Chapter II: Studying Law! (2)

“No, wife, don’t ask me that; I have made sacrifices enough, God knows. I cannot stand to be parted from my little one; send for tutors, governesses or any other sort of SSS, that you want, I will bear all expense, but let me see my dear daughter every day, that’s a dear.” Mrs. Stanton said no more, but she watched with ever growing sorrow; the glow of pride that came to Powhatan’s dark countenance, when gazing at “Laughing Water,” as he called Alice.

The gentle girl was now turning sixteen, and had developed into great loveliness, but seemed wholly unconscious of her charms, and really I believe, that was the one thing that drew so many worshippers to her shrine.

About this time a party of gentlemen had arrived from old England, looking at lands for the settlement of some emigrants who were anxious to throw in their fate with the new settled country, and among them were the sons of some of Mr. Stanton’s early and close friends.

Frank Berkley, nephew of the ex-governor, was among the number, and soon won his way to the hearts of old and young alike, by his kindliness and sprightliness.

Alice seemed unusually lively, when he was regaling her with his exploits at college or his tilts with the fair sex at home, and her merry laugh would ring out at his bright wit or mirthful sallies.

None seemed to observe the vengeful scowls Powhatan would throw at the jolly crowd, as he crossed and recrossed the Hall, but would never enter the parlor, nor join in any of the sports. I said none--none save the anxious mother, who ever had her eye on her darling and when as a great secret Alice confided to her, that Frank wanted to take her across the water with him as his bride, she assented cheerfully, for she felt that to be the only way to save her child from some direful fate.

The party was going farther West, making explorations, and would return about Christmas time, to enjoy the festivities of that season under Mr. Stanton’s hospitable roof, and would then take shipping for home. Farewells were said, and all were well on their way, but Frank lingered. “Stay with us, Frank,” Alice said tearfully, “we will be so lonely when you are gone,” and Frank felt he would willingly tear his heart out, if it would comfort the little girl he had grown to love so much in two months.

“But,” he said, “my darling, then I would be accounted a laggard in duty, for don’t you know I was put in charge of this expedition; and will be held strictly accountable for its failure?”

“Oh!” she said, “Frank, forgive me. I will not be such a baby. I know you will soon be back, and I will try to scare away the blues and bid you a cheerful good-bye,” and he never forgot to his dying day, how she put her arms around his neck and kissed him a fond farewell. The last echo brought to him her parting words, “back soon.” They did not know that an eye had watched their parting, and the owner of that orb, had trembled with rage when he witnessed the caress.

Powhatan tried to coax her to ride or row, and had made and painted pure white, a little canoe for her, but she told him it made her tired to use the oars. “Come and see what a beauty your boat is, Minnehaha; you care no more for your poor Powhatan,” he said sadly.

“Oh yes, I do,” she replied, “but I worked so hard entertaining papa’s friends, I must rest up, but I will see the boat,” and taking his hand she ran lightly to the barn, to see and admire the little white canoe, with places all around the top for lights to be inserted, when the candles were lit at night; it certainly made a beautiful show. But his coaxing could not induce her to go on the water in it, and the craft was only rigged up to show to her friends, and still remained in Powhatan’s workshop. The mornings were beginning to be frosty and the air to show that the weeks had passed along and soon now, they might look for the return of the friends. Wild turkeys were killed and dressed, venison hams were baked and boiled, and the array of cakes and pies in the pantry, looked most tempting. On the afternoon of the 23d of December, Mr. Stanton was decorating the rooms, under the supervision of his good wife, and calling to Alice, said, “Daughter, we do need some holly so much, could you not take one of the boys, and get some from the wood on the swamp road? I must hie me to the postoffice or would get it myself.”

“Oh, yes, Pop, I will take my pony and John and soon be back.”

As she went out Powhatan met her, and having heard what Mr. Stanton said, begged to be allowed to accompany her, saying, “I will take care of you, Minnehaha.” So she could not well refuse, and when he had saddled her pony and old Thunder for himself, they mounted and rode off.

The father returned with the mail, the mother dressed for the evening meal, but Alice came not.

“Oh father,” she cried, “where can she be?” and the mother grew restless and uneasy. Presently seeing John approaching, Mr. Stanton called out,

“John, where is Miss Alice, boy?”

“Sir, I didn’t go with her; she went long that Injun, he say he take good care of her.” Mrs. Stanton was almost beside herself. Wringing her hands, she begged her husband for “God’s sake,” to take some of the men and seek the child, ere she was lost in the dreadful swamps. Searching parties scoured the country all that night, and when the next morning, Mr. Berkeley and his friends arrived, they, too, joined in the hunt, which was kept up for a whole week, but nothing was ever discovered, save Alice’s little pony, quietly grazing on the edge of the swamp.

A rumor came, that from the highest point overlooking the Lake in the Dismal Swamp, a huge black horse, with two riders, was seen to jump directly into the lake and never rose again. From the same fisherman, who dwelt on some high knoll in the swamp the report was scattered far and wide, that at 10 o’clock every bright night was seen a little white canoe, lit with firefly lamps, pushed swiftly through the waters of the lake by a beautiful girl with fair locks floating over her shoulders.

The story was that she crossed the lake and then disappeared in the dark woods beyond. But nothing was ever seen or heard of Alice or her dusky lover again. Mrs. Stanton took to her bed and died of a broken heart, leaving young Berkley to care for the stricken old man, who was soon laid beside her in the garden that had been sweet Alice’s playground. Mr. Stanton left everything he had to Frank Berkley who mourned sincerely for his lost love.

