Samantha at the World's Fair Part 58

[Ill.u.s.tration: "I would be strikin' as Mercury, but I think I would be at my best as Apollo."]

"A loonatick would strike me as the right thing, Josiah Allen, or an idiot from birth.

"Or," sez I, speakin' more ironicler as my fear died away, leavin' in its void a great madness and tiredness, "if you'd brung your scythe along you might personate Old Father Time."

I guess this kinder madded him, and sez he, "Don't you want to pose, Samantha?

"Don't you want to be the Witch of Endor?" sez he.

"Yes," sez I, "I'd love to! If I _wuz_ her you'd see sights in this room that would bow your old bald head in horrow, and drive you, vain old creeter that you be, back where you belong."

He wuz afraid he'd gone too fur, and sez he, "Mebby you'd ruther be Venus, Samantha? Mebby you'd ruther appear in the nude?"

Sez I, coldly, "I should think that you'd done your best to make me appear in that way, Josiah Allen. There's only one thin sheet to keep me from it.

"But," sez I, spruntin' up, "if you talk in that way any more to me I'll holler to Miss Plank!

"Pardner or no pardner, I hain't a-goin' to be imposed upon this time of night!"

Sez I, "I should be ashamed if I wuz in your place, the father and grandfather of a family, and the deacon in a meetin'-house, to be up at midnight a-posin' for statutes and actin'."

"But," sez he, "I didn't know but they would want to sculp me while I wuz here in Chicago, and I thought I'd git a att.i.tude all ready. You never know what may happen, and it's always well to be prepared, and att.i.tudes are dretful hard to catch onto at a minute's notice."

Sez I, "Do you come back to bed, Josiah Allen. What would they want of you for a statute?"

"Wall," sez he, reluctantly relinquis.h.i.+n' his toga, or, in other words the flannel blanket and bedspread--

"I see many a statute to-day with not half my good looks, and if Chicago wanted me to ornament it, I wanted to be prepared."

I sithed aloud, and sez I--

"Here I be waked up for good, as tired as I wuz, all for your vanity and actin'."

"Wall," sez he, "Samantha, my mind wuz all so stirred up and excited by seein' so many ile paintin's and statutes to-day, that I felt dretful."

And as he sez this my madness all died away, as the way of pardners is, and a great pity stole into my heart.

I do spoze he wuz half delirous with seein' too much. Like a man who has oversot himself and come down on the floor.

That man had been led round too much that day, for my own pleasure; to gratify my own esthetik taste I had almost ruined the pardner of my youth and middle age.

His mind had been stretched too fur, for the size on't, so I sez soothin'ly--

"Wall, wall, Josiah, come back to bed and go to sleep, and to-morrow we'll go and see some live stock and some plows and things."

So at last I got him quieted down, though he did murmur once or twice in his sleep--Apollo! Hercules! etc., so I see what his inward state wuz.

But towards mornin' he seemed to git into a good sound sleep, and I did too, and we waked up feelin' quite considerable rested and refreshed.

And it wuzn't till I had a sick-headache bad, and he wuz more than good to me, and I see that he repented deep of it, that I forgive him fully.

But of course it broke up our goin' to fas.h.i.+onable places agin to eat--he come out conqueror, after all--men are deep.

CHAPTER XVI.

Wall, this mornin'--it bein' kind of a muggy and cloudy one, I proposed that we should go and visit the Fishery Department.

And I d'no why I should a thought on it this mornin' more'n another one--only it wuz jest such a day as Josiah and Thomas Jefferson always took for goin' a-fis.h.i.+n' in the creek back of Jonesville.

And then we had fish for breakfast too--siscoes--mebby that put me in mind on it some.

But anyway, I wuz always interested in the subject of fis.h.i.+n', and the hull world is. For what wuz the Postles? Fishers. For what did the Great Master name His beloved? Fishers of men.

Why, the Bible is full of fis.h.i.+n' and fisherman, clear back to Jonah; and how took up he wuz with a fish, and how full the fish wuz of him!

Fis.h.i.+n' wuz the first industry in the New World.

When our Forefathers landed on Plymouth Rock they found the harbor shaped some like a fish-hook, and then consequently they went to fis.h.i.+n'.

Who got Was.h.i.+ngton and his army over the Delaware River that bitter cold night in 1777, when the fate of our country wuz a-hangin' over that sea of broken ice--ruin on this side, and possible success on the other, but the impa.s.sable gulf of bitter cold water and the cras.h.i.+ng ma.s.ses of ice between--who got 'em acrost? Fisherman.

Our country has always been noted in its interest in fis.h.i.+n'. Why, at the Internatial Exhibition at Berlin in 1880, America won the first prize given by the Emperor for its display.

And I knew when it done so well on a foreign sh.o.r.e, it wuzn't goin' to make any failure of itself here under its own line, and fish tree, so to speak.

Wall, as I said, Josiah expressed a willingness to go, and consequently and subsequently we went.

Wall, we found it wuz a group of buildin's on a beautiful island--in the northern part of the lagoon, joinin' the improved part of Jackson Park.

There wuz three on em' in number. The middle one wuz a long buildin'

with a high dome, and some towers in the centre on't, and the arches and the pillows wuz all ornamented off with figgers of fishes, and crabs, and lobsters, and all sorts of water growth. It looked uneek, and first-rate, too.

And when I say it wuz a long buildin', I don't want it understood that I mean length as we call it in Jonesville, but Chicago length--or rather Chicago Jackson Park length, which is fur longer than jest plain Chicago largeness.

In the centre of the big buildin' is a fish-pond all ornamented with rock work, and all sorts of aquatic plants.

And then all joined on to the main buildin', at each end and connected with it by carved arches, handsome as arches wuz ever made in the world, and trimmed off in the uneek way I've mentioned prior to and beforehand, wuz two other buildin's, each one on 'em 135 feet long.

The buildin' to the east is the aquarum, or live fish exhibit, and that to the west is to show off the anglin' exhibit. They wuz round and kinder double-breasted lookin' on both sides.

The shape on 'em is called pollygon--probable named after the man's wife that built it. It had a good many sides to it--mebby Polly had to her. I know wimmen are falsely called seven-sided lots of times.

Wall, in the middle of the buildin' designed for the aquarum is a big pool of water 26 feet in diameter; in the middle of the pool is a risin'

up some rocks covered with moss and ferns, from which cool streams of water are a-drippin' and a-drizzlin' down onto the reeds and rushes, where the most gorgeous-colored fishes you ever see are playin' round in the water, as cool and happy in the middle of a meltin' summer-day--not needin' no fans or parasols, jest a-divin' and a-splas.h.i.+n' down in the wet water, and enjoyin' themselves. I bet lots of swelterin' folks jest envied 'em.

Surroundin' this rotunda, under a gla.s.s ruff, runs two lines of aquarums, separated by a wide gallery--more'n fifty of 'em in all.