CHAPTER IV.
THEOLOGICAL TEA.
AT the call of her mother, Mary hurried into the ‘best room, witha strange discomposure of spirit she had never felt before. Fromchildhood, her love for James had been so deep, equable, and intense,that it had never disturbed her with thrills and yearnings; it hadgrown up in sisterly calmness, and, quietly expanding, had takenpossession of her whole nature without her once dreaming of its power.But this last interview seemed to have struck some great nerve ofher being,—and calm as she usually was, from habit, principle, andgood health, she shivered and trembled as she heard his retreatingfootsteps, and saw the orchard-grass fly back from under his feet.It was as if each step trod on a nerve,—as if the very sound of therustling grass was stirring something living and sensitive in her soul.And, strangest of all, a vague impression of guilt hovered over her._Had_ she done anything wrong? She did not ask him there; she had notspoken love to him; no, she had only talked to him of his soul, and howshe would give hers for his,—oh, so willingly!—and that was not love;it was only what Dr. H. said Christians must always feel.
‘Child, what _have_ you been doing?’ said Aunt Katy, who sat in fullflowing chintz petticoat and spotless dimity short-gown, with hercompany knitting-work in her hands; ‘your cheeks are as red as peonies.Have you been crying? What’s the matter?’
‘There is the Deacon’s wife, mother,’ said Mary, turning confusedly,and darting to the entry-door.
Enter Mrs. Twitchel,—a soft, pillowy, little elderly lady, whosewhole air and dress reminded one of a sack of feathers tied in themiddle with a string. A large, comfortable pocket, hung upon the side,disclosed her knitting-work ready for operation; and she zealouslycleansed herself with a checked handkerchief from the dust which hadaccumulated during her ride in the old ‘one-hoss shay,’ answering thehospitable salutation of Katy Scudder in that plaintive, motherly voicewhich belongs to certain nice old ladies, who appear to live in a stateof mild chronic compassion for the sins and sorrows of this mortal lifegenerally.
‘Why, yes, Miss Scudder, I’m pretty tol’able. I keep goin’, and goin’.That’s my way. I’s a-tellin’ the Deacon, this mornin’, I didn’t see howI _was_ to come here this afternoon; but then I _did_ want to see MissScudder, and talk a little about that precious sermon, Sunday. How isthe Doctor? blessed man! Well, his reward must be great in heaven, ifnot on earth, as I was a-tellin’ the Deacon; and he says to me, sayshe, “Polly, we mustn’t be man-worshippers.” There, dear,’ (_to Mary_,)‘don’t trouble yourself about my bonnet; it a’n’t my Sunday one, but Ithought ’twould do. Says I to Cerinthy Ann, “Miss Scudder won’t mind,’cause her heart’s set on better things.” I always like to drop a wordin season to Cerinthy Ann, ’cause she’s clean took up with vanity anddress. Oh, dear! oh, dear me! so different from your blessed daughter,Miss Scudder! Well, it’s a great blessin’ to be called in one’s youth,like Samuel and Timothy; but then we doesn’t know the Lord’s ways.Sometimes I gets clean discouraged with my children,—but then ag’in Idon’t know; none on us does. Cerinthy Ann is one of the most masterhands to turn off work; she takes hold and goes along like a woman, andnobody never knows when that gal finds the time to do all she does do;and I don’t know nothin’ what I _should_ do without her. Deacon wassaying, if ever she was called, she’d be a Martha, and not a Mary: butthen she’s dreadful opposed to the doctrines. Oh, dear me! oh, dearme! Somehow they seem to rile her all up; and she was a-tellin’ meyesterday, when she was a-hangin’ out clothes, that she never shouldget reconciled to Decrees and ’Lection, ’cause she can’t see, if thingsis certain, how folks is to help ’emselves. Says I, “Cerinthy Ann,folks a’n’t to help themselves; they’s to submit unconditional.” Andshe jest slammed down the clothes-basket and went into the house.’
