HER BOSTON 
 EXPERIENCES 
 
 MARGARET ALLSTON 
 
LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 DAVIS 
 

 Bn!.:0ht at 
 
 ilRTRAND SMITH 
 
 140 Pacific Ave. 
 
 LONG BEACH, 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
HIS AMUSED EXPRESSION LENT ME THE COURAGE 
 
 OF INDIGNATION." 
 
 (See pag 
 
HER BOSTON 
 EXPERIENCES 
 
 A Picture of Modern Boston Society 
 and People 
 
 By 
 
 MARGARET ALLSTON 
 
 Illustrated by 
 FRANK O. SMALL 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 L. C. PAGE & COMPANY (INCORPORATED) 
 
 MDCCCC 
 
 LIBRARY 
 JJJNiVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
Copyright, 
 BY THE CURTIS PUBLISHING COMPANY 
 
 Copyright, iqoo 
 BY THE CURTIS PUBLISHING COMPANY 
 
 Copyright, 1900 
 BY L. C. PAGE AND COMPANY 
 
 ^INCORPORATED) 
 All Rights Reserved 
 
 Colonial $reg* 
 
 Electrotyped and Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co. 
 i, Mass., U. S. A. 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 "HIS AMUSED EXPRESSION LENT ME THE 
 
 COURAGE OF INDIGNATION" Frontispiece 
 CHARLES RIVER EMBANKMENT FROM HAR- 
 VARD BRIDGE 20 
 
 THE SYMPHONY REHEARSAL ... 34 
 THE BOSTON PUBLIC LIBRARY . . 44 
 TREMONT STREET MALL IN WINTER . 70 
 
 "A FAIRYLAND OF LIGHT FLAKY SNOW " 78 
 
 A STORMY DAY FOR CHRISTMAS SHOP- 
 PERS . .... . . -83 
 
 " SEE THE BLUE LIGHTS IN HER HAIR ' ". 92 
 TRINITY CHURCH . . . . . 101 
 
 "HE TOOK US TO OUR CARRIAGE" . .127 
 
 KING'S CHAPEL . . . .v . . 131 
 
 OLD GRANARY BURYING-GROUND . .137 
 
 BOSTON ART MUSEUM . . . .152 
 
 CHRIST CHURCH . . . . . 159 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 "I ... DROPPED THE LILIES INTO ONE 
 
 OF HIS HANDS" . . . . .165 
 
 STATUE OF WASHINGTON AT THE EN- 
 TRANCE TO THE PUBLIC GARDEN . 166 
 
 THE PROCESSION AT THE ARTISTS' FES- 
 TIVAL 193 
 
 COMMONWEALTH AVENUE FROM THE PUB- 
 LIC GARDEN 199 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 DURING my first week in Boston I 
 received the impression that I had 
 found my way into a mammoth woman's 
 club where the principal idea was to doubt 
 and weigh every proposition, then disprove 
 it if possible. I was oppressed with the 
 feeling that I alone was always found want- 
 ing, until I discovered how general is the 
 individual failure, how deficient every new- 
 comer appears in the local eye. Being 
 afforded shortly the company misery loves 
 from among other visitors to the city, I 
 plucked up my spirit and faced the club 
 eye with all the force of my Scotch-Eng- 
 lish ancestry. In consequence, I discovered 
 ii 
 
12 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 how near being a bully Boston is ; that if 
 a little boy can fight back the big boy 
 backs down. In truth, Boston had not 
 meant to fight at all, but was "merely in- 
 vestigating my esoteric being for purposes 
 of mutual improvement." 
 
 This attitude is philanthropic and ethical 
 at the root, but its flower is patterned after 
 the edelweiss, or some other materialised 
 form of frozen virtue utterly cold and sug- 
 gestive of a frosted window-pane through 
 which one can see neither daylight nor 
 sunshine. But on closer acquaintance I 
 found, generally speaking, that when the 
 sun melted the frost off of the Boston ex- 
 terior a right warm heart beat far down 
 underneath, and, although its beats were 
 not rapid nor enthusiastic, they were regu- 
 lar and constant, never swerving from an 
 allegiance once taken. 
 
 I was born in New York City, but raised 
 in the West, where my father went for 
 business purposes during my infancy, he 
 himself having been introduced into this 
 world in Boston. My brothers grew up 
 typical Westerners, filled with contempt 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 13 
 
 for any other section of the country, a 
 spirit erroneously imputed exclusively to 
 Boston and Philadelphia, but in truth one 
 that prevails wherever men are successful 
 and happy. Every bit of ground is to the 
 man what he makes it. An outsider can 
 find his jest in sectional patriotism and still 
 respect it. 
 
 The difference between the Boston spirit 
 and that of other localities is that a Bos- 
 tonian feels an exclusive pride intimating 
 satisfaction, minus invitation, while the 
 Westerner blows his trumpet calling every- 
 body else to have a finger in the best pie 
 ever made, thus revealing the touch of 
 metropolitan provincialism in one and the 
 remnant of pioneer spirit in the other. 
 
 And so I went to Boston confirmed in 
 Henry Ward Beecher's creed, " New Eng- 
 land is a good place in which to be born, 
 but the West is the place in which to grow," 
 and I observed at once the reason for the 
 sage's truism. Bostonians have no desire 
 to sprout. As for me, I am by nature a 
 sprouter, born with an interrogation point 
 behind me. 
 
14 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 I was twenty-two years old when I first 
 went to Boston, to visit the family of my 
 father's eldest brother, Mr. John Allston, 
 who at an early age settled into business 
 prosperity in Boston. His wife, once Miss 
 Brasilia Whetmore, was always, as now, 
 my father tells me, undoubtedly a sprig of 
 the Mayflower, whose opinion of anything 
 lying outside of Boston, even as far as the 
 suburbs, was coldly critical to the extent 
 of open hostility. 
 
 Were it possible for one to imagine Aunt 
 Drusilla's refined nasal feature taking so 
 vulgar a tilt, one might insinuate that she 
 and a few other Bostonians turn up their 
 noses at any contemporary not born in 
 Summer Street, reared on Beacon Hill, and 
 married into the water side of Beacon 
 Street. The tide of propriety and pros- 
 perity moved along that channel, hence 
 this egotistical conclusion reached easily by 
 any proper Bostonian fed upon Saturday 
 beans and the Boston Evening Transcript, 
 the journal which directs the Boston minds 
 and morals. 
 
 Uncle John and Aunt Drusilla had two 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 15 
 
 daughters, one older than I, one a year 
 younger. Dorothy, the elder and least 
 proper, had been married a few years when 
 I made that visit, and Elizabeth, the 
 younger, was only just out of college, there- 
 fore in her first season ; while I, but a year 
 her senior, had been a "worldling " for five 
 years. I say worldling rather than society 
 girl, because I failed to take a degree in 
 society. I loved few things better than the 
 world, but my affections bounded it on all 
 sides, not on the one alone of social posi- 
 tion and remote ancestry connected with 
 tea and Pilgrims, which were an old story 
 to me soon after the date of my cradle. 
 Without change of theme and scene I grew 
 restless. Accordingly, my wise parents 
 gave me what I call a liberal education in 
 contradistinction to a college education, 
 with which statement I declare myself a 
 Philistine at the start, for I chose travel 
 instead of school-books. 
 
 My cousins I found as different from 
 each other as I was from them. Dorothy, 
 upon her marriage to a Bostonian, proper 
 in family but almost improper according 
 
1 6 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 to Aunt Drusilla and other ladies of the 
 ancient regime, owing to certain liberal 
 propensities noticeable in the latter-day 
 Bostonian, fell in with Mr. Granger's late 
 hours, the reading of New York papers, 
 intimacies among people who professed the 
 arts, and a tendency to " run across to the 
 other side " every year, with ease and no 
 hesitancy. This form of backsliding irri- 
 tated Aunt Drusilla, who consequently took 
 the more pride in Elizabeth, a girl after her 
 own heart, of studious habits, broad, phil- 
 anthropic views of life, perfectly settled 
 ideas about Platonic friendship and other 
 relations with the opposite sex, and smdl 
 sympathy with the restless, inconsequent 
 habits of the Grangers, who were content 
 to live on Commonwealth Avenue, instead 
 of on Beacon Street. 
 
 The Grangers were thoroughly good- 
 natured with Aunt Drusilla ; it was safe to 
 be so, because her belligerence stopped at 
 the end of her tongue. When I arrived 
 in Boston, late one October day, my rela- 
 tives had just come up from Beverly Farms, 
 where they formed a prominent part of the 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 17 
 
 Back Bay colony settled along the North 
 Shore each summer. Aunt Drusilla told 
 me at once that Dorothy and Frederic sent 
 word for me to go to them at Lenox for a 
 week before settling down in town. " You 
 know," added my aunt, looking an almost 
 insinuating defiance over her spectacles and 
 from under the small white cap she wore in 
 harmony with her plain black silk gown, 
 whose style and cut were as inevitable as 
 Queen Victoria's bonnet, "you know, Mar- 
 garet, or you will soon know, that my eldest 
 daughter and her husband belong to the 
 younger set, with whose indiscretions and 
 light purposeless lives I have no sympathy. 
 One of Dorothy's friends told me not long 
 ago that she held certain infamous modern 
 novels alongside the Bible in her estimation 
 of moral purpose. Any woman who could 
 find a grain of good in an artist's model, or 
 congeniality with Bohemian tastes, is not 
 the woman for my daughters to associate 
 with. I never hesitate to tell Dorothy how 
 I feel about these matters, but with small 
 effect, I fear." 
 
 Aunt Drusilla looked over at Elizabeth 
 
1 8 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 with a sigh. At the moment Elizabeth 
 was reading a note. Presently she said : 
 "Mother, Warren Hartwell writes to an- 
 nounce his return some time after Thanks- 
 giving." 
 
 Aunt Drusilla looked unusually well 
 pleased for her, I thought. " This is inter- 
 esting intelligence, Elizabeth," she replied, 
 and turning to me, continued : " This gen- 
 tleman of whom we speak, Margaret, is a 
 very old friend of our family. He and my 
 daughters were playmates together, even 
 though he is much their senior ; quite as 
 his mother was my playmate on Summer 
 Street, when our parents lived side by side. 
 He went to Europe last spring with Doro- 
 thy, Frederic, and Elizabeth, but did not 
 return with them in September. Dorothy 
 never returns to town until Thanksgiving. 
 The young people of this generation have 
 little or no appreciation of home life." 
 
 I entirely agreed with this last senti- 
 ment, although perhaps not in the spirit 
 emphasised by my aunt. The gifts of the 
 gods seemed to me wasted upon a blunted 
 appreciation. When, late in October, one 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 19 
 
 walks about that part of Boston known as 
 the Back Bay, the part given over to the 
 social and moneyed elect, one must ques- 
 tion the pride of Bostonians in their homes 
 covered with masses of burnished crimson 
 ivy unrivalled even by that celebrated as 
 Nature's embellishment of English homes 
 and ruins. If the owners felt the clear 
 gold of the autumn air as I do they would 
 not leave their homes boarded up until 
 Christmas time and so know Boston only 
 in its ugliest moods, merely to follow the 
 dictates of Mrs. Grundy, whose guidance 
 is seldom in sympathy with Nature's 
 laws. 
 
 Boston is essentially the autumn city of 
 the world. The air is full of sea ; the sky 
 is radiant with sunlight and deep blue or 
 white floating islands ; restful vigour per- 
 meates the atmosphere. One can scarcely 
 help living to one's utmost possibilities at 
 that time of year in this most attractive of 
 cities. Go and stand on Harvard Bridge, 
 looking off toward Boston, half an hour 
 before sunset. See the glorious sky echoed 
 in colours in the waters of the Charles 
 
20 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 River. The sun, still peeping over Corey 
 Hill, shines in at the rear windows of the 
 mile of houses lining the embankment. 
 To the left rises the gilded dome of the 
 State House, surmounting Beacon Hill and 
 its pregnant past ; to the right, see the 
 long sweep of the river down which comes 
 rapidly a boat-crew, stroking skilfully. 
 Behind lie Cambridge and Cambridgeport, 
 less interesting at this point, because of 
 factories, smoke-stacks, and church steeples 
 mingled in a crude, jarring mass at that 
 distance ; and far off at the north Bunker 
 Hill Monument stands out, pointing to the 
 past. But looking only on the Boston side 
 of the picture, what other American city 
 can boast a more picturesque view in the 
 very midst of its habitable quarter ? It 
 was Charlotte Cushman who requested to 
 be buried in such a position that her rest- 
 ing-place might eternally overlook this view 
 of the city she loved best. It is easy to 
 understand the spirit of her desire either 
 when standing beside her grave in Mount 
 Auburn, across the Charles River, or stand- 
 ing thus on Harvard Bridge while the sun 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 2$ 
 
 fades. The views are identical, with only 
 a difference of distance. 
 
 "There may be other cities of beauty 
 and fame, but they are not Boston, just as 
 heaven may be interesting although it is 
 not Boston," cries the native, and standing 
 on that spot even the Philistine echoes the 
 sentiment warmly. 
 
 Boston had been to me, during all my 
 life previous to the period these random 
 reminiscences will cover, a city shrouded in 
 history, in whose streets I expected to meet 
 Concord philosophers recognisable at a 
 glance ; also many people resembling the 
 Alcott family, and at least ghosts of Rev- 
 olutionary heroes. 
 
 My first shock came when I found my 
 relatives distinctly modern and unrom antic, 
 in few ways different from other people. 
 I had seen them too seldom to retain a 
 clear impression of their personality. It 
 was to please my father that I accepted 
 their invitation to spend the winter with 
 them. 
 
 Aunt Drusilla's invariable costume was 
 quaint and suggestive, and her absorption 
 
24 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 in what she called " affairs of serious con- 
 sequence " was typical of the Boston repu- 
 tation, but Uncle John was a business man 
 of regular habits, who marched sedately 
 over Beacon Hill to his office, with his 
 neighbours, at the same minute every day. 
 He lunched so long, sat in his club so long, 
 dined so long, read the Transcript so long, 
 and slept longer. A sense of humour was 
 his only means of diversion. He and I 
 understood each other from the first. 
 When I asked him how the husbands of the 
 Boston women reformers felt about their 
 wives' work, he replied, quizzically : " Ob- 
 serve me, my dear, and draw your conclu- 
 sions. We simply attend the closer to our 
 own business the more they attend to other 
 people's. A balance must be struck on all 
 questions of interference, you know." 
 
 When I met people I listened closely 
 for evidences of unusual "culture." I was 
 accustomed to the jargon of Parisian artist 
 life, to the metaphysics of Germany in a 
 small way, and now was prepared for an ethi- 
 cal conclusion upon all matters from Brown- 
 ing down to pie. Imagine my astonishment 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 2$ 
 
 when I found Uncle John absorbed in 
 stocks and the pre-Raphaelite cult ; aunt 
 in managing the boards of several chari- 
 table institutions and in raising money for 
 the purpose of furnishing newsboys with 
 an extra pair of Sunday trousers ; Eliza- 
 beth in class reunions, the inside workings 
 of " the Pud," otherwise known as the 
 Hasty Pudding Club of Harvard College, 
 and two literary clubs, for which she was 
 writing papers on " Gladstone's Policy " 
 and "The Lassitude of the Feminine Ma- 
 jority," respectively ; Dorothy in her dress- 
 maker, the Country Club, balls and private 
 theatricals, but principally in Spanish poo- 
 dles and fox terriers. Everybody seemed to 
 have an object in life, as I had expected, but 
 what amazing hobbies some of them rode ! 
 Dorothy canvassed canine habits as seri- 
 ously as her mother governed charity or- 
 ganisations. I soon learned how immaterial 
 was the subject in hand provided it were 
 dealt with mentally and seriously. Pups, 
 puddings, or piety were equally absorbing 
 questions. Clothes were not a popular 
 subject, except among individuals ; they 
 
26 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 were taken for granted, as one might easily 
 imagine when observing the population of 
 Boston. Conversation relative to moneyed 
 interests was tabooed among my aunt's 
 friends. Money, also, was taken for 
 granted. Dollars are, in truth, a vulgar 
 subject, and indubitably Bostonians are the 
 most refined among Americans at that 
 point. 
 
 My cousin Elizabeth was considerable 
 of an athlete. Her particular friend was 
 a girl of twenty-three who, after being 
 graduated from the Harvard Annex, took 
 degrees in Hebrew and mathematics at 
 Oxford, England, for no apparent reason, 
 but as a means to higher education in 
 mental gymnastics. She prided herself 
 upon entire ignorance of purely feminine 
 occupations. Her favourite personal nar- 
 rative was a story of how, upon one occa- 
 sion at Oxford, she was going to some 
 affair with a masculine fellow student. As 
 she put on her gloves a button burst its 
 stitches. She was in despair ! Her land- 
 lady was out ; what was she to do ? She 
 never had sewed on a button in her life. 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 2J 
 
 The man said, " Get me a spool of thread 
 and a needle. I will sew it on for you." 
 She found those requisites in her land- 
 lady's sewing-basket, and stood watching 
 the man sew on the button. This she 
 considered a distinctly clever situation, and 
 she never for a moment realised what any 
 one else might think of her position in the 
 matter, or what a disagreeable phase of 
 modern affectation she illustrated. Aunt 
 Drusilla came very near sniffing when she 
 heard this story, but she was too well-con- 
 nected to do that, other than mentally. 
 
 With Elizabeth and this Miss Renshaw, 
 I began my season in Boston by frequent- 
 ing the golf links at the Country Club. 
 Miss Renshaw, being a many-time medalist 
 at the sport, viewed my mediocre and er- 
 ratic playing with open contempt for femi- 
 nine incapacity. She beat " The Colonel " 
 at every chance, and her work with the 
 brassy competed fairly with the men's. 
 Elizabeth and I were steeped in admiration 
 for her skill on the putting green, but I 
 must confess my feeling stopped short 
 there. 
 
28 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 Finally, after a week of preparatory par- 
 tisan enthusiasm, the Harvard- Yale football 
 game came off. Had the country been 
 ce}ebrating the return of heroes from a 
 great military or naval contest, the City of 
 Boston could not have been more excited 
 or generally upset than by the advent of 
 these athletic heroes. The populace, the 
 lap-dogs, and the shops were decorated 
 either in crimson or blue, the respective 
 colours signifying the sympathies of the 
 wearer. Business was carried on with 
 divided interest. Even elderly Bostonians, 
 who had never seen a football game until 
 past their half-century, were eager for the 
 fray. One suburban mother of nine boys 
 declared in print that she sent each of her 
 sons on to the field, regardless of broken 
 noses, as she would have sent them into 
 the tournaments of old, certain of their 
 physical and moral development as the 
 result. 
 
 By noon the electric cars running across 
 Harvard Bridge had no standing-room left, 
 and every Boston ian who could in con- 
 science get to the grounds was on his way 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 2Q 
 
 over in traps, carriages, wagons, on bicycles 
 and, as a last resort, on foot. We went in 
 a party, artd I was so pleased to see actual 
 enthusiasm among a people unsuspected 
 of that characteristic that my attention 
 centred almost entirely upon the spectators 
 and their ardent interest in what proved to 
 be a one-sided and rather tame game. 
 That night the city was given over to the 
 gambols of the successful and defeated 
 heroes, for in football a man is always a 
 hero, regardless of achievements. The 
 entire lower floor of one of the variety 
 theatres was sold out to college men. 
 They attended in a body, and I could not 
 see that anybody was the better for that 
 fact the next day ; however, the lads had 
 opportunities to do worse than they did, 
 may it be said to their credit, and the fun 
 was a part of the occasion. I felt like a 
 grandmother among them, but my cousin 
 and her friend treated them without ex- 
 ception as respected seniors, giving the 
 boys a taste of conscious heroism none too 
 good for their dispositions in the bosom of 
 the family. I devoutly wished I were 
 
3O HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 eighteen, and given to hero-worship my- 
 self, for then I might have tasted the 
 exhilaration and blood-curdling enthusiasm 
 produced upon the majority by a Harvard 
 or Yale football team. 
 
 A day or so later I had a novel experi- 
 ence. Walking alone on the Beacon Street 
 extension, I felt something run past me 
 attired in white linen trousers, falling far 
 short of the knee, and an armless, throat- 
 less shirt or sweater. One after another 
 of these scantily dressed male creatures 
 passed me by on the run. I had about 
 decided to tell an approaching policeman 
 that the inmates of some lunatic asylum 
 were running away, when I was picked up 
 by Elizabeth, in the carriage, and she ex- 
 plained that the men were the Hare and 
 Hounds Club, taking a run across country. 
 Later I discovered that these lightly clad 
 individuals, with no hats and with bare legs, 
 were to be encountered at any moment in 
 the streets of New Boston. One soon gets 
 over the shock. 
 
