Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 107, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 May 1915 — FOR AGES TO CONE [ARTICLE]

FOR AGES TO CONE

Future Generations Were Their Sole Concern Until They Met One Another. (Copyright. 1915. by the McClure Newspaper Syndicate.) There were those who said that the reason Joseph Blanchard had reached the age of thirty without ever having been in love, to say nothing of having taken a wife, was because he had a fad. Every man has a fad, even to the fad of picking up stray pins on the sidewalk, but what all men are ready to deny is that they have one. Some other fellow is Invariably the guilty party. Thus, while a score of persons iwid that John Blanchard had a fad, he said to himself that be* was the only man in a thousand who steered dear of them. As a youth, Master Blanchard was Inclined to serious thought; one of the most serious was the reservation of the present for the future. He realised that all things, even to nations, must decay and leave no more behind them than the cave dwellers. There must come a time, maybe a hundred thousand years hence, when a new nation would long • to know how the American lived in this day and date. . They would go hunting around for relics and souvenirs, and they would And remains' of skyscrapers, subways, elevated roads. Here and there they would uncover a poem written by a Yankee schoolma’am —now and then a speech delivered by a senator; but from those things could any future historian make out the real life of the people? And John Blanchard wept to making a collection. It was such a collection as would enable the future historians to make out our everyday life, even down to the brand of cigars the men smoked, and the name of the bars of soaps the women bought for the laundries. John Blanchard’s name was to be saved to posterity. The first move he made was to write out his history from birth to date, and then begin a diary, which should only close with his death. He bought books to be inclosed in Iron boxes; he filed away daily papers; he preserved magazines; he gathered postage stampsand coins. John Blanchard was the son of wealthy parents. When he attained his majority he had more wealth awaiting him. He could and he did erect a building and stuff it from basement to garret with his collections. He was still at it when he made a new acquaintance that was bound to bring about changes in his life. John Blanchard might have been the only male faddist in his town that carried the idea to an extreme, and It never occurred to him that a female might enter the lists against him. One (lid, however. It was Miss Myra Ray, a young woman who had dwelt In this vale of tears almost as long as he had, although her fad wasn't born so early.

Miss Myra realized that the day must come when the last trust, the last grafter and the last American must go hence, and leave the ruins Of his cities to be pawed over by relic hunters of a later race and to be the hooting place of big-eyed owls, and that she had a duty to do. Those people who were to come after would be curious about our bird life. They would wonder if our robins had teeth Ilka a grizzly bear, If our blue-' birds carried off and devoured babies, if the woodpecker emerged from his oave at midnight to revel in human gore. It was her mission to leave a leaf of history behind for their benefit. She, as well as Mr. Blanchard, had wealth and could indulge herself. She began collecting the eggs of birds and acquiring stuffed ' specltnens. In this she spent thousands of dollars. She was thorough in her work, too. She cotfid speak and write three different languages, and she never packed up and laid away an egg or a stuffed specimen without writing on three different cards: > "This Is the egg of a quail,” or “This is the quail himself* or whatever egg or bird it was. When Miss Myra had accumulated enough specimens to load several trucks she turned to insects. The race that was to come would ask what kind of horseflies, hornets and fleas the fest Americans did business with The collection of the young woman woul3 answer any question. She could imtatee the Investigator of 100,000 years heiSee Inquiring of himself: “Now, then, I wofSWT' the bftaaed old hornet is a neW tW with tfSor if they had him in fc*g ago?” And then her collecfittff wsuld be discovered. “I'll be halghd If the pesky varmint isn’t right fiwr*. as big as Mfe, and the hossfly fe the next stall to him,” the invtafeator would exclaim. Miss Myra bought insects of small boys, and she went afield for ttam personally- The farmer didn’t pay much attention to the boy roaming over the fields tn search of the grasshopper, but when it eame to a woman racing up and down with a net" in her hand and her eyes bulging out he would stop his plow to stare. “Good lands, tat ’'span I had married that thing instead es Mirandy!” Mr. John Blanchard heard of a farmer who had a vataaKe collection of manuscripts that wuuM give history a fail insight tata ear ways of

