diff options
| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:55:09 -0700 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:55:09 -0700 |
| commit | 0b8e445363baba55bbef8fec4d0b549187a549ad (patch) | |
| tree | 9c56c52f6b59e7788b365ce59fc954e6d99fa4db | |
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-8.txt | 4914 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 114121 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 307482 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-h/19196-h.htm | 5015 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-h/images/illus-0003-1.jpg | bin | 0 -> 53865 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-h/images/illus-0030-1.jpg | bin | 0 -> 39755 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-h/images/illus-0162-1.jpg | bin | 0 -> 36844 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-h/images/illus-0300-1.jpg | bin | 0 -> 35358 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-h/images/logo004.png | bin | 0 -> 8633 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196-h/images/logo320.png | bin | 0 -> 11474 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196.txt | 4914 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19196.zip | bin | 0 -> 114089 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 |
15 files changed, 14859 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/19196-8.txt b/19196-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7d538c5 --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4914 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Homeburg Memories, by George Helgesen Fitch + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Homeburg Memories + +Author: George Helgesen Fitch + +Release Date: September 7, 2006 [EBook #19196] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMEBURG MEMORIES *** + + + + +Produced by Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +HOMEBURG MEMORIES + +[Illustration: Finally the bass catches up with the cornets. + +FRONTISPIECE. _See Page 176_] + + +Homeburg Memories + +BY + +GEORGE FITCH +AUTHOR OF "AT GOOD OLD SIWASH," +"SIZING UP UNCLE SAM," ETC. + + +WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY +IRMA DÉRÈMEAUX + +[Illustration: Publisher's logo] + +BOSTON +LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY +1915 + + +_Copyright, 1915_, +BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. + +_All rights reserved_ + +Published, February, 1915 + +THE COLONIAL PRESS +C. H. SIMONDS CO., BOSTON, U. S. A. + + +TO + +_MY FATHER_ + + +CONTENTS + +CHAPTER PAGE + + I. THE 4:11 TRAIN 1 + + II. THE FRIENDLY FIRE-FIEND 26 + + III. HOMEBURG'S TWO FOUR-HUNDREDTHS 47 + + IV. THE SERVANT QUESTION IN HOMEBURG 71 + + V. HOMEBURG'S LEISURE CLASS 91 + + VI. HOMEBURG'S WORST ENEMY 116 + + VII. THE HOMEBURG WEEKLY DEMOCRAT 142 + +VIII. THE HOMEBURG MARINE BAND 171 + + IX. THE AUTO GAME IN HOMEBURG 200 + + X. THE HOMEBURG TELEPHONE EXCHANGE 230 + + XI. A HOMEBURG SCHOOL ELECTION 254 + + XII. CHRISTMAS AT HOMEBURG 278 + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + +FINALLY THE BASS CATCHES UP WITH THE +CORNETS _Frontispiece_ + +IT SEEMED TO ME THEN AS IF SHE MUST +HAVE COME FROM HEAVEN BY AIR-LINE PAGE 18 + +"SHE'S OUT, BOYS," HE SAYS " 148 + +IN HOMEBURG YOU COME HOME TO THE +WHOLE TOWN " 284 + + +Homeburg Memories + + + + +I + +THE 4:11 TRAIN + +_In Which the World Comes Once a Day to Visit Homeburg_ + + +Hel-lo, Jim! Darn your case-hardened old hide, but I'm glad to see you! +Wait till I unclamp my fingers from this suit case handle and I'll shake +hands. Whoa--look out!! That's the fourth time that chap's tried to tag +me with his automobile baggage truck. He'll get me yet. I wish I were a +trunk, Jim. Why aren't they as kind to the poor traveler as they are to +his trunk? I don't see any electric truck here to haul me the rest of +the way into New York. It's a long, long walk to the front door of this +station, and my feet hurt. + +That's the idea. Let the porter lug that suit case. I'd have hired one +myself, but I was afraid I couldn't support him in the style you fellows +have made him accustomed to. It was mighty nice of you to come down and +meet me, Jim. I've been standing here for five minutes in this infernal +mass meeting of locomotives, trying to keep out from underfoot, and +getting myself all calm and collected before I surged out of this +howling forty-acre depot and looked New York in the eye. It's nothing +but a plain case of rattles. I have 'em whenever I land here, Jim. Dump +me out on Broadway and I wouldn't care, but whenever I land back in the +bowels of a Union Station I'm a meek little country cousin, and I always +want some one to come along and take me by the hand. + +It's the fault of your depots. They're the biggest things you have, and +it isn't fair for you to come at me with your biggest things first. +Every time I start for New York I swear to myself that I'm going to go +into a fifty thousand dollar dining-room full of waiters far above my +station, and tuck my napkin in my collar, just to show I'm a free-born +citizen; and I'm going to trust my life to crossing policemen, and go by +forty-story buildings without even flipping an eye up the corner and +counting the stories by threes. I'm mighty sophisticated until I hit the +city and get out into a depot which has a town square under roof and a +waiting-room so high that they have to shut the front door to keep the +thunder storms out. Then I begin to shrink. And by the time I've walked +from Yonkers or thereabouts, clean through the station and out of a +two-block hallway, with more stores on either side than there are in all +Homeburg, and have committed my soul to the nearest taxicab pirate, I +feel like a cheese mite in the great hall of Karnak. + +No, sir; when I get into a big city depot, I'm a country Jake, and I +need a compass and kind words. I've suffered a lot from those depots. I +missed a train in Washington once because I figured it would take me +only ten minutes to go from my hotel to the train. But I counted only +the distance to the front door of the Union Station. By the time I'd +journeyed on through the fool thing, my train had gone. Once I missed a +train in the Boston station because I didn't know which one of the +thirty tracks my train was on. I guessed it was somewhere to the right, +and I guessed wrong. It was twenty-four tracks away to the left, and I +couldn't get back in time. So I went into their waiting-room, which is +as big as a New England cornfield and has all the benches named for +various towns. I had to stand up two hours because I couldn't find the +Homeburg bench. + +I'm an admirer of big cities, Jim, and I wouldn't have you take a foot +off your Woolworth building, or a single crashity!! bang!! out of your +subways, but I wish there was a little more coziness in your depots. +Why, at Homeburg I'm nearer the train at my house than I am in New York +after I've got to the station. It's great to have a depot so big that it +takes the place of mountain scenery, but it's hard on the poor traveler, +even if it does have all the comforts of away-from-home in it. And then +it swallows up things so. It takes away all the pleasure of having a +railroad in the town. I suppose five hundred trains come into this +station every day, but they're just trains--nothing more. You don't get +any fun or information or excitement out of them. You can't even chase +them--they bang a gate in your face when you try. I'll bet you don't get +as much comfort and fun out of all these five hundred trains, Jim, as we +do out of the 4:11 train at Homeburg. + +No; it's not any better than your trains. It's not as good. You can't +get raw oysters and magazines and individual cocktails and shaves on it. +All you can get is cinders and peanuts, and I would advise you, if you +were hungry, to eat the former and put the latter in your eye. It's the +kind of a train you New Yorkers would ride on and then write home +telling about the horrors of travel in the great West. But it means +everything to Homeburg. It means a lot more than the half dozen limited +trains which roar through our town fifty miles an hour every day and +have made us so expert at dodging that we will develop kangaroo legs in +another generation. It's our train. Here in New York a hundred trains +come in each morning from Chicago, New Orleans, Everywhere and points +beyond, and the office-boy next door to the depot doesn't stop licking +stamps long enough to look up. But when old Number Eleven, which is its +official railroad name, pulls into Homeburg from Chicago each +afternoon, loaded with mail, news, passengers, home-comers, adventurers, +mysterious strangers, friends, brides, heroes, widows and coffins, you +can just bet we're there to see her. + +It's the town pastime. We all do it. Whenever a Homeburg man has nothing +else to do at four o'clock, he steps over to the depot and joins the +long line which leans up against the depot wall and keeps it in place +during the crisis. Some of them haven't missed a roll-call in years. Old +Bill Dorgan, the drayman, has stood on the platform every day since the +line was built, rain or shine. Josh James, the colored porter of the +Cosmopolitan Hotel, knows more traveling men than William J. Bryan. If +he was absent from his post, the engineer wouldn't know where to stop +the train. The old men come crawling down on nice days and sun +themselves for an hour before the train arrives. The boys sneak slyly +down on their way from school and stand in flocks worshiping the train +butcher, who is bigger than the Washington Monument to them. Sometimes a +few girls come down too, and hang around, giggling. But that doesn't +last long. We won't stand for it in our town. Some missionary tells the +girls' parents, and then they suddenly disappear from the ranks and look +pouty and insulted for a month, and we know, without being told, that a +couple of grown-up young ladies of sixteen or more have been spanked in +the good old-fashioned way. Homeburg is a good town, and it makes its +girls behave even if it has to half kill them. + +You haven't any idea, Jim, how much bustle and noise and excitement and +general enthusiasm a passenger train can put into a small town for a few +minutes. Just imagine yourself in Homeburg on a cold winter afternoon. +It's four o'clock. The sun has stood the climate as long as it can and +is getting ready to duck for shelter behind the dreary fields to the +west. If you ran an automobile a mile a minute down the walk on Main +Street you wouldn't have to toot for a soul. Now and then a farmer comes +out of a store, takes a half hitch on the muffler around his neck, puts +on his bearskin gloves and unties his rig. You watch him drive off, the +wheels yelling on the hard snow, and wonder if it isn't more cheerful +out in the frozen country with the corn shocks for company. It's the +terrible half hour of bleak, fading light before the electricity is +turned on and the cozy dark comes down--the loneliest hour of the +winter's day. + +You've stood it about as long as you can, when you notice signs of life +across the street. Three men carrying satchels are steering for the +depot. Dorgan's dray is rattling down the street. Dorgan's dray would +make a cheerful noise if it was the last sound on earth. Little flocks +and groups of people begin plodding across the square. You know them +all. Gibb Ogle is going over to watch the baggageman load trunks. It is +Gibb's life work. Pelty Amthorne is a little late, but he'll have time +to arrange himself against the east end door and answer the roll-call, +as he has for thirty years. Miss Ollie Mingle is going over too. She +must be expecting that Paynesville young man again. If the competition +between her and Ri Hawkes gets any keener, Ollie will have to meet the +train down at the crossing and nab the young man there. Sim Atkinson is +taking a handful of letters down to the station as usual. Ever since he +had his row with Postmaster Flint, he has refused to add to the receipts +of the office, and buys his stamps of the mail clerk. It is Sim's hope +and dream that sometime the annual receipts of the Homeburg post-office +will just miss being enough to bring a raise in salary. Then Sim will +bring it to Flint's attention that he would have bought his ten +dollars' worth of stamps that year at home, if Flint hadn't advertised +his lock box for rent when he neglected the quarterly dues. Watching Sim +thirst for revenge is as much fun as having a real Indian in town. + +There's the headlight half a mile down the track! She's coming fast, ten +minutes late, and, because you've been lonesome all afternoon and need +exercise, you slip into your coat and hustle down. Just as you get to +the depot, Number Eleven comes in with a crash and a roar, bell ringing, +steam popping off, every brake yelling, platforms loaded, expectation +intense, confusion terrific, all nerves a-tingle, and fat old Jack Ball, +the conductor, lantern under arm, sweeping majestically by on the bottom +step of the smoker. Young Red Nolan and Barney Gastit, two of the +station agent's innumerable amateur helpers, race for the baggage car +with their truck, making a terrible uproar over the old planks. The mail +clerk dumps the sacks. Usually he gets a stranger in the shin with +them. Nothing doing to-day. Just missed a traveling man. We still tell +of the time the paper sack scooted across the icy platform and stood +Mayor Andrews on his head. He wanted to abolish the whole post-office +department. + +I've always realized what the city gate must have meant to the medieval +loafers, because I've watched Homeburg's city gate at the 4:11 train so +often. There's Mrs. Sim Estabrook getting home. Must have been +unexpected. No one to meet her. Wonder if Sim's sick again. I'll call up +pretty soon. Wimble Horn's been to Chicago again, evidently. Wonder if +he'll dump his last eighty acres into the Board of Trade. Who's the +fine-looking duck in the fur-lined coat? Not a transient, evidently. He +passed Josh by. Must be visiting somebody. Yes; Mrs. Ackley's kissing +him. That might mean a scandal in New York, but at home it means +relatives. Poor old Jedson Bane's back, I see. Looks pretty bad. +Hospital didn't help him. Guess he's not long for us. Hello, Jed, old +man! How are you? Better? That's fine. You're looking great! For the +love of Mike, will you take a swift look at what's got off? I believe +it's from college. They don't wear clothes like that anywhere else. Oh, +yes, of course, that's why the Singers' automobile came down. Don't know +what we'd do, now that the circus has passed us up, if it wasn't for +Sally Singer. She imports a new specimen from the University about every +two weeks. + +The crowd is off, and you hurl a few good-bys at the travelers getting +on. Our two editors check them off as they go. The _Argus_ and the +_Democrat_ get all their news at this train. There's no slipping in and +out of town in Homeburg. One and all we face the gantlet. Young Andy +Lowes hates to have us beg him not to miss the morning train back, as we +do three times a week; but he simply has to go to Jonesville that +often, and we all know why, and he knows we know. The Parsons are rid of +their Aunt Mary at last. She's worse than an oyster. Put her in a +guest-room and she grows fast to it. They've had her for six months now. +Hello! Peter Link's son is going down to Jonesville. Guess he's got his +job back. Andy would be a good boy if he would only stop trying to make +the distilleries work nights. There goes old Colonel Ackley on his +weekly trip. Wonder if he thinks he fools any one with that suit case. +Ever since the town went dry, he's had business in the next county. +Hello, Colonel! Don't drop that case. You'll break a suit of clothes! +Watch him glare. + +The engine has gotten its breath by this time. Ever notice how human an +engine sounds when it stops after a long run and the air-brake apparatus +begins to pant? Old Ball has been fussing for a minute and now he yells +"'Board." Aunt Emma Newcomb gets in a few more kisses all around her +family. She's going down to the next station. The engine gives a few +loud puffs, spins its wheels a few times, and the cars begin moving +past. Hurrah! Something doing to-day. That grocery salesman who gets +here once a week is coming across the square two jumps to a rod. Go it, +old man! Go it, train! Ball will always stop for a woman, but the +drummers have to take her on the fly. There! He's on--all but his hat. +Red Nolan will keep that for him till his next trip. + +She's moving fast now. The brakeman hops the next to the last car with +grace and carelessness. From every platform devoted friends and +relatives are spilling--it is a point of honor in Homeburg to remain +with your loved ones in the car as long as you dare before leaping for +life. The last car sweeps by. The red and green lights begin to grow +smaller with businesslike promptness. There is a parting clatter as the +train hits the last switch frog two blocks away. Then it's over. The +noise, bustle, confusion, and joyful excitement follow the flying +cinders out of town, and silence resumes its reign. I've never heard +anything so still as Homeburg after the 4:11 has pulled out. + +But we're too busy to notice it as we string across the square to the +post-office. We have the day's cargo to digest. We have to wait for the +evening mail to be distributed, read the evening newspapers, shake hands +with all the returned Homeburgers, size up the brand new Homeburgers and +investigate the strangers. And it keeps us busy until supper time. + +I've lived in Homeburg thirty-five years and more, and the 4:11 train +has been tangled up in my biography all the way. I remember the first +time I ever rode on it. The cars were funny-looking coops then, and the +engine had a sixty-gallon smokestack. I was four, and I yelled with +fear when the train came in and kept it up for the first twenty miles +after they lugged me on board. The conductor chucked me under the chin +and gave me his punch to play with. He was a young man then. He'd +carried my father and mother on their wedding journey, and twenty years +after that first ride of mine he carried me and my wife on our wedding +journey. The other day we gave our oldest girl two dollars and sent her +on her first trip down to Jonesville, by herself. Old Ball was on the +train, and he grinned at me and promised to take good care of her. He's +pretty gray now, but I hope he stays long enough to start another +generation of our family on its travels. + +I went to my first circus, to Jonesville, on old Number Eleven. And I +went down there at sixteen, a member of the Republican Club, with a +torch, and the proudest boy in the State. The next year I started to +college with an algebra and a tennis racket under my arm (they wouldn't +jam into the trunk), and a dozen friends came down to see me off. On +Number Eleven that day I met four other boys going to the same school. +We are still close chums, though one is on the coast, another's here in +New York, and the third is in the Philippines. + +[Illustration: It seemed to me then as if she must have come from heaven +by air-line.] + +It was the next year that I noticed a girl as she stepped off of Number +Eleven and was met by one of the Homeburg girls. I didn't know who she +was, but it seemed to me then as if she must have come from heaven by +air-line, and I felt so friendly toward the girl who met her that I had +to go down to her house to call that very night. The visitor had come to +stay--her father was starting a new store in Homeburg. I'll tell you, +when a snorty old train, which assays two pecks of cinders per car, +hauls the most wonderful girl on earth into your town and dumps her +into your arms--so to speak, and bunching up events a little--you're +bound to love that train. + +I could write the history of Homeburg from the 4:11 too. In fact, the +train has hauled most of Homeburg into the town. Year after year we +watch strangers get off the train and turn around three times, in the +way a stranger does when he tries to orient himself and locate the +nearest hotel. We get acquainted with those strangers, and in the next +week we discover their business and antecedents and politics and +preferences in jokes, and whether they pull for the Chicago Cubs or the +White Sox. In two weeks they are old-time citizens and go down with us +to welcome the newcomers. Henry Broar came to us on the 4:11. I remember +he wore a loppy hat and needed a shave that day, and we didn't assess +him very highly. But he had a whacking law practice inside of a year, +ran for county judge two years later, and now we swell up to the danger +point when people mention Congressman Broar, and let it slip modestly +that we are intimate enough with Hank to trade shirts with him. + +I remember well the day two imposing strangers got off of Number Eleven, +and made the town nearly explode with curiosity by walking out to the +Dover farm at the edge of town and pacing it off this way and that. Took +us a month to learn their business. That was the time we got the Scraper +Works. When Allison B. Unk arrived, he made a tremendous impression by +wearing a plug hat still in its first youth, and rolling ponderously +around town in a Prince Albert. We've despised Prince Alberts ever since +because the town fell for that one and deposited liberally in Unk's new +bank, which closed up a year later. And then there was the time when the +trainmen put off a scared and sick cripple, who lay in the depot +waiting-room with a ring of sympathetic incompetents around him until +Doc Simms could help him. He touched our hearts, and we shelled out +enough to send him on a hundred miles to his people. He came back ten +years later and kept Homeburg balanced magnificently in the air for a +week by showing us how much fun it is to chum with a millionaire. Even +sick cripples are likely to guess the market right in this country, you +know, and he never forgot us. + +As they come in on Number Eleven, so they go. The young men come to +Homeburg full of hope, and their sons go on elsewhere loaded with the +same. Mothers weep on the station platform many times a year while their +Willies and Johns and Petes hike gaily off to chase their fortunes. And +many times a year the old boys come back from Chicago. Some of them are +rich and proud, and some of them are rich and friendly, and some of them +are just friendly. But they all get off of Number Eleven under our +keen, discriminating glare, and they all get the same greeting while we +size them up and wonder if their nobby thirty-five dollar suits are +their sole stocks-in-trade, and just how much a "lucrative position" +means in Chicago. + +When the big strike was on, twenty-five years ago, Number Eleven didn't +run for two days. We might as well have been marooned on St. Helena. It +was awful. When a hand-car came sweeping into town the third day with a +big sail on, we hailed it like starving sailors. It was Number Eleven +which took on a flat-car loaded with Paynesville's fire department +twenty years ago and saved our business section. When President Banks, +of the Great F. C. & L. Railroad, rolled into Homeburg in his private +car, to become "Pudge" Banks again for a day or two and revisit the +scenes of his boyhood, he came on Number Eleven of course. The train +hung around while the band played two selections and the mayor gave an +address of welcome. That was her longest visit in Homeburg. + +The old train even bursts into local politics and social affairs now and +then. It managed to jump the track in the campaign of '96, leaving four +distinguished Democratic speakers, fizzing with oratory, in the +cornfields, and ruining the only rally the Dems attempted to pull off. +And it took DeLancey Payley down after all the rest of the town had +failed, in a manner which kept us tearful with delight for a week. +DeLancey was sequestered in an Eastern college by his loving parents, +and when he was graduated he came home and started an exclusive circle +composed mostly of himself. He was unapproachably haughty, until one day +he accompanied a proud beauty, who was visiting the Singers (our other +hothouse family) to Number Eleven, and lingered too long after the train +started. DeLancey got off, but in doing so he performed a variety of +difficult and instructive feats of balancing on his ear which were +viewed by a large audience with terrific enthusiasm. When DeLancey was +haughty after that, we always praised this feat, and you'd be surprised +to see how soon he got his nose down out of the zenith. + +Every day old Number Eleven brings in its mail-bag full of hopes and +triumphs, of good news, bad news, and tragedy. Every day it brings the +new ideas from the world outside and the latest wrinkles in hanging on +to this whirling old sphere in a pleasant and successful manner. We get +our styles from the Chicago men who step off of its platforms and tarry +with us. We send our brides off on it with an entire change of bill at +each performance. We get our peeps into wonderland and romance and +comedy from the theatrical troupes which straggle out of its cars and +rush to the baggage car to make sure that no varlet has attached their +trunks since the last stop. It is the magic carpet which carries our +youth forth into the great world to wonder and learn and prevail. And +now and then it is the kindly beast of burden who brings back some old +playmate, done with weariness and striving, and coming home to rest in +our cemetery beyond the south hill. + +No, Jim, your thousand trains a day, with their parlor cars, bathrooms, +barber shops and libraries, are all right, but they're just trains. +Number Eleven is a whole lot more than a train. It is the world come to +visit us once a day--a moving picture of life which we enjoyed long +before Edison took out his patent. Do you wonder that it makes me sad to +see so many perfectly good trains going to waste in this roofed-over +township of yours? Take me out of it, please. + + + + +II + +THE FRIENDLY FIRE-FIEND + +_The Joys of Fighting Him with a Volunteer Fire Department_ + + +Hello! Here comes the fire department! Watch the people swarm! Uumpp! +Ouch! Excuse me for living. This is no place for a peaceable spectator. +I'm going to cast anchor in this doorway until the mob gets past. + +No, thank you. I'll not join the Marathon. But you don't know how +homesick and happy it makes me to see this crowd run! I've been in New +York a week now, and honestly this is almost the first really human +impulse I've seen a citizen give way to. Until this minute I've felt as +if I were a hundred thousand miles from Homeburg, with all train +service suspended for the winter. If I could find the man who stepped on +my heels while chasing that engine, I'd thank him and ask him what +volunteer fire department he used to run with. See 'em scramble. + +Whoop! Here comes the hook-and-ladder truck! This is nothing but +Homeburg on a big scale. I'm beginning to envy you city chaps now. That +makes the fourth engine that's come past. You get more for your money +than we do. Look at that chief hurdling curbstones in his little red +wagon. If Homeburg ever gets big enough to have a chief's wagon, I'll +suffocate with pride. + +I see it's the same old story. Fire's all out. It always is by the time +you've run nine blocks. Watch the racers coming back. Stung, every one +of them--gold-bricked. There's a fat fellow who's run half a mile, I'll +bet. If his tongue hung out any farther, he'd trip up on it. But he'll +do it again next time. They all do. Learning to stop running to fires is +as hard as learning to stop buying mining-stock in the West. And it's +just as big a swindle too. The returns from running to fires are +marvelously small. They tell me that a hundred million dollars a year +goes up in flames in this country. I don't believe it. If it does, I +want to know who gets to see all the fun. I don't. + +I've run to fires all my life, until lately, and I've drawn about three +hundred and seventy-five blanks. Once I almost saw a big grain-elevator +burn in a Western town. That is, I would have seen it, if I had looked +out of my hotel window. But I'd run two miles to see a burning haystack +in the afternoon, and I was so dead tired that I slept right through the +performance that night. And once I did see a row of stores burn, back in +Homeburg--at the distance of a mile. I was in school, and the teacher +wouldn't dismiss us. By stretching my neck several feet I could just see +the flames leaping over the trees, but that was all. Some of the bad +boys sneaked out of the door, but I was a good boy, and waited one +thousand years until school was out and the fire was ditto. I've never +felt quite the same since toward either goodness or education. + +Some men run faithfully to fires year after year and view a fine +collection of burning beefsteaks and feverish chimneys and volcanic +wood-sheds, while others stroll out after dinner in a strange city and +spend a pleasant evening watching a burning oil-refinery make a Vesuvius +look pale and sickly in comparison. Luck is distributed in a dastardly +way, and as for myself I've quit trying. I don't run to fires at all any +more. The big cities have fooled me long enough by sending out forty +pieces of apparatus to smother a defective flue. I stay behind and +watch the crowd. It's more amusing and not half so much work. + +Of course in Homeburg it's different. You city people don't realize what +a blessing the fire-fiend is to a small town. Fires mean a whole lot to +us. They keep us from petrifying altogether during the dull seasons. And +they don't have to be real fires, either. Any old alarm will do. Our +fire-bell sounds just as terrible for a little brush fire as it would +for a flaming powder-mill. It's an adventure merely to hear the thing. +Take a winter night in the dull season after Christmas, for instance. +You have begun to go to sleep right after supper. You've finished the +job at nine o'clock, and by two A.M. you're sailing placidly southwest +of Australia in a seagoing automobile. + +Suddenly the pirate-ship in the rear, which you hadn't noticed before, +slips up and begins potting away at you with a dull metallic boom. The +auto slips its clutch, and the engine begins to clang and clatter, and +somebody off behind a red-hot mountain in the distance begins ringing an +enormous bell just as you slide downward into a crater of flame--and +then you wake up entirely, and the fire-bell is going +"clang-clang-clang-clang-clang," while below you hear the ringing crunch +of your neighbor's feet on the cold snow, and outside the north window +there is a red glare which may be either the end of the world or another +exploded lamp in 'Bige Brinton's chicken-incubator; you won't know which +until you have stabbed both feet into one pants-leg, crawled all over +the cold floor for a missing sock, and run half a mile, double-reefing +your nightshirt to keep it from trailing out from under your overcoat. +That's what a fire-alarm means in Homeburg. + +It's just as interesting in the daytime too. Imagine a summer afternoon +in Homeburg about three o'clock. It's hotter than a simoon in the +Sahara, and the aggregate business being done along Front Street is +nineteen cents an hour. The nearest approach to life on the street is +Sam McAtaw sitting in a shady spot on the edge of the sidewalk and +leaning against a telephone-pole, sound asleep. You're sitting in your +office chair, with your feet on the desk, dozing, when suddenly you hear +footsteps outside. Whoever is making them is turning them out with great +rapidity, and that in itself is novel enough to be interesting. The +footsteps go by, and you look at their maker. It is Gibb Ogle surging up +the walk and yanking his ponderous feet this way and that with +tremendous energy. Nothing but a fire or a loose lion can make Gibb run, +and you don't take any stock in the lion theory; so you tumble out after +him. + +By this time Sim Bone is on the street, and Harvey McMuggins is coming +up behind, while half a dozen heads have suddenly sprouted from as many +doorways. Your heart beats with suspense when Gibb comes to the +town-hall corner. Hurrah! He's steering for the fire-house. You're +overhauling him rapidly, and by a big sprint you beat out Clatt +Sanderson, and grab one handle of the fire-bell ropes. Gibb grabs the +other, and then you let her have it for all there is in you. + +Did I say anything about Homeburg being asleep? Forget it. Before you've +hit the bell a dozen taps you can't hear it for the tramp of feet. Every +store in town is belching forth proprietors and clerks. They are coming +bareheaded and coatless; some of them are collarless. Chief Dobbs, who +shoes horses in his less glorious moments and keeps his helmet hanging +on the forge-cover, dashes into the engine-room, grabs his trumpet, and +begins firing orders, not singly, but in broadsides. There's nobody +there to order yet, but he's just getting his hand in, and ten seconds +later, when the first member of the company arrives, he is saluted with +nineteen stentorian commands in one blast. Half a minute later the +engine-house is clogged with fire-fighters, and the air is a maelstrom +of orders, counter orders, suggestions, objections, and hoarse yells. +Then a roar of wheels sounds outside, and you drop the bell-rope handle +and go out to see the finest sight of all. + +I suppose those old Romans thought the chariot-races were pretty nifty, +but if an old Roman should reassemble himself and watch the dray-race to +a Homeburg fire, he'd wonder how he ever managed to sit through a silly +little dash around an arena. From the south comes a cloud of dust and a +terrific racket. At an equal distance from the east comes another cloud +of dust and an even more terrible uproar, Clay Billings's dray having +more loose spokes than Bill Dorgan's. The clouds approach with +tremendous speed. Bill is a little ahead. He is lashing his horses with +the ends of the reins, while from the bounding dray small articles of no +value, such as butter-firkins and cases of eggs, are emerging and +following on the road behind. + +But Clay isn't beaten--not by a thousand miles. He's going to make it a +dead heat or better--no, Bill hit the crossing first. By George! That +Clay boy is a wonder. He deliberately pulled in and shot across behind +Bill, cutting off a good fifty feet. His team stops, sliding on their +haunches, and ten seconds later is being hitched to the hose-cart, while +Clay is on the seat clanging the foot-bell triumphantly. It's the +fiftieth race, or thereabouts, between the two, and the score is about +even. The winner gets two dollars for the use of his team. I've seen +horse-races for a thousand-dollar purse which weren't half as exciting. + +In the meanwhile more messengers have arrived from the fire. It is in +the Mahlon Brown barn, and late advices indicate terrible progress. As +fast as forty-nine rival fingers can do it, the tugs are fastened, and +the cart is off down the street with a long trail of citizens after it. + +Bill's team, badly blown, is hitched to the hook-and-ladder truck, and +willing hands push it out through the door. There is always more or less +of a feud between the hook-and-ladder boys and the hose-cart boys, +because the former get the second team and rarely arrive at the fire in +time to hoist the beautiful blue ladders before the hose-cart gang puts +the conflagration out. Indeed, the feeling has gotten so strong at times +that the hook-and-ladder gang has threatened to double the prize-money +by private subscription and get their rig out first, but patriotism has +thus far prevented this. + +You have rung the bell until you are tired, by this time, and, besides, +the human flood has rushed on, leaving no one to whom you can explain +just how you thought you smelled fire and beat the world to the +engine-house. So you set out for the fire yourself and jog over the +half-mile in pretty fair time, considering the heat. It is an impressive +sight--not the fire itself, but the event. Two thousand, two hundred and +nine people are there--that being the population of Homeburg minus the +sick and wandering. + +In the midst of the seething mass are the hose-cart and the +ladder-truck. Around them dozens of red helmets are bobbing, while the +quivering air is cut and slashed and mangled with a very hurricane of +orders: "Bring up that hose--" "Whoa, keep that horse still--" "Bring +her round this way--" "Bring her round _this_ way--" "Hey, you chumps, +the fire's _this_ side--" "Back up that wagon--" "Come ahead with the +wagon--" "Get out of here till we get a ladder up--" "Axes here--" "Turn +on that water--" "Turn on that water--" "_Turn on that water!!--_" +"Jones, go down and tell that wooden Indian to turn on that water." +"Hold that water, you--" "_Hold that water!_" "Turn her on, I say." +"Turn her--" "Wow--turn that nozzle the other way--" + +And then the water comes with a mighty rush, yanking the nozzlemen this +way and that and sweeping firemen and common citizens aside as if they +were mere straws. + +As a rule, this is the climax, and the end comes rapidly. By this time +Brown, who had put the fire out with a few pails of water before the +alarm sounded, has persuaded the department to call off its hose, the +barn being full of valuable hay. So there isn't anything to do. The +water is turned off. Gibb Ogle explains to the one hundred and eleventh +knot of people how he was going past the place when he saw the tongue of +flame, and every one disperses after a pleasant social time. + +Everybody is tolerably well satisfied except the hook-and-ladder gang, +which, as usual, is skunked again--never got a ladder out. A couple of +the axmen had a little fun with a rear window, but otherwise the affair +is a flat failure. They go back sullenly, but are comforted when the +roll is called, when each member who was present draws a dollar from the +city treasury. As usual, Pete Sundbloom is late, and tries to edge in to +roll-call, though he was a mile away from peril, but he can't make it +stick and gets the hoarse hoot when his little game is discovered. + +I want to ask you--isn't that a pleasant interruption on a dead day? It +makes life worth living, and I really wonder that there isn't more +incendiarism in small towns throughout the United States. + +Of course all the alarms aren't fizzles. Sometimes we have a real fire, +and then the scene defies description. When a fair-sized house burns +down, Chief Dobbs is so hoarse that he can't talk for a week, and when +the row of wooden stores on the south side went up in flames a few years +ago, the old chief, Patrick McQuinn, burst a blood-vessel and had to +retire, the doctor having warned him that he must never use a +speaking-trumpet again. + +I was away at the time, but they tell me that was a grand fire for the +hook-and-ladder boys. They were right in the middle of it, and every +ladder in the truck was out. There was some trouble over the fact that +the big extension ladder was too tall for the buildings, and when Art +Simms had climbed to the top, he managed to fall fifteen feet to the +roof of the furniture-store, bruising himself badly. But, on the whole, +great good was done, and the second story workers were kings that day. +When the hotel caught, and the hook-and-ladder gang got into it, the way +the upper windows belched mattresses, mirrors, toilet-sets, pictures and +beds was unbelievable. Almost everything in the building was saved, and +some of it was successfully repaired afterward. + +The axmen had their innings that day, too. It was a great sight to see +Andy Lowes leap nimbly up the ladder and poke in window after window +with his spiked ax, stepping backward now and then into nozzleman +Jones's face in order to view the effect. The axmen got glory enough to +last for years, and it was an axman who put out the last scrap of fire. +Frank Sundell was the hero. He was sitting on the ridge-pole of +Emerson's restaurant when he noticed a few blazing spots on the shingle +roof beneath him. He might have called the hose department; but, as I +have said, there is a good deal of rivalry between the two, and, +besides, Sundell had had a slow time that day, Lowes doing most of the +display work. So Frank reached cautiously down with his trusty ax, cut +out a blazing section of shingles, and tossed it to the ground. The +crowd cheered, and he was so encouraged that he cut out the rest of the +hot spots and put out the fire single-handed. Sundell is one of our very +best firemen and stands in line for a nozzleman's position some day. + +Of course a small-town fire department doesn't get as much practice in +twisting the fire-fiend's tail as a city fire company; but our boys have +a mighty good record, and we're proud of them. Since we've had +water-works, and the department hasn't had to depend on some cistern +which always went dry just at a critical moment, there hasn't been a +conflagration in Homeburg big enough to get into the city papers. The +boys may be a little overzealous now and then, but they are always on +the job ten minutes after the first tap of the bell, and the way they go +after a red tongue of flame on a kitchen roof reminds me of a terrier +shaking a rat. They are our real heroes,--the fire-laddies,--for outside +of Frank Ericson and Shorty McGrew, who work on the switching-crew, and +come sailing down through town hanging gracefully from the end of a +box-car ladder by one foot and hand, no one else has any chance to face +danger in Homeburg. + +Of course our firemen don't face danger regularly, between meals, like +your big paid departments here, and about the most the ordinary business +man gets in the danger-line is the imminent peril of getting a new +twenty-five-dollar suit in line with the chemical hose; but we don't +forget in Homeburg how old Mrs. Agnew's house burned twenty years ago +this spring and the department was late, owing to the magnificent depth +of Exchange Street, the roads having broken up, and how, when it got +there, the house was a mass of flames, with the poor old lady, who had +been bedridden for years, shrieking inside, and a hundred neighbors +shrieking on the outside; and how Pat McQuinn and Henry Aultmeyer dove +in through a window, with wet coats around their heads and the +chemical-hose playing on their backs; and how they tugged and hauled at +Mrs. Agnew, who weighed two hundred and fifty pounds, and couldn't get a +grip on her, and finally upended the burning bed and dumped her out of +the window, breaking her hip, and then dumped themselves out and rolled +in the wet grass until their hair and mustaches and clothes quit +blazing--after which they retired into cotton-wool for a month. + +Maybe your men would have done it more scientifically and entirely saved +poor Mrs. Agnew, who died the next month of the broken hip, but they +couldn't have stuck to the job any more heroically; and when Homeburg +citizens talk about "brave fire-laddies" and "homely heroes" at the +annual benefit supper of the Volunteer Company No. 1, they mean Pat and +Henry, and are perfectly willing to argue the question with any one. + +So we worship our company to our heart's content, and when it comes +pacing slowly down the street at the head of every parade, with the +members looking handsomer than chorus girls in their dark-blue flannel +suits, red belts, and neat blue caps, we look at them full of pride and +confidence. Our little boys dream of the time when they will grow up and +join the company and wear seven-pound red helmets at fires, and come +home tired and muddy in the gray dawn after a fire and demand hot coffee +from their admiring women-folks; and as for the Homeburg girls--well, +the greatest social function of our town, or of the county for that +matter, is the annual ball of the Homeburg fire department. + +And let me tell you, when the nine-piece orchestra--all home +talent--strikes up the grand march and Chief Dobbs, with his wide-gauge +mustache and vacuum-cleaned uniform, leads the company around the hall, +every hero with the girl or wife of his heart on his arm and a full +hundred couples of the mere laymen crowding in behind, in a long and +many-looped line, the Astor ball would have to do business with a brass +band and a display of fireworks to attract any more enthusiasm. + +That's what the fire department means to us in Homeburg. We don't suffer +half so much from fires as we would from the lack of them; and when this +new concrete construction makes the world fire-proof, and the Homeburg +fire department rusts away and disappears, we will mourn it even more +sincerely than we did the opera house with a real gallery, which got +over-heated one night twenty-five years ago and burned, compelling us to +get along with a mere hall with a flat floor ever afterward. + + + + +III + +HOMEBURG'S TWO FOUR-HUNDREDTHS + +_The Struggles of our Best Families to Impress Us_ + + +Hold on, Jim. Don't hurry so. Remember I don't have a chance to walk up +Fifth Avenue every day. Give me a chance to astonish myself. Here are +ten thousand women going by in clothes that would make a lily turn red +and burn up with shame, and an equal number of proud gents with curlycue +collars on their overcoats, and I want to do the sight justice. + +You see all this parade every day, but I don't, and I want to drink it +all in. See that feminine explosion in salmon plush! That would +paralyze business back home. Watch that hat crossing the street--it +ought to be arrested for being without visible means of support--Oh, I +see! There's a girl under it with one of those rifle-barrel skirts. Gee! +Ssh, Jim! Did you see the lady who just passed? Let's beg her pardon for +intruding on this earth. Say, you could peel enough haughtiness off of +her to supply eight duchesses and still have enough for the lady cashier +at my hotel. I'll bet she is one of your Four Hundred. For goodness' +sake, Jim, if we pass any of your social lighthouses, point them out to +me. I'm here to see the sights. + +I know the rest of the country throws it up to New York a lot because of +its Four Hundred, and that the ordinary small-town man gets so scornful +when he talks of the idle and diamond-crusted rich, with their +poodle-dog pastimes, that he lives in constant danger of stabbing his +eyes with his nose. But I'm not that way; I'm interested. Nothing +fascinates me so much as the stories in your papers about Mrs. Clymorr +Busst's clever pearl earrings, made to resemble door knobs; and about +Mrs. Spenser Coyne's determination to have Columbia University removed +because it interferes with the view from her garage; and about little +Mrs. Justin Wright's charming innocence in buying a whole steamship +whenever she goes over to Europe. I'd go a long way to see your Four +Hundred perform; and moreover, after I had accumulated a precarious +balance on an iron spike fence in order to rest one eye on a genuine +duke while he fought his way out of a church with one of your leading +local beauties, who had just been affixed to him for life, I would not +squint pityingly on the heaving mass of spectators and hiss: + +"We don't do this in Homeburg." + +Because we would do it fast enough if we had a chance. + +We don't have anything like your Smart Set, of course, but I desire to +say with pride that while there aren't enough tiaras in Homeburg to fill +a pill box, and the only limousine we possess is the closed carriage +which is used for the family of the deceased at funerals, we have our +exclusive and magnificent class just as New York has. We haven't a Four +Hundred in Homeburg, but we have a Two Four-Hundredths. If you get as +much real, solid pleasure and amusement in New York watching your Four +Hundred as we do watching the Payleys and the Singers, I envy you. +They're worth all the trouble they cause. + +For a good many years, Mrs. Wert Payley, wife of the First National +Bank, was our Smart Set, all by herself. There was never any question of +it. She admitted it, and we didn't take the trouble to deny it. In a +way, she was regarded as a public benefactor. Nobody else cared to +spend the money necessary to be a Smart Set, and since Mrs. Payley was +willing to fight and be bled, so to speak, to give our town tone and +inject a little excitement into our prairie lives now and then, we felt +that the least we could do was to regard her as a social colossus. + +The Payleys were the only people in Homeburg who had lunch at noon, and +as early as 1900 they ate it from the bare table. She was the only woman +in Homeburg who could "look in" on an afternoon gabble of any kind for a +few minutes and get away with it without insulting the hostess. When she +shook hands with you, you always grabbed in the wrong place, no matter +how much thought you put into it, and while you were readjusting your +sights and clawing for her fingers and perspiring with mortification, +she was getting a start on you which kept you bashfully humble as long +as she was in sight. She was real goods, Mrs. Payley was--not arrogant, +but just naturally superior. People who called at the Payleys' evenings +were the social lights of Homeburg, and whenever some lady wanted to +discharge a few fireworks indicating her social position, she would form +a hollow square around Mrs. Payley in public and get intimate with her +in full view of everybody. Mrs. Payley ran the town, and everybody was +comfortable and content about it until the Singers arrived. + +The Singers came from Cincinnati to cashier in the Farmers' State Bank: +Mrs. Singer was city bred and city heeled and when she met Mrs. Wert +Payley she didn't even blink. She put out her hand a little +nor'-nor'east of her chatelaine watch, when Mrs. Payley put out her hand +some four inches southwest by south, and waited calmly for Mrs. Payley +to correct herself. There was an awful moment of suspense, and when it +became evident that the only way to get Mrs. Singer's hand down to the +other level would be to excavate beneath her and change her foundations, +Mrs. Payley gave in and reached. + +War was declared that minute, and I shudder now when I think of the +months which followed. + +Mrs. Payley, having been on the ground a long time, had fortified it, of +course, and was president of all the clubs. But inside of a month Mrs. +Singer flanked her position. She declined to join most of the clubs on +the plea of being a busy woman, and organized a flower mission. Its +object was to distribute flowers to the sick and needy, who generally +consisted of Pat Ryan. Pat was nearly smothered in flowers that year, +being good-natured, and as the work of collecting said flowers involved +a great deal of meeting in the Singer home and dancing in the Singer +attic, which was floored with hard maple that winter, Mrs. Singer had +the girls of the town organized into a Roman phalanx before spring. + +Mrs. Payley was triumphantly reëlected to the presidency of all her +clubs that winter, but Mrs. Singer organized a public library +association and pulled off a German. Mrs. Payley attended, and when she +tried to patronize Mrs. Singer with her compliments, that clever +infighter beat her to it by explaining the theory of the German to her. +That made Mrs. Payley so mad that the next month she invited the state +president of the Federation of Women's Clubs to visit her, and didn't +ask Mrs. Singer to the tea. The next week Mrs. Singer organized a +Country Club. It only consisted of a two-room pavilion in which picnics +could be held and dances could be pulled off, with long intermissions +for the extraction of slivers from the feet. But it was just as easy to +talk about while you were in town and to refer to in a hushed and +exclusive manner as if it cost a million, and when Mrs. Payley realized +that she could never hope to become exclusive enough to get into it, +though goodness knows she couldn't have been hired to belong to the +foolish thing, she quit speaking to Mrs. Singer, the split became a +chasm, and we began choosing up sides in earnest. + +That winter Mrs. Singer seceded from the church which Mrs. Payley ran, +and founded an Episcopal church, taking seven choir members out of the +Congregational church, to say nothing of the organist. All this mixed up +religion in Homeburg that winter until you could scarcely tell it from a +ward caucus. + +By spring it was dangerous to show favors to either side, and when the +school election came around, it was fought out between the Payley and +Singer factions. Sally Singer had been given higher marks than Sarah +Payley, and the upshot of it all was that when the Payley side prevailed +at election by nine votes, the superintendent lost his job. He was a +good superintendent and the cause of education didn't get over the jolt +for some years, but justice, of course, had to be done. + +The Singers got some satisfaction out of it by electing the school board +treasurer, which took a lot of money out of the First National Bank. +That, of course, got the banks into the row. You city folks may have +your financial flurries, but if you've never been around and between and +under a bank scrap in a small town, you don't know what trouble is. +There were a couple of failures that needn't have happened, and a lot of +partisan financiering, and then the town rose up and sat down on our +social leaders with a most pronounced scrunch. We can stand just about +so much society in Homeburg, but when it gets to elbowing into business, +churches, schools and funerals, we are more sensible than you +metropolitans are. It only takes a half-day to pass the word through a +small town, and one fine morning the Payleys and Singers discovered +that while they were still facing each other like two snorty and +inextinguishable generals, their armies had gone off arm in arm. + +That ended the feud and put society in Homeburg back in its proper +place--in the front parlors in the evening after the dishes had been +done up. The Payleys and Singers still continued to compete, but we +declined to fight and bleed for them and amused ourselves instead by +watching them from the sidelines. Mrs. Payley joined the "When I was in +Europe" brigade, and the Singers got the first automobile in town. It +kept the Singers so busy supporting and encouraging it, that the Payleys +were able to build the first modern house with a sleeping porch and +individual bathrooms--and about the time the Singers came back with a +two-story bungalow full of chopped wood furniture, Mrs. Payley went +abroad again and began to say: "The last time I was in Europe." It was +nip and tuck, year in and year out, between the two, and we all enjoyed +it a lot. + +But it wasn't until the Payley and Singer children came home from +college and formed a tight little circle with their backs out, that we +began to reap the benefits of really haughty society. + +The Payley and Singer children had absorbed all their families had to +offer, and then they went off to school in the East and laid in a +complete stock of the latest styles in superiority. They were all +finished in the same spring and shipped back to Homeburg--magnificent +specimens of college art with even their names done over--and when they +realized that they had to live forever in the old town, where no one +spoke their language or could even understand their clothes, the family +feud was forgotten and the four rushed together for mutual protection +and formed a real Smart Set. + +It's just like your bigger crowd. It doesn't have anything to do with +us in particular. And we are just like you are. You open your Sunday +papers and read reams about the plumbing and pajamas and pet dogs and +love affairs of your first families, and I guess nothing that Sally +Singer or Sarah Payley ever did got past the scornful but lynx-eyed +Homeburgers. When Sarah was getting letters on expensive stationery from +Kansas City, the whole town discussed the probable character of a man +who would put blue sealing wax on his envelopes, and when Sally made her +pa put an addition on the Singer home, we knew what color she was going +to do her boudoir in three months in advance. But we are prouder than +your people. You hire down-trodden reporters to go and abase themselves +to get the information, while we wouldn't lower ourselves enough to ask +even by proxy. We just let the sewing women and hired girls tell us. + +Being an exclusive set in a small town is a whole lot harder than it is +in New York, and I've always admired our youngsters for the way they've +carried it off. Of course, four people can't form a club or give parties +or support an exclusive restaurant; they can't even be exclusive all by +themselves. They have had to mingle with us, but they are always +carefully insulated. They joined our Country Club, but they did it with +their fingers crossed, so to speak. They always come out together and +protect each other from our rude advances as much as possible. They +import college friends whenever they can, and they always have a few +bush leaguers, or utility players, to work in on such occasions. Henry +Snyder used to say he could tell when there was need of the peasantry at +the Singer house by the way Sally Singer would suddenly descend from the +third cross-road beyond Mars to the street in front of the post-office +and ask him with an accurately hospitable smile if he couldn't bring +his sister up to the house that evening to meet a few guests. And once a +year all four turn in and give a real dress rehearsal of up-to-date +social science, to which Homeburg is liberally invited and at which +unknown and unsuspected things are served for refreshments and a new and +deadly variation of bridge or dancing or punch or receiving lines or +conversational technique is put on for our inspection and bewilderment. + +We have a show at our opera-house now and then, and we always go to +these affairs largely to see our Smart Set perform. It always +comes--even East Lynne is better that West Homeburg--and I'll tell you, +by the time they have come rustling in about half way through the first +act, H. DeLancey Payley and W. Sam Singer in clawhammers with an acre +apiece of white shirt and holding about four bushels of pink fluff over +their arms, and the boys have consulted anxiously with the usher, the +two girls, beautiful visions of Arctic perfection, standing in well-bred +suspense and holding their gowns in the 1915 manner, and all four have +hurried down to the best seats and have unharnessed and stowed away +their upholsterings, and DeLancey has folded up his explosive hat and +Sam has leaned back in a lordly way and beckoned to the usher for +another program--by the time all this has transpired, the actors have +forgotten their lines, and we have gotten our money's worth out of the +evening's entertainment. + +The hardships those people inflict on themselves in the sacred cause of +correctness are agonizing. It takes something more than nerve to wear a +silk hat and Prince Albert down to the Homeburg post-office on Sundays +to get the mail--especially with Ad Summers always on hand to spill a +large red laugh into his sleeve and say to some friend in a tremendous +stage whisper that the darn dude's legs must be bowed or he wouldn't +want to hide 'em that way. And as for the carriage proposition, I'm +certain that no martyrs have endured more. DeLancey persuaded Hi Nott to +buy a real city carriage, and the four have used it faithfully; only the +Payleys and Singers live in different edges of town, and by the time Hi +has hauled Sam and his sister across town to the Payleys, through +Homeburg's April streets, which average a little more depth than width, +and has hauled the four down to the theater, there are usually about +three breakdowns. I've seen the four of them plodding haughtily home +from "Wedded but No Wife", the girls holding their imported dresses out +of the mud, and the boys sounding for bottom on the crossings with their +canes, while Hi drove the carriage solemnly down the road beside them. +The mud was too deep for them to get home in the carriage, but everybody +could see it was there and that they had paid for it and had done their +darndest, anyway. After all, that's no worse than the way you New +Yorkers carry your gloves in your hand in warm weather. You don't need +them, but you want the world to know you've got 'em and wouldn't be +found dead without 'em. + +When our Smart Set gives a party, we all try to live up to it as far as +possible, and so we insist on going by carriage. Hi starts hauling us at +six o'clock, six to a load in dry weather, and he usually gets the last +batch there just in time to begin hauling the first platoon home. + +But those are just little troubles for our Smart Set. Your Smart Set has +no troubles except the job of spending its money fast enough to keep +from being smothered by the month's income. It does what it pleases, and +if anybody objects, it raises the price of something or other by way of +retort. But our Smart Set has to live in Homeburg, and what is more, it +has to live off of Homeburg, which is as hoity-toity a place to live +off of as you can find. Sally Singer can't afford to offend any one but +the depositors in the Payley Bank, and if DeLancey caused any Homeburger +to stalk down to his father's bank and extract a thousand-dollar savings +deposit, old man Payley would thrash DeLancey and set him to work on his +farm. They have to show their superiority over us so deftly and +pleasantly that we don't mind it. They have to keep us good-natured +while despising us. With half the genius for contemptuous conciliation +that the Payley and Singer children have displayed in the last five +years, the French nobility could have kept the peasantry yelling for +bread as a privilege long after 1793. + +Emma Madigan weighs two hundred pounds and drives a milk route. She went +to high school with Sally Singer, and it is the joy of her life to poke +her head into the Singer home when Sally has company and yell: "Sall, +here's your milk!" But Sally never tries to refrigerate her with the +Spitzbergen glare which she uses on us collectively when she goes to the +theater. You couldn't possibly refrigerate Emma, but you might encourage +her to say more--like the time when Sarah Payley passed her on the +street without speaking, being busy treading the upper altitudes with a +young Princeton College visitor, and Em yelled back: "For goodness' +sakes, Sarey, if you didn't lace so tight you could get your chin down +and see some one!" + +But most of us are not so frank. We are too good-natured. As a matter of +fact, we'd hate to see the Payleys and Singers common. They help to make +Homeburg interesting, and so long as they know their place and don't +irritate us, we wouldn't hurt their feelings for the world--that is, not +much. + +There was a dancing school in Homeburg two winters ago, and to the +consternation of every one the Payley and Singer young folks joined it. +It took two meetings for us to discover what had clogged up the +atmosphere and taken the prance out of things. Then we tumbled. The +Payleys and Singers were educating us. They were fitting us to live in +the rarified upper altitudes of refinement and to mingle with rank +without stepping all over its feet. By the third meeting Henry Snyder +had caught on to most of the signals and he explained them to a lot of +us beforehand with care. When Sally Singer dropped on to a bench and +moved her skirt ever so slightly aside it was a sign that the young man +with whom she was speaking might sit down and hold sweet converse. And +when Sarah Payley smiled brightly at a gentleman from some distance and +just caressed the chair beside her with her eye for the millionth part +of a second, that young man, if he had a spark of gentility in him, +would hurdle the intervening chairs to arrive. We also discovered how +to get away just before the young ladies got bored, by other delicate +signs, and how to derive the fact that they were thirsty and needed +sustenance, and just how to imprison them in our strong but respectful +arms during a waltz, and how to collect fans and gloves and programs and +handkerchiefs from the floor without grunting or jolting the +conversation. It was hard work, and spoiled the evening to a certain +extent, but we did the best we could until Jim Reebe spoiled it all in +the fourth lesson. Miss Singer had collected her usual six men during +the intermission with as many bright glances, and was being admired +properly and according to Hoyle, when Jim up and remarks, in his +megaphone bass: "Say, Sall, you're a great work of art, but the time you +made a hit with me was the day you slid down the banisters at school." + +That finished the course; and the Smart Set, being unanimously absent +the rest of the winter, we gave ourselves up to vulgar pleasure, stuffed +our white gloves back into the bureaus and yelled for encores when we +couldn't get them any other way. + +I'll tell you, a man could be a hero to his valet with half the exertion +which it takes to be a Somebody to an old grammar-school mate in a small +town. + +Our Smart Set is disintegrating now, and things look blue for social +progress in Homeburg. Sally Singer is getting ready to be married this +summer to a Pittsburgh man who wears a cane. The remaining three look +like the old guard at Waterloo closing in under a heavy fire. Looks to +me as if there were going to be some of these mess alliances to wind up +with, for Sam Singer is calling on Mabel Andrews in citizen's clothing, +she having jeered him out of his Prince Albert; and Henry Snyder has +stopped scoffing and infests the Payley house to an alarming extent. So +I imagine that our Smart Set will get back to shirtsleeves in two +generations less than yours usually requires, and we'll miss it a lot. +Next to the ill feeling between the _Argus_ and the _Democrat_, it has +been our greatest diversion. + + + + +IV + +THE SERVANT QUESTION IN HOMEBURG + +_How Mrs. Singer Amuses Us All by Insisting on Having It_ + + +No apologies, Jim. If the Declaration of Independence who prepares your +meals for you has packed up and gone, I don't need any explanations. I +understand already. You can't ask me up to dinner because there isn't +going to be any dinner. If you don't go out to a restaurant, you'll get +a bite yourself while Mrs. Jim puts the children to bed. And then you'll +spend the evening wondering where you can beg, borrow, abduct, +hypnotize, or manufacture another cook. + +I know all about it. The great sorrow has come upon you, and there's +only one comfort--there are others. It falls upon all who try to get out +of doing their own housework in New York. And I'll bet you were good +enough to the last cook, too--only asked her for one night out a week, +came to her meals promptly, didn't demand more than a fair living wage, +and let her have the rest. Yes, of course you did. And you're going to +let the next one have the best room and ring for her breakfast in the +morning, aren't you? What? Draw the line at that? Well, Jim, I admire +your nerve. You're one of the grand old rugged patriots who will not be +trodden on. Why did your last cook leave, anyway? + +Didn't like the kitchen, eh? And being in a flat you couldn't tear it +out and rebuild it. Yes, I agree with you. The servant problem in New +York is getting to be very serious. To-day you are gay and happy with +luxury and comfort all about you, and to-morrow you are picking +sardines out of a can with a fork for dinner. I am certainly glad I live +in the country, where servant girls do not come on Monday with two +trunks and go away early Thursday morning with three trunks and a +bundle. + +We have no servant problem in Homeburg. However, I exclude Mrs. Singer +from this "we." There are only two servants in the whole town. Mrs. +Singer has them. That is, she tries to have them. Mrs. Singer's attempt +to have servants in a town which is full of hired girls is one of the +things which make life worth living and talking about in Homeburg. + +How do I know about it? Bless you, we all know about it. It's a public +tragedy. Can't help ourselves. We've had four of Mrs. Singer's +ex-servants in our house in six years, and they have all told their +troubles. Mrs. Singer trains girls for the entire town. She's twice as +good as a domestic science school, and she doesn't charge any tuition. +She is devoting her life to the training up of perfect hired girls, and +we revel in the results. It is ungrateful of us to blame her for taking +away our hired girls, because, as a matter of fact, she is our greatest +blessing. Right at this minute in Homeburg I know that two eager +families are sitting around waiting for the latest Singer class in +domestic science to graduate and come back to them for jobs. It ought to +come most any time. The course rarely lasts over three months. + +You see, Mrs. Singer isn't one of us. She came to Homeburg from a large +city, and she brought her ideas with her. She's not the kind of a woman, +either, who is going to cut those ideas down to fit Homeburg. Her plan +is to change Homeburg over to fit her ideas. She's been working at it +for fifteen years now, and I must say she's won out in several cases. +Dress suits are now worn quite unblushingly, we have a country club +half a mile from the post-office--that's the advantage of a small town, +you can get away from the rush and bustle of the city into the sweet +cool country in about four jumps--and no one thinks of serving a party +dinner without salad any more. But she's fallen down on one thing. She +can't keep servants. That problem has been too much for her. Mrs. +Payley, her rival, has had the same hired girl for sixteen years or +more; but Mrs. Singer scorns a hired girl. She must have servants, two +of them, and while she has a remarkable constitution and has stood up +for years under the fight, I don't see how she can keep it up much +longer. + +A hired girl in Homeburg is a very reasonable creature. We never have +any trouble with them, and they have very little with us. We usually +catch them green and wild, just off the steamer, and they come to us +equipped with a thorough working knowledge of the Swedish language, and +nothing else to speak of. Our wives take them in and teach them how to +boil water, make beds, handle a broom, use clothespins, and all the +simpler tricks of housework, to say nothing of an elementary knowledge +of English, which they usually acquire in a month; and we pay this kind +a couple of dollars a week, and they wash the clothes, take care of the +furnace, and mow the lawn with great pleasure. They usually stay a year +or so and then they go to Mrs. Singer's finishing school. They do not go +because they are discontented, but because she offers them five dollars +a week, which is a pretty fair-sized chunk of the earth to a young +Swedish girl just learning to do a few loops and spirals in English and +saving up the steamer fare to bring her sister over. + +Mrs. Singer takes our nice, green, young hired girls, who are willing to +do anything up to the capacity of a stout back, and she tries to make +servants out of them. She gives them embroidered aprons and caps and +makes them keep house her way. And after they have spent a couple of +months making coffee to suit Mrs. Singer, and going over the mahogany to +suit Mrs. Singer, and arranging the magazines on the table to suit Mrs. +Singer, and taking up the breakfast to Miss Sally to suit Mrs. Singer, +and going over the back hall again to suit Mrs. Singer, and keeping +their mouths closed tightly all day to suit Mrs. Singer, and only going +out on Thursday afternoons to suit Mrs. Singer, they sort of get tired +of the job, and one after another they stop Mrs. Singer at a favorable +moment and say these fatal words: + +"Aye gass aye ent stay eny longer." + +Then some Homeburg family joyfully seizes on the deserter, and Mrs. +Singer starts out all over again on the job of making a servant out of a +hired girl. + +I have to admire the woman for her eternal grit. She won't give up for +a minute. She is going to run her house just so if she has to train up +a million girls and lose them all. Half the time she has to do her own +work, but I'll bet that when she has the luncheon ready she puts her +little white lace napkin on her hair and comes in and announces it to +herself in the proper style; and I'll bet, too, that she doesn't talk to +herself while she is working in the kitchen, either. She says the way +Homeburg women talk to their servants is disgraceful; that it lowers a +servant's respect for her mistress. I'd give a lot to see Mrs. Singer +looking at herself coldly in the glass after breakfast and giving +herself orders for the day in a tone that would brook no familiarity +whatever. + +Our women-folks, who are familiar with the Singer residence, say that it +is a beautiful thing full of monogrammed linen and embroidered towels +and curtains that have to be washed as often as a white shirt, and that +whenever they call they are pretty sure to find Mrs. Singer trying to +teach some new and slightly dizzy second girl how to take care of the +house without breaking off the edges. + +You observe the fluency and ease with which I say "second girl." We all +do in Homeburg. We're used to talking about second girls since Mrs. +Singer has tried to keep one. As far as her experience has taught us, we +are firmly convinced that having a second girl is like having mumps on +the other side too. When Mrs. Singer isn't busy trying to teach her cook +how to run the oven and the plate heater and serve the soup all at the +same time, she is attempting to give a new second girl some inkling of +the general ideas of her duties. Trouble is most of them are ten-second +girls. They listen to the program in the Singer household and then they +sprint for safety to some family where they will work twice as hard, but +will give three times as much satisfaction. Then Mrs. Singer arms +herself with the dust rag and clear-starch bowl, and subs on the job +until she finds a new second girl--after which the cook gives up her job +with a loud report, and Mr. Singer stays down-town for dinner at the +Delmonico Hotel until the Singer house management is staved off the +rocks again. + +We feel sorry for the Singers and invite them out a good deal while they +are hunting cooks. And they pay us back royally as soon as the household +staff is fully recruited once more. We eat strange but delicious dishes +made by a reluctant and mystified girl, plus Mrs. Singer's +persuasiveness and will power; and said girl, still reluctant, and +scared into the bargain, serves the dinner with a lace-edged apron and a +napkin on her hair, Mrs. Singer egging her in loud whispers like the +prompter in grand opera. Steering a green cook through a dinner party, +and keeping up a merry conversation at the same time, calls for about as +much social skill as anything I know of. I myself stand in awe of Mrs. +Singer. + +As for the rest of us--we have no servant problem, having no servants. +And about the only hired girl problem we have is the following: "Shall +the girl eat with the family or in the kitchen?" Mrs. Singer wished that +on us. Ten years ago there was no question at all. The girl ate with the +family, and waited on the table when something was needed which couldn't +be reached. Then Mrs. Singer came to town and made her eat in the +kitchen, since which time the question has raged with more or less fury +and the whole town has chosen up sides on it. Half of us want the girl +to eat in the kitchen, and the other half are invincibly democratic and +have her at the table. + +As for the girls, they are divided too. Half of the girls who come to +see about places ask us: "Do I have to eat in the kitchen?" and the +other half ask: "Do I have to eat with the family?" And of course it's +just our luck that the people who wish to dine by themselves never can +find girls who prefer the kitchen, and the people who insist on +associating with their help usually lose them because said help has been +spoiled somewhere else by being allowed to eat in the kitchen, far from +the domestic squabbles and the children with the implacable appetite for +spread bread. + +But on the whole this problem doesn't bother us much, and our hired +girls are a great comfort. They usually stay with us until they are +married or retire from old age, and after they've been ten years in a +house they're pretty much one of the family. The Payleys' girl has been +with them sixteen years, as I said before, and when she wants to go to +the opera-house to an entertainment, Wert Payley makes young DeLancey +Payley take her. It's the only use he's found for DeLancey as yet. We +keep out of the kitchen after supper, unless too strongly pressed by +thirst, because usually from seven to ten some hardworking young Swedish +man sits bolt upright in a straight-backed chair, his head against the +wall, discussing romance and other subjects of interest with a scared, +resolute expression. Usually this goes on for about three years before +anything happens. Then the girl admits, with some hesitation, that she +is going to get married, and our wife or mother, as the case may be, +hustles around and helps make the trousseau and pick out the linen. The +wedding takes place in the parlor, and about a year later the young +Swedish-American citizen who arrives is named after whatever member of +our family is the most convenient as to sex. + +We never entirely lose a good hired girl in Homeburg. They pass us on to +their relatives when they are married, and come back to visit with great +faithfulness. In this topsy-turvy Eldorado of ours where a man +sometimes becomes rich before he really knows what anything larger than +five dollars looks like, many of our girls draw prizes in the shape of +good farmers and prosperous young merchants. But their heads aren't +turned by it. They come around in their new automobiles and take us out +riding, just as if we had money too. The wife of our mayor used to work +for us, and when the electric light gang stuck a light where it would +shine straight into our back porch, thus reducing the value of our house +105 per cent. as a place of employment for a nice, attractive girl in +summers, I stepped over to the mayor's office and asked him if he +remembered how he used to sit on that porch himself. He smiled once, +winked twice, and three minutes afterward four men were on their way to +relocate that pole. + +If I have any criticism of the hired girls in our town, it is because +they go to Europe too much. Now, of course, it's no worse for a hired +girl to go to Europe for the summer than it is for any one else to +indulge themselves in that way. But that's the irritating part. Nobody +else goes. Outside of Mrs. Wert Payley and one or two school teachers, I +don't suppose any Homeburg people have crossed the Atlantic. But half a +dozen of our hired girls go every year. They leave late in the spring, +and during the hot weary summer their mistresses toil patiently along +keeping the job open if they can't find a substitute who will work for a +few months, for the girls who go to Europe are usually pearls of great +price and must be gotten back at all cost. I don't suppose anything is +harder on the temper than to work over a hot kitchen stove all day in +July, and then to sit down to supper, a damp and wilted mess of +weariness, and read a souvenir card from your hired girl, said card +depicting a cool and inviting Swedish meadow with snow-topped mountains +in the distance. + +Our girl has been to Europe three times. She has crossed on the +_Mauretania_, the old _Deutschland_ and the new _Olympic_. Two years +from this summer she thinks she will try the _Imperator_. Often in the +evening she tells us of the wonders of these great vessels--of the +beauty of the sunset at sea, and of the smoke and noise and majesty of +London. I suppose it indicates a jealous disposition, but it makes me +mad sometimes to think that it takes practically all the money I can +earn, working steadily and with two weeks off per year, to send that +girl abroad. + +Of course I don't mean it just that way. She doesn't get all of it. In +fact she gets three dollars a week of it. Out of this she saves about +three dollars and twenty-five cents because sometimes she gets a dollar +extra for doing the washing. And when she goes to Europe for the summer +on the same ship with the Astors and the Vanderbilts, it sounds more +magnificent than it really is. She is on the same ship, but about +eleven decks down, in a corner of the steerage close to the stern, where +the smells are rich and undisturbed. And she doesn't visit ruins and art +galleries in Europe, but a huge circle of loving relatives, who pass her +around from farm to farm for months, while she does amateur business +agent work for the steamship lines, talking up the wonders of America +and--allow me to blush--the saintliness of her employers, and coming +blithely back home in the fall with three or four old childhood chums +for roommates. + +Just the same, I envy our girls. I wish I could go to Europe in the +steerage, not being able to go any other way. + +It's a fortunate thing for us that our hired girls do go back home and +proselyte for America, or else we would soon be jam up against the real +thing in help problems. If, for any reason, the Swedish nation should +cease contributing to Homeburg, we should have to do our own work. I +often wonder at the things our American girls will do rather than to go +on the fighting deck as commander of some one else's kitchen. +Twenty-five of our girls go up to Paynesville every morning at six on +the interurban and make cores in the rolling mills there all day. +Carfare and board deducted, they get less than a good hired girl--and +they don't go to Europe for the summers and never by any chance marry +some rising young farmer who has made the first payment on a quarter +section. Several of our middle-aged young ladies sew for a dollar a day +and keep house by themselves. And there's Mary Smith, who has been a +town problem. She's thirty-five and an orphan. She lives in a house +about as large as a piano box and tries to scare away the wolf by +selling flavoring extracts and taking orders for books. She's never more +than two meals ahead of an embarrassing appetite. Every fall we dig +down and buy her winter coal, and she hasn't bought any clothes for ten +years. Some one gives her an ex-dress and Mary does her best to make it +over, but she never looks much more enticing than a scarecrow in the +result. + +Mary's hands are red with chilblains in the winter, and the poorhouse +yawns for her. But will she take a place as hired girl? Not she. Mary +has her pride. She'll sell you things you don't want, which is as near +begging as graft is to politics, and she'll wear second-hand clothes and +take home cold bread pudding from the hotel--but she will not be a hired +girl and go to Europe in the summer and marry into an automobile. Once +she did consent to become Mrs. Singer's second girl. Mrs. Singer was +desperate, and after a long defense Mary consented on condition that she +be called the "up-stairs maid." But she only lasted three days. Mary +could have drawn five dollars a week and Mrs. Singer's clothes, which +would have fitted her. But Mary couldn't take orders--not that kind. She +came back to take orders from us for a patent glass washtub or something +of the kind--and we sighed wearily. + + + + +V + +HOMEBURG'S LEISURE CLASS + +_It is not as large as New York's but it is twice as ingenious_ + + +Confound it, Jim, I wish you hadn't told me that your friend Williston +never worked a day in his life! You don't know how it disappointed me. + +Why? Because I don't know when I have met a man whom I liked so much at +first sight as I did Williston. He suited me from the ground up. I never +spent a more interesting afternoon with any one. No matter what he did, +he interested me--I enjoyed watching him handle his cigar as well as I +did hearing him tell about his Amazon adventures. Says I to myself: +"Here is a man whose friendship I will win if I have to live in New York +all my life to get it." And then you had to go and spoil it all. + +Oh, yes, I know it's just my backwoods way of looking at things. I'm not +saying what I do as a boast. I'm making a confession of it. I know why +Williston doesn't work. It's because he owns a piano box full of bonds +left by his late lamented pa, and when he was educated, the word "work" +was crossed out of his spelling-book in red ink. And I'm not saying that +he isn't a fine fellow. He's intelligent and witty and companionable and +forty other desirable things. But he won't work. Somehow that sticks in +my vision of him. It reminds me of the case of Mamie Gastit, who was the +prettiest, best-dispositioned, and most capable girl in Homeburg, but +who had a glass eye. We didn't hold it up against her, but it made us +awfully sad. There were plenty of Homeburg girls who would have been +decorated by a glass eye. Why did Providence have to wish it on the +finest girl in town? + +You say it is no crime not to work in New York? Bless you, I know it. In +fact, loafing in New York is the most fascinating business in the world. +Why, it seems as if you New York men actually struggle to get spare +time. I've sat in your office and watched you on Saturday morning +working yourself into a blue haze in your efforts to get done early +enough to cord up a fine big mess of leisure on Saturday afternoon. +That's the difference between New York and Homeburg. In Homeburg you +would have been stretching out your job to last until supper +time--unless you were one of our nineteen golfers, or the roads were +good enough to let you drive over to the baseball game at Paynesville. + +Leisure in New York means pleasure, excitement, and seven dozen kinds of +interest. But for many and many a long year in hundreds of Homeburg +homes, leisure has meant waiting for meal times--and not much of +anything else. + +City people laugh at country people for beating the chickens to roost. +But what are you going to do when going to bed is the most fascinating +diversion available after supper? I've noticed that as fast as a small +town man discovers something else to do in the evening, his light bill +goes up and up. When crokinole was introduced into Homeburg twenty odd +years ago, the kerosene wagon had to make an extra mid-week trip. When +the magazines came down from thirty-five cents to ten and you could get +three of them and a set of books for one dollar down and a dollar a +month until death did you part, they had to put an operator in the +telephone exchange after 8 P.M. because of the general sleeplessness. +When the automobile came, and when two moving picture theaters, a +Chautauqua, and a Lyceum course opened fire in one year, and the +business men fitted up a club with an ancient pool table in it, Homeburg +got chummy with all the evening hours, and kicked so hard about the +electric lights going off at midnight that the company had to run them +an hour longer. And I suppose if any invader ever puts in an all-night +restaurant where you can have lobster and a soubrette on the table at +the same time, a certain proportion of us will get as foolish as you are +and will forget how to go to bed at all by artificial light. + +We've changed that much from the past generation. We know what to do +with leisure in the evening. But we're still awkward and embarrassed +when we meet it by daylight. Since we have built our Country Club, a few +of us have learned to enjoy ourselves in a fitful and guilty fashion +late in the afternoon. But as a rule, even to-day, when you give a +Homeburg man a bright golden daylight hour of leisure, he has no more +use for it than he would have for a five-ton white elephant with an +appetite for ice-cream. And that, Jim, is why I can't speed myself up to +appreciate a young man who has never worked and never intends to. I +still have to look at him with my Homeburg eyes. And in Homeburg, when a +man doesn't work when he has a chance and takes what amusement we have +to offer as a steady diet in perfect content, we know something is the +matter with him--and we are sorry for him. + +Leisure has killed more people in Homeburg than work ever did. For years +our biggest problem was the job of keeping our retired farmers alive. +When a farmer has worked forty years or so, and has accumulated a +quarter section of land, and a few children who need high school +education, he rents his farm and moves into town, where he lives +comfortably on eighty dollars a month and fills a tasty tomb in a very +few years. It isn't so hard on the farmer's wife, because she takes her +housework into town with her and keeps busy. But when the farmer has +settled down in town, far from a chance to work, he discovers that he +has about fourteen hours of leisure each day on his hands and nothing to +do with them but to eat. Out of regard for his digestion he can't eat +more than three hours a day. That leaves him eleven hours in which to go +down-town for the mail and do the chores around the house. + +He stands it pretty well the first year. The second year is so long that +he begins to lay plans for his centennial, and about the third year he +takes to his bed and dies, with a sigh of relief. That's what leisure +does to a Homeburg man who isn't used to it. And that is one of the +reasons why, when I see a man in New York with nothing to do from +choice, I think of the sad army of the unemployed in Homeburg draping +themselves around the grain office every day in fine weather, and +wearing away the weary years in idleness because they are too old to +work, and don't have to, anyway. + +Of late years we have been working earnestly to conserve our retired +farmers. They are fine men, and we hate to see them wasted. We have been +trying to reduce their leisure--just as a city man tries to reduce his +flesh. We elect them to everything possible. We have taught a number of +them how to play pool in the Commercial Club. We have started a farmers' +elevator, a farmers' bank and a planter factory, and have got them to +invest money. That has been a godsend, because it has kept a large +number of them busy and happy trying to save the said money. But where +we have saved one retired farmer, the automobile has saved ten. Whenever +one of our unemployed comes out with a machine, we sigh with relief and +stop worrying about him. It's just the same as if he had been given +wings and a world to explore. In summer, our retired farmers who have +autos loaf around the country from Indiana to Idaho and talk crops in +the garages of a thousand towns. And in winter they rebuild their cars, +and talk good roads. Twenty years ago you could talk good roads to a +farmer or bang him with a club, with the same result. But last year our +retired farmers organized a good roads association, and to amuse +themselves they have dragged the roads for miles around and have built a +mile of rock road leading south to the cemetery--where in the old April +days, as Henry Snyder says, the deceased was buried once, but the +mourners got buried twice--going out and coming back. + +We have a real leisure class in Homeburg, however, outside of the +retired farmers, who really can't help themselves. Our genuine +metropolitan leisure class consists of DeLancey Payley and Gibb Ogle. +They are, as far as I know, the only two people in Homeburg who loaf +from choice year in and year out in perfect content. We have done our +best with both of them, but we have given up. Leisure is what they were +created for. It is a talent with them, and their only talent. They have +developed it to the best of their ability. + +DeLancey's is the saddest case, because so much money was wasted on him. +Wert Payley is the richest man in our part of the country. He owns a +bank and one or two counties out West. He sent DeLancey East to school, +where he was educated regardless of expense or anything else and was +returned a few years ago a finished product, sublime, though a little +terrifying to look at, and reeking with knowledge of one kind or +another. I have heard it said that DeLancey can tell offhand what has +been the correct thing in dress for each of the last thirty-five years, +and that he can handle as many as fifteen articles of cutlery and +forkery at a dinner table with absolute accuracy. + +DeLancey has been at home almost ten years now, and his chief mission +has been to ornament Homeburg and add to its elegance on state +occasions. His father had designed him for a captain of finance, and +when he first came home DeLancey was put in the bank in order that he +might work up by degrees into the bond business or some other auriferous +form of toil. Wert Payley almost had nervous prostration from overwork +that year, and in the end he had to give up. He couldn't carry his own +load and make DeLancey work too. It was too much. No human being should +be asked to do it. Wert often says that if he had had nothing else to do +he could have kept DeLancey at work at least part of the time, but that +he was too old to shoulder the task on top of his other duties. So +DeLancey left the bank, except as an enthusiastic check casher, and took +up his life work--I mean that, of course, figuratively. I mean his life +occupation--hang it, that won't do either! He took up his mission--the +work for which his ardent young soul was fitted. He began to specialize +in leisure. + +For close to nine years DeLancey has loafed. It is a miracle to us. We +can't understand his endurance. Yet he thrives on it. Wert Payley has +given up trying to make him work, but he has taken what he considers to +be an awful revenge. He has refused to spend one cent for carfare. +DeLancey can hang around Homeburg until he dies, but if he wants to +leave, he must earn the money himself. And DeLancey hasn't been fifty +miles from Homeburg since he slipped the clutch out of his tired, +throbbing brain and let it rest, nine years ago. + +We have to admire his ingenuity. He kills time so scientifically. They +say it takes him two hours to do himself up in the morning after he gets +out of bed, and that he has almost as many beautifying tools as an +actress. He doesn't get down-town before ten. It takes him from fifteen +minutes to half an hour to buy his morning cigar. That is, he talks to +McMuggins, the druggist, as long as Mac will stand for it. Mac has a +regular schedule. If Delancey buys a ten-cent cigar, Mac will talk with +him fifteen minutes. If he buys a fifteen-cent cigar, he will talk half +an hour, if business isn't too brisk. Mac keeps a box of fifteen-cent +cigars especially for DeLancey, but he says it is an awful risk. If +DeLancey were to die on him, he couldn't sell those cigars in a hundred +years. + +The tellers at the bank are good for fifteen minutes or so after +DeLancey has bought his cigar; he strolls in and gossips with them +until his father begins to snort ominously in his little railed-off pen +marked "President." Cooney Simpson, the tailor, likes DeLancey, and they +talk clothes for half an hour almost every morning. Then it's noon, and +this is his hardest problem, because every one goes to dinner at noon +except the Payleys and Singers, who have luncheon at one. If DeLancey +can find Sam Singer, he is all right. But Sam, who used to loaf +enthusiastically with him, has rosy ideas about Mabel Andrews now, and +he is working hard in his father's bank and on the farms. It was a +bitter day for DeLancey when Sam went to work. It almost shook his faith +in idleness. But he stood firm. + +Luncheon kills two hours for DeLancey, and then he goes up to the +Homeburg Commercial Club and shoots the pool balls around the table +until 4:30, waiting eagerly for some one to stop working and come to +play with him. Sometimes they come and sometimes they don't. If they +don't, he goes down to the hotel and talks with a traveling man. I often +see him in the lobby of the Delmonico, sitting in magnificent ease, +blowing large smoke rings and talking with an air of unconscious +grandeur to some eager-eyed drummer, who is delighted but mystified at +the ease with which he is breaking into the first families. DeLancey has +a quiet way of talking about the East and the great people thereof which +fools even us sometimes. + +DeLancey makes his toilet after dinner at night and that of course kills +an hour or more. Then he calls on Madeline Hicks, old Judge Hicks's +daughter, when she will let him. He has an idea he would like to marry +her, but while she likes him, they say she can't bring herself to marry +a man of leisure and have the whole town sorry for her. But he takes her +to all the parties, and about once a week his father lets him have the +automobile, if the chauffeur doesn't want to use it. On other nights +DeLancey comes down-town and buys another cigar at the restaurant. It is +as good as a show to see DeLancey buy his evening cigar. You'd think he +was taking over a railroad, he chooses it with such care. The young +farmer boys and the workers in the factory come down-town at night and +loaf around the restaurants without any excuse. They have to kill the +time. But that would be too coarse work for DeLancey. He doesn't come +down-town to loaf--Oh, no! He has merely dropped in on his orbit. It +takes him half the evening to buy his cigar and smoke it, conversing as +he does so with a few selected citizens on the benefits of slim-cut +clothes and the origin of the pussy-cat hat. + +Sometimes DeLancey can abduct some busy young chap and make him play a +round of golf on week-day afternoons, but not often. That's the +difference between our clubs and yours. We have clubs, but we don't use +them. We wouldn't think of spending time there if we could spend it at +business. Nothing is lonelier on week days than our golf club, and one +of the chief duties of the caretaker at the Commercial Club is to dust +off the reading table. We have our clubs, and that is the main object. +We know that they are there, and that we could enjoy them if we wanted +to. Perhaps we do want to. But it's a hard art to learn. And, oh, how +patiently and earnestly DeLancey is trying to teach us! If it were any +one but he, we might learn faster. But he sort of figures as a horrible +example. It's like a battered and yellowed wreck advocating cigarettes, +or a bald-headed barber pushing his own hair tonic. + +Gibb Ogle, the other member of our leisure class, is a very different +kind of a bird. His art is more sublime than DeLancey's because he has +no one to support him. He has worked down to his present state from +nothing at all. He is a self-unmade man. With no resources, not even a +loving wife with a wash tub, he lives a life of perfect ease and +idleness. He doesn't even have to hunt for means of killing time, as +DeLancey does. Time with him dies a natural death. He is not implicated +in the sad event in any way. All he does is to watch its demise. He +watches whole hours pass away while leaning against the door-frame of +the Delmonico Hotel. Chet Frazier and Sim Bone got into an argument one +day, and to settle it they went over and took Gibb away from the +building. It didn't fall, and Sim won. Gibb has watched several thousand +hours expire while propping up the Q. B. & C. depot. He is the chief +spectator at every fire, runaway, dog fight and public event. He is a +movable landmark, as permanent as the Republican flagpole in the city +park. I have never yet gone down-town in the morning without seeing Gibb +on the street. And very seldom have I gone home at night, even in the +howling blizzards of winter, without passing Gibb leaning against the +warm bright show window of the last open place of business, and waiting +with placid greediness for one final event of some kind to transpire +before going to his well-earned repose. + +Beside Gibb's leisure, DeLancey's is poor amateurish stuff. Gibb's total +income during the year would hardly exceed twenty-five dollars, and it +doesn't do him much good at that. When he gets any money, he eats it up +in the most determined and hasty fashion. I have seen him eat a dollar's +worth of ham sandwiches in an afternoon--because he had the dollar. What +he does between dollars is a town mystery. He doesn't beg. He is +believed by some to absorb sustenance from the air, like a plant. But I +happen to know that he absorbs a good deal of sustenance from the +Delmonico Hotel. He has attached himself to this hotel as a sort of +retainer, and through all its changes of ownership he has hung on. He +will not work, but he gives the place his moral support and speaks +highly of it to all comers. He will even carry a satchel across to the +depot, but only as an accommodation to the hotel. In return he asks +nothing and thus saves his proud spirit from the insult of a refusal. +But I think he has first pick of the scattered remains of the dinners +that leave the kitchen door whenever the cook is good-natured. + +I say I think so, because few of us have seen Gibb Ogle eat. He has a +pride, and performs this humiliating act in secret. But grocers tell me +that he is always offering to dispose of broken-up crackers, stale +cheese and old mackerel. "I'll just carry that out for you," he says. +And they understand and let him do it. One night as he hurried past me, +a package dropped from under his coat and broke at my feet. It was +food--dry bread and a bologna skin with a little meat in the end. He +stopped and told me how hard it was to find food for a dog in which he +was interested. But that was a fib. With all his faults Gibb never +maintained a dog in idleness. + +In summers Gibb leads a care-free, happy life, sunning himself all day +and sleeping comfortably at night in any one of a dozen places. He is +our village grasshopper, taking no thought of the chill future. How he +lives through our fierce winters is a mystery. He sleeps in barns. He +sleeps on the coal in the electric light power house. If the clerk at +the hotel happens to be a friend of his, he curls up in a chair in the +lobby. Sometimes all of these fail him. I have heard that he spent one +winter in an empty room over a store, and thawed out his toes on +several mornings. We are always afraid some crackling January dawn will +find Gibb frozen hard on the streets, and it is a relief when spring +comes and he begins to fatten up a little and drink in sunshine again. + +We'd like to send Gibb to the county home. Some of us are even willing +to contribute to his support, scandalous as it would be. But it is hard +to do, because Gibb is no pauper. He is a gentleman of leisure with the +dignity of an Indian. His worn suits are neat, and he is as dapper with +a battered hat and a four-year-old celluloid collar as if he spent real +money on his wardrobe. He chooses his life and lives it without +complaint. Periodically we strive heroically to make him work. The boys +at the planter factory, who are a rough lot but have some hold on Gibb +because they entertain him out of their lunch boxes, kidnap him about +twice a year and drag him in to the superintendent to get a job for +him. Gibb protests frantically that he has business which can't be +neglected--that he is just closing a deal for a good position at the +hotel--that he is going away on a trip--but nothing helps him. He +accepts the job with ill-concealed horror, and the factory boys climb up +on the roof of the main building and hoist a flag. We all know what it +means. Gibb is working again. And we all know what will happen next. + +About two days later Gibb will be limping to the factory very