Wit of Women — Chapter VIII, part 2

THE STILTS OF GOLD.

BY METTA VICTORIA VICTOR.

Mrs. Mackerel sat in her little room, Back of her husband's grocery store, Trying to see through the evening gloom, To finish the baby's pinafore.

She stitched away with a steady hand, Though her heart was sore, to the very core, To think of the troublesome little band, (There were seven, or more), And the trousers, frocks, and aprons they wore, Made and mended by her alone.

"Slave, slave!"

she said, in a mournful tone;

"And let us slave, and contrive, and fret, I don't suppose we shall ever get A little home which is all our own, With my own front door Apart from the store, And the smell of fish and tallow no more."

These words to herself she sadly spoke, Breaking the thread from the last-set stitch, When Mackerel into her presence broke-- "Wife, we're--we're--we're, wife, we're--we're _rich_!"

"_We_ rich!

ha, ha!

I'd like to see;

I'll pull your hair if you're fooling me."

"Oh, don't, love, don't!

the letter is here-- You can read the news for yourself, my dear.

The one who sent you that white crape shawl-- There'll be no end to our gold--he's dead;

You know you always would call him stingy, Because he didn't invite us to Injy;

And I am his only heir, 'tis said.

A million of pounds, at the very least, And pearls and diamonds, likely, beside!"

Mrs. Mackerel's spirits rose like yeast-- "How lucky I married you, Mac," she cried.

Then the two broke forth into frantic glee.

A customer hearing the strange commotion, Peeped into the little back-room, and he Was seized with the very natural notion That the Mackerel family had gone insane;

So he ran away with might and main.

Mac shook his partner by both her hands;

They dance, they giggle, they laugh, they stare;

And now on his head the grocer stands, Dancing a jig with his feet in air-- Remarkable feat for a man of his age, Who never had danced upon any stage But the High-Bridge stage, when he set on top, And whose green-room had been a green-grocer's shop.

But that Mrs. Mac should perform so well Is not very strange, if the tales they tell Of her youthful days have any foundation.

But let that pass with her former life-- An opera-girl may make a good wife, If she happens to get such a nice situation.

A million pounds of solid gold One would have thought would have crushed them dead;

But dear they bobbed, and courtesied, and rolled Like a couple of corks to a plummet of lead.

'Twas enough the soberest fancy to tickle To see the two Mackerels in such a pickle!

It was three o'clock when they got to bed;

Even then through Mrs. Mackerel's head Such gorgeous dreams went whirling away, "Like a Catherine-wheel," she declared next day, "That her brain seemed made of sparkles of fire Shot off in spokes, with a ruby tire."

Mrs. Mackerel had ever been One of the upward-tending kind, Regarded by husband and by kin As a female of very ambitious mind.

It had fretted her long and fretted her sore To live in the rear of the grocery-store.

And several times she was heard to say She would sell her soul for a year and a day To the King of Brimstone, Fire, and Pitch, For the power and pleasure of being rich.

Now her ambition had scope to work-- Riches, they say, are a burden at best;

Her onerous burden she did not shirk, But carried it all with commendable zest;

Leaving her husband with nothing in life But to smoke, eat, drink, and obey his wife.

She built a house with a double front-door, A marble house in the modern style, With silver planks in the entry floor, And carpets of extra-magnificent pile.

And in the hall, in the usual manner, "A statue," she said, "of the chased Diana;

Though who it was chased her, or whether they Caught her or not, she could, really, not say."

A carriage with curtains of yellow satin-- A coat-of-arms with these rare devices: "A mackerel sky and the starry Pisces--" And underneath, in the purest fish-latin, _If fishibus flyabus They may reach the skyabus!

_ Yet it was not in common affairs like these She showed her original powers of mind;

Her soul was fired, her ardor inspired, To stand apart from the rest of mankind;

"To be A No. one," her husband said;

At which she turned very angrily red, For she couldn't endure the remotest hint Of the grocery-store, and the mackerels in't. Weeks and months she plotted and planned To raise herself from the common level;

Apart from even the few to stand Who'd hundreds of thousands on which to revel.