When Mrs. Twitchel began to talk, it flowed a steady stream, as whenone turns a faucet, that never ceases running till some hand turns itback again; and the occasion that cut the flood short at present wasthe entrance of Mrs. Brown.
Mr. Simeon Brown was a thriving ship-owner of Newport, who lived in alarge house, owned several negro-servants and a span of horses, andaffected some state and style in his worldly appearance. A passion formetaphysical Orthodoxy had drawn Simeon to the congregation of Dr. H.,and his wife of course stood by right in a high place there. She was atall, angular, somewhat hard-favoured body, dressed in a style ratherabove the simple habits of her neighbours, and her whole air spoke thegreat woman, who in right of her thousands expected to have her say inall that was going on in the world, whether she understood it or not.
On her entrance, mild little Mrs. Twitchel fled from the cushionedrocking-chair, and stood with the quivering air of one who feels shehas no business to be anywhere in the world, until Mrs. Brown’s bonnetwas taken and she was seated, when Mrs. Twitchel subsided into a cornerand rattled her knitting-needles to conceal her emotion.
New England has been called the land of equality; but what land uponearth is wholly so? Even the mites in a bit of cheese, naturalists say,have great tumblings and strivings about position and rank: he who hasten pounds will always be a nobleman to him who has but one, let himstrive as manfully as he may; and therefore let us forgive meek littleMrs. Twitchel from melting into nothing in her own eyes when Mrs.Brown came in, and let us forgive Mrs. Brown that she sat down in therocking-chair with an easy grandeur, as one who thought it her dutyto be affable and meant to be. It was, however, rather difficult forMrs. Brown, with her money, house, negroes, and all, to patronise Mrs.Katy Scudder, who was one of those women whose natures seems to siton thrones, and who dispense patronage and favour by an inborn rightand aptitude, whatever be their social advantages. It was one of Mrs.Brown’s trials of life, this secret, strange quality in her neighbour,who stood apparently so far below her in worldly goods. Even the quietpositive style of Mrs. Katy’s knitting made her nervous; it was animplication of independence of her sway; and though on the presentoccasion every customary courtesy was bestowed, she still felt, as shealways did when Mrs. Katy’s guest, a secret uneasiness. She mentallycontrasted the neat little parlour, with its white sanded floor andmuslin curtains, with her own grand front-room, which boasted the thenuncommon luxuries of Turkey carpet and Persian rug, and wondered ifMrs. Katy did really feel as cool and easy in receiving her as sheappeared.
You must not understand that this was what Mrs. Brown _supposed_herself to be thinking about; oh, no! by no means! All the little,mean work of our nature is generally done in a small dark closet justa little back of the subject we are talking about, on which subject wesuppose ourselves of course to be thinking;—of course we _are_ thinkingof it; how else could we talk about it?
The subject in discussion, and what Mrs. Brown supposed to be in herown thoughts, was the last Sunday’s sermon, on the doctrine of entireDisinterested Benevolence, in which good Doctor H. had proclaimed tothe citizens of Newport their duty of being so wholly absorbed in thegeneral good of the universe as even to acquiesce in their own finaland eternal destruction, if the greater good of the whole might therebybe accomplished.
‘Well, now, dear me!’ said Mrs. Twitchel, while her knitting-needlestrotted contentedly to the mournful tone of her voice,—‘I was tellin’the Deacon, if we only could get there! Sometimes I think I get alittle way,—but then ag’in I don’t know; but the Deacon he’s quitedown,—he don’t see no evidences in himself. Sometimes he says he don’tfeel as if he ought to keep his place in the church,—but then ag’inhe don’t know. He keeps a-turnin’ and turnin’ on’t over in his mind,and a-tryin’ himself this way and that way; and he says he don’t seenothin’ but what’s selfish, no way.
