Decoration Day

by Sarah Orne Jewett

I.A week before the thirtieth of May, three friends--John Stover andHenry Merrill and Asa Brown--happened to meet on Saturday evening atBarton's store at the Plains. They were ready to enjoy this idle hourafter a busy week. After long easterly rains, the sun had at last comeout bright and clear, and all the Barlow farmers had been planting.There was even a good deal of ploughing left to be done, the seasonwas so backward.The three middle-aged men were old friends. They had beenschool-fellows, and when they were hardly out of their boyhood the warcame on, and they enlisted in the same company, on the same day, andhappened to march away elbow to elbow. Then came the great experienceof a great war, and the years that followed their return from theSouth had come to each almost alike. These men might have been membersof the same rustic household, they knew each other's history so well.They were sitting on a low wooden bench at the left of the store dooras you went in. People were coming and going on their Saturday nighterrands,--the post-office was in Barton's store,--but the friendstalked on eagerly, without being interrupted, except by an occasionalnod of recognition. They appeared to take no notice at all of theneighbors whom they saw oftenest. It was a most beautiful evening; thetwo great elms were almost half in leaf over the blacksmith's shopwhich stood across the wide road. Farther along were two smallold-fashioned houses and the old white church, with its pretty belfryof four arched sides and a tiny dome at the top. The large cockerel onthe vane was pointing a little south of west, and there was stilllight enough to make it shine bravely against the deep blue easternsky. On the western side of the road, near the store, were theparsonage and the storekeeper's modern house, which had a French roofand some attempt at decoration, which the long-established Barlowpeople called gingerbread-work, and regarded with mingled pride anddisdain. These buildings made the tiny village called Barlow Plains.They stood in the middle of a long narrow strip of level ground. Theywere islanded by green fields and pastures. There were hills beyond;the mountains themselves seemed very near. Scattered about on the hillslopes were farmhouses, which stood so far apart, with their clustersof out-buildings, that each looked lonely, and the pine woods aboveseemed to besiege them all. It was lighter on the uplands than it wasin the valley, where the three men sat on their bench, with theirbacks to the store and the western sky."Well, here we be 'most into June, an' I 'ain't got a bush-bean aboveground," lamented Henry Merrill."Your land's always late, ain't it? But you always catch up with therest on us," Asa Brown consoled him. "I've often observed that yourland, though early planted, was late to sprout. I view it there's agood week's difference betwixt me an' Stover an' your folks, but comefirst o' July we all even up.""'Tis just so," said John Stover, taking his pipe out of his mouth, asif he had a good deal more to say, and then replacing it, as if he hadchanged his mind."Made it extry hard having that long wet spell. Can't none on us takeno day off this season," said Asa Brown; but nobody thought it worthhis while to respond to such evident truth."Next Saturday'll be the thirtieth o' May--that's Decoration Day,ain't it?--come round again. Lord! how the years slip by after you gitto be forty-five an' along there!" said Asa again. "I s'pose some o'our folks'll go over to Alton to see the procession, same's usual.I've got to git one o' them small flags to stick on our Joel's grave,an' Mis' Dexter always counts on havin' some for Harrison's lot. Icalculate to get 'em somehow. I must make time to ride over, but Idon't know where the time's comin' from out o' next week. I wish thewomen folks would tend to them things. There's the spot where EbMunson an' John Tighe lays in the poor-farm lot, an' I did meancertain to buy flags for 'em last year an' year before, but I went an'forgot it. I'd like to have folks that rode by notice 'em for once, ifthey was town paupers. Eb Munson was as darin' a man as ever steppedout to tuck o' drum.""So he was," said John Stover, taking his pipe with decision andknocking out the ashes. "Drink was his ruin; but I wan't one thatcould be harsh with Eb, no matter what he done. He worked hard long'she could, too; but he wan't like a sound man, an' I think he tooksomethin' first not so much 'cause he loved it, but to kind of keephis strength up so's he could work, an' then, all of a sudden, rumclinched with him an' threw him. Eb was talkin' 'long o' me one daywhen he was about half full, an' says he, right out, 'I wouldn't havefell to this state,' says he, 'if I'd had me a home an' a littlefam'ly; but it don't make no difference to nobody, and it's the bestcomfort I seem to have, an' I ain't goin' to do without it. I'm ailin'all the time,' says he, 'an' if I keep middlin' full, I make out tohold my own an' to keep along o' my work.' I pitied Eb. I says to him,'You ain't goin' to bring no disgrace on us old army boys, be you,Eb?' an' he says no, he wan't. I think if he'd lived to get one o'them big fat pensions, he'd had it easier. Eight dollars a month paidhis board, while he'd pick up what cheap work he could, an' then hegot so that decent folks didn't seem to want the bother of him, an' sohe come on the town.""There was somethin' else to it," said Henry Merrill soberly. "Drinkcome natural to him, 'twas born in him, I expect, an' there wan'tnobody that could turn the divil out same's they did in Scriptur'. Hisfather an' his gran'father was drinkin' men; but they was kind-heartedan' good neighbors, an' never set out to wrong nobody. 'Twas thecustom to drink in their day; folks was colder an' lived poorer inearly times, an' that's how most of 'em kept a-goin'. But what stoveEb all up was his disapp'intment with Marthy Peck--her forsakin' ofhim an' marryin' old John Down whilst Eb was off to war. I've alwayslaid it up ag'inst her.""So've I," said Asa Brown. "She didn't use the poor fellow right. Iguess she was full as well off, but it's one thing to show judgment,an' another thing to have heart."There was a long pause; the subject was too familiar to need furthercomment."There ain't no public sperit here in Barlow," announced Asa Brown,with decision. "I don't s'pose we could ever get up anything forDecoration Day. I've felt kind of 'shamed, but it always comes in abusy time; 'twan't no time to have it, anyway, right in lateplantin'.""'Tain't no use to look for public sperit 'less you've got someyourself," observed John Stover soberly; but something had pleased himin the discouraged suggestion. "Perhaps we could mark the day thisyear. It comes on a Saturday; that ain't nigh so bad as bein' in themiddle of the week."Nobody made any answer, and presently he went on,--"There was a time along back when folks was too nigh the war-time togive much thought to the bigness of it. The best fellows was them thathad stayed to home an' worked their trades an' laid up money; but Idon't know's it's so now.""Yes, the fellows that stayed at home got all the fat places, an' whenwe come back we felt dreadful behind the times," grumbled Asa Brown."I remember how 'twas.""They begun to call us heroes an' old stick-in-the-mud just about thesame time," resumed Stover, with a chuckle. "We wa'n't no hand forstrippin' woodland nor even tradin' hosses them first few years. Idon' know why 'twas we were so beat out. The best most on us could dowas to sag right on to the old folks. Father he never wanted me to goto the war,--'twas partly his Quaker breed,--an' he used to bedreadful mortified with the way I hung round down here to the storean' loafed round a-talkin' about when I was out South, an' arguin'with folks that didn't know nothin', about what the generals done.There! I see me now just as he see me then; but after I had myboy-strut out, I took holt o' the old farm 'long o' father, an' I'vemade it bounce. Look at them old meadows an' see the herd's grass thatcome off of 'em last year! I ain't ashamed o' my place now, if I didgo to the war.""It all looks a sight bigger to me now than it did then," said HenryMerrill. "Our goin' to the war, I refer to. We didn't sense it no morethan other folks did. I used to be sick o' hearin' their stuff aboutpatriotism and lovin' your country, an' them pieces o' poetry womenfolks wrote for the papers on the old flag, an' our fallen heroes, an'them things; they didn't seem to strike me in the right place; but Itell ye it kind o' starts me now every time I come on the flagsudden,--it does so. A spell ago--'long in the fall, I guess it was--Iwas over to Alton, an' there was a fire company paradin'. They'd gotthe prize at a fair, an' had just come home on the cars, an' I heardthe band; so I stepped to the front o' the store where me an' my womanwas tradin', an' the company felt well, an' was comin' along thestreet 'most as good as troops. I see the old flag a-comin', kind ofblowin' back, an' it went all over me. Somethin' worked round in mythroat; I vow I come near cryin'. I was glad nobody see me.""I'd go to war again in a minute," declared Stover, after anexpressive pause; "but I expect we should know better what we wasabout. I don' know but we've got too many rooted opinions now to makeus the best o' soldiers.""Martin Tighe an' John Tighe was considerable older than the rest, andthey done well," answered Henry Merrill quickly. "We three was theyoungest of any, but we did think at the time we knew the most.""Well, whatever you may say, that war give the country a great start,"said Asa Brown. "I tell ye we just begin to see the scope on't. Therewas my cousin, you know, Dan'l Evins, that stopped with us lastwinter; he was tellin' me that one o' his coastin' trips he was intothe port o' Beaufort lo'din' with yaller-pine lumber, an' he rovedinto an old buryin'-ground there is there, an' he see a stone that hadon it some young Southern fellow's name that was killed in the war,an' under it was, 'He died for his country.' Dan'l knowed how I usedto feel about them South Car'lina goings on, an' I did feel kind o'red an' ugly for a minute, an' then somethin' come over me, an' Isays, 'Well, I don' know but what the poor chap did, Dan Evins, whenyou come to view it all round.'"The other men made no answer."Le's see what we can do this year. I don't care if we be a poorhan'ful," urged Henry Merrill. "The young folks ought to have thegood of it; I'd like to have my boys see somethin' different. Le's gettogether what men there is. How many's left, anyhow? I know there wasthirty-seven went from old Barlow, three-months' men an' all.""There can't be over eight now, countin' out Martin Tighe; he can'tmarch," said Stover. "No, 'tain't worth while." But the others did notnotice his disapproval."There's nine in all," announced Asa Brown, after pondering andcounting two or three times on his fingers. "I can't make us no more.I never could carry figur's in my head.""I make nine," said Merrill. "We'll have Martin ride, an' Jesse Deantoo, if he will. He's awful lively on them canes o' his. An' there'sJo Wade with his crutch; he's amazin' spry for a short distance. Butwe can't let 'em go far afoot; they're decripped men. We'll make 'emall put on what they've got left o' their uniforms, an' we'll scratchround an' have us a fife an' drum, an' make the best show we can.""Why, Martin Tighe's boy, the next to the oldest, is an excellent handto play the fife!" said John Stover, suddenly growing enthusiastic."If you two are set on it, let's have a word with the ministerto-morrow, an' see what he says. Perhaps he'll give out some kind of anotice. You have to have a good many bunches o' flowers. I guess we'dbetter call a meetin', some few on us, an' talk it over first o' theweek. 'Twouldn't be no great of a range for us to take to march fromthe old buryin'-ground at the meetin'-house here up to the poor-farman' round by Deacon Elwell's lane, so's to notice them two stones heset up for his boys that was sunk on the man-o'-war. I expect theynotice stones same's if the folks laid there, don't they?"He spoke wistfully. The others knew that Stover was thinking of thestone he had set up to the memory of his only brother, whose namelessgrave had been made somewhere in the Wilderness."I don't know but what they'll be mad if we don't go by every house intown," he added anxiously, as they rose to go home. "'Tis a terriblescattered population in Barlow to favor with a procession."It was a mild starlit night. The three friends took their separateways presently, leaving the Plains road and crossing the fields byfoot-paths toward their farms.II.The week went by, and the next Saturday morning brought fair weather.It was a busy morning on the farms--like any other; but long beforenoon the teams of horses and oxen were seen going home from work inthe fields, and everybody got ready in haste for the great event ofthe afternoon. It was so seldom that any occasion roused publicinterest in Barlow that there was an unexpected response, and thegreen before the old white meeting-house was covered with countrywagons and groups of people, whole families together, who had come onfoot. The old soldiers were to meet in the church; at half past onethe procession was to start, and on its return the minister was tomake an address in the old burying-ground. John Stover had been firstlieutenant in the war, so he was made captain of the day. A man fromthe next town had offered to drum for them, and Martin Tighe's proudboy was present with his fife. He had a great longing--strange enoughin that peaceful, sheep-raising neighborhood--to go into the army; buthe and his elder brother were the mainstay of their crippled father,and he could not be spared from the large household until a youngerbrother could take his place; so that all his fire and military zealwent for the present into martial tunes, and the fife was asafety-valve for his enthusiasm.The army men were used to seeing each other; everybody knew everybodyin the little country town of Barlow; but when one comrade afteranother appeared in what remained of his accoutrements, they felt theday to be greater than they had planned, and the simple ceremonyproved more solemn than any one expected. They could make no use oftheir every-day jokes and friendly greetings. Their old blue coatsand tarnished army caps looked faded and antiquated enough. One ofthe men had nothing left but his rusty canteen and rifle; but these hecarried like sacred emblems. He had worn out all his army clothes longago, because he was too poor when he was discharged to buy any others.When the door of the church opened, the veterans were not abashed bythe size and silence of the crowd. They came walking two by two downthe steps, and took their places in line as if there were nobodylooking on. Their brief evolutions were like a mystic rite. The twolame men refused to do anything but march as best they could; but poorMartin Tighe, more disabled than they, was brought out and lifted intoHenry Merrill's best wagon, where he sat up, straight and soldierly,with his boy for driver. There was a little flag in the whip-socketbefore him, which flapped gayly in the breeze. It was such a long timesince he had been seen out-of-doors that everybody found him a greatobject of interest, and paid him much attention. Even those who weretired of being asked to contribute to his support, who resented thefact of his having a helpless wife and great family; who alwaysinsisted that with his little pension and hopeless lameness, hisfingerless left hand and failing sight, he could support himself andhis household if he chose,--even those persons came forward now togreet him handsomely and with large approval. To be sure, he enjoyedthe conversation of idlers, and his wife had a complaining way thatwas the same as begging, especially since her boys began to grow upand be of some use; and there were one or two near neighbors who neverlet them really want; so other people, who had cares enough of theirown, could excuse themselves for forgetting him the year round, andeven call him shiftless. But there were none to look askance at MartinTighe on Decoration Day, as he sat in the wagon, with his bleachedface like a captive's, and his thin, afflicted body. He stretched outhis whole hand impartially to those who had remembered and those whohad forgotten both his courage at Fredericksburg and his sorry need inBarlow.Henry Merrill had secured the engine company's large flag in Alton,and now carried it proudly. There were eight men in line, two by two,and marching a good bit apart, to make their line the longer. The fifeand drum struck up gallantly together, and the little procession movedaway slowly along the country road. It gave an unwonted touch of colorto the landscape,--the scarlet, the blue, between the new-ploughedfields and budding roadside thickets, between the wide dim ranges ofthe mountains, under the great white clouds of the spring sky. Suchprocessions grow more pathetic year by year; it will not be so longnow before wondering children will have seen the last. The aging facesof the men, the renewed comradeship, the quick beat of the hearts thatremember, the tenderness of those who think upon old sorrows,--allthese make the day a lovelier and a sadder festival. So men's heartswere stirred, they knew not why, when they heard the shrill fife andthe incessant drum along the quiet Barlow road, and saw the handful ofold soldiers marching by. Nobody thought of them as familiar men andneighbors alone,--they were a part of that army which had saved itscountry. They had taken their lives in their hands and gone out tofight for their country, plain John Stover and Jesse Dean and therest. No matter if every other day in the year they counted for littleor much, whether they were lame-footed and lagging, whether theirfarms were of poor soil or rich.The little troop went in slender line along the road; the crowdedcountry wagons and all the people who went afoot followed MartinTighe's wagon as if it were a great gathering at a country funeral.The route was short, and the long, straggling line marched slowly; itcould go no faster than the lame men could walk.In one of the houses by the roadside an old woman sat by a window, inan old-fashioned black gown, and clean white cap with a prim borderwhich bound her thin, sharp features closely. She had been for a longtime looking out eagerly over the snowberry and cinnamon-rose bushes;her face was pressed close to the pane, and presently she caught sightof the great flag as it came down the road."Let me see 'em! I've got to see 'em go by!" she pleaded, trying torise from her chair alone when she heard the fife, and the womenhelped her to the door, and held her so that she could stand and wait.She had been an old woman when the war began; she had sent sons andgrandsons to the field; they were all gone now. As the men came by,she straightened her bent figure with all the vigor