My Wife and I; Or, Harry Henderson's History

by Harriet Beecher Stowe

The first part of the morning the amiable and smiling predominated, and I began to regret that I had encumbered myself with the troublesome precaution of an umbrella while tramping around down town. In this mood of mind I sat at Fulton Ferry waiting the starting of the Bleecker street car, when suddenly the scene was enlivened to my view by the entrance of a young lady, who happened to seat herself exactly opposite to me.

Now, as a writer, an observer of life and manners, I had often made quiet studies of the fair flowers of modern New York society as I rode up and down in the cars. In no other country in the world, perhaps, has a man the opportunity of being vis-à-vis with the best and most cultured class of young women in the public conveyances. In England, this class are veiled and secluded from gaze by all the ordinances and arrangements of society. They go out only in their own carriage; they travel in reserved compartments of the railway carriages; they pass from these to reserved apartments in the hotels, where they are served apart in family privacy as much as in their own dwellings. So that the stranger traveling in the country, unless he have introductions to the personal hospitality of these circles, has almost no way of forming any opinion even as to the external appearance of its younger women. In France, a still stricter régime watches over the young, unmarried girl, who is kept in the shade of an almost conventual seclusion till marriage opens the doors of her prison. The young American girl, however, of the better and of the best classes, is to be met and observed everywhere. She moves through life with the assured step of a princess, too certain of her position and familiar with her power even to dream of a fear. She looks on her surroundings from above with the eye of a mistress, and expects, of course, to see all things give way before her, as in our republican society they generally do.

During the few months I had spent in New York I had diligently kept out of society. The permitted silent acquaintance with my fair countrywomen which I gained while riding up and down the street conveyances, became, therefore, a favorite and harmless source of amusement. Not an item in the study escaped me, not a feather in that rustling and wonderful plumage of fashion that bore them up, was unnoted. I mused on styles, and characteristics, and silently wove in my own mind histories to correspond with the various physiognomies I studied. Let not the reader imagine me staring point blank, with my mouth open, at all I met. The art of noting without appealing to note, of seeing without seeming to see, was one that I cultivated with assiduity.

Therefore, without any impertinent scrutiny, satisfied myself of the fact that a feminine presence of an unusual kind and quality was opposite to me. It was, at first glance, one of the New York princesses of the blood, accustomed to treading on clouds and breathing incense. There was a quiet savoir faire and self-possession as she sat down on her seat, as if it were a throne; and there was a species of repressed vitality and decision in all her little involuntary movements that interested me as live things always do interest, in proportion to their quantum of life. We all are familiar with the fact that there are some people, who, let them sit still as they may, and conduct themselves never so quietly, nevertheless impress their personality on those around them, and make their presence felt. An attraction of this sort drew my eyes toward my neighbor. She was a young lady of medium height, slender and elastic figure, features less regularly beautiful than piquant and expressive. I remarked a pair of fine dark eyes the more from the contrast with a golden crêpe of hair. The combination of dark eyes and lashes with fair hair, always produces effect of a striking character. She was attired as became a Fifth Avenue princess, who has the world of fashion at her feet,—yet, to my thinking, as one who had chosen and adapted her material with an eye of taste. A delicate cashmere was folded carelessly round her shoulders, and her little hands were gloved with a careful nicety of fit; and dangling from one finger was a toy purse of gold and pearl, in which she began searching for the change to pay her fare. I saw, too, as she investigated, an expression of perplexity, slightly tinged with the ludicrous, upon her face. I perceived at a glance the matter. She was surveying a ten-dollar note with a glance of amused vexation, and vainly turning over her little purse for the smaller change or tickets available in the situation. I leaned forward and offered, as gentlemen generally do, to take her fare and pass it forward. With a smile of apology she handed me the bill, and showed the little empty purse. "Allow me to arrange it," I said. She smiled and blushed. I passed up the ticket necessary for the occasion, returned her bill, bowed, and immediately looked another way with sedulous care.

It requires an extra amount of discretion and delicacy to make it tolerable to a true lady to become in the smallest degree indebted to a gentleman who is a stranger. I was aware that my fair vis-à-vis was inwardly disturbed at having inadvertently been obliged to accept from me even so small an obligation as a fare ticket; but as matters were, there was no help for it. On the whole, though I was sorry for her, I could not but regard the incident as a species of good luck for myself. We rode along—perhaps each of us conscious at times of being attentively considered by the other, until the cars turned up Park Row before the Astor House; she signalled the conductor to stop, and got out. Here it was that the beneficent intentions of the fates, in causing me to bring my umbrella, were made manifest.

THE UMBRELLA.

"Before a very elegant house in Fifth Avenue my unknown alighted, and the rain still continuing, there was an excuse for my still attending her up the steps."

Just as the car started again, came one of those sudden gushes of rain with which perverse April delights to ruffle and discompose unwary passengers. It was less a decent, decorous shower, than a dash of water by the bucketful. Immediately I jumped out and stepped to the side of my gentle neighbor, begging her to allow me to hold my umbrella over her, and see her in safety across Broadway. She meant to have stopped at one or two places, she said, but it rained so she would thank me to put her into a Fifth Avenue stage. So we went together, threading our way through rushing and trampling carriages, horses, and cars,—a driving storm above, below, and around, which seemed to throw my fair princess entirely upon my protection for a few moments, till I had her safe in the up-town omnibus. As it was my route, also, I, too, entered, and by this time feeling a sort of privilege of acquaintance, arranged the fare for her, and again received a courteous and apologetic acknowledgment. Before a very elegant house in Fifth Avenue my unknown alighted, and the rain still continuing, there was an excuse for my attending her up the steps, and ringing the door-bell for her.