The Five-Cent Fare

“A WISE man will not go out of his way for information. He might as well go out of nature or commit suicide.” Thus Thoreau seems to authorize the assumption that has been my consolation during many years of forced intensive travel by way of the discharge of my daily duties; and this assumption is that the experience of men and manners gained in daily necessary travel, even when within the limits of a five-cent fare, is travel of the best sort. It is a solacing doctrine, and simple as it seems as an itinerary of extensive travel opportunities, it is not to be entered upon without preparation. There are conscientious pilgrims who take courses of reading, learn phrase-books, make lists of pensions, and scrapbooks of information gleaned from the columns devoted to the needs of the individual intending a little journey into the world. It is a practice to be commended. One ought not to enter lightly the great army of those who do not stay at home. But the preparation for productive voyaging when going nowhere but “ out ” and “ back ” is, while different in character, essential to success. It consists in one’s external appearance being harmonious and one’s state of mind being sympathetic.

A picture that hangs in the mental gallery of every nature lover is that of the quiet figure of Thoreau clad in premeditated grays. Scarcely to be distinguished from his surroundings, he sits quiescent, watching the feathered and finned and furred life that his presence in no way disturbs; surprising their secrets; observing their beauty; and this without the familiarity of the sentimental naturalist or the cruelty of the sportsman. It is the picture of the looker-on who has consciously harmonized himself to his surroundings, that he may be a part of the scene and not an intruder. It is this democratic acceptance of a neutral background that will distinguish the sophisticated trolley-traveler in his external appearance. We have all noticed how disconcerting to the citizens of our kaleidoscopic commonwealth any intrusion of brilliant array or conspicuous opulence is. In a moment the democracy has become a monarchy, or it may occasion an anarchistic régime quite as readily. Whichever extreme ensues, I have known the entrance of a violet Paquin gown to annihilate an interesting voyage and substitute in its place the rancorous atmosphere of a Club-Tea afternoon.

But after the outward fashion conforms to the laws of the road there still remains the temper of the mind to be adapted to these finer perceptions. We lose all benefit of travel if our attire or carriage is exclusive; how much more is lost if our habit of mind is exclusive! Then we are cut off completely from any community in the positive interests of the hour’s journeying. To indulge a coupé temper while tendering a five-cent fare is unscientific, biologically; caddish, socially; and limiting, personally; and more potent to prevent than mere namecalling is the concrete fact that it spoils all the fun.

It might have been on the afternoon of a Symphony concert or a special Ibsen matinée. It stormed, shudderingly and fitfully — a depressing storm. People who always drove had that day omitted the ceremony and were patronizing the democratic trolley-car. This particular car seemed already populous — merely seemed, no face gleamed the slightest recognition of the presence of any other — when a mother with two little children entered. The mother was obviously inefficient. I knew the babies would cry, and they did, the smaller one emitting shuddering wails that the mother seemed too helpless to hush, while the older one sobbed with quiet persistence. The mother’s anxious, furtive glances sought the faces opposite her, apologetically. She met neither with sympathy nor with disapproval. If among us there was a crying baby we did not permit ourselves to recognize such a squalid situation. Deepening impassivity accompanied the increasing roars. The mother, evidently abashed by her isolation, ceased her feeble efforts to quiet her babies. Had there been any one there to witness it, the moment would have been as impressively dramatic as a crisis in the Ibsen play, — the coming of the hero who now emerged, exactly as opportune. He was a vulgar youth, ruminating jaws, hat pushed back, strong dirty hands, and a direct eye. But he was fortunately a resourceful human being. The scene changed. Crowing, kicking baby tossing in the air; delighted youngster eating a grimy chocolate; smiling, delighted mother casting proud glances up and down the car; noisy, vulgar youth offering the baby for inspection to the haughtiest dame present; general atmosphere of genial good feeling and keen interest in the “ poor hard-worked mother! ” “ A widow for six months! ” “ Entirely without means!” “Pretty children if they were clean ! ” “ Good-hearted boy! ” “ Fellows of that class usually are! ” (Alas, that there must always be a discordant note.) Nevertheless, we rolled over the bridge in an era of good feeling as democratic as a Cook’s tour, and equally as alive to the piquant opportunities of the situation. That we ended our short pilgrimage wiser than we began it is merely another way of saying that our temper had become suited to productive trolley-travel.

Having then made our preparations effectively, what kind of experience can we hope for when our tour is to be so limited and is to become so hackneyed ? Thoreau, when occupied with traveling “ a good deal in Concord,” never hesitated to be detained a half-day by the first rabbit’s track he came across; so out of my mental picture-palace of travel experience, I will not hesitate to select two happy events quite casually, and sit with each for a few minutes of tranquil reflection.

Summer evenings after five o’clock I journey in company with the inhabitants of the North End. For a half-mile our way lies through a land of plenty, a Dutch painting with its regular arrangement of row upon row of tender green with the rich black earth showing between. Windmills and patient plodding horses loom darkly against the slanting sunlight, groups of women with yellow and red and blue kerchiefs about their throats wait heavily at every corner. They come aboard the car, jabbering, gesticulating; their ear-rings brilliant against the grime of the cheek, the brooch of heavy Etruscan gold, the dirty hands adorned with the rings of marriage, the stout shoes, the sturdy waist line, the short skirt, — all eloquent with the story and the character of the Italian laborer. I notice that the old woman is constant companion to the younger one. She it is who is likely to have her apron filled with the evening salad; a savory salad it will be, and the black bread will not lack its rub of garlic — of that I am certain.

