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THE TRI WEEKLY JOURANL
ATLANTA, GA., 5 NORTH FORSYTH ST-
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THE TRI-WEEKLY JOURNAL, Atlanta. Ga.
The City of W onderful N antes
IT is .delightfully astonishing what magi
cal names one discovers amongst the
some two hundred and six thousand
Souls that rejoice in the title, Atlantians—
Hames from the four winds ot history and
the seven seas of poetry and romance. Fancy
yourself meeting Cervantes, not in book and
lamplight but in esh and noontide, your
fellow saunterer along Peachtree, Anno
Domini 1920! And whom should we en
counter at the next corner but Napoleon!
Not altogether a likeness of the Man of Des
tiny, and luckily less ambitious; but Napo
leon for all that —Dave Napoleon, of At
lanta. Where else, we wonder, does a tele
phone directciy list both Homer and Milton?
As for Presidents, every name from Wash
ington to Wilson belongs to this versatile
town, save two. Garfield and Roosevelt, as
patronymics, are wanting; but the Jeffer
sons and Madisons and Polks and Pierces
and, of course, the. Johnsons abound, along
with the rarer Van Buren and Fillmore and
Taft. Not content with Chief Magistrates,
the Gate City’s nomenclature must have its
Clay, Calhoun and Webster, its Emerson,
Whittier, Poe and Lanier, its Daniel Boone
and Winfield Scott. It reaches into all lands
and all times.. Dig as far as you like into
the past, back to the very dust of Eden if
you will; and the oldest nimes you can
fetch forth, Atlanta will match with ner Eve
and Adams, hei Abraham and Moses and
Solomon. Or take the golden age of Queen
Bess. The mightiest and most enchanting
names that rang 'rom the London of those
spacious days are borne incarnate and be
trousered along the streets of the Georgia
capital this very Sunday morning: Raleigh,
Bacon, Marlowe, Beaumont and Fletcher and
•—heaven bless the mark!—WILLIAM
SHAKESPEARE! You see, gentle reader,
this is a town of towns, “the heir of all the
ages” as well as “foremost in the files of
time.” Addison, Steele, Sheridan, Gold
smith, Robert Burns, Byron, Shelley and
Browning are fellow citizens of ours. Charles
Dickens resides in Atlanta. So do Messrs.
Snodgrass, Winkle and Weller Mr. Pick
wick himself, be '.t regrettably admitted, is
not here —that is, not in the body; but by
way of compensation an apartment house is
named for him.
What’s in a name? Browse amongst those
of Atlanta if you would know what rarities
there may be, what drill associations and
contrasts, what treasures for an observer of
the kind described by Shakespeare as “a
snapper-up of unconsidered tiifles.” You
will find, on the briefest excursion, not only
Faith, Hope and Love, but also Pleasure,
Sorrow, Wisdom an-’ Joy, all domiciled as
the kindliest of neighbors along with the
Smiths and Browns. You will find North,
South and West, although, by -n unaccount
able omission, no East. You will find Clink
scales, Sprinkle, Toodle. Midget, Snire, Pim
and Tutt, Thoroughgood. Longfeather and
Stump. You expect White and Black. Long
and Short, Low and High: but will find to
boot Febuary. and May, Sonn, Moon and
Stars. And lest, in the dazzling abundance,
you overlook them, let ns remind you of
Bud Flower and Hang Song.
, Our Friend, the Tree
THERE is much of pathos in the news
from Washington that the old “Morse
Elm,” one of the historic trees of Amer
ica, is all ut gone. Many operations of
“tree surgery” and all known applications of
“tree medicine” have been tried by Wash
ington’s superintendent of city parks, but
without avail. The tree was planted in 1820
in front of the ol< Willard Hotel and chris
tened the “Morse Elm” because of the many
hours spent -en.atu it by Samuel B. Morse,
chatting and joking With his cronies con
cerning the nebulous idea which finally re
sulted in the invention of the telegraph. 'Now
it is little more that a stump; soon it will
not be even that.
In the passing of any loved landmark—the
razing of a house, the crumbling of a rock,
the drying up of spring or river—there is al
ways regret. But about a tree is a glamor, a
touch of something almost human, that makes
Its destruction smack of real tragedy. It
Is as though a person died.
