Papers from Overlook-House

"Stop and see me the first time you come along the main street in a bold manner.

    "Your friend,
    "J. Walters."

These annoyances had at least a good effect. I resolved that I would see the widow, and throwing off my nervous anxiety, explain to her that I could not possibly find materials sufficient for a biography. I intended also to suggest, that a physician might be better qualified for the undertaking.

Hence I gladly accepted the invitation of a fair cousin of mine, to be one of her guests for an evening party; where I felt confident that I should meet the widow.

It had now been several weeks since I had been thrown into the society of ladies. My health was improved. The nervous fever that had agitated me, had passed away. The fascination of one whom I had sometimes met in our village gatherings, seemed to be restoring me to myself.

After a while, my companion looking across the room, said to me, "How well our widow looks this evening."

I thought that there was a mischievous look in her laughing eye. But sure enough – there stood the Empress, who had commanded the biography. She was resting her hand upon a piano, and in deep conversation with Judge Plian.

I crossed the room and spoke to her. She received me politely – but not as one who had the slightest recollection, that there was any tie of the most profound interest between us. Surely a man writing her deceased husband's biography, should have immediately become her chief object of attention. On the contrary, after a few common-place words, she turned to the Judge, and became absorbed in his conversation.

And this was the more remarkable, because the man was by no means good-looking. Nay, I think him rather insignificant. I had a few words with him on the occasion of the trial of that miserable creature, who would get himself hung, and I concluded, not only that he was not well versed in legal learning, but that he was a remarkably stubborn man, riveted to his opinions, even when, by means of lucid argument, you proved him to be in error.

A short time afterwards I entered into conversation with my fair cousin. She directed me to look at the two, near the piano.

"They will make a good-looking couple, will they not?"

"What do you mean?"

"Why, have you not heard of their engagement?"

"Engagement!"

"Yes, it has been a short acquaintance. Indeed, Bob, now that it recurs to my mind, I heard that she sent you out of the way, into the country on business, that the Judge might not be alarmed by the appearance of a rival. But you know that villagers are famous for gossip. Of course there was nothing in it. And I said, you never had a serious thought about her."

Was ever anything like this? Before the shoes were old with which she followed my poor father's body. While the Biography of her deceased husband was in progress, she forms an engagement with a man of no sort of personal attractions, and who, being on the bench, can have his legal decisions confuted by a young lawyer.

Surely the most strict moralist would confess, that I was released from my engagements! Surely Sir Charles Grandison would have said, that I need not put myself forward for an explanation with the widow. If she spoke to me on the subject, could I not say, "Let the Judge write the book?"

These notes have not been written in vain, if I can contribute, in the least degree, to the awakening of the public mind to a demand for greater moral principles, in the composition of histories, and of the memoirs of distinguished men.

I thought that the widow might send me a note, before many days had passed. I waited, and concluded in a Christian spirit, that if she applied to me, she should have the notes which I had accumulated. But I never heard again of my first attempt at writing a memoir. I never heard again of Dr. Bolton's Biography.

IV.

KATYDIDS: – A NEW CHAPTER IN NATURAL HISTORY

John Jones, a man who said he hated strife,
Had from the altar led an able wife.
No lines told scandal on a wrinkled brow;
Temper and Time are rivals with their plow.
Some said that she was gentle as the May;
That Jones, the dog, was now to have his day.

Your pardon, men, I pray you now dispense,
If I proclaim you void of common sense,
When you would have your wives to know no will,
To have no thought but such as you instill;
To be your shadows, never to suggest,
Each judgment crossing yours at once represt;
And to suppose, that every chiding word
Shall from your bearded lips alone be heard.

If no resistance met us in our home,
What petty tyrants would all men become?
The little wits that most of men possess,
For want of sharp'ning would become far less;
The selfish streams that flow from out our will,
So far corrupted be more stagnant still:
And restless, we should wage an inward war,
But for the soothing rays of home's true star.
Oh, let this wrong abuse of women end,
In me, at least, they'll find a sturdy friend.
I give my witness, I who have been thrown,
Widely with all in Country and in Town,
Women are best of all our fallen race,
Richer in heart, than e'en in outward grace,
And if our homes are not the abodes of peace,
The fault is ours; and the complaint should cease.

In that small dwelling there – from morn to night,
A woman toils, withdrawn from human sight;
A plain poor woman, in a common dress,
Of kindly tones, and of uncouth address.

Just wend thy way unto the little brook,
Day after day upon its waters look,
See every day the self-same ripples there,
On those same stones, for ages smooth and bare.

So she from day to day the course of life,
Finds one recurring call of labor's strife,
Save when God's blessed day of rest hath come,
And its sun shines, as in the church, at home.
Unlike the stream she has no murmuring tone,
She has God's will to do, and it is done.

With tender care she trains her youthful band,
And never wearies in her heart or hand;
Is ready, when the music in her ear,
From one loved step, proclaims her husband near,
To spread the frugal board, the welcome give,
In each act say, for self I do not live.