Lexington gazette. [volume] (Lexington, Va.) 1871-1962, 1903-04-08
My Yellow Jacket

My friends make fun of my weak
ness for yellow.
+ 1 confess that / adore it, not
withstanding that / have good rea-
son to detest it. Truly, human ma
ture is a bundle of contradictions.
! I love yellow because of certain
episode in my life which occurred
when l was but eight years of age.
/ love nankeen above all on account
of a jacket of that material which
played in that episode an important
part.
Our school, which had been plac-
ed under the patronage of st, Eliz-
abeth, was q mixed one-that is to
say, up to the age of ten years boys
and girls worked and played togeth-
er. In spite of occasional quarrels
the system, on the whole, worked
very we'll.
/ had not been eight days at st,
Elizabeth's before ! fell in love,
Do not laugh, ] loved with all the
strength of my child nature, with
love disinterested, simple, sincere.
1t was Georgette whom l loved;
but, alas, Georgette did not love me.
How much l suffered in conse-
quencel ] used to hide myself in
corners, shedding many tears and
racking my brain 10 find some
means Of pleasing the obdurate fair
one-labor in vain, q thankless task,
OF eight years of age or at thirty.
To distinguish myself in my stud
les, TO win by my exemplary con-
duct the encomiums of the sisters
Dulorre, all this made no impress
sion upon cruel Georgette. She
made no secret of her preference for
a dull, idle, clustering fellow nine
years old, who won all the races,
who could fling a ball farther than
any one else, carry two huge die
tionaries under his arm and admin
lister terrible thumps,
This hero was rightly picknamed
Met-a-Mort.
I knew what his blows were like,
having been the involuntary recip-
lent Of some of them. Some, do |
say? l had received more than a
dilatory donkey on the road to the
fair.
| And Georgette had only laughed,
Obviously it was absurd to think
of employing physical force against
my redoubtable rival and 'intellec-
{iial superiority in this case availed
me nothing. l determined, there
fore, to annihilate Met-a-Mort by
my empowering magnifcence.
Naturally our parents did not
send us to school attired in our
best clothes. On the contrary, most
of us wore there our oldest and
shabbiest garments. Consequently
l opined that it would be no difficult
achievement to outShine all my
sehoolfellows,
I should have to coax my parents
into loosening their purse strings
and get them to buy me a beautiful
new jacket.
1t took me a very long time to de-
eide what color this Jacket should
be. ] mentally reviewed all the col
ors Of the rainbow, Red tempted
me, but | doubted whether jacket
of that color would be attainable.
Should it be blue, green, indigo, vio-
letP Mo- Not one of those colors
was sufficiently striking.
/ paused at yellow. That might
do. 1t is a rich color. There is
something sumptuous and royal
about it. Summer was approach
ing. l decided finally upon yellow
jacket of nankeen.
Without delay / SET to work on
my sehOol garments. 1t was work
Of destruction, for l wanted to make
them appear as disreputable as pos
sible. l slyly enlarged the holes
wrenched off the buttons and deco
rated my person lavishly with spots
and stains of all kinds.
In what l judged to be an op.
perfume moment ] timidly express
ed my desire,
I had to do more, much more
than that, before / could obtain my
will. / begged, stormed, grumbled
sulked. l became almost i'll with
hope deferred. At length, for the
sake of peace, my parents granted
my eccentric wish.
1t was a proud moment for me
when for the first time ! arrayed
myself in that resplendent nankeer
jacket won at the cost of so many
struggles. Standing before the mir
ror, surveyed myself admiringly
for a full hour. was grand-su
peril
~Ah, my Lord Met-a-Mort, yor
will find yourself ousted at last
Ny shining jacket will soon snatch
from you the prestige acquired By
your stupid, brute force, Georgette
astonished, fascinated, dazzled ant
delighted, will run toward me, fol
/ shall now be the handSomest boz
: in the school. Met-a-Mort will weel
, for chagrin, as l have so often wep
for jealousy and modification"
Alas for my rose colored antici
pationsl l was greeted with
broadside of laughter. Even oul
| I,,lArro