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CHEERFUL AMERICANS 
 
 BY 
 
 CHARLES BATTELL LOOMIS 
 
 AUTHOR OF "THE FOUR-MASTED CAT 'BOAT," ETC. 
 
 twenty-four illustrations, by Florence Scovel SUnn, 
 Fanny Y. Cory, F. L. Fitbian, and F. R. Gruger 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 
 
 1903 
 
Copyright, 1903, by HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 
 
 The stories in this volume were copy- 
 righted separately as follows : 
 
 A Man of Putty and Araminta and the 
 Automobile, copyright, 1903, by the Saturday 
 Evening Post, Philadelphia. The Man 
 from Ochre Point ', New Jersey, and There's 
 Only One Noo York, copyright, 1901, by 
 The Century Co. Too Much Boy, copyright, 
 IQOI, by the Saturday Evening Post, Phila- 
 delphia. The Cosmopolitanism of Mr. 
 Powers, copyright, IQOI, by The Century 
 
 Co. An Eastern Easter, copyright, 
 by The National Press Association. 
 Man in the Red Sweater, copyright by the 
 
 man in ine Kea sweater, copyright by the 
 Brown Book. Little Miss Flutter tys Dis- 
 sertation on War and 7^he Expatriation 
 of Jonathan Taintor, copyright, 1901, by 
 The Century Co. The Memory of Car lot ta^ 
 copyright, 1901, by the Saturday Evening 
 Post, Philadelphia. Truman Wickwire's 
 Gloves and The Deception of Martha 
 Tucker, copyright, IQOI, by The Century 
 Co. The Minister's Henhouse, copyright, 
 1900, by the Saturday Evening Post, Phila- 
 delphia. 77/<? Men Who Swapped Lan- 
 guages, copyright, 1903, by the New Metro- 
 politan Magazine. While the Automobile 
 J?an Down, copyright, 1900, by The Century 
 Co. Veritable Quidors, copyright, 1902, by 
 the Saturday Evening Post, Philadelphia. 
 
 Published July, 1903 
 
TO 
 
 ISABELLA ELDRIDGE 
 
NOTE 
 
 THERE is a great difference of opinion as 
 to the desirability of prefaces. There are 
 those who hold that a preface is in the nature 
 of an impertinence, inasmuch as it is a 
 species of unsolicited talk with a total 
 stranger, who is not in a position to answer 
 back unless he be a reviewer. 
 
 On the other hand there are those who 
 hold, with equal insistence on the point, that 
 a preface is really a necessary salutation, a 
 sort of " Here's luck to us both!" And 
 these last would as soon do anything most 
 rude as fail to provide their books with a 
 well-made and properly adjusted preface. 
 
 And truth to say, readers of books are 
 also divided on the subject, some turning to 
 prefaces with every mark of favor, and 
 others turning hastily the leaf or leaves 
 that contain them. 
 
vi Note 
 
 Behold then my quandary. How shall I 
 escape offense whatever I place, or do not 
 place, before these stories of " Cheerful 
 Americans " ? 
 
 Time presses, the page is meager, and 
 what remarks I might have made concerning 
 *ny tales must go unsaid, in order that I 
 may conclude within a reasonable limit. 
 
 Well, then: to the haters of prefaces, I 
 say that it would ill become me to be know- 
 ingly impertinent or impertinently knowing 
 to any stranger least of all to a reviewer 
 ( Heaven bless him ! ) . 
 
 And to the others, since you think it a part 
 of manners for the author to say something 
 before he lets go of the book " Here's to 
 our better acquaintance ! " 
 
 C. B. L. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 A MAN OF PUTTY, i 
 
 ARAMINTA AND THE AUTOMOBILE, ... 35 
 THE MAN FROM OCHRE POINT, NEW JERSEY, . 48 
 *' THERE'S ONLY ONE Noo YORK," 61 
 
 Too MUCH BOY, .75 
 
 THE COSMOPOLITANISM OF MR. POWERS, . . 87 
 
 AN EASTERN EASTER 105 
 
 THE MAN IN THE RED SWEATER, . . .136 
 LITTLE Miss FLUTTERLY'S DISSERTATION ON WAR, 152 
 THE EXPATRIATION OF JONATHAN TAINTOR, . 158 
 THE MEMORY OF CARLOTTA, .... 168 
 TRUMAN WICKWIRE'S GLOVES, . . . .184 
 THE DECEPTION OF MARTHA TUCKER, . . 194 
 THE MINISTER'S HENHOUSE, .... 215 
 THE MEN WHO SWAPPED LANGUAGES, . . 230 
 WHILE THE AUTOMOBILE RAN DOWN, . . . 252 
 VERITABLE QUIDORS, 277 
 
 vii 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 PAGE 
 ' ' DO YOU THINK YOU'VE GOT THE HANG OF IT 
 
 NOW?" By Florence Scovel Shinn. Frontispiece 
 11 Go TO COLUMBUS AND PREPARE FOR ANOTHER 
 
 VACATION." By F. L. Fithian^ ... 34 
 "YES, N' YORK'S GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME." By 
 
 Florence Scovel Shinn, .... 49 
 
 " I JUST SAT IN MY ROOM AND READ IT." By 
 
 Florence Scovel Shinn, . . . .51 
 " I DON'T SPEAK FRENCH." By Florence Scovel 
 
 Shinn, 54 
 
 " ONCE IT COST ME TEN FRANCS FOR SUPPER." By 
 
 Florence Scovel Shinn, . . . -58 
 
 "NOSING AROUND AMONG A LOT OF MONUMENTS." 
 
 By Florence Scovel Shinn 65 
 
 " I THOUGHT THAT THE SODA WAS PRETTY GOOD." 
 
 By Florence Scovel Shinn , .... 69 
 
 " HE CHATTERED LIKE A CROW IN A CORNFIELD." 
 
 By Florence Scovel Shinn, .... 72 
 11 MADE ME FEEL THAT I WOULD AMOUNT TO 
 
 SOMETHING. " By Florence Scovel Shinn, 87 
 
 " I SUPPOSE YOU ARE LOOKING FORWARD TO THE 
 
 PARIS EXPOSITION?" By Florence Scovel 
 Shinn, . .... .99 
 
 " WHEN DO YOU SUPPOSE THE BOER WAR WILL 
 
 END?" By Florence Scovel Shinn, . .152 
 
 ix 
 
Illustrations 
 
 JONATHAN TAINTOR. By Florence Scovel SJimn. 159 
 "SOME WOMEN GOT TALKIN' TO CYNTHY." By 
 
 Florence Scovel Shinn, . . . .162 
 
 M WE HED AOUR FUST AN* LAST QUAR'L." By I 
 
 Florence Scovel Shinn, .... 166 
 " OH, JOHN, HE'S RUNNING AWAY ! " By Fanny Y. 
 
 Cory, 210 
 
 " MRS. TUCKER SAILED LIKE A SPRITE THROUGH 
 
 THE AIR." By Fanny Y. Cory, . . .212 
 TAIL-PIECE. By Fanny Y. Cory, . . .214 
 LOVE BY AUTO. By Fanny Y. Cory, . . . 252 
 
 " A GENTLEMAN IN IMMACULATE EVENING 
 
 CLOTHES." By Fanny Y. Cory, . . . 260 
 
 " MR. MARTIN, HERE I GO." By Fanny Y. Cory, 268 
 
 "I THINK HE'S COMING." By Fanny Y. Cory, 270 
 " SEVERAL BOYS WERE TRYING TO KEEP UP WITH 
 
 THE VEHICLE." By Fanny Y. Cory, . . 272 
 "MERRY CHRISTMAS" and "WOULD YOU BE 
 
 WILLING TO GO TO PARIS ON A BRIDAL TRIP ? " 
 
 By Fanny Y. Cory, 274 
 
 TAIL-PIECE. By Fanny Y. Cory, . . . 276 
 
 " HE HAD TO EKE OUT HIS LIVING." By F. R. 
 
 Gruger 893 
 
CHEERFUL AMERICANS 
 A Man of Putty 
 
 AS I look back to that day, not two 
 weeks since, it seems impossible that 
 any of the ensuing incidents could have 
 taken place, but when I see that there 
 are three seats at table where there used to 
 be four I am compelled to believe that it is 
 not a dream. 
 
 It is all so like a romance that I believe 
 others will be interested in it. Mrs. Docey 
 says that I am lacking in reserve, that I 
 should not invite the world to share in fam- 
 ily secrets, but I say better for me to tell the 
 story than to have it come out in some sen- 
 sational sheet with names spelled wrong, in- 
 cidents distorted, and a general air of com- 
 monplace vulgarity spread over the whole 
 affair. 
 
A Man of Putty 
 
 Well, to begin. Some two weeks ago I 
 left my office in New York and took the 
 train for the place in the country where my 
 family are summering. Perhaps at this 
 point I should say that my family consists 
 of Mrs. Docey, or did consist of Mrs. 
 Docey, Miss Irene Docey, and Miss Anna 
 Docey. 
 
 I left New York and after two or three 
 hours in the cars I arrived at Barkinton, 
 the station that lies nearest to our summer 
 place. Hitched near the depot I found a 
 horse and wagon awaiting me. It belongs 
 to one of my neighbors up at Hillton. He 
 goes down the road on Saturdays to spend 
 Sunday with his family at " the shore," and 
 he leaves his horse for me to take back. 
 It is a sort of Box and Cox arrangement. 
 I go down on the early Monday morning 
 train, leaving the animal hitched as before. 
 My neighbor comes up soon after and drives 
 home. Thus livery hire is saved and it be- 
 comes possible for him to show his neigh- 
 
A Man of Putty 
 
 borly qualities every week. In the winter 
 he and his wife generally spend a week at 
 our New York house and then we pay for 
 the horse. 
 
 Sometimes my wife or one of my daugh- 
 ters comes down to do a little shopping and 
 goes back with me, but on this particular 
 occasion the horse was quite alone. I 
 climbed into the Concord wagon and had 
 driven a mile on my way when I saw ahead 
 of me a well-put-up man of about thirty 
 years of age. These details of course came 
 to me afterward, but I give them first. He 
 was good-looking, and had acquired that 
 ease of manner that comes to those who are 
 accustomed to have their own way in all 
 things. I have no such ease of manner, 
 alas the day. 
 
 The pedestrian looked over his shoulder 
 at me and stopped and waited for me to 
 come abreast of him. Now it happened that 
 just before I met him my horse had gone 
 lame, and I was of two minds as to whether 
 
A Man of Putty 
 
 or no I ought to get out and walk to relieve 
 the beast of some of his burden. I am not 
 used to horses and I may be unduly sensitive 
 and overmerciful, but I know that if I were 
 lame I should not feel like pulling a man 
 three miles uphill through dusty roads, and 
 I never seem to realize that a horse is 
 stronger than I. However, I had seriously 
 thought of getting out at the next pitch of 
 hill, and congratulated myself on having 
 forgotten to get a hundred of feed for my 
 neighbor. 
 
 When I 'saw the man stop I knew that I 
 must refuse him a ride, and I went over in 
 my mind various ways of couching my re- 
 fusal for in the country to refuse a man a 
 lift is to proclaim yourself too mean to 
 live. 
 
 My horse limped on, and as I came up to 
 the stranger he turned and said, " How do, 
 Summer Resident ? You 're just in time. I 
 was beginning to think the cars never ran 
 on this road." 
 
A Man of Putty 
 
 Surely a breezy salutation, and one that 
 made my seeming churlishness hard to carry 
 off successfully. But before I could get out 
 and tell him of my horse's lameness he had 
 jumped into the wagon with an agility a 
 little out of the common, and I found my- 
 self traveling along with a two-hundred- 
 pound passenger which was twice as bad 
 as a bag of meal. 
 
 " I'm sorry " I began. 
 
 " Sorry? " said he, taking the words out 
 of my mouth. " Sorry for anything on a 
 day like this, when earth and air and sky 
 are uniting in a trio whose harmony is rav- 
 ishingly sweet ? This is no day to be sorry, 
 Summer Resident. What sin is it that 
 makes you sorry? " 
 
 Now I leave it to anybody if this semi- 
 poetic, wholly flippant way of talking was 
 proper toward a man who will soon see 
 forty? My dignity was offended, but I can 
 never make a man understand when my dig- 
 nity has received a stab. He always seems 
 
A Man of Putty 
 
 to think it cause for laughter, and I saw that 
 I could not be dignified with this obtrusive 
 but genial man. So I plopped the words 
 out quick : " My horse has gone lame and I 
 was going to get out at the beginning of 
 this hill." 
 
 " Oh, that's what you were sorry for ? " 
 said he with an unctuous laugh. " Sorry 
 that my coming would prevent your doing 
 it ? Now, my dear Mister Man, you simply 
 must not treat me as company. You have 
 given me a lift, following a law of the coun- 
 try road, but you must not feel called upon 
 to stay and amuse me. Take your little con- 
 stitutional up the hill and I will drive slowly, 
 and when we have reached the level you must 
 get in again, because it is on the level road 
 that we get in our best licks in this hill 
 country." 
 
 He stopped and I actually got out. 
 Well, it was as much on account of the horse 
 as anything. It would have been cruel to 
 make him pull three hundred and ten pounds 
 
A Man of Putty 
 
 uphill, and my new-found friend was evi- 
 dently in no mind to alight. 
 
 " I'm getting out," said I with just a ves- 
 tige of dignity, " because I think the horse 
 has too heavy a load." 
 
 " The act does you credit/' said the 
 stranger with an approving smile. " What 
 is your name, anyhow ? I hate Mister Man 
 and Summer Resident." 
 
 " My name is Docey," said I. 
 
 " From the same root as docile, or I'll eat 
 my hat," said he. " You are just the man 
 who would be merciful to his beast. I wish 
 I were half as merciful. Now that you 
 speak of it I believe that the horse is limp- 
 ing, and I guess it is because he has a stone 
 in his foot. You just lift his forefoot and 
 see." 
 
 Now I hate to touch a horse, having been 
 born and brought up in the city, but there 
 was something in this man that compelled 
 me to lay aside fear, and I lifted the horse's 
 foot, and, sure enough, there lay a stone 
 
8 A Man of Putty 
 
 firmly imbedded between the shoe and that 
 little hillock that lies in the center of the 
 hoof. I got the stone out, but not before 
 the horse had stepped on me and given me 
 a painful bruise that brought the tears to my 
 eyes. 
 
 " What, crying a day like this? " said my 
 Young Man of the Sea. " What's personal 
 pain, man, to the thought that you have re- 
 lieved the horse? Now climb in and we will 
 make the old fellow show his mettle." 
 
 I attempted to climb in on the right side, 
 the better to drive, but he said, " No, get 
 in on the left. You must allow me to re- 
 lieve you of any work until we reach your 
 home. I haven't driven in weeks, and this 
 is just the day to get good work out of the 
 good animal." 
 
 I got into that carriage feeling that the 
 stranger was actually kind to allow me the 
 privilege. Not once had I thought that he 
 would whip up and drive away with horse 
 nnd wagon. I read him for what he was 
 
A Man of Putty 
 
 then, and nothing that has happened since 
 has made me change my opinion. He was 
 a masterful man and I am not. Perhaps in 
 me he saw one on whom he could play. Per- 
 haps if he had been masterful without humor 
 he would not have done what he did, but it 
 was a zestful day, and he was playing cat to 
 my mouse and enjoying it. 
 
 I sat down, he applied the whip, and the 
 horse leaped forward at a pace that neither 
 my neighbor nor myself had ever suspected 
 was within his ability. 
 
 I was now able to study my carriage mate, 
 and I marked him for a man who, if ship- 
 wrecked on an unhabited island in the South 
 Pacific, would be king of that island in six 
 months. He had gray-green eyes, a vigor- 
 ous chin, and a mouth whose grimness was 
 softened by a humorous curve at the tail of 
 his lips. A large, straight nose and a gener- 
 ous ear showed him to be anything but a 
 mean man, and his talk gave evidence to 
 some cultivation wrapped up in a large 
 
io A Man of Putty 
 
 amount of slang and flippancy that often 
 annoyed me. 
 
 " My name is Tolmach," said he, although 
 I had not asked him. " Jack Tolmach. I 
 believe I am descended from the Tollemache- 
 Tollemaches of England, but I don't care a 
 rap. They couldn't wag me if we met. I'm 
 a wagger from the word go. I can't and I 
 won't play second fiddle to anyone." Here 
 he broke off at a tangent to say, " Why, this 
 is no plug. When I saw you coming I said 
 he was a plug. A horse is not so much what 
 his component parts are as he is what gets 
 to him through the reins. You're an easy- 
 going, good-hearted foddy-doddy. No of- 
 fense; I'm just explaining why the horse is 
 going his fastest now. The reins are tele- 
 graph wires and you, the driver, send mes- 
 sages to the horse. You say, ' Old horse- 
 You - are - lame - and - not - strong - Take - 
 your-time- Answer/ And ' Old Horse ' an- 
 swers by drooping his head and ambling. I 
 step into the telegraph office and I say, * My- 
 
A Man of Putty n 
 
 horse - Git - up - and - git - No - answer - 
 required - No - back - talk - of - any - kind/ 
 And he goes.'* 
 
 " I dare say you are right," said I, 
 amused in spite of myself, although his pic- 
 ture of me had been totally unlike the one 
 I should have drawn of myself. Well, per- 
 haps my picture of me would have been as 
 unlike the real Me as his was. 
 
 " When do you dine, noon or night ? " 
 asked he, looking at his watch. 
 
 " We dine at night," said I, wondering 
 what was coming next. 
 
 What was coming next came quickly. 
 
 " That's good. This day and this drive 
 have given me the appetite of a god. I dined 
 at the hotel in the town back there, but I 
 wouldn't know it. Your hotel dinners are 
 as like as canned peas and just about as un- 
 satisfactory. Say, if a man were to make 
 a composite photograph of every country 
 hotel dinner in the United States the com- 
 posite would be like each separate picture. 
 
12 A Man of Putty 
 
 In fact, he could get his composite from the 
 first picture he took. Going to have any 
 company to-night ? " 
 
 " No, not any," said I unsuspectingly. 
 
 " Wrong," said he, bursting out into a 
 laugh so hearty and infectious that I laughed 
 with him. " Wrong, for I am going to dine 
 with you. I told you my appetite had been 
 sharpened." 
 
 Some might have imagined at this point 
 that Mr. Tolmach was out of his senses, but 
 I had no such thought. I had sometimes 
 wondered what would happen if I were to 
 go into some city house and say, " I've come 
 to dinner." He was a good-humored and 
 absolutely audacious practical joker who had 
 found in me an easy prey. 
 
 " Well, really, you seem to have no trouble 
 in asking for what you want," said I, and 
 that was all I could say. I could not, I liter- 
 ally could not say to him, " Mr. Tolmach, I 
 do not know you and I do not keep a public 
 house." That would have given him a 
 
A Man of Putty 13 
 
 chance to say, " So much the better. A se- 
 lect few is better than a motley crowd." 
 
 " Why, no," said he; " of course I have 
 no trouble asking for what I want. As I 
 take it, we are put into the world and are 
 given to understand that we are entitled to 
 as much of the world as we can get. Some 
 men get what they want by purchase, some 
 by grabbing, and some by good-humoredly 
 but firmly asking. I never grab and I often 
 purchase, but I find that there are few who 
 can refuse a well-modulated request with a 
 touch of human nature in it. I began life 
 as a poor boy in the country. My parents 
 died when I was ten, and I was cast on the 
 world knowing how to read, with the multi- 
 plication table mine, with a good natural 
 fist, and plenty of good humor that would 
 stand strains. Lots of men have good 
 humor that is good to look at, but you 
 mustn't touch it. It's what I call touchy 
 good humor. The real good humor is made 
 of India-rubber, and you can jump on it and 
 
14 A Man of Putty 
 
 pinch it and it won't alter the shape a 
 bit." 
 
 " Turn here," said I, for we were now 
 come to the little settlement that announces 
 the nearness of my summer home. 
 
 " Good, I see your house. That white 
 one with the ampelopsis on it. Am I 
 right?" 
 
 " Yes," said I. " Go on with the story 
 of your life." 
 
 " That's all. I could read, write, and 
 cipher, and couldn't get angry, and the rest 
 was easy. I can read a little better now and 
 have read a good deal; I can write my name 
 to a check for fifty thousand dollars, which 
 shows that I understand addition pretty 
 well, and I have two hundred pounds of 
 good nature as against the sixty I had when 
 a boy of ten. I know this country pretty 
 well from Maine to Washington, and I can 
 tell a Van Dyck from a Claude Lorrain in 
 any gallery in Europe. Is this where we 
 get out?" 
 
A Man of Putty 15 
 
 I may not be believed, but by this time I 
 should have been sorry to see the man go 
 on his way. He interested me. He hum- 
 bled my pride, and I took the humbling in 
 good part. I dare say that among the Brah- 
 mins of Boston he would not have passed, 
 but I am not a Brahmin of Boston. I lived 
 in Boston for two years and not a Brahmin 
 knew or cared. But I recognized in Mr. 
 Tolmach a man who was not hidebound by 
 conventions, and I thought that an hour or 
 two of him would be in the nature of enter- 
 tainment for us all, so I legalized his self- 
 invitation by seconding it graciously. 
 
 The horse disposed of, I invited Mr. Tol- 
 mach to sit on the veranda while I went in 
 and told Mrs. Docey of his arrival and ex- 
 plained his nature to her. I half expected 
 him to follow me in, but when he did not I 
 recognized that I had done him an injus- 
 tice. 
 
 My two daughters had gone out for a 
 walk and Mrs. Docey was lying down, but 
 
1 6 A Man of Putty 
 
 she arose, and when she had dressed she 
 came down to the veranda where Mr. Tol- 
 mach and I were rendering cigars value- 
 less. 
 
 When I presented my new-found friend 
 I half expected some hifalutin speech, but he 
 bowed respectfully and murmured some- 
 thing as unintelligible as anyone could have 
 wished. He also offered Mrs. Docey one of 
 my chairs. 
 
 We talked of many things and I could see 
 that Mrs. Docey was impressed with him. 
 While we were talking my daughters re- 
 turned from their walk. Irene is tall and 
 very pretty, Anna is short and interesting- 
 looking. He bowed to both, but addressed 
 himself to Irene, and in a short time Anna 
 excused herself and went into the house, and 
 I saw that she was not pleased with our 
 guest. 
 
 He was the life of the feast when we all 
 assembled in the dining room. He had in- 
 deed been everywhere and he had brought 
 
A Man of Putty 17 
 
 something away from every place. He was 
 not like that business man in western New 
 York who went to Venice and was asked 
 upon his return what he thought of the city 
 of the doges. 
 
 " Had no chance to think anything. Saw 
 it under adverse circumstances. Streets 
 were literally flooded. Yes, there was one 
 thing struck me. The dagos had taken ad- 
 vantage of the flood to rig up a lot of canoes, 
 and they were making hay while the floods 
 lasted. But I left soon." 
 
 Mr. Tolmach was not like that man. He 
 knew the point of view appropriate to each 
 place he had visited in this and the old coun- 
 try, and I was sincerely glad that I had 
 picked him up or, rather, that he had 
 picked me up and brought me home in time 
 for such a pleasant dinner. 
 
 Coffee was served on the veranda, and 
 just about the time that I supposed he was 
 going to rise and take his departure for he 
 had told me that he was due at Columbus, 
 
1 8 A Man of Putty 
 
 Ohio, the forepart of the week, his vacation 
 being at an end he suggested that we take 
 a walk, and as Anna did not care to make one 
 of the party Mrs. Docey and I walked side 
 by side, and he and Irene walked ahead. 
 The west was yet stained with the sunset 
 dyes and the moon was ready to light up 
 the earth as soon as the sun should have en- 
 tirely given over his duties. A crisp west- 
 erly breeze made it just the evening for a 
 walk, but I, thinking only of the conven- 
 tions, said to Mrs. Docey, " When is this 
 man going ? " and was surprised to have 
 her reply, " I don't care if he never goes. 
 I like him." 
 
 " Anna doesn't," said I. 
 
 " Anna is too young," was her answer, 
 given so impressively that I turned and 
 looked at her. She returned my stare and 
 said, " Irene likes him, and that is more to 
 the point." 
 
 I shook my head flabbergastedly. 
 "Women are enigmas," said I. 
 
A Man of Putty 19 
 
 " Why," said Mrs. Docey, lowering her 
 already low voice, " I don't mean that I 
 shouldn't wish him to furnish references, 
 but if I can read character at all he is funda- 
 mentally a nice man and a manly man, and 
 he is very fond of Irene. It is a case of love 
 at first sight with him." 
 
 " Then the sooner he is out of sight the 
 better," said I. I had a vision of my Irene 
 gracing an Ohio home, and I did not like it. 
 
 We had now come to a wood road that 
 leads down to the trolley road that connects 
 Winston and Barkinton. Irene picked a 
 wild-flower by the waning light and brought 
 it to her mother to ask some question con- 
 cerning its species, and I took the opportu- 
 nity to draw Mr. Tolmach aside. 
 
 " I don't want to seem rude," said I, " but 
 the last train from Barkinton leaves at 8.20, 
 and the last connecting trolley will be along 
 in a few minutes. This wood road leads 
 to the track. If you are thinking of going 
 
2O A Man of Putty 
 
 " I gave up that thought just about the 
 time the roast was served, " said Mr. Tol- 
 mach pleasantly but firmly. " I will admit 
 that I forced myself upon you in the road 
 and I have no intention of forcing myself 
 still further, but if you cannot accommodate 
 me for the night perhaps you can tell me of 
 some farmer who does not object to a 
 boarder " 
 
 Mrs. Docey had overheard the last part of 
 his remark, and she came forward at this 
 juncture and said : 
 
 " I think that Mr. Parker has a room 
 vacant, but he had gone to Riverton to-night. 
 If Mr. Tolmach cares to accept " 
 
 There was no help for it now if Mrs. 
 Docey had come to his aid, so I interrupted 
 and said: 
 
 "Why er yes, we'd be er pleased 
 to have you stay overnight. There's a tram 
 that connects with one for the West in the 
 morning." 
 
 "It's very kind of you," said Mr. Tol- 
 
A Man of Putty 21 
 
 mach, speaking to me but looking at Irene, 
 and the last ray of sunlight having vanished 
 from the west we walked home. . . . 
 
 Mrs. Docey slept peacefully that night, 
 but I did not. I accused myself of being a 
 surnph, whatever that is, and I wished that 
 I had whipped up or ever I had seen the 
 odious Mr. Tolmach. He was just as 
 breezy as he had been, but I wanted to pro- 
 tect my daughter from every breeze that 
 blows. 
 
 Breakfast is generally a very pleasant 
 affair. Both Irene and Anna have a way 
 of investing a very small incident with a 
 temporary interest that makes for the en- 
 livenment of a meal, but this morning every 
 time I looked at either Irene or Mr. Tol- 
 mach I felt a twinge of pain. She seemed 
 to dwell so on his words, and all his utter- 
 ances seemed intended for her approval. 
 Mrs. Docey prospered his jests with abun- 
 dant laughter, and even Anna smiled at his 
 Western breeziness. Not one of my family 
 
22 A Man of Putty 
 
 understood that I was playing the role of 
 dignified parent, and after a while I gave 
 over playing it and allowed myself to be 
 amused at Mr. Tolmach's sallies, and even 
 joined with him in airy persiflage. 
 
 After breakfast I intimated to Mr. Tol- 
 mach that we drove to church in Barkinton 
 at ten o'clock, but that if he wished to catch 
 the train I could carry him down in time 
 for it. 
 
 " Trainfe run every day, Mr. Docey," said 
 he;- "but days like this don't occur more 
 than once or twice in a lifetime. I am my 
 own master, and to-morrow will suit my 
 business as well as to-day." 
 
 Just then Irene appeared at the door and 
 said: 
 
 " Mr. Tolmach, if you really want to see 
 the old-fashioned garden I'll take you 
 there." 
 
 Again that twinge, but I did not stop 
 them, although I knew that they were un- 
 chaperoned, and that an old-fashioned gar- 
 
A Man of Putty 23 
 
 den is one of the best places in the world 
 for love-making. I proposed to Mrs. Docey 
 in an old-fashioned garden. 
 
 Anna had gone to her room to prepare her 
 Bible lesson, and Mrs. Docey was in the 
 kitchen superintending the making of some 
 intricate dessert. I sat down by a window 
 overlooking the garden and tried to interest 
 myself with a current magazine, but if my 
 eyes fell on the pictures and text they saw 
 nothing but the picture in the garden: the 
 tall and graceful Irene, and the type of 
 American resolution at her side, as they 
 wandered along the winding walks and pre- 
 tended to interest themselves in hollyhocks 
 and love-in-a-mist when love was in plain 
 sight to me at least. 
 
 What was it my duty to do? Should I 
 rush out into the garden and say, " Here, 
 Mr. Tolmach, if you are going to propose 
 to my daughter wait until you know her bet- 
 ter ! " He might not be going to do it, and 
 I should have added another success to my 
 
24 A Man of Putty 
 
 long- series of ridiculous parts. I could not 
 call Irene into the house on any pretense 
 whatever, for I am not good at pretending. 
 I could merely sit at the window and lament 
 that I am not another type of man. 
 
 It may have been a half -hour later or it 
 may have been the next afternoon that Mrs. 
 Docey went to the back piazza and called 
 Irene in, excusing herself to Mr. Tolmach. 
 Really, it sounded as if she thought that Mr. 
 Tolmach had a claim on the girl already, 
 and that she must ask permission to 
 borrow her daughter for a few brief 
 moments. 
 
 Irene's return to the house was the signal 
 for Mr. Tolmach to return also, only 
 whereas she went to the kitchen he came to 
 the front door and walked into the library 
 where I was sitting. 
 
 "Well, this is another of those days 
 Browning talks about, isn't it ? " said he. 
 
 I told him tartly that I didn't know that 
 Browning talked about any days; that I 
 
A Man of Putty 25 
 
 didn't pretend to follow Browning, but that 
 there was too much east wind to suit me. 
 
 He took no notice of my ill nature, but 
 seated himself in an easy chair, reached over 
 for a cigar, and then withdrew his hand in 
 so whimsical a way that I said, " Help your- 
 self." 
 
 "Join me," said he, quite as if he were 
 presenting me with the box, and we lit from 
 the same match. 
 
 I smoked feverishly; he as calmly as a 
 stage detective. He blew countless wreaths 
 into the study air and looked out of the win- 
 dow at the long reach of hills in a con- 
 tiguous State, hills twenty miles away, but 
 the village's most valuable asset from the 
 point of view of the summer visitor. Oh, 
 if he would only go over those hills and 
 vanish in the illimitable purple! 
 
 " Ever think about your daughter's going 
 off?" said he finally. 
 
 I stabbed a pen into the desk, but I didn't 
 say anything. 
 
26 A Man of Putty 
 
 " Don't wonder at it at all," said he sym- 
 pathetically. " I'd feel just the same way if 
 I had a daughter like Miss Irene." He of- 
 fered me a light for my cigar, which after 
 violently puffing for a season I had allowed 
 to go out. 
 
 When my weed had resumed consump- 
 tion he looked me full in the face and said : 
 " Well, there's no use of mincing words or 
 of wasting 'em. I'm hard hit. If anyone 
 had told me last night that the little man in 
 the Concord wagon drawn by a limping 
 horse was going to carry me to where they 
 would make a target of my heart I should 
 have refused to get in, for I supposed that 
 I was a confirmed bachelor and gloried in 
 the supposition. But I felt like imposing 
 myself on you just because it struck my hu- 
 mor, and here I am, and I want to tell you 
 that your daughter satisfies all my ideas of 
 what a woman should be. Now I expect 
 you to say No because you don't know 
 whether I was born yesterday or have been 
 
A Man of Putty 27 
 
 a criminal in five or six previous existences, 
 but I'm going to give you time to verify 
 me. I'm going to let you call up the Gov- 
 ernor of this State, who happens to be my 
 brother-in-law, and if you're not satisfied 
 with his recommendation I can connect you 
 with solid business men in Stamford and 
 New Britain and Waterbury. I'll get 'em 
 before they go to church, for that's the 
 kind of men all of 'em are churchgoers. 
 I haven't been myself, but if Miss Irene 
 wants me to I'll become whatever she 
 is as soon as I've read up on the re- 
 quirements. If you are convinced that 
 I am what I say I am, a successful man 
 of business who is just entering on his first 
 bit of romance, I'll take to-morrow's train 
 for Columbus and I'll arrange my business 
 so that I can leave it indefinitely, and then 
 I'll come back here and make a father-in- 
 law of you in ten minutes by the clock. I 
 have asked your daughter and she is willing 
 to abide by your decision even if it is ad- 
 
28 A Man of Putty 
 
 verse. She also said something about wait- 
 ing. But there won't be any need of wait- 
 ing, and I know what your decision will be 
 just as I knew yesterday that you would 
 bring me home to dinner. As for waiting, 
 if we decided to do that I'd have to go to 
 Columbus, and neither you nor she would 
 have a chance to study my character, and at 
 the end of six months we shouldn't have ad- 
 vanced a step. This is all I have to say ex- 
 cept that I sounded Mrs. Docey just after 
 breakfast and she repressed a pleased smile. 
 Now, if you'll give me the telephone book 
 I'll show you what number to call up." 
 
 He ended his long speech, which I had 
 heard in silence, and I know that there are 
 those who will say that I ought to have 
 jumped up quickly and thrown him out, but 
 I weigh one hundred and ten pounds, and he 
 weighs at least two hundred, and it's all 
 solid. If I had taken him and flung him he 
 would not have gone far. He would have 
 come back. I should once more have been 
 
A Man of Putty 29 
 
 ridiculous. I determined to submit grace- 
 fully. He showed me the telephone number 
 of the Governor of Connecticut, a sterling 
 man for whom I had voted gladly, and I 
 called him up and found him just about 
 starting for church. 
 
 I told him who I was, and he gave the 
 following replies to my questions : 
 
 "Know Mr. Tolmach Jack Tolmach? 
 Of course I do. He's my brother-in-law 
 my wife's brother." 
 
 It was hard after this declaration of re- 
 lationship for me to ask in cold blood 
 whether my visitor was all right, but one can 
 say things over miles of wire that would 
 sound awkward in a face-to-face conversa- 
 tion, and I put my query. 
 
 " Good as wheat. Fine as silk," came the 
 answer. 
 
 Here someone else seemed to have come 
 near the telephone, for the Governor began 
 to laugh and I heard feminine laughter. 
 
 The Governor continued. " What's your 
 
30 A Man of Putty 
 
 hurry, Mr. Docey? Indorsed any paper of 
 his?" 
 
 " No, oh no, but he wants to marry my 
 daughter." 
 
 Again I heard laughter. It seemed to 
 strike the Governor as queer that I should 
 telephone instead of writing, but Mr. Tol- 
 mach was in a hurry to get back to his busi- 
 ness and the mails are slow. 
 
 I explained this to him. I said : " Mr. 
 Tolmach wants to get back to Columbus and 
 I don't know him as well as as well as I 
 hope to and he suggested you as a well- 
 known man, and I voted for you, so I 
 thought I might call you up even though you 
 never met me. One has to be careful about 
 one's daughter." 
 
 The Governor: I didn't get that last. 
 One has to be what ? 
 
 Myself : One has to be careful about one's 
 daughter. 
 
 The Governor (after a whispered consul- 
 tation with the one who was near probably 
 
A Man of Putty 31 
 
 his wife) : Yes, you are right. One can't 
 be too careful about one's daughter. Well, 
 I can recommend Jack. He's self-made and 
 he's always had his own way, but he gains 
 his will gracefully. 
 