Her genius, at last, spread forth its wings-- Stilts, golden stilts, are the very things-- "I'll walk on stilts," Mrs. Mackerel cried, In the height of her overtowering pride.

Her husband timidly shook his head;

But she did not care--"For why," as she said, "Should the owner of more than a million pounds Be going the rounds On the very same grounds As those low people, she couldn't tell who, They might keep a shop, for all she knew."

She had a pair of the articles made, Of solid gold, gorgeously overlaid With every color of precious stone Which ever flashed in the Indian zone.

She privately practised many a day Before she ventured from home at all;

She had lost her girlish skill, and they say That she suffered many a fearful fall;

But pride is stubborn, and she was bound On her golden stilts to go around, Three feet, at least, from the plebeian ground.

'Twas an exquisite day, In the month of May, That the stilts came out for a promenade;

Their first _entree_ Was made on the shilling side of Broadway;

The carmen whistled, the boys went mad, The omnibus-drivers their horses stopped.

The chestnut-roaster his chestnuts dropped, The popper of corn no longer popped;

The daintiest dandies deigned to stare, And even the heads of women fair Were turned by the vision meeting them there.

The stilts they sparkled and flashed and shone Like the tremulous lights of the frigid zone, Crimson and yellow and sapphire and green, Bright as the rainbows in summer seen;

While the lady she strode along between With a majesty too supremely serene For anything _but_ an American queen.

A lady with jewels superb as those, And wearing such very expensive clothes, Might certainly do whatever she chose!

And thus, in despite of the jeering noise, And the frantic delight of the little boys, The stilts were a very decided success.

The _creme de la creme_ paid profoundest attention, The merchants' clerks bowed in such wild excess, When she entered their shops, that they strained their spines, And afterward went into rapid declines.

The papers, next day, gave her flattering mention;

"The wife of our highly-esteemed fellow-citizen, A Mackerel, of Codfish Square, in this city, Scorning French fashions, herself has hit on one So very piquant and stylish and pretty, We trust our fair friends will consider it treason _Not_ to walk upon stilts, by the close of the season."

Mrs. Mackerel, now, was never seen Out of her chamber, day or night, Unless her stilts were along--her mien Was very imposing from such a height, It imposed upon many a dazzled wight, Who snuffed the perfume floating down From the rustling folds of her gorgeous gown, But never could smell through these bouquets The fishy odor of former days.

She went on her golden stilts to pray, Which never became her better than then, When her murmuring lips were heard to say, "Thank God, I am not as my fellow-men!"

Her pastor loved as a pastor might-- His house that was built on a golden rock;

He pointed it out as a shining light To the lesser lambs of his fleecy flock.

The stilts were a help to the church, no doubt, They kindled its self-expiring embers, So that before the season was out It gained a dozen excellent members.

Mrs. Mackerel gave a superb soiree, Standing on stilts to receive her guests;

The gas-lights mimicked the glowing day So well, that the birds, in their flowery nests, Almost burst their beautiful breasts, Trilling away their musical stories In Mrs. Mackerel's conservatories.

She received on stilts; a distant bow Was all the loftiest could attain-- Though some of her friends she did allow To kiss the hem of her jewelled train.

One gentleman screamed himself quite hoarse Requesting her to dance; which, of course, Couldn't be done on stilts, as she Halloed down to him rather scornfully.

The fact is, when Mackerel kept a shop, His wife was very fond of a hop, And now, as the music swelled and rose, She felt a tingling in her toes, A restless, tickling, funny sensation Which didn't agree with her exaltation.

When the maddened music was at its height, And the waltz was wildest--behold, a sight!

The stilts began to hop and twirl Like the saucy feet of a ballet-girl.

And their haughty owner, through the air, Was spin, spin, spinning everywhere.

