Phemie Frost's Experiences. Ann S. Stephens

the great seal, with a red stone in it, on his finger, and by the heavy gold chain swinging across his breast.

      When I saw this man's eyes fixed on my seat so beseeching, I kind of moved a little more and then let my eyes droop downward, determined not to help his presumptuous design to sit by me a single bit.

      "Thank you," says he, sitting down close to me, and chucking his satchel under the seat. "If there is a superior person in the car, I'm certain to have the luck and the honor to sit beside her. Some people prefer to look out of the window, but I would rather gaze on a sweet, pretty face, by a long shot—especially if it does not belong to a girl with airs."

      I felt myself blushing all over at this delicate compliment, and observed, with becoming diffidence and great originality, that "beauty was only skin-deep at the best, and not by any manner of means to be compared with Christian piety and high intellect."

      The man—he was a stalwart, handsome man; not pursey like Deacon Pettibone, nor slim to bean-poleishness like the circuit preachers that live about, and only pick up a little roundness at camp-meetings; but tall, and what young ladies call imposing. Well, the man gave me another long look at this, and says he:

      "But when all these things jibe in together so beautifully, who is to say which it is that captivates a man's fancy? Not I. It is my weakness to take lovely woman into the core of my heart as a whole; but, if there is one quality that I prize more than another, it is piety."

      I blushed with thrilling consciousness of the grace that has been in me so long that it has become a part of my being; but his praise did not satisfy me. One hates to take sweet things in driblets, with a spoon, when the soup-ladle is handy.

      "Piety is a thing to be had for praying, fasting, and unlimited devotion. Anybody can have it who grapples the horn of the altar in deadly earnest. In short, if there is anything that everybody on earth has a right to, it's religion. The only aristocracy there is about it, comes when one reaches the high point of perfect sanctification—a state that some people do reach, though it is sometimes so difficult to point out the particular person."

      "Ah, indeed!" said he. "But I have penetration, madam, great penetration. Do not torture your sensitive modesty by an attempt to conceal extraordinary perfection from one who can so fully appreciate it, and who grieves to say how uncommon it is."

      I said nothing, but dropped my eyes, and sat up straighter than ever.

      "Permit me," says my polite fellow-traveller, gently laying his hand on my satchel; "this is too heavy for the lap of a delicate female. Supposing we place it side by side with mine under the seat?"

      I held on to the satchel, afraid that he might mash one of the turn-over pies.

      "Do allow me. I really tremble to see a person so formed by nature borne down by such a weight," says my fellow-traveller, with great impressiveness. "It isn't to be thought of."

      "But—but I don't feel the weight so very much," says I, loosening my grip a trifle.

      "But, my dear madam, remember that the life and health of a person like you is of consequence to the whole universe. Remember the siotic nerve."

      "The what nerve?" says I.

      "Siotic," says he. "That nerve which is so tender in very pious people. They say that the Pope has been suffering agonies with it."

      "Dear me," says I, "is it anything mixed up with a heart disease?"

      "Not at all; it is a strain upon the great sensitive nerve that runs like a whip-cord from I don't know where down the back of the le—"

      Oh! sisters, he almost had that terrible word out, but I gave such a start and blushed so that he turned it right round on his tongue, and says he with great emphasis, "limb."

      "Oh!" says I, with a gasp of relief, "now you speak so that a modest New England woman can understand. So there is a nerve!"

      "Peculiarly susceptible in religious and intellectual persons," says he.

      "Running down the limb!" says I.

      "Both limbs," says he, "which a weight carried on the lap is sure to exasperate if it does not end in kinking up the siotic and crippling the l—limbs."

      "Are you a doctor?" says I.

      He smiled.

      "A sort of one," says he, and, without more words, he took my satchel and sat it down by his, under the seat, as sociable as could be.

      After that, he took hold of my hand, as if he was a-going to feel my pulse, looking sweetly anxious.

      "Is there a siotic there?" says I.

      He gave my hand a hard squeeze, and seemed to ruminate.

      "It takes a little time to discover," says he, half closing his eyes. "Be tranquil; there is no danger now. The arm has been in one position rather too long; change was necessary. But this is a change."

      Then he gave my hand another squeeze, and, leaning back, shut his eyes entirely.

      That minute the engine gave out a sharp yell that nearly scared me to death. The cars heaved a jerk and a jolt, the man on the platform sung out something, and before I could say Jack Robinson, my fellow-passenger made a dive under the seat, dragged out his satchel, and made for the door, bowing as he went, and hustling out something about its being his station.

      While I was a-staring after him with all the eyes in my head, the cars gave another jerk, and, splash-bang, away we went, so fast that the man scooting along that platform, waving his hand backwards, seemed to be swimming in fog.

      Sisters, I must say that a feeling of lonesomeness fell upon me after he went; his conversation had been so scientific and interesting that I felt the loss.

      Besides that, I felt a little hungry, and thought I'd take a bite of something to eat. So I stooped down, lifted the satchel to my lap, and tried to open it.

      The lock, it seemed to me, had got a stubborn twist, and wouldn't open; just then the conductor came along, and I gave him a pitiful look.

      "Please, sir, help me a little," says I; "it won't open all I can do."

      The conductor came forward, snatched hold of the satchel, and wrenched it open.

      "Thank you," says I, lifting my eyes to his gaze, and diving my hand down into the satchel, for I meant to give him a doughnut for his politeness; but instead of that luscious cake, my hands sank into a half peck of sawdust packed close in the satchel my fellow-passenger had left behind.

      "Look there," says I; "isn't it dreadful, and I an unprotected female?"

      "Was your money in the bag?" asks the conductor.

      "No," says I, putting one hand up to my bosom, to make sure it was safe. "I always keep my money where—no matter, the—the handsome upstart will have a splendid feast of turnovers and doughnuts, besides a lively drink of cider; but as for money, that is in a safe place."

      "And your ticket?"

      "That," says I, "not being private property, like money, is kept handier."

      With that, I took the ticket from inside of my glove and handed it to him.

      "All right," says he, "the scamp hasn't made so much of a haul as he expected."

      "But he'll have a sumptuous meal," says I, a little down in the mouth; for I was growing hungry, and not a bite left. Just then a boy came into the cars with a basketful of popped corn on his arm. It looked awfully tempting, for every kernel was turned wrong side out, white as snow. I bought a popped corn of the boy, and pacified myself with that till the cars stopped ten minutes, where there was a mean chance to get something more substantial to eat. I went in with the crowd, helter skelter; wrestled my way to a long counter, got a cup of tea which I swallowed scalding hot, and, after a hard struggle for it, carried a wedge of custard pie off with the palm of my hand for a plate, and skivered back to the cars, nibbling it as I ran; for the bell