And agin we’d go by a kinder high island with a tall, noble mansion standin’ up on it with towers and balconies, and winders all ornamented off, and flags a-flyin’. And every house and every tentin’ ground had their own little 42 wharfs runnin’ down into the water and boats hitched to ’em, jest as we’d hitch the old mair and colt to a hitchin’ post. And most of ’em had picturesque boat-houses painted up like the houses.
And all of these pretty houses and towers and flags and boats and everything wuz reflected down into the water, so there wuz handsome pictures above, and still more extremely beautiful ones below. For the sunlight shadow pictures wuz more beautiful fur than the reality, as is often the case. Every little sail-boat and canoe had its white shadder floatin’ along by it, shinin’ out from the blue and sea-green surface of the water.
Josiah wuz turrible interested in tryin’ to see if the reflections wuz exactly like the real seen up above, and he kept leanin’ over the edge of the boat tryin’ to turn his head upside down so’s to git a better look, and at last he nearly fell overboard into the water only I grabbed him quick.
Sometimes—I don’t know what made it—there would be long lines of light in different colors layin’ on the water; long waveless furrows of palest amethyst, lilock, pale rose-color, and pearl, soft green and blue, way off 43 and near to, wide and long and changin’ all the time. Why, some of the time it would seem as if the surface of the river wuz a shinin’ pavement made of them glowin’ and lustrous colors, that you might walk out on. And then agin, cold Reality would say to you that if you tried it, you’d most probable git drownded.
Anon we went by a island with a house standin’ on it, the hull thing seemin’ly nothin’ but house right in the strongest current of the river, and on the end of the island wuz a wheel fixed that run all the machinery of the house, lightin’ it, and pumpin’ water, and runnin’ the coffee mill and sewin’ machine, and rockin’ the cradle, for all I know.
The river waitin’ on ’em, and doin’ it cheerful. A soarin’ soul of power and might, so strong that a wink from its old eye-lids could swallow up a fleet of ships, and a flirt of its fingers overthrow a army of strongest men and toss ’em about like leaves on an autumn gale. To see such a powerful, noble body, that wuz used to doin’ the biggest kind of jobs, quietly bucklin’ down pumpin’ water to supply a tea-kettle, and churn a little butter, mebby!
Why, thinks I, what a lesson to hired girls that is, they’re always so fraid of doin’ a little 44 more than it is their place to do. They’re so fraid of settin’ back a chair, if it is their place to cook, and so afraid of bilin’ a egg if it is their place to slick up the house. Why, it wuz a lesson in morals to see that big grand river crumplin’ down to do housework for a spell.
Frontenac Island used to be called Round Island, I guess because it wuz kinder square in shape. It is a handsome place with a immense hotel[A] settin’ back most a quarter of a mild, and jined by a long railed balcony with another, makin’ room enough, it seemed to me, for an army. The broad, handsome path leadin’ up to it wuz bordered with beautiful flowers and shrubs, lookin’ lovely against the vivid green of the lawn.
I liked the name Frontenac first rate, and Point Vivian, and the name of the hotel on St. Lawrence Park, Lotus, seemed highly appropriate for the idle hours of rest and pleasure in the balmy summer-time.
And that park, while it could pass itself off for an island, wuz really the main land. And if you wanted a doctor on a dark, stormy night, you could get one without going on the wild 45 waves; and if you got skairt in the night and sot off to run, you could run as fur as you wanted to without gittin’ drownded.
I spoke to Josiah about this and he agreed with me, though he took the occasion to bring in Coney Island, much to my shagrin.
“I wish,” sez he, “I wish we could stop off somewheres and git a hot dog.”
“A hot dog?” sez I, consternation showin’ in my foretop. “Don’t you know that dogs roamin’ round loose and overhet in this sultry weather is apt to git mad and bite you?”
“ ’Tain’t that kind of animile I mean. I mean the kind they eat—in Coney Island.”
“Do they eat dogs in Coney Island?” I asks in a faint voice.
“Yes,” sez he.
“And would you eat enny on’t?”
“Why not?” sez he.
“Why not?” I cries regainin’ my voice to once. “Josiah Allen, have you became a canibal like them as lives in heathen lands and welcomes civilized folks with open mouths?”
“Oh,” sez he, “ ’tain’t nothin’ like that. These dogs hain’t made o’ people. No, they air made from sassiges and cooked in front of 46 a open grate fire. They call ’em hot dogs and Serenus sez—”
I didn’t gin him no chance to tell what Serenus sez. I sez many things to him there and then that wuz calculated to make him forgit Coney Island for awhile.
But to resoom forwards. We went by a big castle that wuz built up on a hill on a island of considerable size with quite a grove of trees on it. It wuz a noble, gray stun castle, with high towers and pinnacles shinin’ up toward the blue sky—Castle Rest, its name wuz, and I thought most probable anybody could rest there first rate. The one that built it and the one it wuz built for, had gone up into another castle to rest, the great Castle of Rest, whose walls can’t be moved by any earthly shock. A good little mother it wuz built for, a hard-workin’, patient, tired-out little mother, who wuz left with a house full of boys, and not much in the house, only boys. How she worked and toiled to keep ’em comfortable and git ’em headed right, washin’, cookin’, makin’, and mendin’; learnin’ ’em truthfulness, honesty, and industry with their letters; teachin’ ’em the multiplication table and the commandments; trimmin’ off their childish faults, same 47 as she did their hair; clippin’ ’em off with her own anxious lovin’ hands. Mebby puttin’ a bowl on their heads and cuttin’ round it, or else shinglin’ ’em. But ’tennyrate doin’ her best for them, soul and body, till she got ’em headed right. Some on ’em givin’ their hull lives to help men’s souls, lovin’ this old world mebby for their ma’s sake, because it held so many other good wimmen; for they jest about worshipped her all on ’em. And one of her boys, while the rest of ’em wuz helpin’ men and wimmen to build up better lives, he wuz buildin’ up his creed of helpfulness and improvement in bricks and mortar, tryin’ to do good, there hain’t a doubt on’t.
Mebby them walls didn’t stand so firm as the others did, and tottled more now and then. Strange, hain’t it, that solid bricks and stuns, that you feel and see, are less endurin’ and firm than the things you can’t see—changed lives, faith, hope, charity, love to God, good-will to man, and that whiter ideals and loftier aims and desires may tower up higher than any chimbly that ever belched out smoke.
Curious it is so, but so it is. But ’tennyrate this one son rode on his sleepin’ cars right into millions, and his first thought wuz how he could 48 please best the little Mother. So he built a castle for her. Tired little feet, walkin’ the round of humble duties, waitin’ on her small boys, did they ever expect to tread the walls of a castle? Her own too. I’ll bet it seemed dretful big to her, or would anyway if it hadn’t been so full, so runnin’ over full of the love and thoughtfulness of all of her boys—and Love will fill and glorify cottage or castle.
But here she come yearly and gathered her strong, stalwart sons about her, welcomin’ them with the same old tender smile, and constant love, and she, wropt completely round in the warm atmosphere of their love and devotion. Year after year went happily by till the last time came, and she went away out of her high castle into a still higher one. But I liked Castle Rest, for it seemed a monument riz up to faithful, patient mothers fur and near, rich and poor, by the hand of filial gratitude and love.
Comfort