human
Are you always glad to get back to your own country, Mrs. Kimberly?
gpt
Dutifully glad.
human
Is that all?
gpt
At least, I come back with the same feeling of relief that I am getting back to democracy.
human
That is, suggested Lottie Nelson,
gpt
I always thank Heaven, Lottie, that we have no aristocracy here.
human
But you are wrong, Dolly, we have, objected Robert Kimberly as the party went into the drawing-room.
gpt
Democracy is nothing but an aristocracy of ability. What else can happen when you give everybody a chance? We began in this country by ridding ourselves of an aristocracy of heredity and privilege; and we have only succeeded in substituting for it the coldest, cruelest aristocracy known to man--the aristocracy of brains. This is the aristocracy that controls our manufacturing, our transportation, our public service and our finance; it makes our laws and apportions our taxation. And from this fell cause done our present griefs arise.
human
But you must rid yourself of the grossly material conception of an aristocracy, Mr. Kimberly, said Nelson.
gpt
Our real aristocracy, I take it, is not our material one, as Robert Kimberly insists. The true aristocrat, I hold, is the real but mere gentleman.
human
Exactly right, assented De Castro.
gpt
The gentleman and nothing else is the thing.
human
There is nothing more interesting than the gentleman, returned Robert Kimberly,
gpt
You must remember, though, that ideas of superiority and inferiority are very tricky, commented Imogene.
human
And they persist for centuries. To the Naples beggar, even to-day, the Germans are ’barbarians.’ And whenever I encounter the two I never can decide which _is_ the aristocrat, the traveller or the beggar.
gpt
I read your speech at the New England dinner last night, said Imogene, turning to Nelson,
human
If credit were due anywhere it would be to the occasion, returned Nelson.
gpt
There is always something now in such gatherings to suggest the discomforting reflection that our best native stock is dying out.
human
Oh, dear, are those unfortunate people still dying out? I’ve been worrying over their situation for years. Can’t any one do anything?
gpt
Don’t let it disturb you, Mrs. De Castro,
human
But I am afraid it is getting on my nerves.
gpt
Nothing dies out that doesn’t deserve to die out, continued Bryson.
human
As to the people Nelson speaks of, I incline to think they ought to die out. Their whole philosophy of life has been bad. Nature ought to be ashamed, of course, to pass them by and turn to inferior races for her recruits. But since all races are inferior to them, what can she do but take refuge with the despised foreigner? The men and women that take life on the light-housekeeping plan may do so if they will--for one generation. What may safely be counted on is that nature will find its workers in the human hive even if it has to turn to the savage tribes.
gpt
But the poor savages, doctor--they also are on the verge of extinction, are they not?
human
Then nature will provide its workers from one unfailing source--from those we have always with us, the poor and the despised. And it can be depended on with equal certainty to cast the satisfied, cultivated, and intellectual drones into outer darkness.
gpt
My dear, but the doctor is savage, isn’t he? Lottie Nelson made the appeal indolently to Imogene.
human
We shall soon be asking, doctor, she concluded languidly,
gpt
He would answer, the medical tribe,
human
Speaking of savages, interposed Arthur De Castro,
gpt
Charles and I were making a portage once on the York River. On the trail I met two superb little Canadian lads--straight, swarthy, handsome fellows. They couldn’t speak English. ’You must be French,’ I suggested, addressing the elder by way of compliment in that tongue. Imagine my surprise when he answered with perfect composure, ’Non, monsieur. Nous sommes des sauvages!’
human
For my part, said Imogene,
gpt
I am always glad to hear Doctor Bryson defend families and motherhood. I don’t care how savage he gets.
human
I defend motherhood because to me it is the highest state of womanhood. Merely as an instinct, its mysteries are a never-ending marvel.
gpt
Oh, tell us about them, do, doctor.
human
I will tell you of one, returned Bryson undismayed.
gpt
Take the young mother that brings her first child into the world; from the day of its birth until the day of that mother’s death, her child is never wholly out of her thought. The child may die, may be forgotten by every one else on earth, may be to all other conscious existence in this world as a thing that never was. But in its mother’s heart it never dies. I call that a mystery.