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Page 14
"Here's something about America," I protested, "from Chicago, too. A
whole column--'Movements of Cereals.'"
"Yes, and look at that for a nice attractive headline," responded the
Senator with sarcasm. "'Movements of Cereals!' Gives you a great idea of
pace, doesn't it? Why couldn't they have called it 'Grain on the Go'?"
"Did Mr. McConnell get in for Mayor, or Jimmy Fagan?" I inquired,
looking down the column.
"They don't seem to have asked anybody."
"And who got the Post Office?"
"Not there, not there, my child!"
"Oh!" said momma at the window, "these little gray-stone villages are
too sweet for words. Why talk of Chicago? Mr. McConnell and Mr. Fagan
are all very well at home, but now that the ocean heaves between us, and
your political campaign is over, may we not forget them?"
"Forget Mike McConnell and Jimmy Fagan!" replied the Senator, regarding
a passing church spire with an absent smile. "Well, no, Augusta; as far
as I'm concerned I'm afraid it couldn't be done--at all permanently.
There's too much involved. But I see what you mean about turning the
mind out to pasture when the grazing is interesting--getting in a cud,
so to speak, for reflection afterwards. I see your idea."
The Senator is always business-like. He immediately addressed himself
through the other window to the appreciation of the scenery, and I felt,
as I took out my note-book to record one or two impressions, that he
would do it justice.
"No, momma," I was immediately compelled to exclaim, "you mustn't look
over my shoulder. It is paralysing to the imagination."
"Then I won't, dear. But oh, if you could only describe it as it is! The
ruined chateaux, tree-embosomed----" Momma paused.
"The gray church spires, from which at eventide the Angelus comes
pealing--or stealing," she continued. "Perhaps 'stealing' is better."
"Above all the poplars--the poplars are very characteristic, dear. And
the women toilers in the sunset fields garnering up the golden grain.
You might exclaim, 'Why are they always in blue?' Have you got that
down?"
"They were making hay," poppa corrected. "But I suppose the public won't
know the difference, any more than you did."
Momma leaned forward, clasping her smelling-bottle, and looked out of
the window with a smile of exaltation.
"The cows," she went on, "the proud-legged Norman cows standing
knee-deep in the quiet pools. Have you got the cows down, dear?"
The Senator, at the other window, looked across disparagingly, hard at
work on his beard. He said nothing, but after a time abruptly thrust his
hands in his pockets, and his feet out in front of him in a manner which
expressed absolute dissent. When momma said she thought she would try to
get a little sleep he looked round observantly, and as soon as her
slumber was sound and comfortable he beckoned to me.
"See here," he said, not unkindly, argumentatively. "About those cows.
In fact, about all these pointers your mother's been giving you. They're
all very nice and poetic--I don't want to run down momma's ideas--but
they don't strike me as original. I won't say I could put my finger on
it, but I'm perfectly certain I've heard of the poplars and the women
field labourers of Normandy somewhere before. She doesn't do it on
purpose"--the Senator inclined his head with deprecation toward the
sleeping form opposite, and lowered his voice--"and I don't know that
I'd mention it to you under any other circumstances, but momma's a
fearful plagiarist. She doesn't hesitate anywhere. I've known her do it
to William Shakespeare and the Book of Job, let alone modern authors. In
dealing with her suggestions you want to be very careful. Otherwise
momma'll get you into trouble."
I nodded with affectionate consideration. "I'll make a note of what you
say, Senator," I replied, and immediately, from motives of delicacy, we
changed the subject. As we talked, poppa told me in confidence how much
he expected of the democratic idea in Paris. He said that even the
short time we had spent in England was enough to enable him to detect
the subserviency of the lower classes there and to resent it, as a man
and a brother. He spoke sadly and somewhat bitterly of the manners of
the brother man who shaved him, which he found unjustifiably affable,
and of the inexcusable abasement of a British railway porter if you gave
him a shilling. He said he was glad to leave England, it was
demoralising to live there; you lost your sense of the dignity of
labour, and in the course of time you were almost bound to degenerate
into a swell. He expressed a good deal of sympathy with the aristocracy
on this account, concentrating his indignation upon those who, as it
were, made aristocrats of innocent human beings against their will. It
was more than he would have ventured to say in public, but in talking to
me poppa often mentions what a comfort it is to be his own mouthpiece.
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