Confessions of Boyhood Part 5

Doubtless it was not the intention of my sister at this time to educate me. Perhaps she saw nothing in me worthy of it. I do not much wonder at her conviction, if such it was, as I look at a daguerreotype of myself taken about that period, a round head, mostly hair, a low forehead, a pair of round eyes, thick nose and lips and short neck, altogether just such a solid, stolid child as one would expect to see from the country, bred in the sun and cold, and fed on brown bread and milk. My being with my sister, and a pupil in her school was a temporary expedient until a place could be found for me. At length it was found, a situation in a dry goods store, where I could earn my board and clothing. Thus without warning I fell completely out of the ranks of the elect and again returned to servitude as a shop boy, a runner of errands, a builder of fires and floor-sweeper.

SHOP BOY

In country stores the man or boy behind the counter was an enviable person. Many boys had no higher ambition than to be a store-keeper. I was now behind the counter, and although there was nothing in a dry goods shop to interest me as in the country store, with its varied a.s.sortment of goods, tools, crockery and candies, I felt rather proud of my position, especially when permitted to wait on a customer. He seemed an inferior sort of a person, and I had no idea at first of conciliating him and making a sale. It was not then the custom to observe a fixed price and simply show the goods; but clerks were expected and instructed to use persuasion, to expatiate on quality and beauty, and to take less than they first asked. The cost price was marked with secret characters; the selling price was variable. The more you could get out of a gullible customer, the better; and he who could get the most was the smartest clerk. A thrifty purchaser would beat down the price little by little, the sharp clerk yielding with many protestations until a last offer was made, when, with feigned hesitation, the clerk would wrap up the goods.

One thinks he has bought a cheap bargain, the other figures the profit and laughs in his sleeve. It was not my particular duty to wait upon customers except in a rush of trade, or early in the day before the other clerks had arrived. I opened the store in the morning, swept the floors and sidewalk, dusted the counters, filled the lamps, and in winter built the fire. During the day I ran on errands, delivered goods and was the f.a.g of the proprietor and his two clerks. I soon chafed under the confinement, and when sent out of the store I made no haste to return; the farther away the bundle was to be delivered the better I liked it, and I always took the longest way, loitering about, making acquaintance with strange boys, dogs and any wayside apple or pear tree.

If possible I skirted the region of the wharves and the rivers, where I always found something interesting going on, a vessel arriving or leaving, sailors chaffing and fighting. Sometimes I received a small fee for delivering the bundle at the door of a lady, but this happened rarely; it was not the custom, and seldom was I even thanked. I had only two memorable adventures on my travels; one was an attack on my breeches by a savage dog, and the other--shall I confess it--almost as disagreeable. A young and handsome woman, whom I had often seen in the store, and knew me, I imagine, better than I knew her, called me into the house with my package, set me on her knees, petted and kissed me, and asked me a lot of questions about one of the clerks. I have reason to believe her tender behavior was meant rather for her beloved clerk than for me. I reported nothing on my return, only, on being reproved for my long absence, I said, "Miss--had kept me," which made the clerk look sheepish. I was not sent to her house again. The clerks, however, did use me a good deal as an innocent pander in their various intrigues with the pretty and fast girls of the town. I carried notes, concealed in dry goods bundles, and brought back answers in my jacket pocket, which I was instructed to deliver on the sly.

The proprietor of the store to whom I was bound, and in whose family I lived, was a tall, thin, sallow-faced man. He had a nervous manner, but he was not unkind to me. He clothed and fed me well. He chewed tobacco and was br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with funny stories, funny and usually indelicate.

I heard much swearing, too, and I began to think it the proper thing to try to be wicked myself. I was greatly attached to the two clerks, and they were my models in everything. One of them was also the bookkeeper of the establishment as well as a salesman. He dressed after the mode in trig, close-fitting suits; his pantaloons were like tights, and only kept on his legs by straps under his boots. He played and fooled with me in idle hours. The other clerk was exceedingly sober, often melancholy, seldom smiled and had nothing to do with me, rarely speaking to me. I stood in awe and admiration of him. He wrote poetry for the local newspaper, and I think he felt above us all, and above his position. He belonged to a distinguished family, and why he happened to be a dry goods clerk I never knew. He seemed as much out of his natural place as I. How restless and penned up I felt at times no words can tell. The lean dog with freedom, is much more to be envied than the chained dog with a golden collar. It was a small store of only three counters, and during unoccupied hours there was nothing on the shelves or in drawers with which I could amuse myself. In mere desperation for something to occupy myself I counted spools of cotton and silk, unrolled and rolled again pieces of goods, and many a hot summer afternoon, when both the shops and the streets were deserted, I caught flies and put them in a bottle, and then smoked them to death.

