Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1882-03-22
Pleasures of Near-Sighteduefs.


to say: '.Oh, how 1 wish that I were
near-sighted so that might wear eye
glasses; they make a person look SO in
tellectual and distinguished" Wewish
those people had to wear PAIR of these
torturing instruments for week or SO,
then they would find that the famed
sword of DamocIes was a mild kind of
torment compared with them. For e1-
ample, sometimes when you are walk
ing quietly on the street in the evening
the cord will break, aud down go your
aids to vision upon the 81 1ewalk. obliging
you to 60 down there, too, on ali fours,
and make wild sweeps for them i'll the
dark, until crowd gathers around you
who take you for some escaped lunatic.
Sometimes they drop into your oyster
stew at restaurant, and some stupid
old bore of a fellow who was dining
with you, ever after jocularly remarks
when he meets You, "Come let's go
and have some stewed spectacles.
You'd like to throttle him, but you put
on a sickly smile, swallow your wrath
and repress all outward signs of ill-tem-
per. In cold weather the sudden change
of temperature on entering warm room
will give your glasses such a coating of
steam that for the space of fifteen min
utes or so you can't distinguish your best
friend from any inanimate object, and
you make overtures toward shaking
hands with the stove, and have gener-
al feeling like an inmate Of blind asy-
lum. It's agreeable to enter church
under these circumstances. trip up on
the register in the aisle and make sud
den lunge forward as if you were shot
out of a catapult. When the windows of
your soul get transparent again, you
find that you are in the wrong pew, and
you are obliged to ignominiousIy make
your way back to your own seat with the
delightful feeling that the eyes of the
whole world Me upon you. In hot per-
spring summer days these same treach-
erous combinations of glass and steel
will slide off your nose dozen times in
minute, and you feel, indeed, that
your life is burden. Sometimes when
you go to the theater or the opera, in
removing your outside garment the
string becomes entangled in a button
and off fly your eyeglasses, you know
not where. A friend finally spies them
in the vicinity of the small of your back,
and you discover that they are nearly
ground to powder by the combined ac-
ton of your spinal column and the back
of the seat. You spend the entire even
ing with no company but your own
sweet thoughts, for everything on that
stage is such o blur as to resemble
nothing but Turner'S picture Of the
''Slave Ship" Besides all these pleas
ant little episodes ZOE have to bear the
comments and queries Of your many
dear friends. something like the fol-
lowing: '1s your eyesight failing that
you are obliged to wear glasses?"
Doesn't that spring hurt yo1r nose?"
''They say such q continual pinching Of
the nose has been known to cause can
cer." "How fortunate that You have
such large nose, so that you can wear
eyeglasses. Now, my nose is so small
I never could keep them on" "Why
don't you put that string behind your
ear, or tie it to your buttonhole, in
stead of wearing it around your neck?"
81 should think you would wear spec
tacles with bows, they would be SO
much more convenient" and other
idioic remarks, which rouse you to the
boiling point of wrath internally, and
make you vince some, too, for You know
in your own secret sem that the reason
you persist in putting eyeglasses as.
tride your nose, instead of wearing the
more sensible spectacles with bows, i.
because of the demon, pride, which
makes you fear you will be considered
advanced in years if you adopt any par
of the livery of old age. Alas for th,
pomps and vanities OF this wicked world
| All;0o{or .L,r ,s bacovr;p>y q y, ~,