The Bishop and the Boogerman

by Joel Chandler Harris

"Sanders," said old Jonas, with some asperity, "you don't mean to say that a little bit of a child like that would worry you!"

"Worry me!" exclaimed Mr. Sanders, with as scornful a look as he could on his bland and benevolent face. "Worry me! why, what on earth do you suppose I'm a-doin' in this house?"

"I thought you came to play checkers with me," old Jonas responded.

"Well," Mr. Sanders retorted, "ef you'd put your thoughts in a bag and shake 'em up, an' then pour 'em out, you couldn't tell 'em from these flyin' ants that was swarmin' from under your front steps awhile ago. No, Jonas! Don't le' me shatter any fond dream you've got about me, but sence Nan Dorrin'ton come into the state of Georgy by the Santy Claus route, this little gal is the only human bein' that I ever wanted to pick up an' smother wi' huggin' an' kissin'."

"Is that so, Sanders?" old Jonas inquired, straightening up, with a queer sparkle in his little eyes. "Why, I never thought——"

"Tooby shore you didn't," Mr. Sanders interrupted. "Nobody ever thought that you had any sech thoughts. Ef it was a crime to think 'em, an' you was to git took up on sech a charge, the case'd be non-prosecuted by the time it got in the courthouse. When it comes to that you've got the majority of folks wi' you. You'll hear 'em talk an' brag how fond they are of children, from morning tell night, but jest let one of the youngsters make a big fuss, an' you'll see 'em flinch like the'r feelin's is hurt. No Jonas, don't fool yourself. This world, an' not only this world, but this town is full of children so lonesome that when I think about it I feel right damp; an' thar's times when I set an' think of these little things runnin' about wi' not a soul on top of the yeth for to reely understand 'em, my heart gits so full that ef some un was to slip up behind me an' put salt on my back, I reely believe I'd melt an' turn to water like one of these gyarden snails. It's the honest fact. Now, that child in thar—Adelaide—has allers had some un to understand her an' know what she was thinkin' about; allers tell she come here. Ef I hadn't know'd her mother, I could tell jest by lookin' at Adelaide an' hearin' her talk, that she was one 'oman amongst ten thousan'."

"You put me in the wrong, Sanders, indeed you do; you may not intend it, but you certainly do me wrong."

Mr. Sanders regarded him with unfeigned astonishment: "Why, what have I said, Jonas? Think it over! Is it doin' you wrong for me to say that more than nine-tenths of the little children in the world is lonesome? Does it hurt you when I say that Cordelia, your sister, was a 'oman among ten thousand? If these sayin's hurt you, Jonas, you must have a mortal tender conscience or a mighty thin skin. I've allers had the idee that you ain't a bit wuss than you look to be; do you want me to change my mind? Was thar ever under the blue sky a lonesomer gal than Cordelia, or one easier to love? Did you love her as you ought? Did you treat her right ever' day in the year? Did she ever have a good time of your makin'? An' in spite of it, didn't she keep on gittin' nicer and nicer, an' purtier an' purtier, tell bimeby, along come a young feller—as good a man as ever trod shoe leather—an' snatched her right from under your wing? An' didn't William H. Sanders, late of said county, show the young fellow how, an' when, an' whar to snatch her?"

"Did—did you do that, Sanders? Well, I'm glad I didn't know it at the time, for I am afraid I'd have shot you."

"Shot me!" exclaimed Mr. Sanders, his blue eyes beaming innocently. "Well, I've seed a good many quare things in my day an' time, but I've yit to see the gun that could go off ahead of mine—not when thar was any needcessity. You say you'd 'a' shot me; an' what did I do? I holp Cordelia to the fust an' last taste of happiness she ever had in this world. Did you ever do that much for her? You give her her vittles an' cloze—sech as they was—but do plain vittles an' plain cloze make anybody happy? Ef they do, then this old ball we 're walkin' on—when we ain't fallin' down—must be runnin' over wi' happiness. Why, Jonas, you wouldn't let the gal have no kind of company, male or female; she couldn't go out, bekaze she had nobody for to take her; one little picnic was all the gwine out she done arter she fell in your hands. I tuck her to that an' I never was as glad of anything in my life as I was when she an' Dick Lumsden made up the'r little misunderstandin' that you had been the occasion of, an' had connived at, an' nursed like it was a baby.