The Marlboro democrat. [volume] (Bennettsville, S.C.) 1882-1908, 1907-04-26
BEAUTY ALL AROUND.
The Story OF the Plough Boy eejy ard
Mouse.
The Thought That First Inspired
Burns and Gave tho World a Grcat

1"o AhoNbuV AHot rlrSt llSplreu
Burns aud Gave tho World a Great
Poet.
One day a boy, poor son of power
ty-stricken parents, was driving q
plow through the sterile soil of q
rocky field. The task was hateful to
him. He did not like to work, and
what manual labor he did was done
reluctantly. Only because his faith
er and all the children were compel.
ed to cultivate a wretched farm to
avoid starvation, was this boy found
on that bleak autumn day li~stlessly
holding ramshackle outfit pulled by
a c%adaverous horse. His body was
i there but his thoughts were else.
where and his waking hours were
spent iii benioaning his miserable lot.
While in this frame of mind the
~ploughshare ran through a mouse's
nest, from which the dazed occupant
fled in timid terror. This would
mean nothing to the ordinary pillow
boy. Millions of them, before and
since, have turned up the nest of a
field mouse, have pursued and killed
the occupant and thought no more
about it.
Not SO, this particular farm boy.
He thought much about it during the
rest of the day, and after he turned
out YEARLY for the day his thoughts
still dwelt upon the helpless creature
that had been ruthlessly deprived of
house and home and thrown upon
the charities of a cold and ~unfeeling
world. The result was a poem and
such a poem as had never before fall
en- from the pen Of man. The poor
farmers boy put himself in the place
OF the mouse and spoke to the world
from the mouse's standpoint. Infinite
was the pathos, profound the philos-
ophy, crowded into this brief com
position. 1t meant little to the
mouse, whose injury was beyond re-
pairing, but it meant much for the
boy, nothing less than q crown of
.fadeless Immortality?
Much yet remains unsung and
though there is no longer a Burns tc
sing the songs of nature, to extract
beauty from the humblest incidents
of farm life, the lesson he i~nculcated
has not lost its value. Real happiness
| consists in seeing the charm of things
all around us. in appreciating the
sweets that are set before us, above
all in the faculty of idealizing the
commonplace. We must not wait
for great events, spectacular occur
rences, for things to occur on ;
grand scale. 1t is the ordinary thai
happens every minute, every hour
the extraordinary comes but seldom
It's all there before the farmer, ever
the humblest, much to be admired
something to be appreciated at tn,
full.
If there a a poem in the fright
ened mouse, why not in the cripple,
gosling, the motherless calf, tn
blooming flowers, the growing grain
the lowing herds and the canticles O
the farmyard. "The kingdom 0
heaven is without you" is the mos
valuable of Christ's savings. If no
found there, it will not be found il
gorgeous cathedrals, in solemn tenn
pies or in the mystic land Of langui,
longing. # we wait for tomorrow
it may never come; today, this min
ute, is all that belongs to us. Dali,
life is but a routine, the going owe
and over of the same things. 1t will
surely become tiresome to those VIII
have notlearned how to pluck beaut,
from the wayside, how to continu,
to love what is seen constantly O,
every hand. The music is all thor,
if a harpist be present to touch tn,
cords; a few wires strung in a win
dow being sufficient to extract from
the rowing wind melodies worthy O,
Mozart.
Blessed is the gift of extracting
good from everything and thrice
blessed the messages of encourage
ment and comfort that are brought
by the faculty Of approaching the
common things around us. All are
not philosophers and all cannot be
poets, but every one can learn thai
he has before him in substance al
that can be boosted by the richest
Rockefeller's palace is no more tc
him than the nest was to the mouse
and, more fortunate than TIE wealth
Hest millionaire, the little rodent had
a Robert Burns to immortalizc its
name in song, Though we may not
be able to sing, we are able to ap-
spreciate the song when sung, and
after Investigating the question from
all sides it will be found that herein
lies the secret OF the much sought
happiness. 1t is before you, in the
rustic of the November leaves, the
signing Of the autumnal brcczes, the
plaintive cries of departing birds and
the warmth that causes the children
to cluster around the family frcside.
"A Growing EVIL.
One of the many growing evils of
this country today is the city depart
(ment store. In our town, where we
have the best of stores, the most
honorable of merchants, and where
lgoods are sold at a margin SO small
as not to afford a respectable living