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14
THE AMERICAN BAR.
Frederic B. Condert One of the Great
est Living Lawyers.
A Study of the Legal Time—Not Cor
porations, but the Greed for Gain
Poisons the Profession Women
Should Be Let In—No Reason Why
Parties Should Not Be Given a
Chance—No Decline of the Art of
Oratory.
New York, April 28. —It is a
very hackneyed anecdote that,
about the French troops at Fontenoy, or
some other continental battlefield, who
said to their foes: “Gentlemen of the
guard, fire first.” Yet it recurs inevit
ably and very fitly to me, looking over
the life of Frederic Heno Coudert. He
comes of French military stock, his
father having been an officer in the
Napoleonic wars, who immigrated to this
city after the restoration of the Bour
bons. Perhaps it is within the
range of possibilities that his
father's father was one of that
famous corps who gave their adversaries
the pass in the matter of sudden
death. Paradoxical as it may seem, Mr.
Coudert has been fighting all his life, and
he has practically made no enemies. The
explanation is simple. It is found in that
Gallic strain of invincible courtesy which
says, “Gentlemen, it is our duty to kill,
but that is no reason why we should dis
like each other.” Instances of this are
readily at hand. Mr. Coudert has been
in the very forefront recently of this his
toric banter against the New York
“state machine” organization of the
party to which he has been a de
voted adherent ever since lie took the
stump in the Lineoln-Douglas campaign.
The battles were, of course, the "anti
snapper movement and the Bar Associa
tion's successful opposition to the election
of Judge Maynard. On the heads of most
of his democratic colleagues in those rev
olutions the vials of "regular” wrath
have been emptied. Messrs. Peckham
and Hornblow. r have been subjected to
the humiliation of a rejection by the
Senate of their nominations to the su
preme court bench. .Messrs. Ander
son and and Fairchild have been treated
with anything but respect in the writ
ten and spoken utterances of the “regu
lars.” But Mr. Coudert has totally missed
his share of the angry recriminations
which those movements called out. it is
not that he is less prominent in his party.
Save for the fact that he has never taken
public office, he is more so than most of
the gentlemen named, inasmuch as
he alone among them possesses a
talent for popular oratory of a very rare
order. His appearance upon a public
platform—where he looks so much
like a French parliamentary lender that
you always think of the phrase, “mount
ing the tribune”—is always a signal for
ecstatic applause. At the great Cleve
land-Hill meeting in the campaignof 1891,
when both of those “Kings of Brentford
smelled” for onenightat least one Flower,
he was the recipient of almost as tumul
tuous a greeting as the two rival leaders
of the democracy.
TO WAR WITH A SAD HEART.
His mode of bowing himself into a fight
was never more nicely illustrated than in
the bar association’s big anti-Maynard
meeting last autumn in Cooper Institute.
He was nearly the last of a battery of
legal great guns who went off that night.
Tho others, ,to tell the truth—Messrs.
Peckham and Albert Stiekney and James
C. Carter—made a solemnity of warfare
that would have delighted the heart of
Dugaltl Dalgetty. It was war. but it was
not magnificent. It souuded like a suc
cession of charges to a grand jury. When
Mr. Coudert at last nrose the crowd
did, too. and howled with de
light. Every man jack of them ex
pected a radiant flight of barbed
arrows of humorous eloquence into the
ranks of the foe, such as a republican au
dience delights to see launched from the
bow of Joseph H. Choate, or Tammany
was wont to do from that of Bourke Cock
ran. They thought lie would ' play horse
with Hill.” They shouted with laughter
in anticipation of the treat. Mr. Oou
dert’s first action was to wave his hand
in deprecation of their mirth.
Then he broke into a strain of passion
ate sorrow, the refrain of which was that
this was the first battle of his life
One of his services on the public side of
his profession doubtless did not earn for
him the cordial affection of the great Ju
rist just dead. David Dudley Field. The
main work of Mr. Field's vast life of
work was his codes. He began drawing
them when he was littlo more than a
youth. He had hardly ceased urging
their adoption up to the day of his death.
