Simon. It is that spear that is going to destroy me.
Sam. Don’t give up so Simon Slimpsey; I hate to see you lookin’ so gloomy and deprested.
Simon. It is the awful determination of them lines that apauls me. I have seen it in another. Betsey Bobbett reminds me dreadfully of another; she makes me think of that first wife of mine. And I don’t want to marry again Miss Allen, I don’t want to. I didn’t want to marry the first time, I wanted to be a bachelder. I think they have the easiest time of it by half. Now there is a friend of mine that is only half an hour younger than I be, and that hadn’t ought to make much difference in our looks, had it?
Sam. No, Simon Slimpsey, it hadn’t.
Simon. Well; you ought to see what a head of hair he’s got now; sound to the roots, not a lock missing. I wanted to be one, but my late wife come and kept house for me, and—and married me. I lived with her for eighteen years, and when she left me I was—I was reconciled. I was reconciled some time before it took place. I don’t want to say nothin’ against nobody that hain’t round here in this world, but I lost a good deal of hair by my late wife; and I wanted to keep a lock or two for my children to keep as a relict of me. I have got thirteen, as you know, countin’ each pair of twins as two, and it would take a considerable number of hairs to go round. I don’t want to marry agin.
Sam. Mebby you are borrowin’ trouble without cause, Simon Slimpsey, with life there is hope. Don’t give up so Simon Slimpsey; mebby she’ll marry the editor of the Augur; she’s payin’ lots of attention to him.
Simon. No, he won’t have her, she’ll get round me yet—you mark my words, and when the time comes you will think of what I told you. (Simon weeps) You see if she don’t get round me yet.
Sam. Chirk up, Simon Slimpsey, be a man.
Simon. That is the trouble, if I wasn’t a man she would give me some peace. (He weeps bitterly. The curtain falls, but rises immediately for the quire scene.)
Scene II—Quire Meeting—Two or three rows of seats,—Any number of Singers, the more the better—Editor takes chair in center of first row—Betsey and Miss Gowdy both try to take the vacant seat at his left: Miss Gowdy gets it—Betsey sits in front row at right of Editor, not next to him—Samantha and Josiah sit at left of Miss Gowdy—Elder Peedick, the leader, stands at the right—Josiah and Samantha come in arm in arm after most of them get seated—Josiah says as they walk in, Don’t be a lockin’ arms, Samantha, it will make talk.—Elder Peedick distributes books.