’’Member one night last winter, after the Deacon got warm in bed,there come a rap at the door; and who should it be but old BeulahWard wantin’ to see the Deacon—’twas her boy she sent, and he saidBeulah was sick and hadn’t no more wood nor candles. Now I know’d theDeacon had carried that critter half a cord of wood, if he had onestick, since Thanksgivin’,
and I’d sent her two o’ my best moulds ofcandles,—nice ones that Cerinthy Ann run when we killed a crittur;but nothin’ would do but the Deacon must get right out his warm bedand dress himself, and hitch up his team to carry over some wood toBeulah. Says I, “Father, you know you’ll be down with the rheumatisfor this; besides, Beulah is real aggravatin’. I know she trades offwhat we send her to the store for rum, and you never get no thanks. She’xpects, ’cause we has done for her, we always must; and more we do,more we may do.” And says he to me, says he, “That’s jest the way wesarves the Lord, Polly; and what if He shouldn’t hear us when we callon Him in our troubles?” So I shet up; and the next day he was downwith the rheumatis. And Cerinthy Ann, says she, “Well, father, _now_ Ihope you’ll own you have got _some_ disinterested benevolence,” saysshe; and the Deacon he thought it over a spell, and then he says, “I’m’fraid it’s all selfish. I’m jest a-makin’ a righteousness of it.” AndCerinthy Ann she come out, declarin’ that the best folks never had nocomfort in religion; and for her part she didn’t mean to trouble herhead about it, but have jest as good a time as she could while she’syoung, ’cause if she was ’lected to be saved she should be, and if shewa’n’t she couldn’t help it, any how.’
‘Mr. Brown says he came on to Dr. H.’s ground years ago’ said Mrs.Brown, giving a nervous twitch to her yarn, and speaking in a sharp,hard, didactic voice, which made little Mrs. Twitchel give a gentlequiver, and look humble and apologetic. ‘Mr. Brown’s a master thinker;there’s nothing pleases that man better than a hard doctrine; he saysyou can’t get ’em too hard for him. He don’t find any difficulty inbringing his mind up; he just reasons it out all plain; and he says,people have no need to be in the dark; and that’s _my_ opinion. “Iffolks know they ought to come up to anything, why _don’t_ they?” hesays; and I say so too.’
‘Mr. Scudder used to say that it took great afflictions to bring hismind to that place,’ said Mrs. Katy. ‘He used to say that an oldpaper-maker told him once, that paper that was shaken only one way inthe making would tear across the other, and the best paper had to beshaken every way; and so he said we couldn’t tell, till we had beenturned and shaken and tried every way, where we should tear.’
Mrs. Twitchel responded to this sentiment with a gentle series ofgroans, such as were her general expression of approbation, swayingherself backward and forward; while Mrs. Brown gave a sort of toss andsnort, and said that for her part she always thought people knew whatthey did know,—but she guessed she was mistaken.
The conversation was here interrupted by the civilities attendant onthe reception of Mrs. Jones,—a broad, buxom, hearty soul, who had comeon horseback from a farm about three miles distant.
Smiling with rosy content, she presented Mrs. Katy a small pot ofgolden butter,—the result of her forenoon’s churning.
There are some people so evidently broadly and heartily of this world,that their coming into a room always materializes the conversation. Wewish to be understood that we mean no disparaging reflection on suchpersons;—they are as necessary to make up a world as cabbages to makeup a garden; the great healthy principles of cheerfulness and animallife seem to exist in them in the gross; they are wedges and ingotsof solid, contented vitality. Certain kinds of virtues and Christiangraces thrive in such people as the first crop of corn does in thebottom-lands of the Ohio. Mrs. Jones was a church-member, a regularchurch-goer, and planted her comely person plump in front of Dr. H.every Sunday, and listened to his searching and discriminating sermonswith broad, honest smiles of satisfaction. Those keen distinctionsas to motives, those awful warnings and urgent expostulations, whichmade poor Deacon Twitchel weep, she listened to with great, round,satisfied eyes, making to all, and after all, the same remark,—that itwas good, and she liked it, and the Doctor was a good man; and on thepresent occasion, she announced her pot of butter as one fruit of herreflections after the last discourse.
