Samantha at the Worlds Fair | Page 6

but anyway wantin' to keep out of the sight of the one
who, if he couldn't have her for his own, he wanted to forgit--he packed
up bag and baggage and went West.
Isabelle wouldn't correspond with him, so she told him in that last
hour--still and calm on the outside, and her heart a-bleedin' on the
inside, I dare presoom to say; no, she wanted him to feel free.
What creeters, what creeters wimmen be for makin' martyrs of

themselves, and burnt sacrifices--sometimes I most think they enjoy it,
and then agin I don't know!
But Isabelle acted from a sense of duty, for she jest worshipped the
ground Tom Freeman walked on, so everybody knew, and so she bid
adieu to Tom and Happiness, and lived on.
Wall, one of 'em must stay at home with the old folks, either she or
Christopher Columbus. And when a man and a woman love each other
as Isabelle and Krit did, when wuz it ever the case but what if there
wuz any sacrificin' to do the woman wuz the one to do it.
It is her nater, and I don't know but a real true woman takes as much
comfort in bein' sort o' onhappy for the sake of some one she loves, as
she would in swingin' right out and a-enjoyin' herself first rate.
A woman who really loves anything has the makin' of a first-class
martyr in her. And though she may not be ever tied to a stake, and
gridirons be fur removed from her, still she has a sort of a silent
hankerin' or aptitude for martrydom. That is, she would fur ruther be
onhappy herself than to have the beloved object wretched. And if either
of 'em has got to face trouble and privation, why she is the one that
stands ready to face 'em.
So Isabelle sent Krit off into the great world to conquer it if possible.
And Krit, as the nater of man is, felt that he would ruther branch and
work his way along through the World, and work hard and venter and
dare and try to conquer fortune, than to set round and endure and suffer
and be calm.
Men are not, although they are likely creeters and I wish 'em well, yet
truth compels me to say that they are not very much gin to follerin' this
text, "To suffer and be calm."
No, they had ruther rampage round and kill the lions in the way than to
camp down in front of 'em and try to subdue 'em with kindness and
long sufferin'.

Krit, as the nateral nater of man is, felt that he could and would earn a
good place in the World, win it with hard work, and then lift Isabelle up
onto the high platform by the side of him.
Though whether he had made any plans as how he wuz a-goin' to hist
up the two feeble old invalids, that I can't state, not knowin'.
But Isabelle, he did lay out to do well by her, thinkin' as he did such a
amazin' lot of her, and knowin' how she gin up her own ambitious
hopes for his sake, and knowin' well, though he didn't really feel free to
interfere, how she had signed the death-warrant to her own happiness
when she parted with Tom Freeman. But so it wuz.
Wall, Krit wouldn't have to lift up the old folks onto any worldly hite,
for the Lord took 'em up into His own habitation, higher I spoze than
any earthly mount. About six months before Krit come to Jonesville,
they both passed away most at the same time, and wuz buried in one
grave.
Wall, we all on us in Jonesville thought a sight of Krit before he had
been with us a week. He had come partly to see a man in Jonesville on
particular business, and partly to see us. He wuz a civil engineer, jest as
civil and polite a one as I ever laid eyes on, and wuz a-doin' well, but
Thomas Jefferson thought he could help him to a still better place and
position.
Thomas J. is very popular in Jonesville. He is doin' a big business all
over the county, and is very influential.
Wall, Krit's business bid fair to keep him for some time in Jonesville
and the vicinity, and as he see that Josiah Allen and I wuz a-makin'
preperations to go to the World's Fair--and bein' warmly pursuaded by
us to that effect, he concluded to stay and accompany us thither. The
idee wuz very agreeable to us.
He said his sister Isabelle, after she wuz a little recooperated from her
grief for the old folks, and recovered a little from the sickness that she
had