Homespun Tales | Page 4

bankruptcy, succeeding a too ample
generosity, did scrub the pews when there was no money for paint.
Rumors of our strenuous, and somewhat unique, activities spread
through our parish to many others, traveling so far (even over seas) that
we became embarrassed at our easily won fame. The book was read
and people occasionally came to church to see the old Peabody Pew,
rather resenting the information that there had never been any Peabodys
in the parish and, therefore, there could be no Peabody Pew. Matters
became worse when I made, very reverently, what I suppose must be
called a dramatic version of the book, which we have played for several
summers in the old meeting house to audiences far exceeding our
seating capacity. Inasmuch as the imaginary love-tale of my so-called
Nancy Wentworth and Justin Peabody had begun under the shadow of
the church steeple, and after the ten years of parting the happy reunion
had come to them in the selfsame place, it was possible to present their
story simply and directly, without offense, in a church building. There
was no curtain, no stage, no scenery, no theatricalism. The pulpit was
moved back, and four young pine trees were placed in front of it for
supposed Christmas decoration. The pulpit platform, and the "wing
pews" left vacant for the village players, took the place of a stage; the
two aisles served for exits and entrances; and the sexton with three
rings of the church bell, announced the scenes. The Carpet Committee
of the Dorcas Society furnished the exposition of the first act, while
sewing the last breadths of the new, hardly-bought ingrain carpet. The
scrubbing of the pews ends the act, with dialogue concerning men,
women, ministers, church-members and their ways, including the utter
failure of Justin Peabody, Nancy's hero, to make a living anywhere,
even in the West. The Dorcas members leave the church for their
Saturday night suppers of beans and brown bread, but Nancy returns

with her lantern at nightfall to tack down the carpet in the old Peabody
pew and iron out the tattered, dog's eared leaves of the hymn-book
from which she has so often sung "By cool Siloam's shady rill" with her
lover in days gone by. He, still a failure, having waited for years for his
luck to turn, has come back to spend Christmas in the home of his
boyhood; and seeing a dim light in the church, he enters quietly and
surprises Nancy at her task of carpeting the Peabody Pew, so that it
shall look as well as the others at next day's services. The rest is easy to
imagine. One can deny the reality of a book, but when two or three
thousand people have beheld Justin Peabody and Nancy Wentworth in
the flesh, and have seen the paint of the old Peabody Pew wiped with a
damp cloth, its cushion darned and its carpet tacked in place, it is
useless to argue; any more than it would be to deny the validity of the
egg of Columbus or the apple of William Tell.
As for "Susanna and Sue" the story would never have been written had
I not as a child and girl been driven once a year to the Shaker meeting
at the little village of Alfred, sixteen miles distant. The services were
then open to the public, but eventually permission to attend them was
withdrawn, because of the careless and sometimes irreverent behavior
of young people who regarded the Shaker costumes, the solemn dances
or marches, the rhythmic movements of the hands, the almost hypnotic
crescendo of the singing, as a sort of humorous spectacle. I learned to
know the brethren and sisters, and the Elder, as years went by, and
often went to the main house to spend a day or two as the guest of
Eldress Harriet, a saint, if ever there was one, or, later, with dear Sister
Lucinda.
The shining cleanliness and order, the frugality and industry, the
serenity and peace of these people, who had resigned the world and
"life on the plane of Adam," vowing themselves to celibacy, to public
confession of sins, and the holding of goods in common,--all this has
always had a certain exquisite and helpful influence upon my thought,
and Mr. W. D. Howells paid a far more beautiful tribute to them in
"The Undiscovered Country."
It is needless to say that I read every word of the book to my Shaker

friends before it was published. They took a deep interest in it, evincing
keen delight in my rather facetious but wholly imaginary portrait of
"Brother Ansel," a "born Shaker," and sadly confessing that my two
young lovers, "Hetty" and "Nathan," who could not endure the rigors of
the Shaker faith and fled together in