Chapter X

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

　　He stopped to dinner that evening, and, much to Ruth'ssatisfaction, made a favorable impression on her father. Theytalked about the sea as a career, a subject which Martin had at hisfinger-ends, and Mr. Morse remarked afterward that he seemed a veryclear-headed young man. In his avoidance of slang and his searchafter right words, Martin was compelled to talk slowly, whichenabled him to find the best thoughts that were in him. He wasmore at ease than that first night at dinner, nearly a year before,and his shyness and modesty even commended him to Mrs. Morse, whowas pleased at his manifest improvement."He is the first man that ever drew passing notice from Ruth," shetold her husband. "She has been so singularly backward where menare concerned that I have been worried greatly."Mr. Morse looked at his wife curiously."You mean to use this young sailor to wake her up?" he questioned."I mean that she is not to die an old maid if I can help it," wasthe answer. "If this young Eden can arouse her interest in mankindin general, it will be a good thing.""A very good thing," he commented. "But suppose, - and we mustsuppose, sometimes, my dear, - suppose he arouses her interest tooparticularly in him?""Impossible," Mrs. Morse laughed. "She is three years older thanhe, and, besides, it is impossible. Nothing will ever come of it.Trust that to me."And so Martin's role was arranged for him, while he, led on byArthur and Norman, was meditating an extravagance. They were goingout for a ride into the hills Sunday morning on their wheels, whichdid not interest Martin until he learned that Ruth, too, rode awheel and was going along. He did not ride, nor own a wheel, butif Ruth rode, it was up to him to begin, was his decision; and whenhe said good night, he stopped in at a cyclery on his way home andspent forty dollars for a wheel. It was more than a month's hard-earned wages, and it reduced his stock of money amazingly; but whenhe added the hundred dollars he was to receive from the Examiner tothe four hundred and twenty dollars that was the least The Youth'sCompanion could pay him, he felt that he had reduced the perplexitythe unwonted amount of money had caused him. Nor did he mind, inthe course of learning to ride the wheel home, the fact that heruined his suit of clothes. He caught the tailor by telephone thatnight from Mr. Higginbotham's store and ordered another suit. Thenhe carried the wheel up the narrow stairway that clung like a fire-escape to the rear wall of the building, and when he had moved hisbed out from the wall, found there was just space enough in thesmall room for himself and the wheel.Sunday he had intended to devote to studying for the high schoolexamination, but the pearl-diving article lured him away, and hespent the day in the white-hot fever of re-creating the beauty andromance that burned in him. The fact that the Examiner of thatmorning had failed to publish his treasure-hunting article did notdash his spirits. He was at too great a height for that, andhaving been deaf to a twice-repeated summons, he went without theheavy Sunday dinner with which Mr. Higginbotham invariably gracedhis table. To Mr. Higginbotham such a dinner was advertisement ofhis worldly achievement and prosperity, and he honored it bydelivering platitudinous sermonettes upon American institutions andthe opportunity said institutions gave to any hard-working man torise - the rise, in his case, which he pointed out unfailingly,being from a grocer's clerk to the ownership of Higginbotham's CashStore.Martin Eden looked with a sigh at his unfinished "Pearl-diving" onMonday morning, and took the car down to Oakland to the highschool. And when, days later, he applied for the results of hisexaminations, he learned that he had failed in everything savegrammar."Your grammar is excellent," Professor Hilton informed him, staringat him through heavy spectacles; "but you know nothing, positivelynothing, in the other branches, and your United States history isabominable - there is no other word for it, abominable. I shouldadvise you - "Professor Hilton paused and glared at him, unsympathetic andunimaginative as one of his own test-tubes. He was professor ofphysics in the high school, possessor of a large family, a meagresalary, and a select fund of parrot-learned knowledge."Yes, sir," Martin said humbly, wishing somehow that the man at thedesk in the library was in Professor Hilton's place just then."And I should advise you to go back to the grammar school for atleast two years. Good day."Martin was not deeply affected by his failure, though he wassurprised at Ruth's shocked expression when he told her ProfessorHilton's advice. Her disappointment was so evident that he wassorry he had failed, but chiefly so for her sake."You see I was right," she said. "You know far more than any ofthe students entering high school, and yet you can't pass theexaminations. It is because what education you have isfragmentary, sketchy. You need the discipline of study, such asonly skilled teachers can give you. You must be thoroughlygrounded. Professor Hilton is right, and if I were you, I'd go tonight school. A year and a half of it might enable you to catch upthat additional six months. Besides, that would leave you yourdays in which to write, or, if you could not make your living byyour pen, you would have your days in which to work in someposition."But if my days are taken up with work and my nights with school,when am I going to see you? - was Martin's first thought, though herefrained from uttering it. Instead, he said:-"It seems so babyish for me to be going to night school. But Iwouldn't mind that if I thought it would pay. But I don't think itwill pay. I can do the work quicker than they can teach me. Itwould be a loss of time - " he thought of her and his desire tohave her - "and I can't afford the time. I haven't the time tospare, in fact.""There is so much that is necessary." She looked at him gently,and he was a brute to oppose her. "Physics and chemistry - youcan't do them without laboratory study; and you'll find algebra andgeometry almost hopeless with instruction. You need the skilledteachers, the specialists in the art of imparting knowledge."He was silent for a