COMMUTER'S THANKSGIVING 227 



this tired, fine-faced Scotchman of fifty years 

 whom we chanced to see during the day selling 

 silks behind the counter of a department store. 



It is a chill November evening, with the mea- 

 gre twilight already spent. Our Commuter has 

 boarded a train for a nineteen-mile ride ; then an 

 electric car for five miles more, when he gets off, 

 under a lone electric light, swinging amid the 

 skeleton limbs of forest trees. We follow him, 

 now on foot, down a road dark with night and 

 overhanging pines, on past a light in a barn, and 

 on — when a dog barks, a horse whinnies, a lan- 

 tern flares suddenly into the road and comes pat- 

 tering down at us, calling, "Father! father!" 



We stop at the gate as father and daughter en- 

 ter the glowing kitchen. A moment later we hear 

 a cheerful voice greeting the horse, and then, had 

 we gone closer to the barn, we might have heard 

 the creamy tinkle of milk, spattering warm into 

 the bottom of the tin pail. 



Heaven knew whither, over the reaching rails, 

 this tired seller of silks was going. Heaven was 

 there awaiting him. The yard-stick was laid down 

 at half-past five o'clock; at half : past six by the 

 clock the Commuter was far away, farther than 



