Glenway Wescott

“ Jim stared in astonishment at his brother, his brother's excited eyes, his large earth-colored hands working to turn back the cuffs of the nightshirt. Jealousy, the jealousy that a man ought to feel, that he ought to feel and did not. ”

“ Just as Ralph rose from his knees, Jim thought of his prayer, the prayer of all such men as he: that he might make use of other people's passion, in his life—he would have need of it; and that those who loved him should have no reason to be ashamed of him ”

“ The Spanish-American War broke out, and one day his mother wrote that Evan, having nothing to look forward to at home, had joined the army. America had been at peace since before Jim was born, and he thought of war as if it were death itself, and pictured the island in the south as a military graveyard, full of soldiers and flowers. At any rate, reckless Evan would be the sort of soldier who has no future; he might as well be dead. The family had grown smaller by one. Ralph would do what their father had done before him—work the land and care for the old people ”

“ He loved no one but his uncle, and it was certain that he and his father would never be at peace. He kept threatening to run away from home, and Ralph at least knew that sooner or later he would.
Ralph wanted to go to a school in Milwaukee and become a veterinary surgeon, having a passion for animals, dreaming of race horses, and prize bulls, and dogs worth as much as a whole farm. But he was obviously the one who would never go anywhere, who would have to make sacrifices, and learn to be patient with their father as he grew old and arbitrary. ”

“ He asked himself if he really loved Irene.
"Besides," Ralph insisted, "you hadn't ought to be a singer. Pa's made sacrifices. Only one of us boys could have a chance. I gave up wanting to be a veterinary so you could be a minister—we all want you to. You sing well enough already. Singing doesn't count—it's not much of a man's job."
Jim's dream of a career changed. Everyone left the great hall in which he had wanted to sing, that is, everyone he loved; just a few supercilious strangers would be there, to make fun of the country boy—no one who loved him. ”

“ Irene was very much in love, and often embarrassed him by forcing her way into his heart, as a woman might throw open a door and rustle into a room where a young man—his heavy head in his hands, his forehead wrinkled, his eyes half closed—broods upon his limited resources, and his ambitions, and the opposition to them which may arise. ”

“ In the autumn of 1895 Jim, the lucky one, went off alone to a little college town to learn how to preach virtue and pious progress and the fear of God: a rudely handsome young man, anxious, awkward, and eager to please. ”

“ RALPH TOWER, Alwyn's father, was not an educated man. Because of their poverty his parents could not hope to send more than one son away to school. They wanted a preacher in the family, for no calling was so honorable as the ministry. Jim, their eldest, was more studious than the other two boys, spoke fluently, and took pains with his appearance. So, while still almost a child, he was chosen to receive an education, and it was useless for Ralph and Evan to have ambitions; they would have to stay on the farm in any case. ”

“ Undernourished but energetic, half savage but hopeful, a poor farmer's ordinary sons, dressed in overalls or grown men's clothes hastily cut down, with copper toes on their boots and rabbits' feet in their pockets for good luck until their late adolescence they were as much alike as young dogs of the same litter. ”

“ They heard their father say to their mother that the farm would have to be mortgaged before long; and for some time. the younger boys thought they were as well off as Jim, for apparently, in that family, no one could have a start in life.
But in 1894 Timothy Davis began to send their uncle Leander money from the West every month. Leander was in poor health, and one day he proposed to his brother and sister-in-law that an "old bachelor's wing" be added to their house; the money Timothy sent should pay for it, keep them from running into debt, and enable them to send Jim to college as well. ”