Slowly and with intervals of years ho
persuaded the legislature to adopt his
Civil and Criminal Procedure and his
Penal Code. There remained the cap
sheaf of all, his Civil Code. It was never
adopted. Probably it will never bo
adopted now that its masterful compiler
has passed away. It3 principle is repel
lant to the whole system of Auglo-
Saxon jurisprudence built up through
centuries by the tireless labor of tho
greatest minds of the race. Purely can a
lawyer be found to favor it. No man but
David Dudley Field could have secured
the adoption of the codes that were adopt
ed. And it was the cogent reasoning of
Mr. Coudert, the chosen spokesman of tho
bar association before the legislative com
mittee that blocked the passage of the
last of the Field codes. It is for this roa
son that Mr. Coudert’s pronouncement
upon tho question in the “interview”
printed below is at once of the
f roatest interest and importance to the
awyers and laymen. It seems to have
been assumed, at least popularly, of lato
that because Mr. Field was at' least tho
most ingenious and resourceful if not the
greatest lawyer of his time, and because
his codes were good codes, it must be
right to disregard the precedents of ages
and substitute for the present system of
Jurisprudence that most un-American of
created things, codified law.
HIS METHOD or INTERVIEW.
The word “interview” is nut in quota
tion marks above for the reason that
which is printed below is interviewing in
the sense of being questions and answers
exactly reported, it is not to tie understood
that Air. Coudert and the writer sat down
and talked a long hour by Shrewsbury
clock. Knowing something of Mr. Cou
dert's time-saving methods of expressing
himself for tho public prints, 1 speut the
odd hours of somo ten days before m.v
visit to him in drafting a set of questions
which would cover every point that 1
could think of of public interest in connec
tion with the profession of the law. After
I had stated my purpose and Mr. Coudert
had assented to its propriety his first
word was "Are your questions prepared?”
For answer 1 drew them out of m.v
pocket.
“Very well,” he said, “1 will answer
them.”
Two days afterward the following won
derfully clear, incisive and judicial deliv
erance on the opportunities, the duties
and the tendencies of the lawycrof to-day
was in my mail box. It is not likely that
any young lawyer will find anywhere in
his books precepts either of a higher line
or of more practical advantage. The
ordinary observer of human affairs will
be apt to gather from it some new mean,
ing of the ancient and honorable relation!
“lawyer and client.” Mr. Coudert has
not, as he says, repeated the language of
the queries propounded, but each or his
numbered propositions is a specific
answer to a specific question. The “in
terview” runs:
MB. COrDBRT REPLIES,
in which success could not be coupled
with gior.v. His plaint was that all that
he. all that they could gain in this miser
able strife was the saving of the party's
honor. He proceeded in this strain until
he had entirely changed the mood of his
audience, and then grievously and griev
ingly proceeded to smite the Maynardites
hip and thigh. The incident was thor
oughly Gallic. It was histrionic and yet
sincere.
His forensic methods are the same as
his political ones. Years ago a great jury
lawyer said of him "He possesses a
happy faculty of establishing at the out
sat a friendly relation and mutual under
standing with a jury, and this is half the
battle.” Mr. Couilert has done more
than this. There is a story about him
which is both true and well told, that ia
a bitterly contested will case, in which
everybody else cut everybody else, Mr.
Coudert. while, of course, guard
ing his clients rights with scrupulous
fidelity, renewed a friendship dropped
through the passage of time and inadver
tence with the branch of the family rep
resented by his learned brother on the
other side.
A NEW TORKER BORN" AND BRED.
It is not unusual to think of Mr.
Coudert as trench by birth as well as
descent, but as a matter of fact, he is
more of a New Yorker than nine-tenths
of the leaders of the New York bar. Ho
was born here in 1832 aud educated at
Columbia college, which he entered at 14,
and in the first circumstance has the
advantage of the greatest New Yorker
that ever lived, Alexander Hamilton. He
passed his entrance examination before
he was eligible to practice, and had to
wait for his twenty-first birthday, in the
year 1853, for admission to the bar. He
had been five years out of college.
