The Personality of American CitiesHungerford, Edward
History
The Personality of American Cities
Hungerford, Edward
Cities and towns -- United States; United States -- Description and travel; United States -- Social life and customs -- 1865-1918
Here we are at the William Penn Inn at dawn of a September morning
waiting to tramp our way, at least to the outskirts of the closely built
part of the city. And before we are away from the tavern which has kept
us through the lonely chill of the night, give it a single parting
glance. It has been standing there at the cross-roads of two of the busy
pikes of Montgomery county for a full century and a half. In all those
years it has not closed its door against man or beast, seeking shelter
or refreshment. There is a record of one hundred and fifty years of
hospitality for which it does not have to make apologies.
Sometimes you will discover small inns of this sort along the roadsides
of New England, but we do not know where else you will find them without
crossing the Atlantic and seeking them out in the Surrey and the Sussex
of the older England. Yet around Philadelphia they are plentiful--with
their yellow plastered walls, tight green shutters hung against them,
their low-ceilinged rooms, their broad fire-places, their stout stone
out-buildings, and their shady piazzas, giving to the highway. Some of
them have quite wonderful signs and all of them have a wonderful
hospitality--heritage from the Quaker manner of living.
So from the William Penn Inn one may start after breakfast as one might
have started a century ago--to walk his way into the busy town. The four
corners where the pikes cross stand upon a high ridge--a smooth white
house of stone, a meeting-house of the Friends, and the tavern occupying
three of them. The fourth gives to a view of distant fields--and such a
view! Montgomery is a county of fat farms. You can see the rich lands
down in the valleys, the shrewder genius required to make the more
sterile ridge acres yield. And, as you trudge down the pike, the view
stays with you for a long while.
At the bottom of the hill a little stream and the inevitable toll-gate
that seem to hedge in Philadelphia from every side. But your payment to
the toll-keeper upon the Bethlehem pike this morning is voluntary. His
smile is genial, his gate open. A cigar is to his liking and if you
would tarry for a little time within the living-room of the toll-house
he would tell you stories of the pike--stories that would make it worth
the waiting. But--Philadelphia is miles away, the road to it long and
dusty. You pick up your way and off you go.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account