Whoever has looked upon the majestic
live-oaks of New Orleans— the Suicide Oak,
the Dueling Oaks and a dozen others rich
In legend—must have yearned f< them to
apeak, that they might unfold tales of the
countless dramas to which they were wit
ness. And so every city has its trees, some
centuries old, that stand as the sole surviv
ors of men nd everts long since buried in
the mould of history.
One could ask no more fitting monuments
In a city than the preservation of its trees.
Likewise, to hundreds of individuals there
are trees of c* 1 idhood and of youth which
in middle age he cherishes as comrades in
old joys and old sorrows. One can under
stand the spirit of the Athens, Georgia,
man who drew in due legal form the docu
ment that deeded to itself the tree that to
day is its owne.. Though he were no
longer here, he saw to it that no hand
should profane the sturdv trunk which he
had come to depend on and to love. The
Athens tree is’ not the only one to deserve
such consideration; there are many others
which, were our wishes our deeds, would
live as long as the Morse Elm, and longer.
Tfriis .Vi 1.4 1..* n.
The Future Cotton Sufiftly
CURIOUSLY enough while cotton grow
ers find the market sluggish for
their lates crop, keen students of the
industrial and commercial future are won
dering whether the demand foi this product
can be supplied? Writing in the November
ATLANTIC, Mr. Melvin T. Copeland points
out that cotton has come to be strongly com
petitive with wool, silk and linen, as well as
widely used in other than textile fields—in
book-binding, for instance, and the manu
facture of belting for machinery, and the
composition of automobile tires, this last
mentioned item alone taking from ten to
twenty per cent of the earth’s output of high
grade long-staple cotton. In the years im
mediately preceding the World War the per
capita consumption of cotton cloth was about
nineteen pounds in the United States, from
two to eight pounds in South America, from
six to eighty in Northern and Western Europe,
from three to six in Russia and Southeastern
Europe, from two to three in Asia, and from
one, or less, to two and a half pounds in
Africa. Even if the rate stooa at these fig
ures, increases in population weald multiply
the demand in point of quantity; but as cot
ton fabrics improve and standards of living
advance and tew markets are opened while
old ones are more intensive cultivated, the
rate of consumption is certain tc go upwards
if the material and its finished products can
be procured at affordable prices. The ques
tion, then, as Mr. Copeland ccnceives it, is
whether in the years and decades ahead
enough equipment, enough labor and enough
raw material will be available to supply the
world’s growing demand for cotton products?
The first two factors, he thinks, will adjust
themselves, though they certainly will call for
vigorous and resourceful thinking. But when
it comes to the fuure supply of raw cotton,
this far-looking observer finds a major prob
lem.
He does not see at present how or whence
a sufficiency of the fiber will be produced to
keep pace with the growth of new industries
and new markets. A little more than sixty
per cent of the world’s supply comes from the
United States, and almost entirely from the
South. Sea Island, with its high value, is ex
clusively an Americ n crop; its output is
comparatively small and is not increasing.
“Other kinds of long-staple cctton, inter
mediate between Upland and Sea Island, are
produced in the United States in substantial
quantities,” we are reminded; “but the sup
ply is far from adequate.” Among the ob
stacles to an increase in the production of cot
ton in this country, Mr. Copeland considers
especially serious the boll weevil, lack of la
bor, and competition from food crops. Par
ticularly interesting is his comment on the
second of these difficulties. Observing that the
cotton crop requir i “a highly unbalanced
supply of labor,” he goes on to say:
“Labor-savin; machinery has been applied
far less extensively in picking cotton than in
harvesting the other staple crops. Two .to
three times as much labor is required, for ex
ample, to grow and picl an acre of cotton as
to cultivate rnd harvest an acre of corn. The
chief difference comes during the picking sea
son. In order to keep the fiber free from
leaves and dirt, and to make sure that all the
ripe cotton on the plant is picked without in
juring the immature bolls, cotton is picked
mainly by hand. For three and ..one-half
months each season the cotton farmer needs
a much greater supply of labor than during
the remainder of the year. This seasonal
peak it not easily met. A universally success
ful machine, with practically human intelli
gence, for picking cotton, r/ould be a god
send to the south and to the cotton-manu
facturing industry of the world.”
The conditions here set forth are all too
familiar to the farmers of the South, but it is
well that they should have been recounted
by a distinguished writer in so widely read
and highly regarded a magazine as the AT
LANTIC MONTHLY. When the country at
large and the world at large understand
something of the hazards and difficulties pe
culiar to the raising of cotton, they will not
wonder at the growers’ disappointment over
the trend of th.: autumn’s market. It is evi
dent, however, from the underlying condi
tions which Mr. Copeland has set forth, that
prices which Hl to afford the producer a
fair return cannot, in the very nature of the
situation, be permanent.