 Myself : Oh, yes, I know that. Well, then, 
 you would advise me to let them get mar- 
 ried? 
 
 The Governor : Why, of course, that rests 
 with you, but Jack is all right. How long 
 have you known him ? 
 
 Myself: Oh, since last night. I feel I 
 know him pretty well, but I wanted to make 
 sure. 
 
 The Governor: Your cautiousness does 
 you credit, but it's unnecessary in Jack's case. 
 He's a good boy and will make a good son. 
 I'll write, but I must go now. The Gover- 
 nor is never late to church, you know. 
 
 I caught the ring of immoderate laughter, 
 and then I was cut off. There had been no 
 chance of collusion. I had heard the Gov- 
 ernor mate several political speeches, for 
 
32 A Man of Putty 
 
 although my business is in New York, I am 
 interested in Connecticut politics, and I 
 recognized his voice. 
 
 I felt that to refuse my sanction after Mr. 
 Tolmach had received this clean bill of 
 health would be churlish, a thing that I al- 
 ways try to avoid. I had been in the box, 
 but the door was open, and Tolmach had 
 heard most of my replies, and had gathered 
 the gist of the conversation. He looked 
 radiant. 
 
 "That's just like Bill, said he. "Al- 
 ways ready to oblige, and just as approach- 
 able as if he was the most insignificant man 
 in the State. That was his wife, probably, 
 who was laughing. She has a keen sense of 
 humor." 
 
 " Well, so have I," I replied, " but I don't 
 see what there was to laugh at. My ques- 
 tions were perfectly natural in a father. 
 Perhaps the laughter was a little bit hys- 
 terical, you being her brother." 
 
 At this juncture the door opened and 
 
A Man of Putty 33 
 
 Irene and her mother came in. I made a 
 sign for Tolmach to step out, and he like a 
 good fellow did so. 
 
 After he had closed the door behind him 
 and I heard his manly step on the veranda 
 I said: " Irene, do you love Mr. Tolmach? " 
 
 She hid her face on her mother's shoulder 
 and burst into tears, but nodded her head 
 so emphatically that I could not mistake her 
 meaning, much as I should have liked to. 
 It will be seen that I was not entirely rec- 
 onciled to the new condition of things. 
 
 Mrs. Docey nodded her own head ecstati- 
 cally, and with the firmness that I try to in- 
 fuse into my disposition at critical times I 
 called Mr. Tolmach in. 
 
 He came, his countenance radiant. He 
 looked at Irene and her face kindled as the 
 evening star kindles after the glance of the 
 sun. That may sound poetic, but Irene 
 would make anyone poetic. I determined 
 to give her away with dignity. I went over 
 to her and kissed her. Then I kissed her 
 
34 A Man of Putty 
 
 mother. Then I shook hands with Tolmach 
 and said, with just a touch of a quaver in 
 my voice : 
 
 " Go to Columbus and prepare for another 
 vacation." 
 
 And now to-day, two weeks later, I am 
 writing this and the Governor and his wife 
 are on their way to the station. Mr. and 
 Mrs. Tolmach left an hour since, bound for 
 Europe, where they can compare Claude 
 Lorrains with Van Dycks, and tell which is 
 a. portrait and which a landscape at sight. 
 
GO TO COLUMBUS AND PREPARE FOR 
 ANOTHER VACATION." P. 34- 
 
Araminta and the Auto- 
 mobile 
 
 SOME persons spend their surplus on 
 works of art ; some spend it on Italian 
 gardens and pergolas; there are those who 
 sink it in golf, and I have heard of those who 
 expended it on charity. 
 
 None of these forms of getting away with 
 money appealed to Araminta and myself. As 
 soon as it was ascertained that the automo- 
 bile was practicable and would not cost a 
 king's ransom, I determined to devote my 
 savings to the purchase of one. 
 
 Araminta and I live in a suburban town; 
 she because she loves Nature and I because I 
 love Araminta. We have been married for 
 five years. 
 
 I am a bank clerk in New York, and morn- 
 ing and night I go through the monotony 
 
 35 
 
36 The Automobile 
 
 of railway travel, and for one who is forbid- 
 den to use his eyes on the train and who does 
 not play cards it is monotony, for in the 
 morning my friends are either playing cards 
 or else reading their papers, and one does 
 not like to urge the claims of conversation on 
 one who is deep in politics or the next play 
 of his antagonist ; so my getting to business 
 and coming back are in the nature of purga- 
 tory. I therefore hailed the automobile as 
 a Heaven-sent means of swift motion with 
 an agreeable companion, and with no danger 
 of encountering either newspapers or cards. 
 I have seen neither reading nor card-playing 
 going on in any automobile. 
 
 The community in which I live is not pro- 
 gressive, and when I said that I expected to 
 buy an automobile as soon as my ship came 
 in I was frowned upon by my neighbors. 
 Several of them have horses, and all, or 
 nearly all, have feet. The horsemen were 
 not more opposed to my proposed ownership 
 than the footmen I should say pedestrians. 
 
The Automobile 37 
 
 They all thought automobiles dangerous and 
 a menace to public peace, but of course I 
 pooh-poohed their fears and, being a person 
 of a good deal of stability of purpose, I went 
 on saving my money, and in course of time 
 I bought an automobile of the electric 
 sort. 
 
 Araminta is plucky, and I am perfectly 
 fearless. When the automobile was brought 
 home and housed in the little barn that is on 
 our property, the man who had backed it in 
 told me that he had orders to stay and show 
 me how it worked, but I laughed at him 
 good-naturedly yet firmly. I said, " Young 
 man, experience teaches more in half an hour 
 than books or precepts do in a year. A 
 would-be newspaper man does not go to a 
 school of journalism if he is wise; he gets 
 a position on a newspaper and learns for 
 himself, and through his mistakes. I know 
 that one of these levers is to steer by, that 
 another lets loose the power, and that there 
 is a foot-brake. I also know that the ma- 
 
38 The Automobile 
 
 chine is charged, and I need to know no 
 more. Good-day." 
 
 Thus did I speak to the young man, and 
 he saw that I was a person of force and dis- 
 cretion, and he withdrew to the train and 
 I never saw him again. 
 
 Araminta had been to Passaic shopping, 
 but she came back while I was out in the 
 barn looking at my new purchase, and she 
 joined me there. I looked at her lovingly, 
 and she returned the look. Our joint ambi- 
 tion was realized ; we were the owners of an 
 automobile, and we were going out that 
 afternoon. 
 
 Why is it that cheap barns are so flimsily 
 built? I know that our barn is cheap be- 
 cause the rent for house and barn is less than 
 what many a clerk, city pent, pays for a 
 cramped flat, but again I ask, why are they 
 flimsily built ? I have no complaint to make. 
 If my barn had been built of good stout oak 
 I might to-day be in a hospital. 
 
 It happened this way. Araminta said, 
 
The Automobile 39 
 
 " Let me get in, and we will take just a little 
 ride to see how it goes," and I out of my 
 love for her said, " Wait just a few minutes, 
 dearest, until I get the hang of the thing. I 
 want to see how much go she has and just 
 how she works." 
 
 Araminta has learned to obey my slightest 
 word, knowing that love is at the bottom 
 of all my commands, and she stepped to one 
 side while I entered the gayly painted vehi- 
 cle and tried to move out of the barn. I 
 moved out. But I backed. Oh, blessed, 
 cheaply built barn. My way was not re- 
 stricted to any appreciable extent. I shot 
 gayly through the barn into the hen yard, 
 and the sound of the ripping clapboards 
 frightened the silly hens who were enjoying 
 a dust-bath, and they fled in more directions 
 than there were fowls. 
 
 I had not intended entering the hen yard, 
 and I did not wish to stay there, so I kept 
 on out, the wire netting not being what an 
 automobile would call an obstruction. I 
 
40 The Automobile 
 
 never lose my head, and when I heard Ara- 
 minta screaming in the barn, I called out 
 cheerily to her, " I'll be back in a minute, 
 dear, but I'm coming another way." 
 
 And I did come another way. I came all 
 sorts of ways. I really don't know what got 
 into the machine, but she now turned to the 
 left and made for the road, and then she 
 ran along on her two left wheels for a mo- 
 ment, and then seemed about to turn a 
 somersault, but changed her mind, and, still 
 veering to the left, kept on up the road, pass- 
 ing my house at a furious speed, and making 
 for the open country. With as much calm- 
 ness as I could summon I steered her, but I 
 think I steered her a little too much, for she 
 turned toward my house. 
 
 I reached one end of the front piazza at 
 the same time that Araminta reached the 
 other end of it. I had the right of way, and 
 she deferred to me just in time. I removed 
 the vestibule storm door. It was late in 
 March, and I did not think we should have 
 
The Automobile 41 
 
 any more use for it that season. And we 
 didn't. 
 
 I had ordered a strongly built machine, 
 and I was now glad of it, because a light and 
 weak affair that was merely meant to run 
 along on a level and unobstructed road 
 would not have stood the assault on my 
 piazza. Why, my piazza did not stand it. 
 It caved in, and made work for an already 
 overworked local carpenter who was behind- 
 hand with his orders. After I had passed 
 through the vestibule, I applied the brake, 
 and it worked. The path is not a cinder one, 
 as I think them untidy, so I was not more 
 than muddied. I was up in an instant, and 
 looked at the still enthusiastic machine with 
 admiration. 
 
 " Have you got the hang of it?" said 
 Araminta. 
 
 Now that's one thing I like about Ara- 
 minta. She does not waste words over non- 
 essentials. The point was not that I had 
 damaged the piazza. I needed a new one, 
 
42 The Automobile 
 
 anyway. The main thing was that I 
 was trying to get the hang of the ma- 
 ckine, and she recognized that fact in- 
 stantly. 
 
 I told her that I thought I had, and that 
 if I had pushed the lever in the right way 
 at first, I should have come out of the barn 
 in a more conventional way. 
 
 She again asked me to let her ride, and 
 as I now felt that I could better cope with the 
 curves of the machine I allowed her to get 
 in. 
 
 " Don't lose your head," said I. 
 
 " I hope I shan't," said she dryly. 
 
 " Well, if you have occasion to leave me, 
 drop over the back. Never jump ahead. 
 That is a fundamental rule in runaways of 
 all kinds." 
 
 Then we started, and I ran the motor 
 along for upward of half a mile after I had 
 reached the highway, which I did by a short 
 cut through a field at the side of our house. 
 There is only a slight rail fence surrounding 
 
The Automobile 43 
 
 it, and my machine made little of that. It 
 really seemed to delight in what some people 
 would have called danger. 
 
 "Araminta, are you glad that I saved up 
 for this?" 
 
 " I am mad with joy," said the dear thing, 
 her face flushed with excitement mixed with 
 expectancy. Nor were her expectations to 
 be disappointed. We still had a good deal 
 to do before we should have ended our first 
 ride. 
 
 So far I had damaged property to a cer- 
 tain extent, but I had no one but myself to 
 reckon with, and I was providing work for 
 people. I always have claimed that he who 
 makes work for two men where there was 
 only work for one before, is a public bene- 
 factor, and that day I was the friend of car- 
 penters and other mechanics. 
 
 Along the highway we flew, our hearts 
 beating high, but never in our mouths, and 
 at last we saw a team approaching us. By 
 " a team " I mean a horse and buggy. I 
 
44 The Automobile 
 
 was raised in Connecticut, where a team is 
 anything you choose to call one. 
 
 The teamster saw us. Well, perhaps I 
 should not call him a teamster ( although he 
 was one logically) : he was our doctor, and, 
 as I say, he saw us. 
 
 Now I think it would have been friendly 
 in him, seeing that I was more or less of a 
 novice at the art of automobiling, to have 
 turned to the left when he saw that I was 
 inadvertently turning to the left, but the 
 practice of forty years added to a certain 
 native obstinacy made him turn to the right, 
 and he met me at the same time that I met 
 him. 
 
 The horse was not hurt, for which I am 
 truly glad, and the doctor joined us, and 
 continued with us for a season, but his buggy 
 was demolished. 
 
 Of course I am always prepared to pay for 
 my pleasure, and though it was not, strictly 
 speaking, my pleasure to deprive my physi- 
 cian of his turn-out, yet if he had turned out 
 
The Automobile 45 
 
 it wouldn't have happened and, as I say, 
 I was prepared to get him a new vehicle. 
 But he was very unreasonable; so much so 
 that, as he was crowding us for the seat 
 was not built for more than two, and he is 
 stout I at last told him that I intended to 
 turn around and carry him home, as we were 
 out for pleasure, and he was giving us pain. 
 
 I will confess that the events of the last 
 few minutes had rattled me somewhat, and 
 I did not feel like turning just then, as the 
 road was narrow. I knew that the road 
 turned of its own accord a half-mile farther 
 on, and so I determined to wait. 
 
 " I want to get out," said the doctor tartly, 
 and just as he said so Araminta stepped on 
 the brake, accidentally. The doctor got out 
 in front. With great presence of mind 
 I reversed, and so we did not run over him. 
 But he was furious and sulphurous, and that 
 is why I have changed to homeopathy. He 
 was the only allopathic doctor in Brantford. 
 
 I suppose that if I had stopped and apolo- 
 
46 The Automobile 
 
 gized, he would have made up with me, and 
 I would not have got angry with him, but 
 I couldn't stop. The machine was now 
 going as she had done when I left the barn, 
 and we were backing into town. 
 
 Through it all I did not lose my coolness. 
 I said : " Araminta, look out behind, which 
 is ahead for us, and if you have occasion to 
 jump now, do it in front, which is behind," 
 and Araminta understood me. 
 
 She sat sideways, so that she could see 
 what was going on, but that might have been 
 seen from any point of view, for we were 
 the only things going on or backing. 
 
 Pretty soon we passed the wreck of the 
 buggy, and then we saw the horse grazing 
 on dead grass by the roadside, and at last 
 we came on a few of our townfolk who had 
 seen us start, and were now come out to 
 welcome us home. But I did not go home 
 just then. I should have done so if the ma- 
 chine had minded me and turned in at our 
 driveway, but it did not. 
 
The Automobile 47 
 
 Across the way from us there is a fine 
 lawn leading up to a beautiful greenhouse 
 full of rare orchids and other plants. It is 
 the pride of my very good neighbor, Jacob 
 Rawlinson. 
 
 The machine, as if moved by malice pre- 
 pense, turned just as we came to the lawn, 
 and began to back at railroad speed. 
 
 I told Araminta that if she was tired of 
 riding, now was the best time to stop; that 
 she ought not to overdo it, and that I was 
 going to get out myself as soon as I had 
 seen her off. 
 
 I saw her off. 
 
 Then after one ineffectual jab at the 
 brake, I left the machine hurriedly, and as I 
 sat down on the sposhy lawn I heard a tre- 
 mendous but not unmusical sound of falling 
 glass. . . . 
 
 I tell Araminta that it isn't the running 
 of an automobile that is expensive. It is the 
 stopping of it. 
 
The Man from Ochre Point, 
 New Jersey 
 
 SYMON that was his last name. I'd be 
 willing to wager that his first name was 
 Simple, although on the passenger list it was 
 merely S. Symon. 
 
 I met him the second day out. The rea- 
 son I came to talk to him but perhaps I 
 ought to say that we were both running from 
 Southampton to New York. 
 
 He had a retreating chin and a receding 
 forehead, and ears that must have made 
 walking difficult in a high wind; and the 
 first thing I heard him say drew me to him : 
 
 " I thought St. Paul's was in Rome. I 
 was a whole day in London, but I didn't try 
 to see St. Paul's because I didn't know it 
 was there. But I did go up in a tremenjous 
 church that had a whispering-gallery in it, 
 
 and I thought I'd die a-laughing to hear the 
 48 
 
/ -s 
 
 YES; N' YORK'S GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME." P. 49- 
 
The Man from Ochre Point 49 
 
 voices come right out of the air in front 
 of me. An old feller told me to stop because 
 they were having a funeral below." 
 
 " Why, that was St. Paul's/' said I, join- 
 ing in the conversation with shipboard free- 
 dom. 
 
 " That so ! Wasn't no name over the 
 door." 
 
 My speaking to him was the cue for the 
 man who had been conversing to go away. 
 I think that he knew when he had had 
 enough, but as I needed exercise I deter- 
 mined to pump my new acquaintance. 
 
 " Been over long?" 
 
 " I was two weeks in Europe." 
 
 " Well, what's good enough for you? " 
 
 "What you mean?" 
 
 "Is New York good enough for you?" 
 
 " Oh, yes. Didn't know what you meant, 
 you put it so sudden. Yes; N' York 's good 
 enough for me." 
 
 " Know New York pretty well, don't 
 you?" 
 
50 The Man from Ochre Point 
 
 " Well, I stopped overnight there on my 
 way from Ochre Point to the steamer. My 
 home's in Ochre Point, New Jersey. I 
 think N' York lays over anything in 
 Europe." 
 
 " Then you didn't become denationalized 
 by your trip ? " 
 
 " Demoralized, you mean. Dear, no! I've 
 knocked around Ochre Point too long for 
 that/' 
 
 " What countries did you visit in Eu- 
 rope?" 
 
 " Brussels and Belgium and Paris and 
 England." 
 
 I really felt sorry for him, but I couldn't 
 help saying : 
 
 " Which did you like better, Belgium or 
 Brussels?" 
 
 " Well, to tell the truth, I didn't see much 
 of Brussels, as I was awful tired when I got 
 there, and I went to sleep right after break- 
 fast, and I never woke up till it was supper- 
 time, and I went to Belgium next day. But 
 
F 
 
 ^ -> *P -;> 
 
 " I JUST SAT IN MY ROOM AND READ IT." P. 51. 
 
The Man from Ochre Point 51 
 
 I didn't find much to see there, so I went in 
 the afternoon to Paris." 
 
 I regret that I did not find out just what 
 he meant by Belgium, but his mention of 
 Paris suggested a question: 
 
 " Paris hit you pretty hard, didn't it? " 
 
 " Well, now, it did. I was there four 
 days, and I saw quite a good deal of Paris, 
 although two days it rained, and I didn't go 
 out. I had a book that a feller recommended 
 on board ship, and he lent it to me, and 
 asked me to return it to him in Paris. 
 He gave me his address. Well, it was 
 called ' Smiles and Grins,' and say, that 
 book is full of the most comical sayings. I 
 just sat in my room and read it those rainy 
 days so's I could return it to him, and then 
 when I went to his hotel I found he'd gone 
 the day before. But it was great. I'll lend 
 it to you, if you want." 
 
 I told him I never could read on board 
 ship, as it required too much concentra- 
 tion. 
 
52 The Man from Ochre Point 
 
 "Well, I think this book's easier than 
 some. I didn't mind the weather, on account 
 of the book; and then, it is by an American, 
 and, I tell you, we know how to write." 
 
 " But I should think that you would have 
 hated to give up so much time to reading, 
 when your stay was so limited." 
 
 " Well, I am kind of sorry now; but, you 
 see, when I'm home somehow I don't much 
 care to read, so I just pitched in. Have a 
 cigarette? " 
 
 " No, thanks ; I don't smoke. What did 
 you think of the Exposition ? " 
 
 " Well, I didn't see the inside of it. You 
 see, I traveled with a fellow from Rahway, 
 who wanted to run down into the French 
 country to see a friend of his, and he offered 
 to pay my way if I'd go, because he couldn't 
 speak any French, and neither could I, and 
 he said it would make us feel less lone- 
 
 some." 
 
 "Was it a pretty place you went to? 
 Real country or only suburban ? " 
 
The Man from Ochre Point 53 
 
 Mr. Symon cackled. " Well, now you've 
 got me. I really don't remember. It had 
 one of those French names, and when we 
 got down there it was so hot that I just 
 waited for him in the station and read the 
 paper." 
 
 " What paper was that ? " I asked. 
 
 " Oh, the Ochre Point of View. Oh, I 
 do remember that place. It was Fountain- 
 bloo." 
 
 " Fontainebleau ! " I gasped. " And you 
 didn't leave the station ! Didn't your friend 
 tell you you'd missed something? " 
 
 " No ; you see, he had the wrong address, 
 and he spent all his time looking for his 
 friend, and he said he nearly got lost in a 
 piece of woods, and he came to a place that 
 looked like a castle, but he didn't go in, as 
 he knew his friend didn't live there." 
 
 "What's your friend's name?" 
 
 " Jasper Dinkey." 
 
 I felt that that was just what a Jasper 
 Dinkey would do. Names have a potent 
 
54 The Man from Ochre Point 
 
 influence on actions. " But next day why 
 didn't you go to the Exposition ? " 
 
 " Why, you see, I had to buy my return 
 ticket, and that took a whole morning; and 
 then I went up to my lodgings, and I just 
 took off my coat and vest and collar, and 
 lighted a cigarette, andUhen I took off my 
 shoes and stockings, and you bet I was com- 
 fortable until it was time for me to go out 
 and hunt up a supper. I tell you, a man can 
 be comfortable in Paris." 
 
 " Do you speak French ? How did you 
 make out about supper? Wasn't it din- 
 ner?" 
 
 " Well, I suppose so ; but I always have 
 supper at home, so I call it that. No, I don't 
 speak French only ' ooey.' ' 
 
 " What is ' ooey ' ? " said I, puzzled. 
 
 " Why, ' ooey ' is the French for * yes, if 
 you please/ ' 
 
 " Well, if you didn't know any more 
 French than that, how did you get along? " 
 
 " Well, a French gentleman did tell me 
 
I DON'T SPEAK FRENCH." P. 54. 
 
The Man from Ochre Point 55 
 
 another French word that means ' some of 
 that/ and I always sat down next to some- 
 one who was eating, and when the waiter 
 came I said, ' Ooey, kelk-dee-selar/ and 
 pointed at the plate, and they generally un- 
 derstood right away. But it was expensive/' 
 
 "Why expensive?" 
 
 " Because," said Mr. Symon, tossing his 
 cigarette overboard, " sometimes the man 
 next to me was eating an expensive dish. 
 Once it cost me ten francs for supper, 
 and all I meant to eat was a franc and a 
 half. They said things were higher in the 
 Exposition." 
 
 " So you came away without seeing the 
 Exposition." 
 
 " Yes, I did," said Mr. Symon, lighting 
 another cigarette. "But" (puff) " I've 
 seen " (puff, puff) " our Waverly Fair, and 
 a feller told me the only difference was that 
 our fair is smaller." 
 
 " It is smaller, that's very true. Did you 
 go to London ? " 
 
56 The Man from Ochre Point 
 
 "Yes; I told you so." 
 
 "Sick on the Channel?" 
 
 " Well, now you've got me. I was sick on 
 the boat, but I didn't hear the name. Guess 
 it was the Channel. Oh, say, I saw one pic- 
 ture in France in the only place I did go to. 
 It was about a young woman going to be 
 burned up. In a big, roundish kind of 
 building with pictures painted into the walls. 
 That was the day I went to Fountainbloo." 
 
 "Was it the Pantheon?" 
 
 " Somethin' about a panther, I think. I 
 asked a feller that could talk English what 
 it was all about, and he told me it was about 
 Jonah of the Ark; some of Noah's folks, I 
 suppose. He said it was a she, though the 
 name was Jonah. He seemed to know all 
 about her, although he'd only come that 
 day; but then, he was traveling with a party, 
 so I suppose some of 'em told him. I 
 thought such goings-on wouldn't be allowed 
 in these times. He said they were going to 
 burn her because she wouldn't go into the 
 
The Man from Ochre Point 57 
 
 ark, but just as the flames were beginning to 
 scorch her the flood came and drowned all 
 the people who were torturing her." 
 
 " Then what became of her? " 
 
 " Well, I. think an angel rescued her ; but I 
 couldn't find out, because the big crowd the 
 feller was with all tramped out of the build- 
 ing, and he ran after them. It was one of 
 those traveling parties." 
 
 " Cook's tourists ? " 
 
 " That's it. They seemed in a hurry. I 
 was sorry, because there were other pictures 
 about the same girl. One where she is in 
 a garden, and an angel you can see through 
 is coming to her. I wondered whether it was 
 the angel that saved her from being drowned 
 after the flood put the fire out. You see, 
 the angel picture was on the right, so it 
 must have come after the flood-and-fire pic- 
 ture. All the paintings in that place were 
 pretty slick, I thought." 
 
 " I believe they're considered so." The 
 preparatory dinner-bugle blew, and as I was 
 
58 The Man from Ochre Point 
 
 at the first table I hurried my young friend 
 on to London. " So you say you went to 
 England. What did you think of English 
 scenery? " 
 
 "Well, to tell the truth, I was awful 
 sleepy, and just as soon as I got aboard the 
 train at Dover I leaned back and went to 
 sleep, and I never heard a sound until we 
 reached London. My friend said it was real 
 pretty, only the fields were full of red 
 weeds that he thought must be bad for 
 cattle." 
 
 "Poppies?" 
 
 " Yes, I think that's what he said." 
 
 " Well, what did you see in London? " 
 
 " Say, I want to tell you about that. A 
 feller said that if I wanted to see a sight I 
 must go to this Hyde Park and watch the 
 rich folks ride by on Rotten Street." 
 
 " Rotten Row," I said, correcting him. 
 
 " Well, street or road is all one. I went 
 there and sat on one of the park benches, 
 and I saw three men go by in a half an hour. 
 
 
" ONCE IT COST ME TEN FRANCS FOR SUPPER." P. 55. 
 
The Man from Ochre Point 59 
 
 I tell you, I was disgusted. Why, there's 
 more ridin' in Ochre Point in summer." 
 
 " You went at the wrong time. Well, 
 which did you like best, Paris or London? " 
 
 " N' York 's better'n both of 'em, and for 
 solid comfort Ochre Point aint so far be- 
 hind. I only crossed because my chum 
 wanted me to go. You see, father died last 
 year, and he left me with all the money I 
 want, and I hadn't anything to do at home, 
 so I thought I'd travel. A feller that comes 
 to Ochre Point in the summer said it would 
 enlarge my mind." 
 
 " Well, do you think it has? " 
 
 " Well, there's no telling, but I guess I've 
 enlarged it enough if traveling's the only 
 thing that '11 do it. Ochre Point is good 
 enough for me, for there aint any sights 
 there that I feel bound to see. Now, I'm 
 awful glad that was St. Paul's that I went 
 to, because I knew an I-talian chap who 
 summered at Ochre Point, and he said if I 
 went to Rome I must be sure to see St. 
 
60 The Man from Ochre Point 
 
 Paul's. I guess the laugh's on him. Funny, 
 how ignorant those I-talians are." 
 
 "Didn't he say St. Peter's?" I asked. 
 
 " Whyee, so he did ! Well, I am sorry, 
 because I made sure he'd never heard of that 
 whispering-gallery right in the church, and 
 I was going to have fun with him. Excuse 
 me, and I'll go tell my chum." 
 
"There's Only One Noo 
 York." 
 
 I SAW Thomas J. Brownley four times 
 altogether, counting the ocean voyage 
 as one time. He was about forty-five 
 years old, smooth-shaven, and with blue 
 eyes that looked keen, and yet seemed to 
 have latent softness in them. His nose was 
 aquiline, and I think he could not have 
 passed for anything but an American, no 
 matter how far he strayed from his beloved 
 " Noo York." 
 
 The third day out I came on him softly 
 swearing to himself as he leaned over the 
 forward rail of the hurricane-deck. He 
 grunted inarticulately as I came up and 
 halted beside him. I said : 
 "Morning. Lost anything ?" 
 " Yes, sir! " said he. " Lost my peace of 
 mind. What a curious sort of fool I was 
 
 61 
 
62 "Only One Noo York" 
 
 ever to take my doctor's advice and leave 
 Noo York! Gee-orge Harry! here's three 
 days have passed since I left home, and 
 Lord only knows how many things have 
 happened that I know nothing about. I 
 don't know whether they've renominated 
 McKinley or not, I don't know whether my 
 clerks have busted my business or not. And 
 what do I get in place of it ? A lot of meals 
 cooked different from what I'm used to, and 
 me half sick for nearly a day " 
 
 "Well," I interjected, "you're lucky not 
 to have been sick longer. Some of the pas- 
 sengers haven't shown up yet." 
 
 " Wouldn't have been sick a minute at 
 home." His eyes looked over the " deso- 
 late waste of waters " as if they were trying 
 to see the Statue of Liberty. " Waves, 
 waves, nothing but waves! Not a tree in 
 sight! I was a fool, that's what I was." 
 
 " But I thought you said your doctor pre- 
 scribed the sea-voyage?" 
 
 " Oh, that's only because he thought I 
 
"Only One Noo York" 63 
 
 was working too hard. I wasn't working 
 any harder than I always have worked. 
 Gee-orge Hnrry! I'd rather work myself 
 to death than loaf myself to death. Here 
 'tis three days, and I haven't done a stroke 
 of work. What's worse, I haven't felt like 
 working. That's what knocks. When I 
 get home I may find I'm good for nothing 
 but loafing around, like a fellow whose 
 father was self-made. Dry-goods business 
 may have gone higher 'n a kite, for all I 
 know. And they tell me we're likely to 
 have six or seven days' more of this monoto- 
 nous trip. If I could only sleep all the time, 
 but, cuss it all ! I can't even sleep all night, 
 the berths are so short. Wish 't I'd ar- 
 ranged to come back on the next steamer; 
 but I was talked into doing London and the 
 Paris Exposition." 
 
 " But you'll surely find much to interest 
 you in London." 
 
 " Oh, will I ? You don't know me, then. 
 I'm an American from 'way back, and 
 
64 "Only One Noo York" 
 
 there's only one Noo York. That's where 
 I was born and brought up. What '11 I find 
 to interest me in a town that is ten years 
 behind our metropolis a town that has no 
 American noospapers? I hate picture-gal- 
 leries, and I'm glad to say I've forgotten 
 the little history I ever knew, so their towers 
 and their abbeys won r t take my time for two 
 minutes. No, sir. Well, then, what else 
 is there for me to see? " And he stretched 
 his closed lips as much as to say, " I've 
 stumped you." 
 
 " Their parks," T ventured. 
 
 "Their parks!" he sneered. "And I 
 live two blocks from Central Park ! Parks ! 
 I walk through our park every afternoon on 
 the way home from my store. I get all the 
 park I want, and American park at that. I 
 don't want to look at any behind-the-times 
 English park." 
 
 " Well, you can study the people." 
 
 " Study the people ! Study the people ! 
 I'll get enough people-study on this voyage 
 
NOSING AROUND AMONG A LOT OF MONUMENTS."-?. 65. 
 
"Only One Noo York" 65 
 
 to last me a lifetime. I hate people as such. 
 People are all right to do business with, but 
 to watch 'em eat or to watch 'em watching 
 the waves, those cussed old waves, well, 
 you're welcome to it. It's enough to hear 
 'em talk, without studying them, particu- 
 larly the women a lot of silly women that 
 think they're having a good time now, and 
 talk about expecting to Rave a better time in 
 England nosing around among a lot of 
 monuments and graveyards and towers. 
 Haven't they any country of their own ? If 
 they have so much time, why don't they 
 travel in their own country? This is the 
 first vacation I've had in twenty-two years, 
 and I'd have gone out to California if that 
 cussed doctor hadn't told me I needed a sea- 
 voyage. But these silly women trapesing 
 around Europe, and not knowing Amer- 
 ica ! " He was silent a minute, and then he 
 went on ; " Gee-orge Harry ! I wish I 
 knew whether McKinley was renominated. 
 Think of being without a noospaper for 
 
66 "Only One Noo York" 
 
 three days, three whole days! Aint it a 
 crime? " 
 
 " Why, I'm rather glad to be able to shut 
 down on newspapers for a while," said I. 
 
 " Were you born in America ? " said 
 Thomas J. Brownley, as if he doubted it. 
 
 " Why, yes; and I expect to like America 
 better than ever when I get back; but I like 
 a change " 
 
 " Well, I don't. I began life as a clerk 
 in the house I'm head partner of just thirty- 
 two years ago, and every day every day 
 except Sunday I've come down to that 
 office at eight in the morning, and it's a heap 
 more fun than see-sawing up and down in 
 a steamer, with nothing to do but sleep and 
 
 smoke and talk and eat There's the 
 
 bugle. Now I've got to try and eat a lot of 
 dishes that I wouldn't know if I met 'em in 
 my back yard. You at the second table, are 
 you? Wish I was. Well, there's only one 
 Noo York, and don't you forget it." 
 
 The next time I held an extended con- 
 
"Only One Noo York'' 67 
 
 versation with Thomas J. Brownfey was 
 while I was in London. I saw his tall, thin 
 figure moving nervously along the Strand 
 on a very hot day. He seemed to be looking 
 for something. 
 
 " Hello, brother ! " he said as soon as he 
 saw me. " Gee-orge Harry ! but it's good to 
 see an American face. You look as if you 
 could really talk American. These people 
 try hard enough, but it gives a Noo- Yorker 
 a pain to hear their accent. Say, I'm hunt- 
 ing for some American soda-water. Their 
 blamed tepid water will drive me to drink, 
 although I'm a temperance man. Say, did 
 you ever see so much drunkenness in your 
 life? But if I could get a good old drink 
 of American soda-water, ice-cold, I'd feel as 
 if I could last. Isn't this city awful? " 
 
 Candor compelled me to tell Mr. Brown- 
 ley that I was having the time of my life. 
 
 " I don't understand how you can. You 
 look like a good American." 
 
 I laughed, and suggested that we ride on 
 
68 "Only One Noo York" 
 
 a bus to a place that I knew of where real 
 American soda was dispensed, and we 
 climbed to the top of a white bus. 
 
 " This makes me tired," said he, when we 
 were seated. " I used to be ashamed of the 
 Noo York horse-cars, but when I get back 
 I'll ride on 'em for three or four days so's 
 not to be too startled by the cables and trol- 
 leys and the elevated. Fifty years behind 
 the times. I said before I came here that 
 they were ten years behind, but it's fifty. 
 But " and here his voice took on a very 
 serious tone " I don't understand you fel- 
 lows. I've met two or three men like you 
 that say they're having a good time. You 
 seem to be wide-awake. How can you have 
 a good time in any place but America? 
 Why, every minute I'm thinking how much 
 better we do it all in Noo York. Look at 
 that conductor. No uniform. Seems fairly 
 immoral to be collecting fares with no uni- 
 form. And they tell me you can't open the 
 bus windows. Why, there'd be a riot in 
 
" I THOUGHT THAT THE SODA WAS PRETTY GOOD." P. 69. 
 
"Only One Noo York" 69 
 
 Noo York if they tried to keep car windows 
 shut. And have you seen their noospapers ? 
 Hardly a line about New York, and that 
 little all wrong. One of 'em says Hanna's 
 likely to be nominated on the Democratic 
 ticket. Wouldn't that jar you? I always 
 heard that English papers were deadly dull, 
 but I never knew it until I tried to read one. 
 Nothing about Noo York that's worth 
 printing, and yet Noo York 's the only place 
 where anything happens. If I didn't have 
 my passage engaged, I'd go back to-morrow 
 without seeing Paris." 
 
 Just then we came to the soda-water place, 
 and we descended. I thought that the soda 
 was pretty good; at any rate, it was cool; 
 but Brownley's expression of contempt as 
 he set it down was worth crossing the ocean 
 to see. 
 
 " I wouldn't know it for soda-water if I 
 met it in my back yard. What a country, 
 what a God-forsaken country, this is ! And 
 I left Noo York for it!" 
 
70 "Only One Noo York" 
 
 As I had an engagement, I left Mr. 
 Brownley outside of the soda-water " em- 
 porium," and I did not see him again until 
 we met on the Boulevard des Italiens in 
 Paris. 
 
