Oh, how thankful, how thankful I wuz, that Josiah Allen wuzn't there!
I knew, as he felt a good deal of the time, an antick room was what he would choose out of all others. And I felt stronger than ever the deep resolve that Josiah Allen should not run. He must not be exposed to such dangers, with his mind as it wuz, and his heft. I felt that he would suckumb.
And I wondered that President Arthur, who I had always heard was a perfect gentleman, should come to have a room called like that, but s'posed it was there when he went. I don't believe he'd countenance any thing of the kind.
I was jest a thinkin' this when the hired man come back, and said,—
“The President would receive me.”
“Wall,” says I calmly, “I am ready to be received.”
So I follered him; and he led the way into a beautiful room, kinder round, and red colored, with lots of elegant pictures and lookin'-glasses and books.
The President sot before a table covered with books and papers: and, good land! he no need to have been afraid and hung back; he was dressed up slick—slick enough for meetin', or a parin'-bee, or any thing. He had on a sort of a gray suit, and a rose-bud in his button-hole.
He was a good-lookin' man, though he had a middlin' tired look in his kinder brown eyes as he looked up.