“Yes, indeed!” sez she, “who would have thought it.” And I went on to say, for I see she looked real deprested:
“Ulaly, things hain’t come out as I wanted ’em to; I felt real bad about it after your folks sold their jewelry to help discover us. I dare presume to say they have been sorry 307 time and agin that they ever found us, and I wouldn’t blame ’em, for as Josiah sez to me:
“‘Where would we be to-day if it hadn’t been for Columbus? Like enough we shouldn’t been discovered at all.’ Sez he, ‘Most probable we should be Injins.’ But don’t lay it to Josiah or me, Ulaly, we hain’t to blame, we didn’t do a thing to bring on the trouble. Of course we remembered the Maine some, we had to, and your folks couldn’t blame us for it. Josiah and me felt real provoked and mortified to think that after folks had gin their jewelry to discover us they should blow us up in that way. But I sez to Josiah, ‘Because three hundred are sent onprepared into eternity it hain’t no reason three thousand should be.’ We are great cases for peace, Josiah and I be, and would have managed most any way, even been run on some and imposed upon a little ruther than to have rushed into the onspeakable horrors of war.
“And I don’t want you to blame William, either; he held onto the dogs of war with both hands a tryin’ to hold ’em in.”
“William?” sez she inquirin’ly.
“Yes, William McKinley, our President. He jest held onto them dogs till they wuz likely to tear him to pieces, then he had to leggo. Them dogs wuz jest inflamed by havin’ yellow literatoor shook in their faces, and yells from greedy politicians and time servers, till they wuz howlin’ mad and would have barked themselves blind if he hadn’t leggo. But he didn’t want to, William didn’t, he wanted peace dreadfully.” And she said real sweet, that she knew he did.
“Well, it turned out jest as it did, Ulaly. But I think just as much of you as I did before you lost your propputy, and I d’no as the propputy Uncle Sam got hold of in the dicker is a goin’ to do him much good, not for quite a spell anyway. There is such a thing as bein’ land poor, taxes are heavy, hired help hain’t to be relied on and the more you have the more you have to watch and take care on, though of course it is a pleasure to a certain set of faculties and 308 some particular bumps in your head, to own a path as you may say, most round the world, steppin’ off from California to Hawaii and then on to the Philippines, ready to step off from there, Heaven knows how fur or when or where. It is a pleasure to a certain part of your mind, but other parts of your head and heart hold back and don’t cheer in the procession. But howsumever, Ulaly, that is neither here nor there. I hope your folks are so as to git round. I wuz sorry enough to hear that you and your pardner don’t live agreeable. But though it is a pity, pardners have had spats from Eden to Chicago and I d’no but they always will. The trouble is they take pardners as boons instead of dispensations, and don’t lean hard enough on scripter.
“But this is not the time or place for sermons on how to be happy, though married. How is Christina and Alfonso? I’m afraid he’s gittin’ obstropolous, and I d’no but Christina will have to give him a good spankin’ before she gits through. Of course, spankin’ a king seems quite a big job to tackle, and of course he’s pretty old for it. But it don’t do to let children have their heads too much. One good spankin’ will strike in truth when reams of sermons and tearful expostulations will fail. You might just mention to Christina what I’ve said, and then she can do as she wants to with fear and tremblin’.”
But I see my folks passin’ down a distant path, and I sez: “I will now bid you adoo, Ulaly, as time and Arvilly and Josiah are passin’ away.” She bid me a real pleasant good-by, and I withdrawed myself and jined my folks.
One day the hull of our party visited Fontainbleu and went through the apartments of kings and queens and popes and cardinals. The rooms of Napoleon wuz full of the thrilling interest that great leader always rousted up, and always will, I spoze, till history’s pages are torn up and destroyed. And in the rooms of Marie Antoinette we see the lovely costly things gin to this beautiful queen when the people loved her, and she, as she slept under the beautiful draperies gin by 309 the people, never dreamed, I spoze, that the hands that wrought love and admiration into these fabrics would turn on her and rend her.