|Back Meadows lies three miles to the northwest of Hagar, rich
bottom-lands in Sanderson Hollow, and the Cattle Ridge shelters it on
the north. Five generations of Sandersons have added to the Sanderson
accumulation of this world's goods, without sensible interference on
the part of moths or rust or thieves that break through and steal. Cool,
quiet men, slow of speech and persistent of mood, they prospered
and lived well where other families, desiring too many things or not
desiring anything enough, found nothing at all desirable and drifted
away. The speculative traveller, hunting “abandoned farms,” or studying
the problem of the future of New England's outlying districts, who
should stand on the crest of the Cattle Ridge overlooking the sheltered
valley, would note it as an instance of the problem satisfactorily
solved and of a farm which, so far from abandonment, smiled over all its
comfortable expanse in the consciousness of past and certainty of future
occupancy. These were ready illustrations for his thesis, if he had one:
the smooth meadows, square stone walls and herds of fawn-colored cattle,
large bams and long stables of the famous Sanderson stud; also the
white gabled house among the maples with spreading ells on either side,
suggesting a position taken with foresight and carefully guarded and
secured--a house that, recognizing the uncertainties and drifting
currents of the world, had acted accordingly, and now could afford to
consider itself complacently. The soul of any individual Sanderson might
be required of him, and his wisdom relative to eternity be demonstrated
folly, but the policy of the Sanderson family had not so far been
considered altogether an individual matter. Even individually, if the
question of such inversion of terms ever occurred to a Sanderson, it
only led to the conclusion that it was strictly a Pickwickian usage,
and, in the ordinary course of language, the policy of building barns,
stowing away goods and reflecting complacently thereon, still came under
the head of wisdom.
Mrs. Cullom Sanderson, sister of Israel Sanderson of the last generation
and married into a distant branch of the Sanderson family, carried her
materialism with an unconscious and eccentric frankness that prevented
the family from recognizing in her a peculiar development of its own
quality. When Israel's gentle wife passed from a world which she had
found too full of unanswered questions, it was Mrs. Cullom who plunged
bulkily into the chamber of the great mystery and stopped, gulping with
astonishment.
“I just made her some blanc-mange,” she gasped. “Isn't that too bad!
Why, Israel!”
Israel turned from the window and contemplated her gravely with his
hands clasped behind him.
“I think you had better move down to the Meadows, Ellen,” he said. “If
you will contrive to say as little as possible to me about Marian, and
one or two other matters I will specify, we shall get along very well.”
He went out with slow step and bent head, followed by Mrs. Cullom trying
vainly to find an idea on the subject suggested, which she was quite
positive she had somewhere about her. What Israel may have thought of
the thing that had whispered within his doors in an unknown tongue, and
had taken away what was his without receipt or equivalent exchange, it
were hard to say; equally hard even to say what he had thought of Marian
these twenty years. If her cloistral devotions and visionary moods
had seemed to him, in uninverted terms, folly, he had never said so.
Certainly he had liked her quiet, ladylike ways, and possibly respected
a difference of temperament inwardly as well as outwardly. At any rate,
tolerance was a consistent Sanderson policy and philosophy of life.
There was a slight movement in the chamber, after the silence which
followed the departing footsteps of Israel and Mrs. Cullom. A small
person in pinafores crept stealthily from under the bed and peered
over the edge. It was a hard climb but he persisted, and at last
seated himself on it panting, with his elbows on his knees, gravely
considering. A few hours since, the silent lips had whispered, among
many things that came back to his memory in after years like a distant
chime of bells, only this that seemed of any immediate importance: “I
shall be far away to-night, Joe, but when you say your prayers I shall
hear.” The problem that puckered the small brow was whether prayers out
of regular hours were real prayers. Joe decided to risk it and, getting
on his knees, said over all the prayers he knew. Then he leaned over
and patted the thin, cold cheek (Joe and his mother always tacitly
understood each other), slid off the bed with a satisfied air, and
solemnly trotted out of the room.
Mrs. Cullom Sanderson was a widow; “Which,” Israel remarked, “is a pity.
Cullom would have taken comfort in outliving you, Ellen.”
“Well,” remonstrated Mrs. Cullom, “I'm sure I don't know what you mean,
Israel. I've always respected his memory.”
Israel, gravely regarding her, observed, “You'd better not try to train
Joe,” and departed, leaving her to struggle with the idea that
between Joe and Cullom's comfort Israel was getting very disconnected.
Disconnection of remark did not imply any changeableness in Israel's
temperament. He observed a silent sequence of character, and possibly
a sequence of thought of which he did not care to give evidence, on
matters which he found no profit in discussing. Twelve years later the
mystery again whispered within his doors, and he rose and followed it in
his usual deliberate and taciturn way, without disclosing any opinion on
the question of the inversion of terms. The story of each generation
is put away when its time comes with a more or less irrelevant epitaph,
whether or not its threads be gathered into a satisfactory finale. The
Spirit-of-things-moving-on is singularly indifferent to such matters.
Its only literary principle seems to be, to move on. The new Sanderson
of Back Meadows grew up a slight, thin-faced young fellow. The Sanderson
men were always slight of build, saving a certain breadth of shoulders.
A drooping mustache in course of time hid the only un-Sanderson feature,
a sensitive mouth. The cool gray eyes, slightly drawling speech, and
deliberate manner were all Sanderson, indicating “a chip of the old
block,” as Mr. Durfey remarked to the old Scotchman who kept the drag
store in Hagar. If the latter had doubts, he kept them to himself.
The Sanderson stud sprang from a certain red mare, Martha, belonging
to Blake Sanderson of Revolutionary times. They were a thin-necked,
generally bad-tempered breed, with red veins across the eyes, of high
repute among “horsey” men. Blake Sanderson was said to have ridden the
red mare from Boston in some astonishingly quick time on some
mysterious errand connected with the evacuation of New York, whereby her
descendants were at one time known as the Courier breed; but as no one
seemed to know what the errand was, it was possibly not a patriotic one.
Three of these red, thinnecked mares and a stallion were on exhibition
at the Hamilton County Fair of '76. Notable men of the county were
there, mingled with turfmen of all shades of notoriety; several
immaculately groomed gentlemen, tall-hatted, long-coated, and saying
little, but pointed out with provincial awe as coming from New York and
worth watching; a few lean Kentuckians, the redness of whose noses was
in direct ratio with their knowledge of the business, and whose artistic
profanity had a mercantile value in expressing contempt for Yankee
horse-flesh. There was the Honorable Gerald and the some-say
Dishonorable Morgan Map, originally natives of Hagar, with young Jacob
Lorn between them undergoing astute initiation into the ways of the
world and its manner of furnishing amusement to young men of wealth;
both conversing affably with Gypsy John of not even doubtful reputation,
at present booming Canadian stock in favor of certain animals that
may or may not have seen Canada. Thither came the manager of the opera
troupe resident in Hamilton during the Fair, and the Diva, popularly
known as Mignon, a brown-haired woman with a quick Gallic smile and a
voice, “By gad, sir, that she can soak every note of it in tears, the
little scamp,” quoth Cassidy, observing from a distance. Cassidy was a
large fleshy man with a nickel shield under his coat.
“A face to launch a thousand ships,