Samantha at Coney Island Part 20
Of course, I knowed there would be some bright posies wreathed round the crosses; but there would be thorns in them. And though the road might be soft and agreeable in spots, yet I knowed well what hard rocks there wuz in the highway of life to stub toes on, even common-sized toes, and it did seem a pity such little mites of feet had got to git stun bruises on 'em.
Poor little creeters! I thought, little do you know what sadness and ecstacy, what grief and joy, gloom and glory lays ahead on you. I wuz sorry for 'em, sorry as a dog.
And then I didn't like the idee of the little helpless creeters bein'
laid out on exhibition, like shirt b.u.t.tons, or hooks and eyes, to be stared on by saint and sinner, by eyes tender or cruel--and voices lovin' and hateful to comment on. I felt that the place for little babies wuz to home in the bedroom. And I thought nothin' would tempt me, if Josiah wuz a infant babe, to place him on exhibition like Hamburg edgin', or bobbinet lace. The very idee wuz repugnant to me.
And I wuz more than willin' when the female asked me if I didn't want to go and see the midgets, and we went.
And you don't know what interestin' little creeters they wuz, mindin'
their own bizness and midgetin' away. Actin' out a little play jest as if a company of dolls had come to life, talkin' and actin'. They seemed to be jest as happy and contented as if they wuz eight or ten feet high and heavy accordin'.
As we left this place the female ketched sight of her husband. He bagoned hautily to her with one finger, and she hastened to jine him.
Such is females. And so true it is that love in either sect will rise up above naggin', or any other kind of pardner meanness.
I went forward alone to see the Head Hunters. And I looked on the brown little folks with a feelin' of pity. How did I know they had ever had good advice? I felt here wuz a n.o.ble chance for a P. A.
So I sez to 'em, "I've hearn of your doin's, and I want to advise you for your good." They looked at me real stiddy and I went on, "You may think you hain't so guilty because you only take folkses heads. But for the lands sakes! did you ever stop to think on't? What can they do without their heads? Of course," sez I reasonably, "there is a difference in heads. Some folkses heads hain't got so much sense in 'em as others. I've seen 'em myself that I've thought a good wooden head would be jest as useful. But they are the best they've got, and they're attached to 'em, and they can't git along without 'em. And I always thought you might jest as well take their hull bodies whilst you wuz about it. Don't you see that is so? When it is pinted out to you by a P. A.?"
[Ill.u.s.tration: _"I went forward to see the Head Hunters. I sez to 'em 'I've hearn of your doin's and I want to advise you for your good_.'" (_See page 281_)]
They kinder jabbered over sunthin' to themselves, and I sez as I turned away, "Now, don't let me hear of any more such doin's! Be contented with the heads you've got, and don't try to git somebody elses that don't belong to you." Sez I, "Sunthin' like that, namely stealin' the interior of folkses heads, has been done time and agin among more civilized folks, and it don't work; they git found out."
I left 'em getisculatin' and jabberin' in that strange lingo and am in hopes they wuz promisin' to quit their Head Huntin', but can't tell for certain.
As I santered along a female asked me if I had seen the Divin' Girls, sez she, "There is a immense pond of water, and they are the best divers and swimmers in the world."
But I sez, "n.o.body can dive into deeper depths than I have doven to-day."
"The ocean?" sez she.
"Oceans of anxiety," sez I, "rivers of grief." I spoze my dretful emotions showed on my linement, and to git my mind off she sez, "You ort to see the aligators."
I'd hearn they had immense tanks of water as long as from our house to Philander Dagget's, holdin' thousands and thousands and thousands of aligators, from them jest born, to them a hundred years old, from them the size of your little finger weighin' a few ounces, to them big as elephants, weighin' two tons.
