Part 25

He paused at this point, and we all drew long breaths, wondering what was coming next. There was no denying it, the “cracked Teacup” was clinking a little false,--so it seemed to the company. Yet, after all, the fancy was not delirious,--the mind could follow it well enough; let him go on.

What do you say to this? You have heard all sorts of things said in prose and verse about Niagara. Ask our young Doctor there what it reminds him of. Is n't it a giant putting his tongue out? How can you fail to see the resemblance? The continent is a great giant, and the northern half holds the head and shoulders. You can count the pulse of the giant wherever the tide runs up a creek; but if you want to look at the giant's tongue, you must go to Niagara. If there were such a thing as a cosmic physician, I believe he could tell the state of the country's health, and the prospects of the mortality for the coming season, by careful inspection of the great tongue, which Niagara is putting out for him, and has been showing to mankind ever since the first flint-shapers chipped their arrow-heads. You don't think the idea adds to the sublimity and associations of the cataract? I am sorry for that, but I can't help the suggestion. It is just as manifestly a tongue put out for inspection as if it had Nature's own label to that effect hung over it. I don't know whether you can see these things as clearly as I do. There are some people that never see anything, if it is as plain as a hole in a grindstone, until it is pointed out to them; and some that can't see it then, and won't believe there is any hole till they've poked their finger through it. I've got a great many things to thank God for, but perhaps most of all that I can find something to admire, to wonder at, to set my fancy going, and to wind up my enthusiasm pretty much everywhere.

Look here! There are crowds of people whirled through our streets on these new-fashioned cars, with their witch-broomsticks overhead,--if they don't come from Salem, they ought to,--and not more than one in a dozen of these fish-eyed bipeds thinks or cares a nickel's worth about the miracle which is wrought for their convenience. They know that without hands or feet, without horses, without steam, so far as they can see, they are transported from place to place, and that there is nothing to account for it except the witch-broomstick and the iron or copper cobweb which they see stretched above them. What do they know or care about this last revelation of the omnipresent spirit of the material universe? We ought to go down on our knees when one of these mighty caravans, car after car, spins by us, under the mystic impulse which seems to know not whether its train is loaded or empty. We are used to force in the muscles of horses, in the expansive potency of steam, but here we have force stripped stark naked,--nothing but a filament to cover its nudity,--and yet showing its might in efforts that would task the working-beam of a ponderous steam-engine. I am thankful that in an age of cynicism I have not lost my reverence. Perhaps you would wonder to see how some very common sights impress me. I always take off my hat if I stop to speak to a stone-cutter at his work. “Why?” do you ask me? Because I know that his is the only labor that is likely to endure. A score of centuries has not effaced the marks of the Greek's or the Roman's chisel on his block of marble. And now, before this new manifestation of that form of cosmic vitality which we call electricity, I feel like taking the posture of the peasants listening to the Angelus. How near the mystic effluence of mechanical energy brings us to the divine source of all power and motion! In the old mythology, the right hand of Jove held and sent forth the lightning. So, in the record of the Hebrew prophets, did the right hand of Jehovah cast forth and direct it. Was Nahum thinking of our far-off time when he wrote, “The chariots shall rage in the streets, they shall justle one against another in the broad ways: they shall seem like torches, they shall run like the lightnings”?

Number Seven had finished reading his paper. Two bright spots in his cheeks showed that he had felt a good deal in writing it, and the flush returned as he listened to his own thoughts. Poor old fellow! The “cracked Teacup” of our younger wits,--not yet come to their full human sensibilities,--the “crank” of vulgar tongues, the eccentric, the seventh son of a seventh son, too often made the butt of thoughtless pleasantry, was, after all, a fellow-creature, with flesh and blood like the rest of us. The wild freaks of his fancy did not hurt us, nor did they prevent him from seeing many things justly, and perhaps sometimes more vividly and acutely than if he were as sound as the dullest of us.

The teaspoons tinkled loudly all round the table, as he finished reading. The Mistress caught her breath. I was afraid she was going to sob, but she took it out in vigorous stirring of her tea. Will you believe that I saw Number Five, with a sweet, approving smile on her face all the time, brush her cheek with her hand-kerchief? There must have been a tear stealing from beneath its eyelid. I hope Number Seven saw it. He is one of the two men at our table who most need the tender looks and tones of a woman. The Professor and I are hors de combat; the Counsellor is busy with his cases and his ambitions; the Doctor is probably in love with a microscope, and flirting with pathological specimens; but Number Seven and the Tutor are, I fear, both suffering from that worst of all famines, heart-hunger.

