I didn’t ask her how she managed to get in and out of their little egg-shell boats with that hoop, or through the small aperture that served for a door to the wigwam. Perhaps she dropped it off on the outside when she wanted to go into her queer house—who knows? I might say I should have liked her better without it, on that bright morning, as she stood there by the blue Sault River, with her glossy black hair blowing about her bright eyes. Eleven days in all we were on these beautiful lakes; more than long enough to go to Europe, which I hope some day to see. One night too long we were on the water before we reached Chicago. And what a night that was, of fog and rain and thunder and lightning. So vivid was the lightning that no one would have been surprised at any moment had it struck the vessel. Every peal of thunder seemed as if it thumped us directly on the head. The steamer tipped and rolled, and the rain beat into the cabin windows and dripped on the bed, and deluged the floor. The military company whom we took on board a few hours before, hushed their songs and jests, and watched with us for the daylight that was to ensure the safety of all on board. It came at last; and we breathed freely as we stepped safely on shore. How little we thought, as we shook hands with the merry captain, and I promised “to take another trip on his nice boat next summer,” that the very next night he would be shipwrecked on those waters!
Ah! the poor captain! My eyes fill, my heart aches, as if I had known him years, instead of those few bright fairy days. Poor Captain Jack Wilson, with his handsome, sunshiny face, cheery voice, and manly ways! How little I thought there would be no “next summer” for him, when he so kindly helped me up on the “hurricane deck,” and into the cosy little “pilothouse” to look about; who was always sending me word to come “forward” or “aft,” because he knew I so much enjoyed seeing all beautiful things; who was all goodness, all kindness, and yet, after we left him that morning, found a grave in that cruel surf!
The afternoon of the day we said our last good by to him on the Chicago pier, we had taken a carriage to drive round the city, and reined up at the draw, for a boat to pass through. It was the “Lady Elgin” going forth to meet her doom! We kissed our hands gaily to her, in the bright sunshine, and that night as we slept safely in our beds at the hotel, that brave heart, with a little wailing babe pressed to it, had only a treacherous raft between him and eternity. The poor, poor captain! It was so hard to give him up! As his strong arm sustained the helpless in that fearful night, may God support his own gentle ones in this their direst need.
This was indeed a gloomy ending to our lovely lake trip. We saw many things to interest us on our return to New York through Cleveland and Pittsburgh, but, as you may suppose, we were not very gay; every now and then, when we saw anything beautiful, we would say to each other, “The poor captain!” You know there are some people whom it is so hard to “make dead;” and he was one of these. So strong, so sunshiny, so full of life! How blessed to know all this bright intelligence cannot be extinguished like a taper; else, how sad, my dear children, would life be to us.
WHEN I WAS YOUNG.
Not one girl in ten, now-a-days, knows how to sew. “’Twas not so in my time,” as the old ladies say, with an ominous shake of the head. No; in my school-days proper attention was given to rivers, bays, capes, islands, and cities in the forenoon—interspersed with, “I love, thou lovest, he, she, or it loves;” then, at the child’s hungry hour—(twelve)—we were dismissed to roast beef and apple dumplings. At three we marched back with a comfortable dinner under our aprons—with cool heads, rosy cheeks, and a thimble in our pockets; and never a book did we see all the blessed afternoon. I see her—the schoolma’am (angels see her now), with her benevolent face, and ample bosom—your flat-chested woman never should keep school, she has no room for the milk of human kindness; I see her sitting on that old cane-bottomed chair, going through the useless ceremony of counting noses, to see if there were any truants; and of course there never were from choice, for our teacher never forgot that she was once a child herself. I see her calling one after another to take from her hand a collar, or wristbands, or shirt-bosom to stitch, or some button-holes to make;—good old soul! and then, when we were all seated, she drew from her pocket some interesting book and read it aloud to us—not disdaining to laugh at the funny places, and allowing us to do the same—hearing, well pleased, all our childish remarks, and answering patiently all our questions concerning the story, or travels, or poetry she was reading, while our willing fingers grew still more nimble; and every child uttered an involuntary “Oh!” when the sun slanted into the west window, telling us that afternoon school was over.
Ah, those were the days!
I bless that schoolmistress every time I darn a stocking or make or mend a garment; and I am glad for her own sake that she is not alive now, to see the ologies and isms that are thumped into children’s heads, to the exclusion of things better suited to their age, and which all the French and Italian that ever was mispronounced by fashion, can never take the place of in practical life. Yes—girls then knew how to sew. Where will you find a schoolgirl who does it neatly, now? who does not hate a needle, and most clumsily wields it when compelled to? and not by her own fault, poor thing! though her future husband may not be as ready as I to shield her with this excuse. Modern mothers never seem to think of this. Male teachers, with buttonless shirts on their own backs, seem to ignore it. No place for the needle in school, and no time, on account of long lessons, out. Where is a modern girl to learn this all-important branch of education, I want to know? A fig for your worsted work, your distorted cats, and rabbits, and cows! Give me the girl who can put a shirt together, or the feminine of a shirt either—which, by the way, I could never see the impropriety of mentioning, any more than its male, though I am not going to make any old maid scream by saying “chemise”—of course not!
I am concerned for the rising generation; spinally in the first place, stitch-ically in the second. All the stitches they know of now are in their sides, poor things! I should like every schoolhouse to have a playground, where the pupils could stay when they were not in school—which should be almost never, until ventilation, recesses, and school hours are better regulated—in fact, till the whole system is tipped over, and buried fathoms under ground, and only spoken of as the tortures of the Inquisition are spoken of—with shuddering horror—as remnants of darkness and barbarism. I don’t want children to be burned up, but I don’t care how many badly conducted schoolhouses burn down. I consider every instance a special interposition of Providence; and even if some of the children are burned—horrible as that is—is it not a quicker mode of death than that they are daily put through, poor, tortured things?