II. JOSH BEANPOLE’S COURTSHIP.

“Mother!” exclaimed Josh Beanpole, “Mother, I say, I feel all over in a twitteration like. Huh! huh! Who’d have thought it?”

“What ails ye, Josh?” asked the old woman, stopping her spinning-wheel at this exclamation. “What bug has bit you now?”

“Can’t tell,” said Josh, in a drooping, dolorous tone, and hanging his head as if he had been caught stealing a sheep.

“Can’t tell?” said Mrs. Beanpole, turning quite round, and giving Josh a wondering stare. “Can’t tell? what does the critter mean?”

“Who’d ha’ thought it?” repeated Josh, fumbling in his pockets, twisting round his head and rolling up his eyes in a fashion most immensely sheepish.—“Hannah Downer’s courted!”

Here Josh shuffled himself awkwardly into the settle in the chimney corner, and sunk upon one side, fixing his eyes with a most ludicro-dismal squint upon the lower extremity of a pot-hook that hung at the end of the crane.

“Courted!” exclaimed Mrs. Beanpole, not exactly comprehending the state of her son’s intellectuals. “Well—what’s all that when it’s fried?”

“Arter so many pails of water as I’ve pumped for her,” said Josh in a dismal whine,—“for to go for to let herself to be courted by another feller!”

“Here’s a to-do!” ejaculated the old woman.

“It’s tarnation all over!” said Josh, beginning a bolder tone as he found his mother coming to an understanding of the matter. “It makes me crawl all over to think on’t. Didn’t I wait on her three times to singing school? Hadn’t I e’en a most made up my mind to break the ice, and tell her I shouldn’t wonder if I had a sneakin’ notion arter somebody’s Hannah? I should ha’ been reg’lar courting in less than a month—and Peet Spinbutton has cut me out—as slick as a whistle!”

“Peet Spinbutton!” said the old woman, “well, I want to know!”

“Darn his eyes!” exclaimed Josh.

“Peet Spinbutton!” repeated Mrs. Beanpole; “what, the ensign of the Dogtown Blues? that great lummokin’ feller!”

“Darn him to darnation!” exclaimed Josh, catching hold of the toast-iron as if he meant to lay about him, “to cut in afore me in that ere sort o’ way!”

Mrs. Beanpole caught Josh by the arm, exclaiming:

“Josh! Joshy! Joshy! what are you about? Peet Spinbutton? I don’t believe it.”

“What!” said Josh, “didn’t I hear with my own ears, last night that ever was, Zeb Shute tell me all about it?”

“Zeb Shute! well, what did Zeb Shute say?”

“Why, says he to me:

“ ‘Josh,’ says he, ‘what do you think?’ says he.

“ ‘I don’t know, no, n’t I,’ says I.

“ ‘Tell you what,’ says he, ‘that ’ere Hannah Downer—’

“ ‘What of Hannah Downer?’ says I, for I begun to crawl all over.

“ ‘Tell ye what,’ says he; ‘she’s a whole team.’

“ ‘Ah,’ says I, ‘she’s a whole team, and a horse to let.’

“ ‘Tell ye what,’ says he, ‘guess somebody has a sneakin’ notion that way.’

“ ‘Shouldn’t wonder,’ says I, feelin’ all over in a flustration, thinkin’ he meant me.

“ ‘Tell ye what,’ says he, ‘guess Peet Spinbutton and she’s pretty thick together.’

“ ‘How you talk!’ says I.

“ ‘Fact,’ says he.

“ ‘Well, I never!’ says I.

“ ‘Tell ye what,’ says he. No, that’s all he said.”

“Pooh!” said the old woman, “it’s all wind, Joshy; it’s nothing but Zeb Shute’s nonsense.”

“Do you think so?” exclaimed Josh, with a stare of uncommon animation, and his mouth wide open.

“No doubt on’t, Joshy, my boy,” replied she, “for Peggy Downer was here yesterday forenoon, to borrow a cup of starch, and she never mentioned the leastest word about it under the light of the livin’ sun.”

“If I was only sure of that!” said Josh, laying down the toast-iron and sticking his knuckles into his right eye.

“Joshy, my boy,” said the old woman, “I don’t believe Hannah Downer ever gin Peet Spinbutton the leastest encouragement in the universal world.”

“Think so?” asked Josh, setting his elbows on his knees, his chin in his fists, and fixing his eyes vacantly downward in an angle of forty-five degrees, as if in intense admiration of the back-log.