late with +his off-foot done up in an enormous comforter. "That's what you have +done, boys," he will say with simple dignity, "you've hurt that old sore +foot of mine. It's never been right since I hurt it with the fire +company. It's in awful shape now. I guess I'll lose it at last. You +oughtn't to have done it, boys. Goodness knows, I'd have worked all +these years if I'd had any foot to speak of." + +Then he goes in and resigns--after which the foot recovers in great +haste, and Gibb stands on it relentlessly twelve hours a day in the old +way, while he watches the world go round and waits for the judgment day. + +You'd think from the way we hammer at both DeLancey and Gibb to go to +work that they would hang together, being in the same class. But they +don't. In fact they have the greatest contempt for each other. DeLancey +will not speak to Gibb, and thinks it is a crime that he isn't sent to +the stone pile; while Gibb speaks of DeLancey in pitying accents as a +young man who ought to know better than to waste his time herding a +little white pill into a hole in a cow pasture. Gibb is very severe on +the frivolities of the prosperous. He can't bear to see them frittering +away their time. + +That's our leisure class in Homeburg, and it isn't growing. If it was +we'd be worried, and the Commercial Club would hold meetings about it. +And I'm just telling you these things so that you'll see why I am so +warped and foolish regarding Williston; it's just my small town +ignorance--My, I wish that chap would get a job! + + + + +VI + +HOMEBURG'S WORST ENEMY + +_How Old Man Opportunity Stands Outside the Town and Beckons to her +Greatest Men_ + + +You don't say, Jim! Gosh, let me look! Where? Behind the big fellow in +the two-gallon plug hat? There--I see him! Yes, sir! It's he! I could +tell him anywhere. Do you suppose we could get up nearer? What, go up in +the elevator with him? Say, I haven't the nerve. No, I don't want--This +is close enough--Why, there isn't even a crowd! You mean to say he comes +down here just like this right along? Do you see him often? + +Why, when I go home and tell the boys I watched Teddy Roosevelt go down +the street common as dirt and could have gone up in the same elevator +with him, they'll want me to give a lecture in the Woodmen Hall. It +certainly beats all what you can see in New York for nothing. + +That's where you have all the luck, Jim--you big city folks. You keep +your interesting people at home; there's nowhere bigger for them to go. +No matter how famous or successful they are, they have to stick around +and mingle unless they get Europitis of the intellect. When you grow up +with a chum in New York and he discovers a talent that has been kicking +around in his garret ever since he was born, you don't lose him. He just +stays at home and grows up to fit the town. But when I want to see my +old Homeburg playmates who have succeeded, I have to go to New York or +Chicago or San Francisco, or some other big place where old Opportunity +keeps a wrecking crew busy all the time beating in doors. Opportunity +doesn't come into a small town and knock. He stands outside and beckons. + +Life in Homeburg is one long bereavement because of this fact. Seems as +if the world was always looking Homeburg men over, the way a housewife +looks over an asparagus patch, and yanking out the ones who stick up a +little higher than the rest. We don't worry about the good who die young +in Homeburg; but the interesting who go early and forget to come back +make us sad and sore. No sooner does a Homeburg man begin to broaden out +and get successful and to hoist the town upward as he climbs himself, +than we begin to grieve. We know what is coming. Presently he will go +down to the _Democrat_ office and insert a notice, advertising for sale +a seven-room house with gas and water, good cistern, orchard with +bearing trees, good barn and milch cow, cement walks and watertight +cellar. And he will sell that place at a sacrifice, which he can well +afford, and go off to the city, where he will learn to wear a fur-lined +coat, kick about the financial legislation and visit us on Christmas Day +once per decade. + +I sometimes wonder what Homeburg would be like if all her bright boys +and girls should come back. Don't suppose the town could hold them at +all. It would be stretched out of shape in a week. But it would be a +glorious place to live in, and wouldn't we shine in art and music and +politics and finance--to say nothing of baseball! Suppose we had Forrest +Brady back home, catching for the Homeburg team! He gets seven thousand +dollars a year from Boston now; but I remember when he helped put dents +in Paynesville baseball pride for nothing, and would pay some youngster +a quarter to hustle baggage at the depot in his absence. And suppose the +Congregational choir still had Mary Saunders! Why, we could charge a +dollar a seat for ordinary services, and people would come down from +Chicago to attend! When I think what she gets for one concert now, and +then think how long the Ladies' Aid Society has been working to paint +the church and haven't made it yet, it makes me wish we could put +Homeburg on wheels and haul it after some of our distinguished children. +And what if we had Alex McQuinn to write up the _Democrat_ again? Every +month we almost ruin ourselves at home buying all the magazines he +writes for; but when he was a fat young thing in spectacles hunting +locals and trying to write funny things for the _Democrat_, he wasn't +appreciated at all. Old Judge Hicks, who had no sense of humor, chased +him several miles once for telling how he tried to stop the 4:11 train +by yelling "Whoa" at it. And Editor Ayers had to fire Alex to keep the +peace. + +When Rollin Derby, who draws pictures for your New York paper, went to +school, he could climb a tree by digging his bare toes into the rough +bark, but was not otherwise distinguished. When Maurice Gadby was a boy +in Homeburg, he went barefooted in summer with the rest of us, and who +could have guessed that he would grow up to give tango teas for your +four hundred and only allow the better quality of them to pay him +twenty-five dollars per cup at that? But the career that amuses me most +is Jack Nixon--"Shinner" Nixon, we used to call him. He commands a +battleship for a living now; and Homeburg is exactly seven miles from +the nearest stream that is navigable by a duck. We used to walk out to +that stream Saturday mornings, spend four hours building a dam and then +swim painfully on our elbows and knees in the puddle we had made until +dark, but Shinner wouldn't go in. He was a regular young Goethals when +it came to dam building, but he abhorred water, especially behind the +ears. + +Back of my generation the batting average was just about as good. It +seemed to have been the fashion of Homeburg boys of thirty years ago to +go out and run Nebraska politically. Two governors and a representative +have come from our town. If we had them here now, we wouldn't have to +fight so desperately to get a county surveyor or coroner on the ticket +every four years. Samuel P. Wiggins, who now lives in a stone hut +covering an acre in Chicago and owns a flock of flour mills, was once +Sam Wiggins, who bought grain in our town and married the daughter of +one of our most reliable washerwomen. She comes back occasionally now, +and we can't see but that she's as nice as she used to be when she +hauled our family wash home in a little wagon every Saturday night. +Being rich hasn't hurt her at all, though it has spoiled her figure +beyond the utmost and most heartrending efforts of her clothes to +conceal. + +Then there's Mrs. Maysworth. When she comes down from Chicago for a +visit, the old town fairly hums for a month. We pick up our interest in +art and woman's suffrage and cheap trips to Europe and Dante's +_Inferno_; the Shakespeare Club is revived, the bookstore sells its copy +of Browning, and the tone of the afternoon teas goes up about two +hundred per cent. Mrs. Maysworth was the ruling spirit of a little bunch +of prosperous Homeburg people who lived at the end of Milk Street--we +used to call it the cream end of Milk Street. When they were with us, +Homeburg was called the Athens of the Steenth Congressional District. We +heard singers and lecturers, who jumped towns of fifty thousand on +either side of us. We had state presidents of Women's Federations and +Church Societies. We had a free library before Mr. Carnegie had a bank +account. North Milk Street established it, and every Saturday afternoon +the muddy feet of the tough south side kids scuffled over Mrs. +Maysworth's hardwood floors, the first west of Chicago, while their +owners drew out books, the said library being located in an extinct +conservatory, which protruded from the house like a large wart. + +Homeburg was a Mecca of learning and refinement in those days; and then +six of these families pulled out in the same year and moved to Chicago, +where they could soak up a little more culture instead of giving away +all they had. They left a chasm in our midst as big as the Grand Canyon. +It never has been filled--for me at least. I feel, when I wander up that +fine old shady street, past those houses filled with people who are only +as wise as I am, as if I were wandering through the deserted haunts of +an ancient and irreplaceable civilization. + +That's the way it goes with us--one bereavement after another. It's +mighty hard to be a mother of sons in Homeburg. I worked in the +post-office for a year once--handed out mail--and I got to know just +exactly what most of the mothers in town wanted. I could please them +with a new magazine and mystify them with a circular or a business +letter. But if I wanted to light them up until they took the shadows out +of the corners as they went out, I would give them a letter from a son, +way off somewhere, making good. The best of them didn't write any too +often. Once a week is pretty regular, I suppose, from the other end; but +you should see the mother begin to come in hungry again the second day +after her letter came. And when a boy came home successful and +prosperous, and his proud mother towed him down Main Street on pretense +of getting him to carry a spool of thread home for her, it used to go +to my heart to see the wistful looks of her women friends. There is +hardly a family in Homeburg of the right age which hasn't a grown-up son +off at war somewhere--fighting failure. It's grand when they win; but I +hate to think of some of our boys who haven't come back. + +If it's hard on the mothers, it's even harder on the Homeburg girls. +They say there are one hundred thousand old maids in Massachusetts. I'll +bet that's just about the number of Massachusetts young men who have +gone West or somewhere, and haven't remembered the things they said at +parting as well as the girls did. We've got plenty of girls in Homeburg +who are getting intimately acquainted with the thirties--fine girls, +still pretty, bright, and keeping up with the world. Young men come into +town and do their best to get on a "thou-beside-me" footing, but somehow +the girls don't seem to marry. At the root of almost every case there's +an old Homeburg boy. Maybe he's making good somewhere, and they're both +waiting until he does. Maybe he isn't making good and is too proud to +ask her to wait. Maybe she's waiting alone--because some other girl was +handier in the new place. And maybe it wasn't a case of wait at all, +only the boy who went away looked better to some Homeburg girl than any +of those who stayed at home. That was the case with Sam Flanburg and +Minnie Briggs a few years ago. + +Sam is on the Chicago Board of Trade and is one of our old-time boys. +Two years ago he came back, roaringly prosperous, to visit for the first +time since he had left, and pretty suddenly he discovered to his +amazement that on packing up ten years before he'd left a pearl of great +price behind, said pearl being Minnie. In other words he fell in love +over his ears with her, and Minnie, who was one of our very nicest +girls, with a disposition like triple distilled extract of charity, +treated him like a dog. He stayed around for a month cluttering up the +Briggs's front porch day and night, while Minnie put up an imitation of +haughty indifference and careless frivolity which was as good as a show +for every one in town except Sam, who couldn't see through it. That's +one of our small town assets--you get to look on at most of the love +affairs. We watched Minnie and Sam with our hearts in our mouths for +fear she'd carry it too far and lose him, for every one had it straight +from Mary Askinson, who is intimately acquainted with a close friend of +Minnie's old school chum, that Minnie had been in love with Sam since +they graduated from the high school together. It was all we could do +from breaking in and interfering, especially when Sam went off his feed +and began to throw out ugly talk about going to the Philippines or some +place where fever can be gotten cheap. But one morning Sam came +down-town, and the first man who saw his face called up his wife and +told her the good news. Talk about extra editions for distributing news! +Before a city paper could have gotten an extra on the street, five +intimate friends of Minnie's had dropped in casually to see her, and +when they saw her face, of course they fell on her neck. Sam told Chet +Frazier next day that it made him so mad to think he'd lived twenty +years in the same town with Minnie and had never appreciated his +blessings that he felt like climbing Pikes Peak and kicking himself off. + +There's Mary Smith. She's our prize old maid and dresses like a mail +sack full of government seeds, but they say she was the prettiest girl +in Homeburg when young Cyrus McCord went to Chicago to carve out his +future so that he could come home and marry her. But Cyrus didn't carve +out his future. He married it instead, and Mary is almost fifty now, +living alone and getting peculiar, like so many of our lonely old folks +do. + +Taking it all around, you can't blame us for feeling a little bit +hostile to the big grabby towns which reach out like tax collectors +every year and take a tithe of our boy and girl crop--first choice too. +But of course we're enormously proud of our Homeburg people who go out +and help run the world, and we watch their careers like hawks. When +Chester Arnett was running for a state office out West, I'll bet twenty +Homeburg families subscribed for a Denver paper to read about him; and +when Deacon White was making his great plunges in Wall Street, Homeburg +looked at the financial page of the Chicago papers first and then read +the baseball. We're as happy over their success as if they were our +children--but it's always embarrassing for a little while when a +Homeburg man who has made good comes back to visit in the old town. +We're aching to rush up and wring his arm off, but we want to know how +he feels about it first. One or two experiences have made us gun-shy. We +can't forget Lyla Enbright, who moved away with her family years ago and +married a national bank or something of the kind in the East. She didn't +come home for ten years, but finally the father died and Lyla came back +to sell off some property. A lot of us had made mud pies with Lyla, and +while she hadn't shown any great genius in that or anything else, she +was jolly and we liked her, so we tried to rush up and greet her +rapturously. + +Those who didn't do it say it was one of the funniest things that ever +happened in Homeburg, but I couldn't see it at the time. I was one of +the rushers. Lyla waited until my outstretched hand was within reaching +distance, and then she pulled a lorgnette on me. Say, Jim, did you ever +get right squarely in range of both barrels of an honest-for-God +lorgnette with about a thousand dollars worth of dry goods and a pinch +of brains behind it? If my turn ever comes to face a Gatling gun I hope +to march right up to it like a little man--but lorgnettes? No! Any +hostile army could lick Homeburg by aiming lorgnettes at it. I gave one +look at the thing and fell over myself in heaps getting away. I wouldn't +speak to Sim Bone for a week because he laughed. But after I had +recovered a little, I hunted up Chet Frazier in a hurry and told him +Lyla wanted to see him. By that I got even with Chet for about a dozen +practical jokes. When he got in range of that lorgnette, he said "Gosh!" +and actually ran. Then we survivors lined up and got some comfort out of +it, watching the rest get theirs. + +As I said, Lyla and one or two others who have brought home their +prosperous and expanded corporal beings, and nothing else to speak of, +have made us a little timid about greeting our successful Prods. We hang +around all ready for action, but we need encouragement. We wouldn't +speak first for a farm. We wait for some calloused gabbler to break the +ice. Gibb Ogle usually does it. Gibb would act as a reception committee +for the Angel Gabriel without a quiver. He's always on the street, +anyway, propping up some building or other, and he is always willing to +waddle up to a returned governor or financier or rising young business +man, and stick out his unwashed paw, while we hold our breath and wait +for the result. + +As a rule it's cheering. Our Homeburg boys don't fall down once in +twenty times. No matter who the visitor is, he grabs Ogle's hand and +yells: "Why, hello, Gibb, you fat old scoundrel, how's your sore foot?" +Then we crowd around and fight for the next turn, and go home and +hastily spread the news that So-and-so has come home big and prosperous +as all get-out, and not spoiled a bit. + +Sometimes they don't come back at all, of course, and nervy scouts who +look up the delinquents in their city offices come back with badly +frosted ears and spread the warning. But there are few of these. Even +President Banks of the great F. C. & L. Railroad System, who played on +the Homeburg baseball nine thirty-five years ago, will stop puzzling +over the financial situation long enough to give the glad hand to a +Homeburg man during office hours. Of course I don't mean that any one +from Homeburg can break in on him and pile his desk full of feet. You +have to be a thirty-third degree Homeburger from his standpoint; that +is, you or your father must have stolen apples with him--I belong to the +inner lodge. My father and President Banks ate a peck of peaches one +night in Frazier's orchard, between them, and got half way through the +pearly gates before they were yanked back by two doctors. That's why +Banks took me to lunch when I went to call on him last month. If the +Government would let him, he'd give me a pass home. + +I'll never forget the day when Banks came back to Homeburg. He hadn't +been back for thirty years and hadn't the slightest intention of coming +either, as he admitted afterward. But he was going through on his +special car, and old Number Eleven, which was hauling him, performed the +most intelligent act of its career. The engine broke down right at the +depot, and when Banks found he was in for an hour or two, he got out and +strolled down Main Street to see the town in which he had begun his +life. + +It was a most depressing occasion. No one who had ever come back had +changed as much as Banks. If he had worn a pigtail and talked Choctaw, +he couldn't have grown farther away. It wasn't his fault. He tried his +best. But he hadn't talked our language for years. He couldn't get down +near enough to converse. He passed most of his playmates without +remembering them, but when he saw Pash Wade's sign, he went in and shook +hands with him. About forty of us came in to trade and watched him do +it. It was pathetic. They stood there like strangers from different +lands, Banks trying to unbutton his huge, thick ulster of dignity, and +not succeeding, and Pash trying to say something that would interest +Banks--along the line of high finance of course--state of the country, +etc. They gave it up in a minute, and Banks went out. He found Pelty +Amthorne and shook hands with him. Pelty is pretty loquacious as a rule, +but he couldn't talk to Banks--not that Banks, anyway. He'd never seen +him before. He said "How-dy-do," and, "It's a long time since you were +here," and Banks said, "It is indeed. I hope you and your family are +well." And then Pelty oozed hastily back into the crowd with a relieved +air as if he had done his duty, and Banks looked bored and took out his +watch. But just then Sim Askinson came up all out of breath and burst +through the crowd. + +Sim is little and meek and has a hard time holding his own, even in our +peaceful world. But when he saw Banks, he snorted like a war horse and +grew up three inches. + +"Hello, Pudge, you old son-of-a-gun!" he said, with both hands in his +pockets. + +"Hello, Sim!" said Banks, sort of startled. + +"Where'd you come from?" demanded Sim, "and why ain't you come before? +You're a nice friendly cuss, you are. Sucked any turkey eggs lately?" + +"No, you knock-kneed dishwasher," said Banks as a grin began to edge its +way across his face. "Have you tried to sell any more toads for +bullfrogs?" + +"No, nor I ain't fought out any bumble-bees' nest since the time you got +one up your pant leg and pretty near pounded yourself to death with a +ball bat," said Sim. "Can you still run as fast as the time Wert Payley +and I dared you to ride Malstead's bull?" + +"Where's Wert?" demanded Banks. They were shaking hands now, using all +four of them. "Say, I've got to see him and Wim. Horn. I've got to leave +in a few minutes." + +"Like fun you have," growled Sim, linking arms with Banks. "You seem to +think some one's chasing you. You're going to stay all night, that's +what you're going to do." + +"I am not," said Banks; "and I wouldn't stay with you, anyway. You had a +garter snake in the bed last time I slept with you. I've got to see some +more of the boys, though." + +"He thinks he's going away in a few minutes," said Sim to Wert Payley, +who had heard his name and was now shaking hands with Banks. "Why, the +old fat snide, nobody wants to see him outside of Homeburg. He's going +to get a free supper to-night. Remember Sadie Warren?" + +"Remember!" shouted Banks. "What do you think I am?--Methuselah? I +remember more things than you ever heard of. Why, Sadie and I went +skating the night you couldn't find your fat horse and sleigh." + +"Ya-a-a--" yelled Payley, with a sudden shriek of laughter. "Never knew +who took your rig, did you, Sim?" + +"You--you--" said Sim, glaring at Banks. "You confounded horse thief, I +believe you took Sadie in my own sleigh." + +"Ain't he bright, Pudge," gasped Payley, "only took him thirty years to +catch on." + +"Well, Banksie," said Sim, "Sadie's been more particular about her +young men since that night. We've been married twenty-five years, and I +guess I'll let you come up and eat this evening, anyway. She lets me +bring most any old pelter home." + +"Gosh, boys, I can't." + +"Say, what are you? the porter on that varnished car down there?" +demanded Sim. "Won't they let you off a minute?" + +"Tell you what we'll do," said Pelty Amthorne. "We'll take you to band +practice to-night. Sim still runs it, but he won't let me play any +more." + +"I haven't touched a horn since I left Homeburg," laughed Banks. "But +I'd give ten dollars to see you and Wimble Horn blat away on those altos +again, with your eyes bulging out of your cheeks." + +"We'll get Wimble and we'll break up band practice if you'll stay over." + +"I--" + +"No, you don't," said Sim. "I won't have riff-raff loafing around my +band." + +"You won't, eh?" said Banks. "We'll show you. Come down to the car while +I send about forty telegrams, and then we'll fix you, Mister Askinson." + +Which they did that night, while most of the town looked on. The next +fall Banks came back and stayed three days, and his conduct and that of +his old companions in crime set an example to our younger generation +which didn't wear off for years. They went out orchard robbing in an +automobile, and Banks said he never realized before the wonder of modern +conveniences. + + + + +VII + +THE HOMEBURG WEEKLY DEMOCRAT + +_Which Swamps the Post-Office Every Friday_ + + +No, Jim, as I have already said about thirty-four times this week, I +don't care for a paper. Don't buy one for me. I could read your New York +papers for twenty-four hours at a stretch, and at the end of the time I +would have to stop some good-natured looking chap and ask what the news +was. It's all there, I know, but I don't seem able to find it. Even the +Chicago baseball scores are hidden in the blamed things. Instead of +putting them first, the way they ought to, they stick them down at the +end of the page. As for the editorial pages, I might as well go to +Labrador and hunt for personal friends as to read them. If there's +anything that makes a stranger feel about ten thousand miles from home, +with the cars not running, it is to get into the editorial page of an +unknown newspaper and try to sit in with the family discussions. It +makes me feel like a man who has gotten into a reunion of the Old +Settlers' Association of Zanzibar by mistake. + +It's not much of a trick to go into a strange town and learn to navigate +from hotel to hotel, but it's a hopeless task to try to find your way +around a strange newspaper. Takes about two years to learn to read a +strange newspaper skilfully, anyway, and find your way through it +without banging into the want ads when you want to find the editorials, +and tripping over the poets' column when you are hunting for the crop +reports. You've been buying a paper every time you turned a corner for +the last week, Jim--you New Yorkers seem to have to have a paper about +as often as a whale needs a new lungful of air--and I've taken a hasty +look at all of them, but when I get home I am going to ask my wife what +has happened in the U. S. while I've been away from Homeburg. Outside of +the eternal Mexican case, I don't seem to have discovered a thing. + +Mind you, I don't blame your papers for bearing down hard on the local +news. I suppose it's mighty interesting to you New Yorkers to learn +every morning just how much more money you owe on your new subway, and +whether or not the temperature of Mrs. Van Damexpense's second-best +Siberian wolf-hound is still rising. That's what newspapers are for--to +save you the trouble of stepping around and collecting the events of the +day from the back fence. But your papers don't bear down hard enough on +the Homeburg happenings, and that's why they don't suit me. + +I don't pretend that our Homeburg paper is the equal of yours in any +particular. The best I can say for it is that it's no worse than it was +ten years ago. It hasn't any three-story type, and you could read it for +years without discovering who was being divorced in San Francisco or +murdered in Chicago. People who depend on it don't know yet that war has +been declared in the Balkans, and they won't hear any more politics +until 1916. All week long I think as little about the paper as all this. +But somehow, when Thursday evening comes around, rain or shine, I step +over to the post-office, and if my paper isn't there, I wait a few +minutes, growing more impatient all the time, and then I drift over to +the door of the _Homeburg Weekly Democrat_ office and join the silent +throng. + +Like as not I'll find twenty people there. We don't expect any wild +news. There will probably not be anything in the _Democrat_ when it +comes out, but we want to make sure of it. We don't want to go home +without the paper. We've read it for twenty years, and every week we +open it up and poke through its internals after a sensation that will +stand Homeburg on its ear and split the Methodist church from steeple to +pipe organ. We're as patient as fishers in the Seine, and the fact that +the world has never rocked when the _Democrat_ did come out doesn't +discourage us any. + +We want our paper, and so we stand there and grumble. Now and then one +of us stumps up the narrow hallway to the second story where the +_Democrat_ makes its lair, and looks on with an abused air while two +young lady compositors claw around the bottom of the boxes for enough +type to set the last items, and the foreman stuffs the forms of the last +two pages with old boiler plate, medicine ads and anything that will +fill. There isn't any reason for the _Democrat_ being late any more +than there is for the branch accommodation train, which got almost to +town on time once and stood beyond the crossing for twenty minutes +because her conductor forgot just when she was due and didn't want to +run in too soon. The _Democrat_ is just late naturally. It's part of its +function to be late. Makes it more eagerly sought after. We talk with +the foreman and make nuisances of ourselves generally, and presently old +man Ayers, who runs the paper, waddles in with another item to be set. +The compositors set down their sticks with a jerk and say, "Oh, my +land!" and the foreman goes and puts the item on the case with that air +of patient resignation which is a little more irritating than a swift +kick; and then Chet Frazier, if he's hanging around, which he usually +is, speaks up: + +"For goodness' sakes, Ayers, let that item go and get to press," he +says. "Give it to me and I'll read it aloud down-stairs, your whole +subscription list's down there waiting." + +But we have to wait just the same until the item is set up. Then the +foreman locks up the forms and bangs them on the face with his big +wooden plane, and he and the old man lug them out into the pressroom +while we all hold our breath--sometimes the form explodes on the way and +then we don't get the _Democrat_ for three days. + +Pretty soon we hear the rattle-te-bang-te-clank-te-clicketty-clang of +the old press, and in five minutes more Editor Ayers comes out with an +armful of folded papers all fragrant with fresh black ink. + +[Illustration: "She's out, boys," he says.] + +"She's out, boys," he says. Then we grab copies and hurry to spread the +news of the birth of another _Democrat_. We open the sheet and look +carefully down the page where old man Ayers generally conceals his local +news. For a minute or two there is silence. Then somebody crams his +paper into his pocket. "Hmph, nothing in it," he says, and starts home. + +He's right, too. Outside of the fact that it has another week of old man +Ayers's laborious and worried life in it, it is mighty bare. There isn't +enough news in it to cause a thrill in a sewing circle. But after supper +at home, when we look it over more carefully and the first hot flush of +anticipation has worn off, we do find a lot of information. We find that +Miss Ollie Mingle has gone to Paynesville for a two days' visit (aha, +that Paynesville young man's folks are going to look her over), and that +Mrs. Ackley is visiting her daughter in Ogallala, Neb. (Unless Ackley +straightens up, we don't expect her back.) Wimble Horn is erecting a new +porch and painting his house. (He must have beaten the bucket shop for +once.) We also find that Jedson Bane's peaches are ripe and of the best +quality, which fact he has just proven to the editor's entire +satisfaction. And that old Mrs. Gastit is feeling very poorly, and Pete +Parson, while working on his automobile the other night, contributed a +forefinger to the cause of gasoline by poking around in the cogs while +the engine was running. + +All of this is news and interesting to us; so is the fact that Miss Ri +Hawkes is not teaching in the Snyder district school this week, because +of a sore toe. While this item does not jar the country quite so +extensively as it would if Miss Hawkes belonged to one of your leading +New York families, and was employing an eleven-thousand-dollar physician +to treat her for gout, it is just as important to Miss Hawkes. And there +you have the great keynote of our Homeburg journalism. In the eyes of +the _Democrat_ we are all equal. + +There are not many of us Homeburgers. We will never see twenty-five +hundred again, for as families grow smaller, most of the Illinois towns +like Homeburg are contracting slowly in size even while prosperous. The +_Democrat_ hasn't above seven hundred subscribers, but every one of +those subscribers gets his name in the paper at least once a year, even +if it is only a general mention of his patriotism when he pays his +annual subscription. No baby born in Homeburg is too humble to get its +exact weight heralded to the world through the _Democrat_. Mrs. +Maloney's pneumonia and Banker Payley's quinsy grieve the town in the +same paragraph under the heading "Among our sick." The Widow Swanson's +ten-mile trip down the line to a neighboring town gets as careful +attention as Mrs. Singer's annual pilgrimage to California. In the +matter of news we are a pure democracy. The man who buys a new +automobile gets no more space than the member of Patrick McQuinn's +section crew who scores a clean scoop by digging his potatoes one week +ahead of the town. And when the humblest of us lies down in death he +does it with the serene consciousness that he will get half a column, +anyway, with more if his disease is rare and interesting, and that at +the end of the article the city will sympathize with the family in its +bereavement. When Mrs. Agnew died of her broken hip she got a column, +though she had been financially unable to take the paper for years, +while in the same issue Jay Gould got a two-inch obituary in its boiler +plate inside. + +Your big papers pride themselves on their brevity, except in murder +cases, and I understand that almost every New York editor thinks he +could boil the story of the Creation down into less than the six hundred +words which the Bible wasted on it. But Editor Ayers could give all your +editors instructions in this kind of economy. If the Creation had +happened around Homeburg while he was on the job, he would have called +attention to it the next week about as follows: + +"We understand there was a creation in these parts during the last week. +We did not learn the particulars but those who were on the ground at the +time say that it was a successful affair, and that the new world is +doing as well as could be expected under the circumstances." + +Ayers would write it this way for two reasons. In the first place he +hates to write more than one paragraph. Coming after a hard day's work +collecting bills and chasing subscribers, it is a wearing effort. +Nothing gets much space in the _Democrat_ except obituaries and +marriages, and they are all contributed--the former by the relatives and +the latter by the minister. In the second place, there wouldn't be any +use of wasting a lot of space on a big item because by the time the +_Democrat_ comes out, everybody knows all about it, and the mere facts +would be stale and unimportant beside the superstructure of soaring +fancy which has been built up by the easy-running imaginations of our +chief news dispensers on the street corners. And so, when the creamery +burns down or the evening fast freight runs through an accommodation on +the crossing, the old man puts his duty off until the last minute and +then writes a few well-chosen lines merely to let us know that he is on +the job and lets no news escape him. When you are running a weekly +paper, your competitors in the news business are the talkers in the town +who mingle seven days a week and issue a hundred thrilling extras to +their fellow citizens before your press day comes around. + +Besides, as I have said, old man Ayers can't afford to waste much time +chasing news. He has to get a living for himself as well as for the +_Democrat_, and keeping both his family and the paper alive is a +distinct feat performed weekly. His pay-roll for a foreman and two +girls must amount to over fifteen dollars a week, and that means cold +solid cash which must be wrung from a reluctant public. Seems to me I +never go into a store that I don't see old man Ayers trying to collect a +little cash on an advertising account or wheedling a subscriber into +coming out of the misty past and creeping cautiously down a few years +toward the present on his subscription account. If there is anything +which we can't do without and for which we positively object to paying +real money, it is our home newspaper. Sim Bone has a roaring shoe +business and pays cash for his automobiles, but he has often told me +that paying good paper money for advertising would be as wasteful as +eating it. He carries an ad in the _Democrat_ all the year and changes +it about every six months. It's July now, and he is still advertising +bargains in overshoes--but he won't pay any money. Ayers has to trade +the account out, as he has to do with every other advertiser in the +town. + +People pity the poor ministers' families who have to live on the +scrambled proceeds of donation parties, but an editor's family in our +parts has even harder luck. I have seen Ayers order two suits of clothes +from a clothier who owed him a big bill and was getting wabbly, and then +pass by the meat market empty-handed, because his advertising account +there was traded out. He told me once that he has taken disk-plows, +flaxseed, magazines, encyclopedias and a new back porch in trade for +advertising and subscriptions, but that he has been wearing an obsolete +pair of spectacles, to his great discomfort, for ten years, because our +local jeweler will not advertise. The doctors in town carry cards in the +paper and owe him large amounts because his family is too healthy to +catch up with them; but it will be two years before either of our local +dentists accumulates a big enough bill to allow Mrs. Ayers to have some +very necessary construction and betterment work, as the railroad folks +say, done to her teeth. + +If it weren't for the patent medicine ads, Ayers tells me, he wouldn't +be able to keep afloat for want of ready cash. He says a patent medicine +may be an abomination before the Lord, but that a patent medicine +advertising agent looks to him like a very present help in time of +trouble. The agent comes in and beats him down until he agrees to +publish several hundred yards of notices next to pure reading matter on +all sides for fifteen dollars. But the fifteen dollars is cash--he +doesn't have to take the stuff in trade. And so we are forever running +into such thrilling headlines as, "Horrible Wreck," "Her escape was +simply marvelous," "Worse than the Titanic Disaster," in the +_Democrat's_ local page. And then we exclaim: "Hurray! Real news at +last," and prowl eagerly down the items only to find that the horrible +wreck was a citizen of Swamp Hollow upon whom a wonderful cure was +effected; that "Her escape" was from inflammatory rheumatism by the aid +of Gettem's Dead Shot Specific, and that the Titanic Disaster is +eclipsed annually by the sad ends of thousands of people who neglect to +take Palaver's Punk Pills. It always makes us mad, but we can't kick. If +it weren't for the patent medicine people, we would have to pay for the +_Democrat_ all by ourselves. + +They say that when Editor Ayers first came to Homeburg some forty years +ago he was a bright young man with a great rush of words from the pen, +and that he had a dapper air and was generally admired. The _Democrat_ +contained about a page of solid editorial opinion each week on +everything, from the tariff to the duty of Russia, in whatever crisis +was then pending, and people swore by the paper and didn't make up +their opinions until they had read it. But times have changed. We don't +stand in awe of the _Democrat_ any more. Most of us laugh at it, even +those of us who are not financiers enough to keep our subscriptions +called up. We call it the "Weekly Gimlet" and the "Poorly Democrat," and +we make bright remarks to old man Ayers when he asks us for news and +tell him that he ought to turn the paper inside out so that we can read +the boiler plate first and not have to wade through his stuff. But he +doesn't object. Time and toil and the worry of keeping cash enough on +hand to pay the expressman who dumps his ready prints on the floor each +Wednesday and refuses to budge until he has collected $3.24 have taken +the pepper out of him. He doesn't write editorials any more except on +the week following a national election, and they are affairs of duty +which always begin: "Another election has come and gone and the party +of Jackson--" + +He has made a living for forty years and has sent two sons through +college from the _Democrat_, and the effort has taken the fight out of +him. I never saw him resent a joke but once. That was when Pelty +Amthorne told him that his wife considered the _Democrat_ to be the best +paper she had ever seen. He let Ayers burst a couple of buttons from his +vest in his swelling pride before he explained that the _Democrat_, when +cut in two, exactly fitted his wife's pantry shelves, and that she +didn't have to trim it a bit. The old man turned on his heel without a +word and that week he kindled his old-time fires and wrote the following +for the local page: + + +A citizen of Homeburg who hasn't done anything more exciting for twenty +years than stand off his grocery bill poked fun at the _Democrat_ last +week to our face because there wasn't any more news in it. News, say +we--News in Homeburg? News in a town where an ice-cream social is a +sensation and a dog fight suspends business for three hours? News in a +town where it takes a couple five years to work up a wedding and seven +kinds of wedding cake is the only news in it? Where the city marshal +hasn't made an arrest for two years because no one has done anything +after nine P.M. except snore, and where they have to put up the lamps in +pairs to keep them from getting lonesome? We don't print news from +Homeburg because there isn't any, and the old rooster who joshed us +knows it. He's sore because we can't make half a column out of his trip +to Paynesville eight miles away last summer, but we'll promise to do +better. We'll dump the paste pot in the fire, throw the old shears out +of the window and get out a regular screamer of a _Democrat_ some week; +a paper with red ink on it and big headlines and a real piece of news in +it. We will when this gabby old fossil does his part. When he pays his +six years' subscription, we'll write two columns about it. And even then +no one will believe it. + + +Lafe Simpson, who runs the _Argus_, is a younger man than Ayers and more +ambitious. Oh, yes, we have two papers. In a town the size of Homeburg +you simply have to have two papers, because half of the people are +always mad at one paper. The _Argus_ and _Democrat_ trade subscription +lists about every seven years--not counting the hard-shell Democrats and +blown-in-the-bottle Republicans who have to stand by their papers +whether they get mad at them or not. I've been taking the _Democrat_ for +about five years because Simpson got too busy in the school election one +year to suit me. It's pretty hard on me, because Simpson runs a better +paper; but my neighbor, Sim Askinson, likes the _Democrat_ better and +can't take it because he took his whole family to Chicago one week, and +Ayers overlooked the fact. So he borrows my _Democrat_ every week and I +get his _Argus_, and thus both of us preserve our mad and our dignity +and get what we want just the same. + +If there's anything keener than the competition between two weekly +newspapers in a small town, I'd like to see it--but not feel it. It's a +searching sort of competition which seems to work its way into every +detail of the town's affairs. We town people are judged by our editors +according to our patronage. If a man gives two jobs of letterheads in +succession to the _Argus_, Ayers looks on him as a man who has stabbed +him in the back and has twisted the sword. If the Board of Education +spends $67 for commencement invitations with the _Democrat_ one year and +$69.50 with the _Argus_ the next, things aren't exactly calm and +peaceable again until the discrimination has been explained. When twins +come to a man who has always taken the _Argus_ in preference to the +_Democrat_, old man Ayers wags his head as if to say, "He brought it on +himself;" and when Lafe Simpson meets a man who persistently refuses to +take his paper in preference to the sheet across the street, he greets +him as formally and warily as if he had smallpox and was passing free +samples around. + +Lafe claims to have more circulation than the _Democrat_, and this comes +nearer giving Ayers apoplexy than anything else. He claims that Lafe's +circulation consists two thirds of wind and that he hasn't more than 750 +bona fide subscribers, including deadhead copies to patent medicine +houses. Lafe, on the other hand, says Ayers prints 750 papers merely +from force of habit--that most of his subscribers have been trying to +stop the paper for years and can't. Lafe says that when a man puts his +name on Ayers's subscription list, he might as well carve it in stone +and then try to wipe it off with gasoline. Ayers says, in return, that +when a stranger arrives to make his home in Homeburg, Lafe Simpson meets +him at the train, takes him to his new residence, and hangs around the +doorstep until the stranger subscribes for the _Argus_ in order to +improve the atmosphere around the neighborhood. + +Of course the two papers are always on opposite political sides--no +matter whether it is a school or national election. Makes us scheme a +good deal at times to keep one of them quiet on some public project so +that the other will not jump on it. We had a big time, when the plan to +pave Main Street was going through, to keep Lafe from jumping in and +shouting for it. That would have set Ayers off dead against it, and we +had to muzzle Lafe until Ayers had committed himself. + +The struggles of the two editors to outdo each other have been titanic. +When Simpson put in a steam engine, Ayers mortgaged his plant and got +one of the new gasoline engines just then being introduced into an +unhappy world. He never used it much unless he had lots of time in which +to start it, but it was a great comfort and held Simpson level. When +Simpson bought the building in which the _Argus_ is printed, it nearly +killed Ayers, who couldn't have bought the sign on his building. But he +finally prevailed on the owner to put in a new front and name his block +"The Democrat Building." But about that time Simpson, who is a go-ahead +young chap, bought a young automobile in the last stage of lung trouble, +and Ayers has never really recovered from that blow. + +The two papers go to press on the same day, and the rivalry is intense. +Early in the day the two foremen each visit the rival plants, ostensibly +to borrow some type and a little gasoline, but in reality to count the +advertisements and to see how late the rival sheet is going to be. All +afternoon the forces work feverishly, reports drifting in occasionally +to the effect that over in the other shop they are locking up the forms. +The minute the press turns in the _Democrat_ office, Ayers grabs the +first paper, folds it and saunters hastily over toward the _Argus_. +Sometimes he meets Simpson half way over with a copy of the _Argus_ in +his pocket, and sometimes he gets clear over and has a chance to swell +around for a minute with his new-born paper in plain sight, watching the +mad foreman lock up the forms. The first paper into the post-office gets +distributed first, while the subscribers of the other paper hang around +in a state of frenzy and waver in their allegiance in a manner to make +the stoutest heart quail. And one of the weekly diversions in Homeburg +is watching this race. If it isn't too late in starting, we hang around +and make mild bets on the result. One week old man Ayers and his +foreman will hurry out from the _Democrat_ office and trot hastily over +to the post-office carrying the week's issue of the paper between them +in a wash basket. And the next week Simpson and the office devil will +beat them to it. Now and then they will both appear at the same time and +race side by side, bareheaded, coatless, breathless, and full of hate. I +hear a good deal about the exertions to which your papers go to be on +the street first with extras, but I'll bet there has never been more +voltage in the competition here than there was in Homeburg the night old +man Ayers and young Simpson arrived at the post-office door at precisely +the same second and got their baskets and themselves in a hopeless jam. +Postmaster Flint had to appoint a peace conference to settle the +dispute. + +Ayers is getting pretty old, and for several years we have been worrying +about his future. Since a cruel Government has decided that a newspaper +publisher must keep his subscription list paid up or go out of business, +times have been pretty hard for Ayers; formerly he could let a +subscription account run for ten years and then take a second-hand buggy +or a quarter of beef, or a few odd size grindstones on account; but of +late he has had to dun us every year, and of course that makes us mad, +and we quit his paper with great frequency and vim. I don't know what +would have happened to the old man if Wilson hadn't been elected. But +that, of course, has settled things for him. He will be our next +postmaster. Every one has conceded that except Pash Wade, Emery +Billings, Colonel Ackley, and Sim Askinson, who are also candidates. +However, old man Ayers's petition is as long as all the rest put +together, and when he is appointed and begins to draw down fifteen +hundred dollars a year for handing out his own paper to his +subscribers, we will sigh with relief, and Simpson's yells will be sweet +music in our ears. + +If I had my way, I would put a clause in the Constitution giving all +third-class postmasterships to third-class editors, anyway. It's the +only chance they have of accumulating enough of a surplus to be able to +go into a store with their hats on one side and buy things like other +people. + + + + +VIII + +THE HOMEBURG MARINE BAND + +_Where Music is Cherished for its own Sweet Sake Regardless of +Dividends_ + + +Where you New Yorkers get farthest ahead of us Homeburgers, Jim, is the +fact that you can go out and soak yourself in real, soul-hoisting music +whenever you feel like it--provided, of course, that you have the price +and that some speculator hasn't cornered the tickets, and that you can +get home at night in time to get dressed in time to go back to town, and +that you have sufficient nerve and endurance to go four rounds with your +celebrated subway in the same twenty-four hours. + +You can't realize what having music constantly on tap means to a +pilgrim from a town where two concerts in a winter is a gorge, and where +about the only regular musical diversion is going to church on Sunday +morning and betting on where the veteran soprano in the choir is going +to hang on to the key or skid on the high turns. You laugh at me because +I can't eat down-town unless I am encouraged by a bull fiddle, and +because I gulp at free concert tickets like a young robin swallowing +worms. But if most of your life had been spent listening to Mrs. Sim +Estabrook jumping for middle C about as successfully as a dog jumps for +a squirrel in a hickory tree, you'd splash around in melody, too, while +you had the chance. + +Of course, I don't mean to say that the music canneries don't do as big +a business out our way as they do anywhere. I'll bet they ship as much +as ten barrels of assorted masterpieces a month into Homeburg for our +graphophone cranks; and last winter Wimble Horn broke the piano-player +record by tramping out Tannhäuser in seven minutes flat. But while these +things educate us and enable us to roll our eyes in the right place in a +Wagner number, they don't satisfy the soul any more than souvenir cards +from Europe take away a thirst for travel. We want the real thing, and +year in and out we're music-hungry. We drive our young folks to the +piano and listen to them heroically until they get good, and then they +go away to the city where the gate receipts are better and leave us at +Lutie Briggs's mercy again. Time and time again the only thing that has +stood between Homeburg and a ghastly musical silence has been the +Homeburg Marine Band. + +That's right! Laugh, darn you! What if Homeburg is twenty miles from the +nearest creek? Our band is a lot nearer salt water than your Café de +Paris is to France. And, besides, there are only three names for a +country band, anyway. If it isn't the Marine Band, it has to be the +Military Band, or the Silver Cornet Band. Chet Frazier, who is our +village cut-up, says that they named ours the Marine Band years ago, +after it had waded out to the cemetery on a wet Memorial Day through our +celebrated bottomless roads. + +You can't realize what a comfort and pride a band is in a Class X town, +unless you have grown up in one. They say this isn't a musical country, +but its intentions are certainly good as far as brass bands go. Long +before an American town is big enough to have a post-office, its +citizens have either organized a brass band or are trying to get another +man to move in to complete a quorum. Life never gets so complicated out +on the grain elevator circuit that the station agent, school principal, +and the two rival blacksmiths, and the city marshal can't lug their +horns down-town once a week in the evening and soar sweetly off into +melody at band practice--that is, if they can get off on the same beat +during the evening. + +I can hear our home band now--up over McMuggins' Drug Store on a summer +evening. It's hot--not hot enough to ignite the woodwork, but plenty +warm enough to fry eggs on the sidewalks--and the whole town is out on +the porches and lawns chasing a breeze, except the band. It is up in the +super-heated lodge room of the Modern Woodmen, huddled around two oil +lamps, because the less light it has the less heat will be generated, +and it is getting ready to practice the "Washington Post March" for the +Fourth of July parade. Our band has practiced the "Washington Post +March" for over twenty years, but while the band has altered greatly, +the grand old piece shows no sign of wear and is as fresh and +unconquerable as ever. + +Querulous, complaining sounds come from the lodge room. The tenor horns +are crooning, and the bass horn blatting gently, while the clarionet +players are chasing each other up and down the scale, like squirrels +running round and round in a cage. The warming-up exercises are on. They +will continue until Frank Sundell shaves his last customer and gets up +to the hall with his trombone. You can tell when he comes. He pulls the +slide in and out a couple of times with an unearthly chromatic grunt, +and then there is a deep, pregnant silence. They are going to begin. + +Usually they begin several times. It is as hard to get a band off +together in practice as it is to send a dozen horses from the wire. But +finally the bass catches up with the cornets, and the others sprint or +put on the brakes, and they land on the fourth or fifth beat together. + +For a few minutes it's great. They go over the first four bars in a +bunch, and old Dobbs gets the half note and change of key in the bass, +which usually floors him, like a professional. It is a proud and happy +moment for the leader. But it doesn't last. It's too good to be true. Ad +Smith strikes a falsetto with his cornet and stops for wind; this +rattles his partner, who can't carry the air alone to save him. Dobbs +sits down on the wrong key in the bass. The tenors weaken, discouraged +by the cornet, and everybody hesitates. A couple of clarionets lose the +place and get to wandering around at random, creating terrible havoc. +The altos stop, being in doubt. Ad recovers and launches out with +terrific vim half a beat behind. There is a rally, but it is too late. +You can hear fragments of five different keys, and presently every one +stops except Mahlon Brown, who plays the bass drum and always bangs away +through fire or water until some one turns him off. + +Then there is silence--a good deal of it. We all know what is +happening. Sim Askinson, the leader, is making a few well-chosen +remarks, and each player is turning around in his chair and going over +the faults of his neighbor in the most kindly and thorough fashion. Ed +Smith empties out his baritone horn and takes a little practice run, and +then they commence to begin--or begin to start--or start to +commence--whatever it is, all over again. But when they stop at ten +o'clock, they haven't played the "Washington Post March" clear through +in any one heat. + +Doesn't sound encouraging for the Fourth, does it? But, pshaw, that's +only practice! When the big day comes and the boys put on their caps and +coats and such trousers as will come nearest to blending with the said +coats and march down the street, do they falter and blow up in the back +stretch? Not much. They canter through that air as if they had been born +whistling it. There's a wonderful inspiration in marching to a band +man--give him a horn, a ragged slip of music, and about four miles of +road, and he will prance down the street, climbing over ruts, wading +through mud, reading at night by the light of a torch carried by a boy +who is twenty feet away fighting with another boy; and he will blow his +immortal soul into his horn for hours at a stretch without missing a +note. + +Part of the reason for the difference at home is because we always carry +a few amateurs, who are privileged to come in at practice and do all the +damage they can, but who have to keep mighty quiet on the march. They +can carry their horns, puff out their cheeks and look as grand as they +please, but if they'd presume to cut loose with some real notes and +smear up a piece, they'd be fired in no time. + +We have always been mighty proud of our Homeburg band. Nobody knows how +old it is. We think it arrived with the first inhabitants. These are +all dead, but some of the original horns are still doing duty, and the +brass on them is worn thin and almost bright. Our band is much better +than the average band. That's one of the great Homeburg comforts. +Whenever we get blue about the muddy streets and the small stores, and +the great need of a sewage system, and the disgraceful condition of the +stove in the Q. B. & C. Depot, we think of our band and are comforted. +It has at least twenty members right along, most of whom can play their +instruments, and Sim Askinson, who is a professional music teacher, has +conducted it off and on for twenty-five years. Citizens from other towns +get mighty jealous when they come down to Homeburg Thursday evenings +during the summer and listen to the magnificent concerts which our band +gives. I've seen as many as three hundred rigs around the public square +those nights. And when our band practices up on "Poet and Peasant," +which is its star piece, and goes off to the big band contests which +break loose in the summer and create great havoc, large numbers of our +citizens go along and bet their good money in a manner which keeps the +town poor for months afterward. + +I don't know anything more magnificent than the way our band plays "Poet +and Peasant" with Sim Askinson leading, Ad Smith and Henry Aultmeyer +duetting perfectly for once with their cornets, and the clarionet +section eating up the fast parts in a manner that sends goose flesh up +and down your spine. We're head and shoulders above any other band that +enters the contests, but that's the trouble. The judges are never +educated up to "Poet and Peasant." They always give the prize to the +Paynesville Military Band, which has a five-foot painted bass drum and +has to play "Over the Waves" for a concert piece, because they haven't +got a decent cornet player in town. Sometime they will get a real +musician to judge these contests, and then we will win by seventeen +toots. + +You may not believe it, Jim, but I am an alumnus of the Homeburg band. +Didn't suspect that I was anything but an ordinary citizen, did you? But +it's a fact. I am a band man. I'm too modest to brag about it, but I was +carrying a horn and had a uniform before I was eighteen. I suppose there +is nothing, not even the fire department, that fills a small town boy +with such wild ambition as a band. When I was twelve, I used to watch +that band in its more sublime passages, feeling that if I ever could +become great enough to play in it, others could run the country and win +its great battles with no jealousy from me. The snare drummer at that +time was a boy of sixteen. Of course, being snare drummer in the band, +he didn't mix around much with the common kids, and I didn't know him. +But I watched him until my ribs swelled out and cracked with envy; and I +used to wonder how fortune ever happened to reach down and yank that +particular boy so far up into the rarefied upper regions of glory. + +When I was fourteen, I went after his job. But I never could learn to +play the snare drum. You have to learn to "roll," and I couldn't make my +left hand behave. I tried a year and would probably be trying yet but +for the fact that when Ed Norton left town, he traded me his ruinous old +alto horn for three dollars and a dog. There was about as much music +left in it as there is in a fish horn, but I was as delighted as if it +had been a pipe organ, and when the folks wouldn't let me practice at +home on it, I took it out in the country and kept it in Smily Garrett's +barn. After a while I learned how to fit my face into the mouthpiece in +just the right way, and as the sounds I made became more human, I sort +of edged into town, until finally I was practicing in our own barn. And +the next year Askinson let me come into the band and "pad" as second +alto during the less important engagements. + +I played with the band for five years, and while I never got out of the +"thump section," which was what the trombonists and snare drummers and +the other aristocrats of the band call the altos, I had all the fun and +adventures that a high-priced musician could have had, and was perfectly +happy. I can still remember with pride the deep-green looks on the faces +of Pete Amthorne and Billy Madigan and Snoozer Ackley, as they watched +me marching grandly down the street lugging my precious old three +bushels of brass in my arms, and "ump-umping" until my eyes stuck out of +my head. Of course they didn't know that most of the time I was +watching a change in my notes half a bar away and wondering if I could +make it without falling all over the treble clef. I looked like Sousa to +them, and when I leaned grandly back in my chair at the band concerts +and borrowed a page of music from my neighbor--said page being mostly +Hebrew to me--I felt like a Senator or Chief Justice letting the common +herd have a look at him. + +I pity the poor city boys who have to grow up nowadays and depend on +taxicabs and vaudeville for their excitement. Belonging to the band was +more fun than belonging to the baseball team or the torchlight brigade +or anything else. We got in on everything. They couldn't pull off a +rally or celebration, or even a really successful church social, without +us. I might say that the importance of a Homeburg citizen in the old +days was determined by whether or not the Homeburg Band escorted him to +his tomb. When great doings occurred in the neighboring towns, plain +citizens dug down in their pockets for car-fare, and then dug painfully +down once more for our car-fare. When an ordinary Homeburger wanted to +help boost McKinley to victory by parading in some distant town with a +torch, it cost him five dollars and a suit of clothes. But we not only +went free, but got two dollars apiece for plowing a wide furrow of glory +down the streets between rows of admiring eyes. + +Those two dollars counted a lot in those days, too. It looked like an +easy income to us. All we had to do to earn it was to beg off from our +employers for half a day, travel thirty miles or so by train, usually +standing up and protecting our horns from the careless mob, march eight +or ten miles over unknown streets, picking out dry places underfoot and +notes from a piece of music bobbing up and down in the shadows above our +horns, and then drive home across country after midnight, getting home +in time to go to work in the morning. Why, it was just like finding +money; I've never had so much fun earning it since. I started once to +figure out how many miles our band marched during the first Bryan +campaign, but I gave it up. We never felt it at that time, but it made +me so tired counting that I quit with a distinct footsore feeling. + +The most worrisome task about a Homeburg band was keeping it alive. I +suppose all small town bands have the same trials. We worked against +incredible difficulties. If city people had the same devotion to music +which we displayed, you would have a ten-thousand-piece philharmonic +orchestra in New York playing twenty-four hours a day for glory. We were +always building up our band with infinite pains, only to have Fate jerk +the gizzard out of it just as perfection was in sight. Talent was +scarce, and the rude, heartless city was forever reaching down into +Homeburg and yanking some indispensable players away. Of course there +was always a waiting list of youngsters who would coax a few hoarse +toots out of the alto horn, and we always had a bunch of kid +clarionetists who would sail along grandly through the soft parts and +then blow goose notes whenever they hit the solo part. But try as we +would, we could never get more than two cornets. One of these was Ad +Smith. He was a bum cornetist, but his brother Ed was a good baritone, +and we had to have both or none. The other was usually some anxious +young student who got along pretty well on plain work, but who would +come down the chromatic run in the "Chicago Tribune March" like a fat +man falling down the cellar stairs with an oleander plant. + +As for trombones, there was a positive fatality among them; we were +always losing them. Trombone players have to be born, anyway, and there +was no hope of developing one. Besides, the neighbors wouldn't allow it. +Young Henry Wood showed promise once, but after his father had listened +to him for about six months, he took the slip end of his horn away from +him and beat carpets with it, until it was extinct as far as melody was +concerned. + +For a year we had Mason Peters, who was a wonder on the slide trombone. +But he was only getting twelve dollars a week in Snyder's Shoe Emporium, +and Paynesville, which never tired of putting up dirty tricks on us, +hustled around and got him an eighteen dollar job up there--after which +they came down to Homeburg at the first opportunity with their band to +parade Peters before our eyes. It would have been a grand success if +they hadn't put Peters in the front row. He lived for his art, Peters +did, paying no attention to anything but his trombone, and besides he +was quite deaf. He got confused about the line of march, and when the +band swung around the public square he kept right on up Main Street all +alone, playing in magnificent form and solitary grandeur while the band +swung off the other way. The whole town followed him with tears of joy, +and he traveled two blocks before he became aware of the vast and +appalling silence behind him; then he kept right on for the city limits +on the run. It was a great comfort to us, and by the time we had gotten +through apologizing to the Paynesville boys for following Peters under +the impression that he was the real band, they had offered to fight us +singly or in platoons. + +We used to watch every new citizen like Russian detectives, only we +searched them for horns instead of dynamite. Several times a trombonist +came to town, and music revived noticeably. But none of them lasted. +Trombonists seem to be temperamental, and when they are not changing +jobs they are resigning from the band because they are not allowed to +play enough solos. Our greatest bonanza was a quiet chap named Williams, +who came to town to work in the moulding room of the plow factory. After +he had been there a week, we discovered that he had a saxophone. No one +had ever heard or eaten a saxophone, but we looked it up, and when we +found out what it was, we made a rush for him. At the next practice he +appeared with a bright silver instrument covered with two bushels of +keys and played a solo which sounded like three clarionets with the +croup. We wept for joy and elected him leader on the spot. + +This caused Sim Askinson to resign, of course, and he took Ad and Ed +Smith with him, and they remained in dignified and awful silence for two +years. But we didn't care. One saxophone was worth five baritones, and +while Williams was in town, we were an object of envy to all of the +other bands around. We changed our name to the Homeburg Saxophone Band, +and the way we rubbed it into Paynesville was pitiful. He was a little +fellow, Williams was, and short of wind, which caused him to gasp a good +deal during the variation parts. But he was willing. There was no shirk +about him. After a year our program usually consisted of eleven +saxophone solos and some other piece which could be done almost entirely +on the saxophone, and the jealous Paynesvillains used to ask why we used +nineteen men to play the rests when one man could have produced as much +silence at far less expense. + +Those were glorious years; but of course they didn't last. Williams got +to resigning at the foundry just for the pleasure of having us come down +and plead with the proprietor to raise his pay. Finally he resigned so +much that the proprietor fired him, and then we had to take our caps in +hand and wheedle the Smiths and Askinson back into the band. I haven't +belonged for years, but they are still there. When I drop in at +practice, as many of the alumni do, Askinson greets me cordially and +takes some young cub's horn away from him, so I can sit in. It is just +like old times, especially when Ed Smith lays down his horn after a +slight altercation with some one and goes home never to come back--just +as he has done for the last thirty years. + +That's the worst of music. One's art, you know, has so much influence +over one's temper. To see our band soaring majestically down Main Street +and playing "Canton Halifax" in one great throbbing rough-house of +melody you would never believe that anything but brotherly love existed +between the players. As a matter of fact, we never wasted any harmony +among ourselves. We didn't have any to spare. It took all we had to +produce the music. For twenty-five years the Smiths and Cooney Simpson, +who plays first clarionet, have been at swords' points, each with a +faction behind him. Cooney says it's a shame that a good band must limp +along with a cornetist who always takes three strikes to hit a high +note, and Ed Smith says Cooney wants to be leader and will not be +satisfied until he can play the solo and bass parts at once on his +clarionet. I can see Ed Smith now, after the band has run aground in +practice, taking his horn down and glaring around at Cooney. + +"What you gobstick players need is a time-table," says he, "instead of +notes. Come in on the A about eight-fifteen. If you can do that well, +we'll try to struggle along." + +"Don't get forte," Cooney replies cheerfully. "If you'd try to follow +both those cornets instead of rambling along by yourself, you'd split, +sure." + +"Better play cornet, too, Cooney," says Ad Smith, whirling around. +"You've got enough mouth for both." + +"Well, we ought to have a cornetist," says Cooney, "it's what we've +needed for years." + +This riles the scrub cornet player, whoever he happens to be, and he +gets up excitedly. "We'd get along a lot better without one or two human +calliopes--" he begins. + +"Set down, set down," says old Dobbs from the coils of his tuba. "Let +'em fight. They know it all between pieces--" + +"Who asked you to horn in?" says Ed Smith, getting up preparatory to +going home with his baritone horn and leaving a broken and forlorn world +to grieve his loss. + +Of course this is a crisis. But we never bust up. The Paynesville Band +busts up about twice a year over the division of profits and the color +of their new uniforms and the old question of whether the cornets or +trombones shall march in front. But we never go entirely to pieces. This +is largely because of Sam Green. He is our peacemaker and most faithful +player. He has played second alto in the band for thirty-five years +without a promotion, and is by all odds the worst player I ever saw, +being only entirely at home in the key of C; and he can't play +three-four time to save his soul. But his devotion is marvelous. He is +always the first man down to practice. He lights the lamps, builds the +fires, and when necessary goes out to Ed Smith's home and persuades him +to come back into the band for just this night. And whenever the dispute +between the factions gets to the point where Ed Smith begins gathering +up his doll things, Sam interferes. + +"Come on now, boys," he pleads, "we've got to get this piece worked up. +You're all good players. Why, if Paynesville had you fellows, she'd +have a band. That was my fault that time. I'll get this here thing right +sometime. I'll sit out in the trio now and you fellows take it." + +And pretty soon, as he argues, Ed's proud heart softens, and he comes +back with a glare at Cooney. Then Sim Askinson raps on his music rack +and says: "Gentlemen and trombone players," as he has for a quarter of a +century; and a minute later the band is tumbling eagerly through its +piece once more, all feuds suspended in the desperate effort to come out +even at the end with no surplus bars to be played by some floundering +horn. + +Some time during the evening, as a rule, the various sections get +together on some passage and swim grandly through, every horn in perfect +time, and the parts blending like Mocha and Java. All differences are +forgotten, and the band breaks up with friendly words, Ed Smith and +Cooney going home together. Music has charms to soothe the savage beast, +and it also has a wonderful power of taking the temper out of the grocer +and the painter and the mahout of the waterwork's gasoline engine. + +I never stepped so high or felt so grand as I did the first time I +marched out with the boys and went down the street in the back row of +the band next to the drums, a member in good standing, and dodging every +time I passed under a telephone wire to keep from scraping my cap off. I +never expect to feel that grand again. But I have an ambition. If ever I +should become so famous and successful that when I went back to Homeburg +to visit my proud and happy parents and stepped off of the 4:11 train, I +would find the Homeburg Marine Band there to meet me, I would know that +I had made good, and I would be content. The only thing that encourages +me in my ambition is that the band didn't come down to play when I went +away. Do you know, Jim, it's the funniest thing--the fellows we played +out-of-town in a blaze of glory never happened to be the chaps we came +down to the train to meet afterward, somehow. But I imagine we weren't +the only poor guessers in the world. + + + + +IX + +THE AUTO GAME IN HOMEBURG + +_It has Driven out Politics as a Subject of Debate_ + + +Wait a minute, Jim. I want to look at this automobile.... Yes, I know it +is the sixth machine I've walked around in seven blocks, but what's time +to a New Yorker on Saturday afternoon? This nifty little mile-eater has +an electric gear shift, and I want to ask the chauffeur how he likes it. +Promised Ad Summers I would. + +... Says it hangs a little if his voltage is low. That's what I'd be +afraid of--Gee! there's a new Jacksnipe with a center searchlight. Never +would do for rutty roads. How do you like the wire wheels, Jim? Bad for +side strains, I should think. Look at those foxy inset lamps. Listen to +that engine purr--two cycle, I'll bet. Say, Fifth Avenue is certainly +one great street! I could walk up and down here for a month. There's a +new Battleax--wonder if those two speed differentials are going to work +out. + +All right, Jim, I'll reluctantly shut up and focus my attention on the +salmon-colored cloaks and green stockings for a while. I forgot that you +don't take any deep, abiding interest in automobiles. All they mean to +you is something to ride in, but to me they're as interesting as a new +magazine. I've spent about four days in the sales-rooms since I've been +here, and when I get home I'll be the center of breathless attention +until I've passed around all the information I've dug up. I could go +back without any information about the new shows, or the city campaign, +but if I were to come back without a bale of automobile gossip, I'd be +fired for gross incompetency from the League of Amateur Advisers at +Gayley's garage. + +You thought I said I didn't own a machine? I did say it and I can prove +it. But do you suppose that makes any difference in Homeburg? Here the +other fellow's car is his own business. But in Homeburg an automobile is +every one's business. It's like the weekly newspaper, or the new +minister, or the latest wedding--it's common property. Since gasoline +has been domesticated we're all enthusiasts, whether we are customers or +not. The man who can't talk automobile is as lonely as the chap who +can't play golf at a country club. About all there is left for him to do +is to hunt up Postmaster Flint and talk politics. Flint has to talk all +our politics; it's what he's paid for, but it's mighty hard on him +because he just bought a new machine last spring himself. + +No, you guessed wrong, Jim. Automobiles aren't a curiosity in Homeburg. +How many are there in New York? Say eighty thousand. One for every sixty +people. Homeburg has twenty-five hundred people and one hundred +machines, counting Sim Askinson's old one-lunger and Red Nolan's refined +corn sheller, which he built out of the bone-yard back of Gayley's +garage. That's one for every twenty-five people. Figure that out. It +only gives each auto five members of the family and twenty citizens to +haul around. We're about up to the limit. Of course another one hundred +people could buy machines, I suppose; but that would only allow twelve +and a half passengers, admirers, guests, and advisers for each car. That +isn't anywhere near enough. Why, it wouldn't be worth while owning a +machine! As it is, we are all busy. I've ridden in twenty new machines +this year and passed my opinion on them. It has taken a good deal of my +spare time. I've thought sometimes of buying one myself, but I don't +believe it would be right. If I had a car myself, I would have to +neglect all the others. It wouldn't do. Besides, I like to be peculiar. + +Is every one in Homeburg a millionaire? Goodness, no! Our brag is that +we have less people per automobile than any other town, but then that's +the ordinary brag with an Illinois small town. We're not much ahead of +the others. Automobiles don't stand for riches out our way. Blamed if I +know what they do represent. Mechanical ingenuity, I guess. Country town +people pick up automobiles as easily as poor people do twins. And they +seem to support them about as inexpensively. If you were to take a trip +around Homeburg at seven A.M. on a Sunday morning, you would find about +eighty-seven automobile owners out in the back yard over, under, or +wrapped around their machines. + +In the city you can only tell a car owner these days by his silk socks; +but in the country town the grimy hand is still the badge of the order. +The automobile owner does his own work, like his wife, and on Sunday +morning, instead of hustling for the golf links, he inserts himself into +his overalls and spends a couple of hours trying to persuade the +carbureter to use more air and less gasoline. The interest our +automobile owners take in the internals of their cars is intense. That +is the only thing which mars the pleasure of the professional guest, +such as myself. More than once I've sat in the sun twenty miles from +home while some host of mine has taken his engine down clear to the bed +plate, just because he had the time to do it and wanted to see how the +bearings were standing up. + +I've lived in Homeburg all my life, but I haven't yet solved the mystery +of how some of our citizens own machines. It's a bigger mystery than +yours because our automobile owners pay their bills, and the mortgage +records don't tell us anything. There's Wilcox, the telegraph operator. +He makes seventy-five dollars a month. He works nights to earn it, and +he spends his days driving around the country in his runabout. He's +thirty years old, and I think he invested in an auto instead of a wife. + +You can get a good meal in our local restaurant for twenty-five cents, +and when some painstaking plutocrat comes in and tries to spend a dollar +there, he has to be removed by kindly hands in a state of fatal +distension before the job is finished. A thousand dollars would buy +stock, fixtures, and good will. But a thousand wouldn't buy the +restaurant owner's automobile. He began with two hundred and fifty +dollars' worth of rubbish and a monkey wrench four years ago, and has +pottered and tinkered and traded and progressed until he now owns a last +year's model, staggering under labor-saving devices. + +Our oculist, who does business in a tiny corner in a shoe-store and +never overcharged any one in his life, was our pioneer automobile owner. +He bought a homemade machine and a mule at the same time, and by +judiciously combining the two he got a good deal of mileage out of both. +He would work all morning getting the automobile down-town and all +afternoon getting the mule to haul it back. He has had three machines +since then, and the one he owns now is only third-hand. + +For years Mrs. Strawn washed clothes for the town from morning till +night, two washings a day and all garments returned intact. Her boys +used to call at our house for the wash with a wheelbarrow. They come in +an automobile now. She bought it. It was a hopeless invalid at the time, +but they nursed it back to health, and I hear that next spring they are +going to trade it in for a new machine.... Why do I say machine? Because +that's what an automobile is out our way. It's a machine, and we treat +it as such. Most of our people couldn't take a lobster to pieces to save +their lives, but you ought to see them go through the shell of an auto. +Too many Americans buy portable parlors with sixty-seven coats of +varnish, and are then shocked and grieved to discover when too late that +said parlors have gizzards just like any other automobile and that they +should have been looked after. + +I said there were one hundred automobiles in Homeburg. I was mistaken. +There are ninety-nine automobiles and one car. The Payleys own the car. +They bought it in New York, paid six thousand dollars for it, with a +chauffeur thrown in to drive them home, and they have been under his +thumb ever since. He was the only chauffeur who had ever been brought +alive in captivity to Homeburg, and the whole town inspected him with +the utmost care. He was the best stationary chauffeur I ever saw. He +seemed to regard that car as a monument and was shocked at the idea of +moving it around from place to place. + +It was too high-priced a car to be touched by Sam Gayley, our local auto +doc., and somehow the chauffeur never seemed to be able to keep it in +running order long enough to get up to the Payley residence and take the +family out. He ran around the country a good deal, however, tuning it up +and trying it out, and as he was a sociable cuss, some of us always went +with him. In fact, about every one rode in the Payley car that summer +except the Payleys. Wert Payley used to stop me and ask if I could fix +it up to take him along sometime when I went riding with his chauffeur, +but I never would risk it. Besides, it would be imposing on the boy's +generosity to lug a friend along when you went riding. + +The most of our machines vary from the one thousand, five hundred dollar +touring car to the five hundred dollar little fellows; and since they +have come, life in Homeburg is twice as interesting. They are our +dissipation, our excitement, our amusement, and the focus of our town +pride. The Checker Club disbanded last winter because the members got to +quarreling over self-starters, and I understand that in the Women's +Missionary Societies and the afternoon clubs the comparative riding +qualities of the various tonneaus about the city have about driven out +teething and styles as a subject of debate. For a while during the +Wilson campaign, it looked as if politics was going to get a foothold in +the town, but some enthusiast organized a flying squadron of automobiles +to propagate Democratic gospel, and then it was all off. Everybody +rushed into the squadron, and the trips around the district became +reliability runs, with a lone orator addressing the freeborn citizens +upon the tariff at each stop, and said freeborn citizens discussing +magnetos, springs, and tires with great earnestness and vehemence during +the speech. + +Business always suspends for half a day whenever a new automobile comes +to town. There may be a dozen of the same make already, but that doesn't +make any difference. We are experts, trained to notice the finer shades +of perfection, and until we have seen each new machine put up the clay +hill four miles south of town and have ridden in it over the Q. B. & C. +crossing and the other places which show up bad springs, we can't fix +our minds on our work. Time was when a new baby could come into Homeburg +and hold the attention of the town for a week. Now a baby is lucky if +its birth notice isn't crowded out of the _Democrat_ to make room for +the list of new machines. + +As for those of us who haven't automobiles, life is pleasant and without +responsibilities. We ride in every new automobile, and, what is more, we +go over it as carefully as a farmer does a new horse. We open its hood +and pry into its internal economy. We crank it to test its +compression--half the Homeburg men who have achieved broken wrists by +the crank route haven't autos at all. We denounce the owner's judgment +on oils and take his machine violently away from him in order to prove +that it will pull better uphill with the spark retarded. At night, +during the summer, we hurry through supper and then go out on the front +porch to wait for a chance to act as ballast. + +No automobile owner in the dirt roads belt will go out without a full +tonneau if he can help it--makes riding easier--and this means permanent +employment during the evenings for about three hundred friends all +summer long. In fact the demand for ballast is often greater than the +supply. As a result, we have become hideously spoiled. I have passed up +as many as six automobiles in an evening on various captious pretexts, +waiting all the time for Sim Bone's car, whose tonneau is long and +exactly fits my legs. Once or twice Sim has failed to come around after +I have waved the rest of the procession by, and we have had to stay at +home. I have spoken to him severely about this, and he is more careful +now. + +Because of our great interest in automobiles, vicarious or otherwise, +there is no class-hatred in Homeburg. If a man were to stop by the +roadside and begin to denounce the automobile as an oppressor of the +pedestrian, he would in all probability be kidnaped by some acquaintance +before he was half through and carried forty miles away for company's +sake. About the only Homeburg resident who doesn't ride is old Auntie +Morley, who broke her leg in a bobsled sixty years ago and has had a +holy horror of speed ever since. + +In fact the only classes we have are the privileged class who merely +ride in automobiles and the oppressed class who ride and have to pay for +them, too. Lately the latter class has begun to feel itself abused and +has been grumbling a little, but we overlook it. No appeal to prejudice +and jealousy can move us. Of course, I don't think that an automobile +owner should be expected to leave his wife at home in order to +accommodate his neighbors, and there may be some just complaint when an +owner is called up late at night and asked to haul friends home from a +party to which he hasn't been invited. But on the whole the automobile +owners are very well treated. Suppose we spectators should band together +and refuse to ride in the things or talk about them! The market would +be glutted with second-hand cars in a month. + +We have no trouble with the speed limit in Homeburg either. This may be +due partly to our good sense, but it is mostly due to our peculiar +crossings. Homeburg is paved with rich black dirt, and in order to keep +the populace out of the bosom of the soil in the muddy seasons, the +brick crossings are built high and solid, forming a series of +impregnable "thank-ye-marms" all over the town. One of our great +diversions during the tourist season is to watch the reckless strangers +from some other State dash madly into town at forty miles an hour and +hit the crossing at the head of Main Street. There is a crash and a +scream as the occupants of the tonneau soar gracefully into the top. +There is another crash and more screams at the other side of the street, +and before the driver has diagnosed the case, he has hit the Exchange +Street crossing, which sticks out like the Reef of Norman's Woe. When +he has landed on the other side of this crossing, he slows down and goes +meekly out of town at ten miles an hour, while we saunter forth and pick +up small objects of value such as wrenches, luncheon baskets, hairpins, +hats, and passengers. + +Last summer we picked up an oldish man who had been thrown out of an +unusually jambangsome touring car. He had been traveling in the tonneau +alone, and even before he met our town he had not been enjoying himself. +The driver and his accomplice had not noticed their loss, and when we +had brushed off and restored the old gentleman, he said "Thank God!" and +went firmly over to the depot, where he took the next train for home, +leaving no word behind in case his friends should return--which they did +that afternoon and searched mournfully at a snail's pace for over twenty +miles on both sides of our town. + +Since the automobile has begun to rage in our midst, the garage is the +center of our city life. The machine owners stop each day for +lubricating oil and news and conversation; the non-owners stroll over to +inspect the visiting cars and give advice when necessary; and the +loafers have abandoned the implement store, Emerson's restaurant, and +the back of McMuggins' drug store in favor of the garage, because they +find about seven times as much there to talk about. The city garage +can't compare with ours for adventure and news. I have spent a few hours +in your most prominent car-nurseries and I haven't heard anything but +profanity on the part of the owners and Broadway talk among the +chauffeurs. + +In the country it's different. Take a busy day at Gayley's, for +instance. It usually opens about three A.M., when Gayley crawls out of +bed in response to a cataract of woe over the telephone and goes out +nine miles hither or yon to haul in some foundered brother. Gayley has a +soft heart and is always going out over the country at night to reason +with some erring engine; but since last April first, when he traveled +six miles at two A.M. in response to a call and found a toy automobile +lying bottom-side up in the road, he has become suspicious and +embittered, and has raised his prices. + +At six A.M. Worley Gates, who farms eight miles south, comes in to catch +an early train and delivers the first bulletin. The roads to the south +are drying fast, but he went down the clay hill sidewise and had to go +through the bottom on low. At seven, Wimble Horn and Colonel Ackley and +Sim Bone drop in while waiting for breakfast. Bone thinks he'll drive to +Millford, but doesn't think he can get in an hour's business and get +back by noon. + +This starts the first debate of the day, Colonel Ackley contending that +he has done the distance easily in an hour-ten, and Sim being frankly +incredulous. Experts decide that it can be done with good roads. Colonel +says he can do it in mud and can take the hills on high; says he never +goes into low for anything. Bill Elwin, one of our gasless experts, +reminds him of the time he couldn't get up Foster's Hill on second and +was passed by three automobiles and fourteen road roaches. This is a +distinct breach of etiquette on Bill's part, for he was riding with +Colonel at the time and should have upheld him. The discussion is just +getting good when Ackley's wife calls him home to breakfast over the +'phone, and the first tourist of the day comes in. + +He has come from the west and has had heavy weather. He asks about the +roads east. Gibb Ogle, our leading pessimist, hastens to inform him that +very likely the roads are impassable, because the Highway Commissioners +have been improving them. Out our way road improvement consists of +tearing the roads out with a scraper and heaping them up in the middle. +It takes a road almost a year to recover from a good, thorough case of +improvement. + +The stranger goes on dejectedly, and about nine A.M. young Andy Link +roars in with his father's car, which he has taken away from the old man +and converted into a racer by the simple process of taking off the +muffler and increasing the noise to one hundred miles per hour. Andy +declares that there has been no rain to the northwest and that he has +done sixty miles already this morning, but can't get his carbureter to +working properly, as usual. By this time several owners and a dozen +critics have assembled, and the morning debate on gasoline versus motor +spirit takes place. It ends a tie and both sides badly winded, when +Pelty Amthorne drives in, very mad. He has been over to Paynesville and +back. This is only twenty miles, but owing to the juicy and elusive +condition of the roads, his rear wheels have traveled upward of two +thousand miles in negotiating the distance and he has worn out two rear +casings. + +Right here I wish to state that Homeburg roads are not always muddy. We +average three months of beautiful, smooth, resilient and joltless roads +each year. The remaining nine months, however, I mention with pain. +Illinois boosters say our beautiful rich black soil averages ten feet in +depth, but I think this understates the case--at least our beautiful +black dirt roads seem to be deeper than that in the spring. What we need +in the spring in Illinois are locks and harbor lights, and the man who +invents an automobile buoyant enough to float on its stomach and paddle +its way swiftly to and fro on the heaving bosom of our April roads will +be a public benefactor. + +Pelty is justly indignant, because he had hoped to get another thousand +miles of actual travel out of his tires. We sympathize with him, but in +the middle of his grief Chet Frazier drives up. When he sees his ancient +enemy, he climbs out of his car, comes hastily over to where Pelty is +erupting, and starts trading autos with him. + +Did you ever hear a couple of seasoned horse traders discussing each +other's wares? Horse traders are considerate and tender of each other's +feelings compared with two rural automobile owners who are talking swap +with any enthusiasm. + +"Hello, Pelty," says Chet. "Separator busted again?" + +Everybody laughs, and Chet walks all around the machine. "Why, it ain't +a separator at all," he finally says. "What is it, Pelty?" + +"If you'd ever owned an automobile you'd know," grunts Amthorne, +hauling off a tire. "What's become of that tinware exhibit you used to +block up traffic with?" + +Chet gets the laugh this time. + +"That tinware exhibit stepped over from Jenniesburg in thirty minutes +flat this morning," says Chet. "Lucky you weren't on the road. I'd have +thrown mud on your wind shield." + +"Say!" Pelty shouts. "Your machine couldn't fall ten miles in thirty +minutes. Why don't you get a real automobile? What will you give me to +boot for mine?" + +They are off, and business in the vicinity suspends. + +"I'll trade with you, Pelty," says Chet calmly--quite calmly. "Let me +look it over." + +He walks carefully around the auto, opens the hood and looks in. "Funny +engine, isn't it? I saw one like that at the World's Fair." + +Pelty has the hood of Chet's machine open too and is right there with +the retort courteous. "Is this an engine or a steam heater?" he asks. +"What pressure does she carry?" + +"She never heats at all except when I run a long time on low," Chet says +eagerly. + +"Oh, yes," says Pelty, "I never have to go into low much--" + +"Gosh!" Chet explodes. "When you go up Sanders Hill, they have to close +two district schools for the noise." + +"Only time you ever heard me I was hauling you up with your broken +jack-shaft," snorts Pelty. "You ought to get some iron parts for your +car. Cheese has gone out of style." + +"You still use it for tires, I see," says Chet. + +"Never mind," says Pelty wrathfully. "I get mileage out of my machine; I +don't drive around town and then spend two days shoveling out carbon." + +"Peculiar radiator you've got," says Chet, changing the subject. "Oh, I +see; it's a road sprinkler. What do you get from the city for laying the +dust?" + +"I can stop that leak in two minutes with a handful of corn meal," says +Pelty, busily surveying Chet's machine. "Do you still strip a gear on +this thing every time you try to back?" + +"Why do you carry a horn?" asks Chet. "You're wasteful; I heard your +valves chattering when I was three blocks away." + +"I didn't hear yours chatter much last Tuesday on Main Street," snorts +Pelty. "You cranked that thing long enough to grind it home by hand." + +"Ya-a! Talk, will you?" yells Chet earnestly. "Any man who begins +carrying hot water out to his machine in a teakettle in September knows +a lot about starting cars." + +"Well, get down to business," says Pelty. "You want to trade, you say. +I don't want that mess. It's an old back-number with tin springs, glass +gears and about as much compression as a bandbox. Give me five hundred +dollars and throw your automobile in. I need something to tie my cow to. +She'd haul away anything that was movable." + +"Give you five hundred dollars for that parody on a popcorn wagon?" +snorts Chet. "Why, man, the poor old thing has to go into low to pull +its shadow! You're delirious, Pelty. I'll tell you what I'll do. You +give me a thousand dollars for my car, and I'll agree to haul that old +calliope up to my barn, out of your way, and make a hen roost out of it. +Come on now. It's your only chance." + +Shortly after this they are parted by anxious friends, and the show is +over. I've known Homeburg men to give up a trip to Chicago because Chet +and Pelty began to trade their autos just before train time. + +In New York an auto means comfort and pleasure and advertisement, like a +fur-lined overcoat with a Persian lamb collar. But in Homeburg it means +a lot more. It keeps us busy and happy and full of conversation and +debate. It pulls our old, retired farmers out of their shells and makes +them yell for improvements. It unbuckles our tight-wads and gives our +ingenious young loafers something to do. It promotes town pride, and it +keeps our money circulating so fast that every one has a chance to grasp +a chunk as it goes by. + +It has made us so independent of railroads that we feel now when buying +a ticket to Chicago as if we were helping the poor old line out. Our +Creamery has been collecting milk and shipping butter in an old roadster +with a wagon bed thorax for a year. Two of our rural route mail carriers +use small machines, except in wet weather, and good-roads societies in +our vicinity are the latest fad. We raised one thousand five hundred +dollars last spring to bring the Cannon Ball Trail from Chicago to +Kansas City through our town, and our hotel-keeper contributed one +hundred dollars of it. He says we'll be on the gas-line tourist route to +the coast after the trail has been marked and drained and graded up +well. + +But mostly the automobile means freedom to us. We're no longer citizens +of Homeburg but of the congressional district. We're neighbors to towns +we hadn't heard of ten years ago, and the horizon nowadays for most of +us is located at the end of a ten-gallon tank of gasoline. Why, in the +old days, you had to go fifty miles east and double back to get into the +north part of our county, and more of us had crossed the ocean than had +been to Pallsbury in the north tier of townships. Now our commercial +clubs meet together alternate months, and about seventeen babies in our +town have proud grandparents up there. + +That's part of what the automobile means to us, Jim. Can you blame me +for being so interested in a new one? Maybe it will have some +contrivance for scaring cows out of a narrow road. + + + + +X + +THE HOMEBURG TELEPHONE EXCHANGE + +_What Would Happen if We Tried to Get Along With a City Operator_ + + +All right, Jim! Having now completed the task of telephoning to Murray +Hill several thousand and something, I'm ready to join you at luncheon. +I'm glad I telephoned. I won't have to spend the afternoon doing it now +and, besides, I feel so triumphant. I got through this time without +forgetting to get a nickel first. I usually go into one of those wooden +overcoats and go through all the agonies of elbowing my way through half +a dozen centrals into some one's ear several miles away, and then +discover that I haven't anything but a half dollar. Then I have to stop +and begin all over again. + +Telephoning is one of the prices you have to pay to live in a +metropolis, Jim. I suppose it will always hurt me to pay a nickel for +telephoning. Seems like paying for a lungful of air--and bad air at +that. Coming as I do from the simple bosom of the nation, where talk +over the wires is so cheap that you sometimes have to wait half an hour +while two women are planning a church social over your line, I can't +seem to resign myself to paying the price of a street-car ride every +time I breathe a few sentiments into a telephone. Now the street cars +never fail to dazzle me. They are a wonderful bargain. When we are too +tired to walk in Homeburg, we have to pay at least fifty cents for a +horse from the livery stable, unless some automobile is going our way. +Nothing is more pleasant to me than to slip a nickel to a street-car +conductor and ride ten miles on it. But when we want to use a telephone, +do we go through all this ceremony of dropping a nickel into a set of +chimes? Not much. My bill at home at five cents per telephone call would +be more than my income. Why, many a time I've called up as many as eight +people in the west part of town to know whether the red glow in the sky +was the sunset or the Rolling Mills at Paynesville burning down! And +almost every day I telephone McMuggins, the druggist, to collar a small +boy and send up an Eltarvia Cigar. If that call cost me five cents, I +would be practically smoking ten-cent cigars, and all Homeburg would +regard me with suspicion. + +I suppose it will be a hundred years before we get over saying "Great +invention, isn't it?" every time we have finished a satisfactory session +over the telephone. But I don't think you city people realize how much +of an invention it is. Of course, the telephone is more important in +New York than it is in Homeburg. If you had to go back to the +old-fashioned stationary messenger boy to do your business here, a good +share of the city would have to close out at a sacrifice. You do things +with your telephones which dazzle us entirely, like talking into parlor +cars, calling up steamships, buying a railroad and saying airily "Charge +it," and tossing a few hectic words over to Pittsburgh or Cincinnati at +five dollars per remark, as casually as I would stop in and ask +Postmaster Flint why in thunder the Chicago papers were late again--and +that is about as casual as anything I know of. + +I'm willing to admit that your telephones are much more wonderful than +ours, not only because of what they do for you, but because of the +amount of money they can get out of you without causing revolutions and +indignation meetings. Why, they tell me that business firms here think +nothing of paying one hundred dollars a year for a telephone! At home +once, when we tried to raise the farmer lines from fifty cents to a +dollar a month, we almost had to fortify the town. I take off my hat to +a telephone which can collect one hundred dollars a year from its user +without using thumbscrews. It must have more ways of working for you +than I have ever dreamed of. + +No, the telephone in Homeburg is a very ordinary thing, and we could get +along without it quite nicely as far as exertion is concerned, it being +only a mile from end to end of the town. But if we had to do without our +telephone girls, we'd turn the whole town into a lodge of sorrow and +refuse to be comforted. I know of no grander invention than the country +town telephone girl. She's not only our servant and master, but she's +our watch-dog, guardian, memorandum book, guide, philosopher and family +friend. When our telephone can't give us convenience enough, she +supplies the lack. When brains at both ends are scarce, she dumps hers +into the pot; and when the poor overworked instrument falls down on any +task, she takes up the job. She not only gives our telephone a voice, +but she gives it feet and hands and something to think with. + +I got into a big telephone exchange once and watched it for over a +minute before I was fired out. It was a very impressive sight--rows on +rows of switchboards, hundreds of girls, thousands of little flashing +lights, millions of clickety-clicks and not enough conversation to run a +sewing circle up to refreshment time. The company was very proud of it, +and I suppose it was good enough for a city--but, pshaw, it wouldn't do +Homeburg for a day. If some one were to offer that entire exchange to us +free of charge, we'd struggle along with it for a few hours, and then +we'd rise up en masse and trade it off for Carrie Mason, our chief +operator, throwing in whatever we had to, to boot. + +Our exchange is in the back room of the bank building up-stairs. You +could put the entire equipment in a dray. Our switchboard is about as +big as an old-fashioned china closet and has three hundred drops. I +suppose an up-to-date telephone manager has forgotten what "drops" are +and you can't be expected to know. But out our way the telephone +companies are coöperative, and as every subscriber owns a share, we all +take a deep personal interest in the construction and operation of the +plant, discussing the need of a new switchboard and the advantage of +cabling the Main Street lead, in technical terms. + +Well, anyway, a drop is a little brass door which falls down with a +clatter whenever the telephone which is hitched to that particular drop +wants a connection. And Miss Carrie Mason, our chief operator, sits on +a high stool with a receiver strapped over her rick of blond hair +jabbing brass plugs with long cords attached into the right holes with +unerring accuracy, and a reach which would give her a tremendous +advantage in any boarding-house in the land. Sometimes she has one +assistant, and in rush hours she has two. But on Sunday afternoons and +other quiet times she holds down the whole job alone for hours at a +time; and when I go up to her citadel and ask her to jam a toll call +through forty miles of barbed wire and miscellaneous junk to Taledo by +sheer wrist and lung power, she entertains me as follows while I wait: + +"Yes, indeed, I'll get your call through as soon as I can, but the +connection's--Nmbr--awful--Nmbr--bad to-day--Nmbr--They're not at home, +Mrs. Simmons; they went to Paynesville--Nmbr--I'll ring +again--Nmbr--Hello, Doctor Simms, Mrs. McCord told me to tell you to +come right out to the farm; the baby's sick--Nmbr--The train's late +to-day, Mrs. Bane, you've got plenty of time--Nmbr--I can't get them, +Mrs. Frazier. I'll call up next door and leave word for them to call +you--Nmbr (To me: "Hot to-day, isn't it? I tell 'em we ought to have an +electric fan up here.")