But I told her I could worry along for years without aligators, I never seemed to hanker for 'em, I wouldn't take 'em as a gift if I had to let 'em have the run of the house. Humbly things! though I spoze they hain't to blame for their looks, or their temperses, which are fierce. And I didn't go into the big animal house, thinkin' I wuz so dog tired that I would go back to Bildad's and come back the next day and see all the animals and birds and the hundreds of other shows I'd had to slight that day, enough to devour days of stiddy sight seein'.
The Siege of Richmond, The Great Divide, Switzerland, Congress of Nations, Indian Village, The Orient, Bathin' Pavilions, j.a.panese Tea Gardens, and etc.
I did want to see the Shimpanzee who duz everything but talk. And I thought mebby the reason he wuz so close-mouthed wuz because he hearn so much talkin' he wuz sick on't, as I wuz, and made a sample of himself. But if he did n.o.body follered it, no indeed! Why, you jest spozen a hundred swarms of bees big as giants, with buzzes big accordin', all a swarmin' and a buzzin', and you'll git a little idee of the noise and tumult of Coney Island. But you won't spozen' fur enough, I don't believe. Yes, I laid out to spend considerable time in Dreamland next day. But little did I think of what a day might bring forth, and have got it to think on like them that lose friends, "Oh why didn't I do thus and so? And now it is too late to wait on 'em, and pay attention to 'em?" But I'm leadin' a melancholy horse up to a mournin' wagon, before the thills are on, so I'll stop eppisodin' and resoom forwards. Jest outside the gate of Dreamland I met Bildad, and he sez, "Have you found Josiah yet?"
"No," I sez in despairin' axents, "I hain't seen hide nor hair on him."
And he sez, "Mebby he's gone in bathin'."
"No," I sez, "He took a bath in the wash-tub the night before he come here, and he hain't a man that will wash oftener than he has to."
Sez he, "Hundreds of folks take sand baths, lay in the sand and throw it at each other, cover themselves up in it."
"What for?" I sez.
"Oh, jest for fun. They'll go into the water mebby, and then come ash.o.r.e and roll and tumble in the sand, men, wimmen, and children, mostly foreigners," sez he.
I sez, "It don't seem as if Josiah would go into that bizness; he always despised sand."
"Well," sez he, "as I come by there jest now, I see somebody that looked like Josiah, goin' towards the beach with a girl by him."
I turned onto my heel to once and asked sternly, "Where is that beach?
And where is that sand?" He told me and I made for it to once. I hain't got a jealous hair in my head, but I thought I'd go. Well, it wuz a sight to see, acres and acres of sand dotted with men, wimmen, and children. And beyond, the melancholy ocean, also dotted with swimming heads, with bodies attached, so I spozed. Well might Atlantic be melancholy to see such sights, hundreds of folks comin' out of the water, hundreds goin' in, and other hundreds walkin' or rollin' in the sand or throwin' it at each other or half covered up with it.
And as for the clothes they had on, I thought no wonder the Ocean and I sithed to see it, no money would tempt me to wear 'em to mill or meetin', or to let Josiah wear 'em. They didn't look decent. Either they wuz scrimped for cloth, or they wanted to look so; whichever way it wuz, I pitied 'em.
[Ill.u.s.tration: _"It wuz a sight to see, acres and acres of sand dotted with men, wimmen, and children." (See page 286)_]
But where wuz Josiah? On every side wuz folks settin' and walkin', and mounds of sand with sometimes a head stickin' out, or a foot, or a arm, or a nose. I had hard work to keep from treadin' on 'em. There would be little hillocks of sand with mebby a child's head or foot stickin' out.
Anon a mound over a fat man or a woman big as a hay stack. I walked along for some time keepin' a clost watch on every side, but no Josiah did I see nor no mound I felt wuz hisen, till jest as I wuz ready to drop down with fatigue with my arjous work to keep from treadin' on folks, I ketched sight of a nose stickin' out of a small mound that I thought sure I reconized. My heart bounded at the sight. My first look wuz to see if any girl mound wuz nigh him. But there wuzn't nothin'
but some children's heads and feet stickin' about, and I hastened to that nose and poked the sand from it with my umbrell cryin':
"Dear Josiah! Is this indeed your nose? Have I found you at last?"
