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Jacob William Wright >> The Long Ago
This etext was produced by David A. Schwan, davidsch@earthlink.net.
The Long Ago
by Jacob William Wright
1 The Garden
2 The River
3 Christmas
4 Butter, Eggs, Ducks, Geese
5 The Sugar Barrels
6 Jimmy, the Lamplighter
7 Flies
8 The Autumn Leaves
9 Getting in the Wood
10 The Rain
11 Grandmother
12 When Day is Done
Then said he unto me,
Go thy way,
Weigh me the weight of the fire,
Or measure me the blast of the wind,
Or call me again the day that is past.
II Esdras IV:5
The day is done, and yet we linger here at the window of the private
office, alone, in the early evening. Street sounds come surging up to us -
the hoarse Voice of the City - a confused blur of noise - clanging
trolley-cars, rumbling wagons, and familiar cries - all the varied
commotion of the home-going hour when the city's buildings are pouring
forth their human tide of laborers into the clogged arteries.
We lean against the window-frame, looking across and beyond the myriad
roofs, and listening. The world-weariness has touched our temples with
gray, and the heaviness of the day's concerns and tumult presses in,
presses in . . . . presses in . . . .
Yet as we look into the gentle twilight, the throbbing street below
slowly changes to a winding country road . . . . the tall buildings fade
in the sunset glow until they become only huge elm-trees overtopping a
dusty lane . . . . the trolley-bells are softened so that they are but
the distant tinkle of the homeward herd on the hills . . . . and you and
I in matchless freedom are once more trudging the Old Dear Road side by
side, answering the call of the wondrous Voice of Boyhood sounding
through the years.
The Garden
It was the spirit of the garden that crept into my boy-heart and left
its fragrance, to endure through the years. What the garden stood for -
what it expressed - left a mysterious but certain impress. Grandmother's
touch hallowed it and made it a thing apart, and the rare soul of her
seemed to be reflected in the Lilies of the Valley that bloomed sweetly
year by year in the shady plot under her favorite window in the
sitting-room. Because the garden was her special province, it expressed
her own sturdy, kindly nature. Little wonder, then, that we cherished
it; that I loved to roam idly there feeling the enfoldment of that same
protection and loving-kindness which drew me to the shelter of her
gingham-aproned lap when the griefs of Boyhood pressed too hard upon me;
and that we walked in it so contentedly in the cool of the evening,
after the Four O'clocks had folded their purple petals for the night.
Grandmother's garden, like all real gardens, wasn't just flowers and
fragrance.
There was a brick walk leading from the front gate to the sitting-room
entrance - red brick, all moss-grown, and with the tiny weeds and
grasses pushing up between the bricks. In the garden proper the paths
were of earth, bordered and well-defined by inch-wide boards that
provided jolly tight-rope practice until grandmother came anxiously out
with her oft-repeated: "Willie don't walk on those boards; you'll, break
them down." And just after the warm spring showers these earthwalks
always held tiny mud-puddles where the rain-bleached worms congregated
until the robins came that way.
There's something distinctive and individual about the paths in a garden -
they either "belong," or they do not. Imagine cement walks in
grandmother's garden! Its walks are as much to a garden as its flowers
or its birds or its beetles, and express that dear, indescribable
intimacy that makes the Phlox a friend and the Johnny-Jump-Up a
play-fellow.
-
The best place for angle-worms was underneath the white Syringa bush -
the tallest bloomer in the garden except the great Red Rose that climbed
over the entire wall of the house, tacked to it by strips of red
flannel, and whose blossoms were annually counted and reported to the
weekly newspaper.
Another good place was under the Snowball bush, where the ground was
covered with white petals dropped from the countless blossom-balls that
made passers-by stop in admiration.
Still another good digging-ground was in the Lilac corner where the
purple and white bushes exhaled their incomparable perfume. Grandmother
forbade digging in the flower-beds - it was all right to go into the
vegetable garden, but the tender flower-roots must not be exposed to the
sun by ruthless boy hands intent only on the quest of bait.
