Who Is Mark Twain? (7 page)

J
une 4, Kaltenleutgeben.
In this family we are four. When a family has been used to a group of servants whose several terms of service with it cover these periods, to wit: 10 years, 12 years, 13 years, 17 years, 19 years, and 22 years, it is not able to understand the new ways of a new group straight off. That would be the case at home; abroad it is the case emphasized. We have been housekeeping a fortnight, now—long enough to have learned how to pronounce the servants’ names, but not to spell them. We shan’t ever learn to spell them; they were invented in Hungary and Poland, and on paper they look like the alphabet out on a drunk. There are four: two maids, a cook, and a middle-aged woman who comes once or twice a day to help around generally. They are good-natured and friendly, and capable and willing. Their ways are not the ways which we have been so long used to with the home tribe in America, but they are agreeable, and no fault is to be found with them except in one or two particulars. The cook is a love, but she talks at a gait and with a joyous interest and energy which make everything buzz. She is always excited; gets excited over big and little things alike, for she has no sense of proportion. Whether the project in hand is a barbecued bull or a handmade cutlet it is no matter, she loses her mind; she unlimbers her tongue, and while her breath holds out you can’t tell her from a field day in the Austrian Parliament. But what of it, as long as she can cook? And she can do that. She has that mysterious art which is so rare in the world—the art of making everything taste good which comes under the enchantment of her hand. She is the kind of cook that establishes confidence with the first meal; establishes it so thoroughly that after that you do not care to know the materials of the dishes nor their names: that her hall-mark is upon them is sufficient.

The youngest of the two maids, Charlotte, is about twenty; strong, handsome, capable, intelligent, self-contained, quiet—in fact, rather reserved. She has character, and dignity.

The other maid, Wuthering Heights (which is not her name), is about forty and looks considerably younger. She is quick, smart, active, energetic, breezy, good-natured, has a high-keyed voice and a loud one, talks thirteen to the dozen, talks all the time, talks in her sleep, will talk when she is dead; is here, there, and everywhere all at the same time, and is consumingly interested in every devilish thing that is going on. Particularly if it is not her affair. And she is not merely passively interested, but takes a hand; and not only takes a hand but the principal one; in fact will play the whole game, fight the whole battle herself, if you don’t find some way to turn her flank. But as she does it in the family’s interest, not her own, I find myself diffident about finding fault. Not so the family. It gravels the family. I like that. Not maliciously, but because it spices the monotony to see the family graveled. Sometimes they are driven to a point where they are sure they cannot endure her any longer, and they rise in revolt; but I stand between her and harm, for I adore Wuthering Heights. She is not a trouble to me, she freshens up my life, she keeps me interested all the time. She is not monotonous, she does not stale, she is fruitful of surprises, she is always breaking out in a new place. The family are always training her, always caulking her, but it does not make me uneasy any more, now, for I know that as fast as they stop one leak she will spring another. Her talk is my circus, my menagerie, my fireworks, my spiritual refreshment. When she is at it I would rather be there than at a fire. She talks but little to me, for I understand only about half that she says, and I have had the sagacity not to betray that I understand that half. But I open my door when she is talking to the Executive at the other end of the house, and then I hear everything, and the enjoyment is without alloy, for it is like being at a show on a free ticket. She makes the Executive’s head ache. I am sorry for that, of course; still it is a thing which cannot be helped. We must take things as we find them in this world.

The Executive’s efforts to reconstruct Wuthering Heights are marked by wisdom, patience and gentle and persuasive speech. They will succeed, yet, and it is a pity. This morning at half past eight I was lying in my bed counterfeiting sleep; the Executive was lying in hers, reasoning with Wuthering Heights, who had just brought the hot water and was buzzing around here and there and yonder preparing the baths and putting all manner of things to rights with her lightning touch, and accompanying herself with a torrent of talk, cramped down to a low-voiced flutter to keep from waking me up.

“You talk too much, Wuthering Heights, as I have told you so often before. It is your next worst fault, and you ought to try your best to break yourself of it. I—”

“Ah, indeed yes, gnädige Frau, it is the very truth you are speaking, none knows it better than I nor is sorrier. Jessus! but it is a verdammtes defect, as in your goodness you have said, yourself, these fifty times, and—”

“Don’t!
I never use such language—and I don’t like to hear it. It is dreadful. I know that it means nothing with you, and that it is common custom and came to you with your mother’s milk; but it distresses me to hear it, and besides you are always putting it into
my
mouth, which—”

“Oh, bless your kind heart, gnädige Frau, you won’t mind it in the least, after a little; it’s only because it is strange and new to you now, that it isn’t pleasant; but that will wear off in a little while, and then—oh, it’s just one of those little trifling things that don’t amount to a straw, you know—why, we all swear, the priest and everybody, and it’s nothing, really nothing at all; but I will break myself of it, I will indeed, and this very moment will I begin, for I have lived here and there in my time, and seen things, and learned wisdom, and I know, better than a many another, that there is only one right time to begin a thing, and that is on the spot. Ah yes, by Gott, as your grace was saying only yesterday—”

“There—do be still! It is as much as a person’s life is worth to make even the triflingest remark to you, it brings such a flood. And any moment your chatter may wake my husband, and he”—after a little pause, to gather courage for a deliberate mis-statement—“he can’t abide it.”

