ADMINISTRATION BUILDING.
Susan pulled down a large heap of corn to husk while telling her story, and shook out of it the dry corn-cockles, saying, “First the blade, and then the ear, and then the full corn in the ear,” and adding, “Every cornstalk is a Thanksgiving sermon.” The children drew near to hear, and with them one girl, Susanna, whose eyes grew with the story.
“Tell all you know,” said Deacon White; “and it is mighty interesting to hear a person tell a little more than he knows. I always like people that can see just a little beyond the horizon—what is the imagination for?”
“I shall tell you only the plain truth,” said Susan. “So let me begin with the planting-time, when the bluebirds came with the sky on their wings, and the children dropped the first corn into the ground. I was dreadful poor that year. Mother had just died and left me alone and lonesome, and I began then to be hands and feet for everybody, so as to heal up the great lump in my heart. I had a Rob-Roy shawl that I had worn for years to church, summer and winter, and one June day, as I was coming down the steps of the church, Deacon White here, says he, says he to me, ‘Susan, you ought to have some better things to wear; and if we have a prosperous year, and my ship comes in prosperous-like, I mean to get the folks together in the fall, and to have them make you a present of a real camlet cloak.’
“Could I believe my ears? It was only grand folks that wore camlet cloaks! The wives of people who traded at sea!
“I attended church at Quaker Hill for the most part, because, to tell the truth, I had to dress plain, and my simple clothes did not make me look so poor among the gray Quaker folk as they did among the silk gowns and camlet cloaks at Tiverton. And then, at the hands-shaking after the Quaker meetings, I used often to find something in my hands besides emptiness, and I always felt friendly to the Quaker folk who were led by the Spirit, and who believed their words were Spirit when they preached and exhorted. They are good people, and I wish that the world were full of such, which I say though I am Orthodox.
“Well, I looked at the Deacon. His first wife had a camlet cloak, brought over from the East Indies or some foreign parts where the camels grow.
“But what the Deacon said did touch my heart in a tender place. He was the first person in all the community that had ever seemed to think that I would like to be thought of. My lip trembled, and I pulled down my calash to hide my weakness, because my eyelids began to twitch, and I couldn’t help it. I walked down the steps firmly, and then I took the wood-path home, and sat down on the pine-needles all alone on the way and had a good cry. I didn’t know that I had any such feelings before. It wasn’t the thought of a camlet cloak that made me break up so,—it was that the Deacon had seen that I had had a hard time, and felt for me.
“Well, the corn came up, and the blades waved in the long fields in the June air, and the robins sang everywhere. I was spry that summer, and everywhere I went there arose before me a vision of that camlet cloak. Not that I wanted such a cloak, but I wanted the people to have some regard for me, and what the Deacon said stood for that. Everybody likes to be thought something of sometime.
“The blades of corn turned at last into silk and tassels, and then it was September, and every kernel that had been planted under the April skies had produced an ear, and some two. The green fields turned yellow and rustled, and the crickets piped and the birds sang their last song and flew away. Then came Indian summer, and the Thanksgiving days were near at hand. It had been a prosperous year, and the Deacon’s ship had come in with its gun booming.
“One day the stage came lumbering up the Heights, and the driver drew up the reins before my door, and looked under the great leather boot where the mail-bags were, and brought out a large box, and called,—
“‘Susan, here—I’ve got something for ye, from Newport.’
“‘That’s passing strange,’ said I, throwing my apron over my head. ‘I haven’t any near of kin in Newport.’
“‘Friends,’ said he.
“‘Friends?’ said I. ‘I haven’t many of them anywhere, as for that matter; they’re as scarce as hen’s teeth in this world where there’s so much selfishness. But I hadn’t ought to complain; we all of us get treated better than we deserve. The Lord forgive me for saying such things as those! This is a good world.’
“He handed down a package.
“‘Guess it came from foreign parts,’ said he. ‘Do the best you can, Susan, so that when this bothersome life is all over you will—you will—Go lang;’ and he was out of sight in quick time, the wheels rattling over the stony hill.