of youth. The fifeand drum stopped suddenly; the colors lowered. She did not heed that,but her old eyes flashed and then filled with tears to see the flaggoing to salute the soldiers' graves. "Thank ye, boys; thank ye!" shecried, in her quavering voice, and they all cheered her. The cheerwent back along the straggling line for old Grandmother Dexter,standing there in her front door between the lilacs. It was one of thegreat moments of the day.The few old people at the poor-house, too, were waiting to see theshow. The keeper's young son, knowing that it was a day of festivity,and not understanding exactly why, had put his toy flag out of thegable window, and there it showed against the gray clapboards like agay flower. It was the only bit of decoration along the veterans' way,and they stopped and saluted it before they broke ranks and went outto the field corner beyond the poor-farm barn to the bit of groundthat held the paupers' unmarked graves. There was a solemn silencewhile Asa Brown went to the back of Tighe's wagon, where such lightfreight was carried, and brought two flags, and he and John Stoverplanted them straight in the green sod. They knew well enough wherethe right graves were, for these had been made in a corner bythemselves, with unwonted sentiment. And so Eben Munson and John Tighewere honored like the rest, both by their flags and by great andunexpected nosegays of spring flowers, daffies and flowering currantand red tulips, which lay on the graves already. John Stover and hiscomrade glanced at each other curiously while they stood singing, andthen laid their own bunches of lilacs down and came away.Then something happened that almost none of the people in the wagonsunderstood. Martin Tighe's boy, who played the fife, had studied wellhis part, and on his poor short-winded instrument now sounded taps aswell as he could. He had heard it done once in Alton at a soldier'sfuneral. The plaintive notes called sadly over the fields, and echoedback from the hills. The few veterans could not look at each other;their eyes brimmed up with tears; they could not have spoken. Nothingcalled back old army days like that. They had a sudden vision of theVirginian camp, the hillside dotted white with tents, the twinklinglights in other camps, and far away the glow of smouldering fires.They heard the bugle call from post to post; they remembered thechilly winter night, the wind in the pines, the laughter of the men.Lights out! Martin Tighe's boy sounded it again sharply. It seemed asif poor Eb Munson and John Tighe must hear it too in their narrowgraves.The procession went on, and stopped here and there at the littlegraveyards on the farms, leaving their bright flags to flutter throughsummer and winter rains and snows, and to bleach in the wind andsunshine. When they returned to the church, the minister made anaddress about the war, and every one listened with new ears. Most ofwhat he said was familiar enough to his listeners; they were used toreading those phrases about the results of the war, the gloriousfuture of the South, in their weekly newspapers; but there never hadbeen such a spirit of patriotism and loyalty waked in Barlow as waswaked that day by the poor parade of the remnant of the Barlowsoldiers. They sent flags to all the distant graves, and proud werethose households who claimed kinship with valor, and could drive orwalk away with their flags held up so that others could see that they,too, were of the elect.III.It is well that the days are long in the last of May, but John Stoverhad to hurry more than usual with his evening work, and then, havingthe longest distance to walk, he was much the latest comer to thePlains store, where his two triumphant friends were waiting for himimpatiently on the bench. They also had made excuse of going to thepost-office and doing an unnecessary errand for their wives, and weretalking together so busily that they had gathered a group about thembefore the store. When they saw Stover coming, they rose hastily andcrossed the road to meet him, as if they were a committee in specialsession. They leaned against the post-and-board fence, after they hadshaken hands with each other solemnly."Well, we've had a great day, ain't we, John?" asked Henry Merrill."You did lead off splendid. We've done a grand thing, now, I tell you.All the folks say we've got to keep it up every year. Everybody had tohave a talk about it as I went home. They say they had no idea weshould make such a show. Lord! I wish we'd begun while there was moreof us!""That han'some flag was the great feature," said Asa Brown generously."I want to pay my part for hirin' it. An' then folks was glad to seepoor old Martin made o' some consequence.""There was half a dozen said to me that another year