have not mentioned, I think, a small building that, when we came, stood just across the road from our house—a rather long, low structure with sliding windows, called "the shop." Red raspberries of a large, sweet variety were ripening about it, and within was a short box counter, a shoemaker's work-bench, a cutting-board, a great bag of wooden shoe-pegs, and a quantity of leather scraps, for it had, in fact, been a shop during the two generations preceding our ownership. Before that it appeared to have served as a sort of office for Captain Ben Meeker, who also had been not merely a farmer, as certain records proved. Captain Ben may have built the shop, though I think it was older, for when we examined the picturesque little building, with a view to restoration, it proved to betoo far gone—too much a structure of decay. So we tore down "the shop," and, incidentally, Old Pop, who did the tearing, found a Revolutionary bayonet in the loft; also a more recent, and particularly hot, hornets' nest which caused him to leap through the window and spring into the air several times on the way to the bushes by the brook. But that is another story. We have already had the bee history; hornets would be in the nature of a repetition.
We found something of still greater interest in the old shop. One day, digging over the leather scraps, we uncovered the records above mentioned—that is to say, the old account-books of Captain Ben Meeker and the two generations of shoemakers who had followed him. These ancient folios, stoutly made and legibly written, correlate a good deal of Brook Ridge history for a hundred years. The names of the dead are there, and the items of their forgotten activities.
From Westbury and others we already knew that Benjamin Meeker and Sarah, his wife, had occupied our house at the beginning of the last century—young married folks then—and that there had been a little girl (owner of the small brass-nailed trunk, maybe) who in due time had grown up and married the young shoemaker, Eli Brayton, of "distant parts," he being from eastern New York, as much as fifty miles away. Brayton had remained in the family, set up his bench in one end of the building across the road, and there for a generation made the boots of the countryside,followed in the trade by his son, the "Uncle Joe" who at eighty-five had laid down the hammer and the last a year prior to our coming. This was good history in outline, and Westbury had supplied episodes, here and there, embellished in his improving fashion. The old books came now as a supplement—an extension course, as it were, in the history of Captain Ben and his successors.
While not recorded, we may assume that Captain Ben belonged to the militia, hence his title. That he had another official position we learn from certain items of entry:
To serving one summon on S. Davis3 shillinTo serving one tachment on J. Fillow2 shillinTo fees: execushun Eli Sherwood2 shillin 6 pnc.
Evidently a constable or deputy sheriff, and I think we may assume that the last item records a process, and not a performance. The fees are reassuring. Eli could hardly have been dismissed mortally for two and six.
Captain Ben had still other activities. He owned teams for hire; he dealt in livestock; in addition to his farm he owned asawmill on the brook; he even went out at day's labor—certainly a busy man, requiring carefully kept accounts, and an office.
The accounts begin in 1797 and are sometimes kept in dollars and cents, sometimes in the English fashion, as above. Sometimes the charges are made in one form, the credits in another. It was just as he got started, I suppose, both moneys being in about equal circulation.
Captain Ben's spelling is interesting. He was by no means illiterate. His writing is trim, his accounts in good form and correctly figured. But it was more a fashion in that day to spell as pronounced, and his orthography gives us a personal sense of the period.
"To plowin garding ... 2 shillin." You can almost hear him say that, while "To haulin stun" likewise carries the fine old flavor.
We have heard much of the "good old times when things were cheap," but Captain Ben's book proves that not all commodities were cheap in his day. Calico, for instance, is set down at three and six a yard—that is, eighty-five cents. Handkerchiefs at two shillings thrippence each,sugar at a shilling per pound, which is more than double our war-time prices. It is not well to complain, even to-day, remembering those rates, especially when we note that in 1805 Captain Ben's labor brought him only four shillings a day (six with team), and his sawing, in small lots, but a trifle. Labor was, in fact, cheap at that period; also unfortunately for Captain Ben—rum and brandy.
The book does not say where Ezekial Jackson kept his general store, but that was where Captain Ben dealt, and his items of purchase are faithfully set down. A good many men "swear off" on the New Year, but Captain Ben didn't. He bought a "decantur," price two and six (ah me! it would be an antique, now), and promptly started in having it filled. Behold the startling credits to Ezekial Jackson during the first ten days of 1806:
Jan. 1, By 2 lb. sugar2 shillin" 1, " 1 qt. brandy2 shillin" 5, " 1 qt. brandy2 shillin" 6, " 1 qt. brandy2 shillin" 10, " 1 qt. brandy2 shillin
But perhaps this was too costly a pace, for the next entry is, "Jan. 15, 1 jug, 1 shillin," and on the same date, "One gallon of rum, 6 shillin." That, you see, was somewhat cheaper and required fewer trips to town. On January 20th the jug was filled again, and on the same date we find set down "four and a half yards of chintz and one scane of silk." That chintz and "scane" of silk look suspicious—they look like tranquilizers for Sarah, his wife.