Marked as has always been his power to
sway juries and popular assemblages, the
hues of his life's work have fallen liko
those of most great lawyers of to-day in
other and more toilsome places. His clients
have been said, perhaps extravagantly, to
be “the crowned heads of Europe.” Cer
tain it is that not the least of Mr. Coud
ert’s public services is witnessed to by
the number of foreign criminals in whose
extradition ho has participated. Ho has
been decorated by the French and Italian
governments, the former conferring upon
him tiio cross of the Ivogion of Honor. To
his office at Nos. 68 and 70 William street,
comes the cream of the legal business
growing out of the enormous mercantile
transactions between Paris and New
York. But he has never neglected the
higher sido of law. The greatest eini
neuce that he ever reached in this broad
field was undoubted his appointment last
year as one of the American counsel in
the Bering He* arbitration, where,
with his colleagues, be met the two
great British advocates, the bar leaders
respectively of the Liberal and Conserva
tive parties, Sir Charles Russell and Sir
Richard Webster. Ten vears before that,
however, he was a delegate to the Inter
national congress on the laws of nations,
not a mere nose-rubbing funotion, but an
arena of debate in which he was charged
by the maintenance of the rights and the
improvement of the condition of the
American merchant and ship owner. In
1877 he was one of the democratic law
yers commissioned to represent Ins party
in the returning board muddle in New
Orleans.
OPPOSED TO THE FIELD CODES.
"If I should undertake to answer fully,
and a3 they deserve to be answered, all
the questions that you have put to me, I
should have to write a volume. Probably
you will not care to publish—any more
than lam disposed to write—so extensive
a reply to your interrogatories. I shall,
however, try to give you in the briefest
possible space my views upon the subject
generally without reference to the lan
guage of the inquiries as put in each in
stance by yourself.
“1. Ido not believe that‘tho influence
of the growing power of corporations on
the bar’ has any effect, either in lowering
or raising the standard of the profession.
A corporation is simply a rich client, and
whether his name is Croesus or the Great
American Corporation makes very little
difference. Few lawyers (although there
are a fevvg confine themselves exclusively
to the service of a single corporation, and
that corporation they serve, of course,
with all possible fidelity and zeal.
Generally speaking, prominent lawyers
are to-day for and to-morrow against
these associations, and are as much inter
ested in defeating as in promoting their
views. I have not been able to see that
tho standard of the profession has been in
any way affected by this circumstance.
AVARICE IN ALL WALKS OF LIFE.
“3. That tho profession has been to
some extent ‘commercialized’ I am not
prepared to deny. lam inclined to think
that the high professional standard has
declined since the time when the fee was
an honorarium and the counsel was pro
hibited by law, as well as by his own self
respect, from dragging a recalcitrant
client into court, and throttling him until
ho disgorged a fee.
“A virus of avarice has undoubtedly
been inoculated intoour body, but this is
the result of general commercial
A life of comfort, the fascination of a lux
urious life, and an instinctive disposition
of our guild to keep step with others in
the race for riches have undoubtedly
modified the old spirit of our professional
forefathers. Then, too, with our growing
population the ranks of the bar
have swollen in number, so as to
submerge the old spirit of dignified
and professional self control. The law
yer wants to be rich because everybody
else seeks to be rich. Young men
who would never have dreamt of profes
sional eminence rush into tho profession
headlong, with vague aspirations of be
coming somebody and something in tho
shortest possible space of time. The ma
jority of them, I believe, do not care so
much for the prospect of a justiceship of
the supreme court of the United States
as of a handsome income, which will per
mit them to taste of those pleasures and
luxuries which wealth alone can give.
But others may be said to do the same.
Doctors, for instance, and I am not abso
lutely certain, but would not like to deny
under oath, that the fashionable clergy
man lias been tainted by a homeopathic
dose of the poison. Yet l still claim for
our profession that, relatively speaking,
it is as high in comparison with the rest of
the community as ever.
ELOql EKCE STILL A FORCE.
“3. Much is said about tho decline of
forensic eloquence, but the proposition
that true eloquence is losing its force and
power is not, to my mind, true. Elo
quence can never die or fail of its effect,
if it is roal eloquence; that is, such form
of s|>eech as is best calculated to rouse
and stimulate tho dormant passions of
men. Demosthenes was eloquent, and so
was Lincoln; their stylo of oratory was
different because their audience was dif
ferent. The true orator will now pro
duce his effect whenever he is found and
Is able to use the key which unlocks the
breast of his listener, and subjugates that
listener's will to his own.
