Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools
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Emilie Kip Baker >> Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools
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Our first interview was in Monastier market-place. To prove her good
temper, one child after another was set upon her back to ride, and one
after another went head over heels into the air; until a want of
confidence began to reign in youthful bosoms, and the experiment was
discontinued from a dearth of subjects. I was already backed by a
deputation [Footnote: Deputation: a group of persons sent to act in
behalf of others.] of my friends; but as if this were not enough, all
the buyers and sellers came around and helped me in the bargain; and the
ass and I and Father Adam were the centre of a hubbub for near half an
hour. At length she passed into my service for the consideration of
sixty-five francs and a glass of brandy. The sack had already cost
eighty francs and two glasses of beer; so that Modestine, as I instantly
baptized her, was upon all accounts the cheaper article.
By the advice of a fallacious [Footnote: Fallacious: misleading,
deceptive.] local saddler, a leather pad was made for me with rings to
fasten on my bundle; and I thoughtfully completed my kit and arranged my
toilette. By way of armory and utensils, I took a revolver, a little
spirit lamp and pan, a lantern and some halfpenny candles, a jack-knife
and a large leather flask. The main cargo consisted of two entire
changes of warm clothing, besides my travelling wear of country
velveteen, pilot coat, and knitted spencer, some books, and my
railway-rug, which, being also in the form of a bag, made me a double
castle for cold nights. The permanent larder was represented by cakes of
chocolate and tins of Bologna sausage. All this, except what I carried
about my person, was easily stowed into the sheepskin bag; and by good
fortune I threw in my empty knapsack, rather for convenience of carriage
than from any thought that I should want it on my journey. For more
immediate needs, I took a leg of cold mutton, a bottle of Beaujolais,
[Footnote: Beaujolais: a red wine made in southeastern France.] an empty
bottle to carry milk, an egg-beater, and a considerable quantity of
black bread and white for myself and donkey.
On the day of my departure I was up a little after five; by six we began
to load the donkey; and ten minutes after, my hopes were in the dust.
The pad would not stay on Modestine's back for half a moment. I returned
it to its maker, with whom I had so contumelious [Footnote:
Contumelious: rude and abusive.] a passage that the street outside was
crowded from wall to wall with gossips looking on and listening. The pad
changed hands with much vivacity; perhaps it would be more descriptive
to say that we threw it at each other's heads; and, at any rate, we were
very warm and unfriendly, and spoke with a deal of freedom.
I had a common donkey pack-saddle fitted upon Modestine; and once more
loaded her with my effects.
The bell of Monastier was just striking nine as I got quit of these
preliminary troubles and descended the hill through the common. As long
as I was within sight of the windows, a secret shame and the fear of
some laughable defeat withheld me from tampering with Modestine. She
tripped along upon her four small hoofs with a sober daintiness of gait;
from time to time she shook her ears or her tail; and she looked so
small under the bundle that my mind misgave me. We got across the ford
without difficulty--there was no doubt about the matter, she was
docility itself--and once on the other bank, where the road begins to
mount through pine-woods, I took in my right hand the unhallowed staff,
and with a quaking spirit applied it to the donkey. Modestine brisked up
her pace for perhaps three steps, and then relapsed into her former
minuet. [Footnote: Minuet: a slow, stately dance.] Another application
had the same effect, and so with the third. I am worthy the name of an
Englishman, and it goes against my conscience to lay my hand rudely on a
female. I desisted, and looked her all over from head to foot; the poor
brute's knees were trembling and her breathing was distressed; it was
plain that she could not go faster on a hill. God forbid, thought I,
that I should brutalize this innocent creature; let her go at her own
pace, and let me patiently follow.
What that pace was, there is no word mean enough to describe, it was
something as much slower than a walk as a walk is slower than a run; it
kept me hanging on each foot for an incredible length of time; in five
minutes it exhausted the spirit and set up a fever in all the muscles of
the leg. And yet I had to keep close at hand and measure my advance
exactly upon hers; for if I dropped a few yards in to the rear, or went
on a few yards ahead, Modestine came instantly to a halt and began to
browse. The thought that this was to last from here to Alais [Footnote:
Alais: a town in southeastern France not far from the Rhone River.]
nearly broke my heart. Of all conceivable journeys, this promised to be
the most tedious. I tried to tell myself it was a lovely day; I tried to
charm my foreboding spirit with tobacco; but I had a vision ever present
to me of the long long roads, up hill and down dale, and a pair of
figures ever infinitesimally moving, foot by foot, a yard to the minute,
and, like things enchanted in a nightmare, approaching no nearer to the
goal.
