AN ITINERANT PAIR

WERE you ever at Michigan City, in Indiana? Stop! Let me put the question more carefully. Were you ever compelled to wait for a train at Michigan City? The first inquiry sounds innocent enough, but a Hoosier would detect a covert insult in it. Why? Because one of the three state penitentiaries is situated there and is the town’s chief distinction to the outside public. A native of the state living elsewhere can conceive of no reason why a man should voluntarily take up his residence in the place, or even why he should “stop off,” except to visit some erring and unfortunate relative. Hence, to avoid trouble, those persons in search of local information do well to be on their guard.

I had passed through, many times, on my way to and from Chicago, but until this trip had never taken closer observations than through the car windows. To-day the “lightning express” on the Michigan Central road was three hours too early for the one train that in those days—some years ago now—daily jogged along down the road leading south. What should I do with the time? I looked into the waiting-room of the station. No passenger had left the train but myself, and the place was empty save for an old couple, who had evidently just come in from the country.

I went out and explored the town. Up one street and down another I strolled, until the circuit was made. In every direction was sand—mountains of sand, valleys of sand. It was in drifts upon the sidewalks, in hillocks in the streets. The houses were built upon it. Many dwellings leaned from the perpendicular at various angles, according to their age, the shifty foundations had so worn away and blown away. Though it was a bright April day but few people were on the street, and these seemed in haste to disappear as soon as seen. It may have been a biased imagination that saw this, or the cause may have been the chill lake wind.

Was it fancy, too, that made the women and children, visible here and there at the windows, seem to draw back, as if to hide? The scattering tufts of grass in the front yards seemed to have given over the ambition to cover the earth with green, and were creeping under the sand. Did I imagine a burden in the air, as of grief or guilt? The shadow of the prison seemed to hover over the place. It grew oppressive.

In desperation, I resolved to climb the nearest sand-hill and view the world from that eminence. Perhaps I might find an elevation of spirits when I could survey the prospect from above. Were not poets always telling us to commune with nature, and thereby escape from fret and care; to seek the solitude of a height and see the earth grow fair beneath our feet, the mists and clouds melt into sunlight? Laboriously I crept and scrambled up the slippery side of that miserable hill. From the foot it had not looked far to the summit—perhaps not over one hundred feet—nor yet steep; but with each step forward and each slip back it seemed to grow, until, when half way up I stopped to breathe, it loomed above me like a mountain. Out to the north was Lake Michigan, blue and cold. Far distant could be seen the smoke of steamers; nearer, the white wings of sail-boats; but all were outward bound.

Along the shore the sand dunes stretched for miles. Once, long ago, the lake is said to have covered this ground. Having been given up by water, the earth had not had thrift to reclaim the waste. Even the idle train of vagrant weeds had not wandered in to hide the barrenness. Beyond the town rose the grim, bare walls of the prison. Hundreds of men inside were wearing out the long hours of weary days in toil that was heavy and bitter, because it was enforced. Deprived of freedom of will, of liberty of body, without hope for the future, they waited—for what? For release from bondage, to spend the remnant of their lives as Ishmaelites, followed in the world by sneers and suspicion, or received, if at all, with a virtuous condescension no easier to bear. Probably they deserved their fate. Some of those men had stolen, some had forged, some had murdered; and the way of the transgressor was hard, we were told. It was right that they should suffer, then; but we Pharisees, were we without sin, that we should cast a stone? Had we not done those things that we should not, left undone that which we should? Perhaps, my friend, you took advantage of a man’s need and made an unrighteous profit. Did you not foreclose a mortgage and distress a debtor, when you could have waited? Perhaps you did not love your neighbor, or, may be, you loved his wife too well. Such things had been known. Perhaps—but the catalogue was long. Because the law had not touched us, were we to proscribe those on whom its finger was laid? Life was bitter at best. What were we, good Lord, that we should take all the sweet of existence from any man?

This little sermon I preached to myself, for lack of a better audience; but the wind was too keen to encourage moralizing. What should I gain by climbing to the top of this hill? Each step higher would only show a wider sweep of desolation. Why should I emulate the young man of Alpine fame? He was a foolish youth and came to an untimely end. I had no ambition; besides I had brought no banner to plant at the top to commemorate my deed. It was a gloomy world. Nothing was worth while. I would go down.

