But, alas! the appreciation of wine is lost. Everybody serves wine, no one understands it; everybody drinks it, no one loves it. From a fragrant essence wine has become a coarse reality,—a convention. Chablis with the oysters, sherry with the soup, sauterne with the fish, claret with the roast, Burgundy with the game,—champagne somewhere, anywhere, everywhere; port, grand, old ruddy port—that has disappeared; no one understands it and no one knows when to serve it; while Madeira, that bloom of the vinous century plant, that rare exotic which ripens with passing generations, is all too subtle for our untutored discrimination.
And if, perchance, a good wine, like a strange guest, finds its way to the table, we are at loss how to receive it, how to address it, how to entertain it. We offend it in the decanting and distress it in the serving. We buy our wines in the morning and serve them in the evening to drink the sediment which the more fastidious wine during long years has been slowly rejecting; we mix the bright transparent liquid with its dregs and our rough palates detect no difference. But the lover of wine, the more he has the less he drinks, until, in the refinement and exaltation of his taste, it is sufficient to look upon the dust-mantled bottle and recall the delicious aroma and flavor, the recollection of which is far too precious to risk by trying anew; he knows that if a bottle be so much as turned in its couch it must sleep again for years before it is really fit to drink; he knows how difficult it is to get the wine out of the bottle clear as ruby or yellow diamond; he knows that if so much as a speck of sediment gets into the decanter, to precisely the extent of the speck is the wine injured.
In serving wines, we of the Western world may learn something from the tea ceremonies of the Japanese,—ceremonies so elaborate that to our impatient notions they are infinitely tedious, and yet they get from the tea all the exquisite delight it contains, and at the same time invest its serving with a halo of form, tradition, and association. Surely, if wine is to be taken at all, it is as precious as a cup of tea; and if taken ceremoniously, it will be taken moderately.
What is the use of serving good wine? No one recognizes it, appreciates it, or cares for it. It is served by the butler and removed by the footman without introduction, greeting, or comment. The Hon. Sam Jones, from Podunk, is announced in stentorian tones as he makes his advent, but the gem of the dinner, the treat of the evening, the flower of the feast, an Haut Brion of '75, or an Yquem of '64, or a Johannisberger of '61, comes in like a tramp without a word. Possibly some one of the guests, whose palate has not been blunted by coarse living or seared by strong drink, may feel that he is drinking something out of the ordinary, and he may linger over his glass, loath to sip the last drop; but all the others gulp their wine, or leave it—with the indifference of ignorance.
Good wine is loquacious; it is a great traveller and smacks of many lands; it is a bon vivant and has dined with the select of the earth; it recalls a thousand anecdotes; it reeks with reminiscences; it harbors a kiss and reflects a glance, but it is a silent companion to those who know it not, and it is quarrelsome with those who abuse it.
It seemed a pity that somewhere about the inn, deep in some long disused cellar, there were not a few—just a few—bottles of old wine, a half-dozen port of 1815, one or two squat bottles of Madeira brought over by men who knew Washington, an Yquem of '48, a Margaux of '58, a Johannisberger Cabinet—not forgetting the "Auslese"—of '61, with a few bottles of Romani Conti and Clos de Vougeot of '69 or '70,—not to exceed two or three dozen all told; not a plebeian among them, each the chosen of its race, and all so well understood that the very serving would carry one back to colonial days, when to offer a guest a glass of Madeira was a subtle tribute to his capacity and appreciation.
It is a far cry from an imaginary banquet with Lucullus to the New England Saturday night supper of pork and beans which was spread before us that evening. The dish is a survival of the rigid Puritanism which was the affliction and at the same time the making of New England; it is a fast, an aggravated fast, a scourge to indulgence, a reproach to gluttony; it comes Saturday night, and is followed Sunday morning by the dry, spongy, antiseptic, absorbent fish-ball as a castigation of nature and as a preparation for the austere observance of the Sabbath; it is the harsh, but no doubt deserved, punishment of the stomach for its worldliness during the week; inured to suffering, the native accepts the dose as a matter of course; to the stranger it seems unduly severe. To be sent to bed supperless is one of the terrors of childhood; to be sent to bed on pork and beans with the certainty of fishballs in the morning is a refinement of torture that could have been devised only by Puritan ingenuity.
At the very crisis of the trouble in China, when the whole world was anxiously awaiting news from Pekin, the papers said that Boston was perturbed by the reported discovery in Africa of a new and edible bean.
To New England the bean is an obsession; it is rapidly becoming a superstition. To the stranger it is an infliction; but, bad as the bean is to the uninitiated, it is a luscious morsel compared with the flavorless cod-fish ball which lodges in the throat and stays there—a second Adam's apple—for lack of something to wash it down.
If pork and beans is the device of the Puritans, the cod-fish ball is the invention of the devil. It is as if Satan looked on enviously while his foes prepared their powder of beans, and then, retiring to his bottomless pit, went them one better by casting his ball of cod-fish.
"But from the parlor of the inn
A pleasant murmur smote the ear,
Like water rushing through a weir;
Oft interrupted by the din
Of laughter and of loud applause
"The firelight, shedding over all
The splendor of its ruddy glow,
Filled the whole parlor large and low."
The room remains, but of all that jolly company which gathered in Longfellow's days and constituted the imaginary weavers of tales and romances, but one is alive to-day,—the "Young Sicilian."
"A young Sicilian, too, was there;
In sight of Etna born and bred,
Some breath of its volcanic air
Was glowing in his heart and brain,
And, being rebellious to his liege,
After Palermo's fatal siege,
Across the western seas he fled,
In good king Bomba's happy reign.
His face was like a summer night,
All flooded with a dusky light;
His hands were small; his teeth shone white
As sea-shells, when he smiled or spoke."
To the present proprietor of the inn the "Young Sicilian" wrote the following letter:
Rome, July 4, 1898.
Dear Sir,—In answer to your letter of June 8, I am delighted to learn that you have purchased the dear old house and carefully restored and put it back in its old-time condition. I sincerely hope that it may remain thus for a long, long time as a memento of the days and customs gone by. It is very sad for me to think that I am the only living member of that happy company that used to spend their summer vacations there in the fifties; yet I still hope that I may visit the old Inn once more before I rejoin those choice spirits whom Mr. Longfellow has immortalized in his great poem. I am glad that some of the old residents still remember me when I was a visitor there with Dr. Parsons (the Poet), and his sisters, one of whom, my wife, is also the only living member of those who used to assemble there. Both my wife and I remember well Mr. Calvin Howe, Mr. Parmenter, and the others you mention; for we spent many summers there with Professor Treadwell (the Theologian) and his wife, Mr. Henry W. Wales (the Student), and other visitors not mentioned in the poem, till the death of Mr. Lyman Howe (the Landlord), which broke up the party. The "Musician" and the "Spanish Jew," though not imaginary characters, were never guests at the "Wayside Inn." I remain,
Sincerely yours,
Luigi Monti (the "Young Sicilian").
