People's Pilot, Volume 2, Number 32, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 January 1893 — Page 7

THI OLD MARE'S GAIT, toto Iblks ia quite perticaler xbout u» way they go, ▲tollopin', a-trottin' or a-hltchln' sorter alow; Wkfle Burn has noshans 'bout the style o' doakta* o’ the tail ▲■' others like to Kit thar thia or next week sri’out fail. Aa* others like to hurry, fur they’ve never lamed to wait Fas a chap who stan’s accordin' to the ole mar's gait She sorter ambles easy-like adown the village lane, ▲•bakin' o’ hur quarters wi’ no tenshun on the rein: ▲•browsin' a>* a-nibbltn' o' the weeds along the way: ▲■sorter growin’ wobbiey, like her master growin’ gray: ▲-sorter easy-goin’, an’ no matter if it’s late, It's all the same to both o’ us—it is the critter’s gait. We’ve got beyond the hurryin’ an’ scamperin’ to git Down to the wire fust o’ all: for easy is the bit That rattles round among the stubs o' one that's be’n a colt. Whs’s got a creakin' in hur bones, though once she used to jolt ▲ takin' stride along the way—'twas 'fore we lamed to wait; But now we both are satesfied wi’ jlst a slowin' gait. Bur pedergree it reaches back to Lady Thorn, a queen Who raked the ecollups off the cake a-trottin' down the green; Bur blood was red when she was young, but now it’s gittin' gray Wi’ years that come an’ years that go an' years that slip away. Fur what she’s be’n an' what she's done when i sbs was ’counted great, Bhe’s ]ist a right to jog along accordin’ to hur gait. She used to yank the purses at the county fairs when she Was limber in hur noshuns, when hur j'ints they was free. She used to fool the smarties wi* the sleepy look she wore, But she trotted to the finish an' she always led the score. O’ course that was afore she lamed like me to rest and wait, An’ long afore she settled to this easy-goin* gait. Bhe’s twenty-one this summer, an' she’s good fur thirty-six. She nibbles in the clover, an’ hur feed I grind an* mix Jist like you would a pusson’s who is toothless, old and gray— Fur, to tell you fact, hur grinders, like my own, have passed away. Thar, take hur as she’s standin’, I love hur though she’s late, Fur we’re growin’ ole together an’ I fashion to hur gett —H. S. Keller, in Judge.

AMERICAN PUSH.

■ (fiPVRIGHT. 1891. Sy the Authors' ALLiANce. CHAPTER XL—■ Continued. •‘Scandalous?” he said, with swiftlyehanging manner. “What a name to •all honesty by!” “Oh! lam not so honest, I assure you.” “There, you confessed that you are. Anyone else would have spoken so differently.” “Any other woman, you mean?” “Well, yes,” he assented. “And other women, when they talk with you, metasieur, are anxious to convince you of their honesty.” “Well, yes.' 1 Kathleen seemed to muse a little, ■lowly shaking her head. “That is because you are you." He made an impatient gesture. “It is so conducive to feminine deception, then, this being I, as you put it?” and, without waiting for her to respond, he went on: “What made me in the first place like you so much, mademoiselle, was your charitable forgetfulness of who I really am." “I didn’t forget it in the least, however. I cultivated myself into seeming as if I did.” “ Ah! you’re bent on disappointing me. ” “No, monsieur, only on telling you the truth.”