The descent was rapid and undignified. Eyes, ears and clothing were full of sand. To such irritation of mind had I come that I felt ready for reckless deeds, but I swallowed wrath and sand together and walked on.

Suddenly, in a sunny corner, between a pile of railroad ties and another of fragrant pine lumber, I came upon the old couple whom I had seen at the station. There they were—she with a napkin spread upon her lap and nibbling daintily at a bit of cake; he helping himself freely to sandwiches or chicken, now from the lap that served as table, now from the basket at their feet. Involuntarily, I paused; perhaps, to apologize for the intrusion, perhaps, attracted by the people themselves, or drawn, maybe (who knows?) by the luncheon. Who can tell afterward just how an acquaintance began? In ten minutes we were chatting briskly, and I was cheerfully helping to empty that lunch basket. I think the wife opened the conversation by saying that they had seen me climb the hill, and only wished themselves a little younger, that they might do the same.

No one is so charming to a traveler as a woman, young or old, who knows when and how to dispense with formality, and talk kindly, yet with dignity, to a stranger. It is a rare grace, however, I have come to know.

If my old lady whom I met that day on the sand told too much of her own story, it was not her fault, but mine. I asked questions now and then to lead her on. As we talked about the weather, of the trains, of the time—drifting along in the shallows of conversation as strangers do—I became slowly conscious of a something out of the common in the manner of these old people. Just what it was was hard to define. There was nothing at all remarkable in their personal appearance. He was tall, spare, with a mild, benevolent face, and it needed only one glance to be assured that he was a minister of the Gospel. A Presbyterian minister I would have said, judging from a certain stiffness of carriage and gentle dignity, as well as from the extreme neatness of his well-worn garments. With a little surprise, I learned that he was, as he put it, “the Lord’s servant in the Methodist vineyard”—Methodists of the old school whom I had heretofore met being noticeable rather for a carelessness of dress and a soldierly bearing, as of those who had conquered men. His wife was a slender, nervous little body; one of the women who in these days are called “delicate” and of whom little is expected; one of those who, when the tests of life come, sometimes develop a power of endurance, mental and physical, marvelous to see.

“No, we don’t live here,” she said. “We have been spending a day in the country with some old friends, but we came up to see a young man who is in prison for murder. He was a school-mate of our son Gabriel, and had the making of a man; but he took a wild and reckless turn as he grew up, and never got on the right track again till now.”

“You smile,” said the old minister; “but you know that building is a place of bondage and of punishment for breaking our laws only, and not God’s laws. If a man steal, we shut him up to teach him that he shall not touch our property; but, unless he repent of his sin, I hold that the Lord will punish him still, the same as if we had let him go free. This boy drank to excess, he quarreled, and the jury found that he had killed a man. For the sake of his dead mother and of our son, who is dead and had loved him, we came to see if we could help him on the way to be forgiven; and the good God has blessed us. We found him wretched and without hope. We could give no comfort; we could only pray for help, and the comfort came. Before we came away he began to feel that there was mercy waiting for him. A little light shone out of the darkness; just a glimpse of the glory beyond. It is not for me to say that he was more guilty than another; but we all have need of grace. Cynthy and I pray that the little grain of faith in that boy’s heart may take deep root, until he can bear his punishment with patience; until he can say with humility, ‘Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.’”

“It made my heart ache to leave him,” said Mother Ellis (I knew her pet name must be “Mother,” it fitted so well); “but God, who has been so good to us, has pity for him.”

There was no want of reverence in this continual allusion to the Almighty; no cant, no grating familiarity. This old couple talked of Him as of a revered friend, with whom they had constant intercourse and in whom they had utter faith. Their simplicity was unworldly and beautiful.

“The folks down to Freedom, where we’ve been living lately, wanted us to go to Chicago and see the sights, while we were so near; but John and I we’re too anxious to get home.” Here she looked at John and blushed, and he took her hand in his. They were like a pair of young lovers. It was curious.