 Upon one other subject besides football 
 all Bostonians seemed to find common 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 31 
 
 ground the Symphony Concerts. I soon 
 found that the Symphony Orchestra was, 
 after proper ancestry, the most universal 
 pride and boast of Boston and its suburbs. 
 The only Bostonian I ever knew who saw his 
 home from the outside warned me to ob- 
 serve what he called " the blossom of Puri- 
 tanism, the Boston face," upon the first 
 occasion of my hearing the Orchestra. As 
 usual, in Uncle John's family, the women 
 attended the auction sale of season seats 
 for these concerts, where enormous pre- 
 miums are paid. The women do every- 
 thing of that description in Boston, and 
 the men admire their energy. Each of us 
 had a season ticket for the public Rehear- 
 sal on Friday afternoons, which occasions 
 are, without doubt, the most fashionable 
 series of events in the Boston winter. 
 
 Every day I became more convinced 
 that society, so-called, the elect few who 
 constitute themselves " the people " of a 
 city, was of less collective importance in 
 Boston than in any other American city. 
 I found that these good people lived fenced 
 off in their Back Bay district, following a 
 
32 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 life distinct from the heart-throbs and pulse 
 of the city. Their very separateness de- 
 barred them from rights of leadership. 
 Nobody else in the community cared a rap 
 what they thought or felt except by way 
 of gossip, and many of the actual descend- 
 ants of Massachusetts forefathers had no 
 participation in the life of the Back Bay 
 or Beacon Hill. Exclusiveness sacrifices 
 dominance to the pleasure of " me and my 
 son, John." 
 
 Boston does not develop its character 
 through the medium of its aristocracy alone. 
 It is the most democratic city in America, 
 if not in the world. It is both the cradle 
 and nurse of independence. Evidences of 
 these truths were set forth in the costumes 
 of the feminine majority in evidence at 
 that first Symphony Rehearsal I attended. 
 All of fashionable Boston was present, and 
 still the audience did not look fashionable 
 from a metropolitan standpoint. 
 
 There were so many women ! If you 
 could hear the plaint of that exclamation 
 you would understand at once how oppress- 
 ive in its preponderance is the femininity 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 33 
 
 of Boston. " Woman " is stamped on every 
 inch of Massachusetts ground. She is as 
 inevitable as the seasons She is more 
 difficult to escape than the Mormon eye. 
 She inculcates and illustrates the principles 
 of freedom all the way from her emancipa- 
 tion creed to the shape of her waist and 
 the length of her stride. 
 
 Boston Music Hall is a unique edifice. 
 One is tempted to attribute its existence to 
 that same Puritanical spirit which urged 
 the Pilgrims into a form of worship bare of 
 ornamentation : there must be no " fix- 
 ings " to distract the worshipper from his 
 purpose. So with Music Hall : nothing 
 could be uglier ; no interior could be more 
 barren and unproductive of aesthetic feel- 
 ing. Imagine a building, holding several 
 thousand people, built at the intersection 
 of what in other cities would be called the 
 four alleys of a block. This building is stiff, 
 grimy and unattractive, without ornament 
 inside or out. The Rehearsal is merely 
 the first of two concerts given weekly dur- 
 ing the season except at intervals when 
 the Orchestra is away "concertising." 
 
34 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 The hour set for the Rehearsal is half- 
 past two. At half -past one the doors are 
 surrounded by a crowd of musical students 
 and others struggling for a first place in 
 line. When the doors open there ensues 
 what looks like a panic in a burning build- 
 ing. Each one in the tussle grasps his 
 admission ticket, worth twenty-five cents, 
 and certifying a seat in the second balcony 
 reserved for that purpose, or a few square 
 inches on the floor for one's feet in any 
 part of the house. Most of this eager 
 throng carry books with which to occupy 
 themselves during the long wait before 
 them, and quite evidently as a means of 
 defence during the scramble for the best 
 seats. I doubt that the fine new Music 
 Hall now in process of erection will seem 
 as dear to the student's heart as this 
 shabby hall filled with memories. 
 
 At half -past two the doors invariably 
 close upon a packed house. Men and 
 women stand during the entire programme, 
 sandwiched side by side, and with no sup- 
 port but their enthusiasm. This audience 
 alone suggests youth. Everywhere else 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 37 
 
 in Boston the people seem to have been 
 born mature, but at the Rehearsal, although 
 the Boston face is in the majority, hun- 
 dreds of young girls, clad in their brightest 
 and best, give a butterfly effect to the 
 assembly not visible in the countenance of 
 the individual. The Symphony men have 
 sauntered into their places upon a plain, 
 barren platform by the time the clock, 
 stationed opposite upon the first balcony, 
 indicates five minutes before half -past two. 
 There is a social murmur all over the 
 house. The hands of the clock point to 
 silence. The conductor walks out on the 
 stage amid an immediate lull of voices and 
 a conservative hand-clap. He bows, turns 
 about, raises his baton, quiet reigns over 
 the multitude, the stick falls, and the re- 
 markable body of men begin their story 
 of beauty conveyed by every shade of emo- 
 tional colour, artistic insight, and technical 
 perfection possible to ensemble playing. 
 The audience is wrapped in this atmos- 
 phere for nearly two hours. No one en- 
 joys, in the ordinary acceptation of that 
 term, but every one respects, exalts, bends 
 
38 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 the knee, imbibes yea, even unto a state 
 of worship known at Beyreuth. And that 
 is why Boston is the most musical city in 
 America. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 NO one can understand the force of the 
 trite saying that the wind is tempered 
 to the shorn lamb everywhere but on Boston 
 Common until one has put oneself in the 
 place of the lamb on that spot, or on any 
 other point of attack in Boston. No wind 
 is so lowering to the moral tone, so destruc- 
 tive of wits and promotive of temper, as a 
 northeast tempest in the autumn, or the 
 whirlwind intermitting its fury every five 
 minutes from January until May in Boston. 
 It was in November that I started out 
 for my first contest on foot with a Boston 
 nor'easter. Knowing full well Aunt Dru- 
 silla's disinclination to get the horses wet, 
 no matter what became of the individual, 
 as is the prevailing attitude toward horses 
 in Boston and other places, I determined 
 to walk the half mile leading to the Public 
 39 
 
4O HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 Library, not being timid about any weather 
 I had hitherto encountered. Well protected 
 in rain clothes that I had found sufficient 
 even in Scotland, I started out to do some 
 reading on my own specialty in the quiet, 
 studious reading-rooms of the crowning pos- 
 session of Boston, its library. 
 
 After taking a few steps along the side- 
 walks I began to compare myself to the 
 shorn lamb ; after walking two blocks I 
 experienced the exaltation of a martyr. 
 The wind came from every direction, even 
 from under my feet. I was lifted from the 
 ground and pitched against the corner of a 
 house. My umbrella succumbed judiciously 
 at the start ; it turned wrong side out and 
 broke a rib, indicating my probable con- 
 dition if I pursued the enterprise. I 
 dragged the remains by my side, holding 
 on to my hat, and brushing my dishevelled 
 hair out of my eyes with the other hand. 
 Then the rain fell upon me with the force 
 of a dozen shower baths, reminding me of 
 the Englishman who insisted he had never 
 seen rain until he reached Boston. For- 
 tunately, I was nearing my destination, 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 41 
 
 and proving at the same time that grit 
 strengthens with use, as does every other 
 attribute. 
 
 The climax of my woes came when my 
 boot lace untied and began to flap around 
 my ankles, tripping me up at close inter- 
 vals. This was unendurable. I stopped at 
 a stoop, unmindful of possible spectators, 
 emphatically and with explosive wrath 
 dropped the remains of my umbrella on 
 the lower step, muttering to myself while 
 my hair streamed before my eyes, damp 
 and draggled with the rain ; then, planting 
 one foot on the sidewalk, the other on the 
 second step of the stoop, I tried to tie 
 the string as deliberately as possible under 
 the circumstances. Needless to say, the 
 string was refractory. My face turned 
 red, my temper boiled over, and I fear 
 I stamped. Just then I looked higher 
 than my foot, up toward the drawing- 
 room windows of the house, and met the 
 eyes of a man standing there, evidently 
 enjoying my demonstration. His amused 
 expression lent me the courage of indigna- 
 tion. I returned to the attack, succeeded, 
 
42 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 and marched on without another look up- 
 ward, but showing an indignant back. At 
 that moment I received an indelible impres- 
 sion of the Boston man. 
 
 At any other place in the world a man 
 would have come to my rescue with the 
 offer of an umbrella ; but this one knew 
 nothing about my family, consequently it 
 would have been improper for him to offer 
 assistance to me as a disconnected woman 
 in distress. I had noticed this tendency 
 toward vacuous indifference in all the Bos- 
 ton men I had met, but laid it to the excess 
 of female adulation consequent upon a pro- 
 portion of one man to every twenty-five 
 women ; now I knew it was something 
 deeper, something probably hereditary, ex- 
 plained by the expression of "no in- 
 tentions," adopted generally by the male 
 members of the Boston population. I real- 
 ised at once how much I despised that man, 
 and how I longed to teach him and his fel- 
 low citizens a few lessons. However, my 
 further struggles with the elements kept 
 me employed until I reached the library, 
 after a collision with a pedestrian walking 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 43 
 
 with an umbrella held open horizontally, 
 thus obscuring his vision. He made no 
 apology, but, giving me an annihilating 
 glance, staggered on. 
 
 Even in a nor'easter the Boston Library 
 and the other buildings skirting Copley 
 Square bear out their reputation. Accord- 
 ing to the verdict of architects, they com- 
 bine to form the most interesting square 
 architecturally in America. On a bright 
 day in autumn a colourist revels in the bril- 
 liant-hued ivy massed upon the cosy church 
 and adjacent residences bordering one side 
 of the square in harmony with the soft 
 brown tones of wonderful Trinity Church 
 diagonally opposite. Those in search of 
 pure lines find content in the classic form 
 of the library, emphasised by contrast with 
 the Art Museum and the latter-day edition 
 of the historic Old South Church, whose 
 congregation, after several removals, has 
 settled in new Boston, a long distance 
 from the original site of the church. Cop- 
 ley Square may justly be called the head 
 of Boston ; exactly where its heart lies no 
 one knows positively. 
 
44 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 After drying out in the periodical read- 
 ing-room, I forgot myself in my satisfaction 
 with everything about me. I walked back 
 to the entrance for another look at Sir 
 Harry Vane standing in his niche, only 
 a cavalier in bronze, but even so, replete 
 with a grace, nobility, and charm I had 
 failed so far to find in any other Bostonian. 
 I felt sure he would not have left me on 
 his stoop to wrestle unassisted with con- 
 founding conditions. Up the noble stair- 
 way, guarded by couchant lions, I then 
 went, sitting down for a few admiring 
 moments to rest my eyes upon the soft- 
 tinted marbles and the mural pictures of 
 Puvis de Chavannes on one side, and on 
 the other the court where the misunder- 
 stood Bacchante poised for a short time in 
 all of her unsurpassed loveliness, I saw 
 her but once, and have only an exquisite 
 memory of the most perfect modelling and 
 incarnate loveliness ever rejected by expo- 
 nents of frozen virtue. Having the after- 
 noon before me, I took the elevator for 
 another period of enjoyment before Sar- 
 gent's decorations, unequalled, in my 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 4/ 
 
 opinion, by any of the other choice pos- 
 sessions of the library. One learns the 
 history of religion from the humanitarian 
 standpoint in a study of Sargent's strong 
 execution of a thoughtful conception. His 
 prophets are inspired men, not grotesque 
 supernatural beings. 
 
 I was especially interested in Sargent's 
 work because, a few months previous, I 
 had dined in London with some particular 
 friends of his. My hostess told me how 
 one day Sargent came to them in a mood 
 of artistic despair, insisting that he had 
 conceived an idea beyond his powers of 
 execution. He explained, then gloomily 
 insisted that he was going home to destroy 
 the entire batch of drawings. They pleaded 
 with him not to do so until they had seen 
 them. He consented, and, spurred on by 
 their encouragement, finished his noble 
 design. This remembrance gave me food 
 for long thought as I stood before that 
 splendid expression of a great man's great- 
 est idea, developed through a lifetime. 
 
 Time was moving on, and before going 
 down-stairs I saw more of interest in vari- 
 
48 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 ous rooms than I could well digest in an 
 afternoon. In the delivery-room, later, 
 I looked again at Edwin Abbey's graceful 
 narrative of the pursuit of the " Holy 
 Grail," in a series of mural paintings. 
 His work is highly decorative, but the 
 story has been better told before, through 
 the same medium of expression. It seemed 
 to me that every American should be proud 
 of the Boston Library, with its democratic 
 inscription across the exterior front : " The 
 Public Library of the City of Boston. 
 Built by the People and Dedicated to the 
 Advancement of Learning." 
 
 I found the books I wanted in Bates 
 Hall, and settled myself for an hour's 
 indulgence in my private hobby, which 
 I keep concealed from the general eye 
 as closely as I would veil a sin, for I have 
 a horror of seeming masculine. Wishing 
 to keep my place in one book of reference, 
 while I took another down from the shelf 
 near by, I looked around for a book-mark, 
 but none was to be seen. Opening my 
 money purse, the only object I saw that 
 would answer the purpose was a small 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 49 
 
 photograph of myself, which I carried to 
 please my mother while away from her, 
 for the purpose of identification in case of 
 murder or sudden death, both of which 
 possibilities were ever present to her mind. 
 I slipped the photograph into the place. 
 The book fell to of its own weight. I moved 
 a few steps away and reached for another 
 book. At that moment a hand fell on my 
 shoulder with a masculine force, and in a 
 deep-voiced whisper no audible speech 
 being permitted in the hall some one 
 said : 
 
 " Bon jour, mon enfant ! How in the 
 name of all that's wonderful did you ever 
 arrive at the Hub ? " 
 
 Upon looking back rather startled, I saw 
 the face of the strangest woman I ever 
 knew. Yes, it certainly was Frances 
 Thurlston, whom I had known two years 
 before in Paris, where I spent nearly a 
 year with my mother's sister. To any one 
 who knew Frances it would be needless 
 to say she was an unmarried woman. She 
 is the only professed man-hater in whose 
 professions I put any faith. Probably 
 
5<D HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 the most masculine of women herself, she 
 merely tolerated the sex whose ways she imi- 
 tated as her choice between two evils. She 
 said it was a good thing to be a man, but 
 the worst thing possible to endure a man. 
 Frances must have been forty-five, at least, 
 at that time. She came as near being an 
 artist as any one could who escaped. She 
 did many things well without excelling 
 in any one thing, except criticism of other 
 people's work. Among the artists in Paris 
 she was considered the ablest woman critic 
 who had ever lent her keen insight to their 
 acceptance or rejection. She wrote in a 
 bold, vigorous style; she painted better 
 than an amateur ; she played several 
 instruments fairly well ; but inherited 
 means had killed her artistically. She 
 was rich ; necessity is the mainspring of 
 genius. Frances had no living relative 
 except a married sister, of whom she spoke 
 occasionally. For women she cared in 
 almost a masculine way. I had been one 
 of her fancies the winter I spent in Paris. 
 Her tailor-made broadcloth costumes, worn 
 with white shirt-fronts and standing collars, 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 5! 
 
 emphasised her large-featured, boyish face 
 as did her manly attitudes whether 
 affected or natural I never knew. They 
 were always the same. 
 
 Drawing in a surprised breath, I ex- 
 claimed aloud : " Did you fall with the rain 
 or come in the wind ? " 
 
 " 'Sh ! " she answered, cautioning me. 
 " Don't talk out loud in here. Come into 
 the corridor and we'll have it out." For- 
 getful of books and photographs, I gathered 
 together my belongings and followed her. 
 We settled ourselves in one of the marble 
 embrasure seats overlooking the court near 
 the lions. She began: "You're looking 
 the equal of yourself. How did you get 
 here ? " 
 
 I told her my situation. 
 
 " Going in for the ' smart set/ are you ? " 
 was all she replied, disdainfully. " I never 
 thought you belonged there you have 
 too much of the real thing in you. Know 
 Mrs. Bobby Short and the Hazeltine Gresh- 
 ams, I suppose, and the rest. They try 
 hard to change the temperature of Boston, 
 but nothing will, under another century 
 
52 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 of new blood. It's only a big town affect- 
 ing city airs, just as a country girl dresses 
 to go to the village." 
 
 I confessed that I had met the people 
 she mentioned, but that Aunt Drusilla 
 seemed to belong to another set. 
 
 " Humph ! " she replied. " Old Beacon 
 Hill holding up her skirts for fear of con- 
 tagion. The truth is, Mrs. Robert Short 
 does more toward the advancement of this 
 place in civilisation than a whole woman's 
 clubful of the rest. She educates striving 
 artists, loans her valuable books and pictures 
 upon every occasion, and does a deal of 
 good with one hand the other doesn't know 
 about." 
 
 " Then why do the Boston women have 
 so much to say about her ? " I asked. 
 
 " Jealous ! " Frances grunted. " Did you 
 ever hear of that failing ? The fact is, Mrs. 
 Short is not really in her proper sphere in 
 life, any more than I should be in her 
 shoes. She is an artist, every inch of 
 her. She feels some of the truths we 
 are all seeking in beauty-land. If she 
 weren't manacled by a masculine attach- 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 53 
 
 ment I dare say she would live as I do. 
 There is just the same thing the matter 
 with her there is with me nothing more. 
 I live my life as I like ; she is compelled to 
 temporise and meet ' The Hub ' half way. 
 I met her once in Rome and liked her ; 
 most people do. I say, Margaret, I'm 
 glad you aren't locked to a masculine 
 attachment yet ! " 
 
 I assured her of my lingering freedom, 
 and insisted upon knowing something about 
 herself. 
 
 "I'm a poor subject of conversation," 
 she growled, amiably. " Nothing to tell. 
 Same life. After the crowd broke up in 
 Paris last year, I got a working fever on. 
 Decided I'd let it off in the land of freaks,' 
 the only city I belong to in America. My 
 sister lives here, too, and one must see 
 one's kin once a century. She's Mrs. 
 Howard Drake. Know her ? " 
 
 Yes, I had met her. Was she visiting 
 her sister ? 
 
 " Visiting ! I visit ? " she returned. 
 " You know me better than that ! I 
 haven't stopped over night with anybody 
 
54 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 in twenty years. No ! I have an apartment 
 with a studio, and I'm digging. You may 
 not believe it, but my fever hasn't worked 
 off in a year. If I could lose my money 
 now I'd be famous yet. You come along 
 with me. I've a cab down-stairs. Come 
 home with me and see my picture. I 
 found a model in the North End equal 
 to a little Florentine I had once at Julien's 
 years ago. Then you must come to one of 
 my 'Sundays' and meet some 'freaks.' 
 You know I always gather my own kind 
 about me. There are plenty of them in 
 Boston." 
 
 That night at dinner I told of my meet- 
 ing with a friend I had known in Paris, 
 going somewhat into details in regard to 
 her personality. Uncle said, "A manly 
 female, I should judge. I have rooted ob- 
 jections to the species." Elizabeth turned 
 her slow eyes upon me with the question, 
 " What does she do ? " 
 
 "Pretty much everything but go into 
 society, which she calls a large dish of 
 ' giggle, gabble, gobble, git,' quoting Doctor 
 Holmes." 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 55 
 
 " I should like to study a person possess- 
 ing those characteristics," replied Elizabeth 
 earnestly. 
 
 "Margaret," spoke up Aunt Drtisilla, 
 " I hardly think your mother would care 
 to have you pursue the acquaintance of 
 such a person in America. Such acquaint- 
 ances may do for the other side, but not 
 in Boston. A woman of no connections " 
 "Pardon me!" I interrupted, playing 
 my trump card, "but Miss Thurlston is 
 a sister to Mrs. Howard Drake." 
 
 "The Howard Drakes of Marlborough 
 Street ? " inquired Aunt Drusilla, looking 
 interested. " That is altogether different. 
 Howard Drake's mother was an Osgood of 
 Beacon Hill, and further back her mother 
 lived near us on Summer Street. I remem- 
 ber Frances Osgood's great-grandfather's 
 portrait, painted in the costume of an Eng- 
 lish officer of the Guards. The Osgoods 
 were not Revolutionary patriots, but they 
 were of distinguished English connections. 
 Would you care to call upon Margaret's 
 friend, Elizabeth ? I never visit strangers, 
 you know. I have not even visited my 
 
56 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 cousin, Mary Norris, in Brookline, for ten 
 years. It is such a journey out there, and 
 my life is so fully occupied with larger 
 duties." 
 
 Elizabeth replied that she would be 
 pleased to know Miss Thurlston, provided 
 "her day" did not interfere with club 
 work, or the Symphony, or the Cambridge 
 Conferences, or a new course of lectures 
 on Browning, or a dozen other plans 
 arranged for the winter. 
 
 "What are the Cambridge Confer- 
 ences ? " I asked. 
 
 Uncle John replied, with the laughing 
 light I had seen in his eyes once or twice 
 before : " They are seats of learning, my 
 dear, where prophets ladle out culture with 
 spoons called ethics, and the congregation 
 worships Buddha." 
 
