Keeping One's Place 



go elsewhere clearly if I wished a beach. So 

 might I, if in the accepted sense I wished a view. 

 Across an estuary a causeway ran off sidling 

 without a decent shred of green to veil its flank. 

 More remote, tide water shanties were cast up 

 pitch and toss like so much wreckage about the 

 farther shore. And above this sandy bluff of 

 land which turned and ran out sharply at right 

 angles, the mill turrets of Fall River rose grim 

 and harsh against the sky. Entrenched on its 

 high seat. Capital looked down on Labor even 

 while on holiday. Was I eager then for romance ? 

 Here was no strange wildness to enchant me and 

 to make me fall an easy conquest. Was I wist- 

 ful after sentiment? Here was no appearance to 

 deceive me by tenderness of color or by suavity of 

 line. The humdrum facts of life were what con- 

 fronted me. I must face them if I wished to set- 

 tle down. 



Nor need I — at least if I had social aspira- 

 tions — dally on the single sandy road that looped 

 about the shore. One house there was, set cool 

 and deep in shadow, that had a patriarchal dig- 

 nity. Its first owner had built its chimney big 



[57] 