Educational Department.

CONDUCTED BY THOS. E. WATSON.

Various Phases of the Money Question.

_Hon. Thomas E. Watson, Thomson, Ga._:

DEAR SIR:--Your logical editorial in your October magazine under the caption of “The Money Changer and the Politician” hit the bull’s eye and went straight to the heart of the subject. I heartily endorse the editorial. Hon. A. S. J. S----, a very able and conservative gentleman and also a gold bug as we sometimes denominate them, takes issue with you, as to some of your assertions, and as the Doctor is a subscriber to your magazine and very much open to conviction I am led, as a result of a pleasant discussion with him to ask you some questions on said editorial for the purpose of drawing you out more fully on the subject for the Doctor’s special benefit and for general light on the money question.

The questions that I propound embody the objections of the Doctor to what he otherwise concedes to be an able elaboration of the question under discussion.

You say, “Sparta rose to be a state of the first class on a currency of iron; Rome became Mistress of the World on legal tender copper; coined silver did not come into use until the Northern barbarian beat down her frontiers; gold held no place in the coinage till the imperialism of the Caesars had taken its lead in her decline.”

(1) Do you mean to say, that gold and silver did not exist as currency, prior to that period referred to in the passage just quoted?

The Doctor says you are all wrong here and asks that your authority for the declaration be given.

(2) He wants you to give more explicitly your authority for contending that paper money is Constitutional; he combats the idea of the Constitutionality of a paper currency, asserting that gold and silver is the money of the Constitution and not paper.

(3) What is your authority for saying that Mr. Cleveland ruled that Governmental notes which were payable _in coin_ should be redeemed in _gold only_? He disputes this.

(4) In your glowing description of the effects of paper currency, during the wars referred to by you, how it fed and clothed the soldier and kept starvation from those the soldiers left at home--he asserts that the gold and silver currency in circulation during the times you allude to could have accomplished all you claim; independent of a paper currency.

(5) Was the paper money issued by the Confederate Government during the Civil War as good at any time, during said war, as the paper money issued by the Federal Government during the same war? If not, why not?

Understand me, I am perfectly in accord with you. I am asking these questions in order that you may have an opportunity to knock the sophisticated props from under the gold bug delusions and the people given the plain facts.

Respectfully,

W. M. HAIRSTON.

* * * * *

ANSWER.

(1) Yes. Gold and silver were used in commerce and commodities, even as precious metals, _but not as legal tender money_. The legal tender money of Sparta was of iron. Lycurgus made it so, for a special purpose. See Plutarch’s “Lives,” or Aristotle on “Government.”

The legal tender money of Rome was copper during all the long and bloody years of her relentless and resistless march to world-power.

Gold and silver were used in commerce _on the basis of barter_--but not on any other.

Neither gold nor silver were coined _into legal tender money_, until _after_ Rome had become Mistress of the World.

See any standard History of Rome--Mommsen’s for instance; and see, also, Del Mar’s “Money and Civilization.”

(2) Paper money _is_ Constitutional, for the reason that the Constitution, itself, gives to Congress the right to coin legal tender money, and the Supreme Court of the United States, in a case brought to test that very question, decided, in effect, that the word coin, as used in the Constitution, has the sense of “create,” and that Congress can create legal tender money out of paper, if it sees fit to do so.

Congress _had_ seen fit to do so, for the good and sufficient reason that the expenses of the Government had increased to more than a million dollars per day, and there was no specie money in the Treasury.

The Government made money out of paper because it had nothing else to make it out of.

Ground hog case, Doctor.

(3) The facts in the case. The Contracts were payable in coin, just as in France. The _option_, of payment in silver or in gold, belonged to the Government _under the words and in the spirit of the contract_.

In France, it was the same. The creditors claimed payment in gold, both in this country and in France.

The French Government calmly bossed the situation _as any real Government should_, and paid the contracts as _it_ pleased _in either_ “coin.” When the French Government felt like paying gold coin, gold was paid. When the Government felt like paying silver coin, silver was paid.

In either case, the creditor got what his contract entitled him to get--COIN.

But Mr. Cleveland’s “Government” was not so robust. He took it into his head that “the bankers had the country by the leg.” In fact, he told Mr. Oates of Alabama that such was the case.

Absurd!

No _real Government_ would ever get into that kind of blue funk.

Mr. Cleveland should have shown some of the “back bone” that we have heard so much about. He should have said to those Wall Street Raiders, “I’ll give you COIN--get anything else if you can.”

When the Government had the gold, the yellow metal should have been handed out. When the Government did not have the gold, it should have handed out silver--saying to the Raiders, “Take it, or leave it. Your contract says COIN. There is coin. We make you _the legal tender_ of it. If you don’t take it when so tendered, _your claim against the Government is as dead as Julius Caesar_.”

THEN the Government would have had _the Bankers_ “by the leg.”

But, you see, Cleveland was standing in with the Wall Street crowd--and that makes all the difference.

Suppose our friend, the Doctor referred to by Mr. Hairston, owed ten different notes of ten dollars each, every one of them containing the plain statement that they are payable in “_coin_.”

Suppose that they fall due and are presented for payment. Suppose the Doctor has half the money in gold coin and the balance in silver coin. Suppose he offers the entire $100 in coin, in satisfaction of the debt.

