Out of the Hurly-Burly: or, Life in an Odd Corner

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The reality was bad enough without the unreal nocturnal horrors. I might have sold the brute, but my wife really wanted to have a horse, and I wished to oblige her. But it was very wearing to hear about constantly the feeling of responsibility which the animal engendered. I had to choose between driving him continually and having the lives of the members of my family imperiled when they took him out; and the consciousness that whether there was sickness or business, storm or earthquake, calamity or death, the horse must be driven, gradually placed me in the position of a man who is haunted by some dreadful spectre that clings to him and overshadows him for ever and for ever.

The perpetual nervous worry told upon me. I became thin. My clothing hung loose upon me. I took up two inches in my waistcoat strap. The appetite which enabled me to find enjoyment at the table deserted me. The food seemed tasteless; and if in the midst of a meal the neigh of the horse came eddying up through the air from the stable, I turned away with a feeling of disgust, and felt as if I wanted to prod somebody with the carving-knife.

One day my wife said to me:

"Mr. Adeler, you know that I urged you strongly to buy that horse, and I thought he would do, but – "

"But now you want to sell him! ha! ha!" I exclaimed, with delight. "Very well, I'll send him to the auctioneer this very day."

"I wasn't going to say that," she remarked. "What I wanted to mention was that nearly everybody in good circumstances about here drives a pair, and I think we ought to get another horse; don't you, my dear? It's so much nicer than having only one."

"Mrs. Adeler," I said, solemnly, "that one horse down there in the stable has reduced me to a skeleton and made me utterly miserable. I will do as you say if you insist upon it, but I tell you plainly that if another horse is brought upon these premises I shall go mad."

"Don't speak in that manner, my dear."

"I tell you, Mrs. Adeler, that I shall go stark, staring mad! Take your choice: go without the other horse or have a maniac husband."

She said, of course, she would do without the horse.

But the affliction was suddenly and unexpectedly removed My horse had a singularly brief tail, and I thought it might be that some of his violent demonstrations in the stable were induced by his inability to switch off the flies which alighted upon sensitive portions of the body. It occurred to me to get him up an artificial tail for home use, and I procured a piece of thick rope for the purpose. There was, too, a certain humorousness about the idea that pleased me; and as the amount of jocularity which that horse had occasioned had, thus far, been particularly small, the notion had peculiar attractiveness.

I unraveled about eighteen inches of the rope and fastened the other end to the horse's tail. This, I estimated, would enable him to switch a fly off the very end of his nose when he had acquired a little practice. Unfortunately, I neglected to speak to my man upon the subject; and when he came to the stable that evening, he examined the rope and concluded that I was trying experiments with some new kind of hitching-strap; so he tied the horse to the stall by the artificial continuation. By morning the feed-box was kicked into kindling-wood, and the horse was standing on three legs, with the other leg caught in the hay-rack, while he had chewed up two of the best boards in the side of the stable in front of him.

Subsequently I explained the theory to the man and readjusted the rope. But the patent tail annoyed the hostler so much while currying the horse that he tied a stone to it to hold it still. The consequence was that in a moment of unusual excitement the horse flung the stone around and inflicted a severe wound upon the man's head. The man resigned next morning.

I then concluded to introduce an improvement. I purchased some horse-hair and spliced it upon the tail so neatly that it had the appearance of a natural growth. When the new man came, he attempted to comb out the horse's tail, and the added portion came off in his hand. He had profound confidence in his veterinary skill, and he imagined that the occurrence indicated a diseased condition of the horse. So he purchased some powders and gave the animal an enormous dose in a bucket of warm "mash." In half an hour that pestilential horse was seized with convulsions, during which he kicked out the stable-door, shattered the stall to pieces, hammered four more boards out of the partition, dislocated his off hind leg and expired in frightful agony.

He was more urbane after death than he had been during his life, and I contemplated his remains without shedding a tear. He was sold to a glue-man for eight dollars; and when he had departed, I felt that he would fulfill a wiser and better purpose as a contributor to the national stock of glue than as the unconscious persecutor of his former owner.

"Mrs. Adeler, do you feel any interest in the subject of pirates?"

She said the question was somewhat abrupt, but she thought she might safely say she did not.

