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About The courier. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1894-1903 | View Entire Issue (May 22, 1897)
T0L 12X0 21 ESTABLISHED IN 1SSC PRICE FIVE CENTS LINCOLN, NEB., SATURDAY. MAY 22. 1807 -S ixwra AT HJBUUBD XTBBY IATTJBDAY cmaniifiMuiFnumiiN Office 1132 X street, Up Stairs. Telephone 384. SARAH l'. HARRIS. DORA BACHELLER Editorr Business Manager Subscription Rates In Advance. Per annum 82 00 Six months 1 00 Three months 50 One month 20 Single copies 05 t OBSERVATIONS. : S J It is not generally known that the gas and electric light companies in Lincoln charge, when the bill does not exceed two dollars monthly, 50 cenls for what they call meter rent -although the customer neither occupies the meter nor is the meter at work for him. But if the bill is a dollar and a half the meter rent will bring it to an even two dollars. It would be a disgrace for any self-respecting light company to collect any thing smaller than two dollars. Meters in other places work for nothing, but that does not matter. If the customer were able to regulate consumption so as to use up the electricity he must pay for. whether he UEes it or not, it would soothe his feelings when he pays bis heavy, light bill. A grocer might just as well add a certain sum to every monthly bill, which in his estimation, did not pay for the wear and tear on the delivery wagon, horse and boy. He might as well so far as the logic of the charge is concern . ed, but it would be bad for his business, for there are other grocers who are will ing to throw in wear and tear on wagon, boy and repair of both, but ahe'i! and alas! there is only one electric light m pany, wboEe bills depend entirely upon the company's ideas of their proper size. Shoe rent for collectors and linemen would be "just as reasonable as meter lent. Then- is nothing in the habits of the company to insuro the citizens against any arbitrary expansion of a bill -whose size does cot suit the rules of proportion adopted by the Lincoln Elec tric Light Co. A protest against the overestimated labor of tbo meter for the month in keeping track of he electricity used by the customer is only answered by the gentleman who collects the meter rent that it is a rule of the company This closes discussion and appeals. "It is a rule of the company." Allah il allab. The hypotenuse is still concealed in the block of Tennessee marble which is killing a large square of gras3 in the stato houee grounds. Poor John Currie gave up trying to tind it when his ac quaintances got too poor to advance money for the search. There are some inveterate sportsmen who aro willing to bet that Peary will find the pole before John Currie finds the hypotenuse. 7 he Lincoln monument association, though it has not se'ected a sculptor Is confident that it wil be an easy task as eooh as the marble is their?. Jihn Currie has not officially relinquished his claim to Eeek for the hypotenuse bidden, like Micheal Angelo's scgel, in marble. The last dajs of his Bearch were embittered by the im possibility of the task which he had set himself. If the statue be ever completed old John Curries hand should remove .he veil. He got the Etono in some mys terious way. He was encouraged by a hope that he could carve a statue of Abraham Lincoln before which people would reverently stand as they do be fore St. Gauden's statue in Lincoln park. The really skillful old stone cutter is defeated by his lack of early Btudy of anatomy and modeliDg. The deep shadows of the decorative friezes around the tower of tho Y. M. C. A. buildirg, which grow heavier in successive circles as they ascend and the difference in the patterns prove Mr. Currie has artistic insight. Although not a genius and in capable now of carving a human figure, for which a study of the skeleton is necessary, even to genius, under the in fluence of an artistic environment and with an education Mr. Currie would have made a good scupl tor, for he possesses, first, a devotion to sculpture, and technical skill, zeal and industry when he is working at tho art which by temperament he is fitted for and loves. If there is ever a great statute of Abraham Lincoln here it will be because of John Currie. His defeat is pathetic, but if ho loves art for its own s-ke ho will be content when he unveils the statute of Abraham Lincoln made by a more fortunate man. Miss McXab ban been travelling in South Africa and sending notes to the London papers. When -she re tu reed she found that unprincipalec publishers (how smoothly those words tit together) were preparing to pirate her copy into hooka of their own. She hastily revis ed her notes and got out her own book, the looseness of form and lack of style, of which she makes the vicious publish ers an excuse for. The book tells of her experiences in South Africa very graph ically. In her unconsciously feminine way eLo says she likes Rhodes and does not like Kruger. But she gives no reason