doing business in the nineteenth and twentieth century. It was a farmer who never paid a debt unless he was about to be burned at the stake, and the valuable manuscripts were the dunning letters he had received. You may call it a coincidence. •> You may call ft luck. You may say it was the hand of Providence. Whatever it was it brought the two collectors face to face on that farm. It introduced them. It was a bond between them. It made Mirs Myra agree that the dunning letters were the cap-sheaf of the collection, and it made Mr. Blanchard volunteer to go with her and help capture a few crickets. The farmer refused a very liberal offer for his manuscripts, on the grounds that if he had money his creditors would pursue him afresh; and when he came to half understand the business of the collectors, he was filled with contempt ’That feller orter be splittin’ wood and that woman orter be slicin’ apples to dry!” was the way he looked at It, and when they came to ask where the largest and choicest crickets could be found he pointed to a bush In the pasture and replied: “You’ll find some lively ones down there.” The farmer’s wife came out to him at the plow and asked: “Josiah, what does that woman want?” "Why, she’s one of ’em." “Does she want to buy them dunning letters, or the old letters you wrote me afore we were married?” “No. She’s after bugs.” “Good lands!” “I couldn’t make out exactly what, she wanted of them, but when they asked about crickets I sent ’em over in tha pasture.’*

“Are they goln’ to fry the grease out of ’em for rheumatism?” "Dunno. I couldn’t understand) half their big talk." And as the two collectors walked slowly across the field they warmed toward each other, as was natural. Of the millions of people in the United States they, it was very likely, were the only ones working for those who were to be cavorting around when the Falls of Niagara were worn out like an old washboard. Two lawyers would have been in a wrangle in five minutes as to who should have the crickets after they had been captured. ■ Two editors would have dragged politics Into it and called each other liars.

Two poets would have wrangled about the moonlight and dubbed each other jlnglers. But two collectors! Their souls recognized each other at once and clasped hands, as It were. Mr. Blanchard and Miss Day were so long on their way to the cricket roost that the farmer growled to himselff “If I was after an insect I’d hurry up and get him by a hind leg and then sit. on the fence and do my talking!” But the collectors reached the spot at last. It was a space of matted grass, with brush growing in the midst of it.

There were no crickets to be seen, but it was the hour of the day when such insects sleep and dream, and get ready for the business of the evening. It was right and proper that Mr J. Blanchard should get down on his knees and paw around In the grass, and he pawed with energy and determination. He found Insects after a minute, but they were not crickets. The farmer saw Mr. Blanchard leap to his feet fa surprise. He heard Miss Day uttef a shriek and saw her running away. ■ Then he saw Mr. Blanchard rttkning away and beating the air with his hat. Then it was Miss Day who bounded around and fought something with her field net Then the farmer said to himself: “They’ve struck that bufiiMe bed* nest that I was saving sos a wire fence Man, and perhaps theyU need help. Queer that these bug folks can’t tell * cricket from a bee!" There Wta need of his help. Both collectors W«re tearing around in the field both enffhtftic and woeful. Armed with a brokta bust!, the . rescuer fought the bed* io a standstill, but they had done ttair work. The wife came from the house' to lead Miss Day to it, and the husband brought up the rear of the procession with Mr. Blanchard. “It -will be three or four days before you can go,” said the doctor who was called. It turned tat to be five, fait after the second day time passed joyfully. With their heads and hands bafir daged, and one dye' opened enOtigb to M# their way, the collectors sat 6n the veranda and talked of birds aiid eggg and manuscripts tad Insects add—save. YeW they talked tove to leave a record <Sf how it was done in IoM America in the twentieth centurf- And when they departed tor their' homes the farmer said to hfa wife: “They dfter make them bumblebees a pftaitat of 1100 for sttagfag the fads outer*