"You may change your system of laws,
but whether you are governed b.v com
mon law, civil law, code law or any other,
human nature remains the same and tho
mass of mankind offersitseif a ready prey
to the master of apt speoch.
DEFECTS OF CODIFICATION.
“4. Ido not think that codification In
New York has been a success. The code
of civil procedure has grown from a
timid, shrinking baby, dressed in 800 or
400 brief sections, into an aggressive, self
sufficient octavo that has puzzled tho
courts, baflied the lawyers and ruined the
clients for half a century. I presume,
however, that prescription has given it a
place in our system, and that no efforts
on the part of the bar or the community
will dislodge that code.
THE MORNING NEWS: SUNDAY, APRIL 20, 1894
| “As to the criminal code, it has proba
! bly worked reasonably well. As punish
| ments are arbitrarily fixed and should be
I certain, it is reasonable enough that an
i attempt should be made to formulate into
code form the criminal law of the state.
As the judges of our criminal tribunals
seem to be satisfied, I presume, that with
occasional modifications that system will
endure.
“As to the proposition of enacting our
common law into a civil code, I think
that the good sense of our people is op
posed to it. If it has taken hundreds of
volumes of judicial decisions to construe
rules of practice, what would it be if all
the relations and interests of the citizen
wore determined or sought to be fixed in
a single code Where would be the cer
tainty of such a code, with an annual
legislature tampering with every section
upon the slightest provocation! How
would the system be improved when the
judges undertook in lengthy opinions to
construe the sections! And how long
would it be before the language of the
code itself would be lost sight of, and jus
tice, discouraged and bathed, would go
back to the oid system to search for
truth in the decisions of the courts! it
seems to me that until the evils of our
system are proved to be very much greater
than they are, we should bear with the
ills we have rather than fly to others we
know not of.
“Empirical attempts upon the health
of our body politic are too risky and ex
tensive to be conducted without great
circumspection. It is usual to cry that
lawyers are opposed to a code, because it
would bring the law within the reach of
the layman, but no person of average in
telligence and ordinary fairness will be
lieve this. If he does, our experiment
that 1 have alluded to above in the way of
a code procedure ought to send him off
with silence aud shame into solitude and
penitential meditation.
PLACE AUX DAMES.
“7. I see no objection to the admission
of woman to the bar, but Ido see great
injustice in excluding her if she is fit to
assume its duties, it ma.v be that she
may help to ‘overcrowd the profession,’
but that is no answer to her claim. Why
should she not, if she has the ability,
seek for an honorable livelihood in the
same ranks with her male brethren?
Portias may not bo common, but why
should not every refined and intelligent
woman have a chance to become one if
she likes! It is indeed a weak and piti
able plea on the part of man to say that
there is ‘no reason’ for him to expand and
grow fat, and that, therefore, the weaker
bodied sisters must be left out. This is a
man's argument, but not a manly one.
PROFESSIONAL GAINS UNEQUAL.
“10. What amount a practitioner of
‘ordinary ability, education and good for
tune’ may expect is a question that does
not admit of any answer. What do you
call ‘ordinary good fortune,’ for instance?
Does it imply good luck, weathy rela
tions. an honorable name and other ele
ments which happily used may lead to
success? The scale is a wide one; the
gamut runs from nothing to an annual
fortune. There are lawyers in the large
cities—l speak especially of New York—
whose annual income would be a respec
table estate of itself. There are
others fairly intelligent and well
educated who would bo infinitely better
off as first-class artisans. Men are born
free and equal, says our Declaration of
Independence, and truly, but after thev
nre born tbe rule stops running. The
blind goddess aud the chances of life
create different opportunities, even for
men whose claims would seem to be equal.
When you consider, however, the enor
mous diversity in the gifts of men and
the lottery of favorable chances, it is
wise to stop guessing.
SOME LAWYERS ARE KILLING THE GOOSE,
ETC.
