"Ah! you can well afford to be philosophic now," retorted John, touching the shining curls around his sister's face.
"You don't believe me? I assure you that the only terror old age has for me is its helplessness and imbecility. My natural independence revolts at being a burden even to those whom I love;" and Gertrude's tone had a touch of sadness in it. "You remember old Aunt Hepsy, John? how long her body outlived her mind; how at eighty years she would beg for tin carts, and soldiers, and rag dolls, and amuse herself by the hour with them, like a little child. This, I confess, is humiliating. In this view I can truly say I dread old age. But the mere thinning of the luxuriant locks, the filming of the bright eye, the shrinking of the rounded limbs, these things give me no heart-pangs in the anticipation. I can not understand the sensitiveness with which most men and women, past the season of youth, hear their age alluded to. It certainly can be no secret, for if Time deal gently with them the family register will not; and if the finger of vanity obliterate all traces of the latter, some toothless old crone yet hobbles, who, forgetful of every thing else, yet remembers the year, week, day, minute, and second in which (without your leave) you were introduced to life's cares and troubles.
"Beside, old age need not be repulsive or unlovely," said Gertrude; "look at that aged couple, yonder! How beautiful those silver hairs, how genuine and heart-warming the smile with which they regard each other! To my eye, there is beauty on those furrowed temples, beauty in those wrinkled hands, so kindly outstretched to meet each other's wants. Life's joys and sorrows have evidently knit their hearts but more firmly together. What is the mad love of youthful blood to the sun-set effulgence of their setting lives? God bless them!" said Gertrude, as, kindly leaning one on the other, they passed out the hall. "Old age may be beautiful!"
"Yes," replied John, "when the heart is kept fresh and green; that which neutralizes the counsels of old age is the ascetic severity with which it too often denounces innocent pleasure, forgetting that the blood which now flows so sluggishly in its veins had once the torrent's mad leap. But look, Gertrude, while I discuss this ham omelette, and see what is in the morning papers."
"Well—in the first place, 'dreadful casualty.' What would editors do, I wonder, without these dreadful casualties? I sometimes amuse myself, when I have nothing better to do, in comparing their relative tastes for the horrible, and their skill in dishing it up spicily to the appetites of their various readers. The ingenuity they manifest in this line is quite incredible.
"Observe now, the flippant heartlessness with which these city items, are got up, as if a poor degraded drunkard were the less an object of pity that he had parted with the priceless power of self-resistance! A man who could make a jest of a sight so sad, has sunk lower even than the poor wretch he burlesques.
"Well—let me see—then here are stupid letters from watering-places, got up as pay for the writer's board, at the fashionable hotel, from which they are written and which the transparent writer puffs at every few lines. Then here are some ingenious letters which the editor has written to himself, thanking himself for 'some judicious and sensible editorials which have lately appeared in his columns, and for the general tone of independence and honesty which pervades his admirable paper.' O, dear!" said Gertrude, laughing, "what a thing it is, to be sure, to get a peep behind the scenes!
"Then here is an advertisement headed, 'Women out of employment.' I wonder none of these women have ever thought of going out to do a family's mending by the day or week. I have often thought that a skillful hand would meet a hearty welcome, and a ready remuneration, from many an over-tasked mother of a family, who sighs over the ravages of the weekly wash, and whose annual baby comes ever between her and the bottom of the stereotyped I 'stocking-basket.'
"But a truce to newspapers, with such a bright sun wooing us out of doors; now for Goat Island; but first let me prepare you for a depletion of your pocket-book in the shape of admiration-fees. You will be twitched by the elbow, plucked by the skirt, solicited with a courtesy or a bow; 'moccasins' to buy from sham squaws—'stuffed beasts' to see by the roadside—'views of Niagara,' done in water-colors, 'for sale,' at rude shanties. Then there will be boys popping from behind trees with 'ornaments made of Table Rock;' disinterested gentlemen desirous to 'take you under the sheet' in a costume that would frighten the mermaids; disinterested owners of spy-glasses 'anxious you should get the best view.' I tell you," said Gertrude, "for a damper the spray is nothing to it! You must be content to cork up your enthusiasm till these 'horse-leech' gentry are appeased.
"Do you know, John, that my '76 blood was quite up to boiling-point the first time I came here, when the toll-keeper on the Canada side demanded what was my business, and how long I intended to stay over there?"