for her approval or averaion. The book is full of Kaffir terms and phrases which, with British politeness, sbe does not explain. Why is it that tho English, when they visit India, Africa or Central Asia, incorporate into their re ports the phraceology of a barbarous people and when they visit America in sist on their own terminology? Even Rud yard Kipling scorns to apply the terms, baggage, depot, street car, conductor, servant or hack to tboEe objects which we have designated thus ourselves and which do not exactly correspond with tho nearest English equivalent. Luggage does very well for the English because, until lately, they have cot had the baggage check 6 stem and from tho moment they started on their travels it was a case of lug. Station is a better word than depot, which means, except in America, a place to etoro things. British arrogance is teaching us better and "educators"' are beginning to say station too. Our street cars are not trams the latter is neither descriptive nor picturesque, nor exact. A conduc tor is not a guard nor is a hack a cab. Maid and man are better words than servants for such employes and they also are superceding the lets sympathetic word. But why do we not deserve the creditor blame of our own nomencla ture. It may be a poor thing but it is our own. And when Mr. Kipling allows the heathen to keep their bungalows tiffin and jinrik shas why should he de prive a much more intelligent people, of the same ancestral origin as his own and who are his wife's people, ot their household phraseology? Hack is a much better word than the outlandish jin-rik-sba, yet he discards hack in order to do so, tearing out tho front windows, elevating the shafts, and mounting the driver up behind, thus making it a cab, "which it aint." Besides mak icg kindling wood of the hack in the Anglicising pro ces?. ho has lost entiiely local color Local color is the excuse or Du Maurier for making bis Ecglish books mere French than English. Local color is the reason for the bad livers and the heathen names in Kipling's storied. And the reason is cogent, But even English literary men have enough combativene-s from defeated sires to wish to discourage any kind of American independence of speech, The features of the president of this country are more familiar to a lar er number of the citizens of Lincoln than is tho aspect of Mayor Graham 'and his council. President McKinley could not walk the streets of Lincoln without in stant recognition. His personality is familiar to the public of the United States. Although his character is not of such immediate and apparent impor tance to us we are better acquainted with him than with the executives of our own city government. The humbler city officials, such as the policemen, assessors and tho city scaven ger, are the only representatives of the city known to the property holders at large. Policemen, outside of any influ ence, are appointed because of their brawn, Lonesty and liability to stay awake nights and not at nil on account of their polish. In spite of which the police, as I have known them have never exhibited their power for the purpose of frightening and bullying law abiding citizens. And the city officials in the persons of the scavengers and street cleaners havo been above reproach. But the assessors, who more than any of tho city's hired men. come within conversational reach of the plain citizen, sometimes bring reproach upon the very important de partment they are sent out to secure funds for. In times times past they have been good natured, hard working men who executed their mission with a subdued sense of power that did not deprive the assessed of all dignity and self respect. Some of the men, to speak exactly, one or the men who is paid to estimate the taxable personal property of the Fourth ward, has caused more suspicion of and ob jections to the city government than the strictest bicycle regulations. With his hat on his bead he enters a house presided over by a timid woman, who, as the case may be, is cooking, washing or sweeping. Her, he questions with a manner at once coarse and terrifying. In this individual she converses for the first time with the law and her reverence is replaced by disgust- He goes from house to house and as fast as he goes he makes the city government unpopu lar with that member of the famiiy who is at home da times and whose hand is said to rock the world. This particular deputy of the assessor has exceeded even an assessor's privileges, in consequence of which his services to the city are about to end. The board of managers of the Trans Mississippi exposition is supposed to meet every Saturday, but for several weeks, it is said, that there has not been a quorum present. Thefore the exact functions and power of the woman's board of managers has not yet been de termined upon. So far as the situa tion has unfolded at present, the wo man board is a sub-committee com petent to report and advise but not com-
