The Loup City northwestern. (Loup City, Neb.) 189?-1917, September 30, 1909, Image 8

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    “Has any queen a greater chance to make her individuality felt
than we, each in her home?"
Mrs. Edith McCormick, daughter of John D. Rockefeller, in the
pride of motherhood, put the question in a recent expression of her
opinion as to the dignity of motherhood and the often-quoted sacri
fice maternity entails.
With it she touched nearly upon another question, and one which
has done as much in the swaying of the empires as all the states
men and politicians of the past have been able to accomplish with
the prestige of monarchs and the force of mighty armies:
Who are the real queens of the world?
Does it, indeed, lie in any power, except those of birth and pre
rogative, to invest a woman with the essential attributes of a queen,
omitting only the title and the crown?
THERE is much to be said for
the contention of the daugh
ter of the world’s most famous
millionaire, that every worthy
mother is a queen among
women—every thing, except
this: That she isn’t.
For to bo a queen, a woman must
rule, by whatever means she can com
mand. over a whole people, not over
a family or a few individuals merely:
and over her people her sw ay must en
dure undisputed.
Such pre-eminence and such rule,
while it does eliminate the simple ma
triarch. remains far from debarring
from admission many a woman who
can never wear a crown. And it does
shut out not a few who wear crowns
to-day.
For there are queens who are ob
vious nonentities on their august
thrones, even as there are untitled
women whose sway is as potent, and
as broad, as that ever wielded by the
most tyrannous of kings over the most
subservient of peoples.
In the first group appear a number
of the reigning majesties of the pres
ent, foremost among them the queen
of the most stable kingdom and the
empress of the most extensive empire
the world now knows and in all its
history lias contained—Alexandra of
Great Britain.
In Praise of Alexandra.
She is famed for every attribute of
beautiful and admirable motherhood;
she comes of the most widely en
throned royal race; she is all that Is
lovely and excellent and gracious.
Yet her power, her real power, as a
ruler remains practically nil. Her hus
band, after a career which British
loyalty, reminiscent of his princeship
of Wales, finds it impossible to forget,
and under a constitutional era that
ties such monarchs to the innocuous
ness cf automata, has proved himself
a king in the full reality of the cun
with restrictions ot growing democ
racy such as they would have spurned
with contempt in their haughty, royal
reigns.
On Three Great Thrones.
And, beside him, a consort succeed
ing Victoria and lacking the power to
banish from her offended sight a wom
an whose relations with Edward
would have made that all-powerful old
lady almost exile both him and his
fair protegee from England itself.
It must be often a cruel bitterness
that underlies the gracious smile
with which a consort like Alexandra
hears the flattering title “queen.”
Far worse tne case ot the czarina ot
Russia, whose whole existence is one
series of terrors for the safety of her
husband and her children; and no
more queenly, although much happier,
is the station of the empress of Ger
many, relegated practically to the of
fice of hausfrau, a basis on which
every other German wife and mother
is fully her equal.
These are the three most mighty
thrones in the world to-day, and these
the women who are, in reality, least
among queens. For the real queens,
enthroned in the possession of real
power, the quest must turn to the les
i ser kingdoms, where the head that
wears the crown need but nod to
compel obedience.
Such a real queen is Wilhelmina of
Holland, the only woman living to-day
whose maternity earns her the royal
rank Mrs. McCormick has so futilely
claimed for all her lovely sex. Upon
the ability for motherhood in Wil
helmina, the Dutch realized, their na
tional existence depended; and to her
they give, with the acclaim of rejoic
ing independence, the stanch loyalty
which implies all the power a modern
queen can covet.
Portugal's Unfortunate Queen.
So, too, does little Portugal own a
d>UJ£
Tragedy
Queen / J
, U'
cZfinraSt/U jBjaZfOUXpr
J&BC
ZAtlZI*.
WSLBA.
jtQ.in’eii
ning ami ability iu which Carlyle dis
covered the origin and significance ol
the title.
