To all the other Hissen men and women Martha was a good woman, and she was a good friend to them but she was not really pleasing.
To her brother she was not really pleasing but she was a good enough woman for him to choose a wife for him to content him.
Soon now then Fanny Hissen was married to David Hersland and went out to Gossols with him, and now together they were to begin their living, to make children who perhaps would come to have in them a really important feeling of themselves inside them.
David Hersland who was to be the father of them, of the three children who were not yet come into the world through them, had always in him an important feeling, not inside him for it was all of him, everything was of him and he was it and there was not any difference for him between himself and everything existing.
The mother who was to bear the three children, she perhaps would come to an important feeling, she did not have it as a natural thing to have really an important feeling. With her it must come from a, to her, not natural way of living, and it first had its beginning with her friendship with the Shilling women. Then it came to be stronger with the living in Gossols in the ten acre place in the part of Gossols where no other rich people were living, where she was cut off from the rich living which was for her the natural way of being.
Mrs. Fanny Hersland had always had in her the beginning of an almost important feeling which she had from being like her mother in her nature, the mother who had had, in her sad trickling arising of itself inside her, an almost important feeling. This beginning of an almost important feeling, had never in Fanny Hissen been very real inside her while she was living in Bridgepoint, for then the strongest thing in her was the family way of being and that always would have been just so strong in her and it never would have come to her to have any realler feeling of being important to herself inside her if she had not gone to Gossols and left the family way of being behind her. It was only when she left the family way of living, when she went out to Gossols where she was to have none of the being always a part of the well to do living, that it came to her to begin to have this almost important feeling. It was not marrying that gave her such a feeling. Marrying would never have changed her from her family way of being, it was going to Gossols and leaving the family being and having a for her unnatural way of living that awoke in her a sense inside her of the almost important feeling that was to come to be inside in her.
It had its beginning with her knowing, in the hotel where the Herslands were living before they settled down in the ten acre place, it had its beginning with her knowing old Mrs. Shilling and her daughter Sophie Shilling and her other daughter Pauline Shilling. With them there began inside her a sense of individual being, not that it was different in her to her feeling, it was only different in her being. Now she had no longer in her as the strongest thing inside her the Hissen way of being that was then all her and was the natural way of being to her. Later it grew stronger in her, this being, that never was different to her in her feeling that she knew inside her, but later it grew stronger in her, a very little by her husband and the power over him she had in her, but mostly with the living that came soon to be all the being there was of her, the living with her servants and governesses and dependents and the for her poor queer kind of people who lived near her, and the way she had of being a power, of being of them, with them, and always above them, and the feeling they had in them; and all this gave to her the real being of an almost important feeling.
When one just met with them, old heavy flabby Mrs. Shilling and her daughter the fat Sophie Shilling and the other daughter the thinner Pauline Shilling, they were at first meeting and even after longer knowing like many other ordinary women. Yet always one had a little uncertain feeling that perhaps each one of them had something queer in her. One could never be very certain with them whether this possible queerness of them was because of something queer inside in all them or that they were queer because something had been left out in each one of them in the making of them or that they had lost something out of them that should have been inside in them, that something had dropped out of each one of them and they had been indolent of stupid or staring each one of them then and they had not noticed such a dropping out of them. Each one of them had perhaps a hole then somewhere inside in them and this may have been that which gave to each one of them the queerness that it was never certain was ever really there in any one of them. One never was certain with them that there was anything queer about them. Mostly they were just ordinary stupid enough women like millions of them.
The mother was one of those fat heavy women who are all straight down the whole front of them when they are sitting. When they are walking they are always slowly waddling with heavy breathing.
Many such heavy fat flabby waddling women have something queer about them. These have big doughy empty heads on top of them. These heads on them give to one a kind of feeling such as a baby's head gives to one in the first months of its being living, that the head is not well fastened to them, that it will fall off them if one does not hold it together on them. This kind of a head on them is what gives these fat flabby women the queerness about them that makes strange things of them. They have been living, working, cooking, directing, they have been chosen by a man to content him, they have had children come into the world through them, sometimes strong men and women have been born from inside them, they have made marriages for their children and managed people around them, they have lived and suffered and some of them have had power in them, and they are flabby now with big doughy heads that wobble on them.
It is a queer feeling that one has in them and perhaps it is, that they have something queer in them something that gives to one a strange uncertain feeling with them for their heads are on them as puling babies heads are always on them and it gives to one a queer uncertain feeling to see heads on big women that look loose and wobbly on them.
Old Mrs. Shilling was such a one. It was uncertain always even after a long knowing of her whether the wobbly head on her was all that made a strange thing of her or whether there was something queer inside in her, different from the others of them, different from all of them who always give to one a strange uncertain feeling, all the many fat ones who are made just like her. Perhaps that was all that was queer in her, that which is always queer in all the many fat ones who are made just like her.
