The "Goldfish"

The saddest class in our social life is that of the thoroughbred American girl who is a thousand times too good for her de-luxe surroundings and the crew of vacuous la-de-da Willies hanging about her, yet who, absolutely cut off from contact with any others, either gradually fades into a peripatetic old maid, wandering over Europe, or marries an eligible, turkey-trotting nondescript—"a mimmini-pimmini, Francesca da Rimini, je-ne-sais-quoi young man."

The Atlantic seaboard swarms in summertime with broad-shouldered, well-bred, highly educated and charming boys, who have had every advantage except that of being waited on by liveried footmen. They camp in the woods; tutor the feeble-minded sons of the rich; tramp and bicycle over Swiss mountain passes; sail their catboats through the island-studded reaches and thoroughfares of the Maine coast, and grow brown and hard under the burning sun. They are the hope of America. They can carry a canoe or a hundred-pound pack over a forest trail; and in the winter they set the pace in the scientific, law and medical schools. Their heads are clear, their eyes are bright, and there is a hollow instead of a bow window beneath the buttons of their waistcoats.

The feet of these young men carry them to strange places; they cope with many and strange monsters. They are our Knights of the Round Table. They find the Grail of Achievement in lives of hard work, simple pleasures and high ideals—in college and factory towns; in law courts and hospitals; in the mountains of Colorado and the plains of the Dakotas. They are the best we have; but the poor rich girl rarely, if ever, meets them. The barrier of wealth completely hems her in. She must take one of those inside or nothing.

When, in a desperate revolt against the artificiality of her existence, she breaks through the wall she is easy game for anybody—as likely to marry a jockey or a professional forger as one of the young men of her desire. One should not blame a rich girl too much for marrying a titled and perhaps attractive foreigner. The would-be critic has only to step into a Fifth Avenue ballroom and see what she is offered in his place to sympathize with and perhaps applaud her selection. Better a year of Europe than a cycle of—shall we say, Narragansett? After all, why not take the real thing, such as it is, instead of an imitation?

I believe that one of the most cruel results of modern social life is the cutting off of young girls from acquaintanceship with youths of the sturdy, intelligent and hardworking type—and the unfitting of such girls for anything except the marriage mart of the millionaire.

I would give half of all I possess to see my daughters happily married; but I now realize that their education renders such a marriage highly difficult of satisfactory achievement. Their mother and I have honestly tried to bring them up in such a way that they can do their duty in that state of life to which it hath pleased God to call them. But unfortunately, unless some man happens to call them also, they will have to keep on going round and round as they are going now.

We did not anticipate the possibility of their becoming old maids, and they cannot become brides of the church. I should honestly be glad to have either of them marry almost anybody, provided he is a decent fellow. I should not even object to their marrying foreigners, but the difficulty is that it is almost impossible to find out whether a foreigner is really decent or not. It is true that the number of foreign noblemen who marry American girls for love is negligible. There is undoubtedly a small and distinguished minority who do so; but the transaction is usually a matter of bargain and sale, and the man regards himself as having lived up to his contract by merely conferring his title on the woman he thus deigns to honor.

I should prefer to have them marry Americans, of course; but I no longer wish them to marry Americans of their own class. Yet, unfortunately, they would be unwilling to marry out of it. A curious situation! I have given up my life to buying a place for my children that is supposed to give them certain privileges, and I now am loath to have them take advantage of those privileges.

The situation has its amusing as well as its pathetic side—for my son, now that I come to think of it, is one of the eligibles. He knows everybody and is on the road to money. He is one of the opportunities that society is offering to the daughters of other successful men. Should I wish my own girls to marry a youth like him? Far from it! Yet he is exactly the kind of fellow that my success has enabled them to meet and know, and whom Fate decrees that they shall eventually marry if they marry at all.

When I frankly face the question of how much happiness I get out of my children I am constrained to admit that it is very little. The sense of proprietorship in three such finished products is something, to be sure; and, after all, I suppose they have—concealed somewhere—a real affection for their old dad. At times they are facetious—almost playful—as on my birthday; but I fancy that arises from a feeling of embarrassment at not knowing how to be intimate with a parent who crosses their path only twice a week, and then on the stairs.

