Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 January 1885 — Irrepressible Music. [ARTICLE]

Irrepressible Music.

In the country where wo were brought up there was no great prolusion of musical instruments. We remember the first time we ever saw a music box. It Vas at the day school, and was brought by one of the boys. We thought the machine the most wonderful thing we had ever seen or heard But it was too elaborate for the boys’ management Sometimes we oould not get it going. At other times, under our manipulation, it would start playing a tune and we could not stop it Of course, only in the hours of nooning or of recess did we ordinarily dare to handle. But one day the fortunate owner of the music box let us have it in our desk during the school hours. Over - tempted, we forgot our geography and arithmetic and went into a curious examination of the music box. It never seemed so wondrous sb then; but while we were busy among its cogs and springs and oylinders, tha pesky thing, started to play “Yankee Doodle.” We laid hold and tried to put down the brakes, but we bad touched something that had set it going, and go it would. We put down the lid of the desk and plunged into our arithmetic, furiously reciting to ourselves, “twice eight are Bixteeu, twice twelve are twenty-four.” But the schoolmaster, with irate countenance, (demanded, “who is making that noise?” The more complete silence of the school made the musio-box seem more resonant. By this time the cylinder had reached another tune, “Cornin’ thro’ the Rye,’’ and we felt ourselves cornin’ thro’ the breakers. All the boys looking innocent, the schoolmaster came down to make the tour of the desks. He had examined but three or four when he struck upon ours and seized the music box and held it above our beads in triumph and wrath. Without the usual ten days’ notice we were subpoenaed to appear immediately before the master. The rattan was brought out and we were peremptorily asked to present the palm of onr hand. €ow the sensation produoed by a rattan depends entirely upon which e-'d of it yon come in contact. The end offered to us was not at all attractive. We could not for some time make up our mind to take hold of the wrong end of it. We put out our hand again and again, but every time before the rattan came down we changed our mind and put our hand behind ns; but at last we submitted, and the music, instead of being instrumental, became vocal. We- felt, however, that we Grid, not deserve being whipped sic box. . That day we learned a lesson not found either in geography or arithmetic, that is, that some people have a music-box about them that they cannot manage. You sit in churoh for an hour and a half profoundly interested in the religious services, but your child seems possessed with some uneasy spirit. He wiggles and twists, and tears a leaf out of the psalm book, and tickles his brother with a feather, and drops his penny, and chncklcs out lond to the disturbance of the people in that neighborhood, and seems chuck full of mischief. What is the matter with him? Is he bad ? No. He has an exuberance of feeling. He is full of skip and rollicking and glee. He has under his vest, or in his shoe, a musicbox which he cannot control and for which he is net responsible. With a sense of the ludiorons, and in buoyancy of feeling, you have sometimes been sitting amid circumstances that demanded gravity. Bat a mirthful memory or a grotesque appearance has wrought upon you nntil it lias seemed you must laugh or die. You tried to think of all the solemn and terrible things you have ever heard of. You bit your lin. You pinched yourself unmercifully. You called in tha aid or pocket handkerchief, and all bther available appliances; but laugh you must, and laugh you did, to your chagrin and mortification. The music box had got a-going and you did not >k'now how to stop it. We charge upon phlegmatic temperaments more leniency in their criticism of excitable temperaments. Do not think the boys and girls are going to destruction because their hilarity may sometimes be unreasonable. In the management of tlleir own dispositions some of ns have been breaking colts all our lives, and yet they will not answer to bit and bridle. Let not the rattan of our chastisement be too heavy upon those who are more frisky than we. We protest to this day that in that old country school-house we were not responsible for “Yankee Doodle” and "Cornin’ through the Eve.” Talmage, in the Brooklyn Magazine.