My friend had filled my arms with roses, and I traveled cityward a miniature flower-show. A passing shower had effected the prudence of a closed car. As I took my seat in its dusky, malodorous interior, an Italian girl involuntarily stretched her arms towards my roses and her face beamed its appreciation of their bright beauty. She jabbered to her elderly companion, and to my limited Italian her words seemed a beatitude for roses. And so I divided my treasure and gave myself the pleasure of her gratitude. She jabbered more incoherently now, glancing furtively at me meanwhile and seeming to struggle with an embarrassment. I began to make those futile and uneasy movements that evince a woman’s intention to leave the car within the next ten minutes. Whereupon the girl reached into an inner pocket and stumbled over to my seat, leaving in my surprised possession a bit of needlework, exquisitely done, black from the dirt of the fields, — evidence of her noon-hour industry. She had also asked “ the most beautiful and noble lady to do her the honor to accept this trifle.” But my courtesy failed me, and I crossed over to her and tried to refuse, kindly and firmly, her gift. She looked at me and said, “ But I want to give it to you You were kind. See the beautiful roses. I cannot give roses, but see that, that is a trifle,” and she laughed gayly. “ I do that while I sit under the tree.”

If such is the nature and the taste of Italians, I no longer wonder at that habit of my English forefathers that caused such consternation to austere Roger Ascham. I, too, would not “ eschewe the way to Circe’s court but go & ryde & runne & flie thither.” Awaiting my opportunity for that more complex experience, I will make my way their way during the early twilight of these growing summer afternoons.

And while I sojourn with my Italian companions, I know that merely by changing my route another nickel will enable me to travel a good deal in Germany, in Scandinavia, or in the Jewry of Russia. It’s all as you will have it, mankind going forth and you there to see the going forth. What travel experience offers more significant opportunities than this!

There is another route that I sometimes take, did take regularly every Saturday evening during a long cold winter, and it told me quite another story. My companions with whom I traveled much were all from the Plains and all intent upon the succulent promise of a Sunday dinner, and the week’s supplies to be bought in the Saturday evening markets. They knew one another, and boldly and confidently (also, to my great interest, loudly) proclaimed their tastes and their provident epicurean intentions. One old man of a stature too slight and strength enfeebled, bore his big empty basket jauntily, and always proclaimed, “ For my eatin’ a good fat turkey fixed right ain’t to be beat. I’m expectin’ to get one to-night for twelve cents.”

All winter I suffered vicarious pangs of disappointment to see that basket go home, now weighing heavily on the old man’s arm. No turkey’s legs ever consoled me with their protruding promise. Wet, solid packages explained the resignation that had in it no sign of expected pleasure on the morrow. At last I spoke with the old man. “ Prices are high this winter,” I said.

“Yes,” he answered, “ they be. They bean’t never so high right along on a stretch sence I can remember. Now I’m powerful fond of turkey. It’s good eatin’. But I ain’t had one all winter. I’ve kinder expected every Saturday night that I could get one, but I ain’t yet. Perhaps they’ll be lower next week.” And with this optimistic hope he bore his corned beef less heavily toward the door.

My Saturday evening dinner I called this experience, and I learned of a sauce, one that makes of uneaten dinners a poignant memory. Something also of the renewed gayety that attends the going forth of mankind, whether it be to buy or to eat a dinner, to discover or to conquer a world, was borne in upon me as week after week I joined this Saturday evening expedition. Every week I saw the same confident expectation, the same gayety of anticipation. If any dread of a repetition of last week’s disillusionment lurked in their hearts, their faces did not reveal it. Bare-handed women, wearing the plain gold ring of promised protection, looked brightly into one another’s faces and talked of “He” and “ Him ” and “ Him and Me,” glancing proudly at the aloof figures that embodied the nameless and really nonexistent counterpart of their pronouns. They seemed to forget that last week the limp bag came back just as limp, and that “ he ” did not come, or that “ he ” did come, singing noisily and striking his reveling companions with the Sunday chicken until the poor bird was naked and ashamed. And, thankfully, it often was different; at least if events were unchanged, the dramatispersonœ shifted from week to week. She who was dinnerless to-day might hope for a feast a week later. I often noticed that when the poor fowl lost all its potential epicurean promise and became a mere weapon of offense, next Saturday was pretty sure to expose a very tidy, well-filled basket adorned with the yellowest of legs. While history does indeed repeat itself, there is a kind of tidal action of disappointment and recompense even in so small a matter as Saturday “ beers ” and Sunday dinners.

I traveled a good deal that winter with my dinner companions, and one evening as spring was manifesting her coming by means of a soft southerly wind, I heard my travel experience summarized by a woman sitting beside me. She was old and worn, but a bright spark dwelt in her eye as she talked to her younger companion about life and its compensations. “ They’s allers more shine than wet, and I as says it has seen many springs both wet and dry and I’ve lived a hard life as things go, but they’s allers more shine than wet.”

“ How circumscribed are our walks after all! With the utmost industry we cannot expect to know well an area more than six miles square, and yet we pretend to be travelers, to be acquainted with Siberia and Africa.” And so I expend my five cents hopefully each day for that hour’s fruitful journeying cityward, and am content to exclude Siberia and Africa from the plane of my travel tours. To know Africans and Siberians shall be my sole aspiration. Content with that benefit from travel, I can confidently await the moment when I shall, in obedience to command, “ move up forward in the car,” to find myself face to face with my opportunity.