The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1898-04-14
BOYS BACK IN The THIRTIES.
THE HON GEORGE f. HOAR TELLS
WHAT THEY WE'RE LIKE.
BOys, He Thinks, Are in These Days
More Manly and More Mature Than
when He Was a Youth

When He Was Youth.
Hon. George It. Hoar in the Youths
Companion.
1 believe the boys nowadays are more
manly and mature than they were in my
time. But in giving an account of the life
of boy sixty years ago I must describe
it as saw it, even if it appear altogether
childish and undisnifed to the young gem
tlemen who are to be my readers.
Perhaps all my younger readers do not
know how much that makes up, not only
the luxury, but the comfort of life, has
first come in within the memory of per-
sons now living. The household life Of my
childhood was not much better in those
respects than that of a well-to-do Roman
or Greek. 1t had not improved a great
deal for 1000 years. There were no house
warming furnaces. and stoves were al
most unknown. There were no double
windows and the houses were warmed by
open fires. There were no matches.
There were no water pipes in the houses.
and no provision was made for discharg-
ing sewage. There were no railroads, tele-
graphs or telephones. Letter postage to
New York from Boston was % cents. None
of the modern agricultural machinery then
existed, not even good modern plows,
Crops were planted by hand and cultivat-
ed with the hoe and spade Vegetables
were dug with the hoe and grain and
hay cut with the sickle or scythe. There
were no ice houses. The use of ice for
keeping provisions or cooling water was
| unknown.
My father was well-to-do and his house
| hold lived, certainly, as we'll as any family
! in the town of Concord, where 1 was born.
l have no doubt a Roman boy 200 years
before Christ, or an AthenIan boy 400
| years before Christ lived quite as we'll as
1 did. If not better.
The boy got up in the morning and
dressed himself in a room into which The
| cold air came through the cracks in the
window. If the temperature was % de-
| Grees below outside, it was very little high
er inside. If ne was big enough to make
| the fires he made his way downstairs in
| the dark of winter morning and found,
! If the fire had been properly raked up the
| night before, a few Goals in the ashes
| in the kitchen fireplace. The last person
who went 10 bed the night before had lone
exactly what Homer describes as the
| practice In Ulysses time, when he tells
us that Ulysses covered himself with
| leaves after he was washed ashore in
! Phaiakia:
| He lay down in the midst, heaping the
fallen leaves above as a man hides
| brand in dark bed of ashes, at some
outlying farm where neighbors are not
near, boarding seed of fire to save his
seeking elsewhere.
But first he must get a light. Matches
are not yet invented. So he takes from
| the shelf over the mantelpiece an old tin
or brass candlestick with piece of talow
candle in 1t. and with a tongs takes a
coal from the ashes and holds the candle
| wick against the coal and gives a few
| puffs with his breath. If he has good luck
he lights the wick, probably after many
failures.
My mother had very entertaining story
! connected with the old-rashioned way of
getting a light. Old jeremiah Mason, who
was probably the greatest lawyer we ever
had In New England, unless we except
! Daniel Webster, studied law in my uncle's
office and shared a room in his house with
another law student One April FOOLS day
the two young gentlemen went out late
| in the afternoon, and my aunt, a young
| unmarried girl who lived with her sister,
and another girl went into the room and
took the old, half-burnt candle out of the
candle stick, cut a piece of turnip to re-
semble it, cut out little place like wick
| at the emu, DldCkensu IL WIFI INK ana put
it an the candlestick.
When Mr.. Mason came in in the dark.
he took a coal up with the tongs and put
| it against the wick, and puffed and pulled,
until after a long and vexatous trial he
discovered what was the matter He said
nothing, but waited for his chum 10 come
in, who went through the same trial. When
| they discovered the hoax they framed IN
elaborate complaint in legal jargon against
tfeI, rsrI~ al
TO trial before young lawyer of their ac-
| quaintance. The young ladies' were found
! guilty and sentenced to pay, as a fine a
bowl of eggneg.
After getting his candle lighted, the boy
takes dry kinding, which has been gath
cred the night before and starts a fire.
The next thing is to get some water. He
| Is lucky If the water in the old cast iron
| kettle which hangs on the crane in The
fireplace be not frozen. AS soon as the
fire is started he goes outdoors to thaw
out the pump, If they have a wooden
! pump. But that is all frozen up, and he
has to get some hot water from his kettle
to pour down over the piston till he can
| thaw 1t out. Sometimes he would have
an old-fashioned well, sunk too low in
the ground for the frost to reach it, and
could get water with the old oaken buck
! ct.
He brings in from out of doors a pail or
two of water If there has been a snow
storm the night before he has to shovel a
path to the woodshed, where he can get the
days supply of wood from outside, and
then from the doors of the house out TO
the street. Meantime. the woman whose
duty it Is to get breakfast makes her sp-
| pearance.
The wooden pump, which took the place
of the old well In many dooryards, was
| considered a great invention. We eli
locked with huge respect upon Sanford
Adams of Concern, who invented it, and
was known all over the country.
He was quiet original in his way. The
story used to be told of him that he called
at my fathers house one day to get some
advice as to a matter of law. Father was
| at dinner and went to the door himself
Mr. Adams stated his case in a word or
two as he stood on the doorstep, to which
father gave him his answer, the whole
conversation not lasting more than two
minutes. He asked Mr.. Hoar what he
should pay, and father said, Five dol
lars" Mr.. Adams paid it at once and faith
err said, by the way, there is a little trou-
BILE with my pump it does not seem to
draw water WIN you just look at it?" So