Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition | Page 5

will be worth double the price of
admission."
"Then you expect to ask pay, Josiah?"
"Certainly, why not? Do they not ask pay at the twin celebration?
"But you spoke of inventions; I shall let the rest of the Allens show off.
Lots of 'em have invented things, but of course my inventions will rank
number one. There is my button on the suller door I cut it out of an old
boot leg. Who ever hearn of a leather button before, and it works well if

you don't want to fasten the door tight. Then there is that self actin'
hen-coop of mine that lets a stick fall down and shuts the door when the
hen walks up the ladder."
"But no hen has ever clim the ladder yet, Josiah."
"No, perhaps they hain't yet, but I'm expectin' to see 'em every day,
'tennyrate paint that coop a bright red and yaller and it will attract a
crowd.
"And then there is that travelin' rat trap of brother Henzy's, you know
his grandmother wuz an Allen, I shall mayhap let him appear. And then
there is all my farmin' implements and the rest of the Allen's I lay out to
be just to all, and let 'em all come and show off in my Agricultural
show.
"But of course there has got to be a head to it; Napoleon wuz the head
of the other Purchase, and I'm the head of this. In short, Samantha, I am
It."
Oh, how full of pride and vain glory he wuz, and I knowed such feelin's
would have to be brung down for his spiritual good. I realized it as he
went on,
"I tell you, Napoleon and I would have made a span, Samantha, if he
could been spared till now."
Oh how shamed I wuz to hear such talk, but I sot demute for reasons
named, and he sez agin, "I thought mebby you would want to be one of
the attractions of the Pike, Samantha; I lay out to have livin' statutes
adornin' the side of the lane leadin' up from the beaver medder to the
horse trough."
"Livin' statutes!" sez I, coldly, "I don't know what you mean by them."
[Illustration]
"Why, I thought for a few cents I could git a lot of children and old

folks to be white-washed for a day or two and pose as statutes. It would
be a new thing and a crackin' good idee, for livin' statutes that can wink,
and bow, and talk, and walk round some, I don't believe wuz ever hearn
on before."
"No indeed," sez I, "but I can tell you, Josiah Allen, I've played many
strange parts in the role of life at your request, but I tell you once for all
I shall never, never be whitewashed and set up for a statute, you can set
your mind to rest on that to once."
"Mebby you'd ruther be a Historical Tabloo, Samantha; I lay out to
have beautiful ones, and I thought I wouldn't confine myself to the
States, but would branch out and have the foreign nations represented
figuratively.
"A naval battle between Russia and Japan would draw; if I could fix
some floats on the creek my stun boat could represent Russia, and
Deacon Huffer's Japan, I jest as lives mine would be blowed up and
sunk as not, 'tain't good for much. And if I did have that I would have
the Russian Bear set on the shore growlin', and the Powers furder back
lookin' pleasantly on. You might be a Power, Samantha, if you wuzn't a
female."
"No, thank you, Josiah, I don't hanker after the responsibility for good
or evil that ort to hang onto a Power."
"I'd be the Russian Bear myself, Samantha, with our old buffalo robe,
only I've got everything else to do; I could grasp holt of things and
squeeze 'em tight and growl and paw first rate."
"I wouldn't try to take that Russian Bear's job of graspin' and growlin'
and pawin' onto me, Josiah, if I wuz in your place; it would tucker
anybody out."
"The Eagle of France," sez he dreamily, "could be represented in
reduced form, as artists say, by Solomon Bobbett's old Bramy rooster
with some claws tied on. And Scotland, the land knows there is thistles
enough along the cow path to represent her if they're handled right.

And for Ireland I might have two fellers fightin' with shelalays, Ury
could make the shelalays if he had a pattern."
I knit away with a look of cold mockery on my face that I spose
worried him, for he sez, "I wish I could git you interested in my show,
Samantha. Mebby you'd want to represent Britanny scourin' the blue
seas, you always thought