The Fat of the Land Part 27

Before we reached Queenstown, Jarvis had gained some ground by twice picking me out of the scuppers; but as I resented his steadiness of foot and strength of hand, it was not worth mentioning. I could see, however, that these feats were great in Jane's eyes. The double rescue of a beloved parent, from, not exactly a watery grave, but a damp scupper, would never be forgotten. The giant let her adore his manly strength and beauty, and I could only secretly hope that some wave--tidal if necessary--would take him off his feet and send him into the scuppers.

But he had played football too long to be upset by a watery wave, and I was balked of my revenge.

Jack and Jessie were rather a pleasure to me than otherwise. They settled right down to the heart-softening business in such matter-of-fact fashion that their hearts must have lost contour before the voyage was half over. Polly dismissed them from her mind with a sigh of satisfaction, and I then hoped that she would find some time to devote to me, but I was disappointed. She a.s.sured me that those two were safely locked in the fold, but that she could not "set her mind at rest"

until the other two were safe. After that she promised to take me in hand; whether for reward or for punishment left me guessing.

The six and a half days finally came to an end, and we debarked for Queenstown. The journey across Ireland was made as quickly as slow trains and a circuitous route would permit, and we reached Sligo on the second day. Sir Thomas's agent met us, and we drove at once to the "little castle out from Sligo." It proved to be a very old little castle, four miles out, overlooking the bay. It was low and flat, with thick walls of heavy stone pierced by a few small windows, and a broad door made of black Irish oak heavily studded with iron. From one corner rose a square tower, thirty feet or more in height, covered with wild vines that twined in and out through the narrow, unglazed windows.

Within was a broad, low hall, from which opened four rooms of nearly equal size. There was little evidence that the castle had been inhabited during recent years, though there was an ancient woman care-taker who opened the great door for us, and then took up the Irish peasant's wail for the last of the O'Haras. She never ceased her crooning except when she spoke to us, which was seldom; but she placed us at table in the state dining room, and served us with stewed kid, potatoes, and goat's milk. The walls of the dining room were covered with ancient pictures of the O'Haras, but none so recent as a hundred years. We could well believe Sir Tom's words, "the sod has known us for a thousand years,"

when we looked upon the score of pictures, each of which stood for at least one generation.

The agent told us that our friend had never lived at the castle, but that he had visited the place as a child, and again just before leaving for America. A wall-enclosed lot about two hundred feet square was "the kindest sod in all the world to an O'Hara," and here we placed our dear friend at rest with the "lucky ones" of his race. No one of the race ever deserved more "luck" than did our Sir Tom. The young clergyman who read the service a.s.sured us that he had found it; and our minds gave the same evidence, and our hearts said Amen, as we turned from his peaceful resting-place by the green waters of Sligo Bay.

Two days later we were comfortably lodged at The Hague, from which we intended to "do" the little kingdom of Holland by rail, by ca.n.a.l, or on foot, as we should elect.

CHAPTER LXI

THE BELGIAN FARMER

Leaving Holland with regret, we crossed the Schelde into Belgium, the c.o.c.kpit of Europe. It is here that one sees what intensive farming is like. No fences to occupy s.p.a.ce, no animals roaming at large, nothing but small strips of land tilled to the utmost, chiefly by hand. Little machinery is used, and much of the work is done after primitive fashions; but the land is productive, and it is worked to the top of its bent.

The peasant-farmer soils his cows, his sheep, his swine, in a way that is economical of s.p.a.ce and food, if not of labor, and manages to make a living and to pay rent for his twenty-acre strip of land. His methods do not appeal to the American farmer, who wastes more grain and forage each year than would keep the Netherlander, his family, and his stock; but there is a lesson to be learned from this subdivision and careful cultivation of land. Belgian methods prove that Mother Earth can care for a great many children if she be properly husbanded, and that the sooner we recognize her capacity the better for us.

Abandoned farms are not known in Belgium and France, though the soil has been cultivated for a thousand years, and was originally no better than our New England farms, and not nearly so good as hundreds of those which are practically given over to "old fields" in Virginia.

It is neglect that impoverishes land, not use. Intelligent use makes land better year by year. The only way to wear out land is to starve and to rob it at the same time. Food for man and beast may be taken from the soil for thousands of years without depleting it. All it asks in return is the refuse, carefully saved, properly applied, and thoroughly worked in to make it available. If, in addition to this, a cover crop of some leguminous plant be occasionally turned under, the soil may actually increase in fertility, though it be heavily cropped each year.