 I saw him first, and as I'd taken some- 
 thing of a fancy to the homesick and dis- 
 gruntled fellow, I called out: "Aren't you 
 rather far from New York, Thomas J. 
 Brownley ? " 
 
 He turned, and I thought he would weep 
 for joy. 
 
 He shook my hand with both of his, and 
 looked as happy as if Governor's Island had 
 suddenly loomed up before him. 
 
 After his first delight had subsided and 
 we were sitting together in front of a cafe, 
 he said : " Well, isn't this a sad sight, this 
 city?" 
 
 Again"! had to admit that I was having a 
 good time in spite of a somewhat limited 
 stock of French. 
 
 He rested his head on his hands and shook 
 
"Only One Noo York" 71 
 
 it from side to side. " Oh, how can you say 
 so! Why, I thought I hated London, but I 
 give you my word I'd be glad to be back 
 there to hear their attempts at the Ameri- 
 can language. Did you ever hear such a 
 makeshift for talk as this is? Wouldn't it 
 drive you to crime? And such sights as 
 I've seen since I came here! Why, sir, 
 I never blushed so much in my life as I have 
 here. Filthiest people I ever saw or heard 
 of. Look at the things they sell " 
 
 " To Americans," I said. 
 
 " Don't believe it. Why, I wouldn't run 
 the chance of being found dead with the 
 things they sell on the streets. And I can 
 tell by their looks that what they are saying 
 to each other isn't fit to print. A dirty 
 nation on its last legs. London was para- 
 dise to this, and I didn't know it. Why, 
 sir, when I go back to take my steamer I'm 
 going to write a letter of apology to one o! 
 those miserable London papers, telling them 
 I hadn't seen Paris when I passed through 
 
72 "Only One Noo York" 
 
 London. Oh, it's the language that does it. 
 No one can get away from the English lan- 
 guage and expect to be worth anything as a 
 man. Here, this coffee's on me, but you 
 talk to the waiter. I haven't learned a word 
 of their tongue, thank God ! and I wouldn't 
 on principle, if I lived here all my days. But 
 I've had an awful time trying to get my 
 English understood. My throat is 'most 
 worn out shouting, and still they don't un- 
 derstand. And the insolent cabmen that 
 try to run over you! I grabbed one horse 
 by the head yesterday, and I made him run 
 up on the sidewalk, and I said to the mis- 
 erable driver : * I'm from Noo York, and 
 you can't run me down as you do these un- 
 dersized Frenchmen/ ' 
 
 "What did he say?" Tasked. 
 
 " I don't believe he actually said anything. 
 He chattered like a crow in a cornfield, but 
 no one could talk as "fast as he pretended to. 
 He just wabbled his tongue at me, but I'd 
 shown him that Americans can't be imposed 
 
HE CHATTERED LIKE A CROW IN A CORN-FIELD." P. 72. 
 
"Only One Noo York" 73 
 
 upon, and I came away. Well, sir, I'm 
 awfully glad I met you, and I'm glad to meet 
 any American. Gee-orge Harry! if France 
 had men like ours she wouldn't be going 
 downhill so fast. I give her three years and 
 six weeks to get to perdition. Good-night, 
 and come and see me in Noo York." 
 
 We exchanged cards, and I found out 
 on what steamer he was going to return. 
 I told myself that I ought not to miss the 
 landing of such a devoted patriot, and as I 
 reached New York first I was able to gratify 
 my desire. 
 
 He was the first man to run down the 
 gang-plank, and, as it happened, I was the 
 only man to meet him. Before he saw me 
 he bowed his head for a moment, and I be- 
 lieve he was offering up a prayer of thank- 
 fulness at having landed once more in 
 " God's country." When he saw me he 
 sprang at me and shook my arm so hard that 
 it was lame next day. 
 
 " Thank God ! I'm among real people 
 
74 " Only One Noo York " 
 
 once more. Oh, what a bad dream my trip 
 has been ! Now I want you to listen to me 
 while I say it. There's only one country in 
 the world, and that's America, and there's 
 only one Noo York, and that's right here, 
 and if the good Lord gives me health and 
 strength of mind and body I'll never be such 
 a fool as to go to a foreign shore again. 
 Who's nominated on the Democratic 
 ticket?" 
 
Too Much Boy 
 
 I MET a gentleman on the steamer on 
 my return from Europe who spent all 
 his time in the smoking-room, smoking 
 good cigars and looking neither to the right 
 hand nor to the left, but staring straight 
 ahead into vacancy. He looked to me like a 
 genial man, but he never spoke to anyone, 
 and my curiosity was excited, the more so 
 as I understood that he was the father of the 
 young bunch of mischief who provided ex- 
 citement in large packages for the passen- 
 gers all day long, and whose mother was 
 aging hour by hour owing to the weight of 
 her responsibilities. 
 
 On the sixth day out I sat down in front 
 of him at a card-table and offered him a 
 cigar. He surprised me by accepting it, 
 and when he thanked me his eye warmed 
 
 75 
 
76 Too Much Boy 
 
 and I felt that he was a man of flesh and 
 blood. 
 
 "You don't believe in getting tanned?" 
 I ventured, seeing that his face, on account 
 of his protracted stay in the smoking room, 
 was as white as a bank clerk's just before 
 vacation. 
 
 He hesitated a minute and then, blowing 
 out a huge cloud of smoke, he said : " I be- 
 lieve only in one thing: if you want to 
 enjoy your travels leave your child at 
 home." 
 
 I am sometimes uncomfortably frank, and 
 I now said : 
 
 " Your child doesn't seem to trouble you 
 half as much as he troubles his mother." 
 
 " No," said he in a dead-and-alive tone, 
 " he doesn't trouble me any more, except 
 that he keeps me a prisoner in this gloomy 
 room. Ordinarily when I travel I spend 
 every minute that I can out of doors, but I 
 told Mrs. Maberly I'm Mr. Maberly, as I 
 suppose you and everybody else on board 
 
Too Much Boy 77 
 
 knows I told Mrs. Maberly that the child 
 had taken ten years out of my life on the 
 voyage over, and in Paris, when I took entire 
 responsibility, and that unless I could be 
 free on the voyage back I'd land in New 
 York a doddering idiot. That's why I'm 
 here. That's why my wife never allows the 
 child on this deck. She's sunburned enough, 
 but, poor woman, her hair is growing gray, 
 although it was black as a coal when we left 
 New York." 
 
 I murmured something sympathetic and 
 he heaved a sigh and went on : 
 
 " Why, sir, the only time that I had any 
 pleasure in Paris, although it may sound 
 unfeeling to say so, was when Tom was lost 
 in the sewers." 
 
 I could not repress an exclamation, and 
 Mr. Maberly said : 
 
 " I surprise you; but if you had had to put 
 up with the exuberance of spirits that that 
 child possesses you would have welcomed 
 the relief also, no matter what it cost. For 
 
Too Much Boy 
 
 a ten-year-old he is the biggest cluster of 
 mischief that ever was picked." 
 
 " Well, how about the sewer escapade? " 
 said I, fearing that Mr. Maberly was branch- 
 ing off. 
 
 " Why, you see, one Tuesday we obtained 
 a permit from the prefect of police to visit 
 the sewers, and, together with a crowd of 
 some fifty or more, we descended into the 
 depths. Did you visit them? M 
 
 I told him that a visit to the sewers was 
 a pleasure yet to come. 
 
 " Well, you go down a flight of steps and 
 find a train of platform trolleys awaiting 
 you. Mrs. Maberly and Tom got into the 
 first one. She had to because he ran ahead 
 of the crowd and almost fell beneath the car. 
 That was the last I saw of him for some 
 time. We ran a mile or so through the im- 
 mense vaults, wonderfully clean, yet not the 
 place for an ordinary outing, and at last we 
 debarked and walked along a passageway 
 until we came to an underground river, ac- 
 
Too Much Boy 79 
 
 tually the sewer. Here there was a train of 
 boats hitched together and pulled by men 
 who walked on towpaths. I thought that 
 Tom was with his mother, and Mrs. Ma- 
 berly thought that he was with me, but he 
 wasn't with either of us. 
 
 " When we emerged from the sewer I 
 said, ' Where's Tom ? ' and Mrs. Maberly 
 turned white and ran back and called him. 
 He hadn't come back with us at all. She, 
 womanlike, was for going back for him, but 
 I said : ' Now, Mary, that boy never came 
 to any harm yet. I know a good thing when 
 I see it. Let's celebrate our liberty until he 
 turns up.' But you know what a mother is. 
 Nothing would do but she must try to get 
 the boy. She speaks French, and she said to 
 the guide : ' My little boy is left behind. He 
 was in the passage at the end of the trolley 
 line, but I don't think he got into the boat." 
 
 "The guide shrugged his shoulders and 
 said : ' I'm very sorry, but the trip is over for 
 to-day. On next Tuesday, if you have a 
 
8o Too Much Boy 
 
 permit from the prefect of police, you can 
 go through again and hunt for him. Mean- 
 time, never/ 
 
 " I understood French, although I do not 
 speak it. ' There/ said I ; ' now you see, my 
 dear, you have run up against French red 
 tape, and you might as well rest easy. On 
 Tuesday next we will go about this thing 
 in an orderly manner. We will hunt up the 
 boy with a permit from the prefect. Noth- 
 ing will be gained by bucking against red 
 tape. Meantime let us celebrate our liberty/ 
 
 " But you know what mothers are. She 
 called me heartless, and said her boy would 
 be eaten alive by the rats. * Nonsense/ said 
 I ; ' if the rats plan anything like that it is 
 because they don't know Tom. More likely 
 he'll eat them. He asked me yesterday if 
 I knew of a restaurant where he could get 
 some horse meat/ 
 
 " Will you believe it, I might as well have 
 talked to a dead wall. Nothing must do but 
 a visit to the prefect in order to get a special 
 
Too Much Boy 81 
 
 permit. The prefect was out, but his subor- 
 dinate was there a very polite young man 
 with little mouselike eyes and gleaming 
 teeth. He heard the facts and then said he 
 was very sorry, but he could not issue a per- 
 mit in the absence of the prefect, and he 
 doubted if the prefect himself would do it 
 either, because, the city being full of Ex- 
 position visitors, they could not allow a per- 
 son to make more than one excursion 
 through the sewers. 
 
 " ' But my little boy is there ! ' said my 
 wife. * I beg madame's pardon/ said the 
 subordinate with a polite shrug of the 
 shoulders, ' but if the little boy is now in the 
 sewer he has overstayed the time permitted 
 and has laid himself open to punishment by 
 the authorities/ He pulled down a volume 
 from a shelf and quickly turned to the place 
 he wanted. 
 
 " ' For staying overtime in the sewers of 
 Paris, a fine of ten francs for the first hour 
 and fifteen francs for every succeeding hour 
 
82 Too Much Boy 
 
 is imposed. Children under ten are fined 
 five francs the first hour and ten francs for 
 each succeeding hour/ 
 
 " ' Madame will see,' said he, ' that such 
 a law is necessary, for the sewers of Paris 
 are so inviting, so beautifully clean, that chil- 
 dren like them as a playground, and others 
 as a place of promenade. Your little boy has 
 broken the law, and on Tuesday next, when 
 the visitors go down. I will send an officer 
 along to look for him, and he will ascertain 
 the time that he has been there, and upon 
 payment of the fine he will be restored to 
 you/ 
 
 " At this point I broke in and said to my 
 wife : ' Now, Mrs. Maberly, this is surely 
 providential. You have repeatedly said that 
 you could not enjoy a minute of your stay 
 in Paris on account of Tom's pranks. I dare 
 say that he will be perfectly well cared for 
 in the sewer. While he is enjoying himself 
 at his father's expense in the sewer we will 
 see Paris. We've been here a week, and yet 
 
Too Much Boy 83 
 
 I can't recall a single thing I've seen on ac- 
 count of my worry over that boy. He's safe 
 and sound and underground, in a good 
 sense, so let's celebrate our freedom/ 
 
 " Well, Mrs. Maberly saw that I was talk- 
 ing horse sense, and she asked the officer 
 whether he would be cared for in the sewer. 
 ' But yes, madame/ said he; 'he is the guest 
 of the sewer. He will be fed by the guard- 
 ians of the sewer. From time to time he 
 will advance to the outlets and enjoy a view 
 of the Seine and see the passing boats. For 
 the rest, if he is a good boy the guardians 
 of the sewer will make much of him and he 
 will enjoy himself. No harm can come to 
 anyone in the sewers of Paris. Come back 
 next Tuesday morning and remind me of the 
 boy's absence and ' here he bowed very 
 low and showed his teeth and snapped his 
 eyes, and looked so like a mouse that Mrs. 
 Maberly shuddered ' and I will personally 
 see to it that your boy is restored after the 
 fine is paid.' 
 
84 Too Much Boy 
 
 " * Will there be extra charges for his 
 food? 'I asked. 
 
 "'Not at all. He is the guest of the 
 sewer. He should not have stayed, but now 
 that he is there French hospitality will see to 
 it that he does not starve/ 
 
 " Well, you can't imagine what a feeling 
 of freedom flooded me. I said to Mrs. Ma- 
 berly : * We have earned this holiday. Re- 
 member that the captain of the Landslide 
 asked us to chain the boy in the cabin, recol- 
 lect how at each hotel we have been requested 
 to keep the boy away from every room in 
 the house except his own bedroom, and let 
 us go to Margueries for supper/ 
 
 " Then we left our names, our ages, our 
 religion, our color, our birthplace, the num- 
 ber of years we had been married, and our 
 politics, with the mouse-eyed man, and, it 
 being seven o'clock, we took a cab to Mar- 
 gueries', where we had fried sole and other 
 delicacies, and where I had a delightful 
 time. But I could hear Mrs. Maberly sigh 
 
Too Much Boy 85 
 
 every few minutes and say : ' Poor lonely 
 little boy. I was wicked. Alone with the 
 rats ! Down with red tape ! ' 
 
 " Our hotel was in a quiet square just 
 back of the Bibliotheque Nationale, and so 
 long did I linger over that quiet, boyless din- 
 ner that it was nine o'clock when we arrived 
 there. We found the little park black with 
 people, and firemen with a scaling ladder 
 were just placing it against our hotel. 
 
 "'What is the trouble?' asked I of a 
 man, in elemental French. He shrugged his 
 shoulders and pointed up, and there, on a 
 cornice of the hotel, a perfectly inaccessible 
 place, stood Tom, shouting with glee and 
 saying, ' Never touched me ! ' when firemen 
 tried to reach him from the windows be- 
 neath." 
 
 " How did he get out of the sewer? " I 
 asked of Tom's father. 
 
 " Why, the rogue had left the sewer with 
 us, but had run on ahead, and when we 
 missed him he was on his way to the hotel. 
 
86 Too Much Boy 
 
 I'll never know all the dreadful things he 
 did there that afternoon, but the firemen 
 rescued him at last, and then I spanked him 
 and tied him to his bed and took a train by 
 the Gare du Nord for the country, and spent 
 a happy night in the middle of a cornfield. 
 And next day I engaged passage by this 
 steamer and shifted all responsibility to Mrs. 
 Maberly. That's why my trip is a failure. 
 That's why I'm the talk of the ship. 
 That's why I have no tan. When I leave 
 America again I will see to it that the boy 
 is left in the orphan asylum before I sail." 
 
The Cosmopolitanism of 
 Mr. Powers 
 
 I AM very much influenced by the people 
 I meet. I have talked with men and 
 women who in five minutes, without say- 
 ing a flattering word to me, have made 
 me feel that I would amount to something 
 if death kept away long enough, and I've 
 always cut off my interviews with such 
 people at an untimely period, for fear I 
 would grow too fond of myself. There are 
 others who make me feel idiotic. They do 
 not tell me that they doubt the existence of 
 my brains, but after I have talked with them 
 a few minutes I become doddering and im- 
 becile, and I terminate these interviews also. 
 Then there are persons who make me feel 
 that I am a very poor and mongrel breed of 
 worm; they are so infinitely superior. 
 
88 Cosmopolitanism 
 
 I never felt more worm-like or more in 
 need of turning as worms do, for exercise 
 than when I was talking with V. S. Pow- 
 ers, who condescended to honor with his 
 presence the steamship that carried me over 
 the Atlantic from New York. 
 
 His full name was Vernon Stowe Powers: 
 but, after watching him tread the deck as if 
 he were the owner of the ocean and had 
 kindly given the steamship company the 
 right of way, some wag christened him 
 " Very Superior Powers," and the nickname 
 stuck. 
 
 He was very superior to the ruck. All 
 the rest of us were the ruck. There were 
 several college professors and an artist or 
 two and a hand-made millionaire, and there 
 was one Harvard man whose ancestors to 
 the number of four generations had been 
 baptized in the same font of learning; but 
 they were all ruck. 
 
 The first thing that suggested his superi- 
 ority was his sampling of his food. Those 
 
Cosmopolitanism 89 
 
 of us who were not seasick had ravenous ap- 
 petites, and we were really not in a position 
 to judge of the worth of the meals set before 
 us. The sea winds had bottled up dozens 
 of the " best sauce." But Mr. Powers never 
 allowed his hunger to get the better of his 
 critical faculty, and he made us all feel that 
 we were not used to anything much at home 
 by dabbling at his oatmeal, pecking at his 
 meat, daintily sipping his coffee, his nostrils 
 distended like those of an Arabian charger; 
 and when he had finished his meal, which 
 was always long before anybody else had, 
 he would push his plate away, and leave the 
 table with a sigh and a fervent ejaculation, 
 " Thank Heaven, another meal is finished ! " 
 It was a new kind of grace, and one that he 
 never, to my knowledge, omitted at any 
 meal, and he did not miss one from port to 
 port. 
 
 I once said to him : " Too bad you didn't 
 take one of the ocean greyhounds, where 
 they make more of a specialty of the table." 
 
90 Cosmopolitanism 
 
 " My dear fellow/' said he, and I felt my- 
 self assuming worm-like proportions at 
 once, " I have probably tried every line that 
 crosses this stream, and I merely took this 
 for the novelty of it. The fact is, to be quite 
 candid, I engaged passage on this steamer 
 at twenty-four hours' notice because I could 
 not stand America any longer." 
 
 This declaration and his somewhat Eng- 
 lish hat, and the English cut of his clothes 
 made me certain that he was a native of Al- 
 bion, so I said : 
 
 " Oh, then you were disappointed in your 
 visit. You must be glad to be slowly get- 
 ting back to the delicious English cookery." 
 
 Even a worm can be sarcastic, and that's 
 what I meant to be, but he did not see it. 
 
 " Oh, I don't like English cookery. Don't, 
 don't think that of me. The French are the 
 only cooks, of course, as years of residence 
 in Paris has taught me. But I'm not Eng- 
 lish. I'm a cosmopolite, and I was born in 
 New Haven." 
 
Cosmopolitanism 91 
 
 " Indeed, I come from Hartford way my- 
 self," said I, glad to find a man from my own 
 State, even if he were fleeing from its bor- 
 ders with gladness. 
 
 " Yes, I was born in New Haven, and I 
 know that little crowd from A to Z," said 
 he. " Petty, petty, petty/' he continued, 
 with one of the sourest expressions I ever 
 saw. He was, for the moment, the personi- 
 fication of a lemon, and I fancied that his 
 ' face assumed a yellowish tinge. 
 
 "What's petty?" I asked as we left the 
 taffrail, on which we had been leaning, and 
 began to promenade the decks together. 
 
 " New Haven," said he. " Petty and nar- 
 row and provincial. I've just been back 
 there on legal business, and they are leading 
 the same lives they led when I was last there, 
 ten years ago." 
 
 I suggested that New Haven people were 
 not peculiarly gifted as to the number of 
 their lives ; that they had not a feline appor- 
 tionment, and that once begun, they would 
 
92 Cosmopolitanism 
 
 be apt to lead the only life they had until 
 the leading-string was parted by time. 
 
 " No ; but everyone is so content with 
 his little finite self and his little finite way. 
 They seem to forget that there is a great 
 world outside New Haven " 
 
 " Hartford, for instance," said I. 
 
 " Yes; Hartford is not nearly so narrow. 
 But it's all touched by the same insular 
 spirit. New England is an aggregation of 
 hubs " 
 
 " And where there are hubs there are al- 
 ways wheels, I suppose you mean, isms and 
 the like." 
 
 He did not smile at my anaemic jest. 
 
 " You see," said he, " to one who has 
 traveled, as I have, to every quarter of the 
 globe, this belief of America in her destiny 
 is mortifying. When I am in Europe I for- 
 get America. I actually forget her for 
 weeks at a time." 
 
 He looked at me as if he did not expect 
 me to credit him, but I did. 
 
Cosmopolitanism 93 
 
 " Now, when I'm in America," he con- 
 tinued, " I don't forget England or the Con- 
 tinent they make themselves felt; but with 
 America, poor, new, crude America, out of 
 sight is out of mind." 
 
 " Don't you believe in a great future for 
 America in her art and her music and her 
 literature and her architecture? " 
 
 He looked at me as a man looks at a baby 
 who has upset its pap. 
 
 " Some years ago, Sydney Smith, I think 
 it was, said : ' Who reads an American 
 book?" If he were living now I could 
 truthfully tell him that I don't. For me 
 there is only one literature, and that is Ger- 
 man. Just as France is the great cook, so 
 Germany is the great litterateur." 
 
 I ventured to say, in as much voice as a 
 worm could muster, that it seemed to me 
 that we were holding our own in all the arts, 
 and that probably the coming century would 
 see America the foremost musical nation. 
 I wanted to see how he'd take such a bold 
 
94 Cosmopolitanism 
 
 statement. He took it hard. I thought he 
 would faint. 
 
 " Not really ! Is that your honest 
 opinion?" said he, after weathering the 
 shock. 
 
 I wished that worms had more backbone, 
 because I felt myself writhing, but I man- 
 aged to whisper something about the great 
 composers of the future being Americans, 
 and that perhaps some of them were out of 
 their cradles already. 
 
 " Oh, my poor fellow, what a hopeless 
 provincial you are! Americans have a cer- 
 tain mimetic ability; so has the ape: but 
 America will never lead except in the realm 
 of mechanics. Now, I have heard all the 
 music of all the lands: the wild, barbaric 
 strains of the Dahomeyans, the hideous dis- 
 cords of the Japanese, the rude melodies of 
 the Fuegians, as well as the harmonies of all 
 the civilized nations, and to me Russia is the 
 high priest of modern music. But, do you 
 know, I rather like your standing up for 
 
Cosmopolitanism 95 
 
 American music. This is your first voyage, 
 I believe. Oh, you have so much, so very 
 much to learn, my dear fellow. American 
 music does not carry across the waters. 
 Europe never hears it. That's what counts, 
 you know. It isn't what Americans think 
 of themselves, but what Europeans think of 
 Americans. / know what they think of us, 
 and 7 think like them because / am more a 
 cosmopolite than an American, in spite of 
 the accident of my birth." 
 
 " Where were your parents accidentally 
 born?" I asked which was rather bold of 
 a worm. 
 
 " Oh, my ancestors have been Americans 
 since 1639," sa id he^ and it amused me to see 
 that he was proud of it, cosmopolite though 
 he was. In fact, he was proud of anything 
 that appertained to Vernon Stowe Powers 
 in any degree. 
 
 Just then the orchestra struck up. Now, 
 it is true that the bancTwas not much above 
 the level of a Staten Island ferry-boat harp- 
 
96 Cosmopolitanism 
 
 and-violin duo, but most of us discounted 
 that fact, and steeled our ears against the 
 cacophony, and tried to remember that the 
 young men were working hard for their 
 tips, and took this unmusical way of 
 doing it. 
 
 But Mr. Powers distended his nostrils un- 
 til they reminded me of the india-rubber 
 man, so-caoutchouckian were they. 
 
 " That isn't the Boston Symphony orches- 
 tra, is it ? " said I laughingly. 
 
 " It certainly isn't the Berlin orchestra. 
 I can't speak of the American orchestras, ex- 
 cept by hearsay. But isn't it an outrage to 
 put upon us? As if it wasn't enough to give 
 us food that a mendicant would spurn, they 
 must torture us with such discords as this. 
 It turns my ears inside out. And such stuff 
 as they play ! I suppose that's some of your 
 American music." 
 
 " No; that's the nocturne from Mendels- 
 sohn's ' Midsummer Night's Dream,' " said 
 I, with a worm's glee. 
 
Cosmopolitanism 97 
 
 Most men would have been squelched by 
 this. I would have worked down into the 
 soil to stay there until the next wet morning 
 brought me out as bait, but he never turned a 
 hair. 
 
 " I knew it wasn't Russian," he said, and 
 said it in such a way that I felt he had some- 
 how turned the tables on me. " Very Su- 
 perior " Powers he had. 
 
 Long before the voyage was over the pas- 
 sengers got up a round-robin, couched in 
 respectful terms, asking Him if he wouldn't 
 select an extra fine life-preserver and jump 
 overboard, which would be an easy way of 
 avoiding the music and the meals and the 
 passengers. They wanted me to hand it to 
 him, but I lacked the presence. So he stayed 
 on board until we made port ; but there was 
 not a moment that he did not show how su- 
 perior he was to anyone else. He hated to 
 praise anything that had been praised by an- 
 other. Once a passenger who was standing 
 by his side, looking at the moonlight on the 
 
98 Cosmopolitanism 
 
 water, said : " It's a beautiful ocean, isn't 
 it?" 
 
 " Oh, I suppose so," said he with a sigh of 
 ennui. " I've crossed it so often that its 
 beauty palls on me. And it hasn't the pic- 
 turesque quality of the Pacific or even the 
 Indian Ocean. I might almost say that I 
 know every wave on those oceans, but they 
 never lose their charm for me; but the At- 
 lantic, this trip especially, is so infernally 
 quiet, don't you know. I like to cross in a 
 series of tempests. I'm generally the only 
 one on board, except the captain, who isn't 
 seasick. But of course this old tub wouldn't 
 stand heavy seas. Five days more of it. 
 Fancy!" 
 
 The other passenger said that he was get- 
 ting a good deal of fun out of the process 
 of studying human nature. 
 
 " Human nature? In this crowd! Well, 
 there is human nature and human nature, 
 but I prefer to study it in the world's great 
 capitals, Rome and London and Moscow. 
 
" I SUPPOSE YOU ARE LOOKING FORWARD TO THE 
 PARIS EXPOSITION?" P. 99. 
 
Cosmopolitanism 99 
 
 These poor yokels, who are so easily pleased, 
 haven't any human nature worth talking 
 about. A man who is easily pleased sets 
 himself down as commonplace at once. 
 Now, when I am pleased it's because some- 
 thing very much worth while has happened, 
 and this voyage was not worth while. I 
 never would have taken it if I hadn't been 
 so anxious to get away from the irritations 
 of complacent America." 
 
 Then the other passenger left, and two 
 minutes later I found him kicking a coil of 
 rope all by himself, and he never knew that 
 I saw him. But I had overheard the con- 
 versation, and I sympathized with his feel- 
 ings. 
 
 The last day of the trip a dear old lady 
 said to Mr. Powers quite innocently : " I 
 suppose you're looking forward to the Paris 
 Exposition? " 
 
 I didn't hear his answer, but I dare say 
 that he told her that there was nothing in 
 the Paris Exposition to tempt him; that he 
 
ioo Cosmopolitanism 
 
 had seen one on the Congo in '85 that laid 
 over anything that Paris could do. The old 
 lady looked squelched, and he left her 
 and walked away with his head in the 
 air. 
 
 That day I came upon him at dinner, he 
 was always the first to come to table, and 
 the first to go away, and before he could 
 wither me with his glance, I said briskly: 
 " By the way, are you going to the Exposi- 
 tion?" 
 
 He shook his head pityingly for some 
 seconds before he answered me. 
 
 " You don't know me, evidently. Do I 
 look like a man who would visit a mere ex- 
 position? I'm not a Western ranchman or a 
 New England farmer, or a French peasant 
 who is crazy to see the world for the first 
 time. I know the world, and it is very small. 
 I was a mere youngster when the Centen- 
 nial Exhibition occurred in Philadelphia, but 
 I knew better than to go to it, even then. 
 Instinct is a great thing, and I have it. It 
 
Cosmopolitanism 101 
 
 saves me a lot of bother. Why should I join 
 a crowd of gaping wanderers from every 
 country in the world in order to look at a 
 lot of breadstuffs and fabrics, and cheap 
 pictures and hastily constructed buildings? 
 Oh, no; life is too short for such childish 
 pleasures. I hate crowds. Every self-re- 
 specting man hates crowds, because crowds 
 are bound to be made up of the riffraff. 
 There may be such a thing as a crowd of 
 gentlemen, but it does not last long. The 
 instinct of each member of it is to get away, 
 and that dissolves the crowd." 
 
 " Yes; but you can go early in the morn- 
 ing and avoid the crowd," said a man op- 
 posite. 
 
 " I value my mornings too much," said 
 he, dilating his nostrils. " Besides, an ex- 
 position is a rather childish enjoyment for 
 one who has been everywhere and seen 
 everything. Why should I look on a painted 
 panorama of Egypt when I have sailed down 
 the Nile, or gaze at locomotives from Amer- 
 
IO2 Cosmopolitanism 
 
 ica when I have just gladly shaken her iron- 
 filings off my feet? No; my pleasures are 
 loftier ones." He pushed his plate away 
 from him in a cosmopolite way. " Thank 
 Heaven, the last meal is finished ! " And so 
 saying, he left the room. 
 
 It happened that I did not see him again 
 in the bustle of departure. I thought of him 
 many times, however, and always as being 
 engaged in some very superior occupation: 
 chatting with the Czar, or going on picnics 
 with Tolstoi, or pacing the Russian steppes 
 alone; for somehow I judged that he had 
 chosen Russia to be dignified by his foot- 
 steps. Therefore I was much surprised to 
 find him one evening at the Exposition in 
 the crowd outside one of the little theaters 
 in the Rue de Paris. I could not understand 
 it. I looked around at those who surrounded 
 him to see if, perchance, they were also cos- 
 mopolitans. No. There was a Turk, a 
 German couple, evidently peasants, a Japa- 
 nese actor, a Russian Jew, several French- 
 
Cosmopolitanism 1 03 
 
 men, and some American " Cook's," who 
 only waited a moment and then pressed 
 feverishly on, as is their wont not a cos- 
 mopolite in the crowd except Vernon Stowe 
 Powers. 
 
 I could not imagine why he had changed 
 his mind and come to the Exposition after 
 all, but, for various reasons, I did not dis- 
 cover myself to him. He had evidently 
 risen far above the crowd and would be in 
 no mood to converse with a worm. 
 
 But while I stood somewhat back of him, 
 enjoying the pleasantries of the actors on 
 the little balcony, who, with true Gallic ease 
 and grace, invited the populace to come in- 
 side and witness the play, a Frenchman, evi- 
 dently a stranger to my quondam shipmate, 
 turned to him with a smile, and made a re- 
 mark that even I understood. I looked for 
 a condescending flow of French to be poured 
 on the Parisian's head, with possibly an im- 
 plied correction of the native's accent. 
 But the world-traveler, the ennuied one who 
 
IO4 Cosmopolitanism 
 
 had absorbed all civilizations, said, with an 
 apologetic air: 
 
 " I don't speak French." 
 
 Could it have been Mr. Powers's first voy- 
 age, even as it was mine? 
 
An Eastern Easter 
 
 MY uncle's name, like my own, is 
 Robert Burns McPherson, but, un- 
 like myself, he is not a poet. In fact, he has 
 no profession, but being independently 
 wealthy he delights in preparing for his rela- 
 tives little surprises that sometimes take odd 
 forms. I could not have been more than ten 
 when he invited me to a birthday dinner at 
 which trout formed the principal dish; and 
 when he had helped me and I proceeded to 
 bone my fish a feat that I had already 
 learnt I found a gold eagle secreted in the 
 interior. 
 
 It was some years after that my sister 
 Marcella went out to the henhouse one 
 morning (we lived in the country then) and 
 found an upright piano almost completely 
 
 filling the place. She suspected that Uncle 
 105 
 
io6 An Eastern Easter 
 
 Bob had been at work, and when she found 
 a note tacked on the back of the piano, say- 
 ing : " For a musical girl from one who 
 loves her/' she knew that it was a present. 
 If she had been a little older she might have 
 thought it was a crazy place to leave a 
 present, but as it was she was delighted be- 
 yond all measure. It seemed to have 
 dropped from the clouds. To be sure the 
 hired man and a helper found it a Herculean 
 task to get it into the house without the ap- 
 proved implements for moving pianos; and 
 it was pretty well scratched before it found 
 its way to the parlor. But when Uncle Bob 
 came that evening and found Marcella play- 
 ing it he was so happy and she was so over- 
 joyed that my mother could not scold him 
 for his freakishness. 
 
 He has always said that when he died he 
 did not expect to leave anything to anybody ; 
 he preferred to give it away while he was 
 yet alive. 
 
 So much by way of preamble. Last 
 
An Eastern Easter 107 
 
 spring, towards the end of Lent, my pub- 
 lishers brought out a book of mine called 
 " An Eastern Easter," being a serious poem 
 of some length. The first copy came to me 
 while I was out, and my sister Marcella 
 opened it, and then left it lying on the center 
 table in the parlor. An hour or two later 
 I came home and found it there, and without 
 stopping to look at it for I had already 
 seen a copy at my publisher's I wrapped it 
 up and ran round the corner to give it to my 
 dear friend Enos Dane, who was to sail next 
 day for Europe on the Holl and America 
 line. 
 
 He was so awfully busy packing that he 
 did not open it either, but told me that it 
 would be his first pleasure after the vessel 
 started to read the book, and he would then 
 write me a long, critical letter. Dane has 
 been one of my kindest and yet one of my 
 severest critics, and it is due to him that I 
 ventured upon writing so serious a poem as 
 " An Eastern Easter," which I may say, 
 
io8 An Eastern Easter 
 
 without offense, is modeled after Sir Edwin 
 Arnold's " Light of Asia." 
 
 I was a little disappointed that Enos did 
 not open the package, as I thought that they 
 had bound the book very prettily, and I like 
 his judgment on such matters; and I 
 wouldn't have minded, to tell the truth, if 
 he had asked me to read the first hundred 
 stanzas or so. There are seven hundred in 
 all, eight lines to a stanza, very easy-flow- 
 ing, if I do say it. But that has nothing to 
 do with what followed. 
 
 The next morning Uncle Bob dropped in 
 while we were at breakfast, and from the 
 twinkle in his eye I knew that he had been 
 up to one of his " benevolences/' as we call 
 them in the family. 
 
 " Rather nice book of poems that of 
 yours," said he. 
 
 " Oh, have you seen it? " I said, for I did 
 not suppose the stores would have exposed 
 it for sale so soon. 
 
 "Yes, I saw your copy yesterday after- 
 
An Eastern Easter 109 
 
 noon. Thought I'd give it a send-off. 
 Didn't you find the book-marks?" 
 
 "Book-marks? No," I said. "I have 
 hardly looked at the book, for I wanted Dane 
 to have the first copy. You know he sug- 
 gested my writing the poem." 
 
 My uncle's expression changed. " Do 
 you mean you have given the book away 
 without looking at it? " said he hurriedly. 
 
 " Yes, I took it round to Dane last night. 
 You know he sails for Europe this morn- 
 ing " 
 
 " Why, man, I put ten bills of a thousand 
 each in it just for a starter to bring you good 
 luck." 
 
 "Oh, you jewel of an uncle!" cried I, 
 glancing at the clock. 
 
