“You have never seen anything in your days like Sharon,” said he. “You could not sit down by yourself and make such a thing up. Shakespeare might have, but he would have strained himself doing it. Well, Eastman says 'Lochinvar' will go in my expurgated version. Too bad Sir Walter cannot know. Ever read his Familiar Letters, Great grief! but he was a good man. Eastman stuck about that mention of wine. Remember? 'So now am I come with this lost love of mine To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.' 'Well,' thought I, 'Eastman would agree to water. Water and daughter would go, but is frequently used, and spoils the meter.' So I fiddled with my pencil down in the telegraph office, and I fixed the thing up. How's this? 'So now am I come with this beautiful maid To lead but one measure, drink one lemonade.' Eastman accepts that. Says it's purer. Oh, it's not all sadness here!” “How did you come to be in Sharon?” I asked my exotic acquaintance. “Ah, how did I? How did all our crowd at the railroad? Somebody has got to sell tickets, somebody has got to run that hotel, and telegraphs have got to exist here. That's how we foreigners came. Many travellers change cars here, and one train usually misses the other, because the two companies do not love each other. You hear lots of language, especially in December. Eastern consumptives bound for southern California get left here, and drummers are also thick. Remarks range from 'How provoking!' to things I would not even say myself. So that big hotel and depot has to be kept running, and we fellows get a laugh now and then. Our lot is better than these people's.” He made a general gesture at Sharon. “I should have thought it was worse,” said I. “No, for we'll be transferred some day. These poor folks are shipwrecked. Though it is their own foolishness, all this.”