Chapter Chapter 22 · 第22章

They swarmed up towards Sherburn’s house, a-whooping and raging like

Injuns, and everything had to clear the way or get run over and tromped

to mush, and it was awful to see. Children was heeling it ahead of the

mob, screaming and trying to get out of the way; and every window along

the road was full of women’s heads, and there was nigger boys in every

tree, and bucks and wenches looking over every fence; and as soon as

the mob would get nearly to them they would break and skaddle back out

of reach. Lots of the women and girls was crying and taking on, scared

most to death.

They swarmed up in front of Sherburn’s palings as thick as they could

jam together, and you couldn’t hear yourself think for the noise. It

was a little twenty-foot yard. Some sung out “Tear down the fence! tear

down the fence!” Then there was a racket of ripping and tearing and

smashing, and down she goes, and the front wall of the crowd begins to

roll in like a wave.

Just then Sherburn steps out on to the roof of his little front porch,

with a double-barrel gun in his hand, and takes his stand, perfectly

ca’m and deliberate, not saying a word. The racket stopped, and the

wave sucked back.

Sherburn never said a word—just stood there, looking down. The

stillness was awful creepy and uncomfortable. Sherburn run his eye slow

along the crowd; and wherever it struck the people tried a little to

out-gaze him, but they couldn’t; they dropped their eyes and looked

sneaky. Then pretty soon Sherburn sort of laughed; not the pleasant

kind, but the kind that makes you feel like when you are eating bread

that’s got sand in it.

Then he says, slow and scornful:

“The idea of _you_ lynching anybody! It’s amusing. The idea of you

thinking you had pluck enough to lynch a _man!_ Because you’re brave

enough to tar and feather poor friendless cast-out women that come

along here, did that make you think you had grit enough to lay your

hands on a _man?_ Why, a _man’s_ safe in the hands of ten thousand of

your kind—as long as it’s daytime and you’re not behind him.

“Do I know you? I know you clear through. I was born and raised in the

South, and I’ve lived in the North; so I know the average all around.

The average man’s a coward. In the North he lets anybody walk over him

that wants to, and goes home and prays for a humble spirit to bear it.

In the South one man all by himself, has stopped a stage full of men in

the daytime, and robbed the lot. Your newspapers call you a brave

people so much that you think you _are_ braver than any other

people—whereas you’re just _as_ brave, and no braver. Why don’t your

juries hang murderers? Because they’re afraid the man’s friends will

shoot them in the back, in the dark—and it’s just what they _would_ do.

“So they always acquit; and then a _man_ goes in the night, with a

hundred masked cowards at his back and lynches the rascal. Your mistake

is, that you didn’t bring a man with you; that’s one mistake, and the

other is that you didn’t come in the dark and fetch your masks. You

brought _part_ of a man—Buck Harkness, there—and if you hadn’t had him

to start you, you’d a taken it out in blowing.

“You didn’t want to come. The average man don’t like trouble and

danger. _You_ don’t like trouble and danger. But if only _half_ a

man—like Buck Harkness, there—shouts ‘Lynch him! lynch him!’ you’re

afraid to back down—afraid you’ll be found out to be what you

are—_cowards_—and so you raise a yell, and hang yourselves on to that

half-a-man’s coat-tail, and come raging up here, swearing what big

things you’re going to do. The pitifulest thing out is a mob; that’s

what an army is—a mob; they don’t fight with courage that’s born in

them, but with courage that’s borrowed from their mass, and from their

officers. But a mob without any _man_ at the head of it is _beneath_

pitifulness. Now the thing for _you_ to do is to droop your tails and

go home and crawl in a hole. If any real lynching’s going to be done, it

will be done in the dark, Southern fashion; and when they come they’ll

bring their masks, and fetch a _man_ along. Now _leave_—and take your

half-a-man with you”—tossing his gun up across his left arm and cocking

it when he says this.

The crowd washed back sudden, and then broke all apart, and went

tearing off every which way, and Buck Harkness he heeled it after them,

looking tolerable cheap. I could a staid if I wanted to, but I didn’t

want to.

I went to the circus and loafed around the back side till the watchman

went by, and then dived in under the tent. I had my twenty-dollar gold

piece and some other money, but I reckoned I better save it, because

there ain’t no telling how soon you are going to need it, away from

home and amongst strangers that way. You can’t be too careful. I ain’t

opposed to spending money on circuses when there ain’t no other way,

but there ain’t no use in _wasting_ it on them.

It was a real bully circus. It was the splendidest sight that ever was

when they all come riding in, two and two, a gentleman and lady, side

by side, the men just in their drawers and undershirts, and no shoes

nor stirrups, and resting their hands on their thighs easy and

comfortable—there must a been twenty of them—and every lady with a

lovely complexion, and perfectly beautiful, and looking just like a

gang of real sure-enough queens, and dressed in clothes that cost

millions of dollars, and just littered with diamonds. It was a powerful

fine sight; I never see anything so lovely. And then one by one they

got up and stood, and went a-weaving around the ring so gentle and wavy

and graceful, the men looking ever so tall and airy and straight, with

their heads bobbing and skimming along, away up there under the

tent-roof, and every lady’s rose-leafy dress flapping soft and silky

around her hips, and she looking like the most loveliest parasol.