“I took the package into the house, and opened it, all alone. Could I believe my eyes? It was a camlet cloak, all made of silk and camel’s hair, and grand enough to have bedecked a queen, and large enough to cover my whole body.
“I first thought that I would just sink right down on my knees and pray. Then my vanity got the better of me, and I held up the cloak before the looking-glass; my cap-border rose when I thought how fine I would look going up the steps of the old church with that garment covering me, like a picture of Queen Vashti in the Bible.
“While I was standing there, grand as a drum-major at a general training, who should come in but old Elder Almy, of Portsmouth Farms.
“‘What has thee got there, Susan?’ said he, looking up queerly from under the broad brim of his hat.
“‘A royal garment fit for a queen,’ said I. ‘Look there, Elder Almy—a camlet cloak!’
“‘I see, I see,’ said he. ‘I heard that the Tiverton folks were about to make thee a present,’ said he, ‘and I hoped it would be such an one as would make thy heart better. It is only the present that makes the heart better that the Lord desires thee to have, Sister Susan.’
“‘Elder Almy,’ said I, ‘I am a plain-spoken woman, and I am going to ask you one question, if you are a Quaker. Why should not a poor woman like me have a camlet cloak?’
“‘Thee shouldst, if it would make thee better, Susan. What hast thou to go with thy camlet cloak? Look at thy shoes, Susan. How is thy meal-chest, Susan? How wouldst thee look in thy green calash and thy camlet cloak, Susan?’
“‘But I’m goin’ to get a whole lot of new things to wear with my camlet cloak,’ said I.
“‘How about thy purse, Susan? Hast thou means to live after the pattern of thy royal garment? And would it be good for thy heart if thou hadst? Simple living is a duty, Susan. I dress as simply as my work-folks, Susan. If I did otherwise, I would encourage extravagance in them. Thy camlet cloak begetteth pride, Susan, and pride resisteth the Spirit, Susan. It is better for thee, Susan, far better, to be poor in spirit.’
“Then I up and fell from grace, the Lord forgive me!
“‘Elder Almy,’ said I, ‘I am just as good as any of the people that wear camlet cloaks. There was no different blood in the veins of Queen Anne than that in my own. Small people make small presents. The Governor has sent forth his proclamation for all people to assemble in the churches on the 20th day of the 11th month, and I am going to assemble.’
“‘All of you, Susan?’
“‘Yes, all of me, and the camlet cloak. It doesn’t make one feel happy to be given pewter spoons. There!’
“‘Nor a gold crown, Susan?’
“I was sorry afterwards that I said these things, for Elder Almy and all the Quakers were the most feeling and generous people, and as for Mrs. Almy, why, she would have given away her bonnet off her own head.
“I had some money that I had hidden away in an old Spanish money-jar, against sickness. I resolved to take that and go to Newport and buy me some silk for a hood, an alpaca dress, and a string of beads, which Elder Almy would have classed among the vanities. I went to Newport, and I found there that I needed so many things to go with the camlet cloak that I spent all the money that I had. ‘The Lord who sent the camlet cloak will provide,’ said I.
“I shall never forget that bright Thanksgiving morning that I was to set out from Quaker Hill, and for Tiverton, in my silk hood and camlet cloak. It was a cold morning, but clear. I could hear the surf roaring at Newport, and the bells ringing.
“As I was getting ready to go, I chanced to open the old saddle-room door, and what should I see there but the very foot-stove that my mother used to carry to church, before they had one stove for all the people. A thought struck me. My pew was in a cold part of the church; I would fill the iron cup inside of the foot-stove with coals, and take the stove along with me under my camlet cloak. No one would ever see it, and it would keep me comfortable all the day.
“My mother was better off than I, and her foot-stove was not one of the ordinary kind. It was made of block tin, was perforated in stars, had a mahogany frame, and a brass pan for the coals. It was always a mystery to me how coals in that little hand-stove would hold fire for so long a time. She used to use hard-wood coal, and mostly walnut. I had some good coals of apple-tree wood in the stove that morning, and I put them into the pan, and closed the stove door, and took the stove in my left hand under my cloak like a basket of eggs. Nobody ever carries a foot-stove now, though there can be found one still in the saddle-rooms and eaves-holes of nearly all the old houses, along with the brass warming-pans, candle-moulds, and shovels and tongs and fenders.
