Savannah courier. (Savannah, Tenn.) 1885-1979, 1899-08-18


rooms have been inspected, his trunk
explored, his letters folded differently
from the way they were folded when he
put them away. Who is he?is the ques-
ton asked with intenser interest until
the subject has become monomania.
The simple fact is that he is nobody in
particular but minds his own business.
The best landlords and landladies
cannot sometimes hinder their places
from becoming pandemonium of
whisperers, and regulations are torn to
tattcrs, and evil suspicious are aroused,
and scandals started, and the parlia-
ment of the family is blown to atoms by
some Guy Fawkes who was not caught
in time, as was his English predecessor
of gunpowdery reputation. The rea-
son is that while in private homes fam
lilies have so much to keep them busy,
in these promiscuous and multitude
nous residences there are so many who
have nothing to do, and that always
makes mischief. They gather in each
others rooms and spend hours in con-
sultation about others. If they had 10
walk half mile before they got to the
willing. ear of some listener TO detrac-
tion they would be out of breath before
reaching there and not feel in full glow
of animosty or slander, or might, be-
cause of the distance, not go at all. But
rooms 90, 81, %, 90, "a and rs are on the
same corridor, and when one calTion
crow goes Cav! Caw!" all the other
crows hear it and flock together over
the same carcass. "Oh, ! have heard
something rich! Sit down and let me
tell you all about it," And the first guf-
'faw increases the gathccing, and il has
TO be told all over again, and as they
separate each carries spark from the
altar of Cab TO some other circle until,
| from the coal HEAVIER in the cellar to the
| maid in the top room of the garret. all
are aware of the defamation, and that
evening all who leave the house will
| bear it to other houses until autumnal
fires sweeping across Illinois prairies
are less raging and swift than that
flame of consuming reputation blazing
across the village or city.
Those of us who were brought up in
the country know that the old-fash
Toned Matching of eggs in the haymow
required four or five weeks of breeding,
| but there are new modes of Matching
| by machinery, which takes less time
and do the work by wholesale. So,
while the private home may brood into
life an occasional falsity, and take a
long time TO do it, many of the boarding
houses and family hotels afford a
swifter and more multitudinous style
of moral incubation, and one old gossip
| will get off the nest after one hours
| brooding, clucking a flock of 80 lies
after her, each one picking up It's little
worm of juicy regalement. 1t is no ad-
vantage to hear too much about your
neighbors, for your time will be so
much occupied in taking care of their
faults that you will have 70 time to
look after your own. And while you
are pulling the chickweed out of their
garden, yours will get all overgrown
with horse sorrel and mullen stalks.
One of the worst damages that come
from the herding of so many people
into boarding houses and family hotels
is inflicted upon children. 1t is only
another way of bringing them up on
the commons. While you have your
own private house you can, for the
most part, control their companionship
and their whereabouts, but by 12 years
of age in these public resorts they will
have picked up all the bad things that
can be furnished by the prurient minds
of dozens of people. They will overhear
blasphemies and see quarrels and get
precocious in sin, and what the bar
tender does not tell them the porter
or hostler or bell boy will.
Besides that, the children will go out
into this world without the restraining,
anchoring, steadying and all controll-
ing memory of home. From that none
of us who have been blessed Of such
memory have escaped. 1t grips man
for so years, if he lives so long. 1t pulls
him back from doors into which he
otherwise would enter. 1t smites him
with contrition in the very midst of
his dissipations. AS the fish already
surrounded by the long wide net swim
out TO sea, thinking they can go as far
as they please, and with gay toss of
silvery scale they defy the sportsman
ermen begin to draw in the net hand
over hand and hand over hand, and it
is long while before the captured fins
begin to feel the net, and then they
dart this way and that, hoping to get
out, but find themselves approaching
the shore and are brought up to the
very feet of the captors, so the men,
ory of an early home sometimes seems
to relax and let men out farther and
farther from God and farther and far
ther from shorc-fve years, ten years
90 years, 80 years-but some day they
find an irresistible mesh drawing them
back, and they are compelled TO re.
treat from their prodigality and wan
dering, and, though they make des.
perate effort TO escape the impression
and try TO dive deeper down in sin, aftoi
awhile are brought clear back and held
upon the Rock of Ages.
If it be possible, oh, father and
mother! let your sons and daughters
20 out into the world under the sem
.iomnipotent memory of a good, pure
home. About your two or three rooms
in boarding house or family hotc
you can cast no such glorious sanctity
They will think of these public car
ayansaries as an early stopping place
malodorous with old victuals, coffees
perpetualiy steaming and meats in
everlasting stew or broil, the air sur
charged with carbonic acid and cor
I l. I