The Autobiography of an Idea

She too looked upward, yet told him that the moon was not plowing a path through the clouds, but that the clouds were driven by the wind across the face of the moon. This astounding statement he received as an affront to his common sense, and so stated. But the mother was adamant in her folly. He looked again skyward, to confirm himself. As by accident his eye fastened on the moon; the moon held steady and he was amazed to see the clouds go by. Then consciously he tried it on the clouds and the moon again plowed on. This process he reversed and reversed until he felt sure, and then it was he confided to his weary mother sagging under the intolerable burden of him, that he had made a discovery! He felt a sense of mastery and pride. He, he, had discovered this thing. In a world rising larger, difficulties appeared, and this particular thing was not quite what it seemed at first to be. But he had mastered it. That his mother knew all about it, had told him all about it, instantly faded; the child sank into sleep. The mother, weary unto death, reached her destination; she entered with her sleeping son while the clouds and the moon in the stillness of early night went their serene way undisturbed by further mundane intervention.

Ever at the window pane, he liked to watch the snow, falling gently in large moist flakes and, in the little gusts, swirling and piling here and there, gathering curiously in odd nooks, and crannies, gathering on the window panes across the street, gathering on his own window panes, mantling the trees in a loving way, building far out in a roll from the top of a neighbor house⁠—and not breaking off (why did it not break off?). And the stillness, the muffled stillness, the lovely stillness. He was not satisfied to glance, he must look long, very long and steadily, he must see things move, he must follow the story, he must himself live the drama of dark things slowly changing into white things. It was all so real to him as he gazed through the window pane, alone and very quiet. And then when morning came, the hasty rattle and scoop and sip of the shovels, cleaning the sidewalks, heaping the snow in mountains in the street. Again the song of work, the song of action.

About this time a strange thing happened. It is the mother’s story repeated many times in after years. It seems one afternoon she was at the piano playing a nocturne with the fervor and melancholy sweetness that were her sometime mood. Lost in dreamland she played on and on, when of a sudden she seemed to hear a voice low-pitched like a sigh, a moan. She stopped, looked, listened; no one there. She seemed mistaken; then from under the very piano itself, came a true sob, a child sob and sigh. Why tell what happened? Her precious son in her arms pressed tight to her bosom; tears, tears, an ecstasy of tears, a turmoil of embraces, the flood gates open wide, a wonder, a joy, a happiness, an exultation, an exaltation supreme over all the world. The child did not understand. Why did he, unnoticed, enter the room; why secrete himself where he was found; why was he overcome and melted into lamentation? Had anyone else been playing, would he have thus responded? Had a new world begun to arise, this time a wonder-world within himself? Had there been awakened a new power within this child of three⁠—a power arising from the fountainhead of all tears?

Folly Cove

The family had decided to spend the summer on Cape Ann. They settled in a farm house of the very old fashioned kind, at a tiny spot called Folly Cove. The farm was a fairly large one and spread out to the rockbound coast. It had its weather-beaten orchards, its meadows and its fields, its barn and outbuildings, its barnyard with a well and bright tin bucket worked with a pulley and chain. There were also the farmer, a typical extra-nasal Yankee; the faded, shriveled, worn-out wife; the usual dozen or more children, and a farm hand. Also in the meadow was a well without a curb. Presently the child wanders into this meadow, picking the sparkling flowers, feeling the lush grass, glorying in the open. Quite incidentally in his floral march he walked into the well. It was rather deep, and amid his shrieks he felt that his blue flannel skirt seemed to float about him. His father and mother were away fishing; the farmer busy at a distance. Came the hired man on the run; a quick descent, a quick ascent of the boulder wall of the well, the child was saved. In the arms of the man he was hurried to the farm house and turned over to the women-folk. The farm-man returned to his work. The children quickly gathered. The women-folk rapidly stripped the chilly child, rubbed him down with harsh towels, and stood him naked with back to the glow in the huge fireplace. The children, all older than he, looked on curiously, pointed, giggled. For the first time he was aware of a vague sensitiveness. He felt, uncomfortably, that there was something in the air besides atmosphere. He turned aside. A new world was gestating in the depths.

Upon the return of the parents all was in turmoil again. Appalled thanks, gratitude, relief, amazement, the precious, the precious, and again the precious!

The father, more sedate, bethought him it would be righteous should he hold early communion with the lifesaver, the farm-man. They met. The father offered lucre in gratitude sincere enough. The offer was spurned. Would the farm-man, an American he-man, accept of gold for saving the life of an innocent child? He would not! Things looked bad. There was argument, persuasion, even supplication. Finally as by an inspiration he was asked