Suppose the holder of the notes rejects the silver “coin,” and demands the entire debt in gold coin.

What would the Doctor do?

Would he hurry and scurry about, hunting for gold to satisfy the exacting creditor? I’ll bet a medium sized mouse-colored mule that he wouldn’t.

The Doctor _knows_ that silver coin is legal tender, and _was contemplated as one of the coins of payment at the time the contract was made_.

Consequently, he would tender the silver, and if the _offer to pay_ in that “coin” were refused, the Doctor would simply let the creditor do what the heathen does when Christian Civilization gets after him--RAGE.

(4) Let the Doctor peruse the Life of Chase, who was Secretary of the Treasury under Mr. Lincoln, and he will realize how much he is in error.

Many other authorities might be cited.

Gold and silver had disappeared. Specie payments had ceased. The Government was about “broke.”

_The daily expense account was approaching the two million dollar mark._

Spaulding, Salmon P. Chase, Thaddeus Stevens and others realized that unless the Government could float a paper currency the jig was up.

It was just about then that _Lincoln expressed the opinion that some of the Wall Street bankers ought to be shot_. They were manifesting every disposition to take advantage of the distress of the Government. They were showing that they meant to get rich off the war. And they accomplished their purpose.

They failed to obstruct the plan to issue paper money, but they succeeded in having Congress virtually say that while the Greenback was good enough for the soldier who was shedding his blood for his country, it was not good enough for the Bondholder who was sitting at ease in the financial Zion of Wall Street.

(5) My understanding is that the first paper money issued by the Confederate Government circulated at par _when first issued_.

The legal tender currency of any Government must depend, in any case, upon the strength, resources and credit of the Government.

Even the coin-currency _sinks to the mere commodity-value of the coin_, when the Government sinks.

Even now there is an _artificial value in gold coin, put there by law_.

No pile of a million dollars in gold coin would sell for a million dollars _as metal_.

In such a heap of gold you must allow for “wear and tear.”

The law _does allow_ for that very thing. If the gold coin is worn away to a greater extent than ten per cent, the Government will not receive it as legal tender--nor will the metropolitan banks receive it.

But anything _less_ than ten per cent loss in weight, _the law makes good_, by declaring that _such_ coins are _legal tender_.

Few people stop to think of that.

Therefore, every kind of money is fiat money; that is, THE LAW MAKES IT.

Now, it must be self-evident that _the value which law puts into currency_ SINKS, WHEN THE LAW-MAKING POWER SINKS.

If one can conceive of such a thing as the annihilation of the United States we must know that our gold coins would at once go into the scales to be weighed and priced _as metal_; our silver dollars would do precisely the same thing, and each of them would be worth less than 70 cents.

As for our paper money, it would be waste paper, and nothing else.

United States greenbacks would amuse the collectors of fifty years hence, just as Confederate bills do those of the present day.

Four Pertinent Questions Answered.

Enterprise, Ala.

_Hon. Thomas Watson, Thomson, Ga._:

DEAR SIR:--1. What are the fundamental principles of the four parties, Populist, Socialist, Democratic and Republican?

2. Do you favor the way the United States allows the banks to use national currency without interest and then charge the people 12 per cent? If not, why not?

3. Do you think there is any likelihood of the Rural Free Delivery ever being discontinued and if so on what grounds?

4. What does the Parcels Post Bill advocate?

* * * * *

ANSWER

(1) The Populists believe in the Public Ownership of Public Utilities--such as Railroads, Telegraph and Telephone Lines, and Express Companies.

They look upon the iron highway as a Public Road that should belong to the Public. They believe that the tremendous power which private ownership gives to the private corporations now owning the railroads is too great, _too ruinous when improperly used_, to be exercised by those whose sole aim is to extract the utmost possible dollar of profit out of the franchise.

The Populists believe, also, that there should be _a return to the money-system of the Constitution_.

The National Banks have USURPED the function of supplying the country with a proper currency.

At the present time, when the Government has but $353,000,000 of its own paper notes circulating as money, the National Banks have the enormous sum of $583,000,000 of _their_ paper notes in circulation _as money_.

Populists contend that it is the prerogative and THE DUTY of the government to create ALL THE MONEY THAT CIRCULATES, and to hold unto itself the power of _regulating the supply_.

Populists believe in the Tax upon Incomes, and contend that this tax should progressively increase as the Income increases. They believe also in a tax upon Inheritance.

Populists lay particular stress upon THE GREAT PRINCIPLE OF DIRECT LEGISLATION. They believe in allowing the people to compel the law-making power to act when they, the people, want certain laws. They contend that it is no more than right _to compel_ the law-makers _to refer proposed legislation to those who are affected by it_. This principle has worked happily wherever given a fair trial, and is usually called the _Initiative and Referendum_.

Populists contend, also, that all officers should be elected by direct vote of the people, and that the people should have the right at any time _to retire an officer who has forfeited their confidence_.

This principle is usually referred to as the _Right of Recall_.

In practice it proves a most excellent method of MAKING THE OFFICE-HOLDER “WALK THE CHALK.”

Populists also believe that we should have a system of Postal Savings Banks. These would furnish to the people _convenient_ and _safe_ places of deposit for their savings; and the system would go far to lessen the dangerous power of the metropolitan banks.

Populists are opposed to land monopoly, favor the eight-hour day in factories and similar industries, and believe that the employment of children of tender age in manufacturing establishments, mines, sweatshops, etc., should be watched with hawk-like vigilance _and regulated with a parental care which puts the_ WELL-BEING OF THE CHILD _above every other consideration in the case_.