I now seldom saw my former playmates. Their families traded at a much larger and more fashionable store. Our customers were of an humbler cla.s.s, mainly from the suburbs and adjoining villages. But a boy does not long remain companionless, be there another boy within reach. I became intimate first with a lad in a grocery store, whereby there was considerable access to sugar, raisins and other sweets; through him, together with others in similar situations, I was made a member of their secret society, having been tested as to strength, reliability and other qualifications. Our badge was a red morocco star, worn under the left lappet of the vest. The only purpose of the club that I could ever discover, was to lick every boy who did not belong to it! I was expected to celebrate my initiation by challenging three non-members, which I proceeded to do, licked two and met my match in the third. Then I was warned to attack only boys smaller than myself. The morals of the club were meant to be on a par with those of much older boys, but signally failed. We were as bad as we knew how to be; none of us had the courage or the enterprise to do the naughty things which so excited our emulation in our elders. However, we insulted and beat all the goody-good boys in our way, swore small oaths, smoked and swaggered until sick with nausea, and crowning achievement, learned what a Tom and Jerry tasted like, enticed merely by the name. It was not until we had Ike Bromley for a leader, that we fairly succeeded in being as bad as we wished. He had an instinct for mischief and deviltry, and a way with him that led captive the heart and devotion of all boys. Daring and cool, he could carry a sober, innocent face which would disarm a detective and charm a deacon. Whoever got caught or punished, he always escaped. No one could have guessed at this time that he would become one of the most brilliant journalists of his day, the wittiest and most engaging of men at a dinner table, a boon companion, and beloved friend. Money was very scarce with us; what little we had we earned in various outside ways, in doing extra errands or selling old rubbers, old boots, copper and bra.s.s.

In fact we were the scavengers of the town, and had the run of all the cellars. We managed to sneak or steal our way into most of the shows that visited the town. For some reason, now quite incomprehensible, the wharves were our most common rendezvous. And for what object we spent our small funds on raw clams, eaten out of the sh.e.l.l, and doused with pepper sauce, (which, for my part, I could with the greatest difficulty swallow, bringing tears to my eyes, and burning in my throat for a week after), I as little know, but now suppose it was in imitation of the rough men and sailors about the piers with whom we consorted, and whom we wished to impress with our manliness. Indeed, with all the rough characters about the streets we made friends and aped their manners as much as we could, two or three notoriously fast, rich young men being our particular heroes. Nothing saved us from the realization of our ideals but our extreme youth and native innocence, and perhaps some lurking sense that we were playing at vice, with fire that would not burn and water that would not drown. There was one thing we were ambitious to do, yet could not screw our courage to the sticking point; we wanted to get drunk to see how it felt. Either a Tom and Jerry had not sufficient potency, or we could never find the bottom of the gla.s.s before our stomachs rebelled, for we only paid the penalty in a penitential headache without the fun of the debauch.

I realized all the while the peril of my ways in case they should come to light, which only served to increase the excitement, though now and then I had some serious moments. Several times I barely escaped discovery, and our pranks often defied punishment because of our number and the ease with which we could shoulder off the blame on one another.

I now thought of the children of my sister's school, with whom I had recently been so intimate, with contempt as far beneath me in knowing how to have real sport.

Although I continued to be the menial of the store, I had acquired some knowledge of the business; could snap a piece of broadcloth to show its firm quality and nap, hang dress goods in proper folds over my arm to give an idea how they would look when made up, and talk quite glibly on the cheapness of our wares in comparison with those of our compet.i.tors.

I could see that the small boy in a jacket, and only two heads higher than the counter, amused the men customers with his brag attempt at being a salesman, and that the women smiled down upon him approvingly--all of which he took as a compliment to his success; for successful he often was, to the surprise of the older clerks. With what pride did I enter my sales on a slate kept for the purpose under the cash drawer. I surmised that the women sometimes bought goods just to encourage the boy. The clerks laughed and made fun of me telling me it was my rosy cheeks that sold the goods. Young ladies frequented the shop for no other purpose than to chat and flirt with the clerks, and one I remember always kissed me at any favorable chance. How I hated my red checks, and tried my best to rub out the color. It was a comfort to be told I should outgrow it, and then the girls would not care for me. For two long years I had ceased to care for them. It was even with some shame that I thought of my Launas, they, who later in life, have formed many an ideal of loveliness.

It is said the child in the womb pa.s.ses through all animal forms in its growth from the germ to birth. Whether any incipient wings have been observed I have not heard. In much the same way the boy represents in his growth the different stages of civilization from the savage to the civilized man. Some time the average boy typifies the Indian, the cowboy, prizefighter, pirate, sailor, soldier; and all cla.s.ses of rough, wild men are wonderfully attractive to him. He wishes to be like them and plays at being one of them. For more than a year I was greatly attached to the ruffians on the wharves, and to such of the Montville Indians as I could make friends with. A wandering party of Indians from the Pen.o.bscot tribe had their tents pitched for a whole summer just outside the city, with whom I became intimate, and spent my leisure time with them. I made my errands go their way, however long the circuit. I should have gone away with them, would they have had me. To live in a tent and shoot with a bow became to me the ideal of life. Strange it is that the most vivid memory of that episode remaining with me is the peculiar smell of the Indians; but it was not then offensive to me.