When to my horrow a fierce red whiskered face rared itself up from the sand, and jabbored at me in a onknown tongue; onknown the words, but the language of anger can be read in any tongue. Hisen betokened the most intense madness, and I spoze that in my agitation I might have jabbed him some with my umbrell, and I hastened away, tromplin' as I did so in my haste on various heads and arms, and follered by loud busts of what I most know wuz blood curdlin' profanity, though not Jonesville swearin'.
Well, I wuz tired out and discouraged. No Josiah, no pardner! I felt some like a gra.s.s widder, or I guess it wuz more like a real widder.
'Tennyrate my feelin's wuz too awful to describe, so lonesome, so cast-down and deprested. And no knowin' as I would ever feel any better, no knowin' if that dear man would ever be found. And what would life be without him? Nothin' but a holler mockery filled with movin' shadders, the Reality of life gone and lost.
Night wuz comin' on apace and I thought I might as well abandon my quest for the time, so I returned to Bildad's feelin' some as if I wuz a sickly serial readin'--"To be continued in our next." For I knowed that I would resoom the search bright and early, and find that man or perish in my tracks.
Friday--onlucky day, as it has always been called--had gone to jine the days of the past. I sot on the piazza at Bildad's lookin' out on the seen that, bewilderin' as it wuz by daylight, wuz ten times more bewilderin'ly beautiful by night. Like stars in the tropics, the electric lights flashed out over the hull place, the greatest number of electric lights in the same s.p.a.ce in the world, I wuz told and believe.
Every pinnacle, battlement, tower, balcony, winder, ruff, wuz edged with the blazin' fire embroidery. And the tall mountains, palaces, graceful bridges, piers, pleasure places of all kinds, looked fairy like, under the friendly hand of Night. And 'way up to the very heavens Dreamland tower lifted itself, a gigantic shaft of dazzling brilliancy, dominatin' the hull island. Pa.s.singly beautiful tower by night or day, the first thing the homesick mariner sees as he approaches his Homeland.
Thousands and thousands and thousands of gay pleasure seekers trod the walks to and fro. Thousands and thousands more, rich and poor dined in the gay restaurants and balconies, surrounded with flowers and light and music. And still other thousands enjoyed the myriad amus.e.m.e.nts afforded them. Bildad's sister, who wuz on a visit there from Hoboken, thinks it aristocratick, and herself more refined and rare to run the place down. Lots of folks do that; they go there and stay from mornin' till night, go up in the Awful Tower, take in every b.u.mp-de-b.u.mp and Wobble-de-Wobble, and then turn up their noses talkin' to outsiders about it, as fur as their different noses will turn. She was lame at the time from tromplin' all over the place for the past week. But she sez to me (with her nose turned up as fur as it could, bein' a pug to start with):
"It is Common people who come here mostly." And she kinder glared at me as if mistrustin' I wuz one of 'em.
And I sez, "Well, you know, Lucindy, who it wuz the common people received gladly, and who dwelt among them? And you know Lincoln said, 'It must be the Lord liked the common people, He made so many on 'em.'"
She didn't reply, only with her nose, which looked disdainful. And I sez to myself in astonishment, "Can this be Samantha, praisin' up what she has always run down?" But I had to own up to myself that though I had seen many places more congenial to me, yet I wuz glad that so many people, some of 'em cut off from the beauty of life, could come here quickly and easily, and forgit their cares and toil for awhile, and go home refreshed and ready to take up their burdens agin. And the children, G.o.d bless them! I knowed it wuz indeed to them, the big Wonder Place, and beauty spot of the world and their life.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
JOSIAH FOUND AT LAST! THE AWFUL FIRE AT DREAMLAND AND THE TERRIBLE SIGHTS I SAW THERE
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN