Sketches New and Old Page 7

  THE STORY OF THE GOOD LITTLE BOY--[Written about 1865]

  Once there was a good little boy by the name of Jacob Blivens. He alwaysobeyed his parents, no matter how absurd and unreasonable their demandswere; and he always learned his book, and never was late atSabbath-school. He would not play hookey, even when his sober judgmenttold him it was the most profitable thing he could do. None of the otherboys could ever make that boy out, he acted so strangely. He wouldn'tlie, no matter how convenient it was. He just said it was wrong to lie,and that was sufficient for him. And he was so honest that he was simplyridiculous. The curious ways that that Jacob had, surpassed everything.He wouldn't play marbles on Sunday, he wouldn't rob birds' nests, hewouldn't give hot pennies to organ-grinders' monkeys; he didn't seem totake any interest in any kind of rational amusement. So the other boysused to try to reason it out and come to an understanding of him, butthey couldn't arrive at any satisfactory conclusion. As I said before,they could only figure out a sort of vague idea that he was "afflicted,"and so they took him under their protection, and never allowed any harmto come to him.

  This good little boy read all the Sunday-school books; they were hisgreatest delight. This was the whole secret of it. He believed in thegood little boys they put in the Sunday-school book; he had everyconfidence in them. He longed to come across one of them alive once;but he never did. They all died before his time, maybe. Whenever heread about a particularly good one he turned over quickly to the end tosee what became of him, because he wanted to travel thousands of milesand gaze on him; but it wasn't any use; that good little boy always diedin the last chapter, and there was a picture of the funeral, with all hisrelations and the Sunday-school children standing around the grave inpantaloons that were too short, and bonnets that were too large, andeverybody crying into handkerchiefs that had as much as a yard and a halfof stuff in them. He was always headed off in this way. He never couldsee one of those good little boys on account of his always dying in thelast chapter.

  Jacob had a noble ambition to be put in a Sunday school book. He wantedto be put in, with pictures representing him gloriously declining to lieto his mother, and her weeping for joy about it; and picturesrepresenting him standing on the doorstep giving a penny to a poorbeggar-woman with six children, and telling her to spend it freely, butnot to be extravagant, because extravagance is a sin; and pictures of himmagnanimously refusing to tell on the bad boy who always lay in wait forhim around the corner as he came from school, and welted him so over thehead with a lath, and then chased him home, saying, "Hi! hi!" as heproceeded. That was the ambition of young Jacob Blivens. He wished tobe put in a Sunday-school book. It made him feel a little uncomfortablesometimes when he reflected that the good little boys always died. Heloved to live, you know, and this was the most unpleasant feature aboutbeing a Sunday-school-book boy. He knew it was not healthy to be good.He knew it was more fatal than consumption to be so supernaturally goodas the boys in the books were; he knew that none of them had ever beenable to stand it long, and it pained him to think that if they put him ina book he wouldn't ever see it, or even if they did get the book outbefore he died it wouldn't be popular without any picture of his funeralin the back part of it. It couldn't be much of a Sunday-school book thatcouldn't tell about the advice he gave to the community when he wasdying. So at last, of course, he had to make up his mind to do the besthe could under the circumstances--to live right, and hang on as long ashe could, and have his dying speech all ready when his time came.

  But somehow nothing ever went right with the good little boy; nothingever turned out with him the way it turned out with the good little boysin the books. They always had a good time, and the bad boys had thebroken legs; but in his case there was a screw loose somewhere, and itall happened just the other way. When he found Jim Blake stealingapples, and went under the tree to read to him about the bad little boywho fell out of a neighbor's apple tree and broke his arm, Jim fell outof the tree, too, but he fell on him and broke his arm, and Jim wasn'thurt at all. Jacob couldn't understand that. There wasn't anything inthe books like it.

  And once, when some bad boys pushed a blind man over in the mud, andJacob ran to help him up and receive his blessing, the blind man did notgive him any blessing at all, but whacked him over the head with hisstick and said he would like to catch him shoving him again, and thenpretending to help him up. This was not in accordance with any of thebooks. Jacob looked them all over to see.