"I make the inquiry for the reason that I have just written a ballad which has for its hero a certain bold corsair. This is the first consequence of the death of our horse. In the exuberance of joy caused by that catastrophe, I felt as if I would like to perpetrate something which should be purely ridiculous, and accordingly I organized upon paper this piratical narrative. You think the subject is an odd one? Not so. I do not pretend to explain the fact, but it is true that by this generation a pirate is regarded as a comic personage. Perhaps the reason is that he has been so often presented to us in such a perfectly absurd form in melodrama and in the cheap and trashy novels of the day. At any rate, he is susceptible of humorous treatment, as you will perceive."

"I have had a stronger impulse to write of buccaneers, too, because I am in New Castle; for, somehow, I always associate those freebooting individuals with this village. A certain ancestor of mine sailed away from this town in 1813, in a brig commissioned as a privateer, and played havoc with the ships of the enemy upon the Atlantic. In my childhood I used to hear of his brave deeds, and, somehow, I conceived the idea that he was a genuine pirate with a black flag, skull and cross-bones, and a disagreeable habit of compelling his captives to walk the plank. I was much more proud of him then, Mrs. Adeler, than I should be now had he really been such a ruffian. But he was not. He was a gallant sailor and a brave and honest gentleman, who served his country faithfully on the ocean, and then held a post of honor as warden of the port of Philadelphia until his death. But I never go to the river's side in New Castle without involuntarily recalling that fine old man in the character of an outlawed rover upon the high seas.

"Here, my dear, is the ballad. When I have read it to you, I will send it to the Argus. Since Mr. Slimmer's retirement there has been a dearth of poetry in the columns of that great organ."

