The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1886-05-20
manitomof pilot.
THURSDAY, MAY 20, 1886.
Some Strange Hands.

Hands reveal habits, occupations,
| trades A crop of them rises at the
thought, like the thrust up from a
| crowd in honor of candidate after an
election speech. There is the carpen-
| ter's with the broad thumb, and those
| of the fraternity of flour, ingrained,
mealy, and white; the musicians with
| the powerful wrist and the fingers deli
cate, sensitive, and agile to the last de-
gree; the hand of the seamstress, with
an honorable little bit of nutmeg crater
| on the forefinger that works so hard; OF
| the scientific man, who lectures to ex-
| plain mysteries to lower mortals, and
whose exactitude of touch is the image
| of his mental precision, while the nerv-
Gus stretch of his fingers corresponds
with his tension of mind.
The sleight-of-hand professor is a
man of long fingers. A conjurer with
n slow and chubby hand would betray
the awful secrets of the plum-pudding
that is taken from the depths of your
best hat.
But besides character and trade, the
hands tell the age. Soft and round, the
baby's pair of puff-balls, with their fat
wrists deeply ringed, appear as if they
never can do anything in this world.
Yet the girls hand will become treas
ure, and the boys hand will battle with
life and with his fellow-men for the
mastery 1t Is appalling to think what
those helpless little puff-balls have be-
fore them.
Oh, little hands, that, weak or strong,
Have still to serve or rule so long,
Have still so long to give ask
T hns ,r,nVin h wit hnnE
Have toiled among my fellowmen
Am weary thinking of your taski
After the first dimples, they become
the inky hands of school, then the awk-
ward hands, that don't know what to
do with themselves. Years pass, the
boys hand ceases to grumble at gloves
yea, he wears them in extravaganza
freshness, in comparison as his collars
grow upward, and his shoes tighten
within an inch of his life. The result
of these phenomena is that ring be-
gins to shine with charming strange
| ness on another hand, that seemed but
| a child yesterday. The young wife tells
by her hands that it is not long since
| the wedding, because she can not let
that new ring alone, but twists it
| round for its novelty, and admires it,
Win an UNCONSCIOUS knach OF careSSlnS
it in idle moments. Her dimples dis
| appear as the children gather to make a
home circle; it is the hand OF the wom-
an now, with its very framework trace
| able
Dimples, bones. and wrinkles mark
the three stages of life's progress. With
| the wrinkled stage the steadiness of
youth often remains in resolute charac-
tiers. When the Duke of Wellington was
very old man he could still fill glass
of water to the last possible drop, and
hold it up steadily, brimful. The helpful
hands keep their youthful activity, too,
far into the whitening age. And in the
nobly-loving natures there is a sort of
Immortality of youth; the warmth of
affection has given more than a royal
prerogative; the hand is beautiful al
ways to the eyes that know it familiar
". The latter years may stamp it
with the impress of a longer past of
tenderness, faithfulness, and bounty.
1t is not the ''old' hand, but the dear
| hand, and it never grows older, but on
| ly more dear. He who doubts the truth
of this last mystery has not yet found
| out that hands, as well as hearts, have
peculiar place in our knowledge and
| love of one another CGsSelpS Family
| Magazine for Nay.