--Nmbr--("It would keep us better +tempered.")--Nmbr--Oh, Mrs. Horn, will you tell Mrs. Flint when she +comes home that Mrs. Frazier wants her to call her up?--Nmbr--Now, +Jimmy, you haven't waited two seconds. I know you're anxious to talk to +Phoeb, but she isn't home; she's at the cooking club--Nmbr--Cambridge, +do see if you can't get through to Taledo. I've a party here that's in a +hurry--Nmbr. (To me: "That Taledo line's awful. It's grounded somewhere +on that farmer's line west of Tacoma.")--Nmbr--Yes, Mr. Bell, I'll call +you quick as he comes in his office; I can see his door from my +window--Nmbr--No, Mrs. Bane, the doctor's just gone out to the McCord +farm. If you hurry, you can stop him as he goes past. He left about five +minutes ago--Nmbr--Gee, Paynesville, you gave me an awful ring in the +ear then! No, you can't get through, the line's busy. Well, you'll have +to wait. I can't take the line away from them--Nmbr--Oh! (very softly) +Hello, Sam. Oh, pretty well. I'm most melted--wait a +minute--Nmbr--Hello, Sam (long silence) Oh, get out! My ear's all full +of taffy--wait a minute--Nmbr--Nmbr--No, Mr. Martin, there hasn't been +any one in his office all day. I think he's gone to Chicago--Hello, +Sam--wait a minute, Sam--Nmbr--Nmbr--Hello, Sam--Say, I'm all alone and +jumping sidewise. Call me up about six (very softly). G'by, Sam--Nmbr. +Oh, Mrs. Lucey, is Mrs. Simms at your house? Tell her her husband will +be home late to supper, he's gone out in the country--Hello. Hello. +_Hello_, Taledo. Is your party ready? (To me: "All right, here they are. +You'll have to talk pretty loud.") Hello, Taledo. All ready--Nmbr." + +That is a fair sample of Carrie. We couldn't keep house without her. And +that's why I feel an awful pang of jealousy when I hear that lobster Sam +talking to her. Maybe it's just the ordinary joshing which goes on over +the toll lines in the off hours. But maybe it isn't. Wherever Sam is and +whoever he is, he is a danger to Homeburg. Perhaps he is a lineman at +Paynesville, and then again he may be a grocer in some crossroads town +near by, with a toll telephone in the back of his store. But if he talks +to Carrie long enough and skilfully enough, he will come up to Homeburg, +marry her, and bear her away to his lair, far from our bereaved ears. +We've lost several telephone girls that way, and when a telephone girl +knows all of your habits and customs and those of your friends, and can +tell just where to find you or to find whomever you want found, and has +the business of the town down to the smallest details stowed away in her +capable head, it messes things up dreadfully to have her leave us high +and dry and go to housekeeping--which any one can do. + +Telephone girls are born, not made, in towns like Homeburg. We require +so much more of them than city folks do. When my wife wants to know if +hats are being worn at an afternoon reception, she calls up Carrie. Ten +to one Carrie has caught a scrap of conversation over the line and +knows. But if she hasn't, she will call up and find out. When a doctor +leaves his office to make a call, he calls up Carrie, and she faithfully +pursues him through town and country all day, if necessary. When we are +preparing for a journey, we do not go down to the depot until we have +called up Carrie and have found out if the train is on time, and if it +isn't, we ask her to call us when it is discovered by the telegraph +operator. And when our babies wander away, we no longer run frantically +up and down the street hunting for them. We ask Carrie to advertise for +a lost child seven hands high, and wearing a four-hour-old face-wash; +and within five minutes she has called up fifteen people in various +parts of the town and has discovered that said child is playing Indian +in some back yard a few blocks away. + +Carrie is also our confidante. I hate to think of the number of things +Carrie knows. Prowling into our lines while we are talking, as she does, +in search of connections to take down, she overhears enough gossip to +turn Homeburg into a hotbed of anarchy if she were to loose it. But she +doesn't. Carrie keeps all the secrets that a thousand other women +can't. She knows what Mrs. Wimble Horn said to Mrs. Ackley over the +line which made Mrs. Ackley so mad that the two haven't spoken for three +years. She knows just who of our citizens telephone to Paynesville when +Homeburg goes dry, and order books, shoes, eggs, and hard-boiled shirts +from the saloons up there to be sent by express in a plain package. She +knows who calls up Lutie Briggs every night or two from Paynesville, and +young Billy Madigan would give worlds for the information, reserving +only enough for a musket or some other duelling weapon. She knows how +hard it is for one of our supposedly prosperous families to get credit +and how long they have to talk to the grocer before he will subside for +another month. + +There's very little that Carrie doesn't know. I shudder to think what +would happen if Carrie should get miffed and begin to divulge. Once we +had a telephone girl who did this. She was a pert young thing who had +come to town with her family a short time before. It was a mistake to +hire her--telephone girls should be watched and tested for discretion +from babyhood up--but our directors did it, and because she showed a +passion for literature and gum and very little for work, they fired her +in three months. She left with reluctance, but she talked with +enthusiasm; and Homeburg was an armed camp for a long time. + +Goodness knows we have enough trouble with our telephone even with +Carrie to supply discretion for the whole town. Party lines and rubber +ears are the source of all our woe. You know what a party line is, of +course. It's a line on which you can have a party and gab merrily back +and forth for forty minutes, while some other subscriber is wildly +dancing with impatience. Most of our lines have four subscribers apiece, +and it's just as hard to live in friendliness on a party line as it is +for four families to get along good-naturedly in the same house. + +There's Mrs. Sim Askinson, for instance. She's a good woman and her pies +have produced more deep religious satisfaction at the Methodist church +socials than many a sermon. But St. Peter himself couldn't live on the +same telephone line with her. She's polite and refined in any other way, +but when she gets on a telephone line she's a hostile monopolist. Early +in the morning she grabs it and holds it fiercely against all comers, +while talking with her friends about the awful time she had the night +before when the cold water faucet in the kitchen began to drip. Mrs. +Askinson can talk an hour on this fertile subject, stopping each minute +or two to say, with the most corrosive dignity, to some poor victim who +is wiggling his receiver hook: "Please get off this line, whoever you +are. Haven't you any manners? I'm talking, and I'll talk till I get +through." And then, like as not, when she's through, she'll leave the +receiver down so that no one else will be able to talk--thus holding the +line in instant readiness when another fit of conversation comes on. +Seven party lines have revolted in succession and have demanded that +Mrs. Askinson be taken off and wished on to some one else, and Sim is +mighty worried. His wife has lost him so many friends that he doubts if +he will be able to run for the town board next year. + +We're a nice, peaceable folk in Homeburg, face to face. But like every +one else, we lay aside our manners when we get on the wires and push and +elbow each other a good deal. Funny what a difference it makes when you +are talking into a formless void to some strange human voice. I've never +said: "Get out of here," to any one in my office yet, but when some one +intrudes on my electric conversation, even by mistake, I boil with rage +and I yell with the utmost fervor and indignation: "Get off this line! +Don't you know any better than to ring in?" And the other person comes +right back with: "Well, you big hog, I've waited ten minutes, and I'll +ring all I want!" And then I say something more, and something is said +to me that eats a little semicircular spot out of the edge of my ear. +It's mighty lucky neither of us knows who is talking. Suppose Carrie +should tell. As I say, Carrie holds us in the hollow of her hand. + +But the rubber ear is even worse than the Berkshire manners. A rubber +ear is one that is always stretching itself over some telephone line to +hear a conversation which doesn't concern it. For a long time we were +singularly obtuse about this little point of etiquette in the country. +The fact that all the bells on a line rang with every call was a +constant temptation to sit in when we weren't wanted. We listened to +other people's conversations when we felt like it. It amused us, and why +shouldn't we? We rented our telephone and we had a right to pick it up +and soak in everything that was going through it. + +When the exchange was first put in, fifteen years ago, more than one +Homeburg woman used to wash her dishes with the telephone receiver +strapped tightly to her ear, dropping into the conversation whenever she +felt that she could contribute something of interest. As for the country +lines, it was the regular thing, and nobody minded it at all. That was +what killed the first line out of Homeburg. It had fourteen subscribers +and every one was hitched on the same wire. For a month everything went +nicely. Then old man Miller got mad at two neighbors who were sort of +sizing him up over the wire, and quit speaking to them. And Mrs. Ames +was caught gossiping, and a quarrel ensued in which about half the line +took part, all being on the wire and handy. Young Frank Anderson heard +Barney DeWolf making an engagement with his girl and licked Barney. One +thing led to another until not a subscriber would speak to another one, +and the line just naturally pined away. + +Etiquette has tightened up a lot since then. Still, we have rubber ears +to-day, and they cause half the trouble in Homeburg. You see, the +telephone has entirely driven out the back fence as a medium of gossip. +It offers so much wider opportunities. Nowadays it does all the business +which begins with: "Don't breathe this to a soul, but I just heard--" +and half the time some uninvited listener with an ear like a graphophone +horn is drinking in the details, to be published abroad later. Mrs. Cal +Saunders had our worst case of gummy ear up to a couple of years ago, +and broke up two engagements by listening too much. But she doesn't do +it any more. Clayt Emerson cured her. + +Something had to be done for the good of the town and Clayt, who lived +on the same line with her, conceived the plan of letting Mrs. Saunders +hear something worth while just to keep her busy and happy. So he called +up Wimble Horn and talked casually until he heard the little click which +meant that Mrs. Saunders had focused her large receptive ear on the +conversation. Then he told Horn that he was going to burn the darn stuff +up, trade being bad, anyway. Wimble offered to help him, and for three +nights they talked mysteriously about the crime, mentioning more +plotters, while Mrs. Cal hung on the line with her eyes bulging out, and +confided the secret to all the friends she had. + +Finally on Friday night, Policeman Costello, who was in the deal, told +Clayt that the expected had happened and that Mrs. Saunders had told +him about the horrible incendiary plot which was being hatched. Saturday +night came, and Costello refused to go to Clayt's store unless Mrs. +Saunders would come and denounce the villains, who were among our most +respected citizens. So Mrs. Saunders finally agreed, in fear and +trembling, and, taking a couple of her firmest friends, she led +Policeman Costello down to Clayt's restaurant at midnight, and, sure +enough, there was a light in the back part. Costello burst open the +door, and when they all rushed down on the scene of the crime, they +found Clayt and half a dozen of us manfully smoking up a box of stogies +which a slick traveling man had unloaded on him. Mrs. Saunders insisted +that crime was about to be committed and got so excited that she +repeated Clayt's exact words--in the middle of which a great light came +to her, and she said she was going home. + +"I think you had better," said Clayt, "and I'll tell you something more. +You listen to other people's affairs more than is good for you." + +But she hasn't since. + +Of course you don't have these troubles. But whenever I see New York +people harboring telephones in their homes which absolutely decline to +be civil until you feed them five cents, I think of our Homeburg +blessings and am content. Six dollars a year buys a telephone at home, +and about the only families which haven't telephones are a few widows +who live frugally on nothing a year, and old Mr. Stephens, who has one +hundred thousand dollars loaned out on mortgages and spends half an hour +picking out the biggest eggs when he buys half a dozen. There isn't a +farm within ten miles which isn't connected with the town, and while the +desk 'phone is a novelty with us and we still have to grind away at a +handle to get Central, we can put just as much conversation into the +transmitter and take just as much out of the receiver as if we were +connected with a million telephones. Our Homeburg 'phones are +old-fashioned; and the lines sound as if eleven million bees were +holding indignation meetings on them, but they have made a big family +out of three whole counties, and I guess they will take care of us all +right--so long as Carrie holds out and we can keep that Sam fellow where +he belongs. + + + + +XI + +A HOMEBURG SCHOOL ELECTION + +_Where Woman is Allowed to Vote and Man Has To_ + + +Well, Jim, you've taken me to see a great many wonderful sights in this +municipal monstrosity of yours, but I don't believe one of them has +interested me as much as this parade. I've worn three fat men on my toes +for an hour to get a chance to watch it, but it was worth the agony. +Think of it--at home we are doing well to get an attendance of two +thousand at a fire. Here in New York are several hundred thousand people +stopping their mad grabs at limousines and country houses, and blocking +up the streets to watch a few women parading in the interest of the +ballot for psyche knots as well as bald heads. It's wonderful! How did +the women persuade you to do it? I can't help thinking that they lost a +tremendous chance for the cause. Think how much money the ladies would +have made if each one had worn a sandwich board advertising some new +breakfast food or velveteen tobacco! With a crowd like this reading +every word, they could have charged enough to pay the expenses of a +whole campaign! + +It's the crowd that interested me. As far as the parade went, it wasn't +so much. Half a hundred women in cloaks and staffs setting off on foot +for Washington or Honolulu isn't terrifically exciting. I'd a lot rather +go down the line about twenty or thirty miles and watch them come in to +roost at night. There would be some inhuman interest in that. But what +does all this mob mean? Have you New Yorkers gone crazy over suffrage? +What! Just the novelty of the thing? Well, let me tell you then, you are +goners! You may not want suffrage now, but if the women are going to +choke traffic every time they spring a novelty, you're going to have to +grant them suffrage just to get the chance to attend to business now and +then. + +Me? Of course I'm a suffragist. I'm a suffragist on twenty counts. No, +thanks, I won't argue the question now, because we have to get over to +the hotel for dinner in an hour or two, and there's no use starting a +thing you will have to leave in the middle. I'll just tell you the last +count to save time, and let it go at that. I'm a suffragist because I +want the rest of mankind to have what we've had in Homeburg for the last +twenty years or so. We've been through the whole thing. Whenever a man's +been through anything, he naturally isn't content until he can stand by +and watch some other man get his. Understand? I'm for suffrage in aged +little New York. I want you to have it and have it a plenty. And I want +to watch you while you're having it. It's a grand thing when you've got +used to it. It will do you good, Jim, just like medicine. + +Do women vote in Homeburg? Of course they do. I'd like to see anybody +stop them. I don't mean that they vote for President. That is, they +won't until next time. It's only the more important elections that they +take part in. Oh, I know you folks in the big town think that unless +you're voting for governor or for the ringleaders of your city +government, the job isn't worth while. But that's where you differ from +Homeburg. We men vote for President and get a good deal of fun out of +the campaign. It's a favorite masculine amusement, and the women don't +interfere with us. But it's not important. I mean it's not important to +Homeburg. We stand up all summer and tear our suspender buttons off +trying to persuade each other that Homeburg's future depends on who +reviews the inaugural parade at Washington; but it isn't so, and we know +it. + +The really burning question in Homeburg is the make-up of the next +school board. That is the election which paralyzes business, splits +families, and sours friendships. And let me just convey to you in a few +brief words, underscored with red ink, the fact that women vote in the +Homeburg school elections. If you want to see real, concentrated +politics with tabasco sauce trimmings, go to Homeburg or some other +small town which is fond of its school system and watch the women +getting out the vote. + +Don't waste your time by coming the day before election. Don't even +expect to see any excitement in the morning. We don't smear our school +election troubles all over the almanac. We have the convulsion quickly +and get over it. You could stray into Homeburg on the morning of a +school election and not suspect that anything was going on except, +perhaps, a general funeral. Absolute quiet reigns. People are attending +to business with the usual calm. + +You can tell that there is an election on by the little flags stuck out +a hundred feet from the engine-house doors, but that's the only way. +Inside the judges sit waiting for business about as successfully as a +cod fisher on the banks of the Mississippi. Now and then some one strays +in and casts a vote. By noon half a dozen are in the ballot box. The +nation is safe, the schools are progressing satisfactorily, the ticket +is going through without a kick. Even the candidates stop standing +around outside peddling their cards, go home to dinner and forget to +come back. + +Pretty placid, eh? You bet it is. You know all about the calm before +the storm and the little cloud the size of the man's hand which comes up +about eight bells and does a general chaos business without any advance +notices. Well, that cloud in our school elections is impersonated by +Mrs. Delia Arbingle, and she usually arrives at the polls about three +P.M. with a new ticket, twenty warlike followers, and several thousand +assorted snorts of defiance. + +That's when the storm breaks--and it's a whole lot bigger than a man's +hand by that time. Delia is a mighty plentiful woman physically, and +when she gets her war paint on, she's a regular cloudburst. As I say, +about three o'clock or thereabouts, we suddenly wake up to the fact that +we have a school election in our midst, and that unless we arise as true +men and patriots, it will soon be at our throats. How do we find it out? +Our women folks tell us. You never saw such devoted women folks, or such +determined ones, either. The minute Delia leaves her house with her +marauding band in her annual attempt to get the scalp of the high school +principal who whipped her oldest son seventeen years ago, the women of +Homeburg _rise_. And we men go and vote. + +Now, we're not enthusiastic about voting. We're not afraid of Delia. +We've seen her insurge too often. But we go and vote, anyway. We go by +request. You've never had your loving wife come in and request you to +vote, have you, Jim? Well, you've got something coming. It's a request +which you're going to grant. You may not want to, but that has nothing +to do with the case. This is about the way it happens in Homeburg: I am +sitting in my office. I've got a lot of work on hand, and it's no use to +vote, anyway, and, to tell the truth, I had forgotten all about it. +Suddenly the telephone bell rings: I answer it. Here's my cross-section +of the conversation: + +"Hello? Oh, hello!... No, I haven't voted yet.... Pretty busy to-day.... +You're coming down?... No, I don't want to vote.--What's the use? It's +the same old.... Now, my dear, it's just the same old row. She can't get +any.... But I tell you I'm busy. You go on and.... Yes, of course I'm an +American citizen, but I don't get a salary for it. I'm trying to +earn.... Well, five minutes to cast a useless vote is.... Oh, all right. +Anything to please you.... No, I'll not call up Judge Hicks. He's old +enough to vote by himself.... Oh, all right.... Now, look here, my dear, +I can't ask Fleming to do that. His wife is a friend of Mrs. +Arbingle's.... Yes, I can say that, but it would be a threat.... Oh, the +schools will run anyway. Now, don't get excited.... All right, doggone +it, it'll make a regular fool of me though!... Good-by. + +"Gosh." + +I am mopping my forehead while I say that. I'm going to vote and, what +is more, I'm going over to get Judge Hicks, who is a cross old +man-eater, and get him to vote, and then I am going to call up Fleming, +who would otherwise vote against us, and tell him that if he doesn't +support our ticket, our grocery account will go elsewhere. I hate to do +that like the mischief. It isn't considered ethical in national +elections. But somehow we can't stop and discuss these fine points at +3.15 P.M. with our loving but excited wives. They don't seem to allow +it. + +I get into my coat, pretty cross, and go down-stairs. Homeburg is +frantically awake. Down the street scores of patriots are marching to +the polls. They are not marching in lock-step, but most of them are +under guard just the same. Mrs. Chet Frazier, pale but determined, is +towing Chet out of his store. Mrs. Wimble Horn is hurrying down the +street with an umbrella in one hand and Wimble in the other. From the +post-office comes Postmaster Flint emitting loud wails. It is against +the law to leave the post-office unoccupied, but he can thresh that out +with his wife at home after he has voted. Attorney Briggs was going to +Chicago this afternoon, but I notice he is coming back from the depot. +Mrs. Briggs is bringing him. If I know anything about rage, Attorney +Briggs is ready to masticate barbed wire. His arms are making a blue +haze as they revolve. But he's coming back to vote. He can go to Chicago +to-morrow, but the nation must be saved before five o'clock. + +I do my errands, losing one friend at Fleming's and considerable dignity +at the judge's, because the judge is an old widower and mighty +outspoken. Then I hurry back and go to the polls arm in arm with my +loving wife. We have to wait our turn outside the engine house. From +all corners of town the votes roll in, most of them under convoy. It's +a weird mixture--the men sullen and sheepish, the women inspired and +terrible. Even the candidates, most of whom are men, are embarrassed. +They are peddling tickets frantically, and whenever they falter and show +signs of running, their wives hiss something into their ears and brace +them up again. + +The two hostile forces are eying each other with horrid looks. Mrs. +Arbingle is quiet but deadly. I never saw so much hostility coated over +one face as there is on hers. She is in her glory. This time she is +going to unmask the hosts of corruption, including those who will not +call on her, cave in the school ring, boot out the incompetents, and see +justice done to her son at last. Mrs. Wert Payley, who generally leads +the other side, has higher ideals, of course, and isn't so red in the +face. But she is hostile too. No viperess shall tread on the school +system if she can help it! She keeps her lieutenants hustling, and now +and then she looks over the crowd of captive men on the enemy's side and +issues a command. Then some woman talks to her husband, and he gets red +and mad and wags his arms. But in the end he goes over and talks to a +man on the other side. And then that conversation spreads like a prairie +fire, and the men knot up into a cluster, and hard words are used, and a +lot more friendships go into the back shop for repairs. + +Five o'clock is coming fast. Mrs. Payley looks over her list. Young Ad +Summers has refused to budge from his shop. Miss Ri Hawkes blushes a +little and then goes away to a telephone. Pretty soon Ad appears. He's +panting, into the bargain. He gets in line, votes, and Ri walks away +with him. There is a sigh of relief from the Payley cohorts now because +old man Thompson is coming. He is over ninety and hates like thunder to +go out and vote, but he can't help himself. He has lived in a wheeled +chair for ten years and has to go wherever his granddaughter wheels him. +He passes in, muttering. + +Only five minutes more. The excitement is intense. Hurrah! Some one has +gotten the telegraph operator's goat. He's coming on the run. That +probably means he'll go to the next dancing-club party. Judge Hicks +appears, four women around him. He is mad, but they are triumphant and +they look scornfully at me, saying "chump" with their eyes. He votes. +There is a commotion at the corner because Gibb Ogle has attempted in a +mild way to be corrupted. He wants to know why he can't sleep in the +South School basement. The women are indignant, and appoint two husbands +to deal with him. Gibb votes. Bang! The polls are closed. It's all over +but the counting. + +We'd like to go back to work, but the suspense is too great. Not that we +have any suspense, but our wives have; and if we are worthy of the name +of men, we must help them endure it, even if we ourselves are not +interested in the schools. So we hang around and fume over the +jungle-fingered judges who take as much time as if they were enumerating +the fleas of Africa. Finally a cheer comes from the front of the crowd. +The women beside us gasp anxiously. Which side cheered? Hurrah! There's +Mrs. Payley waving her handkerchief. We win. + +After that, we men can go. The schools have been saved by a vote of 453 +to 78, but it was no thanks to us. No, indeed! If it weren't for the +women where would our schools be? + +We've had women's suffrage in our midst for almost twenty years, as I +say, and looking back over it I can't see a single dull moment +politically. From the day when an indulgent State gave them permission, +our women have guarded the schools at the ballot box. They've done a +thorough and painstaking job, and I must say the schools have improved a +lot. But they have sprung a lot of political ideas which have made the +old-timers sit up with startled looks and scratch their heads +hopelessly. + +That's what you are going to find out, Jim, when woman begins to vote +for herself around here and to vote you into the bargain. She isn't +going to play the game according to the old rules. She has no use for +them. She has her own way of going about things politically, and while +it is effective, its wear and tear on mankind is terrific. When the +Homeburg women first attempted to place a woman on the school board, +about fifteen years ago, most of the men objected, and they decided to +hold a town caucus and call the women in. There were a great many +reasons why a woman shouldn't leave her home and sit around on a school +board, and they felt sure that if they were to talk it over frankly in +meeting they could show them these reasons. And, anyway, the chairman +would be a man, which would of course take care of the situation. + +So a caucus was called, and the Grand Opera House, which holds six +hundred human beings, and about a hundred boys in the front seats, was +jammed until it bulged. We knew that no woman could out-argue our +seasoned old politicians, and when Calvin Briggs, who has planned all +the inside work in the congressional district for twenty years, got up +and showed just why woman ought not to intrude, there was an abashed +silence all over the house, until Emma Madigan, who is a town character +and does just as she pleases, got up. She stood up about fifty-nine +seconds after Briggs had got a good start, and she argued with him as +follows: + +"That's all right, Mr. Briggs--You can't make me sit down, Mr. +Chairman, you nor any of you politicians--You're a fine man to talk +about schools, Mr. Briggs. No, I won't stop. You know a lot about +children, don't you, coming up here with tobacco juice all over your +shirt front; and why don't you pay some taxes before you get up here and +tell how to run a town? All right, Chairman, I'm done." + +But so was Briggs. We couldn't help laughing at him. Editor Simpson, who +runs the _Argus_, stepped into the breach and regretted greatly that so +disgraceful an attack had been made upon a well-beloved citizen by a +woman. No man would dare make such an attack, he opined. Then Emma got +up again. The chairman called her to order, but he might as well have +rapped down the rising tide. + +"I know mighty well no man 'ud dare say what I did, Lafe Simpson," she +shouted. "'Nd you're the biggest coward of 'em all. If you thought you'd +have to lose the school printing, you'd vote for the devil for +president of the school board." + +Of course it was perfectly disgraceful, but what could we do? Emma was a +woman. We couldn't throw her out. We couldn't even get her to listen to +parliamentary rules. And the worst of it was, she was telling the truth. +That was something no one presumes to tell in local elections. To do it +breaks the first commandment of politics; but what do the women, bless +'em, care for our commandments? + +The president of the school board at that time was Sanford Jones. He was +a large party who panned out about ninety-five per cent. solemnity and +the rest water on the brain. At this point in the proceedings he judged +it best to rise and turn the subject by telling us why woman should stay +at home. He got about two hundred words into circulation before Emma got +up. Her scandalized women friends tried to pull her down, and Pelty +Amthorne yelled "whoa," but she was in politics to stay. + +"You look mighty fine standing up there, Mr. Jones," she shouted, "and +tellin' us women to go back home where we belong. But I just want to +tell this here crowd to-night that if you wasn't tighter than the bark +on a tree, your wife wouldn't have to do her own washing. + +"That's why you want her to home. So you can save money." + +After that a gloom fell over the meeting, and as no one else seemed to +care to speak, people began adjourning on all sides of Emma. After every +one else had gone she adjourned. There was no further attempt to hold a +caucus that year, and even now when any school faction desires to get +together and discuss things, it carefully conceals the news from Miss +Madigan. + +That was just one of the many little surprises woman has handed to us +in Homeburg politics. Since they've gotten interested in school +affairs, it beats all how much influence they've got. Take Sadie +Askinson for instance. Her husband wanted to run for member of the +school board, and Sadie didn't want him to, because he was away from +home enough nights anyway, goodness knows. Sim was stubborn, and said +the night before election that he was going down and have some ballots +printed, anyway, and run. But he didn't, because that night Sadie cut +every button off of every garment he had and threw them down into the +well. When the kindergarten business came up about ten years ago, old +Colonel Ackley hung out against it on the board. Said he wasn't going to +stand for wasting the people's money on such foolishness. But he did, +because the Young Ladies' Vigilance Society came and wept upon his +shoulder. It was organized for that purpose, and after the seventh young +lady had soaked up Ackley's coat, he said he'd either vote for +kindergarten or leave town, and he didn't care much which. + +Mrs. Wert Payley, who really runs our school system and once marred her +proud record by defeating a good school superintendent because he didn't +give her daughter good marks, says the English suffragettes are poor +sticks and don't know how to demand the ballot. "If the Homeburg women +were ready to go after any more ballot than we have now," says she, +"would we fool away time getting arrested? Not much! We'd turn our +attention to the men. Every Homeburg woman would take care of her +husband and argue with him. Maybe all the men in town would find 'Votes +for Women' in place of their dinners on the table one night, and sewed +on to their coats the next morning. Maybe they would get corn-meal mush +for thirty days, and maybe, if any he politician presumed to get +obnoxious, he would be dealt with on the public street by a committee. +I know Homeburg, I think, and before Calvin Briggs would stand for the +guying he would receive after half a dozen women had gone down on their +knees to him and grabbed him around the legs so he couldn't get away, +he'd go out of politics. Suffragettes? Bah! What do they know about it? +I'd just like to know how long our men-folks in Homeburg would hold out +if we women were to get sick some fine morning and remain hopeless +invalids until we got the ballot. Why, if Wert Payley presumed to deny +me the ballot, I wouldn't think of parading about it. I'd just have the +girl starch his underwear for about two months, and if that didn't fetch +him, I'd start cleaning house and quit in the middle. The men will give +you anything, if you ask them the right way." + +All of this makes us shiver, because we don't know just how long it will +be before the Homeburg women do make up their minds to have more +ballot. But when they do, we'll brace up like men and give it to them if +the State will let us. We just naturally hate to disappoint our +women-folks. + + + + +XII + +CHRISTMAS AT HOMEBURG + +_And What It Means_ + + +Now don't urge me to stay longer, Jim, because I'm going to anyway. Just +to prove it, I'll take another of those gold-corseted cigars of yours, +which would elevate me from the masses to the classes in three puffs if +I smoked it back home. I didn't begin telling you how much I have +enjoyed myself because I intended to go and wanted to start the soft +music. I just wanted to begin on the job, that was all. It's going to +take me an hour, at least, to tell you and Mrs. Jim what this meal has +meant for me. + +Oh, I know there have been better meals in history perhaps. I suppose +now and then a king gets real hungry and orders up a feed that might +have a shade on this one--just a shade. That's as far as I'll +compromise, Mrs. Jim. You needn't argue the matter. I'm a regular mule +in my opinions. But if you had given me crackers and cheese, and old, +decrepit flexible crackers at that, it would have been all the same. I'd +have devoured them with awe and thanksgiving, and I'd have marveled at +my luck. Here it is Christmas Day, and while half a million strangers in +New York have been eating their hearts along with the regular bill of +fare at boarding-houses and restaurants, I have been grabbed up and +taken into an actual home where they have a Christmas tree! + +I always was lucky, Jim. Every time I fell out of a tree in my youth, I +landed on my head or some other soft spot, but this beats any luck I +ever had. Think of it! Me sitting around in the sub-cellar of gloom +yesterday afternoon with my family a thousand miles away, and deciding +to go to Boston for Christmas just because I'd have to travel ten hours +and that would be some time killed; and then, when I went to my +boarding-house for a clean collar, you called me up, just as I was +leaving. There's a special department of Providence working on my case. +Got a permanent assignment. And you are a Deputy Angel, Mrs. Jim. +Gratitude! You couldn't get my brand of gratitude anywhere. They don't +keep it in stock. Say the word and I will go back and eat a third piece +of mince pie, and die for you. + +I don't want to seem critical. It's hard for me to criticize anything +right now, anyway, I'm so soaked and soused in contentment. I always +strive to admit all of New York's good points, and I've gotten a job +here largely to encourage the old town and help it along. But I do think +that in one respect New York is in the bush league, so to speak. Even +with such people as you to help, you can't get much Christmas out of it. +When I think of Homeburg to-day, I feel proud and haughty. You can beat +us on most everything else, but when it comes to Christmas, we can't +notice you. You don't compete. + +Christmas in this town is only a feat. It's a race against time in two +heats. If you win the first one, you get your shopping done on the day +before. If you win the second, you get through Christmas Day, before +your patience and good spirits give out. Of course, New Yorkers, like +yourselves, who indulge in families and other old customs, have a mighty +good time out of it. Christmas with a family is great anywhere on earth. +But that isn't New York's fault. If you didn't have a family, you would +be dining out or going to some matinée or sitting around watching the +clock. That's where it is your solemn duty to envy Homeburg if you +never have done it before. And that's why I would be homesick to-day if +you had fed me four dinners, Mrs. Jim, and had been a whole covey, or +bevy, or flock, or constellation of angels--whichever is correct. + +I don't mean to say that we get any more at Christmas than you do. We +enjoy and endure our presents, same as any one else. And we have just as +hard a time buying them. There aren't enough people in Homeburg to make +a Christmas jam, but we have our own line of troubles. The question in +Homeburg is not how to keep from spending so much money but how to spend +what we have. The storekeepers don't pamper us. In fact they are severe +with us. If we don't buy what they offer the first year, they store it +up, and we have to take it the next Christmas. When the Homeburg +storekeepers have had a bad season, it's up to us to go back the next +year and face the same old line of junk, knowing it will be there until +we give in and buy it. There are two Christmas gift edition copies of +Trilby still on sale in Homeburg, and Sam Green the druggist has had a +ten-dollar manicure set on sale for ten years now. He won't get another, +either. Says he was stung on the first one, and he's going to get his +money back before he goes in any deeper. It goes down about fifty cents +a year in price, and last year Jim Reebe almost bought it at four +dollars and seventy-five cents for Selma Snood. We have hopes of him +this year--unless he and Selma quarrel or get married, either of which +will be fatal. + +No, we have our troubles, same as you do, and Homeburg is full, on the +day before Christmas, of worried fathers who duck into the stores about +seven P.M. and try to buy enough stuff to eat up a ten dollar bill +before the doors close. But that's a minor detail. What makes me love +our Christmas is its communism. Christmas isn't a family rite in +Homeburg. It's a town festival, a cross between Home-coming Week and a +general amnesty celebration. + +[Illustration: In Homeburg you come home to the whole town.] + +People come home for Christmas all over the world, but in Homeburg you +don't merely come home to your family, you come home to the whole town. +A week before the twenty-fifth the clans begin to gather. Usually the +college folks come first. Sometimes we have as many as a dozen, and the +whole town is on edge to see them. It's next to a circus parade in +interest because you never can tell what new sort of clothes the boys +are going to spring on us. In the grand old days when DeLancey Payley +and Sam Singer used to blow in for Christmas, they walked up from the +depot between double lines of admirers, and their clothes never failed +to strike us with awe. I remember the year when Sam came home with one +of those overcoats with a sort of hood effect in the back. I never +saw one before or since. He was also wearing a felt hat as flat as a +soup plate that year and a two-quart pipe fitted carefully into his +face, and when old Bill Dorgan, the drayman, saw him, he threw up both +hands and cried, "My gosh, it ain't possible!" + +Then the children begin coming back. There is a great difference between +Homeburg and New York regarding children. In New York a child is +personal property. But in Homeburg a child belongs to the whole town. A +birth notice is a real news item in Homeburg. I suppose every baby is +personally inspected by at least two hundred citizens. We criticize +their care and feeding, suggest spanking when they are a little older, +quiver unanimously with horror when they begin to "flip" freight trains, +or get scarlet fever, and watch them grow up as eagerly as you New +Yorkers watched the Woolworth Building. When they are graduated from +high school we are all there with bouquets and presents, and we have an +equity in the whole brood. Molly Strawn, the washerwoman's daughter, got +more flowers than any one last year. And when they leave town to get a +job, if they are boys, or when some rude outsider breaks in with a +marriage license and despoils us of them, if they are girls, we all feel +the loss. + +That's why Christmas means so much more to us. At Christmas time the +town children come home. Will Askinson comes home from Chicago. He's +doing very well up there, and it takes him two hours to get the length +of Main Street on the first day after he arrives. Every one has to hear +about it. Sadie Gastit comes home from Des Moines with a baby; regular +custom of hers. Sometimes she makes the same baby do for two years, but +usually it's a new one. I remember Sadie when she was only knee high to +a grasshopper, and her mother spanked her for climbing the Republican +flagpole during the McKinley campaign. The Flint children come down from +Chicago to visit their aunt. There were only a boy and girl when they +left fifteen years ago. Now there are eleven, counting wife, husband, +and acquisitions. Last year Ad Bridge brought a new wife home from +Denver to show us. Year before last Miss Annie Simms, who has been +teaching in Minneapolis, brought down a young man to show to her family. +She was going to be exclusive about it, but did it work? Not much. She +had to show him all around. We just happened over there in droves. +Everybody loves Annie and we were afraid for a little while that she was +going to be an old maid. The young man will bring her down this year I +suppose. They were married last June. + +All the Homeburg children and grandchildren arrive in the last two days +before Christmas. They go home to their folks to deposit their baggage, +and then they all come down-town to the post-office, to get the mail +ostensibly but in reality to shake hands all around. The day before +Christmas is one long reception on Main Street. The old town fairly +hums. + +As a matter of fact, Christmas is a good deal like a Union Depot. The +approaches are the most important part of it. By the day before +Christmas every one is feeling so good that things begin to happen. +People whom you have never suspected of caring for you come up to your +office and leave things--cigars, and toys for the children, and +Christmas cards. Men with whom you have quarreled during the year shake +hands violently all around a circle on the street, and when they come to +you they grab yours, too; and you begin to talk elaborately as if +nothing had happened--a good deal like two women wading through a formal +call; and it makes you feel so good that pretty soon you buy a box of +Colorado Durable cigars and you go over to the office of some man for +whom you have cherished an undying hatred, because he didn't vote for +you for the school board. You peek in his door, and if he isn't there +you go in and leave the cigars with your compliments. + +There's never been a Christmas at home when I haven't been operated on +for a grouch of this sort, and most always it comes the day before. If I +had my way there wouldn't be any Christmas--only the day before. On the +day before you're so tickled over what the other folks are going to get +from you, and so full of pleased anticipation over what you may get from +the others, that good humor just bursts out all over you like spring +waters from the mountainside. + +On Christmas Eve in Homeburg we all go to the Exercises to hear the +children perform. They build churches in Homeburg with big doors, so +that they can get big Christmas trees in them, and we grown-ups go +early in order to hear the kids squeal with wonder when they come in and +see those thirty-foot miracles in candles and tinsel, down in front. + +Homeburg children are divided into two classes--those who get all of +their presents on the church Christmas trees and have to worry through +the next day without any additional excitement, and those who have to +sit through the Christmas Eve exercises with only a sack of candy to +sustain them and who land heavily the next day. The discussion as to +which is the better way has raged for a generation, anyway; at least my +chum and I discussed it every year when we were boys, he adhering to the +Christmas tree plan, and I to the homemade Christmas. And last year, +when he came back, we began it all over again, he claiming it was cruel +for me to make my children wait until Christmas Day, and I pitying his +poor youngsters for getting done with Christmas before it began. + +Anyway, Christmas Eve is a grand occasion in the churches, and every +year I notice with amazement that some youngster whom I remember as +having been formally introduced to society through her birth notice only +a few weeks ago, seems to me, has gotten large enough to get up on the +platform and speak a piece. They do it at the most unheard-of ages. I +believe there are two-year-old orators in the Congregational Sunday +school. I get a good deal of suspense out of some of your baseball games +here, especially when Chicago plays you, but the most suspense per +individual I've ever noticed has been in these Christmas Eve exercises +when some youngster just high enough to step over a crack in the floor +gets up to recite a piece, and fourteen parents and relatives lean +forward and forget to breathe until he has gotten his forty words out, +wrong end to, and has been snatched off the stage by his relieved +mother. + +Competition gets into everything, and it has marred our Christmas +exercises a little lately. The Methodists are growing fast and are very +ambitious. A few years ago they rented the Opera House, put in two +Christmas trees, with a real fireplace between and a Santa Claus who +came out of it, and charged ten cents admission. That embittered us +Congregationalists. It smacked of commercialism to us, and we would not +budge an inch--besides, there wasn't another Opera House to rent. So, +nowadays, our spirit of good-fellowship on Christmas Eve is sort of +absent-minded and anxious. We are always counting up our attendance and +sizing up our tree, and then sliding over to the Opera House and looking +over the Methodist layout. Sometimes we beat them, but generally they +have a regular mass meeting and make a barrel of money. Last year they +turned people away and brought Santa Claus on the stage in a real +automobile. We were so jealous that we could hardly cool down in time +for Christmas dinner. + +As a matter of fact, the only unimportant part of our Christmas season +is Christmas Day itself. It is a sort of hiatus in the great doings. +When we go home on Christmas Eve, it is with a great peace. We have +bought our presents. We have greeted all the returned prodigals. We have +made up with a few carefully selected enemies. Our children have spoken +their pieces successfully at the Exercises, and have gotten a good start +on the job of eating their way through a young mountain range of mixed +candies and nuts. All the hustle and worry is over, and we are +unanimously happy. The week following Christmas will be one dizzy round +of parties and teas for the visitors, and Homeburg will be a delightful +place full of the friends of boyhood, with an average of one reunion +every fifteen minutes in and out of business hours. But on Christmas Day +nothing will happen except the dinner. We'll get our presents in the +morning, and then at noon the great crisis will come. We'll either +conquer the dinner, or it will conquer us. + +You know how it is, Jim, because that's the kind of dinner you had +to-day. It was an Athletic Feat--not the ordinary kind of city dinner +where you save up carefully during seven courses, and finish strong on +the water crackers and cheese, but a real Christmas gorge. Every time I +sit down to a Christmas dinner in Homeburg, I feel more strongly than +ever that each guest should have his capacity stenciled on him. They are +more careful of box cars in this country than they are of humans. You +never see a box car that doesn't have "Capacity, 100,000 lbs." stenciled +on its sides. And they don't overload that car. There have been times +when, if I could have had "Capacity, two turkey thighs, one wish-bone, +trimmings, and two pieces of pie" stenciled on me, I would have gotten +along better. I think they ought to try to make these Olympic games more +useful to our nation by instituting a Christmas dinner marathon. If we +have to eat for two hours and a quarter, top speed, once or twice a +year, we ought to train up to the task as a nation. + +I always feel a little bit nervous about Christmas dinner before it +comes, but I never shirk. As a matter of fact, it isn't really +dangerous. As far as I know, no one has ever actually exploded in +Homeburg on Christmas Day, and we all seem to get away with the job in +pretty fair shape. But it spoils the day for anything else. The town is +full, in the afternoon, of partially paralyzed men lying around on sofas +in a comatose condition, like anacondas sleeping off their bi-monthly +lunch. Homeburg is absolutely dead for the rest of the day. If a fire +broke out on Christmas afternoon, I don't believe even Chief Dobbs would +have the energy to get up and put on his helmet. It's hard on the exiled +men who just run down for Christmas Day from the cities. They don't get +in on anything but the eating. Sam Frazier struck last year. Said he +wasn't going to pay ten dollars fare and incidentals any more, to come +down from Chicago on Christmas Day for an all-afternoon view of his +brother's feet as said brother lay piled up on the sofa. He was going to +come down after this on the Fourth of July. + +It doesn't affect the women so badly because they don't eat so much. +They haven't time. It takes two women to steer one child safely through +a Christmas dinner, anyway, and about three to get the ruins cleared +away in time to get up a light lunch in the evening for the reviving +hosts. If there is any one time when I would care less to be a woman +than at any other time, it is on Christmas afternoon, when her men-folks +have gone to sleep and have left her with a few cross children and a +carload of Christmas dinner fragments for company. + +That's where you city folks with your servant problem have the best of +us, and I'll not dispute it, Mrs. Jim. On the other hand, the nicest +part of our Homeburg Christmas is the fact that, when we fold our tired +hands over our bulging vests after dinner and lie down to rest, we know +that there is no starving family in Homeburg which has had to celebrate +Christmas by taking on an extra drink of water and indulging in a long, +succulent sniff at a restaurant door. + +We have poor people in Homeburg, but we haven't any poverty problem at +Christmas. It's a strictly local issue, and it is handled by the +neighbors. Having lived a long time in the city, Jim, you may not know +what a neighbor is. It's a person who lives close to you and takes a +personal interest in your affairs. A good neighbor is a woman whose +heart is so large that she has had to annex a lot of outlying territory +around the family real estate in order to fill it. No Homeburg woman +would think of constructing an extraordinarily fine pie without sending +a cut over to her nearest neighbor. + +About Christmas time we are especially busy neighboring in Homeburg, and +any family which lives near us and isn't going very strong on the +Christmas game, because of sickness or trouble, is our meat. It would be +an insult to go across the town and help a family in some other +neighbor's territory, and that was what got Editor Simpson of the +_Argus_ into trouble a couple of years ago. + +Simpson is a young man, a comparative newcomer from the city, and a very +earnest and enterprising party. He runs the _Argus_ on the high gear +and is never so happy as when he is promoting a public movement in real +city style. It occurred to Simpson three years ago that Homeburg ought +not to be behind Chicago in anything, especially at Christmas time, and +so he started a "Good-fellow" movement. They were running it strong in +Chicago that year. Any man who wished to be a "Good Fellow" sent his +name to the "Good-fellow Editor" and offered to provide a Christmas for +one or more poor children. It was a grand idea, stuffed full of +sentiment, and we Homeburg men just naturally ate it up. When the day +before Christmas came, seventy-five "Good Fellows" were on Simpson's +list, and they had offered to take care of one hundred and twenty-five +children, to give each a real Christmas. Simp's office was full of +groceries and toys, applicants were clamoring for children, all was +excitement and enthusiasm--and then a horrible state of affairs was +disclosed. Simpson hadn't provided any children. There was a bleak and +distressing lack of material for us to work upon. In all Homeburg there +weren't ten families who were going without Christmas turkey, or its +equivalent, and in each one of these cases some neighbor had sternly +ordered Simp to keep his hands off and mind his own affairs. There we +were--seventy-five Good Fellows with boatloads of cheer and no way to +dispose of it. The only person we could find in all the town to descend +on was Pat Ryan. We smothered him in groceries, and he ate himself into +biliousness that night and had to have a doctor for three days, which +helped some, but not much. On the whole, it was a dismal failure. + +What! Nine o'clock? Excuse me, Jim. I seem to have taken root here. No; +I am going this time. Back to my room with Christmas all gotten through +with, thank goodness and you folks. You understand. You've made it as +nice for me as any two magicians could have done, and I thank you from +the bottom of my heart. But it's my last Christmas in New York, I hope. +Next month the wife and children come on, and by next Christmas, if I +have any luck at all, we'll join the happy army that swoops down on +Homeburg for the holidays. My, but it will be funny to look at the old +town from the outside in! Me--a visitor in Homeburg! + +Do you know what prosperity is to a whole mob of city people, Jim? It's +the ability to pack up their families and go off to some Homeburg or +other for Christmas. And do you know what makes city people successful, +in Homeburg opinion? It's coming back every year. And if we made a +million apiece, and didn't preserve enough of the old home-town love to +come back, we wouldn't be successful in their eyes, not by a long way. +Well, good-by, philanthropists. And, thank you, I can't come again next +year. I'm saving up to go home. That's what makes this cigar taste so +good, Jim. Last one I'll smoke until carfare is in the bank. + + +THE END + +[Illustration: Publisher's logo] + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Homeburg Memories, by George Helgesen Fitch + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMEBURG MEMORIES *** + +***** This file should be named 19196-8.txt or 19196-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/1/9/19196/ + +Produced by Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/19196-8.zip b/19196-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..cc74a9a --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-8.zip diff --git a/19196-h.zip b/19196-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d2e4fd1 --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-h.zip diff --git a/19196-h/19196-h.htm b/19196-h/19196-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..56cae1a --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-h/19196-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,5015 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of Homeburg Memories, by George Fitch. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .right {text-align: right;} + .left {text-align: left;} + .tbrk { margin-top: 2.75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + + /* picture index */ + + div.picindex ul li { padding-top: 1em ;text-align: center; } + + div.picindex ul ul ul, div.index ul li ul li { padding: 0; text-align: left; } + + div.picindex ul { list-style: none; margin: 0; } + + div.picindex ul, div.index ul ul ul li { display: inline; } + + div.picindex .subitem { display: block; padding-left: 2em; } + + /* index*/ + + div.index ul { list-style: none; } + div.index ul li span.mono {font-family: monospace;} + + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Homeburg Memories, by George Helgesen Fitch + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Homeburg Memories + +Author: George Helgesen Fitch + +Release Date: September 7, 2006 [EBook #19196] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMEBURG MEMORIES *** + + + + +Produced by Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<h1>HOMEBURG MEMORIES</h1> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<p class="center"><a name="illus-0003-1.jpg" id="illus-0003-1.jpg"></a><img src="images/illus-0003-1.jpg" width='551' height='700' alt="Finally the bass catches up with the cornets." /></p> + +<p class='center'>Finally the bass catches up with the cornets.<br /><span class="smcap">Frontispiece</span>. <i>See Page</i> 176</p> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<h1>Homeburg Memories</h1> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>GEORGE FITCH</h2> + +<h3>AUTHOR OF "AT GOOD OLD SIWASH,"<br /> +"SIZING UP UNCLE SAM," ETC.</h3> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<h4>WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY</h4> + +<h3>IRMA DÉRÈMEAUX</h3> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<p class="center"><a name="logo004.png" id="logo004.png"></a><img src="images/logo004.png" width='90' height='126' alt="Publisher's logo" /></p> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<h4>BOSTON</h4> + +<h3>LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY</h3> + +<h4>1915</h4> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<h4><i>Copyright, 1915</i>,<br /> +<span class="smcap">By Little, Brown, and Company.</span><br /> +<br /> +<i>All rights reserved</i><br /> +<br /> +Published, February, 1915</h4> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<h4>THE COLONIAL PRESS<br /> +C. H. SIMONDS CO., BOSTON, U. S. A.</h4> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<h4>TO</h4> + +<h3><i>MY FATHER</i></h3> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<hr /> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<div class="index"> +<ul> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#I">I.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The 4:11 Train</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#II">II.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Friendly Fire-Fiend</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#III">III.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Homeburg's two Four-Hundredths</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#IV">IV.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Servant Question in Homeburg</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#V">V.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Homeburg's Leisure Class</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#VI">VI.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Homeburg's Worst Enemy</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#VII">VII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">he Homeburg Weekly Democrat</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#VIII">VIII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Homeburg Marine Band</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#IX">IX.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Auto Game in Homeburg</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#X">X.</a></span> <span class="smcap">The Homeburg Telephone Exchange</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XI">XI.</a></span> <span class="smcap">A Homeburg School Election</span></li> +<li><span class="mono"> <a href="#XII">XII.</a></span> <span class="smcap">Christmas at Homeburg</span></li> +</ul> +</div> + +<h2>ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> + +<div class="picindex"> +<ul> +<li><a href="#illus-0003-1.jpg"><span class="smcap">Finally the bass catches up with the cornets</span></a></li> +<li><a href="#illus-0030-1.jpg"><span class="smcap">It seemed to me then as if she must have come from heaven by air-line</span></a></li> +<li><a href="#illus-0162-1.jpg"><span class="smcap">"She's out, boys," he says</span></a></li> +<li><a href="#illus-0300-1.jpg"><span class="smcap">In Homeburg you come home to the whole town</span></a></li> +</ul> +</div> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> + +<h1>Homeburg Memories</h1> + +<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2> + +<h3>THE 4:11 TRAIN</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>In Which the World Comes Once a Day to Visit Homeburg</i></p> + +<p>Hel-lo, Jim! Darn your case-hardened old hide, but I'm glad to see you! +Wait till I unclamp my fingers from this suit case handle and I'll shake +hands. Whoa—look out!! That's the fourth time that chap's tried to tag +me with his automobile baggage truck. He'll get me yet. I wish I were a +trunk, Jim. Why aren't they as kind to the poor traveler as they are to +his trunk? I don't see any electric truck here to haul me the rest of +the way into New York. It's a long,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> long walk to the front door of this +station, and my feet hurt.</p> + +<p>That's the idea. Let the porter lug that suit case. I'd have hired one +myself, but I was afraid I couldn't support him in the style you fellows +have made him accustomed to. It was mighty nice of you to come down and +meet me, Jim. I've been standing here for five minutes in this infernal +mass meeting of locomotives, trying to keep out from underfoot, and +getting myself all calm and collected before I surged out of this +howling forty-acre depot and looked New York in the eye. It's nothing +but a plain case of rattles. I have 'em whenever I land here, Jim. Dump +me out on Broadway and I wouldn't care, but whenever I land back in the +bowels of a Union Station I'm a meek little country cousin, and I always +want some one to come along and take me by the hand.</p> + +<p>It's the fault of your depots. They're the biggest things you have, and +it isn't<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span> fair for you to come at me with your biggest things first. +Every time I start for New York I swear to myself that I'm going to go +into a fifty thousand dollar dining-room full of waiters far above my +station, and tuck my napkin in my collar, just to show I'm a free-born +citizen; and I'm going to trust my life to crossing policemen, and go by +forty-story buildings without even flipping an eye up the corner and +counting the stories by threes. I'm mighty sophisticated until I hit the +city and get out into a depot which has a town square under roof and a +waiting-room so high that they have to shut the front door to keep the +thunder storms out. Then I begin to shrink. And by the time I've walked +from Yonkers or thereabouts, clean through the station and out of a +two-block hallway, with more stores on either side than there are in all +Homeburg, and have committed my soul to the nearest taxicab pirate, I +feel like a cheese mite in the great hall of Karnak.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span></p> + +<p>No, sir; when I get into a big city depot, I'm a country Jake, and I +need a compass and kind words. I've suffered a lot from those depots. I +missed a train in Washington once because I figured it would take me +only ten minutes to go from my hotel to the train. But I counted only +the distance to the front door of the Union Station. By the time I'd +journeyed on through the fool thing, my train had gone. Once I missed a +train in the Boston station because I didn't know which one of the +thirty tracks my train was on. I guessed it was somewhere to the right, +and I guessed wrong. It was twenty-four tracks away to the left, and I +couldn't get back in time. So I went into their waiting-room, which is +as big as a New England cornfield and has all the benches named for +various towns. I had to stand up two hours because I couldn't find the +Homeburg bench.</p> + +<p>I'm an admirer of big cities, Jim, and I wouldn't have you take a foot +off your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> Woolworth building, or a single crashity!! bang!! out of your +subways, but I wish there was a little more coziness in your depots. +Why, at Homeburg I'm nearer the train at my house than I am in New York +after I've got to the station. It's great to have a depot so big that it +takes the place of mountain scenery, but it's hard on the poor traveler, +even if it does have all the comforts of away-from-home in it. And then +it swallows up things so. It takes away all the pleasure of having a +railroad in the town. I suppose five hundred trains come into this +station every day, but they're just trains—nothing more. You don't get +any fun or information or excitement out of them. You can't even chase +them—they bang a gate in your face when you try. I'll bet you don't get +as much comfort and fun out of all these five hundred trains, Jim, as we +do out of the 4:11 train at Homeburg.</p> + +<p>No; it's not any better than your trains.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> It's not as good. You can't +get raw oysters and magazines and individual cocktails and shaves on it. +All you can get is cinders and peanuts, and I would advise you, if you +were hungry, to eat the former and put the latter in your eye. It's the +kind of a train you New Yorkers would ride on and then write home +telling about the horrors of travel in the great West. But it means +everything to Homeburg. It means a lot more than the half dozen limited +trains which roar through our town fifty miles an hour every day and +have made us so expert at dodging that we will develop kangaroo legs in +another generation. It's our train. Here in New York a hundred trains +come in each morning from Chicago, New Orleans, Everywhere and points +beyond, and the office-boy next door to the depot doesn't stop licking +stamps long enough to look up. But when old Number Eleven, which is its +official railroad name, pulls into Homeburg from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> Chicago each +afternoon, loaded with mail, news, passengers, home-comers, adventurers, +mysterious strangers, friends, brides, heroes, widows and coffins, you +can just bet we're there to see her.</p> + +<p>It's the town pastime. We all do it. Whenever a Homeburg man has nothing +else to do at four o'clock, he steps over to the depot and joins the +long line which leans up against the depot wall and keeps it in place +during the crisis. Some of them haven't missed a roll-call in years. Old +Bill Dorgan, the drayman, has stood on the platform every day since the +line was built, rain or shine. Josh James, the colored porter of the +Cosmopolitan Hotel, knows more traveling men than William J. Bryan. If +he was absent from his post, the engineer wouldn't know where to stop +the train. The old men come crawling down on nice days and sun +themselves for an hour before the train arrives. The boys sneak slyly +down on their way from school<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> and stand in flocks worshiping the train +butcher, who is bigger than the Washington Monument to them. Sometimes a +few girls come down too, and hang around, giggling. But that doesn't +last long. We won't stand for it in our town. Some missionary tells the +girls' parents, and then they suddenly disappear from the ranks and look +pouty and insulted for a month, and we know, without being told, that a +couple of grown-up young ladies of sixteen or more have been spanked in +the good old-fashioned way. Homeburg is a good town, and it makes its +girls behave even if it has to half kill them.</p> + +<p>You haven't any idea, Jim, how much bustle and noise and excitement and +general enthusiasm a passenger train can put into a small town for a few +minutes. Just imagine yourself in Homeburg on a cold winter afternoon. +It's four o'clock. The sun has stood the climate as long as it can and +is getting ready to duck for shelter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> behind the dreary fields to the +west. If you ran an automobile a mile a minute down the walk on Main +Street you wouldn't have to toot for a soul. Now and then a farmer comes +out of a store, takes a half hitch on the muffler around his neck, puts +on his bearskin gloves and unties his rig. You watch him drive off, the +wheels yelling on the hard snow, and wonder if it isn't more cheerful +out in the frozen country with the corn shocks for company. It's the +terrible half hour of bleak, fading light before the electricity is +turned on and the cozy dark comes down—the loneliest hour of the +winter's day.</p> + +<p>You've stood it about as long as you can, when you notice signs of life +across the street. Three men carrying satchels are steering for the +depot. Dorgan's dray is rattling down the street. Dorgan's dray would +make a cheerful noise if it was the last sound on earth. Little flocks +and groups of people begin plodding across the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> square. You know them +all. Gibb Ogle is going over to watch the baggageman load trunks. It is +Gibb's life work. Pelty Amthorne is a little late, but he'll have time +to arrange himself against the east end door and answer the roll-call, +as he has for thirty years. Miss Ollie Mingle is going over too. She +must be expecting that Paynesville young man again. If the competition +between her and Ri Hawkes gets any keener, Ollie will have to meet the +train down at the crossing and nab the young man there. Sim Atkinson is +taking a handful of letters down to the station as usual. Ever since he +had his row with Postmaster Flint, he has refused to add to the receipts +of the office, and buys his stamps of the mail clerk. It is Sim's hope +and dream that sometime the annual receipts of the Homeburg post-office +will just miss being enough to bring a raise in salary. Then Sim will +bring it to Flint's attention that he would have bought his ten +dollars'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> worth of stamps that year at home, if Flint hadn't advertised +his lock box for rent when he neglected the quarterly dues. Watching Sim +thirst for revenge is as much fun as having a real Indian in town.</p> + +<p>There's the headlight half a mile down the track! She's coming fast, ten +minutes late, and, because you've been lonesome all afternoon and need +exercise, you slip into your coat and hustle down. Just as you get to +the depot, Number Eleven comes in with a crash and a roar, bell ringing, +steam popping off, every brake yelling, platforms loaded, expectation +intense, confusion terrific, all nerves a-tingle, and fat old Jack Ball, +the conductor, lantern under arm, sweeping majestically by on the bottom +step of the smoker. Young Red Nolan and Barney Gastit, two of the +station agent's innumerable amateur helpers, race for the baggage car +with their truck, making a terrible uproar over the old planks. The mail +clerk dumps the sacks. Usually he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> gets a stranger in the shin with +them. Nothing doing to-day. Just missed a traveling man. We still tell +of the time the paper sack scooted across the icy platform and stood +Mayor Andrews on his head. He wanted to abolish the whole post-office +department.</p> + +<p>I've always realized what the city gate must have meant to the medieval +loafers, because I've watched Homeburg's city gate at the 4:11 train so +often. There's Mrs. Sim Estabrook getting home. Must have been +unexpected. No one to meet her. Wonder if Sim's sick again. I'll call up +pretty soon. Wimble Horn's been to Chicago again, evidently. Wonder if +he'll dump his last eighty acres into the Board of Trade. Who's the +fine-looking duck in the fur-lined coat? Not a transient, evidently. He +passed Josh by. Must be visiting somebody. Yes; Mrs. Ackley's kissing +him. That might mean a scandal in New York, but at home it means +rela<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span>tives. Poor old Jedson Bane's back, I see. Looks pretty bad. +Hospital didn't help him. Guess he's not long for us. Hello, Jed, old +man! How are you? Better? That's fine. You're looking great! For the +love of Mike, will you take a swift look at what's got off? I believe +it's from college. They don't wear clothes like that anywhere else. Oh, +yes, of course, that's why the Singers' automobile came down. Don't know +what we'd do, now that the circus has passed us up, if it wasn't for +Sally Singer. She imports a new specimen from the University about every +two weeks.</p> + +<p>The crowd is off, and you hurl a few good-bys at the travelers getting +on. Our two editors check them off as they go. The <i>Argus</i> and the +<i>Democrat</i> get all their news at this train. There's no slipping in and +out of town in Homeburg. One and all we face the gantlet. Young Andy +Lowes hates to have us beg him not to miss the morning train back, as we +do three times a week;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> but he simply has to go to Jonesville that +often, and we all know why, and he knows we know. The Parsons are rid of +their Aunt Mary at last. She's worse than an oyster. Put her in a +guest-room and she grows fast to it. They've had her for six months now. +Hello! Peter Link's son is going down to Jonesville. Guess he's got his +job back. Andy would be a good boy if he would only stop trying to make +the distilleries work nights. There goes old Colonel Ackley on his +weekly trip. Wonder if he thinks he fools any one with that suit case. +Ever since the town went dry, he's had business in the next county. +Hello, Colonel! Don't drop that case. You'll break a suit of clothes! +Watch him glare.</p> + +<p>The engine has gotten its breath by this time. Ever notice how human an +engine sounds when it stops after a long run and the air-brake apparatus +begins to pant? Old Ball has been fussing for a minute and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> now he yells +"'Board." Aunt Emma Newcomb gets in a few more kisses all around her +family. She's going down to the next station. The engine gives a few +loud puffs, spins its wheels a few times, and the cars begin moving +past. Hurrah! Something doing to-day. That grocery salesman who gets +here once a week is coming across the square two jumps to a rod. Go it, +old man! Go it, train! Ball will always stop for a woman, but the +drummers have to take her on the fly. There! He's on—all but his hat. +Red Nolan will keep that for him till his next trip.</p> + +<p>She's moving fast now. The brakeman hops the next to the last car with +grace and carelessness. From every platform devoted friends and +relatives are spilling—it is a point of honor in Homeburg to remain +with your loved ones in the car as long as you dare before leaping for +life. The last car sweeps by. The red and green lights begin to grow +smaller with business<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>like promptness. There is a parting clatter as the +train hits the last switch frog two blocks away. Then it's over. The +noise, bustle, confusion, and joyful excitement follow the flying +cinders out of town, and silence resumes its reign. I've never heard +anything so still as Homeburg after the 4:11 has pulled out.</p> + +<p>But we're too busy to notice it as we string across the square to the +post-office. We have the day's cargo to digest. We have to wait for the +evening mail to be distributed, read the evening newspapers, shake hands +with all the returned Homeburgers, size up the brand new Homeburgers and +investigate the strangers. And it keeps us busy until supper time.</p> + +<p>I've lived in Homeburg thirty-five years and more, and the 4:11 train +has been tangled up in my biography all the way. I remember the first +time I ever rode on it. The cars were funny-looking coops then, and the +engine had a sixty-gallon smoke<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>stack. I was four, and I yelled with +fear when the train came in and kept it up for the first twenty miles +after they lugged me on board. The conductor chucked me under the chin +and gave me his punch to play with. He was a young man then. He'd +carried my father and mother on their wedding journey, and twenty years +after that first ride of mine he carried me and my wife on our wedding +journey. The other day we gave our oldest girl two dollars and sent her +on her first trip down to Jonesville, by herself. Old Ball was on the +train, and he grinned at me and promised to take good care of her. He's +pretty gray now, but I hope he stays long enough to start another +generation of our family on its travels.</p> + +<p>I went to my first circus, to Jonesville, on old Number Eleven. And I +went down there at sixteen, a member of the Republican Club, with a +torch, and the proudest boy in the State. The next year I started<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> to +college with an algebra and a tennis racket under my arm (they wouldn't +jam into the trunk), and a dozen friends came down to see me off. On +Number Eleven that day I met four other boys going to the same school. +We are still close chums, though one is on the coast, another's here in +New York, and the third is in the Philippines.</p> + +<p class="center"><a name="illus-0030-1.jpg" id="illus-0030-1.jpg"></a><img src="images/illus-0030-1.jpg" width='551' height='700' alt="Finally the bass catches up with the cornets." /></p> + +<p class='center'>It seemed to me then as if she must have come from heaven by air-line.</p> + +<p>It was the next year that I noticed a girl as she stepped off of Number +Eleven and was met by one of the Homeburg girls. I didn't know who she +was, but it seemed to me then as if she must have come from heaven by +air-line, and I felt so friendly toward the girl who met her that I had +to go down to her house to call that very night. The visitor had come to +stay—her father was starting a new store in Homeburg. I'll tell you, +when a snorty old train, which assays two pecks of cinders per car, +hauls the most wonderful girl on earth into your town and dumps her +into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> your arms—so to speak, and bunching up events a little—you're +bound to love that train.</p> + +<p>I could write the history of Homeburg from the 4:11 too. In fact, the +train has hauled most of Homeburg into the town. Year after year we +watch strangers get off the train and turn around three times, in the +way a stranger does when he tries to orient himself and locate the +nearest hotel. We get acquainted with those strangers, and in the next +week we discover their business and antecedents and politics and +preferences in jokes, and whether they pull for the Chicago Cubs or the +White Sox. In two weeks they are old-time citizens and go down with us +to welcome the newcomers. Henry Broar came to us on the 4:11. I remember +he wore a loppy hat and needed a shave that day, and we didn't assess +him very highly. But he had a whacking law practice inside of a year, +ran for county judge two years later, and now<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> we swell up to the danger +point when people mention Congressman Broar, and let it slip modestly +that we are intimate enough with Hank to trade shirts with him.</p> + +<p>I remember well the day two imposing strangers got off of Number Eleven, +and made the town nearly explode with curiosity by walking out to the +Dover farm at the edge of town and pacing it off this way and that. Took +us a month to learn their business. That was the time we got the Scraper +Works. When Allison B. Unk arrived, he made a tremendous impression by +wearing a plug hat still in its first youth, and rolling ponderously +around town in a Prince Albert. We've despised Prince Alberts ever since +because the town fell for that one and deposited liberally in Unk's new +bank, which closed up a year later. And then there was the time when the +trainmen put off a scared and sick cripple, who lay in the depot +waiting-room with a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> ring of sympathetic incompetents around him until +Doc Simms could help him. He touched our hearts, and we shelled out +enough to send him on a hundred miles to his people. He came back ten +years later and kept Homeburg balanced magnificently in the air for a +week by showing us how much fun it is to chum with a millionaire. Even +sick cripples are likely to guess the market right in this country, you +know, and he never forgot us.</p> + +<p>As they come in on Number Eleven, so they go. The young men come to +Homeburg full of hope, and their sons go on elsewhere loaded with the +same. Mothers weep on the station platform many times a year while their +Willies and Johns and Petes hike gaily off to chase their fortunes. And +many times a year the old boys come back from Chicago. Some of them are +rich and proud, and some of them are rich and friendly, and some of them +are just friendly. But they all get off of Number Eleven under<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> our +keen, discriminating glare, and they all get the same greeting while we +size them up and wonder if their nobby thirty-five dollar suits are +their sole stocks-in-trade, and just how much a "lucrative position" +means in Chicago.</p> + +<p>When the big strike was on, twenty-five years ago, Number Eleven didn't +run for two days. We might as well have been marooned on St. Helena. It +was awful. When a hand-car came sweeping into town the third day with a +big sail on, we hailed it like starving sailors. It was Number Eleven +which took on a flat-car loaded with Paynesville's fire department +twenty years ago and saved our business section. When President Banks, +of the Great F. C. & L. Railroad, rolled into Homeburg in his private +car, to become "Pudge" Banks again for a day or two and revisit the +scenes of his boyhood, he came on Number Eleven of course. The train +hung around while the band played two selections and the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> mayor gave an +address of welcome. That was her longest visit in Homeburg.</p> + +<p>The old train even bursts into local politics and social affairs now and +then. It managed to jump the track in the campaign of '96, leaving four +distinguished Democratic speakers, fizzing with oratory, in the +cornfields, and ruining the only rally the Dems attempted to pull off. +And it took DeLancey Payley down after all the rest of the town had +failed, in a manner which kept us tearful with delight for a week. +DeLancey was sequestered in an Eastern college by his loving parents, +and when he was graduated he came home and started an exclusive circle +composed mostly of himself. He was unapproachably haughty, until one day +he accompanied a proud beauty, who was visiting the Singers (our other +hothouse family) to Number Eleven, and lingered too long after the train +started. DeLancey got off, but in doing so he performed a variety of +diffi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>cult and instructive feats of balancing on his ear which were +viewed by a large audience with terrific enthusiasm. When DeLancey was +haughty after that, we always praised this feat, and you'd be surprised +to see how soon he got his nose down out of the zenith.</p> + +<p>Every day old Number Eleven brings in its mail-bag full of hopes and +triumphs, of good news, bad news, and tragedy. Every day it brings the +new ideas from the world outside and the latest wrinkles in hanging on +to this whirling old sphere in a pleasant and successful manner. We get +our styles from the Chicago men who step off of its platforms and tarry +with us. We send our brides off on it with an entire change of bill at +each performance. We get our peeps into wonderland and romance and +comedy from the theatrical troupes which straggle out of its cars and +rush to the baggage car to make sure that no varlet has attached their +trunks since the last<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> stop. It is the magic carpet which carries our +youth forth into the great world to wonder and learn and prevail. And +now and then it is the kindly beast of burden who brings back some old +playmate, done with weariness and striving, and coming home to rest in +our cemetery beyond the south hill.</p> + +<p>No, Jim, your thousand trains a day, with their parlor cars, bathrooms, +barber shops and libraries, are all right, but they're just trains. +Number Eleven is a whole lot more than a train. It is the world come to +visit us once a day—a moving picture of life which we enjoyed long +before Edison took out his patent. Do you wonder that it makes me sad to +see so many perfectly good trains going to waste in this roofed-over +township of yours? Take me out of it, please.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2> + +<h3>THE FRIENDLY FIRE-FIEND</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>The Joys of Fighting Him with a Volunteer Fire Department</i></p> + +<p>Hello! Here comes the fire department! Watch the people swarm! Uumpp! +Ouch! Excuse me for living. This is no place for a peaceable spectator. +I'm going to cast anchor in this doorway until the mob gets past.</p> + +<p>No, thank you. I'll not join the Marathon. But you don't know how +homesick and happy it makes me to see this crowd run! I've been in New +York a week now, and honestly this is almost the first really human +impulse I've seen a citizen give way to. Until this minute I've felt as +if<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> I were a hundred thousand miles from Homeburg, with all train +service suspended for the winter. If I could find the man who stepped on +my heels while chasing that engine, I'd thank him and ask him what +volunteer fire department he used to run with. See 'em scramble.</p> + +<p>Whoop! Here comes the hook-and-ladder truck! This is nothing but +Homeburg on a big scale. I'm beginning to envy you city chaps now. That +makes the fourth engine that's come past. You get more for your money +than we do. Look at that chief hurdling curbstones in his little red +wagon. If Homeburg ever gets big enough to have a chief's wagon, I'll +suffocate with pride.</p> + +<p>I see it's the same old story. Fire's all out. It always is by the time +you've run nine blocks. Watch the racers coming back. Stung, every one +of them—gold-bricked. There's a fat fellow who's run half a mile, I'll +bet. If his tongue hung<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> out any farther, he'd trip up on it. But he'll +do it again next time. They all do. Learning to stop running to fires is +as hard as learning to stop buying mining-stock in the West. And it's +just as big a swindle too. The returns from running to fires are +marvelously small. They tell me that a hundred million dollars a year +goes up in flames in this country. I don't believe it. If it does, I +want to know who gets to see all the fun. I don't.</p> + +<p>I've run to fires all my life, until lately, and I've drawn about three +hundred and seventy-five blanks. Once I almost saw a big grain-elevator +burn in a Western town. That is, I would have seen it, if I had looked +out of my hotel window. But I'd run two miles to see a burning haystack +in the afternoon, and I was so dead tired that I slept right through the +performance that night. And once I did see a row of stores burn, back in +Homeburg—at the distance of a mile. I was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> in school, and the teacher +wouldn't dismiss us. By stretching my neck several feet I could just see +the flames leaping over the trees, but that was all. Some of the bad +boys sneaked out of the door, but I was a good boy, and waited one +thousand years until school was out and the fire was ditto. I've never +felt quite the same since toward either goodness or education.</p> + +<p>Some men run faithfully to fires year after year and view a fine +collection of burning beefsteaks and feverish chimneys and volcanic +wood-sheds, while others stroll out after dinner in a strange city and +spend a pleasant evening watching a burning oil-refinery make a Vesuvius +look pale and sickly in comparison. Luck is distributed in a dastardly +way, and as for myself I've quit trying. I don't run to fires at all any +more. The big cities have fooled me long enough by sending out forty +pieces of apparatus to smother a defective flue. I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> stay behind and +watch the crowd. It's more amusing and not half so much work.</p> + +<p>Of course in Homeburg it's different. You city people don't realize what +a blessing the fire-fiend is to a small town. Fires mean a whole lot to +us. They keep us from petrifying altogether during the dull seasons. And +they don't have to be real fires, either. Any old alarm will do. Our +fire-bell sounds just as terrible for a little brush fire as it would +for a flaming powder-mill. It's an adventure merely to hear the thing. +Take a winter night in the dull season after Christmas, for instance. +You have begun to go to sleep right after supper. You've finished the +job at nine o'clock, and by two <span class="smcap">a.m.</span> you're sailing placidly southwest +of Australia in a seagoing automobile.</p> + +<p>Suddenly the pirate-ship in the rear, which you hadn't noticed before, +slips up and begins potting away at you with a dull metallic boom. The +auto slips its clutch,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> and the engine begins to clang and clatter, and +somebody off behind a red-hot mountain in the distance begins ringing an +enormous bell just as you slide downward into a crater of flame—and +then you wake up entirely, and the fire-bell is going +"clang-clang-clang-clang-clang," while below you hear the ringing crunch +of your neighbor's feet on the cold snow, and outside the north window +there is a red glare which may be either the end of the world or another +exploded lamp in 'Bige Brinton's chicken-incubator; you won't know which +until you have stabbed both feet into one pants-leg, crawled all over +the cold floor for a missing sock, and run half a mile, double-reefing +your nightshirt to keep it from trailing out from under your overcoat. +That's what a fire-alarm means in Homeburg.</p> + +<p>It's just as interesting in the daytime too. Imagine a summer afternoon +in Homeburg about three o'clock. It's hotter<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> than a simoon in the +Sahara, and the aggregate business being done along Front Street is +nineteen cents an hour. The nearest approach to life on the street is +Sam McAtaw sitting in a shady spot on the edge of the sidewalk and +leaning against a telephone-pole, sound asleep. You're sitting in your +office chair, with your feet on the desk, dozing, when suddenly you hear +footsteps outside. Whoever is making them is turning them out with great +rapidity, and that in itself is novel enough to be interesting. The +footsteps go by, and you look at their maker. It is Gibb Ogle surging up +the walk and yanking his ponderous feet this way and that with +tremendous energy. Nothing but a fire or a loose lion can make Gibb run, +and you don't take any stock in the lion theory; so you tumble out after +him.</p> + +<p>By this time Sim Bone is on the street, and Harvey McMuggins is coming +up behind, while half a dozen heads have sud<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>denly sprouted from as many +doorways. Your heart beats with suspense when Gibb comes to the +town-hall corner. Hurrah! He's steering for the fire-house. You're +overhauling him rapidly, and by a big sprint you beat out Clatt +Sanderson, and grab one handle of the fire-bell ropes. Gibb grabs the +other, and then you let her have it for all there is in you.</p> + +<p>Did I say anything about Homeburg being asleep? Forget it. Before you've +hit the bell a dozen taps you can't hear it for the tramp of feet. Every +store in town is belching forth proprietors and clerks. They are coming +bareheaded and coatless; some of them are collarless. Chief Dobbs, who +shoes horses in his less glorious moments and keeps his helmet hanging +on the forge-cover, dashes into the engine-room, grabs his trumpet, and +begins firing orders, not singly, but in broadsides. There's nobody +there to order yet, but he's just getting his hand in, and ten seconds<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> +later, when the first member of the company arrives, he is saluted with +nineteen stentorian commands in one blast. Half a minute later the +engine-house is clogged with fire-fighters, and the air is a maelstrom +of orders, counter orders, suggestions, objections, and hoarse yells. +Then a roar of wheels sounds outside, and you drop the bell-rope handle +and go out to see the finest sight of all.</p> + +<p>I suppose those old Romans thought the chariot-races were pretty nifty, +but if an old Roman should reassemble himself and watch the dray-race to +a Homeburg fire, he'd wonder how he ever managed to sit through a silly +little dash around an arena. From the south comes a cloud of dust and a +terrific racket. At an equal distance from the east comes another cloud +of dust and an even more terrible uproar, Clay Billings's dray having +more loose spokes than Bill Dorgan's. The clouds approach with +tremendous speed. Bill is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> a little ahead. He is lashing his horses with +the ends of the reins, while from the bounding dray small articles of no +value, such as butter-firkins and cases of eggs, are emerging and +following on the road behind.</p> + +<p>But Clay isn't beaten—not by a thousand miles. He's going to make it a +dead heat or better—no, Bill hit the crossing first. By George! That +Clay boy is a wonder. He deliberately pulled in and shot across behind +Bill, cutting off a good fifty feet. His team stops, sliding on their +haunches, and ten seconds later is being hitched to the hose-cart, while +Clay is on the seat clanging the foot-bell triumphantly. It's the +fiftieth race, or thereabouts, between the two, and the score is about +even. The winner gets two dollars for the use of his team. I've seen +horse-races for a thousand-dollar purse which weren't half as exciting.</p> + +<p>In the meanwhile more messengers have arrived from the fire. It is in +the Mahlon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> Brown barn, and late advices indicate terrible progress. As +fast as forty-nine rival fingers can do it, the tugs are fastened, and +the cart is off down the street with a long trail of citizens after it.</p> + +<p>Bill's team, badly blown, is hitched to the hook-and-ladder truck, and +willing hands push it out through the door. There is always more or less +of a feud between the hook-and-ladder boys and the hose-cart boys, +because the former get the second team and rarely arrive at the fire in +time to hoist the beautiful blue ladders before the hose-cart gang puts +the conflagration out. Indeed, the feeling has gotten so strong at times +that the hook-and-ladder gang has threatened to double the prize-money +by private subscription and get their rig out first, but patriotism has +thus far prevented this.</p> + +<p>You have rung the bell until you are tired, by this time, and, besides, +the human flood has rushed on, leaving no one to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> whom you can explain +just how you thought you smelled fire and beat the world to the +engine-house. So you set out for the fire yourself and jog over the +half-mile in pretty fair time, considering the heat. It is an impressive +sight—not the fire itself, but the event. Two thousand, two hundred and +nine people are there—that being the population of Homeburg minus the +sick and wandering.</p> + +<p>In the midst of the seething mass are the hose-cart and the +ladder-truck. Around them dozens of red helmets are bobbing, while the +quivering air is cut and slashed and mangled with a very hurricane of +orders: "Bring up that hose—" "Whoa, keep that horse still—" "Bring +her round this way—" "Bring her round <i>this</i> way—" "Hey, you chumps, +the fire's <i>this</i> side—" "Back up that wagon—" "Come ahead with the +wagon—" "Get out of here till we get a ladder up—" "Axes here—" "Turn +on that water—" "Turn on that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> water—" "<i>Turn on that water!!—</i>" +"Jones, go down and tell that wooden Indian to turn on that water." +"Hold that water, you—" "<i>Hold that water!</i>" "Turn her on, I say." +"Turn her—" "Wow—turn that nozzle the other way—"</p> + +<p>And then the water comes with a mighty rush, yanking the nozzlemen this +way and that and sweeping firemen and common citizens aside as if they +were mere straws.</p> + +<p>As a rule, this is the climax, and the end comes rapidly. By this time +Brown, who had put the fire out with a few pails of water before the +alarm sounded, has persuaded the department to call off its hose, the +barn being full of valuable hay. So there isn't anything to do. The +water is turned off. Gibb Ogle explains to the one hundred and eleventh +knot of people how he was going past the place when he saw the tongue of +flame, and every one disperses after a pleasant social time.