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Sweet Cicely

J >> Josiah Allen\'s Wife (Marietta Holley) >> Sweet Cicely



Produced by Richard Prairie, Tiffany Vergon, Charles Aldarondo,
Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team




[Illustration: SWEET CICELY.]

SWEET CICELY

OR

JOSIAH ALLEN

AS A

POLITICIAN

BY

"JOSIAH ALLEN'S WIFE"

(MARIETTA HOLLEY)

_WITH ILLUSTRATIONS_

EIGHTH EDITION

TO

THE SAD-EYED MOTHERS,

WHO, LIKE CICELY,

ARE LOOKING ACROSS THE CRADLE OF THEIR

BOYS INTO THE GREAT WORLD OF

TEMPTATION AND DANGER,

This Book is Dedicated.

PREFACE.

Josiah and me got to talkin' it over. He said it wuzn't right to think
more of one child than you did of another.

And I says, "That is so, Josiah."

And he says, "Then, why did you say yesterday, that you loved sweet Cicely
better than any of the rest of your thought-children? You said you loved
'em all, and was kinder sorry for the hull on 'em, but you loved her the
best: what made you say it?"

Says I, "I said it, to tell the truth."

"Wall, what did you do it _for_?" he kep' on, determined to get a
reason.

"I did it," says I, a comin' out still plainer,--"I did it to keep from
lyin'."

"Wall, when you say it hain't right to feel so, what makes you?"

"I don't know, Josiah," says I, lookin' at him, and beyend him, way into
the depths of emotions and feelin's we can't understand nor help,--

"I don't know why, but I know I do."

And he drawed on his boots, and went out to the barn.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

CHAPTER II

CHAPTER III

CHAPTER IV

CHAPTER V

CHAPTER VI

CHAPTER VII

CHAPTER VIII

CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER X

CHAPTER XI

CHAPTER XII

CHAPTER XIII

CHAPTER XIV


SWEET CICELY




CHAPTER I.


It was somewhere about the middle of winter, along in the forenoon, that
Josiah Allen was telegrafted to, unexpected. His niece Cicely and her
little boy was goin' to pass through Jonesville the next day on her way to
visit her aunt Mary (aunt on her mother's side), and she would stop off,
and make us a short visit if convenient.

We wuz both tickled, highly tickled; and Josiah, before he had read the
telegraf ten minutes, was out killin' a hen. The plumpest one in the flock
was the order I give; and I wus a beginnin' to make a fuss, and cook up
for her.

We loved her jest about as well as we did Tirzah Ann. Sweet Cicely was
what we used to call her when she was a girl. Sweet Cicely is a plant that
has a pretty white posy. And our niece Cicely was prettier and purer and
sweeter than any posy that ever grew: so we thought then, and so we think
still.

[Illustration: JOSIAH TELLING THE NEWS TO SAMANTHA.]

Her mother was my companion's sister,--one of a pair of twins, Mary and
Maria, that thought the world of each other, as twins will. Their mother
died when they wus both of 'em babies; and they wus adopted by a rich
aunt, who brought 'em up elegant, and likely too: that I will say for her,
if she wus a 'Piscopal, and I a Methodist. I am both liberal and truthful
--very.

Maria wus Cicely's ma, and she wus left a widow when she wus a young
woman; and Cicely wus her only child. And the two wus bound up in each
other as I never see a mother and daughter in my life before or sense.

The third year after Josiah and me wus married, Maria wusn't well, and the
doctor ordered her out into the country for her health; and she and little
Cicely spent the hull of that summer with us. Cicely wus about ten; and
how we did love that girl! Her mother couldn't bear to have her out of her
sight; and I declare, we all of us wus jest about as bad. And from that
time they used to spend most all of their summers in Jonesville. The air
agreed with 'em, and so did I: we never had a word of trouble. And we used
to visit them quite a good deal in the winter season: they lived in the
city.

Wall, as Cicely got to be a young girl, I used often to set and look at
her, and wonder if the Lord could have made a prettier, sweeter girl if he
had tried to. She looked to me jest perfect, and so she did to Josiah.

And she knew so much, too, and wus so womanly and quiet and deep. I s'pose
it wus bein' always with her mother that made her seem older and more
thoughtful than girls usially are. It seemed as if her great dark eyes wus
full of wisdom beyend--fur beyend--her years, and sweetness too. Never wus
there any sweeter eyes under the heavens than those of our niece Cicely.

