Ambition


A person never thinks so meanly of ambition as when walking through a

grave-yard.--To see men who have filled the world with their glory for

half a century or more, reduced to a six foot mudhole, gives pride a

shock which requires a long stay in a city to counteract.--The gentlemen

who are now "spoken of for the Presidency," will in less than a century,

have their bones carted away to make room for a street sewer. Queer

creature that man--well, he is.









Way the Women Fixed the Tale-Bearer.





"I dunno where I heer'd it, but I know it's true. I expected it long

ago. I told Jones it'd come out so."



"Why, Uncle Josh, you don't pretend to say that Miller's wife has run

off with Bob Tape, Yardstick's clark, do you?"



"Yes, I do, too; hain't it been the talk of the neighborhood for a year

past, that Miller's wife and that feller--Bob Tape, were a leetle too

thick?"



"Well, Uncle Josh," says his neighbor Brown, "I don't recollect anybody

saying anything about it, but you, and for my part, I don't believe a

word of it."



"Why, hain't Miller's wife gone?" says Uncle Josh.



"I don't know--is she?" says Brown.



"Be sure she is; I went over to the store this morning, the fust thing,

to see if Bob Tape was about--he wasn't there--they said he'd gone to

Boston on business for old Yardstick. O, ho! says I, and then I started

for Heeltap's shop; we had allers said how things would turn out. He was

out, but seein' me go to his shop, he came a runnin', and says he:



"'Uncle Josh, theer gone, sure enough!--I've been over to old Mammy

Gabbles, and she sent her Suke over to Miller's, on purtence of

borrowin' some lard, but told Suke to look around and see ef Miller's

wife wur about; by Nebbyknezer, Miller's wife wur gone! Marm Gabbles

couldn't rest, so she sent back Suke, and told her to ax the children

whare their marm wus; Miller hearing Suke, ordered her to scoot, so Suke

left without hearing the facts in the case, as 'Squire Black says.'



"But Heeltap swears, and I know Miller's wife and Bob Tape have

sloped, as they say in the papers."



"Well," says Brown, "I'm sorry if it's true--I don't believe a word of

it tho', and as it's none of my business, I shall have nothing to say

about it."



Uncle Josh was one of those inordinate pests which almost every village,

town and hamlet in the country is more or less accursed with. He was a

great, tall, bony, sharp-nosed, grinning genius, who, being in

possession of a small farm, with plenty of boys and girls to work it,

did not do anything but eat, sleep and lounge around; a gatherer of

scan, mag., a news and scandal-monger, a great guesser, and a stronger

suspicioner, of everybody's motives and intentions, and, of course,

never imputed a good motive or movement to anybody.



You've seen those wretches, male and female, haven't you, reader? Such

people are great nuisances--half the discomforts of life are bred by

them; they contaminate and poison the air they breathe, with their

noisome breath, like the odor of the Upas tree.



Uncle Josh had annoyed many--he was the dread and disgust of

seven-eighths of the town he lived in. He had caused more quarrels,

smutted more characters, and created more ill-feeling between friends,

neighbors and acquaintances, than all else beside in the community of

Frogtown. Uncle Josh was voted a great bore by the men, and a sneaking,

meddling old granny by the women. So, at last, the young women of the

town did agree, that the very next time Uncle Josh carried, concocted,

or circulated any slanderous or otherwise mischievous stories, they

would duck him in the mill-race.



Now, Brown--old Mister Brown--was the very antipode of Uncle Josh; he

was for always taking matters and things by the smoothest handle. Mister

Brown never told tales, backbited or slandered anybody; everybody had a

good word to say about Mister Brown, and Mister Brown had a good word to

say about everybody. The gals thought it prudent to give old Mister

Brown an inkling of their plans in regard to the disposition they

intended to make of Uncle Josh; the old man laughed, and told them to go

ahead, and to duck old Josh, and perhaps they would reform him.



"Now, gals," says old Mister Brown, "Uncle Josh has just this very day

been at his dirty work; by this time he has spread the news all over the

town, that Miller's wife has gone off with Yardstick's clark. I don't

believe a word of his tale, and if Miller's wife ain't really gone off,

Uncle Josh ought to be soused in the mill-race."



