Greene County herald. (Leakesville, Miss.) 1898-current, 1908-11-20

BY BENZ. f. WULFF. OF STOCK
TON. CAL, A FORMER GREENE
COUNTY, Mss. RESIDENT.


Established in 1893. In all can
Tor, Mr. Editor, | must say that the
ityle and makeup of your paper is
exceedingly we'll adapted to the
community in which you reside,
and it would be better if the above
quotation could have read 'Estab-
Iished in 1862 The Herald stands
alone in being the only Eastern pa
per that care to read-why? Be-
cause it gives the news of that Sec
ton of the country and it does not
overlook the small details of life
which go so far to make a paper
interesting.
Furthermore, the tone of the pa
per is one of an elevating tenden-
CIV. Note, "WHISKEY ADS Ia
BOOED, there are volumes in that
one sentence. There was time
when whiskey played a very promi-
nent part in the homes of many of
the old timers of Greene County as
it did elsewhere both north and
south. 1t was then thought that
every frolic and every picnic was a
blooming failure unless one could
frequently kiss the yetheH ware. y
The wane or decline of that idea
is decided advance in the right
direction.
Heredity and environment makes
the individual. The conjunction of
these along the line of inebriety
produces sad, very sad things. The
writer speaks from experience, for
he has travelled the road from an
occasional sip from the jolly jug
from stump hole in the piney
woods, to the delerium tremens in
more advanced settlements. For
tunately for the writer and bis
family, he was given from boyhood
to another habit-the habit Of read
ing and thinking; and this habit
gave him some scientific knOwlcddg1
which added to some simple 0bser-
vations, evolved a cure for his dis
ease of inebriety, and for six years
or more, he has been absolutely free
from the desperate tyrant known as
King Alcohol.
Well, we'll, Mr.. Editor this runs
up pretty close to personal history
which could not interest your read
ers. You will excuse me, know
because | feel like one released
from the quick-sands just as he is
getting his nose under. The Irish
man was right when he soliloquiz-
ed: "Oh whiskey, you're the Div
i'll"
The correspondence feature OF
the Herald is just the thing for the
sparsely settled country. Indeed,
it is a good thing anywhere. The
propeller of this cratic pencil in
stalled a similar course with one OF
the Stockton Dailies some years a
go, and it doubled that papers
popularity and subscription list. II
gave the rustic representation.
They contributed the coin. Note
the equation?
Brown-Eyes says that Whit
Moody sits around the stove smok-
ing his cob pipe wishing some one
would come in and buy a pair OF
overalls. Now Brown-Eyes mis-
takes the meditation of Whit. You
may wager your last dollar that
Whit has higher but perhaps more
dreamy meditations than of over.
alls. Doubtless in the sclace of the
Greene County Meerschaum, he
hears the rustling leaves of the corn
and sees again the bright eyes of
other days greeting him in kindness
and candor, in the lane which sep
Grating the corn fields, leading along
blythe old Washington Church to the
home of old Timer" Green.
Now Brown Eyes, Charley Hill
man was rather late in thinking
about moving his fence in order to
give his potatoes room to grow.
Potatoes don't grow even in prolific
Greene County after frost, do they?
However, if Hillman would only
build his fence so that his yams
might expand out to California,
should be pleased to take slice.
We have plenty of sweet potatoes
in California; during the fall sea-
son but they are of an inferior
quality. The kind we have here is
the yellow potato such as you have
for early use. One never sees a
genuine yam. Even if they had
them here they would not know how
to keep them until they were good.
They would bed them in sand or
soil until the chemical change of
incipient sprouting set in and thus
spoil them. they do that now
with what they call sweet potatoes
and their insipidity surpasses de.
scription. To a Californian there
is no meaning expressed by "Pos-
sum sop and yam" potatoes. He
knows neither and has therefore
missed one of the luxuries of life
Ia luxury so grand that the mere
mention, as the tradition goes,
made a darkey fall off log in
stanter. What Southerner can ever
forget the movement of the enlarg-
ed white circle in the eye of a
chocolate colored member of
Southern society at the mention of
this luxury? A Northern or West
ern man might suppose that this
particular subject Of the fourteenth
amendment to the U. S. Constitu-
ton was suffering with acute ap-
pendicitis, but denizen of Dixie
would Immediately know that this
ocular agitation was due to the
suggestion of "Possum sop and yam