Through that month and the three following the liquid items follow with alarming monotony, only separated here and there by entries of "tee" and sugar and certain yards of "cotting" and "scanes" of silk for Sarah.
But Sarah was biding her time. The book does not say that the minister was asked to call, or that he came. It does not need to. We may guess it from the next entry:
May 2, By 1 famly bible 1 poun, 13 shillin
That ended the rum chapter. There is not another spirituous entry in all ofEzekial Jackson's credits. "By one mometer" comes next, May 6th. Probably Captain Ben felt himself cooling down pretty rapidly for the season, and wanted to take the temperature. Then follows "two combs"—he was going to keep slicked up—also earthenware, indigo, "cotting," and more scanes of silk, mainly for Sarah, no doubt, and so on to the end, when the account is closed and underneath is written:
This day made all even betwixt Ezekial Jackson and myself.B. M.
Captain Ben's accounts close in 1829, but the shoemaking records had long since begun. They are more prosaic, but they have an interest, too. A book with charges against Joel Barlow and Aaron Burr could hardly fail of that, though the said Joel Barlow is not the poet-diplomat who wrote the "Columbiad" and shone in European courts, nor Aaron Burr the corrupter of Blennerhassett and the slayer of Alexander Hamilton. At least, I judge they were not, for this Barlow and this Burr had cobbling charges against them as late as 1840, whenthe intriguing Aaron and the gifted Joel no longer needed earthly repairs. Nevertheless, they were of the same families, for Joel Barlow, the poet, was born just over the hill from us, and the name of Aaron Burr was known in Connecticut long before it found doubtful distinction in New Jersey.
The shoemaker's accounts reflect a life that is now all but gone. Some of the charges were offset with potatoes, some with rye, some with labor, a few of them with cash. A pair of boots in 1828 brought two dollars and fifty cents. Repairs ranged from six cents up, many of the charges being set down in half-cents. Those were exact, frugal days.
One hundred and fifty Thanksgivings must have preceded ours in the old house, but I think out of them all you could not have picked a better one. I would not like to say a more bountiful one, for I supposein the earlier day they had great wild turkeys and perhaps a haunch of venison, braces of partridges and other royal fare. Even so, they could hardly have eaten it all, and I think their noble turkey did not taste any better than ours. Moreover, we were glad that our deer and partridges were still running free.
We did not lack of native dishes. Our mince and pumpkin pies were home products, as well as our apple-butter and a variety of other preserves. Also, I had discovered a bed of wild cress in the brook and our brown turkey was garnished with that piquant green. Certainly there was an old-fashioned feeling about our first New England holiday—something precious and genuine, that made all effort and cost worth while.
The Pride and the Hope had come home for a week's vacation and were reveling in the house, which they now for the first time saw in order. Of course their rooms had to be personally adjusted, their own special belongings inspected and put away. Their treasures, after two months of absence, wereall new and fresh to them. The Pride, reveling in her own "cozy corner," or curled up in a big chair by the log fire, reread her favorite books; the Hope and the Joy played paper-doll "ladies" on the deep couch, cutting out a whole new generation with up-to-date wardrobes from the costume pages of some marvelous new fashion magazines. Oblivious to the grosser world about them, they caused their respective families to telephone and give parties and visit back and forth, and to discuss openly their most private affairs and move into new houses and make improvements and purchases that would have wrecked Rockefeller if the bills had ever fallen due. That is the glory of make-believe—one may go as far as he likes, building his castles and his kingdoms, with never a cent to pay. It is only when one tries to realize in acres and bricks and shingles that the accounts come in. A spiritistic friend of mine told me recently that the latest communications from the shadow world indicate the life there to be purely mental, that each spirit entity creates its own environment and habitation bythought alone. In a word, it is a world, he said, where imagination is reality and all the dreams come true. Ah me! I hope he is not mistaken! What dreams of empires we have all put away, what air-castles we have seen melt and vanish because of the cost! A place where one may build and plant and renew by the processes of thought alone, unchecked by acreage boundaries or any sordid limitations of ways and means! I cannot think of a better or more reasonable hereafter than that. We get a glimpse of it here in the play of children—little children who perhaps have left the truth not so far behind.
"Fashion ladies" must relax now and then. Even in late November there were pleasant sunny days when the Hope and the Joy roamed the fields or laid a long board across a tumbled wall and teetered away vacation hours to the tune of
Seesaw, Marjory Daw,Sold her bed and laid on straw,
which was probably first sung a good way back—by Cain and Abel, maybe, in somecorner of Eden. No, it would be outside of Eden, for their parents had moved, as I remember, before their arrival. And I wonder if little Cain and Abel had a fire to gather around when the fall evenings began to close in, before the lamps were lit, and if they ever had cakes and toast and sandwiches, with hot chocolate, from an old blue china set from a corner cupboard, and were as hungry as bears, and rocked while they ate and drank and watched the firelight dance on the tea-things and table-legs. If not, I am afraid they missed something, and perhaps it is not to be wondered at that little Cain became gloomy and savage and outcast when he grew up. A fireplace with a cozy cup of chocolate and a bite of something filling will civilize children about as quickly as anything I know of, and would, I am sure, have been good for Cain.
