Year: 1874

After-dinner talk" has been thought Of
great Importance. The expression has passed
into literature, with many records of the
good sayings included Kings and ministers
condescend 10 make efforts at it poets and
ilosophers-greater than kings and minis
ters--do not disdain 10 attempt 10 shine in it.


But nobody has yet shown what "aiter-
supper talk ought to be. We are not
speaking now of the formal entertainment
known rs q supper !" we mean the every
day evening meal in the everyday home-the
meal known heartily and commonly as
"supper" among people who are neither SO
fashionable nor so foolish as 20 take still q
fourth meal at hours when they ought to be
asleep in bed.


This ought 10 he the sweetest and most
precious hour Of the day. 1t is too often
neglected and lost in families. It ought to
he the mothers hour-the mothers opportu-
nifty 10 undo any mischief the day may have
done, 10 forestall any mischief the morrow
may threaten. There is an instructive dis
position in most families to hnger at the
| supper-table, quite unlike the eager haste
which is seen at breakfast and dinner
Work is over fort the day; everybody is tired,
even the little ones who have done nothing
but play. The father is ready for slippers
I Il
ready and eager to recount the incidents of
the day. This is the time when all should
be cheerod. rested, and stimulated by Just
the right sort Of conversation, just the right
! sort OF amusement


The wife and mother must supply this
need, must create this atmosphere. We do
not mean the father does not share the re-
sponsibility Of this as Of every other hour.


But this particular duty is one requiring
qualities which are more essentially feminine
than masculine II wants a light touch and
an mdertoHe 10 bring out the full harmony
of the ideal home evening II must not be
bore. 1t must not be empty it must not
be too much like preachingi II must not be
WHO'LL like play more than all things it
must not be always-no, not If it could be
helped, not even twice-the same 1t must
be that most indefinable, most recognizable
thing, a good time Bless the children
for inventing the phrase 1t has, like all
their phrases, an unconscious touch Of sacred
inspiration in il, in the selection of the good
word good" which lays peculiar benedic-
tion on all things to which it is set


If there were no other reason against
chldren's having lessons assigned to them TO
study at home, We consider this a sufficient
one-that il robs them Of the after-supper
hour with their parents. Even if their brains
could bear without injury the sixth, seventh,
or eighth hour, as it may be, of study, their
| hearts cannot bear being starved.


In the average family this is the one only
hour of the day when father, mother, and
children can be together, free from carts and
unhurried. Even to hepoorest laborer's fam
| lily comes now something like peace and rest
forerunning the intermission Of the night.
Everybody who has any artistic sense rec
ogIizes this instinctively when he sees
| through the open doors of humble houses
the father, and mother and children gath
cred around their simple supper Its mem
tion has already passed into triteness in
verse, so inevitably have the poets felt the
sacred charm of the hour.


Perhaps there is something deeper than,
on first thoughts, would appear in the instant
sense Of pleasure one has in this sight also
/ the universal feeling that the evening gath
ering Of the family is the most sacred one.
| Perhaps there is unconscious recognition
that dangers are near at hand when night
falls, aud that in this hour lies, or should lie,
/ the spell TO drive them away.


1 There is something ALMOST terrible in the
mingling of danger and protection, of harm
and help, of good and bad, in that one thing
darkness. God "giveth his beloved sleep


in it; and in it the devil sets his worst lures,
/ by help of it gaining many soul which he
could never get possession Of in sunlight.
| Mothers. fathers, cultivate after-supper
talk" play after-supper games;" keep
"after-suppcr books" take all the good
newspapers and magazines you can afford,
and read them aloud "after supper" Let
boys and girls bring their friends home with
them at twilight, sure of a hospitable wei
come and of a good time after supper and
parents may laugh to scom all the tempta-
tons which town or village can set before
them to draw them away from home for
their evenings.


These are but hasty hints bare sugges-
tions. But If they rouse one heart to a new
realization Of what evenings at home ought
10 be, and what evenings at home too often
are, they have not been spoken in vain or
out Of season.