I
It was a plain brick house, three full stories, with four broad
chimneys, and overhanging eaves. The tradition was that it had been a
colonial tavern--a dot among the fir-covered northern hills on the
climbing post-road into Canada. The village scattered along the road
below the inn was called Albany--and soon forgotten when the railroad
sought an opening through a valley less rugged, eight miles to the west.
Rather more than thirty years ago the Doctor had arrived, one summer
day, and opened all the doors and windows of the neglected old house,
which he had bought from scattered heirs. He was a quiet man, the
Doctor, in middle life then or nearly so; and he sank almost without
remark into the world of Albany, where they raise hay and potatoes and
still cut good white pine off the hills. Gradually the old brick tavern
resumed the functions of life: many buildings were added to it as well
as many acres of farm and forest to the Doctor's original purchase of
intervale land. The new Master did not open his house to the public, yet
he, too, kept a sort of Inn, where men came and stayed a long time.
Although no sign now hung from the old elm tree in front of the house,
nevertheless an ever-widening stream of humanity mounted the winding
road from White River and passed through the doors of the Inn, seeking
life....
That first summer the Doctor brought with him Sam, the Chinaman, whom we
all came to know and love, and also a young man, who loafed much while
the Doctor worked, and occasionally fished. This was John Herring--now a
famous architect--and it was from his designs, sketched those first idle
summer days, that were built all the additions to the simple old
house--the two low wings in the rear for the "cells," with the Italian
garden between them; the marble seat curving around the pool that joined
the wings on the west; also the substantial wall that hid the Inn, its
terraced gardens and orchards, from Albanian curiosity. Herring found a
store of red brick in some crumbling buildings in the neighborhood, and
he discovered the quarry whence came those thick slabs of purple slate.
The blue-veined marble was had from a fissure in the hills, and the
Doctor's School made the tiles.
I think Herring never did better work than in the making over of this
old tavern: he divined that subtle affinity which exists between north
Italy, with all its art, and our bare New England; and he dared to graft
boldly one to the other, having the rear of the Inn altogether Italian
with its portico, its dainty colonnades, the garden and the fountain and
the pool. From all this one looked down on the waving grass of the
Intervale, which fell away gently to the turbulent White River, then
rose again to the wooded hills that folded one upon another, with ever
deepening blue, always upward and beyond.
Not all this building at once, to be sure, as the millionaire builds;
but a gradual growth over a couple of decades; and all built lovingly by
the "Brothers," stone on stone, brick and beam and tile--many a hand
taking part in it that came weak to the task and left it sturdy. There
was also the terraced arrangement of gardens and orchards on either side
of the Inn, reaching to the farm buildings on the one side and to the
village on the other. For a time Herring respected the quaint old tavern
with its small rooms and pine wainscot; then he made a stately
two-storied hall out of one half where we dined in bad weather, and a
pleasant study for the Doctor from the rest. The doors east and west
always stood open in the summer, giving the rare passer-by a glimpse of
that radiant blue heaven among the hills, with the silver flash of the
river in the middle distance, and a little square of peaceful garden
close at hand.... The tough northern grasses rustled in the breezes that
always played about Albany; and the scent of spruce drawn by the hot
sun--the strong resinous breath of the north--was borne from the woods.
Thus it started, that household of men in the old Inn at the far end of
Albany village among the northern hills, with the Doctor and Sam and
Herring, who had been flung aside after his first skirmish with life and
was picked up in pure kindness by the Doctor, as a bit of the broken
waste of our modern world, and carried off with him out of the city. The
young architect returning in due time to the fight--singing--naturally
venerated the Doctor as a father; and when a dear friend stumbled and
fell in the _via dura_ of this life, he whispered to him word of the Inn
and its Master--of the life up there among the hills where Man is little
and God looks down on his earth.... "Oh, you'll understand when you put
your eyes on White Face some morning! The Doctor? He heals both body and
soul." And this one having heeded spoke the word in turn to others in
need--"to the right sort, who would understand." Thus the custom grew
like a faith, and a kind of brotherhood was formed, of those who had
found more than health at the Inn--who had found themselves. The Doctor,
ever busy about his farms and his woods, his building, and above all his
School, soon had on his hands a dozen or more patients or guests, as you
might call them, and he set them to work speedily. There was little
medicine to be found in the Inn: the sick labored as they could and thus
grew strong....
