THE COURIER
i
their sovereign. When the power was
taken away from the English throne,
royalty was given a longer lease of
life, If not of power. If parliament, at
the suggestion of the chancellor and
compelled by the stress of circum
stances, Imposes a tax on the bread
of the English workman, Jt Is quite
likely that there will be riots. For the
workman has not gained In meekness
since the bread riots of 1869. Even now
papers devoted to the Interests of the
laborer and apparently careless of the
prosperity of England as a whole are
Invoking the spirit of Cobden and do
ing their part, so far as prophesying
has a part in precipitating riots, to
enrage the people over the proposition
of Increased taxation of the necessa
ries of life.
a-
Richard Manifold
Monsieur Beaucalre. In Booth Tark
Ington's story, does not marry Lady
Mary Carlyle. The girl Is a belle and
a great lady of Bath In the time of
George II In England and of Louis XV
of France. Beaucalre Is the Duke of
Orleans, the nephew of the king and the
heir apparent. He loved love so much
that he fled the kingdom because he
would not marry his cousin whom he
had seen but twice. Those were days
when the king could order a man's
head off If he did not like him and It
would come off. So the young prince
fled to England while his uncle's
wrath was a-coollng. He was young
and handsome and unspoiled and he
saw a beautiful lady: but he had lied
to England as the hairdresser of the
Marquis de Mlrepol, while the lady was
haughty and although she was fas
clnated by this mixture of poet, prince
and soldier, when she heard that he
was a lackey she scorned him, though
he was as much of a poet , prince and
fighter as before she heard the news.
In Booth Tarkington's story the prince
remembers his gentle, faithful cousin
who Is truly in love with him and
would marry him If he were a chim
ney sweep, when the spoiled belle-repulses
him. In the book, after the
French ambassador's arrival and rec
ognition of the Prince Imperial he will
not forgive Lady Mary and goes back
to France to mind his uncle and
marry his cousin or anybody else
whom the state shall select for his
consort. But the story has been read
by thousands, and a thousand or two
saw the play at the Oliver last week.
In the play the lady renounces her
pride and accepts her true lover while
she still considers him a man of no
particular birth. He says "Mary!"
Just as Mary Anderson used to say
"Ingomar!" and they fall into the-last-part-of-the-flfth-act
attitude to the
satisfaction of the audience and the
assassination of realism. The curtain
should have fallen on the prince in a
doleful mood facing a chagrined lady
who has lost the parti of the season
and the greatest opportunity of her
life, or of any woman's, for that mat
ter.' The habits of childhood are diffi
cult to eradicate and all the books of
our childhood ended. "So they were
married and lived happily ever after
ward." The stage is more conserva
tive than literature and not nearly so
diversified as the actual romances of
life. A pair of stage lovers must be
married, and unless It is a problem
play or something from the unsanltary
Fiench sewer, they must be happy
ever afterwards. This is unfortunate.
Truth is better for man than the most
flattering and comforting fiction.
It Is true that the pampered daugh
ter of wealth, whose veins distribute
the thin blue blood of an aristocrat
over her body, somethlmes runs away
with a coachman. But currying horses
and driving them does not disqualify
as the occupation of grooming men
does. The occupation of coachman is
not effeminate. It is certain that the
proudest and most beautiful woman of
a fashionable society would never
marry a barber. The most fatuously
Insistent upon a happy ending must
admit this.
On the other hand the woman is not
born who could resist Richard Mans
field's wooing. It is likely that all the
women In the audience thought Lady
Mary's surrender was natural. Mr.
Mansfield retains his youthful grace
and ease of movement. Ills voice is
sonorous and thrilling. He reads his
lines with exquisite discrimination and
music. His technique is finished and
his make-up Is faultless. His support
was beyond criticism.
Mr. Mansfield's companions complain
of a haughtiness and a fastidiousness
that makes association with him In
the same company not an unmixed
pleasure. As he grows older the sat
isfaction he takes in his own appear
ance, poses and costuming Is more ap
parent. In the last scene, when he has
the centre of the stage all to himself
and he Is seated In a throne chair and
all the other members of the company
are doing obeisance, when he Is clothed
In a rose-cplored embroidered brocade
court dress, when he blazes with the
diamonds that should adorn such
genius as his. a look of Ineffable sat
isfaction rests upon his face while he
feels that for a mimic moment, at
least, he Is In the proper relation to
the rest of his world. Every man has
his vanity, and we have forgiven
Mansfield his pride long ago.
