第42章

We have heard of some very hard cases since we have enlivened this world with our brilliant presence.We once saw an able-bodied man chase a party of little school-children and rob them of their dinners.The man who stole the coppers from his deceased grandmother's eyes lived in our neighborhood, and we have read about the man who went to church for the sole purpose of stealing the testaments and hymn-books.But the hardest case we ever heard of lived in Arkansas.He was only fourteen years old.One night he deliberately murdered his father and mother in cold blood, with a meat-axe.He was tried and found guilty.The Judge drew on his black cap, and in a voice choked with emotion asked the young prisoner if he had anything to say before the sentence of the Court was passed on him.The court-room was densely crowded and there was not a dry eye in the vast assembly.The youth of the prisoner, his beauty and innocent looks, the mild, lamblike manner in which he had conducted himself during the trial--all, all had thoroughly enlisted the sympathy of the spectators, the ladies in particular.And even the Jury, who had found it to be their stern duty to declare him guilty of the appalling crime--even the Jury now wept aloud at this awful moment.

"Have you anything to say?" repeated the deeply moved Judge.

"Why, no," replied the prisoner, "I think I haven't, though I hope yer Honor will show some consideration FOR THE FEELINGS OF A POORORPHAN!"

The Judge sentenced the perfect young wretch without delay.

1.36.AFFAIRS AROUND THE VILLAGE GREEN.

It isn't every one who has a village green to write about.I have one, although I have not seen much of it for some years past.I am back again, now.In the language of the duke who went around with a motto about him, "I am here!" and I fancy I am about as happy a peasant of the vale as ever garnished a melodrama, although I have not as yet danced on my village green, as the melodramatic peasant usually does on his.It was the case when Rosina Meadows left home.

The time rolls by serenely now--so serenely that I don't care what time it is, which is fortunate, because my watch is at present in the hands of those "men of New York who are called rioters." We met by chance, the usual way--certainly not by appointment--and Ibrought the interview to a close with all possible despatch.

Assuring them that I wasn't Mr.Greeley, particularly, and that he had never boarded in the private family where I enjoy the comforts of a home, I tendered them my watch, and begged they would distribute it judiciously among the laboring classes, as I had seen the rioters styled in certain public prints.

Why should I loiter feverishly in Broadway, stabbing the hissing hot air with the splendid gold-headed cane that was presented to me by the citizens of Waukegan, Illinois, as a slight testimonial of their esteem? Why broil in my rooms? You said to me, Mrs.Gloverson, when I took possession of these rooms, that no matter how warm it might be, a breeze had a way of blowing into them, and that they were, withal, quite countryfied; but I am bound to say, Mrs.

Gloverson, that there was nothing about them that ever reminded me, in the remotest degree, of daisies or new-mown hay.Thus, with sarcasm, do I smash the deceptive Gloverson.

Why stay in New York when I had a village green? I gave it up, the same as I would an intricate conundrum--and, in short, I am here.

Do I miss the glare and crash of the imperial thoroughfare? The milkman, the fiery, untamed omnibus horses, the soda fountains, Central Park, and those things? Yes I do; and I can go on missing 'em for quite a spell, and enjoy it.

The village from which I write to you is small.It does not contain over forty houses, all told; but they are milk-white, with the greenest of blinds, and for the most part are shaded with beautiful elms and willows.To the right of us is a mountain--to the left a lake.The village nestles between.Of course it does, I never read a novel in my life in which the villages didn't nestle.Villages invariably nestle.It is a kind of way they have.

We are away from the cars.The iron-horse, as my little sister aptly remarks in her composition On Nature, is never heard to shriek in our midst; and on the whole I am glad of it.

The villagers are kindly people.They are rather incoherent on the subject of the war, but not more so, perhaps, then are people elsewhere.One citizen, who used to sustain a good character, subscribed for the Weekly New York Herald a few months since, and went to studying the military maps in that well-known journal for the fireside.I need not inform you that his intellect now totters, and he has mortgaged his farm.In a literary point of view we are rather bloodthirsty.A pamphlet edition of the life of a cheerful being, who slaughtered his wife and child, and then finished himself, is having an extensive sale just now.