The Chief Cause Of Anxiety To Honest Wolfert, However, Was The Growing
Prosperity Of The City.
The expenses of living doubled and trebled; but
he could not double and treble the magnitude of his cabbages;
And the
number of competitors prevented the increase of price; thus, therefore,
while every one around him grew richer, Wolfert grew poorer, and he
could not, for the life of him, perceive how the evil was to be
remedied.
This growing care which increased from day to day, had its gradual
effect upon our worthy burgher; insomuch, that it at length implanted
two or three wrinkles on his brow; things unknown before in the family
of the Webbers; and it seemed to pinch up the corners of his cocked hat
into an expression of anxiety, totally opposite to the tranquil,
broad-brimmed, low-crowned beavers of his illustrious progenitors.
Perhaps even this would not have materially disturbed the serenity of
his mind had he had only himself and his wife to care for; but there
was his daughter gradually growing to maturity; and all the world knows
when daughters begin to ripen no fruit or flower requires so much
looking after. I have no talent at describing female charms, else fain
would I depict the progress of this little Dutch beauty. How her blue
eyes grew deeper and deeper, and her cherry lips redder and redder; and
how she ripened and ripened, and rounded and rounded in the opening
breath of sixteen summers, until, in her seventeenth spring, she seemed
ready to burst out of her bodice like a half-blown rose-bud.
Ah, well-a-day! could I but show her as she was then, tricked out on a
Sunday morning in the hereditary finery of the old Dutch clothes-press,
of which her mother had confided to her the key. The wedding dress of
her grandmother, modernized for use, with sundry ornaments, handed down
as heirlooms in the family. Her pale brown hair smoothed with
buttermilk in flat waving lines on each side of her fair forehead. The
chain of yellow virgin gold, that encircled her neck; the little cross,
that just rested at the entrance of a soft valley of happiness, as if
it would sanctify the place. The - but pooh! - it is not for an old man
like me to be prosing about female beauty: suffice it to say, Amy had
attained her seventeenth year. Long since had her sampler exhibited
hearts in couples desperately transfixed with arrows, and true lovers'
knots worked in deep blue silk; and it was evident she began to
languish for some more interesting occupation than the rearing of
sunflowers or pickling of cucumbers.
At this critical period of female existence, when the heart within a
damsel's bosom, like its emblem, the miniature which hangs without, is
apt to be engrossed by a single image, a new visitor began to make his
appearance under the roof of Wolfert Webber. This was Dirk Waldron, the
only son of a poor widow, but who could boast of more fathers than any
lad in the province; for his mother had had four husbands, and this
only child, so that though born in her last wedlock, he might fairly
claim to be the tardy fruit of a long course of cultivation. This son
of four fathers united the merits and the vigor of his sires. If he had
not a great family before him, he seemed likely to have a great one
after him; for you had only to look at the fresh gamesome youth, to see
that he was formed to be the founder of a mighty race.
This youngster gradually became an intimate visitor of the family. He
talked little, but he sat long. He filled the father's pipe when it was
empty, gathered up the mother's knitting-needle, or ball of worsted
when it fell to the ground; stroked the sleek coat of the
tortoise-shell cat, and replenished the teapot for the daughter from
the bright copper kettle that sung before the fire. All these quiet
little offices may seem of trifling import, but when true love is
translated into Low Dutch, it is in this way that it eloquently
expresses itself. They were not lost upon the Webber family. The
winning youngster found marvellous favor in the eyes of the mother; the
tortoise-shell cat, albeit the most staid and demure of her kind, gave
indubitable signs of approbation of his visits, the tea-kettle seemed
to sing out a cheering note of welcome at his approach, and if the sly
glances of the daughter might be rightly read, as she sat bridling and
dimpling, and sewing by her mother's side, she was not a wit behind
Dame Webber, or grimalkin, or the tea-kettle in good-will.
Wolfert alone saw nothing of what was going on. Profoundly wrapt up in
meditation on the growth of the city and his cabbages, he sat looking
in the fire, and puffing his pipe in silence. One night, however, as
the gentle Amy, according to custom, lighted her lover to the outer
door, and he, according to custom, took his parting salute, the smack
resounded so vigorously through the long, silent entry as to startle
even the dull ear of Wolfert. He was slowly roused to a new source of
anxiety. It had never entered into his head, that this mere child, who,
as it seemed but the other day, had been climbing about his knees, and
playing with dolls and baby-houses, could all at once be thinking of
love and matrimony. He rubbed his eyes, examined into the fact, and
really found that while he had been dreaming of other matters, she had
actually grown into a woman, and what was more, had fallen in love.
Here were new cares for poor Wolfert. He was a kind father, but he was
a prudent man. The young man was a very stirring lad; but then he had
neither money or land.
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