Four Girls at Chautauqua Part 7

CHAPTER VII.

TABLE TALK.

"What is your private explanation of the word 'hotel'?" Marion asked.

She was in an argumentative mood, and it made almost no difference to her which side of the question she argued. "Webster says it is a place to entertain strangers, but you seem to attach some special importance to the term."

"Is that all that Webster says?"

The questioner was not Ruth, but a man who sat just opposite to them at the table, and while he waited for his order to be filled watched with amused eyes the four gills who were evidently in a new element. He was not a young man, and his gray hairs would have arrested the pertness of the reply on Marion's tongue at any other time than this, but you remember that she was not in a good mood. She answered promptly; "Yes, sir, he says ever so many things. In fact, he is the most voluminous author I ever read."

The gentleman laughed. The pertness seemed to amuse him.

"Didn't I limit my question?" he said, pleasantly. "He is voluminous, and what a sensible book he has written. I wish all authors had given us so much information. But I meant, is that all he says about hotels?

Doesn't he justify your friend just a little bit in her expectations?"

"I'm sure I don't know," Marion said, amused in turn at the good-natured interest which the elderly gentleman took in the question. "He has said so much that I haven't had time to digest it all. If you have, won't you please enlighten me as to his wisdom on this subject?" "'Especially one of some style or pretensions,'" quoted the old gentleman, "so Webster adds. You see I am interested in the subject," and he laughed pleasantly. "I have been looking it up, which must be my apology for addressing you young ladies, if so old a man as I must apologize for being interested in girls. The fact is, I had occasion to talk with a young man yesterday who took the people to task most roundly for that very name, on the ground that they had no right to it--that it was a misnomer. I have been struck with the thought that nothing is trivial, not even the name that happens to be chosen for a house where one _waits_ for his dinner," with a strong emphasis on the word "wait,"

which Eurie understood and laughed over.

"Except the remarks that people make about such things," Marion said, answering the first part of the sentence and bestowing a wicked glance on Ruth. "They are trivial enough. Did you agree with the young gentleman?"

"No. I thought it all over and consulted Webster, as I said, and came to the conclusion that in view of this being a more pretentious house than either of the others they had a right to the word. Webster doesn't say what degree of pretension is necessary, you know."

The lifting of Ruth's eyebrows at this point was so expressive that all the party laughed. But the old gentleman grew grave again in a moment, as he said:

"But the thought that impressed me most was what a very perfect system of faith the religion of Jesus Christ is; how completely it commends itself to the human heart, since the very slightest departure from what is regarded as strictly true and right, when it is done by a Christian (society or individual), is noticed and commented upon by lookers-on; they seem to know of a certainty that it is not according to the Spirit of Christ."

This last sentence struck Marion dumb. How fond she was of caviling at Christian lives! Was she really thus giving all the time an unconscious tribute to the truth and purity of the Christian faith?

It was a merry dinner, after all, eaten with steel forks and without napkins, and with plated spoons, if you were so fortunate as to secure one. The rush of people was very great, and, with their inconvenient accommodations, the process of serving was slow.

Marion, her eyes being opened, went to studying the people about her.

She found that courteous good-humor was the rule, and selfishness and ungraciousness the exception. Inconveniences were put up with and merrily laughed over by people who, from their dress and manners, could be accustomed to only the best.

Marion took mental notes.

"They do not act in the least like the ma.s.s of people who stop at railroad eating-houses for their dinner; they are patient and courteous under difficulties; they did not come here for the purpose of being entertained; if they did the accommodations wouldn't satisfy."

There was another little thing that interested Marion. As the tables kept filling, and those who had been served made room for those who had not, she found herself watching curiously what proportion of the guests observed that instant of silent thanks with covered eyes. It was so brief, so slight a thing, I venture that scarcely a person there noticed it, much less imagined that there was a pair of keen gray eyes over in the corner looking and calculating concerning them.

"What if they all had to wear badges," she said to herself, "badges that read 'I am a Christian,' I wonder how many of them it would influence to different words than they are speaking, or to different acts? I wonder if they _do_ all wear them? I wonder if the distinction is really marked, so one looking on could detect the difference, though all of them are strangers? I mean to watch during these two weeks. 'The proper study of mankind is man.' Very well, Brother Pope, a convenient place for the study of man is Chautauqua. I'll take it up. Who knows but I may learn a new branch to teach the graded infants in Ward No. 4."

Ruth did not recover her equanimity. She was rasped on every side. Those two-tined steel forks were a positive sting to her. She shuddered as the steel touched her lips. She had no spoon at all, and she looked on in utter disgust while Eurie merrily stirred her tea with her fork. When the waiter came at last, with hearty apologies for keeping them waiting for their spoons, and the old gentleman said cordially, "All in good time. We shall not starve even if we get no spoons," she curled her lip disdainfully, and murmured that she had always been accustomed to the conveniences of life, and found it somewhat difficult to do without them.

When one is in the mood for grumbling there is no easier thing in the world than to find food for that spirit, and Ruth continued her pastime, waxing louder and more decided after the genial old man had left their neighborhood.

"What is the use in fault-finding?" Eurie said at last, half petulantly.

She was growing very tired of this exhibition. "What did you expect?

They are doing as well as they can, without any doubt. Just imagine what it must be to get conveniences together for this vast crowd. They did not expect anything like such a large attendance at first; I heard them say so and that makes it harder to wait upon them. But of course they are doing just as well as they can, and we fare as well as any of them."

