Autobiography Of An Automaton

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Title:     Autobiography Of An Automaton
Author: John S. Adams [More Titles by Adams]

EARLY one bright summer morning, as I was perambulating beneath those noble trees that stand the body-guard of one of the most beautiful places of which city life can boast,--Boston Common,--I encountered a man who attracted my special attention by his apparent carelessness of action, and humble bearing. He looked dejected likewise, and I seated myself on the stone seat beside him.

He took me by the sleeve of my coat, and whispered in my ear, "I'm an Automaton, sir." A few more words passed between us, after which, at my request, he gave me a sketch of his life, which I propose to give you in language as nearly his own as possible.

"I was born. I came into this world without any consent of my own, sir, and as soon as I breathed the atmosphere of this mundane state I was bandaged and pinned, and felt very much as a mummy might be supposed to feel. I was then tossed from Matilda to Jerusha, and from Jerusha to Jane, and from Jane to others and others. I tried to laugh, but found I could n't; so I tried to cry, and succeeded most admirably in my effort.

"'He's sick,' said my aunt; and my aunt called a doctor, who, wise man, called for a slip of paper and an errand-boy.

"The next I knew, my head was being held by my aunt, and the doctor was pouring down my throat, which he distended with the handle of a spoon, a bitter potion; pouring it down without any consent of my own, sir.

"Whether I got better or worse I don't know; but I slept for a time, and had a strange dream, of a strange existence, upon which I seemed to have suddenly entered.

"The subsequent year was one in which I figured not largely, but considerably. I made a noise in the world, and was flattered so much by my mother's acquaintances that my nose has been what is vulgarly called 'a pug,' ever since. I did n't have my own way at all, except when I screamed. In that I was not an Automaton. I was myself in that particular; and the more restraint they put upon me, the more freedom I had. I cried independently of all my aunts and cousins. They could n't dictate me in that.

"Years passed on, and I grew older, as a matter of course. I grew without any consent of my own, sir, and found myself in jacket and trousers ditto. I was sent to school, and was told to study Greek and Latin, and Algebra, and Pneumatics, and Hydrostatics, and a dozen or twenty other things, the very names of which I have forgotten, but which I well remember bothered me considerably in those days. I had much rather have studied the laws of my own being; much rather have examined and become acquainted with the architecture of my own bodily frame; much rather have studied something more intimately connected with the realities of my own existence; but they made me study what was repulsive to my own mind, and speak big words which I did n't understand, and which my teacher could n't explain without the aid of a dictionary.

"My parents labored under the strange delusion that I was a wonderful child. I don't know why, unless it was because I did n't know anything of life, and I could repeat a little Latin, stumble through a sentence of Greek, and, after having solved a problem seventy-six thousand times to show my wonderful precociousness, could do it again when called upon. Perhaps I'm extravagant. It was n't more than half that number of times. At any rate, sir, I was thought a prodigy--a most astonishing intellectual--I don't know what,--call it mushroom,--because what I had done so many times I could do again.

"I recollect there was a little youngster of my acquaintance,--a charming, flaxen-haired, blue-eyed boy,--who told me, one day, that he did n't care for the dead languages, he had rather know the live ones. I thought so too, and we talked a long time, down behind old Turner's barn, about what should be and what should n't. But I had to go home. I had to be pulled about, this arm with this wire, and that foot with that wire. I had to do this and that, to study this and study that, because-why, because I was an Automaton, sir. I was born such. 'T was in my bones to be an Automaton.

"My school-days passed, and the minister told my father that if he was him he'd send me to college. He-my father-did n't sleep any, that night. He and my mother kept awake till daylight prognosticating my career, and fixing upon a day when I should go to Cambridge.

"That day came. I remember it was a cloudy day. There was a dull shadow over everything. Yes, even over my heart. I didn't want to go to college. I knew I hadn't been allowed to learn anything I wanted to learn out of it; and I knew I should n't do any better shut up within its old dingy, musty, brick walls. I knew I should n't learn anything there. I had rather be out in the world. I had rather be studying in Nature's great college. I had rather graduate with a diploma from God, written on my heart, than to waste years of life away from the great school of human life; to be told by another how I should go, what I should believe, and how I should act, in the great drama of life. But I had to go, sir,--go to college; for I was an Automaton.

