The Talkative Wig
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Eliza Lee Follen >> The Talkative Wig
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THE TALKATIVE WIG
BY
MRS. FOLLEN
With Illustrations by Billings and others
THE OLD GARRET.
"Pray, dear Mother," said the boys, "tell us what else you heard in
the old garret."
"You know," said she, "it was on a rainy Sunday when my mother sent
me up there with my book, Pilgrim's Progress. This book always
delighted me, and set my fancy to work in some way or other.
After reading a while, I began to look at the queer old things in
the garret. Pussy began to purr louder and louder, and at last I
fell again into the same dreamy sleep that I was in at first.
Presently I heard the same confused sound which I heard before when
the old tenants of the garret began to speak. There seemed also to
be a slight motion among them, and a sort of mysterious appearance
came over the whole apartment, as if they were all living, though
very shadowy beings. Presently I heard the creak of the curling
tongs, and he uttered these words:--
"I think we have all been wronged by our friend the wig; he approved
of our all relating our own histories, and promised that, after we
had done so, he would give us his, frankly and truly, as we have
done; instead of that he, as well as the rest of us, fell asleep
when our friend spinning wheel related her story; and, when we all
waked up, he did not fulfil his promise. I move that he be requested
now to give us a faithful account of his whole life, till he was
consigned with us to this dark, gloomy old place. I probably have
been more intimately acquainted with him than any one present; for
once or twice I have assisted in smoothing, or rather frizzing, his
ruffled hairs, and making him fit for company; and, with your leave,
my friends, I urge him in your name to relate his history." A sort
of hum of approbation sounded through the long, dark old garret, and
then the wig spoke.
"Friend Frizzle is right: I did agree to relate my adventures, but I
said I would wait till all had told their stories; now, here are two
of this brilliant company that have not said one word of themselves,
that comical coat and that old cloak; after they have related their
history I will relate mine. The wig hitched a little on his block,
and was silent.
"I am ready," said the coat, "to tell all I know of myself, and I
shall not keep you long, I trust. My friend the baize gown and I had
the same origin on the back of a sheep, only I was of a nicer
texture, and had, from my earliest days, a more refined character;
and, of course, was used for higher purposes. Major Sword there may
know perhaps that I had as much to do with making the major of
Cadets as he had, only I did not make people run when they looked at
me, as he says he did.
I was originally of the most delicate white, and I was made into one
of the very first coats that ever appeared on the parade as one of
the Governor's guards. I think I did more to make the major than my
Lord Sword did. Think of a major without a coat! He would not be a
major, for a moment. He would be hooted at. Now, even were he
without a sword, and had me, such as I once was, on his back, he
would still be known as a major of the Cadets."
"Self-glorification! Come to your story," cried the musket, with a
bounce.
"I will," said the coat. "I was, as I have told you, the major's
military coat, admired by all who looked at me; and I appeared often
on parade days till he gave up his office, and left this country,
when I was left hanging up in his dressing room, and all my glory
was gone.
As the major's boys grew bigger, they would often beg their mother
to allow them to put me on. The rogues were so short then that I
trailed on the ground. I was even so far abused as to be worn by
girls. This tried my feelings sorely, but I was forced to submit.
Once I was so far disgraced as to be worn by one of the girls while
she danced with her brother who was dressed like a monkey, with a
tail over a yard long; and this was not all, she pulled the monkey's
tail too hard, it came off, and then the monkey boy seized the tail
and beat me with it, meaning to beat his sister, but I got the worst
of it. So I lived to be made fun of, and lived for nothing else.
At last, the major's wife, our dear mistress, took me one day into
her gentle hands, and after examining me carefully and making up her
mind to the act, deliberately took her scissors, ripped me up into
pieces, and sent me to the dyer's, to be colored brown. This was too
horrid--I was soused into the vilest mixture you can imagine, and
suffered every thing abominable, such as being stretched within an
inch of my life, and then almost burned to death. At last, I came
out with the color you now see me, not a handsome brown, but a real
sickish rhubarb color. My dear mistress laughed when she looked at
me. "This is a dose," said she, "but it will do for an every day
coat for Jonathan, and I can make it myself, with Keziah Vose's aid;
so I will not grieve about it. So Keziah was sent for and set to
work.