“I’ll tell you what, Joshy,” said Mrs. Beanpole, in a motherly tone, “do you just put on your go-to-meetin’ suit, and go to see Hannah this blessed night.”

“Eh!” exclaimed Josh, starting from his elbows at the astounding boldness of the suggestion, and gazing straight up the chimney. “Do you think she’d let me?”

“Nothin’ like tryin’, Joshy; must be a first time. Besides, the old folks are going to lecture, Hannah’ll be all alone—hey! Joshy, my boy! Nothin’ like tryin’.”

“Eh! eh!” said Josh, screwing himself all up in a heap and staring most desperately at the lower button of his own waistcoat—for the thoughts of actually going a courting came over him in a most alarming fashion; “would ye though, mother? Hannah’s a nice gal, but somehow or other I feel plaguy queer about it.”

“Oh, that’s quite naiteral, Joshy; when you once get a goin’ it be nothin’ at all.”

“Higgle, giggle, giggle,” said Josh, making a silly, sputtering kind of laugh, “that’s the very thing I’m afraid of, that ’ere gettin’ a goin’. Hannah Downer is apt to be tarnation smart sometimes; and I’ve hearn tell, that courtin’ is the hardest thing in the world to begin, though it goes on so slick arterwards.”

“Nonsense, Josh, you silly dough-head; it’s only saying two words, and it all goes as straight as a turnpike.”

“By the hokey!” said Josh, rolling up his eyes and giving a punch with his fist in the air, “I’ve an all-fired mind to try it though!”

Josh and his mother held a much longer colloquy upon the matter, the result of which was such an augmentation of his courage for the undertaking, that the courtship was absolutely decided upon; and just after dark, Josh gave his face a sound scrubbing with soapsuds, drew forth his Sunday pantaloons, which were of the brightest cow-colour, and after a good deal of labour, succeeded in getting into them, his legs being somewhat of the longest, and the pantaloons as tight as a glove, so that on seeing him fairly incased, it was somewhat of a puzzle to guess how he could ever get out of them. A flaming red waistcoat, and a grey coat with broad pewter buttons, set off his figure to the greatest advantage, to say nothing of a pair of bran new cow-hide shoes. Then rubbing his long hair with a tallow candle, and sprinkling a handful of Indian meal by way of powder, he twisted it behind with a leather string into a formidable queue, which he drew so tight that it was with the greatest difficulty he could shut his eyes; but this gave him but little concern, as he was determined to be wide awake through the whole affair. Being all equipt, he mounted Old Blueberry, and set off at an easy trot, which very soon fell into a walk, for the nearer Josh approached the dwelling of his Dulcinea, the more the thought of his great undertaking overpowered him.

Josh rode four times round the house before he found courage to alight; at length he made a desperate effort and pulled up under the lee side of the barn, where he dismounted, tied his horse, and approached the house with fear and trembling. At two rods distance he stopped short. There was a dead silence, and he stood in awful irresolution. All at once a terrible voice, close at hand, caused him to start with great trepidation:—it was nothing but a couple of turkeys who had set up a gobbling from their roost on the top of the barn. Josh looked up, and beheld, by the light of the moon, the old turkey cosily perched by the side of his mate; the sight was overpowering. “Ah! happy, happy turkey!” he mentally exclaimed, and turned about to proceed up the yard, but the next moment felt a violent cut across the broadest part of his nose. He started back again, but discovered it to be only a clothes-line which he had run against.—“The course of true love never did run smooth.” He went fearfully on, thinking of the connubial felicities of the turkey tribe, and the perils of clothes-lines, till he found himself at the door, where he stood fifteen minutes undetermined what to do; and if he had not bethought himself of the precaution of peeping in at the window, it is doubtful whether he would have mustered the courage to enter. But peep he did, and spied Hannah all alone at her knitting-work. This sight emboldened him, and he bolted in without knocking.

What precise sort of compliments Josh made use of in introducing himself, never could be discovered, for Josh laboured under such a confusion of the brain at the time, that he lost all recollection of what passed till he found himself seated in a flag-bottomed chair with a most uncomfortably deep hollow in it. He looked up, and actually saw Hannah sitting in the chimney corner knitting a pepper-and-salt stocking.

“Quite industrious to-night,” said Josh.

“Don’t know that,” replied Hannah.

“Sure on’t,” returned Josh. “Guess now you’ve knit from four to six pearl at the lowest calculation.”

“Shouldn’t wonder,” replied Hannah.