-
Into the lapel of my dress coat She fastened a delicate orchid last
night. It must have cost a pretty penny, at this season - enough, no
doubt, to buy the seeds that would reproduce a half-dozen of my
grandmother's gardens. And as we moved away in the limousine She asked
me why I was so silent. She could not know that when she slipped its
rare stem into place upon my coat, the long years dropped away - and I
stood again where the Yellow Rose, all thorn-covered, lifted its sunny
top above the picket fence - plucked its choicest blossom, put it almost
apologetically and ashamed into the buttonhole of my jacket - stuffed my
hands into my pockets and went whistling down the street, with the
yellow rose-tint and the sunlight and the curls on my child head all
shining in harmony. The first boutonniere of my life - from the bush
that became my confidant through all those wondrous years before they
packed my trunk and sent me off to college!
To be sure, I loved the bright-faced Pansies which smiled cheerily up at
me from their round bed - and the dear old Pinks, of a strange fragrance
all their own - and the Sweet William, and even the grewsome Bleeding
Heart that drooped so sad and forlorn in its alloted corner. Yet it is
significant that last night's orchid took me straight back over memory's
pathway to that simple yellow rosebush by the fence!
-
Tonight, with the forgotten orchid in my lapel, and all the weight of
the great struggle lying heavy against my heart, I stand where the
night-fog veils the scraggly eucalyptus, and the dense silence blots out
all the noises that have intervened between the Then and the Now - and I
can see again the gorgeous Peonies, pink and white, where they toss
their shaggy heads, and gather as of old the flaming Cock's Comb by the
little path. I hear the honeybees droning in the Crab Apple tree by the
back gate, and watch the robins crowding the branches of the Mountain
Ash, where the bright red berries cluster. I see the terrible bumble-bee
bear down the Poppy on its slender stem and go buzzing threateningly
away, all pollen-covered.
And shining clear and true through the mist I see her who was the Spirit
of the Garden. There she stands, on the broad step beside the bed where
the Lilies of the Valley grew, leaning firmly upon her one crutch,
looking out across her garden to each loved group of her flower-friends -
smiling out upon them as she did each day through fifty years -
turning at last into the house and taking with her, in her heart, the
glory of the Hollyhocks against the brick wall, the perfume of the
Narcissus in the border, the wing-song of the humming-bird among, the
Honey-suckle, and the warmth of the glad June sunshine.
The River
The river wasn't a big river as I look back at it now, yet it was wide
and wandering and deep, and flowed quietly along through a wonderful
Middle West valley, dividing the Little Old Town geographically and
socially. Its shores furnished such a boy playground as never was known
anywhere else in all the world - for it was a gentle river, a kindly
playfellow, an understanding friend; and it seemed fairly to thrill in
responsive glee when I plunged, naked and untamed, beneath the eddying
waters of the swimming-hole under the overhanging wild-plum tree.
Its banks, curving in a semi-circle around the village, marked the
borders of the whole wide world. There were other rivers, other
villages, other lands somewhere - all with strange, queer names -
existing only in the geographies to worry little children. The real
world, and all the really, truly folks and things, were along the
far-stretching banks of this our river. Down by the flats, where the
tiny creek widened to a miniature swamp and emptied its placid waters
into the main stream, the red-wing blackbirds sounded their strange cry
among the cat-tails and the bull-rushes; the frogs croaked in ceaseless
and reverberant chorus; the catfish were ever hungry after dark, and the
night was broken by the glare of torches along the little bridge or in a
group of boats where fisher-lads kept close watch upon their corks. Far
below The Dam, where the changeful current had left a wide sand-bar and
a great tree-trunk stretched its fallen length across from the shore to
the water's edge, the mud-turtles basked in the sun-shine, and, at the
approach of Boyhood, glided or splashed to the safety of the water.
The banks of the river were a deep and silent jungle wherein all manner
of wild beasts and birds were hunted; its bosom was the vasty deep out
upon which our cherished argosies were sent. And how often their prows
were unexpectedly turned by some new current into mid-stream; sometimes
saved by an assortment of missiles breathlessly thrown to the far side,
to bring them, wave-washed, back to us; sometimes, alas, swept
mercilessly out to depths where only the eye and childish grief could
follow them over the big dam to certain wreckage in the whirlpools
below, but even then not abandoned until the shore had been patrolled
for salvage as far as courage held out.