She wus very fair and pale, you would think at first; but, when you would
come to look closer, you would see there was nothing sickly in her
complexion, only it was very white and smooth,--a good deal like the pure
white leaves of the posy Sweet Cicely. She had a gentle, tender mouth,
rose-pink; and her cheeks wuz, when she would get rousted up and excited
about any thing; and then it would all sort o' die out again into that
pure white. And over all her face, as sweet and womanly as it was, there
was a look of power, somehow, a look of strength, as if she would venture
much, dare much, for them she loved. She had the gift, not always a happy
one, of loving,--a strength of devotion that always has for its companion-
trait a gift of endurance, of martyrdom if necessary.

She would give all, dare all, endure all, for them she loved. You could
see that in her face before you had been with her long enough to see it in
her life.

Her hair wus a soft, pretty brown, about the color of her eyes. And she
wus a little body, slender, and sort o' plump too; and her arms and hands
and neck wus soft and white as snow almost.

Yes, we loved Cicely: and no one could blame us, or wonder at us for
callin' her after the posy Sweet Cicely; for she wus prettier than any
posy that ever blew, enough sight.

Wall, she had always said she couldn't live if her mother died.

But she did, poor little creeter! she did.

Maria died when Cicely wus about eighteen. She had always been delicate,
and couldn't live no longer: so she died. And Josiah and me went right
after the poor child, and brought her home with us.

[Illustration: CICELY.]

She lived, Cicely did, because she wus young, and couldn't die. And Josiah
and me wus dretful good to her; and many's the nights that I have gone
into her room when I'd hear her cryin' way along in the night; many's the
times I have gone in, and took her in my arms, and held her there, and
cried with her, and soothed her, and got her to sleep, and held her in my
arms like a baby till mornin'. Wall, she lived with us most a year that
time; and it wus about two years after, while she wus to some of her
father's folks'es (they wus very rich), that she met the young man she
married,--Paul Slide.

He wus a handsome young man, well-behaved, only he would drink a little
once in a while: he'd got into the habit at college, where his mate wus
wild, and had his turns. But he wus very pretty in his manners, Paul was,
--polite, good-natured, generous-dispositioned,--and very rich.

And as to his looks, there wuzn't no earthly fault to find with him, only
jest his chin. And I told Josiah, that how Cicely could marry a man with
such a chin wus a mystery to me.

And Josiah said, "What is the matter with his chin?"

And I says, "Why, it jest sets right back from his mouth: he hain't got no
chin at all hardly," says I. "The place where his chin ort to be is
nothin' but a holler place all filled up with irresolution and weakness.
And I believe Cicely will see trouble with that chin."

And then--I well remember it, for it was the very first time after
marriage, and so, of course, the very first time in our two lives--Josiah
called me a fool, a "dumb fool," or jest the same as called me so. He
says, "I wouldn't be a dumb fool if I was in your place."

I felt worked up. But, like warriors on a battle-field, I grew stronger
for the fray; and the fray didn't scare me none.

[Illustration: PAUL SLIDE.]

But I says, "You'll see if you live, Josiah Allen"; and he did.

But, as I said, I didn't see how Cicely ever fell in love with a man with
such a chin. But, as I learned afterwards, she fell in love with him under
a fur collar. It wus on a slay-ride. And he wuz very handsome from his
mouth up, very: his mouth wuz ruther weak. It wus a case of love at first
sight, which I believe in considerable; and she couldn't help lovin' him,
women are so queer.

I had always said that when Cicely did love, it would go hard with her.
Many's the offers she'd had, but didn't care for 'em. But I knew, with her
temperament and nater, that love, if it did come to her, would come to
stay, and it would come hard and voyalent. And so it did.

She worshipped him, as I said at first, under a fur collar. And then, when
a woman once gets to lovin' a man as she did, why, she can't help herself,
chin or no chin. When a woman has once throwed herself in front of her
idol, it hain't so much matter whether it is stuffed full of gold, or
holler: it hain't so much matter _what_ they be, I think. Curius,
hain't it?

It hain't the easiest thing in the world for such a woman as Cicely to
love, but it is a good deal easier for her than to unlove, as she found
out afterwards. For twice before her marriage she saw him out of his head
with liquor; and it wus my advice to her, to give him up.

And she tried to unlove him, tried to give him up.

But, good land! she might jest as well have took a piece of her own heart
out, as to take out of it her love for him: it had become a part of her.
And he told her she could save him, her influence could redeem him, and it
wus the only thing that could save him.

And Cicely couldn't stand such talk, of course; and she believed him--
believed that she could love him so well, throw her influence so around
him, as to hold him back from any evil course.