And then faster and faster they went, all of them dancing, first one

foot out in the air and then the other, the horses leaning more and

more, and the ring-master going round and round the center-pole,

cracking his whip and shouting “Hi!—hi!” and the clown cracking jokes

behind him; and by-and-by all hands dropped the reins, and every lady

put her knuckles on her hips and every gentleman folded his arms, and

then how the horses did lean over and hump themselves! And so one after

the other they all skipped off into the ring, and made the sweetest bow

I ever see, and then scampered out, and everybody clapped their hands

and went just about wild.

Well, all through the circus they done the most astonishing things; and

all the time that clown carried on so it most killed the people. The

ring-master couldn’t ever say a word to him but he was back at him quick

as a wink with the funniest things a body ever said; and how he ever

_could_ think of so many of them, and so sudden and so pat, was what I

couldn’t noway understand. Why, I couldn’t a thought of them in a year.

And by-and-by a drunk man tried to get into the ring—said he wanted to

ride; said he could ride as well as anybody that ever was. They argued

and tried to keep him out, but he wouldn’t listen, and the whole show

come to a standstill. Then the people begun to holler at him and make

fun of him, and that made him mad, and he begun to rip and tear; so

that stirred up the people, and a lot of men begun to pile down off of

the benches and swarm towards the ring, saying, “Knock him down! throw

him out!” and one or two women begun to scream. So, then, the

ring-master he made a little speech, and said he hoped there wouldn’t be

no disturbance, and if the man would promise he wouldn’t make no more

trouble he would let him ride if he thought he could stay on the horse.

So everybody laughed and said all right, and the man got on. The minute

he was on, the horse begun to rip and tear and jump and cavort around,

with two circus men hanging on to his bridle trying to hold him, and

the drunk man hanging on to his neck, and his heels flying in the air

every jump, and the whole crowd of people standing up shouting and

laughing till tears rolled down. And at last, sure enough, all the

circus men could do, the horse broke loose, and away he went like the

very nation, round and round the ring, with that sot laying down on him

and hanging to his neck, with first one leg hanging most to the ground

on one side, and then t’other one on t’other side, and the people just

crazy. It warn’t funny to me, though; I was all of a tremble to see his

danger. But pretty soon he struggled up astraddle and grabbed the

bridle, a-reeling this way and that; and the next minute he sprung up

and dropped the bridle and stood! and the horse a-going like a house

afire too. He just stood up there, a-sailing around as easy and

comfortable as if he warn’t ever drunk in his life—and then he begun to

pull off his clothes and sling them. He shed them so thick they kind of

clogged up the air, and altogether he shed seventeen suits. And, then,

there he was, slim and handsome, and dressed the gaudiest and prettiest

you ever saw, and he lit into that horse with his whip and made him

fairly hum—and finally skipped off, and made his bow and danced off to

the dressing-room, and everybody just a-howling with pleasure and

astonishment.

Then the ring-master he see how he had been fooled, and he _was_ the

sickest ring-master you ever see, I reckon. Why, it was one of his own

men! He had got up that joke all out of his own head, and never let on

to nobody. Well, I felt sheepish enough to be took in so, but I

wouldn’t a been in that ring-master’s place, not for a thousand dollars.

I don’t know; there may be bullier circuses than what that one was, but

I never struck them yet. Anyways, it was plenty good enough for _me;_

and wherever I run across it, it can have all of _my_ custom every

time.

Well, that night we had _our_ show; but there warn’t only about twelve

people there—just enough to pay expenses. And they laughed all the

time, and that made the duke mad; and everybody left, anyway, before

the show was over, but one boy which was asleep. So the duke said these

Arkansaw lunkheads couldn’t come up to Shakespeare; what they wanted

was low comedy—and maybe something ruther worse than low comedy, he

reckoned. He said he could size their style. So next morning he got

some big sheets of wrapping paper and some black paint, and drawed off

some handbills, and stuck them up all over the village. The bills said:

AT THE COURT HOUSE!

FOR 3 NIGHTS ONLY!

_The World-Renowned Tragedians_

DAVID GARRICK THE YOUNGER!

AND

EDMUND KEAN THE ELDER!

_Of the London and Continental

Theatres_,

In their Thrilling Tragedy of

THE KING’S CAMELOPARD

OR

THE ROYAL NONESUCH!!!

_Admission 50 cents_.

Then at the bottom was the biggest line of all—which said:

LADIES AND CHILDREN NOT ADMITTED.

“There,” says he, “if that line don’t fetch them, I dont know

Arkansaw!”