“The truth from people never disappoints me.” “Are you so sure?” she murmured, a little vaguely, not meeting his look. He gave a slight start. “Not quite ■are, not quite sure—in your case. * . . . Bor example, it did disappoint me to learn that you are unhappy.” She would not admit that she had ever confessed this to him during their previous talks, and for a good while they gently battled with one another concerning what human happiness truly means, until Clarimond at last said, with an accent of mild irritation: “For a man or woman of reasonable age there is but one perfect kind of happiness. The heart is a mill, whose wheel should always turn in a full stream and grind forth golden grain. The soul, like a wealthy miller, must be buoyant and gladsome at the labor performed; the deeper he is covered with the dust of that delicious industry the more prosperous he rates himself, while he looks forth on the world defied by his heart’s consoling thrift ” “It is not everybody,” smiled Kathleen, as the speaker paused, “who can be both king and poet in one short life.” “Areyou now satirical,mademoiselle?” “No, no! But lam skeptical There are so few hearts I like that— Mine, I fear, is an idle mill wheel above an empty stream-bed!” “Yet one whose waters have been dried. Or, if not dried, cruelly dammed." “I have not said that, monsieur.” “You say more, I find, thuxxyou mean to say." “Arid yet you do not think me deoeitful; you have granted as much." His eyes, for an instant, seemed to caress her face. “I think you strangely miserable!” he affirmed. Then, lowering his voice a little, and leaning nearer to hen “I can’t but wonder if you are incurably so.” “I am not miserable,” she said, with wistful ardor of denial “It is too bad that you should think this. You said something of the same sort yesterday. But you are wrong—wrong. I still have a great deal to live for.” “Still! And you say that in the early glow of your maidenhood! Still! It is amazing. Or, no; it isn’t amazing at all; it is thoroughly explainable. There is something you want I wonder if I •ould get it for you.” She shook her head quickly and then •tared down at the hanas which lay like two fate curled feathen in her lap

By EDGAR FAWCETT.

•Ko, monsieur." she breathed, enshrining the words, as it were, in a sort of long sigh. “It is nothing that yon coaid get me.” He accepted her reply as a surrender. She wax a sorrower, after all, and the feints of her assertion to the contrary had been admittedly futile. In the silence that now followed they both looked forth upon the incomparable valley, flanked by its mighty mountains, over-scattered by its ethereal villas, crowned, accentuated, dignified by its romantic and imposing palace. The king slowly lifted his hand and pointed to that pale and beauteous edifice. His voice was quite faint (though it reached her ears very clearly indeed) as he said: “I have thought of offering you this for a home.” She did not make the slightest sign of reply. He saw the color leave her cheeks and the light greaten in her eyes. But she did not turn her look towards his. Now her breath came visibly quicker, pulsing the spray of lace at her throat. Soon he saw her delicate hands flutter a little there in her lap like fallen flowers that a breeze blows over and vaguely unsettles. But that was alh “Yes,” he went on, “I have thought of asking you to dwell there with me—as my wife.” At once she turned and met his gaze with great directness. “You—have had this thought, monsieur?” “It k- my wish—my request—my entreaty.” “Your wife?" she repeated; and he saw that she was deeply perturbed. “My queen,” he continued. “I want you to share my throne and crown with me, such as they are. I have never asked any woman to do this until now. I have never asked any woman, for the simplest of reasons. Need I tell you that reason?” He reached his hand forward and took her hand, lifting it to his lips. It had grown cold—piteously

THE KING SLOWLY LIFTED HIS HAND AND POINTED TO THAT PALE AND BEAUTEOUS EDIFICE.

cold, and the kisses that he gave it were somehow bestowed with the compassionate tenderness which implied that he sought to reawaken its natural warmth. “Your queen—your queen,” she said, and withdrew her hand, not rudely, and yet with firmness. The color came back to her cheeks. As he watched her face it seemed like a tea-rose in some delightful process of revivification, faint yet distinct. “That is what I said,” he answered, “and that is what I mean.” He watched her struggle with her agitation. It seemed to him cruel that he should do this, and yet it gave him a curious pleasure just as if she were some oddly beautiful bird that revealed some touch of iridescent splendor beneath its wings every time they were fluttered. But at length Kathleen, so to speak, fluttered her wings once more. “Monsieur,” she said, with a kind of pathetic tranquillity, “there is—your mother.”

