Waterbury evening Democrat., 1907-12-17
ACROSS THE WATER
Old Folks al Home Look for Let
 lers at Christmas Time.

Business is not rushing at the money order department of the post office but quite a few are sending small sums to friends in different parts of the world, so that while the amounts forwarded are not as large as formerly, they will be sufficient in most cases at least to make the old folks at home happy over Christmas. A nice letter even though it does not contain much money goes a long way towards lighting up the home especi- ally at this season, when most peo- ple's thoughts are centered upon the family circle. There may be and no doubt there are, many we'll meaning men and women, who cannot afford to send a check to their friends for Christmas, but 1t is doubtful if any, body is so poor that he could not spare the price of postage stamp and little stationery, so that the man whose parents are disappointed in not receiving a letter at this season is a sort of ingrate and he would be too poor to help anybody even to the ex- tent of cheerful word If he were rolling in riches. Most people who call at the post office and the different foreign agencies and send words of cheer and orders for sums of money
 small and large as they happen to be, could find use for this money in their own homes if they cared to apply it to that purpose, but they prefer to ;e oF lxip OthprS h9nDV and they are right. It is nice ob- ject lesson for children. The man who has little over and above his own immediate needs and is too stingy to make a Christmas present to his parents never will realize what this means until the time comes when he will look in vain for some recog- milton from his own offspring. And there are others, brothers, sisters, neighbors, schoolmates and compan- ions of ones youth who like to keep up old acquantances and to whom a letter from America would be rare treat any time, but more so at Christ mas than any other season. But Ot course it is the old folks, the father or the mother, or both, who have the strongest claims upon our sympathles and naturally they feel the situation most keenly when with their neigh bors they call at the post office at the Christmas time and find that none of the absent ones had remembered them even to the extent of short letter eX- tending to them the compliments Of the season. IL is mistake to con
 clude that there is no welcome for what is termed an empty letter. Many want nothing from their chil- dren, but every father and mother is anxious to hear how the boys and girls are faring in the struggle for life in the parts of the world where they have decided to take up per- manent residence, and as conse- uuence parents in the different towns and hamlets in all parts of the world, the new as we'll as the old, look for a Christmas greeting from their children and surely this is the very least they have right to expect. All honor to the man no matter what his race, creed, or color, or what part of the world he was born in, who puts himself in reminiscent mood at this time and makes up his mind to drcp line home money or no moI-
 ey, and in this way do all that lies in his power to gladden. the hearts oi those who sit musing by the old fire side wondering whether the youths who went out from them to try their luck in other lands are dead or alive. In the absence of letter what other conclusion can they arrive at than that they got lost in the mad scramble for existence and have long since been laid away in the quiet of the grave and try and console them- selves in the belief of a union with the lost ones in the world beyond the great divide. There is nothing fanci- full at all about this picture. There will be thousands Of such homes in different countries the coming Christ mas and it behooves every man and every woman who doesn't want such a condition to obtain where his and her cradles were rocked to get hold of the pen right away, if they have mt airoady dicpharpnd tho oioIipa