 "John!" said Aunt Drusilla, severely, 
 "how can you speak jestingly of one of 
 the finest institutions in Cambridge ? The 
 Conferences, Margaret, we attend on Sun- 
 day afternoons for the purpose of broaden- 
 ing ourselves along all ethical lines of 
 thought. These meetings are deeply inter- 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES $? 
 
 esting. Elizabeth rarely misses one, and I 
 know she will be glad to take you as her 
 guest." 
 
 " Yes, you must not fail to go, my dear," 
 returned Uncle John, as he left us for the 
 library, where he spent most of his even- 
 ings alone. " Of course, Elizabeth only 
 goes for the ethics, but one of her friends 
 told me it was ' perfectly fine,' that Mots 
 of young professors and other college men 
 go, and we have a jolly time afterward.' 
 You can sleep through the meeting in 
 anticipation of ' afterward/ Margaret. That 
 is the way I enjoy myself at ethical 
 societies." 
 
 Uncle John went out, Aunt Drusilla 
 looked resigned, and Elizabeth picked up 
 a book. 
 
 The next day I opened my pocket book, 
 and for the first time remembered I had 
 left my photograph in the library book. 
 Not for several days could I find time to 
 get to the library, owing to our excess 
 of engagements. In two days I attended 
 the New England Woman's Club, where 
 the members no longer knit and crochet in- 
 
58 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 formally while the programme goes on, as in 
 former days, but attend strictly to literary 
 business according to parliamentary law ; 
 another Symphony Rehearsal, a dinner, a 
 lecture at a private house upon the archi- 
 tecture of the Renaissance, a luncheon, 
 and a weekly "at home" of an author 
 who never makes calls, but receives in 
 salon fashion, once a week, anybody who 
 chooses to attend her gatherings, which 
 are full of variety and the kind of persi- 
 flage one reads in the novels one does not 
 understand. This lady was well connected ; 
 therefore, although she lived in a socially 
 decadent part of town, Elizabeth was per- 
 mitted to mix with the great variety of 
 human beings to be met at her house, and 
 to introduce me there. London was in the 
 air, at this house. Nearly everybody had 
 spent some time there, and I found a 
 number of writers and painters who knew 
 English friends of mine. I can safely say 
 that half hour was the most interesting 
 I had spent socially in Boston. It was 
 neither stiff, nor pedantic, nor frisky. Fi- 
 nally, when I went for my photograph, it was 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 59 
 
 not to be found. There was no picture 
 in the book of reference I had used ; could 
 some one have carried it off? I was 
 annoyed at my indiscretion, but spilt milk 
 is never worth crying over. In a few days 
 I forgot all about the incident, having 
 mentioned it to no one. 
 
 Before this I had discovered, by observa- 
 tion and conversation, that Boston dances, 
 dinners, and teas were about the same as 
 those one attends in any other city, with 
 this difference : professional people were 
 to be met everywhere in Boston. Artists 
 are not patronised there ; they are frater- 
 nised, and included socially without passing 
 an examination upon ancestry, as are no 
 other outsiders. Greatly to the credit of 
 Boston stands this fact. Brains and talent 
 will pass muster where no amount of money 
 can among Bostonians, unless it be with 
 those who are ancestry ridden. No doubt 
 they make this recognition somewhat of a 
 pose, but underneath that attitude there is 
 an honest admiration of ability. The major- 
 ity of people occupied with the arts have 
 small time or inclination for society per se ; 
 
60 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 but if by chance they have social tenden- 
 cies, and are equipped with real ability and 
 fairly good manners, they can gratify these 
 instincts in Boston where millionaires with- 
 out the requisites pass unheeded. 
 
 Frances Thurlston said she could not see 
 why, as far as business occupations went, 
 Boston had higher claims than Chicago. 
 "For my part, I cannot see any refined 
 difference between pork and leather. One 
 is the inside of an animal, the other the 
 outside," she insisted. But, notwithstand- 
 ing this fact, I noticed that Frances chose 
 Boston as a place of residence while in 
 America. 
 
 Mr. Warren Hartwell had returned from 
 Europe and called several times by the 
 first week in December. Aunt Drusilla 
 found him almost as absorbing a topic 
 of conversation as reforms. Dorothy spoke 
 of him in the tone of a near relative, but 
 Elizabeth seldom mentioned him. Finally, 
 one night at a dance at Dorothy's, Mr. 
 Hartwell and I held our first conversation 
 alone. I said to him : " There is a familiar 
 look about you, Mr. Hartwell. Have I met 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 6 1 
 
 you somewhere before, or has my aunt's 
 admiration of you thrown a sub-conscious 
 picture on my brain ? " 
 
 " Where could we have met ? " he asked, 
 with a strangely knowing smile. Then, 
 without waiting for a reply, he continued : 
 " I feel that same certainty of having seen 
 you before. There is something familiar 
 about the eyes." 
 
 I changed the subject, because I did not 
 understand his apparent amusement, inex- 
 plicable to me. Soon he asked how I 
 liked Boston. 
 
 "When you ask me that," I replied, 
 " I feel as the foreigner must as he lands 
 at New York, besieged to give his impres- 
 sions of America before he has seen any- 
 thing but the Statue of Liberty." 
 
 " But you have been here several weeks. 
 That I can certify," he replied, again look- 
 ing amused. 
 
 "Oh, yes, all of a month," I said, begin- 
 ning to be provoked by his covert smiles. 
 " I am reserving my impressions to put in 
 a book, provided I have imbibed enough 
 atmosphere to produce one when I leave 
 
62 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 in the spring. So far I have only one 
 distinct impression: hatred of one Boston 
 man whom I do not know." 
 
 " Is the gentleman anonymous ? A great 
 unknown ? " Mr. Hartwell inquired. 
 
 "He is anonymous and unknown to me, 
 but not altogether a gentleman. He saw 
 me in distress and only laughed. You 
 know the Boston laugh is frequently mis- 
 understood by strangers." 
 
 "Perhaps you did not give this espe- 
 cially unfortunate Bostonian an opportunity 
 to assist you," Mr. Hartwell replied, with 
 his grand air balanced by a sudden light- 
 ing of his indifferent eyes. He was a man 
 whom everybody called interesting, but no 
 one could define the source of this element 
 in him. His eyes looked indifferent and 
 tired unless he was interested ; altogether 
 his face was unfathomable, his power 
 elusive. He nettled me, and still I did 
 not dislike him. 
 
 " A man should make and seize his op- 
 portunity, not wait for women to beseech 
 him, after the Boston fashion," I replied, 
 rather discourteously, I fear. 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 63 
 
 " Give him another chance, Miss Allston. 
 Boston ians are open to improvement, you 
 know. By the way, do you like the Boston 
 weather ? " 
 
 I looked up at him quickly, astonished 
 that such a man, after five minutes, should 
 be reduced to the weather as a topic of 
 conversation. Dorothy coming up, I made 
 no reply ; but again I noticed his unreason- 
 able smile. 
 
 After that Mr. Hartwell and I met con- 
 stantly. Aunt Drusilla assured me that 
 Warren was the best-connected man of 
 the younger set in Boston. "Everybody 
 expected him to marry into one of the 
 old families," she continued, significantly. 
 Happening to glance at Elizabeth during 
 this explanation, I saw a slow blush 
 cover her face and neck, whether of anger 
 or something else I could not tell. Eliza- 
 beth always seemed to me to be one of the 
 inevitable spinsters. She was "an old 
 maid " at ten years of age, but now she 
 was also a woman of refinement and large 
 pedantic intelligence. No doubt beneath 
 her calm exterior she quivered at her 
 
64 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 mother's lightly veiled references to 
 Warren Hart well. 
 
 As Frances Thurlston said, if I depended 
 upon Bostonians to show me Boston, I 
 would go away in deep ignorance of the 
 city, for the reason that every division 
 of the inhabitants knows exclusively its 
 own Boston. None of my relations had 
 ever been to the top of Bunker Hill 
 Monument, but they had climbed the 
 Alps ; nor were they familiar with many 
 of the other features of their city rele- 
 gated to tourists. Boston has not only 
 the most beautiful and interesting suburbs 
 of any city in America, but it contains also 
 more concentric circles of humanity than 
 I have found elsewhere in this country. 
 Each circle touches another at some point. 
 The South End is like a young man who, 
 starting out in life with brilliant prospects 
 and making an utter failure of himself, 
 gradually and reluctantly falls below the 
 point of respectability. The North End, 
 in reality historic Boston, is now the Ital- 
 ian and Jewish quarter, whence the police 
 gather their most exciting reports, and 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 65 
 
 where artists go for picturesque humanity, 
 soiled and temperamental. Some other 
 sections are the byword for uninteresting 
 respectability. Then there is the Back 
 Bay, the fashionable quarter, built upon 
 slippery ground, so to speak, considering 
 that the whole district west of the Public 
 Gardens is made ground. 
 
 What a calamity if Boston should awake 
 some morning to find its prominent citizens 
 vanished, " sunk into the unknowable," 
 as they would say at the Cambridge Con- 
 ferences, houses and all ! Much sterling 
 worth and unlimited snobbery would be 
 disposed of simultaneously, but the city 
 in all probability would soon supply other 
 prominent citizens of shorter pedigree, and 
 the gap might be filled with more earth and 
 them. Still, the character of the present 
 Back Bay would be irrevocably lost. 
 
 These matters were all explained to me 
 by Frances, who knew thoroughly every 
 city in which she lived. I would run away 
 from the limitations of the Back Bay for fre- 
 quent expeditions into the remainder of the 
 city under her guidance. 
 
66 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 The poetic Indian summer, which lasted 
 at intervals far into December, enticed us 
 constantly out-of-doors. We drove over 
 great stretches of the firmest, smoothest 
 roads to be found in the environments 
 of any city. Brookline seemed to me 
 a haven of beautiful content, with its fine 
 old trees and homes of various kinds, from 
 places built on the plan and in the propor- 
 tions of an English manor-house, sur- 
 rounded by acres of grounds, to cosy 
 modern houses, of good architecture gen- 
 erally speaking ; one and all quite appar- 
 ently homes, the effect one searches for 
 and misses in Boston proper. 
 
 One day Frances and I were walking 
 along Columbus Avenue, looking neither 
 to the right nor left, when two men ap- 
 proached. I noticed one touch the other, 
 who laughed coarsely and addressed us 
 with " Good day, ain't it ? " both slowing 
 up. I showed such astonishment that 
 Frances whispered, " Look ahead ! Don't 
 speak ! " 
 
 We walked on silently. The men laughed 
 again, but passed on. When we turned into 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 67 
 
 Dartmouth Street, Frances delivered her- 
 self : "I meet more of that in this town 
 than in any city in the world, not ex- 
 cepting Paris. By five o'clock Saturday 
 afternoon, men begin to reel through the 
 streets, and Sunday is a day of dissipation 
 among the lower classes. I can't tell you 
 how often I yes, a middle-aged woman 
 have been spoken to in the last month on 
 the street in the daytime. Boston is only 
 an overgrown college town ; but these 
 beasts one meets on the street are not 
 college chaps, and nobody seems to know 
 who or what they are. A woman is never 
 in danger anywhere if she behaves herself, 
 but she is open to extreme annoyance, and 
 there can be no denying that Boston streets 
 are invaded by an army of the most disa- 
 greeable pests." 
 
 Frances never made a direct statement 
 that she could not substantiate. She told 
 one of the truths which no Bostonian will 
 admit except on compulsion. 
 
 Columbus Avenue, the street where this 
 disagreeable episode occurred, might be 
 called an asylum for Boston freaks. In 
 
68 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 its palmy days, the residences lining Co- 
 lumbus Avenue's asphalt pavement were 
 built and occupied by Boston citizens claim- 
 ing, incipiently, New York's spirit of go and 
 glitter. They laid out a broad avenue after 
 the manner of the New York social mart, 
 building imitative brownstone fronts as 
 homes, and attempting, unsuccessfully, to 
 turn the tide of fashion away from Beacon 
 Street. Some of these imitative people, 
 with dogged pride, still live in the brown- 
 stone fronts. But the major part of the 
 houses on Columbus Avenue are let out 
 by the room, or rooms, to human phenom- 
 ena in the shape of professors of every 
 sleight-of-hand science known to modern 
 folk. On that avenue one can find sover- 
 eign cures for every human affliction, all 
 done after some patent method especially 
 attractive to Bostonians. 
 
 Running off of this avenue are the most 
 interesting domestic squares in Boston. 
 The homes date from the beginning of 
 the South End, and are mostly of English 
 urban architecture, with low stoops. These 
 houses are built of brick enriched in colour 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 69 
 
 by time, and during six months of the year 
 embowered in ivy. A refreshing plot of 
 green grass and trees runs between the 
 curved line of houses, and all is quiet, 
 restful, and dignified. Carts do not rumble, 
 rarely does an equipage pass, children do 
 not shout, and what strata of society occu- 
 pies these remote sanctuaries in the heart 
 of a throbbing city it is difficult to deter- 
 mine when even the policemen have no 
 convincing information to give pertaining 
 thereto. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE day before Christmas a snow fell, 
 fine and powdery, over which one 
 could imagine Saint Nick speeding behind 
 "eight tiny reindeer," lively and quick, 
 generous and hearty. 
 
 Aunt Drusilla told us that when she 
 was a child gifts were exchanged, if at 
 all in New England, at Thanksgiving. 
 Christmas was a religious day, and she 
 recalled one year when, as a girl of fifteen, 
 she made some little gift to her father 
 during the holiday season, as she had 
 known a young friend to do, and was 
 reprimanded for her conduct. 
 
 " You girls do not realise what a change 
 has come over the spirit of Boston since I 
 was a child," she said. " In those days 
 parents were prominent members of a 
 family ; the children, of little consequence. 
 70 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 73 
 
 When I came out I was given a ball, but 
 the married people were conspicuous in 
 the gathering ; not merely a few frisky 
 married women called chaperons, but fine 
 ladies and gentlemen of all ages. Young 
 girls were to be seen, not heard. Nowa- 
 days the girls go to dances alone in their 
 parents' carriage, with no protector but a 
 coachman and footman picked up from 
 dear knows where, servants are so transient 
 and unreliable in our time. Or several 
 girls will take a public carriage together, 
 and ladies of my age are not even invited." 
 
 "They would be glad to have you go, 
 mama-r, if you would only talk about 
 somethin' they understand. People don't 
 want to discuss their souls or other peo- 
 ple's souls at a dance," said Dorothy, tor- 
 menting her Spanish poodle by making 
 thrusts at him with a paper-cutter. 
 
 " No, they prefer, as does one of my 
 daughters, to talk scandal and the French 
 slang of the Latin Quarter," replied Aunt 
 Drusilla, gathering her gray silk shawl 
 about her shoulders with an offended 
 air. 
 
74 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 " What an idea-r, mama-r ! " replied 
 Dorothy. " We talk books, pictures, 
 music, and art with a big A until I 
 frequently wish we really knew what we 
 were talkin' about. 
 
 " Have you noticed, Margaret, that the 
 people who actually do somethin' in Bos- 
 ton talk very little about it ? I'll take you 
 with me to the Lesters', on the Hill. Of 
 course, you have read Mr. Lester's books, 
 or if you haven't you must read one be- 
 fore we go. Quote an author to his face 
 and he is your friend. Mr. Hartwell goes 
 there a lot. He thinks the Lester set the 
 only one worth knowin' in Boston. The 
 Lesters go everywhere, they are very 
 well connected, both here and in London, 
 and on their day one sees a lot of 
 writers and such people there who never 
 condescend to come to me or to mama-r." 
 
 "Dorothy, you put on a wrong 'r' 
 then," I said. 
 
 " The idea-r ! " she exclaimed ; " I never 
 do that." 
 
 "You did it then again," I replied, 
 laughing. 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES J$ 
 
 " Where ? I don't believe it. You 
 told me I called the singer Melbar, Melba-r, 
 when I know I say Melba-r." 
 
 " You certainly do say Melba-r, Doro- 
 thy. You are as deaf to superfluous r's as 
 the rest of New England. Console your- 
 self with the reflection of a Massachusetts 
 farmer who once said to me : * Well, I 
 cal'late if r's is put on in places they ain't 
 used to, outside of New England, it's 
 because them other folks don't know 
 nothin' 'bout usin' 'em.' ' 
 
 Dorothy laughed good-naturedly. "I 
 can hear that we drop our g's, but I can't 
 hear any difference in our pronunciation of 
 the word ' idea-r,' any more than Elizabeth 
 can hear the nasal sound in her voice." 
 
 This conversation took place the day 
 before Christmas, and we decided not to 
 go to the Lesters' until after the holidays, 
 which were already filled with engage- 
 ments. After this decision had been 
 reached, Dorothy jumped up, exclaiming : 
 " Here I sit when I have an appointment 
 to meet Warren Hart well at a jeweler's ! 
 I promised to help him with his Christmas 
 
76 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 shoppin'. Come on, girls. Don't you 
 want to go along ? " 
 
 Elizabeth had promised to drive with 
 her mother, whose day was occupied in 
 directing the dispensation of charities con- 
 tributed by the various societies and asso- 
 ciations she represented. I started off 
 with Dorothy, whose carriage was at the 
 door. As we drove down-town, Dorothy 
 said, with her rather wicked smile : " See 
 here, Madgie, it seems to me you are run- 
 nin' Elizabeth and the other girls rather 
 close with Warren. He tells me you have 
 shown him how weak-minded it is to sit 
 half the day at the Somerset or Puritan Club 
 and spend the other half in 'innocuous 
 desuetude.' He is really a clever chap, 
 but lack of necessity has ruined his ambi- 
 tion. Perhaps you have stirred him up, for 
 he goes to his office every day now. But 
 I say, Madgie, don't you think you were 
 indiscreet to give him your photograph so 
 early in the day ? I'm no prig like mama-r, 
 but there is a limit, you know." 
 
 "I don't know what you are talking 
 about, Dorothy," I returned, feeling as 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES ?/ 
 
 stiff as I must have looked. " I neither 
 have designs on the only eligible man 
 there seems to be in Boston society, nor 
 have I given him my photograph.'' 
 
 " Now don't get snippy about it, my 
 dea-r. I'm only Dorothy; you mustn't 
 mind me. I'm not scoldin'. I should be 
 only too glad to have Warren for a cousin, 
 but I don't like his showin' your photo- 
 graph " 
 
 " Showing my photograph ! Where ? " 
 
 "At the club the other day. Fred 
 heard of it through some of the men, and 
 he didn't like it one bit." 
 
 " Where did he get my photograph ? " 
 I demanded. 
 
 "That's the question," she replied. 
 
 " Well, as I am not a professional beauty 
 nor an actress, nor do I do anything, my 
 pictures are not for sale ; so I think Fred 
 must be mistaken." 
 
 "Then you did not give it to him ? " 
 
 " I give it to him ! I thought you knew 
 me better than that, Dorothy." 
 
 "I thought so myself, Madgie," she 
 said, soothingly. 
 
78 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 "Perhaps it is a mistake. I'll speak 
 about it to Fred again." 
 
 We were silent a moment ; then I said : 
 " Put me down here, Dorothy. I do not 
 wish to meet Mr. Hartwell until Fred finds 
 out the truth of this affair." 
 
 " Never mind, " she began. 
 
 " Set me down at once. I'll walk the 
 rest of the way and do some shopping while 
 I cool off. I respected Mr. Hartwell more 
 than any other man I have met here." 
 
 She stopped the coachman and set me 
 down, expressing regret, and promising to 
 probe the matter through her husband. 
 I walked very fast through the Public 
 Gardens and Common, a fairyland of light 
 flaky snow that had fallen the night be- 
 fore, loading the trees with the garments 
 of the Snow Queen, a wonderful sight ! 
 But even the beauty of the Common could 
 not turn my thoughts from the revelation 
 just made me. Warren Hartwell and I 
 had become sincere friends even in that 
 short while. I forgave him his indiffer- 
 ence and hereditary Bostonianisms be- 
 cause of many counter-attractions. He 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES Si 
 
 seemed to forgive my lack of those quali- 
 ties for somewhat the same reason. I did 
 not understand him always, nor did he 
 mean that I should. In the midst of an 
 intelligent conversation he would say, lan- 
 guidly, " What do you think of the Boston 
 weather by this time, Miss Allston ? " 
 while from under his half-closed lids there 
 came a look reminding me of that mocking 
 tone in his voice. At first I thought the 
 weather must be his hobby, but he never 
 talked on that subject with any one else in 
 my hearing ; then I decided that weather 
 was the weak spot in his brain, as some 
 scientists think we all have one, and finally 
 I refused to answer him, which made his 
 laugh more frequent and disagreeable. 
 
 One Sunday morning we were walking 
 together on Commonwealth Avenue with 
 the stream of fashionable pedestrians re- 
 turning home from church, when Mr. 
 Hartwell suddenly asked : " Did any one 
 ever show you how to tie a boot lace so 
 that it will stay ? " 
 
 " Yes," I replied ; " many people have, 
 with poor results." 
 