My son has attended to his own career now for some fourteen years; in fact I lost him completely before he was out of knickerbockers. Up to the time when he was sent away to boarding school he spent a rather disconsolate childhood, playing with mechanical toys, roller skating in the Mall, going occasionally to the theater, and taking music lessons; but he showed so plainly the debilitating effect of life in the city for eight months in the year that at twelve he was bundled off to a country school. Since then he has grown to manhood without our assistance. He went away undersized, pale, with a meager little neck and a sort of wistful Nicholas Nickelby expression. When he returned at the Christmas vacation he had gained ten pounds, was brown and freckled, and looked like a small giraffe in pantalets.

Moreover, he had entirely lost the power of speech, owing to a fear of making a fool of himself. During the vacation in question he was reoutfitted and sent three times a week to the theater. On one or two occasions I endeavored to ascertain how he liked school, but all I could get out of him was the vague admission that it was "all right" and that he liked it "well enough." This process of outgrowing his clothes and being put through a course of theaters at each vacation—there was nothing else to do with him—continued for seven years, during which time he grew to be six feet two inches in height and gradually filled out to man's size. He managed to hold a place in the lower third of his class, with the aid of constant and expensive tutoring in the summer vacations, and he finally was graduated with the rest and went to Harvard.

By this time he preferred to enjoy himself in his own way during his leisure and we saw less of him than ever. But, whatever his intellectual achievements may be, there is no doubt as to his being a man of the world, entirely at ease anywhere, with perfect manners and all the social graces. I do not think he was particularly dissipated at Harvard; on the other hand, I am assured by the dean that he was no student. He "made" a select club early in his course and from that time was occupied, I suspect, in playing poker and bridge, discussing deep philosophical questions and acquiring the art of living. He never went in for athletics; but by doing nothing in a highly artistic manner, and by dancing with the most startling agility, he became a prominent social figure and a headliner in college theatricals.

From his sophomore year he has been in constant demand for cotillions, house parties and yachting trips. His intimate pals seem to be middle-aged millionaires who are known to me in only the most casual way; and he is a sort of gentleman-in-waiting—I believe the accepted term is "pet cat"—to several society women, for whom he devises new cotillion figures, arranges original after-dinner entertainments and makes himself generally useful.

Like my two daughters he has arrived—absolutely; but, though we are members of the same learned profession, he is almost a stranger to me. I had no difficulty in getting him a clerkship in a gilt-edged law firm immediately after he was admitted to the bar and he is apparently doing marvelously well, though what he can possibly know of law will always remain a mystery to me. Yet he is already, at the age of twenty-eight, a director in three important concerns whose securities are listed on the stock exchange, and he spends a great deal of money, which he must gather somehow. I know that his allowance cannot do much more than meet his accounts at the smart clubs to which he belongs.

He is a pleasant fellow and I enjoy the rare occasions when I catch a glimpse of him. I do not think he has any conspicuous vices—or virtues. He has simply had sense enough to take advantage of his social opportunities and bids fair to be equally successful with myself. He has really never done a stroke of work in his life, but has managed to make himself agreeable to those who could help him along. I have no doubt those rich friends of his throw enough business in his way to net him ten or fifteen thousand dollars a year, but I should hesitate to retain him to defend me if I were arrested for speeding.

Nevertheless at dinner I have seen him bullyrag and browbeat a judge of our Supreme Court in a way that made me shudder, though I admit that the judge in question owed his appointment entirely to the friend of my son who happened to be giving the dinner; and he will contradict in a loud tone men and women older than myself, no matter what happens to be the subject under discussion. They seem to like it—why, I do not pretend to understand. They admire his assurance and good nature, and are rather afraid of him!

I cannot imagine what he would find to do in my own law office; he would doubtless regard it as a dull place and too narrow a sphere for his splendid capabilities. He is a clever chap, this son of mine; and though neither he nor his sisters seem to have any particular fondness for one another, he is astute at playing into their hands and they into his. He also keeps a watchful eye on our dinner invitations, so they will not fall below the properly exclusive standard.

"What are you asking old Washburn for?" he will ask. "He's been a dead one these five years!" Or: "I'd cut out the Becketts—at least if you're asking the Thompsons. They don't go with the same crowd." Or: "Why don't you ask the Peyton-Smiths? They're nothing to be afraid of if they do cut a dash at Newport. The old girl is rather a pal of mine."

So we drop old Washburn, cut out the Becketts, and take courage and invite the hyphenated Smiths. A hint from him pays handsome dividends! and he is distinctly proud of the family and anxious to push it along to still greater success.

