I'd
have lost my nerve or my wits or my balance or something if I hadn't
had the Village to come and _breathe_ in!"
Not so different from the reputation of Old Greenwich, is it?--a place
where the rich would be healed, the weary rest and the sorrowful gain
comfort. Not so different from the lure that drew Sir. Peter out to the
Green Village between his spectacular and hazardous voyages; that gave
Thomas Paine his "seven serene months" before death came to him; that
filled the grassy lanes with a mushroom business-life which had fled
before the scourge of yellow fever; not so different from the
refreshing ease of heart that came to Abigail Adams and Theodosia
Alston when they came there from less comforting atmospheres.
Greenwich, you see, maintains its old and honourable repute--that of
being a resort and shelter and refuge for those upon whom the world
outside would have pressed too heavily.
There is no one who has caught the inconsequent, yet perfectly sincere
spirit of the Village better than John Reed. In reckless, scholarly
rhyme he has imprisoned something of the reckless idealism of the
Artists' Quarter--that haven for unconventional souls.
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