"Don't you be so foolish as to believe that," Ruth said, with a curling lip. "If you could see behind the scenes you would soon discover something very different. That is why it is so provoking to me. Let people who cannot afford to pay any better take such as they can get.

But what right had they to suppose that we had not the money to pay for what we wish? I'm sure _I'm_ not a pauper! You will find that there is a place where the select few can get what they want, and have it served in a respectable manner, and I say I don't like it; I have been accustomed to the decencies of life."

Just behind them the talk was going on unceasingly, and one voice, at this point, rising higher than the others, caught the attention of our girls. Eurie turned suddenly and tried to catch a glimpse of the speaker. Something in the voice sounded natural. A sudden movement on the part of the gentleman between them and she caught a glimpse of the face. She turned back eagerly.

"Girls, that is Mrs. Schuyler Germain!"

"Where?" Ruth asked, with sudden interest in her voice.

"Over at that table, in a water-proof cloak and black straw hat, and eating boiled potatoes with a steel fork. What about being behind the scenes now, Ruthie?"

To fully appreciate this you must understand that even among the Erskines to get as high as Mrs. Schulyer Germain was to get as high as the aristocracy of this world reached; not that she lived in any grander style than the Erskines, or showed that she had more money, but every one knew that her bank accounts were very heavy, and, besides, she was the daughter of Gen. Wadsworth Hillyer, of Washington, and the great-granddaughter, by direct descent, of one of England's n.o.blemen.

She was traveled and cultivated, and all but t.i.tled through her youngest daughter.

Could American ambition reach higher? And there she sat, at a table made of pine boards, eating boiled potatoes with a two-tined steel fork!

Could English n.o.bility sink lower! Ruth looked over at her in quiet surprise for a moment, and then gave her head its haughty toss as she met Eurie's mischievous eyes, and said:

"It is not an aristocracy of position here, then. The leaders keep all their nice things and places for themselves. That is smaller than I supposed them to be."

At this particular moment there was an uprising from the table just behind them. Half a dozen gentlemen leaving their empty plates, and in full tide of talk, making their way down the hall. The girls looked and nudged each other as they recognized them. The younger of the two foremost had a face that can not easily be mistaken, and Eurie, having seen it once, did not need Marion's low-toned, "That is Mr. Vincent."

And Ruth herself, thrown off her guard, recognized and exclaimed over Dr. Hodge.

This climax was too much for Eurie. She threw down her fork to clap her hands in softly glee.

"Oh, Ruthie, Ruthie! How has your dismal castle of favoritism faded!

Yonder is the Queen of American society eating pie at this very instant with the very fork which did duty on her potato, and here goes the King of the feast, wiping his lips on his own handkerchief instead of a damask napkin."

It was at this moment, when Ruth's follies and ill humors were rising to an almost unbearable height, that her higher nature a.s.serted itself, and shone forth in a rich, full laugh. Then, in much glee and good feeling, they followed the crowd down the hill to the auditorium.

For the benefit of such poor benighted beings as have never seen Chautauqua, let me explain that the auditorium was the great temple where the congregation a.s.sembled for united service. Such a grand temple as it was! The pillars thereof were great solemn trees, with their green leaves arching overhead in festoons of beauty. I don't know how many seats there were, nor how many could be accommodated at the auditorium. Eurie set out to walk up and down the long aisles one day and count the seats, but she found that which so arrested her attention before she was half-way down the central aisle that she forgot all about it, and there was never any time afterward for that work. I mean to tell you about that day when I get to it. The grand stand was down here in front of all these seats, s.p.a.cious and convenient, the pillars thereof festooned with flags from many nations. The large piano occupied a central point; the speaker's desk at its feet, in the central of the stand; the reporters' tables and chairs just below.

"I ought to have one of those chairs," Marion said, as they pa.s.sed the convenient little s.p.a.ce railed off from the rest of the audience. "Just as if I were not a real reporter because I write in plain good English, instead of racing over the paper and making queer little tracks that only one person in five thousand can read. If I were not the most modest and retiring of mortals I would go boldly up and claim a seat."

"What is to be next?" Ruth asked. "Are we supposed to be devoted to all these meetings? I thought we were only going to one now and then. We won't be alive in two weeks from now if we pin ourselves down here."

"In the way that we have been doing," chimed in Eurie. "Just think here we have been to every single meeting they have had yet, except the one last night and one this morning."

"We are going to skip every one that we possibly can," said Marion. "But the one that is to come just now is decidedly the one that we can't. The speaker is Dr. Calkins, of Buffalo. I heard him four years ago, and it is one of the few sermons that I remember to this day. I always said if I ever had another chance I should certainly hear him again. I like his subject this afternoon, too. It is appropriate to my condition."

"What is the subject?" Flossy asked, with a sudden glow of interest.

"It is what a Christian can learn from a heathen. I'm the heathen, and I presume Dr Calkins is the Christian. So he is to see what he can learn from me, I take it, and naturally I am anxious to know. Flossy isn't interested in that; I can see it from her face. She knows she isn't a heathen--she is a good proper little Christian. But it is your duty, my dear, to find what you can learn from me."

"What can he possibly make of such a subject as that?" Ruth asked, curiously. "I don't believe I want to hear him. Is he so very talented, Marion?"

"I don't know. Haven't the least idea whether he is what you call talented or not. He says things exactly as though he knew they were so, and for the time being he makes you feel as though you were a perfect simpleton for not knowing it, too."