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About The Columbus journal. (Columbus, Neb.) 1874-1911 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 9, 1910)
i olumbus journal. ColumbUH, Nobr. Consolidated with the Columbus Times April 1, 1904; with the Platte County Argus January 1.19W. Entered at the Postoffice, Columbus. Nebr.. as veeond-elaBS mail matter. rSBKB OrflDBSCBIKIOK: One year, by mail, postage prepaid tl.50 Biz months .78 Three months M . .. .40 WEDNESDAY. FEBRUARY 9, 1910. 8TR0THEB &. STOCKWELL, Proprietors. BJsNEWALS The date opposite your name on your paper, or wrapper shows to what time your subscription is paid. Thus Jan05 shows that payment has been received up to Jan. 1,1906, FebOS to Feb. 1, 1905 and so on. When payment Is made, the date, which answers as a receipt, will be changed accordingly. DISCONTINUANCES Responsible subscrib ers will continue to receive this Journal until the publishers are notified by letter to discontinue, when all arrearage must be paid. If you do not wish the Journal continued for another j ir af ter tho time paid for has expired, yon should previously notify us to discontinue it. CHANGE IN ADDRESS When ordering a ahange in the address, subscribers should be rare to give their old aa well as their new address. Jim Dahlman has gone to Excelsior Springs to get into training for his fight against Shallenberger and the prohibitionists. Governor Marshall of Indiana went into office on the liquor issue, and now wants to stay in office by exclud ing the liquor issue from the next campaign. Nothing like playing them both wavs. Omaha Bee. The editor of the Ainsworth Star Journal believes that insurgency should be "tempered with judgment and discretion and not run mad." Evidently the Star-Journal man is not numbered among the frenzied reform ers who refuse to cross the bridge with Taft. He prefers good company to remaining jon the opposite side with Whedon and the other anti-Taft and anti Burkett shouters. The officers of the democratic state central committee have called a mass meeting of the party to gather at Lin coln on Februar 14th to participate in a dollar banquet. Evidently the writer of the call had in mind the Whedon gathering at Lincoln a few days ago when he said: "A republican administration finds itself repudiated and condemned by multitudes of re publicans because it has departed still further from democratic principles." And then the writer of the call adds: "The country is hungry for democ racy," and "the future of the republic, as dependingon political and industrial liberty, is involved." The call has the same old sound that the platform of a democratic convention annually rings out for the public ear. The future of the republic does not depend alone on any political party. The republic will exist whether the democratic party is successful or not, and the claim that the life of the republic depends upon democratic success sounds silly extremely so. The republic has passed through some critical periods in its history periods in which had the democratic party been in power would have resulted in turning back the dial of time to mid night gloom. But the republic would have survived even if the calamity of a democratic victory had delayed its onward march. The democratic party is not the republic The intelligent, law abiding and patriotic people, and the spirit of patriotism and fairness which dominate them is the rock on which this republic is built, and a democratic defeat and a republican victory will not undermine and cause it to crumble. UNCERTAINTIES OF HISTORY. When we consider that Hudson did not discover New York bay, but that Verrazzano did; when we consider that Fulton did not invent the steam boat, but that Fitch did; when we consider that Bell did not invent the telephone; that Morse did not invent the telegraph; Gutenberg did not in vent the printing press; that Morton did not discover anaeatheia; that Darwin did not discover evolution; that Shakespeare did not write "Ham let;" that Homer did not write the "Iliad;" that Galileo did not say, "And 6till it moves;" that Wellington did not say, "Up, guards, and at them;" that Washington did not win the bat tles of the Revolution; that Robes pierre did not create the Reign of Terror; that Nero was not a nmnster; that Cleopatra was not beautiful when we reflect that history is embla zoned with the titles of usurpers and that true merit lies unchronicled in the grave, let us address a word or two of apology to that much berated enemy ef truth, the newspaper. If history, with a thousand years' leisure at her disposal, cannot find out just who set up a new throne or pulled down an old one, let us forgive the reporter if he misspells the Christian name of the prominent citizen who was thrown from his automobile at 2:30 a. m. New York Evening