MEETING GRANT AND COLFAX.
We had to change cars about noon, as we went into the depot to get our tickets, the ticket man looked so kinder lonesome stuck in there alone, for all the world as if he had done somethin’ and his mother had shet him up, that I thought I would make a little talk with him.
He favored Celestine Wilkins’es husband considerable, jest such a meachin’ lookin’ feller, and I knew Celestine’s husband had a brother down this way somewhere, and so to kinder open a conversation with him, I asked him “If he ever had any relation that married a girl by the name of Gowdey?”
You ought to have heard how that feller snapped me up—he couldn’t have answered me any shorter, if I had asked him to run away with me.
But thinks’es I to myself, he has got morbid through lonesomness. I pitied him shet up alone there, and so in a few minutes I begun agin.
“I didn’t know but he was your brother, he has a good deal such a meachin’ look to him,” and says I, “The country round here hain’t so pleasant as Jonesville, do you think it is sir?”
“He didn’t know or care nothin’ about Jonesville.”
His tone was sharper than that sword aged two, that the bible tells of.
Says I, “Young man you needn’t take my head quite off, if you never did see Jonesville nor had any other advantages. I hain’t to blame for it.” And thinks’es I to myself, you may be lonesome for all of me, you may die of lonesomness for all I care, I shan’t try to make any more talk with you to make your time pass off easier.
We got on to the cars agin and got a good seat. I wanted to set by an open winder, and Betsey didn’t. I mistrust she thought the wind would take the kink out of her frizzles, and so she went on a seat or 2 ahead of me. There was a lot of fashionable lookin’ folks came in too, and one of ’em came along and set right down in the seat with me, the cars bein’ pretty full. She was dressed up like a doll, but she didn’t act stuck up a mite, my opinion is, she knew what belonged to good manners, and I offered her some caraway, for I liked her looks. She took it and thanked me for it, and says I to make talk with her,