College Degenerates
If the young people who are now
undergraduates at the university are
not benefitted by the course, they are
injuied. It Is as hard to stand still
and go neither backward nor forward
In morals and mental conditions as it
is to remain stationary on a bicycle or
on a pair of stilts. The young men
and the young women who are In tlie
university merely to have a good time
and have not the lunate love of cul
ture would much better be earning
their living or helping to make home
happier for the families or which they
are members.
When older people, who long ago
were graduated from school, go away
rrom home Into a strange and Incuri
ous environment where the restraints
of acquaintanceship are removed, some
behave just as well as over. There are
others whose morality Is not deep
seated and inveterate and they play
pranks and allow themselves liberties
that they never take at home.
There are perhaps a thousand or
fifteen hundred out-of-town students
who register at the university every
fall. After the first homesickness has
worn off, the wine of liberty intoxi
cates them and they are apt to act
foolishly. The regular entertainments
of society seem tame. Deep draughts
of youth and of unaccustomed liberty
go to the head, and the average under
graduate's head Is not strong and his
equilibrium is easily disturbed.
The custom of rushing only fresh
men for the fraternities adds to his
conceit. When immediately upon ar
rival the youth who has nothing in
particular to add to society is courted
by delegates from three or four fra
ternities who send him flowers, invite
him to ride, to dine, take him to the
theatre, laugh at his attenuated
Jokes and ignore his rising and
insufferable conceit, the effect up
on the youth's character is la
mentable. Upon the young women
subjected to this process the ef
fect is just the same and Is more
lasting. Fellows take the conceit and
the braggodocio out of a brother by
ridiculing his pretentious remarks and
his self-laudatory stories. But girls
are gentler and their schoolmates suf
fer for the drastic course which, how
ever painful, would make them use
ful members of a fraternity. Hazing
Is not without very desirable charac
teristics. There is no process yet dis
covered which can altogether take Its
place and show a young man and
woman that they are not the centre of
the system and that the new world
they have been born Into has no special
respect for them and no disposition to
overlook faults of conceit or selfish
ness or of undue self-aggrandizement.
In a school properly organized by the
undergraduates the new-comers learn
to rate themselves again, and more
justly. The system of rushing fresh
men spoils them, permits them to go
through the university without learn
ing that very useful and converting
definition of their relationship to so
ciety, uninfluenced by the enervating
fondness and prejudiced good opinion
of parents and parents friends. The
greatest service one man can do anoth
er Is to help him to And his level, and
without destroying his self-respecf help
him to a realization of his comparative
unimportance In the scheme of things.
Because they are blase and tired of
the amusements and distractions of
wholesome society, certain Yale under
graduates have organized a society for
the express purpose of encouraging
students to break the laws. At the
club's annual meeting degrees are
conferred for "B. S." (burglary and
stealing. "D. D." (drunk and disorder
ly), "S. T." (sneak thief). Of course
thl3 Is In the way of fooling and humor.
But the young men who enjoy this
sort of fun would much better be at
work. The faculty have forbidden the
club to hold meetings and members
who acknowledge membership will be
expelled. Most of the undergraduates
are as determined to suppress It as the
authorities, college and municipal, are
themselves. The fact of Its existence
demonstrates the Inadvlsabillty of at
tempting to educate vicious youngsters
for whom there Is but one way of
salvation, and that Is by the way of
work.
The preamble of the criminal club's
constitution reads "that it Is the ob
ject of this society to promote a knowl
edge of crime and the psychological
basis of crime among Its members, and
a contempt for the New Haven police
department."
At a recent banquet behind barred
doors the club adopted the following:
"No person shall be eligible for mem
bership who is not a college man and
who has not been arrested for some
offense against the law of the land.
Upon a vote of two-thirds of the mem
bers already admitted, however, any
student may be admitted to honorary
membership who has shown unusual
boldness In the commission of crime
and In escaping the consequences
thereof."
There Is at Nebraska university no
organized band of criminals, but there
are a dozen or so vicious young men
and women who prowl about the back
doors of residences where festivities of
some kind are In progress. They
watch their chance and steal ice cream
or cake and retire to a fraternity
house where they eat their plunder,
unconscious, perhaps, that they have
joined the criminal classes and that
their university career is for them
worse than futile.
It Is to be said in favor of the pres
ent administration that when a thief
is once thoroughly identified and con-,
vlcted of theft, he or she is dismissed
the university. Hostesses whose re
freshments have been stolen by stu
dent gangs set a policeman to watch
the refreshments they Intend later to
offer their guests.
