Norwich bulletin., 1910-05-14

written Specially for The Bulletin)
Aunt Eliza Jane believes in Order
with big Co." please. She spends
considerable part OF her time setting
t2e pArior and sitting room chairs
back in straight rows and carefully
souaring the rugs with the lines of
the ffoorboards- She also finds 1T
essential to have the window shades
sal drawn to exactly two and half
inches above the middle sash-rail. 1t
wrecks her nerves il the sofa pillows
fail to touch each other, and destroys
her appetite If they overlap fraction
too much. She keeps her household in
a constant state of suppressed terror,
lest someone sometime lay down some
thing wrong side up or wrong end TO-
'Aorder is heavens first law" is
quotation constantly on her tongues
end It is a favorite of mine. too. l
bseieve in it. She doesn't think do,
though When she comes into my shop
and sees the floor stacked with all
serts of agricultural supplies, and the
workbench just heaped with tools and
boxes and small stun of a hundred
rarities. and the baskets hanging in
all sorts of positions from all sorts of
nails and knobs and hooks and pegs.
she burfes me in a flood or reproba-
tion and castigation and admonition
Rnd warning. She thinks that shop of
mine is a verftable chaos Of disorder
rather uncomfortable temple of order
gone-msd. We both believe in the
idea I'm willing to grant her perfect
honesty ar and sincerity .,, Of p srE.sa
towards me. But in the practical
working out of our conceptions, we are
as far apart as the comet and the
sun
For one, don't think order is who'll.
by dependent upon the carpenters
square and the n1ason's plumb If it
Us, then heaven after making order its
first law proceeded forever after to
disobey it. For sees nothing in
nature outside of few rare crystals,
pendicularness. Really, do you know,
I'd rather take heavens interpreta-
tfon of its own law than Aunt Eliza
James? We men set out our apple
march Ike 80 many men on a checker
board But nature plants her orchards
of pines and hemlocks and oaks and
naples and b1rches and hickories in
an order no mathematician could ever
md . geometric rude for. She scat |
tiers her pinxkers and her kalrnfas |
without regard TO rows or ranks. When |
Aunt Eliza Jane sets out border of |
narcissus or daffodils, she plants the |
bulbs so that the center OF each one
ehlls exactly under her garden line.
When they como up she watches them |
aeaselessly, lest Some unruly stalk get |
0sorderIy and lean an inch or two |
away from the perpendicular AS soon |
~ her deiphiniunae get foot or two |
high, she stakes them and ties them |
and bosses them generally till the |
poor things must forget, sometimes, |
hat they are flowers and suspect |
themselves to be yardsticks stuck on |
nd.
When Uncle Ezra or one of the boys |
hurts a finger and wants a bit of |
co4rt- plaster, then you see Aunt Eliza |
James sense of orderifness perfectly |
exeunplf1ed. She keeps everything in !
boxes and b skets and drawers, and |
always in exactly the same order. AS |
the alpha bet is almost instructive with |
ali of US. she takes to an alphabetical |
arrangement. When the court-plaster |
is called for. she knows just where it |
is It is in the box marked Ban |
dages." IN the drawer marked 'Medi- |
call So she pulls out the drawer, |
takes up the box and opens it. Then |
she lifts off the small box of Arnica |
plesters and the bottle of Balsam lin |
iment and the package of Cots "A B /
C.you1 observe-and then of course
comes to the Court-plaster. She re-
turns to the kitchen where the patient
victim is holding his thumb hopefully, |
and picks I'D her work-baSket. She
lays down the Anime dyes packet, and |
the Button-box and the CROCHET silk,
and the Doilies, and so on down to
the Ribbons and the Scissors. When
she gets Them she is ready to cut off |
slice of the plaster and apply tiff |
the sore thumb hasn't got well in the
meantime. Then she puts the things
back in the ba sket, Scissors first, then
Ribbons. and so on back to Airline /
dyes, and also restores the Court-plas-
ter to its place in it's box. and that box
TO It's place in the Medical drawer.
BY this time she needs to begin get
ting dinner--ff the accident happened
fairly early in the morning.
When | want an axe - q hzlf-inch
screw crowbar or a piece of
string, I walk into my shop and grab +!
1t, the first motion. Whatever it is
that 1 want, it's right there. on the |
bench or on the floor or hanging up |
gainst the wall or from the ceiling. |
] oan go into that shop of a dark night
without any light and lay my hand |
almost at once the thing I want. |
Aunt Eliza Jane finds my shop hope
less and untidy confusion. To me it
IS in apple pie order. Which shows, |
among other things. that Aunt Eliza |
Jane and I aren't the same kind of
As to which of us has |
the most correct idea of orderliness,
as an abstract proposition, there's |