“Pigmies are pigmies yet; through perched on Alps,
And pyramids are pyramids in vales,
Time is her own leveler; build herself;
Virtue alone outbuilds the pyramids,
Her monuments shall stand when Egypt’s fall.”[i]
It has been truthfully said, “A fountain cannot rise about its source.” “Water seeks its level.” “The vulture smells carrion from afar,” etc. We have had a striking illustration of these aphorisms of late. When the Baltimore help came to work in the canneries in Milton, but a few days had elapsed before the lewd girls of Milton had found out the affinities of the Baltimore group and were associating with them. God forbid that we should cast the stigma of immorality at all of the Baltimore women who have come here to make an honorable living! They are not all “Minehahas”[ii] but like any other body of persons, they are diversified, and while some of them may be lacking in virtue, we believe there are others whose chastity cannot be doubted. The quiet and over-virtuous people of Milton consider all of the imported help of the canneries nil. This is a wrong conclusion. There are some who are good. It was said some years ago, “Can any good come out of Nazareth?”[iii] And Philip said, “Come and see.” There are many good women, we believe, in the canneries here; some who are otherwise. There is one young woman who came here to make money. She is considered the fastest skinner of tomatoes in Baltimore, her highest record being 73 baskets in 12 hours. She told the writer that for the last three weeks she had averaged $2.50 each day. This woman is here attending to her own business, and go to the cannery when you will, you will always see her at her post.
Mr. and Mrs. William S. Anderson, of Riverton, N. J., have been visiting Mrs. Anderson’s brother Captain George Hunter and family. Mrs. Anderson is one of the largest truck growers in Burlington County, N. J.
Very few squirrels have been killed in this locality this season. The best squirrel shooter in town says, “I am not killing any for they are not fit to eat, the season is late and they are yet carrying their young.”
John B. Welch, Jr., son of the poet, John B. Welch, of this town, while operating a sand drum at Gardner, Mass. had both thumbs torn off at the first joint. He is now in Milton.
David M. Conwell has purchased the property on the corner of Federal Street and Manship Avenue, of W. E. Manship, of Philadelphia. Consideration $1000.
Joseph Calhoun, the young man who has recently opened a barber shop on Federal Street, is doing a good business.
Mr. Robert Blocksom, of Magnolia, was a Milton visitor on Sunday and Monday.
Miss Susie Carey, of Glenside, Pa., attended the funeral of Mrs. Sallie Waples Ponder.
Mrs. Estella H. Allen, of Bucks County, Pa., will teach the Milton public school during the present term.
Mr. J. Stockley Ingram has been appointed constable for Broadkiln Hundred. He will move into town as soon as he can find a vacant house.
By the billing of temperance meetings all over Sussex, Milton was left out.
“’Tis ever thus since childhood,”
I’ve seen my fondest hopes decay,
There’s not a flower that I have prized,
But what was the first to fade away (?)”
Perhaps Hinda and her Geber lover only live in Tom Moore’s Lalla Rookh, but coming events cast their shadows before us.[iv]
Rev. John Jones, of Philadelphia, was a Milton visitor the early part of the week.
The Milton Public Schools opened on Monday. Following is the corps of teachers: Prof. Mortimer Whitehead of Lincoln, E. W. Warren and L. J. Coverdale of Milton, Miss Elizabeth Register of Lewes and Mrs. Estella Bacon, late of Laurel, but now of Milton. Owing to the death of Miss Registers sister, who was killed while on a visit in Philadelphia in alighting from a trolley car, that lady could not be present this week, and her place is being filled by [Miss] Hattie J. Conner.
It was thought the tomato glut was over but the streets of Milton on Tuesday morning belied that belief. On Monday and Tuesday mornings they brought as high as 25 cents a basket.
Mrs. Sophia E. Lawson and Mrs. Laura Summer, sisters of Mrs. Otis Goodwin, from Maine, are guests of Mrs. Goodwin.
Isaac W. Nailor, contractor and builder, of Philadelphia, is visiting in Milton.
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[i] The first line of this verse was a very popular aphorism in the 18th and 19th centuries. Its origin is obscure, although a “Dr. Young” is mentioned as its author in the collection Proverbs, Maxims and Phrases of All Ages: Classified Subjectively, by Robert Christy (1887).
[ii] “Minnehaha” is a fictional character in Longfellow’s poem The Song of Hiawatha. She seduces the protagonist Hiawatha, and so her name is used by Conner to categorize the more “forward” cannery women.
[iii] From the New Testament, John 1:46
[iv] Conner has referenced Thomas Moore’s oriental romance poem Lalla Rookh before, in the issue of March 22, 1901.