Cbc Conservative. 11
will reply to this exhibit of production
ami wealth : "Yes ; but look at the
mortgages and indebtedness. " This is
largely another popular delusion. Al
though a now country requiring vast
investments for public improvements
and private enterprise , yet , surprising as
it mny seem , the public and private debt
is comparatively less than in the older
states. In 1890 , as appears from the
census report , the per capita mortgage
indebtedness of Kansas was $170 ; Ne
braska , $126 ; Missouri , $80 ; Iowa , $104 ;
Minnesota , $152. Take the same unm-
ber of states on the eastern border , and
we have Connecticut , $107 ; Massachus
etts , $144 ; Now York , $208 ; New Jersey ,
$101 ; Pennsylvania , $117.
If we consider the combined national ,
state and local bonded debt , the burden
is much heavier in the East than in the
West. The per capita interest charge
of this combined debt in the West was
48 cents ; in the New England states ,
including New York , New Jersey and
Pennsylvania it was , in 1890 , $1.78.
It may reasonably bo inquired : "How
is the civilization of the West manifest
in educational results ? " With com
mendable pride it may bo answered that
the pioneers and immigrants who have
built up homes and sought fortunes to
ward the setting sun have not been
thoughtless of the welfare of their
children. They have remembered that
the public schools are the safeguards of
our institutions. The schoolhouse and
the church adorn the hilltops and grace
the valleys from the majestic Mississippi
to the glistening waves of the Pacific.
Prom official records we learn about
0,000,000 of pupils in this wide domain
are in the public schools under 180,184
teachers , and in 1897 the expenditures
on account of these schools amounted to
$50,470,071. With these are schools of
higher instructions , academies , normal
schools , colleges , and universities in
every state and territory , liberally sus
tained and endowed.
The "Wild West" is being educated ,
and the comparisons in the census re
port are most gratifying. The average
per cent of illiteracy in the Now Eng
land states and including New York ,
New Jersey and Pennsylvania , nine
states , in 1890 was 5.9 per cent. The
average illiteracy of the nine most wes
tern states farthest removed from the
refined and cultivated East , Montana ,
Wyoming , Colorado , Utah , Nevada ,
Idaho , Washington , Oregon and Califor
nia was 8.9 per cent of the population.
The percentage of illiteracy in Ohio
was 4.7 per cent ; Indiana , 5.8 ; Illinois ,
4.9. In Iowa it was 8.5 ; Kansas , 2.9 ;
and in Nebraska , 2.8. It will bo ob
served , and it is the glory of our whole
country , civilization is marching on ,
until now , in the light of the wonderful
events that have recently taken place
the prophecy of Thomas Benton is ful
filled : "The way to the East is from
the West. " The Occident is bringing
'reedom and knowledge to the Orient.
True , the older states have bestowed
upon the West a priceless baptismal
gift , its fruits of knowledge , skill , in
dustry , capital and manhood. This
leritago has been gratefully received
and cherished and now the valleys of
; ho Mississippi , Missouri , the Rio
Grande , Columbia , Sacramento mid
San Joaquin bloom like the famous vales
of Cashmere. There is no longer any
'Wild West. " It is a memory !
AM OI. .
of the old Kay
iiouso on lower Central avenue , by order
of the city council , removes one of the
few remaining monuments of those
early days which are so recent , and yet
already so far away. Dr. Kay's execu
tor and life-long friend , Mr. Tom
Thomas , states that the doctor bought
this house in 1855 , of A. M. lloso ,
who built it , in the preceding yonr ,
before there were even any bridges
over the creeks , and when the
rival settlement of Kearney , on the
other hill , could enl } ' be reached by
means of the "stone ford" below the
present B. & M. warehouse. He evi
dently selected the site with a view to
its natural beauty , being an old-country
man , with some of what are called the
higher tastes. It stood just below the
eastern edge of the plateau on which the
block-house stood and which extended
some 800 yards back to the edge of the
forest ; to the east there was a slope
down to the river and steamboat land
ing , on the north was quite a ravine
lying between the main hill and that
now known as the Hay ward hill ; and
the south face running down to Table
creek , was probably much as at present.
One who took the trouble to step upon
the vacant lots in the rear of the Morton
House has hitherto been able to catch a
view of something like the original con
dition of this tract , for while streets
have been cut through below the nat
ural level , the surface of the ground
between has remained singularly undis
turbed for about two blocks. He is
standing on the soil of the old parade-
ground itself , where the United States
dragoons used to practice their martial
exercises to the awe of the neighboring
savages , and ho is looking at the back
doors of some very old houses , just as
they were first built. They have a very
different appearance from the street ,
owing to the grading that has been
done , and lower stories having been
built in under some of them. There is
the stone foundation of the old Kimmel
grist-mill , and the place on the corner
east of it where Peter Smith for a long
time kept a meat-market ; then comes
the Kay house , small and low , but with
a wing to the west , and a latticed arbor
behind it , all suggesting that there were
at one time people of taste living com-
fortably in it ; and next stands the pala-
; ial residence that a rival physician
iuilt adjoining it , cutting off the doc
tor's view entirely , oven from his little
Tout porch.
The old doctor lived in his house until
lis death , in 1898. Ho made an eccon-
ric figure on the streets in his latter
days , with his tall form draped in a
gaunt linen duster , always wearing a
: iigh white hat and carrying a cane ; and
he died in poverty. But though thnro
was little in his dilapidated abode to sug
gest to the curious visitor that it had
over been the homo of a cultivated man ,
there were a few small matters that the
doctor had never found it convenient to
part with ; there was a battered and
stringless violoncello , which reminded
some callers of nights when they had
"danced after that old fiddlo" with feet
lighter than at present , and on floors
that had long ago gone up in smoke ;
and there were book shelves covering
the side of 0110 room , containing a li
brary of the steamboat period ; many
medical works of the doctor's , and
bound volumes of ladies' magazines of
his wife's , containing light , reading and
fashion-plates of that funny old time ;
and an ancient Bible in Gaelic. The
books were a good deal in the way , how
ever , so the executor loaded them into a
wagon one day and took them down and
threw them off the bridge ; and that
was practically the end of Dr. Kay.
. . . . , . , , Ifc is certain that
. * „
HAI.ANC15 OF , , , , -
POWEU. the unl'1"00 ' of po
litical power in the
United States rests with independent
voters. They elected McKinley once ,
and because of his non-performance of
promises on monetary reform they may
be inclined to beat him once.
The distressing dilemma of the inde
pendent voter today is that ho must
cheese between maladministration , mis
construction of official duties , misconcep
tion of official honesty and McKiuley-
ism , on one side , and all the blatant
vagaries , vanities , crudities and fal
lacies of free-silverism , on the other.
Unless a new party be formed this
dilemma may confront the independent
voter in 1900. If so it will require great
discrimination to determine the lesser of
the two evils.
The democratic party was never suc
cessful when it masqueraded in other
than democratic habiliments. When it
has plainly proclaimed its principles and
boldly declared against protective tar
iffs and for the gold standard it has
won. Whenever it has dodged or run
off after strange gods it has been de
feated. Thus it will continue forever.
Nothing but a recantation , renuncia
tion and denunciation of the financial
heresies of 1890 can save and restore
democracy.