Post. BEEF RAISERS AND BEEF CON SUMERS. Stock raisers of the country, who have just been in convention in Den ver, have expressed little sympathy with those phases of agitation against the high cost of living that are most frequently featured in the newspapers. Their reasons for withholding their sympathy may be simply and briefly stated. We export $2,000,000 worth of beef annually, and we do not im port any. There is a great demand for our beef abroad, and among people generally speaking who are less able than we are to meet high prices. The reason why the foreign consumer can afford to pay the prevailing high prices for beef and if he did not pay them the beef would not be imported by for eign countries is that he buys with an eje to economy. He does not, as we do in this country, select the porter house and the sirloin the fine rib roaste and the fancy cuts and let the rest go. It is the waste caused by our system of housekeeping, say the stock raisers are not any combination or conspiracy to "boost" prices, that is mainly responsible for our high cost of living. Good housekeeping, which includes good cooking, they say, will solve the problem better than agitation or legislation and in a manner more satisfactory to them. If the product of the animal could be disposed of more uniformly the stock raiser would make more from moderate prices than thoy do now from prices that are high. It is not only at this juncture that the household waste, the kitchen waste, the table waste of this country has been pointed out and commented upon by observant visitors and economists. We have been all over this question before. The only difference now is that it appears in a more aggravated form to ourselves. The American garbage can has long told a story cal culated to astound the prudent and competent European housewife. It has been by no means lost either, up on the prudent and competent house wives of our own country. Beef is only one of the articles with which we are extravagant and waste ful, as it is only one of the articles en tering into the present controversy; all other articles of food are affected relatively. There are, ofcourse, other causes of the advance in prices. But when all is said, the blame for the conditions that cause the present high prices rests largely with the con sumer, as the remedy lies mainly in his hands. Christian Science Monitor. BLIND BANKING AND DUMMY DIRECTORS. When the banks of the whole coun try in 1907 gave us clearing house certificates instead of cash, private in vestigations showed an alarming lax ity of bank directors in the manage ment of their institutions a carlefs ness in the matter of collateral securi ties and a fictitious and ineffectual manner of maintaining their reserves. These discoveries were at that time generally withheld from the public for fear of increasing the financial alarm. The implied negligence of bank directors has up to this time met no public exposure or rebuke. But now comes Mr. Lawrence O. Murry, National Comptroller of the Currency, with his statistical exhibit of the ignorance and incompetence of the directors of national banks throughout the country. It is sensational news. It should raise up an irresistible popu lar demand that the incompetents shall be weeded out. The national bank directorates are in an important sense, public offices, and the public has a right to demand that they shall be filled by men who will attend to busi ness. Mr. Murry shows that half the direc tors now in office have never so much as read the National Bank Act which apprises them of their legal duties! He shows that in nearly half the national bankBitis the habit of the directors to have nothing to say about the making of loans. And in fully half no particular attention is paid by the directorate to the condition of the reserve. Now that the strong pulse of busi ness has given us stiength and confid ence to peer into the dark closets of finance, the time is ripe for a whole some housecleaning. Chicago Exami ner. THE MUTUAL BOYCOTT. It was to be expected that the farm ers would finally get into the game of boycott. The first sign of rural inter est was a rumor from Kansas that the farmers were going to refuse to buy any of the product of city labor in reprisal for the activity of the city laborers in boycotting a farm product. It can be seen with half an eye that the successful culmination of the two boycotts together would settle the cost of living probably for all time. The cost of living is due to two main lines of necessities, food and shelter. The food is furnished by the farmer; the shelter, including raiment, lumber and the tools wherewith to produce them is furnished mainly by the rest. Now it is plain that if the city people refuse to eat the farmers' product-and the farmer refuses to use the city's product an excessive