“My mother will be no obstacle. I can and will prevent her from being one.” She hesitated a moment. “Then there are—there are—(how shall I put it) your traditions." “I’ve trampled on a good many of them, as it is. Come now, mademoiselle,” he pursued, with a gruffness that would have frightened her if it had not ended in a smile. “You’re going to throw me over—you’re going to reject me—to (what is the right phrase?) send me about my business!” “No, no!” she exclaimed. Immediately then she rose and stretched out her right hand. “I will be your wife,” she said, “and I thank you for the great honor you do me.” He also rose at this and wrapped her with his embrace. But something in her lips, her eyes, her look (he could not for his life have told just what) made him put her away at arm’s length, intently scan her features and then recoil several steps, touching her no longer. “Your heart isn’t in it!” he exclaimed. “You’re giving yourself to me only because of your mother!” Her eyes dilated frightenedly. “Oh, no; don’t think that!” she cried “But I do think it—l must! Why not, when I read it, when I see it? Your heart is elsewhere, and you’re willing to let me possess if I will—the void that marks where it once beat Am I not right? Answer me, Kathleen; am I not right?” She burst into a passion of -tears. “Yes! yes! I dare not lie to you. If you were not so good and fine I—l might lie, but you tear the truth from me! You saw my pain, my undying memory; you taxed me with them; you insisted that they haunted me, and I—l confessed that you were not wrong. But I am willing to be your wife—willing. Oh, hear me, monsieur! I am not absurd to phrase it. like that Only it is best to be truthful. You, who are so sincere yourself, will understand, will pkrdbn. I had never taribwn him it would have been so different! I could have loved you then with all n>y soul! I nan imagine tome good woman loving

yoa that way. P.xhaps *t will come to me tn time. You spoke of my mother. No, it is not she—not wholly she. Of •curse she wants such a marriage; what toother would not? I myself am proud to be your wife; only there is that other tore which will not die! Am I not wiser to let you know this? You can’t blame me. I see now in your eyes that you do not blame me. I’ve never asked yen if he has spoken of nje; I’ve never wanted to know. It’s quite over beW. <?n us. There, that is all. I go to you without a guilty eonscience. You know me just as I am. I’ve tried to crush it but it would not be crushed. Suppose I had never said a word about it and let you take me with a falsehood in my soul. Many a woman would have done that. Almost every other woman in the world would have done it. But I’m not vaunting my virtues. I’m simply making a clean breast of things—don’t you see? You do see; yop must! There —I dare say I’ll be a worthy wife to you, monsieur, and I’m certain that I’ll be a very faithful and devoted one. As for a queen (and she laughed wildly through her tears), I may fail at that. It is such an un-dreamed-of part for me to play! But I’ll try. I’ll try hard, strengthened by your help!” The tears were glistening on her cheeks as she put forth both hands to him. He took them, kissing them both, and then, still holding them, he said: “Kathleen, you are a very noble and brave girl. I thank you sincerely for what you have told me. One easily multiplies words. You will understand just how grateful I feel. The evening of the ball is so near that a press of affairs may keep me from seeing you till then. But (as I said to you yesterday, if I mistake not), my carriage will be here at the hour named to conduct your mother and yourself to the palace. Au reooir. Let everything rest undetermined, please, until we meet again.” She felt his lips touch her hand, and

then in the twinkling of an eye, before she could even be sure that he meant to leave her, he had vanished from the room. She sank into a chair. Her heart was throbbing and her head swam a little as she leaned it backward. In a few more seconds her mother shot into her presence by another door. “Kathleen!” “Well, mamma!” “You’ve been crying! You’re in tears yet! What has happened? Is it arranged?" “No; nothing is arranged. That is, if you mean—” “Good gracious! I hope you haven’t quarreled!” “We haven’t quarreled.” “Thank heaven!” Mrs. Kennaird dropped at her daughter’s feet, in a collapse oddly picturesque, considering her size and weight. But after all she was a woman who never dealt awkwardly with her avoirdupois, though just now carried away by an emotion which might well have imperiled gracefulness. “Kathleen! Kathleen! Tell me, my darling. You can’t be unkind enough not to tell me! Did he mention it? Did he say one single word about it? Now, my child, consider how I suffer. Don’t torture me. Let me know everything!" Kathleen regarded her mother for a moment, and then slipped both arms round her neck. “Mamma,” she said, with a deceit born of pity, and also of that love which all the icy ambition, all the worldly striving, all the hard, harsh, American push of her parent had never served to annul, “there is really nothing for you to know except that the king was very kind to me, very kind, and I—well, I became a little nervous. It seems like such a great ordeal, mamma, for me to open the ball with him. And yet he’s good enough to insist that I will get through all right. He—”

