Free Joe and Other Georgian SketchesHarris, Joel Chandler
General
Free Joe and Other Georgian Sketches
Harris, Joel Chandler
Georgia -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
As for Mrs. Tomlinson--the habit is still strong in me to call her
Harriet Bledsoe--I think that in her secret soul she had an
ineradicable contempt for Trunion's extraordinary business energy. I
think his "push and vim," as the phrase goes, shocked her sense of
propriety to a far greater extent than she would have been willing to
admit. But she had little time to think of these matters; for she had
taken possession of her grandson, Master Addison Tomlinson Trunion, and
was absorbed in his wild and boisterous ways, as grandmothers will be.
This boy, a brave and manly little fellow, had Trunion's temper, but he
had inherited the Tomlinson air. It became him well, too, and I think
Trunion was proud of it.
"I am glad," said I, in parting, "that I have seen Aunt Fountain's
Prisoner."
"Ah!" said he, looking at his wife, who smiled and blushed, "that was
during the war. Since then I have been a Prisoner of Peace."
I do not know what industrial theories Trunion has impressed on his
neighborhood by this time; but he gave me a practical illustration of
the fact that one may be a Yankee and a Southerner too, simply by being
a large-hearted, whole-souled American.
TROUBLE ON LOST MOUNTAIN
THERE is no doubt that when Miss Babe Hightower stepped out on the
porch, just after sunrise one fine morning in the spring of 1876, she
had the opportunity of enjoying a scene as beautiful as any that nature
offers to the human eye. She was poised, so to speak, on the shoulder of
Lost Mountain, a spot made cheerful and hospitable by her father's
industry, and by her own inspiring presence. The scene, indeed, was
almost portentous in its beauty. Away above her the summit of the
mountain was bathed in sunlight, while in the valley below the shadows
of dawn were still hovering--a slow-moving sea of transparent gray,
touched here and there with silvery reflections of light. Across the
face of the mountain that lifted itself to the skies, a belated cloud
trailed its wet skirts, revealing, as it fled westward, a panorama of
exquisite loveliness. The fresh, tender foliage of the young pines,
massed here and there against the mountain side, moved and swayed in the
morning breeze until it seemed to be a part of the atmosphere, a
pale-green mist that would presently mount into the upper air and melt
away. On a dead pine a quarter of a mile away, a turkey-buzzard sat with
wings outspread to catch the warmth of the sun; while far above him,
poised in the illimitable blue, serene, almost motionless, as though
swung in the centre of space, his mate overlooked the world. The wild
honeysuckles clambered from bush to bush, and from tree to tree,
mingling their faint, sweet perfume with the delicious odors that seemed
to rise from the valley, and float down from the mountain to meet in a
little whirlpool of fragrance in the porch where Miss Babe Hightower
stood. The flowers and the trees could speak for themselves; the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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