Books: The Long Ago
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Jacob William Wright >> The Long Ago
"Yes, so it does, Mr. Van . . . . . We can use it, I suppose, in
something . . . . . And we always have had it, and . . . . . Well, do as
you think best."
White sugar was good when you had something to go with it.
But brown sugar stood alone - sticky, heavy, crumbly lumps that held
together until a fellow could tip back his head and drop one of the
chunks in his mouth.
And after school grandmother could be persuaded to cut a full-size slice
of bread (thick) and spread it with butter (thick) and you'd start away
with it (quick) - just nibbling at one edge, not really biting - and
you'd sneak into the dark place under the stairs (or into the pantry) -
and reach deep down into the white sugar barrel - and grab a handful -
and sprinkle it over the bread-and-butter - and shake back into the
barrel all that didn't stick to the butter - and then do it all over
again - and pat it down hard - and then sprinkle just a little bit more
on hurriedly, (because grandfather's cane could be heard tapping down
the hall) - and then you emerged with dignity, but with no unnecessary
commotion - and just faded away into the Outer World so softly, so
gently, so contentedly! . . . . .
(Have you tried any bread-and-butter-and-sugar recently? Did it taste
the same as it used to? . . .
No? . . . Perhaps you broke it into pieces instead of beginning at one
side and eating straight through?
Or maybe you got hold of the cooking butter . . . Or did you try it with
baker's bread? . . .
No? . . . Well, why didn't it taste the same?
Jimmy the Lamplighter
The sun had gone down behind the willows on the river-bank. The
night-clouds still carried the crimson-and-purple of the late twilight;
and the deep, still waters of the channel gave back the colors and the
gleam of the first stars that heralded the night . . . . . The martins
chattered under the eaves, scolding some belated member of the clan who
pushed noisily for a lodging-place for the night. The black bat and the
darting nighthawk were a-wing, grim spectres of the dusk. The
whip-poor-will was crying along the river, and far up-stream the loon
called weirdly across the water. . . . .
A small boy was sitting on grandfather's front steps, his elbows on his
knees, his chin in his palms, seeing familiar objects disappear in the
gathering dusk, and watching the stars come out. He was safe, very safe
for grandfather had not gone to the dining-room yet, and his arms could
be reached for shelter in two or three bounds, if need be. So it was
very pleasant to sit on the steps and see the little old town fold-up
its affairs and settle down for the night.
And more particularly to watch for Jimmy, the Lamplighter.
Far up the street, in the almost-dark place, about where Schmidt's
shoestore ought to be, a point of light flashed suddenly, flickered, and
then burned steadily - and in a moment another, across the street . . . .
Then a space of black, and two more points appeared. Down the street
they came in pairs, closely following the retreating day.
And the Little Boy on the Steps knew that it was Jimmy, the Lamplighter,
working his way swiftly and silently. If only the supper bell would
delay awhile The Boy would see old Jimmy light the lamp on grandfather's
corner, as he had seen him countless times before.
Then, just as the red glow faded in the West and Night settled down, he
came swinging sturdily across the street, his ladder hung on his right
shoulder, his wax taper in his left hand. Quickly, unerringly he placed
the ladder against the iron post that sent its metallic ring into the
clear night air as the ladder struck, and was three rounds up almost
before it settled into position. Then a quick opening of the glass; a
struggle with the matches in the wind, a hurried closing of the door,
one quick look upward; an arm through the ladder and a swing to the
shoulder - and Jimmy the Lamplighter was busily off to his next corner.
Once, in the later years, he came with his new lighter - a splendid
brass affair, with smooth wood handle, holding a wax taper that
flickered fitfully down the street and marked old Jimmy's pathway
through the dusk. Although he could reach up and turn on the gas with
the key-slot at the end of the scepter and light it with the taper, all
at one time, he ever carried the ladder - for none could tell when or
where a burner might need fixing, or there would be other need to climb
the post as in the days of the lamp and sulphur-match.
Short of stature, firm of build, was old Jimmy. The night storms of
innumerable years had bronzed his skin and furrowed his face.
Innumerable years, yes - for so faithful a servant as old Jimmy the
Lamplighter was not to be cast away by every caprice of the public mind
which changed the political aspect of the town council. So Jimmy stayed
on through the years and changing administrations -in the sultry heat of
the summer nights, or breasting his way through winter's huge
snow-drifts, fronting the wind-driven sleet, or dripping through the
spring-time rain, his taper hugged tight beneath his thick rubber coat,
his matches safe in the depths of an inside pocket.
