Birmingham state herald., 1895-11-17
OUR SOCIAL WORLD

(AIl items of social interest will be gladly noted in these columns if sent to Mrs George c. Ball. Nineteenth street, between Tenth and Eleventh avenues, South Hlgh- lands. Telephone 98S)
 The story comes to us, in round about way to be sure still it comes, that this age of steam, electricity and of modern science and invention will witness the re- vival of one of the peculiarities of me- diaeval time in the return of the trouba- dours Once more, it is said, we are to hear the dulcet tones of guitar and man. dolin along our busy thoroug hfares, while above the din and roar of commerce will sound the rich, warm notes of ballads that tell of love and life and hope. UT course these singers will come rom southern climes, for 1t is only the glow of tropical suns that makes the heart blossom in a tangle of blooms that are heavy with a sweetness which finds its way to tongue and lip. But with the coming of this story of return or the gay troubadours comes also the vague wondering, how can these things be! Can these tuneful singers warble like them of old. along streets paved in Bel gian block, instead of the sweet-scented lanes where clambered the rose and bloS- somed the white stars on hawthorne hedge? Can they tell their love tales beneath windows draped with the prod net of modern looms, and from which flashes the white light of electricity, now that the diamond-shaped easement is no more? Can they sing their melodies Tn steam launches and luxurious yachts in- stead of gondolas which once fioated down the moonlit streams? And who Will deny that the praying of trombone, beat of drum, blare of trumpet, and even the sobbing of the violin have destroyed in a measure the tastes of the people Tor these tenderer musical instruments that were made to tell the story of the heart!
 And, above all else, will the present conditions of this nineteenth century permit a revival of product that be- longed to another and earlier age: NO, we cannot bring into this latter day civ ilization the distinguishing features or another epoch when humanity but re- fiected it's environments as stream catches the tints of the trees and bloS- soms that grow upon its banks. To the mediaeval time belonged the gay trouba- dour and there he should remain, like the knights of old and the maidens fair, who sighed their lives away in the dim re- cesses of the moated grange. These are restless, teeming years, but the restless ness does not come from the same cause which impelled troubadour and knight to sing and battle in the days that are gone. AS you llSleu tO idlSS ol SdiohS men who rode away on great black chargers; who sought, like Don Quiote, for evils in order to overcome 1t; or who warbled their way over hill and dale, l say, did you ever think seriously of the cause of all this ancient unrest? l am sure you have. for, for many years in the light of present day reckoning has this questioning found an answer. And 1t is nothing more nor less than grim dys- pepsia, that enemy of man, whose first demonstration succeeded the eating of the fruit of Edens trees. It is almost wicked to destroy all the romance of a by-gone time, but this is an iconoclas- tic age, and many of the beautiful tradi- tions of the past are crumbling, like the Egyptian obelisk, in the newer atmos- phere of this day of ours.
 Yes disguise 1t as we may, deplore it as we should. it cannot be denied that the knights and troubadors of that olden time wandered and warbled because the bangs of indigestion laid violent hands upon them. Were it possible to find the musty records of that time doubtless we should discover that the bravery and music were but the expression of a ner- vous body.
 The great boars head, the huge platter and the tankards were the inspiration. of many long crusade. Men feasted, and then they fought; men eat like beasts, and then they went forth to slay; they drank deep draughts of burning fluids and then they sang. Mo- the physical condition of humanity explains, in the light of modern science, many of the romance of an age long gone and now in this time of good housekeepers and good cooking schools; in this period of the new woman, instead of the forlorn maiden of the ''moated grange" the troubadour and the knight are not possible. With the disappearance of dyspepsia, with the cultivation of healthy organs comes an- other people, who tell 'the sweetest story ever told" in another way. We shall keep the tinxling guitar and mandolin, and to their bewitchipg strains sing all the love of warm, dear hearts; but the troubadour Is forever gone with an age when men called things by their wrong names and mlstook physical ills for knightly valor
 This is not new theory, but 1t Is a doctrine which has been evolved from the pages of history, and long held by myself and many friends And 1t Is now sustain ed by men like pr. Talmage and other active, too healthy and too wholesome at this present time for troubadour or knight, but 1t is the fit abode for manly, earnest men. who find their lives so full of duties that there Is no place for the Idle and the objectless. So is there neither place in our present time of activity for the constant warning upon imaginary evils: nor for the qualification of our per eonal spites and grievances. Life is so largely what we make 1t in our inter- course with our fellow men. and sad Is that unworthy knight who forever car ries his lance ready for some eAt Is.sd foe And sadder still is the condition of those men and women who send from trpfr 1,rxn f.f fha