“How bright the water looked at the ferry! How the old ferryman stared when he saw me! How an old crow on a dead tree peered down at me and cried out in the keen air, ‘Haw, haw, haw!’
“I met Elder Almy on the way.
“‘Goin’ to Thanksgiving?’ said he.
“‘How do I look now, Elder?’ said I.
“‘Just like a rag-bag,—a travelling vanity on the road to Vanity Fair. You’ll get there, Susan. Did you hear that crow? What was he talking about, Susan?’
EGYPTIAN JUGGLER.
“‘Pewter spoons, I guess,’ said I. And I just gave him that look that I had given Malachi.
“The churchyard was full of people, the dead and alive; for that matter, the dead are always there. The bell was ringing, and carriages were coming from all the neighboring farms. All eyes were bent upon me as I passed through the crowd and went up the church steps. I took my seat in the back pew where I usually sat, and put my feet on the warm foot-stove and spread over it the camlet cloak like a tent, and looked up to the tall pulpit, the red curtains, and sounding-board, and hour-glass.
“Elder Holmes alluded to me in the opening prayer, as one whom ‘celestial charity delighted to honor.’ After the prayer I looked up again and around, and I saw that all the eyes in the church were turned towards me.
“‘The Lord keep me humble!’ prayed I.
“That prayer was answered. Surely it was.
“The text was a curious one—‘Where there is no vision, the people perish.’ Elder Holmes, he gave a Bible history of visions, and of the times when the Lord spake to Israel in visions, and the times when there were no visions, and then he went over history to show that when people lost their prophetic sense the nation declined. It was a wonderful discourse. But while he was giving a picture of the woful Middle Ages, when the people lost their visions in bloody wars, the church suddenly grew still; you could have heard a pin drop. The foot-stove had made such a warmth under my cloak that I had almost gone to sleep. I was glad that the Middle Ages were gone, and was thinking that things in this world must be above all right now, when the stillness of the church awoke me. I started up and looked around wild like, and my heart gave a thump as I saw Elder Holmes standing in the pulpit, silent, with uplifted hands,—and the great silk sleeves of his robe did make his arms appear awful. The Elder was looking straight at me.
“I turned my head. Every eye in the gallery was fixed upon me. I looked towards the deacons’ pew. The four deacons all set, bent forward like, staring straight at me. What had happened?
“I might well ask that. Every one seemed looking at something over my head. I looked up, and there, right over my head, hung a vision. The heavens had come down, or so thought all the people, and so thought I. How shall I describe it as it appeared to me? I seem to see it now.
“Over my head hung a ring, bright as silver and pearls, and full of golden light. A miraculous ring! From the ring there were floating away little silver rings, which I took to be wings of angels, and which melted away as they went up. The sunlight shone through the silver ring as I sat between the windows, and the vision seemed at times like a circle of glass filled with glimmering gold. I never can describe how I felt at that hour. I thought of the hymn—Heaven forgive my vanity!—
“‘The Lord descended from above,
And bowed the heavens most high,
And underneath his feet he cast
The garments of the sky.’
“I lifted up my eyes to the choir. The singers were all looking down upon me as though they were just rising to sing. Even the bass-viol seemed to be looking. Then I dropped my eyes to the pew where the deacons’ wives sat, and Deacon Coon’s wife, she looked just as though her eyes would shoot out of her head, and Deacon Bradford’s wife, she sat looking just like this, with a snuff-box in her hands—so—and her neck as long as a sea loon’s flying—so.
“It was a curious sight. I shall never forget it to the longest day of my life: the choir, all eyes looking down; the deacons on one side of the high pulpit, looking out of their pew; the deacons’ wives on the other side of the pulpit, looking out of their pew, and the parson in his high curtained pulpit under the sounding-board, with his arms in his robe, uplifted—this way.
“‘Signs and wonders!’ said Parson Holmes. ‘Let us gaze on in silence!’ They did. The silence was awful.
