Huntsville gazette., 1884-11-29
THANKSGIVING.
A Day Peculiarly Belonging to the
Home and to Women. t

Thanksgiving day is one of the two
other, it seems to us, women have a
peculiar right and part. Other festi-
walls, with the single exception of that of
the Nativity, belong to.men, to individu-
ais, to nations, to events; but Thanks
giving alone belongs only to the home,
and is celebrated there in remarka-
bly, primitive and uniform manner
when one considers how universal is
the practice Of the celebration.
Sons come horse to their mothers on
this day; grandmothers throw wide
their doors to already visible posterity;
husbands and wives are surrounded by
their dear ones; long-parted brothers
and sisters are united, with all the
phantoms of childhood and youth about
them;- and it is home to which they
have come, home of which some one
woman is the central being, and the
doors close, and families are by them
selves, and it is there where mothers
and sisters and wives have their hour
of authority, and for the nonce are
recognized supreme.
1t.appears, then, as natural conse-
quence, that the habit of keeping
Thanksgiving day, and keeping it with
a good deal of the ancient ceremonies,
is one that, as a class, and for their
own sakes, women should never allow
to degenerate, its observance being
both to their interest and honor. They
should not, in this light, be content
with simply varying the customary
dinner of the week with one of turkey
and cranberry sauce and mince pie;
they should not allow themselves, with
any disinclination they may feel for ex-
ertion, to fall back on the general
statement that these recurring ami
versaries only serve to make one sad,
and are best when slipped over easily;
or that, with so many of the family
widely scattered, it does not seem
worth while to make much ado
over the day for the few remain
ing together; or that, with death so re-
Gently in the household, there really
does not seem to be much ,propriety in
making merry with gala day. 1t
better becomes them to keep the day,
if they have to keep it wholly by them
selves; to keep it in company with all
the youth belonging within the walls
by any forced construction of family
ties; to keep it as if for the making of
anniversaries that the generation to
come may have to remember; to kdkp
it, however widely scattered the be-
loved may be, that all may know the
Others are doing the same thing, with
loving thoughts of those that are not
with them; to keep it, thankful at least
:Ithat death has brought surcease of suf-
fering to, the departed, if death it be
that has brought the shadow to the
fhouse, and remembering the duty of
making life cheerful as possible to
those that are remaining; to keep it,
lmoreOver, and indeed principally, be-
cause the liberty of giving thanks is in
itself something for which it is worth
while to offer thanks.
tits true that our grandparents made
a most elaborate matter of the eating
and drinking pertaining to the day; but
the origin of that had its excuse in the
newness of the plenty that they found
surrounding them in the new land, and
that they would fain acknowledge by
this sort of sacriticial abundance and
profusion on their tables-the breakfast
board loaded with vastly too much for
dinner of any other day, the dinner
table groaning with its boiled fowl and
oyster sauce, its roast turkey and glib
let sauce, its roast ducks and its brown
goose, its chicken-pie, its cold tongue,
its immense ham, its shaking moulds
of ruby jellies. its various pickles, its
jar of celery, its uncounted vegetables,
its mince-pies, and squash-pies, and
apple-pies and cranberry -tarts, and
plum-pudding, and nuts and raisins,
and figs and apples, and the great
winter pears that had been wrap
ped away in paper in dark draw
ers, and the great decanters of
brown sherry and Madeira, of shrub.
and Of all the strong and red old
liquors that flesh was heir to. And it
is equally true that it is unnecessary to
load our tables with half the amount
of this '.lashings of good food,' SIM
ply in order to do reverence to the day,
or TO maintain the old honors to which
it has been used. The burnt oferipg { Of