"I can't answer for the patriotism; but they are the sentiments of a true son of the Pilgrim Fathers, who renounced their country because they couldn't stand it, and came over here. I mean to follow their example, and go back again. They fled—so the story goes—from persecution. I mean to fly from persecution too,—the persecution of a social atmosphere that I find hostile to my constitution, and a climate not fit for a reasonable being to live in."
"I don't know why you should be so fierce against the climate. By your look, you seem to thrive in it."
"The bodily man thrives passably well. It's the immortal part that suffers. Fierce! why, the climate makes me fierce. Who can be a philosopher in such a climate?—or a poet?—or an artist?—any thing but a steam engine? It is a perpetual spur, an unremitting goad. Nobody is happy in it except the men who ride on locomotives and conduct express trains,—always on the move. O, so you go in here, do you?"
"Yes, to see Mrs. Primrose. Will you come too?"
"No, thank you," replied Chester, walking away, with a comical look.
Morton rang the door bell, and found Mrs. Primrose at home.
There was a book on the table. He took it up. It was a novel, lately published.
Morton praised it.
Mrs. Primrose dissented, with great emphasis.
"You are severe upon the book."