Lincoln County leader., February 13, 1903, Image 2

LlHCOm COUHTT LEADER.
HAS. r. ADA K. lOVll, rm1a.
TOLEDO OREGON.
If It wasn't for silly hens the fox
would not have his reputation.
Steps are being taken to cultivate
American oysters In Europe. Where
will the invasion end?
When It conies to word painting
poets and novelists are not In it witU
sign writers.
Some claim that co-education encour
ages matrimony. Why not? Isn't mat
rimony co-education?
The new process of making silk with
out the services of the worm will not
cause the worm to turn.
If men were half as good as their
obituaries the recording angel would
have to look for another job.
That Marylander who tossed a lleht
ed cigarette into a keg of powder had
the makings of a great chauffeur.
Oil has been discovered in Africa
That continent may now prepare to get
ltseir connected with us by pipe line.
The Dowager Empress of China and
the boxers seem to have forgotten that
lesson taught by the powers not so very
long ago.
A New York City magistrate says
that women have a legal right to
smoke. The average man would not
object to their smoking so much as to
their habit of flaring up.
Montreal physicians have discovered
that electricity will cure consumption
This makes the fifty-seventh consump
tion cure that has been discovered dur
lng the past six months. Why will peo
ple still insist ou dying of consump
tion?
A literary excavator has dug un and
revamped the old charge that most of
Alexandre Dumas' novels were really
written by his staff of secretaries. If
there la any foundation for the charge
It would pay most of our modern nov
elists to .try the secretary plan like
wise.
Dr. Hillis says: "I sometimes think
that the only hope for society Is to
get all the authors in a corner and
shoot them for a generation, till we
could assimilate what we already
have." It may be recalled that I)r,
Illllls lias added something to the mak
ing of books himself.
There Is nothing in all this world
quite so Irritating as overassumptlon
or responsibility. Irresponsibility can
be better tolerated. The man or worn
an there Is no distinction of sex in
the .matter who goes about the world
seeking whom he or she may rebuke,
the person who Is charged with a mis
slon, Is of all men most misery-making,
lie cbauts with Titanic glee, "The
times are out of Joint," and there is
110 lamentation In his declaration that
he Is born to set them right.
When one loses command of himself
and throws the reins upon the neck of
passion, he may have for the moment
a certain enjoyment In the license; but
there must surely come a reaction of
regret. When he Is calm again, and the
fit has piissed away, every serious per
son must be ashamed of what he said
and what he did, of the manner in
which he gave himself away, and the
exhibition he made of himself. He
will recall the amazement on the faces
of his friends, and the silence which
they adopted as a protective measure,
and the soothing language which they
used, as if they were speaking with a
baby, and the glances which paused be
tween them, lie will not soon be
thought the same of with them as he
was before this outburst, nor will he
have the same claim upon their conll
denee as a Bound and clear-headed
man. He has acted like a fretful, peev
ish child, a tul has for the time for
feited his title to manhood and the
place of" a man.
It takes little to cause divorce In
these days. Almost any excuse will
serve. Hut It has remained for the
Postmaster General of the United
States to furnish a cause that Is valid
and widespread. His order forbidding
man and wife to hold clerkships In his
department has furnished the divorce
mill much new grist to grind. Many
clerks prefer to give up their marriage
relations rather than their pay. It Is
always easy to get another husband or
another wife, but It Is not always easy
to get another good Job. One woman
clerk, drawing J1.400 a year, an
nounces that sflo and her husband,
who draws $1,800, have decided to
part. "He lias always spent his sal
ary," she says, "and I have always
speut mine." Neither cares to spend
less. The only alternative1 Is divorce,
and divorce Is cheap and easy, it
would be Interesting to know by what
curious reasoning a man and woman,
divorced, will be any more satisfac
tory to the Postal Department as
olerks than they are married. If there
is any sense in the theory that mar
riage robs a woman of the right to be
a wage-earner, then there is good sense
In the universal tendency toward di
vorce, not only in the PostoSice De
partment, but everywhere else. There
are conditions that unfit a married
woman for regular employment out
side the home. But no such condition
lies in marriage itself. Many childless
wives, with little turn for household
duties, may do as excellent service as
women that are unmarried or divorced.
Many wives are justly proud of the
ability to maintain their own resources,
and even contribute to the household
fund. It is a laudable pride and a
worthy ambition. The government is
In small business when It makes a
sweeping discrimination against these.
