The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1903-03-27

stretching out in a long vista that was lost to sight somewhere in the
vague and impenetrabe distance. All! those were palmy days in this
country when the nation stood on a solid foundation and a maj had to
rattle off the COW to get enough ready cash to take all his family in to see
the side-show. A crcus manager would get eight or ten good, medium
sized families into his tent and then he would send a mar out in front to
turn people away n account of the jam. .
Those were the days Of happy homes. Every home was so happy
you could hear the commoion three miles away on a clear day. AS you
entered the home you were knocked off your feet at the front door by
seven geeful, merry children who were chasing al eighth one with the
Ratchet and laughing with all the rolicking mrth of innocent childhood.
You passed N into the sitting room where another group of ronping,
jolly little ones had the baby dashed to the leg of a rocking chair and were
preparing to burn it at the stake with all the in-concealed merrinent of
care-free youth. Passing on into the next room you were delighted and
pleased to find another ight-hearted and merry bunch, dancing with in
nocent ghe aroundthe room while one of their number was merrilv rub
bling a bottle of shoe polish into the hair of a triplet and shouting with
harmless and infectious joy. Scarcely able to contain your joviaity and
ecstasy, you passed merriy out to the woodshed where the happy, jolly
father of the geeful family had a twin in one hand and an old hickory
smgletree in the other and was caressrng it with all the proud enthusiasm
that an affectonate and idoizing father could bestow..
Those were the ha1cyon days in this country as President Roosevelt
says: Those were the good, old days of whooping cough and triplas
when a pair of jeans pants and a copy of the elementary arithmetic
started at the oldest boy and went right on down the line like a cud of
chewing gum O. a epidemic of the measles. But those glorious, old
times ire ended, a S President Roosevelt says. No longer the land is
filled with the wHdeyed whoop of IS boys and a goat IS they race
through the house, dragging the youngest baby by the ear. The Amer
lean home to-day is sad and lonely. Sunshine and mumps have fled.
Joyousness and teetblng are known no more. The home is gloomy, for
there is no on now to swallow the tacks " pour soft soap into the alarm
clock: No one now to whale away at mamma with the butcher knife "
jb mashed potatoes down papas neck. No one now, as President
Roosevelt says, to grab the cat by the left ear and throw it into the cs-
tern, or spill gravy in the lap of the company.
Twenty-Five years age, as President Roosevelt says, you could enter
almost any American home and be sure of a hearty welcome on the point
of a bent pin. You could sit and talk with the genial host and hostess
and be almost sure to get a handful of lard thrown in your ear, " to
get weted across the neck with a sewing machine belt while YOU were at
prayers. Twenty-Five years ago you could enter most any home a. an
honored guest, and before you had been there IS minutes thew would
prove their happiness by taking your hat out in the back yard and using
it for a football, yanking your neckte out of its socket, and tying your
coat tails together behind the chair and then calling you to the door in
a great hurry. 1t makes one sad to enter a home now and not get laid
low with a superannuated chair-rung, as President Roosevelt says, often
er than once an hour Twenty-Five years ago if you passed a gentleman
wearing an eye with a large, navy-blue background and one ear in his
vest pocket or a lady whose bangs looked like they had been picked be-
fore they were ripe, you knew instinctively that they had been visiting in
some home that was in a high and intense state of happiness.
Those were the glorious, old days when the nation was safe, but
nobody else was. The nation had a grand and promising future, but
the person who went around much knew not the hour nor the moment
when he would have his vest jeked in one direction and his immortal
soul in the other.
The nation was in the zenith of its power and on every hand could
be heard the shril squawk of national stability: Membraneous Group
and the Monroe doctrine were chuns. The land was filled with scarlet
rash and profound faith in the government. The popular street saluta-
ton was: Good morning. How is all the famly?" 20, they ar all
quite hearty, thank you, but II, and they have the measles and a new goat
with short whiskers and a meal eye" But the nation now is tottering:
The race is dying out. Where once the average number of children in a
family was IS it has now dwindled down until it isn't probably more than
a fraction over IA.