“I will be as the grave! I will, indeed, for sleep is to the tired, sleep is the medicine that heals the weary spirit. Heilige Mutter Gottes! before I—”

“Be
still!
”

“Zu befehl. If—”

“Still!
”

After a little pause the Executive began a tactful and low-temperature lecture which had all the ear-marks of preparation about it. I know that easy, impromptu style, and how it is manufactured, for I have worked at that trade myself. I have forgotten to mention that Wuthering Heights has not always served in a subordinate position; she has been housekeeper in a rich family in Vienna for the past ten years; consequently the habit of bossing is still strong upon her, naturally enough.

“The cook and Charlotte complain that you interfere in their affairs. It is not right. It is not your place to do that.”

“Oh, Joseph and Mary, Deuteronomy and all the saints! Think of that! Why, of course when the mistress is not in the house it is necessary that somebody—”

“No, it is not necessary at all. The cook says that the reason the coffee was cold yesterday morning was, that you removed it from the stove, and that when she put it back you removed it again.”

“Ah, but what
would
one do, gnädige Frau? It was all boiling away.”

“No matter, it was not your affair. And yesterday morning you would not let Madame Blank into the house, and told her no one was at home. My husband was at home. It was too bad—and she had come all the way from Vienna. Why did you do that?”

“Let her in?—I ask you would I let her in? and he hard at his work and not wishing to be disturbed, sunk in his labors up to his eyes and grinding out God knows what, for it is beyond me, though it has my sympathy, and none feels for him more than I do when he is in his lyings-in, that way—now
would
I let her in to break up his work in that idle way and she with no rational thing in the world to pester him about? now
could
I?”

“How do you know what she wanted?”

The shot struck in an unprotected place, and made silence for several seconds, for W.H. was not prepared for it and could not think of an answer right away. Then she recovered herself and said—

“Well—well, it was like this. Well, she—of course she could have had something proper and rational on her mind, but then I knew that if that was the case she would write, not come all the way out here from Vienna to—”

“Did you know she came from Vienna?”

I knew by the silence that another unfortified place had been hit. Then—

“Well, I—that is—well, she had that kind of a look which you have noticed upon a person when—when—”

“When what?”

“She—well, she
had
that kind of a look, anyway; for—”

“How did you know my husband did not want to be disturbed?”

“Know it? Oh, indeed, and well I knew it; for he was that busy that the sweat was leaking through the floor, and I said to the cook, said I—”

“He didn’t do a stroke of work the whole day, but sat in the balcony smoking and reading.” [In a private tone, touched with shame: “reading his own books—he is always doing it.”]

“You should have told him; he would have been very glad to see Madame Blank, and was disappointed when he found out what had happened. He said so, himself.”

“Oh, indeed, yes, dear gnädige Frau, he would
say
it, that he would, but give your heart peace, he is always saying things which—why, I was saying to the butcher’s wife no longer ago than day before yesterday—”

“Ruhig!
and let me go on. You do twice as much of the talking as you allow me to do, and I can’t have it. If—”

“It’s Viennese, gnädige Frau. Custom, you see; that’s just it. We all do it; it’s Viennese.”

“But I’m not Viennese. And I can’t get reconciled to it. And your interruptions—why, it makes no difference: if I am planning with the cook, or commissioning a dienstman, or asking the postman about the trains, no matter, you break right in, uninvited, and take charge of the whole matter, and—”

“Ah, Jessus! it’s just as I was saying, and how true was the word! It’s Viennese—all over, Viennese. Custom, you see—all custom. Sorel Blgwrxczlzbzockowicz—she’s the Princess Tzwzfzhopowic’s maid—she says she always does so, and the Princess likes it, and—”

“But I am not the Princess, and I want things
my
way; can’t you understand a simple thing like that? And there’s another thing. Between the time that the three of us went to Vienna yesterday morning, and ten at night when we returned, you seem to have had your hands overfull. When the cook’s old grandfather came to see her, what did you meddle, for?”

U
pon a certain occasion a quarrel arose among the Money in the banker’s strong-box, upon matters of right and privilege. It began between a Nickel and a Copper. In conversation the Nickel chanced to make a disparaging remark about the Copper, whereupon the latter spoke up with heat and said—

“I will have you to know that I am as good as you are.”

“Since when?” retorted the Nickel, with scorn.

“Since the Declaration of Independence said ‘all money is created free and equal.’ What do you say to that?”

“I say it is nothing but a form of speech, and isn’t true. You know quite well that in society I am more welcome than you are; that more deference is paid to me than to you, and that no one would grant that you are equal in rank to me.”

