It is raining again; but I think our friends had time to reach their
homes before it began. We have had a happy day, notwithstanding its
dull promise. I read an Easter sermon,--"_Because it was not possible
that he should be holden of it_." The text itself is more than a
thousand sermons.
* * * * *
The name of the family that was arriving this morning when I left off
writing is Linton. They are from Western Virginia. They stayed with us
for an hour after the reading was over. Our interest in them is still
increased. Winford came again. I asked him to stay; he declined; but I
think he was pleased at being invited. The Hanthams came, mother and
daughter. They arrived at the last moment, and went at the closing of
the book. The corner in which the table stood was curtained off, so
that there was no visible sign of unusual hospitality; but they had
perhaps heard of the custom of the day. Mrs. Hantham would not have
been inexorable; but she was summoned away by a gesture a little too
imperative, perhaps, from a daughter to her mother. Davis Barton came
on horseback, without his father. I set him off again at one o'clock;
for the sky threatened, and his road home was a difficult one at best.
But let me go back to last Sunday. I was just at the breaking-up of
our little assembly by the pine.
The Lintons--they had no name then--were the first to go. The Hanthams
were the next. Then the others dropped off, one by one and two by two:
some taking leave as if they felt themselves guests; others
withdrawing silently, as considering themselves only part of a
congregation. Barton went round shaking hands with one and another. I
was surprised to see him show this attention to Winford. Barton likes
to be well with the world,--that is, with as much of it as he
respects; but he respects himself, and does not seek popularity at the
expense of sincerity. I am confirmed in my belief that there is good
in Winford.
When all the rest were gone, Barton came up to have a talk with the
Doctor, for whom he evidently has a great admiration. Harry remained
with Karl and Fritz, who were holding him in conversation, apparently
on some important matter,--old Hans, a critical listener, completing
the group.
Barton inquired after the success of the Doctor's late excursions, and
complimented him warmly on his powers of endurance, which seemed
almost miraculous in a city man. This Doctor Borrow freely admitted,
declaring that he had hardly ever undertaken an expedition with a
party of people which had not turned out a disappointment,--that he
seldom, indeed, found even a single companion who could walk with him,
or who could rough it as he could.
"You've got one now, though," said Barton.
"Oh, for that," the Doctor answered, laughing, "Harry is a degree
beyond me. I can bear as much as any man, but I know that I'm bearing,
and like to give myself credit for it. Harry never feels either heat
or cold or damp or dust. Nothing disagreeable is able to get at him.
There is no such thing as hard fare for him; and if he knows what
fatigue is, he has never confessed to it."
"And yet I suppose he's something of a scholar, too?" asked Barton;
and he looked thoughtfully down at his son, who always kept close to
him, and who had been drinking all this in eagerly.
As the Doctor hesitated to reply, Barton added,--"I asked him, that
day you were at Quickster, if he had read a book that I had seen a
good deal of talk about in the newspapers, and he said, No, that he
had hardly read anything yet."
"Of course, of course, at his age! Still, you need not precisely take
him at his own estimate. His modesty misleads, as much as some
people's conceit does the other way. He is not always up to the
fashion of the moment in literature; does not try to read everything
that is talked about; but he has read the best of the best."
"Is that the best way, do you think?" asked Barton, anxiously.
"What do you think yourself?" asked the Doctor.
"I should think it must be a good one."
"It depends altogether on what you want to have," said the Doctor,
following the track of Barton's thought, and fixing a searching look
on Davis, as if to ascertain what material was there. "The queen-bee
is fed on special and choice food from the first; if you want a
king-man, you must follow the same course."
"You've seen some fine countries abroad, Sir?" said Barton, presently.
"Any finer than ours?"
"Finer than yours? No. You've a fine country here, Mr. Barton, and a
fresh country: Nature stands on her own merits, as yet. No
'associations' here; no 'scenes of historical interest' for sightseers
to gape at and enthusiasts to dream over. You have your Indian mounds,
to be sure; but these are simple objects of curiosity, and don't exact
any tribute of feeling: you've no 'glorious traditions,' and I assure
you, it is reposing to be out of their reach."
"We've only what we bring with us," answered Barton, a little touched;
"we don't leave our country when we come here."
"Colvil looks now as if he had something in reserve. But I'm not
alarmed. If there had been anything about here that had a tinge of
poetry, I should have heard of it long ago from Harry. Most people
think this sort of folly is in good taste only in Europe. But Harry
brought it home with him in full force. Before he'd been on land a
week, he'd seen Concord and Lexington."
"Had he, though?" cried Barton. "I am an Acton boy, you know," he
added, in a subdued tone, a little abashed by his own vivacity.
"Upon my word, Dudley has waked up the old-fashioned patriot in you
already."--Harry had now come up, and made one of the Doctor's
listeners.--"I saw he was getting hold of you that morning at
Quickster, when you were talking up your State to us. You were
beginning to feel that you had something to do about it. It isn't the
country that belongs to her sons, according to him, but her sons that
belong to the country. Take care! give him time, and he'll make a
convert of you."
"I will give him time," answered Barton, laughing.
"Don't be too confident of yourself. I have to stand on my guard,
myself, sometimes. And don't be misled into supposing that his notions
are the fashion in the part of the world we come from, or in any other
civilized part of it. Harry, you were born some hundreds of years too
late or too early. Fervor in anything, but above all in public
service, is out of place in the world of our day.
"'Love your country; wish it well;
Not with too intense a care:
Let it suffice, that, when it fell,
Thou its ruin didst not share.'
"That's modern patriotism, the patriotism of Europe. Ours is of the
same strain, only modified by our circumstances. Our Mother-land is a
good housekeeper. She spreads a plentiful table, and her sons
appreciate it. She wants no sentimental affection, and receives none.
She is not obliged to ask for painful sacrifice; and lucky for her
that she is not!"