Everybody got out of the way To give the dangerous stilts fair play.

In every corner, at every door, With faces looking like unfilled blanks, They watched the stilts at their airy pranks, Giving them, unrequested, the floor.

They never had glittered so bright before;

The light it flew in flashing splinters Away from those burning, revolving centres;

While the gems on the lady's flying skirts Gave out their light in jets and spirts.

Poor Mackerel gazed in mute dismay At this unprecedented display.

"Oh, stop, love, stop!"

he cried at last;

But she only flew more wild and fast, While the flutes and fiddles, bugle and drum, Followed as if their time had come.

She went at such a bewildering pace Nobody saw the lady's face, But only a ring of emerald light From the crown she wore on that fatal night.

Whether the stilts were propelling her, Or she the stilts, none could aver.

Around and around the magnificent hall Mrs. Mackerel danced at her own grand ball.

"As the twig is bent the tree's inclined;"

This must have been a case in kind.

"What's in the blood will sometimes show--" 'Round and around the wild stilts go.

It had been whispered many a time That when poor Mack was in his prime Keeping that little retail store, He had fallen in love with a ballet-girl, Who gave up fame's entrancing whirl To be his own, and the world's no more.

She made him a faithful, prudent wife-- Ambitious, however, all her life.

Could it be that the soft, alluring waltz Had carried her back to a former age, Making her memory play her false, Till she dreamed herself on the gaudy stage?

Her crown a tinsel crown--her guests The pit that gazes with praise and jests?

"Pride," they say, "must have a fall--" Mrs. Mackerel was very proud-- And now she danced at her own grand ball, While the music swelled more fast and loud.

The gazers shuddered with mute affright, For the stilts burned now with a bluish light, While a glimmering, phosphorescent glow Did out of the lady's garments flow.

And what was that very peculiar smell?

Fish, or brimstone?

no one could tell.

Stronger and stronger the odor grew, And the stilts and the lady burned more blue;

'Round and around the long saloon, While Mackerel gazed in a partial swoon, She approached the throng, or circled from it, With a flaming train like the last great comet;

Till at length the crowd All groaned aloud.

For her exit she made from her own grand ball Out of the window, stilts and all.

None of the guests can really say How she looked when she vanished away.

Some declare that she carried sail On a flying fish with a lambent tail;

And some are sure she went out of the room Riding her stilts like a witch a broom, While a phosphorent odor followed her track: Be this as it may, she never came back.

Since then, her friends of the gold-fish fry Are in a state of unpleasant suspense, Afraid, that unless they unselfishly try To make better use of their dollars and sense To chasten their pride, and their manners mend, They may meet a similar shocking end.

--_Cosmopolitan Art Journal.

_ JUST SO.

BY METTA VICTORIA VICTOR.

A youth and maid, one winter night, Were sitting in the corner;

His name, we're told, was Joshua White, And hers was Patience Warner.

Not much the pretty maiden said, Beside the young man sitting;

Her cheeks were flushed a rosy red, Her eyes bent on her knitting.

Nor could he guess what thoughts of him Were to her bosom flocking, As her fair fingers, swift and slim, Flew round and round the stocking.

While, as for Joshua, bashful youth, His words grew few and fewer;

Though all the time, to tell the truth, His chair edged nearer to her.

Meantime her ball of yarn gave out, She knit so fast and steady;

And he must give his aid, no doubt, To get another ready.

He held the skein; of course the thread Got tangled, snarled and twisted;

"Have Patience!"

cried the artless maid, To him who her assisted.

Good chance was this for tongue-tied churl To shorten all palaver;

"Have Patience!"

cried he, "dearest girl!

And may I really have her?"

The deed was done; no more, that night, Clicked needles in the corner:-- And she is Mrs. Joshua White That once was Patience Warner.

THE INVENTOR'S WIFE.

BY E.

T.

CORBETT.

It's easy to talk of the patience of Job.

Humph!

