Fanny Fern

“ Had cousin John no war to wage with self? Could the long-hoarded hope of years be relinquished without a struggle? Could blissful days and nights, in which to breathe the same air with Rose, win even the faintest smile, were reward enough for any toil,—could such memories cease at once to thrill? Could he see that smile, in all its brightness, beaming upon another?—hear that voice ten fold more musically modulated whispering (not for him) words he would have died to hear—and not feel a pang bitter as death? Tell me, ye who have made earth-idols only to see them pass away? ”

“ What fathers, husbands, brothers, lovers can be thinking about, to be willing that the women they respect and love, should appear in public, looking like women whom they despise, is a marvel to me. Why they do not say this to them, and shame them into a decent appearance—if their glasses cannot effect it—I do not know. Oh, the relief it is to meet a lady, instead of a ballet-girl! Oh, the relief it is to see a healthy, firm-stepping, rosy, broad-chested, bright-eyed woman, clad simply and free from bunches and tags! ”

“ Some pedestrians gaze curiously at him; others, like the Levite, “pass by on the other side.” A woman approaches. She is plainly clad, and bears a basket on her arm. She has a good, kind, motherly face, as if she were hastening back to some humble home, made brighter and happier by her presence. Life is sweet to her. She catches sight of the poor old man; her eye falls upon the label affixed to his breast: “I am blind!” Oh, what if the brightness and beauty of this glad sunshine were all night to her veiled lids? What if the dear home faces were for ever shrouded from her yearning sight? ”

“ The bridal party turn from the altar. Through the stained windows—under the grand arches—past the fluted pillars, the dim light slants lovingly upon the soft ripples of the young bride’s hair—upon the fleecy folds of her gossamer vail—upon the sheen of her bridal robe; the little satin shoe peeps in and out from under the lustrous folds, whose every rustle is music to Percy’s ear.
Hark! Fanny’s lip loses its rose—as she clings, tremblingly, to Percy’s arm. A scuffle—curses—shouting—the report of a pistol—then a heavy fall—then a low groan! ”

“ To sit down in your own dear old chair, and kick your slippers across the room; to talk without being overheard; to eat with only those whom you love about you—for this promiscuous hotel-feeding is repulsive to me beyond the power of expression. I think I am peculiar on this point, but it seems to me as great an individual profanation as to admit the same number of people to see you perform your toilette for dinner. That there are people to whom it is one of the delights of travel to sit down to such hecatombs of food with such a menagerie of human beings, I am well aware. ”

“ Scratch—scratch—scratch, went Ruth’s pen; the dim lamp flickering in the night breeze, while the deep breathing of the little sleepers was the watchword, On! to her throbbing brow and weary fingers. One o’clock—two o’clock—three o’clock—the lamp burns low in the socket. Ruth lays down her pen, and pushing back the hair from her forehead, leans faint and exhausted against the window-sill, that the cool night-air may fan her heated temples. How impressive the stillness! Ruth can almost hear her own heart beat. She looks upward, and the watchful stars seem to her like the eyes of gentle friends. ”

“ The beautiful young mother smiled incredulously, as she looked around their simple room, where little Napoleon’s brothers and sisters played and studied from day to day, under her own eye, their hours for refreshment, sleep, and lessons marked out by her, and never departed from, any more than if it were a convent, and she its stately but loving lady abbess. “Rule the world!” She looked into the baby’s calm blue eyes, and thought no more of it. Were they not happy enough? It was a loving mother’s thought, but none the less heaven-born for that. Rule the world! ”

“ She is young to know sorrow. Life's morning should be all sunshine;—clouds come at its noon and eve.
Listen! some one glides gently into Nettie's room. It is a very old lady, but her form is drawn up as straight as your own, though her face is seamed with wrinkles and her hand trembles with age. She is stern and hard-featured. Should you meet her anywhere you would feel a chill come over you, as if the bright sun were clouded. You never would dare to lay your head upon her lap, and you would not think of kissing her, any more than you would a stone post. ”

“ Neither was she cross or ill-tempered, nor did she beat and push little Horace round and tell him that he was always in the way, as some poor, tired, hard-working women do; not she—she was the merriest, jolliest, funniest, story-telling-est woman you ever heard of; went singing after the hay-cart, singing to the plow, singing to the barn-yard, singing to dinner, and singing to bed. That robbed labor of half its weariness, and winged the feet of every body about her; so little Horace was not afraid to follow his mother about. ”

“ How can I live without love? without Rose's love? Tell me how you learned, Gertrude, to tame down that fiery heart of yours."
Gertrude only replied by her caresses; for, in truth, her heart was too full.
There is an outward life visible to all; there is an inward life known only to our own souls, and Him who formed them.
Was Gertrude's heart "tamed?"
Ah, there were moments when she threw aside book, pallet, and pencil, when she could listen only to its troubled, mournful wailings, because there was nothing in all the wide earth, that could satisfy its cravings. ”