“Tarnation!” said Josh, pretending to be struck with admiration at the exploit, though he knew it was nothing to boast of.

“How’s your mother, Josh?” asked Hannah.

“Pretty considerable smart, Hannah; how’s your mother?”

“So, so,” replied Hannah; and here the conversation came to a stand.

Josh fumbled in his pockets and stuck his legs out till they reached nearly across the room, in hopes to think of something more to say; but in vain. He then scratched his head, but there appeared to be nothing in it.

“Is’t possible,” thought he, “that I’m actually here a courting?”

He could hardly believe it, and began to feel very awkward.

“I swow!” he exclaimed, opening his eyes as wide as he could.

“What’s the matter?” asked Hannah, a little startled.

“Cotch a ’tarnal great musquash this forenoon.”

“Ah!” said Hannah, “how big was it?”

“Big as all out-doors!”

“Lawful heart!” exclaimed Hannah.

Josh now felt a little more at his ease, finding the musquash helped him on so bravely. He hitched his chair about seven feet at a single jerk, nearer to Hannah, and exclaimed:

“Tell ye what, Hannah, I’m all creation for catching musquashes.”

“Well, I want to know!” replied Hannah.

Josh twisted his eyes into a squint, and gave her a look of melting tenderness. Hannah perceived it, and did not know whether to laugh or be scared; so, to compromise the matter, she pretended to be taken with a fit of coughing. Josh felt his heart begin to beat, and was fully convinced he was courting, or something very like it; but what to do next was the question.

“Shall I kiss her?” thought he. “No, no, it’s a leetle too early for that; but I’ll tell her I love her.” At this thought his heart went bump! bump! bump! harder than ever.

“Hannah!” he exclaimed, in a squeaking voice, and stopped short.

“Hey, Josh!” said Hannah.

“Hannah, I—I—” he rolled up the whites of his eyes, in a most supplicating leer, but the word stuck in his throat. Hannah looked directly in his face; he was in a dreadful puzzle what to say, for he was obliged to say something. His eye fell by accident on a gridiron hanging in the chimney corner:

“What a terrible crack your gridiron’s got in it!” exclaimed he.

“Poh!” said Hannah.

Here the conversation came again to a dead stop, for Josh had so exhausted himself in this effort to break the ice, that he was not master of his faculties for several minutes; and when he came fairly to his senses, he found himself counting the tickings of an old wooden clock that stood in the corner. He counted and counted till he had numbered three hundred and ninety-seven ticks, when he luckily heard a cow lowing out of doors.

“Ugh!” said he, “whose cow’s that?”

“Drummer Tucker’s,” replied Hannah.

“Drummer Tucker’s! Well, I want to know!”

This reply suggested an idea.

“Hannah,” asked he, “did you ever see a dromedary?”

“No; did you, Josh?”

“No,” returned Josh, “I never see nothin’ in my life but a green monkey; and then I was a’most skeered to death!”

“Lawful heart! Mercy’s sake!” exclaimed Hannah, and here the conversation came to a pause again.

The longer they sat, the more awkwardly Josh found himself situated; he sat bolt upright in his chair, with his knees close together and his head stooping forward in such a manner that his long queue stuck out horizontally behind, and his eyes stuck out horizontally before, like those of a lobster. For several minutes he sat contemplating the handle of the warming-pan that hung by the side of the fireplace; and then gradually elevating his line of vision, came in sight of a huge crook-necked squash lying on the mantel-piece. Then he looked at Hannah, and then at the dish-cloth in the mouth of the oven, and from the dish-cloth made a transition back to the warming-pan.

“Courting,” thought Josh, “is awful hard work.” The perspiration stood on his forehead, and his eel-skin queue pulled so tight that he began to fear the top of his head was coming off; but not a word could he say. And just at that moment a green stick of wood upon the fire began to sing in a dismal tone, “Que, que, que, que, que.” Nothing frets the nerves more when a body is a little fidgetty, than the singing and sputtering of a stick of wood. Josh felt worse than ever, but the stick kept on: que, que, que, quiddle, de dee, que, que, quiddledy quiddledy que, que, que. Josh caught up the tongs and gave the fire a tremendous poke. This exertion somewhat relieved him.

“Hannah!” said he, hitching his chair a yard nearer.

“Well, Josh.”

“Now,” thought Josh, “I will tell I love her.”

“Hannah,” said he again, “I—” He stared so wildly and made such a horrible grimace that Hannah bounced from her chair. “Hannah, I say,” repeated he; but here again his courage failed him.

