Elijah Kellogg - The Unseen Hand - Or, James Renfew and His Boy Helpers (Elijah Kellogg) - illustrated - (Literary Thoughts Edition)

The old gentleman’s voice trembled, he dashed a tear from his eye and went on. “We raised eleven children, they all grew to man’s and woman’s estate, the girls have married well, the four boys are all well-to-do farmers and prospering. There are nineteen farmers and farmers’ wives without counting their children, and not a miserable idle “shack” among them; all of whom sprang by the father’s side from that poor boy who was the poorest of the poor, and worked his passage to this country, but found in a strange land friends to guide him. So you see what good may come from a friendless boy, if he is well-minded and helped.”

“You know, husband, the children have a long distance to go in the winter to school, and a boy like that would be a great help about the barn and to cut firewood, or go into the woods with you. The clothing of him would not be much, for I could make both the cloth and the clothes, and as for his living, what is one more spoon in the platter? And in regard to the money for his passage you know we haven’t built any new house, and so you won’t need to borrow the money.”

“Wife, if you want to take that boy, I’ll start off to-morrow morning and get him.”

“I want you to do just as you think best in regard to taking anybody, either boy or man. We are only talking the matter over in all its bearings, and as you brought up the disadvantages and risks, your father and myself were bringing up something to balance them; it is not a very easy matter to decide, at any rate.”

“But father,” cried Peter, “Bertie and Maria and I want you to take him.”

“Why do you want me to take him?”

“‘Cause we want him to come here and grow up to be a great, smart, good man, just like our great-grandfather—and as grandfather says he will.”

“And we want to help about it and befriend him,” put in Bertie.

“And me, too,” cried Maria; “I want to befriend him.”

“No, Peter, I didn’t say he would become a good man, because no one knows that but a higher Power. I said that to my certain knowledge one boy did, and that ought to be an encouragement to people to put other boys in the way of making something.”

“Well, that’s what grandpa means,” said Peter, resolved to carry his point.

“Father,” said Maria, “I want you to take him, ‘cause if Peter or Bertie was carried ‘way off where they didn’t know anybody, and where their father and mother wasn’t, they would want somebody who was good, to ask ‘em to come to their house and give them something to eat.”

“Wife, where did Peter get all this news that seems to have set him and the rest half crazy?”

“At Hooper’s, the shoemaker. He went to get his shoes, and Mr. Hooper told him that his father-in-law, John Wood, was going to-morrow to Hanscom’s tavern to get a redemptioner Mr. Wilson had brought over for him, and that neighbor Wood wanted him to get word to you that Wilson had a man and a boy left. Mr. Wood wants you to go over with him to-morrow and take the boy; he says you couldn’t do better.”

“I am going over there day after to-morrow to haul some wheat that I have promised; if the boy is there I shall most likely see him.”

“Oh, father, before that time somebody else may get him.”

“Well, Peter, let them have him; if he gets a place, that’s all that is needed.”

“But perhaps ‘twon’t be a good man like you who’ll get him.”

“He may be a great deal better man.”

More enthusiastic and persistent than her brothers, and unable to sleep, the little girl lay wakeful in her trundle-bed till her mother and father had retired, and then crawling in between them, put her arms around her father’s neck and whispered,—

“Father, you will take the boy, won’t you?”

“My dear child, you don’t know what you are talking about. I have not set eyes on him yet, and perhaps when I come to see him he will appear to me to be a bad, or stupid, or lazy boy, and then you yourself would not want me to take him.”

“No, father; but if you like the looks of him, and Peter likes the looks of him, ‘cause if Peter likes him Bertie and I shall, will you take him then?”

“I’ll think about it, my little girl, and now get into your bed and cuddle down and go to sleep.”

Instead of that, however, she crept to the other side of the bed, hid her face in her mother’s bosom and sobbed herself to sleep.

Notwithstanding the entreaties of the children, their father remained firm in his purpose, but, at the time he had set, started, taking Peter with him, as the lad was to have a pair of new shoes. He was also to buy the cloth to make Bertie a go-to-meeting suit, as the cloth for the best clothes was bought, and made up by their mother who wove all the cloth for every-day wear. He was also to buy a new shawl for Maria, and get a bonnet for her that her mother had selected some days before. In the mean time Peter had received the most solemn charges from both Bertie and Maria, “to tease and tease and tease their father to take the boy.” Just as they were starting Maria clambered up to the seat of the wagon and whispered in his ear,—

“If father won’t take him, you cry; cry like everything.”

Peter promised faithfully that he would.

When the sound of wagon wheels had died away in the distance, Bertie and Maria endeavored to extract some consolation by interrogating their mother, and Bertie asked if she expected their father would bring home the boy.

“Your father, children, will do what he thinks to be his duty, and for the best, but there is an unseen hand that guides matters of this kind. I shall not be very much surprised if the boy should come with them.”

No sooner was the wheat unloaded than Peter entreated his father to go and see the redemptioner.

“Not yet, my son, I must go and pay a bill at Mr. Harmon’s, he is going to Lancaster to-day to buy goods and wants the money. And then I must get your new shoes and the cloth for Bertie’s suit, and a bonnet and shawl for Maria, and then we will go.”

“Couldn’t you pay the bill please, and get our things after you see the redemptioner?”

“I don’t know, I’ll see.”

The truth of the fact was, Mr. Whitman was sorry that he had expressed before his family the transient thought that crossed his mind in regard to the boy, because he felt that his wife and father were anxious that he should take him, although they disclaimed any desire to influence his actions; and being an indulgent parent, the clamorous eagerness of the children aided to complicate the matter. He likewise felt that he had so far committed himself, he must at least go and look at this lad, though inclined to do it in that leisurely way in which a man sets about an unpleasant duty. But, to the great delight of Peter, before the horses had finished their provender, Mr. Wilson himself appeared on the ground.

“Good morning, Mr. Whitman. I understand from Mr. Wood, to whom I have brought a man, that you want a boy. I have a boy and a man at the public house and would like to have you step over and look at them.”

“I have never said to neighbor Wood nor to any one that I wanted a redemptioner; he must either have got it from Peter here, through some one else, or have imagined it. All I ever had to do in the matter was to say, when we were talking in the family about your having a boy among your men, that I did not know but it might be my duty to take the boy. It was however merely a passing thought. I have about made up my mind that I will have nothing to do with it, and I do not think it is worth while (as I have met you) for me to go and see either of them.”

“You had better go look at them, your horses have not yet finished eating.”

“I am an outspoken man, Mr. Wilson, and make free to tell you I don’t like this buying and selling of flesh and blood. It seems to me too much like slavery, which I never could endure. I think a capable man like you had better take up with some other calling, and I don’t care to encourage you in this. If you’ll buy oxen or horses or wheat I’ll trade with you, but I don’t care to trade in human bodies or souls.”