Theodore Dreiser

Twelve Men Theodore Dreiser

Noank is a little played-out fishing town on the southeastern coast of Connecticut, lying half-waybetween New London and Stonington. Once it was a profitable port for mackerel and cod fishing. Today its wharves are deserted of all save a few lobster smacks. There is a shipyard, employing threehundred and fifty men, a yacht-building establishment, with two or three hired hands; a sail-loft, andsome dozen or so shops or sheds, where the odds and ends of fishing life are made and sold. Everything is peaceful. The sound of the shipyard axes and hammers can be heard for miles over thequiet waters of the bay. In the sunny lane which follows the line of the shore, and along which a fewshops struggle in happy-go-lucky disorder, may be heard the voices and noises of the workers attheir work. Water gurgling about the stanchions of the docks, the whistle of some fisherman as hedawdles over his nets, or puts his fish ashore, the whirr of the single high-power sewing machine inthe sail-loft, often mingle in a pleasant harmony, and invite the mind to repose and speculation. I was in a most examining and critical mood that summer, looking into the nature and significanceof many things, and was sitting one day in the shed of the maker of sailboats, where a half-dozencharacters of the village were gathered, when some turn in the conversation brought up the natureof man. He is queer, he is restless; life is not so very much when you come to look upon manyphases of it."Did any of you ever know a contented man?" I inquired idly, merely for the sake of something tosay. There was silence for a moment, and one after another met my roving glance with a thoughtful, selfinvolved and retrospective eye. Old Mr. Main was the first to answer."Yes, I did. One.""So did I," put in the sailboat maker, as he stopped in his work to think about it."Yes, and I did," said a dark, squat, sunny, little old fisherman, who sold cunners for bait in a littlehut next door."Maybe you and me are thinking of the same one, Jacob," said old Mr. Main, looking inquisitively atthe boat-builder."I think we've all got the same man in mind, likely," returned the builder.