THE COURIER.
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rlvliiK nt onc of tnc 5uscs of tlc pres
ent disorganization of the lire depart,
merit. At last Monday 's session Mr.
"Woodward did not olTer any larger
number of resolutions than ho usual
ly docs They were of the same char
acter, and were as usual voted down.
But Monday evening does not last for
ever. The whole session cannot bo
devoicd to the needs of the lire de
partment, and since the time given to
it US consumed by Mr. Woodward in
presenting futile resolutions and in
arguing their expediency it is quite
obvious why the real condition of the
lire department problem remain un
discussed from one council meeting to
another. Although a councilman
docs not draw a large salary the four
monthly meetings of the council cost
the city in salaries and lights about
:i."j.00 a month or $88 75 n session. It
Councilman Woodward consumes an
hour at each meeting his speeches
and advice cost the city $27 25 per ses
sion of three hours' duration (which Is
longer than the average sederunt) or
$99 00 a month or $1,188 a year. And
these calculations do not take Into ac
count the loss the city suffers by rea
son of the business which Is not con
sidered while Mr. Woodward is speak
ing. Eleven hundred and eighty
eight dollars added to the tire chief's
salary would hire a big chief of the
tire department. i
Mr. Woodward Is a councilman and
it Is ot course impossible to prevent
him from exercising the privileges of
the floor (technically so called) to
which, as a councilman he is entitled,
but it is hoped that this short review
and critique of his conduct of the lire
department may Induce him to give
the processes of reflection and reason
a more conspicuous portion of his
time. It is not how much we speak
but how well that induces the respect
of our fellow men. And If Mr. Wood
ward would but consider the value of
Kipling's Skipper's advice "to keep
things sop'ratc,'' it might have an un
expected influence upon his political
fortunes. Finally If these lew words
or well tneint advice turn the council
man's thoughts upon tho Impoverish
ed city and of how It can not afford to
lose $27.25 every Monday evening
while he is speaking thereare grounds
for hoping that his thrifty habits may
aid in his reform. Ills entire refor
mation, which means unbroken silence
is too much to as' but flishes of .taci
turnity from Mr. Woodward would do
much to facilitate business,
, Mr. Bryan
and Mr. Cockran.
"We have been suffering from that
dangerous intoxication of phrases
which seem to do sufficient to sustain
magnificent periods and when all is
over none of us quite know what we
have been talking about" said Mr.
Bourko Cockran to the members of
the Trust Conference.
In reply Mr. Bryan said: "The
Amcican people are entitled to the
best system on every subject. I do
not believe It necessary for us to sit
down quietly and permit a great ag
gregation of wealth to strangle every
competitor."
It Is the easiest trick In the world
to make a child bclievo that ho is
persecuted. It Is but a trifle more
difficult to make a man believe him
self a martyr, and to convince a mob
that it Is persecuted or "throttled,"
'strangled' or "crushed'' and ' rob
bed,'' as Mr. Bryan calls the assault of
capital upon ' the liberties of the peo
ple,'' Is the easiest of .all. The child
and the man sulk when an Iago has
convinced them that they are betray
ed or aro victims of Inhuman selfish
ness, but a mob howls, vows venge
ance and determines to vote for Iago
if he can be induced to be magnani
mous enough to afford it tho chance.
Mr. Bourke Cockran asked the people
not to frighten at nothing and to re
member the principles of a free gov
ernment, when Mr. Bryan was en
deavoring to excite their fears and
resentment against an imperfectly
visualized trust. Tho. difference be
tween Mr. Bryan's attack on trusts
and Mr. Cockran's reply was that the
formercajoled his audience according
to his habit, first by catch phrases
about what the American people are
entitled to and then attempted to
frighten and anger them by calling
trusts, monopolies, and their opera
tions "strangling." Mr. Cockran de
flned a trust and his terms to the ac
ceptance of his audience in the first
place. He discarded generalities and
apparently despised the tricks of the
orator, so far as they Involved arous
ing the prejudices of his audience.
And he was overwhelmingly success
ful in his appeal to reason and the
constitution, if vociferous and re
doubled applause is a sign of success,
and Mr. Bryan counts it so.