And so, as one was added to another, they began to call themselves in
joke "Brothers," and the Doctor, "Father." The older "Brothers" would
return to the Inn from all parts of the land, for a few days or a few
weeks, to grasp the Doctor's hand, to have a dip in the pool, to try the
little brooks among the hills. Young men and middle-aged, and even the
old, they came from the cities where the heat of living had scorched
them, where they had faltered and doubted the goodness of life. In some
way word of the Master had reached them, with this compelling
advice--"Go! And tell him I sent you." So from the clinic or the
lecture-room, from the office or the mill--wherever men labor with
tightening nerves--the needy one started on his long journey. Toward
evening he was set down before the plain red face of the Inn. And as the
Stranger entered the old hall, a voice was sure to greet him from within
somewhere, the deep voice of a hearty man, and presently the Master
appeared to welcome the newcomer, resting one hand on his guest's
shoulder perhaps, with a yearning affection that ran before knowledge.
"So you've come, my boy," he said. "Herring [or some one] wrote me to
look for you."
And after a few more words of greeting, the Doctor beckoned to Sam, and
gave the guest over to his hands. Thereupon the Chinaman slippered
through tiled passageways to the court, where the Stranger, caught by
the beauty and peace so well hidden, lingered a while. The little space
within the wings was filled with flowers as far as the yellow water of
the pool and the marble bench. In the centre of the court was an old
gray fountain--sent from Verona by a Brother--from which the water
dropped and ran away among the flower beds to the pool. A stately elm
tree shaded this place, flecking the water below. The sun shot long rays
beneath its branches into the court, and over all there was an odor of
blossoming flowers and the murmur of bees.
"Bath!" Sam explained, grinning toward the pool.
With the trickle of the fountain in his ears the Stranger looked out
across the ripening fields of the Intervale to the noble sky-line of the
Stowe hills. Those little mountains of the north! Mere hills to all who
know the giants of the earth--not mountains in the brotherhood of ice
and snow and rock! But in form and color, in the lesser things that
create the love of men for places, they rise nobly toward heaven, those
little hills! On a summer day like this their broad breasts flutter with
waving tree-tops, and at evening depth on depth of purple mist gathers
over them, dropping into those soft curves where the little brooks flow,
and mounting even to the sky-line. When the sun has fallen, there rests
a band of pure saffron, and in the calm and perfect peace of evening
there is a hint of coming moonlight. Ah, they are of the fellowship of
mountains, those little hills of Stowe! And when in winter their flanks
are jewelled with ice and snow, then they raise their heads proudly to
the stars, calling across the frozen valleys to their greater brethren
in the midriff of the continent--"Behold, we also are hills, in the
sight of the Lord!"...
Meantime Sam, with Oriental ease, goes slipping along the arcade until
he comes to a certain oak door, where he drops your bag, and disappears,
having saluted. It is an ample and lofty room, and on the outer side of
it hangs a little balcony above the orchard, from which there is a view
of the valley and the woods beyond, and from somewhere in the fields the
note of the thrush rises. The room itself is cool, of a gray tone, with
a broad fireplace, a heavy table, and many books. Otherwise there are
bed and chairs and dressing-table, the necessities of life austerely
provided. And Peace! God, what Peace to him who has escaped from the
furnace men make! It is as if he had come all the way to the end of the
world, and found there a great still room of peace.
Soon a bell sounds--with a strange vibration as though in distant lands
it had summoned many a body of men together--and the household assembles
under the arcade. If it is fair and not cold, Sam and his helpers bring
out the long narrow table and place it, as Veronese places his feasters,
lengthwise beneath the colonnade, and thus the evening meal is served. A
fresh, coarse napkin is laid on the bare board before each man, no more
than enough for all those present, and the Doctor sits in the middle,
serving all. There are few dishes, and for the most part such as may be
got at home there in the hills. There is a pitcher of cider at one end
and a pitcher of mild white wine at the other, and the men eat and
drink, with jokes and talk--the laughter of the day. (The novice might
feel only the harmony of it all, but later he will learn how many
considered elements go to the making of Peace.) Afterward, when Sam has
brought pipes and tobacco, the Master leads the way to the sweeping
semicircle of marble seat around the pool with the leafy tree overhead;
and there they sit into the soft night, talking of all things, with the
glow of pipes, until one after another slips away to sleep. For as the
Master said, "Talk among men in common softens the muscles of the mind
and quickens the heart." Yet he loved most to hear the talk of others.