However, he has never asked my help or assistance—except in a financial way. He has never come to me for advice; never confided any of his perplexities or troubles to me. Perhaps he has none. He seems quite sufficient unto himself. And he certainly is not my friend. It seems strange that these three children of mine, whose upbringing has been the source of so much thought and planning on the part of my wife and myself, and for whose ultimate benefit we have shaped our own lives, should be the merest, almost impersonal, acquaintances.

The Italian fruit-vender on the corner, whose dirty offspring crawl among the empty barrels behind the stand, knows far more of his children than do we of ours, will have far more influence on the shaping of their future lives. They do not need us now and they never have needed us. A trust company could have performed all the offices of parenthood with which we have been burdened. We have paid others to be father and mother in our stead—or rather, as I now see, have had hired servants to go through the motions for us; and they have done it well, so far as the mere physical side of the matter is concerned. We have been almost entirely relieved of care.

We have never been annoyed by our children's presence at any time. We have never been bothered with them at meals. We have never had to sit up with them when they could not go to sleep, or watch at their bedsides during the night when they were sick. Competent nurses—far more competent than we—washed their little dirty hands, mended the torn dresses and kissed their wounds to make them well. And when five o'clock came three dainty little Dresden figures in pink and blue ribbons were brought down to the drawing room to be admired by our guests. Then, after being paraded, they were carried back to the nursery to resume the even tenor of their independent existences.

No one of us has ever needed the other members of the family. My wife has never called on either of our daughters to perform any of those trifling intimate services that bring a mother and her children together. There has always been a maid standing ready to hook up her dress, fetch her book or her hat, or a footman to spring upstairs after the forgotten gloves. And the girls have never needed their mother—the governess could read aloud ever so much better, and they always had their own maid to look after their clothes. When they needed new gowns they simply went downtown and bought them—and the bill was sent to my office. Neither of them was ever forced to stay at home that her sister might have some pleasure instead. No; our wealth has made it possible for each of my children to enjoy every luxury without any sacrifice on another's part. They owe nothing to each other, and they really owe nothing to their mother or myself—except perhaps a monetary obligation.

But there is one person, technically not one of our family, for whom my girls have the deepest and most sincere affection—that is old Jane, their Irish nurse, who came to them just after they were weaned and stayed with us until the period of maids and governesses arrived. I paid her twenty-five dollars a month, and for nearly ten years she never let them out of her sight—crooning over them at night; trudging after them during the daytime; mending their clothes; brushing their teeth; cutting their nails; and teaching them strange Irish legends of the banshee. When I called her into the library and told her the children were now too old for her and that they must have a governess, the look that came into her face haunted me for days.

"Ye'll be after taking my darlin's away from me?" she muttered in a dead tone. "'T will be hard for me!" She stood as if the heart had died within her, and the hundred-dollar bill I shoved into her hand fell to the floor. Then she turned quickly and hurried out of the room without a sob. I heard afterward that she cried for a week.

Now I always know when one of their birthdays has arrived by the queer package, addressed in old Jane's quaint half-printed writing, that always comes. She has cared for many dozens of children since then, but loves none like my girls, for she came to them in her young womanhood and they were her first charges.

And they are just as fond of her. Indeed it is their loyalty to this old Irish nurse that gives me faith that they are not the cold propositions they sometimes seem to be. For once when, after much careless delay, a fragmentary message came to us that she was ill and in a hospital my two daughters, who were just starting for a ball, flew to her bedside, sat with her all through the night and never left her until she was out of danger.

"They brought me back—my darlin's!" she whispered to us when later we called to see how she was getting on; and my wife looked at me across the rumpled cot and her lips trembled. I knew what was in her mind. Would her daughters have rushed to her with the same forgetfulness of self as to this prematurely gray and wrinkled woman whose shrunken form lay between us?

Poor old Jane! Alone in an alien land, giving your life and your love to the children of others, only to have them torn from your arms just as the tiny fingers have entwined themselves like tendrils round your heart! We have tossed you the choicest blessings of our lives and shouldered you with the heavy responsibilities that should rightfully have been our load. Your cup has run over with both joy and sorrow but you have drunk of the cup, while we are still thirsty! Our hearts are dry, while yours is green—nourished with the love that should belong to us. Poor old Jane? Lucky old Jane! Anyhow God bless you!