MRS. JONES'S PIRATEA sanguinary pirate sailed upon the Spanish mainIn a rakish-looking schooner which was called the "Mary Jane."She carried lots of howitzers and deadly rifled guns,With shot and shell and powder and percussion caps in tons.The pirate was a homely man, and short and grum and fat;He wore a wild and awful scowl beneath his slouching hat.Swords, pistols and stilettos were arranged around his thighs,And demoniacal glaring was quite common with his eyes.His heavy black moustaches curled away beneath his nose,And drooped in elegant festoons about his very toes.He hardly ever spoke at all; but when such was the case,His voice 'twas easy to perceive was quite a heavy bass.He was not a serious pirate; and despite his anxious cares,He rarely went to Sunday-school and seldom said his prayers.He worshiped lovely women, and his hope in life was this:To calm his wild, tumultuous soul with pure domestic bliss.When conversing with his shipmates, he very often sworeThat he longed to give up piracy and settle down on shore.He tired of blood and plunder; of the joys that they could bring;He sighed to win the love of some affectionate young thing.One morning as the "Mary Jane" went bounding o'er the seaThe pirate saw a merchant bark far off upon his lee.He ordered a pursuit, and spread all sail that he could spare,And then went down, in hopeful mood, to shave and curl his hair.He blacked his boots and pared his nails and tied a fresh cravat;He cleansed his teeth, pulled down his cuffs and polished up his hat;He dimmed with flour the radiance of his fiery red nose,For, hanging with that vessel's wash, he saw some ladies' hose.Once more on deck, the stranger's hull he riddled with a ball,And yelled, "I say! what bark is that?" In answer to his callThe skipper on the other boat replied in thunder tones:"This here's the bark Matilda, and her captain's name is Jones."The pirate told his bold corsairs to man the jolly-boats,To board the bark and seize the crew, and slit their tarry throats,And then to give his compliments to Captain Jones, and sayHe wished that he and Mrs. Jones would come and spend the day.They reached the bark, they killed the crew, they threw them in the sea,And then they sought the captain, who was mad as he could be,Because his wife – who saw the whole sad tragedy, it seems —Made all the ship vociferous with her outrageous screams.But when the pirate's message came, she dried her streaming tears,And said, although she'd like to come, she had unpleasant fearsThat, his social status being very evidently low,She might meet some common people whom she wouldn't care to know.Her husband's aged father, she admitted, dealt in bones,But the family descended from the famous Duke de Jones;And such blue-blooded people, that the rabble might be checked,Had to make their social circle excessively select.Before she visited his ship she wanted him to sayIf the Smythes had recognized him in a social, friendly way;Did the Jonsons ever ask him 'round to their ancestral halls?Was he noticed by the Thomsons? Was he asked to Simms's balls?The pirate wrote that Thomson was his best and oldest friend,That he often stopped at Jonson's when he had a week to spend;As for the Smythes, they worried him with their incessant calls;His very legs were weary with the dance at Simms's balls.(The scoundrel fibbed most shamelessly. In truth he only knewA lot of Smiths without a y – a most plebeian crew.His Johnsons used a vulgar h, his Thompsons spelled with p,His Simses had one m, and they were common as could be.)Then Mrs. Jones mussed up her hair and donned her best delaine,And went with Captain Jones aboard the schooner Mary Jane.The pirate won her heart at once by saying, with a smile,He never saw a woman dressed in such exquisite style.The pirate's claim to status she was very sure was justWhen she noticed how familiarly the Johnsons he discussed.Her aristocratic scruples then were quickly laid aside,And when the pirate sighed at her, reciproc'ly she sighed.No sooner was the newer love within her bosom bornThan Jones was looked upon by her with hatred and with scorn.She said 'twas true his ancestor was famous Duke de Jones,But she shuddered to remember that his father dealt in bones.So then they got at Captain Jones and hacked him with a sword,And chopped him into little bits and tossed him overboard.The chaplain read the service, and the captain of the barkBefore his widow's weeping eyes was gobbled by a shark.The chaplain turned the prayer-book o'er; the bride took off her glove;They swore to honor, to obey, to cherish and to love.And, freighted full of happiness, across the ocean's foamThe schooner glided rapidly toward the pirate's home.And when of ecstasy and joy their hearts could hold no more,That pirate dropped his anchor down and rowed his love ashore.And as they sauntered up the street he gave his bride a poke,And said, "In them there mansions live the friends of whom I spoke."She glanced her eye along the plates of brass upon each door,And then her anger rose as it had never done before.She said, "That Johnson has an h! that Thompson has a p!The Smith that spells without a y is not the Smith for me!"And darkly scowled she then upon that rover of the wave;"False! False!" she shrieked, and spoke of him as "Monster, traitor, slave!"And then she wept and tore her hair, and filled the air with groans,And cursed with bitterness the day she let them chop up Jones.And when she'd spent on him at last the venom of her tongue,She seized her pongee parasol and stabbed him in the lung.A few more energetic jabs were at his heart required,And then this scand'lous buccaneer rolled over and expired.Still brandishing her parasol she sought the pirate boat;She loaded up a gun and jammed her head into its throat;And fixing fast the trigger, with string tied to her toe,She breathed "Mother!" through the touch-hole, and kicked and let her go.A snap, a fizz, a rumble; some stupendous roaring tones —And where upon earth's surface was the recent Mrs. Jones?Go ask the moaning winds, the sky, the mists, the murmuring sea;Go ask the fish, the coroner, the clams – but don't ask me.

CHAPTER X

A Picturesque Church – Some Reflections upon Church Music – Bob Parker in the Choir – Our Undertaker – A Gloomy Man – Our Experience with the Hot-Air Furnaces – A Series of Accidents – Mr. Collamer's Vocalism – An Extraordinary Mistake

There are but few old villages in the United States that contain ancient churches so picturesque in situation and in appearance as that which stands in the centre of our town, the most conspicuous of its buildings. The churchyard is filled with graves, for the people still cling to that kindly usage which places the sacred dust of the departed in holy ground. And so here, beneath the trees, and close to the shadow of the sanctuary walls, villagers of all ages and generations lie reposing in their final slumber, while from among them the snow-white spire rises heavenward to point the way their souls have gone. There are many of us who were not born here, and who are, as it were, almost strangers in the town, who can wander down the narrow paths of the yard, to out-of-the-way corners, where the headstones are gray with age and sometimes covered with a film of moss, and read in the quaint characters with which the marble is inscribed our own family names. Here lies the mortal part of men and women who were dear to our grandsires; of little children too, sometimes, whose departure brought sorrow to the hearts of those who joined them in Paradise long, long before we began to play our parts in the drama of existence. The lives that ended in this quiet resting-place are full of deepest interest to us; they have a controlling influence upon our destiny, and yet they are very unreal to us. The figures which move by us as we try to summon up the panorama of that past are indistinct and obscure. They are shadows walking in the dusk, and we strive in vain to vest them with a semblance of the personality which once was theirs. They should seem very near to us their kindred, and yet, as we attempt to come closer to them, they appear so remote, so far away in the dead years, that we hardly dare to claim fellowship with them, or to speak of them as of our flesh and blood.

