The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1879-01-01
The Postage Stamps Myth.

lFuLduelpuld 1HueS.l
One of the most curious forms of the myth
in modern times is that relating to the collec-
ton of million old postage stamps. 1t seems
TO possess vitality as great as any of the tales
of wehr-wolves, fortune flowers, elves and
witches that have fourished in the varied but
related folk lore of all the known families of
mankind, yet it has apparently no roots in the
distant past as they have; it springs freshly
from the soil, product of existing conditions.
So many of the great figures whose mythology
interests us as it did, in one form or another,
the countless generations of our predecessors,
were obviously parts of q symbolism based
the son and his companions of the skies, the
light and the darkness, the wind and the
storms that it is curious, to come upon some
thing originating, to all appearance, In the i'm
aginative activity IN our own time, and having
no source whatever more distant than the day
when the postmaster-general began to sell
stamps representing the postage charge upon
letters.
We 90 upon the assum ption because no other
explanation appears available, that this idea of
collecting q great number of old postage stamps
for some benevolent object Is of purely myth
cal origin. Whence came it, else? For many
years it had . popular existence, and mas ap-
peared at intervals in varying forms, with fire.
quent changes of detail. yet no historian could
fssten upon it if he were to try. Even the
newspapers, photographing each vapor of pass
ing opinion, thought or deusioD, have not
caught this 1t has lived "by word of mouth"
pure piece of Middle Ages folklore trans
ferred to the later half of the Nineteenth Gen.
fury. Now it comes up in one form-that a
poor old lady in Philadelphia is trying to get a
million old stamps, in order to obtain admis-
sion to an asy lun, where she will be supported
thereafter; now in another-that the stamps
are to educate poor young man in German
University; again that lady residing in Ger
many, "whose family is one of the Oldest and
most aristoc-atic in Philadelphia" is collect
ing million to send to Asia, where. as there is
great demand for them to paper rooms, they
will be sold and the money used to purchase
children that would otherwise be thrown into
the Ganges. This last is an ingenious and
elaborate form of the myth, and has several
variations; sometimes the poor children saved
with the stamp mOnev are to be subsequen ly
taken to German University and educated.
A very definite form Is this where the stamps
are to 60 to good Catholic Mother Superior in
Indiana, by whom they will be forwarded to
pagan lapds and exchanged by the missionaries
for heather children, though how many green
ones, how many red ones, what number OF
George Washingtons and what number of An
drew Jacksons are required in the market
places of pagan lands for poor little heather
is something that seems to be unsettled.
Altogether, it Is very curious bit of mod
ern mythology, and, although the million
stamps themselves are decidedly commonplace,
yet there are elements quite romantic and pic
turesque 10 1t. The devotion of the thousands
of little folds who have been, at times as the
myth reached their ears, seized with an enthus-
iastic purpose of real phi lanthrophy and have
dedicated themselves to the labor of collecting
from all the old letters that fell in their way
contributive rills that might gradually fill up
the great million-this itself is something beau
tiful. Nor is it to bs denied that the story
takes a dramatic form in its presentation Of
the distant fgures-the sacrifice of the children
in the Ganges by some remorseless and cruel
power; while the missionaries come in as mes
sengers of succor-wth thsir revenue from the
stamps. One can detect here something of
that myth which has occupied the imagination
of all ages In one form or another and found
represen tation in Andromeda and Theseus.
Jason and the Minotaur, and long list be-
sides, though the inter posing influence is not
one that comes armed and accoutered as did
the heroes of old but with persuasions more
consonant to the mercantile usage of to-day
In time to come, if the story, transmitted by
tradition, and perpetuated by that curious
vitality which sustains the myth, while written
history is lost and literature perishes, shall
take on fresh forms. all moving around the
central idea of a million old stamps to be used
for some good purpose, what mine there will
be for the curious student to explore! The
Aztec traditions, ths Indian legends, will not
be of superior interest.