cost of living will be utterly impossible. To begin with, everybody will have cut his purchases in two. In the second place each person will use only his own products, and so being both producer and con sumer the cost is a matter of total in difference to him. It may be admitted that the city people will find certain disadvantages in going without food. So too, the farmers, especially in this climate, will feel somewhat the lack of shelter. But as each side has volun tarily entered upon this step we must presume that they know what they are about r It is a matter of extreme interest and gratification to note the spirit of co operation which the farmers have manifested toward their boycotters. This is best manifested in the move ment reported from Minneapolis wherein stockmen are said to be pledg ing themselves to ship no stock in the next sixty days. While the intention of this is ostensibly to embarrass the middlemen who are supposed to take too large a share of the meat as it goes to market, ii really helps out the cities. If the stockmen ship no meat to the city the city boycott of meat becomes automatic and so an unques tioned success. If the railroads could be induced to stop moving trains and nature to blockade the wagon road permanently with snow, the boycott on both sides would be perfect and the millennium at last realized. State Journal. TARIFF BILL BEST THAT COULD GET. HE Senator Burkett Makes Plain Exact Position in Reference the Payne-AIdrich Law. His to Washington, D. C, Jan. 18, 1910. Mr. If. T. Dobbins, Editor of The News, Lincoln, Neb.: "Dear Sir: I have read with inter est your comments recently printed criticizing inv work in congress. Of course, no man in public life can hope to escape criticism or to please every body. No man ever has and no man ever will. However, it has been my greatest ambition to merit the appro val of the good-thinking people of Nebraska, who have honored me as their public servant, and to that end I have worked diligently and conscien tiously. I have now been in congress almost eleven years, and from what I observe the only criticism of all those eleven years is that I voted for the tariff bill. In fact, all republicans do not agree upon the details, although all do agree that it should be a protec tive tariff rather than a free trade or revenue tariff law. "I am frank to say, as I have said several times in Nebraska during the summer, that I did not agree with the last bill in all its details. It seemed to me that in many particulars the rates might have been less and still have been properly protective. Upon this theory I made the fight as best I could and voted against the original bill as it passed the senate. These differences of opinion, with men in congress as elsewhere, varied all the way from those who were willing to have the rates prohibitive, to those who wanted absolute free trade. Of course, I sympathized with neither of these two extremes. I tried to get the fairer rate somewhere between the extreme high protectionist and the impossible free trader. We worked almost five months on that bill, reconciling differ ences and fighting out those things that could not be more harmoniously adjusted. Then came the final vote upon the bill as reported by the con ference committee, and, as I said, even then it did not suit me, although I was convinced then and am now that it was a great improvement over the Dingley law in the interests of our producers and consumers of Nebraska, and was the very best bill that we could get from our standpoint It did reduce leather, shoes, etc. It did reduce lumber, steel products, coal and many other things. . "The president, who for the time being is the leader of our great party organization and who himself had been an early tariff revisionist thought the bill should be passed. The republican state convention of Nebraska was held just at this time, and the dele gates there assembled passed a resolu tion instructing their delegation in congress to vote for the bill. After this the entire Nebraska republican delegation, from both the senate and the house held a conference, and de cided that it was our duty to vote for the bill whatever our individual opin ion should be as to the bill as a whole or as to its details. "I notice also that my vote on the sugar schedule is criticised. Of course, I cannot tell all about the sugar ques tion within the proper limits of a letter. I must say that to no other schedule of the bill did I devote more earnest attention. The sugar question is the most difficult one that every nation has to handle. In America it is particu larly so because we have both cane and beet sdgar production hexe at home, and in addition we have insular possessions whose future prosperity is almost wholly dependent upon the sugar industry. In addition to this it is the thing