Let's go back to the banks of our beloved river, you and I - and get up
early in the morning and run to the riffles near the old cooper-shop and
catch a bucket of shiners and chubs, and then hurry on to Boomer's dam -
or 'way upstream above the Island where we used to have the
Sunday-school picnics - or, maybe just stay at the in-town dam near the
flour mills and the saw-mills where old Shoemaker Schmidt used to catch
so many big ones - fat, yellow pike and broad black-bass. We will climb
high up on the mist-soaked timbers of the mill-race and settle ourselves
contentedly with the spray moistening our faces and the warm sun
browning our hands - and the heavy pounding of falling waters sounding
in our ears so melodiously and so sweetly. Lazily, drowsily we'll hold a
bamboo pole and guide out shiner through the foam-crowned eddies of the
whirlpool, awaiting the flash of a golden side or a lusty tug at the
line; and dreamily watch a long, narrow stream of shavings and sawdust,
loosed from the opposite planing-mill, float away on the current. And
here, in the dear dream-days, the conquering of the world will be a
simple matter; for through the mist-prisms that rise from the foaming
waters below the dam only rainbows can be seen - and there is Youth and
the Springtime, and the new-born flowers and mating birds, and The
River. . . .
And when the sun is low we'll wind our poles, at the end of a rare and
great day - one that cannot die with the sunset, but that will live so
long as Memory is. Tonight we need not trudge over the fields toward
home, in happy weariness, to Her who waited and watched for us at the
window, peering through the gathering dusk until the anxious heart was
stilled by the sight of tired little legs dragging down the street past
the postoffice. We'll stay here in the twilight, and watch the
fire-flies light their fitful lamps, and the first stars blinking
through the afterglow; and when the night drops down see the black bats
careening weirdly across the moon. . . . And we'll stretch out again on
the wild grass - soothed by the fragrance of the Mayapple and the
violets, and the touch of the night-wind. . . How still it is . . . and
The River doesn't seem to sound so loud when your head's on the ground -
and your eyes are closed - and you're listening to the far, far, far-off
lullaby of tumbling waters - and you're a bit tired, Perhaps . . . a bit
tired. . . .
-
The Winter Stream
Somehow The River never terrified me.
(It did mother, however!)
Perhaps it brought no fear to me because it flowed so gently and so
helpfully through such a wonderful valley of Peace and Plenty. Even in
its austere winter aspect, with its tree-banks bare of leaves and its
snow-and-ice-bound setting, it rejoiced me.
Teams of big horses and wagons and scores of men, worked busily upon its
frozen surface, sawing and cutting and packing ice in the big wooden
houses along the banks.
Always there was enough wind for an ice-boat or a skate-sail, or to send
a fellow swiftly along when mother-made promises were forgotten and an
unbuttoned coat was held outstretched to catch the breeze.
At night the torches and bonfires flickered and glowed where the skaters
sent the merry noises of their revelry afloat through the crisp air as
they dodged steel-footed in and out among the huts of the winter
fishermen.
Perhaps I loved the winter river because I knew that beneath its
forbidding surface there was the life of my loved lilies, and because I
knew that all in good time the real river - our river - would be
restored to us again, alive and joyous and unchanged.
One day, when first the tiny rivulets started to run from the bottom of
the snow-drifts, The River suddenly unloosed its artillery and the crisp
air reechoed with the booming that proclaimed the breaking-up of the
ice. Great crowds of people thronged the banks, wondering if the bridge
would go out or would stand the strain of pounding icecakes. The
unmistakable note of a robin sounded from somewhere. Great dark spots
began to show in the white ice-ribbon that wound through the valley. The
air at sundown had lost its sting.
So day by day the breaking-up continued until at last the blessed stream
was clear - the bass jumped hungry to the fly - the daffodils and
violets sprang from beneath their wet leaf-blankets - and all the world
joined the birds in one grand song of emancipation and joy.
-
The Big Bend
Above the town, just beyond the red iron bridge, the river made a great
bend and widened into a lake where the banks were willow-grown, and
reeds and rushes and grasses and lily-pads pushed far out into
mid-stream, leaving only a narrow channel of clear water.
To the Big Bend our canoe glided often, paddling lazily along and going
far up-stream to drift back with the current.
Arms bared to the shoulder, we reached deep beneath the surface to bring
up the long-stemmed water-lilies - the great white blossoms, and the
queer little yellow-and-black ones.
Like a blight-eyed sprite the tiny marsh-wren flitted among the rushes,
and the musk-rat built strange reed-castles at the water's edge.
The lace-winged dragon-fly following our boat darted from side to side,
or poised in air, or alighted on the dripping blade of our paddle when
it rested for a moment across our knees.
