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OUR GOOD WATER IN TEARS
THE great warm hearts of all our
Householders will go out in one
united bound of tenderest sym
pathy to our faithful and beloved “Ma
ter,” Mrs. Mary E. Bryan, in the death
of her devoted husband.
Major I. E. Bryan died last Thurs
day morning. December 30, at his
home at Clarkston, Ga., after a pain
ful illness of several weens. He was
known as “the father of dlarkston,”
for he had lived there, loved and hon
ored by his neighbors for three de
cades, watching the pretty little sub
urb of Atlanta grow up around him.
Tenderly devoted to his brilliant wife,
he took great pride in her literary
work and achievements. Hand in hand
for more than fifty years they had
walked in loving loyalty, and no one
who has not known the fullness —and
then the breaking of such sacred com
panionship —can understand the un
speakable loneliness of the noble
stricken woman now. She has the
comfort that can come from the love
of three sorrowing children, Mrs. Ada
Wilcox, of St. Louis; Mrs. Pearl Byrd,
of Atlanta, and Mr. Fred Bryan, of
Cocoa, Fla., and her two grandchil
dren, Mr. John Bryan, of Florida, and
Mrs. Ada Bryan Johnson, of Atlanta,
who was the first editor of The Golden
Age Household. But this must not —
'wiilnot —be all of her human comfort.
From all over the land the thousands
who have been blessed by the unsul-
With ©nr Correspondents
■ .n-l
FINETA LOVES CHILDREN.
Dear Mater:
The many individual greetings
from Household friends near and far,
impels me to seek your entertaining
circle on Christmas day. And what
more natural, since Christmas is more
especially the children’s season, than
to meditate upon childhood that bless
ed period of life designated by the Sa
vior as the “Heavenly Kingdom”.
Not that I have any ideas to ad
vance, for Dr. Bott’s benefit, upon the
problem (everything is a “problem”
these days) of disciplining children;
but I can offer some excellent sug
gestions for “spoiling” them, as my
brother’s interesting little trio can tes
tify.
Florence, the eldest and . I “belong
to each other” by mutual adoption;
from her first lisping baby speech, she
has called herself “Fineta’s girl”.
Only lately, with a parting embrace,
she assured me.
“If I had to stay away from you two
winters and two summers, I’d still re
member that I was your girl”.
Having attained to the dignity of
five years, and having become such a
little “mother’s helper”, as she calls
herself, she feels that she can’t leavve
home for long at a time now. But just
prior to her fourth birthday, she came
over unaccompanied by any member
of her immediate family, for a three
weeks visit to “Grandpa’s house.”
You may be sure that the spoiling
to which she was accustomed under
the parental roof was by no means di-»
minished while here. Her grandfa
ther’s daily greeting was,
“Come and give me my hugs and
kisses, you are the sweetest thing in
the world”. She surprised him, one
morning, by backing away and de-
,-jp 1,1- JJ[ O T_J S j j
4 Department of Expression For Those Who Feel and Think.
lied pen, and therefore love the name
of Mary E. Bryan, will mingle their
tears with hers in. this hour of her
deepest sorrow.
If it had been possible for all the
Household members to know the hour
when her great sorrow came and the
day when the sacred dust was laid
away we know that the tribute of ten
der' words and beautiful flowers would
have come from far and near. But we
will shrine her in our hearts of sorrow
and bear her up in our prayers of love.
“I can not go to Florida, Fred,” said
the dear old man, “as I had hoped to
do, but I will go to another land. I
am not afraid to go. I have served
out my day and am going away to be
at rest.” Thus Major Bryan bade
good-bye to his only son and met the
end.
May the dear heart of our House
hold Mother who has been so tireless
in giving joy and comfort to others
with tongue and pen, hear now, every
day and hour the voice of Him who
is tireless ever in redeeming His
promise to His beloved:
“I will not leave you comfortless: I
will come to you.”
O, Mater, dear,
Through all the year,
And the years that are to be,
Rest ever in
Our hearts of love
Till God shall call for thee!
THE EDITOR.
claring in her lisping baby speech,
“You dot no hugs and you dot no
tisses, and I aint quite tho thweet,
now”.
One morning at the breakfast table,
.graridmama said to her,
“Florence you look so much like
your papa, when he was your size, with
pretty curls just like yours”.
Every once in a while, the little
hands went up, and the head was
coquettishly turned, as she asked in
all seriousness,
“Is the little curls still there?”
This was not vanity, but the fear
of losing any resemblance to the idol
ized father.
Florence’s father, like Dr. Botts, is
a practicing physician, and since she
could sit propped up in a basket she
has accompanied him on his cross
country trips—for his practice extends
over wide territory. Her favorite pas
time is “playing doctor,” and it is
amusing to hear this diminutive bit of
humanity correctly repeating in her
baby lingo the many directions she
has heard her father give. All her
dolls are patients—usually in a happy
state of convalescence.
The knowledge of sorrowful things
has been carefully omitted from her
“education.” The sad endings to her
loved stories were always left off, till
Fineta transgressed this long estab
lished rule. To see he. eyes grow se
rious and thoughtful proved too great
a temptation. Besides, she had a
cheerful way of amending things to
her own satisfaction, both in fiction
and reality. For instance, once hear
ing some one exclaim, at the passing
by of a stray cat:
“Just look, I believe that is the ug
liest cat I ever saw.”
“Never mind,” she answered sooth
ingly, “I ’spect another pretty cat will
come along directly.”