 I remember that my feeling of gratitude 
 was mixed up with a wish that he had chosen 
 a more conventional way of making the gift. 
 It was nine o'clock and the Mtildam sailed 
 at ten. I had noticed that in the paper that 
 morning. 
 
no An Eastern Easter 
 
 I sprang from the table, and, saying " I 
 must get that book," I was gone like a shot, 
 stopping only to pick up my hat. I live in 
 Harlem, and I had a little over an hour to 
 get to the company's docks at Hoboken, on 
 the other side of the Hudson River. I took 
 ;an elevated train down to Tweaity-third 
 Street. 
 
 I may as well admit that I was not at that 
 time so well blessed with this world's goods 
 that I could hazard the loss of ten thousand 
 dollars without an effort. Dane might look 
 at the book up on deck and turn a page that 
 concealed the bills just in time to catch a 
 passing breeze, and then where would my 
 money be ? 
 
 At Twenty-third Street I hailed a cab, and 
 promised the man five dollars if he would 
 get me to the Holl pier ten minutes before 
 the boat sailed. I happened to have ten dol- 
 lars in my pocket or I should have been in a 
 fix. 
 
 There were no incidents connected with 
 
An Eastern Easter in 
 
 my getting to Hoboken, and I arrived there 
 in time, paid my man, and rushed up the 
 gang plank. There I found everything in 
 confusion. I did not know the number of 
 Dane's cabin, and no one else seemed to 
 know. I tried to find the purser, but he was 
 as hard to find as Dane. Hurried and wor- 
 ried as I was I did notice a Junoesque girl 
 with great ox eyes, and I said to myself: 
 " If I could have known someone like you I 
 would not be a bachelor to-day." Such in- 
 consequent thoughts do make the transit 
 of a man's brain. Just then I caught a 
 glimpse of Dane, and I followed him until 
 he disappeared in an inside cabin. I knocked 
 at his door; but just then the deep-throated 
 whistle boomed and he did not hear me. I 
 could hear the people who had come to see 
 their friends off leaving the boat in shoals, 
 but still I stood there and knocked. It must 
 have been five minutes before the door 
 opened, and then it was not Dane at all, 
 but a man built and dressed like him. 
 
H2 An Eastern Easter 
 
 " Oh, I beg your pardon," said I. " I 
 thought you were my friend Dane, who has 
 ten thousand dollars of mine, and I was in a 
 hurry because I'm not going across, you 
 know." 
 
 " Going back with the pilot ? " said he. 
 
 " Oh, no, I'm going now. Where can 
 Dane be? " And I rushed up the stairs to 
 see the lordly Hudson flowing all around me 
 and Hoboken growing smaller every mo- 
 ment. I was on my way to Europe ! 
 
 For a moment I was scared, but the words 
 of the man whom I had disturbed came back 
 to me, and I determined to act on his sug- 
 gestion and go back with the pilot. Mean- 
 time I must find Dane. From bow to stern, 
 upstairs and downstairs, or whatever you 
 call it on board ship, I went, but no Dane ap- 
 peared. Could he have missed the steamer? 
 But no, he was the soul of punctuality. Per- 
 haps he was indisposed and in his cabin. 
 But where was his cabin? 
 
 I had an idea that there would be a blare 
 
An Eastern Easter 113 
 
 of trumpets and a roll of drums and no end 
 of things when the pilot left, and I listened 
 for the engines to slacken the while I looked 
 for Dane; but it seems that the pilot does 
 not need to stop the boat in order to get off. 
 
 The purser had hitherto been hidden 
 somewhere, but now I found him and got 
 from him a passenger list. I eagerly scanned 
 the D's. " Dalbreger, Damen, Dayton, 
 
 Eaton " Dane was not on the passenger 
 
 list! That was horrible discovery number 
 one. And I was so sure that he had sailed 
 on the Humbug- American Line. The Hum- 
 bug-American! And this was the Holl and 
 America Line! I always mix those two 
 lines. I had no idea when the steamer of 
 that line would sail. Perhaps she had left 
 already. Oh, how idiotic I had been ! Well, 
 at any rate, I would have a pleasant sail up 
 the bay with the pilot with a chance of 
 getting Dane after all. It will be seen that 
 I am philosophical. I said to the purser: 
 " My friend is not on board." 
 
114 An Eastern Easter 
 
 He was busy finding places at table for 
 various passengers who were besieging him, 
 but he said politely, in his idiom : " Ah, 
 that is too badly. But you will make friends 
 on the voyage." 
 
 " But I'm not going, you know. I'm 
 going back with the pilot." 
 
 The purser stared at me as if he thought 
 I was a lunatic, and several of the passengers 
 turned and looked at me with amused inter- 
 est. 
 
 " The pilot departed already a half-hour 
 ago," said he. 
 
 I dropped into a chair opposite him and 
 said, in a helpless sort of way: "The 
 pilot departed? Then how can I get 
 home?" 
 
 I heard a sardonic-looking man say to his 
 wife : " Get out and walk," and I blushed. 
 
 But the purser said : " You will make the 
 return trip on the steamer. She shall be back 
 in four weeks." 
 
 He seemed to think that it was quite an 
 
An Eastern Easter 115 
 
 ordinary thing for a man to get carried off to 
 Europe by mistake. 
 
 " But I have only five dollars with me. I 
 didn't come to go. I mean I came to go I 
 came to go back with the pilot that is," said 
 I, feeling that the eyes of all these people 
 were upon me, " I came to get my money 
 from Mr. Dane, and he is on the Humbug- 
 American Line." 
 
 The purser said with Dutch phlegm: 
 " You will have to see the captain. The 
 whistle blew to get off all the people already." 
 
 And then he turned to the applicants for 
 advantageous seats at the table, and I sat 
 down feeling rather queer within, and for 
 the first time noticed the motion of the vessel. 
 I knew I was growing whiter and whiter. 
 The purser evidently noticed it also, for he 
 said : " Now go up and sniff some air. It 
 is closely down here." He evidently prided 
 himself on his English. " I will send you 
 to the captain later." 
 
 I half expected to be put at peeling pota- 
 
n6 An Eastern Easter 
 
 toes to work my passage. That is what I 
 had heard they made stowaways do. 
 
 What would Marcella say? And how 
 Uncle Bob would worry. And what would 
 I do, with no change of linen, no vest, no 
 overcoat or steamer rug? Then I began to 
 feel so ill that I did not care what happened. 
 I rushed upstairs and made my way to the 
 side of the boat, and watched the restless 
 waves until I was in a better frame of 
 mind to put it euphemistically. 
 
 I had heard that it is good to walk as much 
 as possible when at sea, so I began to pace to 
 and fro and gradually felt better, and at last 
 took my stand in front of the pilot-house 
 if that is what they call it and won- 
 dered what was going to be the outcome 
 of all this. 
 
 A sweet, low voice at my side said : " Oh, 
 look at those porpoises ! " and I turned and 
 saw my Junoesque young woman. 
 
 " Are those porpoises ? " said I. " I never 
 saw any before." 
 

 An Eastern Easter 117 
 
 I knew that land conventions did not hold 
 at sea, and I talked to her freely. 
 
 14 Yes," said she. "Is this your first 
 trip?" 
 
 " Well, ye-yes. I'm really not sure if it 
 is my trip at all. You see, I didn't mean to 
 come, and I don't know what the captain 
 will do with me." 
 
 She looked at me in wonder for a moment, 
 and then laughed the sweetest laugh ever 
 heard. " Do you suppose he'll give you a 
 life-preserver and let you swim back? But, 
 tell me, didn't you really mean to come?" 
 Then she looked me all over, the way a 
 woman will, and I could see that she was 
 thinking : " He is a little too well-dressed 
 to be a stowaway." 
 
 When I am perturbed I have a way of 
 getting mixed up in my speech. " Why, 
 you see, I came after Mr. Dane's ten thou- 
 sand dollars that I had in his book that is, 
 my uncle put ten thousand dollars in Mr. 
 Dane's new book that is, in my new book 
 
ii8 An Eastern Easter 
 
 that I gave to Mr. Dane, but not the ten 
 thousand dollars. Those my uncle gave to 
 me but, you see, he put it in my book for 
 Mr. Dane, and so I came on board to get it 
 back " 
 
 " To get the book back?" 
 
 " No, to get the money back; and Mr. 
 Dane wasn't on board because he didn't go 
 by this line, and so here I am." 
 
 Miss Delplain for this, as I afterwards 
 learnt, was her name, Miss Dorothy Del- 
 plain, of Philadelphia stared at me as if she 
 thought I was not quite right, and just then 
 the purser and the captain came up. 
 
 " Here he is," said the purser. 
 
 Captain Zollikoffer was a red-cheeked, 
 jolly-looking fellow. " What is this you 
 have done?" said he. "Did you come to 
 see someone off?" 
 
 " No," said I, " I didn't come to see him 
 off, because I'd seen him off last night that 
 is, I bade him good-^by last night; but, you 
 see, I gave him a copy of my latest book. 
 

 An Eastern Easter 119 
 
 I'm Robert Burns McPherson, the poet, and 
 I gave my book to Mr. Dane; but I didn't 
 know until this morning that my uncle had 
 put ten thousand dollars in it for me, and 
 then I came down to the dock to recover 
 the money, but I made a mistake in the line 
 of steamers I thought he'd gone by I al- 
 ways make that mistake about the Humbug- 
 American Line, you know, and that is the 
 line he's gone by and I have only five dol- 
 lars with me and the clothes on my back." 
 
 I knew that the captain had never heard of 
 my writings, but at this point in my some- 
 what long monologue, the Junoesque being 
 said: 
 
 " Oh, are you Mr. McPherson, the poet ? 
 I've been dying to meet you. Didn't you 
 read at an authors' reading in Philadel- 
 phia?" 
 
 I assured her that I had, and had nearly 
 fainted from fright also. 
 
 The captain suddenly burst out laughing. 
 Something had just struck him, " Oh, and 
 
I2O An Eastern Easter 
 
 your friend has your money, and follows us 
 on the Humbug Line ? " 
 
 I told him that that was it exactly, unless 
 he had allowed the money to blow away. 
 
 " Such an uncle ! " continued the captain. 
 " Does he ofttimes give you bills in your 
 books like that?" 
 
 " He has never done it before ; but he put 
 a piano in my little sister's henhouse once." 
 
 The captain suddenly looked dignified, 
 after the manner of the Bishop of Rumtifoo. 
 He plainly thought that I was making fun 
 of him. " Have you anything to identify 
 you ? " said he. 
 
 I put my hand in my pocket and pulled out 
 a rejection from the Book-Borrower. It was 
 a verse of mine with a tenderly worded, 
 printed slip to the effect that the editors felic- 
 itated themselves on the fact of having had 
 a chance to read my poem, and it would be 
 one of their lifelong regrets that they could 
 not use it in the columns of their magazine. 
 
 Captain Zollikoffer took the envelope and 
 
An Eastern Easter 121 
 
 opened it, and put the manuscript in his 
 pocket. Then he put on his eyeglasses and 
 read the rejection. I don't imagine he un- 
 derstood what it was all about, for after he 
 had read it through he took the manuscript 
 out of his pocket and read the first line of 
 that. It began: 
 
 " Oft had I thought when chilling night 
 was gone " 
 
 " Ooh, poetry ! " said he, and put it back 
 in the envelope with editorial promptitude. 
 " Well," he said, " you will pay the passage 
 both ways when you return " 
 
 " Fll pay it when we get to Holland, if 
 Mr. Dane has it, for he will send it to me, 
 I'm sure." 
 
 " The Humbug liner will pass us to-night 
 or to-morrow, and your friend will arrive a 
 day before we reach Rotterdam. Make your- 
 self at home. Such an uncle ! " and he de- 
 parted with the purser. 
 
 An elderly lady who resembled Miss Del- 
 plain now joined that young woman, and I 
 
122 An Eastern Easter 
 
 was presented to Mrs. Delplain, the mother 
 of Juno. 
 
 Luckily for me, the voyage was a smooth 
 one, and after the first day I was not sick. 
 When it became known who I was, and how 
 I came aboard, the passengers vied with each 
 other in attentions to me. They lent me 
 linen, and the purser gave me a steamer cap, 
 and I felt that the best way to get to Europe 
 was to do it on the spur of the moment. But 
 I did wish that nature had not endowed me 
 with such a thin neck. After I put away my 
 own collar I found none that were not miles 
 too big for me. 
 
 As for Miss Delplain, I wondered how I 
 had been able to live without her society for 
 the twenty-seven years that have gone to 
 make up my life. I did not sit at her table, 
 unfortunately, as all the desirable seats had 
 been snapped up before my status was set- 
 tled, and then I had to be content with what 
 I got. The captain had suggested that I 
 travel second-class; but as that would have 
 
An Eastern Easter 123 
 
 cut me entirely off from the fair Philadel- 
 phian's society, I told him that I would 
 rather pay the difference when I got it. 
 
 As soon as breakfast was over each day I 
 sought her out, and we promenaded the boat- 
 deck or played shovel-board until it was time 
 for bouillon. Then I always left her and 
 talked to various passengers, so that she 
 would not tire of my society, but as soon as 
 luncheon was over I sat and chatted with 
 her and her mother until it was time for them 
 to dress for dinner. Alas ! I could make no 
 display of finer raiment, as I was limited to 
 a sack-coat, no vest, and either my Alpine 
 hat or the steamer cap. But in the evenings 
 I forgot that I was not well dressed, and we 
 sat together, just abaft of the place where 
 the smell of cooking comes up, and talked 
 until her mother said it was time to turn in. 
 
 If the reader has guessed that I fell in love 
 with her, it does no credit to his perspicac- 
 ity. Of course I fell in love with her, and 
 so quickly does a friendship on board ship 
 
124 An Eastern Easter 
 
 ripen that we felt as if we had always known 
 each other. 
 
 The Humbug liner I forget Her name 
 should have passed us the second day out, 
 and I suppose she did so. However, on the 
 fifth day we saw her standing still if that's 
 what they call it. The captain said that 
 something must be the matter. I stood with 
 Miss Delplain, watching her as she rose and 
 fell on the waves. It gave me a queer feeling 
 to reflect that here I was practically penni- 
 less, and there was ten thousand dollars of 
 mine not five miles away if the wind had 
 respected the bank bills. 
 
 It seemed an opportune moment to pro- 
 pose, and yet, as soon as I thought of it, my 
 tongue became almost helpless. I made sev- 
 eral false starts, and at last I said : 
 
 "Miss Delplain, are you good at suppos- 
 ing?" 
 
 She said : " Why, yes, I can do anything 
 on an ocean voyage. What do you want me 
 to suppose?" 
 
An Eastern Easter 125 
 
 " Well," said I, " suppose I had those ten 
 thousand dollars in my pocket, that are, I 
 hope, on that steamer; suppose my book 
 were to go like wildfire, do you suppose 
 that do you would you be willing to let 
 me place my steamer chair next to yours for 
 the rest of our lives ? " 
 
 I had no idea how she would take it, as I 
 had never proposed before. In fact, as soon 
 as I had said it, I wished I hadn't. But 
 she smiled a sweeter smile than I had 
 thought the human face capable of, and 
 said 
 
 But, no now that I came to the point of 
 writing what she said, I cannot do it. There 
 are some things too sacred. If this were a 
 made-up story I might, but 
 
 I cannot express how elated and at the 
 same time how depressed her words made 
 me. I pressed her hand silently, and went 
 downstairs to borrow a collar from a man 
 who wore a number sixteen. 
 
 On my way back a fellow-passenger said : 
 
126 An Eastern Easter 
 
 " Hello, that steamer's signaling to us. 
 What's the trouble ?" 
 
 It did not take long for the news to be- 
 come common property that the Humbug 
 liner had broken some part of her ma- 
 chinery and wanted us to tow her into port. 
 This would, of course, make us several days 
 late; but as for me, I felt that anything that 
 made the time of my sojourn in Miss Del- 
 plain's neighborhood possible was to be 
 welcomed. It was so interesting watching 
 them hitch the other steamer on behind, that 
 I entirely forgot what steamer she was until 
 I saw a man standing on her boat-deck who 
 looked surprisingly like Enos Dane. He was 
 too far away for me to shout to him, and too 
 far for me to recognize him absolutely with 
 the naked eye, so I sought the captain. 
 
 " Captain," said I, " I think that the man 
 who has my money is standing on the boat- 
 deck of that steamer. Is there any way of 
 asking him ? " 
 
 I want to put it on record that the cap- 
 
An Eastern Easter 127 
 
 tain was one of the most obliging men I 
 ever saw. He immediately called his first of- 
 ficer, and told him to get the megaphone and 
 ask the first officer of the other steamer 
 whether Mr. Dane was on board. 
 
 Before the first officer could get the meg- 
 aphone, the man began looking at me ear- 
 nestly through a pair of field-glasses. I ran 
 to Miss Delplain, who was sitting with her 
 rnothdr. " Come," said I excitedly, " I 
 think that Mr. Dane is following us that 
 is, he's in the other steamer. The first of- 
 ficer is going to megaphone to him to find 
 out." 
 
 As we reached the first officer, he called 
 out : " Is Mr. Dane, of New York, on board 
 your boat ? " 
 
 The man who looked like Dane nodded his 
 head, and the first officer of the other steamer 
 who heard the hoarse blast of the megaphone 
 nodded also, and picked up an old-fashioned 
 speaking-trumpet, such as fire chiefs use. 
 " Yes," said he. " Who wants him? " 
 
128 An Eastern Easter 
 
 The first officer turned to me, and I said : 
 " Let me take the megaphone." Then I put 
 it to my lips and shouted : " My uncle put 
 some money in my new book of verse, and 
 I gave the book to Mr. Dane without open- 
 ing it. If you're Mr. Dane, have you the 
 money ? " 
 
 At these words, Mr. Dane, all excitement, 
 started for the ladder that leads to the pilot- 
 house, but the first officer, of course, pre- 
 vented his committing the solecism of 
 ascending it by coming down himself and 
 handing the speaking-trumpet to my friend. 
 Miss Delplain stood by my side and I 
 fancied I could hear her heart beating. I 
 said to her quickly : " If he has, will you ? " 
 
 And she answered : " I will, if he has." 
 
 The next minute the somewhat muffled 
 tones of Mr. Dane came through the trum- 
 pet to us and by us, I mean all the passen- 
 gers who could crowd around. He said: 
 " I opened the book in a pretty stiff breeze 
 do you hear ? " 
 
An Eastern Easter 129 
 
 " Yes, yes," I shouted, in an agony of ex- 
 pectancy; " goon." 
 
 " I opened the book in a gale of wind," he 
 repeated. Dane always was a great hand 
 to repeat unnecessarily. " And a bill blew 
 away to sea." 
 
 Miss Delplain's hand sought mine and 
 squeezed it sympathetically. Just then Dane 
 was seized with a fit of sneezing, and he had 
 to interrupt his narrative. It seemed an age 
 before he ceased his vocal spasms. At last 
 he went on. 
 
 " I shut the book up, then went into my 
 cabin, and found nine other bills of a thou- 
 sand each. Are they yours ? " 
 
 " Yes," I shouted. 
 
 " Have you much of a library ? " said he. 
 
 " That was the only book of the kind." 
 
 Then he wanted to know how I came to be 
 on board the Milldam, and how the money 
 came to be in the book. I explained every- 
 thing to him, and asked the captain whether 
 I could go after my fortune or whether he 
 
130 An Eastern Easter 
 
 could send a sailor. I was rather relieved 
 when he detailed a sailor to straddle one of 
 the hawsers and go after the money; and I 
 was so afraid that he would fall overboard 
 on the way back. They never could have re- 
 covered him; and he was so valuable. But 
 he made the return trip in safety and 
 handed me a neat package. My eyes met 
 those of Miss Delplain, and I knew that 
 my ocean trip was going to be good for 
 me. 
 
 I opened the package while my friends 
 crowded around me, and there were the nine 
 bills. I could not blame Dane for the loss 
 of the tenth; but I've often wondered since 
 whether it washed ashore at any of the 
 beaches. What a beautiful little romance a 
 man could make out of it ! 
 
 But my own romance was good enough 
 for me for the present. I asked Mrs. Del- 
 plain's consent that evening, and in the 
 course of conversation it turned out that she 
 had been a schoolmate of my mother, so, of 
 
An Eastern Easter 131 
 
 course, she had not the slightest objection to 
 my marrying Dorothy. 
 
 While I was talking to her a brilliant 
 thought came into my head, induced by 
 what struck me as a curious coincidence. 
 We had been at sea just a week, and it was 
 the day before Easter. 
 
 " Would it not be a happy augury for the 
 success of my book, Mrs. Delplain ? " 
 somehow I could talk to the mother without 
 getting all tied up " would it not be a 
 happy augury for the success of my * East- 
 ern Easter ' if we were married on Easter 
 Day?" 
 
 Mrs. Delplain, who is a Baptist and not up 
 in the Episcopal time-table, said she thought 
 it would; and then the bugle sounded for 
 dinner, and as she had her sea appetite on, 
 she went down without saying anything 
 further. 
 
 As for me, having obtained her consent, 
 I went at once to the Rev. Charles W. Op- 
 dyke, of Philadelphia, who, as luck would 
 
132 An Eastern Easter 
 
 have it, was one of the passengers; and I 
 told him of the good fortune that was to be 
 mine, and asked him if he would unite us 
 in the bonds on Easter Day. He said that, 
 with the captain's consent, nothing would 
 give him greater pleasure. He also said that 
 it was a little unusual to be married on Sun- 
 day, but that he did not see any objection to 
 it. "'The better the day, the better the 
 deed/ when a deed is so good as this," said 
 he. Then I went to nail the captain. 
 
 " Why, most surely," said he. " I will 
 have the cook make a Wilhelmina cake 
 in honor of the occasion. Such an 
 uncle!" 
 
 It seemed hard for him to get over my 
 uncle. 
 
 Then it suddenly occurred to me that I 
 had not told Dorothy about the date. It 
 would be awkward if she learnt it from 
 another passenger. 
 
 She was sitting with her mother in the 
 ladies' saloon. " Dorothy," said I, " let me 
 
An Eastern Easter 133 
 
 congratulate you. You are to be married 
 next Sunday." 
 
 Several passengers looked up in astonish- 
 ment, and Dorothy blushed 'a delightful 
 shade of red. But, before she could speak, 
 her mother said: " Next Sunday? Why, 
 you told me that you wanted to marry her 
 on Easter Sunday." 
 
 Dear Baptist woman, she had supposed 
 dimly that Easter came some time in the fall. 
 But she was true-blue. I told her that I did 
 not believe in long engagements, and that if 
 we waited for Easter to fall in the autumn, 
 we'd both pass away unwedded, and then 
 she said: "It's all the same. If you are 
 to be my son-in-law, the sooner the 
 better." 
 
 Do you know that then for the first time I 
 realized that she would be my mother-in-law, 
 and it gave me a bit of a shiver, but only be- 
 cause the professional jokers have said so 
 much on the subject. I really had no cause 
 for worry, and I leant over, and was just 
 
134 An Eastern Easter 
 
 going to kiss her when I remembered the 
 other passengers, and I didn't do it. 
 
 I tried to get Dane to be my best man, but 
 he is light-headed, and said that he wouldn't 
 come over the hawser for a whole book full 
 of bank bills ; but he wished me every sort of 
 joy. I had sent him a note explaining what 
 was going to happen. 
 
 But, as it turned out, he was best man 
 at a distance after all. Easter morning 
 dawned, beautiful and springlike. We were 
 married in the stern of the vessel really on 
 the steerage deck, under an awning, for no 
 reason in the world but that Dane could be 
 near us and act as best man from the bow 
 of the Humbug liner. 
 
 I hadn't seen Dorothy look so beautiful 
 since we left Hoboken never, in fact. She 
 was dressed in some kind of gray cloth frock, 
 and I had borrowed a coat, also a frock, 
 from a man not much bigger than I, and 
 I wore a collar that Master Eddy Hoch, of 
 Cincinnati, lent me. It was decidedly the 
 
An Eastern Easter 135 
 
 best fit of any I had tried on since my own 
 became undesirable. 
 
 I gave Dorothy one of the bills as a wed- 
 ding present, and I think that that added to 
 her happiness. I feel that I can say this 
 without detracting from my own merits. 
 She felt more comfortable coming to me not 
 entirely dowerless. 
 
 It was the event of the voyage as far as 
 the rest of the passengers were concerned 
 and, in fact, as far as we ourselves were con- 
 cerned. 
 
 When we debarked at Boulogne, Dane 
 and Mrs. Delplain accompanied us on a short 
 wedding trip to Paris. 
 
 Uncle Bob had evidently surmised that I 
 had been carried off, for when Dane went to 
 his banker's there was a cable for me that 
 caused Mrs. McPherson and her husband 
 unalloyed joy. It ran as follows: 
 
 " Book going like hot cakes. Hope you 
 found the book-marks." 
 
The Man in the Red 
 Sweater 
 
 interesting talker is that man 
 JL who, having something to say, says 
 it without stopping to verify his statements, 
 and to whom the day of the week on which 
 a thing happened, the exact name of the 
 man who did it, and the geography of the 
 land in which it was done, are as nothing. 
 
 Such a man was among the passengers 
 on the ocean voyage of which I have made 
 mention, and there were few minutes during 
 the day that he did not have an interested 
 group of auditors around him. That all his 
 statements were mathematically correct, I 
 will not swear, but on an ocean voyage who 
 cares ? 
 
 The guileless blue eyes of this ready talker 
 added a piquancy to his remarks when they 
 
 I3 6 
 
The Man in the Red Sweater 137 
 
 seemed to savor of exaggeration. Before I 
 heard him talk, J took him to be a minister 
 of the gospel merely on account of those 
 eyes ; but after he spoke I no longer thought 
 so, as his language was sometimes racy, and 
 he did not hesitate to use the word that was 
 at tongue, merely because it could not trace 
 a pedigree through five or six diction- 
 aries. 
 
 There was not a soul on board who knew 
 what his name was. He said he'd tell if any- 
 one guessed, but no one did so, and there was 
 no name on the passenger list that corre- 
 sponded with the number of his stateroom. 
 He went by the name of " Red Sweater " 
 behind his back, and " You " to his face. 
 He wore a red sweater, I was going to say, 
 day and night certainly all of every day 
 and white canvas shoes. 
 
 Speech in New York is permeated by that 
 awful, tough accent that even before the 
 days of " Chimmie Fadden " had begun to 
 make permanent impressions on the imita- 
 
138 The Man in the Red Sweater 
 
 tive minds of our youth, and I have heard 
 literary men, whose subject-matter was of 
 the best, use the whining tone with the aspi- 
 rate at the end of most of their words. But 
 slangy as " Red Sweater " was, his enuncia- 
 tion was as cultivated and as clean-cut as 
 that of Edwin Booth himself, that shining 
 exemplar of perfect speech. 
 
 The first day out, when I went down to 
 dinner, " Red Sweater " was talking to a 
 man from Boston, and as I glanced at him 
 I wondered that a minister would appear in 
 so unconventional a garb. But when, in a 
 beautifully modulated voice, he said to the 
 Massachusetts man, " No, sir, there are no 
 long-distance authors to-day," I decided he 
 was not of the cloth. 
 
 The Bostonian, a somewhat vinegary 
 man, with a thin bluish nose and eyes un- 
 pleasantly contiguous, looked shocked at the 
 flippant words, but " Red Sweater " went on 
 unabashed : 
 
 " We have a number of pen trailers who 
 
The Man in the Red Sweater 139 
 
 can do their little hundred-yard dashes, but 
 when it comes to six-day contests we are not 
 in it with the old-fashioned push like Charley 
 Dick and Willie Thack." 
 
 The Bostonian gasped for breath, but the 
 man with the honest blue eyes helped him- 
 self to some celery and patted his left hand 
 with it to emphasize his remarks, and went 
 on talking. 
 
 " Mind you, I'm not standing up at all for 
 the mountains of chapters that the old- 
 timers found in the depths of their ink wells. 
 I remember once saying to Louis Stevenson, 
 on one of these very boats it was when he 
 was coming over the second time, and he had 
 been outlining the plot of * The Master of 
 Ballantrae ' to me. I said, * Louis, don't 
 make the mistake of building a three-vol- 
 ume novel out of a one-volume heap of 
 material.' And he said he wouldn't. But 
 then he was economical in the matter of 
 words. One of his was worth three of the 
 ordinary variety. He didn't fasten his hooks 
 
140 The Man in the Red Sweater 
 
 on the first word that happened to come 
 tumbling out of his mind. He hunted 
 around there until he struck one that was 
 just the right size and shape, and then he 
 slapped it into place, and used a little of the 
 mortar of felicity to make it stick, and there 
 he was. If Scott could have taken lessons 
 from Stevenson on the destruction of useless 
 words, the Waverley novels would pack into 
 a smaller box, and Scott would push Louis 
 very hard with the young people of to-day. 
 Walter used to go to a pile of words, and 
 he'd reach up to get a handful and a whole 
 hodful would tumble on him. It didn't make 
 any difference to him ; he'd use them all and 
 more until you couldn't see the plot for the 
 verbiage." 
 
 'At this point the man from Boston mur- 
 mured something inarticulately and left the 
 table, but the man in the unconventional 
 dress turned his attention to me and went on 
 blithely, and I was only too glad to hear him 
 talk. 
 
The Man in the Red Sweater 141 
 
 " What else did you say to Stevenson? " 
 I asked with sincere interest. 
 
 " Why," said my friend simply, " I said, 
 ' Louis, if Charley was alive to-day, he'd bite 
 out one quarter of " David Copperfield." 
 Same way with Charley Reade and the 
 " Cloister and the Hearth." They'd have to 
 gain the attention of a public that thinks it's 
 getting a new masterpiece hot from the bat 
 every thirteen minutes, and they'd have to 
 strip to their breech clouts to do it. Why, 
 even Thackeray didn't need all the words he 
 used in " Vanity Fair." ' " 
 
 "Did you ever meet Kipling?" I asked 
 somewhat irrelevantly. I wondered whether 
 he would think that the Indian author was 
 an economist in words, but he went off on a 
 new topic as soon as I asked the question. 
 
 " Did I ever meet Kipling? Well, I only 
 spent one summer on Kipling's place. I was 
 shoving the plane that year, just so as to 
 keep me out doors I learned the trick at 
 the Boston ' Tech.,' and when Rudyard found 
 
142 The Man in the Red Sweater 
 
 out that I was fond of literature, He used to 
 come out to the barn where I was shingling, 
 and doing other odd jobs, and he'd perch 
 himself on the scaffolding and talk to me. I 
 told him one day that he wasn't a simon- 
 pure poet. I said, * Mr. Kipling, the truth 
 is, that when Thackeray died, his ballad 
 mantle was hung up for some years, and then 
 you came along and it descended on you, 
 and I want to tell you that you have made 
 a better garment of that mantle. You can't 
 do the sentimental act as well as he could, 
 but if you had written " The White Squall " 
 it wouldn't have been full of bad rhymes and 
 worse rhythm, and even you would have 
 avoided certain coarse lines that the public 
 of to-day won't stand for, and you'd have 
 eased up a little on the Jews, which he didn't 
 seem to be able to do. But after all it isn't 
 first-chop rhymes and dance-rhythms that 
 make a poet, or Gilbert would be one and 
 you'd be another. You are always more 
 than a rhymester because you're dead care- 
 
The Man in the Red Sweater 143 
 
 ful, which Thackeray wasn't, but the mantle 
 of poesy is too big for your frame, and I 
 don't think you'll grow into it in this life. 
 But anyhow, you're warm enough without it. 
 You're one of the warmest babies in the in- 
 cubator, Kipling,' said I." 
 
 "And what did Kipling say?" 
 " Oh, he laughed and said he never saw 
 such a country for educated mechanics. But 
 he knew I was right. He'd never think of 
 putting his steppers into Tennyson's shoes, 
 even to walk around a quatrain. He knows 
 well enough when he's up to the limit." 
 
 I do not know, and I do not care, whether 
 my friend was romancing or not. He had 
 something to say and he said it right along. 
 He would listen if anyone else spoke, and his 
 eye was not of the wandering kind, but he 
 was so much happier when he was doing the 
 talking, that we all let him; all but the Bos- 
 tonian. He avoided him on account of his 
 slang I suppose, although slang dropped into 
 the current of his speech as naturally as 
 
144 The Man in the Red Sweater 
 
 apple blossoms fall into a running brook, 
 and decorated it just as much. He had met 
 everyone, or said he had, and the stories he 
 told of the Czar, the Mikado, Whistler, 
 Paul Kriiger, and other celebrities were al- 
 ways peculiarly fresh, in as much as they 
 were original with him. They had no smell 
 of printer's ink on them. Whether they 
 were true or not, they might well have been. 
 One day someone was talking about the Eng- 
 lish stage, and I happened to say : " I wish I 
 could meet Henry Irving." 
 
 " Didn't you ever meet him? " said " Red 
 Sweater," his fathomless blue eyes looking 
 at me in pity. " Now there's an illustration 
 of what I was saying the other day about 
 great men always being versatile men. Ir- 
 ving is only a great actor because he hap- 
 pened to take up acting. He'd have been a 
 great preacher or a great drummer if he'd 
 happened to go in for those particular arts." 
 
 His eyes took on a reminiscential haze. 
 
 " Why, I remember once, the year of the 
 
The Man in the Red Sweater 145 
 
 great blizzard, the train on which we were 
 parting the air from Springfield to Albany, 
 broke down at an out-of-the-way village in 
 Massachusetts, near the line, and lie got out 
 to walk a little, after the fashion of an Eng- 
 lishman. It would be two hours before we 
 could go on. I'd struck up an acquaintance 
 with him in the smoker, and I accompanied 
 him on his stroll. We passed a little gospel 
 shack after we'd been moving some five 
 minutes and an anxious-looking man in the 
 door called out as we came up, ' Are you 
 Mr. Smorltork, the lecturer ? ' I saw in a 
 minute what had happened, and I said in an 
 undertone to Irving, ' Tell him yes, and go 
 in and give 'em a lecture.' Irving is one of 
 the most playful fellows in the world, and he 
 fell in with the idea at once. I suppose he 
 saw a chance for once in his life to do a little 
 stunt without having all the world know that 
 it was he, Sir Henry Irving, who was doing 
 it. You see, when one has a reputation like 
 his to jolly along it gets to be a bit of a 
 
146 The Man in the Red Sweater 
 
 strain on one's mind after a while to know 
 just how to do it. It sort of keeps you 
 guessing all the time. There are moments 
 when you'd like to be just your fool-self, 
 but the world won't let you. Here at last 
 was Henry's heaven-sent opportunity, and 
 he rose to the mark like a man. We went 
 in together and found a typical country au- 
 dience, wide-eyed and solemn, waiting for 
 Leonidas Smorltork, or some such name as 
 that, to come and tell them what he knew 
 about Charlotte Corday. 
 
 " Well, I walked up with plenty of assur- 
 ance, and said, ' I have great pleasure in 
 introducing to you the famous lecturer 
 Leonidas Smorltork, who will fascinate you 
 with his remarks on the career of the la- 
 mented Charlotte Corday/ And that is just 
 what Irving did. He began with her youth, 
 and he made up some pathetic anecdotes 
 about her happy childhood at Auteuil, and 
 then he told about her feeling called upon to 
 lead the French armies to victory, and how 
 
The Man in the Red Sweater 147 
 
 Lamartine and Robespierre tried to dis- 
 suade her, but she was adamant, and how at 
 last she found herself storming the Bastile, 
 and how freedom shrieked when Charlotte 
 Corday fell and Marat never smiled again. 
 I tell you I was glad I had come and the little 
 audience was spellbound. 
 