We often cooked by our fireplace. We hung a kettle over it for tea and toasted bread on Captain Ben Meeker's long iron toasting-fork. Then at supper-time we would rake out the coals, and on one of theold gridirons brought down from the attic would broil a big steak, or some chops, and if they did not taste better than any other steak or chops we certainly imagined they did, and I am still inclined to think we were right. Then there was popcorn, and potatoes roasted in the ashes, and apples on sticks, though this was likely to be later in the evening, when the tribe was hungry again, for children in vacation are always hungry, just little savages, and the best way to civilize them is to feed them, as I have said. It was too bad they must go back to school, and sometimes we wished there were never any such things as schools; and then again, when the house was one wild riot and hurrah, just at a moment when I wanted to reflect, I could appreciate quite fully the beauties of education and certain remote places where under careful direction it could be acquired. But how silent and lonely the house seemed when the Pride and the Hope were gone!How glad we were that Christmas was only a month away!
In an earlier chapter I have spoken of our attic as an almost unfailing source of supply. Any sort of vessel or implement we might happen to need was pretty certain to turn up there if we looked long enough. It provided us with jugs and jars, and by and by, when the snow came, a wooden shovel and a bootjack for our rubber boots. I said that probably some day we should find a horse and buggy and harness up there, which was about all that we needed, now. It was just one of those careless remarks we all make on occasion. It never occurred to me that it was tinged with prophecy.
We did not find the horse, harness, and buggy in the attic, but we found them—heired them, to use a good New England word, just as we had heired the other things. The automobile had not yet reached BrookRidge, but it was arriving in the centers and suburbs, upsetting old traditions, severing old ties. Once we had been commuters on Long Island, and in our happy suburb there still lived a friend to whom the years had brought prosperity and motor-machines. In the earlier, more deliberate years he had found comfort and sufficient speed in an enviable surrey, attached to a faithful family horse which now, alas! was too slow, too deliberate for the pace of wealth and the honk-honk of style. So the old horse stood in the stable, for his owners did not wish to see him go to strangers. But then one day they heard how we had turned ourselves into farmers, and presently word came that if we needed Old Beek (shortened from Lord Beaconsfield), surrey, and harness complete, they were ours to command. They would be delivered to us in the city, the message said, from which point we could drive, or ship, them to the farm. It was a windfall from a clear sky—we said it must be our lucky year. We accepted the quickest way, and were presently in the city to receive Lord Beaconsfield.
Had it been earlier in the year, during those magic days of September, or even in October, when the drifting leaves had turned the highways into thoroughfares of gold, we should have driven by easy stages the sixty miles, across the hills and far away, to Brook Ridge, resting where the night found us. It was too late for that now. The roadsides were no longer flower-decked or golden. An early snowfall had left them in rather a mixed condition, and the air had a chill in it that did not invite extended travel. We could ship by boat to our nearest Sound port, and the fifteen-mile drive from there seemed no great matter.
We admired the dignity with which His Lordship drew up in front of our New York hotel. He was a large, handsome animal, sorrel as to color, and of a manner befitting his station and advanced years. It was evident that we were not of his class, but with the gentle tact of true nobility he never, either then or later, permitted this difference in rank to make us uncomfortable. He even allowed us to call him "Beek," "Old Beek," "good Old Beek," especiallywhen there was a lump of sugar in prospect. He was very human.
But I anticipate. We were delighted with Lord Beaconsfield and his appurtenances. As for the Joy, she was quite beside herself. Anything with the semblance of a horse would excite the Joy. I got in with the driver, and we made our way to the river-front, where I saw His Lordship to his state-room and the surrey stored away. I don't suppose in all his twenty years he had ever taken a voyage before, but he showed no nervousness or undue surprise, and that night at the port of arrival he came stepping down the gang-plank as unconcernedly as the oldest traveler. We were up and away rather early next morning, for we wished to travel leisurely, and we were not familiar with the road.
