The Shasta courier., 1872-10-19
NUMBER 80.
A WONDERFUL ARCHITECT.

Do you know that the type-setter is
wonderful architect? You see those bits
of lead and zinc lying over, across and
against each other, like the tangled braids
of mermaids hair? And yet they form
army more powerful than any that ever
fought in tented field Yesterday they
stood up proudly, professionally speaking
in one "form," truly in thousand forms.
You may look upon the little bits with a
smile on your lip, but you little dream they
are stronger and wiser than you-that they
will speak, when you are dead and forgot
ten. They have sometimes made you
smile, and sometimes shudder "Stocks p'
Isn't there something in that word p
Haven't you been head and heels in them
for years, and don't your feelings rise and
fall with them alternately? A little fur
ther on you come to the word "Married."
All thought that would make you smile.
I saw you kiss baby then, and that un-
ravels all. You havn't forgot the day when
you went courting, have you? ? There was
a magic in the utterance. You stood at
the altar on the strength of the happiness
you felt, and if you have not always loved
the girl as you ought to, there is no one
you love as we'll You secretly bless the
day when the single word was wreath like
a sacred archway over the joys of you and
yours. Don't you remember little Minnie
she whom you loved so well-she with
the blue eyer and auburn curls. When
Deaths dark Angel folded her little deli
cate hands over her snowy bosom, and seal
ed her..loving eyes with its icy fingers, don't
you remember the great tide of sorrow that
came surging over your smitten heart p
You little thought the other day when you
picked up the papers-that the word
Died. of only four letters-which you laugh
ed at as they lay dusty and dirty in their
square homes-would make you weep
would make you think of her whom God
hath taken.
If you will come to bis Office to- morrow,
the printer will show you how to distribute
knowledge He will pull to pieces tough,
wiry arguments that defed the world -
Those pretty palaces which the poet wrought
will have to come down, and their golden
fancies become tomorrow the integuments
of the politicians prose. In they go
those metallic dwarfs, scattered broadcast
like good seed, which shall bring forth
sixty, aye, hundred fold. "Sixty
lives lost" and Prentice's last joke march
in together, and the printer whistles Yankee
Doodle as carelessly as if human life was
below par, and so it is This is the printers
life and business.
A printing. Office is great bowling al
ley. The printer sets up pins-the world
keeps tally, the editor puts the ball in mo-
ton, and away it goes, carrying death and
destruction:.in its front, sending pin here
and pin there, while noisy rabble al
ways stand by to cheer and hiss down the
player Some play for money: few
precious few-do it to patronize the boss,
and bless mankind. No matter what the
balls are made of, or how they go, if they
only hit the mark. The crowd pocket the
spoils, and the honors are left to the pro-
prietor, who goes behind the scenes and
starves in his shirt-sleeves. And such is
life.
When the printer dies, the world just
gets glimpse of his value as bis coat-tails
vanish into glory, and then it looks very
bad, rubs its head little, calls him very
clever fellow-says his only fault was being
poor, and then the world shoves its sympa-
thy out of sight into that idiom, the human
heart, and on rolls the Juggernaut as
though nothing had happened.
Some day the people will wake up and
find screw lost in the jagged machinery
of human progress. Ifyou do, don't waste
more sympathy than possible on those
NEUROLOGICAL fellows who print your books
and newspapers.-Printer.