Page:Traveler from Altruria, Howells, 1894.djvu/170

164 A pleased intelligence showed itself in her face, and she answered: "Yes, it is a real old-fashioned farmhouse. We have never taken boarders and so we have kept it as it was built, pretty much, and only made such changes in it as we needed or wanted for ourselves."

"It's a pity," I went on, following up what I thought a fortunate lead, "that we city people see so little of the farming life, when we come into the country. I have been here now for several seasons, and this is the first time I have been inside a farmer's house."

"Is it possible!" cried the Altrurian, with an air of utter astonishment; and when I found the fact appeared so singular to him, I began to be rather proud of its singularity.

"Yes, I suppose that most city people come and go, year after year, in the country, and never make any sort of acquaintance with the people who live there the year round. We keep to ourselves in the hotels, or if we go out at all, it is to make a call upon some city cottager, and so we do not get out of the vicious circle of our own over-intimacy with ourselves, and our ignorance of others."