But there was a "Musician," for Ole Bull was once a guest at the
Wayside,
"Fair-haired, blue-eyed, his aspect blithe,
His figure tall and straight and lithe,
And every feature of his face
Revealing his Norwegian race."
The "Spanish Jew from Alicant" in real life was Israel Edrehi.
The Landlord told his tale of Paul Revere; the "Student" followed with his story of love:
"Only a tale of love is mine,
Blending the human and divine,
A tale of the Decameron, told
In Palmieri's garden old."
And one by one the tales were told until the last was said.
"The hour was late; the fire burned low,
The Landlord's eyes were closed in sleep,
And near the story's end a deep
Sonorous sound at times was heard,
As when the distant bagpipes blow,
At this all laughed; the Landlord stirred,
As one awaking from a swound,
And, gazing anxiously around,
Protested that he had not slept,
But only shut his eyes, and kept
His ears attentive to each word.
Then all arose, and said 'Good-Night.'
Alone remained the drowsy Squire
To rake the embers of the fire,
And quench the waning parlor light;
While from the windows, here and there,
The scattered lamps a moment gleamed,
And the illumined hostel seemed
The constellation of the Bear,
Downward, athwart the misty air,
Sinking and setting toward the sun.
Far off the village clock struck one."
Before leaving the next morning, we visited the ancient ballroom which extends over the dining-room. It seemed crude and cruel to enter this hall of bygone revelry by the garish light of day. The two fireplaces were cold and inhospitable; the pen at one end where the fiddlers sat was deserted; the wooden benches which fringed the sides were hard and forbidding; but long before any of us were born this room was the scene of many revelries; the vacant hearths were bright with flame; the fiddlers bowed and scraped; the seats were filled with belles and beaux, and the stately minuet was danced upon the polished floor.
The large dining-room and ballroom were added to the house something more than a hundred years ago; the little old dining-room and old kitchen in the rear of the bar still remain, but—like the bar—are no longer used.
The brass name plates on the bedroom doors—Washington, Lafayette, Howe, and so on—have no significance, but were put on by the present proprietor simply as reminders that those great men were once beneath the roof; but in what rooms they slept or were entertained, history does not record.
The automobile will bring new life to these deserted hostelries. For more than half a century steam has diverted their custom, carrying former patrons from town to town without the need of half-way stops and rests. Coaching is a fad, not a fashion; it is not to be relied upon for steady custom; but automobiling bids fair to carry the people once more into the country, and there must be inns to receive them.
Already the proprietor was struggling with the problem what to do with automobiles and what to do for them who drove them. He was vainly endeavoring to reconcile the machines with horses and house them under one roof; the experiment had already borne fruit in some disaster and no little discomfort.
The automobile is quite willing to be left out-doors over night; but if taken inside it is quite apt to assert itself rather noisily and monopolize things to the discomfort of the horse. Stables—to rob the horse of the name of his home—must be provided, and these should be equipped for emergencies.
Every country inn should have on hand gasoline—this is easily stored outside in a tank buried in the ground—and lubricating oils for steam and gasoline machines; these can be kept and sold in gallon cans.
In addition to supplies there should be some tools, beginning with a good jack strong enough to lift the heaviest machine, a small bench and vise, files, chisels, punches, and one or two large wrenches, including a pipe-wrench. All these things can be purchased for little more than a song, and when needed they are needed badly. But gasoline and lubricating oils are absolutely essential to the permanent prosperity of any well-conducted wayside inn.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN RHODE ISLAND AND CONNECTICUT CALLING THE FERRY
Next morning, Sunday the 8th, we left the inn at eleven o'clock for Providence. It was a perfect morning, neither hot nor cold, sun bright, and the air stirring.
We took the narrow road almost opposite the entrance to the inn, climbed the hill, threaded the woods, and were soon travelling almost due south through Framingham, Holliston, Medway, Franklin, and West Wrentham towards Pawtucket.
That route is direct, the roads are good, the country rolling and interesting. The villages come in close succession; there are many quaint places and beautiful homes.
In this section of Massachusetts it does not matter much what roads are selected, they are all good. Some are macadamized, more are gravelled, and where there is neither macadam nor gravel, the roads have been so carefully thrown up that they are good; we found no bad places at all, no deep sand, and no rough, hard blue clay.
When we stopped for luncheon at a little village not far from Pawtucket, the tire which had been put on in Boston was leaking badly. It was the tire that had been punctured and sent to the factory for repairs, and the repair proved defective. We managed to get to Pawtucket, and there tried to stop the leak with liquid preparations, but by the time we reached Providence the tire was again flat and—as it proved afterwards—ruined.
Had it not been for the tire, Narragansett Pier would have been made that afternoon with ease; but there was nothing to do but wire for a new tire and await its arrival.
It was not until half-past three o'clock Monday that the new one came from New York, and it was five when we left for the Pier.
The road from Providence to Narragansett Pier is something more than fair, considerably less than fine; it is hilly and in places quite sandy. For some distance out of Providence it was dusty and worn rough by heavy travel.
It was seven o'clock, dark and quite cold, when we drew up in front of Green's Inn.
The season was over, the Pier quite deserted. A summer resort after the guests have gone is a mournful, or a delightful, place— as one views it. To the gregarious individual who seeks and misses his kind, the place is loneliness itself after the flight of the gay birds who for a time strutted about in gorgeous plumage twittering the time away; to the man who loves to be in close and undisturbed contact with nature, who enjoys communing with the sea, who would be alone on the beach and silent by the waves, the flight of the throng is a relief. There is a selfish satisfaction in passing the great summer caravansaries and seeing them closed and silent; in knowing that the splendor of the night will not be marred by garish lights and still more garish sounds.
Were it not for the crowd, Narragansett Pier would be an ideal spot for rest and recreation. The beach is perfect,—hard, firm sand, sloping so gradually into deep water, and with so little undertow and so few dangers, that children can play in the water without attendants. The village itself is inoffensive, the country about is attractive; but the crowd—the crowd that comes in summer—comes with a rush almost to the hour in July, and takes flight with a greater rush almost to the minute in August,—the crowd overwhelms, submerges, ignores the natural charms of the place, and for the time being nature hides its honest head before the onrush of sham and illusion.
Why do the people come in a week and go in a day? What is there about Narragansett that keeps every one away until a certain time each year, attracts them for a few weeks, and then bids them off within twenty-four hours? Just nothing at all. All attractions the place has—the ocean, the beach, the drives, the country—remain the same; but no one dares come before the appointed time, no one dares stay after the flight begins; no one? That is hardly true, for in every beautiful spot, by the ocean and in the mountains, there are a few appreciative souls who know enough to make their homes in nature's caressing embrace while she works for their pure enjoyment her wondrous panorama of changing seasons. There are people who linger at the sea-shore until from the steel-gray waters are heard the first mutterings of approaching winter; there are those who linger in the woods and mountains until the green of summer yields to the rich browns and golden russets of autumn, until the honk of the wild goose foretells the coming cold; these and their kind are nature's truest and dearest friends; to them does she unfold a thousand hidden beauties; to them does she whisper her most precious secrets.
