Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1872-09-28

. A WOULD.BE BENEDICT.

/ Obadiah Fuller was courting the widow
Blaine in earnest: he was increasingly
courting some one in earnest. The "sad
safety" of love had never come to him,
because. ere he reached it's flower and
truth, the untimely frost Of rejection by
its over sensitive object nipped his hopes !;
but the stolid insensibility which in nearly
every case provoked the dismissal, also
prevented any great degree of disappoint-
ment and suffering.
Being as see bucket out there in
the kitchen, guess I'll wash my feet" said
Obadiah to the widow. as they sat in her
front room, with all the doors and win
doWs wide open, on hot, July evening
Those who have lived in the foothills
OF the Sierras, breathed the dust, and en-
dured the toll of existence, will appreci-
ate the feeling which indued the utter
ance OF the above remark, though they
might pity the poverty of sentiment
which kept him down to the recognition
of ignoble physical discomfort upon the
occasion OF visit to a lady whose vir-
tues as a housekeeper and economist had
enehained his fancy and excited his
warmest admiration.
"What--what did you say?n excitedly
asked the widow. But when she saw
with distended eyes, the actual prepara-
tion going on, she dropped her voice
into key of the coolest and genteelest
irony Certainly Mr. Fuller, by all
means A foot-bath is undoubtedly re-
freshing--make yourself at home, and
wash your feet, by all means" Where
upon she sat down, very rigidly.
Obadiah, looking at her Aom the kitch-
en-door, wherei he settled down to what
he considered very simple and natural
performance, noticed, for the first time, a
certain thinness in the widows lips, and
a rather combative and determined air
in the cords of her neck.
{ Good evening"" said she. with flash
ing eyes and offended air. Take the
bucket, Mr.. Fuller; since you have none,
| freely give you this one"
Obadiah, ambling toward his cabin,
stopped at store "What curious crea-
lures women folks be! The widow Blaine
gives me this bucket said he.
The next evening he learned from the
widow herself that no man could wash
his feet in her house and live-at least.
IN her affections that no man could put
her best water-pail to unholy uses, with
out tramplng on the best feelings of her
nature, which were those of an untiring
house-keeper that she was a firm be-
liever in place for everything and
everything in its place, and the place for
Obadiah's feet was neither in her buck
ct nor within her doors any more hence
forth. He reached for his hat, and, with
a mildly troubled and pensiye look, de.
parted for home. When he got there.
he gave the bucket q kick, and to this
day considers there was scarcely any
ground for the sudden change in the
widows mind.
This was simply one of many dismiss
sails. which gave him an Indifferent idea
OF the constancy of the sex. Still, the
comforts of a home-that delusive rock
upon which SO many hearts have been
wrecked-had charms for him, and lent
perseverance to efforts which deserved bet
ter success.
Obadiah Fuller, in his infancy, was the
wonder of the neighborhood for fatness;
his eyes were round and unblinking: tears
never came out of them ON the most
melancholy occasions. He grew amaz-
ingly in body his mind and sensibility
far in the rear, were almost lost sight of
in the general scramble of the coarser
appetites for developement His man.
hood had more than fulfilled the promise
of his youth, he ate, and slept to reple-
ton and never ceased wondering why
things are just as they are. To him it
was astounding that woman should re-
fuse the hand of any man who could sup
port her.
Obadiah-a fair representative of a
small class of men existing in every COM
munity-was incapable of inspiring love
in the heart of any woman; yet, as far as
lay in his power, he loved the sex indis-
criminately. He was now in middle-lite
subject to frequent depressions of spirit
through the tickleness OF Ewes fair daugh-
ters, and was correspondingly elated up
on the happy occasion of their benignant
condescension. He made money in the
mines, and kept it-enough to attract the
notice of women of uncertain age. He
had, in its incipient state, the friendly
spirit which takes in its embrace the back
OF its victims chair in public places-than
which, says the modest girl, there is moth
ing more excruciating in the catalogue of
social offences. In fact, he possessed in a
high degree, the markings of first class
society nuisance; but the ''unspiritual god
Circumstance" had debarred him from
the attrtions of that refiner of mind and
manners, and left him an untutored blum
derer. He had many virtues, good hab-
it's business integrity, and o kind heart !;
but his negative virtues and negative vices
were so evenly distributed that he could
arouse no active feeling in the human
breast. Neither loved nor hated, he stood
on that battle-ground so extensively oc-
cupied by that band Of Natures unhappy
creations men and good women !;
Il name unanimously agreed upon by the
world as appropriate for being with neith-
er virtues nor vices.
The hopeful eye of the humanitarian
sees in the dim future of million years
hence a new order of things, when court
ship and marriage will be made easy and
agreeable by the classification of men and
women. Obadiah Fuller should have de.
ferred his coming until that time. Bu
could it have been possible for him, by
the light of science or otherwise, to hav,
found the womar~to whom his attention
were acceptable and his courtng not OBJ
noXious, from what disastrous experiment
he would have been saved! Doubles
there was such an one somewhere; ant
Jane Springer might be she, as upon
gala-day, he invited her to the country