“ We who have awoke in the morning, with a sharp shuddering cry at the awful reality, and closed our eyes again wearily upon the sweet morning light, and the song of birds, and the scent of flowers, every one of which have given us pangs keener than death; we who have risen, and with a dead, dull weight at the heart, moved about mechanically like one walking in sleep, through the gray, colorless treadmill routine of to-day, a wonder to ourselves;—ah! with what infinite love and pity do we look upon the blithe waking of the little child! ”

“ What pampered luxury—what squalid misery, on the same pavé. What unwritten histories these myriad hearts might unfold. How much of joy, how much of sorrow, how much of crime. Now, queenly beauty sweeps past, in sin’s gay livery. Cursed he who first sent her forth, to walk the earth, with her woman’s brow shame-branded. Fair mother—pure wife—frown scornfully at her if you can; my heart aches for her. I see one who once slept, sweet and fair, on a mother’s loving breast. I see one whose bitterest tear may never wash her stain away. ”

“ The shining lock, the little shoe—my friend, it is long years since I shed a tear over mine—I can take them out of their wrappings in my hand, and smile to think that I am so far on my journey that I shall soon see my little one face to face. Whether she or I will be the child when we meet again, God only knows; or, what heavenly mysteries I shall learn, kneeling at my baby's feet, I cannot tell; but this I know, by the kisses I have given many a little face since she died, for her dear sake, that a mother's love was meant to reach far beyond the grave. ”

“ He sat with his back to the door, bending over the cradle of his child, till his snow-white locks rested on its rosy cheeks; talking to it, as was his wont, to beguile his loneliness.
“Mary’s forehead—Mary’s eyes—Mary’s mouth—no more like your old father than a rosebud is like a chestnut-burr. You will love the lonely old man, little one, and perhaps she will, by-and-by; who knows?” and Mark’s voice trembled.
“She will—she does”—said Mary, dropping on her knees at the cradle of her child, and burying her face in Mark’s hands; “my noble, patient husband!” ”

“ Meta’s brow, and cheek, and lips, and tresses were multiplied indefinitely, in all his female heads. Her dimpled hand, he rounded arm, her plump shoulder, her slender foot, all served him for faultless models.
Life was so beautiful to him now; his employment so congenial, his heart so satisfied. It must be that he should succeed. The very thought of failure—“but then, he should not fail!” Poor Will! he had yet to learn that garrets are as often the graves as the nurseries of genius, and that native talent goes unrecognized until stamped with foreign approbation. ”

“ And when George had grown up to be a man, and long after his good father’s white head was under the sod, George used to speak often of his lifting him up to look into a black-bird’s nest, and of the delight and wonder with which he gazed at the little peeping creatures for the first time. I dare say your father and mother can tell you some such little thing which they remember about their childhood’s home, which stands out in their memory now, from the mist of years, like a lovely picture, sunny and glowing and untouched by time. ”

“ He smiled the old smile; he said, 'Right, my girl, a short life and a merry one; there is no future—we die and there's an end!' My tortured soul gave these false words the lie; but I smiled back—he was to be my victim now! Peace was lost, heaven was lost; what should hold me back? The wine cup went round. 'Pledge me,' I said, 'here's to your happy future!' He drained it, poison and all, to the dregs—why not? Men make the laws to suit themselves, so they make no law for the seducer. ”

“ Who was such an idiot as to say that "no woman ever sees beauty in another"? I meet every day a face that no man living could admire more than myself; soulful as well as beautiful. Lovely blue, pensive eyes; golden hair, waving over a pure white forehead; cheeks like the heart of a "blush rose;" and a grieved little rosy mouth, like that of a baby to whom for the first time you deny something, fearing lest it grow too wilful. I think that day lost in which I do not meet that sweet face, framed in its close mourning bonnet. ”

“ I am tired of this brown stuff dress, and these thick leather shoes, and my old sun-bonnet. There comes a nice carriage,—how smooth and shiny the horses are; how bright the silver-mounted harness glitters; how smart the coachman looks, in his white gloves. How nice it must be to be rich, and ride in a carriage; oh! there's a little girl in it, no older than I, and all alone, too!—a rich little girl, with a pretty rose-colored bonnet, and a silk dress, and cream-colored kid gloves. ”

“ How delicious in these days of hot-house-childhood it is to find a little one who can relish puss in the corner. To find one who does not at six years of age turn up its little nose at everything but "round dances," and a supper of "pâté de foie gras" and champagne. What a sorrowful sight are those blasé languid little things who are incapable of a new sensation before they are out of short clothes—to whom already there is no childhood left—who have turned their backs on that path of flowers to which they can never return, through long years of satiety and weariness. ”

“ Nobly the boy struggled: they who are not fastidious as to the means, seldom fail of securing the result they aim at. John Wade’s pride never stood like a lion in his path; he heeded not the supercilious glance or careless tone of his employers, so that he received the hard-earned reward of his toil. At length, from loving money for what it would bring, he learned to love it for its own sake; and when death removed from him those for whom he toiled, he toiled on for love of the shining dross. Pity that gold should always bring with it the canker—covetousness. ”