"As I before said, the day was cloudy. Mother dressed me up. For a week preparations had been making for my exit, and finally I went. I was put in a stage where three men were smoking. I objected, and intimated that it would be much better if those who smoked rode on the outside; but my father said, 'hush,' and told me that smoking was common at college, and I must get used to it. When the stage stopped to change horses, the men got out, and swore, and drank brandy; and I asked whether such things were common at college, and whether I had got to get used to them too. But I could n't get any answer.

"The wind blew cold, but my coat was made so small that I could n't button it together. I would have had it loose and easy, and warm and comfortable; but 't was n't fashionable to have it so. Father followed fashion, and I suffered from the cold. I had a nice, soft cap, that I used to wear to church at home; but father thought that, as I was going to the city, I must have a hat; so he had bought me one, and the hard, stiff, ungainly thing was stuck on my head. I had as lieves have had a piece of stove-pipe there. It made my head ache awfully.

"If I had n't been what I was, I should have worn a nice, easy pair of shoes; but I was an Automaton. I was n't anybody; so I was made to wear a pair of thin boots, that clung to my feet a great deal closer than my skin did,--a great deal, sir.

"Well, we reached Cambridge. It's a pretty place, you know; and I rather liked it until I arrived at the college buildings. Then I did n't like the looks of anything, except the green trees, and the grass, and the shady walks. And I wondered where I could learn the most useful knowledge, within or without the college.

"I was ushered in, and my college life began. To narrate to you all that made up that life, would be irksome to me and tedious to you. I was taught much that I didn't believe then, and don't believe now, and don't think I ever shall. I was made to subscribe to certain forms, and with my lips to adopt certain views, which my heart all the time rebelled against, and reason told me were false. But I said I believed, and I did believe after the fashion of the times; for I believe it's fashionable to believe what you don't know anything about, and the more of this belief you have the better you are. So I believed what my teachers told me, because-why, because I was an Automaton.

"When I returned home, I found myself, quite unexpectedly, a lion. All the neighbors flocked in to see the young man who'd been to college, and in the evening a dozen young ladies--marriageable young ladies--called on me. I tried to have a pleasant time; and should have had, if I had n't been pulled and pushed, and made a puppet-show of; made to go through all my college exercises, to please the pride of my immediate relatives, and minister to the wonder-loving souls of their friends. But, though I did n't want to do all this, though I had much preferred to have sat down and had a quiet talk with one or two,--talked over all that had taken place during my absence, our lives and loves,--yet I was obliged to, sir. I was an Automaton.

"One day,--it was but a week after I had returned,--my father took me into his room, and said he had something to say to me. I knew very well, before he said so, that something out of the usual course was to take place; for, all the morning, he had been as serious and reserved as a deacon at a funeral, and I had caught him holding sly talks with my mother in out-of-the-way places.-I knew something was to happen.

"I sat down, and he did. And then he went on to say that I had probably had some thoughts of marriage. I merely responded, 'Some.'

"He then remarked that every young man should calculate to get a wife and settle down; and that 'old folks' had had experience, and knew a vast deal more about such things than young folks did; and that the latter, when they followed the advice of the former, always were well-to-do in the world, always were respected.

"I began to see what he was driving at. I looked very serious at him, and he a great deal more so at me.

"He talked to me half an hour; it was the longest half-hour I had known since I first measured time. He expatiated on the wisdom of old people; told me I was inexperienced. I, who had been to college! I, who had lived a city life! I was inexperienced! But I let him go on-I could n't help it-you know what I was.

"He then drew his chair closer mine, lowered the tone of his voice, and said,

"'I've picked out a wife for you. It's Squire Parsons' daughter, Susan Jane Maria. She'll be an excellent wife to you, and mother to your children.'