‘You see,’ she said, ‘as I was a-settin’ in the spring-house, thismornin’, a-workin’ my butter, I says to Dinah,—“I’m goin’ to carry apot of this down to Miss Scudder for the Doctor,—I got so much goodout of his Sunday’s sermon.” And Dinah she says to me, says she,—“Laws,Miss Jones, I thought you was asleep, for sartin!” But I wasn’t; only Iforgot to take any carraway-seed in the mornin’, and so I kinder missedit; you know it ’livens one up. But I never lost myself so but what Ikinder heerd him goin’ on, on, sort o’ like,—and it sounded _all_ sorto’ _good_; and so I thought of the Doctor to-day.’
‘Well, I’m sure,’ said Aunt Katy, ‘this will be a treat; we all knowabout your butter, Mrs. Jones. I sha’n’t think of putting any of mineon table to-night, I’m sure.’
‘Law, now don’t!’ said Mrs. Jones. ‘Why you re’lly make me ashamed,Miss Scudder. To be sure, folks does like our butter, and it alwaysfetches a pretty good price,—_he’s_ very proud on’t. I tell him heoughtn’t to be,—we oughtn’t to be proud of anything.’
And now Mrs. Katy, giving a look at the old clock, told Mary it wastime to set the tea-table; and forthwith there was a gentle movement ofexpectancy. The little mahogany tea-table opened its brown wings, andfrom a drawer came forth the snowy damask covering. It was etiquette,on such occasions, to compliment every article of the establishmentsuccessively as it appeared; so the Deacon’s wife began at thetable-cloth.
‘Well, I do declare, Miss Scudder beats us all in her table-cloths,’she said, taking up a corner of the damask, admiringly; and Mrs. Jonesforthwith jumped up and seized the other corner.
‘Why, this ’ere must have come from the Old Country. It’s most thebeautiflest thing I ever did see.’
‘It’s my own spinning,’ replied Mrs. Katy, with conscious dignity.‘There was an Irish weaver came to Newport the year before I wasmarried, who wove beautifully,—just the Old-Country patterns,—and I’dbeen spinning some uncommonly fine flax then. I remember Mr. Scudderused to read to me while I was spinning,’—and Aunt Katy looked afar, asone whose thoughts are in the past, and dropped out the last words witha little sigh, unconsciously, as to herself.
‘Wall, now, I must say,’ said Mrs. Jones, ‘this goes quite beyond me. Ithought I could spin some; but I shan’t never dare to show mine.’
‘I’m sure, Mrs. Jones, your towels that you had out bleaching, thisspring, were wonderful,’ said Aunt Katy. ‘But I don’t pretend to domuch now,’ she continued, straightening her trim figure. ‘I’m gettingold, you know; we must let the young folks take up these things. Maryspins better now than I ever did; Mary, hand out those napkins.’
And so Mary’s napkins passed from hand to hand.
‘Well, well,’ said Mrs. Twitchel to Mary, ‘it’s easy to see that _your_linen-chest will be pretty full by the time _he_ comes along; won’t it,Miss Jones?’—and Mrs Twitchel looked pleasantly facetious, as elderlyladies generally do, when suggesting such possibilities to younger ones.
Mary was vexed to feel the blood boil up in her cheeks in a mostunexpected and provoking way at the suggestion; whereat Mrs. Twitchelnodded knowingly at Mrs. Jones, and whispered something in a mysteriousaside, to which plump Mrs. Jones answered,—‘Why, do tell! now I never!’