It makes no difference where the empty shell is cast when the spiritual man is gone, but I reverence that human instinct which induces a man to wish to be laid at the last by the side of his ancestors and near to those whom he has loved in life. It is at least a beautiful sentiment which demands that those who are with each other in immortality should not be separated here on earth, but together should await the morning of the resurrection.

I like this old church for its simplicity; not only for the absence of splendor in its adornment, but for the methods of worship of which it approves. The choir, from its station in the organ-loft, never hurls down upon the heads of the saints and sinners beneath any of those surprising sounds which rural choirs so often emit, with a conviction that they are achieving wonderful feats of vocalism, and no profane fingers compel the pipes of the microscopic organ to recall to the mind of the listener the music of the stage and the concert-room. From the instrument come only harmonies round, sweet and full, melting in solemn cadences from key to key and rolling down through the church, bringing the souls of the worshipers into full accord with the spirit of the place and the occasion, or else pouring forth some stately melody on which the voices of the singers are upborne. The choir fulfills its highest purpose by leading the people through the measures of those grand old tunes, simple in construction but sublime in spirit, which give to the language of the spiritual songs of the sanctuary a more eloquent beauty than their own. I would rather hear such music as may be found in "Federal Street," in "Old Hundred," in "Hursley" and in the "Adeste Fideles," sung by an entire assembly of people who are in earnest in their religion, than to listen to the most intricate fugue worked out by a city choir of hired singers, or the most brilliant anthem sung by a congregation of surpliced boys who quarrel with each other and play wicked games during the prayers. Such tunes as these are filled with solemn meaning which is revealed to him whose singing is really an act of worship. There is more genuine religious fervor in "Hursley" than in a library of ordinary oratorios. A church which permits its choir to do all the singing might as well adopt the Chinese fashion of employing a machine to do its praying. A congregation which sits still while a quartette of vocalists overhead utters all the praises, need not hesitate to offer its supplications by turning a brass wheel with a crank. Our people do their singing and their praying for themselves, and the choir merely takes care that the music is of a fitting kind.

Miss Magruder sits in the organ-loft now that she is at home, and I doubt not she contributes much to the sweetness of the strains which float from out that somewhat narrow enclosure. Her presence, I observe, ensures the regular attendance of young Mr. Parker at the church, and last Sunday he even ventured to sit with the choir and to help with the singing. I have never considered him a really good performer, although he cherishes a conviction that he has an admirable voice, and such acquaintance with the art of using it as would have given him eminence if he had chosen the career of a public singer. After service I had occasion to speak to the clergyman for a moment, and as soon as he saw me he said:

"Mr. Adeler, did you notice anything about the organ or the choir to-day that was peculiar?"

"No; I do not think I did."

"It is very odd; but it seemed to me when they were singing the two last hymns that something must be the matter with one of the pipes. There was a sort of a rough, buzzing, rasping sound which I have never observed before. The instrument must need repairing."

"I think I know what it was," remarked Mr. Campbell, the basso, who stepped up at that moment.

"The valves a little worn, I suppose?" said the minister.

"Well, no," replied Campbell; "the fact is that extraordinary noise was produced by Mr. Parker, who was making a strenuous effort to sing bass. He seemed to be laboring under a strong conviction that the composers had made some mistakes in the tunes, which he proposed to correct as he went along. Parker's singing is like homœopathic medicine – a very little of it is enough."

Bob attributes the criticism of Campbell to professional jealousy, but he will probably sit down stairs after this. He prefers not to waste his talents upon provincial people who cannot appreciate genuine art. He will content himself with walking home with the fair Magruder after service.