Do you remember that Number Seven said he never wrote a line of “poetry” in his life, except once when he was suffering from temporary weakness of body and mind? That is because he is a poet. If he had not been one, he would very certainly have taken to tinkling rhymes. What should you think of the probable musical genius of a young man who was particularly fond of jingling a set of sleigh-bells? Should you expect him to turn out a Mozart or a Beethoven? Now, I think I recognize the poetical instinct in Number Seven, however imperfect may be its expression, and however he may be run away with at times by fantastic notions that come into his head. If fate had allotted him a helpful companion in the shape of a loving and intelligent wife, he might have been half cured of his eccentricities, and we should not have had to say, in speaking of him, “Poor fellow!” But since this cannot be, I am pleased that he should have been so kindly treated on the occasion of the reading of his paper. If he saw Number Five's tear, he will certainly fall in love with her. No matter if he does Number Five is a kind of Circe who does not turn the victims of her enchantment into swine, but into lambs. I want to see Number Seven one of her little flock. I say “little.” I suspect it is larger than most of us know. Anyhow, she can spare him sympathy and kindness and encouragement enough to keep him contented with himself and with her, and never miss the pulses of her loving life she lends him. It seems to be the errand of some women to give many people as much happiness as they have any right to in this world. If they concentrated their affection on one, they would give him more than any mortal could claim as his share. I saw Number Five watering her flowers, the other day. The watering-pot had one of those perforated heads, through which the water runs in many small streams. Every plant got its share: the proudest lily bent beneath the gentle shower; the lowliest daisy held its little face up for baptism. All were refreshed, none was flooded. Presently she took the perforated head, or “rose,” from the neck of the watering-pot, and the full stream poured out in a round, solid column. It was almost too much for the poor geranium on which it fell, and it looked at one minute as if the roots would be laid bare, and perhaps the whole plant be washed out of the soil in which it was planted. What if Number Five should take off the “rose” that sprinkles her affections on so many, and pour them all on one? Can that ever be? If it can, life is worth living for him on whom her love may be lavished.

One of my neighbors, a thorough American, is much concerned about the growth of what he calls the “hard-handed aristocracy.” He tells the following story:--

“I was putting up a fence about my yard, and employed a man of whom I knew something,--that he was industrious, temperate, and that he had a wife and children to support,--a worthy man, a native New Englander. I engaged him, I say, to dig some post-holes. My employee bought a new spade and scoop on purpose, and came to my place at the appointed time, and began digging. While he was at work, two men came over from a drinking-saloon, to which my residence is nearer than I could desire. One of them I had known as Mike Fagan, the other as Hans Schleimer. They looked at Hiram, my New Hampshire man, in a contemptuous and threatening way for a minute or so, when Fagan addressed him:

“'And how much does the man pay yez by the hour?'

“'The gentleman does n't pay me by the hour,' said Hiram.

“'How mosh does he bay you by der veeks?' said Hans.

“'I don' know as that's any of your business,' answered Hiram.

“'Faith, we'll make it our business,' said Mike Fagan. 'We're Knoights of Labor, we'd have yez to know, and ye can't make yer bargains jist as ye loikes. We manes to know how mony hours ye worrks, and how much ye gets for it.'

“'Knights of Labor!' said I. 'Why, that is a kind of title of nobility, is n't it? I thought the laws of our country did n't allow titles of that kind. But if you have a right to be called knights, I suppose I ought to address you as such. Sir Michael, I congratulate you on the dignity you have attained. I hope Lady Fagan is getting on well with my shirts. Sir Hans, I pay my respects to your title. I trust that Lady Schleixner has got through that little difficulty between her ladyship and yourself in which the police court thought it necessary to intervene.'

“The two men looked at me. I weigh about a hundred and eighty pounds, and am well put together. Hiram was noted in his village as a 'rahstler.' But my face is rather pallid and peaked, and Hiram had something of the greenhorn look. The two men, who had been drinking, hardly knew what ground to take. They rather liked the sound of Sir Michael and, Sir Hans. They did not know very well what to make of their wives as 'ladies.' They looked doubtful whether to take what had been said as a casus belli or not, but they wanted a pretext of some kind or other. Presently one of them saw a label on the scoop, or longhandled, spoon-like shovel, with which Hiram had been working.

“'Arrah, be jabers!' exclaimed Mike Fagan, 'but has n't he been a-tradin' wid Brown, the hardware fellah, that we boycotted! Grab it, Hans, and we'll carry it off and show it to the brotherhood.'

“The men made a move toward the implement.

“'You let that are scoop-shovel alone,' said Hiram.

“I stepped to his side. The Knights were combative, as their noble predecessors with the same title always were, and it was necessary to come to a voie de fait. My straight blow from the shoulder did for Sir Michael. Hiram treated Sir Hans to what is technically known as a cross-buttock.