“Rank!” scoffed the Copper. “In a republic there is no such thing as rank. It is ignored by the highest authority in the land—the Constitution.”

“What of it? So is discrimination in the matter of color. But it is a dead letter, and you know it. You colored people belong in the kitchen, and we won’t allow you in the parlor, let the Constitution say what it will. You affect to repudiate rank, yet you have a rank of your own. One can pick you out in a crowd in the dark by the mere smell of it.”

“I beg your pardon,” responded the Copper coldly; “that is not rank, but merely rankness, which is a quite different thing.”

“Oh, call it by any name you prefer; to my mind the—”

“My friend,” interrupted an emaciated half dollar in a sickly voice, “really I must beg of you to modify your shout a little; you should leave your beer-hall style behind you when you push yourself up toward the upper circles of society.”

“Upper circles be damned!” exploded the Nickel, with beer-house ruggedness of speech; “I want you to understand that I’m as good as you, you poor disreputable ostracised bummer, going around everywhere letting on to be a person of means—brazenly pretending to be worth fifty cents when you can’t pay for six beers to save your life. I would like to know who will be putting on airs next. First it’s this mulatto here whose social intercourse is restricted to the peanut stand and the poor-box, and now it is you!—you who have ceased to be Money, and have gone down, down, down, until now you are nothing but a Commodity, like potatoes and guano.”

“It is true, I am temporarily in misfortune, yet I am nevertheless your superior in rank let the Declaration say what it will; and as I am in impaired health and the odor of stale beer is a damage to me, I shall be obliged if you will move a little further away and—”

“You also!” sniffed a Ten-Dollar Gold-Piece, with its handkerchief to its nose; “for from long usage as a tip you are foul with the noisome fragrance of greasy palms, and to a person of my rank and social condition nothing is more offensive than that.”

“I am as good as you are, dear sir, and I will not move.”

“Then I will.”

“Not at my expense if you please,” said a Hundred Dollar Bill, with asperity. “You are crowding me, and I will not have it. It passes my comprehension—the effrontery of this banker in subjecting me to the vulgar contact of all sorts of—”

“Now
you
are crowding
me
!” whimpered a Thousand Dollar Bond, “and I positively cannot have my snowy garments smirched by your—your—”

“Take that for your impudence!” cried the Hundred Dollar Bill, striking the Bond fairly in the face, and leaving a broad smirch of green ink there, “by the Declaration I am as good as you, and will prove it upon your body.” And straightway the fighting was taken up by the metal moneys and became general; and soon the furious jingling and jangling frightened away a team of arriving burglars and brought the police.

And so it came to pass that the court, and not the disputants, solved the question in dispute. In delivering judgment his Honor said as follows.

“The contention that you are all created free and equal is correct.

“But both here in America and in foreign lands the meaning of that phrase is curiously misunderstood. It does not propose to set aside the law of Nature—which is, that her children are created
un
equal, and of necessity
must
be. They are unequal in strength, health, stature, weight, comeliness, complexion, intellect, and so on. The Constitution cannot alter that and has not tried to. It only makes all equal in one way: it gives each an equal right with his neighbor to exercise his talent, whatever it may be, thus making free to all, many roads to profit and honor which were once arbitrarily restricted to the few.” He turned to a Copper and asked, “How much do you earn per year?”

“Five per cent, your Honor.”

“Nickel, how much do you earn?”

“Five per cent.”

“And you, Half Dollar?”

“Five per cent. That is, on what liars and slanderers are pleased to term my ‘
actual
’ value,” snapped out the Depreciated, with a white flash of anger, at the same time turning his back to hide his tears, which were beginning to drip down over his “In God We Trust”—for he was one of that over-confident early mintage.

“What do you earn, Gold-Piece?”

“Five per cent.”

“Hundred Dollar Bill?”

“Five per cent.”

“Thousand Dollar Bond?”

“Five per cent.”

“Very well. You perceive that you are all on a strictly dead level of equality; each gets the full market value of his talent, whether his talent is large or small; no advantage allowed any one of you on account of birth, station or quality. It is five per cent for all. If you were all Thousand Dollar Bonds you would all earn fifty dollars a year; if you were all Pennies, you would earn half a mill. If you were all Locomotives you could draw a train; if you were all Mice, you could draw a spool of thread. You are all equal in birth, you are all equal before the law, you are all born to 5 per cent. But the equality begins and ends there.” He cast a withering glance at the Half Dollar, and concluded thus: “I am sorry to say that we have among us a few would-be Aristocrats, who claim a fictitious superiority not recognizable by the Constitution of our democracy. It profits them nothing. They get but their 5 per cent; and they get it on what they
are,
not on what they pretend to be.”

Observation
. This fable teaches us that the character of the Equality established by our laws is commonly misunderstood on both sides of the water; and not oftener by the ignorant than by the ostensibly wise.