Among the grasses the wind-harps played weird melodies which only
Boyhood could interpret.
In this place The River sang its love-songs, and sent forth an answering
note to the vast harmonious blending of blue sky and golden day and
incense-heavy air and the glad songs of birds.
And here at this tranquil bend The River seemed to be the self-same
river of the old, loved hymn we sang so often in the Little Church With
The White Steeple - that river which "flows by the throne of God";
fulfilling the promise of the ancient prophet of prophets and bringing
"peace . . . like a river, and glory . . . like a flowing stream."
Christmas
We always used grandmother's stocking - because it was the biggest one
in the family, much larger than mother's, and somehow it seemed able to
stretch more than hers. There was so much room in the foot, too - a
chance for all sorts of packages.
There was a carpet-covered couch against the flowered wall in one corner
of the parlor. Between the foot of it and the chimney, was the door into
our bedroom. I always hung my stocking at the side of the door nearest
the couch, on the theory, well-defined in my mind with each recurring
Christmas, that if by any chance Santa Claus brought me more than he
could get into the stocking, he could pile the overflow on the couch.
And he always did!
It may seem strange that a lad who seldom heard even the third
getting-up call in the morning should have awakened without any calling
once a year - or that his red-night-gowned figure should have leaped
from the depths of his feather bed - or that he should have crept
breathless and fearful to the door where the stocking hung.
Notwithstanding the ripe experience of years past, when each Christmas
found the generous stocking stuffed with good things, there was always
the chance that Santa Claus might have forgotten, this year - or that he
might have miscalculated his supply and not have enough to go 'round -
or that he had not been correctly informed as to just what you wanted -
or that some accident, might have befallen his reindeer-and-sleigh to
detain him until the grey dawn of Christmas morning stopped his work and
sent him scurrying back to his toy kingdom to await another Yule-tide.
And so, in the fearful silence and darkness of that early hour, with
stilled breath and heart beating so loudly you thought it would awaken
everyone in the house, You softly opened the door - poked your arm
through - felt around where the stocking ought to be, but with a great
sinking in your heart when you didn't find it the first time - and
finally your chubby fist clutched the misshapen, lumpy, bulging fabric
that proclaimed a generous Santa Claus.
Yes, it was there!
That was enough for the moment. A hurried climb back into the warm bed -
and then interminable years of waiting until your attuned ear caught the
first sounds of grandmother's dressing in her nearby bedroom, and the
first gleam of winter daylight permitted you to see the wondrous
stocking and the array of packages on the sofa. It was beyond human
strength to refrain from just one look. But alas! The sight of a
dapple-grey rocking-horse with silken mane and flowing tail was too
much, and the next moment you were in the room with your arms around his
arched neck, while peals of unrestrained joy brought the whole family to
the scene. Then it was that mother gathered you into her lap, and
wrapped her skirt about your bare legs, and held your trembling form
tight in her arms until you promised to get dressed if they would open
just one package - the big one on the end of the sofa. After that there
was always "just one more, please!" and by that time the base burner was
warming up and you were on the floor in the middle of the discarded
wrapping-paper, uncovering each wonderous package down to the very last -
the very, very last - in the very toe of the stocking - the big round
one that you were sure was a real league ball but proved to be nothing
but an orange! . . .
No Santa Claus? Huh! . . .
If there isn't any Santa Claus, what does he put all the sample toys in
the stores for every Christmas so boys and girls can see what they want?
If he doesn't fill the stockings, who does, I'd like to know. Some folks
say that father and mother do it - but s'posin, they do, it's only to
help Santa Claus sometimes when he's late or overworked, or something
like that.
The Spirit of Christmas is Santa Claus - else how could he get around to
everybody in the whole world at exactly the same time of the night?
There is a new high-power motor in my garage. It came to me yesterday -
Christmas. It is very beautiful, and it cost a great deal of money, a
very great deal. If we were in the Little Old Town it would take us all
out to Aunt Em's farm in ten minutes. (It always took her an hour to
drive in with the old spotted white mare.)
I am quite happy to have this wonderful new horse of today, and there is
some warmth inside of me as I walk around it in the garage while Henry,
its keeper, flicks with his chamois every last vestige of dust from its
shiny sides.
