MAPS AND FAREWELLS
It was wonderful what a change our new plan wrought in our spirits.
Our melancholy was immediately dispersed, and its place taken by active
anticipations of our journey. The North wind in the trees, instead of
blustering dismissal, sounded to our ears like the fluttering of the
blue-peter at the masthead of our voyage. Strange heart of man! A day
back we were in tears at the thought of going. Now we are all smiles to
think of it, all impatience to be gone. We quote Whitman a dozen times
in the hour, and it is all "afoot and light-hearted" with us, and "the
open road."
But there were some farewells to make to people as well as to trees.
There were friends at Elim to bid adieu, and also there were maps to be
consulted, and knapsacks to be packed--exhilarating preparations.
Our friends looked at us, when we had unfolded our project, with a
mixture of surprise and pity. "Amiable lunatics" was the first comment of
their countenances, and--"There never was any telling what the artistic
temperament would do next!" Had we announced an air-ship voyage to the
moon, they would have regarded us as comparatively reasonable, but to
walk--_to walk_--some four or five hundred miles in America, of all
countries, a country of palace cars and, lightning limited expresses, not
to mention homicidal touring automobiles, seemed like--what shall I
say?--well, as though one should start out for New Zealand in a row-boat,
or make the trip to St. Petersburg in a sedan-chair.
But there were others--especially the women--who understood, felt as we
did, and longed to go with us. I have never met a woman yet whose face
did not light up at the thought of a walking tour, and in her heart long
to don Rosalind clothes and set forth in search of adventures. We thus
had the advantage, in planning our route, of several prettily coiffed
heads bending over our maps and guide-books with us.
"Four hundred and thirty miles," said one of these Rosalinds, whose
pretty head was full of pictures of romantic European travel. "Think what
one could do with four hundred and thirty miles in Europe. Let us try,
for the fun of it."
And turning to a map of Europe, and measuring out four hundred and thirty
miles by scale on a slip of paper, she tried it up and down the map from
point to point. "Look at funny little England!" she said. "Why, you will
practically be walking from one end of England to the other. See," and
she fitted her scale to the map, "it would bring you easily from
Portsmouth to Aberdeen.
"And now let us try France. Why, see again--you will be walking from
Calais to Marseilles--think of it! walking through France, all vineyards
and beautiful names. Now Italy--see! you will be walking from Florence to
Mount Etna--Florence, Rome, Naples, Palermo."
And so in imagination our fair friend sketched out fanciful pilgrimages
for us. "You could walk from Gibraltar to the Pyrenees," she went on.
"You could walk from Venice to Berlin; from Brussels to Copenhagen; you
could walk from Munich to Budapest; you could walk right across Turkey,
from Constantinople to the Adriatic Sea. And Greece--see! you could walk
from Sparta to the Danube. To think of the romantic use you could make
of your four-hundred-odd-miles, and how different it sounds--Buffalo to
New York!"
And again she repeated, luxuriating in the romantic sound of the
words: "Constantinople to the Adriatic! Sparta to the Danube!--Buffalo
to New York!"
There was not wanting to the party the whole-souled,
my-country-'tis-of-thee American, who somewhat resented these European
comparisons, and declared that America was good enough for her, clearly
intimating that a certain lack of patriotism, even a certain immorality,
attached to the admiration of foreign countries. She also told us
somewhat severely that the same stars, if not better, shone over America
as over any other country, and that American scenery was the finest in
the world--not to speak of the American climate.
To all of which we bowed our heads in silence--but the frivolous,
European-minded Rosalind who had got us into this trouble retorted with a
grave face: "Wouldn't you just love, dear Miss----, to walk from
Hackensack to Omaha?"
Another voice was kind enough to explain for our encouragement that the
traveller found in a place exactly what he brought there, and that
romance was a personal gift, all in the personal point of view.
"A sort of cosmetic you apply to the face of Nature," footnoted our
irrepressible friend.
Still another reminded us that "to travel hopefully is a better thing
than to arrive," and still another strongly advised us to carry
revolvers.
So, taking with us our maps and much good advice, we bade farewell to our
friends, and walked back to our camp under the stars--the same stars that
were shining over Constantinople.
The next day, when all our preparations were complete, the shack swept
and garnished, and our knapsacks bulging in readiness for the road, Colin
took his brushes, and in a few minutes had decorated one of the walls
with an Autumn sunset--a sort of memorial tablet to our Summer, he
explained.
"Can't you think up a verse to put underneath?" he asked.
Then underneath he lettered:
_Two lovers of the Sun and of the Moon,
Lovers of Tree and Grass and Bug and Bird,
Spent here the Summer days, then all too soon
Upon the homeward track reluctant fared.
Sun-up, October 1, 1908._
Some apples remained over from our larder. We carefully laid them outside
for the squirrels; then, slinging our knapsacks, we took a last look
round the little place, and locked the door.
Our way lay up the hill, across the pasture and through the beeches,
toward the sky-line.
We stood still a moment, gazing at the well-loved landscape. Then we
turned and breasted the hill.
"_Allons_!" cried Colin.
"_Allons_!" I answered. "_Allons_! To New York!"