Samantha Among the Brethren | Page 7

Authoress of "Wedlock's
Peaceful Repose."
I hadn't heard a word from her for upwards of four years. And the letter
brung me startlin' intelligence.
It opened with the unexpected information that she wuz married. She
had been married three years and a half to a butcher out to the Ohio.
And I declare my first thought wuz as I read it, "Wall, she has wrote
dretful flowery on wedlock, and its perfect, onbroken calm, and
peaceful repose, and now she has had a realizin' sense of what it really
is."
But when I read a little further, I see what the letter wuz writ for. I see
why, at this late day, she had started up and writ me a letter. I see it
wuz writ on duty.
She said she had found out that I wuz in the right on't and she wuzn't.
She said that when in the past she had disputed me right up and down,
and insisted that wedlock wuz a state of perfect serenity, never broken
in upon by any cares or vexations whatsomever, she wuz in the wrong
on't.
She said she had insisted that when anybody had moored their barks
into that haven of wedded life, that they wuz forever safe from any rude
buffetin's from the world's waves; that they wuz exempt from any toil,
any danger, any sorrow, any trials whatsomever. And she had found
she was mistook.
She said I told her it wuz a first-rate state, and a satisfactory one for
wimmen; but still it had its trials, and she had found it so. She said that
I insisted its serenity wuz sometimes broken in upon, and she had
found it so. The last day at my house had tottled her faith, and her own
married experience had finished the work. Her husband wuz a worthy

man, and she almost worshipped him. But he had a temper, and he
raved round considerable when meals wuzn't ready on time, and she
havin' had two pairs of twins durin' her union (she comes from a family
on her mother's side, so I had hearn before, where twins wuz
contagious), she couldn't always be on the exact minute. She had to
work awful hard; this broke in on her serenity.
Her husband devotedly loved her, so she said; but still, she said, his
bootjack had been throwed voyalent where corns wuz hit onexpected.
[Illustration: "FOUR TWINS BROKE IN ALSO ON HER
WAVELESS CALM."]
Their souls wuz mated firm as they could be in deathless ties of
affection and confidence, yet doors had been slammed and oaths
emitted, when clothin' rent and buttons tarried not with him. Strange
actions and demeanors had been displayed in hours of high-headedness
and impatience, which had skaired her almost to death before gettin'
accustomed to 'em.
The four twins broke in also on her waveless calm. They wuz lovely
cherubs, and the four apples of her eyes. But they did yell at times, they
kicked, they tore round and acted; they made work--lots of work. And
one out of each pair snored. It broke up each span, as you may say. The
snorin' filled each room devoted to 'em.
He snored, loud. A good man and a noble man he wuz, so she repeated
it, but she found out too late--too late, that he snored. The house wuz
small; she could not escape from snores, turn she where she would. She
got tired out with her work days, and couldn't rest nights. Her husband,
as he wuz doin' such a flourishin' business, had opened a cattle-yard
near the house. She wuz proud of his growin' trade, but the bellerin' of
the cattle disturbed her fearfully. Also the calves bleating and the lambs
callin' on their dams.
It wuz a long letter, filled with words like these, and it ended up by
saying that for years now she had wanted to write and tell me that I had
been in the right on't and she in the wrong. I had been megum and she

hadn't. And she ended by sayin', "God bless me and adoo."
[Illustration: THE LECTURE.]
The fire crackled softly on the clean hearth. The teakettle sung a song
of welcome and cheer. The oysters sent out an agreeable atmosphere.
The snowy table, set out in pretty china and glassware, looked invitin',
and I set there comfortable and happy and so peaceful in my frame, that
the events of the past, in which Serena Fogg had flourished, seemed but
as yesterday.
I thought it all over, that pleasant evenin' in the past, when Josiah Allen
had come in unexpected, and brung the intelligence to me that there
wuz goin' to be a lectur' give that evenin' by a young female at the
Jonesville school-house, and beset me to