But the crowd—the crowd—the painted throng that steps to the tune of a fiddle, that hangs on the moods of a caterer, whose inspiration is a good dinner, whose aspiration is a new dance,— that crowd is never missed by any one who really delights in the manifold attractions of nature.
Not that the crowd at Narragansett is essentially other than the crowd at Newport—the two do not mix; but the difference is one of degree rather than kind. The crowd at Newport is architecturally perfect, while the crowd at Narragansett is in the adobe stage,— that is the conspicuous difference; the one is pretentious and lives in structures more or less permanent; the other lives in trunks, and is even more pretentious. Neither, as a crowd, has more than a superficial regard for the natural charms of its surroundings. The people at both places are entirely preoccupied with themselves—and their neighbors. At Newport a reputation is like an umbrella—lost, borrowed, lent, stolen, but never returned. Some one has cleverly said that the American girl, unlike girls of European extraction, if she loses her reputation, promptly goes and gets another,—to be strictly accurate, she promptly goes and gets another's. What a world of bother could be saved if a woman could check her reputation with her wraps on entering the Casino; for, no matter how small the reputation, it is so annoying to have the care of it during social festivities where it is not wanted, or where, like dogs, it is forbidden the premises. Then, too, if the reputation happens to be somewhat soiled, stained, or tattered,—like an old opera cloak,—what woman wants it about. It is difficult to sit on it, as on a wrap in a theatre; it is conspicuous to hold in the lap where every one may see its imperfections; perhaps the safest thing is to do as many a woman does, ask her escort to look out for it, thereby shifting the responsibility to him. It may pass through strange vicissitudes in his careless hands,—he may drop it, damage it, lose it, even destroy it, but she is reasonably sure that when the time comes he will return her either the old in a tolerable state of preservation, or a new one of some kind in its place.
Narragansett possesses this decided advantage over Newport, the people do not know each other until it is too late. For six weeks the gay little world moves on in blissful ignorance of antecedents and reputations; no questions are asked, no information volunteered save that disclosed by the hotel register,— information frequently of apocryphal value. The gay beau of the night may be the industrious clerk of the morrow; the baron of the summer may be the barber of the winter; but what difference does it make? If the beau beaus and the baron barons, is not the feminine cup of happiness filled to overflowing? the only requisite being that beau and baron shall preserve their incognito to the end; hence the season must be short in order that no one's identity may be discovered.
At Newport every one labors under the disadvantage of being known,—for the most part too well known. How painful it must be to spend summer after summer in a world of reality, where the truth is so much more thrilling than any possible fiction that people are deprived of the pleasure of invention and the imagination falls into desuetude. At Narragansett every one is veneered for the occasion,—every seam, scar, and furrow is hidden by paint, powder, and rouge; the duchess may be a cook, but the count who is a butler gains nothing by exposing her.
The very conditions of existence at Newport demand the exposure of every frailty and every folly; the skeleton must sit at the feast. There is no room for gossip where the facts are known. Nothing is whispered; the megaphone carries the tale. What a ghastly society, where no amount of finery hides the bald, the literal truth; where each night the same ones meet and, despite the vain attempt to deceive by outward appearances, relentlessly look each other through and through. Of what avail is a necklace of pearls or a gown of gold against such X-ray vision, such intimate knowledge of one's past, of all one's physical, mental, and moral shortcomings? The smile fades from the lips, the hollow compliment dies on the tongue, for how is it possible to pretend in the presence of those who know?
At Narragansett friends are strangers, in Newport they are enemies; in both places the quality of friendship is strained. The two problems of existence are, Whom shall I recognize? and, Who will recognize me? A man's standing depends upon the women he knows; a woman's upon the women she cuts. At a summer resort recognition is a fine art which is not affected by any prior condition of servitude or acquaintance. No woman can afford to sacrifice her position upon the altar of friendship; in these small worlds recognition has no relation whatsoever to friendship, it is rather a convention. If your hostess of the winter passes you with a cold stare, it is a matter of prudence rather than indifference; the outside world does not understand these things, but is soon made to.
Women are the arbiters of social fate, and as such must be placated, but not too servilely. In society a blow goes farther than a kiss; it is a warfare wherein it does not pay to be on the defensive; those are revered who are most feared; those who nail to their mast the black flag and show no quarter are the recognized leaders,—Society is piracy.
Green's Inn was cheery, comfortable, and hospitable; but then the season had passed and things had returned to their normal routine.
The summer hotel passes through three stages each season,—that of expectation, of realization, and of regret; it is unpleasant during the first stage, intolerable during the second, frequently delightful during the third. During the first there is a period when the host and guest meet on a footing of equality; during the second the guest is something less than a nonentity, an humble suitor at the monarch's throne; during the third the conditions are reversed, and the guest is lord of all he is willing to survey. It is conducive to comfort to approach these resorts during the last stage,—unless, of course, they happen to be those ephemeral caravansaries which close in confusion on the flight of the crowd; they are never comfortable.
The best road from Boston to New York is said to be by way of Worcester, Springfield, and through central Connecticut via Hartford and New Haven; but we did not care to retrace our wheels to Worcester and Springfield, and we did want to follow the shore; but we were warned by many that after leaving the Pier we would find the roads very bad.
As a matter of fact, the shore road from the Pier to New Haven is not good; it is hilly, sandy, and rough; but it is entirely practicable, and makes up in beauty and interest what it lacks in quality.
We did not leave Green's Inn until half-past nine the morning after our arrival, and we reached New Haven that evening at exactly eight,—a delightful run of eighty or ninety miles by the road taken.
The road is a little back from the shore and it is anything but straight, winding in and out in the effort to keep near the coast. Nearly all day long we were in sight of the ocean; now and then some wooded promontory obscured our view; now and then we were threading woods and valleys farther inland; now and then the road almost lost itself in thickets of shrubbery and undergrowth, but each time we would emerge in sight of the broad expanse of blue water which lay like a vast mirror on that bright and still September day.
We ferried across the river to New London. At Lyme there is a very steep descent to the Connecticut River, which is a broad estuary at that point. The ferry is a primitive side-wheeler, which might carry two automobiles, but hardly more. It happened to be on the far shore. A small boy pointed out a long tin horn hanging on a post, the hoarse blast of which summons the sleepy boat.
There was no landing, and it seemed impossible for our vehicle to get aboard; but the boat had a long shovel-like nose projecting from the bow which ran upon the shore, making a perfect gang-plank.
Carefully balancing the automobile in the centre so as not to list the primitive craft, we made our way deliberately to the other side, the entire crew of two men—engineer and captain—coming out to talk with us.
The ferries at Lyme and New London would prove great obstacles to anything like a club from New York to Newport along this road; the day would be spent in getting machines across the two rivers.
