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Elder Brown told his wife good-by at the farmhouse door as
mechanically as though his proposed trip to Macon, ten miles away,
was an everyday affair, while, as a matter of fact, many years had
elapsed since unaccompanied he set foot in the city. He did not kiss
her. Many very good men never kiss their wives. But small blame
attaches to the elder for his omission on this occasion, since his
wife had long ago discouraged all amorous demonstrations on the part
of her liege lord, and at this particular moment was filling the
parting moments with a rattling list of directions concerning
thread, buttons, hooks, needles, and all the many etceteras of an
industrious housewife's basket. The elder was laboriously assorting
these postscript commissions in his memory, well knowing that to
return with any one of them neglected would cause trouble in the
family circle.
Elder Brown mounted his patient steed that stood sleepily motionless
in the warm sunlight, with his great pointed ears displayed to the
right and left, as though their owner had grown tired of the life
burden their weight inflicted upon him, and was, old soldier
fashion, ready to forego the once rigid alertness of early training
for the pleasures of frequent rest on arms.
"And, elder, don't you forgit them caliker scraps, or you'll be
wantin' kiver soon an' no kiver will be a-comin'."
Elder Brown did not turn his head, but merely let the whip hand,
which had been checked in its backward motion, fall as he answered
mechanically. The beast he bestrode responded with a rapid whisking
of its tail and a great show of effort, as it ambled off down the
sandy road, the rider's long legs seeming now and then to touch the
ground.
But as the zigzag panels of the rail fence crept behind him, and he
felt the freedom of the morning beginning to act upon his
well-trained blood, the mechanical manner of the old man's mind gave
place to a mild exuberance. A weight seemed to be lifting from it
ounce by ounce as the fence panels, the weedy corners, the persimmon
sprouts and sassafras bushes crept away behind him, so that by the
time a mile lay between him and the life partner of his joys and
sorrows he was in a reasonably contented frame of mind, and still
improving.
It was a queer figure that crept along the road that cheery May
morning. It was tall and gaunt, and had been for thirty years or
more. The long head, bald on top, covered behind with iron-gray
hair, and in front with a short tangled growth that curled and
kinked in every direction, was surmounted by an old-fashioned
stove-pipe hat, worn and stained, but eminently impressive. An
old-fashioned Henry Clay cloth coat, stained and threadbare, divided
itself impartially over the donkey's back and dangled on his sides.
This was all that remained of the elder's wedding suit of forty
years ago. Only constant care, and use of late years limited to
extra occasions, had preserved it so long. The trousers had soon
parted company with their friends. The substitutes were red jeans,
which, while they did not well match his court costume, were better
able to withstand the old man's abuse, for if, in addition to his
frequent religious excursions astride his beast, there ever was a
man who was fond of sitting down with his feet higher than his head,
it was this selfsame Elder Brown.
The morning expanded, and the old man expanded with it; for while a
vigorous leader in his church, the elder at home was, it must be
admitted, an uncomplaining slave. To the intense astonishment of the
beast he rode, there came new vigor into the whacks which fell upon
his flanks; and the beast allowed astonishment to surprise him into
real life and decided motion. Somewhere in the elder's expanding
soul a tune had begun to ring. Possibly he took up the far, faint
tune that came from the straggling gang of negroes away off in the
field, as they slowly chopped amid the threadlike rows of cotton
plants which lined the level ground, for the melody he hummed softly
and then sang strongly, in the quavering, catchy tones of a good old
country churchman, was "I'm glad salvation's free."
It was during the singing of this hymn that Elder Brown's regular
motion-inspiring strokes were for the first time varied. He began to
hold his hickory up at certain pauses in the melody, and beat the
changes upon the sides of his astonished steed. The chorus under
this arrangement was:
I'm glad salvation's free,
I'm glad salvation's free,
I'm glad salvation's free for all,
I'm glad salvation's free.
Wherever there is an italic, the hickory descended. It fell about as
regularly and after the fashion of the stick beating upon the bass
drum during a funeral march. But the beast, although convinced that
something serious was impending, did not consider a funeral march
appropriate for the occasion. He protested, at first, with vigorous
whiskings of his tail and a rapid shifting of his ears. Finding
these demonstrations unavailing, and convinced that some urgent
cause for hurry had suddenly invaded the elder's serenity, as it had
his own, he began to cover the ground with frantic leaps that would
have surprised his owner could he have realized what was going on.
But Elder Brown's eyes were half closed, and he was singing at the
top of his voice. Lost in a trance of divine exaltation, for he felt
the effects of the invigorating motion, bent only on making the air
ring with the lines which he dimly imagined were drawing upon him
the eyes of the whole female congregation, he was supremely
unconscious that his beast was hurrying.
And thus the excursion proceeded, until suddenly a shote, surprised
in his calm search for roots in a fence corner, darted into the
road, and stood for an instant gazing upon the newcomers with that
idiotic stare which only a pig can imitate. The sudden appearance of
this unlooked-for apparition acted strongly upon the donkey. With
one supreme effort he collected himself into a motionless mass of
matter, bracing his front legs wide apart; that is to say, he
stopped short. There he stood, returning the pig's idiotic stare
with an interest which must have led to the presumption that never
before in all his varied life had he seen such a singular little
creature. End over end went the man of prayer, finally bringing up
full length in the sand, striking just as he should have shouted
"free" for the fourth time in his glorious chorus.
Fully convinced that his alarm had been well founded, the shote sped
out from under the gigantic missile hurled at him by the donkey, and
scampered down the road, turning first one ear and then the other to
detect any sounds of pursuit. The donkey, also convinced that the
object before which he had halted was supernatural, started back
violently upon seeing it apparently turn to a man. But seeing that
it had turned to nothing but a man, he wandered up into the deserted
fence corner, and began to nibble refreshment from a scrub oak.
For a moment the elder gazed up into the sky, half impressed with
the idea that the camp-meeting platform had given way. But the truth
forced its way to the front in his disordered understanding at last,
and with painful dignity he staggered into an upright position, and
regained his beaver. He was shocked again. Never before in all the
long years it had served him had he seen it in such shape. The truth
is, Elder Brown had never before tried to stand on his head in it.
As calmly as possible he began to straighten it out, caring but
little for the dust upon his garments. The beaver was his special
crown of dignity. To lose it was to be reduced to a level with the
common woolhat herd. He did his best, pulling, pressing, and
pushing, but the hat did not look natural when he had finished. It
seemed to have been laid off into counties, sections, and town lots.
Like a well-cut jewel, it had a face for him, view it from whatever
point he chose, a quality which so impressed him that a lump
gathered in his throat, and his eyes winked vigorously.
Elder Brown was not, however, a man for tears. He was a man of
action. The sudden vision which met his wandering gaze, the donkey
calmly chewing scrub buds, with the green juice already oozing from
the corners of his frothy mouth, acted upon him like magic. He was,
after all, only human, and when he got hands upon a piece of brush
he thrashed the poor beast until it seemed as though even its
already half-tanned hide would be eternally ruined. Thoroughly
exhausted at last, he wearily straddled his saddle, and with his
chin upon his breast resumed the early morning tenor of his way.
Click Here for Part II
Elder Brown's Backslide
A Classic Funny Story
by
Harry Stillwell Edwards |
