The Log-Cabin Lady - An Anonymous Autobiography Part 4

I would learn table manners from an English lady of aristocratic birth and social experience; but when it came to the human act of a little gift to a faithful servant, I declared my American independence.

I was homesick for Wisconsin, homesick for real and simple people.

I wanted to go home! That night Tom and I had our first real quarrel, and it was over my dismissal of the Scotch lady of aristocratic birth.

Life became intolerable for a while. I dragged through days of bitter homesickness. Nothing seemed real. No one seemed sincere. Life was a stage. Everybody seemed to be acting a part and speaking their pieces with guttural voices. Even my husband's voice sounded different--or else I realized for the first time that Boston apes London English. Tom had learned his mother tongue in Boston, and now suddenly he seemed like a foreigner to me simply because he spoke like these other foreigners.

The sun went out of my heaven. I was dumb with loneliness and sick with the fear of lost faith. Could it be that my husband was affecting these English mannerisms? Certainly he seemed at home in England, while I seemed to be adrift, alone in an arctic ocean.

I had no friend in England, and more and more my husband's special work was engrossing him. When we were together I felt tongue-tied. He had tried to be gentle with me; but I was strange in this world of his, and lonely and sensitive. I had dreamed so much of this world, and now that I was in it, it was false and petty. I longed for the United States, for my Northwest, for my hills and wide, far plains. I wanted to meet somebody from Madison who smiled like a friend.

One day Tom looked at me searchingly, and said I must be ill.

I confessed to a little homesickness. Tom became very attentive.

He took me sightseeing. We lunched at the quaint inn where d.i.c.kens found his inspiration for "Pickwick Papers" and where the literary lights of London foregathered and still foregather for luncheon. We sat in one of the cozy little stalls--just Tom and I.

Suddenly it swept over me that life had gone all wrong. Here was a dream come true, and no joy in my heart. Tom asked me for my thoughts.

I told him, quite frankly, I was thinking of home. I was thinking of mother in her cotton house dress with her knitted shawl around her shoulders, of father in his jeans and high boots tramping over the range with the men; I saw the cow and the pigs and the chickens, the smelly corral and the water hole, the twins trying to rub each other's face in the mud. And I was thinking--Tom would n't fit into my world, and I could not belong to his. That was the second time I heard Tom swear.

He wanted to know what kind of a sn.o.b I thought he was. He'd be as much at home with dad on the ranch as he was in London. "The fault is with you," he said. "You 're not adaptable, and you don't try to be."

Tom did n't understand. He never did. In all the years together, which he made so rich and happy, Tom never understood how hard and bitter a school was that first year of my married life. But Tom did try to give me a good time in London. He took me to interesting places and we were entertained by a number of people, mostly ponderous and stupid. Tom did not suggest that we entertain in our turn. I think he felt I was not ready for it, although even in after years, when we talked frankly about many things, he would never admit this.

I shall never forget my first week-end party in England. I was not well, and Tom, manlike, felt sure the change, a trip down to Ess.e.x and new people, would do me good. The thought of the country and a visit with some good simple country folk appealed to me too, so I packed the bags and met Tom at Victoria Station at eleven o'clock. Alas! It is a far cry from a Montana ranch to a gentleman's estate in England! My vision of a quiet visit "down on a farm" vanished the minute we stepped off the train. Liveried coachmen collected our baggage. They seemed to be discussing something; then I heard Tom say: "I guess that 's all.

I 'll wire back for the rest of it."

We were led to a handsome cart drawn by a fine tandem team, and Tom and I were alone for a minute.

"My G.o.d, Mary!" he burst out, "didn't you bring any clothes for us?"

"I certainly have," I retorted, sure I was in the right this time.

"Your nights.h.i.+rt and my nightgown; your toilet articles and mine; a change of underclothes; a clean s.h.i.+rt and two collars for you, and my new striped silk waist."

I shall never forget Tom's expression.

