THE COUNTRY ROAD 123 



am on the Road, I like to know that I am an 

 object of interest to the dwellers in the houses 

 I pass. I look up at the windows, whose tiny 

 panes reflect the brightness of outdoors and 

 tell me nothing of the life within, and I like to 

 think that some one behind them knows that 

 I am going by. Often there is some sign of 

 recognition a motion of the hand through 

 a parted curtain, or rarely a smiling face; now 

 and then some one looks out from a doorway 

 to send a greeting, or glances up from the gar 

 den or the well ; but even without these tokens 

 I still have the sense of being noticed, and I 

 find it pleasant and companionable. In the 

 city, when I go to see a friend, I approach a 

 house that gives no sign. I mount to a non 

 committal vestibule and push an impersonal 

 button, and after the other necessary prelim 

 inaries I find my friends. In the country as I 

 drive up to the house I notice curtains stir 

 ring, I hear voices, and before I have had 

 time to get out and find the hitch-rope every 

 person in the house is either at the gate or 

 standing in the doorway. Our visit is begun 

 before we have left the Road, the hospitable, 

 social Road. Such ways would probably not 