“My heart beat so violently that I felt that I must get up and go out into the yard. I rose slowly, and went down the aisle, where all the people were sitting like statues. As soon as I got up, there was a great uplifting of what seemed to be pearly angels’ wings around my head—little silvery wings—and then the vision vanished.
“I never felt so proud in all my life as when I went back to Quaker Hill that day, a camlet cloak on my back, and a vision of angels, for aught I could say, hovering over my new silk hood. I imagined I was one of the old patriarchs. What would Quaker Almy say now? Wa’n’t I as good as anybody?
“The news of what had happened spread everywhere. In a day or two Deacon Almy came to see me.
“‘Signs and wonders!’ said I.
“‘Pins and needles!’ said he: ‘The Lord don’t appear in visions to people in camlet cloaks, that talk sassy when reproved. I have a theory about that vision. We are commanded to try the spirit, Susan,’ said he, looking at me with a searching eye. ‘What didst thee carry that day with thee under thy camlet cloak?’
“‘Nothing but my mother’s foot-stove,’ said I.
“‘Did it smoke?’ said he.
“‘A little bit,’ said I.
“‘And where did the smoke go to?’ asked he.
“‘I smothered it under my camlet cloak,’ said I. ‘A little of it might have gone out between my shoulders,’ said I, after stopping to think. ‘I sat bent over, and I couldn’t see my back. How could I?’ The word ‘smoke’ made me feel very uncertain.
“‘And a light smoke always forms a circle before it ascends, and in a ray of sunlight the circle would look like gold,’ said he, ‘and then it would all break apart feathery like,’ said he, ‘and’—I couldn’t endure any more.
“I arose and seized the broom.
“‘You unbelieving Philistine!’ said I.
“‘You may spare that carnal weapon,’ said he. ‘Susan, you are a good woman in the main, but you haven’t the kind of spirit that sees visions. I’m sorry for ye.’
“Well, would you believe it? I began to doubt the vision myself, and Elder Almy, he gave out his suspicions among the people, and some thought one thing and some another.
“But right after Thanksgiving there came an awful snowstorm, and though I had a silk hood and a camlet cloak, I hadn’t no meal, nor hardly anything to eat or burn. Then Elder Almy and some of the brethren came over from the Quaker Hill farms, and brought me two cords of wood, and some bags of meal, and a quarter of beef, and a whole sage cheese, and some stout flannel, and Sister Almy, she put five pistareens in my hand, and gave me a braided husk mat and a quilted bed-coverlet, and they all talked to me about the Inner Light, and humility, and loving others better than self, and then they held a meeting in my kitchen as still as the wings of death; and when they were gone I hung up my camlet cloak in the cupboard for good and all, and resolved to love henceforth and forever just such poor creatures as myself, and to serve ’em as best I could; and I never felt so thankful in all my life. Deacon White here, he and the church all meant well, but, as Elder Almy says, ‘Always make presents that will do people good.’ Good presents, of course, make people feel better than poor ones,—but beautiful things may be serviceable, too.
“This is a good world, Deacon, and I will always love you for the camlet cloak; but then, you know, Deacon, and you know, Elder, that—There, the horn is blowing for dinner, and I’ve husked this morning five baskets of corn.”
“Was it a miracle, Susan?” asked one of the huskers,—the girl with large eyes.
“Well, some say it was, like Elder Holmes, and some, like Elder Almy, say it was only smoke; I can’t be sure. It seems to me like the battle of Sheriff Muir, that my old grandfather, who was a Scotchman, used to tell about:
“‘Some say that they ran,
Some say that we ran,
And some say that nane ran
At a’, man.’
“‘But of one thing I’m sure,
A battle there was at Sheriff Muir,
Which I saw, man,
And we ran, and they ran,
And they ran, and we ran,
Awa’, man.’”
Susan, like ordinary mortals, obeyed the lively dinner-horn, followed by the merry Rhode Islanders.
The Miracle? It is a mystery still. Susan is dead, and the flat gray wall-stone that marked her grave is sinking, moss-covered, into the grass where the sparrows nest, among the many graves that lie on the sunset slope of Quaker Hill.
FISHERIES BUILDING.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE GRANDEST SCENE OF ALL.