“What say, Josh?”

“I—I—it’s a grand time for turnips,” said Josh, “Ugh! ugh! ugh!”

“Poh!” returned Hannah, “let alone of my apron-string, you Josh.”

Josh sat in silence and despair for some time longer, growing more and more nervous every moment. Presently the stick of wood burst out squeaking again in the most doleful style imaginable: Quiddledy, quiddledy quee-ee-ee-iddledy, que, que quiddledy quiddledy que que que-ee-ee-ee-ee-ee. Josh could not bear it any longer, for he verily believed his skull-bone was splitting.

“I swaggers!” he exclaimed, “this is too bad!”

“What’s the matter, Josh?” asked Hannah, in considerable alarm.

“Suthin’ ails me,” said Josh.

“Dear me!” exclaimed Hannah; “shan’t I get you a mug of cider?”

“Do,” replied Josh, “for I don’t feel as I used to did.”

Hannah ran down to the cellar and returned with a quart mug of cider. Josh put it to his lips and took a heavy pull. It was what the farmers call hard cider, and Josh verily feared his eyes would start out of his head while he was drinking it, but after several desperate gulps he succeeded in draining the mug. Then pulling a blue and white check handkerchief from his pocket, he rubbed his face very hard, and looked straight into the fire.

But in a few minutes he found his spirits wonderfully rising; he lifted up his eyes, hitched his chair nearer, sent Hannah a sly look, and actually gave a loud giggle. Hannah giggled in reply, for giggling, like gaping, is contagious. In two minutes more, his courage rose higher; he threw one of his long legs across the other, gave a grin, slapped his hand upon his knee, and exclaimed as bold as a lion:

“Hannah, if a young feller was for to go to offer for to kiss you, what d’ye think ye should do?”

Having uttered these words, he stopped short, his mouth wide open, in gaping astonishment at his own temerity.

If Hannah did not blush, it was probably owing to her being at that moment engaged in blowing the fire at a desperate rate with an enormous pair of broken-winded bellows, which occupation had set her all in a blowze.

She understood the hint, and replied:

“Guess ye’d better not try, Josh.”

Whether this was intended as a warning, or an invitation, never could be satisfactorily known. Josh did not stop to inquire, but he thought it too good a chance to be lost:

“I’ll kiss her! by Golly!” he exclaimed to himself.

He made a bounce from his chair and seized the nozzle of the bellows, which Hannah was sticking at that moment under a huge iron pot over the fire. Now, in this pot were apples a stewing, and so it happened that Hannah, in the confusion occasioned by the visit of Josh, had made a mistake and put in sour apples instead of sweet ones: sour apples when cooking, everybody knows, are apt to explode like bomb-shells. Hannah had been puffing at the bellows with might and main, and raised the heat to a mischievous degree; there was no safety-valve in the pot-lid, and just as Josh was upon the point of snatching a kiss, whop! the whole contents of the pot went off in their faces!

At the same moment the door flew open, and the whole Downer family came in from meeting. Such a sight as they beheld! There stood Josh beplastered with apple-sauce from head to foot, and frightened worse than if he had seen a green monkey. Hannah made her escape, and left Josh to explain the catastrophe. He rolled up his eyes in utter dismay.

“What is the matter?” exclaimed Peggy Downer.

“Ugh! ugh! ugh!” replied Josh, and that was all he could say.

“Goodness’ sake! Josh Beanpole! is that you?” asked Mother Downer, for Josh was so beplastered, beluted and transubstantiated by the apple-sauce, that she did not at first discover who it was.

“I d’n know—no, n’t I,” said Josh.

“What a spot o’ work!” exclaimed Peggy.

Josh looked down at his pantaloons.

“Oh! forever!” he exclaimed, “this beats the gineral trainin’!”

How matters were explained, and how Josh got safe home, I cannot stop to explain. As to the final result of the courtship, the reader may as well be informed that Josh had too much genuine Yankee resolution to be beaten away from his prize by a broadside of baked apples. In fact, it was but a few months afterwards, that Deacon Powderpost, the town clerk, was digging all alone in the middle of his ten-acre potato field, and spied Josh Beanpole looming up over the top of the hill. Josh looked all around the horizon, and finding no other living soul to be seen, came scrambling over the potato hills, and got right behind the Deacon, where in about a quarter of an hour he mustered courage sufficient to ask him to step aside, as he had a communication for his private ear. To make a long story short, Josh and Hannah were published the next Sunday.