The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1896-01-01
The Passing of the New Year.

1t has no doubt often occurred to
you, fellow traveller on Times coach,
that the milestones of New Years fiv
past much faster now than they did
in the early stages Of your journey.
What an interminably long wait it
seemed to be between the first New
Years day of your memory and the
second. Perhaps you We're 6 or 5
years old then and in school for the
first term. If SO. New Years had its
sorrow as well as its JOY, for it was
the last day of the midwinter holidays
and next day YOU had to begin your
wrestling with the intellectual arith-
metic and the geography and maybe
with the elements of the English
grammar. Look back now and pity
yourself. Do not make the mistake
of most of our acquaintance and de-
clare that particular New Years to
have been the happiest OF your exist
ence. Pshaw. 1t was perhaps the
most miserable. The fact that you
have forgotten your childhood's mis-
cries does not make it true that you
had none.
1t was several years after that be-
for the New Year began to move ap-
preciably faster. Perhaps it was not
till your sister and your pretty dark
eyed cousin began to chatf you about
the silky down upon your upper lip,
and your portlv comfortabl father. in
speaking OF some doings of yours of
which he did not approve, referred to
you as a foolish young man. Then
you noticed the flight of time, I'll be
bound. No one had called you a
young man before. You were
ready to forgive the governors chid
ings for that. You rejoiced that al:
though you were very young indeed
you had yet been called man.
At that time you had great respect
for your own opinions on most mat
ters. You began to shave forthwith,
and you fell into the habit of calling
your chum, who was of about your
own age, 'old man.
Ifany one called you my boy, you
felt resentful. 1t seemed SO utterly
out of place. But you had not yet
learned that manhood brings with it
certain definite and sometimes heavy
responsibilities. 1t is possible you
discovered this significant truth very
soon afterward, though perhaps it was
not till two or three more New Years
had passed. At all events the knowl-
edge came to you with somewhat OF a
shock-possibly pleasant, possibly
otherwise. At all events, it was not
long after that that you found out
that your knowledge was not univer-
sal and your wisdom was not infaIli-
bic.
And ever since the New Years have
flown by faster and faster. After
awhile your girth grew greater. Then
there were lines in parts Of your face
that had once been smooth. The top
OF your Uranium, that was once thick
thatched. grew bare and smooth and
shining. Glasses came next. andyour
hands wrinkled up. Then there were
occasional twinges in your joints, and
what hair was left grew gray, then
white. Only yesterday you began to
carry cane-once you carried it for
ornament-because it helped you
when walking. Yesterday? You ask
Oh, yes, remember. 1t was good
ten years ago, but you see the New
Years fly so fast. now. .
What. Are you going to leave the
coach? Is your life journey done?
You amaze me. / thought you We're
good for several more New. Years.
Well, goodby, my boy; goodby.
So he is gone. But, bless me, he was
only Is. He was young man yet.
Now, let us give the new year 1896 a
rousing welcome. And may the road
between here and 1897 be a smoother
one for ali of us than was that of
1895!