It is a strange anomaly; a son, suc
ceeding a mother whose dominant
spirit kept his gray beard almost r
mockery of his destiny to power, anc
instantly exercising more potent in
fliience upon the affairs of the world
than any of his predecessors for a
hundred years, while he is hampered
queen. Amelie, whose courage crowned,
amid the tragedy that made her dow
ager queen, the force of character
with which she long combated the
weaknesses of her husband, Carlos.
?ortugal, for all Us ferocious social
istic plotters, realizes that it has a
genuine queen; amid its sullen growls
it whimpers under her remnants of
power. And Italy, after a period of
distrust, accepted Queen Helena amid
the chaos she so devotedly faced in
the ruins of Messina.
But there ends the brief listing of
the real queens whose crowns are
more than gewgaws; for the greatest,
most genuine of them all, the modern
Semiramis of power, who made all
plotting China bend before her will
and wielded the scepter of her irre
sistible might while she gasped in the
agonies of death, has vanished, with
only a towering place in history to
tell how very possible it has been
for a poor and pretty slave girl to
govern 400,000,000 people by her own
unaided brain.
What, then is fho reality of the
queenly office, as it is enjoyed upon
the modern thrones, when compared
with the power of the uncrowned
queens whose sway is acknowledged
in many lands to-day?
If it be a question of the actuality
of power, exercised over numerous
and influential subjects, only that
famous dowager empress of China,
now dead and done for, could have
presumed to rival the silent, imper
turbable sway which goes with the
millions of Hetty Green as she sits
in her decent black dress in her mod
est office in the Chemical National
bank.
The Real Monarchs.
Every statesman in Europe, and
every monarch confesses that the ac
tual kings, with power to make and
forbid wars, are the Rothschilds,
j slaves—and this by no wiles of beau
ty and no ravishment of form.
Her Position Won.
She won her distinguished position
through such mazes of rivalries and
cabals as few queens, excepting those
of the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries, have encountered—deeply
laid sche.mes of astute schemers,
whose hatreds did not flinch at the
most detestable attacks. She has en
dured, and is now more prized by her
republican compatriots than are the
queens of Kurope by their nominally
loyal subjects.
Italy has its stage queen as well as
France, a woman whose whole life
has been a romance, her rise to great
ness having been marked by as im
pressive a discrepancy as that which
attended the beggar maid whom King
Cophetua loved.
Until the titular queen of Italy bold
ly conquered the affections of her
subjects by braving death and sustain
ing injury after the terrible Sicilian
earthquake, there was small doubt as
to the woman to whom the bulk of
Italy's allegiance was passionately
given, and that in spite of the equally
passionate manner in which the fam
ous actress, Duse, had for some years
been repelling her compatriots’ devo
tion for the sake of her affection for
the ingrate d’Annunzio.
It is rarely, very rarely, that the
stage queen enjoys, like Bernhardt, a
life tenure oi office. Usuallv her sub
f
dteeu
Uaeejlc/
Xhonce
<Sv»VnWi .
whose immense wealth controls the
treasuries that are war's vital sin
ews. If, by some unbelievable turn of
fate—such a one, for instance, as be
fell Samson of old—Hetty Green were
moved to abandon all her alliances,
call all her loans, and try her
strength, just once, the whole United
States would feel that a giant's
strength was shaking the pillars of its
finance.
No queen, that silent old woman
who was once New England's toasted
belle; but no queen, except her con
temporary in distant China, has, in
the century past and present, so made
men bend before her in tribute to her
rule.
While riches are power—and the
powmr most sensibly felt abroad as
well as here—they do not afford the
sole domain that is open to the lead
ers of mankind. Both the intellect
and the emotions serve as foundations
for allegiance often more stanch and
more extensive than can be won by
the anointed queens.
Cisraeh s Course.
If, before a jury expert in weighing
of evidence, the relative powers, of
practical efficiensy, pertaining to
Queen Alexandra and Mrs. Humphry
Ward could be submitted for trial,
nothing but the notorious lip loyalty
of the Englishman could give the ver
dict in favor of the reigning queen.
