The Cecil Whig

LETTER FROM ILLINOIS.

Buckley. Ill., April 6th. 1874

Dear Whig,-Some months have elapsed since I essayed a letter for The Whig; often have I resolved to attempt the task often have the white sheets of foolscap lain before me, and the pen grasped in my fingers, ready to begin the pleasant task. when the thought would arise. what shall I write about? what will the readers of The Whig care to know about the dutch wedding, when the boy rode through the streets of the town hailing you to know if you wanted an invitation to Herr Sour kraut's house to see the ceremony, and drink lager and munch pretzels, if you replied in the affirmative then you gave him a dime with which he purchased a blue ribbon, and tied it on the crown of his tall white paper cap, and how when the town had been thoroughly canvassed. he rode away over the prairies singing a merry German song, with innumerable blue ribbons fluttering in the evening breeze. Nor could the readers of The Whig be expected to be especially interested in a history of our Blind Concert, at the conclusion of which the audience were called upon to decide by ballot, as to who was the handsomest woman in the school house, (we have no Hall) and who was the handsomest man and vice versa, at the conclusion of the balloting the persons receiving the largest number of votes were each presented with a picture of questionable value. Now these little sparkles and eddies on the dull current of village life are of immense interest to those immediately concerned, but they stir not the great bosom of humanity i. e., the readers of The Whig, no more than the hurling of a stone into a mill pond can disturb the ocean.

I suppose you benighted Easterns are aware by this time that the Temperance Crusade has superseded the Panic. The tidal wave, or more properly, the praying wave has not reached this town, in fact, we are a temperance people, no whisky is allowed to be sold within the corporation limits. We have two hotels, but their landlords are temperance men and they are temperance houses. We have two drug stores, but who would think of going to pray with men for selling medicines, yet now and then, that is about twice a month on an average, you may see a drunken man making a spectacle of himself upon the streets of our orderly little town, but as he never gets drunk enough to tell where he got his whisky, the origin of his queer condition remains a mystery.

We have in our midst a flourishing Lodge, numbering among its members the bone and sinew, as well as the beauty and talent of the place. The name of our Lodge is Sebaski, No. 52. In a few weeks we expect to move into our new Hall, on which occasion we propose giving an Entertainment, and if any of her numerous friends in Cecil wish to see your correspondent make her debut upon the stage in the thrilling drama of "Ten Nights in a Bar-room," why let them buy an excursion ticket and come out. If she fails of success why it will simply be because there is nothing in her part. since studying said part I have been confirmed in an idea which has haunted me all my life and that is that opportunity has a great deal to do with success. If there had been no America to discover, where now would repose the fame of that grand, gloomy and peculiar old cove, Columbus? If France had not been convulsed with civil strife and threatened with foreign invasion, where now would be the laurels of the noble Warrior Maid? But for the wrongs of the slaves, would Uncle Tom's Cabin ever have been written? and but for that work, Mrs. Stowe would have been classed among our second-rate novelists.

There is nothing.in The Whig which interests me so much as the articles relating to the Public Schools. If I had time I would like to give you a detailed account of my search for a school when I first arrived in Illinois. The principal objection raised was my apparent lack of muscle. Some of the young ideas of our village have since learned that there may be more muscular strength .contained in a woman's arm than they thought for at first sight. One evening after a twenty miles drive and no school, I astonished my worthy host, by declaring my intention of going to Chicago and hunting for a school where they trained prize fighters. and when I had found such a school, of entering it as a scholar. To study books any more seemed to me a sheer waste of time, since I was politely told by gigantic directors, over and over again, that they wanted nothing of me. unless assured that I could whip the big boys.

Some wiseacre in last week's Whig, solemnly asserts that the youth of Elkton have to be sent to a Catholic school, that their morals may be corrected, and calls the Public Schools hot beds of immorality. Are the Public Schools the only agents of reform in the land? Where are church and home influences? Where is the Sabbath school? If it were possible, we know from reading and observation, that the Catholics of the United States would rejoicingly tear our Public School system up by the roots and utterly destroy every vestige of it. But thank Heaven the people are too much alive to their own interests to permit such sacrilege. The real objection of Catholics to our common schools, is not that morality is not taught within their borders, but that the creed of the church of Rome is not taught therein.

But a more agreeable subject occurs to my mind, and I will leave the vexed question of popular education, and proceed to tell you a little about the Granger wedding, at which I had the honor of being a guest a few evenings since. In the center of the well-loaded table was an immense pyramid, of what do you suppose?-why pop-corn balls. It had a striking and unique effect Of course we envied the bride: who would not envy any one the privilege of dining sumptuously every day off the fat sides of the scrofulous swine, of wearing calico from year's end to year's end, and of indulging in such inspiring recreations as darning socks and feeding the pigs.

A. A. C.