The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1901-04-17
BILL ARP TALKS OF APRIL
The Grandchildren Had Lots of
Fun Out of the Old Man.

~ )lI llCdllS 10 OpcU, Dul IL ulu nC
open. 1t was an April fool. Nothln
shows IN my garden but the peas am
onions. The flowers make no progress
There is no sweet south wind I
breathe upon thcm-no sunshine. o.
Monday the grandchildren impose,
upon me with their llindOo pranks
They gave me Il cup of chocolate will
whipped cream on top, and it wa
nothing but sOapSuds. l pretended [,
be fooled, but wascnt; paid then
back in "ariOus ways. The liiudUO
started this childish custom away bacl
in the ages, and 1t still plcases tn,
children. And now Easter day is a
hand that is another name that came
down from the Pagans. Ostcra wa,
their goddess of sprirg and it was cor
ruptcd INTO Estera. How these ole
heather names do stick TO us. The
names of the days of the week AMI oil
the months came from them. So did
the planets and the consultations
Even the prophets and Job had to take
them from the Egyptians. But the
Scotch people don't call it Easter
They say PasCha day, or passover day.
They won't pattern after anybody,
but John Knox, and he said Paschu.
But there is reason for calling II
Easter, for the coming OF sprin9-the
opening of the earth and the flowers is
emblematlcal of the reSurreC.iUn-thc
opening of the Savior's tomb and Ills
return to bless and comfort His peo.
pie. This day corresponds closely with
the Jewish passover, and SO they oh.
serve it.
Now i want the young people to
know that Lent is another word that
means spriug. 1t is preceded by that
foolish festival called mardi gras-or
fat beef-and continues forty days in
remembrance of the Savior's long fast,
and it ends with Easter, and the COM
munion and other rcjolcings. AS the
old-lme almanacs would say, " "about
this time look for Easter hats and
flowers and tinery." Christmas is an
other festival day that is common to
all Christian nations. There are MANY
other days dedicated to the saints, but
in course of time it was found that
there were not enough days in the
year to go round, and 80 the pope
stopped the saintiIg of 80 many and
ii''N' WV way cNl ul'hib DO All
day. The next day after that is All
Souls day, on which mass is said by
the Roman Catholics for the souls uf
the dead who are in purgatory. 1t
seems that about 800 years age a pill
grim from the holy land found her
nit in Sicily who told him of an open
ing between the cliffs of the noun
tains near by that communicated with
hadcs where Pluto lived aud that he
could see the sulphurous smoke rising
and hear the grOans of the lost souls
who were being tormented in hell and
he had known some of them 10 escape
through the prayers of the priests and
this made the devils very mad and he
could hear them cursing the priests
with awful imprccations. The pilgrim
told all This to the abbots and monks,
and they had day set apart to pray
these lost souls out of hell or hades or
purgatory or whatever 1t is.
Besides these international days
there are national days in every coun-
try. Here we have the Fourth of July
and Washington's birthday and Deco
ration Day and some others. Germany
celebrates the birth of Calvin and
Luther and the kaiser. Scotland that
of Sir William Wallace and Bruce and
John Knox. III old England they ccle-
brate the queens birthday, Magma
Charter day mt Gnt evSry' vWSray'erloCc Of noisop ds1p
all and has been bn poeS tbe ~ hIons I"n9N
verse and song and in dancing around
the May pole. Tennyson wrote a sad,
.,llnI ,, Z,
Mexico celebrates all the Roman
Catholic days and has one other that
the rabblc call Judas Iscariot's day. 1t
is the next day alter Easter. On the
beautiful trees in the piazza or park
they suspend pastcboard images of
Judas lscariOt--lmages as large as life
with little holes bored in them from
head to foot and IN every hole is
fastened cannon cracker. At given
signal the fuse in every cracker is
lighted and all Of them explode nearly
at the same time and such terrific
popping was never heard outside of
battlefield, and poor old Judas is torn
and rent INTO a thousand pieces. This
Is just a sign of what they would do
to him if they had him there alive, but
| reckon it is more for trolic than any
thing, for they shout and laugh and
dance the hornpipe and make all the
racket they can.
Ben Franklin said that man was a
bundle of habits. He might have
added "and supersitions," for most
all people have some belief in super
natural things. Two hundred years
ago almost everybody believed in
witches. Shakespeare wrote about
them in Macbeth" and Burns in
Tam O'Shanter." The Puritans
drowned many innocent women from
mere suspicion of being witches. The
conceiled, self-righteous rascals never
accused man of being wizard. 1t
is the women who have suffered in all
ages. When was boy the young
people were more afraid of ghosts than
they are now.
Ghosts are very scarce in these days
| haven't seen one IN long time. Iii
my early youth | was the mill boy and
remember that one evening in the
carly twiliA ht as was astri,e my horse
and grist and going slowly home
neared the country graveyard OF Fair
view church and saw, or thought
saw, a ghost ahead of me in the bis
road. 1t had arms and legs, but bat
no head. 1t WAS white and ooipc