Rensselaer Republican, Volume 13, Number 17, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 January 1881 — JACK PLAYME’S STORY. [ARTICLE]

JACK PLAYME’S STORY.

This story is not about myself at all, though it Is written as if it was going to be. lam the man that knows the boy the story is about. I am only Jack Play no- He was a very different sort of a "'fellow from me. His mother was the Widow Hennings. His farther had been dead six or seven years when this history begins. They came to Oreenbush a good many summers before he died, and after that the widow made up her mind to stay there. You see, Henri, in gv didn’t leave much—just a couple of thousand on a life insurance and the cottage and an acre at Oreenbush. • All the rest was used up in settling the estate. Hut you’d never guess, not from her talk, £hat she didn’t own a private bank. She talked about the convenience of » fixed income. “One could calculate so exactly how far it would go and never.be disappointed.” And she would groan over the*income tax, when, poor thing it never came nigh her.

, You see, she came of an excellent family. In early times, one of her ancestors was governer, and a great uncle had been senator, beforo it was ■ •'low” to be a senator. That is, she used to say so. I don’t know about it. I have always had to irork hard ive plain, and there whs always the taxes,.hot and heavy, whatever else happened, and “senator” always looked high enough for me. And in most sill the families of her connection the boys went to colleges and the girls to boarding-school, and spoke French and played the piano. Not that I have heard of there being.much money in the family, but they paid their way and studied hard, and got to lie lawyers, doctors or preachers. Never none of 'em down-right workers with their hands for a living. One reason the widow stuck to Oreenbush was the school. The teacher was excellent, and, as it cost nothing, nothing could he better for her son, Horatio-v-“ Rash” for shqrt—“until,” as she’d say, “he’s ready to prepare for college.” Seems to me I can see her now. The same black satin dress, winter and summer. In winter, a threadbare black cloak; in summer, a net shawl, darned in some places very nicely, and black mits, and the

bonnet, made over and over, once a year, through it all. She had some lace she could put on when she went out to tea at the Doctor’s or the Squire’s, and a set of jet and gold ornaments, which were very old, to fasten the lace and swing in the ears. And theAVidow Hennings was a splendid woman! tali, straight as an Indian, and head set well hack on the shoulders. I often watched her go up the broad aisle, and I thought I’d like to liave tested her with a plumb line, she was so straight. But Eliza says I am forever carrying the shop with me. Then she’d a wohderful high hooked nose, and eyebrows that arched over her black eyes like the front door of ah old mansion house, and hardly a gray hair in her head. Must have been an awful cross for such a fine looking woman to give up dress and all the pomps and vanities of this world to live in such a plain way in Hreenbush. Dear heart! she never kept no help, only once a fortnight Bettie Doolittle did out the heaviest of he* washing. The little things, such as chiefs and collars, she did herself, and called it her “fine wash.” It looked like a doll baby’s washing day.

The cottage itself was a cheaplybuilt, plainly-furnished affair, with i common wood-work; but often I found time to do little jobs for her in slack | times; and what with the garden and the interest on the life insurance, and ] the water-color and wax-flower lesJ sons she gave to the ’Squire’s wife and ! and the doctor’s daughters she got J along. . She often made presents of embroidery to brides and babies, and presents were made to her. Once she got a barrel of winter apples, and often a bushel of pears or something like that. On the whole, she got along. If anybody came in while she was making her crocheting, Or her tatting, or her embroidery—not an inch of which she ever used at home—she would talk about how much more lady-like it was to have nice underclothing and plain dresses than “out-show and rags.” Eliza used to say that the things on her clothes line were mended till they were real curiosities. However, they were better than debts, and didn’t tangle her steps like mortgages, for the place was clear and her own. For my part,l could never see the sense of such a common sort of a person as Queen Victoria living in such style and such a natural bom queen as Widow Hennings working so hard and faring so plain.’

But as for Rash. < Not hut that he was the best of sons, ready to help in everything she wanted done. And didn’t he put into his lessons when he found how his mother’s heart was set on his learning. And good and patient he’d listen while she’d tell of the Governor, and the Senator, and the teachers, and the professors, and how anxious she was to have him study hard. She had been well educated herself, and taught him some TAttn

And French, and he wasn’t a bad scholar. But,whatever he got from it it didn’t seem to be what he’d choose. He’d study hard and keep up in his classes, and every spare minute he’d get he’d be fussing around in my shop. He’d pick up his bits of half and quarter inch stuff and notch and whittle and carve and fit and turn out the neatest little toys, chairs,tables and such like, that you ever saw'. He gave one to my little Bess the winter she broke her leg —she’s got it yet. It’s like a chair I once saw in church—carved gothic back and arms, and a table to match. Sometimes it has been all I could do -to get him to give enough attention to his books, he’d be so busy with his work. I kept a strict lookout for that. I’ve got such a little learning myself that I know its value; and he never missed a lesson on my account. I’d seen 100 many make a love of whittling and talk a mere excuse for idling away precious time; and after all there wasn’t no genius of any great account. Horatio was getting to be a large boy, when some connection died and left him a matter o’ SSOO. It was to be used at his mother’s discretion—either kept till he was 21 or spent on his education.

