The Automobile as a Rest Cure

A great cry has gone up out of the land against the automobile as a disturber of the peace, a breaker of quiet and of bones, and an agent of unrest. Such is the habit of man when considering a new thing. He seizes upon the obvious and ignores the real significance of the object of his scrutiny. Even a writer in the Contributors’ Club once voiced a protest. In this circle one would naturally look for maturer judgment and a more philosophic point of view; but he too seized upon the obvious, and carried away by the impulse of the moment, said much that he must remember now with shame and mortification. He said, “I, for one, cannot see that rational speed can exist at the expense of all the other pleasures of the road,” and again, “I like traveling, and I like racing; but I do not care to be implicated in this disreputable debauch of hurry. Our love of haste has made real travel almost as rare as real correspondence.”

But this was all two years ago. He is wiser now, I hope, and begins to realize the true mission of the automobile, and to understand that, instead of being a disturber of the peace, the automobile encourages the calm pleasures of repose and reflection. To be sure it is an occasional breaker of bones; but that is due alone to man’s propensity to blunder. To realize how the automobile induces to quiet living and high thinking one has but to own one, or better still, to have a friend who owns one.

My friend Oliver is a substantial man of affairs, much engrossed in the duties and responsibilities of a successful professional career. Realizing the danger of “nerves,” he purchased an automobile, and frequently invites me to accompany him on his trips into the country. I can never repay his kindness, for these trips have wrought in me a great change. I never knew before the pure delights of repose and contemplation.

I recall an afternoon in early May when I first realized the possibilities of the automobile as a rest cure. We spent the afternoon in the cool recesses of a halfdeserted garage. The oil-soaked asphalt floor, the white beams overhead, the silent machines in quiet rows against the walls, made a picture of peace and tranquillity. The listless movements of the picturesque workmen as they talked their strange jargon in subdued undertones, and frequently rested from their labors, seemed in tune with the place and time. For three long hours Oliver and I sat and rested amid these ideal surroundings. We returned to our homes restored alike in mind and body.

Again, one breathless August afternoon Oliver and I were far afield close to Nature in the noonday of her matures! summer charms. That afternoon again we rested by the highway. We smoked and talked and waited. We observed every growing, flying, creeping, or swimming thing about us. We listened to the dry cicada in the treetop and grew wise in Nature’s lore. We came to know each other as we never had before, and when our peaceful afternoon was ended, we returned to town through the summer twilight, slowly, with no undignified haste, in tow of a helpful friend who chanced our way.

Then there was that glorious autumn day when we roamed far from home, enticed by beautiful foliage and stimulating autumn air. I still remember the journey home. How quiet, and uneventful it all was! The machine, as if realizing its high mission, demanded frequent pauses and went only with gentle sighs of protestation. And when, amid the gathering darkness, we essayed to make haste, it uttered a final groan of anguish and remained immovable and mute. How thick the stars came out! How lovely the moonlight ! How plaintive the whip-poor-will as we thought of far-off friends and dinners!

Since I have become the friend of an automobilist I am a changed man. I am calm and philosophic, a lover and observer of nature and my fellow-men. It is a mystery to me that enterprising manufacturers have so long failed to exploit the restorative qualities of their machines. But it will come before long, for in the minds of thinking men there begins to dawn a faint conception of the untold possibilities for good, in this restless age, of the automobile as a rest cure.