“11. Arbitration has shown itself a
simple and easy process of reaching a
settlement of disputes without delav and
expense. It has found favor with the
various associations of men who are
united for business purposes. The un
conscionable charges which it has of late
years been fashionable to make, the
designate attempt of young men to
squeeze out of the chance client all that
can be had short of absolute destruction,
have created a reluctance on the part of
merchants, brokers and others to engage
in the game of litigation. Perhaps they are
wises and yet all really important ques
tions, where principle is involved, are
best settled by the courts of justice. The
process is expensive and tedious, but as
Moliere has said of medicine, -it is better
for a patient to die according to the
rules of art than to get well by not fol
lowing them. F. K. Coudert.”
Ho who reads, marks, learns and in
wardly digests the above may arrive at
the golden secret of combining a great
business with a high and honorable call
ing, A. E. Watmocs.
A 810 ENTERPRISE.
It Is Proposed to Have All the Smith
Family Erect a Oreat House.
• From the Atlanta <Ga.) Journal.
The great Smith family!
Of course you have all heard of it. In
fact, many of you, directly and indirectly,
arc connected with it.
Ever since the days of Capt. John
Smith, the celebrated pioneer of Poca
hontas fame, it has gone on increasing
and growing, with a productiveness that
has been phenomenal, until to-day it has
spread to every village and hamlet of this
vast United States.
Hut it has remained for one of the patri
otic descendants of the family to conceive
a projoct that is far reaching in its aims
and expectations. That is the building of
a vast auditorium and general meeting
place to be called the "Smith House,”
where all the members of this numerous
family may meet annually and enjoy a
general reunion of the Smiths.
When it is taken into consideration that
the assemblage would surpass in numbers
the army of Xerxes at Thermopylm some
idea may be formed of the immensity of
the undertaking.
Capt. Jack Smith, of Atlanta, one of the
most original members of the fraternity,
and tho man who built the celebrated
“House That Jack Built,” on Peachtree
street, is the orieinator of tho plan.
He proposes that delegates be sent from
every city, town and county of the union
to meet in Atlanta.and that then the small
sum of $1 each, paid in b.v the members
annually, will raise a sum sufficient to
build and keep up the biggest club rooms
and auditorium in the world. Further
than this, he proposes to donate a tract of
land, beautifully situated on one of the
commanding sites around Atlanta, equiva
lent to a #IO,OOO donation, for tho location
of the great building.
He further proposes to pa.v the dues of
at least 100 of the Smiths who are unable
to meet the expense, and in that way
start the ball to rolling.
Capt. Jnck Smith is thoroughly in ear
nest. and is talking the matter up con
stantly in season and out of season.
It is unnecessary to state that should
this mammoth enterprise succeed it will
give Atlafita the rendezvous of the largest
fraternity in the country and the most
uniquo establishment on the face of tho
earth.
In the building it is proposed to incorpor
ate rocks and wood from every country on
earth, with names engraved upon them,
so that travelers from every nation on the
globe will visit Atlanta to see the biggest
and most wonderful building of the kind
ever erected.
One dollar each from tho members of
the Smith family will erect the building,
and it is hoped that the press of the coun
try will take the matter up, so that the
members of the whole family may be in
formed of the enterurise.
Waiter—“Do you wish to dine table
and ’note?’ Hayseed, Jr. “Naw, just bring
us the regular dinner.”—Texas Sil.ings.
SALARIES OF LAWMAKERS.
Interesting Facts Regarding the Pay
ot Congressmen.
How Other Countries Regulate It.
Rulers Whose Incomes Are Princely
in Amount —In tho Early Days.
From the Washington Star.
The House of Representatives in its
eagerness to find a way of keeping a
quorum in sight, without adopting the
quorum-counting rule of the Heed con
gress, has had under consideration several
propositions in different forms to fine
members who absent themselves or refuse
to vote on roll-call. At short intervals
reformers who are new to House ways in
troduce propositions to withhold the sala
ries of members who do not attend the
meetings of the House. But the older
members contend that if a fine were im
posed on recalcitrant members it could
not be collected. To get at the mem
ber's salary it would be necessary to go
back to one of the first laws of congress.