If the government is to throw its own
ponderous weight Into the scale at all,
It should be on the side of wedlock,
and not against it. Of course, It is
easy to say that a marriage which
holds together so loosely is better dis
solved. But tbe loss of half the family
Income is no small matter, especially
when the whole of it has barely sufficed.
The country mouse envies the city
mouse. The country wife thinks with
longing of the concerts, the theaters,
the tempting shops and the congenial
people of the city, and computes them
with the solitude, the drudgery, and
the poverty of resource offered by vil
lage or farm. But the country woman
has one treasure that many of her city
cousins may well covet. She takes It
for granted as she takes the sky, the
air and the music of her children's
voices; to a great many city women It
has become a lost dream. It is a home
a real home, where the chairs and
the dishes and the beds and the walls
and the roof belong to the family;
where a new curtain or a lew rose
bush Is a permanent acquisition; where
even inconveniences are problems to
be solved, not miseries to be endured.
The city family of moderate means is
driven more and more frequently to
the boarding house, the hotel or the
apartment house. One is scarcely bet
ter than the others so far as the gra
cious atmosphere of home Is concerned.
Poor and expensive service, high rents
In the city, railway expenses in the
suburb, the perplexities of market and
kitchen and furnace and sidewalk dls
may more and more the men and worn
en in the city. The boarding house
offers relief, and the tired housekeeper
flutters to It, as a moth to the candle,
regardless for the moment of what she
is losing. When she realizes that her
home has gone, the whole family may
have acquired the hotel habit, a habit
as pernicious as it is permanent. One
after another the unselfishnesses that
flourish In a home have dropped away
In their place have come a passion for
ease and a cynical disregard of the
finer sacrifices of domestic life. This
is the dark side of the picture. Life
may be well lived anywhere, but it Is
a deeper truth that a real home is the
best soli for the cultivation of family
love and of mutual helpfulness.
There be many who have been wont
in times paBt to cast a sympathetic
tear in pity for the lonely spinster, be
cause of the db-e fate that made her
spouseless. The facts seem to show that
these tears should have been shed for
the bachelors instead. The bachelor's
the one to be pitied, not the maid. How
often have we heard It said that the
spinsters, some of them at least, cry
our, as iney wenu tueir lonely way
through life: "Anything, good Lord,
will do." AH of which is a mlsconcep
tlon of the real state of affairs. Instead
of the maid saying, "anything will do,"
sue is cieariy entitled uy the over
whelming argument of numbers, to
say, "Lets see the stock. If you've
got anything that suits, well and good;
otherwise, take It away. For there are
others." The census shows that there
tire In the United States, 0,720.779 bach
elors of marriageable age, and only
4.1'jr,440 spinsters above the age of 20.
Who's the joke on If It isn't on the
bachelor? There wouldn't be enough
of the fair sex to go around if the law
required all men to be ISO before nl-
owed to marry and fixed the age of
girls at 17. Think of it. 2.:.l.:m men
In tills country who couldn't buv Eas
ter bonnets for their wives If they
wanted to. even after every maiden In
the land had wed. Just exactly that
many women have, by the good offices
of the census man, been translated
from the unenviable class of those who
'would but can't," to the ranks of the
'can but won't." It has given a new
dignity to the feminine unyoked, h
new status to the unlinked lass. There
are, It seems, one and three-fifths men
for every woman, leaving out the
widowers, who are sometimes as much
given to marriage as their never-mated
brothers. For a decade, or more. Klrls
can pick and choose, glean and garner,
turn down right and left, play with
many hearts with Impunity, while men
are having a life-and-death bargain
counter scramble to get a wife before
the supply gives out.
I -PW , ' i
1 3a .msifrmiGL mr
THE
REV. DR. HILLIS.
not to be despised.
IMPOSSIBILITY OF SOCIALISM.
By Rev. Dr. mills, of Plymouth Church, Brooklyn.
Massing Individuals Into a compact
body will never better our country. If
we want a great State we must have
great individuals. We can never get
a great republic out of a company of
vagrants, rowdies, people who are
willing that 'others should work for
them. That is why socialism is one
of the great evils .threatening our na
tion to-day. Its growing strength is
It has elected four Mayors in New En
gland and unless a check is put upon it it will elect forty in
the near future. It is a trust which paralyzes the indi
vidual far more than the other trusts which weigh against
the country's interests. It divides up until what Is par
celed out is unsatisfactory to all who have a share in the
division.
