Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1889-07-03
MANY LONG FAREWELLS.
COMMENCEMENT DAY COMES BUT
ONCE IN A LIFETIME.
OPENING THE BOOK OF THE WORLD AT THE
FIRST CHAPTER-wHAT IT MEANS TO
THE eRADUATE-PAsT AND PRES
ENT CoNTRAsTED BY AN oPTI-
MIST

comes painful. The methodieal mileposts !
in the Journey of life seem to slip by faster
and faster. We have Christman and New
Years and all the other festivals OF the
year. We have centennial and semi-cen-
tennial celebrations, but commencement
day comes but once in lifetime; the happy
days spent in school are left behind.
But hold on there, my young friend;
What is that hear you say? You've mao
a pretty good time. Plenty OF tun' pus
mighty glad to get over it all. Mighty g,aa
you can see the world, oh? sick OF poohss
Rather sit at q desk and write for dear me
all day, would yous Rather run around
and be erraud boy, perhapss Rather get
down TO solid business and work from until
6. than to be able to sneak of any attsr'
noon and play balls Think you would pre-
fer dusty, moldy Office ten hours a day TO
a bright sunny school room with perhaps
lot OF pretty girls sitting around yons is
that the iteas seems strange, don't uI
Not y bit OF il, my boy, You've got that
same feeling Of independence which is COM
mon to us all.
But what's that hear my friend down
in the crowd say? Wish you wore back at
your books, do yous Regret all the time
YOU wasted in school, eh? Would like TO
try it over again, would you? Happiest
time of your life, did you say? You think
so. that's all. You couldn't be hired 10
90 back. My friend, you would rather get
IN at o'clock in the morning and toddle
around the front yard after lawn mower,
while last nights due percolates through
YOUR uppers, than be able to sleep until 8
O'Clock and have your own gentle mother
come upstairs and tell you three or four
times in rapid succession that if you don't
oct I'D right away you will be late for
school. Yes, you would. l know you.
You would rather vibrate from one end OF
| the room to the other with a sbrieking
child in one arm and bottle of soothing
syrup in the other, four hours night, than
be kicked out of bed by your older brother
because YOU tried to steal the bed clothes
away from him. Oh, those were happy
DAYS were they? When you romped in
the fields with never a care, with no thought
| for the morrow; when you could sneak into
the pantry at any hour of the day and alb
stract the1efrom goodly hunk OF bread
and butter; when you used to 60 In SWIM
ming incognito and get licked because your
shirt was wrong side out. But bless you,
my friend, those cares that you dldu't have
then, all the troubles, the little things
which make you walk the floor and tear
YOUR hair, and which drive you to think
that YOUR lot is so much harder than the
lot of any one else, including Jobs, those
things are what you are living for. Don t
Won regret the time wasted over your
books. either. If you could get back into
the school room you would study all the
time. would you? You would improve
every shining minute, eh? How old did you
saw YOU were? Forty? and haven't learned
any better than that? Well, well, unwind
from your brain some of those bandages
that you have been wrapping it up in Sc
tenderly for the last twenty years. Sit
down and think it over. And you will
conclude in five minutes that you wouldn't
do anything of the sort. You'll SEQ right
away, if you failed on that particular ex'
ample in arithmetic, it was because you
were having a rousing old time playing bal
and that perhaps the tall was great dea
better for you than figures; that is, better
, physically, and therefore mentally in the
end.
But haven't said word about the girls
, You have all heard this talk about thu
: sweet girl graduate, the delicate bud o
r girlhood blossoming out into the full blown
rose of ripper womauhood. Well, this II
a good thought for Commencement day
( Ali these bright young girls in their whit
dresses, their pretty faces glowing with thu
excitement of the hour and with expecta
t ton of the life which is to come. All Yer.
pretty, isn't it? Now Pm no iconoclast
But is this the right sort of veneer to pain
a sound healthy young woman with? w
l liken them all to some delicate flower, AM
we build hot houses for them to live in, ant
every once in a while some fair Joan of Art
! breaks the glass and steps out, and w
= realize that woman ia not so weak as W
Q have pictured her.
What do the girls think about il? G.
around among the hundred girls in th'
f class and take ballot. Ask each one
t she likes to be thought OF as delicat
. flower fit to live only in dollhouse.
n How many of them will answer yes t
g that?
s Tende-, did you say? Delicate, and all that
Look here, my friend, perhaps you'v
J. never lived in big city and gone slummin
d down 10 the tenement district and seen pale
> delicate-looking women living for years j
8 an atmosphere and working under a strai
st that would PROSTATE Sullivan in 81
T. months.
D. But there's one thing you have noticed
You have seen the lines creeping up an
!" down your own gentle mothers face da
after day, you have watched that sam
~ dear face grow a little paler, little saddle
~ you have seen her growing more patie1
se as the weeks and months rolled on, br
bless you, my friend, you never stopped
d think of that then. Here is a rompins
st rollicking boy, bound to have fun, teariu
lie his clothes at the slightest provocation, g
as ing half mile out of his way to wac
th through puddle Of dirty water, spendin
hours devising some instrument of tortul
". to let loose on the delicate harpstrings of
Id woman's nervous temperament, anythiu
G. to make trouble for Us mother. But v
to mustn't blame the boy. He can't help
,H and we have all done the same thing on
selves. But how about the mother? Ho
long do you think great, strong, bar
ia man would stand this sort of thing?
You come home at night and your wi
be says to you: "Robby has been mlsbehavir
It's again today, but, dear, guess after q
90 you'd better let him off this once" ar
os what do You suppose the young rascal hi
20 done? Oh, nothing very much. He hi
Of only taken the i've young kittens that a
III peared few days ago and buried the
he alive in the back yard. Now, how lon
an my friend, could you stand this sort
ar thing? And yet your wife, pale, delicat
or creature that she is, would have fit
~ Bobby were out of her sight for more tina
70 twelve hours. Let US stop moment an
"a think of what is going to become of a
~ these pretty girls who have had their heat
:, stuffed full of grammar and mathemati,
- and Latin verbs-what are they going
~ be? Wives? Yes, and mothers, some
= them; but tell me, my friends, can yo
10 bring this future that stretches out for
W woman from commencement day to tt
. end-can you bring it down to the mario
Nj limits of a wedding ring?
~ How about the Old maids, thenP Nov
ID lot me whisper word in your ear. As
h matter of fact, marriage isn't the only thin
!. woman thinks about. How many oil
~ maids are there who are old maids frol
"a choice? Nine out of every ten. Chow d
=. you know?' some one in the crowd shou
n out; "you're not an old maid yourself.
h That is so, but, my young friend, yo
d maven Z hlaiuen aunI, haTe you! Ooni'