minute, casting about for the leastvainglorious way in which to express himself."Please don't think I'm bragging," he began. "I don't intend itthat way at all. But I have a feeling that I am what I may call anatural student. I can study by myself. I take to it kindly, likea duck to water. You see yourself what I did with grammar. AndI've learned much of other things - you would never dream how much.And I'm only getting started. Wait till I get - " He hesitatedand assured himself of the pronunciation before he said "momentum.I'm getting my first real feel of things now. I'm beginning tosize up the situation - ""Please don't say 'size up,'" she interrupted."To get a line on things," he hastily amended."That doesn't mean anything in correct English," she objected.He floundered for a fresh start."What I'm driving at is that I'm beginning to get the lay of theland."Out of pity she forebore, and he went on."Knowledge seems to me like a chart-room. Whenever I go into thelibrary, I am impressed that way. The part played by teachers isto teach the student the contents of the chart-room in a systematicway. The teachers are guides to the chart-room, that's all. It'snot something that they have in their own heads. They don't makeit up, don't create it. It's all in the chart-room and they knowtheir way about in it, and it's their business to show the place tostrangers who might else get lost. Now I don't get lost easily. Ihave the bump of location. I usually know where I'm at - What'swrong now?""Don't say 'where I'm at.'""That's right," he said gratefully, "where I am. But where am I at- I mean, where am I? Oh, yes, in the chart-room. Well, somepeople - ""Persons," she corrected."Some persons need guides, most persons do; but I think I can getalong without them. I've spent a lot of time in the chart-roomnow, and I'm on the edge of knowing my way about, what charts Iwant to refer to, what coasts I want to explore. And from the wayI line it up, I'll explore a whole lot more quickly by myself. Thespeed of a fleet, you know, is the speed of the slowest ship, andthe speed of the teachers is affected the same way. They can't goany faster than the ruck of their scholars, and I can set a fasterpace for myself than they set for a whole schoolroom.""'He travels the fastest who travels alone,'" she quoted at him.But I'd travel faster with you just the same, was what he wanted toblurt out, as he caught a vision of a world without end of sunlitspaces and starry voids through which he drifted with her, his armaround her, her pale gold hair blowing about his face. In the sameinstant he was aware of the pitiful inadequacy of speech. God! Ifhe could so frame words that she could see what he then saw! Andhe felt the stir in him, like a throe of yearning pain, of thedesire to paint these visions that flashed unsummoned on the mirrorof his mind. Ah, that was it! He caught at the hem of the secret.It was the very thing that the great writers and master-poets did.That was why they were giants. They knew how to express what theythought, and felt, and saw. Dogs asleep in the sun often whinedand barked, but they were unable to tell what they saw that madethem whine and bark. He had often wondered what it was. And thatwas all he was, a dog asleep in the sun. He saw noble andbeautiful visions, but he could only whine and bark at Ruth. Buthe would cease sleeping in the sun. He would stand up, with openeyes, and he would struggle and toil and learn until, with eyesunblinded and tongue untied, he could share with her his visionedwealth. Other men had discovered the trick of expression, ofmaking words obedient servitors, and of making combinations ofwords mean more than the sum of their separate meanings. He wasstirred profoundly by the passing glimpse at the secret, and he wasagain caught up in the vision of sunlit spaces and starry voids -until it came to him that it was very quiet, and he saw Ruthregarding him with an amused expression and a smile in her eyes."I have had a great visioning," he said, and at the sound of hiswords in his own ears his heart gave a leap. Where had those wordscome from? They had adequately expressed the pause his vision hadput in the conversation. It was a miracle. Never had he soloftily framed a lofty thought. But never had he attempted toframe lofty thoughts in words. That was it. That explained it.He had never tried. But Swinburne had, and Tennyson, and Kipling,and all the other poets. His mind flashed on to his "Pearl-diving." He had never dared the big things, the spirit of thebeauty that was a fire in him. That article would be a differentthing when he was done with it. He was appalled by the vastness ofthe beauty that rightfully belonged in it, and again his mindflashed and dared, and he demanded of himself why he could notchant that beauty in noble verse as the great poets did. And therewas all the mysterious delight and spiritual wonder of his love forRuth. Why could he not chant that, too, as the poets did? Theyhad sung of love. So would he. By God! -And in his frightened ears he heard his exclamation echoing.Carried away, he had breathed it aloud. The blood surged into hisface, wave upon wave, mastering the bronze of it till the blush ofshame flaunted itself from collar-rim to the roots of his hair."I - I - beg your pardon," he stammered. "I was thinking.""It sounded as if you were praying," she said bravely, but she feltherself inside to be withering and shrinking. It was the firsttime she had heard an oath from the lips of a man she knew, and shewas shocked, not merely as a matter of principle and training, butshocked in spirit by this rough blast of life in the garden of hersheltered maidenhood.But she forgave, and with surprise at the ease of her forgiveness.Somehow it was not so difficult to forgive him anything. He hadnot had a chance to be as other men, and he was trying so hard, andsucceeding, too. It never entered her head that there could be anyother reason for her being kindly disposed toward him. She wastenderly disposed toward him, but she did not know it. She had noway of knowing it. The placid poise of twenty-four years without asingle love affair did not fit her with a keen perception of herown feelings, and she who had never warmed to actual love wasunaware that she was warming now.