and the next mornin' we
sallied out some as we would if we had jest landed on the shores of
another planet to explore a new world.

We walked through the streets by big gardens that seemed jest ablaze
with color and swoonin' with perfume. The low white houses wuz banked
up with drifts of blossom and verdure as the Jonesville houses wuz
with snow drifts on a winter day. Sweet voiced birds in gayest plumage
swung and soared aloft instead of the ice-suckles that hung from the
eaves of Jonesville houses. And instead of Ury clad in a buffalo coat
and striped wool mittens walking with icy whiskers and frost-bitten
ears to break the ice in the creek, wuz the gay crowd of men, wimmen
and children dressed in all the rich colors of the rainbow, if they
wuz dressed at all. Solid purple, yellow, green, burnin' colors
palpitating with light and cheer under the warm breezes and glowin'
sunshine.

Sometimes the children wuz in jest the state that Adam and Eve wuz
when they wuz finished off and pronounced good. Sometimes a string and
a red rag comprised their toilette, but they all seemed a part of the
strange picture, the queer, mysterious, onknown Orient. The gorgeous
colorin' of the men's apparel struck Josiah to the heart agin; he
vowed that he would show Jonesville the way for men to dress if he
ever got home agin. Sez he, "I will show Deacon Henzy and Uncle Sime
Bentley that a man can wear sunthin' besides that everlastin' black or
gray." Sez he:

"I can dress gay with small expense; I can take one of your white
woolen sheets and color it with diamond dye a bright red or a green or
yeller at a outlay of ten cents per sheet, and one of my bandannas
will make a crackin' good turban. Let me walk into the Jonesville
meetin' house with that gorgeous drapery wropped round me, why I
should be the lion of the day."

"Yes," sez I, "you would break up the congregation as quick as a real
lion would."

"Well, I'll tell you, Samantha, there is beauty in such a costoom that
our sombry coats and pantaloons and vests can't come nigh to."

I spoze Ceylon is the most beautiful place in the world, such glow and
richness of color, such aboundin' life in the verdure, in the animal
and vegetable kingdom. No wonder so many think it wuz the original
Garden of Eden; no shovelin' snow for Adam or bankin' up fruits and
vegetables for winter's use. No, he could step out barefoot in the
warm velvety grass in December, and pick oranges and gather swee