82 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 " If you will permit me I will show you 
 some day how to make a warranted knot. 
 You might find it useful in case of rain." 
 
 " This is some more book talk, I sup- 
 pose," I returned, looking at him quickly. 
 "Subterranean meanings in pure literary 
 form." 
 
 " Not at all. John Bradley is the man 
 for that sort of thing. Most women com- 
 plain of boot laces when walking far. Did 
 you never have one come untied on the 
 street in the rain or snow ? I have." 
 
 "Yes, indeed, I have, to my disgust." 
 Then I remembered my experience of 
 more than a month before, and told him 
 about it, and why I hated one Bostonian 
 so much. 
 
 He smiled lazily several times during 
 the narrative, and admitted that " the man 
 must have been a cad." At the end of 
 my story he remarked : " Try to forgive 
 him. He was a Bostonian, and couldn't 
 help it." 
 
 " Do you know that man ? " I asked, 
 suspiciously. 
 
 " I know nearly all the men about. But 
 
HER BOSTON- EXPERIENCES 85 
 
 he has never spoken to me of the circum- 
 stance if I do know him, so I cannot say." 
 
 Now, as I thought of what Dorothy had 
 told me, my mind at once reverted to that 
 talk, and I hated him almost as much as I 
 did the other man. 
 
 How gay the crowded streets were! 
 Tremont and Washington Streets, with 
 their narrow sidewalks, from which the 
 hurrying crowds overflowed into the 
 streets, were resplendent with holiday 
 wares upon which the sun shone gaily. 
 Some one pounded me on the chest with 
 the end of a parcel ; then a fat woman 
 brushed between a large man and me, 
 sending him into the gutter. Few apolo- 
 gise on Washington Street. Apologies 
 are either taken for granted, or not in- 
 tended, on the busy streets of Boston. 
 
 Presently the crowd came to a standstill 
 before a Santa Claus in a shop window. I 
 could not move one way or another. A 
 man came out of a stairv/ay against which 
 I was pressed. The crowd threw me 
 against him. "I beg your pardon," said 
 a familiar voice above my shoulder. Look- 
 
86 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 ing up in surprise at the apology, I found 
 myself fairly thrown into the arms of War- 
 ren Hartwell. 
 
 " Miss Allston ! " he exclaimed. " Are 
 you hurt ? What are you doing here in 
 this mob ? " 
 
 "I couldn't help it," I replied. "They 
 pushed me against you. Dorothy is wait- 
 ing for you at the jeweler's." 
 
 " Aren't you coming, too ? " he asked. 
 
 "No," I replied, coldly. "Hurry, or 
 you will keep her waiting." 
 
 Just then the crowd parted and I 
 slipped away from him without another 
 word. I walked on down Washington 
 Street past the Old South Meeting-house 
 and as far as Newspaper Row ; then back 
 again, stopping at a book store. In there 
 the first person I ran against was Frances 
 Thurlston, who knew every book store by 
 heart. 
 
 " Just the girl I want ! " she exclaimed. 
 " Are you coming to-night ? It is my 
 ' freak ' night, you know, and I wish you 
 to meet some of the people who will be 
 there." 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 8? 
 
 I promised to go, provided the girls had 
 made no other engagement for me. 
 
 " My sister is coming to-night, with 
 your friend, Mr. Warren Hart well, in 
 tow," said Frances, as she gave what she 
 called "a Boston punch" with her elbow 
 to a woman who tried to walk over us in 
 her attempt to secure a clerk. 
 
 That afternoon I went with Dorothy 
 and Elizabeth to a piano recital given by 
 one of Mrs. Bobby Short's numerous 
 protegees, assisted by one of the most 
 interesting song singers in Boston. The 
 recital was held in the De Medici room of 
 The Tuileries and was more or less a chari- 
 table affair, aside from its advertising pur- 
 poses. There are more good recitals in 
 Boston during the season than any one 
 could possibly enjoy ; consequently the 
 friends or patrons of the musicians signify 
 to their friends how much under obligation 
 they will be placed to any one buying 
 tickets to these subscription concerts. 
 
 When the well-seasoned professional 
 holds forth at the attractive little subter- 
 ranean hall called Steinert's, he takes more 
 
88 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 chances with the public, and generally, 
 with a few particular, popular exceptions, 
 suffers the consequences ; for chamber 
 music, aside from the Kneisel Quartette's 
 performances, goes begging in Boston, as 
 it does in all American cities. Of course, 
 Mrs. Bobby Short was there, as gracious 
 and as independent of public opinion as 
 ever. She was surrounded by several 
 masculine artistic satellites, all of whom 
 she had assisted toward an honest living 
 in some way or another, thus causing the 
 public tongue to wag its easily grea?ed 
 muscles. Her particular friends were 
 there, and a few others, like Elizabeth and 
 myself. 
 
 The same reverent hearing was given 
 this performance that I had observed at 
 other musical entertainments in Boston, 
 where the average intelligence is unques- 
 tionably beyond that of other American 
 cities. When the trite, misrepresented 
 word " culture " is concerned there is little 
 to be said in favour of Boston, as contrasted 
 with other places ; but, with the best school 
 system we have in our country, the finest 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 89 
 
 library, and a large percentage of heredi- 
 tary intelligence to begin on, it would be 
 surprising and mortifying if the average 
 intelligence were not high. 
 
 Dorothy whispered to me, before the 
 performance began : " Warren Hartwell 
 asked me what was the matter with you 
 this mornin' " 
 
 The pianist appeared. I put my finger 
 on my lips, indicating silence, and heard 
 nothing more of Mr. Hartwell. 
 
 Christmas greens hung in bright quanti- 
 ties every place we went that day. When 
 I reached Frances Thurlston's in time for 
 a cosy dinner with her alone, before the 
 " freaks " arrived, her apartment, too, was 
 festooned at every available spot with 
 holly and evergreens ; but there was no 
 mistletoe, I noticed. Our dinner together 
 was in commemoration of a Christmas 
 Eve spent in Paris with a gay party of 
 English and Americans two years pre- 
 vious. At eight o'clock the " freaks " be- 
 gan to come, most of them people deprived 
 of home life, for whom Frances was mak- 
 ing a bit of Christmas cheer, although she 
 
9O HER- BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 would have denied the sentimental accusa- 
 tion. She was a good hostess, usually 
 touching the best side of every one. 
 
 A few of these people I had met before. 
 They were nearly all local celebrities in 
 some especial way. 
 
 Frances told me that if any one asked 
 me how I liked the climate, to reply, 
 "The east winds give me a tendency to 
 rheumatism." She had no time to ex- 
 plain, for the guests began to arrive ; but 
 when, a few moments later, I found my- 
 self talking to a middle-aged woman with 
 a kind face and pussy-cat manners, wearing 
 a costume representing several different 
 periods of fashion, and she asked me if 
 Boston satisfied my ideal, I replied : " Cer- 
 tainly the east winds do ; they give me a 
 rheumatic tendency." 
 
 "And you so young!" she exclaimed, 
 reproachfully. " My dear child, you have 
 no rheumatism you cannot have you 
 must not have disease. Disease is sin. 
 You must deny it. You are God's child, 
 made in his perfect image. You create 
 your own sin apart from his essence, and 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES Ql 
 
 sin is disease. Say to it, 'out,' and it will 
 out. Remember that only spirit lives ; 
 your body is no more than the food you 
 eat. Come to me if you lose possession of 
 your spirit, and I will do my part toward 
 its resuscitation." 
 
 "Yes'm," I replied, too astonished at 
 her outburst and at my own sin to say 
 more. 
 
 " Promise me that you will deny sin, 
 my dear, and ah ! Mr. Davis, so glad 
 to see you ! This is Miss Allston, our 
 dear Miss Thurlston's guest. I was de- 
 monstrating to her how needless disease 
 is " She continued to expound her 
 doctrines to a running accompaniment by 
 Mr. Davis, who was evidently a brother in 
 the faith, with small regard to the clothing 
 of his flesh in anything but spirit, his cos- 
 tume being an ordinary business suit, 
 creased and untidy. 
 
 Frances interrupted their talk, which 
 was carried on entirely between themselves, 
 while I stood by, an amused but apparently 
 forgotten listener, by bringing up a lady, 
 also middle-aged, but with a beautiful, 
 
92 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 poetic, faded face. Accompanying her 
 was a tall, thin young man with very black, 
 searching eyes and a great deal of black 
 hair. He said very little; he seemed to 
 listen with his eyes. The lady, Miss Tor- 
 rington, was charming. 
 
 Presently the young man, looking across 
 the top of my head with a professional 
 glance, said, abruptly, " See the blue lights 
 in her hair. They fairly quiver." 
 
 Miss Torrington followed the painter's 
 gaze, replying, with ecstatic expression : 
 " I have seen nothing else while we talked. 
 What tone there is ! The shadows in the 
 broad light must be superb. Green is 
 needed somewhere, don't you think ? Per- 
 haps about the throat. Then a little dis- 
 tance, and what an effect ! Where would 
 you touch in the vanishing point, were you 
 working in the wave of hair toward the ear 
 as the point of high light ? " 
 
 "I'd give her several trees and a lane 
 in perspective, and put the figure in the 
 middle ground, draped in whites and blues. 
 She is a better figure than head model. 
 The vanishing point would fall at the sky 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 95 
 
 line of the lane, I should say. What a 
 composition ! If I could only get those 
 hair lights ! Blue ! Blue ! " 
 
 They, too, had forgotten me. This 
 time I was lost in my hair, but I plucked 
 up courage to ask, " Do you see any blue 
 devils there ? I have them, I know." 
 
 " My dear Miss Allston, you must for- 
 give our rapt admiration of your radiant 
 hair. My friend is a rare colourist ; an 
 artist of whom we all expect miracles. I 
 am only a humble follower of the noble 
 impressionist idea, but he is a true disciple, 
 a genius." The young man himself 
 seemed to take this all for granted. 
 
 This black-eyed impressionist now de- 
 manded, "Which do you feel the most, 
 line or colour, Miss Allston ? " 
 
 Happily I was saved from answering by 
 a brisk young author, who flashed his wit 
 at one with dazzling illumination. He 
 approached, greeting us all with " Is the 
 night gray or purple ? Teaching the 
 visitor what colour she is ? I know them 
 and like them almost as well as I do my 
 own books, Miss Allston. This man here 
 
g6 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 assures me he sees purple in my hair. I 
 tell him it is printer's ink, oozing out of 
 my gray matter. Eh ! Duncan ? " 
 
 " I'll leave him to file his wits or boil 
 them down on you, Miss Allston," replied 
 the artist, with a smile, as he turned to 
 speak to a lady who had captured Miss 
 Torrington. 
 
 " My wits are like beef : better for cold 
 storage. That's why I live in Boston. 
 May I etherise time for you until you are 
 claimed by a better man ? " asked Mr. 
 John Bradley, whose books were as popu- 
 lar as he himself. 
 
 " What if he should never come ? He 
 must be rare," I replied, thinking hard to 
 keep up with him. 
 
 " Then I should insist that the majority 
 ruled, and pledge myself to Paradise. But 
 here comes the better man, just when he 
 isn't wanted. He asked me to present 
 him." 
 
 A portly gentleman afflicted with bald- 
 ness approached, dressed in proper evening 
 dress, as was the author. He spoke with 
 a slight accent, either German or Scandi- 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 9/ 
 
 navian ; which, I could not determine. 
 "Miss Thurlston tells me you have lived 
 in Paris, miss. How does this city of 
 Puritanical atmosphere interest you ? Do 
 the east winds unsettle your moral pur- 
 pose, as they bid fair to mine ? " 
 
 " My morality is not in the least affected 
 so far, but my bones are," I replied. 
 "The east wind gives me a tendency to 
 rheumatism." 
 
 " Ah ! That is bad ; but it can be 
 mended. Have you yet learned to know 
 of the healer we have in our midst ? His 
 theories can be traced directly to the New 
 Testament. They are worth examining. 
 His power is that of obsession. You 
 know when the spirit leaves the body it is 
 not instantly purified, but hangs between 
 heavenly and earthly leanings. Those 
 spirits that succumb to the remembrance 
 of the flesh return to earth, settling in the 
 form of disease in human beings. This 
 man simply exorcises these evil spirits 
 by passing his hand over the spot they 
 inhabit " 
 
 " Ah, come now, Gratton ! " said Mr. 
 
Q8 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 Bradley. " Don't tell the young lady she 
 is possessed with devils." 
 
 " He is a mental will-o'-the-wisp, miss. 
 He is never serious. How can we know 
 unless we investigate ? Truth is elusive. 
 It must be probed. It is good to believe." 
 
 "Yes, if you can change your belief 
 once a week, as you do," replied the other, 
 smiling with that humour in his eyes con- 
 doning his frequent liberty of speech. 
 
 Before the evening was over I became 
 so mixed in my mind, what with expres- 
 sions of polite anarchy, the imminence 
 of the socialistic idea, the importance of 
 college settlements, and other theories 
 hinged on to those I have quoted, that I 
 wondered how the world could be large 
 enough to hold them all where each man 
 and woman overflowed with explosive ideas 
 directed oppositely. 
 
 Mrs. Drake came late, accompanied by 
 a musician with a handsome face, and a 
 blase", world-worn expression ; but Mr. 
 Hartwell did not appear. 
 
 Frances asked if I liked the rest of the 
 " freaks " as much as I did her. I re- 
 
HER BOS TOM EXPERIENCES IOI 
 
 plied, " ' The east winds in Boston give 
 me a rheumatic tendency.' Merry Christ- 
 mas ! " 
 
 Not until Christmas Day did I have a 
 chance to talk with Dorothy alone again. 
 My box from home and many Christmas 
 letters made me feel like a boarding-school 
 girl away from home during the holidays. 
 Mr. Hartwell sent Aunt Drusilla enough 
 roses to bank a mantel, but not a sprig to 
 either Elizabeth or me. He dined with 
 us that day, as his only near relative, a 
 married sister, was spending several 
 months at Aiken, where many Bostonians 
 go for health and gaiety. I attended ser- 
 vice Christmas morning with Uncle John 
 at Trinity Church, whose great domed 
 interior, harmonious tones, and peaceful 
 sanctity called to my mind the character of 
 the man whose grand dimensions of mind, 
 soul, and body had unconsciously built the 
 glory of this edifice as a monument to his 
 own noble endeavours in behalf of human- 
 ity. I never heard Phillips Brooks preach, 
 but one autumn I crossed from Liverpool 
 in the same boat with him, and before we 
 
IO2 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 were out a day every one on board felt 
 the presence of a great soul in our midst, 
 a soul so childlike in its own purity, so 
 manly in its strength, that no man nor 
 woman could be other than his or her best 
 in its uplifting presence. 
 
 When we walked home across Copley 
 Square, along Dartmouth Street to Beacon 
 Street, every house was brightened by the 
 greens at the windows. Uncle John said 
 to me, with a little dry sound in his voice : 
 "This day always brings up my mother to 
 me, Margaret. Father never permitted 
 much Christmas at our house, I wish 
 you could have seen the old place, oppo- 
 site to where the theatre is now, but she 
 always had a pair of new stockings for us 
 boys on Christmas morning, and in the toe 
 was some little gift, something each boy 
 wanted particularly. Why, Margaret, I 
 remember Boston when there was no Back 
 Bay. I remember seeing herds of sheep 
 and cattle driven along Washington Street, 
 then a strip of road leading from Boston 
 to Dorcester. I'm getting to be an old 
 man, Margaret, but it has made me young 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 103 
 
 to have your bright face and natural ways 
 in the house." 
 
 I merely put my arm in his for a 
 moment and made him tell more about the 
 Boston of his youth. Uncle John was a 
 lonely man. The members of his family 
 were too much engrossed with outside 
 matters to waste time in making him 
 happy. 
 
 Dinner took the better part of Christ- 
 mas afternoon. Dorothy's one little boy 
 was nearly a moral and physical wreck by 
 night, being the only representative of 
 childhood among us. 
 
 Dorothy made an opportunity to say to 
 me, " I asked Fred about that photograph 
 again, Madgie, and told him what you said. 
 He is indignant, and says he will speak to 
 Warren about it, if you will allow him to." 
 
 "No," I replied, shaking my head, " I 
 want no words between them over me. 
 Thank Fred for me and tell him I intend 
 to find out the truth, and punish Mr. 
 Hartwell myself, if necessary." 
 
 "Better let Fred do it," she insisted; 
 but I was firm. 
 
IO4 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 All that Christmas Day I treated Mr. 
 Hartwell with calm indifference, until 
 finally he walked off with a slight shrug 
 and scarcely noticed me again. 
 
 Elizabeth had a strange way of colour- 
 ing whenever he approached her. She 
 was never familiar with any one nor 
 enthusiastic in her friendships. She was 
 impenetrable where her affections were 
 concerned. 
 
 During the holidays I scarcely breathed 
 between engagements. The marvel of it 
 all is the longevity of the Boston women. 
 They work harder in and out of society 
 than they could endure to work at bread- 
 winning. My nature is too open for me 
 even to pose as a flirt, but I had a plan 
 laid for penetrating the depths of Mr. 
 Warren Hartwell, and it required the aid 
 of several other men. After Christmas 
 Day I resumed my ordinary manner 
 toward him. 
 
 He asked me one night after a theatre 
 party if he had done anything to offend 
 me. I replied, " Is that your conscience 
 speaking ? " 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 105 
 
 " Oh, no ! It is the conscience of my 
 ancestors." 
 
 "Is it probable that you would do any- 
 thing to offend me that I could only know 
 about second-hand ? " I asked. 
 
 Speaking with his usual lazy indiffer- 
 ence, he replied : 
 
 " No, I love you too well for that/' 
 
 I stared at him one moment, then ex- 
 claimed, angrily : 
 
 " I did not think even Boston manners 
 could be so execrable ! " and left him 
 standing alone. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 NOT until late in January did an oppor- 
 tunity arise for the experience at the 
 Lesters' which Dorothy had promised me. 
 I had come to the conclusion, owing 
 to the frequent disillusion I had met with, 
 that heroes of the artistic world were best 
 viewed at a distance personally if one 
 wished to preserve a shred of the worship- 
 ing faculty. As a rule, the artistic nature 
 gives out its best possessions through the 
 medium of its creations or interpretations, 
 reserving a disenchanting personality for 
 social relations. Having taken keen delight 
 in Mr. Lester's books, I had no special 
 desire to know the other side of him ; but 
 for the sake of another view of Boston, 
 I went to his house, only to find him one 
 of the welcome exceptions. Perhaps he is 
 not sufficiently great to afford a disagreeable 
 106 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES IO/ 
 
 manner ; at any rate, he presented a genial, 
 well-bred exterior, devoid of egotistical man- 
 nerisms. Talented people are like Boston 
 men, so used to seeing themselves in 
 admiring eyes that a wholesomely truthful 
 reflection either elicits their surprised ad- 
 miration, or brings out the disagreeable 
 qualities of any spoiled child. To this 
 day, whenever I mount Beacon Hill, a 
 mysterious feeling of expectancy comes 
 over me. I peer around for a fleeting 
 glance of Priscillas, John Aldens, or other 
 far-away people who rightfully belong among 
 those quaint old houses still breathing out 
 history and romance. 
 
 Beacon Hill is the only quiet part of 
 Boston ; removed from the disturbance 
 of steam engines, electric cars, and gen- 
 eral traffic, in fact, it is the only se- 
 questered portion in the centre of any 
 large city that I have found on this side 
 of the Atlantic. At night only occasional 
 electric lights dazzle the inhabitants of the 
 air, but gaslight, in old-fashioned lamps, 
 one here and there, attached to the angles 
 or sides of a house, flickers about among 
 
io8 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 the old-fashioned shadows. The ancient 
 city residence of the Adams family, now 
 passed into other hands, stands behind 
 its one tree as if hiding natural grief at 
 the unfaith of the family which bred its 
 traditions. 
 
 The ballroom of spacious dimensions, 
 built for a Miss Adams upon the occasion 
 of her first appearance in the social world, 
 has been renovated ; but no modern taste 
 can do away with the atmosphere of the 
 dignified past still permeating that desolate 
 room, draughty with the breath of former 
 days, a draught too subtle and spirited 
 to be warmed away by modern furnaces. 
 This town house of the Adams family 
 represents Mount Vernon Street, and the 
 one block of Beacon Street on the hill 
 where certain families honourably continue 
 their ancestral line, though hemmed in dis- 
 agreeably by tailor shops and a club house. 
 
