ON THE COUNTRY.
At which season, I wonder, is the country most lovely, most enjoyable!
Is it in the spring, with its richly-colored carpet, its young green
leaves, its delicious perfumes, its glorious freshness? Ah, why cannot
we, like the trees, put off our old sinful world-steeped habits, and
year by year bud out in purest innocence once again? The hedges, but a
week ago barren and bare, are now clothed in brightest apparel, the
greenest of cloaks thrown over them, lifting up their heads and
sharing in the general rejoicing, in the glory of their annual
resurrection. Is it in summer, with its myriads of blooms, and its
thousand thousand happy voices, the silent torpid river, basking in
the light of the sun, and responding only to the fishes as they frisk
near the surface? Or is it in the autumn, with its many shades, with
its long avenues on which nature has lavished whole tubes of burnt
sienna and vermilion; when you tread on gorgeous paths heavy with
golden leaves? Oh, why are we not as lovely in our autumn of life as
nature is in hers? Why, when she decks herself in the gayest coloring,
do we don our soberest garb? _We_ do not gain in splendor as we grow
older. We lose our beauties and our charms one by one, till at last we
stand destitute. Oh, cruel Time to treat us so!
"Time that doth transfix the flourish set on youth,
And delves the parallels in Beauty's brow."
And yet "God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb." While He takes from
us our youth He also takes away the inclination to be young. We pine
for the happy days of childhood; yet, if the power were given us, who
would wish himself back in the past? We feel we should always like to
be young, but should we not get very weary of the world, should we not
wish for some kind of change?
Or is nature at her best when the year is dead and the earth puts on
her spotless white shroud, when everything around has fallen asleep,
and only robins are left to join in the wake?
Unanswerable question. There are too many opinions. Some prefer
winter, some summer; some like the heat, some like the cold. Only in
one thing do we agree, and that is, in our taste for variety, for
change. Much as we admire the country, lovely as it is, it would not
suit many to live there all the year round. The peace and quiet of our
woodland scenes make us enjoy the town life all the more, while the
unceasing turmoil of the season makes us hail with delight the idea of
once more being
"Far from the madding crowd."
The very thought refreshes you. There is something exhilarating in our
journey country-wards, long and tiring though it may be. Few people
care about a railway journey, and yet with one or two kindred spirits
I think it most enjoyable.
Traveling alone in the midst of strangers, you do feel rather
melancholy. You try to read, and when you are tired of chasing the
words up and down the page, you look out of the window and admire the
scenery as you flit past until your eyes ache to such an extent you
are obliged to withdraw your gaze and be satisfied with the study of
human nature, as far as it can be procured from the inmates of your
compartment. Finally you go to sleep, only to wake up after a few
minutes, to find the eyes of all your fellow passengers upon you, and
this serves to make you nervous and uncomfortable. You dare not close
your eyes again. You feel sure it is the signal for everyone to turn
in your direction, and you will not gratify them.
Then comes luncheon time, when we all begin to grow fidgety, and take
surreptitious looks at our watches, and then glance round at our
companions to see if anyone is taking the first plunge. Hopeless
quest! Nobody ever _will_ be the first to begin to eat in a railway
carriage. Why is it, I wonder? Are they afraid none of the others will
follow suit, and they be left to eat all alone? It would be nervous
work, certainly. You would feel so dreadfully greedy, and yet if you
offered any of your fellow travelers even a sandwich, they would peek
up their heads, give you an astonished look, and decline shortly but
with decision. You are made to feel you have insulted them, and yet
they had such a hungry expression! Rarely indeed, though, do you
undergo such an experience. You only have to rise, and reach down your
basket, and behold! the next moment all the carriage is feeding. We
are nothing but sheep after all. One leads the way, and we all follow.
When you have once made a start, eating on a railway journey is easy
enough work; it is when you grow thirsty that the difficulty comes in.
You pour the sherry, claret, whatever you have (some take milk in a
green bottle--not a very tempting beverage to look at!) on to the
floor, over your gown, on your neighbor's foot (thereby eliciting a
most unholy frown from the recipient of your bounty), anywhere,
indeed, except in your glass. Even if you are fortunate enough to
catch a few drops, it is another Herculæan effort to take it to your
mouth. No, drinking in the train, while it is in motion, requires
years of practice.
