The Conservative *
West Flanders on the 26th of Juno
18110.
Son of the
of an Inspeotor-in-ohiof
Finances , ho originally intended to be
come a schoolmaster , but his inclina
tions led him elsewhere ; ho was a born
artist. lie followed this vocation and
took up the study of art in earnest at
Antwerp , whore ho died. A few
years after ho made some remarkable
copies and portraits of real merit. The
portrait of Mdo. Victoria-Lafontaino , of
the Comedio-Francaiso , is especially
good you find in it the charming
features of the model with all her grace
and intelligence.
The year 1874 saw the artist at work
in London , at the Kensington Museum
and the National Gallery.
M. Charles Felu painted with his foot
with a firmness and confidence of man
ner which is astonishing ; opened his
colour-box and prepared his palette with
such wonderful ease that his position
did not shook in any way. Ho was a
man of fine figure , with a gentle , intelligent
gent and sympathetic face. One forgot
at once that ho had any deficiency. If
nature had shown herself cruel to M.
Folu in some respects , she had given him
the soul of an artist and great talent ;
she had more than repaired his wrongs.
H
The fanatics who
formulated the
Chicago platform in 1896 , are now talk
ing to bring about a reunion of the gold
democrats who , with conservative citi
zens of other parties , elected Grover
Cleveland in 1893 for the purpose of
reaffirming the Chicago platform and
renaming the candidate who stood upon
it in 1896.
Their leader , even , who at Richmond
in 1896 said of the recusant gold stand
ard democrats : -'They shall not come
back , " is now telling of several ways by
which the "gold standard democrats"
aforesaid may be lured into the support
of himself and his fallacies.
Not one in ten thousand of the gold
democrats desires to enter the ranks of
Bryauarohy. Gold democrats were sin
cere and honest. They placed their
country above their party. The gold
democrats made possible , and permitted ,
the election of MoKinley. They stand
today on the currency question just
where they stood in 1896. They stand
onuon-intorfereuce-with-other-natiou's-
business just where they stood then.
The gold democrats did not , the silver
democrats did , favor the declaration of
war with Spain. The latter did all in their
power , by words , by acts , by inspira
tions of every kind , to hurry MoKiuley
and his party into armed collision with
Spain. They boasted that they- had
brought about the war. And now they
[ are , in the judgmental all fair-minded
citizens , estopped from .finding . fault
With its , results , eitner financial or po-
Jitical , If they. , are-disastrous ; , silver
'
( lomoorats and populists are justly
chargeable with a largo share of thorn.
With those paroxysmal emotionalists
who think statesmanship is merely
Bpoooh-making ; principles , ndjustiblo al
ways for vote-catching ; silver , in coin ,
worth twice as much as it is in bullion ;
and -who declare the writ of injunction
an invention of the devil gold demo
crats and conservatives , generally , can
have no affiliation. Nor will they over
attempt to unite with those fetish wor
shippers , those political Dervishes who
are now endeavoring to entice sensible
citizens to sit down at a table where
upon all the edibles are canned fallacies
of the year 1890. What the silver dem
ocrats need , and what they will got be
fore they get harmony by cajoling and
wheedling the gold standard men who
niado defeat for the money heresiod a
certainty in 1896 is a tremendous and
pulverizing pounding in 1900.
There is no letting down among the
gold men. There have been no Sowalls ,
no Sibloys among them. Those Saul of
Tarsus cases in Maine and Pounsyl
vauia , came from the camps of the Sil
ver Sinners , who in 1890 wore yelling
for sixteen to one , and all the other flat
ulencies and frauds which an irrational ,
inexperienced and impertinent leader
ship had grafted upon democracy for
personal prominence and position.
Another thorough and effective
thrashing , which shall teach inexperi
enced audacity the danger of masquer
adiug as mature and deliberate ability
which shall instill the fact that the bal
ance of power party in the United
States is , after all , though it neither ad
vocates nor nominates candidates for the
presidency , a very staid , respectable and
useful party , seems needed.
The Spanish war ,
wAK OK which could as
AVATKKAVAYS. . , . .
easily have been
averted by McKinley as it was by Cleve
land , provided MoKiuloy * had been the
possessor of brains and backbone equal
to those of Cleveland , has first and last
cost the people of the United States
three hundred millions of dollars. Af
ter the war was over , diplomacy , nego
tiation and a treaty settled the interna
tional questions , just as they might
have been settled before , with the ex
ception of the purchase of the Philip
pine war second-hand goods from
Spain at $20,000,000.
Hero in the United States those three
hundred millions of dollars could have
been expended in
A Citiml. . . , , TT
making the Hen-
nepin canal. That amount of money ,
judiciously and economically devoted to
constructing internal waterways in the
United States , would have connected
the valleys of the Mississippi and Mis
souri with the Atlantic Ocean. It
would have completed a perfect means
of water transportation for all the tre-
moudons cereal and meat output of the
Northwestern states. It would have
cheapened transportation and bonofitted
producers and consumers who are Amer
ican citizens. Not a gun would have
been fired , not a single precious human
lifo would have been sacrificed.
TUB CONSERVATIVE , while not a be
liever in ordinary river and harbor bill
Onlhmry. appropriations , nor
j L e
a u advocate o f
promiscuous squandering of public funds
for alleged internal improvements ,
would welcome the transition from a
war of invasion to a national waterway
construction connecting the West and
Northwest with the Atlantic , with the
sincerest enthusiasm. It would bo bet
ter than building either a Panama or a
Nicaragua canal. It would certainly bo
better than bloodshed , and disease , and
death in the Philippines. Expansion of
the means and ways of getting to mar
ket on the seaboard would bo far more
beneficial to the American people than
that territorial expansion which takes
into the Union millions of aluioud-eyod
Orientals , who will not and cannot "as
similate , " either "benevolently" or oth
erwise , with the citizenship of this re
public.
Canals and waterways , to be built
and paid for by the United States ,
should , like charity
At HOIIIW.
ity , begin at homo ,
not in Nicaragua nor in Panama. To
connect Nebraska , Iowa , Kansas , Mis
souri and the Dakotas by canal with the
ocean , requires no treaty with any for
eign power. Is it more patriotic or
profitable to build in foreign territory
than in our own ?
In a recent oral
'NOKOIHES. "
geyser from the
depths of Colonel Bryan's vast chos't of
lungs and chestnuts a remark was
thrown up to the effect that "nobody"
had deserted 16 to 1 since the first battle
closed in 1896.
Sewall , who ran for vice-president as
a democrat on the ticket with Colonel
Bryan , who ran as a populist , is "no
body. " Sibley , of Pennsylvania , who
was the first man named by the silver
men for president , is "nobody. "
Sewall and Sibley have quit. They
see neither hope for a party nor good
for the country in the persistent advo
cacy of the free coinage of silver at 16
to 1 or any other ratio. That makes
them "nobodies. "
"It is the people of Kentucky more
than Governor Taylor that have been
wronged by this reversal of their decision
by the legislature , " says the Phila
delphia Press ( rep. ) . "It is better to
obey a bad law than to bring on a reign
of anarchy , violence , and bloodshed.
Governor Taylor should leave the whole
question to the courts and abandon the
use offeree to prevent the legislature
from meeting or to influence its action. "
