Parental Peculiarities

MY RECOLLECTIONS of my father during the period he remained in Wallingford are vague. On rare occasions on Sunday afternoons he took me for long walks and frequently on week days we went to the mountains to pick raspberries, blackberries and blueberries. Once we went trout fishing, a glorious adventure. Once in response to my oft repeated importunities he took me to Fox Pond to teach me to swim. I had never been in the water before and my joy turned to fear as I felt the chill. Father, annoyed perhaps at my change of front, picked me up and threw me headlong into the water. I remember that I opened my eyes when beneath the surface and found myself in a strange, green frightful world. I was glad eventually to find myself on dry land and scrambled quickly into my clothes. I never asked father again to teach me to swim and I never see the place of my adventure without thinking of my first swimming lesson and of my sadly worried, silent father, who, under different circumstances, might have been a splendid companion.

Later in more congenial and carefree company, I was soon plunging into deep green waters and exploring the wonders to be found there "on my own," and with the infinite satisfaction of knowing that, with the exception of Cecil, no other member of the family knew that I had become an amphibian.

I unexpectedly came upon father in the woods one day when I was playing "hooky" and he promptly cut a stick of the appropriate size and gave me a good tanning. On another occasion when I was indulging in the grand old game of running away from school, I came dangerously near him. I saw him but he did not see me and I slithered away to safety, exulting that the gods were with me for once.

Father used to pace back and forth on the garden walk and, while he seldom spoke, I am sure that he was thinking deeply; that he yearned to find ways and means to restore his self-respect and the esteem of his relatives and friends and also of his family. The great question was: How could he earn the necessary money? Grandfather could not be expected to provide the herewith indefinitely.

During this period father turned to invention. Among other things he invented a newspaper holder to be hung on the wall; a lamp chimney cleaner, and a device intended to protect railroad companies against misappropriations of cash fares paid by passengers to conductors. None of his inventions succeeded in bringing him the millions he sought, so he tried other means. Once he was a traveling salesman; at another time, he was a worker in a toy factory in Mechanicsville, Vermont; at other times he wrote articles for newspapers, but nowhere did he find success.

Some of father's newspaper articles were printed and won considerable praise; they won few dollars however. The publishers were willing to print them so long as they cost nothing, but not longer. Even in the midst of his tribulations father preserved his sense of humor and not infrequently made use of it not only to provoke laughter but also to gratify his inner craving to get back at a world which had used him so inconsiderately. When a certain newspaper published one of his long and capably written articles without tendering compensation, I heard him say, 'Thank God, he didn't charge me for advertising space” Father's articles covered a wide field. Nothing seemed entirely beyond his reach, history, politics, philosophy, religion, geology and science in general, all were in his line and although he took most naturally to humor, it was of an iconoclastic order; he was a master of invective. Whether father specialized on geology during his college days or whether he took the subject up later, I do not know but he wrote long articles on that subject.

On Sundays with Mr. Cal Higgins, he took long rambles in the hills. Mr. Higgins, who in common with others who ran trip hammers in the factory, became very deaf later in life but he used to love to tell me of his long walks with father and he never tired of telling me about the time father bet ten thousand dollars that he could outdistance Mr. Higgins in rolling stones down the mountain side. Father lost the contest and told Mr. Higgins that, unfortunately, he did not happen to have ten thousand dollars in his pocket that morning but that he would give Mr. Higgins a good, five-cent cigar instead. The offer was gladly accepted and the ramble continued.

“One summer afternoon when grandfather, grandmother, the hired girl and I were living alone, I was walking along the principal street in the village, a scant block from home when I saw a lady crossing the street. She was leading a child and carrying a satchel. She had evidently come from the railroad station and was advancing toward me. I had never seen so beautiful a lady nor one so well dressed. The nearest approach I had ever seen was a neighbor name Ann Simonds whom I greatly admired. The strange lady's presence was so overwhelming that I experienced a sensation I had never known before. I was suddenly ashamed of my torn hat, my soiled waist, my patched trousers, and, most of all, my bare feet. I was sorely embarrassed as the lady came forward, looking me searchingly in the eye; I stood spellbound and speechless looking into hers. She inquired, ‘Are you little Paul Harris?’ Astonished that the beautiful lady knew me by name and swelling with emotion, I stammered, "Yes, Mam," whereupon she took me in her arms and passionately kissed me and her face was wet with tears. The words she spoke are emblazoned on my memory. There were, ‘Then I am your mamma, my darling Paul’

Vague memories of someone very like the lady who had taken me in her arms began to take shape but they were still dim and distant. Then the thought burst upon me that this must be the very lady grandmother referred to when she concluded our evening prayer with, "God bless papa and mamma forevermore/' Here was my mamma at last. She took my hand in hers and I led the beautiful lady and my sister, Nina May, to the only home I knew, my New England home.