“ Two women joining the Mutual Admiration Society; emptying their budget of love affairs; comparing baits to entrap victims; sighing over the same rose leaf; sonnetizing the same moonbeam; patronizing the same milliner, and exchanging female kisses! (Betty, hand me my fan!)
Well, let either have one bonnet or one lover more than the other—or, if they are blue stockings, let either be one round the higher on Fame’s ladder—bodkins and darning needles! what a tempest! Caps and characters in such a case are of no account at all. Oh, there never should be but one woman alive at a time. ”

“ Then you may close the book, and lean your cheek against the cover, as if it were the face of a dear friend; shut your eyes and soliloquise to your heart’s content, without fear of misconstruction, even though you should exclaim in the fullness of your enthusiasm, “What an adorable soul that man has!” You may put the volume under your pillow, and let your eye and the first ray of morning light fall on it together, and no Argus eyes shall rob you of that delicious pleasure, no carping old maid, or strait-laced Pharisee shall cry out, “it isn’t proper!” ”

“ The wickedness, to me, consists in making Sunday, which should be a delight, such a tedium, that, in after years, whenever the word strikes upon the ear, or the day returns, the first impulse is to shun and evade it. Oh, let Sunday be what the memory of "mother's room" is to us all—radiant with perfume of flowers and sunshine. The bright spot to look back upon, when old age sits in the chimney-corner, with the sweet psalm from voices hushed by death, or far removed, still sounding in the ears ”

“ It is well for the indefatigable mother and housekeeper to remain ignorant, for one blessed month, of the inevitable, "What shall we have for dinner?" It is well for the man of business, whose thoughts are narrowed down to stocks and stores, to look out on the broad hills, and let the little bird's song stir memories of days when heaven was nearer to him than it has ever been since. It is well for the ossified old bachelor to air his selfishness in the genial atmosphere of woman's smile. ”

“ And even should such a foolish school flirtation end in early marriage, how long, think you, before your husband would weary of a wife who only knew enough to talk about dress or dancing? How painful for you to be silent, through ignorance, should you chance to have intelligent guests at your house. How painful, when your only charm, youth and its prettiness, has faded, to find your husband gradually losing sight of you, as his mind expanded, and yours grew still narrower, with the inevitable cares, that only the brain of a sensible woman can keep from overwhelming her. ”

“ Oh Aunt Dolly! hate me, if you will, but love her; she will not live long to trouble any body," and Rose kissed the furrowed temples and stroked back the thin gray locks.
"Well, if I ever!" said Dolly, looking innocent; "I believe the whole world is going mad! Come along, Betty."
"Maria! Maria!" whispered the old lady, again nestling up to Rose.
"There, you see, she is quite out; she fancies you are somebody she has seen before."
"No—she takes me for Maria, my mother," said Rose; "you say that I look like her exactly."
"Come along, Betty!" said the infuriated Mrs. Howe. ”

“ What a party of horses stamped their iron shoes in Grandpa Scott's barn on Thanksgiving morning! What a party of little children in bright autumn-leaf dresses and white aprons, went scampering through the house! What a fuss they all made over the littlest baby! What a fire (big enough to roast an ox whole) blazed in the great, wide, sitting-room fireplace!
How Grandpa Scott walked round, not knowing whether to laugh or to cry, patting this one on the head, chucking the other under the chin, and tossing a third up to the wall. ”

“ SUNDAY MORNING.
HOW many pleasant breakfast-tables it looks down upon! No need to hurry away to office, or store, or counting-room. Fathers come leisurely down in dressing-gown and slippers, and sip their coffee without danger of choking. They have time to look round and see how tall the children are growing, and that nothing in this world is so beautiful as a rosy baby fresh from slumber. Mother, too, has the old girlish smile, that comes not often on a week-day, or if it does, father has not time to notice it, and that, perhaps, after all, is the reason it comes so seldom. ”

“ Occasionally a lamp twinkled from some upper window, where a half-starved seamstress sat stitching her life away, or a heart-broken mother bent over the dead form of a babe, which her mother’s heart could ill spare, although she knew not where to find bread for the remaining babes who wept beside her. Now and then, a woman, lost to all that makes woman lovely, flaunted under the flickering street-lamps, while her mocking laugh rang out on the night air. Mary shuddered, and drew back—there was that in its hollowness which might make even devils tremble. ”

“ And then, when your heart is so soft that anybody could knock you down with a feather, get into the darkest hole you can find, and cry it out! Then crawl out, bathe your eyes till they shine again, and if you have one nice garment left, out with it, put it on! turn your shawl on the brightest side; put your best and prettiest foot foremost; tie on your go-to-meetin’ bonnet, and smile under it, if it half kills you; and see how complaisant the world will be when—you ask nothing of it! ”

“ Rose sat over the untasted morsel, looking vainly from one face to another, for some glance of sympathy for the new comer.
They were once new comers—some long since, some more newly; their hearts, too, like Rose's, had yearned for sympathy; their ears ached, as did hers, for one kind tone; but that was all past. Many suns had risen and set on that hopeless search; risen and set, but never on their sports or plays.
The moon sometimes looked in upon them asleep in their little narrow cots. She saw the bitter waking from some mocking dream of home. ”