I Confess That I Became Tired Of My Sojourn At Both The Places I
Have Named.
At each I think that I saw every house in the place,
although my visit to Seymour was made in the night; and at both I
was lamentably at a loss for something to do.
At Crestline I was
all alone, and began to feel that the hours which I knew must pass
before the missing train could come would never make away with
themselves. There were many others stationed there as I was, but to
them had been given a capability for loafing which niggardly Nature
has denied to me. An American has the power of seating himself in
the close vicinity of a hot stove and feeding in silence on his own
thoughts by the hour together. It may be that he will smoke; but
after awhile his cigar will come to an end. He sits on, however,
certainly patient, and apparently contented. It may be that he
chews, but if so, he does it with motionless jaws, and so slow a
mastication of the pabulum upon which he feeds, that his employment
in this respect only disturbs the absolute quiet of the circle when,
at certain long, distant intervals, he deposits the secretion of his
tobacco in an ornamental utensil which may probably be placed in the
farthest corner of the hall. But during all this time he is happy.
It does not fret him to sit there and think and do nothing.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 253 of 531
Words from 67704 to 67955
of 142339
