We are at the seaside. It is the fashion in America for whole families
to shut up their houses in hot weather and go off to some summer
resort--the women of them--whether to be cool, or to be in the fashion I
do not yet know. Grandmother wanted to go one place, Aunt Gwendolin to
another, and Uncle Theodore, who said he might run over for a few
Sundays, to yet another. At last a charming spot upon the Atlantic coast
was decided upon. Uncle Theodore settled the question emphatically,
because dear grandmother needed the revivifying influence of the sea
air.
Aunt Gwendolin fretted a little at first for fear it might be humdrum,
and commonplace, and for fear none of "our set" would be there; but she
recovered from her depression when she heard that Mrs. Delancy, Mrs.
Deforest, Mrs. Austin, and others of the same clique had also chosen
that particular part of the coast as their recuperating place.
Mrs. Delancy dropped in one day to tell her that the whole fashionable
tide had turned toward that coast this summer, and she knew we should
have a "simply _grand_ season."
Aunt Gwendolin's spirits rose after that, and she immediately went about
ordering a most elaborate summer wardrobe--morning gowns, evening
gowns, walking suits, yachting suits, bathing suits.
Uncle Theodore went ahead of the rest of the party and engaged a suite
of rooms in the most fashionable hotel on the Beach, from the broad
balconies of which the view of the sea is grand, and the air delicious.
Grandmother and I spend much time together. As I am not "out" Aunt
Gwendolin says that I cannot attend any of the functions to which she is
going daily--and nightly. I do not know what I miss by being obliged to
stay away from the parties and balls, but I know it is very delightful
wandering on the beach with grandmother, watching the lights, shades,
and colours on the water, the dipping and skimming of the water birds,
the movements of the lobster fishers, the going out and coming in of
the tide, and all the many, many objects of interest around the great
sea world; never caring whether I am fashionable or not fashionable,
whether anybody is noticing me or not noticing me.
The only objects that I do not like to look at on this sea beach are the
human bathers. The sea-gulls taking their bath are graceful, but, oh!
those grown-up women in skirts up to their knees, and bare arms,
wandering over the beach like great ostriches! They mar the picture of
beauty which the earth and sky and sea unite to make, and I would shut
them up if I had the power--or add more length to their bathing suits.
Perhaps the sea-gulls would not look graceful either if they had half
their feathers off.
We were here a week when Professor Ballington came. We were all a
little surprised to see him because he is not a "society man," as Aunt
Gwendolin says. He does not appear to care much for "functions," and
spends much time wandering on the beach. Grandmother and I meet him
frequently.
One time when I went out for a little run before breakfast I found him
staring at the great green sea that kept restlessly licking the sand at
his feet. He looked lonesome, and I tried to say something to cheer him
up. Then he asked permission to join me in my stroll, and we had a most
delightful time, finding shells, and stones, the formations of various
periods of time, Professor Ballington said. He seems to know everything.
I do not wonder he cares so little for society, or the company of women
in general. Strange how much more the men, the cultured men, the society
men, of America know than the women! I suppose it is because the women
have to spend so much time talking about the change of sleeves.
There was a dance one night in the ballroom, which is around at the
opposite side of the house from our apartments, and leaving grandmother
absorbed in her book, I slipped around on the balcony and peeped through
the slats of the closed shutters on the dancers within.
All was in a whirl, and there I saw, with my own two eyes, men with
their arms around the waists of women, whirling those same women around
the great room in time to music played by an orchestra. It made me dizzy
to look at them.
"Wouldn't that shock China!" I cried. "Shall _I_ have to submit to that
when I come _out_? Oh, why cannot I always stay _in_?"
I was so excited I did not know I was talking aloud, until the voice of
Professor Ballington over my head said:
"You do not like the thought of coming out into society? You would like
always to stay in domestic retirement?"
"Yes, yes," I said; "what can save me from coming _out_?"
"Marry some good man," he said, "and spend your energies making a quiet,
happy home for _him_."
He was looking at me in a very peculiar way, and I felt frightened, I
don't know why, and skipped along the balcony back to grandmother's
sitting-room.
When I entered who should be there talking to grandmother but Mrs.
Paton. She said she had felt lonesome without grandmother in the city,
and had made up her mind to spend a week at the seaside.
"Oh, grandmother!" I cried, as soon as I had greeted Mrs. Paton, "shall
I _have_ to come _out_? Cannot I always stay _in_?"
Grandmother clasped my hand in hers, in the old way she had of quieting
me, and explained to Mrs. Paton that I did not incline to the ways of
society people, and had a dread of entering the world which Aunt
Gwendolin loved so well.
"Give your life to some noble cause, my dear," said Mrs. Paton
earnestly, turning her eyes upon me. "The world is in sore need of
consecrated women. You could be a foreign missionary, or a home
missionary. Oh, don't waste your life on the frivolity called Society!"
This is not Professor Ballington's advice. Which is right? How glad I
am that in this "land of the free," I am not compelled to follow any
will but my own!
_August_ SEASIDE.
Well, I did get a surprise last evening while out strolling on the
beach, for whom should I meet but "Sawbones," otherwise Chauffeur
Graham. He is having summer holidays now, and before settling down to
some work to make money for his autumn college expenses, he snatched a
day to get a whiff of sea air, he said.
He seemed very pleased to see me, and I was _delighted_ to see him, and
extended my hand to him in cordial greeting.
I know Aunt Gwendolin would object to her niece shaking hands with the
chauffeur--it was the medical man I shook hands with.
I stayed out there as long as I dared, and we had a lovely stroll along
the beach in the moonlight, the waves whispering at our feet as we
walked and talked. Chauffeur Graham said that it always seemed to him
that the waves were coming from the many far-off lands with their
incessant pleadings that we carry our enlightenment and advantages to
the suffering places of the earth.
That was the medical man speaking in him. He must be noble or he would
never hear those voices in the waves.
How I wish it were proper for me to give him some of the money I do not
know what to do with, so that he could go on with his studies and not
need to work between times to earn a pittance.
Grandmother says she is going to engage him again in the autumn, when we
all return to the city; she knows him now, and feels safe in his hands,
he is so careful.
"It is such a nuisance to have a man that you cannot command at any hour
of the day--or night," said Aunt Gwendolin. "Make him understand, if you
engage him again, that all his time belongs to _us_. These gentlemen
chauffeurs who are straining after a university education are
unendurable!"
"He shall have whatever time he wants for his studies or examinations.
It is the least I can do to show my sympathy with his life work,"
returned my grandmother.
_Another Stroll_.
I had another stroll this evening on the beach with Chauffeur
Graham--while Aunt Gwendolin was getting ready for the dance--and he
told me something.
"When I am through with my medical course," he said, "I intend to go to
China to practise what I have learned."
I stopped suddenly in my walk and faced him. "Why are you going to
China?" I demanded.
It makes me indignant to have this nation, an infant in years,
patronising my hoary-headed Empire!
"If a man is going to do his duty by the world," he returned, "he will
go where his work is most needed. They have no native medical school in
China.
"They are a great people," he added after a short pause, "likely to be
in the van of the world's march in the ages to come; and I want to have
a hand in getting them ready. Napoleon said, 'When China moves she will
move the world.' All the broken legs will be set in this country whether
I am here to set them or not; I want to go where they will not be set
unless I do it."
"Go where the vineyard demandeth
Vinedresser's nurture and care."