Populists believe in UNTAXED NECESSARIES OF LIFE, and contend that whatever tariff duties are imposed should be laid upon luxuries.

In brief, Populists strive for the adoption of those principles which would make this A REAL REPUBLIC, instead of an Aristocracy ruled by a Class, or a Plutocracy in which Dollars dominate.

And during the whole time that the Politicians and Sages and Powers have been laughing at us, WE HAVE BEEN QUIETLY FURNISHING WITH OUR GARMENTS THE WARDROBES OF SUCH EMINENT POLITICIANS, SAGES AND POWERS AS ROOSEVELT, BRYAN AND HEARST.

Bryan accuses Roosevelt of stealing the very clothes _that Bryan himself stole from us_.

As for Hearst--before he fell down on that Murphy deal--his editorials and speeches were nothing in the world but the echo of James B. Weaver, Jerry Simpson and Mary Ellen Lease!

Had he kept up the lick, and not gone into that deal with Murphy, HE WOULD HAVE BEEN ELECTED GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK. He parted with his most valuable asset when he ceased to be an Independent.

The Socialists _think_ they believe in the collective ownership of those things necessary to the production and distribution of wealth, _but what they are actually driving at_ IS THE CONFISCATION OF PRIVATE PROPERTY and a jolly good division of the same, in order that THE HAVE NOTS WILL BE UPON AN EQUAL FOOTING WITH THE HAVES.

That’s the inner meaning of practical Socialism, and that’s why it assumes so savage a character in our great cities.

In the hearts of the rank and file Socialists, _are burning the same fierce fires as animated_ THE GOTHS AND THE HUNS WHEN THEY BORE DOWN UPON OPULENT ROME.

I have heard these people talk and I _know_ what it is _they really mean_.

The Democratic Party, at present, hasn’t got any principles capable of proof.

They are waiting for the next National Convention to hand out a new suit of clothes.

They are awful sick and tired of that Parker platform, which is _almost_ the same as the Republican platform--as poor old Gassaway Davis said.

But they cannot “point with pride” to any other platform until the National Convention meets. Just what will _then_ be done, it would take an able-bodied prophet to tell. My own opinion is that they will adopt the leading principles of Populism and put Bryan to running for the Presidency again.

The Republican Party is doing just what Alexander Hamilton thought ought to be done--running the Government in partnership with the rich, for the benefit of the rich.

The Republican rule is a Plutocracy, tempered by an occasional spasm of Rooseveltism.

(2) No. Because I do not believe in Special Privilege, nor in the confiscation of $134,000,000 of money that belongs to the taxpayers. To take away the people’s money on the pretext that the Government needs it to pay expenses, and then _to deliver it over to a few Pet Banks to be used without interest_, IS CONFISCATION. And it’s a burning NATIONAL INJUSTICE AND SHAME!

(3) No. Because Congress dare not do it. The people would not stand it.

(4) The transportation by the Government, through the mails, of small packages--say one, two, three, four, five, ten, fifteen pounds--at a moderate cost, thus protecting the people from the robber Express Companies.

Book Reviews.

CONDUCTED BY THOS. E. WATSON.

ANN BOYD. By Will N. Harben. Harper & Bros., New York City,
Publishers. Price $1.50.

Among the lads whose parents belonged to that great, wholesome class which Lincoln used to call “the plain people,” you would have found the creator of Abner Daniel, Pole Baker, and Ann Boyd had you gone to the little North Georgia town of Dalton, soon after the Civil War.

Two years old at the time that the deliberate treachery of William H. Seward provoked the rash Confederates into firing upon Fort Sumter,--the costly folly against which Bob Toombs protested in vain,--Mr. Harben heard and saw much of the actual marching and countermarching of the ensuing four years of THE MOST UTTERLY INSANE WAR RECORDED IN HISTORY.

Having been given a private education, the young man embarked in business enterprises, and it was not until after 1886 that a mediocre business man was offered up, a willing sacrifice, to a first-class literary artist. Harben, the business man, means nothing to anybody, but Harben, the literary genius, means a vast deal to everybody--for he is, today, the most distinctly _original and creative literary genius in America_.

_David Harum_ took the world by storm because of its unique portrayal of a typical American business-man--shrewd, strong, persistent, humorous, rough in most places and soft in spots. Banker and horse-trader, David Harum knew human nature like a book, and was chock full of that rare article called common sense.

Abner Daniel was in all respects the equal of David Harum, without being an imitation; Pole Baker was superior, in some respects, to Abner Daniel, and Ann Boyd enters a different class altogether.

The creations of Dickens and Thackeray offer nothing better, nothing more human, nothing more symmetrically natural and fascinating, than this heroic woman--tender-hearted, pure, brave and true--whose husband forsakes her, whose child is taken away from her, whose enemies persecute her, whose friends drop away from her, but who, standing at bay and battling with the whole array, CONQUERS.

It is pathetic and it is grand.

How the proud woman covers her wounds and complains not; how the strong soul finds itself _sustained from within_; how she brings a stupidly narrow, prejudiced and malicious neighborhood to confusion and utter defeat, is a story that makes one thrill with sympathy and admiration.

This number of the JEFFERSONIAN MAGAZINE begins the serial publication of Mr. Harben’s greatest book.

READ IT CAREFULLY.

Few better books have been written.