Job had nothin' to try him;

Ef he'd been married to 'Bijah Brown, folks wouldn't have dared come nigh him.

Trials, indeed!

Now I'll tell you what--ef you want to be sick of your life, Jest come and change places with me a spell, for I'm an inventor's wife.

And sech inventions!

I'm never sure when I take up my coffee-pot, That 'Bijah hain't been "improvin'" it, and it mayn't go off like a shot.

Why, didn't he make me a cradle once that would keep itself a-rockin', And didn't it pitch the baby out, and wasn't his head bruised shockin'?

And there was his "patent peeler," too, a wonderful thing I'll say;

But it hed one fault--it never stopped till the apple was peeled away.

As for locks and clocks, and mowin' machines, and reapers, and all such trash, Why, 'Bijah's invented heaps of them, but they don't bring in no cash!

Law!

that don't worry him--not at all; he's the aggravatinest man-- He'll set in his little workshop there, and whistle and think and plan, Inventin' a Jews harp to go by steam, or a new-fangled powder-horn, While the children's goin' barefoot to school, and the weeds is chokin' our corn.

When 'Bijah and me kep' company, he wasn't like this, you know;

Our folks all thought he was dreadful smart--but that was years ago.

He was handsome as any pictur' then, and he had such a glib, bright way-- I never thought that a time would come when I'd rue my weddin'-day;

But when I've been forced to chop the wood, and tend to the farm beside, And look at 'Bijah a-settin' there, I've jest dropped down and cried.

We lost the hull of our turnip crop while he was inventin' a gun, But I counted it one of my marcies when it bust before 'twas done.

So he turned it into a "burglar alarm."

It ought to give thieves a fright-- 'Twould scare an honest man out of his wits, ef he sot it off at night.

Sometimes I wonder ef 'Bijah's crazy, he does such curious things.

Have I told you about his bedstead yit?

'Twas full of wheels and springs;

It hed a key to wind it up, and a clock-face at the head;

All you did was to turn them hands, and at any hour you said That bed got up and shook itself, and bounced you on the floor, And then shet up, jest like a box, so you couldn't sleep any more.

Wa'al, 'Bijah he fixed it all complete, and he sot it at half-past five, But he hadn't more 'n got into it, when--dear me!

sakes alive!

Them wheels began to whizz and whirr!

I heard a fearful snap, And there was that bedstead with 'Bijah inside shet up jest like a trap!

I screamed, of course, but 'twant no use.

Then I worked that hull long night A-tryin' to open the pesky thing.

At last I got in a fright: I couldn't hear his voice inside, and I thought he might be dyin', So I took a crowbar and smashed it in.

There was 'Bijah peacefully lyin', Inventin' a way to git out agin.

That was all very well to say, But I don't believe he'd have found it out if I'd left him in all day.

Now, since I've told you my story, do you wonder I'm tired of life, Or think it strange I often wish I warn't an inventor's wife?

AN UNRUFFLED BOSOM.

(_Story of an old Woman who knew Washington.

_) BY LIZZIE W.

CHAMPNEY.

An aged negress at her door Is sitting in the sun;

Her day of work is almost o'er, Her day of rest begun.

Her face is black as darkest night, Her form is bent and thin, And o'er her bony visage tight Is stretched her wrinkled skin.

Her dress is scant and mean; yet still About her ebon face There flows a soft and creamy frill Of costly Mechlin lace.

What means the contrast strange and wide?

Its like is seldom seen-- A pauper's aged face beside The laces of a queen.

Her mien is stately, proud, and high, And yet her look is kind, And the calm light within her eye Speaks an unruffled mind.

"Dar comes anodder ob dem tramps," She mumbles low in wrath, "I know dose sleek Centennial chaps Quick as dey mounts de path."

A-axing ob a lady's age I tink is impolite, And when dey gins to interview I disremembers quite.

Dar was dat spruce photometer Dat tried to take my head, And Mr. Squibbs, de porterer, Wrote down each word I said.