And yet . . . how gladly would I give it up if only I could have been in
my feather bed last night - if I could have awakened at daybreak and
crept softly, red-flanneled and barefooted, to the parlor door - if I
could have groped for grandmother's stocking and felt its lumpy shape
respond to my eager touch - and if I could have known the thrill of that
dapple-grey rocking-horse when I flung my arms around its neck and
buried my face in its silken mane!
Butter, Eggs, Ducks, Geese
It seems mighty convenient to telephone your grocer to send up a pound
of butter and have it come all squeezed tight into a nice
square-cornered cardboard box whose bright and multi-colored label
assures you that the butter has been properly deodorized fumigated,
washed, sterilized, antisepticized and conforms in every other respect
to the Food and Drugs Act, Serial 1762973-A. You read the label again
and feel reasonably safe at meals.
Huh! Precious little grandmother knew about that kind of butter!
Hers came in a basket - a great big worn-brown-and-shiny, round bottom,
willow basket, hand-wove. It didn't come in any white-and-gold delivery
wagon, either. It was delivered by a round-faced, rosy-checked,
gingham-gowned picture of health, whose apron-strings barely met around
the middle - for Frau Hummel brought it herself - after having first
milked the cows with her own hands and wielded the churning-stick with
her own stout German arms. She had the butter all covered up with fresh,
sweet, white-linen cloths-and hand-moulded into big rolls - each roll
wrapped in its own immaculate cloth - and when that cloth was slowly
pulled away so that grandmother could stick the point of a knife in the
butter and test it on her tongue, you could see the white salt all over
the roll - and even the imprint of the cloth-threads . . . Good? . . .
Why, you could eat it without bread!
"What else have you got today, Mrs. Hummel?" (Grandmother never could
say "Frau" - and as if she didn't know what else was in the basket!)
"Vell, Mrs. Van, dere is meppe some eks, und a dook - und also dere is
left von fine stuffed geese."
So the cloth covering was rolled farther back - and the 3-dozen eggs
were gently taken out and put in the old tin eggbucket - and just then
grandfather came in and lifted tenderly out of the basket one of those
wonderful geese "stuffed" with good food in a dark cellar until fat
enough for market. . . . Ever have a toothful of that kind of
goose-breast or second joint? . . . No? . . . Your life is yet
incomplete - you have something to live for! . . . Goodness me! I can't
describe it! How can a fellow tell about such things! It's like - well,
it's like Frau Hummel's "stuffed" goose, that's all! . . .
And then it was weighed on the old balances, steels - (no, I don't mean
scales!) - steelyards, you know - a long-armed affair with a pear-shape of
iron at one end and a hook at the other and a handle somewhere in
between at the center-of-gravity, or some such place. . . . Anyway, they
gave an honest pound, which is perhaps another respect in which they
were different.
Then the ducks, too, were unwrapped from their white cloths and weighed -
usually a pair of them - and the old willow basket had nothing left
but its bundle of cloths when Frau Hummel started out again on her
10-mile walk to the farm.
Whenever I see a glassy-eyed, feather-headed, cold-storage chicken half
plucked and discolored hanging in a present-day butcher-shop
accumulating dust - or a scrawny duck almost popping through its skin -
I think of Frau Hummel and her willow basket. . . .
But Frau Hummel isn't here now - and they don't build ducks and geese
like hers any more - and her old willow basket is probably in some
collection while we use these machine-made things that fall to pieces
when you accidentally stub your toe against them in the cellar. . . . We
are hurrying along so fast that we don't see anything until it's cooked
and served. . . . We just use the phone and let them send us any old
thing that they can charge on a bill. . . . But in those days
grandfather and grandmother inspected everything - and it just had to be
good - and there weren't any trusts - or eggs of various grades from
just eggs to strictly fresh eggs and on down to eggs guaranteed to boil
without crowing. Every Frau Hummel in the country wanted the Van Alstyne
trade - and Frau Hummel knew it - and she never brought anything to that
back kitchen door unless it was perfect of its kind.
No wonder grandfather lived to be 92 and grandmother 86 - in good health
and spirits to the last!
The Sugar Barrels
Do you remember the three barrels of sugar in the dark place under the
stairs - or were they in the big pantry just off the kitchen?
Well, anyway, there were three, you recollect - two of white and one of
brown.
Always the brown sugar - and each Autumn the same colloquy:
"Mr. Van, don't you think we can get along without the brown sugar this
year?"
"Now, Mrs. Van, you've got to have a little brown sugar in the house -
and it comes cheaper by the barrel."