"If I had been anything else than what I was, I should have sprang up and declared my own ability to choose a wife for me and 'a mother for my children;' but I did n't do any such thing. I nodded a calm assent to all he said; for you know, sir; I was an Automaton.

"I was to go with my father, that night, and see Susan,--she that was to be my Susan,--O, no, not so; I was to be her Jacob. So, when tea was over, and I had been 'fixed up,'-I was fixed, I tell you,--father led the way over Higginses' rough pasture. I should have gone round, in the road, where it was decent walking, if I had been anybody; but I was n't any one; I was a--well, you know what. I got one of my boots full of water, and father fell down and bruised his nose; but I took off my boot and poured the water out, and he put a piece of court-plaster on his nose,--a great black piece,--and we did n't look as bad as we might, so he said; and so I said, 'of course.'

"Susan was at home, seated in the middle of a great room, as if on exhibition; and perhaps she was,--I thought so. I had seen Susan before, and always disliked her. There was nothing in her personal appearance, or her mind, that pleased me. I never met her without marking her future life as that of an old maid. But she was to be my wife; father said so, mother shouted amen; and I was to love her, and so I said I did, 'of course.'

"It seemed to me that she knew all about what I came for; for she put out her little slim hand, that never made a loaf of bread nor held a needle, but had only fingered the leaves of Greek and Latin Lexicons, and volumes of Zoology and Ornithology, and thrummed piano-keys,--all very well in their place (don't think I depreciate them), but very bad when their place is so large that there's no room for anything else,--very bad, sir.

"As she took my hand she attempted to kiss me; but, being rather shy, I dodged when I saw her lips a-coming, and they went plump on to father's nose, and exploded on his piece of court-plaster.

"It was all fixed that night, and I was to be married one week from the ensuing Sunday.

"We went home. I received a smile from those who were so considerate as to hunt me up a wife.

"If you'd seen the Greentown Gazette a fortnight after, and had looked at the list of marriages, you might have read, 'Married: In this town, by Rev. Ebenezer Pilgrade, Mr. Jacob Jenkins, Jr. (recently from college), to Susan Jane Maria Parsons, estimable daughter of Nehemiah Q. Parsons; all of this place.'

"We lived at home. My wife soon found out what I was, found out that I was an Automaton, and she pulled the wires and put me in motion, in any way she wished. I opened an office, put out a sign, and for a time practised law and physic, and when the minister was sick took his place and preached. I preached just what they wanted me to. I felt more like an Automaton than ever, stuck up in a high box, talking just what had been talked a thousand times from the same place. It would n't do, I was told, to have any ideas of my own; and, if had them, I must n't speak them. So my parish and me got along pretty well.

"Of course I had joined the church. I was told that I must, and so I did; but I won't tell you what my thoughts were in regard to what I was told to believe, for that's delicate ground. I don't know what your religion is, sir, and I might offend you, and I would n't do so for the world. You see I am an Automaton yet. I'll do just as you want me to. I hate to be so; but, somehow or other, I can't be otherwise. It's my nature.

"You think I'm prosy. I won't say much more, for I see you take out your watch as though you wished I'd stop, that you might go; so I'll close with 'finally,' as I do in preaching.

"Well, then, finally, father died, mother died, Susan run off, and I've become almost discouraged. I have three children to take care of, but they are good children. They do just precisely as I tell them, and won't do anything without asking me whether it's right; and I ask somebody else. They have n't got any minds of their own, any more than I have. They'll do just as I tell them. I've nobody in particular now to tell me what I shall do; so I take everybody's advice, and try to do as everybody wants me to do. I've come to Boston on a visit, and shall go back to-night, if you think best.

"Now I've given you my autobiography. You can do just what you want to with it,--print it, if you like. People, perhaps, will laugh at me when they read it; but perhaps there are other Automatons besides me."

He came to a full stop here; and, as it was getting late, I arose, wished him well, bade him good-by, and left. I had proceeded but a few steps, when I felt a touch on my shoulder, and, turning, found it was the Automaton, who had come to ask me whether I thought he had better go home that night.

[The end]
John S. Adams's short story: Autobiography Of An Automaton

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