Still more unfortunately, while I
was delighting in the drawing-room of that wonderful old house, with the
portraits of ladies in powdered hair and men in cocked hats and periwigs
looking down upon me from the walls, I was impelled to reassure myself
as to the spelling of the name. Let us assume that the name sounded like
"Bowfee." That was not it but it will suffice for illustration.
"I suppose," I said to our charming cicerone, "that the family name is
spelled 'B-o-w-f-e-e'?"
I had no sooner spoken than I realized, with a sudden access of horror
what I had done. In guessing I had sinned, but in guessing wrong I had
ruined myself. All this came to me instantly and positively, as by a
psychic message of unparalleled definiteness from the dead ancestors
whose portraits hung upon the paneling. It was as though they had joined
in a great ghostly shout of execration, which was the more awful because
it was a silent shout that jarred upon the senses rather than the ear
drums. Then, before the lady replied, while the sound of my own voice
saying "B-o-w-f-e-e" seemed to reverberate through the apartment, I
suddenly comprehended the spirit of Charleston: understood that,
compared with Charleston, Boston is as a rough mining camp, while New
York hardly exists at all, being a mere miasma of vulgarity.
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