第90章

It happened, or rather, to tell the truth, it was contrived,--for Ihave waited too long for things to turn up to have much faith in "happen," that we who have sat by this hearthstone before should all be together on Christmas eve.There was a splendid backlog of hickory just beginning to burn with a glow that promised to grow more fiery till long past midnight, which would have needed no apology in a loggers' camp,--not so much as the religion of which a lady (in a city which shall be nameless) said, "If you must have a religion, this one will do nicely."There was not much conversation, as is apt to be the case when people come together who have a great deal to say, and are intimate enough to permit the freedom of silence.It was Mandeville who suggested that we read something, and the Young Lady, who was in a mood to enjoy her own thoughts, said, "Do." And finally it came about that the Fire Tender, without more resistance to the urging than was becoming, went to his library, and returned with a manuscript, from which he read the story of MY UNCLE IN INDIANot that it is my uncle, let me explain.It is Polly's uncle, as Ivery well know, from the many times she has thrown him up to me, and is liable so to do at any moment.Having small expectations myself, and having wedded Polly when they were smaller, I have come to feel the full force, the crushing weight, of her lightest remark about "My Uncle in India." The words as I write them convey no idea of the tone in which they fall upon my ears.I think it is the only fault of that estimable woman, that she has an "uncle in India" and does not let him quietly remain there.I feel quite sure that if I had an uncle in Botany Bay, I should never, never throw him up to Polly in the way mentioned.If there is any jar in our quiet life, he is the cause of it; all along of possible "expectations" on the one side calculated to overawe the other side not having expectations.And yet I know that if her uncle in India were this night to roll a barrel of "India's golden sands," as I feel that he any moment may do, into our sitting-room, at Polly's feet, that charming wife, who is more generous than the month of May, and who has no thought but for my comfort in two worlds, would straightway make it over to me, to have and to hold, if I could lift it, forever and forever.And that makes it more inexplicable that she, being a woman, will continue to mention him in the way she does.

In a large and general way I regard uncles as not out of place in this transitory state of existence.They stand for a great many possible advantages.They are liable to "tip" you at school, they are resources in vacation, they come grandly in play about the holidays, at which season mv heart always did warm towards them with lively expectations, which were often turned into golden solidities;and then there is always the prospect, sad to a sensitive mind, that uncles are mortal, and, in their timely taking off, may prove as generous in the will as they were in the deed.And there is always this redeeming possibility in a niggardly uncle.Still there must be something wrong in the character of the uncle per se, or all history would not agree that nepotism is such a dreadful thing.

But, to return from this unnecessary digression, I am reminded that the charioteer of the patient year has brought round the holiday time.It has been a growing year, as most years are.It is very pleasant to see how the shrubs in our little patch of ground widen and thicken and bloom at the right time, and to know that the great trees have added a laver to their trunks.To be sure, our garden,--which I planted under Polly's directions, with seeds that must have been patented, and I forgot to buy the right of, for they are mostly still waiting the final resurrection,--gave evidence that it shared in the misfortune of the Fall, and was never an Eden from which one would have required to have been driven.It was the easiest garden to keep the neighbor's pigs and hens out of I ever saw.If its increase was small its temptations were smaller, and that is no little recommendation in this world of temptations.But, as a general thing, everything has grown, except our house.That little cottage, over which Polly presides with grace enough to adorn a palace, is still small outside and smaller inside; and if it has an air of comfort and of neatness, and its rooms are cozy and sunny by day and cheerful by night, and it is bursting with books, and not unattractive with modest pictures on the walls, which we think do well enough until my uncle--(but never mind my uncle, now),--and if, in the long winter evenings, when the largest lamp is lit, and the chestnuts glow in embers, and the kid turns on the spit, and the house-plants are green and flowering, and the ivy glistens in the firelight, and Polly sits with that contented, far-away look in her eyes that I like to see, her fingers busy upon one of those cruel mysteries which have delighted the sex since Penelope, and I read in one of my fascinating law-books, or perhaps regale ourselves with a taste of Montaigne,--if all this is true, there are times when the cottage seems small; though I can never find that Polly thinks so, except when she sometimes says that she does not know where she should bestow her uncle in it, if he should suddenly come back from India.

There it is, again.I sometimes think that my wife believes her uncle in India to be as large as two ordinary men; and if her ideas of him are any gauge of the reality, there is no place in the town large enough for him except the Town Hall.She probably expects him to come with his bungalow, and his sedan, and his palanquin, and his elephants, and his retinue of servants, and his principalities, and his powers, and his ha--(no, not that), and his chowchow, and his--Iscarcely know what besides.

Christmas eve was a shiny cold night, a creaking cold night, a placid, calm, swingeing cold night.