On inquiry we learned there were two roads—one to the east and one to the west of a little river, the same that formed a mill-pond in Westbury's door-yard, and here a wide orderly stream flowed into the sea. The "Glen" road—the one to the east—was thought to be the shorter, so wechose that. It was a good selection, so far as scenery was concerned, but if I had the same drive to make again I would go the other way. With the exception of a small box of lunch crackers for the Joy, we had provided no food for the journey, for we said we could stop at a village inn when the time came and get something warm. That was a good idea, only there were no villages. There was not even a country store in that lost land of forest and hill and rocky cliff and desolate open field. Now and then we came to a house, but so dead and forbidding was its aspect that we did not dare even to ask our way. Never a soul appeared in the door-yard, and if smoke came from the chimney it was a thin, blue wisp as from dying embers. The land was asleep, under the spell of the white touch. To knock at one of those houses would have been, as it seemed, to call its occupants from their winter trance.
We traveled slowly, for the roads were sticky, and there were many hills. We could not ask Lord Beaconsfield to do more than walk, which he did sturdily enough,tugging up the long hills, though they were probably the first he had ever seen, for his part of Long Island had been level ground. What must he have thought of that chaotic desolation, where most of the woods and a good many of the fields were set up at foolish angles against other woods and fields and where there was no sign of food for man or beast?
But if we were timid about making inquiries, His Lordship was not. When his appetite became urgent he forgot that he had come of a proud race, and soon after noon-time began to trumpet his demands, and his alarm, like an ordinary horse. His stable at home must have been red, for at every barn of that friendly color—and most of them were of that hue—he sent a clarion neigh across the echoing hills. The Joy, bundled warmly, munched her crackers and made little complaint. Her elders diverted themselves by admiring the winter scenery—the bared woods, lightly dressed with snow, the rocky cliffs and ledges, the tumbling black river that now and again came into view.
As the afternoon wore on and we arrived nowhere, we became disturbed by doubts as to our direction. It was true that we seemed to be following the general course of the river, but was it the right river? Hadn't we gone trailing off somewhere on a second-class tributary that had been leading us all day through a weird, bedeviled territory that probably wasn't on the map at all? The brief daylight was fading and it was important that we arrive somewhere, pretty soon. We must make inquiry. It would be better to rouse even one of the seven sleepers than to wander aimlessly into the night. At the next house, I said, we would knock.
But at the next house we actually discovered something moving—something outside. As we came nearer it took the form of a man, a sad man, dragging a crooked limb from a wood-pile. I drew up.
"Good afternoon," I said. "Can you tell us where we are?""Good afternoon," I said. "Can you tell us where we are?"
"Good afternoon," I said. "Can you tell us where we are?"
"Why, yes," he grunted, as he worked and pulled at the limb. "You're at Valley Forge."
Valley Forge! Heavens! We were withintwenty miles of Philadelphia, on the Schuylkill. At the pace we had been going it did not seem reasonable. This must be enchantment, sure enough.
"Look here," I said, "you don't mean that this is Valley Forge where Washington was quartered."
"Don't know anything about that," he said, still grunting over the crooked limb, "but I've been quartered here for more 'n sixty years, an' it's always been the same Valley Forge in my time."
"Is—is this Connecticut?"
"That's what it is."
I breathed easier. If he had said Pennsylvania it would have meant that we were a hundred and fifty miles from home.
"Do you know of any place called the Glen?"
"Of course; right up ahead a few miles. Where'd you folks come from, anyway? You don't appear to know much about locations."
I side-stepped, thanking him profusely. We were all right, then, but it seemed a narrow escape.
At last we entered the Glen and recognized certain landmarks. It was a somber place now—its aspect weirdly changed since the first days of our coming. Then it had been a riot of summer-time, the cliffs a mat and tangle of green that had shut us in. On this dull December evening, with its vines and shrubs and gaunt trees bare, its pointed cedars and hemlocks the only green, its dark water swirling under overhanging rocks, it had become an entrance to Valhalla, the dim abode of the gods.
How friendly Westbury's lights looked when we crossed the bridge by the mill and turned into the drive, and what gracious comfort there was in his bright fire and warm, waiting supper. We did not go up the hill that night. Good Old Beek found rest and food and society in Westbury's big red barn.
I have referred more than once, I am sure, to my study behind the chimney, a tinyplace of about seven by nine feet, once, no doubt, the "parlor bedroom." I selected it chiefly because of its size. I said one could condense his thoughts so much better in a limited area. I shelved one side and end of it to the ceiling, put dull-green paper on the walls, padded its billowy floor with excelsior, put down dull-green denim as a rug basis, and painted the woodwork to match. Then I set my work-table in the center, where I could reach almost anything without getting up; and certainly with its capable fireplace it was as cozy and inviting a work-room as one would find in a week's travel.
The difficulty was to get busy at the condensing process. Work was pressing. Not exactly the work, either, but the need of it. No, I mean the necessity of it. It was the need of funds that was pressing—that is what I have been trying to convey. With all the buying and improving, and the loads of new indispensables that Westbury was constantly bringing from the nearest town of size, the exchequer was running low. I am not really so lazy, once I get started, butI have a constitutional hesitancy in the matter of getting started. My will and enthusiasm are both in good supply, but my ability to sit down and really begin is elusive.
