Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1906-09-13
AGE OF SENTIMENT.
OLD JESTER TIME DELIGHTS IN
PLAYING STRANGE TRICKS.
Aging Folk Seem to Be the Only Sen.
tlmentalists left-Present Gener-
alton Seeks Money and Ma
terial Comforts.
BY MARGARET E. sANGsrER.


mentalists we have left are the old.
Time is a jester and he likes to play
strange tricks by sleight of hand. He
has stolen the slender grace of yonder
substantial matron and given her a
goodly store of ayoirdupois. He has
robbed her of the roundness and
smoothness of girlhood and left
creases and crows feet to mark the
years, but Of one thing he has not
been able to defraud her. Deep in
her heart there is a spring of ro-
nance that bubbles up with the same
silver sound and sweet freshness that
1t did when she was a bride, and al
though she may be a grandmother, she
is more sentimental now than the
pretty bride of the second generation.
Many an old fellow whose name is
known in the stock market and at
whose beck the world of finance
changes place as children do in the
game of stage coach, has an unsus-
pected fountain of sentiment hidden
In his soul He is shrewd, hard-head-
ed and sagacious, but the soft bit of
sentiment is in him still, and it re-
spends to the touch of music and
poetry, to the watt Of perfume, or
the sight of daisies in June. Such a
man will carry folded away in his
vest pocket bit of fugitive verse or
faded photograph, the kind that was
formerly called carte de visite. The
picture is oldfashioned, but 1t brings
back to him the memory of a girl who
died long ago, in the peace summer
that followed our civil war
The old people watch with certain
sympathetic interest the love affairs
of their juniors and often resent and
regret the obvious lack of sentiment
shown by these. A young woman mar
ries a man who can give her COM
Portable home and relieves her from
the drudgery of teaching or sewing
or the inconvenience Of dependence
on parents who have younger children
to provide for To the sensible per
son who takes a discreet, common
place view of life, 1t seems justi-
fable proceeding, eminently wise on
the part of the young woman. Why
should she ask for anything more than
a solid foundation of respect and
esteem on which to begin her mar
ried life The people of her own
period are very apt to take this mat
ter OF fact view. Not so the elderly
ladies who were wooed and won with
chivalrous ardor in the long ago, who
y In he
regard love as hallowed and marriage
as sanctuary, and who shudder at
the thought of q profane foot cross
ing that sacred Threshold. They have
had to part with many illusions on the
road, but the one illusion that has
remained to them a pure reality is
Loves young dream.
Watch people as they read the lat.
est passionate novel and listen to their
criticisms and discussions. The
younger portion of the community
wait with resignation, not to say in
magazine in which the current serial
shall begin, and resume its exciting
episodes. II broke off at a psyche
logical moment. To the white-haired
woman who read It, seated In her
easy-chair beside the window the
story was of breathless interest The
people were not mere puppets, but liv-
ing beings who had reached climax
of good or III fortune, and she prob
ably met them in her dreams for a
day or two. She IL is who loves
lover. She II is who looks across the
room at some one as old as herself
who was young when she was, and
meets in his eyes the glance OF COM
prehension that she fails to find In the
younger faces about her.
Every generation receives its stamp
in the days OF its youth. The pres
ent generation is living In a time OF
wonderful material progress, in a
time, too, when TO be rich Is the am
bition OF nine-tenths Of the communi-
ty and when to nine-tenths poverty
seems the most dreaded fate In the
universe. SO universal Is the desire
for wealth and for the Injuries and
privileges that wealth makes possible,
that various crimes and corruptions
have found their way into places that
once would have sbuddered at the
thought OF them and scorned their
very name.
How can sentiment live and flourish
in a time when gold and greed are the
idols q mems hearts?
For the fourishing OF sentiment
leisure is needed. Not only is the
present generation ambitious for ma
terial prosperity, but 1t is in hurry
10 get on. People no longer live con-
tentedly year after year, In the same
place; they do not strike their roots
deeply anywhere; they are always on
the road California or the Bahamas,
Europe or the far east, allure ped
pie from their firesldes, and globe
trotters are so common that their
coming and going ELECTS no comment.
Time was that great traveller was
a lion, but ia these days he has lost
prestige, and nobody pays him much
attention. The age Is one OF hustle,
haste and a thousand crowding en-
gagements. without leisure we can
not have serenity, and without sereni-
~ NC da uof have continent Com