butchers and the grocers have to live, too, as well as the poor, and so
it's as broad as it's long."




XI


I could not make out whether Mr. Makely approved of his wife's philosophy
or not; I do not believe he thought much about it. The money probably
came easily with him, and he let it go easily, as an American likes to
do. There is nothing penurious or sordid about this curious people, so
fierce in the pursuit of riches. When these are once gained, they seem to
have no value to the man who has won them, and he has generally no object
in life but to see his womankind spend them.

This is the season of the famous Thanksgiving, which has now become the
national holiday, but has no longer any savor in it of the grim
Puritanism it sprang from. It is now appointed by the president and the
governors of the several states, in proclamations enjoining a pious
gratitude upon the people for their continued prosperity as a nation, and
a public acknowledgment of the divine blessings. The blessings are
supposed to be of the material sort, grouped in the popular imagination
as good times, and it is hard to see what they are when hordes of men and
women of every occupation are feeling the pinch of poverty in their
different degrees. It is not merely those who have always the wolf at
their doors who are now suffering, but those whom the wolf never
threatened before; those who amuse as well as those who serve the rich
are alike anxious and fearful, where they are not already in actual want;