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GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



June 15 



Oti^ 





By /I.I.R.OOT 



Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy.— Ex. 20:8. 



Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of 

 the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sit- 

 teth in the seat of the scornful. — Psalm 1:1. 



It seems probable that dirigible balloons 

 are going to be quite a feature of our city 

 parks and other resorts; and our dailies last 

 week were giving notice that there w^uld be 

 a number of ascensions from Luna Park, 

 Cleveland, during the present week, com- 

 mencing on Sunday, June 3. As soon as I 

 noticed the opening flight would be made on 

 Sunday, I said to Mrs. Root that there would 

 very likely be an accident, and perhaps the 

 aeronaut would lose his life. May be some 

 of you will call me superstitious when I in- 

 sist that Sunday is not as good a day for 

 such reckless feats of daring as some other 

 day. I do not think I am superstitious or 

 unreasonable; and I am well satisfied myself 

 that Sunday is no different from any other 

 day except as community at large make it 

 different. Our nation has decided that our 

 American Sunday is to be a day of rest. I 

 would accept it as the day that God told us 

 to remember and keep holy. The man who 

 has no regard for the feelings of Christian 

 people, especially church-going people, is a 

 man who will be likely to have trouble any 

 way. He is not a person, in my opinion, to 

 be intrusted with such risky business as go- 

 ing up in a dirigible balloon. It is a suffi- 

 ciently reckless undertaking in the present 

 stage of invention to be undertaken any day 

 in the week. Whoever does it should have 

 careful advisers and careful helpers— men 

 who can look over the apparatus and see 

 that every thing is all right, and as safe as 

 we know how to make it. Such men can 

 not be found who will volunteer their ser- 

 vices for a Sunday ascension. When the 

 Leader for this morning, June 4, announced 

 that the air- ship broke in two when about a 

 thousand feet up in the air, I do not believe 

 I had much of a disposition to say, " There, I 

 told you so;" that is, not in a way that I 

 would want to boast that my prophecy or 

 prediction had been fulfilled. I mean this: 

 It is just about what we might reasonably 

 expect the result to be with the average 

 man or men who will lend themselves to such 

 an undertaking on Sunday. Before I knew 

 that their initial flight was to be made on 

 that day I had planned to make a trip to 

 Cleveland to see it, although I confess I am 

 not much interested in any machine that has 

 to be pulled up in the air by a balloon to en- 

 able it to fly. 



Our second text admonishes us to be care- 

 ful about the company we keep— the crowd 



we are in. 1 very much dislike to travel in 

 any way on God's holy day; and I especially 

 dislike it because of the crowd I am forced 

 to go along with or be classed with I do 

 sometimes travel on Sunday. I suppose 

 ministers often feel almost obliged to patron- 

 ize electric cars on Sunday in order to make 

 their appointments; but I hope— and, in 

 fact, I believe— that our good ministers are 

 very careful to avoid accepting any appoint- 

 ments that necessitate Sunday travel. In 

 the same way, I would try to avoid using 

 the electric cars to get to church; first, be- 

 cause we are giving the car people an excuse 

 for Sunday traffic and the managers for 

 their Sunday work. Second, because of the 

 low character of the crowd we are almost 

 sure to get in with.* If I could not get to 

 church in any other way than by the electric 

 cars I do not know but I would patronize 

 them; but I would try hard to keep out of 

 such a condition of things. 



In this same Cleveland daily that mentions 

 the collapse of the air-ship and the narrow 

 escape from death of its operator (he was 

 taken up unconscious, but escaped with his 

 life), we have another item of news that I 

 wish to give you: 



diver's clothes stolen as he recovers body. 



While watching his father fish from the pier at the 

 foot of Willson Avenue yesterday, Frank Ficre, six 

 years old. No. 1161 E. 61st Street, fell through a hole in 

 the dock and was drowned. More than a hundred per- 

 sons were close by. Several of them saw the boy fall, 

 and heard his cries, but none attempted to rescue him 



Flynn & Froelk's ambulance was called. John Thra- 

 sher, one of its crew, volunteered to recover the body. 

 He stripped, and dived three times. The third time he 

 recovered the body. 



Thrasher left his clothing on the dock. While he was 

 under water some one stole all of it except his trousers 

 and coat. These were thrown into the lake. 



The Ficres are Hungarians. The father is a laborer. 



Now, friends, it will repay you if you read 

 the above over carefully. Even if it is a 

 brief sketch of a sad accident, it throws 

 considerable light on a good many matters. 

 We do not know much about this father; 

 but we do know he did not hesitate to go 

 fishing on Sunday and take along his six- 

 year-old boy. It seems to me he must have 

 been a stupid heartless father to allow that 

 boy to be playing on a dock where there were 

 holes he might fall through. We also won- 

 der that he permitted the boy to get so far 

 away that he did not see him fall nor hear 

 his cries. A hundred persons were close 

 by. What were they doing there on Sunday? 



* Here is something I have just clipped from the 

 Cleveland Plain Dealer in regard to the crowds one is 

 pretty sure to meet on Sunday travel: 



" The New York Tribune remarks that it would be a very 

 good thing to station policemen on all Sunday street-cars 

 returning from pleasure resorts. It would be a good thing 

 —just as good a thing in Cleveland as in New York When 

 it comes to street-car hoodlums Cleveland won't take a back 

 seat for any one." 



Why do the Tribune and Plain Dealer specify Sunday 

 street-cars returning from pleasure resorts? Because, 

 as everybody knows, the class of people who visit 

 resorts on Sunday are a lower class and a tougher class 

 than go to resorts and excursions held on week days. 

 One might think that even resorters should be a little 

 more dignified and manly on God's holy day; but it 

 seems to be just the other way. My friend, do you want 

 to be in that kind of crowd? do you want to be classed 

 as one of them? 



