BROTHER GARDNER'S PHILOSOPHY.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XVI, Issue 236, 4 October 1881, Page 4

BROTHER GARDNER'S PHILOSOPHY.

' When a man axes me who libs nex 5 donli,' began the old man as the triangle sounds to order, 'I answer him Brown, or Jones, or White, or whatever de name may be, but when he goes beyand dat an' axes what salary de man aims, how often his wife changes bonnets' an' how dey make seben dollars a week go furder dan I kin fo'teen, I became a clam. I has no business to know, an' when Ido know I won't toll. I used to have some curiosity in dis direcshun, but I have got over it of late jars. When I know dafc a sartin man, receivin' a salary of twelve dollars per week, kin give parties, hire carriages, an' dress his wife in silks, it makesj me look glum. Dat is, it used to. When de ole woman used to tell me dat sartin people had new silks, new hats, new close, an' new shoes once a month de y'ar round, an' we bavin' to lib cms on de same money, it made me mad. Dat is, it used to. When I saw men who owed fur deir washin' strutin' aroun' like lords, while I had to work days in a week an' pay my debts, I felt like smashin' frew de sidewalk. But I has got ober all dis. When I meet a woman who kin dress like a banker's wife on de ten or twelve dollahs per week paid her husband, I doan' 'low myself to eber fink about it. When I see a man buyin' twenty-cent cigars, sportin' a cane, and takin' champagne, when his chillen at home am bar'fut, I try to believe dat it am all right. When a lady wid three hundred dollahs worf of close on, axes me to do a job of white washin' in a parlor wbar' de hes' pieturs come from a tea store, an' de bes char am under chattel mortgage, I doan't stop to wonder who she thinks she am foolin.'. Kayburs ob mine, who owe all de' butchers widin a circle of a mile, kin pay fo' dollahs cash fur a libery rig on Sunday, an' I shan't criticise. Wives may go shopin' ebery day in the week, an' gin parties ebery night, an' ole woman will keep de cabin jist de same. Since we quit wonderin' nn' speculatin' ober dese fings we feel much better. We know fur a fact jist how fur we kin make money go. In odder folks kin lib like lords on a salary of six hundred dollahs a y'ar it's a streak of good luck an' none of our bizness. My advice to you am to let sich fings post. Dey are mysteries wid which we have no bizness, an' de mo' you ponder ober dem de less you will injoy what you have honestly aimed by had work an' saved by good economy .'—-Detroit Free Press.