“O never mind the brickbat,” said Mrs. Bangs, “let that alone; ‘tis no concern of ours—only make haste and prepare the turkey for the spit. Your head is always running after things that don’t concern you.”
Thus spoke Mrs. Bangs, the mother of thirteen children, all girls. She was a strong, healthy woman of fifty years of age, and in the three characters of daughter, wife and mother, had been exemplary. She was the only child of a respectable farmer, and at her parent’s death inherited the farm which a few years after her marriage rose greatly in value. It was on the outskirts of a populous city which had increased so rapidly that at the birth of her second child the farm was laid out in streets, in every one of which they had sold several lots for buildings.
Her husband was a chemist, and his laboratory was very near this valuable property, so that he could attend to his business in the manufactory and look after the workmen who were building his houses. What Mr. Bangs learned during his apprenticeship, that he knew well, and on that stock of knowledge he operated all his life. He manufactured the best aqua ammonia in the country, free from that empyreumatic, old tobacco-pipe taste and smell, which it has in general when made in America, and his salt of tartar had not an opaque grain in it. Thus it was with all the drugs that he made, for he was more intent upon keeping up his good name than in making money speedily, and his pride was in having it said that Christopher Bangs’s word was as good as his bond. Further than this there was but little to be said, excepting that he was a disappointed man, and had the feeling of being ill used.
This disappointment consisted in not having a son—one, he said, who could take up the business when he laid it down—one to whom he could confide the few secrets of his trade.
When the birth of the first girl was announced, it was very well; not that he did not fret in secret, but he took it as a thing of course, and as he was daily in the habit of hearing Mrs. Bangs congratulate herself that the child was a girl, because she could assist her in her household cares, he was resigned to it, although it was full three months before his club mates were told of his having an increase of family. But he really did murmur when the second girl came. “Why, at this rate,” said he, indignantly, “I cannot have a child named after me at all. Christopher Bangs will end with me, and who is to be the better of all the valuable secrets of the laboratory?”
“Oh, la! my dear,” said his wife, “let that alone, it’s no concern of ours, and as to the child’s name, don’t fret about that, for can’t I name this dear chubby little thing Christina, the short of which is Kitty, and that is as good as Kit any day in the year; and only think what a help this dear, chubby little thing will be to her sister.”
Mr. Bangs sulked out of the room and went to his laboratory, and his wife went through her nursing and household duties with double alacrity. The third daughter came, and Mr. Bangs heard it with surprise that bordered on despair. “Never mind it, Kit,” said the contented, good-tempered Mrs. Bangs; “we’ll call this dear, chubby, little thing after your old uncle Joseph; Josephine is a very pretty name.”
“I don’t care what you call it,” said her crusty husband; “I consider myself as an ill used, injured man; only I hope, since you like girls so well, that you may have a round dozen of them.”
“Oh la! husband, what makes you so spiteful against girls?” said she—“but let that alone, it is no concern of ours—a dozen, indeed! how do you think we can manage to live in this small house with so large a family? You must build a bigger house, man; so, my dear Kit, set about it,”—and this was all the concern it gave her.
After that he troubled himself no more with inquiries about the sex of the child, and in due time, one after the other, the round dozen came. The only thing that troubled the contented, busy woman was the naming of the little girls. She certainly, when she could spare her thoughts from her increased cares, would have liked a boy now and then, to please her husband; but as this was not to be, she did the next best thing to it—she gave them all boys’ names. So, after the first, which was called Robina, came Christina, then Josephine, then Phillippa, Augusta, Johanna, Gabriella, Georgiana, and Wilhelmina. At the birth of her tenth child she paused—her father’s name was Jacob, and as she had named Gabriella after her husband’s father, Gabriel, she thought it but fair to honour her own likewise—but Jacob! However, she was not a woman to stop at trifles, even if she had the time; so the poor, little, chubby thing—for now she added poor to the chubby—the poor, chubby, little thing was called Jacobina. Then in due time came the eleventh, which was Frederica—the twelfth, Benjamina—“and now,” said the still happy Mrs. Bangs, “what to call my baker’s dozen is more than I can tell. I have one more than Christopher wished me to have, but let that alone; ‘tis no concern of ours; only Robina, dear, step to the parlour and tell your father what a strait I am in about the name. There is his friend, Floss; he has a curly headed, chubby little boy by the name of Francis, and it is a girl’s name too; ask him if he would like to name the poor, dear, chubby, little thing after his friend’s son.”