The Maryville times. (Maryville, Tenn.) 1884-1944, 1896-11-28
OFFERING THANKS.
puRlTANS DID NOT ORIGINATE THE
THANKSGIVING IDEA.

Our National Festival sprang From an
Old Hebrew Custom-Feasts of Demeter
and the Harvest Homes of the Saxons
and Celts Were Similar.
The story Of the first Thanksgiving
in New England loses none of its inter
est as time rolls ON. With each ami
versary new charm beckons in persua-
sive power to old colony days i'll Plym
outh. 1t is q land of lingering visions;
of scant stock of pilgrim fathers, sur
vivors Of the hundred souls and more
washed by the Mayfower on the bleak
New England coast when winter pre-
vailed against them so that their clothes
froze, many times like coats Of iron.
But bark to clank of cutlass and
corselet of STEEL What, no! Miles Stand
ish, "clad in doublet and hose and
boots of Ccrdovan leather" striding
again with martial air, and yet once
more doth the hurrying pen of the strip
ling, John Alden. with the dew of
his youth and the beauty thereof. in
dite epistles filled with the name and
the fame of Priscilla, the ''loveliest maid
in Plymouth.
Two hundred and seventy-five years
have passed since the faint line Of the
Atlantic coast shimmered before the
straining eyes of the Puritan forefa
theirs, but it is not hard to picture their
first Thanksgiving in the golden autumn
of 1921. The cruel, hungry winter
(there was row of graves, and their
number was almost half of the entire
company was passed. Summer smiled
on their cornfields, and autumn brought
abundant harvest. 1t is joyous de-
scription that Edward Winslow, the his
torian of the Plymouth colony, writes
of the pioneer Puritanical Thanksgiving
that followed:
"Our harvest being gotten in, our
Governor (William Bradford) sent four
men on fowling, SO that we might after
special manner rejoice together after
we had gathered the fruit of our labors.
They four in one day killed as much
foule as, with a little help beside,
served the company almost - week. At
which time, amongst other recreation, we
exercised our arms, many of the Indians
coming amongst us, and among the rest
their greatest king, Massasoyt, with
some so men, whom for three days we
entertained and feasted, apd they went
out and killed five deer, which they
brought to the plantation and bestowed
on our Governor and upon the captain
(Myles Standish) and others"
Governor Bradford completes the
picture by enumerating the blessings
which induce the Thanksgiving cere-
mony:
They began now to gather in ye
small harvest they had and to fitte up
their homes and dwellings against win
ter. being all well recovered in health
and strength, and had all things in
good plenty, for as some were thus en-
ployed in affairs abroad others were ex-
ercised in fishing about codd and bass
and other fish Of which yey took good
store, of which every family had their
portion. All ye Somer ther was no
waste, and now began to come in store
Of foule, as winter approached, Of which
this place did abound when they came
first (but afterwards decreased by de-
grees), and beside water foule ther was
great store Of wild Turkies, of which
they took many, beside venison. &c.
Beside they had about peck Of meal q
weeke to person or now since harvest,
Indian corn to ye proportion.
Not one Of the American holidays Is
so suggestive of the love of home which
is dominant in the national mind as
Thanksgiving, but in history the fes
tival does not find its exclusive home
here. The Thanksgiving idea is an ole
, one. The New England Puritans, il
concentrating day of thanks, were
only following in the footsteps of the
{ Hebrews. who annually observed feas
Of tabernacles or of ingathering. Thanks
giving lives i'll the classic authors in al
lusions to the feasts of Demeter. Har
vest homes were held by the Saxons ant
the Celts, and what more beautiful pic
ture of an aboriginal autumn festiva
could there be than the story Of Hia
watha's feast of Mondamin:
Homeward then went Hiawatha
To the lodge of old Nokonis,
1 And the seven days of his fasting
We're accomplished and completed.
But the place was not forgotten
{ Where he wrestled with Mondamia,
Nor forgotten nor neglected
7 Was the grave where lay Mondamin,
Sleeping in the rain and sunshine,
= Where his scattered plumes and garments
{ Faded in the rain and sunshine.
Day by day did Hiawstha
Go to wait and watch beside it;
Kept the dark mold soft Ibovo it;
Kept it clean from wees and insects;
Drove away, with SCOTS and siioutings,
Kahgahgee, the king of ravens.
I Till at length the small green feather
From the earth shot slowly upward,
Then another and another,
And before the summer ended
) Stood the maize in all its beauty,
/ With its shining robes about it.
And its long, soft, yellow tresses,
4 And IN rapture Hiawatha
Cried aloud: "It is Mondamini
Yes, the friend of man. Mondamin!"
Then he called to old Eokomis
And Iagoo, the great boaster;
Showed them where the maize was grow
ing;
Told them of his wondrous vision,
g or his wrestling and his triumph,
OF this new gift to the nations,
O Which should be their food forever.
And still later, when the autumn
9 Changed the long, green leaves to yellow
= And the soft and juicy kernels
Grew like wampum hard and yellow,
2 Then the ripened ears he gathered.
Stripped the withered husks from off then
4 AS he once had stripped the wrestler.
Gave the first feast of Mondamin