It is a beautiful hope, the very beautifulest and divinest piece of folly
a woman can commit. Beautiful enough in the sublime martyrdom of the idee,
to make angels smile; and vain enough, and foolish enough in its utter
uselessness, to make sinners weep. It can't be done--not in 98 cases out
of a 100 at least.

Why, if a man hain't got love enough for a woman when he is tryin' to win
her affection,--when he is on probation, as you may say,--to stop and turn
round in his downward course, how can she expect he will after he has got
her, and has let down his watch, so to speak?

But she loved him. And when I warned her with tears in my eyes, warned her
that mebby it wus more than her own safety and happiness that wus
imperilled, I could see by the look in her eyes, though she didn't say
much, that it wusn't no use for me to talk; for she wus one of the
constant natures that can't wobble round. And though I don't like
wobblin', still I do honestly believe that the wobblers are happier than
them that can't wobble.

I could see jest how it wuz, and I couldn't bear to have her blamed. And I
would tell folks,--some of the relations on her mother's side,--when they
would say, "What a fool she wus to have him!"--I'd say to 'em, "Wall, when
a woman sees the man she loves goin' down to ruination, and tries to
unlove him, she'll find out jest how much harder it is to unlove him than
to love him in the first place: they'll find out it is a tough job to
tackle."

[Illustration: SAMANTHA AND THE "BLAMERS."]

I said this to blamers of Cicely (relatives, the best blamers you can find
anywhere). But, at the same time, it would have been my way, when he had
come a courtin' me so far gone with liquor that he could hardly stand up--
why, I should have told him plain, that I wouldn't try to set myself up as
a rival to alcohol, and he might pay to that his attentions exclusively
hereafter.

But she didn't. And he promised sacred to abstain, and could, and did, for
most a year; and she married him.

But, jest before the marriage, I got so rousted up a thinkin' about what I
had heard of him at college,--and I studied on his picture, which she had
sent me, took sideways too, and I could see plain (why, he hadn't no chin
at all, as you may say; and his lips was weak and waverin' as ever lips
was, though sort o' amiable and fascinating),--and I got to forebodin' so
about that chin, and my love for her wus a hunchin' me up so all the time,
that I went to see her on a short tower, to beset her on the subject. But,
good land! I might have saved my breath, I might have saved my tower.

I cried, and she cried too. And I says to her before I thought,--

"He'll be the ruin of you, Cicely."

And she says, "I would rather be beaten by his hand, than to be crowned by
another. Why, I love him, aunt Samantha."

You see, that meant a awful sight to her. And as she looked at me so
earnest and solemn, with tears in them pretty brown eyes, there wus in her
look all that that word could possibly mean to any soul.

But I cried into my white linen handkerchief, and couldn't help it, and
couldn't help sayin', as I see that look,--

"Cicely, I am afraid he will break your heart--kill you"--

"Why, I am not afraid to die when I am with him. I am afraid of nothing--
of life, or death, or eternity."

Well, I see my talk was no use. I see she'd have him, chin or no chin. If
I could have taken her up in my arms, and run away with her then and
there, how much misery I could have saved her from! But I couldn't: I had
the rheumatiz. And I had to give up, and go home disappointed, but
carryin' this thought home with me on my tower,--that I had done my duty
by our sweet Cicely, and could do no more.

As I said, he promised firm to give up drinking. But, good land! what
could you expect from that chin? That chin couldn't stand temptation if it
came in his way. At the same time, his love for Cicely was such, and his
good heart and his natural gentlemanly intuitions was such, that, if he
could have been kep' out of the way of temptation, he would have been all
right.

If there hadn't been drinking-saloons right in front of that chin, if it
could have walked along the road without runnin' right into 'em, it would
have got along. That chin, and them waverin'-lookin', amiable lips,
wouldn't have stirred a step out of their ways to get ruined and
disgraced: they wouldn't have took the trouble to.

And for a year or so he and the chin kep' out of the way of temptation, or
ruther temptation kep' out of their way; and Cicely was happy,--radiently
happy, as only such a nature as hern can be. Her face looked like a
mornin' in June, it wus so bright, and glowing with joy and happy love.

I visited her, stayed 3 days and 2 nights with her; and I almost forgot to
forebode about the lower part of his face, I found 'em so happy and
prosperous and likely.

Paul wus very rich. He wus the only child: and his pa left 2 thirds of his
property to him, and the other third to his ma, which wus more than she
could ever use while she wus alive; and at her death it wus to go to Paul
and his heirs.

They owned most all of the village they lived in. His pa had owned the
township the village was built on, and had built most all the village
himself, and rented the buildings. He owned a big manufactory there, and
the buildings rented high.