With Victoria, of course, the dispute
would have been too unequal, for she
was an imperious young lady and old
lady; and all the literary lights of her
era—except, perhaps, Thackeray—fail
to show so pronounced an impression
as she made on the manners and mor
als of her times, while India became
her empire because Disraeli, as her
prime minister, comprehended how
much she longed for the title, albeit
Great Britain already enjoyed the sub
stance. Yet that very title, manufac
tured from thin air to add another
crown, has in the end served to rivet
the chains of ownership upon half a
continent in Asia.
as things go soberly at present,
the odds of power all He with the
woman novelist, whose influence all
England admits freely.
As thing* go, too, in France, the
drama gives to the world another
queen, whose dominance no one dares
deny. Sara Bernhardt can still lay
her slender hands upon the inmost
souls of men and hale them forth
until their owners are her liumbls
jects fall away with the decadence of
her beauty. But sometimes, among
the charming dolls of the theater,
there appears the woman of genius,
like Bernhardt and Duse, the inspira
tion of whose divine flame compels
loyalty to the last. That has been the
endowment of some few of the en
tions. which constitutes on the stage
a more potently royal power than all
but a few of those who wear the
crown can exercise, extends to music.
Every age brings its queen of song,
some wondrously gifted creature on
whose parted lips the thousands hang
entranced. Like the actress, no origin
is too low, no birthplace too distant,
to keep her from destiny.
Australia gave to the world the
regal Melba; but multitudes the world
over have testified to her power over
the senses and the emotions of the
peoples.
With the one exception of Wilhel
mina of Holland in which her people's
gratitude for their rescued independ
ence remains still warm, there lives
probably not a queen whose passing
from her throne would so move to
anxiety or mourning the very subjects
who protest allegiance as would the
loss of one of the uncrowned queens
of this modern day.
That is because this modern day ac
throned queens, and history has glam
oured them with romance in every
tint with which it limns their careers.
Duse, for the sake of one treacher
ous devotee, neglected her audiences
and dragged her sublime talents into
the oblivion of his dull stagecraft. She
survives to-day, a possibility of the
future, but, for the present, a queen
in abdication who gave her all for
love.
The Regal Melba.
The irresistible sway over the emo
cepts its kings very much on toler
ance. its queens only as inevitable at
tachments, and its real leaders in
thought and art as rare possessions
it cannot afford to lose.
_»
An Infant Industry.
“What do you consider the most
crying need of the day?”
“I don’t know; but if you had said
the most crying need of the night, I
should have said sterilized milk.”
Meow!
“Another terminal grab!”
“Where?”
“In the nursery. Little Bobby has
just pulled the cat’s tail.”
A SALON OF THE ANCIENTS
Old Rome and its Life Portrayed for
the Lasting Judgment of
Moderns.
The salon of Clodia on the Palatine
and in her villa on the seashore of
Baine drew together the foremost pol
iticians, poets and orators of the time
—men of the older generation, like
Cicero and Metellus, young men like
her brother, Clodius, the brilliant and
erratic tribune, or Caelius, whom Cic
ero calls "the best-informed politician
In Rome.” “The burning eyes” of
Clodia, which Cicero celebrates in his
fierce attack upon her, her brilliant
wit, her versatile character, her skill
as a dancer, her abandon and bohe
snianism, her Claudian pride and con
tempt for popular opinion are all
marks of that fiery southern tempera
ment which could find no middle
course between love and hate, which
would hesitate for no scruple and be
thwarted by no obstacle from grati
fying her desires or satisfying her
thirst for revenge, which would be aa
fickle as it would be relentless to
ward fickleness in others. It is her
glory and her misfortune that her
character and exploits have been
painted by the most gifted poet, the
greatest orator, and one of the most
brilliant wits of her time. She tired
of Catullus of his wrath and scorn.
She failed to ensnare Cicero, and she
avenged herself upon him by driving
him into exile and taking his prop
erty from him. She was jilted and
laughed at by the once-devoted Coeli
us. and consequently brought a charge
of attempted murder against him and
almost compassed his ruin. Whether
she deserved the abuse which Catul
lus heaps upon her in his later poems,
whether she merits the epitaph of the
“three-cent Clytemnestra” which Cae
lius puts upon her, or is “the Pala
tine Medea” whom Cicero paints her
in his defense of Caelius, we may
never know.—Scribner’s Magazine.
