Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1895-11-27
LINGER IN MEMORY.
SWEET RECoLLEcTIoNs OF BYGoNE
THANKSGIvINGS

Regrets For Days That Are No More.
Dreaming of Snow Clad Hills.
What has become of the Thanksgiv-
ing day as it existed generation ago?
Has it gone out with the fashion that
prevailed and the fads that kept busy
the fancies of our ancestors? Was It
mere perfume that exhaled with its own
blossoming time, to make way for
stronger growth? The Thanksgiving
that you and remember was as differ
ept from the Thanksgiving of today as
cider is different from quinine bitters.
It was a day of cheer, mingled with
thanks, like the bite and the sweetness
that go to make up the vintage of the
apple.
How we used to watch it coming over
the New England hills in that region
which saw its rise, and which has not
yet seen its decline, as we out here in
the sordid and progressive west have
done! 1t was oftenest ushered in with
snowstorm that came in great, wavering
flakes at first, soon changing to fine
network of crystal, enveloping the tree
trunks in passementerie of pearl, fes-
tooning the twigs with ermine and
bending down the roadside weeds until
their jeweled foreheads touched the
earth. The fields were unbroken white
and the air an elixir. One felt like
romping with the school children and
flinging care to the winds when such
Thanksgiving days dawned a quarter Of
century ago.
From my very soul I pity anybody
with memories like these, yet obliged
to eat Thanksgiving dinner at board
ing house or restaurant table. 1t is bad
enough to vegetate the year round in a
hostelry that is never home, but when
the circling months return that especial
day of good cheer, sanctified by thou
sand sweet and tender memories, that
time of family reunion and festival of
fellowship, to be obliged to meet the
day without the sauce Of congeniality
and the spice of conviviality to flavor
its meats at table where your right
hand neighbor gobbles and goes, where
your left hand neighbor curses the wait
er and fees him in the same breath,
where the conversation consists of plain
tive requests to the landlady for a
grudgingly bestowed move OR whispered
suggestion as to pudding or pie (alas,
it used to be both y my soul bleeds for
the victim Of such destiny on Thanks
giving day. do not mean to convey
the impression that all boarding places
are mere Hill rows where man exists as
cabbages do-in files-and lives as they
do-according to the procession of Sc
rene vegetation. There are homelike ho-
tells and pleasantly arranged boarding
houses, no doubt, but even at their choic-
est and their best it is hard to have to
eat ones Thanksgiving dinner there.
Does not your eye brighten even now to
recall that dinner as it announced and
consummated itself in the days of long
ago:
Who does not weep at retrospective
thought of the simmery promise that
was waited through the kitchen door of
the turkey that was to be? Who does
not moisten his lips to remember the
crispness of that long fatted fowl,
smothered in perfume of its own gravy?
Who does not grow faint at memory Of
the oysters, the chicken pies, the flanked
hams and the noble presentation of every
vegetable that grows beneath the orbed
sun? How merrily the children laughed,
how their blue eyes sparkled, and
their black eyes shone to pull the wish
ing bone with grandma across the groan-
ing table-dear old grandma, serene and
peaceful in her snow white cap and
folded kerchiefl
How the relative from abroad, the
uncle who went for gold in the forties
and returned by slow stages after 20 years
by way of the tropics, smiled upon us
all and furtively clasped hands with
grandma underneath the table to test
the reality of the occasion! How the
old lady heaped his plate and removed
especial tidbits from her own until his
stock of cheer was Alpinel How the ci-
der flowed and how it stung as we
quaffed at its amber heart! How The
widowed aunt from distance and all
the little cousins, who never had the tur-
key taste on their tongues until grand
ma invited them to eat Thanksgiving
dinner with us all, visibly grew and
grew before our astonished eyes until,
like the snap dragon flower, we expect
ed them to go to pieces of their own ro-
tundity!
How gentle listlessness gradually
pervaded the company until we drowsl-
ly refused all offers of more and dream
ily pondered as to whether or no we
should ever care to eat again And yet
when the pie came how we frightened
How we rose to the exigency of the pud-
ding and fairly Haunted ourselves in
the face of the raisins and the nuts An
upspringing fame of energy, to be fol-
lowed by more complete lassitude than
the first, until the eyes that looked on
the still bountiful supply of food sheath
ed themselves as "sheathes film the
bruised eaglet's eye," and we sank into
slumber as we sat
Oh, bright New England days forev-
er passed! Are ye indeed dead, or only
sleeping until a sordid time has blown
over and the hearts of men arouse them
selves from a long Indifference to what
is fair and true and sweet?-Amber in
Chicago Herald
Oyster Soup.