Samantha at Saratoga [50]
with a white rosette in my hat." "You are goin' to walk into meetin' with your hat on, are you?" sez I coldly. "Oh, ketch a feller up. You know what I mean. And don't you think I'll make a show? Won't it create a sensation in Jonesville?" Sez I: "Most probable it would. But you haint a goin' to wear no bows on your hat at your age, not if I can break it up," sez I. He looked almost black at me, and sez he, "Don't go too fur, Samantha! I'll own you've been a good wife and mother and all that, but there is a line that you must stop at. You mustn't go too fur. There is some things in which a man must be footloose, and that is in the matter of dress. I shall have a white rosette on my hat, and some big white buttons up and down the back of my overcoat! That is my aim, Samantha, and I shall reach it if I walk through goar." He uttered them fearful words in a loud fierce whisper which made the dog bark at him for more'n ten minutes stiddy, at the top of its voice, and in quick short yelps. If it had been her young child that wuz yellin' at a visitor in that way and ketchin' holt of him, and tearin' at his clothes, the child would have been consigned to banishment out of the room, and mebby punishment. But it wuzn't her babe and so it remained, and it dug its feet down into the satin and laces and beads of Miss Flamm's dress, and barked to that extent that we couldn't hear ourselves think. And she called it "sweet little angel," and told it it might "bark its little cunnin' bark." The idee of a angel barkin'; jest think on't. And we endured it as best we could with shakin' nerves and achin' earpans. It wuz a curius time. The dog harrowin' our nerve, and snappin' at Josiah anon, if not oftener, and ketchin' holt of him anywhere, and she a callin' it a angel; and Josiah a lookin' so voyalent at it, that it seemed almost as if that glance could stun it. It wuz a curius seen. But truly worse wuz to come, for Miss Flamm in an interval of silence, sez, "We will go first to the Gizer Spring, and then, afterwards, to the Moon." Or, that is what I understand her to say. And though I kep' still, I wuz determined to keep my eyes out, and if I see her goin' into anything dangerus, I wuz goin' to reject her overtures to take us. But thinkses I to myself, "We always said I believed we should travel to the stars some time, but I little thought it would be to-day, or that I should go in a buggy." Josiah shared my feelin's I could see, for he whispered to me, "Don't le's go, Samantha, it must be dangerus!" But I whispered back, "Le's wait, Josiah, and see. We won't do nothin' percipitate, but," sez I, "this is a chance that we most probable never will have ag'in. Don't le's be hasty." We talked these things in secret, while Miss Flamm wuz a bendin' over, and conversin' with the dog. For Josiah would ruther have died than not be s'pozed to be "Oh Fay," as Maggie would say, in everything fashionable. And it has always been my way to wait and see, and count 10, or even 20, before speakin'. And then Miss Flamin sez sunthin' about what beautiful fried potatoes you could get there in the moon, and you could always get them, any time you wanted 'em. And the very next time she went to kissin' the dog so voyalently as not to notice us, my Josiah whispered to me and sez, "Did you have any idee that wuz what the old man wuz a doin'? I knew he wuz always a settin' up there in the moon, but it never passed my mind that he wuz a fryin' potatoes." But I sez, "Keep still, Josiah. It is a deep subject, a great undertakin', and it requires caution and deliberation." But he sez,"I haint a goin', Samantha! Nor I haint a goin' to let you go. It is dangerus." But I kinder nudged him, for she had the dog down on her lap, and was ready to resoom conversation. And about that time we got to the entrance of the spring, and one of her relatives got down and opened the carriage door. I wondered ag'in that she didn't introduce us. But I didn't care if she didn't. I felt that I wuz jest as good as they wuz, if they wuz so haughty. But Josiah wantin'