The fat daughter Sophie Shilling in the ways one mostly felt her has many millions who are made just like her. The fat daughter Sophie Shilling was a little like her mother but her head was not yet wobbly on her. Sometimes there was something about her that perhaps came from something queer inside her. Mostly she was just an ordinary rather fat young woman and there are many millions made just like her.
As one knew her with her mother and her sister she was an amiable enough good sister and daughter. Mostly one felt that she was a very good sister and a very good daughter. Not that it was a family of women that as far as one could know them were very trying to one another. They seemed to have enough money to live comfortably in the hotel together. They had a poodle dog who was company for the mother. They never quarreled with each other. They did not have any troubles there at the hotel where they were comfortably living together.
Sophie Shilling and Pauline Shilling were sisterly with one another. Sophie Shilling like most fat sisters was afraid of the thinner. Sometimes it is the thinner who is afraid of the fatter when two daughters are sisterly together but most often it is the fat sister who is afraid of the thinner. It is not so much being older or younger that makes sisters afraid of one another, it is a kind of power that always one has over the other, mostly it is the fat one who is afraid of the other because it would hurt more if pins were stuck into her, not that the thinner is always in any way meaner, sometimes it is the fat one who is afraid who is the meaner, but there is so much more of her, there is so much more unprotected surface to her, somehow, it is that which makes her afraid of the thinner even when the thin one is really never nas
ty to her. This was true of the sisters Sophie Shilling and Pauline Shilling, the fat one always had fear in her but the thin one never in any way was ever mean or nasty to her. It is this fear that the fat one has in her that often makes the people who know her and see the mother and the sister with her feel that the thin one has mean ways in her. Not that the fat one complains of her but there is a fear in her, and often it is only a fear from there being so much of her, but when others feel the fear in her they are sure it must come from the mean things the thinner one does to her. So it was with Sophie Shilling and they were very sisterly together.
It was a month or so after the Herslands had come to the hotel that Mrs. Hersland began to know Sophie Shilling. She had met her going about in the hotel and sometimes when she was out she met with her and they came in together. They soon were a good deal together. They soon began to call on each other. Mrs. Hersland began to know the mother and the sister Pauline Shilling. Pauline did not take much interest in her. Mostly she and Sophie did not have friends together. The way in which Sophie was afraid of her sister made any one who knew her have an awe of Pauline Shilling, made them have a kind of feeling about her so that they could never be easy with her. Always in them must be a suspicious feeling that there was danger for them in her and they must not be too free when being with her or talking to her. It was the fear in the fat sister that gave to all who knew her a restraint when they were with Pauline Shilling. Not that Sophie ever complained of her, not that Sophie ever knew that she had such a fear in her. It was always there though and affected all who knew her although from their own knowing of her they could see that Pauline Shilling had no mean ways in her. Of course there were people who first knew the thin sister and they never had any such feeling about her. But all who first knew Sophie Shilling never could come to be easy with her sister. Mrs. Hersland first knew Sophie Shilling. It is easy to see how the knowing Sophie Shilling and her mother and the sister Pauline Shilling would awaken in her the always possible almost important feeling that was quiet until then inside her.
Sophie Shilling never meant very much to her. They were very much together and Fanny Hersland always felt for her. She had no affection for her and after she moved away from the hotel she did not very often see her.
The year that they both lived in the hotel they were a great deal together but Sophie did not impress her, she never became really important to her, Mrs. Hersland had not realty any affection for her. Mrs. Hersland never came to feel any nearer to the mother, and the sister Pauline Shilling.
Knowing Sophie Shilling and her mother and her sister was really very important to her. They were a problem to her.
Always she had a feeling for Sophie Shilling. Sophie never complained to her and the sister Pauline was always a puzzle to her. She never came to really know inside her that the feeling she had about Pauline Shilling was because of the fear that was always in the fatter sister, a fear that she felt always to be inside Sophie Shilling. Sophie never complained of her sister. She never knew she had such a fear in her. At first Fanny Hersland always felt for her, then slowly she felt that Pauline had no mean ways in her. Pauline was always very pleasant to her, she was always very decent to her mother and her sister Sophie. Perhaps later Mrs. Hersland would have liked it better if she had not first known the sister Sophie but that never really came to be a feeling inside her, even to the end of her knowing her she always felt for her, but, more and more it came to her that she was not sure of what she felt about her or about the mother or the sister Pauline Shilling and so it came to be that there commenced inside her, from the not being certain of the judgment which was natural to her, there came to be inside her a beginning of an almost individual feeling.
The thinner sister Pauline Shilling has not so many millions who are made just like her. There have been always many millions made just like the mother and the fatter sister Sophie Shilling but there have never been so many millions made altogether like the thinner sister Pauline Shilling.
