PS 3519 .fi85 B6 1913 Copy 1 W GDK 7 i\dmyin4§ /h&; 0^0, vViAUcutM^ ^.LamUL Book of RamLling,s Bits of Homely Philosophy Written For My Friends, The Public By Myra Williams Jarrell BOOK OF RAMBLINGS Dedication A f 5 J^^ THIS little book is lovingly dedicated to those who have rambled with me in the Garden of Memory, and gathered a few posies to put between the covers of an old book; those who have stepped with me into the Kitchen of Life, where dwell the lowly ones of the earth; those who have danced with me upon the Glades of Child- hood, and glimpsed the joy of imperishable youth, MY READERS. Copyri^ted by Author 1913 2 DEC30I9I3 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS CONTENTS Page That Man of One 5 The Room of Long Ago 10 A Grouch and Twenty Years - - - 15 Married People's Jokes 21 The Fear of the Casual Visitor - - - 24 The Haunted House 30 The Art of Letter-writing - . - - 35 The Woman Who Had a Grievance - 39 The Bad Little Girl 44 A Dream of Affluence 49 My Neighbor 53 The Wall a Woman Built - - - 57 The Man Who Wanted to Help - - 60 A Tribute 65 Teacher 70 A House Cleaning 75 The Woman Who Dreamed - - - - 80 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS By Albert T. Reid Page 'The Casual Visitor" 25 'The Bad Little Girl" 45 'The Man Who Wanted to Help" - - 61 'The Woman Who Dreamed" - - - 81 Printing Department, KANSAS FARMER, Topeka, Kansas. BOOK OF RAMBLINGS That Man of One HE was just a little boy when you first knew him. Just a little, towsly-headed, freckle- faced, snub-nosed boy. There probably were patches on his pants, and his galluses didn't join, but you never noticed it. Then, as now, love was blind, and that blessed blindness which has ever been a boon to women, con- cealed his defects. He whispered behind his hand when the teacher was looking the other way, and drew funny pictures on his slate. Likely as not, it was a caricature of you, with hair ribbon adorning the end of your pigtail, out of all proportion to the few hairs it con- tained. Maybe, too, he drew you cross-eyed, and slant-mouthed. Undoubtedly he did, for everything looked funny to his sense. And everything he did, even the cross eyes and slant mouth; yes, even the face he made at you, to convince Johnny Jones that he felt only contempt for a Mere Girl, seemed funny to you then. Something within you responded to something within him. The same some- thing which caused him to turn handsprings as he passed you on the road going home from school, looking at you all the time out- of the corner of his eye to see if his prowess was making the impression he intended it should upon your youthful mind. BOOK OF RAMBLINGS But he did not remain long a towsly-haired boy with the one freckle which spread over his entire face, with patches on pants and un- strung galluses. When next he dawned upon your notice he was an athletic High School boy, training for football, with long hair, wide trousers and clothes generally hung with care- ful carelessness. He would not learn to dance, and that was a cross to you, for dancing had become a passion by that time, and you found your feet and heart tripping in time to every harmonious sound of music. Still it was a sat- isfaction to you that his ears were clean, and that he was willing to chat with you lightly about team work, and the studies that you had in common. Then, too, he treated you to soda water at the corner drug store, on rare and treasured occasions. He usually was very red in the face at such times, and showed an un- comfortable tendency to dodge when any of his acquaintances came into the store. But you didn't mind — oh, dear, no! You fluifed your hair and bit your lips to show your dim- ples, and crooked your little finger as you drank, to show that you were familiar with all the little elegances of polite society, and felt, all at once, horribly grown up. (?» ^ ^ And then he changed again! He had big mournful eyes with soulful expression. He 6 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS played the mandolin and chanted ballads of sweet passion to you in a tuneless little voice. He satisfied that period of your development which made of life such a serious, sad thing. He knew instinctively that you carried a bur- den far too heavy for your slender shoulders. You did not need to tell him that you were unappreciated in your home circle. That Father was engrossed in business, and did not realize his rare privilege in rearing a genius. That Mother was too busy in looking after the cares of the household to sympathize wholly with your ad astra per aspera temperament. That Brother Tom was rough and uncouth, and openly ridiculed your choicest sentiments. That Sister Ann wasted no time watching from the housetops in your interests, but mimicked your refined manners in the privacy of the family; that the family cruelly found her vul- garity amusing, He