All these propensities were greatly stimulated by reading at this time the Wandering Jew of Eugene Sue. I had found the volume, a paper covered pamphlet edition, in a drawer in the store. I carried it home secretly and read it at night. After I was supposed to be in bed and asleep, and the house still, I used to get up, partly dress, light my lamp and read often until midnight or as long as the oil held out. I doubt if any one knows the supreme pleasure and excitement of reading, who has not read a book surrept.i.tiously. All the mysteries and horrors of the Wandering Jew entered into my soul, and while it opened a scene and actions utterly new to me, it sobered me far beyond anything that had ever happened to me. About the same time I had many gloomy days and nights of terror from having seen the bodies of twenty-five drowned pa.s.sengers from the wreck of a steamboat which plied between Norwich and New York City. Our poet clerk took me with him to see them the morning they were brought to the dock on another steamboat of the same line. They were laid out in rows on the main deck, frozen stiff, for it was the winter season, covered with sand and particles of ice, their flesh dreadfully lacerated and blue, their features contorted into ghastly shapes. Among them were two men whom we knew well, frequenters of our store. I clung to the hand of the clerk, and should have fainted, had he not taken me away immediately. He himself was overcome, and his sad face was sadder and longer for many days. The whole city was in gloom and mourning. A revival, which was in progress in one of the Baptist churches, added greatly to its converts in consequence of the accident, and the presence of death in such near and fearful form.

PISTOL MAKER

At length Fortune took a new turn at her wheel. Suddenly the store door closed behind me; broom, oil can, coal hod and scissors knew me no more.

I rejoiced in my release and in the prospect of new scenes, new faces and pleasures. What was to be my occupation did not give me one thought; I had as yet no choice, no preference. Wherever there were boys was my world and my trade.

Two of my sister's influential patrons, who had been instrumental in bringing her to Norwich, removed their business to Worcester, Ma.s.s. She followed them, and, as usual, I followed her. The business of her patrons was the manufacture of pistols, a patented, six-barrelled, self-c.o.c.king revolver, the first of its kind, I believe, ever invented, and a wonder in its day. The whole six barrels revolved on a rod running through their center, and by one and the same ratchet movement the hammer was raised and the chambers of the barrel thrown into position to receive the discharge from a percussion cap. There was a great demand for these pistols in the South and West. It was, I suppose, on account of my sister's intimacy with the families of these manufacturers that a place was found for me in their works.

See me now no longer in a linen shirt and brown broadcloth jacket, but again in blue jean overalls, with grimy, oily hands and dirty face, shut in walls from which was no escape for ten hours each day. The lathes, hand tools, forges and engine which operated the machinery were novel and interesting to me at first. I was the only boy in the establishment.

The workmen, all skilled mechanics, were a remarkably fine body of men.

They earned large wages, lived quite comfortably, and were prominent in their several circles and churches. One of them became Lieut. Gov. of Ma.s.s. I was placed under the charge of the foreman of the first floor where the heavier part of the material of the pistol was prepared. I did the odd jobs of the room, worked a punching machine and managed the lathe that turned the rough outside of the pistol barrel. My master took an active personal interest in me and was very minute and painstaking in his instructions. He was a very pious man and lost no opportunity of exhorting me to seek religion and become converted. It made no impression on me; I understood no word he said. Besides, just the same words had always been familiar to me and had never conveyed any meaning to my simple ears. It did not trouble me to be called a sinner; it never occurred to me to question whether I was or not. In short in my innocence and indifference, I was a perfect type of the thing itself, as understood by the church. But when my master invited me to go a-fishing on some half holiday, that was a very different sort of a text, which I well understood. Alas, when the fish did not bite, it gave an uncomfortable opportunity for a little exhortation. In addition to the work in the shop I spent much time in the office, where I was employed in putting the last touches to the pistols before being packed for delivery. I burnished the silver plates, set in the handles, cleaned and oiled the chambers, hammers and nipples, and polished the whole with fine chamois skin. Thus I had a hand in the beginning and completion of the construction of a pistol, and knew pretty well all the intermediate operations. I also obtained an inkling of the way the business was conducted by hearing the conversation and discussions of the proprietors. I heard many secrets. Some of them confused my small glimmerings of moral sense. It seemed to me that I had known the same sort of obliquities among boys in the swapping of jacknives. I heard the bookkeeper say one day, "business is business; this is no Sunday school." I had bewildering thoughts. Was it possible these pistols were not what they seemed and would not kill a man? For I knew they were sold mostly in the South for the fighting of duels. I longed to try one on a cat. The sun rose and set on my suspicions, with never a solution. To this day I cannot rid myself of an innate doubt when I make a purchase.

I expect to be cheated.

