The pioneer express. [volume] (Pembina, Dakota [N.D.]) 1883-1928, 1897-01-01

alone and wrote but 1t would not be
the same thing, for writing Il not ne
cessarily thinking nowadays, whatever
It may have been In the olden time; be-
sides, my writing was at an end be-
fore the thinking began. The hour
was one that had long impressed me
profoundly. The hour was the one
which separates night from morning,
the month the one which separates the
old year from the new year. The poet,
Camoens, who wrote Portuguese and
Spanish with equal AGILITY and felici-
ty. was wont to say, the hographers
tell us, when he employed both Ian
guages In writing the. same poem, that
he had one foot In Portugal and the
other in Spain. I am like C0mOens, I
thought; not because am bi-lingual
as he was, for my poor motherston
liz the only one / know, and that i'm
perfectly, but because my feet tonight
are in two Kingdoms. sat and unused
awhile In the silence and then contin-s
ued, thinking aloud us sometimes do,
I am told. No, nm not like that great
poet (peace to his perturbed spirit), but
rather like the old Roman god who
was potent at this season, bi-fronted
Janus. / had never quite understood
the significance Of the thought Of
which he was the symbol; but, sitting
there, on the threshold Of night and
morning, 1t slowly dawned on me and
scOlored my meditations.
Hail to thee, great Jsnus, hail! Thou
alone Of all the gods hadst the power
Of looking forward and backward at
the same time; Of seeing at a single
glance the future and the past. They
were alike to thee, Janus, for thou
vert q god, but they are not alike to
me, for I am q mortal, and / am old.
I cannot perceive what Is before me,
for my sight ID growing more and
more dim; nor, II know myself, do l
care to; for, whatever 1t may be, it can
not be what It was once. When was
young, the coming Of a New Year al
why's found me jubilant; now am old,
the coming Of the New Year always
finds me silent. Ny favorite book
then was 'The Pleasure of Hope"
which / long since ceased to read; my
favorite book now is t'The Pleasure Of
Memory" Of which ] mean to read a
page tonight. It will not take me
long. and it will suit the hour and the
! time. It is about the New Year. Not
the New Year that is to be, but the
New Years that were. The old, old.
New Years. js n.
RearE tecollect ions OF New Years
were not cOnhectCt d the lttti e-uld.
town IN which I was born nor with
aIySofs tl.sSSl ttle: old towns An which
my boyhdq was passed; for II my
cared more Tor New Years day than
for any other In the year, I did not dis
cover that fact. But suspect they
did not, forstlle> Afassac husetts Of sixty
! or seventy years ago had DO holidays
to speak 0f-only the Fouxth Of July.
when rustic patriots assembled In halls
and churches to hear the Declaration.
Of Independence read and the times
that tried mems souls eulogizeG in
long ontlons, and Thanksgiving, when
the separated members OF families re-
united themselves In the old nome
steads, where. around the crowded ta-
BILE, they lsnt down to the midday din
ner and devoured the annual turkey
and the occasional mince-pie. Not in
old, Puritan Massachusetts, but In old,
Dutch New York, did my first actual
acquaintance with the New Year be-
gan. 1t was late in the 3Os or late in
the 40s-precisely when it matters not
and wasEa lad Of fifteen or therea-
bouts. Weiwere poor people, and con-
sequently my knowledge of what was
going on inIthe world was of the slight
est. don't think read the daily
papers, and know didn't read the
monthly magazines, for believe there
were two or three then. Ny literature
was c0nfined to my school books--to
Matte Brun's geography, to Colborne's
arithmetic think 1t was Colborn's-
and to the grammar of Goold Brown,
that grammatical Columbus who dis
covered the common gender! Still,
there are things that we learn without
reading; things that are in the air, as
one may say, and one of them was the
knowledge that New Years was gem
eral and generous holiday. I know 1t
was general one, for did not go to
school that day, nor did my stepfather
60 to work; and knew 1t was gem
erous one when my mother sent me to
the little corner store where she pur-
chased our groceries, for the grocer
gave me two or three cakes, oblong
cakes, stamped with ornamental pat
terms sprinkled with sugar and favored
with carawsy seeds. was SO aston
sished at his liberality that almost
forgot to thank him. While was re-
membering my manners bevy Of boys
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