I
My wife Josephine declares that I have become a philosopher in my old
age, and perhaps she is right. Now that I am forty, and a trifle less
elastic in my movements, with patches of gray about my ears which give me
a more venerable appearance, I certainly have a tendency to look at the
world as through a glass. Yet not altogether darkly be it said. That
is, I trust I am no cynic like that fellow Diogenes who set the fashion
centuries ago of turning up the nose at everything. I have a natural
sunniness of disposition which would, I believe, be proof against the
sardonic fumes of contemplation even though I were a real philosopher.
However, just as the mongoose of the bag-man's story was not a real
mongoose, neither am I a real philosopher.
You will remember that Diogenes, who was a real philosopher, occupied a
tub as a permanent residence. He would roll in hot sand during the heat
of summer, and embrace a statue of snow in winter, just to show his
superiority to ordinary human conventions and how much wiser he was than
the rest of the world. The real philosophers of the present day are not
quite so peculiar; but they are apt to be fearfully and wonderfully
superior to the weaknesses of humanity. For the most part they are to be
found in the peaceful environs of a university or on some mountain top a
Sabbath day's journey from the hum of civilization, where they eschew
nearly everything which the every-day mortal finds requisite to comfort
and convenience, unless it be whiskey and water. I have sometimes
fancied that more real philosophers than we are aware of are partial on
the sly to whiskey and water. But that is neither here nor there; for,
as I have already stated, I am not a real philosopher.
I have altogether too many faults to be one, and should constantly be
flying in the face of my own theories. Barring the aforesaid weakness
for whiskey and water, it is fair to assume that the average real
philosopher lives up to his own lights and by them; whereas I, at least
according to Josephine, am liable to be frightfully inconsistent. She
has never forgotten my profanity on the occasion when we discovered after
dinner that the soot had come down in the drawing-room and was over
everything in spite of the fact that the chimney had been swept three
weeks before. Now, if there is one thing which I abhor and am
perpetually inveighing against as vulgar and futile, it is unbridled
language. Josephine must have heard me say fifty times if she has heard
me one that the man who fouls his tongue with an oath is a senseless oaf.
And yet I am bound to admit that when I discovered what had happened I
swore deliberately and roundly like the veriest trooper. In order to
appreciate the situation exactly I should add that it has long been a
mooted point between Josephine and me whether chimneys require to be
swept at all. My darling insists that the sweep shall overhaul the house
annually, while I cling, with what she is pleased to call masculine
fatuity, to the theory that soot, like sleeping dogs, should be let alone.
Have you ever entered a drawing-room just after a healthy, thorough fall
of soot? If so, you will appreciate what is meant by its
all-pervasiveness. The remotest articles of furniture are rife with
infinitesimal smut, much as they were rife with the remains of the lady
in Kipling's story after the jealous orang-outang had done with her. And
yet granting that the provocation was dire, a philosopher, a real
philosopher, would have acted very differently. A philosopher of the
grandest type would have reasoned that what was done was done, and that
there was no more use in crying over fallen soot than over spilt milk.
He would calmly have adopted prompt measures to ameliorate the situation,
and after the servants were fairly at work would have taken his wife
apart and pointed out to her, in well-chosen language, that here was only
another instance of his superior wisdom. One of a more virulent type,
but still a philosopher, might have indulged in mirth--quiet sarcastic
mirth. No person of a truly philosophic cast of mind and with a rooted
antipathy to damning would have sworn lustily as I did.
I remember taking little Fred, my namesake and eldest son, to skate with
me one winter's afternoon on a suburban pond. He did famously for a
tyro, but we both wearied at last of his everlasting strife to maintain
the perpendicular, and I was conscious of a rush of joy when he became
completely absorbed in watching a man who was fishing for pickerel. Have
you ever fished for pickerel through a hole in the ice? If so you will
recall that it is chilly and rather dispiriting work, especially if the
fish are shy. They certainly were shy that afternoon, for the individual
in question had angled long and bagged nothing, as I gleaned from the
answers to the direct interrogatories put by my urchin during the few
minutes I stood paternally by and watched the proceedings.
"Caught anything?"
"Nop."
"Had a bite?"
"Nop."
"How long you been fishing?"
"An hour."
As I glided away light-heartedly on the delicious curves of the outer
edge, I reflected that he was evidently a persevering pot-hunter who
would not be easily discouraged, and that I could count upon his
engrossing the attention of my offspring for a considerable period.