Books Received.

BUFF. A tale for the thoughtful. By A Physiopath. Boston. Little,
Brown & Co., Publishers. Price $1.00.

_Gabrielle, Transgressor._ A novel. By Harris Dickson. J. B.
Lippincott Company, Publishers, Philadelphia. Price $1.50.

_Starting in Life._ What each calling offers ambitious boys and young
men. By Nath’l. C. Fowler, Jr. With 33 illustrations by Charles
Copeland. Little, Brown & Co., Publishers. Price $1.50 net.

THE DRAGON PAINTER. A novel. By Mary McNeil Fenollosa. Illustrated by
Gertrude McDaniel. Boston. Little, Brown & Co., Publishers. Price
$1.50.

MY PEOPLE OF THE PLAINS. By Ethelbert Talbot. Illustrated. Harper &
Bros., Publishers, New York. Price $1.75 net.

SOME SUCCESSFUL MARRIAGES. By Abbey Meguire Roach. Illustrated. Harper
& Bros., Publishers, New York. Price $1.25.

RICH MEN’S CHILDREN. By Geraldine Bonner. Illustrated in color by C.
M. Relyea. Bobbs-Merrill Co., Publishers, Indianapolis, Ind. Price
$1.50.

THE SPIRIT OF DEMOCRACY. By Chas. Fletcher Doles, New York. Thos. Y.
Crowell & Co., Publishers. Price $1.50.

I AM SERMONS. By Thos. Shelton. Published by Christian, Denver, Col.
Price 50 cents.

THE TEETH AND THEIR CARE. By Thaddeus P. Hyatt, D. D. S., Brooklyn, N.
Y. King Press. Price 50 cents.

A Peep Into the Weekly Papers.

Disgraceful Railroad Service.

Sometimes “patience ceases to be a virtue” and this is one of the times.

The _Record_ has kept quiet on the subject of the disgraceful, indifferent, unwarranted and careless manner in which the Southern Railway has treated its patrons from Toccoa to Elberton, through fear of being classed as a chronic kicker.

But the thing has become so awful until this paper can keep still no longer.

Our business men here in Royston--and we suppose it’s the same way in Lavonia, Bowersville, Canon and Bowman--are losing money every day in the week through this giant corporation’s ill-treatment. Our cotton buyers have hundreds of bales of cotton stored here in every conceivable place because they can’t get cars to ship it away.

Our merchants have goods on the road which were shipped to them days, weeks and almost months ago, and are losing sales daily because they can’t get the goods delivered on time.

Sometimes there is no freight train to arrive here for two days at a time. Whose fault this is _The Record_ doesn’t know, but it must be the “Big Guns” who own the road.

Not a freight train has arrived here on time in two months. Thousands of dollars have been lost to the merchants and farmers of this section through the criminal neglect of those who are at the head of this greedy octopus, better known as the Southern Railway, which has Georgia in its power as strongly as ever a boa constrictor of South Africa encircled its victim.

How long? Oh Lord! How long, will this thing last?

Hasn’t Georgia’s Railroad Commission some power to do something for the people of Georgia in this matter? If they haven’t they might as well close up shop and go home and try and find some calling more suitable to their respective talents, provided the members of that representative (?) body have any.

The depot agent at this place is as painstaking and gentlemanly as any railroad official in Georgia, but is helpless. He is worked to death for want of sufficient help. He is doing the work of two men.

From the section boss to the highest official on the line in question--the Elberton Air Line--that’s the road we’re talking about--the pay is less by one third than it should be and not half enough help is employed in any of the departments.

If the crew on the freight train that runs on this road were animals, we could indict the authorities for cruelty to animals, but as they are only human beings there is no law to cover the case. More’s the pity. There’s something wrong with the law when it allows a greedy corporation to work its men to death.

Why not put on two freight trains per day, having them to leave Elberton and Toccoa early in the morning and returning in the afternoon? _The Record_ believes this would solve the problem and stop the congestion of freight on this line, at least.

The people of this section are broad minded and generous, and only want what is due them from any standpoint, but propose to get what is coming to them if it is gettable.

As we said in the beginning, we tried to keep still about this matter, but our hammer has begun to knock and we propose to keep it up until something is done.

_The Record_ will begin, next week, to circulate a petition among our business men regarding this matter and proposes to send said petition to Vice-President Andrews, of the Southern, in Charlotte, N. C., to Mr. McMannus, in Greenville, S. C., and to the great and only Georgia Railroad Commission, in the city of Atlanta.

Will our sister cities along the Southern, from Toccoa to Elberton, do the same thing?

_The Record_ will wait and see.--_Royston (Ga.) Record._

Paid Dear for Their Titles.

The girls of these United States have always borne the name of being the most vivacious, intelligent and common sense mortals of any other nation, but as is the case in all other things, there are exceptions to the rule, and when they do depart from the record they can make the very worse breaks of any. Just think of as intelligent, cultivated girls as Anna Gould and Consuelo Vanderbilt allowing such broken down old foreign sports, gamblers and roues as Count Boni de Castellane and the Duke of Marlborough, persuading them that they were loved, not for their riches but themselves, and marrying such cattle when they could have secured good, honest, sober, loving husbands at home. One is now suing for divorce in Paris after her Frenchman has spent eight millions of her money, and the other is applying for a separation in London. If it was foreign titles these girls were seeking, they have paid dear for their little toy and really deserve no sympathy, but if they sought the men merely for their supposed merits, the two women ought to have guardians appointed over them for the remainder of their lives, for they have no idea of how to take care of themselves.--_Gainesville (Fla.) Elevator._

Honesty and Honor.

