THE SUNDAY OREGOXIAX, PORTLAND, AUGUST 13, 1916.
Doubting men are not
achievers; those who win
are self-believers.
We can't prolong life, so
we must accomplish more
with our lives.
JOSE
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To a Snoh:
By HERBERT KAUFMAN
Why talk so much about your ancestors? It's a very ordinary experience to own a string of
forebears. You seem to forget that everybody has them. And, averaging up the lots, one
set is probably about as good as the next.
Here we find an outfit of "rich men, poor men, beggar men, theives;" there a group of
"doctors,, merchants, lawyers, chiefs." Don't bother to produce a special genealogical chart,
the old nursery rhyme is apt to prove a far more accurate one.
All folks experience their tips and downs: The tides of success and failure ebb and flow
through the centuries; fortunes rise and fall and mount again.
A certain number of shady and rotten branches are to be found on each family tree. Time
prunes and grafts them back to vitality. The process is ceaseless and unvarying the fruitage
utterly unreliable.
Weaklings, poltroons, cringers, wantons and wastrels are behind and before you.
There were undesirable progenitors among your grandparents and there will be as many
among your offspring.
Future collaterals will wait upon the unborn progeny of your domestics, nor will they be
the first of the lineage to serve in humble capacities.
Even kings have closets-f ul of such skeletons. The Obrenovitches were formerly swine herds
and the Hapsburgs were the most prominent butchers of their day.
Of whatever present social position, the Smiths, the Taylors, the Wrights, the Carpenters,
the Ghapmans, the Millers, all sprang from folk who followed the occupations indicated by
their names. Nomenclature invariably discloses origin.
The various tides of immigration which populated this continent chiefly brought peasants
and artisans doers and darers builders, nation-makers.
America was settled by farmers, petty tradesmen, plantation hands and tickets o' leave.
They were forced to make good; without resources, there was no alternative but the "devel
opment of the resources about them.
The Knickerbockers were mainly' shopmen, cobblers, chandlers, furriers and peddlers de
cent, earnest citizens, orderly, God-fearing people.
They made no pretense to caste; they knew too much about themselves.
As good metal is now simmering in the Melting Pot to strengthen the national alloy."
They too- will have their opportunities in the Republic the offspring of Greeks and Italians
and Scandinavians.
Guiseppes, Estrates and Oles are destined to wed your kin. Don't sniff. Sparta, Norseland
and Rome were proud breeders.
Who knows what valorous lymph surges in the bootblack at the corner or the fruit dealer
across the way?
They've forgotten what they were, to concentrate hope and ambition upon what they mean
to be. Still, if occasion called and ancestors were matched, it's dollars to crullers that your
bunch wouldn't have the best of it by a long sight.
(INCIDENTALLY, IT MAY BE PERTINENT TO INQUIRE WHAT YOU HAVE
ACCOMPLISHED. THAT TICKET OF ADMISSION TO SELECT CIRCLES WAS IS
SUED TO YOUR GRANDFATHER FOR SERVICES RENDERED. WHERE'S YOUR
OWN?)
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by-
Herbert Kaufman
You haven't ever done your best;
You've still to meet the telling
test.
Keep battling, make another try;
Don't let your faith and courage
die.
Existence is a finish fight
In which each man exerts his
might,
And by sheer strength attains his
right.
Fate does not tell us in advance
When we have faced the final
chance.
'Tis not our privilege to know
TTow often we must undergo
; -fi Defeat before the winning bout.
) AmDiuon can i ana won x sxay
DUl uses iiuui nic
ground:
fiA And comes back for another
fmm KAWia round:
-'asVVl HftUSfi It won't lie still, it can't be
MM i. if rSK? downed.
ln as 5ou ve blow f or blow
"KrS'-S And do not seek to strike too low,
You stand a show.
IT CAN'T BE DONE
THE quart undertook .a gallon job and immediately disclosed its real
measure. Those who do not recognize their own limits soon betray
them to their fellows. Bluff loses every position it wins. Promises
will open the door of opportunity, but only performance will turn the lock
on the other side.
Time trails the cleverest pretender and exposes his record. The only
employes who are constantly sure of their posts are "delivery men."
