THE COURIER.
X
THE COURIER,
Official Organ of the Nebraska State
Federatioo of Women's Cubs.
KXTBBBOIK THX KMTOmCI AT LINCOLN At
SBOOHD CLAMMATTXK.
PUBLISHED EVEBY BATDBDAY
-BT-
tie mm hunk iid nblissik go
Office 1132 N street, Up Stairs.
Telephone 384.
SARAH B. HARMS.
Editor
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OBSERVATIONS.
g OBSBRVA
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Highway Rights.
A suggestion made by Harper's
Weekly that roadside advertisements
are worth one half a cent apiece has
denuded a mile of country of dlsfigur
iog advertisements tacked to trees or
glued? to rocks. Advertisers ruth
lessly destroy beauty up and "down
the rcad-sider-.tba people's parks
fences and trees are disfigured by tall,
green, red and yellow letters. Be
sides the outrage to nature it is an
inroad of one advertiser upon the
rights of others. For the highway
belongs to all and can only be mon
opolized by gift of a franchise, pre
sented by a misguided council to a
corporation. It is not a path through
a wilderness that is valuable but the
track beaten by thousands of people,
and the side of the path is a good
advertising medium because pedes
trians have eyes and their bodies
must be clothed, fed and medicated.
Since the days when the strongest
built a castle and enclosed all the
land not similarly enclosed by an
other strong man, the rights of the
many are ignored and made into priv
ileges for the few. The distruction
of a free people's view by patent-medicine
advertisers is a survival of feud
al aggression which a meek and
long suffering people still endure..
Imperialism.
President McKinley's expression of
this country's purposes in regard to
China should be enough to refute the
charges of imperialism made against
him. All we want in China is an
measurable treasure and opportuni
ties stimulated the imaginations of
men. And this crusade of the na
tions of Christendom to China re
sembles that other march, undertaken
at the end of the eleventh century,
when from all parts of Europe, says
William of Malmesbury, "thousands
upon thousands, hurried to engage in
the holy war." The most distant
islands and savage countries, were
inspired to join the army, Welshman,
Scotchman, Dane, Norwegian, forsook-their
homes to join the proces
sion of 6,000.000 men, who went to
wrest the holy sepulchre from the
Turk. In their progress they got
acquainted and their -superstitious,
bigoted horror of the -foreigner -was
weakened and commerce was tremen
dously stimulated. In this new cru
sade against China the Turk himself
wishes to join. It is as truly now as
then a march of civilization against
barbarism and isolation except for
Germany and Russia, who will doubt
less be rewarded with territory for
their -participation in the Chinese
reformation.
It is as unwise for a nation as for a
person to refuse to be governed by the
logic of events. After the Spanish
American war began the United
States was obliged to accept the rules
of war and abide by its conquests.
The party of the opposition was anx
ious that this country should champ
ion the cause of Cuba. War declared,
it must be ended as quickly as pos
sible. The destruction of the Spanish
fleet "must' destroy a power which
Spain controlled with an ocean be
tween itself and colony.
The sinking of the Spanish fleets in
the Pacific and in the Atlantic cut
the wire between Spain and her col
onies and the war was over. The anti
imperialists pretend to think that we
should "have fought"3patnin her own
way, that we had no business in Fill
pine waters, etcetera, etcetera. Tbey
do not light their own battles so, if
they ever win any.
The anti-imberialists will not de
line imperialism. They recognize that
it is a bogy and will not bear defini
tion. A man of intelligence when
driven into a corner and in the in
terests of free discussion will define
the word, but no two antis agree, so
that, republicans are still ignorant
of the meaning of the charge pre
ferred against the administration.
Man's Summer Rig.
Cool looking people increase the
sum of coolness. Men owe a debt to
the community to look cool. The or
gandies, lawns, dimities, laces, light
parasols, and white hats that flutter
up and down the streets are cooling as
well as cool. Tbey are the summer as
much as the trees, the grass, the
flowers, the birds and tbe breeze. If
it were not for tbe uncomfortable,
apoplectic, choleric masculine inhabi
tants that uiake Lincoln look like a
hot place, this city might very easily
acquire a summer-resort reputation.
Tbe nights are cool, there are no
mosquitoes, tbe flees will not leave
the dogs and there is a wandering,
onen door, wide enough to let in our
produce and manufactures and pro- yet withall searching breeze that will
lection for citizens of the United
States, who for either p'easure or
business are In China. Through no
missionary intention the one hun
dred millions of Chinese will be ele
vated and educated through the fact
of the open door braced open and
kept open by the powers. The world
has threatened China's isolation for a
hundred jears. The Chinese epoch of
intercourse with the world has ar
rived. There is a stirring of the na
tions like that at the end of the
cool anything not swathed in and
sealed by woo1. The only reason why
men do not discard woolen coats in
summer is because they would rather
stifle, they would rather invite a heat
stroke than be called effeminate. A
long time ago women appropriated
everything in masculine attire that
she thought she needed, collars, tics,
vest, coat, hats and shoes. All of tbe
distinctively ugly haberdashery such
as the silk tile and the Prince Albert
coat women have let alone. And her
fiftentlrcentary when" America" was evident disapproval"har done "much
discovered and a new world with im- to make them unpopular. In tbe
summer time tbey are not worn by
any man of sense and savoir faire ex
cept on extra ceremonious occasions
unknown to small towns'" remote from
fashion. Their use is confined to
traveling fakirs and to professional
men who desire to advertise an
artificial, superfluous and unseason
able dignity.
