Woodruff County news., 1907-11-28
THE SPIRIT AND FEAST OF
 THANKSGIVING

Sido by side with the Hong, un- broken custom handed down to us by our forefathers" of setting apart an- nually special day for Thanksgiving has also dwelt with us the idea that we must have as nearly as practicable the same kind of a feast as that en- joyed by the first settlers upon these shores. From sentimental view point this theory is undoubtedly cor rect, and would really work out beau tifully were 1t not for certain changed conditions affecting our supply of sea- sonable provisions. A regulation plan of directions for getting up proper Thanksgiving dinner even this year would suggest the providing of oy- sters, turkeys, chicken for chicken pie, with vegetables, fruits, rich pastries, and delicacies in abundance. The idea is to arrange composite meal which shall comprise as nearly as may be the various fruits and products of the earth. And a good and praiseworthy idea 1t is, too, if only everybody had the wherewithal to purchase these
 
 an oysterless and turkeyless Thanks giving for many persons. The causes contributing to this state of things cannot be discussed here; nor does 1t much matter to the man who en- ters meat market and sees turkey which he longs to purchase for his family, but which he knows he cannot afford, just why the commodity, with many others, is so far beyond his means. The thing is he knows it is beyond his means, and therefore he will have to do without it. He must to some extent give up the idea of try ing to initiate that first Thanksgiving dinner in the forest.
 In some respects the preparation of that feast, or the obtaining the arti- cles comprised in 1t, must have been a comparatively simple matter The settlers had but to take down the fowling piece, go into the woods, and bring home the wild game. Well filled oyster beds lay quite near the shore. The harvest was fruitful; grain, wild fruits, such vegetables as they knew how to raise were abundant; nuts of various kinds were plentiful-what. then, was to hinder the making ready feast that should fitly supplement the public Thanksgiving rendered unto the Lord? There is the point. The feast is but the outward sign or token of that which underlies the whole Thanksgiving idea. It is the feeling in the heart, the sentiment of grati- tude for good received, that, after all, constitutes the real Thanksgiving. With this feeling present the absence of the turkey, even though he is every where acknowledged to be the king of the feast, need not be counted misfortune.
 We are too apt to forget just how things were with the settlers. We take the idea of that great historical feast into our minds, and we overlook the dark shadows that must have been in that first Thanksgiving picture It would be good thing if we would try to remember the little graveyard by the waters edge" and make an effort to recall what the record says, that not one household in the New Massa- chusetts colony but had recently been visited by death or severe and pro- tracted illness. But still the prepara- tions for the feast went on, and at convenient time they "solemnized a day of thanksgiving unto the Lord" Surely we can learn a lesson from the simple faith of these pious souls. We are not called upon to-day to suf- fer the privations which were the lot of our forefathers, but any year may bring changed conditions which may necessitate more or less self-denial on our part. If the man who finds him. self unable to buy material for an expensive dinner knows that his fam fly circle is complete and unbroken, and everybody in health and fully able to enjoy the dinner when 1t is pre- pared, he surely has good and suffi- cient cause for thankfulness.