“'All right!" cried Mrs. Kennaird, regaining her feet with a phenomenal alacrity. “There won’t be a woman in the ballroom who can hold a candle to you.” At this same time, as it happened, Alonzo Lispenard was crossing the threshold of a small apartment, full of books, busts and a few very rare pictures, where Eric Thaxter had passed many an hour of artistic musing. Alonzo held a paper in his hand. “You see,” he said, after handing the paper to Eric, and throwing himself into a chair at his friend’s side, “my royal command for the state ball has actually come.” Erie merely glanced at the paper. “Mine has just come, too,” he said. “What?” queried Alonzo. “Were you not invited till now?” “No. It was that horrible princess. Clarimond has been letting her have her head, but the other night he pulled her up with a short rein. 1 hear that she’s now humility itselt tam naturally delighted. I’ve seen it coming, Lonz, but of course I could say nothing to the king.” “And you will go to the ball?” said Alonzo, slowly. “Go? Yes. It will be great fun to see the haughty old Brindisi dame de-

posed. Shell be obliged to beam on us. We will go together, be beamed on in dno!” “I cannot go, Eric.” “Not go, Lons? But you must!" “Must!” “You will insult the king. And remember, you are his—" “Servant,” struck in Alonzo, bitterly. “Absurd! He of all men would hate that word of your* Listen: I know everything that passed between you. I think, on the whole, that you behaved very welL” t Alonzo gave a harsh little laugh. “It’s a wonder that you’re willing to admit that.” “Oh, I’m willing to light for you, dear boy, when I think you’re in the right. Clarimond, however, apologized.” “Yes, a king’s apology.” “My dear Lonz, you’re sulky." Alonzo repeated his laugh. “What a queerly wrong kind of word from you, Eric, who usually pride yourself on the mot jutte!" Eric smiled. “There is a great deal of talk about the right word in the right place, but it has always seemed to me that'there should be in all cases at least five words to choose from; otherwise language becomes a pauper, and expression a mere joiner’s mechanism!” Alonzo tossed his head. “This burst of brilliancy,” he said, somberly, “leads “Another word in which to define your present mood —jealous.” Alonzo gave a great start Then he tried to laugh, for the third time, and lamely failed. “Oh, that’s cruel of you!" Here his brow clouded. “And if lam jealous of a man like that!" “A very noble and exceptional man, remember!” “Oh, yes. But a man whose immense rank compromises Kathleen by the fact of his being in love with her!" Eric played for a moment with, an ivory paper cutter which had lain on the desk near which his friend had discovered him while deep in the solution of some new architectural problem. “How do you know the king is in love with her?” he suddenly asked. “Bah!” grumbled Alonzo. “How do I know I am I, you are you?" “Well, granted that he is. Come now, Lonz, you’ve known him long enough to feel, if not also to know, that he’s n man who would scorn to treat any pure woman—well,” Eric went on, after a pause and a gesture, “to treat any pure woman as kings have too often done.” Alonzo gnawed his lip. “What on earth will he do, then, Eric? He is in love with her.” “Every man is. lam. I’ve only seen her the least little bit and yet—” “Oh, seriously! He can’t marry her!" “Can’t he!” “What do you mean?” cried Alonzo, jumping up from his chair as though something had stung him. “Ah,” said Eric, with a voice cool and incisive, “I thought you had forever broken with her. How, then, can it wake your wrath if she should become the queen of Saltravia?” “It wouldn’t —it wouldn’t,” muttered Alonzo, pale and visibly distressed. [to BE CONTINUED.]

Minute Wonders of Nature.

