When we got to Jonesville, we found they was a goin’ to start the Debatin’-school, jest the same as if the Editor hadn’t got the Zebra. We went into Tirzah Ann’s a few minutes, and she give us a piece of fresh beef—Whitfield had jest bought a quarter—Josiah hadn’t killed yet. Beef is Josiah’s favorite refreshment, and I told him we would have it for dinner the next day. Josiah begun to look clever; and he asked me in affectionate and almost tender axents, if apple dumplin’s didn’t go first rate with roast beef and vegetables. I told him yes, and I would make some for dinner, if nothin’ happened. Josiah felt well; his worrysome feelin’s all departed from him. The storekeeper had jest opened an uncommon nice chest of tea, too. I never see a man act and look cleverer than my pardner did; he was ready to go anywhere, at any time.
We got to the school-house where it was held, in good season, and got a good seat, and I loosened my bunnet strings and went to knittin’. But, as I said, they was determined (some on ’em) that I should hold up one of the sides of the arguments; but of course, as could be expected in such a interestin’ and momentous affair, in which Jonesville and the world at large was so deeply interested, there was them that it galled, to see a woman git up so high in the world. There was them that said it would have a tendency to onsettle and break up the hull fabric of society for a woman to take part in such hefty matters as would be argued here. Some said it was a revolutionary idee, and not to be endured for half a moment of time; and they brought up arguments from the Auger—wrote by its Editor—to prove out that wimmen ortn’t to have no such privileges and honors. They said, as sick as the Editor was now, it would kill him if he should hear that the “Creation Searchin’ Society”—that he had labored so for—had demeaned itself by lettin’ a woman take part in it. They said as friends of the Editor, they wouldn’t answer for the shock on his nervous and other system. Neither would they answer for the consequences to Jonesville and the world—the direful consequences, sure to flow from liftin’ a female woman so far above her spear.
Their talk was scareful, very, and some was fearfully affected by it; but others was jest as rampant on the other side; they got up and defied ’em. They boldly brought forward my noble doin’s on my tower; how I had stood face to face with that heaven-honored man of peace, Horace Greely—heaven-honored and heaven-blest now—how he had confided in me; how my spectacles had calmly gazed into hisen, as we argued in deep debate concernin’ the welfare of the nation, and wimmen. How I had preserved Grant from perishin’ by poetry; how I had labored with Victory and argued with Theodore. They said such doin’s had rose me up above other wimmen; had lifted me so far up above her common spear, as to make me worthy of any honors the nation could heap onto me; made me worthy even to take a part in the “Jonesville Creation Searchin’ and World Investigatin’ Society.”
I let ’em fight it out, and didn’t say a word. They fit, and they fit; and I sot calmly there on my seat a knittin’ my Josiah’s socks, and let ’em go on. I knew where I stood in my own mind; I knew I shouldn’t git up and talk a word after they got through fightin’. Not that I think it is out of character for a woman to talk in public; nay, verily. It is, in my opinion, no more wearin’ on her throat, or her morals, to git up and talk to a audience for their amusement and edification, in a calm and collected voice, than it is for her to key up her voice and sing to ’em by the hour, for the same reason. But everybody has their particular fort, and they ort in my opinion to stick to their own forts and not try to git on to somebody else’es.
Now, influencin’ men’s souls, and keepin’ their morals healthy by words of eloquence, is some men’s forts. Nailin’ on good leather soles to keep their body’s healthy, is another man’s fort. One is jest as honorable and worthy as the other, in my opinion, if done in the fear of God and for the good of mankind, and follerd as a fort ort to be follerd. But when folks leave their own lawful forts and try to git on to somebody else’es fort, that is what makes trouble, and makes crowded forts and weak ones, and mixes things. Too many a gettin’ on to a fort at one time, is what breaks it down. My fort haint talkin’ in public, and I foller it up from day to day, as a fort ort to be follerd. So I was jest as cool as a cewcumber, outside and inside, and jest as lives see ’em go on makin’ consummit idiots of themselves as not, and ruther.
THE LYCEUM.
THE YOUNG NEPHEW.
It was enough to make a dog snicker and laugh (if he hadn’t deep principle to hold him back, as I had,) to see ’em go on. The President Cornelius Cork, and Solomon Cypher talked the most. They are both eloquent and almost finished speakers; but Solomon Cypher havin’ had better advantages than the President, of course goes ahead of him as an oriter. A nephew of hisen, P. Cypher Bumpus, old Philander Bumpus’es only boy, (named after his father, and uncle Cypher,) has been there to his uncle’s givin’ him lessons all winter, in elocution and dramatic effects. Solomon has give him his board for tutorin’ him.