Spirit of the age. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1849-1865, 1858-11-03
Winter Evenings.

Who that has ever read that beautiful,
touching Poem by Burns, 'The Cotter's Sat
urday Night" can ever forget the happy fam
lily group so graphically depicted there. The
scene is laid when
November chill blows loud with angry
sough,"
and when the ''shortning winter day is"
brought to "a close" The good old "Cotter'
gathers round his eclean hearth stane' which
his thrifty wife" has prepared Tor him
With 'lisping infant p~rattling on his knee"
and the "elder BARNS gathered round the
frugal board, the Poet has drawn one of the
happiest, most cheerful domestic scenes ever
depicted. Reader, if you have not perused
it lately, do SO nox, we beseech you, and en-
JOY the rich literary as well as social. enter
~tainment it affords.
1t is a happy family circle-ah happy home.
E How the very words thrill the heart, and
: call up long-lost memories of when we too
climbed our Parents knee,
The envied kiss to share"
A happy home! Who does not love to visit
p such a home! And how many more there
: might be in our happy land, if home were
made the place for pleasant social gatherings
and mental improvement. The long winter
evenings are creeping upon us. To make
home attractive and delightful to our sons
: and daughters, the means to make it so must
be supplied-foremost among which are good
N reading, and congenial refined society. II
&c out, they would find less disposition on the
Il part of their children for night gadding ii
10 search of company.
Allow us to propose . plan: Let every
lie family supply itself with the Spirit Of The
~ Age, and some other good papers, periodical
nc and books, and let these constitute a circula
lat ting library for the family, each taking on,
by turns until the whole have been read b,
- all. After thus spending say two hours, lie
the party become conversational, when tn
nd matter read shall be discussed and digested
ng and lnterspersed with some good music, vo
inf cal and instrumental, by the whole. company
and thus, all will be proited and delighted b
of the evenings entertainment.
ex- If to this be added the visiting of some neigl
Dor friends who will sympathise with an
on contribute to thish happy and profitable maj
'er- ner of spending the evening, the e~ntertai.
;,toroSt;no .,
E to agreeable. And if a few families would for
pa a"Social Circle, with the agreemen to holds
~ternate weekly meetings of this character
ra- their respective homes, what an attracti
to feature in society would be added and no
hip, greatly would it promote the virtue and I
I'll tinement of the young men of our country
MIA. Then the bar rooms and gambling salooI
would lose their attractions, and a high al
healthy tone of morals and intelligence pe
mis-. wade every community where it was prs
tised.
has Who will introduce this or some simil
lnm means of intellectual and social improvement
' nn3 by which the girls and boys, the young M
ield and women may be brought into associate
as a with each other, and be mutually improv
of a in mind and mannorc Tboro :, - 1;4.1o
"o this elevated sociability in southern socie
,ole- too little attractiveness thrown aroul
care h0me by our fathers and mothers. If th,
tlon would see the vices of their children reforl
ed, they must first reform, by making hor
who and its associations the happiest place
) ne earth to their children.
icoc