The Saint Paul globe., 1905-01-22

sands of dollars, and the city became.
anxious to assure the outside world
that there was hardly enough cold
weather to freeze bucket of water,
Other crazes came and the adult popu-
lace dropped coasting.
Small Boy Still at Ii
Not so with the small boy Despite
his impetuosity he is one of the most
conservative of animals, and pastimes
centuries old are still his chief delight
and solace. The pageantry that marked
the days of the craze might appeal to
him, as something pleasant in itself.
but essentially outside of the sport, ex-S
traneous and nom essential. Thus, when
the gaudy trappings We're stripped from
coasting, the small boy of that day and
generation continued with his sled, and
succeeding stages of youngsters stepped
into the ranks as fast as adolescence
depleted them, and the boy of today is
sliding down hill" with vigor and dar-
ing, albeit that he has never heard of
the good old days when it was the chief
winter sport of the community. In his
little soul the poetry of rapid motion
throbs as violently as it did in the
| opium shattered De Quincy, seated
aloft on the English mail coach. On
Lexington, Chatsworth, Eagle street.
! Cedar, Ramsey, or dozen other hills,
he is every day expending the maxi.
| mum amount of labor for few brief
| seconds of arrow like fight
| To one for whom the magic portals
! Of childhood are forever barred, there
| comes plenty Of philosophy establish
Ing the futility of coasting as a line of
human endeaVor The pioneer China
man who was inveigled on to a tobog-
| gan at Quebec, summed his experience
eloquently and briefly, "Shzzzz-wall1
! back half mile" which will probably
| jibe with the sentiments of the staid
| and portly man of affairs, who in the
early eighties made the WabaSha hill
echo with his shouts Of elemental glad
ness.
The small boy is not philosopher,
or rather he transcends all PHILOSOPHERS.
He may never have reasoned tosthe
conclusion that the total of indisputa
| bic knowledge may be compressed to
the one atom that man knows that
| pleasure is pleasant, but he conducts
| himself accordingly. He is prof1igate e
! in the expenditure of effort in pursuit
/ of joy. The half-mile walk is simply
an incident to him, of SO slight i'm
portance that it is barely within his
consciousness. He takes no note of the
/ long uphill, with his sled tugging OBJ
stinately at his heels, but babbles. to his
| fellows, his mind still flooded SWifh the
delight of his fight. So he continues,
darting down the hill for twosnainutes,
toiling back for. fifteen, well satisfied
With his bargain until the early Winter
shadows shoe him home to the freside
and the supper table.
| Hills in Fine Condition
/ This winter has been particularly fit-
ting for the small boy and his sled.
There came plenty of snow and traff1c
soon packed and glazed il until it offers
little or no friction to the polished
steel runners.
There is much to see in an al fternoon
on one of the hills, and If one be un-
| obstrusiye enough budding human ma
ture may be studied deeply. Life's
tragedies, comedies. struggles and pas
sions are enacted in the miniature.
] There is the scramble for precedence;
the demand for conformity to youthful
customs, and the desire Of each to bear
off the honors for the longest slide.
/ There are insults and injured feelings,
forgiveness and reconciliations aris-
tocracy and proletariat, the same. as in
the world of grownups, except in the
matter of social standing the law is re-
yersed, the youth from the fats by
virtue of physical or other prowess
generally overruling the child of lux
ury.
The great sociological problem on the