It was dark when we ran into the city. This particular visit to New Haven is chiefly memorable for the exceeding good manners of a boy of ten, who watched the machine next morning as it was prepared for the day's ride, offered to act as guide to the place where gasoline was kept, and, with the grace of a Chesterfield, made good my delinquent purse by paying the bill. It was all charmingly and not precociously done. This little man was well brought up,—so well brought up that he did not know it.
The automobile is a pretty fair touchstone to manners for both young and old. A man is himself in the presence of the unexpected. The automobile is so strange that it carries people off their equilibrium, and they say and do things impulsively, and therefore naturally.
The odd-looking stranger is ever treated with scant courtesy and unbecoming curiosity; the strange machine fares no better. The man or the boy who is not unduly curious, not unduly aggressive, not unduly loquacious, not unduly insistent, who preserves his poise in the presence of an automobile, is quite out of the ordinary,— my little New Haven friend was of that sort.
It is a beautiful ride from New Haven to New York, and to it we devoted the entire day, from half-past eight until half-past seven.
At Norwalk the people were celebrating the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the town; the hotel where we dined may have antedated the town a century or two.
Later in the afternoon, while wheeling along at twenty miles an hour, we caught a glimpse of a signpost pointing to the left and reading, "To Sound Beach." The name reminded us of friends who were spending a few weeks there; we turned back and made them a flying call.
Again a little farther on we stopped for gasoline in a dilapidated little village, and found it was Mianus, which we recalled as the home of an artist whose paintings, full of charm and tender sentiment, have spread the fame of the locality and river. It was only a short run of two or three miles to the orchard and hill where he has his summer home, and we renewed an acquaintance made several years before.
It is interesting to follow an artist's career and note the changes in manner and methods; for changes are inevitable; they come to high and low alike. The artist may not be conscious that he no longer sees things and paints things as he did, but time tells and the truth is patent to others. But changes of manner and changes of method are fundamentally unlike. Furthermore, changes of either manner or method may be unconscious and natural, or conscious and forced.
For the most part, an artist's manner changes naturally and unconsciously with his environment and advancing years; but in the majority of instances changes in method are conscious and forced, made deliberately with the intention—frequently missed—of doing better. One painter is impressed with the success of another and strives to imitate, adopts his methods, his palette, his key, his color scheme, his brush work, and so on;—these conscious efforts of imitation usually result in failures which, if not immediately conspicuous, soon make their shortcomings felt; the note being forced and unnatural, it does not ring true.
A man may visit Madrid without imitating Velasquez; he may live in Harlem without consciously yielding to Franz Hals; he may spend days with Monet without surrendering his independence; but these strong contacts will work their subtle effects upon all impressionable natures; the effects, however, may be wrought unconsciously and frequently against the sturdy opposition of an original nature.
No painter could live for a season in Madrid without being affected by the work of Velasquez; he might strive against the influence, fight to preserve his own eccentric originality and independence, but the very fact that for the time being he is confronted with a force, an influence, is sufficient to affect his own work, whether he accepts the influence reverentially or rejects it scoffingly.
There is infinitely more hope for the man who goes to Madrid, or any other shrine, in a spirit of opposition,—supremely egotistical, supremely confident of his own methods, disposed to belittle the teaching and example of others,—than there is for the man who goes to servilely copy and imitate. The disposition to learn is a good thing, but in all walks of life, as well as in art, it may be carried too far. No man should surrender his individuality, should yield that within him which is peculiarly and essentially his own. An urchin may dispute with a Plato, if the urchin sticks to the things he knows.
Between the lawless who defy all authority and the servile who submit to all influences, there are the chosen few who assert themselves, and at the same time clearly appreciate the strength of those who differ from them. The urchin painter may assert himself in the presence of Velasquez, providing he keeps within the limits of his own originality.
It is for those who buy pictures to look out for the man who arbitrarily and suddenly changes his manner or method; he is as a cork tossed about on the surface of the waters, drifting with every breeze, submerged by every ripple, fickle and unstable; if his work possess any merit, it will be only the cheap merit of cleverness; its brilliancy will be simply the gloss of dash.
It requires time to absorb an impression. Distance diminishes the force of attraction. The best of painters will not regain immediately his equilibrium after a winter in Florence or in Rome. The enthusiasm of the hour may bring forth some good pictures, but the effect of the impression will be too pronounced, the copy will be too evident. Time and distance will modify an impression and lessen the attraction; the effect will remain, but no longer dominate.
It was so dark we could scarcely see the road as we approached New
York.
How gracious the mantle of night; like a veil it hides all blemishes and permits only fair outlines to be observed. Details are lost in vast shadows; huge buildings loom up vaguely towards the heavens, impressive masses of masonry; the bridges, outlined by rows of electric lights, are strings of pearls about the throat of the dusky river. The red, white, and green lights of invisible boats below are so many colored glow-worms crawling about, while the countless lights of the vast city itself are as if a constellation from above had settled for the time being on the earth beneath.
It is by night that the earth communes with the universe. During the blinding brightness of the day our vision penetrates no farther than our own great sun; but at night, when our sun has run its course across the heavens, and we are no longer dazzled by its overpowering brilliancy, the suns of other worlds come forth one by one until, as the darkness deepens, the vault above is dotted with these twinkling lights. Dim, distant, beacons of suns and planets like our own, what manner of life do they contain? what are we to them? what are they to us? Is there aught between us beyond the mechanical laws of repulsion and attraction? Is there any medium of communication beyond the impalpable ether which brings their light? Are we destined to know each other better by and by, or does our knowledge forever end with what we see on a cloudless night?
It was Wednesday evening, September 11, when we arrived in New York. The Endurance Contest organized by the Automobile Club of America had started for Buffalo on Monday morning, and the papers each day contained long accounts of the heartbreaking times the eighty-odd contestants were having,—hills, sand, mud, worked havoc in the ranks of the faithful, and by midweek the automobile stations in New York were crowded with sick and wounded veterans returning from the fray.
The stories told by those who participated in that now famous run possessed the charm of novelty, the absorbing fascination of fiction.
Once upon a time, two fishermen, who were modestly relating exploits, paused to listen to three chauffeurs who began exchanging experiences. After listening a short time, the fishermen, hats in hand, went over to the chauffeurs and said, "On behalf of the Ancient and Honorable Order of Fishermen, which from time immemorial has held the palm for large, generous, and unrestricted stories of exploits, we confess the inadequacy of our qualifications, the bald literalness of our narratives, the sober and unadorned realism of our tales, and abdicate in favor of the new and most promising Order of Chauffeurs; may the blessing of Ananias rest upon you."
It is not that those who go down the pike in automobiles intend to prevaricate, or even exaggerate, but the experience is so extraordinary that the truth is inadequate for expression and explanation. It seems quite impossible to so adjust our perceptions as to receive strictly accurate impressions; therefore, when one man says he went forty miles an hour, and another says he went sixty, the latter assertion is based not upon the exact speed,—for that neither knows,—but upon the belief of the second man that he went much faster than the other. The exact speeds were probably about ten and fifteen miles an hour respectively; but the ratio is preserved in forty and sixty, and the listening layman is deeply impressed, while no one who knows anything about automobiling is for a moment deceived. At the same time, in fairness to guests and strangers within the gates, each club ought to post conspicuously the rate of discount on narratives, for not only do clubs vary in their departures from literal truth, but the narratives are greatly affected by seasons and events; for instance, after the Endurance Contest the discount rate in the Automobile Club of America was exceedingly high.
