Читать книгу New England Joke Lore: The Tonic of Yankee Humor - Arthur George Crandall - Страница 4

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When the young business man or girl stenographer who has grown up in one of the innumerable thriving towns or cities of the broad Mississippi Valley, scans the morning paper on the way to the daily task and reads of the incidental happenings duly chronicled as New England News, there may perhaps be a glance of the mind’s eye at that little corner of the map of the United States as revealed in the not remote school days. Then it was necessary, if one would be on harmonious terms with the teacher, to at least memorize the state capitals of Vermont, New Hampshire, and little Rhode Island, as well as those of the somewhat much more imposing looking states of Maine, Massachusetts, and Connecticut. And how small and insignificant they all looked compared with the rest of the map!

It is true that geographies of good standing are not supposed to deceive, but it is doubtful if any of them ever quite did justice to the northeast corner of the U. S. of America.

And when, as sometimes happens in these modern times, the young business man marries the little stenographer and by industry and intelligence becomes prosperous, there is a desire for the well earned holiday. He and the girl stenographer now become a matron, if permitted choice, are impelled to explore that same little corner of the earth so shabbily set forth by the map, but so attractively described by acquaintances who have toured that section in summer.

And perhaps they will repeat these visits and view many smiling valleys and listen to the soothing lullabies of the surf by night and to unconvincing statements of hotel clerks by day—and yet will have missed the most satisfying and illuminating characteristic of New England—contact with the real typical New England Yankee.

Nowhere on earth does the aphorism that appearances are often deceitful more frequently prove to be true than in New England, especially in the rural districts. The impressive appearing motorist displaying the now familiar license tag of the region may be a local tradesman rated in the commercial register as “capital $500 to $1000, credit limited.” Just behind in a cloud of dust the carelessly dressed man in shabby looking buggy drawn by a placid old horse, may own a fine farm, many pedigreed cattle and possess in addition an abundance of reserve cash with which to take advantage of any favorable opportunity for investment. While the apparel may “oft portray the man,” it is far from being an infallible test in New England. Even when the native of this region is transplanted to some bustling city, he is prone to develop carelessness in dress as prosperity steals upon him.

The native resident who remarks casually that the New England climate consists of “nine months winter and three months late in the fall,” is not probably making any plans to remove elsewhere. He is taking a sardonic pleasure in making it clear that he is laboring under no delusions as to what the seasons will reveal in the months to come. He makes no attempt to gloss over the enormities of the midwinter season, but indeed seems to take much satisfaction in quoting the below zero records which make a Philadelphian, for instance, gasp with horror.