Part 10 (2/2)
”Permit me to put your question into plainer language,” interposed Mr.
Grahame. ”Mr. Danforth would ask, Mary, whether you would not prefer to live where you would not be compelled to degrade your mind----”
”No, no, I protest against the degradation,” exclaimed Mr. Danforth.
”To degrade your mind,” pursued Mr. Grahame, answering the interruption only by a smile, ”by exercising it on such homely things as brewing coffee and baking cakes, or to soil your fair hands with brooms and dusters.”
”For the soil of the hands we have sparkling rills, and for the degradation of the mind, I, like Mr. Danforth, protest against it.”
”But how can you make your protest good?”
”You have taught me that there is no degradation in labor, pursued for fair and right ends, and that where the end is n.o.ble, the labor becomes enn.o.bling.”
”But what n.o.ble ends can be alleged for the drudgery of domestic life? I am translating your looks into language,” said Mr. Grahame, turning playfully to his guest; ”correct me if I do not read them rightly.”
”If I say you do, I fear Miss Grahame will think them very impertinent looks.”
”I shall not complain of them while I can reply to them so easily,” said Mary gayly. ”He who knows how much a well-ordered household contributes to the cultivation of domestic virtues and family affections, will not think a woman degraded who sacrifices somewhat of her tastes and pleasures to the deeper happiness of procuring such advantages for those she loves.”
”But is not that state of society preferable, in which, without her personal interference, by the employment of those who have no higher tastes, she may accomplish the same object?”
”That question proves that you do not, like my father, desire to see the working and the thinking cla.s.ses united. You seem to propose that the first shall ever remain our hewers of wood and drawers of water.”
”Is it not a fact that there have been, are, and always will be those in the world who are fitted for no other position?”
”That there are and always have been such persons, I acknowledge; but when labor ceases to be degrading, because it is partaken by all, may we not hope that new aspirations will be awakened in the laborer--that he will elevate himself in the scale of being when he feels elevation possible?”
Mary Grahame spoke with generous enthusiasm, yet with a modest gentleness which made Horace Danforth desire to continue the argument.
”Admitting all this,” he said, ”it does not answer my question, which was, whether you did not prefer that state of society in which you were able to avail yourself of the services of such a cla.s.s?”
”There are moments, doubtless, when indolence would plead for such self-indulgence; but I should be mortified, indeed, where this the prevailing temper of my mind.”
”Pardon me if I say that I do not see how it can be otherwise--how a lady of Miss Grahame's refinement and taste can be pleased with the employments, for instance, to which Mr. Grahame just now referred.”
”Not pleased with them in themselves, but she may accept them, may she not, as a necessary part of a great object to which she has devoted herself?”
”And this object?--but, forgive me. The interest you have awakened in the subject, and your kindness in answering my questions, make me an encroacher, I fear,” he added, as he marked the heightened color with which Mary glanced at her father as he paused for her answer.
”Not at all; but I speak in presence of my master, and will refer you to him,” she replied, with another smiling glance at her father.
”You see,” said Mr. Grahame, ”that even in these wilds, 'the world's dread laugh' retains its power. Mary, I see, is afraid of being called a female Quixote, and even I find myself disposed to win you to some interest in my object, before I avow it. This I think I can best do by a sketch of the circ.u.mstances which led to its adoption. I will give you such a sketch, therefore, if you will promise to acquit me of egotism in doing so.”
”That I will readily do. I shall be delighted to hear it.”
”You shall have it, but not now; for I see, by certain cabalistic signs, known only to the initiated, that Mary is about to leave us for some of those same degrading employments, and if you will take a ride with me, I will relieve you from all danger of contact with them, and will, at the same time, show you something of our neighborhood.”
The proposal was of course accepted. The ride embraced a circuit of ten miles, in which they pa.s.sed only two houses. The first of these was built with an apparent regard to convenience and comfort, and even some effort at adornment, as manifested in the climbing plants with which the windows were draperied, and the flowers which adorned the little court in front. Mr. Grahame stopped before the gateway of this court, and a woman of coa.r.s.e, rough exterior, though scrupulously clean, came out to speak to him, and to urge his alighting and entering the house with his friend. This Mr. Grahame declined; he had stopped only to inquire after a sick child, and to express a hope that her husband's hay had turned out well.
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