It Was Very Small, Furnished With A Bed, A Chair, And Some
Clothes-Pegs; And It Derived All That Was
Necessary for the life of
the human animal through two borrowed lights; one looking into the
passage, and the second
Opening, without sash, into another
apartment, where three men fitfully snored, or in intervals of
wakefulness, drearily mumbled to each other all night long. It
will be observed that this was almost exactly the disposition of
the room in M'Naughten's story. Jones had the bed; I pitched my
camp upon the floor; he did not sleep until near morning, and I,
for my part, never closed an eye.
At sunrise I heard a cannon fired; and shortly afterwards the men
in the next room gave over snoring for good, and began to rustle
over their toilettes. The sound of their voices as they talked was
low and like that of people watching by the sick. Jones, who had
at last begun to doze, tumbled and murmured, and every now and then
opened unconscious eyes upon me where I lay. I found myself
growing eerier and eerier, for I dare say I was a little fevered by
my restless night, and hurried to dress and get downstairs.
You had to pass through the rain, which still fell thick and
resonant, to reach a lavatory on the other side of the court.
There were three basin-stands, and a few crumpled towels and pieces
of wet soap, white and slippery like fish; nor should I forget a
looking-glass and a pair of questionable combs. Another Scots lad
was here, scrubbing his face with a good will. He had been three
months in New York and had not yet found a single job nor earned a
single halfpenny. Up to the present, he also was exactly out of
pocket by the amount of the fare. I began to grow sick at heart
for my fellow-emigrants.
Of my nightmare wanderings in New York I spare to tell. I had a
thousand and one things to do; only the day to do them in, and a
journey across the continent before me in the evening. It rained
with patient fury; every now and then I had to get under cover for
a while in order, so to speak, to give my mackintosh a rest; for
under this continued drenching it began to grow damp on the inside.
I went to banks, post-offices, railway-offices, restaurants,
publishers, booksellers, money-changers, and wherever I went a pool
would gather about my feet, and those who were careful of their
floors would look on with an unfriendly eye. Wherever I went, too,
the same traits struck me: the people were all surprisingly rude
and surprisingly kind. The money-changer cross-questioned me like
a French commissary, asking my age, my business, my average income,
and my destination, beating down my attempts at evasion, and
receiving my answers in silence; and yet when all was over, he
shook hands with me up to the elbows, and sent his lad nearly a
quarter of a mile in the rain to get me books at a reduction.
Again, in a very large publishing and bookselling establishment, a
man, who seemed to be the manager, received me as I had certainly
never before been received in any human shop, indicated squarely
that he put no faith in my honesty, and refused to look up the
names of books or give me the slightest help or information, on the
ground, like the steward, that it was none of his business. I lost
my temper at last, said I was a stranger in America and not learned
in their etiquette; but I would assure him, if he went to any
bookseller in England, of more handsome usage. The boast was
perhaps exaggerated; but like many a long shot, it struck the gold.
The manager passed at once from one extreme to the other; I may say
that from that moment he loaded me with kindness; he gave me all
sorts of good advice, wrote me down addresses, and came bareheaded
into the rain to point me out a restaurant, where I might lunch,
nor even then did he seem to think that he had done enough. These
are (it is as well to be bold in statement) the manners of America.
It is this same opposition that has most struck me in people of
almost all classes and from east to west. By the time a man had
about strung me up to be the death of him by his insulting
behaviour, he himself would be just upon the point of melting into
confidence and serviceable attentions. Yet I suspect, although I
have met with the like in so many parts, that this must be the
character of some particular state or group of states, for in
America, and this again in all classes, you will find some of the
softest-mannered gentlemen in the world.
I was so wet when I got back to Mitchell's toward the evening, that
I had simply to divest myself of my shoes, socks, and trousers, and
leave them behind for the benefit of New York city. No fire could
have dried them ere I had to start; and to pack them in their
present condition was to spread ruin among my other possessions.
With a heavy heart I said farewell to them as they lay a pulp in
the middle of a pool upon the floor of Mitchell's kitchen. I
wonder if they are dry by now. Mitchell hired a man to carry my
baggage to the station, which was hard by, accompanied me thither
himself, and recommended me to the particular attention of the
officials. No one could have been kinder. Those who are out of
pocket may go safely to Reunion House, where they will get decent
meals and find an honest and obliging landlord. I owed him this
word of thanks, before I enter fairly on the second {1} and far
less agreeable chapter of my emigrant experience.
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