Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1879-01-03

How do the anniversaries come in groups,
jOsthug each other, and crowding together
rs the year, 20 on, till, as | said. life gets to
he made up OF anniversaries Is this not
true: You can answer me-you sir, or you,
madam, who have crossed the glad meridian
heights and are on the downward slope This
day, perhaps, is the anniversary of your
graduation; this, of your entrance uuon
some field Of lubor-no matter whether il ue
"a wide one or n narrow one-for which you
had eagerly prepared yourself this. it may
he. of your first communion, when it seemed
to you, in your hour of exultatiou, that God
| had set his seal upon your forehead and wills
| pcred "Pcnce' this of your happy botroth-
nj; this, Of your wedding day, with its sol
emn joys, its trembling hopes, its tremendous
| yet half-fclt responsibilities. Yesterday was
the birthday Of your eldest son. lie is IA man
! grown, perhaps-but you think of him as
your boy still, the little fellow whom you low
ed and scolded twenty years or more ago
To-day twelve month since or five, or ten,
as the case may be, you gave your one sweet
| daughter to be the light of another man =
heart, the JOY of another mans home. You
wonder how you ever did il; aud you think
for the tiftieth time that of all cool proceed
ngs on the face of the earth the coolest is
when some young fellow, in all the self-assur-
ance and blessed audacity of youth, steps up
to a father and quietly asks him TO pluck the
heart out of his bosom and place il in his
hands
Just twenty years ago to-day, it may be,
your baby died-the little one that had not
learned to know his name. He would be IA
tall, manly boy now if he had lived. You
wonder how it is in the land to which he has
gone Is he still babe or has he grown
to the full stature of manhood? Who can
telly But it does not matter. Your heart
your father-heart, your mother-heart tells
you that in this world or the next be he
child or man, "he cannot drift beyond Gods
love and care" If Whittier had written no
single line but that, you would bless him to
your dying day.
Yesterday was the anniversary of your
white haired fathers death and one day last
week your first awakening thought was that
for just so many years your wife, or your
husband, or your mother, had known the Sc
cret Of the eternal years As we grow older the
grave stones multiply in our paths till we can
scarcely see the way for the shadows they cast
But there are births az well as Deaths
there are smiles as well as tears-there are
words of joyous congratulation as heart
warm as those of sympathy.
One generation crowds upon the heels of
another and before you know it, you are
keeping the anniversary of your grandson's
! blltll' anu IlNhblilb VIC htN-SOlitl III u cup
of cold water, if you prefer it. The king is
dead-Long live the king
What was the proposition with which
started? That, as we grow older, anniver-
saries inevitably take on a tinge of sadness ?
The world is SO wide, separations are so GER
tain and so long, there are so many changes
and so many partings, that this is undoubted-
ly true, even of the general anniversaries
those that belong to the world and not the
person. We laugh with tears in our hearts,
if not in our eyes aud there grows to be a
good deal of make-believe in our joy.
And yet, after all, and Notwithstanding all,
this is blessed world, and it is good thing
to be alive in this last quarter of the nine
teenth century-so good a thing that we will
wipe our eyes, thank Heaven, and take cour-
age, even while at the beginning of this New
Year we pray with Hiny Tim,-
"God sus, every one !"
Of III Mrs. JuHa @. r. Dorr.