And tonight, as the Boy still watches, in memory, old Jimmy on his
rounds, they are a bit odd, these queer old street lamps that just seem
to belong to the night, after the garish blaze of electric signs and the
great arc-lights in the shop windows. Yet it shines through the years,
this simple lamp of the Long Ago, as it shone through the night of old -
a friendly beacon only, the modest servant of an humble race. . . . .
Jimmy's boy Ted, who carried his father's ladder and taper when the good
old man laid them down, now nods in his chimney-corner o' nights. But
his boy, old Jimmy's grandson, is still a lamplighter - still
illuminating the streets of his town, still turning on its lamps when
the loon calls weirdly across the river in the gathering dusk.
He bears no ladder nor fitful taper - he dreads no sultry summer heat -
he breasts no snowdrifts - he battles against no wind-driven sleet and
rain.
There he sits, inside yonder great brick building, his chair tipped back
against the wall, reading the evening paper while the giant wheels of
the dynamo purr softly and steadily. He lowers his paper - looks at the
clock - then out into the early twilight . . . . then slowly turns to
the wall, pushes a bit of a button, takes up his paper again, and goes
on with his reading - while a thousand lights burn white through the
city! . . . .
Ah, Jimmy, Jimmy! the world is all awry, man! Your son's son lights his
thousand lamps in a flash that's no more than the puff of wind that used
to blow your match out when you stood on your ladder and lighted one!
Flies
Come to think of it, the Old Folks never made such a fuss about flies as
we make nowadays. You cannot pick up a magazine without running plump
into an article on the deadly housefly - with pictures of him magnified
until he looks like the old million-toed, barrel-eyed, spike-tailed
dragon of your boyhood mince-pie dreams. The first two pages convince
you that the human race is doomed to extermination within eighteen
months by the housefly route!
Grandmother never resorted to very drastic measures. The most violent
thing she ever did was to get little Annie, Bridget-the-housewoman's
Annie, to help her chase them out. They went from room to room
periodically (when flies became too numerous), each armed with an old
sawed-off broom-handle on which were tacked long cloth streamers - a
sort of cat-o'-nine-tails effect, only with about a score or more of
tails. After herding the blue-bottles and all their kith and kin into a
fairly compact bunch at the door, little Annie opened the screen and
grandmother drove them out - and that's all there was to it.
Another favorite device (particularly in the dining-room and kitchen),
was the "fly-gallery" - a wonderful array of multicolored tissue-paper
festooned artistically from the ceiling or around the gas-pipes to lure
or induce the fly into moments of inactivity. There was no extermination
in this device - it was purely preventive in its function - the idea
being that since there must be fly-specks, better to mass them as much
as possible on places where they would show the least and could be
removed the easiest when sufficiently accumulated.
But the greatest ounce-of-prevention was the screen hemisphere. Gee! I
haven't thought of that thing for years, have you? Of course you
remember it - absolutely fly-proof - one clapped over the butter,
another over the crackerbowl, another over the sugar!
And say! I almost forgot! . . . (Yes, I know you were just going to
speak of it!) . . . That conical screen fly-trap where the flies see
something good inside, crawl up to the top and then over and in - and
then can't get out - but just buzz and buzz and buzz - and make a lot of
fuss about it - bluebottles and all - no respecter of persons - and when
it gets full of the quick and dead in flydom, Bridget takes it out in
the back yard and dumps it. Very simple . . . clean, peaceful,
effective.
My, My! But it's a far cry back to those days, isn't it? And wouldn't
you like right this minute to sneak into the cool, curtain-down,
ever-so-quiet dining-room again . . . and nose around to see if anything
edible bad been overlooked - and see one of those dear old round
fly-screens guarding the sugar!
The Autumn Leaves
There were three recognized uses for leaves in the Autumn - first, to be
banked by the wind along fences or sidewalk edges and provide
kicking-ground for exuberant youngsters returning home from school;
second, to be packed around the foundations of the house as a measure
for interior comfort in winter; and, third, to be pressed between the
pages of the big Bible and kept for ornamental purposes until they
crumbled and had to be thrown away. This last-named use was always
questioned by every red-blooded boy, and more tolerated than accepted -
a concession to the women of earth, from little sister with her
bright-hued wreath to mother and grandmother with their book of pressed
leaves.
