The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1907-01-04

fifteen cents per day for food by
purchasing nickel beer morning,
noon and night at a free lunch es-
adjustment at whose counter he
ate cOpiously. This worked beau
tifully for few weeks until the
bartender began to sit up and
take notice that the OutgO was all
out of proportion to the income
and then the Londonderry states
man merely had to select a new
free lunch route. | only incor-
pOrate this idea in these memoirs
in view of the possibility that it
may sometime be available to
some of you. Probably entirely
out of the question now in
Orange county.
The outward and visible mani
festations of Christmas here are
usually a frightful and for three
days incessant din from tin horns
manipulated by small boys and
hOodlums of all sizes, but this
year the police sat down hard on
this form of idiotic enjoyment
and only here and there a soil
tary squall rent the frosty air.
The practice has been increasing
for years of making the day and
night into a vale Of Gehenna by
the raging of horns in the faces
of shoppers and everybody else
on the streets until it became such
a nuisance last year that decent
public opinion demanded that it
cease. Hence the official
of the blackguards
this season.
A walk through the principal
streets and the market spaces
Monday and Christmas eve was
a most interesting sight even to a
old resident. The great depart
ment stores and all the smaller
shops Mere their brightest and
busiest, and in the shopping dis
tricts one only moved slowly and
with difficulty. Tens of thousands
of belated purchasers were surg
ing and crOwding to fill out their
lists, and in more than one in
stance the crowds became mObs
and riots nearly resulted. On
the opening of a new ten cent
store a week ago such an army of
women charged the store on the
doors being unlocked that twenty
extra policemen were hurriedly
telephOned for and even this de-
tail was unable to withstand the
mob. The consequence was that
the interior of the store was prac-
tically wrecked and not an arti-
Gle sold the first day.
The great stores were packed on
every floor with struggling push
ing, squirming and angry masses,
and purchasing was almost i'm.
possible. Besides the army OF
purchasers thousands of sight
seers and merrymakers filled the
sidewalks, along with scores of
of tops and mechanical
contraptions without name or
limit. The market spaces were
filed with evergreen trees and
holly by the ton and acre, with a
good supply of the inevitable mis-
tletoe, all brought in from the
from ten to five hundred
miles distant Holly grows wild
like any forest tree in Virginia
and Maryland, but the demand for
it is such that the region here
abouts is soon depleted and most
of the stock comes from the Caro-
linas and even farther south. The
mistletOe practically all comes
from south of Virginia.
In the evenings for a week be
fore Christmas all the open spaces
around the great markets was
packed with the above Christmas
greens, and before them burned
huge bOnfires to keep some degree
of warmth in the white and color
ed attendants and also to add to
the attractiveness of the thus
brilliantly lighted scene. Certain
Iy the hundreds of curbstOne bon
fires surrounded by happy dark
9ys and with the freight dancing
on the great banks of Christmas
Trees and holly made a most pic
Euresque sight. Then the Out-Of
door stalls at markets, miles of
them, piled high with every mag
nable eatable under the moon,
ish, flesh, vegetable and fruit, all
by anxious purchas
ers, made a most interesting sight
TO throngs of visitors.
Meantime the theatres are all
playing to packed houses, and
everything in the nature of an
of any kind finds a
most satisfactory patronage. The
Army lads and lassies
lave been busy for weeks collect
ng funds sufficient to give a
thousand bountiful free dinners
o as many deserving poor, and by
he help of the "Army" another
lrmy of Gods unfortunates from
he byways and hedges are once
more gathered into the feast in
lis name. The local Organiza-
ion of X. p, Almas Temple, it
elf provided five hundred baskets
containing a ham a sack of flour,
neck of nOtatOes, a pound each