"Choked with Ribbons." 69 for essay," and a lovely cup, besides, while under all was a note from "S. Francis, Secretary Illinois Agricultural Society," congratulating "a lady so young on an achievement so creditable." I was of an enthusiastic nature that was evident from the way I went with a hop, skip and jump through every room in the house, singing out "Hurrah!" until Bridget in the kitchen, Mike in the garden, and rollicking old Carlo took up the strain, and the whole family laughed and shouted and rejoiced in my joy. No girl went through a harder experience than I, when my free, out-of-door life had to cease, and the long skirts and clubbedup hair spiked with hair-pins had to be endured. The half of that down-heartedness has never been told and never can be. I always believed that if I had been let alone and allowed as a woman, what I had had as a girl, a free life in the country, where a human being might grow, body and soul, as a tree grows, I would have been "ten times more of a person," every way. Mine was a nature hard to tame, and I cried long and loud when I found I could never again race and range about with freedom. I had delighted in my short hair and nice round hat, or comfortable "Shaker bonnet," but now I was to be "choked with ribbons" when I went into the open air the rest of my days. Something like the following was the "state of mind” that I revealed to my journal about this time: This is my birthday and the date of my martyrdom. Mother insists that at last I must have my hair "done up woman-fashion." She says she can hardly forgive herself for letting me "run wild" so long. We've had a great time over it all, and here I sit like another Samson "shorn of my strength." That figure won't do, though, for the greatest trouble with me is that I never shall be shorn again. My "back" hair is twisted up like a corkI carry eighteen hair-pins; my head aches miserably; my feet are entangled in the skirt of my hateful new gown. I can never jump over a fence again, so long as I live. As for chasing the sheep, down in the shady pasture, it's out of the question, and to climb to my Eagle's-nest" seat in the big burr-oak would ruin this new frock beyond repair. Altogether, I recognize the fact that my "occupation's gone." screw; Something else that had already happened, helped to stir up my spirit into a mighty unrest. This is the story as I told it to my journal: This is election day and my brother is twenty-one years old. How proud he seemed as he dressed up in his best Sunday clothes and drove off in the big wagon with father and the hired men to vote for John C. Frémont, 70 Busy-ness Happiness. like the sensible "Free-soiler" that he is. My sister and I stood at the window and looked out after them. Somehow, I felt a lump in my throat, and then I could n't see their wagon any more, things got so blurred. I turned to Mary, and she, dear little innocent, seemed wonderfully sober, too. I said, "Would n't you like to vote as well as Oliver? Don't you and I love the country just as well as he, and does n't the country need our ballots?" Then she looked scared, but answered, in a minute, 'Course we do, and 'course we ought, but don't you go ahead and say so, for then we would be called strong-minded." 64 These two great changes in my uneventful life made me so distressed in heart that I had half a mind to run away. But the trouble was, I had n't the faintest idea where to run to. Across the river, near Colonel Burdick's, lived Silas Hayner and several of his brothers, on their nice prairie farms. Sometimes Emily Scoville, Hannah Hayner, or some other of the active young women, would come over to help mother when there was more work than usual; and with Hannah, especially, I had fellowship, because, like myself, she was venturesome in disposition; could row a boat, or fire a gun, and liked to be always out-of-doors. She was older than I, and entered into all my plans. So we two foolish creatures planned to borrow father's revolver and go off on a wild-goose chase, crossing the river in a canoe and launching out to seek our fortunes. But the best part of the story is that we were never so silly as to take a step beyond the old home-roof, contenting ourselves with talking the matter over in girlish phrase, and very soon perceiving how mean and ungrateful such an act would be. Indeed, I told Mary and mother all about it, after a little while, and that ended the only really "wild" plan that I ever made, except another, not unlike it, in my first months at Evanston, which was also nothing but a plan. "You must go to school, my child, and take a course of study; I wish it might be to Oberlin this was my mother's quiet comment on the confession. 'Your mind is active; you are fond of books and thoughts, as well as of outdoors; we must provide them for you to make up for the loss of your girlish good times; so, without any scolding, this Roman matron got her daughter's aspirations into another channel. To be busy doing something that is worthy to be done is the happiest thing in all this world for girl or boy, for old or young. On the day I was eighteen, my mother made a birthday cake, and I was in the highest possible glee. I even went so far as to write what Oliver called a "pome," which has passed into oblivion, but of which these lines linger in memory's whisperinggallery: There is a God - an uncreated Life That dwells in mystery. Him, as a part of his vast, boundless self, I worship, scorning not, nor yet reluctantly I receive and honor, for He says: And He is Lord and God! But now having thro' waitings long, And hopings manifold, Arrived here at the limit of minority, I bid it now, and evermore, adieu, And, sinful though it may be, Weep not, nor sigh, As it fades with the night. * The clock has struck! O! heaven and earth, I'm free! And here, beneath the watching stars, I feel And resting on my spirit as it ne'er Toward evening, on this "freedom day," I took my seat quietly in mother's rocking-chair, and began to read Scott's "Ivanhoe." Father was opposed to story books, and on coming in he scanned this while his brow grew cloudy. "I thought I told you not to read novels, Frances," he remarked, seriously. "So you did, father, and in the main I've kept faith with you in this; but you forget what day it is.' "What day, indeed! I should like to know if the day has anything to do with the deed!" "Indeed it has-I am eighteen-I am of age-I am now to do what I think right, and to read this fine historical story is, in my opinion, a right thing for me to do." My father could hardly believe his ears. He was what they call " dumbfounded." At first he was inclined to take the book away, but that would do harm, he thought, instead of good, so he concluded to see this novel action from the funny side, and laughed heartily over the situation, Oliver doing the same, and both saying in one breath, "A chip of the old block." After the visit East we began to be somewhat restive even in our blessed old nest, and gave our father little peace till he arranged to send us away to school, and so it came about that in the spring of 1858 we left our Forest Home forever. Looking back upon it in the sweet valley of memory and from the slowclimbed heights of years, my heart repeats with tender loyalty the words written by Alice Cary about her country home : "Bright as the brightest sunshine, The light of memory streams "Round the old-fashioned homestead, Where I dreamed my dream of dreams." |