How it came to be what we everywhere find it, the wise men cannot agree.  The many authorities are so divided, that I see no way but for us to accept the custom as we find it, wherever we may happen to be, and be careful not to abuse it.

Some jokes are peculiar to some places.  In England, where it is called “All Fools’ Day,” one favorite joke is to send the greenhorn to a bookseller to buy the “Life and Adventures of Eve’s Grandmother,” or to a cobbler to buy a few cents’ worth of “strap oil,”—­strap oil being, in the language of the shoe-making brotherhood, a personal application of the leather.

But this custom, with others, common in coarser and rougher times, is fast dying out.  Even now it is left almost entirely to playful children.  This sentiment, quoted from an English almanac of a hundred years ago, will, I’m sure, meet the approval of “grown-ups” of this century: 

“But ’t is a thing to be disputed,
Which is the greatest fool reputed,
The one that innocently went,
Or he that him designedly sent.”

=Memorial Day=

May 30

It is said that the observance of this day grew originally out of the custom of the widows, mothers, and children of the Confederate dead in the South strewing the soldiers’ graves with flowers, including the unmarked graves of the Union soldiers.  There was no settled date for this in the North until 1868, when General John A. Logan, as commander-in-chief of the Grand Army of the Republic, designated May 30.  It is now generally observed, and is a legal holiday in most of the States.

=THE BOY IN GRAY=

A Ballad for Memorial Day

BY MARY BRADLEY

Fredericksburg had had her fray,
And the armies stood at bay;
Back of wall, and top of hill,
Union men and men in gray
Glowered at each other still.

In the space between the two
Many a hapless boy in blue
Lay face upward to the skies;
Many another, just as true,
Filled the air with frantic cries.

  “Love of God!” with pity stirred,
  Cried a rebel lad who heard. 
  “This is more than I can bear! 
  General, only say the word,
  They shall have some water there.”

  “What’s the use?” his general,
  Frowning, asked.  “A Yankee ball
  Drops you dead, or worse, half way,
  Once you go beyond the wall.” 
  “May be!” said the boy in gray.

  “Still I’ll risk it, if you please.” 
  And the senior, ill at ease,
  Nodded, growling under breath,
  “For his mortal enemies
  I have sent the lad to death.”

  Then a hotter fire began
  As across the field he ran,—­
  Yankee shooters marked a prey,—­
  But beside each wounded man
  Heedless knelt the boy in gray.

  Parched lips hailed him as he came;
  Throats with fever all aflame,
  While the balls were spinning by,
  Drained the cup he offered them,
  Blessed him with their dying cry.