"Do you know where we are going?" he groaned. "To one of the grandest houses in England! Oh, Lord! I ought to have told you. You 'll need all the clothes you have down here. And--and a valet and maid will unpack the bags--oh, h.e.l.l!" After more of the same kind of talk, he began to cook up some yarn to tell the valet.

Suddenly all that is free-born in me rose to the surface. "Is it the thing for gentlemen to be afraid of the valet?" I asked my husband.

"Does a servant regulate your life and set your standards?"

Tom was quiet for several moments; then he took my hand and said very earnestly: "Mary, don't you ever lose your respect for the real things.

It will save both of us." After a while he added: "Just the same, I 'll have to lie out of this baggage hole."

He did, in a very casual, laughing way--such a positive set of lies that I marveled and began to wonder how much of Tom was acting and how much was real.

Tom went back to London on the next train, and reached the "farm" with our baggage before it was time to dress for the eight-o'clock dinner.

The dinner was long and stupid. After dinner the women went into the drawing-room and gossiped about politics and personalities until the men joined them, when they sat down to cards. I did not know how to play cards, and so was left with a garrulous old woman who had eaten and drunk over-much.

It had been a long day for me. I was ill and tired. Suddenly sleep began to overpower me. I batted my eyes to keep them open. I tried looking at the crystal lights, but my leaden eyes could not face them.

The constant drone of that old woman was putting me to sleep. I tried to say a few words now and then to wake myself. I felt myself slipping.

Once my head dropped and came up with a jerk. I watched the great French clock. Its hands did not seem to move. I looked at Tom. He was absorbed in his game. I could not endure it another minute. I went over and said good night to my hostess who had spoken to me only once since my arrival.

Drowsy as I was, I noticed she seemed surprised. "Oh, no," I told her; "I am not ill, only very sleepy."

How good my pillow felt!

The next morning Tom was cross. I had made a _faux pas_. I had shown I was bored and peeved and had gone to bed before the hostess indicated it was bedtime. It "was n't done" in England.

"What do you do if you can't keep awake?" I asked. "You slip out quietly, go to your room ask a maid to call you after you have had forty winks, then you go back and pretend you are having a good time," said Tom.

There were some bitter hours after we got back to London. But Tom won, and I promised to get a companion. Then there came into my life the most wonderful of friends. She was the widow of a British Army officer who had been killed in India, and her only child was dead. She was a woman of education and heart; she understood my needs, all of them, and I interested her. She had seen great suffering; she had a deep feeling for humanity and an honest desire to be of use in the world. In the English register my companion was listed as the Honorable Evelyn, but we quickly got down to Mary and Eve. We loved each other. Eve went to France with us a few months later. She made me talk French with her.

My first formal dinner in France was a pleasant surprise. It was like a great family party--not dull and quiet like the English dinner, and ever so much more fun. Everybody partic.i.p.ated. If there was one lion at the table, everybody shared him.

[Ill.u.s.tration: p060.jpg MY FIRST FORMAL DINNER IN FRANCE]

There is something in being born on a silken couch. Nothing surprises you. You are at ease anywhere in the world. Eve fitted into Paris as naturally as in her native London, I began to feel at home there myself.

It was a city of happy people--care free, natural, sympathetic. There was a lack of restraint which, after the oppressive dignity of London, was a rare treat. No one was critical. Every one accepted my halting and faulty French without ridicule or condescension. The amiability and the friendliness of the French people thawed my heart and began to lift me out of my slough of homesickness. Happiness came back to me.

There had been hours in England when only the knowledge that a woman's rarest gift was coming to me, and that Tom was proud and happy about it, kept me from running away--back to the simple life of my own United States.

I was homesick for mother. Babies were a mystery to me, although I had helped mother with all of hers. We had buried three of them in homemade coffins--pioneering is a ruthless scythe, and only the fit survive. I began to understand my mother and the glory in the character which never faltered, although she was alone and life had been hard. How could I whine when I had Tom and a good friend--and life was like a playground?

I loved the French. They regard life with a frankness which sometimes shocked my reserved Boston husband. He never accepted intimacy. The restraint of old England was still in his blood. The free winds of the prairie had swept it from mine.