How long mother remained in Wallingford I cannot remember; it seemed not long. Sometime during her visit she gave me a bouquet of lilies of the valley. I know not where she obtained them but lilies of the valley since that day have seemed to me the purest of flowers, a fitting symbol of mother love, and they are always associated in some indefinable way with the beautiful lady whose presence so thrilled me that midsummer day in Wallingford.

The chronology of events in the lives of our family are lost to me. The main objective in the lives of both my parents was to assemble their children under one roof and to feed and clothe them. One attempt to establish a home was made in Cambridge, New York, but proved a failure. I was left alone much of the time, mother being away giving music lessons. The life which had come to me unbidden seemed not worth while; heavy clouds which hung over me seemed at times to engulf me; there was no silver lining to them. Sometimes, to be sure, they parted for an instant and permitted the love light to shine through; that was when mother had time to fold me in her arms and utter sweet words of affection. Conditions must have seemed hopeless to both of my parents. Mother put up a courageous fight, worthy of the daughter of her schoolteacher mother, Clarissa Fobes Bryan, and worthy of her Huguenot grandmother. Olive Chapelle Bryan.

One dark night a man whom I had never seen before drove up to the door in a sleigh. He was elderly and bearded. Mother addressed him as Mr. Hitchcock. When I meet anyone by the name of Hitchcock, I connect the name with the elderly bewhiskered man with his sleigh and buffalo robes and the drive of that winter night. On that memorable night, Mother, Mr. Hitchcock and I got into the sleigh, the buffalo robes were tucked about us and we were soon gliding over the moonlit snow. Where we were bound for I did not know until I eventually heard mother say, "Mr. Hitchcock, this little boy is going to his grandpa and grandma to live."

Our sleigh ride terminated at the railroad station. A curtain has been drawn over what followed but it is fair to assume that mother put me on board the train in care of the conductor and that I arrived in Rutland in due time. I was probably met by grandfather or grandmother or both, taken aboard the same train that father, Cecil and I had taken on that ineffaceable first night, the nine miles intervening between Rutland and Wallingford were passed in the customary time, and I slept that night in my comfortable bed in the blessed home of my grandparents. I was back to the home of freedom and plenty; no more would I suffer want.

Back in Cambridge a mother's heart was furiously beating. A second time she had been driven to the realization of the fact that, even with her courageous assistance, it was impossible for father to keep the family together. It must be admitted that housekeeping was not congenial to mother's nature while giving music lessons was. Her income from her music lessons was insufficient at times to provide one and occasionally two maids and to help feed the family in time of need. She was a firm believer in keeping up appearances at all times and the way she spent money was perfectly scandalous in the eyes of her frugal New England mother-in-law. The extravagances of father were less conspicuous than those of mother but certainly more personal. Cigar bills and kindred expenses could hardly be considered necessities of life. However no one with a knowledge of the facts could have spoken of father as a good provider; in fact that honor to grandfather for whom there was no escape. Grandfather simply had to be a good provider or the clock would run down.

As I grew older grandmother and I used to have heated arguments as to who was most to blame for the unhappy condition in father's home. One day grandmother said, Your mother is very wasteful, Paul; some women can throw more food out of the back door with a spoon than their husbands can put in the front door with a shovel. Your mother seems to me to be that kind of a woman, I am sorry to say. The idea of her keeping a servant and sometimes two of them when your father was having all that he could do to supply necessary food for her and the children.

Grandmother's remark brought on a storm of anger; manifestly, it was easier for her to see mother's faults than her virtues and she seemed utterly oblivious of father's faults. With considerable asperity, I answered, "Mother kept help in the kitchen so that she could go out and give music lessons. We would have starved to death if she hadn't." "Oh no, it has never been that bad, Paul," grand­mother said, "and the first duty of a mother with six children is to stay at home with them; whatever else may happen, that's where her place should be. If she will attend to her family, things will come out right somehow. I have seen many cases where it has worked. Providence seems to take care of widows with children. Pa never would have let them suffer if things were going right in the home, and, more than that, your father would have done much better in his work if he could have had the inspiration of a good, well-regulated home. That would have been much better than gew­gaws, or anything else money can buy."

Way down in my heart, I couldn't help feeling that there was something in what grandmother had said. The leaven of my grand­parents' philosophy was working. I could clearly see that happiness, contentment and peace depended more upon orderliness, thoughtfulness and kindliness than upon genius, spasmodic effort or keep­ing up appearances. However, mother had been wonderfully courageous and father could hardly have claimed that virtue. What kind of a prodigy mother would have had to be in order to have filled the expectations of grandmother, is difficult to imagine.