Part 10 (2/2)
No; I do not know which of these things you will choose,--perhaps you will choose none of them. But it is easy enough to see how fast a day of vacation will go by if you, Stephen, or you, Clara, have these several resources or determinations.
Here is the ground-plan of it, as I might steal it from Fanchon's journals:--
”TUESDAY.--Second day of vacation. Fair. Wind west. Thermometer sixty-three degrees, before breakfast.
”Down stairs in time.” [_Mem._ 1. Be careful about this. It makes much more disturbance in the household than you think for, if you are late to breakfast, and it sets back the day terribly.]
”Wiped while Sarah washed. Herbert read us the new number of 'Tig and Tag,' while we did this, and made us scream, by acting it with Silas, behind the sofa and on the chairs. At nine, all was done, and we went up the pasture to Mont Blanc. Worked all the morning on the drawbridge. We have got the two large logs into place, and have dug out part of the trench. Home at one, quite tired.”
[_Mem._ 2. Mont Blanc is a great boulder,--part of a park of boulders, in the edge of the wood-lot. Other similar rocks are named the ”Jung-frau,”
because unclimbable, the ”_Aiguilles_” &c. This about the drawbridge and logs, readers will understand as well as I do.]
”Had just time to dress for dinner. Mr. Links, or Lynch, was here; a _very interesting_ man, who has descended an extinct volcano. He is going to give me some Pele's hair. I think I shall make a museum. After dinner we all sat on the piazza some time, till he went away. Then I came up here, and fixed my drawers. I have moved my bed to the other side of the chamber. This gives me a _great deal more room_. Then I got out my palette, and washed it, and my colors. I am going to paint a cl.u.s.ter of grape-leaves for mamma's birthday. It is _a great secret_. I had only got the things well out, when the Fosd.i.c.ks came, and proposed we should all ride over with them to Worcester, where Houdin, the juggler, was. Such a splendid time as we have had! How he does some of the things I do not know. I brought home a flag and three great peppermints for Pet. We did not get home _till nearly eleven._”
[_Mem._ 3. This is pretty late for young people of your age; but, as Madame Roland said, a good deal has to be pardoned to the spirit of liberty; and, so far as I have observed, in this time, generally is.]
Now if you will a.n.a.lyze that bit of journal, you will see, first, that the day is full of what Mr. Clough calls
”The joy of eventful living.”
That girl never will give anybody cause to say she is tired of her vacations, if she can spend them in that fas.h.i.+on. You will see, next, that it is all in system, and, as it happens, just on the system I proposed.
For you will observe that there is the great plan, with others, of the fortress, the drawbridge, and all that; there is the separate plan for Fanchon's self, of the water-color picture; and, lastly, there is the unplanned surrender to the accident of the Fosd.i.c.ks coming round to propose Houdin.
Will you observe, lastly, that Fanchon is not selfish in these matters, but lends a hand where she finds an opportunity?
Chapter XI.
Life Alone.
When I was a very young man, I had occasion to travel two hundred miles down the valley of the Connecticut River. I had just finished a delightful summer excursion in the service of the State of New Hamps.h.i.+re as a geologist,--and I left the other geological surveyors at Haverhill.
I remembered John Ledyard. Do you, dear Young America? John Ledyard, having determined to leave Dartmouth College, built himself a boat, or digged for himself a canoe, and sailed down on the stream reading the Greek Testament, or ”Plutarch's Lives,” I forget which, on the way.
Here was I, about to go down the same river. I had ten dollars in my pocket, be the same more or less. Could not I buy a boat for seven, my provant for a week for three more, and so arrive in Springfield in ten days' time, go up to the Hardings' and spend the night, and go down to Boston, on a free pa.s.s I had, the next day?
Had I been as young as I am now, I should have done that thing. I wanted to do it then, but there were difficulties.
First, whatever was to be done must be done at once. For, if I were delayed only a day at Haverhill, I should have, when I had paid my bill, but eight dollars and a half left. Then how buy the provant for three dollars, and the boat for six?
So I went at once to the seaport or maritime district of that flouris.h.i.+ng town, to find, to my dismay, that there was no boat, canoe, dug-out, or _batteau_,--there was nothing. As I remember things now, there was not any sort of coffin that would ride the waves in any sort of way.
There were, however, many _pundits_, or learned men. They are a cla.s.s of people I have always found in places or occasions where something besides learning was needed. They tried, as is the fas.h.i.+on of their craft, to make good the lack of boats by advice.
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