“And,” says Josiah, “it will be the makin’ of Jonesville if he comes back; and of me, too, for he talks of buyin’ my west lot for a house-lot, and he has offered me 4 times what it is worth, of his own accord,—that is, if he makes up his mind to come back.”
“Wall,” says I, “you wouldn’t take advantage of him, and take 4 times what it is worth, would you?” Says I sternly: “If you do you won’t never prosper in your undertakin’s.”
“He offered it himself,” says Josiah. “I didn’t set no price; he sot it himself. And it wouldn’t be no cheatin’, nor nothin’ out of the way, to take it, and I would take it with a easy conscience and a willin’ mind. But the stick is,” says he dreamily, “the stick is to get him to come back. He likes us now, and if we can only endear ourselves to him a little mite more he will come. And I am goin’ to work for it; I am bound to serenade him.”
Says I coldly: “If you want to endear yourself to him you are goin’ to work in the wrong way.” And says I, still more frigidly: “Was you a layin’ out to sing yourself, Josiah Allen?”
“Yes,” says he, in a animated way. “The way I thought of workin’ it was to have about 8 of us old men, who used to be boys with him, get together and sing some affectin’ piece under his winder; make up a piece a purpose for him. And I don’t know but we might let some wimmen take a hand in it. Mebby you would want to, Samantha.”
“No sir!” says I very coldly. “You needn’t make no calculations on me. I shall have no hand in it at all. And,” says I firmly, “if you know what is best for yourself, Josiah Allen, you will give up the idee. You will see trouble if you don’t.”
“Wall, I s’pose it will be some trouble to us; but I am willin’ to take trouble to please Liab, as I know it will. Why, if I can carry it out, as I think we can, it will tickle that man most to death. Why, I’ll bet after hearin’ us sing, as we shall sing, you couldn’t dog him from Jonesville. And it will be the makin’ of the place if we can only keep him here, and will put more money into my pocket than I have seen for one spell. And I know we can sing perfectly beautiful, if we only set out to. I can speak for myself, anyway; I am a crackin’ good singer, one of the best there is, if I only set out to do my best.”
Oh! what a deep streak of vanity runs through the naters of human men. As many times as it had been proved right out to his face that he couldn’t sing no more than a ginny-hen, or a fannin’-mill, that man still kep’ up a calm and perennial idee that he was a sweet singer.
Yes, it is a deep scientific fact, as I have often remarked to Josiah Allen, that the spring of vanity that gushes up in men’s naters can’t be clogged up and choked. It is a gushin’ fountain that forever bubbles over the brink with perennial and joyful freshness. No matter how many impediments you may put in its way, no matter how many hard stuns of disappointment and revilin’ and agony you may throw into that fountain, it won’t do no more than to check the foamin’ current for a moment. But presently, or sometimes even before that, the irrepressible fountain will soar up as foamin’ly as ever.
As many times, and times agin, as Josiah’s vanity had been trampled on and beat down and stunned, yet how constant and clear it was a bubblin’ up and meanderin’ right before my sight. And before I had got through allegorin’ in my own mind about the curious and scientific subject, he gave me another proof of it.