 In front of these old places moves the 
 hum of human masses hurrying to and fro, 
 backward and forward in step with time, 
 through the Common, with its circuitous 
 walks shaded by noble trees of illustrious 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES IOQ 
 
 ancestry, its Frog Pond and soldiers' monu- 
 ment, all echoes of more humanly pic- 
 turesque days. Behind Mount Vernon 
 and Chestnut Streets, whose occupants are 
 sometimes of the true blue and oftener of 
 assorted blood, though choosing always 
 conventional, stereotyped modes of living, 
 comes the section reputed to be Bohemia. 
 There, on Pinckney Street above Charles 
 and along Joy Street, one begins to see life. 
 The majority of the old homes on Pinckney 
 Street are converted into lodging-houses, 
 although a few professional families still 
 occupy an entire house apiece. There are 
 to be found rooming spinsters of Mayflower 
 descent, generally poor connections of the 
 same families residing on Beacon Street not 
 far away, near enough to mention fre- 
 quently and intimately ; musicians ; news- 
 paper people ; painters ; incipient authors 
 and a few full-fledged ; professors of many 
 languages ; teachers ; composers ; impecuni- 
 ous youths with high spirits and one " dress 
 suit " among several ; female typewriters 
 and private secretaries. Here is the free- 
 dom of the Latin Quarter, with but a small 
 
110 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 amount of its license. Human nature bears 
 a close family resemblance all over the 
 world when judged by communities with 
 similar earmarks, but in America individ- 
 uals merely pose as Bohemians ; they sel- 
 dom come up (or down) to the " Simon 
 pure " article of foreign cities. America is 
 eminently a respectable country, well- 
 washed morally, and with considerable 
 respect for the neighbours' opinion. Ameri- 
 cans become Bohemianised in Paris, but 
 seldom in Boston, where the spook of 
 Cotton Mather and other standards of re- 
 spectability still hold sway with a groan 
 and a ghostly shudder at a mishap. In 
 truth, this Boston Bohemia stands for good 
 spirits and innocent unconventionality, and 
 is several times more virtuous than Boston 
 society, no matter how pretentiously and 
 flamboyantly the little country tries to dis- 
 prove its virtue. 
 
 There can be no general license in a 
 neighbourhood dotted with boarding-houses 
 where one must pass an examination both 
 in respectability and brains before admit- 
 tance is allowed, and which are conducted 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES III 
 
 by patterns of spinsterial virtue who sit at 
 the head of a table full of cultured boarders, 
 announcing the cultured menu to each in- 
 dividual somewhat in this wise : " Miss 
 
 , will you partake of lamb warmed in 
 
 its own gravy ? Or a suggestion of shep- 
 herd's pie ? Or possibly chicken pie to 
 come ? " 
 
 Beyond this hint at freedom the negroes 
 begin to live and hold their own in a solid 
 mass to the very foot of the hill. This 
 is fashionable Africa, where the quality is 
 high and the negro inhabitant would be a 
 foreigner to the members of his race in 
 most cities. But to the north and east 
 of the hill, surrounding the rear of the 
 State House, there is a life carried on under 
 the rose, in the silence of conscious guilt, 
 which, whether it be found in the Latin 
 Quarter of Paris, in Bloomsbury, Lon- 
 don, or on the shady side of Beacon Hill, 
 is the rotten core of society. This life is 
 one of the various weeds called license, 
 grown in the garden of freedom and not 
 reached by the hand of the law. 
 
 Below Charles Street, bearing upon the 
 
112 HER BOSTON EX PER II NCES 
 
 river at the western foot of the streets 
 reviewed above, there is another exclusive 
 quarter. There one finds the Church of 
 the Advent, from which run off whimsical 
 little streets laid out in half-circles or 
 obtuse angles, and living amidst some 
 strictly Sabbatarian and conventional fami- 
 lies, the "quality of the artistic life," who 
 divide their time between the callings of 
 society and those of their professions. 
 There one hears an echo of Paris, too ; 
 many French phrases intersperse conversa- 
 tion, imitation salons are held on Sunday 
 night and other nights. Without doubt 
 that tiny section covers more of the real 
 wit, wisdom, and worldliness than any one 
 other part of Boston. On one of these 
 streets Dorothy took me to an evening 
 at the Lesters'. A man at one time was 
 known by the books he read and the 
 friends he made, but at present in judging 
 his tendencies one must also consider the 
 interior of his home, no matter if that 
 home be contained in one room. The 
 interior of the Lesters' house was very 
 eloquent upon this theme. The hangings, 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 1 1 3 
 
 furniture, pictures, cosy corners, and deco- 
 rative objects of interest were all in 
 accord with an aesthetic nature moulded 
 by intimacy with the world. The guests, 
 with few exceptions, were of the American 
 type never mentioned abroad ; people who 
 are accustomed from birth to social usages, 
 including the use of forks for pie and 
 beans and apropos of beans let me inter- 
 rupt myself long enough to say that no one 
 can judge of baked beans outside of Bos- 
 ton. Just as the Scotchman loses his 
 most interesting characteristics removed 
 from his " ain fireside," so beans lose all 
 family resemblance and flavour baked out- 
 side of Massachusetts. 
 
 There is an unutterable succulence 
 about a Boston bean, and a toothsome 
 sweetness which, once wholly appreciated 
 under proper conditions, can never be lost 
 to the memory of the palate. 
 
 But, to return, Elizabeth, who was with 
 us that night, soon became absorbed in a 
 discussion with the same tired-eyed com- 
 poser whom I have mentioned before, 
 concerning the ethics of the Wagnerian 
 
114 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 *> 
 
 theory of art. My charming hostess pre- 
 sented to Dorothy and me a celebrated 
 Frenchman who was lecturing upon French 
 literature at Harvard. He seemed im- 
 mensely attracted toward Dorothy, to whom 
 he said with an air of flippant intensity, so 
 to speak: "A manifold pleasure to meet 
 in such charming society the ideal Ameri- 
 can, Mrs. Granger ! It is my hope that 
 she has not failed to remember the occa- 
 sion upon which we met last then 
 he turned into French, which Dorothy 
 chattered glibly, and Elizabeth included 
 me in her conversation with the composer. 
 "Perhaps my cousin, who has lived in 
 Paris, can help us to decide," she said. 
 " Margaret, I contend that the Wagnerian 
 principles of Art are too fraught with meta- 
 physical significance ever to take hold 
 upon the Latin mind. Mr. Tomlins does 
 not agree with me. What do you think ? " 
 She looked at me with the Boston face ; 
 he glanced at both of us as if bored with 
 any opinion opposing his own. I replied, 
 " True art is not racial. The Latin races 
 discriminate between the true and the 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES I I 5 
 
 spurious in Wagner's work, whereas the 
 Germans idolise him without discrimina- 
 tion." I used all of those big words 
 bravely, the punishment must be made 
 to fit the crime. Elizabeth was impressed 
 and the composer ceased to be bored for 
 a minute. He took up the discussion 
 almost as if I were his equal mentally ; 
 but to my relief Mr. John Bradley came 
 up just then. "Again I find you a vic- 
 tim," he said. "All I am good for in 
 Boston is to act as a sandwich between 
 wit and wisdom. There is a man looking 
 for you. Have you seen him yet ? Hart- 
 well. He told me to hunt you up." 
 
 "You are indeed a social martyr, Mr. 
 Bradley," I replied. "If Mr. Hartwell 
 feels the need of my society he can find 
 me without putting his friends on the 
 warpath." 
 
 "Oh, don't call it that, or I shall feel 
 called upon to assume the arduous duties 
 of an arbitration committee. Hartwell's 
 a lazy duck. Then, too, he knew I'd 
 enjoy the mission. He only asked me 
 if you were here. There's something great 
 
Il6 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 out about Hartwell. Have you heard it ? 
 The fellows were telling me the other 
 night at the Pewter Mug Club. He's 
 completely ' bowled over ' by some strange 
 woman's picture he carries around with 
 him, begging the fellows to locate the 
 original. Picked up the photograph on 
 the street or some place. You know 
 Hartwell's such a close-mouther that every- 
 body is full of this ' corker ' on him. I've 
 put the story down for future reference. 
 It will * go ' as < copy.' " 
 
 My heart seemed to plunge downward, 
 it stood so still. I felt pale, but managed 
 to reply, " Is that the way the people talk 
 in your books, Mr. Bradley, or is Rudyard 
 Kipling phraseology coming into vogue ? " 
 
 "I beg pardon, Miss Allston. A man 
 catches slang like the measles. Thanks 
 for tripping up my vocabulary. Now, if 
 I could only imitate the language of my 
 Hibernian laundress, my ships would sail 
 over the mountain. She lives in Meander 
 Lane, and confides in me ; two facts tell- 
 ing against her. ' My Lard, sour ! Pwhat 
 'm I to be doin', sour ? Me bye, Jimmy, 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 1 1/ 
 
 he wor took to the ashpital, sour, the 
 ashpital, and beloiks thim lazy thramps 
 o' doctors il kilt him sure, they're sure to. 
 Is the place afther bein' named ashpital 
 for phwat they turns 'em into ashes, sour ? 
 Dust to dust ashes to ashes I've 
 heard it the marnin' afther the wake, 
 sour.' She was in tears, I was in " 
 
 A man and woman approached as he 
 talked. At that moment the man inter- 
 rupted him by laying a heavy hand on his 
 shoulder, saying loudly, " Bradley, my boy, 
 glad to see you ! Decided to come back 
 to the land of the bourgeois after all, did 
 you ? " Mr. Bradley, looking surprised 
 and bored, I fancied, shook hands with 
 both of them in his airy way, while the 
 woman broke into a peculiar laugh which 
 seemed to be an affliction of hers, remark- 
 ing in the midst of it, "We are glad to 
 find a sympathetic soul on this side, Mr. 
 Bradley (fearful laugh) ; Mr. Travers and 
 I could hardly tear ourselves away from 
 Italy (whoop). America is so bourgeois, 
 so tame, so PLEBEIAN! (giggle). Have 
 you begun to feel at home yet ? We come 
 
Il8 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 back with some noisy Americans. So 
 tiresome ! " 
 
 He made some reply I did not hear 
 because Elizabeth, deserted by the com- 
 poser, who left her standing alone, had 
 turned to me. Mr. Bradley presented to 
 us, from sheer compulsion, Mr. and Mrs. 
 Travers. Elizabeth put up her lorgnette 
 with a look I understood. " Everybody 
 knows the Allstons," said Mr. Travers. 
 " I guess we came across some of your 
 relations in Paris. Nice people for Ameri- 
 cans. My wife and I about made up 
 our minds never to come back to this 
 bourgeois country last summer. A man 
 can't be a gentleman in America. Why, 
 them fellows in London don't go to busi- 
 ness till ten o'clock, and close, at four. 
 You'd ought to go to Paris, you two, if 
 you want some fun. Paris is the only 
 place to live in." 
 
 He continued in the same strain for 
 possibly ten minutes, reiterating that 
 "we'd ought to go to Paris," without 
 stopping to find out whether or not we 
 had ever gone. Meantime that coarse 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 119 
 
 laugh would sound at disagreeable inter- 
 vals close by, until I saw Elizabeth, with a 
 sudden " excuse me," walk off and leave 
 me with the untamed American, who 
 could see no good in his own country. I 
 was too full of amused utterance to speak. 
 Mr. Bradley would twinkle his gay eyes at 
 me every time the laugh sounded, and 
 the man 'kept on telling me, "I'd ought 
 to go to Paris," until some other people 
 coming up, Mr. Bradley turned the couple 
 over to the newcomers. " Been to Paris ? " 
 the author asked as he turned to me. 
 " You'd ought to go to Paris ! Take them 
 with you, if you go, and leave them there. 
 I wonder how they ever got into this 
 house. I never met them anywhere else 
 in town. There's Hartwell ! I wonder 
 if the maiden's picture reposes in his left 
 breast pocket. Let's go and ask him." 
 I objected, and he remained chatting with 
 me, while covertly, out of the corner of my 
 eye, I noticed Mr. Hartwell watching us. 
 
 Directly Dorothy brought up a very 
 interesting gentleman, a musical critic with 
 a keen wit and ready tongue smacking 
 
120 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 unconsciously of continental life. He in- 
 terested me so completely that I regretted 
 the interruption of a talkative girl, who 
 approached us exclaiming, " Now, my dear 
 Mr. Wendel, you are not to escape me 
 again to-day ! I did everything but whistle 
 to attract your attention at the dear recital 
 this afternoon. Wasn't it dear ? When 
 you 'do' the Kneisel Quartette to-morrow 
 night I wish you would mention each man 
 separately, they are all such dears. What 
 I want is to know if you will give the 
 private theatricals one of your stunning 
 advance notices in your paper. That 
 paper is such an old dear, you must like 
 to write for it. Oh ! Miss Allston, 
 Elizabeth's cousin. Pardon ! How-de- 
 you-do ? I did not see you. They tell 
 me you are awfully good at that sort of 
 thing theatricals, I mean been trained 
 in Paris, and all that. Aren't you going 
 in for them, too? just to help us out? 
 You mustn't think we only go in for cul- 
 ture in Boston. They bore me so when 
 I visit New York by expecting me to talk 
 wisdom, something I never do." 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 121 
 
 I excused myself from them after a few 
 moments. As I moved away the clergy- 
 man of Uncle John's church accosted me. 
 He began at once to talk about the theatri- 
 cals the girl had mentioned. They were 
 to be for some charitable purpose in which 
 he was interested. From that subject he 
 branched off into a story of one of his 
 parishioners, a lady, who had bemoaned 
 for years her inability to assist him as 
 much as she desired with money in chari- 
 table work. Finally a fortune fell to her 
 lot and she ceased giving altogether. He 
 asked her why she had failed him in her 
 plenty. "Yes," she replied, "the Lord 
 has bestowed upon me more money, but at 
 the same time he has taken away my dis- 
 position to give. How do you account for 
 that ? " Some very good music, as is the 
 rule at the Lesters', interrupted his reply, so 
 I never heard how he answered that poser. 
 After the music I realised that the house 
 was full of lions and lionesses all roaring 
 at once. In the company of lions one 
 must be very long-eared to venture upon 
 an individual bray. With short ears one 
 
122 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 knows enough to listen and bow down. 
 However, a painter with a noble brow, 
 deep, serious eyes, and long, curling black 
 hair talked to me about everything else 
 but his work and himself. I knew, when 
 I realised his identity, that he left the 
 talking for other people to do. Another 
 painter with more manner than genius, 
 and possessed of a fluent tongue which 
 dealt out persiflage faster than I could 
 think, did not leave himself out of the 
 conversation entirely. The woman who 
 writes the most popular magazine stories 
 of the day was there : a quiet, unassuming 
 person with a saintly smile. There were 
 poets long and short haired, book re- 
 viewers, and several newspaper editors. 
 Mrs. Bobby Short sailed in late (she always 
 seems like a graceful ship in full sail with 
 several tugs steaming in her wake), with 
 one of the first violins of the Symphony 
 Orchestra, an English actor, and a young 
 man whose identity was evidently un- 
 known. The particular lioness was an 
 opera singer from the Metropolitan Opera 
 House Company in New York, who was to 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 123 
 
 be the soloist at the Symphony concert that 
 week. This singer, Mrs. Short and her 
 wake, and some of Dorothy's friends had 
 been dining together at Mrs. Short's and 
 came in with quite a breeze, very full of 
 each other and their recent dinner. After 
 several attempts I escaped to a secluded 
 cosy corner behind the piano, where I grate- 
 fully sat' alone for a few moments, taking 
 breath while criticising Boston in ambush. 
 But I had only a moment alone in which 
 to enjoy this intermission, for presently I 
 saw Warren Hartwell, who had been talk- 
 ing to the prima donna, look vacantly 
 around the room ; then, upon catching 
 sight of me, he followed to my retreat. 
 
 I saw him coming and wished for a hole 
 in the wall behind me. Between us, as 
 he advanced, there passed a plain-looking 
 couple of middle age from whom one 
 would have expected Latin verse at least. 
 I shall always remember how that woman 
 looked coyly at the man, saying with an 
 air, " I'm afraid you're a butterfly ! " 
 
 Mr. Hartwell was coming nearer. He 
 had written me a note, which I left un- 
 
1 24 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 answered. To his salutation I barely re- 
 plied, letting my hand drop to my side. 
 His face was wide awake that night. 
 
 " Miss Allston," he began, bending over 
 me as I sat there, " I wrote you a note 
 two weeks ago. The next day I was called 
 to New York, where I have been ever 
 since until to-day. I left orders to forward 
 my letters. No reply came from you. 
 Did you receive my note ? " 
 
 " Yes," I replied, looking past him. 
 
 " As I said, a man untrained at the pen 
 cannot put on paper the thoughts he 
 holds highest. I told you that I loved 
 you, which seemed to make you angry. 
 I wished to say more. You deserted 
 me. I wrote, asking for an interview 
 when I could say the rest. You have 
 not answered my note. Am I to under- 
 stand" 
 
 "You are to understand," I replied, 
 looking directly up at him, " that outside 
 of Boston, men do not love women they 
 do not respect ; and, not being a Boston- 
 ian, I have nothing to reply to your 
 letter." 
 
"HE TOOK US TO OUR CARRIAGE. 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES I2/ 
 
 "What do you mean ? Have I done or 
 said anything disrespectful? Oh, Mar- 
 garet, do not " 
 
 " Hush," I cautioned. " Here comes 
 Elizabeth. We are going. I have noth- 
 ing to say to you, Mr. Hartwell, except 
 that if you have a photograph of me I 
 should like to have it returned at once." 
 
 " How did you know ? " he attempted 
 to say, but Elizabeth reached us and he 
 took us to our carriage almost in silence. 
 As he closed the carriage door he said, 
 "Ah, by the way, Miss Allston, may I 
 drive you out on the boulevard to-morrow 
 afternoon ? The ground is just right 
 for sleighing even in town. In the coun- 
 try it will be better." 
 
 "Thanks, no," I replied; "you are very 
 kind, but I have an engagement." He 
 closed the door quickly with a sudden 
 good night. 
 
 "What is the matter with Warren?" 
 asked Dorothy. " Is he in a temper ? " 
 
 " I don't know," I replied. " I thought 
 a Boston man was too indifferent ever to 
 lose his temper." Dorothy laughed. " The 
 
128 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 idea ! I believe you like Boston men 
 better than you pretend to, Madgie." 
 
 " I certainly would not tell them so if I 
 did. They are conceited enough already." 
 
 "They certainly are all of that," she 
 admitted, with another laugh. Elizabeth 
 said nothing. She leaned back against 
 the cushions, looking very tired. About 
 my cousin Elizabeth's face, there was 
 always a touch of nobility. When her 
 lorgnette was not in use she might have 
 been called a severely handsome woman, 
 but her emotional nature had become so 
 entirely subordinated to her mental activity 
 that, even at her age, there was scarcely a 
 vestige of girlhood remaining in her face 
 or manner. She was like her mother, in 
 that all expression of feeling must be con- 
 trolled first and last. One must renew 
 one's acquaintance with a typical Boston- 
 ian at every fresh encounter. For fear of 
 undue intimacy the Puritan nature repels 
 even those toward whom it is attracted. 
 A Bostonian will go out of his way to do 
 you a favour, and at the same time affirm 
 that he has done nothing to oblige you, 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 131 
 
 until one feels his act to be a condescen- 
 sion, an impression he had no desire 
 to convey. This is also a characteristic 
 of the Britisher, of whom the Bostonian is 
 the closest descendant characteristically in 
 the United States. So it was with Aunt 
 Drusilla. She was a thoroughly good 
 woman ; the trouble lay in her exact 
 knowledge of how good she was and how 
 good other people ought to be. 
 
 The day following the evening at the 
 Lesters' I went with her to attend a special 
 meeting of the woman suffragists at King's 
 Chapel. My aunt, though not an active 
 public worker in the emancipation cause, 
 was a great enthusiast in that movement, 
 never missing a meeting where her best 
 friends were always to be seen. As we 
 drove down-town she said, in a tone of rep- 
 rimand, "Margaret, the girls tell me you 
 have had some quarrel or trouble with 
 Warren Hartwell. The mere thought of 
 such a possibility is displeasing to me. 
 When I was a girl, girls were too well bred 
 to quarrel with young men, but nowadays 
 girls are forward, acting as though there 
 
132 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 were no line drawn between the sexes. 
 Warren has been on intimate terms with 
 our family from his birth, as were his peo- 
 ple before him. I should regret any strained 
 relations brought about by our niece." Had 
 she been my mother or my mother's sister 
 I should at once have opened my heart to 
 her, but no one could confide in Aunt 
 Drusilla with any sense of relief. Instead, 
 I avoided the question by saying, rather 
 wickedly, I admit, " Did it ever occur to 
 you, Aunt Drusilla, that the fence between 
 the sexes, which you speak of having existed 
 in your girlhood, is being taken down by 
 these very women we are going to hear talk 
 this afternoon ? " 
 
 " No, nothing so untrue or unreasonable 
 could occur to me," she replied, indig- 
 nantly, forgetting Mr. Hartwell. " These 
 women are the nobility of the land ; they 
 are the pioneers, directed by a ruling hand 
 to clear the world of wrongs, to free their 
 sister slaves of the spirit oppressed for 
 centuries by selfish man." 
 