Even for purposes of comfort their use was more or less secondary -
granted because the banking-up process was a man's job and an out-door
enterprise. Then, too, it was a lot of fun to rake the big yard and get
the fallen leaves into one or two huge piles; and wheelbarrow them to
the edge of the house where old Spencer had driven the wooden pegs that
held the boards ready to receive the leaves. Load after load was dumped
into the trough-like arrangement and stamped down tight and hard by old
Tom's huge feet and little Willie's eager but ineffective ones - and
then the top board was fastened down, and never a cold winter wind could
find its way under the floors with such a protective bulwark around the
house. . . . And in the spring the boards had to be taken down - and
countless bleached bugs fairly oozed out into the spring sunlight - and
the snow-wet soggy leaves were raked out and burned, and the smoke was
so thick and heavy that it hardly got out of the yard.
But the real use of leaves - their only legitimate function in the Autumn,
according to all accepted boy-law - was for kicking purposes.
Plunging through banks of dry leaves along the edge of the
sidewalk-knee-deep sometimes - scattering them in all directions, even
about our heads - there was such a racket that we could scarcely hear
each other's shouts of glee. And we'd run through them only to dive
exhausted into some huge pile of them, rolling and kicking and hollering
until some kid came along and chucked an armful, dirt and all, plumb
into our face! This was the signal for a battle of leaves - and perhaps
there would have been fewer tardy-marks, teacher, if there had been
fewer autumn leaves along the route . . . Perhaps!
There were influences that tempered the joys of leaf-kicking - some
"meanie" was always ready to hide a big rock, or other disagreeable
foreign substance, under a particularly inviting bunch of leaves - then
watch and giggle at your discomfiture when you came innocently ploughing
along!
What a riot of wonderful color they made just after the first frosts had
turned their green to red and gold and brown! As a boy I disdained so
weak a thing as noticing the coloring on Big Hill - but now, in the
long-after years, I realize that its vivid Autumn garment was
indestructibly fixed in my memory and has lived - saved for me until I
could look back through Time's long glass and understand and love that
glorious picture. Not even the brush of a Barbizon master could tell the
story of Big Hill, three miles up the river from Main Street bridge,
gleaming in the hues that Jack Frost mixed, beneath the blue-gold dome
of a cloudless sky - for it could not paint the chatter of the squirrel,
or the glint of the bursting bittersweet berry, or the call of the crow,
or the crisp of the air, or the joy of life that only boyhood knows!
Getting in the Wood
An autumnal event of importance, second only to the filling of the
meat-house, was the purchase and sawing of the wood.
Three sizes, remember - the 4-foot lengths for the long, low stove in
the Big Room, 12-inch "chunks" for the oval sheet-iron stove in the
parlor, and the fine-split 18-inch lengths for the kitchen. (Yes, they
burned wood in the kitchen - not only wood, but oak and maple and
hickory - the kind you buy by the carat nowadays!)
And what a fire it made! Two sticks of the long wood in the stove in the
Big Room, and the damper open, and you'd have to raise the windows
inside of fifteen minutes no matter how low the thermometer registered
outside. In the kitchen grandmother did all her cooking with a wood fire -
using the ashes for the lye barrel - and the feasts that came steaming
from her famous oven have never been equalled on any gas-range ever
made. (Gas-range! how grandmother would have sniffed in scorn at such a
suggestion!) Even coal was only fit for the base burner in the family
sitting-room - and that must be anthracite, or "hard" coal, the kind
that comes in sacks nowadays at about the same price as butter and eggs.
And even the wood had to be split just so and be "clear" and right, or
grandmother would scold grandfather for not wearing his near-seeing
specs when he bought it. "Guess they fooled you on that load, Mr. Van,"
she'd say. "It isn't like the last we had."