</p> + +<p>Everybody is tolerably well satisfied ex<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span>cept the hook-and-ladder gang, +which, as usual, is skunked again—never got a ladder out. A couple of +the axmen had a little fun with a rear window, but otherwise the affair +is a flat failure. They go back sullenly, but are comforted when the +roll is called, when each member who was present draws a dollar from the +city treasury. As usual, Pete Sundbloom is late, and tries to edge in to +roll-call, though he was a mile away from peril, but he can't make it +stick and gets the hoarse hoot when his little game is discovered.</p> + +<p>I want to ask you—isn't that a pleasant interruption on a dead day? It +makes life worth living, and I really wonder that there isn't more +incendiarism in small towns throughout the United States.</p> + +<p>Of course all the alarms aren't fizzles. Sometimes we have a real fire, +and then the scene defies description. When a fair-sized house burns +down, Chief Dobbs is so hoarse that he can't talk for a week, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> when +the row of wooden stores on the south side went up in flames a few years +ago, the old chief, Patrick McQuinn, burst a blood-vessel and had to +retire, the doctor having warned him that he must never use a +speaking-trumpet again.</p> + +<p>I was away at the time, but they tell me that was a grand fire for the +hook-and-ladder boys. They were right in the middle of it, and every +ladder in the truck was out. There was some trouble over the fact that +the big extension ladder was too tall for the buildings, and when Art +Simms had climbed to the top, he managed to fall fifteen feet to the +roof of the furniture-store, bruising himself badly. But, on the whole, +great good was done, and the second story workers were kings that day. +When the hotel caught, and the hook-and-ladder gang got into it, the way +the upper windows belched mattresses, mirrors, toilet-sets, pictures and +beds was unbelievable. Almost everything in the building was saved, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> +some of it was successfully repaired afterward.</p> + +<p>The axmen had their innings that day, too. It was a great sight to see +Andy Lowes leap nimbly up the ladder and poke in window after window +with his spiked ax, stepping backward now and then into nozzleman +Jones's face in order to view the effect. The axmen got glory enough to +last for years, and it was an axman who put out the last scrap of fire. +Frank Sundell was the hero. He was sitting on the ridge-pole of +Emerson's restaurant when he noticed a few blazing spots on the shingle +roof beneath him. He might have called the hose department; but, as I +have said, there is a good deal of rivalry between the two, and, +besides, Sundell had had a slow time that day, Lowes doing most of the +display work. So Frank reached cautiously down with his trusty ax, cut +out a blazing section of shingles, and tossed it to the ground. The +crowd cheered, and he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> was so encouraged that he cut out the rest of the +hot spots and put out the fire single-handed. Sundell is one of our very +best firemen and stands in line for a nozzleman's position some day.</p> + +<p>Of course a small-town fire department doesn't get as much practice in +twisting the fire-fiend's tail as a city fire company; but our boys have +a mighty good record, and we're proud of them. Since we've had +water-works, and the department hasn't had to depend on some cistern +which always went dry just at a critical moment, there hasn't been a +conflagration in Homeburg big enough to get into the city papers. The +boys may be a little overzealous now and then, but they are always on +the job ten minutes after the first tap of the bell, and the way they go +after a red tongue of flame on a kitchen roof reminds me of a terrier +shaking a rat. They are our real heroes,—the fire-laddies,—for outside +of Frank Ericson and Shorty McGrew, who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> work on the switching-crew, and +come sailing down through town hanging gracefully from the end of a +box-car ladder by one foot and hand, no one else has any chance to face +danger in Homeburg.</p> + +<p>Of course our firemen don't face danger regularly, between meals, like +your big paid departments here, and about the most the ordinary business +man gets in the danger-line is the imminent peril of getting a new +twenty-five-dollar suit in line with the chemical hose; but we don't +forget in Homeburg how old Mrs. Agnew's house burned twenty years ago +this spring and the department was late, owing to the magnificent depth +of Exchange Street, the roads having broken up, and how, when it got +there, the house was a mass of flames, with the poor old lady, who had +been bedridden for years, shrieking inside, and a hundred neighbors +shrieking on the outside; and how Pat McQuinn and Henry Aultmeyer dove +in through a window, with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> wet coats around their heads and the +chemical-hose playing on their backs; and how they tugged and hauled at +Mrs. Agnew, who weighed two hundred and fifty pounds, and couldn't get a +grip on her, and finally upended the burning bed and dumped her out of +the window, breaking her hip, and then dumped themselves out and rolled +in the wet grass until their hair and mustaches and clothes quit +blazing—after which they retired into cotton-wool for a month.</p> + +<p>Maybe your men would have done it more scientifically and entirely saved +poor Mrs. Agnew, who died the next month of the broken hip, but they +couldn't have stuck to the job any more heroically; and when Homeburg +citizens talk about "brave fire-laddies" and "homely heroes" at the +annual benefit supper of the Volunteer Company No. 1, they mean Pat and +Henry, and are perfectly willing to argue the question with any one.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></p> + +<p>So we worship our company to our heart's content, and when it comes +pacing slowly down the street at the head of every parade, with the +members looking handsomer than chorus girls in their dark-blue flannel +suits, red belts, and neat blue caps, we look at them full of pride and +confidence. Our little boys dream of the time when they will grow up and +join the company and wear seven-pound red helmets at fires, and come +home tired and muddy in the gray dawn after a fire and demand hot coffee +from their admiring women-folks; and as for the Homeburg girls—well, +the greatest social function of our town, or of the county for that +matter, is the annual ball of the Homeburg fire department.</p> + +<p>And let me tell you, when the nine-piece orchestra—all home +talent—strikes up the grand march and Chief Dobbs, with his wide-gauge +mustache and vacuum-cleaned uniform, leads the company around<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> the hall, +every hero with the girl or wife of his heart on his arm and a full +hundred couples of the mere laymen crowding in behind, in a long and +many-looped line, the Astor ball would have to do business with a brass +band and a display of fireworks to attract any more enthusiasm.</p> + +<p>That's what the fire department means to us in Homeburg. We don't suffer +half so much from fires as we would from the lack of them; and when this +new concrete construction makes the world fire-proof, and the Homeburg +fire department rusts away and disappears, we will mourn it even more +sincerely than we did the opera house with a real gallery, which got +over-heated one night twenty-five years ago and burned, compelling us to +get along with a mere hall with a flat floor ever afterward.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<h3>HOMEBURG'S TWO FOUR-HUNDREDTHS</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>The Struggles of our Best Families to Impress Us</i></p> + +<p>Hold on, Jim. Don't hurry so. Remember I don't have a chance to walk up +Fifth Avenue every day. Give me a chance to astonish myself. Here are +ten thousand women going by in clothes that would make a lily turn red +and burn up with shame, and an equal number of proud gents with curlycue +collars on their overcoats, and I want to do the sight justice.</p> + +<p>You see all this parade every day, but I don't, and I want to drink it +all in. See that feminine explosion in salmon plush!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> That would +paralyze business back home. Watch that hat crossing the street—it +ought to be arrested for being without visible means of support—Oh, I +see! There's a girl under it with one of those rifle-barrel skirts. Gee! +Ssh, Jim! Did you see the lady who just passed? Let's beg her pardon for +intruding on this earth. Say, you could peel enough haughtiness off of +her to supply eight duchesses and still have enough for the lady cashier +at my hotel. I'll bet she is one of your Four Hundred. For goodness' +sake, Jim, if we pass any of your social lighthouses, point them out to +me. I'm here to see the sights.</p> + +<p>I know the rest of the country throws it up to New York a lot because of +its Four Hundred, and that the ordinary small-town man gets so scornful +when he talks of the idle and diamond-crusted rich, with their +poodle-dog pastimes, that he lives in constant danger of stabbing his +eyes with his nose. But I'm not that way; I'm<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> interested. Nothing +fascinates me so much as the stories in your papers about Mrs. Clymorr +Busst's clever pearl earrings, made to resemble door knobs; and about +Mrs. Spenser Coyne's determination to have Columbia University removed +because it interferes with the view from her garage; and about little +Mrs. Justin Wright's charming innocence in buying a whole steamship +whenever she goes over to Europe. I'd go a long way to see your Four +Hundred perform; and moreover, after I had accumulated a precarious +balance on an iron spike fence in order to rest one eye on a genuine +duke while he fought his way out of a church with one of your leading +local beauties, who had just been affixed to him for life, I would not +squint pityingly on the heaving mass of spectators and hiss:</p> + +<p>"We don't do this in Homeburg."</p> + +<p>Because we would do it fast enough if we had a chance.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span></p> + +<p>We don't have anything like your Smart Set, of course, but I desire to +say with pride that while there aren't enough tiaras in Homeburg to fill +a pill box, and the only limousine we possess is the closed carriage +which is used for the family of the deceased at funerals, we have our +exclusive and magnificent class just as New York has. We haven't a Four +Hundred in Homeburg, but we have a Two Four-Hundredths. If you get as +much real, solid pleasure and amusement in New York watching your Four +Hundred as we do watching the Payleys and the Singers, I envy you. +They're worth all the trouble they cause.</p> + +<p>For a good many years, Mrs. Wert Payley, wife of the First National +Bank, was our Smart Set, all by herself. There was never any question of +it. She admitted it, and we didn't take the trouble to deny it. In a +way, she was regarded as a public benefactor. Nobody else cared to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> +spend the money necessary to be a Smart Set, and since Mrs. Payley was +willing to fight and be bled, so to speak, to give our town tone and +inject a little excitement into our prairie lives now and then, we felt +that the least we could do was to regard her as a social colossus.</p> + +<p>The Payleys were the only people in Homeburg who had lunch at noon, and +as early as 1900 they ate it from the bare table. She was the only woman +in Homeburg who could "look in" on an afternoon gabble of any kind for a +few minutes and get away with it without insulting the hostess. When she +shook hands with you, you always grabbed in the wrong place, no matter +how much thought you put into it, and while you were readjusting your +sights and clawing for her fingers and perspiring with mortification, +she was getting a start on you which kept you bashfully humble as long +as she was in sight. She was real goods, Mrs. Payley was—not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> arrogant, +but just naturally superior. People who called at the Payleys' evenings +were the social lights of Homeburg, and whenever some lady wanted to +discharge a few fireworks indicating her social position, she would form +a hollow square around Mrs. Payley in public and get intimate with her +in full view of everybody. Mrs. Payley ran the town, and everybody was +comfortable and content about it until the Singers arrived.</p> + +<p>The Singers came from Cincinnati to cashier in the Farmers' State Bank: +Mrs. Singer was city bred and city heeled and when she met Mrs. Wert +Payley she didn't even blink. She put out her hand a little +nor'-nor'east of her chatelaine watch, when Mrs. Payley put out her hand +some four inches southwest by south, and waited calmly for Mrs. Payley +to correct herself. There was an awful moment of suspense, and when it +became evident that the only way to get Mrs. Singer's hand down to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> the +other level would be to excavate beneath her and change her foundations, +Mrs. Payley gave in and reached.</p> + +<p>War was declared that minute, and I shudder now when I think of the +months which followed.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Payley, having been on the ground a long time, had fortified it, of +course, and was president of all the clubs. But inside of a month Mrs. +Singer flanked her position. She declined to join most of the clubs on +the plea of being a busy woman, and organized a flower mission. Its +object was to distribute flowers to the sick and needy, who generally +consisted of Pat Ryan. Pat was nearly smothered in flowers that year, +being good-natured, and as the work of collecting said flowers involved +a great deal of meeting in the Singer home and dancing in the Singer +attic, which was floored with hard maple that winter, Mrs. Singer had +the girls of the town organized into a Roman phalanx before spring.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span></p> + +<p>Mrs. Payley was triumphantly reëlected to the presidency of all her +clubs that winter, but Mrs. Singer organized a public library +association and pulled off a German. Mrs. Payley attended, and when she +tried to patronize Mrs. Singer with her compliments, that clever +infighter beat her to it by explaining the theory of the German to her. +That made Mrs. Payley so mad that the next month she invited the state +president of the Federation of Women's Clubs to visit her, and didn't +ask Mrs. Singer to the tea. The next week Mrs. Singer organized a +Country Club. It only consisted of a two-room pavilion in which picnics +could be held and dances could be pulled off, with long intermissions +for the extraction of slivers from the feet. But it was just as easy to +talk about while you were in town and to refer to in a hushed and +exclusive manner as if it cost a million, and when Mrs. Payley realized +that she could never hope to become exclusive<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> enough to get into it, +though goodness knows she couldn't have been hired to belong to the +foolish thing, she quit speaking to Mrs. Singer, the split became a +chasm, and we began choosing up sides in earnest.</p> + +<p>That winter Mrs. Singer seceded from the church which Mrs. Payley ran, +and founded an Episcopal church, taking seven choir members out of the +Congregational church, to say nothing of the organist. All this mixed up +religion in Homeburg that winter until you could scarcely tell it from a +ward caucus.</p> + +<p>By spring it was dangerous to show favors to either side, and when the +school election came around, it was fought out between the Payley and +Singer factions. Sally Singer had been given higher marks than Sarah +Payley, and the upshot of it all was that when the Payley side prevailed +at election by nine votes, the superintendent lost his job. He was a +good<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> superintendent and the cause of education didn't get over the jolt +for some years, but justice, of course, had to be done.</p> + +<p>The Singers got some satisfaction out of it by electing the school board +treasurer, which took a lot of money out of the First National Bank. +That, of course, got the banks into the row. You city folks may have +your financial flurries, but if you've never been around and between and +under a bank scrap in a small town, you don't know what trouble is. +There were a couple of failures that needn't have happened, and a lot of +partisan financiering, and then the town rose up and sat down on our +social leaders with a most pronounced scrunch. We can stand just about +so much society in Homeburg, but when it gets to elbowing into business, +churches, schools and funerals, we are more sensible than you +metropolitans are. It only takes a half-day to pass the word through a +small town, and one fine morning the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> Payleys and Singers discovered +that while they were still facing each other like two snorty and +inextinguishable generals, their armies had gone off arm in arm.</p> + +<p>That ended the feud and put society in Homeburg back in its proper +place—in the front parlors in the evening after the dishes had been +done up. The Payleys and Singers still continued to compete, but we +declined to fight and bleed for them and amused ourselves instead by +watching them from the sidelines. Mrs. Payley joined the "When I was in +Europe" brigade, and the Singers got the first automobile in town. It +kept the Singers so busy supporting and encouraging it, that the Payleys +were able to build the first modern house with a sleeping porch and +individual bathrooms—and about the time the Singers came back with a +two-story bungalow full of chopped wood furniture, Mrs. Payley went +abroad again and began to say: "The last time I was in Europe." It was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> +nip and tuck, year in and year out, between the two, and we all enjoyed +it a lot.</p> + +<p>But it wasn't until the Payley and Singer children came home from +college and formed a tight little circle with their backs out, that we +began to reap the benefits of really haughty society.</p> + +<p>The Payley and Singer children had absorbed all their families had to +offer, and then they went off to school in the East and laid in a +complete stock of the latest styles in superiority. They were all +finished in the same spring and shipped back to Homeburg—magnificent +specimens of college art with even their names done over—and when they +realized that they had to live forever in the old town, where no one +spoke their language or could even understand their clothes, the family +feud was forgotten and the four rushed together for mutual protection +and formed a real Smart Set.</p> + +<p>It's just like your bigger crowd. It<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> doesn't have anything to do with +us in particular. And we are just like you are. You open your Sunday +papers and read reams about the plumbing and pajamas and pet dogs and +love affairs of your first families, and I guess nothing that Sally +Singer or Sarah Payley ever did got past the scornful but lynx-eyed +Homeburgers. When Sarah was getting letters on expensive stationery from +Kansas City, the whole town discussed the probable character of a man +who would put blue sealing wax on his envelopes, and when Sally made her +pa put an addition on the Singer home, we knew what color she was going +to do her boudoir in three months in advance. But we are prouder than +your people. You hire down-trodden reporters to go and abase themselves +to get the information, while we wouldn't lower ourselves enough to ask +even by proxy. We just let the sewing women and hired girls tell us.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p> + +<p>Being an exclusive set in a small town is a whole lot harder than it is +in New York, and I've always admired our youngsters for the way they've +carried it off. Of course, four people can't form a club or give parties +or support an exclusive restaurant; they can't even be exclusive all by +themselves. They have had to mingle with us, but they are always +carefully insulated. They joined our Country Club, but they did it with +their fingers crossed, so to speak. They always come out together and +protect each other from our rude advances as much as possible. They +import college friends whenever they can, and they always have a few +bush leaguers, or utility players, to work in on such occasions. Henry +Snyder used to say he could tell when there was need of the peasantry at +the Singer house by the way Sally Singer would suddenly descend from the +third cross-road beyond Mars to the street in front of the post-office +and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> ask him with an accurately hospitable smile if he couldn't bring +his sister up to the house that evening to meet a few guests. And once a +year all four turn in and give a real dress rehearsal of up-to-date +social science, to which Homeburg is liberally invited and at which +unknown and unsuspected things are served for refreshments and a new and +deadly variation of bridge or dancing or punch or receiving lines or +conversational technique is put on for our inspection and bewilderment.</p> + +<p>We have a show at our opera-house now and then, and we always go to +these affairs largely to see our Smart Set perform. It always +comes—even East Lynne is better that West Homeburg—and I'll tell you, +by the time they have come rustling in about half way through the first +act, H. DeLancey Payley and W. Sam Singer in clawhammers with an acre +apiece of white shirt and holding about four bushels of pink fluff over +their arms, and the boys<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> have consulted anxiously with the usher, the +two girls, beautiful visions of Arctic perfection, standing in well-bred +suspense and holding their gowns in the 1915 manner, and all four have +hurried down to the best seats and have unharnessed and stowed away +their upholsterings, and DeLancey has folded up his explosive hat and +Sam has leaned back in a lordly way and beckoned to the usher for +another program—by the time all this has transpired, the actors have +forgotten their lines, and we have gotten our money's worth out of the +evening's entertainment.</p> + +<p>The hardships those people inflict on themselves in the sacred cause of +correctness are agonizing. It takes something more than nerve to wear a +silk hat and Prince Albert down to the Homeburg post-office on Sundays +to get the mail—especially with Ad Summers always on hand to spill a +large red laugh into his sleeve and say to some friend in a tremendous +stage<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> whisper that the darn dude's legs must be bowed or he wouldn't +want to hide 'em that way. And as for the carriage proposition, I'm +certain that no martyrs have endured more. DeLancey persuaded Hi Nott to +buy a real city carriage, and the four have used it faithfully; only the +Payleys and Singers live in different edges of town, and by the time Hi +has hauled Sam and his sister across town to the Payleys, through +Homeburg's April streets, which average a little more depth than width, +and has hauled the four down to the theater, there are usually about +three breakdowns. I've seen the four of them plodding haughtily home +from "Wedded but No Wife", the girls holding their imported dresses out +of the mud, and the boys sounding for bottom on the crossings with their +canes, while Hi drove the carriage solemnly down the road beside them. +The mud was too deep for them to get home in the carriage, but everybody +could see it was there and that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> they had paid for it and had done their +darndest, anyway. After all, that's no worse than the way you New +Yorkers carry your gloves in your hand in warm weather. You don't need +them, but you want the world to know you've got 'em and wouldn't be +found dead without 'em.</p> + +<p>When our Smart Set gives a party, we all try to live up to it as far as +possible, and so we insist on going by carriage. Hi starts hauling us at +six o'clock, six to a load in dry weather, and he usually gets the last +batch there just in time to begin hauling the first platoon home.</p> + +<p>But those are just little troubles for our Smart Set. Your Smart Set has +no troubles except the job of spending its money fast enough to keep +from being smothered by the month's income. It does what it pleases, and +if anybody objects, it raises the price of something or other by way of +retort. But our Smart Set has to live in Homeburg, and what is more, it +has to live<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> off of Homeburg, which is as hoity-toity a place to live +off of as you can find. Sally Singer can't afford to offend any one but +the depositors in the Payley Bank, and if DeLancey caused any Homeburger +to stalk down to his father's bank and extract a thousand-dollar savings +deposit, old man Payley would thrash DeLancey and set him to work on his +farm. They have to show their superiority over us so deftly and +pleasantly that we don't mind it. They have to keep us good-natured +while despising us. With half the genius for contemptuous conciliation +that the Payley and Singer children have displayed in the last five +years, the French nobility could have kept the peasantry yelling for +bread as a privilege long after 1793.</p> + +<p>Emma Madigan weighs two hundred pounds and drives a milk route. She went +to high school with Sally Singer, and it is the joy of her life to poke +her head into the Singer home when Sally has company and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> yell: "Sall, +here's your milk!" But Sally never tries to refrigerate her with the +Spitzbergen glare which she uses on us collectively when she goes to the +theater. You couldn't possibly refrigerate Emma, but you might encourage +her to say more—like the time when Sarah Payley passed her on the +street without speaking, being busy treading the upper altitudes with a +young Princeton College visitor, and Em yelled back: "For goodness' +sakes, Sarey, if you didn't lace so tight you could get your chin down +and see some one!"</p> + +<p>But most of us are not so frank. We are too good-natured. As a matter of +fact, we'd hate to see the Payleys and Singers common. They help to make +Homeburg interesting, and so long as they know their place and don't +irritate us, we wouldn't hurt their feelings for the world—that is, not +much.</p> + +<p>There was a dancing school in Homeburg two winters ago, and to the +con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span>sternation of every one the Payley and Singer young folks joined it. +It took two meetings for us to discover what had clogged up the +atmosphere and taken the prance out of things. Then we tumbled. The +Payleys and Singers were educating us. They were fitting us to live in +the rarified upper altitudes of refinement and to mingle with rank +without stepping all over its feet. By the third meeting Henry Snyder +had caught on to most of the signals and he explained them to a lot of +us beforehand with care. When Sally Singer dropped on to a bench and +moved her skirt ever so slightly aside it was a sign that the young man +with whom she was speaking might sit down and hold sweet converse. And +when Sarah Payley smiled brightly at a gentleman from some distance and +just caressed the chair beside her with her eye for the millionth part +of a second, that young man, if he had a spark of gentility in him, +would hurdle the intervening chairs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> to arrive. We also discovered how +to get away just before the young ladies got bored, by other delicate +signs, and how to derive the fact that they were thirsty and needed +sustenance, and just how to imprison them in our strong but respectful +arms during a waltz, and how to collect fans and gloves and programs and +handkerchiefs from the floor without grunting or jolting the +conversation. It was hard work, and spoiled the evening to a certain +extent, but we did the best we could until Jim Reebe spoiled it all in +the fourth lesson. Miss Singer had collected her usual six men during +the intermission with as many bright glances, and was being admired +properly and according to Hoyle, when Jim up and remarks, in his +megaphone bass: "Say, Sall, you're a great work of art, but the time you +made a hit with me was the day you slid down the banisters at school."</p> + +<p>That finished the course; and the Smart<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> Set, being unanimously absent +the rest of the winter, we gave ourselves up to vulgar pleasure, stuffed +our white gloves back into the bureaus and yelled for encores when we +couldn't get them any other way.</p> + +<p>I'll tell you, a man could be a hero to his valet with half the exertion +which it takes to be a Somebody to an old grammar-school mate in a small +town.</p> + +<p>Our Smart Set is disintegrating now, and things look blue for social +progress in Homeburg. Sally Singer is getting ready to be married this +summer to a Pittsburgh man who wears a cane. The remaining three look +like the old guard at Waterloo closing in under a heavy fire. Looks to +me as if there were going to be some of these mess alliances to wind up +with, for Sam Singer is calling on Mabel Andrews in citizen's clothing, +she having jeered him out of his Prince Albert; and Henry Snyder has +stopped scoffing and infests the Payley house to an alarming extent. So +I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> imagine that our Smart Set will get back to shirtsleeves in two +generations less than yours usually requires, and we'll miss it a lot. +Next to the ill feeling between the <i>Argus</i> and the <i>Democrat</i>, it has +been our greatest diversion.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<h3>THE SERVANT QUESTION IN HOMEBURG</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>How Mrs. Singer Amuses Us All by Insisting on Having It</i></p> + +<p>No apologies, Jim. If the Declaration of Independence who prepares your +meals for you has packed up and gone, I don't need any explanations. I +understand already. You can't ask me up to dinner because there isn't +going to be any dinner. If you don't go out to a restaurant, you'll get +a bite yourself while Mrs. Jim puts the children to bed. And then you'll +spend the evening wondering where you can beg, borrow, abduct, +hypnotize, or manufacture another cook.</p> + +<p>I know all about it. The great sorrow<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> has come upon you, and there's +only one comfort—there are others. It falls upon all who try to get out +of doing their own housework in New York. And I'll bet you were good +enough to the last cook, too—only asked her for one night out a week, +came to her meals promptly, didn't demand more than a fair living wage, +and let her have the rest. Yes, of course you did. And you're going to +let the next one have the best room and ring for her breakfast in the +morning, aren't you? What? Draw the line at that? Well, Jim, I admire +your nerve. You're one of the grand old rugged patriots who will not be +trodden on. Why did your last cook leave, anyway?</p> + +<p>Didn't like the kitchen, eh? And being in a flat you couldn't tear it +out and rebuild it. Yes, I agree with you. The servant problem in New +York is getting to be very serious. To-day you are gay and happy with +luxury and comfort all about<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> you, and to-morrow you are picking +sardines out of a can with a fork for dinner. I am certainly glad I live +in the country, where servant girls do not come on Monday with two +trunks and go away early Thursday morning with three trunks and a +bundle.</p> + +<p>We have no servant problem in Homeburg. However, I exclude Mrs. Singer +from this "we." There are only two servants in the whole town. Mrs. +Singer has them. That is, she tries to have them. Mrs. Singer's attempt +to have servants in a town which is full of hired girls is one of the +things which make life worth living and talking about in Homeburg.</p> + +<p>How do I know about it? Bless you, we all know about it. It's a public +tragedy. Can't help ourselves. We've had four of Mrs. Singer's +ex-servants in our house in six years, and they have all told their +troubles. Mrs. Singer trains girls for the entire town. She's twice as +good as a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> domestic science school, and she doesn't charge any tuition. +She is devoting her life to the training up of perfect hired girls, and +we revel in the results. It is ungrateful of us to blame her for taking +away our hired girls, because, as a matter of fact, she is our greatest +blessing. Right at this minute in Homeburg I know that two eager +families are sitting around waiting for the latest Singer class in +domestic science to graduate and come back to them for jobs. It ought to +come most any time. The course rarely lasts over three months.</p> + +<p>You see, Mrs. Singer isn't one of us. She came to Homeburg from a large +city, and she brought her ideas with her. She's not the kind of a woman, +either, who is going to cut those ideas down to fit Homeburg. Her plan +is to change Homeburg over to fit her ideas. She's been working at it +for fifteen years now, and I must say she's won out in several cases. +Dress suits are now worn quite unblushingly, we have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> a country club +half a mile from the post-office—that's the advantage of a small town, +you can get away from the rush and bustle of the city into the sweet +cool country in about four jumps—and no one thinks of serving a party +dinner without salad any more. But she's fallen down on one thing. She +can't keep servants. That problem has been too much for her. Mrs. +Payley, her rival, has had the same hired girl for sixteen years or +more; but Mrs. Singer scorns a hired girl. She must have servants, two +of them, and while she has a remarkable constitution and has stood up +for years under the fight, I don't see how she can keep it up much +longer.</p> + +<p>A hired girl in Homeburg is a very reasonable creature. We never have +any trouble with them, and they have very little with us. We usually +catch them green and wild, just off the steamer, and they come to us +equipped with a thorough working knowledge of the Swedish lan<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span>guage, and +nothing else to speak of. Our wives take them in and teach them how to +boil water, make beds, handle a broom, use clothespins, and all the +simpler tricks of housework, to say nothing of an elementary knowledge +of English, which they usually acquire in a month; and we pay this kind +a couple of dollars a week, and they wash the clothes, take care of the +furnace, and mow the lawn with great pleasure. They usually stay a year +or so and then they go to Mrs. Singer's finishing school. They do not go +because they are discontented, but because she offers them five dollars +a week, which is a pretty fair-sized chunk of the earth to a young +Swedish girl just learning to do a few loops and spirals in English and +saving up the steamer fare to bring her sister over.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Singer takes our nice, green, young hired girls, who are willing to +do anything up to the capacity of a stout back, and she tries to make +servants out of them.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> She gives them embroidered aprons and caps and +makes them keep house her way. And after they have spent a couple of +months making coffee to suit Mrs. Singer, and going over the mahogany to +suit Mrs. Singer, and arranging the magazines on the table to suit Mrs. +Singer, and taking up the breakfast to Miss Sally to suit Mrs. Singer, +and going over the back hall again to suit Mrs. Singer, and keeping +their mouths closed tightly all day to suit Mrs. Singer, and only going +out on Thursday afternoons to suit Mrs. Singer, they sort of get tired +of the job, and one after another they stop Mrs. Singer at a favorable +moment and say these fatal words:</p> + +<p>"Aye gass aye ent stay eny longer."</p> + +<p>Then some Homeburg family joyfully seizes on the deserter, and Mrs. +Singer starts out all over again on the job of making a servant out of a +hired girl.</p> + +<p>I have to admire the woman for her eternal grit. She won't give up for +a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> minute. She is going to run her house just so if she has to train up +a million girls and lose them all. Half the time she has to do her own +work, but I'll bet that when she has the luncheon ready she puts her +little white lace napkin on her hair and comes in and announces it to +herself in the proper style; and I'll bet, too, that she doesn't talk to +herself while she is working in the kitchen, either. She says the way +Homeburg women talk to their servants is disgraceful; that it lowers a +servant's respect for her mistress. I'd give a lot to see Mrs. Singer +looking at herself coldly in the glass after breakfast and giving +herself orders for the day in a tone that would brook no familiarity +whatever.</p> + +<p>Our women-folks, who are familiar with the Singer residence, say that it +is a beautiful thing full of monogrammed linen and embroidered towels +and curtains that have to be washed as often as a white shirt, and that +whenever they call they are pretty<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> sure to find Mrs. Singer trying to +teach some new and slightly dizzy second girl how to take care of the +house without breaking off the edges.</p> + +<p>You observe the fluency and ease with which I say "second girl." We all +do in Homeburg. We're used to talking about second girls since Mrs. +Singer has tried to keep one. As far as her experience has taught us, we +are firmly convinced that having a second girl is like having mumps on +the other side too. When Mrs. Singer isn't busy trying to teach her cook +how to run the oven and the plate heater and serve the soup all at the +same time, she is attempting to give a new second girl some inkling of +the general ideas of her duties. Trouble is most of them are ten-second +girls. They listen to the program in the Singer household and then they +sprint for safety to some family where they will work twice as hard, but +will give three times as much satisfaction. Then Mrs. Singer arms<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> +herself with the dust rag and clear-starch bowl, and subs on the job +until she finds a new second girl—after which the cook gives up her job +with a loud report, and Mr. Singer stays down-town for dinner at the +Delmonico Hotel until the Singer house management is staved off the +rocks again.</p> + +<p>We feel sorry for the Singers and invite them out a good deal while they +are hunting cooks. And they pay us back royally as soon as the household +staff is fully recruited once more. We eat strange but delicious dishes +made by a reluctant and mystified girl, plus Mrs. Singer's +persuasiveness and will power; and said girl, still reluctant, and +scared into the bargain, serves the dinner with a lace-edged apron and a +napkin on her hair, Mrs. Singer egging her in loud whispers like the +prompter in grand opera. Steering a green cook through a dinner party, +and keeping up a merry conversation at the same time, calls for about as +much social skill as anything<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> I know of. I myself stand in awe of Mrs. +Singer.</p> + +<p>As for the rest of us—we have no servant problem, having no servants. +And about the only hired girl problem we have is the following: "Shall +the girl eat with the family or in the kitchen?" Mrs. Singer wished that +on us. Ten years ago there was no question at all. The girl ate with the +family, and waited on the table when something was needed which couldn't +be reached. Then Mrs. Singer came to town and made her eat in the +kitchen, since which time the question has raged with more or less fury +and the whole town has chosen up sides on it. Half of us want the girl +to eat in the kitchen, and the other half are invincibly democratic and +have her at the table.</p> + +<p>As for the girls, they are divided too. Half of the girls who come to +see about places ask us: "Do I have to eat in the kitchen?" and the +other half ask: "Do<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> I have to eat with the family?" And of course it's +just our luck that the people who wish to dine by themselves never can +find girls who prefer the kitchen, and the people who insist on +associating with their help usually lose them because said help has been +spoiled somewhere else by being allowed to eat in the kitchen, far from +the domestic squabbles and the children with the implacable appetite for +spread bread.</p> + +<p>But on the whole this problem doesn't bother us much, and our hired +girls are a great comfort. They usually stay with us until they are +married or retire from old age, and after they've been ten years in a +house they're pretty much one of the family. The Payleys' girl has been +with them sixteen years, as I said before, and when she wants to go to +the opera-house to an entertainment, Wert Payley makes young DeLancey +Payley take her. It's the only use he's found for DeLancey as yet. We +keep out of the kitchen after supper,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> unless too strongly pressed by +thirst, because usually from seven to ten some hardworking young Swedish +man sits bolt upright in a straight-backed chair, his head against the +wall, discussing romance and other subjects of interest with a scared, +resolute expression. Usually this goes on for about three years before +anything happens. Then the girl admits, with some hesitation, that she +is going to get married, and our wife or mother, as the case may be, +hustles around and helps make the trousseau and pick out the linen. The +wedding takes place in the parlor, and about a year later the young +Swedish-American citizen who arrives is named after whatever member of +our family is the most convenient as to sex.</p> + +<p>We never entirely lose a good hired girl in Homeburg. They pass us on to +their relatives when they are married, and come back to visit with great +faithfulness. In this topsy-turvy Eldorado of ours where a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> man +sometimes becomes rich before he really knows what anything larger than +five dollars looks like, many of our girls draw prizes in the shape of +good farmers and prosperous young merchants. But their heads aren't +turned by it. They come around in their new automobiles and take us out +riding, just as if we had money too. The wife of our mayor used to work +for us, and when the electric light gang stuck a light where it would +shine straight into our back porch, thus reducing the value of our house +105 per cent. as a place of employment for a nice, attractive girl in +summers, I stepped over to the mayor's office and asked him if he +remembered how he used to sit on that porch himself. He smiled once, +winked twice, and three minutes afterward four men were on their way to +relocate that pole.</p> + +<p>If I have any criticism of the hired girls in our town, it is because +they go to Europe too much. Now, of course, it's no worse<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> for a hired +girl to go to Europe for the summer than it is for any one else to +indulge themselves in that way. But that's the irritating part. Nobody +else goes. Outside of Mrs. Wert Payley and one or two school teachers, I +don't suppose any Homeburg people have crossed the Atlantic. But half a +dozen of our hired girls go every year. They leave late in the spring, +and during the hot weary summer their mistresses toil patiently along +keeping the job open if they can't find a substitute who will work for a +few months, for the girls who go to Europe are usually pearls of great +price and must be gotten back at all cost. I don't suppose anything is +harder on the temper than to work over a hot kitchen stove all day in +July, and then to sit down to supper, a damp and wilted mess of +weariness, and read a souvenir card from your hired girl, said card +depicting a cool and inviting Swedish meadow with snow-topped mountains +in the distance.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span></p> + +<p>Our girl has been to Europe three times. She has crossed on the +<i>Mauretania</i>, the old <i>Deutschland</i> and the new <i>Olympic</i>. Two years +from this summer she thinks she will try the <i>Imperator</i>. Often in the +evening she tells us of the wonders of these great vessels—of the +beauty of the sunset at sea, and of the smoke and noise and majesty of +London. I suppose it indicates a jealous disposition, but it makes me +mad sometimes to think that it takes practically all the money I can +earn, working steadily and with two weeks off per year, to send that +girl abroad.</p> + +<p>Of course I don't mean it just that way. She doesn't get all of it. In +fact she gets three dollars a week of it. Out of this she saves about +three dollars and twenty-five cents because sometimes she gets a dollar +extra for doing the washing. And when she goes to Europe for the summer +on the same ship with the Astors and the Vanderbilts, it sounds more +magnificent than it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> really is. She is on the same ship, but about +eleven decks down, in a corner of the steerage close to the stern, where +the smells are rich and undisturbed. And she doesn't visit ruins and art +galleries in Europe, but a huge circle of loving relatives, who pass her +around from farm to farm for months, while she does amateur business +agent work for the steamship lines, talking up the wonders of America +and—allow me to blush—the saintliness of her employers, and coming +blithely back home in the fall with three or four old childhood chums +for roommates.</p> + +<p>Just the same, I envy our girls. I wish I could go to Europe in the +steerage, not being able to go any other way.</p> + +<p>It's a fortunate thing for us that our hired girls do go back home and +proselyte for America, or else we would soon be jam up against the real +thing in help problems. If, for any reason, the Swedish nation should +cease contributing to Homeburg,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> we should have to do our own work. I +often wonder at the things our American girls will do rather than to go +on the fighting deck as commander of some one else's kitchen. +Twenty-five of our girls go up to Paynesville every morning at six on +the interurban and make cores in the rolling mills there all day. +Carfare and board deducted, they get less than a good hired girl—and +they don't go to Europe for the summers and never by any chance marry +some rising young farmer who has made the first payment on a quarter +section. Several of our middle-aged young ladies sew for a dollar a day +and keep house by themselves. And there's Mary Smith, who has been a +town problem. She's thirty-five and an orphan. She lives in a house +about as large as a piano box and tries to scare away the wolf by +selling flavoring extracts and taking orders for books. She's never more +than two meals ahead of an embarrassing appetite. Every fall we dig<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> +down and buy her winter coal, and she hasn't bought any clothes for ten +years. Some one gives her an ex-dress and Mary does her best to make it +over, but she never looks much more enticing than a scarecrow in the +result.</p> + +<p>Mary's hands are red with chilblains in the winter, and the poorhouse +yawns for her. But will she take a place as hired girl? Not she. Mary +has her pride. She'll sell you things you don't want, which is as near +begging as graft is to politics, and she'll wear second-hand clothes and +take home cold bread pudding from the hotel—but she will not be a hired +girl and go to Europe in the summer and marry into an automobile. Once +she did consent to become Mrs. Singer's second girl. Mrs. Singer was +desperate, and after a long defense Mary consented on condition that she +be called the "up-stairs maid." But she only lasted three days. Mary +could have drawn five dollars a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> week and Mrs. Singer's clothes, which +would have fitted her. But Mary couldn't take orders—not that kind. She +came back to take orders from us for a patent glass washtub or something +of the kind—and we sighed wearily.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<h3>HOMEBURG'S LEISURE CLASS</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>It is not as large as New York's but it is twice as ingenious</i></p> + +<p>Confound it, Jim, I wish you hadn't told me that your friend Williston +never worked a day in his life! You don't know how it disappointed me.</p> + +<p>Why? Because I don't know when I have met a man whom I liked so much at +first sight as I did Williston. He suited me from the ground up. I never +spent a more interesting afternoon with any one. No matter what he did, +he interested me—I enjoyed watching him handle his cigar as well as I +did hearing him tell about his Amazon adventures. Says I to myself:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> +"Here is a man whose friendship I will win if I have to live in New York +all my life to get it." And then you had to go and spoil it all.</p> + +<p>Oh, yes, I know it's just my backwoods way of looking at things. I'm not +saying what I do as a boast. I'm making a confession of it. I know why +Williston doesn't work. It's because he owns a piano box full of bonds +left by his late lamented pa, and when he was educated, the word "work" +was crossed out of his spelling-book in red ink. And I'm not saying that +he isn't a fine fellow. He's intelligent and witty and companionable and +forty other desirable things. But he won't work. Somehow that sticks in +my vision of him. It reminds me of the case of Mamie Gastit, who was the +prettiest, best-dispositioned, and most capable girl in Homeburg, but +who had a glass eye. We didn't hold it up against her, but it made us +awfully sad. There were plenty of Homeburg girls who would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> have been +decorated by a glass eye. Why did Providence have to wish it on the +finest girl in town?</p> + +<p>You say it is no crime not to work in New York? Bless you, I know it. In +fact, loafing in New York is the most fascinating business in the world. +Why, it seems as if you New York men actually struggle to get spare +time. I've sat in your office and watched you on Saturday morning +working yourself into a blue haze in your efforts to get done early +enough to cord up a fine big mess of leisure on Saturday afternoon. +That's the difference between New York and Homeburg. In Homeburg you +would have been stretching out your job to last until supper +time—unless you were one of our nineteen golfers, or the roads were +good enough to let you drive over to the baseball game at Paynesville.</p> + +<p>Leisure in New York means pleasure, excitement, and seven dozen kinds of +interest. But for many and many a long<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> year in hundreds of Homeburg +homes, leisure has meant waiting for meal times—and not much of +anything else.</p> + +<p>City people laugh at country people for beating the chickens to roost. +But what are you going to do when going to bed is the most fascinating +diversion available after supper? I've noticed that as fast as a small +town man discovers something else to do in the evening, his light bill +goes up and up. When crokinole was introduced into Homeburg twenty odd +years ago, the kerosene wagon had to make an extra mid-week trip. When +the magazines came down from thirty-five cents to ten and you could get +three of them and a set of books for one dollar down and a dollar a +month until death did you part, they had to put an operator in the +telephone exchange after 8 <span class="smcap">p.m.</span> because of the general sleeplessness. +When the automobile came, and when two moving picture theaters, a +Chautauqua, and a Lyceum<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> course opened fire in one year, and the +business men fitted up a club with an ancient pool table in it, Homeburg +got chummy with all the evening hours, and kicked so hard about the +electric lights going off at midnight that the company had to run them +an hour longer. And I suppose if any invader ever puts in an all-night +restaurant where you can have lobster and a soubrette on the table at +the same time, a certain proportion of us will get as foolish as you are +and will forget how to go to bed at all by artificial light.</p> + +<p>We've changed that much from the past generation. We know what to do +with leisure in the evening. But we're still awkward and embarrassed +when we meet it by daylight. Since we have built our Country Club, a few +of us have learned to enjoy ourselves in a fitful and guilty fashion +late in the afternoon. But as a rule, even to-day, when you give a +Home<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span>burg man a bright golden daylight hour of leisure, he has no more +use for it than he would have for a five-ton white elephant with an +appetite for ice-cream. And that, Jim, is why I can't speed myself up to +appreciate a young man who has never worked and never intends to. I +still have to look at him with my Homeburg eyes. And in Homeburg, when a +man doesn't work when he has a chance and takes what amusement we have +to offer as a steady diet in perfect content, we know something is the +matter with him—and we are sorry for him.</p> + +<p>Leisure has killed more people in Homeburg than work ever did. For years +our biggest problem was the job of keeping our retired farmers alive. +When a farmer has worked forty years or so, and has accumulated a +quarter section of land, and a few children who need high school +education, he rents his farm and moves into town, where he lives +comfortably on eighty<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> dollars a month and fills a tasty tomb in a very +few years. It isn't so hard on the farmer's wife, because she takes her +housework into town with her and keeps busy. But when the farmer has +settled down in town, far from a chance to work, he discovers that he +has about fourteen hours of leisure each day on his hands and nothing to +do with them but to eat. Out of regard for his digestion he can't eat +more than three hours a day. That leaves him eleven hours in which to go +down-town for the mail and do the chores around the house.</p> + +<p>He stands it pretty well the first year. The second year is so long that +he begins to lay plans for his centennial, and about the third year he +takes to his bed and dies, with a sigh of relief. That's what leisure +does to a Homeburg man who isn't used to it. And that is one of the +reasons why, when I see a man in New York with nothing to do from +choice, I think of the sad<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> army of the unemployed in Homeburg draping +themselves around the grain office every day in fine weather, and +wearing away the weary years in idleness because they are too old to +work, and don't have to, anyway.</p> + +<p>Of late years we have been working earnestly to conserve our retired +farmers. They are fine men, and we hate to see them wasted. We have been +trying to reduce their leisure—just as a city man tries to reduce his +flesh. We elect them to everything possible. We have taught a number of +them how to play pool in the Commercial Club. We have started a farmers' +elevator, a farmers' bank and a planter factory, and have got them to +invest money. That has been a godsend, because it has kept a large +number of them busy and happy trying to save the said money. But where +we have saved one retired farmer, the automobile has saved ten. Whenever +one of our unemployed comes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> out with a machine, we sigh with relief and +stop worrying about him. It's just the same as if he had been given +wings and a world to explore. In summer, our retired farmers who have +autos loaf around the country from Indiana to Idaho and talk crops in +the garages of a thousand towns. And in winter they rebuild their cars, +and talk good roads. Twenty years ago you could talk good roads to a +farmer or bang him with a club, with the same result. But last year our +retired farmers organized a good roads association, and to amuse +themselves they have dragged the roads for miles around and have built a +mile of rock road leading south to the cemetery—where in the old April +days, as Henry Snyder says, the deceased was buried once, but the +mourners got buried twice—going out and coming back.</p> + +<p>We have a real leisure class in Homeburg, however, outside of the +retired farmers, who really can't help themselves.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> Our genuine +metropolitan leisure class consists of DeLancey Payley and Gibb Ogle. +They are, as far as I know, the only two people in Homeburg who loaf +from choice year in and year out in perfect content. We have done our +best with both of them, but we have given up. Leisure is what they were +created for. It is a talent with them, and their only talent. They have +developed it to the best of their ability.</p> + +<p>DeLancey's is the saddest case, because so much money was wasted on him. +Wert Payley is the richest man in our part of the country. He owns a +bank and one or two counties out West. He sent DeLancey East to school, +where he was educated regardless of expense or anything else and was +returned a few years ago a finished product, sublime, though a little +terrifying to look at, and reeking with knowledge of one kind or +another. I have heard it said that DeLancey can tell offhand what has +been the correct thing in dress for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> each of the last thirty-five years, +and that he can handle as many as fifteen articles of cutlery and +forkery at a dinner table with absolute accuracy.</p> + +<p>DeLancey has been at home almost ten years now, and his chief mission +has been to ornament Homeburg and add to its elegance on state +occasions. His father had designed him for a captain of finance, and +when he first came home DeLancey was put in the bank in order that he +might work up by degrees into the bond business or some other auriferous +form of toil. Wert Payley almost had nervous prostration from overwork +that year, and in the end he had to give up. He couldn't carry his own +load and make DeLancey work too. It was too much. No human being should +be asked to do it. Wert often says that if he had had nothing else to do +he could have kept DeLancey at work at least part of the time, but that +he was too old to shoulder the task on top<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> of his other duties. So +DeLancey left the bank, except as an enthusiastic check casher, and took +up his life work—I mean that, of course, figuratively. I mean his life +occupation—hang it, that won't do either! He took up his mission—the +work for which his ardent young soul was fitted. He began to specialize +in leisure.</p> + +<p>For close to nine years DeLancey has loafed. It is a miracle to us. We +can't understand his endurance. Yet he thrives on it. Wert Payley has +given up trying to make him work, but he has taken what he considers to +be an awful revenge. He has refused to spend one cent for carfare. +DeLancey can hang around Homeburg until he dies, but if he wants to +leave, he must earn the money himself. And DeLancey hasn't been fifty +miles from Homeburg since he slipped the clutch out of his tired, +throbbing brain and let it rest, nine years ago.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p> + +<p>We have to admire his ingenuity. He kills time so scientifically. They +say it takes him two hours to do himself up in the morning after he gets +out of bed, and that he has almost as many beautifying tools as an +actress. He doesn't get down-town before ten. It takes him from fifteen +minutes to half an hour to buy his morning cigar. That is, he talks to +McMuggins, the druggist, as long as Mac will stand for it. Mac has a +regular schedule. If Delancey buys a ten-cent cigar, Mac will talk with +him fifteen minutes. If he buys a fifteen-cent cigar, he will talk half +an hour, if business isn't too brisk. Mac keeps a box of fifteen-cent +cigars especially for DeLancey, but he says it is an awful risk. If +DeLancey were to die on him, he couldn't sell those cigars in a hundred +years.</p> + +<p>The tellers at the bank are good for fifteen minutes or so after +DeLancey has bought his cigar; he strolls in and gossips<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> with them +until his father begins to snort ominously in his little railed-off pen +marked "President." Cooney Simpson, the tailor, likes DeLancey, and they +talk clothes for half an hour almost every morning. Then it's noon, and +this is his hardest problem, because every one goes to dinner at noon +except the Payleys and Singers, who have luncheon at one. If DeLancey +can find Sam Singer, he is all right. But Sam, who used to loaf +enthusiastically with him, has rosy ideas about Mabel Andrews now, and +he is working hard in his father's bank and on the farms. It was a +bitter day for DeLancey when Sam went to work. It almost shook his faith +in idleness. But he stood firm.</p> + +<p>Luncheon kills two hours for DeLancey, and then he goes up to the +Homeburg Commercial Club and shoots the pool balls around the table +until 4:30, waiting eagerly for some one to stop working and come to +play with him. Sometimes they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> come and sometimes they don't. If they +don't, he goes down to the hotel and talks with a traveling man. I often +see him in the lobby of the Delmonico, sitting in magnificent ease, +blowing large smoke rings and talking with an air of unconscious +grandeur to some eager-eyed drummer, who is delighted but mystified at +the ease with which he is breaking into the first families. DeLancey has +a quiet way of talking about the East and the great people thereof which +fools even us sometimes.</p> + +<p>DeLancey makes his toilet after dinner at night and that of course kills +an hour or more. Then he calls on Madeline Hicks, old Judge Hicks's +daughter, when she will let him. He has an idea he would like to marry +her, but while she likes him, they say she can't bring herself to marry +a man of leisure and have the whole town sorry for her. But he takes her +to all the parties, and about once a week his father<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> lets him have the +automobile, if the chauffeur doesn't want to use it. On other nights +DeLancey comes down-town and buys another cigar at the restaurant. It is +as good as a show to see DeLancey buy his evening cigar. You'd think he +was taking over a railroad, he chooses it with such care. The young +farmer boys and the workers in the factory come down-town at night and +loaf around the restaurants without any excuse. They have to kill the +time. But that would be too coarse work for DeLancey. He doesn't come +down-town to loaf—Oh, no! He has merely dropped in on his orbit. It +takes him half the evening to buy his cigar and smoke it, conversing as +he does so with a few selected citizens on the benefits of slim-cut +clothes and the origin of the pussy-cat hat.</p> + +<p>Sometimes DeLancey can abduct some busy young chap and make him play a +round of golf on week-day afternoons,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> but not often. That's the +difference between our clubs and yours. We have clubs, but we don't use +them. We wouldn't think of spending time there if we could spend it at +business. Nothing is lonelier on week days than our golf club, and one +of the chief duties of the caretaker at the Commercial Club is to dust +off the reading table. We have our clubs, and that is the main object. +We know that they are there, and that we could enjoy them if we wanted +to. Perhaps we do want to. But it's a hard art to learn. And, oh, how +patiently and earnestly DeLancey is trying to teach us! If it were any +one but he, we might learn faster. But he sort of figures as a horrible +example. It's like a battered and yellowed wreck advocating cigarettes, +or a bald-headed barber pushing his own hair tonic.</p> + +<p>Gibb Ogle, the other member of our leisure class, is a very different +kind of a bird. His art is more sublime than De<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span>Lancey's because he has +no one to support him. He has worked down to his present state from +nothing at all. He is a self-unmade man. With no resources, not even a +loving wife with a wash tub, he lives a life of perfect ease and +idleness. He doesn't even have to hunt for means of killing time, as +DeLancey does. Time with him dies a natural death. He is not implicated +in the sad event in any way. All he does is to watch its demise. He +watches whole hours pass away while leaning against the door-frame of +the Delmonico Hotel. Chet Frazier and Sim Bone got into an argument one +day, and to settle it they went over and took Gibb away from the +building. It didn't fall, and Sim won. Gibb has watched several thousand +hours expire while propping up the Q. B. & C. depot. He is the chief +spectator at every fire, runaway, dog fight and public event. He is a +movable landmark, as permanent as the Republican<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> flagpole in the city +park. I have never yet gone down-town in the morning without seeing Gibb +on the street. And very seldom have I gone home at night, even in the +howling blizzards of winter, without passing Gibb leaning against the +warm bright show window of the last open place of business, and waiting +with placid greediness for one final event of some kind to transpire +before going to his well-earned repose.</p> + +<p>Beside Gibb's leisure, DeLancey's is poor amateurish stuff. Gibb's total +income during the year would hardly exceed twenty-five dollars, and it +doesn't do him much good at that. When he gets any money, he eats it up +in the most determined and hasty fashion. I have seen him eat a dollar's +worth of ham sandwiches in an afternoon—because he had the dollar. What +he does between dollars is a town mystery. He doesn't beg. He is +believed by some to absorb sustenance<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> from the air, like a plant. But I +happen to know that he absorbs a good deal of sustenance from the +Delmonico Hotel. He has attached himself to this hotel as a sort of +retainer, and through all its changes of ownership he has hung on. He +will not work, but he gives the place his moral support and speaks +highly of it to all comers. He will even carry a satchel across to the +depot, but only as an accommodation to the hotel. In return he asks +nothing and thus saves his proud spirit from the insult of a refusal. +But I think he has first pick of the scattered remains of the dinners +that leave the kitchen door whenever the cook is good-natured.</p> + +<p>I say I think so, because few of us have seen Gibb Ogle eat. He has a +pride, and performs this humiliating act in secret. But grocers tell me +that he is always offering to dispose of broken-up crackers, stale +cheese and old mackerel. "I'll just carry that out for you," he says. +And they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> understand and let him do it. One night as he hurried past me, +a package dropped from under his coat and broke at my feet. It was +food—dry bread and a bologna skin with a little meat in the end. He +stopped and told me how hard it was to find food for a dog in which he +was interested. But that was a fib. With all his faults Gibb never +maintained a dog in idleness.</p> + +<p>In summers Gibb leads a care-free, happy life, sunning himself all day +and sleeping comfortably at night in any one of a dozen places. He is +our village grasshopper, taking no thought of the chill future. How he +lives through our fierce winters is a mystery. He sleeps in barns. He +sleeps on the coal in the electric light power house. If the clerk at +the hotel happens to be a friend of his, he curls up in a chair in the +lobby. Sometimes all of these fail him. I have heard that he spent one +winter in an empty room over a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> store, and thawed out his toes on +several mornings. We are always afraid some crackling January dawn will +find Gibb frozen hard on the streets, and it is a relief when spring +comes and he begins to fatten up a little and drink in sunshine again.</p> + +<p>We'd like to send Gibb to the county home. Some of us are even willing +to contribute to his support, scandalous as it would be. But it is hard +to do, because Gibb is no pauper. He is a gentleman of leisure with the +dignity of an Indian. His worn suits are neat, and he is as dapper with +a battered hat and a four-year-old celluloid collar as if he spent real +money on his wardrobe. He chooses his life and lives it without +complaint. Periodically we strive heroically to make him work. The boys +at the planter factory, who are a rough lot but have some hold on Gibb +because they entertain him out of their lunch boxes, kidnap him about +twice a year and drag him in to the superintend<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span>ent to get a job for +him. Gibb protests frantically that he has business which can't be +neglected—that he is just closing a deal for a good position at the +hotel—that he is going away on a trip—but nothing helps him. He +accepts the job with ill-concealed horror, and the factory boys climb up +on the roof of the main building and hoist a flag. We all know what it +means. Gibb is working again. And we all know what will happen next.</p> + +<p>About two days later Gibb will be limping to the factory very late with +his off-foot done up in an enormous comforter. "That's what you have +done, boys," he will say with simple dignity, "you've hurt that old sore +foot of mine. It's never been right since I hurt it with the fire +company. It's in awful shape now. I guess I'll lose it at last. You +oughtn't to have done it, boys. Goodness knows, I'd have worked all +these years if I'd had any foot to speak of."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span></p> + +<p>Then he goes in and resigns—after which the foot recovers in great +haste, and Gibb stands on it relentlessly twelve hours a day in the old +way, while he watches the world go round and waits for the judgment day.</p> + +<p>You'd think from the way we hammer at both DeLancey and Gibb to go to +work that they would hang together, being in the same class. But they +don't. In fact they have the greatest contempt for each other. DeLancey +will not speak to Gibb, and thinks it is a crime that he isn't sent to +the stone pile; while Gibb speaks of DeLancey in pitying accents as a +young man who ought to know better than to waste his time herding a +little white pill into a hole in a cow pasture. Gibb is very severe on +the frivolities of the prosperous. He can't bear to see them frittering +away their time.</p> + +<p>That's our leisure class in Homeburg, and it isn't growing. If it was +we'd be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> worried, and the Commercial Club would hold meetings about it. +And I'm just telling you these things so that you'll see why I am so +warped and foolish regarding Williston; it's just my small town +ignorance—My, I wish that chap would get a job!</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<h3>HOMEBURG'S WORST ENEMY</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>How Old Man Opportunity Stands Outside the Town and Beckons to her Greatest Men</i></p> + +<p>You don't say, Jim! Gosh, let me look! Where? Behind the big fellow in +the two-gallon plug hat? There—I see him! Yes, sir! It's he! I could +tell him anywhere. Do you suppose we could get up nearer? What, go up in +the elevator with him? Say, I haven't the nerve. No, I don't want—This +is close enough—Why, there isn't even a crowd! You mean to say he comes +down here just like this right along? Do you see him often?</p> + +<p>Why, when I go home and tell the boys<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> I watched Teddy Roosevelt go down +the street common as dirt and could have gone up in the same elevator +with him, they'll want me to give a lecture in the Woodmen Hall. It +certainly beats all what you can see in New York for nothing.</p> + +<p>That's where you have all the luck, Jim—you big city folks. You keep +your interesting people at home; there's nowhere bigger for them to go. +No matter how famous or successful they are, they have to stick around +and mingle unless they get Europitis of the intellect. When you grow up +with a chum in New York and he discovers a talent that has been kicking +around in his garret ever since he was born, you don't lose him. He just +stays at home and grows up to fit the town. But when I want to see my +old Homeburg playmates who have succeeded, I have to go to New York or +Chicago or San Francisco, or some other big place where old Opportunity +keeps a wrecking<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> crew busy all the time beating in doors. Opportunity +doesn't come into a small town and knock. He stands outside and beckons.</p> + +<p>Life in Homeburg is one long bereavement because of this fact. Seems as +if the world was always looking Homeburg men over, the way a housewife +looks over an asparagus patch, and yanking out the ones who stick up a +little higher than the rest. We don't worry about the good who die young +in Homeburg; but the interesting who go early and forget to come back +make us sad and sore. No sooner does a Homeburg man begin to broaden out +and get successful and to hoist the town upward as he climbs himself, +than we begin to grieve. We know what is coming. Presently he will go +down to the <i>Democrat</i> office and insert a notice, advertising for sale +a seven-room house with gas and water, good cistern, orchard with +bearing trees, good barn and milch cow, cement<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> walks and watertight +cellar. And he will sell that place at a sacrifice, which he can well +afford, and go off to the city, where he will learn to wear a fur-lined +coat, kick about the financial legislation and visit us on Christmas Day +once per decade.</p> + +<p>I sometimes wonder what Homeburg would be like if all her bright boys +and girls should come back. Don't suppose the town could hold them at +all. It would be stretched out of shape in a week. But it would be a +glorious place to live in, and wouldn't we shine in art and music and +politics and finance—to say nothing of baseball! Suppose we had Forrest +Brady back home, catching for the Homeburg team! He gets seven thousand +dollars a year from Boston now; but I remember when he helped put dents +in Paynesville baseball pride for nothing, and would pay some youngster +a quarter to hustle baggage at the depot in his absence. And suppose the +Congregational choir still had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> Mary Saunders! Why, we could charge a +dollar a seat for ordinary services, and people would come down from +Chicago to attend! When I think what she gets for one concert now, and +then think how long the Ladies' Aid Society has been working to paint +the church and haven't made it yet, it makes me wish we could put +Homeburg on wheels and haul it after some of our distinguished children. +And what if we had Alex McQuinn to write up the <i>Democrat</i> again? Every +month we almost ruin ourselves at home buying all the magazines he +writes for; but when he was a fat young thing in spectacles hunting +locals and trying to write funny things for the <i>Democrat</i>, he wasn't +appreciated at all. Old Judge Hicks, who had no sense of humor, chased +him several miles once for telling how he tried to stop the 4:11 train +by yelling "Whoa" at it. And Editor Ayers had to fire Alex to keep the +peace.</p> + +<p>When Rollin Derby, who draws pic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span>tures for your New York paper, went to +school, he could climb a tree by digging his bare toes into the rough +bark, but was not otherwise distinguished. When Maurice Gadby was a boy +in Homeburg, he went barefooted in summer with the rest of us, and who +could have guessed that he would grow up to give tango teas for your +four hundred and only allow the better quality of them to pay him +twenty-five dollars per cup at that? But the career that amuses me most +is Jack Nixon—"Shinner" Nixon, we used to call him. He commands a +battleship for a living now; and Homeburg is exactly seven miles from +the nearest stream that is navigable by a duck. We used to walk out to +that stream Saturday mornings, spend four hours building a dam and then +swim painfully on our elbows and knees in the puddle we had made until +dark, but Shinner wouldn't go in. He was a regular young Goethals when +it came to dam building,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> but he abhorred water, especially behind the +ears.</p> + +<p>Back of my generation the batting average was just about as good. It +seemed to have been the fashion of Homeburg boys of thirty years ago to +go out and run Nebraska politically. Two governors and a representative +have come from our town. If we had them here now, we wouldn't have to +fight so desperately to get a county surveyor or coroner on the ticket +every four years. Samuel P. Wiggins, who now lives in a stone hut +covering an acre in Chicago and owns a flock of flour mills, was once +Sam Wiggins, who bought grain in our town and married the daughter of +one of our most reliable washerwomen. She comes back occasionally now, +and we can't see but that she's as nice as she used to be when she +hauled our family wash home in a little wagon every Saturday night. +Being rich hasn't hurt her at all, though it has spoiled her figure<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> +beyond the utmost and most heartrending efforts of her clothes to +conceal.</p> + +<p>Then there's Mrs. Maysworth. When she comes down from Chicago for a +visit, the old town fairly hums for a month. We pick up our interest in +art and woman's suffrage and cheap trips to Europe and Dante's +<i>Inferno</i>; the Shakespeare Club is revived, the bookstore sells its copy +of Browning, and the tone of the afternoon teas goes up about two +hundred per cent. Mrs. Maysworth was the ruling spirit of a little bunch +of prosperous Homeburg people who lived at the end of Milk Street—we +used to call it the cream end of Milk Street. When they were with us, +Homeburg was called the Athens of the Steenth Congressional District. We +heard singers and lecturers, who jumped towns of fifty thousand on +either side of us. We had state presidents of Women's Federations and +Church Societies. We had a free library before Mr. Carnegie had a bank<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> +account. North Milk Street established it, and every Saturday afternoon +the muddy feet of the tough south side kids scuffled over Mrs. +Maysworth's hardwood floors, the first west of Chicago, while their +owners drew out books, the said library being located in an extinct +conservatory, which protruded from the house like a large wart.</p> + +<p>Homeburg was a Mecca of learning and refinement in those days; and then +six of these families pulled out in the same year and moved to Chicago, +where they could soak up a little more culture instead of giving away +all they had. They left a chasm in our midst as big as the Grand Canyon. +It never has been filled—for me at least. I feel, when I wander up that +fine old shady street, past those houses filled with people who are only +as wise as I am, as if I were wandering through the deserted haunts of +an ancient and irreplaceable civilization.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span></p> + +<p>That's the way it goes with us—one bereavement after another. It's +mighty hard to be a mother of sons in Homeburg. I worked in the +post-office for a year once—handed out mail—and I got to know just +exactly what most of the mothers in town wanted. I could please them +with a new magazine and mystify them with a circular or a business +letter. But if I wanted to light them up until they took the shadows out +of the corners as they went out, I would give them a letter from a son, +way off somewhere, making good. The best of them didn't write any too +often. Once a week is pretty regular, I suppose, from the other end; but +you should see the mother begin to come in hungry again the second day +after her letter came. And when a boy came home successful and +prosperous, and his proud mother towed him down Main Street on pretense +of getting him to carry a spool of thread home for her, it used to go +to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> my heart to see the wistful looks of her women friends. There is +hardly a family in Homeburg of the right age which hasn't a grown-up son +off at war somewhere—fighting failure. It's grand when they win; but I +hate to think of some of our boys who haven't come back.</p> + +<p>If it's hard on the mothers, it's even harder on the Homeburg girls. +They say there are one hundred thousand old maids in Massachusetts. I'll +bet that's just about the number of Massachusetts young men who have +gone West or somewhere, and haven't remembered the things they said at +parting as well as the girls did. We've got plenty of girls in Homeburg +who are getting intimately acquainted with the thirties—fine girls, +still pretty, bright, and keeping up with the world. Young men come into +town and do their best to get on a "thou-beside-me" footing, but somehow +the girls don't seem to marry. At the root of almost every case<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> there's +an old Homeburg boy. Maybe he's making good somewhere, and they're both +waiting until he does. Maybe he isn't making good and is too proud to +ask her to wait. Maybe she's waiting alone—because some other girl was +handier in the new place. And maybe it wasn't a case of wait at all, +only the boy who went away looked better to some Homeburg girl than any +of those who stayed at home. That was the case with Sam Flanburg and +Minnie Briggs a few years ago.</p> + +<p>Sam is on the Chicago Board of Trade and is one of our old-time boys. +Two years ago he came back, roaringly prosperous, to visit for the first +time since he had left, and pretty suddenly he discovered to his +amazement that on packing up ten years before he'd left a pearl of great +price behind, said pearl being Minnie. In other words he fell in love +over his ears with her, and Minnie, who was one of our very nicest +girls, with a disposition like<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> triple distilled extract of charity, +treated him like a dog. He stayed around for a month cluttering up the +Briggs's front porch day and night, while Minnie put up an imitation of +haughty indifference and careless frivolity which was as good as a show +for every one in town except Sam, who couldn't see through it. That's +one of our small town assets—you get to look on at most of the love +affairs. We watched Minnie and Sam with our hearts in our mouths for +fear she'd carry it too far and lose him, for every one had it straight +from Mary Askinson, who is intimately acquainted with a close friend of +Minnie's old school chum, that Minnie had been in love with Sam since +they graduated from the high school together. It was all we could do +from breaking in and interfering, especially when Sam went off his feed +and began to throw out ugly talk about going to the Philippines or some +place where fever can be gotten cheap. But one morn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span>ing Sam came +down-town, and the first man who saw his face called up his wife and +told her the good news. Talk about extra editions for distributing news! +Before a city paper could have gotten an extra on the street, five +intimate friends of Minnie's had dropped in casually to see her, and +when they saw her face, of course they fell on her neck. Sam told Chet +Frazier next day that it made him so mad to think he'd lived twenty +years in the same town with Minnie and had never appreciated his +blessings that he felt like climbing Pikes Peak and kicking himself off.</p> + +<p>There's Mary Smith. She's our prize old maid and dresses like a mail +sack full of government seeds, but they say she was the prettiest girl +in Homeburg when young Cyrus McCord went to Chicago to carve out his +future so that he could come home and marry her. But Cyrus didn't carve +out his future. He married it in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span>stead, and Mary is almost fifty now, +living alone and getting peculiar, like so many of our lonely old folks +do.</p> + +<p>Taking it all around, you can't blame us for feeling a little bit +hostile to the big grabby towns which reach out like tax collectors +every year and take a tithe of our boy and girl crop—first choice too. +But of course we're enormously proud of our Homeburg people who go out +and help run the world, and we watch their careers like hawks. When +Chester Arnett was running for a state office out West, I'll bet twenty +Homeburg families subscribed for a Denver paper to read about him; and +when Deacon White was making his great plunges in Wall Street, Homeburg +looked at the financial page of the Chicago papers first and then read +the baseball. We're as happy over their success as if they were our +children—but it's always embarrassing for a little while when a +Homeburg man who has made good comes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> back to visit in the old town. +We're aching to rush up and wring his arm off, but we want to know how +he feels about it first. One or two experiences have made us gun-shy. We +can't forget Lyla Enbright, who moved away with her family years ago and +married a national bank or something of the kind in the East. She didn't +come home for ten years, but finally the father died and Lyla came back +to sell off some property. A lot of us had made mud pies with Lyla, and +while she hadn't shown any great genius in that or anything else, she +was jolly and we liked her, so we tried to rush up and greet her +rapturously.</p> + +<p>Those who didn't do it say it was one of the funniest things that ever +happened in Homeburg, but I couldn't see it at the time. I was one of +the rushers. Lyla waited until my outstretched hand was within reaching +distance, and then she pulled a lorgnette on me. Say, Jim, did<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> you ever +get right squarely in range of both barrels of an honest-for-God +lorgnette with about a thousand dollars worth of dry goods and a pinch +of brains behind it? If my turn ever comes to face a Gatling gun I hope +to march right up to it like a little man—but lorgnettes? No! Any +hostile army could lick Homeburg by aiming lorgnettes at it. I gave one +look at the thing and fell over myself in heaps getting away. I wouldn't +speak to Sim Bone for a week because he laughed. But after I had +recovered a little, I hunted up Chet Frazier in a hurry and told him +Lyla wanted to see him. By that I got even with Chet for about a dozen +practical jokes. When he got in range of that lorgnette, he said "Gosh!" +and actually ran. Then we survivors lined up and got some comfort out of +it, watching the rest get theirs.</p> + +<p>As I said, Lyla and one or two others who have brought home their +prosperous and expanded corporal beings, and noth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span>ing else to speak of, +have made us a little timid about greeting our successful Prods. We hang +around all ready for action, but we need encouragement. We wouldn't +speak first for a farm. We wait for some calloused gabbler to break the +ice. Gibb Ogle usually does it. Gibb would act as a reception committee +for the Angel Gabriel without a quiver. He's always on the street, +anyway, propping up some building or other, and he is always willing to +waddle up to a returned governor or financier or rising young business +man, and stick out his unwashed paw, while we hold our breath and wait +for the result.</p> + +<p>As a rule it's cheering. Our Homeburg boys don't fall down once in +twenty times. No matter who the visitor is, he grabs Ogle's hand and +yells: "Why, hello, Gibb, you fat old scoundrel, how's your sore foot?" +Then we crowd around and fight for the next turn, and go home and +hastily spread the news that So-and-so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> has come home big and prosperous +as all get-out, and not spoiled a bit.</p> + +<p>Sometimes they don't come back at all, of course, and nervy scouts who +look up the delinquents in their city offices come back with badly +frosted ears and spread the warning. But there are few of these. Even +President Banks of the great F. C. & L. Railroad System, who played on +the Homeburg baseball nine thirty-five years ago, will stop puzzling +over the financial situation long enough to give the glad hand to a +Homeburg man during office hours. Of course I don't mean that any one +from Homeburg can break in on him and pile his desk full of feet. You +have to be a thirty-third degree Homeburger from his standpoint; that +is, you or your father must have stolen apples with him—I belong to the +inner lodge. My father and President Banks ate a peck of peaches one +night in Frazier's orchard, between them, and got half way through the +pearly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> gates before they were yanked back by two doctors. That's why +Banks took me to lunch when I went to call on him last month. If the +Government would let him, he'd give me a pass home.</p> + +<p>I'll never forget the day when Banks came back to Homeburg. He hadn't +been back for thirty years and hadn't the slightest intention of coming +either, as he admitted afterward. But he was going through on his +special car, and old Number Eleven, which was hauling him, performed the +most intelligent act of its career. The engine broke down right at the +depot, and when Banks found he was in for an hour or two, he got out and +strolled down Main Street to see the town in which he had begun his +life.</p> + +<p>It was a most depressing occasion. No one who had ever come back had +changed as much as Banks. If he had worn a pigtail and talked Choctaw, +he couldn't have grown farther away. It wasn't his fault.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> He tried his +best. But he hadn't talked our language for years. He couldn't get down +near enough to converse. He passed most of his playmates without +remembering them, but when he saw Pash Wade's sign, he went in and shook +hands with him. About forty of us came in to trade and watched him do +it. It was pathetic. They stood there like strangers from different +lands, Banks trying to unbutton his huge, thick ulster of dignity, and +not succeeding, and Pash trying to say something that would interest +Banks—along the line of high finance of course—state of the country, +etc. They gave it up in a minute, and Banks went out. He found Pelty +Amthorne and shook hands with him. Pelty is pretty loquacious as a rule, +but he couldn't talk to Banks—not that Banks, anyway. He'd never seen +him before. He said "How-dy-do," and, "It's a long time since you were +here," and Banks said, "It is indeed. I hope you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> and your family are +well." And then Pelty oozed hastily back into the crowd with a relieved +air as if he had done his duty, and Banks looked bored and took out his +watch. But just then Sim Askinson came up all out of breath and burst +through the crowd.</p> + +<p>Sim is little and meek and has a hard time holding his own, even in our +peaceful world. But when he saw Banks, he snorted like a war horse and +grew up three inches.</p> + +<p>"Hello, Pudge, you old son-of-a-gun!" he said, with both hands in his +pockets.</p> + +<p>"Hello, Sim!" said Banks, sort of startled.</p> + +<p>"Where'd you come from?" demanded Sim, "and why ain't you come before? +You're a nice friendly cuss, you are. Sucked any turkey eggs lately?"</p> + +<p>"No, you knock-kneed dishwasher," said Banks as a grin began to edge its +way across his face. "Have you tried to sell any more toads for +bullfrogs?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p> + +<p>"No, nor I ain't fought out any bumble-bees' nest since the time you got +one up your pant leg and pretty near pounded yourself to death with a +ball bat," said Sim. "Can you still run as fast as the time Wert Payley +and I dared you to ride Malstead's bull?"</p> + +<p>"Where's Wert?" demanded Banks. They were shaking hands now, using all +four of them. "Say, I've got to see him and Wim. Horn. I've got to leave +in a few minutes."</p> + +<p>"Like fun you have," growled Sim, linking arms with Banks. "You seem to +think some one's chasing you. You're going to stay all night, that's +what you're going to do."</p> + +<p>"I am not," said Banks; "and I wouldn't stay with you, anyway. You had a +garter snake in the bed last time I slept with you. I've got to see some +more of the boys, though."</p> + +<p>"He thinks he's going away in a few<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> minutes," said Sim to Wert Payley, +who had heard his name and was now shaking hands with Banks. "Why, the +old fat snide, nobody wants to see him outside of Homeburg. He's going +to get a free supper to-night. Remember Sadie Warren?"</p> + +<p>"Remember!" shouted Banks. "What do you think I am?—Methuselah? I +remember more things than you ever heard of. Why, Sadie and I went +skating the night you couldn't find your fat horse and sleigh."</p> + +<p>"Ya-a-a—" yelled Payley, with a sudden shriek of laughter. "Never knew +who took your rig, did you, Sim?"</p> + +<p>"You—you—" said Sim, glaring at Banks. "You confounded horse thief, I +believe you took Sadie in my own sleigh."</p> + +<p>"Ain't he bright, Pudge," gasped Payley, "only took him thirty years to +catch on."</p> + +<p>"Well, Banksie," said Sim, "Sadie's been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> more particular about her +young men since that night. We've been married twenty-five years, and I +guess I'll let you come up and eat this evening, anyway. She lets me +bring most any old pelter home."</p> + +<p>"Gosh, boys, I can't."</p> + +<p>"Say, what are you? the porter on that varnished car down there?" +demanded Sim. "Won't they let you off a minute?"</p> + +<p>"Tell you what we'll do," said Pelty Amthorne. "We'll take you to band +practice to-night. Sim still runs it, but he won't let me play any +more."</p> + +<p>"I haven't touched a horn since I left Homeburg," laughed Banks. "But +I'd give ten dollars to see you and Wimble Horn blat away on those altos +again, with your eyes bulging out of your cheeks."</p> + +<p>"We'll get Wimble and we'll break up band practice if you'll stay over."</p> + +<p>"I—"</p> + +<p>"No, you don't," said Sim. "I won't have riff-raff loafing around my +band."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You won't, eh?" said Banks. "We'll show you. Come down to the car while +I send about forty telegrams, and then we'll fix you, Mister Askinson."</p> + +<p>Which they did that night, while most of the town looked on. The next +fall Banks came back and stayed three days, and his conduct and that of +his old companions in crime set an example to our younger generation +which didn't wear off for years. They went out orchard robbing in an +automobile, and Banks said he never realized before the wonder of modern +conveniences.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<h3>THE HOMEBURG WEEKLY DEMOCRAT</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>Which Swamps the Post-Office Every Friday</i></p> + +<p>No, Jim, as I have already said about thirty-four times this week, I +don't care for a paper. Don't buy one for me. I could read your New York +papers for twenty-four hours at a stretch, and at the end of the time I +would have to stop some good-natured looking chap and ask what the news +was. It's all there, I know, but I don't seem able to find it. Even the +Chicago baseball scores are hidden in the blamed things. Instead of +putting them first, the way they ought to, they stick them down at the +end of the page. As for the editorial pages, I might as well go to +Labrador and hunt for per<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span>sonal friends as to read them. If there's +anything that makes a stranger feel about ten thousand miles from home, +with the cars not running, it is to get into the editorial page of an +unknown newspaper and try to sit in with the family discussions. It +makes me feel like a man who has gotten into a reunion of the Old +Settlers' Association of Zanzibar by mistake.</p> + +<p>It's not much of a trick to go into a strange town and learn to navigate +from hotel to hotel, but it's a hopeless task to try to find your way +around a strange newspaper. Takes about two years to learn to read a +strange newspaper skilfully, anyway, and find your way through it +without banging into the want ads when you want to find the editorials, +and tripping over the poets' column when you are hunting for the crop +reports. You've been buying a paper every time you turned a corner for +the last week, Jim—you New Yorkers seem to have to have a paper<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> about +as often as a whale needs a new lungful of air—and I've taken a hasty +look at all of them, but when I get home I am going to ask my wife what +has happened in the U. S. while I've been away from Homeburg. Outside of +the eternal Mexican case, I don't seem to have discovered a thing.</p> + +<p>Mind you, I don't blame your papers for bearing down hard on the local +news. I suppose it's mighty interesting to you New Yorkers to learn +every morning just how much more money you owe on your new subway, and +whether or not the temperature of Mrs. Van Damexpense's second-best +Siberian wolf-hound is still rising. That's what newspapers are for—to +save you the trouble of stepping around and collecting the events of the +day from the back fence. But your papers don't bear down hard enough on +the Homeburg happenings, and that's why they don't suit me.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p> + +<p>I don't pretend that our Homeburg paper is the equal of yours in any +particular. The best I can say for it is that it's no worse than it was +ten years ago. It hasn't any three-story type, and you could read it for +years without discovering who was being divorced in San Francisco or +murdered in Chicago. People who depend on it don't know yet that war has +been declared in the Balkans, and they won't hear any more politics +until 1916. All week long I think as little about the paper as all this. +But somehow, when Thursday evening comes around, rain or shine, I step +over to the post-office, and if my paper isn't there, I wait a few +minutes, growing more impatient all the time, and then I drift over to +the door of the <i>Homeburg Weekly Democrat</i> office and join the silent +throng.</p> + +<p>Like as not I'll find twenty people there. We don't expect any wild +news. There will probably not be anything in the <i>Dem<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span>ocrat</i> when it +comes out, but we want to make sure of it. We don't want to go home +without the paper. We've read it for twenty years, and every week we +open it up and poke through its internals after a sensation that will +stand Homeburg on its ear and split the Methodist church from steeple to +pipe organ. We're as patient as fishers in the Seine, and the fact that +the world has never rocked when the <i>Democrat</i> did come out doesn't +discourage us any.</p> + +<p>We want our paper, and so we stand there and grumble. Now and then one +of us stumps up the narrow hallway to the second story where the +<i>Democrat</i> makes its lair, and looks on with an abused air while two +young lady compositors claw around the bottom of the boxes for enough +type to set the last items, and the foreman stuffs the forms of the last +two pages with old boiler plate, medicine ads and anything that will +fill. There isn't any reason<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> for the <i>Democrat</i> being late any more +than there is for the branch accommodation train, which got almost to +town on time once and stood beyond the crossing for twenty minutes +because her conductor forgot just when she was due and didn't want to +run in too soon. The <i>Democrat</i> is just late naturally. It's part of its +function to be late. Makes it more eagerly sought after. We talk with +the foreman and make nuisances of ourselves generally, and presently old +man Ayers, who runs the paper, waddles in with another item to be set. +The compositors set down their sticks with a jerk and say, "Oh, my +land!" and the foreman goes and puts the item on the case with that air +of patient resignation which is a little more irritating than a swift +kick; and then Chet Frazier, if he's hanging around, which he usually +is, speaks up:</p> + +<p>"For goodness' sakes, Ayers, let that item go and get to press," he +says. "Give<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> it to me and I'll read it aloud down-stairs, your whole +subscription list's down there waiting."</p> + +<p>But we have to wait just the same until the item is set up. Then the +foreman locks up the forms and bangs them on the face with his big +wooden plane, and he and the old man lug them out into the pressroom +while we all hold our breath—sometimes the form explodes on the way and +then we don't get the <i>Democrat</i> for three days.</p> + +<p>Pretty soon we hear the rattle-te-bang-te-clank-te-clicketty-clang of +the old press, and in five minutes more Editor Ayers comes out with an +armful of folded papers all fragrant with fresh black ink.</p> + +<p class="center"><a name="illus-0162-1.jpg" id="illus-0162-1.jpg"></a><img src="images/illus-0162-1.jpg" width='700' height='578' alt="She's out, boys, he says." /></p> + +<p class='center'>"She's out, boys," he says.