Wall, it wus in the second year of their marriage that that old college
chumb--(and I wish he had been chumbed by a pole, before he had ever gone
there). He had lost his property, and come down in the world, and had to
work for a livin'; moved into that village, and opened a drinking-saloon
and billiard-room.

He had been Paul's most intimate friend at college, and his evil genius,
so his mother said. But he was bright, witty, generous in a way,
unprincipled, dissipated. And he wanted Paul's company, and he wanted
Paul's money; and he had a chin himself, and knew how to manage them that
hadn't any.

Wall, Cicely and his mother tried to keep Paul from that bad influence.
But he said it would look shabby to not take any notice of a man because
he wus down in the world. He wouldn't have much to do with him, but it
wouldn't do to not notice him at all. How curius, that out of good comes
bad, and out of bad, good. That was a good-natured idee of Paul's if he
had had a chin that could have held up his principle; but he didn't.

So he gradually fell under the old influence again. He didn't mean to. He
hadn't no idee of doin' so when he begun. It was the chin.

He begun to drink hard, spent his nights in the saloon, gambled,--slipped
right down the old, smooth track worn by millions of jest such weak feet,
towards ruin. And Cicely couldn't hold him back after he had got to
slippin': her arms wuzn't strong enough.

She went to the saloon-keeper, and cried, and begged of him not to sell
her husband any more liquor. He was very polite to her, very courteous:
everybody was to Cicely. But in a polite way he told her that Paul wus his
best customer, and he shouldn't offend him by refusing to sell him liquor.
She knelt at his feet, I hearn,--her little, tender limbs on that rough
floor before that evil man,--and wept, and said,--

"For the sake of her boy, wouldn't he have mercy on the boy's father."

But in a gentle way he gave her to understand that he shouldn't make no
change.

And he told her, speakin' in a dretful courteous way, "that he had the law
on his side: he had a license, and he should keep right on as he was
doing."

[Illustration: CICELY IN THE SALOON.]

And so what could Cicely do? And time went on, carryin' Paul further and
further down the road that has but one ending. Lower and lower he sunk,
carryin' her heart, her happiness, her life, down with him.

And they said one cold night Paul didn't come home at all, and Cicely and
his mother wus half crazy; and they wus too proud, to the last, to tell
the servants more than they could help: so, when it got to be most
mornin', them two delicate women started out through the deep snow, to try
to find him, tremblin' at every little heap of snow that wus tumbled up in
the path in front of 'em; tremblin' and sick at heart with the agony and
dread that wus rackin' their souls, as they would look over the cold
fields of snow stretching on each side of the road, and thinkin' how that
face would look if it wus lying there staring with lifeless eyes up
towards the cold moonlight,--the face they had kissed, the face they had
loved,--and thinkin', too, that the change that had come to it--was
comin' to it all the time--was more cruel and hopeless than the change of
death.

So they went on, clear to the saloon; and there they found him,--there he
lay, perfectly stupid, and dead with liquor.

And they both, the broken-hearted mother and the broken-hearted wife, with
the tears running down their white cheeks, besought the saloon-keeper to
let him alone from that night.

The mother says, "Paul is so good, that if you did not tempt him, entice
him here, he would, out of pity to us, stop his evil ways."

And the saloon-keeper was jest as polite as any man wus ever seen to be,--
took his hat off while he told 'em, so I hearn, "that he couldn't go
against his own interests: if Paul chose to spend his money there, he
should take it."

"Will you break our hearts?" cried the mother.

"Will you ruin my husband, the father of my boy?" sobbed out Cicely, her
big, sorrowful eyes lookin' right through his soul--if he _had_ a
soul.

And then the man, in a pleasant tone, reminded 'em,--

"That it wuzn't him that wus a doin' this. It wus the law: if they wanted
things changed, they must look further than him. He had a license. The
great Government of the United States had sold him, for a few dollars, the
right to do just what he was doing. The law, and all the respectability
that the laws of our great and glorious Republic can give, bore him out in
all his acts. The law was responsible for all the consequenses of his
acts: the men were responsible who voted for license--it was not him."

"But you _can_ do what we ask if you will, out of pity to Paul, pity
to us who love him so, and who are forced to stand by powerless, and see
him going to ruin--we who would die for him willingly if it would do any
good. You _can_ do this."

He was a little bit intoxicated, or he wouldn't have gid 'em the cruel
sneer he did at the last,--though he sneeren polite,--a holdin' his hat in
his hand.

"As I said, my dear madam, it is not I, it is the law; and I see no other
way for you ladies who feel so about it, only to vote, and change the
laws."