The Inter-County Highways
APROPOS of the officially announced
plans for a highway to link New
nan, Griffin, Monticello and Augusta,
the Herald, of the last mentioned city, re
calls the interesting fact that before the days
of the railroad a stage coach traversed that
flourishing region. It was unfortunate that
the route ever fell into disuse, for as the
Herald points out: “Persons now wishing
to go by private conveyance from Augusta
to Griffin or Newnan must either go to
Macon and then up, or go to Atlanta and then
down. Griffin is about half way between
the two cities, and Newnan is directly west.
The travel between Augusta and Indian
Springs is heavy, and this cross-country
route will shorten the distance considerably.”
Here we have an apt example of the space
cutting, time-saving, prosperity-making
work that is being done under Georgia’s new
system of highway construction. Time was,
and not many years ago, when our road plan
ning and road building proceeded mainly
upon the principle of every county for itself
and the mud-devil take the hindmost. Some
instances of fruitful co-working there were
but for the most pait there was lack of cor
related effort among counties in the same
district, let alone in widely distant parts of
the Commonwealth. Under that condition of
affairs nothing 11’ e the new Augusta-to-Grif
fin highway would have been projected.
But now that we have State supervision
and are hewing to the lines of a Statewide
system, the counties co-operating are with a
view to collective interests and carry out
plans of far-reaching service. The result will
ae a well functioning order of traffic arte
ries and veins through which the life-tides of
commerces and agriculture and industry can
flow without hindrance. This means a more
prosperous Georgia, a Georgia more produc
tive and more progressive.
EDITORIAL ECHOES
Our own confident meteorological pre
diction is that we shall have no skirt-high
snowdrifts this season. —Ohio State Journal.
A large part of New York’s population
' seems composed of “master minds,” judging
from recent graft reports.—Denver Times.
Perhaps the American gold producers
’ would like to have a tariff on gold.—Omaha
, World-Herald.
Just because this a horseless age is no rea
son why it should be horse senseless. —Nor-
, folk Virginian Pilot.
’ You may get what cheer there is out of
’ the glad news that bread has been reduced
‘ one-half cent a loaf in Winnipeg.—Cleveland
Plain Dealer.
We’ll Pay You a visit
Just now we are strongly inclined towards
i "tempting to raise a brood of turkeys next
I 'ar. —Cuthbert Leader.
! This inclination on the part of the farmer
i -’’tor of the Leader doubtless caused the
i hen doomed for the Thanksgiving dinner to
; go to laying while in the coop. We commend
[ Editor Howell for his enterprising intentions
and will see him later.
CHILDREN’S RIGHTS
By H. Addington Bruce
CHILDREN, w are repeatedly told, have
the right to a carefree childhood.
They have the right to pass their days
in play, through play fitting themselves for
the activities of later life. Serious effort
should not be expected of them. In the na
tural course of events effort and responsi
bilities will be imposed upon them all too
soon.
Undeniably the right to play is one of the
prime rights of children. Undeniably, too,
children should be kept as free from care as
possible.
But to let children do nothing but play, to
give them an absolutely carefree childhood,
is to withhold from them other and even
more important rights.
They have the right, specifically, to be
helped to develop their minds so that they
can use them vigorously and efficiently in
their years of adult endeavor. Since the mind
grows with exercise even as the body does,
this requires that elementary mental train
ing should be begun in earliest life.
With such training properly given—that
is, given in such away that the child will
really enjoy it—there need be no fear of
mental overstrain. Mental overstrain results,
on the contrary, when parents let the minds
of their children “lie fallow” until they
reach school age.
They then expect them to study gladly
and to learn easily. But because habits are
formed early, children who have been reared
on the -“let children play all the time” prin
ciple usually have acquired habits of thought
and desire that make all study both irk
some and difficult.
Nervous troubles are a common outcome,
with Iperhapt a lifelong incapacity for real
thinking and effective doing. All because the
poor children were denied the right to be
given at an early age upbuilding mental ex
ercises.
And, just as wisely directed mental train
ing is a fundamental right of children, so
is wisely directed training in self-control.
Play can contribute to this, but the con
tribution of play alone is not enough. By
precept and example every child should be
aided so to behave that self-control becomes
second nature to him.