Then again, your fellow passengers are not always all that can be
desired. Often they are neither pleasant in themselves nor interesting
as a study. I traveled with an awful old lady the other day. She had
six small packages with her in the carriage, besides her hand-bag and
umbrellas and half the contents of an extra luggage van. The
long-suffering porter who had looked after her boxes and finally put
her in the train, was crimson with his exertions. The generous lady,
having searched several pockets before finding the necessary coin,
bestowed on him a threepenny piece for his trouble! "Thank yer, mum,"
he went off muttering grimly, "I'll bore a 'ole in the middle and 'ang
it round my neck."
This good dame never ceased to worry all through the journey. She
pulled her things from under the seat and put them up in the rack, and
then reversed their locality. At each station she called frantically
to the guard to know where she was and if she ought to change.
Finally, when we reached our destination, it was proved that she had
taken her ticket to one place and had her luggage labelled to another;
and there she was, standing on the platform gesticulating violently,
while the train was steaming off with her belongings. What happened I
do not know, for I was hurried off by my friends; but I should think
it would be long before she and her luggage met again.
Fortunately she never knew how near she was to her death. If ever I
had murderous intentions in my heart, it was on that journey north.
You do not feel very affectionate toward the country on a wet day.
Indeed, it is a most mournful affair altogether, unless you have a
particularly merry house party. There is absolutely nothing to do. The
heavens weep at such inopportune moments too. There is sure to be some
large picnic, some delightful gathering on the "tapis," when they
choose to exhibit their griefs. And they never notice how unwelcome
such a display of feelings is, but go on weeping, weeping, weeping all
day long, until at last you catch the malady yourself, and are obliged
perforce to mingle a few of your own tears with theirs.
No, there is simply nothing to be done, and Satan has quite a
difficulty to find enough work for all the idle hands. Some can be
perfectly happy in spending all their time in solving the intricacies
of those many wonderful puzzles which have appeared lately as a sort
of antidote to the mischief generally supposed to be perpetrated by
the aforesaid gentleman. Unfortunately, an entirely contrary effect is
produced on me. They did not look far enough ahead when they made me.
They could not conceive the wonderful minds of this time, and so did
not endow me with a sufficient quantity of patience. If they could
have imagined those marvelous little tin saucers, with shot running in
and out of horse-shoes, &c., with _me_ in the perspective, well, I
think they would have gone about their work more carefully, and
perhaps brought about a happier result. As it is, the puzzles are
always swept away now at my approach. I have smashed so many.
It is base ingratitude, too, on my part, to bring them to so speedy an
end; for what I owe to those dear little things I am powerless to
express. Those entertaining people who sit speechless, and only answer
yes and no with an eternal smile on their faces: give them a puzzle.
There is no further effort to amuse them required on your part. They
are at once absorbed in "shot." Their only idea is to successfully get
them into their places. They never do; but being good thorough-going
characters will never give up the attempt.
You meet several of these people in the country, but they never get
very friendly. You shock them too much with your "London manners."
They vote you "fast," and turn aside, fearful of contamination for
their daughters.
Oh, the dreariness, the heaviness of a country dinner party! It seems
to last four times as long as any other--parish, horses, or crops the
only topic of conversation. How can you be interested in old Jane
Smith's rheumatism when you have never heard of her before; in the
swelling of a favorite mare's hock, when you did not know it possessed
such a thing. People's views grow so dreadfully narrow, shut up in
their small parish. Their stock of conversation is so very small. It
is wise to find out your dinner partner at once, and avoid that man as
you would a disease until the meal is announced. If not, if you
accidentally get in his neighborhood, and he talks to you, all his
conversation is at once exhausted, and you are obliged to hear it over
again at table, or submit to an interesting silence.
Dinner parties anywhere are, I think, a mistake. It is a wicked waste
of time to spend nearly three hours over eating and drinking. And you
require such a very interesting "taker-in" to make it bearable at all.
The river is the nicest way of spending a holiday, in my opinion; you
are so free and untrammeled. Mrs. Grundy even waives some of her laws
on the river. The smaller the cottage, the more primitive the place,
the more enjoyable it is. You can spend your time on the water, and
when you are tired of that, you can hire a pony and trap and drive
through some of the loveliest bits of English scenery, to your heart's
content.
Only be careful before engaging your pony to find out its previous
occupations. It is a necessary caution, I assure you. It once took me
nearly an hour to drive out of one of the smallest villages
imaginable. And why? Because my pony had formerly belonged to the
butcher, and insisted on first going his rounds! I coaxed, I
persuaded, I lashed him, but it was all of no avail. On he trotted
until he reached the familiar doors of his late customers, and then he
stopped and _would_ not go on for at least five minutes. One place
was worse than any. I could not get him away for over a
quarter-of-an-hour. This rather mystified me until I was told later
that the butcher was on "walking out" terms with the cook residing
there!