It would pay the young American farmer to study Belgian methods, crude though they are, for the insight he could gain into the possibilities of continuous production. The greatest number of people to the square mile in the inhabited globe live in this little, ill-conditioned kingdom, and most of them get their living from the soil. It has been the battle-field of Europe: a thousand armies have harrowed it; human blood has drenched it from Liege to Ostend; it has been depopulated again and again. But it springs into new life after each catastrophe, simply because the soil is prolific of farmers, and they cannot be kept down.

Like the poppies on the field of Waterloo, which renew the blood-red strife each year, the Belgian peasant-farmer springs new-born from the soil, which is the only mother he knows.

After two weeks in Holland, two in Belgium, and two in London, we were ready to turn our faces toward home.

We took the train to Southampton, and a small side-wheel steamer carried us outside Southampton waters, where we tossed about for thirty minutes before the _Normania_ came to anchor. The wind was blowing half a gale from the north, and we were glad to get under the lee of the great vessel to board her.

The transfer was quickly made, and we were off for New York. The wind gained strength as the day grew old, but while we were in the Solent the bluff coast of Devon and Cornwall broke its force sufficiently to permit us to be comfortable on the port side of the ship.

As night came on, great clouds rolled up from the northwest and the wind increased. Darkness, as of Egypt, fell upon us before we pa.s.sed the Lizard, and the only things that showed above the raging waters were the beacon lights, and these looked dim and far away. Occasionally a flash of lightning threw the waters into relief, and then made the darkness more impenetrable. As we steamed beyond the Lizard and the protecting Cornish coast, the full force of the gale, from out the Irish Sea, struck us. We were going nearly with it, and the good ship pitched and reared like an angry horse, but did not roll much. Pitching is harder to bear than rolling, and the decks were quickly vacated.

I turned into my stateroom soon after ten o'clock, and then happened a thing which will hold a place in my memory so long as I have one. I did not feel sleepy, but I was nervous, restless, and half sick. I lay on my lounge for perhaps half an hour, and then felt impelled to go on deck. I wrapped myself in a great waterproof ulster, pulled my storm cap over my ears, and climbed the companionway. Two or three electric bulbs in sheltered places on deck only served to make the darkness more intense.

I crawled forward of the ladies' cabin, and, supporting myself against the donkey-engine, peered at the light above the crow's-nest and tried to think that I could see the man on watch in the nest. I did see him for an instant, when the next flash of lightning came, and also two officers on the bridge; and I knew that Captain Bahrens was in the chart house. When the next flash came, I saw the other lookout man making his short turns on the narrow s.p.a.ce of bow deck, and was tempted to join him; why, I do not know. I crept past the donkey-engine, holding fast to it as I went, until I reached the iron gate that closes the narrow pa.s.sage to the bow deck. With two silver dollars in my teeth I staggered across this rail-guarded plank, and when the next flash came I was sitting at the feet of the lookout man with the two silver dollars in my outstretched hand. He took the money, and let me crawl forward between the anchors and the high bulwark of the bows.

The sensations which this position gave me were strange beyond description. Darkness was thick around me; at one moment I was carried upward until I felt that I should be lost in the black sky, and the next moment the downward motion was so terrible that the blacker water at the bottom of the sea seemed near. I cannot say that I enjoyed it, but I could not give it up.

When the great bow rose, I stood up, and, looking over the bulwark, tried to see either sky or water, but tried in vain, save when the lightning revealed them both. When the bow fell, I crouched under the bulwark and let the sea comb over me. How long I remained at this weird post, I do not know; but I was driven from it in such terror as I hope never to feel again.

An unusually large wave carried me nearer the sky than I liked to be, and just as the sharp bow of the great iron ship was balancing on its crest for the desperate plunge, a glare of lightning made sky and sea like a sheet of flame and curdled the blood in my veins. In the trough of the sea, under the very foot of the immense steamship, lay a delicate pleasure-boat, with its mast broken flush with its deck, and its helpless body the sport of the cruel waves.

The light did not last longer than it would take me to count five, but in that time I saw four figures that will always haunt me. Two sailors in yachting costume were struggling hopelessly with the tiller, and the wild terror of their faces as they saw the huge destruction that hung over them is simply unforgettable.

The other two were different. A strong, blond man, young, handsome, and brave I know, stood bareheaded in front of the c.o.c.kpit. With a sudden, vehement motion he drew the head of a girl to his breast and held it there as if to shut out the horrible world. There was no fear in his face,--just pain and distress that he was unable to do more. I am thankful that I did not see the face of the girl. Her brown hair has floated in my dreams until I have cried out for help; what would her face have done?

