353 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



Apr. 1. 



should make no effort at all to dress like other 

 people, and to furnish our houses like other 

 people; but I do say that it is my honest belief 

 thai a great part of our trouble* are caused by 

 our trying so hard to conform to the "fashion 

 of this world " when we honestly can not afford 

 it. I have not (as yet) purchased or worn a 

 pair of toothpick-ioed boots or shoes. I do not 

 believe it would be best for me to say emphat- 

 ically that I am never going to wear them : but 

 I have been thinking pretty strongly that I 

 should never conform to this extreme fashion 

 in footgear— I mean the kind where they run 

 away out to a point so sharp that they may 

 well suggest the idea of tooihpicks. It always 

 makes me think of the caricatures where the 

 prince of darkness is pictured with exceedingly 

 long and pointed toe and heel; and I am really 

 afraid, fathers and mothers, and boys and girls, 

 that the evil one has may be a little to do with 

 these sharp-toed boots and shoes. When we 

 were discussing the matter the other morning 

 at breakfast, somebody said that everybody 

 who tried to be well dressed had bowed down 

 and accepted the new fashion. When our good 

 pastor the other »Sunday morning, however, 

 was speaking, I happened to look down to his 

 neatly dressed feet, and felt glad to see him 

 wear square-toed boots like my own, and I am 

 quite sure nobody in Medina would think of 

 calling him in aiiy respect old-fashioned. 



In a certain household I heard them talk 

 about discarding a beautiful oval-top extension 

 dining-table. It was made of the finest wood, 

 and showed the very nicest workmanship; and 

 the careful housewife had kept it so it was 

 almost as handsome and perfect as when it 

 first left the cabinet-maker's store. I remem- 

 ber of thinKing, when the fashion came in for 

 cutting off the sharp round corners of our 

 dining tables, that it was really a humane im- 

 provement. Not many years ago a child was 

 killed by running against the sharp corner of 

 a table. The oval tables are so much prettier, 

 and more convenient (so it seems to me), that I 

 dia not think they would ever be discarded; 

 but I am told now everybody is getting rid of 

 them, no matter how good a table and how 

 much it cost. Square tables are all the fashion, 

 and we must be up with the fashion or we can 

 not sleep. A few davs ago a good friend of 

 mine said something like this: 



" Mr. Knot, there are a lot of people^in our 

 town who live and think of nothing but keep- 

 ing up with the city fashions, or, at least, get- 

 ting as near to the city style as thev possibly 

 can, and these very people can not afford it." 



A great many times the people who can ;not 

 afford it, or who ought not to afford it, are dis- 

 carding old things that are good and service- 

 able because the style is changed. I thought 

 once I would say something about women's 

 dresses and the big sleeves; but I might make 

 a blunder if I should undertake to do so. I 

 think I heard somebody say the cloth in some 

 of the big sleeves would make a very preity 

 dress for a little girl; but may be the statement 

 was an exaggeration. Just one more point:'5n 



I am pained many times nowadays by seeing 

 children supplied with so many nice toys at 

 such low prices. You may smile at this, for 

 The A. I. Root Co. has dealt in toys quite a lit- 

 tle, and the catalogs have perhaps urged the 

 people to buy them. Well, I have felt bad 

 sometimes to read our own catalogs — not that 

 there is any thing in them that is positively 

 bad. perhaps, but they have reminded me of 

 the time whpn my good father used to whittle 

 out (for quite a family) our sleds and wagons 

 winter evenings. Oh how we did used to enjoy 

 seeing him cut things out of pine, and build 



beautiful structures with that sharp knife of 

 his in just one long winter evening! We boys 

 coveted that sharp knife and the soft pine wood 

 he whittled so beautifully! Why, even the 

 coiled-up shavings that he made were hand- 

 some, and we boys tried hard to whittle out 

 something as nice as the one that "pa made." 

 My older brother became very expert in this 

 work. I remember his making about the 

 handsomest sled I ever saw, out of some hard 

 seasoned ash. Fifty years ago the ingenuity 

 of the boys and girls was called forth in the ef- 

 fort to make their own things; but now we get 

 them ready made by machinery for only a 

 nickel. They cost so little that, if a toy gets 

 out of order, it is thrown into the backyard, 

 or stored away in the corncrib I have been 

 speaking ol. No one tries to mend it, as it costs 

 so little; and even the farmers who sell their 

 corn at 10 and 1.5 cts. a bushel must supply 

 nickels for toys, or rides on electric cars, or for 

 the "slot-machines," and for all else that is 

 going on, or else they will not be " in fashion." 

 I have heard statements at our farmers' insti- 

 tutes to the effect that the farmer is entitled to 

 the best of every thing in the land; he should 

 have as many books and papers, and as nice a 

 parlor, as the banker and storekeeper in the 

 town. Had the speaker added, "If he can af- 

 ford it." I do no not know but I should have 

 said all right. But the idea that some agricul- 

 tural papers have advanced, or the ivay the 

 idea was advanced, that the farmer is entitled 

 to these things, even if it requires a mortgage 

 on his farm, it seems to me is a terrible error. 



Now dear friends, I fear that we are all more 

 or less guilty. 1 am afraid that we who live in 

 the country, and raise garden-stuff for a living, 

 are somewhat to blame for the extravagant ap- 

 propriations that are being made at our state- 

 houses or court-houses in order that we may 

 get even with our rivals in other States or 

 counties in fine buildings. Progress and im- 

 provement are good things. But there are 

 thousands of other things vastly more impor- 

 tant just now than having toothpick-toed shoes 

 and other things to match because they are the 

 fashion. I do not believe these things bring 

 real happiness; and I know from experience 

 that I feel happier and better when I rescue 

 implements from want of care, than I do when 

 I go and buy new things because it is less 

 trouble than to go and fix up the old ones. 

 Christ Jes7is should come before fashion or any 

 thingelse that this world has to offer. Better, 

 a thousand times better, be ont of fashion than 

 to be without the love of the Savior in our 

 hearts. 



THECDISGRACECOFaTHE^CENTURY. 



All over the land there has been a lamentation 

 that our penitentiaries have to be built lareer. 

 Good people are also feeling sad that our pris- 

 ons are mostly filled with American hoys; and, 

 at the same time, at least one State of the 

 Union seems to think it a fine thing to encour- 

 age and develop the mania for prize- fighting. 

 I did not intend to mention the matter at all in 

 these pages, for many times it seems to be true 

 that " the least said the soonest mended." As 

 the fight is over, we might let it drop; but 

 science has been called in to perpetuate and 

 keep it up bv degrading that beautiful new in- 

 vention of Edison's to the level of making it 

 reproduce the hideous spectacle of one human 

 being pounding another to jellv amid the 

 cheers of a crowd of spectators. The W. C. T. 

 U. ha«, however, happily wakened, and is de- 

 manding, not only of the President of the 

 United States, but of the governors of the vari- 

 ous States, that the kinetoscope shall not be 