It was especially so that winter; there were so many excuses for not getting started. Mornings I would rise firm in the resolve that the day and hour were at hand. After breakfast I would determinedly start for the room behind the chimney. Unfortunately I had to pass through our "best room" to get there. There was certain to be a picture or something a little out of place in that room. Whatever it was, it must be attended to. It would annoy me to leave a thing like that unremedied. One's mind must be quite untrammeled to condense. Sometimes I had to rearrange several of the pictures, and straighten the books, and pull the rugs around a little, before I felt ready for the condensing process. But then I would be certain to notice something out in the yard that was not in place. We took a pride in our yard. Once outside, one thing generally led to another,and in the course of time I would be pawing over stuff in the barn. Then it was about luncheon-time—it would hardly be worth starting the condensing business till afterward.
Perhaps I would actually get into the room behind the chimney after luncheon, but one could not begin work until the fire was replenished and a supply of wood brought. Then while one was at it one might as well get in a supply of fuel for the other fires, so as to have a clear afternoon for a good substantial beginning.
Oh, well, you see where all those paltry subterfuges ended. It was the easiest thing in the world to remember something I wanted to tell Westbury—something important—and our telephone lines were not yet connected. It would be about five when I got back, and of course one could not start a piece of work late in the day when one was all worn out. To-morrow, bright and early, would be the time.
Then, just as likely as not, to-morrow would be one of those bad-luck days. Ina diary which I kept at the time I find a record of a day of that sort.
Began this morning by breaking a lamp chimney before I was dressed. I continued by stepping on Pussum's tail on the way down-stairs in the dark, which caused me to slide and scrape the rest of the way. Elizabeth came to the head of the stairs with a fresh lamp and the remark that she thought I had given up using such language. In applying the liniment I upset the greasy stuff on the living-room rug and it required an hour's brisk rubbing to get it out. Not being satisfied with this, I turned over a bottle of ink when I sat down after breakfast to dash off an important note before mail-time. Nobody could think consecutively after a series like that, so I went out for some fresh air and decided to clean up a rough corner by the brook. I scratched my nose, strained my wrist, and mashed my finger with a stone. Only a 100-per-cent. Christian could remain calm on such a day. To-morrow I shall go warily and softly, and really begin work.
Began this morning by breaking a lamp chimney before I was dressed. I continued by stepping on Pussum's tail on the way down-stairs in the dark, which caused me to slide and scrape the rest of the way. Elizabeth came to the head of the stairs with a fresh lamp and the remark that she thought I had given up using such language. In applying the liniment I upset the greasy stuff on the living-room rug and it required an hour's brisk rubbing to get it out. Not being satisfied with this, I turned over a bottle of ink when I sat down after breakfast to dash off an important note before mail-time. Nobody could think consecutively after a series like that, so I went out for some fresh air and decided to clean up a rough corner by the brook. I scratched my nose, strained my wrist, and mashed my finger with a stone. Only a 100-per-cent. Christian could remain calm on such a day. To-morrow I shall go warily and softly, and really begin work.
I did, in fact, against all intention and good judgment, begin one evening just about bedtime, and worked until quite late. It was not a bad beginning, either, as such things go—at least, I have tried harder and made worse ones. After that the condensing process went better. I could any time find excuses for not working, but I did nothunt for them so anxiously. I was pretty fairly under way by Christmas, and the room behind the chimney had all at once become the most alluring place in the world.
e have always had a tree for Christmas. Long ago, far back in our early flat-dwelling days, we had our first one, and I remember we shopped for it Christmas Eve among the bright little Harlem groceries where they had them ranged outside, picking very carefully for one symmetrical in shape and small of size and price, to fit our tiny flat and, oh yes, indeed, our casual income. I remember, too, that when it was finally bought I put it on my shoulder with a proud feeling, and we drifted farther, picking up the trimmings—the tinsel and gay ornaments, the small gifts for the one very small person who hadso recently come to live with us, discussing each purchase with due deliberation, going home at last with rather more than we could afford, I fear, for I recall further that we did not have enough left next morning to buy butter for breakfast. How young we were then, and how poor, and how happy! and Christmas morning, with its twinkling mystery, was the most precious thing of the whole year.
It still remained so. Time could not dim the magic of the starlit tree. Another little person had come, and another. A larger tree and more decorations were needed, and the presents grew in number and variety, but the old charm of secret preparation, and morning gifts, and the lights that first twinkled around a manger, did not fade.