upon which we have always relied for a large part of our revenue. As I said upon the floor of the senate at the time, no other country had so successfully handled its sugar question as America. "No people on earth buy sugar as cheaply as the American except the English; and no country except ours has been able, so far as I can learn, to develop successfully a beat sugar in dustry without paying a bounty out of their public treasury. Our beet sugar industry has multiplied ten times in the last ten years without a bounty, which is a source of some public pride and a fact not to Ik treated lightly. We ought not to do anything that would destroy it Those states that produce largely of beet sugar were very solicitous lest their great indus try should be injured. I received peti tions from two thousand of our Nebr aska people, protesting against any re duction in the sugar schedule. We did reduce the tariff' on all sugar schedules five points and on those com ing from Cuba twenty per cent, and admitted sugar from the Philippine Islands, Porto Rico and Hawaii free, I voted against further reduction, as did also as much of a revisionist as Senitor Cummins and other senators. I do not know that I did right, but thought I did, and only today in talk ing with Senator Cummins he said we were absolutely right in not reducing it further. "Now the Dutch standard. Some time I hope to have an opportunity to explain to our good people just what fraud would be perpetrated upon them by striking out the Dutch standard test in our customs house. I think the recent developments at New York de monstrate that the government needs every test possibly to guard against fraud and deception. The best auth ority I could get at the time told me so, a man who has been on the board of customs appeals for many years told me the Dutch standard test ought not to be disturbed. It was struck out about twenty years ago, and at the be ginning of the very next congress, the secretary of the treasury addressed a letter to congress reciting reasons why the Dutch standard test should be re enacted into law. It was put back and has remained ever since. "The man who conceived the plan to strike out the Dutch standard test was Mr. W. L. Bass, of Santo Domin go. He is a well known sugar planter of that island, with 9,500 acres of plan tation. He has been here almost con stantly for the last ten years trying to get his sugar into our market on a le vel with our American-produced su- W . . WT gar. His was a great lobbyist ana l spent an evening with him in his. rooms listening to his arguments as why the Dutch standard should be eliminated. But in the end I concluded that he was looking at it from a selfish stand point and that if he succeeded in knocking out the Dutch standard that it would open up the door for the per petration of the most gigantic frauds upon the American people and would permit the sale to them of bleached dirt and sugar. To my personal knowledge Mr. Bass presented his case to the president and the president thought as I did, that it was a humbug. "I am not criticising anyone who voted to strike it out. They voted just as conscientiously as I did. The thing that appealed to me did not appeal to them. But I was satisfied that I was right then, and the more I have studi ed the question, the more I am satified still that I am right. I realized that it was not a popular vote because there was a press bureau here organized to promulgate the doctrine of knocking out the Dutch standard, and the people would not have presented to them as fully the argument on the other side. I have not replied to all this heretofore but have trusted to the good judge ment of the people to work out the problem in their own way, realizing that when I came up for re-election whatever doubts and difficulties there were in the people's mind I would try to meet I may have made mistakes in my eleven years in congress, but I have never dodged a vote and have never cast a vote that I did not hon estly believe was right, after every pos sible effort to find out what the right was. I have never equivocated, and everybody knows, who wants to know where I stand on every public ques tion. "It is some gratification to me not to be assaulted on more than a single point after eleven years of public ser vice. I doubt if there are very many men who have gone so long with so little criticism. I have voted always for progressive legislation, I stood with President Roosevelt in every syllable of the progressive legislation which he advocated. I supported his conserva tion policy, the pore food law, the em ployers' liability law, the meat inspec tion bill, the rate bill, and I even went farther than he was recommending and voted for two or three things even more progressive than he recommend ed, such as the valuation of railroads, which