ing summer do not disturb them; the
seashore is far off; Paris and Monte Carlo are but places, vague
and indistinct, the fairy tales of travellers; their city is the
four walls of their home; their world the one long, silent, street
of the village; their end the little graveyard beyond; it is all
planned out, foreseen, and arranged.

Such a life is not without its charms, and it is small wonder that
in all ages men of intellect have sought in some form of
communistic association relief from the pressure of strenuous
individualism. We may smile with condescension upon the busy
sisters in their caps and gingham gowns, but, who knows, theirs
may be the better lot.

Life with us is a good deal of an automobile race,--a lot of dust,
dirt, and noise; explosions, accidents, and delays; something
wrong most of the time; now a burst of headlong speed, then a jolt
and sudden stop; or a creeping pace with disordered mechanism; no
time to think of much except the machine; less time to see
anything except the road immediately ahead; strife to pass others;
reckless indifference to life and limb; one long, mad contest for
success and notoriety, ending for the most part in some sort of
disaster,--possibly a sea of flame.

If we possessed any sense of grim, sardonic humor, we would
appreciate how ridiculous is the life we lead, how utterly absurd
is our waste of time, our dissipation of the few days and hours
vouchsafed us. We are just so many cicadas drumming out the hours
and disappearing. We have abundance of wit, and a good deal of
humor of a superficial kind, but the penetrating vision of a
Socrates, a Voltaire, a Carlyle is denied the most of us, and we
take ourselves and our accustomed pursuits most seriously.

On our way back from the village we stopped at the birthplace of
Samuel Tilden,--an old-fashioned white frame house, situated in
the very fork of the roads, and surrounded by tall trees. Not far
away is the cemetery, where a stone sarcophagus contains the
remains of a man who was very able if not very great.

Probably not fifty people in the United States, aside from those
living in the neighborhood, know where Tilden was born. We did not
until we came abruptly upon the house and were told; probably not
a dozen could tell exactly where he is buried. Such is fame. And
yet this man, in the belief of most of his countrymen, was chosen
president, though never seated; he was governor of New York and a
vital force in the