Pope says that an honest man is the noblest work of God and Paul says to provide things honest in the sight of all men.

Webster says that honor is esteem due or paid to worth. Bacon says that some in their actions do woo, and affect honor and reputation.

In common parlance we call a man honest, if he pays his just and true debts. Is that true? If a person pays debts with money secured by extorting the widows and orphans, by pressing the poor, by selling hell and damnation to youths, is he to be called honest? Certainly not. He is neither honest nor honorable.

There is another class of folk, who think themselves honest and would resent with their strong arms even an insinuation of dishonesty on their part, that fall as far short of being honest and honorable men as thieves do of being angels. They are an ingenious sort of people, whose heads are full of tricks and schemes, and their greatest joy consists of working them upon the public. They had rather make money dishonestly than honestly. To enlist them in any cause only the whisper of the word scheme is necessary. Yet, they pay their debts and they seem to think that this alone will carry them to “heaven on flowery beds of ease.”

_The honest and honorable men in a community are those, with characters so well known, as to never be approached secretly or otherwise, in behalf of screening any evil, upholding any wrong, fostering any unholy scheme. They stand boldly for right living and everybody knows it._

The clever, popular men of a community are not always the honorable and the honest. Their popularity often results from their closed lips and silent hands. They are polite, generous and liberal, but are approachable and ready participants in any sort of secret deal for a little cash. Money in their eyes looks brighter than honesty and they are neither honest nor honorable, although very clever fellows.

But there is in every community persons, possessed of righteous consciences, with so high ideals of the right and so much hatred for the wrong, as to be unable to restrain themselves in taking brave, bold stands in every civic and religious reform.

_Boys, the object of this article is to elevate manhood in Gwinnett county and the latter are the characters for your patterns. Be men._

Say, what is honor? ’Tis the finest sense

Of justice which the human mind can frame,

Intent each lurking frailty to disclaim,

And guard the way of life from all offense,

Suffered or done.--Wordsworth.

--_Gwinnett, (Ga.) Journal._

Sacred Prosperity.

Divine right is still to be discovered in high finance, although not so usual as a few years ago it was. A group of minority stockholders, clamoring for an accounting from Mr. HARRIMAN, were consoled by his lawyer with the assurance that “Mr. Harriman moves in a higher world, where stockholders may not hope to enter.” The president of the Union Pacific Railroad may continue to keep stockholders beyond the battlements of his personal paradise; but the Interstate Commerce Commission, by virtue of the Railroad Rate bill, have the right to make inquisitorial entry. The rate bill became a law on August 28. The raising of the Union Pacific dividend from six to ten per cent. was effected by Mr. Harriman on August 16. If the Interstate Commerce Commission have been under embarrassment about picking a railroad which shall be compelled to lower its freight rates, the juxtaposition of dates should make them easy. A road which at once pays exorbitant dividends and charges exorbitant rates seems to need their services. It is not for the purpose of paying higher wages to his conductors and engineers that Mr. Harriman charges high rates. His operating expenses are but 52.51 per cent. of his gross receipts; whereas the average of all our railroads is 67.79 per cent. When a shipper pays Mr. Harriman one dollar, fifty-three cents goes to pay the trainmen and for the other purposes embraced under operating expenses; about two cents goes for taxes, and forty-five cents goes to paying the interest on bonds and to meeting the necessities of Mr. Harriman’s ten per cent. requirements.--_Collier’s Weekly._

Trial for Murder.

Our system of criminal jurisprudence is better than most, and as good as any with the possible exception of the English. But no one denies that it has monstrous faults. In New York recently one man shot another over a woman. Both men were rich and the woman beautiful--a combination that will instantly wreck the essential purpose of criminal law anywhere in the United States. Already the newspapers abundantly foreshadow what will happen. The material facts in the case--so far as concerns the purpose of the law to protect human life--were brought out by the coroner in about half an hour. Hereafter we shall hear very little of them.

Press reports assure us that a fine array of legal talent on either side is preparing to play a splendid game of chess. If it can be shown that one of the men led a life more vicious than the other that will score ten for the side that shows it. The sorry muck-heap of the woman’s career will be raked fore and aft until it has yielded every point that will count on one side or the other. The lawyers will construct a great melodrama, with the villain, heroine and hero, to be presented to the jury. The verdict--the very life of the accused--will depend upon the skill with which the game is played and the success with which the melodrama is “put on.”

“Thou shalt not kill,” says the commandment. One can imagine a completely civilized state, in noble dignity, requiring the one man to answer whether he did kill and murder the other, contrary to its statute. It is merely an imagining, however. Our famous murder trials, with their tawdry tricks in the face of death and their rotten plays to sentiment, are pretty exclusively barbarous.--_Saturday Evening Post._

The Negroes.