Don't you remember how you were hanging around the kitchen one Saturday
morning kind-a waiting for something to come within reach, and
grandfather's cane came tap-tapping down the long hall, and he pushed
open the kitchen door and stood there, just inside the door, until the
kettle started boiling over and making such a noise. And then he
announced that he thought he better go out and see if there was any wood
in market. (As if there weren't fifty farmers lined up there almost
before daylight!) It was about nine o'clock and the sun had had a chance
to warm things up a bit - so grandmother wrapped him up in his knitted
muffler and away he went beneath his shiny silk hat. And because you
stood around and looked wistfully up at him, he finally turned back,
just before he reached the big front door and said: "Want to go along,
Billie?" Of course you went, because there were all kinds of shops on
the way up town to the wood market and grandfather always had an extra
nickle for such occasions.
Can't you just see that wood-market now, as it used to be in the Long
Ago - with its big platform scales - and its wagons of accurately-piled
cord-wood marked on the end of some stick with the white chalk-mark of
the official "inspector" and measurer - and the farmers all bundled-up
and tied-around with various cold-dispelling devices and big mitts and
fur caps? So far as you could tell then (or now, either, I'll wager!)
every load was exactly like every other load - but not so to
grandfather, for he would scrutinize them all, sound them with his
stick, barter and dicker and look out for knots - and then make the
rounds again and do it all over before finally making his selection -
and I distinctly remember feeling that the wood left in market after
grandfather had made his selection wasn't worth hauling away!
Load after load was driven up to the high backyard fence and its sticks
heaved into the yard and piled in perfect order - and it made a goodly
and formidable showing when Old Pete, the wood-sawyer, finally arrived
on the scene. The time of wood-buying was determined partly by Pete's
engagements - he went first to the Perkinses and next to the Williamses
and so on in rotation as he had done for years, his entire winter being
"engaged" far ahead. It did not seem possible, to boyish mind, that one
man could ever get all that wood sawed and split, even if he was a great
giant Norseman with the finest buck-saw in the country.
But each year Old Pete's prowess seemed to increase - and day after day
the ceaseless music of his saw sounded across the crisp air - and the
measured strokes of his axe struck a clarion note - until finally the
yard showed only chips and saw-dust where that vast wood-pile had been -
and the big barn was piled full to the rafters - the kitchen wood and
chunks on one side, the big wood on the other.
Then Pete would come in and announce that the job was done - and
grandfather would bundle-up and go out for a final inspection. Pete
removed the pad from his leg (you remember the carpet he wore on his
left knee - the one that held the stick in place in the buck when he was
sawing) and together they went into the barn - and talked it all over -
and Pete said it was harder wood than last year's and more knots in it
and ought to be worth two shillings more than contract price - and
grandfather finally allowed the excess - and Old Pete came in and got
his money (in gold and silver) and a bowl of coffee and some bread - and
went his way to the Jonesses or some other folks.
And you, young man - you surely hated to see that great Viking go - for
he had told you many a wonderful tale at the noon hour as he munched his
thick sandwiches - and no one could look at his massive head and huge
shoulders and great beard and hair and doubt that his forebears had done
all that he credited to them.
Somehow, Old Pete seemed more real than most men you knew - except
grandfather, of course. There was something unexplainable in the man and
his work that rang true - something that was so wholesome and sound. He
wasn't like old Hawkins, the grocer - he'd as lief give you a rotten
apple as not if he could smuggle it into the bag without you seeing him;
and Kline the candy-man sometimes sold you old hard stuff mixed with the
fresh. But Old Pete here - he just worked honest and steady - out in the
open - at a fixed wage - and he did an honest job and was proud of it
even if it was only sawing wood. He worked faithfully until it was done,
and then he got a good word and a bowl of coffee and his wages in gold
and silver - and went his way rejoicing, leaving behind him the glory of
labor well performed blending with the refreshing fragrance of new-cut
logs that sifted through the cracks of the old barn.
The Rain
It is early, and Saturday morning - very, very early.
Listen! . . . An unmistakable drip, drip, drip . . . and the room is
dark.
A bound out of bed - a quick step to the window - an anxious peering
through the wet panes . . . . and the confirmation is complete.
It is raining - and on Saturday, the familiar leaden skies and steady
drip that spell permanency and send the robin to the shelter of some
thick bush, and leave only an occasional undaunted swallow cleaving the
air on swift wing.
In all the world there is no sadness like that which in boyhood sends
you back to bed on Saturday morning with the mournful drip, drip, drip
of a steady rain doling in your ears.
Out in the woodshed there is a can of the largest, fattest angle-worms
ever dug from a rich garden-plot - all so happily, so feverishly, so
exultantly captured last night when Anticipation strengthened the little
muscles that wielded the heavy spade. All safe in their black soil they
wait, coiled round and round each other into a solid worm-ball in the
bottom of the can.
