The Eaton Democrat. (Eaton, Ohio) 1875-1903, 1882-03-30
The Cuban Gentleman.

He appears to you at first a man all
hair, eyes, teeth and shirt collar. It is
not precisely the correct view, but such
is apt to be the impression conveyed to
a conservative and doubling mind. After
better acquaintance he gives you the
idea of a man who is at least sui qeneris,
with q unique form of body and a
hitherto unclassiied type of mind.
After a YEA or two he begins to seem to
you to be a rather clever fellow, with
in q character otherwise excellent, but
an agreeable man in many respects. To
a coutenance always expressive of a
certain refinement, often of great
beauty, and almost never coarse, angular
or hard, he joins a physique the thinnest
and most attenuated eve found COM
patible with locomotion and the general
control of q muscular system. His legs
are spindles, his arms much like f1attened
sticks somewhat enlarged at the articula-
tions. OF stomach he usually has about
as much as birds of the crane species
are remarkable for, and is seldom dis
posed to undue enlargement in the
region of the waistband. His shoulders
are thin and sharp, and if he stoops
slightly, it need not necessarily be re-
garded as an indication either of
scholarship or disease of the lungs.
His complexion is seldom fair, and gen.
orally of a not unhandsome swarthiness,
though sometimes approaching a hue
that, by the present opinion of prejudiced
mankind, is not exactly a society color.
But I have never seen a Cuban with
what we call a "dumb" face or an un-
intelligent eye.
This man is the born dandy. He
wears jewelry like a woman and like a
woman's. He pinches feet that are
small enough naturally into agonizing
shoes. He wears collars monstrous in
size or ridiculous in smallness, with
shirts of dazzling colors and cuts SO very
decoLIete that you may observe the
sharp ends of his collar-bones and the
very bottom of his thin throat. At the
date of this writing he goes about the
streets with pantaloons that hang upon
his little legs like bags, and flap and
yaw in the breeze. His coat seems to
have been made for a taller man, whereas
a year ago it had a tendency to creep up
ward toward the back of his neck. But
the c~enterpiece and glory of his costume
is his hat. Where such fashions in
headgear as he delights himself with
really have their origin I know not. As
the climate is warm, and seemingly for
hat reason, the hat is narrow, black,
heavy and shaped like an inverted stove.
kettle. This man sometimes attends a
ball in O black dress suit, a white neck
tie and a green shirt. A Cuban town is
full of such figures, and few of them
are, by any chance, at work at anything.
Born In a slave country, the presumptive,
probable or actual heir to a share in
some sugar plantation, or if not, living
by his wits or upon his relations, the
young Cubans imagines that his destiny
is to ornament the tropics ; to be q thing
of beauty, and kill time while he
is thus elegantly occupied.-Cuban
Sketches.
Prose Poems From the Chinese.
Il Woman Before Her Mirror
Seated before her mirror, she gazes a
the moonlight. The bamboo blind il
down, and breaks the entering light !; i
seems as though all through the room
n sees jade shivered into q Thousand
atoms. But instead of combing her hal
she let's down the bamboo blind, and tn,
moon appears yet more brilliant, ever
as a woman clad in silk, who let's he,
robe fall.
The Porcelain Pauilion.-In tn,
midst of the little artificial lake ther,
rises a pavilion of green and white por
celain. 1t is reached by o bridge o
jade that curves like the back of a tiger
And in that pavilion friends clad il
bright robes are drinking together cup
of lukewarm wine. Gaily they convers
or write verses, pushing their hats q lit
tie back on their heads, OF tucking u
their sleeves. And in the lake itself
where the little bridge, reflected upsid
down, looks like a crescent of jade, Their
are also friends in bright robes, upsid
down, in a pavilion of porcelain.
The Stairway of Jade-Under tn
sweet light of the full moon, the empires
remounts her stairway of jade, all glim
mering with dew. And the hem Of he
robe softly kisses the edge of every ste
the white satin and the jade resembl
each other. The light Of the moon ha
as she passes over the threshold she
all dazzled for before the window, upo
the curtain that is embroidered wit
crystal pearl, there seems to be a con
pany Of diamonds disputing for Ii
light, and on the floor of pale woo
there seemeth to be q circle of dancin
stars.
Characters EteTndl.-Even while
make verses, I watch from my windo
the swaying of the bamboos. I let cha
acters fall upon the white paper; afar G
n would fancy plum tree leaves wei
falling crosswise upon snow. The d
lightful GOODNESS of mandarin orang,
passes away when a woman carries the
too long in the gauze of her sleeve.
as a white frost vanishes in the IN; b
the characters which I have let fall upe
the paper will never become efface
[Any who has noticed the PECULIAR
of Chinese written characters will o
preciate the extremely poetical sinaile
The Fdn.-The young bride is sittir
alone in the perfumed chamber, in
which the husband entered for the fiji
time only the evening before. In b
hand she holds her fan, wherein the
characters are written "When the
is sitting, and the winds are still, I q
beloved, and they beg the boon of
freshment from one. But when t
winds arise, and the air grows cold, I g
disdained and forgotten" And VIII
reading these characters the you
woman dreams of her spouse and s
thoughts, like clouds, wrap themselv
about her. CHOW is the heart of I
husband young and ardent; my husba
comes to me that his heart may be
freshed. But when his heart shall ha
| become chill and tranquil, will I n,
| perhaps. be disdained and forgotten %
Old Trees.
The ages attained by some Of Il
conifer@ are scarcely less ~extraordinal
than their colossal bulk. The create
longevity assigned to any tree is perhal
credited to the celebrated taxodium
d. Hlo---o. = Nil 11r FL - -;