Accordingly, I was surprised some five minutes later to observe the
fisherman (who wore no skates) shambling across the pond toward the
shore. Glancing from him to his late station I perceived a little group
of skaters gathered around my son and heir, who was dabbling with a stick
in the abandoned hole. They appeared to be diverted by something and one
of them, my friend Harry Bolles, who had his handkerchief up to his
mouth, made a bee-line to meet me. From his lips I learned what had
happened, which was this wise: The horny-handed pot-hunter, having
presently pulled a solitary pickerel out upon the ice and freed it from
his hook, turned aside to cut another piece of bait; whereupon my hopeful
picked up the fish and popped it back into its native element without so
much as a syllable of commentary; and thereupon (being act three in the
tragedy) he of the horny hand, having realized the situation in its
terrible entirety, pulled up his line, shovelled back the particles of
ice into the hole and betook himself upon his shambling way without one
word. Not a word, mark you. There was a real philosopher, if you like,
a thorough-going, square-trotting philosopher. The only alternative was
child-murder or silence, and my pot-hunter chose the simplest form of the
dilemma. "I thought the fish would like it," said little Fred, when
interrogated upon the subject.
And yet, despite my occasional inability to practice what I preach,
Josephine is correct in her diagnosis that my cast of mind is becoming
more philosophic as the years roll on. The consciousness that I am the
author of four children (two strapping sons and two tall daughters),
anyone of whom may constitute me a grandfather before I am fifty, renders
me conservative and disposed, metaphorically speaking, to draw in my
horns a little. I am beginning to go to church again, for instance. You
may have taken it for granted that I have been regular in my attendance
at the sanctuary. Certainly I have never been a scoffer; but, on the
other hand, I must confess that somehow it has come to pass since
Josephine and I plighted our troth that our pew has stood empty on the
Lord's day oftener than the orthodox consider fitting. And the worst of
it is I used to attend service about every other Sabbath before I became
a benedict, and Josephine taught a Sunday-school class up to within six
months of our wedding ceremony. She, dear girl, has harbored ever since
the belief that she continues to go to church almost every Sunday either
in the morning or the afternoon, a harmless delusion which for some time
I took no pains to dispel, knowing as I did that she meant to go every
Sunday. Yet I knew also that pitiless, unemotional statistics would
reveal an average attendance on her part of rather less than ten times in
the course of each year. I was brute enough finally to call attention to
a tally-sheet, covering a period of three calendar months, which I had
kept for my private edification, and I was punished by seeing her sweet
eyes fill with tears before she proceeded to plead to the indictment.
"You know, Fred, perfectly well that I have to stay at home with the
children every other Sunday morning in order to allow Lucille to go to
church."
"But how about the other mornings and all the afternoons?" I inquired,
with the effrontery of a hardened sinner seizing his opportunity to take
a saint to task.
Josephine blushed, partly from guilt and partly from indignation. "It
rained torrents last Sunday morning, and Sunday morning fortnight--er--I
was sick. I remember that I was all dressed to go one afternoon when old
Mr. Philipps called and I didn't like to leave him. Besides, I feel as
though I ought to stay at home occasionally on Sunday afternoons in order
to teach the children the Scriptures. The Sunday morning before
that--er--I went. No, it must have been a fortnight previous, for I
recollect now that I had planned to go, when you said that you hated to
skate alone and declined to take the entire responsibility of the
children on the pond on account of little Fred and the pickerel."
"And I said, too, I remember, that in all probability there wouldn't be
black ice again all winter."
"You did, you did," my darling cried, with tragic impetuosity, "and it is
cruel of you to remind me of it."
"Moreover, it was a correct prophecy. It snowed that very night and the
people who waited until Monday were nowhere."
"Oh, Fred, Fred, I'm a wicked woman. You're the last person in the world
who ought to tax me with it, but it is true. I don't go to church as I
ought. And yet I do mean to go. But if it isn't one thing which
prevents, it's another. Lucille must have every other Sunday morning,
and you seem so disappointed if I refuse to go skating or canoeing with
you and the children on the fine days that I foolishly yield."
"And you the daughter of a deacon," I continued, unsparingly. Let me
state by way of explanation that Josephine's late father was for many
years one of the pillars of the religious society to which he belonged.
"I know, I know. It is shameful. I--we are little better than heathens,
Fred. Only think of it, four times in three months!" she added, glancing
at the tell-tale sheet. "And I brought up to go regularly both morning
and afternoon in addition to Sunday-school! I am a heathen; and as for
you, I don't know what to call you!" she exclaimed, with a sad,
reproachful smile.