We did not buy a tree at Brook Ridge. There was no need. Across the road, partway up the slope, was a collection of green and shapely little cedars—a regular Santa Claus grove—and on the afternoon before Christmas, a gray, still afternoon, heavy with mystic portent, Elizabeth and I took a small ax and climbed up there, andpicked and selected, just as we had done in those earlier years, and came home with our tree, stealthily carrying it in the back way, to the wood-house, and fitting it to the small green stand that we had used and preserved from year to year. The little girl for whom we had bought the first tree was the Pride, now aged twelve, and no longer without knowledge of the Christmas saint, but the romance of not knowing, of still believing in it all, was too precious to be put away yet, and she was off to bed with the others to bring more quickly the joyous morning. Alone, as heretofore, Elizabeth and I tied and marked the tissue packages, and in someof the books wrote rhymes, such as only Santa Claus can think of when he has finished his remote year of toil and has started out with his loaded sleigh to strew happiness around the world.
I suppose there is no more delightful employment than to watch the thing that will give a splendid joy to one's children grow and glisten under one's hands—to view it at different angles during the process; to note how it begins to look "Christmasy," to add a touch here, a brightness there, to see it at last radiant and complete, ready for the morning illumination. On the topmost branch each year there was always the same little hanging ornament, a swinging tinseled cherub that we had bought for the very first little tree and the very first little girl, in the days when we had been so young, so poor, and so happy.
It was midnight when the last touch was given and the cherub was swinging at the top, and it was only a wink or two afterward, it seemed, that there were callings back and forth from small beds and a general demand for investigation. A hurried semi-dressing, a fire blazing up the chimney, adoor thrown open upon a sparkling, spangled tree. Eager exclamations, moments of awed silence, after which the thrilling distribution of gifts. Human life holds few things better or happier than such a Christmas morning. Whatever else the Christ-child brought to the world, that alone would make his coming a boon to mankind.
On our wall hung a quaint framed print of the first Christmas family, and under it some verses by the now all-but-forgotten poet, Edwin Waugh. In those days it was our custom, when the distribution was over and the morning light filled the room, to gather in front of the picture and sing the verses to a simple tune of our own. It was a poor little ceremony, but, remembering it now, I am glad that we thought it worth while. The verses are certainly so, and I want to preserve them here—they are so little known.
Long time ago in Palestine,Upon a wintry morn,All in a lowly cattle-shedThe Prince of Peace was born.The clouds fled from the gloomy sky,The winds in silence lay,And the stars shone bright with strange delightTo welcome in that day.His parents they were simple folkAnd simple lives they led,And in the ways of righteousnessThis little child was bred.In gentle thought and gentle deedHis early days went by,And the light His youthful steps did leadCame down from heaven on high.He was the friend of all the poorThat wander here below;It was His only joy on earthTo ease them of their woe.In pain He trod His holy path,By sorrow sorely tried;It was for all mankind He lived,And for mankind He died.Like Him let us be just and pure,Like Him be true alway,That we may find the peace of mindThat never fades away.
So came the deeps of winter—January in New England. With the Pride and theHope back at school, Elizabeth and I, with the Joy, shut away from most of the sounds and strivings of men, looked out on the heaping drifts and gathered about blazing logs, piled sometimes almost to the chimney throat.
It was our refreshment and exercise to bring in the logs. We were told that in a former day they had been dragged in by a horse, who drew them right up to the wide stone hearth. But we did not use Lord Beaconsfield for this work. For one thing, he would have been too big to get through the door; besides, we were strong, and liked the job. We had two pairs of ice-tongs, and we would put on our rubber boots, and take the tongs, and go out into the snow, and fasten to a log—one at each end—and drag it across Captain Ben's iron door-sill, and lift it in and swing it across the stout andirons with a skill that improved with each day's practice. They were good, lusty sticks—some of them nearly two feet through. These were the back-logs, and they would last two or three days, buried in the ashes, breaking at last into a mass of splendid coals.
In New England one builds a fire scientifically, if he expects to keep warm by it. There must be a fore-stick and a back-stick, and a pyramid of other sticks, with proper draught below and flame outlets above. And he must not spare fuel—not if he expects heat. Westbury dropped in one afternoon just when we had completed a masterpiece in fire-building. He went up to warm his hands and regarded the blazing heap of hickory with critical appraisal.
"That fire cost you two dollars," he remarked, probably recalling the number of days it had taken Old Pop and Sam to cut and cord the big hickory across the brook.
"It's worth it," I said. "I've paid many a two dollars for luxuries that weren't worth five minutes of this."
Westbury dropped into a comfortable chair, took out his knife, and picked up a piece of pine kindling.
"You think this beats city life?" he observed, whittling slowly.
"Well, that depends on what you want. If you like noise and action, the city's theplace. We once lived in a flat where there was a piano at one end of the hall and two phonographs at the other. Then there was a man across the air-shaft who practised on the clarinet, and a professional singer up-stairs. Besides this, when the season was right, we had a hand-organ concert every few minutes on the street. When everything was going at once it was quite a combination. The trolley in front and the Elevated railway behind helped out, too, besides the automobiles, and the newsboys and more or less babies that were trying to do their part. Some people would be lonesome without those things, I suppose."
