It was a merry dinner, after all, eaten with steel forks and without napkins, and with plated spoons, if you were so fortunate as to secure one. The rush of people was very great, and, with their inconvenient accommodations, the process of serving was slow.
Marion, her eyes being opened, went to studying the people about her. She found that courteous good-humor was the rule, and selfishness and ungraciousness the exception. Inconveniences were put up with and merrily laughed over by people who, from their dress and manners, could be accustomed to only the best.
"They do not act in the least like the mass of people who stop at railroad eating-houses for their dinner; they are patient and courteous under difficulties; they did not come here for the purpose of being entertained; if they did the accommodations wouldn't satisfy."
There was another little thing that interested Marion. As the tables kept filling, and those who had been served made room for those who had not, she found herself watching curiously what proportion of the guests observed that instant of silent thanks with covered eyes. It was so brief, so slight a thing, I venture that scarcely a person there noticed it, much less imagined that there was a pair of keen gray eyes over in the corner looking and calculating concerning them.
"What if they all had to wear badges," she said to herself, "badges that read 'I am a Christian,' I wonder how many of them it would influence to different words than they are speaking, or to different acts? I wonder if they _do_ all wear them? I wonder if the distinction is really marked, so one looking on could detect the difference, though all of them are strangers? I mean to watch during these two weeks. 'The proper study of mankind is man.' Very well, Brother Pope, a convenient place for the study of man is Chautauqua. I'll take it up. Who knows but I may learn a new branch to teach the graded infants in Ward No. 4."
Ruth did not recover her equanimity. She was rasped on every side. Those two-tined steel forks were a positive sting to her. She shuddered as the steel touched her lips. She had no spoon at all, and she looked on in utter disgust while Eurie merrily stirred her tea with her fork. When the waiter came at last, with hearty apologies for keeping them waiting for their spoons, and the old gentleman said cordially, "All in good time. We shall not starve even if we get no spoons," she curled her lip disdainfully, and murmured that she had always been accustomed to the conveniences of life, and found it somewhat difficult to do without them.