‘It’s strange,’ said Mrs. Twitchel, taking up her parable again, insuch a plaintive tone that all knew something pathetic was coming,‘what mistakes some folks will make, a-fetchin’ up girls. Now there’syour Mary, Miss Scudder,—why, there a’n’t nothin’ she can’t do: butlaw, I was down to Miss Skinner’s, last week, a-watchin’ with her,and re’lly it ’most broke my heart to see her. Her mother was a mostamazin’ smart woman; but she brought Suky up, for all the world, as ifshe’d been a wax doll, to be kept in the drawer,—and sure enough, shewas a pretty cretur,—and now she’s married, what is she? She ha’n’tno more idee how to take hold than nothin’. The poor child means wellenough, and she works so hard she ’most kills herself; but then she isin the suds from mornin’ till night,—she’s one the sort whose work’snever done,—and poor George Skinner’s clea
n discouraged.’
‘There’s everything in _knowing how_,’ said Mrs. Katy. ‘Nobody oughtto be always working; it’s a bad sign. I tell Mary,—“Always do up yourwork in the forenoon.” Girls must learn that. I never work afternoons,after my dinner dishes are got away; I never did and never would.’
‘Nor I, neither,’ chimed in Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Twitchel,—bothanxious to show themselves clear on this leading point of New-Englandhousekeeping.
‘There’s another thing I always tell Mary,’ said Mrs. Katy,impressively. ‘“Never say there isn’t time for a thing that ought tobe done. If a thing is _necessary_, why, life is long enough to finda place for it. That’s my doctrine. When anybody tells me they can’t_find time_ for this or that, I don’t think much of ’em. I think theydon’t know how to work,—that’s all.”’
Here Mrs. Twitchel looked up from her knitting, with apologetic giggleat Mrs. Brown.
‘Law, now, there’s Miss Brown, she don’t know nothin’ about it, ’causeshe’s got her servants to every turn. I s’pose she thinks it queerto hear us talkin’ about our work. Miss Brown must have her time allto herself. I was tellin’ the Deacon the other day that she was aprivileged woman.’
‘I’m sure, those that have servants find work enough following ’em’round,’ said Mrs. Brown,—who, like all other human beings, resentedthe implication of not having as many trials in life as her neighbours.‘As to getting the work done up in the forenoon, that’s a thing I nevercan teach ’em; they’d rather not. Chloe likes to keep her work ’round,and do it by snacks, any time, day or night, when the notion takes her.’
‘And it was just for that reason I never would have one of thosecreatures ’round,’ said Mrs. Katy. ‘Mr. Scudder was principled againstbuying negroes,—but if he had _not_ been, I should not have wanted anyof _their_ work. I know what’s to be done, and most help is no helpto me. I want people to stand out of my way and let me get done. I’vetried keeping a girl once or twice, and I never worked so hard in mylife. When Mary and I do all ourselves, we can calculate everything toa minute; and we get our time to sew and read and spin and visit, andlive just as we want to.’
Here, again, Mrs. Brown looked uneasy. To what use was it that shewas rich and owned servants, when this Mordecai in her gate utterlydespised her prosperity? In her secret heart she thought Mrs. Katymust be envious, and rather comforted herself on this view of thesubject,—sweetly unconscious of any inconsistency in the feeling withher views of utter self-abnegation just announced.
Meanwhile the tea-table had been silently gathering on its snowyplateau the delicate china, the golden butter, the loaf of faultlesscake, a plate of crullers or wonders, as a sort of sweet fried cakewas commonly called,—tea-rusks, light as a puff, and shining on topwith a varnish of eggs,—jellies of apple and quince quivering in amberclearness,—whitest and purest honey in the comb,—in short, everythingthat could go to the getting-up of a most faultless tea.
‘I don’t see,’ said Mrs. Jones, resuming the gentle pæans of theoccasion, ‘how Miss Scudder’s loaf-cake always comes out just so. Itdon’t rise neither to one side nor t’other, but just even all ’round;and it a’n’t white one side and burnt the other, but just a good brownall over; and it don’t have any heavy streak in it.’
‘Jest what Cerinthy Ann was sayin’, the other day,’ said Mrs. Twichel.‘She says she can’t never be sure how hers is a-comin’ out. Do what shecan, it will be either too much or too little; but Miss Scudder’s isalways jest so. “Law,” says I, “Cerinthy Ann, it’s _faculty_,—that’sit;—them that has it has it, and them that hasn’t—why, they’ve got towork hard, and not do half so well, neither.”’
