Folly Cove
The family had decided to spend the summer on Cape Ann. They settled in a farm house of the very old fashioned kind, at a tiny spot called Folly Cove. The farm was a fairly large one and spread out to the rockbound coast. It had its weather-beaten orchards, its meadows and its fields, its barn and outbuildings, its barnyard with a well and bright tin bucket worked with a pulley and chain. There were also the farmer, a typical extra-nasal Yankee; the faded, shriveled, worn-out wife; the usual dozen or more children, and a farm hand. Also in the meadow was a well without a curb. Presently the child wanders into this meadow, picking the sparkling flowers, feeling the lush grass, glorying in the open. Quite incidentally in his floral march he walked into the well. It was rather deep, and amid his shrieks he felt that his blue flannel skirt seemed to float about him. His father and mother were away fishing; the farmer busy at a distance. Came the hired man on the run; a quick descent, a quick ascent of the boulder wall of the well, the child was saved. In the arms of the man he was hurried to the farm house and turned over to the womenfolk. The farm-man returned to his work. The children quickly gathered. The womenfolk rapidly stripped the chilly child, rubbed him down with harsh towels, and stood him naked with back to the glow in the huge fireplace. The children, all older than he, looked on curiously, pointed, giggled. For the first time he was aware of a vague sensitiveness. He felt, uncomfortably, that there was something in the air besides atmosphere. He turned aside. A new world was gestating in the depths.
Upon the return of the parents all was in turmoil again. Appalled thanks, gratitude, relief, amazement, the precious, the precious, and again the precious!
The father, more sedate, bethought him it would be righteous should he hold early communion with the lifesaver, the farm-man. They met. The father offered lucre in gratitude sincere enough. The offer was spurned. Would the farm-man, an American he-man, accept of gold for saving the life of an innocent child? He would not! Things looked bad. There was argument, persuasion, even supplication. Finally as by an inspiration he was asked if he would not accept something that was not money. The farm-man replied that if the father insisted and would not otherwise be calmed, he would with pleasure accept from him, as a casual gift, a plug of chewing tobacco. Thus was the value of a man-child ascertained.
In the course of his exploration, he came to the other well, the one in the barn yard with pulley, chain, and big bright tin bucket. He was curious, and began huge experiments. Somehow the bucket got loose from the hook, struck the water with a splash and began to fill. He leaned over the edge in alarm. What was to be done? The bucket began its swaying descent, glinting this way, darkening that way, became dusky and was gone. In its place arose from the well an accusation seeming to say “guilty,” and there arose within and without the child a new world, the world of accountability.
He spent most of his time with his father; the bond of union was the love of the great out-of-doors. Too young to philosophize and search his soul to discover sin, he took all things for granted. It seemed natural to him that there should be flowers, grass, trees, cows, oxen, sunshine and rains, the great open sky, the solid earth underfoot, men, women, children, the great ocean and its rockbound shore. All these he took at their face value—they all belonged to him. He would sit beside his father on a great boulder watching him fish with pole and line. He would remain patiently there, inspirited by the salt breeze, listening to the joyous song of the sea as the ground swells reared and dashed upon the rocks with a mighty shouting, and a roaring recall, to form and break and form again. It seemed to lull him. It was mighty. It belonged to him. It was his sea. It was his father fishing.
One day as he was sitting alone on the boulder his father swung into sight in a row boat, and pulled for the open sea. The child did not know about rowboats, he had not discovered them, he did not understand how they went. Suddenly father and boat disappeared, the child gave a shriek of alarm, then as suddenly man and boat reappeared, to disappear again. The ground-swell running high, the breeze stiffening, the boat with the man grew smaller and smaller at each appearance; there was a flash each time. Smaller grew the boat until it became a speck, then it began to grow bigger and bigger. The child, dumbfounded, ran to meet his father, in wild excitement, at the landing. His father, very patient in such matters, explained it all as best he could, and the child listened eagerly, with some understanding. What was said must be true, because his father, who knew everything had said so. But what he knew, all of himself, and beyond the knowledge of others, was that the sea was a monster, a huge monster that would have swallowed up his father, like one of the giants he had told his grandmama about, if his father had not been such a big strong man. He felt this with terror and pride. Thus arose in prophecy the rim of another world, a world of strife and power, on the horizon verge of a greater sea.
For the remainder of the summer, nothing of special import occurred. The family returned to the city.
When all were settled, he was sent to the primary school of that district. He reported to the family at the end of the first day that teacher had called him to the platform to lead the singing. What a dreary prison the primary school of that day must have been. His recollection of his stay there is but a gray blank. Not one bright spot to recall, not one stimulus to his imagination, not one happiness. These he found only at home. He learned his letters, he followed the routine, that is all. Nor were there any especially memorable events at home until the matter of the farm came up and was discussed interminably. He had been merely enlarging his geographical boundaries, and exhausting the material. The primary school had, for the moment, dulled his faculties, slackened his frank eagerness, ignored his abundant imagination, his native sympathy. Even the family influence could not wholly antidote this. The neighborhood was growing disreputable. Next came the farm.