So long as Josephine was content to berate herself without including me
in her anathemas, I had been ready to acquiesce in what she said, but now
that she seemed disposed to drag me into the conversation I felt it
incumbent upon me to reply with dignity:
"Will you please explain, my dear, why it is that, though I used to be a
regular worshipper before we became man and wife, I have almost entirely
ceased to attend church since that time? Who is responsible for the
change, I wonder."
There is a point beyond which it is not safe to prod Josephine, and I
could see from the expression of her eye that we had reached it on this
occasion. She drew herself up and answered haughtily:
"I have heard you make that insinuation several times before, Fred. It
is not merely silly, it is disgraceful. I keep you from church? Don't
you know," she exclaimed, with a quaver of emotion, "that your refusal to
go is a source of genuine grief to me, and that I just hate to go alone?
Don't you know that I should like nothing better than to go with you
every Sunday, and that I am ready to go to any church you will select?"
"Yes," I answered, doggedly, "I am well aware that you would prefer to
have me become anything rather than remain--er--a steadfast worshipper of
nature."
Josephine made a little gesture of impatience such as my well-born
apotheosis of nature is apt to evoke. For a few moments she looked as
though she were going to cry; then, with an almost passionate outburst,
she exclaimed:
"You will promise me, Fred, won't you, that when the children are old
enough to understand what it means not to go to church you will go too?"
Now, it may be that my response at the time to this pathetic appeal was
not altogether satisfactory to my darling; but she has forgotten her
fears and her tears to-day in the happy consciousness that as surely as
the bells begin to ring on Sunday morning I begin to brush my silk hat
with the feverish impatience of an abandoned church-goer. Punctuality,
which has always seemed to Josephine a pitiful sort of virtue, ranks in
my category of human conduct almost on a par with brotherly love, and I
am apt to make myself and her pretty miserable on each returning Sabbath
by my endeavors to get the family out of the house and into our pew on
time. It is only by bearing strictly in mind what day it is that I am
able to keep my lips from speaking guile when little Fred remembers at
the last moment that he has forgotten his pocket-handkerchief or
Josephine's glove bursts open in the process of being hastily rammed on
and I am compelled to wait while she sends upstairs for a fresh pair.
You should see how her nostrils swell with pride as we sweep by my old
pal, Nicholas Long, and his wife, who are manifestly not going to church.
I can discern on Nick's face, as we pass, an expression which is half
sardonic, half pitiful. Evidently he has not forgotten my quondam
oft-repeated vow that no child of mine should be taught the orthodox
fairy tales in unlearning which I had spent some of the best years of my
life. And now I am a recreant, and he who aided and abetted me in my
asseverations of independence remains faithful. Yes, but Nick, poor
fellow, has no children. His grin seems to say, "See what you are
missing, poor old patriarch; Dorothy and I are off for a ten-mile tramp
in the country."
Yet, despite his apparent jubilation of spirit, I detect a longing
expression in Dorothy's eyes and I notice that she steals a second glance
over her tailor-made shoulder at little Winona, our youngest, who is an
uncommonly pretty child, if I do say it.
"There go a light-hearted, honest couple with the courage of their
convictions," I remark to Josephine, tentatively. "Before the sermon has
begun they will be on the river and they will come home delightfully
tired just in time for dinner."
"Light-hearted? I believe, Fred, that they are both perfectly
miserable," she exclaimed, with a sweeping glance of pride at her
progeny. "I was thinking just before you spoke how much I pitied that
woman."
I can remember as if it were yesterday Nick Long telling me with bubbling
ecstasy, shortly after he was engaged, that his lady-love had a clear,
analytical mind, almost like a man's. "No nonsense about her," he said.
"She sees things just as they are." I rather got the impression at the
time that he intended thereby to insinuate gently but plainly that he was
a far luckier dog than I who had married a woman with a mind
conspicuously feminine. I should like very much to know whether, if
Dorothy were to be blessed with children after all, Nick would have to go
to church.
Not only have I lost moral courage in the matter of some of my deepest
convictions, but I notice also with consternation that my physical
bravery is ebbing away as my years increase. I have drawn the line, for
example, squarely and tautly on burglars. One night not very long since
I was awakened by noise and, after listening, I came to the conclusion
that it proceeded from housebreakers. I slipped out of bed stealthily
and put my ear to the bolted chamber door in order to confirm my
conviction. My movements aroused Josephine, who sat up in bed and asked
hoarsely what the matter was. I put my finger on my lips quite
irrelevantly, for it was pitch dark.
