The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1891-07-30
THURSDAY MORNING. JULY 80, 1891.
BILL ARP.
The People Running Crazy on Societies

BILL ARP.
The People Running Crazy on Societies
Atlanta Constitution.
"sorrow endureth for a night, but JOY
cometh in the morning." That is unless.
the cook has quit and you have to rise
before sunup and cook breakfast your
self. But I don't mind it much and it's a
fair compromise for me to cook break fast
and the girls to clean up after my mess
ing and cook the other two meals. In
fact, / would enjoy the frolic, if the old
cranky stove would bake the biscuits
brown on the bottom, but this morning
they were as white as cotton and we're
blistered on,top, and Mrs. Arp said it
would take me two or three days to get
my hand in, and she limited that the old
stove was about burnt out anyhow and
that it had to be fred up an hour or two
sooner 80 as TO get properly hot in the
lower chamber. So reckon I will have
to rise with the chickens and flap my
wings and fire up. The children beg me
to wake them up and let them do it all,
but their mother says it nearly kills them
to get up 80 soon, and she had rather do
it herself. But it is most astonishing
how late at night these children can set
up at party or frolic and still keep
their health, and I have admired the
alacrity with which they rise when they
are going on an excursion OF picnic and
have to take an early start. There seems
to be power of stirring around this
summer, considering the hard times, and
I have thought that maybe all this going
to and fro had something to do with the
hard times. It don't cost so much to
travel, but there is always some fixing
up to do beforehand, and that costs mon.
ey. My folks told me last summer that
the excursion rate to st. Simon's and
back was only Sc, and the children had
never seen the ocean, and it did look like
ne could afford that little sum and ought
to embrace the golden opportunity.
And so surrendered, and prepared my
finances for the $6 apiece and two or
three days board, but they stayed ten
days, and that with all the preliminary
fxings, I never got over the golden op'
portunity and the strain for six months.
But Mrs. Arp declares it was worth it,
and she wouldn't mind going again this
summer if I had the money to spare,
which I haven't and never expect to
have again.
Old DR.. Kirk says that these excur-
sions and conventions will break the
country, and that nobody can stand it
but the negroes. And here they go and
there they go, like fddler's elbow-the
lawyers to Columbus, and the doctors to
Augusta, and the editors to New York,
and the dentists to Atlanta, and the Roy.
al Arcanum to Savannah, and the Ma
sons to Macon, and the conductors to
Gainesville, and the school teachers to
Brunswick, and the military to Chicka-
mauga, and the legislature to Salt
Springs, and some more editors to Chi.
cago, and the college boys and the col
lege girls everywhere in squads, and
then there are the Odd Fellows and the
knights of Honor and Knights of Pythi-
as and Knights of Labor and Knights of
Jericho and Scylla and Charybdis, and
the baseball teams that are all on the go
somewhere, and besides all these there
are big lot Of women and girls and fan.
cy fellows visiting the springs, and q
heap of them dance and gamble and
drink and carry on scandalous, and a
heap of them don't, but it all costs mon
ey, and our young men haven't got it to
spare, and they come home broke and
don't lay up q dollar, and they can't
marry, for they haven't got anything to
marry on, but they firt around amazing
and make mash and go home and brag
about it. Why there are boys in all
these towns that are clerking or working
for thirty or forty dollars month, and
it takes it all for clothes and buggy rides
and excursions, and they are not laying
up dollar, and the old man is kept
bowed down and hard run to help them
along, and its all wrong, all wrong. and
the boys ought to put ou the brakes and
stop it,"
And the good old doctor came down
with his cane hard on the brick; and
about this time old Uncle Simon Peter
came along and took up the subject as
the doctor left off and said: eyes, they
have got too many societies, and l used
to be as big fool as anybody and jined
every one that came along-the Masons
and Sons of Temperance, and Bible So
cieties, and I don't know how many
more, and what with preaching and
travelling and the conference and all the
societies like to have never got acquain.
ted with my family, for WAS out some
where every night; and one day my wife
saw notice in the newspaper that there
was new society just come for the pro-
lection of henpecked husbands, and she
called my attention to it and asked if I
hadn't better join it and run for presi-
dent and that put me to thinking, and
I quit for while, until it occurred to me
not long ago that could do some good
by joining the Alliance and helping them
to reform the world and save the coun-
try, and SO I joined, and I've been talk.
ing to them about whiskey and tobacco
and extravaganza and corruption at
Washington. but my ideas don't seem to
be popular. and they say my views are