The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1878-10-12
BIRTHDAYS.

/ The different way in which the earth
rolls round in different epochs of oar lives
is something really amazing.
When we are chilGren-six and LONE
ing to be seven, ten and longing to be
eleven, thirteen and longing to be sixteen
with what lagging steps the seasons follow
one another, and what eternities our birth
days compass But when we are grown
and have reached maturity, and see each
year checking off bead on the yronu
side of the string, how swiftly summer
chases winter, and all the signs Of the 20
diac revolve around our heads in one up-
broken flashing streak of light!
/ We learn to value our BIRTHDAYS AZ an
early age, when parents keep with eager
ness the anniversary that brought them
their little treasures, until the little treas
ures have themselves caught the habit of
regarding the day as noteworthy. and look
forward to festivities and gifts, while no
day but Christmas seems so bright in
memory or in anticipation. When an
preaching girlhOOd, fresher zest is added
to their pleasure in each one as it brings
them nearer to the blessed time of long
trails and high combs; or, if of the sterner
sex, as that boundary line draws near
which, having crossed, proclaims them
dOubly men in being citizens with n vote
and voice. But by-and-by the birthdays
are an old story; we have had enough Of
themi they serve, perhaps, only as remind
ers OF those joys that are gone and can not
come again, aud Of the remaining ones that
are so few. People forget them: we would
be glad if we could forget them ourselves.
Then when we recall, in lonely travel. in
absence, in the exile of business. some
glad birthday when we came down in the
morning to find our place at the table
wreathed with flowers, and all the glad.
gracious gifts, small or great, that loving
hands bad arranged about it, and smiling
faces greeting us, and perhaps the day set
apart for some festal use entirely, and We
now contrast it with this solitary and de-
serted day of middle life or later. the last
birthday grows gloomier for the brightness
of the first, and we envy those happv
wretches who, being born on the 29th Of
February, are only once in four wears
obliged to feel their wretchedness.
Yet, on the contrary, when we have
those we love about US, with the little new
faces, soas and daughters, nephews and
nieces, where is the cheer which Is e0ual
to that manifested on one set day simply
and solely because we are in the world?
In domestic life prosaic aud utilitarian con.
Germs are apt to absorb the greater part of
the general thought and care; one is so rapt
In maintaining the family credit at the
proper standard, for instance, another in
keeping all things deceutly and in order.
these in pleasure, those in work. that a
great deal of the mere outward and effu-
sive expression of affection is neglected
and the main fact taken for granted; and
thus it is often only the fixed anniversa-
ries that bring the hidden thing to LIGHT
and let us know that, although hands and
lips are SO busy, the heart is just as full,
and we are jast as dearly loved by the
young and as necessary to the happiness
of the old. Such birthdays. in fact. are
red-letter days-the days marked by
white stone; are themselves, as one might
say, mile-stones on the journey toward the
city of infinite peace and joy. They come
like answers to our challenge of fate. and
whatever may be our unavoidable defect
tion at the realization which, in spite of
themselves, they bring of the passage of
time, we hear, with each such recurrence,
the voice of that
''Sentinel
Who moves about from place to place,
And whispers to the worlds of space
In the dark night that all is well.'
-HdrDeris Bazar.