BETSEY BOBBET.
As I said she is awful opposed to wimmin’s havein’ any right only the right to get married. She holds on to that right as tight as any single woman I ever see which makes it hard and wearin’ on the single men round here. For take the men that are the most opposed to wimmin’s havin’ a right, and talk the most about its bein’ her duty to cling to man like a vine to a tree, they don’t want Betsey to cling to them, they won’t let her cling to ’em. For when they would be a goin’ on about how wicked it was for wimmin to vote—and it was her only spear to marry, says I to ’em “Which had you ruther do, let Betsey Bobbet cling to you or let her vote?” and they would every one of ’em quail before that question. They would drop their heads before my keen grey eyes—and move off the subject.
But Betsey don’t get discourajed. Every time I see her she says in a hopeful wishful tone, “That the deepest men of minds in the country agree with her in thinkin’ that it is wimmin’s duty to marry, and not to vote.” And then she talks a sight about the retirin’ modesty and dignity of the fair sect, and how shameful and revoltin’ it would be to see wimmen throwin’ ’em away, and boldly and unblushin’ly talkin’ about law and justice.
Why to hear Betsey Bobbet talk about wimmin’s throwin’ their modesty away you would think if they ever went to the political pole, they would have to take their dignity and modesty and throw ’em against the pole, and go without any all the rest of their lives.
Now I don’t believe in no such stuff as that, I think a woman can be bold and unwomanly in other things besides goin’ with a thick veil over her face, and a brass mounted parasol, once a year, and gently and quietly dropping a vote for a christian president, or a religeous and noble minded pathmaster.
She thinks she talks dreadful polite and proper, she says “I was cameing” instead of “I was coming,” and “I have saw” instead of “I have seen,” and “papah” for paper, and “deah” for dear. I don’t know much about grammer, but common sense goes a good ways. She writes the poetry for the Jonesville Augur, or “Augah,” as she calls it. She used to write for the opposition paper, the Jonesville Gimlet, but the editer of the Augur, a long haired chap, who moved into Jonesville a few months ago, lost his wife soon after he come there, and sense that she has turned Dimocrat, and writes for his paper stiddy. They say that he is a dreadful big feelin’ man, and I have heard—it came right straight to me—his cousin’s wife’s sister told it to the mother in law of one of my neighbor’s brother’s wife, that he didn’t like Betsey’s poetry at all, and all he printed it for was to plague the editer of the Gimlet, because she used to write for him. I myself wouldn’t give a cent a bushel for all the poetry she can write. And it seems to me, that if I was Betsey, I wouldn’t try to write so much, howsumever, I don’t know what turn I should take if I was Betsey Bobbet, that is a solemn subject and one I don’t love to think on.
I never shall forget the first piece of her poetry I ever see. Josiah Allen and I had both on us been married goin’ on a year, and I had occasion to go to his trunk one day where he kept a lot of old papers, and the first thing I laid my hand on was these verses. Josiah went with her a few times after his wife died, a 4th of July or so and two or three camp meetin’s, and the poetry seemed to be wrote about the time we was married. It was directed over the top of it “Owed to Josiah,” just as if she were in debt to him. This was the way it read.
“OWED TO JOSIAH.
Josiah I the tale have hurn,
With rigid ear, and streaming eye,