Some-male. persons with the histor
ical and geographical sense, realize
that, the Esquimaux dress in furs
because the arctic region is a cold
place, and the Zulu in a loin cloth
because the equator is near the fire.
These people desire to conform to
their own climate, which for a sea
son every year is arctic- and for an
other season is equatorial. -They are
hindered in a very sensible design by
otber men who ridicule the would-be-cool
and insist that they wear tbe
polar costume tbe year through. The
latter made a mock and a martyr out
of tbe first man that dared to carry
an umbrella in the streets of London,
imperturbable JosephrHanway who
was in ill health and desired to pro
tect, himself from the rain. Before
his time tbe umbrella had been mon
opolized by women. His peculiar
quality of mind was not disturbed
when the gamins called him ' "Sissy"
or the seventeenth century slang
equiva'ent fur the word which means
effeminacy. He carried his umbrella
and at first there were only a few
brave enough to imitate him. But
the most sensitive can carry it now
without fear of ridicule.
A garment similar to a shirt waist
is now constructed for men. It is
built on masculine lines and needs
no coat. It is not made to be covered
by a coat and is quite as presentable.
Several, and perhaps many years will
pass beforermen will consent to 'wear
it. But just as soon as a few of tbe
hrave have broken it in, there will be
just as many shlrt-waisted men as
there are now shirt waisted women.
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A Human Document.
The Declaration of Independence
was written, most, of it, by one man
and subscribed by many. The man
who wrote it was enamoured of free
and equal. He used these words as the
French revolutionists used, Liberti
egalite.fraternite to work a spell. He
furnished Americans with an ideal
but it is idle to say we have attained
it. Man is not born free and equal
but bound by heredity, custom, tra
dition and superstition and from the
top to the bottom of human heights
there are inequalities of all degrees.
The document was written in an age
of fine writing, when sophomores set
tbe style and it does not mean very
much. Had the Revolutionary he
roes not given it vogue and authority
it would not still mean anything to
this literal, uopoetic, down.on-oratory
generation. It is only sacred as a
historical document and as a speci
men of the best thing tbe continental
congress ever publisbed. As a dec
laration of the truth about man's
birth it is a lie. and as a document
marking the limits of the growth of
the United States it is not trust
worthy. J j
Teachers' Wages.
With an ascending scale of prices
teachers' wages in the Lincoln public
schools have not been raised. The
same argument which induced the
board to lower them applies now to
their increase. Then prices were fall
ing and salaries too and it was said
that with the same amount of money
the teacher could buy goods that in
prosperous times cost her one-third
Trnfre." Shels paying IhTprlce of pros
perous times now and her salary
should be correlated with the corn
temporary prices.
The raise asked for requires an in
crease in the" salary appropriation of
only $5,000. Tbe teachers who meek
ly accepted the cut and went on with
their work deserve consideration now
that prosperity is circling about our
heads meditating upon a suitable
spot upon which tonight and abide.
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The Famine in India.
Pictures in the missionary periodi
cals of the Indian farmer plowing
with a bullock and a pointed stick for
a plow explain the famine in India.
It is not English occupation, for the
famine districts are the northern
states where Englishmen are scarce.
Modern agricultural implements, and
modern methods of enriching erapor
rished land is what India needs. The
farmers keep no stock, only a few bul
locks which they use in plowing and
harvesting. They have, therefore,
little manure and the exhausted land
produces less than fifty years ago and
it is feeding many times the number
of people. In the famine of 1866 two
million people died, in 1877 more than
five millions died. There is some--thing
wrong in the agricultural sys
tem where famines can occur every
eleven years and find millions of peo
ple unprovided for emergencies. In
dia's exhausted soil must be' enriched
and induced to yield what other soils,
cared for with educated agricultural
intelligence, yields.
Budbists will not eat meat and ir
relevant as it may seem famine is
dep'eting the population, because he
soil lacks animal enrichment. Break
a cog in the wheel of growth, food
and decay and nature revenges her
self cruelly, inevitably, and takes
seven fold of that which she has been
deprived of.
The Telephone Ordinance.
In dealing with real estate agerits,
or with any man who represents both
buyer and seller, it is sometimes dif
ficult to discover whose interests he
represents For instance, property is
listed with a real estate dealer to rent
or sell for the highest price obtain
able. Renters and purchasers go to
this same man for bargains. He
charges one or both of his customers
a percent The ethics of the business
are unknown to me, but on tbe prin
ciple that he is the fortunate one who
sells something and not he who ac
quires it, the real estate agent
charges his commission to the former,
no matter how real a bargain the
purchaser ha secured. The forego
ing is not intended as a reflection
upon real estate agents, but as a ref
erence to the difficulties of their busi
ness and what a nice balance is re
quired in adjusting their relations 'to
the opposing interests of their two
classes of customers.
Of course it is not the same thing
with members of tbe city council.
They are elected by the citizens 'to
look after the city. They are counsel
and the citizens are their clients,
whatever the cause. They are sup
posed to meet once a week to admin
ister and audit the affairs of the city
from the standpoint of the city and
not to aid any corporation or indi
vidual in its or his private designs
against the citizens for the purposes
of gain.
There should be no suspicion that
the council is capable of considering
any subject from any other point 'of
view than the city's. Yet in the
council's dealing with the two tele
phone companies there is, apparently,
a lack of zeal for the 'city's interest
"and a'tender regard "for that "of '(he
"Nebraska Telephone Company. It Is
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