Every man who started finished ahead of the others,—except those who never intended to finish at all. Each man went exactly as far as he intended to go, and then took the train, road, or ditch home. Some intended to go as far as Albany, others to Frankfort, while quite a large number entered the contest for the express purpose of getting off in the mud and walking to the nearest village; a few, a very few, intended to go as far as Buffalo.
At one time or another each made a mile a minute, and a much higher rate of speed would have been maintained throughout had it not been necessary to identify certain towns in passing. Nothing happened to any machine, but one or two required a little oiling, and several were abandoned by the roadside because their occupants had stubbornly determined to go no farther. One man who confessed that a set-screw in his goggles worked loose was expelled from the club as too matter-of-fact to be eligible for membership, and the maker of the machine he used sent four-page communications to each trade paper explaining that the loosening of the set-screw was due to no defect in the machine, but was entirely the fault of the driver, who jarred the screw loose by winking his eye.
Each machine surmounted Nelson Hill like a bird,—or would have, if it had not been for the machine in front. There were those who would have made the hill in forty-two seconds if they had not wasted valuable time in pushing. The pitiful feat of the man who crawled up at the rate of seventeen miles an hour was quite discounted by the stories of those who would have made it in half that time if their power had not oozed out in the first hundred yards.
Then there was mud along the route, deep mud. According to accounts, which were eloquently verified by the silence of all who listened, the mud was hub deep everywhere, and in places the machines were quite out of sight, burrowing like moles. Some took to the tow-path along the canal, others to trolley lines and telegraph wires.
Each man ran his own machine without the slightest expert assistance; the men in over-alls with kits of tools lurking along the roadside were modern brigands seeking opportunities for hold-ups; now and then they would spring out upon an unoffending machine, knock it into a state of insensibility, and abuse it most unmercifully. A number of machines were shadowed throughout the run by these rascals, and several did not escape their clutches, but perished miserably. In one instance a babe in arms drove one machine sixty-two miles an hour with one hand, the other being occupied with a nursing-bottle.
There were one hundred and fifty-six dress-suit cases on the run, but only one was used, and that to sit on during high tide in Herkimer County, where the mud was deepest.
It would be quite superfluous to relate additional experience tales, but enough has been told to illustrate the necessity of a narrative discount notice in all places where the clans gather. All men are liars, but some intend to lie,—to their credit, be it said, chauffeurs are not among the latter.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN ANARCHISM "BULLETINS FROM THE CHAMBER OF DEATH"
During these days the President was dying in Buffalo, though the country did not know it until Friday.
Wednesday and Thursday the reports were so assuring that all danger seemed past; but, as it turned out afterwards, there was not a moment from the hour of the shooting when the fatal processes of dissolution were not going on. Not only did the resources of surgery and medicine fail most miserably, but their gifted prophets were unable to foretell the end. Bulletins of the most reassuring character turned out absolutely false. After it was all over, there was a great deal of explanation how it occurred and that it was inevitable from the beginning; but the public did not, and does not, understand how the learned doctors could have been so mistaken Wednesday and so wise Friday; and yet the explanation is simple,—medicine is an art and surgery far from an exact science. No one so well as the doctors knows how impossible it is to predict anything with any degree of assurance; how uncertain the outcome of simple troubles and wounds to say nothing of serious; how much nature will do if left to herself, how obstinate she often proves when all the skill of man is brought to her assistance.
On Friday evening, and far into the night, Herald Square was filled with a surging throng watching the bulletins from the chamber of death. It was a dignified end. There must have been a good deal of innate nobility in William McKinley. With all his vacillation and infirmity of political purpose, he must have been a man whose mind was saturated with fine thoughts, for to the very last, in those hours of weakness when the will no longer sways and each word is the half-unconscious muttering of the true self, he shone forth with unexpected grandeur and died a hero.
Late in the evening a bulletin announced that when the message of death came the bells would toll. In the midst of the night the city was roused by the solemn pealing of great bells, and from the streets below there came the sounds of flying horses, of moving feet, of cries and voices. It seemed as if the city had been held in check and was now released to express itself in its own characteristic way. The wave of sound radiated from each newspaper office and penetrated the most deserted street, the most secret alley, telling the people of the death of their President.
Anarchy achieved its greatest crime in the murder of President
McKinley while he held the hand of his assassin in friendly grasp.
Little wonder this country was roused as never before, and at this moment the civilized world is discussing measures for the suppression, the obliteration, of anarchists, but we must take heed lest we overshoot the mark.
Three Presidents—Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley—have been assassinated, but only the last as the result of anarchistic teachings. The crime of Booth had nothing to do with anarchy; the crime of half-witted Guiteau had nothing to do with anarchy; but the deliberate crime of the cool and self-possessed Czolgoscz was the direct outcome of the "propaganda of action."
Because, therefore, three Presidents have been assassinated, we must not link the crimes together and unduly magnify the dangers of anarchy. At most the two early crimes could only serve to demonstrate how easy it is to reach and kill a President of the United States, and therefore the necessity for greater safeguards about his person is trebly demonstrated. The habit of handshaking, at best, has little to recommend it; with public men it is a custom without excuse. The notion that men in public life must receive and mingle with great masses of people, or run the risk of being called undemocratic, is a relic of the political dark ages. The President of the United States is an executive official, not a spectacle; he ought to be a very busy man, just a plain, hard-working servant of the people,—that is the real democratic idea. There is not the slightest need for him to expose himself to assault. In the proper performance of his duties he ought to keep somewhat aloof. The people have the right to expect that in their interest he will take good care of himself.
As for anarchism, that is a political theory that possesses the minds of a certain number of men, some of them entirely inoffensive dreamers, and anarchism as a theory can no more be suppressed by law than can any other political or religious theory. The law is efficacious against acts, but powerless against notions. But anarchism in the abstract is one thing and anarchism in the concrete is another. It is one thing to preach anarchy as the final outcome of progress, it is quite another thing to preach anarchy as a present rule of conduct. The distinction must be observed, for while the law is helpless against theories, it is potent against the practical application of theories.
In a little book called "Politics for Young Americans," written with most pious and orthodox intent by the late Charles Nordhoff, the discussion of government begins with the epigram,—by no means original with Nordhoff,—"Governments are necessary evils."
Therein lurks the germ of anarchism,—for if evil, why should governments be necessary? The anarchist is quick to admit the evil, but denies the necessity; and, in sooth, if government is an evil, then the sooner it is dispensed with the better.