Mr. Cockran said to begin with that
'If there Is a monopoly that oppresses
I believe that there is no constitu
tional limitation, there is no provi
sion of government, there is no power
on earth against these; people redress
ing a wrong when it becomes a wrong.
The question to which I think the at
tention of these conferences should be
directed is whether this one exists,
and where it is.
The difficulty of preventing free and
independent citizens from forming
partnerships among themselves is the
obstaclo to a control of the trusts. In
treating it Mr. Cockran had the ad
vantage of an unassailable premise.
The debate, which became a debate
in spite of Mr. Bryan's aversion to ad
vertising the wide gulf which sper
atcs some democrats from other dem
ocrats is the 11 rso skirmish of tho dem
ocratic convention of 1900.
Rural Free Delivery.
All publishers should urge the ox
tension of the rural free delivery fys
torn. Its adoption means an im
mediate addition to the number of
people who take newspapers and
magazines. Farmers are no fonder
than other people of stale newspapers,
Being accustomed to fresh air, fresh
eggs, cream, butler and other fresh
things, the category or which does
not exclude human beings, the farmer
more than tho city man, who is
obliged to take his milk, butter and
eggs after they aro faded and staled by
a railroad journey, objects to jejune
and wilted news. According to
The Chicago Record, a number of
thirty-mile mail routes, running
twelvo miles out of Crawfordsville,
have had a dally mall service for a
year. During the first montli of the
service each carrier delivered about
1,000 pieces and collected about 300
letters. In the course of the year the
number of pieces delivered increased
to 5,000 a niohth and tho letters col
looted to 1,800, besides papers and
other parcels. It Is also stated that
the service Increases the value of land
along the routes and tends, as the
figures demonstrated, to enormously
Increase tho number of papers and
periodicals taken.
Tho carriers have been allowed to
perform messenger and express ser
vice for the households on their
routes, thus making tho service prof,
ltablo to the government and the
messengers too. A dally trip to town
is Impossible to thrifty farmers or
farmer's wives, but In families where
there aro little children, tho unfor
soon need of medicines, schoolbooks
and school supplies make it necessary
that the tired farmer and his tired
horses should go to town on many a
night when body and temper rebel.
In the region about Crawfordsville,
Indiana, the farmers' wives contlde
their errands to the postman whoso
fee is so small thai the farmer is glad
to pay it and save a trip to town.
Since rural free delivery pays in
Indiana, which as a state, is literary
only in the spots occupied by Mr.
James Whl'comb Riley and General
Lew Wallace, It Is certain that it
would pay in Nebraska, where Illiter
ate people are so scarce that the col
lector of funny stories based on Ignor
ance and mis conception skips the
sta'c on his way to the real west.
This trial in Indiana should convince
the postmaster general that rural free
delivery is not premature. It will in
crease the revenues of the postal de
partment by Increasing the amount
of mail matter sent and besides it will
establish quick communication with
the furnuM and lessen their Isolation.
To everybody but the farmer the news
is conveyed by telegraph and rural
free delivery will make him a cus
tomer of the associated press Should
the Postmaster General accomplish
this reform his administration will
become epochal and mark the last
year of the century by a memorable
and beneficent innovation.
"The Peace Commissioners Return.
They are coming back to America,
but no one knows or cares what ship
they have sailed on. Everybody
knows that Dewey is coming back on
the Olympla. For the peace commis
sioners no tali shafts lino an avenue
of fame, no victory's wide wings arc
stretched in triumphant acclaim.
Their triumphs have not inspired the
sculptors to erect an arch emblazoned
with the heraldry of war and cet
about with sculptured sailors and
soldiers. It is fortunate that a diplo
matist is generally so well satisfied
with himself that ho does not notice
the absence of popular recognition of
ills victories against other smug emis
saries in broadcloth, around, a mahog
any table, and It is also fortunate
that the man of peace with manifold
theories for hastening tho 'millonium
is so engaged in propagating and ex
plaining them that ho does not notice
that the man of action still wears
the bays and still receives the plau
dits of a people as martial as those of
Rome who welcomed Caesar back
from the wars.