 " The treasurer wanted to hand ' Mr. 
 Smorltork ' a check, but Irving said, with a 
 Louis XL air, ' Mail it to me address/ and 
 then we went back to the train. He didn't 
 mix history up any more than some expert 
 historiographers do, and he didn't claim to be 
 an expert. He brought sunshine into a little 
 village, and if his facts didn't tally with 
 French history, ho one there was ever the 
 wiser. Truth is mighty and will prevail, but 
 while it's getting ready to prevail, let us have 
 a little of the other thing to brighten us up. 
 I've always thought that if old man Mun- 
 chausen had gone to the trouble of verifying 
 all his statements, his stories would have 
 lost spontaneity, and he wouldn't have had 
 
148 The Man in the Red Sweater 
 
 time to write more than the first one. Bill 
 Nye once said to me, r Truth, sir, is a very 
 valuable thing, and the less truth there is, 
 the more valuable it becomes. If everybody 
 spoke the truth all the time it would be like 
 Confederate money of no use except to an- 
 tiquarians/ ' Here he paused and corrected 
 himself for the first and only time. " I was 
 mistaken," said he, " it wasn't Bill Nye, but 
 Mark Twain, who told me that." 
 
 Here someone said : " Does it make 
 any difference who says a thing if it's 
 good?" 
 
 " Red Sweater " looked compassionately 
 at his questioner and said, " You can wager 
 your saccharine existence it does. If James 
 McNeill Whistler says a good thing once, it 
 is accepted at its full value, but little Tommy 
 Incog might say it until he was blue in the 
 face and it wouldn't be worth shucks unless 
 someone happened to hear it who was not 
 prejudiced by a name or lack of a name. If 
 Felicia Hemans had written ' The Heathen 
 
The Man in the Red Sweater 149 
 
 Chinee/ lots of good souls would have 
 found it full of religious sentiment, and if 
 Bret Harte had written ' Onward, Christian 
 Soldiers ' there would have been crowds of 
 people hunting for the joke, and finding it, 
 too. You can pile your fortune on the fact 
 that names color statements." And then the 
 dinner bugle blew and the conversation, or 
 monologue, ended. 
 
 We touched at France at dusk of a humid 
 summer's day, and there many went to 
 Boulogne on the tender. There was also one 
 who came to the steamer from the tender. 
 He was an American, and he seemed to be 
 looking for a friend. In the course of his 
 search his eye fell on " Red Sweater," who 
 was entertaining some of us with a story of 
 how General Boulanger once gave him a lift 
 on the highway running to Chartres. The 
 newcomer stopped over to the raconteur, 
 whispered one or two words in his ear, and 
 stepped back a pace. " Red Sweater's " color 
 heightened, and his blue eyes glistened just 
 
150 The Man in the Red Sweater 
 
 a trifle, but he finished his story, and then 
 said: 
 
 " Well, boys, my plans have been suddenly 
 changed, and instead of going to Rotterdam 
 I'm going ashore here with my friend. 
 Good-by and good luck." 
 
 Then he and the stranger hurried off, and 
 in a short time " Red Sweater's " baggage, 
 which consisted of a small steamer trunk and 
 a hand bag, was put on the tender, and he 
 and his friend went away in the mist that 
 lay over the Channel. 
 
 It was kept pretty quiet, but the Captain 
 told me that " Red Sweater " was wanted 
 for some little irregularity committed in 
 New York, and that a prison yawned for 
 him, undoubtedly. He also told me his 
 name, and it was not " Red Sweater." 
 
 Well, my blue-eyed friend, my good 
 wishes go with you wherever you are. If 
 your love of truth has taught you to be 
 sparing of it, and you are now suffering the 
 consequences, I hope that they have not 
 
The Man in the Red Sweater 151 
 
 doomed you to solitary confinement, for that 
 would be too hard on the other prisoners. 
 Here's hoping that they make you editor of 
 the prison paper, and put me on the exchange 
 list. 
 
Little Miss Flutterly's Disser- 
 tation on War 
 
 SHE was just as pretty as she knew how 
 to be, and she didn't have to help nature 
 much. Day after day I had seen her talk- 
 ing to the young men on the steamer, but 
 I did not come under the spell of her tongue 
 until the evening before we landed at New 
 York. 
 
 She was about seventeen, with a voice 
 wonderfully sweet, and almost Southern in 
 its softness. I had long desired to meet her, 
 because I like to hear a pretty woman talk. 
 The army chaplain introduced me to her. 
 They had evidently been talking about war, 
 for as I sat down and the chaplain went be- 
 low for a smoke, she said : 
 
 " When do you suppose the Boer war will 
 end?" 
 
 Before I could reply she went on, swiftly 
 
 152 
 
Miss Flutterly's Dissertation 153 
 
 and softly and irresistibly : " Don't you think 
 wars are cruel? I'd hate to see a French 
 war, because the French must be awfully 
 cruel, judging by their cabmen. My! their 
 horses did look so tired out. So different 
 from the horses in Amsterdam and The 
 Hague. Didn't you love Holland? So 
 awfully neat. The vegetables were piled up 
 so prettily on the carts. That reminds me 
 that I saw in the paper the other day that 
 sweet potatoes are unknown in England. 
 Just fancy! Well, they're only just begin- 
 ning to use ice, they're so conservative. 
 You know, they think it's bad for the stom- 
 ach. I heard pa say that he thought gin 
 was much worse. It must be awful stuff, 
 almost as bad as absinthe. I never tasted 
 absinthe, but in Paris my brother Tom 
 wanted to see what it was like, and he had 
 to be brought home, although there isn't any 
 word for home in French. I wonder how 
 they can sing ' Home, Sweet Home/ But 
 did you know that we haven't any word for 
 
154 Miss Flutterly's Dissertation 
 
 country? You know, the French say patrie, 
 but we can only say ' country/ and of course 
 that might mean the place where you go on 
 your vacation. 
 
 " Oh, dear me hum, my vacation's almost 
 over, and I have had the loveliest time. I'll 
 have to begin school the week after we land. 
 I tell mother I've learned more about for- 
 eign countries than all the arithmetics and 
 grammars in the world could teach me. 
 What country did you like best ? I thought 
 that Belgium was next to Holland. I don't 
 mean geographically, of course I know that ; 
 but it was neater there than in Paris. But 
 Holland was the neatest. I'll never forget 
 the vegetables piled up on the carts. But in 
 Holland I saw a mother smoking a lady, 
 too. Don't you think it is shocking for a 
 mother to smoke? Like as not when her 
 sons grow up they'll take to smoking, too. 
 I think it's kind of fun, don't you know, 
 but awfully improper. But aren't the 
 French improper? I wanted to go to some 
 
Miss Flutterly's Dissertation 155 
 
 of those queer places, but ma said it would 
 never do: that we might meet somebody 
 there that we knew. You know, we were 
 always meeting somebody that we knew. 
 Why, it seemed as if you couldn't go to 
 any large city without seeing Americans. 
 Awfully nice to meet Americans, I think. 
 There aren't any people as bright as Ameri- 
 cans. Don't you think so? And what is 
 your candid opinion of German girls ? Don't 
 you think our girls are prettier? And the 
 Dutch. They aren't pretty, but they are so 
 neat. It seems a pity that the Dutch and 
 the English should be fighting, for the Dutch 
 are so neat, and the English are our cousins, 
 and blood is thicker than water. But wasn't 
 the water awful in Holland ? I had to drink 
 mineral water all the time. I think they 
 must use all their best water to keep the 
 streets clean. Paris seemed dirty after Hol- 
 land, and then the French horses did look 
 so thin and abused. So did the Belgians'. I 
 think they must have French blood. They 
 
156 Miss Flutterly's Dissertation 
 
 are so cruel, those French. But the women 
 certainly are stylish. Only I can't say as 
 much for the men. Their bushy, long hair, 
 and their baggy trousers, and their ridicu- 
 lous hats, and the girls with bloomers on 
 wheels ! Oh, I think they were anything but 
 stylish. The English never wear bloomers. 
 I will say that Tor them, although I'm no 
 Anglomaniac. But I did like London. Aw- 
 fully dirty, but awfully fascinating. If Eng- 
 land were as clean as Holland I think I'd 
 like it better than Holland, because you can 
 understand the language; but they don't 
 make any attempt with their vegetables, and 
 they don't use sweet potatoes; but they 
 certainly are great fighters, only I think it 
 is a pity that the poor little Dut oh, here 
 comes Miss Standish. I promised to play 
 shovel-board with her, so I must go. I've 
 been awfully pleased to talk about the war 
 with you and the trip. Awfully jolly to 
 travel, don't you think ? It makes one keep 
 one's eyes open. Hello, you dear thing! I 
 
Miss Flutterly's Dissertation 157 
 
 know you'll beat me all to pieces. [To me] 
 I really think that conversation is more in- 
 tellectual than games. You must tell me 
 some more about that horrid war to-mor- 
 
 row."- 
 
The Expatriation of Jonathan 
 Taintor 
 
 WHILE I was in London I met a New 
 York friend who was stopping in 
 that America-in-London, Bloomsbury, and 
 during our conversation he told me that he 
 had for a fellow-boarder no less a person 
 than Jonathan Taintor. 
 
 I felt that I ought to know Jonathan 
 Taintor, and I have since found out that 
 most people have heard something concern- 
 ing him; but although the name had a good 
 old Connecticut sound, I could not fit Mr. 
 Taintor into any nook, so I frankly said to 
 my friend: "Jonathan Taintor lies in the 
 future for me." 
 
 " Why, I'll have to introduce you. I be- 
 lieve he's been written up before, but he's 
 such a character that it will do you good to 
 
 158 
 
JONATHAN TAINTOR. P. 159- 
 
Jonathan Taintor 159 
 
 meet him. Can't you come to dinner to- 
 night?" 
 
 Now, I had been reckoning on going that 
 evening to the opera at Covent Garden; but 
 characters do not pop around every corner, 
 and, besides, I had not seen my New York 
 friend for a long time, so I accepted his cor- 
 dial invitation. 
 
 That evening at seven I went to the 
 American boarding-house in Bedford Place, 
 just off High Holborn, and was soon sitting 
 at dinner with my friend. 
 
 Directly opposite me sat a man who might 
 have left the valley of the Connecticut five 
 minutes before. There are Taintors all 
 about the Haddams that look just like 'him. 
 He was short, thick-set, with dreamy blue 
 eyes, a ruddy face that betokened a correct 
 life, a curved nose, broad, straight, shaven 
 upper lip, and a straggling silver chin-beard. 
 
 There was more or less twang in the tones 
 of everyone at the table, but his voice had a 
 special nasal quality that seemed to bespeak 
 
160 Jonathan Tain tor 
 
 a lifetime of bucolic Yankee existence. It 
 was really so pronounced as to sound 
 stagy. 
 
 The talk at dinner was desultory, and Mr. 
 Taintor said little. I noticed that he had a 
 dish of corned beef and cabbage, although 
 the piece de resistance for the rest of us 
 was beef with a Yorkshire pudding. He left 
 the table before coffee was served, but not 
 before my friend had asked him to join us 
 later on the balcony for a smoke and chat. 
 
 When we went up we found him already 
 on the balcony, smoking a corn-cob pipe of 
 American manufacture. My friend intro- 
 duced us, and he shook my hand with one 
 downward jerk. How often have I felt that 
 pressure in the rural Districts of Connecti- 
 cut! 
 
 When Mr. Taintor learned that I had 
 been in London only a week and had just 
 come from Middletown, his face lighted up 
 with interest, and he said : 
 
 " You may have passed my wife in the 
 
Jonathan Taintor 161 
 
 street. She often comes to town market 
 days." 
 
 " Oh, then she's not with you/' was my 
 somewhat idiotic reply. 
 
 " No, she aint; an' unless the good Lord 
 heaves enough sand into the Atlantic to 
 make the walkin' good, she won't never be 
 with me." 
 
 "You must be anxious to get back? 
 Been over here some weeks ?"" said I. 
 
 " A matter of thirty year," he replied, 
 and sighed prodigiously. 
 
 " Why, you must be quite an Englishman 
 by this time." 
 
 He looked troubled. " Dew I look Eng- 
 lish?" said he. 
 
 "No, no," I replied comfortingly; "you 
 might pass for Uncle Sam." 
 
 " Well, I hope I'll never pass fer anythin* 
 wuss," said he. " It's jest thirty year in 
 November sence I left America, an' I've be'n 
 in this dreary taown ever sence; but I aint 
 never read an English noospaper nor ridden 
 
1 62 Jonathan Taintor 
 
 in an English omnibus or horse-car or 
 steam-car, neither, an' I try to eat as much 
 as possible what I would ef I was at home 
 with Cynthy. An' I'm a Republican clean 
 through." 
 
 " Well, what's keeping you here? " said I. 
 
 Mr. Taintor pressed down the tobacco in 
 his pipe to make it burn better, and said : " I 
 can't stan' the trip. Y' see, when we was 
 married we thought we'd cross the ocean on 
 aour weddin' trip. Father hed lef me com- 
 for'ble, an' Cynthy hed be'n dead-set on 
 crossin' all through aour courtship. Fact is, 
 her sister Sairy said 'at 'at was all she was 
 marryin' fer; but of course Sairy was a great 
 joker, an' I knowed better. Well, we went 
 daown to Noo York the day before the 
 steamer sailed, an' we put up at a hotel there 
 on Broadway, an' durin' the evenin' some 
 women got talkin' to Cynthy, an' told her 
 haow awful sick she was like to be ef she 
 hedn't never be'n on the ocean before. 
 Well, it frightened her so that she backed 
 
Jonathan Taintor 163 
 
 plumb aout er the harness said she guessed 
 we'd better go to Saratogy instead; an* the 
 upshot was we hed aour fust an* last quar'l 
 then. I told her I'd bought the tickets fer 
 Europe an* we'd hev to go, an* she said she 
 wouldn' expose herself to two or three weeks 
 of sickness under the idee it was a picnic 
 party, an' all I could say to her couldn't 
 shake her. Well, it was bad enough losin' 
 the price of one ticket, but I couldn't lose 
 the price of two, an' so we finally come to an 
 agreement. She was to go up to Saratogy, 
 although the season up ther' was over, an' I 
 was to cross the ocean alone. It was too 
 late to git my money back, an', to tell the 
 truth, I allers did hate to give a plan up, 
 'thout I hed sufficient reason; so nex' morn- 
 in' we went daown to the dock, fer we'd 
 made up, an' she was comin* ter see me off. 
 She took on consid'able, an' I was cut up 
 myse'f, partic'larly when I thought of the 
 ticket thet was bein' thrown away. But she 
 caught a glimpse of the waves behind a 
 
164 Jonathan Taintor 
 
 ferryboat, an' she turned white as a sheet an* 
 shook her head; so I kissed her good-by, an* 
 the steamer sailed away with me on it, an* 
 her a-wavin' her arms an' cryin' on the 
 dock." 
 
 " Poor fellow ! " said I sympatheti- 
 cally. 
 
 " Well, the amount of seasickness she 
 saved herself by stay in' to hum couldn't be 
 reckoned 'thout I was a scholar, which I 
 aint. I took to my berth before we was 
 aout of sight of land, an' ef the brimstun of 
 the future is any wuss 'an what I suffered, 
 I don't want to die. But I wished I could 
 die all the way over. I come right here to 
 London, because there was a man I knew 
 comin' here, too, an* I wrote to Cynthy to 
 come right over as soon as she could, an* 
 we'd live aour lives aout here; fer bad as it 
 was here, nothin' on top of creation could 
 tempt me to go back, not even her pretty 
 face." 
 
 He stopped a minute and half closed his 
 
Jonathan Taintor 165 
 
 eyes, and I fancy he was calling her pretty 
 face back through the thirty years. 
 
 "Well, well, that was hard lines," 
 said I. 
 
 " Yes, but it was wuss when I got her 
 reply. She told me she hedn't hed a happy 
 minute sence I left, although she hed gone 
 up to Saratogy, but the water tasted like 
 something was into it, an' she'd come away 
 after one day, an' was now on the farm at 
 Goodspeed's Landing. An' she said thet ef 
 I'd be'n so sick she'd probably die, an' she 
 couldn't bear to think of bein' heaved into 
 the Atlantic, an' must stop where she was. 
 Ah me! Sence then we've be'n as lovin' 
 as we could be, writin' reg'lar an' remem- 
 berin' each other's birthdays an' aour wed- 
 din' anniversaries; but we haint sot eyes on 
 each other, an' won't until we're both safe 
 on that other shore they tell us abaout. An* 
 I hope thet trip '11 be a smooth one." 
 
 "And what does Mrs. Taintor do all 
 alone?" 
 
1 66 Jonathan Taintor 
 
 He knocked the ashes out of his pipe and 
 put it into his pocket before he replied : 
 
 " She runs the old farm as I never could 
 have run it. She's a born farmer, that wife 
 of mine is. She has a hired man to help, 
 but she does a good share of the work her- 
 self, an* every year she sen's me half the 
 airnings; an' I live on here, hatin' it all an* 
 hopin' for the time to come when the ocean 
 '11 either dry up or freeze over, or that Cyn- 
 thy will overcome her dislike to the trip. 
 Married life aint e'zac'ly pleasant so fur 
 apart, but I c'n truthfully say we've never 
 quar'led sence I come here, an' I aint seen 
 a woman sence I landed thet could hold a 
 candle to Cynthy. Cynthy is a pretty gal." 
 
 Shortly afterward the old man retired to 
 his own room, and then my friend, who had 
 not spoken once since we came out, wickedly 
 hinted that maybe Mr. Taintor only imag- 
 ined that he loved Cynthia, and that they 
 were happier separated; but I hate to spoil 
 idyls in that way. To me it is very beauti- 
 
"WE HED AOUR FUST AN' LAST QUAR'L." P. 163. 
 
Jonathan Taintor 167 
 
 ful, the thought of that dear old lady in 
 Connecticut, who runs the farm and writes 
 loving letters to her expatriated spouse and 
 sends him a share of the profits, but who 
 cannot overcome her antipathy to the unsta- 
 ble sea. And when I think of Mr. Taintor 
 as he appeared that evening in Bloomsbury, 
 with his honest Yankee face, and his loyalty 
 to Yankee traditions, and his ardent love for 
 his absent wife, I say, " Hurrah for both of 
 them!" 
 
The Memory of Carlotta 
 
 WHAT a beautiful thing is con- 
 stancy; beautiful in a woman, 
 more beautiful in a man. I think that I 
 never saw a finer exemplification of the 
 divine attribute than in Apthorp Polhemus, 
 whom I met at the Paris Exposition on his 
 second wedding trip. 
 
 I was visiting for the fourth or fifth time 
 the American art exhibit in the Grand Palais 
 des Beaux Arts, and was proud to have just 
 heard from the lips of a passing Frenchman 
 that with the exception of France there was 
 no nation whose exhibit could compare with 
 that from the United States. While I was 
 still glowing with patriotic fervor a woman 
 entered the first room dragging a reluctant 
 husband after her. " My," said she in a 
 high-keyed, strident voice, "there aint 
 many pictures in this room, are there ? " A 
 
Memory of Carlotta 169 
 
 rapid twist of the head and room number 
 one was finished, so far as she was con- 
 cerned, and her energetic feet carried her 
 into the next room, where she made a 
 similar remark and hurried her poor, tired 
 husband along. But happening to see 
 Brown's eternal group of street boys with 
 " shining morning faces " she stopped for 
 nearly thirty seconds ! Sargent had not ap- 
 pealed to her, Inness had labored in vain, 
 Whistler had plied a useless brush; but she 
 recognized something in the Brown picture, 
 and gloated just as long as she had time to 
 do it. "That's elegant," she said to her 
 husband. " That took the $5000 prize at 
 Chicago. Come along, there's three rooms 
 more; " and her husband, ready to drop, 
 and with no eye for pictures, even $5000 
 ones, dragged after her into another room. 
 
 A voice at my side said : " There are 
 many people who, in the education of their 
 color sense, never get beyond Brown." 
 
 I chortled appreciatively, and turned to 
 
i yo Memory of Carlotta 
 
 see who had spoken. It was Apthorp Pol- 
 hemus, as I afterward learned Apthorp 
 Polhemus, who, on his second wedding trip, 
 displayed such marked constancy to his first 
 wife. 
 
 Finding that in art matters our tastes 
 were similar, we struck up a ready acquaint- 
 ance and did the rest of the rooms together. 
 
 " Traveling alone? " said I. 
 ' Yes er no, no. Mrs. Polhemus is 
 along, but she got overtired yesterday, and 
 stayed at the hotel this morning. It seems 
 strange to say Mrs. Polhemus," he went on, 
 his naturally mournful face assuming a more 
 mournful cast. " She is Mrs. Polhemus, 
 but not the Mrs. Polhemus." 
 
 I looked a little puzzled, and he explained 
 as we walked through the galleries, stopping 
 here and there as we were attracted By the 
 works of art. 
 
 " Ten years ago (Isn't that a characteris- 
 tic Inness?) I married my first wife, Car- 
 lotta, and for five fleeting years we were 
 
Memory of Carlotta 171 
 
 happy together. We came over here for a 
 wedding trip. (Those lips are just the 
 color of smoked beef. ) We came over here 
 for a wedding trip, and I knew then what 
 happiness was. (Childe Hassam knows his 
 Fifth Avenue, doesn't he?) Carlotta was 
 fond of music, fond of paintings, fond of 
 sight-seeing, and we both felt that Europe 
 had been constructed for our amusement. I 
 was not absent from her for a moment, and 
 such a thing as a harsh word was unknown 
 to either of us. (I say, isn't that a poetic 
 treatment of the Brooklyn Bridge? One of 
 Ranger's, isn't it? He understands the 
 poetry of the commonplace. I wish Carlotta 
 could have seen that.)" 
 
 " Excuse me, but did you say that you are 
 married again?" I asked. 
 
 "Yes oh, yes," said Mr. Polhemus, 
 making a cone of his hand through which 
 to view the picture that had taken his fancy. 
 " I found that I needed to talk to someone 
 of the charms of dear Carlotta, and Helen 
 
172 Memory of Carlotta 
 
 was very sympathetic, and so I married her. 
 (Church is at it again. It's always Beauty 
 and the Beast with him.) Then I had the 
 happy thought of revisiting the scenes made 
 dear to me by Carlotta. I live them over 
 again (Now, that's my idea of how a por- 
 trait should not be painted. The face is 
 only an accessory to the fabrics), and al- 
 though the present Mrs. Polhemus doesn't 
 pretend to be the equal of Carlotta, either 
 in mind or attractiveness, yet she is a very 
 comfortable traveling companion, and it 
 adds to my mournful pleasure to tell her the 
 delights of that memorable trip ten years 
 ago. ('The Senator's Birthplace.' Isn't 
 that bleak? It was on just such a bleak 
 New England scene that I met Carlotta.)" 
 We passed to the next picture, and he sud- 
 denly stopped talking, and became lost in 
 thought before it. It was the portrait of a 
 noble-looking woman. His eyes moistened 
 and I turned away, not wishing to spy on 
 his emotion. 
 
Memory of Carlotta 173 
 
 " To the life Carlotta to the life." 
 I took especial notice of the picture. It 
 was that of a woman with dark hair and 
 regular and singularly mobile features, old- 
 fashioned and winsome. I thought that if 
 Carlotta looked like that, it was no wonder 
 that Mr. Polhemus had loved her. But I 
 afterward visited many a gallery with the 
 married widower, if so I may call him, and 
 he never failed to spot at least one portrait 
 or ideal head that was the painted present- 
 ment of Carlotta, and the various pictures 
 did not look any more alike than the numer- 
 ous portraits of Napoleon. One of them 
 was Rubens' first wife, and another was his 
 second wife, both fleshly women, miles re- 
 moved from the spiritual face that he had 
 first pointed out to me. Yes, after a while, 
 I could tell intuitively when he was going to 
 stop and gaze rapturously at a picture, and 
 then say, in low tones : " To the life, my 
 Carlotta." I dare say that he found a rem- 
 iniscence in all of them ; it was certainly not 
 
174 Memory of Carlotta 
 
 a pose of his. There never lived a more 
 simple man that Apthorp Polhemus. 
 
 That morning we did the American gal- 
 leries pretty thoroughly, and I could not tell 
 which pleased me the more, his just and 
 often humorous comments on the pictures, 
 or his revelation of constancy to a departed 
 companion, as evinced in his yearning and 
 sympathetic encomiums on Carlotta. 
 
 At last we parted at the hideous Porte 
 Triumphale, after making an appointment 
 to meet that evening at Vieux Paris to hear 
 a Colonne concert. 
 
 " Carlotta raved over Colonne, and I want 
 the present Mrs. Polhemus to hear the man 
 whose orchestra gave us such happiness." 
 
 Those were his words as he hailed a 
 voiture and was driven to his hotel. 
 
 I had been leaning for some minutes over 
 the ramparts of the reproduction of Old 
 Paris, looking at the feast of lights that be- 
 sprinkled the waters of the Seine, when I 
 saw Mr. Polhemus approaching. His sad, 
 
Memory of Carlotta 175 
 
 pale face looked even more melancholy in 
 the evening light, and was in marked con- 
 trast to the pretty, fresh, pink-and-white 
 features of the lady who had elected to be 
 the recipient of the praises of " Number 
 One." Her voice was as sweet as that of a 
 Southern woman, and I regretted for the 
 moment that there had been a Carlotta. But 
 in the end my admiration for the constancy 
 of the bereft traveler became dominant. 
 
 He presented me, and we went into the 
 hall where the concert was to be given. 
 Picturesque damsels in little caps and short 
 dresses came to us and performed useless 
 offices for which they demanded " benefices." 
 I handed one a two-franc piece for a pro- 
 gramme, and she retained it, murmuring 
 " Benefice " in so soft a voice that it was not 
 until the music had begun that I realized 
 that I had been cheated. I wondered 
 whether Mr. Polhemus would refer to Car- 
 lotta in the presence of Mrs. Polhemus. I 
 was not long kept in doubt. The first num- 
 
176 Memory of Carlotta 
 
 her on the programme was the Suite Algeri- 
 enne of Saint-Saens. 
 
 " M-m-m-m-m," said Mr. Polhemus, as if 
 he had just tasted a delicious grape. " How 
 delightful! One of Carlotta's favorites. 
 My dear Helen, I wish that you had Car- 
 lotta's musical sense. You won't like this 
 as she did." 
 
 Mrs. Polhemus blushed one of the loveli- 
 est colors I ever saw on a satin skin. " No, 
 but I hope I'll like it as 7 do. I'm very fond 
 of Saint-Saens." 
 
 " Yes, my dear," said Mr. Polhemus, 
 " but she was fond of him with a musician's 
 fondness. Your ears like him, but it was 
 her immortal soul that drank him in." 
 
 I was satisfied. Here was constancy to 
 beat the band, as the vulgarians say. How 
 easy it would have been for a man of no 
 convictions to assert that the present Mrs. 
 Polhemus loved music just as much as Car- 
 lotta had been wont to. But Mr. Polhemus 
 would not lay perjury to his soul. 
 
Memory of Carlotta 177 
 
 When the music again began, he was 
 silent, and again his eyes moistened, and at 
 the end of the first movement he applauded 
 with tremendous enthusiasm and said : 
 
 " I wish that you had known Carlotta, my 
 dear." 
 
 " I wish I "had," said Helen, and there 
 was a world of meaning in her simple words. 
 I really felt sorry for Mrs. Polhemus. Not 
 because Mr. Polhemus was constant to the 
 memory of his first love, but because she had 
 missed the position herself. In my humble 
 opinion, she was worthy to have been his 
 first choice. And yet it must have been a 
 sort of education to her to learn what a cul- 
 tured woman like Carlotta had thought of 
 this temple and that statue; of how she had 
 reveled in a tone picture at the Opera, or 
 been ravished by a feast of color in the 
 Louvre. Mr. Polhemus knew just what to 
 pick out for her delectation; anything that 
 had received the hallmark of Carlotta's dis- 
 criminating praise was meet to show to her 
 
178 Memory of Carlotta 
 
 successor; and, as Helen herself was a 
 woman of innate refinement, I believe that 
 she fully appreciated her benefits, although 
 she may not altogether have shared his love 
 for Carlotta. 
 
 I journeyed with them for nearly a week, 
 as we were a congenial trio, and I never saw 
 Mrs. Polhemus in any mood but an amiable 
 one. This was probably because Mr. Pol- 
 hemus himself was singularly even-tem- 
 pered. I could well believe that he and 
 Carlotta had lived in amity. 
 
 Once, at the hotel in Brussels, Mrs. Pol- 
 hemus said that she did not care for a cer- 
 tain carrot soup, and her husband was over- 
 come with dejection. 
 
 " Why, Helen, I am sure I must have told 
 you that Carlotta used to make this kind of 
 soup herself, and it was one of her favorites 
 to the last. I remember she said she was 
 fond of carrots for three reasons : they were 
 so opulent in color, their flavor was just the 
 thing that soup needed, and their long, deli- 
 
Memory of Carlotta 179 
 
 cately tapering form reminded her of her 
 mother, whom I never saw. You should 
 like this soup for Carlotta's sake." 
 
 Mrs. Polhemus smiled a strange smile, 
 but she did not attempt to finish the soup. 
 However, her widowed husband did not 
 notice it. " To-morrow," said he, " we 
 must go to the park. Carlotta always 
 thought the vistas more beautiful than any 
 in Paris." 
 
 And so he was all the time; thoughtful 
 of the comfort of Helen and ingeniously 
 devising means by which she could be made 
 to drink at the fountains which Carlotta's 
 fingers had blessed. 
 
 At Antwerp I was to leave them, and I 
 regretted it for more than one reason; but 
 I was not going to do Antwerp until after I 
 had been to Holland. Just as we were en- 
 tering the outskirts of the city, Mr. Polhe- 
 mus said reminiscently : 
 
 " I have put up at two hotels here in 
 Antwerp. One is very good, and the other 
 
180 Memory of Carlotta 
 
 is atrocious. In my student days I stopped 
 at the good one, but when I came with Car- 
 lotta I relied on the advice of a traveler, and 
 we put up at the bad one that is, we first 
 put up at it and then had to put up with it. 
 It was the er well, no matter now ; I have 
 it in my notebook. We passed a horrible 
 night there. The dinner was awful, the ser- 
 vice worse, the beds something beyond be- 
 lief, and the ringing every few minutes of 
 the Cathedral chimes made sleep impossible, 
 if nothing else had done so. But Carlotta 
 was so patient under it all. We spent the 
 night sitting on chairs and looking out on 
 an air-shaft looking for air. Every few 
 minutes the bells seemed to be trying to rec- 
 ollect an operatic aria that they had only 
 half heard ; and then at the quarters, I think 
 it was, the big bell Carolus would ' swallow 
 up the universe in sound ' that was Car- 
 lotta's poetic phrase and while its sweet, 
 resonant tones were sounding, we felt rec- 
 onciled to our plight. But it was hot and 
 
Memory of Carlotta 181 
 
 humid, and the hotel was old and unsavory. 
 Altogether it was one of the most painful 
 recollections of my married life." 
 
 " Then, of course, you'll go to the hotel 
 you stayed at when you were a student," 
 said Helen in a matter-of-fact tone. 
 
 Mr. Polhemus looked at her in mild sur- 
 prise. " Why, no, my dear. I would not 
 miss refreshing my memory of that night 
 for worlds. When I think of the saintlike 
 equanimity of dear Carlotta, I love her more 
 than ever. I will, if possible, get the same 
 room, and you shall see for yourself what 
 Carlotta " 
 
 It has been remarked by some judge of 
 human nature that women are enigmas. 
 Oh, sapient one! They are. It was not 
 much that Mr. Polhemus had asked. It 
 would be a mere recollection next day. As 
 the Psalmist has said, joy would come in 
 the morning, but Helen forgot the Psalmist, 
 forgot what she owed Mr. Polhemus and 
 the memory of Carlotta, and gave him an 
 
1 82 Memory of Carlotta 
 
 angry look that would have pierced a pachy- 
 derm. 
 
 I was only too glad to bid them good-by 
 when, a minute later, we stopped at Ant- 
 werp and they left the railway carriage. I 
 heard her tell the porter the name of the 
 best hotel in Antwerp, so, if Mr. Polhemus 
 did spend the night on a sanctified chair lis- 
 tening to the bells, he did so alone, with 
 nothing but the memory of Carlotta for a 
 companion. 
 
 My way after that led through Holland, 
 and I did not expect to see any more of the 
 Polhemuses, as they were going to Dussel- 
 dorf from Antwerp. But travelers do not 
 always hold fast to their itineraries, and a 
 week later, in The Hague, as I stood in front 
 of Paul Potter's Bull, wondering whether 
 my judgment was poor or Mr. Potter had 
 been too highly praised, I heard a familiar 
 voice behind me that of a woman. She 
 said : " Why in the world is the man pushed 
 off to one side ? He looks as if he'd fall out 
 
Memory of Carlotta 183 
 
 of the frame. I think he must have been 
 put in as an afterthought, after the bull was 
 finished." 
 
 I could feel her companion wince. 
 " Don't, my dear. You are positively sacri- 
 legious. That is the most celebrated cattle 
 picture in the world, and Carlot " 
 
 " Mr. Polhemus, I must remind you once 
 for all that 7 am Mrs. Polhemus now, and 
 my opinion is that Troyon would have 
 painted that bull and man far better." 
 
 Let those who will gloat over Mr. 
 Polhemus' discomfiture. I could not. I 
 escaped unseen into the crowd, while Mr. 
 Polhemus, who had harped once too often 
 on the merits of Carlotta, laid his harp aside 
 until he should need it in a duet. 
 
Truman Wickwire's Gloves 
 
 r-pRUMAN WICKWIRE was as rich 
 -I as he was mean, and if you had 
 known Truman you would have consid- 
 ered him wealthy from any point of view. 
 He had inherited a small fortune, and 
 did not need to work, but still kept at 
 his trade of wheelwright. He lived in a 
 little hill town in northeastern Connecticut, 
 and, as luck would have it, was married. 
 Whatever luck was in the proposition was 
 on his side, for his wife, a meek, good-tem- 
 pered little woman, led a dog's life through 
 his dictatorial ways. 
 
 One day he could not find his gloves. He 
 was going to a funeral, and although at any 
 other time gloves would have been an ab- 
 surdity, for a funeral they were a necessity. 
 
 Mrs. Wickwire was at work in the 
 
Truman Wickwire's Gloves 185 
 
 kitchen; for Truman had never grown rich 
 enough to relieve his wife of the smallest 
 detail of housework, and she slaved for his 
 comfort, as she had any time these twenty 
 years. 
 
 He came to the door of their bedroom, 
 which opened off the kitchen, and, in his 
 rough, unpleasant bass, shouted: 
 
 " Sayrah, where' s my gloves?" 
 
 Mrs. Wickwire looked up despairingly. 
 " Why, Truman, I'm sure I don't know. 
 Where'd you put 'em when you last had 
 'em? You wore 'em to Zelia Higgins' 
 funeral, didn't ye?" 
 
 " Well, as I wear 'em to every funeral, 
 an' she was the last t' die hereabouts, of 
 course I did. But that don't tell me where 
 they are. I ask you." 
 
 " Well, really, I dunno, Truman. I'll go 
 look for 'em." She was mixing dough 
 when she spoke, but she got up and washed 
 her hands, and began a fruitless hunt of a 
 half-hour without protest. Whether she 
 
1 86 Truman Wickwire's Gloves 
 
 ever felt like protesting or not, she certainly 
 never uttered a complaint. 
 
