What is the conflict ABOUT quality by john galsworthy?

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1200979

2026-01-11 16:10

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I knew him from the days of my extreme youth, because he made my

father's boots; inhabiting with his elder brother two little shops

let into one, in a small by-street--now no more, but then most

fashionably placed in the West End.

That tenement had a certain quiet distinction; there was no sign

upon its face that he made for any of the Royal Family--merely his

own German name of Gessler Brothers; and in the window a few pairs

of boots. I remember that it always troubled me to account for

those unvarying boots in the window, for he made only what was

ordered, reaching nothing down, and it seemed so inconceivable that

what he made could ever have failed to fit. Had he bought them to

put there? That, too, seemed inconceivable. He would never have

tolerated in his house leather on which he had not worked himself.

Besides, they were too beautiful--the pair of pumps, so

inexpressibly slim, the patent leathers with cloth tops, making

water come into one's mouth, the tall brown riding boots with

marvelous sooty glow, as if, though new, they had been worn a

hundred years. Those pairs could only have been made by one who saw

before him the Soul of Boot--so truly were they prototypes

incarnating the very spirit of all foot-gear. These thoughts, of

course, came to me later, though even when I was promoted to him,

at the age of perhaps fourteen, some inkling haunted me of the

dignity of himself and brother. For to make boots--such boots as he

made--seemed to me then, and still seems to me, mysterious and

wonderful.

I remember well my shy remark, one day, while stretching out to him

my youthful foot:

"Isn't it awfully hard to do, Mr. Gessler?"

And his answer, given with a sudden smile from out of the sardonic

redness of his beard: "Id is an Ardt!"

Himself, he was a little as if made from leather, with his yellow

crinkly face, and crinkly reddish hair and beard; and neat folds

slanting down his cheeks to the corners of his mouth, and his

guttural and one-toned voice; for leather is a sardonic substance,

and stiff and slow of purpose. And that was the character of his

face, save that his eyes, which were gray-blue, had in them the

simple gravity of one secretly possessed by the Ideal. His elder

brother was so very like him--though watery, paler in every way,

with a great industry--that sometimes in early days I was not quite

sure of him until the interview was over. Then I knew that it was

he, if the Words, "I will ask my brudder," had not been spoken;

and, that, if they had, it was his elder brother.

When one grew old and wild and ran up bills, one somehow never ran

them up with Gessler Brothers. It would not have seemed becoming to

go in there and stretch out one's foot to that blue iron-spectacled

glance, owing him for more than--say--two pairs, just the

comfortable reassurance that one was still his client.

For it was not possible to go to him very often--his boots lasted

terribly, having something beyond the temporary--some, as it were,

essence of boot stitched into them.

One went in, not as into most shops, in the mood of: "Please serve

me, and let me go!" but restfully, as one enters a church; and,

sitting on the single wooden chair, waited--for there was never

anybody there. Soon, over the top edge of that sort of well--rather

dark, and smelling soothingly of leather--which formed the shop,

there would be seen his face, or that of his elder brother, peering

down. A guttural sound, and the tip-tap of bast slippers beating

the narrow wooden stairs, and he would stand before one without

coat, a little bent, in leather apron, with sleeves turned back,

blinking--as if awakened from some dream of boots, or like an owl

surprised in daylight and annoyed at this interruption.

And I would say: "How do you do, Mr. Gessler? Could you make me a

pair of Russia leather boots?"

Without a Word he would leave me, retiring whence he came, or into

the other portion of the shop, and I would continue to rest in the

wooden chair, inhaling the incense of his trade. Soon he would come

back, holding in his thin, veined hand a piece of gold-brown

leather. With eyes fixed on it, he would remark: "What a beaudiful

biece!" When I, too, had admired it, he would speak again. "When do

you wand dem?" And I would answer: "Oh! As soon as you conveniently

can." And he would say: "To-morrow Ford-nighd?" Or if he were his

elder brother: "I will ask my brudder!"

Then I would murmur: "Thank you! Good-morning, Mr. Gessler."

"Goot-morning!" he would reply, still looking at the leather in his

hand. And as I moved to the door, I would hear the tip-tap of his

bast slippers restoring him, up the stairs, to his dream of boots.

But if it were some new kind of foot-gear that he had not yet made

me, then indeed he would observe ceremony--divesting me of my boot

and holding it long in his hand, looking at it with eyes at once

critical and loving, as if recalling the glow with which he had

created it, and rebuking the way in which one had disorganized this

masterpiece. Then, placing my foot on a piece of paper, he would

two or three times tickle the outer edges with a pencil and pass

his nervous fingers over my toes, feeling himself into the heart of

my requirements

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What is the conflict ABOUT quality by john galsworthy?

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