The Magnificent Ambersons Booth Tarkington (reading like a writer txt) đ
- Author: Booth Tarkington
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This house was the pride of the town. Faced with stone as far back as the dining-room windows, it was a house of arches and turrets and girdling stone porches: it had the first porte-cochĂšre seen in that town. There was a central âfront hallâ with a great black walnut stairway, and open to a green glass skylight called the âdome,â three stories above the ground floor. A ballroom occupied most of the third story; and at one end of it was a carved walnut gallery for the musicians. Citizens told strangers that the cost of all this black walnut and woodcarving was sixty thousand dollars. âSixty thousand dollars for the woodwork alone! Yes, sir, and hardwood floors all over the house! Turkish rugs and no carpets at all, except a Brussels carpet in the front parlourâ âI hear they call it the âreception-room.â Hot and cold water upstairs and down, and stationary washstands in every last bedroom in the place! Their sideboardâs built right into the house and goes all the way across one end of the dining room. It isnât walnut, itâs solid mahogany! Not veneeringâ âsolid mahogany! Well, sir, I presume the President of the United States would be tickled to swap the White House for the new Amberson Mansion, if the Majorâd give him the chanceâ âbut by the Almighty Dollar, you bet your sweet life the Major wouldnât!â
The visitor to the town was certain to receive further enlightenment, for there was one form of entertainment never omitted: he was always patriotically taken for âa little drive around our city,â even if his host had to hire a hack, and the climax of the display was the Amberson Mansion. âLook at that greenhouse theyâve put up there in the side yard,â the escort would continue. âAnd look at that brick stable! Most folks would think that stable plenty big enough and good enough to live in; itâs got running water and four rooms upstairs for two hired men and one of âemâs family to live in. They keep one hired man loafinâ in the house, and they got a married hired man out in the stable, and his wife does the washing. They got box-stalls for four horses, and they keep a coupay, and some new kinds of fancy rigs you never saw the beat of! âCartsâ they call two of âemâ âway up in the air they areâ âtoo high for me! I guess they got every new kind of fancy rig in there thatâs been invented. And harnessâ âwell, everybody in town can tell when Ambersons are out driving after dark, by the jingle. This town never did see so much style as Ambersons are putting on, these days; and I guess itâs going to be expensive, because a lot of other folksâll try to keep up with âem. The Majorâs wife and the daughterâs been to Europe, and my wife tells me since they got back they make tea there every afternoon about five oâclock, and drink it. Seems to me it would go against a personâs stomach, just before supper like that, and anyway tea isnât fit for muchâ ânot unless youâre sick or something. My wife says Ambersons donât make lettuce salad the way other people do; they donât chop it up with sugar and vinegar at all. They pour olive oil on it with their vinegar, and they have it separateâ ânot along with the rest of the meal. And they eat these olives, too: green things they are, something like a hard plum, but a friend of mine told me they tasted a good deal like a bad hickory-nut. My wife says sheâs going to buy some; you got to eat nine and then you get to like âem, she says. Well, I wouldnât eat nine bad hickory-nuts to get to like them, and Iâm going to let these olives alone. Kind of a womanâs dish, anyway, I suspect, but most everybodyâll be makinâ a stagger to worm through nine of âem, now Ambersons brought âem to town. Yes, sir, the restâll eat âem, whether they get sick or not! Looks to me like some people in this cityâd be willing to go crazy if they thought that would help âem to be as high-toned as Ambersons. Old Aleck Minaferâ âheâs about the closest old codger we gotâ âhe come in my office the other day, and he pretty near had a stroke tellinâ me about his daughter Fanny. Seems Miss Isabel Ambersonâs got some kind of a dogâ âthey call it a Saint Bernardâ âand Fanny was bound to have one, too. Well, old Aleck told her he didnât like dogs except rat-terriers, because a rat-terrier cleans up the mice, but she kept on at him, and finally he said all right she could have one. Then, by George! she says Ambersons bought their dog, and you canât get one without paying for it: they cost from fifty to a hundred dollars up! Old Aleck wanted to know if I ever heard of anybody buyinâ a dog before, because, of course,
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