Now Jonathan was a white-haired, chubby boy, and this was his first
coat. Keziah went by her eye altogether. She took no measures except
for the sleeves, and these she said she would make large and long,
to allow for Jonathan's growing. She made me so broad behind that
one brass button could not see the other, although they were, as you
see, almost as large as a small plate; the skirts came down so as to
hide the calves of his legs, and were so full as nearly to meet
before. My sleeves had a regular slouch. There was no hollow in the
back, and I looked as if I was made for one of the boys' snow men,
not for a human being.
When I was finished and put on for the first time, all the children
and their mother were present, as it happened. My droll looks and
rhubarb color, the comical expression of Jonathan's face,--for he
was a great rogue,--and his sun-bleached hair, half hidden by my
high, stiff collar, set them all into a gale of laughter. He took
hold of my full skirts, one on each side, and began to dance; and
even his mother and Keziah laughed too. Nothing was to be done. A
few times, the mother of Jonathan tried to induce him to wear me at
home, for she could not afford, she said, to lose all I had cost
her; but it was all in vain--giggle, giggle, went all the children
when they saw me, and I had to be hung up, as you see me now.
Whenever they wanted a comical dress in any of their plays, I was
brought out, and that little girl asleep there, and her brothers
still amuse themselves with my comical looks. Alas! I am of no other
use in this world.
The young people used to amuse themselves by acting little plays, or
some other nonsense; and when they wanted to make a very ridiculous
figure, I noticed they came for me. I always observed that whoever
had me on talked through his nose, with an ugly drawl, and used
vulgar words and expressions, such as "Now you don't! Do tell!
Sartin true!"
Once they put me on a dancing bear. This was insulting. I don't like
to think of it. I try to forget it.
In short, every one laughs when I am present, for some reason or
other; and I suppose I have been kept on account of the merriment I
have afforded the family. After all, my friends, I am not sure that
he who adds to the innocent gayety of people is not as valuable a
person as one who has more dignity, and who never made any one laugh
in his life.
I have done, my friends--the old cloak is a more serious, dignified
person than I, and will now, I trust, give us her history."
The old cloak began to speak in a different tone from that of the
coat. I cannot say the tone was gloomy, though it was very serious.
It was a kindly, affectionate tone, that made you not unhappy, but
thoughtful. "I agree," said she, "with my neighbor who has just
spoken, that no one deserves better of society than he who promotes
its innocent merriment. No bad person can know what true gayety of
heart is. Goodness and cheerfulness are like substance and shadow;
where the one is, the other will always follow.
I was made of German wool; and, in my country, the people all laugh
and sing. They keep still a saying of old Martin Luther, which runs,
if I remember rightly,--
"Wo man singt, leg' ich mich freilich nieder. Bose Menschen haben
keine Lieder."
"Keep to plain English, you Hushan!" shouted the musket with a kick.
"I am sorry to hurt your feelings, my old soldier," said the good
natured cloak. "I think, however, it is rather hard of you to keep
the name of Hessian as a term of reproach forever, just because a
few poor miserable fellows once came over here to fight you. Was it
not enough to have treated them as you say you did in the Jerseys?
For the benefit of you and those less prejudiced, I will translate
the couplet:--
"Where I singing hear,
I lay me, free from fear.
Men intent on wrong
Never have a song."
I was a singer myself once during the short time when I was
connected with one of dame spinning wheel's relatives. I am not even
a laugher now. Still I am contented and cheerful, and I remember
past trials without any bitterness. I went through all processes of
carding, spinning, weaving, dyeing, stretching, dressing, &c., and
was at last placed in a shop for sale. A beautiful young girl
purchased me for her bridal pelisse. Never did a happier heart beat
than did hers on the Sunday after she was married, when she wore me
to the church, holding by her husband's arm. I could not but partake
of the pleasure which she received from the gentle pressure of his
arm when she put hers within his, saying, "I am glad, dear, you like
my pelisse so much."
O, how happy we all were! How proud my mistress was of me! How proud
I was of her! I hate to pass hastily over these happy days, but I
suppose the history of them would not be very interesting to any of
my hearers; for one day was very much like another. Never did any
garment cover a more innocent, joyful heart than that of my
mistress.