The men and women who lurk in the
bottoms are herded by the police Into
the reservation. If they come out
boldly at night they are reprimanded
and sent back to their purlieus.
The well-dressed gang of both sexes
sheltered- In fraternity houses slip by
the police. Such students are disgrac
ing the institution, the very large ma
jority of self-respecting and respect
able undergraduates, and destroying
their own careers.
The young women who accept invi
tations from bachelors to enter their
quarters without a chaperone should
be immediately returned to their pa
rents. An education can be of little
use to a young woman who has learned
at the same time to lay aside for the
sake of a frolic her own self-respect.
Awntmcnt Equalization
Nebraska people have got it Into
their heads that the railroads are
shirking taxes, and some of the citi
zens of the state are quite excited
about it. Without examining tax lists
or pretending to make a comparative
and exhaustive examination of the
subject, they wag their heads andsay
it is a shame that the railroads of the
state do not bear their share of the
burdens of state and city government.
Mr. Frank Harrison, editor of The Ne
braska State ltecord. can not be ne
cused of slavish consideration for cor
porations, railroad or otherwise. He
Is singularly free from prejudice, and
his reasoning and Judgments are
sound. It occurred to him to examine
the tax lists after listening to the loase
talk about the railroads not paying
their shure of the taxes, and as a man
Interested In public events and as an
editor of a paper, he made a compara
tive examination of the amounts the
furmers and the railroad companies
pay Into the treasury.
The present agitation for the pur
pose of obtaining a higher railroad
assessment was begun because the
state was In debt and not primarily
because the taxation was unequal.
Now. it does not matter how much we
need the money. If the railroads pay
their share of the taxation they should
not be compelled to pay more. Jusl be
cause the farmers are the legislators
and county commissioners and county
assessors and the railroads are only
represented Indirectly in the vurlous
departments of city and county ad
ministration. According to the records, which Mr.
Harrison lias printed and called at
tention to. the state of Nebraska Is
in debt to the amount of J1,907.435.U.
Taxpayers ol the state owe It J3,31.
SjT.40. There Is not a railroad In the
state Indebted to a county or city to
the amount of one dollar. Whatever
the railroad taxes are. big or lltt'e,
equul or unequal, the railroad treas
urers have paid them and the cities,
counties and state have had the use of
the money from the time the first rail
projected a mile into the state from
the Iowa border. The farmers and
other politicians who are talking about
the oppression of the railroads and the
favoritism shown them have not done
so well. They owe the state almost
twice the amount of the debt, or to be
exact, within J1S3.512.S:: or twice the
amount of the public debt.
In his report. November 30, 1900,
State Auditor Cornell said: "In 1893
the assessed valuation of the state was
$193,733,133; In 1900, J171.717.593. With
our Increased population and wealth,
the assessed valuation of the state Is
J21.983.530 less than It was seven years
ago, a discreditable showing. Indeed.
Mr. Harrison has made a compara
tive study of the taxes assessed
against the most valuable of the ag
ricultural products of Nebraska In the
most fertile and prosperous counties
as well as In those whose acreage Is
devoted to grazing. He concludes from
adequate premises that raising the
assessment ot the railroads will not
remedy the evil because of which prej
udice Is making a scapegoat of the
railroads.
Mr. Harrison says: "I have little
sympathy with those who raise the
cry that the railroads are escaping
taxation and that to radically raise
their assessments would remedy the
difficulty. The shirking Is general. I
find on lnquliy that In western coun
ties like Kimball and Dawes the rail
roads pay almost one-half of the en
tire tax, while tens of thousands of
high priced cattle in those counties es
cape taxation altogether.
"In Cherry county, which Is equal In
area to four states like Ithode Island,
the single line of road pays almost one
third of the total tax. And yet. from
counties like these comes the demand
for increased taxation of railroads.
"In Dawes county live stock assess
ments for this year are as follows;
Horses and mules. J3 to J10; three-year-old
steers and older, JS; two-year-old
steers, J3; yearlings, J3; cows, J3 to J7;
hogs, Jl per 100 pounds. In Box Butte,
adjoining Dawes on the south, horses
are assessed at JiO, two-year-old steers,
$M; three-year-olds. J36; yearling
steers. J16; and other stock in propor
tion. "In Fillmore, one of the best counties
In the state, where it is the constant
boast that land is selling for fifty, sixty
and even seventy-five dollars an acre,
and where there Is some of the finest