Training for social adaptability which
means training for kindness, helpfulness, al
truism, tact, self-denial —is another basic
right of children.
Denied this right—as is every child who
is pampered and indulged—the blighting
handicap of selfishness is almost certain to
burden the child through maturity. Other
handicaps, too, may result, especially the
handicap of undue aggressiveness, the han
dicap of a bad temper, the handicap of a
jealous disposition.
All of which does not mean that child
hood should or need be made a period of
rigorous schooling. bhe indispensable train
ing, whether of the mind or ot the morale,
may be carried on without abating one whit
the joys of childhood.
But it does mean that parents must keen
ly appreciate their responsibilities as par
ents. It does mean that the father or moth
er who would leave his or her children pret
ty much to their own devices, in accordance
with the “carefree childhood” theory, is sow
ing the seeds of a bitter harvest for the chil
dren in years to come.
(Copyright, 1920, by the Associated News
papers.)
ROCKEFELLER
By Dr. Frank Crane
(Copyright, 1920, by Frank Crane.)
Sixty-three million seven hundred and six
ty-three thousand three hundred and fifty
seven dollars is the staggering sum John D.
Rockefeller has just added to his already
mountainous gifts for human welfare.
His total gifts to date are estimated at
$475,000,000 and some say over half a mil
lion.
Thisiis $125,000,000 more than Carnegie’s
beneficences.
It is the greatest amount of money ever
given in history by one man for benevolent
purposes.
It is hard to estimate Rockefeller, because
he is richer than the rest of us. He has
succeeded where thousands, playing the
same game, and employing identical meth
ods, have failed or come short. And it takes
more justice than most of us possess to be
just to one who has beaten us.
Eliminating envy, however, as much as
be mortally possible, we have to conclude
that this man, leaving out of consideration
all question as to how he got his money, is
doing more good, gauging what is good by
the practical methods at hand, than any
human being that ever lived.
That is, of course, doing more good as
far as money can do good.
This does not necessarily make him a
great man, nor put him in the rank of Lin
coln, Plato or Saint Francis.
But it does show that he is great enough
to be in the grip of a great impulse, a great
conviction and idea, and perhaps that is the
best any of us can do.
He made his money in the rough and
tumble of American and modern business,
and in away probably no worse nor better
than that of his rivals.
Pass that. He got his money, quite as
other millionaires and country storekeepers
get theirs. We will not discuss the “Capi
talistic” system.
But, having got it, he is using it in away
that shows the vast advancement of the
world. Going over the list of rich men, from
Croesus and Midas on down through the
Medici, the Fuggers and the Rothschilds, to
this day, and even granting that luck or un
just privilege or what not made some people
wealthy and kept others poor, the fact re
mains that this gigantic figure, whom fate
put in charge of a vast wealth unit, has
turned the stream of his millions toward
helping his fellowmen, and not hurting.
It is harder to be charitable toward the
rich than toward the poor. Envy gums
equity. But fair-minden folk will not grudge
this man his meed of praise.
The list of his beneficiaries reveals thou
sands of human beings aided. Diseases re
duced, poverty relieved, institutions of learn
ing assisted, churches helped and almost
every practical agency for relieving want and
woe given encouragement. That’s surely
that.
He built himself no throne, founded no
dynasty, amassed no collection of gold and
jewels and erected no gingerbread chateaux
in Europe and America to out-dazzle others.
He seems to be a simple-hearted old man,
upon whom, as he sits alone in his study or
lies at night upon his»bed, the Spirit of that
One who is “Servant of All” has descended,
at least in a measure.
Unfortunate enough to have incurred the
charge of being a Rich Man, he is trying to
wash his hands before he goes to be judged.
And the world of his fellowmen, whatever
their theories and obsessions, their pro
grams and propaganda, should think very
kindly of one who. undismayed by their con
demnation and criticism, has dared to help
them.
He’s just a human being after all, and as
another human being, one of the common
masses, I should like to take his hand and
say, “Thank you!” provided, of course, I
could break through the army of those at his
gates who want to get something from him.
It is difficult to see how he is going to be
utterly condemned at the last, if He is to
be the Judge whose rule was stated:
“Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one
of the least of these My brethren ye have
done it unto Me.”
Around the World
Tri-Weekly News Flashes From All Over
the Earth.