was the only person in the whole world who understood you. And you adored him for it! You adored the length of his eyelashes, and the delicate eflfeminacy of his face. His mouth, with its curved red lines, was a poem to you — a poem of which you never tired. That is, not for some time. ^ 3f 3^ After a while you began to find a sameness in his voice, in his expression of sympathetic, soulful, high-class passion. Disillusion fol- BOOK OF RAMBLINGS lowed the discovery of monotony, and for a few years you did not believe in yourself, or your capacity for constant love. You scoffed at the tender passion, and were cold and un- touched by the love offered you by other men. 0* 0» Ijw And then he came back to you — this com- posite man of yours. You never noticed the color of his eyes, nor the length of his hair. You did not know whether his mind ran in Ibsenesque channels or was commercial. You knew only that it was he. You listened in a trance to his avowal of love. You never ques- tioned him. You never looked behind. In- deed, you saw only the precious present, and the long vista of dreams stretching out ahead, indefinite, but unspeakably sweet with prom- ise. You look back even now upon that period and you are thrilled by its remembrance! ,^ 5 ^ And then the Man of One changes. The lover is merged in the husband. There may at times be lacking the romance, which marked his passage across your life from that first little tow-headed love, who likely as not deliv- ers groceries at your back door now — but something has taken the place of that romance, something deeper, finer, more substantial. You have, with that man of yours, waited in breathless anxiety beside a little crib; in 8 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS voiceless agony watched a little life almost flicker out — to be wafted back to you like a breath from Heaven. And the union of your two souls at that moment— your soul and the soul of that man of yours — who can compre- hend save the One Mind which knows every- thing! Shadows and sunshine alike have softly en- veloped the dwelling place of love, but through it all, the Man of One has loomed big, vital, instinct with life. He has changed with the changing years. Care and responsibility, and maybe sorrow, have deepened the lines on cheek and forehead, and touched his hair with silver. His form has taken on added weight and corpulence — proof of your material care of the body — but the Man himself is essentially the same. The love which must have its outlet through all the years has its center and circumference now in the Man, the husband. Life with that Man of One seems very real and good — a something to cling to — a some- thing to cling to through all the years to come, until, with the feeling of being no longer needed here, comes the desire to step over the border, you and that man of yours, hand in hand — just over the border, no farther, into that fair country which awaits you. BOOK OF RAMBLINGS The Room of Lon^ A^o PROSPERITY came to a woman one day — it matters not how or why or whence. She was not totally unprepared for it, for she had employed most of her leisure hours building- Castles in Spain. So that, when the Call came, she knew the exact shade of the hangings to be used in each room of the beautiful house she created; she had seen it all in the visions she had had — the glimpses into the future, rosy with promise. This room, hung in soft grays and old blues, with its mahogany furniture, she had long en- joyed in thought; that one, with the tints of the autumn on wall and floor, should be fur- nished in golden oak. The sun parlor, with the cretonne hangings, and the old ivy cling- ing to the inner walls, reaching ever a little higher, should have deep, restful chairs of green wicker. There should stand her work basket, of the same design — here, a Vicker table strewn with magazines and a few favor- ite books. In this retreat should tea be served, brought in by a deft servant on a tea cart of the green wicker. Here, over the teacups, should a few choice and congenial spirits chat lightly of the Spiritual Uplift, the Intellectual Output, and the Philosophical Intake. 10 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS When she came to dispose of the furnishings —possessions that had ckittered the old house —the woman paused. And that part of her that was sentimental refused to part with some of the dear old things that had been so closely identified with her past, its struggles, its bitter- ness, its tears, its love, and its richness of compensation. So the other woman — the prosperous, newly rich, the one to whom had come that beneficence of spirit commonly associated with wealth— felt that she could afford to indulge the sentimental caprice that had made it pain to part with the old. One room, therefore, in the new house, was consecrated to the preservation of such old possessions as were dearest. She called it, to herself, the Room of Long Ago. ^ % ^ At first, so exhilarating was the influence of the new-found wealth, so exquisite and ar- tistic and wholly harmonious were the new rooms in their lovely dressing, she paid small heed to the Room of Long Ago. But one day— when an unlovely suspicion had entered her mind— the suspicion, un- founded, surely!