I lasted well for some years, but my sleeves, at last, became
threadbare; soon after, there were actual holes in them, and holes
also in my waist; I was, I must confess, a shabby-looking pelisse.
My dear mistress took me into her hands one day, and, after
examining me all over, said, with a sigh, "I cannot wear it any
longer; I must give it up." At last, her expression brightened and
she added, "I can give it to cousin Jane; I am very tall, and she is
very short. The skirt is good, and she can make a cloak of it; and
so my precious pelisse will still be where I can see it."
Forthwith I was sent to cousin Jane, with a very pretty note
explaining to her the reasons why her cousin took the liberty of
offering her the old pelisse. Cousin Jane wanted a cloak, and could
not afford to buy one; so I was carefully ripped up and turned, and
made into a very respectable garment.
Cousin Jane was a dressmaker; and, in her service, I learned
something of what dressmakers have to endure. She had not been long
engaged in her trade; and, at first, she would put me on in the
morning with a brisk, vigorous manner, but in the evening, when she
returned home, how differently she took me up! how differently she
threw me over her weary shoulders!
Soon she ceased to put me on in the morning in the same strong,
elastic manner, but took me up languidly, and as if she dreaded the
day, and, when she went into the air, wrapped me very closely about
her, just as if I was her only comfort, and pressed me to her heart,
as if in hopes it would ache less.
Poor dear cousin Jane, my heart aches to think of her. Day after
day, from morning till night, and often till the next day began, she
toiled and toiled, stooping over her work, sewing, sewing, hour
after hour, and day after day, stooping all the time, till her eyes
lost their brightness, her step all its elasticity, till her
shoulders grew round, and her health failed.
O, had those for whom she labored, for her small day's wages, but
observed how the lamp of life was gradually going out, they would
not have allowed her so to work without any respite; they would have
made her take better care of her own health; they would have sent
her home early; they would not have allowed her to work thirteen or
fourteen hours a day in their service.
There was one family in which she worked where the master and
mistress insisted that at one o'clock Jane should lay aside her
work, and walk till two, when they dined. Then they insisted upon
her dining at their own table, and tried to make her meal a social
and pleasant one.
O, these were white days for poor Jane. Could I not tell when she
was going to work in this family by the way she threw me over her
shoulders? Did I not feel her gentle heart beating with unwonted
warmth as she came home from this family before eight o'clock,
accompanied by the truly good man of the house or some trusty
person? When she hung me up in her small bed room, did I not notice
her grateful, happy smile? She felt that she was recognized by these
good people as a sister and friend, and that the words which we hear
at church and read in the Bible, "All men are brethren," were not
mere words with them.
These evenings she would make her small fire, and sometimes indulge
herself in reading a little while; she would go to bed early, and
did not look so pale in the morning.
Had all the customers of cousin Jane been as kind and considerate as
these good people were, she might have lived; and I should, perhaps,
have continued in her possession; but life was too hard for her,--
she struggled with it for many years, and then her sweet spirit
turned wearily away from it; she grew weaker and weaker, the color
grew brighter and brighter on her cheek, and the light in her eye;
she looked like a spirit; and, ere long, she was one.
My first owner came, as soon as she heard how ill Jane was, and took
her home to this house in the country. Here our good mistress nursed
her poor cousin, and made the last days as happy as she could; but
Jane was weary of this life, and longed for a better one. She passed
away as gently and sweetly as a summer evening cloud or a dying
flower.
Our mistress said to her husband, "All Jane's clothes, except this
dear cloak, I have given to the poor. This I must keep myself; for
it was one of my wedding garments, and dear Jane has made it all the
dearer to me. I shall keep it to lend to friends who are caught here
in the rain; it shall be called the friend's cloak, and shall always
be kept in the closet in the hall, close at hand."
Now, I suppose every one knows of how much use such a cloak is in a
family. Never was a cloak more employed than I, and for all sorts of
things. I was used to play dumb orator. I was at every one's
service. I don't know how they ever did without me.
Don't be astonished that I did not wear out; my lining was strong,
and I tell you an old cloak has a charmed life; you cannot wear it
out; like charity, it suffereth long and is kind.
