Iowa
Old Press
THE SIDNEY ARGUS - HERALD
Sidney, Fremont Co., Iowa
October 18, 1934
Melancholy Days
"The melancholy days have come, the saddest of the
year," is a line from an old poem that our grandparents
used to quote at this season of the year. One rarely hears it now
and we are inclined to believe that the sentiment is all bunk. To
be sure, there are melancholy days in Autumn and they will come a
little later when rain beats the once gorgeous foliage of the
trees into a sodden mass on the water-soaked ground. There are
melancholy days in the fall of the year when one realizes that
the coal bin must be filled and the monotonous round of tending a
furnace or building the kitchen fire must begin. But they are not
necessarily the saddest of the year. They are no sadder than the
days that brought the late spring frost that nipped the beans and
other tender things in the garden. They are no more melancholy
days than the days when the sun broadcasted its high frequency
waves and hot winds came out of the south to curl the corn
leaves. There is a certain solemnity about Autumn but there need
be no melancholy. No season has a monopoly on melancholy days and
sadness is largely a condition of mind that may assert itself at
any time. Another poet once wrote: "What is so rare as a day
in June?" Nothing that we know of unless it be a perfect day
in October which as a charm that cannot be adequately described
either in prose or poetry.-- Auburn Herald.
[transcribed by W.F., April 2008]