The morning call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1878-1895, 1894-06-21
FOR THE FOURTH.
Do Noise and Smoke
Make Patriots?
1t VIII Hardly Terrify the Small
Boy or Deter Him From
Having His Fun.

At last the temeritous tubercule and the
meandering microbe are in danger. The
! patriotism of the country is to be diverted
against them instead of going up in noise
and smoke on the Fourth of July; and the
ladies of the San Francisco Sanitary
League are TO have the credit Of the inno-
walton.
They ask that new declaration of inde-
Dendence be made from the shackles of
custom, so that on the natal day Of this
great nation. instead of little boys going
I'D in ragged pieces in the middle of ex-
plosions, kindergarten schools may be
built throughout the length and breadth
of the land; that milk inspectors may be
made to get hustle on themselves, and
sewer-gas may be dissipated.
The kind and observing ladies of the
Sanitary League will remember the har-
rowing poetical brevity concerning little
Willie, last name unknown, poet unidenti-
lied. 1t goes something like this:
Little Willie had rocket
On yellow stick
ut, 1t went slzI sIz! The deadly shock
Made him deadly sick
And his funerals tomorrow.
Not the poets. but little Willie's; and IL
really isn't tomorrow, either, for it hap
pened years and years ago. But they hold
up the sudden and saddening fate of little
Willie as a warning to mothers to keep
their little ones away from gunpowder
and the noise and heat and danger that
characterize the day they celebrate
"Gunpowder is destructive and dan
gerous thing" says Mrs. S. NJ. Thrasher.
secretary of the league, whether used in
war or peace. In war its harmful force Is
directed against the enemy; In peace it is
our own people who fall and our property
which is annihilated. The almost un-
limited freedom which has usually bee
given TO our youth on our natal day and
the licensed use of explosives has a coarse
aHd barbaric influence"
The Fourth of July. as it is cele brated In
these days, the ladies rather hold, is fun
for the cat, but death on the mice, the
small boy, with his pack of irecrackers.
In this particular instance representing the
cat. and the sensitive, nervous public the
mice.
For years and years the small boy has
appropriated the Glorious Fourth as his
oWnest own, and the small boys papa, who
was once a small boy himself, furnishes
the cash that his scion may turn himself
loose and be patriotic TO a finish. Some
times Inc hnish is rather rough on certain
portions of small boyhood-his hair is
sihgea. a hnger or two may be suddenly
blown OF. or an eye Knocked out. but, as
general rule be takes it like little man.
and rather regrets that every day is not
the Fourth.
What does the small boy care for tuber-
cuious milk, or sewer gas? He does not
know anything about such things and
does not want to. He breathes in his
patriotism in fire and smoke, and the sizzle
oil squlb furnishes more joy to i'm than
would the last expiring groans of twice
ten thousand tubercules.
The ladies of the Sanitary League are
earnest enough in their work, but they
will hardly be able to reconcile the small
boy TO a quiet Fourth. They might do it
by making it one glorious vista of parti-
boy could sail on a river of red lemonade
In a gllded boat, where he might pluck