My new friends in Paris discovered my happy secret. It was my all-absorbing thought, and I was delighted to be able to discuss it frankly. Motherhood is the great and natural event in the life of a woman in France, and no one makes a secret of it. I was very happy in Paris. And then--Tom had to go to Vienna.

Not even Tom, Eve, and the promised baby could make me happy there. In all the world I had seen no place where the line of cla.s.s distinction was so closely drawn, where social customs were so rigid and court forms so sacred, as at the Austrian capital. Learning the social customs of Vienna seemed as endless as counting the pebbles on the beach--and about as useful. The clock regulated our habits in Vienna. Up to eleven o'clock certain attire was proper. If your watch stopped you were sure to break a social law. I once saw a distinguished diplomat in distress because he found himself at an official function at eleven-thirty with a black tie--or without one, I have forgotten which!

At first it offended me to receive an invitation--or a command--to appear at a formal function, with an accompanying slip telling exactly what to wear. Then I laughed about it.

Finally I rebelled. On the plea of ill health, I made Tom do the social honors for me, while Eve and I did the museums and the galleries and the music fetes. Years later I went back to Vienna, and I did not discredit my country. But I never loved the city. I enjoyed its art, its fascinating shops, its picturesque streets and people, and its beautiful women. But for me Vienna has the faults of France and England, the poverty and arrogance of London, and the frivolity of Paris, without their redeeming qualities.

So I was glad to return to England. The second day in London, Tom took me to an exhibition important in the art world, or at least in the official life of London. Everybody who was somebody was there. I saw the Princess of Wales and the Marquis of Salisbury, who was then Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. I saw Mr. Balfour, so handsome and gracious that I refused to believe there had ever been cause to call him "b.l.o.o.d.y Balfour." There was something kingly about him--yet he was simply Mr. Balfour. Years afterward I realized that to know Mr. Balfour is either to wors.h.i.+p him or hate him. No one takes the middle course.

I had begun to have a beautiful time that afternoon.

I felt happy, acutely conscious of my blessings and of one coming blessing in particular. Mr. Gladstone joined us, and Sir Henry Irving came over to speak to Eve. She told him I had just said that England had a mold for handsome men. Irving was interesting and striking, though certainly not handsome; but he took the compliment to himself, smiled, bowed his thanks, and said:

"And America for beautiful women."

Mr. Gladstone, too, could indulge in small talk. "You should have seen her rosy cheeks before she went to the Continent," he said, and added kindly that I looked very tired and should go down to Hawarden Castle and rest.

"Oh," I explained happily, "it is n't that--I 'm not tired. It is such a happy reason!" I felt Eve gasp. Mr. Gladstone opened his kind eyes very wide, and his heavy chin settled down in his collar. It was the last bad break I made. But it was a blessing to me, for it robbed all social form of terror. For the first time, I realized that custom is merely a matter of geography. One takes off one's shoes to enter the presence of the ruler of Persia. One wears a black tie until eleven o'clock in Vienna--or does n't. One uses fish knives in England until he dines with royalty--then one must manage with a fork and a piece of bread. One dresses for dinner always, and waits for the hostess to say it is time, and speaks only to one's neighbor at table. In France one guest speaks to any or all of the others; all one's friends extend congratulations if a baby is coming; one shares all his joys with friends. But in England n.o.body must know, and everybody must be surprised. No one ever speaks of himself in England. They are sensitive about everything personal. But there is an underground and very perfect system by which everything about everybody is known and noised about and discussed with everybody except the person in question.

It is a mysterious and elaborate hypocrisy.

With the aid of Eve, I made a thorough study of the geography of social customs. I learned the ways of Europe, of the Orient, and of South America. It is easier to understand races if one understands the psychology of their customs. I realized that social amenities are too often neglected in America, and our manners sometimes truthfully called crude. But I told myself with pride that our truly cultivated people will not tolerate a social form that is not based on human, kindly instincts. It was not until the World War flooded Europe with American boys and girls that I realized the glory of our social standards and the great need to have our own people understand those standards.