In the twinkling of an eye it was over. I heard a sound as when one breaks an egg on the edge of a cup,--no more. I screamed with horror, ran across the guarded plank, climbed the gate, and fell headlong and screaming over the donkey-engine. Picking up my battered self, I shouted:

"Bahrens! Bahrens! for G.o.d's sake, help! Man overboard! Stop the ship!"

I reached the ladder to the bridge just as the captain came out of the chart house.

"For G.o.d's sake, stop the ship! You've run down a boat with four people! Stop her, can't you!"

"It can't be done, man. If we've run down a boat, it's all over with it and all in it. I can't risk a thousand lives without hope of saving one.

This is a gale, Doctor, and we have our hands full."

I turned from him in horror and despair. I stumbled to my stateroom, dropped my wet clothing in the middle of the floor, and knew no more until the trumpet called for breakfast. The rush of green waters was pounding at my porthole; the experience of the night came back to me with horror; the reek of my wet clothes sickened my heart, and I rang for the steward.

"Take these things away, Gustav, and don't bring them back until they are dry and pressed."

"What things does the Herr Doctor speak for?"

"The wet things there on the floor."

"Excuse me, but I have seen no things wet."

"You Dutch chump!" said I, half rising, "what do you mean by saying--Well, I'll be d.a.m.ned!" There were my clothes, dry and folded, on the couch, and my ulster and cap on their hook, without evidence of moisture or use.

"Gustav, remind me to give you three rix-dollars at breakfast."

"Danke, Herr Doctor."

Of such stuff are dreams made. But I will know those terror-stricken sailors if I do not see them for a hundred years; and I am glad the dark-haired girl did not realize the horror, but simply knew that the man loved her; and I often think of the man who did the nice thing when no one was looking, and whose face was not terrorized by the crack of doom.

CHAPTER LXII

HOME-COMING

Even Polly was satisfied with our young people before we entered New York Bay. If anything in their "left pulmonaries" had remained unsoftened during the voyage out and the comradery of the Netherlands, it was melted into non-resistance by the homeward trip. I could not long hold out against the evidence of happiness that surrounded me, and I gave a half-grudging consent that Jarvis and Jane might play together for the next three or four years, if they would not ask to play "for keeps" until those years had pa.s.sed. They readily gave the promise, but every one knows how such promises are kept. The children wore me out in time, as all children do in all kinds of ways, and got their own ways in less than half the contract period. I cannot put my finger on any punishment that has befallen them for this lack of filial consideration, and I am fifteen-sixteenths reconciled.

I was downright glad that Jack "made good" with Jessie Gordon. She was the sort of girl to get out the best that was in him, and I was glad to have her begin early. Try as I might, I could not feel unhappy that beautiful September morning as we steamed up the finest waterway to the finest city in the world. Deny it who will, I claim that our Empire City and its environments make the most impressive human show. There is more life, vigor, utility, gorgeousness about it than can be found anywhere else; and it has the snap and elasticity of youth, which are so attractive. No man who claims the privilege of American citizenship can sail up New York Bay without feeling pride in his country and satisfaction in his birthright. One doesn't disparage other cities and other countries when he claims that his own is the best.

We were not specially badly treated at the custom-house,--no worse, indeed, than smugglers, thieves, or pirates would have been; and we escaped, after some hours of confinement, without loss of life or baggage, but with considerable loss of dignity. How can a self-respecting, middle-aged man (to be polite to myself) stand for hours in a crowded shed, or lean against a dirty post, or sit on the sharp edge of his open trunk, waiting for a Superior Being with a gilt band around his hat, without losing some modic.u.m of dignity? And how, when this Superior Being calls his number and kicks his trunk, is he to know that he is a free-born American citizen and a lineal descendant of Roger Williams? The evidence is entirely from within. How is he to support a countenance and mien of dignity while the secrets of his chest are laid bare and the contents of his trunk dumped on the dirty floor? And how must his eyes droop and his face take on a hang-dog look when his second-best coat is searched for diamonds, and his favorite (though worn) pajamas punched for pearls.

There are concessions to be made for one's great and glorious country, and the custom-house is one of them. Perhaps we will do better sometime, and perhaps, though this is unlikely, the customs inspectors of the future will disguise themselves as gentlemen. We finally pa.s.sed the inquisition, and, with stuffed trunks and ruffled spirits, took cabs for the station, and were presently within the protecting walls at Four Oaks, there to forget lost dignities in the cultivation of land and new ones.