Mexico weekly ledger., 1878-07-04

If we were asked to enumerate our
national holidays we should name
Christmas, Fourth of July and
Thansgivlhg and Decoration Days.
Washington's birth day, the 18th
September, aud 9Th January, once SC
vigorously celebrated are now neg
lected. Times are changed and we
change with them.
We have lively recollections of the
two first named holidays. The Christ
mas of our childhood is associated
with bells and fire-crackers. We
think of it in connection with cakes
and pies, and egg-nog, and turkey.
We remember too the grand old
Fourth with its gatherings and mus
teIs, its professions and marches, its
trainings and sham battles. For
weeks before its advent, society was
in ferment. Eevery hody prepared
to participate in its extravagances,
enthusiasts and Qualifications. Then
in our estimate, ginger cake and GIN
ger pop surpassed all other luxuries.
Then there was no tune like "Yankee
DOODLE" nor composition written by
man, more soul inspiring than the
Declaration. We listened to its
measured tones with reverence and
longed to be another Jefferson. But
this was only the beginning, as the
day wore on it Increased in magic.
Enchanted by the recital, we heard
heros of the olden time re-fight their
battles, mid punch and toddies, till
as toast succeeded toast the fury of
the celebration wed with those of the
old barons, when they quaffed intox-
ication from the skulls of their fallen
foes.
Is it too much to say that to-day
the country is not equal to an old
fashioned Fourth of July celebration.
Its heroes have departed, its militia Is
defunct, and its whiskey changed.
There is not enough of the old spirit
in the land to lend to a Fourth of Ju-
ly, the fascination and enchantment
that formerly p~ertained to it, and we
are glad of it. We are a changed
people, a more matured and wiser
nation, occupied with what is grander
and nobler than ~rollicking fun and
frolic.
What would the Fourth, Eighth,
Twelfth and 1wenty-second have
been without their signers and gener-
ais. And how could they have been
maintained without the drums and
trappings of the muster. Democracy
made an abortlve effort to appropriate
and prolong the Eighth, and failed.
Indeed the Fourth itself had been
buried with all its glory, if it had not
been conformed to advancing nation
al sentiment.
TO understand how the temper of
our people has changed consider our
modern and perhaps most popular
holiday, Decoration Day. Its heroes
are as real as those of &c. Their
deeds were as grand as those of the
Revolution, and the recital of them
would be as soul inspiring. Did the
olden times furnish ony better con-
tested battles than those of Bulls
Run, Wilson's Creek, Shiloh, Malve rn
Hill, South Mountain or The Wilder
At the same time our modern
whiskey is capable of madness and
.eleriam far surprising the intoxica-
ton of the past, but W are a mor
sober people. We take juster views.
We lament our noble dead and con
slider that if war has its glories, it has
It's rayages and taxes too.
Some writer has thus expressed
himself in substance, if not in words:
There was a time when our ances-
,ors amused themselves and families
by climbing May-poles and running
Jack races" The popuiace in Italy
till amuses itself with carnival.
There has been an idea promulgated
hat Americans needed more holidays,
nut nothing has been more grotesque
han the attempts that have been
made to introduce them. The men
f '76 secuted CREASED poles, their 6
.'osterity have not put on sacks, and !
here is never more melancholy specta- i