Turkeys Escape
The most exciting incident on the log
f the Scandinavian-American liner Unit
ed States, which docked at New York re
cently, was the escape from their crates of
seventy-eight turkeys. Mischievous boys
reed the gobblers. The turkeys were in
ended for Thanksgiving dinner for the
-’2O passengers.
The most skillful efforts of crew and
passengers were required to recapture the
urkeys. Three of them, preferring self
immolation to slaughter, flew from the
ship. One of the birds made for a passing
steamer, but could not quite reach her and
drowned. When last seen the others were
heading for Greenland, hundreds of miles
away.
Tea at Harvard
The Harvard union, gathering place for
the men of the college, has inaugurated after
noon tea. Tiffin wai made an event in the
undergraduate day in the belief that it would
serve both to promote the club idea of the
student commons and to serve as relief from
the day’s grind through the winter months,
when outdor activities are curtailed.
With the tea the menu provided for muf
fins, toast and strawberry jam.
France to Sell Stamps
The French government is making prep
arations to sell the greatest collection of
stamps which was ever made, valued at $2,-
000,000. It comprises the collection of Bar
on Ferrary, who died in 191'., and by the
terms of his will the collection was left to
the Berlin Postal Museum, The collection
was In Paris at the time and it was seized
as alien property.
Chinese Divorce
The first Chinense woman in Canada to
avail herself of the Dominion divorce laws is
Mrs. Wong Lai, of Vancouver, who has peti
tioned the court for a legal separation from
her husband.
Memorial Tablet
A handsome tablet in. memory of Lucy
Webb Hayes, wife of President Rutherford B.
Hayes, is to be erected in the IJayes memorial
at Fremont, Ohio, by the Nationa. W. C. T. U.
Profitable Lettuce
A carload of lettuce shipped from the San
ford, Fla., section brought its growers a
profit of $2,455.44, after sale on the New
York market, according to recent dispatches.
The profit is believed to be a record. The
shipment contained four hundred hampers.
$20,000,000 Loan
The Mercurio a newspaper of San
tiago, Chile, says it understands negotia
tions are in ; rogress by the ministry of
finance for a loan of $20,000,000 in the
United States for the purchase of rolling
stock for the state railways.
The railwmy bill, carrying authoriza
tion to contract a loan of approximately
7,500,000 pounds gold, already has
passed the senate and now is before the
chamber of deputies.
Gift to Wilson
Governor Bickett, of North Carolina, and
his son called at the White House this week
to leave for President Wilson a number of
partridges which they killed on a recent
hunting trip. They were received by Secre
tary Tumulty.
Senator M’Cormlck in France
United States Senator Medill McCormick
arrived at Cherbourg, France, this week on
the steamer Aquitania from New York. A
special car chartered by Mr. McCormick was
attached to the Paris Express.
Steals Cheese
For the theft of a cheese from a steam
ship lying at the foot of Congress street,
Brooklyn, Anthony Liberio, a ongshoreman
employed on the pier there, was sentenced to
twenty days in jail in Special Sessions,
Brooklyn. The cheese, brought here from a
South American port, had been cut into
small pieces and distributed about Liberio’s
person.
New Gas Shell
Successful tests have been completed of a
new poison gas shell in Tokio, Japan. This
shell is of Japanese manufacture.
Election at Uruguay
Election returns from Montevideo,
Uruguay, indicate the Government Party
has scored a triumph throughout the
country, obtaining two posts on the Na
tional Administrative Councu, on which
the Nationalists will have but one. The
Government Party has won four seats
in the senat., while the Nationalists
have been successful in carrying two.
Fake Labels
Charged with manufacturing and selling
thousands <rt counterfeit. Internal Revenue
stamps for liquor “bootlegging” purposes,
nine men are held by the New York Secret
Service officials and other arrests are prom
ised. These stamps, together with cleverly
counterfeited labels of various brands of li
quor, have enabled bootleggers to flood the
city with one-day old whisky, made of in
gredieiits of poor quality, if not actually dan
gerous to the health of its drinkers.
Strike Ends
The strike of the orchestra, chorus and
stage hands which closed the Paris opera in
the middle of October has been called off and
the house re-opened for perfo mances. The
orchestra, which was the last body of em
ployes to give in, today agreed the terms.
At the time of the walk-out it was said that
the trouble originated by the refusal of Jac
ques Rouche, the director, to change the rules
concerning the chorus and to agree not to
employ more than one foreign artist every
three months.