Senator Bailey talks, as there is no law against his utterances. “The free negro,” he declares, in his amiable attempt to induce in his hearers a calm and rational mode of thought, “is a more serious menace to the South than the negro in slavery.” In Alabama, a couple of weeks ago, at a Republican convention, there was not a negro present--one of the details indicating a general drift of the Republicans toward leaving the negroes out of their politics. Meantime, the negroes themselves are divided sharply in their meeting of the situation. The so-called “Niagara Movement” puts out an address to the country which observes: “We claim for ourselves every single right that belongs to a free-born American, political, civil, and social.” The whole address is a mass of almost bombastic rhetoric on this theme. Meantime, another leader speaks: “Let constructive progress be the dominant note among us in every section of America. An inch of progress is worth more than a yard of fault-finding. The races that have grown strong and useful have not done so by depending upon finding fault with others, but by presenting to the world evidences of progress in agriculture, industrial and business life, as well as through religious, educational, and civic growth.” Without failing to make it clear that he wishes the equal protection of the law, Mr. Washington refuses to complain, to whine about social rights and aspirations, and prefers to tell his fellows the most useful things to do. He leaves white faults to white men and warns negroes against negro weaknesses. Which leader will the negroes follow, and which speaks with wisdom and with strength?--_Collier’s Weekly._

The Labor Famine.

What has become of all our laborers is a question which no one seems able to answer just at present, but that they are not to be had is too well known. In the cotton belt of Texas, churches and Sunday schools are organizing parties and going into the fields to save the crop; in other of the cotton growing states the women are helping the men gather the staple; immigrants are offered work almost before they have put a foot on American soil; out West two great rival railroads are scouring the woods for men; factories where child labor has been legislated out are running short-handed, and it would appear that if our prosperity did not abate a bit from other causes it would do so from lack of labor with which to carry it on. Meanwhile communities are learning the gentle art of smiling, trade is booming and not even an approaching election can offer an opening to the pessimist.--_Pensacola News._

Cotton and the Negro.

Our Statesmen tell us in one breath that the salvation of the South is in the planting of less cotton and getting more for it and, in the very next breath, they say that immigration will save us. They invite the yankee to come, and the German, and the Irish, and the Scandinavian and even the Italian.

If it be true that we are planting enough cotton, even too much, and it is true, wherein will the South be benefited by having thousands of the foreigners settle here to raise more cotton? There is but one answer. We don’t need any more cotton planters.

But it is contended that foreign immigration will settle the race question. Maybe it will. Maybe it won’t. The cotton patch negro hasn’t given us any trouble, nor will he, and he isn’t going to leave either. He is satisfied, his landlord is satisfied, and a German or a Scandinavian upon the scene will mean two cotton patches instead of one, one for him and one for the negro.

True, there are many of our ambitious farmers who can’t secure enough laborers to make enough cotton to get rich as fast as they would, but they’ll get rich quick enough in using our present available labor, thereby raising less cotton, getting more for it, and, at the same time, either resting their lands or sowing it in small grain. And when these wealthy farmers plant less cotton, they benefit every poor fellow, standing between the plow handles, in the entire South.

And this one or two horse farmer is the ideal citizen, anyway. The best communities are those made up of small farmers. The churches, schools and social conditions in a community, in which one man owns all the land and runs forty plows, are not as good as one with forty land owners. Oglethorpe county would, no doubt, be a better county today, if Jim Smith had never been born, and this is not said with the spirit of criticising a single act of his life, either.

It’s all right for immigrants to build our cities, our railroads, our manufacturing enterprises or to labor in the cities, on the railroads, in the factories or even take servants’ places, but the South doesn’t need any more cotton raisers.--_Gwinnett (Ga.) Journal._

The Railroad Power.

The railroad magnates have divided up the lines in this country among nine families of plutocrats, who by controlling transportation of passengers and freight, can control the Government. They are divided as follows:

Harriman 22,276
Vanderbilt 20,493
Pennsylvania 20,138
Hill 19,407
Morgan 18,789
Gould 13,789
Moore 13,028
Rockefeller 10,293
Santa Fe 7,809
-------
Total 146,112

That is three-fourths of the mileage of the country and the control of the main lines in every state and territory. It puts into the hands of these men a greater power than was ever exercised by any group of kings, lords and dukes who ever formed a community of interests. In all past history, to overthrow such a power as that, a resort to long and bloody wars was the only recourse. It remains to be seen whether the great peace movements of the last few years, for which Andrew Carnegie has built a temple at The Hague, will produce a sentiment strong enough to settle this question peaceably. Would Andrew Carnegie encourage anarchistic disorders if he thought there was a danger of a reduction of the tariff on steel? Railroad combination and robber tariffs are only another manifestation of what we once called the “money power.”--_Omaha (Neb.,) Investigator._

Populism Forever.

Whatever may be the future of the People’s party, whether it is doomed to pass away and give place to some other party that will present its principles, or whether it may yet rise as it deserves to do and get control of the Government, remains yet to be seen.

One thing is certain. It has already accomplished more in this Government in the last fifteen years in the way of creating public sentiment and political conviction than both of the old parties.

Fifteen years ago the two old parties were discussing nothing but Tariff. The Money question, the Railroad question and the Trust question were entirely ignored by them. Not because the leaders of the two old parties did not know the magnitude and importance of these questions; but they got their campaign boodle from these rich corporations and they were willing to accept the money and let the common people perish.

When the Populists came on the scene they began to “cry aloud and spare not.”

They showed that the same laws of supply and demand that regulated the prices of other commodities, also regulated the price of money, that when money was plentiful, prices were high, all kinds of business prosperous and labor fully employed and well paid. While on the other hand when money was scarce it was high; all industries paralized, men out of work and their families suffering for bread.

They showed that the great railroad corporations had secured the public franchises and were taxing the people without their consent and without mercy.

