The Observations of Professor Maturin

by Clyde Furst

“After the General came the Colonel, an attorney so genial that, it was said, he habitually bowed to trees and hitching-posts, from mere force of habit. Every one suspected him of storing up popularity against the day when he might run for office. Whether he ever compassed or even desired such an end, I do not know.

“The Town Beauty, I learned, had long since married an officer in the army. We had, I think, even more than our share of handsome girls, but to gaze upon her was such an unalloyed delight that she came to be prized as one of the chief attractions of the town. It used to be said, jocosely, that after visitors had seen the new court house, they were always made to wait until she passed, before any one would show them the way to the fair grounds. Certainly she never disappointed the fondest anticipations, except during one sad season when the whole town mourned. Most inexcusably she had attempted to improve the lily and the rose of her complexion by means of a cosmetic, which must have been devised solely to further the sale of the same manufacturer’s healing lotions. The damage wrought was most distressing, and recovery was slow and anxious, but happily complete. There was some desire to express the public anxiety that there should be no more such experiments; but the lesson had been learned, and thereafter her loveliness only bloomed the richer.

“The persons mentioned were all conspicuous members of the local aristocracy, to which the professions of law, and, to a lesser degree, of medicine, were the open sesame. The chief members of these professions, together with all such persons as were distinguished for family, and a selection from those who were distinguished for wealth, made up a somewhat exclusive social set, which gave an annual ball, invited friends to dinner, and went on vacations—sometimes even to Europe. As for the great majority, the men were devoted chiefly to business and sometimes to politics; the women to their homes and their churches, which last regulated all of their social as well as their religious activities.

“For the recreation of our elders there was always a great deal of driving. It was possible to keep a carriage on an income that would not suffice for that alone in the metropolis. The carriage roads were and still are excellent and the country charming, with here and there a stately old manor house for historic atmosphere. Even then the mountains were frequently resorted to. Now they are easily accessible, and boast not only numerous hotels, but many cottages to which the more fortunate go back and forth daily in summer. To my boyhood the mountains represented not only untamed nature, but their hotels were outposts of the great world beyond. The mountains represented history also, for on the side of one was a battlefield, marked with a huge cairn of stones; and they meant literature, as well, for in one of the gaps was the home of an author whose novels and poems were in the town library.

“With us young people bicycles were popular to a degree that once, in the days of the old, high wheels, drew even a national meet to the old town. But the simple attractions of the place palled on our travelled guests, and the occasion began to look like a failure until, in the evening, the entertainment committee got together and started a false alarm of fire, which allowed the visitors to pull the hand-apparatus of the local fire companies madly about the streets, until their superabundant energies were exhausted and they went to bed happy.

“These volunteer fire companies were centres of the most intense interest, making up in anticipation and preparation for the practical efficiency which, happily, they were seldom called upon to demonstrate. They held innumerable initiations, elections, anniversaries, and reorganizations; and they were always considering, with infinite attention to detail, the adoption of new uniforms and the purchase of new equipment. All of which we youngsters ardently emulated with an organization which, in a vocabulary more aspiring than accurate, we called ‘The Juneviles.’

“Even more, if possible, than by the fire companies, our interest was stirred by the annual county fair, which, for four days in the autumn, crowded the town with visitors and filled the central square, of evenings, with all sorts of travelling mountebanks. This was eagerly welcomed as practically our only opportunity for familiarity with the histrionic art, for the attractions of the town theatre were not of a sort to be generally approved. I remember, however, attending at least one performance there when young enough to be tremendously puzzled by the difficulties of a harlequin in attempting to get through a wall the door of which mysteriously changed from place to place, while from time to time the wall became all doors or showed no doors at all.

“Sometimes the few bookish people gathered into reading clubs or welcomed visiting lecturers, who also conducted discussions and criticised essays, when anybody wrote them. The only lecture that I recall dealt with Rugby, and impressed me partly for Tom Brown’s sake, but chiefly because on that occasion the most sensitive man in the town covered himself with confusion by absent-mindedly clapping his hands together in pursuit of a mosquito, with the effect of applauding loudly at a most inappropriate time. The after-lecture discussions struck me then as very learned, but I judge now that I must have been easily impressed, since the only specimen that I remember was the statement that ‘Carlyle was a bear, wallowing in a sea of words,’ made by the principal of the high school.

“Even now I should consider him as remarkable as his rhetoric. For he was not only the official head of the dozen schools in his building, but he also taught, alone and unaided, all of the classes in the high school, preparing us for college in every subject from algebra to zoölogy, and doing it well. His only limitation was that he chewed tobacco, secretly, or as secretly as he was able with the eyes of thirty boys constantly upon him.

“Not the least interesting feature of my visit was the opportunity it provided for noting the present status of old schoolmates. Most of them had developed in directions that might have been anticipated from their youthful traits. Even the fact that two of the most harum-scarum had become responsible bank directors was explained by the remembrance that youthful lawlessness may often represent merely a superabundance of excellent energy. The school dreamer had become the chief confectioner of the town, expending his imagination on a new-art shop and a summer garden lighted by the electric eyes of Cheshire cats and owls perched in the trees. The serious boy had acquired practice as a physician until his stout body and large head seemed bursting with incommunicable knowledge concerning the local human comedy. The clever boy had become a successful attorney, more than satisfied with his profession as an excellent working hypothesis in an unintelligible world. The boy who had become a musician pleased me, perhaps, most of all. With a talent that would win distinction anywhere, he rejected the distractions of cities for a simple environment, where he might discover and develop his spontaneous self.