 At the end of half an hour she went to 
 him in the barn, where he was harnessing 
 the old sorrel. " Truman, I can't find them 
 gloves." 
 
 He was feeling in a particularly bad 
 humor, as the old horse had just trod on his 
 foot, and he glared at her a moment with- 
 out speaking. A faint tinkle of the butch- 
 er's bell came up the road, borne on the 
 south wind, and it gave him a malicious 
 idea. As he climbed into the wagon to go 
 to the funeral without his gloves, he 
 said: 
 
 " Sayrah, you must ha' lost those gloves, 
 an' until you find 'em you can't buy any 
 meat. Do you hear me ? " 
 
 " What '11 you do? " was her answer. 
 
 " Don't you worry about me. I guess I 
 won't be meat-hungry before you find 'em. 
 Git ap." 
 
 He cut the horse viciously with his whip, 
 
Truman Wickwire's Gloves 187 
 
 and started north a minute before the 
 butcher drove up to the house. 
 
 If Mrs. Wickwire was disappointed at not 
 having been invited by her husband to go 
 to the funeral, she did not show it. She 
 walked slowly out to the butcher's wagon. 
 Although as lean as hard work could make 
 her, she was very fond of meat, a fact of 
 which her husband was well aware. 
 Through force of habit she said to the 
 butcher: " What you got?" 
 
 The butcher, Darius Hunt, was a jovial 
 man, and he answered her with his time- 
 honored rigmarole of " Ham, ram, lamb, 
 beef, an' mutton." 
 
 " I can't buy any meat to-day," she said, 
 in her mild little voice. As she spoke, she 
 lifted the lid that covered the end of his 
 wagon, and sniffed hungrily at the fresh 
 meat. 
 
 " What's matter ? Lost pocket-book, or 
 is it gettin' to be Lent, or what is up?" 
 Mr. Hunt's merry eyes beamed above his 
 
1 88 Truman Wickwire's Gloves 
 
 fat red cheeks, and he looked the picture of 
 beefy good nature. 
 
 " Mr. Wick wire won't let me buy any 
 meat, because I can't find his funeral 
 gloves." 
 
 Mr. Hunt dropped his cleaver and burst 
 out laughing. " Well, is that his latest? " 
 
 He had served the Wickwires for years, 
 and was, besides, a member of the same re- 
 ligious society, so he knew the oddly assorted 
 couple with all the thoroughness that coun- 
 try people sometimes give to acquaintance- 
 ship. 
 
 " Well, now, Mis' Wickwire, you aint so 
 stout that you've got to stop meat to reduce 
 your weight, an' jes' so long as I swing my 
 bell on this route I'll let you have what meat 
 you want, an' I'll look to Truman for my 
 money. You've always paid cash, but I'm 
 not afraid of losin' my money not while 
 I have a tongue in my head," he added sig- 
 nificantly. 
 
 Mean in most things, Mr. Wickwire did 
 
Truman Wickwire's Gloves 189 
 
 not stint himself on meat, and at dinner he 
 ate nearly half a steak before he remembered 
 his dictum. 
 
 Then he uncorked his vials. " How in 
 thunder did you get this meat? Didn't I 
 tell you not to buy any? Have you found 
 my gloves ? " 
 
 The meek little woman replied: "No; 
 but Mr. Hunt insisted on me takin* what I 
 needed." 
 
 Wickwire stretched his lips into a snarl- 
 ing smile. " Well, I won't insist on payin' 
 him what he needs in the way of money. 
 You didn't pay him, did you ? " 
 
 " Why, no; you told me not to buy 
 any." 
 
 The smile became an unpleasant laugh. 
 " Well, if he wants to give us meat, all right; 
 but I didn't order the meat, and I won't pay 
 for it, not if he supplies us for the rest of 
 our lives." 
 
 His anticipation of getting the best of the 
 butcher put him in such good humor that he 
 
190 Truman Wickwire's Gloves 
 
 ate twice as much as usual, and vouchsafed 
 some interesting details of the burial he had 
 attended. 
 
 East Whitfield was four miles from the 
 Center, and as Mr. Wickwire did not " farm 
 it," being a wheelwright, they relied on the 
 butcher 'for all their meat. 
 
 Darius Hunt came Wednesdays and Sat- 
 urdays. The next Saturday he drove up 
 and rang his bell. Mrs. Wickwire was out 
 in the garden picking currants to make jelly 
 for her husband. She hurried out to the 
 wagon. She always hurried to everything, 
 so that no one might be kept waiting on Her 
 account. 
 
 " Good-morning. Ham, ram, lamb, beef, 
 or mutton? Wickwire found his gloves 
 yit?" 
 
 "No, he hasn't; but it put him in real 
 good humor to get that meat. He says he 
 aint a-goin' to be responsible for it." Mrs. 
 Wickwire said this with misgivings. It 
 was her duty to tell the butcher that he was 
 
Truman Wickwire's Gloves 191 
 
 likely to get no payment for his meat; but 
 she feared that he would refuse to let her 
 have any more, and then she knew enough 
 of Truman to fear his tongue at a meatless 
 dinner. 
 
 " He aint a-goin' to be responsible, aint 
 he? Well, I aint a-goin' to git thin over 
 that end of it. What '11 ye have to-day?" 
 
 That afternoon the butcher met Mr. 
 Wickwire in the Center. He was going 
 into the hardware store, which stood next to 
 the office of the Whitfield Witness. He 
 had come into town on business, and was 
 dressed in his Sunday best. 
 
 " Afternoon, Truman," said Hunt, in his 
 hearty, pleasant voice. 
 
 Wickwire turned and looked at him. 
 
 " Hm," he grunted. 
 
 " Got a little bill against you for meat." 
 
 Both men walked over to the curbstone 
 to be out of the way of the Saturday crowd. 
 
 " Don't concern me; I didn't order it," 
 said Wickwire. 
 
192 Truman Wickwire's Gloves 
 
 " No; but your wife did, and I guess 
 you're responsible for her debts." 
 
 " I told her not to buy any more 
 meat " 
 
 " Until she had found your old gloves. 
 Well, you have a right to be as mean as it is 
 your nater to be, but ef you don't pay spot- 
 cash now, I'm a-goin' right in to see my 
 good friend Editor Mason here in the Wit- 
 ness office, an' he'll print the whole story, 
 an' it '11 be good readin' fer people here- 
 abouts. Tryin' to starve a wife into 
 findin' your mis'able gloves ! n 
 
 Wickwire knotted his brows. He knew 
 that, although the butcher was a good- 
 natured man, he had plenty of determina- 
 tion. He did not care to have the story go 
 any farther, and yet he hated to go back on 
 his word to his wife. While he hesitated, 
 Hunt took a step in the direction of the 
 Witness office. 
 
 Instantly Wickwire became rattled, and 
 felt in every pocket but the right one for his 
 
Truman Wickwire's Gloves 193 
 
 purse. At last his hand went into his coat- 
 tail pocket and pulled out the missing 
 gloves. 
 
 He looked at them in sheepish wonder for 
 a minute. 
 
 The butcher broke the silence. "It's 
 clear that Mrs. Wickwire don't go through 
 your pockets." 
 
The Deception of Martha 
 Tucker 
 
 An Automobile Extravaganza 
 
 IT was not that Martha Tucker was 
 particularly fond of horses so much as 
 that she was afraid of automobiles of 
 every sort, kind, or description. That was 
 why she said that she would never consent 
 to her husband's purchasing a motor car- 
 riage. 
 
 " Horses were good enough for my father, 
 and I guess that horses will do for me as 
 long as I live and John is able to keep them," 
 said she to various friends on numerous oc- 
 casions. 
 
 But if she was ridiculously old-fashioned 
 in her notions, John was not, and he cast 
 about in his mind for same way to circum- 
 vent Martha without her knowing it. The 
 194 
 
Martha Tucker 195 
 
 thing would have been easy to do if it had 
 not been for the fact that they were a very 
 loving couple. John seldom went anywhere 
 without taking his wife along, and as his 
 business was of such a nature that he car- 
 ried it on under his roof-tree, he was unable 
 to speed along in happy loneliness on a loco- 
 mobile or electric motor. Besides all this, 
 John Tucker's conscience was such a pecu- 
 liar affair that if he hoodwinked Martha it 
 must be in her sight. 
 
 The Tuckers always spent their summers 
 at Arlinburg, the roads around which were 
 famous for driving; and almost their only 
 outdoor recreation, aside from wandering 
 afoot in the fields, was found in riding be- 
 hind any one or two of his half-dozen horses. 
 The fact that he was abundantly able to 
 maintain the most expensive automobile ex- 
 tant made it doubly hard for John to ab- 
 stain from the use of one. 
 
 " I gave up smoking to please Martha 
 when we first married, but I do not intend 
 
196 Martha Tucker 
 
 to give up the idea of running an automo- 
 bile of my own, just because she has the old- 
 fogy notions of the Hiltons in her blood. 
 Her father never rode in a steam-car, al- 
 though the road passed by his back door, 
 and all the Hiltons are old-fogyish which 
 sums up their faults." 
 
 John said this to an old schoolmate who 
 was spending a Sunday at his house. 
 
 " Wouldn't she try one of your neigh- 
 bor's automobiles, and see how she likes it? " 
 
 " No, sir ; her no is a no. But I mean to 
 ride in one with her sometime, if I have to 
 blindfold her and tell her it's a baby-car- 
 riage." 
 
 It may have been a week after this con- 
 versation that John and Martha wandered 
 in the woods picking wild flowers, and Mrs. 
 Tucker was inoculated with ivy-poisoning 
 that settled in her eyes, so that for several 
 days she was confined to her room, and 
 when she came out she was told by her 
 doctor to wear smoked glasses for a week or 
 
Martha Tucker 197 
 
 two, her eyes still being inflamed and very 
 painful. " Keep outdoors; go riding as 
 much as you can, but don't take off the 
 glasses until the inflammation has entirely 
 subsided," said he. 
 
 John was sincerely sorry for his wife's 
 misfortune, but when he heard that she 
 would see through a glass darkly for the 
 matter of a week or two, he made up his 
 mind to act and act quickly. 
 
 They went out for a ride that he might 
 test her vision. The horse he was driving 
 was a gray, Roanoke by name. 
 
 " My dear," said Mr. Tucker, " don't you 
 think that the gait of this black horse is 
 very like that of Roanoke? " 
 
 " I'm sure I can't tell," said Martha. 
 " With these dismal glasses on I'm not 
 quite sure whether it's a horse or a cow in 
 the harness. I get a hazy outline of some 
 animal, but no color and little form. Don't 
 ever touch poison-ivy if you value your 
 sight." 
 
198 Martha Tuckeri 
 
 " Well, the doctor says you'll be all right 
 in a week or two. By the way, Martha, I'm 
 going to run down to New York to-morrow 
 on business. I'll be back in the evening. 
 If your eyes were all right you might come 
 along, but as it is, I guess you'd better not 
 go down." 
 
 " No ; driving around with James will do 
 me more good than a stuffy train. Come 
 
 home as soon as you can, dear, and " 
 
 She hesitated. " I hate the old things, but 
 if you are so set on trying one of those auto- 
 mobiles, why don't you do it to-morrow 
 when you are in New York ? " 
 
 " Why, I believe I will, my dear. I wish 
 I could overcome your prejudice against 
 them." 
 
 " But you can't, dear, so don't try." 
 
 When Mr. Tucker reached New York, 
 the first thing that he did was to visit an 
 automobile repository. 
 
 " Would it be possible for you to let me 
 have an automobile that could be operated 
 
Martha Tucker 199 
 
 from behind, so that my wife and I could sit 
 in front and simply enjoy the ride? " 
 
 " Why, certainly," said the man. " We 
 have every style known to the most advanced 
 makers." 
 
 "And could I have shafts attached to it 
 so that if it broke down I could call in the 
 services of some horse? " 
 
 " But, sir, our machines never break 
 down. That is why we are selling one every 
 minute in the working-day. Our agents 
 are located in every known city of the earth, 
 and our factories are running day and 
 night, and in spite of it we are falling be- 
 hind in our orders in a rapidly increasing 
 ratio." 
 
 " Is that so ? " said Mr. Tucker, turning 
 to leave the store. " Then I'm afraid I'll 
 have to go elsewhere, as I wanted one 
 shipped to me to-morrow or next day. A 
 birthday present for my wife, you under- 
 stand." 
 
 " Oh, I suppose," said the wily salesman, 
 
2oo Martha Tucker 
 
 " that I could let you in ahead of your turn 
 if the payment were cash." 
 
 " Of course the payment will be cash. 
 That's the only way I ever pay." 
 
 A half-hour from that time John Tucker 
 was being propelled through New York's 
 busy streets in a smoothly running, almost 
 noiseless automobile worked from behind, 
 and its way led down to a harness store in 
 Chambers Street. As yet there were no 
 shafts, but he had provided for a pair. 
 
 Mr. Tucker went into the harness-store. 
 " Good-day," said he. " I want to buy a 
 wooden horse like the one out in front, only 
 covered with horse-skin." 
 
 "Well, sir," said the clerk, "we don't 
 manufacture them ourselves, but we can 
 order one for you. Going into the harness 
 business? " 
 
 " No, but I want to try an experiment. 
 Would it be possible for me to have a 
 mechanical horse built that would move its 
 legs in a passable imitation of trotting?" 
 
Martha Tucker 201 
 
 " Nowadays everything is possible/' said 
 the salesman, " but it would be very expen- 
 sive." 
 
 " Well, I'll tell you just what I want it 
 for," said Mr. Tucker, and entered into de- 
 tails concerning Mrs. Tucker's aversion to 
 automobiles, her ivy-poisoning, and his 
 scheme. The clerk seemed interested. 
 
 " If the lady's eyes are as inflamed as all 
 that," said he, " she would not notice the 
 lack of natural motion, and it would Be easy 
 to place a contrivance inside of the figure 
 that would imitate the sound of trotting, 
 and your wife's imagination would do the 
 rest. But I think that your idea of having 
 the horse on a platform like the one out front 
 is not a good one. If the platform struck 
 a rock in the road it would knock the whole 
 thing to smithereens. Better place small- 
 ish wheels on the inner side of the ankles, 
 fix the hind legs so they will be jointed at 
 the thighs, and then you can run up hill and 
 down dale with no trouble." 
 
2O2 Martha Tucker 
 
 Mr. Tucker clapped his hands like a boy. 
 " That's fine! My wife will get thoroughly 
 used to an automobile without knowing she 
 is riding in one, and then when she recovers 
 the use of her eyes I'll give the wooden horse 
 a well-earned rest. Call up that factory on 
 the 'phone, and I'll order my hobby-horse 
 at once. You think that I can get it in a day 
 or two?" 
 
 " It's only a question of expense, sir, and 
 you say that is nothing." 
 
 " Of course it's nothing. Nothing is any- 
 thing if I can take my wife out automobiling 
 without her knowing it." 
 
 Three days later Mr. Tucker said to his 
 wife at luncheon : 
 
 " My dear, as this is your birthday, I have 
 given myself the pleasure of buying you a 
 new horse and wagon, and it will be ready 
 for us to go out in half an hour." 
 
 " Oh, you dear, thoughtful man ! " said 
 Mrs. Tucker, beaming as well as she was 
 able to through her smoked glasses. Then 
 
Martha Tucker 203 
 
 she rose and gave him a kiss that made him 
 feel that he was a guilty wretch to be medi- 
 tating the deception of such a lovable wife. 
 But he had gone too far to retrace his steps 
 now, and he eased his feelings with the 
 thought that the end would justify the 
 means. 
 
 " You are always doing things to please 
 me," said she. 
 
 "No such thing," he replied. "You 
 may not like this horse as well as you like 
 Roanoke or Charley, but it is quite a swag- 
 ger turnout, and I've decided to have James 
 go with us and sit behind on the rumble." 
 
 " Oh, but, my dear, we will not be driving 
 alone if he is with us." 
 
 " Nonsense ! We've been married twenty 
 years, and anyhow James is a graven image. 
 He will not know we are along." (" He will 
 be too busy running the thing," added Mr. 
 Tucker mentally.) 
 
 A half-hour later Mr. Tucker announced 
 to his wife that he was ready, and she put a 
 
2O4 Martha Tucker 
 
 few finishing touches to her toilet, bathed 
 her eyes with witch-hazel, adjusted her 
 smoked glasses, and went out to the porte- 
 cochere. 
 
 She dimly discerned the horse, the wagon, 
 the groom at the horse's head, and her hus- 
 band. There was an indescribably swagger 
 look about the equipage, and she wished 
 that she could take off her glasses and gloat 
 over her new possession, but the doctor's 
 orders had been imperative. She did, how- 
 ever, approach the horse's head to pet him, 
 but her husband said : " Don't, dear. He 
 may not like women. Wait until he is used 
 to us before you try to coddle him." 
 
 They stepped to their seats; the groom 
 left the horse's head and handed the reins 
 to Mr. Tucker, mounted the rumble., and off 
 they started. 
 
 "Why, it's like sailing," said Mrs. 
 Tucker. 
 
 " Pneumatic tires, my dear," answered 
 her husband glibly. 
 
Martha Tucker 205 
 
 " And how rhythmical the horse's hoof- 
 beats are!" 
 
 " An evidence of blood, my darling. I 
 know this horse's pedigree: by Carpenter 
 out of Chestnut " 
 
 " Oh, don't. I never cared for those 
 long genealogies. Whether he has blood or 
 not, he is certainly the smoothest traveler I 
 ever saw." 
 
 They had been skillfully guided along the 
 winding path that led to the highway by the 
 chauffeur, who, although he was a James, 
 was not the James who generally worked in 
 the stable, but a James hired at the office of 
 the company in order that he might break 
 in the local James. 
 
 After they reached the road the way for 
 a mile or more was clear and straight, and 
 they met with no teams. The horse was 
 wonderfully lifelike, except in his action, or 
 rather lack of action, for his forefeet were 
 eternally in an attitude of rest. The hind 
 legs rose and fell with the inequalities of 
 
206 Martha Tucker 
 
 the road, and his mane and tail waved in the 
 breeze like the real horsehair that they were. 
 
 " This is the poetry of motion," said Mrs. 
 Tucker. " I don't believe you'll ever find 
 an automobile that can run like this." 
 
 " I'll admit that I wouldn't wish one to 
 go better. Are you all right back there, 
 James?" 
 
 " All right, sir." 
 
 " Why, how queer James' voice sounds ! 
 I never noticed that squeak in it before." 
 
 " It's the exhilarating effect of our fast 
 driving. Do you think that you could stand 
 a faster pace?" 
 
 " Why, if you're not afraid of tiring the 
 horse. He seems to be going like the wind 
 now." 
 
 " Oh, he won't mind. Faster, James." 
 
 "Why do you say that to James? Did 
 you think he was driving, you absent- 
 minded dear, you?" 
 
 " I did, for the moment." 
 
 James was sure he was driving, and at this 
 
Martha Tucker 207 
 
 command from his employer he put on al- 
 most the full force of the electricity. The 
 wagon gave a leap forward, and turning 
 into a macadamized road at this point, they 
 went along at the rate of twenty miles an 
 hour. 
 
 Mrs. Tucker clutched her husband's arm. 
 " John, his speed is uncanny. We seem to 
 be going like an express-train." 
 
 " It's the smoothness of the road and his 
 perfect breeding, my dear. Do you notice 
 that this furious gait does not seem to affect 
 his wind at all ? " 
 
 "No, I hadn't noticed it; but isn't it 
 queer how regular his hoof-beats are? and 
 they do not seem to quicken their rate at 
 all." 
 
 John had noticed this, too, and he had 
 regretted not having told the manufacturer 
 to arrange the mechanism so that the hoof- 
 beats would become more or less rapid ac- 
 cording to the gait; but he answered 
 quickly : 
 
208 Martha Tucker 
 
 " That, my dear, is because he reaches 
 farther and farther. You know some 
 breeds of horses gain speed by quickening 
 their gait. This horse gains it by a length- 
 ened reach. He is a remarkable animal. 
 Actually, my dear, we are overtaking a loco- 
 mobile." 
 
 " Oh, John, is he used to these horrid 
 steam-wagons? " 
 
 " Nothing will frighten this horse, 
 Martha. You can rest assured of that." 
 
 A minute later they passed the locomo- 
 bile. If Mrs. Tucker could have seen the 
 , codfish eyes of the occupant of the vehicle 
 when he saw a hobby-horse going by at the 
 rate of twenty miles an hour, she would 
 have questioned his sanity. If she could 
 have seen the scared looks and the scared 
 horse of the people in the approaching 
 buggy she would have begun to wonder 
 what possessed her new possession. But 
 her goggles saved her from present worry, 
 and the buggy was passed in a flash. 
 
Martha Tucker 209 
 
 "Oh, I do wish I could take off my 
 glasses for a minute so that I could enjoy 
 this rapid motion to the full! How the 
 trees must be spinning by ! " 
 
 " Don't touch your glasses," said Mr. 
 Tucker hurriedly. " If a speck of dust or 
 a pebble were to get into your eye, you might 
 become permanently blind. Positively, you 
 are like a child with a new rocking-horse. 
 This turnout will keep until your eyes are 
 fully recovered, and I hope we may enjoy 
 many a spin in this easy carriage, with or 
 without this horse." 
 
 " Never without him, dear. After the 
 delight of this swift motion I never would 
 go back to lazy Roanoke or skittish Charley. 
 I have never ridden in any carriage that 
 pleased me like this one." 
 
 " She's a convert already without know- 
 ing it," said her husband to himself, but her 
 next remark dispelled his illusion. 
 
 " How can anyone like a noisy automobile 
 better than this? You can't improve on 
 
2io Martha Tucker 
 
 nature. By the way, I forgot to ask you if 
 you rode in one the other day in New 
 York." 
 
 "To be sure. I didn't tell you, did I? 
 It was really almost as nice as this, although 
 the traffic impeded us some. OB, James, 
 look out!" 
 
 This interruption was involuntary on the 
 part of Mr. Tucker, and his words were not 
 noticed by his wife in the confusion of that 
 which followed. They were going down a 
 hill at a fearful rate, when the off foreleg 
 of the wooden horse became a veritable off 
 foreleg, for it hit a log of wood that had' 
 dropped from a teamster's cart not five 
 minutes before, and broke off at the knee. 
 The jar almost threw Mrs. Tucker out; she 
 grasped the dash-board to save herself, and; 
 caught a momentary glimpse of the oddly 
 working haunches of the imitation beast. 
 
 " Oh, John, he's running away." 
 
 Now this was not quite accurate, for he 
 was being pushed away by a runaway auto- 
 
Martha Tucker 2M 
 
 mobile. Mr. Tucker noticed the increased 
 speed and turned to admonish James. 
 
 James had left. 
 
 The departure of James was coincident 
 with the collision, and he was at that mo- 
 ment extricating himself from a sapling into 
 which he had been pitched. He yelled direc- 
 tions to Mr. Tucker which lacked carrying 
 power. 
 
 The vehicle had now come to a turn in 
 the road, and not receiving any impulse to 
 the contrary, it made for a stone wall that 
 lay before it. Mr. Tucker knew nothing 
 about the working of the machine, but with 
 admirable presence of mind he seized a pro- 
 jecting rod, and the wagon turned to the 
 left with prompt obedience, but so suddenly 
 that it ran upon two wheels and nearly up- 
 set. 
 
 So far so good, but now what should he 
 do? To get over to the back seat was either 
 to give the whole thing away, or else make 
 Mrs. Tucker question his courage. 
 
212 Martha Tucker 
 
 He was too obstinate to disclose his secret 
 until he should be forced to, so he sat still 
 and awaited developments. Developments 
 do not keep you waiting long when you are 
 in a runaway automobile, and in just one 
 minute by his watch, although he did not 
 time it, the end came. 
 
 Too late to do any good, John Tucker 
 jumped over the back of the seat, because 
 he saw the wooden horse again approaching 
 a stone wall beyond which lay a frog pond. 
 
 He pulled the lever as before, but he could 
 not have pulled it hard enough, for the next 
 moment there was a shock, and then Mrs. 
 Tucker sailed like a sprite through the air 
 and landed in the water like a nymph, while 
 some kindling wood in a horsehair skin was 
 all that was left of Mr. Tucker's thorough- 
 bred. 
 
 Mr. Tucker was not hurt By the impact, 
 for he had grasped an overhanging bough 
 and saved himself. He dropped to earth, 
 vaulted a stone wall, and rescued the fainting 
 
Martha Tucker 213 
 
 figure of his wife. The kindly services of a 
 farmer procured her the shelter of a neigh- 
 boring farmhouse. 
 
 Mr. Tucker knew from past experiences 
 that his wife was an easy iainter, and after 
 assuring himself that no bones were broken 
 he left her for a few minutes that he might 
 run out to seek for James, who might be at 
 death's door. 
 
 He found him gazing upon the ruins of 
 the wooden horse. 
 
 Upon learning that the man was unin- 
 jured he drew a bill from his pocket and 
 said : " My boy, here's money for your ex- 
 penses and your wages, and if there is any 
 go in this machine, run her to New York and 
 tell your people that they can have fier as a 
 gift. I am through with automobiles/' 
 
 But a half-hour later Mrs. Tucker, fully 
 conscious but somewhat weak, sat up on the 
 bed in the farmer's best chamber and 
 said : 
 
 " John, I think that if it had been a horse- 
 
214 
 
 Martha Tucker 
 
 less automobile it wouldn't have been so 
 bad." 
 
 Whereupon John overtook James just 
 setting out for New York, and gave him an 
 order for one horseless automobile. 
 
 And now John is convinced that his wife 
 is a thoroughbred. 
 
The Minister's Henhouse 
 
 REV. SIGOURNEY HARDWICKE, 
 of South Hanaford, was very suc- 
 cessful with hens. He had begun with a 
 hen and twelve chickens which a neigh- 
 bor had given him, and he now had a 
 flock of fifty. Of course all this had not 
 been accomplished without a severe attack 
 of hen fever, but as the disease did not lead 
 him to neglect his pastoral duties there was 
 none in his flock his human flock who 
 complained of his devotion to the feathered 
 bipeds. 
 
 . When he had but thirteen, an old dry- 
 goods box slatted with laths was a suffi- 
 cient shelter, and later, when his hatches 
 averaged eleven to the setting, the woodshed 
 sufficed to house them all; but now with 
 fifty the woodshed was sadly inadequate, 
 
 and unless he could manage to provide a 
 215 
 
216 The Minister's Henhouse 
 
 better abode for them before snow flew, his 
 success with fowls would be numbered 
 among- the lost arts. Some men would have 
 bought a hammer and a pound or two of 
 nails, and would have knocked together a 
 good enough henhouse, but although the 
 Rev. Sigourney Hardwicke had a hypnotic 
 way of encouraging hens to lay when other 
 folk were vainly clamorous for eggs, and 
 although he could bring the most fractious 
 hen through the period of incubation with- 
 out any desertion of nest, simply by moral 
 suasion and the force of a good example, he 
 hadn't the slightest skill in the use of tools. 
 The Rev. Mr. Hardwicke was short and 
 stout and jolly, and it was said of him that 
 the roosters crowed for joy at the sight of 
 him, and the hans would hurry off to their 
 nests to lay extra eggs for him whenever 
 occasion demanded. He lived alone in the 
 big parsonage the last incumbent had had 
 thirteen children and a wife for although 
 he believed, with the Bible, that it is not good 
 
The Minister's Henhouse 217 
 
 for man to be alone, yet he was still waiting 
 for just the right helpmeet. 
 
 One morning, a few days before Thanks- 
 giving, when to the typical country sounds 
 had been added the pleasant noise of fowls 
 scratching among fallen and crisp leaves, 
 and the air was pungent with autumn 
 smoke, Woodford Upham drove by the par- 
 sonage just as the parson came out oF the 
 kitchen door to feed his flock. They were 
 all Black Langshans, and as handsome a 
 group of birds as one would be likely to see 
 outside of a poultry show, their merits ap- 
 pealing to layman and fancier alike. 
 
 Mr. Hardwicke had a peculiar call for his 
 fowls. " Too hoo, hoo, hoo, hoo," 'he 
 sang in a resonant tenor, and the dusky birds 
 came flocking from all corners of the field, 
 where they had been scratching, to pick up 
 the grain which their master was sowing 
 broadcast. Was his Sunday flock as eager 
 for spiritual sustenance? 
 
 Mr. Upham reined up. a Where in tarn 
 
2i8 The Minister's Henhouse 
 
 where do you keep 'em ? " said Tie, as the 
 mob of fowls pushed and shoved like a 
 human crowd at a public function. 
 
 " Well, they keep the woodshed warm 
 holding 'em," said the minister with a 
 chuckle. " I'm thinking seriously of giving 
 up my study to them and taking to the 
 woods myself." 
 
 Mr. Upham threw the reins over his 
 horse's ample girth and got out of the 
 wagon. 
 
 " They are pretty," said he emphatically. 
 " I used to think that a hen was a hen, but 
 I don't know " 
 
 " Well, I've killed off all my roosters, so 
 they really are hens," said the minister with 
 a whimsical smile. 
 
 " Yes, but I mean I believe there is 
 something in breed. You ought to have a 
 henhouse. Your hens are gettin' them- 
 selves talked about a good deal. Mrs. Up- 
 ham says it does her more good than a ser- 
 mon to see the way you've managed to 
 
The Minister's Henhouse 219 
 
 make your hens pay. She never has eggs 
 unless they're so plenty it would be scan- 
 dalous not to, and she* often asks me to find 
 out how you manage it." 
 
 Mr. Hardwicke stooped over and stroked 
 the greenish-black back of a matron of two 
 summers. " That's it; I manage it. If a 
 hen ought to lay and won't, I tempt her 
 palate with hot food, and I talk to her a 
 little and tuck her in at night, and she gen- 
 erally looks at it my way after a few days. 
 If she's setting, and feels like visiting her 
 neighbors instead of keeping her eggs warm, 
 I talk a little more, and maybe shut her on 
 her nest for a day or so, and she finally de- 
 cides to stay by the ship like Captain Law- 
 rence, and so I keep up my average of eleven 
 to a brood. But in the hen business as in 
 others eternal vigilance is the price of suc- 
 cess/' 
 
 " But you do need a henhouse," said Mr. 
 Upham, stepping over to the diminutive 
 woodshed and looking in. 
 
22O The Minister's Henhouse 
 
 " Yes, I do need a henhouse, but I don't 
 suppose that the society would think one a 
 part of my perquisites, as I may not be here 
 for life. There's no telling how long you 
 can stand my sermons." 
 
 " Well, I wouldn't make them any 
 longer," said Mr. Upham solemnly; " but I 
 don't know what we would have done for 
 eggs last week when we had my wife's folks 
 out to see us if we hadn't been able to draw 
 on your supply, and I think it's the general 
 opinion that your salary aint so princely 
 but we can manage somehow to squeeze out 
 enough to put up a henhouse. And if we 
 ever do decide to get another minister 
 why, we'll have to see to it that he keeps 
 hens before we give him a call." 
 
 Mortimer Wallace, the Shakespearian 
 reader, had a summer home in South Hana- 
 ford, and he had gone in for fancy fowls 
 for a time, but although fie had read in 
 Shakespeare that there is a tide in the affairs 
 of men which leads on to fortune, he was 
 
The Minister's Henhouse 221 
 
 out of town when the flood tide came, and 
 so he reluctantly decided to sell the Buff 
 Cochins, for which he had paid fancy prices, 
 at the local quotation on fowls, which was 
 fifty cents a head weight no objection. 
 
 His last hen sold, he suffered a revulsion 
 of feeling against henkind in general, and 
 he longed to sell his henhouse that -he 
 might forget that hens existed. 
 
 But to take it up and move it by ox-power 
 would double its cost, and, besides, South 
 Hanaford farmers thought it a trifle too 
 ornate for every-day egg-laying, and so he 
 found no takers, although he set a tempting 
 price upon it. But when Mr. Upham drove 
 away from the minister's he happened to 
 pass the Wallace henhouse, and he immedi- 
 ately thought that here were two wants that 
 offset each other- Mortimer Wallace's wish 
 to be rid of his perpetual reminder of his 
 failure as a fancier, and the minister's de- 
 sire for an adequate dwelling for his thriv- 
 ing fowls. 
 
222 The Minister's Henhouse 
 
 He spoke of it to Deacon Abner Curtis 
 the next Sunday while they were waiting 
 for the close of Sunday school. It had been 
 an immemorial custom for the older men to 
 gather together on the church steps and get 
 rid of non-churchly thoughts by talking 
 them out before service began. 
 
 ' You know that Wallace wants to sell 
 his henhouse, and it's about time that we 
 bought the parson a place for his chickens to 
 roost in. He's shown he's the only man, 
 woman, or child in these parts that under- 
 stands hens, and I don't see why we couldn't 
 buy Wallace's building and move it over to 
 the parson's. Thanksgiving Day comes this 
 week, and it would be a han'some thing to 
 do." 
 
 " Haow fur is it?" asked Deacon Cur- 
 tis. 
 
 " Half a mile." 
 
 " I think it's a good projec' fer the young 
 people's society. The church moved the 
 chapel an' paid fer the noo stove, and it's 
 
The Minister's Henhouse 223 
 
 time the young 1 people did somethin'. 
 What's Wallace want fer it?" 
 
 Mr. Upham bowed pleasantly to the min- 
 ister, who was just entering the church. 
 " Twenty dollars," said he. 
 
 " Twenty dollars fer that hid jus bloo 
 btiildin'? His wants aint small/' 
 
 " Well, what is it worth ? Suppose you 
 was sellin' it." 
 
 "Oh, that's different. I never sold no 
 henhouses an' I dunno what I'd ask, but I'd 
 never pay twenty dollars fer no henhouse. 
 No hens 'd be wuth it. Why can't the pastor 
 knock one together himself? " 
 
 " He aint got the gift of the ham- 
 mer." 
 
 The bell, which had been tolling, now 
 stopped, and the moaning of the meTocteon 
 gave notice of the end of worldly discus- 
 sions ; but at the prayer meeting in the even- 
 ing it was proposed by the President of the 
 Christian Endeavor Society that Mr. Wal- 
 lace be approached and sounded as to the 
 
224 The Minister's Henhouse 
 
 least figure for which he would part with 
 his henhouse. 
 
 Monday morning a deputation waited on 
 him just as he was starting out to fill a lec- 
 ture engagement. He asked the spokesman 
 to jump into his buggy and drive with him 
 to the station, and on the way there William 
 Curtis, Abner's son, asked him what was 
 his rock-bottom price for selling the -hen- 
 house. 
 
 " Well, I wanted twenty, but I'll sell it to 
 him, or to you for him, for fifteen dollars 
 because he's been able to do what I failed to 
 do make hens lay." 
 
 They had now arrived at the station, and 
 a few minutes later Mr. Wallace went to 
 Boston to read " A Midsummer Night's 
 Dream," and Curtis reported the conversa- 
 tion to the treasurer of the society. 
 
 It was the opinion of those who had been 
 so fortunate as to taste it that there was no 
 one in South Hanaford, or in Hanaford 
 Center, for that matter, who could make 
 
The Minister's Henhouse 225 
 
 such orange cake as Mrs. Wallace. The 
 feathery sponge cake, the delicious orange 
 filling, and the orange frosting, so thick and 
 sweet, would have been worthy of the great 
 Savarin himself, if Savarin ever knew 
 anything as delicious as orange layer cake. 
 Mrs. Wallace was conscious of her genius 
 in this particular line, and when her next- 
 door neighbor, pretty Zoe Moulton, came 
 and asked her if she would be willing to 
 make one of her cakes for an ice-cream 
 festival that was to be given at the Con- 
 gregational church Wednesday evening, 
 she, being a most obliging woman, willingly 
 consented, although she and her husband 
 were Swedenborgians. Zoe hurried away, 
 conscious that whoever else might make 
 a cake, to her would belong the honor of 
 securing the cake of cakes, the pi&ce de re- 
 sistance of the whole festival. 
 