The first members of congress did not
have annual salaries. They were paid
like the members of certain state legisla
tures—according to the number of days
they were called to serve. Their i>er diem
was SB. and if they had worked every day
in the year, except Sundays, on legisla
tive business they would have drawn
much less than the present members of
the lower house draw for working an
average of six months in a year Mem
bers of congress are now paid at the rate
of 818.50 a day, or (allowing six months of
actual work iu a vear. which is a good
average) 827 a day for the time they
give to legislative business. In addi
tion to the numberof days spent at Wash
ington, each early congressman had an
allowance of one day s pay for each
twenty miles traveled going to Washing
ington or returning to his home. In the
beginning of the century it took some
thing like six weeks for a man to travel
from Providence, R. 1., to the capital.
Nowadays he can make the trip in less
than a day. Mileage now is figured at 10
-seats a mile by the shortest route, The
senator who travels in his special car
without expense from the Pacific coast to
Washington receives SOOO for the
expenses of his trip, just as does
tho senator who buys a railroad ticket.
In either case there is a considerable
profit. Mileage is one of the indirect con
tributions of the government to the con
gressman’s income. There are others—
for example, the stutionry allowance of
8125 a year, which may be drawn in cash,
if the congressman wishes, and the allow
ance for “binding,” under which the
member frequently has private workdone
for him or his family. But with all of theso
allowances, the senator or member of the
House is seldom able to live within his
congressional income.
PAT OP REPRESENTATIVES HIGH.
We pay the members of our lower house
more than similar statesmen are paid in
any other country in the world. But we
pay our senators less than the senators of
the Canadian parliament receive; and our
cabinet officers draw beggarly salaries in
comparison with the advisors of foreign
rulers. As to our President, although he
usually saves about 50 per cent, of his sal
ary, he could not support the extrava
gances of the rulers of other great nations
on ten times the amount.
France, Austria, Holland and Portugal
follow the American plan of paying their
legislators annual salaries. In France
these salaries are equivalent to about
81,780 a year; in Austria, about the same;
in Holland, members of the lower house
receive 8880a year; in Portugal both
peers and deputies receive *Bl5 a year.
In Belgium a singular system prevails.
Members of the chamber of representa
tives. who live in Brussels, receive no
pay ; those who live elsewhere receive $-4
a month. Virtually, therefore, there is
no salary attached to the position of
representative. The *B4 a month is paid
to out-of-town members in lieu of sub
sistence, as an army officer would say.
Great Britain and Italy pay their legis
lators nothing; but the Italian legislators
are entitled to free transportation, and
they receive other concessions in the mat
ter of taxation aud patronage.
In Switzerland and Denmark the per
diem pay of the early United States con
gress prevails. In Switzerland members
of the national council receive *2.50 a day,
and members of the state council *1.50 to
*2.50 a day.
Perhaps the most thoroughly overpaid
national legislature (Jf it can be called so)
is the legislature of Canada. It has sfi
more legislators than England. There
are 215 members of the Chamber of Depu
ties, who draw *I.OOO each for each ses
sion of the parliament; and there are 80
members'of the Senate,who receive *IO,OOO
per year each. The speakers of the two
houses receive *B,OOO- per year each.
That is just the amount paid to tho presi
dent of tho Senate of the United States
and the speaker of our House of Repre
sentatives.
CANADIAN LEGISLATIVE SALARIES.
The amazing discrepancies in tho sala
ries of Canadian legislative officials are to
be found in other governments. The
United States pays it senators and repre
sentatives Mike. #5,000 a year each ; and
to tho presiding officers! of tho two
Houses it pays #B,OOO a year each. Can
ada pays #I,OOO to one class of legislators,
SIO,OOO to another, and #B,OOO each to the
presiding officers. England pays nothing
to the members of the House of Lords or
the House of Commons, but the speaker
of the commons has a salary equivalent
to #35,000 and a house; while the lord
chancellor draws a salary of #50,000-
equalto that of President Cleveland—of
which #-0,000 is his salary as speaker of the
House of Igjrds, and #30,000 is his salary
as a judge; and the retiring pension of
the lord chancellor is #35,000 a year.