Presently she went on, with a contented sigh, as if the little by-play needed some explanation:

“You see, John and I, we’re going home—to a home of our own—for the first time in our lives, though we’ve been married forty years come June. Forty years! It’s a long time, looking at it some ways; but again it only seems a little while since we were young and lived ’way back in York state. Those hills and woods were pretty to look at. I’ve never seen their like since. Maybe it’s wicked, but I always think o’ the hills ’round the New Jerusalem as being like those about the head-waters o’ the Allegheny. Like as not, though, the New York hills have been cleared and ‘improved’ till they’re bare enough and ugly; but I’ve no fine words to tell ye how they used to look to me. I’ve learned now to see beauty in a level country; but it took a long while. When we first came to Indiana, John and I, seemed as if I couldn’t any way get used to the low land. Do you remember Chestnut Hill, John, over toward Cattaraugus? If I were one o’ the painter folks I could make a picture of it now. There was a tall, dead tree at the very top, with two branches reaching out like arms, making a cross that could be seen for miles. When I was young and foolish, I used to wish I were a Roman Catholic, that I might go and pray at the foot of that tree rather than in church.”

“I don’t remember about the hills being so pretty—’bout the same as others, I guess,” said unpoetical John; “but I reck’lect the road through the pine woods. Do you, Cynthy?”

Again the faded eyes of both brightened with love that is ever young. Again came the blush on the wife’s wrinkled cheek, and this time John’s feeble arm went around her waist. There was silence for a little space; but I doubt not the air was filled with the fragrance of the pine forest, that their ears heard the murmur of the trees. Once more they listened with their hearts to the words of long ago, which had made that woodland path so fair a memory.

“When I first knew John he taught our district school, and used to come to my Uncle Isaac’s pretty often. Teachers boarded around in those days, and I did think he took his turn at Uncle’s pretty often. I knew he was a pious young man, who’d had a call to be a preacher, and, like a silly girl, was a little afraid of him and didn’t want to see him. He stayed all summer when there was no school, helping my uncle and the neighbors in haying and harvest, studying between times. In those days the best of men worked in the harvest-field. Before early apples were ripe I mistrusted what was keeping him, and somehow I had got all over being afraid of him. I had found out that he was an orphan, like myself, and had no home. I was only staying with Uncle Isaac, and it must have been that which made my mind turn toward him. But he never said anything, John didn’t; only kept hanging ’round and looking as if he wanted to speak. John was bashful; but, though I’ve heard o’ men too bashful to ask a girl to marry ’em, I never knew one, and I guess John ’u’d a plucked up courage after awhile, even if the revival hadn’t come. ’Long in October Brother Duzan came along through that region, and held meetings that were powerfully blessed. It was early in the season for a revival; but everybody turned out to the meetings at our school-house. I had never experienced religion then, though Uncle Isaac often made me the subject of prayer. I was giddy and thoughtless, and, like many another, I couldn’t or, rather, wouldn’t see how good the Lord was to me.

“Well, I went with the rest to the meetings; but my heart was hard. Seemed as if it grew harder the more the brethren and sisters prayed and exhorted, though all the young folks I knew were going forward to the mourners’ bench and were being converted. One night Brother Duzan preached his dreadful sermon on future punishment of the godless, that he always kept for the crowning effort. He told, in awful words, how the unconverted sinner would finally suffer and burn in endless torment, and everybody was crying and groaning but myself. That threat couldn’t soften me then, and I’m free to confess has no effect now. Then John, he led in prayer. His voice was so soft and gentle that it hushed the excitement. He besought the tender Shepherd, who loved all His sheep, to look with special care upon the playful lambs, whose willful feet refused to follow whither they were led; to draw them back with merciful hands before they should learn, too late, that only the narrow, rocky path led to the green pastures that were beside still waters.

“I knew he prayed for me, and my heart was melted then; and, for fear the tears would come, I slipped out of the door, while the rest were on their knees. But John saw me—though how he could, with his back turned, I never knew—and I didn’t get far into the pine woods alone. He began where the prayer had stopped. ‘The Lord was waiting,’ he said, ‘for me to stretch out my hands, and He would take me into the blessed fold.’ And I? What should I do but cry, as a woman always does when she should not. Then John, to comfort me, began to tell how God loved me; and from that, some way, it was easy to say how—well, no, John, I shan’t tell what you said then, and don’t you, either. I kind o’ forgot for a minute that we were not alone, and was thinking out loud, I guess. I hope our friend will excuse me, for when she comes to be old such places in her life will stand out clear in her memory, where many another important thing has faded away.

“The next night I went to meeting, and made a profession of religion. What could I do but praise the Lord for being so good to me, who was so undeserving. Had he not given me John, and what was I that such a blessing should be mine?”

