by; oh, how these matters wear into the gray matter of our brains!”
“Gray matter!” sez I, with my nose uplifted to its extremest height, “I should call it black matter!”
“Well, the name is immaterial, but these labors, though pocket filling, are brain wearing. And of late I and the rest of our loyal henchmen have been worn out in our labors in tariff revision. You know how we claim to help the common people by the revision; you’ve probable read about it in the papers.”
“Yes,” sez I coldly, “I’ve hearn talk.”
“Yes,” sez he, “but if we do succeed, after the most strenious efforts in getting the duty off champagne, green turtle, olives, etc., and put on to sugar, tea, cotton cloth and such like, with all this brain fag and brain labor—”
“And tongue labor!” sez I in a icy axent.
“Yes, after all this ceaseless toil the common people will not show any gratitude; we statesmen labor oft with aching hearts.” And he leaned his forward on his hand and sithed.
But my looks wuz like ice-suckles on the north side of a barn. And I stopped his complaints and his sithes by askin’ in a voice that demanded a reply:
“Can you and will you do Serepta’s errents? Errents full of truth and justice and eternal right?”
He said he knew they wuz jest runnin’ over with them qualities, but happy as it would make him to do ’em, he had to refuse owin’ to the fur more important matters he had named, and the many, many other laws and preambles that he hadn’t time to name over to me. “Mebby you have heard,” sez he, “that we are now engaged in making most important laws concerning moth-millers, and minny fish, and hog cholera. And take it with these important bills and the constant strain on our minds in tryin’ to pass laws to increase our own salaries, you can see jest how cramped we are for time. And though we would love to pass some laws of truth and righteousness—we fairly ache to—yet not havin’ the requisite time we are forced to lay ’em on the table or under it.”
“Well,” sez I, “I guess I may as well be a-goin’.” And I bid him a cool goodbye and started for the door. But jest as my hand wuz on the nub he jumped up and opened the door, wearin’ that boughten second-hand smile agin on his linement, and sez he:
“Dear madam, perhaps Senator B. will do the errents for you.”
Sez I, “Where is Senator B.?” And he said I would find him at his Post of Duty at the Capitol.
“Well,” I said, “I will hunt up the Post,” and did. A grand enough place for a Emperor or a Zar is the Capitol of our great nation where I found him, a good natured lookin’ boy in buttons showin’ me the Post.
“NO HAMPERIN’ HITCHIN’ STRAPS”
Well, Senator B. wanted to do the errents but said it wuz not his place, and sent me to Senator C., and he almost cried, he wanted to do ’em so bad, but stern duty tied him to his Post, he said, and he sent me to Senator D., and he did cry onto his handkerchief, he wanted to do the errents so bad, and said it would be such a good thing to have ’em done. He bust right into tears as he said he had to refuse to do ’em. Whether they wuz wet tears or dry ones I couldn’t tell, his handkerchief wuz so big, but I hearn his sithes, and they wuz deep and powerful ones.
But as I sez to him, “Wet tears, nor dry ones, nor windy sithes didn’t help do the errents.” So I went on his sobbin’ advice to Senator E., and he wuz huffy and didn’t want to do ’em and said so. And said his wife had thirteen children, and wimmen instead of votin’ ort to go and do likewise.
And I told him it wouldn’t look well in onmarried wimmen and widders, and if they should foller her example folks would talk.
And he said, “They ort to marry.”
And I said, “As the fashion is now, wimmen had to wait for some man to ask ’em, and if they didn’t come up to the mark and ask ’em, who wuz to blame?”
He wouldn’t answer, and looked sulky, but honest, and wouldn’t tell me who to go to to git the errents done.
But jest outside his door I met the Senator I had left sobbin’ over the errents. He looked real hilarious, but drawed his face down when he ketched my eye, and sithed several times, and sent me to Senator F. and he sent me to Senator G.
