October Vagabonds | Page 7

the whole-souled,

my-country-'tis-of-thee American, who somewhat resented these
European comparisons, and declared that America was good enough
for her, clearly intimating that a certain lack of patriotism, even a
certain immorality, attached to the admiration of foreign countries. She
also told us somewhat severely that the same stars, if not better, shone
over America as over any other country, and that American scenery
was the finest in the world--not to speak of the American climate.
To all of which we bowed our heads in silence--but the frivolous,
European-minded Rosalind who had got us into this trouble retorted
with a grave face: "Wouldn't you just love, dear Miss----, to walk from
Hackensack to Omaha?"
Another voice was kind enough to explain for our encouragement that
the traveller found in a place exactly what he brought there, and that
romance was a personal gift, all in the personal point of view.
"A sort of cosmetic you apply to the face of Nature," footnoted our
irrepressible friend.
Still another reminded us that "to travel hopefully is a better thing than
to arrive," and still another strongly advised us to carry revolvers.
So, taking with us our maps and much good advice, we bade farewell
to our friends, and walked back to our camp under the stars--the same
stars that were shining over Constantinople.
The next day, when all our preparations were complete, the shack
swept and garnished, and our knapsacks bulging in readiness for the
road, Colin took his brushes, and in a few minutes had decorated one of
the walls with an Autumn sunset--a sort of memorial tablet to our
Summer, he explained.
"Can't you think up a verse to put underneath?" he asked.
Then underneath he lettered:
Two lovers of the Sun and of the Moon, Lovers of Tree and Grass and

Bug and Bird, Spent here the Summer days, then all too soon Upon the
homeward track reluctant fared.
Sun-up, October 1, 1908.
Some apples remained over from our larder. We carefully laid them
outside for the squirrels; then, slinging our knapsacks, we took a last
look round the little place, and locked the door.
Our way lay up the hill, across the pasture and through the beeches,
toward the sky-line.
We stood still a moment, gazing at the well-loved landscape. Then we
turned and breasted the hill.
"Allons!" cried Colin.
"Allons!" I answered. "Allons! To New York!"
CHAPTER VIII
THE AMERICAN BLUEBIRD AND ITS SONG
I wish I could convey the singular feeling of freedom and adventure
that possessed us as Colin and I grasped our sticks and struck up the
green hill--for New York. It was a feeling of exhilaration and romantic
expectancy, blent with an absurd sense of our being entirely on our own
resources, vagrants shifting for ourselves, independent of civilization;
which, of course, the actual circumstances in no way warranted. A
delightful boyish illusion of entering on untrodden paths and facing
unknown dangers thrilled through us.
"Well, we're off!" we said simultaneously, smiling interrogatively at
each other.
"Yes! we're in for it."
So men start out manfully for the North Pole.

Our little enterprise gave us an imaginative realization of the solidarity,
the interdependence, of the world; and we saw, as in a vision, its four
corners knit together by a vast network of paths connecting one with
the other; footpaths, byways, cart-tracks, bride-paths, lovers' lanes,
highroads, all sensitively linked in one vast nervous system of human
communication. This field whose green sod we were treading
connected with another field, that with another, and that again with
another--all the way to New York--all the way to Cape Horn! No break
anywhere. All we had to do was to go on putting one foot before the
other, and we could arrive anywhere. So the worn old phrase, "All
roads lead to Rome," lit up with a new meaning, the meaning that had
originally made it. Yes! the loneliest of lovers' lanes, all silence and
wild flowers, was on the way to the Metropolitan Opera House; or, vice
versa, the Flat Iron Building was on the way to the depths of the forest.
"Suppose we stop here, Colin," I said, pointing to a solitary,
forgotten-looking little farmhouse, surrounded by giant wind-worn
poplars that looked older than America, "and ask the way to
Versailles?"
"And I shouldn't be surprised," answered Colin, "if we struck some
bright little American schoolgirl who could tell us."
Although we as yet knew every foot of the ground we were treading, it
already began to wear an unfamiliar houseless and homeless look, an
air of foreign travel, and though the shack was but a few yards behind
us, it seemed already miles away, wrapped in lonely distance, wistfully
forsaken. Everything we looked at seemed to have gained a new
importance and significance; every tree and bush