diversion, and so, although the round of weary labor may not be thus
easily relaxed, the wife has been deputed to do the Christmas shopping
and has gone forth into the crowded East Side street, from which
she has returned with a meat bone, a cut from a butcher’s at twelve
cents a pound, green pickles, three turnips, a carrot, a half-dozen
small candles, and two or three toys, which, together with a small
three-foot branch of hemlock, purchased earlier in the day, completes
the Christmas preparation for the morrow. Arba, the youngest, although
like the others she will work until ten this Christmas Eve, is to have
a pair of new shoes; Zicka, the next older, a belt for her dress. Mrs.
Zorg, although she may not suspect, will receive a new market basket
with a lid on it. Zorg--grim, silent, weary of soul and body--is to
have a new fifteen-cent tie. There will be a tree, a small sprig of
a tree, upon which will hang colored glass or paste balls of red and
blue and green, with threads of popcorn and sprays of flitter-gold, all
saved from the years before. In the light of early dawn to-morrow the
youngest of the children will dance about these, and the richness of
their beauty will be enjoyed as if they had not been so presented for
the seventh and eighth time.
Thus it runs, mostly, throughout the entire region on this joyous
occasion, a wealth of feeling and desire expressing itself through
the thinnest and most meager material forms. About the shops and
stores where the windows are filled with cheap displays of all
that is considered luxury, are hosts of other children scarcely
so satisfactorily supplied, peering earnestly into the world of
make-believe and illusion, the wonder of it not yet eradicated from
their unsophisticated hearts. Joy, joy--not a tithe of all that is
represented by the expenditures of the wealthy, but only such as may be
encompassed in a paper puff-ball or a tinsel fish, is here sought for
and dreamed over, an earnest, child-heart-longing which may never again
be gratified if not now. Horses, wagons, fire engines, dolls--these are
what the thousands upon thousands of children whose faces are pressed
closely against the commonplace window panes are dreaming about, and
the longing that is thereby expressed is the strongest evidence of the
indissoluble link which binds these weakest and most wretched elements
of society to the best and most successful.
THE RIVERS OF THE NAMELESS DEAD
The body of a man was found yesterday in the North River at
Twenty-fifth Street. A brass check, No. 21,600, of the New York
Registry Company, was found on the body.--N. Y. Daily Paper.
There is an island surrounded by rivers, and about it the tide scurries
fast and deep. It is a beautiful island, long, narrow, magnificently
populated, and with such a wealth of life and interest as no island in
the whole world before has ever possessed. Long lines of vessels of
every description nose its banks. Enormous buildings and many splendid
mansions line its streets.
It is filled with a vast population, millions coming and going, and is
the scene of so much life and enthusiasm and ambition that its fame is,
as the sound of a bell, heard afar.
And the interest which this island has for the world is that it is
seemingly a place of opportunity and happiness. If you were to listen
to the tales of its glory carried the land over and see the picture
which it presents to the incoming eye, you would assume that it was
all that it seemed. Glory for those who enter its walls seeking glory.
Happiness for those who come seeking happiness. A world of comfort and
satisfaction for all who take up their abode within it--an island of
beauty and delight.
The sad part of it is, however, that the island and its beauty are, to
a certain extent, a snare. Its seeming loveliness, which promises so
much to the innocent eye, is not always easy of realization. Thousands
come, it is true; thousands venture to reconnoiter its mysterious
shores. From the villages and hamlets of the land is streaming a
constant procession of pilgrims who feel that here is the place where
their dreams are to be realized; here is the spot where they are to be
at peace. That their hopes are not, in so many cases, to be realized,
is the thing which gives a poignant tang to their coming. The beautiful
island is not compact of happiness for all.
And the exceptional tragedy of it is that the waters which surround the
beautiful island are forever giving evidence of the futility of the
dreams of so many. If you were to stand upon any of its shores, where
the tide scurries past in its never-ending hurry, or were to idle for a
time upon its many docks and piers, which reach far out into the water
and give lovely views of the sky and the gulls and the boats, you might
see drifting past upon the bosom of the current some member of all
the ambitious throng who, in time past, set his face toward the city,
and who entered only to find that there was more of sorrow than of
joy. Sad, white-faced maidens; grim, bearded, time-worn men; strange,
strife-worn, grief-stricken women; and, saddest of all, children--soft,
wan, tender children--floating in the waters which wash the shores of
the island city.
And such waters! How green they look, how graceful, how mysterious!
From far seas they come--strange, errant, peculiar waters--prying
along the shores of the magnificent island; sucking and sipping at the
rocks which form its walls; whispering and gurgling about the docks and
piers, and flowing, flowing, flowing. Such waters seem to be kind, and
yet they are not so. They seem to be cruel, and yet they are not so;
merely indifferent these waters are--dark, strong, deep, indifferent.
And curiously the children of men who come to seek the joys of the city
realize the indifference and the impartiality of the waters. When the
vast and beautiful island has been reconnoitered, when its palaces have
been viewed, its streets disentangled, its joys and its difficulties
discovered, then the waters, which are neither for nor against, seem
inviting. Here, when the great struggle has been ended, when the years
have slipped by and the hopes of youth have not been realized; when
the dreams of fortune, the delights of tenderness, the bliss of love
and the hopes of peace have all been abandoned--the weary heart may
come and find surcease. Peace in the waters, rest in the depths and the
silence of the hurrying tide; surcease and an end in the chalice of the
waters which wash the shores of the beautiful island.
And they do come, these defeated ones? Not one, nor a dozen, nor a
score every year, but hundreds and hundreds. Scarcely a day passes but
one, and sometimes many, go down from the light and the show and the
merriment of the island to the shores of the waters where peace may
be found. They stop on its banks; they reflect, perhaps, on the joys
which they somehow have missed; they give a last, despairing glance at
the wonderful scene which once seemed so joyous and full of promise,
and then yield themselves unresistingly to the unswerving strength of
the powerful current and are borne away. Out past the docks and the
piers of the wonderful city. Out past its streets, its palaces, its
great institutions. Out past its lights, its colors, the sound of its
merriment and its seeking, and then the sea has them and they are no
more. They have accomplished their journey, the island its tragedy.
They have come down to the rivers of the nameless dead. They have
yielded themselves as a sacrifice to the variety of life. They have
proved the uncharitableness of the island of beauty.
[Illustration]
THE END
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they
were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation
marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left
unbalanced.
Illustrations in this eBook have been positioned between paragraphs. In
versions of this eBook that support hyperlinks, the page references in
the List of Illustrations lead to the corresponding illustrations.
Transcriber removed duplicate book title on page before first chapter.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Color of a Great City, by Theodore Dreiser