The weekly Union times. [volume] (Union C.H., South Carolina) 1871-1894, 1888-12-07
AN OLD TIME "noe DOWN y
a Country Party in Canada In tho Days
OF Long Ago,

Souy sarty In Canada In tho Days
OF Long Ago.
Did you ever get "bid" to a dance in
the country3 mean a real, home made,
hith concessions, log house, quarter Of o
century back country party. A spree, q
hoe down, neighborhood shaker Of the
simple. ready, rough, pioneer days. Did,
ehf Then you will remember that on the
morning of the day fixed for the party
the board partition that ran across the
middle OF the house was pulled down, and
the beds were piled in one corner, and
the bunk was showed up to the end Of tho
house beside tho stove, and the stout
legged kitchen table was placed against
the wall at the other end of the room, and
stout legged chair planted on the table,
and to that chair the fiddler was elevated,
Z. and there he rolled his gray old head
trom side to side, and whisked lightning
from his elbow and fingered in ecstatic
frenzy and beat time with his cowhide
boots, and the throb of his eager music
touched the very inner keys of life and
stirred the young blood and softened the
hardening muscles and loosed the settled
Joints Of age until the stove shook and
the dishes ratified on the shelves and the
beat of the feet on tho dancing floor was
like the crashing Of score Of mallets,
deadened as by ohe sweep of o mighty
broom betweer1.
How they dancedl How the fellow
who had few steps shone and capered
and pounded the floor with his cowhidesl
And how they swungl Round and round,
and round and round, until the perspira-
tion rolled down the face and the breath
gasped for renewal Of the lease. Tanned
and degenerate days. They swing no
more. And they dance no moro. The
mighty clatter of the old Scotch reel
where old people unlimbered and shook
OIL the steps of youth, and the young
people gasped to keep pace with the
elders; and the opera reel-they called
1t the upper reel-which the old folks
also invaded; and then the cutting out
Jig, where the youths one after the
other did their finest steps, and the girls
did the same, and you often got on the
track of liking or an incipient COM
\ pany keeping by noting the time and
tclrcumstances under which some par
acular girl selected to take the floor, and
y VINO thus became the partner of her
choice, and the same with the male end
OF the performance, where the cut out
was much more likely to have q signifi-
cance
DO you remember that as boy you
felt if you could grow up to cali off
dances, or perhaps call off and play the
fiddle at the same time, as you once
knew a man do, and whose image lived
In your memory for weeks, that clerking
In store or even teaching school would
be nowhere; or perhaps you know clerk
who kept store and could call off also,
and you ached to grow up and be as
great man 10 he? 1t is hardly likely
you knew male teacher who could
dance much. Somehow the worry in
the teachers head over arithmetical
problems and the confusion of dates and
the eccentricities Of parsing seemed to
get into tho teachers feet when he get
on the floor, or, as native used to put
1t in place where once lived, his left
foot was Methodist and mixed him VI
and disgraced him every time htnDesid
aged to get for partner stranx med tn
/ hadn't been told how badly he lie Ia.
~ seems ems singular iI1s a now: whosg 'ime' an'
ere woodchoppathe children I an
hiagr
My.heart smote me rs I thought O
the wife and children who would ncve
see him again-of tho black pail of sor
row which would settle down over :
happy household.
"And tell father and mother!" Ii,