I seemed in a fair way at last of acquiring a trade, and it might have been, except for the accident of my boarding place. For there I first came in contact with books and students. It was not a regular boarding house, save for three months in the winter. I was taken into the family on account of its a.s.sociation with mine long before in Bellingham. The master of the house had formerly been the clergyman of that town, but was now a botanic-eclectic physician and general medical professor of a school, which held one winter session in his house. It was attended by only a dozen students. Lobelia was Prof. ----'s strong point. Everybody in the house was put through a course of lobelia with a heavy sweat, sometimes to cure a slight indisposition, but more often as an experiment. My only escape from the drudgery of the workshop was in feigning sickness and undergoing the Professor's panacea. This confined me to the bed for a day and gave me another day for recovery, when I could be about and enjoy myself. These sweatings and retchings took the color out of my cheeks so that when I returned to the shop it was easily believed that I had been ill, and, with considerable sympathy, my master also warned me of the brevity and uncertainty of life and the necessity of preparing for the day of wrath. Little did he know how all this could be escaped by a good dose of lobelia.

It was a curious life I led at this time between my regular occupation, lobelia, the dissecting room of the professor and frequent religious exhortations. I was immensely delighted by the secrets of the bas.e.m.e.nt cellar, where, in winter, the cadavers were kept I became accustomed to the sight of them, and frequently inspected them when alone, curious to see the internal structure of a human body, for until that time I was not conscious of any internal structure of the human body. Hands and feet were the epitome of my physiology. The whole business of dissection was conducted in the most clandestine manner, although the subjects were obtained from Boston and were, no doubt, honestly procured. There was probably some professional reason for their being all women. I know not why, but I seemed to be trusted by the Professor and his little band of students, and when cadavers arrived at the railroad station by express, I was often sent to watch them until they could be removed. They came in large casks packed in oats.

I had little time to make acquaintance with boys, as I was not allowed on the street in the evening, and Sunday was strictly observed. Nor did I know any girls of my own age. With the pretty waitress of the Professor's dining-room, some years older than myself, I had occasional ardent encounters on back stairs and in dark entries. I was less embarra.s.sed by them than formerly and began to play the beau. As usual, only girls much older than myself attracted me. I began to have the same experience with regard to men. There were even some moments when I dimly realized why some men were respected and honored. For the proprietors of the pistol factory I had a deep reverence. One of them, the inventor of the self-c.o.c.king pistol, was the model of a reserved, dignified gentleman. I saw much of him in the office attending to his business, deciding and despatching it with few words. The other member of the firm was in complete contrast to his partner. His round, jolly face was always wreathed in smiles, a joke, a pun, or story always forthcoming, and business the last thing to be considered. He was a college graduate and a poet of local reputation. It is singular in my boyhood how often I happened to be dropped in the vicinity of small poets. This gentleman was, like myself, a native of Bellingham, and on that account he sometimes noticed me and made inquiries after my well-being. He seemed to me a very great man, chiefly because he wrote poetry and had it printed in books. I imagine that he expected me to remain a mechanic, and had little thought of the influence he was unconsciously exerting over the future. Nor did I myself recognize it, until years later when my first article appeared in a magazine; feeling some pride in this grand, world-moving effort, I sent it to him as a lawful tribute. Time had not been kind to him; he had almost lost the use of his hand for writing and was using some sort of mechanical contrivance for that purpose. But the fire of the proselyter still burned in him, and he ended his note of acknowledgment with the old familiar query about the salvation of my soul.

THE AWAKENING

Having no boy a.s.sociates I began to cultivate the Professor's students.

I spent my leisure time with them, and, through their conversation, entered a new world. Words are too cold a medium to convey the change that came over me, for at the same time that I began in some measure to appreciate the learning and general knowledge of these young men I began to be conscious of my own ignorance, I became aware that I knew nothing, never had, and probably never should. Consequently I was more depressed than stimulated. I reflected on the conversations I heard among the students, and the pithy, sententious sayings of the Professor at the table. He usually settled all discussions and table talk with a witticism or apt quotation, I was about to say with a toothpick; for he had a curious habit of digging his thumb and finger into his vest pocket and fumbling for one, jabbing it into one side of his mouth and delivering his wisdom from the other side. His wife who sat opposite to him, tall, lean and prim always frowned on any levity at the table. It was her opinion that we should eat our food in silence and as quickly as possible, so that, as she often remarked, the table could be cleared and the kitchen work not be delayed. To her great distress the conversation often became so lively that the meal dragged, and various were her devices for bringing back our attention to the business at hand. I had some sense of the humor of the situation, and as I never took part in the talk, I amused myself by exchanging winks with the pretty waitress.