Address to School-Children.
Mr. Alfred Austin who is below the
standard even of poets laureate has
some very excellent Ideas of life and
Its conduct. To the boys of St. Ed
mund's school, Canterbury on Prize
day Mr. Austin insisted that we
were not living in a changed world of
morals, of principles or of manners.
"Nothing, surely that was funda
mentally important in the two most
important of ail things life and con
ducthas changed. Telegraphs and
telephones had almost annihilated
time and space, but they had neither
moved nor shaken the foundations of
morality.- Railways had added to
the speed of locomotion, but they had
left philosophy that was sound before
their invention as sound and station
ary as ever. Parliaments, books,
newspapers, conferences, public meet
ings had increased in number, but the
duties of the statesman, the resources
of tho orator, and tho canons of pure
literature remained unaffected by
their multiplication,"
Then ho adjured them, moreover,
"to revere honest, useful work In all
men. It was often said that life was
short. But thero were two things for
which It was much too long. It was
too long for Idleness, too long for
mero pleasure-seeking, both of which
ended In unutterable weariness. Re
fresh body and mind, as .far as possi
ble, with variety of exercise, W.iu
devoting your main energies t 2
one worthy purpose. If you ils, "1"e
confound distinction with not ILi?
I !ilLmo9tr??'l"n.deP!,eeral .A ,
only when it was conferred In C
who were themselves distinguished"
It is plainly to be seen hen ti,a't
Mr. Austin does not confuse the tr.
fling with the essential, and tin evcr
lasting, notwithstanding his . ......
His remarks strengthen conirtnni
concerning the modernity if ai
ethical precepts and deductions
and relieve the timid who fear that
future discoveries will create a new
heaven and a new earth. Whereas
time, space and matter which are
conquered by new Inventions have to
do only with the physical world
while the sermons Plato, Marcus
Aurelius, and the Christ arc as mod
ern as though they had of just de
livered them.
The Omaha Sho
in tne oeginning or the season tlft
managers of the Omaha show an
nounced that a certain number of
thousand dollars had been set aside
for advertising in various large pa
pers But nevertheless Mr. Outright
the tactless advertising agent of the
show requested the country and
weekly papers of Nebraska to adver
tise the show for a few passes. All of
the self-respecting papers sent Mr.
Outright their advertising rates. He
replied by informing them that the
show was quite able to get along with
out the Nebraska press and lie con.
tlnued to send press notices to the
despised country papers. Just assoon
as they arrived they were thrown un
opened into the editor's waste basket.
Last year the patronage of the coun
try people In Nebraska made the Ex
position successful. Their trade
trebled the business of the retail
stores and their traffic put the Oma-
Country people take country paper?
anc' when those papers report a dis
gusting and demoralizlngshoworprim
nothing whatever of a show, country
people who are simple minded enough
to have confidence in the country
editor, arc not apt to patronizo It.
Reliable reports indicate that the
grounds of the exposition are very
beautiful, the lighting superb and
worth traveling fifty miles to see, but
families will not travel hundreds o(
miles to see landscape gardening and
an electrical display. Neither are
conscientious bub snubbed editors
going to advise their readers to
spend their money so foolishly. Mr.
Cutright's snarl that the exposition
could get along without this or that
paper is true enough. Events have
proven that no show can bo a success
in Nebraska unless tho despised coun
try neonlo natn.nl'n It nnri the Omaha
show has "gotten along" without the
country people, but shabbily
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Th Street Fatf
Today la the last of the street feilM
which has filled the streets with bappj
looking people for a week. The mioj
beautiful and picturesque booths which
the merchants have erected have trans
formed the street9 of thb city into fome
thlng new and strange. Those- mer
chants who erected elegant booths arid
ornamented them with some regard to
the laws of color have been widely com
plemented and will be quoted formontbi
to come, There are other morchantft
with good intentions, but uneducated in
the effect of one color upon another who
erected booths and ornanaentod the
with most of the blue and green ami red
cheetie cloth in etosk. The effect, fj
from being pleasing, gave an incorrect
impression in many cases of tho qutlw,