As my dear mistress's children grew up, I was treated very much as
you all have been; that is to say, with no respect at all. What a
different life was mine from that which I led with dear, gentle
cousin Jane. Peace be with her sweet spirit!
One prank which the boys played some years after Jane's death, I
must relate, and then I have done. The eldest, whose name was
Willie, took me, the evening before thanksgiving day, and, having
dressed himself up in some of the cook's dirty old clothes, and hung
a basket on his arm, put me over his shoulders, and I went begging
of all the neighbors for something to keep thanksgiving with. He
disguised his voice by putting cotton wool in his mouth, and I
wonder myself how I came to know him. Two or three boys of his
acquaintance went with him, all dressed as beggars; and a grand
frolic they had.
They went to one house where a man lived that made great pretensions
to religion and goodness, but who the boys strongly suspected was
not very compassionate to the poor.
"Please," said Willie, "give us a little flour and raisins for our
mother to make a thanksgiving pudding with to-morrow." His answer
was a slam of the door in his face.
"Let us go to Granny Horton's," said one of the boys; "she has not
gone to bed yet."
"O," said Willie, "you know she has nothing but what mother sends
her, or some of the neighbors. It would be a shame. I carried her a
pair of chickens this morning, and some flour and raisins; and it is
a shame to beg of her, she is so kind. But won't it be funny if she
gives us something, when Squire Marsh would not; at any rate, she'll
not slam the door in our faces. Come, let's go quickly, before she
puts out her little light and goes to bed. I bet she'll give us one
of her chickens. But let us take whatever she gives us, just for the
fun, and for fear we should be found out."
Willie was to be the spokesman. He felt rather queerly at first; but
the fun of the thing was too tempting, so he agreed to speak. He was
dressed as a girl, and wrapped me closely about him, as if he was
very cold. He had on an old straw bonnet, and his face was painted,
so that she could not recognize him, he knew.
They knocked at Granny Horton's door, and she, in a kind, gentle
voice, replied, "Come in!" Willie, pretending to be a girl, told how
she and her brother and sister had come from the farther part of the
town, where they lived in the woods with a mother who was very old,
and had hardly any thing to eat; and how they wanted something good
to carry to her for thanksgiving day--a little flour, or a chicken,
or any thing; that it was too hard for his dear mother to have
nothing but beans on that day; that beans were what they lived on
commonly.
He looked so mournful, and spoke in such a mournful tone that the
dear old woman, after thinking one moment, said to him, "I have two
chickens, a quart of flour, and two pounds of raisins, sent to me by
a good lady this morning, and brought to me by a real good little
boy called Willie. I can't ask their leave, but I guess they would
not scold me for giving your mother half of what he brought me; so
you shall have it, dear. 'It's more blessed to give than to
receive.' 'The Lord gave and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be His
name.'"
While she was saying over these blessed words, she was busy dividing
the flour and the raisins, and putting them and the chicken into the
basket which Willie gave her.
They all thanked the old woman very kindly, and went off with her
flour and chicken.
"What shall we do with it all?" said they, as soon as they were out
of the house.
"Let us," said Willie, "beg all we can every where, and get our
basket full, and carry it back to her, and, when she is asleep, get
into her house again, and put it on her hearth. I know how to open
the window on the outside when she thinks it fast."
This was a good joke for the boys; so they went from house to house,
and, except at the squire's and one other place, got something from
every one, till, at last, their basket was full. Then they went
home, and got a peck of apples from their mother.
Willie then led the way to Granny Horton's again. They looked in at
the window, and, by the light of the few embers still burning, saw
the good woman asleep in her great, old-fashioned chair, with her
spectacles on, and by her side a little stand on which lay her Bible
open at the place where she had been reading.
"I can get in," said Willie, "and put the basket down by her side
before she wakes."
Accordingly, he went to a little window in the back part of the
house, climbed in, came softly into the room where she was, and set
the baskets, all running over with good things, down on the hearth.