— that her money was re- sponsible for her sudden popularity; one day when her world seemed to have gone criss- cross—not she, but the world; when the lovely 11 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS new possessions seemed to hold themselves coldly aloof from her, she fled from them, from her world, and shut herself into the Room of Long Ago. She sank into the depths of an old Morris chair of near-mahogany, and velour cushions that had faded in the sunlight of many years. How well she remembered the day they had bought it! She smiled at the recollection — smiled through the tears in her eyes. Her John had put in a few extra hours working, had re- ceived extra money for his services, and had bought it to surprise her. When she came down stairs for the first time after the baby came, John had gently put her down into its soft, comfortable depths, and placed the little, warm, cuddly form of her first-born in her arms. He was out in the world now, carving out his own niche in the world — and the arms which had held him were empty! The rug on the floor of the Room of Long Ago — the dear faded old rug! On it had John played horse with little John, the youngster clinging to him, shrieking with mingled joy and terror, as the fiery steed galloped over the floor. On the wall were pictures of big John and little John — yes, of herself, too— crude pic- tures, many of them, but so smiling and happy. The one of John with the baby in his arms 12 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS might not be a work of art, such as she had in her downstairs drawing room, but to her, the pride and joy in John's face, and the roguish expression of little John's made it the most beautiful thing in the world. Her old desk — would she ever again sit there and write little nonsensical rhymes, in the hope that some publisher might see in them buds of promise! And the old scratched center table — with the reading lamp — how many evenings had she and John sat, one on each side, he with his paper and she with a book— or a bit of white needle work — too precious for words! Here, too, in after years, had little John labored with fractions and decimals; here, also, were the initials he had carved on the then smooth surface of the table, and for doing which she had punished him — as if it mattered! Her fingers touched lovingly the letters, and she bit her lips to keep back the tears. The little china dog on the mantle John had bought the day that little John had cut his first tooth. A smile chased away the tears as she recalled how she and John had exclaimed over and admired the tiny pearl. Over in on^ corner of the room stood an old piano, battered and scratched and slightly out of tune — the one she had practiced her scales upon in her girlhood home. She went 13 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS over and sat down upon the old-fashioned stool. She touched the keys, and they gave out a plaintive sound. Then her fingers wandered, as her mind went back to those early days of their struggle with poverty, into the old songs that she and her John had sung together during the tender days of courtship, and the beautiful days of their young wedded life. Thin, but unspeakably sweet, like a voice from the past, the notes spoke to her, and they brought to her the message of peace she had sought. tf» !?• 0* When her hour was ended — the little hour she had allowed herself from the glitter of the present — she left the Room of Long Ago. On the threshold she paused. Her eyes took in every detail, from the plain ruffled muslin cur- tains at the windows, and the homely gera- nium blooming in the sunshine, to the old- timey wall paper, and the faded rug. Her eyes traveled slowly from object to object, dwell- ing upon each one lovingly, and she whis- pered, ^'Always I have you to come back to, dear Room of Long Ago.'' 14 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS A Grouch of Twenty Years SHE was twenty and she had a Grouch. She was young and pretty with life all before her- — yet she had a Grouch. An ugly, wicked old thing he was, and he touched her and smoothed out the dimples of laughter, and re- cast the mould of her fresh young lips, so that they drooped at the corners, instead of exer- cising Youth's prerogative, and curving up- ward. Over her pretty, unusually merry eyes, he drew a somber veil which dimmed their light. For this calumny — this lie which he put upon her — this disfiguring