</p> + +<p>"She's out, boys," he says. Then we grab copies and hurry to spread the +news of the birth of another <i>Democrat</i>. We open the sheet and look +carefully down the page where old man Ayers generally conceals his local +news. For a minute or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> two there is silence. Then somebody crams his +paper into his pocket. "Hmph, nothing in it," he says, and starts home.</p> + +<p>He's right, too. Outside of the fact that it has another week of old man +Ayers's laborious and worried life in it, it is mighty bare. There isn't +enough news in it to cause a thrill in a sewing circle. But after supper +at home, when we look it over more carefully and the first hot flush of +anticipation has worn off, we do find a lot of information. We find that +Miss Ollie Mingle has gone to Paynesville for a two days' visit (aha, +that Paynesville young man's folks are going to look her over), and that +Mrs. Ackley is visiting her daughter in Ogallala, Neb. (Unless Ackley +straightens up, we don't expect her back.) Wimble Horn is erecting a new +porch and painting his house. (He must have beaten the bucket shop for +once.) We also find that Jedson Bane's peaches are ripe and of the best +quality,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> which fact he has just proven to the editor's entire +satisfaction. And that old Mrs. Gastit is feeling very poorly, and Pete +Parson, while working on his automobile the other night, contributed a +forefinger to the cause of gasoline by poking around in the cogs while +the engine was running.</p> + +<p>All of this is news and interesting to us; so is the fact that Miss Ri +Hawkes is not teaching in the Snyder district school this week, because +of a sore toe. While this item does not jar the country quite so +extensively as it would if Miss Hawkes belonged to one of your leading +New York families, and was employing an eleven-thousand-dollar physician +to treat her for gout, it is just as important to Miss Hawkes. And there +you have the great keynote of our Homeburg journalism. In the eyes of +the <i>Democrat</i> we are all equal.</p> + +<p>There are not many of us Homeburgers. We will never see twenty-five +hundred<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> again, for as families grow smaller, most of the Illinois towns +like Homeburg are contracting slowly in size even while prosperous. The +<i>Democrat</i> hasn't above seven hundred subscribers, but every one of +those subscribers gets his name in the paper at least once a year, even +if it is only a general mention of his patriotism when he pays his +annual subscription. No baby born in Homeburg is too humble to get its +exact weight heralded to the world through the <i>Democrat</i>. Mrs. +Maloney's pneumonia and Banker Payley's quinsy grieve the town in the +same paragraph under the heading "Among our sick." The Widow Swanson's +ten-mile trip down the line to a neighboring town gets as careful +attention as Mrs. Singer's annual pilgrimage to California. In the +matter of news we are a pure democracy. The man who buys a new +automobile gets no more space than the member of Patrick McQuinn's +section crew who scores a clean<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> scoop by digging his potatoes one week +ahead of the town. And when the humblest of us lies down in death he +does it with the serene consciousness that he will get half a column, +anyway, with more if his disease is rare and interesting, and that at +the end of the article the city will sympathize with the family in its +bereavement. When Mrs. Agnew died of her broken hip she got a column, +though she had been financially unable to take the paper for years, +while in the same issue Jay Gould got a two-inch obituary in its boiler +plate inside.</p> + +<p>Your big papers pride themselves on their brevity, except in murder +cases, and I understand that almost every New York editor thinks he +could boil the story of the Creation down into less than the six hundred +words which the Bible wasted on it. But Editor Ayers could give all your +editors instructions in this kind of economy. If the Creation had +happened<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> around Homeburg while he was on the job, he would have called +attention to it the next week about as follows:</p> + +<p>"We understand there was a creation in these parts during the last week. +We did not learn the particulars but those who were on the ground at the +time say that it was a successful affair, and that the new world is +doing as well as could be expected under the circumstances."</p> + +<p>Ayers would write it this way for two reasons. In the first place he +hates to write more than one paragraph. Coming after a hard day's work +collecting bills and chasing subscribers, it is a wearing effort. +Nothing gets much space in the <i>Democrat</i> except obituaries and +marriages, and they are all contributed—the former by the relatives and +the latter by the minister. In the second place, there wouldn't be any +use of wasting a lot of space on a big item because by the time the +<i>Democrat</i> comes out, everybody knows all about<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> it, and the mere facts +would be stale and unimportant beside the superstructure of soaring +fancy which has been built up by the easy-running imaginations of our +chief news dispensers on the street corners. And so, when the creamery +burns down or the evening fast freight runs through an accommodation on +the crossing, the old man puts his duty off until the last minute and +then writes a few well-chosen lines merely to let us know that he is on +the job and lets no news escape him. When you are running a weekly +paper, your competitors in the news business are the talkers in the town +who mingle seven days a week and issue a hundred thrilling extras to +their fellow citizens before your press day comes around.</p> + +<p>Besides, as I have said, old man Ayers can't afford to waste much time +chasing news. He has to get a living for himself as well as for the +<i>Democrat</i>, and keeping both his family and the paper alive is a +dis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span>tinct feat performed weekly. His pay-roll for a foreman and two +girls must amount to over fifteen dollars a week, and that means cold +solid cash which must be wrung from a reluctant public. Seems to me I +never go into a store that I don't see old man Ayers trying to collect a +little cash on an advertising account or wheedling a subscriber into +coming out of the misty past and creeping cautiously down a few years +toward the present on his subscription account. If there is anything +which we can't do without and for which we positively object to paying +real money, it is our home newspaper. Sim Bone has a roaring shoe +business and pays cash for his automobiles, but he has often told me +that paying good paper money for advertising would be as wasteful as +eating it. He carries an ad in the <i>Democrat</i> all the year and changes +it about every six months. It's July now, and he is still advertising +bargains in overshoes—but he won't pay<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> any money. Ayers has to trade +the account out, as he has to do with every other advertiser in the +town.</p> + +<p>People pity the poor ministers' families who have to live on the +scrambled proceeds of donation parties, but an editor's family in our +parts has even harder luck. I have seen Ayers order two suits of clothes +from a clothier who owed him a big bill and was getting wabbly, and then +pass by the meat market empty-handed, because his advertising account +there was traded out. He told me once that he has taken disk-plows, +flaxseed, magazines, encyclopedias and a new back porch in trade for +advertising and subscriptions, but that he has been wearing an obsolete +pair of spectacles, to his great discomfort, for ten years, because our +local jeweler will not advertise. The doctors in town carry cards in the +paper and owe him large amounts because his family is too healthy to +catch up with them; but it will be two years before either<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> of our local +dentists accumulates a big enough bill to allow Mrs. Ayers to have some +very necessary construction and betterment work, as the railroad folks +say, done to her teeth.</p> + +<p>If it weren't for the patent medicine ads, Ayers tells me, he wouldn't +be able to keep afloat for want of ready cash. He says a patent medicine +may be an abomination before the Lord, but that a patent medicine +advertising agent looks to him like a very present help in time of +trouble. The agent comes in and beats him down until he agrees to +publish several hundred yards of notices next to pure reading matter on +all sides for fifteen dollars. But the fifteen dollars is cash—he +doesn't have to take the stuff in trade. And so we are forever running +into such thrilling headlines as, "Horrible Wreck," "Her escape was +simply marvelous," "Worse than the Titanic Disaster," in the +<i>Democrat's</i> local page. And then we exclaim:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> "Hurray! Real news at +last," and prowl eagerly down the items only to find that the horrible +wreck was a citizen of Swamp Hollow upon whom a wonderful cure was +effected; that "Her escape" was from inflammatory rheumatism by the aid +of Gettem's Dead Shot Specific, and that the Titanic Disaster is +eclipsed annually by the sad ends of thousands of people who neglect to +take Palaver's Punk Pills. It always makes us mad, but we can't kick. If +it weren't for the patent medicine people, we would have to pay for the +<i>Democrat</i> all by ourselves.</p> + +<p>They say that when Editor Ayers first came to Homeburg some forty years +ago he was a bright young man with a great rush of words from the pen, +and that he had a dapper air and was generally admired. The <i>Democrat</i> +contained about a page of solid editorial opinion each week on +everything, from the tariff to the duty of Russia, in whatever crisis +was then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> pending, and people swore by the paper and didn't make up +their opinions until they had read it. But times have changed. We don't +stand in awe of the <i>Democrat</i> any more. Most of us laugh at it, even +those of us who are not financiers enough to keep our subscriptions +called up. We call it the "Weekly Gimlet" and the "Poorly Democrat," and +we make bright remarks to old man Ayers when he asks us for news and +tell him that he ought to turn the paper inside out so that we can read +the boiler plate first and not have to wade through his stuff. But he +doesn't object. Time and toil and the worry of keeping cash enough on +hand to pay the expressman who dumps his ready prints on the floor each +Wednesday and refuses to budge until he has collected $3.24 have taken +the pepper out of him. He doesn't write editorials any more except on +the week following a national election, and they are affairs of duty +which always be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span>gin: "Another election has come and gone and the party +of Jackson—"</p> + +<p>He has made a living for forty years and has sent two sons through +college from the <i>Democrat</i>, and the effort has taken the fight out of +him. I never saw him resent a joke but once. That was when Pelty +Amthorne told him that his wife considered the <i>Democrat</i> to be the best +paper she had ever seen. He let Ayers burst a couple of buttons from his +vest in his swelling pride before he explained that the <i>Democrat</i>, when +cut in two, exactly fitted his wife's pantry shelves, and that she +didn't have to trim it a bit. The old man turned on his heel without a +word and that week he kindled his old-time fires and wrote the following +for the local page:</p> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<p>A citizen of Homeburg who hasn't done anything more exciting for twenty +years than stand off his grocery bill poked fun<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> at the <i>Democrat</i> last +week to our face because there wasn't any more news in it. News, say +we—News in Homeburg? News in a town where an ice-cream social is a +sensation and a dog fight suspends business for three hours? News in a +town where it takes a couple five years to work up a wedding and seven +kinds of wedding cake is the only news in it? Where the city marshal +hasn't made an arrest for two years because no one has done anything +after nine <span class="smcap">p.m.</span> except snore, and where they have to put up the lamps in +pairs to keep them from getting lonesome? We don't print news from +Homeburg because there isn't any, and the old rooster who joshed us +knows it. He's sore because we can't make half a column out of his trip +to Paynesville eight miles away last summer, but we'll promise to do +better. We'll dump the paste pot in the fire, throw the old shears out +of the window and get out a regular screamer of a <i>Democrat</i> some week; +a paper with red ink on it and big headlines and a real piece of news in +it. We will when this gabby old fossil does<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> his part. When he pays his +six years' subscription, we'll write two columns about it. And even then +no one will believe it.</p> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<p>Lafe Simpson, who runs the <i>Argus</i>, is a younger man than Ayers and more +ambitious. Oh, yes, we have two papers. In a town the size of Homeburg +you simply have to have two papers, because half of the people are +always mad at one paper. The <i>Argus</i> and <i>Democrat</i> trade subscription +lists about every seven years—not counting the hard-shell Democrats and +blown-in-the-bottle Republicans who have to stand by their papers +whether they get mad at them or not. I've been taking the <i>Democrat</i> for +about five years because Simpson got too busy in the school election one +year to suit me. It's pretty hard on me, because Simpson runs a better +paper; but my neighbor, Sim Askinson, likes the <i>Democrat</i> better and +can't take it because he took his whole<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> family to Chicago one week, and +Ayers overlooked the fact. So he borrows my <i>Democrat</i> every week and I +get his <i>Argus</i>, and thus both of us preserve our mad and our dignity +and get what we want just the same.</p> + +<p>If there's anything keener than the competition between two weekly +newspapers in a small town, I'd like to see it—but not feel it. It's a +searching sort of competition which seems to work its way into every +detail of the town's affairs. We town people are judged by our editors +according to our patronage. If a man gives two jobs of letterheads in +succession to the <i>Argus</i>, Ayers looks on him as a man who has stabbed +him in the back and has twisted the sword. If the Board of Education +spends $67 for commencement invitations with the <i>Democrat</i> one year and +$69.50 with the <i>Argus</i> the next, things aren't exactly calm and +peaceable again until the discrimination has been explained. When<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> twins +come to a man who has always taken the <i>Argus</i> in preference to the +<i>Democrat</i>, old man Ayers wags his head as if to say, "He brought it on +himself;" and when Lafe Simpson meets a man who persistently refuses to +take his paper in preference to the sheet across the street, he greets +him as formally and warily as if he had smallpox and was passing free +samples around.</p> + +<p>Lafe claims to have more circulation than the <i>Democrat</i>, and this comes +nearer giving Ayers apoplexy than anything else. He claims that Lafe's +circulation consists two thirds of wind and that he hasn't more than 750 +bona fide subscribers, including deadhead copies to patent medicine +houses. Lafe, on the other hand, says Ayers prints 750 papers merely +from force of habit—that most of his subscribers have been trying to +stop the paper for years and can't. Lafe says that when a man puts his +name on Ayers's subscrip<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span>tion list, he might as well carve it in stone +and then try to wipe it off with gasoline. Ayers says, in return, that +when a stranger arrives to make his home in Homeburg, Lafe Simpson meets +him at the train, takes him to his new residence, and hangs around the +doorstep until the stranger subscribes for the <i>Argus</i> in order to +improve the atmosphere around the neighborhood.</p> + +<p>Of course the two papers are always on opposite political sides—no +matter whether it is a school or national election. Makes us scheme a +good deal at times to keep one of them quiet on some public project so +that the other will not jump on it. We had a big time, when the plan to +pave Main Street was going through, to keep Lafe from jumping in and +shouting for it. That would have set Ayers off dead against it, and we +had to muzzle Lafe until Ayers had committed himself.</p> + +<p>The struggles of the two editors to outdo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> each other have been titanic. +When Simpson put in a steam engine, Ayers mortgaged his plant and got +one of the new gasoline engines just then being introduced into an +unhappy world. He never used it much unless he had lots of time in which +to start it, but it was a great comfort and held Simpson level. When +Simpson bought the building in which the <i>Argus</i> is printed, it nearly +killed Ayers, who couldn't have bought the sign on his building. But he +finally prevailed on the owner to put in a new front and name his block +"The Democrat Building." But about that time Simpson, who is a go-ahead +young chap, bought a young automobile in the last stage of lung trouble, +and Ayers has never really recovered from that blow.</p> + +<p>The two papers go to press on the same day, and the rivalry is intense. +Early in the day the two foremen each visit the rival plants, ostensibly +to borrow some type and a little gasoline, but in reality<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> to count the +advertisements and to see how late the rival sheet is going to be. All +afternoon the forces work feverishly, reports drifting in occasionally +to the effect that over in the other shop they are locking up the forms. +The minute the press turns in the <i>Democrat</i> office, Ayers grabs the +first paper, folds it and saunters hastily over toward the <i>Argus</i>. +Sometimes he meets Simpson half way over with a copy of the <i>Argus</i> in +his pocket, and sometimes he gets clear over and has a chance to swell +around for a minute with his new-born paper in plain sight, watching the +mad foreman lock up the forms. The first paper into the post-office gets +distributed first, while the subscribers of the other paper hang around +in a state of frenzy and waver in their allegiance in a manner to make +the stoutest heart quail. And one of the weekly diversions in Homeburg +is watching this race. If it isn't too late in starting, we hang around +and make<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> mild bets on the result. One week old man Ayers and his +foreman will hurry out from the <i>Democrat</i> office and trot hastily over +to the post-office carrying the week's issue of the paper between them +in a wash basket. And the next week Simpson and the office devil will +beat them to it. Now and then they will both appear at the same time and +race side by side, bareheaded, coatless, breathless, and full of hate. I +hear a good deal about the exertions to which your papers go to be on +the street first with extras, but I'll bet there has never been more +voltage in the competition here than there was in Homeburg the night old +man Ayers and young Simpson arrived at the post-office door at precisely +the same second and got their baskets and themselves in a hopeless jam. +Postmaster Flint had to appoint a peace conference to settle the +dispute.</p> + +<p>Ayers is getting pretty old, and for several years we have been worrying +about<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> his future. Since a cruel Government has decided that a newspaper +publisher must keep his subscription list paid up or go out of business, +times have been pretty hard for Ayers; formerly he could let a +subscription account run for ten years and then take a second-hand buggy +or a quarter of beef, or a few odd size grindstones on account; but of +late he has had to dun us every year, and of course that makes us mad, +and we quit his paper with great frequency and vim. I don't know what +would have happened to the old man if Wilson hadn't been elected. But +that, of course, has settled things for him. He will be our next +postmaster. Every one has conceded that except Pash Wade, Emery +Billings, Colonel Ackley, and Sim Askinson, who are also candidates. +However, old man Ayers's petition is as long as all the rest put +together, and when he is appointed and begins to draw down fifteen +hundred dollars a year for handing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> out his own paper to his +subscribers, we will sigh with relief, and Simpson's yells will be sweet +music in our ears.</p> + +<p>If I had my way, I would put a clause in the Constitution giving all +third-class postmasterships to third-class editors, anyway. It's the +only chance they have of accumulating enough of a surplus to be able to +go into a store with their hats on one side and buy things like other +people.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<h3>THE HOMEBURG MARINE BAND</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>Where Music is Cherished for its own Sweet Sake Regardless of Dividends</i></p> + +<p>Where you New Yorkers get farthest ahead of us Homeburgers, Jim, is the +fact that you can go out and soak yourself in real, soul-hoisting music +whenever you feel like it—provided, of course, that you have the price +and that some speculator hasn't cornered the tickets, and that you can +get home at night in time to get dressed in time to go back to town, and +that you have sufficient nerve and endurance to go four rounds with your +celebrated subway in the same twenty-four hours.</p> + +<p>You can't realize what having music<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> constantly on tap means to a +pilgrim from a town where two concerts in a winter is a gorge, and where +about the only regular musical diversion is going to church on Sunday +morning and betting on where the veteran soprano in the choir is going +to hang on to the key or skid on the high turns. You laugh at me because +I can't eat down-town unless I am encouraged by a bull fiddle, and +because I gulp at free concert tickets like a young robin swallowing +worms. But if most of your life had been spent listening to Mrs. Sim +Estabrook jumping for middle C about as successfully as a dog jumps for +a squirrel in a hickory tree, you'd splash around in melody, too, while +you had the chance.</p> + +<p>Of course, I don't mean to say that the music canneries don't do as big +a business out our way as they do anywhere. I'll bet they ship as much +as ten barrels of assorted masterpieces a month into Homeburg for our +graphophone cranks; and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> last winter Wimble Horn broke the piano-player +record by tramping out Tannhäuser in seven minutes flat. But while these +things educate us and enable us to roll our eyes in the right place in a +Wagner number, they don't satisfy the soul any more than souvenir cards +from Europe take away a thirst for travel. We want the real thing, and +year in and out we're music-hungry. We drive our young folks to the +piano and listen to them heroically until they get good, and then they +go away to the city where the gate receipts are better and leave us at +Lutie Briggs's mercy again. Time and time again the only thing that has +stood between Homeburg and a ghastly musical silence has been the +Homeburg Marine Band.</p> + +<p>That's right! Laugh, darn you! What if Homeburg is twenty miles from the +nearest creek? Our band is a lot nearer salt water than your Café de +Paris is to France. And, besides, there are only<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> three names for a +country band, anyway. If it isn't the Marine Band, it has to be the +Military Band, or the Silver Cornet Band. Chet Frazier, who is our +village cut-up, says that they named ours the Marine Band years ago, +after it had waded out to the cemetery on a wet Memorial Day through our +celebrated bottomless roads.</p> + +<p>You can't realize what a comfort and pride a band is in a Class X town, +unless you have grown up in one. They say this isn't a musical country, +but its intentions are certainly good as far as brass bands go. Long +before an American town is big enough to have a post-office, its +citizens have either organized a brass band or are trying to get another +man to move in to complete a quorum. Life never gets so complicated out +on the grain elevator circuit that the station agent, school principal, +and the two rival blacksmiths, and the city marshal can't lug<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> their +horns down-town once a week in the evening and soar sweetly off into +melody at band practice—that is, if they can get off on the same beat +during the evening.</p> + +<p>I can hear our home band now—up over McMuggins' Drug Store on a summer +evening. It's hot—not hot enough to ignite the woodwork, but plenty +warm enough to fry eggs on the sidewalks—and the whole town is out on +the porches and lawns chasing a breeze, except the band. It is up in the +super-heated lodge room of the Modern Woodmen, huddled around two oil +lamps, because the less light it has the less heat will be generated, +and it is getting ready to practice the "Washington Post March" for the +Fourth of July parade. Our band has practiced the "Washington Post +March" for over twenty years, but while the band has altered greatly, +the grand old piece shows no sign of wear and is as fresh and +unconquerable as ever.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span></p> + +<p>Querulous, complaining sounds come from the lodge room. The tenor horns +are crooning, and the bass horn blatting gently, while the clarionet +players are chasing each other up and down the scale, like squirrels +running round and round in a cage. The warming-up exercises are on. They +will continue until Frank Sundell shaves his last customer and gets up +to the hall with his trombone. You can tell when he comes. He pulls the +slide in and out a couple of times with an unearthly chromatic grunt, +and then there is a deep, pregnant silence. They are going to begin.</p> + +<p>Usually they begin several times. It is as hard to get a band off +together in practice as it is to send a dozen horses from the wire. But +finally the bass catches up with the cornets, and the others sprint or +put on the brakes, and they land on the fourth or fifth beat together.</p> + +<p>For a few minutes it's great. They go over the first four bars in a +bunch, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> old Dobbs gets the half note and change of key in the bass, +which usually floors him, like a professional. It is a proud and happy +moment for the leader. But it doesn't last. It's too good to be true. Ad +Smith strikes a falsetto with his cornet and stops for wind; this +rattles his partner, who can't carry the air alone to save him. Dobbs +sits down on the wrong key in the bass. The tenors weaken, discouraged +by the cornet, and everybody hesitates. A couple of clarionets lose the +place and get to wandering around at random, creating terrible havoc. +The altos stop, being in doubt. Ad recovers and launches out with +terrific vim half a beat behind. There is a rally, but it is too late. +You can hear fragments of five different keys, and presently every one +stops except Mahlon Brown, who plays the bass drum and always bangs away +through fire or water until some one turns him off.</p> + +<p>Then there is silence—a good deal of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> it. We all know what is +happening. Sim Askinson, the leader, is making a few well-chosen +remarks, and each player is turning around in his chair and going over +the faults of his neighbor in the most kindly and thorough fashion. Ed +Smith empties out his baritone horn and takes a little practice run, and +then they commence to begin—or begin to start—or start to +commence—whatever it is, all over again. But when they stop at ten +o'clock, they haven't played the "Washington Post March" clear through +in any one heat.</p> + +<p>Doesn't sound encouraging for the Fourth, does it? But, pshaw, that's +only practice! When the big day comes and the boys put on their caps and +coats and such trousers as will come nearest to blending with the said +coats and march down the street, do they falter and blow up in the back +stretch? Not much. They canter through that air as if they had been born +whistling it. There's a wonderful<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> inspiration in marching to a band +man—give him a horn, a ragged slip of music, and about four miles of +road, and he will prance down the street, climbing over ruts, wading +through mud, reading at night by the light of a torch carried by a boy +who is twenty feet away fighting with another boy; and he will blow his +immortal soul into his horn for hours at a stretch without missing a +note.</p> + +<p>Part of the reason for the difference at home is because we always carry +a few amateurs, who are privileged to come in at practice and do all the +damage they can, but who have to keep mighty quiet on the march. They +can carry their horns, puff out their cheeks and look as grand as they +please, but if they'd presume to cut loose with some real notes and +smear up a piece, they'd be fired in no time.</p> + +<p>We have always been mighty proud of our Homeburg band. Nobody knows how +old it is. We think it arrived with the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> first inhabitants. These are +all dead, but some of the original horns are still doing duty, and the +brass on them is worn thin and almost bright. Our band is much better +than the average band. That's one of the great Homeburg comforts. +Whenever we get blue about the muddy streets and the small stores, and +the great need of a sewage system, and the disgraceful condition of the +stove in the Q. B. & C. Depot, we think of our band and are comforted. +It has at least twenty members right along, most of whom can play their +instruments, and Sim Askinson, who is a professional music teacher, has +conducted it off and on for twenty-five years. Citizens from other towns +get mighty jealous when they come down to Homeburg Thursday evenings +during the summer and listen to the magnificent concerts which our band +gives. I've seen as many as three hundred rigs around the public square +those nights. And when our band prac<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span>tices up on "Poet and Peasant," +which is its star piece, and goes off to the big band contests which +break loose in the summer and create great havoc, large numbers of our +citizens go along and bet their good money in a manner which keeps the +town poor for months afterward.</p> + +<p>I don't know anything more magnificent than the way our band plays "Poet +and Peasant" with Sim Askinson leading, Ad Smith and Henry Aultmeyer +duetting perfectly for once with their cornets, and the clarionet +section eating up the fast parts in a manner that sends goose flesh up +and down your spine. We're head and shoulders above any other band that +enters the contests, but that's the trouble. The judges are never +educated up to "Poet and Peasant." They always give the prize to the +Paynesville Military Band, which has a five-foot painted bass drum and +has to play "Over the Waves" for a concert piece, because they haven't +got<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> a decent cornet player in town. Sometime they will get a real +musician to judge these contests, and then we will win by seventeen +toots.</p> + +<p>You may not believe it, Jim, but I am an alumnus of the Homeburg band. +Didn't suspect that I was anything but an ordinary citizen, did you? But +it's a fact. I am a band man. I'm too modest to brag about it, but I was +carrying a horn and had a uniform before I was eighteen. I suppose there +is nothing, not even the fire department, that fills a small town boy +with such wild ambition as a band. When I was twelve, I used to watch +that band in its more sublime passages, feeling that if I ever could +become great enough to play in it, others could run the country and win +its great battles with no jealousy from me. The snare drummer at that +time was a boy of sixteen. Of course, being snare drummer in the band, +he didn't mix around much with the common<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> kids, and I didn't know him. +But I watched him until my ribs swelled out and cracked with envy; and I +used to wonder how fortune ever happened to reach down and yank that +particular boy so far up into the rarefied upper regions of glory.</p> + +<p>When I was fourteen, I went after his job. But I never could learn to +play the snare drum. You have to learn to "roll," and I couldn't make my +left hand behave. I tried a year and would probably be trying yet but +for the fact that when Ed Norton left town, he traded me his ruinous old +alto horn for three dollars and a dog. There was about as much music +left in it as there is in a fish horn, but I was as delighted as if it +had been a pipe organ, and when the folks wouldn't let me practice at +home on it, I took it out in the country and kept it in Smily Garrett's +barn. After a while I learned how to fit my face into the mouthpiece in +just<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> the right way, and as the sounds I made became more human, I sort +of edged into town, until finally I was practicing in our own barn. And +the next year Askinson let me come into the band and "pad" as second +alto during the less important engagements.</p> + +<p>I played with the band for five years, and while I never got out of the +"thump section," which was what the trombonists and snare drummers and +the other aristocrats of the band call the altos, I had all the fun and +adventures that a high-priced musician could have had, and was perfectly +happy. I can still remember with pride the deep-green looks on the faces +of Pete Amthorne and Billy Madigan and Snoozer Ackley, as they watched +me marching grandly down the street lugging my precious old three +bushels of brass in my arms, and "ump-umping" until my eyes stuck out of +my head. Of course they didn't know that most of the time<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> I was +watching a change in my notes half a bar away and wondering if I could +make it without falling all over the treble clef. I looked like Sousa to +them, and when I leaned grandly back in my chair at the band concerts +and borrowed a page of music from my neighbor—said page being mostly +Hebrew to me—I felt like a Senator or Chief Justice letting the common +herd have a look at him.</p> + +<p>I pity the poor city boys who have to grow up nowadays and depend on +taxicabs and vaudeville for their excitement. Belonging to the band was +more fun than belonging to the baseball team or the torchlight brigade +or anything else. We got in on everything. They couldn't pull off a +rally or celebration, or even a really successful church social, without +us. I might say that the importance of a Homeburg citizen in the old +days was determined by whether or not the Homeburg Band escorted him to +his tomb. When<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> great doings occurred in the neighboring towns, plain +citizens dug down in their pockets for car-fare, and then dug painfully +down once more for our car-fare. When an ordinary Homeburger wanted to +help boost McKinley to victory by parading in some distant town with a +torch, it cost him five dollars and a suit of clothes. But we not only +went free, but got two dollars apiece for plowing a wide furrow of glory +down the streets between rows of admiring eyes.</p> + +<p>Those two dollars counted a lot in those days, too. It looked like an +easy income to us. All we had to do to earn it was to beg off from our +employers for half a day, travel thirty miles or so by train, usually +standing up and protecting our horns from the careless mob, march eight +or ten miles over unknown streets, picking out dry places underfoot and +notes from a piece of music bobbing up and down in the shadows above our +horns, and then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> drive home across country after midnight, getting home +in time to go to work in the morning. Why, it was just like finding +money; I've never had so much fun earning it since. I started once to +figure out how many miles our band marched during the first Bryan +campaign, but I gave it up. We never felt it at that time, but it made +me so tired counting that I quit with a distinct footsore feeling.</p> + +<p>The most worrisome task about a Homeburg band was keeping it alive. I +suppose all small town bands have the same trials. We worked against +incredible difficulties. If city people had the same devotion to music +which we displayed, you would have a ten-thousand-piece philharmonic +orchestra in New York playing twenty-four hours a day for glory. We were +always building up our band with infinite pains, only to have Fate jerk +the gizzard out of it just as perfection was in sight. Talent was +scarce, and the rude,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> heartless city was forever reaching down into +Homeburg and yanking some indispensable players away. Of course there +was always a waiting list of youngsters who would coax a few hoarse +toots out of the alto horn, and we always had a bunch of kid +clarionetists who would sail along grandly through the soft parts and +then blow goose notes whenever they hit the solo part. But try as we +would, we could never get more than two cornets. One of these was Ad +Smith. He was a bum cornetist, but his brother Ed was a good baritone, +and we had to have both or none. The other was usually some anxious +young student who got along pretty well on plain work, but who would +come down the chromatic run in the "Chicago Tribune March" like a fat +man falling down the cellar stairs with an oleander plant.</p> + +<p>As for trombones, there was a positive fatality among them; we were +always losing them. Trombone players have to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> be born, anyway, and there +was no hope of developing one. Besides, the neighbors wouldn't allow it. +Young Henry Wood showed promise once, but after his father had listened +to him for about six months, he took the slip end of his horn away from +him and beat carpets with it, until it was extinct as far as melody was +concerned.</p> + +<p>For a year we had Mason Peters, who was a wonder on the slide trombone. +But he was only getting twelve dollars a week in Snyder's Shoe Emporium, +and Paynesville, which never tired of putting up dirty tricks on us, +hustled around and got him an eighteen dollar job up there—after which +they came down to Homeburg at the first opportunity with their band to +parade Peters before our eyes. It would have been a grand success if +they hadn't put Peters in the front row. He lived for his art, Peters +did, paying no attention to anything but his trombone, and besides he +was quite deaf. He got con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span>fused about the line of march, and when the +band swung around the public square he kept right on up Main Street all +alone, playing in magnificent form and solitary grandeur while the band +swung off the other way. The whole town followed him with tears of joy, +and he traveled two blocks before he became aware of the vast and +appalling silence behind him; then he kept right on for the city limits +on the run. It was a great comfort to us, and by the time we had gotten +through apologizing to the Paynesville boys for following Peters under +the impression that he was the real band, they had offered to fight us +singly or in platoons.</p> + +<p>We used to watch every new citizen like Russian detectives, only we +searched them for horns instead of dynamite. Several times a trombonist +came to town, and music revived noticeably. But none of them lasted. +Trombonists seem to be temperamental, and when they are not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> changing +jobs they are resigning from the band because they are not allowed to +play enough solos. Our greatest bonanza was a quiet chap named Williams, +who came to town to work in the moulding room of the plow factory. After +he had been there a week, we discovered that he had a saxophone. No one +had ever heard or eaten a saxophone, but we looked it up, and when we +found out what it was, we made a rush for him. At the next practice he +appeared with a bright silver instrument covered with two bushels of +keys and played a solo which sounded like three clarionets with the +croup. We wept for joy and elected him leader on the spot.</p> + +<p>This caused Sim Askinson to resign, of course, and he took Ad and Ed +Smith with him, and they remained in dignified and awful silence for two +years. But we didn't care. One saxophone was worth five baritones, and +while Williams was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> in town, we were an object of envy to all of the +other bands around. We changed our name to the Homeburg Saxophone Band, +and the way we rubbed it into Paynesville was pitiful. He was a little +fellow, Williams was, and short of wind, which caused him to gasp a good +deal during the variation parts. But he was willing. There was no shirk +about him. After a year our program usually consisted of eleven +saxophone solos and some other piece which could be done almost entirely +on the saxophone, and the jealous Paynesvillains used to ask why we used +nineteen men to play the rests when one man could have produced as much +silence at far less expense.</p> + +<p>Those were glorious years; but of course they didn't last. Williams got +to resigning at the foundry just for the pleasure of having us come down +and plead with the proprietor to raise his pay. Finally he resigned so +much that the proprietor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> fired him, and then we had to take our caps in +hand and wheedle the Smiths and Askinson back into the band. I haven't +belonged for years, but they are still there. When I drop in at +practice, as many of the alumni do, Askinson greets me cordially and +takes some young cub's horn away from him, so I can sit in. It is just +like old times, especially when Ed Smith lays down his horn after a +slight altercation with some one and goes home never to come back—just +as he has done for the last thirty years.</p> + +<p>That's the worst of music. One's art, you know, has so much influence +over one's temper. To see our band soaring majestically down Main Street +and playing "Canton Halifax" in one great throbbing rough-house of +melody you would never believe that anything but brotherly love existed +between the players. As a matter of fact, we never wasted any harmony +among ourselves. We didn't have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> any to spare. It took all we had to +produce the music. For twenty-five years the Smiths and Cooney Simpson, +who plays first clarionet, have been at swords' points, each with a +faction behind him. Cooney says it's a shame that a good band must limp +along with a cornetist who always takes three strikes to hit a high +note, and Ed Smith says Cooney wants to be leader and will not be +satisfied until he can play the solo and bass parts at once on his +clarionet. I can see Ed Smith now, after the band has run aground in +practice, taking his horn down and glaring around at Cooney.</p> + +<p>"What you gobstick players need is a time-table," says he, "instead of +notes. Come in on the A about eight-fifteen. If you can do that well, +we'll try to struggle along."</p> + +<p>"Don't get forte," Cooney replies cheerfully. "If you'd try to follow +both those cornets instead of rambling along by yourself, you'd split, +sure."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Better play cornet, too, Cooney," says Ad Smith, whirling around. +"You've got enough mouth for both."</p> + +<p>"Well, we ought to have a cornetist," says Cooney, "it's what we've +needed for years."</p> + +<p>This riles the scrub cornet player, whoever he happens to be, and he +gets up excitedly. "We'd get along a lot better without one or two human +calliopes—" he begins.</p> + +<p>"Set down, set down," says old Dobbs from the coils of his tuba. "Let +'em fight. They know it all between pieces—"</p> + +<p>"Who asked you to horn in?" says Ed Smith, getting up preparatory to +going home with his baritone horn and leaving a broken and forlorn world +to grieve his loss.</p> + +<p>Of course this is a crisis. But we never bust up. The Paynesville Band +busts up about twice a year over the division of profits and the color +of their new uniforms<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> and the old question of whether the cornets or +trombones shall march in front. But we never go entirely to pieces. This +is largely because of Sam Green. He is our peacemaker and most faithful +player. He has played second alto in the band for thirty-five years +without a promotion, and is by all odds the worst player I ever saw, +being only entirely at home in the key of C; and he can't play +three-four time to save his soul. But his devotion is marvelous. He is +always the first man down to practice. He lights the lamps, builds the +fires, and when necessary goes out to Ed Smith's home and persuades him +to come back into the band for just this night. And whenever the dispute +between the factions gets to the point where Ed Smith begins gathering +up his doll things, Sam interferes.</p> + +<p>"Come on now, boys," he pleads, "we've got to get this piece worked up. +You're all good players. Why, if Paynes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span>ville had you fellows, she'd +have a band. That was my fault that time. I'll get this here thing right +sometime. I'll sit out in the trio now and you fellows take it."</p> + +<p>And pretty soon, as he argues, Ed's proud heart softens, and he comes +back with a glare at Cooney. Then Sim Askinson raps on his music rack +and says: "Gentlemen and trombone players," as he has for a quarter of a +century; and a minute later the band is tumbling eagerly through its +piece once more, all feuds suspended in the desperate effort to come out +even at the end with no surplus bars to be played by some floundering +horn.</p> + +<p>Some time during the evening, as a rule, the various sections get +together on some passage and swim grandly through, every horn in perfect +time, and the parts blending like Mocha and Java. All differences are +forgotten, and the band breaks up with friendly words, Ed Smith and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> +Cooney going home together. Music has charms to soothe the savage beast, +and it also has a wonderful power of taking the temper out of the grocer +and the painter and the mahout of the waterwork's gasoline engine.</p> + +<p>I never stepped so high or felt so grand as I did the first time I +marched out with the boys and went down the street in the back row of +the band next to the drums, a member in good standing, and dodging every +time I passed under a telephone wire to keep from scraping my cap off. I +never expect to feel that grand again. But I have an ambition. If ever I +should become so famous and successful that when I went back to Homeburg +to visit my proud and happy parents and stepped off of the 4:11 train, I +would find the Homeburg Marine Band there to meet me, I would know that +I had made good, and I would be content. The only thing that encourages +me in my ambition is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> that the band didn't come down to play when I went +away. Do you know, Jim, it's the funniest thing—the fellows we played +out-of-town in a blaze of glory never happened to be the chaps we came +down to the train to meet afterward, somehow. But I imagine we weren't +the only poor guessers in the world.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2> + +<h3>THE AUTO GAME IN HOMEBURG</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>It has Driven out Politics as a Subject of Debate</i></p> + +<p>Wait a minute, Jim. I want to look at this automobile.... Yes, I know it +is the sixth machine I've walked around in seven blocks, but what's time +to a New Yorker on Saturday afternoon? This nifty little mile-eater has +an electric gear shift, and I want to ask the chauffeur how he likes it. +Promised Ad Summers I would.</p> + +<p>... Says it hangs a little if his voltage is low. That's what I'd be +afraid of—Gee! there's a new Jacksnipe with a center searchlight. Never +would do for rutty roads. How do you like the wire wheels, Jim? Bad for +side strains, I should think.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> Look at those foxy inset lamps. Listen to +that engine purr—two cycle, I'll bet. Say, Fifth Avenue is certainly +one great street! I could walk up and down here for a month. There's a +new Battleax—wonder if those two speed differentials are going to work +out.</p> + +<p>All right, Jim, I'll reluctantly shut up and focus my attention on the +salmon-colored cloaks and green stockings for a while. I forgot that you +don't take any deep, abiding interest in automobiles. All they mean to +you is something to ride in, but to me they're as interesting as a new +magazine. I've spent about four days in the sales-rooms since I've been +here, and when I get home I'll be the center of breathless attention +until I've passed around all the information I've dug up. I could go +back without any information about the new shows, or the city campaign, +but if I were to come back without a bale of automobile gossip, I'd be +fired<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> for gross incompetency from the League of Amateur Advisers at +Gayley's garage.</p> + +<p>You thought I said I didn't own a machine? I did say it and I can prove +it. But do you suppose that makes any difference in Homeburg? Here the +other fellow's car is his own business. But in Homeburg an automobile is +every one's business. It's like the weekly newspaper, or the new +minister, or the latest wedding—it's common property. Since gasoline +has been domesticated we're all enthusiasts, whether we are customers or +not. The man who can't talk automobile is as lonely as the chap who +can't play golf at a country club. About all there is left for him to do +is to hunt up Postmaster Flint and talk politics. Flint has to talk all +our politics; it's what he's paid for, but it's mighty hard on him +because he just bought a new machine last spring himself.</p> + +<p>No, you guessed wrong, Jim. Auto<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span>mobiles aren't a curiosity in Homeburg. +How many are there in New York? Say eighty thousand. One for every sixty +people. Homeburg has twenty-five hundred people and one hundred +machines, counting Sim Askinson's old one-lunger and Red Nolan's refined +corn sheller, which he built out of the bone-yard back of Gayley's +garage. That's one for every twenty-five people. Figure that out. It +only gives each auto five members of the family and twenty citizens to +haul around. We're about up to the limit. Of course another one hundred +people could buy machines, I suppose; but that would only allow twelve +and a half passengers, admirers, guests, and advisers for each car. That +isn't anywhere near enough. Why, it wouldn't be worth while owning a +machine! As it is, we are all busy. I've ridden in twenty new machines +this year and passed my opinion on them. It has taken a good deal of my +spare time. I've<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> thought sometimes of buying one myself, but I don't +believe it would be right. If I had a car myself, I would have to +neglect all the others. It wouldn't do. Besides, I like to be peculiar.</p> + +<p>Is every one in Homeburg a millionaire? Goodness, no! Our brag is that +we have less people per automobile than any other town, but then that's +the ordinary brag with an Illinois small town. We're not much ahead of +the others. Automobiles don't stand for riches out our way. Blamed if I +know what they do represent. Mechanical ingenuity, I guess. Country town +people pick up automobiles as easily as poor people do twins. And they +seem to support them about as inexpensively. If you were to take a trip +around Homeburg at seven <span class="smcap">a.m.</span> on a Sunday morning, you would find about +eighty-seven automobile owners out in the back yard over, under, or +wrapped around their machines.</p> + +<p>In the city you can only tell a car owner<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> these days by his silk socks; +but in the country town the grimy hand is still the badge of the order. +The automobile owner does his own work, like his wife, and on Sunday +morning, instead of hustling for the golf links, he inserts himself into +his overalls and spends a couple of hours trying to persuade the +carbureter to use more air and less gasoline. The interest our +automobile owners take in the internals of their cars is intense. That +is the only thing which mars the pleasure of the professional guest, +such as myself. More than once I've sat in the sun twenty miles from +home while some host of mine has taken his engine down clear to the bed +plate, just because he had the time to do it and wanted to see how the +bearings were standing up.</p> + +<p>I've lived in Homeburg all my life, but I haven't yet solved the mystery +of how some of our citizens own machines. It's a bigger mystery than +yours because our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> automobile owners pay their bills, and the mortgage +records don't tell us anything. There's Wilcox, the telegraph operator. +He makes seventy-five dollars a month. He works nights to earn it, and +he spends his days driving around the country in his runabout. He's +thirty years old, and I think he invested in an auto instead of a wife.</p> + +<p>You can get a good meal in our local restaurant for twenty-five cents, +and when some painstaking plutocrat comes in and tries to spend a dollar +there, he has to be removed by kindly hands in a state of fatal +distension before the job is finished. A thousand dollars would buy +stock, fixtures, and good will. But a thousand wouldn't buy the +restaurant owner's automobile. He began with two hundred and fifty +dollars' worth of rubbish and a monkey wrench four years ago, and has +pottered and tinkered and traded and progressed until he now owns a last +year's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> model, staggering under labor-saving devices.</p> + +<p>Our oculist, who does business in a tiny corner in a shoe-store and +never overcharged any one in his life, was our pioneer automobile owner. +He bought a homemade machine and a mule at the same time, and by +judiciously combining the two he got a good deal of mileage out of both. +He would work all morning getting the automobile down-town and all +afternoon getting the mule to haul it back. He has had three machines +since then, and the one he owns now is only third-hand.</p> + +<p>For years Mrs. Strawn washed clothes for the town from morning till +night, two washings a day and all garments returned intact. Her boys +used to call at our house for the wash with a wheelbarrow. They come in +an automobile now. She bought it. It was a hopeless invalid at the time, +but they nursed it back to health, and I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> hear that next spring they are +going to trade it in for a new machine.... Why do I say machine? Because +that's what an automobile is out our way. It's a machine, and we treat +it as such. Most of our people couldn't take a lobster to pieces to save +their lives, but you ought to see them go through the shell of an auto. +Too many Americans buy portable parlors with sixty-seven coats of +varnish, and are then shocked and grieved to discover when too late that +said parlors have gizzards just like any other automobile and that they +should have been looked after.</p> + +<p>I said there were one hundred automobiles in Homeburg. I was mistaken. +There are ninety-nine automobiles and one car. The Payleys own the car. +They bought it in New York, paid six thousand dollars for it, with a +chauffeur thrown in to drive them home, and they have been under his +thumb ever since. He was the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> only chauffeur who had ever been brought +alive in captivity to Homeburg, and the whole town inspected him with +the utmost care. He was the best stationary chauffeur I ever saw. He +seemed to regard that car as a monument and was shocked at the idea of +moving it around from place to place.</p> + +<p>It was too high-priced a car to be touched by Sam Gayley, our local auto +doc., and somehow the chauffeur never seemed to be able to keep it in +running order long enough to get up to the Payley residence and take the +family out. He ran around the country a good deal, however, tuning it up +and trying it out, and as he was a sociable cuss, some of us always went +with him. In fact, about every one rode in the Payley car that summer +except the Payleys. Wert Payley used to stop me and ask if I could fix +it up to take him along sometime when I went riding with his chauffeur, +but I never would risk it.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> Besides, it would be imposing on the boy's +generosity to lug a friend along when you went riding.</p> + +<p>The most of our machines vary from the one thousand, five hundred dollar +touring car to the five hundred dollar little fellows; and since they +have come, life in Homeburg is twice as interesting. They are our +dissipation, our excitement, our amusement, and the focus of our town +pride. The Checker Club disbanded last winter because the members got to +quarreling over self-starters, and I understand that in the Women's +Missionary Societies and the afternoon clubs the comparative riding +qualities of the various tonneaus about the city have about driven out +teething and styles as a subject of debate. For a while during the +Wilson campaign, it looked as if politics was going to get a foothold in +the town, but some enthusiast organized a flying squadron of automobiles +to propagate Democratic gospel, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> then it was all off. Everybody +rushed into the squadron, and the trips around the district became +reliability runs, with a lone orator addressing the freeborn citizens +upon the tariff at each stop, and said freeborn citizens discussing +magnetos, springs, and tires with great earnestness and vehemence during +the speech.</p> + +<p>Business always suspends for half a day whenever a new automobile comes +to town. There may be a dozen of the same make already, but that doesn't +make any difference. We are experts, trained to notice the finer shades +of perfection, and until we have seen each new machine put up the clay +hill four miles south of town and have ridden in it over the Q. B. & C. +crossing and the other places which show up bad springs, we can't fix +our minds on our work. Time was when a new baby could come into Homeburg +and hold the attention of the town for a week. Now a baby is lucky if +its birth notice isn't crowded<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> out of the <i>Democrat</i> to make room for +the list of new machines.</p> + +<p>As for those of us who haven't automobiles, life is pleasant and without +responsibilities. We ride in every new automobile, and, what is more, we +go over it as carefully as a farmer does a new horse. We open its hood +and pry into its internal economy. We crank it to test its +compression—half the Homeburg men who have achieved broken wrists by +the crank route haven't autos at all. We denounce the owner's judgment +on oils and take his machine violently away from him in order to prove +that it will pull better uphill with the spark retarded. At night, +during the summer, we hurry through supper and then go out on the front +porch to wait for a chance to act as ballast.</p> + +<p>No automobile owner in the dirt roads belt will go out without a full +tonneau if he can help it—makes riding easier—and this means permanent +employment<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> during the evenings for about three hundred friends all +summer long. In fact the demand for ballast is often greater than the +supply. As a result, we have become hideously spoiled. I have passed up +as many as six automobiles in an evening on various captious pretexts, +waiting all the time for Sim Bone's car, whose tonneau is long and +exactly fits my legs. Once or twice Sim has failed to come around after +I have waved the rest of the procession by, and we have had to stay at +home. I have spoken to him severely about this, and he is more careful +now.</p> + +<p>Because of our great interest in automobiles, vicarious or otherwise, +there is no class-hatred in Homeburg. If a man were to stop by the +roadside and begin to denounce the automobile as an oppressor of the +pedestrian, he would in all probability be kidnaped by some acquaintance +before he was half through and carried forty miles away for company's +sake.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> About the only Homeburg resident who doesn't ride is old Auntie +Morley, who broke her leg in a bobsled sixty years ago and has had a +holy horror of speed ever since.</p> + +<p>In fact the only classes we have are the privileged class who merely +ride in automobiles and the oppressed class who ride and have to pay for +them, too. Lately the latter class has begun to feel itself abused and +has been grumbling a little, but we overlook it. No appeal to prejudice +and jealousy can move us. Of course, I don't think that an automobile +owner should be expected to leave his wife at home in order to +accommodate his neighbors, and there may be some just complaint when an +owner is called up late at night and asked to haul friends home from a +party to which he hasn't been invited. But on the whole the automobile +owners are very well treated. Suppose we spectators should band together +and refuse to ride in the things or talk about<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> them! The market would +be glutted with second-hand cars in a month.</p> + +<p>We have no trouble with the speed limit in Homeburg either. This may be +due partly to our good sense, but it is mostly due to our peculiar +crossings. Homeburg is paved with rich black dirt, and in order to keep +the populace out of the bosom of the soil in the muddy seasons, the +brick crossings are built high and solid, forming a series of +impregnable "thank-ye-marms" all over the town. One of our great +diversions during the tourist season is to watch the reckless strangers +from some other State dash madly into town at forty miles an hour and +hit the crossing at the head of Main Street. There is a crash and a +scream as the occupants of the tonneau soar gracefully into the top. +There is another crash and more screams at the other side of the street, +and before the driver has diagnosed the case, he has hit the Exchange +Street crossing,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> which sticks out like the Reef of Norman's Woe. When +he has landed on the other side of this crossing, he slows down and goes +meekly out of town at ten miles an hour, while we saunter forth and pick +up small objects of value such as wrenches, luncheon baskets, hairpins, +hats, and passengers.</p> + +<p>Last summer we picked up an oldish man who had been thrown out of an +unusually jambangsome touring car. He had been traveling in the tonneau +alone, and even before he met our town he had not been enjoying himself. +The driver and his accomplice had not noticed their loss, and when we +had brushed off and restored the old gentleman, he said "Thank God!" and +went firmly over to the depot, where he took the next train for home, +leaving no word behind in case his friends should return—which they did +that afternoon and searched mournfully at a snail's pace for over twenty +miles on both sides of our town.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span></p> + +<p>Since the automobile has begun to rage in our midst, the garage is the +center of our city life. The machine owners stop each day for +lubricating oil and news and conversation; the non-owners stroll over to +inspect the visiting cars and give advice when necessary; and the +loafers have abandoned the implement store, Emerson's restaurant, and +the back of McMuggins' drug store in favor of the garage, because they +find about seven times as much there to talk about. The city garage +can't compare with ours for adventure and news. I have spent a few hours +in your most prominent car-nurseries and I haven't heard anything but +profanity on the part of the owners and Broadway talk among the +chauffeurs.</p> + +<p>In the country it's different. Take a busy day at Gayley's, for +instance. It usually opens about three <span class="smcap">a.m.</span>, when Gayley crawls out of +bed in response to a cataract of woe over the telephone and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> goes out +nine miles hither or yon to haul in some foundered brother. Gayley has a +soft heart and is always going out over the country at night to reason +with some erring engine; but since last April first, when he traveled +six miles at two <span class="smcap">a.m.</span> in response to a call and found a toy automobile +lying bottom-side up in the road, he has become suspicious and +embittered, and has raised his prices.</p> + +<p>At six <span class="smcap">a.m.</span> Worley Gates, who farms eight miles south, comes in to catch +an early train and delivers the first bulletin. The roads to the south +are drying fast, but he went down the clay hill sidewise and had to go +through the bottom on low. At seven, Wimble Horn and Colonel Ackley and +Sim Bone drop in while waiting for breakfast. Bone thinks he'll drive to +Millford, but doesn't think he can get in an hour's business and get +back by noon.</p> + +<p>This starts the first debate of the day, Colonel Ackley contending that +he has<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> done the distance easily in an hour-ten, and Sim being frankly +incredulous. Experts decide that it can be done with good roads. Colonel +says he can do it in mud and can take the hills on high; says he never +goes into low for anything. Bill Elwin, one of our gasless experts, +reminds him of the time he couldn't get up Foster's Hill on second and +was passed by three automobiles and fourteen road roaches. This is a +distinct breach of etiquette on Bill's part, for he was riding with +Colonel at the time and should have upheld him. The discussion is just +getting good when Ackley's wife calls him home to breakfast over the +'phone, and the first tourist of the day comes in.</p> + +<p>He has come from the west and has had heavy weather. He asks about the +roads east. Gibb Ogle, our leading pessimist, hastens to inform him that +very likely the roads are impassable, because the Highway Commissioners +have been im<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span>proving them. Out our way road improvement consists of +tearing the roads out with a scraper and heaping them up in the middle. +It takes a road almost a year to recover from a good, thorough case of +improvement.</p> + +<p>The stranger goes on dejectedly, and about nine <span class="smcap">a.m.</span> young Andy Link +roars in with his father's car, which he has taken away from the old man +and converted into a racer by the simple process of taking off the +muffler and increasing the noise to one hundred miles per hour. Andy +declares that there has been no rain to the northwest and that he has +done sixty miles already this morning, but can't get his carbureter to +working properly, as usual. By this time several owners and a dozen +critics have assembled, and the morning debate on gasoline versus motor +spirit takes place. It ends a tie and both sides badly winded, when +Pelty Amthorne drives in, very mad. He has been over to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> Paynesville and +back. This is only twenty miles, but owing to the juicy and elusive +condition of the roads, his rear wheels have traveled upward of two +thousand miles in negotiating the distance and he has worn out two rear +casings.</p> + +<p>Right here I wish to state that Homeburg roads are not always muddy. We +average three months of beautiful, smooth, resilient and joltless roads +each year. The remaining nine months, however, I mention with pain. +Illinois boosters say our beautiful rich black soil averages ten feet in +depth, but I think this understates the case—at least our beautiful +black dirt roads seem to be deeper than that in the spring. What we need +in the spring in Illinois are locks and harbor lights, and the man who +invents an automobile buoyant enough to float on its stomach and paddle +its way swiftly to and fro on the heaving bosom of our April roads will +be a public benefactor.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span></p> + +<p>Pelty is justly indignant, because he had hoped to get another thousand +miles of actual travel out of his tires. We sympathize with him, but in +the middle of his grief Chet Frazier drives up. When he sees his ancient +enemy, he climbs out of his car, comes hastily over to where Pelty is +erupting, and starts trading autos with him.</p> + +<p>Did you ever hear a couple of seasoned horse traders discussing each +other's wares? Horse traders are considerate and tender of each other's +feelings compared with two rural automobile owners who are talking swap +with any enthusiasm.</p> + +<p>"Hello, Pelty," says Chet. "Separator busted again?"</p> + +<p>Everybody laughs, and Chet walks all around the machine. "Why, it ain't +a separator at all," he finally says. "What is it, Pelty?"</p> + +<p>"If you'd ever owned an automobile you'd know," grunts Amthorne, +hauling<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> off a tire. "What's become of that tinware exhibit you used to +block up traffic with?"</p> + +<p>Chet gets the laugh this time.</p> + +<p>"That tinware exhibit stepped over from Jenniesburg in thirty minutes +flat this morning," says Chet. "Lucky you weren't on the road. I'd have +thrown mud on your wind shield."</p> + +<p>"Say!" Pelty shouts. "Your machine couldn't fall ten miles in thirty +minutes. Why don't you get a real automobile? What will you give me to +boot for mine?"</p> + +<p>They are off, and business in the vicinity suspends.</p> + +<p>"I'll trade with you, Pelty," says Chet calmly—quite calmly. "Let me +look it over."</p> + +<p>He walks carefully around the auto, opens the hood and looks in. "Funny +engine, isn't it? I saw one like that at the World's Fair."</p> + +<p>Pelty has the hood of Chet's machine<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> open too and is right there with +the retort courteous. "Is this an engine or a steam heater?" he asks. +"What pressure does she carry?"</p> + +<p>"She never heats at all except when I run a long time on low," Chet says +eagerly.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," says Pelty, "I never have to go into low much—"</p> + +<p>"Gosh!" Chet explodes. "When you go up Sanders Hill, they have to close +two district schools for the noise."</p> + +<p>"Only time you ever heard me I was hauling you up with your broken +jack-shaft," snorts Pelty. "You ought to get some iron parts for your +car. Cheese has gone out of style."</p> + +<p>"You still use it for tires, I see," says Chet.</p> + +<p>"Never mind," says Pelty wrathfully. "I get mileage out of my machine; I +don't drive around town and then spend two days shoveling out carbon."</p> + +<p>"Peculiar radiator you've got," says<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> Chet, changing the subject. "Oh, I +see; it's a road sprinkler. What do you get from the city for laying the +dust?"</p> + +<p>"I can stop that leak in two minutes with a handful of corn meal," says +Pelty, busily surveying Chet's machine. "Do you still strip a gear on +this thing every time you try to back?"</p> + +<p>"Why do you carry a horn?" asks Chet. "You're wasteful; I heard your +valves chattering when I was three blocks away."</p> + +<p>"I didn't hear yours chatter much last Tuesday on Main Street," snorts +Pelty. "You cranked that thing long enough to grind it home by hand."</p> + +<p>"Ya-a! Talk, will you?" yells Chet earnestly. "Any man who begins +carrying hot water out to his machine in a teakettle in September knows +a lot about starting cars."</p> + +<p>"Well, get down to business," says Pelty. "You want to trade, you say.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> +I don't want that mess. It's an old back-number with tin springs, glass +gears and about as much compression as a bandbox. Give me five hundred +dollars and throw your automobile in. I need something to tie my cow to. +She'd haul away anything that was movable."</p> + +<p>"Give you five hundred dollars for that parody on a popcorn wagon?" +snorts Chet. "Why, man, the poor old thing has to go into low to pull +its shadow! You're delirious, Pelty. I'll tell you what I'll do. You +give me a thousand dollars for my car, and I'll agree to haul that old +calliope up to my barn, out of your way, and make a hen roost out of it. +Come on now. It's your only chance."</p> + +<p>Shortly after this they are parted by anxious friends, and the show is +over. I've known Homeburg men to give up a trip to Chicago because Chet +and Pelty began to trade their autos just before train time.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span></p> + +<p>In New York an auto means comfort and pleasure and advertisement, like a +fur-lined overcoat with a Persian lamb collar. But in Homeburg it means +a lot more. It keeps us busy and happy and full of conversation and +debate. It pulls our old, retired farmers out of their shells and makes +them yell for improvements. It unbuckles our tight-wads and gives our +ingenious young loafers something to do. It promotes town pride, and it +keeps our money circulating so fast that every one has a chance to grasp +a chunk as it goes by.</p> + +<p>It has made us so independent of railroads that we feel now when buying +a ticket to Chicago as if we were helping the poor old line out. Our +Creamery has been collecting milk and shipping butter in an old roadster +with a wagon bed thorax for a year. Two of our rural route mail carriers +use small machines, except in wet weather, and good-roads societies in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> +our vicinity are the latest fad. We raised one thousand five hundred +dollars last spring to bring the Cannon Ball Trail from Chicago to +Kansas City through our town, and our hotel-keeper contributed one +hundred dollars of it. He says we'll be on the gas-line tourist route to +the coast after the trail has been marked and drained and graded up +well.</p> + +<p>But mostly the automobile means freedom to us. We're no longer citizens +of Homeburg but of the congressional district. We're neighbors to towns +we hadn't heard of ten years ago, and the horizon nowadays for most of +us is located at the end of a ten-gallon tank of gasoline. Why, in the +old days, you had to go fifty miles east and double back to get into the +north part of our county, and more of us had crossed the ocean than had +been to Pallsbury in the north tier of townships. Now our commercial +clubs meet together alternate months, and about seventeen babies<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> in our +town have proud grandparents up there.</p> + +<p>That's part of what the automobile means to us, Jim. Can you blame me +for being so interested in a new one? Maybe it will have some +contrivance for scaring cows out of a narrow road.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2> + +<h3>THE HOMEBURG TELEPHONE EXCHANGE</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>What Would Happen if We Tried to Get Along With a City Operator</i></p> + +<p>All right, Jim! Having now completed the task of telephoning to Murray +Hill several thousand and something, I'm ready to join you at luncheon. +I'm glad I telephoned. I won't have to spend the afternoon doing it now +and, besides, I feel so triumphant. I got through this time without +forgetting to get a nickel first. I usually go into one of those wooden +overcoats and go through all the agonies of elbowing my way through half +a dozen centrals into some one's ear several miles away, and then +discover that I haven't anything but a half dollar.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> Then I have to stop +and begin all over again.</p> + +<p>Telephoning is one of the prices you have to pay to live in a +metropolis, Jim. I suppose it will always hurt me to pay a nickel for +telephoning. Seems like paying for a lungful of air—and bad air at +that. Coming as I do from the simple bosom of the nation, where talk +over the wires is so cheap that you sometimes have to wait half an hour +while two women are planning a church social over your line, I can't +seem to resign myself to paying the price of a street-car ride every +time I breathe a few sentiments into a telephone. Now the street cars +never fail to dazzle me. They are a wonderful bargain. When we are too +tired to walk in Homeburg, we have to pay at least fifty cents for a +horse from the livery stable, unless some automobile is going our way. +Nothing is more pleasant to me than to slip a nickel to a street-car<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> +conductor and ride ten miles on it. But when we want to use a telephone, +do we go through all this ceremony of dropping a nickel into a set of +chimes? Not much. My bill at home at five cents per telephone call would +be more than my income. Why, many a time I've called up as many as eight +people in the west part of town to know whether the red glow in the sky +was the sunset or the Rolling Mills at Paynesville burning down! And +almost every day I telephone McMuggins, the druggist, to collar a small +boy and send up an Eltarvia Cigar. If that call cost me five cents, I +would be practically smoking ten-cent cigars, and all Homeburg would +regard me with suspicion.</p> + +<p>I suppose it will be a hundred years before we get over saying "Great +invention, isn't it?" every time we have finished a satisfactory session +over the telephone. But I don't think you city people realize how much +of an invention it is.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> Of course, the telephone is more important in +New York than it is in Homeburg. If you had to go back to the +old-fashioned stationary messenger boy to do your business here, a good +share of the city would have to close out at a sacrifice. You do things +with your telephones which dazzle us entirely, like talking into parlor +cars, calling up steamships, buying a railroad and saying airily "Charge +it," and tossing a few hectic words over to Pittsburgh or Cincinnati at +five dollars per remark, as casually as I would stop in and ask +Postmaster Flint why in thunder the Chicago papers were late again—and +that is about as casual as anything I know of.</p> + +<p>I'm willing to admit that your telephones are much more wonderful than +ours, not only because of what they do for you, but because of the +amount of money they can get out of you without causing revolutions and +indignation meet<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span>ings. Why, they tell me that business firms here think +nothing of paying one hundred dollars a year for a telephone! At home +once, when we tried to raise the farmer lines from fifty cents to a +dollar a month, we almost had to fortify the town. I take off my hat to +a telephone which can collect one hundred dollars a year from its user +without using thumbscrews. It must have more ways of working for you +than I have ever dreamed of.</p> + +<p>No, the telephone in Homeburg is a very ordinary thing, and we could get +along without it quite nicely as far as exertion is concerned, it being +only a mile from end to end of the town. But if we had to do without our +telephone girls, we'd turn the whole town into a lodge of sorrow and +refuse to be comforted. I know of no grander invention than the country +town telephone girl. She's not only our servant and master, but she's +our watch-dog, guardian, memorandum book, guide, philosopher and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> family +friend. When our telephone can't give us convenience enough, she +supplies the lack. When brains at both ends are scarce, she dumps hers +into the pot; and when the poor overworked instrument falls down on any +task, she takes up the job. She not only gives our telephone a voice, +but she gives it feet and hands and something to think with.</p> + +<p>I got into a big telephone exchange once and watched it for over a +minute before I was fired out. It was a very impressive sight—rows on +rows of switchboards, hundreds of girls, thousands of little flashing +lights, millions of clickety-clicks and not enough conversation to run a +sewing circle up to refreshment time. The company was very proud of it, +and I suppose it was good enough for a city—but, pshaw, it wouldn't do +Homeburg for a day. If some one were to offer that entire exchange to us +free of charge, we'd struggle along with it for a few hours, and then +we'd rise up en masse<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> and trade it off for Carrie Mason, our chief +operator, throwing in whatever we had to, to boot.</p> + +<p>Our exchange is in the back room of the bank building up-stairs. You +could put the entire equipment in a dray. Our switchboard is about as +big as an old-fashioned china closet and has three hundred drops. I +suppose an up-to-date telephone manager has forgotten what "drops" are +and you can't be expected to know. But out our way the telephone +companies are coöperative, and as every subscriber owns a share, we all +take a deep personal interest in the construction and operation of the +plant, discussing the need of a new switchboard and the advantage of +cabling the Main Street lead, in technical terms.</p> + +<p>Well, anyway, a drop is a little brass door which falls down with a +clatter whenever the telephone which is hitched to that particular drop +wants a connection. And<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> Miss Carrie Mason, our chief operator, sits on +a high stool with a receiver strapped over her rick of blond hair +jabbing brass plugs with long cords attached into the right holes with +unerring accuracy, and a reach which would give her a tremendous +advantage in any boarding-house in the land. Sometimes she has one +assistant, and in rush hours she has two. But on Sunday afternoons and +other quiet times she holds down the whole job alone for hours at a +time; and when I go up to her citadel and ask her to jam a toll call +through forty miles of barbed wire and miscellaneous junk to Taledo by +sheer wrist and lung power, she entertains me as follows while I wait:</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed, I'll get your call through as soon as I can, but the +connection's—Nmbr—awful—Nmbr—bad to-day—Nmbr—They're not at home, +Mrs. Simmons; they went to Paynesville—Nmbr—I'll ring +again—Nmbr—Hello, Doctor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> Simms, Mrs. McCord told me to tell you to +come right out to the farm; the baby's sick—Nmbr—The train's late +to-day, Mrs. Bane, you've got plenty of time—Nmbr—I can't get them, +Mrs. Frazier. I'll call up next door and leave word for them to call +you—Nmbr (To me: "Hot to-day, isn't it? I tell 'em we ought to have an +electric fan up here.")—Nmbr—("It would keep us better +tempered.")—Nmbr—Oh, Mrs. Horn, will you tell Mrs. Flint when she +comes home that Mrs. Frazier wants her to call her up?—Nmbr—Now, +Jimmy, you haven't waited two seconds. I know you're anxious to talk to +Phoeb, but she isn't home; she's at the cooking club—Nmbr—Cambridge, +do see if you can't get through to Taledo. I've a party here that's in a +hurry—Nmbr. (To me: "That Taledo line's awful. It's grounded somewhere +on that farmer's line west of Tacoma.")—Nmbr—Yes, Mr. Bell, I'll call +you quick as he comes in his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> office; I can see his door from my +window—Nmbr—No, Mrs. Bane, the doctor's just gone out to the McCord +farm. If you hurry, you can stop him as he goes past. He left about five +minutes ago—Nmbr—Gee, Paynesville, you gave me an awful ring in the +ear then! No, you can't get through, the line's busy. Well, you'll have +to wait. I can't take the line away from them—Nmbr—Oh! (very softly) +Hello, Sam. Oh, pretty well. I'm most melted—wait a +minute—Nmbr—Hello, Sam (long silence) Oh, get out! My ear's all full +of taffy—wait a minute—Nmbr—Nmbr—No, Mr. Martin, there hasn't been +any one in his office all day. I think he's gone to Chicago—Hello, +Sam—wait a minute, Sam—Nmbr—Nmbr—Hello, Sam—Say, I'm all alone and +jumping sidewise. Call me up about six (very softly). G'by, Sam—Nmbr. +Oh, Mrs. Lucey, is Mrs. Simms at your house? Tell her her husband will +be home late to supper, he's gone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> out in the country—Hello. Hello. +<i>Hello</i>, Taledo. Is your party ready? (To me: "All right, here they are. +You'll have to talk pretty loud.") Hello, Taledo. All ready—Nmbr."</p> + +<p>That is a fair sample of Carrie. We couldn't keep house without her. And +that's why I feel an awful pang of jealousy when I hear that lobster Sam +talking to her. Maybe it's just the ordinary joshing which goes on over +the toll lines in the off hours. But maybe it isn't. Wherever Sam is and +whoever he is, he is a danger to Homeburg. Perhaps he is a lineman at +Paynesville, and then again he may be a grocer in some crossroads town +near by, with a toll telephone in the back of his store. But if he talks +to Carrie long enough and skilfully enough, he will come up to Homeburg, +marry her, and bear her away to his lair, far from our bereaved ears. +We've lost several telephone girls that way, and when a telephone girl +knows<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> all of your habits and customs and those of your friends, and can +tell just where to find you or to find whomever you want found, and has +the business of the town down to the smallest details stowed away in her +capable head, it messes things up dreadfully to have her leave us high +and dry and go to housekeeping—which any one can do.</p> + +<p>Telephone girls are born, not made, in towns like Homeburg. We require +so much more of them than city folks do. When my wife wants to know if +hats are being worn at an afternoon reception, she calls up Carrie. Ten +to one Carrie has caught a scrap of conversation over the line and +knows. But if she hasn't, she will call up and find out. When a doctor +leaves his office to make a call, he calls up Carrie, and she faithfully +pursues him through town and country all day, if necessary. When we are +preparing for a journey, we do not go down to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> the depot until we have +called up Carrie and have found out if the train is on time, and if it +isn't, we ask her to call us when it is discovered by the telegraph +operator. And when our babies wander away, we no longer run frantically +up and down the street hunting for them. We ask Carrie to advertise for +a lost child seven hands high, and wearing a four-hour-old face-wash; +and within five minutes she has called up fifteen people in various +parts of the town and has discovered that said child is playing Indian +in some back yard a few blocks away.</p> + +<p>Carrie is also our confidante. I hate to think of the number of things +Carrie knows. Prowling into our lines while we are talking, as she does, +in search of connections to take down, she overhears enough gossip to +turn Homeburg into a hotbed of anarchy if she were to loose it. But she +doesn't. Carrie keeps all the secrets that a thousand other women +can't.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> She knows what Mrs. Wimble Horn said to Mrs. Ackley over the +line which made Mrs. Ackley so mad that the two haven't spoken for three +years. She knows just who of our citizens telephone to Paynesville when +Homeburg goes dry, and order books, shoes, eggs, and hard-boiled shirts +from the saloons up there to be sent by express in a plain package. She +knows who calls up Lutie Briggs every night or two from Paynesville, and +young Billy Madigan would give worlds for the information, reserving +only enough for a musket or some other duelling weapon. She knows how +hard it is for one of our supposedly prosperous families to get credit +and how long they have to talk to the grocer before he will subside for +another month.</p> + +<p>There's very little that Carrie doesn't know. I shudder to think what +would happen if Carrie should get miffed and begin to divulge. Once we +had a tele<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span>phone girl who did this. She was a pert young thing who had +come to town with her family a short time before. It was a mistake to +hire her—telephone girls should be watched and tested for discretion +from babyhood up—but our directors did it, and because she showed a +passion for literature and gum and very little for work, they fired her +in three months. She left with reluctance, but she talked with +enthusiasm; and Homeburg was an armed camp for a long time.</p> + +<p>Goodness knows we have enough trouble with our telephone even with +Carrie to supply discretion for the whole town. Party lines and rubber +ears are the source of all our woe. You know what a party line is, of +course. It's a line on which you can have a party and gab merrily back +and forth for forty minutes, while some other subscriber is wildly +dancing with impatience. Most of our lines have four subscribers apiece, +and it's just as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> hard to live in friendliness on a party line as it is +for four families to get along good-naturedly in the same house.</p> + +<p>There's Mrs. Sim Askinson, for instance. She's a good woman and her pies +have produced more deep religious satisfaction at the Methodist church +socials than many a sermon. But St. Peter himself couldn't live on the +same telephone line with her. She's polite and refined in any other way, +but when she gets on a telephone line she's a hostile monopolist. Early +in the morning she grabs it and holds it fiercely against all comers, +while talking with her friends about the awful time she had the night +before when the cold water faucet in the kitchen began to drip. Mrs. +Askinson can talk an hour on this fertile subject, stopping each minute +or two to say, with the most corrosive dignity, to some poor victim who +is wiggling his receiver hook: "Please get off this line, whoever you +are. Haven't you any manners? I'm talking,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> and I'll talk till I get +through." And then, like as not, when she's through, she'll leave the +receiver down so that no one else will be able to talk—thus holding the +line in instant readiness when another fit of conversation comes on. +Seven party lines have revolted in succession and have demanded that +Mrs. Askinson be taken off and wished on to some one else, and Sim is +mighty worried. His wife has lost him so many friends that he doubts if +he will be able to run for the town board next year.</p> + +<p>We're a nice, peaceable folk in Homeburg, face to face. But like every +one else, we lay aside our manners when we get on the wires and push and +elbow each other a good deal. Funny what a difference it makes when you +are talking into a formless void to some strange human voice. I've never +said: "Get out of here," to any one in my office yet, but when some one +intrudes on my electric conver<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span>sation, even by mistake, I boil with rage +and I yell with the utmost fervor and indignation: "Get off this line! +Don't you know any better than to ring in?" And the other person comes +right back with: "Well, you big hog, I've waited ten minutes, and I'll +ring all I want!" And then I say something more, and something is said +to me that eats a little semicircular spot out of the edge of my ear. +It's mighty lucky neither of us knows who is talking. Suppose Carrie +should tell. As I say, Carrie holds us in the hollow of her hand.</p> + +<p>But the rubber ear is even worse than the Berkshire manners. A rubber +ear is one that is always stretching itself over some telephone line to +hear a conversation which doesn't concern it. For a long time we were +singularly obtuse about this little point of etiquette in the country. +The fact that all the bells on a line rang with every call was a +constant temptation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> to sit in when we weren't wanted. We listened to +other people's conversations when we felt like it. It amused us, and why +shouldn't we? We rented our telephone and we had a right to pick it up +and soak in everything that was going through it.</p> + +<p>When the exchange was first put in, fifteen years ago, more than one +Homeburg woman used to wash her dishes with the telephone receiver +strapped tightly to her ear, dropping into the conversation whenever she +felt that she could contribute something of interest. As for the country +lines, it was the regular thing, and nobody minded it at all. That was +what killed the first line out of Homeburg. It had fourteen subscribers +and every one was hitched on the same wire. For a month everything went +nicely. Then old man Miller got mad at two neighbors who were sort of +sizing him up over the wire, and quit speaking to them. And<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> Mrs. Ames +was caught gossiping, and a quarrel ensued in which about half the line +took part, all being on the wire and handy. Young Frank Anderson heard +Barney DeWolf making an engagement with his girl and licked Barney. One +thing led to another until not a subscriber would speak to another one, +and the line just naturally pined away.</p> + +<p>Etiquette has tightened up a lot since then. Still, we have rubber ears +to-day, and they cause half the trouble in Homeburg. You see, the +telephone has entirely driven out the back fence as a medium of gossip. +It offers so much wider opportunities. Nowadays it does all the business +which begins with: "Don't breathe this to a soul, but I just heard—" +and half the time some uninvited listener with an ear like a graphophone +horn is drinking in the details, to be published abroad later. Mrs. Cal +Saunders had our worst case of gummy ear up to a couple of years<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> ago, +and broke up two engagements by listening too much. But she doesn't do +it any more. Clayt Emerson cured her.</p> + +<p>Something had to be done for the good of the town and Clayt, who lived +on the same line with her, conceived the plan of letting Mrs. Saunders +hear something worth while just to keep her busy and happy. So he called +up Wimble Horn and talked casually until he heard the little click which +meant that Mrs. Saunders had focused her large receptive ear on the +conversation. Then he told Horn that he was going to burn the darn stuff +up, trade being bad, anyway. Wimble offered to help him, and for three +nights they talked mysteriously about the crime, mentioning more +plotters, while Mrs. Cal hung on the line with her eyes bulging out, and +confided the secret to all the friends she had.</p> + +<p>Finally on Friday night, Policeman Costello, who was in the deal, told +Clayt<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> that the expected had happened and that Mrs. Saunders had told +him about the horrible incendiary plot which was being hatched. Saturday +night came, and Costello refused to go to Clayt's store unless Mrs. +Saunders would come and denounce the villains, who were among our most +respected citizens. So Mrs. Saunders finally agreed, in fear and +trembling, and, taking a couple of her firmest friends, she led +Policeman Costello down to Clayt's restaurant at midnight, and, sure +enough, there was a light in the back part. Costello burst open the +door, and when they all rushed down on the scene of the crime, they +found Clayt and half a dozen of us manfully smoking up a box of stogies +which a slick traveling man had unloaded on him. Mrs. Saunders insisted +that crime was about to be committed and got so excited that she +repeated Clayt's exact words—in the middle of which a great light came +to her, and she said she was going home.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I think you had better," said Clayt, "and I'll tell you something more. +You listen to other people's affairs more than is good for you."</p> + +<p>But she hasn't since.</p> + +<p>Of course you don't have these troubles. But whenever I see New York +people harboring telephones in their homes which absolutely decline to +be civil until you feed them five cents, I think of our Homeburg +blessings and am content. Six dollars a year buys a telephone at home, +and about the only families which haven't telephones are a few widows +who live frugally on nothing a year, and old Mr. Stephens, who has one +hundred thousand dollars loaned out on mortgages and spends half an hour +picking out the biggest eggs when he buys half a dozen. There isn't a +farm within ten miles which isn't connected with the town, and while the +desk 'phone is a novelty with us and we still have to grind away at a +handle to get<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> Central, we can put just as much conversation into the +transmitter and take just as much out of the receiver as if we were +connected with a million telephones. Our Homeburg 'phones are +old-fashioned; and the lines sound as if eleven million bees were +holding indignation meetings on them, but they have made a big family +out of three whole counties, and I guess they will take care of us all +right—so long as Carrie holds out and we can keep that Sam fellow where +he belongs.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2> + +<h3>A HOMEBURG SCHOOL ELECTION</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>Where Woman is Allowed to Vote and Man Has To</i></p> + +<p>Well, Jim, you've taken me to see a great many wonderful sights in this +municipal monstrosity of yours, but I don't believe one of them has +interested me as much as this parade. I've worn three fat men on my toes +for an hour to get a chance to watch it, but it was worth the agony. +Think of it—at home we are doing well to get an attendance of two +thousand at a fire. Here in New York are several hundred thousand people +stopping their mad grabs at limousines and country houses, and blocking +up the streets to watch a few<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> women parading in the interest of the +ballot for psyche knots as well as bald heads. It's wonderful! How did +the women persuade you to do it? I can't help thinking that they lost a +tremendous chance for the cause. Think how much money the ladies would +have made if each one had worn a sandwich board advertising some new +breakfast food or velveteen tobacco! With a crowd like this reading +every word, they could have charged enough to pay the expenses of a +whole campaign!</p> + +<p>It's the crowd that interested me. As far as the parade went, it wasn't +so much. Half a hundred women in cloaks and staffs setting off on foot +for Washington or Honolulu isn't terrifically exciting. I'd a lot rather +go down the line about twenty or thirty miles and watch them come in to +roost at night. There would be some inhuman interest in that. But what +does all this mob mean? Have you New York<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span>ers gone crazy over suffrage? +What! Just the novelty of the thing? Well, let me tell you then, you are +goners! You may not want suffrage now, but if the women are going to +choke traffic every time they spring a novelty, you're going to have to +grant them suffrage just to get the chance to attend to business now and +then.</p> + +<p>Me? Of course I'm a suffragist. I'm a suffragist on twenty counts. No, +thanks, I won't argue the question now, because we have to get over to +the hotel for dinner in an hour or two, and there's no use starting a +thing you will have to leave in the middle. I'll just tell you the last +count to save time, and let it go at that. I'm a suffragist because I +want the rest of mankind to have what we've had in Homeburg for the last +twenty years or so. We've been through the whole thing. Whenever a man's +been through anything, he naturally isn't content until he can stand by +and watch some other man<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> get his. Understand? I'm for suffrage in aged +little New York. I want you to have it and have it a plenty. And I want +to watch you while you're having it. It's a grand thing when you've got +used to it. It will do you good, Jim, just like medicine.</p> + +<p>Do women vote in Homeburg? Of course they do. I'd like to see anybody +stop them. I don't mean that they vote for President. That is, they +won't until next time. It's only the more important elections that they +take part in. Oh, I know you folks in the big town think that unless +you're voting for governor or for the ringleaders of your city +government, the job isn't worth while. But that's where you differ from +Homeburg. We men vote for President and get a good deal of fun out of +the campaign. It's a favorite masculine amusement, and the women don't +interfere with us. But it's not important. I mean it's not important to +Homeburg. We stand up all summer<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> and tear our suspender buttons off +trying to persuade each other that Homeburg's future depends on who +reviews the inaugural parade at Washington; but it isn't so, and we know +it.</p> + +<p>The really burning question in Homeburg is the make-up of the next +school board. That is the election which paralyzes business, splits +families, and sours friendships. And let me just convey to you in a few +brief words, underscored with red ink, the fact that women vote in the +Homeburg school elections. If you want to see real, concentrated +politics with tabasco sauce trimmings, go to Homeburg or some other +small town which is fond of its school system and watch the women +getting out the vote.