Can’t Make Diamonds
The latest effort of scientists to manufac
ture genuine diamonds has failed, according
to an announcemt t by William I. Rosenfeld,
vice president of the American J welers’ Pro
tective association and director of the Jewel
ers’ vigilance committee. The committee,
he said, has made an exhaustive investiga
tion of the reported discovery of a diamond
making formula by a German, and is con
vinced that the formula will not produce
gems equal to nature’s product. Report of
the “discovery” several weeks ago, Mr. Ros
enfeld said, startled the jewelry and precious
stone trade throughout the world.
New Pilgrims’ Order \
The Order of the Pilgrims, a new nation
al organization, created by the general court
of the National Society of the Sons and
Daughters of the Pilgrims, at a meeting in
Providence, R. 1., announced that the first
fifty members elected included former Presi
dent Taft, President-elect Harding, United
States Senators Lodge and Colt, and Bishop
Jame. De Wolf Perry.
Membership is limited to pilgrim de
scendants of distinguished ancestry and po
litical or patriotic service.
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 7, 1920.
THE PASSING OF THE DUEL
By Frederic J. Haskin
X1 » ASHINGTON, D. C., Dec. 2.—Duel
ling has been dealt a heavy blow in
’ ’ France, we learn, by the refusal of
Leon Daudet, a member of the chamber of
deputies, who fought eleven duels before the
war, to accept another challenge. He de
clares that duelling is a foolish practice, and
that there is no excuse for it “since the
war.”
It seems strange to Americans that in
France men still formally fight to death, as
they do alsc in other European countries
and in most of Latin-America. It has been
more than half a century since „ duel of any
impjrtanee was fmght in the United States,
and almost a century since the duel here was
in its heyday.
We might claim from this that we are a
more civilized country than France, but that
w’ould be a hard claim to substantiate by
any other evidence. It would also be hard
to claim much credit for not uelling when
we will have our little lynching parties and
race riots, and in view of the record we have
made in Haiti. A malicious critic might say
that we have given up the fair fight for the
unfair one.
As a matter of fact, duels have undoubtedly
held a high and recognized place in countries
which were by every other standard highly
civilized, and a study cf the subject leaves one
not at all sure that combat jetween man and
man, strictly regulated, is a wholly bar
barous proceeding. The duel seems to be
condemned more and more, not because it
is essentially uncivilized, but because it is
wasteful of human life, and because it tends,
especially in a democracy, to degenerate
into a means of legitimizing murder.
Why Duel Declineu
"" This seems to be the real cause of its de
cadence in this country. Duelling is an
aristocratic practice. In theory, it is a com
bat between two peers, regulated by the
strictest regard for fairness. But in this
country everyone is a peer. Onfe man is as
good as another in theory, and all had, until
a few years ago, the right to bear arms.
Hence the duel became a means by which
a rascal skilled with gun could kill a useful
man and go free.
Long and interesting is the history of the
duel in America, and it makes us realize
keenly how much we have changed. A book
on duelling, wr’tten in 1868 by an English
man who had traveled extensively in this
country, says that “America is the land
where life is hel cheaper than anywhere
else. There duels are off-hand diversions.”
He goes on to say that the walls and fur
niture of Washington hotels were scarred by
the bullets which excited legislators and
politicians had fired at one another.
In a word, 50 years ago we were the most
cantankerous, truculent and self-assertive
people on earth. All men went armed and
were always ready to lay down their lives
in defense of their honor, their property
and their dignity. In those days you did
not even jostle a man on the street without
making elaborate apology or else fighting
for your life.
Now we are as completely disarmed as
medieval peasants. We are driven about like
sheep in great herds. We peacefully stand
on each other’s toes in the subways, while
consideration for the stranger it a rare vir
tue in our midst. There would seem to be
just a mite of truth in a statement of an old
writer on the subject that “the duel is a
sharn but salutary remedy for rude and of
fensive conduct.” He also points out that
there is little excuse for ny nation which
still goes to war to pride itself on the abo
lition of duelling. “When individuals and
nations have learned to treat each other with
respect.” he thinks both duelling and war
may be unnecessary, but he does not think
that the one is either any worse or any less
necessary than the other.