 Young people delight in committees, and 
 one committee never knows what another 
 committee has done, which may account for 
 
226 The Minister's Henhouse 
 
 the fact that upon Mr. Wallace's return from 
 his Boston trip he found the following letter 
 awaiting him : 
 
 DEAR MR. WALLACE : You have always shown 
 yourself to be public spirited, and I have been asked 
 on behalf of our young people to request you to give 
 us a reading at a little jollification we intend hold- 
 ing next Wednesday. Anything you want to read 
 will be listened to with delight. I have been re- 
 quested to write this letter by the Young People's 
 Society of Christian Endeavor, of which, unfortu- 
 nately, I am not a member, owing to age limitations. 
 Yours cordially, 
 
 SIGOURNEY HARDWICKE. 
 
 This was not the first time that Mr. Wal- 
 lace had been asked to recite for his health. 
 There are no people who are expected to give 
 so much for nothing as entertainers in vari- 
 ous lines unless it be ministers. Perhaps 
 it was a fellow-feeling that made the lecturer 
 sit down and say that he would be delighted 
 to accede to the request. He, whose date- 
 book was full to repletion and for whom 
 bureaus fought, graciously consented to 
 read for the young people, as it happened 
 
The Minister's Henhouse 227 
 
 to be an open date with him. The " jolli- 
 fication " was a great success, and not only 
 was all South Hanaford there, but many 
 people drove out from Simsbury, glad to 
 hear Wallace read for twenty-five cents ad- 
 mission. In Hartford he charged a dollar. 
 He was in fine form, and responded to en- 
 cores until his throat might well have been 
 raw. 
 
 After the literary entertainment was con- 
 cluded, the entertainer and his wife sought 
 the tables where confections were to be dis- 
 pensed for a consideration. In order to 
 make sure that the cake was good, Mr. Wal- 
 lace chose that which his wife had made, and 
 he cheerfully paid thirty cents for that and 
 the ice-cream, fifteen cents a plate being the 
 sum usually charged at suppers and festivals 
 in the church. 
 
 When Mr. Hardwicke came up to con- 
 gratulate Mr. Wallace on the undeniable hit 
 that he had made, the latter " blew him off " 
 to cake, if one may be pardoned so worldly 
 
228 The Minister's Henhouse 
 
 an expression as applied to so good a man as 
 the parson. 
 
 While the supper was in progress, Wil- 
 liam Curtis arose and, in the halting way, 
 not peculiar to him alone, said : " I er 
 take pleasure in announcing on behalf of the 
 er Young People's Society of Christian 
 Endeavor, that we have taken in this evening 
 a er trifle over twenty dollars, and the 
 sale of cake will bring half as much again. 
 I want to thank those who er who do- 
 nated the cake, and I think er that we all 
 think er that we ought to thank er 
 Mr. Wallace for responding so generously 
 with his choice selections. We wondered 
 how we could afford to do what we er 
 wanted to do, and if it had not been for his 
 kindness in reducing the price of his hen- 
 house in the first place, 'and then in er 
 kindly consenting to give us his er more 
 than valuable services this er evening, it 
 would not have been possible for us to pur- 
 chase his henhouse and present it as a er 
 
The Minister's Henhouse 229 
 
 Thanksgiving offering to our er beloved 
 and worthy pastor." 
 
 When he sat down with a moist forehead 
 and a sense of having done his duty he was 
 astonished to hear a hearty and general guf- 
 faw follow a momentary silence. In the 
 midst of it, and while Mr. Curtis was won- 
 dering what had caused it, Mr. Wallace and 
 the Rev. Mr. Hardwicke, moved by similar 
 impulses, arose and walked toward each 
 other and shook hands. 
 
 Then Mr. Hardwicke said with unction, 
 " This is undoubtedly good old New Eng- 
 land." 
 
The Men Who Swapped 
 
 Languages 
 
 THERE are many persons in the world 
 to whom some of the facts in this 
 story will seem improbable. I have no 
 fault to find with them. Thirty years 
 ago they would have said that the phono- 
 graph was not only improbable, but impos- 
 sible. I cannot explain how M. Jean Al- 
 bertin obtained entire command of Howard 
 Benton's remarkably fine English vocabu- 
 lary any more than I can explain how the 
 phonograph so successfully catches the sound 
 of the human voice and reduces it to an ab- 
 surd squeak. I know that it does this thing, 
 and I know that M. Albertin not only se- 
 cured the English speech of his friend, but 
 gave him his own equally great command 
 of French, just as men exchange pieces of 
 real estate. 
 
 230 
 
Swapped Languages 231 
 
 It may be worth while to go somewhat 
 into detail in this matter. M. Albertin was 
 about to go to America in the interest of a 
 French house, and he had absolutely no Eng- 
 lish beyond a few rather idiotic phrases. He 
 was a man of fine natural ability and attain- 
 ments, with a charm of manner that made 
 friends for him among all classes. Indeed 
 although thoroughly at home among the 
 most cultivated, he was fond of seeking ac- 
 quaintances among the lowly born merely 
 that he might study the manners of man in 
 all walks of life, and it was this democratic 
 tendency that was the cause of his undoing. 
 
 M. Albertin believed that what was worth 
 doing at all was worth doing well, but he 
 lacked the time to learn English, as his 
 American trip was undertaken on the spur 
 of the moment. A few days before he sailed 
 he met in a cafe his good friend Howard 
 Benton, of Boston, who it may be a mere 
 coincidence is acquainted with both Nik- 
 ola Tesla and Thomas Edison, although he 
 
232 Swapped Languages 
 
 himself is not an inventor, but a man of 
 leisure. 
 
 Benton, although a university man, was 
 unable to speak French fluently, although, 
 strange to say, he could write it exceedingly 
 well. But he was devoting much of his 
 leisure time to the mastery of the oral lan- 
 guage. These dry details are absolutely 
 necessary to the proper understanding of the 
 subsequent events. 
 
 Now we come to the unexplainable part. 
 I was an ear witness, but I can offer no ex- 
 planations. I was sitting at a neighboring 
 table; I knew them both slightly, and there 
 is no manner of doubt that on a sudden M. 
 Albertin began to speak an English as idio- 
 matic and pure as the best. And Benton re- 
 plied in a faultless French. 
 
 Both burst out laughing as gleefully as 
 children, and said something that I did not 
 catch, and then came mutual congratula- 
 tions. 
 
 " I would have been willing to pay you 
 
Swapped Languages 233 
 
 for your language," said Mr. Benton, " but 
 if we exchange I fancy that one is as valu- 
 able as the other, as mine is of the Boston 
 variety, and has been handed down from 
 father to son for seven generations, and 
 I certainly recognize the perfection of 
 yours." 
 
 After a little desultory conversation Al- 
 bertin suddenly burst out laughing. " Upon 
 my word," said he naively, " I did not sup- 
 pose that I spoke French with such distinc- 
 tion. It amuses me to hear the actual tongue 
 that I have been wagging all my life. But 
 please be careful of it. Don't let it get 
 broken." 
 
 Then, in high good humor, they pledged 
 each other's health. Benton's last words as 
 they left the cafe together were : " Do be 
 careful of my dear old tongue, for if I ever 
 do return to America I want enough lan- 
 guage to properly berate the Customs 
 officers." 
 
 M. Albertin shortly afterward went to 
 
234 Swapped Languages 
 
 New York. He carried with him valuable 
 letters that opened to him the doors of the 
 most desirable people, both American and 
 French, and his masterly use of English, 
 added to his charms of mind and manner, 
 made him much sought after. It was 
 thought queer that he never uttered a word 
 of French, but it was attributed to a species 
 of vanity, as some of his compatriots who 
 had known him in Paris knew his facile use 
 of the language of Moliere. He was not a 
 babbler about his own affairs, and if Amer- 
 icans thought him odd because he talked a 
 better English than nine-tenths of the New 
 Yorkers, his self-conceit was tickled. For 
 strangely enough he was proud of his com- 
 mand of this tongue that had come to him 
 already prepared like Chicago canned 
 tongue. On the other hand, if his compa- 
 triots, especially those who had heard and 
 known him in Paris, were puzzled because 
 he always replied to their French in ready 
 English, he implied that they had better go 
 
Swapped Languages 235 
 
 and do likewise, and give over their 
 " wizzes " and " zats." 
 
 From time to time he picked up French 
 words and phrases, just as any American 
 does, but he was not by nature a linguist, 
 and he would never gain the careless ease 
 and rapid flow that had been characteristic 
 of his speech at home. 
 
 It has been said that M. Albertin had a 
 taste for all kinds of life, and when he found 
 himself in New York that city of aston- 
 ishing contrasts he took frequent opportu- 
 nities for gratifying the taste. In turn, 
 "Chinatown," "Little Italy," and all the 
 various settlements of the Castle Garden 
 graduates were visited by him, and he 
 scraped acquaintance with representatives of 
 every country on the map of Europe. But 
 neither Pole, nor Italian, nor German 
 amused him as much as did the New York 
 "tough." M. Albertin had a sense of 
 humor, and the metaphors and the exaggera- 
 tions of the Bowery boy appealed to him as 
 
236 Swapped Languages 
 
 they had appealed to Thackeray nearly forty 
 years before. 
 
 Upon one of these excursions into low 
 life M. Albertin fell in with a gentleman by 
 the name of Buck Mulrennan, a man whose 
 speech was picturesque as the Rocky Moun- 
 tains, and who was said to have been the 
 original of many a newspaper sketch. And 
 Buck found something to admire in this 
 affable Frenchman who was such a " slick 
 chinner." One evening during a conversa- 
 tion between the two in a Bowery music 
 hall, M. Albertin was seized with the mad 
 whim of temporarily swapping speech with 
 Mr. Mulrennan. 
 
 The exchange was made, and M. Al- 
 bertin, who was feeling somewhat gay, 
 treated the affair as a huge joke. He roared 
 with laughter at hearing Buck use words 
 and phrases, and a style of enunciation that 
 had been foreign to him for generations 
 to put it mildly. As for Buck, he entered 
 into the spirit of the thing, and was amused 
 
Swapped Languages 237 
 
 at hearing the elegant M. Albertin use col- 
 loquialisms and slang of the East Side, and 
 the two passed an evening of real delight in 
 each other's company. But when the 
 Frenchman went to his hotel he unaccount- 
 ably neglected to re-exchange the two very 
 diversified specimens of speech, and thus 
 Buck was enabled to visit several " cafes " 
 (to use a pleasant " Puritanism ") to show 
 off his new acquirement. 
 
 M. Albertin lived at the Schiedam-Haar- 
 lem Hotel. Something was the matter with 
 the steam pipes the next morning, and he 
 summoned a hall boy. When the boy came 
 M. Albertin opened the door and said, with 
 the charm of manner that distinguished 
 him: 
 
 " Soy, cully, w'at fell's de matter wit der 
 heat? Me back bone is an icicle an* me 
 blood '11 lose its charter if it don't begin run- 
 nin' again soon. Pump some heat up an' be 
 quick. See ? " 
 
 This from courtesy itself was sufficiently 
 
238 Swapped Languages 
 
 stupefying, but it was nothing to the lan- 
 guage the Frenchman used to the hotel clerk 
 some minutes later. 
 
 That functionary thought that M. Al- 
 bertin had taken leave of his senses, and so 
 did the waiter, who, on approaching the 
 breakfast table at which the Parisian sat was 
 greeted with, " Ah, git a move on." 
 
 " Yes, sir. Cold morning, sir. What 
 shall it be this morning, sir? " 
 
 " Bring me a stack of wheats an' some hot 
 Scotch." 
 
 " Hot Scotch at breakfast, sir? " said the 
 waiter, surprised out of his usual self-con- 
 trol. 
 
 "Gee, can't youse take a joke? I mean 
 hot Scotch oatmeal. An* soy, folly dat up 
 wit' a dish er chuck an' a moiphey on 
 der half shell. Come, sherry yer nibs, 
 now." 
 
 Of course, the waiter understood M. Al- 
 bertin, for he had been born and brought up 
 in the Ninth himself, but the language 
 
Swapped Languages 239 
 
 sounded out of place in the beautiful break- 
 fast room of the Schiedam-Haarlem. 
 
 As for M. Albertin, what had seemed a 
 good joke by gaslight was a hideous thing 
 in the light of day, and the perspiration was 
 pouring down his face in spite of the trouble 
 with the steam pipes. He knew too well 
 what had happened. It had been a hazy jest 
 the night before, but now, unless he could 
 find Buck and induce him to return his 
 tongue, it was an irrevocable and dreadful 
 reality. 
 
 During the rest of the meal he fell back 
 upon the little French that he had managed 
 to pick up from his compatriots, and he 
 summoned the head waiter, who was a 
 Frenchman, to attend him. But it was any- 
 thing but an amelioration of his woe, for the 
 head waiter, of course, knew M. Albertin's 
 nationality, and could hardly conceal his 
 contempt for a man who had so poor a 
 grasp of his mother tongue. 
 
 The breakfast over, M. Albertin opened 
 
240 Swapped Languages 
 
 the morning paper and found two items of 
 the most awful interest to him. One was in 
 the nature of a reminder. His ease in Eng- 
 lish had led to his being called upon to speak 
 at various dinners, and this was an an- 
 nouncement of the annual dinner of the 
 Chaucer Society at the Harland House. It 
 ran : " Among the speakers will be that ac- 
 complished linguist, M. Albertin, who out- 
 rivals the Chinese Ambassador in his grasp 
 of an alien language. He will respond to the 
 toast, ' The Purity of English; May it Never 
 Grow Less/ ' 
 
 With what pleasure he had looked for- 
 ward to this occasion ! With what apt quo- 
 tations from " The Canterbury Tales " 
 would he have interlarded his speech. With 
 what pride would he have watched the grow- 
 ing interest in the faces of his auditors as he, 
 a foreigner, tossed airy phrases off his 
 tongue as a child throws bubbles from a pipe 
 bowl ! But now ! 
 
 But the other piece of news was a 
 crusher. 
 
Swapped Languages 241 
 
 " BUCK MULRENNAN KlLLED FOR HlS 
 
 TONGUE. Too MUCH WILLIE-BOY." 
 
 This was the elegant headline, and the 
 news was that Buck had been shot dead by 
 an inebriated longshoreman who objected to 
 the ultra-polished language of an erstwhile 
 tough. 
 
 " Dere goes Bent'n's langwidge," said M. 
 Albertin out loud, but to himself he thought 
 in French : 
 
 " Oh, how miserable! How can I ever 
 face my friend Benton again? I have lost 
 the language of which he told me to be so 
 careful. And the poor Buck. That it 
 should be my fault that he thus meets the 
 death." 
 
 Sympathy for his quondam acquaintance 
 was, however, swallowed up in an over- 
 whelming pity for himself when he should 
 acquaint Benton with his irreparable loss. 
 He could not make it good in any way. It 
 was a debt of honor which he could not re- 
 pay. Why had he allowed his tongue to 
 
242 Swapped Languages 
 
 wander even for a night? He put on his 
 coat and hat and walked out of doors, here, 
 there, anywhere. Should he attend the ban- 
 quet, and in broken French talk about the 
 preservation of the purity of English? 
 Should he stay away and thus insult the men 
 who were honoring France in honoring him ? 
 He could see no way open to him that 
 brought peace with honor. 
 
 He found himself at last on an elevated 
 train, and with instinctive politeness he rose 
 to give his seat to a lady who entered the 
 car soon after. 
 
 She, with a gracious bow and smile, re- 
 fused it. " I am going but a few blocks," 
 said she. 
 
 " Ah, g'wan. Take der seat. Wouldn't 
 I look like a gilly sittin' an* youse standin' ? 
 Take der seat, loidy, take der seat." 
 
 Covered with confusion, the lady sank 
 into the seat, and M. Albertin, blushing scar- 
 let, went out upon the platform to try to 
 forget himself, for the whole car-full was in 
 
Swapped Languages 243 
 
 a titter at the incongruity between his lan- 
 guage and his dress and manner. But this 
 incident gave him a cue for his action in the 
 evening. 
 
 In the afternoon he went back to the hotel 
 and found a cablegram from Paris calling 
 him back on the next steamer. The reason 
 for his desired return would have filled him 
 with joy the day before, as it was no less 
 than the announcement of a legacy of sev- 
 eral hundred thousand francs, but now a 
 prompt return meant a speedy meeting with 
 the man whom he had so cruelly robbed of 
 his language. And there was still the din- 
 ner. That would take place before the 
 steamer sailed ! 
 
 But the dinner would now take care of it- 
 self, thanks to his experience on the train. 
 To-day was Friday. He would make an 
 ass of himself at the banquet and then go 
 directly to the steamer, and in a few hours 
 he would be detached from most of his sub- 
 lunary troubles, for a week at least, and it 
 
244 Swapped Languages 
 
 might turn out that Howard Benton would 
 have no further use for his language, and 
 would be willing to settle for its loss on a 
 money basis .which, thanks to the legacy, it 
 would be perfectly possible to meet. 
 
 He kept as quiet as possible, and went over 
 and over in his mind the speech of the even- 
 ing. He had luncheon served in his room, 
 and went from the hotel to the banquet hall 
 without speaking to a soul, paying the cab- 
 man with a wealth of dumb show. 
 
 " Poor feller," said the latter, as he got 
 up on the box after depositing M. Albertin 
 at the door of the Harlan3 House. " It's a 
 turribil afflicshin to be widout visible manes 
 of spache." 
 
 Luckily M. Albertin was a little late Tor 
 the dinner, and was seated between two 
 slightly deaf men who were perfectly willing 
 to do all the talking themselves, and it was 
 not until he was called upon for a speech 
 that he had to do more than respond in 
 monosyllables. 
 
Swapped Languages 245 
 
 He rose in his seat and all eyes were fixed 
 upon him. As has been hinted, he already 
 had a New York reputation as a witty and 
 singularly facile after-dinner speaker whose 
 matter was as good as his manner, and his 
 language more felicitous than either. 
 
 He slowly scanned the expectant diners 
 with a preternaturally grave face. 
 
 " Chairman an' Gents all, ah dere! " (as- 
 tonishment and puzzled laughter). " I have 
 been ast ter respon' to der toas' ' Der Purerty 
 of Englush.' Gee, dat's a hot bunch of 
 grapes fer me to han'le, but it's up to me, an' 
 I s'pose I'm nex'. 
 
 " Der mos' of der gang er spiketails here 
 knows dat I'm a Frenchy. Me farder an' 
 me mudder was bot' natives of der red-hot 
 city an' in me chil'hood on'y der pures' 
 French dat could be got was inserted in me 
 talk box be means of me ears. Ware an' 
 how I got der same twist on Englush it 
 wouldn' interes' youse ter hear ter-night, 
 but I got me hooks on it wit'out damergin' 
 
246 Swapped Languages 
 
 der goods as youse kin see an' I'm here 
 ter-night ter give youse points on der 
 preservation of it. No, not Five Points, as 
 der feelintropical gent at me left has ser- 
 gested. Five Points is a dead issue. 
 
 " Mos' of us gits der accent in our yout' 
 dat we're go'n' ter carry to der undertaker's 
 garden. Dere has been cases of people 
 loinin' ter talk like a Harvard perfesser 
 w'en deir boyhood hadn' been foun' guilty of 
 grammar, but it's not comm'n. Derefore der 
 bes' way fer a kid ter fill his nut full of a 
 choice an' hollerday assortment of Englush 
 is to hear nut'n' but der mos' carefully se- 
 lectet bran's all t'rough his kidhood." 
 
 Already his speech was a success. This 
 Frenchman who could take the salient points 
 of tough speech and caricature them to befit 
 his use and do it, too, with such an uncon- 
 scious air, was worth a half-dozen ordinary 
 pedantic talkers. Here and there were 
 shocked faces, but these mostly belonged to 
 men who lived too far from New York to 
 
Swapped Languages 247 
 
 recognize the dialect. The younger men 
 hailed it with delight and it is to be feared 
 that it would have a deteriorating effect 
 upon their own accents, so imitative are the 
 young in great cities. 
 
 " Many Americ'ns " (he went on) " are 
 fon' of der use of slang. Dey t'ink it's 
 smart, an* dey put inter use a woid dat is 
 hot from der griddle. But woids, like 
 Rome, can't be built in a day, an' it's much 
 better to use on'y dose dat c'n show der 
 badge of der fifty-year-ol' dictionaries, an' 
 w'y? Because it's a t'ousan' times better 
 to put a langwidge on stilts dan on crutches. 
 
 " So, in conclusion, lemme say, T'ink bee- 
 fore youse speak, an' let yer speech be 
 golden, an' der bes' way to make it so is to 
 keep silence fer silence is golden. See? 
 An' dat lets me out." 
 
 After the speech was finished certain 
 members of the Chaucer Society wanted to 
 carry M. Albertin around the room on their 
 shoulders, but with many shrugs and point- 
 
248 Swapped Languages! 
 
 ings to the cablegram and the clock, he made 
 his way to the coat-room and thence to the 
 steamer, whither he had caused his baggage 
 to be sent. 
 
 Next morning, just before he sailed, he 
 bought a bundle of morning papers, fully 
 prepared to be held up to ridicule by the re- 
 porters; but to his real astonishment he 
 found that he had become famous in a single 
 night. Some reported the speech in full, 
 and M. Albertin was amused to see how the 
 spellings of the dialect differed. All united 
 in saying that as an inverted object lesson 
 on purity of diction it was one of the happi- 
 est efforts in the annals of post-prandial elo- 
 quence and worthy of the occasion. 
 
 "Ah, well," thought M. Albertin, "I 
 leave in time. I have known when to stop, 
 and my reputation will increase in the retro- 
 spect. I could not have kept it up." And 
 then the steamer swung out and he imme- 
 diately retired to his cabin, for he was not a 
 good sailor. 
 
Swapped Languages 249 
 
 When he reached France he acted like an 
 honorable man. He first sought out Howard 
 Benton and told him what had happened to 
 his tongue. As he said, " I can't do nut'n 
 but pay yer fer it an' ask fer me own chin- 
 music back. Youse had a good grip on 
 French beefore, so youse won't fall down, 
 but wit'out me French I'm a dead farmer 
 over here." 
 
 Howard Benton saw the justice of his 
 plea and settled with him for the loss of his 
 language on a basis of ten thousand dollars. 
 And then, being robbed of his pure French, 
 he went to work to learn it in the ordinary 
 way, and in a year's time he had con- 
 quered it. 
 
 Returning voyagers often brought to M. 
 Albertin reports of the esteem as an imper- 
 sonating speaker that he had gained in New 
 York, but he was too wise to return, as he 
 really had not the slightest native skill in 
 rendering dialects and was quite content to 
 rest on his easily acquired laurels. 
 
250 Swapped Languages 
 
 What might have been a great disaster to 
 him and to Mr. Benton had happily been 
 averted by the news in the telegram. If 
 Benton had been less of a cosmopolite 
 which is a euphemism for one whose love 
 of country has abated he might have 
 longed to go home and talk the speech of his 
 youth, and then his uncouth dialect would 
 have been a hindrance to him, but he rarely 
 used it, as most of his friends were French- 
 men. 
 
 Now and then, in a spirit of mis- 
 chief, he aired it in order to test French- 
 men's ears, and once he visited the Salon 
 in company with a venerable French jurist 
 and, pausing before one of Whistler's paint- 
 ings, he said : " Soy, Munseer Chartrocce, 
 dere's a ' siffleuse ' dat may pipe off der key 
 now an' den, but ully gee ! who wouldn' like 
 to swipe his pipes? " 
 
 And M. Chartreuse replied in French: 
 
 " Do you know that I can understand the 
 Britons when they speak English, but while 
 
Swapped Languages 251 
 
 your American has a droll sound, it is like 
 German to me. I fancy it has the strength 
 of a growing tongue." 
 
 " Right you are, Munseer," said Benton. 
 " It's growin' ter beat der ban'." 
 
While the Automobile Ran 
 Down 
 
 A Christmas Extravaganza 
 
 IT was a letter to encourage a hesitating 
 lover, and certainly Orville Thornton, 
 author of "Thoughts for Non-Thinkers/' 
 came under that head. He received it on a 
 Tuesday, and immediately made up his 
 mind to declare his intentions to Miss An- 
 nette Badeau that evening, 
 
 But perhaps the contents of the letter will 
 help the reader to a better understanding of 
 the case. 
 
 DKAR ORVILLE: Miss Badeau sails unexpectedly 
 for Paris on the day after Christmas, her aunt 
 Madge having cabled her to come and visit her. 
 Won't you come to Christmas dinner ? I've invited 
 the Joe Burtons, and of course Mr. Marten will be 
 there, but no othersexcept Miss Badeau. 
 
 Dinner will be at sharp seven. Don't be late, al- 
 though I know you won't, you human time-table. 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 253 
 
 I do hope that Annette will not fall in love in 
 Paris. I wish that she would marry some nice New 
 Yorker and settle near me. 
 
 I've always thought that you have neglected mar- 
 riage shamefully. 
 
 Remember to-morrow night, and Annette sails on 
 Thursday. Wishing you a Merry Christmas, I am, 
 Your old friend, 
 
 HENRIETTA MARTEN. 
 
 Annette Badeau had come across the line 
 of Orville's vision three months before. She 
 was Mrs. Marten's niece, and had come from 
 the West to live with her aunt at just about 
 the time that the success of Thornton's book 
 made him think of marriage. 
 
 She was pretty and bright and expansive 
 in a Western way, and when Thornton met 
 her at one of the few afternoon teas that 
 he ever attended he fell in love with her. 
 When he learned that she was the niece of 
 his lifelong friend, Mrs. Marten, he sud- 
 denly discovered various reasons why he 
 should call at the Marten house once or twice 
 a week. 
 
 But a strange habit he had of putting off 
 
254 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 delightful moments in order to enjoy antic- 
 ipation to its fullest extent had caused him 
 to refrain from disclosing the state of his 
 heart to Miss Badeau, and so that young 
 woman, who had fallen in love with him 
 even before she knew that he was the gifted 
 author of "Thoughts for Non-Thinkers," 
 often wished to herself that she could in 
 some way give him a hint of the state of her 
 heart. 
 
 Orville received Mrs. Marten's letter on 
 Christmas Eve, and its contents made him 
 plan a schedule for the next evening's run- 
 ning. No power on earth could keep him 
 away from that dinner, and he immediately 
 sent a telegram of regret to the Bell-wether 
 of the Wolves' Club, although he had been 
 anticipating the Christmas gorge for a 
 month. 
 
 He also sent a messenger with a note of 
 acceptance to Mrs. Marten. . . . 
 
 Then he joined the crowd of persons who 
 always wait until Christmas Eve before buy- 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 255 
 
 ing the presents that stern and unpleasant 
 duty makes it necessary to get. 
 
 It would impart a characteristic Christmas 
 flavor if it were possible to cover the ground 
 with snow, and to make the air merry with 
 the sound of flashing belts of silvery sleigh- 
 bells on prancing horses; but although 
 Christmases in stories are always snowy and 
 frosty, and sparkling with ice-crystals, 
 Christmases in real life are apt to be damp 
 and humid. Let us be thankful that this 
 Christmas was merely such a one as would 
 not give a ghost of a reason for a trip to 
 Florida. The mercury stood at 58, and even 
 light overcoats were not things to be put on 
 without thought. 
 
 Orville knew what he wished to get and 
 where it was sold, and so he had an advan- 
 tage over ninety-nine out of a hundred of 
 the anxious-looking shoppers who were 
 scuttling from shop to shop, burdened with 
 bundles, and making the evening the worst 
 in the year for tired sales-girls and -men. 
 
256 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 Orville's present was not exactly Christ- 
 massy, but he hoped that Miss Badeau would 
 like it, and it was certainly the finest one 
 on the velvet tray. Orville, it will be seen, 
 was of a sanguine disposition. 
 
 He did not hang up his stocking; he had 
 not done that for several years; but he did 
 dream that Santa Claus brought him a beau- 
 tiful doll from Paris, and just as he was say- 
 ing, " There must be some mistake/' the 
 doll turned into Miss Badeau and said: 
 " No, I'm for you. Merry Christmas ! " 
 Then he woke up and thought how foolish 
 and yet how fascinating dreams are. 
 
 Christmas morning was spent in polish- 
 ing up an old essay on " The Value of the 
 Summer as an Invigorator." It had long 
 been a habit of his to work over old stuff on 
 his holidays, and if he was about to marry 
 he would need to sell everything he had 
 of a literary-marketable nature. But this 
 morning a vision of a lovely girl who on 
 the morrow was going to sail thousands of 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 257 
 
 miles away came between him and the page, 
 and at last he tossed the manuscript into a 
 drawer and went out for a walk. 
 
 It was the draggiest Christmas he had 
 ever known, and the warmest. He dropped 
 in at the club, but there was hardly anyone 
 there; still, he did manage to play a few 
 games of billiards, and at last the clock an- 
 nounced that it was time to go home and 
 dress for the Christmas dinner. 
 
 It was half-past five when he left the club. 
 It was twenty minutes to six when he slipped 
 on a piece of orange-peel and measured his 
 length on the sidewalk. He was able to rise 
 and hobble up the steps on one foot, but the 
 hall-boy had to help him to the elevator and 
 thence to his room. He dropped upon his 
 bed, feeling white about the gills. 
 
 Orville was a most methodical man. He 
 planned his doings days ahead and seldom 
 changed his schedule. But it seemed likely 
 that unless he was built of sterner stuff than 
 most of the machines called men, he would 
 
258 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 not run out of the round-house to-night. 
 His fall had given his foot a nasty wrench. 
 
 Some engineers, to change the simile, 
 would have argued that the engine was off 
 the track, and that therefore the train was 
 not in running condition; but Orville merely 
 changed engines. His own steam having 
 been cut off, he ordered an automobile for 
 twenty minutes to seven; and after he had 
 bathed and bandaged his ankle he deter- 
 mined, with a grit worthy of the cause that 
 brought it forth, to attend that dinner even 
 if he paid for it in the hospital, with An- 
 nette as special nurse. 
 
 Old Mr. Nickerson, who lived across the 
 hall, had heard of his misfortune, and called 
 to proffer his services. 
 
 " Shall I help you get to bed? " said he. 
 
 " I am not due in bed, Mr. Nickerson, for 
 many hours; but if you will give me a few 
 fingers o<f your excellent old Scotch, with the 
 bouquet of smoked herring, I will go on 
 dressing for dinner." 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 259 
 
 " Dear boy," said the old gentleman, al- 
 most tearfully, " it is impossible for you to 
 venture on your foot with such a sprain. It 
 is badly swollen.'* 
 
 " Mr. Nickerson, my heart has received a 
 worse wrench than my foot has, therefore I 
 go out to dine." At sound of which enig- 
 matical declaration Mr. Nickerson hurried 
 off for the old Scotch, and in a few minutes 
 Orville's faintness had passed off, and with 
 help from the amiable old man he got into 
 his evening clothes with the exception of 
 his left foot, which was incased in a flowered 
 slipper of sunset red. 
 
 " Now, my dear Mr. Nickerson, I'm a 
 thousand times obliged to you, and if I can 
 get you to help me hop downstairs I will 
 wait for the automobile on the front stoop." 
 (Orville had been born in Brooklyn, where 
 they still have "stoops.") " I'm on time 
 so far." 
 
 But if Orville was on time, the automo- 
 bile was not, the driver not being a meth- 
 
260 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 odical man; and when it did come, it was all 
 the motorman could do to stop it. It seemed 
 restive. 
 
 " You ought to shut off on the oats," said 
 Orville gayly, from his seat on the lowest 
 step of the " stoop." 
 
 The picture of a gentleman in immaculate 
 evening clothes, with the exception of a 
 somewhat rococo carpet slipper, seemed to 
 amuse some street children who were pass- 
 ing. If they could have followed the 
 " auto " they would have been even more 
 diverted, but such was not to be their for- 
 tune. Mr. Nickerson helped his friend into 
 the vehicle, and the driver started at a lively 
 rate for Fifth Avenue. 
 
 Orville lived in Seventeenth Street, near 
 Fifth Avenue; Mrs. Marten lived on Fifth 
 Avenue, near Fortieth Street. Thirty- 
 eighth Street and Thirty-ninth Street were 
 reached and passed without further incident 
 than the fact that Orville's ankle pained him 
 almost beyond the bearing -point; but, as it 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 261 
 
 is not the history of a sprained ankle that I 
 am writing, if the vehicle had stopped at 
 Mrs. Marten's my pen would not have been 
 set to paper. 
 
 But the motor-wagon did not even 
 pause. It kept on as if the Harlem River 
 were to be its next stop. 
 
 Orville had stated the number of his des- 
 tination with distinctness, and he now rang 
 the annunciator and asked the driver why 
 he did not stop. 
 
 Calmly, in the even tones that clear- 
 headed persons use when they wish to in- 
 spire confidence, the chauffeur said : " Don't 
 be alarmed, sir, but I can't stop. There's 
 something out of kilter, and I may have to 
 run some time before I can get the hang of 
 it. There's no danger as long as I can 
 steer." 
 
 " Can't you slacken up in front of the 
 house, so that I can jump ? " 
 
 "With that foot, sir? Impossible, and, 
 anyway, I can't slacken up. I think we'll 
 
262 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 stop soon. I don't know when it was 
 charged, but a gentleman had it before I was 
 sent out with it. It won't be long, I think. 
 I'll run around the block, and maybe I can 
 stop the next time." 
 
 Orville groaned for a twofold reason: 
 his ankle was jumping with pain, and he 
 would lose the pleasure of taking Miss 
 Badeau in to dinner, for it was a minute 
 past seven. 
 
 He sat and gazed at his carpet slipper, 
 and thought of the daintily shod feet of the 
 adorable Annette, as the horseless carriage 
 wound around the block. As they ap- 
 proached the house again, Orville imagined 
 that they were slackening up, and he 
 opened the door to be ready. It was now 
 three minutes past seven, and dinner had be- 
 gun beyond a doubt. The driver saw the 
 door swing open, and said: "Don't jump, 
 sir. I can't stop yet. I'm afraid there's a 
 good deal of run in the machine." 
 
 Orville looked up at the brownstone front 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 263 
 
 of the house with an agonized stare, as if he 
 would pull Mrs. Marten to the window by 
 the power of his eyes. But Mrs. Marten 
 was not in the habit of pressing her nose 
 against the pane in an anxious search for 
 tardy guests. In fact, it may be asserted 
 with confidence that it is not a Fifth Avenue 
 custom. 
 
 At that moment the puree was being 
 served to Mrs. Marten's guests, and to pretty 
 Annette Badeau, who really looked discon- 
 solate with the vacant chair beside her. 
 
 " Something has happened to Orville," 
 said Mrs. Marten, looking over her shoulder 
 toward the hall door, " for he is punctual- 
 ity itself." 
 
 Mr. Joe Burton was a short, red-faced 
 little man, with black mutton-chop whiskers 
 of the style of '76, and a way of looking in 
 the most cheerful manner upon the dark 
 side of things. " Dessay he's been run 
 over," said he choppily. " Wonder anyone 
 escapes. Steam-, gasoline-, electric-, horse- 
 
264 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 flesh-, man-propelled juggernauts. Ought 
 to be prohibited." 
 