In the meantime there came up behind us a tall peasant, perhaps forty
years of age, of an ironical snuffy countenance, and arrayed in the
green tail-coat of the country. He overtook us hand over hand, and
stopped to consider our pitiful advance.
"Your donkey," says he, "is very old?"
I told him, I believed not.
Then, he supposed, we had come far.
I told him we had but newly left Monastier.
"Et vous marchez comme ca!" [Footnote: Et vous marchez comme ca! "and
you are moving like that!"] cried he; and, throwing back his head, he
laughed long and heartily. I watched him, half prepared to feel
offended, until he had satisfied his mirth; and then, "You must have no
pity on these animals," said he; and, plucking a switch out of a
thicket, he began to lace Modestine about the stern works, uttering a
cry. The rogue pricked up her ears and broke into a good round pace,
which she kept up without flagging, and without exhibiting the least
symptom of distress, as long as the peasant kept beside us. Her former
panting and shaking had been, I regret to say, a piece of comedy.
My _deus ex machina_, [Footnote: Deus ex machina: "the god out of
the machine"; some supernatural intervention.] before he left me,
supplied some excellent, if inhumane, advice; presented me with the
switch, which he declared she would feel more tenderly than my cane; and
finally taught me the true cry or masonic word of donkey-drivers,
"Proot!" All the time, he regarded me with a comical incredulous air, as
I might have smiled over his orthography or his green tail-coat. But it
was not my turn for the moment.
I hurried over my midday meal, and was early forth again. But, alas, as
we climbed the interminable hill upon the other side, "Proot!" seemed to
have lost its virtue. I prooted like a lion, I prooted melliflously
[Footnote: Melliflously: sweetly. Find this allusion in "Midsummer
Night's Dream," Act I, Scene 2.] like a sucking-dove; but Modestine
would be neither softened nor intimidated. She held doggedly to her
pace; nothing but a blow would move her, and that only for a second. I
must follow at her heels, incessantly belaboring. A moment's pause in
this ignoble toil, and she relapsed into her own private gait. I think I
never heard of any one in as mean a situation. I must reach the lake of
Bouchet, where I meant to camp, before sundown; and, to have even a hope
of this, I must instantly maltreat this uncomplaining animal. The sound
of my blows sickened me. Once, when I looked at her, she had a faint
resemblance to a lady of my acquaintance who formerly loaded me with
kindness; and this increased my horror of my cruelty.
It was blazing hot up the valley, windless, with vehement sun upon my
shoulders; and I had to labor so consistently with my stick that the
sweat ran into my eyes. Every five minutes, too, the pack, the basket,
and the pilot-coat would take an ugly slew [Footnote: Slew: twist.] to
one side or the other; and I had to stop Modestine, just when I had got
her to a tolerable pace of about two miles an hour, to tug, push,
shoulder, and re-adjust the load. And at last, in the village of Ussel,
[Footnote: Ussel: a town about one hundred miles northwest of Alais.]
saddle and all, the whole hypothec [Footnote: Hypothec: literally, the
property of a tenant held by a landlord as security for rent. Here, of
course, the property insufficiently secured on the donkey.] turned round
and grovelled in the dust, below the donkey's belly. She none better
pleased, incontinently drew up and seemed to smile; and a party of one
man, two women, and two children came up, and, standing round me in a
half-circle, encouraged her by their example.
I disposed it, Heaven knows how, so as to be mildly portable, and then
proceeded to steer Modestine through the village. She tried, as was
indeed her invariable habit, to enter every house and every courtyard in
the whole length, and, encumbered as I was, without a hand to help
myself, no words can render an idea of my difficulties. A priest, with
six or seven others, was examining a church in process of repair, and
his acolytes [Footnote: Acolytes: assistants of the priest during mass.]
laughed loudly as they saw my plight. I remembered having laughed myself
when I had seen good men struggling with adversity in the person of a
jackass, and the recollection filled me with penitence. That was in my
old light days, before this trouble came upon me. God knows at least
that I shall never laugh again, thought I. But O, what a cruel thing is
a farce to those engaged in it!