they was goin' tohave flags out, and trim up their places somehow or 'nother. Folks hasfeelin' enough, but you've got to rouse it," said Merrill."I have thought o' joinin' the Grand Army over to Alton time an'again, but it's a good ways to go, an' then the expense has been o'some consideration," Asa continued. "I don't know but two or threeover there. You know, most o' the Alton men nat'rally went out in therigiments t' other side o' the State line, an' they was in otherbattles, an' never camped nowheres nigh us. Seems to me we ought tohave home feelin' enough to do what we can right here.""The minister says to me this afternoon that he was goin' to arrangean' have some talks in the meetin'-house next winter, an' have some ofus tell where we was in the South; an' one night 'twill be about camplife, an' one about the long marches, an' then about thebattles,--that would take some time,--an' tell all we could about theboys that was killed, an' their record, so they wouldn't be forgot. Hesaid some of the folks must have the letters we wrote home from thefront, an' we could make out quite a history of us. I call ElderDallas a very smart man; he'd planned it all out a'ready, for thebenefit o' the young folks, he said," announced Henry Merrill, in atone of approval."I s'pose there ain't none of us but could add a little somethin',"answered John Stover modestly. "'Twould re'lly learn the young folksa good deal. I should be scared numb to try an' speak from the pulpit.That ain't what the Elder means, is it? Now I was one that had a goodchance to see somethin' o' Washin'ton. I shook hands with PresidentLincoln, an' I always think I'm worth lookin' at for that, if I ain'tfor nothin' else. 'Twas that time I was just out o' hospit'l, an' ableto crawl about some. I've often told you how 'twas I met him, an' hestopped an' shook hands an' asked where I'd been at the front an' howI was gettin' along with my hurts. Well, we'll see how 'tis whenwinter comes. I never thought I had no gift for public speakin', 'less'twas for drivin' cattle or pollin' the house town-meetin' days. Here!I've got somethin' in mind. You needn't speak about it if I tell it toye," he added suddenly. "You know all them han'some flowers that waslaid on to Eb Munson's grave an' Tighe's? I mistrusted you thought thesame thing I did by the way you looked. They come from Marthy Down'sfront yard. My woman told me when we got home that she knew 'em in aminute; there wa'n't nobody in town had that kind o' red flowers buther. She must ha' kind o' harked back to the days when she was MarthyPeck. She must have come over with 'em after dark, or else dreadfulearly in the mornin'."Henry Merrill cleared his throat. "There ain't nothin' half-way 'boutMis' Down," he said. "I wouldn't ha' spoken 'bout this 'less you hadled right on to it; but I overtook her when I was gittin' towards homethis afternoon, an' I see by her looks she was worked up a good deal;but we talked about how well things had gone off, an' she wanted toknow what expenses we'd been put to, an' I told her; and she saidshe'd give five dollars any day I'd stop in for it. An' then she spokeright out. 'I'm alone in the world,' says she, 'and I've got somethin'to do with, an' I'd like to have a plain stone put up to Eb Munson'sgrave, with the number of his rigiment on it, an' I'll pay the bill.'Tain't out o' Mr. Down's money,' she says; ''tis mine, an' I want youto see to it.' I said I would, but we'd made a plot to git some o'them soldiers' headstones that's provided by the government. 'Twas ashame it had been overlooked so long. 'No,' says she; 'I'm goin' topay for Eb's myself.' An' I told her there wouldn't be no objection.Don't ary one o' you speak about it. 'Twouldn't be fair. She was realwell-appearin'. I never felt to respect Marthy so before.""We was kind o' hard on her sometimes, but folks couldn't help it.I've seen her pass Eb right by in the road an' never look at him whenhe first come home," said John Stover."If she hadn't felt bad, she wouldn't have cared one way or t'other,"insisted Henry Merrill. "'Tain't for us to judge. Sometimes folks hasto get along in years before they see things fair. Come; I must begoin' home. I'm tired as an old dog.""It seemed kind o' natural to be steppin' out together again. Strangewe three got through with so little damage, an' so many dropped roundus," said Asa Brown. "I've never been one mite sorry I went out in oldA Company. I was thinkin' when I was marchin' to-day, though, that weshould all have to take to the wagons before long an' do our marchin'on wheels, so many of us felt kind o' stiff. There's one thing,--folkswon't never say again that we can't show no public sperit here in oldBarlow."

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