John H. Patterson once turned over the details of an approaching ban
quet to an individual whose glib tongue won an executive responsibility.
The following morning he interrupted an important conference to ask the
President if he preferred to have ice cream or water ice served on the
aforesaid occasion.
"Both. Your resignation is accepted," was the instant response.
Patterson had gauged his man in a flash. Only a congenial idiot would
intrude with such a trivial consideration upon a vital board meeting.
They're all discovered in time.
Masquerading asses will bray in the neighborhood of lions.
THE CHILDREN'S HOUR
A CHILD first learns the sound of a word its meaning comes to him
afterwards. There's an appreciable distance between the two periods.
The reasoning faculty develops slowly. Therefore, don't expect obe
dience too early. Nature knows nothing of behavior; man invented all the
rules of restraint.
Goody-goody little boys and girls are abnormal types. Kids should tum
ble about, knock things over and raise a bit of dickens. Worry if they don't
rollic and romp and occasionally rob the jam pot and raid the pie pans.
It indicates something wrong in them or you.
James Whitcomb Riley
HE didn't write of gods and kings
And all such highfalutin' things;
But folks and boys and bumblebees.
And when he talked of Summer, say,
The printing smelled of clover hay.
And you could see the lazy breeze
. Go nosin' through the locust trees
Around the house where you were born.
And hear the old tin dinner horn.
He didn't read up Persian tales,
Of these bul-buls and. nightingales;
But went and sat out on the rails
And listened to the thrush and wren
Cheep in the meadow brambles, when
The song of birds was in his pen ;
The whippoorwill and bobolink
Gave music lessons to his ink.
He turned words into wishing rings
That made forgotten memories start
Tears trickling in your lonely heart;
And painted signposts all the way
Along the pike to Yesterday.
God must be feeling mighty good
To have him 'round . (I know I would)
A-telling tales of lazy scamps
And run-aways and dogs and tramps.
It don't seem queer to picture him ,
All fussed with golden robes and wings
Up there upon an armchair cloud
Inventing stories for a crowd
Of breathless little Cherubim
Of fairy, goblin, witch and elf.
When he rode by the other days,
There wasn't anything to say
But "Good-bye, Jim, take keer yourself."
His First Trip
HE CAME rolling down the avenue in an old, high
wheel, solid-tire machine one of the things they
called an automobile back yonder in the prim
itive ages of the industry.
Rims, dashboard and hubs were caked with mud
a leatherette suitcase was roped on the back.
Everybody turned to look. But he was looking
too, and had a great deal more to see.
Passing chauffeurs, in fine frenzy of inspiration,
rose delightfully to the occasion and delivered expert
opinions to the chaffing sidewalk crowd.
But the boy from the country chugged ahead he
didn't give a hang about appearances didn't know
there were any. The banter and ridicule didn't feaze
him. These city folk couldn't understand what it
meant to coax and cozen that creaking ramshackle into
town.
The Lord only knows how far he had come or how
much farther he'll go. Men who can make the best of
the best at hand are bound to ride far.
They use a special quality of gasoline the "Deter
mination Brand."
One of these days he'll come back and in style. This
was just a survey; he wanted to size up the fighting
ground. And when he does return watch out for him.
He has acquired the habit of surmounting difficulties
of getting where he wants to go. He'll laugh last.
Nil Desperandum"
LAST Fall a wind storm uprooted the big willow.
They sawed off the trunk and carted it away but,
by some freak of chance, left the ugly stump be
hind. All "Winter long, it lay in the yard bottom up,
broken roots in the air. Then Spring came pulsing
through the earth and found one slender rootlet fight
ing for survival. Now a score of valiant young shoots
are waving their fronds above the wreck. Soon a clump
of verdure will mask the spot, then lusty trunks will
push up in the sun the dead wood will rot away and
all trace of the disaster be wiped out.
Why aren't you still doing business at the old
stand? What more can you ask of Providence than
the right to keep on while there is a chance to sprout
again?
New successes obliterate the memory of old failures.
Be a willing willow, not a weeping one.
COPVRHillT, 181. BY H KRBKIIT KAl KM A.N, GREAT BRITAIN ANO ALL OTHER RIOHU HCiKHtEU.
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