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6,
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VOL. XV., NO. Ill
ESTABLISHED IN 1880
PRICE FIVE CENTS
m
LINCOLN. NEBR., SATURDAY. JANUARY '20. 1900.
Bmm
BXTHBDIN THE POSTOVTIC AT LINCOLN AS
SECOND CLASS MATTES.
ed and hammered into, be sure it will
always be a stovepipe and nothing
else, yielding to a stovepipe's tempta
tions and putting up a stovepipe
front. A sod house or the little frame
shanties of a new western town are
more to be respected because they do
The term 'ittakkiri,' meaning 'all
gone,' or 'utterly vanished,' in the
sense of 'ail told,' is contemptuously
applied to the verses in which the
verse-maker has uttered his whole
thought. 'Like the single stroke of a
temple bell, the perfect short poem
not pretend to be anything but a should set murmuring and undulating
vaal means temporary loss of prestige
to the whole of Anglo Saxondotu of
which America is an important mem
ber. It seems to me that it is both
shortsighted and unpatriotic to ex
tend our sympathy or help to the
Boers. They are fighting against the
principle of the representation of tax
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OBSERVATIONS.
The Stovepipe in Architecture.
The galvanized iron trimmings,
cornices, and ornamental corner tow
ers that mark the revival of building
in Lincoln are ugly, insincere, and un-time-worthy.
Instead of finishing a
building these trimmings disfigure it.
Tne winds play with them as with
paper. Of frail and flimsy construc
tion they cannot be securely fastened
to roofs and corners which their own
ers have been told they will ornament.
A high wind tears them loose and
the streets are littered for days "with
the impossible "ornaments" which
are a libel on architecture. The in
fluence of noble masses and piles of
brick and stone is easily demonstra
ble. A counterfeit cornice crowning
a building of honest brick or stone
discredits the whole, and has a bane
ful influence on those upon whom it
casts its unworthy shadow. There are
a few blocks in Lincoln, notably the
Richards building, the telephone
building and the State university li
brary that possess this priceless char
acteristic of sincerity. There are
others also which are equally worthy
of respect. There is no real economy
in the use of a material so sensitive
to wind and time as thin sheets 'of
iron rolled into funnels and cornu
copias. There is no economy in using
a material for a building that was
manufactured for stovepipe, for
whatever form the stovepipe is twists-
temporary shelter. Nevertheless there
are many buildings here finished with
this unfortunate material. They
have served a good purpose and were
erected by good citizens who believed
in Lincoln. But I believe it is not
too early to discard make-believes
and expedients. We are better off
without them and their continuous
use is a reflection on our taste and
good judgment.
Write a Poem!
In "Ghostly Japan," Lafcadio
Hearn's new book on that country,
Mr. Hearn expatiates upon the in
tensity and power of the poetry writ
ing habit.
Tor centuries poetry has been a
universal fashion of emotional utter
ance in Japan. It is everywhere;
sung in the fields and in the streets;
engraved on the domestic utensils,
even on the toothpicks. 'It were a
hopeless effort,' says Mr. Hearn, 'to
enumerate a tithe of the articles dec
orated with poetical texts.
You might wander as I have done
into a settlement so poor that you
could not obtain there, for love or
money, even a cup of real tea; but I
do not believe that you could discover
a settlement in which there is no
"body capable of making a poem.
"Of the short poem which is the
principal subject of his essay, Mr.
Hearn notes the curious fact that the
writing of this particular form of
Japanese verse has been practiced
more as a moral duty tnan as a mere
literary art and he quotes an old
ethical teaching. 'Are you very
angry? Do not say any.ihing un
kind, but compose a poem. Is your
best beloved dead? Do not yield to
useless grief, but try to calm your
mind by making a poem. Are you
troubled because you are about to
in the mind of the hearer many a -payers,
ghostly aftertone of long duration.'
Ilere are two of Mr. Hearn's transla
tions of short poems, illustrating the
power of suggestion:
A Mother's Remembrance.
Sweet and clear in the night, the voice of a
boy at study,
Reading out of a book, . . . Ialsoon:e
had a boy!
Happy Poverty.
Wafted into my room, the scent of the
flowers of the plum tree
Changes my broken window into a source
of delight.
"As showing the ingenuity of the
Japanese in composing impromptu
short poems Mr. Hearn cites one
which is intended to portray the last
degree of devil-may-care poverty
perhaps the brave misery of the wan
dering student. It is translated as
follows:
Heavily pours the rain on the hat that I
stole from the scarecrow.
