we have always been a strong partisan of brooklyn, and when we found ourself, in company with titania, set down in the middle of a golden afternoon with the vista of grand avenue before us, we felt highly elated. just how these two wayfarers chanced to be deposited in that quiet serenity, so far from their customary concerns, is not part of the narrative.
there are regions of brooklyn, we have always felt, that are too good to be real. placid stretches of streets, with baby carriages simmering in the sun, solid and comfortable brownstone houses exhaling a prosperous condition of life, tranquil old-fashioned apothecaries' shops without soda fountains, where one peers in and sees only a solitary customer turning over the pages of a telephone book. it is all rather like a chapter from a story, and reminds us of a passage in “the dynamiter” where some untroubled faubourgs of london are winningly described.
titania was wearing a little black hat with green feathers. she looked her best, and was not unaware of it. our general plan, when destiny suddenly[pg 233] plumps us into the heart of brooklyn, is to make our way toward fulton street, which is a kind of life-line. once on fulton street we know our way. moreover, fulton street has admirable second-hand bookshops. nor do we ever forget that it was at the corner of fulton and cranberry streets that “leaves of grass” was set up, in the spring of 1855, walt doing a good deal of the work himself. the only difficulty about getting to fulton street is that people will give you such contradictory instruction. one will tell you to go this way; the next will point in the opposite direction. it is as though brooklynites suspect the presence of a stranger, and do not wish their sacred secrets to be discovered. there is a deep, mysterious freemasonry among the residents of this genial borough.
at the corner of grand and greene avenues we thought it well to ask our way. a lady was standing on the corner, lost in pleasant drowse. april sunshine shimmered all about: trees were bustling into leaf, a wagonload of bananas stood by the curb and the huckster sang a gay, persuasive madrigal. we approached the lady, and titania spoke gently: “can you tell me——” the lady screamed, and leaped round in horror, her face stricken with fearful panic. she gasped and tottered. we felt guilty and cruel. “we were not meditating an attack,” we said, “but just wanted to ask you the way to fulton street.” perhaps the poor soul's nerves[pg 234] were unstrung, for she gave us instruction that we felt instinctively to be wrong. had we gone as she said (we now see by studying the map) we would have debouched into wallabout bay. but undoubtedly it was the protective instinct of the brooklynite, on guard before strangers. is there some terrific secret in brooklyn that all residents know about but which must never be revealed to outsiders?
making a mental note not to speak too suddenly at the next encounter, the two cheerful derelicts drifted along the sunny coast of grand avenue. a shining and passionless peace presided over the streets. a gentle clop-clop of hooves came trotting down the way: here was a man driving a white horse in a neat rubber-tired buggy without a top. he leaned back and smiled to himself as he drove along. life did not seem to be the same desperate venture it appears round about broadway and wall street. who can describe the settled amiability of those rows of considerable brown houses, with their heavy oak doors, their pots of daisies on the stoop, their clear window panes, and now and then the face of a benignant grandmother peeping from behind lace curtains. the secret of brooklyn, perhaps, is contentment, and its cautious residents do not want the rest of us to know too much about it, lest we all flock over there in swarms.
we then came to the bustle of fulton street,[pg 235] which deserves a book in itself. some day we want to revisit a certain section of fulton street where (if we remember rightly) a rotisserie and a certain bookstore conspire to make one of the pleasantest haunts in our experience. we don't know exactly what the secret of brooklyn may be, but we are going to spend some time over there this spring and lie in wait for it.