Human hair varies in thickness from the 250th to the 600th part of an inch. The fiber of the very coarsest wool is only the 500th part of au inch in diameter, while in some species of the sheep it takes 1,500 of their hairs laid side by side to cover an inc h on the rule. The silk worm’s web is only the 5,300 th part of an inch in thickness, and some of the spiders spin a web so minute that it would take 60,000 of them to form a rope an inch in diameter. A pound’s weight of spider’s web of this size would reach around the world and then leave enough to reach from New York to San Francisco. A single grain of musk has been known to perfume a room for twenty yeaas. At the lowest computation that grain of musk must have been divided into 320,000,000,000,000 particles, each of thorn capable of affecting the olfactory argans. The human skin is perforated by at least 1,000 holes in the space of each square inch. For the sake of argument? say there are exactly 1,000 of these little drain ditches to each square inch of skin surface. Now estimate the skin surface of the averaged-sized man at sixteen square feet and we find that ho has 2,804,000 pores.—Chicago Herald.

His Valet.

A young joutherner who recently visited New York brought with him as his valet a huge negro, six feet four inches in height and of the richest mahogany in color. The black was gigantic, though beautifully proportioned, silent, imperturbable and wellbred. His manners and decorum would put to shame many a “Jeemes,” whose whiskers are generally his only stock in trade. “Oh, I take Norfolk —that’s his name—with me sometimes when I go away from home,” said the southerner. “He saves me a lot of trouble, and you wouldn’t believe what a splendid servant he is. Although he is a big fellow he is as deft and clever about my room or in waiting at table as any. French valet. He can make a mint julip that would open your eyes. With horses he is excellent. Then he is such a splendid looking fellow. Notice his beard. It is long and forked and he plaits it up on jveek days, to let it flow in all its glossy richness on Sunday. My grandfather bought him when a boy and he was brought up in our family. Never left us when he was set free. He believes in fetiches, ‘conjuring,’ and so forth. Most of them do that, however, down my way.”—N. Y. Advertiser.

An Enthusiast.

Fritz —Have you seen my latest mash) Karl—A tall girl with black hair and dar’Acomplexion? “Yes; and hasn’t she got a perfect figure and face?” “I noticed that her teeth were black.” “Well, don’t black teeth match black hair and a dark complexion?”—Texas Siftings.

Rather Singular.

: ‘That fellow’s queer,” said the law yer’s new office boy. “What makes you think so?” asked the typewriter. “Why, be hain’t deaf, and yet he toU dcr boss he wanted a hearing.”—Texas Siftings.

INDIVIDUAL INCOMES.

