The Talkative Wig Part 1

The Talkative Wig.

by Eliza Lee Follen.

THE OLD GARRET.

"Pray, dear Mother," said the boys, "tell us what else you heard in the old garret."

"You know," said she, "it was on a rainy Sunday when my mother sent me up there with my book, Pilgrim's Progress. This book always delighted me, and set my fancy to work in some way or other.

After reading a while, I began to look at the queer old things in the garret. p.u.s.s.y began to purr louder and louder, and at last I fell again into the same dreamy sleep that I was in at first.

Presently I heard the same confused sound which I heard before when the old tenants of the garret began to speak. There seemed also to be a slight motion among them, and a sort of mysterious appearance came over the whole apartment, as if they were all living, though very shadowy beings. Presently I heard the creak of the curling tongs, and he uttered these words:--

"I think we have all been wronged by our friend the wig; he approved of our all relating our own histories, and promised that, after we had done so, he would give us his, frankly and truly, as we have done; instead of that he, as well as the rest of us, fell asleep when our friend spinning wheel related her story; and, when we all waked up, he did not fulfil his promise. I move that he be requested now to give us a faithful account of his whole life, till he was consigned with us to this dark, gloomy old place. I probably have been more intimately acquainted with him than any one present; for once or twice I have a.s.sisted in smoothing, or rather frizzing, his ruffled hairs, and making him fit for company; and, with your leave, my friends, I urge him in your name to relate his history." A sort of hum of approbation sounded through the long, dark old garret, and then the wig spoke.

"Friend Frizzle is right: I did agree to relate my adventures, but I said I would wait till all had told their stories; now, here are two of this brilliant company that have not said one word of themselves, that comical coat and that old cloak; after they have related their history I will relate mine. The wig hitched a little on his block, and was silent.

"I am ready," said the coat, "to tell all I know of myself, and I shall not keep you long, I trust. My friend the baize gown and I had the same origin on the back of a sheep, only I was of a nicer texture, and had, from my earliest days, a more refined character; and, of course, was used for higher purposes. Major Sword there may know perhaps that I had as much to do with making the major of Cadets as he had, only I did not make people run when they looked at me, as he says he did.

I was originally of the most delicate white, and I was made into one of the very first coats that ever appeared on the parade as one of the Governor's guards. I think I did more to make the major than my Lord Sword did. Think of a major without a coat! He would not be a major, for a moment. He would be hooted at. Now, even were he without a sword, and had me, such as I once was, on his back, he would still be known as a major of the Cadets."

"Self-glorification! Come to your story," cried the musket, with a bounce.

"I will," said the coat. "I was, as I have told you, the major's military coat, admired by all who looked at me; and I appeared often on parade days till he gave up his office, and left this country, when I was left hanging up in his dressing room, and all my glory was gone.

As the major's boys grew bigger, they would often beg their mother to allow them to put me on. The rogues were so short then that I trailed on the ground. I was even so far abused as to be worn by girls. This tried my feelings sorely, but I was forced to submit.

Once I was so far disgraced as to be worn by one of the girls while she danced with her brother who was dressed like a monkey, with a tail over a yard long; and this was not all, she pulled the monkey's tail too hard, it came off, and then the monkey boy seized the tail and beat me with it, meaning to beat his sister, but I got the worst of it. So I lived to be made fun of, and lived for nothing else.

At last, the major's wife, our dear mistress, took me one day into her gentle hands, and after examining me carefully and making up her mind to the act, deliberately took her scissors, ripped me up into pieces, and sent me to the dyer's, to be colored brown. This was too horrid--I was soused into the vilest mixture you can imagine, and suffered every thing abominable, such as being stretched within an inch of my life, and then almost burned to death. At last, I came out with the color you now see me, not a handsome brown, but a real sickish rhubarb color. My dear mistress laughed when she looked at me. "This is a dose," said she, "but it will do for an every day coat for Jonathan, and I can make it myself, with Keziah Vose's aid; so I will not grieve about it. So Keziah was sent for and set to work.

