Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 November 1875 — Winter Sports. [ARTICLE]

Winter Sports.

Now that tlie rigor of winter is beginning to be felt, and lawns, arbors, and lakes and w alks must be deserted, and the young folks collected around the family stove, their thoughts will turn to toys, games and so forth, to while away the long evenings and dull days. I was talking with my young friend, Johnny Prill, the newsboy, the other day. He agreed with me that inventors had not done their duty by the young, and that there was no excitement dr fun in boxes of blocks, dancing-jacks, picture-books, or toy-billiards. “ We wants novelty,” said Johnny, as he slowly picked a cigar-stub to pieces; “ young folks gits as tired of old things as old folks do. I goes in for something new every day. To-day I hollers about the murder; to-morrow aliout the floods; next day .about the railroad slaughter; and it’s sunthin’ new everv day. Do you supposes, Mister Quad, if 1 was to holler one holler all the time that I could make a livin’ in this town after tne fust week?” My yohng friend has not the skill to manufacture a new novelty, but he has a lively imagination, and fishing up a piece of red chalk from his coat-tail pocket he sat down on the flags, spit on tne chalk, and remarked* “ Now, Mister Quad, supposes thirds a feller in a chair, and that is another feller, and that’s a girl, and that’s a baby, and that’s the hired girl, and here’s the old folks. There they set, lookin’ at each other, big tire, gas burnin’ up, and all as dumb as posts ’cause they haven’t got any new games. The wind is a-howlin’ outdoors, snow blowin’, and that family might be happy if they went in for new things.” He spit on the chalk again, moved around a little and continued : “ Well, supposes this ’ere boy goes out and gets a whip; these ’ere boys get the broomstick; the old gent here drops down on his hands and knees for a boss, and the feller with the whip makes him jump over the broomstick, just as the spotted hosses do in the circus. The girl lass, the baby kicks up his'heels, and all is joy and peace in that fam’ly, where all was gioom afore.” I encouraged the idea, and after wiping out the chalk-marks with his coat-tail he went on: “Or supposes 'this ’ere boy gits the clothes-line, harnesses the old gent to the wood-box, all thc children pile in and. (lie hoss walks away. Wouldn’t that ’ere leetle innercent baby just put {at on to his ribs, though! Supposes the hoss draws ’em all round to here all O K and then balks and kicks. Crowd comes around, the driver puts on the whip, harness gets broke and finally he runs away and falls into a sewer. There’d be a hull hour of fun for them innercent children, and they’d go to bed feelin’ like playful lambs ana foxes and rabbits.” “But would the old man do it?” I asked, as Johnny’s coat-tail again swept the chalk-marks out of existence. He’d be bound to. They are his chilHferiV and he’s gbrtff perwldh fbr’enn —I guess the law would fix him mighty quick if he let them innercent children *set up there on them stuffed chairs with nuthin’ to uo but look at the stove and the rug,” Having a clean spot again he put the chalk to the flags, and continued: “ Suppose the old man gets a telegraph to go to Chicago and he hain’thome. Them children can’t set there on them stuffed chairs just’cause the old man is out of town. Well, what does the mother do but gets down like this and purtendsto be a dog, and growls and barks and shows her teeth. They gits the baby on the sofa, and this ’ere boy takes a piller, that one a rug, and this one the broom, and they goes in to give that dog such fits as will learn him to never take another hunk out’n a boy’s hind leg. I can almost hear that innercent leetle baby hollerin’ for joy!” “ It might work,” I said, in a doubtful voice. “ She’d have to work, Mister Quad. I don’t know much’bout law, but I know the children has got to be cared for if it takes the house down. It’s agin the law for the women to paint and powder and git-on fash’nable clothes and things till tlie children has been brung up.” As I made no reply he erased the marks and said: “ Or supposes the hired girl has freckles on her nose and loves children. Here’s the stairs, here, and here’s the hired girl goin’ up. The children all git together here by the hall door, and the hired girl rolls down stairs head over heels, and that innercent leetle baby lass till they have to pat him on the back! Wouldn’t that be bully, Mister Quad, and couldn’t that fam’ly afford to raise the wages of that hired girl?” “The hired gill might refuse,” I suggested. “ She dasn’t—you bet shedasnt! Hired firls is hired to help bring up the chilren, cook ’taters, mop off tlie steps, and let their beaus in at the side gate. She’d be a purty hired girl if she wouldn’t roll -downstairs to make fun for all them nice children, and she’d be discharged quicker’n spit!". The boy’s idea may be a little crude, but he speaks for the whole rising generation, and I demand that fathers and mothers and hired girls give his ideas their attention.— M. Quad, in N. T. Graphic.