In the same issue, a Spectator reporter interviewed a man who choose to express his opinions on the way that the Queen's Birthday had been celebrated in his youth, twenty years previously in 1865 :
“ ‘Well, what do you intend
doing Monday?’ asked a Spectator reporter of one of the grand army of bachelors
on the shade side of thirty.
“ ‘Oh, I dun’no; possibly
take in a park and put in an easy time generally. Plenty to choose from. That
proposed feu-de-joie, by the way, revives old recollections.’
“ ‘Tell you what it is,’ he
resumed a moment later, branching into a side issue as a small boy was observed
covertly smothering an ignited firecracker on the near approach of a policeman;
‘the boys of the present day don’t know what fun is, compared with the youth of
twenty years ago. In those days, we could beg or steal old bones, boiler
bottoms and scrap iron for months ahead and convert them into cash to procure
the coveted supply of powder and fireworks. No boy was thought of much accountwho
did not possess either a pistol or cannon of some description, and the racket
we kicked up Queen’s birthday morning was enough to raise the dead. The greater
the noise, the happier the boy. Plenty of shot guns were pressed into service,
too, and fired along the streets without fear of the law. Didn’t appear to be
any more fires or accidents in consequence either. The parades were next in
order. Those were the balmy days of the volunteer fire department, and it was a
pretty cold 24th when the members thereof didn’t blossom out in the
full colors of the rainbow. Caller act, No. 2, a piano-box engine, was the
favorite, pressed hard by Neptune the hose reel. Rescue No. 2 was composed of
rather tough material, largely from Corktown, which invariably demonstrated
later in the day when the ‘bhoys’ got limbered up with forty rod. The hook and
bucket brigade made a good showing as well. Well, the military turnout,
composed of the British regulars then in the city, and the volunteers, in
connection with the firemen, was the big feature of the day. All Hamilton
generally put in appearance at the back of the palace to witness the evolutions
and the firing of the feu-de-joie, which was then a regular institution. The
small boy was at his wit’s end to know how to dispose of his store of coppers
to best advantage as he passed the numerous toffee stalls that lined King
street all the way to the parade ground. Seems to me folks were grittier then.
There were no street cars in those days, and you’d see a woman dragging babes
from the other end of the city, with three or four kids hanging to her skirts;
face was red as old what’s-his-name, but happy, bound to see a show and give the
young ones a chance as well. The Calithumpians and the races divided up the
honors of the afternoon and civic fireworks wound up the day.’
“ ‘No doubt,’ he continued
after a satisfactory glimpse through the bottom of a soda-water glass, ‘the
present way of celebrating is an improvement on the past. About the only thing
to be said in its favor was that the money spent was mainly kept in the city,
instead of being bestowed on railway travel and outside attractions. Per
contra, there was a full amount bad whiskey drank, fights innumerable, and as
for the uproar we boys kicked up, to experience it now would drive me crazy. We
had our time, and as for the present generation, you know, what the eye don’t
see the heart don’t sigh for – barring, of course, a feller’s best girl going
back on him Have something? What ! Nothing? Well, what’s going to happen?’ ”
Hamilton Spectator. May 23, 1885
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