The Van Buren press., 1896-09-12
ARP SAYS IT is HOT.
He Lives In Lively Village and
Should Know.
Old Chaps of Cartcrsville = The Major
Grows Reminiscent and Writes In
Retrospective Fashion-Old-
Time Politics.

in an aged bosom. The republicans nre
making much ado about something that
Mr.. Bryan said about the supreme
court, and even some of the Georgia
lawyers criticised him severely and de-
Tended the court as the best bulwark of
our liberties, and spoke of 1t as the high
tribunal that stood like n wall to pro-
teet the people against the assaults of
passion and prejudice. All that is very
pretty to a young man, but old men
have more memory and less confidence
There was a time, a good long time,
when that court had the respect and the
reverence of the nation, especially of
the south, when John Marshall and
Roger B. fancy, two southerners, were
the chief justices for a period of nearly
GO years; but soon after fancy lied
partisan politics and sectional preju
dices crept into the court and it is there
yet. 1t has been only 90 years since
members of that court ruled Mr. Tiden
out of the presidency and seated Hayes,
as clear an act of legal fraud as was ever
perpetrated by the most inscriptions
politicians. Law is said to be the per-
lection of human reason. Then how is
it that in such great questions repub-
lean judges decide one way and demo-
Gratis the other? tits right melancholy
to recall that stupendous farce-seven
democrats and eight republicans all up-
der oath to do justice in this greatques-
ton, and yet they drew the party lines
to a man. That Tilden was elected all
parties now admit and history has so
recorded. He was cheated out of the
high office by three members of that SUI
preme court. This is the same court
that decided that income tax to be IN
constitutional. Why, l wouldn't trust
such court with any case that involves
great corporations, or sectional ques-
tions. Ever since Joe Bradley was
young man and up to 1870 he was pres
ident or director of two railroads and
several great insurance companies. He
couldn't tote fair with them on one side
and the people on the other to save his
life. No, l am like Bryan. I've lost
confidence in the integrity OF that
court. I will not say that its members
can be bought with money, but their
wills are nodded by undue influence and
ought to be broken. That income Tx
was a fair and just measure and would
have put into the treasury near 10000
900 and no doubt saved the government
from the disgrace of that bond business.
But didn't start to write on politics.
The weather is too hot to think about
anything that eXcites indignation We
old chaps here in Gainesville have been
going to school every night for n week,
preparing fer the deestrict skule show
that was to come off. The ladies got
it up and then levied on us and put the
oldest men and women in an infant
class, and we had TO toe n chalk mark
and learn our a b on a blackboard and
be taught to sing 81 want to be an
angel" and we had to speak speech
like we used to speak it away back in
the SOS and 40's. Some of us had to
walk up and be licked for our mischief,
and we had a recess and played many,
many stars with the girls and I got
kissed several times and so forth. The
un-old-fashioned, innocent fun. Old
people are never so happy as when re-
calling the memories of the old school
days. That is about as far back as we
can go, and it is big landmark in life's
history. Shakespeare tells Of the whin-
ing schoolboy creeping unwillingly
into school. That was a true picture
sometimes, but, as q general thing, we
were glad to 90. Charles Lamb writes
OF his joyful school days. 1t was n
most delightful mixture. With moth
er to help us get our lessons and ia
Their to encourage and a teacher to
praise us when we did well, the daily
task was not hard, and then the sur
roundings, the frolics, the recess the
dinner bucket, the good time going
home in the evening, the pretty
branches we had to cross, the red gull
lies where we got chalk, the walnut
trees over in the field and the chestnut
trees on the hill, and then there were
persimmons and blackhawks and may
pops not far away. We had townball
Mt noon, glorious old townball that has
been debased and degraded into base.
ball. We used to give good balls to the
batter and wanted him TO hit it and
knock 1t mile if he could. Then there
was our old-fashioned shiny that was
akin to the modern golf. 1t was hard
game and kept us with bruised shins
and bloody toes, and gradually fell into
a state of innocuous desuetude.
And there were some pretty girls to
look on and admire, and we had ouI
sweethearts, and loved to stand by them
at the Friday evening spelling, and
sometimes ventured to hold their
hands on the sly, and would purposely
misspen the word to let them getabove
That was chivalry, pure and simple
Then came Saturday, a long, long
happy day, when we gathered chinqua
nins or chestnuts, or went to the mil
and went in washing while waiting fol
the grist. Sometimes we didn't wait
for the grist, but ran pony races hoInt
and went back in the afternoon for an
other frolie.
1t is still memory's delight to recall
those delightful days, and it is no won
der that the poets have written abou
them; and one of them says:
''1Iow dear to my heart are the scenes
of my childhood"
The next era that stands out mos
prominently is that of the lover. Shake
speare knew all about that, too, an'
drew the picture, no doubt, from hi
own experience when he was dying 70