“From all I hear it hain’t a wicked dance at all, but jest a pretty dancin’ party down in the parlor, jined in by men and wimmen and their children and mebby their grand-children, and it is always so sweet,” sez he, “to see a man and his grand-children dancin’ together. Oh, if Delight wuz only here!” sez he.
I riz up and sez in almost heart breakin’ axents:
“Josiah Allen, be you a thinkin’ of dancin’ yourself?”
“No,” sez he, “no, Samantha, I jest want to look on a spell, that’s all.”
But there wuz a look in his eyes that I hated to see, for I had seen it many times in the past, and it had always foreboded trials to me and humiliation to my pardner. How queer human critters be! what strange and mysterious tacts they will git on and how they will foller up them tacts and fads of theirn. But I d’no as human critters are any worse about follerin’ up their tacts and fads and follerin’ ’em blind, than old Mom Nater is. Now who hain’t noticed her queer moods and how prolonged they be, and how sudden and onexpected they will come onto her? When she takes it into her head to have a pleasant spell of weather, how she’ll 117 foller it up, clear skies, pleasant days and nights for weeks and weeks. And if she takes it into her head to have it rain, how she will keep the skies drippin’ right along for most all summer. And then when she has a dry spell, how dry she is! no matter how much the dwindlin’ creeks and empty wells and springs complain, she has got to carry out her own idees till she gits ready to change.
Josiah Allen, since I had been his pardner had took many a fad into his old head, which he had carried out as only Nater or a man can carry ’em, onreasonable, mysterious, out of season, but bound to let ’em run. Sometimes in the past it had been a desire for singin’ base that had laid holt on him, base in every sense the word can be used. Then agin he had painful and prolonged spells of wantin’ to be genteel and fashionable, then anon political ambition had rousted up his rusty old faculties and for months and months Coney Island had been his theme, and wuz now, and so on through a long roll of characters he had desired to play in the drama of life.
But dancin’! never did I expect to see that man with his age and his profession and his achin’ old bones, wantin’ to dance. But so it 118 wuz, as will be seen in the follerin’ pages. Queer as a dog folks are on this planet, and I d’no but the Marites and Jupiters and Saturnses are jest as queer. But to quit eppisodin’ and resoom forwards agin.
I have always found that it hain’t best to draw the matrimonial rope too tight round your pardner’s jungular veins. I see he wuz sot on goin’ and I felt I would ruther he would go with me who could have some savin’ control over him, than to have him git reckless and sally off alone. So it wuz settled that we should go that night at early candle light. And Faith wuz to go with us. Yes, I, Josiah Allen’s wife, had gin my consent to go to a dance. But jest so the environin’ cord of circumstances gits us all wound up in its tangles time and agin. And as the way of poor weak mortals is, havin’ made up my mind to go I tried to bring to mind all the mitigatin’ circumstances I could. I thought of how the lambs capered on the hillside, how the leaves on the trees danced to the music of the south wind, and how even the motes swung round with each other in the sunlight. And then I thought of how David danced before the ark, and how Jeptha’s daughter danced out to meet her father (to be 119 sure she had her head took off for it, but I tried to not dwell on that side of the subject). And then I remembered how I did love music, and in spite of myself I felt kinder chirked up thinkin’ I should enjoy quite a long spell on’t. And thinkses I, if dancin’ is a little mite off from the hite Methodists ort to stand on, music is the most heavenly thing we can lay holt of below, so I sort o’ tried to even up them two peaks in my mind and lay a level onto ’em and try to make myself believe they struck about a fair plane of megumness, and shet my eyes to the idee that it slanted off some and wuz slippery.
Oh what weak creeters we be anyhow! Well, that night there wuz goin’ to be a extra big party, and I wuz for startin’ at once after supper, for truly I felt that I wuz performin’ a hard and arjous job, and as my way is I wuz for tacklin’ it to once and gittin’ over it. Yes, I felt it wuz goin’ to be a wearin’ job to git Josiah Allen to that parlor durin’ them festivities and back agin with no damage or scandal arisin’ from the enterprise.
But Faith sez, “It will be too early, they won’t begin to dance till eight. We eat at six.” And I sez, “For the land’s sake! if I’d 120 got to dance I should begin early and stop early, so’s to git a little rest.” And she sez: