The law-abiding people of this community were startled on Tuesday,
and the greatest indignation prevailed at an editorial article in the
_Sentinel_ denouncing the practice of hugging in the public parks. The
article went on to show that the placing of seats in the parks leads
to hugging, and the editor denounced hugging in the most insane manner
possible.
The _Sun_ does not desire to enter politics, but when a great
constitutional question like this comes up, it will be found on the side
of the weak against the strong.
The _Sentinel_ advises the removal of the seats from the park because
hugging is done on them. Great heavens! has it come to this? Are the
dearest rights of the American citizen to be abridged in this summary
manner? Let us call the attention of that powerful paper to a clause in
the Declaration of Independence, which asserts that “all men are created
free and equal, endowed with certain inalienable rights, among which are
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” When the framers of that
great Declaration of Independence were at work on that clause, they must
have had in view the pastime of hugging in the parks.
Hugging is certainly a “pursuit of happiness.” People do not hug for
wages--that is, except on the stage. Nobody is obliged to hug. It is a
sort of spontaneous combustion, as it were, of the feelings, and has to
have proper conditions of the atmosphere to make it a success. Parties
who object to hugging are old, usually, and have been satiated, and are
like a lemon that has done duty in circus lemonade. If they had a job of
hugging, they would want to hire a man to do it for them.
A man who objects to a little natural, soul-inspiring hugging on a back
seat in a park, of an evening, with a fountain throwing water all over
little cast-iron cupids, has probably got a soul, but he hasn't got it
with him. To the student of nature there is no sight more beautiful than
to see a flock of young people take seats in the park, after the sun has
gone to bed in the west, and the moon has pulled a fleecy cloud over her
face for a veil, so as not to disturb the worshippers.
A couple, one a male and the other a female, will sit far apart on the
cast-iron seat for a moment, when the young lady will try to fix her
cloak over her shoulders, and she can't fix it, and then the young man
will help her, and when he has got it fixed he will go off and leave one
arm around the small of her back. He will miss his arm, and wonder where
he left it, and go back after it, and in the dark he will feel around
with the other hand to find the hand he left, and suddenly the two hands
will meet; they will express astonishment, and clasp each other, and be
so glad that they will begin to squeeze, and the chances are that they
will cut the girl in two, but they never do. Under such circumstances, a
girl can exist on less atmosphere than she can when doing a washing.
There is just about so much hugging that has to be done, and the
_Sentinel_ should remember that very many people have not facilities at
their homes for such soul-stirring work, and they are obliged to flee
to the parks, or to the woods, where the beneficent city government has
provided all of the modern improvements.
Hugging is as necessary to the youth of the land as medicine to the
sick, and instead of old persons, whose days of kittenhood are over,
throwing cold water upon the science of hugging, they should encourage
it by all legitimate means.
When, in strolling through the parks, you run on to a case of sporadic
hugging, instead of making a noise on the gravel walk, to cause the
huggists to stop it, you should trace your steps noiselessly, get behind
a tree, and see how long they can stand it without dying. Instead of
removing the cast-iron seats from the parks, we should be in favor of
furnishing reserved seats for old people, so they can sit and watch the
hugging.
It doesn't do any hurt to hug.
People think it is unhealthy, but nobody was ever known to catch cold
while hugging. It is claimed by some that young people who stay out
nights and hug, are not good for anything the next day. There is
something to this, but if they didn't get any hugging they wouldn't be
worth a cent any time. They would be all the time looking for it.
No, good Mr. _Sentinel_, on behalf of fifty thousand young people who
have no organ to make known their wants, we ask you to stay your hand,
and do not cause the seats to be removed from the parks. Remember how
many there are who have yet to learn the noble art of hugging, and give
them a chance.