She was the only person in the house near my own age. We were very good friends; she cut me a little larger piece of pie than she served to the others, darned my socks and called me "Sonny," and "curly head." She was not averse to an arm around her waist, and I repaid her kindness in the only currency I had--a kiss. However, I more enjoyed the society of the students than I did hers. I could be in their company without being noticed. No word escaped me and slowly, then, at length, overwhelmingly, there was borne in upon me the crushing sense of the difference between these young men and myself, their interests, expectations, future careers and mine. Yet I saw no way out of my present situation. The bitter seeds of unrest, and ambitions without opportunities, were at the same time planted in a fruitful soil. When the soul of man is awakened, not one but all its faculties awaken together. Hitherto the memory of my past life had no existence and no interest. It was a blank page.

All at once, when most cast down and discouraged in my thought of the future, that blank page of the past became illuminated and full of delightful pictures and memories. I was entirely overcome by them. They all pointed back to Bellingham, which I had not thought of since leaving it. The attraction to the place became irresistible. It seemed as if there I could recover myself and begin my life over again, continuing all its joys, reuniting all its companionships. It is obvious to me now that this was an evasive yet ingenuous effort to escape from myself, an awakening that had come to me, which I knew not how to meet. I revolved several plans for getting back to my native place and becoming a farmer.

None of these were practicable, and I determined to go, trusting to chance to make the way plain. But even the going had difficulties. I solved them by setting out. I crossed the bridge before I came to it, and all the way was easy. I could take no scrip for the journey, for I had none; neither two coats, for I had but one; nor yet could I take the blessing of any one, for to no one save the waitress did I entrust my intentions. I set out on foot, and once on the road, I felt as free and joyous as a bird. There were twenty-five miles to cover, and I expected to do them from sun to sun of a late April day. Sometimes I ran for a mile or two from sheer eagerness to arrive. Most of the way I sauntered along thinking of nothing, overflowing with animal spirits. Enough the freedom, the open sky, the earth, which had been lost to me for three years. It did not occur to me that I was running away, not from outward conditions, but from myself; that at last I had come to the not unusual crisis in the life of boys. However, it was a very mild form of runaway, twenty-five miles, and its objective my old home; not the lure of the sea nor the army, nor yet the adventures of the dime novel hidden in the hay mow. No, it was none of these, but strangely in contrast to them, an impulsive, pa.s.sionate awakening of memory, an attempted escape from a future, which had been shown to me as in a vision, and from which I shrank in fear and despair.

At noon I was half way between Grafton and Upton and I rested on a high bank with my back against a stone wall. There I could see the church spires of Milford town, and beyond, the land fell away toward Bellingham. I ate some food that the waitress had given me for the journey, and took the road again. Soon I was in Milford. The remainder of the way was very familiar. I knew every house, rock and tree; yet everything looked smaller than I antic.i.p.ated. I hurried on as I wished to arrive at Uncle Lyman's before his supper time, which I knew was invariably at five o'clock the year round. Uncle Lyman's house, to which I was going, was the house in which I was born. He had been my father's most intimate friend. The house had always been like a home to me, even after my family had one of their own. As I hurried along I saw again the house, one-storied, and the elm tree, with its branches extending over the roof, and arching the highway. I suddenly remembered the flat stone that had been set in its bole for a seat, which the tree had so overgrown that, as a child, I could sit there and be almost hidden from sight; and the brook which flowed through the fields near the house, where the gra.s.s was always a darker green along its course, even when it dried up; and the windings so many and sharp that they seemed to write letters when one looked down upon them from a little elevation. I have sat in a tree and fancied I spelled out words in the green gra.s.s.

As I came nearer the house I became more and more agitated about the welcome that awaited me. It was friendly, yet surprised, and not as warm as I had expected. Had they changed? Or was it I? Certainly I did not feel at home. This was the house most dear to me, this the settle where I had sat when my legs did not reach the floor. How familiar sounded the voices I now heard, one deep and penetrating, the other a thin falsetto; yet I did not feel the comfort I had imagined that I should. At the table were the same dishes I remembered; the taste was gone. After supper I went out and tried to sit in my old seat in the elm. It was too small for me now; alas, it seemed to disown me, to have cast me out. The barn which once looked so enormous appeared insignificant. I went to bed unreconciled and unhappy. Yet how can a healthy boy awake in the morning dejected? Night, pitying night, which knows how the evil days succeed each other, hinders their sad return and hides in her oblivious mantle their weariness, their sorrows and their disappointments. I was awake at dawn, and yesterday was forgotten. The sun shone across the tops of the forest oaks just beginning to show their red buds. There was dew on the gra.s.s and a sweet, earthy smell in the air. Robins were calling everywhere and blue birds flying low from fence to fence. The little brook was full to the brim; the lush gra.s.s laid flat along its borders.

I found the places where I used to erect my miniature mill wheels, and the remains of the little dam. Here was already antiquity. I did not need Egypt or Greece. Childhood contains their whole story. The season was unusually early; the great elm was becoming misty with the ruffled edges of its unfolding leaves. The outermost sprays began to drop from increasing weight of sap and leaf bud. Catkins hung on birch and willow and alder and the ancient bed of tansy had a new growth of three inches.