Westbury whittled reflectively.
"I like to be where it's busy," he commented, "but I guess a fellow could get tired of too much of it. It's pretty nice to live where you can look out on the snow and the woods, and where you can hear it rain, and in the spring wake up in the night and listen to the frogs sing." Westbury's eye ranged about the room, taking in the pictures and bric-à-brac and the bookshelves along the wall. "I wonder what Captain Ben Meekerwould think to see his old kitchen turned into a library," he went on, thoughtfully. "Not many books in his day, I guess; maybe one or two on the parlor table, mostly about religion. They were pretty strong on religion, back in that time, though Captain Ben, I guess, didn't go in on it as heavy as his wife. Captain Ben was more for hunting, and horses, and dogs, and the man that could cut the most grass in a day. The story goes that when Eli Brayton, the shoemaker, wanted to marry Molly Meeker, Captain Ben wouldn't give her to him because he said Eli hadn't proved himself a man yet. Brayton was boarding in the family and working in the little shop that used to stand across the road. Aunt Sarah Meeker, Captain Ben's wife, wanted the shoemaker in the family because he was religious; but Captain Ben said, 'No, sir, he's got to prove himself a man before he can have Molly.' Well, one day Eli Brayton saw a fox up in the timber, and came down to the house and told Captain Ben about it. 'Let me have your gun,' he said, 'and I'll go up and get that chap that's beenkilling your chickens lately.' 'All right,' says Captain Ben, 'but you won't get him.' Eli didn't say anything, but took the old musket and slipped up there, and by and by they heard a shot and pretty soon he came down the hill with Mr. Fox over his shoulder. They went out on the step to meet him, and he threw the fox down in front of Molly Meeker. 'There's some fur for you,' he said, 'and I guess he won't catch any more chickens.' Captain Ben went up to Eli and slapped him on the shoulder. 'Now you've proved yourself a man,' he says, 'and you can have Molly.' That was my wife's grandmother. She was an only child and the Meekers and the Braytons lived here together. Eli Brayton grew to be quite a character himself. When they came around to him to collect money for the church he'd contribute some of his unpaid shoe accounts. He knew the people that owed them would pay the church, because they'd be afraid not to. Old Deacon Timothy Todd used to do the collecting. He had a high-keyed voice and no front teeth, and always chewed as he talked.He'd pull out the bill and shake it at the man that owed it and say: 'A debt to the church is registered above. Not to pay it is a mortal sin. To perish in sin is to be burned with brimstone and eaten by the worm that dieth not.' Before Deacon Todd got through that sinner was ready to come across."
Westbury in childhood had seen Deacon Timothy Todd and could imitate his speech and manner. He enjoyed doing it as much as we enjoyed hearing him.
"Deacon Todd had two boys," he went on, "Jim and Tim, and he used to say, 'My Jim is a good boy, but Tim proved himself a bad one when he slapped his mother with an eel-skin.' Deacon Todd married a second time. He lent some money to a woman to set up a business in Westport, and a little while after his wife died he went down to collect it. Somebody met him on the road and asked him where he was going. 'Well,' he said, 'I'm just going down to Westport to collect a little money I loaned a young woman, and I'll bring back the money or the young woman, one of the two,' and hedid. He was back with her next day. Timothy Todd was a great old chap. When the Civil War broke out he didn't want to go. He was getting along pretty well, then—forty or so—and had already lost two of his front teeth and claimed he couldn't bite off the ca'tridges. They used to have to bite off the paper ends of them for muzzle-loading guns. Then the draft came and he was scared up for fear they'd get him. They didn't, though, but they got about all the others that were left, and Deacon Todd went down to see them off. When the train came and he saw them all get on, and the train starting, he forgot all about not wanting to go, and jumped on with them, and went. 'I saw all my friends was goin',' he said, 'an' th'd be nobody left in the country but me. "I reckon I can bite them ca'tridges off with my eye-teeth, if I really want to do it," I says, an' I was on the train an' half-way to Danbury before I recollected that Mrs. Todd had told me to bring home a dime's wuth o' coffee an' a pound o' sugar. I didn't get back with 'em fer two years, an' then I come inlimpin' with a bullet in my left hind leg. "Here's that pound o' coffee and dime's wuth o' sugar," I says. "I waited fer 'em to git cheaper."'"
Westbury's visits did much to brighten up the somber days, while our blazing hearth and the sturdy little furnace down-stairs kept us warm and cozy. Looking out on a landscape that was like a Christmas card, and remembering the drabble and jangle of the town, we were not sorry to be among the clean white hills.