They showed that their great corporations, growing enormously rich were combining together and forming “Trusts” and that they will eventually control all prices, and as completely own and control the country as did the Barons under the Feudal system.

Their cry and their plea was invincible.

Their arguments could not be answered.

Ridicule and abuse might serve to keep them down for awhile, but the just indictment against the two old parties was destined some day to be sustained.

Today the Populist looks on with pleasure and sees his principles growing in public favor every day.

The Republican president and the Democratic leader are endorsing the very doctrines that were fifteen years ago considered the most radical.

All honor to the Populists.--_Nevada County (Ark.) Picayune._

Sense.

Can there be such a thing as a radical conservative? John Temple Graves thinks Col. Pleasant Stovall, of the _Savannah Press_, fits that kind of a job. We believe that a trimmer--if that is what Col. Graves means to call Col. Stovall--is the most decent citizen that afflicts human society. He stops rushing things when a sense of the proprieties tells him that a thing has been rushed far enough to make it coarse or common (use which word you prefer), and the result is that his hair does not grow too long, nor his ears too puritanically short.

Yes, sir, the medium grade takes the cake. Except in an occasional storm, the radicals may overrun all opposition; but it don’t last, and the fellow that wins on an extravagant moral issue may be found in the ditch dead drunk as soon as public sentiment gets normal and resorts for a season to common sense arrangements of its ethics and politics.

Yes, the men who make an over-display of honesty for the season always get left as soon as the folks get back to their normal qualities. Common sense controls when the excitement has passed.--_Cordele Rambler._

A Lesson in Fusion.

Hearst got beat for Governor of New York while the balance of the State ticket he was on got elected. A few of the successful candidates are Independence League men, but most of them are straight Democrats. Thus Hearst’s reform work was turned to the benefit of corrupt and foul Tammany. We hope this lesson in fusion will be enough for the League. Hearst was defeated by about 60,000, while the other State candidates on the League-Democratic fusion ticket were elected by small pluralities. Tammany scratched Hearst. The Wall Street element of the Democratic party either scratched him or voted the Republican ticket. We are inclined to think well of Hearst because of those who scratched him. Hearst says the fight for the rights of the people is still on. With his great daily papers he can do a vast work toward overthrowing the rule of the money power, if he gets into the middle of the road and stays there. But if he endeavors to work within the old party he will do more to prevent the success of the people than forty Clevelands could do. Maybe the thing wasn’t hardly ripe and he had to back out, which he did by fusing with the Democrats after the League had nominated a straight ticket. We are guessing that Hearst will be in the middle of the road supporting Tom Watson for President in 1908.--_Missouri World._

A Significant Vote.

Whatever may be said of W. R. Hearst’s individual sincerity and integrity of purpose, the vote which almost landed him in the governor’s chair of New York State--a position which is next to the presidency--is the vote which is dissatisfied with corporation conditions. It is a significant vote. And the strong anti-Hearst sentiment among the “upper ten” all over the South is also significant. Everywhere men are, consciously or unconsciously, taking their positions along lines of economics.--_Farmers’ Journal, Abilene, Texas._

Where He Belongs.

Tom Watson is back in Georgia, where he belongs. He is too warm, too impulsive, too frank and too honest for New York--cold, calculating, deceitful, hateful New York.--_Farmers’ Journal, Abilene, Tex._

Letters From the People.

Half Jackal and Half Hyena.

_Lucian L. Knight, Los Angeles, Cal._

I cannot silence without gratifying the impulse which prompts me to write you at once after reading what you have to say about that superlative scoundrel, Mann. As a friend who holds you in loyal and affectionate admiration, I resent with all my heart the treatment which you have received at the hands of one who is man in name only and who in nature is half jackal and half hyena. I am aware how true it is that the most insignificant of insects may vex even the noble lion. Mann may be a millionaire, but I warrant his shillings are dirty. How miserably poor the wretch is when the only assets he has in the world are the millions which lie in the bank!

I know how little things have annoyed me at times and I know how much I have appreciated an impulsive word of sympathy, even from “the least of these.”

I am sorry I could not get the extracts you were to send me in time for Vol. I of the Reminiscences which will be ready for publication within the next few weeks; but I hope to get them in time for Vol. II. The work will require two volumes. I have met with so much encouragement that I am warranted in beginning at once upon Vol. II. Disappointed in other cherished plans and prospects, I am now putting my life’s ambition into this work which I trust to be able to make of literary and historic value to Georgia.

An Anonymous Slander Rebuked.

_W. H. Eddy, Los Angeles, Cal._

Can you explain what quality there is in human nature, that prompts some specimens of the race to the doing of things which are admirably adapted to the hindrance of all that they profess to be in earnest support of? Now, for instance: in _The Appeal to Reason_ of October 27th, is an unsigned article headed, “Populism and the Pap.” Being unsigned would indicate that it came from the pen of J. A. Wayland, or that of F. D. Warren, the present Managing Editor. Now, both of these men have been earnest workers for several years, or at least for what they conceive to be the cause of socialism. It would seem as though, when two men are associated in a work which each of them has advocated and written signed articles in favor of, lauding it as a movement opposed to dishonesty, deceit and all the baser tendencies of the depraved mind, that when he takes a notion to stultify himself, descend to the lowest practices of the gutter blackguard, he would have consideration enough for his associate to sign his name, so that decent people who may be so unfortunate as to peruse it, and such of the patrons of the paper as have both decency and brains enough to resent it, might not blame the innocent party inadvertently.