When Huxley defines anarchy as that "state of society in which the rule of each individual by himself is the only government the legitimacy of which is recognized," and then goes on to say, "in this sense, strict anarchy may be the highest conceivable grade of perfection of social existence; for, if all men spontaneously did justice and loved mercy, it is plain that the swords might advantageously be turned into ploughshares, and that the occupation of judges and police would be gone," he lends support to the theoretical anarchist. For if progress means the gradual elimination of government and the final supremacy of the individual, then the anarchist is simply the prophet who keeps in view and preaches the end. If anarchy is an ideal condition, there always will be idealists who will advocate it.
But government is necessary, and just because it is necessary therefore it cannot be an evil. Hospitals are necessary, and just because they are necessary therefore they cannot be evils. Places for restraining the insane and criminal are necessary, and therefore not evil.
The weaknesses of humanity may occasion these necessities; but the evil, if any, is inherent in the constitution of man and not in the social organization. It is the individual and not society that has need of government, of hospitals, of asylums, of prisons.
Anarchy does not involve, as Huxley suggests, "the highest conceivable grade of perfection of social existence." Not at all. What it does involve is the highest conceivable grade of individual existence; in fact, of a grade so high that it is quite beyond conception,—in short, it involves human perfectibility. Anarchy proper involves the complete emancipation of every individual from all restraints and compulsions; it involves a social condition wherein absolutely no authority is imposed upon any individual, where no requirement of any kind is made against the will of any member—man, woman, or child; where everything is left to individual initiation.
So far from such a "state of society" being "the highest conceivable grade of perfection of social existence," it is not conceivable at all, and the farther the mind goes in attempting to grasp it, the more hopelessly dreary does the scheme become.
When men spontaneously do justice and love mercy, as Huxley suggests, and when each individual is mentally, physically, and morally sound, as he must be to support and govern himself, then, and not till then, will it be possible to dispense with government; but even then it is more conceivable than otherwise that these perfect individuals would—as a mere division of labor, as a mere matter of economy—adopt and enforce some rules and regulations for the benefit of all; it would be necessary to do so unless the individuals were not only perfect, but also absolutely of one mind on all subjects relating to their welfare. Can the imagination picture existence more inane?
But regardless of what the mentally, physically, and morally perfect individuals might do after attaining their perfection, anarchy assumes the millennium,—and the millennium is yet a long way off. If the future of anarchy depends upon the physical, mental, and moral perfection of its advocates, the outlook is gloomy indeed, for a theory never had a following more imperfect in all these respects.
The patent fact that most governments, both national and local, are corruptly, extravagantly, and badly administered tends to obscure our judgment, so that we assent, without thinking, to the proposition that government is an evil, and then argue that it is a necessary evil. But government is not evil because there are evils incidental to its administration. Every human institution partakes of the frailties of the individual; it could not be otherwise; all social institutions are human, not superhuman.
With progress it is to be hoped that there will be fewer wars, fewer crimes, fewer wrongs, so that government will have less and less to do and drop many of its functions,—that is the sort of anarchy every one hopes for; that is the sort of anarchy the late Phillips Brooks had in mind when he said, "He is the benefactor of his race who makes it possible to have one law less. He is the enemy of his kind who would lay upon the shoulders of arbitrary government one burden which might be carried by the educated conscience and character of the community."
But assume that war is no more and armies are disbanded; that crimes are no more and police are dismissed; that wrongs are no more and courts are dissolved,—what then?
My neighbor becomes slightly insane, is very noisy and threatening; my wife and children, who are terrorized, wish him restrained; but his friends do not admit that he is insane, or, admitting his peculiarities, insist my family and I ought to put up with them; the man himself is quite sane enough to appreciate the discussion and object to any restraint. Now, who shall decide? Suppose the entire community—save the man and one or two sympathizing cranks—is clearly of the opinion the man is insane and should be restrained, who is to decide the matter? and when it is decided, who is to enforce the decision by imposing the authority of the community upon the individual? If the community asserts its authority in any manner or form, that is government.
If every institution, including government, were abolished to-morrow, the percentage of births that would turn out blind, crippled, and feeble both mentally and physically, wayward, eccentric, and insane would continue practically the same, and the community would be obliged to provide institutions for these unfortunates, the community would be obliged to patrol the streets for them, the community would be obliged to pass upon their condition and support or restrain them; in short, the abolished institutions—including tribunals of some kind, police, prisons, asylums—would be promptly restored.
The anarchist would argue that all this may be done by voluntary association and without compulsion; but the man arrested, or confined in the insane asylum against his will, would be of a contrary opinion. The debate might involve his friends and sympathizers until in every close case—as now—the community would be divided in hostile camps, one side urging release of the accused, the other urging his detention. Who is to hold the scale and decide?
The fundamental error of anarchists, and of most theorists who discuss "government" and "the state," lies in the tacit assumption that "government" and "the state" are entities to be dealt with quite apart from the individual; that both may be modified or abolished by laws or resolutions to that effect.
If anything is clearly demonstrated as true, it is that both "government" and "the state" have been evolved out of our own necessities; neither was imposed from without, but both have been evolved from within; both are forms of co-operation. For the time being the "state" and "government," as well as the "church" and all human institutions, may be modified or seemingly abolished, but they come back to serve essentially the same purpose. The French Revolution was an organized attempt to overturn the foundations of society and hasten progress by moving the hands of the clock forward a few centuries,—the net result was a despotism the like of which the world has not known since the days of Rome.
Anarchy as a system is a bubble, the iridescent hues of which attract, but which vanish into thin air on the slightest contact with reality; it is the perpetual motion of sociology; the fourth dimension of economies; the squaring of the political circle.
The apostles of anarchy are a queer lot,—Godwin in England, Proudhon, Grave, and Saurin in France, Schmidt ("Stirner"), Faucher, Hess, and Marr in Germany, Bakunin and Krapotkin in Russia, Reclus in Belgium, with Most and Tucker in America, sum up the principal lights,—with the exception of the geographer Reclus, not a sound and sane man among them; in fact, scarcely any two agree upon a single proposition save the broad generalization that government is an evil which must be eliminated. Until they do agree upon some one measure or proposition of practical importance, the world has little to fear from their discussions and there is no reason why any attempt should be made to suppress the debate. If government is an evil, as so many men who are not anarchists keep repeating, then the sooner we know it and find the remedy the better; but if government is simply one of many human institutions developed logically and inevitably to meet conditions created by individual shortcomings, then government will tend to diminish as we correct our own failings, but that it will entirely disappear is hardly likely, since it is inconceivable that men on this earth should ever attain such a condition of perfection that possibility of disagreement is absolutely and forever removed.
Anarchism as a doctrine, as a theory, involves no act of violence any more than communism or socialism.
Between the assassination of a ruler and the doctrine of anarchy there is no necessary connection. The philosophic anarchist simply believes anarchy is to be the final result of progress and evolution, just as the communist believes that communism will be the outcome; neither theorist would see the slightest advantage in trying to hasten the slow but sure progress of events by deeds of violence; in fact, both theorists would regret such deeds as certain to prove reactionary and retard the march of events.
