Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1912-02-11

quainted q say you in general, not
a specific way), dishing up some chirp
about the weather or the train service,
or anything of that sort, why, the Eng
lishman will promptly paste his monocle
on his eye, or deliberately adjust his eye
glasses, or else just stare penetratingly
and impalingly at YOU; and that will be
about all. Occasionally he will yield to
the Joint of staring through you and say
ing in a grating, suppressive tone: "Eh,
what?"
Which, also. will be about ALL You're
squinched. You curl up. You've got to
curl up. You instantly sense the mor.ify
ing feeling that you haven't conformed to
the custom of the country, which is not
anything like a chirpful country. You
get back to 1.-The states you exude con-
siderable immaterial material about the
grumpiness of the Englishman, his Gin
hospitality his sullenness, his INNER
sion in himself, and so on and SO on; all
of which is perfectly true.
But if, by any future chance, you be-
come perforce sort of roamer on trains
and boats and things UP and down and
criss-cross over our own bright land, and
are bored to extinction and even crema-
ton by chinful individuals who are bound
and determined to talk at and to you, no
matter whether you want them to do the
same or not, until you are charred to a
clinker, you will sooner or later, l think,
come to the natural and inevitable con-
clusion that the Englishman who won't
let himself be talked at and to by
strangers is perfectly kee-rect and right
just about forty ways from the ace.
Because, you see, there is no use in the
world denying the fact that as a sep
arate folk and people we Americans sure
are a chatterful lot We love to say it.
We insist upon saying 1t. No matter
whether there is nothing whatever except
highly standardized brand Of brittle bran
in our say-So. We are going to say it even
if We are perfectly aware that our say
ing II will be the cause of our being
blown to fragments at the very next mo-
ment.
And we will talk to and at perfect
strangers, whether they like it or not.
whether they indicate, so that a child of
six could understand, that they don't
want to talk none whatever and are CON-
pletely immersed in their own private af-
fairs.
Lately this present chronicler of iinfn-
utive malt has been compelled by the
power of circumstances over which he
had no control to do so much galloping
hither and yon on trains and boats and
things around certain sections of the
l should say the delirium-of sleeping two
nights running in the same bed gave him
such an acute case of happy hysteria
that he almost had to send for the doc
tor, and no doubt would have done that
same had he not known that the doctor
would only have made his condition a
great deal worse.
During all of this sad, mad pacing
around the land, l got mine," in addition
to the quota Of several thousand other
travelling persons, at the hands-I should
say the mouths-of the CUFF ful cooks
Most of it happened in the smoking COM
partments of trains. I became SO leary
of the smoking compartments of trains
that / almost abandoned the vicious and
degenerating habit Of smoking; nearly,
that is. Frequently, instead of going into
the smoking compartments, I'd stand out
In the cold, raw vestibule of the ear and
there ease little hurried nicotine into
myself land generally get myself ordered
to quit that stuff by some train attache
or other), rather than take a chance ON
nudging into the smoking compartment
and there annexing unto my diaphragm
a few injurious fumes of tobacco smoke.
found myself becoming quite cagey in
this respect Thus, when I felt prompted
to yield to hideous passion for tobacco
smoke, I'd pull back the curtain of the
smoking compartment and take a quick
slant at the occupant or oc~ CpantS there