Mrs. Katy took all these praises as matter of course. Since she wasthirteen years old, she had never put her hand to anything that she hadnot been held to do better than other folks, and therefore she acceptedher praises with the quiet repose and serenity of assured reputation:though, of course, she used the usual polite disclaimers of ‘Oh, it’snothing, nothing at all; I’m sure I don’t know how I do it, and wasnot aware it was so good,’ and so on. All which things are proper forgentlewomen to observe, in like cases, in every walk of life.
‘Do you think the Deacon will be along soon?’ said Mrs. Katy, whenMary, returning from the kitchen, announced the important fact, thatthe tea-kettle was boiling.
‘Why, yes,’ said Mrs. Twitchel. ‘I’m a-lookin’ for him every minute. Hetold me, that he and the men should be plantin’ up to the eight-acrelot, but he’d keep the colt up there to come down on; and so I laidhim out a clean shirt, and says, “Now, father, you be sure and bethere by five, so that Miss Scudder may know when to put her teaa-drawin’.”—There he is, I believe,’ she added, as a horse’s tramp washeard without, and, after a few moments, the desired Deacon entered.
He was a gentle, soft-spoken man, low, sinewy, thin, with black hairshowing lines and patches of silver. His keen, thoughtful dark eyemarked the nervous and melancholic temperament. A mild and pensivehumility of manner seemed to brood over him, like the shadow of acloud. Everything in his dress, air, and motions indicated punctiliousexactness and accuracy, at times rising to the point of nervous anxiety.
Immediately after the bustle of his entrance had subsided, Mr. SimeonBrown followed. He was a tall, lank individual, with high-cheek bones,thin, sharp features, small, keen, hard eyes, and large hands and feet.
Simeon was, as we have before remarked, a keen theologian, and had thescent of a hound for a metaphysical distinction. True, he was a manof business, being a thriving trader to the coast of Africa, whencehe imported negroes for the American market; and no man was held tounderstand that branch of traffic better,—he having, in his earlierdays, commanded ships in the business, and thus learned it from theroot. In his private life, Simeon was severe and dictatorial. Hewas one of that class of people who, of a freezing day, will plantthemselves directly between you and the fire, and there stand andargue to prove that selfishness is the root of moral evil. Simeon saidhe always had thought so; and his neighbours sometimes supposed thatnobody could enjoy better experimental advantages for understandingthe subject. He was one of those men who suppose themselves submissiveto the Divine will, to the uttermost extent demanded by the extremetheology of that day, simply because they have no nerves to feel,no imagination to conceive, what endless happiness or suffering is,and who deal therefore with the great question of the salvation ordamnation of myriads as a problem of theological algebra, to be workedout by their inevitable _x_, _y_, _z_.
But we must not spend too much time with our analysis of character,for matters at the tea-table are drawing to a crisis. Mrs. Jones hasannounced that she does not think ‘_he_’ can come this afternoon; bywhich significant mode of expression she conveyed the dutiful ideathat there was for her but one male person in the world. And now Mrs.Katy says, ‘Mary, dear, knock at the Doctor’s door and tell him thattea is ready.’
_Theological Tea_
Sampson Low, Son & Co. Jany 24, 1859 Page 37.]
The Doctor was sitting in his shady study, in the room on the otherside of the little entry. The windows were dark and fragrant with theshade and perfume of blossoming lilacs, whose tremulous shadow, mingledwith spots of afternoon sunlight, danced on the scattered papers of agreat writing-table covered with pamphlets and heavily-bound volumes oftheology, where the Doctor was sitting.
A man of gigantic proportions, over six feet in height, and builtevery way with an amplitude corresponding to his height, sitting bentover his writing, so absorbed that he did not hear the gentle sound ofMary’s entrance.
‘Doctor,’ said the maiden, gently, ‘tea is ready.’