And suffice it to say I wuz sent round, and talked to, and cried at, and sulked to, and smiled at and scowled at, and encouraged and discouraged, ’till my head swum and my knees wobbled under me. And with all my efforts and outlay of oratory and shue leather not one of Serepta Pester’s errents could I git done, and no hopes held out of their ever bein’ done. And about the middle of the afternoon I gin up, there wuz no use in tryin’ any longer and I turned my weary tracks towards the outside door. But as bad as I felt, I couldn’t help my sperit bein’ lifted up some by the grandeur about me.
Oh, my land! to stand in the immense hall and look up, and up, and see all the colors of the rain-bow and see what wonderful pictures there wuz up there in the sky above me as it were. Why, it seemed curiouser than any Northern lights I ever see in my life, and they stream up dretful curious sometimes. And as I walked through that lofty and most beautiful place and realized the size and majestic proportions of the buildin’ I wondered to myself that a small law, a little unjust law could ever be passed in such grand and magnificent surroundin’s. And I sez to myself, it can’t be the fault of the place anyway; the law-makers have a chance for their souls to soar if they want to, here is room and to spare to pass laws big as elephants and camels, and I wondered that they should ever try to pass laws as small as muskeeters and nats. Thinkses I, I wonder them little laws don’t git to strollin’ round and git lost in them magnificent corridors. But I consoled myself, thinkin’ it wouldn’t be no great loss if they did. But right here, as I wuz thinkin’ on these deep and lofty subjects, I met the good natured young chap that had showed me round and he sez:
“You look fatigued, mom.” (Soarin’ even to yourself is tuckerin’.) “You look very fatigued; won’t you take something?”
I looked at him with a curious silent sort of a look; for I didn’t know what he meant. Agin he looked clost at me and sort o’ pityin’; and sez he, “You look tired out, mom. Won’t you take something? Let me treat you to something; what will you take, mom?”
I thought he wuz actin’ dretful liberal, but I knew they had strange ways in Washington anyway. And I didn’t know but it wuz their way to make some present to every woman that comes there, and I didn’t want to act awkward and out of style, so I sez:
“I don’t want to take anything, and don’t see any reason why you should insist on’t. But if I have got to take sunthin’ I had jest as soon have a few yards of factory cloth as anything. That always comes handy.”
I thought that if he wuz determined to treat me to show his good feelin’s towards me, I would git sunthin’ useful and that would do me some good, else what wuz the good of bein’ treated? And I thought that if I had got to take a present from a strange man, I would make a shirt for Josiah out of it. I thought that would save jealousy and make it right so fur as goodness went.
“But,” sez he, “I mean beer or wine or liquor of some kind.”
I riz right up in my shues and dignity, and glared at him.
Sez he, “There is a saloon right here handy in the buildin’.”
Sez I in awful axents, “It is very appropriate to have it here handy!” Sez I, “Liquor duz more towards makin’ the laws of the United States from Caucus to Convention than anything else duz, and it is highly proper to have it here so they can soak the laws in it right off before they lay ’em onto the table or under ’em, or pass ’em onto the people. It is highly appropriate,” sez I.
“Yes,” sez he. “It is very handy for the Senators and Congressmen, and let me get you a glass.”
“No, you won’t!” sez I firmly. “The nation suffers enough from that room now without havin’ Josiah Allen’s wife let in.”
Sez he, “If you have any feeling of delicacy in goin’ in there, let me make some wine here. I will get a glass of water and make you some pure grape wine, or French brandy, or corn or rye whiskey. I have all the drugs right here.” And he took a little box out of his pocket. “My father is a importer of rare old wines, and I know just how it is done. I have ’em all here, Capsicum, Coculus Indicus, alum, copperas, strychnine; I will make some of the choicest, oldest, and purest imported liquors we have in the country, in five minutes if you say so.”
“No!” sez I firmly, “when I want to foller Cleopatra’s fashion and commit suicide, I will hire a rattlesnake and take my pizen as she did, on the outside.”
Well, I got back to Hiram Cagwin’s tired as a dog, and Serepta’s errents ondone. But my conscience opholded me and told me I had done my
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