Loss of Personal Prowess
Certainly no good brief can be made out
in defense of duelling. Yet it does seem un
deniable that when a man renounces all per
sonal prowess and entrusts hi,, safety ana
honor to policemen, he loses something. The
typical good citizen of today, sedentary,
short-winded, physically unfit for any kind
of encounter, and nervously unable to face
disaster, is surely not altogether an ad
mirable figure. We hank back with pleasure
to tales of en who wielded i wicked sword
shot straight and faced death calmly.
This is not argument in favor o’s fighting,
but it does seem to indicate that civiliza
tion has robbed TEL individual of something
valuable. This was what William James had
in mind when he said that war might be
abolished if we could substitute something
else strenuous nd dangerous for it. He sug
gested that your young men be enlisted in
armies to go out and conquer the wilder
ness—to reclaim deserts, explore rivers and
forests. That .light be a substitute for duel
ling, too.
The trouble seems to be that the heroic
impulse—the will to dare and suffer —is de
cadent among us. We are too comfortable
to fight each other or the wilderness. The
man who craves bittie and adventure is as
much out of place among us as a lion in a
barn yard.
Old Laws on Duelling
Public opinion on duelling was always di
vided in this country, even in colonial times.
There was a feeling that men had a right
to settle their differences by combat, but it
was also recognized that valuaole lives were
lost in that way, and much crime committed
in the name of honor. The killing of Ham
ilton by Burr probably gave the duel its
first serious setback. Various laws were
passed to prevent duelling, and of them
were strange. In New Orleans, a “court of
honor” was established for the urbitration of
individual differences. This apparently was
to do for individuals about what the Hague
tribunal tries to do for nations, and it ap
parently succeeded about as well. A Massa
chusetts law forbade duelling and provided
that the body of a man killed in a duel
should be used for dissection. A Mississippi
law dealt a body blow to the practice by
providing that a T, a who killed another in
a duel must pay his victim’s debts.
The famous Cilley-Graves duel, in which
one congressman killed another, also re
sulted in a great popular revulsion against
duelling. A committee of congress investi
gated this fight and recommended the ex
pulsion of Graves from the house., Cilley was
challenged, shot and killed for remarks
which he made on the floor of the house, and
which were perfectly in order. This was in
violation of the constitution of the United
States. It further appeared that the whole
thing was very nearly a frame-up on Cilley,
and there was a plan on foot to murder him
in case he was not killed in the duel. These
unsavory revelations brought it to the at
tention of the people that duelling in Amer
ica had degenerated from a test of skill
between gentlemen to a deadly weapor in
the hands of bullies and criminals. Although
duelling continued more or less until after
the Civil War, it declined from the time of
Cilley’s death, which was in 1838.
Morgan Blake’s Smile
Wonder if that’s a form-fitting smile
which Morgan Blake wears in The Atlanta
Journal’s sport pages now and then. At
least so far as the pictures are concerned it
must be the “smile that won’t come off.” —
Charles Beaupre in Reporter.
The picture in question was made soon
after the winning of the Southern league
baseball pennant by Atlanta. We’ve seen
Blake when he looks even funnier than his
picture indicates.
DOROTHY DIX TALKS '
BY DOROTHY DIX
The Price of Wedding Bells
Copyright, 1920, by the Wheeler Syndi-
cate, Inc.
A YOUNG girl of my acquaintance said
to me the other day:
“I told Jim that I would marry nim
whenever he saved up enough money to
furnish a little home for us. I don’t ask
for anything fine. I don’t expect to start
where my parents are leaving off, for it has
taken father thirty years’ hard work to get*
where he can afford to give mother Oriental
rugs, and carved mahogany, and aluminum
pots and pans.
“I love Jim, and I’d be satisfied with
mighty little, but that little has got to be
paid for. lam not going to ba one of those
installment brides whose honeymoon is
knocked into flinders by the collector ham
mering on the door.
“I’ve seen debt kill love too often to want
to take any chances on it. I don’t want my
husband to have to think how much I am
costing him, and wonder how on earth he’s
going to get the money for my upkeep, every
time he thinks of me. I want to be the nice,
sweet meringue on his life, not the lemon
pie beneath.
"If a young couple start out in life loaded
down with debt, they haven’t got one chance
in fifty to get out of it, and they haven’t one
chance in a hundred of not coming to hate
each other. They are simply foredoomed to
make a failure of both life and matrimony. '
“The man celdom gets any higher than he
is, because there is nothing that holds one
down like a pile of bills on his back. He
can’t climb with that load to carry, and it
gets bigger and bigger, because there is sure )
to come sickness, and rainy days, that all
cost more money.
