The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1884-05-22
BILL ARP,s TALK.
Tho Weekly Chat of the Barlow Philoso-
pher Takes Bucolic Form.
atlanta Constitution.

Tho Weekly Chat of the Barlow Philoso-
pher Takes n Bucolic Form.
atlanta Constitution.
Daniel Webster begun q great speech
by saying that when a vessel had been
m.tossed for many days in cloudy
weather aud lost her reckoning the first
thing to do when sunshine came was to
figure up and find out where she was, or
words to that effect.
The agricultural department sends me
a circular and asks show did your cattle
come out of winter quarters 2"
1t has been hard winter and miser.
able spring, and we farmers have been
demoralized and disheartened, and now
when the storms and floods and cyclones
have ceased to afflict us, and the blessed
sun of this blessed month of May is
warming up our hearts and homes, it is
natural for US to sum it all up and see
where we are and what we have come out
of winter quarters ourselves. We went
into those quarters on the heel of stingy
crop, and take it all in all, have had a
hard time; but, nevertheless, ne are
lively and thankful, for it might have
been worse. The elements have been on
fearful rampage, and the floods have
furrowed the fields and carried our best
soil away down into the gulf of Mexico,
and left us more bottom land than we
wanted. The corn we had planted has
departed these coasts, and the compost
with it, and the work is all to be done
over again. Fences aud rails and water
gates have gone on scurshion, and
there's work to do-lots of work-but
there's nobody dead or hurt, nobody sick
but me, and I've got only the rheuma-
tism, and nobody cares but me-that is
except Mrs. Arp, and she says she does
care little. I've tried most everything
that everybody has told me, except poke
berries, which preacher said was sure
cure, and I'm waiting for them to come;
for don't want to 60 grunting around
like I was only half man and prema-
turely superannuated. 1t is bad, very
bad, and jerks me around lively, and
makes me get up away in the night and
hunt liniment and sit by the fire; but it
is friendly disease, that sticketh to you
like brother, for it dodges from the
shoulder to the collar bone, and from
there to the arm, and then to the back OF
the neck and then to the shoulder again,
and seems to say, I'll play around a little
just for change, but l will never leave
thee or forsake thee. So it is all right,
and I'll compromise with fate and for-
tune on rheumatism. 1t is not to be
compared to war, or pestilence or death
in the family, or long lingering disease.
So / think that, take it all in all, we
have come out of winter quarters pretty
we'll, and as the good old Methodist
preachers say in their prayers, We thank
Thee, Oh Lord, that it is as we'll with US
as what it is. Blessings on the return of
spring, the time when the little chaps
can 60 barefooted and paddle in the
branch and fish for minnows and the
older ones can ramble over the fields and
marches and gather wild flowers and
make boquets for the parlor and the
dining room. 1 60 about with them
most every day and enjoy it. I have to
get fishing poles and make whistles, and
cut the rough twigs from the crabapples
that have such lovely blooms, and I have
to bait the hooks for Mrs. Arp and the
girls, for they don't like to handle the
little clean wigg!ing worms, and when
they catch a fish have to get the hook
out of his mouth, and have to watch
out for snakes and Lizards, and blaze out
the way generally, and of course it
makes me feel proud and consequential,
sorter like rooster who gives warning
of the hawks, and makes powerful to
do, and when he finds bug, calls all the
hens and eats it himself just before they
get there.
Nav has come with all her sweet men,
cries and maiden ways. The children
don't have to be penned up in the house
now. They are ever 30 happy. Last
night it was splendid to hear them sing.
ing their little songs, so as to get little
grand child to sleep, and it took "Dixie,"
and "There was frog who lived in q
pool" and "We'jl pass over Jordan" and
"Shinebone alley" and several more,
but the little thing surrendered when
they struck up "Scotlands burning" and
she was soon in the land of happy
dreams. These little grandchildren were
born for the country, and they all ought
to be there. Of course they can't be ex-
hibited to visitors very often, and don't
have to dress in their fine clothes, but
they are the better of for it.
1t is curious how easily folks change
their opinions. Some of my older chill
dren used to think the younger ones were
awful bad and ought to have lots of
whipping, and if they had children they
shouldn't do such things and 80 fourth.
Well, they have got children now, chill
dren of their own, and they are about as
bad as the common run, but they don't
get any whipping, and are not likely to
get any, and they are most too precious
to be scolded, and that is always the
way, and it is right too, I reckon, for if
the mother was not blind to the faults of
her bad children they wouldn't get
good word from anybody. Sickness and
badness run together now. "The little
darling is sick, or he wouldent be 81
cross" "When he is we'll be is just as
good as he can be-" That is the modern
philosophy, aud 50 when the child is bad
and cuts up, and disturbs the general
tranquility, it is sick and must have some
carminative or cherry pectoral, or some
other bad tasted stuff, and that gets up
more squalling and does less good than
little dose of carminatiye with the palm
of the hand on some tender place that
was made for counter-irritants.
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