</p> + +<p>Don't waste your time by coming the day before election. Don't even +expect to see any excitement in the morning. We don't smear our school +election troubles all over the almanac. We have the con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span>vulsion quickly +and get over it. You could stray into Homeburg on the morning of a +school election and not suspect that anything was going on except, +perhaps, a general funeral. Absolute quiet reigns. People are attending +to business with the usual calm.</p> + +<p>You can tell that there is an election on by the little flags stuck out +a hundred feet from the engine-house doors, but that's the only way. +Inside the judges sit waiting for business about as successfully as a +cod fisher on the banks of the Mississippi. Now and then some one strays +in and casts a vote. By noon half a dozen are in the ballot box. The +nation is safe, the schools are progressing satisfactorily, the ticket +is going through without a kick. Even the candidates stop standing +around outside peddling their cards, go home to dinner and forget to +come back.</p> + +<p>Pretty placid, eh? You bet it is. You<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> know all about the calm before +the storm and the little cloud the size of the man's hand which comes up +about eight bells and does a general chaos business without any advance +notices. Well, that cloud in our school elections is impersonated by +Mrs. Delia Arbingle, and she usually arrives at the polls about three +<span class="smcap">p.m.</span> with a new ticket, twenty warlike followers, and several thousand +assorted snorts of defiance.</p> + +<p>That's when the storm breaks—and it's a whole lot bigger than a man's +hand by that time. Delia is a mighty plentiful woman physically, and +when she gets her war paint on, she's a regular cloudburst. As I say, +about three o'clock or thereabouts, we suddenly wake up to the fact that +we have a school election in our midst, and that unless we arise as true +men and patriots, it will soon be at our throats. How do we find it out? +Our women folks tell us. You never saw such devoted women folks, or such +determined<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> ones, either. The minute Delia leaves her house with her +marauding band in her annual attempt to get the scalp of the high school +principal who whipped her oldest son seventeen years ago, the women of +Homeburg <i>rise</i>. And we men go and vote.</p> + +<p>Now, we're not enthusiastic about voting. We're not afraid of Delia. +We've seen her insurge too often. But we go and vote, anyway. We go by +request. You've never had your loving wife come in and request you to +vote, have you, Jim? Well, you've got something coming. It's a request +which you're going to grant. You may not want to, but that has nothing +to do with the case. This is about the way it happens in Homeburg: I am +sitting in my office. I've got a lot of work on hand, and it's no use to +vote, anyway, and, to tell the truth, I had forgotten all about it. +Suddenly the telephone bell rings: I answer it. Here's my cross-section +of the conversation:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Hello? Oh, hello!... No, I haven't voted yet.... Pretty busy to-day.... +You're coming down?... No, I don't want to vote.—What's the use? It's +the same old.... Now, my dear, it's just the same old row. She can't get +any.... But I tell you I'm busy. You go on and.... Yes, of course I'm an +American citizen, but I don't get a salary for it. I'm trying to +earn.... Well, five minutes to cast a useless vote is.... Oh, all right. +Anything to please you.... No, I'll not call up Judge Hicks. He's old +enough to vote by himself.... Oh, all right.... Now, look here, my dear, +I can't ask Fleming to do that. His wife is a friend of Mrs. +Arbingle's.... Yes, I can say that, but it would be a threat.... Oh, the +schools will run anyway. Now, don't get excited.... All right, doggone +it, it'll make a regular fool of me though!... Good-by.</p> + +<p>"Gosh."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span></p> + +<p>I am mopping my forehead while I say that. I'm going to vote and, what +is more, I'm going over to get Judge Hicks, who is a cross old +man-eater, and get him to vote, and then I am going to call up Fleming, +who would otherwise vote against us, and tell him that if he doesn't +support our ticket, our grocery account will go elsewhere. I hate to do +that like the mischief. It isn't considered ethical in national +elections. But somehow we can't stop and discuss these fine points at +3.15 <span class="smcap">p.m.</span> with our loving but excited wives. They don't seem to allow +it.</p> + +<p>I get into my coat, pretty cross, and go down-stairs. Homeburg is +frantically awake. Down the street scores of patriots are marching to +the polls. They are not marching in lock-step, but most of them are +under guard just the same. Mrs. Chet Frazier, pale but determined, is +towing Chet out of his store. Mrs. Wimble Horn is hurrying down the +street with an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> umbrella in one hand and Wimble in the other. From the +post-office comes Postmaster Flint emitting loud wails. It is against +the law to leave the post-office unoccupied, but he can thresh that out +with his wife at home after he has voted. Attorney Briggs was going to +Chicago this afternoon, but I notice he is coming back from the depot. +Mrs. Briggs is bringing him. If I know anything about rage, Attorney +Briggs is ready to masticate barbed wire. His arms are making a blue +haze as they revolve. But he's coming back to vote. He can go to Chicago +to-morrow, but the nation must be saved before five o'clock.</p> + +<p>I do my errands, losing one friend at Fleming's and considerable dignity +at the judge's, because the judge is an old widower and mighty +outspoken. Then I hurry back and go to the polls arm in arm with my +loving wife. We have to wait our turn outside the engine house. From +all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> corners of town the votes roll in, most of them under convoy. It's +a weird mixture—the men sullen and sheepish, the women inspired and +terrible. Even the candidates, most of whom are men, are embarrassed. +They are peddling tickets frantically, and whenever they falter and show +signs of running, their wives hiss something into their ears and brace +them up again.</p> + +<p>The two hostile forces are eying each other with horrid looks. Mrs. +Arbingle is quiet but deadly. I never saw so much hostility coated over +one face as there is on hers. She is in her glory. This time she is +going to unmask the hosts of corruption, including those who will not +call on her, cave in the school ring, boot out the incompetents, and see +justice done to her son at last. Mrs. Wert Payley, who generally leads +the other side, has higher ideals, of course, and isn't so red in the +face. But she is hostile too. No viperess shall tread on the school +system if she can<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> help it! She keeps her lieutenants hustling, and now +and then she looks over the crowd of captive men on the enemy's side and +issues a command. Then some woman talks to her husband, and he gets red +and mad and wags his arms. But in the end he goes over and talks to a +man on the other side. And then that conversation spreads like a prairie +fire, and the men knot up into a cluster, and hard words are used, and a +lot more friendships go into the back shop for repairs.</p> + +<p>Five o'clock is coming fast. Mrs. Payley looks over her list. Young Ad +Summers has refused to budge from his shop. Miss Ri Hawkes blushes a +little and then goes away to a telephone. Pretty soon Ad appears. He's +panting, into the bargain. He gets in line, votes, and Ri walks away +with him. There is a sigh of relief from the Payley cohorts now because +old man Thompson is coming. He is over ninety and hates like thunder to +go out and vote,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> but he can't help himself. He has lived in a wheeled +chair for ten years and has to go wherever his granddaughter wheels him. +He passes in, muttering.</p> + +<p>Only five minutes more. The excitement is intense. Hurrah! Some one has +gotten the telegraph operator's goat. He's coming on the run. That +probably means he'll go to the next dancing-club party. Judge Hicks +appears, four women around him. He is mad, but they are triumphant and +they look scornfully at me, saying "chump" with their eyes. He votes. +There is a commotion at the corner because Gibb Ogle has attempted in a +mild way to be corrupted. He wants to know why he can't sleep in the +South School basement. The women are indignant, and appoint two husbands +to deal with him. Gibb votes. Bang! The polls are closed. It's all over +but the counting.</p> + +<p>We'd like to go back to work, but the suspense is too great. Not that we +have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> any suspense, but our wives have; and if we are worthy of the name +of men, we must help them endure it, even if we ourselves are not +interested in the schools. So we hang around and fume over the +jungle-fingered judges who take as much time as if they were enumerating +the fleas of Africa. Finally a cheer comes from the front of the crowd. +The women beside us gasp anxiously. Which side cheered? Hurrah! There's +Mrs. Payley waving her handkerchief. We win.</p> + +<p>After that, we men can go. The schools have been saved by a vote of 453 +to 78, but it was no thanks to us. No, indeed! If it weren't for the +women where would our schools be?</p> + +<p>We've had women's suffrage in our midst for almost twenty years, as I +say, and looking back over it I can't see a single dull moment +politically. From the day when an indulgent State gave them permission, +our women have guarded the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> schools at the ballot box. They've done a +thorough and painstaking job, and I must say the schools have improved a +lot. But they have sprung a lot of political ideas which have made the +old-timers sit up with startled looks and scratch their heads +hopelessly.</p> + +<p>That's what you are going to find out, Jim, when woman begins to vote +for herself around here and to vote you into the bargain. She isn't +going to play the game according to the old rules. She has no use for +them. She has her own way of going about things politically, and while +it is effective, its wear and tear on mankind is terrific. When the +Homeburg women first attempted to place a woman on the school board, +about fifteen years ago, most of the men objected, and they decided to +hold a town caucus and call the women in. There were a great many +reasons why a woman shouldn't leave her home and sit around on a school +board,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span> and they felt sure that if they were to talk it over frankly in +meeting they could show them these reasons. And, anyway, the chairman +would be a man, which would of course take care of the situation.</p> + +<p>So a caucus was called, and the Grand Opera House, which holds six +hundred human beings, and about a hundred boys in the front seats, was +jammed until it bulged. We knew that no woman could out-argue our +seasoned old politicians, and when Calvin Briggs, who has planned all +the inside work in the congressional district for twenty years, got up +and showed just why woman ought not to intrude, there was an abashed +silence all over the house, until Emma Madigan, who is a town character +and does just as she pleases, got up. She stood up about fifty-nine +seconds after Briggs had got a good start, and she argued with him as +follows:</p> + +<p>"That's all right, Mr. Briggs—You can't make me sit down, Mr. +Chairman,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span> you nor any of you politicians—You're a fine man to talk +about schools, Mr. Briggs. No, I won't stop. You know a lot about +children, don't you, coming up here with tobacco juice all over your +shirt front; and why don't you pay some taxes before you get up here and +tell how to run a town? All right, Chairman, I'm done."</p> + +<p>But so was Briggs. We couldn't help laughing at him. Editor Simpson, who +runs the <i>Argus</i>, stepped into the breach and regretted greatly that so +disgraceful an attack had been made upon a well-beloved citizen by a +woman. No man would dare make such an attack, he opined. Then Emma got +up again. The chairman called her to order, but he might as well have +rapped down the rising tide.</p> + +<p>"I know mighty well no man 'ud dare say what I did, Lafe Simpson," she +shouted. "'Nd you're the biggest coward of 'em all. If you thought you'd +have to lose the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> school printing, you'd vote for the devil for +president of the school board."</p> + +<p>Of course it was perfectly disgraceful, but what could we do? Emma was a +woman. We couldn't throw her out. We couldn't even get her to listen to +parliamentary rules. And the worst of it was, she was telling the truth. +That was something no one presumes to tell in local elections. To do it +breaks the first commandment of politics; but what do the women, bless +'em, care for our commandments?</p> + +<p>The president of the school board at that time was Sanford Jones. He was +a large party who panned out about ninety-five per cent. solemnity and +the rest water on the brain. At this point in the proceedings he judged +it best to rise and turn the subject by telling us why woman should stay +at home. He got about two hundred words into circulation before Emma got +up. Her scandalized women<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span> friends tried to pull her down, and Pelty +Amthorne yelled "whoa," but she was in politics to stay.</p> + +<p>"You look mighty fine standing up there, Mr. Jones," she shouted, "and +tellin' us women to go back home where we belong. But I just want to +tell this here crowd to-night that if you wasn't tighter than the bark +on a tree, your wife wouldn't have to do her own washing.</p> + +<p>"That's why you want her to home. So you can save money."</p> + +<p>After that a gloom fell over the meeting, and as no one else seemed to +care to speak, people began adjourning on all sides of Emma. After every +one else had gone she adjourned. There was no further attempt to hold a +caucus that year, and even now when any school faction desires to get +together and discuss things, it carefully conceals the news from Miss +Madigan.</p> + +<p>That was just one of the many little surprises woman has handed to us +in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> Homeburg politics. Since they've gotten interested in school +affairs, it beats all how much influence they've got. Take Sadie +Askinson for instance. Her husband wanted to run for member of the +school board, and Sadie didn't want him to, because he was away from +home enough nights anyway, goodness knows. Sim was stubborn, and said +the night before election that he was going down and have some ballots +printed, anyway, and run. But he didn't, because that night Sadie cut +every button off of every garment he had and threw them down into the +well. When the kindergarten business came up about ten years ago, old +Colonel Ackley hung out against it on the board. Said he wasn't going to +stand for wasting the people's money on such foolishness. But he did, +because the Young Ladies' Vigilance Society came and wept upon his +shoulder. It was organized for that purpose, and after the seventh young +lady<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> had soaked up Ackley's coat, he said he'd either vote for +kindergarten or leave town, and he didn't care much which.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Wert Payley, who really runs our school system and once marred her +proud record by defeating a good school superintendent because he didn't +give her daughter good marks, says the English suffragettes are poor +sticks and don't know how to demand the ballot. "If the Homeburg women +were ready to go after any more ballot than we have now," says she, +"would we fool away time getting arrested? Not much! We'd turn our +attention to the men. Every Homeburg woman would take care of her +husband and argue with him. Maybe all the men in town would find 'Votes +for Women' in place of their dinners on the table one night, and sewed +on to their coats the next morning. Maybe they would get corn-meal mush +for thirty days, and maybe, if any he politician presumed to get +ob<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span>noxious, he would be dealt with on the public street by a committee. +I know Homeburg, I think, and before Calvin Briggs would stand for the +guying he would receive after half a dozen women had gone down on their +knees to him and grabbed him around the legs so he couldn't get away, +he'd go out of politics. Suffragettes? Bah! What do they know about it? +I'd just like to know how long our men-folks in Homeburg would hold out +if we women were to get sick some fine morning and remain hopeless +invalids until we got the ballot. Why, if Wert Payley presumed to deny +me the ballot, I wouldn't think of parading about it. I'd just have the +girl starch his underwear for about two months, and if that didn't fetch +him, I'd start cleaning house and quit in the middle. The men will give +you anything, if you ask them the right way."</p> + +<p>All of this makes us shiver, because we don't know just how long it will +be before<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span> the Homeburg women do make up their minds to have more +ballot. But when they do, we'll brace up like men and give it to them if +the State will let us. We just naturally hate to disappoint our women-folks.</p> + +<hr /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2> + +<h3>CHRISTMAS AT HOMEBURG</h3> + +<p class='center'><i>And What It Means</i></p> + +<p>Now don't urge me to stay longer, Jim, because I'm going to anyway. Just +to prove it, I'll take another of those gold-corseted cigars of yours, +which would elevate me from the masses to the classes in three puffs if +I smoked it back home. I didn't begin telling you how much I have +enjoyed myself because I intended to go and wanted to start the soft +music. I just wanted to begin on the job, that was all. It's going to +take me an hour, at least, to tell you and Mrs. Jim what this meal has +meant for me.</p> + +<p>Oh, I know there have been better meals<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span> in history perhaps. I suppose +now and then a king gets real hungry and orders up a feed that might +have a shade on this one—just a shade. That's as far as I'll +compromise, Mrs. Jim. You needn't argue the matter. I'm a regular mule +in my opinions. But if you had given me crackers and cheese, and old, +decrepit flexible crackers at that, it would have been all the same. I'd +have devoured them with awe and thanksgiving, and I'd have marveled at +my luck. Here it is Christmas Day, and while half a million strangers in +New York have been eating their hearts along with the regular bill of +fare at boarding-houses and restaurants, I have been grabbed up and +taken into an actual home where they have a Christmas tree!</p> + +<p>I always was lucky, Jim. Every time I fell out of a tree in my youth, I +landed on my head or some other soft spot, but this beats any luck I +ever had. Think of it! Me sitting around in the sub-cellar<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span> of gloom +yesterday afternoon with my family a thousand miles away, and deciding +to go to Boston for Christmas just because I'd have to travel ten hours +and that would be some time killed; and then, when I went to my +boarding-house for a clean collar, you called me up, just as I was +leaving. There's a special department of Providence working on my case. +Got a permanent assignment. And you are a Deputy Angel, Mrs. Jim. +Gratitude! You couldn't get my brand of gratitude anywhere. They don't +keep it in stock. Say the word and I will go back and eat a third piece +of mince pie, and die for you.</p> + +<p>I don't want to seem critical. It's hard for me to criticize anything +right now, anyway, I'm so soaked and soused in contentment. I always +strive to admit all of New York's good points, and I've gotten a job +here largely to encourage the old town and help it along. But I do think +that in one respect New York is in the bush league,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> so to speak. Even +with such people as you to help, you can't get much Christmas out of it. +When I think of Homeburg to-day, I feel proud and haughty. You can beat +us on most everything else, but when it comes to Christmas, we can't +notice you. You don't compete.</p> + +<p>Christmas in this town is only a feat. It's a race against time in two +heats. If you win the first one, you get your shopping done on the day +before. If you win the second, you get through Christmas Day, before +your patience and good spirits give out. Of course, New Yorkers, like +yourselves, who indulge in families and other old customs, have a mighty +good time out of it. Christmas with a family is great anywhere on earth. +But that isn't New York's fault. If you didn't have a family, you would +be dining out or going to some matinée or sitting around watching the +clock. That's where it is your solemn duty to envy Homeburg if you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> +never have done it before. And that's why I would be homesick to-day if +you had fed me four dinners, Mrs. Jim, and had been a whole covey, or +bevy, or flock, or constellation of angels—whichever is correct.</p> + +<p>I don't mean to say that we get any more at Christmas than you do. We +enjoy and endure our presents, same as any one else. And we have just as +hard a time buying them. There aren't enough people in Homeburg to make +a Christmas jam, but we have our own line of troubles. The question in +Homeburg is not how to keep from spending so much money but how to spend +what we have. The storekeepers don't pamper us. In fact they are severe +with us. If we don't buy what they offer the first year, they store it +up, and we have to take it the next Christmas. When the Homeburg +storekeepers have had a bad season, it's up to us to go back the next +year and face the same old line<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> of junk, knowing it will be there until +we give in and buy it. There are two Christmas gift edition copies of +Trilby still on sale in Homeburg, and Sam Green the druggist has had a +ten-dollar manicure set on sale for ten years now. He won't get another, +either. Says he was stung on the first one, and he's going to get his +money back before he goes in any deeper. It goes down about fifty cents +a year in price, and last year Jim Reebe almost bought it at four +dollars and seventy-five cents for Selma Snood. We have hopes of him +this year—unless he and Selma quarrel or get married, either of which +will be fatal.</p> + +<p>No, we have our troubles, same as you do, and Homeburg is full, on the +day before Christmas, of worried fathers who duck into the stores about +seven <span class="smcap">p.m.</span> and try to buy enough stuff to eat up a ten dollar bill +before the doors close. But that's a minor detail. What makes me love +our Christmas is its communism.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span> Christmas isn't a family rite in +Homeburg. It's a town festival, a cross between Home-coming Week and a +general amnesty celebration.</p> + +<p class="center"><a name="illus-0300-1.jpg" id="illus-0300-1.jpg"></a><img src="images/illus-0300-1.jpg" width='700' height='575' alt="In Homeburg you come home to the whole town" /></p> + +<p class='center'>In Homeburg you come home to the whole town.</p> + +<p>People come home for Christmas all over the world, but in Homeburg you +don't merely come home to your family, you come home to the whole town. +A week before the twenty-fifth the clans begin to gather. Usually the +college folks come first. Sometimes we have as many as a dozen, and the +whole town is on edge to see them. It's next to a circus parade in +interest because you never can tell what new sort of clothes the boys +are going to spring on us. In the grand old days when DeLancey Payley +and Sam Singer used to blow in for Christmas, they walked up from the +depot between double lines of admirers, and their clothes never failed +to strike us with awe. I remember the year when Sam came home with one +of those overcoats with a sort of hood effect<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span> in the back. I never +saw one before or since. He was also wearing a felt hat as flat as a +soup plate that year and a two-quart pipe fitted carefully into his +face, and when old Bill Dorgan, the drayman, saw him, he threw up both +hands and cried, "My gosh, it ain't possible!"</p> + +<p>Then the children begin coming back. There is a great difference between +Homeburg and New York regarding children. In New York a child is +personal property. But in Homeburg a child belongs to the whole town. A +birth notice is a real news item in Homeburg. I suppose every baby is +personally inspected by at least two hundred citizens. We criticize +their care and feeding, suggest spanking when they are a little older, +quiver unanimously with horror when they begin to "flip" freight trains, +or get scarlet fever, and watch them grow up as eagerly as you New +Yorkers watched the Woolworth Building. When they are graduated from +high school we<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> are all there with bouquets and presents, and we have an +equity in the whole brood. Molly Strawn, the washerwoman's daughter, got +more flowers than any one last year. And when they leave town to get a +job, if they are boys, or when some rude outsider breaks in with a +marriage license and despoils us of them, if they are girls, we all feel +the loss.</p> + +<p>That's why Christmas means so much more to us. At Christmas time the +town children come home. Will Askinson comes home from Chicago. He's +doing very well up there, and it takes him two hours to get the length +of Main Street on the first day after he arrives. Every one has to hear +about it. Sadie Gastit comes home from Des Moines with a baby; regular +custom of hers. Sometimes she makes the same baby do for two years, but +usually it's a new one. I remember Sadie when she was only knee high to +a grasshopper, and her mother spanked her for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span> climbing the Republican +flagpole during the McKinley campaign. The Flint children come down from +Chicago to visit their aunt. There were only a boy and girl when they +left fifteen years ago. Now there are eleven, counting wife, husband, +and acquisitions. Last year Ad Bridge brought a new wife home from +Denver to show us. Year before last Miss Annie Simms, who has been +teaching in Minneapolis, brought down a young man to show to her family. +She was going to be exclusive about it, but did it work? Not much. She +had to show him all around. We just happened over there in droves. +Everybody loves Annie and we were afraid for a little while that she was +going to be an old maid. The young man will bring her down this year I +suppose. They were married last June.</p> + +<p>All the Homeburg children and grandchildren arrive in the last two days +before Christmas. They go home to their folks<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> to deposit their baggage, +and then they all come down-town to the post-office, to get the mail +ostensibly but in reality to shake hands all around. The day before +Christmas is one long reception on Main Street. The old town fairly +hums.</p> + +<p>As a matter of fact, Christmas is a good deal like a Union Depot. The +approaches are the most important part of it. By the day before +Christmas every one is feeling so good that things begin to happen. +People whom you have never suspected of caring for you come up to your +office and leave things—cigars, and toys for the children, and +Christmas cards. Men with whom you have quarreled during the year shake +hands violently all around a circle on the street, and when they come to +you they grab yours, too; and you begin to talk elaborately as if +nothing had happened—a good deal like two women wading through a formal +call; and it makes you feel so good that pretty soon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span> you buy a box of +Colorado Durable cigars and you go over to the office of some man for +whom you have cherished an undying hatred, because he didn't vote for +you for the school board. You peek in his door, and if he isn't there +you go in and leave the cigars with your compliments.</p> + +<p>There's never been a Christmas at home when I haven't been operated on +for a grouch of this sort, and most always it comes the day before. If I +had my way there wouldn't be any Christmas—only the day before. On the +day before you're so tickled over what the other folks are going to get +from you, and so full of pleased anticipation over what you may get from +the others, that good humor just bursts out all over you like spring +waters from the mountainside.</p> + +<p>On Christmas Eve in Homeburg we all go to the Exercises to hear the +children perform. They build churches in Homeburg with big doors, so +that they can get<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> big Christmas trees in them, and we grown-ups go +early in order to hear the kids squeal with wonder when they come in and +see those thirty-foot miracles in candles and tinsel, down in front.</p> + +<p>Homeburg children are divided into two classes—those who get all of +their presents on the church Christmas trees and have to worry through +the next day without any additional excitement, and those who have to +sit through the Christmas Eve exercises with only a sack of candy to +sustain them and who land heavily the next day. The discussion as to +which is the better way has raged for a generation, anyway; at least my +chum and I discussed it every year when we were boys, he adhering to the +Christmas tree plan, and I to the homemade Christmas. And last year, +when he came back, we began it all over again, he claiming it was cruel +for me to make my children wait until Christmas Day, and I pitying his +poor young<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span>sters for getting done with Christmas before it began.</p> + +<p>Anyway, Christmas Eve is a grand occasion in the churches, and every +year I notice with amazement that some youngster whom I remember as +having been formally introduced to society through her birth notice only +a few weeks ago, seems to me, has gotten large enough to get up on the +platform and speak a piece. They do it at the most unheard-of ages. I +believe there are two-year-old orators in the Congregational Sunday +school. I get a good deal of suspense out of some of your baseball games +here, especially when Chicago plays you, but the most suspense per +individual I've ever noticed has been in these Christmas Eve exercises +when some youngster just high enough to step over a crack in the floor +gets up to recite a piece, and fourteen parents and relatives lean +forward and forget to breathe until he has gotten his forty words out, +wrong end<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> to, and has been snatched off the stage by his relieved +mother.</p> + +<p>Competition gets into everything, and it has marred our Christmas +exercises a little lately. The Methodists are growing fast and are very +ambitious. A few years ago they rented the Opera House, put in two +Christmas trees, with a real fireplace between and a Santa Claus who +came out of it, and charged ten cents admission. That embittered us +Congregationalists. It smacked of commercialism to us, and we would not +budge an inch—besides, there wasn't another Opera House to rent. So, +nowadays, our spirit of good-fellowship on Christmas Eve is sort of +absent-minded and anxious. We are always counting up our attendance and +sizing up our tree, and then sliding over to the Opera House and looking +over the Methodist layout. Sometimes we beat them, but generally they +have a regular mass meeting and make a barrel of money. Last year they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span> +turned people away and brought Santa Claus on the stage in a real +automobile. We were so jealous that we could hardly cool down in time +for Christmas dinner.</p> + +<p>As a matter of fact, the only unimportant part of our Christmas season +is Christmas Day itself. It is a sort of hiatus in the great doings. +When we go home on Christmas Eve, it is with a great peace. We have +bought our presents. We have greeted all the returned prodigals. We have +made up with a few carefully selected enemies. Our children have spoken +their pieces successfully at the Exercises, and have gotten a good start +on the job of eating their way through a young mountain range of mixed +candies and nuts. All the hustle and worry is over, and we are +unanimously happy. The week following Christmas will be one dizzy round +of parties and teas for the visitors, and Homeburg will be a delightful +place full of the friends of boyhood, with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span> an average of one reunion +every fifteen minutes in and out of business hours. But on Christmas Day +nothing will happen except the dinner. We'll get our presents in the +morning, and then at noon the great crisis will come. We'll either +conquer the dinner, or it will conquer us.</p> + +<p>You know how it is, Jim, because that's the kind of dinner you had +to-day. It was an Athletic Feat—not the ordinary kind of city dinner +where you save up carefully during seven courses, and finish strong on +the water crackers and cheese, but a real Christmas gorge. Every time I +sit down to a Christmas dinner in Homeburg, I feel more strongly than +ever that each guest should have his capacity stenciled on him. They are +more careful of box cars in this country than they are of humans. You +never see a box car that doesn't have "Capacity, 100,000 lbs." stenciled +on its sides. And they don't overload that car. There have been times<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span> +when, if I could have had "Capacity, two turkey thighs, one wish-bone, +trimmings, and two pieces of pie" stenciled on me, I would have gotten +along better. I think they ought to try to make these Olympic games more +useful to our nation by instituting a Christmas dinner marathon. If we +have to eat for two hours and a quarter, top speed, once or twice a +year, we ought to train up to the task as a nation.</p> + +<p>I always feel a little bit nervous about Christmas dinner before it +comes, but I never shirk. As a matter of fact, it isn't really +dangerous. As far as I know, no one has ever actually exploded in +Homeburg on Christmas Day, and we all seem to get away with the job in +pretty fair shape. But it spoils the day for anything else. The town is +full, in the afternoon, of partially paralyzed men lying around on sofas +in a comatose condition, like anacondas sleeping off their bi-monthly +lunch. Homeburg is absolutely dead for the rest<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span> of the day. If a fire +broke out on Christmas afternoon, I don't believe even Chief Dobbs would +have the energy to get up and put on his helmet. It's hard on the exiled +men who just run down for Christmas Day from the cities. They don't get +in on anything but the eating. Sam Frazier struck last year. Said he +wasn't going to pay ten dollars fare and incidentals any more, to come +down from Chicago on Christmas Day for an all-afternoon view of his +brother's feet as said brother lay piled up on the sofa. He was going to +come down after this on the Fourth of July.</p> + +<p>It doesn't affect the women so badly because they don't eat so much. +They haven't time. It takes two women to steer one child safely through +a Christmas dinner, anyway, and about three to get the ruins cleared +away in time to get up a light lunch in the evening for the reviving +hosts. If there is any one time<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span> when I would care less to be a woman +than at any other time, it is on Christmas afternoon, when her men-folks +have gone to sleep and have left her with a few cross children and a +carload of Christmas dinner fragments for company.</p> + +<p>That's where you city folks with your servant problem have the best of +us, and I'll not dispute it, Mrs. Jim. On the other hand, the nicest +part of our Homeburg Christmas is the fact that, when we fold our tired +hands over our bulging vests after dinner and lie down to rest, we know +that there is no starving family in Homeburg which has had to celebrate +Christmas by taking on an extra drink of water and indulging in a long, +succulent sniff at a restaurant door.</p> + +<p>We have poor people in Homeburg, but we haven't any poverty problem at +Christmas. It's a strictly local issue, and it is handled by the +neighbors. Having lived a long time in the city, Jim, you may not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span> know +what a neighbor is. It's a person who lives close to you and takes a +personal interest in your affairs. A good neighbor is a woman whose +heart is so large that she has had to annex a lot of outlying territory +around the family real estate in order to fill it. No Homeburg woman +would think of constructing an extraordinarily fine pie without sending +a cut over to her nearest neighbor.</p> + +<p>About Christmas time we are especially busy neighboring in Homeburg, and +any family which lives near us and isn't going very strong on the +Christmas game, because of sickness or trouble, is our meat. It would be +an insult to go across the town and help a family in some other +neighbor's territory, and that was what got Editor Simpson of the +<i>Argus</i> into trouble a couple of years ago.</p> + +<p>Simpson is a young man, a comparative newcomer from the city, and a very +earnest and enterprising party. He runs the <i>Argus</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> on the high gear +and is never so happy as when he is promoting a public movement in real +city style. It occurred to Simpson three years ago that Homeburg ought +not to be behind Chicago in anything, especially at Christmas time, and +so he started a "Good-fellow" movement. They were running it strong in +Chicago that year. Any man who wished to be a "Good Fellow" sent his +name to the "Good-fellow Editor" and offered to provide a Christmas for +one or more poor children. It was a grand idea, stuffed full of +sentiment, and we Homeburg men just naturally ate it up. When the day +before Christmas came, seventy-five "Good Fellows" were on Simpson's +list, and they had offered to take care of one hundred and twenty-five +children, to give each a real Christmas. Simp's office was full of +groceries and toys, applicants were clamoring for children, all was +excitement and enthusiasm—and then a horrible state<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> of affairs was +disclosed. Simpson hadn't provided any children. There was a bleak and +distressing lack of material for us to work upon. In all Homeburg there +weren't ten families who were going without Christmas turkey, or its +equivalent, and in each one of these cases some neighbor had sternly +ordered Simp to keep his hands off and mind his own affairs. There we +were—seventy-five Good Fellows with boatloads of cheer and no way to +dispose of it. The only person we could find in all the town to descend +on was Pat Ryan. We smothered him in groceries, and he ate himself into +biliousness that night and had to have a doctor for three days, which +helped some, but not much. On the whole, it was a dismal failure.</p> + +<p>What! Nine o'clock? Excuse me, Jim. I seem to have taken root here. No; +I am going this time. Back to my room with Christmas all gotten through +with, thank goodness and you folks. You under<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span>stand. You've made it as +nice for me as any two magicians could have done, and I thank you from +the bottom of my heart. But it's my last Christmas in New York, I hope. +Next month the wife and children come on, and by next Christmas, if I +have any luck at all, we'll join the happy army that swoops down on +Homeburg for the holidays. My, but it will be funny to look at the old +town from the outside in! Me—a visitor in Homeburg!</p> + +<p>Do you know what prosperity is to a whole mob of city people, Jim? It's +the ability to pack up their families and go off to some Homeburg or +other for Christmas. And do you know what makes city people successful, +in Homeburg opinion? It's coming back every year. And if we made a +million apiece, and didn't preserve enough of the old home-town love to +come back, we wouldn't be successful in their eyes, not by a long way. +Well, good-by, philanthropists. And, thank you, I can't come<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> again next +year. I'm saving up to go home. That's what makes this cigar taste so +good, Jim. Last one I'll smoke until carfare is in the bank.</p> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<p class='center'>THE END</p> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + +<p class="center"><a name="logo320.png" id="logo320.png"></a><img src="images/logo320.png" width='200' height='176' alt="Publisher's logo" /></p> + +<p class='tbrk'> </p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Homeburg Memories, by George Helgesen Fitch + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMEBURG MEMORIES *** + +***** This file should be named 19196-h.htm or 19196-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/1/9/19196/ + +Produced by Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + +</body> +</html> diff --git a/19196-h/images/illus-0003-1.jpg b/19196-h/images/illus-0003-1.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..ddd2fff --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-h/images/illus-0003-1.jpg diff --git a/19196-h/images/illus-0030-1.jpg b/19196-h/images/illus-0030-1.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..cbf99df --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-h/images/illus-0030-1.jpg diff --git a/19196-h/images/illus-0162-1.jpg b/19196-h/images/illus-0162-1.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d6ad9c3 --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-h/images/illus-0162-1.jpg diff --git a/19196-h/images/illus-0300-1.jpg b/19196-h/images/illus-0300-1.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..1e81585 --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-h/images/illus-0300-1.jpg diff --git a/19196-h/images/logo004.png b/19196-h/images/logo004.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..052fbc0 --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-h/images/logo004.png diff --git a/19196-h/images/logo320.png b/19196-h/images/logo320.png Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d822b6d --- /dev/null +++ b/19196-h/images/logo320.png diff --git a/19196.txt b/19196.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4bcf048 --- /dev/null +++ b/19196.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4914 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Homeburg Memories, by George Helgesen Fitch + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Homeburg Memories + +Author: George Helgesen Fitch + +Release Date: September 7, 2006 [EBook #19196] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMEBURG MEMORIES *** + + + + +Produced by Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +HOMEBURG MEMORIES + +[Illustration: Finally the bass catches up with the cornets. + +FRONTISPIECE. _See Page 176_] + + +Homeburg Memories + +BY + +GEORGE FITCH +AUTHOR OF "AT GOOD OLD SIWASH," +"SIZING UP UNCLE SAM," ETC. + + +WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY +IRMA DEREMEAUX + +[Illustration: Publisher's logo] + +BOSTON +LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY +1915 + + +_Copyright, 1915_, +BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. + +_All rights reserved_ + +Published, February, 1915 + +THE COLONIAL PRESS +C. H. SIMONDS CO., BOSTON, U. S. A. + + +TO + +_MY FATHER_ + + +CONTENTS + +CHAPTER PAGE + + I. THE 4:11 TRAIN 1 + + II. THE FRIENDLY FIRE-FIEND 26 + + III. HOMEBURG'S TWO FOUR-HUNDREDTHS 47 + + IV. THE SERVANT QUESTION IN HOMEBURG 71 + + V. HOMEBURG'S LEISURE CLASS 91 + + VI. HOMEBURG'S WORST ENEMY 116 + + VII. THE HOMEBURG WEEKLY DEMOCRAT 142 + +VIII. THE HOMEBURG MARINE BAND 171 + + IX. THE AUTO GAME IN HOMEBURG 200 + + X. THE HOMEBURG TELEPHONE EXCHANGE 230 + + XI. A HOMEBURG SCHOOL ELECTION 254 + + XII. CHRISTMAS AT HOMEBURG 278 + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + +FINALLY THE BASS CATCHES UP WITH THE +CORNETS _Frontispiece_ + +IT SEEMED TO ME THEN AS IF SHE MUST +HAVE COME FROM HEAVEN BY AIR-LINE PAGE 18 + +"SHE'S OUT, BOYS," HE SAYS " 148 + +IN HOMEBURG YOU COME HOME TO THE +WHOLE TOWN " 284 + + +Homeburg Memories + + + + +I + +THE 4:11 TRAIN + +_In Which the World Comes Once a Day to Visit Homeburg_ + + +Hel-lo, Jim! Darn your case-hardened old hide, but I'm glad to see you! +Wait till I unclamp my fingers from this suit case handle and I'll shake +hands. Whoa--look out!! That's the fourth time that chap's tried to tag +me with his automobile baggage truck. He'll get me yet. I wish I were a +trunk, Jim. Why aren't they as kind to the poor traveler as they are to +his trunk? I don't see any electric truck here to haul me the rest of +the way into New York. It's a long, long walk to the front door of this +station, and my feet hurt. + +That's the idea. Let the porter lug that suit case. I'd have hired one +myself, but I was afraid I couldn't support him in the style you fellows +have made him accustomed to. It was mighty nice of you to come down and +meet me, Jim. I've been standing here for five minutes in this infernal +mass meeting of locomotives, trying to keep out from underfoot, and +getting myself all calm and collected before I surged out of this +howling forty-acre depot and looked New York in the eye. It's nothing +but a plain case of rattles. I have 'em whenever I land here, Jim. Dump +me out on Broadway and I wouldn't care, but whenever I land back in the +bowels of a Union Station I'm a meek little country cousin, and I always +want some one to come along and take me by the hand. + +It's the fault of your depots. They're the biggest things you have, and +it isn't fair for you to come at me with your biggest things first. +Every time I start for New York I swear to myself that I'm going to go +into a fifty thousand dollar dining-room full of waiters far above my +station, and tuck my napkin in my collar, just to show I'm a free-born +citizen; and I'm going to trust my life to crossing policemen, and go by +forty-story buildings without even flipping an eye up the corner and +counting the stories by threes. I'm mighty sophisticated until I hit the +city and get out into a depot which has a town square under roof and a +waiting-room so high that they have to shut the front door to keep the +thunder storms out. Then I begin to shrink. And by the time I've walked +from Yonkers or thereabouts, clean through the station and out of a +two-block hallway, with more stores on either side than there are in all +Homeburg, and have committed my soul to the nearest taxicab pirate, I +feel like a cheese mite in the great hall of Karnak. + +No, sir; when I get into a big city depot, I'm a country Jake, and I +need a compass and kind words. I've suffered a lot from those depots. I +missed a train in Washington once because I figured it would take me +only ten minutes to go from my hotel to the train. But I counted only +the distance to the front door of the Union Station. By the time I'd +journeyed on through the fool thing, my train had gone. Once I missed a +train in the Boston station because I didn't know which one of the +thirty tracks my train was on. I guessed it was somewhere to the right, +and I guessed wrong. It was twenty-four tracks away to the left, and I +couldn't get back in time. So I went into their waiting-room, which is +as big as a New England cornfield and has all the benches named for +various towns. I had to stand up two hours because I couldn't find the +Homeburg bench. + +I'm an admirer of big cities, Jim, and I wouldn't have you take a foot +off your Woolworth building, or a single crashity!! bang!! out of your +subways, but I wish there was a little more coziness in your depots. +Why, at Homeburg I'm nearer the train at my house than I am in New York +after I've got to the station. It's great to have a depot so big that it +takes the place of mountain scenery, but it's hard on the poor traveler, +even if it does have all the comforts of away-from-home in it. And then +it swallows up things so. It takes away all the pleasure of having a +railroad in the town. I suppose five hundred trains come into this +station every day, but they're just trains--nothing more. You don't get +any fun or information or excitement out of them. You can't even chase +them--they bang a gate in your face when you try. I'll bet you don't get +as much comfort and fun out of all these five hundred trains, Jim, as we +do out of the 4:11 train at Homeburg. + +No; it's not any better than your trains. It's not as good. You can't +get raw oysters and magazines and individual cocktails and shaves on it. +All you can get is cinders and peanuts, and I would advise you, if you +were hungry, to eat the former and put the latter in your eye. It's the +kind of a train you New Yorkers would ride on and then write home +telling about the horrors of travel in the great West. But it means +everything to Homeburg. It means a lot more than the half dozen limited +trains which roar through our town fifty miles an hour every day and +have made us so expert at dodging that we will develop kangaroo legs in +another generation. It's our train. Here in New York a hundred trains +come in each morning from Chicago, New Orleans, Everywhere and points +beyond, and the office-boy next door to the depot doesn't stop licking +stamps long enough to look up. But when old Number Eleven, which is its +official railroad name, pulls into Homeburg from Chicago each +afternoon, loaded with mail, news, passengers, home-comers, adventurers, +mysterious strangers, friends, brides, heroes, widows and coffins, you +can just bet we're there to see her. + +It's the town pastime. We all do it. Whenever a Homeburg man has nothing +else to do at four o'clock, he steps over to the depot and joins the +long line which leans up against the depot wall and keeps it in place +during the crisis. Some of them haven't missed a roll-call in years. Old +Bill Dorgan, the drayman, has stood on the platform every day since the +line was built, rain or shine. Josh James, the colored porter of the +Cosmopolitan Hotel, knows more traveling men than William J. Bryan. If +he was absent from his post, the engineer wouldn't know where to stop +the train. The old men come crawling down on nice days and sun +themselves for an hour before the train arrives. The boys sneak slyly +down on their way from school and stand in flocks worshiping the train +butcher, who is bigger than the Washington Monument to them. Sometimes a +few girls come down too, and hang around, giggling. But that doesn't +last long. We won't stand for it in our town. Some missionary tells the +girls' parents, and then they suddenly disappear from the ranks and look +pouty and insulted for a month, and we know, without being told, that a +couple of grown-up young ladies of sixteen or more have been spanked in +the good old-fashioned way. Homeburg is a good town, and it makes its +girls behave even if it has to half kill them. + +You haven't any idea, Jim, how much bustle and noise and excitement and +general enthusiasm a passenger train can put into a small town for a few +minutes. Just imagine yourself in Homeburg on a cold winter afternoon. +It's four o'clock. The sun has stood the climate as long as it can and +is getting ready to duck for shelter behind the dreary fields to the +west. If you ran an automobile a mile a minute down the walk on Main +Street you wouldn't have to toot for a soul. Now and then a farmer comes +out of a store, takes a half hitch on the muffler around his neck, puts +on his bearskin gloves and unties his rig. You watch him drive off, the +wheels yelling on the hard snow, and wonder if it isn't more cheerful +out in the frozen country with the corn shocks for company. It's the +terrible half hour of bleak, fading light before the electricity is +turned on and the cozy dark comes down--the loneliest hour of the +winter's day. + +You've stood it about as long as you can, when you notice signs of life +across the street. Three men carrying satchels are steering for the +depot. Dorgan's dray is rattling down the street. Dorgan's dray would +make a cheerful noise if it was the last sound on earth. Little flocks +and groups of people begin plodding across the square. You know them +all. Gibb Ogle is going over to watch the baggageman load trunks. It is +Gibb's life work. Pelty Amthorne is a little late, but he'll have time +to arrange himself against the east end door and answer the roll-call, +as he has for thirty years. Miss Ollie Mingle is going over too. She +must be expecting that Paynesville young man again. If the competition +between her and Ri Hawkes gets any keener, Ollie will have to meet the +train down at the crossing and nab the young man there. Sim Atkinson is +taking a handful of letters down to the station as usual. Ever since he +had his row with Postmaster Flint, he has refused to add to the receipts +of the office, and buys his stamps of the mail clerk. It is Sim's hope +and dream that sometime the annual receipts of the Homeburg post-office +will just miss being enough to bring a raise in salary. Then Sim will +bring it to Flint's attention that he would have bought his ten +dollars' worth of stamps that year at home, if Flint hadn't advertised +his lock box for rent when he neglected the quarterly dues. Watching Sim +thirst for revenge is as much fun as having a real Indian in town. + +There's the headlight half a mile down the track! She's coming fast, ten +minutes late, and, because you've been lonesome all afternoon and need +exercise, you slip into your coat and hustle down. Just as you get to +the depot, Number Eleven comes in with a crash and a roar, bell ringing, +steam popping off, every brake yelling, platforms loaded, expectation +intense, confusion terrific, all nerves a-tingle, and fat old Jack Ball, +the conductor, lantern under arm, sweeping majestically by on the bottom +step of the smoker. Young Red Nolan and Barney Gastit, two of the +station agent's innumerable amateur helpers, race for the baggage car +with their truck, making a terrible uproar over the old planks. The mail +clerk dumps the sacks. Usually he gets a stranger in the shin with +them. Nothing doing to-day. Just missed a traveling man. We still tell +of the time the paper sack scooted across the icy platform and stood +Mayor Andrews on his head. He wanted to abolish the whole post-office +department. + +I've always realized what the city gate must have meant to the medieval +loafers, because I've watched Homeburg's city gate at the 4:11 train so +often. There's Mrs. Sim Estabrook getting home. Must have been +unexpected. No one to meet her. Wonder if Sim's sick again. I'll call up +pretty soon. Wimble Horn's been to Chicago again, evidently. Wonder if +he'll dump his last eighty acres into the Board of Trade. Who's the +fine-looking duck in the fur-lined coat? Not a transient, evidently. He +passed Josh by. Must be visiting somebody. Yes; Mrs. Ackley's kissing +him. That might mean a scandal in New York, but at home it means +relatives. Poor old Jedson Bane's back, I see. Looks pretty bad. +Hospital didn't help him. Guess he's not long for us. Hello, Jed, old +man! How are you? Better? That's fine. You're looking great! For the +love of Mike, will you take a swift look at what's got off? I believe +it's from college. They don't wear clothes like that anywhere else. Oh, +yes, of course, that's why the Singers' automobile came down. Don't know +what we'd do, now that the circus has passed us up, if it wasn't for +Sally Singer. She imports a new specimen from the University about every +two weeks. + +The crowd is off, and you hurl a few good-bys at the travelers getting +on. Our two editors check them off as they go. The _Argus_ and the +_Democrat_ get all their news at this train. There's no slipping in and +out of town in Homeburg. One and all we face the gantlet. Young Andy +Lowes hates to have us beg him not to miss the morning train back, as we +do three times a week; but he simply has to go to Jonesville that +often, and we all know why, and he knows we know. The Parsons are rid of +their Aunt Mary at last. She's worse than an oyster. Put her in a +guest-room and she grows fast to it. They've had her for six months now. +Hello! Peter Link's son is going down to Jonesville. Guess he's got his +job back. Andy would be a good boy if he would only stop trying to make +the distilleries work nights. There goes old Colonel Ackley on his +weekly trip. Wonder if he thinks he fools any one with that suit case. +Ever since the town went dry, he's had business in the next county. +Hello, Colonel! Don't drop that case. You'll break a suit of clothes! +Watch him glare. + +The engine has gotten its breath by this time. Ever notice how human an +engine sounds when it stops after a long run and the air-brake apparatus +begins to pant? Old Ball has been fussing for a minute and now he yells +"'Board." Aunt Emma Newcomb gets in a few more kisses all around her +family. She's going down to the next station. The engine gives a few +loud puffs, spins its wheels a few times, and the cars begin moving +past. Hurrah! Something doing to-day. That grocery salesman who gets +here once a week is coming across the square two jumps to a rod. Go it, +old man! Go it, train! Ball will always stop for a woman, but the +drummers have to take her on the fly. There! He's on--all but his hat. +Red Nolan will keep that for him till his next trip. + +She's moving fast now. The brakeman hops the next to the last car with +grace and carelessness. From every platform devoted friends and +relatives are spilling--it is a point of honor in Homeburg to remain +with your loved ones in the car as long as you dare before leaping for +life. The last car sweeps by. The red and green lights begin to grow +smaller with businesslike promptness. There is a parting clatter as the +train hits the last switch frog two blocks away. Then it's over. The +noise, bustle, confusion, and joyful excitement follow the flying +cinders out of town, and silence resumes its reign. I've never heard +anything so still as Homeburg after the 4:11 has pulled out. + +But we're too busy to notice it as we string across the square to the +post-office. We have the day's cargo to digest. We have to wait for the +evening mail to be distributed, read the evening newspapers, shake hands +with all the returned Homeburgers, size up the brand new Homeburgers and +investigate the strangers. And it keeps us busy until supper time. + +I've lived in Homeburg thirty-five years and more, and the 4:11 train +has been tangled up in my biography all the way. I remember the first +time I ever rode on it. The cars were funny-looking coops then, and the +engine had a sixty-gallon smokestack. I was four, and I yelled with +fear when the train came in and kept it up for the first twenty miles +after they lugged me on board. The conductor chucked me under the chin +and gave me his punch to play with. He was a young man then. He'd +carried my father and mother on their wedding journey, and twenty years +after that first ride of mine he carried me and my wife on our wedding +journey. The other day we gave our oldest girl two dollars and sent her +on her first trip down to Jonesville, by herself. Old Ball was on the +train, and he grinned at me and promised to take good care of her. He's +pretty gray now, but I hope he stays long enough to start another +generation of our family on its travels. + +I went to my first circus, to Jonesville, on old Number Eleven. And I +went down there at sixteen, a member of the Republican Club, with a +torch, and the proudest boy in the State. The next year I started to +college with an algebra and a tennis racket under my arm (they wouldn't +jam into the trunk), and a dozen friends came down to see me off. On +Number Eleven that day I met four other boys going to the same school. +We are still close chums, though one is on the coast, another's here in +New York, and the third is in the Philippines. + +[Illustration: It seemed to me then as if she must have come from heaven +by air-line.] + +It was the next year that I noticed a girl as she stepped off of Number +Eleven and was met by one of the Homeburg girls. I didn't know who she +was, but it seemed to me then as if she must have come from heaven by +air-line, and I felt so friendly toward the girl who met her that I had +to go down to her house to call that very night. The visitor had come to +stay--her father was starting a new store in Homeburg. I'll tell you, +when a snorty old train, which assays two pecks of cinders per car, +hauls the most wonderful girl on earth into your town and dumps her +into your arms--so to speak, and bunching up events a little--you're +bound to love that train. + +I could write the history of Homeburg from the 4:11 too. In fact, the +train has hauled most of Homeburg into the town. Year after year we +watch strangers get off the train and turn around three times, in the +way a stranger does when he tries to orient himself and locate the +nearest hotel. We get acquainted with those strangers, and in the next +week we discover their business and antecedents and politics and +preferences in jokes, and whether they pull for the Chicago Cubs or the +White Sox. In two weeks they are old-time citizens and go down with us +to welcome the newcomers. Henry Broar came to us on the 4:11. I remember +he wore a loppy hat and needed a shave that day, and we didn't assess +him very highly. But he had a whacking law practice inside of a year, +ran for county judge two years later, and now we swell up to the danger +point when people mention Congressman Broar, and let it slip modestly +that we are intimate enough with Hank to trade shirts with him. + +I remember well the day two imposing strangers got off of Number Eleven, +and made the town nearly explode with curiosity by walking out to the +Dover farm at the edge of town and pacing it off this way and that. Took +us a month to learn their business. That was the time we got the Scraper +Works. When Allison B. Unk arrived, he made a tremendous impression by +wearing a plug hat still in its first youth, and rolling ponderously +around town in a Prince Albert. We've despised Prince Alberts ever since +because the town fell for that one and deposited liberally in Unk's new +bank, which closed up a year later. And then there was the time when the +trainmen put off a scared and sick cripple, who lay in the depot +waiting-room with a ring of sympathetic incompetents around him until +Doc Simms could help him. He touched our hearts, and we shelled out +enough to send him on a hundred miles to his people. He came back ten +years later and kept Homeburg balanced magnificently in the air for a +week by showing us how much fun it is to chum with a millionaire. Even +sick cripples are likely to guess the market right in this country, you +know, and he never forgot us. + +As they come in on Number Eleven, so they go. The young men come to +Homeburg full of hope, and their sons go on elsewhere loaded with the +same. Mothers weep on the station platform many times a year while their +Willies and Johns and Petes hike gaily off to chase their fortunes. And +many times a year the old boys come back from Chicago. Some of them are +rich and proud, and some of them are rich and friendly, and some of them +are just friendly. But they all get off of Number Eleven under our +keen, discriminating glare, and they all get the same greeting while we +size them up and wonder if their nobby thirty-five dollar suits are +their sole stocks-in-trade, and just how much a "lucrative position" +means in Chicago. + +When the big strike was on, twenty-five years ago, Number Eleven didn't +run for two days. We might as well have been marooned on St. Helena. It +was awful. When a hand-car came sweeping into town the third day with a +big sail on, we hailed it like starving sailors. It was Number Eleven +which took on a flat-car loaded with Paynesville's fire department +twenty years ago and saved our business section. When President Banks, +of the Great F. C. & L. Railroad, rolled into Homeburg in his private +car, to become "Pudge" Banks again for a day or two and revisit the +scenes of his boyhood, he came on Number Eleven of course. The train +hung around while the band played two selections and the mayor gave an +address of welcome. That was her longest visit in Homeburg. + +The old train even bursts into local politics and social affairs now and +then. It managed to jump the track in the campaign of '96, leaving four +distinguished Democratic speakers, fizzing with oratory, in the +cornfields, and ruining the only rally the Dems attempted to pull off. +And it took DeLancey Payley down after all the rest of the town had +failed, in a manner which kept us tearful with delight for a week. +DeLancey was sequestered in an Eastern college by his loving parents, +and when he was graduated he came home and started an exclusive circle +composed mostly of himself. He was unapproachably haughty, until one day +he accompanied a proud beauty, who was visiting the Singers (our other +hothouse family) to Number Eleven, and lingered too long after the train +started. DeLancey got off, but in doing so he performed a variety of +difficult and instructive feats of balancing on his ear which were +viewed by a large audience with terrific enthusiasm. When DeLancey was +haughty after that, we always praised this feat, and you'd be surprised +to see how soon he got his nose down out of the zenith. + +Every day old Number Eleven brings in its mail-bag full of hopes and +triumphs, of good news, bad news, and tragedy. Every day it brings the +new ideas from the world outside and the latest wrinkles in hanging on +to this whirling old sphere in a pleasant and successful manner. We get +our styles from the Chicago men who step off of its platforms and tarry +with us. We send our brides off on it with an entire change of bill at +each performance. We get our peeps into wonderland and romance and +comedy from the theatrical troupes which straggle out of its cars and +rush to the baggage car to make sure that no varlet has attached their +trunks since the last stop. It is the magic carpet which carries our +youth forth into the great world to wonder and learn and prevail. And +now and then it is the kindly beast of burden who brings back some old +playmate, done with weariness and striving, and coming home to rest in +our cemetery beyond the south hill. + +No, Jim, your thousand trains a day, with their parlor cars, bathrooms, +barber shops and libraries, are all right, but they're just trains. +Number Eleven is a whole lot more than a train. It is the world come to +visit us once a day--a moving picture of life which we enjoyed long +before Edison took out his patent. Do you wonder that it makes me sad to +see so many perfectly good trains going to waste in this roofed-over +township of yours? Take me out of it, please. + + + + +II + +THE FRIENDLY FIRE-FIEND + +_The Joys of Fighting Him with a Volunteer Fire Department_ + + +Hello! Here comes the fire department! Watch the people swarm! Uumpp! +Ouch! Excuse me for living. This is no place for a peaceable spectator. +I'm going to cast anchor in this doorway until the mob gets past. + +No, thank you. I'll not join the Marathon. But you don't know how +homesick and happy it makes me to see this crowd run! I've been in New +York a week now, and honestly this is almost the first really human +impulse I've seen a citizen give way to. Until this minute I've felt as +if I were a hundred thousand miles from Homeburg, with all train +service suspended for the winter. If I could find the man who stepped on +my heels while chasing that engine, I'd thank him and ask him what +volunteer fire department he used to run with. See 'em scramble. + +Whoop! Here comes the hook-and-ladder truck! This is nothing but +Homeburg on a big scale. I'm beginning to envy you city chaps now. That +makes the fourth engine that's come past. You get more for your money +than we do. Look at that chief hurdling curbstones in his little red +wagon. If Homeburg ever gets big enough to have a chief's wagon, I'll +suffocate with pride. + +I see it's the same old story. Fire's all out. It always is by the time +you've run nine blocks. Watch the racers coming back. Stung, every one +of them--gold-bricked. There's a fat fellow who's run half a mile, I'll +bet. If his tongue hung out any farther, he'd trip up on it. But he'll +do it again next time. They all do. Learning to stop running to fires is +as hard as learning to stop buying mining-stock in the West. And it's +just as big a swindle too. The returns from running to fires are +marvelously small. They tell me that a hundred million dollars a year +goes up in flames in this country. I don't believe it. If it does, I +want to know who gets to see all the fun. I don't. + +I've run to fires all my life, until lately, and I've drawn about three +hundred and seventy-five blanks. Once I almost saw a big grain-elevator +burn in a Western town. That is, I would have seen it, if I had looked +out of my hotel window. But I'd run two miles to see a burning haystack +in the afternoon, and I was so dead tired that I slept right through the +performance that night. And once I did see a row of stores burn, back in +Homeburg--at the distance of a mile. I was in school, and the teacher +wouldn't dismiss us. By stretching my neck several feet I could just see +the flames leaping over the trees, but that was all. Some of the bad +boys sneaked out of the door, but I was a good boy, and waited one +thousand years until school was out and the fire was ditto. I've never +felt quite the same since toward either goodness or education. + +Some men run faithfully to fires year after year and view a fine +collection of burning beefsteaks and feverish chimneys and volcanic +wood-sheds, while others stroll out after dinner in a strange city and +spend a pleasant evening watching a burning oil-refinery make a Vesuvius +look pale and sickly in comparison. Luck is distributed in a dastardly +way, and as for myself I've quit trying. I don't run to fires at all any +more. The big cities have fooled me long enough by sending out forty +pieces of apparatus to smother a defective flue. I stay behind and +watch the crowd. It's more amusing and not half so much work. + +Of course in Homeburg it's different. You city people don't realize what +a blessing the fire-fiend is to a small town. Fires mean a whole lot to +us. They keep us from petrifying altogether during the dull seasons. And +they don't have to be real fires, either. Any old alarm will do. Our +fire-bell sounds just as terrible for a little brush fire as it would +for a flaming powder-mill. It's an adventure merely to hear the thing. +Take a winter night in the dull season after Christmas, for instance. +You have begun to go to sleep right after supper. You've finished the +job at nine o'clock, and by two A.M. you're sailing placidly southwest +of Australia in a seagoing automobile. + +Suddenly the pirate-ship in the rear, which you hadn't noticed before, +slips up and begins potting away at you with a dull metallic boom. The +auto slips its clutch, and the engine begins to clang and clatter, and +somebody off behind a red-hot mountain in the distance begins ringing an +enormous bell just as you slide downward into a crater of flame--and +then you wake up entirely, and the fire-bell is going +"clang-clang-clang-clang-clang," while below you hear the ringing crunch +of your neighbor's feet on the cold snow, and outside the north window +there is a red glare which may be either the end of the world or another +exploded lamp in 'Bige Brinton's chicken-incubator; you won't know which +until you have stabbed both feet into one pants-leg, crawled all over +the cold floor for a missing sock, and run half a mile, double-reefing +your nightshirt to keep it from trailing out from under your overcoat. +That's what a fire-alarm means in Homeburg. + +It's just as interesting in the daytime too. Imagine a summer afternoon +in Homeburg about three o'clock. It's hotter than a simoon in the +Sahara, and the aggregate business being done along Front Street is +nineteen cents an hour. The nearest approach to life on the street is +Sam McAtaw sitting in a shady spot on the edge of the sidewalk and +leaning against a telephone-pole, sound asleep. You're sitting in your +office chair, with your feet on the desk, dozing, when suddenly you hear +footsteps outside. Whoever is making them is turning them out with great +rapidity, and that in itself is novel enough to be interesting. The +footsteps go by, and you look at their maker. It is Gibb Ogle surging up +the walk and yanking his ponderous feet this way and that with +tremendous energy. Nothing but a fire or a loose lion can make Gibb run, +and you don't take any stock in the lion theory; so you tumble out after +him. + +By this time Sim Bone is on the street, and Harvey McMuggins is coming +up behind, while half a dozen heads have suddenly sprouted from as many +doorways. Your heart beats with suspense when Gibb comes to the +town-hall corner. Hurrah! He's steering for the fire-house. You're +overhauling him rapidly, and by a big sprint you beat out Clatt +Sanderson, and grab one handle of the fire-bell ropes. Gibb grabs the +other, and then you let her have it for all there is in you. + +Did I say anything about Homeburg being asleep? Forget it. Before you've +hit the bell a dozen taps you can't hear it for the tramp of feet. Every +store in town is belching forth proprietors and clerks. They are coming +bareheaded and coatless; some of them are collarless. Chief Dobbs, who +shoes horses in his less glorious moments and keeps his helmet hanging +on the forge-cover, dashes into the engine-room, grabs his trumpet, and +begins firing orders, not singly, but in broadsides. There's nobody +there to order yet, but he's just getting his hand in, and ten seconds +later, when the first member of the company arrives, he is saluted with +nineteen stentorian commands in one blast. Half a minute later the +engine-house is clogged with fire-fighters, and the air is a maelstrom +of orders, counter orders, suggestions, objections, and hoarse yells. +Then a roar of wheels sounds outside, and you drop the bell-rope handle +and go out to see the finest sight of all. + +I suppose those old Romans thought the chariot-races were pretty nifty, +but if an old Roman should reassemble himself and watch the dray-race to +a Homeburg fire, he'd wonder how he ever managed to sit through a silly +little dash around an arena. From the south comes a cloud of dust and a +terrific racket. At an equal distance from the east comes another cloud +of dust and an even more terrible uproar, Clay Billings's dray having +more loose spokes than Bill Dorgan's. The clouds approach with +tremendous speed. Bill is a little ahead. He is lashing his horses with +the ends of the reins, while from the bounding dray small articles of no +value, such as butter-firkins and cases of eggs, are emerging and +following on the road behind. + +But Clay isn't beaten--not by a thousand miles. He's going to make it a +dead heat or better--no, Bill hit the crossing first. By George! That +Clay boy is a wonder. He deliberately pulled in and shot across behind +Bill, cutting off a good fifty feet. His team stops, sliding on their +haunches, and ten seconds later is being hitched to the hose-cart, while +Clay is on the seat clanging the foot-bell triumphantly. It's the +fiftieth race, or thereabouts, between the two, and the score is about +even. The winner gets two dollars for the use of his team. I've seen +horse-races for a thousand-dollar purse which weren't half as exciting. + +In the meanwhile more messengers have arrived from the fire. It is in +the Mahlon Brown barn, and late advices indicate terrible progress. As +fast as forty-nine rival fingers can do it, the tugs are fastened, and +the cart is off down the street with a long trail of citizens after it. + +Bill's team, badly blown, is hitched to the hook-and-ladder truck, and +willing hands push it out through the door. There is always more or less +of a feud between the hook-and-ladder boys and the hose-cart boys, +because the former get the second team and rarely arrive at the fire in +time to hoist the beautiful blue ladders before the hose-cart gang puts +the conflagration out. Indeed, the feeling has gotten so strong at times +that the hook-and-ladder gang has threatened to double the prize-money +by private subscription and get their rig out first, but patriotism has +thus far prevented this. + +You have rung the bell until you are tired, by this time, and, besides, +the human flood has rushed on, leaving no one to whom you can explain +just how you thought you smelled fire and beat the world to the +engine-house. So you set out for the fire yourself and jog over the +half-mile in pretty fair time, considering the heat. It is an impressive +sight--not the fire itself, but the event. Two thousand, two hundred and +nine people are there--that being the population of Homeburg minus the +sick and wandering. + +In the midst of the seething mass are the hose-cart and the +ladder-truck. Around them dozens of red helmets are bobbing, while the +quivering air is cut and slashed and mangled with a very hurricane of +orders: "Bring up that hose--" "Whoa, keep that horse still--" "Bring +her round this way--" "Bring her round _this_ way--" "Hey, you chumps, +the fire's _this_ side--" "Back up that wagon--" "Come ahead with the +wagon--" "Get out of here till we get a ladder up--" "Axes here--" "Turn +on that water--" "Turn on that water--" "_Turn on that water!!--_" +"Jones, go down and tell that wooden Indian to turn on that water." +"Hold that water, you--" "_Hold that water!_" "Turn her on, I say." +"Turn her--" "Wow--turn that nozzle the other way--" + +And then the water comes with a mighty rush, yanking the nozzlemen this +way and that and sweeping firemen and common citizens aside as if they +were mere straws. + +As a rule, this is the climax, and the end comes rapidly. By this time +Brown, who had put the fire out with a few pails of water before the +alarm sounded, has persuaded the department to call off its hose, the +barn being full of valuable hay. So there isn't anything to do. The +water is turned off. Gibb Ogle explains to the one hundred and eleventh +knot of people how he was going past the place when he saw the tongue of +flame, and every one disperses after a pleasant social time. + +Everybody is tolerably well satisfied except the hook-and-ladder gang, +which, as usual, is skunked again--never got a ladder out. A couple of +the axmen had a little fun with a rear window, but otherwise the affair +is a flat failure. They go back sullenly, but are comforted when the +roll is called, when each member who was present draws a dollar from the +city treasury. As usual, Pete Sundbloom is late, and tries to edge in to +roll-call, though he was a mile away from peril, but he can't make it +stick and gets the hoarse hoot when his little game is discovered. + +I want to ask you--isn't that a pleasant interruption on a dead day? It +makes life worth living, and I really wonder that there isn't more +incendiarism in small towns throughout the United States. + +Of course all the alarms aren't fizzles. Sometimes we have a real fire, +and then the scene defies description. When a fair-sized house burns +down, Chief Dobbs is so hoarse that he can't talk for a week, and when +the row of wooden stores on the south side went up in flames a few years +ago, the old chief, Patrick McQuinn, burst a blood-vessel and had to +retire, the doctor having warned him that he must never use a +speaking-trumpet again. + +I was away at the time, but they tell me that was a grand fire for the +hook-and-ladder boys. They were right in the middle of it, and every +ladder in the truck was out. There was some trouble over the fact that +the big extension ladder was too tall for the buildings, and when Art +Simms had climbed to the top, he managed to fall fifteen feet to the +roof of the furniture-store, bruising himself badly. But, on the whole, +great good was done, and the second story workers were kings that day. +When the hotel caught, and the hook-and-ladder gang got into it, the way +the upper windows belched mattresses, mirrors, toilet-sets, pictures and +beds was unbelievable. Almost everything in the building was saved, and +some of it was successfully repaired afterward. + +The axmen had their innings that day, too. It was a great sight to see +Andy Lowes leap nimbly up the ladder and poke in window after window +with his spiked ax, stepping backward now and then into nozzleman +Jones's face in order to view the effect. The axmen got glory enough to +last for years, and it was an axman who put out the last scrap of fire. +Frank Sundell was the hero. He was sitting on the ridge-pole of +Emerson's restaurant when he noticed a few blazing spots on the shingle +roof beneath him. He might have called the hose department; but, as I +have said, there is a good deal of rivalry between the two, and, +besides, Sundell had had a slow time that day, Lowes doing most of the +display work. So Frank reached cautiously down with his trusty ax, cut +out a blazing section of shingles, and tossed it to the ground. The +crowd cheered, and he was so encouraged that he cut out the rest of the +hot spots and put out the fire single-handed. Sundell is one of our very +best firemen and stands in line for a nozzleman's position some day. + +Of course a small-town fire department doesn't get as much practice in +twisting the fire-fiend's tail as a city fire company; but our boys have +a mighty good record, and we're proud of them. Since we've had +water-works, and the department hasn't had to depend on some cistern +which always went dry just at a critical moment, there hasn't been a +conflagration in Homeburg big enough to get into the city papers. The +boys may be a little overzealous now and then, but they are always on +the job ten minutes after the first tap of the bell, and the way they go +after a red tongue of flame on a kitchen roof reminds me of a terrier +shaking a rat. They are our real heroes,--the fire-laddies,--for outside +of Frank Ericson and Shorty McGrew, who work on the switching-crew, and +come sailing down through town hanging gracefully from the end of a +box-car ladder by one foot and hand, no one else has any chance to face +danger in Homeburg. + +Of course our firemen don't face danger regularly, between meals, like +your big paid departments here, and about the most the ordinary business +man gets in the danger-line is the imminent peril of getting a new +twenty-five-dollar suit in line with the chemical hose; but we don't +forget in Homeburg how old Mrs. Agnew's house burned twenty years ago +this spring and the department was late, owing to the magnificent depth +of Exchange Street, the roads having broken up, and how, when it got +there, the house was a mass of flames, with the poor old lady, who had +been bedridden for years, shrieking inside, and a hundred neighbors +shrieking on the outside; and how Pat McQuinn and Henry Aultmeyer dove +in through a window, with wet coats around their heads and the +chemical-hose playing on their backs; and how they tugged and hauled at +Mrs. Agnew, who weighed two hundred and fifty pounds, and couldn't get a +grip on her, and finally upended the burning bed and dumped her out of +the window, breaking her hip, and then dumped themselves out and rolled +in the wet grass until their hair and mustaches and clothes quit +blazing--after which they retired into cotton-wool for a month. + +Maybe your men would have done it more scientifically and entirely saved +poor Mrs. Agnew, who died the next month of the broken hip, but they +couldn't have stuck to the job any more heroically; and when Homeburg +citizens talk about "brave fire-laddies" and "homely heroes" at the +annual benefit supper of the Volunteer Company No. 1, they mean Pat and +Henry, and are perfectly willing to argue the question with any one. + +So we worship our company to our heart's content, and when it comes +pacing slowly down the street at the head of every parade, with the +members looking handsomer than chorus girls in their dark-blue flannel +suits, red belts, and neat blue caps, we look at them full of pride and +confidence. Our little boys dream of the time when they will grow up and +join the company and wear seven-pound red helmets at fires, and come +home tired and muddy in the gray dawn after a fire and demand hot coffee +from their admiring women-folks; and as for the Homeburg girls--well, +the greatest social function of our town, or of the county for that +matter, is the annual ball of the Homeburg fire department. + +And let me tell you, when the nine-piece orchestra--all home +talent--strikes up the grand march and Chief Dobbs, with his wide-gauge +mustache and vacuum-cleaned uniform, leads the company around the hall, +every hero with the girl or wife of his heart on his arm and a full +hundred couples of the mere laymen crowding in behind, in a long and +many-looped line, the Astor ball would have to do business with a brass +band and a display of fireworks to attract any more enthusiasm. + +That's what the fire department means to us in Homeburg. We don't suffer +half so much from fires as we would from the lack of them; and when this +new concrete construction makes the world fire-proof, and the Homeburg +fire department rusts away and disappears, we will mourn it even more +sincerely than we did the opera house with a real gallery, which got +over-heated one night twenty-five years ago and burned, compelling us to +get along with a mere hall with a flat floor ever afterward. + + + + +III + +HOMEBURG'S TWO FOUR-HUNDREDTHS + +_The Struggles of our Best Families to Impress Us_ + + +Hold on, Jim. Don't hurry so. Remember I don't have a chance to walk up +Fifth Avenue every day. Give me a chance to astonish myself. Here are +ten thousand women going by in clothes that would make a lily turn red +and burn up with shame, and an equal number of proud gents with curlycue +collars on their overcoats, and I want to do the sight justice. + +You see all this parade every day, but I don't, and I want to drink it +all in. See that feminine explosion in salmon plush! That would +paralyze business back home. Watch that hat crossing the street--it +ought to be arrested for being without visible means of support--Oh, I +see! There's a girl under it with one of those rifle-barrel skirts. Gee! +Ssh, Jim! Did you see the lady who just passed? Let's beg her pardon for +intruding on this earth. Say, you could peel enough haughtiness off of +her to supply eight duchesses and still have enough for the lady cashier +at my hotel. I'll bet she is one of your Four Hundred. For goodness' +sake, Jim, if we pass any of your social lighthouses, point them out to +me. I'm here to see the sights. + +I know the rest of the country throws it up to New York a lot because of +its Four Hundred, and that the ordinary small-town man gets so scornful +when he talks of the idle and diamond-crusted rich, with their +poodle-dog pastimes, that he lives in constant danger of stabbing his +eyes with his nose. But I'm not that way; I'm interested. Nothing +fascinates me so much as the stories in your papers about Mrs. Clymorr +Busst's clever pearl earrings, made to resemble door knobs; and about +Mrs. Spenser Coyne's determination to have Columbia University removed +because it interferes with the view from her garage; and about little +Mrs. Justin Wright's charming innocence in buying a whole steamship +whenever she goes over to Europe. I'd go a long way to see your Four +Hundred perform; and moreover, after I had accumulated a precarious +balance on an iron spike fence in order to rest one eye on a genuine +duke while he fought his way out of a church with one of your leading +local beauties, who had just been affixed to him for life, I would not +squint pityingly on the heaving mass of spectators and hiss: + +"We don't do this in Homeburg." + +Because we would do it fast enough if we had a chance. + +We don't have anything like your Smart Set, of course, but I desire to +say with pride that while there aren't enough tiaras in Homeburg to fill +a pill box, and the only limousine we possess is the closed carriage +which is used for the family of the deceased at funerals, we have our +exclusive and magnificent class just as New York has. We haven't a Four +Hundred in Homeburg, but we have a Two Four-Hundredths. If you get as +much real, solid pleasure and amusement in New York watching your Four +Hundred as we do watching the Payleys and the Singers, I envy you. +They're worth all the trouble they cause. + +For a good many years, Mrs. Wert Payley, wife of the First National +Bank, was our Smart Set, all by herself. There was never any question of +it. She admitted it, and we didn't take the trouble to deny it. In a +way, she was regarded as a public benefactor. Nobody else cared to +spend the money necessary to be a Smart Set, and since Mrs. Payley was +willing to fight and be bled, so to speak, to give our town tone and +inject a little excitement into our prairie lives now and then, we felt +that the least we could do was to regard her as a social colossus. + +The Payleys were the only people in Homeburg who had lunch at noon, and +as early as 1900 they ate it from the bare table. She was the only woman +in Homeburg who could "look in" on an afternoon gabble of any kind for a +few minutes and get away with it without insulting the hostess. When she +shook hands with you, you always grabbed in the wrong place, no matter +how much thought you put into it, and while you were readjusting your +sights and clawing for her fingers and perspiring with mortification, +she was getting a start on you which kept you bashfully humble as long +as she was in sight. She was real goods, Mrs. Payley was--not arrogant, +but just naturally superior. People who called at the Payleys' evenings +were the social lights of Homeburg, and whenever some lady wanted to +discharge a few fireworks indicating her social position, she would form +a hollow square around Mrs. Payley in public and get intimate with her +in full view of everybody. Mrs. Payley ran the town, and everybody was +comfortable and content about it until the Singers arrived. + +The Singers came from Cincinnati to cashier in the Farmers' State Bank: +Mrs. Singer was city bred and city heeled and when she met Mrs. Wert +Payley she didn't even blink. She put out her hand a little +nor'-nor'east of her chatelaine watch, when Mrs. Payley put out her hand +some four inches southwest by south, and waited calmly for Mrs. Payley +to correct herself. There was an awful moment of suspense, and when it +became evident that the only way to get Mrs. Singer's hand down to the +other level would be to excavate beneath her and change her foundations, +Mrs. Payley gave in and reached. + +War was declared that minute, and I shudder now when I think of the +months which followed. + +Mrs. Payley, having been on the ground a long time, had fortified it, of +course, and was president of all the clubs. But inside of a month Mrs. +Singer flanked her position. She declined to join most of the clubs on +the plea of being a busy woman, and organized a flower mission. Its +object was to distribute flowers to the sick and needy, who generally +consisted of Pat Ryan. Pat was nearly smothered in flowers that year, +being good-natured, and as the work of collecting said flowers involved +a great deal of meeting in the Singer home and dancing in the Singer +attic, which was floored with hard maple that winter, Mrs. Singer had +the girls of the town organized into a Roman phalanx before spring. + +Mrs. Payley was triumphantly reelected to the presidency of all her +clubs that winter, but Mrs. Singer organized a public library +association and pulled off a German. Mrs. Payley attended, and when she +tried to patronize Mrs. Singer with her compliments, that clever +infighter beat her to it by explaining the theory of the German to her. +That made Mrs. Payley so mad that the next month she invited the state +president of the Federation of Women's Clubs to visit her, and didn't +ask Mrs. Singer to the tea. The next week Mrs. Singer organized a +Country Club. It only consisted of a two-room pavilion in which picnics +could be held and dances could be pulled off, with long intermissions +for the extraction of slivers from the feet. But it was just as easy to +talk about while you were in town and to refer to in a hushed and +exclusive manner as if it cost a million, and when Mrs. Payley realized +that she could never hope to become exclusive enough to get into it, +though goodness knows she couldn't have been hired to belong to the +foolish thing, she quit speaking to Mrs. Singer, the split became a +chasm, and we began choosing up sides in earnest. + +That winter Mrs. Singer seceded from the church which Mrs. Payley ran, +and founded an Episcopal church, taking seven choir members out of the +Congregational church, to say nothing of the organist. All this mixed up +religion in Homeburg that winter until you could scarcely tell it from a +ward caucus. + +By spring it was dangerous to show favors to either side, and when the +school election came around, it was fought out between the Payley and +Singer factions. Sally Singer had been given higher marks than Sarah +Payley, and the upshot of it all was that when the Payley side prevailed +at election by nine votes, the superintendent lost his job. He was a +good superintendent and the cause of education didn't get over the jolt +for some years, but justice, of course, had to be done. + +The Singers got some satisfaction out of it by electing the school board +treasurer, which took a lot of money out of the First National Bank. +That, of course, got the banks into the row. You city folks may have +your financial flurries, but if you've never been around and between and +under a bank scrap in a small town, you don't know what trouble is. +There were a couple of failures that needn't have happened, and a lot of +partisan financiering, and then the town rose up and sat down on our +social leaders with a most pronounced scrunch. We can stand just about +so much society in Homeburg, but when it gets to elbowing into business, +churches, schools and funerals, we are more sensible than you +metropolitans are. It only takes a half-day to pass the word through a +small town, and one fine morning the Payleys and Singers discovered +that while they were still facing each other like two snorty and +inextinguishable generals, their armies had gone off arm in arm. + +That ended the feud and put society in Homeburg back in its proper +place--in the front parlors in the evening after the dishes had been +done up. The Payleys and Singers still continued to compete, but we +declined to fight and bleed for them and amused ourselves instead by +watching them from the sidelines. Mrs. Payley joined the "When I was in +Europe" brigade, and the Singers got the first automobile in town. It +kept the Singers so busy supporting and encouraging it, that the Payleys +were able to build the first modern house with a sleeping porch and +individual bathrooms--and about the time the Singers came back with a +two-story bungalow full of chopped wood furniture, Mrs. Payley went +abroad again and began to say: "The last time I was in Europe." It was +nip and tuck, year in and year out, between the two, and we all enjoyed +it a lot. + +But it wasn't until the Payley and Singer children came home from +college and formed a tight little circle with their backs out, that we +began to reap the benefits of really haughty society. + +The Payley and Singer children had absorbed all their families had to +offer, and then they went off to school in the East and laid in a +complete stock of the latest styles in superiority. They were all +finished in the same spring and shipped back to Homeburg--magnificent +specimens of college art with even their names done over--and when they +realized that they had to live forever in the old town, where no one +spoke their language or could even understand their clothes, the family +feud was forgotten and the four rushed together for mutual protection +and formed a real Smart Set. + +It's just like your bigger crowd. It doesn't have anything to do with +us in particular. And we are just like you are. You open your Sunday +papers and read reams about the plumbing and pajamas and pet dogs and +love affairs of your first families, and I guess nothing that Sally +Singer or Sarah Payley ever did got past the scornful but lynx-eyed +Homeburgers. When Sarah was getting letters on expensive stationery from +Kansas City, the whole town discussed the probable character of a man +who would put blue sealing wax on his envelopes, and when Sally made her +pa put an addition on the Singer home, we knew what color she was going +to do her boudoir in three months in advance. But we are prouder than +your people. You hire down-trodden reporters to go and abase themselves +to get the information, while we wouldn't lower ourselves enough to ask +even by proxy. We just let the sewing women and hired girls tell us. + +Being an exclusive set in a small town is a whole lot harder than it is +in New York, and I've always admired our youngsters for the way they've +carried it off. Of course, four people can't form a club or give parties +or support an exclusive restaurant; they can't even be exclusive all by +themselves. They have had to mingle with us, but they are always +carefully insulated. They joined our Country Club, but they did it with +their fingers crossed, so to speak. They always come out together and +protect each other from our rude advances as much as possible. They +import college friends whenever they can, and they always have a few +bush leaguers, or utility players, to work in on such occasions. Henry +Snyder used to say he could tell when there was need of the peasantry at +the Singer house by the way Sally Singer would suddenly descend from the +third cross-road beyond Mars to the street in front of the post-office +and ask him with an accurately hospitable smile if he couldn't bring +his sister up to the house that evening to meet a few guests. And once a +year all four turn in and give a real dress rehearsal of up-to-date +social science, to which Homeburg is liberally invited and at which +unknown and unsuspected things are served for refreshments and a new and +deadly variation of bridge or dancing or punch or receiving lines or +conversational technique is put on for our inspection and bewilderment. + +We have a show at our opera-house now and then, and we always go to +these affairs largely to see our Smart Set perform. It always +comes--even East Lynne is better that West Homeburg--and I'll tell you, +by the time they have come rustling in about half way through the first +act, H. DeLancey Payley and W. Sam Singer in clawhammers with an acre +apiece of white shirt and holding about four bushels of pink fluff over +their arms, and the boys have consulted anxiously with the usher, the +two girls, beautiful visions of Arctic perfection, standing in well-bred +suspense and holding their gowns in the 1915 manner, and all four have +hurried down to the best seats and have unharnessed and stowed away +their upholsterings, and DeLancey has folded up his explosive hat and +Sam has leaned back in a lordly way and beckoned to the usher for +another program--by the time all this has transpired, the actors have +forgotten their lines, and we have gotten our money's worth out of the +evening's entertainment. + +The hardships those people inflict on themselves in the sacred cause of +correctness are agonizing. It takes something more than nerve to wear a +silk hat and Prince Albert down to the Homeburg post-office on Sundays +to get the mail--especially with Ad Summers always on hand to spill a +large red laugh into his sleeve and say to some friend in a tremendous +stage whisper that the darn dude's legs must be bowed or he wouldn't +want to hide 'em that way. And as for the carriage proposition, I'm +certain that no martyrs have endured more. DeLancey persuaded Hi Nott to +buy a real city carriage, and the four have used it faithfully; only the +Payleys and Singers live in different edges of town, and by the time Hi +has hauled Sam and his sister across town to the Payleys, through +Homeburg's April streets, which average a little more depth than width, +and has hauled the four down to the theater, there are usually about +three breakdowns. I've seen the four of them plodding haughtily home +from "Wedded but No Wife", the girls holding their imported dresses out +of the mud, and the boys sounding for bottom on the crossings with their +canes, while Hi drove the carriage solemnly down the road beside them. +The mud was too deep for them to get home in the carriage, but everybody +could see it was there and that they had paid for it and had done their +darndest, anyway. After all, that's no worse than the way you New +Yorkers carry your gloves in your hand in warm weather. You don't need +them, but you want the world to know you've got 'em and wouldn't be +found dead without 'em. + +When our Smart Set gives a party, we all try to live up to it as far as +possible, and so we insist on going by carriage. Hi starts hauling us at +six o'clock, six to a load in dry weather, and he usually gets the last +batch there just in time to begin hauling the first platoon home. + +But those are just little troubles for our Smart Set. Your Smart Set has +no troubles except the job of spending its money fast enough to keep +from being smothered by the month's income. It does what it pleases, and +if anybody objects, it raises the price of something or other by way of +retort. But our Smart Set has to live in Homeburg, and what is more, it +has to live off of Homeburg, which is as hoity-toity a place to live +off of as you can find. Sally Singer can't afford to offend any one but +the depositors in the Payley Bank, and if DeLancey caused any Homeburger +to stalk down to his father's bank and extract a thousand-dollar savings +deposit, old man Payley would thrash DeLancey and set him to work on his +farm. They have to show their superiority over us so deftly and +pleasantly that we don't