Mrs. Hennings decided at once that it should help him through college. She could help out the balance somehow, and it seemed like as if the good old days of the governor had come again, when she could talk about “colleges,” and so forth. So, one evening as he was sitting by her, reciting his Latin to her, she just began the subject, and Rash told me all about it the next day. Rash ■said he never saw no one so beat as his mother was when he told her she shouldn’t touch that money, but just as soon as I thought him old enough, he was going to learn a trade. “A trade! And what trade?” “Why, a carpenter and joiner, to be sure. I love that sort of work, and Jack Playne says I’ll do well at it.” “But, my dear son, what ever made you think of learning that trade? There never was a carpenter in our family, and, in fact, I don’t know that they ever amount to much.” \ “What, my dear mother,” said Rash, “you forgef; wasn’t our Savior one; and don’t that, make the craft honorable forever?” “True, my dear child. Yours is a just reproof; and yet our Savior did not choose his humble calling. It was a lesson of obedience which he was taught by submitting to his parents’ necessities. His work has been fixed and fitted for him before the foundation of the world. But for you, my dear boy, I had hoped to see you in the chair of the professor.” “I am afraid dear mother,” said Rash, quite humbly, “that I’d rather make the chair than sit in it. Ij know it is not so great - a work, but it is my work, which after all, is the important thing. And if I make the chair strong and well, and handsome and easy, I don’t see why I’m not just as respectable as he is. It’s my work to build the pulpit for another man to preach in; and we may as well accept the fact. But, mother don’t you want to see some of my work? things I’ve done odd spells?” For his mother had bowed her head on her hand, and her face was growing set, and her lips showed a white thread. She wasn’t one of the crying sort. I hate a weeper but they don’t begin to be as unmanageable as ths stony-eyed sort, that neither speak

nor cry, In a minute or two Rash came dewn out of the woodshed loft with his arms full. There was a set of toy bedroom furniture, and a ship full-rigged, and, best of all, was a work-box for his mother, inlaid with different kjnds of wood with a raised oval of apple-tree wood on the lid, carved out into a wreath of the finest fern leaves, inclosing her initials. It was just as neat work as if one of the New York or Boston men had done it, and Rash was just a boy, and altogether self-taught In the way of carving. “It’s most a pity to show this tonight. I was going to keep this for your birthday, day after to-morrow, but It seems only right and natural to show It now, when we were talking the thing over.” Now, set as Mrs. Hennings was against Rash’s learning a trade, she could not help admiring his work, for it was so neat, and not a botch anywhere. For one day, when ho was making it, says I to him: “Now, Rash, whatever you’ve got in hand, don’t you stop to think if you can afford to do it just as well for the money you’re to get for it. There’s one thing you can’t afford, and that Is to bungle. It hurts you more than those you work for. Don't ever do anything that can’t warrant ’pon honor.”

And I’ll *ever forget how his eyes sparkled, and he told me how the cathedrals of the middle ages were built by men who made religion of their work, and built as if they were worshiping, and dared not cheat the Lord, and that in them the back of an ornament or statue was finished, though nobody can see it without the greatest pains, with just as much neatness as if it was to show in the public square, and that was the way he meant to work and live. As I said, the wid«w was pleased in spite of herself. “And where did you get this pretty design?” said she, pointing to the fern wreath. “Why, I wanted a pattern of some sort, and just then Jessie Playnecame along, and she’s got such a wreath as this twisted around her hat. I thought it was none the worse for being so near at hand; and so I just draughted it off and whittled it out. See—here is the draught.” And with that he took it out of his bo*,

Now the widow, though she is as proud as Luolflsr, Is nobody’s fool; and she sees plain enough that there was more than a common Jack of a carpenter in her boy; for she oould draw and paint in water colors herself, and was called a good hand at it. So the long and short of it was, she gave her consent to Rash going into my shop to learn my trade at the end of the school term. And then she

seat Rash up stairs with his treasures and went to bad. And what a sick headache she had the next day! Rash got his breakfast and came over after sister Eliza to stay with his mother, and that’s how he told me all about the talk. She had a blind, si k, stupid headache all day. She got up as the sun went down, and she didn’t really feel like hereelf for a day or two. And 1 perceived that her hair was hevep so black and glossy again as it had been. Eliza Playne, my sister, went over and stayed with her a day or two. But how Rash did work; never slighted the least thing—faithful early and late. I tell you one don’t get such ’prentice work often; and such work holds out forever, in more senses than one.