The English vs. the Dutch.
The defeat of English arms in the
Transvaal would be an interruption
to civilization and to progress.
Whatever our political sympathies
may be, whatever our inheritance,
whatever our prejudice, the indis
putable effect of English administra
tion is before our eyes and is a mat
ter of history. Whatever is best in
law, in literature, in institutions is
English. For this reason, if for no
other the success of England in the
Transvaal was assured with the es
tablishment of the law of the survival
of the fittest. The world is under no
obligations to Hollander, to German,
to Italian, to Frenchman, to Span
iard, to Russian, and to no inhabi
tants of North Europe nor of the
They, precipitated tiie war;
they tired the first shot and made it
impossible for England to maintain
her self-respect without fighting.
The Dutch are subtle, sullen, hard
fighters, but they have not developed
South Africa. On the contrary, they
have been worse than negative and
have hindered and obstructed Eng
lish enterprise there. The Boer's
claims of devotion to the Bible and
his profession of a servile Christi
anity have elicited sympathy for him
in this particular war that he decs
n)D deserve. His profession of re
ligion is only an extra condemnation
for refusing representation to that
part of the population which pays
nine-tenths of the taxes. His re
ligion is a formal verse committing,
queer sort, like no other religion any
where else. It leaves him as gross
and as leathery as it finds him. It
does not reach the head and if. it
touch his heart it does nut soften it.
It is a religion ol the mouth. It has
made the speech of the Boer a col
lection of cant phrases and ill-fitting,
archaic parables. Moreover, he pa
rades his religion, as a beggar ex.
hioits his sores, for sympathy. There
Is no depriving him of it, as there is
no way of depriving the beggar of the
alms the exhibition of his self-inflicted
wounds elicit. Nevertheless it
would be better for the beggar better
for civilization worse for pauperism
and a blow to bigotry if our alms and
our sympathy were more worthily
bestowed.
Enemies of the English insist that
Ooni Paul Kruger has a right to deny
representation to the English and to
oppress them with sumptuary laws,
that the English in the Transvaal
have the power of locomotion and can
move if they do not like it. This is
ever the reply of a tyrant to appeals
die, leaving so many things untinish- Orient. Constitutional law came for redress.
ed? Be brave and write a poem on from the Romans through the Eng- Singularly, the wealthiest and
death! Whatever injustice or mis- lish to the world. In literature be- worthiestor the English in the Trans
fortune disturbs you, put aside your sides Shakspere there are only Dante vaal are Irish. They have been fore
resentment or your sorrow as soon as and Homer. In the arts Italy, France ed in their work of developing the
possible and write a few lines of sober anr Germany have made notable
and elegant verse for a moral exercise, contribution?. The world owes Hol
land some hne examples or genre
painting and some fine laces. The
modern impetus to trade and the
methods of commerce, nearly every
thing that made the nineteenth cen
tury modern came from England. In
in ,
'I
"The custom of writing verses
times of ill fortune still prevails.
have frequently known poems,' says
Mr. Hearn, 'to be written under the
most trying circumstances of misery
orsuffering nay, even upon a bed of
death; and if the verses did not dis
play an extraordinary talent they at
least afforded extraordinary proof of
self-mastery under pain.'
"Another-curious fact concerning
Japanese poetry is that a poet would
be condemned for attempting any
completeness of utterance in a short
poem, the object being to stir the
imagination without satisfying - it.
country to coniorm to rules so tyran
nical that were they applied to Irish
men in Ireland, would set Ireland
ablaze with insurrection from Bel
fast to Cork. In her Majesty's army
the Irish generals and the duty
bound Irish soldiers are fighting with
might and main for England and
the establishment and growth of na- Irish, English American and all kinds
tions there is no question of right or of rights In the Transvaal. All loyal
wrong. A weak nation is broken up
and replaced by a strong because
the latter is stronger. The Lord is
on the side of the strong because, in
the long run, the strongest are the
most obedient to its laws which are
the laws of nature and truth. The
defeat of English arms in the Trans-
American citizens, all true philoso
phers, all believers In progress and
evolution, all opponents of cant and
hypocrisy, all believers in education
are, because of these principles, on
the side of the English. The insin
cere and undemunstrable sentiraen
talism which effects to believe that
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