Almost Time for May Baskets

1901

Month of May is Near

Admirers of Young Women and of Old Folks Will Hang Nosegays on Doors — Recalls Visions of Childhood and Youth — Happy Days of Yore

The youngsters will be out with their May baskets in a few nights now. The evening will be punctuated with bursts of illy suppressed laughter and "pit-a-pat" will go the small scurrying feet when the door bell bearing the nosegay has been rung. We have all hung May baskets in our time. Hung them for love and hung them for sentiment and kindness. Who has not hung May baskets? To have failed is to have missed one of the prettiest customs of the American people. There is nothing more joyous than to make the hearts of others beat with pleasure as we do acts of kindness and love to those we hold dear. And how better can this sentiment of affection and regard be expressed than through the language of flowers. Flowers are nearest the angels, and the purer the expression of sentiment the happiest the lover, be the loved one gray-haired and bent or brown-eyes with rosy cheeks.

Who has not wandered in the woodland for the pink anemone and the anemone patens of the common sort, from the meadow bottoms gleaned the caltha palustrus from its banks of yellow? Who has not had mother or sister make the baskets and arrange the tinsel, placing therein the bunches of sweet-scented blossoms? As night grew on apace and the cool May time air snuffed good in the nostrils of youth and toned the muscles to a tension for sprinting, who has not met the neighbor's boy in the woodshed or out by the front gate and with him sped away in the darkness to the home of some fair inamorata whom youthful affection has sought out and made the ideal of ideals? Softly up the front walk with the best and prettiest basket of them all you steal. Deftly it is hung o'er the knob of the big door and then — !

"Ting! Ting! Ting!" goes the bell in blatant tones.

Hip! And with a great stride you leap from the porch and race into the plutonian darkness. From a safe distance you watch the operations at the door, hear the exclamation of delight and then, if there chances to be a big brother, you light out and do some hot footing lest he catch you and discover your passion for his sister. At school next day you manage to insinuate something about May baskets and then you tell a white lie when face to face with a question of identity. You know that you fib, she knows and you both know that each other knows it — but what is the difference, she knows you hung the basket.

And the old people, God bless them, we have all hung baskets of flowers on their door-knobs, and have been happier and better for it. Now as we look back upon the hanging we believe we are happier to have hung the baskets for the old and feeble ones than for the youthful ones. Time cannot obliterate the gratification for having hung these baskets, at least, with no selfish motive, no ax to grind, nothing but pure and unadulterated kindness and a desire to make others happy.

Thus youth, passing along the short shore line of happiness, grows to middle age when May baskets may not be, with propriety, hung, when business threatens to blot out the sentiment of youth. Then it is the children and the young people steal into our lives and re act the old, old story that brings back a flood of recollections and of peace.

Daddy's Bedtime Story — "Where the Bad Boy Found His Manners"

1911

The Bad Boy in the Ditch

"He was really a naughty, ill mannered boy," began daddy. "His parents were wealthy, and they left him to the care of servants, who did not know how to make a good boy of him. The result was that he was impudent to the servants and cruel to dogs and cats and insisted on having his own way always. I shall tell you how he learned a good lesson.

"It happened in the summer time. One day this naughty boy, whose name was Dick, was standing at the gate of his father's house when another boy came there. He was a poor boy — you could tell that by his old clothing — but his shirt waist and his knickerbockers were clean and neat, and his face shone with good nature as well as soap and water. You could tell by looking at him that he was a jolly fellow. He carried in his hand a tin can full of ripe, juicy blackberries, and he asked Dick to buy them.

" 'Go away from here,' said Dick, with a frown, 'or I shall set the dog on you. We don't need your berries. We have everything we want!'

" 'If you have, please give me a drink of water,' said the poor boy. But Dick threatened again to set the dog on him, so he went away whistling.

"Then Dick said to himself: 'Those blackberries looked good. I think I will go and get some for myself.' He went out of the gate and down the road to a place where he knew the blackberries grew. The bushes were on the far side of a wide ditch, which was filled with mud. Dick was too lazy to find a good place to cross, so he tried to jump the ditch.

"He landed right in the middle in mud up to his waist When he tried to get out he found that he was stuck fast and could not free himself. Then he called for help. But it was a lonely spot, and for a long time he heard no answer. Then he heard a voice saying, 'Who's there?'

"Then Dick called again as loudly as he could, and soon he saw at the side of the ditch the poor boy whom he had treated so rudely. 'Hello!' said the boy. 'How did you get in there?'

" 'I fell in,' said Dick. 'Please help me out?'

" 'All right,' said the other boy. And he lay down at the side of the ditch, not minding the mud on his clothing, and reached out his hand to Dick. He was a strong boy, so he soon was able to get Dick out. Dick thanked him and went home to be cleaned off.

"The next day when the poor boy came around again to try to sell his berries Dick was very nice to him. 'Where did you find your manners?' asked the boy. 'In the ditch,' said Dick."

Eli Clouse Revives Annual Hunting Story

1909

It is reported in the city papers that Eli Clouse of Friend's Cove, 30 miles northeast from Cumberland, in Bedford County, has again killed a big deer that had been roaming over the Martin Mountain for many years. The deer was called "Old Elick." It is peculiar that the same old Eli Clouse kills the same old deer every year but he does. Next year "Old Elick" will be roaming again and old Clouse will kill him and tell the old story again to the old hunters who come to hunt on the State reservation and the story will get in the city papers as is its custom. Another peculiar feature of this story is that Martin Hill, where Clouse kills his old deer, is only a few miles from each reporter's headquarters. Surely the mountain do move as often as the deer has lives. It is the reporter's faith that moves the mountain every time. — Cumberland Alleganian.


The Man in the Moon

Russian folklore tells that the man in the moon was one who was seeking the isle in which there is no death. At last, after traveling far, he found the longed-for heaven and look up his above in the moon. After a hundred years had passed, death called for him one Christmas eve and a fierce struggle ensued with the moon, who was victorious; and so the man stayed where he was.


Daily Thought

Whoever you are, be noble; Whatever you do, do well; Whenever you speak, speak kindly — Give joy wherever you dwell.