No Ma i io K titled to More Tban a Good Living and a Maki ig Fa >d For Old Says the Topeka Advocate: “We publish elsewhere in this issue a communication from R. T. Snediker, of Hartford, Kam, which, though in the main presents a good argument, contains some statements that in our judgment weaken it materially. Taking the following as an example: Bu t the people believe in the sacred of property, and If a man has an Income of Jl,i4>J,ihJ) or f 10,000,'W0 a year, the result of his own Individual effort, it is his, and down deep in their hearts they would respect a man who showed such marked ability. Now, as a matter of fact, no man ever had an income of >1,000,000 or >10,000,000 a year or of >1,000,000 or >10,000,000 in a lifetime, the result of his own individual efforts unaided by special privileges and discriminations which have given him advantages over his fellow men. In what occupation did any man ever earn such an income? It is folly to talk about it It was never done and never can be where men enjoy equal privileges in. the struggle of life; and we do not believe that well informed people, as a rule, will be found to entertain any superior respect for the class of men who from dividends on watered stock and gambling speculations, either in money or the necessities of life, have become possessed of the great incomes to which Mr. Snediker refers. While the fault is really with the conditions which permit such accumulations, yet these men are largely responsible for the conditions which have all been secured through bribery and corruption. ” I work each and every week day, many nights and part of every Sunday, but succeed in earning, or at least getting paid, less than >4 a day for a thirtyday month. And yet I am receiving remuneration for my labor which is three or four times the average wages realized by the masses of laborers or wage-earners. Now, if Adam had lived until now and had received >5 every day since his creation until the present time, spending nothing, he would have accumulated less than >11,000,000. Mr. Snediker is a single taxer of the strictest sect of individualism and believes that having given everyman (not free) access to land, the proper conditions are a hand to hand conflict with “the survival of the fittest’’ as the ultimate, the fight being waged under a banner inscribed “Every man for himself and the devil take the hindmost.” The single tax theory offers labor no boon, because it proposes to take as a tax the exact amount of benefit derived from access to land. Untaxed use and occupancy would give to all access to land and charge nothing for the privilege. The one theory is individualistic, the other socialistic, and between these two schools of thought there is an irrepressible conflict which will never cease until the nations of the earth recognize and acknowledge "the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man.” My esteemed friend, Mr. W. H. T, Wakefield, editor of the Jeffersonian, of Lawrence, Kan., in the course of (from his standpoint) an able article assailing the income tax theory, gives expression to identically the same thought as is expressed by Mr. Snediker. Speaking of the income tax, he says: Tried by the first test, that of justice, it falls In this, that it does not require contribution to the use of society in proportion to benefits conferred by society. One mar have an income derived from exceptional talents, energy, or self denial, by fortunate inventions, discoveries, etc., or by skill as an organizer and director of labor, yet receive little or nothing from society (government) and cause it little or no expense. Another may have the same income drawn from a monopoly of what really belongs to the people, as of valuable lands or locations, use of mines, forests, franchises, etc., and may also cause large expense to the government in protecting him in the enjoyment of special privileges. Herein we have the same selfish individualism advocated and the same failure to recognize the truth that individuals are but members of an organic body, the genus homo, otherwise known as society, the community, government, etc. It is to the whole of this organic body and not to any few individual members of such body that talents and ability belong. It is for the human race that energy should be expended and to humanity should belong all new discoveries of God’s old blessings, as well as all outward manifestations of the manifold kinds of genius with which the race has been endowed by its Creator. All incomes are paid in wealth produced by labor, while all laborers are entitled to the same remuneration for their best efforts for the same length of time. Broadly speaking, all are entitled to a comfortable living and a decent burial, no more and certainly no less, Xrom the common fund produced by the common labor of alt Allow me to reiterate: If actual use and occupancy were made a prerequisite to a legal claim to land including mines, forests, eta; if usury (interest) were destroyed by the inauguration of the sub-treasury plan and the nationalization of the banking system; if the people themselves owned and operated at cost all public utilities; if, in addition, laws were enacted and enforced which would render it impossible to organize and maintain a trust; if all these things were dbne an individual would find it difficult to pile up a million dollars in the course of a lifetime. Then if all revenues were raised by a graded tax upon net incomes above a certain sum, say >1,009, and upon estates and legacies, all men would be sure of a living, at least, free of rent, interest and taxes It would be interesting to have Messrs Snediker and Wakefield point out how many of the monopolies they speak of would or could continue to exist under such a system as I have outlined. And they might also endeavor to form a conclusion as to the number of individuals who would be liable for tax if each were allowed a good living and >I,OOO each year free from all taxation. I am aware that single-taxers and others will contend that an income tax cannot be collected; that it will be fraudulently evaded or sworn off, or charged up to expenses, or be recouped in higher rents and prices, or lower wages, eta To this I answer that if use and occupancy were made a pn>

requisite to land ownership there wouli no longer be any rent, high or low, while the competition of those business exploiters who did not receive any taxable income would prevent the income tax from being recouped in higher prices or lower wages. So far as evasion is concerned, the efforts in the direction of such evasion would be a matter of indifference to all those whose net incomes did not exceed one thousand dollars. An interesting struggle might be waged in the ranks of plutocracy, but labor would not be in it Labor, being assured of its total product, free from rent and taxation, could look on serenely, while the plutocrats watched and fought each other. But in case, or rather for fear, that some would yet accumulate too large a portion of the net production of the labor of the nation, every estate should be administered upon by a public administrator, or where there is a will, probated and executed by a public executor, and a heavy graded tax levied upon all wealth left by deceased persons, above a certain set and determined amount Geobgk C. Ward.

