Punch/Volume 147/Issue 3811/The Awakening
(A Little Romance of the Restraurant-Car.)
Is there a sight so soothing to the brain As England's outlines green and softly curved,Visions of wooded slope and fertile plainSeen by the traveller in a dining-train,No doubts to vex him and no talk to strain, His seat, his chance companion, both reserved?
I think not. Yet the rather stoutish man Who never raised his head but chewed and chowedAnnoyed me as I feasted. I beganTo deem him one who had no higher plan,No larger outlook in life's journeyings, than Resonant demolition of his food.
I longed to point to him the hedges twined With starry blossoms, and the coats like silkOf oxen as they wandered unconfined;I longed to ask him if his heavier mindPreferred the cattle of more stedfast kind Stamped with advertisements of malted milk.
The little red-brick hamlets, poised apart, And all the grandeur of the rolling leas—I longed to ask him if they brought no smartOf scarce-remembered boyhood to his heart.But I refrained; and he took cherry tart And after that two different kinds of cheese.
And then we neared a little market town Half hidden in the dale, that seemed to clingFondly about a church of old renown;And here the fat man started and looked downAnd filled his tumbler to the foaming crown And held it high as if to pledge the King.
Some memory seemed to stir within his breast As though the curtain of old days were torn,And, as he drained the glass with eager zest,"Behold," I thought, "I wronged him. In that nest,So far from turmoil, full of old-world rest (He is about to tell me), he was born.
"And now, before the antique spire hath fled, Because remembrance of his home is dear,He toasts it deeply." All my wrath was dead.Then the man smiled at me and wagged his head;"Junction for Little Barleythorpe," he said; "A week ago these points upset my beer."Evoe.