 "They may be all that," I replied, "and 
 still be responsible for the new independ- 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 133 
 
 ence common to the younger generation of 
 women. They have given a push to liberty 
 of thought which is invariably followed by 
 liberty of action. 7 do not condemn them 
 for what they have done ; I honour them, but 
 I only suggested that you are inconsistent 
 in blaming the girls for being what their 
 mothers are making them. Let them vote 
 by all means, I say, then take the conse- 
 quences." 
 
 " You show your ignorance by laying at 
 our door any advocacy of liberty between 
 sexes," she replied. "Our war-cry is 'the 
 individual right : ' give every woman her 
 individual rights as a human being ; give 
 her elevation of mind ; throw light upon 
 her intelligence and she will raise the stand- 
 ards of the world and pull men up after 
 her." 
 
 " But, my dear aunt, the freedom of the 
 single individual means the freedom of all 
 individuals. The woman does not live 
 her life isolated with her freedom from 
 the rest of the world. Freedom is a con- 
 dition existing between individuals. If 
 she lived alone she would of necessity be 
 
134 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 tree because there would be no one to 
 interfere with her actions." 
 
 " You are entirely mistaken ; your prem- 
 ises are all wrong. Political rights are 
 distinct and apart from the right to burn 
 your neighbour's house down if you are so 
 inclined. I fear, Margaret, you have im- 
 bibed anarchistic views in Paris or among 
 the kind of Bostonians you meet at Miss 
 Thurlston's." 
 
 The distinctive feature of a woman's 
 argument is the feminine knowledge of how 
 to tack. If the wind blows too hard from 
 one quarter she veers, then asserts that she 
 was stronger than the wind. Aunt Drusilla 
 had the art of tacking to perfection. I 
 dropped the subject. As we went into 
 King's Chapel she said, firmly, " I hope 
 you understand, Margaret, that what I 
 said about Warren Hartwell amounts 
 to a request from your hostess and 
 aunt." 
 
 " Certainly I understand, Aunt Dru- 
 silla," and to myself I echoed, "Warren 
 Hartwell is the best-connected young man 
 in Boston." 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 137 
 
 When of a Sunday afternoon I had gone 
 to King's Chapel to vesper services, the 
 quaint church with its high-backed box-pews 
 cushioned in red stuff, its old-English gal- 
 lery, and high pulpit reached by winding 
 stairs, gave me a sense of peace and spiri- 
 tual rest. Although the church doctrines 
 are now Unitarian, the form of worship is 
 almost identical with the old ritual used 
 before the Trinitarian belief was exchanged 
 for the newer faith. The combination lends 
 a humanitarian spirit to the form of worship 
 and to the wise, simple words of the good 
 man who preaches there. I have sat in my 
 high-backed pew overlooking the ancient 
 burying-ground and wondered what the hu- 
 man relics lying beneath those headstones 
 would think of the violin solo floating out 
 upon the quiet air from the choir-loft above 
 my head, could their senses quicken again 
 for a moment. 
 
 Those dead were probably not imbued 
 with the Calvinistic spirit of their doctrinal 
 opponents lying now in the Old Granary 
 burying-ground of the Park Street Church 
 across the street a block away ; but still I 
 
138 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 think they would be surprised at the advance 
 of ideas they must meet with if they ever 
 look in at those windows. How would one 
 of the grand dames lying out there take the 
 meeting we attended that day ? I fancy 
 she would shudder at some of the opinions 
 advanced, provided she understood them in 
 the least. But there was nothing at which 
 a modern mind could shudder in the expres- 
 sions of those women. First of all, they 
 were sincere, an element in their work or 
 any one's work which cannot be too highly 
 valued. Not among that entire assemblage 
 did I note a face spotted with the stains of 
 the flesh. They were distinctly high, if fre- 
 quently narrow-minded, women. Even if, 
 as some do hold, the emancipationists are 
 mistaken in their cause, their enthusiasm 
 must either be ennobling or a high class of 
 women comprehend the suffrage idea. They 
 were mostly middle-aged or elderly women 
 of unworldly appearance as to dress ; in fact, 
 one could label the assembly as a meet- 
 ing of cultivated, conscientious, corsetless 
 women. Without exception they spoke ably 
 and authoritatively, even when ingenuity 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 139 
 
 was required to disguise their arguments as 
 flimsy and unstable. 
 
 The most convincing argument I ever 
 heard upon the question of women's politi- 
 cal rights was made by a man, and it was 
 convincing because, instead of dwelling 
 upon the oppression and slavery to his sex, 
 which the majority of women will not admit 
 to be their position, he brought out the one 
 argument, incapable of refutation, that if a 
 woman of intelligence holds property she 
 has at least as much right to say how it 
 shall be disposed of by State or municipal 
 law as has some ignorant foreigner with not 
 a penny nor an inch of ground to his name. 
 If the suffragists would dwell upon a few 
 such practical, salient points they might 
 arouse a widespread enthusiasm among 
 women, without which their cause will never 
 succeed. Aunt Drusilla could not induce 
 even her own daughters to attend these 
 meetings, and out of a dozen women I heard 
 her invite for that particular occasion, I 
 alone accepted her invitation ; confessedly, 
 out of curiosity. 
 
 I had never before seen Aunt Drusilla 
 
I4O HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 unbend as she did at the close of the meet- 
 ing, mingling among the sisters of the faith. 
 Every one congratulated every one else, 
 with the exclamation, " How interesting the 
 meeting has been to-day ! Unusually so, I 
 think. The cause progresses ; I hope I 
 may live to see the day of our great success. 
 It is bound to come ! " 
 
 I left my aunt in this hopeful frame of 
 mind and walked home for the sake of exer- 
 cise. In my room I found awaiting me my 
 long-lost photograph, with a note from Mr. 
 Hartwell in which he said : 
 
 " MY DEAR Miss ALLSTON : Kindly permit 
 me to return this photograph of you which I found 
 last fall in a book in Bates Hall at the Public Li- 
 brary. If you condemn me for keeping it after 
 I recognised the original, my only excuse is to be 
 found in the hope I had of securing your ultimate 
 permission to retain it among my choice posses- 
 sions. 
 
 " This hope you have distinctly shown me to be 
 futile, and I return the photograph with many 
 apologies for not having done so earlier. I am 
 leaving town to-day, so will bid you good-bye now, 
 as you have given me to understand that my 
 presence is obnoxious to you. I regret having 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 141 
 
 heightened your already poor opinion of my fellow 
 citizens, because I had learned to value that 
 opinion. 
 
 " Believe me most sincerely yours, 
 
 " WARREN HARTWELL." 
 
 Something unusual happened to me after 
 reading that letter. I tore my photograph 
 in two, threw it on the grate fire and cried 
 over the letter. If he had waited until he 
 was punished enough I should have tried to 
 forgive him. Men are so obtuse, especially 
 Boston men. Could he have left town with- 
 out coming to the house at all ? The family 
 would never forgive me. How unfortunate ! 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE month of February passed, dupli- 
 cating with variations the gay and 
 serious entertainments I have already de- 
 scribed, but without a word from Warren 
 Hartwell. He had called upon the family 
 that afternoon while I was at the woman's 
 suffrage meeting, but finding no one at 
 home, he left his card for Aunt Drusilla, 
 with the word "good-bye " written in one 
 corner. No one in town seemed to know 
 where he had gone, but you may be sure 
 there were rumours of infinite variety. 
 
 One cold, blustering night in early March, 
 after a day of winds which made one feel 
 like a centripetal force drawing the blasts 
 of the earth toward a common and unfor- 
 tunate centre, we all sat around the library 
 open fire, where the logs crackled spitefully 
 at every new blast from across the river. 
 142 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 143 
 
 Uncle John sat by, reading the Transcript. 
 Dorothy had been dining with us previous 
 to attending a rehearsal of the private 
 theatricals to be given after Easter and in 
 which she was to take a minor part. Fred 
 was in New York. Elizabeth, looking over 
 at her sister, asked, " What is all this talk I 
 hear about Warren ? Does Fred know any- 
 thing ? " 
 
 " He has probably heard what you have. 
 He knows nothing." 
 
 Elizabeth continued, " A woman came up 
 to me this afternoon at the loan exhibition 
 at the Grundmann studios and asked me if 
 I knew the truth about Warren Hartwell. 
 She went on to say that everybody said he 
 had followed out West a vaudeville actress 
 whose picture he carries around with him 
 and shows everywhere, and she actually 
 asked me if it were true." 
 
 "The idear!" broke in Aunt Drusilla. 
 c< How scandalous ! How dare they say such 
 a thing about a Hartwell ! I hope you told 
 her the truth, Elizabeth." 
 
 " I do not know the truth, mother. I 
 told her I knew that Warren was above any 
 
144 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 such liaison, but I have heard different 
 versions of that picture story all winter." 
 
 Dorothy looked at me and my eyes fell. 
 
 " Don't believe one word they say, Eliza- 
 beth," Dorothy said, quickly. " Surely you 
 don't believe everything you hear. Young 
 men are always being talked about, and 
 
 "Stop, Dorothy," I said. "Give some 
 better excuse than that for him or none at 
 all." 
 
 They all looked, at me, except Uncle John, 
 who was immersed in his paper. " If you 
 wish to know the truth about the photo- 
 graph, I can give it to you," I continued, 
 feeling like an army recruit in his first 
 battle. " Mr. Hartwell has been carrying 
 about and showing at the club a photograph 
 of me, which he found in a library book 
 where I left it." 
 
 "The idear!" exclaimed Aunt Drusilla. 
 "John, do you hear that ? " 
 
 " Yes, my dear," uncle responded, ab- 
 sently, reading on. 
 
 Then Dorothy and I between us went 
 into details, telling what we thought we 
 knew. I explained that Mr. Hartwell had 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 145 
 
 returned to me the object under discussion 
 the day he left town. Elizabeth said, quietly, 
 " I do not believe Warren showed your 
 photograph at the club, Margaret. Warren 
 has always been a gentleman." 
 
 Dorothy insisted that Fred had heard all 
 about when and how he did it, but some 
 way or another I could not corroborate her 
 belief by my own evidence. I was forced 
 into an explanation, but I could not bring 
 myself to dye the villain blacker than he 
 was already painted. In the midst of the 
 discussion Uncle John dropped his paper 
 and in an awed voice exclaimed, "Louise 
 French is dead ! " 
 
 " Dead ! " the three women echoed. 
 
 " Yes, here is the notice : * French. At 
 Aiken, March 5, Louise Hart well French,, 
 wife of Samuel L. French. Funeral ser- 
 vices to be held at her late residence, Marl- 
 borough Street, at 1 1 A. M., March 9.' Then 
 here is a personal notice saying she died sud- 
 denly, attended by her husband and brother, 
 who have been with her for some time past 
 and who will accompany the remains home." 
 
 While my relatives, each in her different 
 
146 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 way, expressed her grief for a lifelong 
 friend, my mind dwelt upon that friend's 
 brother. He had been at Aiken with his 
 invalid sister while the town was ringing 
 with gossip concerning his movements. 
 Why could not the other reports be untrue, 
 too ? But if they were, how did Mr. Bradley 
 know he possessed a photograph and the 
 men at the club know it was my likeness, 
 unless he had shown it ? No ; there was a 
 clear case against him, and I felt my teeth 
 close hard together even while I pitied him 
 in his grief for his only sister. 
 
 The death of Mrs. French brought about 
 a cessation of gaieties, including even the 
 minor diversions of the Lenten season, not 
 only among the members of our own house- 
 hold, but also among several families all of 
 whom had been friends of the Hartwells 
 personally or ancestrally since the Revolu- 
 tion at the latest. Bostonians have two 
 particular occasions when they are demon- 
 strative, in case of death, or indefinite 
 departure. This state lasted for a week or 
 two, and was only broken by the grand 
 opera season. 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 147 
 
 There is no one feature of Boston more 
 astonishing, considering the claims the city 
 lays to musical enlightenment, than the kind 
 of building in which Bostonians, at that 
 time, listened to grand opera during the few 
 weeks of the year when the New York com- 
 pany visited Boston. 
 
 Opera was given in a mammoth barn 
 called Mechanics' Building, built for food 
 fairs, horse shows, and other like diversions. 
 Its seating capacity is large, its hearing 
 capacity infinitely small. At the back of 
 the galleries the singers resembled puppets 
 moving about in pantomime. Even the 
 De Reszkes and Plangon, with their great 
 volume of vocal tone, could scarcely be 
 heard in many parts of the house. The 
 seats are rudely made of wood, and are on 
 a par as to comfort with the reserve at a 
 circus. The draughts come and go at will, 
 consequently the women hesitated to wear 
 evening costumes. However, a sprinkling 
 of such attire was always to be found 
 amidst the otherwise plainly dressed audi- 
 ence. The victims amiably, year after year, 
 paid fabulous prices for these disagreeable 
 
148 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 places ; which fact of itself argues for their 
 appreciation of opera as much as their ab- 
 surd submission to conditions which could 
 easily be remedied, argues against it. At 
 last the prevailing rebellion against such 
 operatic accommodations took form and 
 were met by a transference of the annual 
 week of opera to a large theatre, where the 
 price of admittance was raised far beyond 
 the limit of the average pocketbook. 
 
 Between acts we would wrap up in opera 
 cloaks to avoid pneumonia, and promenade 
 barren, black, dirty corridors for a bit of 
 display under the name of sociability. Of 
 course, everybody with connections was 
 there, not to speak of the several thousand 
 people besides, who in reality supported the 
 enterprise by crowding to hear popular 
 opera favourites, regardless of the merits of 
 the opera or performance. Boston may 
 move on a highly discriminating plane 
 orchestrally ; she certainly does not operati- 
 cally. 
 
 Dorothy's friends rivalled each other in 
 entertaining the expensive vocalists, at 
 least, they entertained those who did not 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 149 
 
 decline all invitations, as was the case with 
 the superlatively great artists Jean and 
 Edward De Reszke and Calve, whose fame 
 is built on a firmer rock than society favour. 
 Frances Thurlston knew several of the 
 singers well, personally ; an acquaintance 
 dating back some ten years in Paris. I 
 enjoyed meeting them quietly at her apart- 
 ment much more than at a crowded " after- 
 noon," or even at a dinner. With Frances 
 they were good comrades, not roaring lions ; 
 but with only a few exceptions, opera singers 
 are more interesting on the stage than in a 
 social capacity. 
 
 After several weeks Mr. Hartwell re- 
 sumed his familiar visits at Uncle John's. 
 My relatives had apparently forgotten the 
 incident of the picture, or chose to ignore 
 it out of respect for Warren's bereavement. 
 
 He was much changed. He talked but 
 little to any one, scarcely at all to me. I 
 avoided him as much as possible. The 
 author, Mr. Bradley, was in close attend- 
 ance upon me by that time. He said he 
 had undertaken to teach me Bostonese. 
 Although himself a Bostonian of impeccable 
 
I5O HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 connections, he possessed the faculty of 
 laughing at himself and of enjoying more 
 than one kind of life. He insisted that 
 Frances Thurlston furnished him more ma- 
 terial than any one other person he had ever 
 known. She almost liked him. They were 
 like two men together. He was always 
 making a note of her expressions. He con- 
 ducted Frances and me all about the city, 
 making himself invaluable to us by his 
 actual knowledge and humourous style of 
 narrative. It seems a pity he does not put 
 more of himself into his books, and less of 
 literary characters. 
 
 Easter came late that year, bringing a lull 
 in the winds and many attractive symptoms 
 of spring. One place of interest to which 
 Mr. Bradley introduced us, merely as a 
 glimpse of Boston at one point, not for any 
 particular merit the exhibit displayed that 
 year or any year, was the annual exhibition 
 of pictures at the Art Club. Mr. Bradley 
 insisted that his wit was only an editorial 
 revision of the conversations he overheard 
 at this exhibition. " Of course, you know," 
 said he, " nobody but a few of the girl stu- 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 1 5 I 
 
 dents at the Art Museum come to look at 
 the pictures." 
 
 "What do the rest come for?" I in- 
 quired, while Frances, who had left us sit- 
 ting on one of the benches located in the 
 middle of the room, walked up very close 
 to a picture, looked at it keenly through 
 squinted eyelids, then slowly stepped back- 
 ward in approved fashion, gradually gaining 
 a proper distance and in so doing upset a 
 little man who was making funnels of his 
 hands for the purpose of artistic focus. 
 " They come to look at each other, Bos- 
 tonians are so picturesque, you know. Ten 
 thousand blisters ! " laughed Mr. Bradley. 
 " She's upset Foller ! He was focussing 
 the vanishing-point ! She broke into the 
 middle ground ! He'd forgive her for libel 
 or theft, but never for that ! " 
 
 " Who is the man ? " I asked. 
 
 "Foller! Don't you know him ? There's 
 one of his prize things over there. Got 
 three thousand for it several years ago. 
 Hasn't made a penny since." 
 
 As we sat there I began to believe what 
 he said was true. Most of the people 
 
152 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 glanced cursorily at the pictures, and, after 
 one quick tour about the rooms, relapsed 
 into chatter. The art exhibition, at night, 
 anyway, seemed to be but a social gathering 
 decorated by the pictures on the walls. 
 What else can be expected when so little 
 of vital interest is exhibited ? At the Art 
 Museum one can see good pictures, also at 
 the yearly loan exhibit, where there are col- 
 lected the best to be found among the 
 private possessions of the dilettante collect- 
 ors ; but an Art Club exhibition is, as a 
 rule, far below the average as a whole, and 
 there seems to be no satisfactory explana- 
 tion of the fact. 
 
 In the Art Museum there are good 
 pictures, casts, marbles, tapestries, laces, 
 and many other beautiful objects suffi- 
 cient to claim one's attention indefinitely ; 
 but having seen quantities of much the 
 same thing before, I was more interested 
 in watching the girl students of the school 
 connected with the Museum pour out on to 
 the streets, conspicuous in working blouses 
 and great gingham aprons daubed liberally 
 with impressionist colours, at the sound 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 155 
 
 of a passing band. They chattered and 
 munched candy or cakes from the con- 
 fectioner's hard by, giggling and frisking 
 about in true student ways ; then like 
 a flock of sheep they scurried back to 
 work. And even more was I interested 
 in the great number of Italians who con- 
 gregate in this building of a Sunday after- 
 noon, when there is no admission fee. 
 Among the miscellaneous crowd collected 
 there on Sunday these Italian women, 
 some in gay garments, others in plain 
 dark clothes, invariably brightened by a 
 brilliant handkerchief or scarf about the 
 neck or draped on the head, lend bright 
 patches of colour to the throng. They 
 seldom wear hats, even in cold weather. 
 The men are less picturesque in attire, 
 but are equally so in face and gesture. 
 Mr. Bradley accounted for their choice 
 of that particular place for Sunday rendez- 
 vous by their native taste for the best 
 expression of art obtainable without cost. 
 He took us over the North End, a part 
 of which is now relegated to these Italians. 
 The most picturesque of them make a 
 
156 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 living by grinding orchestrions and rattling 
 tambourines on the streets of new Boston. 
 The dagos sell bananas and work as day 
 labourers. Over there we investigates 
 North Square, which is said to have more 
 historical associations than any other spot 
 in America. Until within a half-century 
 it was a fashionable centre, but now the 
 Paul Revere house is the most famous 
 landmark within its precincts, carrying us 
 back in thought to 1775. Near it stands 
 the old Hichborn house, of much later 
 date. The site of the first Old North 
 Church, where the three Mathers preached, 
 is adjacent. Sir Henry Frankland, who 
 gained notoriety by marrying Agnes Sur- 
 riage, a servant at a Marblehead inn, also 
 resided on this square, next door to 
 " Stingy Tommy " Hutchinson, who was 
 governor as early as 1771. Along there 
 Major Pit cairn had his headquarters dur- 
 ing the Revolutionary War, not far from 
 where the first public markets were lo- 
 cated, adjacent to a watch-house, fire- 
 engine station, and town pump. 
 
 When one can shut one's eyes to the 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 159 
 
 present condition of North Square, permit- 
 ting these characters, with their signifi- 
 cance, to file through one's brain, the 
 North End is well worth visiting; but 
 when one walks up Salem Street with 
 a strong desire to sing aloud, " My name 
 is Solomon Levi, I live on Salem Street," 
 owing to the uninterrupted Semitic charac- 
 ter of the shops and their contents, then 
 comes upon Christ Church, in whose 
 belfry Robert Newman, its sexton, hung 
 the now celebrated signal-lights, standing 
 in its original aspect except for that signal- 
 light steeple long ago blown down and 
 replaced by one of Bulfmch's design, the 
 incongruity is historically bewildering and 
 disturbing. The neighbourhood is incon- 
 sistent. One wishes American history were 
 commemorated by fenced-off localities into 
 which no foreign elements could penetrate 
 and discolour. 
 