Here, the mild eye of Reverend John looked at me over his wife’s head with a mischievous twinkle. As she went on, however, his face resumed its serenity.

“We have lived many years since then. Sometimes the way has been rough and hard. We have had trials and losses; but mercy and goodness have followed us, for we have borne the burdens together. I can confess now, though I never said so to John, that one of the heaviest crosses of my life has been the wish for a home. When we were married, I knew that I was taking an itinerant Methodist preacher for better or worse (it has always been the better, never the worse, John); but I could not know till I had tried it what a wandering, unsettled life it was. Different in the early days from now, too. When we came out here, it was looked upon as more of an undertaking than going to Europe now. There were no railroads then running here and there across the country; so we came by water on a flat-boat to Pittsburgh and in a steamboat from there. Stopped at Cincinnati to see the sights. It was a fine city then, but they say it’s grown since.

“Daughter, a volume would not hold our experience of forty years. We have been sojourners, never long in one place. It’s only of late years, you know, that Methodist ministers are allowed to labor more than two years in one church. Then there was the loneliness; for sometimes John would be gone on the circuit, away from his family for weeks at a time. I could not go, because of the children. We have been here and there, here and there, and used to live in pretty wild places, with few neighbors.”

John took up the thread here: “I never was what is called a popular preacher,” he said, with a gentle smile. “I tried to do my duty—the Lord knows that; but the people would sometimes grow anxious about building up the church, and would want a man who could bring in large accessions to the membership. I tried to win souls to the Master, with His help; but, though I trust my sheaves will contain more than weeds, the harvest in my field has been less abundant than in many. The elders and bishops are judges of men, and they stationed me where I could do best, no doubt. Latterly, some have told me that people nowadays do not like to hear so much about Christ and Him crucified, that they prefer the religion of humanity, and that I should adapt my style to the times; but it is too late. I am too old to learn a new religion or to sugar-coat or rarefy the old one. It was a lack of faith, I fear, that caused a disappointment when they sent me to an obscure corner, a by-way, as sometimes they did. It was all the Master’s vineyard, and I should have worked without a murmur; but I thought too much, perhaps, about the little earthly reward and that I could make no provision for old age. We knew the Lord had always been good to us, Cynthy. We should have trusted Him in this, for He had never failed us and He never will. ‘Underneath us are the everlasting arms.’”

“Yes,” said Cynthy, “the Lord has provided for us. We are to have a home of our own in our old age; a home where our children can come to visit us or to stay. As I said, I couldn’t complain. It was the will of Heaven that we should live as sojourners. We could not set our hearts upon this house or that tree, as people will. The room where the son died or the daughter married could not be kept sacred, for we must leave them; the roses and the vines which we might plant would grow to gladden other eyes than ours. Such worldly affections do not seem wrong; but they might have been a snare to us. For a year or two John has been so afflicted with rheumatism that he could not go about, and has been put on the superannuated list.

“If you know anything about Methodists, you know they do not contribute to the fifth collection as liberally as to some others, and the fund for worn out ministers is small. I suppose they do not realize the needs of any one so near them. We have always lived on a little—no one knows so well as a Methodist preacher’s family how to make much out of nothing; but of late we have been sore pressed. Our children—only five are living out of ten—are scattered far and wide. Two are missionaries in India; two are teaching in the south, and our oldest son, a farmer in Texas, is the only one who is at all forehanded. He has wanted us to make our home with him; but we couldn’t quite make up our minds. Seemed as if we couldn’t quite give up to go so far and get used to new things and a new country. Old people get dreadful set in their ways, you know.

“It had got to look, though, as if the Lord meant that we should go, and we were beginning to make our plans and to talk of a few farewell visits we must make.

“We have some old friends we should want to see once more, and we must take another look at the graves where our children were laid at rest. It had come to be about settled that we were to go. The Gosport Howitzer had mentioned it in its personal column, saying we should be greatly missed, when a letter came telling us the Widow Green up at Arcady had died and left us her property. We’d been up to see Mrs. Green not long before, and she talked then of leaving what she had to the Foreign Missionary Society, and we never once thought of her mentioning us in her will. But she did leave us the home. Not much, maybe you’d say—its only a little cottage and an acre o’ ground; but it’s a home, for all that, an’ I’ve wanted one for so many years.