 Annette could not repress a shudder. 
 Her aunt saw it, and said : " Orville will 
 never be run over. He's too wide-awake. 
 But it is very singular." 
 
 " He may have been detained by an order 
 for a story," said Mr. Marten, also with the 
 amiable purpose of consoling Annette. For 
 both of the Martens knew how she felt to- 
 ward Mr. Thornton. 
 
 " Maybe he's lying on the front sidewalk, 
 hit by a sign or bitten by a dog. Dogs ought 
 not to be allowed in the city; they only add 
 to the dangers of metropolitan existence," 
 jerked out Mr. Burton, in blithe tones, 
 totally unaware that his remarks might 
 worry Annette. 
 
 " Dear me ! I wish you'd send someone out 
 to see, Aunt Henrietta." 
 
 " Nonsense, Annette. Mr. Burton is al- 
 ways an alarmist. But, Marie, you might 
 step to the front door and look down the 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 265 
 
 avenue. Mr. Thornton is always so punc- 
 tual that it is peculiar." 
 
 Marie went to the front door and looked 
 down the street just as Thornton, gesticu- 
 lating wildly, disappeared around the corner 
 of Fortieth Street. 
 
 " Oh, why didn't she come sooner! " said 
 he aloud to himself. " At least they would 
 know why I'm late. And she'll be gone be- 
 fore I come round again. Was there ever 
 such luck? Oh for a good old horse that 
 could stop, a dear old nag tfiat would pause 
 and not go round and round like a blamed 
 carrousel ! Say, driver, isn't there any way 
 of stopping this cursed thing? Can't you 
 run it into a fence or a house? I'll take the 
 risk." 
 
 " But I won't, sir. These automobiles are 
 very powerful, and one of them turned over 
 a newsstand not long since and upset the 
 stove in it, and nearly burned up the news- 
 man. But there's a plenty of time for it to 
 stop. I don't have to hurry back." 
 
266 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 " That's lucky," said Orville. " I thought 
 maybe you'd have to leave me alone with 
 the thing. But, say, she may run all night. 
 Here I am due at a dinner. I'm tired of 
 riding. This is no way to spend Christmas. 
 Slacken up, and I'll jump when I get around 
 there again." 
 
 " I tell you I can't slacken up, and she's 
 going ten miles an hour. You'll break your 
 leg if you jump, and then where'll you be? " 
 
 " I might be on their sidewalk, and then 
 you could ring their bell, and they'd take 
 me in." 
 
 " And have you suing the company for 
 damages? Oh, no, sir. I'm sorry, but it 
 can't be helped. The company won't charge 
 you for the extra time." 
 
 " No, I don't think it will," said Thorn- 
 ton, savagely, the more so as his foot gave a 
 twinge of pain just then. 
 
 " There was no one in sight, ma'am," said 
 Marie when she returned. 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 267 
 
 " Probably he had an order for a story 
 and got absorbed in it and forgot us," said 
 Mr. Marten; but this conjecture did not 
 seem to suit Annette, for it did not fit what 
 she knew of his character. 
 
 " Possibly he was dropped in an elevator," 
 said Mr. Burton. " Strain on elevators, 
 particularly these electrical ones, is tre- 
 mendous. Some of 'em have got to drop. 
 And a dropping elevator is no respecter of 
 persons. You and I may be in one when it 
 drops. Probably he was. Sure, I hope not, 
 but as he is known to be the soul of punctual- 
 ity, we must put forward some accident to 
 account for his lateness. People aren't al- 
 ways killed in elevator accidents. Are they, 
 my dear ? " 
 
 11 Mr. Burton," said his wife, " I wish you 
 would give your morbid thoughts a rest. 
 Don't you see that Annette is sensitive? " 
 
 " Sensitive with someone dying every 
 minute? It's merely because she happens to 
 know Orville that his death would be un- 
 
268 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 pleasant. If a man in the Klondike were to 
 read of it in the paper he wouldn't remem- 
 ber it five minutes. But I don't say he was in 
 an elevator. Maybe someone sent him an 
 infernal machine for a Christmas present. 
 May have been blown up in a manhole or 
 jumped from his window to avoid flames. 
 Why, there are a million ways to account 
 for his absence." 
 
 Marie had opened the parlor windows a 
 moment before, as the house was warm, and 
 now there came the humming of a rapidly 
 moving automobile. Mingled with it they 
 heard distinctly, although faintly, " Mr. 
 Marten, here I go." 
 
 It gave them all an uncanny feeling. The 
 fish was left untouched, and for a moment 
 silence reigned. Then Mr. Marten sprang 
 from the table and ran to the front door. 
 He got there just in time to see an auto- 
 mobile dashing around a corner and to hear 
 a distinctly articulated imprecation in the 
 well-known voice of Orville Thornton. 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 269 
 
 In evening clothes and bareheaded, Mr. 
 Marten ran to Fortieth Street, and saw the 
 vehicle approaching Sixth Avenue, its oc- 
 cupant still hurling strong language upon 
 the evening air. Mr. Marten is something 
 of a sprinter, although he has passed the fifty 
 mark, and he resolved to solve the mystery. 
 But before he had covered a third of the 
 block in Fortieth Street he saw that he could 
 not hope to overtake the runaway automo- 
 bile, so he turned and ran back to the house, 
 rightly surmising that the driver would 
 circle the block. 
 
 When he reached his own doorstep, badly 
 winded, he saw the automobile coming full 
 tilt up the avenue from Thirty-ninth Street. 
 
 The rest of the diners were on the steps. 
 " I think he's coming," he panted. " The 
 driver must be intoxicated." 
 
 A moment later they were treated to the 
 spectacle of Orville, still hurling impreca- 
 tions as he wildly gesticulated with both 
 arms. Several boys were trying to keep up 
 
270 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 with the vehicle, but the pace was too swift. 
 No policeman had yet discovered its rotary 
 course. 
 
 As Orville came near the Marten mansion 
 he cried " Ah-h-h ! " in the relieved tones of 
 one who has been falling for half an hour, 
 and at last sees ground in sight. 
 
 " What's the matter? " shouted Mr. Mar- 
 ten wonderingly, as the carriage, instead of 
 stopping, sped 'along the roadway. 
 
 " Sprained foot. Can't walk. Auto out 
 of order. Can't stop. Good-by till I come 
 round again. Awful hungry. Merry 
 Christmas!" 
 
 " Ah ha ! " said Joe Burton. " I told you 
 that it was an accident. Sprained his foot 
 and lost power over vehicle. I don't see the 
 connection, but let us be thankful that he 
 isn't under the wheels, with a broken neck, 
 or winding round and round the axle." 
 
 " But what's to be done ? " said Mrs. Mar- 
 ten. " He says he's hungry." 
 
 " Tell you what! " said Mr. Burton, in his 
 
I THFNK HE'S COMING! "P. 269. 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 271 
 
 explosive way. " Put some food on a plate, 
 and when the carriage comes round again 
 I'll jump aboard, and he can eat as he 
 travels." 
 
 " He loves puree of celery," said Mrs. 
 Marten. 
 
 " Very well. Put some in a clean lard- 
 pail or a milk-pail. Little out of the ordi- 
 nary, but so is the accident, and he can't help 
 his hunger. Hunger is no disgrace. I 
 didn't think he'd ever eat soup again, to tell 
 the truth. I was making up my mind 
 whether a wreath or a harp would be better." 
 
 " Oh, you are so morbid, Mr. Burton," 
 said his wife, while Mrs. Marten told the 
 maid to get a pail and put some puree into 
 it. 
 
 When Thornton came around again he 
 met Mr. Marten near Thirty-ninth Street. 
 
 " Open the door,. Orville, and Joe Burton 
 will get aboard with some soup. You must 
 be starved." 
 
 " There's nothing like exercise for get- 
 
272 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 ting up an appetite. I'll be ready for Bur- 
 ton," said Orville. " Awfully sorry I can't 
 stop and talk; but I'll see you again in a 
 minute or two." 
 
 He opened the door as he spoke, and then, 
 to the great delight of at least a score of 
 people who had realized that the automobile 
 was running away, the rubicund and stout 
 Joe Burton, a pail of puree in one hand and 
 some table cutlery and silverware and a nap- 
 kin in the other, made a dash at the vehicle, 
 and with help from Orville effected an en- 
 trance. 
 
 " Merry Christmas ! " said Orville. 
 
 " Merry Christmas ! Awfully sorry, old 
 man, but it might be worse. Better drink it 
 out of the pail. They gave me a knife and 
 fork, but they neglected to put in a spoon or 
 a dish. I thought that you were probably 
 killed, but I never imagined this. Miss 
 Badeau was terribly worked up. I think 
 that she had decided on white carnations. 
 Nice girl. You could easily jump, old man, 
 
PH 
 
 M 
 
 W 
 
 A 
 
 o ^ 
 
 o ^ 
 
 ^5 J 
 i i 
 
 > w 
 P5 J 
 H 
 
 g > 
 
 c/5 
 >1 
 O 
 PQ 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 273 
 
 if you hadn't sprained your foot. Hurt 
 much?" 
 
 " Like the devil ; but I'm glad it worried 
 Miss Badeau. No, I don't mean that. But 
 you know." 
 
 " Yes, I know/' said Burton, with a soci- 
 able smile. " Mrs. Marten told me. Nice 
 girl. Let her in next time. Unusual thing, 
 you know. People are very apt to jump 
 from a runaway vehicle, but it seldom takes 
 up passengers. Let her get in, and you can 
 explain matters to her. You see, she sails 
 early in the morning, and you haven't much 
 time. You can tell her what a nice fellow 
 you are, you know, and I'm sure you'll have 
 Mrs. Marten's blessing. Here's where I get 
 out." 
 
 With an agility admirable in one of his 
 stoutness, Mr. Burton leaped to the street 
 and ran up the steps to speak to Miss 
 Badeau. Orville could see her blush, but 
 there was no time for her to become a pas- 
 senger that trip, and the young man once 
 
274 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 more made the circuit of the block, quite 
 alone, but strangely happy. He had never 
 ridden with Annette, except once on the 
 elevated road, and then both Mr. and Mrs. 
 Marten were of the company. 
 
 Round sped the motor, and when the Mar- 
 tens' appeared in sight, Annette was on the 
 sidewalk with a covered dish in her hand 
 and a look of excited expectancy on her face 
 that added a hundredfold to its charms. 
 
 " Here you are only ten cents a ride. 
 Merry Christmas ! " shouted Orville gayly, 
 and leaned half out of the automobile to 
 catch her. It was a daring, almost an im- 
 possible jump, yet Annette made it without 
 accident, and, flushed and excited, sat down 
 in front of Mr. Thornton without spilling 
 her burden, which proved to be sweetbreads. 
 
 " Miss Badeau Annette, I hadn't ex- 
 pected it to turn out this way, but of course 
 your aunt doesn't care, or she wouldn't have 
 let you come. We're really in no danger. 
 This driver has had more experience dodg- 
 
The Automobile Ran Down 275 
 
 ing- teams in this last hour than he'd get in 
 an ordinary year. They tell me you're going 
 to Europe early to-morrow, to leave all your 
 friends. Now, I've something very impor- 
 tant to say to you before you go. No, 
 thanks, I don't want anything more. That 
 puree was very filling. I've sprained my 
 ankle, and I need to be very quiet for a week 
 or two, perhaps until this machine runs 
 down, but at the end of that time would 
 you " 
 
 Orville hesitated, and Annette blushed 
 sweetly. She set the sweetbreads down 
 upon the seat beside her. Orville had never 
 looked so handsome before to her eyes. 
 
 He hesitated. " Go on," said she. 
 
 " Would you be willing to go to Paris on 
 a bridal trip?" 
 
 Annette's answer was drowned in the 
 hurrah of the driver as the automobile, grad- 
 ually slackening, came to a full stop in front 
 of the Martens'. 
 
 But Orville read her lips, and as he handed 
 
276 The Automobile Ran Down 
 
 his untouched sweetbreads to Mrs, Burton, 
 and his sweetheart to her uncle, his face 
 wore a seraphically happy expression; and 
 when Mr. Marten and the driver helped him 
 up the steps at precisely eight o'clock, An- 
 nette's hand sought his, and it was a jolly 
 party that sat down to a big though some- 
 what dried-up Rhode Island turkey. 
 
 " Marriage also is an accident," said Mr. 
 Burton. 
 
Veritable Quidors 
 
 I WAS a stranger in that part of the 
 country and yet I had managed to have 
 extra- good luck at both shooting and 
 fishing, and that without a guide. I had 
 shipped my spoils to Boston and was walk- 
 ing to Panscot in order to see what was said 
 to be one of the best examples of ecclesiasti- 
 cal architecture of the Colonial type to be 
 found in New England. 
 
 Thanksgiving Day was but a few days dis- 
 tant, and the air was redolent of autumnal 
 spices. A more than ordinarily moist sum- 
 mer had kept many of the trees in full leaf- 
 age, and maples and hickories looked proud 
 to be flaunting their red and yellow banners 
 so late in November. 
 
 My way, which had run along a wood 
 road, suddenly opened upon a highway in 
 
 277 
 
278 Veritable Quidors 
 
 good repair for that section of the country, 
 and yet the tufts of grass between the ruts 
 gave evidence that it was not traveled over- 
 much. My chance of obtaining a lift to 
 Panscot was not a good one. 
 
 I consulted my pocket compass and turned 
 to the right, breaking into a long stride that 
 I might reach my journey's end before night- 
 fall. 
 
 As I walked I heard the crunch of heavy 
 wheels behind me, and, looking back, I saw 
 an old-fashioned and very dilapidated omni- 
 bus lumbering down upon me. It was drawn 
 by two " rat-tailed, ewe-necked bays " and 
 was driven by Michael Angelo's Moses. Ah, 
 but he was a patriarchal fellow, and looked 
 like a leader in Israel, and yet he was Yankee 
 clear through. 
 
 As he came alongside he reined up and 
 said, " Going to Panscot? " 
 
 " If I don't get lost," said I. 
 
 " I can take you there for a half a dollar," 
 said he, and then added in an apologetic 
 
Veritable Quidors 279 
 
 tone : " Y' see, this is reg'ler stage rowte, 
 or I'd carry ye fer nuthin'." 
 
 " I shouldn't think it would pay if you 
 don't have any more passengers than you 
 have to-day," said I, glancing at the empty 
 'bus and then climbing up alongside the 
 driver. It is better to ride with a companion 
 than to walk alone. 
 
 He covered my legs with an ancient horse- 
 blanket, and as he clucked to the horses he 
 said, " It don't pay. Fact is, you can tell 
 your grandchildren, ef you ever git as far 's 
 that, that you rode on the last trip of the 
 Doddtown an' Panscot stage. That darned 
 new railroad has run me out of a living at 
 seventy- four years of age." 
 
 I expressed interest in his bit of news, and 
 encouraged him to go on, and after cutting 
 off a generous slice of Virgin Leaf and re- 
 marking that he chewed tobacco for the 
 " teethache," he told me his history, which 
 was mournful enough. 
 
 " Ef Colonel Shaw was alive to-day I'd 
 
280 Veritable Quidors 
 
 be retired on a pension jes' as soon as they 
 wound up the affairs of the company, but the 
 Colonel died a couple of years ago, an* his 
 pardner, Lemuel Dan'elson, is business clean 
 through, an' when he hands me my eight 
 dollars endin' up this week, he'll walk off 
 without sayin' a word, jes' as ef I hadn't 
 drove on this rowte fer twenty-five years, 
 an' drove this very stage fer twenty. After 
 I get my eight dollars I'll drive the stage 
 down to my house, an' I'll tell Rhody she's 
 my wife thet she can have a noo henhouse 
 on wheels, an' then I'll turn the hosses out in 
 the lot, an* my life-work '11 be done, an' 
 nuthin' but the stage an' hosses to show 
 fer 't." 
 
 " How do you happen to own the stage 
 and the horses? " I asked. 
 
 " Well, Lemuel Dan'elson, he owed me a 
 month's wages about six months ago, an' 
 fin'ly he says, says he, * You can have the 
 hosses an* the stage ef you'll give me five 
 dollars to boot, an' we'll call it square.' 
 
Veritable Quidors 281 
 
 Y' see, the bosses aint wuth five dollars 
 apiece, stric'ly speakin', an' I knoo the stage 
 wouldn't hold out many centuries more, but I 
 took him up, fer I see the finish of every- 
 thing then. I knoo this railroad was goin' 
 through, an' I wanted the stage an' the 
 bosses where I could look arter them. Stage 
 remin's me of the ' One-Hoss Shay ' my boy 
 used to recite when he was at school. It '11 
 drop to pieces all to once. Ever read it? 
 Writ by Oliver Wendell Holmes, of Bost'n." 
 
 I told him that I had read it, and that as 
 soon as I had seen the team, they had re- 
 minded me of the deacon's horse. 
 
 He fetched a hearty laugh and clucked 
 lovingly to the superannuated pair, and they 
 pricked up their ears and struck a four-mile- 
 an-hour gait as willingly as if they had been 
 colts. 
 
 " Stage was sightly enough when the 
 Colonel brought it up from Noo York. My 
 ol* woman has always kept the little picters 
 clean " 
 
282 Veritable Quidors 
 
 Here he paused and looked down through 
 a small hole in the front end of the stage, 
 evidently a place through which fares were 
 handed. 
 
 " By gummy/' said he, " I can't turn it 
 into a henhouse 'less I take out them picters. 
 Whoa-p!" 
 
 The stage came to a sudden stop because 
 the right-hand tug had snapped. The ven- 
 erable driver leaped nimbly off the seat and, 
 taking from his pocket an awl and some 
 pieces of copper wire, he proceeded to couple 
 the two parts of the trace quite as if it were 
 an ordinary thing. And I now noticed that 
 it was an ordinary thing, and that the leather 
 harness was reinforced with copper wires in 
 a dozen places. 
 
 While he was tinkering at the harness I 
 went back to take a look at the " picters/' 
 wondering what he meant. I found them 
 to be panel pictures set above the windows 
 and in the swinging door at the back. There 
 were perhaps a dozen or more, and they 
 
Veritable Quidors 283 
 
 might have been painted by some disciple of 
 Watteau, so dainty were the conceptions and 
 so harmonious and decorative the coloring". 
 
 " Where did you say that stage came 
 from? " said I after we had taken up our 
 journey again. 
 
 " From Noo York. Colonel Shaw went 
 down there jes' after they quit runnin' stages 
 on Broadway an' took up with hoss cars, an' 
 he bought two of 'em, but the other one got 
 afoul of the railroad down to Turner's 
 Crossing about five years ago, an', as I tole 
 my ol' woman at the time, thet was the las' 
 stage of the perceedings. Warn't more'n 
 slivers left. Before thet, Jed. Huit used to 
 drive, startin' from Doddtown when I left 
 Panscot, an' turn about, but he got his arm 
 broke an* both the bosses was kilt, an' the 
 Colonel, he retired Jed. on a pension, an' I 
 was left to do the hull business. Like the 
 picters?" 
 
 " Why, they're worth framing," said I. 
 "They're little gems." 
 
284 Veritable Quidors 
 
 " That's what lots of folks has said. I be- 
 lieve they call 'em kromios. Well, we'll put 
 'em in the parlor jes' ez they are." 
 
 Here the old fellow suddenly changed the 
 subject by looking around at me quizzically 
 and saying, " Don't know of a likely place in 
 the city fer a young feller like me thet aint 
 afraid of work, do yer ? " 
 
 I hardly knew how to take his question, 
 jocose though its intention was, and I said 
 nothing for a moment. Somehow it struck 
 me as pathetic. My companion was silent, 
 except for whistling a bar of the " Arkansaw 
 Traveler " over and over with a peculiar in- 
 drawing and exhaling of the breath that sus- 
 tained the tone indefinitely. 
 
 " Can't you farm it? " said I, just for the 
 sake of saying something. 
 
 " Farms aint overproductive in winter 
 hereabouts," said he dryly, looking at me 
 from under his shaggy eyebrows. " No, I 
 can't farm it, an* I have only a couple of 
 acres, anyhow. Y* see, our boy went West 
 
Veritable Quidors 285 
 
 to make his fortune, an' I sold pretty much 
 all the land I had to git him started, an' he 
 married out there, but somehow the money 
 got soaked up in one er them dry times in 
 Kansas, an' his wife died, leavin' him a little 
 tot, an' fin'ly he come home with the con- 
 sumption, an' ma she baby'd him an' done 
 what she could with herbs an' some of these 
 here paytent med'cines, but it warn't no use, 
 an' we had to give him up. An' the little 
 girl she done the best she could to take his 
 place in his ma's heart, but of course it 
 warn't quite the same. So ther's jes' us 
 three an' me out of a job an' Thanksgiv- 
 ing nex' week." 
 
 I ventured to say that he had not much to 
 be thankful for, but he laid his hand on my 
 knee impressively and said: 
 
 " Don't say that. My boy is better off 
 than ef he was sufferin' here. An' Rhody, 
 she enjoys better health than most people at 
 seventy-two, an' little Becky, she's sunshine 
 all the time, wet weather or dry. Ef I had 
 
286 Veritable Quidors 
 
 some money laid by to carry her along until 
 some feller gives her a home of her own I 
 wouldn't fret a bit. Anyhow, 'taint ez ef 
 we was among strangers. We know every- 
 one an' everyone knows us. Folks around 
 here is neighborly. Aint a day passes thet 
 someone don't run in to chat with Rhody, 
 an' as fer the money part of it, we won't be 
 objec's of charity ez long ez I can use an ax 
 or a saw. We'll have plenty to thank the 
 Lord fer when Thanksgivin' comes 'round, 
 an' I dare say He'll raise up some way of 
 pervidin' fer Becky ef we're called away 
 while she's a child. But I'll miss these trips. 
 By gummy, the people I've met an' the talks 
 I've had! Why, I haint never be'n more'n 
 fifty miles from Panscot, but I feel's if I'd 
 be'n 'round the world. Swappin' talk is a 
 big eddication. I'll miss thet part of it the 
 wust way, but ther' aint no law ag'in my 
 hitchin' up my team ef it gits extry lonesome, 
 an' drivin' over the road on my own hook an' 
 jes' fer the company I may pick up. Nex' 
 
Veritable Quidors 287 
 
 summer, ef the Lord spares me, I cal'late to 
 do thet consider 'ble jes' fer the sake of seein' 
 the world." 
 
 And the way between Panscot and Dodd- 
 town is mostly through the woods. Yet I 
 doubt not that Ezra. Mathews had seen more 
 of the world on those monotonous trips than 
 many a globe trotter who travels with eyes 
 and ears hermetically sealed. 
 
 I saw the end of the Doddtown and Pan- 
 scot stage line; I was in at the death. My 
 fine old patriarch drove up to the Globe 
 Hotel and walked into the office with me 
 close behind. He handed in one dollar, a 
 passenger having ridden from Doddtown to 
 Hackettsville. Then he said to the thin- 
 nosed individual with a mouth like a bank 
 slit, and who proved to be Lemuel Daniel- 
 son : " Well, Lemuel, this winds up the 
 stage-coach business in these parts." 
 
 " Hmn, hmn," said Lemuel, much as if 
 Ezra had said we were likely to have a fair 
 day to-morrow. Then he put the dollar into 
 
288 Veritable Quidors 
 
 the drawer, took up eight dollars which he 
 handed to the driver with the remark, 
 " Wages/' and picked up his paper which he 
 had been reading. 
 
 We walked out of the hotel, but just as 
 we reached the veranda Lemuel called out in 
 a harsh, penetrating voice, " Come back, 
 Ezry." 
 
 Ezra went back, but I stayed outside. In 
 a minute he returned with a queer smile 
 hovering on his lips. 
 
 " Wanted me to give him a receipt in full 
 for all my wages up to to-day. Jes' suppose 
 the world was full of his kind " 
 
 I accompanied Ezra to his home, in the 
 stage. He said he wanted to show me a 
 letter written by John Hancock to his grand- 
 father. 
 
 John Hancock must have kept the ink 
 manufacturers busy furnishing the raw ma- 
 terial for his flamboyant but sturdy signa- 
 ture. There it was at the end of a letter, and 
 in spite of the lapse of time there seemed to 
 
Veritable Quidors 289 
 
 be ink enough in it to carry it well into the 
 next century. 
 
 But more interesting to me than the auto- 
 graph was the old stage driver's little grand- 
 daughter, Becky. She met her grandpa with 
 a kiss of welcome, and set me wondering if 
 the old man would be able to keep her out of 
 the poorhouse until she should be of age to 
 marry. I really did not wonder that he felt 
 he had much to be thankful for with such an 
 incarnation of sunshine in the house. 
 
 I also had the pleasure of meeting Mrs. 
 Mathews, and feeling that I knew her 
 through her husband, I told her that I was 
 sorry that the old stage line was broken up, 
 and then I regretted that I had mentioned 
 the subject, for her eyes filled. 
 
 I hate to see people cry, and so it would 
 seem did Miss Becky, for she sprang into her 
 grandmother's lap and began to wipe away 
 the tears with her clean little apron. Mrs. 
 Mathews excused herself on the plea that she 
 thought her buscuits were burning, and the 
 
290 Veritable Quidors 
 
 two went into the kitchen, while Mr. 
 Mathews asked me to come out and he would 
 show me the church in quest of which I had 
 come to Panscot. 
 
 He had left the team at his hitching-post, 
 and he now drove it into his barn, its shed, 
 where he unhitched the horses. 
 
 " There now," said he, giving each one a 
 slap on the flank, " take your vacation same 
 as city folks. I'm tired of drivin' ye, an' we 
 need the stage fer our chickens." 
 
 Whether the horses understood him or 
 not is open to question, but they certainly 
 understood one of their new prerogatives, 
 for they both ambled off down a lane to a bit 
 of meadow, and then lying down they tried 
 to roll over, and, after many attempts, one of 
 them succeeded, to his companion's impotent 
 envy. 
 
 The church proved to be all my fancy had 
 pictured it, and I hope that there is a village 
 protective association that will see to it that 
 no one defaces it with modern furbishings, 
 
Veritable Quidors 291 
 
 Its gracefully tapering white spire, its den- 
 tals and classic floral festoons, are reminders 
 of a time when people had unconscious good 
 taste, and had not become sophisticated 
 enough to be vulgar, although, to be sure, 
 they were decades away from that era of a 
 love for the arts that is now upon us. 
 
 I took my leave of the kindly old man with 
 sincere regret and went back to the Globe 
 Hotel, and the next morning I took an early 
 train for New York, to which I was going 
 for the first time in my life on a visit to a 
 landscape painter who has found out how to 
 be artistic and successful at the same time. 
 
 I supposed that the story of the old stage 
 driver was finished. I recognized him as a 
 picturesque personage, and I told my artist 
 friend all about him, because, although he 
 paints landscapes, he is interested in men. 
 For some reason, perhaps because I thought 
 that an " arrived " painter would not care to 
 hear about the decorations in an old New 
 York omnibus, I did not say anything about 
 
292 Veritable Quidors 
 
 the " kromios," but I did enlarge upon the 
 old man's loss of occupation and the pre- 
 cariousness of the future of the sunny little 
 Becky, and Maltby was all sympathy at once. 
 
 "Pretty country up there?" said he. 
 "Paintable?" 
 
 " Beautiful. Just your style, too. Do you 
 think of going up there next summer? " said 
 I, laughing, for I knew that Maltby reserved 
 his summers for the South of France. 
 
 " I was thinking that perhaps I might go 
 up there and board with the old chap." 
 
 " Well, I'm afraid that they are too old to 
 take kindly to boarders." 
 
 And then the matter dropped and we 
 talked of other things. 
 
 After dinner we were sitting in Maltby's 
 studio, smoking. He was talking about 
 early American artists and how some of 
 them who were in advance of their times 
 died unrecognized. " There's one old chap 
 who would have been a court favorite in the 
 days of Louis XIV., but as he happened to 
 
" HE HAD TO EKE OUT HIS LIVING." P. 293. 
 
Veritable Quidors 293 
 
 live in New York in the early part of this 
 century he had to eke out his living by paint- 
 ing panels in omnibuses and on fire engines. 
 His name was John Quidor. He worked on 
 canvas, too, you understand, but he relied 
 on his money for the landlady by doing 
 what many artists would have considered 
 plebeian work. Most of the stages were 
 sold and broken up long ago, but I was 
 lucky enough to get hold of one picture the 
 other day that I wouldn't part with for 
 $500. It's worthy of most of the old 
 Dutch genre painters." 
 
 I don't know why it didn't remind me of 
 my old stage driver's " kromios," but I 
 never thought a thing about them until 
 Maltby had taken me into his bedroom and 
 had showed me a panel of some village chil- 
 dren sliding on the ice. I almost yelled 
 when I saw it. 
 
 " Why, man, the old fellow up in Maine 
 has a dozen of those. His stage-coach 
 came from New York " 
 
294 Veritable Quidors 
 
 " What ! " cried Maltby, taking my hand 
 in his in his earnestness. " Are you sure? " 
 
 " Am I sure? Of course I am. There's 
 a scene in a park, a lady feeding her deer, 
 and a Maypole dance, and, let me see, and 
 a sleigh ride and the last load of hay and 
 two or three others, some of them illustrat- 
 ing scenes in Irving's sketches." 
 
 " Oh, George! " said Maltby, " carry me 
 home to die! There's a picture collector in 
 this town who told me that he would give 
 his eye teeth for one of those pictures. If 
 they are veritable Quidors that old man up 
 in Maine is about to sit down in a tub of 
 butter. I'll sell just one of them to Prid- 
 ham at a good price and I'll keep the rest. 
 Are you dead sure that they are the real 
 thing? When can we go up there? Does 
 he appreciate their value ? " 
 
 Maltby is an excitable fellow, and he was 
 all over the room while he was talking, now 
 looking at the little panel, and then putting 
 questions to me like shot out of a cannon. 
 
Veritable Quidors 295 
 
 I was willing 1 to stake my reputation on 
 the fact that the pictures in the omnibus 
 and the one that Maltby had were by the 
 same hand, and as a consequence the next 
 evening's express into Panscot bore the 
 artist and myself. . . . 
 
 Maltby had been looking at the pictures 
 by the light of a candle, and we were now 
 sitting in the parlor, and in the doorway 
 stood the little granddaughter, who seemed 
 to be afraid to enter a room sacred to funer- 
 als as a general thing. 
 
 " Do you mean to say that you two grown 
 men come all the way up here to look at 
 them picters? " said Ezra. 
 
 " Not exactly that," said Maltby slowly, 
 " I want to buy them. How much are they 
 worth?" 
 
 Mrs. Mathews was of the party, and she 
 fairly hung on Ezra's answer. She seemed 
 to have a keen eye for business. 
 
 " Why," said Ezra, " I didn't cal'late to 
 sell 'em. I'm kinder fond of 'em myself. If 
 
296 Veritable Quidors 
 
 they're wuth a trip up here to you I guess 
 they're wuth keepin' " 
 
 " Why, Ezry, aint you ashamed of your- 
 self?" said Mrs. Mathews, her voice trem- 
 bling with intensity. " We aint in a posi- 
 tion to refuse this gentleman's offer to buy." 
 
 " No, no, so we haint," said Ezra, a new 
 light breaking on him. " But, mother, I 
 like them picters an' I was go'n' to have 'em 
 sawed out an' set up in here." 
 
 "Well, what are they worth?" asked 
 Maltby in a hard, businesslike tone that sur- 
 prised me. 
 
 Ezra looked at his wife, and then he 
 looked at the little vision in the doorway. 
 " Well," said he finally, " I guess ef you've 
 come all the way up here from 'York they 
 ought to be wuth they ought to be wuth 
 t " 
 
 Ezra looked appeal ingly at his wife. He 
 was plainly going to say "two dollars 
 apiece," but I saw the knotted fingers of her 
 right hand straighten out, and he said, 
 
Veritable Quidors 297 
 
 "They ought to be worth five dollars 
 
 apiece." 
 
 The simplicity of the old couple appealed 
 to me and I hoped that the low figure would 
 awaken Maltby's usually generous instincts, 
 but he seemed to be overcome by his rare 
 chance for a bargain. 
 
 " I don't know," said he musingly. 
 " After all, they're only decorations in a very 
 old stage-coach. I think that four dollars 
 and a half apiece would be a better figure. 
 That would be nearly eighty dollars for the 
 lot." 
 
 " E e ighty dollars! " said Ezra, suck- 
 ing in his breath with evident surprise at the 
 grand total. 
 
 "Eighty dollars!" said Mrs. Mathews, 
 setting her head on one side and patting her 
 husband's hand affectionately. 
 
 Then Ezra turned to me and said, 
 " Young man, I guess Thanksgivin' Day 
 will be a time of extray rejoicing in this 
 fam'ly." 
 
298 Veritable Quidors 
 
 As for me I felt like denouncing Maltby 
 for a mean cad. 
 
 Luckily I kept my mouth shut, but it was 
 hard work. I made up my mind to double 
 the amount on my own hook and let my 
 friend know of it when we had returned to 
 New York. 
 
 Suddenly Maltby broke into a hearty 
 laugh. 
 
 " I thought that Yankees were born bar- 
 gainers," said he. " If you'd held out for 
 five I should have given it." 
 
 This, in my opinion, was adding insult 
 to injury, but Maltby seemed to enjoy rub- 
 bing it in, and as for the Mathewses, they 
 did not seem to realize that they were losing 
 a great opportunity. They looked at each 
 other delightedly and murmured " eighty 
 dollars " at intervals. 
 
 At last Maltby rose to his feet and said as 
 he walked toward the door, " I just wanted 
 to see what I could do in the way of bar- 
 gaining myself, but I'm not very good at it." 
 
Veritable Quidors 299 
 
 Here he put his hands on little Becky's head 
 and the child nestled up to him in a way I 
 thought he did not deserve. 
 
 He went on, "Of course I want to pay 
 you what the pictures are worth to me, and 
 I want to tell you that I expect to get all my 
 money back. I'll pay you $200 apiece for 
 them, or $3200 for the lot." 
 
 Then I had such a revulsion of feeling 
 that I had to leave the room. I went out and 
 sat down in the stage, and by the moonlight 
 I could see the sixteen pictures that were 
 to make the next Thursday a day of Thanks- 
 giving indeed for Ezra and his wife and 
 little Becky. 
 
 THE END 
 
Books of Good Cheer 
 
 A DUKE AND HIS DOUBLE 
 
 BY EDWARD S. VAN ZILE 
 
 With a Frontispiece by FLORENCE SCOVEL SHINN 
 
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 TIOBA 
 
 BY ARTHUR COLTON 
 
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 HER L/VDYSHIP'S ELEPHANT 
 
 By DAVID DWIGHT WELLS 
 With a Cover by NICHOLSON. i 2 mo. $1.25. 
 
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 PUBLISHERS NSW YORK 
 
 VI '03. 
 
Three Novels by ANTHONY HOPE 
 
 With Illustrations by 
 
 C. D. GIBSON and H. C. CHRISTY 
 
 iamo. $1.50 each. 
 55th Impression of 
 
 THE PRISONER OF ZENDA 
 
 With five full-page illustrations by CHARLES DANA GIBSON, and a view 
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 the surface play of words lies a tragi-comedy of life . . . There is infinite 
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 FATHER STAFFORD. By Anthony Hope 
 
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 A Change of Air. ioth Impression 
 
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 PUBLISHERS NEW 
 
 VI '03. 
 
BY ANTHONY HOPE 
 
 AUTHOR OF THE PRISONER OF ZENDA 
 THE INDISCRETION OF THE DUCHESS 
 
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 iv '99 
 
THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SANTA CRUZ 
 
 This book is due on the last DATE stamped below. 
 
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