 Then we saw the narrowest street in 
 Boston, which is saying as little as possible 
 for its width. It is called Salutation, and 
 is too narrow to admit of a sidewalk. The 
 trite complaint of tourists that Boston 
 
160 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 streets are bewildering in their turns and 
 twists is a one-sided view of the city, 
 a view confined to the old North End and 
 the commercial portions of the newer city. 
 The Back Bay and South End are stereo- 
 typed enough in regularity to suit any taste 
 for parallel lines. Mr. Bradley related how 
 his grandfather told him, as a child, about 
 the life at the Red Lion, The King's Head, 
 and Ship Tavern, and about travelling to 
 Troy, New York, in a stage, the longest 
 trip the old gentleman had ever taken. 
 " But the old boy thought he knew the 
 world," said his grandson, who was, with- 
 out doubt, as "well connected" as any 
 Bostonian with whom I was acquainted, 
 and the only one who spoke of his ancestry 
 as if it did not amount to much. But he 
 had lived most of his life in Europe. How- 
 ever, his intimate personal relation to the 
 past brought those days close to us as we 
 strayed with him about the North End. 
 He insisted that only once was he con- 
 cerned about his ancestry, and that was 
 when he walked through the Common 
 at the time the earth of the old burying- 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES l6l 
 
 ground there was being broken up for 
 the purpose of running the subway under- 
 neath. "I believe I caught a chill at the 
 tomb of some of my ancestors. As I stood 
 talking to the men about some relics they 
 had found, I suddenly remembered that this 
 was the tomb of some of my maternal con- 
 nections way back, and that chill came on," 
 he said, without much evidence of the ague. 
 
 I do not remember any man whom I 
 liked better than I did John Bradley. 
 Everybody liked him. He said people 
 always liked him too much to love him, 
 especially women. 
 
 This must have been my case, because 
 I wished several times I could love him. 
 John Bradley had not a particle of the 
 Boston man's pose. He never took him- 
 self too seriously. He looked at one when 
 one was speaking quite as though he were 
 gaining information or pleasure ; generally 
 the latter. Yes, John Bradley would be an 
 interesting husband for some one. 
 
 On Easter Sunday I started out alone 
 on foot, intending to call for Frances, as 
 we had arranged to attend service to- 
 
1 62 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 gether. The day was moist and warm. 
 I welcomed spring with every breath. 
 Along Beacon Street, in the tiny grass 
 plots belonging to each house, the crocuses 
 were nodding their heads in tune with the 
 spring melodies in the air. 
 
 All about the bold equestrian statue 
 of Washington at the Arlington Street 
 entrance to the Public Gardens the hya- 
 cinths bloomed profusely, scenting the air 
 deliciously. I made a little detour for the 
 sake of the loveliness all about, walking 
 slowly toward the bridged lake, where al- 
 ready the swan-boats had begun to ply 
 for the benefit of the happy children. 
 Alone, on a bench under a budding tree, 
 sat a man whose back I recognised. 
 
 He faced the lake, and did not see me ; 
 but he looked so lonely, sitting there with 
 his head slightly bowed, that even his top 
 hat with its band of mourning and his 
 immaculate frock coat could not stiffen the 
 relaxed, forsaken look about him. I might 
 easily have turned back, but my weak heart 
 proved stronger than my will. I wore fas- 
 tened to my jacket a bunch of lilies-of-the- 
 
I . . DROPPED THE LILIES INTO ONE OF HIS HANDS.' 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 165 
 
 valley. Unfastening them, I slowly walked 
 past him and dropped the lilies into one of 
 his hands, which lay open, palm up, on his 
 knee. My honest intention was to pass on 
 without a word, but the tone of his " Mar- 
 garet ! " held me. We looked at each other 
 silently for a moment, then I smiled : 
 whereupon rising and removing his hat, he 
 asked, " Did you intend these for me or for 
 some tramp upon whom you took pity ? " 
 
 "I knew your back," I replied. "You 
 looked so lonely "I hesitated. 
 
 " Oh, it was pity, then, in any case ? " 
 he said. "Well, I am lonely, there is 
 no use to deny it." 
 
 Avoiding the subject, I said, " I had no 
 idea a Bostonian with connections would 
 do anything so plebeian as to sit in the 
 Public Gardens on a bench." 
 
 "You seem to forget that Bostonians 
 are human beings, after all ; that they 
 have hearts as well as connections, hearts 
 not easily stirred, but enduring in affection." 
 
 I tried to swallow my own heart at that 
 moment : it leaped high ; then, impetuously, 
 I stepped nearer to him and held out my 
 
1 66 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 hand. " Come and go to church with Miss 
 Thurlston and me, won't you ? " 
 
 " Do you mean it ? Do you want me ? " 
 
 " Yes ; this is a day on which to for- 
 give. I can't leave you sitting there alone." 
 
 " Well, I suppose pity is better than 
 nothing," he said, moving along by my 
 side. " I will go. I cannot yet admit 
 that I ever committed any great breach of 
 etiquette toward you ; but you seem to 
 think I did, so even momentary forgive- 
 ness is a good deal, coming from you." 
 
 "Don't let us talk about it any more, 
 Mr. Hartwell," I said. " Smell the flowers, 
 listen to the chimes, and thank God for all 
 we have and are. When I think of my 
 own mistakes I can afford to forgive for at 
 least one day, when it is a day like this." 
 
 "Could you forgive that man who let 
 you tie your own shoe string on his step ? " 
 inquired he, with the gayest look I had 
 seen on his face since Christmas. 
 
 " Yes, even that man, provided he would 
 do penance by tying it now," I replied, 
 without any particular thought. 
 
 " Permit me," he replied, and before I 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 169 
 
 knew what he was doing, down he went 
 on one knee on the grass beside the bench 
 and was tying my shoe-string, which was 
 dragging. A well-connected Bostonian on 
 one knee, Easter morning, in the Public 
 Gardens ! " What if some one should see 
 us ? " I gasped. 
 
 " Why should you care ? " he replied, giv- 
 ing the bows an extra pull before he stood 
 up. "You are not a Bostonian." 
 
 " Well, do you mean to say you are the 
 man who laughed at me that day in the 
 rain ? " 
 
 " What else could a man do ? That was 
 my sister's house. The day I landed I 
 was taken with the most ridiculous dis- 
 ease a grown man could have, measles. 
 I caught them from my sister's children. I 
 was shut up for several weeks at her house ; 
 you know I crossed earlier than I intended. 
 That rainy day I was getting fierce with 
 boredom. While roaming about the house 
 I chanced into the drawing-room and looked 
 out to examine the weather. I arrived on 
 the scene just in time to see a woman try- 
 ing to tie her boot lace. You looked as 
 
I/O HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 though you were swearing. Were you? 
 Then you glanced up at me, and what dis- 
 dain your face took on ! With that one blast 
 of scorn you turned away and stumbled on, 
 believing, I suppose, that I had been a 
 witness of the entire performance. Did 
 I laugh ? How could a man help it ? I 
 never forgot your face, anyway." 
 
 "And you did not tell me in all these 
 months ! " I asked, laughing in spite of 
 myself at the remembrance. 
 
 "That is the way Bostonians leave an 
 impression of great knowledge. They tell 
 enough and intimate the rest, as I have 
 done, thus working on the imagination of 
 the listener with great effect. Don't you 
 think ? Then, too, when a woman has a 
 poor opinion of a man to begin on, he is not 
 likely to tell the worst until he finds the 
 case hopeless. I 
 
 "Here, turn to the right, up Boylston 
 Street," I interrupted. " Have you forgot- 
 ten the way ? " 
 
 " No, but a glimpse of happiness some- 
 times obscures a man's vision. Where did 
 you say we were going ? " 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 171 
 
 " To join Miss Thurlston, then to 
 church." 
 
 " And pick up Bradley on the way ? " he 
 asked, with affected indifference. 
 
 "Mr. Bradley is out of town," I said, 
 looking away from him. 
 
 " I am glad to hear that. Do you know, 
 Miss Allston, I started through the Garden 
 this morning in rather a desperate mood. 
 The taste of spring in the air, as I breathed 
 it, enticed me into sitting down among the 
 flowers. I was thinking, when you came 
 up, what a poor use of the world's beauty 
 we make at least, those of us who live 
 cooped up amidst brick and mortar. Ordi- 
 nary men in cities become so dependent 
 upon human beings and human thought that 
 when trouble comes they do not know how 
 to turn to the wonderful expressions of God 
 which speak to the poet or to any artistic 
 temperament." 
 
 I listened to Mr. Hartwell with deep 
 respect, because I knew how difficult it must 
 be for a man of his reserved nature to put 
 such thoughts into words. I knew he was 
 addressing one whom he held dear to 
 
1/2 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 himself, otherwise he would have thought 
 without speaking. 
 
 " Yes," I said, gently. " We of the artistic 
 temperament have many joys and many 
 sorrows other people do not know." 
 
 " Take a chap like Bradley," he went on. 
 " He is always expressing himself, finding 
 form for everything he feels ; but some- 
 times I wonder if such men feel as deeply 
 as I, who am pent up." 
 
 "No, I do not believe they do feel like 
 your kind ; or perhaps their feeling is as 
 deep, but it is not lasting. Their power of 
 expression relieves them and makes room 
 for newer feelings. I would trust your kind 
 for strength and endurance more than I 
 would the other." 
 
 " Is that honest ? " he asked, looking 
 down at me with the eyes of a man not 
 used to being conquered, with an unwill- 
 ing delight there. 
 
 "Yes," I replied, hurriedly; "but here 
 we are at Miss Thurlston's." 
 
 " Wait a moment. Could I do anything 
 to make you forget my mistake about the 
 picture ? " 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 173 
 
 " Nothing but disprove the facts." 
 His face lengthened, and we walked up 
 the steps of the apartment house together 
 without speaking. After church Mr. Hart- 
 well went home with me to Easter dinner, 
 being engaged previously as a guest at that 
 feast ; but he relapsed into a spiritless man- 
 ner toward me, and after that day I rarely 
 saw him. He was not going out socially, 
 and after that Easter Day talk he came 
 seldom to our house. Always once a week 
 flowers were sent me without a card. Al- 
 though my instinct assured me of the 
 source of this weekly offering, I could not 
 refuse to enjoy the flowers nor to be 
 secretly glad of the remembrance. 
 
 We were once more deep in social labours. 
 I am nearly certain that Elizabeth attended, 
 on an average, four chamber concerts and 
 recitals weekly, besides the Symphony Re- 
 hearsal. Even my absorbing interest in 
 music could not urge me to such immoder- 
 ate attendance. What one values one must 
 not exhaust. Elizabeth was conscientious 
 in her pleasure as well as in her industry. 
 She laboured at piano practice long after the 
 
174 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 spirit which achieved was fagged, and urged 
 by the same Puritan rod she religiously 
 attended concerts for fear she might fail in 
 her duty toward the art she held the highest. 
 Musical fanaticism is not so prevalent in 
 Boston as in Germany, but there are indica- 
 tions of individual tendency that way. 
 
 Dorothy took me to the only club meet- 
 ing I was ever known to enjoy, and the 
 reason for this result lay in the fact that 
 the Playgoers was a club only in name and 
 membership, while in fact its meetings were 
 receptions at which local celebrities and 
 others convened for the purpose of lionising 
 some distinguished actor, author, or singer. 
 
 Frances Thurlston was there that after- 
 noon, accompanied by John Bradley's sister 
 and her latest " freak," of whom she plainly 
 was getting a surfeit. This Professor 
 Langdon Frances called her peripatetic 
 poet. 
 
 There was no certainty as to which 
 branch of knowledge he professed particu- 
 larly ; certainly there were few in which he 
 had not lingered more ambitiously than 
 famously. He had lectured, preached, 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 175 
 
 taught school, and scribbled over the major 
 part of the United States, judging from his 
 frequent and unreserved personal revela- 
 tions. If there was a single celebrity he 
 had not known intimately, we had never 
 heard of him or her, and his memory for 
 other people's thoughts and sayings was 
 marvellous and tiresome. 
 
 We are all plagiarists, as for that ; but 
 some of us prefer our own feeble turn of 
 expression to unending quotation of more 
 heroic forms. Professor Langdon was 
 verging on to fifty. His figure was the 
 best thing about him, and would have been 
 better clothed in garments large enough 
 to fit. His inevitable frock coat separated 
 widely at the usual meeting of the tails in 
 the back, and even wider across the chest. 
 We wondered many times if a hat of the 
 right size would have been more expensive 
 than one many times too small for his long 
 auburn curls. Between valuable quotations, 
 of which his conversation was composed, he 
 would pause for an ecstatic moment, shut 
 his eyes, and raise his face heavenward for 
 inspiration. There were many indications 
 
1/6 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 pointing to our belief that he subsisted 
 entirely on onions. Mr. Bradley called him 
 Saint Bermuda, insisting that Frances was 
 fated to cultivate the fruits of his knowl- 
 edge indefinitely, possibly maritally. 
 
 If ever Frances hated one man more than 
 most men, the unfortunate was Saint Ber- 
 muda, and the more she hated the more 
 he reverenced her. He told us once he 
 honoured strength, even when it was 
 directed against himself. John Bradley 
 merely looked at us, articulating with his 
 lips " Bermudas ? " That afternoon he had 
 joined Frances and Miss Bradley on the 
 street and, with his usual genial intimacy, 
 attached himself to their party. Accord- 
 ingly, the first people we saw at the Play- 
 goers were the Professor in an interval of 
 silent, closed-eyed ecstasy while talking 
 to Miss Bradley, and John Bradley, con- 
 doling humourously near by with Frances, 
 who looked fierce. Needless to say the 
 Professor attracted much attention. He 
 seemed to know nearly everybody in the 
 room, and in a few moments had got him- 
 self presented to the lion of the occasion, 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 1 77 
 
 who, being a foreigner, wrote afterward, in 
 the first chapter of his impressions of 
 America, that Bostonians wore clothes too 
 small for them, ate onions, and quoted 
 poetry to excess ; which passage plainly 
 evinced that Saint Bermuda's was the 
 strongest personality he met in Boston. I 
 never saw a Mormon preacher, but Pro- 
 fessor Langdon always reminded me of one. 
 
 From the Playgoers I left Dorothy and 
 went with Frances and her party to an 
 Italian restaurant for dinner. When Bos- 
 tonians break out with a desire for flesh- 
 pots, they hie them to an Italian restaurant 
 as the straightest course to Egypt ; whereas, 
 a newborn babe is hardly more virtuous 
 than one of those eating-houses, where 
 bad manners and bad tobacco are the only 
 indications of bad morals to be seen. 
 
 Professor Langdon insisted that after 
 dinner we must accompany him to one of 
 the most interesting and cultured meetings 
 ever held in Boston, where we would have 
 a chance to talk with earnest, spiritual- 
 minded people at their club called by some 
 Greek name, meaning the doorway or arch- 
 
178 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 way, if I recall it correctly. Mr. Bradley 
 added his persuasions so gravely and per- 
 sistently that I viewed him with suspicion. 
 I knew he scented "copy" or "larks," the 
 two objects of his existence. And so we 
 went to the club with the Greek name ; a 
 party, as Mr. Bradley confided to me, com- 
 posed of several " freaks " and himself, 
 representative Bostonians. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 SAINT BERMUDA'S promised gath- 
 ering of exalted spirits surpassed even 
 his own personality in unique entertain- 
 ment. Many of Frances Thurlston's 
 coterie were present, but the predominat- 
 ing element was representative of the 
 Cambridge Conferences and the Theosoph- 
 ical cult. At one side of the room stood a 
 young man whom at first I mistook for 
 a mulatto. He was surrounded by women, 
 upon whom he cast rather weary glances 
 out of large, innocent, bovine eyes. He 
 spoke seldom ; whether from lack of words 
 or opportunity, one could not say at a 
 glance. 
 
 " You have not met Swami ! " exclaimed 
 
 Saint Bermuda. " His is a grand soul. 
 
 He is teaching us, in the words of my 
 
 friend, Hamilton Mabie, that ' Culture's 
 
 179 
 
l8o HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 distinctive characteristic is not extent, but 
 quality of knowledge ; not range, but vital- 
 ity of knowledge ; not scope of activity, but 
 depth of life.' Swami is a grand soul ! " 
 
 " But who is Swami ? And why do the 
 women swarm so ? " I persisted. 
 
 " Boston bees about a Hindoo flower, 
 sucking spiritual honey," interposed Brad- 
 ley. 
 
 " A Hindoo priest, you mean ? " 
 
 " Exactly ; or idol, I should say, to look 
 at the worshiping women," he replied, with 
 serious disdain. 
 
 " How can they act so over any man ? " 
 sniffed Frances. 
 
 " Ah ! he is a grand soul, Miss Thurls- 
 ton," replied Saint Bermuda. "Are you 
 not inspired in his presence, as his follow- 
 ers are, in the words of our great poet, 
 Lowell, to 
 
 " ' Be noble ! and the nobleness that lies 
 In other men, sleeping, but never dead, 
 Will rise in majesty to meet thine own ' ? " 
 
 " I can't say that I am," replied Frances, 
 with scorn. "He looks as bored as the 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 181 
 
 baby lion at the Zoo used to when the 
 women patted him and tried to kiss him." 
 
 " That is but Swami's bodily fatigue," 
 exclaimed a feminine Theosophist standing 
 with us. " His eternal ego, his spiritual 
 essence, grasps and holds the higher life 
 ever before our more backward being. 
 Nirvana stands as a mountain-top before 
 his gaze. His spirit rises slowly toward 
 that eminence under transitory forms 
 and " 
 
 "As my friend John Fiske says," inter- 
 rupted Saint Bermuda, " when God re- 
 vealed himself to his ancient prophet he 
 came not in the earthquake nor the tem- 
 pest, but in a voice that was still and 
 small ; so that divine spark, the soul, as 
 it takes up its abode in this realm of fleet- 
 ing phenomena, chooses 
 
 " Oh, Professor Langdon," broke in a 
 voice I seemed to have heard before, "we 
 have not seen you at our < evenings ' this 
 winter ! Are you deserting us, or is liter- 
 ary work taking all your time ? " 
 
 A laugh followed, asserting the identity 
 of the speaker. I had met her at the 
 
1 82 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 Lesters'. Turning to Mr. Bradley, she 
 went on, " So glad to have a chance to 
 tell you how much I enjoyed your new 
 book. Having heard so much talk and 
 criticism about it, I was surprised to find 
 it so good. Americans have such poor taste 
 in literature. I like everything you write." 
 
 "You are very good," murmured John 
 Bradley, trying to hide the joke he saw on 
 himself. We escaped, and crossed the 
 room to meet Swami. I found him an 
 intelligent Hindoo, who spoke good, though 
 limited, English. He confessed that it 
 surprised him to find such an earnest fol- 
 lowing of his own religion as came under 
 his observation in a Christian community 
 like Boston. 
 
 Presently there was some very .bad vocal 
 music made by a corpulent lady wearing 
 a dress altogether too short in the skirt 
 for grace, and too tight in the waist to 
 admit of a proper exhibition of her method 
 of breathing, the feature of vocal life in 
 Boston which really supplants the impor- 
 tance of singing. Judging from the con- 
 versation of singing pupils in Boston, one 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 183 
 
 can easily fancy that song is produced by 
 some mechanical contortions carried on 
 below the waist, regardless of beauty or 
 health. This singer was a method con- 
 tortionist. People who dwell altogether 
 in either their souls or brains have poor 
 taste in music, but even they can recog- 
 nise all lack of sentiment in singing, and, 
 accordingly, no one heeded her muscular 
 efforts. Everybody buzzed obliviously. 
 
 Swami remained the centre of feminine 
 gravity, and there were few men pres- 
 ent to rival him in spiritual or mundane 
 attractions. 
 
 As we left the hall Mr. Bradley said, 
 "That was Hartwell who just passed us 
 on the street. Did you see him ? " 
 
 " No," I replied, looking back at the 
 vanishing figure. 
 
 " He did not recognise us. His sister's 
 death seems to be wearing on him. He 
 hardly looks himself. I hear he is going 
 to England for the summer." 
 
 " Indeed ! " I said, as calmly as possible. 
 " I had not heard that. When does he 
 sail ? " 
 
184 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 " Next week, some of the men told me." 
 
 The day following I asked Elizabeth if 
 she had heard that Mr. Hart well was 
 going abroad. She looked at me steadily, 
 replying : " Warren has not told me if he 
 is going. He seems unhappy and lonely. 
 Perhaps the trip would do him good." 
 
 "No doubt it would," I replied, and we 
 said no more. 
 
 The next afternoon Elizabeth and I 
 attended an afternoon tea at Copley Hall, 
 given in connection with an exhibition of 
 paintings by modern artists. Warren 
 Hartwell was there, standing before a 
 marine view which evidently pleased him. 
 He stood holding his hat behind him with 
 both hands, oblivious of his many acquaint- 
 ances. 
 