Six hundred years I t'ought it was, Or else it was sixteen-- Yes; I'd shook hands wid Washington And likewise General Greene.

I tole him all de generals' names Dar ebber was, I guess, From General Lee and La Fayette To General Distress.

Den dar's dem high-flown ladies My _old_ tings came to see;

Wanted to buy dem some heirlooms Of real Aunt Tiquity.

Says I, "Dat isn't dis chile's name, Dey calls me Auntie Scraggs," And den I axed dem, by de pound How much dey gabe for rags?

De missionary had de mose Insurance of dem all;

He tole me I was ole, and said, Leabes had dar time to fall.

He simply wished to ax, he said, As pastor and as friend, If wid unruffled bosom I Approached my latter end.

Now how he knew dat story I Should mightily like to know.

I 'clar to goodness, Massa Guy, If dat ain't really you!

You say dat in your wash I sent You only one white vest;

And as you'se passin' by you t'ought You'd call and get de rest.

Now, Massa Guy, about your shirts, At least, it seems to me Dat you is more particular Dan what you used to be.

Your family pride is stiff as starch, Your blood is mighty blue-- I nebber spares de indigo To make your shirts so, too.

I uses candle ends, and wax, And satin-gloss and paints, Until your wristbands shine like to De pathway ob de saints.

But when a gemman sends to me Eight white vests eberry week, A stain ob har-oil on each one, I tinks it's time to speak.

When snarled around a button dar's A golden har or so, Dat young man's going to be wed, Or someting's wrong, I know.

You needn't laugh, and turn it off By axing 'bout my cap;

You didn't use to know nice lace, And never cared a snap What 'twas a lady wore.

But folks Wid teaching learn a lot, And dey do say Miss Bella buys De best dat's to be got.

But if you really want to know, I don't mind telling you Jus' how I come by dis yere lace-- It's cur'us, but it's true.

My mother washed for Washington When I warn't more'n dat tall;

I cut one of his shirt-frills off To dress my corn-cob doll;

And when de General saw de shirt, He jus' was mad enough To tink he got to hold review Widout his best Dutch ruff.

Ma'am said she 'lowed it was de calf Dat had done chawed it off;

But when de General heard dat ar, He answered with a scoff;

He said de marks warn't don' of teef, But plainly dose ob shears;

An' den he showed her to de do' And cuffed me on ye years.

And when my ma'am arribed at home She stretched me 'cross her lap, Den took de lace away from me An' sewed it on her cap.

And when I dies I hope dat dey Wid it my shroud will trim.

Den when we meets on Judgment Day, I'll gib it back to him.

So dat's my story, Massa Guy, Maybe I's little wit;

But I has larned to, when I'm wrong, Make a clean breast ob it.

Den keep a conscience smooth and white (You can't if much you flirt), And an unruffled bosom, like De General's Sunday shirt.

HAT, ULSTER AND ALL.

BY CHARLOTTE FISKE BATES.

_John Verity's Experience.

_ I saw the congregation rise, And in it, to my great surprise, A Kossuth-covered head.

I looked and looked, and looked again, To make quite sure my sight was plain, Then to myself I said: That fellow surely is a Jew, To whom the Christian faith is new, Nor is it strange, indeed, If used to wear his hat in church, His manners leave him in the lurch Upon a change of creed.

Joining my friend on going out, Conjecture soon was put to rout By smothered laugh of his: Ha!

ha!

too good, too good, no Jew, Dear fellow, but Miss Moll Carew, Good Christian that she is!

Bad blunder all I have to say, It is a most unchristian way To rig Miss Moll Carew-- She has my hat, my cut of hair, Just such an ulster as I wear, And heaven knows what else, too.

AUCTION EXTRAORDINARY.

BY LUCRETIA DAVIDSON.