Other English salaries are equally
amazing compared with those which are
paid to similar officials under this gov
ernment. There is the chief justice of the
supreme court, for example. In England
ho has #40,000 a year. Chief Justice Ful
ler of our supreme court has a salary of
#10,500 a year. The judges of the higher
court of justice in England receive #35,000
each; the associate justices of our su
preme court receive #IO,OOO each. The at
torney general of England has #35,000 a
year, and his fees sometimes amount to
#35,000 a year more. The first lord of the
treasury receives #35.000 a year; the first
lord of tho admirality, #32,500 a year.
Attorney General Olney, Secretary Carl
isle aud Secretary Herbet have to get
along with #B,OOO a year each, und a
horse and carriage.
FAY OF HtTLKRS.
Our President does not draw tho small
est salary paid to the head of a nation,
but he comes within a very few of doing
so. The president of Switzerland receives
#3,000 a year, and the president of the
Argentine Republic only SBO,OOO. Presi
dent Cleveland draws #50,000a year; and.
as I have said, probably saves half of
that sum. It is said to have been a point
of honor with some of the presidents of
the French republic that they would not
save any part of their salaries, because
they believed that tho money was in
tended to bo used in supporting tho dig
nity of the office. No President of the
United States has hnd any such idea, and
most of them who have served a full term
have takon nice little nest-eggs away
with them. Tho salary of the president
of the French republic Is $340,000 a year.
Napoleon 111. received #5.000,000 a year;
but he had to bear many of tho expenses
of the government, such as the mainte
nance of palaces, subsidizing theators,
etc. The present head of the French re
public has uono of these expenses, and he
can leave office a rich roan if he serves a
term of fair length. Our President has a
house given him. and all of the “official”
expenses of that house are paid for him,
but the distinctly household expenses
come out of his own pocket.
The Queen of England receives *300.000
for the privy purse, besides a civil allow
ance nearly six times as great. The
Prince of Wales has an income of *500.000
a year, the princess *50.000, and each of
the children of the Prince of Wales #IBO,-
000 a year.
The Emperor Francis Joseph receives
*1.800,000 a year from Austria, and *1,600.-
000 a year from Hungary. He is obliged
to maintain out of this a number of libra
ries. museums, parks, etc., and to pay the
subsidies of several theaters.
King Humbert, of Italy, has an allow
ance of *3,000,000 a year, out of which he.
too. has to keep up palaces in different
parts of the nation—in cities formerly
capitals of independent states.
The Empetor af Japan has an annual
allowance of more than *2,250,000. The
Prince of Montenegro lias only *20,500
a year, but Russia allows him *25,000
more.
THE SHAH OF PERSIA.
The Shah of Persia has the income
from a private fortune of *27,000,000, ac
cumulated by his family in office.
The King of Sweden and Norway re
ceives nearly *OOO,OOO a year from his peo
ple.
The King of Greece has an allowance
from his country of *200,000 a year,|and a
further allowance of *20,001p from Great
Britain, France and Russia.
The King of Belgium has an allowance
of about *050.000 a year.
The King of Servia receives #240,000 a
year. The infant King of Spain and his
family have an allowance of *2,000,000 a
year. The Emperor William gets *1,225,-
000 from Prussia alone, and his grand
father is said to have saved #12,000,000
out of his allowance from the state.
The Czar of Russia is credited with re
ceiving more than #12,000,000 from his
government.
in the light of these facts concerning
the pay of foreign rulers and foreign law
makers. it would appear that the states
men of America are rather under-paid.
It is a fact that, with the exception of
the President, the man who saves money
in public life is a great exception. Per
haps that is one reason why the average
congressman does not take kindly to the
proposition to “dock” him for staying
away from the sessions of the House. It
is a fact that if certain business men,
whose services are of great value to the
House, did not run homo occasionally to
look after their affairs, they could not
afford to remain in congress. A great
many men can say that congress has
ruined them financially.
“WILLIE” WILDE’S BRIDE.
He Talks in Light and Airy Strain at
His Marriage to Mrs. Leslie.
From the New York Press.
London, April 14.—William C. K.
