Samantha at Coney Island, and a Thousand Other Islands. Marietta Holley

Samantha at Coney Island, and a Thousand Other Islands

a monument riz up to faithful, patient mothers by the hand of filial gratitude and love.”49“I tried to stop him. I didn’t want him to demean himself before the oarsmen tryin’ to find boats that hadn’t been hearn on in hundreds of years.”68“‘I won’t wear a veil,’ sez he stoutly. But the next time a gale come from the sou’west I laid the brim back and tied the veil in a big bow knot under his chin.”83“ ‘What does ail you, Samantha, lockin’ arms with me all the time—it will make talk! he whispered in a mad, impatient whisper, but I would hang on as long as Mr. Pomper wuz around.”99“As they come nigh me I riz up almost wildly and ketched holt of my pardner and sez I: ‘Desist! Josiah Allen, stop to once!’ The aged female looked at me in surprise.”132“‘No,’ sez Mr. Pomper, ‘I want it done as speedily as possible, fer my late lamented left me thirteen children, two pairs of triplets, two ditto of twins, and three singles.’”144“Mr. Pomper, thinkin’ he would see better, got up on the bench, and jest as he shouted out ‘How firm a foundation,’ the bench broke and down he come.”169“And then he would call in Uncle Nate Peedick and they would bend their two gray bald heads and talk about specifications and elevations till my brain seemed most as soft as theirn.”196“‘Serenus and Josiah are havin’ a gay time at Coney Island. I’ve jest had a card from Serenus,’ sez Miss Gowdey. You could have knocked me down with a pin feather.”215“I stood before what seemed to be a great city. Endless white towers riz up as if callin’ attention to ’em.”227“On we went under the waterfall, up, up, down, down, and finally shot out jest where we got in.”231The Witching Waves “Folks get into little automobiles and steer ’em themselves.”236“A boat full of men and women set out from the highest peak, shot down the declivity like lightnin’ and dashed ’way out on the other side of the bridge.”239“Rows of high-headed mettlesome hosses.”247“I’m tellin’ the livin’ truth, as she towered up in front on me, her breast opened and a man’s face looked out on me.”254“As I went down with lightnin’ speed I had’nt time to think much.”259“Pretty soon it begun to move and one by one they wuz throwed off and went down I know not where.”261“As I went into Dreamland it seemed as if all the folks in the city was there.”267“We got in a small boat and wuz carried round and round till we dived into a dark tunnel.”277“I went forward to see the Head Hunters. I sez to ’em ‘I’ve hearn of your doin’s and I want to advise you for your good.’ ”282“It wuz a sight to see, acres and acres of sand dotted with men, wimmen, and children.”287“I rushed forwards and cried to the lordly beast above, jest ready to spring: ‘Don’t harm Josiah! Devour me instead.’ ”304“I myself never sot foot on the Bowery; I wuzn’t goin’ to nasty up my mind with it, though I hearn there wuz some good things to be seen there.”314“‘The suller!’ He stood agast, perfectly dumb-foundered but wuzn’t goin’ to give in he had made a mistake. It wuz too mortifying to his pride.”319“I don’t know how long they stood there, his eyes searchin’ the dear face and findin’ a sacred meanin’ in it.”348

CHAPTER ONE

Table of Contents

IN WHICH THE CONEY ISLAND MICROBE ENTERS OUR QUIET HOME

Table of Contents

Samantha at Coney Island and

a Thousand Other Islands

CHAPTER ONE

IN WHICH THE CONEY ISLAND MICROBE

ENTERS OUR QUIET HOME

When Serenus Gowdey got back last fall from Brooklyn, where his twin brother, Sylvester, lives, he couldn’t talk about anything but Coney Island. He slighted religion, stopped runnin’ down relations, politics wuz left in the lurch, and cows, hens, and crops, wuz to him as if they wuzn’t. He acted crazy as a loon about that Island.

Why, Sylvester’ses wife told Miss Dagget and she told the Editor of the Augur’s wife, and she told Ben Lowry’s widder, and she told the Editor of the Gimlet’s mother-in-law, and she told me. It come straight, that Serenus only stayed there nights and to a early breakfast, but spent his hull durin’ time to Coney Island, and he a twin too. She said Sylvester felt so 4 hurt she wuz afraid it would make a lastin’ hardness. And it made me enough trouble too, yes indeed! for he would come and pour out his praises of that frisky, frivolous spot into Josiah’s too willin’ ears, till he got him as wild as he wuz about it.

Why, evenin’s after he’d been there recountin’ its attractions till bed-time, Josiah would be so wrought up he’d ride night mairs most all night. He’d spring up in bed cryin’ out, “All aboard for Coney Island!” or, “There is the Immoral Railway! See the divin’ girls, and the Awful Tower. Get a hot dog; look at the alligators, etc., etc.” I gin him catnip to soothe his nerve, but that didn’t git the pizen out of his system; no, acres of catnip couldn’t.

Oh, how dead sick I’d git of their talk, Coney Island! Luna Park! Well named, I’d say to myself, it is enough to make anybody luny to hear so much about it. Steeple Chase! chasin’ steeples, folly and madness. Dreamland! night mairs, most probable. Why, from Serenus’ talk that I hearn onwillingly about toboggan slides, merry-go-rounds, swings, immoral railways, skatin’ rinks, diving girls, loops de loops, and bumps de bumps, trips to the moon and trashy shows of all kinds I got the idee there 5 wuzn’t nothin’ there God had made, only the Ocean and the little incubator babies, though them two shows wuzn’t what you might call similar and the same size. Why, I myself, with my powerful mind, would git so cumfuddled hearin’ his wild and glarin’ descriptions, that my brain would seem to turn over under my foretop, and I didn’t wonder at Josiah’s bein’ led away by it, much as I lamented it, for he soon declared that go there he would.

In vain I reminded him that he wuz a deacon and a grand-father. He said he didn’t care how many deacons he wuz, or how many grand-fathers; he wuz goin’ to see that beautiful and entrancin’ place with his own eyes. I tried to quell him down, but couldn’t quell him worth a cent, with Serenus firin’ him up on the other side.

One Sunday, Elder Minkley preached an eloquent sermon describing the glories of the New Jerusalem, and Josiah said goin’ home that from Serenus’ tell, the elder had gin a crackin’ good description of Coney Island.

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