A little out of the village, Modestine, filled with the demon, set her
heart upon a by-road, and positively refused to leave it. I dropped all
my bundles, and, I am ashamed to say, struck the poor sinner twice
across the face. It was pitiful to see her lift up her head with shut
eyes, as if waiting for another blow. I came very near crying; but I did
a wiser thing than that, and sat squarely down by the roadside to
consider my situation. Modestine in the meanwhile, munched some black
bread with a contrite hypocritical air. It was plain that I must make a
sacrifice to the gods of shipwreck. I threw away the empty bottles
destined to carry milk; I threw away my own white bread, and, disdaining
to act by general average, kept the black bread for Modestine; lastly I
threw away the cold leg of mutton and the egg whisk, although this last
was dear to my heart.
Thus I found room for everything in the basket, and even stowed the
boating-coat on the top. By means of an end of cord I slung it under one
arm; and although the cord cut my shoulder, and the jacket hung almost
to the ground, it was with a heart greatly lightened that I set forth.
--ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON (adapted).
[Footnote: Would you judge that this was the writer's first experience
in camping? Why? What is added to the story by attributing human
qualities to Modestine? How did she seem to be always putting him in the
wrong? Do people ever work such tricks? What characteristics of the
author are shown in this sketch? Is the humor of the story one of
situation merely? What other selections are similar to this in the style
of writing? in the humor?]
A NIGHT IN THE PINES
The trees were not old, but they grew thickly round the glade: there was
no outlook, except northeastward upon distant hill-tops, or straight
upward to the sky; and the encampment felt secure and private like a
room. By the time I had made my arrangements and fed Modestine, the day
was already beginning to decline. I buckled myself to the knees into my
sack and made a hearty meal; and as soon as the sun went down, I pulled
my cap over my eyes and fell asleep.
Night is a dead monotonous period under a roof; but in the open world it
passes lightly, with its stars and dews and perfumes, and the hours are
marked by changes in the face of Nature. What seems a kind of temporal
death to people choked between walls and curtains, is only a light and
living slumber to the man who sleeps afield. All night long he can hear
Nature breathing deeply and freely; even as she takes her rest she turns
and smiles; and there is one stirring hour unknown to those who dwell in
houses, when a wakeful influence goes abroad over the sleeping
hemisphere, and all the out-door world are on their feet. It is then
that the cock first crows, not this time to announce the dawn, but like
a cheerful watchman speeding the course of night. Cattle awake on the
meadows; sheep break their fast on dewy hillsides, and change to a new
lair among the ferns; and houseless men, who have lain down with the
fowls, open their dim eyes and behold the beauty of the night.
The stars were clear, colored, and jewel-like, but not frosty. A faint
silvery vapor stood for the Milky Way. All around me the black
fir-points stood upright and stock-still. By the whiteness of the
pack-saddle, I could see Modestine walking round and round at the length
of her tether; I could hear her steadily munching at the sward; but
there was not another sound, save the indescribable quiet talk of the
runnel over the stones. I lay lazily smoking and studying the color of
the sky, as we call the void of space, where it showed a reddish gray
behind the pines to where it showed a glossy blue-black between the
stars. As if to be more like a pedler, I wear a silver ring. This I
could see faintly shining as I raised or lowered the cigarette; and at
each whiff the inside of my hand was illuminated, and became for a
second the highest light in the landscape.
A faint wind, more like a moving coolness than a stream of air, passed
down the glade from time to time; so that even in my great chamber the
air was being renewed all night long. I thought with horror of the inn
at Chasserades and the congregated night caps; with horror of the
nocturnal prowesses of clerks and students, of hot theatres, and
passkeys and close rooms. I have not often enjoyed a more serene
possession of myself, nor felt more independent of material aids. The
outer world, from which we cower into our houses, seemed after all a
gentle, habitable place; and night after night a man's bed, it seemed,
was laid and waiting for him in the fields, where God keeps an open
house.
As I lay thus, between content and longing, a faint noise stole towards
me through the pines. I thought, at first, it was the crowing of cocks
or the barking of dogs at some very distant farm; but steadily and
gradually it took articulate shape in my ears, until I became aware that
a passenger was going by upon the high-road in the valley, and singing
loudly as he went. There was more of good-will than grace in his
performance; but he trolled with ample lungs; and the sound of his voice
took hold upon the hillside and set the air shaking in the leafy glens.
I have heard people passing by night in sleeping cities, some of them
sang; one, I remember, played loudly on the bagpipes. I have heard the
rattle of a cart or carriage spring up suddenly after hours of
stillness, and pass for some minutes, within the range of my hearing as
I lay abed. There is a romance about all who are abroad in the black
hours, and with something of a thrill we try to guess their business.