One Vegetarian Monarch.
The king of Italy is the only vege
tarian monarch.
13 A VICTORY FOR HUSBAND
Official Notification That Wife May
Not Grow Thin if Husband is
Opposed Thereto.
A woman in Silesia has been haled
into court by her husband because she
persisted in growing thin in opposi
tion to his wishes. In his petition for
a divorce the Silesian gentleman de
clared the lady obtained her husband
under false pretenses, for when he
married her she was full sized and of
ample and generous proportions and
he had every reason to believe that
she would remain so. When slimness
became the fashion, however, she sud
denly began fading away in order to
wrear the latest style of empire gown.
She rode horseback three hours each
morning, played tennis two hours, and
then took fat-reducing walks. Com
plainant further avers that she ate
like a bird. How successful was this
strenuous pursuit of slenderness may
be judged from the fact that in three
months’ time she had lost 31 pounds
and a portly husband.
For the hard-hearted Silesian judge
granted the captious husband's plea
for a divorce and delivered a fiery at
tack upon the prevailing styles in fem
inine architecture. He laid down the
principle that no lady has a right to
fade away without her husband's con
sent, and he completely disallowed
defendant's plea that half a wife is
better than none.
The wife is left free to continue her
disappearing process as long as she
likes. It is hoped that her frugal hab
its of living will prove useful to her,
row that she is deprived of a hus
band's support.—Success Magazine.
Triumph for Capt. Cody.
The record-breaking performance by
Capt. Fred Cody, the American, who
has been experimenting wdth an aero
plane of his own contrivance for the
British war office, is an achievement
that will still further lift the United
States as the leader of airship enter
prise. The incident will doubtless
stimulate aeroplane enthusiasm in
Great Britain, which ha3 been con
, spicuously slow thus far.
WOULD ELIMINATE THE ERROR COLUMN
Cut out the error column.
This is the suggestion of Fred Ten
ney, famous first basemau, once man
ager of the Boston National league
club and now with the New York
Giants.
By the elimination of this column in
the tabulated score, with the exception
of wild throws on which base runners
advance an extra base, this veteran
believes than another step forward
would be made. His idea, when care
fully considered, presents conditions
that are worthy of thought
"How many times are batters rob
bed of what are almost sure base
hits?” says Tenney. “This is especial
ly true in line drives to the infielders.
No great credit is due the infielder for
getting these balls, as a rule, for they
are shot straight at him. Of course,
there are exceptions, as there are to
almost everything, but that is the rule.
As a matter of fact the batsman is al
most entitled to a hit Surely he hit
the pitcher hard enough to get one,
but the luck of the game, that cuts t
such an important figure in baseball,
happens in that instance to be against
him.
“So I figure that if the error column,
so far as fumbled balls or bad throws
to a baseman are concerned, was elim
inated, making everything a hit, it
would only just about even up for
those infield line drives that the bat
ter loses because the inlielder Lappens
to be right in front of a Lard-hit ball
driven straight into his hands.
“Naturally the scoring of a fielder's
choice would remain just as it is to
day, for the batsman is not entitled
to a hit where the infielder makes the
play on some other base-runner when
the batsman could have been thrown
out at first. Again, there must be some
way of scoring extra bases taken by a
runner on a bad throw. For that I
would leave the error column in the
box score, but it would represent wild
throws, not fumbled balls, or a bad
throw to first on a batted ball.
“This would naturally make some
difference in the batting ar.d fielding
averages of the players, but 1 don't
think it would boost any batsman very
much, while it would take away that
excuse for a fielder shirking a hard
chance tor fear he might be penalized
for a misplay. There are some such
men playing the game, you know,
though one of that kind is never a
high-class performer.