W r ilde, better known as “Wille” Wilde,
continues to talk about his second mar
riage. He is not as picturesque nor as
handsome as his big brother Oscar; nor
again, is he as talented. He is one of
those sort of men who from his youth up
has been always promising to do some
thing brilliant, but his fame chiefly rests
upon the fact that he is Oscar’s brother,
and that he married Mrs. Frank Leslie,
who divorced him as speedily as might be.
In defiance of the mandate of the New
York courts in granting the divorce to
Mrs. Leslie Wilde scoffs at the idea of the
American laws having any right to pro
hibit his taking another wife. His mar
riage to Miss Sophia Lees took place on
Jan. 11, but the fact was kept quiet until
last Thursday.
MR. WILDE EXPLAINS.
Mr. Wilde in an interview with a repre
sentative of the Press said:
“My present wife is a lady I have known
for many years, a countrywoman of mine,
having been born in Dublin, and is the
daughter of the secretary of the board of
trade of Ireland. Recently we met
frequently at dinners and other
entertainments and it happened
that upon each instance of that
sort I was favored with the request
to conduct her to supper and otherwise
see that she participated in the enjoy
ments of the evening. The result was
natural—we got married. To own up the
entire truth of the matter, I might tell
you that we ran away and were married
secretly. Since our marriage she has
been living at home with ner mother, and
I have been living at home with my
mother, Lady Wilde. Now, however, we
see an opportunity to establish a menage
a deux, and we therefore publicly an
nounce our position. It may be that we
shall be married over again, possibly in
Westminster Abbey, with a lot of
bishops and a lot of high dignitaries offi
ciating.
“I had some difficulty in getting a
license to marry a second time. The
English church makes a great deal of
ceremony about permitting an individual
who has got the worst of it in a divorce
suit marrying again. My visits to
Somerset house were numerous before I
finally overcame her majesty’s objection
to this stop. But finally it was ar
ranged.
“Without wishing in any way to reflect
upon the ladies of America, I m’ustexpress
a certain satisfaction that my present
bride is not American. The stories that
I received any money from Mrs. Frank
Leslie when I married her are absolutely
false. I did demand a settlement bf
#5,000 from her, and this she promised in
the presence of my mother to make me,
but when I reached New York she argued
that American customs did not permit an
ante nuptial settlement, and, therefore,
she would not arrange anything diflnitely
until after we were married. She said if
after that event I would call upon her
lawyers, Messrs. Cromwell & Sutherland,
they would adjust the matter to my en
tire satisfaction.
RE DIDN’T GET TQE MONEY.
“But they never would do so, and con
sequently I never got mv#s,ooo. I ar
gued with both Mrs. iAtslio and her at
torneys that tho Earl of Craven had re
ceived a marriage settlement before he
would consent to marry Mi#i Bradley
Martin, and Mr. Bradley Martin paid off
l-'Ord Craven’s debts to the amount of
something near #1,250,000 before the cere
mony was performed. You soe, it was
this way, Lord Craven has large estates
here, and he told Mr. Bradley Martin
that they turned in an income of $175,000
a year, but that owing to tho mortgages
and other claims against them he did not
receive moro than #35,000. and this of
course, they could not live on. So Mr.
Martin at once cleared off all these
mortgages and turned him over the es
tate free and clear, which was, of course
no more than he should do, and was :i
very satisfactory arrangement to Lord
Craven. -
“Well. I really neverhad anything from
Mrs. Loslie. Of course. I had my bed to
sleep in. and my apartments at tho Ger
lach, and I drove a pair of horses that
were nominally mine, but really were
hers, and, of course, those horses ate oats
which 1 did not pay for. Occasionally I
would have a dollar in mv pockets to
spend in drinks, but I had nothing to pay
m.v duos at the Lotus Club. Of course
Mrs. Leslie paid my traveling expenses,
that was no more than was right, but
really I had no money'at all practically
excepting what I earned myself.
’ That really was the reason 1 could not
stand it any longer, and while the young
lady 1 have now married is poor, still I
am very happy, and we will soon, I hope
have a Very handsome homo.”
Wife—Anything new in the sermon this
morning? Husband—l guess there must
have been ; 1 didn’t got to sleep until it
was half over.—lnter Ocean.
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