"Would to God I _could!_" said the old white-haired mother, with her
solemn eyes lifted to the heavens, in which was her only hope.

"Would to God I could!" repeated my sweet Cicely, with her eyes fastened
on the face of him who had promised to cherish her, and comfort her, and
protect her, layin' there at her feet, a mark for jeers and sneers, unable
to speak a word, or lift his hand, if his wife and mother had been killed
before him.

But they couldn't do any thing. They would have lain their lives down for
him at any time, but that wouldn't do any good. The lowest, most ignorant
laborer in their employ had power in this matter, but they had none. They
had intellectual power enough, which, added to their utter helplessness,
only made their burden more unendurable; for they comprehended to the full
the knowledge of what was past, and what must come in the future unless
help came quickly. They had the strength of devotion, the strength of
unselfish love.

They had the will, but they hadn't nothin' to tackle it onto him with, to
draw him back. For their prayers, their midnight watches, their tears, did
not avail, as I said: they went jest so far; they touched him, but they
lacked the tacklin'-power that was wanted to grip holt of him, and draw
him back. What they needed was the justice of the law to tackle the
injustice; and they hadn't got it, and couldn't get holt of it: so they
had to set with hands folded, or lifted to the heavens in wild appeal,--
either way didn't help Paul any,--and see him a sinkin' and a sinkin',
slippin' further and further down; and they had to let him go.

He drunk harder and harder, neglected his business, got quarrelsome. And
one night, when the heavens was curtained with blackness, like a pall let
down to cover the accursed scene, he left Cicely with her pretty baby
asleep on her bosom, went down to the saloon, got into a quarrel with that
very friend of hisen, the saloon-keeper, over a game of billiards,--they
was both intoxicated,--and then and there Paul committed _murder_,
and would have been hung for it if he hadn't died in State's prison the
night before he got his sentence.

[Illustration: PAUL SHOOTING HIS FRIEND.]

Awful deed! Dreadful fate! But no worse, as I told Josiah when he wus a
groanin' over it; no worse, I told the children when they was a cryin'
over it; no worse, I told my own heart when the tears wus a runnin' down
my face like rain-water,--no worse because Cicely happened to be our
relation, and we loved her as we did our own eyes.

And our broad land is _full_ of jest such sufferin's, jest such
crimes, jest such disgrace, caused by the same cause;--as I told Josiah,
suffering, disgrace, and crime made legal and protected by the law.

And Josiah squirmed as I said it; and I see him squirm, for he believed in
it: he believed in licensing this shame and disgrace and woe; he believed
in makin' it respectable, and wrappin' round it the mantilly of the law,
to keep it in a warm, healthy, flourishin' condition. Why, he had helped
do it himself; he had helped the United States lift up the mantilly; he
had voted for it.

He squirmed, but turned it off by usin' his bandana hard, and sayin', in a
voice all choked down with grief,--

"Oh, poor Cicely! poor girl!"

"Yes," says I, "'poor girl!' and the law you uphold has made her; 'poor
girl'--has killed her; for she won't live through it, and you and the
United States will see that she won't."

He squirmed hard; and my feelin's for him are such that I can't bear to
see him squirm voyalently, as much as I blamed him and the United States,
and as mad as I was at both on 'em.

So I went to cryin' agin silently under my linen handkerchief, and he
cried into his bandana. It wus a awful blow to both on us.

Wall, she lived, Cicely did, which was more than we any one of us thought
she could do. I went right there, and stayed six weeks with her, hangin'
right over her bed, night and day; and so did his mother,--she a
brokenhearted woman too. Her heart broke, too, by the United States; and
so I told Josiah, that little villain that got killed was only one of his
agents. Yes, her heart was broke; but she bore up for Cicely's sake and
the boy's. For it seemed as if she felt remorsful, and as if it was for
them that belonged to him who had ruined her life, to help her all they
could.

Wall, after about three weeks Cicely begun to live. And so I wrote to
Josiah that I guessed she would keep on a livin' now, for the sake of the
boy.

And so she did. And she got up from that bed a shadow,--a faint, pale
shadow of the girl that used to brighten up our home for us. She was our
sweet Cicely still. But she looked like that posy after the frost has
withered it, and with the cold moonlight layin' on it.

Good and patient she wuz, and easy to get along with; for she seemed to
hold earthly things with a dretful loose grip, easy to leggo of 'em. And
it didn't seem as if she had any interest at all in life, or care for any
thing that was a goin' on in the world, till the boy wus about four years
old; and then she begun to get all rousted up about him and his future.
"She _must_ live," she said: "she had got to live, to do something to
help him in the future.

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