The Idyl of Red Gulch

"The Idyl of Red Gulch" is a concise novella by Bret Harte, set in the American West during the gold rush era. The story explores life in a small mining town, focusing on the interactions and relationships between its quirky inhabitants. Through a blend of humor and poignancy, Harte captures the essence of frontier life, highlighting themes of love, aspiration, and the complexities of human nature. The narrative features vivid descriptions and rich characterizations, showcasing Harte's signature style and his ability to evoke the spirit of a rapidly changing landscape.

• Short story

								
Sandy was very drunk. He was lying under an azalea bush, in pretty much
the same attitude in which he had fallen some hours before. How long
he had been lying there he could not tell, and didn't care; how long
he should lie there was a matter equally indefinite and unconsidered.
A tranquil philosophy, born of his physical condition, suffused and
saturated his moral being.

The spectacle of a drunken man, and of this drunken man in particular,
was not, I grieve to say, of sufficient novelty in Red Gulch to
attract attention. Earlier in the day some local satirist had erected a
temporary tombstone at Sandy's head, bearing the inscription, "Effects
of McCorkle's whisky--kills at forty rods," with a hand pointing to
McCorkle's saloon. But this, I imagine, was, like most local satire,
personal; and was a reflection upon the unfairness of the process
rather than a commentary upon the impropriety of the result. With this
facetious exception, Sandy had been undisturbed. A wandering mule,
released from his pack, had cropped the scant herbage beside him, and
sniffed curiously at the prostrate man; a vagabond dog, with that deep
sympathy which the species have for drunken men, had licked his dusty
boots, and curled himself up at his feet, and lay there, blinking one
eye in the sunlight, with a simulation of dissipation that was ingenious
and doglike in its implied flattery of the unconscious man beside him.

Meanwhile the shadows of the pine trees had slowly swung around until
they crossed the road, and their trunks barred the open meadow with
gigantic parallels of black and yellow. Little puffs of red dust, lifted
by the plunging hoofs of passing teams, dispersed in a grimy shower upon
the recumbent man. The sun sank lower and lower; and still Sandy stirred
not. And then the repose of this philosopher was disturbed, as other
philosophers have been, by the intrusion of an unphilosophical sex.

"Miss Mary," as she was known to the little flock that she had just
dismissed from the log schoolhouse beyond the pines, was taking her
afternoon walk. Observing an unusually fine cluster of blossoms on the
azalea bush opposite, she crossed the road to pluck it--picking her
way through the red dust, not without certain fierce little shivers of
disgust and some feline circumlocution. And then she came suddenly upon
Sandy!

Of course she uttered the little staccato cry of her sex. But when she
had paid that tribute to her physical weakness she became overbold, and
halted for a moment--at least six feet from this prostrate monster--with
her white skirts gathered in her hand, ready for flight. But neither
sound nor motion came from the bush. With one little foot she then
overturned the satirical headboard, and muttered "Beasts!"--an epithet
which probably, at that moment, conveniently classified in her mind the
entire male population of Red Gulch. For Miss Mary, being possessed of
certain rigid notions of her own, had not, perhaps, properly appreciated
the demonstrative gallantry for which the Californian has been so justly
celebrated by his brother Californians, and had, as a newcomer, perhaps
fairly earned the reputation of being "stuck-up."

As she stood there she noticed, also, that the slant sunbeams were
heating Sandy's head to what she judged to be an unhealthy temperature,
and that his hat was lying uselessly at his side. To pick it up and to
place it over his face was a work requiring some courage, particularly
as his eyes were open. Yet she did it, and made good her retreat. But
she was somewhat concerned, on looking back, to see that the hat was
removed, and that Sandy was sitting up and saying something.

The truth was, that in the calm depths of Sandy's mind he was satisfied
that the rays of the sun were beneficial and healthful; that from
childhood he had objected to lying down in a hat; that no people but
condemned fools, past redemption, ever wore hats; and that his right
to dispense with them when he pleased was inalienable. This was the
statement of his inner consciousness. Unfortunately, its outward
expression was vague, being limited to a repetition of the following
formula--"Su'shine all ri'! Wasser maar, eh? Wass up, su'shine?"

Miss Mary stopped, and, taking fresh courage from her vantage of
distance, asked him if there was anything that he wanted.

"Wass up? Wasser maar?" continued Sandy, in a very high key.

"Get up, you horrid man!" said Miss Mary, now thoroughly incensed; "get
up, and go home."

Sandy staggered to his feet. He was six feet high, and Miss Mary
trembled. He started forward a few paces and then stopped.

"Wass I go home for?" he suddenly asked, with great gravity.

"Go and take a bath," replied Miss Mary, eying his grimy person with
great disfavor.

To her infinite dismay, Sandy suddenly pulled off his coat and vest,
threw them on the ground, kicked off his boots, and, plunging wildly
forward, darted headlong over the hill, in the direction of the river.

"Goodness heavens!--the man will be drowned!" said Miss Mary; and then,
with feminine inconsistency, she ran back to the schoolhouse and locked
herself in.

That night, while seated at supper with her hostess, the blacksmith's
wife, it came to Miss Mary to ask, demurely, if her husband ever got
drunk. "Abner," responded Mrs. Stidger, reflectively, "let's see: Abner
hasn't been tight since last 'lection." Miss Mary would have liked to
ask if he preferred lying in the sun on these occasions, and if a cold
bath would have hurt him; but this would have involved an explanation,
which she did not then care to give. So she contented herself with
opening her gray eyes widely at the red-cheeked Mrs. Stidger--a fine
specimen of Southwestern efflorescence--and then dismissed the subject
altogether. The next day she wrote to her dearest friend, in Boston:
"I think I find the intoxicated portion of this community the least
objectionable. I refer, my dear, to the men, of course. I do not know
anything that could make the women tolerable."

In less than a week Miss Mary had forgotten this episode, except that
her afternoon walks took thereafter, almost unconsciously, another
direction. She noticed, however, that every morning a fresh cluster of
azalea blossoms appeared among the flowers on her desk. This was not
strange, as her little flock were aware of her fondness for flowers, and
invariably kept her desk bright with anemones, syringas, and lupines;
but, on questioning them, they one and all professed ignorance of the
azaleas. A few days later, Master Johnny Stidger, whose desk was nearest
to the window, was suddenly taken with spasms of apparently gratuitous
laughter that threatened the discipline of the school. All that Miss
Mary could get from him was, that someone had been "looking in the
winder." Irate and indignant, she sallied from her hive to do battle
with the intruder. As she turned the corner of the schoolhouse she came

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