Suppose there are forty houses in a block, and Instead
of each man owning one for himself and keeping it in
order each man owns one-fortieth of the bouse he lives in
and one-fortieth of each of the others. ..Will he care as
much if the stoops are swept off on a snowy morning, and
will he keep the back yards in as good order as if it was
his own house? Every man's home is his castle. He has
given his promise to one woman and she has sworn fealty
to him. But suppose socialism steps into plan this home
according to its rules. Do you believe that their children
will be better if reared by nurses appointed by the State,
as socialism decrees? Socialism in other domains would be
just as objectionable.
Submerge the individual in the State, as socialism or
dains, and you destroy domestic Institutions stifle the life
blood of the nation. Better let every man bear his burden
and in his purpose to succeed he will do far more for the
world than If he were i. mere atom In a great Industrial
creation.
Money la klng-and at the sama time
a very Interesting subject.
COMMERCIALIZED MARRIAGE.
By Mil flipper Haynara.
"If a man has got enough ahead to. go to a hos
pital when he is sick he is a fool to get married,"
said a man who had learned wisdom from experi
ence. Most men would, without being sure of
the hospital, leave themselves even In sickness to
the mercy of the landlady father than marry, if
they believed that the woman was taking ac
count of stock in this business like fashion. It
is a marvelous thing that sentiment holds its own
at all In the face of the tremendous pressure put upon it to
surrender to financial expediency. Yet It does hold Its own
to an extent which makes this cold-blooded slander largely
uncalled for. Commercial marriages exist, they are not a
matter of course. Among the parasite class of women, the
Idle, helpless daughters of wealthy or burdened daughters
of wealthy or burdened men, only good fortune can save
a woman from thinking of marriage as a change of bankers
which must be prudently considered.
Thank heaven all women are not parasites. The majori
ty of husbands are poor men on an income so small that
the women who marry them will not be unduly tempted by
dazzling perquisites. The "home" may tempt, but It will
be the sentiment of home and not Its upholstery. The op
portunity to work hard for board and clothes would be
available without selling oneself for the privilege.
The shoe of existing industry pinches chiefly for the
poor In the uncertainty of continued employment, and hence
among the more prudent sentiment and marriage sometimes
are denied for conscience sake. Whatever the station in
life, the commercial side of marriage sooner or late makes
Its appearance, no matter how the individual may seek to
free himself or herself from it
The independent working woman Is the greatest safe
guard against the mercenary marriage. If woman's modern
activity does nothing more than save many of them fron
marrying for. a home, it Las a redeeming Influence. If
women had much to sacrifice or interrupt by marriage It
would, in a large measure, protect men from being chostj
as a kind of bargain sale endowment policy.
There is no danger that any "career" or ambition win
tempt a woman to refuse the home call if she is a normal
woman, and if she Is not, society is the gainer and the ma
Interested fortunate because of her refusal. Where no la.
centlve draws toward marriage except those inherent l
nature and the human soul, there will be few misfits.
There will never be Ideal marriages until womeu, anj
men as well, may feel certain that work Is assured for short
hours at any time it is desired or all the time, at a gener
ous wage. Then the question of home and children will
become the disinterested personal question it should be,
and never vitiated by sordid motives or painful, hopelw
bondage.
THE HANDICAP OF WEALTH.
By Cbauncey M. Depevr, V. S. Senator from JVeir Ycri
The young man who is born rich Is se
riously handicapped for success in life,
He hasn't the spur of necessity, and un
less he Is peculiarly trained and mow
than ordinarily organized he has little
ambition. The world is too easy for him.
Its temptations are 'about him on everj
side with bad habits which make him
worthless, or laziness or idleness whlck
makes him useless. Of course, there are
c. m. DErKW. a few 80ns 0f ricn men wno uave sue.
cesses in life, but they are so exceptional their cases art
very marked and remarked.
By being born poor I do not mean extreme povertj.
Granted that with the advantages of the public schools the
boy's parents can give him a first-class education and then
he has to make his own career, the spur of necessity will
arouse every faculty which helps make success. With
moderate success comes ambition, and as his spheres of
activity enlarge he acquires a sense of power. He learns
the value of temperance and character. He knows by ex
perience that health and industry con accomplish almost
anything and carry its possessor almost anywhere. As he
grows in position, wealth and Influence he Is the more
thankful every day for the condition which compelled him
to do his mightiest or drop out of sight
The vast majority of those who start under the condi
tions that I have mentioned live long and prosper. From
their number come those who move the world and govern
it, who are Its masters In business enterprises, its leaders
in the professions, its statesmen and rulers, Its men of
thought and action.
THE GUM-CHEWING HABIT.