A mile down the river the dam is calling - the tumbled waters are
swirling and eddying and foaming over the deep places where the
black-bass wait - and old Shoemaker Schmidt, patriarch of the river, is
there this very minute, unwinding his pole, for well he knows that if
one cares to brave the weather he will catch the largest and finest and
most bass when the rain is falling on the river.
But small boys who have anxious mothers do not go fishing on rainy days -
so there is no need of haste, and one might as well go back to bed and
sleep unconcernedly just as late as possible. If only a fellow could get
up between showers, or before the rain actually starts, so that he could
truthfully say: "But, mother, really and truly, it wasn't raining when
we started!" it would be all right, and the escape was warrantable,
justified and safe; but with the rain actually falling, there was
nothing to do but go to sleep again and turn the worms back into the
garden if the rain didn't let up by noon.
-
It is one of the miracles of life that Boyhood can turn grief into joy
and become almost instantly reconciled to the inevitable like a true
philosopher, and change a sorrow into a blessing. The companion miracle
is that Manhood with its years of wisdom forgets how to do this.
And so, when the rainy day becomes hopelessly rainy, and Shoemaker
Schmidt is left alone at the dam, the rain that sounded so dismal at
dawn proves to be a benefactor after all. There will be no woodsplitting
today, no outdoor chores - for if it's too wet to go fishing, as mother
insists, of course it's too wet to carry wood, or weed gardens or pick
cucumbers for pickles. The logic is so obvious and conclusive that even
mother does not press the point when you remind her of it - and you are
free for a whole day in the attic.
Instantly the blessing is manifest - the sadness of that day-break drip,
drip, drip is healed - the whole character of the day is changed, and
the rain-melody becomes not a funeral-march but a dance.
The attic is the place of all places you would most love to be on this
particular calendar day!
How stupid to spoil a perfectly good Saturday by sitting on a hard beam,
with wet spray blowing in your face all the time, and getting all tired
out holding a heavy fish-pole, when here is the attic waiting for you
with its mysterious dark corners, its scurrying mice that suddenly
develop into lions for your bow-and-arrow hunting, and its maneuvers on
the broad field of its floor with yourself as the drum-corps and your
companions as the army equipped with wooden swords and paper helmets!
-
The day has been rich in adventure, and exploration, and the doing of
great deeds.
And it has been all too short, for the attic is growing dim, and mother
is again calling us - telling us to send our little playmates home and
come and get our bread and milk.
A last arrow is shot into the farthest comer where some undiscovered
jungle beast may be prowling.
A last roll is given to the drum, and the army disbands.
A sudden fear seizes upon us as we realize that night has come and we
are in the attic, alone.
And with no need of further urging we scamper unceremoniously down the
stairs, slam the attic door, hurry into the kitchen where Maggie has our
table waiting . . . .
-
Eight o'clock - and we're all tucked away among the feathers again!
Aren't we glad we didn't go down to the river - it would have been a
cold, dismal day - and perhaps they weren't biting today, anyway - and
we should have gotten very wet.
It is still raining, raining hard - pattering unceasingly on the roof . . .
And the tin eave-troughs are singing their gentle lullaby of running
water trickling from the shingles . . . a lullaby so soothing that we do
not hear mother softly open the door . . . and come to our crib and
place the little bare arms under the covers and leave a kiss on the
yellow curls and a benediction in the room.
Grandmother
Do you remember the day she lost her glasses? My, such a commotion!
Everybody turned in to hunt for them. Grandmother tramped from one end
of the house to the other - we all searched - upstairs and down - with
no success.
They weren't in the big Bible (we turned the leaves carefully many times -
it was the most likely place). They weren't in either of her sewing
baskets, nor in the cook-book in the kitchen. Grandfather said she could
use one pair of his gold-bowed ones - but shucks! She couldn't see with
anything except those old steel-bowed specs! . . .
And then, when she finally sat down and said for the fiftieth time: "I
wonder where those specs are!" . . . and put the corner of her apron to
her eyes - I happened to look up, and there they were - on the top of
her head! Been there all the time . . . And she enjoyed the joke as much
as we did - a joke that went around the little town and followed her
through all the years within my memory of her.