“'Naow, Dutchman,' said Hiram, 'if you don't want to be planted in that are post-hole, y'd better take y'rself out o' this here piece of private property. “Dangerous passin,” as the sign-posts say, abaout these times.'

“Sir Michael went down half stunned by my expressive gesture; Sir Hans did not know whether his hip was out of joint or he had got a bad sprain; but they were both out of condition for further hostilities. Perhaps it was hardly fair to take advantage of their misfortunes to inflict a discourse upon them, but they had brought it on themselves, and we each of us gave them a piece of our mind.

“'I tell you what it is,' said Hiram, 'I'm a free and independent American citizen, and I an't a-gon' to hev no man tyrannize over me, if he doos call himself by one o' them noblemen's titles. Ef I can't work jes' as I choose, fur folks that wants me to work fur 'em and that I want to work fur, I might jes' as well go to Sibery and done with it. My gran'f'ther fit in Bunker Hill battle. I guess if our folks in them days did n't care no great abaout Lord Percy and Sir William Haowe, we an't a-gon' to be scart by Sir Michael Fagan and Sir Hans What 's-his-name, nor no other fellahs that undertakes to be noblemen, and tells us common folks what we shall dew an' what we sha'n't. No, sir!'

“I took the opportunity to explain to Sir Michael and Sir Hans what it was our fathers fought for, and what is the meaning of liberty. If these noblemen did not like the country, they could go elsewhere. If they did n't like the laws, they had the ballot-box, and could choose new legislators. But as long as the laws existed they must obey them. I could not admit that, because they called themselves by the titles the Old World nobility thought so much of, they had a right to interfere in the agreements I entered into with my neighbor. I told Sir Michael that if he would go home and help Lady Fagan to saw and split the wood for her fire, he would be better employed than in meddling with my domestic arrangements. I advised Sir Hans to ask Lady Schleimer for her bottle of spirits to use as an embrocation for his lame hip. And so my two visitors with the aristocratic titles staggered off, and left us plain, untitled citizens, Hiram and myself, to set our posts, and consider the question whether we lived in a free country or under the authority of a self-constituted order of quasi-nobility.”

It is a very curious fact that, with all our boasted “free and equal” superiority over the communities of the Old World, our people have the most enormous appetite for Old World titles of distinction. Sir Michael and Sir Hans belong to one of the most extended of the aristocratic orders. But we have also “Knights and Ladies of Honor,” and, what is still grander, “Royal Conclave of Knights and Ladies,” “Royal Arcanum,” and “Royal Society of Good Fellows,” “Supreme Council,” “Imperial Court,” “Grand Protector,” and “Grand Dictator,” and so on. Nothing less than “Grand” and “Supreme” is good enough for the dignitaries of our associations of citizens. Where does all this ambition for names without realities come from? Because a Knight of the Garter wears a golden star, why does the worthy cordwainer, who mends the shoes of his fellow-citizens, want to wear a tin star, and take a name that had a meaning as used by the representatives of ancient families, or the men who had made themselves illustrious by their achievements?

It appears to be a peculiarly American weakness. The French republicans of the earlier period thought the term citizen was good enough for anybody. At a later period, “Roi Citoyen”--the citizen king was a common title given to Louis Philippe. But nothing is too grand for the American, in the way of titles. The proudest of them all signify absolutely nothing. They do not stand for ability, for public service, for social importance, for large possessions; but, on the contrary, are oftenest found in connection with personalities to which they are supremely inapplicable. We can hardly afford to quarrel with a national habit which, if lightly handled, may involve us in serious domestic difficulties. The “Right Worshipful” functionary whose equipage stops at my back gate, and whose services are indispensable to the health and comfort of my household, is a dignitary whom I must not offend. I must speak with proper deference to the lady who is scrubbing my floors, when I remember that her husband, who saws my wood, carries a string of high-sounding titles which would satisfy a Spanish nobleman.

After all, every people must have its own forms of ostentation, pretence, and vulgarity. The ancient Romans had theirs, the English and the French have theirs as well,--why should not we Americans have ours? Educated and refined persons must recognize frequent internal conflicts between the “Homo sum” of Terence and the “Odi profanum vulgus” of Horace. The nobler sentiment should be that of every true American, and it is in that direction that our best civilization is constantly tending.

We were waited on by a new girl, the other evening. Our pretty maiden had left us for a visit to some relative,--so the Mistress said. I do sincerely hope she will soon come back, for we all like to see her flitting round the table.

I don't know what to make of it. I had it all laid out in my mind. With such a company there must be a love-story. Perhaps there will be, but there may be new combinations of the elements which are to make it up, and here is a bud among the full-blown flowers to which I must devote a little space.