The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1895-02-07
FABLES THAT NEVER DIE.
Folly OF Being Afraid OF Night Air-The
shower of Frogs story.

There is that well-ixed old legend
about the injurious property of night
air, says the Brooklyn Eagle. What a
lot of people are dying of consumption
because they will not let air into the
house after dark. 1t is night air, you
know. and that is-well. it is night air,
'and somebody told your grandfather's
second cousins wife'S sister-in-law that
night air was unwholesome. SO they
leave all the windows and breathe the
breaths of an entire family and the eN-
halations of closets and the gas of
furnaces and stoves all night, and get
up with headache tut with cOngratu
lations that none of that dreadful air
from the hills and th1 woods and the
fields has GOT into the house. Ask
them how the cattle that are out all
night breathing hight air, keep so
healthy. ASH them wh#t makes soldiers
and sailors and proSpcctors and hunters
50 biz chestcd an hardy, living, as they
do. in the air al n5yht aS well rs lii the
ia, time. But you ,an'J break up an
ut,l lie with Icg.mcur of troops or 4
hers ~ ct,'c. wv. 'I,"c used to be
"A ~, i. vas ,,"-. 20 ,-,. magazines,
to IL, a. nnl, Iii ri' ..r people
crazy. a. g.. ~- -; ,..f it the
moonrg.. n.3." r y. the
morning u !, ... n.
who cal ed "a T.. matte,
borrowing the lnho.~--, --.~-,' n IN a
word from. was perhaps responsible for
that. He never thought to look at the
effect of moonlit slumber on an army or
watchman.
Every now and then we read reports
of shower of frogs or toads or snakes
or lizards or young alligatOrs. But
these showers never occur near where
ANYBODY lives. Since the resuscita-
ton of the Brooklyn Institute these
animals appear to know that if they
fall into the streets Of this city they
will become subjects of scientific sur
yeillance, and they have carefully re-
fraiRed from falling even in Prospect
The wheat grown from seeds pre-
served for 5000 years and more in
mummy cases covers square miles OF
imagination-and the frogs that have
been imprisoned in granite or coal, deep
down in the hearts OF mountains, fo1
billions and billions of years-a couple
of billions before frogs were created,
woald be marshaled into q respectable
army. When he got into the granite the
granite was presumably white hot, but
the frog got himself cry>talized in, JUS
| the same, and when the chunk Is blasted
he hops and starts for the nearest POND
! as brisk as if he had only been locked
| up over night.
Once in while he gets into the
stomach of citizen. this frog does, anC
sometimes his place in that stron nghoio
is taken by snake which, resisting
gastric acid and needless of the lack o
| air. PLAYS around for months, now an'
then coming up into the throat Of hi
host to suggest that it is dinner time
Ordinarily. snake eats only live food
but perhaps he accuStOms himself t
oysters if his keeper will consideratel
eat them.
The rustic occasionally looks at
cloudy sky, pierced by rays of the SUI
that spread into visible fan of light
Md SAYS: Its goin' to rain. Ih
suns DRAWN water" And he reall
thinks it is water going up, instead c
light coming down. Ii it rains 1t Is be
cause the clouds are there, and 1t
about time to rain, not because the su
is working as hard as usual for tn
evaporation of water on the surface {
the earth.
One might fill some columns abor
the divining rod that can find gold an
silver and hasn't brought any of 81
countless millions of the late unlamente
Kidd to light, and about honor anon
thieves, and about the evils that beta
possessors of the opal, and about II
Mapleton and some other ghosts, an
i about raising umbrellas on the stage an
about thirteen people at the table, and
whole lot of other things, but it wouldn
do any good.