Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1904-12-21

We are liable TO tell each other any
thing through the year, but we never
say anything with a Christmas pres
ent unless we mean it.
The plush photograph album is no
deceiver of persons, and the earmitts
speak louder than words.
The pair of wrist-warmers come
straight from the heart, and the fancy
vest which has a breaking out on it
in six colors is given on account Of the
love of the giver, and not on account of
the grand, spectacular beauty OF the
gift.
We don't take our Christmas present
downtown on the morning of the Goth
and see how much we can get on it in
order to ascertain how much affection
the giver has for us. Ii we don't get
anything but a frost-bitten card with
a picture of a Russian soldier expiring
on a two-dollar bedstead, or Santa
Claus sliding down an eight-inch Chin
ney with a clothes hamper full of toys
on his shoulder, or a village church
with the janitor sitting out on the
front steps trying to think what to do
with his salary, or an unknownsfarm-
er driving II the card on a load
of four-foot wood, we should, we say,
be happy over a gift like this even if
we don't admire the great scenic
beauty of the janitor, for it shows that
w have a friend who hasn't forgot
ten us.
And speaking Of the granulated
Christmas card brings to mind it's
great companion piece of artistic tri-
umph, the New Years card. No artist
has ever been able to illustrate so
graphically and SO wonderfully the
swift and fearful flight of time as has
the profound genius who makes the
New Years cards.
We have before us a picture of the
year 1902, taken when a child, on "a
card that has sandpaper and table salt
nailed all ove one side Of it.
AT the time the negative was secured
he was a sweet and beautiful little
fellow, with sunny ringlets of golden
hair, and on his lips was the happy
smile of innocent childhood. All, how
sweet he looks in his little bathing suit
standing there in his bare feet in the
snow, with the mercury frozen to a
cake, and the biting blasts playing
with his curls and blowing them in a
southeasterly direction!
But now we have a new photograph
of him just taken, and D, what a
change the year has wrought! He is
an old man now with wasted limbs and
round shoulders and long Angora
whiskers and a general air of hope
less and settled melancholy. All, one
would O. believe that time couldImake
such a change, but, according to the
New Years artist, we are yanked on,
ever on, faster than we realize, and
the little child that this New Years
plays bare-footed in the snow will next
year be the emaciated old gentleman
with flowing whiskers and facial neu-
ralgia.
We never look at New Years card
any more without having a severe pain
in the vicinity of the chilblains.
But we are hustled along by time at
a pretty lively gait. We do not, of
course, jump from the paregoric bot
tie to the rheumatism liniment quite
as extemporaneously as the New
Years artist would make us believe,
but we are, however, carried along at
a good rate of speed.
The year just passing has, in fact,
seemed all too short, and vet, in the
world of science, literature and state
craft, how many events of vast andfar-
reaching Importance have been en-
acted! I.
In Iowa a man ate IA raw eggs at one
sitting, thus establishing a new worlds
record in this department of litera-
ture, and in Kansas a man swallowed
six pumpkin pies at one time without
disturbing his intellectual poise.
A gifted! Michigan men pushed a
wheelbarrSw clear from his home to
Washington, d. c., and back again, and
a Nan in Kentucky called another man
a liar and lived through it.
An Indiana scientist had almost in,
vented a perpetual motion machine
when they came and got him and
hauled him away to a place of secur-
ity, and another co-worker in the great
field of thought went through the rap
ids of Niagara Falls in a barrel.
And thus we see that general civil
cation has kept marching right along
during the year 1902, Notwithstanding
the ~inclemency of the weather.
Let us each, as we approach the new
year, bear in mind that we are a year
Older now than we were last New
Years, and SO a good many things that
people were willing to overlook in us
a year ago will not now be passed by
SO lightly.
Let us all, in fact, during the year
1908, so live that people will wonder
what political office we are thinking of
coming out for.
Intelligent Shepherd Dog.
From rural France ome a story