 I was determined to know if he intended 
 to leave town soon or not ; consequently, 
 I moved gradually in his direction. If 
 Elizabeth saw him she made no sign, but 
 joined some friends as I moved along 
 before the pictures. Finally I reached his 
 immediate neighbourhood. I tried to make 
 him feel my presence without speaking, 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 185 
 
 and succeeded. He recovered himself 
 with a sudden side movement of the head 
 and a quick sigh. " I did not see you," 
 he said. " When did you come ? " 
 
 " Several moments ago. Have you 
 found something good ? " 
 
 " Yes. There is the touch of Nature in 
 this man's work. I wonder if any one 
 else cares for the sea as much as I do. 
 By the way, Miss Allston, to revert to 
 rather a disagreeable subject, would you 
 object to telling me how your photograph 
 ever got into 'The American Angler's 
 Book,' a natural history of sporting fish ? 
 This marine of the Gloucester fishermen 
 reminds me of that strange coincidence, my 
 own special hobby being fish and fishing." 
 
 " Not really ! " I exclaimed, almost seiz- 
 ing his arm in my eager pleasure at this 
 revelation. "Do you like deep-sea fish- 
 ing ? Can you fish all day in a boat at sea 
 under the broiling sun, eating lunch out of 
 a tin pail, and wearing ' ilers ? ' Can you 
 do all this and enjoy every minute of it ? 
 If you can I could almost forgive you " 
 I hesitated. 
 
1 86 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 "Almost but not quite?" he asked, 
 evidently controlling himself. 
 
 "No. Not quite," I replied, moving 
 away, as I felt a great heat of colour 
 come over my face. 
 
 He stepped along beside me, replying in 
 another voice, "And about the photo- 
 graph ? " 
 
 " Oh, don't you understand ? We have 
 the same hobby. Fishing is my mania. 
 I have every edition of Izaak Walton pub- 
 lished, and I have a room at home fitted 
 up with reels, and rods, and flies, and 
 trolling lines, every kind of tackle. My 
 father declares I am an evolution from a 
 fish or a mermaid. That day I was look- 
 ing up some facts about game fish, and put 
 my photograph in the book to keep the 
 place while I turned to speak to Miss 
 Thurlston ; then forgot, and left it there." 
 
 " Strange, indeed ! " he replied. " I 
 went to Bates Hall to look at that same 
 book. It would almost seem that you are 
 flying in the face of Providence to treat 
 me as you do. Have you no regard for 
 Fate ? no superstition ? " 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 1 8? 
 
 " None whatever," I replied, stiffly. " I 
 hear you are going to England." 
 
 " I have thought of it. I shall probably 
 sail within a fortnight." 
 
 Elizabeth heard him say this, as she 
 came up to where we stood. She entered 
 into a discussion of his plans, but he and 
 I had no further talk alone. 
 
 Several times during the next ten days 
 he took Elizabeth and me to ride out 
 through the Fenway and along the River- 
 way. All through Brookline the blossom- 
 laden fruit-trees perfumed the air. The 
 world seemed steeped in rich verdancy and 
 youth, Nature's perennial offering to 
 mankind from her brimming cup. When 
 man learns how to accept the riches 
 Nature offers him he will know the secrets 
 of life. Mr. Hart well enjoyed a horse 
 under him as much as I did. This I 
 realised with a sigh. As he said, it seemed 
 almost ungrateful to elude Fate, when she 
 had once brought in contact two such 
 congenial natures. 
 
 I was worn out physically from the con- 
 tinuous social labour I had undergone, and 
 
1 88 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 would have been ready to go home, had it 
 not been for a promised visit to Frances 
 after my relatives left town a few days 
 later. 
 
 Dorothy had already gone, but returned 
 to chaperon us at the Artists' Festival, 
 one of the unusual, and therefore interest- 
 ing, social events. 
 
 Poor Dorothy ! Since those days (not 
 so very long ago, either) she has read her 
 fate in weary numbers. Underneath her 
 rippling, fun-seeking exterior there was 
 always enough of her parents' nature to 
 have held her head level had she found a 
 worthier mate. Her sense of duty took 
 the form of immersion in whatever gave 
 her husband the most pleasure. She 
 spoiled Fred exactly as she did her pet 
 dogs and her babies, losing her own dignity 
 and most of her influence in the act. 
 She never knew until it was too late 
 that human hearts crave the unattainable. 
 Ever since Christmas the small grief- 
 wrinkles had been gathering about her 
 eyes, hidden only too frequently by a 
 laugh that rang unmirthfully. 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 189 
 
 Wrinkles have been a special study of 
 mine. After years of observation, I have 
 become sufficiently astute to detect worry- 
 wrinkles from grief-wrinkles at a glance. 
 I knew Dorothy was worn to tatters, 
 physically, by the social business of the 
 past winter, but after I saw the heartache 
 in her eyes I knew, also, how much hope- 
 lessness there was in her apparent fatigue. 
 Poor Dorothy ! The crash did not come 
 for several months, but that night at the 
 Artists' Festival, where she had few rivals 
 in beauty of feature and carnage, I caught 
 one glimpse of the truth when she turned 
 from a gay chattering group and saw Fred 
 talking to a certain frisky debutante at 
 some distance from us. At the moment I 
 thought her unjust to Fred, but in the 
 end it proved otherwise. Poor, frivolous 
 Dorothy ! 
 
 But to return, for weeks previous we 
 had been running in and out of the Art 
 Students' Association rooms, deciding with 
 the committee on arrangements upon our 
 costumes for the festival. The event was 
 to partake of the character of a historical 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 pageant, including the festivities attending 
 the return of the Crusaders, the costumes 
 being limited by the committee to such as 
 were worn in Europe between the years 
 1000 and 1450. 
 
 Dorothy was dressed as an early Renais- 
 sance beauty, her costume having been 
 copied, with the aid of a New York artist, 
 from an old French print. Elizabeth 
 wore an antique peasant's costume she 
 had picked up in Switzerland, and its 
 quaint, old-fashioned modesty became her 
 rather severe style. Frances Thurlston 
 got up my costume, and I never before 
 saw her take such keen interest in any- 
 thing. She had a chest of old fabrics, 
 including several large squares of cloth-of- 
 gold. She unearthed from among her 
 possessions a portrait of a Florentine prin- 
 cess, and from her fabrics, with the aid of 
 several artists, Mr. Bradley, and a dress- 
 maker, we produced what they all called 
 "a stunning effect." 
 
 Many of the costumes were more elab- 
 orate than ours, but few were more 
 picturesque. The men of the Tavern 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 1 93 
 
 Club went as Crusaders, and those of the 
 Architectural Club as archers. At half- 
 past nine the mediaeval procession accom- 
 panying the Crusaders passed through 
 Copley Hall, and an exceedingly gorgeous 
 parade it was, impressing one anew with 
 the sombre, disenchanting effect of modern 
 costuming when contrasted in thought 
 with the regal tones and strong harmonies 
 of early-day attire. 
 
 Copley Hall was transformed into an 
 immense mediaeval tent, suggestive of Ivan- 
 hoe, Richard the Lion-hearted, Rebecca, 
 and Rowena, whose prototypes we saw 
 reproduced in the procession. The walls 
 of the tent were covered on three sides 
 with interesting old tapestries, topped by a 
 frieze of shields emblazoned with gold and 
 heraldic devices. The remaining side was 
 reserved for a raised dais, on which sat the 
 patronesses of the occasion royally attired, 
 wearing in shining masses the jewels which 
 Boston women have the good taste to wear 
 seldom and with discretion. 
 
 At one side there was a stage made to 
 resemble a bit of woodland, and beyond, 
 
194 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 through tent-like draperies, there was 
 revealed an out-door scene, where the 
 mediaeval games and pastimes were held 
 after a short play had been given by ama- 
 teurs of our acquaintance, without scenery, 
 as was the custom in ancient times. After 
 the play the scarabund, a rustic round, and 
 several other quaint old dances were given 
 with considerable spirit and rustic abandon. 
 This antique dancing continued until the 
 stroke of midnight, when,, with swift transi- 
 tion, the form of dance changed to that of 
 our own times, and all the spectators joined 
 in. Richard Cceur de Lion dancing the 
 two-step was, I admit, "a terpsichorean 
 anachronism," as John Bradley said. 
 
 No one is permitted to attend an Artists' 
 Festival except those costumed according 
 to the dictates of the occasion, which is at 
 every point picturesque and consistent 
 with a particular design, thus creating a 
 far more interesting effect than that of 
 a fancy-dress ball, where the costumes are 
 miscellaneous and without artistic purpose. 
 John Bradley was one of the Crusaders, 
 and his costume turned him into a fasci- 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES IQ5 
 
 nating, dashing warrior-gallant ; but, as I 
 looked at him, I imagined Warren Hart- 
 well, with his tall, erect figure and haughty 
 features, arrayed in such a garb. He 
 would have made the Coeur de Lion of the 
 evening look insignificant. I wished for 
 him in Crusader's costume. 
 
 As Mr. Bradley took me through Allston 
 Hall, converted into a garden surrounded 
 by a lattice covered with roses, on our way 
 to booths where refreshments were served, 
 he commented upon my costume. " Cloth- 
 of-gold suits you," he said, rather solemnly 
 for him. " That is your sphere, my prin- 
 cess, high up above me ; but I can look and 
 stretch out my hands." 
 
 " Are you taking to quotation like our 
 friend, Saint Bermuda? " I asked, looking at 
 him uncertainly. 
 
 "Yes," he replied, quickly, "and I will 
 finish with Browning : 
 
 " l No artist lives and loves, that longs not 
 Once, and only once, and for one only. 
 
 So to be the man, and leave the artist, 
 
 Gain the man's joy, miss the artist's sorrow.' " 
 
196 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 "Mr. Bradley," I replied, sympathetically, 
 " your life is not, then, entirely made up of 
 merriment and * copy ' ? " 
 
 " You know better than that, but you 
 cannot help me. Your life is cast upon the 
 cloth-of-gold, mine is the colour of printer's 
 ink, black. Our colours are certainly out 
 of harmony." He spoke bitterly. I said 
 trite things in trying to answer uncon- 
 sciously. He replied, almost brusquely : 
 " That is over now. Every man has his mo- 
 ment of weakness. Come, let us guage the 
 horn of plenty at the court of the Lion- 
 hearted." 
 
 I do not believe people know much of 
 the real John Bradley ; but still his moods 
 are melodramatic, and his suffering more 
 poetic than cruel. 
 
 At that moment Mrs. Bobby Short swept 
 up to us in an early Venetian costume of 
 great magnificence and beauty. Her satel- 
 lites followed close behind, and soon we 
 were merged into their number. Together 
 we passed into the viand booths. Upon no 
 other occasion have I ever seen Bostonians 
 in numbers unbend from their hereditary 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 199 
 
 stiffness so universally and gracefully. 
 They seemed to dramatise themselves away 
 from unbending Puritanism and lose them- 
 selves in the more ardent spirit of the past. 
 Undoubtedly, the Artists' Festival is un- 
 equalled by any other form of social enter- 
 tainment I have ever witnessed in America, 
 in point of beauty, historical interest, and 
 actual, vital pleasure. Every one taking 
 part feels himself for once in his life a 
 picture, a romance, or a poem ; therefore, 
 he thoroughly enjoys himself in the imagi- 
 nation, where the better part of joy finds 
 source. 
 
 The festival closed the social season, and 
 my relatives left town. I went to Frances 
 for the promised visit ; then she, Mr. 
 Bradley, and I began to make a child's holi- 
 day of the springtime. She bore with him 
 nobly, considering his sex. We sat on the 
 benches in the Public Garden, where pansies 
 and tulips had succeeded the earlier flowers 
 in great, glowing masses, relieved by the 
 intensely green grass and trees. We loi- 
 tered along Commonwealth Avenue on 
 "the sunny side," among the dozens of 
 
20O HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 infants taking the air in their carriages, in 
 charge of nurses chattering a conglomerate 
 language, made up of French, Swedish, 
 German, and English from the Emerald 
 Isle. We even took trips about the lake in 
 the garden on the swan-boats, and longer 
 trips down the harbour to Hull and Nan- 
 tasket. 
 
 They were showing me how real Boston 
 lives, the great democracy from the city 
 and suburbs to whom these open spaces of 
 air and sunlight mean health and virtue. 
 We climbed Blue Hill in Milton, and were 
 rewarded by a glorious panoramic stretch 
 of harbour, hills, and suburbs. Then we 
 canoed on the upper Charles, where the 
 reflections of its wooded banks and circui- 
 tous loveliness remind one of the Thames 
 above Richmond. This life suited me bet- 
 ter than the cloth-of-gold, but I never 
 confessed as much to Mr. Bradley, while 
 Frances was happier than I had ever seen 
 her before. 
 
 One quiet morning, when the air was 
 heavily still, portentous of a thunderstorm, 
 I sat alone writing, Frances having gone 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 2OI 
 
 out. The elevator boy shouted up through 
 the tube that Miss Allston wished to see 
 me. 
 
 " Elizabeth ! " I exclaimed, mentally, as I 
 shouted back permission for her to come 
 up. " What can Elizabeth be doing in town 
 this hot day ? " 
 
 She came in looking whiter than usual 
 and more set about the mouth, the ex- 
 pression which reminded one of her mother. 
 Almost without preface she began : " I 
 have come especially to see you, Margaret. 
 Are we alone ? " 
 
 " Yes. What is the matter ? " 
 
 " Warren Hartwell came down to spend 
 Sunday with us before sailing next Thurs- 
 day. Yesterday afternoon he and I went 
 out on the rocks by the Ledge, do you 
 remember that place?" She stopped as 
 though my recollection were of importance. 
 
 " Is he drowned ? " I cried, in suspense. 
 
 "No," she said, quickly. "You would 
 care a great deal if he were, wouldn't you ? " 
 
 " Yes," I said, with relief. " I would 
 care ; so would you or any of his friends." 
 
 "Yes, his friends would care," she re- 
 
202 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 plied, drawing her veil down from her 
 sailor hat over her face. " Warren and I 
 have been more like brother and sister than 
 mere friends all our lives, and that accounts 
 for his talking to me as he did. He told 
 me that he loved you hopelessly, Margaret, 
 but that sometimes he was tempted to be- 
 lieve you cared for him and held back for 
 some inexplicable reason. He said he knew 
 you were offended because he did not return 
 your photograph the moment he discovered 
 its identity, but he wished to know of me 
 if I thought that trivial offence would 
 keep from him a woman who truly loved 
 him " 
 
 " Did he consider it honourable to show 
 my picture at ? " I broke in ; but she 
 interrupted me. 
 
 " Wait a moment. He did not show your 
 picture at the club after he knew whose 
 picture it was. I asked him that question, 
 to his utter astonishment. He replied that, 
 on the evening after finding it, he was talk- 
 ing to Willoughby Winford at the club 
 about photography, and, by chance, pro- 
 duced the unknown photograph, as an 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 2C3 
 
 excellent example of modern process, and 
 asked Mr. Winford if he knew the original. 
 That is all, Margaret, but out of that grew 
 all the gossip. The first man gave one 
 version, the second another, and the latter's 
 wife probably a third, hers of the lurid, 
 yellow-journal type. You know how such 
 stories gather mud as they run. I could 
 never believe that of Warren I know him 
 too well ; but you doubted him, and still you 
 love him ! How could you, Margaret ? " 
 
 She leaned against the chair, throwing 
 back her light jacket, as if for air. My 
 cousin Elizabeth was to me at that moment 
 a heroine. 
 
 I stretched out my hand to her. She 
 held it tightly in a clinging grasp, while her 
 head leaned away from me as I said, rapidly : 
 " Elizabeth, you have done us both the 
 greatest service a woman could do. Tell me 
 how to show my gratitude ? I believe his 
 word, if I did not believe in him against 
 strong evidence " 
 
 " Believe his word ! " she interrupted. 
 " If you did not, your love would not be 
 worth suffering for I mean, his suffering 
 
204 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 for. There is no man living more honour- 
 able than Warren. I don't see how any 
 one could doubt him." 
 
 I bent over her hand, my eyes cast 
 down. I knew my cousin Elizabeth to be 
 more worthy the love of this man than I 
 was, but I must not tell her so. 
 
 " He said he would write, asking for an 
 interview before he sails. He thought it 
 unlikely he could find you alone here," she 
 continued, in short breaths, as if the heat 
 oppressed her, drawing away her hand as 
 she spoke. 
 
 " I will write him at once when to 
 come " 
 
 "No, you must not," she exclaimed, 
 grasping my arm and looking at me with 
 all of her indomitable will and pride in her 
 face. " You must never let him know that 
 I came to you. I was afraid you might 
 refuse him the interview ; that is what I 
 ask in return. Promise me." 
 
 " Never in all our lives, Elizabeth ? " 
 
 " Never so long as we all do live," she 
 replied, solemnly, grasping the back of a 
 chair. 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 2O$ 
 
 " I promise, Elizabeth," and I leaned 
 over and kissed her. 
 
 " I must go," she said, hurriedly, looking 
 at her watch, "or I shall miss the noon 
 train." 
 
 " You are the best woman I ever knew, 
 Elizabeth," I began. 
 
 " Remember your promise. Good-bye," 
 she replied, and went down-stairs. 
 
 As I sat meditating, too engrossed in the 
 thought of what she had done to realise 
 immediately the influence of her act upon 
 my life, a special-delivery letter came from 
 Warren Hartwell, asking for a few mo- 
 ments with me, only long enough for him 
 to make an important explanation. 
 
 He came the following afternoon, and I 
 committed myself to life with a Bostonian, 
 though not without promise of his reform in 
 several matters, particularly in the pronun- 
 ciation of the word "idea." He admitted 
 that the "r" was as superfluous as his 
 many other faults, whereupon I assured 
 him he had fewer faults than any other 
 Bostonian. But he only smiled in the pro- 
 voking, incredulous way he has. 
 
2O6 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 "What a good girl Elizabeth is!" he 
 said, before leaving me. " We owe her 
 a great deal for telling me how matters 
 stood with you, Margaret. Elizabeth was 
 always a good girl, conscientious and clear- 
 headed." 
 
 His tone was so condescending that for 
 a moment I was tempted ; but I remem- 
 bered her face, and was true to her. All I 
 said was : " Neither one of us is worthy of 
 Elizabeth Allston. She is a heroine." 
 
 " I did not know you cared so much for 
 her as that, dear," he said. " She has cer- 
 tainly been a good friend to me all my life. 
 I shall be glad to be her cousin, but I know 
 a woman who is at least her equal in every 
 way." 
 
 Even though I loved him, I pitied his 
 lack of insight. With a woman's inconsist- 
 ency I should have been unhappy had lie 
 thought otherwise, and was unhappy be- 
 cause he thought as he did it seemed 
 unfair to Elizabeth. 
 
 When John Bradley congratulated me he 
 merely said, " I was not wrong about the 
 cloth-of-gold. Hartwell is a lucky man." 
 
HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 2O/ 
 
 Frances grunted considerably and berated 
 men in general ; but I think her real griev- 
 ance lay in believing that I was marrying 
 the wrong man for my best happiness. 
 She had only seen the cloth-of-gold side of 
 Warren. I did not agree with her. I had 
 learned that the Bostonian feels deeper 
 than other men, even though he does not 
 tell you so every day ; also, that he can 
 unbend. 
 
 Aunt Drusilla merely exclaimed, " The 
 idear ! you two ? " but looked more than she 
 spoke, voicing the opinion of Boston society 
 when one of its members forgets himself 
 and his connections enough to marry an 
 outsider. 
 
 I told Warren that if he had contem- 
 poraneous connections I should not be 
 certain of our future, but I considered 
 myself equal to managing one Bostonian. 
 
 " You have shown that throughout our 
 acquaintance," he replied. " In fact, as far 
 as the reform movement goes, I don't know 
 but you are a pretty good Bostonian al- 
 ready." 
 
 And perhaps he was right. However, I 
 
20 8 HER BOSTON EXPERIENCES 
 
 replied, " The spirit of reform is induced by 
 the crying need of mankind ; " but he held 
 out his arms and silenced me by replying, 
 " You have come to fill a crying need, an 
 empty home, Margaret. Come and fill the 
 need of my heart and you can finish your 
 reform of its owner as you will." 
 
 " Of its owner ? " I asked, into his left 
 breast pocket. " That would be I." 
 
 "Well, I don't know but your tongue 
 would be as good a starting-place for re- 
 form as any. After that movement is set 
 in motion there will be small difficulty in 
 regulating your slave, generally known as 
 Warren Hart well." 
 
 My slave ! When the upright fall they 
 sink low. When a Bostonian unbends he 
 drops all the way to his knees. 
 
 That was the moment of my revenge 
 and happiness. 
 
 THE END. 
 
'S 
 

 
 N9 820602 
 
 PS3503 
 
 Bergengren, A.F. E675 
 Her Boston experiences. H4 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 DAVIS