Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1885-07-29
LOVE AND LEARNING.
STORY WITH A MORAL CONCEALED ON
THE PREMISES.
[Longman's Magazine.l
EPISODE HE LOVES HER.

The town of Noesis was not built upon a
hill; neither was its light hidden under q
bushel. 1t stood in calm and peaceful
vale, into which the sorrows of great
and wicked world seldom penetrated
There was river in the centre of this vale
and hills on either side. One might have
expected to find much beauty in the towr
of Noesis and surroundings, but one would
have been sadly mistaken. Beauty was
not permitted to exist there. The towr
was built not only upon a rock, but also
on strictly utilitarian principles. The
river ran between artificial banks, con
structed wholly with view to so CONTROL
ing its waters as to make them useful in
running the saw-mills and woolen-factories
There were trees in 'Noesis, but they were
there simply for the purpose of providing
the town with lungs. They stood IN
straight rows up and down the streets,
each tree whitewashed to a height of six
feet from the ground, and each precisely
the same shape and size as it's fellows.
There were three kinds Of houses in Noesis
the large house, the small house, and the
medium house. All were precisely similar
in style, and were proportioned with geo.
metricul exactness. In fact, the influence
of geometry was abroad in the town.
Trigonometry found warm spot in the
soul of every Noesian, and quaternious and
determinants were to them things of beau
ty and joys forever. For Noesis was the
home Of reason, the domain of pure
science, the kingdom of utilitarianism.
Nothing ornamental was permitted to ex-
list in the town; only the useful found an
abiding place there. The sinuous, willowy
windings of the river had been delusion
and a snare. The dreams of architects
who saw in their minds eyes great mul
lioned windows and cloud-capped towers
had been rudely dispelled. There was no
place in the town of Noesis for them.
Science and mathematics reigned supreme,
and whatever was, was right-angled.
The day had gone by, said the Noesians,
when the minds of men could be fed on
such dainty unsubstantlal food as Pope,
Addison, Milton, Shakespeare, Byron, OR
Tennyson. Not even Homer in the origi-
nal tongue, or Virgil in his own stately
hexameters, was considered good for hu-
man brains. The Noesians revelled in
the exercise of inductive processes, lead
ing, as their chief professor expressed it,
to those general conceptions of the uni
verse which have been forced upon us all
by physical science" The only musical
monochord and the steam-whistle. The
flowers of the field were interesting accord
ing as they were monocotyledonous or
polycotyledonous
In this town dwelt Hypatia Green. A
lovelier creature the air never breathed
upon. Her hair was of that marvellous
hue that turns to gold under the magic
touch of the sun. Her eyes were deep,
dark brown, so rich and expressive that
only the inhabitants of Noesis could look
into them unmoved. Her smooth, round
cheeks were tinted to delicate pink with
the warm, rich blood that flowed beneath
them, and her two full lips always looked
ready to pout, had they not been restrained
by her strong will. Hypatia Green was a
daughter of culture, She was professor of
"Rational Torrefaction" in the Noesis
High School. In palmer speech, she
taught scientific cooking. She had
brought cooking to a point Of mathemati-
cal exactness. Every piece of beef that
she roasted was done just as well as every
other piece, and not a whit more or less.
Her omlets were always of precisely the
same size, color, and consistency. Her
coffee was never olouded with grounds, and
was never too weak nor two strong. Her
bread was never heavy, her cake was never
damp. Nothing which Hypatia cooked
ever failed to come out precisely as her re-
ceipt said it would. Is it to be wondered
at that Hypatia had been much sought
after by the eligible young men of Noesis?
In such a town cooking must of course,
rank high as science The working Ca
pacity of man, indeed his entire useful
ness, depends upon the condition of his
stomach, and for perfection in this he must
look to his cook. That Hypatia was as beauti.
full as college boy first dream of love never
occurred to any one. Beauty had no part
nor place in the town of Noesis. But men
loved Hypatia for her cooking, gift that
could not wither and grow stale with the
flight of years. Hypatia, however, remain
ed fancy free. She was wrapped up in hel
omlets, and she cared not half SO much
about the heart Of man as she did about
the heart of an onion.
OF course Noesis was on the line of a
great railway. So rational town could
not have existed elsewhere. A dozen
trains thundered by its rectangular station
every day. Eight of them were express
trains that did not stop, and ordinary No
esians, who sometimes sauntered around
wrapped in meditation like other people,
would pause and gaze with scientific de-
light upon the swift movements of the To-
comotives Those who are familiar with
the science of subtraction will infer that
the other four trains did not stop at Noe
sis. The last one arrived there in the even
ing, and on that particular evening in the
month of May it brought Alfred Swim
burne Cottle.
AS one might imagine from his name,
this young man was poet. He looked
like ole. He was more than handsome,
for there was in his face something of that
ideal beauty which Hellenic sculptors
wrought into the faces Of their gods
Cottle lived in Utopia, . town that was
surrounded by an atmosphere of dreams
and supernatural loveliness. There he had
spent his youth in fashioning melodious
verses and sleeping his soul in the litera-
lures Of Greece, Rome and England; he
knew nothing of science and cared nothing
for it. 1t may, therefore, be inferred that
he was unacquainted with the true charac-
ter of Noesis. If he had known the town
he would undoubtedly, to put it mildly,
have eschewed 1t. He went thither be-
cause he did not know the place, and he
loved to go to places where he had never
been before.
AS he descended from the train at the
Noesis station he gazed about him with
something of mild surprise.
"Well," he thought, 'sthis may be iolly
good place to spend vacation, but it looks
to me more like good place to be buried
in. However, I'm here, and Pm going to
find out what there is in the town.
"Want to go to the Huxley House, sir?"
said stage driver, stepping up to him.
"Well, want to go to hotel. Is that
the best?'
s'There isn't any other, sir.''
"Then you may take me to the Huxley
House."
Cottle followed the driver to his vehicle.
and soon was gliding over a perfectly
smooth pavement.
81 say, driver" said he, "how's the
cooking at this hotel?'
"First-class, sir. We have cooking
down to science fere. Cook at Huxley
House is pupil of Miss Hypatia.'
"Who the deuce is Miss Hypatia?''
The driver turned and stared at Cottie as
if he had come from some unknown world.
sMiss Hypatia Green is professor of
rational torrefaction' at the High School,
SIR
Cottle looked blankly at the man for a
moment, and then, as the meaning of the
sentence penetrated his brain. he hurst into