I dreamed a dream in the midst of my slumbers, And as fast as I dreamed it, it came into numbers;

My thoughts ran along in such beautiful meter, I'm sure I ne'er saw any poetry sweeter: It seemed that a law had been recently made That a tax on old bachelors' pates should be laid;

And in order to make them all willing to marry, The tax was as large as a man could well carry.

The bachelors grumbled and said 'twas no use-- 'Twas horrid injustice and horrid abuse, And declared that to save their own hearts' blood from spilling, Of such a vile tax they would not pay a shilling.

But the rulers determined them still to pursue, So they set all the old bachelors up at vendue: A crier was sent through the town to and fro, To rattle his bell and a trumpet to blow, And to call out to all he might meet in his way, "Ho!

forty old bachelors sold here to-day!"

And presently all the old maids in the town, Each in her very best bonnet and gown, From thirty to sixty, fair, plain, red and pale, Of every description, all flocked to the sale.

The auctioneer then in his labor began, And called out aloud, as he held up a man, "How much for a bachelor?

Who wants to buy?"

In a twink, every maiden responsed, "I--I!"

In short, at a highly extravagant price, The bachelors all were sold off in a trice: And forty old maidens, some younger, some older, Each lugged an old bachelor home on her shoulder.

A APELE FOR ARE TO THE SEXTANT.

BY ARABELLA WILSON.

O Sextant of the meetinouse which sweeps And dusts, or is supposed to!

and makes fiers, And lites the gas, and sumtimes leaves a screw loose, In which case it smells orful--wus than lampile;

And wrings the Bel and toles it when men dies To the grief of survivin' pardners, and sweeps paths, And for these servaces gits per annum;

Wich them that thinks deer let 'em try it;

Gittin up before starlite in all wethers, and Kindlin' fiers when the wether is as cold As zero, and like as not green wood for kindlins (I wouldn't be hierd to do it for no sum);

But o Sextant there are one kermodity Wuth more than gold which don't cost nuthin;

Wuth more than anything except the Sole of man!

I mean pewer Are, Sextant, I mean pewer Are!

O it is plenty out o' dores, so plenty it doant no What on airth to do with itself, but flize about Scatterin leaves and bloin off men's hats;

In short its jest as free as Are out dores;

But O Sextant!

in our church its scarce as piety, Scarce as bankbills when ajunts beg for mishuns, Which sum say is purty often, taint nuthin to me, What I give aint nuthing to nobody; but O Sextant!

You shet 500 men women and children Speshily the latter, up in a tite place, Sum has bad breths, none of em aint too sweet, Sum is fevery, sum is scroflus, sum has bad teeth And sum haint none, and sum aint over clean;

But evry one of em brethes in and out and in Say 50 times a minnet, or 1 million and a half breths an hour;

Now how long will a church full of are last at that rate?

I ask you; say fifteen minnets, and then what's to be did?

Why then they must breth it all over agin, And then agin and so on, till each has took it down At least ten times and let it up agin, and what's more, The same individible doant have the privilege Of breathin his own are and no one else, Each one must take wotever comes to him, O Sextant!

doant you know our lungs is belluses To blo the fier of life and keep it from Going out: und how can bellusses blo without wind?

And aint wind are?

I put it to your konshens, Are is the same to us as milk to babies, Or water is to fish, or pendlums to clox, Or roots and airbs unto an Injun doctor, Or little pills unto an omepath, Or Boze to girls.

Are is for us to brethe.

What signifize who preaches ef I cant brethe?

What's Pol?

What's Pollus to sinners who are ded?

Ded for want of breth!

Why Sextant when we dye Its only coz we cant brethe no more--that's all.

And now O Sextant?

let me beg of you To let a little are into our cherch (Pewer are is sertin proper for the pews);

And dew it week days and on Sundays tew-- It aint much trobble--only make a hoal, And then the are will come in of itself (It love to come in where it can git warm).

And O how it will rouze the people up And sperrit up the preacher, and stop garps And yorns and fijits as effectool As wind on the dry boans the Profit tels of.

--_Christian Weekly.

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