But here the romance was double; first this glad passenger, lit
internally with wine, who sent up his voice in music through the night;
and then I, on the other hand, buckled into my sack, and smoking alone
in the pine-woods between four and five thousand feet towards the stars.
--ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
[Footnote: What use does the author make of contrast? What things does
he notice? Did you ever sleep at night out of doors? If so, was the
night empty of impressions or did you hear and see things? What
characteristic things has Stevenson chosen to give you in the picture of
camping out at night? What things do you suppose Stevenson most enjoyed
in his life out of doors?]
LIFE IN OLD NEW YORK
In those good old days of simplicity and sunshine, a passion for
cleanliness was the leading principle in domestic economy, and the
universal test of an able housewife.
The front door was never opened, except for marriages, funerals, New
Year's Day, the festival of St. Nicholas, or some such great occasion.
It was ornamented with a gorgeous brass knocker, which was curiously
wrought,--sometimes in the device of a dog, and sometimes in that of a
lion's head,--and daily burnished with such religious zeal that it was
often worn out by the very precautions taken for its preservation.
The whole house was constantly in a state of inundation, [Footnote:
Inundation: a flood.] under the discipline of mops and brooms and
scrubbing brushes; and the good housewives of those days were a kind of
amphibious [Footnote: Amphibious: able to live in water and on land.]
animal, delighting exceedingly to be dabbling in water,--insomuch that
an historian of the day gravely tells us that many of his townswomen
grew to have webbed fingers, "like unto ducks."
The grand parlor was the sanctum, where the passion for cleaning was
indulged without control. No one was permitted to enter this sacred
apartment, except the mistress and her confidential maid, who visited it
once a week for the purpose of giving it a thorough cleaning. On these
occasions they always took the precaution of leaving their shoes at the
door, and entering devoutly [Footnote: Entering devoutly, etc. What
Oriental custom is the author alluding to?] in their stocking feet.
After scrubbing the floor, sprinkling it with fine white sand,--which
was curiously stroked with a broom into angles and curves and
rhomboids,--after washing the windows, rubbing and polishing the
furniture, and putting a new branch of evergreens in the fireplace, the
windows were again closed to keep out the flies, and the room was kept
carefully locked, until the revolution of time brought round the weekly
cleaning day.
As to the family, they always entered in at the gate, and generally
lived in the kitchen. To have seen a numerous household assembled round
the fire, one would have imagined that he was transported to those happy
days of primeval simplicity which float before our imaginations like
golden visions.
The fireplaces were of a truly patriarchal magnitude, where the whole
family, old and young, master and servant, black and white,--nay, even
the very cat and dog,--enjoyed a community of privilege, and had each a
right to a corner. Here the old burgher would sit in perfect silence,
puffing his pipe, looking in the fire with half-shut eyes, and thinking
of nothing, for hours together; the good wife on the opposite side,
would employ herself diligently in spinning yarn or knitting stockings.
The young folks would crowd around the hearth, listening with breathless
attention to some old crone of a negro, who was the oracle of the
family, and who, perched like a raven in a corner of the chimney, would
croak forth, for a long winter afternoon, a string of incredible stories
about New England witches, grisly ghosts, and bloody encounters among
Indians.
In these happy days, fashionable parties were generally confined to the
higher classes, or noblesse; that is to say, such as kept their own
cows, and drove their own wagons. The company usually assembled at three
o'clock, and went away about six, unless it was in winter time, when the
fashionable hours were a little earlier, that the ladies might reach
home before dark.
The tea table was crowned with a huge earthen dish, well stored with
slices of fat pork, fried brown, cut up into morsels, and swimming in
gravy. The company seated round the genial board, evinced their
dexterity in launching their forks at the fattest pieces in this mighty
dish,--in much the same manner that sailors harpoon porpoises at sea,
or our Indians spear salmon in the lakes.
Sometimes the table was graced with immense apple pies, or saucers full
of preserved peaches and pears; but it was always sure to boast an
enormous dish of balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog's fat and called
doughnuts or olykocks, a delicious kind of cake, at present little known
in this city, except in genuine Dutch families.