“To succeed, a man rnusfr have a little
monej laid by, so that he can take advantage
of whatever luck throws in his way, for the
only key that ever unlocks the door of op
portunity is a golden one. He must be able
to take a few risks. Above all, if he is to
accomplish anything worth while, he must
have a calm, clear mind, and be able to give
the best of his abilities to his work, instead
of having half of his brain cells employed in
trying to figure out some way to stave off
the installment man.
“The man who starts out in married life
in debt is beaten at the very outset. He
can’t embrace the opportunity that comes
his way, because all of his money is going to
pay on the Early Grand Rapids dining room
suite. He’s bound to stick to his clerkship,
no matter whether it leads anywhere or not, is
because he is behind with the butcher and ’
the baker, and he can’t risk beb.g out of
work a week. And he can’t develop the kind
of personality that employers pay for, be
cause debt takes the heart out of a man, and
kills ambition quickei than anything else in
the world and turns s he sunniest nature into
a grouch.
“I want my husband to be a successful
man, and I’m not going to- be the one
to handicap him in the race.
“I want my marriage to be a success and
that’s why I insist that it should have a good
strong financial plant under it. It would be
all right far people who are in love to get
married, if they coulc exist in real life as
they do in novels, on romance and kisses.
“But they can’t. We’ve all got more
stomach than we have heart, and after we
get married we are just as hungry as we
were before, and take just as keen an inter- .
est in beefsteak and inions. Also, we’ve got to K
be clothed and housed, and we find that
sentiment plays a pretty poor second fiddle
to our physical comfort.
“Nor does just getting married, e’ en to
the person you love, make up to you en- j
tirely for doing without the kind of things
you have been accustomed to all your life,
and when a man . woman are forced 'to
make a perpetual sacrifice of every taste and
habit for each other, they soon begin to won
der if the game is wo-th the candle.
“Think of all the peevish, fretful, discon
tented wives you kno-. who are always com
plaining because they are shabby and can’t
do any of the things they used to do. Do
you think that their husbands are having
any particular picnic? Think of all the synl
cal, bitter men you know who have fallen
out of love with the pretty, dainty girls they
married, just because the girls have been
forced into becoming unattractive drudges,
and who are always warning other men
against matrimony! Pleasant fi their wives,
isn’t it, to be made o realize that their hus
sands regard ’hem as burdens?
“The truth is that a family Is a luxury i
that comes high, and whether you enjoy it
or not, or even whether you’ve got a right *
to indulge yourself in one, depends alto
gether on wh 1* r you can afford it. To
get married when you haven’t the price of
a bed, or a chair, or a cooking stove, is just
as silly and wicked a thing to do, as it is V
set un an automobile where you pay two dok
lars down on it, and are paying the balance
as long as you live,and where you have heart
failure every time you have to buy anothe»
"allon of gasoline. »
“And I, for one, am not going to
my soul to eld Man Trouble in that way.
“Understand, I don’t think that a young
couple should wait until they’re rich to get
married, or until they can furnish a home
in splendor: but they haven’t got any right
to get married until they can start life out
of debt.
“And that’s the ultimatum I’ve put up to
Jim. If he does not think lam worth work- t
ing and saving for, he doesn’t want me bad
enough to get me. I’ll say that.”
WITH THE GEORGIA PRESS \
BY JACK PATTERSON
Just as Was Expected
The Georgians on their trip to the manu
facturing centers have made a great impres
sion, as might have been expected.—Thomas
ville Times-E-nterpris*.
That bunch of Georgians would make a
favorable impression anywhere.
Must Have Been Hungry
Recently a man in Chicago ate twenty
seven feet of sausage, five pounds of raw
beef, three eggs and a lot of other things „
and then quit becaus r no one would
tee<r to pay for more food for him. —Colum- ‘
bus Enquirer-Sun.
We don’t suppose that anybody had any
more money after paying for what had al
ready been consumed.
A Curious Newspaper
One of the most curious newspapers in the
world is the Kamloops Wawa, a journal
printed in shorthand and circulating among
the Indians of British Columbia. —Cordele
Dispatch.
Guess it is printed in shorthand to con
serve print paper, but we didn’t know that
the Indians had taken to stenography.
And It Doesn’t Come Back
A school teacher’s dollar goes farther than
it did one year ago.—Commerce Observer, y
So does that of a newspaper man, or it
would if he had one.