“SILVER ON ITS MERITS."

There Are No Eqawl Merita When There la No Equality Before the Law. The Chicago Tribune, which is one of the most extreme single gold standard papers in the country, has an editorial in its issue of the 9th inst entitled “Silver on Its Merits." It says: A paper which takes every possible occasion to And fault with the Tribune soys the latter Is not in favor of treating silver on an equality with gold This Is not true. The Tribune believes in the fullest possible use of silver on its merits The commercial world rates 22.23 grains of pure gold as being worth a dollar, and just now it rates 678 grains of silver as worth the same kind of a dollar. Let both be treated on precisely the some terms of actual value. This is all that the most ultra free coinage men ask. In order to treat these two metals on “the same terms” silver must be remonetized or gold demonetized. Does not the Tribune know that the world’s annual production of gold is about 1125,000,090, and that the amount required for the arts and manufactures is but about half that amount, or >65,000,000? If it does not know this, let it consult the report of Mr. Leech, director of the mint And does it not know that if gold were demonetized, as sliver has been, and discarded as a money metal, so that holders of gold bullion could no longer go to. the mints and have their bullion coined and have an arbitrary and fixed valuation placed upon the coins received, gold would become a mere commodity and would largely fall in price, just as silver has fallen? It is true that the “commercial world rates 23.22 grains of pure gold as worth a dollar,” and until the perpetuation of one of the greatest wrongs against the in terests of mankind that has ever blackened the pages of history, in the demonetization of silver, that same “commercial world” rated 871 grains of pure silver as worth a dollar. In fact, under the laws of most nations, whose coinage was at a lower ratio than ours, that number of grains was worth more than a dollar. The "commercfaFworld” did not always so rate gold. When California and Australia were producing so largely, Germany, Austria and some other nations demonetized gold, and that metal sank below its coinage value in those countries. In the opinion of the monetary commission of 1876 the movement would have become universal in Europe but for the resistance of bi-metallic France. If it had become general, what does the Tribune think gold bullion would then have been worth? And if gold were treated as silver has been treated in these later years, and excluded from the coinage of nations, so that it no longer had a fixed coinage value, but only a market value as a commodity—as something to be used in the arts and manufactures—what does the Tribune think would have been done with the excess of >60,000,000 in the-production of 1891 over the >65,000,000 that the director of the mint says was required for other than monetary purposes? And with this excess of supply for such purposes. would not its value have largely declined? Will the Tribune give a fair answer to these questions? Comparative “actual values” can only be ascertained by putting the two metals on the same footing as to coinage. It would then be seen that the world can get along very much easier without gold than without silver. This is so for two reasons. One is that to-day three-fourths of mankind use silver as their exclusive money metal; and the other is that, as everyone knows, silver, by reason of its lesser proportionate worth, is adapted to the small payments which make up the bulk of the everyday transactions of mankind, and which require sums less than >5 in amount, while gold is wholly unfit for use in such transactiona Both the metals are produced in excess of the quantities required for the arts and manufactures, and, therefore, they are alike dependent upon law, and law alone maintains their values at the coinage rata This is as true with gold as it is with silver.—Kansas City Journal. The Income Tax. The Chicago Tribune devotes a column of editorial space to argument (?) against a graduated income tax The writer first asserts that the much maligned multi-millionaires are really philanthropic patriots, paying in all the government revenues now, in addition to keeping the wheels of industrial progress revolving and filling the hands of labor. Then he proceeds to demonstrate that ■if an income tax is levied these same millionaires will evade it by false returns and the burden of it will fall on “the widows’ and orphans’ estates.” This is proving toomuch. The man who will try to evade the income tax will and does get out of paying his lawful dues under the present system of taxation. Moreover, all plutocratic sheets of the Tribune stamp meet every suggestion of reform in finance and taxation with this cry of robbery of “widows’ and orphans’ estates,” and it has been sooverworked it is losing force.—Vanguard. —Get ready for the great funeral of 1896, the funeral of the demo-plutocrat-ic party.—Fort Worth (Tax.) Advance.