The Guthrie daily leader. [volume] (Guthrie, Okla.) 1893-1996, 1904-12-16

JONAH ANu The WHALE.
" this wholesale seaaociasm does not
stop pretty soon we viii be race Of
sksptlcs
One by one the blessed stories Of cur
youth are talen away from us. The
basis upon which chldlike faith rests
is getting narrow and more harrow.
Before long some savant will come
along with prcof that no apples grew
in the Garden of Eden that Sampson
was understood and aenemic. aad that
jon never had any turkey
one of the beliefs that made Sunday
school attractive to ms was the won
derful story of some man by the name
If Jonah. popularity supposed by the
wise ones Of The infant class tc have
swallowed a whale.
We we're in no mood to ocvil or
question We accepted IL. end our
vigorous infant imaglnations immcdi
ately got to work and evolved a per
fectly satisfactory theory TO account
Tor 1t True. we had never met with
sny cases of the gini in our somewhat
limited personal experiences; we had
never seen n whale. But then we had
never seen a Jorah either Who were
we that We should doubt? We prefer
red belief aLd there was fine
l3robdlgnag Favor 10 the story that
recommended it. We even tried in a
spirit Of emulation, to swallow the
camel from our Nosifs ark We wera
in no mood 10 strain at either guats
or camels OF whales.
But disillucionment came with wears.
BY the time we had been promoted so
often that it was expected that we
w3uld bring iive.aent piece instead
If a copper ceat 10 sunday school. we
had iearnel ;hqt Ionah did not swal-
low the whale Int that the whale had
swallowed Jonah was tame beside
the former story; still there was some
play for the imagination left.
We vonde'ed how Jonah passed.
away tho time dnrins his three days
in the whales interior
department We imagined the conster-
nation OF the men who cut into The ami
ma whsn the nan Of prayer popped
out. We wOuld have liked 10 have
been cut out from a whale ourselves
juut 10 enjoy the general astonish-
-nent.
But again came a dlsillusionment
At school we leaTed that The throat
Of a whale is so small thst MT even a
Nunlber 4 size,l prophet could get into
his stomach Inquiry revealed he fact
that IL was not whale at all but a
big esn' of sorae SOFT or other who
swallowea Jcaah We Thought &c,
mieht have been shark Tut research
the habits Of sharks con.
WINGED us that while one Of them
would aot 'iloly BE- averse To taking
Jonah in the chances against him get
ting out lcain we're rather small.
Theology came to ON assistance
We gathered that it was some sort of
a FISH OF which we had never heard
before-a specially prepared fish as
4 We're. WIN. after having appeared
THE once upon the scene. plunged deep
into the waters Of oblivion and was
never heard OF again The romantic
element returned to the story and we
believed It again
And we have for years forborhe fur
lher investigations. We wished to
continue to believe.
Now comes one Mr. Ferrar Fenton.
scholar and translator of the Bible
from the Hebrew, who tells MS that
Jonah was not swallowed hy any
specially prepare esh even lie vas
simply picked up ny the crew OF ship
called The Great FISH" and stayed
nthe hold of the vessel for three days.
Now. wo dca't know who is right