Next morning Miller's wife came home; she had been down to her sister's,

a few miles off, to see a sick child; her husband had been away at a

law-suit, in a neighboring town, and so Miller nor his wife knew nothing

of the report of her elopement with Bob Tape, until their return.



Miller was in a rage, but couldn't find out the author of the report.

Miller's wife was deeply mortified that such a suspicion should arise of

her; she had been making Bob Tape some new clothes to go to Boston in,

and here was the gist of Bob and Miller's wife's intimacy! There was a

great time about it--Miller swore like a trooper, and his wife nearly

cried her eyes out.



A few evenings afterwards, it being cool, clear weather in October,

Polly Higgins and Sally Smith called in to see Miller's wife, and asked

her to join them in a little party that some of the neighboring women

had got up that evening, for a particular purpose. Miller's wife not

having much to do that evening, her husband said she might go out a

spell if she chose, and she went, and soon learned the purport of the

call--old Uncle Josh was to be ducked in the mill-race! and Miller's

wife, disguised as the rest, was to help do it. When she heard that old

Josh had circulated the report of her elopement, Miller's wife did not

require much coaxing to join the watering committee.



It was so planned that all the women, some ten or twelve in number, were

to put on men's clothes and lay in wait for Uncle Josh at his lane gate,

about a quarter of a mile from the mill-race. Old Josh always hung

around the tavern, Heeltap's shoe-shop, or the grocery, until 9 P. M.,

before he started for home, and the girls determined to rush out of a

small thicket that stood close by old Josh's lane gate, and throwing a

large, stout sheet over him, wind him up, and then seizing him head,

neck and heels, hurry him off to the mill-race, and duck him well.



Mind you, your country gals and women are not paint and powder,

corset-laced and fragile creatures, like your delicate, more ornamental

than useful young ladies of the city; no, no, the gals of Frogtown were

real flesh and blood; Venuses and Dianas of solidity and substance; and

it would have taken several better men than Uncle Josh to have got away

from them. It was a cool, moon-shiny night, but to better favor the

women, just as old Josh got near his gate, a large, black cloud obscured

the moon, and all was as dark as a stack of black cats in a coal cellar.

Miller's wife acted as captain; dressed in Bob Tape's old clothes he had

left at her house to be repaired, she gave the word, and out they

rushed.



"Seize him, boys!" said she, in a very loud whisper. Over went the

sheet, down came old Josh, co-blim! Before he could say "lor' a massy,"

he was dragged to the mill-race, tied hand and foot, blindfolded, his

coat taken off, and he was ca-soused into the cold water! Fury! how

the old fellow begged for his life!



"O, lor' a massy, don't drown me boys! I--a, I--" ca-souse he went

again.



"Give him another duck," says one--and in he'd go again.



"Now, we'll learn you to carry tales," says another.



"And tell lies on me and Miller's wife," says Bob Tape--ca-souse he

went.



"O, lor' a mas--mas--e, do--do--don't drown me, Bob; I'll--I'll promise

never to--" in they put him again; the water was as cold as ice.



"Will you promise never to take or carry a story again?"



"I d--d--d--do promise, if--yo--yo--yo--you--don't--duc--" and in he

went again.



"Do you promise to mind your own business and let others alone, Uncle

Josh?"



"Ye--ye--yes, I d--do, I--I--I'll promise anything--bo--boys, only let

me go," says Uncle Josh.



"Well, boys," says Polly Higgins, rousing, jolly critter she was, too,

"I owe Uncle Josh one more dip: he lied about my gal, Polly Higgins,

and--"



"O, ho, Seth Jones, that's you, ain't it?--Well--we--well, I said

nothing about Polly; it was Heeltap said it, 'deed it was."



Then they let old Josh off, vowing they'd give Heeltap his gruel next

night, and the moment Josh got clear of his sousers, he cut for home.

Next day Heeltap cleared himself.--Uncle Josh soon found out that he had

been ducked by the women, and, for his own peace, moved to Iowa, and

Frogtown has been a happy place ever since.



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