The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1892-02-12
A Sudden and Mysterious
Pilgrimage Noted
This Year.
LOVE LETTERS CAUGHT ON TIKI FLY.
The Kodak Brought to Bear Upon a
Busy YOnng Woman-How
the Social World Makes
Merry.

valentines SnOulQ nave DeeQ revived SO
suddenly in 1899 remains a mystery. For
ten years past it has been slowly anguish
ing, like many another good old custom,
and there were sad forebodings that the
tender missives of February IA would
soon be as much out of date as New
of the last generation. Not that young
folks stopped falling IN love, or telling
each other so-praised be Cupid. you
might as well try to stop the vo-
lation of the earth-but the form
of expression changed. Just as mauy
hearts were sent through the mails.
but not or February IA. nor yet wrapped
in tissue paper and poetry with more feet
than a centipede. And so valentine max
ers began to cry "Ichabodl" and the i'm
mortal Fourteenth was descending to the
level of any other fourteenth, when sud-
denly without apparent cause, the. de-
mand for valentines becomes greater
thai the supply, st~ationers' shops blossom
like the rose, and St. Valentine, whose
face was do wncast in 1891, wears a smile
of gratified pride.
There is at least one girl in Jersey City
who received a valentine ahead of time
the writer knows or one, for it was she
who showed her u dainty concoction bear
ing the card of a man who evidently in
tends to be first in point of time at
least. 1t was supposed to be a book
mark-all valentines this year must a
an excuse for beiug-and was of boiling
cloth over blue satin. In the centre II
disc had been outlined in gold, within
whose edge was painted a bit of blue
sky, river view and quiet meadow. Across
the entire length went a flight OF reed
kir1y Tia yuln1o an fF,fr v,nr an FD,,r
inches wide and niue long and bore not
one word of lettering.
AN UNIQUE TOKEN.
1t was q girl in Lafayette, whose name
| can't tell, who showed me an unique
valentine, which by this time is reposing
in some mailbag. 1t was u pair OF sciz-
zors cut from stiff cardboard, painted to
represent the original article, the two
parts Joined by a tiny gold wire SO that
they could open and shut, and IN either
blade the inscription
If you love me as ! love you,
These shears won't cut our love in two.
Some one out of town will find on his
breakfast table next Monday morning an
envelope with a Jersey City postmark, en-
closing a square of birch bark. in the cen
tire of which is painted a half circle OF
blue Sky, across which three swallows
are flying. The ubiquitous Kodak gets
in its work even GU st. Valentines Day,
and several weeks ago a fair hancee con-
t1ded to the writer tLat with its aid she
was preparing a valentine for "the only"
which would be absolutely original. Ac-
cording to her description, it was to be a
booklet with leaves AKA inches. of cream
water color paper, seven in number, each
of which bears her photograph in the garb
appropriate to some day OF
the week. Mondays page shows
Stretched ssr %l'h upward nei to Slmnlsd a lo afmi
clothesline; T~uesday'she milks inc irons;
Wednesday she wears a panty tea-gown
and is evidently lat home;" Thursday
she blossoms out in full evening dress,
and so on till Sunday, when with her best
bib and tucker and prayer book in hand
she is seen stepping decorously TOWARD
the church. Perhaps the f1ance will
wonder. as did the ritter, whether the
same girl h~abitually does the family
washing on Monday and dances the CO.
tillion on Thursday. or whether it is
merely intended to show what she could
do II she really wanted to:
Fl PRETTIEST OF ALL.
The prettiest valentine that the writer
has seen this year will be the property of
a Jersey City maiden next Monday morn
ing. There is a cardboard portfolio,
painted in imitation birchbark. Inside is
bon. heavily fringed, and covered with
boiling cloth. on which is painted the
figure of a girl in Gainsborough hat and
last-century garb. Her hands are
clasped, and her eyes full of charming
undecision. Leugthwise Of the whole
and to the left of the figure runs an inch
wide white satin ribbon, on which is
painted in silver letters.
Ibave none other than a woman's reason
think him so, because-I think him SO.
1t goes without saying that the more
nearly unique a valentine, the more
chance it has of anding favor in the loved
one's eyes. So, evidently, thought a
Boston man, who sent the maiden of his
bashful choice a skye terrier with the
sentiment attached to his collar,
Love me, love my dog" Rumor hath ii
that the maiden compromised on the
dog.
Young man of no originality, do you
want to know what to seud your best be-
loved tomorrow Go, get thee to a candy
store and lay GU divers moneys in a fiat
basket full of sweets, which tie with a
big bow of satin ribbon, under which put
Il little note and u bunch of violets. Yon
don't know what to say in the note?
Then you have no business to be sending
valentines.
If you are engaged. everything is cut
out for you. Buy y little silver frame,
heart shaped, of course, put FOUR picture
inside, heap the whole with your
afianeed's favorite fiower-let us hope
for your purses sake it's not orchids
and send by messenger. But then en-
gagged peopl have three hundred aud
sixty-f1ve Saint Valentines Days in the
year. and do not desire special considera-
tion. Valentine parties nave already
been described at length in these columns.
There were indications of one to be neld
this year by an uptown girls club, but
nothing seems TO have come OF it..
Now q word about last years vaien-
tines. There are sure to be bundles of
them around the house. relics of days
when bashtul boys nearly pulled out the
bell by the roots and fled wildly. Why
not collect these and mail tnem to some
less fortunate friend TO whom the good
gray saint pays few visits? The idea is
not such a wild one-the writer knows a
little lady who finds time every year to
mail some fifty valentines to children all
over the country, from the cold white
hills of New Hampshire to the damp cell
lars of New York's squalid tenements.
There is no text about casting YOU VAL
entines upon the mails, but it is none the
less true that tue little kindness will re-
tarn unto you seven-fold III the knowl-
edge of happiness shared.