Down the hill toward Beaver Pond, and along the meadow cl.u.s.ters of ferns were leading up their brides and bridegrooms in opposite pairs with bowed heads. It was twenty days before the usual pasturing time; but Uncle Lyman was turning his cattle out for half a day to keep the gra.s.s from becoming too rank and sour. I helped him drive the cows, oxen and heifers to the pasture. How they gamboled, kicked up their heels and tossed their heads. No more bow and stanchion, no more dry hay and confinement for them. I shared in their exhilaration, having been myself a prisoner for the past six months, and as we drove them afield, could hardly keep from dancing and shouting. "There, my son," said Uncle Lyman, "let me see if you have forgotten how to put up the bars."

I lifted them into place with a will, and thought, this is the life for me. Emboldened by his question I opened my mind in a roundabout way as to helping him all summer on the farm. He saw my drift at once and told me he could not hire me, nor any other boy; he must have a man if anybody, and that I must stick to my trade.

"You can stay a few days," he continued, "and then you had better go back to it," and as if to soften his advice he added, "The first cloudy day we will try for pickerel, though it is rather too early."

This might have been discouraging and a dreadful check to my plans, but by some sudden transition wholly inexplicable, I had already half given them up. My discontent and melancholy had been exhausted in the running away; and a few hours experience of disenchantment reconciled me to my lot.

There is no human experience more acutely painful than when one awakens to the fact that he is a person, an ego, unrelated to people or things, with no real claim to a.s.sert save that of habit or a.s.sociations. The sense of isolation and loneliness is at first overpowering, and vainly does he try to attach himself to former objects and environment. The awakening may come in mature years, it may come in youth; but at what time it appears, the old heavens and the old earth crumble and the soul faces its own destiny and recognizes that it must walk alone.

I was surprised to see how the face of things had altered, when, in the course of the day, I hunted up the two playmates with whom I had formerly been most intimate. I met a cold reception. We could not find our way back to the old ground, the old innocent relation. As for Launa Probana, I did not so much as inquire for her. Time and change had not yet made her distinct and dear. After this I enjoyed myself very well for a few days, excusing my prank with the notion that it was a vacation. We went fishing, but the pickerel would not come from their hiding places. In the evenings Uncle Lyman and his wife at their several sides of the fireplace, she with her knitting, and he with his pipe, and I in a corner of the settle, talked of the days when my father was alive, and of the labors they underwent to make a good farm, clearing the brush and stones and building the fences. They told me of my birth and my father's joy at having a son. Then when I inquired for Nahum, their son, whom I remembered as a young man, when I was a child, a sudden silence fell over the great kitchen. There was no reply and the mother's head drooped over her work and tears fell upon it. I wondered, but did not dare to speak, and shortly I climbed the attic stairs to my bed. The next day Uncle Lyman cautioned me not to mention Nahum again before his wife. He said he had run away, and they knew not where he was. A guilty pang struck my heart; I became conscious of what I had done, and thought perhaps at that very moment my sister might be weeping for me.

Nothing was now wanting to complete the failure of my escapade, and I was as eager to run back as I had been to run away. Memories, touched by imagination, had come to naught in contact with reality. I learned my first lesson in keeping it and ideals in their proper place. A bird in the bush is worth two in the hand! Utopia is a far country, toward which to travel is better than to arrive. It was some years before I restored the Bellingham of my imagination. If experience be nothing but suffering then I had experienced; over this transaction therefore I grant an act of oblivion.

The return to Worcester was tedious. I was in no hurry, dreading my reception; what should I say, what should I answer? I revolved many explanations, but each I could think of contained a falsehood. With all my waywardness I was never a good liar; the lie was manifest in my face and I could feel it there as something not myself. I concluded to say nothing and not attempt any apology. This proved the wiser plan. Few questions were asked; reproachful looks were to be expected. Some penalty I paid in the shop also; harder tasks were set for me and I was kept more strictly to my work. The students of Prof. Lobelia were now gone, the sessions of his medical school closing in April, and the house seemed lonesome. In the course of the summer there came into the family a young man who was preparing himself to be a missionary. For the first time I heard of Greek and Latin books. The young man was studying both; it excited my curiosity. Here were other things of which I knew nothing, and I began at this period to be oppressed continually by the more and more frequent discovery of the extent of my ignorance. Luckily I knew how to read. My rustic mentors had warned me against girls, but never of books. I found in the Professor's library a queer a.s.sortment of odds and ends of learned works. There was a shelf of theology and missionary records, doubtless collected when he was a minister; many shelves of medical books, and a small number of miscellaneous works, histories and cyclopaedias. Among these latter I chanced one day to take down Whelpley's Compend of History. All that I can remember of it now are its stories of ancient heroes, Alexander, Caesar, the greater and lesser men of Greek and Roman annals. That of Alexander made the deepest impression upon me; I know not why, perhaps his conquests, his glory, his youth. I scarcely knew before what the word hero meant. It was a mark of utter inexperience and a visionary temperament that my ambition should have been so aroused by the career of an ancient hero instead of the man who had invented a self-c.o.c.king pistol. It was to be two thousand years behind the times, in an age when half a generation is sufficient to write you down as belated and not wanted. However, it is well to have a hero in youth, an example, a spur, a Bucephalus, although one gets many a fall before he reaches the goal, and I can date my desire to know more and to achieve something from the reading of that brief compend of ancient history.