Thus insensibly for the Novice there begins the life of the place,
opening in a gentle and persistent routine that takes him in its flow
and carries him on with it. He finds Tradition and Habit all about him,
in the ordered, unconscious life of the Inn, to which he yields without
question.... Shortly after dawn the bell sounds, and then the men meet
at the pool, where the Doctor is always first. A plunge into the yellow
water which is flecked with the fallen leaves, and afterward to each
man's room there is brought a large bowl of coffee and hot milk, with
bread and eggs and fruit. What more he craves may be found in the hall.
Soon there is a tap on the newcomer's door, and a neighborly voice calls
out--"We all go into the fields every morning, you know. You must earn
your dinner, the Doctor says, or borrow it!" So the Novice goes forth to
earn his first dinner with his hands. Beyond the gardens and the
orchards are the barns and sheds, and a vista of level acres of hay and
potatoes and rye, the bearing acres of the farm, and beyond these the
woods on the hills. "Nearly a thousand acres, fields and woods," the
neighbor explains. "Oh, there's plenty to do all times!" Meantime the
Doctor strides ahead through the wet grass, his eyes roaming here and
there, inquiring the state of his land. And watching him the newcomer
believes that there is always much to be done wherever the Doctor leads.
It may be July and hay time--all the intervale grass land is mowed by
hand--there is a sweat-breaking task! Or it may be potatoes to hoe. Or
later in the season the apples have to be gathered--a pleasant pungent
job, filling the baskets and pouring them into the fat-bellied barrels.
But whatever the work may be the Doctor keeps the Novice in his mind,
and as the sun climbs high over the Stowe hills, he taps the new one on
the shoulder--"Better stop here to-day, my boy! You'll find a good tree
over there by the brook for a nap...."
Under that particular tree in the tall timothy, there is the coolest
spot, and the Novice drowses, thinking of those wonderful mowers in
_Anna_, as he gazes at the marching files eating their way through the
meadow until his eyelids fall and he sleeps, the ripple of waving
timothy in his ears. At noon the bell sounds again from the Inn, and the
men come striding homeward wiping the sweat from their faces. They
gather at the swimming pool, and still panting from their labor strip
off their wet garments, then plunge one after another, like happy boys.
From bath to room, and a few minutes for fresh clothes, and all troop
into the hall, which is dark and cool. The old brick walls of the tavern
never held a gayer lot of guests.
From this time on each one is his own master; there is no common toil.
The farmer and his men take up the care of the farm, and the Master
usually goes down to his School, in company with some of the Brothers.
Each one finds his own way of spending the hours till sunset--some
fishing or shooting, according to the season; others, in tennis or games
with the boys of the School; and some reading or loafing--until the
shadows begin to fall across the pool into the court, and Sam brings out
the long table for dinner.
The seasons shading imperceptibly into one another vary the course of
the day. Early in September the men begin to sit long about the
hall-fire of an evening, and when the snow packs hard on the hills there
is wood-cutting to be done, and in early spring it is the carpenter's
shop. So the form alters, but the substance remains--work and play and
rest....
To each one a time will come when the Doctor speaks to him alone. At
some hour, before many days have passed, the Novice will find himself
with those large eyes resting on his face, searchingly. It may be in the
study after the others have scattered, or at the pool where the Master
loved to sit beneath the great tree and hear his "confessions," as the
men called these talks. At such times, when the man came to remember it
afterward, the Doctor asked few questions, said little, but listened. He
had the confessing ear! And as if by chance his hand would rest on the
man's arm or shoulder. For he said--"Touch speaks: soul flows through
flesh into soul."
Thus he sat and confessed his patients one after another, and his dark
eyes seemed familiar with all man's woes, as if he had listened always.
Men said to him what they had never before let pass their lips to man
or woman, what they themselves scarce looked at in the gloom of their
souls. Unawares it slipped from them, the reason within the reason for
their ill, the ultimate cause of sorrow. From the moment they had
revealed to him this hidden thing--had slipped the leash on their
tongues--it seemed no longer to be feared. "Trouble evaporates, being
properly aired," said the Doctor. And already in the troubled one's mind
the sense of the confused snarl of life began to lessen and veils began
to descend between him and it.... "For you must learn to forget,"
counselled the Doctor, "forget day by day until the recording soul
beneath your mind is clean. Therefore--work, forget, be new!"...
A self-important young man, much concerned with himself, once asked the
Master:
"Doctor, what is the regimen that you would recommend to me?"