It was only a little after Christmas that we began planning for our spring garden. As commuters, we had once possessed a garden—a bit of ground, thirty-five feet square, but fruitful beyond belief. Now we had broad, enriched spaces that in our fancy we saw luxuriant with vegetable and bright with flower.
I suppose one of the most deeply seatedof human instincts is to plant and till the soil. It is the thing that separates us most widely from other animal life. The beasts and birds and insects build houses, lay up food, and some of them, even if unwittingly, change the style of their clothing with the seasons. But no animal except man digs and plants and cultivates the flower and fruit and vegetable that nourish his body and soul. It is something that must date back to creation, for in the deepest winter, when the ground is petrified and the skies are low and gray, the very thought of turning up the earth, and raking and planting, awakens a thrill in the innermost recesses of the normal human heart, while a new seed-catalogue, filled with gay pictures and gaudy promises, becomes a poem, nothing less.
What gardens we anticipate when the snow lies deep and we pore over those seductive lists by a blazing fire! Never a garden this side of Paradise so fair as they. For there are no weeds in our gardens of anticipation, nor pests, nor drought, nor any blight. The sun always shines there,and purple flowers are waving in the wind. No real garden will ever be so beautiful, because it will never quite be bathed in the tender light, never wave with quite the loveliness of those fair, frail gardens of our dreams.
We planted many dream gardens that winter. Splendid catalogues came every little while, and each had its magic of color and special offers—"Six rare roses for a dollar," "Six papers of seeds for ten cents"—six of anything to make the heart happy, for a ridiculously small sum. The rich level behind the barn was to us no longer hard with frost and buried beneath the drifts, but green and waving. Some days we walked out to look over the ground a little and pick the places where we would have things, but our imagination seemed to work better in the house by the big fireplace, especially when we rattled the buff-and-green seed-packets that presently began to come and were kept handy in the sideboard drawer.
Our former garden had been so small that we feared we should not have enough forthese new areas, and almost daily we increased certain staples and discovered something we had overlooked, some "New Wonder" tomato, or "Murphy's Miracle" melon. Being strong for melons, I pinned my faith to Murphy's Miracle, and ordered several packets of the seeds that would produce it. Then I began to have doubts. I said if half those seeds sprouted and did half as well as the catalogue promised, the level behind the barn would fall a prey to Murphy and become just a heap of melons. Elizabeth suggested that I add another acre and devote my summer vacation to peddling them.
Elizabeth was mainly for salads. Anything that could be served with French dressing or mayonnaise found a place on her list. She got a new copy of her favorite Iowa catalogue, and when she found in it a special combination offer of "Twelve new things to eat raw" (it had formerly been nine) she was moved almost to tears.
In the matter of sweet corn and beans our souls were as one—a sort of spiritual succotash, as it were—and we encouraged oneanother in any new departure that would increase or prolong this staple supply. Flowers we would have pretty much every-where—hollyhocks in odd corners; delphinium and foxglove along the stone walls; bunches of calliopsis and bleeding-heart and peonies; borders of phlox and alyssum; beds of sweet-williams and corn-flowers and columbines—all those lovely, old-fashioned things, with the loveliest old-fashioned names in the world. Where did they get those names, I wonder? for they are among the most wonderful in the language—each one a strain of word music. We ordered hollyhock roots and hollyhock seed, and delphinium roots and delphinium seed, and all the others in roots and seeds that could be had in both ways, and roses and roses and roses, till I found it desirable to lay aside the fascinating catalogues now and then for certain industries in the little room behind the chimney, which I called my study, in order to be able to provide the "inclosed stamps or check, in payment for the same."
But I believe there is no money that onespends so willingly as that invested in garden seeds. That is because the normal human being is a visionary, a speculator in futures, a dealer in dreams. For every penny he spends in winter he pictures an overflowing return in beauty or substance, in flower and fruit, the glorious harvest of radiant summer days.
We had other entertainments. I have not thus far mentioned the domestic service that followed Lazarus. There was a hiatus of brief duration, and then came Bella—Bella and Gibbs. Bella was from town and of literary association. We inherited her from authors whose ideals perhaps did not accord with hers—I do not know. At all events, she tried ours for a period. I know that she was considerably middle-aged, hard of hearing, and short of sight, and that when I tried to recall her name I could not think of anything but"Hunka-munka." Heaven knows why—it must have expressed her, I suppose.
But Hunka-munka—Bella, I mean—had resources. Her specialties were Kipling and deep-dish apple pie. We could have worried along without Kipling, but her deep-dish pie with whipped cream on it was a poem that won our hearts. I must be fair. Hunka-munka's cooking was all good, as to taste, and if her vision had been a bit more extended it might have been of better appearance. I suppose the steam collected on her super-thick glasses and she had to work somewhat by guess. Never mind—I still recall her substantial and savory dinners with deep gratitude, especially the pie of the deep dish with whipped cream atop.