When Rash was eighteen, and pretty near out of his time, ’Squire Porter came home. He’d been traveling in Europe several years, buying worlds of pictures, books and curious things generally, and the next thing was to fit up his house. I had a job, of course; but in his library he wanted extra work—alcoves for his books, gothic carving and what not; and of course it needed an extra good hand. “I’ve just the hand for fancy carving like that,” says I, “and if you’ll trust him with it, he’ll go at it like training day.” , “Who is it?” says the’Squire. Mind I don’t want it botched, and I ain’t afraid of my money.” “Not a bit of it,” says I. “It’s young Horatio Hennings, son of the Widow Hennings, who lives in the cottage by the big willow.” “Dear, dear,” says the ’Squire, “I know his folks, and it must have cost her a struggle to consent to have her boy learn a mechanic’s trade.” So then I just set down and told the

"Squire the whole story, how the boy wouldn’t be kept back, though he was not unmindful of his books, and that he had such a hankering after tools that he’d stolen his chance,if he hadn’t been allowed; and what excellent work he turned off, and all about it. And the ’Squire listened and laughed, and said: •‘Send him in. I don’t know him, aor he me; but take care he don’t spoil it all.”

. .Just as I expected, the job was just to Rash’s mind. He got up them alcoves in first-rate style, and threw in a lot of fancy oarving. There was an alcove for the “English classics,” as the ’Squire called ’em, and Rash built it out of the best oak, and -earved a wreath of oak leaves and acorns over the arched cornice. The one for Greek' and Latin he ornamented with laurel leaves, and the big one for the histories had a center-piece of armor and banners and shields and what not. But the one for American authors, be carved the finest thing you ever saw. Over the top was a bunch of waterlillies, magnolias, and golden rods, and dropping down the sides were vines of the "trailing arbutus” he called it, but for all the world our own Mayflower.. Why the library was just a picture before anything went into it. It’s years ago, and folks liavn’t done wondering at it yet. I’d not have done ’it for SIO,OOO. When all was done, and the chips all swept out the ’Squire invited a party to see his improvement. Not a large party, but some choice friends from Boston and New York, and some acquaintances he’d made in traveling, and an Englishman, who had written books himself, who was stopping with him. And the best of all was, lie invited Rash and his mother, too. He did, now, really! Rash he went to Boston, and bought her a new black silk, a good one, and a dress cap (widow’s cap, they called

it) and a new suit of clothes for himself. (He’d had good wages for overwork a good while.) It was a wonderful bright moonlight night, and as I sat by my door, smoking, I saw them pass. Mrs. Hennings had on her new black silk, opened from the neck to the waist in front, and some fine, old, yellow lace in the neck, festooned with her little black pin, and her earrings on, and her widow’s cap and her net shawl, and her new laylock kid gloves in her hands. Shapely hands, too, if she did work, and in one of’em a fine old Japanese fan, which her grandfather had brought hmoe in some of his voyages. And Rash! He’d grown to be a tall lad —almost a young man, really out of his time now, with rosy cheeks and black-curly hair, and just a shade on his upper lip. And his clothes fitted him as well os if they were wet and

clung to him. I tell you, as he stepped along with his mother, Rash looked “good enough to eat.” So Eliza said. The ’Squire invited him to the house, and took 'em all into the wonderful library to have coffee, or icea or something. Whatever, it was, it was a mere excuse to get them there, Then he began to show his alcoves, and explain them; and when they’d seen all the tasts and judgment he’d shown in picking out his flowers and leaves and vines to match the bind of books, and everyboby had admired it —the English author in particular was

specially struck—the squire brought In Rftsh and introduced him as “the artist,” and Introduced him and his mother to everybody. And he got one order from a New York man on the spot; and the Englishman said to him that “one who could house books so royally must do Jt for the love of them, as well as for the love of his work," Ahd he said something Rash didn'tjtell (but his mother did) I'most forgot, about its being a wonderful country, where even Its artisans had the manners of gentlemen. At least it was either artist or artisans. I don’t know which.

As Rash handed his mother a cup of tea, he said in a low voice: “Now mother, isn’t it better to be a first-class carpenter than such a poor professor as I should have made?” MI don’t think you’d have failed at anything,*’ she answered. Bat the squire heard her and laughed.

“I don't know about that,” says be} “many a good meohanio is spoiled to make a poor professional man. It’s far better to be sure the work is our own work, and Its the best of its kind, than to be notional about the kind of work; and

* T '• *** *-vf» +-* by the by, Haratio here’s a bit of spending money for you, come round to-morrow and get a jfeoeipt in fall.” So ended this royal evening. Next day the ’Squire called round and proposed that Rash should go to New York and study with an artist friend of his, who was also an architect, for a year. Didn’t he jump at the chance ? As for the edvelope, it had a check for $1,000; the work was done very cheap at that; I’d not.done it for twice that, if I could have done it at all.

So now, Rash’s fortune was made. He made lots of money with his designs and carvings, and n«w he’s married to the ’Squire’s daughter, and lives in Fifth avenue ? Not a bit of it. He came back and married little Bessie Playne, my pet, and has a pretty place at Yonkers, and the widow lives there, too. I guess they get on pretty well. Both the women think that Rash is perfection, which is the main thing. Sometimes I go up there for a day, but the widow, she has so much to say about the governor and senator and blood and gentility that I’m mostly glad to get home and stretoh my legs by the fireplace and smoke my clay pipe. She has a great deal to say about the genius in blood, though I don’t doubt genius helped Rash, and I guess it was as much grit as genius. However, I don’t know much about it.