Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1885-07-08

in, only we didn't sing-may be because we
couldn't. And then he kissed and hugged
her, which if ther had not been so many
people round would have been very natural.
Then he sung how when she was baby he
had saved her life, and he showed her the
scar on her arm.
But they don't rest easy long in Operies.
This was too pretty and soft to last. The
Gipsy Queen was in love with Thaddeus,
and when she found he was sparkin' Arleen-
ner, she laid plan against 'em. She made
out how Arleenner had stole locket belong
in to the Count, and she was arrested and
taken before him, and it was proved against
her, and they was just about to put her in
jail, when the Count saw the scar on her
arm, and knowed it was his lost child and,
then come another Dustin fuss. The Count
sung he was so glad, and Arleenner sung
so was she. And he sung he was goin' to
marry her to the Kings son, and she put
her pretty arms around Thaddeus, and sung
she wouldn't marry anybody but him, and
the Count sung she couldn' marry Gipsy,
and Thaddeus up and drawed out paper
and said that proved he wasn't no Gipsy,
but a big man in his own country; and so
the Count gave his consent and you
thought all was goin' straight at last, when
in came that Gipsy Queen with Gipsy she
had hired to kill Arleenner, and, as good
luck would have it, he missed his aim and
killed the Queen. And I felt like jumping
up and cracking my heels together, I was
so glad, she was such an awful shriekef, and
hateful, besides. And then that was all.
think if I live thirty years will never
get all that music out of my head. I've
got as good an ear for music as anybody,
but it would take twenty ears to hold all
that If they would only talk some and
sing some. "What is more beautiful than
music ?" some folks asks, and it seems
question which poses the world; but I'll tell
you nachure is, and it is agin nachure to
sing everything. Now take sich an every
day sentiment as this: ''Will you come to
supper, your Excellency?' How much
better to say the thing right off than for
half dozen people to make a jewett of it,
and squall the changes on it, and roll and
pitch it round like it was a ball they was
playin' with, and all the appetite his Excel
lency had is;sung out of him! I say it's rid
dickerlous nonsense. It's like what they
call the 'toning in church whar they sings
and whines the prayers to God Almighty.
It's all agin nachure. Love songs is beau
tiful, and serenades will fetch the hardest
hearts, but say mix in the singin' with a
little common sense talkin' and it would be
improvement all round.
Why any body happenin' into one of them
opperys, without being prepared by reading
a library, would think they had got into
lunatic asylum-to see four OF five men and
women screechin' at each other, ther hands
Ayin' out from ther chists (Which let me say
is ainvariable movement, stretchin' of their
necks until it is agonizin' to see the bones
and siners stand out, and their mouths so
wide open that you expect every minute to
hear ther jaw bones crack. And then the
choris!-that is the worst of all; fifty or
hundred men and women dressed in the most
outlandlsh way, each tryin' to outyell the
other; and add to all this the determination
of the musitioners in the grand finally not
TO be outdone by the singers. They all get
SO wound up, the fact is they can't stop
themselves. The man with the big fiddle
fairly turns a sumersault over it trying to
get first, and the little fddlers saws away
until it is enough to wake mp the ghosts Of
the cats which was made into fiddle strings
and the big drummers and middle sized and
little drumm ers is bent upon nothin' else
but beatin' hole in their instruments; and
the horn blowers big and little looks dan
gerously appoplektic; and the tamboreeners
and bell ringers comes nobly to the front,
till the tempest of sound goes roarin' and
surgin' thro' the house, gittin' louder and
louder and stronger and stronger and high
er and higher, till they can neither get up
nor down; and it ends by their slammin'
and smashin' everything to pieces, and all
comes down together with Blim blam!
blum b-r-r-r-rum and you look up,
thinkin' of course the roof is gone and the
moon aud stars shinin' overhead.
Maybe if had studied it when I was a
new born infant, and kept at it stiddy till
is it is too much for me.-Mary Tucker Ma
gill, IN Harper's Magazine.
The First of its Kind and Most Singular
Industry in the WOrld-Catching
and Canning the Hard-Shell
Gpah.