Now Jonathan was a white-haired, chubby boy, and this was his first coat. Keziah went by her eye altogether. She took no measures except for the sleeves, and these she said she would make large and long, to allow for Jonathan's growing. She made me so broad behind that one bra.s.s b.u.t.ton could not see the other, although they were, as you see, almost as large as a small plate; the skirts came down so as to hide the calves of his legs, and were so full as nearly to meet before. My sleeves had a regular slouch. There was no hollow in the back, and I looked as if I was made for one of the boys' snow men, not for a human being.

When I was finished and put on for the first time, all the children and their mother were present, as it happened. My droll looks and rhubarb color, the comical expression of Jonathan's face,--for he was a great rogue,--and his sun-bleached hair, half hidden by my high, stiff collar, set them all into a gale of laughter. He took hold of my full skirts, one on each side, and began to dance; and even his mother and Keziah laughed too. Nothing was to be done. A few times, the mother of Jonathan tried to induce him to wear me at home, for she could not afford, she said, to lose all I had cost her; but it was all in vain--giggle, giggle, went all the children when they saw me, and I had to be hung up, as you see me now.

Whenever they wanted a comical dress in any of their plays, I was brought out, and that little girl asleep there, and her brothers still amuse themselves with my comical looks. Alas! I am of no other use in this world.

The young people used to amuse themselves by acting little plays, or some other nonsense; and when they wanted to make a very ridiculous figure, I noticed they came for me. I always observed that whoever had me on talked through his nose, with an ugly drawl, and used vulgar words and expressions, such as "Now you don't! Do tell!

Sartin true!"

Once they put me on a dancing bear. This was insulting. I don't like to think of it. I try to forget it.

In short, every one laughs when I am present, for some reason or other; and I suppose I have been kept on account of the merriment I have afforded the family. After all, my friends, I am not sure that he who adds to the innocent gayety of people is not as valuable a person as one who has more dignity, and who never made any one laugh in his life.

I have done, my friends--the old cloak is a more serious, dignified person than I, and will now, I trust, give us her history."

The old cloak began to speak in a different tone from that of the coat. I cannot say the tone was gloomy, though it was very serious.

It was a kindly, affectionate tone, that made you not unhappy, but thoughtful. "I agree," said she, "with my neighbor who has just spoken, that no one deserves better of society than he who promotes its innocent merriment. No bad person can know what true gayety of heart is. Goodness and cheerfulness are like substance and shadow; where the one is, the other will always follow.

I was made of German wool; and, in my country, the people all laugh and sing. They keep still a saying of old Martin Luther, which runs, if I remember rightly,--

"Wo man singt, leg' ich mich freilich nieder. Bose Menschen haben keine Lieder."

"Keep to plain English, you Hushan!" shouted the musket with a kick.

"I am sorry to hurt your feelings, my old soldier," said the good natured cloak. "I think, however, it is rather hard of you to keep the name of Hessian as a term of reproach forever, just because a few poor miserable fellows once came over here to fight you. Was it not enough to have treated them as you say you did in the Jerseys?

For the benefit of you and those less prejudiced, I will translate the couplet:--

"Where I singing hear, I lay me, free from fear.

Men intent on wrong Never have a song."

I was a singer myself once during the short time when I was connected with one of dame spinning wheel's relatives. I am not even a laugher now. Still I am contented and cheerful, and I remember past trials without any bitterness. I went through all processes of carding, spinning, weaving, dyeing, stretching, dressing, &c., and was at last placed in a shop for sale. A beautiful young girl purchased me for her bridal pelisse. Never did a happier heart beat than did hers on the Sunday after she was married, when she wore me to the church, holding by her husband's arm. I could not but partake of the pleasure which she received from the gentle pressure of his arm when she put hers within his, saying, "I am glad, dear, you like my pelisse so much."

O, how happy we all were! How proud my mistress was of me! How proud I was of her! I hate to pa.s.s hastily over these happy days, but I suppose the history of them would not be very interesting to any of my hearers; for one day was very much like another. Never did any garment cover a more innocent, joyful heart than that of my mistress.

I lasted well for some years, but my sleeves, at last, became threadbare; soon after, there were actual holes in them, and holes also in my waist; I was, I must confess, a shabby-looking pelisse.

My dear mistress took me into her hands one day, and, after examining me all over, said, with a sigh, "I cannot wear it any longer; I must give it up." At last, her expression brightened and she added, "I can give it to cousin Jane; I am very tall, and she is very short. The skirt is good, and she can make a cloak of it; and so my precious pelisse will still be where I can see it."