If ever a man finds a path to the true life, he experiences two awakenings, the intellectual and the spiritual, and it matters little which is first. In Worcester I stumbled upon the two books in the s.p.a.ce of three years, which led me from darkness to day. The first was that I have just described; the other was of somewhat the same character, Emerson's Representative Men.

The beech at last divides the rock in whose invisible seam its tiny seed was sown. I now began to spend all my leisure time in reading, and to be more and more aware of my unprofitable and aimless life. Books carried me this way and that. I was wholly overcome by them as by a strong personal influence, especially when I read Byron. The student whom I have mentioned had a few books of poetry, and among them the complete works of Byron in one thick volume bound in calf, and printed on cheap, thin paper. He himself had written verses before his conversion. He now looked upon his poets as witnesses of his former sinful state. He wanted to sell them to me with all their sins, and eventually I did buy his copy of Byron for fifty cents, after borrowing and becoming so enamoured of it that I felt I could not live without the book. The Byronic moods and fashion I imitated to the best of my ability. I began to turn down my Sunday linen collar which had stood up to my ears, and to wear my hair long and careless; whereas formerly, I had brushed it back and upward as straight as possible, after the manner of ministers and school-masters, now I let it hang as it would over my forehead and neck.

Melancholy was the wear, and for this, in my present temper, not much effort was required. I did not, as Alexander and Chrysostom had done, put my favorite author under my pillow; but often having to sleep on the floor, this volume of Byron served as my pillow. In turn one book after another held me like a captive lover, and I endeavored to conform my life to what I read, no sooner enthralled by one than I found another more enchanting. I formed a taste for reading that has lasted all my life, in which, if there be any education, any mental discipline, is the only consistent part of my development. Our critics and literary mentors extol such books as are fit to be read a second time. I have a still better reason for a second reading, because I forget the first. When I strictly examine myself I cannot say that the contents of any book remain long with me, not even the Greek and Latin grammars over which I spent years of terrible toil. Somewhat survives the years, vague, inexact and never at hand when wanted. Enough for me that I know pretty well where to find what I have once read. I have been drawn to the authors, who have written especially for me, by a certain, recurrent impulse and appet.i.te. Then I can go to the shelf in the dark. I find that memory is a faculty over which we cannot use the whip and spur to much purpose. It goes its own gait through barren or fertile fields, gathering many a weed with its flowers. How many trifles one carries through life from childhood days, by no effort of his own, things of the senses mostly, when these were unwritten tablets and blank for the first impressions. Upon these tablets are indelibly retained a certain box, a spool, a pair of stairs, the smell of a neighbor's house, when, with all my efforts, I cannot recover my father's voice and countenance, nor many another thing that would make a golden treasury of memory. Instead, it is more like the lumber of an old attic, or the contents of a boy's pocket. From much reading I began to observe the difference between written and spoken languages, and to single out the people who used the best speech in their common conversation. I tried myself to talk like the books I read. Never before had I noticed any difference between men as to education. All were on the same plane, only separable by some personal relation to myself. Little by little they became distinct so that I attempted to cla.s.sify them in a crude and bookish way. Character and the moral point of view, with their manifold applications to life, were as yet hidden from me. I judged men and women by their speech, even by their p.r.o.nunciation, and thought that I could detect the accent of the educated. In short, education became all in all to my mind; the one desirable possession, and its end the writing of books, its reward fame.

As was natural I tried to write, but my rude penmanship, my inability to spell the words, which I was ambitious to use, the difficulty of beginning a sentence, and still greater perplexity of ending it, completely disgusted me and filled me with despair. It was more evident than ever that education was the ladder for my enterprise. There was, at that time, in Worcester a learned blacksmith, who knew fifty languages; he might have been an example to me; yet I had never heard of him. I knew only the great men of Whelpley's ancient history, and the poet Byron. Schools and colleges a.s.sumed great and greater importance. I saw no way of educating myself: I expected it to be done for me, as everything thus far had been. I was nearly sixteen years old, barely able to read and write, but no more advanced than the average boy of ten or twelve.