“We regret the Widow Green, of course. She was a good Christian woman, though a trifle irritable; but she’d been bedridden and so afflicted for many a day that it was her desire to go whenever the call should come. We shall have no care for ourselves the rest of our days, for the future is provided for. We are such weak creatures that faith is not always strong enough to take no thought for the morrow. We want a sign—something we can see and touch.

“Is it wrong, I wonder, to think so much about worldly things? I have planned how every room shall look. I have seeds of all the flowers I can find like the ones that grew in the yard when I was a girl. We shan’t have very much money; but, with our share of the Retired Preachers’ Fund and with our garden, we shall have enough. I’m spry if I be old, and always had a knack at making things grow. John’s a master hand to work in the garden, too, when he’s well. I tell John (don’t laugh at a foolish old woman)—I tell John that this is like a wedding journey. We traveled a long way when we were married; but we didn’t reach the home for forty years. John is as anxious to get there as I, but is more sensible and not so impatient. We are going to stop at Kokomo to-night with Brother and Sister Roberts, and in the morning we shall go on home to Arcady. Home! How sweet the word sounds, John!”

There had been a movement of freight cars in our vicinity for some minutes; distant whistles of locomotives echoed around, and John had become restless. He rose stiffly, but eagerly. “Cynthy, I think it must be near time for our train; it would never do for us to miss this one, or we shouldn’t get home till to-morrow night. Let us go.”

I left them on the car, with hope and expectation in their faces, and said farewell as to old friends. “Come and see us in our home, my daughter,” was their last word. “May the Lord bless you as he has blessed us, and good-bye!”

As I waited yet a little for my train the benediction seemed to linger. The boats were coming gayly in to shore now; the western sun shone with a warm glow upon the distant prison windows; school children laughed and shouted as if care and crime were not. Truly, the world had not all gone wrong. There was hope yet, and life was worth living after all.

A year later, in the station at Indianapolis, I caught a glimpse of the two kind old faces once more. The eagerness had gone out of them; there was peace and resignation instead of hope. They looked out of a car that was westward bound. A farmer, standing at my elbow, told the story.

“Father Ellis? Yes. Him and his wife is goin’ West, to jine their son ’at has a cattle ranch some’rs in Texas. One o’ these yer onlucky Methodis’ preachers, the old man is. Preached around on circuits in Indianny fer a matter o’ thirty or forty year. Married an’ had right smart o’ children, of course, as his perfession allays does. How they managed to scratch along an’ raise them young-uns on the skimped wages Methodist preachers do get beats me. Seems ’sef people like them ort to be fed by the ravens, as Elisha was, or some sech way; or their meal-bar’ls filled up, like the widder Cruse’s. How’s’ever, I s’pose some way’s allays pervided. In this case the old man had got past his preachin’ days, an’ not a nickel saved fer old age, when old Mis Green, at Arcady, north o’ hyer, up an’ died, an’ left him her little jag o’ proputty. Not worth much, to be sure; but a right snug little home.

“With this an’ what he’d get from the superannuated fund, they was fixed to inch along comfortable to the end o’ their days. But law! what does the old fellow do, when they hadn’t got more’n fairly settled, but go security fer Jim Jeffries, out Cicero road! Anybody with a grain o’ business sense ’ud a knowed it was flyin’ in the face o’ Providence, for Jeffries allays was slack an’ shif’less an’ ’twan’t noways likely’t he’d be able to meet them notes; an’ he didn’t nuther, an’ Father Ellis he hed to pay the debt, but it took all they was. So hyer they be, all tore up by the roots, so to speak. Doggoned pity, I say.”

I went aboard the car to speak a word of greeting. The aisle was blocked by a small woman, with a large basket, and by a young miss who exchanged farewell giggles with a departing friend, interspersed with messages to their respective beaux. While I waited just behind them, the old wife’s voice reached me, soft and clear, amid all the confusion. I listened, and I turned away, sure that they needed no comfort I could offer.

“The Lord has been very good to us, John. I can see now that my heart was set too much on worldly things, and it was best they should be taken away. The Lord doeth that which is good, John. He has left us each other.”

“Yes, Cynthy, He has said: ‘I am with thee and will keep thee in all places whither thou shalt go.’ We are old, my dear, and night will soon pass forever into the dawn of eternal day. May we enter together into the land that is no longer very far off. Let us pray, love, that death shall not part us; that, still together, when the morning is come, we may open our eyes in the Heavenly Kingdom, where a place is prepared for us.”