When alone with us she was such a
little chatter-box, that her muteness
The Golden Age for January 6, 1910.
in the presence of others, was at times
provoking. Once when I questioned
her as to her indifference to the ef
forts of a little cousin to amuse her,
she explained, with all the gravity im
aginable:
“Well, you see, Fineta, I’m not very
well acquainted with him. Besides,
you know, I’m not much of a laugh
er, any way.”
Before her visit was over, she prov
ed a regular monopolist, and if I mo
mentarily got out of her sight.
“Fineta, where is you at? Where is
you at, Fineta?” more imperiously,
and if an immediate reply was not
forthcoming, this oft-repeated query
was followed by a wail that brought
me instantly to the rescue.
“What is the matter, Florence? Are
you hurt?”
“No, I’s des er cryin’ for you. I des
wants to be where you is.”
And are we not told that we must
“become as a little child?” As a little
child, in its complete dependence, its
confiding trust, its unquestioning love
—thus only, do we perceive our true
relationship to the Heavenly Father.
Is it not true, as Swinburne says:
“Where children are not, Heaven is
not, and Heaven if they come
not again, shall be never,
But the face and the voice of a child
are assurance of Heaven, and
its promise forever.”
So, I believe that my advice to Mrs.
Botts would be, to go on spoiling the
baby—for children will eventually out
grow “spoiling”—but they tell me that
husbands never do!
With cordial good-wishes for all,
and prayers for our dear Mater’s New
Year’s happiness, and the speedy re
covery of her loved invalid,
Sincerely,
FINETA.
Athens, Ala.
THE CRUELTY OF THE CRITIC.
In these days of the automobile and
the aeroplane is there not a growing
tendency toward skepticism?
A proof of this is the keen and re
lentless critical spirit which is assur
edly one of the marked characteristics
of the present age. Nothing is taken
for granted, and the tendency of the
times is to discredit everything. Es
pecially is this true as to our history;
even the Bible itself is being assailed.
Leaf by leaf, book by book they seek
to strip it of its historic treasures, and
thereby take from it much of its charm
over the imagination and its power
over the soul. But shall we not con
tinue to believe that man once dwelled
in a region of perfect happiness? and
that Paradise was lost? Shall we not
still believe that there was a flood
and then a rainbow that bespake our
everlasting covenant with God? Then
they tell us there was never a Homer
and that the immortal Iliad is but a
mere collection of ancient poetry. But
will we not rather believe such a poet
was once a reality; that over the vine
clad hills of Greece, and under its
matchless skies of blue, this old bard,
blind and unable to appreciate the
beauties of his surroundings, roamed
and sang for his daily bread, and for
immortality? They say Joan of Arc is
a mythical woman and never stood
haloed by saintly courage, while the
flames bore her up into “the beautiful
gates ajar.”
They are trying to prove that the
story of the cherry tree and the hatch
et is false, and before long I guess they
will be trying to prove that such a man
as George Washington never lived/.nd
never led the Americans to victory.
How well we remember the senti
ments that kindled within us when
we first read the story of William
Tell and his child, but now we are told
that is all a myth; that there never
was a William Tell, or a Geisler, or an
apple on a boy’s head.
Indeed, is not this critical temper
becoming more and more destructive
and in its over-zeal for facts, plain,
blunt facts that hurt, it has destroyed
many of the beauties of history.
This tendency in the popular mind
of today may have its uses in freeing
the mind from traditional error and
from ancient superstition, but it is not
worth while to denude truth of its
robes, even though woven by the hand
of tradition and especially when these
robes are often very beautiful and only
render truth the more attractive.
If we must style these romances of
history as myths, they should still re
tain that glamour which the mists of
years have thrown around them. They
all have an office to perform, and most
assuredly they have already accom
plished much. As we have heard of
most of them from early youth, have
they not made truth, valor and patri
otism shine brighter than they would
otherwise have done? Who doubts that
the story of George Washington and
the cherry tree has had a wholesome
influence on the youth of America, and
that the story of Pocahontas carries
with it a lesson. We can only watch
these onslaughts of sacred things-With
an increasing interest, but an interest
that is filled with increasing alarm.
The Bible has stood the test of the
cruel onslaughts of ages past and it
will continue to be the only lamp by
which the feet of an erring, sin-cursed
world may be guided over the dark
and thorn-pricked way lire.
I prefer to accept it in its old-time
purity.
FAITH.
COUNTRY FOLK.
Much has lately been written and
said concerning the unhappy lot of the
country people, the wives of the farm
ers, especially.
A large number of those who have
been saying so much being mere
guessers and theorists, as their ideas
betray, until since the subject has
been agitated many of them had evi
dently given no thought to the mat
ter. Then from the shadows of walls
of brick, they, darting out into the
rural districts, accepted as typical and
universal the conditions existing in the
particular locality upon which they
chanced to alight. Hence, the conflict
ing opinions as to whether the country
people as a class are really happy or
the reverse. Many of these writers
completely ignoring the fact that the
source of happiness or unhappiness is
often found within the human heart
itself and not in any great degree de
pendent upon surrounding conditions.
The happiest people I ever knew live
among the hills of North Alabama and
Georgia. As a rule these people are
perfectly content in them Arcadian
simplicity. None of ti X great ques
tions of theology, politics, progress or
reform which so agitate the thinking
wrold ever penetrate here.
To be sure, the men often vote, but
like sheep, they simply follow a lead
er, and this leader is usually a “store
keeper” of the nearest town and the
one who “handles” the particular
brand of “manufactured” tobacco to
which the voter happens to be most
addicted. His “Sunday tobacco,” for
his own home grown “stingy green,”