No motion, no sound, except the quick tracing of the pen over the paper.
‘Doctor! Doctor!’ a little louder, and with another step into theapartment,—‘tea is ready.’
The Doctor stretched his head forward to a paper which lay before him,and responded in a low, murmuring voice, as reading something.
‘Firstly,—if underived virtue be peculiar to the Deity, can it be theduty of a creature to have it?’
Here a little waxen hand came with a very gentle tap on his hugeshoulder, and ‘Doctor, tea is ready,’ penetrated drowsily to the nerveof his ear, as a sound heard in sleep. He rose suddenly with a start,opened a pair of great blue eyes, which shone abstractedly under thedome of a capacious and lofty forehead, and fixed them on the maiden,who by this time was looking up rather archly, and yet with an attitudeof the most profound respect, while her venerated friend was assemblingtogether his earthly faculties.
‘Tea is ready, if you please. Mother wished me to call you.’
‘Oh!—ah!—yes!—indeed!’ he said, looking confusedly about, and startingfor the door in his study gown.
‘If you please, sir,’ said Mary, standing in his way, ‘would you notlike to put on your coat and wig?’
The Doctor gave a hurried glance at his study gown, put his hand tohis head, which, in place of the ample curls of his full-bottomed wig,was decked only with a very ordinary cap, and seemed to come at onceto full comprehension. He smiled a kind of conscious, benignant smile,which adorned his high cheek-bones and hard features as sunshine adornsthe side of a rock, and said, kindly, ‘Ah, well, child, I understandnow; I’ll be out in a moment.’
And Mary, sure that he was now on the right track, went back to thetea-room with the announcement that the Doctor was coming.
In a few moments he entered, majestic and proper, in all the dignityof full-buttomed, powdered wig, full, flowing coat, with ample cuffs,silver knee and shoe buckles, as became the gravity and majesty of theminister of those days.
He saluted all the company with a benignity which had a touch of themajestic, and also of the rustic in it; for at heart the Doctor wasa bashful man, that is, he had somewhere in his mental camp thattreacherous fellow whom John Bunyan anathematizes under the name ofShame. The company rose on his entrance; the men bowed and the womencurtsied, and all remained standing while he addressed to each, withpunctilious decorum, those inquiries in regard to health and well-beingwhich preface a social interview. Then, at a dignified sigh from Mrs.Katy, he advanced to the table, and all following his example, stood,while, with one hand uplifted, he went through a devotional exercisewhich, for length, more resembled a prayer than a grace,—after whichthe company were seated.
‘Well, Doctor,’ said Mr. Brown, who, as a householder of substance,felt a conscious right to be first in open conversation with theminister, ‘people are beginning to make a noise about your views. I wastalking with Deacon Timmins the other day down on the wharf, and hesaid Dr. Stiles said that it was entirely new doctrine—entirely so,—andfor his part he wanted the good old ways.’
‘They say so, do they?’ said the Doctor, kindling up from anabstraction into which he seemed to be gradually subsiding. ‘Well, letthem. I had rather publish _new_ divinity than any other, and the moreof it the better,—_if it be but true_. I should think it hardly worthwhile to write, if I had nothing _new_ to say.’
‘Well,’ said Deacon Twitchel,—his meek face flushing with awe of hisminister—‘Doctor, there’s all sorts of things said about you. Nowthe other day I was at the mill with a load of corn, and while I wasa-waitin’, Amariah Wadsworth come along with his’n; and so while wewere waitin’, he says to me, “Why, they say your minister is gettin’to be an Arminian;” and he went on a-tellin’ how old Ma’am Badger toldhim that you interpreted some parts of Paul’s Epistles clear on theArminian side. You know Ma’am Badger’s a master-hand at doctrines, andshe’s ’most an uncommon Calvinist.’
‘That does not frighten me at all,’ said the sturdy Doctor. ‘SupposingI do interpret some texts like the Arminians. Can’t Arminians haveanything right about them? Who wouldn’t rather go with the Arminianswhen they are _right_, than with the Calvinists when they are wrong?’
