The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1890-08-15

4 =
the art of farming. But under these
deceptive titles are the same cheating
and the same betting the same drunk
enness and the same vagabondage and
the same denominations that were to be
found under the old horse racing system.
| L never knew a man yet who could
give himself to the pleasures of the turf
for long reach of time and not be bat
tered in morals. They hook up their
spanking team and put on their sport
ing cap and light their cigar and take
the reins and dash down the road to
perdition. The great day at Saratoga
and Long Branch and Cape May. and
nearly all the other watering places is
the day of the races The hotels are
thronged, nearly every kind of equipage
is taken up at an almost fabulous price,
and there are many respectable people
mingling with jockeys, and gamblers,
and ibertines, and foul mouthed men
and fiashy women. The bartender stirs
up the brandy smash. The bet runs high.
The greenhorns surprising all is fair,
put in their money soon enough to lose
it Three weeks before the race takes
place the struggle is decided and the
men in the secret know on which steed
to bet their money. The two men on
the horses riding around long before ar
range who shall be beat
Leaning from the stand or from the
carriage are men and women so alb
sorbed in the struggle of bone and
muscle and mettle that they make a
grand harvest for the pickpockets who
carry off the pocket books and porte
monnaies.
All, my friends, have nothing to do
with horse racing designations this sum-
mer. Long ago the English Govern
ment got through looking to the turf
for the Dragon and light cavalry horse.
They found the turf depreciates the
stock, and it is yet worse for men.
Thomas Hughes, the member of Parlia-
ment and the author, known all the
world over, hearing that new turf en-
terprise was being started in this coun-
try, wrote letter, in which he said:
Heaven help you, then; for of all the
cankers of our old civilization there is
nothing in this country approaching in
unblushing meanness, in rascality hold
ing its head high, to this belauded in
stitution of the British turf"
1 go further. and speak Of another
temptation that hovers over the water
ing places; and this is the temptation
to sacrifice physical strength. The
modern Bethesda was meant to recuper-
ate the, physical health, and yet how
many come from the water 'ng places,
their health absolutely destroyed New
York and Brooklyn idiots boasting of
having imbibed twenty glasses of con-
gress water before breakfast. Families
accustomed to going to bed at ten
o'clock at night gossiping until one or
two O'clock in the morning Dyspep-
tics, usually very cautious about their
health, mingling ice creams and lemons
and lobster salads and cocoa nuts until
the gastric juices lift up all their voices
of lamentation and protest Delicate
women and brainless young men chas-
SEEING themselves into vertigo and cat
alepsy. Thousands OF men and women
coming back from our watering places
in the autumn with the foundations laid
for ailments that will last them all their
life long.
Another temptation lowering around
the watering place is to the formation
of hasty and lifelong alliances The
watering places are responsible for more |
of the domestic infelicities of this coun-
try than all the other things combined. |
Society is so art fetal there that no sure |
Judgment of character can be formed. |
Those who form comprehensive amid |
such circumstances go into lottery |
where there are twenty blanks to one |
prize. In the severe tug of life you
want more than glitter and splash. |
Life is not ball room where the music |
decides the step, and bow and prance
and graceful swing of long trail can
make up for strong common sense. You
may as we'll go among the gaily-painted
yachts of a summer regatta to find war
vessels as to 60 among the light spray
Of the summer watering place to find
character that can stand the test of the
great struggle of human life.
II there is any man in the community
that excites the contempt of every man
and woman, it is the soft-handed, soft
headed fop, who, perfumed until the
air is actually sick, spends his summer
in taking killing attitudes, and waving
sentimental adieus, and talking in
nothings and finding his
heaven in the set Of lavendar kid glove.
Boots as tight as a. inquisition, two
hours of consummate skill exhibited in
The tie of flaming crayat his converse
ion made up of 'tAh's" and los" and
'tewed down to make . teaspoonful Of
,alves' foot jelly. There is only the
to such a man as that and
hat is the frothy young woman at the
place, her conversation made
Up of French moonshine; what she has
IN her head only equaled by what she
has on her back; useless ever since
The was born, and to be useless
Until she is dead; and what they
will do with her in the next world
10 not know, except to set her upon the
banks of the river of Life for all eter-
lity to look sweet God intends US to
admire music and fair faces and grace
ul step, but amid the heartlessness and
he imitation and the fantastic infu-
,nces of our modern watering places,
,eware how you make life coyenantsl
Another temptation that will hover
,ver the watering place is that of bane-
I'll literature. Almost every one start
ng off for the summer takes some read
ng matter. 1t is book out of the
library or off the book stand, or bought
# the boy hawking books through the
ars. 1 really believe there is more
'estiferous trash read among the intel
igent classes in July and August than
n all the other ten months of the year.