She had been brought up on the hull of the commandments but on that one in particeler; she wuz brung up sharp but good. But not one lie could I ketch him in. And he stuck to it, that his father wuz a banker and doin’ a heavy business.
Wall, it kep’ on, she a goin’ with him through ambition, for I see plain, by signs I knoo, that she didn’t love him half as well as she did Abram. And I felt bad, dretful bad, to set still and see Ambition ondoin’ of her. For oft and oft she would speak to me of Bial’s father’s bank and the heft of the business he wuz a doin’.
And I finally got so worked up in my mind that I gin a sly hint to Abram Gee, that if he ever wanted to get Ardelia Tutt, he had better make a summer trip to Saratoga. I never told Ardelia what I had done, but trusted to a overrulin’ destiny, that seems to enrap babys, and lunatiks, and soft little wimmen, when their heads get kinder turned by a man, and to Abram’s honest face when she should compare it with Bial Flamburg’s, and to Abram’s pure, sweet breath with that mixture of stale cigars, tobacco, beer, and peppermint.
But Abram wrote back to me that his mother wuz a lyin’ at the p’int of death with a fever - that his sister Susan wuz sick a bed with the same fever and couldn’t come a nigh her and he couldn’t leave what might be his mother’s death-bed. And he sez, if Ardelia had forgot him in so short a time, mebby it wuz the best thing he could do, to try and forget her. Anyway, he wouldn’t leave his dying mother for anything or anybody.
That wuz Abram Gee all over, a doin’ his duty every time by bread and humanity. But he added a postscript and it wuz wrote in a agitated hand - that jest as soon as his mother got so he could leave her, he should come to Saratoga.
The verses that Ardelia sent over to me wuz as follers:
“A LAY ON A FEMALE TROUT IN CENTRAL PARK.
“BY ARDELIA TUTT.
“Oh trout, sweet female trout, oh fain would I
In hottest day, perspirin’ dretfelee
Desend, and dressed most cool like thee, would lie
As deep in water, some two feet, or three
Or even four.
“Who would not dress like thee on summer day?
How cool thy robes—lo! not one boddice waist
Or corset stay, to make thee taper small.
Thou taperest without them, and not then with haste,
Or Bandaline.
“Thou crimpest not, or bangest up thy hair;
Thou hast no hair to bang, sweet trout so dear,
Thou dost not dance round dances, nor repair
Unto the thronged piazzas, nor appear,
Sweet modest trout.
“In long and haughty trains thou never dost appear
And switch them up and down the corredere and hall
With diamond jewels hanging to thy ear;
Thou hast not ears to hang them on, no! not at all.
No, not one ear.
“Thou walkest not in high heeled shoes, thou cannest not
For reesons it were vain to now relate.
Ah no! But let us cast one eye adown thy grot
And see thee sweet and patient wear thy fate,
And wear it well.
“At Garden parties, Race Course, Music Hall,
We ne’er have set our weary eyes thy form upon;
Thou dost not ramble in the crowded maul,
Thou hast no legs sweet trout to ramble on;
Ah! no! dear one.
“And so thou seemest well content to saunter not,
Or waltz about in garments fine and gay;
Oh. Mortal Man! a lesson learn of Trout
If thou no legs hast got, why seek to waltz away,
Or promenade?
“And, beautius female, learn thou of dear trout
So move and swim in thine own native way;
Seek not high stations, titles great, and flout
Not thou at fate, but gently swim away
On native waves.
“Cool blooded hold thy heart, like female trout;
Melt not at sweet, false words, that melt and seeth and burn;
She melteth not, oh no! she cooly turns about
And nibbles on, so thou, and follow on
Sweet female one.”
Chapter IX.
JOSIAH’S FLIRTATIONS.
They say there is a sight of flirtin’ done at Saratoga. I didn’t hear so much about it as Josiah did, naturally there are things that are talked of more amongst men than women. Night after night he would come home and tell me how fashionable it wuz, and pretty soon I could see that he kinder wanted to follow the fashion.
I told him from the first on’t that he’d better let it entirely alone. Says I, “Josiah Allen, you wouldn’t never carry it through successful if you should undertake it—and then think of the wickedness on’t.”