The Warner sun. (Warner, Brown Co., Dakota [S.D.]) 1885-1???, 1886-04-16
Novel Reading on the Ocean

Novel Reading on the Ocean.
Hon. d. N. Richardson Of Iowa. y
making a trip round the world ana
writes interesting letters to the Amer.
lean Rural Home. Describing the pas
sage on a steamer from San Francisco
to Japan, he says:
Novel reading is a notable featuroo :,
steamer life, as it is ofhomel life ashore
The beaten tracks of our libraries RIM
not to the historical shelves, nor vet
to those Of science. The alcoye OF ra.
llgious reading is terra incognita. bnt
worn is the carpet and broad the az
ten-trod track that leads to long and
closely packed shelves ofthenoveIist,s
product. Ship reading is about the
same. Just wait a few days till the
NAL de mer has vanished, the novelty
OF the sea wOrn out, then make :
"round up" of the reading matter. A
history or TWO, now and then a fairly
written book of travel, q magazine q,
two-and novels everywhere! Paul de
kock in the hands Of specialized men;
the vagaries of lola thumbed and
conned by matrons and maidens, the
lamentations of Ouida, and here and
there q better one by Black or Wal,
lace, or some one else-all read and
read and passed from hand to hand
as if the chief end and aim of man, the
haven and hope of women, were tc
cram their leisure hours and people
their ample brains with slip-shod
writing about imaginary situations,
high-spiced scenes and questionable
characters.
Even our Japan friends, what are
they reading iii their vertically lined
books? Romance. do you have
many novels in your languagegp
asked the intently reading Asiatic.
ooh, yes, we have very many
novels"
care their plots and characters
much like those of French and Yankee
writers-of home life, courtships, love
scenes, marriage, suicide, and social
fireworks in general?"
80, yes; they are very much the
same, only / like them rather better
ours than yours"
eyes, but are your social habits
then, like ours? For instance, you
are q young, unmarried man; you
know many nice young women; you
have picked out one you think you
would like make your wife-whatdoyou
do about it? Court the girl, gain her
consent and then 90 and ask her par
ents if you may wed her."
80, no, no; that wouldn't do atall
If | think the girl will make me q
good wife, / must go and ask her par
ents first. Our parents NEEDLE toe
much with young folks love affairs
They want to know all about it,
what we talk about and ~think-lust
the same as they do in Europe. like
much better the way you do IN Amerl.
ca, and we must have 1T that way
too, sometime"
But where do you get the romance
fer your books if the old folks do the
young folks counting, and don't al.
low them any social latitude2"
"Oh, well, they think they do it all
but they don't. Our young folks have
their way under the rose, and because
they strive for what they are denied
there are plenty Of things to write the
books about?"
So it goes here and there and N
lands beyond the sea. Love laughs
at locksmiths," and nature ever con
tends for its own course-and age ior.
gets not youth. So thus it ls that
the chairs and stools and shelves are
thickly strewn with warmly tinted
often tainted, fiction b~ooks.-wny
these are closely held before brignl
eyes, and closer yet to eyes grown am
with age; why heads, both young ano
old, bow to the shrine ofthe romantic
goddess. On sea or land, at home OF
far away, the same old father Adam
and dear old mother Eve hand down
and down the ever tempting ana ever
welcome luscious Eden apple.