A New England Barny O'Reirdon

— There is a small watering-place on the New England coast which owns a counterpart of Lover’s amusing Barny O’Reirdon. He is a taciturn, not to say stolid villager, who finds an occupation in taking the summer boarders out in his sail-boat. For want of more instructive conversation, these passengers have fallen into the way of chaffing Job for never having carried his craft across the Atlantic Ocean, and visiting the famous cities of Europe. He had never been farther from home than Boston, but these light-minded men tried to persuade him that Boston could not hold a candle to London and Paris. Job received all the gibes thrust at him in apparent unconcern, but in reality was determined to take his own time for sharpening weapons of his own. So, last March, having merely intimated to his friends and neighbors that he was going off for a little while, and might join one of those excursion parties which “ go West,” Job went to Boston and shipped for Liverpool.

In eight weeks he was home again, but as silent as ever. It was rumored that he had been abroad, but Job allowed any and all rumors to fly about, with no favoring breeze of his own. Little by little, however, as the summer boarders returned, the mystery of Job’s wanderings was revealed. No one, I believe, has the whole story of his trip, and Job appears to have kept no log, but certain facts have come to light in this modern Odyssey.

For one thing, Job went to London. Whatever else he had in the way of luggage, he had no guide-book, never having heard of such an assistant. He had only a dim remembrance of what the summer boarders had told him ; he had his village ears and eyes, his tongue being of little service, and he had an invaluable pocket-compass, by which he laid his course through the streets of London and Paris.

“ Where did you stay in London, Job ? ” some one asked him.

“ At Morley’s.”

“ What, at Morley’s Hotel, in Trafalgar Square ? ” much doubting Job’s selection of this hostelry.

“ I don’t know where Trafalgar Square is. Morley’s was just east of the tall pillar.”

“ And how did you fare at Morley’s ?„ a little curious to know another fellow-sufferer’s experience.

“ I did n’t get my victuals there,” said Job. “ I was afraid Mr. Morley would feel slighted.” His querist was a little puzzled, but by a series of questions elicited the explanation that Job, not knowing how far he might have strayed away from Mr. Morley’s when the dinner-bell rang, and having no mind to be late at his meals and so put Mr. Morley to much annoyance, nor to be absent altogether without warning and so give Mr. Morley good reason to think him rude, thought it the part of kindness to make some definite arrangement in advance. He explained the situation to the clerk in charge, who was “ real kind.”

Job’s travels took him to Paris, where, he said, they were getting ready for a big show. As he spoke no French, his investigations were somewhat curtailed, if indeed he had it in mind to make any investigations; for the most ingenious cross-examination failed to elicit any special curiosity on his part. Did he see the Louvre and the Tuileries ? He did not know them by that name, but upon having the buildings of the Louvre described to him, he allowed he had seen that place, but thought it a hospital. But what did he see ? Well, he saw the shops, and he went into some of them. There were well-educated, handsomely dressed young women to wait on him; just such, Job said, with some show of enthusiasm, as you would find at Jordan & Marsh’s or Houghton & Dutton’s. It turns out that Job in his pea-jacket, with his compass for a guide and his close-mouthed manner, was taken for an eccentric Englishman, so that our countrymen were not credited with this unique specimen. One falls to wondering, when one thinks of Job, whether his mental make - up differed essentially from that of the North American Indian who, when exposed to all the glories of governmental civilization away from his reservation, receives impressions with a stolid, immovable countenance. Is there actually no rebound from the mind in his case ?