"Fred, are there burglars in the house?" she gasped.
"Sh! Yes."
"What are you doing, Fred? Oh, you mus'n't go down and expose yourself
on any account." She was evidently very much agitated. "Promise me that
you will not."
Having ascertained that the door was secure I walked across the room and
turned on the electric light. Josephine was sitting bolt upright,
quivering with excitement. Her eyes followed my every movement, as,
having slipped on my trousers and a pair of boots, I began to look around
me, tramping sturdily.
"Fred, they'll hear you if you make such a noise," said my wife, in an
agonized whisper.
"I fervently trust so," I retorted. "That's why I'm doing it."
As I spoke my eye lit at last on something adapted to my purpose. I had
been trying to avoid the destruction of a wash basin, and I seized with
grateful eagerness the pair of Indian clubs which offered themselves and,
lifting them to the level of my brow, let them fall clamorously on the
floor. The welkin rang, so to speak, and I sank with nervous exhaustion
into an arm-chair.
The house seemed deathly still and it struck me that Josephine on her
part was ominously quiet. When she spoke at last it was to ask:
"Haven't you a pistol?"
"Yes, dear."
"Are you going to let them take everything?"
"It is for them to decide, darling."
"But, Fred----" Josephine did not finish her sentence. The words she
uttered were, however, so full of poignant surprise and disappointment
that I felt constrained to inquire with a guilty attempt at nonchalance:
"Is there anything you would like to have me do?"
"You are the best judge, of course," she answered, coldly. "Only, do you
think it is the usual way?"
"The usual way?" I echoed. Among the few points in Josephine's character
which irritate me is her weakness for custom, and it is growing on her.
"No, I suppose that the correct social thing would have been to stand at
the head of the banisters in my nightgown with a lighted candle and make
a target of myself."
"Why did you buy a pistol, then?" inquired my better half.
"So that the children needn't shoot themselves with it after it was
locked up and the cartridges carefully hidden," I replied, with levity.
We were both so heated that we had practically forgotten that flat
burglary was supposed to be going on.
"You didn't use to talk in that way," said Josephine, with slow
precision. "I only hope, Fred, for your sake that people won't hear
about this."
"They will not, certainly, unless you tell them, Josephine."
"Tell them? I wouldn't mention what has happened for the world," she
answered, looking at me with a sort of sorrowful disdain. Thus is it
that the ideals which women form concerning us are one by one shattered!
I am sure that Josephine would have been inconsolable had I fallen a
victim to the bullet of a house-breaker. You will recall that her first
impulse was to prevent me from exposing myself for the sake of the solid
silver service. She had taken it for granted that I would slip the bolt
and go part way down stairs, at least, pistol in hand, and she had wished
to caution me against undue rashness. Consequently, it was a rude blow
to her sensibilities to find that I was such a craven. She cared no more
for our apostle spoons and gold-lined vegetable dishes than I did; it was
the principle of the thing which distressed her. Why had I bought a
six-shooter shortly after our marriage except to be equipped for just
such an emergency? It did certainly seem that I was bound by all the
laws of custom to pop at least once over the banisters, even though I
took no aim and scurried back into my bedroom immediately after. That
would have satisfied her, she subsequently admitted to me; but to drop a
pair of Indian clubs on the floor in order to make a clatter could be
regarded as little less than pusillanimous, philosophy or no philosophy.
We have talked it over many times since, and I have endeavored to make
plain to her that in the process of evolution thinking men have come to
the conclusion that the husband and father who chops logic at dead of
night with an accomplished burglar on the wrong side of his chamber door
is akin to a lunatic. She listens to my arguments attentively, and she
has done me the honor to admit that there is more to be said in my behalf
than she thought at first; but I remember that the last time we conversed
upon the subject she shook her head with the air of a woman who, in spite
of everything, is still of the same opinion, and she murmured gently:
"As I told you before, Fred, if you had fired once over the banisters, I
would say nothing."
"But I might have been killed or maimed for life as a consequence," I
blurted, feelingly. Josephine looked a little grave, as she is apt to do
at any suggestion of my sudden taking off, but with a sweet sigh she
answered, succinctly:
"There are certain risks in this world that a man has to take."