There have been always many millions made just like the mother and the fatter sister Sophie Shilling. That is, there have been always many millions made just like them if they really have nothing queer inside them. Perhaps they have something queer inside them that makes them different from the many millions who have been made just like them.
There have been many millions made just like the mother and the fatter sister Sophie Shilling. That is there are many millions who have been made just like them all excepting the something queer inside them which perhaps made them different inside them from the many millions who have always been made just like them.
Perhaps there was nothing that was really queer inside them. Perhaps it was only from the three of them living together and not meaning much to one another and not meaning very much to any other and so making all together a queer feeling when one felt them together which lasted over to the knowing each one of them. And so one had a feeling that there was something really queer inside them. This was most likely all that they had of queerness in them. They, did not have much meaning and the three of them being together and not having much meaning for each other gave one a sense of them that they had something queer inside them. Very likely that was all there was of queerness in them.
The thinner sister Pauline Shilling seemed perhaps to have more of individual being in her. Perhaps that was only because there are not so many millions made just like her as there are many millions made like her mother and her fatter sister. Perhaps that was all the individual being that she had in her.
Perhaps really the queerness of them came from there not being enough in each one of them to fill out the inside in them and so they did not have much meaning or any power or any sense of appealing.
The thinner one had not really any more meaning than the fatter one or than the mother who had born them. She had a more individual seeming because she was a thin one and she was one of them who have not quite so many millions made just like them. But even as a thin one she had not enough inside her to really fill her, to really make her important, not inside her, but to any one who came to be about her, she was not filled out enough inside her to give her any power or make any appeal to any one who came near her. The emptiness in her was different from the emptiness that was inside her fatter sister or her mother.
Pauline Shilling had not any fear in her of any one such as her sister had of her. The fatter sister had this fear in her because she was not all filled up inside her and that gave to her all the unprotected surface that she always had had on her and that made her have a fear in her, not from anything that was ever done to her, but from all the unprotected surface there was of her. She never knew at any time that she had such a fear always inside her and that made it the more deceiving in her, for one always felt it with her but one never really knew it about her.
The thinner sister had not any such a fear in her as the fatter sister had of her and always inside her. This is perhaps why one has a feeling that they are not so many millions made just like her. Perhaps there are as many millions made just like the thinner sister as there are millions made like the fatter sister or the mother.
The many millions made just like the fatter sister or the mother, each one fills up so much more space than a thinner that one gets the feeling that they are commoner, that there are many more millions of them made fatter than there are millions made thinner, and that these the fatter are made more just alike to one another. It is the unprotected surface of these who are made like the fatter sister, that make them seem more completely just like one another than when they are thinner. It is the uncertain head on the many millions made just like the mother that make them seem to be exactly like each other, a great deal more like one another than any of the thinner, alike as these may be to each other.
The vague fear the fatter one almost always has inside her gives a more common quality to her than any other kind of fear she could have in her. The vague fear that comes from all that unprotected surface of her makes it easier to
see in her that she is just like all the other millions who have been made just like her all the other millions who have the same kind of fear that she has in her. This fear makes it easier to see a likeness to her than any other kind of fear that she might have had inside her.
The thinner sister Pauline Shilling had a fear in her, she had a fear in her and all the many millions who have been made just like her have the same kind of fear as she has in her, but it is not from the unprotected surface of her, one does not always feel it when one is with her, it has not then the common feeling that can make it so apparent that there are so many made just like her as the fear in her sister makes it to every one that knows her.
The fear the thinner sister had always in her also came from there being not enough inside to fill her, came not from the unprotected surface of the outside of her but from her not being filled out well inside her and so she had the fear in her that always trying to fill up a hole in her without enough to fill it from the being in her without making some other hole inside her, was certain to give to her. This made her without any power, or appeal to any one who was near her.
She was always busy inside in her filling up the hole in her from the rest of her and so making another, for there was not enough inside her ever to entirely fill her. Always she was filling up a hole in her and always she was keeping anything from touching her, everything from coming close to her lest it should push an outside hole into her. She could never feel a power in any other, she could not believe in any other, she could not concern herself with any other, she could never let any other come close to her, she was always there, not filled up inside her, and that was the whole of her, that always gave a fear to her to be inside her, but a kind of fear that did not make a common person of her, as the fear inside her did with the fatter sister Sophie Shilling. It did not make an individual of her because there was never there a whole of her. She did not know that there was not a whole one of her. This incompleteness of her only made a self-defensive instinct in her, and that was all there was to her, comfort and keeping out of danger was all there was of living to her, and so she had no power in her for she had no power of attacking in her, for she was not all together, and it gave her no appeal to any one who came near her because they never could really come close to her, she could not let them touch her lest they should push a hole into her. She could not come near to any other, or believe in any other, and always she must be concerned with herself and the defense of her lest any one should touch her and make a hole into her.
The Making of Americans, Being a History of a Family's Progress Page 12