There is one thing about the church with which I must find fault. I have never been able to comprehend why it is customary throughout this country, even in the large cities, to permit undertakers to decorate the exteriors of churches with their advertisements, as ours is decorated by our undertaker. In old times, when the sexton was the grave-digger and general public functionary, it was well enough to give publicity to his residence by posting its whereabouts in a public place. There were oftentimes little offices which he had to perform for the congregation and for the neighborhood, and it was necessary that he should be found quickly. But the present fashion, which allows an undertaker – who has no other connection with the church than that he sits in a pew occasionally and goes to sleep during the sermon – to nail a tin sign, bearing a picture of a gilt coffin, right by the church door, so that no man, woman or child can enter that sanctuary without thinking of the grave, is monstrous.

It is very proper that the minds of the people should be turned to contemplation of the certainty of death whenever they go to church. But it is hardly necessary to disturb a man's reflections upon the necessity of preparing for the grave by confronting him with an advertisement which compels him to remember how much it is going to cost his relations to put him there. Besides this, it makes the undertakers covetous, and fills their gloomy souls with murderous wishes.

I have seen ours standing against the wall in the churchyard on a Sunday morning with his hands in his pockets, glowering at the congregation as they go in, eyeing and criticising the members, and muttering to himself, "Splendid fit he'd make in that mahogany coffin I've got at home!" "There goes a man who ought to have died five years ago if I'd been treated right!" "I'll souse that Thompson underground some of these fine days!" "Those Mulligan girls certainly can't give the old man anything less than a four-hundred-dollar funeral when he dies!" "Healthiest looking congregation of its size I ever saw!" etc., etc.

If I were in authority in the church, I would suppress that gilded advertisement and try to convert the owner of it. No man should be permitted to waste his Sabbaths in vain longings for the interment of his fellow-men.

They are very busy now at the church putting in new furnaces in order to be prepared for the cold weather. New ones were introduced last winter, I am told, but they were not entirely successful in operation. The first time the fire was put in them was on Saturday morning, and on Sunday the smoke was so dense in the church that nobody could see the clergyman. The workman had put the stove-pipe into the hot-air flue. Next Saturday night the fires were lighted, out on Sunday morning only the air immediately under the roof was warm, and the congregation nearly froze to death. The sexton was then instructed to make the fire on Thursday, in order to give the church a chance to become thoroughly heated. He did so, and early Sunday morning the furnaces were so choked up with ashes that the fires went out, and again the thermometer in the front pew marked zero.

Then the sexton received orders to make that fire on Thursday, and to watch it carefully until church-time on the following Sabbath. He did so, and both furnaces were in full blast at the appointed hour. That was the only warm Sunday we had last winter. The mercury was up to eighty degrees out of doors, while in the church everybody was in a profuse perspiration, and the bellows-blower at the organ fainted twice. The next Sunday the sexton tried to keep the fires low by pushing in the dampers, and consequently the church was filled with coal-gas, and the choir couldn't sing, nor could the minister preach without coughing between his sentences.

Subsequently the sexton removed one of the cast-iron registers in the floor for the purpose of examining the hot-air flue. He left the hole open while he went into the cellar for a moment, and just then old Mr. Collamer came in to hunt for his gloves, which he thought he had left in his pew. Of course he walked directly into the opening, and was dragged out in a condition of asphyxia. That very day one of the furnaces burst and nearly fired the church. The demand for heaters of another kind seemed to be imperative.

Old Collamer, by the way, is singularly unfortunate in his experiences in the sanctuary. He is extremely deaf, and a few Sundays ago he made a fearful blunder during the sermon. The clergyman had occasion to introduce a quotation, and as it was quite long, he brought the volume with him; and when the time came, he picked up the book and began to read from it. We always sing the Old Hundred doxology after sermon at our church, and Mr. Collamer, seeing the pastor with the book, thought the time had come, so while the minister was reading; he opened his hymn-book at the place. Just as the clergyman laid the volume down the man sitting next to Mr. Collamer began to yawn, and Mr. Collamer, thinking he was about to sing, immediately broke out into Old Hundred, and roared it at the top of his voice. As the clergyman was just beginning "secondly," and as there was of course perfect silence in the church, the effect of Mr. Collamer's vociferation was very startling. But the good old man failed to notice that anything was the matter, so he kept right on and sang the verse through.