THE COUNTRY ROAD 127 



tramp who does not really know his business. 

 Some of the same ones come back year after 

 year, and, in defiance of modern sociological 

 science, we offer them the hospitality of the 

 back porch with sandwiches and coffee, while 

 we exchange the commonplaces of the season. 

 It is the custom of the Road. 



And so the procession of the Road moves 

 on. If we wait long enough and it is not 

 so long either everything goes by: gay 

 wedding parties, christening parties, slow 

 funerals, the Road bears them all; and to 

 those who live beside it nothing is alien, no 

 thing indifferent. Throughout the week the 

 daytime is for business remembering al 

 ways that on the country Road business is 

 never merely business, but always sociability 

 too; the early evening is for pleasure; the 

 night is for rest, for that stillness that cities 

 never know, broken only when human neces 

 sity most sharply importunes, in the crises of 

 birth, of death. On Sundays all the world 

 drives to church, or sits on its doorstep and 

 watches the rest. And Sunday and week 

 days alike, every one s interest goes out to the 

 Road. 