STUDENT LIFE

After much solicitation I persuaded my sister to send me for one term to the Worcester Academy. This was a school then in the suburbs of the city under the patronage of the Baptists. It had formerly been a manual labor school; that is, students could pay their expenses by labor on a farm belonging to the inst.i.tution. This feature had been given up, and it was conducted like other inst.i.tutions of a similar character. It was essentially a country academy, intended primarily for youths who, having gone through the common schools, desired some further education at small expense. One or two terms were considered sufficient to round off the culture of farmers' sons. The school pretended to teach Latin and Greek, and occasionally sent a student to college. A few, having acquired a taste for study, remained long enough to fit themselves to become teachers of common schools, or to enter one of the professions, which at that time did not place so much importance as at present upon lengthy preparation and a degree. The expenses were as light as was the fare.

The rooms were scantily furnished; chairs, tables and beds were in the last stages of dilapidation from the rough usage of a generation of students. No one felt or was held responsible for their condition. Some of the students boarded themselves in the dormitory, which did not add to the tidiness and order of their rooms. Books, clothing, plates and pots, wood and food were scattered about promiscuously. Each room was a citadel, neither teachers nor steward ever entered it; a servant made up the bed, and that was the extent of her function. We filled our own water pails, cut our own wood and swept the room when we happened to think of it, and could borrow a broom. As I have said, the common table was meagerly kept. How could it have been otherwise at the rate of one dollar per week? We often rose in rebellion at the cooking, when we drove the waitress from the room, hurling the food, and after it, the dishes, upon the floor. No punishments ever followed these out-breaks, nor any of our pranks with the bell, the steward's horse and cow and the princ.i.p.al's desk. The discipline was mild; or rather there was none. And yet there were many diligent students and a few who distinguished themselves in later life. The best features of the inst.i.tution were its unbounded freedom, the close democratic companionship of the students, the affectionate attachments formed, and the tremendous interest we took in the meetings of the Philomathean society for debates, and the reading of essays and poetry, exhibited also in a lesser degree in the Sat.u.r.day declamations and compositions. How deep and real were our personal attachments I may ill.u.s.trate in mentioning that I have maintained two of them for fifty years. Others that faded out of my life I still remember with grateful and tender feelings, especially a young man considerably older than myself, to whom I was pa.s.sionately devoted. He was a handsome, reserved fellow with the eyes and lips of genius. He played the violin, and well do I recall the sensitive twitchings of his mouth at any strain of unusual thrilling sweetness. It made my heart beat faster when he spoke to me, which was rarely; and never before had I felt such a deep emotion as when coming from the city one evening he asked me to take his arm. It was the common custom with all of us when walking or strolling about the grounds to lock arms or put them about each other's necks. Only with him, the violinist, it was less usual than with the others. How often have I wondered what was the subsequent career of him whom we thought the greatest man among us.

With such freedom, such slight discipline, and so little pressure in the cla.s.sroom, it was nevertheless the best arena for the development of the whole man which I have ever known. Our debates were exciting, often fierce; sometimes we almost came to blows, and instead of being merely practice and forensics, they were very real and vital, so much so, that we generally resumed them when two or three met in their rooms or on their walks. They were sure to continue until the next meeting, when a new question would be proposed. Usually the topics for debate and the princ.i.p.al disputants were selected a week in advance. Much time was given to preparation, to the complete neglect of our studies. The debates were extemporaneous, and after the preliminary speeches, the question was open to all. The topics of debate were generally on the social and political issues of the time; anti-slavery, temperance, women's rights; these questions often led into religious and theological controversies. Not who was the better scholar, but who was the better speaker, and next the better writer, was the popular estimate of reputation and settlement of rank in school. We strove above everything to be eloquent, to become orators; that being at the time the aim set before us by ambitious public men, inspired by the examples of Webster, Clay, Calhoun and others. It is my belief that, at this period, one of the great public prizes of glory, which young students set before themselves, was to deliver a Fourth of July oration. Meanwhile no instruction was given in elocution, rhetoric or composition. The required exercises in declamation and writing were conducted with almost no criticism. They neither added nor subtracted from our standing with the teachers by any sign known to us. We were left to our own self-instruction, which, on account of our enthusiasm, emulation and rivalries, was the very best of school-masters. We studied parliamentary law from a little volume called Cushing's manual; for who could tell when he might be called upon to be an officer of the club, or at what point he could with safety move the previous question? Very amusing were some of the attempts of the students to speak extemporaneously; the stammering, the hesitation, the confusion and final flunk; the confidence with which some one would spring to his feet, as if full to the muzzle, and the entire inconsequence and futility of his words, ending in apparent abject paralysis of speech. We dealt liberally in jeers at any exhibition of bathos or fustian; in laughter and applause at any touch of eloquence or wit. What better training was there than this? I have always had a fond lingering desire to be an orator, but when before an audience found myself as cold as a clod. Toward essay writing and reading our att.i.tude was somewhat different. Yet here we looked for and were only satisfied with eloquence--good, resounding periods with plentiful cla.s.sical allusion and quotations of poetry. We always expected at least one apostrophe to "Science Hill," which was the consecrated name of the eminence on which the academy building stood.