The Warner sun. (Warner, Brown Co., Dakota [S.D.]) 1885-1???, 1886-03-19
How JOEL PARKS MANAGED
HIS DAUGHTER.
BY F. L. c.

BY F. Il. {. ROBBINS
One evening Joel Parks, a wealthy
manufacturer in the thriving New Eng
land village of Redfeld, and DR.. Mills,
leading physician OF the same place,
sat chatting in the doctors Office. A
stranger noting the age and rather
prosaic appearance of the two men
would hardly have guessed the topic
of conversation. They were discussing
works of fiction.
~ must have been going or so years
old when | read my first novel," MI.
Parks was saying. "You see a man
that starts on LIES journey, as l did,
barefooted, so to speak, has got to at
tend to business and nothing else for
agood many years, if he expects to
get anywhere in particular at last. He
doesn't have much time for reading,
doctor. But in the last few
years I've read a good many,
and | enjoy them, especially when
they seem true to life, and | think /
can generally tell when they are. /
like Trollope on that account. new
er saw an archbishop or q dude, but
know as well as / want to that he Just
hits them of to a T. And | like that
Howells, if he does hold such men as
/ be up to ridicule. And let me tell
you, doctor, there's instruction in
novels, Those writer's have to study
human nature. / have got many a
hint about managing men from read
ing those books"
eyes" said the doctor, 'Pve read
them all my life, and / like them yet
love passages and all. Funny, isn't
it?" he continued, chow two old gray
heads like you and me will follow the
love story of a silly boy and girl who
won't listen to their neutrality-suspicious.,
and sympathize with them every
time. We never have any feeling for
the sensible fathers and mothers of
u age who are being plotted
against"
tI don't know about that was the
reply; II do sometimes sympathize
with the old folks, and think that if /
had been in their place / would have
been lore successful in having my
way"
well, JOEL" said the other with q
laugh, IL guess that is one point on
which you neve get much instruction
from the story tellers. Papa and
mamma always have their ideas OF
their daughters future. The wrong
young man happens along and she de-
velops her ideas quite opposite from
theirs. And she always comes out
ahead. If you want to carry your
point with your offspring you will
have to learn how outside OF a story
book"
"Oh, as to that, perhaps the in.
~struction is all there, only it's instruc-
ton how net to do it. I don't sup
pose that / shall aver want to inter
fere with my daughter about q hus-
band or q lover, but if should, / am
not sure but that / could learn some.
thing from the novelists.
If there were no condolences there
would be no stories. 1t was a coinci-
dence that later on the same evening,
Mrs. Joel Parks, an estimable lady
whose mind was in her husband
keeping, said to him:
Joel, have you ever noticed that
Lee Triton and Annie seemed to be
taking q notion toward each other?''
Joel was engaged with his newspa
per at the time, and he did NOT take
his eyes from the list ofnewly appoint
ed postmasters which he had been
reading. But it cost him an effort, for
his wiie's question WAS ashock indeed.
Such 80 idea had never occurred to
him, and as he sat there physically at
ease, be found his thoughts sadly
crowding each other.
Lee TiltonI One of his own clerks|
Likely fellow enough, pleasant and
honest. But be didn't like Lee Til.
ton. He didn't know just Why, and he