mind it. They have to keep us good-natured +while despising us. With half the genius for contemptuous conciliation +that the Payley and Singer children have displayed in the last five +years, the French nobility could have kept the peasantry yelling for +bread as a privilege long after 1793. + +Emma Madigan weighs two hundred pounds and drives a milk route. She went +to high school with Sally Singer, and it is the joy of her life to poke +her head into the Singer home when Sally has company and yell: "Sall, +here's your milk!" But Sally never tries to refrigerate her with the +Spitzbergen glare which she uses on us collectively when she goes to the +theater. You couldn't possibly refrigerate Emma, but you might encourage +her to say more--like the time when Sarah Payley passed her on the +street without speaking, being busy treading the upper altitudes with a +young Princeton College visitor, and Em yelled back: "For goodness' +sakes, Sarey, if you didn't lace so tight you could get your chin down +and see some one!" + +But most of us are not so frank. We are too good-natured. As a matter of +fact, we'd hate to see the Payleys and Singers common. They help to make +Homeburg interesting, and so long as they know their place and don't +irritate us, we wouldn't hurt their feelings for the world--that is, not +much. + +There was a dancing school in Homeburg two winters ago, and to the +consternation of every one the Payley and Singer young folks joined it. +It took two meetings for us to discover what had clogged up the +atmosphere and taken the prance out of things. Then we tumbled. The +Payleys and Singers were educating us. They were fitting us to live in +the rarified upper altitudes of refinement and to mingle with rank +without stepping all over its feet. By the third meeting Henry Snyder +had caught on to most of the signals and he explained them to a lot of +us beforehand with care. When Sally Singer dropped on to a bench and +moved her skirt ever so slightly aside it was a sign that the young man +with whom she was speaking might sit down and hold sweet converse. And +when Sarah Payley smiled brightly at a gentleman from some distance and +just caressed the chair beside her with her eye for the millionth part +of a second, that young man, if he had a spark of gentility in him, +would hurdle the intervening chairs to arrive. We also discovered how +to get away just before the young ladies got bored, by other delicate +signs, and how to derive the fact that they were thirsty and needed +sustenance, and just how to imprison them in our strong but respectful +arms during a waltz, and how to collect fans and gloves and programs and +handkerchiefs from the floor without grunting or jolting the +conversation. It was hard work, and spoiled the evening to a certain +extent, but we did the best we could until Jim Reebe spoiled it all in +the fourth lesson. Miss Singer had collected her usual six men during +the intermission with as many bright glances, and was being admired +properly and according to Hoyle, when Jim up and remarks, in his +megaphone bass: "Say, Sall, you're a great work of art, but the time you +made a hit with me was the day you slid down the banisters at school." + +That finished the course; and the Smart Set, being unanimously absent +the rest of the winter, we gave ourselves up to vulgar pleasure, stuffed +our white gloves back into the bureaus and yelled for encores when we +couldn't get them any other way. + +I'll tell you, a man could be a hero to his valet with half the exertion +which it takes to be a Somebody to an old grammar-school mate in a small +town. + +Our Smart Set is disintegrating now, and things look blue for social +progress in Homeburg. Sally Singer is getting ready to be married this +summer to a Pittsburgh man who wears a cane. The remaining three look +like the old guard at Waterloo closing in under a heavy fire. Looks to +me as if there were going to be some of these mess alliances to wind up +with, for Sam Singer is calling on Mabel Andrews in citizen's clothing, +she having jeered him out of his Prince Albert; and Henry Snyder has +stopped scoffing and infests the Payley house to an alarming extent. So +I imagine that our Smart Set will get back to shirtsleeves in two +generations less than yours usually requires, and we'll miss it a lot. +Next to the ill feeling between the _Argus_ and the _Democrat_, it has +been our greatest diversion. + + + + +IV + +THE SERVANT QUESTION IN HOMEBURG + +_How Mrs. Singer Amuses Us All by Insisting on Having It_ + + +No apologies, Jim. If the Declaration of Independence who prepares your +meals for you has packed up and gone, I don't need any explanations. I +understand already. You can't ask me up to dinner because there isn't +going to be any dinner. If you don't go out to a restaurant, you'll get +a bite yourself while Mrs. Jim puts the children to bed. And then you'll +spend the evening wondering where you can beg, borrow, abduct, +hypnotize, or manufacture another cook. + +I know all about it. The great sorrow has come upon you, and there's +only one comfort--there are others. It falls upon all who try to get out +of doing their own housework in New York. And I'll bet you were good +enough to the last cook, too--only asked her for one night out a week, +came to her meals promptly, didn't demand more than a fair living wage, +and let her have the rest. Yes, of course you did. And you're going to +let the next one have the best room and ring for her breakfast in the +morning, aren't you? What? Draw the line at that? Well, Jim, I admire +your nerve. You're one of the grand old rugged patriots who will not be +trodden on. Why did your last cook leave, anyway? + +Didn't like the kitchen, eh? And being in a flat you couldn't tear it +out and rebuild it. Yes, I agree with you. The servant problem in New +York is getting to be very serious. To-day you are gay and happy with +luxury and comfort all about you, and to-morrow you are picking +sardines out of a can with a fork for dinner. I am certainly glad I live +in the country, where servant girls do not come on Monday with two +trunks and go away early Thursday morning with three trunks and a +bundle. + +We have no servant problem in Homeburg. However, I exclude Mrs. Singer +from this "we." There are only two servants in the whole town. Mrs. +Singer has them. That is, she tries to have them. Mrs. Singer's attempt +to have servants in a town which is full of hired girls is one of the +things which make life worth living and talking about in Homeburg. + +How do I know about it? Bless you, we all know about it. It's a public +tragedy. Can't help ourselves. We've had four of Mrs. Singer's +ex-servants in our house in six years, and they have all told their +troubles. Mrs. Singer trains girls for the entire town. She's twice as +good as a domestic science school, and she doesn't charge any tuition. +She is devoting her life to the training up of perfect hired girls, and +we revel in the results. It is ungrateful of us to blame her for taking +away our hired girls, because, as a matter of fact, she is our greatest +blessing. Right at this minute in Homeburg I know that two eager +families are sitting around waiting for the latest Singer class in +domestic science to graduate and come back to them for jobs. It ought to +come most any time. The course rarely lasts over three months. + +You see, Mrs. Singer isn't one of us. She came to Homeburg from a large +city, and she brought her ideas with her. She's not the kind of a woman, +either, who is going to cut those ideas down to fit Homeburg. Her plan +is to change Homeburg over to fit her ideas. She's been working at it +for fifteen years now, and I must say she's won out in several cases. +Dress suits are now worn quite unblushingly, we have a country club +half a mile from the post-office--that's the advantage of a small town, +you can get away from the rush and bustle of the city into the sweet +cool country in about four jumps--and no one thinks of serving a party +dinner without salad any more. But she's fallen down on one thing. She +can't keep servants. That problem has been too much for her. Mrs. +Payley, her rival, has had the same hired girl for sixteen years or +more; but Mrs. Singer scorns a hired girl. She must have servants, two +of them, and while she has a remarkable constitution and has stood up +for years under the fight, I don't see how she can keep it up much +longer. + +A hired girl in Homeburg is a very reasonable creature. We never have +any trouble with them, and they have very little with us. We usually +catch them green and wild, just off the steamer, and they come to us +equipped with a thorough working knowledge of the Swedish language, and +nothing else to speak of. Our wives take them in and teach them how to +boil water, make beds, handle a broom, use clothespins, and all the +simpler tricks of housework, to say nothing of an elementary knowledge +of English, which they usually acquire in a month; and we pay this kind +a couple of dollars a week, and they wash the clothes, take care of the +furnace, and mow the lawn with great pleasure. They usually stay a year +or so and then they go to Mrs. Singer's finishing school. They do not go +because they are discontented, but because she offers them five dollars +a week, which is a pretty fair-sized chunk of the earth to a young +Swedish girl just learning to do a few loops and spirals in English and +saving up the steamer fare to bring her sister over. + +Mrs. Singer takes our nice, green, young hired girls, who are willing to +do anything up to the capacity of a stout back, and she tries to make +servants out of them. She gives them embroidered aprons and caps and +makes them keep house her way. And after they have spent a couple of +months making coffee to suit Mrs. Singer, and going over the mahogany to +suit Mrs. Singer, and arranging the magazines on the table to suit Mrs. +Singer, and taking up the breakfast to Miss Sally to suit Mrs. Singer, +and going over the back hall again to suit Mrs. Singer, and keeping +their mouths closed tightly all day to suit Mrs. Singer, and only going +out on Thursday afternoons to suit Mrs. Singer, they sort of get tired +of the job, and one after another they stop Mrs. Singer at a favorable +moment and say these fatal words: + +"Aye gass aye ent stay eny longer." + +Then some Homeburg family joyfully seizes on the deserter, and Mrs. +Singer starts out all over again on the job of making a servant out of a +hired girl. + +I have to admire the woman for her eternal grit. She won't give up for +a minute. She is going to run her house just so if she has to train up +a million girls and lose them all. Half the time she has to do her own +work, but I'll bet that when she has the luncheon ready she puts her +little white lace napkin on her hair and comes in and announces it to +herself in the proper style; and I'll bet, too, that she doesn't talk to +herself while she is working in the kitchen, either. She says the way +Homeburg women talk to their servants is disgraceful; that it lowers a +servant's respect for her mistress. I'd give a lot to see Mrs. Singer +looking at herself coldly in the glass after breakfast and giving +herself orders for the day in a tone that would brook no familiarity +whatever. + +Our women-folks, who are familiar with the Singer residence, say that it +is a beautiful thing full of monogrammed linen and embroidered towels +and curtains that have to be washed as often as a white shirt, and that +whenever they call they are pretty sure to find Mrs. Singer trying to +teach some new and slightly dizzy second girl how to take care of the +house without breaking off the edges. + +You observe the fluency and ease with which I say "second girl." We all +do in Homeburg. We're used to talking about second girls since Mrs. +Singer has tried to keep one. As far as her experience has taught us, we +are firmly convinced that having a second girl is like having mumps on +the other side too. When Mrs. Singer isn't busy trying to teach her cook +how to run the oven and the plate heater and serve the soup all at the +same time, she is attempting to give a new second girl some inkling of +the general ideas of her duties. Trouble is most of them are ten-second +girls. They listen to the program in the Singer household and then they +sprint for safety to some family where they will work twice as hard, but +will give three times as much satisfaction. Then Mrs. Singer arms +herself with the dust rag and clear-starch bowl, and subs on the job +until she finds a new second girl--after which the cook gives up her job +with a loud report, and Mr. Singer stays down-town for dinner at the +Delmonico Hotel until the Singer house management is staved off the +rocks again. + +We feel sorry for the Singers and invite them out a good deal while they +are hunting cooks. And they pay us back royally as soon as the household +staff is fully recruited once more. We eat strange but delicious dishes +made by a reluctant and mystified girl, plus Mrs. Singer's +persuasiveness and will power; and said girl, still reluctant, and +scared into the bargain, serves the dinner with a lace-edged apron and a +napkin on her hair, Mrs. Singer egging her in loud whispers like the +prompter in grand opera. Steering a green cook through a dinner party, +and keeping up a merry conversation at the same time, calls for about as +much social skill as anything I know of. I myself stand in awe of Mrs. +Singer. + +As for the rest of us--we have no servant problem, having no servants. +And about the only hired girl problem we have is the following: "Shall +the girl eat with the family or in the kitchen?" Mrs. Singer wished that +on us. Ten years ago there was no question at all. The girl ate with the +family, and waited on the table when something was needed which couldn't +be reached. Then Mrs. Singer came to town and made her eat in the +kitchen, since which time the question has raged with more or less fury +and the whole town has chosen up sides on it. Half of us want the girl +to eat in the kitchen, and the other half are invincibly democratic and +have her at the table. + +As for the girls, they are divided too. Half of the girls who come to +see about places ask us: "Do I have to eat in the kitchen?" and the +other half ask: "Do I have to eat with the family?" And of course it's +just our luck that the people who wish to dine by themselves never can +find girls who prefer the kitchen, and the people who insist on +associating with their help usually lose them because said help has been +spoiled somewhere else by being allowed to eat in the kitchen, far from +the domestic squabbles and the children with the implacable appetite for +spread bread. + +But on the whole this problem doesn't bother us much, and our hired +girls are a great comfort. They usually stay with us until they are +married or retire from old age, and after they've been ten years in a +house they're pretty much one of the family. The Payleys' girl has been +with them sixteen years, as I said before, and when she wants to go to +the opera-house to an entertainment, Wert Payley makes young DeLancey +Payley take her. It's the only use he's found for DeLancey as yet. We +keep out of the kitchen after supper, unless too strongly pressed by +thirst, because usually from seven to ten some hardworking young Swedish +man sits bolt upright in a straight-backed chair, his head against the +wall, discussing romance and other subjects of interest with a scared, +resolute expression. Usually this goes on for about three years before +anything happens. Then the girl admits, with some hesitation, that she +is going to get married, and our wife or mother, as the case may be, +hustles around and helps make the trousseau and pick out the linen. The +wedding takes place in the parlor, and about a year later the young +Swedish-American citizen who arrives is named after whatever member of +our family is the most convenient as to sex. + +We never entirely lose a good hired girl in Homeburg. They pass us on to +their relatives when they are married, and come back to visit with great +faithfulness. In this topsy-turvy Eldorado of ours where a man +sometimes becomes rich before he really knows what anything larger than +five dollars looks like, many of our girls draw prizes in the shape of +good farmers and prosperous young merchants. But their heads aren't +turned by it. They come around in their new automobiles and take us out +riding, just as if we had money too. The wife of our mayor used to work +for us, and when the electric light gang stuck a light where it would +shine straight into our back porch, thus reducing the value of our house +105 per cent. as a place of employment for a nice, attractive girl in +summers, I stepped over to the mayor's office and asked him if he +remembered how he used to sit on that porch himself. He smiled once, +winked twice, and three minutes afterward four men were on their way to +relocate that pole. + +If I have any criticism of the hired girls in our town, it is because +they go to Europe too much. Now, of course, it's no worse for a hired +girl to go to Europe for the summer than it is for any one else to +indulge themselves in that way. But that's the irritating part. Nobody +else goes. Outside of Mrs. Wert Payley and one or two school teachers, I +don't suppose any Homeburg people have crossed the Atlantic. But half a +dozen of our hired girls go every year. They leave late in the spring, +and during the hot weary summer their mistresses toil patiently along +keeping the job open if they can't find a substitute who will work for a +few months, for the girls who go to Europe are usually pearls of great +price and must be gotten back at all cost. I don't suppose anything is +harder on the temper than to work over a hot kitchen stove all day in +July, and then to sit down to supper, a damp and wilted mess of +weariness, and read a souvenir card from your hired girl, said card +depicting a cool and inviting Swedish meadow with snow-topped mountains +in the distance. + +Our girl has been to Europe three times. She has crossed on the +_Mauretania_, the old _Deutschland_ and the new _Olympic_. Two years +from this summer she thinks she will try the _Imperator_. Often in the +evening she tells us of the wonders of these great vessels--of the +beauty of the sunset at sea, and of the smoke and noise and majesty of +London. I suppose it indicates a jealous disposition, but it makes me +mad sometimes to think that it takes practically all the money I can +earn, working steadily and with two weeks off per year, to send that +girl abroad. + +Of course I don't mean it just that way. She doesn't get all of it. In +fact she gets three dollars a week of it. Out of this she saves about +three dollars and twenty-five cents because sometimes she gets a dollar +extra for doing the washing. And when she goes to Europe for the summer +on the same ship with the Astors and the Vanderbilts, it sounds more +magnificent than it really is. She is on the same ship, but about +eleven decks down, in a corner of the steerage close to the stern, where +the smells are rich and undisturbed. And she doesn't visit ruins and art +galleries in Europe, but a huge circle of loving relatives, who pass her +around from farm to farm for months, while she does amateur business +agent work for the steamship lines, talking up the wonders of America +and--allow me to blush--the saintliness of her employers, and coming +blithely back home in the fall with three or four old childhood chums +for roommates. + +Just the same, I envy our girls. I wish I could go to Europe in the +steerage, not being able to go any other way. + +It's a fortunate thing for us that our hired girls do go back home and +proselyte for America, or else we would soon be jam up against the real +thing in help problems. If, for any reason, the Swedish nation should +cease contributing to Homeburg, we should have to do our own work. I +often wonder at the things our American girls will do rather than to go +on the fighting deck as commander of some one else's kitchen. +Twenty-five of our girls go up to Paynesville every morning at six on +the interurban and make cores in the rolling mills there all day. +Carfare and board deducted, they get less than a good hired girl--and +they don't go to Europe for the summers and never by any chance marry +some rising young farmer who has made the first payment on a quarter +section. Several of our middle-aged young ladies sew for a dollar a day +and keep house by themselves. And there's Mary Smith, who has been a +town problem. She's thirty-five and an orphan. She lives in a house +about as large as a piano box and tries to scare away the wolf by +selling flavoring extracts and taking orders for books. She's never more +than two meals ahead of an embarrassing appetite. Every fall we dig +down and buy her winter coal, and she hasn't bought any clothes for ten +years. Some one gives her an ex-dress and Mary does her best to make it +over, but she never looks much more enticing than a scarecrow in the +result. + +Mary's hands are red with chilblains in the winter, and the poorhouse +yawns for her. But will she take a place as hired girl? Not she. Mary +has her pride. She'll sell you things you don't want, which is as near +begging as graft is to politics, and she'll wear second-hand clothes and +take home cold bread pudding from the hotel--but she will not be a hired +girl and go to Europe in the summer and marry into an automobile. Once +she did consent to become Mrs. Singer's second girl. Mrs. Singer was +desperate, and after a long defense Mary consented on condition that she +be called the "up-stairs maid." But she only lasted three days. Mary +could have drawn five dollars a week and Mrs. Singer's clothes, which +would have fitted her. But Mary couldn't take orders--not that kind. She +came back to take orders from us for a patent glass washtub or something +of the kind--and we sighed wearily. + + + + +V + +HOMEBURG'S LEISURE CLASS + +_It is not as large as New York's but it is twice as ingenious_ + + +Confound it, Jim, I wish you hadn't told me that your friend Williston +never worked a day in his life! You don't know how it disappointed me. + +Why? Because I don't know when I have met a man whom I liked so much at +first sight as I did Williston. He suited me from the ground up. I never +spent a more interesting afternoon with any one. No matter what he did, +he interested me--I enjoyed watching him handle his cigar as well as I +did hearing him tell about his Amazon adventures. Says I to myself: +"Here is a man whose friendship I will win if I have to live in New York +all my life to get it." And then you had to go and spoil it all. + +Oh, yes, I know it's just my backwoods way of looking at things. I'm not +saying what I do as a boast. I'm making a confession of it. I know why +Williston doesn't work. It's because he owns a piano box full of bonds +left by his late lamented pa, and when he was educated, the word "work" +was crossed out of his spelling-book in red ink. And I'm not saying that +he isn't a fine fellow. He's intelligent and witty and companionable and +forty other desirable things. But he won't work. Somehow that sticks in +my vision of him. It reminds me of the case of Mamie Gastit, who was the +prettiest, best-dispositioned, and most capable girl in Homeburg, but +who had a glass eye. We didn't hold it up against her, but it made us +awfully sad. There were plenty of Homeburg girls who would have been +decorated by a glass eye. Why did Providence have to wish it on the +finest girl in town? + +You say it is no crime not to work in New York? Bless you, I know it. In +fact, loafing in New York is the most fascinating business in the world. +Why, it seems as if you New York men actually struggle to get spare +time. I've sat in your office and watched you on Saturday morning +working yourself into a blue haze in your efforts to get done early +enough to cord up a fine big mess of leisure on Saturday afternoon. +That's the difference between New York and Homeburg. In Homeburg you +would have been stretching out your job to last until supper +time--unless you were one of our nineteen golfers, or the roads were +good enough to let you drive over to the baseball game at Paynesville. + +Leisure in New York means pleasure, excitement, and seven dozen kinds of +interest. But for many and many a long year in hundreds of Homeburg +homes, leisure has meant waiting for meal times--and not much of +anything else. + +City people laugh at country people for beating the chickens to roost. +But what are you going to do when going to bed is the most fascinating +diversion available after supper? I've noticed that as fast as a small +town man discovers something else to do in the evening, his light bill +goes up and up. When crokinole was introduced into Homeburg twenty odd +years ago, the kerosene wagon had to make an extra mid-week trip. When +the magazines came down from thirty-five cents to ten and you could get +three of them and a set of books for one dollar down and a dollar a +month until death did you part, they had to put an operator in the +telephone exchange after 8 P.M. because of the general sleeplessness. +When the automobile came, and when two moving picture theaters, a +Chautauqua, and a Lyceum course opened fire in one year, and the +business men fitted up a club with an ancient pool table in it, Homeburg +got chummy with all the evening hours, and kicked so hard about the +electric lights going off at midnight that the company had to run them +an hour longer. And I suppose if any invader ever puts in an all-night +restaurant where you can have lobster and a soubrette on the table at +the same time, a certain proportion of us will get as foolish as you are +and will forget how to go to bed at all by artificial light. + +We've changed that much from the past generation. We know what to do +with leisure in the evening. But we're still awkward and embarrassed +when we meet it by daylight. Since we have built our Country Club, a few +of us have learned to enjoy ourselves in a fitful and guilty fashion +late in the afternoon. But as a rule, even to-day, when you give a +Homeburg man a bright golden daylight hour of leisure, he has no more +use for it than he would have for a five-ton white elephant with an +appetite for ice-cream. And that, Jim, is why I can't speed myself up to +appreciate a young man who has never worked and never intends to. I +still have to look at him with my Homeburg eyes. And in Homeburg, when a +man doesn't work when he has a chance and takes what amusement we have +to offer as a steady diet in perfect content, we know something is the +matter with him--and we are sorry for him. + +Leisure has killed more people in Homeburg than work ever did. For years +our biggest problem was the job of keeping our retired farmers alive. +When a farmer has worked forty years or so, and has accumulated a +quarter section of land, and a few children who need high school +education, he rents his farm and moves into town, where he lives +comfortably on eighty dollars a month and fills a tasty tomb in a very +few years. It isn't so hard on the farmer's wife, because she takes her +housework into town with her and keeps busy. But when the farmer has +settled down in town, far from a chance to work, he discovers that he +has about fourteen hours of leisure each day on his hands and nothing to +do with them but to eat. Out of regard for his digestion he can't eat +more than three hours a day. That leaves him eleven hours in which to go +down-town for the mail and do the chores around the house. + +He stands it pretty well the first year. The second year is so long that +he begins to lay plans for his centennial, and about the third year he +takes to his bed and dies, with a sigh of relief. That's what leisure +does to a Homeburg man who isn't used to it. And that is one of the +reasons why, when I see a man in New York with nothing to do from +choice, I think of the sad army of the unemployed in Homeburg draping +themselves around the grain office every day in fine weather, and +wearing away the weary years in idleness because they are too old to +work, and don't have to, anyway. + +Of late years we have been working earnestly to conserve our retired +farmers. They are fine men, and we hate to see them wasted. We have been +trying to reduce their leisure--just as a city man tries to reduce his +flesh. We elect them to everything possible. We have taught a number of +them how to play pool in the Commercial Club. We have started a farmers' +elevator, a farmers' bank and a planter factory, and have got them to +invest money. That has been a godsend, because it has kept a large +number of them busy and happy trying to save the said money. But where +we have saved one retired farmer, the automobile has saved ten. Whenever +one of our unemployed comes out with a machine, we sigh with relief and +stop worrying about him. It's just the same as if he had been given +wings and a world to explore. In summer, our retired farmers who have +autos loaf around the country from Indiana to Idaho and talk crops in +the garages of a thousand towns. And in winter they rebuild their cars, +and talk good roads. Twenty years ago you could talk good roads to a +farmer or bang him with a club, with the same result. But last year our +retired farmers organized a good roads association, and to amuse +themselves they have dragged the roads for miles around and have built a +mile of rock road leading south to the cemetery--where in the old April +days, as Henry Snyder says, the deceased was buried once, but the +mourners got buried twice--going out and coming back. + +We have a real leisure class in Homeburg, however, outside of the +retired farmers, who really can't help themselves. Our genuine +metropolitan leisure class consists of DeLancey Payley and Gibb Ogle. +They are, as far as I know, the only two people in Homeburg who loaf +from choice year in and year out in perfect content. We have done our +best with both of them, but we have given up. Leisure is what they were +created for. It is a talent with them, and their only talent. They have +developed it to the best of their ability. + +DeLancey's is the saddest case, because so much money was wasted on him. +Wert Payley is the richest man in our part of the country. He owns a +bank and one or two counties out West. He sent DeLancey East to school, +where he was educated regardless of expense or anything else and was +returned a few years ago a finished product, sublime, though a little +terrifying to look at, and reeking with knowledge of one kind or +another. I have heard it said that DeLancey can tell offhand what has +been the correct thing in dress for each of the last thirty-five years, +and that he can handle as many as fifteen articles of cutlery and +forkery at a dinner table with absolute accuracy. + +DeLancey has been at home almost ten years now, and his chief mission +has been to ornament Homeburg and add to its elegance on state +occasions. His father had designed him for a captain of finance, and +when he first came home DeLancey was put in the bank in order that he +might work up by degrees into the bond business or some other auriferous +form of toil. Wert Payley almost had nervous prostration from overwork +that year, and in the end he had to give up. He couldn't carry his own +load and make DeLancey work too. It was too much. No human being should +be asked to do it. Wert often says that if he had had nothing else to do +he could have kept DeLancey at work at least part of the time, but that +he was too old to shoulder the task on top of his other duties. So +DeLancey left the bank, except as an enthusiastic check casher, and took +up his life work--I mean that, of course, figuratively. I mean his life +occupation--hang it, that won't do either! He took up his mission--the +work for which his ardent young soul was fitted. He began to specialize +in leisure. + +For close to nine years DeLancey has loafed. It is a miracle to us. We +can't understand his endurance. Yet he thrives on it. Wert Payley has +given up trying to make him work, but he has taken what he considers to +be an awful revenge. He has refused to spend one cent for carfare. +DeLancey can hang around Homeburg until he dies, but if he wants to +leave, he must earn the money himself. And DeLancey hasn't been fifty +miles from Homeburg since he slipped the clutch out of his tired, +throbbing brain and let it rest, nine years ago. + +We have to admire his ingenuity. He kills time so scientifically. They +say it takes him two hours to do himself up in the morning after he gets +out of bed, and that he has almost as many beautifying tools as an +actress. He doesn't get down-town before ten. It takes him from fifteen +minutes to half an hour to buy his morning cigar. That is, he talks to +McMuggins, the druggist, as long as Mac will stand for it. Mac has a +regular schedule. If Delancey buys a ten-cent cigar, Mac will talk with +him fifteen minutes. If he buys a fifteen-cent cigar, he will talk half +an hour, if business isn't too brisk. Mac keeps a box of fifteen-cent +cigars especially for DeLancey, but he says it is an awful risk. If +DeLancey were to die on him, he couldn't sell those cigars in a hundred +years. + +The tellers at the bank are good for fifteen minutes or so after +DeLancey has bought his cigar; he strolls in and gossips with them +until his father begins to snort ominously in his little railed-off pen +marked "President." Cooney Simpson, the tailor, likes DeLancey, and they +talk clothes for half an hour almost every morning. Then it's noon, and +this is his hardest problem, because every one goes to dinner at noon +except the Payleys and Singers, who have luncheon at one. If DeLancey +can find Sam Singer, he is all right. But Sam, who used to loaf +enthusiastically with him, has rosy ideas about Mabel Andrews now, and +he is working hard in his father's bank and on the farms. It was a +bitter day for DeLancey when Sam went to work. It almost shook his faith +in idleness. But he stood firm. + +Luncheon kills two hours for DeLancey, and then he goes up to the +Homeburg Commercial Club and shoots the pool balls around the table +until 4:30, waiting eagerly for some one to stop working and come to +play with him. Sometimes they come and sometimes they don't. If they +don't, he goes down to the hotel and talks with a traveling man. I often +see him in the lobby of the Delmonico, sitting in magnificent ease, +blowing large smoke rings and talking with an air of unconscious +grandeur to some eager-eyed drummer, who is delighted but mystified at +the ease with which he is breaking into the first families. DeLancey has +a quiet way of talking about the East and the great people thereof which +fools even us sometimes. + +DeLancey makes his toilet after dinner at night and that of course kills +an hour or more. Then he calls on Madeline Hicks, old Judge Hicks's +daughter, when she will let him. He has an idea he would like to marry +her, but while she likes him, they say she can't bring herself to marry +a man of leisure and have the whole town sorry for her. But he takes her +to all the parties, and about once a week his father lets him have the +automobile, if the chauffeur doesn't want to use it. On other nights +DeLancey comes down-town and buys another cigar at the restaurant. It is +as good as a show to see DeLancey buy his evening cigar. You'd think he +was taking over a railroad, he chooses it with such care. The young +farmer boys and the workers in the factory come down-town at night and +loaf around the restaurants without any excuse. They have to kill the +time. But that would be too coarse work for DeLancey. He doesn't come +down-town to loaf--Oh, no! He has merely dropped in on his orbit. It +takes him half the evening to buy his cigar and smoke it, conversing as +he does so with a few selected citizens on the benefits of slim-cut +clothes and the origin of the pussy-cat hat. + +Sometimes DeLancey can abduct some busy young chap and make him play a +round of golf on week-day afternoons, but not often. That's the +difference between our clubs and yours. We have clubs, but we don't use +them. We wouldn't think of spending time there if we could spend it at +business. Nothing is lonelier on week days than our golf club, and one +of the chief duties of the caretaker at the Commercial Club is to dust +off the reading table. We have our clubs, and that is the main object. +We know that they are there, and that we could enjoy them if we wanted +to. Perhaps we do want to. But it's a hard art to learn. And, oh, how +patiently and earnestly DeLancey is trying to teach us! If it were any +one but he, we might learn faster. But he sort of figures as a horrible +example. It's like a battered and yellowed wreck advocating cigarettes, +or a bald-headed barber pushing his own hair tonic. + +Gibb Ogle, the other member of our leisure class, is a very different +kind of a bird. His art is more sublime than DeLancey's because he has +no one to support him. He has worked down to his present state from +nothing at all. He is a self-unmade man. With no resources, not even a +loving wife with a wash tub, he lives a life of perfect ease and +idleness. He doesn't even have to hunt for means of killing time, as +DeLancey does. Time with him dies a natural death. He is not implicated +in the sad event in any way. All he does is to watch its demise. He +watches whole hours pass away while leaning against the door-frame of +the Delmonico Hotel. Chet Frazier and Sim Bone got into an argument one +day, and to settle it they went over and took Gibb away from the +building. It didn't fall, and Sim won. Gibb has watched several thousand +hours expire while propping up the Q. B. & C. depot. He is the chief +spectator at every fire, runaway, dog fight and public event. He is a +movable landmark, as permanent as the Republican flagpole in the city +park. I have never yet gone down-town in the morning without seeing Gibb +on the street. And very seldom have I gone home at night, even in the +howling blizzards of winter, without passing Gibb leaning against the +warm bright show window of the last open place of business, and waiting +with placid greediness for one final event of some kind to transpire +before going to his well-earned repose. + +Beside Gibb's leisure, DeLancey's is poor amateurish stuff. Gibb's total +income during the year would hardly exceed twenty-five dollars, and it +doesn't do him much good at that. When he gets any money, he eats it up +in the most determined and hasty fashion. I have seen him eat a dollar's +worth of ham sandwiches in an afternoon--because he had the dollar. What +he does between dollars is a town mystery. He doesn't beg. He is +believed by some to absorb sustenance from the air, like a plant. But I +happen to know that he absorbs a good deal of sustenance from the +Delmonico Hotel. He has attached himself to this hotel as a sort of +retainer, and through all its changes of ownership he has hung on. He +will not work, but he gives the place his moral support and speaks +highly of it to all comers. He will even carry a satchel across to the +depot, but only as an accommodation to the hotel. In return he asks +nothing and thus saves his proud spirit from the insult of a refusal. +But I think he has first pick of the scattered remains of the dinners +that leave the kitchen door whenever the cook is good-natured. + +I say I think so, because few of us have seen Gibb Ogle eat. He has a +pride, and performs this humiliating act in secret. But grocers tell me +that he is always offering to dispose of broken-up crackers, stale +cheese and old mackerel. "I'll just carry that out for you," he says. +And they understand and let him do it. One night as he hurried past me, +a package dropped from under his coat and broke at my feet. It was +food--dry bread and a bologna skin with a little meat in the end. He +stopped and told me how hard it was to find food for a dog in which he +was interested. But that was a fib. With all his faults Gibb never +maintained a dog in idleness. + +In summers Gibb leads a care-free, happy life, sunning himself all day +and sleeping comfortably at night in any one of a dozen places. He is +our village grasshopper, taking no thought of the chill future. How he +lives through our fierce winters is a mystery. He sleeps in barns. He +sleeps on the coal in the electric light power house. If the clerk at +the hotel happens to be a friend of his, he curls up in a chair in the +lobby. Sometimes all of these fail him. I have heard that he spent one +winter in an empty room over a store, and thawed out his toes on +several mornings. We are always afraid some crackling January dawn will +find Gibb frozen hard on the streets, and it is a relief when spring +comes and he begins to fatten up a little and drink in sunshine again. + +We'd like to send Gibb to the county home. Some of us are even willing +to contribute to his support, scandalous as it would be. But it is hard +to do, because Gibb is no pauper. He is a gentleman of leisure with the +dignity of an Indian. His worn suits are neat, and he is as dapper with +a battered hat and a four-year-old celluloid collar as if he spent real +money on his wardrobe. He chooses his life and lives it without +complaint. Periodically we strive heroically to make him work. The boys +at the planter factory, who are a rough lot but have some hold on Gibb +because they entertain him out of their lunch boxes, kidnap him about +twice a year and drag him in to the superintendent to get a job for +him. Gibb protests frantically that he has business which can't be +neglected--that he is just closing a deal for a good position at the +hotel--that he is going away on a trip--but nothing helps him. He +accepts the job with ill-concealed horror, and the factory boys climb up +on the roof of the main building and hoist a flag. We all know what it +means. Gibb is working again. And we all know what will happen next. + +About two days later Gibb will be limping to the factory very late with +his off-foot done up in an enormous comforter. "That's what you have +done, boys," he will say with simple dignity, "you've hurt that old sore +foot of mine. It's never been right since I hurt it with the fire +company. It's in awful shape now. I guess I'll lose it at last. You +oughtn't to have done it, boys. Goodness knows, I'd have worked all +these years if I'd had any foot to speak of." + +Then he goes in and resigns--after which the foot recovers in great +haste, and Gibb stands on it relentlessly twelve hours a day in the old +way, while he watches the world go round and waits for the judgment day. + +You'd think from the way we hammer at both DeLancey and Gibb to go to +work that they would hang together, being in the same class. But they +don't. In fact they have the greatest contempt for each other. DeLancey +will not speak to Gibb, and thinks it is a crime that he isn't sent to +the stone pile; while Gibb speaks of DeLancey in pitying accents as a +young man who ought to know better than to waste his time herding a +little white pill into a hole in a cow pasture. Gibb is very severe on +the frivolities of the prosperous. He can't bear to see them frittering +away their time. + +That's our leisure class in Homeburg, and it isn't growing. If it was +we'd be worried, and the Commercial Club would hold meetings about it. +And I'm just telling you these things so that you'll see why I am so +warped and foolish regarding Williston; it's just my small town +ignorance--My, I wish that chap would get a job! + + + + +VI + +HOMEBURG'S WORST ENEMY + +_How Old Man Opportunity Stands Outside the Town and Beckons to her +Greatest Men_ + + +You don't say, Jim! Gosh, let me look! Where? Behind the big fellow in +the two-gallon plug hat? There--I see him! Yes, sir! It's he! I could +tell him anywhere. Do you suppose we could get up nearer? What, go up in +the elevator with him? Say, I haven't the nerve. No, I don't want--This +is close enough--Why, there isn't even a crowd! You mean to say he comes +down here just like this right along? Do you see him often? + +Why, when I go home and tell the boys I watched Teddy Roosevelt go down +the street common as dirt and could have gone up in the same elevator +with him, they'll want me to give a lecture in the Woodmen Hall. It +certainly beats all what you can see in New York for nothing. + +That's where you have all the luck, Jim--you big city folks. You keep +your interesting people at home; there's nowhere bigger for them to go. +No matter how famous or successful they are, they have to stick around +and mingle unless they get Europitis of the intellect. When you grow up +with a chum in New York and he discovers a talent that has been kicking +around in his garret ever since he was born, you don't lose him. He just +stays at home and grows up to fit the town. But when I want to see my +old Homeburg playmates who have succeeded, I have to go to New York or +Chicago or San Francisco, or some other big place where old Opportunity +keeps a wrecking crew busy all the time beating in doors. Opportunity +doesn't come into a small town and knock. He stands outside and beckons. + +Life in Homeburg is one long bereavement because of this fact. Seems as +if the world was always looking Homeburg men over, the way a housewife +looks over an asparagus patch, and yanking out the ones who stick up a +little higher than the rest. We don't worry about the good who die young +in Homeburg; but the interesting who go early and forget to come back +make us sad and sore. No sooner does a Homeburg man begin to broaden out +and get successful and to hoist the town upward as he climbs himself, +than we begin to grieve. We know what is coming. Presently he will go +down to the _Democrat_ office and insert a notice, advertising for sale +a seven-room house with gas and water, good cistern, orchard with +bearing trees, good barn and milch cow, cement walks and watertight +cellar. And he will sell that place at a sacrifice, which he can well +afford, and go off to the city, where he will learn to wear a fur-lined +coat, kick about the financial legislation and visit us on Christmas Day +once per decade. + +I sometimes wonder what Homeburg would be like if all her bright boys +and girls should come back. Don't suppose the town could hold them at +all. It would be stretched out of shape in a week. But it would be a +glorious place to live in, and wouldn't we shine in art and music and +politics and finance--to say nothing of baseball! Suppose we had Forrest +Brady back home, catching for the Homeburg team! He gets seven thousand +dollars a year from Boston now; but I remember when he helped put dents +in Paynesville baseball pride for nothing, and would pay some youngster +a quarter to hustle baggage at the depot in his absence. And suppose the +Congregational choir still had Mary Saunders! Why, we could charge a +dollar a seat for ordinary services, and people would come down from +Chicago to attend! When I think what she gets for one concert now, and +then think how long the Ladies' Aid Society has been working to paint +the church and haven't made it yet, it makes me wish we could put +Homeburg on wheels and haul it after some of our distinguished children. +And what if we had Alex McQuinn to write up the _Democrat_ again? Every +month we almost ruin ourselves at home buying all the magazines he +writes for; but when he was a fat young thing in spectacles hunting +locals and trying to write funny things for the _Democrat_, he wasn't +appreciated at all. Old Judge Hicks, who had no sense of humor, chased +him several miles once for telling how he tried to stop the 4:11 train +by yelling "Whoa" at it. And Editor Ayers had to fire Alex to keep the +peace. + +When Rollin Derby, who draws pictures for your New York paper, went to +school, he could climb a tree by digging his bare toes into the rough +bark, but was not otherwise distinguished. When Maurice Gadby was a boy +in Homeburg, he went barefooted in summer with the rest of us, and who +could have guessed that he would grow up to give tango teas for your +four hundred and only allow the better quality of them to pay him +twenty-five dollars per cup at that? But the career that amuses me most +is Jack Nixon--"Shinner" Nixon, we used to call him. He commands a +battleship for a living now; and Homeburg is exactly seven miles from +the nearest stream that is navigable by a duck. We used to walk out to +that stream Saturday mornings, spend four hours building a dam and then +swim painfully on our elbows and knees in the puddle we had made until +dark, but Shinner wouldn't go in. He was a regular young Goethals when +it came to dam building, but he abhorred water, especially behind the +ears. + +Back of my generation the batting average was just about as good. It +seemed to have been the fashion of Homeburg boys of thirty years ago to +go out and run Nebraska politically. Two governors and a representative +have come from our town. If we had them here now, we wouldn't have to +fight so desperately to get a county surveyor or coroner on the ticket +every four years. Samuel P. Wiggins, who now lives in a stone hut +covering an acre in Chicago and owns a flock of flour mills, was once +Sam Wiggins, who bought grain in our town and married the daughter of +one of our most reliable washerwomen. She comes back occasionally now, +and we can't see but that she's as nice as she used to be when she +hauled our family wash home in a little wagon every Saturday night. +Being rich hasn't hurt her at all, though it has spoiled her figure +beyond the utmost and most heartrending efforts of her clothes to +conceal. + +Then there's Mrs. Maysworth. When she comes down from Chicago for a +visit, the old town fairly hums for a month. We pick up our interest in +art and woman's suffrage and cheap trips to Europe and Dante's +_Inferno_; the Shakespeare Club is revived, the bookstore sells its copy +of Browning, and the tone of the afternoon teas goes up about two +hundred per cent. Mrs. Maysworth was the ruling spirit of a little bunch +of prosperous Homeburg people who lived at the end of Milk Street--we +used to call it the cream end of Milk Street. When they were with us, +Homeburg was called the Athens of the Steenth Congressional District. We +heard singers and lecturers, who jumped towns of fifty thousand on +either side of us. We had state presidents of Women's Federations and +Church Societies. We had a free library before Mr. Carnegie had a bank +account. North Milk Street established it, and every Saturday afternoon +the muddy feet of the tough south side kids scuffled over Mrs. +Maysworth's hardwood floors, the first west of Chicago, while their +owners drew out books, the said library being located in an extinct +conservatory, which protruded from the house like a large wart. + +Homeburg was a Mecca of learning and refinement in those days; and then +six of these families pulled out in the same year and moved to Chicago, +where they could soak up a little more culture instead of giving away +all they had. They left a chasm in our midst as big as the Grand Canyon. +It never has been filled--for me at least. I feel, when I wander up that +fine old shady street, past those houses filled with people who are only +as wise as I am, as if I were wandering through the deserted haunts of +an ancient and irreplaceable civilization. + +That's the way it goes with us--one bereavement after another. It's +mighty hard to be a mother of sons in Homeburg. I worked in the +post-office for a year once--handed out mail--and I got to know just +exactly what most of the mothers in town wanted. I could please them +with a new magazine and mystify them with a circular or a business +letter. But if I wanted to light them up until they took the shadows out +of the corners as they went out, I would give them a letter from a son, +way off somewhere, making good. The best of them didn't write any too +often. Once a week is pretty regular, I suppose, from the other end; but +you should see the mother begin to come in hungry again the second day +after her letter came. And when a boy came home successful and +prosperous, and his proud mother towed him down Main Street on pretense +of getting him to carry a spool of thread home for her, it used to go +to my heart to see the wistful looks of her women friends. There is +hardly a family in Homeburg of the right age which hasn't a grown-up son +off at war somewhere--fighting failure. It's grand when they win; but I +hate to think of some of our boys who haven't come back. + +If it's hard on the mothers, it's even harder on the Homeburg girls. +They say there are one hundred thousand old maids in Massachusetts. I'll +bet that's just about the number of Massachusetts young men who have +gone West or somewhere, and haven't remembered the things they said at +parting as well as the girls did. We've got plenty of girls in Homeburg +who are getting intimately acquainted with the thirties--fine girls, +still pretty, bright, and keeping up with the world. Young men come into +town and do their best to get on a "thou-beside-me" footing, but somehow +the girls don't seem to marry. At the root of almost every case there's +an old Homeburg boy. Maybe he's making good somewhere, and they're both +waiting until he does. Maybe he isn't making good and is too proud to +ask her to wait. Maybe she's waiting alone--because some other girl was +handier in the new place. And maybe it wasn't a case of wait at all, +only the boy who went away looked better to some Homeburg girl than any +of those who stayed at home. That was the case with Sam Flanburg and +Minnie Briggs a few years ago. + +Sam is on the Chicago Board of Trade and is one of our old-time boys. +Two years ago he came back, roaringly prosperous, to visit for the first +time since he had left, and pretty suddenly he discovered to his +amazement that on packing up ten years before he'd left a pearl of great +price behind, said pearl being Minnie. In other words he fell in love +over his ears with her, and Minnie, who was one of our very nicest +girls, with a disposition like triple distilled extract of charity, +treated him like a dog. He stayed around for a month cluttering up the +Briggs's front porch day and night, while Minnie put up an imitation of +haughty indifference and careless frivolity which was as good as a show +for every one in town except Sam, who couldn't see through it. That's +one of our small town assets--you get to look on at most of the love +affairs. We watched Minnie and Sam with our hearts in our mouths for +fear she'd carry it too far and lose him, for every one had it straight +from Mary Askinson, who is intimately acquainted with a close friend of +Minnie's old school chum, that Minnie had been in love with Sam since +they graduated from the high school together. It was all we could do +from breaking in and interfering, especially when Sam went off his feed +and began to throw out ugly talk about going to the Philippines or some +place where fever can be gotten cheap. But one morning Sam came +down-town, and the first man who saw his face called up his wife and +told her the good news. Talk about extra editions for distributing news! +Before a city paper could have gotten an extra on the street, five +intimate friends of Minnie's had dropped in casually to see her, and +when they saw her face, of course they fell on her neck. Sam told Chet +Frazier next day that it made him so mad to think he'd lived twenty +years in the same town with Minnie and had never appreciated his +blessings that he felt like climbing Pikes Peak and kicking himself off. + +There's Mary Smith. She's our prize old maid and dresses like a mail +sack full of government seeds, but they say she was the prettiest girl +in Homeburg when young Cyrus McCord went to Chicago to carve out his +future so that he could come home and marry her. But Cyrus didn't carve +out his future. He married it instead, and Mary is almost fifty now, +living alone and getting peculiar, like so many of our lonely old folks +do. + +Taking it all around, you can't blame us for feeling a little bit +hostile to the big grabby towns which reach out like tax collectors +every year and take a tithe of our boy and girl crop--first choice too. +But of course we're enormously proud of our Homeburg people who go out +and help run the world, and we watch their careers like hawks. When +Chester Arnett was running for a state office out West, I'll bet twenty +Homeburg families subscribed for a Denver paper to read about him; and +when Deacon White was making his great plunges in Wall Street, Homeburg +looked at the financial page of the Chicago papers first and then read +the baseball. We're as happy over their success as if they were our +children--but it's always embarrassing for a little while when a +Homeburg man who has made good comes back to visit in the old town. +We're aching to rush up and wring his arm off, but we want to know how +he feels about it first. One or two experiences have made us gun-shy. We +can't forget Lyla Enbright, who moved away with her family years ago and +married a national bank or something of the kind in the East. She didn't +come home for ten years, but finally the father died and Lyla came back +to sell off some property. A lot of us had made mud pies with Lyla, and +while she hadn't shown any great genius in that or anything else, she +was jolly and we liked her, so we tried to rush up and greet her +rapturously. + +Those who didn't do it say it was one of the funniest things that ever +happened in Homeburg, but I couldn't see it at the time. I was one of +the rushers. Lyla waited until my outstretched hand was within reaching +distance, and then she pulled a lorgnette on me. Say, Jim, did you ever +get right squarely in range of both barrels of an honest-for-God +lorgnette with about a thousand dollars worth of dry goods and a pinch +of brains behind it? If my turn ever comes to face a Gatling gun I hope +to march right up to it like a little man--but lorgnettes? No! Any +hostile army could lick Homeburg by aiming lorgnettes at it. I gave one +look at the thing and fell over myself in heaps getting away. I wouldn't +speak to Sim Bone for a week because he laughed. But after I had +recovered a little, I hunted up Chet Frazier in a hurry and told him +Lyla wanted to see him. By that I got even with Chet for about a dozen +practical jokes. When he got in range of that lorgnette, he said "Gosh!" +and actually ran. Then we survivors lined up and got some comfort out of +it, watching the rest get theirs. + +As I said, Lyla and one or two others who have brought home their +prosperous and expanded corporal beings, and nothing else to speak of, +have made us a little timid about greeting our successful Prods. We hang +around all ready for action, but we need encouragement. We wouldn't +speak first for a farm. We wait for some calloused gabbler to break the +ice. Gibb Ogle usually does it. Gibb would act as a reception committee +for the Angel Gabriel without a quiver. He's always on the street, +anyway, propping up some building or other, and he is always willing to +waddle up to a returned governor or financier or rising young business +man, and stick out his unwashed paw, while we hold our breath and wait +for the result. + +As a rule it's cheering. Our Homeburg boys don't fall down once in +twenty times. No matter who the visitor is, he grabs Ogle's hand and +yells: "Why, hello, Gibb, you fat old scoundrel, how's your sore foot?" +Then we crowd around and fight for the next turn, and go home and +hastily spread the news that So-and-so has come home big and prosperous +as all get-out, and not spoiled a bit. + +Sometimes they don't come back at all, of course, and nervy scouts who +look up the delinquents in their city offices come back with badly +frosted ears and spread the warning. But there are few of these. Even +President Banks of the great F. C. & L. Railroad System, who played on +the Homeburg baseball nine thirty-five years ago, will stop puzzling +over the financial situation long enough to give the glad hand to a +Homeburg man during office hours. Of course I don't mean that any one +from Homeburg can break in on him and pile his desk full of feet. You +have to be a thirty-third degree Homeburger from his standpoint; that +is, you or your father must have stolen apples with him--I belong to the +inner lodge. My father and President Banks ate a peck of peaches one +night in Frazier's orchard, between them, and got half way through the +pearly gates before they were yanked back by two doctors. That's why +Banks took me to lunch when I went to call on him last month. If the +Government would let him, he'd give me a pass home. + +I'll never forget the day when Banks came back to Homeburg. He hadn't +been back for thirty years and hadn't the slightest intention of coming +either, as he admitted afterward. But he was going through on his +special car, and old Number Eleven, which was hauling him, performed the +most intelligent act of its career. The engine broke down right at the +depot, and when Banks found he was in for an hour or two, he got out and +strolled down Main Street to see the town in which he had begun his +life. + +It was a most depressing occasion. No one who had ever come back had +changed as much as Banks. If he had worn a pigtail and talked Choctaw, +he couldn't have grown farther away. It wasn't his fault. He tried his +best. But he hadn't talked our language for years. He couldn't get down +near enough to converse. He passed most of his playmates without +remembering them, but when he saw Pash Wade's sign, he went in and shook +hands with him. About forty of us came in to trade and watched him do +it. It was pathetic. They stood there like strangers from different +lands, Banks trying to unbutton his huge, thick ulster of dignity, and +not succeeding, and Pash trying to say something that would interest +Banks--along the line of high finance of course--state of the country, +etc. They gave it up in a minute, and Banks went out. He found Pelty +Amthorne and shook hands with him. Pelty is pretty loquacious as a rule, +but he couldn't talk to Banks--not that Banks, anyway. He'd never seen +him before. He said "How-dy-do," and, "It's a long time since you were +here," and Banks said, "It is indeed. I hope you and your family are +well." And then Pelty oozed hastily back into the crowd with a relieved +air as if he had done his duty, and Banks looked bored and took out his +watch. But just then Sim Askinson came up all out of breath and burst +through the crowd. + +Sim is little and meek and has a hard time holding his own, even in our +peaceful world. But when he saw Banks, he snorted like a war horse and +grew up three inches. + +"Hello, Pudge, you old son-of-a-gun!" he said, with both hands in his +pockets. + +"Hello, Sim!" said Banks, sort of startled. + +"Where'd you come from?" demanded Sim, "and why ain't you come before? +You're a nice friendly cuss, you are. Sucked any turkey eggs lately?" + +"No, you knock-kneed dishwasher," said Banks as a grin began to edge its +way across his face. "Have you tried to sell any more toads for +bullfrogs?" + +"No, nor I ain't fought out any bumble-bees' nest since the time you got +one up your pant leg and pretty near pounded yourself to death with a +ball bat," said Sim. "Can you still run as fast as the time Wert Payley +and I dared you to ride Malstead's bull?" + +"Where's Wert?" demanded Banks. They were shaking hands now, using all +four of them. "Say, I've got to see him and Wim. Horn. I've got to leave +in a few minutes." + +"Like fun you have," growled Sim, linking arms with Banks. "You seem to +think some one's chasing you. You're going to stay all night, that's +what you're going to do." + +"I am not," said Banks; "and I wouldn't stay with you, anyway. You had a +garter snake in the bed last time I slept with you. I've got to see some +more of the boys, though." + +"He thinks he's going away in a few minutes," said Sim to Wert Payley, +who had heard his name and was now shaking hands with Banks. "Why, the +old fat snide, nobody wants to see him outside of Homeburg. He's going +to get a free supper to-night. Remember Sadie Warren?" + +"Remember!" shouted Banks. "What do you think I am?--Methuselah? I +remember more things than you ever heard of. Why, Sadie and I went +skating the night you couldn't find your fat horse and sleigh." + +"Ya-a-a--" yelled Payley, with a sudden shriek of laughter. "Never knew +who took your rig, did you, Sim?" + +"You--you--" said Sim, glaring at Banks. "You confounded horse thief, I +believe you took Sadie in my own sleigh." + +"Ain't he bright, Pudge," gasped Payley, "only took him thirty years to +catch on." + +"Well, Banksie," said Sim, "Sadie's been more particular about her +young men since that night. We've been married twenty-five years, and I +guess I'll let you come up and eat this evening, anyway. She lets me +bring most any old pelter home." + +"Gosh, boys, I can't." + +"Say, what are you? the porter on that varnished car down there?" +demanded Sim. "Won't they let you off a minute?" + +"Tell you what we'll do," said Pelty Amthorne. "We'll take you to band +practice to-night. Sim still runs it, but he won't let me play any +more." + +"I haven't touched a horn since I left Homeburg," laughed Banks. "But +I'd give ten dollars to see you and Wimble Horn blat away on those altos +again, with your eyes bulging out of your cheeks." + +"We'll get Wimble and we'll break up band practice if you'll stay over." + +"I--" + +"No, you don't," said Sim. "I won't have riff-raff loafing around my +band." + +"You won't, eh?" said Banks. "We'll show you. Come down to the car while +I send about forty telegrams, and then we'll fix you, Mister Askinson." + +Which they did that night, while most of the town looked on. The next +fall Banks came back and stayed three days, and his conduct and that of +his old companions in crime set an example to our younger generation +which didn't wear off for years. They went out orchard robbing in an +automobile, and Banks said he never realized before the wonder of modern +conveniences. + + + + +VII + +THE HOMEBURG WEEKLY DEMOCRAT + +_Which Swamps the Post-Office Every Friday_ + + +No, Jim, as I have already said about thirty-four times this week, I +don't care for a paper. Don't buy one for me. I could read your New York +papers for twenty-four hours at a stretch, and at the end of the time I +would have to stop some good-natured looking chap and ask what the news +was. It's all there, I know, but I don't seem able to find it. Even the +Chicago baseball scores are hidden in the blamed things. Instead of +putting them first, the way they ought to, they stick them down at the +end of the page. As for the editorial pages, I might as well go to +Labrador and hunt for personal friends as to read them. If there's +anything that makes a stranger feel about ten thousand miles from home, +with the cars not running, it is to get into the editorial page of an +unknown newspaper and try to sit in with the family discussions. It +makes me feel like a man who has gotten into a reunion of the Old +Settlers' Association of Zanzibar by mistake. + +It's not much of a trick to go into a strange town and learn to navigate +from hotel to hotel, but it's a hopeless task to try to find your way +around a strange newspaper. Takes about two years to learn to read a +strange newspaper skilfully, anyway, and find your way through it +without banging into the want ads when you want to find the editorials, +and tripping over the poets' column when you are hunting for the crop +reports. You've been buying a paper every time you turned a corner for +the last week, Jim--you New Yorkers seem to have to have a paper about +as often as a whale needs a new lungful of air--and I've taken a hasty +look at all of them, but when I get home I am going to ask my wife what +has happened in the U. S. while I've been away from Homeburg. Outside of +the eternal Mexican case, I don't seem to have discovered a thing. + +Mind you, I don't blame your papers for bearing down hard on the local +news. I suppose it's mighty interesting to you New Yorkers to learn +every morning just how much more money you owe on your new subway, and +whether or not the temperature of Mrs. Van Damexpense's second-best +Siberian wolf-hound is still rising. That's what newspapers are for--to +save you the trouble of stepping around and collecting the events of the +day from the back fence. But your papers don't bear down hard enough on +the Homeburg happenings, and that's why they don't suit me. + +I don't pretend that our Homeburg paper is the equal of yours in any +particular. The best I can say for it is that it's no worse than it was +ten years ago. It hasn't any three-story type, and you could read it for +years without discovering who was being divorced in San Francisco or +murdered in Chicago. People who depend on it don't know yet that war has +been declared in the Balkans, and they won't hear any more politics +until 1916. All week long I think as little about the paper as all this. +But somehow, when Thursday evening comes around, rain or shine, I step +over to the post-office, and if my paper isn't there, I wait a few +minutes, growing more impatient all the time, and then I drift over to +the door of the _Homeburg Weekly Democrat_ office and join the silent +throng. + +Like as not I'll find twenty people there. We don't expect any wild +news. There will probably not be anything in the _Democrat_ when it +comes out, but we want to make sure of it. We don't want to go home +without the paper. We've read it for twenty years, and every week we +open it up and poke through its internals after a sensation that will +stand Homeburg on its ear and split the Methodist church from steeple to +pipe organ. We're as patient as fishers in the Seine, and the fact that +the world has never rocked when the _Democrat_ did come out doesn't +discourage us any. + +We want our paper, and so we stand there and grumble. Now and then one +of us stumps up the narrow hallway to the second story where the +_Democrat_ makes its lair, and looks on with an abused air while two +young lady compositors claw around the bottom of the boxes for enough +type to set the last items, and the foreman stuffs the forms of the last +two pages with old boiler plate, medicine ads and anything that will +fill. There isn't any reason for the _Democrat_ being late any more +than there is for the branch accommodation train, which got almost to +town on time once and stood beyond the crossing for twenty minutes +because her conductor forgot just when she was due and didn't want to +run in too soon. The _Democrat_ is just late naturally. It's part of its +function to be late. Makes it more eagerly sought after. We talk with +the foreman and make nuisances of ourselves generally, and presently old +man Ayers, who runs the paper, waddles in with another item to be set. +The compositors set down their sticks with a jerk and say, "Oh, my +land!" and the foreman goes and puts the item on the case with that air +of patient resignation which is a little more irritating than a swift +kick; and then Chet Frazier, if he's hanging around, which he usually +is, speaks up: + +"For goodness' sakes, Ayers, let that item go and get to press," he +says. "Give it to me and I'll read it aloud down-stairs, your whole +subscription list's down there waiting." + +But we have to wait just the same until the item is set up. Then the +foreman locks up the forms and bangs them on the face with his big +wooden plane, and he and the old man lug them out into the pressroom +while we all hold our breath--sometimes the form explodes on the way and +then we don't get the _Democrat_ for three days. + +Pretty soon we hear the rattle-te-bang-te-clank-te-clicketty-clang of +the old press, and in five minutes more Editor Ayers comes out with an +armful of folded papers all fragrant with fresh black ink. + +[Illustration: "She's out, boys," he says.] + +"She's out, boys," he says. Then we grab copies and hurry to spread the +news of the birth of another _Democrat_. We open the sheet and look +carefully down the page where old man Ayers generally conceals his local +news. For a minute or two there is silence. Then somebody crams his +paper into his pocket. "Hmph, nothing in it," he says, and starts home. + +He's right, too. Outside of the fact that it has another week of old man +Ayers's laborious and worried life in it, it is mighty bare. There isn't +enough news in it to cause a thrill in a sewing circle. But after supper +at home, when we look it over more carefully and the first hot flush of +anticipation has worn off, we do find a lot of information. We find that +Miss Ollie Mingle has gone to Paynesville for a two days' visit (aha, +that Paynesville young man's folks are going to look her over), and that +Mrs. Ackley is visiting her daughter in Ogallala, Neb. (Unless Ackley +straightens up, we don't expect her back.) Wimble Horn is erecting a new +porch and painting his house. (He must have beaten the bucket shop for +once.) We also find that Jedson Bane's peaches are ripe and of the best +quality, which fact he has just proven to the editor's entire +satisfaction. And that old Mrs. Gastit is feeling very poorly, and Pete +Parson, while working on his automobile the other night, contributed a +forefinger to the cause of gasoline by poking around in the cogs while +the engine was running. + +All of this is news and interesting to us; so is the fact that Miss Ri +Hawkes is not teaching in the Snyder district school this week, because +of a sore toe. While this item does not jar the country quite so +extensively as it would if Miss Hawkes belonged to one of your leading +New York families, and was employing an eleven-thousand-dollar physician +to treat her for gout, it is just as important to Miss Hawkes. And there +you have the great keynote of our Homeburg journalism. In the eyes of +the _Democrat_ we are all equal. + +There are not many of us Homeburgers. We will never see twenty-five +hundred again, for as families grow smaller, most of the Illinois towns +like Homeburg are contracting slowly in size even while prosperous. The +_Democrat_ hasn't above seven hundred subscribers, but every one of +those subscribers gets his name in the paper at least once a year, even +if it is only a general mention of his patriotism when he pays his +annual subscription. No baby born in Homeburg is too humble to get its +exact weight heralded to the world through the _Democrat_. Mrs. +Maloney's pneumonia and Banker Payley's quinsy grieve the town in the +same paragraph under the heading "Among our sick." The Widow Swanson's +ten-mile trip down the line to a neighboring town gets as careful +attention as Mrs. Singer's annual pilgrimage to California. In the +matter of news we are a pure democracy. The man who buys a new +automobile gets no more space than the member of Patrick McQuinn's +section crew who scores a clean scoop by digging his potatoes one week +ahead of the town. And when the humblest of us lies down in death he +does it with the serene consciousness that he will get half a column, +anyway, with more if his disease is rare and interesting, and that at +the end of the article the city will sympathize with the family in its +bereavement. When Mrs. Agnew died of her broken hip she got a column, +though she had been financially unable to take the paper for years, +while in the same issue Jay Gould got a two-inch obituary in its boiler +plate inside. + +Your big papers pride themselves on their brevity, except in murder +cases, and I understand that almost every New York editor thinks he +could boil the story of the Creation down into less than the six hundred +words which the Bible wasted on it. But Editor Ayers could give all your +editors instructions in this kind of economy. If the Creation had +happened around Homeburg while he was on the job, he would have called +attention to it the next week about as follows: + +"We understand there was a creation in these parts during the last week. +We did not learn the particulars but those who were on the ground at the +time say that it was a successful affair, and that the new world is +doing as well as could be expected under the circumstances." + +Ayers would write it this way for two reasons. In the first place he +hates to write more than one paragraph. Coming after a hard day's work +collecting bills and chasing subscribers, it is a wearing effort. +Nothing gets much space in the _Democrat_ except obituaries and +marriages, and they are all contributed--the former by the relatives and +the latter by the minister. In the second place, there wouldn't be any +use of wasting a lot of space on a big item because by the time the +_Democrat_ comes out, everybody knows all about it, and the mere facts +would be stale and unimportant beside the superstructure of soaring +fancy which has been built up by the easy-running imaginations of our +chief news dispensers on the street corners. And so, when the creamery +burns down or the evening fast freight runs through an accommodation on +the crossing, the old man puts his duty off until the last minute and +then writes a few well-chosen lines merely to let us know that he is on +the job and lets no news escape him. When you are running a weekly +paper, your competitors in the news business are the talkers in the town +who mingle seven days a week and issue a hundred thrilling extras to +their fellow citizens before your press day comes around. + +Besides, as I have said, old man Ayers can't afford to waste much time +chasing news. He has to get a living for himself as well as for the +_Democrat_, and keeping both his family and the paper alive is a +distinct feat performed weekly. His pay-roll for a foreman and two +girls must amount to over fifteen dollars a week, and that means cold +solid cash which must be wrung from a reluctant public. Seems to me I +never go into a store that I don't see old man Ayers trying to collect a +little cash on an advertising account or wheedling a subscriber into +coming out of the misty past and creeping cautiously down a few years +toward the present on his subscription account. If there is anything +which we can't do without and for which we positively object to paying +real money, it is our home newspaper. Sim Bone has a roaring shoe +business and pays cash for his automobiles, but he has often told me +that paying good paper money for advertising would be as wasteful as +eating it. He carries an ad in the _Democrat_ all the year and changes +it about every six months. It's July now, and he is still advertising +bargains in overshoes--but he won't pay any money. Ayers has to trade +the account out, as he has to do with every other advertiser in the +town. + +People pity the poor ministers' families who have to live on the +scrambled proceeds of donation parties, but an editor's family in our +parts has even harder luck. I have seen Ayers order two suits of clothes +from a clothier who owed him a big bill and was getting wabbly, and then +pass by the meat market empty-handed, because his advertising account +there was traded out. He told me once that he has taken disk-plows, +flaxseed, magazines, encyclopedias and a new back porch in trade for +advertising and subscriptions, but that he has been wearing an obsolete +pair of spectacles, to his great discomfort, for ten years, because our +local jeweler will not advertise. The doctors in town carry cards in the +paper and owe him large amounts because his family is too healthy to +catch up with them; but it will be two years before either of our local +dentists accumulates a big enough bill to allow Mrs. Ayers to have some +very necessary construction and betterment work, as the railroad folks +say, done to her teeth. + +If it weren't for the patent medicine ads, Ayers tells me, he wouldn't +be able to keep afloat for want of ready cash. He says a patent medicine +may be an abomination before the Lord, but that a patent medicine +advertising agent looks to him like a very present help in time of +trouble. The agent comes in and beats him down until he agrees to +publish several hundred yards of notices next to pure reading matter on +all sides for fifteen dollars. But the fifteen dollars is cash--he +doesn't have to take the stuff in trade. And so we are forever running +into such thrilling headlines as, "Horrible Wreck," "Her escape was +simply marvelous," "Worse than the Titanic Disaster," in the +_Democrat's_ local page. And then we exclaim: "Hurray! Real news at +last," and prowl eagerly down the items only to find that the horrible +wreck was a citizen of Swamp Hollow upon whom a wonderful cure was +effected; that "Her escape" was from inflammatory rheumatism by the aid +of Gettem's Dead Shot Specific, and that the Titanic Disaster is +eclipsed annually by the sad ends of thousands of people who neglect to +take Palaver's Punk Pills. It always makes us mad, but we can't kick. If +it weren't for the patent medicine people, we would have to pay for the +_Democrat_ all by ourselves. + +They say that when Editor Ayers first came to Homeburg some forty years +ago he was a bright young man with a great rush of words from the pen, +and that he had a dapper air and was generally admired. The _Democrat_ +contained about a page of solid editorial opinion each week on +everything, from the tariff to the duty of Russia, in whatever crisis +was then pending, and people swore by the paper and didn't make up +their opinions until they had read it. But times have changed. We don't +stand in awe of the _Democrat_ any more. Most of us laugh at it, even +those of us who are not financiers enough to keep our subscriptions +called up. We call it the "Weekly Gimlet" and the "Poorly Democrat," and +we make bright remarks to old man Ayers when he asks us for news and +tell him that he ought to turn the paper inside out so that we can read +the boiler plate first and not have to wade through his stuff. But he +doesn't object. Time and toil and the worry of keeping cash enough on +hand to pay the expressman who dumps his ready prints on the floor each +Wednesday and refuses to budge until he has collected $3.24 have taken +the pepper out of him. He doesn't write editorials any more except on +the week following a national election, and they are affairs of duty +which always begin: "Another election has come and gone and the party +of Jackson--" + +He has made a living for forty years and has sent two sons through +college from the _Democrat_, and the effort has taken the fight out of +him. I never saw him resent a joke but once. That was when Pelty +Amthorne told him that his wife considered the _Democrat_ to be the best +paper she had ever seen. He let Ayers burst a couple of buttons from his +vest in his swelling pride before he explained that the _Democrat_, when +cut in two, exactly fitted his wife's pantry shelves, and that she +didn't have to trim it a bit. The old man turned on his heel without a +word and that week he kindled his old-time fires and wrote the following +for the local page: + + +A citizen of Homeburg who hasn't done anything more exciting for twenty +years than stand off his grocery bill poked fun at the _Democrat_ last +week to our face because there wasn't any more news in it. News, say +we--News in Homeburg? News in a town where an ice-cream social is a +sensation and a dog fight suspends business for three hours? News in a +town where it takes a couple five years to work up a wedding and seven +kinds of wedding cake is the only news in it? Where the city marshal +hasn't made an arrest for two years because no one has done anything +after nine P.M. except snore, and where they have to put up the lamps in +pairs to keep them from getting lonesome? We don't print news from +Homeburg because there isn't any, and the old rooster who joshed us +knows it. He's sore because we can't make half a column out of his trip +to Paynesville eight miles away last summer, but we'll promise to do +better. We'll dump the paste pot in the fire, throw the old shears out +of the window and get out a regular screamer of a _Democrat_ some week; +a paper with red ink on it and big headlines and a real piece of news in +it. We will when this gabby old fossil does his part. When he pays his +six years' subscription, we'll write two columns about it. And even then +no one will believe it. + + +Lafe Simpson, who runs the _Argus_, is a younger man than Ayers and more +ambitious. Oh, yes, we have two papers. In a town the size of Homeburg +you simply have to have two papers, because half of the people are +always mad at one paper. The _Argus_ and _Democrat_ trade subscription +lists about every seven years--not counting the hard-shell Democrats and +blown-in-the-bottle Republicans who have to stand by their papers +whether they get mad at them or not. I've been taking the _Democrat_ for +about five years because Simpson got too busy in the school election one +year to suit me. It's pretty hard on me, because Simpson runs a better +paper; but my neighbor, Sim Askinson, likes the _Democrat_ better and +can't take it because he took his whole family to Chicago one week, and +Ayers overlooked the fact. So he borrows my _Democrat_ every week and I +get his _Argus_, and thus both of us preserve our mad and our dignity +and get what we want just the same. + +If there's anything keener than the competition between two weekly +newspapers in a small town, I'd like to see it--but not feel it. It's a +searching sort of competition which seems to work its way into every +detail of the town's affairs. We town people are judged by our editors +according to our patronage. If a man gives two jobs of letterheads in +succession to the _Argus_, Ayers looks on him as a man who has stabbed +him in the back and has twisted the sword. If the Board of Education +spends $67 for commencement invitations with the _Democrat_ one year and +$69.50 with the _Argus_ the next, things aren't exactly calm and +peaceable again until the discrimination has been explained. When twins +come to a man who has always taken the _Argus_ in preference to the +_Democrat_, old man Ayers wags his head as if to say, "He brought it on +himself;" and when Lafe Simpson meets a man who persistently refuses to +take his paper in preference to the sheet across the street, he greets +him as formally and warily as if he had smallpox and was passing free +samples around. + +Lafe claims to have more circulation than the _Democrat_, and this comes +nearer giving Ayers apoplexy than anything else. He claims that Lafe's +circulation consists two thirds of wind and that he hasn't more than 750 +bona fide subscribers, including deadhead copies to patent medicine +houses. Lafe, on the other hand, says Ayers prints 750 papers merely +from force of habit--that most of his subscribers have been trying to +stop the paper for years and can't. Lafe says that when a man puts his +name on Ayers's subscription list, he might as well carve it in stone +and then try to wipe it off with gasoline. Ayers says, in return, that +when a stranger arrives to make his home in Homeburg, Lafe Simpson meets +him at the train, takes him to his new residence, and hangs around the +doorstep until the stranger subscribes for the _Argus_ in order to +improve the atmosphere around the neighborhood. + +Of course the two papers are always on opposite political sides--no +matter whether it is a school or national election. Makes us scheme a +good deal at times to keep one of them quiet on some public project so +that the other will not jump on it. We had a big time, when the plan to +pave Main Street was going through, to keep Lafe from jumping in and +shouting for it. That would have set Ayers off dead against it, and we +had to muzzle Lafe until Ayers had committed himself. + +The struggles of the two editors to outdo each other have been titanic. +When Simpson put in a steam engine, Ayers mortgaged his plant and got +one of the new gasoline engines just then being introduced into an +unhappy world. He never used it much unless he had lots of time in which +to start it, but it was a great comfort and held Simpson level. When +Simpson bought the building in which the _Argus_ is printed, it nearly +killed Ayers, who couldn't have bought the sign on his building. But he +finally prevailed on the owner to put in a new front and name his block +"The Democrat Building." But about that time Simpson, who is a go-ahead +young chap, bought a young automobile in the last stage of lung trouble, +and Ayers has never really recovered from that blow. + +The two papers go to press on the same day, and the rivalry is intense. +Early in the day the two foremen each visit the rival plants, ostensibly +to borrow some type and a little gasoline, but in reality to count the +advertisements and to see how late the rival sheet is going to be. All +afternoon the forces work feverishly, reports drifting in occasionally +to the effect that over in the other shop they are locking up the forms. +The minute the press turns in the _Democrat_ office, Ayers grabs the +first paper, folds it and saunters hastily over toward the _Argus_. +Sometimes he meets Simpson half way over with a copy of the _Argus_ in +his pocket, and sometimes he gets clear over and has a chance to swell +around for a minute with his new-born paper in plain sight, watching the +mad foreman lock up the forms. The first paper into the post-office gets +distributed first, while the subscribers of the other paper hang around +in a state of frenzy and waver in their allegiance in a manner to make +the stoutest heart quail. And one of the weekly diversions in Homeburg +is watching this race. If it isn't too late in starting, we hang around +and make mild bets on the result. One week old man Ayers and his +foreman will hurry out from the _Democrat_ office and trot hastily over +to the post-office carrying the week's issue of the paper between them +in a wash basket. And the next week Simpson and the office devil will +beat them to it. Now and then they will both appear at the same time and +race side by side, bareheaded, coatless, breathless, and full of hate. I +hear a good deal about the exertions to which your papers go to be on +the street first with extras, but I'll bet there has never been more +voltage in the competition here than there was in Homeburg the night old +man Ayers and young Simpson arrived at the post-office door at precisely +the same second and got their baskets and themselves in a hopeless jam. +Postmaster Flint had to appoint a peace conference to settle the +dispute. + +Ayers is getting pretty old, and for several years we have been worrying +about his future. Since a cruel Government has decided that a newspaper +publisher must keep his subscription list paid up or go out of business, +times have been pretty hard for Ayers; formerly he could let a +subscription account run for ten years and then take a second-hand buggy +or a quarter of beef, or a few odd size grindstones on account; but of +late he has had to dun us every year, and of course that makes us mad, +and we quit his paper with great frequency and vim. I don't know what +would have happened to the old man if Wilson hadn't been elected. But +that, of course, has settled things for him. He will be our next +postmaster. Every one has conceded that except Pash Wade, Emery +Billings, Colonel Ackley, and Sim Askinson, who are also candidates. +However, old man Ayers's petition is as long as all the rest put +together, and when he is appointed and begins to draw down fifteen +hundred dollars a year for handing out his own paper to his +subscribers, we will sigh with relief, and Simpson's yells will be sweet +music in our ears. + +If I had my way, I would put a clause in the Constitution giving all +third-class postmasterships to third-class editors, anyway. It's the +only chance they have of accumulating enough of a surplus to be able to +go into a store with their hats on one side and buy things like other +people. + + + + +VIII + +THE HOMEBURG MARINE BAND + +_Where Music is Cherished for its own Sweet Sake Regardless of +Dividends_ + + +Where you New Yorkers get farthest ahead of us Homeburgers, Jim, is the +fact that you can go out and soak yourself in real, soul-hoisting music +whenever you feel like it--provided, of course, that you have the price +and that some speculator hasn't cornered the tickets, and that you can +get home at night in time to get dressed in time to go back to town, and +that you have sufficient nerve and endurance to go four rounds with your +celebrated subway in the same twenty-four hours. + +You can't realize what having music constantly on tap means to a +pilgrim from a town where two concerts in a winter is a gorge, and where +about the only regular musical diversion is going to church on Sunday +morning and betting on where the veteran soprano in the choir is going +to hang on to the key or skid on the high turns. You laugh at me because +I can't eat down-town unless I am encouraged by a bull fiddle, and +because I gulp at free concert tickets like a young robin swallowing +worms. But if most of your life had been spent listening to Mrs. Sim +Estabrook jumping for middle C about as successfully as a dog jumps for +a squirrel in a hickory tree, you'd splash around in melody, too, while +you had the chance. + +Of course, I don't mean to say that the music canneries don't do as big +a business out our way as they do anywhere. I'll bet they ship as much +as ten barrels of assorted masterpieces a month into Homeburg for our +graphophone cranks; and last winter Wimble Horn broke the piano-player +record by tramping out Tannhaeuser in seven minutes flat. But while these +things educate us and enable us to roll our eyes in the right place in a +Wagner number, they don't satisfy the soul any more than souvenir cards +from Europe take away a thirst for travel. We want the real thing, and +year in and out we're music-hungry. We drive our young folks to the +piano and listen to them heroically until they get good, and then they +go away to the city where the gate receipts are better and leave us at +Lutie Briggs's mercy again. Time and time again the only thing that has +stood between Homeburg and a ghastly musical silence has been the +Homeburg Marine Band. + +That's right! Laugh, darn you! What if Homeburg is twenty miles from the +nearest creek? Our band is a lot nearer salt water than your Cafe de +Paris is to France. And, besides, there are only three names for a +country band, anyway. If it isn't the Marine Band, it has to be the +Military Band, or the Silver Cornet Band. Chet Frazier, who is our +village cut-up, says that they named ours the Marine Band years ago, +after it had waded out to the cemetery on a wet Memorial Day through our +celebrated bottomless roads. + +You can't realize what a comfort and pride a band is in a Class X town, +unless you have grown up in one. They say this isn't a musical country, +but its intentions are certainly good as far as brass bands go. Long +before an American town is big enough to have a post-office, its +citizens have either organized a brass band or are trying to get another +man to move in to complete a quorum. Life never gets so complicated out +on the grain elevator circuit that the station agent, school principal, +and the two rival blacksmiths, and the city marshal can't lug their +horns down-town once a week in the evening and soar sweetly off into +melody at band practice--that is, if they can get off on the same beat +during the evening. + +I can hear our home band now--up over McMuggins' Drug Store on a summer +evening. It's hot--not hot enough to ignite the woodwork, but plenty +warm enough to fry eggs on the sidewalks--and the whole town is out on +the porches and lawns chasing a breeze, except the band. It is up in the +super-heated lodge room of the Modern Woodmen, huddled around two oil +lamps, because the less light it has the less heat will be generated, +and it is getting ready to practice the "Washington Post March" for the +Fourth of July parade. Our band has practiced the "Washington Post +March" for over twenty years, but while the band has altered greatly, +the grand old piece shows no sign of wear and is as fresh and +unconquerable as ever. + +Querulous, complaining sounds come from the lodge room. The tenor horns +are crooning, and the bass horn blatting gently, while the clarionet +players are chasing each other up and down the scale, like squirrels +running round and round in a cage. The warming-up exercises are on. They +will continue until Frank Sundell shaves his last customer and gets up +to the hall with his trombone. You can tell when he comes. He pulls the +slide in and out a couple of times with an unearthly chromatic grunt, +and then there is a deep, pregnant silence. They are going to begin. + +Usually they begin several times. It is as hard to get a band off +together in practice as it is to send a dozen horses from the wire. But +finally the bass catches up with the cornets, and the others sprint or +put on the brakes, and they land on the fourth or fifth beat together. + +For a few minutes it's great. They go over the first four bars in a +bunch, and old Dobbs gets the half note and change of key in the bass, +which usually floors him, like a professional. It is a proud and happy +moment for the leader. But it doesn't last. It's too good to be true. Ad +Smith strikes a falsetto with his cornet and stops for wind; this +rattles his partner, who can't carry the air alone to save him. Dobbs +sits down on the wrong key in the bass. The tenors weaken, discouraged +by the cornet, and everybody hesitates. A couple of clarionets lose the +place and get to wandering around at random, creating terrible havoc. +The altos stop, being in doubt. Ad recovers and launches out with +terrific vim half a beat behind. There is a rally, but it is too late. +You can hear fragments of five different keys, and presently every one +stops except Mahlon Brown, who plays the bass drum and always bangs away +through fire or water until some one turns him off. + +Then there is silence--a good deal of it. We all know what is +happening. Sim Askinson, the leader, is making a few well-chosen +remarks, and each player is turning around in his chair and going over +the faults of his neighbor in the most kindly and thorough fashion. Ed +Smith empties out his baritone horn and takes a little practice run, and +then they commence to begin--or begin to start--or start to +commence--whatever it is, all over again. But when they stop at ten +o'clock, they haven't played the "Washington Post March" clear through +in any one heat. + +Doesn't sound encouraging for the Fourth, does it? But, pshaw, that's +only practice! When the big day comes and the boys put on their caps and +coats and such trousers as will come nearest to blending with the said +coats and march down the street, do they falter and blow up in the back +stretch? Not much. They canter through that air as if they had been born +whistling it. There's a wonderful inspiration in marching to a band +man--give him a horn, a ragged slip of music, and about four miles of +road, and he will prance down the street, climbing over ruts, wading +through mud, reading at night by the light of a torch carried by a boy +who is twenty feet away fighting with another boy; and he will blow his +immortal soul into his horn for hours at a stretch without missing a +note. + +Part of the reason for the difference at home is because we always carry +a few amateurs, who are privileged to come in at practice and do all the +damage they can, but who have to keep mighty quiet on the march. They +can carry their horns, puff out their cheeks and look as grand as they +please, but if they'd presume to cut loose with some real notes and +smear up a piece, they'd be fired in no time. + +We have always been mighty proud of our Homeburg band. Nobody knows how +old it is. We think it arrived with the first inhabitants. These are +all dead, but some of the original horns are still doing duty, and the +brass on them is worn thin and almost bright. Our band is much better +than the average band. That's one of the great Homeburg comforts. +Whenever we get blue about the muddy streets and the small stores, and +the great need of a sewage system, and the disgraceful condition of the +stove in the Q. B. & C. Depot, we think of our band and are comforted. +It has at least twenty members right along, most of whom can play their +instruments, and Sim Askinson, who is a professional music teacher, has +conducted it off and on for twenty-five years. Citizens from other towns +get mighty jealous when they come down to Homeburg Thursday evenings +during the summer and listen to the magnificent concerts which our band +gives. I've seen as many as three hundred rigs around the public square +those nights. And when our band practices up on "Poet and Peasant," +which is its star piece, and goes off to the big band contests which +break loose in the summer and create great havoc, large numbers of our +citizens go along and bet their good money in a manner which keeps the +town poor for months afterward. + +I don't know anything more magnificent than the way our band plays "Poet +and Peasant" with Sim Askinson leading, Ad Smith and Henry Aultmeyer +duetting perfectly for once with their cornets, and the clarionet +section eating up the fast parts in a manner that sends goose flesh up +and down your spine. We're head and shoulders above any other band that +enters the contests, but that's the trouble. The judges are never +educated up to "Poet and Peasant." They always give the prize to the +Paynesville Military Band, which has a five-foot painted bass drum and +has to play "Over the Waves" for a concert piece, because they haven't +got a decent cornet player in town. Sometime they will get a real +musician to judge these contests, and then we will win by seventeen +toots. + +You may not believe it, Jim, but I am an alumnus of the Homeburg band. +Didn't suspect that I was anything but an ordinary citizen, did you? But +it's a fact. I am a band man. I'm too modest to brag about it, but I was +carrying a horn and had a uniform before I was eighteen. I suppose there +is nothing, not even the fire department, that fills a small town boy +with such wild ambition as a band. When I was twelve, I used to watch +that band in its more sublime passages, feeling that if I ever could +become great enough to play in it, others could run the country and win +its great battles with no jealousy from me. The snare drummer at that +time was a boy of sixteen. Of course, being snare drummer in the band, +he didn't mix around much with the common kids, and I didn't know him. +But I watched him until my ribs swelled out and cracked with envy; and I +used to wonder how fortune ever happened to reach down and yank that +particular boy so far up into the rarefied upper regions of glory. + +When I was fourteen, I went after his job. But I never could learn to +play the snare drum. You have to learn to "roll," and I couldn't make my +left hand behave. I tried a year and would probably be trying yet but +for the fact that when Ed Norton left town, he traded me his ruinous old +alto horn for three dollars and a dog. There was about as much music +left in it as there is in a fish horn, but I was as delighted as if it +had been a pipe organ, and when the folks wouldn't let me practice at +home on it, I took it out in the country and kept it in Smily Garrett's +barn. After a while I learned how to fit my face into the mouthpiece in +just the right way, and as the sounds I made became more human, I sort +of edged into town, until finally I was practicing in our own barn. And +the next year Askinson let me come into the band and "pad" as second +alto during the less important engagements. + +I played with the band for five years, and while I never got out of the +"thump section," which was what the trombonists and snare drummers and +the other aristocrats of the band call the altos, I had all the fun and +adventures that a high-priced musician could have had, and was perfectly +happy. I can still remember with pride the deep-green looks on the faces +of Pete Amthorne and Billy Madigan and Snoozer Ackley, as they watched +me marching grandly down the street lugging my precious old three +bushels of brass in my arms, and "ump-umping" until my eyes stuck out of +my head. Of course they didn't know that most of the time I was +watching a change in my notes half a bar away and wondering if I could +make it without falling all over the treble clef. I looked like Sousa to +them, and when I leaned grandly back in my chair at the band concerts +and borrowed a page of music from my neighbor--said page being mostly +Hebrew to me--I felt like a Senator or Chief Justice letting the common +herd have a look at him. + +I pity the poor city boys who have to grow up nowadays and depend on +taxicabs and vaudeville for their excitement. Belonging to the band was +more fun than belonging to the baseball team or the torchlight brigade +or anything else. We got in on everything. They couldn't pull off a +rally or celebration, or even a really successful church social, without +us. I might say that the importance of a Homeburg citizen in the old +days was determined by whether or not the Homeburg Band escorted him to +his tomb. When great doings occurred in the neighboring towns, plain +citizens dug down in their pockets for car-fare, and then dug painfully +down once more for our car-fare. When an ordinary Homeburger wanted to +help boost McKinley to victory by parading in some distant town with a +torch, it cost him five dollars and a suit of clothes. But we not only +went free, but got two dollars apiece for plowing a wide furrow of glory +down the streets between rows of admiring eyes. + +Those two dollars counted a lot in those days, too. It looked like an +easy income to us. All we had to do to earn it was to beg off from our +employers for half a day, travel thirty miles or so by train, usually +standing up and protecting our horns from the careless mob, march eight +or ten miles over unknown streets, picking out dry places underfoot and +notes from a piece of music bobbing up and down in the shadows above our +horns, and then drive home across country after midnight, getting home +in time to go to work in the morning. Why, it was just like finding +money; I've never had so much fun earning it since. I started once to +figure out how many miles our band marched during the first Bryan +campaign, but I gave it up. We never felt it at that time, but it made +me so tired counting that I quit with a distinct footsore feeling. + +The most worrisome task about a Homeburg band was keeping it alive. I +suppose all small town bands have the same trials. We worked against +incredible difficulties. If city people had the same devotion to music +which we displayed, you would have a ten-thousand-piece philharmonic +orchestra in New York playing twenty-four hours a day for glory. We were +always building up our band with infinite pains, only to have Fate jerk +the gizzard out of it just as perfection was in sight. Talent was +scarce, and the rude, heartless city was forever reaching down into +Homeburg and yanking some indispensable players away. Of course there +was always a waiting list of youngsters who would coax a few hoarse +toots out of the alto horn, and we always had a bunch of kid +clarionetists who would sail along grandly through the soft parts and +then blow goose notes whenever they hit the solo part. But try as we +would, we could never get more than two cornets. One of these was Ad +Smith. He was a bum cornetist, but his brother Ed was a good baritone, +and we had to have both or none. The other was usually some anxious +young student who got along pretty well on plain work, but who would +come down the chromatic run in the "Chicago Tribune March" like a fat +man falling down the cellar stairs with an oleander plant. + +As for trombones, there was a positive fatality among them; we were +always losing them. Trombone players have to be born, anyway, and there +was no hope of developing one. Besides, the neighbors wouldn't allow it. +Young Henry Wood showed promise once, but after his father had listened +to him for about six months, he took the slip end of his horn away from +him and beat carpets with it, until it was extinct as far as melody was +concerned. + +For a year we had Mason Peters, who was a wonder on the slide trombone. +But he was only getting twelve dollars a week in Snyder's Shoe Emporium, +and Paynesville, which never tired of putting up dirty tricks on us, +hustled around and got him an eighteen dollar job up there--after which +they came down to Homeburg at the first opportunity with their band to +parade Peters before our eyes. It would have been a grand success if +they hadn't put Peters in the front row. He lived for his art, Peters +did, paying no attention to anything but his trombone, and besides he +was quite deaf. He got confused about the line of march, and when the +band swung around the public square he kept right on up Main Street all +alone, playing in magnificent form and solitary grandeur while the band +swung off the other way. The whole town followed him with tears of joy, +and he traveled two blocks before he became aware of the vast and +appalling silence behind him; then he kept right on for the city limits +on the run. It was a great comfort to us, and by the time we had gotten +through apologizing to the Paynesville boys for following Peters under +the impression that he was the real band, they had offered to fight us +singly or in platoons. + +We used to watch every new citizen like Russian detectives, only we +searched them for horns instead of dynamite. Several times a trombonist +came to town, and music revived noticeably. But none of them lasted. +Trombonists seem to be temperamental, and when they are not changing +jobs they are resigning from the band because they are not allowed to +play enough solos. Our greatest bonanza was a quiet chap named Williams, +who came to town to work in the moulding room of the plow factory. After +he had been there a week, we discovered that he had a saxophone. No one +had ever heard or eaten a saxophone, but we looked it up, and when we +found out what it was, we made a rush for him. At the next practice he +appeared with a bright silver instrument covered with two bushels of +keys and played a solo which sounded like three clarionets with the +croup. We wept for joy and elected him leader on the spot. + +This caused Sim Askinson to resign, of course, and he took Ad and Ed +Smith with him, and they remained in dignified and awful silence for two +years. But we didn't care. One saxophone was worth five baritones, and +while Williams was in town, we were an object of envy to all of the +other bands around. We changed our name to the Homeburg Saxophone Band, +and the way we rubbed it into Paynesville was pitiful. He was a little +fellow, Williams was, and short of wind, which caused him to gasp a good +deal during the variation parts. But he was willing. There was no shirk +about him. After a year our program usually consisted of eleven +saxophone solos and some other piece which could be done almost entirely +on the saxophone, and the jealous Paynesvillains used to ask why we used +nineteen men to play the rests when one man could have produced as much +silence at far less expense. + +Those were glorious years; but of course they didn't last. Williams got +to resigning at the foundry just for the pleasure of having us come down +and plead with the proprietor to raise his pay. Finally he resigned so +much that the proprietor fired him, and then we had to take our caps in +hand and wheedle the Smiths and Askinson back into the band. I haven't +belonged for years, but they are still there. When I drop in at +practice, as many of the alumni do, Askinson greets me cordially and +takes some young cub's horn away from him, so I can sit in. It is just +like old times, especially when Ed Smith lays down his horn after a +slight altercation with some one and goes home never to come back--just +as he has done for the last thirty years. + +That's the worst of music. One's art, you know, has so much influence +over one's temper. To see our band soaring majestically down Main Street +and playing "Canton Halifax" in one great throbbing rough-house of +melody you would never believe that anything but brotherly love existed +between the players. As a matter of fact, we never wasted any harmony +among ourselves. We didn't have any to spare. It took all we had to +produce the music. For twenty-five years the Smiths and Cooney Simpson, +who plays first clarionet, have been at swords' points, each with a +faction behind him. Cooney says it's a shame that a good band must limp +along with a cornetist who always takes three strikes to hit a high +note, and Ed Smith says Cooney wants to be leader and will not be +satisfied until he can play the solo and bass parts at once on his +clarionet. I can see Ed Smith now, after the band has run aground in +practice, taking his horn down and glaring around at Cooney. + +"What you gobstick players need is a time-table," says he, "instead of +notes. Come in on the A about eight-fifteen. If you can do that well, +we'll try to struggle along." + +"Don't get forte," Cooney replies cheerfully. "If you'd try to follow +both those cornets instead of rambling along by yourself, you'd split, +sure." + +"Better play cornet, too, Cooney," says Ad Smith, whirling around. +"You've got enough mouth for both." + +"Well, we ought to have a cornetist," says Cooney, "it's what we've +needed for years." + +This riles the scrub cornet player, whoever he happens to be, and he +gets up excitedly. "We'd get along a lot better without one or two human +calliopes--" he begins. + +"Set down, set down," says old Dobbs from the coils of his tuba. "Let +'em fight. They know it all between pieces--" + +"Who asked you to horn in?" says Ed Smith, getting up preparatory to +going home with his baritone horn and leaving a broken and forlorn world +to grieve his loss. + +Of course this is a crisis. But we never bust up. The Paynesville Band +busts up about twice a year over the division of profits and the color +of their new uniforms and the old question of whether the cornets or +trombones shall march in front. But we never go entirely to pieces. This +is largely because of Sam Green. He is our peacemaker and most faithful +player. He has played second alto in the band for thirty-five years +without a promotion, and is by all odds the worst player I ever saw, +being only entirely at home in the key of C; and he can't play +three-four time to save his soul. But his devotion is marvelous. He is +always the first man down to practice. He lights the lamps, builds the +fires, and when necessary goes out to Ed Smith's home and persuades him +to come back into the band for just this night. And whenever the dispute +between the factions gets to the point where Ed Smith begins gathering +up his doll things, Sam interferes. + +"Come on now, boys," he pleads, "we've got to get this piece worked up. +You're all good players. Why, if Paynesville had you fellows, she'd +have a band. That was my fault that time. I'll get this here thing right +sometime. I'll sit out in the trio now and you fellows take it." + +And pretty soon, as he argues, Ed's proud heart softens, and he comes +back with a glare at Cooney. Then Sim Askinson raps on his music rack +and says: "Gentlemen and trombone players," as he has for a quarter of a +century; and a minute later the band is tumbling eagerly through its +piece once more, all feuds suspended in the desperate effort to come out +even at the end with no surplus bars to be played by some floundering +horn. + +Some time during the evening, as a rule, the various sections get +together on some passage and swim grandly through, every horn in perfect +time, and the parts blending like Mocha and Java. All differences are +forgotten, and the band breaks up with friendly words, Ed Smith and +Cooney going home together. Music has charms to soothe the savage beast, +and it also has a wonderful power of taking the temper out of the grocer +and the painter and the mahout of the waterwork's gasoline engine. + +I never stepped so high or felt so grand as I did the first time I +marched out with the boys and went down the street in the back row of +the band next to the drums, a member in good standing, and dodging every +time I passed under a telephone wire to keep from scraping my cap off. I +never expect to feel that grand again. But I have an ambition. If ever I +should become so famous and successful that when I went back to Homeburg +to visit my proud and happy parents and stepped off of the 4:11 train, I +would find the Homeburg Marine Band there to meet me, I would know that +I had made good, and I would be content. The only thing that encourages +me in my ambition is that the band didn't come down to play when I went +away. Do you know, Jim, it's the funniest thing--the fellows we played +out-of-town in a blaze of glory never happened to be the chaps we came +down to the train to meet afterward, somehow. But I imagine we weren't +the only poor guessers in the world. + + + + +IX + +THE AUTO GAME IN HOMEBURG + +_It has Driven out Politics as a Subject of Debate_ + + +Wait a minute, Jim. I want to look at this automobile.... Yes, I know it +is the sixth machine I've walked around in seven blocks, but what's time +to a New Yorker on Saturday afternoon? This nifty little mile-eater has +an electric gear shift, and I want to ask the chauffeur how he likes it. +Promised Ad Summers I would. + +... Says it hangs a little if his voltage is low. That's what I'd be +afraid of--Gee! there's a new Jacksnipe with a center searchlight. Never +would do for rutty roads. How do you like the wire wheels, Jim? Bad for +side strains, I should think. Look at those foxy inset lamps. Listen to +that engine purr--two cycle, I'll bet. Say, Fifth Avenue is certainly +one great street! I could walk up and down here for a month. There's a +new Battleax--wonder if those two speed differentials are going to work +out. + +All right, Jim, I'll reluctantly shut up and focus my attention on the +salmon-colored cloaks and green stockings for a while. I forgot that you +don't take any deep, abiding interest in automobiles. All they mean to +you is something to ride in, but to me they're as interesting as a new +magazine. I've spent about four days in the sales-rooms since I've been +here, and when I get home I'll be the center of breathless attention +until I've passed around all the information I've dug up. I could go +back without any information about the new shows, or the city campaign, +but if I were to come back without a bale of automobile gossip, I'd be +fired for gross incompetency from the League of Amateur Advisers at +Gayley's garage. + +You thought I said I didn't own a machine? I did say it and I can prove +it. But do you suppose that makes any difference in Homeburg? Here the +other fellow's car is his own business. But in Homeburg an automobile is +every one's business. It's like the weekly newspaper, or the new +minister, or the latest wedding--it's common property. Since gasoline +has been domesticated we're all enthusiasts, whether we are customers or +not. The man who can't talk automobile is as lonely as the chap who +can't play golf at a country club. About all there is left for him to do +is to hunt up Postmaster Flint and talk politics. Flint has to talk all +our politics; it's what he's paid for, but it's mighty hard on him +because he just bought a new machine last spring himself. + +No, you guessed wrong, Jim. Automobiles aren't a curiosity in Homeburg. +How many are there in New York? Say eighty thousand. One for every sixty +people. Homeburg has twenty-five hundred people and one hundred +machines, counting Sim Askinson's old one-lunger and Red Nolan's refined +corn sheller, which he built out of the bone-yard back of Gayley's +garage. That's one for every twenty-five people. Figure that out. It +only gives each auto five members of the family and twenty citizens to +haul around. We're about up to the limit. Of course another one hundred +people could buy machines, I suppose; but that would only allow twelve +and a half passengers, admirers, guests, and advisers for each car. That +isn't anywhere near enough. Why, it wouldn't be worth while owning a +machine! As it is, we are all busy. I've ridden in twenty new machines +this year and passed my opinion on them. It has taken a good deal of my +spare time. I've thought sometimes of buying one myself, but I don't +believe it would be right. If I had a car myself, I would have to +neglect all the others. It wouldn't do. Besides, I like to be peculiar. + +Is every one in Homeburg a millionaire? Goodness, no! Our brag is that +we have less people per automobile than any other town, but then that's +the ordinary brag with an Illinois small town. We're not much ahead of +the others. Automobiles don't stand for riches out our way. Blamed if I +know what they do represent. Mechanical ingenuity, I guess. Country town +people pick up automobiles as easily as poor people do twins. And they +seem to support them about as inexpensively. If you were to take a trip +around Homeburg at seven A.M. on a Sunday morning, you would find about +eighty-seven automobile owners out in the back yard over, under, or +wrapped around their machines. + +In the city you can only tell a car owner these days by his silk socks; +but in the country town the grimy hand is still the badge of the order. +The automobile owner does his own work, like his wife, and on Sunday +morning, instead of hustling for the golf links, he inserts himself into +his overalls and spends a couple of hours trying to persuade the +carbureter to use more air and less gasoline. The interest our +automobile owners take in the internals of their cars is intense. That +is the only thing which mars the pleasure of the professional guest, +such as myself. More than once I've sat in the sun twenty miles from +home while some host of mine has taken his engine down clear to the bed +plate, just because he had the time to do it and wanted to see how the +bearings were standing up. + +I've lived in Homeburg all my life, but I haven't yet solved the mystery +of how some of our citizens own machines. It's a bigger mystery than +yours because our automobile owners pay their bills, and the mortgage +records don't tell us anything. There's Wilcox, the telegraph operator. +He makes seventy-five dollars a month. He works nights to earn it, and +he spends his days driving around the country in his runabout. He's +thirty years old, and I think he invested in an auto instead of a wife. + +You can get a good meal in our local restaurant for twenty-five cents, +and when some painstaking plutocrat comes in and tries to spend a dollar +there, he has to be removed by kindly hands in a state of fatal +distension before the job is finished. A thousand dollars would buy +stock, fixtures, and good will. But a thousand wouldn't buy the +restaurant owner's automobile. He began with two hundred and fifty +dollars' worth of rubbish and a monkey wrench four years ago, and has +pottered and tinkered and traded and progressed until he now owns a last +year's model, staggering under labor-saving devices. + +Our oculist, who does business in a tiny corner in a shoe-store and +never overcharged any one in his life, was our pioneer automobile owner. +He bought a homemade machine and a mule at the same time, and by +judiciously combining the two he got a good deal of mileage out of both. +He would work all morning getting the automobile down-town and all +afternoon getting the mule to haul it back. He has had three machines +since then, and the one he owns now is only third-hand. + +For years Mrs. Strawn washed clothes for the town from morning till +night, two washings a day and all garments returned intact. Her boys +used to call at our house for the wash with a wheelbarrow. They come in +an automobile now. She bought it. It was a hopeless invalid at the time, +but they nursed it back to health, and I hear that next spring they are +going to trade it in for a new machine.... Why do I say machine? Because +that's what an automobile is out our way. It's a machine, and we treat +it as such. Most of our people couldn't take a lobster to pieces to save +their lives, but you ought to see them go through the shell of an auto. +Too many Americans buy portable parlors with sixty-seven coats of +varnish, and are then shocked and grieved to discover when too late that +said parlors have gizzards just like any other automobile and that they +should have been looked after. + +I said there were one hundred automobiles in Homeburg. I was mistaken. +There are ninety-nine automobiles and one car. The Payleys own the car. +They bought it in New York, paid six thousand dollars for it, with a +chauffeur thrown in to drive them home, and they have been under his +thumb ever since. He was the only chauffeur who had ever been brought +alive in captivity to Homeburg, and the whole town inspected him with +the utmost care. He was the best stationary chauffeur I ever saw. He +seemed to regard that car as a monument and was shocked at the idea of +moving it around from place to place. + +It was too high-priced a car to be touched by Sam Gayley, our local auto +doc., and somehow the chauffeur never seemed to be able to keep it in +running order long enough to get up to the Payley residence and take the +family out. He ran around the country a good deal, however, tuning it up +and trying it out, and as he was a sociable cuss, some of us always went +with him. In fact, about every one rode in the Payley car that summer +except the Payleys. Wert Payley used to stop me and ask if I could fix +it up to take him along sometime when I went riding with his chauffeur, +but I never would risk it. Besides, it would be imposing on the boy's +generosity to lug a friend along when you went riding. + +The most of our machines vary from the one thousand, five hundred dollar +touring car to the five hundred dollar little fellows; and since they +have come, life in Homeburg is twice as interesting. They are our +dissipation, our excitement, our amusement, and the focus of our town +pride. The Checker Club disbanded last winter because the members got to +quarreling over self-starters, and I understand that in the Women's +Missionary Societies and the afternoon clubs the comparative riding +qualities of the various tonneaus about the city have about driven out +teething and styles as a subject of debate. For a while during the +Wilson campaign, it looked as if politics was going to get a foothold in +the town, but some enthusiast organized a flying squadron of automobiles +to propagate Democratic gospel, and then it was all off. Everybody +rushed into the squadron, and the trips around the district became +reliability runs, with a lone orator addressing the freeborn citizens +upon the tariff at each stop, and said freeborn citizens discussing +magnetos, springs, and tires with great earnestness and vehemence during +the speech. + +Business always suspends for half a day whenever a new automobile comes +to town. There may be a dozen of the same make already, but that doesn't +make any difference. We are experts, trained to notice the finer shades +of perfection, and until we have seen each new machine put up the clay +hill four miles south of town and have ridden in it over the Q. B. & C. +crossing and the other places which show up bad springs, we can't fix +our minds on our work. Time was when a new baby could come into Homeburg +and hold the attention of the town for a week. Now a baby is lucky if +its birth notice isn't crowded out of the _Democrat_ to make room for +the list of new machines. + +As for those of us who haven't automobiles, life is pleasant and without +responsibilities. We ride in every new automobile, and, what is more, we +go over it as carefully as a farmer does a new horse. We open its hood +and pry into its internal economy. We crank it to test its +compression--half the Homeburg men who have achieved broken wrists by +the crank route haven't autos at all. We denounce the owner's judgment +on oils and take his machine violently away from him in order to prove +that it will pull better uphill with the spark retarded. At night, +during the summer, we hurry through supper and then go out on the front +porch to wait for a chance to act as ballast. + +No automobile owner in the dirt roads belt will go out without a full +tonneau if he can help it--makes riding easier--and this means permanent +employment during the evenings for about three hundred friends all +summer long. In fact the demand for ballast is often greater than the +supply. As a result, we have become hideously spoiled. I have passed up +as many as six automobiles in an evening on various captious pretexts, +waiting all the time for Sim Bone's car, whose tonneau is long and +exactly fits my legs. Once or twice Sim has failed to come around after +I have waved the rest of the procession by, and we have had to stay at +home. I have spoken to him severely about this, and he is more careful +now. + +Because of our great interest in automobiles, vicarious or otherwise, +there is no class-hatred in Homeburg. If a man were to stop by the +roadside and begin to denounce the automobile as an oppressor of the +pedestrian, he would in all probability be kidnaped by some acquaintance +before he was half through and carried forty miles away for company's +sake. About the only Homeburg resident who doesn't ride is old Auntie +Morley, who broke her leg in a bobsled sixty years ago and has had a +holy horror of speed ever since. + +In fact the only classes we have are the privileged class who merely +ride in automobiles and the oppressed class who ride and have to pay for +them, too. Lately the latter class has begun to feel itself abused and +has been grumbling a little, but we overlook it. No appeal to prejudice +and jealousy can move us. Of course, I don't think that an automobile +owner should be expected to leave his wife at home in order to +accommodate his neighbors, and there may be some just complaint when an +owner is called up late at night and asked to haul friends home from a +party to which he hasn't been invited. But on the whole the automobile +owners are very well treated. Suppose we spectators should band together +and refuse to ride in the things or talk about them! The market would +be glutted with second-hand cars in a month. + +We have no trouble with the speed limit in Homeburg either. This may be +due partly to our good sense, but it is mostly due to our peculiar +crossings. Homeburg is paved with rich black dirt, and in order to keep +the populace out of the bosom of the soil in the muddy seasons, the +brick crossings are built high and solid, forming a series of +impregnable "thank-ye-marms" all over the town. One of our great +diversions during the tourist season is to watch the reckless strangers +from some other State dash madly into town at forty miles an hour and +hit the crossing at the head of Main Street. There is a crash and a +scream as the occupants of the tonneau soar gracefully into the top. +There is another crash and more screams at the other side of the street, +and before the driver has diagnosed the case, he has hit the Exchange +Street crossing, which sticks out like the Reef of Norman's Woe. When +he has landed on the other side of this crossing, he slows down and goes +meekly out of town at ten miles an hour, while we saunter forth and pick +up small objects of value such as wrenches, luncheon baskets, hairpins, +hats, and passengers. + +Last summer we picked up an oldish man who had been thrown out of an +unusually jambangsome touring car. He had been traveling in the tonneau +alone, and even before he met our town he had not been enjoying himself. +The driver and his accomplice had not noticed their loss, and when we +had brushed off and restored the old gentleman, he said "Thank God!" and +went firmly over to the depot, where he took the next train for home, +leaving no word behind in case his friends should return--which they did +that afternoon and searched mournfully at a snail's pace for over twenty +miles on both sides of our town. + +Since the automobile has begun to rage in our midst, the garage is the +center of our city life. The machine owners stop each day for +lubricating oil and news and conversation; the non-owners stroll over to +inspect the visiting cars and give advice when necessary; and the +loafers have abandoned the implement store, Emerson's restaurant, and +the back of McMuggins' drug store in favor of the garage, because they +find about seven times as much there to talk about. The city garage +can't compare with ours for adventure and news. I have spent a few hours +in your most prominent car-nurseries and I haven't heard anything but +profanity on the part of the owners and Broadway talk among the +chauffeurs. + +In the country it's different. Take a busy day at Gayley's, for +instance. It usually opens about three A.M., when Gayley crawls out of +bed in response to a cataract of woe over the telephone and goes out +nine miles hither or yon to haul in some foundered brother. Gayley has a +soft heart and is always going out over the country at night to reason +with some erring engine; but since last April first, when he traveled +six miles at two A.M. in response to a call and found a toy automobile +lying bottom-side up in the road, he has become suspicious and +embittered, and has raised his prices. + +At six A.M. Worley Gates, who farms eight miles south, comes in to catch +an early train and delivers the first bulletin. The roads to the south +are drying fast, but he went down the clay hill sidewise and had to go +through the bottom on low. At seven, Wimble Horn and Colonel Ackley and +Sim Bone drop in while waiting for breakfast. Bone thinks he'll drive to +Millford, but doesn't think he can get in an hour's business and get +back by noon. + +This starts the first debate of the day, Colonel Ackley contending that +he has done the distance easily in an hour-ten, and Sim being frankly +incredulous. Experts decide that it can be done with good roads. Colonel +says he can do it in mud and can take the hills on high; says he never +goes into low for anything. Bill Elwin, one of our gasless experts, +reminds him of the time he couldn't get up Foster's Hill on second and +was passed by three automobiles and fourteen road roaches. This is a +distinct breach of etiquette on Bill's part, for he was riding with +Colonel at the time and should have upheld him. The discussion is just +getting good when Ackley's wife calls him home to breakfast over the +'phone, and the first tourist of the day comes in. + +He has come from the west and has had heavy weather. He asks about the +roads east. Gibb Ogle, our leading pessimist, hastens to inform him that +very likely the roads are impassable, because the Highway Commissioners +have been improving them. Out our way road improvement consists of +tearing the roads out with a scraper and heaping them up in the middle. +It takes a road almost a year to recover from a good, thorough case of +improvement. + +The stranger goes on dejectedly, and about nine A.M. young Andy Link +roars in with his father's car, which he has taken away from the old man +and converted into a racer by the simple process of taking off the +muffler and increasing the noise to one hundred miles per hour. Andy +declares that there has been no rain to the northwest and that he has +done sixty miles already this morning, but can't get his carbureter to +working properly, as usual. By this time several owners and a dozen +critics have assembled, and the morning debate on gasoline versus motor +spirit takes place. It ends a tie and both sides badly winded, when +Pelty Amthorne drives in, very mad. He has been over to Paynesville and +back. This is only twenty miles, but owing to the juicy and elusive +condition of the roads, his rear wheels have traveled upward of two +thousand miles in negotiating the distance and he has worn out two rear +casings. + +Right here I wish to state that Homeburg roads are not always muddy. We +average three months of beautiful, smooth, resilient and joltless roads +each year. The remaining nine months, however, I mention with pain. +Illinois boosters say our beautiful rich black soil averages ten feet in +depth, but I think this understates the case--at least our beautiful +black dirt roads seem to be deeper than that in the spring. What we need +in the spring in Illinois are locks and harbor lights, and the man who +invents an automobile buoyant enough to float on its stomach and paddle +its way swiftly to and fro on the heaving bosom of our April roads will +be a public benefactor. + +Pelty is justly indignant, because he had hoped to get another thousand +miles of actual travel out of his tires. We sympathize with him, but in +the middle of his grief Chet Frazier drives up. When he sees his ancient +enemy, he climbs out of his car, comes hastily over to where Pelty is +erupting, and starts trading autos with him. + +Did you ever hear a couple of seasoned horse traders discussing each +other's wares? Horse traders are considerate and tender of each other's +feelings compared with two rural automobile owners who are talking swap +with any enthusiasm. + +"Hello, Pelty," says Chet. "Separator busted again?" + +Everybody laughs, and Chet walks all around the machine. "Why, it ain't +a separator at all," he finally says. "What is it, Pelty?" + +"If you'd ever owned an automobile you'd know," grunts Amthorne, +hauling off a tire. "What's become of that tinware exhibit you used to +block up traffic with?" + +Chet gets the laugh this time. + +"That tinware exhibit stepped over from Jenniesburg in thirty minutes +flat this morning," says Chet. "Lucky you weren't on the road. I'd have +thrown mud on your wind shield." + +"Say!" Pelty shouts. "Your machine couldn't fall ten miles in thirty +minutes. Why don't you get a real automobile? What will you give me to +boot for mine?" + +They are off, and business in the vicinity suspends. + +"I'll trade with you, Pelty," says Chet calmly--quite calmly. "Let me +look it over." + +He walks carefully around the auto, opens the hood and looks in. "Funny +engine, isn't it? I saw one like that at the World's Fair." + +Pelty has the hood of Chet's machine open too and is right there with +the retort courteous. "Is this an engine or a steam heater?" he asks. +"What pressure does she carry?" + +"She never heats at all except when I run a long time on low," Chet says +eagerly. + +"Oh, yes," says Pelty, "I never have to go into low much--" + +"Gosh!" Chet explodes. "When you go up Sanders Hill, they have to close +two district schools for the noise." + +"Only time you ever heard me I was hauling you up with your broken +jack-shaft," snorts Pelty. "You ought to get some iron parts for your +car. Cheese has gone out of style." + +"You still use it for tires, I see," says Chet. + +"Never mind," says Pelty wrathfully. "I get mileage out of my machine; I +don't drive around town and then spend two days shoveling out carbon." + +"Peculiar radiator you've got," says Chet, changing the subject. "Oh, I +see; it's a road sprinkler. What do you get from the city for laying the +dust?" + +"I can stop that leak in two minutes with a handful of corn meal," says +Pelty, busily surveying Chet's machine. "Do you still strip a gear on +this thing every time you try to back?" + +"Why do you carry a horn?" asks Chet. "You're wasteful; I heard your +valves chattering when I was three blocks away." + +"I didn't hear yours chatter much last Tuesday on Main Street," snorts +Pelty. "You cranked that thing long enough to grind it home by hand." + +"Ya-a! Talk, will you?" yells Chet earnestly. "Any man who begins +carrying hot water out to his machine in a teakettle in September knows +a lot about starting cars." + +"Well, get down to business," says Pelty. "You want to trade, you say. +I don't want that mess. It's an old back-number with tin springs, glass +gears and about as much compression as a bandbox. Give me five hundred +dollars and throw your automobile in. I need something to tie my cow to. +She'd haul away anything that was movable." + +"Give you five hundred dollars for that parody on a popcorn wagon?" +snorts Chet. "Why, man, the poor old thing has to go into low to pull +its shadow! You're delirious, Pelty. I'll tell you what I'll do. You +give me a thousand dollars for my car, and I'll agree to haul that old +calliope up to my barn, out of your way, and make a hen roost out of it. +Come on now. It's your only chance." + +Shortly after this they are parted by anxious friends, and the show is +over. I've known Homeburg men to give up a trip to Chicago because Chet +and Pelty began to trade their autos just before train time. + +In New York an auto means comfort and pleasure and advertisement, like a +fur-lined overcoat with a Persian lamb collar. But in Homeburg it means +a lot more. It keeps us busy and happy and full of conversation and +debate. It pulls our old, retired farmers out of their shells and makes +them yell for improvements. It unbuckles our tight-wads and gives our +ingenious young loafers something to do. It promotes town pride, and it +keeps our money circulating so fast that every one has a chance to grasp +a chunk as it goes by. + +It has made us so independent of railroads that we feel now when buying +a ticket to Chicago as if we were helping the poor old line out. Our +Creamery has been collecting milk and shipping butter in an old roadster +with a wagon bed thorax for a year. Two of our rural route mail carriers +use small machines, except in wet weather, and good-roads societies in +our vicinity are the latest fad. We raised one thousand five hundred +dollars last spring to bring the Cannon Ball Trail from Chicago to +Kansas City through our town, and our hotel-keeper contributed one +hundred dollars of it. He says we'll be on the gas-line tourist route to +the coast after the trail has been marked and drained and graded up +well. + +But mostly the automobile means freedom to us. We're no longer citizens +of Homeburg but of the congressional district. We're neighbors to towns +we hadn't heard of ten years ago, and the horizon nowadays for most of +us is located at the end of a ten-gallon tank of gasoline. Why, in the +old days, you had to go fifty miles east and double back to get into the +north part of our county, and more of us had crossed the ocean than had +been to Pallsbury in the north tier of townships. Now our commercial +clubs meet together alternate months, and about seventeen babies in our +town have proud grandparents up there. + +That's part of what the automobile means to us, Jim. Can you blame me +for being so interested in a new one? Maybe it will have some +contrivance for scaring cows out of a narrow road. + + + + +X + +THE HOMEBURG TELEPHONE EXCHANGE + +_What Would Happen if We Tried to Get Along With a City Operator_ + + +All right, Jim! Having now completed the task of telephoning to Murray +Hill several thousand and something, I'm ready to join you at luncheon. +I'm glad I telephoned. I won't have to spend the afternoon doing it now +and, besides, I feel so triumphant. I got through this time without +forgetting to get a nickel first. I usually go into one of those wooden +overcoats and go through all the agonies of elbowing my way through half +a dozen centrals into some one's ear several miles away, and then +discover that I haven't anything but a half dollar. Then I have to stop +and begin all over again. + +Telephoning is one of the prices you have to pay to live in a +metropolis, Jim. I suppose it will always hurt me to pay a nickel for +telephoning. Seems like paying for a lungful of air--and bad air at +that. Coming as I do from the simple bosom of the nation, where talk +over the wires is so cheap that you sometimes have to wait half an hour +while two women are planning a church social over your line, I can't +seem to resign myself to paying the price of a street-car ride every +time I breathe a few sentiments into a telephone. Now the street cars +never fail to dazzle me. They are a wonderful bargain. When we are too +tired to walk in Homeburg, we have to pay at least fifty cents for a +horse from the livery stable, unless some automobile is going our way. +Nothing is more pleasant to me than to slip a nickel to a street-car +conductor and ride ten miles on it. But when we want to use a telephone, +do we go through all this ceremony of dropping a nickel into a set of +chimes? Not much. My bill at home at five cents per telephone call would +be more than my income. Why, many a time I've called up as many as eight +people in the west part of town to know whether the red glow in the sky +was the sunset or the Rolling Mills at Paynesville burning down! And +almost every day I telephone McMuggins, the druggist, to collar a small +boy and send up an Eltarvia Cigar. If that call cost me five cents, I +would be practically smoking ten-cent cigars, and all Homeburg would +regard me with suspicion. + +I suppose it will be a hundred years before we get over saying "Great +invention, isn't it?" every time we have finished a satisfactory session +over the telephone. But I don't think you city people realize how much +of an invention it is. Of course, the telephone is more important in +New York than it is in Homeburg. If you had to go back to the +old-fashioned stationary messenger boy to do your business here, a good +share of the city would have to close out at a sacrifice. You do things +with your telephones which dazzle us entirely, like talking into parlor +cars, calling up steamships, buying a railroad and saying airily "Charge +it," and tossing a few hectic words over to Pittsburgh or Cincinnati at +five dollars per remark, as casually as I would stop in and ask +Postmaster Flint why in thunder the Chicago papers were late again--and +that is about as casual as anything I know of. + +I'm willing to admit that your telephones are much more wonderful than +ours, not only because of what they do for you, but because of the +amount of money they can get out of you without causing revolutions and +indignation meetings. Why, they tell me that business firms here think +nothing of paying one hundred dollars a year for a telephone! At home +once, when we tried to raise the farmer lines from fifty cents to a +dollar a month, we almost had to fortify the town. I take off my hat to +a telephone which can collect one hundred dollars a year from its user +without using thumbscrews. It must have more ways of working for you +than I have ever dreamed of. + +No, the telephone in Homeburg is a very ordinary thing, and we could get +along without it quite nicely as far as exertion is concerned, it being +only a mile from end to end of the town. But if we had to do without our +telephone girls, we'd turn the whole town into a lodge of sorrow and +refuse to be comforted. I know of no grander invention than the country +town telephone girl. She's not only our servant and master, but she's +our watch-dog, guardian, memorandum book, guide, philosopher and family +friend. When our telephone can't give us convenience enough, she +supplies the lack. When brains at both ends are scarce, she dumps hers +into the pot; and when the poor overworked instrument falls down on any +task, she takes up the job. She not only gives our telephone a voice, +but she gives it feet and hands and something to think with. + +I got into a big telephone exchange once and watched it for over a +minute before I was fired out. It was a very impressive sight--rows on +rows of switchboards, hundreds of girls, thousands of little flashing +lights, millions of clickety-clicks and not enough conversation to run a +sewing circle up to refreshment time. The company was very proud of it, +and I suppose it was good enough for a city--but, pshaw, it wouldn't do +Homeburg for a day. If some one were to offer that entire exchange to us +free of charge, we'd struggle along with it for a few hours, and then +we'd rise up en masse and trade it off for Carrie Mason, our chief +operator, throwing in whatever we had to, to boot. + +Our exchange is in the back room of the bank building up-stairs. You +could put the entire equipment in a dray. Our switchboard is about as +big as an old-fashioned china closet and has three hundred drops. I +suppose an up-to-date telephone manager has forgotten what "drops" are +and you can't be expected to know. But out our way the telephone +companies are cooeperative, and as every subscriber owns a share, we all +take a deep personal interest in the construction and operation of the +plant, discussing the need of a new switchboard and the advantage of +cabling the Main Street lead, in technical terms. + +Well, anyway, a drop is a little brass door which falls down with a +clatter whenever the telephone which is hitched to that particular drop +wants a connection. And Miss Carrie Mason, our chief operator, sits on +a high stool with a receiver strapped over her rick of blond hair +jabbing brass plugs with long cords attached into the right holes with +unerring accuracy, and a reach which would give her a tremendous +advantage in any boarding-house in the land. Sometimes she has one +assistant, and in rush hours she has two. But on Sunday afternoons and +other quiet times she holds down the whole job alone for hours at a +time; and when I go up to her citadel and ask her to jam a toll call +through forty miles of barbed wire and miscellaneous junk to Taledo by +sheer wrist and lung power, she entertains me as follows while I wait: + +"Yes, indeed, I'll get your call through as soon as I can, but the +connection's--Nmbr--awful--Nmbr--bad to-day--Nmbr--They're not at home, +Mrs. Simmons; they went to Paynesville--Nmbr--I'll ring +again--Nmbr--Hello, Doctor Simms, Mrs. McCord told me to tell you to +come right out to the farm; the baby's sick--Nmbr--The train's late +to-day, Mrs. Bane, you've got plenty of time--Nmbr--I can't get them, +Mrs. Frazier. I'll call up next door and leave word for them to call +you--Nmbr (To me: "Hot to-day, isn't it? I tell 'em we ought to have an +electric fan up here.")--Nmbr--("It would keep us better +tempered.")--Nmbr--Oh, Mrs. Horn, will you tell Mrs. Flint when she +comes home that Mrs. Frazier wants her to call her up?--Nmbr--Now, +Jimmy, you haven't waited two seconds. I know you're anxious to talk to +Phoeb, but she isn't home; she's at the cooking club--Nmbr--Cambridge, +do see if you can't get through to Taledo. I've a party here that's in a +hurry--Nmbr. (To me: "That Taledo line's awful. It's grounded somewhere +on that farmer's line west of Tacoma.")--Nmbr--Yes, Mr. Bell, I'll call +you quick as he comes in his office; I can see his door from my +window--Nmbr--No, Mrs. Bane, the doctor's just gone out to the McCord +farm. If you hurry, you can stop him as he goes past. He left about five +minutes ago--Nmbr--Gee, Paynesville, you gave me an awful ring in the +ear then! No, you can't get through, the line's busy. Well, you'll have +to wait. I can't take the line away from them--Nmbr--Oh! (very softly) +Hello, Sam. Oh, pretty well. I'm most melted--wait a +minute--Nmbr--Hello, Sam (long silence) Oh, get out! My ear's all full +of taffy--wait a minute--Nmbr--Nmbr--No, Mr. Martin, there hasn't been +any one in his office all day. I think he's gone to Chicago--Hello, +Sam--wait a minute, Sam--Nmbr--Nmbr--Hello, Sam--Say, I'm all alone and +jumping sidewise. Call me up about six (very softly). G'by, Sam--Nmbr. +Oh, Mrs. Lucey, is Mrs. Simms at your house? Tell her her husband will +be home late to supper, he's gone out in the country--Hello. Hello. +_Hello_, Taledo. Is your party ready? (To me: "All right, here they are. +You'll have to talk pretty loud.") Hello, Taledo. All ready--Nmbr." + +That is a fair sample of Carrie. We couldn't keep house without her. And +that's why I feel an awful pang of jealousy when I hear that lobster Sam +talking to her. Maybe it's just the ordinary joshing which goes on over +the toll lines in the off hours. But maybe it isn't. Wherever Sam is and +whoever he is, he is a danger to Homeburg. Perhaps he is a lineman at +Paynesville, and then again he may be a grocer in some crossroads town +near by, with a toll telephone in the back of his store. But if he talks +to Carrie long enough and skilfully enough, he will come up to Homeburg, +marry her, and bear her away to his lair, far from our bereaved ears. +We've lost several telephone girls that way, and when a telephone girl +knows all of your habits and customs and those of your friends, and can +tell just where to find you or to find whomever you want found, and has +the business of the town down to the smallest details stowed away in her +capable head, it messes things up dreadfully to have her leave us high +and dry and go to housekeeping--which any one can do. + +Telephone girls are born, not made, in towns like Homeburg. We require +so much more of them than city folks do. When my wife wants to know if +hats are being worn at an afternoon reception, she calls up Carrie. Ten +to one Carrie has caught a scrap of conversation over the line and +knows. But if she hasn't, she will call up and find out. When a doctor +leaves his office to make a call, he calls up Carrie, and she faithfully +pursues him through town and country all day, if necessary. When we are +preparing for a journey, we do not go down to the depot until we have +called up Carrie and have found out if the train is on time, and if it +isn't, we ask her to call us when it is discovered by the telegraph +operator. And when our babies wander away, we no longer run frantically +up and down the street hunting for them. We ask Carrie to advertise for +a lost child seven hands high, and wearing a four-hour-old face-wash; +and within five minutes she has called up fifteen people in various +parts of the town and has discovered that said child is playing Indian +in some back yard a few blocks away. + +Carrie is also our confidante. I hate to think of the number of things +Carrie knows. Prowling into our lines while we are talking, as she does, +in search of connections to take down, she overhears enough gossip to +turn Homeburg into a hotbed of anarchy if she were to loose it. But she +doesn't. Carrie keeps all the secrets that a thousand other women +can't. She knows what Mrs. Wimble Horn said to Mrs. Ackley over the +line which made Mrs. Ackley so mad that the two haven't spoken for three +years. She knows just who of our citizens telephone to Paynesville when +Homeburg goes dry, and order books, shoes, eggs, and hard-boiled shirts +from the saloons up there to be sent by express in a plain package. She +knows who calls up Lutie Briggs every night or two from Paynesville, and +young Billy Madigan would give worlds for the information, reserving +only enough for a musket or some other duelling weapon. She knows how +hard it is for one of our supposedly prosperous families to get credit +and how long they have to talk to the grocer before he will subside for +another month. + +There's very little that Carrie doesn't know. I shudder to think what +would happen if Carrie should get miffed and begin to divulge. Once we +had a telephone girl who did this. She was a pert young thing who had +come to town with her family a short time before. It was a mistake to +hire her--telephone girls should be watched and tested for discretion +from babyhood up--but our directors did it, and because she showed a +passion for literature and gum and very little for work, they fired her +in three months. She left with reluctance, but she talked with +enthusiasm; and Homeburg was an armed camp for a long time. + +Goodness knows we have enough trouble with our telephone even with +Carrie to supply discretion for the whole town. Party lines and rubber +ears are the source of all our woe. You know what a party line is, of +course. It's a line on which you can have a party and gab merrily back +and forth for forty minutes, while some other subscriber is wildly +dancing with impatience. Most of our lines have four subscribers apiece, +and it's just as hard to live in friendliness on a party line as it is +for four families to get along good-naturedly in the same house. + +There's Mrs. Sim Askinson, for instance. She's a good woman and her pies +have produced more deep religious satisfaction at the Methodist church +socials than many a sermon. But St. Peter himself couldn't live on the +same telephone line with her. She's polite and refined in any other way, +but when she gets on a telephone line she's a hostile monopolist. Early +in the morning she grabs it and holds it fiercely against all comers, +while talking with her friends about the awful time she had the night +before when the cold water faucet in the kitchen began to drip. Mrs. +Askinson can talk an hour on this fertile subject, stopping each minute +or two to say, with the most corrosive dignity, to some poor victim who +is wiggling his receiver hook: "Please get off this line, whoever you +are. Haven't you any manners? I'm talking, and I'll talk till I get +through." And then, like as not, when she's through, she'll leave the +receiver down so that no one else will be able to talk--thus holding the +line in instant readiness when another fit of conversation comes on. +Seven party lines have revolted in succession and have demanded that +Mrs. Askinson be taken off and wished on to some one else, and Sim is +mighty worried. His wife has lost him so many friends that he doubts if +he will be able to run for the town board next year. + +We're a nice, peaceable folk in Homeburg, face to face. But like every +one else, we lay aside our manners when we get on the wires and push and +elbow each other a good deal. Funny what a difference it makes when you +are talking into a formless void to some strange human voice. I've never +said: "Get out of here," to any one in my office yet, but when some one +intrudes on my electric conversation, even by mistake, I boil with rage +and I yell with the utmost fervor and indignation: "Get off this line! +Don't you know any better than to ring in?" And the other person comes +right back with: "Well, you big hog, I've waited ten minutes, and I'll +ring all I want!" And then I say something more, and something is said +to me that eats a little semicircular spot out of the edge of my ear. +It's mighty lucky neither of us knows who is talking. Suppose Carrie +should tell. As I say, Carrie holds us in the hollow of her hand. + +But the rubber ear is even worse than the Berkshire manners. A rubber +ear is one that is always stretching itself over some telephone line to +hear a conversation which doesn't concern it. For a long time we were +singularly obtuse about this little point of etiquette in the country. +The fact that all the bells on a line rang with every call was a +constant temptation to sit in when we weren't wanted. We listened to +other people's conversations when we felt like it. It amused us, and why +shouldn't we? We rented our telephone and we had a right to pick it up +and soak in everything that was going through it. + +When the exchange was first put in, fifteen years ago, more than one +Homeburg woman used to wash her dishes with the telephone receiver +strapped tightly to her ear, dropping into the conversation whenever she +felt that she could contribute something of interest. As for the country +lines, it was the regular thing, and nobody minded it at all. That was +what killed the first line out of Homeburg. It had fourteen subscribers +and every one was hitched on the same wire. For a month everything went +nicely. Then old man Miller got mad at two neighbors who were sort of +sizing him up over the wire, and quit speaking to them. And Mrs. Ames +was caught gossiping, and a quarrel ensued in which about half the line +took part, all being on the wire and handy. Young Frank Anderson heard +Barney DeWolf making an engagement with his girl and licked Barney. One +thing led to another until not a subscriber would speak to another one, +and the line just naturally pined away. + +Etiquette has tightened up a lot since then. Still, we have rubber ears +to-day, and they cause half the trouble in Homeburg. You see, the +telephone has entirely driven out the back fence as a medium of gossip. +It offers so much wider opportunities. Nowadays it does all the business +which begins with: "Don't breathe this to a soul, but I just heard--" +and half the time some uninvited listener with an ear like a graphophone +horn is drinking in the details, to be published abroad later. Mrs. Cal +Saunders had our worst case of gummy ear up to a couple of years ago, +and broke up two engagements by listening too much. But she doesn't do +it any more. Clayt Emerson cured her. + +Something had to be done for the good of the town and Clayt, who lived +on the same line with her, conceived the plan of letting Mrs. Saunders +hear something worth while just to keep her busy and happy. So he called +up Wimble Horn and talked casually until he heard the little click which +meant that Mrs. Saunders had focused her large receptive ear on the +conversation. Then he told Horn that he was going to burn the darn stuff +up, trade being bad, anyway. Wimble offered to help him, and for three +nights they talked mysteriously about the crime, mentioning more +plotters, while Mrs. Cal hung on the line with her eyes bulging out, and +confided the secret to all the friends she had. + +Finally on Friday night, Policeman Costello, who was in the deal, told +Clayt that the expected had happened and that Mrs. Saunders had told +him about the horrible incendiary plot which was being hatched. Saturday +night came, and Costello refused to go to Clayt's store unless Mrs. +Saunders would come and denounce the villains, who were among our most +respected citizens. So Mrs. Saunders finally agreed, in fear and +trembling, and, taking a couple of her firmest friends, she led +Policeman Costello down to Clayt's restaurant at midnight, and, sure +enough, there was a light in the back part. Costello burst open the +door, and when they all rushed down on the scene of the crime, they +found Clayt and half a dozen of us manfully smoking up a box of stogies +which a slick traveling man had unloaded on him. Mrs. Saunders insisted +that crime was about to be committed and got so excited that she +repeated Clayt's exact words--in the middle of which a great light came +to her, and she said she was going home. + +"I think you had better," said Clayt, "and I'll tell you something more. +You listen to other people's affairs more than is good for you." + +But she hasn't since. + +Of course you don't have these troubles. But whenever I see New York +people harboring telephones in their homes which absolutely decline to +be civil until you feed them five cents, I think of our Homeburg +blessings and am content. Six dollars a year buys a telephone at home, +and about the only families which haven't telephones are a few widows +who live frugally on nothing a year, and old Mr. Stephens, who has one +hundred thousand dollars loaned out on mortgages and spends half an hour +picking out the biggest eggs when he buys half a dozen. There isn't a +farm within ten miles which isn't connected with the town, and while the +desk 'phone is a novelty with us and we still have to grind away at a +handle to get Central, we can put just as much conversation into the +transmitter and take just as much out of the receiver as if we were +connected with a million telephones. Our Homeburg 'phones are +old-fashioned; and the lines sound as if eleven million bees were +holding indignation meetings on them, but they have made a big family +out of three whole counties, and I guess they will take care of us all +right--so long as Carrie holds out and we can keep that Sam fellow where +he belongs. + + + + +XI + +A HOMEBURG SCHOOL ELECTION + +_Where Woman is Allowed to Vote and Man Has To_ + + +Well, Jim, you've taken me to see a great many wonderful sights in this +municipal monstrosity of yours, but I don't believe one of them has +interested me as much as this parade. I've worn three fat men on my toes +for an hour to get a chance to watch it, but it was worth the agony. +Think of it--at home we are doing well to get an attendance of two +thousand at a fire. Here in New York are several hundred thousand people +stopping their mad grabs at limousines and country houses, and blocking +up the streets to watch a few women parading in the interest of the +ballot for psyche knots as well as bald heads. It's wonderful! How did +the women persuade you to do it? I can't help thinking that they lost a +tremendous chance for the cause. Think how much money the ladies would +have made if each one had worn a sandwich board advertising some new +breakfast food or velveteen tobacco! With a crowd like this reading +every word, they could have charged enough to pay the expenses of a +whole campaign! + +It's the crowd that interested me. As far as the parade went, it wasn't +so much. Half a hundred women in cloaks and staffs setting off on foot +for Washington or Honolulu isn't terrifically exciting. I'd a lot rather +go down the line about twenty or thirty miles and watch them come in to +roost at night. There would be some inhuman interest in that. But what +does all this mob mean? Have you New Yorkers gone crazy over suffrage? +What! Just the novelty of the thing? Well, let me tell you then, you are +goners! You may not want suffrage now, but if the women are going to +choke traffic every time they spring a novelty, you're going to have to +grant them suffrage just to get the chance to attend to business now and +then. + +Me? Of course I'm a suffragist. I'm a suffragist on twenty counts. No, +thanks, I won't argue the question now, because we have to get over to +the hotel for dinner in an hour or two, and there's no use starting a +thing you will have to leave in the middle. I'll just tell you the last +count to save time, and let it go at that. I'm a suffragist because I +want the rest of mankind to have what we've had in Homeburg for the last +twenty years or so. We've been through the whole thing. Whenever a man's +been through anything, he naturally isn't content until he can stand by +and watch some other man get his. Understand? I'm for suffrage in aged +little New York. I want you to have it and have it a plenty. And I want +to watch you while you're having it. It's a grand thing when you've got +used to it. It will do you good, Jim, just like medicine. + +Do women vote in Homeburg? Of course they do. I'd like to see anybody +stop them. I don't mean that they vote for President. That is, they +won't until next time. It's only the more important elections that they +take part in. Oh, I know you folks in the big town think that unless +you're voting for governor or for the ringleaders of your city +government, the job isn't worth while. But that's where you differ from +Homeburg. We men vote for President and get a good deal of fun out of +the campaign. It's a favorite masculine amusement, and the women don't +interfere with us. But it's not important. I mean it's not important to +Homeburg. We stand up all summer and tear our suspender buttons off +trying to persuade each other that Homeburg's future depends on who +reviews the inaugural parade at Washington; but it isn't so, and we know +it. + +The really burning question in Homeburg is the make-up of the next +school board. That is the election which paralyzes business, splits +families, and sours friendships. And let me just convey to you in a few +brief words, underscored with red ink, the fact that women vote in the +Homeburg school elections. If you want to see real, concentrated +politics with tabasco sauce trimmings, go to Homeburg or some other +small town which is fond of its school system and watch the women +getting out the vote. + +Don't waste your time by coming the day before election. Don't even +expect to see any excitement in the morning. We don't smear our school +election troubles all over the almanac. We have the convulsion quickly +and get over it. You could stray into Homeburg on the morning of a +school election and not suspect that anything was going on except, +perhaps, a general funeral. Absolute quiet reigns. People are attending +to business with the usual calm. + +You can tell that there is an election on by the little flags stuck out +a hundred feet from the engine-house doors, but that's the only way. +Inside the judges sit waiting for business about as successfully as a +cod fisher on the banks of the Mississippi. Now and then some one strays +in and casts a vote. By noon half a dozen are in the ballot box. The +nation is safe, the schools are progressing satisfactorily, the ticket +is going through without a kick. Even the candidates stop standing +around outside peddling their cards, go home to dinner and forget to +come back. + +Pretty placid, eh? You bet it is. You know all about the calm before +the storm and the little cloud the size of the man's hand which comes up +about eight bells and does a general chaos business without any advance +notices. Well, that cloud in our school elections is impersonated by +Mrs. Delia Arbingle, and she usually arrives at the polls about three +P.M. with a new ticket, twenty warlike followers, and several thousand +assorted snorts of defiance. + +That's when the storm breaks--and it's a whole lot bigger than a man's +hand by that time. Delia is a mighty plentiful woman physically, and +when she gets her war paint on, she's a regular cloudburst. As I say, +about three o'clock or thereabouts, we suddenly wake up to the fact that +we have a school election in our midst, and that unless we arise as true +men and patriots, it will soon be at our throats. How do we find it out? +Our women folks tell us. You never saw such devoted women folks, or such +determined ones, either. The minute Delia leaves her house with her +marauding band in her annual attempt to get the scalp of the high school +principal who whipped her oldest son seventeen years ago, the women of +Homeburg _rise_. And we men go and vote. + +Now, we're not enthusiastic about voting. We're not afraid of Delia. +We've seen her insurge too often. But we go and vote, anyway. We go by +request. You've never had your loving wife come in and request you to +vote, have you, Jim? Well, you've got something coming. It's a request +which you're going to grant. You may not want to, but that has nothing +to do with the case. This is about the way it happens in Homeburg: I am +sitting in my office. I've got a lot of work on hand, and it's no use to +vote, anyway, and, to tell the truth, I had forgotten all about it. +Suddenly the telephone bell rings: I answer it. Here's my cross-section +of the conversation: + +"Hello? Oh, hello!... No, I haven't voted yet.... Pretty busy to-day.... +You're coming down?... No, I don't want to vote.--What's the use? It's +the same old.... Now, my dear, it's just the same old row. She can't get +any.... But I tell you I'm busy. You go on and.... Yes, of course I'm an +American citizen, but I don't get a salary for it. I'm trying to +earn.... Well, five minutes to cast a useless vote is.... Oh, all right. +Anything to please you.... No, I'll not call up Judge Hicks. He's old +enough to vote by himself.... Oh, all right.... Now, look here, my dear, +I can't ask Fleming to do that. His wife is a friend of Mrs. +Arbingle's.... Yes, I can say that, but it would be a threat.... Oh, the +schools will run anyway. Now, don't get excited.... All right, doggone +it, it'll make a regular fool of me though!... Good-by. + +"Gosh." + +I am mopping my forehead while I say that. I'm going to vote and, what +is more, I'm going over to get Judge Hicks, who is a cross old +man-eater, and get him to vote, and then I am going to call up Fleming, +who would otherwise vote against us, and tell him that if he doesn't +support our ticket, our grocery account will go elsewhere. I hate to do +that like the mischief. It isn't considered ethical in national +elections. But somehow we can't stop and discuss these fine points at +3.15 P.M. with our loving but excited wives. They don't seem to allow +it. + +I get into my coat, pretty cross, and go down-stairs. Homeburg is +frantically awake. Down the street scores of patriots are marching to +the polls. They are not marching in lock-step, but most of them are +under guard just the same. Mrs. Chet Frazier, pale but determined, is +towing Chet out of his store. Mrs. Wimble Horn is hurrying down the +street with an umbrella in one hand and Wimble in the other. From the +post-office comes Postmaster Flint emitting loud wails. It is against +the law to leave the post-office unoccupied, but he can thresh that out +with his wife at home after he has voted. Attorney Briggs was going to +Chicago this afternoon, but I notice he is coming back from the depot. +Mrs. Briggs is bringing him. If I know anything about rage, Attorney +Briggs is ready to masticate barbed wire. His arms are making a blue +haze as they revolve. But he's coming back to vote. He can go to Chicago +to-morrow, but the nation must be saved before five o'clock. + +I do my errands, losing one friend at Fleming's and considerable dignity +at the judge's, because the judge is an old widower and mighty +outspoken. Then I hurry back and go to the polls arm in arm with my +loving wife. We have to wait our turn outside the engine house. From +all corners of town the votes roll in, most of them under convoy. It's +a weird mixture--the men sullen and sheepish, the women inspired and +terrible. Even the candidates, most of whom are men, are embarrassed. +They are peddling tickets frantically, and whenever they falter and show +signs of running, their wives hiss something into their ears and brace +them up again. + +The two hostile forces are eying each other with horrid looks. Mrs. +Arbingle is quiet but deadly. I never saw so much hostility coated over +one face as there is on hers. She is in her glory. This time she is +going to unmask the hosts of corruption, including those who will not +call on her, cave in the school ring, boot out the incompetents, and see +justice done to her son at last. Mrs. Wert Payley, who generally leads +the other side, has higher ideals, of course, and isn't so red in the +face. But she is hostile too. No viperess shall tread on the school +system if she can help it! She keeps her lieutenants hustling, and now +and then she looks over the crowd of captive men on the enemy's side and +issues a command. Then some woman talks to her husband, and he gets red +and mad and wags his arms. But in the end he goes over and talks to a +man on the other side. And then that conversation spreads like a prairie +fire, and the men knot up into a cluster, and hard words are used, and a +lot more friendships go into the back shop for repairs. + +Five o'clock is coming fast. Mrs. Payley looks over her list. Young Ad +Summers has refused to budge from his shop. Miss Ri Hawkes blushes a +little and then goes away to a telephone. Pretty soon Ad appears. He's +panting, into the bargain. He gets in line, votes, and Ri walks away +with him. There is a sigh of relief from the Payley cohorts now because +old man Thompson is coming. He is over ninety and hates like thunder to +go out and vote, but he can't help himself. He has lived in a wheeled +chair for ten years and has to go wherever his granddaughter wheels him. +He passes in, muttering. + +Only five minutes more. The excitement is intense. Hurrah! Some one has +gotten the telegraph operator's goat. He's coming on the run. That +probably means he'll go to the next dancing-club party. Judge Hicks +appears, four women around him. He is mad, but they are triumphant and +they look scornfully at me, saying "chump" with their eyes. He votes. +There is a commotion at the corner because Gibb Ogle has attempted in a +mild way to be corrupted. He wants to know why he can't sleep in the +South School basement. The women are indignant, and appoint two husbands +to deal with him. Gibb votes. Bang! The polls are closed. It's all over +but the counting. + +We'd like to go back to work, but the suspense is too great. Not that we +have any suspense, but our wives have; and if we are worthy of the name +of men, we must help them endure it, even if we ourselves are not +interested in the schools. So we hang around and fume over the +jungle-fingered judges who take as much time as if they were enumerating +the fleas of Africa. Finally a cheer comes from the front of the crowd. +The women beside us gasp anxiously. Which side cheered? Hurrah! There's +Mrs. Payley waving her handkerchief. We win. + +After that, we men can go. The schools have been saved by a vote of 453 +to 78, but it was no thanks to us. No, indeed! If it weren't for the +women where would our schools be? + +We've had women's suffrage in our midst for almost twenty years, as I +say, and looking back over it I can't see a single dull moment +politically. From the day when an indulgent State gave them permission, +our women have guarded the schools at the ballot box. They've done a +thorough and painstaking job, and I must say the schools have improved a +lot. But they have sprung a lot of political ideas which have made the +old-timers sit up with startled looks and scratch their heads +hopelessly. + +That's what you are going to find out, Jim, when woman begins to vote +for herself around here and to vote you into the bargain. She isn't +going to play the game according to the old rules. She has no use for +them. She has her own way of going about things politically, and while +it is effective, its wear and tear on mankind is terrific. When the +Homeburg women first attempted to place a woman on the school board, +about fifteen years ago, most of the men objected, and they decided to +hold a town caucus and call the women in. There were a great many +reasons why a woman shouldn't leave her home and sit around on a school +board, and they felt sure that if they were to talk it over frankly in +meeting they could show them these reasons. And, anyway, the chairman +would be a man, which would of course take care of the situation. + +So a caucus was called, and the Grand Opera House, which holds six +hundred human beings, and about a hundred boys in the front seats, was +jammed until it bulged. We knew that no woman could out-argue our +seasoned old politicians, and when Calvin Briggs, who has planned all +the inside work in the congressional district for twenty years, got up +and showed just why woman ought not to intrude, there was an abashed +silence all over the house, until Emma Madigan, who is a town character +and does just as she pleases, got up. She stood up about fifty-nine +seconds after Briggs had got a good start, and she argued with him as +follows: + +"That's all right, Mr. Briggs--You can't make me sit down, Mr. +Chairman, you nor any of you politicians--You're a fine man to talk +about schools, Mr. Briggs. No, I won't stop. You know a lot about +children, don't you, coming up here with tobacco juice all over your +shirt front; and why don't you pay some taxes before you get up here and +tell how to run a town? All right, Chairman, I'm done." + +But so was Briggs. We couldn't help laughing at him. Editor Simpson, who +runs the _Argus_, stepped into the breach and regretted greatly that so +disgraceful an attack had been made upon a well-beloved citizen by a +woman. No man would dare make such an attack, he opined. Then Emma got +up again. The chairman called her to order, but he might as well have +rapped down the rising tide. + +"I know mighty well no man 'ud dare say what I did, Lafe Simpson," she +shouted. "'Nd you're the biggest coward of 'em all. If you thought you'd +have to lose the school printing, you'd vote for the devil for +president of the school board." + +Of course it was perfectly disgraceful, but what could we do? Emma was a +woman. We couldn't throw her out. We couldn't even get her to listen to +parliamentary rules. And the worst of it was, she was telling the truth. +That was something no one presumes to tell in local elections. To do it +breaks the first commandment of politics; but what do the women, bless +'em, care for our commandments? + +The president of the school board at that time was Sanford Jones. He was +a large party who panned out about ninety-five per cent. solemnity and +the rest water on the brain. At this point in the proceedings he judged +it best to rise and turn the subject by telling us why woman should stay +at home. He got about two hundred words into circulation before Emma got +up. Her scandalized women friends tried to pull her down, and Pelty +Amthorne yelled "whoa," but she was in politics to stay. + +"You look mighty fine standing up there, Mr. Jones," she shouted, "and +tellin' us women to go back home where we belong. But I just want to +tell this here crowd to-night that if you wasn't tighter than the bark +on a tree, your wife wouldn't have to do her own washing. + +"That's why you want her to home. So you can save money." + +After that a gloom fell over the meeting, and as no one else seemed to +care to speak, people began adjourning on all sides of Emma. After every +one else had gone she adjourned. There was no further attempt to hold a +caucus that year, and even now when any school faction desires to get +together and discuss things, it carefully conceals the news from Miss +Madigan. + +That was just one of the many little surprises woman has handed to us +in Homeburg politics. Since they've gotten interested in school +affairs, it beats all how much influence they've got. Take Sadie +Askinson for instance. Her husband wanted to run for member of the +school board, and Sadie didn't want him to, because he was away from +home enough nights anyway, goodness knows. Sim was stubborn, and said +the night before election that he was going down and have some ballots +printed, anyway, and run. But he didn't, because that night Sadie cut +every button off of every garment he had and threw them down into the +well. When the kindergarten business came up about ten years ago, old +Colonel Ackley hung out against it on the board. Said he wasn't going to +stand for wasting the people's money on such foolishness. But he did, +because the Young Ladies' Vigilance Society came and wept upon his +shoulder. It was organized for that purpose, and after the seventh young +lady had soaked up Ackley's coat, he said he'd either vote for +kindergarten or leave town, and he didn't care much which. + +Mrs. Wert Payley, who really runs our school system and once marred her +proud record by defeating a good school superintendent because he didn't +give her daughter good marks, says the English suffragettes are poor +sticks and don't know how to demand the ballot. "If the Homeburg women +were ready to go after any more ballot than we have now," says she, +"would we fool away time getting arrested? Not much! We'd turn our +attention to the men. Every Homeburg woman would take care of her +husband and argue with him. Maybe all the men in town would find 'Votes +for Women' in place of their dinners on the table one night, and sewed +on to their coats the next morning. Maybe they would get corn-meal mush +for thirty days, and maybe, if any he politician presumed to get +obnoxious, he would be dealt with on the public street by a committee. +I know Homeburg, I think, and before Calvin Briggs would stand for the +guying he would receive after half a dozen women had gone down on their +knees to him and grabbed him around the legs so he couldn't get away, +he'd go out of politics. Suffragettes? Bah! What do they know about it? +I'd just like to know how long our men-folks in Homeburg would hold out +if we women were to get sick some fine morning and remain hopeless +invalids until we got the ballot. Why, if Wert Payley presumed to deny +me the ballot, I wouldn't think of parading about it. I'd just have the +girl starch his underwear for about two months, and if that didn't fetch +him, I'd start cleaning house and quit in the middle. The men will give +you anything, if you ask them the right way." + +All of this makes us shiver, because we don't know just how long it will +be before the Homeburg women do make up their minds to have more +ballot. But when they do, we'll brace up like men and give it to them if +the State will let us. We just naturally hate to disappoint our +women-folks. + + + + +XII + +CHRISTMAS AT HOMEBURG + +_And What It Means_ + + +Now don't urge me to stay longer, Jim, because I'm going to anyway. Just +to prove it, I'll take another of those gold-corseted cigars of yours, +which would elevate me from the masses to the classes in three puffs if +I smoked it back home. I didn't begin telling you how much I have +enjoyed myself because I intended to go and wanted to start the soft +music. I just wanted to begin on the job, that was all. It's going to +take me an hour, at least, to tell you and Mrs. Jim what this meal has +meant for me. + +Oh, I know there have been better meals in history perhaps. I suppose +now and then a king gets real hungry and orders up a feed that might +have a shade on this one--just a shade. That's as far as I'll +compromise, Mrs. Jim. You needn't argue the matter. I'm a regular mule +in my opinions. But if you had given me crackers and cheese, and old, +decrepit flexible crackers at that, it would have been all the same. I'd +have devoured them with awe and thanksgiving, and I'd have marveled at +my luck. Here it is Christmas Day, and while half a million strangers in +New York have been eating their hearts along with the regular bill of +fare at boarding-houses and restaurants, I have been grabbed up and +taken into an actual home where they have a Christmas tree! + +I always was lucky, Jim. Every time I fell out of a tree in my youth, I +landed on my head or some other soft spot, but this beats any luck I +ever had. Think of it! Me sitting around in the sub-cellar of gloom +yesterday afternoon with my family a thousand miles away, and deciding +to go to Boston for Christmas just because I'd have to travel ten hours +and that would be some time killed; and then, when I went to my +boarding-house for a clean collar, you called me up, just as I was +leaving. There's a special department of Providence working on my case. +Got a permanent assignment. And you are a Deputy Angel, Mrs. Jim. +Gratitude! You couldn't get my brand of gratitude anywhere. They don't +keep it in stock. Say the word and I will go back and eat a third piece +of mince pie, and die for you. + +I don't want to seem critical. It's hard for me to criticize anything +right now, anyway, I'm so soaked and soused in contentment. I always +strive to admit all of New York's good points, and I've gotten a job +here largely to encourage the old town and help it along. But I do think +that in one respect New York is in the bush league, so to speak. Even +with such people as you to help, you can't get much Christmas out of it. +When I think of Homeburg to-day, I feel proud and haughty. You can beat +us on most everything else, but when it comes to Christmas, we can't +notice you. You don't compete. + +Christmas in this town is only a feat. It's a race against time in two +heats. If you win the first one, you get your shopping done on the day +before. If you win the second, you get through Christmas Day, before +your patience and good spirits give out. Of course, New Yorkers, like +yourselves, who indulge in families and other old customs, have a mighty +good time out of it. Christmas with a family is great anywhere on earth. +But that isn't New York's fault. If you didn't have a family, you would +be dining out or going to some matinee or sitting around watching the +clock. That's where it is your solemn duty to envy Homeburg if you +never have done it before. And that's why I would be homesick to-day if +you had fed me four dinners, Mrs. Jim, and had been a whole covey, or +bevy, or flock, or constellation of angels--whichever is correct. + +I don't mean to say that we get any more at Christmas than you do. We +enjoy and endure our presents, same as any one else. And we have just as +hard a time buying them. There aren't enough people in Homeburg to make +a Christmas jam, but we have our own line of troubles. The question in +Homeburg is not how to keep from spending so much money but how to spend +what we have. The storekeepers don't pamper us. In fact they are severe +with us. If we don't buy what they offer the first year, they store it +up, and we have to take it the next Christmas. When the Homeburg +storekeepers have had a bad season, it's up to us to go back the next +year and face the same old line of junk, knowing it will be there until +we give in and buy it. There are two Christmas gift edition copies of +Trilby still on sale in Homeburg, and Sam Green the druggist has had a +ten-dollar manicure set on sale for ten years now. He won't get another, +either. Says he was stung on the first one, and he's going to get his +money back before he goes in any deeper. It goes down about fifty cents +a year in price, and last year Jim Reebe almost bought it at four +dollars and seventy-five cents for Selma Snood. We have hopes of him +this year--unless he and Selma quarrel or get married, either of which +will be fatal. + +No, we have our troubles, same as you do, and Homeburg is full, on the +day before Christmas, of worried fathers who duck into the stores about +seven P.M. and try to buy enough stuff to eat up a ten dollar bill +before the doors close. But that's a minor detail. What makes me love +our Christmas is its communism. Christmas isn't a family rite in +Homeburg. It's a town festival, a cross between Home-coming Week and a +general amnesty celebration. + +[Illustration: In Homeburg you come home to the whole town.] + +People come home for Christmas all over the world, but in Homeburg you +don't merely come home to your family, you come home to the whole town. +A week before the twenty-fifth the clans begin to gather. Usually the +college folks come first. Sometimes we have as many as a dozen, and the +whole town is on edge to see them. It's next to a circus parade in +interest because you never can tell what new sort of clothes the boys +are going to spring on us. In the grand old days when DeLancey Payley +and Sam Singer used to blow in for Christmas, they walked up from the +depot between double lines of admirers, and their clothes never failed +to strike us with awe. I remember the year when Sam came home with one +of those overcoats with a sort of hood effect in the back. I never +saw one before or since. He was also wearing a felt hat as flat as a +soup plate that year and a two-quart pipe fitted carefully into his +face, and when old Bill Dorgan, the drayman, saw him, he threw up both +hands and cried, "My gosh, it ain't possible!" + +Then the children begin coming back. There is a great difference between +Homeburg and New York regarding children. In New York a child is +personal property. But in Homeburg a child belongs to the whole town. A +birth notice is a real news item in Homeburg. I suppose every baby is +personally inspected by at least two hundred citizens. We criticize +their care and feeding, suggest spanking when they are a little older, +quiver unanimously with horror when they begin to "flip" freight trains, +or get scarlet fever, and watch them grow up as eagerly as you New +Yorkers watched the Woolworth Building. When they are graduated from +high school we are all there with bouquets and presents, and we have an +equity in the whole brood. Molly Strawn, the washerwoman's daughter, got +more flowers than any one last year. And when they leave town to get a +job, if they are boys, or when some rude outsider breaks in with a +marriage license and despoils us of them, if they are girls, we all feel +the loss. + +That's why Christmas means so much more to us. At Christmas time the +town children come home. Will Askinson comes home from Chicago. He's +doing very well up there, and it takes him two hours to get the length +of Main Street on the first day after he arrives. Every one has to hear +about it. Sadie Gastit comes home from Des Moines with a baby; regular +custom of hers. Sometimes she makes the same baby do for two years, but +usually it's a new one. I remember Sadie when she was only knee high to +a grasshopper, and her mother spanked her for climbing the Republican +flagpole during the McKinley campaign. The Flint children come down from +Chicago to visit their aunt. There were only a boy and girl when they +left fifteen years ago. Now there are eleven, counting wife, husband, +and acquisitions. Last year Ad Bridge brought a new wife home from +Denver to show us. Year before last Miss Annie Simms, who has been +teaching in Minneapolis, brought down a young man to show to her family. +She was going to be exclusive about it, but did it work? Not much. She +had to show him all around. We just happened over there in droves. +Everybody loves Annie and we were afraid for a little while that she was +going to be an old maid. The young man will bring her down this year I +suppose. They were married last June. + +All the Homeburg children and grandchildren arrive in the last two days +before Christmas. They go home to their folks to deposit their baggage, +and then they all come down-town to the post-office, to get the mail +ostensibly but in reality to shake hands all around. The day before +Christmas is one long reception on Main Street. The old town fairly +hums. + +As a matter of fact, Christmas is a good deal like a Union Depot. The +approaches are the most important part of it. By the day before +Christmas every one is feeling so good that things begin to happen. +People whom you have never suspected of caring for you come up to your +office and leave things--cigars, and toys for the children, and +Christmas cards. Men with whom you have quarreled during the year shake +hands violently all around a circle on the street, and when they come to +you they grab yours, too; and you begin to talk elaborately as if +nothing had happened--a good deal like two women wading through a formal +call; and it makes you feel so good that pretty soon you buy a box of +Colorado Durable cigars and you go over to the office of some man for +whom you have cherished an undying hatred, because he didn't vote for +you for the school board. You peek in his door, and if he isn't there +you go in and leave the cigars with your compliments. + +There's never been a Christmas at home when I haven't been operated on +for a grouch of this sort, and most always it comes the day before. If I +had my way there wouldn't be any Christmas--only the day before. On the +day before you're so tickled over what the other folks are going to get +from you, and so full of pleased anticipation over what you may get from +the others, that good humor just bursts out all over you like spring +waters from the mountainside. + +On Christmas Eve in Homeburg we all go to the Exercises to hear the +children perform. They build churches in Homeburg with big doors, so +that they can get big Christmas trees in them, and we grown-ups go +early in order to hear the kids squeal with wonder when they come in and +see those thirty-foot miracles in candles and tinsel, down in front. + +Homeburg children are divided into two classes--those who get all of +their presents on the church Christmas trees and have to worry through +the next day without any additional excitement, and those who have to +sit through the Christmas Eve exercises with only a sack of candy to +sustain them and who land heavily the next day. The discussion as to +which is the better way has raged for a generation, anyway; at least my +chum and I discussed it every year when we were boys, he adhering to the +Christmas tree plan, and I to the homemade Christmas. And last year, +when he came back, we began it all over again, he claiming it was cruel +for me to make my children wait until Christmas Day, and I pitying his +poor youngsters for getting done with Christmas before it began. + +Anyway, Christmas Eve is a grand occasion in the churches, and every +year I notice with amazement that some youngster whom I remember as +having been formally introduced to society through her birth notice only +a few weeks ago, seems to me, has gotten large enough to get up on the +platform and speak a piece. They do it at the most unheard-of ages. I +believe there are two-year-old orators in the Congregational Sunday +school. I get a good deal of suspense out of some of your baseball games +here, especially when Chicago plays you, but the most suspense per +individual I've ever noticed has been in these Christmas Eve exercises +when some youngster just high enough to step over a crack in the floor +gets up to recite a piece, and fourteen parents and relatives lean +forward and forget to breathe until he has gotten his forty words out, +wrong end to, and has been snatched off the stage by his relieved +mother. + +Competition gets into everything, and it has marred our Christmas +exercises a little lately. The Methodists are growing fast and are very +ambitious. A few years ago they rented the Opera House, put in two +Christmas trees, with a real fireplace between and a Santa Claus who +came out of it, and charged ten cents admission. That embittered us +Congregationalists. It smacked of commercialism to us, and we would not +budge an inch--besides, there wasn't another Opera House to rent. So, +nowadays, our spirit of good-fellowship on Christmas Eve is sort of +absent-minded and anxious. We are always counting up our attendance and +sizing up our tree, and then sliding over to the Opera House and looking +over the Methodist layout. Sometimes we beat them, but generally they +have a regular mass meeting and make a barrel of money. Last year they +turned people away and brought Santa Claus on the stage in a real +automobile. We were so jealous that we could hardly cool down in time +for Christmas dinner. + +As a matter of fact, the only unimportant part of our Christmas season +is Christmas Day itself. It is a sort of hiatus in the great doings. +When we go home on Christmas Eve, it is with a great peace. We have +bought our presents. We have greeted all the returned prodigals. We have +made up with a few carefully selected enemies. Our children have spoken +their pieces successfully at the Exercises, and have gotten a good start +on the job of eating their way through a young mountain range of mixed +candies and nuts. All the hustle and worry is over, and we are +unanimously happy. The week following Christmas will be one dizzy round +of parties and teas for the visitors, and Homeburg will be a delightful +place full of the friends of boyhood, with an average of one reunion +every fifteen minutes in and out of business hours. But on Christmas Day +nothing will happen except the dinner. We'll get our presents in the +morning, and then at noon the great crisis will come. We'll either +conquer the dinner, or it will conquer us. + +You know how it is, Jim, because that's the kind of dinner you had +to-day. It was an Athletic Feat--not the ordinary kind of city dinner +where you save up carefully during seven courses, and finish strong on +the water crackers and cheese, but a real Christmas gorge. Every time I +sit down to a Christmas dinner in Homeburg, I feel more strongly than +ever that each guest should have his capacity stenciled on him. They are +more careful of box cars in this country than they are of humans. You +never see a box car that doesn't have "Capacity, 100,000 lbs." stenciled +on its sides. And they don't overload that car. There have been times +when, if I could have had "Capacity, two turkey thighs, one wish-bone, +trimmings, and two pieces of pie" stenciled on me, I would have gotten +along better. I think they ought to try to make these Olympic games more +useful to our nation by instituting a Christmas dinner marathon. If we +have to eat for two hours and a quarter, top speed, once or twice a +year, we ought to train up to the task as a nation. + +I always feel a little bit nervous about Christmas dinner before it +comes, but I never shirk. As a matter of fact, it isn't really +dangerous. As far as I know, no one has ever actually exploded in +Homeburg on Christmas Day, and we all seem to get away with the job in +pretty fair shape. But it spoils the day for anything else. The town is +full, in the afternoon, of partially paralyzed men lying around on sofas +in a comatose condition, like anacondas sleeping off their bi-monthly +lunch. Homeburg is absolutely dead for the rest of the day. If a fire +broke out on Christmas afternoon, I don't believe even Chief Dobbs would +have the energy to get up and put on his helmet. It's hard on the exiled +men who just run down for Christmas Day from the cities. They don't get +in on anything but the eating. Sam Frazier struck last year. Said he +wasn't going to pay ten dollars fare and incidentals any more, to come +down from Chicago on Christmas Day for an all-afternoon view of his +brother's feet as said brother lay piled up on the sofa. He was going to +come down after this on the Fourth of July. + +It doesn't affect the women so badly because they don't eat so much. +They haven't time. It takes two women to steer one child safely through +a Christmas dinner, anyway, and about three to get the ruins cleared +away in time to get up a light lunch in the evening for the reviving +hosts. If there is any one time when I would care less to be a woman +than at any other time, it is on Christmas afternoon, when her men-folks +have gone to sleep and have left her with a few cross children and a +carload of Christmas dinner fragments for company. + +That's where you city folks with your servant problem have the best of +us, and I'll not dispute it, Mrs. Jim. On the other hand, the nicest +part of our Homeburg Christmas is the fact that, when we fold our tired +hands over our bulging vests after dinner and lie down to rest, we know +that there is no starving family in Homeburg which has had to celebrate +Christmas by taking on an extra drink of water and indulging in a long, +succulent sniff at a restaurant door. + +We have poor people in Homeburg, but we haven't any poverty problem at +Christmas. It's a strictly local issue, and it is handled by the +neighbors. Having lived a long time in the city, Jim, you may not know +what a neighbor is. It's a person who lives close to you and takes a +personal interest in your affairs. A good neighbor is a woman whose +heart is so large that she has had to annex a lot of outlying territory +around the family real estate in order to fill it. No Homeburg woman +would think of constructing an extraordinarily fine pie without sending +a cut over to her nearest neighbor. + +About Christmas time we are especially busy neighboring in Homeburg, and +any family which lives near us and isn't going very strong on the +Christmas game, because of sickness or trouble, is our meat. It would be +an insult to go across the town and help a family in some other +neighbor's territory, and that was what got Editor Simpson of the +_Argus_ into trouble a couple of years ago. + +Simpson is a young man, a comparative newcomer from the city, and a very +earnest and enterprising party. He runs the _Argus_ on the high gear +and is never so happy as when he is promoting a public movement in real +city style. It occurred to Simpson three years ago that Homeburg ought +not to be behind Chicago in anything, especially at Christmas time, and +so he started a "Good-fellow" movement. They were running it strong in +Chicago that year. Any man who wished to be a "Good Fellow" sent his +name to the "Good-fellow Editor" and offered to provide a Christmas for +one or more poor children. It was a grand idea, stuffed full of +sentiment, and we Homeburg men just naturally ate it up. When the day +before Christmas came, seventy-five "Good Fellows" were on Simpson's +list, and they had offered to take care of one hundred and twenty-five +children, to give each a real Christmas. Simp's office was full of +groceries and toys, applicants were clamoring for children, all was +excitement and enthusiasm--and then a horrible state of affairs was +disclosed. Simpson hadn't provided any children. There was a bleak and +distressing lack of material for us to work upon. In all Homeburg there +weren't ten families who were going without Christmas turkey, or its +equivalent, and in each one of these cases some neighbor had sternly +ordered Simp to keep his hands off and mind his own affairs. There we +were--seventy-five Good Fellows with boatloads of cheer and no way to +dispose of it. The only person we could find in all the town to descend +on was Pat Ryan. We smothered him in groceries, and he ate himself into +biliousness that night and had to have a doctor for three days, which +helped some, but not much. On the whole, it was a dismal failure. + +What! Nine o'clock? Excuse me, Jim. I seem to have taken root here. No; +I am going this time. Back to my room with Christmas all gotten through +with, thank goodness and you folks. You understand. You've made it as +nice for me as any two magicians could have done, and I thank you from +the bottom of my heart. But it's my last Christmas in New York, I hope. +Next month the wife and children come on, and by next Christmas, if I +have any luck at all, we'll join the happy army that swoops down on +Homeburg for the holidays. My, but it will be funny to look at the old +town from the outside in! Me--a visitor in Homeburg! + +Do you know what prosperity is to a whole mob of city people, Jim? It's +the ability to pack up their families and go off to some Homeburg or +other for Christmas. And do you know what makes city people successful, +in Homeburg opinion? It's coming back every year. And if we made a +million apiece, and didn't preserve enough of the old home-town love to +come back, we wouldn't be successful in their eyes, not by a long way. +Well, good-by, philanthropists. And, thank you, I can't come again next +year. I'm saving up to go home. That's what makes this cigar taste so +good, Jim. Last one I'll smoke until carfare is in the bank. + + +THE END + +[Illustration: Publisher's logo] + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Homeburg Memories, by George Helgesen Fitch + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HOMEBURG MEMORIES *** + +***** This file should be named 19196.txt or 19196.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/1/9/19196/ + +Produced by Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/19196.zip b/19196.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9034aa9 --- /dev/null +++ b/19196.zip diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..84ff6ef --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #19196 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19196) |