change from youth- ful beauty and sweetness to dourness and sourness — she should have dismissed him from her presence. But, instead, she nursed her ugly, old Grouch, and petted him, and kept him by her all of one sweet summer day — thereby losing that one precious, never-to-be- regained period. No young girl with her first suitor was ever more proud than this twenty-year-old girl was of her Grouch. ''Come out and play," called her young companions. ''We are going to take a lunch and climb to the top of Mount Wilson." She might have gone, for when she was normal she liked to walk, and she enjoyed all 15 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS the things which healthy young blood sug- gests. "You'll not go," insisted her guest, the Grouch. ''Let them go, and have a good time without you. You stay here with me." So she listened to him, and the gay young voices died away in the distance. And then, paradoxically, because her Grouch had med- dled and cheated her of her good time, she clung more closely to him than ever, and she blamed her friends, and everybody in the whole world because she was miserable — except just herself and the Grouch. 0» ijw ^ Once she looked out of her window. She saw the wonderful lights and shadows on the plains, and she knew that the pines of her beloved mountains offered inviting shade. The Peak was clean-cut and glowed with pink- ish splendor, close up against the skyline, while down in the valley below some fleecy white clouds drifted lazily. The whole landscape beckoned to her and whispered, ''Come and sketch me." She glanced longingly toward sketch book, and palette, and other paraphernalia, for the artist was strong in her. 'But the Grouch, whom for the moment she had forgotten, again claimed her, and said grudgingly, ''Don't go. You would forget all about me, out there 16 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS in the blessed sunshine, with the shadow of the pines all about you, and the Peak, with its majesty and stillness guarding the picture you would make. Stay here in this stuffy room. And don't look out of the window again — for it's dangerous to m.e." ^ ^ ^ So she obeyed the behest of her ugly, ridic- ulous old Grouch. Her having him at all was ridiculous — for what concord hath a Grouch and Twenty Years? She shut out the sunshine and laughter and beauty and joy and gave herself up wholly to the entertainment of the ugly, old Grouch. The day wore on — the precious day which had begun so auspiciously — the day which had begun just for her — -to do with as she chose — to make of benefit or to waste. And the only use she made of it v/as to shut her- self up with a Grouch. At eventide, when the gay company of which she was one had gathered about the wide fireplace, and were toasting marshmal- lows and telling stories, she wearied of her Grouch. She had not found him very good company through her lost day. Her lusty youth finally wrestled with and downed him. Then she threw him out of the window and laughed as she saw him vanish 17 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS like a puff of smoke — for after all, he was no more than that. The laugh brought the dimples back to her cheeks, and the laughter to her eyes. All the ugly lines of ill temper that the Grouch had marked on her face, smoothed themselves out and she was Twenty Years, minus a Grouch — Twenty Years — magical time of Youth! When she joined her companions, she be- came the merriest one in the bunch — all the more merry because she had lost so much time. ''What was the matter with you today?" someone asked. ''How did you come to have a Grouch?" She puckered her pretty brows in thought a moment, and then laughed. "To save my soul I don't remember," she said. tf» tfw tjw Thus it usually is, when a Grouch takes up his (note the masculine gender) abode with any of us. We know not whence he came or why, or wherefore. We can give no satisfac- tory explanation as to our reason for admit- ting him into our consciousness. He is a sly, invidious, sneaking intruder who should be banished from civilized society. But he gets in some way. He has a card of en- trance into the most select set. It cannot be his appearance which entitles him to the card, 18 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS nor can it be his genealogy, for he can claim no higher personages for his family tree than 111 Temper, and Envy, and Jealousy. We know him for what he is. We know him to be the most uglifying guest we can admit, for beauty and he do not affiliate. We know that in time he is going to rob us of whatever of grace or loveliness we may have been endowed with, and that he is going to drive our friends away from us. And yet we bid him welcome. We take the covering from the furniture, and we ransack the larder of our thought for its choicest pos- sessions for his consumption. And he is very, very greedy. He gobbles up everything in the household worth having or saving. We may have some little tid-bit of thought we are treasuring — something we value too highly to have out where anyone can see it— something we keep in the farthest corner of the cupboard of our mentality, to be taken out in private and rejoiced over. But nothing is sacred to the Grouch. He seeks out the treasures of forbidden places- — and consumes them. M ^ ^ A Grouch and Twenty Years! An anach- ronism, surely! We may smile in amusement at it — and welcome back the dimples, which never remain long away, while the heart is young. 