  One thing that Jacob wanted to do was to find a lame dog that hadn't anyplace to stay, and was hungry and persecuted, and bring him home and pethim and have that dog's imperishable gratitude. And at last he found oneand was happy; and he brought him home and fed him, but when he was goingto pet him the dog flew at him and tore all the clothes off him exceptthose that were in front, and made a spectacle of him that was

  astonishing. He examined authorities, but he could not understand thematter. It was of the same breed of dogs that was in the books, but itacted very differently. Whatever this boy did he got into trouble. Thevery things the boys in the books got rewarded for turned out to be aboutthe most unprofitable things he could invest in.

  Once, when he was on his way to Sunday-school, he saw some bad boysstarting off pleasuring in a sailboat. He was filled with consternation,because he knew from his reading that boys who went sailing on Sundayinvariably got drowned. So he ran out on a raft to warn them, but a logturned with him and slid him into the river. A man got him out prettysoon, and the doctor pumped the water out of him, and gave him a freshstart with his bellows, but he caught cold and lay sick abed nine weeks.But the most unaccountable thing about it was that the bad boys in theboat had a good time all day, and then reached home alive and well in themost surprising manner. Jacob Blivens said there was nothing like thesethings in the books. He was perfectly dumfounded.

  When he got well he was a little discouraged, but he resolved to keep ontrying anyhow. He knew that so far his experiences wouldn't do to go ina book, but he hadn't yet reached the allotted term of life for goodlittle boys, and he hoped to be able to make a record yet if he couldhold on till his time was fully up. If everything else failed he had hisdying speech to fall back on.

  He examined his authorities, and found that it was now time for him to goto sea as a cabin-boy. He called on a ship-captain and made hisapplication, and when the captain asked for his recommendations heproudly drew out a tract and pointed to the word, "To Jacob Blivens, fromhis affectionate teacher." But the captain was a coarse, vulgar man, andhe said, "Oh, that be blowed! that wasn't any proof that he knew how towash dishes or handle a slush-bucket, and he guessed he didn't want him."This was altogether the most extraordinary thing that ever happened toJacob in all his life. A compliment from a teacher, on a tract, hadnever failed to move the tenderest emotions of ship-captains, and openthe way to all offices of honor and profit in their gift, it never had inany book that ever HE had read. He could hardly believe his senses.

  This boy always had a hard time of it. Nothing ever came out accordingto the authorities with him. At last, one day, when he was aroundhunting up bad little boys to admonish, he found a lot of them in the oldiron-foundry fixing up a little joke on fourteen or fifteen dogs, whichthey had tied together in long procession, and were going to ornamentwith empty nitroglycerin cans made fast to their tails. Jacob's heartwas touched. He sat down on one of those cans (for he never mindedgrease when duty was before him), and he took hold of the foremost dog bythe collar, and turned his reproving eye upon wicked Tom Jones. But justat that moment Alderman McWelter, full of wrath, stepped in. All the badboys ran away, but Jacob Blivens rose in conscious innocence and beganone of those stately little Sunday-school-book speeches which alwayscommence with "Oh, sir!" in dead opposition to the fact that no boy, goodor bad, ever starts a remark with "Oh, sir." But the alderman neverwaited to hear the rest. He took Jacob Blivens by the ear and turned himaround, and hit him a whack in the rear with the flat o
f his hand; and inan instant that good little boy shot out through the roof and soared awaytoward the sun, with the fragments of those fifteen dogs stringing afterhim like the tail of a kite. And there wasn't a sign of that alderman orthat old iron-foundry left on the face of the earth; and, as for youngJacob Blivens, he never got a chance to make his last dying speech afterall his trouble fixing it up, unless he made it to the birds; because,although the bulk of him came down all right in a tree-top in anadjoining county, the rest of him was apportioned around among fourtownships, and so they had to hold five inquests on him to find outwhether he was dead or not, and how it occurred. You never saw a boyscattered so.--[This glycerin catastrophe is borrowed from a floatingnewspaper item, whose author's name I would give if I knew it.--M. T.]

  Thus perished the good little boy who did the best he could, but didn'tcome out according to the books. Every boy who ever did as he didprospered except him. His case is truly remarkable. It will probablynever be accounted for.