The world has nothing to fear from anarchism as a theory, and up to thirty or forty years ago it was nothing but a theory.
The "propaganda of action" came out of Russia about forty years ago, and is the offspring of Russian nihilism.
The "propaganda of action" is the protest of impatience against evolution; it is the effort to hasten progress by deeds of violence.
From the few who, like Bakunin, Brousse, and Krapotkin, have written about the "propaganda of action" with sufficient coherence to make themselves understood, it appears that it is not their hope to destroy government by removing all executive heads,—even their tortured brains recognize the impossibility of that task; nor do they hope to so far terrify rulers as to bring about their abdication. Not at all; but they do hope by deeds of violence to so attract attention to the theory of anarchy as to win followers;—in other words, murders such as those of Humbert, Carnot, and President McKinley were mere advertisements of anarchism. In the words of Brousse, "Deeds are talked of on all sides; the indifferent masses inquire about their origin, and thus pay attention to the new doctrine and discuss it. Let men once get as far as this, and it is not hard to win over many of them."
Hence, the greater the crime the greater the advertisement; from that point of view, the shooting of President McKinley, under circumstances so atrocious, is so far the greatest achievement of the "propaganda of action."
It is worth noting that the "reign of terror" which the Nihilists sought to and did create in Russia was for a far more practical and immediate purpose. They sought to terrify the government into granting reforms; so far from seeking to annihilate the government, they sought to spur it into activity for the benefit of the masses.
The methods of the Nihilists, without the excuse of their object, were borrowed by the more fanatical anarchists, and applied to the advertising of their belief. Since the adoption of the "propaganda of action" by the extremists, anarchism has undergone a great change. It has passed from a visionary and harmless theory, as advocated by Godwin, Proudhon, and Reclus, to a very concrete agency of crime and destruction under the teachings of such as Bakunin, Krapotkin, and Most; not forgetting certain women like Louise Michel in France and Emma Goldman in this country who out- Herod Herod;—when a woman goes to the devil she frightens him; his Satanic majesty welcomes a man, but dreads a woman; to a woman the downward path is a toboggan slide, to a man it is a gentle but seductive descent.
It is against the "propaganda of action" that legislation must be directed, not because it is any part of anarchism, but because it is the propaganda of crime.
Laws directed towards the suppression of anarchism might result in more harm than good, but crime is quite another matter. It is one thing to advocate less and less of government, to preach the final disappearance of government and the evolution of anarchy; it is a fundamentally different thing to advocate the destruction of life or property as a means to hasten the end.
The criminal action and the criminal advice must be dissociated entirely from any political or social theory. It does not matter what a man's ultimate purpose may be; he may be a communist or a socialist, a Republican or a Democrat, a Presbyterian or an Episcopalian; when he advises, commits, or condones a murder, his conduct is not measured by his convictions,—unless, of course, he is insane; his advice is measured by its probable and actual consequences; his deeds speak for themselves.
A man is not to be punished or silenced for saying he believes in anarchy, his convictions on that point are a matter of indifference to those who believe otherwise. But a man is to be punished for saying or doing things which result in injuring others; and the advice, whether given in person to the individual who commits the deed, or given generally in lecture or print, if it moves the individual to action, is equally criminal.
On August 20, 1886, eight men were found guilty of murder in Chicago, seven were condemned to death and one to the penitentiary; four were afterwards hanged, one killed himself in jail, and three were imprisoned.
These men were convicted of a crime with which, so far as the evidence showed, they had no direct connection; but their speeches, writings, and conduct prior to the actual commission of the crime had been such that they were held guilty of having incited the murder.
During the spring of 1886 there were many strikes and a great deal of excitement growing out of the "eight-hour movement in Chicago." There was much disorder. On the evening of May 4 a meeting was held in what was known as Haymarket Square, at this meeting three of the condemned made speeches. About ten o'clock a platoon of police marched to the Square, halted a short distance from the wagon where the speakers were, and an officer commanded the meeting to immediately and peaceably disperse. Thereupon a bomb was thrown from near the wagon into the ranks of the policemen, where it exploded, killing and wounding a number.
The man who threw the bomb was never positively identified, but it was probably one Rudolph Schnaubelt, who disappeared. At all events, the condemned were not connected with the actual throwing; they were convicted upon the theory that they were co-conspirators with him by reason of their speeches, writings, and conduct which influenced his conduct.
An even broader doctrine of liability is announced in the following paragraph from the opinion of the Supreme Court of Illinois:
"If the defendants, as a means of bringing about the social revolution and as a part of the larger conspiracy to effect such revolution, also conspired to excite classes of workingmen in Chicago into sedition, tumult, and riot, and to the use of deadly weapons and the taking of human life, and for the purpose of producing such tumult, riot, use of weapons and taking of life, advised and encouraged such classes by newspaper articles and speeches to murder the authorities of the city, and a murder of a policeman resulted from such advice and encouragement, then defendants are responsible therefor."
It is the logical application of this proposition that will defeat the "propaganda of action." If it be enacted that any man who advocates the commission of any criminal act, or who afterwards condones the crime, shall be deemed guilty of an offence equal to that advocated or condoned and punished accordingly, the "propaganda of action" in all branches of criminal endeavor will be effectually stifled without the doubtful expedient of directing legislation against any particular social or economic theory.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN NEW YORK TO BUFFALO UP THE HILL
It was Saturday, the 14th, at nine o'clock, when we left New York for Albany, following the route of the Endurance Contest.
The morning was bright and warm. The roads were perfect for miles. We passed Kings Bridge, Yonkers, Hastings, and Dobbs Ferry flying. At Tarrytown we dropped the chain. A link had parted. Pushing the machine under the shade of a tree, a half-hour was spent in replacing the chain and riveting in a new link. All the pins showed more or less wear, and a new chain should have been put on in New York, but none that would fit was to be had.
We dined at Peekskill, and had a machinist go over the chain, riveting the heads of the pins so none would come out again.
Nelson Hill, a mile and a half beyond Peekskill, proved all it was said to be,—and more.
In the course of the trip we had mounted hills that were worse, and hills that were steeper, but only in spots or for short distances; for a steady steep climb Nelson Hill surpassed anything we found in the entire trip. The hill seems one-half to three-quarters of a mile long, a sharp ascent,—somewhat steeper about half-way up than at the beginning or finish. Accurate measurements were made for the Endurance Contest and the results published.
The grade was just a little too much for the machine, with our luggage and ourselves. It was tiresome walking so far beside the machine, and in attempting to bring it to a stop for a moment's rest the machine got started backward, and was well on its way down the hill, gaining speed every fraction of a second. It was a short, sharp chase to catch the lever operating the emergency brake,—which luckily operated by being pushed forward from the seat,—a pull on the lever and the machine was brought to a stop with the rear wheels hanging over the edge of a gulley** at the side. After that experience the machine was allowed to go to the top without any more attempts to rest.
At Fishkill Village we saved a few miles and some bad road by continuing on to Poughkeepsie by the inland road instead of going down to the Landing.