The tea was served out of a majestic Delft teapot, ornamented with
paintings of fat little Dutch shepherds and shepherdesses tending
pigs,--with boats sailing in the air, and houses built in the clouds,
and sundry other ingenious Dutch fancies. The beaux distinguished
themselves by their adroitness in replenishing this pot from a huge
copper teakettle. To sweeten the beverage, a lump of sugar was laid
beside each cup, and the company alternately nibbled and sipped with
great decorum; until an improvement was introduced by a shrewd and
economic old lady, which was to suspend, by a string from the ceiling, a
large lump directly over the tea table, so that it could be swung from
mouth to mouth.
At these primitive tea parties, the utmost propriety and dignity
prevailed,--no flirting nor coquetting; no romping of young ladies; no
self-satisfied struttings of wealthy gentlemen, with their brains in
their pockets, nor amusing conceits and monkey divertisements [Footnote:
Divertisements: diversions, amusements.] of smart young gentlemen, with
no brains at all.
On the contrary, the young ladies seated themselves demurely in their
rush-bottomed chairs, and knit their own woolen stockings; nor ever
opened their lips, excepting to say yah, Mynheer, or yah, Vroww,
[Footnote: Yay, Mynheer: "yes, sir." Yay, Vrow: "yes, madam."] to any
question that was asked them; behaving in all things like decent,
well-educated damsels. As to the gentlemen, each of them tranquilly
smoked his pipe, and seemed lost in contemplation of the blue and white
tiles with which the fireplaces were decorated; wherein sundry passages
of Scripture were piously portrayed. Tobit [Footnote: Tobit. The Book of
Tobit is part of the Apocrypha.] and his dog figured to great advantage;
Haman [Footnote: Haman is the king's counselor in the Book of Esther.]
swung conspicuously on his gibbet; and Jonah appeared most manfully
leaping from the whale's mouth, like Harlequin [Footnote: Harlequin: the
clown in early Italian and later French comedy.] through a barrel of
fire.
The parties broke up without noise and without confusion. They were
carried home by their own carriages, that is to say, by the vehicles
nature had provided them, excepting such of the wealthy as could afford
to keep a wagon.
--WASHINGTON IRVING.
[Footnote: Are there any parts of the country where the traditions of
the "best parlor" are still kept? Does the early life in New York appear
to you attractive or uninteresting? Does the description seem like
ridicule? The descendants of the old Dutch families resented Irving's
way of making fun of their ancestors. Point out passages which might
justify this complaint. Compare this sketch with "A Pine Tree Shilling"
in the style of writing, method of description, and humor.]
THE BAZAAR IN MOROCCO
How can I describe the swarming crowds of the bazaar, the constant,
noiseless stir of all those bournouses [Footnote: Bournouses: cf. "An
Arab Fisherman."] in the semi-darkness! The little labyrinthine avenues
cross each other in every direction, covered with their ancient roofing
of wood, or else with trellises of cane, over which grape-vines are
trained. Fronting on these passages are the shops, something like holes
in a wall as regards size, and in them the turbaned dealers sit
squatted, stately and impassible, among their rare knick-knacks. Shops
where the same kind of goods are sold are grouped in quarters by
themselves. There is the street of the dealers in clothing, where the
booths are bright with pink, blue, and orange silks, and with brocades
of gold and silver, and where ladies, veiled and draped like phantoms,
are posted. There is the street of the leather merchants, where
thousands of sets of harness of every conceivable color, for horses,
mules, and asses, are hanging from the walls; there are all sorts of
objects of strange and ancient fashion for use in the chase or in war:
powder-horns inlaid with gold and silver, embroidered belts for sword
and musket, travelling bags for caravans and amulets [Footnote: Amulets:
ornaments worn as a charm against evil.] to charm away the dangers of
the desert. Then there is the street of the workers in brass, where from
morning till night is heard the sound of hammers at work on the
arabesques [Footnote: Arabesques: a kind of low-relief carving of man
and animal figures fantastically interlaced.] of vases and plates; the
street of the papooch embroiderers, where all the little dens are filled
with velvet, pearls and gold; the street of the furniture decorators;
that of the naked, grimy blacksmiths; that of the dyers, with purple or
indigo-bedaubed arms, Finally, the quarter of the armorers, who make
long flint-lock muskets, thin as cane-stalks, the silver inlaid butt of
which is made excessively large so as to receive the shoulder. The
Moroccans [Footnote: The Moroccans ... in this country. What similar
statement was made in "An Arab Fisherman"?] never have the slightest
idea of changing the form adopted by their ancestors, and the shape of
their musket is as immutable as all things else are in this country; it
seems like a dream to see them at this day making such quantities of
these old-fashioned arms.
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