was offered by Senator La Follette. "I think President Taa's Tecent messages must convince the people who read them carefully that he is adher ing strictly to these policies. In fact he has even gone further in his con servation policy than President Roose velt did and this morning's press has an interview with Mr. Pinchot endors ing the Taft message. He has gone further in some particulars with re ference to corporation control than did President Roosevelt I regret that I did not agree with President Taft for a ship subsidy. But with all these pro gressive ideas I am in strict accord. "I want to be in harmony with our president, the leader of our party. I shall try to stay in harmony with him as long as he stands for the progres sive ideas that are calculated to keep our legislation up with the develop ment of our industries, and our com merce and with the elevating standard of our social and moral affairs I shall stand with him. And while I am here working hard for what I believe is right I hope the good people of Ne braska who have stood by me in the years that are passed, who known what my career has b?en, and who know that for twelve years I have fought the battle of progressive re publicanism in state and congressional conventions will stay with me during the coming battle. It seems to me that my record for a dozen years en titles me to the support for a second term of all unprejudiced and good minded people. "Very truly yours, "E.J.BURK17TT." LANDES SHEPHERDS. French Peasants Who Are Experts In Walking on Stilts. There Is a vast district iu France where the entire community goes about and transacts its business on stilts. This district is called "Les Landes." The inhabitants, who arc among the poorest peasants in France, gain their subsistence by fishing, by snch little agriculture as Is possible and by keep ing cows and sheep. The shepherds make use of their stilts for two pur posesfirst, because walking is quite impossible on account of the sage and undergrowth of brush, and, second, because the height of their stilts gives them a greater range of vision. Thestllts generally are about six or seven 'feet high. Near the top there is a support for the foot, which has a strong stirrup and strap, and still nearer the top a band of leather fas tens the stilt firmly to the leg just be low the knee. Some stilts, especially those made for fancy walking and for tricks, are even higher than seven feet and the man who uses these and he must be an expert can travel as fast as ten miles an hour. The lower end of this kind of stilt is capped with a sheep bone to prevent its splitting. Some of these Landes shepherds are wonderfully clever in the management of their stilts. They run races, step or jump over brooks, clear fences and walls and are able to keep their bal ance and equilibrium while stooping to the ground to pick up pebbles or to gather wild flowers. They rail prone upon their faces and assume their perpendicular without an effort and in a single moment after they have thus prostrated themselves. Technical World Magazine. A VICTIM OF WORRY. The Man Who Is Always Expecting Some Kind of Trouble. There is always a cloud on his face because he is constantly expecting that something unfavorable is going to Imp pen. There is going to be a slump in business, or be Is going to have a loss, or somebody Is trying to undermine him, or he is worried about his health, or fears bis children .will be sick or go wrong or be killed. In other words, although he has achieved quite a remarkable success, yet he has never really had u huppy day in his life. AH his life this man has been chasing rainbows, thinking if he could only get a little farther on, a little higher up, he would be happy, but he is just as far from it as when a boy. I believe this condition has all come from the habit of un happiness which he formed during his hard boyhood and which he has never been able to overcome. He has learned to look for trouble, to expect It, and he gets it. I have been his guest many a time. He has a beautiful home, a very charming wife, a most delightful fam ily, but there Is always the same cloud on his face, the same expression of anxiety, of unhapplness, of forebod ing. A little properly directed training in bis boyhood would have changed his whole career, and he would have been a happy, Joyous, harmonious man in stead of being discordant and unhappy. There is everything in starting right. What is put Into the first of life is put into the whole of life. Success Maga zine. No Panic. "We had a bad fire scare In church today." "Good gracious! Was there a panic?" "Not to notice. The minister preach ed on the infernal regions." New York Journal. Prodigal, fellow seems to That be extrava- gant." "Hopelessly. He spends his own money just as if it were the govern URQty T-onlvrHTn Courier-JourngL COAL Pocahontas tSmokeless Illinois, Rock Springs and Colorado Coals at prices that will interest you. Let us figure with you lor your winter's supply. T. B. Hord Grain Co. Bell 188 Made His Ideas Row. I used to write for a medical peri odical. On returning home one day after a very heavy day's work at th hospital and feeling completely ex hausted I found a note from the ed itor, "Please let me have an article on such and such a subject tonight" 1 sat down with pen and paper before me, but not a word could I write. Then I lay bark lazily and began to speculate as to the cause of my want of ideas. 