Willie had hardly got back to the window, when the good woman waked
up; and there, directly before her eyes, stood the baskets. She took
them up, and looked at them for some minutes before she took any
thing out. At last, she began to examine their contents. When she
came to her chicken and flour and raisins, in the very papers in
which she had wrapped them; she looked up and clasped her hands with
such astonishment, with such a look of wonder and gratitude, that
the boys, in their glee, laughed outright, and so loud that she
heard them.
She ran to the window, but they were gone; and she never knew how it
was that her chicken and flour brought her back seven fold.
When next the cook went to see her, with me on,--I was every body's
cloak,--the old lady told her the whole story of finding the chicken
and flour, and so many other good things with them. The secret was
kept; and it was Granny Horton's firm faith that it was the wings of
angels she heard when she went to the window. Indeed she thought she
had seen the wings, for as Willie turned to run, he forgot to hold
me tight, and the wind blew me up so as to hide him entirely, and
she took me for great dark wings.
I fear you may be weary of my story. I have much more that I could
relate, but I have already been too long.
I am, as you see, ragged and worn, but the dear family have an
affection for me still, as well as for all the rest of us; and so I
am allowed to remain here in this most respectable company. I trust
the wig will now give us his history for which we have waited so
long."
"There is time enough before eight o'clock for the story of the
wig," said Frank, "if you can remember it, Mother. He ought to tell
his story now, as he promised."
"As the wig began to speak," said their mother, "he gave a slight
hitch on one side, just as if some one pushed him up a little, and
then, after a short pause, began thus: "You will be astonished,
perhaps, to know that it is more than a hundred years since I first
saw the light. None of you have lived so long, or seen as much as I
have. I cannot tell all I have seen or known. It would take too
long, and weary you too much. I can only give a slight sketch of my
long life.
In the year seventeen hundred and fifty, the baby head upon which I
grew came into this strange world in which we live. O, how happy was
the mother who saw me for the first time! How full was her joy when
she stroked the small head of her little girl, and exclaimed, "How
beautiful and soft her hair is! softer than velvet or satin." Even
then, every one said, "What a beautiful head of hair! What a lovely
baby!"
The little girl whose head I adorned was the daughter of a poor
vicar who lived with his wife in an obscure country town in England.
Alice was their fifth child, but their only daughter. She was very
beautiful, and, I may say it surely without vanity now, I was her
greatest ornament. I was of a beautiful auburn color, and fell in
thick clusters all over her happy, gentle head, and shaded her
laughter-loving face. After a day of hard work, how fond her mother
was of taking her little pet in her lap, and twisting up every curl
in nice order under her white linen night-cap, before putting her to
bed! Her father, too, would wind my ringlets around his great
fingers, made hard and rough with toil in the garden, and would kiss
every one of them, and pray God to bless the young head on which
they grew.
As the dear head grew larger, I grew larger and thicker. Every one
who saw me noticed me. One would say, "It looks like a pot of
hyacinths"; another, "It has caught the sunshine and kept it."
What a pleasant life I led! When Alice grew a large girl, she became
something of a romp, and one of her favorite amusements was to go to
the top of a hill near her father's house, when there was a high
wind, and let it blow through her curls, and sing and shout and
dance from the fulness of her joy. When she came home, she would say
"Mother, the wind has been combing my hair."
O the horrid combing that I had to endure every morning! One must be
a head of curly hair to know how terrible is a comb.
If you will not think me too long, I must talk a little more about
the dear Alice, and tell you what I witnessed till I was separated
from her."
"Go ahead," said the old musket.
"I must tell you how her sweetness and goodness once saved the house
from robbery. It was the custom of her father and mother, on Sunday,
to lock up the house, while they went to church. A pot of pork and
beans, and a pudding of Indian meal was put in the oven to bake for
their dinner.
One Sunday, as Alice had a heavy cold, they left her at home. She
was then fourteen years old, and felt herself quite equal to taking
charge of the house.
It was generally known that the curate's house was locked up on
Sunday; and a poor, foolish, as well as wicked fellow, determined to
take that opportunity to help himself to the good curate's silver,
or any other valuable, he could find in the house. It happened that
the man took the Sunday when Alice was left at home for his wicked
purpose.
When he came to the door which he intended to break open, he was
admitted by Alice, who saw him coming. She asked him to come in and
sit down, then inquired if he had travelled far, and set before him
some bread and butter and cold water.