"It wouldn’t take long for those who
are watching the batting averages
closely to figure out the difference this
change would make in the hitting of a
player. And, I say. why should a bat
ter be penalized by having a hit taken
away from him when he manages to
hit the ball in such a way that an. in
fielder musses it up? Rather, I think,
to do justice on all sides, a base hit
should be credited.
“No one who follows baseball close
ly ever thinks of judging a player’s
ability in the field by the official field
ing averages. We all know well that
a good player goes after everything
within reach, never fearing a possible
error through a fumble or a bad throw
to first. He is there to tr- to make
the play, to get everything he can get
his hands on, and if he shirks because
he is afraid of that error, then he
isn’t going to get lots of balls that he
might have handled cleanly and gone
through with for a put-out. The pres
ent fielding averages are practically
worthless, for it is almost always that
the best players have the lowest per
centage, while those who don’t or
can't cover much ground get away
with the fewest errors and, therefore,
are at the top in the averages. Hence,
in picking young ball players, scouts
judge by what they see them do, not
by what they read in the fielding av
erages.
‘‘I believe that such a change in the
scoring rules would make good ball
players of some of the poorer ones,
and that it would make still better
performers of the best of them. To
me it looks as though it would be a
step in the right direction, keeping
pace with the rapid advances now be
ing made in baseball. No one would
be hurt, while both batsmen and field
ers would be benefited. ,
“I would like to see the Baseball
Writers’ Association of America take
this question up at its meeting this
winter and present it to the joint rules i
committee of the National and Amen- ;
can leagues for serious consideration." >
| CRACK KANSAS CITY PITCHER
Pat Flaherty, up to a few months
ago a member of the Boston National
league twirling staff, has been doing
fine work since joining the Kansas
City American association team.
Flaherty has served in both the big
leagues and while pitching good ball,
has always been more or less unrortu
ate
Seven of last year’s Pennsylvania
team will be missing this fall.
Yale’s call by Capt. Coy has beeD
sent out, although the quarterbacks,
including Corey, French and Johnson,
started work at Greenport, L. I., some
time ago. There will be more than
seventy men in the full squad.
T. A. Butklewicz, former guard and
tackle at Princeton and Pennsylvania
has been engaged to take charge ol
the Princeton squad, his attention be
ing particularly directed to the line
men.
Princeton has lost by graduation
Tibbott, Eddie Dillon, Booth and
Dowd, but has a wealth of good ma
terial to fill these and other places.
Havana will enjoy a big boom in
football sport this fall. The last game
scheduled this year is between Rol
lins college and University of Havana
on December 25.
Heydler Signs New Umpire.
William Brannan, who has been
umpiring in the Wisconsin-Iilinols
league. ,has been added to the Na
tional league corps of arbiters by
Pesid; nt Heydler. Brannan is a giant,
standing six feet three inches.
Robins’ Curious Nesting Places.
The two robins which have built
their nest in the cover of a meter at
the Market Drayton Electric Light
works have many precedents in the
choice of unconventional nesting
places A year or two ago a robin’s
nest was built on a book shell in a
night nursery at Chiselhurst which
was occupied without interruption by
a nurse and child. Four eggs were
laid, and two young birds were
hatched out. Two other robins built
their nest on the axle of a colliery
wagon in daily use at Seghill, in
Northumberland. Among other curi
ous recent nesting places have been
the breast pocket of a scarecrow at
Ashbourne, a nail box in a village
forge, the skeleton of a crow, and the
rifle range butts at Ticehurst, Sussex
—Westminster Gazette.
Monopoly of Oil Supply.
The world’s entire supply of the oit
of bergamot comes from a small sec
tion of Calabria, fronting on the
Straits of Messina.
OUR OLDEST FLATS
Work of Repairing Famous Cliff
Palace Going On.
Investigation Shows That Ancients
Used Great Apartment Houses for
1,000 Families Before History
Was Written.
Kansas City.—Centuries before the
first apartment house had taken form
in the minds of modern architects the
cliff dwellers had developed the flat
I to an extent that the builders in the
great cities are just beginning to ap
proximate. The old-time Americans
were not content to house a dozen or
a score of families under the same
roof; they made room for an entire
community, sometimes consisting of
possibly 1.000 persons, with their
places of worship and entertainment,
their workshops and all their indus
trial activities, excepting, of course,
agriculture.
