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 a.s.semble 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 sc.r.a.ped; 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 bra.s.s 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 a.s.sert 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 Ma.s.sachusetts 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 pa.s.sing 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-sh.o.r.e 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 pa.s.s 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 ident.i.ty 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 d.u.c.h.ess 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 pa.s.ses 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 pa.s.sed and things had returned to their normal routine.
The summer hotel pa.s.ses 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 nonent.i.ty, 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 sh.o.r.e; but we were warned by many that after leaving the Pier we would find the roads very bad.
As a matter of fact, the sh.o.r.e 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 sh.o.r.e 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.