By Rev. Dr. Seorge P. Hall, or Chlctgo,
When I see a woman mouthing gum
in public I feel like shouting: "If those
women must chew let them take to the
basement 1" To-day on street cars, In
theaters, at ball games and races, In
the parlor and everywhere it Is a com
mon Bight to Bee girls and women of
mature years chewing gum. It li a
habit which has scarcely a redeeming
feature, and I for one "wish to use all
the Influence I have In discouraging the
same. It distorts the face, Induces ex-
rev. dr. ball, cesslve saliva and gives tbe breath I
sickening, drug-store-like perfume. While I cannot say
that It Is particularly Injurious, I can most assuredly say
that In public at least gum-chewing Is indecent A bery
of waxtwlsters always suggests to me Insipidity In conver
sation and rudeness of manners.
mm
GREAT BUDA-PESTH BRIDGE.
Claasad One of the Handaomeat
Vlrducte in the World.
Some engineers think the Ketten
Buspension bridge at Buda-Festh Is the
finest viaduct in existence. It does not
begin to be as big as the Brooklyn
bridge, but In symmetry, In masslve-
The man who spends half his time
trying to classify people said he never
saw bo many left-eyed passengers In
one car.
"What do you mean by left-eyed pas
sengers?" asked his eomnaninn.
Teople who use their left eye more
man tneir right," was the reply. "The
species 1b not common, and of course
'(MKttiPttfel'.
THE KETTEN SUSPENSION BU1DGE AT BUDA-PESTH
ness, In artistic adornment, the one
linking Buda and Pestu Is a beantv. It
cost $3,000,000 and was completed In
lo4. That for Brooklyn was modeled
from this one and was built twentv
years afterward. A cantilever viaduct
is the latest thing to make another
roadway above the water between the
cities. The calculations of the engi
neers did not come out correotlv and
when it was thought the huge frame
work was ready for traffic a serious
mistake was discovered and new w.
els for supporting the crossing are now
being made to right matters. Severn!
millions have been expended In this no
ble passageway of steel which embod
ies tne latest ideas in the bracket nrln-
clple of bridge support. The super
structure Is painted red and looks very
impressive, as the top n 150 feet
above the water.
n-ne but a student In ocular science
would be able to detect offl.nnd the
few whom we do meet A left-handed
person advertises his peculiarity at
once; but not so the left-eyed man
As a rule It takes an oculist to deter
mine which eyes has been used most,
but there are certain peculiarities of
the pupil and lid that may be taken as
pretty sure signs by the trained ob
server. "Left-eyed people are made, not
born. Most of us have been blessed
by nature with
- , vi trijuai visual
power, but the attitude we strike read-
. nmiU, i-uuses un to exercise
one eye more than the other, and the
first thlmr we fenm .
. " " c ore ngnt or
left eyed This 1, a one-sidedness that
Should ira-. l. .-i . . 1
ut5 lullen ,nt0 conglj,,,..
atlon when hnvinr nil. . .
eyed man with left-eyed spectacle.; or
vice versa. Is at a decided disadvant
age, and It is the optician's business '
to see that he 1b properly fitted." New
York Times.
Circumstantial Evidence.
It Is a rule, to which good lawyer
usually adhere, never to toll mnm than
one knows. A newspaper tells a funny
n . - a , , .... . 1
oiuiy ui a lawyer wno carried tne rui
to the extreme.
One of the agents In a Midland Re
vision Court In England objected to
a person whose name was on the reg
ister, on the ground that he was dead.
The revising barrister declined to ac
cept the assurance, however, and de
manded conclusive testimony on tbe
point. The agent of the other side rose and
gave corroborative evidence as to toe
decease of the gentleman In question.
"But, sir, how do you know the
maa'B dead?" demanded the barris
ter. "Well," was the reply, "I don't know.
It's very difficult to prove."
"As I suspected," returned the bar
rister. "You don't know whether he'a
dead or not."
The barrister glanced triumphantly
round the court, but his expression,
grndually underwent a change as tbe
wltness coolly continued:
"I was saying, sir, that I don't know
whether he Is dead or not, but I do
know this: Thev burled him ahout
month ago on suspicion."
' i i
Just One. '
Others hoaliluu I
ueivwl UOTO fcv.
ambitious to be "writ down" In char
acter.
Publle Onlnlnn an .V. . . Omtlh
. u . u vuj q iuai a wvu"
African cnnRtnlml
' v uatta j VWUJUJUUUCI "
to a local troop officer, asking If tnert
-rie nuy aonKeys in camn.
The renlv mmo in tit fnar'a.
handwriting:
res, one R. II. Symea, captain."
contribution box aa the $5 gold pleot'
and much more frequently.