We inquired the way from an old man, who said, "If you want to go to P'keepsie, follow the road just this side the post-office; you will save a good many miles, and have a good road; if you want to follow the other fellers, then keep straight on down to the Landing; but why they went down there, beats me."
It was six-thirty when we arrived at Poughkeepsie. As the next day would be Sunday, we made sure of a supply of gasoline that night.
Up to this point the roads, barring Nelson Hill, and the weather had been perfect, but conditions were about to change for the worse.
Sunday morning was gray and drizzly. We left at eight-thirty. The roads were soft and in places very slippery; becoming much worse as we approached Albany, where we arrived at half-past three. There we should have stopped. We had come seventy-five miles in seven hours, including all stops, over bad roads, and that should have sufficed; but it was such an effort to house the machine in Albany and get settled in rooms, that we decided to go on at least as far as Schenectady.
To the park it was all plain sailing on asphalt and macadam, but from the park to the gate of the cemetery and to the turn beyond the mud was so deep and sticky it seemed as if the machine could not possibly get through. If we had attempted to turn about, we would surely have been stuck; there was nothing to do but follow the best ruts and go straight on, hoping for better things. The dread of coming to a standstill and being obliged to get out in that eight or ten inches of uninviting mud was a very appreciable factor in our discomfort. Fortunately, the clutch held well and the motor was not stalled. When we passed the corner beyond the cemetery the road was much better, though still so soft the high speed could be used only occasionally.
The tank showed a leak, which for some reason increased so rapidly that a pail of water had to be added about every half-mile. At last a pint of bran poured into the tank closed the leak in five minutes.
On reaching Latham it was apparent that Schenectady could not be made before dark, if at all, so we turned to the right into Troy. We had made the two long sides of a triangle over the worst of roads; whereas, had we run from Albany direct to Troy, we could have followed a good road all the way.
The next morning was the 16th of September, the sun was shining brightly and the wind was fresh; the roads were drying every moment, so we did not hurry our departure.
The express office in Albany was telephoned for a new chain that had been ordered, and in about an hour it was delivered. The machine was driven into a side street in front of a metal roofing factory, the tank taken out and so thoroughly repaired it gave no further trouble. It was noon before the work was finished, for the new chain and a new belt to the pump had to be put on, and many little things done which consumed time.
At two o'clock we left Troy. The road to Schenectady in good weather is quite good, but after the rain it was heavy with half-dried mud and deep with ruts. From Schenectady to Fonda, where we arrived at six-thirty, the roads were very bad; however, forty-five miles in four hours and a half was fairly good travelling under the adverse conditions. If the machine had been equipped with an intermediate gear, an average of twelve or fifteen miles could have been easily made. The going was just a little too heavy for the fast speed and altogether too easy for the low, and yet we were obliged to travel for hours on the low gear.
From New York to Buffalo there is a succession of cities and villages which are, for the most part, very attractive, but good hotels are scarce, and as for wayside inns there are none. With the exception of Albany and one or two other cities the hotels are old, dingy, and dirty. Here and there, as in Geneva, a new hotel is found, but to most of the cities the hotels are a disgrace.
The automobile, however, accustoms one to discomforts, and one gets so tired and hungry at night that the shortcomings of the village hotel are overlooked, or not fully realized until seen the next morning by the frank light of day.
Fonda is the occasion of these remarks upon New York hotels.
It was cloudy and threatening when we left Fonda at half-past seven the next morning, and by ten the rain began to fall so heavily and steadily that the roads, none too dry before, were soon afloat.
It was slow going. At St. Johnsville we stopped to buy heavier rubber coats. It did not seem possible we would get through the day without coming to a stop, but, strange to relate, the machine kept on doggedly all day, on the slow gear nearly every mile, without a break of any kind.
It was bad enough from St. Johnsville to Herkimer, but the worst was then to come.
When we came east from Utica to Herkimer, we followed the road on the north side of the valley, and recalled it as hilly but very dry and good. The Endurance Contest was out of Herkimer, through Frankfort and along the canal on the south side of the valley. It was a question whether to follow the road we knew was pretty good or follow the contest route, which presumably was selected as the better.
A liveryman at Herkimer said, "Take my advice and keep on the north side of the valley; the road is hilly, but sandy and drier; if you go through Frankfort, you will find some pretty fierce going; the road is level but cut up and deep with mud,—keep on the north side."
We should have followed that advice, the more so since it coincided with our own impressions; but at the store where we stopped for gasoline, a man who said he drove an automobile advised the road through Frankfort as the better.
It was in Frankfort that several of the contestants in the endurance run came to grief,—right on the main street of the village. There was no sign of pavement, macadam, or gravel, just deep, dark, rich muck; how deep no one could tell; a road so bad it spoke volumes for the shiftlessness and lack of enterprise prevailing in the village.
A little beyond Frankfort there is about a mile of State road, laid evidently to furnish inhabitants an object lesson,—and laid in vain.
A little farther on the black muck road leads between the canal and towpath high up on the left, and a high board fence protecting the railroad tracks on the right; in other words, the highway was the low ground between two elevations. The rains of the week before and the rains of the last two days had converted the road into a vast ditch. We made our way slowly into it, and then seizing an opening ran up on to the towpath, which was of sticky clay and bad enough, but not quite so discouraging as the road. We felt our way along carefully, for the machine threatened every moment to slide either into the canal on the left or down the bank into the road on the right.
Soon we were obliged to turn back to the road and take our chances on a long steady pull on the slow gear. Again and again it seemed as if the motor would stop; several times it was necessary to throw out the clutch, let the motor race, and then throw in the clutch to get the benefit of both the motor and the momentum of the two-hundred pound fly-wheel; it was a strain on the chain and gears, but they held, and the machine would be carried forward ten or twelve feet by the impetus; in that way the worst spots were passed.
Towards Utica the roads were better, though we nearly came to grief in a low place just outside the city.
It required all Wednesday morning to clean and overhaul the machine. Every crevice was filled with mud, and grit had worked into the chain and every exposed part. There was also some lost motion to be taken up to stop a disagreeable pounding. The strain on the new chain had stretched it so a link had to be taken out.
It was two o'clock before we left Utica. A little beyond the outskirts of the city the road forks, the right is the road to Syracuse, and it is gravelled most of the way. Unfortunately, we took the left fork, and for seven miles ploughed through red clay, so sticky that several times we just escaped being stalled. It was not until we reached Clinton that we discovered our mistake and turned cross country to the right road. The cross-road led through a low boggy meadow that was covered with water, and there we nearly foundered. When the hard gravel of the turnpike was reached, it was with a feeling of irritation that we looked back upon the time wasted in the horrible roads we need not have taken.
The day was bright, and every hour of sun and wind improved the roads, so that by the time we were passing Oneida Castle the going was good. It was dark when we passed through Fayetteville; a little beyond our reserve gallon of gasoline was put in the tank and the run was made over the toll-road to Syracuse on "short rations."