Forthwith I was sent to cousin Jane, with a very pretty note explaining to her the reasons why her cousin took the liberty of offering her the old pelisse. Cousin Jane wanted a cloak, and could not afford to buy one; so I was carefully ripped up and turned, and made into a very respectable garment.

Cousin Jane was a dressmaker; and, in her service, I learned something of what dressmakers have to endure. She had not been long engaged in her trade; and, at first, she would put me on in the morning with a brisk, vigorous manner, but in the evening, when she returned home, how differently she took me up! how differently she threw me over her weary shoulders!

Soon she ceased to put me on in the morning in the same strong, elastic manner, but took me up languidly, and as if she dreaded the day, and, when she went into the air, wrapped me very closely about her, just as if I was her only comfort, and pressed me to her heart, as if in hopes it would ache less.

Poor dear cousin Jane, my heart aches to think of her. Day after day, from morning till night, and often till the next day began, she toiled and toiled, stooping over her work, sewing, sewing, hour after hour, and day after day, stooping all the time, till her eyes lost their brightness, her step all its elasticity, till her shoulders grew round, and her health failed.

O, had those for whom she labored, for her small day's wages, but observed how the lamp of life was gradually going out, they would not have allowed her so to work without any respite; they would have made her take better care of her own health; they would have sent her home early; they would not have allowed her to work thirteen or fourteen hours a day in their service.

There was one family in which she worked where the master and mistress insisted that at one o'clock Jane should lay aside her work, and walk till two, when they dined. Then they insisted upon her dining at their own table, and tried to make her meal a social and pleasant one.

O, these were white days for poor Jane. Could I not tell when she was going to work in this family by the way she threw me over her shoulders? Did I not feel her gentle heart beating with unwonted warmth as she came home from this family before eight o'clock, accompanied by the truly good man of the house or some trusty person? When she hung me up in her small bed room, did I not notice her grateful, happy smile? She felt that she was recognized by these good people as a sister and friend, and that the words which we hear at church and read in the Bible, "All men are brethren," were not mere words with them.

These evenings she would make her small fire, and sometimes indulge herself in reading a little while; she would go to bed early, and did not look so pale in the morning.

Had all the customers of cousin Jane been as kind and considerate as these good people were, she might have lived; and I should, perhaps, have continued in her possession; but life was too hard for her,--she struggled with it for many years, and then her sweet spirit turned wearily away from it; she grew weaker and weaker, the color grew brighter and brighter on her cheek, and the light in her eye; she looked like a spirit; and, ere long, she was one.

My first owner came, as soon as she heard how ill Jane was, and took her home to this house in the country. Here our good mistress nursed her poor cousin, and made the last days as happy as she could; but Jane was weary of this life, and longed for a better one. She pa.s.sed away as gently and sweetly as a summer evening cloud or a dying flower.

Our mistress said to her husband, "All Jane's clothes, except this dear cloak, I have given to the poor. This I must keep myself; for it was one of my wedding garments, and dear Jane has made it all the dearer to me. I shall keep it to lend to friends who are caught here in the rain; it shall be called the friend's cloak, and shall always be kept in the closet in the hall, close at hand."

Now, I suppose every one knows of how much use such a cloak is in a family. Never was a cloak more employed than I, and for all sorts of things. I was used to play dumb orator. I was at every one's service. I don't know how they ever did without me.

Don't be astonished that I did not wear out; my lining was strong, and I tell you an old cloak has a charmed life; you cannot wear it out; like charity, it suffereth long and is kind.

As my dear mistress's children grew up, I was treated very much as you all have been; that is to say, with no respect at all. What a different life was mine from that which I led with dear, gentle cousin Jane. Peace be with her sweet spirit!

One prank which the boys played some years after Jane's death, I must relate, and then I have done. The eldest, whose name was Willie, took me, the evening before thanksgiving day, and, having dressed himself up in some of the cook's dirty old clothes, and hung a basket on his arm, put me over his shoulders, and I went begging of all the neighbors for something to keep thanksgiving with. He disguised his voice by putting cotton wool in his mouth, and I wonder myself how I came to know him. Two or three boys of his acquaintance went with him, all dressed as beggars; and a grand frolic they had.