Only an Incident
9781465536600
pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
Joppa was the very centre of all things. That was the opening clause in the creed of every well-educated and right-thinking Joppite. Geographically, however, it was not the centre of any thing, being considerably off from the great lines of railway travel, but possessing two little independent branch roads of its own, that connected it with all the world, or rather that connected all the world with it. For though there were larger places than Joppa even in the county in which it condescended to find itself, and though New York, and Philadelphia, and even Boston, were undeniably larger, as its inhabitants reluctantly admitted when hard pressed, yet they were unanimous in agreeing, nevertheless, that the sun rose and set wholly and entirely for the benefit of their one little aristocratic community. Yes; the world was created for Joppa, that the Joppites might live, move, and have their being with as much convenience and as little trouble as possible. Bethany, a considerable town near by, was built to be its shopping emporium; Galilee, a little farther off, to accommodate its art needs; Morocco, a more considerable town still farther off, to be the birthplace of those ancestors who were so unfortunate as to come into the world before there was any Joppa to be born in. Even New York was erected mainly to furnish it with a place of comfortable resort once a year, when it transplanted itself there bodily in a clan, consoling itself for its temporary aberration of body by visiting exclusively and diligently back and forth among its own people, and conforming life in all particulars as far as possible to home rules, still doing when in New York, not as the New Yorkers but as the Joppites did, and never for a moment abandoning its proud position as the one only place in the world worth living in. There certainly was much to say in favor of Joppa. In the first place, it was remarkably salubrious. Its inhabitants died only of old age,—seldom even of that,—or of diseases contracted wholly in other localities. Measles had indeed been known to break out there once in the sacred person of the President of the village, but had been promptly suppressed; besides, it was universally conceded that being in his second childhood he should be considered liable. The last epidemic of small-pox even had swept by them harmless. Only two old and extremely ugly women took it, whereas Bethany and Upper Jordan were decimated. So Joppa was decidedly healthy, for one thing. For another, it was moral. There had not been a murder heard of in ever so long, or a forgery, and the last midnight burglar was such a nice, simple fellow that he did not know real silver when he saw it, and ran off with the plated ware instead. And Joppa was not only moral, but religious; went to church no end of times on Sundays, and kept as many of the commandments as it conveniently could. It had four churches: one Methodist, frequented exclusively by the plebeians; one Baptist, of a mixed congregation; one Presbyterian, where three fourths of the best people went; and one Episcopal, which the best quarter of the best people attended, and which among the Presbyterians was popularly supposed to be, if not exactly the entrance to the infernal regions, yet certainly only one short step removed from it. And added to all these good traits, Joppa was a beautiful place. There were a few common, ugly little houses in it, of course, but they were all tucked away out of sight at one end, constituting what was known as the village, while the real Joppa meant in the thoughts of the inhabitants only the West End so to speak, where was a series of pretty villas and commodious mansions running along a broad, handsome street, and stretching for quite a distance along the border of the lake. For, oh! best of all, Joppa had a lake. To speak of Joppa in the presence of a Joppite, and not in the same breath to mention the lake with an appreciative adjective, was to make as irrevocable a mistake as to be in conversation with a poet and forget to quote from his latest poem; for next to their wives, their dinners, and their ease, the Joppites loved their beautiful little lake. And they had cause thus to love it, for apart from its exquisite charm as the main feature of their landscape, it gave them a substantial reason for existence. What could they have done with their dolce far niente lives, but for the fishing and rowing and sailing and bathing and sliding and skating which it afforded them in turn? It was all they had to keep them from settling down into a Rip Van Winkle sleep, this dear little restless lake, that coaxed them out of their land-torpor, and forced them occasionally to lend a manly hand to a manly pursuit. For there was this distinguishing peculiarity about Joppa, that no one in it seemed to need to work, or to have any manner of business whatever. Its society, outside of the village, was formed wholly of cultivated, refined, wealthy people, who had nothing in the world to do, but idly to eat and drink up the riches of the previous generation. It is a widely admitted truth, that one generation always gathers for another, never for itself, and that the generation which is thus generously gathered for, is invariably found willing to sacrifice without a murmur any latent duty to harvest on its own account, consenting to live out its life softly upon the hard-earned savings of its predecessors, without regard to posterity, and calling itself gentlemen where its fathers were content to be known as men. So this was Joppa, a place mighty in its own conceit, and high too in the estimate of others, to whom it was becoming known as the gayest and the prettiest of all dear little summer resorts; and thither strangers were beginning to flock in considerable numbers each year, made warmly welcome by the Joppites as an occasion for breaking out into an unending round of parties and picnics and dinners and lunches and teas, and even breakfasts when there was not room to crowd in any thing else. The summer was one continual whirl from beginning to end. There were visitors and visits; there was giving and receiving; there were flirtations and rumors of flirtations; there was everything the human heart could desire in the way of friendly hospitality and liveliest entertainment. Saratoga might be well enough, and Newport would do in its way; but for solid perfection, said the Joppites, there was no place in the world quite like Joppa
