Norwich bulletin., 1909-12-04
THE MAN WHO TALKS

youth and age they have a different front. To youth they are filled with
 expectancy-to age they are filled with
 lnemories-pleasant memories, which, | like the beautiful flowers which have l faded, have left durable impression. l Age puts into these months the joy l youth gets out of them-but age can not keep in them the pleasure it once | found there-or the cheerful faces, or 1 the singers with their pretty songs, or
 the mothers and fathers with their | gracious remembrances, or the broth CTS and sisters and friends who used to
 make up the happy company. These picture months to age have been made | so by the merry days of youth--pic- lures that were and scenes which may | be renewed in the borderland, and
 which are solace to declining years. l received letter not long since which referred to a man who had fin- | ished his earthly career, and in which | the information was imparted that "he
 was not a religious man I do not
 know that I ever read more disturb ing sentence than that. The writer, of course, thought he was not; but what did he know about it? It came over me that some men we call profane
 might be more religious than some who think it good policy to perfunctorily keep up religious appearance. Re hgfon is not a pose and a parade, but a matter of feeling and doing, and there is good fellowship in the real
 thing, not an icy interest in ones fel- bowman. Doing kindnesses because
 one thinks he must to be saved, not
 because he loves to. is the cheapest kind of goodness on earth and the thinnest. This man who twas not re- ligious" sacrificed his life teaching his feilowmen how to live right and to es- cape the affiictions which come through ignorance, and I reckon he was as religious as those who declare such man is not.
 The other day we received from "J. C.. E." a souvenir postal card of the mouth of the Shetucket river where it renters the Thames, directing our att tention to the head of the old guard" formed by the ledge and the abutment of the old bridge on the right bank of the river on which the westerly end of ths covered railroad bridge used to rest--a better face than the old man of the mountains" or the face of the man in the moon..' Never having heard of 1t before it is a real discovery to "J. C. E." but my attention has been called to it before. Yet it had got out of mind. It is more prominent upon this Reid & Hughes Co. card than 4 NF-i bf4OAt ScLW AN anu ny the photo up endwise the land and woods on the west bank of the Thames form champagne bottle-not that Norwich takes to the bottle more than other cities of it's size, but because
 when this was made a champagne country its beauty was enhanced by these receding wooded hills on which the aboriSines found bowers of beauty and the wild birds and animals : home.
 The truest representative Satan ever
 had on earth is Old John Barleycorn.
 He lures all who make his acquaint-
 ance from happiness to misery. The
 man who smiles with him will weep with sorrow later on. John Barley corn has landed many men in a prison
 cell and not a few on the gallows. He
 doesn't know any road but the road
 to ruin, and he never advises any one
 to stop at the halfway house. He
 makes half the world weep and a
 great part of it mourn. He puts vice where virtue is and laughs when in-
 nocent and helpless children come to
 want. His magic consists of chang
 ing men to sots and women to hags;
 he delights to put misery in the place
 of happiness; and his only ambition
 is to make the world stagger. No
 good can be said of him. The devil
 himself would be failure if he kept Old Johns company too long.
 The rear platform crowc upon a trolley car are a recognized nuisance to the women who have to board the car and to the conductor who has to collect the fares, and not a few find 1t q convenient method of sliding off before the conductor gets to them and to evaoe the fare. Having rode there more than I can really find any de- fense for, I feel qualified to call att tention to what the conscientious trolley Conductor regards as a nuis- ance. It Is not pleasant for a lady to have to crowd through a lot of ear-platforlners to get into the car or to get out. There are times when this condition cannot be helped, of course for a car aisle crowded with strap hangers is no more agreeable to ladies than crowded platforms. This could be avoided by the company if they knew when crowds are going to be out. but there is really no way to anticipate such times. and there are times when all the cars are in serv- ice and 1t cannot be avoided hence is not an offence.
 We have always regarded a mother in-laW as a necessity and have never synnpathized with those who joke about her. She is neither a joke nor conundrum. She would be more popular with sons-in-law if she did not soon acquaint them with the fact that they do not know it all, and vol unteer to teach her daughter how 10 manage a husband or the husband how to make his mate cherish and obey him. It takes two mothers-in- law to form the right and left wings of a family and the family cannnr ha complete without them. They are the pair who beat a full hand--rhey're true trumps. A mother-in-law never wrote a book on How to Be Happy Though Married" for it takes q spins ter to direct along such lines. They have the recipes for making chow chow and for finding peace or pare goric when the first baby is cutting it's teeth. They're a help i the hour of perplexity and sometimes perplex- ity itself
 What do you suppose the reason is that people do not do as we think they should do? If they only would, how much happier life would be-for us. We do not know that it would be any happier for them. We only think that it might be. and we are as liable to be wrong as right in this conclusion. If half the world should be given their way it seems to me as if the other half | would have something to laugh at all of the time We are so human that we sometimes pray for conditions which would upset us if our prayers were answered and we had them sud- denly thrust upon us. What we win we are entitled to, and what we long for would not be worth having if it came easy. What we think others should do is an assumption usually