1 thought: "The brain is thi same as it was yesterday, but yester day I was not tired. Perhaps It is the feebler circulation that prevents the brain from acting. If the blood does not go up to the brain I may bring the brain down to the blood." I therefore placed my head fiat on the table, look ing sideways at the paper, and began to write easily. On raising my bead again every Idea fled, so 1 placed my head again down on the table and fin ished the article with my bead in that position. Sir T. Lauder Brunton in Practitioner. Tricks of Short Sight. Not only the inanimate but the ani mate world presents itself In strange forms to the myopic. Humanity, for instance. Is often revealed in some what inhuman guise. Thus, so far as ocular demonstration goes, the world to the shortsighted is peopled by men and women as faceless, sometimes even as headless, as the horseman of legendary fame. Indoors myopic per sons get quite accustomed to talking with persons who have neither eyes nor nose. Out of doors the phenome non is more striking because oftener repeated. At quite a short distance the face melts into the atmosphere and becomes either a cloud or. like H. G. Wells invisible man, a nothingness. "I see the bat and the figure, some times the beard. I see the walking stick. If the hand is ungloved this stick is waving miraculously a little way from the sleeve edge, for the hand. like the face, has vanished. Strand Magazine. A New Line To The Northwest Through The Big Horn Basin The Big Horn Basin is fast settling up and offers the greatest opportunities for farmers, and especially FARM RENTERS to secure fine government irrigated farms at the mere cost of the water, and often A SINGLE CROP CAN BE MADE TO PAY FOR THE FARM. Ten yearly payments without interest. This is cheaper than paying rent in any locality. With the completion of the new line this promises to be come a great wealth producing region. The oil, gas and irrigation of the Big Horn Basin will make that country a combination of farm and industrial prosperity. Write me for full descriptive literature. Go with me to the Basin and let me help you select a new home. DOLLARS PAID FOR RENT ARE LOST. D. CLEM DEAVER, General Agent, Magazine Old Books Rebound In fact, for anything in the book binding line bring your work to Journal Office Phone 160 Ind. 206 Masquerading In the Past. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries Venire set the fasbiou in all matters of amusement and wns a sort of combination of our Monte Carlo and Paris. Throughout the eighteenth cen tury the Venetlaus were seized with a perfect mania for masqueradiug aud gambling. Paris and London follow-.! snit. and the two most popular amuse ments, both public aud private, were masquerades and gambling snloout People uot only wore their masks or visors at balls, but in the mall ami the parks ami the theaters. At leugtli matters got to such a pass that when a police raid was made on a certain low dam-ing place in So ho and an or der was given for every one to unmask what was the amazement of the police to find that at least a third of the com pany cousisted of ladles aud gentle meu of the highest aristocracy, some of whom bad even brought their daughters. London Saturday Keview. Bread and Pipe Baker. The lecturer at the cooking scho.il sometimes enlivened her remarks with an anecdote. "The eighteenth century baker,"" she said, "was a pipe cleaner as well, just as the barber a little earlier was a surgeon. Everybody In those, days smoked clay pipes, provided the same as cups or spoons by the coffee houses Well, each morning a waiter carrie.l his master's stock of pipes, some hun dred perhaps, to the nearest bakery. The baker would boil them, then dip them In liquid lime, then bake them dry. They came out of the oven as sweet and white as new." Philadel phia Bulletin. Degrees of Hunger. "I'm simply starving'."- cried the short story writer at the Hungry Club. "I wish they'd begin dinner." "I never saw you when you weren't tarvlng," said the poet. "I'm never as hungry as you arc. though," the short story writer declar ed, "because I write prose." New York Press. Land Seekers Information Bureau, Room C, "Q" Building. Omaha, Nebraska. Binding
