Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1877-12-10
LETTER FROM NEW YORK.
Special Correspondence.

Another Thanksgiving has come and |
gone. All the curious phenomena have
been exhibited which, time out of mind |
have accompanied the festival. and these |
phenomena still remain the impenetrable
mysteries which have ever hung over the
day. The most profound and acute
minds which have ever been Matched out
by the American Eagle have focused
their powers upon the questions which l
shall presently PROFOUND, and have fall
ed, uniformly, utterly and ignominious-
ly to arrive at satisfactory solutions
thereof.
The problems to which | have refer
red are, briefly, these: Why is it that
national gratitude in this republic Is so
inseparably connected with the fowl of
the barnyard? What is the hidden rea-
son for the undeniable fact that the spir-
it of annual thankfulness resolutely sets
its face against almost all of the escu-
lent and nutritious viands which on ev-
cry day of the year, this one November
Thursday excepted, are welcome occu-
pants of the table?
Why should the king of meats, the
time honored roast beef. the modest but
substantial corned beef and cabbage, and
even the sumptuous green turtle soup,
be sternly banished from the Thanks
giving board in the interests of the des-
pot turkey? And even conceding. with
out fruitless investigation, the suprema-
cy of the sylph-like gObbler, the grace
full gander and the venerable spring
chicken, we are at once confronted with
another and no less knotty problem, to
wit, why is it that the American citizen,
equally with his wife. his sons, his
daughters, his aunts, his cousins and
even his mother-in-law, finds it quite
out of the question to bring himself into
frame Of mind favorable to a suitable
acknowledgement of benefits received,
without gorging himself to the extreme
limit of his capacity. Is there really
some subtle connection between indiges.
ton and gratitude, the instructive rec.
ignition of which prompts the average
man to stuff himself as tightly as the
brown and savory fowl is stuffed which
he yearly dismembers in the presence O.
his hilarious and expectant family? L
not, how are we to get around the per
, picking question as to why the day W,
| celebrate should be held sacred to tn,
seductive but woe -precipitating mine
pie. an achievement of American cooker,
most alluring to the taste, but NOR
fraught with condensed nightmare thai
9 was Pandora's box with assorted evils
But possibly the consideration of thes
abstruse points may not be PARTICULAR
D interesting to your readers and as l ca
3 hardly hope to grapple successfully wit
t the difficulties they present, l will dis
t miss the subject for year; at the en-
u Of which time. if am yet in the Ian
d of the living, l presume that the newt
n able recurrence of the internal discom
t fort which | am at this moment endul
: ing, may provoke me to something ful
b Their in the same line.
> The observance of the day in the C
= TVS public and charitable institution
J. was of the customary character. In fol
s. Of the principal ones over two thousar
le children were RECALLED with the trad
lie tional fare, beside a thousand or
n grown people who were destitute. In tt
er prisons the usual gloom of rainy d.
a. was much lessened by ThanksgiviI
I'd fare. Friends of prisoners on Blackwell
al Island were permitted to supply the
Ill with delicacies; and they and the i
er mates of the charity institutions the
lie and on the adjacent islands were plent
ny fully fed on poultry. The turkeys pu
a chased by the city for the purpose nul
or bered $4,000. No visitors were adm
al ted to the City Prison. but the inmat
&c, had Thanksgiving food.
nd Thanksgiving. however. is not the O
in ly occasion which has lent lustre to I
an week just past. We have had. and,
fact. are still having, grand and l
~. paralleled baby show, an exhibit
'pt sprOuting humanity bewildering to