He dropped back on Quincy like a lump of lead; he rebounded
like a football, tossed into space by an unknown energy which
played with all his generation as a cat plays with mice. The
simile is none too strong. Not one man in America wanted the
Civil War, or expected or intended it. A small minority wanted
secession. The vast majority wanted to go on with their
occupations in peace. Not one, however clever or learned, guessed
what happened. Possibly a few Southern loyalists in despair might
dream it as an impossible chance; but none planned it.
As for Henry Adams, fresh from Europe and chaos of another
sort, he plunged at once into a lurid atmosphere of politics,
quite heedless of any education or forethought. His past melted
away. The prodigal was welcomed home, but not even his father
asked a malicious question about the Pandects. At the utmost, he
hinted at some shade of prodigality by quietly inviting his son
to act as private secretary during the winter in Washington, as
though any young man who could afford to throw away two winters
on the Civil Law could afford to read Blackstone for another
winter without a master. The young man was beyond satire, and
asked only a pretext for throwing all education to the east wind.
November at best is sad, and November at Quincy had been from
earliest childhood the least gay of seasons.
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