19 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS But a Grouch and Forty, Fifty, or Sixty! Heaven save us from the contemplation! Yet there isn't such a great stretch as one might imagine, between Twenty, and Forty, or Fifty, or Sixty. And the Grouch who gains entrance to the consciousness of Twenty — how he chortles with glee — for he knows that by his touch he can convert Twenty into Forty. And he knows that if Twenty Years opens the door and lets him in — he will have lodgement, off and on — through all the years — till Twenty Years have merged into Forty and Fifty and Sixty — and the face of Twenty Years has be- come seared and scarred by the fires of ill humor he has kindled. ^ ^ rfS BUT— sometimes a blessed word— there is one virtue a Grouch possesses — and that is timidity. He is easily discouraged. He will knock at your door — like Opportunity. And, like Opportunity — though Ingalls' beautiful poem proclaims otherwise — he will come back and knock again. He will even peer in through the closed shut- ters of your house, through which he can see the light streaming, to see if you are at home — -for he's a sneaking, prying fellow. But if he continues to knock, and you do not open, he will give a sigh of renunciation, 20 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS and pass on. Heed this, dear, sweet, joyous Twenty Years— and let your blinds be drawn and your door tightly closed — -^nd keep your dimples and your sunshine and the merry light in your eyes through all the years to come. Married People's Jokes Two bright and interesting young women were discussing Married People's Jokes in my hearing, not long ago, in no uncertain tones. I asked them to enumerate some, to see if ''Among those present" were those of my childhood recollection. I found that they were, and after I was left alone, they passed in mental review before me, those Married People's Jokes, in squads and batallions. Some there were, moss-grown and gray, but still time-honored. Some had an assumption of jauntiness, some showed the marks of age. Some there were that were cruel, some sensual and vulgar, many that were vapid, more that were meaningless. In all stages of preservation and decay, they passed before me. Some made no effort to conceal their years, even glorying in the fact that they had survived more fitting ones. Som.e there were, with haggard faces, some 21 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS who strove with hair dye and wrinkle remov- ers to keep up an appearance of youth. Some were active, some lagged behind, and some there were who stepped to one side, to let the stragglers pass. And the road they took led to the place where Love lies buried — not, perhaps, the whole body of Love, but the fair and beautiful heart of it, while there remains but the outer garment, the semblance of what has been. One Joke there is, the oldest born, who had his birth in the Garden of Eden, and who has been parading himself ever since. It is the ancient one, that SHE did the Proposing. He is so old — so very old, and toothless, that he can no longer wound. Then the one about He being Her Last Chance. He, too, is beginning to feel his age, and to wonder if, after all his years of service, he may not soon retire. I saw the twin Jokes, about His Next, and Her Next, capering as actively as though they, too, had found the Fountain of Perennial Youth. There was one so gaily caparisoned, so lively, that at first glance I took her for a new one, and might have continued so thinking, had I not heard the other Jokes whispering among themselves. One said: ''She puts on so much war paint that she fools some people. But I remember that when I was a mere in- 22 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS fant, she was going about with her skirts down, and her hair up." Then, on closer inspection, I saw that the Joke under discussion was that antedikivian one about the things He would do, when She went 'To the Country, Hooray, Hooray!" One little fellow I saw — he looked so small, so harmless — yet I believe he is the most dan- gerous Joke of all. He was born of the mod- ern custom of swapping wives and husbands at theaters and balls. He might more properly be called an Innuendo than a