Drive on, John."
MY FRIEND, THE TRAMP
I had been sauntering over the clover downs of a certain noted New
England seaport. It was a Sabbath morning, so singularly reposeful
and gracious, so replete with the significance of the seventh day
of rest, that even the Sabbath bells ringing a mile away over the
salt marshes had little that was monitory, mandatory, or even
supplicatory in their drowsy voices. Rather they seemed to call
from their cloudy towers, like some renegade muezzin: "Sleep is
better than prayer; sleep on, O sons of the Puritans! Slumber
still, O deacons and vestrymen! Let, oh let those feet that are
swift to wickedness curl up beneath thee! those palms that are
itching for the shekels of the ungodly lie clasped beneath thy
pillow! Sleep is better than prayer."
And, indeed, though it was high morning, sleep was still in the
air. Wrought upon at last by the combined influences of sea and
sky and atmosphere, I succumbed, and lay down on one of the
boulders of a little stony slope that gave upon the sea.
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