The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 01, No. 05, March, 1858

"Unless I make fun of you, what else have I to laugh at?"

"Well, do! Make fun of me to your heart's content! Who cares?"

"You promise to laugh with us, and not be offended?"

"I promise not to be offended. My laughing depends upon your wit."

"There is no mirth left in me, Kate. I am convinced that I ought to say with Jacques, ''Tis good to be sad, and say nothing.'"

"Then I shall answer as Rosalind did,—'Why, then, 'tis good to be a post!' No, no, Charlie, do be merry. Or if you cannot, just now, at least encourage 'a most humorous sadness,' and that will he the first step to real mirth."

"I shall never be merry again, Lina, till you let me recall Mr. –.

That care weighs me down, and I truly believe retards my recovery."

"Hush, Charlie!" she said, imperiously.

"Now, dear Kate, do not be obstinate. My position is too cruel. With the alleviation of knowing your happiness secure, I could bear my lot. But now it is intolerable, utterly!"

She was silent.

"You must give me that consolation."

"To say I would ever leave you, Charlie, while you are so helpless, would be to tell a lie, for I could not do it. Mr. – is a civil engineer. He is always travelling about. I should have no settled home to take you to. How can you suppose I would abandon you? Do you think I could find any happiness after doing it? Let us be silent about this."

"I will not, Kate. I am sure, that, besides being a selfish, it would be a foolish thing to submit to you in this matter. I shall linger, perhaps, until your youth is gone, and then have the pang, far worse than any other I could suffer, of leaving you quite alone in the world. Do listen to reason!"

She sat thinking. At last she said, "Well, wait one year."

"That would be nonsensical procrastination. Does not the doctor declare that a year will not better my condition?"

"But he cannot be sure. And I promise you, Charlie, that, if Mr. – asks me then, I will think about it,—and if you are better, go with him. More I will not promise."

"A year from last February, you mean?"—A pause.

"Encroacher! Yes, then."

"And you will write to him to say so?"

"Indeed! That would be pretty behavior!"

"But as you rejected him decidedly, he may form new"–She clapped her hand upon my mouth.

"Dare to say it!" she cried.

I removed her hand, and said, eagerly, "Now, Kate, do not trifle. I must have some certainty that I am not wrecking your happiness. I cannot wait a year in suspense. I am a man. I have not the patience of your incomprehensible sex."

"I have more than patience to support me, Charlie," she whispered. "He insisted upon refusing to take a positive answer then, and said he should return again next spring, to see if I were in the same mind. So be at ease!"

I sighed, unsatisfied.

"I am sure he will come," she said, turning quite away, that I might not dwell upon her warm blush.

"There is Ben with the horse. Are you ready?" she asked, glad to change the subject.

I was always ready for that I had enjoyed the "jaunting-car-r-r" so much, that my sister, resolved to gratify me further, had made comfortable arrangements for longer excursions. I found that I could sit up, if well supported by pillows; and so Kate had her "cabriolet" brought out and repaired.

She had not the least idea of what a cabriolet might be, when she named her vehicle so; but it sounded fine and foreign, and was a sort of witty contrast to the misshapen affair it represented. It was indescribable in form, but had qualities which recommended it to me. It was low, wide-seated, high-backed, broad, and long. The front wheels turned under, which was a lucky circumstance, as Kate was to be driver. Ben could not be spared from his work, and I was out of the question.

We have a horse to match this unique affair, called "Old Soldier,"—an excellent name for him; though, if Kate reads this remark, she will take mortal offence at it. She calls the venerable fellow her charger, because he makes such bold charges at the steep hills,—the only occasions upon which the cunning beast ever exerts himself in the least, well knowing that he will be instantly reined in. Kate has a horror of going out of a walk, on either ascent or descent, because "up-hill is such hard pulling, and down-hill so dangerous!"

Old Soldier can discern a grade of five feet to the mile of either. If I did not know his history, (an old omnibus horse,) I should say he must have practised surveying for years. He accommodates himself most obligingly to his mistress's whims, and walks carefully most of the time, except when he is ambitious of great praise at little cost, when he makes the charges aforesaid.

"He is so considerate, usually!" Kate says; "he knows we don't like tearing up and down hills; but now and then his spirit runs away with him!"—I wish it would some day with us. No hope of it!

We stop every two miles to water the horse, and though we are exceedingly moderate in our donations, we are a fortune to the hostlers. I carry the purse, as Kate is quite occupied in holding the reins, and keeping a sharp look-out that her charger don't run off. Not that he ever showed a disposition that way,—being generally quite agreeable, if we wish him to stand ever so long a time; but Kate says he is very nervous, and he might be startled, and then we might find it impossible to stop him,—a thing easy enough hitherto.

I am obliged to keep the purse in my hand all the time, there being such frequent use for it. Kate says,—

"Give the man a half-dime, Charlie, if you can find one. A three-cent piece looks mean, you know; and a fip mounts up so, it is rather extravagant. That is the twelfth fip that man has had this week, and for only holding up a bucket a half-minute at a time; for Soldier only takes one swallow."

She will pay every time we stop, if it is six times a day.

"Shall I give the man a half-dollar at once," I ask, "and let that do for a week?"

"No, indeed! How mean I should feel, sneaking off without paying!"

When the roadside shows a patch of tender grass, Kate eyes it, and checks Soldier's pace. He knows what that means, and edges toward the tempting herbage.

"Poor fellow!" his driver says,—"it is like our having to pass a plate of peaches. Let him have a bite."

And so we wait while he grazes awhile. It is the same thing when we cross a brook, and Soldier pauses in it to cool his feet and look at his reflection in the water.

"Perhaps he wants a drink. We won't hurry him. We will let him see that we can afford to wait."

If he had not come to that conclusion from the very start, he must have believed human beings were miracles of patience and forbearance.

I could write a fine dissertation upon Kate's foolish fondness and her blind indulgence. I could show that these are the great failings of her sex, and prove how very much more rational my sex would be in like circumstances. But I find it too pleasant to be the recipient of such favors myself just now, to find fault. Wait until I do not need woman's tenderness, and then I'll abuse it famously. I will say then, that she is weak, foolish, imprudent; I will say, she kills with kindness, spoils with indulgence, and all that; but just now I will say nothing.

In one thing I think her kindness very sensible,—she uses no check-rein. I think with Sir Francis Head, that all horses are handsomer with their heads held as Nature pleases. I pity the poor creatures when I see them turning to one side and the other, to find a little relief in change of position. To restrain horses thus, who have heavy loads to pull, is the height of folly, as a waste of power.

You take no interest in these remarks, perhaps; but treasure them. If ever, Cousin Mary, you drive a dray, they will serve you.

[To be continued.]

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THY PSYCHE