Joke. His older brother used to be, not a Joke, but a Tragedy, and he was never mentioned in the families in which he dwelt — only by the neighbors, and then in whispers, that the children might not hear. This small joke, this Innuendo — about Her Husband's Case with Her Dearest Friend^ — is very proud of his position in society, and boastfully proclaims that he belongs exclu- sively to the Smart Set. For in circles less smart, men and women who are wedded still plod along in the good old-fashioned way, each woman with her own instead of her friend's husband. There are so many of these Jokes, alas, that it is impossible to enumerate them all. But you know them when they happen along. And, knowing them, you realize that each one 23 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS carries a poisonous dart, aimed at the heart of Love. It is a wonder that any girl or young man can dare to venture into matrimony when on all sides they hear these Married People's Jokes. Their salvation lies in the fact that they believe themselves to be immune from them. And so they will be, if they are v/ell mated, and if they both sincerely try to do their part tov/ard cementing the ideal relationship they have pictured, during the betrothal stage. Married People's Jokes, like tramps, leave their chalk-mark on the gate of the household. And happy that couple upon whose gate is written, that all Jokes that run may read: 'This is no place for Jokes. You would starve to death for lack of sustenance here. Go on to the next place, where may be found food and lodgement." TKe Fear of tKe Casual Visitor THE Great Fear of Woman, is for the Casual Visitor. Everything else sinks into obscurity, beside that haunting Fear, the Thing which pursues her relentlessly through- out her length of days. She takes it with her to bed, and she awakens to find it sitting on her chest grinning at her, when the dawn of 24 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS a new day breaks. The Fear of the Casual Visitor! ^ tif 39 How many lives it has all but wrecked. How much domestic infelicity it is responsible for. It drives Woman, like a galley slave, through the sweet smelling days of Spring, on through the torridity of the summer months — past the autumn, with its luring tints on the foliage, on into the short, dark days of winter, until one year is merged into another year and yet another. Then when the hands are still, and the heart at rest from earthly worries, and not till then, is Woman free from the Great Fear which took up its abode with her when she assumed the responsibility of housekeeping. ^ d9 ^ ''Come and rest a while on the porch and feast on this beautiful panorama of green and gold and violet, which is spread out all over the landscape — just for you — for you," urges Woman's other self, the Play-Lady, she of the Dreams, who is always trying to hitch her wagon to a star — what does SHE know of the Fear? She has no cognizance of the Casual Visitor, who is liable to drop in at any time and find the beds unmade, and the dishes unwashed. ''Oh no," Woman hastily answers with a 26 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS sigh of renunciation, turning her back squarely upon her tempter, ''Oh, no, I have no time to look at the view. 1 must get my house all in order. Some One might come." She is afraid of the Casual Visitor! But the Play Lady, she of the Dreams, is strangely persistent, especially when she is aided and abetted by a glimpse of green pastures, and distant hills, and flecks of clouds which in themselves, furnish entertainment for hours upon hours for imaginative temperaments. ''Steal a little time," whispers the Play Lady, she of the Dreams, "just sit still a wee bit, and let the Silence tell you all the lovely things it has to tell, if you will but listen." "But I can't," stubbornly reasserts that practical, workaday woman, thinking of the thing which never leaves her, the Great Fear. ^ ^ ^ And so she is driven, day in and day out, deadening as far as she is able, that Other Part of her, that shiftless, lazy, unpractical Play Lady, SHE of the Dreams. But there are days — oh, such tedious, work laden days — when she knows that a little way down the road, the golden rod is blooming for her, just waiting for her to come and pick armsful of it, to make her house riotous with its joyous color. Days when she can close her eyes and see the red of the sumach, and the 27 BOOK OF RAMBLINGS tawny tints of the maples, in the woods just a little way oflf — such a little way. She knows that the water is flowing sleepily under the old stone bridge, with the overhanging branches of wild grapes, joining in the chorus of invitations that are clamorously backing up the Play Lady, She of the Dreams, who insistently urges a cessation of duties — duties which are constantly being pushed to the fore- ground by the Fear.