‘That’s it,—you’ve hit it, Doctor,’ said Simeon Brown. ‘That’s whatI always say. I say, ‘Don’t he _prove_ it? and how are you going toanswer him?’ That gravels ’em.’
‘Well,’ said Deacon Twitchel, ‘Brother Seth—you know Brother Seth,—hesays you deny depravity. He’s all for imputation of Adam’s sin, youknow; and I have long talks with Seth about it, every time he comes tosee me; and he says, that if we did not sin in Adam, it’s givin’ up thewhole ground altogether; and then he insists you’re clean wrong aboutthe unregenerate doings.’
‘Not at all,—not in the least,’ said the Doctor, promptly.
‘I wish Seth could talk with you some time, Doctor. Along in thespring, he was down helpin’ me to lay stone fence,—it was when we wasfencin’ off the south-pastur’ lot,—and we talked pretty nigh all day;and it really did seem to me that the longer we talked, the sotterSeth grew. He’s a master-hand at readin’; and when he heard that yourremarks on Dr. Mayhew had come out, Seth tackled up o’ purpose andcome up to Newport to get them, and spent all his time, last winter,studyin’ on it and makin’ his remarks: and I tell you, sir, he’s atight fellow to argue with. Why, that day, what with layin’ stonewall and what with arguin’ with Seth, I come home quite beat out,—MissTwitchel will remember.’
‘That he was!’ said his helpmeet. ‘I ’member, when he came home, saysI, “Father, you seem clean used up;” and I stirred ’round lively like,to get him his tea. But he jest went into the bedroom and laid downafore supper; and I says to Cerinthy Ann, “That’s a thing I ha’n’tseen your father do since he was took with the typhus.” And CerinthyAnn, she said she knew ’twa’n’t anything but them old doctrines,—thatit was always so when Uncle Seth come down. And after tea father waskinder chirked up a little, and he and Seth set by the fire, and wasa-beginnin’ it ag’in, and I jest spoke out and said,—“Now, Seth, these’ere things doesn’t hurt you; but the Deacon is weakly, and if he getshis mind riled after supper, he don’t sleep none all night. So,” saysI, “you’d better jest let matters stop where they be; ’cause,” says I,“’twon’t make no difference, for to-night, which on ye’s got the righton’t;—reckon the Lord’ll go on his own way without you; and we shallfind out, by’m-by, what that is.”’
‘Mr. Scudder used to think a great deal on these points,’ said Mrs.Katy, ‘and the last time he was home he wrote out his views. I haven’tever shown them to you, Doctor; but I should be pleased to know whatyou think of them.’
‘Mr. Scudder was a good man, with a clear head,’ said the Doctor; ‘andI should be much pleased to see anything that he wrote.’
A flush of gratified feeling passed over Mrs. Katy’s face;—for oneflower laid on the shrine which we keep in our hearts for the dead isworth more than any gift to our living selves.
We will not now pursue our party further, lest you, Reader, get moretheological tea than you can drink. We will not recount the numerousnice points raised by Mr. Simeon Brown and adjusted by the Doctor,—andhow Simeon invariably declared, that that was the way in which hedisposed of them himself, and how he had thought it out ten years ago.
We will not relate, either, too minutely, how Mary changed colourand grew pale and red in quick succession, when Mr. Simeon Brownincidentally remarked that the ‘Monsoon’ was going to set sail thatvery afternoon for her three-years’ voyage. Nobody noticed—in thebusy amenities—the sudden welling and ebbing of that one poor littleheart-fountain.
So we go,—so little knowing what we touch and what touches us as wetalk! We drop out a common piece of news,—‘Mr. So-and-so is dead,—MissSuch-a-one is married,—such a ship has sailed,’—and lo, on our righthand or our left, some heart has sunk under the news silently,—gonedown in the great ocean of Fate, without even a bubble rising to tellits drowning pang. And this—God help us!—is what we call living!