MACON
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HE languid town of Macon, Georgia, will ever remain in my mind as myfirst island of respite after vagrancy. My friend C. D. Russell lentme his clothes, took me to his eating-place, introduced his circle.We settled the destiny of the universe several different ways inperipatetic discourse. After one has ventured one hundred and fifty miles through evergladesand spent twenty-four sleepless hours riding in freight-cabooses themarrow of his bones is marsh, his hair and clothes are moss, cindersand bark, his immortal soul is engine-smoke. Feeling just so, I hadentered Russell’s law office. He was at court. I sent word by hispartner that I had gone to school with him in Ohio, that I had maileda postal last Sunday from Florida telling him I would arrive afootin three weeks,--but here I was, already. The word was carried withSouthern precision. “There is a person in the office who went to school with you inIndiana.” “I did not go to school in Indiana.” “He has been walking in Mississippi and Alabama. He wrote you a postalsix weeks ago.” “How does he look?” “Like the devil. He is principally pants and shirt.” The cavalier knew who that was. He found me, took me to his castle,introduced civilization. CIVILIZATION is whiter than the clouds, andfull of clear water. One enters it with a plunge. CULTURE is a fuzzyfabric with which one rubs in CIVILIZATION. After I had been intimatewith these, I was admitted to SOCIETY: a suit of the cavalier’sclothes. I looked like him then, all but head and hands. I regardedmyself with awe, as a gorilla would if he found himself fading into aGibson picture. A chair is a sturdy creature. I wonder who captured the first one?Who put out its eyes and taught it to stand still? A table-clothis ritualistic. How nobly the napkin defends the vest, while thoseglistening birds, the knife, the fork, the spoon, bring one food. How did these things to eat get here among these hundreds of houses?One would think that if anything to eat were brought among so many men,there would be enough hungry ones to kill each other and spoil it withblood. Why do people stop eating when they have had just a bit? Why not go onforever? We were in another room. The cavalier showed on the table what hecalled his Bible: the letters of Lord Chesterfield. To one who hasnot slept in all his life, who has lived a thousand years on freighttrains, books do not count much. But how ingenious is a white iron bed,how subtle are pillows, how overwhelming is sleep!
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