The Indianapolis journal., 1899-02-19
COUNTRY LIFE IN WINTER TIME.
Fireside joys of Shut-In Days When
Snow Is on the Ground.
p A Ynnnr in snringfleld Rennhlican


Fireside Joys of Shut-In Days When
Snow Is on the Ground.
e. A. Young. in Springfield Republican.
For those to whom the championship of
their own thoughts is a nightmare. and the
cOziness of a freside with only the home
friends or a chance call from homely neigh
bors seems a dearth, a winter in the coun-
try would be a dismal experience. But to
the care-Weary man, or the woman who has
learned the real value of town gayeties and
diversions, the rugged face of a rural winter
may show a smile that at least has no false
pretension in it. There is sometimes a chill
in the heart that steam heat and town
friends do not reach Human nature is
found at its truest in children; and what
child may not find delight indoors and out
in a country home when snow heaps upon
the window ledge, and mimic tamaracks,
tropic ferns and cacti are etched in frost on
the panes? The ice-ocked stream or pond
is not lit at night by an electric glare, nor
swarming like the city. rink with skaters,
but a bonfire of brush is easy to build and
there is a world of ruddy cheer in it.
There is so much in the freside, whether
we are young or old. But the fire must be
of wood and you must not be reminded of
the IS a cord that it costs in the city. 1t
is all the better if there is little snow or
ice on it to hiss and siZze; and there should
be a stick of hemlock to make a noise like
a bunch of frecrackers, and birch to give
out a Whit of fragrance, and oak to assure
a bed of Goals. You need one black, tight
stove Ito bake ye to a puddin' on the
zero days, and an open CRATE or small fire.
place for the evenings and when 1t is mild
cr. Then there is always the fire in the
kitchen, with the big woodbox to sit on and
dangle your legs. Whoever goes near a
kitchen fire in the city, unless it be to bake
or brOi? If the vicar of Wakefield had
been modern and townbred, he would have
had no fireside adventures TO tell, and there
would have been no "reminiscences of their
travels from one room to another.
To be really shut in by storm and cold is
possible only in the country in the winter
time. When you We're, in the city you may
h of oGpd "a q VIZ
home from church. or a social affair that
you wished to escape, but it was only pre-
tense. Here, where you ma the road bll-
lowy and trackless upon a Sunday morning,
you need have no stings of conscience If you
haul out the box of old newspapers and
magazines which you have never before
the books you meant sometime to read, and
the thought you never had leisure to think
Here any man may evolve backlog studies
while he pOkes his own fire. What a loss
to literature had there been no rural winters
to tell about in verse or tale. What a win
ter was that upon which John Ridd dwells
so vividy in Lorna Doone."
"All the earth was fiat with snow, all the
air thick with snow; more than this no man
could see, for all the world was showing" ,"
"As a rule it showed all day. cleared up at
night and froze intensely, with the stars as
bright as jewels, earth spread out in lus-
trOus twilight, and the sounds In the air as
sharp and cracking as artillery; then, in
the morning, snow again before the sun
could come to help, But TOR the country
would never have been spoken, nor would
he have given us the freside picture Of
'Zekel and Hubby
While the social instinct is a natural and
wholesome one, [ fear that there is too
much seeking after happiness and recrea-
tiOn outside of the home. Is this because
there is no cheer in the bTonzed steam
pipes or the ''hole in the lOor?" With the
ater and concert, party and Club-meeting,
with unnumbered societies connected with
every church, calls become rare, even be-
tween friends. When the summers heat
makes winter pastimes intolerable all who
can HE them to the seashore or country re-
sort; so, in becoming boarders somewhere,
home is entirely abandoned for the season.
Under such conditions there is little for the
child to treasure in the memory, and despite
the technical literary training which he gets
in school, / believe he is missing the ma
terial for making The poetry and romance
of the future. Can any literature manual
kindle a child's imagination like a reading
from Walter Scott by a wood fire, with
sounds Of roaring blast and sitting snow
outside? Every northern poet has a good
word for the snug delight of the winter fire
side. Says CoWper:
crown thee king of intimate delights,
Fireside enjOyments, home-born happiness,
And all the comforts that the lowly roof
OF undisturbed retirement, and the hours
Of long uninterrupted evening know.
And Heine, who oftener sings in a satiri-
cal key:
Outside fall the snowfakes lightly
Through the night loud raves the storm;
In my room the fire glows brightly
And tits cozy, silent, warm.
A ruggeder note rings through the winter
song at the end of Loves Labor's Lost" !"
and even Mark Twain becomes almost poet
&c in his description of the ice-storm. In
deed the New England poets rise to their
highest plane when their theme Is home life
in winter:
The sled and traveller stopped, the courier's
feet
Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates
sit
Around the radiant fireplace, inclosed
In a tunultuous privacy of storm.
Better than Emerson, better than any
other poet in any land, is Whittier, in ut
tering the feeling that set me a-prosing:
Yet, haply, in some lull of life,
Some truce of God, which breaks its strife,
The worldling's eyes shall gather dew,
Dreaming in throngful city ways
OF winter joys his boyhood knew;
And dear and early friends-the few
Who yet remain--shall pause to view
These Flemish pictures of old days;
Sit with me by the homestead hearth,
AnG stretch the hands of memory forth
TO warm them at the wood fires blaze!
Most of the hardships imposed upon man
by nature are wholesome, but of them all,
when wisely and sturdily faced, those of the
New England winter seem to be the health
fullest in their effect upon the mind The
long evenings and shut-in days bring leisure
without lassitude, close knitting all the