This mode of living had its incon
veniences as well as its manifest au
advantages. If the baby had the colic
on a cold and wintry night, pater fa
rnilias could go for the medicine man
without exposing himself to the ele
ments and the back-door gossips could
keep the whole community under sur
veillance without extreme exertion.
But to dodge going to church when
the kiva, or place of worship, was
only a few hundred feet away, under
the same roof that sheltered the home
must have taxed the inventive ingenu
ity of the first American seriously
The weather would never serve as an
excuse and a Sunday headache would
be only a flimsy one. To visit the
"affinity” under the watchful eye of
wife and mother-in-law must have
been quite a problem and the club
must have been tame and common
place when conducted within calling
distance of the home. Decidedly, the
modern way is much better, say the
Sybarites.
The present summer Dr. J. W.
Fewkes of the Smitsonian institution
has been engaged in the interesting
task of cleaning and renovating the
greatest of aboriginal apartment
houses. Ordinarily a house cleaning
job is of interest only to the persons
engaged thereon or inconvenienced
thereby. A scientific house cleaning
is different; and Dr. Fewkes’ under
taking derives national interest and
importance from the fact that it con
sisted in removing the accumulated
dust, debris and rubbish of ages from
the famous Cliff palace, the most im
Earliest Apartment House in world.
posing prehistoric ruin In America
and the largest and most spectacular
cliff dwelling in the world.
Primarily Dr. Fewkes’ labors were
intended to aid in the preservation of
the Cliff palace—to prevent its fur
ther decay and demolition and to
place it in condition for the enjoy
ment and edification of the increasing
number of tourists and sightseers that
annually drift that way. Another ob
jest in view was research—to gain,
if possible, some insight into the state
of culture, the manner of life and
ways of thought of the flat-dwellers
of prehistoric America; to ascertain
their relationship, if any, to the ex
isting tribes of the southwest and to
make possible an intelligent g jess as
to their origin and their fate.
No attempt was made at restoration
I or reconstruction; that would have
been destructive of the sentiment to
which the relics of the people of the
j stone age owe the major part of their
interest. The old ruins remain now .
as before, the unmarred and unal
tered w'ork of the people of the back
The excavation of the accumulated
debris and dust heaps of the centuries
has been carried on with the greatest
care to avoid the working of further
destruction. Walls that seemed in
danger of falling have been patched,
buttressed or braced to save them
from utter demolition and to preserve
them in their present condition for
the edification and wonderment of fu
ture generations; but the ragged sky
line of the great Cliff palace has not
been marred with modern stone and
mortar and not a trowel hasaitywhe:t
been applied excepting as a conserx
ing (not as a rebuilding) agent For
what he has refrained from doing
quite as much as for what he has
done, Dr. Fewkes deserves the grati
tude of all who are interested *n
American antiquities.
From a scientific viewpoint the
most interesting result of Dr. Fewkes'
investigation of the Ciiff palace is the
conclusive evidence brought to Ugh',
of the close relationship of the Hopi
Indians of northern Arizona to the
prehistoric cliff dwellers of the .Mesa
Verde.
Dr. Fewkes’ excavations have re
vealed the fact that the Cliff palace is
much larger than has ever before
been suspected. The lower terraces
and apartments were covered, filled
and entirely hidden by fallen walls,
talus from the cliff and the rubbish of
centuries. All this has been cleared
away, showing that the Cliff palace
contains 175 rooms and 23 kivas. It
may have accommodated a population
of anywhere from 700 to 1,000 per
sons.
A Man of Judgment.
“She turned her entire fortune over
to him as soon as they were married/
“She must have unbounded faith ic
his judgment to give him control of
so much."
“She has, he is the first man that
ever told her she was beautiful,’*
In the Air.
Tom—Just saw Miss Welloph on
the street and lifted my hat
Dick—And did she respond’
Tom—Yes. She lifted her nose.