I talked with the Scotch Preacher afterward about the incident.  He said that he, too, marveling at the old man’s calmness, had referred to it in his presence.  Uncle Richard turned to him and said slowly: 

“I am an old man, and I have learned one thing.  I have learned to accept life.”

Since that day I have seen Uncle Richard Summers many times walking on the country roads with his cane.  He always looks around at me and slowly nods his head, but rarely says anything.  At his age what is there to say that has not already been said?

His trousers appear a size too large for him, his hat sets too far down, his hands are long and thin upon the head of his cane.  But his face is tranquil.  He has come a long way; there have been times of tempest and keen winds, there have been wild hills in his road, and rocky places, and threatening voices in the air.  All that is past now:  and his face is tranquil.

I think we younger people do not often realize how keenly dependent we are upon our contemporaries in age.  We get little understanding and sympathy either above or below them.  Much of the world is a little misty to us, a little out of focus.  Uncle Richard Summer’s contemporaries have nearly all gone—­mostly long ago:  one of the last, his old wife.  At his home—­I have been there often to see his son—­he sits in a large rocking chair with a cushion in it, and a comfortable high back to lean upon.  No one else ventures to sit in his chair, even when he is not there.  It is not far from the window; and when he sits down he can lean his cane against the wall where he can easily reach it again.

There is a turmoil of youth and life always about him; of fevered incomings and excited outgoings, of work and laughter and tears and joy and anger.  He watches it all, for his mind is still clear, but he does not take sides.  He accepts everything, refuses nothing; or, if you like, he refuses everything, accepts nothing.

He once owned the house where he now lives, with the great barns behind it and the fertile acres spreading far on every hand.  From his chair he can look out through a small window, and see the sun on the quiet fields.  He once went out swiftly and strongly, he worked hotly, he came in wearied to sleep.

Now he lives in a small room—­and that is more than is really necessary—­and when he walks out he does not inquire who owns the land where he treads.  He lets the hot world go by, and waits with patience the logic of events.

Often as I have passed him in the road, I have wondered, as I have been wondering to-day, how he must look out upon us all, upon our excited comings and goings, our immense concern over the immeasurably trivial.  I have wondered, not without a pang, and a resolution, whether I shall ever reach the point where I can let this eager and fascinating world go by without taking toll of it!

XII